June 11, 2023 • 25 mins
Do you ever find yourself resorting to emotional cutoff in relationships? Curious about what's truly driving this behavior? This thought-provoking episode dives into the complex subject of emotional cutoff, enmeshment, self-differentiation, and their impact on our ability to recognize and appreciate our own value, as well as the value of others. We share insights on why people rely on emotional cutoff, the motivations behind it, and whether it's a healthy reaction, while also discussing the importance of acknowledging our inherent worth and ensuring our actions align with it.
Through examining emotional cutoff as a subconscious need to confirm someone's importance in our lives, we explore the unintended numbing effect it can have, rather than fostering a healing connection. Join us as we discuss the value of self-differentiation through compassionate inquiry and the power of holding space for those we struggle with, even if we have to accept something we don't want to. Discover the potential of acceptance to help us better understand our actions and move beyond the numbness of emotional cutoff, freeing ourselves from what holds us back and embracing our full humanity.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Igor (00:10):
Hello and welcome to Dating, marriage and Divorce
Conversations where we analyze,navigate and troubleshoot all
stages of your romantic life.
I'm your host, igor Meistelman,a divorce attorney turned
relationship coach.
Hello everybody and welcomeback to the show.
(00:31):
This episode is inspired by anincredible session I had with a
couple recently, and the topicthat came up was the topic of
emotional cutoff.
Now, what does that mean?
I understand.
If I physically cut somethingoff, or I cut someone off,
(00:51):
whether I do it in a car orwhether I do it emotionally, by
disconnecting from them, i couldmove across the country, i
could block their phone number.
I guess you can call that acutoff.
I want to talk about a muchdeeper concept and try to really
go to a root heart of what itmeans to do a cutoff, and is it
(01:14):
a healthy thing?
Is it an unhealthy thing?
Is it indicative of somethingdeeper that we need to
understand?
Why do people do such things ascutoff, and do we even
recognize when we do them?
Do we realize that when we are,for example, exiting, such as
going on our phone, ontechnology, such as giving
(01:37):
silent treatment I talkedrecently about the Four Horsemen
of the Apocalypse from JohnGottman's materials what is
exactly happening inside of usthat causes us, that brings us
to a place of a cutoff?
What is motivating thisbehavior?
What is it that we're trying toachieve and accomplish by
attempting a cutoff, and isthere a better way?
(02:02):
Should we be doing somethingelse other than cold turkey,
disconnect, bye, bye, see youlater.
You will never hear from meagain.
No, will I hear from you.
Is there a better way?
Well, in order to answer thatquestion, we definitely need to
go to the root, the heart of ahuman experience, as always, as
(02:22):
I always like to do, because themore we can understand that on
that granular level, the more wecan appreciate and understand
what is appropriate to do rightnow.
Is the appropriate thing acutoff, in fact?
Is there an alternative version?
Is there some other approach asto what I should be doing right
now other than a cutoff?
(02:45):
So let's begin with thefollowing concept and it's a
concept that I bring uprepeatedly, and so it must come
up again as the ubiquitous,always present aspect of a
relational world, and thatconcept is, of course,
enmeshment andself-differentiation.
And, of course, for those of uswho are not deeply familiar
with this concept, enmeshmentand self-differentiation are two
(03:08):
signees, twins that seem tonever be able to separate, and
they almost serve as oneindicating existence or lack of
existence of the other.
If I'm enmeshed, what thatmeans in world of relationship
work is that I've struggled withmaintaining my independent
(03:29):
existence.
I struggle recognizing, valuing, believing and cherishing who I
am, what I am and what I bringto the table.
When it comes to being arelational creature, enmeshment
is a good indicator that I amnot in a very clear place as to
(03:49):
who I am, what I am, andtherefore I need in some way to
attach myself to you, and then,through you, i will experience
some sense of value, ofself-worth.
Only through you can Iexperience this, and without you
(04:10):
, i feel something is lacking, Ifeel something is missing, and
so I will do everything possibleto hold on to you, because
through you and throughconnection to you is how I
validate my existence, is how Iexperience value of myself, and
that's why people who are enmeshwill use sentences like you
(04:31):
make me feel amazing, and shemakes me feel special, and he
makes me feel valued.
What about you?
do you have any value of yourown?
That becomes all of a sudden amuch more difficult question to
answer.
What appreciations do you havefor yourself?
That's a very uncomfortablequestion, but if somebody is
(04:54):
appreciating me that I couldspot miles away, can I
appreciate myself Much harder?
conversation, and so on and soforth.
And so the goal is to help usmake our way away from that type
of a measurement and alwayshave a starting point of I have
a fundamental value, i have acertain importance in my
(05:18):
existence.
I am Salam ala Kim.
