WEBVTT
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This program is designed to provide general information with regards
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to the subject matters covered. This information is given with
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the understanding that neither the hosts, guests, sponsors, or station
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are engaged in rendering any specific and personal medical, financial,
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legal counseling, professional service, or any advice. You should seek
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the services of competent professionals before applying or trying any
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suggested ideas.
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At the end of the day, it's not about what
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you have or even what you've accomplished. It's about what
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you've done with those accomplishments. It's about who you've lifted up,
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who you've made better. It's about what you've given back.
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Denzel Washington, Welcome to Inspire Vision. Our sole purpose is
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to elevate the lives of others and to inspire you to.
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Do the same.
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Har Many, Welcome to the show.
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Hi, doctor Doug, thank you so much for having me.
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Hey, it's great to have you on the show. This
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is something that I'm really fascinated about because I know
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you're doing things a little bit differently than a lot
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of psychotherapists and other people that are doing to help people,
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and so I'm really fascinated about how this is going
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to go. I want your story though, because I find
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that that's always interesting to the audience is who are
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you and how did you get to this point and
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what motivated you to move in this direction and also
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what motivated you to write that latest book of yours ALIGNE.
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Yeah, So I grew up in a family of healers,
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and I was surrounded and like really steeped in a
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culture of personal growth throughout my entire life. My mom,
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she was a breath worker and a coach, and she
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would lead these workshops in our home that fascinated me
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and I actually I started practicing transcendental meditation when I
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was six. She had me initiated into the practice of
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trans and dental meditation, and I also started doing breath
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work around the age of eighteen and assisting in her workshops.
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And my dad as a physician who has a really
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alternative approach to health and empowering his patients, and I
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watched them living their purpose and I loved being in that,
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you know, swimming in that energetic school, so to speak.
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But whenever I was suffering, I would go seek out
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psychotherapy and I was really disappointed. I didn't like the
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way I felt I didn't like the things therapist said
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to me, quite honestly, and I was confused that why
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the place where most people seek support and transformation and
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healing seems so limited to me. And so when it
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was time to go to college, I majored in psychology
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and loved what I was learning, and I assisted in
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a lot of research and really dove into the psychology department.
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But I was still wondering, like, how can I bridge
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this divide between all of this personal growth transformation that
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I knew was possible that I had experienced outside of
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a clinical space, but how could I bring that into
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a counseling container. And so when I started studying clinical
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psychology and graduate school, I started to like scratch the surface.
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I learned spiritual psychology and gestalt and psycho synthesis, which
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are all very trans personal models of counseling, which, for
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those who are listening, trans personal psychology is really about
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being with clients beyond the personality. So as a therapist,
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I'm not engaging from my personality and I'm not engaging
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with my client's personality. Where in the trans personal realm
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where transcendent experiences happen. And I was fascinated with transpersonal counseling,
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but I still wasn't quite sure the real clinical application,
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Like how can I really hold space in a way
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that offers my clients a space to come back to
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their true nature, to the truth of who they are.
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And I dedicated many, many, many years of my career
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finding my way to be that type of spaceholder and
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eventually found my way to teaching Gestalt at Europa University
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here in Boulder, Colorado. And I'm so in love with
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psychology now and counseling, which is which is just such
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a wonderful surprise, because I started off so dissatisfied and
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I'm now thoroughly in love with transpersonal counseling, especially teaching
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student therapists. It's just a wonderful space to be in.
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Oh, that's wonderful. And you talk about gestalt, can you
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can you describe what type of therapy that is?
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Yeah, Gestalt is a trans personal approach to counseling that
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really focuses on the here and now, present moment. The
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belief is that relationship happens in the present moment, healing
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happens in the present moment, and so why many therapy
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focuses on the past and the history and analyzing how
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a person came to be. Gestalt therapists are really focusing
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on how a client is disrupting contact with themselves and
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the environment in the present moment, and any disruption to
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contact of presence becomes the entry point to transformation. And
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it's a very experimental, experiential approach to counseling where we
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sort of rearrange the therapeutic container in dynamic ways, so
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we're not always just sitting talking. We're doing a lot
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of different things, and really magical experiences can unfold and
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really deep repair within a client system.
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Well, and you know, it's interesting because you talk about
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how a lot of therapy, and obviously a lot of
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psychology therapy is just talk therapy, and as you say,
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I mean, I've been there too. It's just so frustrating
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because nothing's getting accomplished and you're just talking, talking, talking,
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whereas as you're starting to really focus on something a
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little bit different that works. But as you talk about
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not going into the past to focus on that, at
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the same time, isn't it true that those subconscious imprints
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are literally creating our lives? And so I'm curious how
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with gestal. You're in the present, here and now, and
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yet you're still able to go in and deal with
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those past imprints that are still existing in present time. Yeah,
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you're right, they exist in present time exactly.
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That's exactly it. Yeah, we call it unfinished business in gestalt.
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And so what is incomplete from the past, like an
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experience where a need wasn't fully met in the past.
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The ways living in the present moment through what we
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call contact boundary disturbances, so disruptions to the present moment contact.
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The way they live in a person systems system now
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is actually a rigid, rigid way of thinking and behaving
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that when it was created in the past was really adaptive.
