← Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee
Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee
The Hidden Reason You Can't Stop Overthinking, People-Pleasing And Overworking with Dr Nicole LePera #664
02:00:37
Why do we sometimes react in ways we don’t mean to? Why does criticism land so heavily when others can brush it off? And why, even when life looks good from the outside, do we feel stuck on the inside?
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- [00:00]
A
Before we get into this week's episode, I am really excited to share that I am bringing my Thrive Tour, Transform your health and Happiness to Canada and Europe this September and November. It's a live, interactive, uplifting show that over 20,000 people came to last year across the UK and Australia. I'll be sharing powerful stories, life changing insights and simple tools that will inspire you to feel better, think clearer and live with more intention and joy. To get your tickets right now and see all of the dates and venues go to Dr. Chatterjee.com forward/live. I really hope that you can join me.
- [00:46]
B
When we are triggered and having that disproportionate response, whether it's the outward one where we're screaming and yelling and doing things we don't mean, or the the inward one where we're disconnecting, kind of shutting down, going numb. All of that is kind of indicative of this inner child that's living in our body. But the moment that an insight is gained and awareness is gained, it is the moment that change has already begun.
- [01:09]
A
Hey guys, how you doing? Hope you're having a good week so far. My name is Dr. Rangan Chatterjee and this is my podcast Feel Better, Live More. Have you ever found yourself reacting in a way that surprises you? Snapping at someone you love or taking criticism extra hard? Or maybe you can't shake a sense that something's off, even when life looks fine on paper? Well, today's conversation is about what's really happening and what we can do about it. You'll be pleased to hear that I'm welcoming back a very popular guest, the clinical psychologist Dr. Nicole Lupera. Nicole is known to millions online as the Holistic Psychologist and she's with me to talk about her brand new book, Reparenting the Inner Child the New Science of Our Oldest Wounds and How to Heal Them. We begin when Nicole's whole framework starts with the nervous system. She explains the signs that yours might be out of balance. That feeling of being stuck, the restlessness, the disproportionate reactions and that constant busyness we fool ourselves is productivity. From there we go deep into the concept of the inner child, the part of us shaped in early childhood that's still the root of our adult feelings and behaviors. And even though we might not know it, what I really appreciate about Nicole's approach is that it's never about blame. We talk about how even well intentioned parents leave us with adaptations we carry into childhood. She explains the different parental archetypes from her book, the Surprising Role of epigenetics or inherited trauma, and how healing comes down to two steps, Becoming aware and then making different choices. This is a profoundly useful episode that I'm certain will shift your thinking even before you finish listening. As Nicole puts it, the moment awareness arrives is the moment change has already begun. It's really clear to me, Nicole, that we see the world through the state of our nervous systems. What would you say the common signs are that might indicate someone has a nervous system that is perhaps a little bit out of balance?
- [03:46]
B
I think the first sign that really inspired this whole journey into holistic focus, obviously grounded in the nervous system, is a kind of feeling of stuckness. No matter kind of how I'm thinking differently, I can't seem to change those reactions in real time. And I think beneath the surface, when we begin to drop into our bodies, it's a sense of restlessness and agitation. I think for a lot of us where we feel on edge, we feel uncomfortable in our own skin. I think many others kind of don't even feel connected to their bodies at all. They have a sense of numbness or a lack of awareness that they're even living in a body on the day to day. But I think those are kind of the major signs because our nervous system is determining how grounded we feel, how aware we are of our surroundings, our ability to think clearly and logically and responsively about life. And again, when we're kind of driven by dysregulation, we lose access to all of that.
- [04:38]
A
Yeah, I think a lot of the time it also shows up in our relationships, doesn't it? Often with those really personal and intimate relationships where we might blow up, you know, get angry, get annoyed, become overly sensitive to criticism. All these things also indicate a dysregulated nervous system, don't they?
- [04:59]
B
Yeah, I think the more that we are kind of in relationship with others, but the relationship with ourself included, those are, I think, the moments where we kind of notice not only the dysregulation. What I speak of is the inner child. Those moments of the disproportionate reactions where we're saying and doing things that we don't mean. Again, our intention is to show up as a caring, connected individual, yet we're blowing up or shutting down. And again, I even think it's beyond those moments of reactivity. I think a lot of us have adapted. We become an identity, we play a role. We kind of function in a certain way within our relationships. Whether we become the caregiver to others, the appeaser And I believe all of that is kind of grounded in these dysregulated moments beginning in childhood where those were the only way that we have learned to adapt, because that was all that the circumstances allowed at one time. And yet our body hasn't updated. We're in a different context or perhaps in different relationships, yet we're still driven to see, believe and repeat the same patterns.
- [05:59]
A
For someone who's never come across the term inner child before, or perhaps someone has no awareness that their childhood experiences might be impacting their adult behaviors and their adult reactions, how do you get this message across to them if they need convincing?
- [06:22]
B
Yeah. So our inner child is a part of us that was formed in childhood that we retain. Right. It's what learned safety, it's what learned connection, it's what learned how to deal with unpredictability, conflict, disconnection, unmet needs. And I think there's a lot of us, especially well into adulthood, where we either don't want to look back, it feels like it was so far ago, we don't imagine it's still creating any impact in our daily life. Or if you're like me, I have very little ability to recall what happened. I can't tell the story necessarily of what was happening or not happening in my home. Yet I'm living those reactions. And those are the moments that we were both kind of just talking about. The kind of disproportionate reactions, the identities that just don't feel like us, our inability to change even if we set the intention to do so. All of that is kind of indicative of the. This inner child that's living in our body, the sense of urgency, the overwhelming emotions that quite literally seem to take over no matter what we want to do differently. And I think many of us, again, we meet those moments in our daily life or in just our daily patterns in general.
- [07:27]
A
Yeah. Okay. So the central idea I feel in much of your work, including your brand new book, Reparenting the Inner Child, the New Science of Our Oldest Wounds and How to Heal Them, is that in childhood we undergo certain experiences. Some of those are positive, some of those perhaps are not as positive as they could have been. And we adapt to those situations and those adaptations can become problematic. So I want to go back to a passage in the introduction, if you're new, but that I really enjoyed reading. Before the external world begins to shape our instincts, we exist in a state where we feel spontaneous and free, filled with wonder and awe, connected to our natural inclinations, creativity and imagination. But as soon as we begin to explore our environment, we start picking up cues about how to belong. And with that awareness comes a slow disconnection from our natural wholeness. That's the book in a nutshell. That's such a powerful message, isn't it?
- [08:46]
B
Yeah, that's, I think, our human experience. And these adaptations are beautifully evolutionarily driven. They're wiring us to survive those early environments because we need connection to physiologically sustain life, right? We're one of the few, if not the only mammal that is born so underdeveloped. And this is a newer finding in our field where, I mean, there was a time where parenting experts, even just a couple decades ago, weren't talking about the immaturity of the human nervous system, right? This idea that children could just soothe or calm themselves on their own, and the reality of it is that we can't. And our nervous system is being shaped even before we're physically born into whatever circumstances we're born into. It's actually being shaped by our ancestors. And again, this is a beautiful adaptation because we live driven by prediction and survival, and we want to more or less learn the environment enough so that we can begin to function in that environment and in childhood, when relationships are the foundation in which we find safety and security. Though, of course, not all of us do have those relationships. Those are where those earliest adaptations begin. And so, ideally, right, we not only have present caregivers, we have caregivers that are grounded and safe in their own bodies. And I think this explains why the large majority of us are not living or do carry dysfunctional habits from our childhood. Because even if, as was the case for me, I had two very present caregivers who were very, well, intentionally doing the best they can, even seemingly committed to breaking some of the habits of their own childhood, yet without the information, without the capacity in their own nervous system to be calm, grounded, attuned to a different developing individual, a child that is not them, many of us are left more so with unmet emotional needs where the person around us is dysregulated themselves. So no matter how much they very much want to support us in exploring our environment and venturing out and developing our own unique self, they're unable to, again, because they're carrying the adaptations that serve them in their earliest environments.
- [10:51]
A
It's basically, I guess, the question for us as children, are we going to be authentic or are we going to attach? You know, attachment versus authenticity. And, you know, as Gabor Mate will say, whenever a child is faced with that choice they will choose attachment over
- [11:10]
B
authenticity because attachment is the only way as a child. They can't step away from the relationship. They can't zoom out and understand all of the different reasons and factors which are contributing to their parents inability to allow them to be authentic all they know. And again, this is very survival driven is they need their parent. So they will contort themselves in all of these dysfunctional ways. Oftentimes they will idealize the parent because it's safer to imagine that the parent is good. And this is, I think, where shame begins to develop. In addition to all of these dysfunctional coping habits in childhood, if we didn't have that present and attuned caregiver, the belief that many of us land on is it's not something that's lacking in my parent, which is always the case. The child will take full ownership of what is wrong and take it as a meaning that they are unworthy of being their selves. And so yes, it comes down to attachment will trump everything. And even writing a book, right, seemingly about individual development, I remember kind of thinking through. I cannot begin this book without first speaking about the power and importance of attachment, not only hypothetically, but grounded again in the nervous system.
- [12:26]
A
Yeah, I think the implications of your work in this book are quite profound. I think on an individual level, if there's an adult who comes across your work, there's the possibility for healing ourselves. Right. Understanding what adaptations we've developed and then going through the steps to change things. I certainly feel on my journey. Born to Indian immigrant parents in the uk, academic success was very much prioritized. I took on the belief as a young boy, through no fault of my parents, I might add, that I was only worthy of love when I was a straight A student or I got top grades. Once I became aware of that, I was able to see where that came from. Go through the process of perhaps being a bit frustrated, but then also understanding your parents are human. It totally makes sense through their lens of coming to a different country, of facing discrimination. But healing is possible because once you understand it, and I know we're going to get to some of these helpful practices that you fill your book with, but you can go back and make peace with what happened and. And there is a new possibility, a new freedom, a new lightness, a new liberation. When you exist in the world, when you go in and I guess do the work, right?
- [13:58]
B
Absolutely. And I think all of my messaging is my intention at least is one of that level of empowerment where I mean the goal and purpose isn't necessarily even to go back to kiss blame because much like you're describing, I think a lot of us had very well intentioned parents that were seemingly right, trying to create a situation where we didn't have to suffer in the way that they had yet again because of a lack of own capacity, ability. I think society plays a huge role too. Right. We were left with patterns that don't serve us. And I think being able to expand and say my parents did the best they can, this is the ways that they were able to show up and meet my needs. And at the same time, we right here were the needs that I did not necessarily have met. Because a lot of us get stuck on one or we get stuck on one of the sides where we feel so bad, kind of acknowledging our parents limitations that we're actually doing ourself a disservice because we still have unmet needs that are probably driving a lot of our daily habits. And then we are gonna continue to betray ourself, abandon ourself in ways that again, we learned in childhood because we could not see our parents clearly. And others get stuck on the other side where they're stuck in such anger and resentment and blame. And this idea of, well, I shouldn't have to do anything differently, my parents should have showed up for me in a different way. That then we do limit ourself in the ability to have grace, compassion, see our parents for who they are and give ourself the possibility to evolve and change into someone different.
