The Life-Changing Power of Making Repairs w/ Dr. Sarah Michaud

Welcome back to another episode of the Therapy in a Nutshell podcast. I'm Emma McAddom and I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist. And this podcast is all about taking the life-changing, but usually kind of complicated topics of therapy and boiling them down into simple, easy to understand concepts that you can use in your daily life. If you find today's episode is helpful to you, please pass it on to someone else who could benefit from it as well. Each podcast episode comes from a corresponding video you can find on the Therapy in a Nutshell YouTube channel. Also, these podcasts are educational and don't replace the advice or direction you may be receiving from a therapist or other health professionals. Now please enjoy the episode. You're harboring the secret. You know, that's saying whereas sick is our secrets. That's true. If you're harboring some shameful thing, it's going to manifest in some way. Yeah. It has to. It does. It comes out and it can look like anxiety. Panic. Depression. Yeah. Victim mindset. Anger. Withdrawal. What else, Sarah? Self-harm. Self-harm. Yeah. Self-harm. Yeah. Self-choose. Substance use is big. Yeah. It does self-sabotation. Emotional. Not being able to manage your emotions. Emotional dysregulation because you have to always be out of your body. When you can't tolerate what you're feeling or something from your past, you have to escape it in some way. Okay. So, Sarah, I am so excited to talk about this because I've been thinking about this quite a bit and I do love the idea of self-compassion. I feel like self-forgiveness can be an important step at an area that I see that does not receive enough emphasis. And this matters to me because I see it as one of the most healing things you can do is this practice of actually making amends, of actually when you've done something wrong, actually fixing it. So, let me give you an example. I follow this psychologist who's a writer and he's great. Like, almost everything he writes, I'm like, that's so helpful. That's so cool. And one of his followers wrote into him and was like, "Hey, back in the day, I cheated." And it was like a certificate exam. Like, it was a really important exam. Yes. Not like the bar exam, but maybe he was a pharmacist or some other thing that he had to do. And he cheated on his exam. And maybe it's been five or ten years now and he says, "I still feel bothered by this." It's kind of, see, what I talk about also is how it manifests. Go ahead. So, this psychologist who I respect and admire, his advice was, "You need to work on self-forgiveness." No. That was my thought, too. He's never going to have freedom. Because he's always going to know that he is not fixed what he did wrong. So, would you say, I think you are more of an expert on this because AA does have a, the 12-step process, does have a practice of making amends and fixing things. But I feel like most modern psychology is so like, just like you should try to feel good. And I'm like, no, you should actually do good works and then you'll feel good. So my advice to this person would have been, "Okay, you harmed other people and you betrayed yourself. You know that you lied. So now we fix it." My advice would be, you have the choice if you want to fill this of going back to your licensing board and telling them, "I'm going to redo my exams." And making actual repairs. Because what I would hypothesize is in that guy's life, it's manifesting in a bunch of ways. He's an expert. That's what happens. Yeah, he's anxious, he's depressed, he's suicidal, he has crappy relationships, he can't be himself, he has secrets, he has substance abuse. You cannot live with that kind of guilt and shame and not have it come out similar. And that's the thing. This is the thing that I feel and I've been very hesitant to speak to it, which is one of the reasons I brought you on. Because I think Sarah probably has a lot of experience in this area. But when we do something that goes against our sense of what is right, so I lie. Or like, let's imagine I, I mean, I have done this. When I worked at a pizza place, the rule in the policy that I had signed when I worked there was that you pay 50% for your food. Yeah. And then sometimes we'd have a manager who would just give it to us. Or sometimes we would just like everyone else would just take the food, go in the backroom, eat it quietly, and then move on. And at some point, I was asked in a different job interview, "Do you ever steal from your employer?" Yes or no. And in that moment, I was confronted with the reality that I was stealing from my employer. Right. And in that moment, when we're stealing from our employer or when we're lying or when we're betraying our deepest sense of what is right and wrong, if we continue to do it, we have to cover it up somehow. Yes. We have to cover it up with blame. Like, oh, well, my employer doesn't pay me enough. So I deserve to do this. Or anger, like, "Oh, well, he deserves it." Or shame. Well, I'm just a bad person anyway. I'll never really deserve more than this. And then we don't trust other people either. We assume other people are going to be bad. We have to justify all of the things that we've done wrong in some way. We have to make some fake math to make it okay. And then that fake math sticks with us in all our relationships. It shows up later. Okay. I'm talking a lot. What do you think? No, but that's a human condition. I mean, we talk about that on my little YouTube channel a lot. The substance abuse is the same way. I mean, the whole, the quintessential component of substance abuse is denial, rationalization, minimization. And then you get sober. And what you realize is just because you get sober, all the, all the behaviors are still there. You have to now have to rationalize and minimize everything else because we want to feel okay. And yet it's about clearing it up. You know, I was thinking of this. Let me just pause for a second. I want to make this point really clear. Got. When you have harmed someone else or you've gone against your deepest sense of what is right, you have a choice in that moment to go back and make repairs or to. Twist reality. Yes. And twisting reality looks like minimizing what you did wrong, maximizing what other you did wrong or the, or the opposite, which is like fine. I'm just a terrible person. Creating labels. And I would say in my religious tradition, I was taught frequently that when you've done something wrong, you go confess and make repairs and not just like to a priest. Like you go tell the person what you did wrong and then you try to make it right. Yes. And you try to learn from it and come back to it. So with this pizza example, when I realized what it really hit my heart, oh, I've been stealing. I ended up going to my manager, going to his office and being like, hey, Jim, I've been eating food without paying for it for like a year. And I was like crying because I cry easily. And he was like, oh, okay, Emma, thanks for telling me. Feel free to write me a check and pay me back for what you'd be. Yeah. So then I did. And then my heart was clear. Yes. That was done. There are different kinds of amends like financial amends is one category. Absolutely. And you're right. It's all about also changing behavior and learning from. Do you know what I mean? I mean, we can't amend for, but we can at least be