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The person created safety and homeostasis within a system that
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wasn't designed for their well being. But then it becomes
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a rigid pattern, a rigid way of being, and a
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person is wondering, like, why is my experience of myself
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so limited? Why do I keep doing the same thing,
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Why do I keep sabotaging my relationships, et cetera. Those patterns,
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they are seated in the past, but the way they
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show up now is really how we're working with them.
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So we're not looking behind us. We're looking into what
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I call spiritual time, where the energy of that version
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of ourselves is right now in this moment.
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Well, and you know, you talk about the energy and
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version of ourselves and I think for a lot of
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people they don't really understand what that means. So from
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your perspective, who are we? Who are we? And how
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do we get back to that situation of really being
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who we are?
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Yeah, we are multi dimensional beings, and we are dynamic,
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and we are ever evolving. We're not stagnant. And I
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think that when people feel stuck, it's because they think
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they're stagnant and they're orienting to a way of being
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that served them once but no longer really serves who
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they're becoming. And so when our nervous system is disregulated,
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the way that we try to find safety is to
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control the world around us or to manage ourselves. And
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when we are you know, engaging in these behaviors that
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are really coming from a trauma response of feeling scared
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or angry or you know, fawning, trying to make everybody happy,
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we are we're keeping ourselves disregulated while we're actually trying
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to regulate. It can be a little confusing because those
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are actually attempts at regulation. Trying to get other people
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to like us or to be okay with everything is
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an attempt at regulation, but it keeps us in a
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perpetual state of dysregulation, which keeps us from being present.
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So the more available we can be for our experience,
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the more we can actually regulate our nervous system and
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find our way back to a healthy, aware state where
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we're more connected and aligned with our true nature.
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Interesting, and you know, it comes to mind mind that
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I've observed some people that you know, as you talk
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about people who are depressed or you know, struggling, or
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they find that they self sabotage, and that's one element
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of what they do. But also I noticed that there
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are some that constantly attract the same type of people,
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the same type of experience, and then they find themselves
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in what I would say the victim mode of you know,
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well they did this to me, and they did that
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to me, and they find themselves in that mode. How
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how does that work? How does it work that people
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find and attract the very same things that they're really
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trying to avoid it, yet they keep attracting it.
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It's such a good question, and I think it's really
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the plight of so many people, especially if they think
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that they're doing something different, like they go and find
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a different relationship or move locals, and they think that
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they're doing something different and that they're going to attract
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a different experience, and then they're in the same cycle.
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And you know, as I'm listening to a quote from
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one of the creators of Geshtal therapy, Fritz Pearls, comes
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to mind, and he famously says, we live in a
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house of mirrors, thinking we're looking out windows. So that
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is to say that when we think that the people
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outside of us are separate from us, and we look
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to them to have a different experience of ourselves, we're
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actually getting pulled further away from the solution to our
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healing and our transformation. That really looking within and seeing
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how is this person actually a reflection of my wound
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or a reflection of my condition self, so that I
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can learn and integrate and heal and feel more whole
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and connect with my true source of love within myself
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and then show up from that place. It's it's a
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delicate balance though, because I really I would not ever
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want a victim blame like there are some dynamics where
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it's just a truly unhealthy relationship, and removing ourselves is
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the most important thing that we can do for ourselves.
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And yet each experience that we have is such a beautiful,
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sacred opportunity to deepen into contact with ourselves, to come
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home to ourselves even more. I remember, I remember a gohead.
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I was just going to say, I remember when I
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had this epiphany, because you know, I'm a human being,
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and I I had this experience many times in my
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life where I'm in a different relationship and I think
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this is going to be it, this is going to
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be the different experience. And I had this epiphany one
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day that I kept attracting these abusive relationships because the
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men that I was in a relationship with were a
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reflection of my own self hate. And it wasn't until
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I could be with my own self loathing in a
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way that was loving and healing that I would never
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ever allow myself to endure such such an experience and
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call it love.
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Well, And why do we see some people get into
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these codependent relationships where and you know, at the worst
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part of it, they're really experiencing abuse. They truly are
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a victim, and I don't want to take away from that.
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They're victims. They're experiencing that, and yet they stay or
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they leave and then they come back. And what is
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it that causes that codependency that they are not able
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to literally say, as you did, enough is enough, I'm
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out of here, and then really remain out of there.
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Yeah. So the neurobiology of especially the female nervous system,
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but of all nervous systems is that when we when
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we don't have a perceived sense of power, especially you know,
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intergenerationally and you know through through time, we the safest
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place for us to be is in what's called a
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fawning response, which is the last place the nervous system
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goes to find a sense of safety, which means to
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stay here, to not do anything, to disrupt the status quo,
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to be okay with everything, and it's and it's really
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a trauma response. It's a way to try to find safety.
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And the less power we have in society, and especially
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perceived power, the more likely we are to stay in fawning.
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Well, and as you say, you you managed to break
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out of that. But as you're working with people, how
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do you help them literally to get to that point
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where they have the courage to break away and disconnect
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from not only that individual victim type of situation, but
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also in many cases the friends, the people surrounding them
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that are literally doing the same thing that maybe an
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individual is doing, at least from any Martians standpoints.
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Yeah, the short answer is therapeutic, and this happens over
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time therapeutically. But the short answer here is I help
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people to become a secure base for themselves, to give
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themselves what it is that they're hoping other people will
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give them. So if they're looking for safety from other people,
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how can they be a safe space for themselves, If
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they're looking for love and acceptance outside of themselves, how
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can they love and accept themselves and to keep deepening