- [15:30]
A
Yeah. I have to acknowledge that there will be some people out there who've had really toxic childhoods. There might have been, you know, physical abuse, emotional abuse. And of course in those situations it doesn't change the reality of what you're talking about. But it may be harder. Right. Let's put it this way, Nicole. To heal, do you feel that someone has to make peace with what happened in their childhood or can they heal without doing so?
- [15:57]
B
I think it depends on how we're defining make peace the way I would define make peace. And I think a way that allows us to move forward is to accept that it happened. Right. Peace doesn't need to mean I feel good about it. Nor does peace mean I have to be in relationship with perhaps the people that abused me or neglected me. But I think peace, when we look at it as more of an acceptance that that did happen and it is impacting me now, and here are the ways in which it's impacting me now, I think then we can heal in the sense of giving myself. Because I think what healing then is in definition is giving. Giving myself the opportunity to have a new experience. I could not change what happened then. Right. I don't have to even feel positive about what happened then or interact with the people who created the circumstances that caused my abuse, my pain, my suffering. But if I acknowledge that it did happen then, now, or that it's happening now, let me kind of bring it forward in time, then I give myself the opportunity to kind of end the story differently, create a new response again, where those other reactions or just identities would have colored how I'm moving forward.
- [17:03]
A
Yeah, I really love that distinction, and I think it's a really challenging topic to talk about. But I think it comes down to we can't change what has happened. We may wish we were parented differently. We may wish we had not experienced certain things. And for people who've had difficult childhoods, my heart goes out to them. I can't imagine what that must have been like. And at the same time, if someone does want to move forward in their life and, you know, live these new possibilities and have that sense of freedom and calm and lightness, I think you're right. You have to at some point accept that this is what did happen. I don't like it. I wish it hadn't. But now I'm going to make different choices going forward.
- [17:57]
B
Right. And I think it's important to have that moment, moments, period of time to be with the grief, the pain, the anger. I think that's absolutely part of the journey. That is, I think, an uncomfortable piece, though. Then there is the kind of pivot point, right. Where I maybe see where the grief, the anger, the dysfunctional habits are still driving my current circumstances. And then I give myself a new opportunity to do differently. Because without that moment, I do think as part of the healing journey, it is really sitting in how I feel about what didn't happen. Whether it's anger, whether it's resentment, whether it's loss, because all of those emotions are real. And I think a lot of us have gotten very savvy at keeping those so kind of contained beneath the surface that we don't even realize how much emotion is still driving our current actions.
- [18:50]
A
Yeah. When it comes to healing, you have a part in the book which I completely echo, which is there are two steps to healing. Number one, becoming aware. Step number two, making different choices. And I really do think healing can be looked at that simply if we sort of zoom out. In my experience, many people get stuck at step one. They Take this wealth of information that's out there these days, podcasts like this one, online blogs, Instagram pages like yours, and they get insights. They go, oh, my God, that's me, right? Oh, I get now why this really bothers me or why when I get criticized, I overreact. And often it does come from our childhoods. But I found people, often they get stuck there, as we say, they're blaming their parents, they're blaming their childhood, and that could go on for years. And I gotta have real sympathy for that. But I don't think that's helpful in all your work either with clients yourself, or I know you have an online community, the Self Healer Circle. Have you found that people get stuck at step one quite a lot? And if so, how do you help them move on to step two, which is making different choices?
- [20:16]
B
So this is what inspired me to even evolve into a holistic framework, because I would work with very wise, very committed clients in my private practice when I kind of began this journey, working more traditionally. And it didn't seem that no matter how much insight and awareness clients would gain about their patterns that maybe brought them into the treatment room, they would still come in week after week and report the same behaviors, the same dysfunctional habits in their relationship. And even outside of being stuck in blame, anger and resentment. I mean, I am a prototypical person who was stuck in analysis. I wanted to be a clinical psychologist. Why? Because it felt safer to kind of hover above my lived experience and try to seek understanding. Because it kept me separate from all of the emotions, all of the overwhelming sensations that had been living in. In my dysregulated body for quite some time. Because that's what we're talking about we need to do to build the bridge into new actions is as simple as it sounds. I almost can imagine people getting so frustrated when they're like, well, what do I do? And I'm like, well, you become aware of the patterns, and then you show up newly and you make a new choice. And I know it can imagine it sounds very frustrating that it's that simple. But building that bridge means shifting into action, right? Reconnecting with our body. That's driving a lot of our reactions or our behavioral patterns. And for our nervous system, that is challenging. We love the habitual. We love to be able to predict what happens next. It decreases the uncertainty and the fear that's related to the uncertainty. It is energetically conservative, right? To not have to think from our very powerful prefrontal cortex and make new choices. We are able to limit the amount of calories our body is using. So for a million different reasons, we don't wanna do the uncomfortable thing. And the uncomfortable discomfort begins even with a healthy choice, the minute we step out of those patterns to create a new action. So for me, the minute I stop living in my mind and drop down to my body, I'm already immediately now met with all of the discomfort that's been living there for so long. So what we're really talking about is expanding the capacity of our nervous system to tolerate newness. Not all at once. And I think that's where a lot of us do ourselves a disservice. Especially now with a million pieces of information online and all of these protocols that you can do, and even from the depths of suffering. I can understand, of course, you want to have this idea that if I just change my lifestyle from top to bottom starting tomorrow, that I will find the quickest route to feeling better. But what we're really doing from a nervous system standpoint is any new choice is going to expand our capacity for discomfort. The more new choices we tack on, the more uncomfortable we become. And the way our body will work is we'll get to what I call, like, the point of no return. The more stressed we become, the more we fall right back on those old habits because they're comforting, they're familiar, even if they're dysfunctional.
- [23:14]
A
Yeah. When I think about these behaviors or the behaviors that we might introduce into our life to, you know, get healthier and, you know, work on our longevity, whatever it might be that we're looking for, I always think it's not about the behavior. It's about what's going on behind the behavior. You know, you can do healthy habits from a really dark place, from one of guilt and shame, and you don't love yourself. You're punishing yourself through these choices. And I have done that in the past, or you can make the same choice, but the energy behind it is completely different. There's compassion there, there's grace. There's no, I want to do this behavior because it supports the person I want to be. It's not about disciplining yourself or shaming yourself. There's a. It's the same behavior, but there's a different energy behind it, 100%.
- [24:10]
B
I think what's interesting now is with all of the information out there, all of the health protocols. Right. Aimed at health and wellness, I do think that a lot of people are coming at those behaviors, habits, even, from a more shameful place Perhaps even from a distracting place, from a very rigid place. I will always, when people ask, like, do you have a protocol? Is there something you do every day? Non negotiable. And my answer might surprise people is no, because my body feels different every day. Right. The thing that kind of helped me feel supported on one day where I have high energy might not be the thing that makes me feel supported the next day. So it's can I drop in and understand the why, the intention for what's driving the behavior, and in my opinion at least, can I allow my body's needs, which for a lot of us change over time, over seasons, as we age? And so can I reconnect with that kind of level of flexibility?
- [25:06]
A
I couldn't agree with you more. I personally don't really like the word protocol. I realized over the last few years it's a very popular term in online health and wellness. And I get it, some people respond well to it, right? I'm just saying, personally, for me, there's a rigidity to a protocol that I don't think is helpful long term. Now let me just clarify what I mean by that. Let's say you're stuck and you're lost and you have no motivation, you don't know where to turn. And I reckon in the short term a protocol actually might be helpful because it gives you some rigidity, it takes you out of the stuckness and gives you something to follow. But what I've seen in my clinical practice, Nicole, is that the people who heal in the long term, not just for a few weeks or months, at some point the plan stops becoming my plan for them and it starts to become their plan. Right. So they take the guidance that I may have given them, but over time they've started to listen to themselves and figure out, you know, what? Actually, Yeah, I think 70% of that works well for me, but that 30%, it's not the right approach. To me, I feel better when I do it this way. I've always loved that. And I think, as you're saying, I think that's one of the missing pieces. When people are trying to make these changes, they're latching on to the latest protocol from the latest influencer online that they follow. And as I say, it can be helpful for a short time, but then at some point you gotta start tuning into yourself and asking yourself, is this the right approach for me?
- [26:46]
B
Yeah, I 100% agree. And I think some of us resist structure and protocols again because of the learning that happened in childhood where maybe we have, as I call it, an over permissive parent where we had no boundaries, no limits. So now even the suggestion, right, that there's a protocol out there that could be helpful, right, Feels restrictive, controlling, you're not going to tell me what to do. So I think in some scenarios, right, that particular person could benefit from some level of structure in their life, kind of an internal motivation, learning how to do something even when we don't necessarily want to, or where it feels controlling or because again, in childhood we. Without those limits, right. It does feel very restrictive to have someone tell me what to do. But my goal is always much like yours is not to. Even though I do give somewhat of a structured framework of how to heal. All of my intention with any of the exercises are not to just listen to me. All of those exercises are kind of redirecting your intention inward, right?
- [27:52]
A
You mentioned these overly permissive. I think, was it an overly permissive parent? And I want to talk to you about this. It's towards the start of the book here in the section on emotionally immature parents and you almost go through different archetypes of certain parents and I never really come across that before. Can you talk to some of the common ones, like for example, the status orientated parent, if that was our parent, what does that mean for us? Foreign. Today's episode is sponsored by Do Health, a personalized health companion that I have helped create. Now, I built Do Health to transform the way we think about health. You see, for many years whilst working in the nhs, I saw the same thing over and over again. Modern medicine is really good at treating illness, but it was never designed to prevent you from getting sick in the first place, nor to optimize your health. DO Health is here to change that. It takes everything that I know about health and well being, including my four pillars of health, and makes it personal to you. You get an initial blood test which measures and screens you for over 50 biomarkers. But then all the focus turns to the 11 core biomarkers that are scientifically proven to improve your metabolic health, including many markers which are not easy to get from your NHS gp, like fasting insulin, APOB and homocysteine. Once we have your blood tests each week, together with you, we create a personal achievable plan. And several times a year we recheck your bloods to make sure that things are moving in the right direction. This is the future of preventative health. A few small changes that will have a huge impact on your life. For listeners of my show, Do Health are offering you fixed early access pricing less than 21 pounds per month to all those that sign up to the waitlist today. This is incredible value. Don't forget that this price includes three yearly blood tests as well as 52 custom weekly plans and unlimited daily interactions with Coach Joy. All you have to do is go to dohealth co forward slash Live More and use the code Live More to gain access to the wait list. Right now. This episode is sponsored by Sleep Reset. Now, many people struggling with sleep feel stuck between two options. Take sleeping pills or keep suffering through bad nights. What most people don't realize is that there's actually a clinically proven treatment for insomnia that does not involve medication. Cbti, which stands for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia, which helps retrain your brain and body to sleep naturally. Sleep Reset is a virtual sleep clinic that delivers a personalized program based on CBTI that helps you rebuild healthy sleep patterns step by step. Instead of just tracking your sleep, it it gives you a personalized sleep schedule, daily guidance and support from real sleep clinicians who specialize in insomnia. Think of it like having access to a sleep clinic without leaving your home. For my listeners, Sleep Reset is offering a free seven day trial. All you have to do is go to thesleepreset.com podcast. Start your first week of real Clinician designed insomnia treatment certificate tonight.
- [32:06]
B
So much like we've both been I think describing in our childhood, a status oriented parent is a parent who is kind of more driven by performance, right? Presenting ourself in a particular way, sometimes even looking in a particular way.
