Stop Chasing Harmony. Learn Repair

Welcome to grit and grace, the place where grit shapes you, grace carries you, and friends walk beside you through it all. I'm Pam Raider, and along with my co-hosts, Aaron Payne and Brian Thieson, we're here to laugh, cry, and tell the truth about what it means to be fully human. Think of us as your old friends. We share real stories, a little cowboy logic, and transformational tools, because here's the thing. Life's going to kick your ass sometimes, but it'll also invite you to rise, and when you've got grit and grace, and a few good friends, you will get through it all. So pull up a chair, grab your coffee, and buckle up. Hey everybody, welcome back to our grit and grace podcast, where we turn all things grit into grace as best we can as humanly possible. I'm really excited about our show today. I'm Aaron Payne, your host with my co-host, Pam Raider. Hey everyone, it's great to be here. We have a pretty special podcast for you today, because I feel like this is some new stuff for me that is streamlining some of my tools even better. It's really based on one of our favorite relationship therapists, Terence Reel, and he did a recent podcast with Mel Robbins, and we're going to pull some stuff out of here. So this is going to be our take on his work, and we've broken down parts work a lot, and this is like, it's more simple. It feels a little bit easier actually to work with, so this podcast is really for anyone who wants to improve romantic relationships, all all the relationships in your life romantic otherwise. And if you don't have a romantic relationship and you want one, listen up because you might figure out what's been going on, why they're not working out for you. And I just want to say we're all in relationships, whether we're in a romantic relationship or not, we have relationships with co-workers, we have relationships with our family, we have relationships with friends, and sort of how you do one thing is how you do everything. And so this podcast is for every human being who is in relationship, who wants to have a little more skill, and I'm not going to say a little more ease or peace. I'm going to talk about skill because it's actually hard work, having clear space and relationships, having relationships at work, it's hard work. And this idea, I want to just put this out there right now that if it's the right one, you'll know because it's easy. Don't mistake a lack of resistance for success. So Terrence talks about relationships are a perpetual cycle of harmony, disharmony, and repair. Yeah, but most of us don't know how to repair. So we're constantly in harmony, disharmony, harmony, disharmony. So it's if you're in harmony, disharmony repair is what a good relationship is. Yeah, and if we, if we take out the repair, so we've got harmony, then disharmony, how do we get back to harmony? We sweep everything under the rug and pretend it didn't happen. So now we have unresolved issues, resentment, building, and usually the same fight coming up over and over again, because there is no repair. So let's talk about what, what is repair in a relationship, having the skills to be able to talk about, okay, what happened, how I feel about what happened. This is what I tell myself how it made me feel and what I'd like to see happen. Yeah, or what I would like to have happen. So repair requires me radical responsibility. First, right. So let's, let's go back to the beginning when we're talking about this kind of work. And I love Terry Reels work. I teach it in my become the catalyst certification coaching certification program because it's revolutionary. It's simple. Everyone can understand it. And I use it with my clients every day. And they're blown away with the results. We are sort of taught that other people should just know what we want to need. We repress our own needs. And then when they're not met, we pull up strategies from our childhood. That work. So basically when we get into any kind of relationship, especially romantic, but it could be otherwise. The people that we attract into relationship with us are our Terry Reels says they're your unfinished business. You marry your unfinished business. You got friends that are sometimes your unfinished business. Essentially, you attract the kind of people that are similar to those that caused wounds in you in the past, so that you have the opportunity to heal that. But what happens is a person does something that reminds you of something that happened to you in the past. And instead of recognizing that it's a deeply old ancient even wound from the past, we look at that person in the moment as the cause of all of our nervous system dysregulation and discomfort. And we don't know what to do about it. So we go into old strategies. So what we have is the wounded child. Maybe you felt abandoned as a child. Maybe you felt like someone didn't care for you. Maybe you felt unseen or unimportant or like what you had to say doesn't matter. And let's take that one. Let's say you have this wound. Like what I have to say doesn't matter. I was told to hush up and be quiet and you know