honest about and then try to like learn from it and try to embody something differently in the future. And that is making amends. I want to save like different ways to make amends for the like further down the road in this conversation because there are so many ways to make amends. Yeah. And yeah, I have different kinds of amends. I have examples. I have things to not do with amends. I have out of set it up. But it's really your right about what it causes you, how it affects you, how we deal with it in our present life. Like if we don't want to own it, it comes out. This is alcoholics where I first learned this, but the guy that first were Bill W. Got it was a guy who was a Christian minister. It was called the Oxford group back in the early 1900s. And the guy that started it was a minister who got really angry with a bunch of people left his ministry and then realized, oh my God, I'm not going to be free unless I make amends to these people. And I know it's in a lot of religions, but you know, Bill W. Got the idea from that. The guy that started A.A. And I think without the holics, you know, it's so obvious that we've done some stuff wrong. But all human beings do stuff wrong. It's not just alcoholics and I was going to take it out of that frame also. And the other thing is this idea that people are so much more comfortable with being a victim. I've been a victim. I've had sexual assaults. I've had different and things happen to me, but it doesn't mean it's not the both end. We can be a victim and do bad things. It's all of us. Yes. I mean, you know, there are a menace to certain people that have done us wrong, but we've also done wrong. Like I think of divorces. So many people get so stuck with staying angry at their spouse when they've been angry for 20, you know, they've been married for 20 years and done a lot of stuff. So it's about what the big book says, putting the person in the category of the spiritually sick and looking at your own behavior. Even if someone has done stuff to you, you still have to own your part to be free. So it's not just the things you've done to innocent people. It's actually the hardest ones. Our ones where we rationalize and blame others and yet don't look at our part in the relationship. And I do want to acknowledge, like when we, when we veer off the path, when we've done wrong, and it's normal that we all do wrong. Okay. This is normal. Yes. It's natural, normal and human to make mistakes. Yes. Okay. The question is next, what will we do with it? Yes. If we hide or rationalize it, we deepen our sense of shame and distance ourselves from others. Yes. And there's two big ways we do this. And the first big way is to believe that we're the one who's good and everyone else is bad. Yes. And this is a form of self justification. Well, my ex was so terrible that the little things I did weren't bad anymore. They don't count anymore. Right. The other way that we justify ourselves, and this was hard for me to learn. I learned this when I was very depressed, probably the most depressed part of my life when I was like 2021. Got it. Was that also some people flip the opposite way and they decide, fine, I'm a terrible human being. Yes. I'm broken. I'm deficient. I'm disordered. Look at all these pathologies I have. Yes. I'm just bad. And that is just as likely to prevent someone from making amends, making repairs, reconnecting with the human race as the opposite, like these two different ways. And so for these folks, the second group where I was for a long time, which is, well, I'm just a bad person then. Yes. Right. Yes. For them saying, well, you need to fix what you did wrong. They're going to be likely to just try to beat themselves up instead of actually making repairs, like, following, withdrawing, blaming themselves, labeling themselves. And that's not, that's not making amends. No. And, you know, one group of people, because I've known people for years and years doing this process, they make amends, but they still can't let go of the guilt. And the idea of making amends is to set yourself free. That's right. It's not to just, it's not to just beat yourself, flag your faces over and over again. That's correct. Yeah. So this is like, why am I so attached to being the victim, right? Or feeling the bad person. Yeah. Centering to rationalize my behavior. I can stay inside for weeks because I'm such a bad person and be okay with it, even though I'm not going to my kids' school events or whatever the case may be. I do. And I think that's where self forgiveness comes in, yes, after we've taken the steps to make repairs, then we have to truthfully and honestly treat ourselves with love and compassion and courage. It takes a buttload of courage. Oh, but I said, yes, willingness, encourage and the ability to tolerate some discomfort for long-term gain. Yeah. And I think for me, when I was really depressed, for me to let go of this label of myself is like broken or bad. Yes. It took a lot of courage to say, maybe I'm not broken. That means I have to keep trying. That means when I mess up, I have to keep apologizing and go back and show my face again. I have to show up again and keep parenting when I've just yelled at my kids. Yes, yes. Yes. And the benefits and like to say, this is really where you can have better relationships, way less anxiety, more energy and vitality because you're not preoccupied with the past. Yeah. There's so much that comes out of it, liberation, you know, more intimacy with people, better relationships, more sense of peace. I mean, in the A.A. Bigbook, they say, after this step, there's a list of promises. And it's like we're going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace no matter how this is what you are saying. So far down the scale we have gone, we will know that our experience will benefit others being of service. You know, so there's all these, the feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear. Our attitude and outlook on life will change. So that's how significant this work is. I mean, and a lot of people in A.A. get to this part and they stop because it's too hard. I bet people relapse when they get to a med. So why is it so hard? And I think because it activates the shame and the guilt and the incident or whatever happened. And it's almost like you're getting it out of your body and looking at it. And it's just so much easier to, you know, blame others. And that's where the self-propulsion comes in. I have to have the passion for myself that I stole my mother's pearls to bike. Okay. I have to trust that for whatever reason those things happened, I did what I did. And now I can know that my experience can benefit other people and I can support for finding freedom, you know. I think it is immensely liberating, but because the rationalization, yes, pre-numbed your emotions a little bit, actually facing making an honest, what is it called? Honest accountability? What's that step where you write that all the bad? What things you did? Oh, the moral inventory. The moral inventory. Actually being honest with yourself that you messed up is going to increase your pain briefly. I know. Honesty is a huge piece of this. Yeah. So when I saw that survey and it said, "Do you steal from your employers?" And I had to answer yes or no. That increased my sense of anxiety. Yes. And then I had the choice. And I could have rationalized, which would have made me feel a little bit