- [32:20]
A
Can I just pause you then Nicole a minute? Because I think it's a key point here. I just want to make sure we're keeping in mind which is it could also have been our interpretation. Do you know what I mean? Certainly something I've found in my life is that as I said before about my parents is that I honestly feel my parents were fantastic. But I took on the belief that I was only loved when I achieved certain things. Do you see what I mean? There's a subtle difference, Right?
- [32:46]
B
Right. And I think some of this is again going to the parents ability too and how they communicate, right? This unconditional love. And again I think this goes back to imagining the circumstances. My parents as well, who came from an immigrant household, right. They did not learn how to, even though inside they felt that unconditional love, driven again by societal factors, by the reality that there are certain aspects of achievement that afford most humans around the world Some level of security, financial, even kind of emotional security, relational security, that's real. So I, I think a lot of us are dealing with what you're beautifully describing, which is a mismatch between an inner desire and the outward presentation which is again driven by the environment, by culture, by beliefs, by their own past and ancestors and ways that they've learned to communicate certain emotional feelings. But again, if that was the circumstances in childhood, which was very much, I know for a fact, much like you, I was wired both directly and indirectly. I would bring home the 96. I'd get asked why it wasn't 100, snap, snap, snap or right when I was not kind of doing well as I did very clearly at softball when I was say in dance class and I wasn't in the front of the line. Right. My mom was a little less interested. She came to still my recitals, but it didn't light her up as much. So sometimes it's direct and other times it's this indirect messaging. But again it came from a very well intentioned place. They thought that academic achievement would result in successful college, successful financials future.
- [34:18]
A
And it did.
- [34:19]
B
And it did. I mean, and there's also a little bit of status oriented in terms of appearance. My mom coming from a very traditional older generation where. Right. Women looked a particular traditional way which secured them the marriage and the financial security. Again at a time where not many women had that on their own. Right. There was all these versions of messaging that weren't inherent to who I was, but how I was presenting myself. All very well intentioned. I do know both of my parents, my mother who is also no longer here, she'll have been dead five years in May. Very well intentioned. Right. I think the internal unconditional love was there, but because they were functioning in a society, right. They were driven to teach me again through direct and indirect messaging that my worth only depended on how I was presenting myself in the world and more so how the world was reacting to my presentation.
- [35:13]
A
Yeah, it is beautifully put. And I guess if I think about my own parenting, I've always tried to make sure my children know that I love them irrespective of any achievement. Right. It doesn't mean I don't want them to achieve or do well, but I want them to know that my love for them is not dependent on that. And you know, some people get this. I was flicking through your Instagram this morning and one of your recent posts was that all parents traumatize their children. Okay, so we'll come back to that in a short moment. Let's go back to these different parent archetypes. Right. So you had started to describe the status orientated parent before I sort of, you know, briefly interrupted you. Let's go back to that. So what does the status orientated parent look like? And what does that do to us as children?
- [36:02]
B
So again, it's this focus on appearance, performance, right. Kind of a way of being in the world. Even a hierarchical. Right. Idea of what is better or less than. A lot of times we might even hear that direct indirect messages, or we're compared to our siblings, our peers. Again, where we are absorbing these messages and then we are modifying the parts in which we show other people, and then the parts in which we feel shameful, messy, imperfect, and we don't show. And that, again, drives our reactions in certain times where we become so hypersensitive to even any perceived criticism. Even if it's not criticism, it's helpful feedback, someone else's perspective. We take it personally, right? We kind of embody these identities around it. But I wanna go back to what you're saying because you're sharing such wisdom when you're describing even your parenting, right. A lot of these habits we've developed. So for me, and I think you, this drive to succeed, if I'm honest and oftentimes people will say, what's the goal of all this? How do I know when I'm healed? Is it never doing that again? I can make a case that, at least for me personally, I don't wanna lose my drive, I don't wanna lose my passion. It helps me show up and make the impact that I want to make on the world. What I want to do is just like you're beautifully teaching your kids, I wanna feel worthy regardless of if I'm performing in a moment. I wanna give myself the ability to rest, to say no, if that's what I need. Not to just overstep my boundaries and have to show up in a particular way because that's what's desired or required of me. So I think, and what I'm describing here is kind of where I build to in the book, which is this process of integration where our past becomes a part of us. It doesn't drive us though anymore. So I'm expanding and I'm saying, right, discipline, passion, drive, motivation, all of that is important to me. But I don't have to be driven, so to speak, by those aspects of me to avoid shame and unworthiness as I had been for so long.
- [38:01]
A
Yeah, it's not the behavior, it's what's behind the behavior.
- [38:05]
B
So when you allow yourself choice, flexibility, right. The ability to say no, to rest in a moment, not to again have to feel like I have to hide the messy parts of myself to give myself the opportunity to make a mistake every now and again. That's how we learn, that's how we grow to take in feedback from another person, even if it feels immediately like criticism. So I want to be able to do all of those things and choose which part or which action. Right. I'm going to live from or respond to in the moment.
- [38:33]
A
Yeah. It's kind of interesting you mentioned criticism there and that's come up a few times in this conversation. I used to be hypersensitive to criticism not that long ago, I would say, you know, relatively in the context of my life, it doesn't tend to bother me anymore. And my belief is that criticism only really bothers us to the extent that we believe it to be true. And I guess one of the things that I found really helpful was asking myself the question, why does this comment bother you? Why? Oh, you know, this reminds me of what happened when I was at school. Oh, this reminds me of something mum said to me, whatever it might be. And again, going to that two step path to healing. Number one, becoming aware and then moving to the second stage, which is make a different choice. Actually, you know what, I don't need to let that bother me. That's useful feedback for me that I can use to change my behavior going forward. Certainly that's been my experience with getting better at dealing with criticism. Is this something you've ever struggled with? And if so, Nicole, how did you get through it?
- [39:48]
B
Oh, I mean, I've had my fear of criticism and feedback almost would have prevented me from posting online. In the very early stages of this, I had a very real concern of what will people think, right. As I'm coming up with this new, not new, but like I'm integrating this holistic model and I want to start to speak of it, right. I was very clear and concerned about being misinterpreted. Right. Being told by either colleagues in my field that I very much esteem that I was now talking about the body and nervous system and nutrition and who am I to talk about that? What role does that play? And so that almost prevented me from as Lolly, my partner, was kind of urging me to go online from even wanting to in the beginning stages, there was a lot of fear about what I would post. I would have always kind of Like a running therapist in my head, where I would run something in my head before I said it out loud. And always worry, how will someone, this person, that type of person take what I'm saying? And I wasn't really able to be in a full flow state when I was speaking or creating or delivering content in any way. Because that fear was so real, right? And it's the fear of, right. Not only being seen as less than perfect, not wording something, not talking to something that I'm allowed to be speaking to, but it's a fear that I think a lot of us humans share, which is being misinterpreted, right? Not being fully seen for my intention or for the desire that I'm creating or sending in the message itself. And that's a very core fear, right? Again, it's very socially driven. We to some extent, shame and all of that restrictive behaviors where we don't wanna speak or say something that we really mean to be true is driven by our need to be socially accepted. Again, originating in childhood, very much a social emotion. It keeps us operating within the bounds of society. And when we feel like we're being ostracized or being told that we are not a part of this group, it very much is a not only emotional pain, a physiological pain.
- [41:51]
A
How did you manage that though, Nicole? Because as I've already mentioned, if you look at your platforms today online, they are huge, okay? You cannot post on Instagram without, I say a minimum of 30,000 people, you know, engaging with your posts and sometimes hundreds of thousands, okay? It is inconceivable that every comment is going to be positive. You've already shared that you had a fear before you started posting. Now the reality is that you do post and have done for many years. How have you dealt with criticism and pushback?
- [42:30]
B
So to get me to a place now where I learn how to navigate feedback, I had to live the experience. I had to go and get all different types of criticism from all different types of people. And again, this is very nervous system, body driven. Teach myself and in the embodiment that I will be okay, right? Teach myself through boundaries, through knowing where I'm at in terms of my capacity when I'm not eating well, not sleeping well, overstressed for whatever reason is not the time to go into the places that I know are gonna have most likely the negative comments. But of course, sometimes I'm always surprised that when a piece of content goes up and sometimes I know when it's gonna be a little bit more controversial and I'm like prepared for what could come back and feedback and other times I'm completely blindsided because even in my community that has very aligned individuals, more or less, we are all subjective, right? We're all gonna view and hear and consume a piece of content through everything that we've been talking about, our past experiences, our beliefs. So you can never fully anticipate what's going to get criticism or not. And I am. So while I've learned how to live the experience, create boundaries, right, kind of take my own accountability when I'm putting myself in an environment or you know, in something stressful, when I don't have the limits to do it, that by no means means to turn off right access to feedback because that's how I've been able to learn from my community, hear what's important, hear ways to word certain topics in a way that to my, you know, best intention will land and not just kind of create resistance in the audience though I also understand that that's an unrealistic expectation to have the idea that everything or that my work is going to be everything for everyone. So between the practical applications of boundaries, really understanding myself and my limits, but also making sure that I'm getting comfortable right within trusted communities, my team, my personal life, that I still allow myself to practice hearing the harder versions of feedback and to, to teach my body that while it might feel kind of end of life in that moment and my body goes into a nervous system reaction, that I can teach myself that I'm okay, I can get through it, I can regulate my body, these connections will still maintain, the community will still be there. And it's just been quite literally living that experience over the past however many years it's been though again, there are still moments where I have to hold myself accountable and know when I'm at my limit and you know, know where to go for feedback that can feel more helpful than just kind of really tearing down.
- [45:06]
A
Yeah, it reminds me of something you say towards the end of the book, that healing is non linear. There is no finish line to cross, which I think is absolutely beautiful and a very important message for us all to sit with. But you can apply that to what I've just said about criticism or what you've just said, which is we can do the work, we can get to a really good place and then sometimes we might fall into old patterns. And I think as you just mentioned yourself, and certainly for me, if I find myself starting to take criticism personally, it's a reminder now to go, oh what's going on in your life? Oh, maybe you're working too hard. Maybe you've had a few sleep deprived nights. Maybe you need to rest a little bit more. It's a signal that basically I'm taking on too much. So in many ways it's a beautiful signal. It's like, oh, criticism's always gonna be out there. I think for all of us as human beings, especially if you're doing something where you are putting your voice out there. It is naive to think you're not going to get criticism of some sort. The question is, how much are you gonna let that criticism bother you and affect you? And can you use that criticism as a teaching moment? You do write in the book a little bit about triggers and I'd love you to explain, you know, what is a trigger? The way you see things.
- [46:29]
B
This is beyond just criticism, right?
- [46:31]
A
Yeah.
- [46:32]
B
Moments of dysregulation are. I will always. Our triggers can be our teachers, right? Those indicate that something deeper is happening. And on a physiological level, what is happening in our body when we are triggered and having that disproportionate response, whether it's the outward one where we're screaming and yelling and doing things we don't mean, or the inward one where we're disconnecting, kind of shutting down, going numb. And it's something we are being flooded, right, with emotion, with nervous system dysregulation. We're seeing threat or old experience in the present moment. So I always like to explain that because I think those are the most shameful moments where once our body calms down, we have a new perspective. We're like, why did I say or do that thing that I didn't necessarily mean or didn't align? And the why again, is all driven by our body, by the chemicals, the hormones, the dysregulation in our nervous system that is taking over and shifting us from the grounded, logical, the responsive, how we want to show up and instead dropping us right back into all these instincts that we have been talking about.