your brother knows best or whatever. And then you perceive that your partner isn't listening to you. Now it could be that they're busy. They're stirring the spaghetti on the stove and they've got something on their mind and it has nothing to do with how much they care about you, but you have to repeat yourself. And it triggers this old wound if I'm not important in what I have to say doesn't matter. Now the wounded child is activated. Who comes out to protect the wounded child? Well, the adaptive child. The adaptive child is smart. The adaptive child either. In my case, my adaptive child pout. She pouts. She throws a very dramatic pout to make sure that someone notices her pouting. That's her strategy. Some people are fighters. They'll go after you. You are always do this to me. You never listen. Always a never the fighter. Some people will completely shut down and hope that you chase them. But that is the adaptive child responding to an old wound and it has not a fucking thing to do with your partners during the spaghetti on the stove thinking about something that happened at work today. There's no wise adult in the room here. Right. And so yeah, you speak exactly to what's next. It's like your wise adult. That's the part of you that has a frontal lobe, by the way, it's a part of the brain. That's what he repeated multiple times. The adaptive child in a different part of the brain and you can't use the full function of your brain when you're in your adaptive child. I know this, but it kind of blew my mind. It's like the wise adult cannot be there. If no, in the adaptive child. So our job is when we get flooded. And that's what Terry real calls it flooded. Like you get that love that strong emotional thing and to recognize to have the personal responsibility to go, oh, I'm flooded here. This reaction that I'm about to have does not lead me towards what I want in this relationship. And it's not about suppressing your feelings. It's about actually getting to what's real and what's true. So you see that adaptive child about to throw a pout in my case. I think for you, you're either shut down or fight her. Right. Yeah, I feel like I've done the I've run the gambit. Like because I think I found I found as well, you know, I have in the past one as well. But I shut down. I'm definitely passive aggressive and annoyed and disappointed. And then I that justifies my behavior of withdrawing right. Oh, yeah. You called. I can be passive aggressive to and actually quite snarky. Like, yeah, quite sarcastic or rude or like cutting a little bit. And until that adaptive child did a good job because they didn't have connection to higher reasoning or rationalization. They didn't understand everything that was going on the full context. They're only responding to their emotions and they're trying to get their needs met. So we don't shame the adaptive child. But here's the thing. We'll talk about what the wise adult is and what the wise adult does in a moment. But what I want to say about this is you and I had a conversation yesterday and both of us just about our heads just about blew off. Because I said here we're all worried about being abandoned. And we're taught on Instagram and YouTube. Don't abandon yourself. Ask for your needs in that moment when your adaptive child is freaking out. We call that honoring our needs and not abandon yourself. That's bullshit. Right. Then you are the one abandoning that version of yourself. You are literally sitting in the backseat of your car letting your adaptive child drive without a license. Who's abandoning who abandoning the wise adult that needs to be driving the car? Well, you're abandoning the child. The wise adult is abandoning the child. Right. Yes. Yes. So when you look to our partner to soothe this comfort that they didn't cause. And I love this expression. Essentially, we bleed all over people that didn't cut us. And that's just like, when you get that in your relationships, how many times you bleed all over somebody that didn't cut you, boy, it changes everything. Yeah, no doubt. So how do we get to the wise adult, Aaron? What is it? Like when you're flooded, you know, your partner does something. And I want to use this example because this is common. This is what I hear a lot in with my clients. And this was a complaint I had in my previous marriage. I have to repeat myself all the time. He never listens to me. Okay. So that was that was my perception. That's because I had a father who worked all the time. He was responsible for like a full company was out of town all the time, had all kinds of responsibilities. And he was in and out of the house. Not as often as a nine to five father. And I felt like I was chasing him from attention all the time, which is no fault of my fathers. It's just my perception as a child. And He would be he's also a real dreamer and like an inventor and he creates things and he's always in his mind thinking about things. And he's one of those people that can be hyper focused and not here. What's going on. Child I interpreted that as I'm not important. My dad doesn't pay attention to me because I'm not