Episode 120: Coffee Shop Conversations: How to Slow Down When Everything Is Moving Fast

Summary

Shed and Shine – Episode 120: Coffee Shop Conversations: How to Slow Down When Everything Is Moving Fast

Podcast: Shed and Shine
Hosts: Gino Wickman and Rob Dube
Episode Release Date: June 24, 2026
Episode Theme: Learning how to slow down and recharge when life—and entrepreneurship—feels overwhelming, featuring real talk on practical strategies, emotional wellness, and subconscious healing.

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Episode Overview

In this “Coffee Shop Conversation” episode, Gino Wickman and Rob Dube revisit a cherished ritual: unscripted, intimate discussions that reflect their 25-year tradition of meeting at Starbucks and talking about life and business. This episode centers on practical and internal ways to slow down amid intense entrepreneurial and personal demands. Both hosts share personal routines, explore the science and mystery of subconscious healing, and candidly discuss the necessity of space, breaks, and self-discovery.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Origin of “Coffee Shop Conversations”

• [00:32] Gino explains the episode’s freeform style:

  “Rob and I would never know what the other person was going to talk about. And today we have no idea what the other person's going to bring up as a topic. … I take myself to a place where there's nobody listening, and he and I are just having the old coffee shop conversation.”

2. Topic 1: Slowing Down When Life is Fast

Rob’s Setup: The “Goodfellas” Analogy

• [01:53–02:55] Rob describes picturing Gino as Ray Liotta in Goodfellas, overwhelmed and juggling a thousand things—then asks:

  “When things are going fast and furious for you, … how do you slow down?”

Gino’s Answer: Time Off as Non-negotiable

• [03:00–05:47]
  • Gino admits he gets “wigged out”—a term his wife uses to call out stress he still resists:

    “You are wigged out. … I get pissed. It triggers me, right? Because I got it all under control. … Then I calm down and I see once again she’s right.”
    (Gino, 03:13 – 03:36)

  • He shares his core remedy: regular time off (evenings, weekends, vacation, and an annual month-long sabbatical):

    “If I—I mean, I’d probably be dead by now if I didn’t take time. … It almost did. So I take time off.” (Gino, 04:16 – 04:28) “Everybody’s got to figure out their own. But that’s how I avoid the wigged out.” (Gino, 04:41)

  • Gino’s “wigged out” state has diminished significantly over the years due to this conscious scheduling to recharge.

Buffering Busy Days: Mini Breaks

• [05:47–08:08]
  • Gino’s practical strategy: building 30-minute “buffer” breaks between intense work meetings.

    “There’s still a half-hour buffer in between every one of those meetings. … That 30 minutes is magical in terms of bringing me back down to the ground.” (Gino, 05:57 – 06:45)

  • Mini-breaks also include deep belly breaths or brief meditations:

    “I can feel the amping up and I’ll just take two, three, four, five belly breaths. And that brings me down to the ground as well. Sometimes I will meditate during the day.” (Gino, 07:10 – 07:18)

Rob’s Perspective: Mindful Pauses

• [08:08–09:10] Rob shares a story about running on a stressful day, slowing down to walk in the woods, and noticing how a mindful pause reset his nervous system:

  “Just taking that short period of time can just really reset your nervous system.” (Rob, 09:05)

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3. Topic 2: Subconscious Healing and Physical Wellness

Gino’s Curiosity: The Impact of Subconscious Work

• [09:12–10:15] Gino asks Rob about recent work with a practitioner, Gabe Roberts, who seemed to impact both Rob’s mindset and his chronic eczema:

  “…what he did for you. And do you really believe there’s something that he did to heal that for you?” (Gino, 10:12)

Rob on Subconscious and Regression Work

• [10:22–14:30]
  • Rob worked with Gabe for “subconscious work” and “regression work,” recalling emotional moments from his own life and possibly past lives:

    “There was just a session that we had where I just said, I’m just done. I don’t need to work with you anymore. … I just. I can’t explain it. It’s like, I don’t need to do this. It’s all good. I’m whole. It is what it is.” (Rob, 11:11 – 11:21)

  • Describes a notable session:

    “There was a brownstone. I was sitting on the steps, and the inside was like on fire. … I walked in and I said, everything’s fine. And the fire was gone. And that was the end of it. And it was that session where I felt, this is it.” (Rob, 13:10 – 13:26)

  • Regression can go “back to being in the womb” or “past lives.”
  • Subconscious work helps bypass the conscious mind, accessing buried memories or sensations.

