Episode 157 - Leaving Polygamy, Finding my Voice with Shirlee Draper

Today, I get to talk with someone whose story has stayed with me for years. Shirlee Draper grew up in a polygamist community that became more controlling and unsafe as time went on. With no money, no work history, and no support outside her community, she made the difficult decision to leave everything behind and start over. We discuss the tension between staying and knowing something isn’t right, and what it takes to start trusting yourself again. This conversation is not just about Shirlee’s journey—it’s about what can happen when women find their voice and their autonomy. Here’s what we cover:

• How Shirlee spent years saving money and quietly planning before she could leave

• What it means to choose the “least harmful option” when every choice feels like a betrayal

• Why we can’t understand other people’s choices without their experiences and context

• Why decision-making is something you have to learn after being told what to do your whole life

• What it looks like to help women build their own inner voice instead of replacing it with another authority

Shirlee Draper was born and raised in “Short Creek.” After leaving the community, she obtained a Bachelor of Social Work and a Master of Public Administration. She has served in many capacities in the rebirth of her hometown, including facilitating the election of the first female mayor in 2017; opening a community health clinic in 2019; serving on the board of the UEP Trust and Short Creek Community Center; and part of the Collective Impact project aimed at community revitalization.She is employed as Deputy Director for Cherish Families, a social service nonprofit which helps people from polygamous backgrounds move from crisis to thriving. She specializes in bridging the population with mainstream society and provides education for outside service providers and government agencies She also serves on several state and civic committees. Shirlee lives in St. George with her special needs children and loves to play the piano, read and travel.

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facebook.com/shirlee.draper

linkedin.com/in/shirlee-draper

lostandfound.club/events

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Transcript

 Sara Bybee Fisk 00:59

I am so excited for you to hear this interview with Shirlee Draper. Her story has inspired me, and as I have followed the work that she has done, it has just been an endless source of inspiration. It is so deeply human. Let me tell you a little bit about Shirlee. Shirlee grew up in the FLDS church, the fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which is an offshoot of the LDS church that I grew up in. And she grew up in this really tightly knit border community known as Short Creek, which is Colorado City, Arizona. She was born into a polygamous family and raised in the FLDS church that really dictated everything about what she wore, who she married, and how much of the outside world she was allowed to see. At 23, Shirlee was placed into an arranged marriage. She became a first wife, and then part of a plural wife household, and then a mother of four children, including a medically fragile daughter that she almost lost. And then, with no money, no credit history, no rental history, she packed her children into a car and left everything she had ever known in her community when she realized she did not want that life anymore.That all by itself would be remarkable. It would be an incredible story. But what Shirlee has done since then is what really made me want to have her on the podcast. I actually first met Shirlee back in 2018 when Short Creek was just beginning to open itself up to the outside world. For context, Warren Jeffs was the self-proclaimed prophet of the FLDS church, and he wielded absolute control over the community for years, arranging marriages, including lots of underage girls, expelling families on a whim, abuse and violence, and using fear and isolation as tools of really total domination. It's an incredible story. Google it if you're interested. He was arrested in 2006, and he's currently serving a life sentence for sexual assault of minors. His grip on Short Creek had been so complete and so suffocating that even after his arrest, it took years before the community felt safe enough to cautiously begin opening its doors. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 03:27

And I was among a small group of people who got to visit in 2018 as that was starting to happen and meeting Shirlee then, kind of planted a seed that eventually led to this conversation. A little bit more about Shirlee, just so you really get a feel for how amazing she is. Shirlee went back to school, she earned a master's in public administration, and she is today the director of operations for Cherish Families, which is a nonprofit that has grown from two volunteers in 2014 to 21 employees that help families in 17 different states, Canada and Mexico.And the heart of what Cherish Families does is something that I find I just connect with. so completely. It's meeting women exactly where they are and helping them make choices about what they want for their lives. If a woman wants to leave her polygamous community, then Cherish Families helps her leave with housing and support and case management and mental health resources and somebody who actually understands what she's walking away from. But there are women who don't want to leave. They want to stay. And if she wants to remain with her family and in her community and with her faith group, then Cherish Families helps her to do that too with dignity, without judgment, and with resources that will help her make the best decisions for her life. Because the goal is not ever to tell women what to do, right? The goal is to make sure women actually have choice, informed choice, resources to help them make their choice. And that's what Shirlee does. And I think it is just incredible. Now, some of you might be thinking, okay, what does somebody who has left a polygamous, you know, life and faith organization have to do with me? And you're going to find out what Shirlee and I talk about in this episode, the themes, finding your own voice when every system is telling you to be quiet, trusting your gut, even when the stakes are high, and making brave decisions before you can possibly know how they'll turn out. Those are not niche experiences, right? They are the human experience and Shirlee just lived them in a different way than most of us will. But that clarity makes her one of the most honest and insightful, wise people that I've ever encountered about what it actually looks like to stop outsourcing your life to other people's expectations, and to start trusting yourself to reconnect, or to connect to the voice that all of us have, that helps us know what is best to do. You do not have to have grown up in a polygamous community, in order to know what it feels like to silence yourself or to stay somewhere out of fear, or to wonder if you're allowed to want something different. Shirlee's story just covers all of those themes, and I'm so excited for you to hear this. Finally, if this episode moves you or is intriguing to you and you want to go deeper, I have actually some, it's news that I'm truly excited about. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 06:35

This April 17th through 19th, Shirlee is leading a historical tour of Short Creek in Hilldale, Utah, and I will be there. All of the proceeds benefit Cherish families. It is genuinely a rare opportunity to visit this community, to be hosted by Shirlee, to learn its history, and to support the women and families that Shirlee's organization works with.You can find all the details and get your tickets, find out any information you need at lostandfound.club. I will put the link in the show notes. I'd love to see you there. Please welcome the remarkable Shirlee Draper. Shirlee, it is such a pleasure to have a chance to talk with you again. It's been several years since you and I interacted, but I have thought about you many, many, many, many times. 

Shirlee Draper 07:24

Thank you. It's an honor to be asked to be on your show. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 07:26

As we kind of begin our interview, I'm really interested in if you could just give us an overview of your life as many details as you would want us to know that kind of set up the context for our conversation today. 

Shirlee Draper 07:41

Hey, that's, that's not a small ask. Let's do that. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 07:46

Just that little thing. 

Shirlee Draper 07:48

Okay. So, of course, born and raised in the FLDS community in Short Creek, which is Hilldale, Utah, Colorado City, Arizona. And growing up really in a village, like it was, everybody in town was either my relative, my neighbor, my school friend. I literally knew everybody in town. When the saying, you know, takes a village to raise a child, nobody knows what that means anymore. We really did have a village. We took care of each other. We lived in common. The community was owned by a trust, which was owned by the church. And so, that meant that we were all pretty cohesive.And we had a community garden, and we all went and bottled the fruit, and it went in the bishop's storehouse, and people who needed it could take it. And we just had our plays and programs and dances. And we were a self-contained community. As a child, there were very overt messages about, you know, what a girl's role is, what a woman's role is. But I was raised by a woman who was not quite a round peg for a round hole. She was quite an outlier. And so, my mom, very early on, well, she instilled a love of reading into me. And so, I read everything I could get my hands on, but she was also quite a feminist, very outspoken, quite independent.And so, she instilled in me the, and quite explicitly, you know, you question things. You feel good in your soul before you do things. She called it the distant early learning system. If somebody sets your bells off, she said, you trust your inner being. And so, my mom taught me how to be outspoken at the same time as kind of reinforcing the religion. And so, it was a little anachronistic, but that's human nature. Like, there are all of these contradictions we're constantly encountering, and that was my home life. And so, before Warren Jeffs came along, we had, you know, I went to public school, graduated from public high school. I was going to the local community college. There was a lot of freedom.I was working. I had my own job. I had my own car. There was, you know, girls were not expected to get married really young, but they were expected to toe the line. They were expected to be obedient and say the right things and do the right things. And I wasn't necessarily saying the right things, but I was doing the right things. I was a good girl. I would go to church every Sunday. I fully believed in this religion that was the correct religion because I was born into it, and that's how we define correct religions. And I fully believed, you know, this is what God wanted. And there were things about it that I didn't agree with, and I just figured I was going to navigate those things, and I would have it out with God after I died. And so, I was placed into an arranged marriage because that's how our community did it. And soon after my marriage, or even right around the time I was getting married, was when Warren Jeffs was really starting to rise to power. 

Shirlee Draper 11:12

But at that point, he didn't really have any impact on my life. You know, he was in Salt Lake. Mostly, you know, he'd come down with his father once in a while. We'd see him around and things like that, but I never had any regard for him, and it didn't mean anything to me.But soon after I was married, I had three children in rapid succession. And by then, he'd really kind of ensconced himself into this leadership. And I remember the first time I heard him speak in church, and he said something that made me just go, oh, I don't like this guy. Like, that's not what we believe. And so I just, at that point, I'm like, well, and it doesn't matter because he's not in leadership, I don't have to worry about him. But I started to see him really slide himself between his father, who was the prophet at the time, and the community and start to really do horrible things and taking families apart and instilling really ridiculous rules and saying we can't say certain words, we can't wear certain colors, we can't play, we can't, you know, all of these things, we can't be critical or questioning of any doctrine and then really seeing the cost when people would start to do any of those things, they would immediately be ejected from the community, they would lose their families, they would lose all contact with any friends, family, anything. And so that cost was so high, and that's when it became so rigid that I started realizing that I would have to be really careful, I would have to start being silent about my questions and my concerns, my way of operating in this world. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 13:04

So fascinating that you have a mother who teaches you about this distant early warning system. And then one of your earliest memories of Warren Jeffs is him triggering that early warning system.That's exactly right. And you feeling in your body, I don't like this guy. 

Shirlee Draper 13:25

the very first time I heard him speak. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 13:27

help those who would be listening to this who don't really understand the cost of being ejected from the community, right? They might think, Oh, well, you just go live somewhere else. Or yeah, you just, you know, you just move.Can you please, if you're, if you're watching the YouTube version of this, Shirlee's eyes just got real big. Can you please help them understand what the actual cost was. 

Shirlee Draper 13:55

Oh yes, there was no just about it. First of all, if the church owns the home that you live in, and you've spent your entire life giving over everything you own, and all of your money and everything because that was

Sara Bybee Fisk 14:10

the practice, that was the expectation, right? You're provided a home, buys church, and in exchange, you... 

Shirlee Draper 14:17

Yes. You turn over all of your access to the church. We were living Brigham Young's version of the United Order. And so for many people, you have no assets that you can parlay into a new home. For everyone, you have no rental history. You can't just walk up to a landlord and say, I've got all of these years of good rental history. So there's all of these barriers. For women specifically, there's no credit history. There's no income. Sometimes there's not a lot of education, no work history. And so for me specifically, there was no just anything. By the time I decided I have to get out of here, I had three children and another on the way. And with no rental history, no credit history, no work history, no income for children, and two of them were special needs. And my daughter, who was medically fragile, her nighttime nursing care, all of my friends, all of my family, my identity, my sense of belonging, everything was tied up in this community. I had literally nothing on the outside, no assets, no support structure, no sense of belonging.And I don't know if your listeners are in tune to how critical the sense of belonging is to good mental health. When you are taken from that, it has a huge psychological cost. So all of these costs coupled with the fact that every time I left my community, I was treated with a lot of hostility because we were deviants. We were evil. And so people would see me in my distinctive dress and go, that's one of those. She's evil. She's not welcome here. And I would get treated like that. So when I'm saying the cost of being ejected from this community, where first of all, it's mostly safe, you take away the Warren Jeff, but everything else is safety. It's belonging, it's love, it's support, it's all of this structure. And so you're choosing in a moment, am I going to negotiate with Warren Jeffs? Or I'm going to leave literally everything and try to negotiate with the hostility on the outside. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 16:44

That is certainly the tension that I want to get into in just a second, but before I just, I want to go back because you talked about this kind of beautiful village, right? This self-contained community.And for those who are not familiar with the way that the FLDS community works, it was isolated. The only people who lived in that community were members of the FLDS communities and the various, you know, maybe different branches. Is that the right way to say that? 

Shirlee Draper 17:17

kind of. I mean, it was the vast majority was FLDS. There were a few outliers. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 17:22

Okay, thank you. And this beautiful community that you talk about where everybody takes care of each other, everybody donates all of their extra money and food into this common pot that takes care of everyone.That seems like such a beautiful idea until you look at the effects on the women and those who want to leave, no job history, no rental history, no ability to provide for themselves, no understanding of how the quote unquote outside world works so that you can navigate it. Your dress is distinctive, your hair is distinctive, your manner of speech is distinctive. And any time you leave your community, you are treated as the deviant other.I remember traveling through on family trips, traveling through that Four Corners area and stopping in a Walmart and seeing members, I'm not sure where they are from, but the distinctive dress, the long hair, the buns, the many, many children, and just staring, right? And so I can't imagine what that was like for you as a woman with children, especially the ones that you described having special needs and medical fragility. And so at a certain point, you knew you wanted to leave.Yes. Right. Yeah. Okay. Yes. Can you tell me a little bit more about what was it that kind of tipped you over from, I don't like this. I don't know about this. This, my early warning system is being pinged too. I don't want to be here anymore. 

Shirlee Draper 19:05

Yes, there was actually a moment, and I had actually several of these moments, but the one that tipped me from going, I can navigate this, I think I can figure this out, to I have to get out of here, was the day that Warren Jeff stood up in church and said, Father said we have to take our children out of school. And it was because it was a public school and they couldn't keep apostates or others from the outside in coming to that school. And so our children would have to associate with apostates, which was again, very high cost. So that day, because education meant so much to me and my children weren't even of school age at that point. And I just thought, oh my gosh. And again, remember my history is having read every book in the school library and everybody's library is in town. And there was a lot of history books in there. And I'd read about what dictators like Hitler does and about how shutting down education is very, very important to keep people in ignorance. I just had a chill run down my back and I'm like, oh my God, okay. So I knew this train was going off a cliff, but it's going off a cliff now. This is it, I have to get my children out of here.And that day it was nuts. I'm sitting there in church and I'm thinking, I can't be the only one that's feeling like this. And I'm looking around at other people's faces to see if anybody else is going, what? And everybody was just like, very serene. And I'm like, did you not hear what he said? And I just, I sat, I used to be in the choir, but that day was sitting in the audience and I leaned forward and I looked at the side doors and I thought, those are closed. If they trot the poisoned Kool-Aid in here now, how am I going to get out? That moment I equated to this, this is it. Like, this is the final straw. This is, there's no getting out of this. I had no idea how much worse he could get. I had no idea. All I knew was that I was not going to stay there and let him do that to my kids. And so, and that was, so in 1998, I decided that I wasn't part of anything and I might have to leave, but I think that was in the year 2000 that he said that. And that was the moment that I was like, oh, I'm not, I can't just play around anymore. Like, I have to actively get going on planning this. And I have to figure out a way to leave on my own terms with, and that means I have to have time to create assets and figure out finances so that I can take my children with me. Because if I had just left at that moment, I would have been sleeping under a bridge and I couldn't do that to my children. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 22:28

I think what people can identify with is being a part of a system that is getting increasingly more toxic, controlling, whereas less sovereignty and freedom, and thinking, okay, all right, I'm going to have to figure out how to do this. I'm going to figure out how to handle this. Okay, I can do this because what they get out of being in the system, like a job or a certain relationship is still worth it to them, quote unquote, worth it, right? But then there's that moment where it tips over into, wow, I don't think this is worth it anymore.That's right. And there are professions like that. There are relationships like that. There are situations like that. And systems like that. Systems like that. That's exactly right, right? And so whether it's the polygamist FLDS system or the medical system where you're a doctor in a hospital that is increasingly just squeezing more and more and more and more out of you and having less and less and less room for you as a human and what your humanity demands, I think we're talking about themes that are very, very familiar to a lot of people. And so I appreciate you speaking about it that way. And I also appreciate you bringing up the fact that you centered the experience of your children, because I often think that women especially and parents will often do things for our children that we may not necessarily do for ourselves. And that is also a really important connection point for people listening to this because you knew if we're going to leave, it has to be done in a certain way so that I can take my children with me so that they are safe and so that I can care for them. 

Shirlee Draper 24:35

Yeah, that's right. And I think I probably, I don't know, it's hard to speculate, but it really was trying to keep my children safe, that gave me the strength to do most of it.And that was that was really the moment where I stopped thinking, I'm just going to continue to try to negotiate this, I'm just going to, you know, keep quiet, keep to myself, keep, you know, keep we have to, we have to be done. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 25:08

Yeah. You've said that you spent some time in what you call the little dance of self-suppression, right? Because you were not ready to be kicked out. You wanted to avoid being ejected, but you knew that that was the direction you were heading in. How did you manage that?And how do you distinguish between being strategically patient and self-betrayal? 

Shirlee Draper 25:37

That's complex because it felt like a betrayal. It felt like a betrayal, but no matter what I did, it was going to be a betrayal. In that moment, I'm choosing the least harmful thing. Not the best option, but the least harmful option because all of the options are harmful.From that moment on, I'm packing up a pan here and a blanket there and some toys and things that might not be missed from the household and starting to pack boxes together and I'm starting to save money. I'm starting to make plans, but I have to keep my mouth shut about how I feel about Warren Jeffs and what's happening because if I'm exposed, I'll be ejected and they'll be able to keep my kids and it will be a fight after that. Those were all betrayals. Listening to people talk about Warren Jeffs as if he's God and inside it's burning my very soul. That was a betrayal to not say anything, but it would have been a bigger betrayal to my long-term plans to expose myself. Starting in the year 2000 until the last week of February in 2004, that's four years of betraying myself in service of something better for my kids and just listening and trying to not give myself away while I'm strategizing and saving and planning. It came to a moment where it was a ready or not moment. There was a Saturday meeting where Warren Jeffs called 21 leaders of the community in front of the audience and ejected them publicly and then he made everybody get down on their knees and swear allegiance to him. And that was my moment where I was like, there will be no more betrayal. And every time I took a breath for those four years, it was like there was a band that was tightening around my chest to where I couldn't breathe and I couldn't breathe and I couldn't breathe. And that was the final moment was like a harness clicked into place. And I went, this is the day there will be no more days like this. When I finally said, OK, next Saturday, I'm driving away. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 28:10

That's so incredibly powerful and also so nuanced. I think it's so fascinating that we want there to be good guys and bad guys. We want there to be right choices and wrong choices. And we so often look on the outside of people's lives and want them to have made different decisions.But I think you're talking about having to choose the lesser harmful things in service of the greater purpose is such a beautiful thing to consider because we just can't know what that is for other people all the time. That's right, that's exactly right. And so the judgments that we make and the way that we look through the window to their lives and criticism is such a disservice not only to us, right, because we don't know, but to the humanity of other people and to the wisdom that individuals are only given for their own lives. 

Shirlee Draper 29:15

That is so true. I've learned since then, and I've said so many times, that if there's one thing I know, is that if I were the person I'm looking at and wondering why they're doing something, if I had been raised, because they had been raised, if I had the information in my head that they have in their head, if I have the fears and the experiences and all of the things that make up their world, I would be doing what they're doing. Yes, yes.And I can't just imbue my perspective into their world and expect them to do something different because they don't have the information that I have in my head, and I don't have the information that they have in their head. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 29:54

Yeah, their life makes sense in the context of their experiences and what they know. And I think that's so easy to lose.I lose sight of it, right? When I look at people with whom I, I have differences, I want them to act, quote unquote, better, different. I lose sight of that. And I really appreciate how you're, how you're talking about that. So the following Saturday came, what happened? 

Shirlee Draper 30:21

So I had, I had found two allies during those intervening four years and one was my younger brother whose soul had also been insulted by Warren Jeffs. I finally found somebody I could talk to about it. And so he was very sympathetic and told me, you know, I will gather up your boxes and keep them in my room so that you won't be found out. And I had recruited him and my nephew to get a U-Haul and show up at my house that following Saturday. And I think, you know, there's, there's this, this pervasive notion out there that if somebody left, they had to flee in the middle of the night and people were coming after them and they were dragging them back and all of that. And that might have been true for one or two people, but, but writ large, you know, Warren Jeffs was very mindful of the poisoning of the well. If he was preemptively removing them so that they would not talk about things that he didn't want them to talk about. So, so rather than having people come after you, it was good riddance and we never want to see you again, mostly.So, so my plan was that Saturday I was going to get up and just tell my husband and my sister wife that I'm leaving and I'm taking my children and I'm also taking this particular piece of furniture and, you know, things like that. But it was, you know, if it was very lucky, my husband and sister wife decided to go out of town that day. And so I didn't have to navigate that. So my brother pulled the U-Haul up to the front gate at 10 o'clock in the morning and we loaded up and drove away. But, but before I left town, I went around to my family to tell them goodbye. So I, I just made the announcement to my family. I just went to my parents. I went to each of my siblings in their homes and said, I do not believe in this. I think it's been very harmful. I understand that you do. And I also understand that if you believe in this, this means this is the end of our relationship and I'm not going to pursue you. I won't, you know, I won't put you in harm by coming to your house, but I want you to know, here's my address. You can come and find me at any time. My door is always open to you. And so I just, I said goodbye believing that that would be the last time I would ever see them. And so you can imagine that day was so hard because I was so close with my family. And, and leaving them and rethinking, you know, I'm going to a place where I'm going to be friendless and family less. I'm going to be an orphan. You know, it had to take me being at a point where I literally could not breathe before that was going to happen. So I moved, I moved to St. George that day and, and my parents and my brother and his wife came and found me that they just got in their car and followed me down to make sure that I was moved in okay. They helped me move all the furniture. They made sure everything was safe and secure and we had food and, and they didn't leave until like one or two in the morning. And, and I just, in that moment I was like, well, I wish I'd have known you were going to do that before. I would have left a long time ago. So. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 33:57

Yeah, not being able to talk about it, not being able to talk about your feelings, not being able to talk about that distant warning system that is now fully on fire every single day in your body suffocating you not being able to breathe.Do you have a sense of what that was like for your mother to watch you do that? 

Shirlee Draper 34:21

You know, it's so interesting. This is my mom because she's passed away now, but she occupies such a huge part of who I am and what I became. And she is so, she's so human in that she's got so many contradictions because until she died, she still professed to believe in the religion, but she wasn't doing the dutiful, obedient things that she was supposed to be doing. And so she chose to live her religion on her terms.My mom was one of the few people that I actually expressed quite a bit of my discontent to. One time I told her that I felt like that Warren Jeffs was the antichrist because he was undoing everything Christ taught us. And she never betrayed me, you know. And she said, you know, I said, what, you know, Christ only asked us to love. And Warren's telling us to not love. I can't think of anything more antichrist than that. And she said to me, and as I look back, I think it was so ingenious how she worded it. She said, that's not right. And I'm like, no, it is not right. And it could have meant anything. She could have meant that you're not saying the right thing about Warren or that she agreed with me that it wasn't right. But she never, never did shun me. From that moment on, she would come and see me all the time. And we spend a lot of time together. And so she was, it couldn't have been a surprise to her that I was going to leave. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 36:09

I experienced the smallest part, I think, of what you're talking about because when I was having my own inner turmoil, I couldn't talk about it with my parents either. I was afraid that I was afraid of their disappointment. I was afraid of crushing them. And the day that I told them that I was leaving, it was the hardest conversation that I ever had.And I had nowhere near on the line that you had, right? I did experience the loss of friends and community, but nowhere near the scale that you are describing. And so when you were driving away, what was that like for you? 

Shirlee Draper 36:51

you. Again, the contradictions, you know, it was terrifying. You know, the there was an overriding fear of the unknown. I know I'm leaving behind hell, but I don't know that it's not hell that I'm going into. There was

Sara Bybee Fisk 37:10

so that your previous treatment whenever you would leave the community. 

Shirlee Draper 37:14

Yeah. And, and being unclear about how I'm going to, you know, how am I going to help my children navigate, um, acculturation? My kids don't know anything about public school or, you know, pop culture or anything. That's a huge barrier.Um, how am I going to navigate financial systems and structures that I don't know anything about? There's the fear, of course, of, of losing all of my friends and family and not knowing, you know, where my support structure is going to be. But there was also a sense of exhilaration. And I am, I think I have a little bit of a neurodivergence in that I've always mistaken fear for excitement. So, and so I did have this sense of grand adventure. Like I have no idea what's going on and I'm free. I'm going to be making every decision on my own without repercussions, without, you know, denigration. I will choose exactly what I want to do. I will manage my life exactly how I want to manage my life. And so that sense of exhilaration as I was driving away coupled with the fear and the sorrow was just, it was really overwhelming.So having left this very controlling culture, I was, I was so excited to join what from the outside looked like such an egalitarian society, you know, all of the right things are said, you know, women have all of these rights and women can hold public office. And, and it was, in fact, it was one of the things that the FLDS pointed to as evil was that women didn't know their place in outside society. And so I was really excited to join this, this place. And, and it was, it was such a shock and a disappointment that the outside world really wasn't different than the FLDS. It was just more covert about it. There were a lot of unspoken rules, a lot of microaggressions, a lot of side eyes, but you know, nobody was ever honest about women shouldn't do that. They never said it out loud, but, but there was a lot of cues that I just kept just tripping over and bumbling into. And pretty soon I'm like, Oh, Oh, Oh, I see how it is. Okay. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 39:49

I wish you were wrong, Shirlee. 

Shirlee Draper 39:51

I wish I were wrong too. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 39:55

Hey, have you ever had a moment where you really wanted to ask for something? You wanted to maybe set a limit or tell someone about the support you needed and you just couldn't make yourself say it, almost like the words got stuck? Me too. And actually, I lived that way for years. I felt alone and exhausted. And it's the whole reason that I do the work that I do now.If any part of that sounds familiar, have I got a workshop for you? My next workshop is called Say What You Want to Say. And it is for you if you find that it is really easy to speak up for maybe your clients or your kids or your colleagues, but when it comes to your own personal life, you can't ask for what you want. Or maybe you've noticed that you spend a lot of time, days, weeks, maybe even months rehearsing what you want to say, but then the minute things get uncomfortable, you cave or you apologize or you retreat. You're not the problem. You just never learned the skill. Say What You Want to Say is a free one-hour workshop that's happening on April 9th at 5 p.m. Pacific. And here's what I can promise. You will leave with one skill and one thing you can actually do that week. So you become the woman who can have any conversation she needs to have and handle whatever happens. Check the show notes for the registry link or you can also grab it from my Instagram bio and I'll see you there. But yeah, the gender roles and the rigidity and the desire for compliance over sovereignty is, yeah, it's a feature, not a bug. 

Shirlee Draper 41:40

Oh yeah. Yeah. And I mean, and that's what makes, you know, right now there's, there's this dystopian fun house mirror where, you know, handmade's tail apparently has been a, a how to instead of a cautionary table and tail. And so now I'm, I'm looking at this stuff being coded and being, now this is being said out loud, you know, these kinds of things. And I'm, I'm horrified because I'm like, did nobody learn anything from what we just went through.Yeah. Like people are saying out loud, women need to be obedient and submissive. And I'm like, Oh yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 42:19

Oh, but no. Women need to know their place, right? Women shouldn't vote. Women should be... Yes, there's a lot more of that being done. 

Shirlee Draper 42:28

said out loud now. And it's, you know, actually, in retrospect, it's good that these things are rising to the surface because before, you know, I would be calling this out 22 years ago when I joined this wonderful society. And I would be called a feminazi. And that's not true.And women have all of these special privileges. But now that it's being said out loud, now I'm like, now can we talk about this? 

Sara Bybee Fisk 42:54

Yeah, it is. You and I are in agreement.We have to expose that dark underbelly of people who still think this way. We have to know that they are not just a figment of feminist nightmares, right? It's happening in actuality. 

Shirlee Draper 43:14

Yeah. And now, because now because, you know, it's being recorded, it's on the internet, we can not just say, this is what I'm experiencing, because women can't be believed that that's what they're experiencing, it has to be shown. And another man has to be saying it before other men can say, Oh, oh, you are experiencing this. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 43:34

It is true. It is happening. So, Shirlee, you now work with women who are exiting controlling systems. I would love to know about your work with Cherish families. 

Shirlee Draper 43:48

I would love to talk about cherished families. So, you know, it's interesting, the more the more therapy I do, the more I realize, you know, cherished families is, is a result of my trauma. We always work through our trauma. But it was born out of, you know, seeing, you know, I'm like, okay, this is my experience. There are going to be more and more people who are going to catch on to this, who are going to be victims of trauma and family abuse and all of these things that are going to need help. And in fact, people would show up at my house, I was having people sleep on my couch while I would be connecting them with services. And and I would go to elected officials and say, Hey, did you know that there's all these kids being taken from their parents and farmed out to different places and being abused and what we know about childhood trauma and its impacts on the lifespan, we are going to have a flood of crisis. It's coming, it's arriving. And I felt like chicken little running around, saying the sky is falling and everybody's like, Oh, yeah, probably, probably. And nobody was doing anything about it.And so finally, I realized that I'm was going to have to do something about it. And that's when I can collect connected with Alina Darger. And she'd already filed the paperwork for cherished families. She came and hey, I hear you're talking about doing this work. And I said, Yes, I am. But I also had had a lot of experience with other organizations who were trying to quote unquote rescue the polygamists. And what that looked like was rescuing them from their bad religion and imposing the correct one on them and thereby solving all their problems. And you know, shipping them out of the world. It's like now you're a whole human being because you look like me. So now you're worthy of God's blessings. And and then a lot of exploitation in the process, you know, putting people on television, making them say horrible things about their own DNA, their family, their upbringing. And and I just I was horrified by that.So you know, we Alina and I had to come to Jesus, I'm like, you will not exploit people, you will not do this. And and a lot of it really was about, you know, we're not making people's decisions. So one of the things that cherish families does not do is tell people they have to leave polygamy. We're like, what would you like to do? What help do you need? What would help you become a whole human being expressive of your own wants and desires and best life choices. So we help people from any polygamous background, they don't have to be leaving for us to get help for them to get help from us. And we provide crime victim services, which is so huge, mental health, housing, family peer support, basic needs, legal services, and and we connect to any other thing that people need. 

Shirlee Draper 46:50

So our overarching program is crisis to thriving. And we measure 10 life domains, it's whatever you need in any of these life domains to reach thriving. If that's a job, we'll connect you with workforce services in a very culturally sensitive way, so that they can provide services and help you get education and and a job that you know, sets you up for success. If you need education, we'll get you into a university or whatever is appropriate for you. If it's you know, in medical services, we have all of these partnerships that that help people get the resources they need. And it's a way that is that is so much more cultural, culturally sensitive and friendly. So I am really proud of the work that we do. . 

Sara Bybee Fisk 47:33

I hear two things kind of reflected back in the story of what you do with cherished families. Number one, you are now that ally that you found in your brother and in your nephew. You are now the person that they can talk to, that they can run these ideas by, that they can get perspective from. And that is so essential, right? To have someone who is willing to hear your inner thoughts of like, I don't know that I want to do this. Or there's something about this, that distant early warning system, right? Mind is being pinged and I think you're someone that I can talk to about that. I might not know what it means yet. I might not even know what I want to do about it yet. That's right.But I hear that echoed often in the work that I do with women, where something doesn't feel right. They don't know totally what it means yet or what it's going to mean for their life. And they're very scared to think about the final destination of this, whether it's in a relationship that is not showing up or working out the way they thought it would, a job, any kind of a friendship. Right. So I have found that if I push them in any direction, there's a collapse because they're not ready to make the decisions. And then the second thing that I hear is that strategic patience again, where honoring someone's sovereignty and inner wisdom is the only way for it to develop within themselves. And it's like trying to harvest fruit before it's ready, right? It has to have the time that it needs to grow and mature because otherwise you're not going to get what you want. You're going to get fruit that isn't ripe, fruit that isn't ready. And it's going to, in most cases, they're just going to go back and kind of double down even harder on what is already known and safe and familiar. 

Shirlee Draper 49:45

Yes, that's exactly right. And for this population, particularly, because they've been told what to do their entire lives, and particularly under Warren Jeffs, where perfect obedience at the hint of something that you're told to do, you jump. There is no questioning, there's no thought for yourself. And so to tell someone what's best for them to do is just recreating that authority that Warren Jeffs had over them. And so you take that burden, that mental of Warren Jeffs off them, and you put your own onto them. And all you're doing is perpetuating the crisis.And so it's so important for us to help people develop their own inner will, their own inner listening, their own inner self-determination. And many times, we've had people just say, I'm at this crossroads, I need you to tell me what to do. And we're like, how about we walk through a decision tree? What would happen if? And if you choose this, what might happen? And just really building into those skills, because they have it, they have it within themselves. They just need to learn how to tap into that. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 50:59

That is such an important point because I think having also, you know, a lot of experience with being told what to do and being told what to wear and how to behave and what was okay and what to watch and what music to listen to and what life decisions were best on a, on a different scale, right? Where the scales are not the same. And I want to acknowledge that I am so familiar with that feeling of just tell me what's right. Just tell me what to do and looking to some authority figure outside of myself who seems to have it together, right? I'm just going to follow what they want, but you're so right in that that just recreates the system that keeps me disconnected from myself and it reinforces that I don't know and that I can't handle the consequences of making my own decisions.And I think one of the most powerful things that I have learned for myself is that I can, I can handle messing up. I can handle making the quote unquote wrong choice. I don't know that I believe that there, you know, are right and wrong choices. The way I, I know for sure that I, I don't believe that there are right and wrong choices the way I used to. Um, but I, I can handle making a mistake. Right. That's how we grow. And I think when you grow up in, you know, either the FLDS version of perfect obedience or the mainstream LDS version of, you know, obeying with exactness, right? Cause that's one of the phrases that I grew up with. Oh, wow. There is that disconnection from yourself and this absolute a hundred percent focus on am I keeping the rules? Can someone look at me and judge me worthy and, and honorable and obedient? So, York Creek had kind of this impenetrability to like out outsiders, right? Law enforcement didn't really go in. And do you think that that is important to talk about what happened after Warren left and in terms of what that meant for Cherish families, because Cherish families started before he was arrested or it was getting started kind of at the same time that kind of all of that was falling, that house of cards was coming down for him. 

Shirlee Draper 53:29

So, Cherish Families wasn't incorporated until January 2014. We got our 501c3 then, but Alina and I were both doing, you know, grassroots, independent social work from, you know, 2003. So, we were, you know, doing this kind of work and trying to connect people to help and everything until we finally had a structure that we could get grants and employ people. But yes, during that time, and even up until around 2015, 2016, my big goal with the work that I was doing was helping people get out of Short Creek, get out from under the control, because, you know, everybody was spying on everybody else. They had cameras. They were destroying people's lives, moving them around from house to house. And for me, it was like, if I can get you out of that community, you know, it's, it's tenuous. It's rough out here, but we can get you, we can get you settled. We can get you safe. We can start helping you make your decisions and, you know, get education until, until after the Department of Justice got a guilty verdict for the towns for discriminating in the police department.And that's when the reform started to happen, 2016, 2017. We really started to have a good police department that we could, we could report crimes to. Up to that point, it was the FLDS police department that was an arm of the church. And whenever I was reporting crimes in that community, I was going to the county sheriff to report crimes. And they were coming in and secretly, you know, working with me to investigate behind the backs of the local police department. And so, and so now with all of the reformations that have happened in the community, you know, homes are privatized. There's a lot of new people moving in. A lot of people who left are coming back and it's a completely different place. And now I'm telling people, and I remember the first time I told a woman this, she'd left the community. She called me, really needed some support. And I'm, and I heard myself say out loud, I think it would be a good idea for you to move back. And I was like, did I say that? And now, you know, we have affordable housing. Cherish families owns affordable housing in the community. And it's a, it's a great place for children to get back into school and be really understood and, you know, get back into community. And, and it's, it's a completely different place. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 56:02

That was the Short Creek that I visited. It was in probably right. I'm going to have to go find the year, but it was the turning over, right? You did. Right in that time.Yes, there were two restaurants, I think. And when we went, so I visited Short Creek as part of a group that was attempting to help. And one of the projects that we did was to take the former home of Warren Jeffs and attempt to turn it into a halfway home for people leaving polygamy. It's my understanding now that that was not the successful project that we hoped it would be at the time, but it gave me four or five days in that community talking with people and the hope was palpable. The way that people were describing their hopes and their dreams for rebuilding, for people returning, for them being able to own their own homes that had been part of the FLDS Trust. It was such a unique experience and the way that I remember it was in the voice of one woman that I'd spoke to. I remember her first name was Heather and she just said, it feels like I have a chance to create my life now. It feels like I actually have a chance to create the life that I want for myself now. Right. 

Shirlee Draper 57:43

Yeah, yeah, those were those were magical and heady times because we made a strategic plan. There was a group of us that got together, we called ourselves the community alliance, we made a strategic plan for the community. And we followed it through it happened.And so now, you know, we're turning the old meeting house into a community center, we've got a rec center, we've got all of these parks, and we've got trails planned. And we have a completely, you know, non religious, both towns are led by a completely secular town council. And, and it's just I mean, it's like a phoenix rising from the ashes. It's pretty glorious. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 58:25

must be so just affirming for you because I think back to that little girl whose mom was teaching her about that early warning system. And I mean, first of all, so revolutionary in the context of the life you grew up in.But that guide, that inner knowing is what tells us about the life we want for ourselves. And then to be able to live that out, not just in your own life, but then to be able to translate that work into the community that you loved, that you grew up in, that nurtured you, that cared for you, that was that beautiful. And I'm sure it wasn't all beautiful. There's always good and bad things of every situation. But to be able to take that back to that beautiful community that you grew up in must have been amazing for you. 

Shirlee Draper 59:26

Right. I'm, and it's one of the things that we, that we grapple with too, you know, it's like with such huge change and with everything being privatized, how do we get back that sense of community that was so destroyed, that sense of belonging that was just utterly annihilated by Warren Jeffs. And so there's been a conscious effort to, to rebuild the things, you know, our, our celebrations, our parks, the, the things that would bring us together are dances. There, there is a concerted effort to recreate those things so that as people are coming back and they're healing their wounds, that we are reestablishing a sense of community and belonging, because that was so important.And so, you know, looking at, at the whole, at the whole of, of my life of our childhood and taking what was working and was so great and healing the rest. It's, it's a very intentional and, and strategic and complex thing, you know, because so many people's amazing memories really are wrapped up in having two moms, you know, the, our, our lovely mayor, my best friend, Donia Jessup. One of the things she talks about was she always had a mom at home was providing their lunch and their dinner, even while her mom was working and she so deeply loved her other mother and she's still her mother to this day, even though the families are no longer together. And so, and so we, we look at that and we say, how do we recreate that without having the, the patriarchal and harmful systems that created that? And so we, we create our own grandmothers and we connect them with people and we create our own mothers and we adopt family members and, and we figure out other ways to do that. But it is very complex because there's also a lot of trauma wrapped up in the good. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:01:26

I didn't even think about that. Like how do you navigate the privatization? How do you not tip over into toxic capitalism where now it's every man for himself, every, every person who can just extract and earn for themselves.Like how do you preserve the best parts of what a community like Short Creek offered without poisoning it with the toxic traits of capitalism.That's, that's so fascinating. 

Shirlee Draper 01:02:03

I will say that's an uphill battle. We started off with a lot of empty homes and now, there are no empty homes and there's been a lot of investment and at one point, I did a housing study and found that 13% of the entire housing inventory was tied up into short-term rental and that was the direction it was going.So, now, housing there is just as expensive as it is in St. George and it's very expensive in St. George. So, we've got lower quality but the same prices and it's driving out the vulnerable, which is one of the reasons that cherished families invested in the affordable housing. We took a couple of very large houses and we're retrofitting them into multifamily apartments so that we can preserve places for the vulnerable and the population to be able to stay there and receive the benefits of community, home, all of the rebuilding efforts. But, it's hard to fight against that capitalistic machine. I wish I could say with any kind of confidence that we're going to be able to do it but I mean right now, that's the one of the cults that we're in as capitalism. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:03:22

Yeah, you have done a lot of cultural competency training for professionals who work with this population.What do outsiders most misunderstand about women who come from these communities and how does that, what farm does that misunderstanding or those misunderstandings do? 

Shirlee Draper 01:03:47

Well, I mean, there are several. One that I will point to is that women must be stupid to have the temerity to be born into this structure and be staying there and even choosing into it. And so there's this level of pity and condescension that's directed to our women. And I say that's greatly misplaced.You know, most women from all of these communities, first of all, we're all products of our socialization. But I wouldn't say that very many of them are dumb. There's a high level of competence and resilience that most experience, they're the most express. But even beyond that, there are reasons, there are functional reasons that women might opt to stay in polygamy. There are benefits that nobody wants to encounter. And it's true for really all, we talk about Muslim or Hindu or really any Mormonism. There are benefits to these structures. And when they're unpopular religions, nobody wants to hear about the benefits.And so I think that vulnerable, weak women is, that trope to be repeated is very, very harmful because it attracts predators to our community. We've had at least five men that I know of move to the community specifically to exploit women because this is a trope that keeps being repeated. So, for me, I'm like, let's first of all, get rid of the notion that somebody is a bad person for being born into or socialized into whatever the structure is that they're living in. And start to have room for this understanding that human experience is so complex and that everybody's experience can be different.So that's another, that's a third trope is that all of us have the same experience. So I will hear over and over and over, oh, I read so-and-so's book and so I know what you went through. And I'm like, you couldn't possibly know based on her experience because my experience was nothing like hers. And so there's this question, I always get these questions, what do they all do when this? When people leave the FLDS, do they do this? And I'm like, who's they? Tell me how everybody in St. George buys their groceries and I will condense for you the FLDS experience. It's not to be contained because humans all express so differently. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:06:54

love that you speak to the individuality of that experience and of our human tendency to just kind of collapse everyone from a particular religion, community, profession, culture, language group into a monolith and into one kind of singular experience. That's the human brain trying to simplify and reduce.I think a lot of times so that we can understand, but we have to fight against the urge and the inclination to oversimplify because it does rob people of their individual experiences. 

Shirlee Draper 01:07:39

Right. But it also, you know, and it's something that I have to fight against so much, it also collapses us to our worst common denominator, too, right? It's like, I've heard of all of the horrible things that happened in the FLDS. And so you're all guilty of it.Right. And so every news story that focuses on something that happened, and you can go find the comments that say, they all do this, to this day, they all abuse children, they all are, you know, are horrible in this way, they all get married under age. It's like, that's, that's not helpful. When people are trying to unpack and and look at the complexities of what they want to do, if all their experiences collapsed into this evil thing, then they don't have this luxury of unpacking and keeping what works. And so it causes people to go from from this one extreme to a far other extreme, where there's always, you know, really, really counterproductive things come out of that. People need time to unpack what might work. And if they're not allowed to, because of this dominant narrative, we're going to be unpacking on the other side. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:08:52

That is such an important point. And just speaks again to that strategic patience that you have made such a part of your own survival story and now the career of service.These conversations are my favorite because they really make me think about how I want to ask in a way that honors your experience and really gets at something of value for everyone because we are not all born into the same circumstances. And it is individuals who make up every single system. And so as you look back on the way that one leader dramatically changed the experience you were having and how that one leader sought to silence women and sought to train women in particular to abandon themselves in really particular ways. What do you think we as women in general can learn from that? 

Shirlee Draper 01:10:06

Well, I think there's a pattern, right, with authoritarians, with autocrats, that they have to not be questioned. And so I think it bears looking at and witnessing and seeing patterns. I'm literally begging people to see patterns of the creation of autocracy and fascism because they're there.There are no new tricks. The pattern is the same, and it's over and over and over. You just need to go reread the prints. From the beginning of time, the pattern has been the same. And I don't know, I think it's so in your face. And certainly, it starts with women. But it never ends there. And so men who are so comfortable with having women be silenced need to know, they're coming for you. When you create structures and systems that oppress people, you will end up being oppressed. This is a wheel that does not stop just because you're up. And so I think it's so important for people to understand. The world is made so much better when women are allowed to participate in society, in leadership, in structures. Like, there are objective studies that show how much better companies do, how much better governments do, how much more peaceful, how many more people are at the table when women are fully empowered. And for people who seek to oppress that, it's nothing more than a dream of power over others. It's not in service to a better society. It's not in service to anything being better other than having more power for themselves. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:12:08

That's it. And I'm so appreciative, Shirlee, of you taking the time to share your experience with me and with my audience.I have such respect for the way that you have turned your experience into a career of service and of helping. And as you noted, there's some working through of trauma in that. I feel that in my career, right? I help women leave the structure and the system of people, please. And there is an autobiographical line straight from my old life and who I was and what I used to believe to what I do now. And I feel very privileged to stand with a next two women like you doing this work, because I think we want the same thing. We want women to be able to speak, to say what needs to be said, to have a voice in whatever sphere they want. If it's just their own home, if it's just their own life, if that's what they want, I want them to have that. If they want it to be in their community, I want them to have that in their government, in broader political systems, I want them to have that. And I am just so appreciative of being able to do that work with you. 

Shirlee Draper 01:13:25

autonomy. Autonomy.And I'm sorry, I think that women are just more invested in everyone having a better experience and a better life. And maybe that's what makes capitalism so incompatible with egalitarianism. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:13:47

I agree. I think that over and over and over and over and over again, because another branch of the work that I do is with a nonprofit organization that works in Bolivia, which is where I served my LDS mission. And we work with women and children. And over and over and over and over again, we see that when we empower a woman, when we give a woman resources, she turns to her children and her family and her community, and she wants everyone to have a better, improved experience.That's right. And I, we could go back and forth. Is that nurture nature? I don't know that there's a good answer, but what I do know is that the research bears it out. Whether you are giving women microloans in terms of money, whether you are educating women, whether you are giving women work and job opportunities, they invest and they reinvest in their children and in their broader communities. 

Shirlee Draper 01:14:43

That's exactly right. It's my experience, you know, there's the old saying, a rising tide lifts all boats, and I like to amend that by saying when women are out fixing the holes in everyone else's boats, yes, but if we're torpedoing other people's boats, the rising tide does not lift all boats. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:15:05

That's right. That's right. But Shirlee, I'm so appreciative of your time. Is there anything in our conversation that you didn't get to say that you would like to end with? 

Shirlee Draper 01:15:15

Uh, I would, I would love to invite, I think that your audience would be really, really appreciative of this. We're doing an event with lost and found club as a women's retreat in Hilldale in short Creek, the weekend of April 17th through 19th, and it's going to be absolutely amazing. People get to tour the community and, and, uh, learn about it, but also learn about each other and it's going to be a lot of fun. And so anybody who is interested in that, we only have, I think 30 tickets left.Uh, they can go to lost and found.org. I think it's lost and found club.org or something and see the information there. But I would love to invite, invite people to that. And it's not just women men can come to, but they won't be staying on the same location that we'll be staying in because it'll be a shared house, but it's, it's going to be a lot of fun. And that will, that's a fundraiser for cherish families. And I'd also like to invite, you know, anybody who loves the work that we're doing to please become a monthly supporter right now, we're really looking to build our monthly giving club and, and just go to cherish families.org and support our work because, you know, we, we have had some amazing federal funds that got cut last year, along with everyone else. And so we're, we're struggling to maintain the level of services, but, but we're so committed to it. And so always looking for new friends and supporters. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:16:41

I will make sure that there are links to all of those events in the show notes. And as always, you can send me an email, sarahatsarahfisk.coach, if you have any questions about how to connect with Shirlee. Shirlee, thank you so much. 

Shirlee Draper 01:16:56

Thank you, it's been an honor. 

Episode 156 - Healing in a Community of Women Re-Release

I’m bringing back an episode that explores something I care about deeply: the healing that happens when women gather in community. We live in a culture that conditions women to believe something is wrong with them—that we’re too emotional, our thoughts don't make sense, and we can’t trust ourselves. But when women share their real experiences with each other, that belief begins to unravel. In this re-release, I discuss the communities I’ve been part of that have shaped my life and why support from other women can drive powerful change. Here’s what I cover:

• How patriarchal conditioning teaches women to believe they constantly need fixing

• Why witnessing other women’s stories helps us see that we are not “extra special super broken”

• How being witnessed by other women can completely change the way we see ourselves

• Two common obstacles that keep women from seeking community and how to move through them

• Why learning with and from other women creates powerful momentum for growth and change

Find Sara here:

sarafisk.coach

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What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

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Transcript

 00:59

I realized this morning that I was not subscribed to my own podcast. So I went to the Apple Podcast page, which is where I listen to podcasts and subscribed. And I saw a couple reviews that just made my heart so happy. 

 01:17

I wanted to share them with you. E Wong206 says, I came to this podcast through another podcast, Judith Gatan, my girls style masterclass. She says, Sarah Fisk is unbelievably honest and raw, calling out all the good girl programming that it's hard to see when you've been swimming in the patriarchal ocean for so long. 

 01:39

Thanks for sharing your truth and keep it coming, please. Thank you. I really, really appreciate that. If you have not had a chance to rate and review and subscribe to the podcast, I would be grateful and happy if you would do that. 

 01:56

You can do that by going to whatever page you use for your, to get your podcast, Apple, Spotify, BuzzSprout. There's lots of ways to find it. And then subscribing and leaving a review. I wanted to talk today about something that is really near and dear to my heart. 

 02:15

And that is healing in communities of women. And as I thought about how I wanted to set this up, there's a really interesting kind of push-pull here. And what I want to start with is that patriarchy programs women to believe that there is something wrong with them. 

 02:40

They are too emotional. Their thoughts don't make sense. They can't be trusted. Their bodies are unreliable. And so all of that programming really primes women to believe that they need to be fixed, that there's things wrong with them, and that if they could just fix the things that are wrong, then they would be worthy, they would be more valuable, then they would finally have the life that they think they want. 

 03:14

And so I want to point that out because it is very, very real. What it ends up creating is a lot of hustle around being better, always having some project that you're working on with yourself, your weight, your wrinkles, your heart rate, you know, your, there's an ongoing, most women that I speak to, I speak to a lot, they have some project that they're always working on to improve themselves, either their bodies or their minds, their personalities, their emotional state, their mental state. There's just a constant list of things to do. And so if that is you, I want you to just pause for a second and ask yourself, why? Why is it that I have this list of things about myself that I think need to be improved? 