important. And I felt diminished. And so in the moment when I would say in the kitchen, you know, like, Hey, did you think about that going out for dinner with so and so on Saturday night. And he goes, you never said anything to me about that. Everything in my inside scream. I'm about to blow the lid off my head. And I would rate into and like you said, we run the gamut. It would be like, I already told you this. How come you can't listen to me. You never listen to me. And he's like, what are you talking about? I wasn't there. We didn't have that conversation. And then I would go after him. And when he finally shut down, then I would go out until he would chase me. So now I have a seven year old girl who's essentially chasing her father running my marriage. Right. Wow. Wow. Like one of the things I loved about what Terry said in the podcast was when his partner is allowing her adaptive child to run the marriage. He puts his little Terry behind him because he's the little Terry is not allowed or she's not allowed to get at the little Terry. And I just for me that just put it into a real perspective because it's like my little Aaron is not allowed to run my relationship. Just like Terry protected his little Terry so that his wife wasn't attacking the little like it just it just sort of brought it full circle for me. It's like, oh, yeah, like the wise adult. And I think this is the definition of love. What what is real love with a romantic or otherwise the ability to hold space for other people. So have them feel seen heard and understood space for them. So you see, oh, whoa, they're in their adaptive child. I know what that's about. And I'm not going to bring my seven year old out to do get out on the playground with them. Yes, I'm going to listen until they're not flooded anymore. Or I'm going to say, hey, can we take a break and get back to this in a little while. It seems like you're flooded right now. And I want to how I want to hear what you have to say. Like bringing the wise adult to the table is recognizing that we, if we're in our adaptive child, we are going to get what we've always got. To get something new, we have to come online and look at what is our true north. What is the highest intention here? What do we want to have happen? And what's my part in this? What's my responsibility? Thank you. So how do we get to the wise adult? And really what I'm asking is like, what do we want in a relationship? Right. So this is where I think that we have to learn. And Terry real talks about this about having real conversations. First of all, about where are we going in this relationship? How are our values aligned? What is it that we want? How do we, how do we argue? Like what are the boundaries there? And I talk often with my clients about creating sort of the rules of engagement. And it's like two wise adults sitting down and saying, yeah, there's no name calling. There's no door slamming. We're not getting up and running out of the room. If I need a break, I'm going to say I need 10 minutes or I need an hour or can we revisit this tomorrow when my wise adult could come online. We actually have to have a context for it, not in the moment because when you're in the heat of the moment, none of that's going to fly. Unless we actually have agreed upon some ways to what's most important to us. And maybe in your relationship, like respectful communication is most important to you. And so we have to identify what those things are first. That's what I, that's my, my take on it. Secondly, we have to distinguish in the moment. Would I rather spend my life running away from what I don't want feeling disrespected feeling unseen feeling unheard or would I like to put my big girl panties on and walk towards creating a relationship where I feel heard seen and known. And if I want those things for me, I got to take a good hard look. Am I actually giving those things to my partner? Yeah, a good hard look. It's and it's a good hard look. Two things that I really took from and they're really simple, really simple is harshness is never a good idea. And when you feel flooded, take a break. And that was like, I know that I have that understanding, but I was like, yeah, take I'm flooded. I need to take a break. Yeah. And if somebody kind of calls you out on harshness, like I think Terry likes to say that harshness will never accomplish what from loving kindness will. Yes, kindness. So if that, you know, I got called out on some harshness the other day by my guy and it wasn't harsh actually it was just a tone in my voice. And it was exactly the situation I was talking about telling him about something actually about our retreat talking about it. And he made a comment about, you know, like I don't remember you telling me about that. And I started asking questions and I kind of I felt that trigger come up and I wasn't present to it, but I felt it as I look back, I can see that I felt flooded. And then I said, I was like, well, if you didn't interrupt me, you would get the rest of the story. And it definitely had that tone to it and bless his heart. He's very perceptive, very aware, very. And so he just sat and he listened and he asked me some questions about it. And then when we're done, he goes, so can I ask you question? I'm like, what? And he goes, what was with the sass. And I was like, there was so sass. What are you talking about? But as he was saying it, I was like, ooh, yeah, that was my adaptive child coming out to be a little indignant, a little sarcastic little all control this. And I just, I was like, yeah, there, oh, yeah, I don't actually want to be that I don't want to bring that part of me for if I don't need her to come out and have a conversation, this is a safe place for me to have any kind of conversation. I don't need her to come out and start a fight on the playground. That's essentially what's happening. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. How does it show up for you? Have you, have you got a spot recently where you've had like this process? What's been mind blowing for me is the idea of the adaptive child, because I thought I was in the wounded child the whole time, which apparently we only have a capacity of seconds for the actual wounded child. I immediately go into who we had to become in order to protect ourselves when we were little like you were explaining earlier. So yes, I've had this happen a lot. And honestly, my adaptive child recently in my in my new relationship, honestly, my adaptive child can last for a couple of days. I have gotten really good at hiding her a little bit and just letting that harshness rip out every once in a while, because it's not all the time or it's just a little bit. I can gaslight myself and my partner, and I feel horrible saying this, but I can gaslight that situation a little bit to being like, well, I'm not doing this. I'm just hurt because you're not hearing me, right? Yeah. Yeah. Well, I can crazy. Well, and I love what you just said about the wounded child. So we hear a lot about inner child work and you and I have talked about it. And it is really powerful to identify what the core wounds were in for a lot of people, it's abandonment of some sort for a lot of people that's feeling unsafe or unheard. That the root of all of our wounds is, I'm not enough and therefore not lovable. That's the fundamental human experience, right? The commonality. Now, once you identify that, it no longer has any purpose in my view. I used to think that we should sit there and we have to soothe that inner child and we got to do all these. Now, just identify it so you can see the brat you had to become to deal with her to protect. Yeah. And I mean, funny. I like to be funny about it because otherwise we can take it too seriously and you and I are too intensity and we get all bound up in these things totally. Look, I can go like, wow, I was pretty bratty and that little brat like that adaptive child. Yes, she was smart, but I actually it helps me to call her a brat. Do I really want that brat running my life right now? Yeah, that's fair. You know, yeah, I get that not to shame shame that part of myself. That's what she did to survive and she did a great job. But I'm free marriages in. I'm zero. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, so I don't mind having a marriage and I'm fucking zero marriages in. So yes, I mean, basically we're both batten the thousand here in our own ways. Yeah, right, because the relationships triggered old stuff and then we went into our adaptive child and not always, you know, I would love to say that to our credit, we've both done a lot of work and a lot of people say I've done a lot of work, it's not always. Yes, and though if we're honest with ourselves, when we feel out of our depth, when we don't know what to do, when we feel sad, scared or uncertain, we go into that adaptive child. So let's talk about kind of more specifically how to take responsibility as the wise adult. What's the, you know, we've talked a little bit about a blaneless communication and responsibility and all of that, but Terry real talks about we kind of have two places where we go in relation, we have to go one up. Meaning I'm grandiose and I know more than you and I'm coming after you and you never do this for me and I'm, I'm big and I'm coming down on you. Yeah, or we're one down where we feel like, you know, we might be people pleasing or shutting down or avoiding because we feel like we don't know or, you know, whatever that is. To fix everything. And he's like to be in a healthy, repairing relationship that it's a democracy. If you're grandiose and you're one up, you need to make yourself smaller. And if you're one down, you need to get some courage. Yeah, make it up a little bigger so that you can have the important conversations. Now, I love the three things that he said he was like, you have to be willing to rock the boat. That's number one. And for people, pleasers, fawners, if that's your adaptive child, that's going to feel terrifying. That will be hard, yeah, or feel hard. But if you want intimacy and depth, you're going to have to rock the boat and that doesn't mean going and screaming and calling names. It means actually saying, hey, I don't love the