I'm made in God's image andtherefore there is something
inextricably valuable to me.
So if someone says somethingmean, rude, hurtful, i don't
have to be defined by theirworld.
I don't have to be defined bytheir words.
(05:39):
Not only that, i can evenoperate from a place of
recognition, wonderment,curiosity.
What must be going on in theirworld that causes them or gives
them the need to express thisway, that they have no other way
to express other than this?
And so a person who is enmeshedwith someone else.
(06:01):
Take, for instance, arelationship of a parent and a
child.
If the relationship did notdevelop in a healthy way and
there wasn't built on what wecall a secured attachment, where
parent honored their child,celebrated their child and even
when the child needed to bedisciplined, it was never at the
cost of child's intrinsicinherent value.
(06:22):
You are special, you are verydear to us and we love you
unconditionally.
But what happened is not okay,and so now there's consequences
for your actions, but not in anyway does it compromise,
jeopardize your value as a humanbeing.
Who you are is important, nomatter what we value, no matter
(06:42):
what Happens to be that.
There are consequences for ouractions, because that is part of
living in an adult world, in aworld based on rules and
consequences.
But who you are is valuable, nomatter what and when.
That value is imparted and thechild grows up and becomes an
adult who is comfortableexperimenting, who is
comfortable taking risk,engaging relationships, not
(07:06):
feeling anxiety or worry aboutthe future.
Why is that?
Because that human being italways could find their home in
the following environment I domatter, i am someone, i am
important and when I makemistakes I am loved, no matter
what.
God loves me, my parents loveme, my friends love me, i love
(07:30):
myself, i see value in who I amand my mistakes are just an
opportunity to grow and tobecome more Well.
What happens if I didn't growup with secure attachment?
What if I was judged,criticized, or what if I simply
wasn't seen.
So you can guess now what wouldbe the total reverse of
(07:50):
everything just described.
Now I'm anxious.
Now I'm always worried Willothers love me?
Will others like me?
Will I win respect from others?
What if I do one action and Iwill be judged for it?
That will be a confirmation Iam bad, i am incapable, i am not
(08:13):
deserving, i'm not worthy.
All of this stuff usually willflow out of that type of
upbringing or interactions in mysocial settings or in my
classroom environments.
Maybe there were teachers orclassmates that bullied me, and
in any of these combinations Iexperienced something that left
me feeling and left me believingI'm not deserving, i'm not
(08:37):
worthwhile and therefore Ibetter be very careful.
Now I have to be always on alert, and so now I live with anxiety
.
I'm always worried, and anxietylong enough could become
depression.
And now I experience all thesethings that cause me to be
dysregulated and panic and worryabout my performance,
especially performance in public, and especially my performance
(08:58):
in my relational existence.
How will I be viewed, will I becherished, will I be valued?
How will others see me?
and then becomes an endlessobsession of will I meet their
expectations, will I meetothers' standards Instead of me
setting my own standards,defining them very well and
(09:21):
living only within thoseparameters, of course, subject
to healthy boundaries wheresomething or someone or ideas or
beliefs can enter that I canthink about, analyze and process
, but I don't have to obsessover them, i don't have to let
them take my world captive, idon't have to be captured by
(09:41):
others' beliefs and allow myworld to be held by captive by
those beliefs, and instead Icould live a life where I see
myself and I see you and yourworld can exist and my world can
exist.
And this now very nicely seguesus into discussion about cutoff.
What is a cutoff?
(10:03):
Cutoff essentially happens whenI am so matched with you and
your world signals to me thatsomething is taking a place and
in that reality, either you canexist or I can exist, but we
cannot exist simultaneously andtherefore there's only one way
(10:27):
to survive under that perception, belief or emotional experience
I have to cut you off.
So let's take, for instance, ifI experienced a relationship
with one of my parents that wasdeeply toxic, deeply hurtful,
painful, and now I'm an adultand all I keep saying to myself
(10:48):
is I can't believe this happenedto me and I can't believe the
way I was treated was allowed.
I can't believe God allowedthis.
I can't believe the universeallowed this.
I will find somebody to blamefor why what happened took place
and why I'm now essentiallydamaged goods.
And so what do I do in order tosurvive this deeply painful
(11:13):
reality?
There's only one thing I can doI cut you off for my life.
I erase your number from myphone number.
I block your number.
I tell all my friends andrelatives how I will never speak
to you again and I remindeverybody that I don't want to
deal with you and that if youever reach out to me, good luck
getting hold of me.
I will never answer your phonecalls or your emails or text
(11:34):
messages.
I will ghost you.
Why must I do all this?
and here's the irony Why am Icutting you off?
It might seem like healthy.
Move right, make someseparation from that toxic
person.
Now I want to be very clearabout something.