better. I could have talked to Jim and that made me more anxious. And after I talked to Jim, I feel good. Like I feel really good. But why would he have? It's like, tell a secret to someone like all of a sudden all this energy is released. So you're right. I always talk about short-term pain for long-term relief. It's like to be uncomfortable for a temporary little moment to be free. So on a practical level, how does someone do it? They know or maybe they don't know that they've harmed someone. That they've done something wrong in their past. We all have. We all have. Yes. How does someone start to do it on a practical level? All right. On a practical level, I think when you sit quietly, it's already right there. It's right underneath the surface. If you can access it, if you're not acting out, if you're not substance abuse, or coping in a bunch of ways, but some stuff will come up. So you make a list of names or a pizza place. I actually had to make amends to a place that I stole stuff from when I was a drug addict. And the store was gone now. But what you do is you do something to balance out the karma. So it was a tool house. It was like a garden shop. So I ended up donating money to a place in my town that they were starting a community garden. So it's like even if things like graveside amends is another one. I made it a very powerful graveside amend to my mother. So you start with a list of names, maybe just the top three we can say to people. Then you write out specifically, there's like, there's tools. You want to be as specific as possible. You don't want to say, I'm really sorry I did this, but it was because. And yes, the rationalization, which you know, some people do that because they want to feel better. You just stick with what specifically you're making, making the amend for the other warning is if you're still angry at the person about something else, you've got to resolve the anger before you make the amend because I know people that have gone to make amends and then just gotten activated. You can't do that. So you got to be ready to do it. You have to be ready and willing to really do it. And so, you know, we have this, this thing where you make three columns and you do. the super easy ones, you know, okay. Yes, super easy ones. Then you do the ones that harder, but I want freedom. And then you do the ones that, like I'm never gonna do. And my first husband was on the never I'm gonna do list. And over time, they make it over to the easy list because the more work you do on yourself, the more freedom you want. And that, a men with him, was incredibly powerful. And one of our relationships, so I like, can you describe it just a little bit? You don't have to give personal details. Yeah, well, he, I've made that powerful. Well, I was so angry at him for not being who I wanted him to be, even though when I looked back, of course he was, he was exactly what he was supposed to be. And so I worked in my own work and my resentment, so worked through some anger and saw that, if I'm gonna raise my son with him, I need that relationship with him. And you can be victimized and still have done, I mean, I was with the guy for six years to say I never did anything as ridiculous. Right? So I just focused on my part. I put him in the Southern category of the spiritually sick we call it, just turned and looked at myself. And there was like five or six big things. I mean, he's Canadian, he moved to the United States for me. And I told him I'd go back to Canada after our son was born. No intention of moving back to Canada ever. Yeah. I mean, I owed him big immense. And then this is the saying, and I don't know if you wanna do this part, but at the end, you ask, God, I could get careful. You ask the person, is there anything else? Ooh, yeah. And he said something to me. And I thought, I have goosebumps right now. I said, you're absolutely right. And I apologized for that. And I hadn't remembered it. Now, sometimes someone's gonna go, oh, well, what about, and you may not feel like you own a man for that. So you definitely have to feel like you have a choice. So someone could say something and you could say, you know what, I'm gonna think about that and I'm gonna get back to you. Such a good answer. I got a moment with my ex. It was definitely clear. So, yeah. And I mean, he's, you know, again, it's amazing. He used to be such a spiritual practice for me. I was so enraged to them. And the spiritual practice, you mean the tormentor, a mentor who tormentors. That's exactly what he said. - Exactly. - You're giving all your peace to. And yet, if I work through the anger and the, my part and the resentment piece, which maybe could be another episode, is that working through the resentment stuff is so key first, really? But anyways, can I pause you? Is that a step in the 12 steps? - Yeah, tell me the steps. - Okay, the fourth step. So the first step is where Powerless Over I'll call our lives begin in Manjul. But again, there are so many zillions of 12 step programs. It could be, and Powerless Over my husband. I'm Powerless Over my kids. And Powerless Over, you know, my ADD. I mean, what happened to that? - Shopping addiction, yeah. Yeah. Second came to believe in a Power of Greater than myself could restore my to sanity. But it doesn't have to be God. If people aren't religious, it's just the idea that you don't necessarily have all the answers, that you have to trust another process. - Yeah. - Three turn my will and my life over to the care of God, as I understood him. Four is the moral inventory. Now the inventory, it's resentment, fears, and sex. So it's all our anger and our resentments. It's the fear which is really underneath resentment, and then it's our sexual history. And I've done sexual histories with people that have had sex with one person or 100 people. So it's not really about the people. It's about what we're carrying, 'cause a lot of shame, a lot of shame in the sexual inventory. So then we do the fifth step, which is I tell another person. I tell my spots or I read it to them. Six and seven, I ask God to remove my defects of character, my shortcomings, eight, I make the list of the people to make amends, do nine, I make amends. And then 10, which is part of nine really, is daily amends. So you do a nightly check-in, where if I, like my sponsor this morning, yelled at this coffee girl yesterday, what am I gonna do today to clear that off? Am I gonna drive back there to say, I'm sorry, whatever. So the idea of the 10 is, so you don't accumulate 500 more resamments. - This is what I think is so freeing about it, 'cause if we imagine, like, when I harm someone else and I don't make amends, it's like a brick in my backpack. - Yes. - And if I do this for 20 years where I'm just getting angrier and more defensive and more isolated and upset at people or more victim-y or more like I'm such a bad person, my backpack gets very heavy. - Yes. - You could do one big step to lay down that backpack, but we each pick up bricks each day. - Yes. - And having a practice to set those bricks down each day is powerful. And this is where my personal spiritual and religious practice comes in, is that we do a nightly prayer and we are grateful. And when we express, we look at, like we consider our day and we think, how did it go? Is there someone I need to fix? And then you ask for help to do better the next day. And then each Sunday, we do like a bigger