 04:17

That's not to say that self-improvement is bad or wrong, because the other side of this push-pull is that sometimes the ways in which we are thinking about ourselves, treating ourselves, the point of view that we have when we are in the focus of our own attention is causing us a lot of harm and is causing us a lot of pain. 

 04:43

And so I do believe that there is value in working on the painful, damaging thoughts that we have about ourselves so that we can come to a place of greater self-acceptance, possibly greater self-love and self-trust, and that that is always good for women. 

 05:04

And so I just want to acknowledge that push-pull kind of right at the outset, because what I want to talk about is finding community to heal in. I have really benefited throughout my life from having communities of women in which to talk, to be seen, to share my experiences. 

 05:29

Humans need interpersonal contact, right? So many of us are still suffering because of, you know, COVID lockdown and not being able to be out and about. I mean, some of us loved it. I will say there was part of me that really loved not having any options to go anywhere or do anything and to just be home. 

 05:52

But that also runs its course as well. And we do want to be with other people. It's an actual need that we as humans have. So I grew up in the Mormon church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 

 06:10

And one of the things that Mormons do really well is community. And I had a community of young women my age. I later had a community of women my age and going through a lot of the same things. And it was really helpful to me at the time. 

 06:29

There came a point when it wasn't helpful anymore, but there were always communities in which I could go and be seen and witnessed, get help. Another community that was really important to me was a homeschool community that I was a part of for like 10 years with other families who were homeschooling their kids. 

 06:53

It was such, it was such a joy to get together with the other moms and talk about things. I noticed we shared a lot of like birth stories. It became apparent to me that one of the most important things that women do is they share stories about themselves that only other women can really understand because it's been their experience. 

 07:17

We shared challenges with kids and challenges with, you know, self, and that was a really important community for a while. When I decided I no longer wanted to participate in the religious community of Mormonism, post-Mormon groups were really important to me because I could express feelings, frustration, I could compare my experience and have it validated and honored. 

 07:50

I could read and commiserate and offer support and help to others. It's been really fantastic. And then lastly, probably one of the most important rooms that I'm currently a part of is a group of coaches who are in a business mastermind together. 

 08:08

My coach, her name is Stacey Baiman. And it is so powerful to be in a room of mostly women who are all working toward the same purpose, building coaching businesses. I get to see women who are powerful. 

 08:24

I get to see women who are intelligent. I get to see my genius in a room full of geniuses. That's one of my favorite phrases that my dear friend Maggie Reyes, who's also a coach in that community, says, is like, we get to witness ourselves in community with other women. 

 08:44

So as I thought about why this is so important, I came up with, for me, like four really essential reasons. And I just want to talk about each one of them. It's important to have a safe space to share and be supported. 

 09:01

One of the things that is, I'm going to be talking a little bit about different communities that I know of, including the community that I have created, Stop People Pleasing, which is a group coaching program, and encouraging you to consider joining, finding your communities as we go through these things together. 

 09:23

So one of the things that is really beautiful about the community of Stop People Pleasing is that it is a safe place to share stories about your people pleasing that in other circumstances might embarrass you or you might be self-conscious. 

 09:44

It's so fascinating when people come to any community where there is a shared goal, like making money as a coach in my business coaching community or stopping people pleasing in the Stop People Pleasing group coaching program, to have the opportunity to see other people working through your same challenges is so beautiful. 

 10:13

It is such a human thing. It's such a female thing to think that there is something wrong with me. I call it extra special super broken. That, you know, there's something just that is that's just me. 

 10:31

I'm the only one in the world who has this particular problem. And when you're in a community where it is safe to share your experiences and you get supported, you find out, oh my gosh, we are all the same. 

 10:45

The circumstances might be different. The challenges might look a little different. But we're all having a very similar human experience. We're struggling with a lot of the same things. And that just seems to be how it is. 

 10:59

It's not about me personally. I am not extra special, super broken. This just kind of seems to be how it is. And we all get to wrestle with those challenges together. Reason number two, to learn with and from other women, I think is a sacred experience. 

 11:24

I mentioned that there's kind of a beautiful momentum when everyone is working on the same goal together, right? We are all working on finding our people pleasing, understanding it, having grace and graciousness with ourselves in the process. 

 11:41

And we are watching other women do the same. It is the experience that can give us different points of view. And especially in something like a group coaching program, you learn not only from me, the coach, but you learn from the other women as well. 

 12:02

Because sometimes someone else is struggling with something. And because it's not you, you can see it so clearly. You can see the unkindness in the way she's talking to herself. You can see the options that she has that you don't think you have. 

 12:20

And then when you observe and can learn in a little detached way, then you can apply some of that teaching to yourself in a much, much more readily because you've seen it, you've witnessed it. We unlearn together as well. 

 12:42

We witness and support each other's progress. Reason number three is sharing stories, being witnessed. Going back to what I said about the homeschool group, we talked about the things we had in common. 

 13:00

We talked about the struggles that were unique to that particular endeavor. We shared hard things that happened. And so sharing stories and being witnessed by other loving, supportive women is such a beautiful experience. 

 13:18

In one of our groups, we had a woman. Her name is Tammy. I've actually changed it to protect her privacy a little bit, but Tammy was really struggling with paying for her adult son's bills. Tammy was not in a financial position to do that, but she kept doing it out of obligation. 

 13:40

And when we coached on it, it was tied to some mental health challenges that her son was experiencing and her fear about what would happen if she told him that she wasn't going to be able to pay for these bills anymore, which is what really was best for her and the outcome that she wanted. 

 14:02

The way in which the other women in the group witnessed and supported and loved and helped her as she worked through the complicated feelings and decided to take the action to get him the support he needed and then stop paying for his bills was such a beautiful thing to witness and to be a part of. 

 14:26

In Stop People Pleasing, we have had women who are in college and women who are in their 70s in the same group. And to see them cheer each other on, to see older women offering advice to younger women and really supporting them and helping them through their experience is one of the most beautiful parts. 

 14:49

I think of any female community. When I was still attending church, I shared something. I had a bunch of kids, really young. My daughter, Rachel, was 13 months old when her twin brothers were born. So for a little while, it felt like literally a three-ring circus. 

 15:08

And I remember going to my LDS community and sharing in the women's group just about how hard it was. And an older woman expressed to me her love and her understanding of the situation. And she said a sentence, she just said, it won't always be that way. 

 15:28

Someday they're not going to run and hug you. Someday they're not going to. She said, I know it's hard, but just know that eventually they're not going to do that. And that sentence sustained me through a lot of the really difficult, high demand times of having a lot of young kids. 

 15:46

And so the support that we offer each other through our experience is just so precious and invaluable. The last reason, reason number four, is to have people to cheer you on. In Stop People Pleasing, one of the things that we start every group coaching session with is celebrations. 

 16:07

And we celebrate the hell out of everything, awareness, times when you acted just a little bit differently than you would have in the future. Like maybe you didn't say yes immediately to a request that you didn't really want to do, but maybe you took a pause. 

 16:24

Maybe you said yes later. That's fine. We're going to celebrate the pause. And so to come to a community where women can celebrate and listen and support and offer you someone to cheer you on. It's just such, it's such an amazing, amazing experience. 

 16:47

If you're thinking, well, I don't have that kind of a community, what I want to talk about next is how to find one. Lots of communities are created around shared values and shared interests. So the first thing I would encourage you to do is define that. 

 17:05

What do I value? What are my interests? Do I want to join a marathon running club so that I can run a marathon? Do I want to join a book club because I would really like to have some more books and friends to discuss them with? 

 17:18

And come on, we all know we go to the book club meetings for the snacks. So good snacks. Is that what I want more of in my life? Because by defining the why, that's how you know whether or not the group is working for you. 

 17:32

It's important to have a clear vision of what you value, what would be worth your time to give to, so that you can decide, is this something I want to keep doing? Is this hitting the spot, scratching the itch, whatever it is, whatever your why is, is going to be really important to know. 

 17:51

Once you're clear on the why, it's just a matter of like Google searches to find community groups and things that you can try out and be a part of. So then let's talk about two obstacles that for sure, maybe one or maybe both, maybe neither. 

 18:08

I don't know. I guess I shouldn't say that, but I've noticed two common obstacles. The brain has an incredible capacity for negativity bias. And what that means is your brain scans what's going on and takes it to the negative, sometimes extreme. 

 18:27

If you have anxiety or some other type of added mental health challenge, it can be even harder. But the negativity bias that our brains produce is almost always wrong. I recently read a fantastic book that I cannot recommend more highly. 

 18:45

It's called Platonic by Dr. Marissa Franco. And she's talking about finding platonic friendships, but she mentions several studies that have been done in several different ways, several different groups, several different countries, and they all confirm the same thing. 

 19:05

The negative thoughts that we have about ourselves are not the negative thoughts that other people have about us, usually. So when we're going to a party or going to join a group, we are automatically thinking about being rejected, where we might not belong, where we might not fit in. 

 19:22

We're assuming that people do not like us, do not want to talk to us. And the data shows that's simply not true. People like us more than we think they do. People are more open to getting to know us, to talking to us, talking with us, and forming a connection than we think they are. 

 19:43

And so the first obstacle that you're going to face, possibly, is the negativity bias in your brain. You're just going to have to do a very good job of catching it and redirecting it. Here's how I suggest doing that. 

 19:59

If the brain bully starts up, they're not going to like you. You're too fast or not too fast. You're too slow. I guess if you're going to join a running club, being too fast might not be a problem, but you're too slow. 

 20:13

You're not going to do it right. They already have all of their connections and friendships formed and there's not room for you. It's to catch that talk and then redirect it. I love to redirect my own brain by saying, no, we're not going to talk about that. 

 20:31

We're not going to do that. We're not going to beat ourselves up. Chances are they like me. Chances are they're going to be open to forming a relationship with me. Chances are I'm going to find people who I fit in with. 

 20:44

So oftentimes I can redirect with just some logical thinking. Other times I need a little bit more of some emotion processing. So I sit with my anxiousness. It's not a problem. It's not bad. It's not wrong. 

 20:59

It's a normal part of being a human. And so if I can sit and be with my anxiousness, my fear of being vulnerable in a loving way, I give myself more of an opportunity to be successful when I feel those same feelings in the moment. 

 21:18

It is uncomfortable to not have a community. It's uncomfortable to have goals you want to work on or issues that you want to solve and to not have a community in which to do that. It is also uncomfortable to present yourself to a community, to apply, to join, to seek out, to try and create. 

 21:44

What I'm asking you to consider is that the discomfort of finding a community is actually the discomfort that serves you because it moves you forward in the direction of human connection, human interaction, working together with other people on a project, or reducing a harmful behavior like we do in Stop People Pleasing the Group Coaching. 

 22:11

That discomfort's going to be there either way. You're either uncomfortable because you don't have it and you feel lonely and disconnected, or you're going to feel uncomfortable as you go out and get it because it's going to require that you put yourself in new situations and try new things. 

 22:25

So pick the discomfort that works best for you. I will also say this. It is impossible to change. And by change, I mean eliminate a behavior that doesn't serve you anymore or meet a goal or try something new. 

 22:42

It's impossible to change while doing the same thing. Growth and progress is predicated on something changes, something changing, because if you do what you've always done, you will get what you've always gotten. 

 22:59

Obstacle number two is the fact that women are programmed to believe that taking care of everyone else first is essential. And that if we deserve anything for ourselves, it's after we have met the needs of everybody else. 

 23:21

And then there's another kind of double whammy thought there, because if we do take time for ourselves, then it's probably selfish. If we spend money on ourselves, it's probably selfish and irresponsible. 

 23:35

And I don't fully deserve to have this thing. My growth, my time for myself should come after I take care of everyone else's needs first. Prioritizing myself is bad and wrong and selfish and spending money on myself. 

 23:54

That is even worse. Here's what I want you to consider. Many of us are already dealing with the lack of community in other ways. We're spending money on other things. We are shopping. We are buying things maybe we don't need all the time. 

 24:14

We are eating. We are keeping busy to try and distract from some of the loneliness, some of the disconnectedness, some of the frustration, some of the hopelessness that we feel around these unrealized dreams and goals. 

 24:32

So you're already doing something to try and solve this problem on your own, whether it's eating or buffering with Netflix or, and again, none of these things are bad. I absolutely love a good Netflix show. 

 24:48

Just ask my kids. Where I want to point it out is that many of us think I don't deserve to take time for myself. We are already taking time, but we're just doing it in sneaky ways like watching TV and scrolling social media. 

 25:05

Many of us think it's irresponsible or selfish to spend money on myself. We are already spending money in other places. Most of the time, it's unconscious and it is not solving the problem for us. The money is going out anyway. 

 25:20

Many of us think, I don't deserve to have this time, but we're trying to give ourselves other treats or pleasures like food, because we do want something for ourselves. So I'm simply asking you to consider the wisdom of swapping the time, the energy, the effort, the money that you're already spending trying to distract yourself from the loneliness, the unmet goals, not having the opportunity to be in community for the sacrifice of time, 

 25:56

energy, and effort to have a community. The sacrifice is almost the same. The ways in which we are uncomfortable, yeah, it's going to be uncomfortable either way. But what I have overwhelmingly found is that when women join communities, they heal, they are seen, they're listened to, they're supported, and they have, they take all of that support and love and being cheered on, and they make amazing changes in their lives. 

 26:33

They run marathons for the first time. They learn how to swim as adults. They stop people pleasing. Every day, there is a podcast. Well, I guess almost every day that I listen to. It's the Daily by the New York Times. 

 26:48

And one of their advertisers is Dana Farber Cancer Research. And there's a line that they say in these commercials, and I just love it. So I want to share it with you and tell you why I love it. Here's the line. 

 26:59

And it's not exact. I'm going to butcher it. Nothing moves the needle on beating cancer like a relentless series of breakthroughs. That is what happens in group coaching. We meet, we learn tools, we practice them, you go out into the world, you practice them, you get feedback, you notice, and then you come back for coaching on what worked, what didn't work, what we can try again, what we can do differently. 

 27:30

And those are the relentless series of breakthroughs that actually get the people pleasing eliminated. You join a running club and you run a quarter of a mile your first time. And then the next time you're able to run just over a quarter of a mile. 

 27:48

And then you get to a half a mile and then a mile, so forth and so on, so on. Those little breakthroughs happen with much more support and ease and fun in community. Thanks for listening. I hope something that I said was valuable to you. 

 28:06

And I hope that it encourages you to look for the communities that you think will best serve you. And if it doesn't exist, to create it. I'll talk to you next week.

Episode 155 - The Powerful Combination of Choice and Voice Re-Release

To what degree do you feel capable of saying what you want to say in your life and in your relationships? In this episode, I’m revisiting one of my favorite episodes about the powerful combination of choice and voice. A revolution happens when women say what they want to say. When you can express how you really feel, it becomes easier to stand up for yourself and set expectations. Your relationships shift, your choices become clearer, and you stop performing and start actually living. Here’s what I cover:

• One of the key skills I teach my clients: how to articulate themselves during difficult conversations

• How reconnecting to your own wants and needs is a process that takes time

• Why we are capable of updating the relationships in our lives to match our current wants and needs

• Why authenticity removes the pressure to perform in order to feel accepted

• How learning to handle the stress of advocating for yourself leads to deeper integrity and lasting comfort

Find Sara here:

sarafisk.coach

pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

 00:59

All right, let's jump in. This topic of saying what you want to say has been on my mind almost constantly for the last couple months. This last Monday, I hosted a free coaching session to teach women my process for getting to the right words to say what you want to say, and then for feeling the stressful, yucky feelings that come up when you do. 

 01:29

It was amazing. I'm going to be doing it again. So watch for the next date to be announced or you can check the link in my bio once I settle that and I'll put it there. But what is just being confirmed to me over and over and over again is that there is a revolution that happens in the lives of women when they can say what they want to say. 

 01:53

And I choose those words very, very carefully. It felt revolutionary for me. And then as I have developed this process and tested it with clients and in different situations, it just keeps proving true to me that when we experience the ability to say exactly what we want to say, it opens up an amazing opportunity. 

 02:21

So I want to talk about it again from a little bit of a different vantage point so that I can encourage you to look at your own life and ask yourself this question. To what degree do I feel capable of saying what I want to say in my own life and in each relationship that I have? 

 02:43

You know, if I have a romantic partnership, if I have child relationships, if I have work relationships, friend relationships, parent, sister, any kind of relationships that we have, I want you to think through each of them and just ask yourself, to what degree do I feel capable of saying what I want to say, which is an accurate representation of who I am and what I think? 

 03:11

Because that's really important to know. We're going to back out. We're going to zoom out. Back up, zoom out for just a second. What we feel allowed to say is a conglomeration of all of the rules that we were taught about the different groups in which we grew up. 

 03:34

So your family had rules about what you were allowed to say. I remember very distinctly telling my own children that they were not allowed to tell each other to shut up. It just felt so mean. I didn't want them to do that to each other. 

 03:47

So that was like one of our family rules. And there are rules about what you can and cannot say in religious organizations, community organizations, political organizations where you work. And in the beginning, when we are learning all of these rules as infants, before we can really understand language, what we are programmed biologically to be very keyed into are facial expressions and the results of what we do and what we say. 

 04:20

And so from infancy, we're gathering all of these rules and clues about what is allowable. And there's a very good reason for that. We have to have big people to take care of us until we're pretty old. 

 04:34

Like think about the average age at which someone might be fully capable of meeting all of their needs. And it's not until 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, you know, sometimes older. And so it is for very good reasons that we are so attuned to what it means to be in a group and needing to stay in the group and the fear or the danger signals that come up whenever we think about saying something that might challenge what we're allowed to say in the group. 

 05:06

All of that is very good and very right. And we are right to people please when we are young because it's how we get our needs met, which include loving, connected, bonds, friendship, belonging. All of that is necessary. 

 05:21

The issue becomes that we don't update our software, you know, that's always kind of running in the background telling us what we can and cannot do when we become adults who are capable of meeting a lot of those own needs ourselves and we're develop, we're able to develop and create love and safety outside of the group, sometimes for ourself or in other relationships that we seek. 

 05:47

And so this podcast episode is an attempt to give you some good reasons for updating that software. And what I mean by updating the software is, what am I capable of doing today? How am I capable of taking care of myself in stressful situations where I stand up for myself, where I say what I want to say, that I wasn't capable of doing earlier for whatever reasons, maybe in a previous marriage or previous relationship or previous workplace or in a previous situation. 

 06:18

How am I different now? And what are the benefits of updating that software? So here is the premise that I want to work with. I think the whole world suffers when women are not able to say what they want to say. 

 06:39

Now, bold premise, maybe, but here's why I think it's true. When women are not able to say what they want to say, they are cut off from their own wanting. They have to constantly push down or subjugate their own wanting to the needs of others. 

 07:00

And sometimes that's important. But the problem is, is that when women grow up with their wanting always coming in second place to everybody else's, they never fully connect to who they are and what they want. 

 07:17

And that means that they are not able to fully choose what they're doing, even if it's not something they enjoy. Let me give you an example. So early in my marriage, we didn't ever really talk about gender roles because they were just already spelled out for us. 

 07:38

I was going to be home with the kids taking care of the house, and my husband was going to be working and, you know, earning money. We never talked about it. And it was always just such a given in my mind that the needs of the kids, the needs of the house, the needs of the husband, the needs of, you know, taking care of the children were always more important than my own. 

 08:03

And I mean, I'm pausing because I'm even thinking it through again right now. Because I was not able to fully choose being home with kids because it was just handed to me as the rule. There were parts of that job that I hated. 

 08:26

There were parts of that job that just created a lot of resentment and irritation. And I just constantly had to shove that down because I didn't have another choice. I felt like I had no choice. So would I have chosen that job? 

 08:50

I mean, now maybe not, but let's just imagine that I had had the chance to sit down and to fully think through, okay, do I want to have children? If so, how many? Do I want to be home with them full-time? 

 09:06

Do I want to work part-time? How do we want the household to run? Who do we want to be taking care of household things? Do I want it to be 100% me? Do I want, and by the way, it wasn't always 100% me. 

 09:19

My husband was very helpful. So if he's listening to this, honey, I love you and I know you helped. But the point is, without fully choosing it, there were always parts of it that were really, really hard for me. 

 09:34

And I was never able to come up with valid reasons why I wanted to do it. Once we were in it and had five kids, I was like, well, we have five kids now. So this, that, that train has left the station and now I just have to keep doing these things. 

 09:50

Now, I love my kids. I love being home with them. All that's a given. But there is something essential that happens when a woman is present enough with her wanting to choose something, even if the task is not enjoyable. 

 10:06

So changing diapers. Didn't love it. Now, I chose to have my children, so it made the diaper part of it okay. Again, even if it's not enjoyable, if I can find a reason that I like for doing it, then it becomes a task that has less chance of creating resentment. 

 10:30

So the very first thing I want you to consider is when women are able to fully choose what they're doing, even when it's not enjoyable, it changes. And the only way we can fully choose is being connected to our wanting. 

 10:46

And the only way we can be fully connected to our wanting is if we feel free to say what we really want to say. So when we're not connected to our wanting and we kind of we are cut off from our choice, we have to expend extra energy pretending and performing. 

 11:09

So I would go to my church group, the women's group meeting, where everybody was talking about how much they loved motherhood and how beautiful it was to be a mother. And yes, some parts of it certainly were. 

 11:24

But I remember like putting a smile on my face and pretending and performing like, oh my gosh, I love this so much too. And being extra aware of the fact that I was choosing my words carefully. I was trying to silver line things. 

 11:43

I was trying to put lipstick on a pig, however you want to say that, because some aspects of it, I really just didn't enjoy, but I didn't feel free to say that. I felt like it meant something about me as a mom, or I would be judged. 

 11:57

So for me, that happened a lot at church and in friend groups because of the type of rules around enjoying motherhood and that being a sign that I was a good, faithful woman. But for you, it might be somewhere else. 

 12:11

Like, what are you not allowed to say at work? What are you not allowed to say in your relationship? Where do you have to pretend and perform or hide parts of yourself or suppress part of your opinion? 

 12:24

And that's what I want you to think about. Because what happens is that no one is getting when we're not able to say what we want to say, no one is getting the real honest versions of us. And so I'm pretending and performing, and then you're looking at my pretend performance and you're thinking things about me. 

 12:46

And I remember when I finally got to the point where I could be a little more honest about how hard it was, about how tired I was. And I would say something to kind of express that. And I would have women come up to me and say, oh my gosh, I'm so glad you said that. 

 13:05

I'm tired too. This is really hard for me too. I don't know what I'm doing too. But until I felt some liberty to be honest, everybody was just looking at this pretend version of me. And we are looking at so many pretend versions of women who are performing to meet whatever standards they think other people want, and they're not able to talk about what's really going on. 

 13:33

And so not only is no one getting the honest version, but then that's what your relationship is based on. It's based on this pretend performances. Everybody pretends and performs. Now, in relationships, we're always discovering more about ourselves, right? 

 13:49

So I'm not saying that at any one point you become the 100% real, authentic version of yourself. I don't think it works that way. But we miss out on the satisfaction of being in relationships that are as real as possible for the moment. 

 14:09

And we miss out on the juice, the juice that's worth the squeeze of really doing what lights us up because so much of our time is spent pretending and performing. We end up giving so much of our time and energy and effort to things that we aren't fully choosing or choosing for reasons that we really like and spending more energy because we are repressing or suppressing or hiding our true feelings about it. 

 14:46

It kind of reminds me of that t-shirt you see. I'm sorry, I'm late. I didn't want to be here, right? So not only is there, are we late because we didn't want to be there, but then we have to pretend and perform that we're happy to be there. 

 15:00

So here's what I think the goal is. The goal is to know and like your reasons for doing whatever you're doing, even if it's not enjoyable, and to be able to say what those reasons are, to say what is important to you, to offer your opinion. 

 15:21

When we're agreeing to things that we haven't fully chosen for ourselves, it binds us and it limits us because it cuts us off from the true power of our choice. I choose to be here. I choose to be invested in this. 

 15:39

I choose to give my time and my energy and my resources to this, even if it's not enjoyable, because I know my reasons for doing it and I like my reasons for doing it. And then once we know what we want, we choose it for reasons that we like and then we can express it. 

 16:00

So the powerful combination of a choice and then having a voice is what I think is so powerful. Now, as I began to figure out more about myself in my romantic relationship with my husband, let's just go with that one because I think it's a good one. 

 16:25

You are always discovering more about yourself. And one of the biggest benefits of a relationship, especially like a primary romantic relationship, it's where we get so many of our needs met. Our need for safety, our need for connection, our need for communication and validation, and to have someone else who is that place for us, that soft landing, who knows us and loves us and protects us. 

 16:57

I talk to so many women whose relationships are mostly working. They're mostly happy. They're mostly okay. And it kind of gets worse from there. And when we dig into why it's not a fully satisfying romantic relationship, it is because usually the woman feels like she is not able to rewrite the rules, right? 

 17:29

Like when I married my husband, I was a very different person. We will have been married for 25 years next year. We celebrated 24 this year, bonkers. And I was a very, very different person. And for so many years, the fact that I didn't feel like I could update our agreement, right? 

 17:48

Because our agreement was I'm going to stay home with kids and you work. There was this undercurrent of resentment that was running almost all the time because I did not like taking care of the house. 

 18:01

I did not like it that I was fully in charge of cooking and shopping and cleaning up. And again, remember, he did help. So, but it was always like helping me, right? This is your job, Sarah, and I'm helping you with it. 

 18:16

When that's not, it's not really what I wanted. I didn't really have a good example of what I wanted, which was, you know, true mutual partnership. But once I began to see that that's what I wanted, I didn't feel like I could ask for it because the roles were defined and we had already agreed to them, right? 

 18:40

So so many of us find ourselves in relationships that mostly work because we are mostly able to say what we want to say. But there's always some areas, whether it's in financial areas of the relationship, sexual areas of the relationship, communicative or emotional relationships of areas of the relationship. 

 19:03

There's always this part where it just doesn't quite work. So you have to shove down those emotions or hide them or suppress them, or we end up eating or shopping. There's so many different ways in which we have to deal with the negative implications of not being able to do what we want to do and say what we want to say. 

 19:27

It's astounding. Think about how often you are frustrated by not able by being by not feeling like you are able to stand up for yourself, share an opinion, ask for something, create an expectation around a need or a request, and how often you have to mask that with food, with scrolling, with shopping, with going and talking to someone else outside your relationship, like a friend or someone else, 

 20:02

editing. All of that just takes more energy. No wonder we're so fucking tired, right? Every woman I talk to is so tired. So as our relationship progressed and I developed the ability to say what I wanted to say, it was disruptive. 

 20:27

And sometimes we're in a partnership where we can say what we want to say and the person responds in a loving, open way, even though they don't understand it and they're willing to work with us. And that's how relationships progress to the next iteration, right? 

 20:44

Where both people make sacrifices to understand each other, where they're coming from, what they want, and to give it to the other person. And that's how relationships progress. This is one big update to the software that we need to make. 

 21:02

Women, we are capable of updating our relationships to match our current wants and needs. But to do that, we have to learn to say what we want to say. Second big update. If I want to update my relationship, if I want to get to the next iteration where we are both able to say what we want to say and give that to each other and come into these new versions together. 

 21:30

If we're not able to do that together, I'm able to go find a relationship where I can do that. If I'm in a relationship with someone who doesn't want me to say what I want to say and get more of what I want, I'm able to go find relationships where I can be that. 

 21:49

Sometimes that means a divorce or separation. Sometimes that doesn't mean a divorce. It just means understanding the limits of this particular relationship and making your peace with it, if that's what you want to do. 

 22:03

And then going to find other relationships where you can show up as fully you. There isn't a right or wrong here. But what that allows you to do is have places where you can fully show up and fully be seen. 

 22:18

And you are no longer expending that extra effort to shove down your emotions, to have your life full of things that you aren't consciously choosing, to edit and to hide, and where you're not able to connect to your own wants and needs, because other peoples are always in the way and they will not let you become the new person that you want to be. 

 22:45

Their limitations become your limitations. There are so many benefits to updating our software about what we are allowed to say or not. The connection to themselves that the women have who go through this process is incredible. 

 23:10

Their ability to connect to what they want and to own it and to find a way to say it that honors the relationships that they're in and themselves is such a beautiful and possible thing. One of the biggest benefits that I found is that I get to be the same person everywhere I am. 

 23:35

I did so much pretending I was one person at church and I was one person at home and I was different person with my friends and a different person with my family and a different, you know, different versions that I thought were acceptable. 

 23:50

Takes a lot of energy to do that. And once I felt confident that I could say what needed to be said and that I could handle the stress of saying it and that my relationships would either come with me or not and that I could handle either outcome. 

 24:10

There's a tremendous sense of self-connection and unity and integrity that comes from I'm just the same person everywhere. What you see is what you get. And the way that I listen to myself and the way that I treat myself and my own wants becomes the standard that I want in my relationships. 

 24:35

So all of my relationships currently are ones in which I am able to be seen completely. And that doesn't mean, and I'll say this, that doesn't mean that I tell everyone everything, but the extent to which I feel comfortable sharing, that is seen and honored. 

 24:59

And relationships deepen. Vulnerability is available. Openness. And I mean, the word that's coming up is it just feels congruous. It's everything is congruent. And that feels really, really good. Doing this work has also helped me to really decide when I want to give my time and energy and effort to something, it's because I like my reasons for doing it. 

 25:32

And when I don't, it's because I like my reasons for doing it. And so it totally still happens. Like by no means am I hoping that you understand that this is like a skill in which I have perfection, not at all. 

 25:47

But it is a skill saying what I want to say and liking my reasons for giving my time and energy to things has produced a life where I just don't do a lot of things that I don't really want to do for reasons that I like. 

 26:04

When I talk to women who are tired, one of the primary reasons is because their life is full of things that they have not consciously chosen for reasons that they really like. And you can never rest enough from a life that is too full of things that you don't really want to be doing. 

 26:30

I want to say that again because it was really powerful for me to understand that. I was constantly thinking, gosh, I just need a break. I would go to bed at night thinking about all the things I had gotten done that day. 

 26:41

And I would get up the next day and just do it again and do it again. And I would just be thinking, gosh, I just, I just need a break. But you cannot, you can't take enough breaks from a life that is so full of things that you're not consciously choosing and don't really want to be doing. 

 27:01

And saying what you want to say allows you to see with clarity what you do want to do and what you don't want to do. This is going to be something that I continue to explore in my coaching and in podcasting and in the workshops that I'm going to be offered because I really feel like it is at the heart of the big changes that so many women want to make, but they don't know where to start. 

 27:34

I think saying what you want to say is so powerful because all the time that is now going to pretending and suppressing and performing and making up stories that aren't totally true, disconnection from our wants, all of that time comes back to you now. 

 27:58

You don't have to do it anymore. And so now you have all that time to do something else with. If this podcast episode has meant a lot to you, I really would love it if you would share your thoughts with me. 

 28:13

I get DMs every week about people's reactions and I respond. And I love that because it continues to inform me about how this is landing for you. It continues to inform the way I teach about it. And then the other thing I want you to do is just watch my social media and get on my email list because that's where I announce all of the upcoming workshops. 

 28:38

And we're going to be doing a lot of this because I imagine like millions of women who feel capable of saying what they want to say and then dealing with the discomfort and the yuckiness that comes from saying that because that is real as well and very normal. 

 28:57

But millions of women who feel empowered to say what they want to say. And I think the way that that will change their relationships and all of those relationships influence other relationships, I feel like the ripple effect, it's, I mean, can you imagine it? 

 29:17

Can you imagine just for yourself being able to show up anywhere and in a way that is congruent with your values and how you want to be in the world, your desire to be kind and respectful, your desire to be blunt and clear, saying that. 

 29:36

And what a tremendous effect that would have on you, on your relationships, and on the world. And that, that's the work I'm committed to doing. Thank you so much for listening. I'll see you next week.

Episode 154 - What Needs To Be Said with Alex Reegan Re-Release

This episode is a reminder of how prejudice can soften when we look beyond policies to see real people, and it feels especially important to bring it back now. In this re-release of a past conversation, I’m joined by my dear friend Alex Regan, a trans man, interfaith minister, speaker, author, and transformative spiritual coach. Meeting Alex changed my life because it replaced my experience of an abstract label with a real human being with a nervous system, a story, hopes, and fears just like me. Once you see someone clearly like that, it becomes much harder to ignore how they are being treated. My hope is that hearing Alex’s story will create that same kind of shift for you. Here’s what I cover:

• How stories reduce prejudice by turning a “group” into a real person you actually care about

• How good girl conditioning trains us to abandon ourselves and why that wiring shows up everywhere

• Alex’s journey of unlearning evangelical rules and building trust in his own inner knowing

• What it looks like to stop fighting for approval and let people be wrong about you

• How community changes everything when you stop performing and start living as your real self

Find Alex here:

www.alexreegan.com

www.instagram.com/revreegs 

Find Sara here:

sarafisk.coach

pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

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Transcript

Sara Bybee Fisk 00:59

This week's podcast is a re-release of one of my very most favorite episodes. To this day, I've only had two men on my podcast. One of them is my husband and the other is Alex Regan, and I wanted to share a quick just reflection. Meeting Alex changed my life, and I didn't realize how profoundly hearing Alex's story would change me. He wasn't trying to convince me of anything. We were not having a debate about politics or policy. It changed me because I got to know him, and Alex is trans. He was the first trans person that I ever got to have more than just a few passing sentences with and the way that our conversation changed my life stays with me to this day. There is a well-known idea in psychology called the content hypothesis, and it basically says that prejudice will decrease when people actually know someone from a group that they have been taught to fear or judge or misunderstand. When there's an actual human that you're talking to, instead of just interacting with an abstract idea, something shifts in the brain, and the story stops being theoretical, and it becomes really, really personal. That's exactly what happened to me when I met Alex. I didn't meet a, quote-unquote, trans issue or a trans policy. I met a person. I got a friendship out of it, someone with a life and a story and a nervous system and hopes and fears and dreams, and it was just like my life. Once you see someone clearly like that, it just becomes a lot harder to ignore the ways that they're being treated because now when I hear about trans policies being enacted on trans bodies and trans lives, I think about Alex, and now I know many trans people. I have trans people in my close family and among close friends. My hope is that this episode will help you see Alex clearly, and then it will become a lot harder for us to ignore the way people like Alex are being treated.Right now in places like Kansas where the driver's licenses of trans people were literally canceled overnight, policies are being passed that affect trans people in these really critical, kind of sweeping ways, totally ignoring their humanity, right? 

Sara Bybee Fisk 03:39

How are they going to get to work? Are they going to get the things done that requires them to have mobility?And so that's why I'm re-releasing this. Regardless of where you land politically, these decisions like the one in Kansas are not abstract for the people who are living them. They land on real people with real lives, real concerns. So this conversation is my small way of pushing back against the distance that lets us turn people into issues and never see the people behind them. Stories close the distance and sometimes hearing one person's story is enough to change your mind. Here's the conversation with my good friend, Alex Regan. I have been so excited to have this interview with you, my good friend, Alex. And we'll get to my nervousness in a minute because this is going to be such an important interview, I think, for so many people. You have been so important to me. And I just want to make sure that I do you and your story justice and in the bigger picture of what we are trying to do as good girls, unlearning that socialization and the rules. This is just going to be fantastic. I'm so glad you're here. 

Alex Reegan 05:00

I'm so glad to be here. I'm really excited. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 05:03

This is Alex Regan, and Alex is an interfaith minister, speaker, and transformative spiritual coach who uses his intuitive wisdom to help guide people toward their own inner knowing. His journey has led him to sobriety, shamanism, and then seminary. That's an interesting path, which helped him reclaim his faith and trust in the divine. 

Alex Reegan 05:27

And I'll just add in and the author of that nice new book that you're holding. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 05:35

This is, I mean, we were going to have a conversation anyway, but then you went and wrote this amazing book, which I was sharing. If you can't see me unless you go to the YouTube channel and watch this video, I had to take out like three fourths of the tabs that I had in here because I knew I would never be able to find what I actually wanted to like really focus on your book.What needs to be said was just released. And it is such an incredible journey. It's your journey, but I found myself so much in the pages of it. I see so many similarities between dropping the good girl rules and finding who we really are and your journey. 

Alex Reegan 06:22

I mean, that was like my biggest hope. You know, a lot of people even ask me, what's your hope that you get out of this, that other people get out of this? And one of the first things I said is that people see themselves. And one of the most amazing endorsements I got was from Sonia Choquette, one of the other big Hay House authors. And she basically said exactly that, that you'll see yourself in this story.And, you know, I've spoken to several other groups already. I was speaking to an LGBTQ church group and, you know, this woman piped up that she said, you know, I'm a lesbian. And when we first started talking, she's like, I was just like, oh, I'll go to this, but I don't know what I could possibly sort of get out of this, you know, kind of. And then she said about halfway through it, she started to realize that she saw herself in my story and she started to really understand herself in a different way. And I was like, bingo, that's exactly, that's exactly what, you know, I sort of have joked to, I challenge you to read this and not see yourself in it, which is I think really important right now. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 07:19

I love that because on the surface, your story from a person assigned female at birth, and then through your journey to find yourself as a trans man, and the the journey of that experience doesn't seem, it seems very niche, right? Like only a very few specific people have that that journey.But I think that's true. And before we get into that, I actually want to back up for a second because you I don't even think you realize that the importance of the role that you played early on in my growth and understanding of humans under the label, right? We have lots of labels that get thrown around a lot today. And in some ways, I can appreciate that the brain wants to categorize as a way of understanding, right? Man, woman, child, adults, boy, girl, and I've spoken on the podcast before about my brother in law coming out as gay in 1998. And how just sitting with his story over years and years and seeing him and knowing him and loving him and watching his, his struggles and watching him grow into relationships really softened me and led me to think that not only was I wrong about some of the things that I had been taught to believe about people who are gay, but that my church was wrong. 

Alex Reegan 08:57

Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 08:58

And I will admit, here's, here's kind of where my nervousness comes in. The trends and the, the, the, the T and the LGBTQ was the last place for me of, of some confusion and fear. I didn't understand it. I didn't, I was afraid of the fact that you could think that you were different than who you were. And I had been raised to believe that there's two boxes. There's a mailbox and a female box and you check one of those. And it all depends on the sexual equipment that you're born with. And that's, that's that. 

Alex Reegan 09:32

Yeah, ironically, someone checks the box for you. It's not even that you check the box. That's true. Someone else checks it for you. Someone else checks it for you. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 09:39

else takes a look and checks the box for you. And so when you and I met, that's kind of the state that I found myself in. And even today, I am still in a state of understanding and of relearning and unlearning. And so some of my nervousness today is I really want to honor you and your journey and yet I'm still learning.So here we are, I'm willing to show up and have a conversation with you, even though I might make some mistakes and you are willing to be here in conversation with me. And I think this is just such a beautiful, a beautiful thing, even though I'm nervous. 

Alex Reegan 10:19

Definitely. Well, one, I don't want you to be nervous because I think that this is the natural state of where we actually grow and expand the curiosity and saying, I'm willing to have a conversation. I might mess up. I might not do it right. I might mess up. I might not say it right. But the truth of the matter is there's something powerful in the curiosity in that sort of like, I don't know what this will turn into. I don't know that I have all the answers. I don't know that I'll say it right or correct. I might be wrong. I might be willing to say, I'm not sure. And I think that's where the power is in our connection in all of us as humanity is when we're able to just sort of step aside from our own, like this is how it is. And I know what this is the right thing and instead have curiosity and openness to say, hey, I'm not sure what can I learn from you? And the truth is we can learn so much from each other from both sides. It's not it's not about that one person, I don't think has all the answers and there's only one way to do it. So yeah, don't be nervous.We're in this together. And you know, we'll we'll figure it out. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 11:24

So you and I met at a Rob Bell event and the year has even slipped my mind. Was it 2018? 

Alex Reegan 11:35

I think 2018 or early 2019, somewhere around there. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 11:40

So Rob Bell, you can look up his podcast if you'd like, a really great voice and kind of, you know, this work of understanding yourself. And I, you and I, we're both living in Arizona at the time, you and Flagstaff and me in the Phoenix area, and we got on our plane. I don't think we, I don't even know that we talked at the event. 

Alex Reegan 12:03

Maybe more than just, hello, how are you? A couple little just exchanges. It wasn't like anything that was like a full conversation, just some small talk like exchanges. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 12:14

Yeah, pleasantries. And then we get on our plane. And you are seated next to me. And in the other seat is our friend, Andrea. And we pull away from the gate, John Wayne Airport, ready to come home.And there's a lightning storm. And we sit on the tarmac in those seats, sharing our snacks for the next three hours. And you just what I what I remember is it's like you just unfolded yourself to us in the most beautiful way. I mean, it's making me a little emotional now to remember just in that space. It feels like there was just like this little holy bubble. And I don't say holy, and necessarily a religious but like a sacred like the universe is saying, it's time, Sara, it's time for you to have an experience with a person under the label. 

Alex Reegan 13:10

Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 13:11

And that's what happened. And you began to respond to some questions in such a beautiful way.And I just want to say right now that it is not your job. And I think you know this, but to everyone out there who might be listening who is trans or black or a person of color, it is not your job to educate people who have questions. If it is something that feels good for you to do, fantastic. What was it like for you in that moment, Alex, to receive our questions? 

Alex Reegan 13:45

You know, in that space of genuine, in the holiness, I think that's a great word for it, because I felt that too. And I had forgotten it even was a lightning storm. I couldn't even remember why it was we were stuck on the tarmac for three hours. And our flight was like 45 minutes or something. It was just like, we could have been home and on our way, you know, but it was like, literally we could have flown across the country by that time. And yeah, I think the holiness of the curiosity, the wonder, the like genuine, I want to understand and know you and questions from those heart spaces for me have always been just a no brainer. Like I'm always the type of person who wants to just like dive beneath the surface. If people are open to going, you know, deeper with me beyond the like, hey, how's the weather? What's going on with your job? Was it, you know, and really talk about deep life things and spirituality and self-development and healing work and all stuff like I'm in. And so I never feel phased by those questions. And I'm so open always to those kinds of conversations because I think one, that that's an important way in which we actually get to know people.I mean, I think this is what is sort of like confusing right now is there's a lot of misinformation. It's just sort of been, you know, taken, I mean, this happened also to the gay community. I mean, this always reminds me back in the nineties, like when Ellen came out on TV, on her TV show, the moment that happened, it was like, it opened up this possibility that this could just be your neighbor. This could be the lady you met at the PTA that's so-and-so's mom. This could be, you know, like this could be the guy at the grocery store. And all of a sudden society began to evolve into these spaces of like, oh, it is my neighbor. It is my friend to cry. It is my brother-in-law. It is, you know, and that unraveled this sort of monstrosity that had been sort of like, you know, it reminds me of Scooby-Doo when there's like just a guy hiding underneath the mask. You know, it's always just a guy. It's not like the monster, okay? And I think that's what's happened societally and trans people have sort of been the sort of next, you know, target of that. And it's just, there's a lot of confusion. So I think anytime you can answer genuine questions, I'm always open to that. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 16:08

It was that openness that really allowed me to proceed. And one of the reasons I wanted to have this conversation is that a lot of what we're doing, unlearning these good girl rules, is that we are seeing I have been taught to be afraid of this label. I have been taught that this label is bad. I have been taught that this thing is bad. And that has come from an outside source.But once I have the opportunity to check in with myself, my own intuitive knowing and wisest part of me, what do I think then? And that's what I felt like came online that day in those airplane seats, as we shared Almond's and Apple's slice of this. And is that I had set aside, this is what I have been taught to think of trans people. And I am experiencing now this human with his warmth, with his struggle. And I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about that journey that you had to know yourself. 

Alex Reegan 17:25

Yeah, I mean, it was, it felt like a long, long arduous journey because, you know, I think, as you know, growing up in any sort of like fundamentalist religion, I grew up in a very evangelical family. The denomination of our church as a whole was not super conservative, but my family and their immediate friends certainly were. And so I think in that you sort of learn, you unlearn your guidance system that is completely innate in you, right? Like, you know things that are right for you and everyone's sort of talking you out of that, you know? I mean, it reminds me back to like, you know, in the third grade being like, I have to go to the bathroom. I have to go to the bathroom. Like, I don't feel well. And they're like, no, no, sit down. You don't have to go. Wait till break. And I ended up totally throwing up on the teacher shoes because it was like, I knew, dude, I got to go to the bathroom, but they convinced you, no, it's not the right time. And I share that because I think that's what religion in a way did to me.You know, it basically made me sort of not trust myself until me internally, like you don't know. And whatever you think, you know, you probably are on the wrong track. So just kind of stuff that away somewhere and just ignore it. And so, you know, I think it took a lot of, you know, sort of, I mean, just tearing down everything I ever believed in and thought was true. You know, it's like, if you have a house and there's something wrong with the, with the foundation, you have to tear the whole thing out. And so that's really what I had to do in my twenties and even some into my thirties was just tear down everything. So, you know, when I came out or when I was outed to my family, like in my twenties, then I just decided like, I hate God. I don't want anything to do with God, anything to do with anybody who wants anything to do with God. You know, I kind of just ran away from it all because I had to, in a way, completely remove myself to figure out who I was and what I really wanted and needed in the world. And I remember, you know, I had a therapist in my late twenties who said to me, you know, it seems like we have to figure out what it is that you want. And so I want you to get a notebook. I want you to start writing down what you want. And I just had to tell him, like, I don't know how to even say that. Like, I don't know how to even write down something because what I wanted was not part of the equation. That was not an option. You know, that's not what they were teaching us. It was like, no, what does God want? What does your family want? Like, what are these rules want? This is what society wants you to do. This is a sign female birth. You have to follow all these rules and do all these very specific things that I noticed cis men not having to do at all. Like, I was always like, wait, what? You know, I tell a story in the book about being around six and my brother and some of the other boys in the neighborhood were out playing in the sprinklers and my mom comes running out and is like, you have to put your shirt on. 

Alex Reegan 20:20

What are you doing? And I just remember just like looking at them, looking at me. And I remember just being completely baffled because first of all, I was like, why, why do I have to do something different? Like, why don't they have to put their shirts back? You know, like it just, my brain could not even compute it. Cause when I looked at them, I thought I was the same as them, you know? And I mean, I know cis women who have gone through similar things where their family was telling them to do these societal things, you know, cross your legs or do different things. Like, and it's just such a ridiculousness to have to like conform yourself to these weird societal rules that somebody just made up.Um, so yeah, I don't know. It was just a long journey of really undoing those things of stepping outside of those beliefs and kind of then trying to figure out for myself, okay, what do I want? Who am I without all of this? Where does my life go from here then? And, and that was, you know, I mean, that's still in the process. I suppose in a lot of ways, you know, I don't think it's a, it's a journey that ends. Um, but yeah, hopefully that gives you a little bit of an answer to that. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 21:28

First of all, I love that story that I had highlighted to for sure and read because I think it is such a beautiful snapshot of how we are, how being a human, being raised by people who are not in touch with their own intuitive wisdom and inner guidance, how they just pass that on. And really, it's an education in ignoring red flags, like your stomach was sending you a red flag that day in class, like we're going to throw up and the adult outside of you is like, nope, nope.And that happens, that happens whether you are at first, whether you are male or female and being, you know, socialized male or female, because things happen. Like, I don't care if you don't want to give him a hug or kiss, he's your uncle, get over there and give him a hug. You're not sad. You're not hurt. That didn't happen. Go apologize, right? And so there's all of these ways in which outside authority, we are taught because we are dependent on the big people in our lives, and we want love and connection from them, we learn to ignore ourselves. 

Alex Reegan 22:42

Yep. Yep. And we learned that we'll lose, we could potentially lose the safety, the security. They might not feed us. They might not pull those. They might not keep a roof over our heads if we don't follow.I mean, it's probably not usually that extreme, but it certainly can be. And so we learn, okay, in order to do this, I have to sacrifice myself, you know, in order to keep my safety, my food, my, you know, the big people. I like that, as you call it. Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 23:08

Well, and at that young age, living with disapproval, living with disconnection is just like living without a roof over your head. True. Yeah. It is essential.We cannot not have that connection. And so as we learn, oh, what I feel and what I want doesn't matter as much as what the big people are telling me matters. So we shove that intuitive red flag finder down. And I think religion only kind of adds another layer to that because now there's just a whole other set of authorities, God being God being the ultimate authority and all these people who say they speak for God and they are going to tell you what God wants from you. It just, I mean, no fucking wonder, right? That, yeah, that this becomes a process of untangling and unlearning. 

Alex Reegan 24:07

Yeah, no doubt. And it's a long process. You know, it's not something you do overnight. It's not one therapy session. It's not one X, Y, or Z thing. You know, it, it, I honestly still believe that this will be something I work on my whole life is unraveling.Um, the, those, like the wiring in my brain from such young ages about how I'm supposed to be, who I'm supposed to be, what I'm supposed to do, and how you, you know, the good in you is what gets you to heaven or get to your parents approval or whatever the things are. And that if you're not that, you know, there are ramifications and repercussions and that's a lot of weight to live under. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 24:47

And then we gather information about our expression. Is this okay? Is this okay with you? And sometimes we're met with rules like, no, not okay. Put your shirt back on, right? And then we experienced punishment or disconnection. And then we have to self abandon to reclaim that connection. We have to give in to what the big people want. And sometimes what they want is even done with love and concern for us. But then we are constantly living in that self-abandonment so that we can have the connection.But then eventually we can't do it anymore. Like that splitting from ourselves, pushing our own wants and our needs and desires down just doesn't work. And so we express again, and then we experience the rules or the conditioning. And then we experienced the punishment and the disconnection again. And we just keep going around and around in that circle. And I just want to read, this was such a tender part of the book. And I just wanted to read it because it's one of those moments where you expressed and then you got data, right? You said, the first time my mother lets me select my own clothes for school picture day, I come out of the bedroom looking like I just stepped out of the Miami Vice set. I am bursting with pride. I'm wearing a flower and a button up shirt. Oh, this is just so precious. A magenta suit jacket and a matching tie. So that's your expression. And then you get the information from your mom. My mother takes one look at me and looks like she wants to sink into the ground. Every bit of her body language screams that she regrets letting me choose my own outfit. 

