May 15, 2025 • 48 mins
Welcome back Steve Oskard, talking with us about how to author your own growth. Steve works with Sexological Bodywork & Somatic Sex Education, over 30 years Steve has been guiding clients to explore how they hold their life story in their bodies. Steve works with clients to discover how we hold shame and trauma in our bodies. He works with clients to explore touch, movement, dialog, breath, sound and awareness as a way to find freedom in their sexual expression and in the whole of their lives.
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Fifty Shades of Bullshit is broadcast live Thursdays at 4PM PT on K4HD Radio - Hollywood Talk Radio (www.k4hd.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com). Fifty Shades of Bullshit TV Show is viewed on Talk 4 TV (www.talk4tv.com).
Fifty Shades of Bullshit Podcast is also available on Talk 4 Media (www.talk4media.com), Talk 4 Podcasting (www.talk4podcasting.com), iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, Audible, and over 100 other podcast outlets.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The following show contains adult content. It's not our intent
to offend anyone, but we want to inform you that
if you are a child under the age of eighteen
or get offended easily, this next show may not be
for you. The content, opinions, and subject matter of these
shows are solely the choice of your show hosts and
their guests, and not those of the Entertainment Network or
any affiliated stations. Any comments or inquiry should be directed
(00:22):
to those show hosts. Thank you for listening.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hey everyone, and welcome to Fifty Shades of Bullshit. I'm
your host, Christine Lalan and this is the podcast where
we uncover the truth about online dating. Now let's begin.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Hey everyone, I'm Christine and this is fifty Shades of Bullshit.
Welcome back, everybody. We're really excited to have Steve Offguard
back with you again this week.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Kay, Steve, Hi, Christine, How the good going? Great? And
it's great to be here, great to have What do
we determine? How many times have I been?
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Today is Steve's seventh time I'm going to talk to Look,
but you might be the longest running one like you
might be the one.
Speaker 4 (01:14):
Who's come back the most because you know how loyal
I am. You just call me up at the last minute.
I'm like, let's do it. Let's come up with something
great to talk about.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
I know it is funny because it's very It's once
in a while I get somebody who cancels at the
last minute, and I'm always thinking, now, who have I
not had in a while, or who would be fun
to have a conversation with, And you do pop up
in my head. So I'm really thrilled to have you,
So thank you very much for swooping in and saving
(01:45):
the day today.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
Wouldn't it be awful if this was like a bad
first date and we just had nothing to talk about
and we didn't know what it's saying exactly right.
Speaker 3 (01:57):
And I've had a few of those, Well you know
what it's like when like I can have a conversation
with anybody. I really can. I can. If someone was
to challenge me to go they pick somebody and say,
now your challenge is to go talk to them, I
could do it. Like I used to be an event
(02:18):
coordinator for a yacht company and we used to have
to go to these mixers and that there were like
five of us women who worked there in different departments
of the yacht company, but all in sales for parties,
different things, corporate, wedding, whatever. And our boss would always say, Okay,
(02:43):
so the person that comes back with the most cards,
it's win something. I won every time, every time, and
they hated.
Speaker 4 (02:53):
Me these They're a chick. There's a card magnet, you know.
And I just would like, I hope the prizes were great.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Right, they were fairly decent, So I just can't have
a hard time not winning.
Speaker 4 (03:08):
Well, I think I think the magic is all in
the listening, you know, Yes, And we talked about that
as a potential topic for today, but like how really
listening is curiosity is all all the magic? Absolutely conet
with people.
Speaker 3 (03:23):
Well, for those of you who do not know Steve,
he's actually, as we just said, been here seven times
now and today we're actually going to talk about author
authoring your own growth. And let me tell you a
little about Steve. He works with sexological bodywork. Did I
(03:43):
say that right?
Speaker 4 (03:44):
Exactly? But close sexological bodywork.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
Sexological There we go. It is in education. But for
over thirty years, Steve has been guiding clients to explore
how they hold their life story and their bodies now
see that to me is fascinating. I think we all
really do hold a lot of trauma in our bodies.
(04:07):
So Steve specializes in working with clients to discover how
we hold shame and trauma in our bodies. He works
with and teaches clients to explore touch, movement, dialogue, breath, sound,
and awareness as a way to find freedom in their
sexual expression and the whole, in the whole of their lives.
I I do love breath work. I do think that
(04:31):
embodying your body and figuring out, you know, what is
going on is the most important thing because our head
in our body, it's all it all works together.
Speaker 4 (04:41):
Yeah, I really think that psychotherapy is really moving in
the direction of integrating somatic and embodied experiences. So I
mean the simple question of you know, dialoguing with a
therapist and having the mask, but do you notice in
your body when you talk about that? You know, regardless
of what you're talking about, as you're calling some experience
(05:02):
or some some feeling or some emotion, that's they're actually
noticing the body. And that's one of the most useful
tools that I share with people.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
I think that's fascinating, you know, We've talked a lot
about my growth the show with my life because of
the show. Many times I think I thought I was
doing so well, see and then you know not and
(05:34):
really hard because you know, I share my growth on
here all the time. And the reason why I talk
about this and the reason why we do these shows
is because I want people to understand that there are
just regular old folks out there like myself who experience
these things, who go through these things, that we're not alone,
(05:55):
that there is work to do, but it's feasible, it's doable.
I do find that I am becoming, well, not becoming,
experiencing that I'm feeling a lot of When I talk
to somebody and there is some kind of miscommunication or
(06:19):
they're upset about something with me or whatever, I tend
to get very sensitive and I take things extremely personal
and then I get defensive and then I deflect with well, fine,
I'm not I don't, I shouldn't be here anyway. I
suck either. So I do find that I'm I'm struggling
(06:39):
with that. That's my biggest struggle right now, and I'm
aware of it, and hopefully being aware of it is
my first step.
Speaker 4 (06:48):
Yes, awareness, the primary piece to beginning the healing process
is beginning to become aware of something.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
Yeah, and it's it's not an easy thing to admit
that you, you know, make mistakes. And I've never been
one to have a hard time apologizing. I've I've always
been able to do that. When my kids were growing up,
I used to say to them all the time, all right,
so here's the thing. You're in trouble, and you need
(07:18):
to go to your room and think about why and
how this whole thing went down, what your part was
in it, and then I'm going to need you to
apologize for your behavior. But when you do apologize, I
want to know whether you understand what that behavior was
and why you need to apologize. And then I would
(07:38):
give them time, and then I would go back and
then I would sit down with them and I would
say things like, Okay, so mom probably couldn't have could
have handled that better. I probably I know that I
probably shouldn't have lost my mind and yelled at you,
which is hard to do, hard not to do, especially
(07:58):
when you were raised that way, when people all they
did was scream at you. So that was hard to
admit that I lost my shit sometimes and I would
say to them, so, I need to apologize to you
for this, this, and this on my part. And then
as they saw that I did it, then they would
(08:18):
start to understand how to do it themselves. And hopefully
they learned that. I don't know if they did, but
it taught me a lot.
Speaker 4 (08:27):
You should ask them. You should ask them, hey, when
when I did this, what was that like for you?
Speaker 3 (08:32):
Yeah? I should. I'm going to ask.
Speaker 4 (08:34):
Them because that's really challenging to reflect on yourself, especially
as a child, when you don't exactly understand what you
did that was bad or you know the you know,
so actually look and see why did I do that?
You know, reflecting on oneself is a stage of maturity
when you could actually like, here's me living my life
(08:57):
in relationship with other people, and then oh, I could
actually observe myself. I could be this being up over
here and observe myself and see the things that I
do and actually connect the dots like, oh, I know
I did that. I was afraid. I know I did that.
It's shamed, you know, and just like oh, and the
(09:19):
observer of the self.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
That's a good step, you know. I don't think I
learned that part like shame and doubt and and fear
those kind of things. Until very recently, I think I'm
starting to realize that I still hold a lot of
self doubt and struggles, you know, with trusting. I say,
(09:42):
I trust, but you know in heart when you know
your life has been full of trauma, and it's kind
of like you know a dog, you know, going for
the food you give them, and then every time you
go to give it to them, kick them in the
head when they go for it. And then next thing
you know, they're going to starve to death because they're
(10:03):
so afraid that you're going to kick them in the
head again. And I just it's like that with relationships.
With me, it's really hard to focus on staying positive
and in the moment with the person you're with, not
assuming they're going to do the same shit to you
that has been happening to you so much in the past.
(10:23):
And I think I've done fairly well doing that. I
do know that I that I still make mistakes and
I still need, you know, learning, and it's an ever
growing thing and that's why we're here today.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
Yeah, it's interesting. You reminded me of a conversation I
had just the other day. I'm working with a couple
where one of the partners the relationship, previous relationship ended
really badly, and they started to get really more and
more intimate with this current relationship, and they're pulling back.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
They're pulling Sorry, I don't know why. My phone started talking.
Speaker 4 (11:06):
It sounds fascinating.
Speaker 3 (11:08):
Oh my god, what is going on? I don't know.
I touched my phone and all of a sudden it
started talking to me.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
It was way more interesting than what I was going
to say.