way things are going right now and I have some things to say about it. I'd love to be heard. Now the second part is to tell the truth and the truth is it's not usually the other person's behavior. It's usually, hey, when this happens, that triggers this old wound in me, the story I make up in my head about it is. And here's what happens emotionally. Now we often feel angry and Terrence real expressed like taking the biggest emotion and putting it last because that helps us process what's really going on. We can say, when you don't listen to me, I feel angry. Well, is that really the only emotion? I feel sad, I feel small, I feel unimportant, I feel diminished, I feel rejected and all of that makes me feel angry. Oh, that's different. It is different. It's the impact is different. That's vulnerable and now that person really hears your heart. And then we have to follow it with the third thing with which is repair. What would make you feel better? Like so often we're just like, hey, you did this and it makes me feel like that. And I don't like it. Well, you know what I have to say about that? So what? I want like, I need to know what would make you feel better. I can't guess, I'm not a mind reader. And my partner is on a mind reader, your partner is on a mind reader. And here's the thing, most often we engage in a fight like that. We haven't even stopped to think what would make us feel better. We're just like, don't do this to me. What is it that you do want? What would specifically make you feel better? And that can be a negotiation, democracy, right? We have conversations, negotiations. That's a wise adult coming online. Absolutely. And being able to speak, you know, you're like, you're truth, right? And really figure out what you need, which is what you just said. Yeah. And if we don't, if we don't know what we need yet, it's probably not the time to have the conversation. Right. The conversation has to be had in the moment. You can be like, wow, this is triggering me. I feel flooded. These are the things I feel. What do I really want to be different? What would make me feel better? And if you don't know yet, then wait to have the conversation. Take a break and wait. And honestly, that break at times has made me feel even more anxious. So it's what came to me right away when we were talking about this is taking a break for some people is going to feel like rocking the boat. And that's your courage right there. Boom. Rock the boat. You know, and so the more that you do this and expand your capacity to be able to rock the boat, the easier it is going to be able to take that break. And then you can step to like to the next level, which is just like waiting to talk or waiting to say, this is what I need. When you don't really know what it is yet. Totally still kind of steps. Totally. There's one question that I want to chat about with you. And I think this is really a big distinction and important thing that, you know, I heard Terrence real talk about this many years ago. And I love this question. And it guides a lot of what I do now. Because we're sort of taught that you can have it all. And it's going to be, you know, the right one will be the perfect person. Well, here's some news. None of us are perfect. We all have an adaptive child. We're all going to have defaults and some things that go on that are not perfect. And almost always there's going to be some part of our ideal vision, if you will, that we're sacrificing in a relationship. And by that, I mean, maybe you thought you wanted to have financial security. Someone who's emotionally intelligent, you've got a great sex life. You both love to travel. And you have, you have a vibrant social life. Like maybe all of those things are really important to you. And you get with a partner and everything's good, but they really don't love to travel. They hate travel. And you really wanted that. So the question is, is what you get from the relationship? Enough for it to be worth it for you to grieve for that little thing or that thing that you're missing. And if the answer is, yeah, totally, like this partner gives me everything. And I just don't, they don't want to travel with me. Okay, great. Then you stay. And if not, if you're grieving that thing so much that you can't get over it, then maybe that's not the partner for you because you're going to wind up resenting them. Now, I've seen, as have you, many people in relationships where they choose financial stability and their grieving emotional capacity. To me, that's not worth it. For some people, it might be for me, it's not. I look at my current criteria is non-negotiables are non-negotiables are emotional intelligence. The ability to hold space, willingness to grow together, mutual respect and care. Aligned values like someone who loves to have fun. Those are things that matter to me. And then if there are other pieces that are sort of missing, I'm willing to grieve those things because I have lived three marriages where I didn't have most of those other things. And I can see the importance of them now. I will never again grieve. It is not worth it for me