Alex Reegan 26:29

Yeah, yeah, my brother is a few years older than me and he remembers vividly the look on her face of just being like, oh God, you know, like, oh no, I don't. And I'm thinking to myself, I don't even know where I found like maybe the flower shirt, okay. But I don't know where I found a little magenta short sleeve like jacket and a tie that was matching color. Like I don't even know how I pulled that out of whose closet like, but yeah, that's what I came out wearing. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 26:59

So, so much of our lives as little people is doing just this, like, is it okay? Is this okay? Is this emotion okay? Is this expression okay?And then we run into the rules, the good girl conditioning, the good boy conditioning too, which exists, you know, at that point too. And so,

Alex Reegan 27:16

Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 27:17

It is, I see you as somebody deeply, deeply brave for being in the fight for who you are for this long. And you're just going to have to read the book, you know, if you're listening to the podcast, you're just going to have to read the book to really get a sense for how many times you, Alex, were told, no, no, that's not okay.No, that's a sin. Hell, eternal damnation, burnt in all the different ways that that messaging was sent to you in much the same way that as good girls, be nice. Don't offend anyone. Don't make waves. Don't do anything that will hurt anybody else. And other people's needs and wants for us dominated our lives for so long. 

Alex Reegan 28:09

Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 28:11

You mentioned in the book that your fighting time is over. Say more about that. 

Alex Reegan 28:18

Yeah, I think, you know, this doesn't isn't something that will work for everyone. I know there's a lot of things that we could be fighting against. Still, there's a lot of there's over 400 and something anti-trans bills in the United States alone. Right now, there's a lot of racial inequity, poverty, you know, gender inequity. There's a lot of things still going on that we need to do better.But I think for myself, I just had to decide that I couldn't just be the one sort of like, you know, fighting against something. And I wanted to reevaluate about really just looking at what I was for versus what I was against. And just that has a different energy to it to to really sink into, well, what am I for? What do I stand for versus like, what do I stand against? And so that was part of it. And then I also think there was, you know, this aspect of myself where I started to realize that I was really in a place of judgment. Like I was feeling like I could very easily kind of say, well, like, I'm better than you, like I'm on the right side of history because I'm for I'm pro choice. I'm for like humans, you know, being safe. I'm against like racism, you know, and it feels really easy to sort of be vindicated in those ideas and to just say like, you know, this is the right way to do it. And I guess what I started to say to myself, and this is not everyone might not feel even comfortable doing this. But for myself, I started to challenge myself to say, for instance, with my parents who I have vastly different beliefs about a lot of different things. But I started to ask myself, what if I'm neither better or worse than them? Hmm. And they are neither better or worse than me. Because what I found is is my parents ultimately, they want me to be different so that they feel better. And if I want them to do something different, so I feel better, I am ultimately no different than they are. And so if I stop acting in that space, if I stop needing them to be a certain way so that I feel something and instead I just choose to like tap into myself, OK, how do I get to where I need to be? Whether that's peacefulness, whether that's, you know, even just being a little content, whether that's working through my own issues so that no matter what someone else is doing, I can be OK. And that is tremendously hard work. It's it's probably the hardest work I've undertaken because it's everything seems like it's dependent on all the things around you for us to sort of be OK. And that has I've discovered that's kind of a losing battle. Like I'm never going to, you know, I'm never going to get all the things I need so that I'll feel OK. And so I have to find a way to do that inside of me. So I think that's what the fighting days are done kind of meant that I'm just like I'm done fighting against all of that and deciding that I have all the answers and that you have to do it how I think it should be done. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 31:23

That's so relevant to this, you know, that kind of the ongoing conversation that I'm in, which is, how do you disconnect from all of the authority figures and the people in your life, who you have depended on to tell you who you are and what you should be doing, and bring that back in house, right? And how do you make peace with the fact that they are going to continue to be who they are?They're likely going to continue to have the same opinions and the same thoughts about you and what you're doing as bad or wrong, if that's what they think. But how do you exist? Letting them be wrong about you? How do you exist? Knowing fully that because I have my own trust in what I'm doing, because I have my own affirmation that who I am is good and right. Like, sure, having yours would be great, but I don't need it. 

Alex Reegan 32:25

Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 32:26

I can drop the fight to try and get it because the fight means me always changing myself to be what you want so that you will reward me with the connection I'm seeking from you. 

Alex Reegan 32:36

Definitely, definitely. And the thing I found too is the work always begins inside of us. Like that's actually where the change happens. We can never get someone else to do something differently just cause we want them to. And even if we could, one, it probably won't be lasting. They probably won't keep change, you know, doing it because we wanted them.And two, we won't feel what we think we're going to feel. It has to be inside of us that we change. And that's the thing we're kind of like, no, anything but that. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 33:07

And what I love in your book is that you provide a way to do that in this way that you use these dearly beloved prompts. Now I acknowledge that a lot of people have a tricky relationship with capital G God, right?This man up in the somewhere who's watching, you know, he sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake, kind of weird thing. And I always. 

Alex Reegan 33:36

it's a little too much like Santa Claus. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 33:39

Right. Right. And but this was this was always confusing to me is he loves me, but he's going to punish me. 

Alex Reegan 33:47

Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 33:48

Like, how do I understand love in terms of potentially being punished and always thinking, I got to do more. I got to do more to please him, to earn his favor, to make sure that I am doing enough.And I want to get to the dearly beloved prompts in just a second, but what you wrote here on page 181 is so beautiful. You said, this work, this journey home to ourselves, begins to create deep new space within us slowly. We gain access to a place of renewal as if we had done a home renovation. And I think this is what you're talking about. When you bring the work inside the walls of our home, one sheltered us. Yes, that's why we built them. But now time has come for us to knock down the walls that no longer give us shelter, but instead confine us. 

Alex Reegan 34:39

Mm-hmm 

Sara Bybee Fisk 34:40

So gorgeous. The work is never complete.We have entered a constant becoming. So how do? First of all, I noticed that you use lowercase G in your description of God. Tell me tell me why that was chosen. 

Alex Reegan 35:00

Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, that kind of stems back to when I was in seminary. So I went to an interfaith seminary program. And, you know, so the first whole year was studying all the different world religions. And when we got to the month of Christianity, I remember being kind of like annoyed. Like I was like, I don't need to study Christianity. I spent two thirds of my life up until, you know, it felt like so much of my life studying Christianity. I didn't want to study that. And I remember my dean saying to me, I'm going to challenge you to enter this space with an open mind and to imagine that Jesus could be different than who you imagined him to be or who you were taught that he was.And so in the process of that month, you know, up until then, even I just wouldn't even really use the word God. I mean, so most of my 20s and 30s, I just wouldn't even use the word God. I just didn't even like that word. I didn't like people who were using that word, you know, it was really triggering for me still. So something in that, I guess I really entered into that space. OK, deal. I'm going to have a little more curiosity. I'm going to sort of try to set aside some of my judgment and try to look at this with a little bit of a like a beginner's mind, as they say in Buddhism, you know, to try to just look at this with new eyes. And I did that and I did start to see something different. I started to see the possibility of what if this isn't all bad? You know, what if it's just been manipulated like so many things have and there are positive things that I can take from this. And I guess in that I just started using God with a lowercase G. I just decided like I can kind of reclaim God because God with the capital G, it has a lot of connotations. Like you said, you know, it means a lot of things to a lot of different people. It makes people feel like they own God. And I feel like that's sort of one of the most predominant things I've found myself saying is nobody owns God. And I feel like making it a lowercase G, it's sort of like reclaims that. It's like, oh, I can call it God because I'm not saying it's your God. I'm just saying it's God. And and that kind of I don't know, that gave me some space to sort of evolve beyond what I had known and to kind of like what we're talking about at the very beginning, there was then a curiosity to say I can learn something here beyond what I had known. So I think that really helped me to do that. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 37:22

What I love about what you said is it's essentially the same process that I went through when I didn't yet know that I was going to eventually leave the church I grew up in, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Mormons. But I remember that there was a time when I used to think that I got to God or that my relationship with God was through the church. And I had, like, God is up here on top, I'm down here below, and the church is in the middle, kind of facilitating all of it for me. And I remember it's almost like I took that middle piece, the church, and I set it off to the side. Like, I still appreciate what the church does for me, but what I have with God is mine. It is my own.And I don't need it to be facilitated or policed through this institution. Like, what God and I have, it's our own, it's my own thing. It's our own thing. And that was even revolutionary for me because growing up in a religion where there are lots of outside authorities who, you know, there's a prophet, and the prophet speaks directly to God, and then he tells us what God said and his word is as if it were God's word himself. And so,

Alex Reegan 38:41

Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 38:41

that there's something very revolutionary about taking the authority out of it. And so for those of you who are listening, maybe you have a great relationship with God that you love, maybe you are restructuring it. But what I love about what Alex has done is redefining God to be the presence in your life that works for you. You can do that.You can do that. And in fact, you can benefit greatly from it. And one of the ways that I think you invite us into exploring the benefits is with these dearly beloved writing prompts that are throughout the book. And I'm just going to read you possibly my favorite one. At the end of every chapter, you just have a prompt and you say turn to the God within. And this is the one on page 179 and ask, how can I get in touch with the fact that my life is okay, that my life is not will be okay. My life is how can I foster a deeper faith in the universe, in you and in my own compass? Why did you choose

Alex Reegan 39:49

beloved. That actually comes from Liz Gilbert. So I was in a writing class back in I think 2017 with Martha Beck, who's just an amazing author and teacher. And it was like a six or eight week course that it was all over the phone back then. This was like before Zoom and all of that stuff happened. So, you know, she'd have like a weekly call, you'd go on the call, everybody was just listening, she'd give different tips, and then you turn in writing assignments. And on the Friday of each of the ends of the week, she had Liz Gilbert on, which is like one of her closest friends. So it was like amazing.You got like these two amazing authors and you got to like listen to them, talk about writing and all these things. And one of the things one day was Liz Gilbert started talking about a process that she does herself, which was she'd sit down in the morning and she'd write herself a letter from love. And she usually would start it off. Back then, this is what she, I think now she just says she just starts it off as from love. But she said, dear beloved, this is what I want to tell you. You know, and when I heard that, I just went, oh my God, this is amazing.And so for months, I just, every day I would just sit down and write and I would just wherever I was that day. So, you know, whatever that one is in that, that one that I wrote, that's from years ago, this is not even tied into the book. These happened well before the book was even taking much form. So if I was having a really bad, it would be like, dear beloved, you know, angry, frustrated, you know, suffering self, this is what I want to tell you. And then I just would let myself like tap into whatever you want to call it, the God within the divine, our guides, ancestors, whatever, and love as Liz Gilbert says. And I just would get these responses and they almost came through. If you notice in the writing, it's a different writing. It doesn't even sound like my voice per se, because it's like it came through in this almost channeled way. That was really this like message for me. And so I did that for months. I think I ended up with almost 60 of these dear beloveds. And so I always knew somehow, oh, this should be part of something that I share. And as I began, you know, putting the book together, I was like, Oh, this will fit perfectly. And hilariously, there was literally one of those for the ends of every chapter and ones that fit perfect.I mean, it's not like we, I mean, we edited a few things like my, the grammar and some things, but literally they fit perfectly with each of the chapters. Like you couldn't have made that up. Like it was literally just that synchronicity. So yeah, the beloved also felt important to me because of my roots. In fact, one of the Hay House editors that, Oh, should we take out beloved? We can put another word. Like that might be more accessible to people. I'm like, this is the one thing I'm like, please don't take that out. Because especially a lot of Christianity, there is this, the Bible talks a lot about us being the beloved, you know? 

Alex Reegan 42:38

And so there was this part of me also that was reclaiming that, that was like, we are the beloved of the divine of God. I don't care who you are. I don't care if you're white, black, Jewish, straight, gay, trans cyst, the whole gamut of all of us. We are the beloved as a whole body of what I believe is the true body of Christ, not what's, you know, sort of taught as the body of Christ.And so keeping that beloved felt so important to me too, because it was like this healing energy for myself to just call myself that dear beloved. And, and then other times in the book, you know, I actually refer to the reader as dear beloved, you know, like that I just want them to know like we're, we are each other's beloved. Like this goes so much deeper and beyond, you know, the ideas around that kind of language and being sort of that being kind of gate kept gatekeeping away from people being the beloved because they're not part of the body of Christ anymore. And I, I just think we all fall in that there's no, there's no separation. Like I, that line I say where there's no place where you end and I begin. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 43:49

That just is so beautiful because I think inadvertently, probably. I mean, I just have so much compassion for my parents and who were raised by their parents, right? Who none of them were taught like, hey, you are good. 

Alex Reegan 44:10

Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 44:11

you are good. And it's not that they weren't taught that. It's just that message, I think, gets blurred when, hey, close your legs, put your shirt back on, go kiss your uncle. You're not tired. You're not hungry. You're not going to throw up. Like it gets lost because now we just become this creature to please. And are people pleasing?I don't really believe our people pleasing is optional, but that's a separate discussion. Because it gets our needs met and it helps us to survive. But the programming that we get as good girls is that you need to fix yourself. You need to be better. You need to be trying harder. You need to be doing more. And that there's almost something fundamentally broken in us, which if we're going to talk about Christianity, it was Eve, right? Who messed everything up for everyone. And it was, there are teachings in the there's also teachings about how your body is bad and cover it up and you can inadvertently cause men to have impure thoughts. And so what I love about Beloved is that it, I think it brings us back to our essential goodness. 

Alex Reegan 45:27

Yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 45:28

you are good, you are beloved, you are valuable, you are worthy and that the information that we are open to receiving when we think about ourselves that way. 

Alex Reegan 45:38

Yep. That's so different. Yes. So different. Yeah. Yeah. And we don't have to any longer, what you're saying is great. Like we become performative versions of ourselves in this, right? When we're following all the good girl, good boy rules of this is how you do things. This is who you have to be. We become this performative version of ourselves. That's not even the real version of us. And so I think, yeah, stepping outside of that, pulling back into the truth of we're not broken. There's nothing wrong with me. And I don't care if you think there is, you know, that's on you to figure out and to recognize that we are that beloved. It's about calling ourselves the beloved, you know, it's about seeing ourselves as that. Like I am my beloved, you know, like, and loving ourselves and welcoming ourselves home, you know, because we can't just keep, it's just, we can't just keep playing this performance of it's like we're, it's like we're on always, we're putting on a show for everyone to make sure we get, like you said, when we're younger, to make sure we get our needs met, because we have to do it. It's you're right. It's not optional. It's a survival mechanism. It is literally sheerly survival. But then when we become adults and it's not any longer survival method, that's what I'm talking about in the sort of building, taking down the walls that are no longer service. Yeah. It helped us survive as children. Now it is keeping us captive in these spaces and we have to be willing to tear down those walls and say no more, you know, like I am not going to perform for you so that you feel whatever you think you need to feel by me doing this. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 47:13

Yeah. One of the most fascinating parts of kind of my discussion and our ongoing discussion about this is how the rules changed for you after you transitioned. 

Alex Reegan 47:25

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, and it's, that's ever evolving because of you, I don't know if you, those of you who are not watching can't see, but I'm starting to get more facial hair here. And so like that's changing it even more, you know, like I'm noticing how I was in the store the other day and it was pretty older gentlemen. Uh, we pass each other and he gave me the very much like, Hey there son, you know, like he really like engaged with me. And in the past, like they, he would have just walked right past me, you know, there wouldn't have been like an engagement. And so I'm noticing interesting things like that where older men who wouldn't normally have engaged with me are now kind of seeing me as their peer and seeing me as the, this equal. And so I'm getting more engagement in some of those interesting areas.Um, but the interesting thing too, is that like I transitioned while still working for the nonprofit that I work for and things like that. So it hasn't necessarily changed. You know, I have some friends who have transitioned and then now they're in different jobs. And so now they're seeing potentially as just assist man. And they're totally having a completely different experience. You know, people are treating them totally different. There really are not the same rules that there are for people assigned female at birth. And so I have seen more and more of that, um, as, as like, I've just trained as my transition sort of continues to evolve and it's definitely, um, yeah, I don't, I notice, um, you know, even sometimes in, in work environments where the people as I'm female at birth were definitely treated differently and expected to like do more behind the scenes work and kind of, you know, like, Oh, you guys should eat, you, you ladies should eat in the office over here.And meanwhile, most of the assessment are out in the room with the like larger group of people at the conferences and things and just little weird things like that. Where I've noticed and, and now I think I'm sort of in this weird in between sometimes for them because maybe they feel weird being like, you should go in there with them, you know, kind of, I guess go out there where I don't know where to send you, you know, kind of thing. And just noticing the differences, um, and just also noticing how different, um, you know, I, I've been joking that I really want to write a graphic novel that's about bathrooms because first of all, bathrooms are a huge issue right now, right? That's one of the big things we're facing. Like, uh, trans people can't use the wrong bathroom, you know, all this stuff that's going on. Um, but I really want to just, because it is two different environments. I mean, you know, the women's restroom is very much like, there's a lot of talking going on. There's a lot of engaging. There's a lot of noise. There's a lot of like people at the mirror. Oh, can I borrow that? Oh, what are you doing? And you know, especially if you're in restaurants or out at bars or places like that, you know, the women's restroom was, is so interactive. Really. There's like a lot going on in there. 

Alex Reegan 50:21

And it's also usually very clean. Let me just say, even though y'all might think it's not clean, it's very clean.And then there's the men's restroom, which is literally like your, it's like church. There's no talking. There is no talking. There is no eye contact. If you bump into someone, don't say sorry, or excuse me, because then they will look at you. We're like, why are you talking? You like broke the rule of fight club. Um, also they're disgusting. I just have to like, I don't know what's happened in half of them. So it's an interesting difference too. And the energy levels are just completely different. And you know, honestly, when I was still, before I transitioned, I was stopped by women going into the restroom. I was told you're going into the wrong bathroom. What's wrong with it? And I was like, do you think I can't read? Like I would walk with other women assigned female birth who are women themselves and identify as women into the bathroom with them. People would still stop me from going into the bathroom. Like it was constantly a trauma for me to ever use the bathroom in public.And now I never have a problem. Like men don't even look up. It's like, go in, go to the bathroom. That's it. Go out. There's no. And so that's just one of the interesting little things. It's just also my own differences in how I'm treated. I actually was treated worse sometimes by cis women in bathrooms and in places like that. Because I think in part that people pleasing and that performative, it's like there's also are assuming all women have to look like all other women do. There's a lot of judgment around if you look masculine presenting, there's just a lot of judgment around that you're not conforming. And that's like seeped so into all of our brains that we will literally judge other people saying you should also conform and do this performative thing so that I feel safe in the fact that I have to do it. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 52:30

Oh yeah. And for, for a lot of the people that I work with, that's where a lot of our resentment comes from of like, listen, I am busting my ass to perform. Yep. Why, why the hell aren't you? Like we're all in this together where we all got to perform and pretend that we are not feeling bad or feeling sad or that we actually are happy to be here when we are not at all happy to be here.Like the pretending and the performativeness just is, is endemic in, in, in our, our, our lives as, as people pleasers. And so for those of us who are stepping away from conformity and stepping away from pretending and performing, there was a beautiful part in the book. Um, it's one of my gazillion tabs here where you talk about meeting Doris and, um, her band of, of people that you began to really think like, wait a second, these might be my people. You've met somebody who was trans. Was it probably possibly for the first time? 

Alex Reegan 53:37

Yeah, that I knew of, yeah. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 53:39

Yeah, that you knew of. And so one of the things the reason I wanted to mention that is for those of you who are listening, who are on learning and stepping out of performance and pretending and people pleasing.What role, Alex, do you think having people other people you connect with who are also undoing? What role? 

Alex Reegan 54:01

that play? I mean, I think that's life-changing. And I think the thing I'd say first to that is you will find those people as well. Like it almost becomes like a magnet because I think when you start that process of pulling back, when you start the process of like, I'm not going to just do this to please you anymore. I'm not going to follow your stupid rule just because you had to follow them and you want me to follow them too, you know, whatever the nonsense is like passed down through generation to generation. There's a lot of fear in that moment of that pullback, like sort of as you disconnect, it's like recut in the umbilical cord again, I think in a way. And you're like, yeah, no, I'm not going to fall. I don't care that this is what you all have done for ancestry down the line. I'm not going to do it. There's a lot of fear in that initial thing.Like I will be abandoned. I'll lose my own community. I'll lose it. And you might. And yet when you move far enough away from that, you will start to like draw in like magnets, the other people doing this work in the world, people who are no longer, you know, like submitting to, I have to follow these standards and these rules. I'm going to be outside of the binary or outside of gender norms or outside of the good girl norms outside of this is what you have to do to be good for God. Whatever all of those things are, you will find other people on that journey and you will find each other because I have found that over and over and over again. As my life has gone on ever since I actually kind of pulled back and said no more almost as soon as I did that, I started to find other people doing this work and you will, you will find community and it matters that it will be helpful because you'll also meet people kind of further down the road than you who've like been doing this a little longer than you. You know, sometimes I meet people who are just newly deconstructing from Christianity and I'm like, shit, I've been doing that for like 25 years now. Like, what do you want to know? You know, like, let's talk about this. And they're like, I've been out of the church for two months. I'm like, Oh God, okay, where are you? You know, and I think it's nice to know that you'll then meet people that maybe have been doing it a little longer or further down the road. And you can kind of say, Hey, how did this work for you? What I'm at this part where I'm really stuck where how did you get around this part? And, and you really can find that space in those communities to help you really unlock that more and find yourself then in that process. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 56:29

Absolutely. And because we are humans who are meant to be in relationships, in communities, in groups, I love that you say that you will find it. It's almost like when I started doing the work for myself to love and accept myself and to deal with the fear of punishment, the fear of disconnection and to connect to myself. It's all I, I liken it to kind of like I started sending out a different frequency. My frequency was no longer who do you want me to be? What can I do for you? How can I please you? How can I fit into your plan for what you think my life should look like to? Yeah, I am a sovereign being. And that frequency attracts a different type of no doubt, a different type of person. And so I love that you say that.What, what is your hope for what your book will do in the world? 

Alex Reegan 57:30

I mean, I think, you know, it partly just goes back to that idea that I hope people will see themselves in my story. You know, it's really easy to think again that we're so different. You know, we spend it's not just a societal thing. I think it's also just how our egos are built. And we sort of spend our whole time just sort of identifying the other, you know, like whether it's because people have different color skin, they have a different religion, they have a different dialect of language or they sound different, they have a different accent, whatever the things are that we really have like pinpointed. In fact, I kind of think there's something to the way that we've manifested this world that is such a like multifaceted, diverse place. There's just so many different people from so many different walks of life. And the fact that like we have the opportunity to learn to see each other in each other as opposed to seeing each other as the other is like that is the it's like we're given every day a thousand opportunities to do it over and over again and to keep and to choose the sort of I don't want to say the right answer, but to choose love, to choose to see one another.And so I think that's my hope is that right now it just feels like we're really in this space where there's a lot of confusion, a lot of misunderstanding, a lot of misinformation, a lot of fear mongering, which, you know, always is a big red flag to me. You know, if people are pointed at someone else and saying they're to blame for your lot in life for whatever is wrong in your life, that's usually a red flag. And so I think I hope that people, you know, my challenge has been to several people. If you think you can't find yourself in my story, that's sort of this trans man who grew up in an evangelical household who came through and got rid of Christianity, went through addiction, went through weed smoking, went through finding shamanism and became an interfaith minister. If you think you just cannot find yourself in this story because it feels so different from you, I promise you, like I challenge you to read this book. And and I don't believe that you'll come out on the other side of it without seeing yourself in some piece of yourself in this, because I truly wholeheartedly believe that we are oneness. I believe that we're all connected. We all know what it's like. You know, the surface level of the story might be different. But underneath, if we excavate beneath the story level to our emotions, we all feel the same emotions. We all feel we all know what it feels like to want to belong. We all know what it feels like to want to be worthy. Most of us know what it feels like to probably feel like we are a sinner or we're not good enough or we haven't done it right. You know, we all are running through the same current of wanting to connect and belong. And I think, you know, that's my hope is that people will find that sense of belonging even in something that they think, you know, is not is not for me. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:00:30

Well, I see myself in your story and it's why I wanted to share it with, uh, the people who listened to this podcast and it's not that the circumstances are the same, it's that the journey is the same to find who you are, to be seen for who you are, to stop the pretending and performing that gets in the way of being seen for who you really are. I mean, the most common thing that, you know, middle-aged moms and women who I talk with, they say, I just don't even know who I am.Like if you take away the kids, the job, all the things that I do for others, like who am I? And I think that that beautiful yearning just, it doesn't seem to go away. 

Alex Reegan 01:01:18

No. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:01:19

to be wanting to be seen and known for who you are. And so I love that I see myself in your story and I love that other people now have the opportunity to do that as well.And to make that easier, I am gonna be giving away five copies of Alex's book. And I just wanna say right now, here's how you can get yourself entered into the drawing for it. So Alex is on social media at RevRiggs, RevRiggs, R-E-E-G-S, that's his handle on all of the social media platforms. And if you follow Alex, that will get you an entry into each of his social media platforms. You can also follow me on my social media platforms, Serifis Coaching or Serifis Coach, it's one of those two. So follow on social media, you can also follow the podcast, that would actually be fantastic and rate it. And if you just screenshot that, DM it to me, I'm gonna take all of these names and put them into an entry, send you a book. And then Alex, tell them what you're gonna add to that. 

Alex Reegan 01:02:28

So I realize it's too complex and complicated to try to have you send me the book so I can sign it and send it back to you. So as long as you send Sara your information, we'll get you at least I'm going to make some placards that I can sign and I'll send it to you and then you'll be able to stick it in your book so that you have a signed copy of the first edition. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:02:46

Beautiful. So sign up, follow, screenshot it and DM it.And then I would love to put one of these books in your hand. And if one of these books does not end up in your hands through this giveaway, they're the the softcover is available now anywhere you buy books. And please, once you read it, write a review. Um, Alex, is there anything that we didn't cover that you really wanted to say? 

Alex Reegan 01:03:14

Hmm. I think, you know, I just want to say, you know, thank you to hopefully, I mean, to you, first off, but I think hopefully my hope is that the listeners also will understand the opportunity in this moment, which is to be open and have curiosity to something that you might not understand something you might even have fear or anxiety around something that seems so foreign to you. And so outside of your realm and your life, and to just like have curiosity to be open to something new and to learning something beyond what you know, because I think the beauty is, is that you don't know who you could attract into your life and who you could meet and what could change, you know, just like Sara saying, when we met, you know, we could have just like met and passing at that event, talked, chatted and gotten on different planes and gone on with our lives. And a lot of us do that in our lives. You know, we don't end up in that moment sometimes. And I think partly the reason we don't end up in those holy moments where you actually get that opportunity to have that little bubble experience where you learn something and expand and grow is because we don't have enough curiosity is because we just aren't open to possibilities beyond what we think we already know and what we think how things are.And this is, this is it, this is how it is. And so, you know, I just hope that we all would take that opportunity in our own daily lives, you know, to just have a little more curiosity, have a little more open heartedness towards each other towards a stranger at the grocery store, you know, the cashier that you're talking to or the teller at the bank, it doesn't have to be some huge, you know, broad thing, but it can just be some simple little meeting that we have with each other where we're willing to see each other and to see, I see you, you know, because I think the truth is that we're all here to be seen. That's what all of us want. We want to be seen for who we are. We want to be loved for who we are. And we can give that to people if we just open up our hearts and have a little more curiosity and understanding that, you know, we don't know everything, but we're willing to learn and expand and grow. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:05:21

beautiful. And I just want to point out something that we don't have to understand each other to see each other.We don't have to understand deepest, you know, inner workings to just extend seeing to each other. And so I'm kind of in my mind seeing like like a continuum, like the first step is just to see below the label, like this is a human having a particular experience, I don't have to understand it, to see them and to understand that they are a human who has rights and who has who, who is entitled to the same opportunities that I want for my life. And so as if you are listening, and this is your first time lists listening to someone who is trans curiosity and and seeing is enough. 

Alex Reegan 01:06:15

Yeah, great place to start. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:06:17

But if you follow that a little bit longer along the continuum to actually becoming a friend, or maybe even an ally, that is an amazing opportunity to then step in front of some of these people who we see are brothers and sisters who are tired of fighting, who are tired of trying to just carve out a place to exist in the world of dignity, of access to health care, access to the things that, you know, those of us who present at, you know, this head and to put our bodies in front of their bodies in terms of legislation, calling people, standing up for them in our circles of friends. Like, that is work you can do if you want to.It's not essential to just see and have curiosity about someone. But I do just want to acknowledge that what you have enabled me to do, Alex, is be you and to see the similarities in our lives and that your life and your journey is, we're the same. And it has influenced me to step up and advocate and write and call and that has been such a beautiful gift that knowing you has given me. 

Alex Reegan 01:07:51

Well, I appreciate that. I mean, that means a lot to me. And I think, you know, what you're saying is so right. You can start at the very basic part of just being willing to see people as humans. And, and I love what you said about that next space of putting art, putting yourselves in front of these bodies. And that goes not just for LGBTQ people, but for people of color and anyone who's fighting against oppression and is seen as a minority in this world. And I think this is how we heal the world together. We do it together.We don't do it just like one person standing, fighting, screaming at the top of their lungs when nobody might even be hearing us, we have to come together and do this work together. And I would challenge people. There are a lot of these bathroom laws and a lot of things like that happening. Keep your eyes open for people. Keep your eyes open for persons that you might see coming into the bathroom that might look like they are presenting. Maybe maybe it's the women's bathroom and someone's presenting. Maybe they look a little bit like me and keep an eye out for that person. Like watch and make sure other people aren't being mean or trying to harass them. Cause like I said, that was something I faced for decades in my life long before I ever transitioned. So, you know, we can keep an eye out for each other and we can look out for each other and know that we're, you know, I see you and I'm standing beside you. It doesn't mean that you have to like literally physically confront someone or get involved in a situation that might be uncomfortable. It might just be about like Sara saying, you might step in front of someone into the, like the sinks just to separate something where you see something that doesn't feel right. You know, like use, use your privilege, whatever privilege that might be to try to like hold space in the world for folks who don't necessarily, you know, have that privilege right now. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:09:39

Yeah. I love the definition of privilege and I wish I could remember where it came from. It's not mine, but it's privilege is whatever you don't have to deal with. 

Alex Reegan 01:09:51

Hmm 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:09:51

right? I don't have to deal with being mistaken for any gender other than how I present.And so that privilege where I can just walk into spaces that are for females and no one questions me, I just don't have to worry about it. And so privilege is a loaded word for some people, but I like to think of it as just whatever you don't have to deal with. And so I love the idea that I can use the part of my life that is easy to advocate for and take a stand for people whose lives are not easy when it comes to something as simple as just walking into a fucking bathroom. 

Alex Reegan 01:10:30

Yeah, yeah, for sure. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:10:32

Alex, this conversation, I just I wish we could talk forever and we will, you know, off offline.But is there anything else that you want people to know about the work that you do about working with you in some way? 

Alex Reegan 01:10:51

Yeah, definitely. I mean, one thing, if you belong to a church or a spiritual community, I do a lot of speaking and guest preaching spots. So if you want to have me, you know, come and talk somewhere, you can contact me on my website and reach out that way. I also do a lot of, I still do some one-on-one coaching. I also do some workshops and smaller group things as well. So feel free, you know, my website's just alexregan.com, you know, you can feel free to reach out to me there, email me, you know, and we can set up a time to talk and figure out what it is that I can do to help you or your community.I love to be out there in the world talking about not just my story, but also just about the things that I've learned along the way that I really think, you know, one of the things I put in the book was I really tried to give you workbook things, you know, like actual sort of homework that you could do yourself, things that have worked for me in hopes that they might work for you as well. And so, you know, any way I can, you know, support a community you might be in, if it's other LGBTQ groups as well. But even, you know, I think one of the things I'd certainly feel called to is coming into spiritual communities and spaces that are open and affirming and talking to them because I've gotten a lot of great responses from people, people who, you know, like Sara is saying that it just helped them to see a new frame of reference and it really helped them open their hearts and their minds. And that's like where I think, you know, I can be of great service to people. So yeah, hit me up. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:12:21

Well, it's certainly where you shine because I have had the privilege of being in the congregation when you preached and when your wife Doris sing just the most gorgeous songs. And so, yeah, Alex, thank you so much for your time and for writing this book. It is a gift to the world. 

Alex Reegan 01:12:39

Thank you. Thank you. I can't tell you how much I appreciate it. I'm glad to be here. 

Episode 153 - Using the Past and the Future to Solve Problems in the Present

It’s so easy to feel stuck and overwhelmed when we haven’t figured something out yet. But what if you looked for the evidence in your life that you can solve the problem? In this episode, I share how I’m borrowing belief from my past self to help me make a decision I’m wrestling with now. Instead of demanding certainty or shaming myself for not knowing the answer, I’m using real proof from my own history to help me relax while I take the time to figure it out. Here’s what I cover:

• How leaving the church one step at a time taught me how to untangle my beliefs

• Why your brain relaxes when you offer it real evidence from your past

• How to copy and paste a past growth process onto the problem you’re facing today

• The self-judgment that creeps in when you think you should have it figured out by now

• A powerful visualization to help you imagine the future version of you who already solved the problem

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What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

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Transcript

00:59

Short and sweet episode coming your way today that is really based on some work that I'm doing and a realization that I had that was really helpful. And I hope there's some value for you as well. 

 01:12

I am currently working on resolving how I feel about charging money for my coaching services. And I have struggled with this for years, years and years and years. I've charged more. I've charged less. 

 01:28

I've worried a lot about what other people think of what I charge. I have adjusted it. I've given it away. I've been all over the place. And a lot of that is because women are taught that we should be helpers. 

 01:43

We should be givers. We should be willing to help other people and solve their problems for free. That our time is not really our own, that it's the best and highest use of it is to help other people. 

 01:59

And so when you are in the type of profession that I am, where you are helping and wanting to help other people, for me, there's been some challenges. And there's a part of me that really believes that it is wrong to charge money when you could do it for free, right? 

 02:20

It's wrong to charge money for something that comes easily to you. It's wrong to charge money to help other people resolve their problems. I should be willing to just do it for free. And that it's wrong to profit in some ways off of other people's suffering. 

 02:40

And you can kind of hear that that part has kind of a dramatic take on what I do, because it's not all suffering. Yes, people pleasing causes a lot of problems and there is some suffering. Anyway, as I have tried to better understand what all the different parts of me have been programmed to believe, it has felt for a long time like this particular issue is just, I'm just kind of stuck in it. 

 03:11

I could charge this, but then that's too much. I could charge this, but then it's too little. I could do this or do that or do this. And it all just kind of feels like I am trying to land on the right number that will keep other people happy and that will make me happy as well. 

 03:29

And it's all over the place. That number doesn't exist. So you can see how the programming that I have grown up with really is kind of making me look outside of myself. What's the right answer? What does this person say I should charge? 

 03:46

What does this person, what will this person think? And it's kind of just tied me up in knots over the years. And so I just drop it. I've just kind of dropped it and, you know, kind of limped along, not really feeling like I've made a powerful decision or I've made a decision that I am very happy with that really kind of resonates with my values. 

 04:11

So I was talking about this with my coach last week. And in just the opportunity to talk through this with her, I realized I have had problems in the past that I thought were this kind of intractable, this stuck. 

 04:35

And I was able to work through them. And that gave me such relief and hope. And so what I wanted to talk a little bit about is how I am now borrowing the process and kind of borrowing some belief from what I did before to help myself feel confident in this time where I don't have this pricing issue solved yet, but I'm using my past success with changing something. 

 05:13

And I'm going to get into what it was in just a second. My past success in changing what I thought was just this intractable belief and how I was able to finally kind of loosen my grip on that and have a different experience. 

 05:28

I'm using that, the memory of that to inform what I do next. So what was the belief that I shifted? And why did it feel so immovable? When I was realizing just how out of alignment continuing to go to church was for me. 

 05:51

When I really looked, I'd looked at, you know, what the Mormon church taught about things that were really sensitive and tender to me, and I didn't agree. I wanted to leave. I wanted to stop going, but I didn't feel like I would ever fully be able to leave. 

 06:12

I felt like a part of me would always be wondering, should I go back? Was it the wrong decision? Am I messing up my kids? Am I missing something? Is there, you know, a part of something that I'm not seeing that if I knew, I would want to go back to church. 

 06:33

And so I kind of imagined myself leaving. And my fear was I would never fully be able to leave, that I would always feel kind of a lack of confidence about my decision, that I might always kind of crumple or collapse in the face of questions from people that I knew and loved who were still practicing Mormons. 

 06:57

And I felt really kind of immobilized by that fear for a while. Like I'm not ever fully going to be either in the church or out, just kind of in this limbo space between those two states. And it took up a lot of my time. 

 07:14

It took up a lot of my brain space. And I think if I look back, the parts of me that were active were just really trying to protect me from making a decision where I might be open to the criticism and judgment of others, or where there might be some very normal things to regret or to feel sadness about the loss of. 

 07:43

There are so many positive things about having a religious community, and Mormonism does a few things really, really well. There's a lot of opportunity for social connection and service and a lot of opportunity to meet other people who are like-minded. 

 08:02

And I thought about the loss of those things and thought, gosh, will I ever get over that? Will I ever just not grieve that anymore? And so that limbo between wanting to leave, but not feeling like I was able to, it feels a lot like the stuckness that I'm feeling right now. 

 08:21

So when I looked back and asked myself, okay, so how, how did I do that? I had the opportunity to really kind of step through the steps. So first thing that I did was that I didn't demand that I make a change within a certain time period. 

 08:43

I knew that I was going to need some time and some space to be able to feel comfortable. And I could also, now looking back, I can see that my brain wanted to know, what does the end look like? Our brains crave certainty. 

 09:03

They create concrete evidence. They crave, you know, the known and do not like the unknown. And so my brain at the time was really wanting to get to what is this going to look like on the other side? 

 09:15

And I couldn't come up with something really concrete. But what I did was I had to trust myself to take just the next step. And if I look back, the way that I left the Mormon church was one step at a time. 

 09:36

And for me, that journey was over lots of years. It was like over seven or eight years, right? Just one little step. And sometimes I didn't even realize that I was taking a step. But as I told myself the truth and didn't discount what I was feeling, I let it really, really matter how uncomfortable I was, how much I wanted something different, how the effects of what was being taught at church were showing up in my life and in the lives of those that I loved who were affected by them. 

 10:09

I just did the next thing, the next step. I skipped meetings that I didn't want to be at. Then I started declining invitations to participate in other things that weren't in alignment for me. I started talking about my fears. 

 10:29

I got a coach who helped me work through the grief. And I just did the next thing that felt right. And so what I was able to create over time is a lot of trust with myself because every time I took the next step, I felt better. 

 10:51

I was still scared, right? In a lot of situations, I was scared to completely disengage, completely leave. But I was the next step, the next step, the next step that really showed me you can do this. 

 11:07

You can do this. So when I think now about how stuck I felt around being able to fully leave Mormonism, it's not that it feels silly to me because I remember what a struggle it was, but I am so confident and solid in my choice. 

 11:24

I've had lots of people, you know, question or try and poke holes in my reasons and, you know, share their opinion of what I should be doing. And I can just say, okay, yeah, well, thanks for sharing your opinion. 

 11:38

And I feel so rock solid, sturdy, and confident about that decision that it gives me a lot of hope that I can also feel that way someday about this decision that I'm working with now. So now, when I'm looking at this current quote unquote problem, right, opportunity to better understand myself, to better understand my parts, and to solve the issue at hand, which for me is I want to make a powerful, grounded, aligned with my values decision about what I charge. And I don't want it to be up for discussion. I want to feel confident and joyful about it. And I want it to accurately reflect the value that I provide. 

 12:26

So the value that I'm getting out of looking back at how I solved that old problem is I realized with this new problem, what I charge, I was really being hard on myself. Why haven't you figured this out? 

 12:44

Why are you still going back and forth about this? I mean, for heaven's sake, you've been a coach now for eight years. Why don't you have this down? So I had to drop that really sneaky judgment. And I got to look back at how I already did it by taking the next step and holding it with gentleness, not a strict timeline, not any judgment or criticism, and some spaciousness that kind of gave my nervous system a chance to relax. 

 13:24

Because the message that I was sending to myself is, listen, we can take our time with this. We can take all the time that we need to be able to make a decision that feels good. And so all of that felt really good when I realized it last week. 

 13:42

And then it just kind of made me zoom out a little bit and give myself some space. But also my brain started thinking, okay, why does this work? Why does it work to look back on past success and kind of copy and paste what worked to what the problem that needs to be solved now is? 

 14:03

And I just briefly want to point some things out. Our brains are designed to conserve energy. Clinging to familiar beliefs because they feel safe is easier energetically in terms of just the energy that it takes to create new beliefs. 

 14:21

And so, of course, your brain is going to want to cling to the familiar because in terms of energy, that's what conserves the most energy and it's what feels the safest. So when you show your brain proof from your own history, you know what? 

 14:39

We have untangled some sticky beliefs before. We have made decisions that felt powerful and so aligned before. And when we can offer that to our parts, to ourself, to our brain, there is some relaxing that happens. 

 14:59

It's like you take a deep breath. You're like, oh yeah, we've done this before, right? That builds self-trust because it's built on what actually happened instead of, I think, what sometimes for me feels a little out of reach, which is more like fantasy confidence, right? 

 15:19

I can look back and see, no, I actually did this. I'm not trying to manifest anything. I'm referencing my actual past history. And it became such a powerful moment for me because I could relax like, okay, we've already done this once around something that felt like impossible to unwind. 

 15:42

And we did it. So we can have all the confidence and faith that we're going to be able to do it again. So if that is valuable for you to look back, there is often a lot of success that you've already created by taking small steps or doing what it was that helped you that you can reference for what you are working on now. 

 16:11

Lastly, looking back isn't the only way to expand your reference for what is possible for you. Because another way to do it is to actually go to the future and create a version of you that exists in the future, future you, that is based on who you want to become. 

 16:37

So that's what I want to do right now. If you're driving, just listen. If you can write some things down and you want to, great. I'm going to take you through a little bit of a visualization that teaches you how to draw on the future to create an idea in your imagination, which is really, really powerful of who you could become or who you would need to be to solve the current problem. 

 17:04

So here's what I want you to do. Just start to imagine yourself two to three years from now. What is that person like? The belief or the problem that you're currently struggling with, it's no longer running your life. 

 17:19

It's not a problem anymore. And I want you to really imagine that version of you in a specific set. And I want you to ask yourself, what do you notice about her? How is she sitting? How does she hold herself? 

 17:40

What does she believe about herself? What does she no longer tolerate or argue with? What is she capable of doing that current you is not able to do? How did she get there? If you look at who she is and you work backward, what is one small move that you made to become her? 

 18:14

What is one small belief that feels accessible to you now that she just absolutely like nails? Sometimes it's helpful to think about a ladder, right? If she's at the top of the ladder, what are all the rungs that she had to climb in terms of action she took or beliefs that she developed and held that got her to where she is? 

 18:42

And what is one small move or step that you can take in her direction this week? How would your body move if you were already her? What would you be thinking and believing? I want you to just let that image sit with you. 

 19:04

So if I were doing this about this desire for me to feel confident and joyful about the money that I charge, I would imagine future me explaining what I charge to a client, smiling, feeling so grounded and calm, handling objections with ease and with compassion, because money is, you know, it's a sensitive subject for a lot of people. 

 19:33

And what one person thinks is a lot of money, another person doesn't, and vice versa. So I just imagine myself talking about it very openly, very compassionately, but also feeling like sturdy about it. 

 19:50

I'm smiling. I don't feel any pressure or any embarrassment or any shame. It just feels like sturdy confidence in my body. And so then if I ask myself, okay, if that's at the top of the ladder, what's like the next rung for me? 

 20:10

It might be something like reviewing my current prices and seeing how I feel about that. Like, do I feel happy and joyful and confident about where I am now? Interesting question. And I would take a look at that. 

 20:25

And so using future me to guide this is so beautiful because it gives me a really powerful tool, my imagination, to create who I want to be and hold that out like the light at the end of the tunnel. And then all I have to do is let her tell me what I would do. 

 20:51

I can ask future me, what's one thing you would share with me right now? Let me see. Let me see if I can. My head really wasn't in it because I'm recording this episode, but I'm going to give myself just a beat here. 

 21:06

Future me would tell me that it's possible to have a joyful exchange of money for goods and services. And if you're watching, you know, this on my YouTube channel or otherwise, my face just kind of totally lit up because that's a belief that I don't have yet, right? 

 21:29

I can see that it's possible. And I can see why my part who grew up with a lot of money scarcity and insecurity would have a hard time believing that. Like it's possible to have a joyful exchange of money for goods or services. 

 21:49

And that feeling, it feels amazing for me right now, but also I would not have come up with that on my own had I not been doing this exercise with you right now. So I invite you to look to the past and to the future for help with solving the current issues that you're wrestling with. 

 22:15

What have you already done in the past that can inform what you're doing now? Copy and paste what you did onto your current situation. Adjust it if it needs, but give your brain the evidence from the past of something you've already done. 

 22:35

And another equally powerful tool is looking to the future. Who do I have to be to solve this? What is she like? What does she believe? How is she different? What would she tell me about this issue that I am working through right now? 

 22:54

And how can I walk up the rungs of the ladder toward where she is? It is really powerful to use our past evidence and our future imagination and bringing those tools to the present. Because I think I know I feel like the stuckness, I feel like it's just going to go on forever. 

 23:18

And this is a really beautiful way to draw on evidence that you already have that beliefs can change. You don't need blind faith, right? You have actual reference points. That past self is proof. And your future self is a beautiful, powerful guide. 

 23:36

Thank you so much for listening. I would love to know if you feel like there is something in this episode that really resonated for you. If you do that future me exercise and want to share that with me, I would love to hear it. sara@sarafisk.coach.

Episode 152 - How to Stay Informed Without Losing Yourself

The overwhelming amount of information, emotion, and terror we are experiencing in the world right now can make it hard to know what to do with ourselves. Last week’s episode came from my own experience of feeling like I was going to break and realizing my nervous system was completely overloaded. In this episode, I build on that and talk about what to do—because it’s not enough to say you will “just get off social media” or “stop doom scrolling.” If it were that simple, I would have stopped, and maybe you would have too. We’ll look at why this is so hard to put down and what it takes to step back in a way that allows you to stay informed without losing yourself in the crush of information. Here’s what I cover:

• Why doom scrolling is not activism and can hinder you from taking thoughtful action

• The good girl rules that make disengaging feel like a moral failing

• Why learning to regulate your nervous system can be a powerful form of resistance

• What happens when your reptile brain takes over and you’re stuck in looping thoughts

• Practical ways to regulate so you can stay informed and respond in ways that actually help

Find Sara here:

sarafisk.coach

pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

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Transcript

00:59

Today's episode is kind of a part two to last week's episode. And so if you haven't listened to that one, it might be a good idea to go back and listen. This can also stand alone, and it's really kind of prescient for the time that we are in. 

 01:14

It is February 17th. I'm located in the United States, and there's a lot of geopolitical and world events that are happening as well, and a lot going on politically in the United States. And that matters, but what we're going to talk about is applicable to any time there is an overwhelming, crushing amount of information and emotion and terror and trauma that we have to deal with. 

 01:43

Because that can happen on a global scale or on a countrywide scale, I guess, but it can also happen personally. It can also happen personally. And so if you didn't listen to last week's episode, it's probably a good idea to start with that first. 

 02:00

But if you didn't, it's also going to be fine. So last week's episode was really in response to my own experience where I just felt like I was going to break. And I didn't, this is so fascinating to me, you know, this work of, you know, coaching and mental health. 

 02:20

There's always blind spots. There's always things that we can't see about ourselves. I have a coach, right? I have a therapist. And those people help me to see these things. And I couldn't, I honestly did not know what was going on with me last week, as I describe. 

 02:38

And then I found the post by the Mama Attorney, which I read in last week's episode. Great. Please go check that out. And it really helped give me words for what was happening to me when I didn't realize that my nervous system was just completely overloaded. 

 02:59

And then in today's episode, I want to build on that a little bit. I want to talk about what to do instead, because it's not enough to say, okay, just get off social media. Don't doom scroll. Just, you know, shut it off. 

 03:12

And if it were that simple, I would have stopped, right? And maybe you would have stopped already. But there's a couple of pieces that I want to name that are going on here that are part of why some of us feel like we're really hooked into what's going on. 

 03:29

And we feel like there's a really primitive part of our brain that starts to run the show. And what to do instead? I hope that by the end of this episode, you better understand maybe why this is so hard to put down and when you're ready to put it down, what to do instead so that you can stay informed without feeling like, you know, you're losing yourself in this crush of information. 

 03:54

So let's go back to where we often go first, which are what are the good girl rules that might be driving some of your activity here? If you feel guilty when you disengage from social media during a crisis, that guilt just doesn't come out of nowhere. 

 04:13

Here are just a few of some of the rules that I have been keeping track of as I have worked with clients and investigated kind of how I was feeling. And a client put it into words this way. She said, you know, I don't matter as much as other people who are experiencing terrible things matter. 

 04:36

I thought that was so fascinating because I think it's true. A lot of us are taught that if bad things are happening to other people, whatever you're experiencing, that's nothing. You should be grateful. 

 04:48

It's easy for you, right? You have privilege or you, if you look away, it's because you're selfish. And so just check and see if that is a belief that might be driving some of your behavior that if bad things are happening in the rest of the world, I don't matter. 

 05:06

Another way this shows up is I can't feel okay if others are hurting or if I feel okay while others are hurting. Something is wrong with me. I shouldn't do that. If there are bad things happening, then I should feel bad. 

 05:24

Check that one. Some other rules. If I don't stay informed 24-7 about what's going on, then I'm irresponsible or I'm a bad person or I'm a bad ally. I'm complicit if I don't engage with this and keep myself abreast of every little thing that's happening. 