ordinance around clearing that queue, clearing that backpack. And that's what my religion is. Like my religion is like, can I clear my heart off? Can I serve people? - Yes. - Like we're twins. - Yeah. - And I think for people who don't have that religious practice or spiritual practice, like A, or 12 step programs also offers that. But I feel like in general, psychology in general has ignored this freedom giving step. - Yes. - So like someone might feel really angry. It's like you felt really angry at your ex-husband. - Yeah. - And you probably thought it was because of everything he did to you. But it's, and that may be true too, that also might be true. - And when we have harmed someone else, anger is an amazing way to rationalize. - Yes. - And so we carry that anger on purposes of shield. - Oh absolutely. - Yeah. - When we make repairs, we don't need to carry that anger because we don't need to defend ourselves so much anymore. - So we can spend all day talking about anger, management, practices. - Right. - And it's like, "But what if you just messed up and you need to say sorry?" - Yes. - Yes. - Or you stole something and you need to pay back. - Right. - Or you hurt someone and you need to pay for their medical bills or their therapy. - Right. - I mean, there's stories in AA where people admit crimes and have gone to jail. - Yeah. - So I mean, it's really about your only going to get the freedom if you balance the scale. - Yeah. - If you're harboring the secret, you know, that's saying whereas sick is our secrets. That's true. If you're harboring some shameful thing, it's gonna manifest in some way. - Yeah. - It has to. - It does. It comes out and it can look like anxiety, panic, depression, victim mindset, anger, withdrawal. What else, Sarah? - So far. - With relationships. - Self-harm. - Yeah. - So far. - Yeah. - Soft use. - Substance use is big. - Yeah. - It just self-sufficient. - Emotional not being able to manage your emotions. I mean, emotional dysregulation because you have to always be out of your body. I have the most powerful story I was gonna tell is about this guy. He in college at his frat, they were very verbally abusive to this woman. And he describes this whole scene, which was so powerful. And he had so much guilt for that woman. And it was something about how she looked. And he tracked her down and he was sober like a couple of years. And the event had happened 15, 20 years before. And he tracked her down. And now I have goosebumps again. And she told him because of that event, she had been suicidal for years. She'd been depressed for years. She had suffered so much. And he gave her freedom. And he set himself free. Both. She was sobbing because what he said is, it was not about you. I wanted to feel part of this frat. I didn't feel like I belonged. I went along with these guys to yell at you and say these mean things. It was because of me. And again, goosebumps, the power, like of setting people free. Yeah, you know? And I think I would hope that everyone has had an experience like this. And I'm wondering if some people literally have never had that experience where they've hurt someone and gone back and tried to make a repair and it went good. Like are there people who's never? No. Most people have never experienced this. Okay. I have four brothers, right? And when I got sober over the years, I've talked to my brothers about making amends And they see to me, gosh, I wish I was in it. A.A.I. a lot of people to make amends to and I say you don't have to be an A.A. to make amends to people. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's so crazy that oh, I'm not gonna track down this woman that I abused 20 years ago because Because why people are in denial that it's affecting that's what I think Well, I our brain is incredibly good. Yeah, like manipulating the truth So somehow that distortion just popped in I'm not an A so I can't make amends Very comforting thought very comforting thought But unhealing is the opposite of healing right This is interesting to me because I grew up in like I grew up in such religious culture where this called Repentance in in my religious culture, but it's not a shameful thing. It's like a joyful thing. Yes, and I was you know taught it from a young age and we practiced it from a young age and It to me the idea that like some people have never had the chance to like make a clean like amends in their life where they like Apologized without a butt or whatever. I'm sorry. I did that but did it like no, I'm just I'm sorry. I did that that probably Huh, no, I'm gonna make more videos about this Sarah because I think it's I think it's powerful and I don't see people Talking about it. They feel like it's shameful. It's the opposite of shameful I know and it also somehow people think like if you're owning it like you're the bad guy or something like now Oh now people are got no actually it's totally liberating and like you said I think what's really important is to say we all do stop We're human. Yeah, we're all going to stop. Thank you Yeah, graders that are mean fifth grades brutal my 11 year olds in fifth grade right now This this kid in her class called another kid who is not white a chimpanzee and That is apparently like a brain rot character from something on YouTube The kid thought she called him a chimpanzee The kids in the class thought she called him a monkey and therefore everyone's like now calling her a racist And everyone got like all these kids were like brutally like teasing her and My daughter comes home and this is her good friend said mom is calling someone a monkey racist and I was like yes And so then we had this conversation, but then I was like oh, well, I don't think she meant that we should get this cleared up Like we should get these two kids in a room and their parents in a room and be like She did it me to do everything and he's like didn't I like he probably felt like he was being racially attacked and yes It wasn't intended that way from everything So the mom texts me that nice like oh my gosh I just heard about what happened at school like can you believe it? I didn't know the kids were bullying my daughter about this and then she just didn't send her daughter to school the next day And that's how they handled it and I get like you want to protect your daughter from being bullied But if you're not going to get kids in a room with parents and hopefully the parents would be very reasonable That's like yeah, and you never know right so maybe that wasn't safe to do that But ideally in an ideal world. Yes, these people would come together. They would talk it through They would listen to it. It's a great chance to teach this whole fifth grade class About racial abuse and what it is and what it isn't and now like I was telling my daughter like Yeah, did you know like English soccer players if there was a black guy in the team They the other team would throw bananas at them Like this is a real issue. There's a good chance to like teach and learn and instead they just kind of Teased and with drew and that's how the situation was managed That's like this could have been such a cool chance of like healing, you know And it's not even managed. That's the thing like they think it's kind of it It's not and this is what's my this is what's interesting to me is that I think most people don't have the education the skills the opportunities To learn how freeing how freeing this