to grieve the lack of emotional connection or intimacy. That's not worth it to me. But grieving, you know, some, some hobbies that we don't share in common or, you know, whatever. And that's fine with me. Yeah. What are, what are non-negotiable to you in a relationship these days? Well, a lot of what you just said. Yeah. You're basically my best friend, and we talk about this shit all the time. Yeah. Someone who's fun and carefree is kind of a non-negotiable for me anymore. Because I've had a lot of not very fun relationships. But mostly it's someone who is interested in the deeper parts of me. My emotions, how I feel, what matters to me and having a partner who cares about that. And who I can care about that in return for them is really, you know, and so that's that's emotional intimacy that you're talking about. For sure. And my current partner lives three thousand away. And it was a big deal for me to understand. What I came to is that I can grieve the three thousand miles away because the rest of it. Is so aligned with what I need and who I am now. And he fulfills me on a level that is, I've never experienced before. And so him being so far away. I just, it's not easy, but I deal with it because the rest of it is so worth it. See, that's such a great example. I love Terry Real gives an example on the podcast we were listening to. And I do remember reading this in one of his books. I think the new rules of marriage. And he was talking about one of his clients who used to be quite a wild single guy. And he moved the single life and and was swinging from the chandeliers and loved the quite the wild ladies, you know, and then he met this lovely woman. And deeply fell in love with her and she is the love of his life. And he and she is a survival survivor of sexual trauma. And so she's not swinging from the chandeliers. And there's some work that's being done in that area. And it's not how it used to be. And when he was asked is grieving your old life and your old ways worth what you get. And he said 100,000% of course it is there. There's likely going to be a give up somewhere is my point. And this I realistic the right person will be all the things. I think is it's a cop out because what it's saying is I don't need to do any work when the right person comes along. My life will be great. When you take responsibility for being the right person, the person in your relationship that you would want to be with like. There's a woman who wrote a book called the gift. Her name is can't remember her name. Edie something or she's a Holocaust survivor. She's a psychotherapist and she talks about how she's like in her 90s, she might be passed away now, I think. Is she talked about couples coming into her office for relationship therapy. And the first thing she would ask them, they'd be like, well, he did this and she did that and everything and she would ask each of them, would you want to be married to you. All right. The listeners of that right now. I want. You want to be in a relationship with you the way you are right now, would you want to be here to you like become the person that you would like to be married to. Come the person that you want to see. And then in relationship, we are in the the truest form of it in terms of we are. And I hate he's a term using, but we are using on each other, but using the relationship as a catalyst to become better and better versions of ourselves together. But now. All fully formed and perfect. No, no. Well, he says in, you know, like you mentioned earlier, we marry our unfinished business. And the beauty and that, the gift and that is not that my partner shows me my core wound. It's what I do with it when I see the core wound. That's the beauty, that's the gift, that's what I think you're talking about right now is like become the person who you would want to marry. That to me, that's how you do it. And then the relationship can flourish, yeah, at that point, the gift, the hope, the gift is that once we can see it, we then, you know, do something about it. And that's the gift. Yeah. That, and that is a gift now. Here's the thing. We often, and we're taught by family, friends, and society, individual empowerment. So you don't desire to be talked to that way. And you should tell him. And like Terence real talks about that that's the doomsday recipe for relationships that we need to get off of this, this sort of, you know, we talk about masculine and feminine energy. That's great. And they're great ways to understand ourselves in each other. But that can't be the only conversation in, in relationship, we really need to look at relational health and standing for our relationship, not just individual empowerment. How are we both empowered in this relationship? How can we both be seen heard and known? How do we stand for that? And as I said, it's often modeled for us by our parents or by our friends or family and society as a whole. And so when we go to them to ask for opinions or bring our problems, they'll often say you don't deserve that. And he should and blah, blah, blah. And to me, that's not someone standing for your relationship. When