 05:48

They matter more than I do. Those are some of the things that I've heard from clients this week. And I think for me personally, it's like a good person doesn't look away. And if I look away in any way, if I take a break, if I don't watch this, if I don't post about it, if I don't reshare it, then it's some kind of like moral failing on my part. 

 06:12

And so I name those just because those subconscious rules play out in real life, right? Last week, I'm having dinner with my family and one of my sons was joking about something and I was laughing and feeling pretty lighthearted. 

 06:29

And then a voice in my head literally was like, there are so many bad things happening in the world right now. How can you be laughing right now? That's a part of me that is really programmed to feeling empathy with other people means that I don't feel happy when they're sad, that I'm not okay when they're suffering. 

 06:52

And again, when I say this out loud, I know it doesn't logically make sense. I know that that's not how I'm actually supposed to live. But that's what is so interesting about our parts is that they don't always, they don't make logical sense, but they were programmed to believe things in very subtle subconscious ways over lots of years. 

 07:17

And so if you notice some of that coming up for you, it's not going to be logical. But that's why you find yourself checking your phone, right? And thinking that I need to be up on every little thing that happens. 

 07:36

You are in your social media feed and you can tell that it's a graphic video of something violent or something scary happening and you want to scroll past, but you don't because you think, oh, if I don't watch this, I'm irresponsible or I'm complicit or I need to witness this. 

 07:56

So you watch it, then you feel sick and hopeless and flooded. And then we sometimes we associate that with, okay, now I'm being a good person. These are how the good girl rules work. They equate our goodness with our willingness to suffer, our willingness to endure, our willingness to self-sacrifice. 

 08:24

And so if that is how it's showing up for you, you're in really good company because it's showing up that way for a lot of my clients. It's so hard to turn off the social media and the engaging in content because if we do, we're bad. 

 08:44

But here's the truth. And this is what I loved so much about what the mama attorney posted is that watching graphic trauma videos that have no context and no way to understand them is not the same thing as helping. 

 09:03

It's not how we actually support survivors. It actually doesn't do anything other than feed the algorithm and profit, you know, social media because it's not actually doing anything. It just feeds that trauma cycle and it is your body that is paying the price. 

 09:28

So just notice how those subconscious good girl rules might be showing up and driving some of your action. Let's talk about your reptile brain. I thought it was brilliant that the mama attorney brought that up because it's a part of our brain that we don't always realize is activated, but there are real serious consequences. 

 09:52

It's the survival center of our brain. When this part of your brain is activated, you are not making thoughtful decisions. You are not making decisions with the part of your brain that is best equipped for long-term thinking, for taking care of yourself, for anticipating consequences. 

 10:13

That's your prefrontal cortex. The survival, the amygdala part of your brain is all about just making it, just surviving. And here's what it looks like when you are in that reptile part of your brain. 

 10:31

Things feel like they're looping the same thoughts, the same images, the same memories, right? And you lose yourself in that loop. You hyper-focus on trying to have something make sense to you. And you'd think, this is so much of what she was describing in those slides, like, I just need a little, I just need to understand the next piece. 

 10:56

But that hyper focus is your brain trying to find a point of reference that makes sense. And with that, there's some urgency. There's the feeling that something terrible is going to happen, either if I look away, if I don't understand this, if I can't make this make sense, something bad is going to happen. 

 11:18

There's a lot of irritation and frustration with anything that interrupts you. I was sitting on the table watching some videos about ICE activity, and my son came up and told me it was time to take him to play practice. 

 11:34

And I was irritated with him that he was interrupting my attempts to make sense of what I was watching because that's what I was doing. I was re-watching the same video over and over again, just trying to make it make sense. 

 11:48

You might notice in your body that your jaw is tight, your breath is shallow, there's pressure and tightness or heaviness. You can't sleep. I started having nightmares. I started having a reoccurring nightmare that I was grabbed from my car. 

 12:05

I have dark hair. I have brown skin. I'm Latina. I fit the profile, right, for these, for this ICE activity that I'm talking about right now. And so that survival mechanism, I started making plans for what I would do if that did happen. 

 12:22

And all of that, that's not bad or wrong. It's a part of my brain that is trying to make sense of information that doesn't make sense, that doesn't follow the rules, the rule of law, the way things have always happened. 

 12:39

And so when it's important to recognize when you are in that survival reptile center of your brain, because you do not make good decisions there, you lose access to long-term thinking and to the tools to regulate your nervous system. 

 12:59

And here's something important to notice. When you're in your reptile brain or lizard brain, right, that just means that your brainstem and amygdala have taken control because there are perceived threats, right? 

 13:14

There are threats to your survival and you are going to experience some things like rapid heartbeat or physical sensations, sweating, shallow breathing. You might have some fight behaviors, arguing, shouting, criticizing, defending, trying to prove you're right. 

 13:33

You might have some flight behaviors, right? Avoiding eye contact, procrastination, changing the subject, scrolling social media, that doom scrolling that we all just kind of, you know, fall into from time to time. 

 13:46

That could be considered a flight behavior. You might notice some freezing behaviors where you just feel frozen and not able to make decisions, not able to do things that you know are good for you, like stop scrolling. 

 14:02

So it's important to notice when you are in that state, because noticing is what allows your thinking brain, that prefrontal cortex, to come back online. Oftentimes, it's not the only thing that we need to do, though. 

 14:22

We need to regulate. We need to give our nervous system a chance to experience peace and calm. So here are some things you can do. Go hug someone. You don't even have to tell them why you need the hug. 

 14:42

We mammals have a beautiful gift of co-regulation. What that means is if I'm activated solidly in my lizard brain, I think something terrible is going to happen. I can use the nervous system of someone who is calm to help calm myself. 

 15:01

Think about what happens when someone wraps their arms around you and takes a big, deep breath with you. Notice how even the tone in my voice changing to calm feels good to you. That is because we can co-regulate. 

 15:24

Hugging is a great way to co-regulate. Just standing next to someone or having a normal, calm conversation. Sitting down on the floor, feeling the floor underneath your butt if you're sitting on the floor or your feet if you're standing. 

 15:42

Having someone hug you while you feel your feet firmly planted on the ground is a great way to co-regulate. You can also breathe slower than you think you might need to. Slowing the breath down is a way to signal to your brainstem, we're okay. 

 16:01

We're okay. We're not being chased. We have time to breathe. One of my favorites, go outside. How many times do we catch ourselves in that hunched over position, scrolling? Go outside, move your body, touch grass, literally, touch something solid. 

 16:22

Put a piece of food in your mouth and feel yourself chew it. Experience the slowness of the taste being picked up by your taste buds as your mouth moves it around. Slowing things down is an incredibly effective way to regulate. 

 16:44

So talking slowly, eating slowly, walking slowly, if that's helpful, or sometimes you can sense that your body needs fast movement, shaking, stomping, bouncing, swaying, swinging, right? All of that signals to the body, we're okay. 

 17:04

And you have to really feel what just feels good for you. There's one of the things that the mama attorney said that really stuck with me. I think she said it like, you need to rule your own realm, which essentially just means what is actually in your control. 

 17:23

One of the beauties of social media is it allows us to connect to a lot of people around the world. And the double-edged sword of that is that it gives us access to more information than one nervous system is equipped to hold. 

 17:40

You are one nervous system, right? You are not equipped to hold global trauma, right? There are some things you do have control over or jurisdiction over, right? Your home, your children, your partner, your friends, your dog, your pet, your sister, your parents, right? 

 18:02

So when you are trying to decide how to feel better, the question like, what do I actually control? What actually is in my power? What actually is my responsibility can really help narrow things down to what is doable for you, to what is actually in your zone of influence under your control, your home, your children, your pet, right? 

 18:29

Your vote, your donations, your phone settings. We're going to get into that in a second. You can rule that realm way more effectively from your prefrontal cortex when you're able to make those really thoughtful decisions about how to take care of yourself. 

 18:48

So regulating is really, really important. Choose one or two of the things that I just mentioned, experiment with them, try them on. You might find that one works really well and other not so well. Great. 

 19:00

We're each individuals. Choose what works for you. Now I just want to get really practical. It might be time to purge your social media feed. It might be time to mute or unfollow accounts that are sharing these really traumatic fragments of information. 

 19:23

In one of the Mama Attorney's follow-up videos, I didn't know you could do this. You can turn off suggested posts, right? All the posts that social media is suggesting that you follow based on your viewing activity. 

 19:37

You have to do that every 30 days, but you can turn it off. You can also turn off autoplay on videos. I had to completely delete the app for a reset. That might not be what you need, but some of these other really concrete ideas, purging, muting, unfollowing, turning off suggested post, turning off autoplay, maybe even deleting the app. 

 20:05

Those are concrete steps you can take to give yourself a break. Because when you are dysregulated, it doesn't help anyone. You watching those videos doesn't actually help the victims and you do not have to absorb the horror. 

 20:25

Your goodness as a person is not predicated on watching endless reels of the same videos, of the same horror. Those videos are for people who don't believe that bad things are happening. You already believe it. 

 20:40

You've seen it once. You know it's true. You know it's happening. You don't have to keep re-traumatizing yourself in the name of your goodness. If you want to actually help victims in the Epstein files, victims of ICE raids and their terror, if you want to help victims in global worldwide, in Gaza, in Iran, in these places that are engulfed in violence and oppression and the types of things that we want to help with, 

 21:17

there are actual routes that help them. If you're in the United States or if you're in countries where you have access to calling your representatives, call them. Encourage them to pass laws that protect the vulnerable, that expose the predators. 

 21:36

Find organizations to donate to that are doing the actual work of helping these people. Volunteer locally, vote, build strong community. Talk about this with your children in a way that helps them contextualize and understand what's going on. 

 21:55

You can support journalists who are doing careful recording and reporting so that the people who are involved in the perpetration of these horrific acts will be brought to justice. It's really hard, but I think we need to hear it. 

 22:12

Scrolling is not activism. Scrolling does not actually help the victims. If you are one of the people who have already been convinced that this is bad and going on and should be remedied, scrolling is not going to help. 

 22:29

It leads so often to that collapse that I experienced when I was no use to anybody. And these systems that thrive on chaos, they benefit when we are too overwhelmed to take thoughtful action. So the best, the most powerful form of resistance and response is to be regulated. 

 22:56

It's not possible all the time, right? Let me just say this. I don't know anyone who is trustworthy who would ever say that we are always going to be regulated. I don't think that's the human experience. 

 23:10

When we learn how to regulate ourselves so that we can take thoughtful action that helps to create the world we want to live in, that is when we really win. So if you feel restless when you take a step back from social media, that's normal. 

 23:29

It's your system looking for calm when there's been a lot of chaos. If you feel guilty, then that's one of those good girl rules doing the talking. You do not have to self-destruct in order to prove your goodness to anyone. 

 23:47

You can care deeply about what is going on in the world without sacrificing your nervous system. You can demand accountability and that action be taken to protect vulnerable people without absorbing like every video that is out there. 

 24:06

And the more we choose to self-regulate and to hug and to touch grass and to feel the earth beneath our feet and that regulates us, the more we are able to take the kind of thoughtful action that is going to help not only create the world we want to live in, but get actual justice and compensation and resources and help for the people who need it. 

 24:34

Thank you for listening. Thank you for being in this with me. Your messages and DMs are really, I'm so grateful for the time that you take to reach out and to share about your experience. I'm right in it with you. 

 24:49

I'll talk to you next week.

Episode 151 - Your Body Was Never Meant to Hold This

Over the last few weeks, the constant exposure to human suffering, injustice, and horrifying information has felt like an avalanche. If you’ve been taking this in through social media and the news like I have, you might notice yourself swinging between obsessing and shutting down, or believing that if you look away or take a break, it means you don’t care. In this episode, I share what helped me understand what was actually happening in my nervous system and why feeling overwhelmed doesn’t mean you’re broken. It means your body was never meant to hold all of this. Here’s what I cover:

• An Instagram post that helped me understand how the overwhelm we’re living through impacts the body

• How flooding ourselves with horrific information without containment destabilizes our nervous systems

• Why empathy and good girl conditioning can turn caring into self-sacrifice

• Three things to pay attention to so we can stay connected to the truth without losing ourselves

• What it looks like to give yourself permission to decide what level of engagement is right for you

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

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Transcript

00:59

A little bit of a different episode today, because one of the most valuable parts of being in a community, and this podcast listening audience is a community, is being able to learn from and feel supported by and connected to each other's experiences. 

 01:20

I love it when you DM me and you email me your experiences, your stories. I feel connected to you. I feel like I know you better. And I'm going to share a little bit about my experience over the last couple of weeks, why there almost wasn't a podcast episode today, in the hopes that the conversations that I've been having with my friends and with my clients about these things can offer you some relief as well, because it is, it is a really taxing, chaotic time. It is horrifying from one day to the next, what we learn in the Epstein files. It is horrifying what we learn about human suffering around the globe. 

 02:16

It's horrifying what we're learning about how people are being treated in our own country. If you were in the US and other countries, some of those same things are happening. It's an avalanche of information. 

 02:30

And about middle of the week, last week, it felt like I just could not go on. And I don't have that experience very often. I am generally optimistic. I'm happy. I can find the good. I love dancing and singing and being funny and laughing and finding the humor. 

 02:51

And I just, it felt like I was cement. I couldn't think. I couldn't move. I was angry. I was sad. And by the middle of the week, I just felt like I was almost completely shut down. I got into bed with my husband and I just cried and cried and cried and cried and listed like all of the horrible things that were going on in the world. 

 03:20

And it felt like I was, I was hopeless and helpless. Couldn't stop it. I couldn't do anything about it. And I have not felt like that broken, that absolutely grief-stricken and powerless in a long time. 

 03:43

And so I went to sleep, which sometimes that is really just the best thing that I can do, maybe you too. But the next morning, I still didn't feel any kind of like resilient sturdiness. And then I read this Instagram post. 

 04:03

So I'm just going to read it to you. I think there's about eight slides. This comes from a creator. Her name is the Mama Attorney. I'm going to link to the post in the show notes so that you can go read it because it just, it gave me context. 

 04:22

And here's what's amazing. I know about the nervous system, right? It's something that I coach on and do, but I didn't see this happening. And so I was so grateful that she wrote this and that it showed up in my algorithm because when we are in moments of extreme stress, we forget what we know, right? 

 04:44

It's not always front and center. And then you pair that with a lot of other good girl rules that show up for me around being informed and not looking away from human suffering and the rules of being a good person. 

 05:03

And it was a lot. I forgot completely about the nervous system. And she lays it out so brilliantly. So here we go. Here are the slides. Lawyer here. The method with which the Epstein files are being released is deliberately designed to put you in a psychological trance. 

 05:27

This is their strategy. And here's how I know this. In trial practice, when there are exhibits involving violence, children, or extreme harm, we do not simply dump information into the room. We go back and forth extensively about how and when something is shown. 

 05:49

The judge guides the process. Experts contextualize it. It is a container equipped to hold this content. Courts understand that when the brain is flooded with horror, your system gets hijacked by the primal brain. 

 06:09

You go into hypervigilance, rage, obsession, and collapse. We have a name for this, reptile theory. Reptile theory is a trial strategy built on this premise. If you can bypass the cognitive brain and activate the primitive survival brain, which is the oldest or reptile part of the brain, you can control outcomes without ever persuading on facts or law. 

 06:43

This strategy is not allowed at trial. This is why trials involving extreme harm rely on structure. The law does not do this to protect perpetrators, but to protect the jury. What is happening now is the opposite. 

 07:04

There is a massive document drop with no categorization, containment, or guidance. The onus is placed entirely on the reader to make sense of chaos. There are random redactions that force the brain into constant guesswork. 

 07:23

You have to deduce, infer, fill in the blanks. This keeps the mind spinning, searching, and looping. So, number one, you become consumed. You deep dive. You push to get more information. You stop sleeping. 

 07:43

It takes over your life. Your focus narrows until there is nothing else. Gradually, they frack all of your life force. They keep you locked in an endless energy loop in their sick mind games. You become one of their victims. 

 08:02

Or two, you disengage completely. You decide it's too much, too confusing, too overwhelming. You walk away. It implodes from your exhaustion. And either way, they win. Same here. We received events frozen in fragments. 

 08:26

There is no arc, only horrifying snapshot after horrifying snapshot. A nervous system can hold horror only if it is sequenced, paced, and contextualized. If it's not, it will oscillate, fixate, or shut down. 

 08:49

What you are being fed is exposure to terror without containment. Make no mistake, this is psychological guerrilla warfare. When the nervous system is overwhelmed, it seeks relief. This looks like outrage, doom scrolling, obsessing, or wanting to throw your phone in the ocean. 

 09:12

Time starts to collapse. Days blur together. You check your phone compulsively. You think, I just need to understand this piece. But there is no final piece. There's always another fragment, another horror dangling just out of frame. 

 09:31

And you lose your agency. When the trauma cannot be held by the people who caused it and cannot be processed by systems designed to contain it, it looks for somewhere else to go. It looks for nervous systems capable of carrying the terror. 

 09:56

Mothers are particularly vulnerable to psychological warfare because of our protective instincts. I would probably just say people in general, but that's just me. I know plenty of men and non-gender binary people who would fit that description. 

 10:17

Back to the slides. So your body begins to alchemize what the children could not because they were in a shock state. And what these men responsible refused to metabolize. So you feel it. You feel it all. 

 10:37

You feel it in your jaw, your gut, your chest. You're weary around your kids. You rage at your partner. You cut out relatives. You feel irritable and you have a headache and you can't sleep. You feel crazy. 

 10:51

This is the trance and it's where they want you. Please know this. Super important. You are not crazy. You are having a normal biological response to abnormal psychological warfare. Oscillating between being completely consumed and enraged and wanting to turn away and burn your phone forever is a healthy response. 

 11:20

That swing is your nervous system trying to protect itself. The risk is not the oscillation. The risk is not noticing it. Noticing is the rupture to the trance. It's how you peel away. The moment you observe the pattern, instead of being inside it, the spell weakens. 

 11:44

When you name the wave, you start asking, what is being done to me and why? Noticing restores agency. Agency to engage or disengage, to step back, take breaks, to only review synthesis instead of fragments. 

 12:02

Agency to refuse to become a landfill for unprocessed violence. You can demand accountability without sacrificing yourself. Justice does not require self-destruction. You are allowed to survive this intact. 

 12:25

In fact, that is part of the rebellion too. So when I read that, it was like the light went on. And I was like, that's right. Exposure to terror without containment. Yes. And how she names oscillating back and forth between obsession and shutdown. 

 12:55

Yes. That's what I was experiencing. And a really quick review of some really important things that she says. The nervous system needs containment. Humans can, and we have to be able to process horrific things. 

 13:17

But we need pacing, structure, and meaning. And flooding without that just destabilizes our nervous systems and thus our bodies. Another thing that she said that I thought was really important to highlight, obsessing and shutting down are not failures. 

 13:39

I went back and forth between I have to know everything about this particular point to total and complete shutdown. And those are protective responses. Nothing was wrong with me. My system was overwhelmed. 

 13:54

But when I was in it, and I'm still in it, let's be real here, but I'm not as totally in it. When I was totally in it, I couldn't see it. And I was looking around at other people who seemed to be going about their day normally. 

 14:09

And I couldn't understand it. I couldn't understand like, how am I supposed to care about what we're eating for dinner when these horrible things are happening? And I just couldn't make sense of feeling obsessed one minute and then totally shut down the next. 

 14:27

And then the third point that I think she makes that is really important is that the real danger isn't that we care too much. The real danger is that we don't know what's happening to us. It's the loss of agency that we experience in that avalanche because we don't realize that we can choose how and when to engage. 

 14:53

And choosing is so important. So when I was in that obsessive part, it felt like I could not look away, right? I was reading. I was checking. I was trying to just understand this one other piece. I was looking for somebody else who could give it context, who could put it into some kind of sequence for me. 

 15:16

But I felt like I was unraveling like my sleep, my patience, my body, it all just felt like complete and total breaking. It was really hard for me to switch back and forth between the mundane and the massive uncertainty because I didn't have any kind of context. 

 15:41

There was no buffer. There was no time. And so my nervous system was really struggling to know how to hold both of those things. All of these horrific things are happening and what's for dinner. And that's not, that's not failure. 

 15:58

That's a nervous system that hasn't been given adequate support. So a lot of that is fueled for us by some of these good girl or good person rules. And I named a few of them. Maybe you identify, I have had the thought, like I need to stay informed because that's what good people do. 

 16:22

If I look away from this, I'm bad or I'm somehow complicit. If I don't participate, then I'm part of the problem. If I take a break from this, it means I don't care. We are wired for empathy. So it makes so much sense when some of those beliefs sneak in and start driving, especially our social media consumption. 

 16:48

So many of us, me included, were taught that goodness means self-sacrifice in some way. And we know that bearing witness to brutality, to violence, to injustice has mattered historically. That's what's turned it around. 

 17:08

And so it becomes hard to figure out where do I show up? Where do I witness? How do I witness in a way that actually matters? Because for a lot of us, that just turns into a lot of scrolling on social media, which doesn't actually create an impact in the world, right? 

 17:29

We've liked a reel or we've shared it, but that hasn't actually done anything for us. And sometimes it doesn't do anything for the communities of people that we want to help by watching reels and being informed about what they're going through. 

 17:49

But it contributes to the problem because that constant exposure, when you're driven by those beliefs, the constant exposure without any kind of a choice, that is what is overwhelming. Compassion without choice just becomes self-destruction. 

 18:10

And I didn't see it. And I felt totally destroyed. I didn't understand. And I had to remind myself that absorbing everything had nothing to do with my goodness as a person. Nothing to do with it. That I could and should and needed to find a way to rest from the information so that I could resource, so that I could pull my joy and my pleasure and my community and my reasons for living back online, front and center, because I lost, it's like I lost connection to all of that. It actually brought up one of my experiences in the past in a really interesting kind of parallel way. When I was leaving Mormonism, there were massive amounts of information being shared about historical claims the church had made, claims of truth, claims of where things had come from and what had happened that were not true. 

 19:27

And so if you can imagine, you know, it was me with, you know, a couple of friends and social media and people who were posting, but no real shared container. There was no like trusted authority anymore. 

 19:45

It's just like, you know, the wild west of social media with whatever people want to put out there. And it was incredibly destabilizing. There were days when it felt like the ground was moving underneath my feet. 

 20:02

I couldn't find it like what was solid anymore. What could I believe? Who could I trust? All of these things that had felt so real and so important to me were just like dissolving and dismantling in front of my eyes. 

 20:17

It was too much, too fast without support. And I noticed that same feeling. It was multiplied this time around, but that same feeling of like obsession and then collapse, deep dive and then complete exhaustion. 

 20:41

And so seeing that again gave me a chance to take a deep breath and say, okay, all right. I felt this before. And although that information wasn't dumped on me like it is being dumped on us now, that same destabilizing too much too fast without support was very familiar. 

 21:08

And so noticing that and then reading this Instagram post helped me to close the loop. And here's what I mean when I say that. Traumatic experiences create these open loops in our body that want to be completed. 

 21:28

But we look for completion a couple really important ways. Number one, to have it explained to us. It's the context. It's exactly what she was talking about. To have someone help us to process it, to know the purpose of something, to be able to see it in a broader picture where we know that it's going to be okay. 

 21:51

And so recognizing that feeling in my body that was very familiar after leaving Mormonism, and then the context of this Instagram post really helped me to give myself the loop closure of the permission to step away. 

 22:12

And that's what I want to end with here. If you're feeling completely overwhelmed and spun out and angry and rage ball one minute and then collapsing in tears the next, they're not broken. That is exactly what a healthy nervous system does when it is trying to take in too much too fast. 

 22:40

And if you need to look away, that does not mean you don't care. It means your nervous system needs a break. We have to learn how to stay connected to the truth without completely losing ourselves. And so as you kind of decide what cadence is right for you, I want you to pay attention to a couple of things. 

 23:08

Number one, pay attention to your body. Your body will tell you when it is too much. And you can give yourself permission to take a break. Maybe you tell yourself, taking a break is how I prepare myself so that I can stay engaged the way I want to. 

 23:31

Everyone needs breaks. No one is meant to exist in this avalanche. And no one can exist in this avalanche without context, without help, and without soft places to land. So you have permission. I needed permission. 

 23:55

I'm passing it on to you. The way that we remain human throughout this is by recognizing where our agency is, recognizing when we get caught up again in that either obsession or collapse pattern where our nervous system is trying to make sense, taking a step out of that into resting, into doing something else. 

 24:22

Guys, I went to a local craft store and I bought stuff to start cross stitching again. I never in a million years thought I would do it. I was like, I need something that is fun. I didn't used to think it was fun. 

 24:40

That's so interesting. But I totally found a pattern that I think is adorable doing something like that. I have a friend who's crocheting, right? Lots and lots of crocheting. I'm reading some books that are Theo of Golden. 

 24:52

That's what I want to recommend to you. Theo, Theo of Golden, reading some books, right? That take us out of some of these spins that we get in. It's essential that you do that because if we're going to be here for the long haul demanding accountability and showing up in any way that we can, in any way that we deem useful and right for us, to help the people around us and to help ourselves, to help our families, to help our clients, to help the people we work with and for, whoever it is, you have to take care of yourself. You have to be able to use your agency to decide when you engage and how. I wish there were another way, but there isn't right now. 

 25:49

And so what we can do is take care of each other, share how we're feeling. If anything from this episode has resonated for you, I would love to hear about that. I would love to hear about what's hard, what's working, what's not working for you, because together is how we get through this. 

 26:05

I really, really believe that that is true. And we will. I'll see you next week.

Episode 150 - Erotic Wholeness with Darshana Avila

In this episode, I sit down with erotic wholeness guide Darshana Avila to talk about embodiment, authenticity, and coming home to the body. Darshana was featured on Netflix’s Sex, Love & Goop, which was one of my early introductions to a broader idea of eroticism as I began to unravel my good girl conditioning. We explore what happens when women don’t know what they want or don’t trust their bodies—a disconnection shaped by the systems we were raised in, not personal failure. Darshana offers a different path forward, rooted in compassion, nervous-system safety, and learning to listen to the body. Here’s what we cover:

• How Darshana defines erotic wholeness and why it’s not limited to sex

• Why “I don’t know what I want” is a common and understandable starting point

• What compartmentalization looks like in real life and how conditioning keeps it in place

• How authenticity begins with sensing what is and isn’t for you

• Simple ways to begin reconnecting through your senses and the four allies of erotic embodiment

Darshana Avila is a trauma-informed somatic educator, practitioner and international speaker who helps people reconnect with the most essential aspects of themselves — their truth, their desires, and their capacity for profound pleasure and power. Her work has been featured on Netflix’s Sex, Love & Goop, The Guardian, The New Yorker, and numerous leading podcasts.

Find Darshana here:

darshanaavila.com 

instagram.com/darshana_avila 

youtube.com/@darshana-avila

linkedin.com/in/darshana-avila

https://darshanaavila.com/podcast/ 

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

Sara Bybee Fisk 00:57

Okay, Darshana, I will say I have seen you before today. I have, because I watched your Goop episode, girl. That was one of my introductions as a recovering good girl who comes out of a very religiously conservative background, but was one of my introductions into this kind of broader idea of eroticism. 

Darshana Avila 01:23

Mm hmm. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:24

And it was really, really helpful for me. And you can tell I'm chomping at the bit to jump right in, because I just did. .Or we'd go much further. I would love for you to introduce yourself to people. What would you like people listening to know about you? 

Darshana Avila 01:38

Well, hello, Darshana Avila here. I call myself an erotic wholeness guide, and that is a totally self-styled job title that I got to give myself. Really what I am is an intimacy junkie, an embodiment junkie, which is to say I have always been curious about what my body is capable of, what our bodies are capable of, and how two or more of us, or even us with our own selves, can truly be in relationship in a deep, profound, intimate way. Small talk makes my skin crawl, literally. I've always been drawn to these depths, and sex and intimacy and relationships in general have been playground and laboratory and crucible for growth for me in so many ways, and at a certain point in my life, I decided that in order for me to go on my own journey of ex-good girl-ing, I was going to cut ties with a lot of the very mainstream trappings of what life is supposed to look like and what success is supposed to be measured by and follow what my heart and my body and my intuition were pointing me toward, and that's why we're here having this conversation. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 02:57

Okay. There is so much in there.I was writing a few things down because when we think about the line that you kind of drew there from embodiment and intimacy that kind of took you to leave behind some of what our modern capitalist patriarchal, you know, world would call success. Yep. There's a very clear through line for you there. 

Darshana Avila 03:28

Yeah, there's a departure from that mainstream definition because it is my assertion and I know I'm not the only one. Our mainstream culture, what you just named patriarchy, capitalism, white supremacy, we could add a whole other list there. It is fundamentally a culture of disembodiment. It's fundamentally a culture that in implicit and explicit ways has severed us from the wisdom of our bodies, from a connection to our emotions and our sensations, to really being driven by this intrinsic well of wisdom that we all have. And the reason why that's happened is pretty straightforward and simple. You are a far more compliant cog in the wheel, feeding those systems of power when you are not feeling yourself.So to do what I've done is radical, truly. It is radical activism in the world that we live in to say, I'm going to prioritize getting to know my body. I am going to pay attention to my impulses, my desires, my boundaries, and figure out what's authentic for me because we are not compliant cogs in the wheel when we do that. And we're living in a moment where we're seeing this. I mean, it's kind of exciting. We're seeing this grow and grow and so many more people are waking up to this realization. And I believe this will be our tipping point. The more we are feeling our grief, the more we are feeling our longing, our desire, our hunger, our passion, our frustration with the status quo, that is what actually creates cultural change. And that's really what I'm here for. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 05:17

Well, me too. Yay. And that's one of the reasons why I wanted to have this conversation, because the thing that I hear most often from the women that I talk to is I don't, I'm not even sure who I really am. And I have them fill out this little intake form and the word authentic, or I want to live with authenticity, which can we please save authentic from becoming, from going the way of the live, laugh, love. I really, we need this word because that's the word that I see over and over again. And I really want to hold that word as hopefully something special and not kind of the trite way that it gets used and abused because it is a source of deep pain.Yeah, I feel that. To the women that I talk to, like, I don't know, like what do I want to do with my life, my time, my energy? I've spent so much time letting the machine tell me what I should be and who I should be and what my body should look like and what my body should do and who my body is good for that I don't know that I have much of a connection to it. 

Darshana Avila 06:29

Yeah. I mean, and my version of that is the most common thing women coming to work with me say is, I don't know what I like. Yeah, I don't know what I want. Yes, I might find myself in a partnership with someone super loving and well intentioned who would really love to know the answer to these questions. I don't know.And that's because at 40 something at 50 something sometimes at 60 or 70 something occasionally I get a 20 something or 30 something like, they're, they're just looking around and saying, Wait a second, there's really never been a moment in my entire sexual experience. There's really never been a moment in all of my years of being in relationships of many forms, when I've ever truly stopped to consider me at the center. What is true for me? What do I enjoy? What's a boundary? It's really a transformative moment. And to your comment about authenticity, I agree, like let's let's preserve that word, please. Here's a few synonyms that I'll toss out there. Wild. I love reclaiming the world the word wild when we think about like we use it to speak about like wild flowers or wild forage this that or the other, which is to say something that has not been cultivated on a farm and messed with by humanity. Who are we in our wildness then? Who are we before this conditioning before all of the things that society and culture have told us, as you said, who we could be should be how to be what to look like, do it this way, do it that way. So what is our wildness? What is our naturalness? What is our state of being before all of that conditioning and all of that acculturation gets heaped on top of us. And my my mission is to help as many people figure that out for themselves as possible. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 08:28

Well, I would love to help you get this message out because I feel like it's the same thing that I'm teaching in a different form. Yeah.So let's start with some definitions. So you are an erotic wholeness guide. Yes. What would you want me to understand about what that means and what it would look like for me to go through the journey with you to erotic wholeness? 

Darshana Avila 08:53

Fabulous questions. Okay, erotic. Let's define this in its broadest term, which to me is also its simplest term, life force energy. So eroticism is that vital animating force, creativity in its purest form that we can channel into our sexuality, but that's not the only place we get to channel it. And this is where our dominant culture has really screwed up our thinking. Because most of us hear the word erotic, and we think of it as a direct synonym for sex. And some of us actually hear the word erotic, and we think of it as like a very sensationalized, like, oh goodness, clutch my pearls kind of version of sex. And this is a way of really reclaiming what is truly our vital life force.And I need to give credit where credit is due. I stand on the shoulders of giants, chief among them, Audre Lorde, who was an integral, integral figure in the black intersectional feminist movement. And if you have never heard of her, go Google uses of the erotic. It is a beautiful essay written by Audre, and it is gonna go into a really gorgeous explanation of what I mean when I talk about eroticism as life force energy. So it shows up, yes, in your sex, but it's also there in your sensuality. It's in your art, it's in your activism. It's in anything and everything you're passionate about, from the way you tend relationships to the way you do your work in the world. So there's nowhere that your erotic nature is not, because you are erotic by nature. When we reclaim that term as something that's more about our life force, we are then stepping into a tremendous source of power. Because if we're channeling that with intention and we're bringing it with us everywhere, you know, like you hear about this concept of a well-fucked woman. Like I hear about this concept anyway. Like what does that evoke for you? Someone who's in her pleasure, someone who's in her power, someone who feels confident, who's creative and dynamic. So that is what your erotic energy gives you, whether you're getting it through fucking or not. And that's a beautiful way to get it. It's just not your only way. And that's really what I want people to know. And that's a beautiful bridge to defining what wholeness is. So wholeness as a nod to the fact that as we go through life, particularly modern Western life where we have to continually compartmentalize and fragment pieces of ourselves and okay, this has to get contained over here. And I show this part of myself here, but oh, and now this protective strategy is coming out because the only way I know how to stay safe is to people please. And all this chaos is going on. We tend to take this on as a personal failing because that is how our individualistic culture treats this and pathologizes any of us for really just doing our survival dance. So the fragmenting, the compartmentalizing is part of how we've survived. Wholeness is a nod then to what gets to happen, the process we go through when at certain times in our lives, whatever that is, middle years for many of us, sometimes a little earlier, Saturn return maybe, You look around and you say like, wait a sec, there's a different way to do this. 

Darshana Avila 12:15

There's a different way to be. There's a different way for me to relate to myself and to move in the world. And that's to gather up all those fragments. That's to open up the compartments and figure out what integration looks like. And get in touch with the part of you, call it soul. Call it capital S self. Call it your higher self, whatever you wish. The part of you that has always been and always will be fully intact, overflowing with wisdom, clear in direction. And when you can get in touch with that part and let that part really be the one that leads and holds all those fragments and all those compartmentalized ones, you stand in an embodiment of your power, unlike anything else. And so guiding people toward their erotic wholeness is about understanding your erotic nature, stepping into the whole full power of your being, and really living a life that turns you on and contributes to something greater than yourself.For me, one of my little darshanisms, my slogans, is erotic wholeness is about personal liberation and service to collective liberation. And what I mean when I say that is each and every one of us getting free contributes to the totality of us getting free. We can only begin where we are. So for many of us, it's I got to look at myself. I got to do my work, not because you have to do everything by yourself, but because the more you've done your own work and you are piecing this together for you, the more effective you're going to be in creating broader change.And that collective liberatory action really gets to unfold. So that's the first answer. I have a lot to say here. Do you want me to pause for a sec or should I get right into what the journey look like? 

Sara Bybee Fisk 14:12

So let's pause because I should have known I was going to want to jump in. And so I love thinking about things like granularly. So my question is, how would someone know if they were compartmentalized? What would their life look like?What would their... Because some people listening might be like, am I compartmentalized? 

Darshana Avila 14:37

Yeah, yes, you are. That's the answer. Yes, you are. Yes, you are because we all are, myself included.I'm sure you would self-identify it that way too, Sara, because any of us who has begun to pursue our healing and our wholeness, whatever that path looks like, whatever it's called, I use the term survival dance, protective strategies, adaptive strategies, things that we do that oftentimes actually curry social favor. So for a woman to be accommodating and pleasing, a good girl, a people pleaser, to be the one who's the peacekeeper in her family dynamic, to be the martyr who's forever overextending herself so long as everybody else is taken care of, this has been bred into us. Those are not our authentic ways of being. Those are not the only ways that we are being. And I assure you that if that's how you're moving through the world, you are compartmentalizing a lot. You are, by very nature of living with those strategies at the forefront, your relationship to your own sense of agency, to your preferences, to your desires is being sublimated. To an extent, we could say, sure, this is the nature of what it is to parent, for instance. One of my best, best friends is a single mother by choice. And it was her child's birthday over the weekend, so her birth-a-versary. And she leaves me a voice memo, and she's like, my mom kept her overnight last night. This is the first time I've woken up in my own house without my child, and I don't know how long. She has to sublimate every one of her impulses, her needs, her rhythms, but she's the solo parent of a six-year-old.Like, it makes sense when you put it into that kind of context. But many of us are playing out these patterns even when it isn't an absolute necessity, and we're doing it because culture teaches us to do that. So learning to recognize these strategies for what they are, learning to create that sacred space, and it is a sacred, sacred thing to get curious, to be in a degree of self-inquiry that might lead you to find, like, huh, do I even like fill in the blank that I have been doing on repeat? That could be the way that you're having sex with your partner, that could be the food that you're eating, that could be the clothing that you're wearing, it could be the exercise class that you're going to, you know, like, do I even like these things that I'm quote-unquote choosing? Or am I doing these things out of a certain habit or conditioning, cultural incentivizing that just has me going on a degree of autopilot without ever questioning what's true for me? So that's a great way to signal to yourself that there's compartmentalization going on. And like I said, we're all doing it. So welcome to the club. You're not the only one. It is not a personal failing. Please hear me say that. If you hear nothing else, we need to stop pathologizing this as if I, Darshana, you, Sara, you person listening are the sole one to be responsible for this and at fault for this. 

Darshana Avila 18:03

What we do each have is opportunity. And only we can take advantage of our own opportunities for ourselves. So while it may not be a personal failing that you're doing this thing, it is a personal opportunity and responsibility to do it differently. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 18:20

Yeah. Especially if you want a different experience, right?Which by the time you get to midlife, that's just beautiful kind of natural time in a lot of women's lives where they look at the first half of their life and they think, is it always going to be like that? Am I always going, are there always going to be parts of myself that I don't know? Are there always going to be emotions that I'm uncomfortable feeling or talking about? Are there always going to be places in my friendship where I don't feel like really seen and heard because those are some of the common things that I hear from women? And that to me looks like the compartmentalization in their own lives is that there's parts of myself that I don't know and parts of myself that I can't share. 

Darshana Avila 19:00

Exactly. And in my world, it picks up there and goes into is this as good as sex is ever going to get? Is this all it's ever going to be in my partnership? Am I now that I'm divorced and have a chance to do it over? Am I going to keep making the same choices that old me made or am I going to try something different for myself?And so what you know, the journey that I take people on, it's rooted in two main professional modalities that I work with. So I'll name those first and then kind of explain what that looks like. I am a somatic experiencing practitioner and I am a sexological body worker. Somatic experiencing is a beautiful modality that focuses on how we tend to our nervous systems and heal trauma through the body. Sexological body work is very niche and we could a simple way to describe it is erotic therapeutic explorations. So I do hands on hands in work with my clients. Yes, hands in because most of my clients have vulvas and vaginas and I put my hands in them. So it's definitely out of the box for a lot of people. You mentioned the Netflix show that I was a part of sex, love and goop, which was incredible. And in that series, you see five experts and five couples working together, going on a journey together. The couple that I worked with, Chandra and Camille, a young lesbian couple, one of whom was dealing with much like you mentioned about yourself, Sara, like a lot of religious conservatism that was living in her body in such a way that she couldn't even be open to touch and penetration from her partner. You see me work with them episodes three, four and six. If you want to go and watch it, you see me work with them individually and jointly. And the example of Chandra, who started out not being able to receive any penetration, we were able to do work together that brought her to the place where that could happen, not just without pain, but with pleasure. So that's me kind of like, like I'm going straight to the happy ending. Haha, pun not totally intended. But the work that I do is very much about embodiment, nervous system tending. How do you actually come out from behind these habituated patterns that generally keep us either very dissociated from ourselves or so accelerated, busy, doing, doing, doing constantly that we just don't have to notice because we're not really available to pay attention because, oh, my God, I've got to check 17 things off on my to do list. And that's how our energy feels. So slowing down, cultivating presence. That is where we then begin to learn what your preferences are. We get to explore in a very experiential way that is rooted in consent that moves at a very deliberate and slow pace. What actually brings you alive? What feels good in your body? How do you learn to cultivate this awareness so that you can say, I like this, not that a little more this way, a little less of this element, so on and so forth. And we begin to craft experiences that ultimately can include having a really delicious sexual encounter where you are at the center. So as a practitioner, I don't receive touch from my clients. My clothing stays on. 

Darshana Avila 22:25

I've got gloves on my hands. Like there's a lot that's in place to create a very clear container of integrity and professionalism and the roles are very well defined.But I am there as a facilitator of my client's pleasure. Or when I'm working with couples, some of what I might do is guide and teach and then help them relate with each other in those ways. And this is really outside the box for most of us. And I completely get it. If you're listening to this and you're like, are you kidding me? She does what? Like, yeah, I do. I'm a professional pussy stalker, y'all. It's pretty cool. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 23:00

I love it. 

Darshana Avila 23:01

And I wish we lived in a world where this was not so rare and with the acknowledgement that it is that it is very outside of the box for us to consider that we might step into a professional setting. That's completely above board it's not like you're going you know like through some back channels to find someone like i work in the full light of day everybody knows what's going on it's not all that different really from going to well that's not sure it's very different from going for a regular.But you know like think of it in that kind of framework where you are trusting someone to help you be in your body because you don't know how to or you cannot do these things for yourself, the difference is, unlike a massage therapist who you need them to go and get the knots out what I want is to give you everything you need to not need me anymore to be able to source for yourself this sense of personal power to have clarity about the things that bring you closer to what you need to be in your body.

Sara Bybee Fisk 24:40

Okay. I have so many questions and so many comments. First of all, I am not a somatic experiencing practitioner yet, but I've done my first two years because my guess is I was running into the same maybe thing you were, which is if we can't feel safe in our bodies, we can't feel the different kind of discomfort that comes from asking for what we want or we can't work through the shame. We can't work through the guilt that comes up when my clients are trying to set and keep a boundary. For example, the same thing that your clients need when they are going to ask for something that they want from a sexual experience that feels so dangerous or feels so forbidden. It's such an interesting overlap to me that being able to feel safe in our bodies is, I think, one of the main things that patriarchy does not want for us because we are taught in so many ways that our bodies from the very beginning, if you are in any, you know, everyone, whether you are religious or not, you grew up under the shadow of Eve, right? The one who made the wrong choice and allowed herself to be tempted and fucked it all up for the rest of us and her body became the bad thing. That was cursed. That's why we, you know, it is never endingly fascinating to me the million ways that we are taught to be scared of our bodies, to not trust our bodies and to think that our bodies are actually bad. 

Darshana Avila 26:22

Mm hmm. You're 100% correct. And there's another thing that you said that I want to touch on, which is feeling safe in our bodies is also the anecdote, the counterbalance to our experience of safety outside. And that's a mindfuck for a lot of us because you what you said is 100% true, we're, we're taught to vilify and distrust our bodies to shame our bodies, all these things. We're also taught and add this to the list of things that make this make sense because they're so contradictory. We're also taught that other people should know what is good for our bodies. So it's this message of like, you can get safety from for instance, your male partner who will know how to touch you and please you and love you. But you know, actually, really, it's not about you feeling good. It's about you making them feel good. So hot, like, and this confusion plays out, this direct paradox plays out in so many places. So safety is never guaranteed on the outside. Never.I don't use definitive words lightly. So when I say that it's because it's true, no one can guarantee you an experience of total safety moving through life. What you can learn to do is cultivate a felt experience of safety within which is to say be at home in your body. Be so connected that to your point when you get a signal that tells you Spidey sends hackles on the back of my neck or going up. I'm swiping on this guy on the app and I'm like, yeah, I don't know about this one like follow that or you're in bed with your partner and your partner asks you like to do something that maybe feels a little outside the box, but actually you're like, you know, I think I am curious about this. What happens if I decide to lean in with with gentleness with caution like it empowers us to walk away from what is not for us just as readily as it empowers us to then be able to lean in to good growth to generativity to expanding our capacity and we are not taught these things.You know, we are taught like I said like the world is horribly unsafe, but there's probably somebody out there who you could partner with that'll make you feel safe and like all that crazy conditioning that goes on. This is the answer to that. This is the anecdote. It's about cultivating your own personal agency so that you can be discerning about what is and is not for you. If there's I don't know what else could be a more like apt definition of authenticity back to what we were talking about earlier than that. It's you discerning for yourself. This is my authentic. Yes, this is my authentic. No, I desire this. I do not desire that my boundary lies here. My preference is there. Boom boom boom. I'm in my power. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 29:17

Yeah, I love that definition of authenticity, knowing in my body, what is for me, what is not for me. What instantly comes to mind is just the hundred million ways in which we are separated from our bodies and we are told to override it from childhood.And I've talked a lot about that on different podcast episodes. I'm sure you have talked about that a lot with your clients and where you kind of share your ideas as well. So then getting back into our bodies has to be something that we feel comfortable doing. Tell me a little bit about how you begin to help a client get back into their body when that is not familiar to them. 

Darshana Avila 30:03

Yeah, yeah. Well, we go slow for starters. And that right there flies in the face of how most of us are living our lives most of the time. Right? Like, like we are so sped up. So slowing down to the pace of presence.What that means to me is that we're really creating spaciousness and time to be in a deep listening. I do a practice with my clients fairly early on, like, once we get past some initial sessions are usually like subtle bodywork, more energetic type tendings where I'm basically they're borrowing my nervous system, they may or may not realize it, but I'm the co regulating force and helping them to settle things down so they can start to become receptive. You need to be receptive for any growing to happen, right? Like you can't, if a vessel is full, if there's no room to pour into it, what are you going to do? Like you can pour, pour, pour, it's just going to splash out all over the place, right? So think of yourself that way, we have to create the conditions for receptivity in your body, in your nervous system, before any of this good growth can begin to happen.So I start my clients out at that end of the spectrum and depending upon what they're walking in the door with, for instance, if it's somebody with a very complex or significant trauma history, we might spend a lot of time on that piece of the journey before we move on to anything remotely sensual sexual type of intimacy. As we progress, no matter where they are, we're like we're always starting with in addition to that foundation of tending to the nervous system and creating receptivity, we start to explore the building blocks of safety. What does it actually feel like? And how do we constantly in ways me and another person in this case, I'm that other person that they get to be practicing with distance and proximity, the pace of connection? How do we, you know, animal to animal, do I come at you front to front body? Do I come at you alongside like we actually like play we do experiments, I'm looking out at my office space as I'm talking to you like, we walk all over this room, we do weird things in here that are fantastic to just play around with like, what is it like to be two bodies in space together and choose how you want to bridge connection.So few of us ever slow down enough to think about this, because we're so used to just people invading our space, or going into other people's spaces. And we have certain social norms that you know, here you shake hands, here you hug, oh, go kiss your grandma, like it's so deeply rooted from childhood through adulthood. Again, it's like other people telling us how to be in our bodies. So we slow things down. So you get to figure out how it actually feels for you to be in your body, and begin to identify when you're bracing, when tension and vigilance are coming into your system, and when you are relaxing. 

Darshana Avila 32:59

And when there's openness and receptivity available for a genuine connection to happen. Once that's online, we explore in a really nuanced way around touch around consent, all sorts of vocabulary that gets built up to really create a more empowered dynamic where if you are my client, you can be assured that if you say the XYZ word, I interpret it the same way you intend it, because that right there is a place where a lot of us miss the other person in our interpersonal relating.So for instance, we might say very nebulous words like, hey, sweetie, I want you to rub me or touch me words rub and touch are super vague. But if I say, I really would like for you to give me a shoulder massage, medium pressure, nice and slow, and really focus in like up to where my neck connects with my skull. That's a very, very different set of instructions. And can you give me a shoulder rub? Now, if all you asked for is a shoulder rub, and that's all your partner has to go on, and they're just giving you their best approximation of that. Is it really their fault if you're not getting what you want? No. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 34:18

It's not. Okay.And I can just hear the collective cringe of women out there, but like, if I'm that specific, that's going to come across as too needy, too demanding, too bitchy, too bossy. Right. And so I can feel like on the one hand, when you are talking about the deliberate, detailed nature of communication, I start to feel that life energy. Like, yes, that is, I want women to be able to speak as freely as they want to about anything they want to, whether it's, you know, where to put the groceries in the fridge or how to give me a neck rub. And that conditioning about don't be too needy, don't be too bitchy, don't be too bossy. 