Here's important caveat Ifsomebody is being physically,
emotionally, psychologicallyabusive, manipulative, and you
(11:57):
need to create physical distancefrom that person, that is
absolutely the right thing to do.
There has to be room todisengage.
There has to be safe space thatI could retreat into and move
away and create space betweenyou and me so that I don't have
to be experiencing victimization, i don't have to feel that I'm
(12:19):
your captive and you get to dowith me whatever you want and
you can mistreat me or abuse mewhenever you want.
It's perfectly okay to createphysical distance.
However, we're not talkingabout physical cut-off, where I
physically distance myself.
We're talking about emotionalcut-off.
What is going on in my innerworld And what goes on in that
(12:41):
world is going to be veryindicative and very helpful to
give us some guiding posts.
Where should my journey continue?
if I am one of those people, ifI find myself committing an
emotional cut-off of someoneelse in my life, why am I doing
this?
What is driving the behavior?
Because the irony will be isthat the more I am cut-off, the
(13:04):
more I am enmeshed with thatperson.
And that's the great paradox.
Because let's think about this,let's unpack that statement.
Why would my cut-off beindication of enmeshment?
Wouldn't it be an indication ofmy independence?
No, it's not, because trueindependence, in terms of being
(13:25):
relational, is when I couldfinally see you and accept that
you are also going through ajourney, accept that you are
going through something and youhave your own history.
You have your own journey thatbrought you to where it brought
you, and so when my parentwasn't able to give me, for
(13:48):
instance, the emotional lovethat I needed or recognition
that I craved so badly, it's notbecause they were waking up in
the morning and saying tothemselves gosh, how do I ruin
my child today.
What would be a good way tocause permanent damage, to
afflict my child?
(14:10):
Now, if a person did live withthat, i first want to say how
sad and sorry I feel for thatperson.
It is truly a sad experience,and that person will need to go
through a certain amount oftherapy and processing and a
real, real, deep journey to beable to free themselves from an
evil that maybe took place, thatbefallen in their life.
(14:32):
But that's not what we'retalking about here.
What I'm discussing now isparents who woke up and
literally did their best, evenwhen they messed up and they
hurt us and they did damage tous, but it was never intentional
damage.
They simply did the best theycould with the tools that they
had available to them.
So how do I relate to a parentlike that?
(14:54):
I still feel hurt.
Are you telling me.
I should just forgive them.
I should try to turn off thatmemory.
Should I delete in some way?
No, exact opposite.
I should walk closer to thatmemory and as I come closer to
that memory, i should also comecloser to realization that the
person who was interacting withus was a human being who was
(15:16):
doing the best they could withthe tools available to them.
And so when I attempt to cutthem off, what I'm actually
cementing in my world is theirpermanent place in my world.
You see, we could cut off, butcut off is just a fancy phrase
for having a numbing effect.
(15:36):
All I did was put a massivebandaid with no vacane on it and
I numbed the wound, but I didno healing.
I did no freeing, no liberating, no unburdening of that wound.
All I did was numb it.
And by numbing that wound, allI do is I actually affirm and
(15:59):
confirm in my subconscious Andfor those who it's a really
severe for in subconscious orunconscious part of ourselves
we're cementing actually howimportant this person is in our
lives and that I simply cannotseparate myself from that person
.
And so all I could do isattempt a cut off.
But that cut off is a statementof affirmation, confirmation
(16:24):
that this person is so importantto my life that the only thing
I could do is attempt to cutthem off.
And so by doing a cut off, bysort of saying you don't exist
anymore, i will not answer yourphone calls anymore, i am
actually cementing in my mindhow important they are, because,
think about it, if I had totake on such a radical step, if
(16:46):
this is what I needed to resortto, i am making statement to
myself how critically importantthey are.
After all, how do we part wayswith people we don't think, who
are not so important?
you know what we do We juststop thinking about them.
But when I have to take acrucial step, such as move
across state lines, i have tocut you out of my phone number.
(17:08):
I have to keep tellingeverybody or mentioning to other
people just how much you're notimportant to me and I will
never speak to you again.
And here, look, i deleted theirnumber and I blog them.
All of these steps are actuallyvotes for just how much this
person is still very significantto me and I cannot live without
(17:29):
them.
And so I have to resort tothese drastic steps because I
have not been able to figure outany other way to create a
healthy differentiation betweenthem and myself.
So what would a journey begin tolook like?
Well, the first step would beself-differentiation.
I could start to practice torecognize their independent
(17:54):
existence.
How do I do that?
Through compassion.
Compassion is the very thing weneed to get this job done.
I can stop and, instead ofspeaking from place of judgment
and from place of criticism, ican speak from a place of
compassionate inquiry.