Speaker 3 (11:18):
So you were saying with this couple.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
Yes, I'm working with a couple. Uh. Ignore ignore thought
I thought our guests was that we had someone piping
in to remind us I was working with this couple
and one of the partners there are previous relationship ended
really badly, and uh, starting to get more intimate in
(11:41):
this relationship, and as they're getting more vulnerable, they're getting
afraid and pulling back. And it's almost like somehow in
our body, in our memories, in our thoughts, even though
logically we might know that I have nothing to fear
here or this is going great, there's some kind of
more gone conclusion like where this might end up. So
(12:03):
you know, somehow we need to disconnect from the way
we feel like it's going and really be present and
then learn to enjoy and love the person that we're with.
Speaker 3 (12:13):
Yeah, that's great, it's not uh, it's a challenge. I
think for most people we don't really learn as we're
growing up from our parents. You know, you don't really anaesthesia. No,
of course, I don't kick puppies. It's just an example
of a shitty person.
Speaker 4 (12:34):
We have a bunch of comedians in the chat room.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
Yeah, we do. They like and like being funny. I
love it. So Steve, tell me what defines growth for
you when you work with a client. What do you
think defines that.
Speaker 4 (12:50):
I think the first piece of it is one's desire.
Where do they want to go? What do they want?
And for some people, when they come to counseling or therapy,
or or they go to their chiropractor, whatever it is,
all they can think of is I want to be
out of pain. So that could be an interm step.
But I always encourage people to look at what is
it that they really desire, What is it as possible
(13:13):
that maybe never has been before, but they want for
themselves and their lives something beyond just getting their head
above water, or something beyond just be getting out of pain,
so that they can genuinely be working towards something that's
fun and inspiring and enjoyable for their life. So growth
would be finding the areas or the edges where it's
(13:34):
just a little uncomfortable. But I know there's some learning
here and some discovery here.
Speaker 3 (13:39):
I agree when you work with people who are looking
to make changes in their life and make those shifts,
I think that a lot of times. Correct me if
I'm wrong. Could it be that we sometimes have to
shift from passive to intentional? Do you think that that is?
Speaker 4 (14:01):
Like absolutely? Years, For years I went to my therapist
hoping they fix me. You know, I remember in my
twenties and thirties, give me the solution to this problem
so I could quit someffering about this thing that I
keep talking about over and over. I'm sick of it,
and finally realized I have to be the one that
comes forth and generates the direction that we're going to
(14:22):
go in. You know. I remember recently I had a
client come to our session and he said, Okay, I
want to talk about this today, and I was like,
oh great. It was the first time he initiated something
very specific that he wanted to talk about. Now it
happened to be sex, which I love talking about sex,
but you know, but I was like, hey, finally that's
(14:46):
what brought him to me years ago, is actually talking
about the sex life. And finally he really got to
the place where he could say, I want to work
on this today. And that was a turning point for
our sessions. You know, since then he's and a lot
less passive in how he's related to what he wants
for his life. And then you go back out into
(15:06):
life and in between sessions, which is where the real
work begins, so you get to experiment and explore with people.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
True, it's taking those things that you are, the tools
and the tricks and all the things that are guiding
you to move forward from like you said, from being
passive and making decisions on your growth and actually implementing them.
I think that's where a lot of people have a
big disconnect, is knowing how to go from making the
(15:33):
decision that you're going to make changes, but then actually
taking those actual steps like practicing, like practicing shooting basketball hoops.
Speaker 4 (15:44):
It really is, life is not like you know, formula.
I don't have the answer. When people come to me
for the answer, I'm like, this is your life, yes,
you know. And you know, if if at the end
of the session I say to sometimes say go out
and break something like go out and you know, make
some mistakes. Life is messy. But if my sessions with
(16:08):
people give people the freedom to just kind of stumble
a little bit and be a little clumsy in life
al alujah, I think. I think the idea of having
ourselves all buttoned up and figured out, you know, at
the end of a session to kind of think, Okay,
now I know how to face life. No, we have
no idea, but now I know how to be clumsy.
Now I know how to be in the unknown. Now
(16:29):
that's what I want from my sessions and I you know,
my conversations with people. And one of the things I
wanted to talk about today is how is something that
people can do that can be really useful. And it's
something that I started doing maybe two years now. And
you don't need a therapist. You just need a friend
(16:52):
who you know, you like, you trust. And I met
somebody who I knew had a similar background to me.
We didn't know each other really well. But I called
him and I asked him, if you wanted to do this.
It's based on you can look this up. There's what
we do is loosely based on what's called co counseling.
Now there's been a lot, there's a structure to it,
and there's some books about it, but we just loosely
(17:15):
took from that model. And basically we talk the same
time once a week and it's essentially listening terms and
you're one person talks. We chose twenty minutes, but you
could do it for fifteen, or you could do it
for thirty, or you could do it longer or shorter.
We chose twenty minutes. I'll talk and he just listens,
(17:37):
and then we switch. But then we added something at
some point. Once the first person finishes talking, usually the
second person will say, and I just added this at
one point, is there something you'd like to be acknowledged
for anything? And it just is simple. The person is
not listening to see how they can provide input. Even
(17:59):
when you do go to a therapy session, a therapist
or a psychiatrist or whoever you're working with is listening
for how they might guide you or how they could
give you input based on their wealth of experience, and
someone I have great advice, he's great experience. Of course,
that's why we're going to them. But there's this different
quality when someone is just listening to listen and add nothing.
(18:22):
And it actually shifted for me the experience of actually
working with my therapist. I had a lot more clarity
into the sessions that I went to with my therapist
after doing these sessions with this friend.
Speaker 3 (18:36):
I love that.
Speaker 4 (18:37):
Yeah, it's really powerful. It's a great idea because I
knew I was not going to get feedback. I was
not going to be it was not an echo chain
for my own judgments even you know, or I wasn't
going to get coaching or some ideas. Now, what was
interesting is what emerged after a while, because he's a
smart guy and he's trained as a coach, is there
were some times I thought, well, I do want some
(18:59):
direction with So we actually set up a second call.
So now we actually talk twice a week, and in
the second call, we actually do some coaching with each other.
But part of that includes learning to ask for what
kind of coaching you want to have? Sometimes advice you
want advice, I listen, I don't know what to do.
I'm just I'm like blindfolded with my hands tied. Tell
(19:22):
me what to do, you know, which is what you
could ask a friend. You can't quite ask a therapist
that that. But sometimes you want coaching like which tends
to be more questions to kind of mind for the
gold within you. So so working with someone who who
has some skills is great and actually could also be
more challenging for them if you're just going to do
(19:44):
listening terns and and I encourage people to do it
because it is like using a friendship in a very
specific way. And then you know, there are times you
might go out and hang out and do other things
and socialize, but but having a speci time where you
have this quality of a relationship, I think it's it's
really powerful to find someone like that.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
I love that mystery is asking. Is no feedback a
good thing?
Speaker 4 (20:12):
And this particular model, I say absolutely, because I know
that a lot of times I and this isn't true
for everybody, but I am like anticipating getting some judgment sometimes,
like sometimes I want to be able to say out
loud something that I have shame shame around and getting
no feedback and just getting someone to listen. And I
(20:34):
think sometimes it also like this is not necessarily rigid.
Sometimes you know, one of us will responding like oh
I hear you, you know, or something like with just
a response that's compassionate when when one of us has
said something like oh wow, I get how tough that
was for you. So it's not to be stoic and
rigid or frozen, but to be an empty vessel of
(20:59):
one who can live and Missy, it takes some practice,
but I'm telling you, if you have a friend, try
it just twenty minutes and twenty minutes of just I'll
tell you. One more thing that I that I learned
is that it doesn't have to have any continuity to it.
You know, I talk about, you know, something that happened yesterday,
and then something I'm going to do tomorrow, and I
(21:21):
could be all over the place and it's it's okay,
this is my time. It's really it really is. So
I think, yes, the no feedback is a good thing,
but Missy, you could also experiment with other things. Like
I told we added this second day where we do
get feedback, and we actually asked for coaching. So thanks
(21:42):
for your questions.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Jannis and I do something very similar to this. Yeah,
we when we talk, we do. If it's one of
those times that I know that she's struggling with something.
I don't talk about me at all. I just she
she said her things, and then I give her encouragement
and then I say, do you want do I have
(22:06):
asked her do you want a solution or support? Like
do you want feedback or do you just and help
or do you want me to just encourage you to
keep going? And she'll tell me. And I think we're
getting even better at it. I mean I met Janice
in November three and a half years ago when I
(22:28):
started the podcast. She was in that group, and her
and I've come a long way. I mean today she
even said, hey, I'm feeling like we didn't even speak,
and she sent me a message saying, hey, are you okay?
Something feels off and you popped into my head where
you know, And I said, yeah, I'm struggling today. I'm
(22:50):
I'm on the struggle bus. And she said, I can't
talk on the phone, but if you want to send
me it, send it all to me. So I talked
it all out, I sent it to her and then
she just was very loving and said, you know, first
of all, you got this. Second of all, this is
what I wish for you, and that gives me kind
of insights sometimes. Yeah, Sogla, it's really great and we've
(23:16):
come a long way, and I like that for people.