Darshana Avila 35:04

Yep, yep, yep. What would you say to that? What I would say to that is, fair point, well made, Sara. Also true, the reason why that all feels so cringy to us is because we have not created a culture in our relationships that is a departure from that dominant cultural conditioning.So in my space, when you come into my office to work with me, we have a very different culture in here. A culture that celebrates being explicit and thorough and giving direction and feedback as gifts to our relationship. It's going to enhance our mutual sense of safety and satisfaction, so when somebody is taking the time to say, this is how I want it, I'm like, thank you, amazing. I don't have to guess now, woo-hoo. And so you have opportunities, and I absolutely coach my clients around this, whether I'm working with them individually or as a couple. You have the opportunity to create culture in your own personal relationships.All it takes is two or more people agreeing on a certain set of norms for it to be called a culture, so that's why I'm using this word. So if the culture in your partnership is one where in moments of neutrality, when you and your partner are sitting down, checking in about the health of your relationship, maybe it's because you just went through something really frickin' rough together and you're like, okay, we gotta figure out a better way. Well, that might be a great moment to say, hey, I would really like to create a norm for us of being more explicit with our feedback and noticing like, yeah, sometimes we're gonna take it as like a rejection or it might feel a little bossy or demanding, but what happens if we start to think about this as like a gift to the relationship? What happens if we choose to say thank you? It's really great to know what it is that you're needing right now, so I don't have to sit here and try to mind read, or I'm not over here wondering, am I doing it okay? Do they like it? Is this working for them? When we are more generous and clear, we really are creating win-win dynamics. Your point, like I said, was a really fair one where if the culture does not exist to hear these things as a gift, to celebrate and receive them as such, then yeah, the bossy, the too much, the too demanding, all of those narratives, those cultural tropes, 100% makes sense that those would come online, but the thing is those are not objective facts.They are not truth. It is a conditioning that just as it was handed to you, you can toss out the window. It takes practice. I'm not acting as if this is like a one and done situation. It's a lot easier for me to narrate the possibility than for each of us to make this transformation, but that's why you've got people like you and me to help, like you don't have to go this alone. Like those of us who have devoted ourselves to this work, if we're doing it well, it means it's because we've also been unwinding these very patterns in ourselves. Let us help you. Let us help you. That's what we're here for. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 38:12

And so many times what I have found is that when someone is feeling in this like really stuck, disembodied, I don't like my life. I don't know what I want. I don't think that this is how I want to keep doing it, but I don't really know any other way. Helping them understand what's on the other side of that journey is really, really helpful because they can point to it and say, yes, I do want that.So when I hear you say, you know, one of the benefits of embodiment, if we're going to reduce it to that, or one of the conditions of living an embodied life is that you know what is for you and what is not for you. You know that from the inside out. That gut feeling that you have about things is true for you. You can be another benefit. The explicitness in communication is a benefit to your relationships. It means that you have more intimate, more deeply connected relationships when you can say exactly what you need and want to say. 

Darshana Avila 39:17

And then we become insisting on permission to do this for ourselves. We are also extending that permission to whoever we're in relationship with. In that way alone, it is such a tremendous gift.You just said it. It's like sometimes we need to be shown the example of what is possible. Well, what happens if you get to be the person who's showing your sweetheart or your child or your friend or your sister or whoever it is? Like, hey, guess what? There's another way to do this whole being human together thing. We can actually celebrate feedback and we can take the time to be a bit more thorough. And look, it does not mean that this is carte blanche. You just get up on your soapbox and start finger pointing. You need to da da da da. That's not the vibe. The vibe, if we're talking about this as a gift that's being given and received, is to really be in a loving centered place of like, okay, like here's what feel really amazing to my body right now. Are you down for helping me to make that happen? Like that's what it comes down to in the realm that I'm often talking to people about, right? Like when we are speaking of sexual preferences or sensual ones, the way we wanna be touched, the movements and shapes and so on and so forth that we wanna make with our bodies, who else but us really is gonna know how it feels from the inside? Nobody, right? So if I'm with a lover, I absolutely wanna know what is gonna have my lover feel great in their body while we're together. Why? When? They feel good. It enhances my likelihood of feeling good. We have more fun together. It's like it's a zero sum game y'all. So when we really take that down to its basics of that we're speaking about agency, you in your personal power. And I'm imagining that most people who would be listening to this podcast would be the sort of folks who say like, yeah, our body, our choice. We deserve to be the ones who have a say over what goes on. Well, this is just an extension of that. If we can't tell our partners what feels good to us in the bedroom, what business do we have being in bed with them? Or are they with us? What are we perpetuating when we refuse our authenticity and just keep performing? Like, is that what you wanna do? Is that the culture you wanna uphold? Or are you ready to maybe break out and create a new culture in your relationship? Again, I understand it's easy for me to say it, not undermining that this is deep growth, big transformational work, but what it also isn't is rocket science. It's so complicated, you know? It just takes some practice. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 42:12

love that. So what's a simple way that someone who is listening to this can begin their journey toward being more embodied and connected to their eroticism? 

Darshana Avila 42:25

Yeah, you've got these beautiful friends. They're called your five senses. And I want you to start getting to know them. So what I mean there is take a little more time, be a little more present with what you are feasting on, literally and metaphorically.What does it taste like? What does it feel like in your mouth when you sip that first coffee, or in my case, your chai latte in the morning? You know, like, what does it feel like? The example I'm often giving is how many of us, and you can raise your hand unless you've got both hands on the wheel right now, how many of us shower fast as can be, moisturize like we're doing like some crazy, like rapid dance, like what if you took time to soothe the spread lotion on your skin and you spent three minutes doing that instead of 13 seconds? Go for a walk and really open up your eyes and ears and nose. What do you smell? What's blooming? What's falling off the trees? How is the light playing? Is there a pop of street art or color somewhere that calls to you? Is there a birdsong? Why we want to start paying attention to our senses is because they are the vehicle. That is how we are perceiving. Well, technically our body is the vehicle. Through our senses, we are perceiving our world and it is giving us information about what we do and do not like because you're gonna have pretty clear preferences of like, that sound is delightful to me. That sound is nails on a chalkboard to me. So we start learning about preferences when we're paying attention to our senses.Then I'm gonna want you to move in the direction of indulging in what feels good. So listen to the beautiful music, eat the delicious morsel, take the time putting your moisturizer on, those kinds of things. That is where you get to create simple accessible practices. It doesn't require money. It doesn't require a lot of time. Your senses go with you wherever you are. And if somebody is listening to this podcast who has a limit to one of their sentences, or senses, excuse me, not sentences, if you are blind, if you are deaf, like you still have your other sense faculties, use them. It is the primary way to get in touch with what your body needs, wants, is asking for. And then I'm gonna give you one more little nugget. And these are your four allies of erotic embodiment. They are also free and very readily accessible. They are breath, sound, movement, and touch. And with those four, with breath, sound, movement, and touch, you have tools available to you to modulate and regulate your experience anywhere, everywhere. Taking deep breaths in through the nose, out with a vocal exhale, three, six, nine of those, you're gonna feel your nervous system tone start to shift downward. You will get more relaxed. Touch, sound, movement. You can do these in little micro ways. Like if you're feeling tight, you might shake your wrists or roll your shoulders. See, you just did it, Sara. Like you're like, oh yeah, I'm gonna roll my neck out. 

Darshana Avila 45:43

Self touch, a beautiful simple practice. You can rub the palms of your hands together to generate a little bit of heat and then bring those warm palms to your jawline, over your eyes, a hand on your heart, a hand on your belly. Give yourself a big squeeze if you're needing to feel a little containment and your edges are free and you're like, whoa, I gotta gather it back together. So through breath, sound, movement, and touch, we have ways to soothe ourselves when we need it.We also have ways to amp ourselves up. Boost your energy. Get yourself a little more activated. And these are the fundamental things that we're always going to be playing with when we talk about embodiment. Your senses and these allies are what come with you everywhere. So any which way, even in tiny doses, if you spend one minute today paying attention to what I just gave you guidance around and that's more than you did yesterday, high five babe. Good job. Those are the building blocks that you get to then construct with. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 46:49

Thank you for that. And I want to ask another question, because you talked about, you know, if there's one of your senses that is either impaired or not fully accessible to you, then there are still some other senses or ways that you could work on embodiment.What about someone who's experienced trauma? And they either it could be sexual trauma, it could be other types of trauma where their body doesn't feel like the safe place that it needs to be. How can they create a satisfying embodiment experience? 

Darshana Avila 47:22

the same tools as it were, so it's still your senses, it's still these allies and embodiment, really small doses. In the world of somatics, which is body-based wisdom, and as specifically applied to trauma, we have a notion called titration. And what titration means is that wherever your growth edge is, wherever that limit presently lies, you move toward it, you touch, and then you move back to where it's safe. So a nervous system of human, let's talk about the whole human, the whole human who is still really actively in a trauma response. That trauma could have happened three decades ago. If you are still experiencing the impacts of that trauma and being in your body does not feel like a safe place to be, and for instance, if your default strategy to manage that is constant busyness, thus the thought of stillness is terrifying and feels like more than you can do.Three seconds, like if, okay, like be still for three seconds, great. That's then go back to being busy. Okay, kind of come back again tomorrow. Four seconds, oh, okay, there I did pat on the back. So we've really, really got to lower the bar here. All of us are carrying trauma of some sort or another. Some of us are navigating very significant trauma responses in our bodies. And that may or may not, to my opinion, to your opinion feel correlated to the thing that happened to us. Like we're not here, it's not a competition. It's not a judgment. What it is about is your subjective experience. And if being in your body does not feel like the safe place to be, teeny little micro doses of being there repeated over time, you are going to grow your capacity. That being said, get a guide. Get a guide, get a therapist, get a somatic healer. You do not need to do this alone, really. And look, I would love for anybody who is listening to this and is like, I want what Darshan has got. Come work with me. Here's what's also true. I know I'm not accessible to everyone. That's fine. Go find someone who is. Like let yourself be helped. You do not need to do this alone. Pretty much every single trauma out there happens in a relationship. So it stands to reason that we need relationship to help us resolve and move beyond that. Let it be a relationship of your choosing with someone who's really qualified to join you for this chapter of your journey. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 49:57

I love that. Let yourself be helped. Let yourself be held. Let yourself be witnessed. Let yourself be heard. Yes.So important. So if people are interested in working with you because they love, as I have, every sentence that's come out of your mouth on this episode, where can they find you? 

Darshana Avila 50:16

You can find me on all the socials, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, I'm kind of sort of there sometimes if that's where you hang out, if you're a business-y type. My website really is the best hub and that's my name, darshanaavala.com. I do have an online community called Galgasm that is basically just like a free repository of a ton of resources that you can dive in with straight away. And then if you wanna work with me, it's totally an option. I am based in Oakland, California, a lot of my clients come from other states and other countries and work with me in addition to people who happen to be local. So if you want what I'm dishing out, then I would be delighted to hear from you and to discuss how we might be able to do that together. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 51:01

Darshana, do you have anything exciting that's coming up that you want people to know about? 

Darshana Avila 51:05

Yes, actually, I am I've been hard at work over here in a quiz and archetypal quiz, which is the embodied protector quiz. So it's very apropos of what we've been talking about here.And it's a really beautiful way to gain insight into what are your go to protective mechanisms? What are these patterns that you've been playing out? How are they showing up personally, relationally, culturally? So you get a frame of like, okay, this is what I'm up to here. Here's where I maybe have been a little bit blind to some of my stuff. And that's a beautiful place to begin to unwind it and to step more fully into your erotic wholeness. So this is going to be available on my site. And you all might be some of the first to get to experience it and take this quiz. And I welcome you in so that you can learn more about you and what your path to erotic wholeness would be. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 51:56

Oh, I love a good quiz. So I will be going to a website to take that immediately because I do think it's so helpful when someone can point out pieces of the puzzle in a different way for me to see myself.So I, yes, go take the quiz. 

Darshana Avila 52:13

Awesome. Thank you. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 52:16

We'll put all of those links in the show notes and I just want to express gratitude for your willingness to come and share just some really, really beautiful, helpful ideas. Is there anything as we kind of wrap up here that you haven't gotten to say that you really want to make sure gets added to this conversation? Oh my gosh. That's a dangerous question. 

Darshana Avila 52:38

No, I'm gonna reiterate something that I did said because it bears repeating and I think I even said if you take nothing away. But this one thing and that is whatever is going on for you dear listener like none of it is a personal failing We have so much cultural heat nonsense Pathologizing making us feel like it's all our fault and then it feels really really hopeless and we feel really really helpless inside of these things No No, right here right now. We're gonna just set that narrative aside You are not at fault and you absolutely are not beyond being helped So let that happen let yourself shed the layers of shaming and blaming your precious self Let yourself be helped as we've already said like that is what I want y'all to know.

Sara Bybee Fisk 53:28

Amen. Perfect note to end on. Again, thank you so much for this conversation.

Episode 149 - We Need To Talk About Codependency

For a long time, codependency has been framed as weakness or passivity—that’s why so many strong, capable, high-functioning women hear that word and immediately think, that is absolutely not me. In this episode, I explore where the concept of codependency actually came from and why that original definition often doesn’t fit. When we widen the lens, codependency starts to look a lot more like over-functioning and organizing your time, energy, and identity around other people. When we can understand it in that way, it opens up a much more honest and hopeful path forward. Here’s what I cover:

• Why the original addiction-based definition of codependency misses how it shows up for high-functioning women

• How control can turn into codependency and start to replace your self-connection

• What it looks like when your identity is built around being needed or emotionally steady

• How codependency costs you your time, energy, and brain space, whether it feels like over-functioning or under-functioning

• Questions to help you notice where you’re managing others in order to feel okay

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

00:59

We're going to talk about codependency and specifically where we got that word and why so many strong, intelligent, high functioning, highly capable women hear that word and think that is absolutely not me, but what we can actually learn from what it actually is. 

 01:20

Because for so long, codependency has been framed as weakness, as passivity. You're not able to say no. You stand by while someone else's chaos and shenanigans cause all kinds of negative results and you just don't do anything about it. 

 01:36

And when I bring this up with clients that I'm working with, a lot of them share that definition and they don't identify with it at all, right? These women are not passive. They're capable, they are competent, they are endlessly resourceful, often the strongest person in the room. 

 01:57

But I think if we understand codependency from a different lens, it actually opens up a really beautiful opportunity for growth and how to have a better experience. So let's start at the beginning. The concept of codependency actually came out of work in addiction recovery spaces in the late 20th century. 

 02:20

And one of the most influential books in that movement was Codependent No More by a woman named Melody Beattie. And for the time, it was an amazing book because it cracked open this very confusing behavior pattern that was observed in groups or families where there was one person who was addicted to alcohol, whatever, and what the other family members did in relationship to that addicted person. 

 02:53

And it named patterns that were invisible and oftentimes really confusing. Because in addiction, codependency was described as staying with someone when they're harming themselves or others. Enabling. 

 03:10

That's kind of where this enabling language comes out of where you enable their destructive behavior. You are losing yourself through constant over-accommodation. And you're not able to detach from this other person, even when what they're doing is something that is clearly unhealthy. 

 03:32

And that framing made a lot of sense inside of those addiction systems. This was a really important book that mattered a lot because it helped people understand why loving someone with an addiction could slowly kind of erase you. 

 03:49

And it gave language to pain that was just kind of normal and had been normal for generations. But the problem was, is that that model framed codependency primarily as under functioning, not setting limits, enduring clearly messed up disruptive behavior, this chronic self-sacrifice, avoidance, collapsing or being helpless emotionally. 

 04:20

Someone who didn't believe that they could survive without the other person. And they were constantly just hoping that the other person would change. Now, a lot of those behaviors are true of us when we are stuck in people pleasing. 

 04:35

I'm not trying to say that that definition doesn't work and doesn't have value because absolutely we can each see places or situations in which we do that. I just think it's incomplete because when the only image of someone who is codependent is someone who is powerless, who is overwhelmed, who's unable to act. 

 05:01

That feels very weak and it feels very passive. There's lots of distress and hand wringing, but nobody ever intervenes or asserts themselves or says, I'm not putting up with this anymore. This has got to stop. 

 05:18

And that's what makes the definition feel so alien to high functioning women. Because that's not what's happening, right? What gets missed or what I think needs to be added is that the old definition frames codependency as under functioning. 

 05:40

And I think we need to include what happens when the woman doesn't collapse, when she doesn't disappear and she's not powerless and feeling confused and wringing her hands. The original definition really assumes the problem is a lack of action. 

 05:57

But for many of us, the problem isn't passivity. It's too much action, taking too much responsibility, inserting, doing, planning, analyzing, controlling too much. When I first ran into this first definition, it was through my participation in a 12-step program. 

 06:21

If you've listened to some of my earlier episodes in the beginning, when my husband and I are talking, we talk about the time when we were still attending church and he was looking at pornography, which in Mormon land is a big no-no. 

 06:35

And so the response from our church leaders at the time was to send us to these 12-step addiction programs, because obviously, if you're looking at porn, you have a sex addiction or a porn addiction. 

 06:46

That's not always true, but that was the assumption. And then I went to a separate 12-step for codependence and we read codependent no more. And I just kept thinking, this is not me, right? I'm not passively standing by wringing my hands and afraid to bring this up with my husband. 

 07:07

I was strong. I was keeping track of everything, right? I was very observant and I had an endless ability to critique and to adjust and to plan and to try and control outcomes. I had scheduled check-ins where, you know, we would talk about his progress. 

 07:25

I had all of these systems in place for figuring out if he was looking at porn or not looking at porn. And so I was not like losing myself quietly over in the corner, crying tears and wringing my hands. 

 07:41

I was over functioning. I was holding everything together. This is what I was telling myself at the time, like, like, I am going to fix this, right? We, we are going to do this based on all of these outcomes in this spreadsheet. 

 07:56

I don't know that I actually have a spreadsheet, but I wouldn't put it past me for it to be the one time that I did make a spreadsheet. Like all of these markers will show us that you are moving in the right direction. 

 08:07

And I could come up with that stuff all day long. And so I didn't think that codependency would be my issue at all. But a really beautiful change has happened over the last little while as therapists and other thinkers have begun to apply the concept of codependency outside of just these addiction spaces, the definition has changed. 

 08:36

And so there's a lot more discussion of control disguised as taking care of people. And maybe you can think back to what I was just doing with my husband and his quote unquote porn addiction. Like, did I want him to think I was caring for him? 

 08:54

Sure, but I was controlling the hell out of him, right? Identity built around being needed. That is a really beautiful addition to this codependency discussion that we're having where, okay, what happens when your whole identity is built around being indispensable to other people? 

 09:15

That's not under-functioning. That's not quiet, tear-stained hand-wringing in the corner. That's over-functioning, over-responsibility. And then the third really important thing that has been added to the conversation about codependency is that we used to look at self-abandonment as some kind of moral high ground, right? 

 09:40

That I am so strong. I am so good. I've completely given myself over to solving this problem. And I just want to shout out authors like Terry Cole, who's the author of Too Much, and Pia Melody is a different trauma-informed thinker who have really helped us expand this codependency lens a little bit larger. 

 10:01

So here's what I want you to think about. Codependency, how I have found it to be most valuable to define for me and those I work with. It's not about not being able to set limits or not being able to say no. 

 10:17

It is about organizing all of your time, energy, and identity around managing others so that you can feel better and your own needs become optional. Because if you think back to what I was doing with my husband, my feeling better was dependent on him acting the way I thought he should be acting. 

 10:44

And I think you could think, if you slow down right now and just ask yourself this question, do I have a relationship where I insert myself, where I organize my time and my energy and maybe even my identity around them doing or feeling better so that I can do and feel better. 

 11:07

I think a lot of us have that type of relationship because what this looks like in real life is someone who's codependent, they know exactly how someone else is feeling and they don't always know how they're feeling. 

 11:22

They spend a lot of time mentally rehearsing conversations to prevent disappointment or conflict. They know how to automatically adjust their body language, their tone, or their needs to keep things running smoothly. 

 11:37

Sometimes they're the emotional processor for everyone else. I have a client who serves this function in her office. Everybody is always coming into her office, closing the door and wanting to talk through office stuff going on with her, right? 

 11:52

She processes emotions with and for everyone. People who jump in to fix problems no one asked you to fix. Staying in relationships where you are essential, everybody relies on you, but you are not supported the same way. 

 12:09

It's the person who remembers everything and anticipates what's going on and can kind of plan and organize around what other people need, not always knowing what you need. And here's the biggest one that really kind of hits me between the eyes. 

 12:27

Taking responsibility for outcomes that aren't yours. Caring about something more than the other person does, so much so that you have the plan, you have the resources, you're the one that's going to make it happen. 

 12:43

And what's confusing is that that looks like success from the outside. It's what we were taught we were supposed to be doing. The strong one, the smart one, the one who keeps it all running. We were taught if you do those things for other people, those things will be done for you. 

 13:03

And that's not the case because that's not how it works. Codependency is expensive. It costs so much time, hours spent thinking about other people's needs, moods, their reactions, and planning for that. 

 13:23

The energy output is incredible. That constant hypervigilance, the emotional labor that you're doing for other people, the way that that is just exhausting. Yeah, that's part of the cost. It costs brain space, managing relationships instead of being in your own life and solving your problems. 

 13:47

And I mean, resources, that just goes unsaid, right? Overgiving, overdoing financially, professionally, emotionally, while sometimes undergiving to yourself. It's not free to be codependent. It's just what we expect of women. 

 14:08

And whether your codependency feels a little bit more like the underfunctioning or the over functioning, it doesn't really matter. It's costing you your life, your time, your energy, your brain space. 

 14:23

And that's why it's so important to talk about. There's another part of this that I really want to address with some compassion and understanding because it makes so much sense. We don't hold on to these codependent behaviors because there's something wrong with us. 

 14:38

We hold on to them because they worked at some point in our past lives. And for many of us in our present lives, being competent, hopeful, all that emotional attunement that we learned was how we felt safe and belonged. 

 14:57

We weren't setting out to manage other people strictly to control them in the beginning. It was actually about preventing bad things from happening. So many of us had this little voice that said, listen, if you stay ahead of this, if you always know how to anticipate what other people need and want, that's how you control bad things from happening. 

 15:20

And for a lot of high functioning women, codependency becomes then part of our identity. We are the one who gets shit done, the strong one, the reliable one, the one who can handle it. And so the identity risk is real here. 

 15:38

It's not just about changing our behavior. It's who am I if I'm not always showing up in this capacity for other people? What do I do then? I think that was a question that I literally asked. Well, if I'm not going to spend all of this time managing and controlling what my husband is doing so that I can feel better, what am I going to do? 

 16:01

I have no idea. It's not just a behavioral change. It's a change in how I see myself. It can also mean disappointing people, right? All these people that you have been kind of smoothing the way for, they are going to feel some of the discomfort that you have been removing from their lives. 

 16:22

What is that going to be like? That's not nothing. And so if it feels scary to let go of some of these behaviors or to even think about it, that makes so much sense, right? It just means that this thing that used to keep you safe and might still in some of your relational situations be how you feel valuable, how you feel recognized and good. 

 16:47

Yeah, that matters. That means something. I just want to leave you with some questions, not as diagnosis, right? Nobody is doing anything wrong here. You are simply showing up in your relations the way you were taught to that got you safe and connected, right? 

 17:04

There's nothing wrong with you. I am curious about the energy expenditure, though, the time, the resources, the brain space, the way that this is showing up in your day-to-day life in terms of costing all this energy, you might want to have a different experience. 

 17:22

So here's some questions. And I want you to just consider. And if this episode really resonates for you, I want to talk to you about it. I want to talk to you about how you can make the switch from spending all of this time and energy managing other people so that you can feel better to just feeling better. 

 17:40

So here are the questions. How much time do I spend tracking other people's moods, needs, or reactions? And do I spend that much time checking in on myself? Question number two. Do I feel responsible for keeping things running smoothly or staying stable or okay in my relationships? 

 18:10

Meaning, when something feels off, do I feel an instinct to fix, to manage, or to somehow compensate for that? Question number three. Do I earn my place in relationships by being useful, competent, or emotionally steady? 

 18:33

So that gets to like, how am I valued? Am I valuable for what I can handle or for who I am? Question number four, do I rehearse conversations in my head to avoid other people feeling disappointed or to manage conflict or misunderstanding? 

 18:54

So am I planning how to say things so that no one gets upset? And last question, when I imagine expressing my own clear need or truth, what does my body feel? Do I feel fear? Do I feel pressure to soften it? 

 19:17

Does it feel risky? So you begin to get a sense of how codependency might be showing up for you. And that's where the work begins, right? Being aware and then wanting to have a different experience. Because what I can tell you now is that the amount of time and energy that I spent trying to manage and control other people's outcomes and congratulating myself for being the person who cared enough to do that, right?

 19:58

All that time and energy, all it created in my relationships was distance and contention and lack of trust. So what I want for you is the same thing that I want for me, which is I want to have relationships that feel mutual and feel reciprocal. 

 20:17

Are there times when people will need and want my help because I'm amazing? Yes. Same with you. You're amazing. You're capable. You have great instincts, right? You know what needs to be done. Is that valuable? 

 20:30

Yes. But I also want you to be able to show up as you with your needs, with your wants, with your dreams, and have there be place for both of those. Because the price of this codependency is that so much of your time and energy gets invested into other people that there's not a lot of it for you. 

 20:51

And that's what I hope you'll get curious about. And if you want to talk with me about how we can work on that together, use the link that's in my bio to set up a call. Because what is on the other side of codependency in your relationships is confidence and secure connection. 

 21:07

Thanks for listening. I'll see you next week.

Episode 148 - You Can Get Good at Conflict

Improving your conflict skills isn’t about finding the perfect words—it’s about understanding why conflict feels so hard in the first place. When your body believes that speaking up could cost you connection, of course it freezes, softens, or stays quiet. In this episode, I talk about how our nervous systems learned early on that conflict wasn’t safe, and why that doesn’t mean something is wrong with you. When we slow down and get curious about our conflict response rather than judging it, that’s when real change becomes possible, and you can actually get good at conflict. Here’s what I cover:

• How shifting from “what’s wrong with me?” to “why does this make sense?” helps eliminate the self-criticism spiral

• The early lessons your body learned about conflict, compliance, and staying connected

• How people-pleasing and staying small function as intelligent survival strategies

• The questions I offer to help you look backward and make sense of your conflict response

• How attachment patterns shape what your body expects will happen when conflict threatens connection

Register for my upcoming workshop HERE!

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

00:58

The longer I do this, the more convinced I am that the way we are able to handle conflict, the way we are able to have difficult conversations that name our needs, our wants, our desires, what's working for us, what's not working for us, what hurt our feelings, what made us experience uncomfortable emotion in our relationships. 

 01:24

It really is freedom and it really is the linchpin in what makes you feel close in a relationship, what makes you feel like you can really be seen and heard. And so for a long time inside of Stop People Pleasing, which is my six-month group coaching program, we have spent a lot of time working on having difficult conversations. 

 01:50

And I recently expanded that section or that module, I guess, of our program to be a month. And I call it conflict month. And I laugh because when I say conflict month, I'm sure some of you are thinking, hell no, like there's, there's just, I am allergic to conflict. 

 02:12

I don't like it. I don't feel like I do a good job. And I totally get that. Conflict is the thing that feels like kryptonite, right? We hold back. We try to smooth things over. We disappear altogether. 

 02:28

We hold it inside. We don't rock the boat. And that response actually makes so much sense. And it is why we spend an entire month on conflict inside of Stop People Pleasing. Not because I think in a month we can have all the conflict solved and you can have all the skills and tools you'll ever need, but because beginning to understand how our nervous systems react in conflict, I think is the key to being able to live truly free. 

 03:00

It doesn't mean that hard things will never happen. It doesn't mean that there won't ever be rupture in relationship. But what it means is that we can talk about it. And if we're going to talk about it, we have to understand first why we can't talk about it. 

 03:17

Conflict isn't just about communication skills. If it were, I'm sure most of you who are so capable and so thoughtful and so incredibly intelligent, you would have figured it out. If it was just about figuring out the right words, done, right? 

 03:33

We would figure those out. But it's because whenever we think about saying those words, it's the nervous system response. This isn't safe. This is dangerous. Conflict is also about safety. And it's about the way we find connection. 

 03:52

It's about the way that our nervous systems learned a long time ago about what happens when you speak up or disagree or tell the truth. So that 's why we start with the body and we slow it way down. We start asking a different question because a lot of the women that I get inside of Stop People Pleasing, they come in and they're very self-critical. 

 04:20

I am a 40X year old woman or a 51X year old or a 30X year old. And why can't I just say the thing? Why do I freeze? Why does my stomach clench and my throat close up? What is wrong with me? While I understand where that question comes from, it just keeps you locked in this cycle of self-questioning and self-criticism and doesn't actually help us make sense of why you're having that reaction. 

 04:48

So I like to start with a different question. How did my body learn to react like this when conflict shows up? This question really matters because before we try to change something, we want to understand it. 

 05:05

So many women are stuck in that self-criticism and they can't see past the question of what's wrong with me to the better question, which I think is, why does this make sense? Conflict feels dangerous. 

 05:23

It feels dangerous to relationships. It feels dangerous to belonging, to being loved and included and connected. And when we can first start with how does this make sense, it softens that critical self-judgment piece of us that we've been locked in for so long. 

 05:42

And that alone creates some space for change. So let's start there together today. There's something important that I want you to remember about when you were younger. We all depended on the care of bigger, more capable adults. 

 06:00

Our parents, our caregivers, our school teachers, our coaches, religious leaders, all of those people kind of formed this protective net around us that allowed us to get what we needed to continue to survive. 

 06:13

And in that system, especially in the time that we grew up, we didn't have power. And often we didn't even really have a choice. We couldn't leave. We couldn't set and enforce boundaries. We couldn't say, I don't like that. 

 06:31

This doesn't work for me. I don't want to do that without some repercussions. And even when the adults in your life were well-loving or well-intentioned, the message was often very, very clear. If you do not comply, if you are not agreeable, if you're not obedient, if you disrupt this system, there are consequences. 

 06:54

And sometimes those consequences were small, right? I remember when I taught kindergarten, if a child was being disruptive at their table, I would remove them. That was a consequence, exclusion, being separated from your peers, being separated from your group. 

 07:14

Sometimes the consequences meant abuse, withdrawal of love. Even just weathering the disappointment or the silence or the emotional distance of those adults that we needed so badly for survival, that was a punishment. 

 07:33

And our nervous systems learned very, very early what is safe to do and what is not. And that learning made sense in the context of being young and being dependent. We had to do what the big people wanted. 

 07:51

Quick interruption. Thank you so much for listening. I asked this client a question today that I want to ask you. How long are you going to let yourself go unseen and unheard in your most important relationships? 

 08:05

This woman is so capable and so intelligent and also so lonely and resentful. And I know so many of you are as well. So I have a workshop coming up. Say what you need to say. And it's really important for two reasons. 

 08:19

Number one, it's going to teach you how to find the exact right words. I know that's something we all struggle with. What do I say is such a common question. But number two, it's also going to teach you how to work with the fear or the overwhelm or the anxiety that comes up when you actually go to say those words because we need both. 

 08:40

We need the right words, but we also need to be able to regulate our nervous systems so that we can actually say them and get to the connection and the vulnerability that we want and deserve. You deserve to be seen and heard in your relationships. 

 08:56

Check out the link in my bio. All the information you need about the workshop is there and I can't wait to see you. So I want you to hear this clearly. The problem is not that we learned to do that. That was brilliant. 

 09:13

That was an incredible survival system that we learned how to abide in. The problem now is that that adaptation, that survival strategy is still running. And so now, as an adult woman who is capable, who is articulate, who has some resources and can develop new skills, your body still believes if I'm not nice, if I don't smooth things over, if I rock the boat, something bad will happen. 

 09:48

And so you keep making yourself smaller. You keep editing and performing and paying the price. This is not weakness. This is not something wrong with you. Again, this is that brilliant, intelligent survival strategy that protected you for a long time. 

 10:07

And the only thing we need to do now is update it. In adult relationships, we really need to be seen. Not in all our relationships, but we need at least one or two where we can feel honest, where we can feel there's some reciprocity, where we can feel that there's intimacy, we are seen and we are known. 

 10:33

But that old strategy, performing and minimizing and staying silent, it doesn't create those things. It creates protection, right? You feel safe, but it's at the expense of honesty and vulnerability and connection sometimes. 

 10:53

And that's why so many women that I talk to are full of resentment and loneliness. We are so busy worrying about other people. And there's that voice inside that says, but what about us? What about me? 

 11:10

When will I get to be seen and supported the same way I do for everybody else? Or that voice of resentment. I am busting my ass day in and day out to do this for everyone else. Why are they not doing it for me? 

 11:26

So resentment and loneliness and frustration and sadness and grief, those are all, those make so much sense. And so during conflict month, we actually look backward before we look forward. And these are some of the questions that I ask inside the group that I want to ask you now so that you can do some looking backward in a way that feels helpful. 

 11:53

Question number one, what were you taught to believe about conflict? Maybe it was dangerous or disrespectful, or maybe it was just completely useless. Maybe you learned, I'm going to have a need, I'm going to speak up, and nobody's going to do a thing about it. 

 12:10

I will not be thought of. I will not be considered. Disrespectful. I'm going to bring up something I want and someone's going to get mad at me for having the nerve. Dangerous kind of covers a lot of the things that we felt, right? 

 12:26

I'm going to be abandoned. Nobody's going to want me. So think about the answer to that question. What were you taught to believe about conflict? Question number two, who was allowed to be angry in your family and who wasn't? 

 12:43

That'll tell you a lot about who gets to express their needs and who doesn't. What happens when you express needs or wants or preferences. And then question number three, what happened when someone challenged authority or named a need or said no? 

 13:03

Just think back to those answers because they will give you some really important data about why your current conflict response is what it is. And it makes sense. And when we start with, oh my gosh, this makes so much sense. 

 13:23

Of course I feel like this. Of course I'm not willing to speak up. Of course this is hard for me. That is a place where change can happen and growth can happen. There's another layer that really shapes how you show up in conflict and that is attachment. 

 13:41

Attachment describes how we learned to stay connected to the people that we needed and what our body now expects will happen when we feel that connection is at risk or there's conflict. If we lean anxious, conflict can feel like if I say this, I will lose the relationship. 

 14:05

I will be abandoned. So we stay quiet, we soften, we manage, we pretend, and we perform. If you lean avoidant, conflict can actually feel very overwhelming. I'm going to lose myself. I'm not going to know what to say. 

 14:20

This is going to be too much. So you shut down, you detach, and you disengage. Those two styles, anxious and avoidant, describe a lot of people out there. There's more nuance there. I have a podcast episode number 43 that goes into some of that nuance. 

 14:39

But both of those responses make sense. There's one other attachment style, secure attachment, that holds a different belief that even if it feels really aspirational and like not what you're able to believe today, I still want you to hear it. 

 14:58

Secure attachment believes we can disagree and it's actually going to be okay. Conflict is actually going to bring us closer. It doesn't mean something is wrong. It's normal in human relationships. And as we go through this conflict together, we're going to better understand each other. 

 15:18

We're going to be able to see and honor each other as individual better. And we're going to be more connected. Connection isn't threatened by conflict. It's facilitated by it. And that belief changes everything because we can then start to help your body not react to conflict as a danger anymore. 

 15:45

It's not something that happens overnight, but over time, working with the parts of you that become very activated, the anxious part, the avoidant part, we can actually help your body not have the same reaction to conflict. 

 16:02

We also do a lot of working with our conflict avoidant parts because almost always there's a part of you that says, don't do it. Whenever there's conflict, don't do it. Don't say it. Just keep the peace. 

 16:17

This is going to blow everything up. You're going to get in a lot of trouble. You're going to lose the relationship. You're going to be overwhelmed, right? Whether that part is inherently avoidant or anxious, their solution is the same. 

 16:29

Don't say it. And so instead of fighting that part, we listen. We learn to ask, what are you afraid of? What are you trying to protect? And what do you need to know about who I am now so that we can have a different experience? 

 16:49

And that's where real change happens, not through forcing, but through partnership. The adult you, the adult you are now, learns to lean in to that younger part who learned that conflict was dangerous. 

 17:08

And instead of saying, what is the matter with you? What is wrong with you? Why can't you just say this? To say instead, I actually understand. This is scary. I hear you. You were right back then. And I'm here now. 

 17:24

That kind of partnership builds trust and it lays the foundation for our bodies to have a different experience with conflict as adults. All of this brings me to the workshop that I'm offering in a few weeks because Stop People Pleasing is not open right now, but I want you to have the opportunity to learn how to work with your nervous system in conflict. 

 17:51

And so I have a workshop, say what you need to say, because two things are always required in conflict. Number one, you do have to have words that feel good to you, the right words for you and for your situation. 

 18:04

And number two, you have to have a regulated nervous system. You have to be able to say the words and deal with the discomfort that comes up when you do. You need both. There's no point in having the perfect language if your body goes into full survival mode. 

 18:21

So inside this workshop, we're going to work on finding the language that is honest and grounded and true for you. And we're going to learn to stay connected to that little part that is scared. And we're going to learn how to say what needs to be said without abandoning yourself. 

 18:39

And if this feels like work you're ready for, the link is in the show notes and in my bio, and I would love to see you there. Before I go, I want to leave you with a few questions to gently explore over the next couple of weeks. 

 18:53

I find that the practice of just letting myself sit with a question and telling all my parts and my nervous system, like, it's safe to answer this. I'm not going to judge you. I'm not going to get mad at you. 

 19:06

I just want to know a little bit about what's going on here. That's the spirit in which these questions are offered. So question number one, when conflict begins, what is the first sensation you notice in your body? 

 19:21

Number two, what does your nervous system seem most afraid of in conflict? Number three, after conflict, how long does it take your body to settle and what helps? Number four, if your conflict response is protecting something valuable, what might that be? 

 19:46

Your answers are some really, really great information. Because if you can notice, for example, in answer to question number one, when conflict begins, I immediately just feel sick in my stomach. That points to a way that you can support your body. 

 20:04

If, in answer to question number two, what does your nervous system seem most afraid of in conflict? Well, it's being abandoned. Then that gives you a little bit of information about what your nervous system needs to feel supported. 

 20:17

It needs to know that you will not abandon you. It needs to know that no matter what, you will be there and just feel whatever needs to be felt. If you're answering question number three and you say, oh, it takes my body a day to settle and I need to walk and I need a bath, that points to some beautiful supportive things that you can do for yourself. 

 20:42

And if you say, it takes my body days and I don't really ever settle, it just kind of goes away. That points to a need for more skills and resources so that you can have a different experience. And maybe in response to question number four, if your conflict response is protecting something, what would that be? 

 21:03

It's protecting my relationship. It's protecting my ability to even be in relationship with this person. That's just good to know because what it says is that that young part of you doesn't have any other resources or skills and really wants to keep this relationship. 

 21:23

And right now they're doing it through self-abandonment. Again, really important information to have. Because when we shift from self-judgment into curiosity, that's what creates the space to change and do something different. 

 21:39

I would love to know what came up for you when you answered those questions. DM me, email me. I'd love to hear. And if that workshop sounds like something you're ready to do, I would love to see you there. 

 21:50

Thanks again for listening. Let me know what landed for you in this episode, and I'll see you soon.

Episode 147 - How I Make Sense of the Absolute Bullshit Going on Right Now

We are living through an incredibly intense political, social, and cultural moment, and it’s easy to fall into the despair and overwhelm of it all. In this episode, I’m sharing a framework that helps me make sense of what's happening and hold onto hope. Spiral dynamics explains how humans organize around shared value systems, and what happens when those systems collide and begin to collapse. While these transitions are often destabilizing and painful, what we’re living through is not random–and understanding the pattern offers the reminder that how we choose to show up, care for ourselves, and embody the values we want to see matters. Here’s what I cover:

• The origin of spiral dynamics and how the framework can show up in everyday life

• Why systems resist evolution with the same fear and violence they were established with

• How the framework of spiral dynamics relates to good girl rules and people-pleasing tendencies

• Why nervous system safety and connection matter alongside protest, organizing, and action during times of change

• How rest, pleasure, joy, and community are not distractions, but essential tools for surviving times of massive transition

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

00:59

I want to explain something that helps me make sense of the intense political and social things that we are seeing play out in the United States, if you live here or around the world.

 01:13

I explained this very poorly in a group coaching session last week with some of the graduates of my Stop People Pleasing program. And so if nothing else, this podcast is for you because it really helps me when I look at this framework called spiral dynamics to see what is happening.

 01:36

And I hope it helps you too, because in a time when there is not a lot of hopeful things in the broader political and social and cultural landscape, this actually does give me some hope in the midst of everything that is so hard and so sad. 

 01:57

Spiral dynamics was developed by a psychologist, Claire Graves, and later expanded on by a guy named Don Beck. And I learned it by listening to and working with Richard Rohr. So let's dive in. Spiral dynamics teaches that human beings organize themselves around shared value systems. 

 02:19

They are deep, they're often unconscious beliefs about things like what keeps us safe, how power should work, what success looks like, and whose lives matter and matter the most. And these value systems don't emerge randomly. 

 02:34

They emerge in response to life's conditions. They change when life's conditions change. When the world becomes more complex, more interconnected or more aware, the old system eventually stops working. 

 02:52

And that might sound like a good thing, but it's actually where things get very, very intense. Let me give you a couple of examples. We can see this when we look just at parenting. When we think about how a lot of us were raised, I'm 52. 

 03:07

If you're younger, it might not apply. But for generations, parenting was organized around obedience. Because I said so, don't talk back. If you didn't comply, it meant you disrespected your parents. 

 03:22

And that kind of made sense, although it wasn't very kind, in a world that valued order, hierarchy, and control. Think about how many systems and how many organizations and communities were organized around order. 

 03:40

Who's in charge? Who's not in charge? Who has power? Who doesn't have power? And controlling the people in that system, right? It begins to make some sense. But then, as psychology and neuroscience and emotional awareness expand, that system started to break down. 

 03:59

I didn't raise my children that way. I wanted some emotional attunement and connection and consent. And I looked at the way that I, even in the beginning years of my parenting, used punishment to control. 

 04:16

And I didn't want to do that anymore. It didn't feel good. But there was also a backlash. You can hear in a lot of circles, you know, kids are too soft. No one respects authority anymore. We've gone too far. 

 04:30

And this isn't like random. It's two value systems colliding. You can see it in work culture. I mean, if you want to go back, one of the clearest examples of spiral dynamics in action throughout history is the Industrial Revolution. 

 04:46

As societies industrialized, a new value system took over, right? One that was focused on efficiency and profit and growth above everything else, even above humans, because humans became labor units. 

 05:03

Time became money and rest became laziness. And this system solved some issues, right? Mass production, economic expansion, and technological progress. But it came at an enormous human cost. People were working like 12 to 16 hours a day. 

 05:23

Children labored in factories. Injury and death were routine. There were no protections. There were no weekends. There were no safety nets. And eventually, the conditions became so extreme that that system could no longer sustain itself. 

 05:38

And that's when resistance emerged. Workers organized. They protested. They demanded limits and safety and dignity. And the system did not respond gently. It responded violently. Police and military were used to break strikes, people who were organizing. 

 05:58

People were jailed, injured, and killed in the name of keeping that system in place. But here is where spiral dynamics teaches us something that I think is important. Systems resist evolution with the same fear and violence that they used to establish themselves. 

 06:21

And yet, because life conditions demanded it, those systems did change. I mean, that's how we got the eight-hour workday and weekends and child labor laws and workplace safety standards. The system didn't collapse, it developed, but at a very big cost to the people who lived during the collision of those two value systems. 

 06:48

You can see it inside relationships too. Many women were raised inside a relational value system that tells us to be a good girl, be agreeable, don't rock the boat. Your job is to maintain harmony. And for a lot of years, that system, because women didn't have equal access to power and resources, kept relationships stable. 

 07:16

But we're not putting up with that anymore. Now women want to be seen. They want to have equal access to all the places where decisions are made. And so they're labeled difficult and rights are given and then taken away by people who don't want us to move to the next level of equality. 

 07:38

So again, you can see the collision of those two value systems there. And this moment feels so intense because transitions between those value systems are always destabilizing. The old way no longer works. 

 07:57

The new one isn't fully formed yet. Those people who are in power cling to that power. People feel afraid. They cling to certainty. They want authority. They look backward to the good old days and how things used to be so much better. 

 08:16

And while it makes sense, it is not easy. We are living in the middle of a global transition, and the middle is always the hardest part. One of the important, and I think this is kind of the most important teaching of spiral dynamics, is this. 

 08:35

You cannot shame or dominate or punish people into a new value system. That just recreates and perpetuates the old one. Evolution happens as people feel safer, when connection replaces isolation, when nervous systems can regulate, and when meaning and joy are allowed alongside marching and protesting and calling centers and doing the things that create the conditions for the new system to come into being. 

 09:11

If you feel crushed by the middle that we are in right now, I am with you. I feel the heaviness and the grief of this moment. And I have so much privilege and I have so such distance from this. There are people who are suffering every single day. 

 09:34

And we have humans who are being kept in camps. And so I want to keep in mind that my suffering is nothing like theirs. And I still suffer. Two things can be true at the same time. You are feeling the heaviness and the weight and the sadness and the grief. 

 09:54

I want to name something explicitly here because it matters to me. If you decide to look into spiral dynamics, you'll find that a lot of people use it in a lot of different ways. There's a wide range of interpretations and applications, and there are critiques of it that I think are not only valid, but are important to name, especially from a feminist or a racial justice perspective. 

 10:18

Spiral dynamics comes out of Western psychology, which carries kind of its own inherent set of values and assumptions. And one of those assumptions is the tendency to rank development as good development or bad development, better development, right? 

 10:35

Higher or lower. And I don't believe that that holds true across the board, especially just looking through a Western lens. One of the clearest examples of this is that Indigenous ways of knowing, deep relationship to the earth, embodiment, community, and interdependence, those ways of living and organizing have existed for centuries. 

 10:57

They're not new and they are not underdeveloped, right? In many ways, they hold wisdom that our kind of dominant Western way of thinking about it are only now realizing we desperately need and are so valuable. 

 11:13

So spiral dynamics through a Western lens can be used to dismiss or minimize less developed values as it gets defined there because they don't fit that really kind of narrow definition of what progress should look like. 

 11:31

That is not how I'm using spiral dynamics or how I find it to be helpful. I find it helpful as a pattern recognition tool, a way to understand that we are living in an intense moment of collision of value systems. 

 11:48

I don't use it to rank people or cultures. I don't use it to claim moral superiority. And I absolutely am not going to use it to bypass or to excuse harm. Because this transition time that we're living in is not abstract. 

 12:06

It's the death of violent systems of extraction and power, racist, misogynist, deeply entrenched systems that are trying to hang on and survive and to keep us under control. And real people are paying the price for our resistance to those systems. 

 12:28

Black and brown people around the world have and are bearing the brunt of this violence as they have for generations. And many white allies, people are putting their bodies, their safety, and their privilege on the line as well. 

 12:44

I don't want any framework, spiral dynamics or otherwise, to tidy this up or to make it sound spiritually neat. What we are living through is not clean or gentle. There is real hurt, real terror, real grief, and real loss happening right now. 

 13:04

So the way that I hold spiral dynamics is this. It's not an excuse. It's not a bypass. It's not a way to downplay suffering. It's a way to see a pattern clearly. And to describe that clash of values also helps me decide how I want to position myself inside of it. 

 13:24

Because as I embody the values that I want to see take root in the world, care, connection, dignity, mutuality. I help that transition. I'm a part of bringing that transition about. As I take care of myself and my community, I embody what I want to see in the world. 

 13:49

And as I stay human in the face of these dehumanizing systems, I help the transition. And what I feel like it does is it helps me be very clear-eyed about what I want to be doing and how important it is that even in the midst of all of this chaotic terror, that I hold on to the values of rest and pleasure and play and joy, because that is what I want to see more of in the world. 

 14:22

This framework and no framework should be used in a way that erases the pain of the moment. But I hope it offers some context and a way to understand what's happening and to ask ourselves, if we want to, the important question of, you know, given what we are living through, what role do I want to play? 

 14:43

What values do I want to use my life to embody and to bring more of into the world? Because it's what I want everyone to have. So while I hope that this explanation of spiral dynamics is helpful, it's very brief. 

 15:00

I didn't mean to go into a lot of description. You can look it up and read more if you're interested. My hope is that you can take from this episode two things. Number one, systems of values are colliding and the old one is collapsing and they collapse in the same violent manner in which they lived. 

 15:22

And number two, this is why rest and pleasure and laughter and community and care and dancing and joyful existence and finding beauty. They're not distractions. They are essential because this is how humans survive these kinds of transitions. 

 15:45

So hug someone, care for someone, care for yourself. There aren't going to be like a bunch of breathing exercises that are going to make this go away. It is going to help, like for sure, breathe and drink water and touch some grass and hug your pet. 

 16:06

But I hope that being clear-eyed about what is happening gives us some stamina, gives us some sturdiness, and a little bit more resilience because each of us has the opportunity to act within our sphere, to act within our privilege, to act within our limitations, and those are different for everyone, to help each other through this moment. 

 16:34

And that's what I hope this podcast episode offers you. A little bit of explanation, my love and my respect, and a reminder. Rest, laugh, get together with people that you love because that's how we're going to get through this. 

 16:54

I'll see you next week.

Episode 146 - Five Questions I’m Asking This Year

Is your social media feed overflowing with New Year’s resolutions and tips to optimize your life? This mindset can feel overwhelming, so instead of pushing for the “perfect” 2026, I’m offering something else in this episode: five questions I return to again and again to recalibrate my relationship with myself. These questions aren’t about productivity or self-improvement. They’re an invitation to unlearn good girl conditioning, step out of self-abandonment, and choose a way of living that actually feels like yours. Here’s what I cover:

• How women’s socialization continues to shape our choices and behaviors

• What passivity actually looks like when your desires and preferences go unspoken

• Why overworking isn’t just physical labor, but emotional, relational, and mental labor too

• How self-abandonment is at the core of people pleasing and putting yourself last

• Why joy, fun, and play can be nourishment instead of something you earn after work

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching.

See you inside!

Transcript

00:58

Happy New Year, friends. I'm still not quite sure what time is going as fast as it is going, but here we are, January 5th. That's the day I'm recording this. And I hope you had in all of your holidaying and celebrating some rest and some connection and some joy. 

 01:17

If your social media feed is anything like mine is right now, it is full of New Year's resolution-y stuff, right? How to craft the perfect 2026 with all the amazing things you're going to change and become and do and stop and start. 

 01:36

And I just, I have never identified less with this kind of like optimization mindset that we seem to be in. And I think largely it's because I'm a 52-year-old woman who's in perimenopause, like so many of you. 

 01:58

I'm also struggling every day with the heaviness of living in the political chaos and the slide into fascism that is life in the United States right now. It is a lot. And I've never felt more, first of all, certain that we are doing something wrong with our relentless march toward optimizing every single part of our lives. 

 02:30

And I've just never felt less drawn to the big goals kind of genre of life. Because in the past, I would have absolutely jumped on the goal setting bandwagon, outlined my 17-point plan for major changes I was going to implement that I was totally overwhelmed by the 1st of February and totally abandoned. 