can be yes Okay, so how on a practical level you write your name's you come up with your easiest category of names How do you do it? How do you go through it this in a way that's actually helpful and I know there's a caveat like unless it would Cause more harm right there's different debates about this I was gonna say if you've been having an affair on your wife You don't just go to your wife and say honey. I've been having an affair and You know everything's fine so you don't just blurt out something you if it's gonna really harm the other person Well, how it's done is you want to see the person live if possible You of course you can write a letter and all that but if you can get together with the person live you say I'd really like to clear something up with you. Can you give me some time to get together? You know in AA they say I've been going through this process. They kind of explain it because people seem surprised But when you get together with the person you just say I just really have been burdened by This thing I did it. I want to make amends you. I want to say I'm really sorry for x, y and z And I'm really sorry the impacts on you you don't explain it. You don't say why you did it You don't ask for forgiveness. That's the other thing. You can't expect forgiveness because not all amends end well Some and here here's the key right like when you decide like if you tell your wife about a fair or when you decide Like to make amends. It's not about you It's actually you think about what's best for the other person. You're fixing what you did to them. Yes Yeah, so you don't ask them to forgive you No, you you know the hope is that it'll clear up the relationship But I've had some examples where the person goes to a relationship that was really harmed and the woman said, you know Thank you for doing this, but I just want you know this doesn't mean we're gonna be friends They have really good friends for several years and then the person did something really mean and she said you know Thank you, but you know, I still don't want to be friends So I'm totally acceptable like you should not you should not go into making amends with the expectation Yeah, the other person is gonna be nice that they're like we would hope they would that's gonna forgive you that they're gonna Yeah, cool. Let's be best buddies. That's not the point. Yes The point is to do your half Yeah, just your your 100% of your side of this problem. That's it That's it right and then let it sit What's happening inside of you at the moment whatever guilt or remorse you're feeling and you have to tolerate what's happening for the other person The other thing about a men's Emma there are things we are tortured over That the other person doesn't even I made an amends I know I know I've done twice I've reached out to people is like hey this thing I said must have really hurt you and they're like what? Yes, and just about that Yeah, for years by this thing I did my cousin when I was like eight years old Yeah, I get together with her as an adult yeah, I tell her this experience of when we were kids and we were down the cape and I and she says Sarah No memory The leaders I was tortured by that. Yeah, I mean that's the other thing We could be tortured by things and we don't even know the other person is forgotten about it or didn't even hurt them So that's another element right feeling bad about things that maybe someone else didn't even take that way Yeah, so okay, so that here here comes a question like if you've stolen something you can try to repay it If you don't have money you can work to repay it. Yeah, never repay it. You can I don't know what and go to jail if you have to I guess like that's an option. I'm not saying that's the best option, but like what are things? Like harm you've caused that feels unrepairable Feels like you can apologize for it and that is a helpful step you can take responsibility You can say so I'm let's just imagine someone who's sexually assaulted someone yes You've harmed their personhood. They're yes, yes You can take that mean the men's comes in Okay, it's called living demands. I may tell me about it. Okay Say I've done something horrendous like that. I can make the amend and Then I can think about how can I make this right for the rest of my life really? So do I volunteer at a rape shelter or a place do I donate money? Do I help my sister who's having trouble with me? I mean you really think of a way that you're making living a Men's to to balance out the karma. It's like that's the way I'm saying it, but yes You can feel okay about it because you're right some things you do and you you can't change the impact on the other person So how are you gonna live in a way? You know, I mean people kill people and drunk driving You know and so you can't make that right but you can now be of service to as many people as possible I'm gonna throw out a couple that I can think of but like someone There's a TED talk that I share all the time I'll pop the link in the description, but this guy sexually assaulted his date and then she 10 years later reaches out to him He'd been doing the whole like hiding like not hiding from the law, she hadn't filed an in-reportor. I think he had just been trying to convince himself he was a good person for 10 years, right? Trying to convince himself he was an okay person. And she reaches out to him and he says, he owns it, he says, I'm sorry, that was so wrong of me. He explains it and then not explains it, but he shares and the two of them continue this dialogue over email for a couple of years until they decide to meet and then they decide to write a book together. And then he decides to explore the thoughts and the beliefs around women that had led him to thinking this was okay. And then he shared his experience in a public platform. I'm not saying everyone needs to go public with their mistakes, but it's like because he was willing to share his experience as an abuser, yes, that provided an opportunity for millions of people to learn from him and consider their ways of thinking and impact of that. And he can never go back and undo what he did, but he can contribute to the process of healing in that way. - Yes, beautiful. - Yes. - I could think of another guy who he was drunk, he punched someone in the back of the head who was just walking down the street and that guy fell and hit the sidewalk and then he ended up dying. He went through the court process, he put a guilty, he spent time in jail, he was willing to share what he did wrong, I don't, what's the different word than confess Sarah? Confess carries like religious terms, but it's like he was willing to take accountability, like take accountability. - Take accountability. - Take full accountability. I did this and it was harmful and I hurt your family and I hurt our community and I'm so. - Yes, yes. - And that didn't fix it, but it's better than running and hiding, hiding and hiding. - Because you're gonna love to yourself a lot better and have compassion for yourself and what happened if you're being of service and using it, we will see where our experience can benefit others. - You know what I mean? - Yeah. Can you have other examples of how when people feel like they can't make repairs, like maybe the person refuses to speak with them? - Yes. - Or if they speak with this person, they might be abused. Or the person's dead. Give me some examples. How can we make amounts