Gino’s Reflections and Subconscious Healing

• [14:30–16:10] Gino relates his own experience healing back pain (“all pain is psychosomatic”), referencing Dr. Sarno’s work and energy meditation:

  “I healed my lower back pain through subconscious work … Sarno believes it’s all repressed anger, you know, just releasing and releasing and releasing.” (Gino, 14:35 – 15:48)

  • Both agree that openness is crucial for this kind of healing:

    “If you’re open, I think that’s a big piece to it.” (Rob, 16:10)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Gino on the reality of stress:

  “You are wigged out. … I get pissed. It triggers me, right? Because I got it all under control.” (03:12 – 03:36)

• On the importance of time off:

  “If I—I mean, I’d probably be dead by now if I didn’t take time. … My heart would have given out. It almost did.” (04:16 – 04:28)

• Gino’s secret to staying grounded:

  "That 30 minutes is magical in terms of bringing me back down to the ground." (06:45)

• Rob’s mindful pause:

  “Just taking that short period of time can just really reset your nervous system.” (09:05)

• Rob’s breakthrough:

  “I just. I can’t explain it. It’s like, I don’t need to do this. It’s all good. I’m whole. It is what it is.” (11:18–11:21)

• Reflecting on openness and healing:

  “If you’re open, I think that’s a big piece to it.” (16:10)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:32–01:39: Coffee Shop Conversations origin & format explained
• 01:53–03:00: Rob introduces “slowing down” topic with a “Goodfellas” comparison
• 03:00–05:47: Gino’s routines for decompressing and taking time off
• 05:47–08:08: Day-to-day slow-down strategies: buffer breaks, breathing, and meditation
• 08:08–09:10: Rob’s analogy: running, walking, and nervous system reset
• 09:12–10:15: Gino queries Rob about subconscious healing and physical symptoms
• 10:22–14:30: Rob details regression/subconscious work and transformative session
• 14:30–16:10: Gino discusses psychosomatic healing and the power of belief

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Takeaways

• Deliberate breaks and personal “off” time are essential to creative longevity and emotional balance—especially for driven people.
• Little practices, from belly breaths to walking instead of running, can radically reset your internal pace.
• Subconscious work, regression, and meditative practices can lead to profound healing—if you’re willing and open.
• Being called out on your stress (“wigged out”) by those closest to you, though triggering, is an opportunity for self-reflection.
• Psychosomatic frameworks (like Dr. Sarno’s) have tangible results for those willing to explore deeper causes of pain and illness.

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For listeners craving a reminder that slowing down is a skill—and sometimes, a soul-level healing journey—this episode is restorative, honest, and rich with practical wisdom.

Transcript

[A]

Hello, everyone. My name is Rob Dube and I am here with Gino Wickman. Gio, good to see you.

[B]

You as well. I always try and get you to laugh.

[A]

What should we talk about?

[B]

Let's talk about a coffee shop. Yeah, send it on over. These it up. And this is a coffee shop conversation. So for those of you out there that don't know what this is, is Rob and I, for the last 25 years, or however long it's been, I lose track of time. He and I would meet in a coffee shop couple times a year and we would spend a half a day and we would just talk about life and anything and everything. And they were the most amazing conversations. And so we've brought that thing we've always done to this podcast series. And so every so often we will do a coffee shop conversation. And so what that is is Rob and I would never know what the other person was going to talk about. And today we have no idea what the other person's going to bring up as a topic. Today Rob is going to go first. We typically get through and he's just going to bring up the topic. I will be surprised by it. And we're just going to talk about it. And the whole idea is, you know, I take myself to a place where there's nobody listening, and he and I are just having the old coffee shop conversation. And then I'll go next.