 02:56

So I know the drill and I know that goal setting is kind of woven into so many parts of our lives. And I just, I don't want it this year. I'm tired. I'm like tired on a new level of weariness that comes from, I think, living with all the pressures. 

 03:21

And I mentioned the aforementioned, you know, political upheaval and chaos. And so I want to share something with you that I do for myself a lot. I have five questions that I return to over and over again as a way of just calibrating in big ways and small ways how I feel about myself and my life and the connection that I feel toward myself or the lack of it. 

 03:50

And I really hope to offer you these five simple questions that have nothing to do with productivity or self-optimization. They're just questions meant to free you, to free up some part of you, to free up old ways of thinking, to unlearn ways that we've been taught that we should be in the world, and to identify ways in which or places where our socialization is still popping up. 

 04:23

Because women are overly socialized to be agreeable instead of honest. We are socialized to be useful instead of fulfilled or satisfied. We are programmed to be endlessly resilient instead of supported and self-sacrificing instead of honoring ourselves. 

 04:46

And so these questions, fairly simple. I'm going to offer them to you in several different ways. It's more of like a corrective exercise than a big goal setting exercise. You'll see what I mean. For each of the questions, I'm just going to ask it. 

 05:02

I'm going to give you a little bit of context, why it matters, what usually gets in the way of us answering it and then bringing that answer into our daily lives in a really useful way. And then you can take what is valuable to you, leave the rest. 

 05:19

I'm really a fan of just taking one little thing that lands or that resonates or that feels useful and just leaving everything else. You do not have to answer all these questions. That is not the point. 

 05:31

It's to take one or two things and bring it into your daily life in whatever way feels really meaningful to you. So question number one, where do I fall into passivity? And there's a couple other ways that you could ask this of yourself as well. 

 05:50

Number one, where do I stay quiet in order to keep things like running smoothly? Where do I have an opinion that I'm not sharing? Or where am I waiting for someone else to decide for me? Because for me, passivity is kind of what I have relabeled or I used to relabel or mislabel, that's better said, as easygoing or low maintenance or nice. 

 06:20

But relationally, passivity is where resentment grows. Women don't name preferences, limits, or desires. We were taught that those are how we are too much or too big or too dramatic. And when we aren't able to name what we want, relationships become unbalanced and intimacy and honesty can't be there because we're not saying what we actually want. 

 06:49

Passivity is, it's like the absence of desire. It's the absence of preference. It's the absence of this is what I want. And we need to see the places where we are being passive to keep the peace. Often that's what we were taught to do in the homes we grew up in. 

 07:11

Because passivity as an adult means you are not showing up in the full way that you deserve in your own life. We spend so much time being compliant and performing what we think other people want that we slide into these passive roles where we just go along to get along. 

 07:35

And that's something that I want to see in my own life because it's where I can take a step into sharing something that I want, sharing something that matters to me, having a boundary or some other kind of limitation that would make my life better. 

 07:50

So if any of that resonates or matters or your curiosity gets piqued, that's a great question to ask yourself. Where am I falling into passivity? Question number two, where am I overworking? This question matters a lot because overworking isn't just about the physical labor that we do. 

 08:11

It's about the emotional labor. It's about the relational labor. It's about the mental labor that we do oftentimes to earn love, to avoid conflict, to prove that we are worthy or worthwhile, and to prevent other people from being disappointed in us. 

 08:29

It is self-abandonment that is dressed up as responsibility. And for a lot of my super ambitious women out there, that ambition, if you kind of peel back that layer of ambition underneath is trying to earn love, belonging, the good opinion of other people. 

 08:52

And so overworking or seeing where you are overworking is just a moment to pause and say, am I getting out of this overworking situation something that is valuable for me? Or am I putting in more than is my share? 

 09:12

Am I taking care of things that are not my responsibility? Women are so expected to do invisible labor, emotional tracking, planning, remembering. And we are so praised for our endurance and the way that we keep showing up over and over and over again in these really highly resilient, productive, and totally unsustainable ways. 

 09:34

And so if this question, where am I overworking, creates some curiosity for you, here's some other ways that you might ask it. Where am I doing more than my share? What am I carrying that isn't actually mine? 

 09:53

Where am I exhausted but still really pushing hard? Question number three. Where am I abandoning myself? This question really matters because self-abandonment is the core of people pleasing. It is saying I matter less than anything going on outside of me that somebody else wants or needs or wants me to do for them. 

 10:22

So this happens when we consistently override our own intuition. We override our boundaries or don't have any. We don't feel our own emotions and we don't pay attention to the signals from our body about what we like, what we want, what we don't want. 

 10:43

And for the good girls out there, right, this is lesson number one that we learned. We learned that what we think, what we feel, what we want to have happen is secondary to what everybody else wants. 

 10:57

And so unlearning that, unlearning that disconnection takes some energy and some focus. There are some other ways that you might ask this to help you see, where am I self-abandoning? You might ask yourself, where am I saying yes when my body says no? 

 11:23

Where am I ignoring my own discomfort? Is there something that I'm tolerating in my life that I don't want to tolerate anymore? Because each of those questions gets at the heart of how we are trained to attune to everyone else outwardly and not to attune to ourselves inwardly. 

 11:45

So this is how we unlearn behavior. Question number four, where can I honor myself and my needs better? This is one of my favorite questions because it's like a reclamation question. This is the question I go to when I don't feel like myself, when I feel like I'm doing too many things for other people or where I'm not connected enough to myself. 

 12:14

Because for me, when I'm not honoring myself, that's when I feel burnout and resentment and withdrawal. And I feel like my emotions are kind of out of control. Women's needs are often framed as burdensome. 

 12:29

Many women are praised for not needing, right? You're such an easygoing person. You're so easy to get along with. And what that does is it creates this false binary in our mind where I can't take care of myself if I'm taking care of other people. 

 12:46

Like it's either or either they get care or I get care. And that can feel selfish. So really looking at the answer to this question helps us see that it's not a binary. It helps us step into our full and whole personhood, deserving of the same kind of support and love that we so freely give other people. 

 13:09

You can also ask, what do I need more of right now? Or what would support actually look like for me? If I trusted my needs, what would change? Those are some other ways to ask that so you can get at some good answers for yourself. 

 13:27

Last one, this is a big focus for me this year. And it's the first time that I've kind of brought this question into the list that I regularly ask myself. And it is this. Question number five, where do I need more joy, fun, or play? 

 13:44

This question matters because joy isn't frivolous. Play isn't immature. And fun is so necessary to balance out and to give ourselves the nervous system care that the times we are living in demand right now. 

 14:04

Joy helps restore our creativity, our desire, our aliveness, our imagination, all of the things that really make life worth living. And they are especially important right now in the climate that we're in. 

 14:22

Not just politically, but medically, right? Perimenopause and having to support other people and wanting to still build relationships of trust and joy with others means we need to give ourselves joy and play and fun. 

 14:39

It's not a reward. It's nourishment. So many of us learned that the most important thing you can do with your time is work. And if there's any time left over, then maybe you can have a little bit of joy or fun or play. 

 14:52

But what I want to do and what I am doing this year for myself is really centering joy, fun, and play. So if you are curious about how you might bring a little bit more of that into your life, here's some other ways you could ask. 

 15:08

What lights me up that I've been postponing? When was the last time I felt playful? What was I doing? What was it like to get some input there? And what feels like relief? Because sometimes relief can lead to fun or play or joy. 

 15:27

For me, what really feels joyful is listening to music and dancing, spending time with people one-on-one where I can have a really nourishing conversation. For you, the answers might be different, but they are so important. 

 15:44

As I end here, I just want to reiterate, you don't need to answer all of these questions. They are offered to you in the spirit of just what sparks some curiosity? What sparks some, maybe some annoyance or some guilt or some other type of emotion that makes you want to spend a little more time with these questions? 

 16:06

Let your brain have these questions as something to just mull over. And then whatever comes up, great. And then if something useful comes up, you can decide what to do with that. And if there isn't anything useful in that question, let it go and take what really feels like a fit. 

 16:23

Because again, if we are learning to trust our bodies and trust our intuition, the place to start is with these questions. Have a great week. I'll see you soon.

Episode 145 - Best Of: How To Have Your Own Back

Learning to have my own back is the most powerful thing I’ve ever done for myself, which is why I’m bringing back this essential episode as we head into the new year. Many women internalize their mistakes, leading to a spiral of shameful thoughts that can be very draining. But how can we shut that down? If we bully ourselves, then we're not safe with ourselves, and we're not safe anywhere. You deserve that essential safety. In this episode, I'll help you identify the bullying voice in your head and shut it down. Here’s what I cover:

• How to recognize the internal bully in your own voice and why certain “questions” are actually accusations

• Why being unsafe with yourself creates shame spirals that drain hours of your time and energy

• A powerful reframe using your younger self to stop self-bullying before it takes over

• Two practical ways to shut down the brain bully: the hard pass and loving engagement

• How having your own back makes it possible to take risks, try new things, and live with more freedom

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

00:58

If I only ever do two podcast episodes, I would say that this is one of the most important ones. The other one is about wanting. And I did that last week. And so this week, I really wanted to dive into the other really essential tool. 

 01:22

Maybe not even a tool, more of like a practice that has made the biggest difference in my own life. And if I could help women, people socialized as women, do only two things, it would be these two things. 

 01:36

Number one, connect to their wanting. Listen to the last episode. And number two, to have their own back. Learning to have my own back has been the single most powerful thing I have ever done for myself. 

 01:54

And it's a process and a practice that I want to break down for you because I think it unlocks so much potential in your life. Now, I think in broad terms, there's always exceptions. Many women that I speak to internalize mistakes and they make it about themselves and their character. 

 02:22

And when I ask women to tell me about their internal chatter and when I think back to my own internal chatter, it always sounded something like this. You always do this. What is the matter with you? Why can't you get this right? 

 02:38

You're so lazy, unreliable, et cetera, et cetera. What's wrong with you? And the problem is that, well, there's two problems. First of all, those aren't really questions. Those are accusations and they have no good answer. 

 02:58

And number two, what they do is they create just a spiral of shame and guilt and self-disgust that ends up taking hours and hours and hours of your time, your mental headspace and your energy. So what I want to talk about today is how you shut that down, because this is what I know to be true. 

 03:28

Women who beat themselves up have no place that is truly safe. I'll say that again. If you're not safe with you, if you're not safe with your own inter in your own internal world in your body, then you're not safe anywhere. 

 03:47

And so if you are the one bullying you, then nowhere is safe. And the price of not having that essential safety with yourself is huge. And I'll talk specifically about why that is in a minute. But I have seen it over and over and over again that when a woman can be her own safe space by having her own back, by refusing to bully herself, then she has a lot more options than a woman who has not yet learned how to do that. 

 04:19

So that's what I want to talk about. I want to offer you two ways to shut off the internal bully. But first, I want you to just think, how do you bully yourself? I gave you an example, some sentences that run around in my head, but I want you to just think, what is your internal chatter like when you don't get something right or when something doesn't turn out the way you want it to turn out? 

 04:49

Are you berating yourself, doubting yourself, second guessing, criticizing, judging, really coming at yourself? How? Because it's important to identify the bullying voice in your head for what it is, really a bully. 

 05:09

When you have that in your mind, I want to ask you a question. How would you behave if someone you loved was on the receiving end of those sentences? So for example, let's say I'm at the park with my daughter and she's trying to swing, pumping her legs, not going anywhere. 

 05:33

And some stranger says to her, what's the matter with you? Why can't you get that right? Like, what would I do? I just got like full body chills, even just imagining her being on the receiving end of that. 

 05:46

I would step in so fast and pop that shit off. There was no way I would allow someone to speak to my child that way. Or think about this. Imagine yourself as like a five, six, seven, eight-year-old, a child. 

 06:07

Imagine someone speaking to that little version of you the same way. Would you allow it? One of the things that I do is I keep a picture of myself as a little girl on my desk to remind me. I would never put up with someone speaking to her the way that I have sometimes put up with allowing myself to speak to me. 

 06:36

That's where it gets a little tricky. Because we speak to ourselves in our own voice, in our head, like when I'm thinking my thoughts in my head, they're in my own voice. And so when I'm asking myself those awful question, what's the matter with you? 

 06:53

Why can't you get this right? It's, I hear it as me speaking to me. If it was some like, you know, nefarious Darth Vader voice, then I think it would be easier to pick up on. But one of the first things we have to do is to catch it, to catch our own voice in our heads, bullying ourselves. 

 07:14

And then we have to stop it, either by imagining it happening to someone you love or a littler version of you. I want to give you two different ways to engage with this bully to stop it. Number one, I call it the hard pass, and it is exactly what it sounds like. 

 07:35

It is a no, a firm, unequivocal no. So the bullying voice starts up and sometimes it feels so good to just say that powerful, no, we are not doing this. I won't do it. No one speaks to me that way, not even me. 

 07:58

No, this is not happening. And then you have to move your body. Get up and walk around your house. Shake your arms. Stand up. But that movement of your body helps reset. So the bullying voice starts up. 

 08:15

If the hard pass sounds really good to you, it feels really powerful and really positive. Then you say, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I will not engage in bullying. Nobody bullies me, not even me. And then get up and move your body. 

 08:37

I was doing this for a while. And my husband said to me, like, do you know you talk to yourself a lot? And I said, yeah, I, that's on purpose because I'm really trying to stop this behavior. So the first way is called the hard pass. 

 08:53

It's that strong, powerful no, no, no, no. The second is called loving engagement. And loving engagement is exactly how it sounds. Maybe it starts with a deep breath. I know. Oh, okay. Yeah. Here's that voice again. 

 09:16

Let's take some deep breaths. This makes sense that we're doing this. We've done this for a long time, but we are not going to do it today. We're not going to do it. Nope. Come on. And then you get up and move your body. 

 09:33

So notice that you end up in the same place. There is some way to cut the behavior off, either the hard pass no or the loving engagement, more gentle version. Then you move your body and you cut it off. 

 09:49

You stop the behavior. The reason that I love these two ways of engaging with the bully is because it gives you the option to be powerful and definitive when you want or loving and definitive. Either way, the answer is no. 

 10:09

And it just takes some practice to get to know yourself enough to know which one is going to feel better in the moment. I truly believe it is essential to stop the bullying so that you can then, when you're not activated with a lot of shame and guilt, you can look at why it's happening without feeling flooded by all of those emotions that really aren't helpful. 

 10:38

When you are looking at behavior that you want to change and you're feeling guilty and flooded and full of shame, all of your time and energy and effort gets sucked up in criticizing and self-doubting and blaming and second guessing and doing all of those things rather than just solving the problem. 

 10:59

So the reason that this is so essential is that when you can cut off the bullying, then you can actually just look at the behavior or the thing that happened and ask yourself some good questions about it. 

 11:16

Like, is there something here that I should be different or should I should be doing differently? Is there something here that I want to change? Whatever is happening in the moment isn't about me and my character anymore. 

 11:31

Maybe there is a change that I'd like to make. But I can't make the change if I'm so consumed by the shame and the guilt that I just don't have any energy left to really evaluate, okay, so this didn't go the way I wanted. 

 11:47

Is there actually a change that I want to make that would be positive for me? One of the biggest benefits of learning to have your own back and cut off that bullying behavior is that now you can handle trying new things and putting yourself out there and taking some risks because all you have to feel is the fear of doing something new. 

 12:14

And it's never about beating yourself up for not getting it right. Let me give you an example. I meet with a small group of coaches who are starting their new business and we talk a lot about, you know, doing things that scare us and doing things that are new for us. 

 12:33

And I've been coaching and a business owner long enough that some of those new things don't scare me quite as much. But I decided to do something that would scare me, like terrify me, not just scare me, terrify me. 

 12:46

And that was to sing for them. I have always wanted to take singing lessons, and I am right now. I've always wanted to be able to sing comfortably in front of other people. Not quite there yet. But I knew that I wanted to sing for them, not only because it would be growth for me, but because I could handle feeling the fear of singing with total confidence that no matter what happened, I would not beat myself up at all, 

 13:21

even a little bit. And here's what happened. I got so emotional during the song that I cried through half of it. I squeaked out some other lyrics here and there, but I was just so terrified and so afraid that I probably cried through 70% of the song. 

 13:43

And I lived. And in the end, I was so proud of myself for doing something that terrified me. I didn't even think about beating myself up for not doing a good job technically singing. It didn't even cross my mind. 

 14:01

I could just do the thing that was terrifying because I had full confidence that I would not criticize or judge myself or my performance at all. I have the safety with myself to just try something new, knowing that I might get it wrong. 

 14:23

It might not turn out the way I want it to, but I'm going to be able to learn from that. So it puts me in this space where I can really almost eliminate the idea of failing, because failing means that I tried something and it didn't go the way I want. 

 14:41

And that's the end of it. And I feel terrible about it. Now, I really like to think of it as I'm either like winning, it's going exactly the way I want, or it's a chance for me to learn. Because if it doesn't go the way I want, I am totally going to feel the frustration, the disappointment, the sadness, all of those normal human emotions. 

 15:06

But I am not going to add any additional criticism or judgment at all. I'll just feel sad, feel disappointed. And then I can ask myself, like, how can what worked here? What didn't work so well? And what can I do differently? 

 15:25

And then I can try it again because none of my time is consumed with the shame and guilt spiral of judgment and criticism. The other really beautiful thing that happens when you learn to have your own back is that when things not working out are never about your character, then other people start to get the same generous interpretation. 

 15:58

Brene Brown and Dr. Becky, who are two of my favorite people to listen to, they both talk about this most generous interpretation. And when I'm giving myself the most generous interpretation, meaning it's never about my character, but it might be about some actions that I want to do differently, then I can give that to other people as well. 

 16:21

This has made a huge difference in my relationships with my children and my husband. I think I used to think, I know I used to think, that they were doing things to me or that they were doing things on purpose. 

 16:37

It felt like I was constantly being victimized. This sounds so dramatic now, but I was constantly being victimized by something that they were doing to me. And I would get upset and there was a lot of blame and a lot of sorting through the judgment and the criticism. 

 16:56

And when I am the recipient of my own most generous interpretation, now I can offer it to them as well. And I truly believe that they're doing their best because I believe I'm doing my best. That doesn't mean things don't work out. 

 17:16

Actually, what I mean to say is that doesn't mean that things always go perfectly. Things go not perfectly quite a lot because that just seems to be the human experience. But when things don't go the way I plan, we can just feel sad or disappointed or even frustrated, overwhelmed, fearful. 

 17:36

We can just feel the emotion. And there doesn't have to be a lot of the shame and blame and guilt piled on top of that. It's also increased my capacity to sit with the times that I disappoint other people. 

 17:55

Now, this can be deeply uncomfortable because we all, we don't like it when we disappoint other people. We are programmed to want to belong in groups, to want acceptance and friendship and connection. 

 18:08

And when we disappoint someone, those are threatened. But when I have disappointed people, my close relationships, my dear friends, my family, and I don't make it about myself, meaning I don't call myself a terrible mother or a terrible wife or a terrible friend. 

 18:29

I can just look at the actions, what happened and solve for that and not try to make it about me as the problem, my character. It just feels so much cleaner. I can just look at the circumstances, the facts of what happened, the actions that I did or didn't take, and evaluate it. 

 18:55

What worked? What didn't work? What would I do differently? And it's not about me. A huge gift of this practice of having my own back is time. When I ask women to tell me how much time they spend in their heads bullying themselves, criticizing, second guessing, doubting, all of those behaviors. 

 19:23

Most of them say it's about three to five hours a day. I mean, that just, it just blows my mind. Ruminating about past things that you didn't get right, worrying about future situations that you're concerned about, replaying events, wishing I had said that, wishing I had done that, berating myself for not knowing, not doing certain things. 

 19:47

Yeah, three to five hours a day. And even just on the low end, let's just take three hours a day. That's 21 hours a week times 52 weeks a year. That's 1,092 hours a year on the low end that women's brains are tied up with this kind of bullying, self-critical behavior. 

 20:13

No wonder we're so tired. Our bodies might be doing something else. You know, we're driving carpool or going to work or doing what we do, but internally, we are just browbeating ourselves for hours and hours. 

 20:27

And when you learn to stop, you get that time and brain space back. And you get it to do whatever you want with. You want to read a book? Fantastic. You want to start a new company? Fantastic. Either way, that part doesn't matter so much to me. 

 20:43

What matters is that your time, which is the one thing we cannot get more of, you get your time back. That's a huge benefit of shutting down the brain bully and learning to have your own back. Hey, thanks for listening to this episode. 

 21:04

I want to interrupt for just a second and invite you to join me on Facebook in my free group called Stop People Pleasing. It's where I spend time each week answering questions, sharing my work, announcing upcoming workshops, and coaching the members to stop people pleasing. 

 21:24

You can join by using the link in the show notes or check the link in my Instagram bio. I'd love to have you. See you there. This is really important to me. It is so important that it's something that I teach in every single one-to-one coaching relationship that I have. 

 21:46

And I teach it in the Stop People Pleasing group program that I run. And here's why it's so essential. In the group program, we have five challenges. Number one, to tell the truth. People pleasers are liars. 

 22:03

When we don't feel like we can be honest about why we really don't want to do something, we lie. We make up excuses. So one of the first challenges is to tell the truth. Another challenge is to ask for something. 

 22:18

People pleasers, man, we have a hard time asking for what we want and need because we've been taught that we shouldn't inconvenience anyone or that if we want something, we need to have really, really, really, really, really good reasons for wanting it. 

 22:29

And we should be able to justify it. Just wanting it is not enough. And so that's why one of the challenges is to ask for something that we want. Another challenge is to say no to something. Another challenge is to disappoint someone. 

 22:45

That's a good one. Another challenge is to learn how to really care for yourself. So those five challenges all happen in my 16-week group program, Stop People Pleasing. And in order for them to happen, you have to have your own back. 

 23:04

Imagine you tell someone the truth, like, I'm just not really interested in that. Thank you. Ooh, that might bring on a wash of shame and guilt. And I'm a bad friend. I'm a bad mom. But we learn to shut that off so we can just feel the fear of disappointing someone without the shame and guilt. 

 23:26

Saying no is the same thing. Disappointing someone. Often these are very similar challenges. I remember when I first understood that this was essential. From time to time, I used plant medicine as a way to help me really get insight into myself and my thinking. 

 23:50

And I was having an afternoon on that type of a journey and I was laying on the couch. And I don't know, it was probably, I don't know, three or four months prior to that. I used to work for a coaching certification company where I would meet weekly with coaches, with CLAP, students who wanted to become coaches to teach them the art and the technique of coaching. 

 24:20

And I had missed a class. It was, I mean, I was so, I was so deeply embarrassed and ashamed. I felt so guilty. And I browbeat myself for weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks. I would lay down at night. 

 24:37

Gosh, what is the matter with you? Why didn't you get the, you should have done that. You should have known. You should have checked. That went on for weeks. Three or four months later, I was having this plant medicine experience. 

 24:48

I was laying on the couch, just really wanting to be introspective and spend some time with myself and my own thoughts. And I sensed in my body some fear. And so I just asked, hey, what's that fear about? 

 25:04

What's going on? What's the matter? And my body answered, it's you. We're afraid of you. You are so, it's making me emotional to remember. You are so mean to us when we don't get it right. You are just, you are relentless in the way that you terrorize and browbeat and punish us. 

 25:37

That's why we're afraid. And in that moment, that was the hard pass for me. I just decided I will never, ever, ever, ever do that again. I will never take what is my best effort. Even the day that I didn't show up for that class, I was doing my best. 

 25:59

I didn't make the decision that morning, you know, I'm just going to half ass this thing. Not even saying that that's wrong, but I didn't do that that morning. It was my best. And I took a mistake and turned it into a weapon over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. 

 26:19

And in that moment, when I felt the fear that I had created in my own body, I knew that I had to stop because if I wasn't safe with me, I knew that I wasn't safe anywhere. So if this is a behavior that you are ready to stop, first of all, yes, your life is going to change. 

 26:48

And I offer you those two tools, the hard pass and loving engagement, and the idea that this is a practice. It is something that I did not get good at overnight, even though I felt such a strong impulse and learned such a deeply valuable lesson that day. 

 27:08

It was a practice of catching it and cutting it off and catching it and cutting it off and catching it and lovingly saying, I know, I know, we're getting better. We're doing better. This is something we've done for a long time. 

 27:22

It's going to take a while to fully resolve, but I did it over and over again. And now here's what I know to be true. I can do things that terrify me, like sing in front of other people. And all I have to feel is the negative emotion that is normal for the human experience, fear, right? 

 27:48

Fear of being judged, fear of, yeah, I had all of that, but I don't, I know that I will never judge myself. It has cleaned up all of the judgment and victimization that I felt in other relationships with people who were close to me, where I'm able to just disappoint people and feel that disappointment with them and not add any other self-judgment on top of it. 

 28:18

Women who are their own safe place have an incredible opportunity, a powerful place from which to change their own lives. They can experiment with different behaviors that are closely connected to their wanting because they know that they will have their own back. 

 28:42

So let me know how this works for you. When you try the hard pass, how does it go? When you try loving engagement. And if this is something where you want to have a consultation with me, I would love to talk to you about not only how this work is going for you, but how I could be helpful. 

 29:02

You can sign up for a consult using the button on my, and any of my social media bios. There's a link tree there that has the schedule a consult button or just through my website. But my goal in releasing this podcast episode is that you have the tools to practice it on your own to make this powerful change in your life. 

 29:25

And I promise you this, if you will stick with it, things will look radically different. Thanks for listening. See you next week.

Episode 144 - Best Of: Too Much and Not Enough

This week, I’m bringing back one of the most meaningful and widely listened-to episodes of the podcast. The patriarchal, capitalist, Western way of life imposes certain values and expectations on the way women think, feel, and choose to live. When we fail to meet these expectations, we can often feel lackluster or unsatisfied. Even if we do attain these expectations, there is always another critique looming about the deficit in our lives. In this episode, we will discuss how perfectionism is a manifestation of these societal pressures, and explore ways to shift our mindset to focus on being better, rather than perfect. Here’s what I cover:

• The importance of celebrating our daily small wins rather than fixating on what we could do better

• How the word “better” becomes an invisible authority that keeps women stuck and self-doubting

• Why women are taught not to let emotional labor, grief, or inner work count as real success

• How it's possible to feel accomplished in this society by doing things that bring us joy and make us feel whole

• A simple practice for letting accomplishments land in the body instead of dismissing them

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

00:58

Okay, I'm trying something today. This is going to be a walking podcast. Don't even know which number it is. I'll figure that out later. But I sometimes forget that I have been raised in a patriarchal Western capitalist society that has placed its values on me and its expectations on me. 

 01:28

And because I've just lived with them for so long, I mean, I'll be 50 this year, 2023. I have, let's say that, you know, my awareness came online around two or three. It's like 47 years of living with the expectations of a woman in a patriarchal capitalist Western model way of life. 

 01:55

And one of the things that is the most invisible to women is the expectations that have been put on them. There's always these expectations and funny enough, we never meet them. You should just be a little bit skinnier, a little bit prettier. 

 02:18

You should work a little harder. You should help a few more people. You should be a little more efficient. You should be a little bit smarter. You should use your time a little more wisely. You should be a little more productive or a lot, right? 

 02:35

So little and a lot. It doesn't really matter. The point is, there are these expectations that we kind of carry around with us. They're invisible, but they're the context in which we live so much of our lives. 

 02:52

And for a lot of us, this shows up as perfect. Like I need to be perfect. My experience isn't necessarily with the word perfect, but it's with the word better. You should be better. And better is this kind of hazy, really undefined thing. 

 03:12

Like when I ask myself, well, okay, what would better look like? A lot of times I don't have a very specific answer for what better would look like, but it's just this constant companion looming with this kind of authority in my life. 

 03:34

And I catch it sometimes, other times I don't. And what precipitated this whole podcast and episode and this thinking is whenever I go to post something online, I'm aware that it is going to be looked at by people I don't know, maybe people who know more than me, maybe people who are just writing right. 

 03:58

Like I know people are going to look at it. And I always think, you know what? I'll post this idea or this thought or this experience. I'll post it when it's better. I just need to make it better, just a little bit better. 

 04:16

And again, better doesn't have like a real specific definition, but sometimes I think, you know, I just need to sit on this for a little while. I just need to make sure that it's really right so that nobody disagrees with me. 

 04:33

Nobody thinks I'm wrong. Nobody challenges me. Nobody has a problem with what I said. Like there's some place where we can reach as women, either in our posts or in our bodies, in the way we mother, in the way we work, in the way we partner, that will be unassailable, unimpeachable, where we will finally be right. 

 05:03

And so a lot of us, me included, this is a podcast about me. This is a podcast about my brain. Because my brain is the same as yours. If you're also a woman who has been raised in a patriarchal Western capitalist society, there's this constant expectation that something should be more. 

 05:28

More than what we have. Bigger, better, skinnier, lesser, you know, whatever the words are. We're not meeting the expectation. And so what ends up happening is we don't do anything. We don't post. We don't show up. 

 05:44

We don't take up space. We don't say what's on our mind. We don't. We don't live into us. We don't live into what lights us up. We don't have the experience of feeling satisfied. Satisfaction. It's so elusive for women because we live in that space of expectations that we're never going to reach. 

 06:24

And let's say for some reason we are able to attain the whatever perfect body. There's always somewhere else where we should be trying harder. Okay, fine. You now work out the perfect amount for a woman to work out. 

 06:42

What about your finances? What about your intelligence? What about your mothering or partnering or whatever skills? There's this constant deficit that we carry around. So here's what I want you to do. 

 06:59

This will not be hard at all. I want you to think right now of five things that you could be doing more of, that you could be doing better. It's like they don't even, they're right there. For me, I could be healthier. 

 07:17

I could stop eating sugar. I, because that's bad, right? I don't really think sugar is bad, by the way. I could be working out more consistently. I could be reading better books. I could stop watching, you know, so much TV at night. 

 07:34

I could be running my business in a better way. I could be keep, oh, definitely keeping like better track of my finances. See, there's like, I don't even count. What's that? 10? Every single one of us always has that list pretty much at our fingertips. 

 07:52

Okay, now we're going to try the opposite. I want you to tell me, think about it right now, about 10 things. It's not going to do 10. That's too many. Let's do five things that you are doing really, really well. 

 08:11

Can you think of five things? I'm going to try it. Okay. I'm doing really well keeping my commitment to myself about my Pilates class that I signed up for. I've gone once, but I'm going to count it, right? 

 08:28

Because again, when you never are allowed to meet the standard, going one time to a Pilates class doesn't count. You have to go, you have to go, I don't know how many times would I have to go for it to really count as like success. 

 08:44

And then my brain says 10, right? So after 10 times, I would get to count it as success. And what I'm saying right now is, no, I've gone once and that counts a success. Okay, so that's one thing I'm doing well. 

 08:59

Doing a really good job walking my dog. I'm out on a walk right now. Okay, I'm doing really good sitting with some sadness and grief that is related to some events. My grandma passed away, father-in-law passed away, both in the month of December. 

 09:18

And even when I said that, I just get this grief that comes up. But I'm really good at just allowing it to be there. I don't have to fix it. I'm really good at understanding that that grief is because I loved him so much. 

 09:45

So much better at sitting with uncomfortable feelings. I've also been really good at working out some complicated feelings in a friendship that's really important to me lately. Okay, it's taking my brain so much more time to come up with what I'm good at. 

 10:11

And when I asked my brain what I need to be better at, it was right there. If your brain did the same, welcome to brains, women's brains, in Western patriarchal capitalist societies. Something wrong with you. 

 10:28

It's we have just been overly focused on where we should get better. And the rewards for getting close to the expectations of capitalist Western patriarchal societies are big. I mean, have you ever lost weight and people just compliment you up one side and down the other? 

 10:53

Of course, it's a physical outside thing that they can see. But also, do they congratulate you? Or do you congratulate yourself? That's a better question. When you do something hard, like sit with your negative emotions. 

 11:09

We don't let that count. So on the one hand, there's these standards that we never meet. And then when we make a little progress in the direction of either meeting a standard that we choose on purpose or that is important to us or that for whatever reasons we just decide we want to meet, we don't let it count. 

 11:34

Like my one Pilates class. It only counts after 10 classes. So think right now, where is an area of your life that you can let it count? That you can let whatever small, even as I say that, it's so shitty to diminish whatever movement you have made, even if you think it's small. 

 12:06

I don't think one Pilates class is small, but I think there are people out there who would. Where can I let my movement in a direction that I choose for myself count? Okay, do you have something? Because here's what I want you to do. 

 12:26

I want you to think about that thing that you have done. I'm going to think about my one Pilates class. It felt so good to go. It was hard. I've never done Pilates before. But I did it. And when I left, I felt like the fucking queen of the universe. 

 12:50

One glass. All right. So when you think about the one thing that you have done, how do you feel about it? And if you feel any hesitation to let it, to diminish it, go on, sign, or to not let it count. 

 13:15

Here's what I want you to do. Set that feeling aside and say, okay, I understand that my brain is programmed to not let this count. But that's not what we're doing right now. What we're doing right now is finding that feeling when I did the thing that I wanted, no matter how big or how small. 

 13:36

And I'm finding that. And so for me, queen of the universe feeling, it's, oh, it's in my chest. That's where I feel a lot of things. I think that's very common. And it just feels light. My shoulders kind of sink back a little bit. 

 13:53

My head, my chin raises a little open and light. Okay, are you finding that feeling? For me, that feeling right now on a scale of one to ten, it's about a two. So rate your feeling as well. It's not very big. 

 14:12

But what I'm going to do is I'm going to take breaths and I'm going to pretend like that feeling is like a balloon in my chest. And with my focus and my concentration, I can actually turn that feeling up. 

 14:27

I can make it bigger. So take some breaths with me. Find that feeling of accomplishment or success or confidence or whatever it is that's in your chest and blow on the out-breath or the in-breath, whatever feels better. 

 14:50

Expand it. Think about it getting bigger. Think about it getting more intense and using the power of your brain to focus and pay attention, to expand that feeling wherever it is in your body, and to really soak it in, to really let it count. 

 15:19

Because that is the thief. Better is the thief. It's the thief of this feeling. It's the thief of feeling like your accomplishments count and matter. And what happens when we don't let our feelings, excuse me, our accomplishments count and matter is that life is far less satisfying, far less joyful, far less of something that gets us out of bed in the morning. 

 16:00

Because when we have, when one Pilates class doesn't count and only 10 Pilates classes count, that means I can't celebrate, I can't own it, I can't brag about it, I can't really live into the person who goes, being the person who goes to Pilates. 

 16:21

I can't live into that until I'm at 10. And what happens if I don't get to 10? Then all of it was for nothing. It was never who I was. I don't get to feel success. And then we just end up shitting all over ourselves in this way that is so painful. 

 16:42

So I like New Year's. I like New Year's resolutions. I like the opportunity to recenter myself. You know, I think you can really do it anytime. I think there's nothing magical about January, but I do think it's a time of year when a lot of us do it. 

 17:04

So here is my New Year's resolution. I'm just going to let things count. If it's one Pilates class, if it's sitting with negative emotions for five minutes, two minutes, one minute, if it's increased awareness of the way I'm talking to myself or the way that I am or the way that I am envisioning myself as a woman, as a contributor. 

 17:43

I'm going to watch out for that word better because right now, in this moment, what I have to say is perfect. Who I am is perfect. What I do with my time is perfect. It's good. I am good. And if I want to make some changes, great. 

 18:11

If I'd like to watch a little less TV at night, fine. But it's not so I can be better. It's because I just have something else I want to do with that time. And so I offer this New Year's resolution to you. 

 18:28

What can you let count more? How can you take the small wins and steps in the direction of your choosing that you are taking? How can you let it count? Because that is where the juicy satisfaction is. 

 18:47

Let me know. Comments, emails, DMs, because I'd really love to cheer you on.

Episode 143 - Self-Silencing is Making You Sick

A lot of the women I work with are carrying the same fear: the fear of disappointing other people. We were taught that being good means being nice, low-maintenance, and emotionally contained–even when it costs us. But staying silent doesn’t just strain our relationships; it takes a real toll on our bodies and our health. In this episode, I explore how self-silencing is making women sick, why it quietly creates resentment and loneliness, and simple ways to start speaking up and building more health, honesty, and real connection in your life. Here’s what I cover:

• A Time article that dives into the statistics and psychology behind women and self-silencing

• How staying quiet to keep the peace actually prevents real closeness

• The cultural conditioning that causes self-silencing and why it’s not your fault

• Why your emotions are a rich source of information about your needs and well-being

• Three core skills that will help you be more honest without abandoning yourself

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Transcript

00:58

I could sum up this entire episode in three words. Be more disappointing. If you've been listening for a while, you know that I am really in favor of women developing the tools to be able to advocate better for themselves, which often disappoints other people, to say what they need to say, which often disappoints other people. 

 01:19

But some of the reading that I've been doing lately has put this need for us to be able to let other people down and to take better care of ourselves in much sharper focus. A lot of the women that I work with struggle with the same fear. 

 01:34

They're very afraid to disappoint other people, right? We've all been taught that being a good woman, a good employee, a good sister means being nice all the time, putting other people first, and always keeping your own emotions under control. 

 01:49

But here's what I know now more than ever. It affects not just your relationships. It's making your relationship sick to some degree. It also is having a tremendous effect on your health, your physical health. 

 02:05

And today I want to talk about an article that I read. It's out of Time magazine, came out in their September issue. It's called Self-Silencing is Making Women Sick. Because we have to talk about what self-silencing does to our relationships, but also to our bodies. 

 02:23

I'm 52 years old. I have just kind of come out of some of the fog of perimenopause, and I'm actively working on so many aspects of trying to get healthier so that I can age with a little more mobility and a little more freedom. 

 02:39

And this is just as important as weightlifting, okay? Just as important as walking the dog, just as important as making sure that I'm eating the right food. And because I want all of us to enjoy the maximum amount of freedom, we've got to talk about it. 

 02:55

So let's start with what happens to your body when you cannot speak up for what you need. The facts are seriously alarming. I want you to hear this next sentence and appreciate it for the bonkers statistic that it is. 

 03:12

Women make up almost 80% of autoimmune disease cases. That's crazy. We are much more likely to have chronic pain, insomnia, fibromyalgia, long COVID, IBS, Hashimoto's, migraines. There's a really long list. 

 03:33

And 80% of autoimmune disease cases are women. We are also twice as likely as men to die after a heart attack. Think about that. We experience depression and anxiety at twice the rate of men. Now, I think that some of that has got to be because men aren't speaking up, but when women report twice as likely to be depressed and anxious as men. 

 04:04

And we are nine times more likely to have anorexia, which is the deadliest mental health disorder. Now, maybe you're thinking, okay, but isn't that just like biology? And maybe there's some, you know, genetic component in there? 

 04:22

No, not exactly. So we need to go back to the late 1980s to get a really clear view of this. So in the late 1980s, a psychologist named Jack Dana started noticing that a lot of her female patients who had depression also had a pattern. 

 04:43

And she called it the pattern of self-silencing. Taking care of everyone else, trying to make everyone else happy. Don't express what you really feel or need. And she found that the women were doing this to try and be close to people and to get their relationship needs met. 

 05:04

Think about that for a second. Women were staying silent to feel close to people. We'll come back to how messed up that is in a minute. But Jack found that this behavior, which comes from patriarchy, right? 

 05:20

How society teaches women to act, was directly connected to depression. But here's where it gets really scary. Other research has shown that self-silencing isn't just bad for your mental health. It actually is terrible for your physical health as well. 

 05:37

In 2022, researchers found that women of color who said things like, quote, I rarely express my anger to people close to me, close quote, were 70% more likely to have health problems, the kind that lead to heart attacks. 

 05:57

Other studies have connected staying silent to IBS, chronic fatigue, and even cancer. And here's the worst finding. In one study, research followed about 4,000 people for 10 years. And they found that the women who didn't speak up when they had fights with their husbands were four times more likely to die early than women who did speak up. 

 06:26

Four times. And even when they looked at things like age and blood pressure and smoking and cholesterol and kind of some other health factors, it didn't change. Women who didn't speak up were four times more likely to die early than women who did. 

 06:44

When women push their feelings down and ignore their own needs, their bodies literally start breaking down. I want you to think about the physical toll or the sensations that you feel when you shut down your anger. 

 07:02

My stomach clenches. It feels like I have this kind of burning in my gut. When I'm sad, when I need help, when I feel overwhelmed and I just internalize all of that, what this article and many others are showing us is that not expressing our big emotions, not asking for help, not saying what we need, not knowing how to express a need, not being able to resolve problems, not being able to have difficult conversations actually result in our bodies being sicker. 

 07:40

It's a serious, serious problem, not just for our physical health, but because of the fact that it can produce this four times more likely statistic where we actually die. So I'm bringing it up because there are some skills, we're going to talk about them, that can absolutely address this. 

 08:03

And I'm at that midlife age. I know so many of the women that I talk with who are like, I just, I have run out of fucks to give. I just don't quite have the skills yet to be able to express myself the way I want. 

 08:18

I want this episode to be really useful for you. We got to talk about one other thing, though. Staying silent isn't just making women sick. It's also making our relationships sick as well. Remember how Dana Jack described self-silencing and how women do it so that they can feel close to people and get their relationship needs met? 

 08:40

It's interesting because it's like the only need we have is to feel close to people. We don't actually know that we have the opportunity to show up as our real selves. That's interesting to note. Here's something really ironic and actually pretty cool to stack on top of that. 

 08:55

Staying silent actually prevents the very closeness that women are trying to protect and create by staying silent. If you can just see this pattern, you know, a woman is taught, if I have needs that are too big, if I have wants that are considered too much or too dramatic, if I have opinions that other people don't like, if I am really myself, I will be rejected. 

 09:21

So I stay silent and then nobody gets to know the real me and I don't actually have that closeness. It is such a sad irony. Think about it. When you hide your real feelings, people don't actually know you. 

 09:35

When you pretend you're fine when you're not, when you say yes, when you mean no, when you armor up and you get really hyper independent and say, you know, I don't need help, I can do it on my own. And you keep people at a distance, you're actually building relationships based on a pretend version of yourself, a performative version. 

 09:54

Your partner, your friends, your family, they are in a relationship with someone who isn't showing them who they really are. And the sadness is we know it. That's why we feel lonely in our relationship sometimes. 

 10:08

That's why we feel resentful when other people don't support us the same way we support everybody else. They don't know we need that support. We have programmed them to think that we are all capable, that we can, you know, do it on our own, and that actually that's how we want to do it. 

 10:27

I talk to so many women who are in relationships with people that care about them, but they still feel completely alone and scared that if people really knew who they were, that they would be abandoned. 

 10:44

And that's why so many of us are dealing with so much loneliness and resentment. Resentment builds when there is no honesty. I know you know the feeling, right? Nice on the outside, angry on the inside, smiling while you do whatever it is you're doing for other people, secretly furious that no one offered to help, saying I'm fine through clenched teeth, even while your body is just like throbbing and thrumming on the inside, 

 11:14

keeping track of every single thing you're upset or hurt about. And that resentment, it's not just poisoning your relationships. It's poisoning your body. I know there's much better medical explanations for this, but the surge of cortisol and adrenaline that just bathes our body in all of those stress hormones, it is not good for us. 

 11:39

It's not good for us. One of the things that also falls apart when there isn't honesty is trust. When you don't speak honestly about what you really need and want, and then you get upset about it, people learn they can't trust your yes. 

 11:55

They can't trust your quote unquote, I'm fine, right? They start to feel like something is off with you, even though they can't explain it. And they do what humans do, right? They self-protect. Maybe there's a little more distance. 

 12:09

And you lose trust in yourself too. When you've ignored your needs for too long, sometimes you don't even know what they are anymore. You genuinely don't know what you want. We become strangers to ourselves when all of our energy and effort is focused on doing everything for everyone else. 

 12:28

It's the most common thing I hear from women when I talk to them. I don't even know who I am and I don't really know what I truly like. We also have to be honest about something else. Our silence puts burdens on other people. 

 12:47

When we don't tell people what we need, we're basically asking them to read our minds, right? Which sets them up to fail because they can't do that. And then we get mad at them for not being able to intuit something that we never said. 

 13:03

There's distance. There's confusion. Sometimes there's walking on eggshells around us trying to figure out what's wrong. Staying silent doesn't protect our relationships. It doesn't bring us closeness. 

 13:18

It doesn't protect them from fights. It just makes the conflict quieter, almost constant, and it goes into our bodies. It goes underground. This is saddest in our most intimate relationships because without self-disclosure, without sharing who we really are, what we really like, what we really want, we can't have intimacy and connection. 

 13:46

And in some of our more, maybe less important relationships, they just kind of stay surface level, right? Maybe they just kind of stay in a shallow place. And maybe that's fine, conversations on the surface. 

 13:59

But it's really sad when that is what is happening in our most important relationships. When there's all that resentment underneath and all that anger, we have to keep our conversations on the surface because going deeper could lead to conflict. 

 14:17

There's emotional distance everywhere. And a lot of the women I know just would call that quote unquote keeping the peace. It comes at such a high cost, the loneliness. I speak to so many women who are really, really lonely. 

 14:34

They long to be known. They long to be seen. They long to be heard. They long to know who they really are and to live a truly just authentic and satisfying life. But this is what self-silencing does to connection. 

 14:50

It destroys it from the inside out. So it is making us sick and it is destroying our relationships. It's destroying the potential for intimacy, the potential for deeply rewarding, vulnerable, intimate connection. 

 15:09

Hey, quick interruption. If you are currently holding like 47 mental tabs open, the gifts, the travel, your own emotions, everyone else's feelings, I have something that will actually make this holiday season easier for you. 

 15:24

I've got two workshops that are available right now, instant access, that you can watch for free through December 31st. One is about setting and keeping boundaries, and the other is how to disappoint someone and not die. 

 15:37

They're short, they're good, and they will help you lower your holiday stress and remind you of some skills that are really useful and essential all year round, but especially right now. The links in the show notes, go grab a tiny bit of relief. 

 15:52

Back to the episode. So we have to talk about this because I never want to have a podcast episode where I blame women for this because it's not our fault, right? We keep staying silent, even when it's literally killing us and ruining our relationships, but it's not our fault. 

 16:12

That is what our culture rewards. All the way from young women to old, we get praised for being chill, right? For being so go with the flow, so low needs. I have so many women who tell me that they were praised for not having needs by their own mothers who were also overwhelmed, right? 

 16:32

We get praised in the workplace for doing all our work all by ourselves and for helping other people on the team or in the department get their work done as well. There's so much praise and adoration for women who don't speak up. 

 16:50

But the things that we are praised for are not actually good. We think that they're strengths, but they're actually really toxic. In other words, women who tell me things like, I don't deserve to put myself first, or I don't know how to put myself first. 

 17:10

I agree to things even when I don't want to. I don't speak up when I have a need or a want. I can't disappoint other people, right? My friends need me or my family needs me to show up. If I tell my husband what I really think, he'll leave or he won't like me. 

 17:29

While we think we are generating closeness with that, I hope you can hear in just the message of this episode and the message of that time article that what we're really doing is risking our health, risking dying early, and being lonely and not having the satisfying relationships that we want. 

 17:54

So what do we do? First, we need to stop treating our emotions like they're problems to shut down. We need to stop treating our emotions like they're problems. Your emotions are the richest source of usually untapped information about you. 

 18:18

Your emotions are trying to tell you something. Anger. I think anger is your best friend. Anger is the emotion that loves you the most. Sometimes it's trying to tell you something about something that needs to change about your situation. 

 18:34

Sadness might mean you're losing something important. Grief, that there's changes in your life, that there's something that needs attention. Anxiety might mean a need to feel safe. So instead of pushing that anger away or hiding your sadness, try asking yourself, what do I need right now? 

 18:55

In fact, do this with me. It's my favorite exercise. Put your hands on your chest or somewhere else that feels like loving connection. And just ask yourself, what do I need right now? What are my emotions trying to tell me? 

 19:10

Our fatigue is trying to tell us we are doing too much. Our fear is trying to tell us that we might need more support. Our overwhelm is telling us that we need more resources. Our loneliness is telling us we want genuine connection. 

 19:28

And none of that is selfish. You deserve to be able to feel emotions that are totally human, totally normal, totally part of the human experience, and learn about what that emotion is trying to tell you to improve your life. 

 19:46

That's not selfish. We also need to get a little bit more comfortable setting boundaries, right? Be more disappointing. I know that for women who have been taught that being likable is like everything, setting boundaries might even feel wrong, feel selfish, feels harsh. 

 20:04

Many women feel that if they actually say what they need or where their limits are, it will ruin their relationships. But the opposite is true. When you set healthy boundaries, your relationships actually get stronger and healthier. 

 20:21

I have lived it myself. I have seen it over and over again in the clients that I work with in my group coaching program. When we are able to be truthful about where our limits are, relationships get healthier and stronger. 

 20:38

All relationships? No, I'm going to be honest, right? There are some people who enjoy and benefit from your lack of boundaries. They are probably not going to like it when you show up with a lot more boundaries, but those aren't the relationships that you need to be investing in. 

 20:57

And we actually want to know. We actually want to know who we should be putting some time and energy into developing a closer relationship with and who we shouldn't, because that's what boundaries do. 

 21:08

They create clarity. They create trust. They let people know where you actually stand. They allow real closeness to happen because you're finally showing up as your real self. I have a friend who does not like drop-ins, right? 

 21:26

She does not like it when you show up to her house. And one time I did it and I witnessed firsthand that she didn't like it. And so when we were talking later, I felt really bad. I felt like I had done something wrong. 

 21:40

And when she told me, like, I have this need to just know who's going to be coming over to my house. It helps me get ready to receive them as my best self. It allows me to either say, you know, yes or no to you coming over. 

 21:56

And it was definitely uncomfortable because I wasn't used to communicating in such honest, clear terms. But it has been such a gift to our friendship for me to know exactly where she is on that and for me to be able to honor that. 

 22:12

So the closeness that we have now actually increased after she told me what her boundary was and what she needed from me. Having healthy relationships isn't just emotionally good. This is where our healthy relationships and our physical health really enhance each other. 