I do think that everybody needs that person that isn't
going to just interrupt while you're talking and giving their
opinion the whole time. And I have friends like that,
which is fine, that's who they are and I love
them for that, but that they're not going to be
the ones I call for.
Speaker 4 (23:36):
Yeah, well, it's great because you know what you want,
and you might want different things. Sometimes there might be
the people with solutions that gosh, I really do need
some solutions now, and those are the times you call them.
And it's interesting because I know I tend to hear
people talking about men are this way and women are
(23:57):
this way, and that's often said that men are always
trying to provide solutions and what women really want is
just to be heard.
Speaker 5 (24:04):
Well, that is an overgeneralization because I mostly want to
be heard because I love figuring out things on my
own and I know I've learned the most from my mistakes,
and I've fallen down and made an ask out of
myself and just laughed at myself and I had the
best time from my mistakes.
Speaker 4 (24:21):
And what I want more from my friends is just
to be my cheering sections, my advisors. And then there
are times like I'm like, Okay, not quite sure and
this friend I know is really good with this, And
that's probably a growth edge for me is learning how
to ask the friends who I know are good at
things to support me with specific things. I love that.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
Now do you tell people when they are trying to
do that shift that we had talked about from say
passive to intentional, do you ever give them like an
exercise to kind of start learning how to implement those
in other areas of their life.
Speaker 4 (25:01):
Yeah, it's funny you should mention. I thought of it.
So when we first were talking about this. There's something
that I do with people that I actually call installing
the observer. So if you think about how we are
when we're quietly going about our day and doing additions
and having thoughts, the thoughts are usually from a specific perspective.
(25:27):
It's like someone's voice is in there, you know, And
if you want to dive deeper into what's called internal
family systems. It's a much more sophisticated model at noticing
what I call the choir, all the different voices that
you have. You got your mother in there, you know,
you got your father and your third grade teacher. But
their voices, or in internal family systems, they call them
(25:51):
parts that shape us well. In order to even recognize that,
you have to have what I call the observer, who
can actually just be there noticing the different parts of you.
So I have this exercise that I do with people
sometimes where I have them imagine and it's very simple.
It's not actually you know, I've done in several different ways,
(26:15):
but you could actually close your eyes just imagine that
there's some observer here that's also you, who's observing you
in all the different ways that you be, the ways
when you're being funny, in the way of being social,
the ways that when you're being afraid, the ways that
you're being when you're being you know, successful, the way
that you're being when you're not successful. So could actually
see the certain attributes that you're expressing, that there's this
(26:38):
part of you. It's kind of like there was a
camera watching you, like the Truman show you've ever seen
the movie is watching you throughout your life objectively, not
getting caught in the emotions of how you are, but
just oh and then actually could even connect the dots
to see why, oh, why is he afraid in this
(26:58):
kind of experience. Oh, it makes sense because look at
the pattern, so you can start to see on things unfolding.
And you mentioned attachment styles earlier, earlier today, and that
is another emerging model that people are using to see
how how you behave in certain circumstances, in certain situations.
(27:20):
Did you mention attachment styles or was that I think.
Speaker 3 (27:22):
That when I was talking about it, attachment styles is
always kind of like right there in that topic. Yeah,
you know, because you know I you know, in my
past I've been an anxious attachment through making changes and
my growth and healing parts of me that need healing.
(27:45):
I think that that is kind of kind of gradually
kind of crumbling and going away. I'm not as anxious
attachment anymore. I think that once in a while I'll
start to feel it and acknowledge it and go, this
isn't necessary this, this isn't needed in this moment, and
I acknowledge it and let it go. I think that
(28:07):
I'm getting a much healthier attachment now because I also
have felt that I was going the extreme and not
wanting to attach at all just because I've been over
all of it for so long. But it does not
healthy for my growth either, So I know that I've
(28:29):
got to kind of find that happy medium in there
that is more healthy for myself and my partner, whoever
my partner may be. You know, do you ever suggest
to people that they try to journal it all, or
you know, maybe write down skills, habits, mindsets that they
want to refine or anything like that, or anything that
(28:51):
maybe like challenging for them.
Speaker 4 (28:54):
I always ask I tried to ask people what they
like to do for what feels comfortable, because I know
people aren't going to do if I say okay, go
journal and they're not a journal going to do it.
I want to. I want to give people something to
do that they you know, that they'll have fun with,
that will be an exploration for them. And yeah, there
(29:16):
are times that I challenge people say come on, just
just do it once, you know, like I might, but
I really try to find the thing that they're gonna
they're going to experiment without in their life, because that's
where really happens in the session itself. Yeah, we're going
to start some things up and we're going to talk
about some things, but where it really happens is in
between sessions. And I think you mentioned about journaling and
(29:41):
and you talked about yourself and kind of looking at things.
There's reflection and excavation of our past, which it can
be very rich and fascinating and fruitful, and we could
also getmired in it. So there is reflection and excavation,
but there's also creation, which is really looking to what
(30:03):
you want and it's looking to the future, and it's
creating the life that you want to have. And most
people think they need to drudge up every part of
the past before they can actually create their future. Well
that's not true, you know, but you know, so we
sometimes get stuck looking backwards when we really want to
go that way. So we're walking backwards into the future,
(30:24):
maybe walking backwards into the future.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
I love that you should write that down because that.
Speaker 4 (30:28):
Makes our because you know, we want to watch look
to the future with wonder and awe and fascination and playfulness,
and playfulness doesn't necessarily mean silk silly, but it could be,
you know, a lightheartedness with our relationship to life. And
I think that's where I like to encourage people to
(30:50):
dip their toes in the water and the risk in
that realm more than risking into going into dark places
that they're afraid about. That's great. The darkness will come up,
the shadow work will come up when you're looking to
the future because some obstacle might come up for you. You know,
you could take a deep dive and do some great
(31:11):
shadow work and it's powerful, but you could also get
stuck there.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
Uh yeah, I do believe that. I also think that
with I can't have growth with that. What I realized today,
over the last couple of days, I've struggled with some things.
I've had the worst headache because I think it's a
stress situation. I think I'm realizing that growth doesn't come
(31:40):
without friction, because otherwise I wouldn't have known I still
had the problem. I thought I was like good, I
thought I was great, and then next thing you know,
I'm getting super defensive about something and then I get
passive aggressive. And I fucking hate passive aggressive. And I
find that being passive aggressive to my self like I'm
(32:01):
turning it towards myself. I'm torturing myself with it, and
I and I really kept thinking, why why is this
ship happening? Why is it coming up? Why? Why?
Speaker 4 (32:12):
Why?
Speaker 3 (32:13):
And then I thought, well, wait a minute. Without this friction,
I wouldn't have the growth, and neither would I have
the growth with the person I'm having the friction with.
So I shouldn't be beating myself up or trying to heal,
because I think I beat myself up for it, like
I expect myself to be better and healed sooner and quicker, faster,
(32:33):
and go, go go.
Speaker 4 (32:35):
But you know, there's some timeline.
Speaker 3 (32:38):
I've had fifty plus years of abuse and trauma, and
it's you know, yes, I've walked away from all that
I've I've done a lot of work over the years.
I've worked towards you know, healing really hard these last
couple of years because I'm ready to be in a
solid partnership with somebody that's loving and wonderful. But I
(33:01):
also can't have the the lululusion that it's going to
be perfect because I'm healed and I'm not healed. I
will never fully be healed. It's a journey. I realized that.
And I'm grateful for the friction that I have with
the people I've had them with in the last few days,
(33:22):
because I guess I couldn't grow without knowing that I
had that growth to still do. I didn't realize I
was still hanging on to those kind of things. Yeah,
and and so I don't want I guess what I'm
trying to see is I don't want people to be
too hard on themselves. You know, I try to give
others grace, but I'm not really given myself a lot
(33:43):
of grace.
Speaker 4 (33:44):
Yeah, be kind to yourself.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
Yeah, I need to be nicer, nice time.
Speaker 4 (33:48):
You're you, You've got I am the only me.
Speaker 3 (33:53):
I've got true st that is true. What about revisiting
and revising, say, the narratives of somebody's life, like I
don't know about like you know, we're talking about being
the author of your own you know, healing basically here
(34:18):
and our stories aren't fixed. I've learned that the hard way.
My story isn't fixed. My story is always revolving, evolving.
You know, how can you suggest maybe to people that
they can maybe pivot or rewrite or update what they're
looking to do in their life.
Speaker 4 (34:36):
I think a great question. Thanks. I think that along
with installing the observer is being able to recognize the
story as a story. Like you said, it's not that
they're actually malleable. That it's not in particularly the conclusions
that we came to out of the story. So whatever
happened to us happened or to the best of our
(35:00):
memory or the worst of our memory, whichever, and then
we concluded something about ourselves and how we needed to
be in life to make it and survive. So it's
the conclusion that you came to that was like a sentence,
you know. I mean, like, we'll take a simple example.