[A]

There we go. Okay. And normally we're at Starbucks. That's the place. So I have a list of five things

[B]

to.

[A]

I'm curious when things are going fast and furious for you, when you've got a lot going on in your work life and in your non work life, how do you slow down before you answer? I'll say this. While you're writing things down that come to you, sometimes I picture you, which could be completely wrong. It's just what I picture. If any of you have seen the movie Goodfellas, there's a scene where Ray Liotta's character is in the kitchen and he's cooking and there's all this stuff going on and there's a helicopter and he's sweating and he's got to do this and he's checking on that, and then he has to get in the car and he's driving around town and there's just all like. He's just like going a thousand miles an hour, a thousand things in his head. And sometimes I feel like Gino's doing that. I'd be conversing with you. You're over here, you're doing this. I thought to myself, I wonder how he slows things down in the midst of all this. So that's my topic for you.

[B]

So there's a couple of things that come up first. And you know, and what I'm trying to do right now is just take myself to the coffee shop because again, we're sitting here, I'm sipping on my tea, you're sipping on whatever you sip on, and you're just saying, hey, Gino.

[A]

Hi.

[B]

How do you deal with fast and furious, Right? So what you just described is what it sometimes looks like and feels like. And the first thing that comes to my mind is, is Kathy, my wife. And she, she'll have this thing that she'll say to me every once in a while and she'll like, I'll come home and she'll look at me and just kind of like take a step back and go, man, you are wigged out. So she says it exactly that way and I get soaked out.

[A]

I get.

[B]

If you are wigged out and I get pissed. I'm like, I get. It triggers me, right? Because I got it all under control. So it's. But it's a beautiful thing. So I get triggered. I get mad at her for saying that. Then I calm down and I see once again she's right. And it like starts to calm me down, you know, so it brings me down. But anyway, so that's what that brought up for me because I'm guessing I look just like Ray Liotta in that exact moment when she says, you look way out. Because I'm. So now I want to pull that scene up for her and say, does this look familiar? That's the first thing that came up. The second thing that comes up, it feels, this one feels like you've thrown me a softball. And that's not going to be true because I'm sure you'll have a follow up question. But you're saying, how do I, you know, not go fast and furious or not be wigged out? So let's use wigged out because that's the word, you know, in my household. It's. I take time off, you know, so I take time off and I don't want to just. It seems like a softball and an easy answer and it's one of the disciplines. But I just, I take time off. If I, I mean, I'd probably be dead by now if I didn't take time. And I just kept going at the speed I went at in my 20s. I would probably be dead right now. My heart would have given out. It almost did. So I take time off. So the point I'm trying to make here is, you know, I come home at a decent time and I'm wigged out. So, you know, I've got three hours to decompress, which really helps and resets me for the next day. But that's not enough. I take most weekends off. That allows me to decompress. I take week long vacations, I take a month long sabbatical. And I think that's my special formula. And I am not prescrib a formula. Everybody's got to figure out their own. But that's how I avoid the wigged out. Now the good news is, you know, I was wigged out every minute of every day. In my 20s, I was wigged out half the time. In my 30s, you know, 70% of the time as wigged out. So it diminishes my wigginess. There's been a couple wigged out moments in the last month, I would say. But then I had this. It's like the last maybe three months of the year last year, no wigging. So it's diminished greatly. But it is because I take time off and I recharge and I'll start there.

[A]

Yeah. So I'm wondering when the wigging out is actually happening. How are you remaining in a peaceful place?