- [47:36]
A
Yeah, sometimes if you think about how much our childhoods affect us in our adult bodies, it's amazing that anyone gets on right? Really, because we don't see the world as it is. We see the world as we are. Right? And often this is really brought home to us when we get involved in an intimate relationship, right? Because then you often have two unhealed inner childs who then come together because they're in love and they might choose to get married. And then suddenly you realize, oh, many aspects of our personalities are just children, right? We haven't tended to that inner child that perhaps needed certain things that he or she didn't get when they were younger, right? So it does make us think about how much of the division in the world is driven by dysregulated nervous systems.
- [48:36]
B
As far as I'm concerned, I think all of it, right? Because when we are in survival mode, right? Which when our nervous system is activated, however kind of that looks to you. The fight, the flee, the shutdown response, right through all those behavioral adaptations, what is quite literally happening in our body is our focus is narrowing to ourself. This idea of a lot of talk is happening now, let me put it that way around this concept of narcissism, this self focus. I believe that it exists quite literally on a spectrum. And the more activated and dysregulated we are, the more we are fighting for our survival in terms of our nervous system, the more unable we are to see or care about another's perspective, wants, needs, emotions in any given situation, Even if it's our closest loved one, even if it's our child, the person that we want to be there to support in a different way, Everything is narrowing. Our literally eyes turn inward. We get very black and white in the way that we think. I'm right, you're wrong, we can be very combative. And that's when we can act, in my opinion, at least, very hurtful to other people. I think that driving division, conflict, war, right? Everything in between where we feel like we have to fight someone else because that is what our nervous system is doing. It's not seeing you as a separate, unique individual that's worthy and deserving of love. Even if I disagree, I lose the ability in my body to care, to expand to a different perspective, to take in feedback, to do everything that I think we are inherently able to do. As compassionate social creatures, we become driven to survive in the moment at all cost.
- [50:15]
A
Yeah. In the book you make the case that constant busyness, which is something that many people struggle with, is a sign of a dysregulated nervous system and can be thought of as a survival strategy. Can you explain?
- [50:31]
B
So keeping ourselves busy, right? On the surface sense of things, it keeps our attention somewhere. It keeps us moving in action. If we look beneath the surface at what that behavior is doing, it's keeping our attention outward, not inward on us, right? It's keeping us moving. For a lot of us who never had safety and security, the ability to just as I kind of intro to the Book, just be in childhood, rest, feel at ease, right? Stillness, solitude. I mean, there was a time where I lived in the busiest city in the world, New York City. I thought I would live and die in a city where there was constant noise, constant stimulation. While I loved snowboarding, I would go to the mountains and snowboard. I had to have a television on at night because the sound of solitude, of silence, of not having all of my days planned, whether it was with things I wanted to achieve or even plans with friends, the minute my body was needing or had to or had the opportunity to stop, what was I met with the agitation, the overwhelming sensations that busyness was protected me from. So I think busyness becomes an outward manifestation of a kind of dysregulated nervous system. The energy inside that's being translated to attentional focus outside and to doing again. Because we didn't learn, it didn't feel safe to stop, not to do. We didn't feel enough. Maybe when we were. Some of us even got very direct messaging on to avoid right, sitting. It's lazy, it's this, it's that. And so we don't have that. Whether it was kind of very direct in that matter or indirect, because in stillness meant waiting for the next explosion. Or maybe in your childhood there was never a moment of quiet, there was always yelling, unpredictability. So now your nervous system registers peace, ease as so unfamiliar, right. That it's to be avoided because it's going back to that moment where it wasn't safe or it wasn't possible even.
- [52:26]
A
Yeah. You write about this right at the start of your book, don't you? How in your childhood you were always kept busy, you were always scheduled, right? So the question for me is, was there already an existing dysregulated nervous system that was managed through scheduling you, or was it that the over scheduling of your childhood has resulted in you not knowing how to be still?
- [52:58]
B
I think that I, like many of us, I was born with a dysregulated nervous system. Again, what we're talking about when I bring up even ancestors is epigenetics, right? The passing on not necessarily of our DNA changing, but how our DNA is functioning. And so I think that the large majority of us who came from insecure ancestral experiences, whether they were displaced by war, immigrated to a new country, there was abuse in the relational family and the kind of societal experience we now know that, right? Development begins in utero. That's when our brain begins to form. And so all of us who come from those families or Even just those immediate environments where we have to think about what was happening in my mother's life as she was carrying me. How much stress was in the home, how much cortisol, right, Was crossing the placenta. And so I have an idea of all of the stress that was in my home that came from my ancestors, that was even around my pregnancy. So when my mom died, I was at my mother's funeral and one of my aunts came up to me and shared with me, laughing, a story of. So I was unplanned. My mom was 42 when I was born and my dad was 45. And I had an older sister who was 15 and a brother who was 18. There was no plans to have a pregnancy that late in life. And so when my mom started to have symptoms of morning sickness, she disclosed to this aunt that she was very close with a concern that she had stomach cancer. Very, you know, on brand for my family because we had a lot of health related issues, my older sister included had, or especially I should say my mom with chronic illness. But my sister with a lot of acute illnesses in her early childhood. So she would have never, right, thought, oh, this is pregnancy symptoms. She immediately went to stomach cancer. Long story short, she went to the doctor and was diagnosed with pregnancy with me, right? But I think about those early weeks or however long it took my mom to get the diagnosis of pregnancy and how much cortisol and fear and worry of that I was. Stomach cancer was impacting my development. So again, whether it was acute in my family. But for me it goes back ancestors of, you know, a family who just had a lot of insecurity in a lot of ways. Studies will now show that there are children, many of us, who are born with hypersensitive amygdalas, limbic systems, nervous systems, where we are experiencing, seeing and experiencing stress where perhaps there isn't, and having. And overreaction to it. So as I intro the book, right, that from the moment I was born, I was quote, unquote, bouncing off the walls, right? All of this overwhelming energy without a calm environment. I lived in a city. In addition to having stuff inside the home, there was noises outside the home, there was sirens, there was crime. That was a very real risk. So much so that when I went to high school, some of my friends from the suburbs weren't allowed to come to my home. So all of this stress in my environment was, was manifesting in, as in childhood were just emotion, were just movement. So I started to bounce off the walls and my family, I Think from a very well intentioned manner, were trying to help me direct my energy, were trying to help themselves deal with me and all of my energy and again, were setting me up to succeed if they could find the thing I was good at and invest in the thing I was good at, academics ultimately and athletics, right then I would have the success in life. But this is the case for a lot of us where development, ancestral epigenetic changes. And this is why for a long time, when I would learn in the field that, well, wait a minute, brains look different, so is it nature or nurture? And now epigenetics really marries the two. It says, yes, brains are going to be functioning and wired differently for some of us from in utero development. Again, because these early adaptations to stress will change the way our brain functions. Because at one time when there was stress everywhere, it benefits us to be wired and prepare for stress around every corner. And it of course can be changed because we can rewire ourself at any age. But to simply answer your question, I think I was born with that hypersensitive nervous system. Some of us call us highly sensitive kids. I think that's again, this dysregulation that both of us are describing along that
- [56:58]
A
line of thought, then it's not only that, it's our childhoods that are affecting our adult behaviors, it's our ancestors lives. What were the adaptations they needed to survive in the environment in which they used to live? I guess food would be an obvious thing, right? I think you write about this in the book, right? So explain how food helps us see this through a different lens. Today's episode is sponsored by Lingo by Abbott. As many of you know, when glucose is relatively stable, you feel better day to day with steadier energy, mood and focus. But over time, unstable and elevated glucose can impair your metabolic health and increase the risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Globally, more than 760 million adults are estimated to have prediabetes. And 6.3 million people in the UK are estimated to be living with prediabetes, many without symptoms or a diagnosis. Now, the problem is that our healthcare system often waits until you get sick before taking action, when we should take a proactive approach to prevent problems before they start. Now, most of us don't have access to our own glucose data and therefore don't have clear feedback on how our everyday choices impact our glucose. That's where Lingo by Abbott comes in. Lingo is a biosensor and app that helps you see how food Movement and lifestyle choices affect your glucose in real time, so you can notice patterns and build healthier habits in the moment. With Lingo, you can get to know your glucose to to build healthier habits for today and tomorrow. For listeners in the US and UK, Lingo by Abbott is offering an exclusive 10% off a four week plan. Just visit Halolingo.comLiveMore for more information. Terms and conditions apply. Again, that's Halolingo.comLiveMore this episode is brought to you in partnership with Airbnb. You know, I talk a lot about the value of genuinely switching off. And last summer when I took my family to Australia for a few weeks, that's exactly what we did. But it only occurred to me afterwards that I'd probably missed a trick. Our home was sitting empty the whole time and it would have been a smart way to earn a little extra money. Have you ever thought about listing your space on Airbnb and then, like me, just not actually done it because, well, maybe you thought you might not have time for it? I get it. That's what I used to think as well. But with Airbnb's co host network, you can team up with a local co host to take care of everything for you. They help look after your guests and your home. So whether you need help getting set up or just want someone to handle the day to day while you switch off a co host could make it even easier than you'd think. Find a co host@airbnb.co.uk host.
- [60:40]
B
So even just make this a bit more concrete. Even so, women are born with all of the eggs that they will ever have. So the egg that developed like all of us as humans or went into our development was actually created in the womb of our grandmother, right? As our mother was in her own gestation period. So to make this concrete for people, like quite literally a part of us was living back then. So that is again impacting our environment. And from a very evolutionary standpoint, that's mad, isn't it? That's crazy. And also too, to make it clear, sperm also very much plays a role where men in and their lifestyle choices. And the sperm that would eventually go to create you, right, does begin the impact, I should say begins before conception. So to be clear, both genders, right, everyone is playing a role. But again, women and the fact that their eggs are kind of, that's it. And that begins so early. And again, from a very evolutionary standpoint makes total sense, right? If we were born into the same village where more or less circumstances did say the same. Why wouldn't that be beneficial? And so what I cite is a very fascinating study. It's called the Dutch Hunger study.
- [61:45]
A
Yeah.
- [61:46]
B
And so they investigated during the Netherlands several years ago, decades ago, there was a very severe famine. And so much so that there was like no food was available. And if it was, had very limited nutritional content. And what they found was that women who were pregnant during this time, when of course, they, you know, kind of their ability, they. I'm going to really simplify this. Their body changed in terms of the way they utilized energy, held onto fat. Not being sure of when the next meal would come made complete sense that their body did that. What they then saw in the children that were born to these women was the same sort of changes where their body, the way it used energy, the way it held onto fat. And then over time, if there was no intervention, they would begin to evidence some physical diseases, high blood pressure, cancer, a million different other things that would kind of be then the impact of very beautiful changes. Because if we, if food is unpredictable, scarce, abstinent at all, these changes helped that person survive. And then they're carried on for generations, assuming that that child is born, the offspring is born to the same environment. Of course, now things have changed. We have airplanes, we fly to different geographical locations. Right. Society changes very quickly where scarcity in one generation can change to another. Yet we are still operating from a body that is wired for that early environment. Just to kind of bring the hope into that study. They then found that the offspring who had access to nutrition, who had healthier lifestyles, were able to change kind of the way their bodies, the epigenetics of the way their own system functioned, that if they were to then have children, they would almost reverse in a very simple way the changes that had happened to prepare them to survive. But again, all of this is grounded in very beautiful adaptations. What was needed, our lives have changed, and this is why a lot of us are carrying wired into us even now. Right. Some of us hold onto fat differently, we process things differently, or we have these unspoken traumas where we're not living in a world of scarcity, but yet we're still wired to see lack instead of the abundance that perhaps is available, whether it's physical stuff, money, or emotional scarcity. Again, because this began generations before us when that was the lived experience.