of make repairs? - The example with my mom, I mean, she, you know, I did grave sight of men's and I had stolen a bunch of her jewelry for drugs when I was a kid and 'cause of my addiction and she passed away fairly young from alcoholism and when it was time to make amends to her, she had passed away and I wrote them all out with a sponsor. The other thing to do with amends and this is another key thing is don't do it by yourself, meaning you really need to double check the amends of another human being 'cause we are so tricky. We are rationalized. We will go into it angry unless you do it with a partner or someone else that knows this work, you can really make things worse. So I checked it out. I went to or grave. I went to or grave sight and I made the amends and I had to ultimately forgive myself and you know, then I do work with other alcoholics then I do a bunch of stuff in my daily life to make up for that. It's interesting because it's thinking about how, again, to balance the scales. That's the way I think of it. There's all kinds of ways. There's donating money. There's offering services. There's helping another, oh, I know another one. Okay, this is a great one. So when I was drinking, I told the friend of mine's car, actually not really a friend. It was a woman I was renting an apartment from and I was going off on a trip skiing to your area. Anyways, and when I got back, she confronted me and said, "Oh my God, I walked out the next day. You had left and my car was sold a blah, blah, blah. So by the time I got sober and tried to hunter down, she was deceased." And what I ended up doing is I wrote out all the amends of the sponsor. I drove to where we used to live together. And I made the amends, but since then, I've given cars away. So when my car gets to a lot of miles, like a friend of mine's sons in high school who didn't have any money and didn't have a car, it was time for me to get a new car and I gave him my car. And I done that with several younger people, like teenagers that don't have any money. So I mean, that's how I balanced out the scales. You know, so things like that. I love it. I love it. Yeah. And I think when we really look at making amends, I see this almost as like a path we walk. And it's like, oh, let's say someone sexually assaulted someone, making amends might just involve like changing how you see women, considering those beliefs on how you see women, and moving forward, treating women with utmost respect in your behaviors. Yes. Absolutely. And by embodying this new value of treating women with respect and protecting women, you are making amends for the harming of debted. And so when we look at the underlying beliefs that fueled our-- The behaviors. Yeah. Then we can just simply living differently and trying to live differently, trying, working on changing. Yes. You're thinking, your behaviors, your feelings, that can create new paths for you, a new freedom for you. Yes. And a genuine sense of self-esteem, like a genuine sense of like, I am actually proud of who I am, because I'm a different person now. Now, I want to go back to something you just said, which was, do this with someone because our mind can be tricky. And I think if I remember correctly, as part of this, you tell your wrongs to your higher power and also to one other physical human being. Is that correct? Well, that's the fourth step. So the fourth step is you make a cheer for God. The ninth step is, yeah, God's going to be there, but it's more you're working with a sponsor in AA. So the only reason I say that is I've done rogaments. And they haven't worked. You know, we're like, I met my brother's house in Vermont, and I have the great idea. Oh, I'll make amends to him. But I haven't really prepared, and I haven't reviewed any of that. And it's OK, but it could have been better. And sometimes you end up not being clear. So my sponsors read them to me. And I'm telling you, very often we talk a bunch about it, and they redo them, and they redo them, and they redo them, because they sneak in justifications and rationalizations. It's so human. Here's the only thing I think. Because yeah, we do. We sneak in here, and I did this. When you did this, then I did that. And our brain is very good at rationalizing that, but it's also too good at slipping the other direction. And this is what I was wondering. It's like, if someone believes they've done something wrong, and then they share it with a therapist, or with their clergy, or with a sponsor. And that sponsor is actually-- that wasn't your fault. That can also be very freeing. So I can think of like three examples of this. I can think of a girl who, when she was five, her mom told her to watch her baby sister. And the mom was on the phone somewhere else, and the baby sister wandered into the road and got hit by a car. It was good. And this lady, for her entire life, was like, it's my fault my sister was killed. And the truth is, no five-year-old is responsible for that. That was not-- you don't need to make amends for that. Yes. That's a great point, because we go through the list. And there are amends where you say, no, that wasn't about-- right. Yes. Good. And I can think of another example in my religious tradition, my faith, where a woman posted this on Instagram. She said, I had had this kind of negative sexual experience. And then a later on, a boyfriend was like, oh, that was bad. You shouldn't have done that. You need to go talk to the bishop. You need to go confess. And so she felt all this shame, like, oh, am I bad? Am I dirty? And then she went to the bishop and told the bishop what had happened. And he said, well, can we pray about it? And they prayed together. And then afterwards, he looked up and he said, I want you to know that what happened to you was not your fault. That was actually abuse. She was a little kid, right? Or young teenager? It's like, that actually you were not complicit on that. Yes. But going through the process of telling another human being can help us clear up that trickiness, when we can fall to either side-- Oh, it's everyone on the side. Or I'm such a bad person. And telling another human can help us clean that up and clear out that cue or that backpack of bricks. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. I was thinking of like we say in AA, this is where the magic happens. This is where really you get the freedom. I had this Quick story. I'm gonna tell you about my second husband George, right? And this is where we talk about it like I Was in victim in the sense my husband relapsed after a long term of sobriety and so my life became crazy for a good two years Until I kind of finally got the courage to say hey, this isn't gonna work but after a while of Post the was that divorce I did some more work and I decided I needed to make a men's term because we were together for quite a while And he was deceased by then so I did I wrote out my amends and I thought oh my god, I'm getting shoved up now and I thought of this beach in Maine where we used to go and I have a lot of really great memories of that beach and I got to the beach and it was like in the fall so it was cool weather and there was a guy Getting out of a car in front of me going into the beach and we said hello and blah blah blah I walked down to the beach. I sat where we used to sit. I Read my amends. I had a lot of feelings and You know thank him also at the end. You I just wanted