[B]

I think what I do when it's. I'm trying to find your words fast and furious. I'm still taking mini breaks, as I've mentioned in past episodes. My doctor called it that or time off. So for instance, let's pretend it's like a red line day and I maybe have whatever it is, six meetings top to bottom. There are an hour and a half, like the day is full. There's still a half hour buffer in between every one of those meetings. So I come out of that meeting and I can debrief and hand off all the things I need to hand off from that meeting and then prepare well for the next meeting. Where most will jump from meeting to meeting to meeting to meeting to meeting. That 30 minutes is magical in terms of bringing me back down to the ground. And then again I'll heat up in that next meeting and maybe I don't come all the way down to the ground, but by the end of the day, after, you know, four or five, six of those, even with those half hour buffers in between, you know, by the end of the day I'm wigged out. But those little breaks in between to kind of catch up. Definitely greatly reduce the wigginess because I, I probably would be twice as wigged out if I didn't do that. So that's one example. And then the other mini break I've talked about in the past is just the deep belly breath. So now I'm so conscious of this where it's like I can feel the amping up and I'll just take two, three, four, five belly breaths. And that brings me down to the ground as well. Sometimes I will meditate during the day. You know, if I'm working from home in my home office, I've got my meditation chair right there. I'll just go sit in that for 5, 10, 15 minutes. That works. I'll do it my office occasionally if it's just me working in my office. But sometimes it's a session, you know, it's an intense, all out, tough eight hour session and there's no place to go hide, you know, those are the ones I think that maybe I get most wigged out because I gave it my all and there's no time to decompress and that 25 minute drive home wasn't enough. And then that's when Kathy sees that look in my eyes. So there's some thoughts.

[A]

No, those are very practical. You know, I'll just share a personal experience that came up for me. I was running one day, I had a very busy day. I was wigged out and I went for a run because I just felt like I had to release some physical energy. And I went on this. I was out and around neighborhoods and things like that. But then I got off onto this half mile trail that I like and I was running through. The trail was in the woods. And I realized about halfway through, why am I running in here? Let me slow down and walk and just take my time and take it all in. So I walked for a quarter mile till I got back out to the sidewalk and started running again. And I noticed I had more energy all of a sudden. And also all this stuff that I'd been thinking about earlier in the day that was going on, the wigged out stuff, it felt like a lot calmer and clearer to me now. So I just use that as an analogy of just like your belly breaths or that meditation, just taking that short period of time can just really reset your nervous system.

[B]

I think it's time for topic number two.

[A]

Let's do it.

[B]

All right. Mr. Here's mine. So in our mastermind, we had a guest. So every March I take A sabbatical or some time off. And so I'm not on the march. Mastermind. And so we bring a guest in, and we had a guest and seemed pretty powerful. You also took a sabbatical in there, and so we didn't see each other for two months. The guest is somebody who you've been working with, and I notice a difference in you, so I feel like he's had an impact on you. I also heard you mention that he may be the one that has helped you with your eczema skin condition. So I'm just curious because we talked about the eczema in previous episodes and, you know, we've talked about psychosomatic stuff. So I would just love to hear your perspective on him, what he did for you. And do you really believe there's something that he did to heal that for you?

[A]

I have no clue.

[B]

That's okay.

[A]

That's the truth.

[B]

Then back into my truth.

[A]

But, yeah, I mean, his name is Gabe Roberts. And, yeah, he was introduced to me through somebody that I work with, a functional doctor, and he did subconscious work with me. So that was kind of my first entry point into ever doing anything like that. There was also some regression work. So I'm trying to not get too much into the weeds with it. Not because I don't want to talk about it, but I don't know that it's super relevant right now. But I just can say in the work that we did leading into where I felt like I just completely let go, There was just a session that we had where I just said, I'm just done. I don't need to work with you anymore. Which is what he wants. That's the goal. I said, I just. I just. I can't explain it. It's like, I don't need to do this. It's all good. I'm whole. It is what it is.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And. Yeah.

[B]

And how many sessions did you do? You may said it. I missed it.

[A]

Three.

[B]

Yeah, right.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And when were the three sessions?

[A]

They were in the late summer, fall time frame.

[B]

Yeah. So it was the middle end of last year.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[B]

Right. So again, you said you don't want to go deep. I'm going to take.

[A]

I don't mind.

[B]

But only for five minutes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Because I'm sitting here in a coffee shop with you, curious about this thing that happen in your life. And the guy seems really interesting. So I watched the playback of the Mastermind. Seems like a really interesting guy. And so when you say regression work, what is regression work?