(18:14):
Why was my parent like this?
Why is my spouse like this?
Why was my former best friendshowing up this way?
Why is that?
all they could think of as away to relate to me was to hurt
me, was to punish me, was totake revenge against me.
Perhaps they're living withsomething in their own life
(18:36):
that's causing them so much painand such a limited ability of
maintaining presence that allthey could think of is to be
hurtful.
They cannot think of any otherway to show up for me, because,
if they could, they would, andso I could now, from that place
of curiosity, allow for them totake on shape, form, life of
(19:01):
existence.
Now they could begin to existfor me, and I could even begin
to ask questions like why didyou do those things?
What is it that you needed?
What question I love asking ishow did it serve you?
What did you achieve by doingthat?
What did it give you or offeryou?
(19:23):
by me needing to experience youthis way, what did you need to
see out of me?
that you wanted to maintain acertain dance, a certain form of
interaction between us, and youfelt that the only way you
could preserve this dance is byshowing up in these painful,
hurtful ways.
(19:43):
How did this serve you?
And here's the cool part Whenwe take the time to really truly
practice seeing that otherperson's humanity, their fragile
state of existence, as theywere, we're actually
subconsciously allowing our ownworld to exist as well.
(20:06):
And so what is one very powerfulway to soothe and comfort our
own world?
You know what that is?
By internally, secretly, awayfrom everybody's eye, holding
space for the other person,especially a person who we
struggle with.
Person we struggle.
(20:26):
Holding space for Person westruggle, honoring, recognizing,
allowing to exist in their ownpain, in their own struggle.
Somehow we need them to alsoremain in a place where they are
demonized, where they'rebelittled in our own eyes, where
we see them with a very myopicvision, only in some narrow
(20:50):
sense can they exist.
You can only be an evil door.
You can only be my abuser.
You can only exist as the onewho mistreated me.
There could be no other qualityin you.
I cannot allow room for yourhumanity.
And if I ask myself, why isthat?
Because if I allow you to behuman, if I allow you to have
(21:12):
your imperfections, what willthat then signify?
What will that leave me with?
If I have to allow you to exist?
And very often what people willdiscover when they think about
these types of deeply, almostexistential questions is they'll
discover then I have to nowaccept.
Maybe something happened to methat I don't want to come to
(21:34):
terms with, maybe the pain Ifelt until now from the way you
treated me.
I never wanted the surface, andso in order for me to truly
allow you to be human, for youto exist, i now have to hold
space for my own humanity, of myown feelings.
What happened, of what it waslike for me around, what
(21:55):
happened?
and I don't want to go there.
I don't want to be vulnerablethat way.
But guess what if we don't gothere?
You know what we do We leave itin the subconscious, but it
lives through us, it interactsthrough us, it talks back to our
relationships through us, andwe are wondering sometimes why
(22:17):
am I having these intensereactions to you?
Why is it that when I'minteracting with my spouse, i
get triggered so easily in thefollowing situations?
Why is it that when thesethings happen, like I just see
the pattern, x happens, i go toY and I immediately have these
types of responses?
Why is this happening?
Well, a big reason it'shappening is precisely because I
(22:40):
have refused or I have failedto acknowledge or notice that
there's some deeply unresolvedpart of me that's still comes
online and instead of meresolving it and bringing it
from the subconscious intoconscious and then be able to do
something about it and what wecall unburdening myself from
(23:01):
whatever it is that I'm holdingand carrying around with me,
instead of doing thisunburdening, instead, what I
choose to do is I continue toenergize its strength.
By doing what?
By saying this person won'texist for me anymore.
Oh yeah, this person hurt me.
Done with them.
They don't exist anymore.
I won't acknowledge them, iwon't say hello, i won't say
(23:22):
goodbye, you don't exist.
Once more problem.
Every time I say that, everytime I encounter that conscious
thought, i actually give anothervote for just how much you
exist, and it's really only theroad through radical forgiveness
, absolute forgiveness andacceptance.
(23:44):
I want to fully accept you and Icould begin by simply saying to
myself why do you do what youdo?
Because this is who you are.
You couldn't be anything else.
This is what you knew, and youserved the world and me and
yourself through the tools thatyou had, and these are the only
(24:04):
tools you had.
This is all you knew.
You had nothing else and yourdisposal, and so you did what
you know best, which is youshowed up in the ways you could,
and I want to now honor thatand recognize it and allow room
for it to exist as it is,because if you could have done
(24:24):
better, you would have, andbecause you didn't, that is the
proof that you couldn't havedone more, and now all I could
do is practice accepting you inyour humanity, accepting you as
who you are.