You raise your hand and you give the wrong answer
in class, and you're embarrassed because everybody laughs, and then
(35:23):
you decide, I'm never going to do that again. I'm
just shy in front of groups. So then you never
do you never grab the mic at karaoke, you never
the one who gives the speech, or because you decided
something about you concluded, and it happened in a moment
of you know, I don't want to call it trauma,
(35:44):
but it was a moment when it was traumatic because
on a scale of you know something. Have you felt embarrassed,
you felt a shame. It was too much at that time,
so you part of you contracted and you concluded something
either consciously or unclonunched and then decided that, Okay, I'm
just never going to raise my hand again, I'm never
going to be the one to be in front of
(36:05):
groups or whatever however it played out. But then you
realize one day at karaoke, everybody sayings and you get
up and saying it's like, I have a pretty good voice,
and then all of a sudden you realize this isn't awful.
I should do this more, and then you give yourself
some more. So it might happen randomly like a karaoke
or you could say, gosh, I want more of this
(36:25):
in my life, whatever it is it is being able
to be in front of groups, or be able to
introduce myself to people, or being able to love myself more,
or whatever it is that you want more of in
your life. And you could look and see that, oh,
that's the story that's not allowing it. And I think
part of what we were beginning to recognize as somatic
(36:48):
work and embodied work is becoming more popular is that
how we hold something in our bodies, like the glue
that keeps the story together. So you can see people
hold their certain things in their posture, and you could
see that, you know people, the way people move or
don't move, the limitations that they have could be attached
(37:10):
to some story and that a different approach to having
the story be more malleable can sometimes be doing some
kind of movement or breath work or somatic engagement, somatic inquiry.
Speaker 3 (37:22):
Yeah, you know what, the first time I ever did
breath work, I will say, and I say it as
often as I can on here. If people don't understand
breath give it a try, because it is. It is
really extraordinary. And I remember the first time doing it,
and at the beginning they were talking about what to
(37:44):
what to keep in mind and what to you know,
do is like, you know, go to the bathroom if
you have to go, but then come right back and
get right back into it or whatever. And I remember
him saying, if you're starting to feel this tightness or
this this overwhelming feeling in your body, get up on
your hands and knees and rock back and forth. Just
(38:07):
move your body, just go with it, allow it to
work its way through your body. And that was the
most fucking powerful thing I've ever experienced in my life,
because I could feel the pain starting starting in my
back and it was just tightening and tightening. And I've
had severe back pain since I was very young. And
(38:29):
I realized that my trauma was has been held in
my back and a lot of my a lot a
lot of my abuse has been physical and mental, emotional,
it's all of it. But I've realized that, oh, maybe
I should do this. So I got up in my
hands and knees and I started rocking back and forth,
(38:50):
and I had the eyemask on and I'm breathing and
and it was. It was the most enlightening, amazing thing
to feel that just below right out of my body.
And as it blowed out of my body, I laid
back down and I remember thinking in that moment, oh
my god, I've never been good enough for anybody. I've
(39:12):
never been good enough. And that was that which was
moving through me. And because the music brings up thing
throughoutat breath work, and as I realized that I'm letting
it go, I'm just sobbing and heartbroken and thinking, wait,
it's who fucking cares. If I'm not good enough for
(39:34):
anybody else, I'm good enough for me. And I think
that that was a moment that really just changed everything
for me, is that I needed to accept myself and
take what you were talking about, Like when people feel
shame or guilt from something that happens to them or
a situation that happens, and they hold on to it
(39:56):
for so long. And here I'd held on that I
was never good enough for anybody, much less myself. And
it was after that that I started learning that that
ever important job of loving yourself first.
Speaker 4 (40:09):
Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 3 (40:11):
That's a tricky thing, and I hope that people learn
these things.
Speaker 4 (40:14):
You know, what you just shared is a great illustration
of how somatic work works. Okay, and nowadays everybody's everybody's
using the word somatic because it's become a buzzword, and
some people really have a way of explaining it beautifully.
And some people they did a weekend workshop and now
they're somatic therapist, so that it happens, you know, but
(40:39):
you described how I see somatic work. It's actually integrating
a somatic or body based experience with speculating some about
some limiting belief or some experience or story that you're
holding in your body. And what you did is you
connected the dots. Now, whether or not it's true that
(41:02):
the back pain over here that you're experiencing is connected
to the belief I'm not enough doesn't matter. It's that
you're making the connection. You're engaged in of opening or
untangling an experience of contraction in your body. So part
(41:22):
of how I describe what happens when we conclude something
about ourselves, if it's a moment in life, when we
experience something traumatic, our body contracts somehow. Physically experientially, we
contract somehow, and if we don't have a way to
open or discharge or release that, then there's gonna be
(41:45):
this area of contraction in our nervous system in our body.
So I often think of trauma work as like pulling
on a tangle ball of yarn, and we're pulling on
threads and if it doesn't move, we're not going to
pull at it. We're not going to try to pull
on one of these strings. That'll be like too aggressively
(42:05):
trying to work on something. And the old model of
working with trauma was the face your fears that exposure
therapy model, and although that model worked in some cases,
it also retraumatized traumatized people. But what you described in
your experience with breath work is some memory or thought
(42:25):
bubbled to the surface that was connected to this action
of releasing and moving your body. So something got opened up.
It was like pulling a thread that came lose where
you could actually be curious. And now, I said, in
some cases, that's all that's needed is the I'm not
good enough is free. In some cases, that's where the
(42:49):
work begins. Now I could begin to be curious about
all the times in my life where I decided I
wasn't good enough or I pulled my held myself back.
So hopefully in some cases just be free, you know,
and float off like a feather. Or it could be
the beginning of some beautiful discovery that could still have
pain and an upset and challenges connected to it, but
(43:12):
if you could now lean into it because you've had
the experience of that opening or connecting of the dots,
it could be a great, a great avenue to explore.
Speaker 3 (43:21):
That's great. When I guess what people need to realize
I think, I think within myself, I know I do
is that I don't need to have all the answers
to begin when you begin to start growing and healing
(43:41):
and moving through things, right, you know it's isn't it
like just the beginning is just acknowledging.
Speaker 4 (43:49):
Yeah, a desire. You need a desire to move in
some direction.
Speaker 3 (43:54):
Yeah, so it's like it's like one It is like
growth is one direction and healing is another. You mentioned
also shadow work. I think shadow work is a is
a very important step. Some people don't understand what shadow
work is. Can do you mind describing what that is?
Speaker 4 (44:13):
Yeah, it will be. We kind of touched on it some.
It's like looking at all those connections and all the
times in life where something happened and you experienced a
sense of contraction, shame, fear, and you have that kind
of in your history. So it's somehow stored in your
body or your nervous system, or your memories. It could
(44:36):
also be memories that have been suppressed. I was with
someone recently who was able to access a lot of
times where she felt a tremendous, tremendous amount of shame
in connection to her relationship with men and how it
manifests is in a nonlinear way. She was talking about
(44:58):
something that happened at this time, and then this time
and then this time. Because it was almost like someone
you know, pop the pop the balloon, and all of
a sudden it all came out at the same time.
There was no uh, there was no It was not linear,
and I was at first I realized I was trying
to follow what she was saying. And then I realized, oh,
this is just a release and uh. She was able
(45:21):
to access all these times around this theme of shame
for her because you know, she had a history of
experiences of people treating her in a particular way where
she felt shamed. So shadow of Work is about really
the courage to explore those places where you have shame
and where they might have come from and what might
(45:43):
have happened. It takes a lot of courage, and I
think a willingness to be curious and go slow. I say,
go at the space of curious speed of curiosity. You know,
and you can. When you can be curious, great, But
if it gets to a point where it's you know
too much as how to decide and work in a
(46:03):
different direction.
Speaker 3 (46:05):
I did shadow work a handful of years ago, about
two and a half years ago. I did some shadow
work with a woman who took me through mentally going
through a wall or around the wall and seeing myself
as a young, a little girl, you know, because no
one's ever protected me, no one has ever, you know,
(46:27):
but you know, made me feel like I was not
being hurt. And I went back and did the work
myself by being that person for my young self, And
that was really an incredible opportunity. And I find myself
going there in my mind in my childhood, in times
(46:48):
and places and spaces where I know that I was
needing comfort and support and love and protection, and I
go and do that and I allow myself to you know,
give that to myself. So that's I think that's important.
Speaker 4 (47:03):
Yeah, shadow work doesn't have to be scary, you know,
there's always a component of it of bringing love and
nurturance to the parts of you that are bubbling to
the surface. Yes, I really if you're not able to
do that yourself, having somebody who can really just support
you and be with you in that space.
Speaker 3 (47:22):
Yeah, I love that. Well, Steve, I don't know how
it happens, but time just freaking fly, I know, went back.
I'd love to have you back obviously again. I don't
know when Jada's coming back, so I would love to
talk to you about maybe being a co host with
me for a little bit. Yeah, see if that's something
you want to do. And to all of you who
(47:44):
come and make comments every week, come and support us
every week, we thank you so much. It really means
a lot to me knowing that I can touch a
life and help somebody in some way, and Steve you
are a big part of that today, So thank.
Speaker 4 (47:57):
You very much. Yeah, my pleasure. Thanks for having you bet.