[A]

That is where something happened to you at some point in your life, and there was a moment in time when it first happened. Now, it may have happened numerous times after, but there was a moment of time. So he gets you through his various techniques. He gets you to a place where you go to that moment and it seems like it can't. Like what is coming out of your. Out of. I'll use my own experience. When I say you, I'm referring to me. What is happening with me in that is. I'm saying where I am, what the situation is. And it seems like I'm just making it up, which he says it's going to seem like you're making it up, he said, but just stay with it. And that's the moment it happened. And that's the time where he takes you through a process to be safe, essentially. And it can go back to, you know, being in the womb. It can go back to past lives, if you believe in that kind of thing, which I do, but I'm not suggesting everyone should or that it's even a thing, you know. And so I had those kinds of experiences with him. And there was one in particular. There was a brownstone. I was sitting on the steps, and the inside was like on fire. And I saw it was on fire. I turned around, I walked in and I. And I said, everything's fine. And the fire was gone. And that was the end of it. And it was that session where I felt, this is it.

[B]

Cool. And that's the way it's supposed to work. That's weird. Now, with that, I love that you brought up past life regression. I recorded an episode on this, so you have no idea. So it will have aired before this. So it's funny that that's coming up again for some crazy reason. And I was curious, when you said regression, was it this life or past life regression? Because there's both types, like you said. So you've answered that. And then what the subconscious work. What does that mean? What is subconscious?

[A]

So it's just getting you out of your conscious mind and getting, you know, getting you into your subconscious, going deep inside of the things that your conscious mind is. Are blocking from coming. Like that first moment when I was, you know, in a room and there was something going on in the other room with my parents, and it was not good. And I can't remember exactly what it was, or I'd say it, but I was in a bed and I was a baby. And it just seems like that can't even be real. How Can I remember that? That can't be real. That was where my subconscious came out. You know, he got me there.

[B]

Love it, love it, love it, love it. And then I think the last thing that comes up and is a curiosity because I'm such a believer and we've been talking about this, like, I healed my lower back pain through subconscious work and. Yeah, and Dr. Sarno's work and healing back pain and that type of thing. Because it's. Again, there's a belief, as Gabe believes, all pain is psychosomatic. I mean, how powerful is that? And so I'm just curious. And when I say pain, all body conditions are psychosomatic. Back to your eczema and your skin condition. So is the skin condition resolved for you?

[A]

I would say so at this moment. Will it come back? I have no idea.

[B]

I mean, so it's incredible. You know, that's probably the most fascinating part for me, whatever it was, right? Because you don't know, but you've been doing the work, whatever the work is, you know, and sometimes the work is, I believe my back pain was most healed. Dr. Sarno has these 10 things you read every day, which I think were really helpful. And some aha's about, you know, how perfectionists walk in a constant state of anger because nothing can be perfect. Those were two powerful insights, but I think the most powerful. I did some subconscious work with a woman which stuck with me as well. But just the time I would spend in meditation. I would do this meditation at night, going into my back and into just an energetic field of my subconscious and just removing that. Sarno believes it's all repressed anger, you know, just releasing and releasing and releasing. So just powerful stuff.

[A]

And how's your back?

[B]

It's great. It's gone. I mean, it's crazy. Things that I used to do that hurt my back have not hurt my back. We'll see how golf season goes. But it's like. It's crazy. I mean, it's gone.

[A]

I mean, I've heard the stories over and over again. And if you're open, I think that's a big piece to it. I mean, you were open to it, you know, you have to bet.

[B]

Yeah, you bet. Well, thank you for sharing that myself. And that's the coffee shop.

[A]

All right, there we go. We're out of time. Thank you as always to each and every one of you for joining us, and we look forward to seeing you next time. And in the meantime, stay focused and

[B]

much love, thank you for listening in today. We truly appreciate you taking the time to spend with us. And please tune in for the next episode. Until then, we wish you all the best in freeing your true self. Stay focused and much love.