 22:31

Healthy relationships are physically protective. One study showed that people with supportive relationships have a 50% lower risk of dying early. Let me say that again. Real connection, the kind that is built on honesty, on self-disclosure, on speaking up, literally helps you live longer. 

 22:55

And it makes the quality of the time that we are alive so much more joyful. I want to be clear, right? This is a process. Being authentic takes some time. It's not about being reactive. It's not about dumping all your emotions on other people without any thought, right? 

 23:13

I think you know that. It's about staying connected to yourself while also staying connected with others. But there's both self-connection and connection to others. That's part of it, learning how to maintain, first of all, how to create, and then how to maintain a connection to yourself. 

 23:33

You're already very connected to other people, right? I already know that. But the connection to you is a skill that we can work on together. And then, as you have connection with yourself, you need to learn to say different words like, I can't do that, but I really care about you. 

 23:52

Or, that won't work for me, but what I can do is this. Or, what you said really hurt my feelings and I need to talk to you about it. Or, I love you and I'm also very angry right now and I need a chance to deal with that on my own. 

 24:12

It's about disappointing people honestly with what is really going on and then being able to take care of those big emotions that come up in us. So it's about staying connected to ourselves. If we want to pull out three skills here, number one, staying connected to you. 

 24:34

Number two, saying different words. And number three, knowing how to take care of the big emotions that come up for you when you start to self-disclose, when you start to say what you need, when you start to be more honest. 

 24:51

Those skills actually start to build a new way of you being in relationship in the world. I'm not saying it's easy. I'm saying that it needs to happen because your health and your relationships really depend on it. 

 25:08

It means we need to stop celebrating women for sacrificing themselves, right? For overgiving and overdoing and being able to do it all on their own. We need to start celebrating women for respecting themselves enough to have limitations, to have boundaries. 

 25:25

It means we need to teach our daughters that their needs matter just as much as everyone else's. It means that we need to create a new normal where women can honor their emotions, get their needs met, put those needs into words and share them, and actually communicate in honest, beautiful ways. 

 25:45

I think it is one of the most incredible gifts of where I am in life right now. Perimenopause, midlife, it is just really clear to me what matters and what I want my life to look like. And because of coaching, I have the skills to get that. 

 26:03

And I really want to share those skills with you. If any of this sounds like you are ready to develop some of these skills, there's a link in my bio. There's a link in the show notes. Set up a call with me. 

 26:16

We'll have 60 minutes to talk about what you need. I will send you on your way with concrete skill work to do some of these things for yourself. Because here is what I want you to understand. Self-silencing, it's literally making you sick. 

 26:36

It's destroying your body. It's increasing your risk of heart disease, autoimmune disorders, chronic illness, and dying early. And maybe it's not destroying your relationships, but it's in the way of the true intimacy that you really want. 

 26:55

It's creating resentment. It's breaking down trust. And it's keeping everybody lonely, even when we're sometimes surrounded by people that love us. It's really heartbreaking. Women who stay silent for the sake of a relationship, they don't get it. 

 27:12

It's destroying that very relationship. So, yes, you need to be more disappointing. We need to learn how to tell the truth more, even when it's uncomfortable. And there are real skills, like I know that can be terrifying. 

 27:27

I felt terrified, but there are real skills that you can learn to connect to yourself, to learn how to say different words, and to take care of your emotions and your nervous system so that you can do it. 

 27:43

You deserve it. You deserve to be both healthy and truly known. Thanks for listening. I'll see you next week.

Episode 142 - Understanding Religious Trauma Part 2 with Kendra Hill

Some social structures can hold us for a time, but if they don’t expand as we grow, they eventually become suffocating and cause more harm than good. The decision to step out of that container can feel destabilizing, but it opens you up to a deeper sense of self-trust and allows you to see your own growth with more clarity. In part two of my conversation with licensed therapist Kendra Hill, we explore her Religious Trauma Checklist and discuss how naming these patterns can help you recognize the progress you’ve already made, and continue unraveling religious trauma with love. If you haven’t listened to part one yet, make sure to start there. Here’s what we cover:

• Why it can feel like the rug has been pulled out from under you when you lose religious certainty

• How trauma reorganizes your inner world and why old structures eventually stop working

• The grief of outgrowing a belief system or community that once felt like home

• Kendra’s “soup” metaphor for rejecting everything before reclaiming what still fits

• What it looks like to rebuild self-trust and walk away from environments that don’t honor you

Kendra Hill is a neurodivergent artist, beauty seeker, exvangelical, and believer in people. By profession she is a Licensed Professional Counselor in the State of Colorado and an online coach across the nation with a specific focus on providing space for those who have some kind of religious background, religious trauma, are deconstructing their faith, or come from high control environments. She has recently relocated to New York City but remains passionate about holding space for people's stories - especially the ones it seems like no one else understands. Kendra co-owns a private practice called Unraveling Free Therapy & Coaching and is currently accepting new clients. 

Find Kendra here:

www.unravelingfree.com

https://www.instagram.com/unravelingfree

https://unravelingfree.com/religious-trauma-checklist-freebie

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

Sara Bybee Fisk 00:57

One of the things that I have bumped up against as I have unraveled my behavior from people pleasing and codependent tendencies is my religious upbringing. What I was taught to believe, what I was taught to believe about God and how he looks at me and how I'm supposed to please him by being obedient and there's has been a lot there for me and maybe there is for you too. I hear a lot from women who grew up in religious congregations, sometimes very conservative like mine and how scary it is to not please people anymore, especially when God is involved. So my conversation with Kendra Hill on religious trauma speaks directly to that.We define it, we talk about what it is, what it isn't and how to begin to unravel it with love. Kendra is a licensed therapist. She is neurodivergent. She is a beauty seeker and an ex evangelical herself and she really believes deeply in people. I think you're going to love this conversation. Part two, you have a really great handout. I'm going to link to your website where people can sign up to get it. It's a religious trauma checklist and we've gone through just a lot of them just in our discussion. There's just a couple more that I want to highlight because they really kind of stood out to me. This is something that I see a lot in people. I often struggle with shame, believing I'm unworthy and or I hold a low view of myself. It's this idea of like I'm constantly a sinner. I'm constantly doing something wrong. There's always something wrong with me or something I should be working to improve. Like I'm a constant 24 seven self-improvement project. 

Kendra Hill 02:47

Mm-hmm. Why would anybody believe that they're wrong coming from these belief systems? Doesn't make any sense, right? I'm just kidding. That didn't land, but... 

Sara Bybee Fisk 03:04

Well, it's so fascinating because our desire for certainty as humans is so strong. And when someone hands us this, like this is the way it is, these are the rules you're supposed to follow, and this is the outcome that you get when you follow those rules. And God is like this cosmic vending machine and you put your good behavior in and then you get to push a prize and it's wealth or health in this life or eternal reward in the life to come. And I can understand why that feels so compelling as a human. I totally wanna know what happens. But the sense of the rug being pulled out from under you when you just can't make sense that it works that way anymore. When you kind of come out of that certainty bubble, I just, there were days when I felt like the very ground underneath my feet was moving. Like nothing felt fixed, nothing felt true, nothing felt reliable anymore. Because if that wasn't true, what else wasn't true? 

Kendra Hill 04:18

Yeah it kind of makes me think of another way to maybe describe what happens with trauma and bear with me here because this is just like coming to me but I'm thinking about how you know internally we organize ourselves around what happens to us in life and so if something happens that's super overwhelming to the point where we struggle to cope where it overwhelms our nervous system then essentially what's happening inside is that these structures the way that we have structured ourselves the way that we have organized ourselves inside it's like a bomb goes off or if it's chronic it's like something's wearing away at those structures right and there has to be some type of reorganization to help us feel stable like we can move through the world and personally my story is like I said I didn't grow up in this really fundamentalist evangelical Christian environment that a lot of people I see have grown up in but I did grow up in a pretty traumatic environment and I carried a lot of trauma with me into college and when I found this campus ministry it was like yes here's the blueprint for how I can rebuild in my inside world that feels like it's just shattered right and just laying in shambles and needs so much work oh it was such a relief and that's why I say like I needed it I needed that blueprint and a lot of neurodivergent folks really latch onto that like that structure and that guidebook and like yes yes I need this but then you know we continue to progress we continue to develop and at some point we're like these structures are now harming me but why and how and what do I do with that and then what you're describing this the rug being pulled out from under you is what a lot of people feel when they start to deconstruct it's like well what the fuck I had this whole structure this was the answer and it didn't hold me now what do I do and it's a pile of rubble again

Sara Bybee Fisk 07:05

That is such a good point. I think so many people who are in kind of the first half of life where we really need a structure, we really need, like you said, that guidebook, the community that loves us and kind of holds us up. I mean, the promise of a community that loves and sees us is so powerful. And I do believe it actually exists in some places.And if a community cannot grow with you and honor you as you change and your beliefs shift, then that's when, for me, it began to feel like, I can't be myself here. I'm growing and changing and I am doubting this or I'm coming to believe that this might not be what you said it was, or it might not be for me what I needed to be for me. And that experience isn't honored here. In fact, it's punished. And so for a lot of people who start off really loved, I loved the structure of my religious community. I loved knowing exactly what was going to come next. The thinking had been done for me and all I had to do was kind of show up every week and serve and believe and be faithful and keep the rules until it felt like I was being kind of torn apart from the inside out of like, I can't be who I really am here anymore. My children can't be. I have a daughter who is gay and that's not okay in Mormon land. And there's a lot of things that happen for a lot of us in religious communities that are not okay and can't be honored and are actually punished. And that's leads to a lot of deconstruction and that experience that you articulated so beautifully. 

Kendra Hill 09:02

Yeah, and I think that's the case for a lot of people. I often talk about how when we're babies, some babies, not all babies like to be swaddled, but that swaddling is so important for some babies to help them calm down and to suit them. But if you kept the swaddle that tight or if it stayed the same shape, then that baby wouldn't be able to grow and thrive. And I feel like that's what can happen with these structures.They can hold us for a time and they can actually really be what we needed for a time. But then when we start to change and grow and those aren't able to change or expand with us, there's so much tension. And it's like we can go a couple of different ways. We can make ourselves smaller and we can cut off parts of ourselves. I'm so glad this didn't happen in your family, but it could have been like, well, that's just not allowed. And so we're going to stay here. And it makes sense when people do that. I get it. That sense of belonging is so compelling and it's so scary to leave that. But then you're living a life just not able to be fully yourself. You're cutting off parts of you or like trying to fit into a shape that you were never made to stay in. And so people expand beyond that and sometimes decide, okay, I need to step out of this container now. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 10:42

Oh, I have such empathy and compassion for when you feel yourself kind of pushing against the limitations and it can be a religious community. It can even just be like a past kind of iteration of your life, you know, like the rules and kind of structure that aren't necessarily religious, but that you used to think were good and right for yourself.And so finding out who you really are and really deeply trusting who you are and your ability to know things and guide yourself and be kind of this sovereign authority is such, it's such a beautifully messy journey. If someone is listening and either recognizing some of this in themselves or curious about it, how would they begin to investigate it and maybe even start to heal it? 

Kendra Hill 11:42

I really think that I'm really thankful for this conversation and I'm thankful that more conversations like this are happening. I just heard from someone the other day that they more recently deconstructed and they had the wonderful privilege of having all of this information, these terms. They've been exposed to the term religious trauma. There are more resources around it. There are books written about it now, which wasn't the case a handful of years ago. And so I would say even just that, being able to name what is happening is huge.That's a huge first step. So I mean, truly that quiz on our website about if you have religious trauma, if you're curious, look at that quiz or look at a blog post or start reading about what religious trauma is and see if you can relate. And if you can, it can be really hard because a lot of times the people you have around you that you would normally go to when things come up that you need to process are probably not going to be able to process this with you because it would also cause them to start to pull some threads that they might not be ready to pull and then have their own belief system unravel too. But sometimes you have people who can relate. Anyway, I'm going on a tangent. Learning more, reaching out to, there are lots of like Instagram creators now who talk about religious trauma, even like being part of a community online to start to notice, okay, I'm not alone. There are other people who are going through this. That can be huge because it can feel so isolating. And then reaching out to, I mean, a practice like ours Unraveling Free where we're not just solely focusing on religious trauma, but it's the therapist who understand the nuances of it. So you don't have to start from scratch explaining like what your background is, who can understand like some of what can come up in this process. That's an option too. Yeah, does that answer? 

Sara Bybee Fisk 14:24

Yes. That's great.And I just want to kind of recall something that you said earlier that you really try to keep in mind and that someone that you talk to about this needs to be someone who can point you back to yourself, your own authority, your own, even if it feels like it's barely there, right? You're a little baby foal who's just been born and can't even really walk upright. Totally fine. They still need to point you back to yourself and your ability to know, even if it feels uncomfortable or unsure right now. And that curiosity over time, if you're being gentle and if you're being gracious and if you're being generous with yourself, it will grow into higher and higher, stronger levels of self-trust and self-authority. 

Kendra Hill 15:21

Yeah. And so you were telling me when we were talking before that you looked at that religious trauma checklist and used it to actually see the progress that you've made in your own healing. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 15:34

Totally. When I first downloaded it, I went through it. It's fantastic. I want everyone to take a look at it, so it will for sure be linked.But there were so many, for example, I have a deep fear of being judged for who I am. I think I have an average human, but the deep, the paralyzing fear, it's gone. Another one is trusting myself feels wrong or dangerous. No, trusting myself feels like absolutely the right decision. And even before we started recording, I was describing to you a meeting that I was in this morning, and it was a training about how to host in-person group events so that there's connection and so that people find community together, which I'm very interested in doing. But there were aspects of the meeting that in my body just felt like, nope, there was the ask for details of intimate experiences or intimate details, meaning how have I transformed or where am I learning and growing? And to me, that feels like I want to know you a little better before I open up about the things that are in my heart. And so there was this request for intimacy that didn't feel earned. There was demands for participation that didn't feel genuine. I was being asked to agree, and everybody else was nodding their head and agreeing in ways that didn't feel authentic. And so in a lot of ways, I can look at who I am now. And a lot of this feels like it is in a much better place than it was when I first came out of church experience. And I also always see room for growth. I still get stuck sometimes, and there is a right way to do things. And I still feel sometimes a sense of I'm behind. And while everybody else was learning how to be these amazing self-actualized humans in the world, I was busy learning how to be a good Mormon. And I can feel even some some embarrassment sometimes that I don't know things that either other women my age know, or I didn't have experiences that other women my age had. I wasn't sleeping around and drinking my way through college. That kind of excludes me from conversations. And that's just one example, right? There's others, but I still think it shows up for me, even culturally, in some ways, I have five children, a lot of people are like, Oh, my gosh, white, five children. And I have to understand like, yep, when that's the measurement of faithfulness in your religious tradition, that's what you do. And so I still bump up against some some feelings about it sometime. 

Kendra Hill 18:36

Yeah, of course, and that makes so much sense. And I love what you're bringing though, because it's realistic, right? There's hope that if you have religious trauma, it doesn't have to control your life forever. And you're an example, and there are so many examples of people who have not stayed in the darkest grips of religious trauma. There's so much hope for that.And of course, these things affect you. They're part of your development. And I think the difference is, you know, we talk about mental wellness in our field, not being that these things don't ever come up, but when they do come up, you know how to navigate them and you trust yourself to navigate them. You don't have to use those same strategies of avoiding or bypassing or pushing them away, seeking external authority, whatever it is. You actually get to navigate them now. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 19:39

That is such a beautiful definition of what, I don't know, if you want to call it healing, I know that word gets used a lot, but that you have the tools to navigate it. You trust yourself to navigate it. You feel some sturdiness or some resilience that you didn't feel before.I find, you know, that I also, it feels like I come back to myself faster. Like when I was sitting in that meeting this morning, I was like, this isn't very comfortable. I don't really like this. I was like, I don't have to be here. And I left, you know, and a full hour and a half early, I was just like, I'm done with this. And so I felt like that was a moment of like, oh, you know what? You don't have to stay here. You don't ever have to do anything you don't truly want to do again. And I felt it and was able to kind of step out. 

Kendra Hill 20:30

I love that example and the phrase, you don't have to stay here, so liberating. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 20:36

Yeah. The last thing that I want to name that I think I'm just really beginning to understand that has been part of my process and I'm interested in your thoughts is I'm also able to look back at some of the good things that happened to me because I grew up Mormon with genuine appreciation and also acknowledgement that it might not have been the healthiest or the best way to do it. Like there is a shadow side to it as well.And let me give you an example. Many young Mormon kids really serve missions in other parts of the world. I know that mission trips are kind of a practice in a lot of Christian faiths. And my mission was to Bolivia. I loved it. I loved learning Spanish and learning to love that people. It's a country that I continue to visit and work in today as part of a charitable organization. And also there were some highly inappropriate, dangerous positions that I was put in that were wildly inappropriate for a 21 year old, 22 year old woman to navigate alone.And so being able to kind of hold the good and name the bad, which is very different for everybody and is very individual and to let what was good for me matter to me and what didn't work for me and what was bad to me matter to me, even if I'm the only one who feels that way. You know, if I'm in a room full of people and they're like, no, missions are amazing. I still feel like I get to say, this part was, I appreciated and love this part. And this part was not good and amazing for me. 

Kendra Hill 22:33

That's beautiful that you can do that now. And I think what I want to emphasize there is I feel like that is a particular place that you can get to in your healing process. And I just want to name that for people who are listening who are like, hell no, I am nowhere near that place.Because I think people often have to go through this process of, I kind of have this metaphor of you know, there you have some soup, and you've been eating this soup for a long time. And all of a sudden, you realize that it's been making you very sick. And you can't eat the soup anymore. And so you you don't go anywhere near any of the ingredients that were in that soup. Because you need to get away from it, you need to recover, you can't be reminded of it, it's gonna it's gonna cause these certain like reactions in your body if you get close to it. And that is really valid. That's a really valid part of getting out of a system that is controlling you, or that you feel stuck in. And so then as you do some more, you know, processing around it, I think that's where you can start to slowly introduce like, well, I really liked the carrots. Let me try the carrots and see, was that making me sick? And I can I can trust myself to know, right, I can taste the carrot and I can go, is that making me sick? Or do I want that? Do I like that? Is that nourishing to my body? Okay, yes. But this part of the soup, this base, that that made me sick, right. And so that can be a bit of a process of like, what can I reintroduce? What can I look back on and be grateful for without that feeling like such a threat anymore? 

Sara Bybee Fisk 24:27

Bye. I'm so glad that you said it that way. Because that was the process for me. I had to kind of reject everything. And then come back to, well, that was okay. And there were some things that I loved about that experience or learned. And I don't ever want to do it again.Eating carrots for me at that time to borrow your metaphor. There were some good things that I learned from that. And I never want to eat carrots again. And there is no right way to do this. I have so many, you know, just the aspect of growing up in Mormonism is sometimes prevalent in other religious groups as well. And that women are supposed to have children and stay home with them. And I know so many women who have so much grief around becoming mothers, when they really, it wasn't a choice they were consciously making because they couldn't really choose to not be a mother without being punished or looked down on. And so they have really complicated feelings about their children. They've really complicated feelings about the experience of being a wife or a mother about not being able to explore other parts of them.And you never ever have to feel good about that. I don't want to be misunderstood at all that I have learned to find some things that were good that I can appreciate doesn't mean that that is the process for anyone else. And so I really love the way that you described rejecting it all. And then if anything comes back as something that you want to honor, that's completely up to you. 

Kendra Hill 26:10

Yeah, and I love your addition. I think it's so important that you may not want to add something back, but you can still appreciate it from before. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 26:18

Yeah, it's possible. And just to honor kind of the grief that I think kind of runs through a lot of these experiences and of not being able to choose and not knowing exactly what it was that we were doing or agreeing to or tying ourselves down to is something that comes up over and over and over again. And there isn't an end to my own grief and grieving process. And so if that feels familiar to you too as well, well, you're in good company.Is there anything that you want to say that you haven't been able to say so far in our conversation that you really, really want to make sure it gets added? 

Kendra Hill 26:59

Nothing is coming to mind. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 27:01

And I just really appreciate your thoughtfulness and wisdom, because I think also inherent in this conversation is, okay, well, how do I fix it? Who's the authority who's going to tell me how I fix this, right?And we just kind of bounce from one person telling us what to do to another. And so I feel like the way that you have answered so many of these questions is with some good information, a couple of like touch points, but a real appreciation for the individual nature of this and the fact that you can trust yourself to do it. And so I have really loved this conversation. 

Kendra Hill 27:50

Oh, thank you for saying that. And that means a lot. That means so much to hear.And as you say that, I can just feel myself getting emotional because it is so what I want for people to trust themselves and believe in themselves. And I'm really, really aware that the mental health field, or the coaching space, like any of these places, can become fundamentalists, right? And so I appreciate that too about our conversation, that we don't want fundamentalism in any form. We just want to talk about it. And ultimately, we want people to be informed enough to explore their own experiences and do what they need to do. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 28:36

To that end, your website and the checklist will all be linked in the show notes, and I would really encourage anyone who is curious about the role of religious trauma to contact Kendra and Casey, the other therapist, in her practice, because I never think it's a bad idea to just have a conversation. And I can imagine that there are some people out there who have some niggling questions now, have a conversation. And if it results in working together fantastic, if it results in just some better information or something to work on next, also, that's never a bad idea.So thank you so much, Kendra, for this conversation. 

Kendra Hill 29:19

Mmm, thanks for having me, Sara. 

Episode 141 - Understanding Religious Trauma Part 1 with Kendra Hill

People-pleasing and codependent tendencies often stem from a religious upbringing. In my own journey of unraveling those behaviors, I’ve had to confront what I was taught to believe about God, obedience, and how “being good” kept me in line. In part one of my conversation with licensed therapist Kendra Hill, we define religious trauma and explore how fear, bypassing, and chronic self-surveillance get wired into us. Here’s what we cover:

• Why many women feel terrified to stop people pleasing when religion is involved

• How growing up with a fear of divine punishment can shape your nervous system

• The difference between religious trauma and religious hurt

• How spiritual bypassing teaches us to ignore our emotions

• What happens when you’re taught to trust authority instead of trusting yourself

Kendra Hill is a neurodivergent artist, beauty seeker, exvangelical, and believer in people. By profession she is a Licensed Professional Counselor in the State of Colorado and an online coach across the nation with a specific focus on providing space for those who have some kind of religious background, religious trauma, are deconstructing their faith, or come from high control environments. She has recently relocated to New York City but remains passionate about holding space for people's stories - especially the ones it seems like no one else understands. Kendra co-owns a private practice called Unraveling Free Therapy & Coaching and is currently accepting new clients.

Find Kendra here:

www.unravelingfree.com

https://www.instagram.com/unravelingfree

https://unravelingfree.com/resources

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

Sara Bybee Fisk 00:57

One of the things that I have bumped up against as I have unraveled my behavior from people-pleasing and codependent tendencies is my religious upbringing, what I was taught to believe, what I was taught to believe about God and how he looks at me and how I'm supposed to please him by being obedient. There has been a lot there for me, and maybe there is for you too. I hear a lot from women who grew up in religious congregations, sometimes very conservative like mine, and how scary it is to not please people anymore, especially when God is involved. My conversation with Kendra Hill on religious trauma speaks directly to that. We define it, we talk about what it is, what it isn't, and how to begin to unravel it with love. Kendra is a licensed therapist, she is neurodivergent, she is a beauty seeker and an ex evangelical herself, and she really believes deeply in people. I think you're going to love this conversation, part one and part two will be available soon. I am here with Kendra Hill, and Kendra, we are not complete and total strangers, but I found you online. When I was researching religious trauma, it's something that I've been wanting to have a conversation about with someone for some time, and I read through a lot of your materials on your website, and I feel like if we lived closer, we might be best friends. 

Kendra Hill 02:29

Aww. I wish we could find out. I wish we could find out. We can be online best friends. That's okay. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 02:35

That's right. But one of the things that I appreciated about you is before we even started recording, and I'm just going to say this because if I don't, I'll forget.I'm going to have you introduce yourself in just a second. There are a couple of things we wanted to do and a couple of things we don't want to do. And one of the things we don't want to do is come to this podcast as some kind of healed, refined, perfect versions of ourselves. We are both still very much in the things that happened. And so I just, I wanted to start by acknowledging that for myself and my appreciation for you in being here. 

Kendra Hill 03:13

Yeah, thanks for acknowledging that. I think it's so important.Yeah, I think sometimes there can be this assumption even for therapists that because we're therapists or coaches or because we help guide people that we have it all figured out and we really don't. We have some skills. We have, you know, we have some ability to walk with people, but yeah, very much still human. Okay. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 03:40

much. What would you want people listening to know about you, what you do, how you came to that work? 

Kendra Hill 03:50

What I would love for people to know is what I do professionally is I am a therapist. I'm a licensed professional counselor in the state of Colorado. I currently live in New York City, but still see people online. And as a coach, I see people across the nation. But really, one of my specialties is helping people who have experienced some type of religious trauma, religious harm, who are going through a faith shift, a faith deconstruction, deconversion, and also people who just come from high control environments in general.So I didn't necessarily grow up in a super fundamentalist environment. I did grow up kind of culturally Christian. And my parents took us to church on Sundays, but it was really more of a moral act than a devout Christian habit. And so it wasn't really until college that I really got into Christianity and joined a campus ministry. And oh man, I like soaked it up like a sponge, but I needed it. So I was at a place in my life where I needed that kind of structure. I needed to feel like I belonged somewhere. I needed to feel like I had some kind of family. And so it was just kind of like, Oh, here it is. Here's my answer. And had some really great experiences there. And then, you know, on the flip side of that had some more damaging experiences. But fast forward to, you know, I had some of my own kind of church trauma. And then I went to seminary for my counseling degree. And there's this joke that people call it cemetery instead of seminary, because a lot of people start deconstructing and questioning things when they go to seminary. So that was the case for me. And I had questioned some things all along, but it was really when I started really learning about mental health, and really like how people change and heal, that I started seeing all of the incongruencies in what I was learning and what I was seeing in my church. And I noticed that a lot of what I was seeing in my church was just a lot of like shame based motivating people to change and fear, fear based motivation. And it just really contradicted what I was learning about how people thrive. And there was a lot more to it. That went into kind of the questions I was asking, but it started there. And then I ended up working at a Christian group practice for a couple of years when I graduated. And I'm so glad for that opportunity, because as I was still deconstructing my own faith, I was sitting with people who really needed a space to do that they were coming for Christian counseling. But what I was finding is that people, like person after person that I sat with had these stories of how certain things had been twisted or certain, you know, their emotions had been really bypassed because of spiritual concepts. Just like person after person, they just shared these things in common. And it really made me want to focus on that and give people a space where they could explore how they've been hurt by religion, how they've been hurt by church, how they've been hurt by belief systems, all of that. And so that's what led me to where I am. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 07:54

Amazing. I would love to start by just defining some terms.When you talk about religious trauma, is that the same as religious hurt? Is it different? How would you either differentiate those two terms or are they the same? 

Kendra Hill 08:15

It's a great question. I would say they are different, and I use both for a very specific reason, because often when people actually have religious trauma, they wouldn't name that they have religious trauma. And so it's a little more accessible to say I have religious harm or religious hurt, even if it could be considered trauma. I just like to have the option for people to, if one is more accessible.But here's how I would differentiate them. Religious trauma is a form of trauma. And so what trauma is, is basically it's not what you experience. It's not what happened, but it's how your nervous system responds to what has happened. And everybody has a different nervous system, and so everybody has a different response. So one person may experience something, and it shows up in their body as trauma in the aftermath. Another person might experience the same thing, and they don't end up carrying trauma as a result of that. So basically, trauma happens when something is so overwhelming that your nervous system can't cope with it. And then there gets to be this stuck energy inside. With religious trauma, it really just means that the harm happened in some kind of religious context. So religion was weaponized against somebody. A pastor or a church member was the cause of harm. The system, the church system, was the cause of harm. Thank you. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 10:05

Okay, I want to add a couple things to that, and I want you to just tell me, I think we're talking about the same thing. So I remember being terrified of doing something that might get me punished by God. And that for me was a deeply unsettling, like I couldn't make it make sense. So sometimes God punishes you because you're bad, but he doesn't punish all the bad people.And sometimes you get punished even when you're good, just kind of accidentally, it just seemed like in I don't even have a real frame of reference for the age at which I began to feel that like, kind of like whack-a-mole existence of like, wow, this, I could get punished if I inadvertently do something wrong. So I have to try really hard to never do something wrong. But sometimes good people get punished anyway, and sometimes bad people don't even get punished in that just kind of the unsettling feeling that kind of always lived in my body below the surface. So that would be an example of trauma that comes from religious teachings. Yeah. 

Kendra Hill 11:16

Yes, it's a great example, actually. And I think it leads to something else that's important here is that, you know, trauma can happen from like a single incident. So that's where we get the term PTSD a lot of times.But when we talk about religious trauma, it's often something called complex trauma. And complex trauma is a pattern of behavior over time or a pattern of harm that happens over time. It's often harder to see, harder to talk about, harder to identify. So people who grew up in abusive households might develop complex trauma. It's often relational. And, yeah, that's a great example of, it's not like you can pinpoint one thing that happened that made you afraid. It was just the teachings themselves over time, and how you interacted with them and probably your brain as it was developing, not being able to hold the nuances of like, what does it mean that I'm going to go to hell if I punched it, right? As a child, it's just like, that's so scary. You can't make sense of it. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 12:39

can't make sense of it. And then you don't have a loving adult who's like, wait, wait, wait, wait, let me help you understand these big feelings you're having.Let me put this into context that matters for where you are developmentally, just kind of being left alone with this idea of a god who both loved me, but also needed to be paid off because I was going to sin and do things wrong. And Jesus had to die so that God could be paid off and be convinced to love me and let me come live with him again. It was a pervasive just fear. And I can actually feel it again in my body right now as we're talking about it. And I can hold it with some kind of detachment and love at this point, but it was really pervasive. And so if you're listening and feeling some of that fear first of all, I'm sorry. And second of all, that is so common to have these pervasive fears, anxieties, terror even that come from the way we were taught that God was watching us, evaluating us, whether we're good enough, worthy enough, and so normal. And then you kind of pair, at least in a lot of Christian religions, especially the one I grew up in, in particular Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Mormons, the practice of punishing people who were not obeying the rules. Sometimes that punishment was very public, and sometimes it was less public. But when you kind of line up the landmines, like first of all, I have to be so good so that God loves me. And if I'm not, He might punish me, but I'm definitely going to get punished by my congregation, or there's going to be some kind of consequence, even if that's, I'm not allowed to participate in certain things. Another type of traumatic event can be punishment, or withholding, or being separated, or singled out, or deemed not worthy or not good. I'm interested in your thoughts about that. 

Kendra Hill 15:00

Yeah, I agree with that. And I think with trauma, if it ends up showing up, then it's often in the form of I'm not safe, other people aren't safe, the world isn't safe.And then with, you know, this added layer of religion, God's not safe. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 15:27

Yeah, this God that I'm supposed to love and trust is actually not safe. And that creates just such a disconnect, like how do you reconcile that God's ways are not my ways. God's ways are higher than my ways. I think that kind of was the line that I was handed a lot, like, Sara, you're just not meant to understand everything.And that kind of gets into the second thing I wanted to find, which is bypassing. Because I think bypassing is used to kind of wallpaper over a lot of those traumatic events. And so how would you define bypassing? 

Kendra Hill 16:07

Yeah, I think you're right. I think bypassing really is kind of any strategy to avoid actually feeling emotions or actually being with an experience that you're having. So an example I hear a lot is, you know, that if somebody is feeling anxious and they're told, well, do not be anxious about anything. Just pray about it. Just pray about it. Or have more faith. Or if somebody loses someone, well, they're with Jesus now, right? And no matter how well intentioned those comments are from other people, it really does take somebody away from what they really need to feel in order to move through whatever it is that they're experiencing.And so then what happens is you just push it down, right? And you receive this message of like, okay, well, if I feel something that's not acceptable, so I need to figure out how to just bypass it myself, right? I'm going to internalize that and go, well, clearly this isn't allowed. And so what do I do with it? I got to find a way to not address it. And then it just like builds and builds and builds. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 17:29

This isn't allowed. Yes.Or I'm bad for feeling this. Like nobody else is feeling this. Everybody else, you know, somebody dies and I get the explanation. Well, God needed them in heaven and everybody else seems to be fine with it. Why am I not fine with it? It must be that my experience is somehow bad or I'm bad for feeling this. 

Kendra Hill 17:54

Oh my gosh. You're saying so much there, Sara. Like you keep coming back to this concept of loneliness and isolation in this context. And it's so true.And that's actually part of what causes trauma to be embedded in our nervous systems is when we feel really alone in the midst of something overwhelming. And I'm hearing that from you over and over again, like, these things are overwhelming. And yet nobody else seems to be feeling this way. Nobody else seems to understand. Nobody is there to like help me through it. And on top of that, you're wrong for feeling that way. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 18:32

And the antidote for feeling bad and wrong is to double down, to believe harder, to read the Bible or scriptures more, to pray more, to trust more, to believe your leaders more. And that that is the way that you will overcome all these feelings that you're not supposed to be feeling.And you will become not only just a better follower of the religious canon or a better whatever, a better Muslim, a better Christian, a better Baptist, a better whatever. But that by doubling down, I did this for so many years. I would feel anxious. I would feel alone. I would feel isolated. I would feel like literally the sentence in my head was like, there's no way I'm good enough. Like with everything that God expects, I was having dinner with some friends. This has many years ago, some Mormon friends. And we were playing kind of a question game. And the question was, if you could be in a room with any historical figure and ask them any question, what would it be? You know, very typical dinner party question. And people are like, Abraham Lincoln, you know, how did it feel to write the Emancipation Proclamation or give the Gettysburg Address or other people? And I said with like so earnestly and so sincerely, like, I want to talk to Jesus. And the question I would ask him is, is it enough? Did I do enough? And I'm even feeling some emotion of that question right now, not because I currently feel it, but because I remember what it was like to carry the weight of that question every single day. Is it enough? Am I doing enough? And never, I don't think I ever was able to have like a real solid yes. I think I felt better about it some days than others. But that's what kept me kind of in this try and try and try and try loop. And I wonder if that is something that you, you know, have any thoughts about that you wouldn't mind sharing. 

Kendra Hill 20:48

Yeah. Well, I appreciate you going there. I think a lot of people know what that's like. You've been in these kinds of environments.Yeah, I even remember I worked for my campus ministry after I graduated from college, and the very first kind of training had like a week of training. And the very first training I went to, I remember afterwards feeling that, like they were talking about, I don't know, like qualities that leaders need to have in this ministry. And afterwards, I went up to the presenter and I said, I don't think I should be doing this. There's no way that I'm good enough to do this. No way. And I remember being told, like something like that, that's normal. Like it's, you know, a lot of people feel that way, but it was so confusing. Right. And so I think part of that is that you get really like contradictory messages where on one hand you're told, well, you're not good enough. And that's what this is about. You need a savior because you're not good enough. And so you don't have getting these messages over and over and over again, that you need to be this, this, this, this to please God, to be a good Christian, to be in God's will. It's so confusing. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 22:25

So confusing. And your brain has to hold these very contradictory ideas and somehow make sense of it. And you look around and in my congregations, a lot of people seem to be doing that with no sweat, right? And it didn't seem to be bothering them a lot.And so that's what created a lot of the lonely feeling for me was like, I'm the only one who is struggling to make sense of this. And I just wonder if people are listening and they have grown up in religious organizations that they have some religious hurt or harm, or they can even identify some things that feel like what you and I have been describing, how might it be showing up in their lives in ways that might not be really super obvious to them. 

Kendra Hill 23:23

That's a great question. So we get this question a lot.What does this actually look like? How do I know if I have religious trauma? And there's actually a blog post on our website with that title. Do I have religious trauma or something like that? It shows up different for everyone. You know, an interesting thought I was just having about this is if you have religious trauma, it's probably going to be really hard to identify that you have religious trauma. Because part of it is that you can't trust yourself. So going back to that idea that trauma kind of instills this sense in you that you're not safe, the world's not safe, other people aren't safe, God's not safe. But especially when you have been conditioned with the spiritual bypassing that we're talking about, that means that you haven't had the chance to really understand your own experiences or your own emotions, which emotions are information. They give us information about what's wrong and what we need. So if we're taught to ignore those things, and then you pile on purity culture, that your body is bad or don't trust your body, don't feel things in your body, right? It's going to be really hard to be connected enough to yourself to go, I think I have religious trauma. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 24:59

Yeah. 

Kendra Hill 25:01

So at first it might show up as like something just feels really wrong, right? Like, but there might be a lot of conflict. I shouldn't be feeling this way.I shouldn't be feeling this way. There's nothing wrong. There's nothing that should make me feel this way right now. So if there's that, even that kind of struggle, that might be an indicator that like, there's something to pay attention to that's trying to come to the surface. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 25:30

It just strikes me as so fucking convenient that one of the things that is possible to be taught inside of religious communities is you can't trust yourself, but you can trust the leaders. Don't trust yourself. Trust me. I know how to guard you. We know better, right? And in my experience in Mormon land, it was all old white men who knew what was better for me. And that is very convenient.You can't be believed and you should believe me. And then the second thing that your comment brought up for me is you are trustworthy as long as your experiences line up with what the church teaches. But if you have any feelings or inklings or receive any ideas that don't line up with what the church teaches, then you're wrong. So fucking convenient and such a catch-22, right?Because there's no clarity that I can rely on that comes from me. So I might as well just not believe myself and just believe authorities and leaders outside of me. 

Kendra Hill 26:48

Yeah. And that's something I see a lot when I sit with people. And something I really like I work hard to reduce my authority, or even like how people sense that I have authority, because a lot of people who have religious trauma are coming from these environments have an external sense of authority. So it comes from outside of me, not inside of me. And so I have to be really careful with that because of course that would be transferred to me as a therapist or as an expert, right, of some kind. And I don't want that.I really want to help people recognize that, oh my gosh, what if authority doesn't have to just be outside of you? What if you actually can trust yourself?Well, thank you so much. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 27:46

that I really struggled with that idea of having authority in and of myself. It was really something that took me a long time.I felt very disconnected from my ability to know that something was right for me. Like, how do you know something is right? If somebody outside of you doesn't tell you. It was really difficult for me to even look around at other people who seemed to have skills and abilities that I wanted and know, is it okay to become that? Is it okay, for example, in my Christian tradition, feminism was not something that was okay. Is it okay to want that? What if I feel this wanting of some of those ideas and of that worldview, but I will be judged for it? It just all felt really tangled up and hard to decipher even my wants. Well, from what I was told, I should want. 

Kendra Hill 28:47

Mm-hmm. Oh my gosh.Yeah, there's like this constant surveillance of yourself. Yes. So you can't just, you can't just be, you can't just be feeling what you're feeling or experiencing what you're experiencing. It's always these layers of, well, but should I be feeling that or experiencing that or is that okay to feel an experience and, oh, it's exhausting. 

Episode 140 - Being a Highly Sensitive Woman with Allyssya Gossett

In this episode, I talk with coach and host of The Highly Sensitive Woman podcast, Allyssya Gossett. Sensitivity has shaped Allyssya’s life and how she moves through the world, and now she helps other highly sensitive women understand that nothing is “wrong” with them, but that there’s actually incredible strength in the way they’re wired. Today, we talk about what it means to be highly sensitive and how embracing your sensitivity allows you to live more authentically. Here’s what we cover:

• The definition of a highly sensitive person and how to recognize the signs in yourself

• How I discovered my sensitivity after years of not having the language for it

• The wide spectrum of sensitivity and how it shows up differently for everyone

• Barriers that prevent sensitive women from understanding and honoring their needs

• How embracing your sensitivity empowers you to advocate for yourself without shame

• Resources for learning how to take care of yourself as a highly sensitive person 



For decades, Allyssya struggled to believe she was worthy of taking up space in the world. She listened to society’s rules for how she “should” be or feel, made herself small to accommodate others, and tried to put herself in a box just to fit in. Not embracing her true self led to years of debilitating anxiety and depression. Once she embraced who she is and how she was created, Allyssya learned to challenge those old beliefs, stop worrying so much about what others think of her, and step outside her comfort zone so she could confidently live a life she created instead of one chosen for her. The self-acceptance journey fueled her passion for sharing her experiences and knowledge with others as a life coach and podcast host, helping other highly sensitive women just like her let go of self-doubt, find their voice, and live with internal peace and bold confidence.

Find Allyssya here:

info@allyssya.coach 

https://www.instagram.com/lifecoach_allyssya

https://www.facebook.com/lifecoachallyssya 

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-highly-sensitive-woman-confidence-set-boundaries

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

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Transcript

 Sara Bybee Fisk 00:57

We get to spend some time in this episode with one of my most favorite people, Allyssya. I'm so glad you're here. Would you please introduce yourself to the audience? 

Allyssya Gossett 01:09

Oh, thank you so much for having me, Sara. My name is Allyssya Gossett. I am a coach and podcast host of The Highly Sensitive Woman, and I do that work because I too am a highly sensitive woman, and that sensitivity has permeated my entire life and how I move through the world, and so I'm just thrilled to be here to talk about that and speak to other highly sensitive women. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:35

I have been really looking forward to this conversation because I've shared with you that I had some sensitivity, that I had no idea was sensitivity, and we can talk a little bit more about the particulars of how I discovered that, but before we do, what is your definition of someone who is highly sensitive or the markers or just what would somebody be looking for if they wanted to know if they are sensitive? 

Allyssya Gossett 02:07

My go-to definition of that for when people ask me, you know, they're in my life and they're like, what does it mean that you're a highly sensitive woman? It's all of my senses are kind of on high alert at all times. And I tend to feel more emotions than the average person.And I feel those emotions deeper and stronger than the average person. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 02:35

Okay. So more emotion, kind of at a deeper or higher level, and you are picking up on maybe more sound noise, more in your visual field, more all of your senses then seem like they're turned up. Does that feel right? Yes.Okay. When I was trying to figure out like, what is wrong with me? To me, what felt the most overloading was noise. It was like all of the sudden, and I had five kids. So I still have five kids, I guess I should say. They're all still my kids. But when they were all home and it was noisy and it just seemed fine. But then it was like one day, a switch flipped. And I just felt like the level of noise all the time was way too much. And so I started doing some digging and looking into it. And I couldn't really find anything that said like, yeah, you might be highly sensitive because what I was reading was mostly about like, do food textures bother you? Is there scratchy fabrics that you don't like to wear or tags or type clothing? And I thought, no, no, no, I don't really have any of that. And so looking at myself as someone who was sensitive just based on the clue of noise, I didn't really make that connection.Do you find that that is common, that we can be really sensitive in maybe one primary way that kind of takes over and not in other ways? Does that question make sense? 

Allyssya Gossett 04:24

Yes, it makes sense. And yes, I would say that there is most definitely a spectrum and a range. I know when I took like the official, are you a highly sensitive person quiz? I don't remember what the total score is that you can get, but let's pretend it's 20. I got a 19. Like there is no doubt whatsoever that I'm a highly sensitive person and I, I guess, tracked in every area.But for sure, some people might not be as sensitive in some of their senses as others. Even as a highly sensitive person, my fragrance sensitivity, for example, is extremely high. And I have some friends who are highly sensitive women, some clients, and that one isn't necessarily as heightened for them. I also notice that you, you, you mentioned fabrics. There are times when I can wear certain clothes that are in my closet. And there are other times when my nervous system is a little more heightened and I'm like, I cannot wear this today. It's too scratchy. And so even within a person on a given day or a season that they are in in their life, they might find that their senses are more or less heightened because maybe some others are a little more heightened at the time. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 05:44

So I love that explanation. And I find that that is, you know, true for me as well. And I think, you know, you named the, I think the most important part, which is where is my nervous system? And if it feels fairly regulated, if it feels fairly like I have a good connection to myself, then I do tend.That's like the day I go to Costco, you know, where it just feels like overwhelming stimulation. I still put my Apple AirPods in and I put them on noise cancellation. And I don't make eye contact with anybody. But those are the Costco days for me. But then there are other days where it already feels like there is such a load. I'm either stressed or I'm tired, or I just feel extra worried. And so yeah, that actually makes a lot of sense for me. Why would it matter for someone listening to know if they are sensitive or not? 

Allyssya Gossett 06:41

Oh goodness, there are so many reasons. One, and this was a huge one for me, is in the United States in particular, we don't really celebrate the highly sensitive people, we celebrate the people who go through the world and break rules and kind of are outspoken and pushing boundaries and those types of things. And when someone is, I don't know, watching a movie and they get emotional and tear up, we're like, oh, don't be so sensitive, right? Like we're just not celebrated in the United States and it's sort of viewed as a negative thing.So knowing that you are a highly sensitive person can be helpful in that it can give words to what you are experiencing and it can help you not feel so alone and so broken because you recognize that it's not just you and that you aren't this weird outlier or like you have said, super special, extra broken, right? That there are lots of people like you and we just happen to live in the United States in a country that doesn't really celebrate that type of person. It also shows up in the way that you interact with people and your relationships because your nervous system just often cannot manage the conflict that can come with not being a people pleaser and not just agreeing to whatever the circumstances may be or whatever's being presented to you. And so your nervous system is kind of always on high alert and what you end up doing in conjunction with your senses being stimulated and then trying to avoid conflict, a lot of times you withdraw and so you don't have those relationships that you so desperately crave because as a highly sensitive person, you're not really super interested in surface level conversations. You wanna get to the really good stuff but there's so many barriers that come from all this messaging and stimulation and people pleasing that it gets in the way of those relationships and that just contributes more to the feeling like you're broken and isolating and it just becomes this perpetual cycle. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 09:10

I love that explanation because I think, well, I'm actually remembering, I have a close friend and there was a book that came out several years ago now, it's called Quiet about, are you familiar with it? Yeah. It's about being an introvert in a world built for extroverts, right? Extrovertism is celebrated and rewarded and kind of held up as the way we should be, the way to be successful, the way to make friends and influence people and the way to get the best jobs and have the best relationships.And she read this book and I remember her telling me about it with tears in her eyes, like, I identify with I'm an introvert. And she had the name and she's like, there's nothing wrong with me. I'm just moving through a world that is not made for me. And I imagine there's a lot of overlap between introverts and sensitivity, sensitive people. And to move through the world with the constant feedback that there is something wrong with you, you're too emotional, you're too quiet, you're too withdrawn, you're too fill in the blank only makes sensitive people withdraw more because it's not safe to be constantly trying to put yourself out there if you're just getting slapped on the hand or told that you're doing it wrong. And so to have a name for it, to have a kind of framework for this is how I am and it's okay, and it's not even just okay, it's perfectly valid, right? It doesn't need to be explained, it doesn't need to be proven as valid, it is valid just because it is your experience that that must be really important for people to have. 

Allyssya Gossett 10:56

Yes. And highly sensitive people make up about 20% of the population.And of those, about 70% of us are introverts. And interestingly enough, I always identified strictly as an introvert, as I was going through life and then in discovering being a highly sensitive person and actually having words and definitions to it and learning how to manage it better and have skills to regulate my nervous system and to have those difficult conversations. I have noticed that I've shifted more into an ambivert and there are definitely times where being around people does energize me. And so it's just interesting to me that maybe, maybe we truly are an introvert, but maybe some of it just comes because we've gotten all of that messaging and we don't quite know how to deal with it, that we could get energized by being around people and we could be capable of more. We just aren't quite there yet. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 12:00

The other thing that kind of comes to mind, my youngest son, whenever he was overwhelmed when he was young, he would just burst into tears. And he would just sit down on the floor and just burst into tears. And there was no moving him until he was ready, until he had gotten it all out. And I remember I had a friend over and she didn't really scold him, him directly. But she said, oh, yeah, that one cries a lot, doesn't he? You're gonna have to, you're gonna have to like, how did she say it? Kind of like work that out of him. And I remember just thinking, I don't even know how I would. Like this is just, like, what am I gonna do? Punish him when he's already upset, he's already, and so what I ended up doing was kind of redesigning how I interacted with him differently than my other kids who didn't have that same reaction to overwhelm.And I didn't know that that was, I mean, he might be highly sensitive. I guess I shouldn't just assume just by that one trait, but the other, I think, big plus in learning this about yourself is that you can design your life to work with those sensitivities and not always be trying to overcome them as if there's something wrong with you. Because when he would get upset, I would just kind of stop everything and sit with him and rub his back. And I would say, do you want me to stay here or go away and come back? And I would let him decide. And so we kind of redesigned how we interacted based on that trait of his. And I would think it would be really important for people to know this about themselves so that they can do some of that for themselves and make their life easier. 

Allyssya Gossett 13:50

Yes. And I say all the time, all emotions come out of me in tears. And a very typical response to that from the other person is, oh, don't cry. And I very politely now have the words to say, it's okay that I'm crying.Or something that I learned from you is to proactively, when the tears start to fall, say, you'll notice that I'm crying. It's because I care so much. And by allowing myself the freedom to cry when I need to, I notice I don't actually cry as much, which is kind of interesting. And even when I do cry, I a lot of times have more control over the tears. You know, it's more of like a slow stream than a full-on sob, although a full-on sob definitely has its place and can be very cathartic for sure. But I'm able to, because I'm not trying to shove the tears down, and I'm not shaming myself internally for crying, and I'm not allowing the other person to shame me either. I'm able to articulate what emotion I'm feeling. I'm able to find the words a little more readily in the moment. And yes, to your point, that has been life-changing for me, because that was such a big thing. Oh, don't let them see me cry, regardless of what emotion I was feeling. And I still get pretty angry if I'm crying because I'm angry. But I will then say that. I'm angry, and I'm crying, and now I'm angry because I'm crying. But I'm angry, and this is why I'm angry. And before, I couldn't put words to it, because I was just so embarrassed that I was crying that that kind of overrode all of the other emotions that I was feeling. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 15:38

Okay, I love that, what you just shared, because what I heard was, you're not only advocating for your needs. I need to cry and I need to let this out. You're understanding why it happens to you and you're able to explain it. And you're able to recognize it as something that is good about you. It's a strength that you're able to feel this way. And you just have a better understanding of why you need things that other people might not, in addition to, you know, quiet and downtime.But like, to emote, to let this out, and you're able to stop other people from kind of dumping their expectations or their discomfort on you when they say, Oh, don't cry, it's okay. Because their issues are their issues. And their discomfort is theirs to deal with. And it just seems like you're able to have much more of your own kind of grounded, connected experience, which is what I wonder if that's kind of behind the way that you own it so beautifully. And you're like, this is what I need. I need to cry. I need to let this out. And if you're uncomfortable with it, that's yours to deal with. That's not mine. 