- [64:00]
A
Yeah, that's the opportunity, isn't it, for all of us. Like, if we are able to go in and heal, it doesn't just impact us. It also has a potential to impact future generations. It works both ways. And it's. You know, I think one of the things that many of us feel these days is with all the awareness that exists out there about trauma and inner child work and the sort of things you're sharing and other people around the world are sharing, it really does give me hope that there's an opportunity that this generation can start to heal. And if this generation can start to heal, it heals the wounds of the past and it perhaps reduces many of the wounds for the future.
- [64:49]
B
I couldn't agree more. I think even for those of us like myself who might not choose to have offspring, I mean, the work that we're doing, and this could sound lofty to some people, is we're beginning a new way of being in our current society. Again, like I said, I truly believe that division, right, Kind of the hurt people, hurt people saying, I believe that to be true. So as we are creating safety, security, healthier relationships, even if we don't choose to pass on the epigenetics, which is completely possible. I mean, this word cycle breakers is very real. We are breaking not only behavioral cycles, but physiological cycles of dysregulation and gifting that then to our offspring, our future generations. But again, even if we choose not to have them, we're changing the world around us. And I think we're living at a time where a lot of us are feeling very helpless. We're now met and have accessibility to all of the suffering from around the world. And I think humans instinctually, right, want to help, want to know how to help people and relieve the suffering. And I believe, at least this is how we do that. We change the way we're functioning. We create safety and security in our interpersonal relationships, in our communities, wherever they might be. And then we're literally changing the signals that our nervous system is sending to the world around us. And I always think about my community self healer circle. And we have this really cool feature, and it's much like a Google map, but it's a private one. And members can drop the pin in geographical locations so they can connect with each other. And sometimes I go in there and I have chills. I just see from around the world all these little pins, and I think about, wow, all of these signals are beginning to shift from dysregulation, from fear, from division to safety, security, acceptance, compassion. And I have hope even at a hopeless time. So I really like to speak to empowerment, not only to change ourselves again, to change our future generations, but to change now. What is happening in the world.
- [66:40]
A
Yeah, I love that. You know, I very much see change as something that we do one person at a time. In the sense that you start changing who you are and how you show up. Well, everyone who you interact with starts to experience that. And again, it's not to have guilt or shame around it. It's just to remind ourselves that actually the way we show up matters. And if you don't like what's going on in the world, you want to change the world. Call me naive, but I feel the best way you change the world is to start by changing yourself.
- [67:14]
B
And I couldn't agree more. And I think it's very common, right. And a lot of us, as we're struggling, say, in relationships, a theme throughout this conversation. It's so natural, right, to see the problem someone else is causing. Well, if you just showed up differently or did a little this more or that. Right. Then I'll just feel differently. And of course that's natural, to have that instinct of you change, not me. And again, I think one of the most difficult realities of life, aside from dealing with the uncertainty of all of it, is the lack of control. We can't. We can desperately want and wish someone to be different and to have a different experience with them in relationship, whatever the relationship might be, but it's not gonna be demanding, giving them an ultimatum. Oftentimes I see the word boundaries as misused, in my opinion, to be more of a delivery of a boundary or an ultimatum or a consequence instead of saying exactly what we're agreeing. No, no, you keep being you. I'm gonna change the way I'm showing up. I'm gonna create a boundary or a limit perhaps, where there once wasn't one. I'm going to give myself the opportunity to embody safety, security, openness, and that is then more indirectly the way we create change. But I want to just say something really quickly about passion and purpose too, please. Because I do think, especially when people see, like, you and me, they set this expectation that I can't be impactful. Like, we have this idea, I think at least, that purpose needs to be huge at scale and that if we don't have, like, something that's more public, like you or I have created for ourself, because this has been our journey, that we are not making the impact that you were beautifully describing. So I just wanted to get a little disclaimer in there or a re. Kind of imagining of what purpose can be. Because purpose looks like whatever is kind of driving us from Inside our unique gifts, our talents. For a lot of us, it is kind of existing only in our smaller relational circles. But it doesn't mean that's only the impact because again, that goes so much beyond ourselves.
- [69:04]
A
Yeah. I sometimes wonder about all the people out there, the many millions who are making huge impact that we've never heard of. Because these are the people who've got their priorities right, who don't feel the need to constantly be busy or overachieve. They do prioritize time with their friends and their family. They're not posting online because they're enjoying their lives. Right. And they're impacting their communities. And there'll be millions of people around the world who actually do do that, yet we don't see them, therefore we don't celebrate them. And we don't think it's real. But of course it is real. And I would say over the last few years, I've met people like that. I go, wow, you just got it. Maybe you were lucky, maybe you had the right parenting, whatever it might be, but you're living it. You're living the life that many people want, but no one knows about it. And I think that's a really beautiful thing. Nicole, could we just go back to the parental archetypes for a moment? Right. We've mentioned two so far, the over permissive parents and the status orientated parent. The critical parent, I imagine, is one that many people might resonate with.
- [70:13]
B
Yeah. So the critical parent is a parent who, as the word says, criticizes shames. Right. Kind of does not allow acceptance and self expression, whatever the parameters may be. Some of us are even criticized for sharing emotions. Right. Again, emotions being a newer landscape for people, some of the criticism comes around, you're too dramatic. Right. You're not enough. You're not doing the way I need you to or I desire you to show up and do. And again, this voice that often becomes the critical voice in our mind is informed, colored, influenced by those early voices, those voices of criticism of shame. And again, often it comes from perhaps a very well intentioned reason with. Right, There's a reason certain aspects are being criticized to keep belonging for status in the community, whatever it might be. But whenever we are told directly or indirectly that we are part of us is shameful is not enough. Right. We are going to then adapt. We're gonna show less of that side. We're gonna have a very loud internal critical voice. Some of us might stop showing up at all. Right. Because it's too unsafe. We've learned to be seen in any way. If every way that we were in childhood was met with criticism, that then we shrink ourselves. We don't share us, our embodiment, our perspective, our ideas, because again, we're always anticipating that criticism.
- [71:40]
A
Yeah, I mean, you write beautifully in this section here. Chronic criticism sends the message that the child is inherently flawed. Over time, children internalize this harsh lens and grow with self doubt and a powerful inner critic that mirrors their parents voice as adults. They may fear failure, overachieve in pursuit of approval, or avoid taking risks altogether. There's a lot of crossover, isn't there, between the different parental styles? Some of the traits I feel are quite similar. Would you agree with that?
- [72:13]
B
There's a lot of, and a lot of times when I, I'm always of two minds when I give archetypes in this way because I don't ever want people to feel like, oh, I have to find the one parent that I had. I think again, we're very complex creatures. There's, there's similarities and differences in each.
- [72:29]
A
I think it's really helpful actually because, you know, having, I think you've got eight or nine in the book, right. Someone may not identify with the term, the status orientated parents, but they might identify with the term the critical parent, even though there may be a bit of crossover. So I think it's quite nice the way you've done that. But on the subject of criticism then I imagine there's a lot of parents thinking, okay, but of course one of my jobs as a parent is to help my child be the best they can be. So if they haven't done something as well as they could have done that thing, what am I meant to do as a parent? I don't want to come across as critical, but I want to help my child get better. Are you able to give any guidance to that parent as to how they could have that conversation?
- [73:23]
B
Yeah, I think this intention comes up a lot in the parenting styles. Whether it's kind of using criticism to corral or kind of modify behavior using strict boundaries and limits, perhaps in another kind of parent to kind of contain behavior, all with this idea of right, I want you to be the best, I want you to be accepted. I want society and your relationships and your perhaps financial security to be intact for you in the future. And so this idea of how do the really the way we shape behavior to just focus it on this kind of idea of criticism, effort, right? What are we criticizing? Are we criticizing the outcome or are we able to see and separate outcome for Effort, Right. So we might want someone and want a child to operate in a certain way, of course, when we're investigating why it is and how it relates to how we feel about ourselves or what society thinks of us, and unpacking all of that. But again, it's effort. Right. Because outcome and effort are two separate things, in my opinion. Right. We could have a child who tries very hard and just for whatever reason, is not able to succeed in whatever way or show up, translate that effort into the outcome that we want. So if we're able to say, right, I want what's best for you. At the same time, though, I want you to honor yourself, be true to who you are, maybe just put in a good effort, even if the outcome doesn't translate to what cause usually we're criticizing outcome instead of the effort that underlies it.
- [74:53]
A
Yeah. One thing I found helpful over the years is to ask my kids what they think. So it would be, you know, do you think you did your best there? You know, because they often know, right? You ask them, and then it doesn't become me telling them. It's like, yeah, you know what? Actually, I think if I'd done this slightly differently, it would have been better. If I'm completely honest, Nicole, I feel I've done a lot of inner child work over the years to help me understand my present and then change my present through deliberate, aware choices. I would say one of the biggest drives for me to do so was to be a better parent. I didn't want my children to take on the patterns or some of the patterns that I took on. And so I've certainly done everything I have been aware of at least, and within my capabilities to try and prevent that from happening. Now, what will the end result be? That I can't tell you. But that's certainly been one of my big drives.
- [76:01]
B
I just want to quickly talk about effort and then respond to this, because separating effort as you're doing, did you try your best regardless of the outcome? Because something I had learned, and this goes back to this kind of fear of failing if and when. So in childhood, it was very clear to me very early that there were some things that, quote, unquote, came naturally to me, right? Academics, some versions of athletics, I was just simply good at. And so I confused for a long time, right, that as needing to be my guidepost, meaning I would avoid for a very long time things that were hard even if I wanted to do them, if I had to try hard at something, I immediately would tell myself that, oh, this wasn't for me. It's not what I'm good at. I should avoid this thing. And so until I learned that, right, effort is something that is important to be able to contain, maintain, give effort to something without aside from the outcome, right. I probably would have allowed myself to pursue things from a very young age that might have been of more interest to me in adulthood. But I avoided them because they didn't come easily. I wasn't used to being seen and acknowledged, and I did not have effort validated because. And I was told a running thing in my family was, oh, things just come easy to you, Nicole. So I developed this false belief that if something didn't come easy, that effort with something on some extent to be avoided. And so I wanna get to the parenting though. Cause I think we've been kind of weaving around this for a long time, which is like a lot of parents do listen. And I really wanna celebrate parents who are listening. And I don't want ever parents to be heard or any of my work to be heard or taken from a shaming manner. And I also want parents to hear that it is unrealistic, as you kind of brought up that post, that you be a perfect parent. And a lot of parents that are meeting this work are doing so when the children are, you know, already grown or at a certain level of development, where the fear then is, well, have I already messed them up? Is there any kind of undoing this? Or do I just have to leave, live with shame, and maybe hear from my children later of how terrible I was? And so what I want to make sure I'm putting into words during this conversation is that moments of disconnection, not meeting an expectation, not meeting a child's need or a partner's need into adulthood is part of the human experience. And so interpersonal research has now shown that conflict, so to speak, disagreement, disconnection, unmet needs are a natural part of a relational experience of being human. And they're actually not only is it unrealistic to imagine that that never be a part of our relational journey, with our children included, but that actually the presence of conflict or disagreement or unmet needs, often which conflict and disagreement stem from isn't an indicator of the health or the security of a relationship. What is is the ability to have a different awareness, make space for a different perspective, take accountability and repair on the other side of it. So I want parents to hear this in direct words, which is, it's never too late. It is so valuable at any time in life to Create space to hear maybe difficult feedback from your child. Maybe it's not exactly as how you remembered it to be, but perhaps your child is going to share an experience that might be upsetting and what is so important or these moments unavoidable, you might have an overreaction, whether it's with your child or your partner. More important is what happens next. Can I calm down? Can I. Can I have to first calm my body down to be able to write, expand to hear someone else's perspective, to hear the difficult feedback? Or the fact that there is a need that has gone unmet for however long it's been that you've been in this relationship with this person. But can I be calm enough to allow that in? Can I take accountability? Can I perhaps say I'm sorry? And again, that and when Many of us were not modeled that in childhood. So this is a skill we need to learn. Again, all grounded in the body. But those are the moments that are going to predict the future security of the relationship.