Speaker 3 (48:01):
So everyone out there, same time, same place next week
and until then, let's just keep this shit real. If
you enjoyed this episode, please share with your friends, like
and follow us on Instagram at fifty Shades of Underscore
Bullshit and Facebook at fifty Shades of Bullshit.
Speaker 2 (48:22):
Thanks so much for listening, and we really hope to
see you again next week.
The following show contains adult content. It's not our intent
to offend anyone, but we want to inform you that
if you are a child under the age of eighteen
or get offended easily, this next show may not be
for you. The content, opinions, and subject matter of these
shows are solely the choice of your show hosts and
their guests, and not those of the Entertainment Network or
any affiliated stations. Any comments or inquiry should be directed
(00:22):
to those show hosts. Thank you for listening.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hey everyone, and welcome to Fifty Shades of Bullshit. I'm
your host, Christine Lalan and this is the podcast where
we uncover the truth about online dating. Now let's begin.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Hey everyone, I'm Christine and this is fifty Shades of Bullshit.
Welcome back, everybody. We're really excited to have Steve Offguard
back with you again this week.
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Kay, Steve, Hi, Christine, How the good going? Great? And
it's great to be here, great to have What do
we determine? How many times have I been?
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Today is Steve's seventh time I'm going to talk to Look,
but you might be the longest running one like you
might be the one.
Speaker 4 (01:14):
Who's come back the most because you know how loyal
I am. You just call me up at the last minute.
I'm like, let's do it. Let's come up with something
great to talk about.
Speaker 3 (01:21):
I know it is funny because it's very It's once
in a while I get somebody who cancels at the
last minute, and I'm always thinking, now, who have I
not had in a while, or who would be fun
to have a conversation with, And you do pop up
in my head. So I'm really thrilled to have you,
So thank you very much for swooping in and saving
(01:45):
the day today.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
Wouldn't it be awful if this was like a bad
first date and we just had nothing to talk about
and we didn't know what it's saying exactly right.
Speaker 3 (01:57):
And I've had a few of those, Well you know
what it's like when like I can have a conversation
with anybody. I really can. I can. If someone was
to challenge me to go they pick somebody and say,
now your challenge is to go talk to them, I
could do it. Like I used to be an event
(02:18):
coordinator for a yacht company and we used to have
to go to these mixers and that there were like
five of us women who worked there in different departments
of the yacht company, but all in sales for parties,
different things, corporate, wedding, whatever. And our boss would always say, Okay,
(02:43):
so the person that comes back with the most cards,
it's win something. I won every time, every time, and
they hated.
Speaker 4 (02:53):
Me these They're a chick. There's a card magnet, you know.
And I just would like, I hope the prizes were great.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
Right, they were fairly decent, So I just can't have
a hard time not winning.
Speaker 4 (03:08):
Well, I think I think the magic is all in
the listening, you know, Yes, And we talked about that
as a potential topic for today, but like how really
listening is curiosity is all all the magic? Absolutely conet
with people.
Speaker 3 (03:23):
Well, for those of you who do not know Steve,
he's actually, as we just said, been here seven times
now and today we're actually going to talk about author
authoring your own growth. And let me tell you a
little about Steve. He works with sexological bodywork. Did I
(03:43):
say that right?
Speaker 4 (03:44):
Exactly? But close sexological bodywork.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
Sexological There we go. It is in education. But for
over thirty years, Steve has been guiding clients to explore
how they hold their life story and their bodies now
see that to me is fascinating. I think we all
really do hold a lot of trauma in our bodies.
(04:07):
So Steve specializes in working with clients to discover how
we hold shame and trauma in our bodies. He works
with and teaches clients to explore touch, movement, dialogue, breath, sound,
and awareness as a way to find freedom in their
sexual expression and the whole, in the whole of their lives.
I I do love breath work. I do think that
(04:31):
embodying your body and figuring out, you know, what is
going on is the most important thing because our head
in our body, it's all it all works together.
Speaker 4 (04:41):
Yeah, I really think that psychotherapy is really moving in
the direction of integrating somatic and embodied experiences. So I
mean the simple question of you know, dialoguing with a
therapist and having the mask, but do you notice in
your body when you talk about that? You know, regardless
of what you're talking about, as you're calling some experience
(05:02):
or some some feeling or some emotion, that's they're actually
noticing the body. And that's one of the most useful
tools that I share with people.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
I think that's fascinating, you know, We've talked a lot
about my growth the show with my life because of
the show. Many times I think I thought I was
doing so well, see and then you know not and
(05:34):
really hard because you know, I share my growth on
here all the time. And the reason why I talk
about this and the reason why we do these shows
is because I want people to understand that there are
just regular old folks out there like myself who experience
these things, who go through these things, that we're not alone,
(05:55):
that there is work to do, but it's feasible, it's doable.
I do find that I am becoming, well, not becoming,
experiencing that I'm feeling a lot of When I talk
to somebody and there is some kind of miscommunication or
(06:19):
they're upset about something with me or whatever, I tend
to get very sensitive and I take things extremely personal
and then I get defensive and then I deflect with well, fine,
I'm not I don't, I shouldn't be here anyway. I
suck either. So I do find that I'm I'm struggling
(06:39):
with that. That's my biggest struggle right now, and I'm
aware of it, and hopefully being aware of it is
my first step.
Speaker 4 (06:48):
Yes, awareness, the primary piece to beginning the healing process
is beginning to become aware of something.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
Yeah, and it's it's not an easy thing to admit
that you, you know, make mistakes. And I've never been
one to have a hard time apologizing. I've I've always
been able to do that. When my kids were growing up,
I used to say to them all the time, all right,
so here's the thing. You're in trouble, and you need
(07:18):
to go to your room and think about why and
how this whole thing went down, what your part was
in it, and then I'm going to need you to
apologize for your behavior. But when you do apologize, I
want to know whether you understand what that behavior was
and why you need to apologize. And then I would
(07:38):
give them time, and then I would go back and
then I would sit down with them and I would
say things like, Okay, so mom probably couldn't have could
have handled that better. I probably I know that I
probably shouldn't have lost my mind and yelled at you,
which is hard to do, hard not to do, especially
(07:58):
when you were raised that way, when people all they
did was scream at you. So that was hard to
admit that I lost my shit sometimes and I would
say to them, so, I need to apologize to you
for this, this, and this on my part. And then
as they saw that I did it, then they would
(08:18):
start to understand how to do it themselves. And hopefully
they learned that. I don't know if they did, but
it taught me a lot.
Speaker 4 (08:27):
You should ask them. You should ask them, hey, when
when I did this, what was that like for you?
Speaker 3 (08:32):
Yeah? I should. I'm going to ask.
Speaker 4 (08:34):
Them because that's really challenging to reflect on yourself, especially
as a child, when you don't exactly understand what you
did that was bad or you know the you know,
so actually look and see why did I do that?
You know, reflecting on oneself is a stage of maturity
when you could actually like, here's me living my life
(08:57):
in relationship with other people, and then oh, I could
actually observe myself. I could be this being up over
here and observe myself and see the things that I
do and actually connect the dots like, oh, I know
I did that. I was afraid. I know I did that.
It's shamed, you know, and just like oh, and the
(09:19):
observer of the self.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
That's a good step, you know. I don't think I
learned that part like shame and doubt and and fear
those kind of things. Until very recently, I think I'm
starting to realize that I still hold a lot of
self doubt and struggles, you know, with trusting. I say,
(09:42):
I trust, but you know in heart when you know
your life has been full of trauma, and it's kind
of like you know a dog, you know, going for
the food you give them, and then every time you
go to give it to them, kick them in the
head when they go for it. And then next thing
you know, they're going to starve to death because they're
(10:03):
so afraid that you're going to kick them in the
head again. And I just it's like that with relationships.
With me, it's really hard to focus on staying positive
and in the moment with the person you're with, not
assuming they're going to do the same shit to you
that has been happening to you so much in the past.
(10:23):
And I think I've done fairly well doing that. I
do know that I that I still make mistakes and
I still need, you know, learning, and it's an ever
growing thing and that's why we're here today.
Speaker 4 (10:37):
Yeah, it's interesting. You reminded me of a conversation I
had just the other day. I'm working with a couple
where one of the partners the relationship, previous relationship ended
really badly, and they started to get really more and
more intimate with this current relationship, and they're pulling back.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
They're pulling Sorry, I don't know why. My phone started talking.
Speaker 4 (11:06):
It sounds fascinating.
Speaker 3 (11:08):
Oh my god, what is going on? I don't know.
I touched my phone and all of a sudden it
started talking to me.
Speaker 4 (11:15):
It was way more interesting than what I was going
to say.
Speaker 3 (11:18):
So you were saying with this couple.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
Yes, I'm working with a couple. Uh. Ignore ignore thought
I thought our guests was that we had someone piping
in to remind us I was working with this couple
and one of the partners there are previous relationship ended
really badly, and uh, starting to get more intimate in
(11:41):
this relationship, and as they're getting more vulnerable, they're getting
afraid and pulling back. And it's almost like somehow in
our body, in our memories, in our thoughts, even though
logically we might know that I have nothing to fear
here or this is going great, there's some kind of
more gone conclusion like where this might end up. So
(12:03):
you know, somehow we need to disconnect from the way
we feel like it's going and really be present and
then learn to enjoy and love the person that we're with.