you and I talk, we call each other out on our shed, we rarely say, well, maybe that's the other person's thing to look at. We're like, well, what did you do? Yeah, like I'm standing for your relationship right now. And like, let's look at what you haven't seen about this. So if you are struggling in relationship, one of the really important things that you need to do is surround yourself with people that will stand for your relationship with the exception of if you're an abusive relationship and get the fuck out. Yeah, of course. Or get whatever you need. Yeah. And though, if you're in a relationship that's just struggling with the same fights over and over again, don't go to your friends who tell you that your partners and as whole. Go to your friends and teach them how you want to be supported or go to friends that say, okay, well, that seems like it's a cycle. What's your part in the cycle? Let's pull that apart so we can maybe. And if you don't have a friend like that, get a coat, get a therapist. Like, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, get some help from someone who's going to stand for, yes, you as an individual and being heard and seen, but for the relationship. Because for your growth in it. Yeah, because if we don't have someone standing for the relationship, we wind up with two individually empowered people that are roommates. God, that sounds awful. And that's been my reality. And I just never wanted that, you know, and I don't live in a cave in the Himalayas. So my life is about relationships period. Yeah. And I think that relating to people is really important. Well, let's bring this to this is something that Terrence doesn't talk about or hadn't talked about on that podcast, but I think it's really valued. I think about my relationship with my adult children. And there have been some, some, you know, bumps along the road as there always are when they're emancipating and becoming adults. And then all of a sudden, all their childhood grievances come up and they, you know, whatever. And it's easy to get defensive and be like, how dare you you ungrateful little, you know, and you should or to go into your adaptive child, another version of the adaptive child, because your child, your child coming after you will trigger you too. Your adaptive child of like fawning and people pleasing, but that's also not empowering the relationship. So bringing the wise adult online is what kind of relationship do I want to have with my adult children and I someone that I would want to be in relationship with if I if this was my mother. And so I just want to broaden this sort of perspective around it's not just romantic relationships like who are you being with your children with your parents with your siblings, co workers. Yeah, and I think that we're too quick friends friends. I think we're too quick to draw about to create boundaries before we've ever done any work on ourselves before we've taken responsibility. I think that we're in this society that says just create some boundaries, keep them away from you. You don't need that shit in your life. Cut them off. Like there are times I struggle for sure with a couple of key people in my family, and I will never cut them off. No, ever. No, I feel the same way. I mean, short of, you know, they're being. It's like abuse. Of course, you know, that sort of thing, but like general like, oh, my mom's past it. Like if someone says to me, my mother's passive aggressive, and I just can't take it anymore. And she doesn't listen to me. So I'm cutting her off. I'm like, grow up. Yeah, grow up. That is not an answer. Heal your own wound so that this aggressive doesn't trigger you. Like that's her stuff. It has nothing. Yeah. That's on her. Yeah. So I love this idea of, okay, identify your wounded child. So you got a wound. So you got a wound. Welcome. Welcome to the club. Welcome to being a human. Everybody. Welcome to the human race. You got to come to earth school. If you didn't have one, I wouldn't be any. Somebody hurt you. Yeah. Yeah. There wouldn't be any beauty. Identify. Where does your adaptive child tend to go? What is your strategy? What's what's his or her strategy? Does she or he withdraw? Does she go going for the kill? Does she dominate? Does he or she dominate and try to go after that person? Do you avoid? Like what is your strategy? Do you try to fix something that really isn't yours to fix over functioning over function is great. Yeah, that's a big strategy. And then what does it feel like in your body when you get flooded when you get triggered? I don't even love the word triggered because it's so overused like I'm triggered or whatever. Okay. You're flooded when you're actually flooded and you don't have access to your prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for reasonable thought. What is it? I'm in that. I need to walk around the block. I need to not engage in this conversation now because my brat is coming out to fight. And I think that when we identify what our adaptive child does, then and only then we can take responsibility. And like you say, put him or her behind us. And stand in front of them as the wise adults and say, here, I'm going to drive the car now. And we've had a plan as to where we're going in this relationship. And I'm going to set the GPS to that. And so let's have a rational conversation when this happens. This is how it occurred for me. These are the emotions I felt. What would make me feel better as this? Is that okay to do this? Yeah. Then those questions come easily. Yeah. And I want to just present this to no matter how much work you do. And Aaron and I've done a lot of work. Well, we're not more involved in anybody. My adaptive brat comes out to fight toe to toe sometimes. And sometimes I can watch her and know what's happening. And I'm like, you go girl. Yeah. This feels good. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so we do the best we can. The best we can, right? And we come back and we repair. But understanding this, deshaming, which is what you and I are all about, just deshaming it. I was just going to talk about that actually. I was just going to bring it back to. And just because this is what you and I always talk about. What the adaptive child had to learn how to do. So Terry real talks about always honoring the intelligence of the adaptive child because no wonder. And of course, you were in a family dynamic that you had to withdraw. You had to lie. You had to become passive aggressive in order to protect yourself. And so there's an intelligence there. And when we can honor that intelligent, it immediately decames it immediately. Yeah. And I want to actually want to present that because lying is a big one for adaptive child. And it these little white lies often to avoid conflict or to defy somebody like you don't have control over me. You know, when people feel controlled. So there, I mean, there are many. We talked about like fighting, falling, pleasing and all that, but lying is a function of the adaptive child. Absolutely. I mean, if you were a child who was going to get physically maybe hit. If you're in like, you know, our, our generation, or if you went over to say, Johnny's house. So you say you went over to Tommy's house instead. Well, good job. Yeah, exactly. But you're not in that scenario anymore. You know, and he Terry taught Terry and surreal talks about this on that podcast. So I think that what I would like to do is invite people. If they're interested in this, our retreat registration is open. The grit and grace retreat. And this is the work we're going to do. We're going to make it fun. We're going to make it powerful. And we're going to have a blast to step in horseback ride and yoga and hiking, all the things eating. Food, laughing. But if this interests you and you want to have a big breakthrough in the relationships in your life, whether you're in a romantic relationship or not matters not. Come to the grit and grace retreat May 21st to the 24th in Spring Lake Ranch, 100 mile house BC spots are already going fast. I think we're almost 50% sold out already. So if you want to get in on this, you need to go down below the show notes and click the link and register. It's going to be like nothing you've ever done. And it'll be the best investment you ever make in your life. Aaron and I and the cowboy himself are going to be there and we're committed to living more in our wise adults and helping you find a pathway to do the same. Because to me, the most important aspect, the most important indicator predictor of a fulfilled good life is the state of our relationships. And if we can improve any or all of our relationships, we're going to feel more fulfilled, more aligned, more peaceful, more joyful. So why wouldn't you want to come do that work? I'm so excited because to me, this feels new. It's a new idea that is just a lot more simple and it's all really easy to apply. And I'm just so excited to teach more people how to just go even a little bit deeper than this is going to give you all of the things that Pam just mentioned. And I'm just so excited to be able to be in a container with some amazing people and have a good time doing it. It's my idea of fun. Me too. Couple weirdos there. Yeah. Couple weirdos. Come be weird with us because we got you. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. So think about this. All of your relationships. Every one of them. There's opportunities. There's grit. There is resistance. There are triggers. There are prickles. There is flooding. That's the grit. And if you have the grace to practice getting into your wise adult, you can turn all of that into gold. My friends. Thank you for listening. If this show resonated with you, please share it with your friends. It helps the show grow. And we're just trying to help people have happier lives. So share it, send it on to your friends. And if you want, we will also include the link to Terry Reels podcast with Mel Robbins in the show notes. So you can go a little bit deeper here. What he has to say, I highly recommend reading his books, us and the new rules of marriage are particularly great. And until then, until next time. Until next time, everybody, hit those buttons. [MUSIC]