to thank him for all the positive things that of our relationship It wasn't just about his addiction that happened in the last couple of years and so I want I'm walking back to my car and The same guy is getting back in his car and the next car and I said to him hey we chatted for a while He asked me where I was from blah blah and then I was about to get in my car and I said where are you from and he goes freedom? And I said freedom and he said freedom new Hampshire. It's a town in New Hampshire And it was like I have goosebumps telling you this because Whether you believe in God or the goodness of the universe or whatever It's like that moment. I was free from George Yeah, everything that had happened and it was like you know That's a situation where someone could be a victim forever You know my husband relapsed and I'm angry and and you know what? When I own my part then I was able to not only like own my part But see the bigger picture. That's the last thing I should say about this is You know my brother who's a therapist always says pull the lens back and I love that because So often we're in our own spin About our realities and our things that have happened to us and we forget That other people are having their own experience and there it's like when you become a mom and suddenly you see your own mom Totally different because totally lies. Oh my gosh She was experiencing all this while she was raising me. I had no idea It's the same feeling. It's like when you can pull the lens back and look at the other person's experience Not just yours I think it's really helpful. So that was one story I wanted to tell one last one this from a friend of mine is He is out mother was an alcoholic very abusive. I mean this guy Foster homes abuse by therapists sexual I mean like just endless trauma And that's why he's such a great example of a men's because he got sober. He's an attorney now and he went to make a men's to his hockey coach and His hockey coach and his mother was deceased and he had you know He still was like saw his mother is like never caring about him never and you know Speaking up for him and all this stuff and he makes a men's to his hockey coach and He ends up getting from his hockey coach All of this information about how much his mother cared about him because his mother used to talk to the hockey coach about him And how awesome he was and so in that a men He's getting from the grieve side information about his mom that he would never have had I made him that just to me is like the magic of this work It's just so powerful and we've talked about so many different kinds that those are a couple of just really powerful examples of You will get things that you don't even know you want to get Yeah, I I do feel like I don't know how to say this like I I'd person okay, I keep going back to religion because this is the language I have around this But there's this like religious Which is I consider like my practice right? This is what I do religion is more like a baby My spiritual practice my religion sometimes fuels my spiritual practice like this sense of like there is something big and Deep and connected that's healing and loving and powerful So my religion is my actions and it sometimes help it frequently helps me connect with this bigger thing which is God or whatever is in the universe. Yes and There are certain practices that tap us in to this beautiful healing power That is immense and as whether you are spiritual or not the effects of it are powerful when I read The book by Dick Schwartz. I had that similar experience when I practiced the self-energy Yes tapping into something deeply healing and When I see people Practice gratitude. Yes, and they like they count their blessings They tap into this abundance this beautiful abundance that exists in the invisible web around us This is how I could describe it. I don't know that you could use psychological terms and say statistically This is an effective practice if you don't believe in this that's fine But there's something real about it. There's something real about it and when I see people like slowing it down and getting present Yes being fully present. I see them tap into something real and beautiful Yes, and when I see people make amends. Yes, I see them tap into these experiences like you're talking about like something Beautiful is transformative in these experiences. I have goosebumps because in the in the big book of AA You know on everybody's guy and believe me isn't the only answer. I just want to say I know there's lots of options Yeah, he talks about You clear this out Because you want more space for the sunlight of the spirit Yeah, and I really believe that when we are crippled by guilt remorse things we've done shame And all the ways we try to manage all that we have no room for the spirit And when I can honestly say and when I share it meetings I share this there is not one person on the planet Right now that I have been in completion with and how many people can say that like no There's nobody I run into and I think oh god. I owe them ten bucks. Oh my god. I did that and Most human beings don't have that freedom because we're holding on to things that we're not Saying we're sorry for or even Another thing I just this is kind of has to do with it in this seminar. I did back in the 80s the S training I don't know if you ever heard of this right This guy Werner Erhard created this training and there's all these big workshops personal growth workshops and he said one time Upset for human beings is caused by three things unrealistic expectations awarded intentions and undelivered communications and out of fear People don't communicate things they need to communicate with people they love amends or no amends Right just that withholding and not sharing and amends is part of that and I just believe when we can complete that like you said earlier in You know around it just completes this cycle we balance out the karma and We are free so on a practical level. Yes someone wanted to take action this week To make amends. Yes What would you tell them to do because sometimes our first attempts at making amends without support and guidance combined? Yes, I Would think of a super easy one Like say you've owed your brother $50 for 10 years and you've been angry Like something practical You know this idea even if you don't have the way we work through resumments and anger Try to say to yourself. I don't want to be thinking about this 50 bucks anymore and you may think oh I don't think about it, but trust Emma and I that's it is affecting your life in a way that you don't Realize so put him in a category of saying just I forgive him I forgive myself whatever stuff you have with him and just see If you pay him the $50, do it as an experiment. See how you feel afterwards or the following week. See if you get any freedom or clarity. So try it and, you know, call up someone that you're comfortable with and apologize for, you know, not reaching out to them when they were sick or whatever. Try to do something that doesn't feel that hard. Yeah. Start smoking. Something simple and something very crystal clear, not muddy because the muddy ones may take more time. What do you think? I mean, I would say when possible, consult with a wise person. Of course. Whether that's a sponsor, I think most people don't have sponsors or a therapist or a church leader or just a friend who's not going to just like