Designing Courses for the Nervous System with Anne Bishop & Chantill Lopez

Hey, before we get to the episode, I just want to let you know about an offer at Mirasee.co slash leak. I'm Andrew Chapman, director of podcasting here at Mirasee FM, and we've got an offer for you there for a free revenue leak checklist. That's right. If you run your own business, you can find out exactly where your business might be losing money and you may not be aware of it. So again, go to Mirasee.co slash leak. That's L-E-A-K. And you can get all the info and that free checklist. Mirasee. We can give people coaching and tips on mindset, and it definitely helps some people and they move forward more effectively and the overall results are better. But it's not it's not the whole answer right, because there are people who are getting the coaching on mindset and still not succeeding. So filling in that gap, I think, is a really interesting problem. And they've hit on some solutions to it that, frankly, are new to me, and I'm still wrapping my head around them fully. Hello, and welcome to Course Lab, the show that teaches creators like you how to make better online courses. I'm Danny Iney, the founder and CEO of Mirasee, and I'm here with my co-host, Abe Crystal, the co-founder of Ruzuku. Hey there, Danny. In each episode of Course Lab, we showcase a course and creator who is doing something really interesting, either with the architecture of their course or the business model behind it, or both. Today, we welcome Anne Bishop and Chantille Lopez to the show. Together, Anne and Chantille run the Embodied Course Creation Program. We're so excited to have you both. Thanks for having us. Yes, thank you. So I think this is the first time that we've ever had two guests on the show at once. So tell us the story, I guess, tell us your two individual stories and how they came together and how that brought you to online courses. Want to start, Anne? Sure. So Chantille and I have both been in the movement industry for a very long time. I became a Pilates instructor in about 2001. And at that time in the world, I had to actually describe to people what Pilates was and how to pronounce it. And it wasn't a very popular thing. I got really involved with that. I was very interested in teaching movement. I just happened to say like, yeah, I love to teach. And I happened to teach movement. And so I began a brick and mortar business. I was always very interested in research. And so about 10 years into my Pilates business, I decided to go back to graduate school and I studied brain science at Harvard University so that I was able to connect movement and motor learning to in-person movement learning, but also online learning. And at that point, I was really connected to curriculum design. And then I began working for a company with online curriculum design specifically within motivation and engagement. And so when I returned, Chantille and I reconnected. We had connected once in 02 very briefly as we were both in that circle. And then I said, hey, I love to teach, but I think that there's a lot missing in the mind-body education world. And so at that point, Chantille and I really hatched an idea to start to work together. And then in 2016, we launched what is today the Embodied Course Creators Program. So Chantille, what's your version of the story? My history is similar and different. I was a journalist in the early part of my young career for years and decided that as a mover my whole life, journalism was really not for me. Sitting in an office and taking notes and doing all the things 70 hours a week was not going to serve me well. So I moved into or toward pursuing a career as a teacher of movement. I taught Pilates for 20 years. I owned two studios. I ran teams of, you know, 10 and 12 and 15 people. But really, I think what brought me to where I am now is I was a teacher trainer internationally and noticed that there were huge gaps in the way that we were supporting teachers and becoming entrepreneurs and successful in all aspects of their work and their lives. And so I started an educational company called Skillful Teaching and started a mentoring program. And in about 2013, I wrote a book called Moving Beyond Technique, which was focused on teaching and the art and psychology really of teaching and moving beyond just the technique that teachers in particularly Pilates tend to be overly focused on. And then I took my work online. So since 2013, Ann and I together, we counted recently like 90 online courses with a variety of topics. And in that moment that Ann is describing, she came to me after Harvard and said, hey, I really love what you're doing with your online business and your educational company. And I'm starting my own and started Body Brain Connect. And we really supported each other in elevating the work that we were doing that we both believed was filling a huge gap in the community of movement and embodied practices. And then that's when we created the Embodied Course Creation Program. Awesome. That's fantastic. So your program, Embodied Course Creation, I mean, there are so many programs out there about how to create online courses. You know, I teach a couple of them. There are many, but you have a very particular niche and approach to this. Tell us about that. Yeah. Well, I think one of the things that sets us apart is when we are really trying to elevate people in the movement profession. And when I say movement profession, I mean people who are Pilates teachers, yoga teachers, dance