And that's why that emotionalcut-off is a weapon of choice
for overwhelming percent ofpeople, because in some ways,
(24:47):
it's much easier to settle forthe present numbness than for
the opportunity to go to a veryvulnerable place, feel a lot of
emotion, but then to unburdenand free ourselves from those
things and maybe, just maybe,return with a deep embrace to
those people who we had to cutoff in order for us to exist.
(25:11):
I hope you enjoyed today'sepisode.
Thank you for joining us today.
For questions, comments, topicsyou'd like to hear more about,
or to try our 24 weekrelationship challenge, email us
at relationship reimagined atgmail.
Hello and welcome to Dating, marriage and Divorce
Conversations where we analyze,navigate and troubleshoot all
stages of your romantic life.
I'm your host, igor Meistelman,a divorce attorney turned
relationship coach.
Hello everybody and welcomeback to the show.
(00:31):
This episode is inspired by anincredible session I had with a
couple recently, and the topicthat came up was the topic of
emotional cutoff.
Now, what does that mean?
I understand.
If I physically cut somethingoff, or I cut someone off,
(00:51):
whether I do it in a car orwhether I do it emotionally, by
disconnecting from them, i couldmove across the country, i
could block their phone number.
I guess you can call that acutoff.
I want to talk about a muchdeeper concept and try to really
go to a root heart of what itmeans to do a cutoff, and is it
(01:14):
a healthy thing?
Is it an unhealthy thing?
Is it indicative of somethingdeeper that we need to
understand?
Why do people do such things ascutoff, and do we even
recognize when we do them?
Do we realize that when we are,for example, exiting, such as
going on our phone, ontechnology, such as giving
(01:37):
silent treatment I talkedrecently about the Four Horsemen
of the Apocalypse from JohnGottman's materials what is
exactly happening inside of usthat causes us, that brings us
to a place of a cutoff?
What is motivating thisbehavior?
What is it that we're trying toachieve and accomplish by
attempting a cutoff, and isthere a better way?
(02:02):
Should we be doing somethingelse other than cold turkey,
disconnect, bye, bye, see youlater.
You will never hear from meagain.
No, will I hear from you.
Is there a better way?
Well, in order to answer thatquestion, we definitely need to
go to the root, the heart of ahuman experience, as always, as
(02:22):
I always like to do, because themore we can understand that on
that granular level, the more wecan appreciate and understand
what is appropriate to do rightnow.
Is the appropriate thing acutoff, in fact?
Is there an alternative version?
Is there some other approach asto what I should be doing right
now other than a cutoff?
(02:45):
So let's begin with thefollowing concept and it's a
concept that I bring uprepeatedly, and so it must come
up again as the ubiquitous,always present aspect of a
relational world, and thatconcept is, of course,
enmeshment andself-differentiation.
And, of course, for those of uswho are not deeply familiar
with this concept, enmeshmentand self-differentiation are two
(03:08):
signees, twins that seem tonever be able to separate, and
they almost serve as oneindicating existence or lack of
existence of the other.
If I'm enmeshed, what thatmeans in world of relationship
work is that I've struggled withmaintaining my independent
(03:29):
existence.
I struggle recognizing, valuing, believing and cherishing who I
am, what I am and what I bringto the table.
When it comes to being arelational creature, enmeshment
is a good indicator that I amnot in a very clear place as to
(03:49):
who I am, what I am, andtherefore I need in some way to
attach myself to you, and then,through you, i will experience
some sense of value, ofself-worth.
Only through you can Iexperience this, and without you
(04:10):
, i feel something is lacking, Ifeel something is missing, and
so I will do everything possibleto hold on to you, because
through you and throughconnection to you is how I
validate my existence, is how Iexperience value of myself, and
that's why people who are enmeshwill use sentences like you
(04:31):
make me feel amazing, and shemakes me feel special, and he
makes me feel valued.
What about you?
do you have any value of yourown?
That becomes all of a sudden amuch more difficult question to
answer.
What appreciations do you havefor yourself?
That's a very uncomfortablequestion, but if somebody is
(04:54):
appreciating me that I couldspot miles away, can I
appreciate myself Much harder?
conversation, and so on and soforth.
And so the goal is to help usmake our way away from that type
of a measurement and alwayshave a starting point of I have
a fundamental value, i have acertain importance in my
(05:18):
existence.
I am Salam ala Kim.
I'm made in God's image andtherefore there is something
inextricably valuable to me.
So if someone says somethingmean, rude, hurtful, i don't
have to be defined by theirworld.
I don't have to be defined bytheir words.
(05:39):
Not only that, i can evenoperate from a place of
recognition, wonderment,curiosity.
What must be going on in theirworld that causes them or gives
them the need to express thisway, that they have no other way
to express other than this?
And so a person who is enmeshedwith someone else.
(06:01):
Take, for instance, arelationship of a parent and a
child.