Speaker 3 (12:13):
Yeah, that's great, it's not uh, it's a challenge. I
think for most people we don't really learn as we're
growing up from our parents. You know, you don't really anaesthesia. No,
of course, I don't kick puppies. It's just an example
of a shitty person.
Speaker 4 (12:34):
We have a bunch of comedians in the chat room.
Speaker 3 (12:36):
Yeah, we do. They like and like being funny. I
love it. So Steve, tell me what defines growth for
you when you work with a client. What do you
think defines that.
Speaker 4 (12:50):
I think the first piece of it is one's desire.
Where do they want to go? What do they want?
And for some people, when they come to counseling or therapy,
or or they go to their chiropractor, whatever it is,
all they can think of is I want to be
out of pain. So that could be an interm step.
But I always encourage people to look at what is
it that they really desire, What is it as possible
(13:13):
that maybe never has been before, but they want for
themselves and their lives something beyond just getting their head
above water, or something beyond just be getting out of pain,
so that they can genuinely be working towards something that's
fun and inspiring and enjoyable for their life. So growth
would be finding the areas or the edges where it's
(13:34):
just a little uncomfortable. But I know there's some learning
here and some discovery here.
Speaker 3 (13:39):
I agree when you work with people who are looking
to make changes in their life and make those shifts,
I think that a lot of times. Correct me if
I'm wrong. Could it be that we sometimes have to
shift from passive to intentional? Do you think that that is?
Speaker 4 (14:01):
Like absolutely? Years, For years I went to my therapist
hoping they fix me. You know, I remember in my
twenties and thirties, give me the solution to this problem
so I could quit someffering about this thing that I
keep talking about over and over. I'm sick of it,
and finally realized I have to be the one that
comes forth and generates the direction that we're going to
(14:22):
go in. You know. I remember recently I had a
client come to our session and he said, Okay, I
want to talk about this today, and I was like,
oh great. It was the first time he initiated something
very specific that he wanted to talk about. Now it
happened to be sex, which I love talking about sex,
but you know, but I was like, hey, finally that's
(14:46):
what brought him to me years ago, is actually talking
about the sex life. And finally he really got to
the place where he could say, I want to work
on this today. And that was a turning point for
our sessions. You know, since then he's and a lot
less passive in how he's related to what he wants
for his life. And then you go back out into
(15:06):
life and in between sessions, which is where the real
work begins, so you get to experiment and explore with people.
Speaker 3 (15:12):
True, it's taking those things that you are, the tools
and the tricks and all the things that are guiding
you to move forward from like you said, from being
passive and making decisions on your growth and actually implementing them.
I think that's where a lot of people have a
big disconnect, is knowing how to go from making the
(15:33):
decision that you're going to make changes, but then actually
taking those actual steps like practicing, like practicing shooting basketball hoops.
Speaker 4 (15:44):
It really is, life is not like you know, formula.
I don't have the answer. When people come to me
for the answer, I'm like, this is your life, yes,
you know. And you know, if if at the end
of the session I say to sometimes say go out
and break something like go out and you know, make
some mistakes. Life is messy. But if my sessions with
(16:08):
people give people the freedom to just kind of stumble
a little bit and be a little clumsy in life
al alujah, I think. I think the idea of having
ourselves all buttoned up and figured out, you know, at
the end of a session to kind of think, Okay,
now I know how to face life. No, we have
no idea, but now I know how to be clumsy.
Now I know how to be in the unknown. Now
(16:29):
that's what I want from my sessions and I you know,
my conversations with people. And one of the things I
wanted to talk about today is how is something that
people can do that can be really useful. And it's
something that I started doing maybe two years now. And
you don't need a therapist. You just need a friend
(16:52):
who you know, you like, you trust. And I met
somebody who I knew had a similar background to me.
We didn't know each other really well. But I called
him and I asked him, if you wanted to do this.
It's based on you can look this up. There's what
we do is loosely based on what's called co counseling.
Now there's been a lot, there's a structure to it,
and there's some books about it, but we just loosely
(17:15):
took from that model. And basically we talk the same
time once a week and it's essentially listening terms and
you're one person talks. We chose twenty minutes, but you
could do it for fifteen, or you could do it
for thirty, or you could do it longer or shorter.
We chose twenty minutes. I'll talk and he just listens,
(17:37):
and then we switch. But then we added something at
some point. Once the first person finishes talking, usually the
second person will say, and I just added this at
one point, is there something you'd like to be acknowledged
for anything? And it just is simple. The person is
not listening to see how they can provide input. Even
(17:59):
when you do go to a therapy session, a therapist
or a psychiatrist or whoever you're working with is listening
for how they might guide you or how they could
give you input based on their wealth of experience, and
someone I have great advice, he's great experience. Of course,
that's why we're going to them. But there's this different
quality when someone is just listening to listen and add nothing.
(18:22):
And it actually shifted for me the experience of actually
working with my therapist. I had a lot more clarity
into the sessions that I went to with my therapist
after doing these sessions with this friend.
Speaker 3 (18:36):
I love that.
Speaker 4 (18:37):
Yeah, it's really powerful. It's a great idea because I
knew I was not going to get feedback. I was
not going to be it was not an echo chain
for my own judgments even you know, or I wasn't
going to get coaching or some ideas. Now, what was
interesting is what emerged after a while, because he's a
smart guy and he's trained as a coach, is there
were some times I thought, well, I do want some
(18:59):
direction with So we actually set up a second call.
So now we actually talk twice a week, and in
the second call, we actually do some coaching with each other.
But part of that includes learning to ask for what
kind of coaching you want to have? Sometimes advice you
want advice, I listen, I don't know what to do.
I'm just I'm like blindfolded with my hands tied. Tell
(19:22):
me what to do, you know, which is what you
could ask a friend. You can't quite ask a therapist
that that. But sometimes you want coaching like which tends
to be more questions to kind of mind for the
gold within you. So so working with someone who who
has some skills is great and actually could also be
more challenging for them if you're just going to do
(19:44):
listening terns and and I encourage people to do it
because it is like using a friendship in a very
specific way. And then you know, there are times you
might go out and hang out and do other things
and socialize, but but having a speci time where you
have this quality of a relationship, I think it's it's
really powerful to find someone like that.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
I love that mystery is asking. Is no feedback a
good thing?
Speaker 4 (20:12):
And this particular model, I say absolutely, because I know
that a lot of times I and this isn't true
for everybody, but I am like anticipating getting some judgment sometimes,
like sometimes I want to be able to say out
loud something that I have shame shame around and getting
no feedback and just getting someone to listen. And I
(20:34):
think sometimes it also like this is not necessarily rigid.
Sometimes you know, one of us will responding like oh
I hear you, you know, or something like with just
a response that's compassionate when when one of us has
said something like oh wow, I get how tough that
was for you. So it's not to be stoic and
rigid or frozen, but to be an empty vessel of
(20:59):
one who can live and Missy, it takes some practice,
but I'm telling you, if you have a friend, try
it just twenty minutes and twenty minutes of just I'll
tell you. One more thing that I that I learned
is that it doesn't have to have any continuity to it.
You know, I talk about, you know, something that happened yesterday,
and then something I'm going to do tomorrow, and I
(21:21):
could be all over the place and it's it's okay,
this is my time. It's really it really is. So
I think, yes, the no feedback is a good thing,
but Missy, you could also experiment with other things. Like
I told we added this second day where we do
get feedback, and we actually asked for coaching. So thanks
(21:42):
for your questions.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Jannis and I do something very similar to this. Yeah,
we when we talk, we do. If it's one of
those times that I know that she's struggling with something.
I don't talk about me at all. I just she
she said her things, and then I give her encouragement
and then I say, do you want do I have
(22:06):
asked her do you want a solution or support? Like
do you want feedback or do you just and help
or do you want me to just encourage you to
keep going? And she'll tell me. And I think we're
getting even better at it. I mean I met Janice
in November three and a half years ago when I
(22:28):
started the podcast. She was in that group, and her
and I've come a long way. I mean today she
even said, hey, I'm feeling like we didn't even speak,
and she sent me a message saying, hey, are you okay?
Something feels off and you popped into my head where
you know, And I said, yeah, I'm struggling today. I'm
(22:50):
I'm on the struggle bus. And she said, I can't
talk on the phone, but if you want to send
me it, send it all to me. So I talked
it all out, I sent it to her and then
she just was very loving and said, you know, first
of all, you got this. Second of all, this is
what I wish for you, and that gives me kind
of insights sometimes. Yeah, Sogla, it's really great and we've
(23:16):
come a long way, and I like that for people.
I do think that everybody needs that person that isn't
going to just interrupt while you're talking and giving their
opinion the whole time. And I have friends like that,
which is fine, that's who they are and I love
them for that, but that they're not going to be
the ones I call for.
Speaker 4 (23:36):
Yeah, well, it's great because you know what you want,
and you might want different things. Sometimes there might be
the people with solutions that gosh, I really do need
some solutions now, and those are the times you call them.