teachers, massage therapists, OTs, PTs, Reiki teachers, like anybody really who brings some kind of movement or embodiment, somatic, you know, therapists, we have such a wide range of folks coming to us, but they have a deep interest in taking what can sometimes feel like a sacred work. You know, when you're touching people or getting people to move, you're working with people's bodies in some capacity. It feels almost sacrilegious to think that you could bring that level of integrity or impact into an online space. And so what Ann and I do is we teach them that they can leverage their knowledge even for greater impact on their students without ever being in the same room with them. And how does that happen in practice? Because, I mean, I tend to agree. I think these things can be done online, but this is definitely in the category of course areas where people have assumptions about, well, how could you do this online without being there, without seeing them, without touching them, without repositioning them, etc. So how do you think about that and how do you approach this? We lean into a type of course design that's called universal design for learning. And we particularly use a concept within the engagement principles. And so one of our tenets is to first address the friction that some people feel, like you said, within, you know, essentially a service-based, you know, where you feel like you need to have your hands on someone or there has to be that sort of in-person essence. And essentially what that is, is that's a barrier within someone's mind that's essentially based in fear. And so what we want to do is we want to find a way to reach someone who's curious about designing a course to reduce that fear level. So there are very specific strategies that you can employ that essentially, like, reduce the threat and reduce the fear level of, you know, oh, well, online isn't going to have as much meaning. So when we teach course design, there is a community piece. Within the live piece of the online arrangement, we really work with something called the nervous system work, which I'll let Chantel speak to that as that's her definite form of expertise. But also within the specific, if you're dripping your content out as an example of that, you know, you're providing activities and things like that. We are always trying to find ways in which to offer opportunities for our students to step into embodied practices within the online space so that they are not feeling like, you know, I'm ahead on a screen. Yeah. So to expand on that, embodied practices are really anything that are kind of, they can be exploratory, they can be very simple movements, they can be breath work. And it's a way to get people to be more present in the engagement, whether they're engaging directly with you or they're engaging with recorded material. But one of the things that we really support our folks in adding or building into their design is designing for variability. And so there is always a multitude of ways for people to interact with the material, to have the material reinforced. There are both pre-recorded and live components. We really believe in learner choice and learner voice. So that's a huge concept that we work with because when you're talking specifically about, well, anything but movement, one of the things we, I think, pride ourselves on when we're in person doing our work in person is that we can respond kind of instantaneously to whatever is happening. Or we might put our hands on somebody. We can make changes. But you can do it through an online learning experience, which is, again, both there is a live component, that's what we promote, and a pre-recorded component. But you're providing, you're designing for opportunities for community feedback, shared authority in a community where you're elevating other people's perspective and their challenges and their successes. So people begin to feel safer. Like you can't just add a community component and think that that works. It just doesn't. You have got to know how to facilitate the community component. But you can do that in a way where you are designing for variability and you're allowing this feedback in exchange to happen on multiple layers and multiple levels. And the truth is, specifically for a movement practitioner, if you are constantly putting your hands on somebody, they are reliant on your feedback to make choices and decisions. That holds your students hostage to your expertise. I was wondering if, you know, for people listening who are new to these ideas, could you kind of make it more concrete for them? Are there examples of what would it look like to design a course that is embodied or incorporates these principles? Yeah. So let's say potentially you're a person who is not coming from an embodied field, but maybe you practice embodiment yourself and you're like, OK, I get the value, but I don't feel super confident in practicing and suddenly like putting on a yoga teacher hat and try to leave or, you know, maybe even leaving somebody through breathing. Like maybe that's something that's uncomfortable. So the thought here is that one of the things that we find is that one of the most powerful components of embodiment is not necessarily that you're moving, but is that you're sensing. So a very practical way in which you can employ embodiment practices within your course design is as you're designing activities, as you're designing videos or references or curriculum that you want to employ. One of the things I think