If the relationship did notdevelop in a healthy way and
there wasn't built on what wecall a secured attachment, where
parent honored their child,celebrated their child and even
when the child needed to bedisciplined, it was never at the
cost of child's intrinsicinherent value.
(06:22):
You are special, you are verydear to us and we love you
unconditionally.
But what happened is not okay,and so now there's consequences
for your actions, but not in anyway does it compromise,
jeopardize your value as a humanbeing.
Who you are is important, nomatter what we value, no matter
(06:42):
what Happens to be that.
There are consequences for ouractions, because that is part of
living in an adult world, in aworld based on rules and
consequences.
But who you are is valuable, nomatter what and when.
That value is imparted and thechild grows up and becomes an
adult who is comfortableexperimenting, who is
comfortable taking risk,engaging relationships, not
(07:06):
feeling anxiety or worry aboutthe future.
Why is that?
Because that human being italways could find their home in
the following environment I domatter, i am someone, i am
important and when I makemistakes I am loved, no matter
what.
God loves me, my parents loveme, my friends love me, i love
(07:30):
myself, i see value in who I amand my mistakes are just an
opportunity to grow and tobecome more Well.
What happens if I didn't growup with secure attachment?
What if I was judged,criticized, or what if I simply
wasn't seen.
So you can guess now what wouldbe the total reverse of
(07:50):
everything just described.
Now I'm anxious.
Now I'm always worried Willothers love me?
Will others like me?
Will I win respect from others?
What if I do one action and Iwill be judged for it?
That will be a confirmation Iam bad, i am incapable, i am not
(08:13):
deserving, i'm not worthy.
All of this stuff usually willflow out of that type of
upbringing or interactions in mysocial settings or in my
classroom environments.
Maybe there were teachers orclassmates that bullied me, and
in any of these combinations Iexperienced something that left
me feeling and left me believingI'm not deserving, i'm not
(08:37):
worthwhile and therefore Ibetter be very careful.
Now I have to be always on alert, and so now I live with anxiety
.
I'm always worried, and anxietylong enough could become
depression.
And now I experience all thesethings that cause me to be
dysregulated and panic and worryabout my performance,
especially performance in public, and especially my performance
(08:58):
in my relational existence.
How will I be viewed, will I becherished, will I be valued?
How will others see me?
and then becomes an endlessobsession of will I meet their
expectations, will I meetothers' standards Instead of me
setting my own standards,defining them very well and
(09:21):
living only within thoseparameters, of course, subject
to healthy boundaries wheresomething or someone or ideas or
beliefs can enter that I canthink about, analyze and process
, but I don't have to obsessover them, i don't have to let
them take my world captive, idon't have to be captured by
(09:41):
others' beliefs and allow myworld to be held by captive by
those beliefs, and instead Icould live a life where I see
myself and I see you and yourworld can exist and my world can
exist.
And this now very nicely seguesus into discussion about cutoff.
What is a cutoff?
(10:03):
Cutoff essentially happens whenI am so matched with you and
your world signals to me thatsomething is taking a place and
in that reality, either you canexist or I can exist, but we
cannot exist simultaneously andtherefore there's only one way
(10:27):
to survive under that perception, belief or emotional experience
I have to cut you off.
So let's take, for instance, ifI experienced a relationship
with one of my parents that wasdeeply toxic, deeply hurtful,
painful, and now I'm an adultand all I keep saying to myself
(10:48):
is I can't believe this happenedto me and I can't believe the
way I was treated was allowed.
I can't believe God allowedthis.
I can't believe the universeallowed this.
I will find somebody to blamefor why what happened took place
and why I'm now essentiallydamaged goods.
And so what do I do in order tosurvive this deeply painful
(11:13):
reality?
There's only one thing I can doI cut you off for my life.
I erase your number from myphone number.
I block your number.
I tell all my friends andrelatives how I will never speak
to you again and I remindeverybody that I don't want to
deal with you and that if youever reach out to me, good luck
getting hold of me.
I will never answer your phonecalls or your emails or text
(11:34):
messages.
I will ghost you.
Why must I do all this?
and here's the irony Why am Icutting you off?
It might seem like healthy.
Move right, make someseparation from that toxic
person.
Now I want to be very clearabout something.
Here's important caveat Ifsomebody is being physically,
emotionally, psychologicallyabusive, manipulative, and you
(11:57):
need to create physical distancefrom that person, that is
absolutely the right thing to do.
There has to be room todisengage.
There has to be safe space thatI could retreat into and move
away and create space betweenyou and me so that I don't have
to be experiencing victimization, i don't have to feel that I'm
(12:19):
your captive and you get to dowith me whatever you want and
you can mistreat me or abuse mewhenever you want.