back you up. But really help you be your best self. Maybe talk with one other human about this. Yes. Great idea. And then consider how to move forward. Yes. There's also a book that I really like that kind of teaches this, not exactly, but it's not as concrete as AA, but it's the book leadership and self deception or the anatomy of peace by the Arb and Jansitute. Both of those kind of walk through like how we deceive ourselves and how to get an open like clearer hearts. Yes. So I think people could read the anatomy of peace. That might be helpful. Right. I'm sure there are, I mean, any kind of spiritual book talks about cleaning this. I mean, I think a lot of them. I think a lot of them do and I think I am trying to think of a psychology modality that does because marriage and family therapy. That's what I do. Does like marriage therapy. Like you learn how to make repairs and how to fix things. Yes. Couples. Couples work. Yes. But individual therapy. I think very rarely. Well, I don't see it taught. Maybe in session therapists are just doing it. Yes. Yes. It's a really great point because it's more about validating someone's pain or. Yeah. And yeah, the repair stuff is later. You're absolutely right. The thing that kills me is when we get to this point in the step work, you know, where I end up seeing it's time to do this work, when I did it for myself, it wasn't like I needed to think about it. I knew exactly what I had done wrong. And, you know, I was in my 20s the first time I did this and I've done it ongoingly over the years. It's right there. I mean, if you said quietly enough with yourself, you are going to know because it's something that is disturbing. It really is. I know. The stuff that's harder is the people were really mad at still. And yet we've done bad behavior. You know a woman who has been married to someone who has an addiction for a long time. And she's been so pissed off at him. She is finally in the last couple of years owning how she's been a ranging maniac to this guy. That's like for years, it's like, oh, it's because he drag. No. No. You know, your range and how you've taken it out on him is what you're doing. Right? I'm not justifying his behavior at all. But those are the kind of harder situations when if someone that we've been harmed by. Yeah. You know, that is true clarity. And I had to do that with my mom where I thought for so long she had mistreated me. She had mistreated me. She mistreated me. And when I truly looked at how I treated her, I could just, this is how I think of it. I take a piece of paper and I draw a line down the middle. It's okay if I want to admit. These are the things that hurt me that she did. And then I can write down the things I did that were that things I did that harmed her or things I did that were that went against what was right and true. My deep ascent of what's good. Yes. Like maybe I yelled or I rebelled or I pushed her way or I fought her off or I blamed or talked bad about her. Yes. And I can just take this paper and write my half of it and I can tear it in half and I can set her aside. Yes. And I can say I'm just going to do this part. I'm just on my side of this. Yes. I think it's healing. It's not to minimize the pain that was caused you. I mean that's the other thing. It's not, it's still there. It's like, "Wash, right. I haven't been hurt." It's not forgiving that either. It's not saying, it's not saying that that was okay or it's not saying it doesn't still hurt you now. Yes. We don't have to carry our whole load of bricks anymore. Yes. Yes. You know, did you ever read the Four Agreements? Yeah, I don't know that. Okay. Of course. All right. The part in that book that I thought was so profound is when he talks about the movie theaters. I don't know if you remember this part. He talks about going into a movie theater and you look at the screen and it's a movie about you. And there's you and your spouse and your kids and your parents and blah, blah, blah. Everything makes total sense. And you're like, "Yeah, that's exactly how my life is gone." And then you get up and you go into another movie theater. And it's the same movie, but it's about your mom. And so it's all from your mom's reality. And you're in the theater and you're like, "No, that's not how that went." No, no, no, no. No, she wasn't doing that. And it's like, then you get up, you go into another movie theater and it's your son. And it's all from your son's point of view and your son's experience of the world. And you're like, "What?" And so to me, that is so liberating to remember. We are not experiencing life from the other people in our world's experience. Whether they've done us wrong or we've done them wrong, we can rationalize. They can rationalize everybody's having their own perception of reality. This is so helpful when I have, you know, disagreements with my son and we talk things out. And he's like, "Oh my God, I didn't see it that way at all. I've made amends to him, present day amends for things." And he's like, "Oh my God, Mom, no, this is how I say." So I mean, that's where you get to see everybody's having a different experience of this world. We can only be responsible for our part and we can't control what anybody else is doing, say, and or thinking. We can only be responsible for us. And that goes back to being amends. Yeah. Yeah. Well, this has been fascinating. I really appreciate your time, your expertise. And I think there's more to say on this and hopefully we can find a way to say it. I did wonder, did you get a chance to finish the story with your mom? You said you made the list, you'd taken her jewelry. She had passed away. Right. Then what? Oh yeah, I did. No, I did, you know, I did. Oh, okay. I mean, basically, you know, I made the gravesite amends. I had all the feelings about it. And I have processed it in therapy. And I do things in my world now. It's so weird about my mom. And I don't even know if you're going to believe this. I have a better relationship with my mom now than I did when she was alive. I believe it. I really feel like she, you know, she passed away from alcoholism young. And I feel her presence. And so I feel now that I literally have a connection with her that I didn't have before. And I believe in the local hallex. And that's how I make up for whatever I did with her. And I made living amends in my world. So, yeah, she was a big one. The husbands were big. But, you know, then there's the small ones that can accumulate. You know what I mean? So it's really important to do that daily stuff too. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So the big practice, the daily practice of just clearing out your backpack are all really valuable, really valuable. And there's a lot of different ways to do it. I do think it's like life changing. I mean, I think that's something about gratitude to me. As we've been doing it for like, you know, over 50 years in AA, you know, because that's part of the practice. And now like all the research is coming out of me. We can turn it around. I mean, shifting our attitude is so key. Yeah. And gratitude's such a biggie to that. Yeah. It's awesome. You work the best. Thanks, Sarah. Thanks for being here. Really appreciate it. Oh my God. I just love you. You're the best. You are a soul system, my friend. And thanks. Yep. Okay. We'll do it again sometime. All right. Awesome. 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