that gets often overlooked is asking people to have a felt sense of their body while they're working through work. So if you are within a business program or let's say a marketing program, and this is something that we see a lot is if we try to teach teachers within, let's say you're trying to teach someone how to market. When someone has to step into marketing potentially within the online space or coming into a place of a personal brand, they might have to overcome feelings of, do I have enough to be an authority figure? I'm going to have to be visible. And what can happen for them is they get a response that is highly fearful and they are uncomfortable stepping into the marketing piece of their business. And so if you are someone who is speaking about marketing and you're trying to teach that to your students, that you're training in your course, and you're seeing that they're not getting past that, they're struggling. They're like, you know, gosh, you know, I just don't like to put myself out there. Like, who am I? I don't want to bother my email list. Right. And so what's happening in that experience is that you can address that from a mindset perspective. I like what Chantilla always says. She says, there's some things you just can't think your way through. And so what we want to do is we know that people are highly variable. So some people are going to be able to overcome that challenge through mindset shift. But some people may only be able to overcome that challenge through more of a perceptual shift. And that perception shift is one that's occurring within their body. So asking people to say, as you're moving through X, Y, or Z challenge within your business growth, within your strategies, what is your body feeling? And the challenge that we have found is most people do not have a language around how their body is sensing and feeling because it's just not a question that has been asked, particularly sometimes within the field of business coaching or marketing coaching. Or just outside of the field of very specific body-based profession. Yeah, we talk about that all the time. And so it's something that we're really skilled at, but then it's a skill that can be obviously shared across domains. And so our goal would be to say, if you are working within an industry, what is another question beyond a mindset perspective? And so like asking people to sense their bodies. So in a very practical standpoint, when you're designing your course, do you have opportunities for people to reflect on their felt sense? And that's one of the things that we felt has been really powerful for working with people is giving them that opportunity to address learners' challenges through their body's perception. Yeah, because it really comes down to that. Some people, as Anne said, can have an easier time, you know, making mindset shifts. But for most of us, particularly when we come up against something that's really challenging, the baseline unconscious experience is that our nervous system is like, hold on. This feels scary. This feels unsafe. And then what happens is that perpetuates our, you know, inner thoughts about like, I can't do this. I'm an imposter. I don't have the skill. I don't have the time, like all the excuses we make. But the bottom line is you can change your thinking. But if your body is still responding, your nervous system is still responding by saying, I'm not safe, which shows up in a lot of different ways. It can show up in apathy. So retreating, like as course designers, we see that a lot, right? People get into the course. They're super jazzed. They're excited. They hit a hurdle and they're like gone. Where did they go? I think this is a huge contributing factor to people not finishing coursework is because they are entering a moment in time or up against a task or in a space where they're uncomfortable and they don't feel safe. And retreating or rebelling are very common reactions. But the thing is, is that not everybody can think their way through that. And as a course designer, as I was saying earlier, you can design for those things. You can design to support when people start to rebel or retreat or do the things that they do. But you also want to be able to say, hey, there is a way that you can become aware, not just from your thinking perspective, but from your body perspective, which is essentially a nervous system experience. It's a nervous system awareness that I'm having some resistance. My heart races. I start to get sweaty. I've become paralyzed. I can't, you know, I can't talk maybe, or I fumble with my words. Those are all nervous system responses. And so if we can support other course creators in understanding that connection, and then with these very simple, you know, tools that they can provide their participants, it can create a shift in the nervous system state, which optimizes the brain for learning, literally allows us to hear better, allows us to take more risks, ask questions. Like it's all behavior change, but it's all body-based first. This is an unconscious experience that we all have, and it can mean the difference between people actually being successful in a program and not being successful. And it doesn't honestly take a lot, but it does take some understanding of what the correlation is between the body, the nervous system, and the learning experience. A practical way in which you employ this to say, okay, if I've started a course, and maybe you're doing like kind of what's more popular now, right? A higher, some people