And it's interesting because I know I tend to hear
people talking about men are this way and women are
(23:57):
this way, and that's often said that men are always
trying to provide solutions and what women really want is
just to be heard.
Speaker 5 (24:04):
Well, that is an overgeneralization because I mostly want to
be heard because I love figuring out things on my
own and I know I've learned the most from my mistakes,
and I've fallen down and made an ask out of
myself and just laughed at myself and I had the
best time from my mistakes.
Speaker 4 (24:21):
And what I want more from my friends is just
to be my cheering sections, my advisors. And then there
are times like I'm like, Okay, not quite sure and
this friend I know is really good with this, And
that's probably a growth edge for me is learning how
to ask the friends who I know are good at
things to support me with specific things. I love that.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
Now do you tell people when they are trying to
do that shift that we had talked about from say
passive to intentional, do you ever give them like an
exercise to kind of start learning how to implement those
in other areas of their life.
Speaker 4 (25:01):
Yeah, it's funny you should mention. I thought of it.
So when we first were talking about this. There's something
that I do with people that I actually call installing
the observer. So if you think about how we are
when we're quietly going about our day and doing additions
and having thoughts, the thoughts are usually from a specific perspective.
(25:27):
It's like someone's voice is in there, you know, And
if you want to dive deeper into what's called internal
family systems. It's a much more sophisticated model at noticing
what I call the choir, all the different voices that
you have. You got your mother in there, you know,
you got your father and your third grade teacher. But
their voices, or in internal family systems, they call them
(25:51):
parts that shape us well. In order to even recognize that,
you have to have what I call the observer, who
can actually just be there noticing the different parts of you.
So I have this exercise that I do with people
sometimes where I have them imagine and it's very simple.
It's not actually you know, I've done in several different ways,
(26:15):
but you could actually close your eyes just imagine that
there's some observer here that's also you, who's observing you
in all the different ways that you be, the ways
when you're being funny, in the way of being social,
the ways that when you're being afraid, the ways that
you're being when you're being you know, successful, the way
that you're being when you're not successful. So could actually
see the certain attributes that you're expressing, that there's this
(26:38):
part of you. It's kind of like there was a
camera watching you, like the Truman show you've ever seen
the movie is watching you throughout your life objectively, not
getting caught in the emotions of how you are, but
just oh and then actually could even connect the dots
to see why, oh, why is he afraid in this
(26:58):
kind of experience. Oh, it makes sense because look at
the pattern, so you can start to see on things unfolding.
And you mentioned attachment styles earlier, earlier today, and that
is another emerging model that people are using to see
how how you behave in certain circumstances, in certain situations.
(27:20):
Did you mention attachment styles or was that I think.
Speaker 3 (27:22):
That when I was talking about it, attachment styles is
always kind of like right there in that topic. Yeah,
you know, because you know I you know, in my
past I've been an anxious attachment through making changes and
my growth and healing parts of me that need healing.
(27:45):
I think that that is kind of kind of gradually
kind of crumbling and going away. I'm not as anxious
attachment anymore. I think that once in a while I'll
start to feel it and acknowledge it and go, this
isn't necessary this, this isn't needed in this moment, and
I acknowledge it and let it go. I think that
(28:07):
I'm getting a much healthier attachment now because I also
have felt that I was going the extreme and not
wanting to attach at all just because I've been over
all of it for so long. But it does not
healthy for my growth either, So I know that I've
(28:29):
got to kind of find that happy medium in there
that is more healthy for myself and my partner, whoever
my partner may be. You know, do you ever suggest
to people that they try to journal it all, or
you know, maybe write down skills, habits, mindsets that they
want to refine or anything like that, or anything that
(28:51):
maybe like challenging for them.
Speaker 4 (28:54):
I always ask I tried to ask people what they
like to do for what feels comfortable, because I know
people aren't going to do if I say okay, go
journal and they're not a journal going to do it.
I want to. I want to give people something to
do that they you know, that they'll have fun with,
that will be an exploration for them. And yeah, there
(29:16):
are times that I challenge people say come on, just
just do it once, you know, like I might, but
I really try to find the thing that they're gonna
they're going to experiment without in their life, because that's
where really happens in the session itself. Yeah, we're going
to start some things up and we're going to talk
about some things, but where it really happens is in
between sessions. And I think you mentioned about journaling and
(29:41):
and you talked about yourself and kind of looking at things.
There's reflection and excavation of our past, which it can
be very rich and fascinating and fruitful, and we could
also getmired in it. So there is reflection and excavation,
but there's also creation, which is really looking to what
(30:03):
you want and it's looking to the future, and it's
creating the life that you want to have. And most
people think they need to drudge up every part of
the past before they can actually create their future. Well
that's not true, you know, but you know, so we
sometimes get stuck looking backwards when we really want to
go that way. So we're walking backwards into the future,
(30:24):
maybe walking backwards into the future.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
I love that you should write that down because that.
Speaker 4 (30:28):
Makes our because you know, we want to watch look
to the future with wonder and awe and fascination and playfulness,
and playfulness doesn't necessarily mean silk silly, but it could be,
you know, a lightheartedness with our relationship to life. And
I think that's where I like to encourage people to
(30:50):
dip their toes in the water and the risk in
that realm more than risking into going into dark places
that they're afraid about. That's great. The darkness will come up,
the shadow work will come up when you're looking to
the future because some obstacle might come up for you. You know,
you could take a deep dive and do some great
(31:11):
shadow work and it's powerful, but you could also get
stuck there.
Speaker 3 (31:15):
Uh yeah, I do believe that. I also think that
with I can't have growth with that. What I realized today,
over the last couple of days, I've struggled with some things.
I've had the worst headache because I think it's a
stress situation. I think I'm realizing that growth doesn't come
(31:40):
without friction, because otherwise I wouldn't have known I still
had the problem. I thought I was like good, I
thought I was great, and then next thing you know,
I'm getting super defensive about something and then I get
passive aggressive. And I fucking hate passive aggressive. And I
find that being passive aggressive to my self like I'm
(32:01):
turning it towards myself. I'm torturing myself with it, and
I and I really kept thinking, why why is this
ship happening? Why is it coming up? Why? Why?
Speaker 4 (32:12):
Why?
Speaker 3 (32:13):
And then I thought, well, wait a minute. Without this friction,
I wouldn't have the growth, and neither would I have
the growth with the person I'm having the friction with.
So I shouldn't be beating myself up or trying to heal,
because I think I beat myself up for it, like
I expect myself to be better and healed sooner and quicker, faster,
(32:33):
and go, go go.
Speaker 4 (32:35):
But you know, there's some timeline.
Speaker 3 (32:38):
I've had fifty plus years of abuse and trauma, and
it's you know, yes, I've walked away from all that
I've I've done a lot of work over the years.
I've worked towards you know, healing really hard these last
couple of years because I'm ready to be in a
solid partnership with somebody that's loving and wonderful. But I
(33:01):
also can't have the the lululusion that it's going to
be perfect because I'm healed and I'm not healed. I
will never fully be healed. It's a journey. I realized that.
And I'm grateful for the friction that I have with
the people I've had them with in the last few days,
(33:22):
because I guess I couldn't grow without knowing that I
had that growth to still do. I didn't realize I
was still hanging on to those kind of things. Yeah,
and and so I don't want I guess what I'm
trying to see is I don't want people to be
too hard on themselves. You know, I try to give
others grace, but I'm not really given myself a lot
(33:43):
of grace.
Speaker 4 (33:44):
Yeah, be kind to yourself.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
Yeah, I need to be nicer, nice time.
Speaker 4 (33:48):
You're you, You've got I am the only me.
Speaker 3 (33:53):
I've got true st that is true. What about revisiting
and revising, say, the narratives of somebody's life, like I
don't know about like you know, we're talking about being
the author of your own you know, healing basically here
(34:18):
and our stories aren't fixed. I've learned that the hard way.
My story isn't fixed. My story is always revolving, evolving.
You know, how can you suggest maybe to people that
they can maybe pivot or rewrite or update what they're
looking to do in their life.
Speaker 4 (34:36):
I think a great question. Thanks. I think that along
with installing the observer is being able to recognize the
story as a story. Like you said, it's not that
they're actually malleable. That it's not in particularly the conclusions
that we came to out of the story. So whatever
happened to us happened or to the best of our
(35:00):
memory or the worst of our memory, whichever, and then
we concluded something about ourselves and how we needed to
be in life to make it and survive. So it's
the conclusion that you came to that was like a sentence,
you know. I mean, like, we'll take a simple example.
You raise your hand and you give the wrong answer
in class, and you're embarrassed because everybody laughs, and then
(35:23):
you decide, I'm never going to do that again. I'm
just shy in front of groups. So then you never
do you never grab the mic at karaoke, you never
the one who gives the speech, or because you decided
something about you concluded, and it happened in a moment
of you know, I don't want to call it trauma,
(35:44):
but it was a moment when it was traumatic because
on a scale of you know something. Have you felt embarrassed,
you felt a shame. It was too much at that time,
so you part of you contracted and you concluded something
either consciously or unclonunched and then decided that, Okay, I'm
just never going to raise my hand again, I'm never
going to be the one to be in front of
(36:05):
groups or whatever however it played out. But then you
realize one day at karaoke, everybody sayings and you get
up and saying it's like, I have a pretty good voice,
and then all of a sudden you realize this isn't awful.