- [79:58]
A
As you were talking there, Nicole, I think I had, at least for me a penny dropping moment, which is we know individually that it is hard experiences, difficult experiences in life where we grow the most, where we learn the most about ourselves. Right. If, for example, on an individual level our life was all plain sailing and nothing ever went wrong, we wouldn't develop or cultivate so many of those important skills that we do through grief, through relationship problems, through work issues, whatever it might be. They're all opportunities to grow and learn in relationships. If there's never any conflict, if there's never any struggle, then of course how is that relationship going to be shaped? Maybe as you're saying, we need a bit of conflict, a bit of struggle now and again. Maybe that's what helps kind of refine the relationship and sort of tender, kind of loose parts of the sides and really forge down as to what is the core of this relationship. Maybe conflict's a good thing. If it's managed in the right way, 100%.
- [81:10]
B
I mean, if and when and I get oftentimes I used to do a lot of couples work when I was in individual practice and it could be to some extent a bit concerning. Right. If you are of or maybe existing in a relationship where we always agree, there's never any conflict. Right. How you're different people. What do you mean? Every single moment of every day. Right. You are in total agreement with perspective, with want me, desire, emotion, even what you want to have for dinner. Right? Again, I operated for a very long time in that conflict free model, not because I was in perfect alignment, but because I wasn't either connected to what it was that I wanted or needed or how I felt or even what I wanted for dinner or if I had an idea, I would overstep myself to try and please and appease the people around me. Because again, that's how I gained safety in childhood, right? Attuning myself to how I needed to be. To avoid. For my mom, it wasn't outward explosion of emotion, it was more disconnection. And to avoid disconnection, which again in childhood is threatening to my survival, physiological and emotional, I became. And out of the three siblings, my brother and my sister would joke because I was the golden child, as it was called. Not because necessarily I was in full agreement, but because I acted like it. I smiled, I said, whatever you think, mom. I never voiced my opinion because I learned through my mom. Not necessarily, again with explosive behavior, but with a look, with the removal of attention or warmness or connection or love. I learned very quickly that to maintain that connection, I carried this into my adulthood. To be seemingly conflict free, only to understand that I wasn't in perfect alignment with the world around me. I was too afraid or disconnected from my actual perspective. Want, need or emotion any given moment to feel safe enough to communicate that.
- [83:03]
A
Yeah, it's so fascinating to hear and for you to share your own personal experiences because I think sometimes there might be a tendency for people to think, oh, you know, Nicole's got all these followers, she's written all these books, she's got it all sorted. And as you often openly share, you know, it's a constant process. As we said before, you know, healing is non linear. There's no end point. It's part of what it is to be a human being. At least it's part of what it means to be a conscious, aware human being who's trying to make progress and you know, trying to stop these cycles that maybe have been perpetuated for, for good reason through generations. We could spend so long, Nicole, talking about childhoods and all the different patterns. I would like us to talk about some practical things that were possible in terms of what we can actually do. So healing is a two step process. Number one, you've got to become aware. Hopefully throughout the conversation so far, people have started to become aware of elements of their childhoods and how it's impacting them as adults. Now let's move on to what they can actually do and how they can make different choices. There's a whole selection in the book. There are just so many. Do you have a favorite one that you feel you'd like to share at this point in the conversation?
- [84:24]
B
I want to even just bring awareness into beyond awareness that you're gaining from a podcast or in a therapist office or in a good conversation with a loved one. I want to bring awareness into the lived embodiment in real time. And what I mean when I say that is learning how to as we're going about our day. And the most foundational tool that I'm always kind of citing, going back to, whether you're in my membership or my books, is in real time awareness, meaning. And we are all helped by the phone that we carry around that we can set an alarm on, or the post it note near our desk at work, or even the habit that already exists in our life, the fact that many of us brush our teeth at least once a day or have a drink of coffee, whatever it is. And so awareness is a lived, embodied experience, right? Not just the awareness that we're talking about, oh, I see my patterns. But in action, in real time, rebuilding that connection with my body. So when that alarm goes off, when that, you know, we walk past the post it note, or we're at that kind of habit time or we want to stack another habit onto. Awareness exists in the ability to refocus our attention. Not on our to do list, not on the million needs that maybe our child has in front of us, but on us and our body. And it's as simple as I call it a conscious check in where we shift the focus, right? And we begin to explore how my body is feeling in this moment. And I like to cite kind of three anchors for where we can shift our awareness to. Because these happen to be three physiological systems that shift and change as our body increases in stress. And so they are the tension in our muscles, right? Even just shifting our focus and noticing a lot of us until someone suggests that we do so, are not aware that we're clenching our jaw. Shoulders are up to our ears that are we're bracing around our midsection. All of that tension, or on the other side of it, the numbness, the fact that I can't even feel, the fact that I'm in a body that's surrounded by muscles. Usually both of those are markers of how stressed my body has become. Because as we become stressed, naturally energy builds. Our muscles become tense so we can fight or flee the situation at hand. The more chronic that stresses are overwhelming, the more some of us then drop to that kind of Playing dead. End of the spectrum, like animals do, we become. Become numb. We can't even feel any energy in our muscles to get off the couch even if we wanted to. We call it procrastination, lack of motivation. But again, it's our nervous system telling us that we're in a stress state. So our muscles a great place to refocus that attention. Maybe even just doing a quick scan of your body right now as you're listening and noticing kind of what end of that spectrum you're on. Or do you feel yourself, oh, I'm being held nicely. I'm at ease. I'm able to get up if I wanted to, but I don't feel so agitated that I have to get up and do something. Our breath is also a great marker of something we could shift our focus of attention to because our body is always breathing. Sometimes our breathing or our breathing shifts, and sometimes what we will notice is a stressed state of breathing where it's really quick and shallow, indicating we're in that kind of sympathetic, energized state. Some of us are holding our breath. Even I often drop into my body and notice, oh, I've been holding my breath for a while. All of this bracing is shifting my breathing into a stress state. And then those systems, the more stressed we become, impact our heart rate. So this consciousness and awareness that I'm talking about actually, in my opinion, has to come off of the insightful podcast moment or the moment in therapy where I can talk about my pattern. It has to be a lived experience, because if in those moments I notice that my body is stressed, then I could start to ask and explain, explore and get curious. If I don't yet know the answer, what does my body need, right? If I'm tense, can I relax a bit and create more ease in my muscles? If I'm holding my breath, right, can I begin to release that restriction, allow my body to breathe? Or if it's so quick, can I slow it down? Because now we're living the experience of awareness. We can then drop into our mind, right? What am I interpreting? What meaning am I making of the situation that's creating the impact emotionally in my body, right? And now we start to build choice with a regulated body, right? We can now begin to choose to show up in a way that kind of breaks those habits. Because again, the first step is awareness, so that I can break the habitual reaction and then create the new opportunity by saying, what is it that I need getting curious, because I think a lot of us, again, have the Expectation that I just know what I need. If you've never practiced, though, connecting with your body, you might not exactly know what feels good and supportive to you when you're angry, sad, you might not even have those words in the moment. And you're just connecting with the heaviness, the agitation and then, right, helping your body, helping yourself first be in presence with those sensations and then helping your body to process them.
- [89:07]
A
That was beautiful. And so many things came up for me as you were talking. Firstly, this idea that awareness has multiple levels. It's not just awareness in your mind. Oh, I understand now how Mum and Dad doing this for me when I was a kid has affected me in adulthood. That's great. But that's awareness with the mind. Now you're saying there's also awareness with the body. And even as you were just describing it, I let my belly go out and felt, oh, maybe for the last hour with Nicole, I'd been holding onto Tinus without realizing it. Right. So that allowed me to soften. It also reminded me of when we were talking about constant busyness as a survival strategy and the fact that so many people now are chronically constantly busy and therefore are completely disconnected from their bodies. They're all stuck in their mind. This task, that task, I've got to do that. Got to check the WhatsApp. I've got five minutes to myself, but instead of being with myself, I'm going to go on Instagram, I'm going to go somewhere else. So constant distraction from our bodies. The other thought I had, Nicole, was how many of the times we read an email and interpret it as a criticism or as a reflection of who you are as a human. But actually, maybe that email was never that. Maybe it was just the fact that everything in your body was tight because you've been accumulating stress since the morning you've not had a break. Perhaps you've got experience of this with clients and people in your online community, but let's say you had a timer that went off once an hour or once every two hours and it was just a little gentle. Maybe it was not an aggressive, harsh tone, but a really a warming and maybe like a meditation bell to remind you to go, oh, what if for the next minute, I just take a few deep breaths and just pay attention to how I'm feeling. I imagine if someone did that three times in the morning, three times in an afternoon, they'd still get the same amount of work done and they'd be so much more present and, dare I say, it more productive as they're doing it, 100%.
- [91:20]
B
And that's kind of the foundation of change and acknowledging that a minute will be a very long time for a lot of us that aren't used to just being with ourself. And if we have a lot of dysregulation, if our whole life has been busyness and we're avoiding kind of what's inside of us, it doesn't even have to be. I think a lot of times when we think about this moment of awareness, consciousness meditation, a lot of us call it, I do think we have this idea that it has to be in silence, right? When that alarm goes off, I have to shut everything off. I have to close my eyes. I have to sit here, and I have to be comfortable, and my thoughts have to be calm. A lot of us, again, we have so much dysregulation in our body. We're not practiced at doing that. That is an absolute nightmare. It's actually not a safe place for us to be, again, if we're carrying a lot of dysregulation in our body. So I make the suggestion that we don't even have to be taking this moment in silence, right? Take the moment of just being in your body when you're drinking a cup of tea, right, and have that be just the process of sitting there, feeling the warmth in your hands, right, Drinking tea. And I'm using this kind of. When I began, I was so dysregulated, again, so not used to silence. There was no safety and stillness for me that the most approachable, accessible place that I was able to be in presence with myself was in nature. So I would take myself, not put on. Even though. Thank you for listening to this podcast. Not put on a podcast, like. Not walk with, like, sound, but just take myself on. I happen to now live, very gratefully, thankfully, on a lake. So for me, right, when I'm in the natural world, and it's not that I'm closing my eyes and I'm turning out stimulation, and I'm now with all of the overwhelming thoughts in my mind. Cause that's, again, what happens when our body is stressed. I'm giving myself somewhere to focus, right? I'm looking at the water, you know, I'm hearing the sound in the trees, right? That's another place that kind of can be a foundation for a lot of us to begin this practice of presence and awareness. Because again, if we had this expectation that we turn off the lights, we turn down the sound, we close our eyes and now we're met with all of this overwhelming sensations in our body and the racing thoughts in our mind that we're probably not going to continue that practice. So I'm giving permission to build a bridge of this conscious practice wherever it feels most approachable. Because you're doing so much more kind of internally and you're building again, that muscle, the safety of how to learn and increase your capacity to be with more and more uncomfortable sensations. And you're not able to do that right away, nor is it safe for a lot of us to do that right away.