call them high ticket courses. So maybe someone has just paid multiple thousands of dollars to join your course, right? Or multiple hundreds of dollars to join your course or your mastermind. And then all of a sudden, you're seeing that they're not as engaged. So one of the things that Chantil does very, very well is this concept of a pre-week. And so this is something that we support course creators in designing is so that one of the ways in which you sort of down-regulate people's nervous system, make them feel more safe in taking your course is essentially setting expectations, right? And then also having the student or your client who purchased your course enter into self-reflection practices that say, hey, what are you going to do when you come up against resistance in this program? And what that does is that really elevates the autonomy of the student because we're not trying to just design for you to create an expert course. We want you to design your course so that you can create expert students, right? And so you're entering them into opportunities where they take ownership for the course. So they're meeting you instead of you sort of, you know, being in this ivory tower and then them just like hanging on your word, right? Because we definitely know from movement and through health and wellness that people get better outcomes the more they take ownership of the course. And so that ownership of like, well, yeah, you know, I bought this course and it requires five hours a week and I have no time because I'm a busy X, Y, or Z. Well, okay, well then what's the ownership around reorganizing your schedule as a busy X, Y, Z so that you're able to get the desired outcome that you say that you want, right? And so it's really meeting people head on about those challenges. Well, and getting people to meet themselves head on, I think. Yeah. And you can design for that. So in a pre-week or pre-work, however you deliver it, this concept of wedging or scaffolding, they're slightly different. So wedging is like, I'm preemptively going to get my participants to think about the ways that they have messed up before or fallen off track. And then what prevents them from getting back on track? Because there's all kinds of things. Like one is guilt, one is shame. You know, there's like all kinds of excuses and real experiences that we have that prevent us from like getting back on the horse and recommitting. So when you're doing this pre-week or pre-work, you know, whether you're saying, you know, go like one embodied possibility for a pre-week or pre-work would be like, what is the most optimal space for you to work in or be creative in? Those might be different spaces. To get them to begin to think about where does my body feel most grounded? Like you can use all kinds of language that's appropriate for your professional slant or whatever it is that you're teaching. But getting people to like really consider like, well, I work really well sitting in my slingback chair in my backyard next to my morning glories. Like that's where I'm most creative, you know, or to acknowledge that they actually have this office. It's private, but they can never get work done there because it's so sterile or it's too cold or there's no light. That's embodiment. That's encouraging. Like how is the whole person showing up for the endeavor? And then you're saying, okay, well, if I know these things will support me, what happens when I mess up or I fall off track or I get behind? What strategies and tools have I used before that I can make a list of and prioritize? Like this is the way I'm going to get myself back on track. And then we invite people to choose how they want us to engage with them if they fall off track. Now, this is not appropriate for every course design, but for one that has live components or where there's a high touch interaction, it can be. And so that's the wedging is like, I'm going to decide, I'm going to reflect on how am I going to support myself? What kind of support am I going to need? And then the scaffolding is choosing the support, right? Being able to say, me as the course designer, even if I never respond to the response saying, share how you want your facilitators to support you, right? So it's just a powerful way that ultimately the objective and the outcome is that this kind of work sets a nervous system at ease, makes it feel safer because you know what to expect. And you can enter into a new environment of learning and growth without feeling anxious or with less likelihood to totally flub things or fall into bad habits and patterns. Awesome. That was great. I love how you kind of build and ping pong off of each other. We've been doing it for a while. I mean, I feel like we could ask you questions about this for at least another hour. Is there anything else to anything we should squeeze in before the debrief? No, I was thinking the same thing. I was like, we could keep on going, but we need to have time to do a debrief before the hour. Yeah, great. Well, thanks for having us. Chantel Lopez and Anne Bishop are the creators of the Embodied Course Creation Program. You can learn more about them and all their work over at embodiedcoursecreation.com. That's embodiedcoursecreation.com. Now stick around for my favorite part of the show, where Abe and I will pull out the best takeaways for you to apply to your course. Abe, there was a lot here. Where shall we begin? Yeah, I mean, what is there not to talk about? It's all pretty intriguing. I mean, they really have a different