It's perfectly okay to createphysical distance.
However, we're not talkingabout physical cut-off, where I
physically distance myself.
We're talking about emotionalcut-off.
What is going on in my innerworld And what goes on in that
(12:41):
world is going to be veryindicative and very helpful to
give us some guiding posts.
Where should my journey continue?
if I am one of those people, ifI find myself committing an
emotional cut-off of someoneelse in my life, why am I doing
this?
What is driving the behavior?
Because the irony will be isthat the more I am cut-off, the
(13:04):
more I am enmeshed with thatperson.
And that's the great paradox.
Because let's think about this,let's unpack that statement.
Why would my cut-off beindication of enmeshment?
Wouldn't it be an indication ofmy independence?
No, it's not, because trueindependence, in terms of being
(13:25):
relational, is when I couldfinally see you and accept that
you are also going through ajourney, accept that you are
going through something and youhave your own history.
You have your own journey thatbrought you to where it brought
you, and so when my parentwasn't able to give me, for
(13:48):
instance, the emotional lovethat I needed or recognition
that I craved so badly, it's notbecause they were waking up in
the morning and saying tothemselves gosh, how do I ruin
my child today.
What would be a good way tocause permanent damage, to
afflict my child?
(14:10):
Now, if a person did live withthat, i first want to say how
sad and sorry I feel for thatperson.
It is truly a sad experience,and that person will need to go
through a certain amount oftherapy and processing and a
real, real, deep journey to beable to free themselves from an
evil that maybe took place, thatbefallen in their life.
(14:32):
But that's not what we'retalking about here.
What I'm discussing now isparents who woke up and
literally did their best, evenwhen they messed up and they
hurt us and they did damage tous, but it was never intentional
damage.
They simply did the best theycould with the tools that they
had available to them.
So how do I relate to a parentlike that?
(14:54):
I still feel hurt.
Are you telling me.
I should just forgive them.
I should try to turn off thatmemory.
Should I delete in some way?
No, exact opposite.
I should walk closer to thatmemory and as I come closer to
that memory, i should also comecloser to realization that the
person who was interacting withus was a human being who was
(15:16):
doing the best they could withthe tools available to them.
And so when I attempt to cutthem off, what I'm actually
cementing in my world is theirpermanent place in my world.
You see, we could cut off, butcut off is just a fancy phrase
for having a numbing effect.
(15:36):
All I did was put a massivebandaid with no vacane on it and
I numbed the wound, but I didno healing.
I did no freeing, no liberating, no unburdening of that wound.
All I did was numb it.
And by numbing that wound, allI do is I actually affirm and
(15:59):
confirm in my subconscious Andfor those who it's a really
severe for in subconscious orunconscious part of ourselves
we're cementing actually howimportant this person is in our
lives and that I simply cannotseparate myself from that person
.
And so all I could do isattempt a cut off.
But that cut off is a statementof affirmation, confirmation
(16:24):
that this person is so importantto my life that the only thing
I could do is attempt to cutthem off.
And so by doing a cut off, bysort of saying you don't exist
anymore, i will not answer yourphone calls anymore, i am
actually cementing in my mindhow important they are, because,
think about it, if I had totake on such a radical step, if
(16:46):
this is what I needed to resortto, i am making statement to
myself how critically importantthey are.
After all, how do we part wayswith people we don't think, who
are not so important?
you know what we do We juststop thinking about them.
But when I have to take acrucial step, such as move
across state lines, i have tocut you out of my phone number.
(17:08):
I have to keep tellingeverybody or mentioning to other
people just how much you're notimportant to me and I will
never speak to you again.
And here, look, i deleted theirnumber and I blog them.
All of these steps are actuallyvotes for just how much this
person is still very significantto me and I cannot live without
(17:29):
them.
And so I have to resort tothese drastic steps because I
have not been able to figure outany other way to create a
healthy differentiation betweenthem and myself.
So what would a journey begin tolook like?
Well, the first step would beself-differentiation.
I could start to practice torecognize their independent
(17:54):
existence.
How do I do that?
Through compassion.
Compassion is the very thing weneed to get this job done.
I can stop and, instead ofspeaking from place of judgment
and from place of criticism, ican speak from a place of
compassionate inquiry.
(18:14):
Why was my parent like this?
Why is my spouse like this?
Why was my former best friendshowing up this way?
Why is that?
all they could think of as away to relate to me was to hurt
me, was to punish me, was totake revenge against me.
Perhaps they're living withsomething in their own life
(18:36):
that's causing them so much painand such a limited ability of
maintaining presence that allthey could think of is to be
hurtful.
They cannot think of any otherway to show up for me, because,
if they could, they would, andso I could now, from that place
of curiosity, allow for them totake on shape, form, life of
(19:01):
existence.