I should do this more, and then you give yourself
some more. So it might happen randomly like a karaoke
or you could say, gosh, I want more of this
(36:25):
in my life, whatever it is it is being able
to be in front of groups, or be able to
introduce myself to people, or being able to love myself more,
or whatever it is that you want more of in
your life. And you could look and see that, oh,
that's the story that's not allowing it. And I think
part of what we were beginning to recognize as somatic
(36:48):
work and embodied work is becoming more popular is that
how we hold something in our bodies, like the glue
that keeps the story together. So you can see people
hold their certain things in their posture, and you could
see that, you know people, the way people move or
don't move, the limitations that they have could be attached
(37:10):
to some story and that a different approach to having
the story be more malleable can sometimes be doing some
kind of movement or breath work or somatic engagement, somatic inquiry.
Speaker 3 (37:22):
Yeah, you know what, the first time I ever did
breath work, I will say, and I say it as
often as I can on here. If people don't understand
breath give it a try, because it is. It is
really extraordinary. And I remember the first time doing it,
and at the beginning they were talking about what to
(37:44):
what to keep in mind and what to you know,
do is like, you know, go to the bathroom if
you have to go, but then come right back and
get right back into it or whatever. And I remember
him saying, if you're starting to feel this tightness or
this this overwhelming feeling in your body, get up on
your hands and knees and rock back and forth. Just
(38:07):
move your body, just go with it, allow it to
work its way through your body. And that was the
most fucking powerful thing I've ever experienced in my life,
because I could feel the pain starting starting in my
back and it was just tightening and tightening. And I've
had severe back pain since I was very young. And
(38:29):
I realized that my trauma was has been held in
my back and a lot of my a lot a
lot of my abuse has been physical and mental, emotional,
it's all of it. But I've realized that, oh, maybe
I should do this. So I got up in my
hands and knees and I started rocking back and forth,
(38:50):
and I had the eyemask on and I'm breathing and
and it was. It was the most enlightening, amazing thing
to feel that just below right out of my body.
And as it blowed out of my body, I laid
back down and I remember thinking in that moment, oh
my god, I've never been good enough for anybody. I've
(39:12):
never been good enough. And that was that which was
moving through me. And because the music brings up thing
throughoutat breath work, and as I realized that I'm letting
it go, I'm just sobbing and heartbroken and thinking, wait,
it's who fucking cares. If I'm not good enough for
(39:34):
anybody else, I'm good enough for me. And I think
that that was a moment that really just changed everything
for me, is that I needed to accept myself and
take what you were talking about, Like when people feel
shame or guilt from something that happens to them or
a situation that happens, and they hold on to it
(39:56):
for so long. And here I'd held on that I
was never good enough for anybody, much less myself. And
it was after that that I started learning that that
ever important job of loving yourself first.
Speaker 4 (40:09):
Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 3 (40:11):
That's a tricky thing, and I hope that people learn
these things.
Speaker 4 (40:14):
You know, what you just shared is a great illustration
of how somatic work works. Okay, and nowadays everybody's everybody's
using the word somatic because it's become a buzzword, and
some people really have a way of explaining it beautifully.
And some people they did a weekend workshop and now
they're somatic therapist, so that it happens, you know, but
(40:39):
you described how I see somatic work. It's actually integrating
a somatic or body based experience with speculating some about
some limiting belief or some experience or story that you're
holding in your body. And what you did is you
connected the dots. Now, whether or not it's true that
(41:02):
the back pain over here that you're experiencing is connected
to the belief I'm not enough doesn't matter. It's that
you're making the connection. You're engaged in of opening or
untangling an experience of contraction in your body. So part
(41:22):
of how I describe what happens when we conclude something
about ourselves, if it's a moment in life, when we
experience something traumatic, our body contracts somehow. Physically experientially, we
contract somehow, and if we don't have a way to
open or discharge or release that, then there's gonna be
(41:45):
this area of contraction in our nervous system in our body.
So I often think of trauma work as like pulling
on a tangle ball of yarn, and we're pulling on
threads and if it doesn't move, we're not going to
pull at it. We're not going to try to pull
on one of these strings. That'll be like too aggressively
(42:05):
trying to work on something. And the old model of
working with trauma was the face your fears that exposure
therapy model, and although that model worked in some cases,
it also retraumatized traumatized people. But what you described in
your experience with breath work is some memory or thought
(42:25):
bubbled to the surface that was connected to this action
of releasing and moving your body. So something got opened up.
It was like pulling a thread that came lose where
you could actually be curious. And now, I said, in
some cases, that's all that's needed is the I'm not
good enough is free. In some cases, that's where the
(42:49):
work begins. Now I could begin to be curious about
all the times in my life where I decided I
wasn't good enough or I pulled my held myself back.
So hopefully in some cases just be free, you know,
and float off like a feather. Or it could be
the beginning of some beautiful discovery that could still have
pain and an upset and challenges connected to it, but
(43:12):
if you could now lean into it because you've had
the experience of that opening or connecting of the dots,
it could be a great, a great avenue to explore.
Speaker 3 (43:21):
That's great. When I guess what people need to realize
I think, I think within myself, I know I do
is that I don't need to have all the answers
to begin when you begin to start growing and healing
(43:41):
and moving through things, right, you know it's isn't it
like just the beginning is just acknowledging.
Speaker 4 (43:49):
Yeah, a desire. You need a desire to move in
some direction.
Speaker 3 (43:54):
Yeah, so it's like it's like one It is like
growth is one direction and healing is another. You mentioned
also shadow work. I think shadow work is a is
a very important step. Some people don't understand what shadow
work is. Can do you mind describing what that is?
Speaker 4 (44:13):
Yeah, it will be. We kind of touched on it some.
It's like looking at all those connections and all the
times in life where something happened and you experienced a
sense of contraction, shame, fear, and you have that kind
of in your history. So it's somehow stored in your
body or your nervous system, or your memories. It could
(44:36):
also be memories that have been suppressed. I was with
someone recently who was able to access a lot of
times where she felt a tremendous, tremendous amount of shame
in connection to her relationship with men and how it
manifests is in a nonlinear way. She was talking about
(44:58):
something that happened at this time, and then this time
and then this time. Because it was almost like someone
you know, pop the pop the balloon, and all of
a sudden it all came out at the same time.
There was no uh, there was no It was not linear,
and I was at first I realized I was trying
to follow what she was saying. And then I realized, oh,
this is just a release and uh. She was able
(45:21):
to access all these times around this theme of shame
for her because you know, she had a history of
experiences of people treating her in a particular way where
she felt shamed. So shadow of Work is about really
the courage to explore those places where you have shame
and where they might have come from and what might
(45:43):
have happened. It takes a lot of courage, and I
think a willingness to be curious and go slow. I say,
go at the space of curious speed of curiosity. You know,
and you can. When you can be curious, great, But
if it gets to a point where it's you know
too much as how to decide and work in a
(46:03):
different direction.
Speaker 3 (46:05):
I did shadow work a handful of years ago, about
two and a half years ago. I did some shadow
work with a woman who took me through mentally going
through a wall or around the wall and seeing myself
as a young, a little girl, you know, because no
one's ever protected me, no one has ever, you know,
(46:27):
but you know, made me feel like I was not
being hurt. And I went back and did the work
myself by being that person for my young self, And
that was really an incredible opportunity. And I find myself
going there in my mind in my childhood, in times
(46:48):
and places and spaces where I know that I was
needing comfort and support and love and protection, and I
go and do that and I allow myself to you know,
give that to myself. So that's I think that's important.
Speaker 4 (47:03):
Yeah, shadow work doesn't have to be scary, you know,
there's always a component of it of bringing love and
nurturance to the parts of you that are bubbling to
the surface. Yes, I really if you're not able to
do that yourself, having somebody who can really just support
you and be with you in that space.
Speaker 3 (47:22):
Yeah, I love that. Well, Steve, I don't know how
it happens, but time just freaking fly, I know, went back.
I'd love to have you back obviously again. I don't
know when Jada's coming back, so I would love to
talk to you about maybe being a co host with
me for a little bit. Yeah, see if that's something
you want to do. And to all of you who
(47:44):
come and make comments every week, come and support us
every week, we thank you so much. It really means
a lot to me knowing that I can touch a
life and help somebody in some way, and Steve you
are a big part of that today, So thank.
Speaker 4 (47:57):
You very much. Yeah, my pleasure. Thanks for having you bet.
Speaker 3 (48:01):
So everyone out there, same time, same place next week
and until then, let's just keep this shit real. If
you enjoyed this episode, please share with your friends, like
and follow us on Instagram at fifty Shades of Underscore
Bullshit and Facebook at fifty Shades of Bullshit.
Speaker 2 (48:22):
Thanks so much for listening, and we really hope to
see you again next week.
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