slant, I think, than we typically talk about on CourseLab or in course creation in general. So it's really fun to play with and explore their ideas. I mean, I think the biggest thing for me is introducing this lens of embodied learning. And this is something that's, I think, been largely missing, you know, from our discussions about course design, even though occasionally we might hit on, you know, someone talking about some type of physical activity they've incorporated into a course. But this overall perspective, I think it relates to aspects of psychology that have kind of been left out of learning design. Like we really tend to focus on the cognitive aspects of learning and secondarily, you know, emotional aspects of learning. But there are many researchers, you know, Andy Clark is the one I know, and there are many others, too, who have focused on embodied cognition and how thinking is very much rooted in our physical bodies. And so if we're not taking that into account, we're potentially missing a huge aspect of the learning experience. So it's really interesting from a theoretical level. But what we can also get into is, and it's time until we're able to share specific ways that we can actually start doing that in our own courses, which is fascinating. And it kind of goes to the meta question that we're encouraging our students and clients to ask all the time, which is, what are we solving for? What is the root cause? What is the real issue? Because if you're not addressing the root issue, everything gets much, much harder. So as a, for example, if someone is having, you know, what Anne and Chantel described as a nervous system reaction of discomfort, fight, flight, rebelling, et cetera, and that's making it hard for them to progress through your learning program. Then, you know, if you're just seeing it as, well, they're not making progress through, what can I do to increase that? I'm going to gamify it. I'm going to add rewards. I'm going to make them part of a cohort so there's more momentum. So the parabolic discounting is reversed and all that kind of stuff, but you're not addressing the root cause. Like you might be able to, you know, overwhelming force your way into getting them past that hurdle, but it's much easier to just actually solve what the real issue is. And so having good visibility on the full array of challenges people might experience, then bringing the right tools to bear is very, very important. Both specifically for people who are in embodied professions, but as you said, bringing it as an additional dimension to any number of learning experiences can be very powerful. Yeah. I mean, I really liked this idea that shifting your mindset is not always the solution, right? There's been an intense focus on mindset in psychology, you know, over the last 10, 20 or so years. And that's filtered into the course design world where we've said, and even into conventional education, right? Where there's a lot of focus in primary schools and universities now on getting students to adopt a growth mindset, for example. And it's not that there's not value to that there is, but we also know, first of all, that those interventions, when they've been studied in a large scale, like scientific way, don't necessarily have a huge impact. There've been very rigorous studies of growth mindset, for example, that show like, yeah, it helps, but you know, it's on the margin. And we see it in our own, you know, more entrepreneurial courses too, right? We can give people coaching and tips on mindset, and it definitely helps some people and they move forward more effectively and the overall results are better. But it's not the whole answer, right? Because there are people who are getting the coaching on mindset and still not succeeding. So filling in that gap, I think is a really interesting problem. And they've hit on some solutions to it that frankly are new to me, and I'm still wrapping my head around them fully. But I definitely like the idea of trying to help participants in a course shift their perception and their like sense of awareness. And also their sense of like safety, as opposed to just shifting their mindset. So I think there's a lot of potential there. I agree. You know, something else that jumped out to me as a pattern with other conversations and interviews we've had on the show as well is that this is on the face of it, what many would expect to be a challenging niche, right? Teaching people how to create online courses around stuff that one expects to have to be in a room able to touch other people to do. It sounds challenging. And we've seen a lot of examples of this over the time that we've been doing the show and working with students more broadly in the world of course creation, which is, you know, there's that line out of the last lecture by Randy Posh that the brick walls on the path aren't there to stop you. They're there to keep everyone else out and give you an opportunity to show how much you want it. And when you tackle these challenging niches and give it the energy and attention to figure out a creative way of getting things done, it actually becomes really powerful and effective and lucrative. And, you know, I've yet to find a so-called challenging niche that someone's like, yeah, I try it. We just couldn't figure it out. There was no way. Right. That doesn't seem to happen. Right. It's always figureoutable. And the other thing that jumped out to me from the conversation is that both Anne and Chantel are very skilled, very