Now they could begin to existfor me, and I could even begin
to ask questions like why didyou do those things?
What is it that you needed?
What question I love asking ishow did it serve you?
What did you achieve by doingthat?
What did it give you or offeryou?
(19:23):
by me needing to experience youthis way, what did you need to
see out of me?
that you wanted to maintain acertain dance, a certain form of
interaction between us, and youfelt that the only way you
could preserve this dance is byshowing up in these painful,
hurtful ways.
(19:43):
How did this serve you?
And here's the cool part Whenwe take the time to really truly
practice seeing that otherperson's humanity, their fragile
state of existence, as theywere, we're actually
subconsciously allowing our ownworld to exist as well.
(20:06):
And so what is one very powerfulway to soothe and comfort our
own world?
You know what that is?
By internally, secretly, awayfrom everybody's eye, holding
space for the other person,especially a person who we
struggle with.
Person we struggle.
(20:26):
Holding space for Person westruggle, honoring, recognizing,
allowing to exist in their ownpain, in their own struggle.
Somehow we need them to alsoremain in a place where they are
demonized, where they'rebelittled in our own eyes, where
we see them with a very myopicvision, only in some narrow
(20:50):
sense can they exist.
You can only be an evil door.
You can only be my abuser.
You can only exist as the onewho mistreated me.
There could be no other qualityin you.
I cannot allow room for yourhumanity.
And if I ask myself, why isthat?
Because if I allow you to behuman, if I allow you to have
(21:12):
your imperfections, what willthat then signify?
What will that leave me with?
If I have to allow you to exist?
And very often what people willdiscover when they think about
these types of deeply, almostexistential questions is they'll
discover then I have to nowaccept.
Maybe something happened to methat I don't want to come to
(21:34):
terms with, maybe the pain Ifelt until now from the way you
treated me.
I never wanted the surface, andso in order for me to truly
allow you to be human, for youto exist, i now have to hold
space for my own humanity, of myown feelings.
What happened, of what it waslike for me around, what
(21:55):
happened?
and I don't want to go there.
I don't want to be vulnerablethat way.
But guess what if we don't gothere?
You know what we do We leave itin the subconscious, but it
lives through us, it interactsthrough us, it talks back to our
relationships through us, andwe are wondering sometimes why
(22:17):
am I having these intensereactions to you?
Why is it that when I'minteracting with my spouse, i
get triggered so easily in thefollowing situations?
Why is it that when thesethings happen, like I just see
the pattern, x happens, i go toY and I immediately have these
types of responses?
Why is this happening?
Well, a big reason it'shappening is precisely because I
(22:40):
have refused or I have failedto acknowledge or notice that
there's some deeply unresolvedpart of me that's still comes
online and instead of meresolving it and bringing it
from the subconscious intoconscious and then be able to do
something about it and what wecall unburdening myself from
(23:01):
whatever it is that I'm holdingand carrying around with me,
instead of doing thisunburdening, instead, what I
choose to do is I continue toenergize its strength.
By doing what?
By saying this person won'texist for me anymore.
Oh yeah, this person hurt me.
Done with them.
They don't exist anymore.
I won't acknowledge them, iwon't say hello, i won't say
(23:22):
goodbye, you don't exist.
Once more problem.
Every time I say that, everytime I encounter that conscious
thought, i actually give anothervote for just how much you
exist, and it's really only theroad through radical forgiveness
, absolute forgiveness andacceptance.
(23:44):
I want to fully accept you and Icould begin by simply saying to
myself why do you do what youdo?
Because this is who you are.
You couldn't be anything else.
This is what you knew, and youserved the world and me and
yourself through the tools thatyou had, and these are the only
(24:04):
tools you had.
This is all you knew.
You had nothing else and yourdisposal, and so you did what
you know best, which is youshowed up in the ways you could,
and I want to now honor thatand recognize it and allow room
for it to exist as it is,because if you could have done
(24:24):
better, you would have, andbecause you didn't, that is the
proof that you couldn't havedone more, and now all I could
do is practice accepting you inyour humanity, accepting you as
who you are.
And that's why that emotionalcut-off is a weapon of choice
for overwhelming percent ofpeople, because in some ways,
(24:47):
it's much easier to settle forthe present numbness than for
the opportunity to go to a veryvulnerable place, feel a lot of
emotion, but then to unburdenand free ourselves from those
things and maybe, just maybe,return with a deep embrace to
those people who we had to cutoff in order for us to exist.
(25:11):
I hope you enjoyed today'sepisode.
Thank you for joining us today.
For questions, comments, topicsyou'd like to hear more about,
or to try our 24 weekrelationship challenge, email us
at relationship reimagined atgmail.
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