- [93:53]
A
Yeah, I really appreciate how you sort of highlighted that that awareness can be as simple as drinking that cup of coffee in the morning whilst paying attention.
- [94:06]
B
Right.
- [94:06]
A
That's what we're talking about. Right. We're talking about paying attention. Instead of slurping it down whilst emailing, just pay attention to the whole process. The warmth, the joy of the coffee on your tongue and, you know, the enjoyment, whatever it might. Recently I was on a meditation retreat and one of the guys who I was on the retreat with was sharing with me how, you know, he used to over drink alcohol and caffeine and all sorts of stuff, but he still enjoys coffee, but he's limited it to one a day. But he has criteria around it, which is, I can only have one, but when I have that one, I cannot be doing anything else. And really he's talking about, I'm gonna be present with that coffee. And he says that's all he needs now. He doesn't need five or six cups, he needs one cup where he's fully present and he's not doing other stuff. And he's lucky he lives on a. You know, he says he's got a balcony where he lives, so he'll go out to the balcony, enjoy the warmth, really savor the taste and look out. And I think sometimes when we talk about these behaviors that we want to
- [95:21]
B
change,
- [95:24]
A
we're always talking about the what? Well, how many cups of coffee should I drink? What is enough? Rather than the how. Well, what if the reason you need four cups of coffee is because you're not present with the first cup? What would your caffeine requirement be like if you were able to be fully present with that first cup? The other thought I had, Nicole, was when you thought about the lake, you expressed gratitude for living somewhere where you have access to a lake. I had a few years ago, a patient who lived right in the center of a city. And we would talk about nature and the benefits, and he said, oh, Man, I don't have time. There's no nature around. And you know how I helped him? I basically recommended he listen to five minutes of nature sounds on his phone each morning. I am not kidding you. That was life changing. This is a guy in his 20s. He wasn't connected to nature, but he'd put on bird sounds or the wave, the ocean, the sounds of the ocean first thing in the morning. And little by little that started to change how he saw himself, how he showed up in the world. So yes, if you're lucky to live in nature or near beautiful nature, great. If you don't, you can still access nature, can't you?
- [96:35]
B
100%. I think there's actually studies that show the regulating benefits of the sounds of nature. And so I'm even describing this practice at. I did begin in a city. I did not have immediate access. I was not living in a lake that I was now though I was walking and I would take the route that took me through the very tiny city park and kind of find the green spaces. But again, if you're completely limited and that's unavailable, there's incredible research out there that talks about nature sounds, certain even sound frequencies that can really help our body regulate. But again, I think what we're talking about here is not just plugging in the nature sounds and being on our cell phone and lost in our mind. We're talking about listening to the birds in that moment or even just the fact that we're walking through the earth in any given moment and just being present to our body, moving through time and through space. And I always try to be really accessible with these tools because the reality is life is busy and a lot of these habits are driving our life. And these practices don't feel safe. And we're never going to change, make new choices unless we find a way to approach it in a way that feels feasible, not only practically, but in terms of creating a new habit, which for a lot of us is so counter to these small, small moments of presence. But they can go an incredible long way. So much so that when asked like, well, what is your routine? First thing you do in the morning. And the first thing I do in the morning, every morning is I have a cup of coffee. I don't, I'm not on my phone, oftentimes my partner is there. We have a few moments to connect, we'll maybe go outside. And thankfully I live in a place where there's sunshine now, first thing in the morning. So I just let it hit my skin and I taste my coffee. It's just presence. There's not a structure, there's not an activity. It's just being in my body in that day and building that foundation then to carry me through the day where I remember then at lunchtime, for instance, to tune into what is my body feeling like today. Is it hungry? Is it hungry for a certain thing in particular? Can I taste the food I'm eating instead of contorting myself and trying to be on my phone and eat food at the same time? And so then we can build that habit into more parts of our day once we just create the foundational presence at any part of our day.
- [98:39]
A
Yeah, I think there's a lot to be said for doing one thing at a time. The simplest thing, the most obvious thing, but the thing that is getting lost from society. We're always multitasking. We're always catching up as we do something else. Try for a week of just doing one thing at a time, and even that will bring a degree of presence to your life that will have profound benefits in terms of more practical things that we can do. And I want to emphasize that in the book. There are so many wonderful practical exercises, like, you know, writing a letter to your inner child. I think there's an attachment timeline. There's so many people are going to find things in there for them that really appeal to them. Walking, of course, is one of the best things we can do. You posted a few days ago on Instagram. Walking is therapy. The natural bilateral eye movement. The sun on your skin if it's sunny and the activation of your frontal lobe helps you process emotions. You'll see everything differently after a walk because your body just made sense of what your brain couldn't. I love that.
- [99:54]
B
Yeah. Walking's a great opportunity too, to have both connection with ourself. Difficult conversation. There's a lot of research. There was this one therapist, I forget her name now, where she would walk with clients. Not like having to immediately look in someone's eyes. The bilateral stimulation of the eye movement, the kind of regulating nature of just movement in general allowed and facilitated the possibility, kind of going back to the couples or the relational stuff with conflict. Right. It allowed those conversations to be more approachable. And bilateral stimulation, the eye movement that naturally happens when either we're walking or even back to the phones, being turned inward on such a small screen is naturally signaling stress to our body because that's what, as I described earlier, our eyes will do. Right. When we have to find the threat at hand and keep our Eyes on them to make sure that we're safe. Now, all of us are doing that all day long with a phone. So whether we're getting out on a walk and just letting our eyes fall on the horizon, not looking at our phone when we're walking, if we can avoid that habit, but even just looking up from our phone throughout the day and just like scanning our room. Right. Anytime we're moving our eyes. This is what emdr, a very, I think, very helpful therapy for a lot of trauma. And I talk about in the book ways to bilaterally stimulate through, right, the butterfly hold, where we're literally crossing our arms and kind of rhythmically right and left, kind of tapping, even just across our midsection, pulling our left leg up and our right arm up. Anytime we're bilaterally stimulating our eyes or our body, what we're doing is we're reintegrating the right and the left hemisphere of our brain. If I'm going to simplify it, the right is feeling, sensation, emotion, instinct. The left is logic, story, narrative, meaning. And when trauma happens, that connection, that bridge, kind of disintegrates those hemispheres. Again, I'm really simplifying it. Don't communicate as effectively. So we feel things that we can't put into words, or we can talk about things, but we don't have the feeling. So these moments, in addition to just kind of calming our body into that parasympathetic state, are actually doing a great service for our integration where we can over time. Because what healing is, is aligning emotion, intention, feeling, action, right. And being able to then live in that coherence. But if and when trauma happened at any point in our life, that bridge is broken. And so we can, though, rebuild those connections through these bilateral stimulations throughout the day.
- [102:26]
A
A lot of what you're asking us to do or suggesting we might want to do is reconnect with our bodies. The cold and cold plunges are a way that many people have started to reconnect with their bodies. But I don't think you believe that they're for everyone, do you?
- [102:44]
B
So I think that they can be greatly helpful. If our nervous system has the capacity, cold will stress our body out, Our blood vessels constrict, our muscles become tense. Right. Sounds like the stress response that I was describing earlier. So I discovered cold therapy very early on in my journey, But I was in such a dysregulated, overwhelmed body that it felt near intolerable. And I had since learned that actually that was my body sending a signal that I Should not be tolerating it to that degree. I don't need to be in the 40 degree cold plunge. Right. I can turn my shower if I want to experiment with slight cold. Because cold can be not only physically beneficial. Right. Stimulating our body, kind of our blood vessels, getting our blood running mentally, it can kind of clear our mind, but it can help our nervous system become more flexible, assuming that it has that capacity. So for a lot of us, again, if we are completely overwhelmed or in that shutdown state, diving into the coldest water will only overstress our already overstressed system. So we can experiment with cold. But I would call it cool would be a great place to start. The goal would be really to resource our body, learn how to downshift in that parasympathetic state, slowing our movements, deep breathing. Right. Really grounding our attention in the kind of check in with senses in a given moment. What can I see? Touch, taste, all of those things. Right. Learning how to calm our body so that then when we want to kind of increase the level of cold, so to speak, we're not just going to send ourselves right back into old habits.
- [104:19]
A
Yeah. It just really highlights the importance of individuality. Right. And of course, cold has been life changing for so many people. And at the same time, it's not for everyone, at least not for everyone at the same part of their journey. And I think this is one of the things I just see around so much online is people want to know good or bad. Is cold good or is it bad? Well, it depends. Is fasting good? It's like, well, it depends. For some people it's life change. For other people, it's very toxic. Right. And I feel certainly that's what I try and do on this podcast and have done for many years, is to try and showcase the nuance that exists, that context matters. For every single piece of health advice, context matters. And too often that context is removed online.
- [105:14]
B
Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And so often too, when I get asked and even think about, of course I want to be of impact. And I know one book is hopefully going to be in many individual hands. So it's always an interesting kind of internal exercise in how do I translate something? Which is very much what I try to do in this book, Mapping this idea of the different aspects of development onto a reparenting journey so that hopefully more readers than not can kind of see where they might not have had needs met in childhood and then kind of know where to begin. But I'm always hesitant of Doing that, though, the question I often get asked is very similar, like, what's the protocol? What do I need to do? And I think a lot of times I frustrate people because I always go back to, well, your body will tell you. Build that connection, right? Learn how to tune into your own internal signals, whether it's your physical needs or that deeper sense of intuition, and rebuild the trust, right? Through habits, through discipline, through working, through discomfort, and learning that we can tolerate difficult things and branching out to create even more habits. But I can't give you the exact answer. I can give you, like, a schematic, so to speak, a general roadmap, but I wouldn't want to give it to you because I don't know you. I don't live in your body. You're so uniquely different. I want to give you the tools to reconnect with your own inner knowing. And that's always my goal.
- [106:32]
A
Yeah, no, I love that, and I echo it so, so much. Nicole, I just want to move away from your book for just a moment. I really enjoy reading the posts on your Instagram page, and I noted down a couple which really caught my interest this morning. So can I just read a couple out to you and get your comments? One was to do with emotionally immature mothers. Okay. And so this is, I think, quite a provocative post. For some people, emotionally healthy mothers want their daughters to shine, but some emotionally immature mothers see their daughter as a threat. What does that mean?