experienced, very well credentialed. And they both could probably have done this independently. And yet they recognize that one plus one can be more than two, that it creates an opportunity for conversational interplay, for ideas to build on each other, for division of labor, et cetera. And a lot of entrepreneurs tend to think that, you know, OK, I'm going to go out there and start something and create something and I've got to do it alone. And there's a thinker and teacher that I follow, Scott Galloway. He teaches out of NYU and he likes to say that greatness is in the agency of others. And that's definitely been my experience. You know, the courses that we run, the business that we've built, the service we provide to people, none of it would exist if I tried to do it by myself. And I mean, Abe, I'm sure you've had the same experience building businesses and software platforms and so forth. We're very limited in what we can do on our own. And so looking for someone of high caliber with whom to partner is kind of it wasn't the core focus of the conversation, but I think it was a powerful meta lesson to take away. Thank you for listening to Course Lab. I'm Abe Gristel, co-founder and CEO of Ruzuku, here with Danny Iny, founder and CEO of Mirasee. Course Lab is part of the Mirasee FM podcast network, which also includes such shows as Just Between Coaches and Soul Savvy Business. This episode of Course Lab was produced by Sylvia Lamb. Jeff Govertz and assembled the episode. Danny Iny is our executive producer. Post-production by Post Office Sound. Many thanks to Anne Bishop and Chantel Lopez for coming onto the show today. You can find out more about them over at embodiedcoursecreation.com. That's embodiedcoursecreation.com. To make sure you don't miss the excellent episodes coming up on Course Lab, follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you're listening right now. And if you like the show, we'd love it if you could leave us a starred review. It really does make a difference. Thank you, and we'll see you next time. Thank you. All right, are you ready? Wait, what's my cue? It's a behind the scenes kind of thing. Hello, and welcome to Just Between Coaches, the podcast that tackles difficult coaching conversations head-on. I'm Melinda Cohen, and your host for this show. I also know that I'm listening when, again, my mind is relaxed. So I can almost sense that I'm listening on multiple levels. That's a great frame. That's a really great way to think about it. I think so, actually, now that I'm thinking about it. Because I think that something that is very dangerous is for people to think that being a great coach comes from having the credentials. One has nothing to do with the other. So again, part of it is just, you know, either through questions or asking what they've tried, or sometimes it's, you know, the forest for the trees thing. My favorite part of having the hard conversation is, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. Okay. So while I love what's on the other side, I think navigating through that conversation is my favorite part. Yeah. Yeah. Because we're not there necessarily as coaches to provide solutions. We're there to guide our people towards solutions. And I don't know if it's, you know, societal pressure or peer pressure, but we don't want to look like we don't know what we're doing. I want to help and support coaches so that they can evolve into their greatness. My desire for the show is if I could scoop up all of the coaches and bring them into my living room and bring up the topics that leave crinkles in our forehead so that we can fully understand what it means to show up in our greatness, fully confident so that we can build better businesses, so that we can be better coaches, so that we can make a lasting impact on this world collectively. And we want to rise to that level. That being said, you do want to set yourself up and your clients up for success by making sure that there is clarity around their expectations and your expectations as to how you can help them. People have to know a little bit about what you offer. Otherwise, how do they know that they need what you can help them with in terms of that transformation? And I love having the conversations and navigating the topics that keep us at the forefront in a time with what I call the results revolution. Yeah, well, first of all, I just want to start by saying that this is a really good problem to have, right? So if you have someone who's resisting your price, it means they're really interested in working with you. The thing is, sometimes it becomes negative. It becomes toxic. I've been in the coaching industry for almost 20 years now. And over these years, I have seen everything behind the scenes in our industry. Everything that works, everything that doesn't work. I've seen the evolution of our industry and of what it means to be a coach. I just want to say to all the coaches out there, you know, matching who you are to the kind of coach that you want to be is just a practice. Do you want to add some parting words? No, I think you did great. This was a lot of fun. Thank you so much for having me. This is Melinda Cohen, and you've been listening to Just Between Coaches. You'll find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Yeah, this is absolutely the tone, the feel, the everything. Okay, so I'm going to stop the recording now. Why are you stopping the recording? This is going to be fun. Oh my gosh. That's a wrap. That is going to be an amazing session.