Allyssya Gossett 16:59

Yes. And it took me a very long time to get there and it has certainly ebbed and flowed. But now I do see all of the things that come with it, you know, the empathy and the compassion that I'm able to have for other people. For so long, I saw that as a bad thing.And now I really celebrate it and I recognize that I, it's kind of a package deal, right? Like I can't turn off my sensitivities to the extent that I would sometimes very much like to without turning off some of those other traits that really make me who I am and allow me to be the kind of friend and partner and coach that I am. And I don't want to turn it off now. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 17:48

Isn't that amazing to have really come into your own, yourself, who you are, what you offer and to really appreciate like the whole ecosystem of emotions and emotional intelligence that you are. I think that's such, that's so incredible that you are able to have that, that you're able to help your clients develop that because we do tend to want like the quote unquote good things about our personality without understanding the other parts of our personalities or our upbringing or experiences that those are attached to.Like I couldn't be, I'm speaking as if are you, I couldn't be Allyssya, the person who feels deeply and loves deeply and connects deeply without this sensitivity. 

Allyssya Gossett 18:38

Yes. And I think when I finally understood that, that was when things really started to change. And I want to be clear that there are still days where it's hard and there are still days when I wish I could flip the switch and turn it off.But as a whole, I just am finally comfortable in my own skin and don't see myself as being broken or like I was made wrong. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 19:07

Yeah, if you're comfortable, you know, answering this next question with personal experience, great. If you want to talk about client experience, you know, whatever feels most relevant, but I'm really interested in what obstacles are in the way for someone who is highly sensitive to really understand and honor that about themselves.Like why, why is it so hard to come to that place where you feel like I'm a valid person with a valid experience that matters just as much as everybody else? 

Allyssya Gossett 19:42

I think it's hard because it has been ingrained in us from the very beginning, in our day to day lives. Sometimes it's from the adults, sometimes it's from our peers. And then society as a whole has just been giving us that messaging over and over and over again. And so it is really hard to undo that programming and really hard to kind of rewire those very deeply worn grooves in our brains that our way is wrong and we should be different. And that process is bumpy.When you're trying to kind of rewire the thought patterns and to understand that your nervous system and how it's responding is not wrong. It's just really, really hard to do. And it takes time and sometimes having the patience to ride the wave and knowing that there won't be one day where the switch flips and you're like, oh my goodness, this is the best thing ever. And I love everything about myself and that you never revert back and that you never have those low points. And I can speak for myself that when those low points come, it used to be very devastating. When those low points would come again, I'd be like, oh, I thought I had fixed it. I thought I was never going to have to revisit this again. I thought I was past it. At this age in my life, I should be fill in the blank, right? And I think when I began to understand that there will be times where I'll be in that low spot again and that it will be hard again, allows me to not compound it with the shame and blame of here you are again and see here's some more evidence of why. And I see this coming up with my clients too, and we have to work through the ebb and the flow and understanding that that's totally normal and that each time that we might go kind of into that low place, we don't stay there as long. Maybe we don't go as deep and we're able to get to a place of accepting this is how I'm wired and this is who I am and we're able to get to that place much sooner and the time in between the kind of falling into the valley and kind of bouncing back up to the acceptance is much shorter. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 22:34

That is so I see so much overlap there. I obviously talk a lot about good girl programming, right? Good girl rules. And I think about the way that our upbringing just kind of really sets up what is good, what is bad, what is rewarded, what is punished. And I was really rewarded for production, like doing stuff like get it done, get it done, get it done, get it done. There's always more, there's always more. And the more you can do, the better, which I think had me just overriding a lot of my fatigue, a lot of my need to rest, my desire for play, right?When you're working all, you know, so hard. You just, you look at people around you playing and you get mad. Because they're like, wasting time when work could be getting done. And so I think back to like the particular way that I was programmed to not pay attention. To any sensitivity, because really, it's sensitivity that gets in the way of like, the big capitalist machine, you know, that we're all just cogs in feels like that. And so when we look at like people pleasing in particular, this, this kind of way that we live out those good girl rules. Where do you see sensitivity and people pleasing kind of overlapping? What's the Venn diagram look like there? 

Allyssya Gossett 24:04

I think one of the biggest ones is because we are so sensitive to everything that's going on around us, we very quickly pick up on a shift, a shift in someone else's mood, a shift in the emotions of the room. And because of that, our bodies are like, uh oh. And so then we immediately kind of go into, what did I do wrong? And what do I need to fix? And so we just very, very seamlessly slide right into people pleasing and assume that that shift is a result of something we did or did not do. And so we're going to do whatever we can to correct it. And it may or may not have anything to do with us, but that's where I see probably the biggest overlap is because we can pick up on those subtle differences so, so easily. We're just real quick to shift into people pleasing. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 25:04

Yeah, is there kind of the default? Well, I know there is in like good girl rules where you automatically think when something is off, it's my fault or I have to fix it.Does that feel similar for people who are highly sensitive? Does it feel turned up? Is it a higher feeling of threat or needing to fix this or it's my fault? 

Allyssya Gossett 25:28

I think there's definitely some of that and then there's also because there's so much empathy and compassion like we almost want to like take it on so that the other person isn't feeling whatever it is that they are feeling in this very unhealthy way for sure but and it's not even conscious much of the time especially if you've never had words to it but for sure like we we want to help and so it's it's the combination of I want to fix it and I don't want there to be anything wrong and then at the same time like I have so much compassion and empathy for you like I just want to help you and so I'm going to take it on for you. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 26:14

Okay, that's so interesting. Yeah, that kind of double-edged way in which your sensitivity shows up to try to make things better. I feel like there must also be a lot of masking going on. Pretending, because if someone has sensitivities that they don't either know where they come from, or they can't appreciate them as a valuable part of themselves, and they're being told, this is bad, this is wrong, you shouldn't be this way, then I'm guessing that there is a lot of pretending or performing that's happening.Does that feel right as well? Oh, for sure. 

Allyssya Gossett 27:00

Yes. And sometimes we can do that better than others. You know, there are times where we can perform or we can pretend like everything's okay. And people around us have no idea. And I know that I sort of wore that as a badge of honor for a lot of years. I, many, many years ago, had a pretty significant kind of breakdown and my nervous system had reached its limit. And I had to take some time off of work and really get the care that I needed. And I remember everyone around me being like, we had no idea. And I was so proud of myself that they had no idea how much I was suffering behind closed doors. And we're just very, very good at it because we have learned as we're going through life, you know, that the sensitivity isn't necessarily a good thing. And so you've got to keep that hidden. And so you just, you become kind of a natural performer. And then it's interesting now because like, I don't want to perform. I want people to see the raw real me, not to an inappropriate level by any means. Certainly there are things that I keep private, but because I want this to become such a norm in people's lives and for them to accept highly sensitive people, like I pulled the mask down and I want people to see it and really celebrate it and just show that there are different ways to be in the world. And I almost can't put it up even when I feel like it would probably be very appropriate. I almost just can't do it anymore. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 28:55

that feel for you to be able to live that way. I mean, going from having a breakdown and being proud that your coworkers and friends didn't know how much you were suffering to where you are now of like, I actually can't put that mask or that I can't do that performing anymore.What does that like for you? 

Allyssya Gossett 29:16

uh it's kind of exhilarating and very freeing and I finally feel like I'm living life and not just existing and kind of going through the motions. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 29:31

Yeah. And you know what? That is what women want, right? They just want to be able to find out who am I really, what do I really want to do with my one wild precious life with the, you know, the time that I have.And I love that you feel that so deeply. And I love that that's what you are able to help your clients achieve because that journey from what, if there's something wrong with me, I think there is something wrong with me that like I'm extra special, super broken too. I am living the life that I want to be living. And if other people have thoughts about it, that's there is to deal with not mine is so joyful. And it's so, um, it's also hard, right? There's, there's also things to overcome and feel, but the joy on your face and the joy that I have seen you experience, the joy that I've experienced as I have, you know, kind of come home to that real version of myself. Um, there's, there's nothing, there's nothing like it. 

Allyssya Gossett 30:37

There isn't and you know, you mentioned time like it's so so precious and I feel like I lost so much time in my 20s and my 30s that I don't want to waste time anymore pretending and it's really cool to see my clients doing the same and I just want to say that.And this has come up for me it's come up for my clients like I should be here by a certain point and so I just want to say that yes, I mean I was fortunate enough to finally start shifting in my 40s some people are lucky enough that they're recognizing that they're highly sensitive women in their 20s and some are maybe in their 60s 70s 80s and it is never too late. To finally have words to what it means to be a highly sensitive person and to really start to celebrate that so that you can live however much time because none of us are guaranteed tomorrow regardless of our age right so however much time that you can be living it the way that you want to be living it. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 31:40

So if someone is curious about their own sensitivities, right? I think we all kind of notice things about ourselves and we're like, huh, is that a thing or is that not a thing?Maybe it's a thing. Maybe it's not either way in terms of the sensitivity conversation that we're having, where would you suggest that they either start learning more about being a highly sensitive person and then once they discover that perhaps they are, how would they begin to take better care of that part of them or honor that part of them? What would you tell them? 

Allyssya Gossett 32:17

Um, and there is a website, the highly sensitive person, there's a book. I took a quiz and that's how I first, um, discovered it. And I love this work so much.I started a podcast, the highly sensitive woman. And so I'm talking about all of these things and giving, you know, tips for how to protect your nervous system and regulate it and learn how to manage your senses as you are trying new activities and those types of things. And I think the first thing is understanding that you are not alone. There are 20% of the entire population. So millions of people are just like you and it is to be celebrated the way that you are wired. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 33:10

So understanding how to regulate and protect their nervous system seems to be really central to this. Why is it such a central part of having a different experience as a highly sensitive person? 

Allyssya Gossett 33:26

Because when your nervous system is so dysregulated, you don't want to do the things, right? Like when your nervous system is heightened, kind of like you were saying you don't go to Costco on certain days, right? There are certain things that you don't want to do and so you're missing out.There are certain conversations that you don't want to have and so you're not able to necessarily build the relationships or the type of relationships that you want to have. You find yourself doing a lot of things that you don't want to do or not doing a lot of things that you do want to do. You're spending a lot of time ruminating about conversations that you did have and so the dysregulated nervous system kind of gets in the way of pretty much everything and so learning how to regulate and manage your nervous system in a way that honors your sensitivity and allows you to have the conversations that you want to have and do the things that you want to do and not do the things that you don't want to do is critical. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 34:32

So, if someone was interested in finding out more about how you teach that and working with you, where would they go to find that out? 

Allyssya Gossett 34:43

When they can listen to the Highly Sensitive Woman podcast, I am also on Instagram at Life Coach Allyssya, and they can send me a message and we could have a conversation, info at Allyssya.coach, and we can just see if we would be a good fit to work together. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 35:02

Anyone who got to work with you would just be so lucky because you are not only just a fantastic human, but such a good coach. I have had the chance to work with you personally.Yes, if that is interesting to you, I would really highly recommend that people do that. As we wrap up the conversation, is there anything else that you either wanted to say that you didn't get a chance to or just want to make sure we put into words? 

Allyssya Gossett 35:31

I think if you are listening and you suspect that you are a highly sensitive person, I would highly encourage you to explore that further and get a better understanding because living with that mask on and trying to pretend like your way is bad is really getting in the way of an incredible gift that you have and truly some superpowers. I want you to be able to tap into those superpowers that are your sensitivity and use them in the most incredible way. 

Sara Bybee Fisk 36:08

I love that. I'm thinking back to just honoring the fact that, you know, this one part of me, it really does seem to be for me, my sensitivities is mostly around noise and big crowds of people. And I can really just confidently say that's a no for me.And to really feel like that is deeply honoring of myself and of my capacity without saying that it should be different. I should want to go do that. I should be able to handle that. I just don't do that anymore. I find that the experience that I am able to have when I honor that part of myself is actually fun for me, is actually rejuvenating, is actually pleasurable. And I just don't have to pretend anymore, which does, isn't that what we all really, really want to stop pretending and performing. 

Allyssya Gossett 37:05

Yes, and I can relate to so much of that. I'm able to enjoy things that I used to say I would never be able to enjoy because of my sensitivity and it's because I've learned to embrace it and work with it instead of fighting against it that allows me to do so much more than I ever thought that I was capable of doing and I'm seeing that with my clients too and it it's just

Sara Bybee Fisk 37:28

so good. It is just so good. Yes. Well, thank you, Allyssya.I hope that this conversation, I wish I could have had this conversation with someone or listened to it years ago, because I think it would have just given me a framework for something that I just had no idea. I'm like, what is wrong with me? Why is this thing so hard for me? So I'm really grateful that you would take the time to have this conversation. 

Allyssya Gossett 37:54

Thank you so much for having me Sara, truly a pleasure anytime I get to chat with you. 

Episode 139 - A Four-Step Plan for a Holiday That Actually Feels Good

We all want the holidays to feel meaningful and connected, but the pressure to meet expectations often pulls us away from what truly matters to us. Between obligations, traditions, cooking, cleaning, and planning, we often miss out on quality time with the people we care about or a chance to rest. If you’re exhausted just thinking about putting on another holiday for everyone else, this episode will walk you through a simple four-step framework to help you create the holiday season you actually want. Here’s what I cover:

• Why people-pleasing is at an all-time high during the holidays

• Three questions to help you pause and ask yourself what you truly want

• How to predict the discomfort that comes with prioritizing yourself

• An exercise to write down what support you need to make the holiday you want possible

• How to mentally rehearse the holiday and regulate your nervous system beforehand

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

00:58

Somehow, it's November, and somehow Thanksgiving is next week. And despite my shock that here's where we are in 2025, I wanted to do a short and very useful episode about how to have the holidays you want without people pleasing, because it is one of the times of the year where I hear the same thing from a lot of my clients and a lot of women.

 01:29

I want my holidays to feel meaningful and connected. I want to enjoy the people that I'm with. I want to have time with family that I don't get to see during the rest of the year. My kids come home from college or my family comes in from out of state. 

 01:47

I take time off work. Like I spend a lot of time and effort on the holidays, but somehow I always end up feeling overwhelmed, resentful. And it feels like there's like years of backlogged resentment that comes up and doing things for other people that either weren't on my list or I don't really want to do and I don't know how to get out of that. 

 02:10

So if you have felt like that, this episode is for you because the holidays are a very normal time when people pleasing can be at an all-time high. We are wrestling with the expectations that everybody has, right? 

 02:26

And not just the family members, but our cultural expectations that holidays should be magical, that holidays should be peaceful and connecting and where there's just so much expectation and hopes and dreams kind of tied up in the holiday seasons. 

 02:43

There's traditions that we're trying to navigate. There's my family's traditions. There's other people's family traditions. There's obligations. This is when a lot of holiday parties and gatherings and events pop up. 

 02:56

And there's the feeling like I want to be at all of them or I should be at all of them, obligation, fear, guilt, fear of missing out, fear of disappointing people. So it can really kind of be a pressure cooker time for a lot of us who want to have the magical holiday and who are also kind of tired of putting on holidays for other people, right? 

 03:22

We have a lot of years under our belt where we're the ones who do all of the back end work, all of the planning, all the organizing, all of the inviting, all of the scheduling, all of the buying, all of the wrapping, all of the cooking, all of the cleaning. 

 03:34

I mean, I'm exhausted. And that's just, you know, beginning of the episode where we're talking about everything that we end up making ourselves responsible for. So I want you to know, if this has been your experience of the holidays, you're not doing it wrong. 

 03:49

There's nothing wrong with you. It's the perfect storm of all of that internalized pressure and external pressure, social pressure, family pressure, expectations pressure. So what I want to do today is walk you through a pretty straightforward four-step framework that will help kind of put a structure around creating the holiday season you want. 

 04:16

It's not going to go perfectly. So let's just, let's just let that go right now. Okay. You're going to take from this episode a couple of ideas that feel really relevant to you and you're going to try it out. 

 04:28

And you're going to have a little bit of a different experience. And then you're just going to keep trying it in your daily life. Okay. So this comes straight out of a workbook that I have created for past holiday workshops that I used to do around this pressure. 

 04:44

And I'm going to figure out how to get that workbook to you. So stay tuned for that. So step number one is your job to do. You have to pause. You can't stop people pleasing if you don't know what you want. 

 05:01

Because if you don't know what you want, you're just going to default to what everybody else wants. So instead of defaulting to the holiday you think you are quote unquote supposed to have, I want you to pause and ask yourself three questions. 

 05:14

Number one, what would make this holiday season meaningful for me? Question number two, who do I want to connect with? And question number three, what values matter to me most right now? And that can be gathering specific. 

 05:36

If I choose to go to a work holiday party, what would make that meaningful for me? Who do I want to connect with at that work gathering? And what values to me matter most at that work gathering? Family gathering, same questions. 

 05:52

What would make it meaningful? Who do I want to connect with? And what values do I think are important that really need to come to the forefront during that particular gathering? By doing a little bit of this thinking beforehand, we can actually make decisions that will get us the outcome that we want. 

 06:13

So for example, last year, what mattered most to me during my Thanksgiving gathering was that I got to spend time with my college-age kids and that I didn't have to contribute to a lot of the cooking and cleaning up. 

 06:27

And so answering those questions ahead of time was what allowed me to make the decisions that I did that made last Thanksgiving my most meaningful Thanksgiving yet. And so if you could only prioritize three things this season, what would they be? 

 06:47

That's another way of kind of scaling down because I know each of you are looking at possibly a mountain of other people's expectations, a mountain of things that you've done in the past, all the decorating, all the cooking, all the shopping, right? 

 07:02

And it's not that those things are bad. It's that when we aren't specific about what we want, what we, what you want, we're going to default to what everybody else wants. So step number one is to pause and answer those questions. 

 07:17

Step number two is to predict. Every holiday choice has an emotion attached to it. And avoiding discomfort is what fuels people pleasing. So if I choose, let's go back to the choices I made last year for my Thanksgiving gathering, that I want to prioritize people over food, what that means is I might get some questions about why we're having non-traditional, easier to make food or why. 

 07:47

And actually what I did last year was I just asked for help and my brother-in-law stepped in and he made almost the entire Thanksgiving dinner with some help from kids. I didn't do a thing, but it wasn't until I knew what I wanted and I was willing to feel uncomfortable asking for it that I got that great Thanksgiving that we had last year. 

 08:10

So step number two is really just about predicting the discomfort that you're going to feel when you narrow it down, when you prioritize what you want. There's going to be some discomfort there. There is no version of the holidays that doesn't include uncomfortable emotions. 

 08:32

Because right now, you're the one feeling most of the discomfort because you're doing all the cooking, the planning, the cleaning, the scheduling, the shopping, the wrapping. See what I mean? Like you're carrying all of that discomfort right now. 

 08:45

And so in this new version of the holidays, you are choosing to switch to a different kind of discomfort where you feel maybe a little guilty that you're not offering the 14 course Thanksgiving meal that includes all of your family favorites and traditional foods. 

 09:02

That is a choice you can make because the discomfort of overextending yourself, that's one type of discomfort that happens when we say yes to everything. And when we say no, you might have to deal with the possible discomfort of knowing you're disappointing people or knowing that they were wishing things were different. 

 09:23

But this particular step stops this fantasy idea that there's a perfect painless option because you've just been paying the full price of the discomfort. And so by narrowing it a little bit and by putting some of what you want into the holiday, it spreads that around a little bit. 

 09:41

Step number three, you're going to plan. You're going to choose your discomfort on purpose and you are going to identify specifically where you feel the pressure to overextend yourself. Write down the changes you want to make. 

 09:58

Write down and decide what support you will need and what conversations need to happen. And if you need to script the words, you're going to want to use the say what you want to say process. And I have a whole podcast episode just on how to do that. 

 10:16

So I'm going to give you some example phrases right now. You might say, you know what, I'm going to keep the holidays a little more simple this year. Or, you know what, I'm not able to host, but I'd love to bring a dish. 

 10:30

Or thanks for understanding. Rest is really a priority for me this season. Or my priority this Thanksgiving dinner is really connecting with so-and-so or really spending some time doing such and such. 

 10:44

Once you identify what you want and identify the changes and support you need, write it down and put it into words. Then you're going to spend a little bit of time letting your nervous system process and practice whatever new discomfort you're going to step into. 

 11:06

Because if you don't practice and process that emotion, that's when we abandon the plan. So what that means is you're going to notice how it feels in your body to think about putting your new holiday plan into motion. 

 11:23

You're going to connect with your body, hands on your chest, if you don't have anywhere else that feels really good. And you're just going to breathe in and out intentionally and notice, oh my gosh, I'm feeling really nervous because I've told everybody that I'm not going to do a big Thanksgiving dinner anymore because I'm prioritizing connection with my college kids. 

 11:46

I'm noticing I'm feeling really nervous about this asking for the kind of help that I want preparing the dinner. I'm noticing some guilt coming up. And you're just going to give yourself a chance before you even have any of these conversations, give yourself a chance to feel it on your own, hands on your body, love and generosity, and talk to yourself with compassion. 

 12:11

I'm right here with you. Gosh, that makes so much sense that you're feeling nervous about this. You know what? You're not alone in this. I'm going to be right here with you and I'm listening. Your nervous system has to feel supported if you're going to say new things, right? 

 12:28

Make new decisions, set new boundaries, or create new traditions. And it really matters that you take the time to do that behind the scenes first. The next step, you're going to do some mental rehearsal, right? 

 12:43

I want you to visualize yourself in the holiday that you want. Mental rehearsal is one of the most powerful tools for changing habits. I want you to see yourself prioritizing. Let's go back to the Thanksgiving example I've been using. 

 13:03

So I want to picture myself asking for help. I want to just let that discomfort and that guilt be there. I want to picture myself intentionally making choices to spend time with the people that I want. 

 13:18

And then I'm going to rehearse it like a movie so my brain can stop resisting the change and my body gets a chance to feel the emotions that need to happen so that I can actually say and do things differently. 

 13:37

So when you're watching this movie, you're seeing yourself having the holiday you want. You're seeing yourself saying the hard things, the different things, feeling the emotion and staying connected. 

 13:50

That is the behind the scenes work. And then the last step is you just got to say the words. I'm so happy that we get together for Thanksgiving. And this year, I don't want to do all of the cooking and cleaning up. 

 14:04

What can we do about that? Or I'm so happy you're all coming home for Thanksgiving. I want to make sure that I spend some time one-on-one with you. How can we make that happen? Because saying those words, that's actually the last step after we take really good care of ourselves behind the scenes. 

 14:24

So hopefully this will give you some holiday clarity. Pausing, predicting, planning, and then processing those emotions, and then all before you say that will really help you create connection without self-betrayal, which is where we end up feeling resentful and angry that I'm doing it again this Christmas or this Thanksgiving or this Hanukkah or whatever, just like I did last year. 

 14:49

And we want to break the cycle of having holidays that don't feel fulfilling where we feel like we end up just putting on a holiday for someone else. So you deserve a holiday that feels like you. And if you want the workbook that I mentioned, go ahead and just send me an email so that you can do this work for yourself behind the scenes. 

 15:14

So that when we get to New Year's Day and beyond, you look back at a holiday season that was deeply fulfilling and deeply impactful for you and your loved ones. Thanks for listening. I'll see you next week.

Episode 138 - Grief Isn’t Linear: Learning to Carry What You’ve Lost with Krista St-Germain

Many of us know that grief isn’t linear, yet so much of what we’re taught still has us trying to get it “right.” In this conversation, I’m joined by Krista St-Germain, life coach, grief guide for widows, and host of The Widowed Mom Podcast. Krista shares how she helps women navigate grief with self-compassion, gentleness, and kindness, and stop making themselves wrong for what they feel. This episode isn’t just for those who’ve lost a spouse, but for anyone navigating loss and learning not to “fix” their feelings, but to create more capacity to hold them. Here’s what we cover:

• Why grief can’t be defined by the familiar “stages” and why it doesn’t end with acceptance

• How healing comes from increasing your capacity to support yourself, not from trying to change what you feel

• What secondary losses look like and how they reveal the ongoing nature of grief

• How to stop making yourself wrong for what you feel and practice meeting your emotions with compassion instead

• Why we sometimes feel uncomfortable around grief and how to show up for others in a way that is truly helpful

• How mentioning someone’s loss shows you remember and why that can mean so much

• The importance of normalizing sadness and modeling healthy grief, especially for children



Find Krista here:

https://www.coachingwithkrista.com/happier-holidays-for-widowed-moms/ 

https://www.coachingwithkrista.com/podcast/

https://www.instagram.com/lifecoachkrista/ 

Find Sara here:

https://sarafisk.coach

https://pages.sarafisk.coach/difficultconversations

https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/

https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/

https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach

https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333

What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Book a Free Consult

Transcript

Sara Bybee Fisk 00:58

True story, Krista St-Germain, you are one of my very most favorite people on the planet. If you're watching a little clip of this, we match today, so I feel like there's...

Krista St-Germain 01:09
Well, it's so ironic because you are one of my favorite people on the planet. So it works.

Sara Bybee Fisk 01:15

It works for us. Krista, we've had a couple of conversations before. One on this podcast about how helpful you were to me during a time of intense grief and how much coaching helped me. You're a coach for a living. You work with women who have recently lost partners. What do you want people to know about, like, why were you drawn to that? Why do you do that work?

Krista St-Germain 01:39

Well, yeah, I mean, I wasn't, it wasn't part of any sort of long plan. No. So my husband died, right? So in 2016, swimmingly life was going swimmingly. And then we took this trip and we came back from that trip. And on the way back, he was trying to change a flat tire on my car and was hit by a drunk driver and he died, you know, less than a day later.So I didn't really even have grief on the purview at all until I just had my own grief experience. And so much of that was so much harder than it needed to be. And there was a lot more suffering than there needed to be, because what I later learned was that, you know, what I thought I understood about grief was pretty outdated and not very helpful. And so really it just came from this idea that if I could help people with that, they could have an easier experience. I had no idea that the five stages of grief wasn't the way that grief went. I really thought that's what it was going to be like. And, you know, there's a lot, a lot of other things that I learned too, but yeah, that's why I just wanted people to have better experiences.

Sara Bybee Fisk 02:52
So interesting because, man, we humans love some stages, don't we?

Krista St-Germain 02:56

Well, yeah. I mean, I didn't get that because it would be nice. It totally would be nice.

Sara Bybee Fisk 03:01

Yeah. Yeah. It was very linear. You complete stage one, then you go to stage two, then stage three, you can have a sense of like, I'm making progress, this makes sense. I really understand it. How do you think it impacted you to think that there were stages and then to then realize, oh, maybe it doesn't work like this?

Krista St-Germain 03:27

Well, I definitely felt some resistance to the idea that it wouldn't work like that because if it, if there is no end place called acceptance, then what is there? What does that mean? What does that look like? And so it just felt a little too wide open.You know, I would have preferred that it be clearly defined and objective and it kind of, well, it was not super comfortable for me. And also personally, I was the type of person who wanted to get the A, you know, and be the star in the class. And I kind of went into grief, like I'm, I'm going to show them, like I'm going to, I'm going to do this and, and it's going to be the best it's ever been done. And I'm going to read the books and do the things. And, and so that was kind of disappointing too, because that was where I had found safety in the past was kind of that performative, validated sense. And it just wasn't available. So fairly uncomfortable.

Sara Bybee Fisk 04:24

Yeah, and I just can't help but think about like grief itself is this unwieldy, it feels endless, it feels for a lot of people, I know it felt like this for me, just like this black pool of bottomlessness that once I go in there, I'm never coming out. And so if there isn't this place called acceptance where I just get to go and that's the end of it, those two things together, like there's no stages where I'm just going to get to some kind of quantifiable clearly defined end, that would make grief a lot easier, I think, to at least conceptually go into because you're like, okay, there's this end to it.I'm almost to the end, I'm getting there. And so if there isn't the end of it, what is there?

Krista St-Germain 05:18

Yeah, I think there's a capacity that gets built. There's a capacity to carry it. There's a capacity to feel it. There's a capacity to think about it with intention to decide who you want to be in it. And there's an integration that happens. So we go from not, not from being sad to being grateful or sad to being happy, but we go from being sad and

believing that we'll fall into the pit of sadness and never come out to, to realizing that, Oh, I actually can allow the sadness to be there because it will always be, but we kind of develop a relationship with it, make peace with it. And I do think it gets less intense over time, typically. And then we also go from a what the hell even happened to me. And I am completely powerless in this to recognizing that, yes, there are many things I'm powerless about, but also I get to choose what I want to think about this, what I want to make it mean in my life and who I want to be. Given that it happened, I get to use what I went through as a way to kind of inventory my life and the way that I'm living and make sure I like it. And if I don't align with, you know, what I value, so it can be a still brutal and also a beautiful opportunity to reconnect with what's important to you and make sure that you're living what matters to you.

Sara Bybee Fisk 06:49

I think that is really beautiful, especially because grief usually happens because of something that you didn't choose. This thing that I didn't choose has now changed my life forever. And I do think it makes a lot of sense that there's a feeling of maybe powerlessness or what the fuck? Or just like how did this happen? And so to be able to find a place even in that where there's a choice, deciding who I want to be, having some intention about even how I think about it, that's such a beautiful place to even think about getting to. And I think a lot of the women that I work with who are experiencing grief, it actually brings out at first a lot of their people pleasing tendencies like performing and pretending and overdoing as a way to cope with it when they're still in that powerlessness of it.

Krista St-Germain 08:02

Oh, 100%. And yeah, I think about conversations I've had with clients, especially clients who have been in like higher control faiths. Oh, the performative nature, the, the, I remember somebody telling me a story about having somebody from their ward over to the house. It was like someone in leadership and I don't remember the position. And I mean, her husband had just died and it was all about is the house clean enough and what are they going to think and you know, holding it together.And just the Ike, you could just feel the amount of pressure that was in her body of trying to make sure that other people were, were pleased with how she was grieving. And that's pretty sadly common.

Sara Bybee Fisk 08:47

Yeah. I'm thinking about conversations that I've had with clients who are in grief where, you know, this performing or pretending or like we just, we just got to keep going, got to keep marching on. And a lot of times it actually just amplifies all of kind of the

freneticness because there's this grief underneath, right? Kind of this like constant underground movement of grief. And then they just try and cover it up and cover it up and cover it up and cover it up with a clean house, with being put together so they look like they're grieving well or showing up for their kids with lots of activities and distractions and all of this from a place of like, I think this is the right thing to do. I think this is helpful.I think my children need to know that there's still things, you know, to live for if their father has passed away or I think my children still need to know that there's things to live for if we are no longer going to the same church we used to go to or if there's been some other kind of loss in the family. And so it ends up creating just this soup of pressure and exhaustion and overdoing because I don't think, well, I'll just ask you, why do you think that happens?

Krista St-Germain 10:17

I mean, I think it's because we're coping and we're doing the best we can with what we know in the moment.Like nobody taught us how to do it any other way. And so it makes a whole lot of sense that we would try to outrun the grief or avoid it with, you know, keeping ourselves busy or distracting or any, any, any other number of things that work temporarily.So it's like a survival strategy.It's a coping strategy. And you know, for a while it might be more helpful than not for some people, but I think most people reach a point where they realize, okay, I, part of me sees that if I don't slow down and let myself feel some of this, I'm going to burn out, it's too much.I'm running myself into the ground.And then there's another part that is quite afraid of slowing down long enough to feel it or deal with whatever's inside.And, but you start to see the scale kind of tipping in one direction where it's like, uh, I better learn this skill.I better figure this out for myself. Otherwise, you know, the trajectory of burnout and depletion is not good. And then, then it's time.

Sara Bybee Fisk 11:24

I also just want to name that I think sometimes, well, first, just in my own experience, I didn't know that what I was feeling was grief, right? I think with the loss of a spouse, that's very obvious. With other losses, it's a little less obvious about why I have this feeling that, you know, maybe feels a little sad, but I shouldn't be feeling it because, like, in some settings, grief makes a lot of sense. Like, somebody died. Grief, yes. But I think other types of losses, we, it's like the grief is a little harder to identify. Does that make sense?

Krista St-Germain 12:03

Yeah, it totally does. So there's the, you know, someone dying as bereavement, a type of grief. Then there's the broader definition of grief. So a natural human response to a perceived loss, perceived loss. So you could be on the tail end of something you absolutely wanted. Like maybe it's been super hard for you to come out to your friends and family and you finally do it and you are so proud of yourself for doing it. And, and so you think, well, I should be happy. I should feel relief and maybe to some extent you do, but then also what you might find you also feel is grief. You might feel grief because you, you, you think you should have done it sooner, you know, or for all the years where you didn't do it and now you're doing it. Right. It wasn't the way you wanted your life to go. And now you see that it did and you lost all of these years where you being, you were being, you know, not your authentic self, right? You expect something to go one way and it goes another and that's so many things, but, but the important part is that to you, it feels like a loss.

Sara Bybee Fisk 13:16

And I think we're that, I love that you said it that way because I think that for a lot of like my life, people outside of me told me what was valid and not valid, right? I had all of these kind of external authorities and I think a lot of women can kind of identify with like needing to check with someone else. Is this a valid loss for me to feel bad about? Is this, am I allowed to feel sad about this? Because there is such a habit, a way of life of just making sure that it's okay with other people that I feel this way.

Krista St-Germain 13:54

Isn't that wild that we're taught that? That's crazy. It's wild and it makes me sad and angry.

Sara Bybee Fisk 14:02

It does. It does. And I think that the needing to check with someone else to see if it's okay that I feel this way just adds another layer of separation from it, anxiety about it. And what I would say, and I'm just interested in any of your thoughts is that if I feel like this is a sad thing, it gets to be a sad thing and nobody else has to agree with me.

Krista St-Germain 14:30

100%. Sometimes people will say like, what's the thing you really want people to hear? And that's it for me is like, if you could just not ever make yourself wrong for how you feel. I mean, that would solve so many of the challenges that we have, especially as

women, we feel something and we make ourselves wrong for it or we feel something and we don't believe it's okay until somebody else says it is. Or we feel something and we think, well, it was okay for me to feel it for a certain amount of time, but I've passed that time. And so now it's not okay. Now it's a sign of dysfunction or me having done something wrong or something being wrong with me.

Sara Bybee Fisk 15:08

Yes. And I see that with grief, right? Like this thing happened x number of years ago, I should be over it in a different place.

Krista St-Germain 15:20

Yeah. Accepting. And if I were accepting, I wouldn't feel sad or I wouldn't have feelings about it, which is ridiculous. Grief is the natural human response to a perceived loss and we can't go back and undo the loss and we're always going to have a response to it. Doesn't it then make sense that we would always have feelings about it? Yeah. So we're not trying to change the feelings that we have about it. We're trying to create a greater capacity to support ourselves when those feelings are present so that we can have an easier experience of them and the energy can shift and move. And secondary losses will keep happening forever. Right. And a lot of times we can't plan for them. And so if we're trying to measure our success in grief based on how we feel and we're buying into the idea that we're supposed to feel the emotions on the higher end of the scale, but not the ones on the lower end of the scale, well, then we have no space to have secondary loss experiences, which are such a huge part of grief for most people. It doesn't make sense.

Sara Bybee Fisk 16:21

Yeah, give me an example of a secondary loss and what you mean by feeling the feelings of the higher end and lower end.

Krista St-Germain 16:28

Okay. Yeah. So second, so the primary losses, you know, for my clients that their spouse died for somebody else, it could be whatever the main loss is. So let's say somebody didn't want to lose a job, right? They wanted to be in that space and they lost that job. That would be the primary loss.A secondary loss would be now I don't get to go to lunch with that one coworker that I love or our relationship changed because I don't get to see them every day. So that loss, that secondary loss wouldn't have happened without the primary loss having happened. And the thing about secondary losses is that

for most people it's experienced kind of as a death by a thousand paper cuts because yeah, the primary loss, we expect that one will hurt and other people give us support around that hurt. But then we keep coming across scenarios in life that are secondary, but still involve grief. So, okay, the spouse died. Now it's wedding day. Spouse isn't there, right? It's the birth of a grandchild spouse isn't there. It's all the things that keep happening where in our mind and in our heart, they should be there and they aren't, or it shouldn't have been this way. And it is. And so that's, those are secondary losses.

Sara Bybee Fisk 17:41

I'm so glad that you said that, because I think that when we don't understand not making ourselves wrong for whatever that we're feeling, you get to the wedding day of your daughter and spouse isn't there. And instead of allowing what you're feeling to just be right, you beat yourself up. It's been 30 years or why am I like, I need to focus and be happy. What's wrong with me? We're doing this.

Krista St-Germain 18:10

Yeah, sometimes it's not even just the day of right. It's all the lead up of worry about, you know, I'm going to be a burden to people. I'm going to be a downer. I don't want, you know, it's so-and-so special day. I don't want to bring them down.I don't, we associate a display of emotion with some sort of character weakness or flaw, which is also so sad.

Sara Bybee Fisk 18:32

Yes, and that brings up something I want to get into in just a minute. But before we go there, one of the things that I think is misunderstood about not ever making yourself wrong for how you feel is that that is not the same thing as saying, I want to stay in this feeling or that this feeling is okay.Or it's like somehow I live here now. You can not make yourself wrong for how you're feeling and still learn how to choose how you show up in that feeling. Choose to be intentional in how you act. Like for example, if I'm super angry with my husband, I don't want to do this. If I'm angry, then making myself wrong is the only way I know how to get myself out of it.

Krista St-Germain 19:32
But it really doesn't even work.

Sara Bybee Fisk 19:33

It really doesn't even work.

Krista St-Germain 19:37

Yeah. Because then it's still there. You know, so we just might cover it up or switch gears, but really it's, it didn't actually go away. It didn't get digested.

Sara Bybee Fisk 19:51

So how do you help clients learn how to not ever make themselves wrong for how they feel?

Krista St-Germain 19:59

I mean, I don't, well, I don't know that I, anybody's bat in a hundred here. Yeah. Um, because we're humans and so perfection maybe doesn't need to be the goal. But it is a lot of practicing of just noticing the subtle ways that I make myself wrong and then like, right. Noticing it and then being prepared in advance with something that helps me kind of write that. So of course, like my favorite thing and I say it in my hand just goes to my heart. And it's like, no, of course, of course I feel this way. Of course, this is what's going on. Not to say that it will always be, but it makes so much sense that it is. Right. So however it is that I'm feeling, if we can make it make sense and then treat ourselves like it makes sense, that helps.

Sara Bybee Fisk 20:52

And then, weirdly enough, this is the counterintuitive part. The feeling almost relaxes its grip just a tiny bit. And I find that that's the space that I need to be able to decide how do I want to show up here? Because when I'm in the grip of it, and it's really tight, and I'm fighting it or trying to distract myself from it, it's like I don't even have the space to even be with myself to ask myself, okay, you're angry. How do you want to show up here? What would feel good right now?

Krista St-Germain 21:28

For me, it's, it's, yeah, it's space. It's cognitive ability. Like I can't even really get clarity on what's going on, let alone decide who I want to be in it. If the emotion is super intense, I need a way to make sure that I feel safe in my body and I need a way to, to normalize what I'm feeling and let it, let it flow through.So, you know, tapping is a huge

tool that I tend to gravitate towards. And, and what I love about it is that, well, I mean, I love so many things about it, but one of the things I really love about it is that as you're speaking, you are normalizing what you feel and saying it and, and following it up with a statement that is accepting of how you feel. And then that energy gets to shift and move and you can think again, and you can decide then now, now what, and who do I want to be? And what do I want next? And it feels completely different than trying to white knuckle your way through talking yourself out.

Sara Bybee Fisk 22:30

And you're talking about EFT, emotion, freedom, tapping. We both have our favorite tapping practitioner, Melanie Faye. We love some Melanie Faye. We love some Melanie Faye.So if tapping is, if you're curious about that, check out Melanie Faye, F-A-Y. When you were talking about the secondary losses and kind of how they stack up and the wedding and kind of that scenario, one of the things that came to my mind is how often I am with someone who's in grief and I feel like I don't know what to say sometimes. And I think we all want to be of comfort. We all want to be loving, well, maybe not everybody, but I think the people listening to this podcast want to. And so what is it about our experience of grief, of other people's grief that makes it so uncomfortable? And then how do we actually show up for other people in a way that is helpful? I just remember I just read a blog post by a woman who just lost her wife and she said, please do not ask me, how are you doing? Please do not ask me that. It's such a hard question. And so first of all, what is it about it that makes it so uncomfortable for us? And then how do we show up for people we love?

Krista St-Germain 24:01

Yeah, actually just recorded an episode of my podcast, um, called what to say and what not to say to a new widow. And it has blown me away the feedback that I'm getting on it because it is such a struggle that people have.And it's such a frustration when they are the one in grief, um, to, to have so many strange things that are usually well intentioned, you know, be said to them. So some, some general ideas. I think one, we weren't taught. Nobody helped us, right? So how we're expected to exercise a muscle that never got developed. It's such an unfair ask. So we should show ourselves some grace about that. We also have been taught to believe that emotions are problems that need to be fixed. So we often don't have a very big capacity to feel uncomfortable or to be with somebody else who feels uncomfortable. We perceive that as a problem and we have a writing reflex that says, I need to make them feel better. I can't feel good until they feel better or something has gone wrong if they don't feel good. Many of the things that people say that are received as dismissive come from that space. They're in a better place. At least they're no longer suffering. You're young. You'll find someone else be grateful for the time that you had. At least you know, know what love is like all of these things that I

know the look on your face is priceless. People mean well, but wow, you know, so if we could come from the approach that says feelings aren't problems to be fixed, they're just experiences to be allowed or witnessed and we could be with someone as they feel, however it is they feel because we aren't deciding that it should be some other way. That's what most people respond well to. It's just someone who's not, who doesn't believe they're broken and isn't trying to fix them, who believes that no, this is what grief is like. And of course, and while I'm so sorry and I love you, this sucks and I'm not going to try to take it away from you or minimize it or make you find some sort of silver lining because it just doesn't feel right.

Sara Bybee Fisk 26:17

I think, hopefully, I've never said it. I mean, who knows? Back in my super religious days, I think I heard a lot of crazy things like God needed them in heaven and that kind of thing. I think where I kind of get tripped up is I want the right words that are not going to make it worse or not going to remind them of something painful. And it just feels, yeah, it feels...

Krista St-Germain 26:44

Yeah. I think we want to, I think we want to reframe that and say that they, your words about their loss did not remind them. They did not forget. Your words remind them that you did not forget. And typically that is well received because they are probably feeling much more alone in their grief than you expect that they are.And they might be looking like they're doing really good and, you know, they're putting on the brave face or they look okay. And so it's easy to think, well, they're doing so great. I don't, I don't want to remind them. No, no, they didn't forget, but they might think that you did.

Sara Bybee Fisk 27:24

I chuckled for just a second, because when you said, Oh, no, they didn't forget, it was kind of like, yeah, like, I like I could, like, I would think that my words would suddenly just remind them out of the blue of this horrible thing that's happened.

Krista St-Germain 27:35

I used to think the same thing too though. So, you know, I think that's a pretty human thing. And I also encourage, if we're talking about somebody who actually died, I encourage people to say that person's name, you know, bring them up. Because again, it's a way of saying, I didn't forget and showing interest.People typically like to talk about,

not universally, but often they like to talk about their person or tell stories. What were they like? Or what would they tell me a funny story? Or if there's a moment where it reminds you of that person, yeah, say it. That used to happen to me all the time at work because Hugo and I worked together. And so everybody at work knew him. Some of them had worked with him for 10 years longer than me. And there would be the perfect moment where they could crack a Hugo joke, but you could see the hesitation, right? Because they're afraid of hurting me. And so I just decided, okay, maybe I need to crack the joke. Maybe I need to bring it up. And then it's like, okay, you know, now that's what she wants. She wants to talk about him. She wants us to say the obvious thing.

Sara Bybee Fisk 28:42

I love that there's so many things that feel almost counterintuitive because we've been taught, like, don't talk about it, don't say it. But I just had a friend who posted on Facebook about the loss of her dad, who was well known. And she just said, I'd love to hear any memories you have with my dad. I just want to keep all of that alive and present.And so, yeah, they are feeling likely much more alone than we might guess. And I think I love what you said that our words remind them that we haven't forgotten. Yeah. Is there anything that you haven't gotten to say during our conversation that you really want to make sure you include as part of this?

Krista St-Germain 29:23

Well, you know, we had talked a little bit before about showing grief, especially as a parent and how sometimes we have this inclination to hide our grief from our kids. And I get that and I actually had some of that myself and what I've seen in my clients is part of the reason grief is so hard from the get-go is because it wasn't normalized for us. And so then we come into our own grief experience and if we haven't had some good role models of how to actually cry those tears and be okay or do what we need to do to process those feelings, talk about it, you know, be okay, it's not the elephant in the room, then we might think that's the way to do it and without really realizing that we're perpetuating accidentally the cycle that's made our grief hard. And so I think if we can show and be honest, maybe not like tsunami style wailing that might scare a child, but to actually show them that it is okay and healthy to have feelings and to cry and to be sad and to articulate that, you know, if it's a mom, I used to tell my kids all the time, mommy's sad and it's okay to be sad, mommy's crying and it's okay to cry. It's always okay.And I'll be okay. I am okay. And I'm sad. And so if you're worried about doing damage to your kids because you're having an intense grief experience and you're inclined to hide it, I would offer that sometimes more damage is done by hiding it and can we find ways to let them in on it so that we can role model it in healthy, healthy ways. My daughter, she was home for the weekend and we were playing this little card game and the question was something like, when did you first realize that I was human towards a parent? And she

made a comment that it was her walking into the living room and seeing me crying and I was watching a TV show or something and I said, what happened? And she said, well, you said something like what you, you know, like very, you like what you would normally say. And I'm like, Oh God, what's that? What would I normally say? And she was like, well, like, it's okay to cry, you know, like, and I'm like, okay, good. That's what I want to do here. I'm so glad, you know, she's 22, but I'm so glad that back then I normalized that for her because it's obvious, it feels so obvious for her to say it to me now. And if we could do more of that, you know.

Sara Bybee Fisk 31:57

so good. When you're talking about that, it's just bringing up for me. Like when I talk about people pleasers, everyone kind of thinks of the very classic people pleaser who's maybe very high strong and anxious and checking on everybody. Are you okay? Can I get you anything? And I think those, if we're speaking in just broad generalities, that type of person doesn't want their feelings to inconvenience anyone, right? They don't want to have any needs that are inconvenient for anyone or that take up any space or that take up anyone else's time because you're not supposed to do that. You're not supposed to be inconvenient or a burden for anyone.And I think there's another maybe personality profile that is also doing some people pleasing, but it looks very different. They're very strong. They're very armored up and they're like, I don't need anyone. I can do it all myself. I don't need help. I can rely on myself. And they might be more inclined to push those feelings down in the name of being strong, being sturdy, being super resilient because that's kind of the way they've gotten through everything is by only relying on themselves, not needing any other help. And so whether you're listening to this and you feel like I'm more of the strong, independent, armored up, or I'm more of the anxious, checking in on everybody all the time, being able to feel that and to not gloss over those feelings is what is going to be the thing that ultimately counterintuitively helps you feel so much better.

Krista St-Germain 33:40

Yeah, to a certain extent, I still feel myself going through some of that. Enneagram three, I'm not hugely familiar with the Enneagram, but have been using it as a tool lately and just realizing, yeah, a lot of my, you know, validation from others has been because of independence and accomplishment and achievement.And it's not super comfortable to, to be vulnerable and, you know, to, and to find spaces where I feel safe enough to do that. And I, I, the more I see it myself, the more I can see it in others too, you know, I don't think it's

Sara Bybee Fisk 34:17

uncommon at all. No, it's not.Enneagram is a really fascinating way of just kind of learning more about what motivates you, what scares you kind of what, how you like to move through the world, how you like to be seen. And yeah, I'm an Enneagram eight.

Krista St-Germain 34:32 Oh, the challenger.

Sara Bybee Fisk 34:33 Yeah.

Krista St-Germain 34:34
Yes, that doesn't surprise me actually knowing you. Yeah.

Sara Bybee Fisk 34:38 As it's ups and downs.

Krista St-Germain 34:42

Well, I bet, I bet people know, you know, they know what they're going to get around you.

Sara Bybee Fisk 34:48

the time. It's weird though because being an Enneagram eight who is a people pleaser, I think that just created tons of that pretending and performing that we've been talking about.So if people are interested, Krista, in what you've had to say, which is brilliant and you should be interested, take it from me, where can they find out more about you? What do you have coming up?

Krista St-Germain 35:13

Yeah. So I have a podcast as well. It's called the widowed mom podcast. And I realized that people are listening and going, but I'm not a widow. It's totally fine.If they're

interested in learning about grief, you know, just forget the widow part and you can just come and listen for grief also on YouTube with that now these days, and then if you know any widows, I'm doing a free online event on November 18th, it'll be three days, three, three days, three tools that I will teach to help make the holidays easier. I realize we can't really make the holidays easy, but I do believe that the right tools can make them easier and so they can register for that.

Sara Bybee Fisk 35:51

Awesome. All of that will be in the show notes so you can find it there. Krista, you've just been someone who I have relied on for lots of years to be a voice, uh, not just of wisdom, but just like so much compassion. And that's what I hear coming through this is just not ever letting yourself be wrong for what you feel and treating yourself with so much gentleness and kindness. And of course I'm feeling that way with your hands on your chest. And I just really appreciate knowing that you are there as a friend and there as a guide for women who are experiencing a lot of grief over the last.

Krista St-Germain 36:27

But the more, the more I do this work, the more convinced I am that compassion is what we need. 100%.

Sara Bybee Fisk 36:35
Thank you for this conversation.

Krista St-Germain 36:37 Yeah, my pleasure.