- [107:14]
B
So, again, emotional maturity. This is not. I'm not speaking from a derogatory standpoint. I'm speaking from the evolution of everything we've been talking about. The ability to be grounded in my perspective, expand, hear another, see kind of who I am and my child even as being someone who's uniquely different. And so when parents, as many of ours have had, they have not had access to the tools and resources they need, so they begin to develop a certain sense of immaturity where they can't expand, honor that a child, even if they look the same and you want them to so desperately be the same, that they're a different, unique human, they don't have perhaps, the ability to tolerate conflict and disagreement and difference and understand that, right? There's gonna be a different expression that doesn't necessarily have to be a reflection on me and my parenting. So in absence of being able for the parent to have just been comfortable, right, being who they are and find that value from within, as we've been talking about throughout this conversation, they will then project onto a child right they'll project a sense of similarity. Well, you must be exactly who I am. They'll project a desire for a certain presentation and. Or they will become, if they don't have self trust and self security and self esteem of their own, they could either want their child to succeed, to reflect positively on them and their parenting, or they could equally feel threatened. Yeah, right. By the validation that my child is getting, by the attention that my child is getting. Sometimes it gets very complicated, right, Where a child is getting more attention from the co parent than the parent wants and things get really kind of confused. And then indirectly and directly there's this sense of I'm threatened and it can turn into a jealousy, a over focus on looks, a parent who's trying to win in a certain circumstance. And again, all of that messaging, going to the child about kind of who they are and how they have to show up to be accepted by that parent.
- [109:15]
A
And all of that reminds us and highlights the importance of, of reparenting the inner child. Because if that emotionally immature mother was able to do that, no matter where they are in their life, that can change. And for the daughter of that emotionally immature parent who maybe grew up with that, again, reparenting the inner child is important. It's important for both, right? To be able to move on. Another one that caught my eye was this one. The art of letting someone be in a bad mood will completely change your life. Why?
- [109:56]
B
So I think that goes back to again, one of the parents that we didn't necessarily talk about earlier, but this, the idea of what I'm gonna describe, the reactive parent, right? At a time, monitoring someone's moods was probably the safest thing that we could do, right? Sensing any shift in tone, in energy, in presentation, in any way at one time, if there was predictability, if there was explosive behavior, even if again, the behavior was a kind of shutdown, disconnection, sensing those changes, that hypervigilance, being more attuned to someone else's shifts kept us safe. Because what we could modify how we showed up, we could be a little less of this, a little more of that, maintain the connection and the safety, whatever was available. And so a lot of us carry that hypervigilance into adulthood where we're always maybe not even conscious that we're doing it. I know I struggle anytime I sense a shift. And my partner, Loli, she becomes a little quiet or her mood's a little snippy, even if it has nothing to do with me, she answers me in a short way because she's stressed out about work or thinking about something different or is just tired, overwhelmed herself, needs a minute again. In childhood, what's being queued up for me and activated is those shifts meant something, right? For me, they meant disconnection. So I then have a tendency to ask a million times, are you okay? What's wrong? Are you okay? What's wrong? Is something wrong? Did I upset you? Or in my mind, right? I'm imagining that I was the cause of that shift. So learning, right, the habit I have that self, that monitoring not self of others kept me safe because at one time it was what I needed to do to maintain the connections and attention that was available. But now it has created not only a meaning where I will always assume that anyone in a bad mood around me is because of something I did or did not do. And I will assign, right, that responsibility of I've upset you, right? Because that's what I learned in childhood, right? Me, my emotions, my energy would cause stress or upset in the home. So I continue to assign that meaning. And the reality often is, is that's not the case. There's many different reasons. And even if it is upset with me, I have to break that kind of immediate connection between upset with me equals disconnection from me, Upset with me equals you're abandoning me, upset with me equals you're rejecting me, right? Everything that I learned from those more implicit, unspoken messages in childhood comes alive in those moments. So learning, right? Seeing the habit that we have to not allow someone to be upset or in a bad mood, trying to micromanage, solve the problem, make them feel better. Sometimes I do it through humor. I'm gonna try and be funny and make sure you're laughing and having a good time with me. All of that is this inner child who's so desperate to make you feel okay so that I can feel connected and safe.
- [112:47]
A
Yeah, I think so many people will resonate with that as they listen. I think the one to maybe close this conversation on is something you posted, I think just a few days ago now, but really speaks to the new book and all the potential that is within it for us if we choose to go there. And this was your post. You heal your inner child when someone compliments you and you say nothing but thank you when you don't apologize for crying when someone asks you what you're doing today and you say relaxing. That's such a beautiful post. And as I say, gives us a sense of the possibility that's out there for us. Why do you think that those Very simple things signal to us that we are quite far along on our healing journey.
- [113:55]
B
So when you allow yourself to hear and accept a compliment, you're allowing yourself to be seen. I still struggle with this. The minute someone says something nice about me, I feel like I have to reflect something very nice about them right back. It's hard for me to allow myself to be seen outside of what I'm doing or how I'm performing. Just someone to see me or experience me and say something nice. The ability to allow ourself to emote, to cry, to have an emotion, right? So many of us and I think sometimes it becomes second nature where we're saying I'm sorry. And I watch it oftentimes too a lot on TV shows. I love reality tv. I learn a lot about human nature in addition to online, which is a prolific example or evidence or stream of examples to give. But we are so instinctual with having an emotion and immediately saying I'm sorry instead of just allowing ourself to not only be in our emotion, but allowing someone else to be in our emotion with us. So right, Allowing ourself to be seen, allowing ourself to be complimented and then the ability to again a theme throughout this conference, just be rest to tune into when I need a moment, to just allow myself to be in my own presence, to lay down on the couch, not to have a day that's kind of curated and planned. And I think again, all of these are markers of our ability to be calm, to be regulated, to be at peace with ourself. Through rest, through the experience of emotions will be always a part of our journey. The goal to healing is not to be devoid of emotions. They contain incredibly important information. They allow us to feel connected to the world around us. That's what so many of us are looking for. Not to have our problem solved or be told that we shouldn't feel this way. Just have someone sit down next to us and say I understand, I understand why you would even feel that way. And to allow ourself to be seen in all of our positive included the ability to accept and to be with compliment. I think all of those are again markers of the entire theme of this conversation in my work is of our nervous system regulation, our health, our true health and our true wellness.
- [116:00]
A
Well, let's see how you're doing with accepting a compliment. I think your work over the last few years, your public facing work, has had such a profound impact on so many people. I've enjoyed reading your posts. I know from many of My team, many of my friends, they have found so much wisdom from reading what you have to share. And I think this latest book, Reparenting the Inner Child, the New Science of Our Oldest Wounds and How to Heal Them, is going to be such a helpful and life changing read for so many people. So I want to say thank you for all the work you've done and thank you for writing it.
- [116:40]
B
Thank you. I will practice just breathing into that. Thank you.
- [116:43]
A
Yeah. And as well as the book, Nicole, you obviously post on all the social media platforms under the name the Holistic Psychologist. You also have this membership community. What do people get if they sign up for that?
- [116:58]
B
So the Membership Community Self Healer Circle, it's global so you can join from around the world. It's virtual. We join together every month. We release a new topic. Next month we're doing covert narcissism. So we have workshops with myself and outside presenters that come in and workbooks to give us kind of the tools to work through the journey. We have a new edition which is incredible of nine different therapist led groups to really kind of capitalize on the connection piece. I think a large reason why people join the circle is of course to learn to have a library of tools, resources, meditations, ways to translate insight into action. Though I think many more join for the community. When you join, you get much like it's now on our own private app. So it's not affiliated with any social media platforms. So I like to think about it like a Facebook cause. Every member gets a profile page and can interact with other members by putting up posts, responding to other members posts, dming the members map to connect with people in their area. And so a lot of these conversations, of course the social media platforms will always be part of what we at the Holistic Psychologists do. It is actually our way to continue to, you know, give back and have impact and understand that not everyone has the money though. Thank you. If you ever buy any of my books and join my membership. Of course it allows these social media platforms to put out the free and accessible resources and conversations of the beautiful community that will always exist, hopefully on those platforms and to gain those resources there. But the Circle is really for the people who want it a little bit deeper of a dive, a little bit more of a safer space. As we were kind of joking earlier, so often I get people who are in my DMs because they can't. They want to put up a comment or respond to something but they're so afraid that someone that they know might see or hear. So it's really been created out of the desire, as something I said earlier, the belief, I think, that a lot of us have the shame we feel feeling alone in our reactions, our struggles. And so the community, I think for a lot of people has become a safe space to feel less alone.
- [118:55]
A
Yeah, I love that. Nicole, you're clearly doing so much work to help so many people. To finish off this conversation, I want us to think about the person who is listening. And throughout this conversation, they've really gained a lot of insight as to why they behave in the manner in which they do. Some people, though, will take that insight and I believe they'll think it's too late for me. I lash out. I People, please. I overreact. I overwork. If they say to you, Nicole, this has been me for several decades, is it too late for me to change? What do you say to them?
- [119:45]
B
I would want to acknowledge that they're already starting to change. The ability to gain insight or to see ourself, in a way, hopefully. The reason why I'm always laboring the evolution, the science, right, the dynamics, is to hopefully allow the criticism and shame to expand into grace and compassion for oneself. But the moment of awareness, in my opinion, is the beginning of change. So I want to acknowledge that, listener, that you are already in the action of creating a new opportunity. Now, the goal, right, is, as we've been talking about throughout the translate, the insight that you've gained from listening to this podcast. And again, thank you for tuning in, but to your daily experience, not the traditional sense of insight that you and I had been talking about, but the lived experience. Because every moment that we tune into ourself is a moment where we give ourself the opportunity to shift our body into a state that will allow us to show up differently. Though I don't want it to be lost on people that the moment that an insight is gained and awareness is gained. Right. Hopefully again, even if there's that voice of criticism or fear or worry that it's too long, it's too late, it's overdue. I've messed up all these people and I've hurt people in my life, is really the moment we can give ourself the opportunity to, with a bit of understanding of why we've adapted in that way, maybe allow in the possibility of feeling grace and compassion in a future moment. But it is the moment that change has already begun.
- [121:09]
A
Yeah. Beautiful. Nicole, thank you for all the work that you do. Thank you for writing this new book, and thank you for coming back on the podcast.
- [121:17]
B
This has been such an honor. Thank you for having me and for all the work and beautiful embodiment that you are putting out into the world too.
- [121:27]
A
Really hope you enjoyed that conversation. Do have a think about one thing you can take away and apply in your own life and also one thing you could teach to someone else. Remember, when you take teach someone else, it not only helps them, it also helps you learn and retain the information. Now before you go, I just wanted to let you know about something I'm really excited about. On July 1st, I am kicking off my first ever 21 day energy reset. It's a simple challenge built around the four pillars of how you feel each day. How you relax, eat the eat, move and sleep. And if you're someone who's tired of feeling tired, then this challenge is for you. Over 21 days, you'll build simple daily habits that will help you wake up with more energy, feel calmer and clearer, and start to feel like yourself again. Small actions which will lead to a big change in how you feel. And the best part? You won't be doing it on your own. You'll be doing it alongside other people. And I'll be there with you on the live kickoff call. It's 29.99 to join and you can sign up now at drchatterjee.com resets and before you take off, always remember you are the architect of your own health. Making lifestyle change is always worth it because when you feel better, better, you live more.