STOP the Bullying, SHED the Bitch.....

Hello and welcome to Shedding the Bitch Radio, where you can discuss, debate, and get advice on how to discover and shed the bitches of angst, attitude, and negative mindsets so you can realize your dreams and life purpose and create and accelerate the riches you want in life. Join us here live every Tuesday at noon Eastern and dialogue with us at 818-572-2910. You can also chat with us at blogtalkradio.com/sheddingthebitch or share your stories on our website sheddingthebitch.com. Whatever the bitch is that's holding you back from living your life to your fullest, it's not worth giving up the riches in life that you deserve. So call in now and let Bernadette Boas know what's holding you back. 818-572-2910.

Hello everyone! Happy, happy, happy Tuesday! This is indeed Bernadette Boas on Shedding the Bitch Radio. And it is an absolutely glorious spring day, and that is no foolish joke because it's also April 1st. And never really a good prankster, I, um, honestly, I'm not good at kind of what do you do on April Fools? How can I fool you?

I don't know.

I don't want to actually, um, and I hope that's okay with you, but, uh, no fool. This is Bernadette, and we're gonna have a very lively show, at least on my part, and hopefully you'll join in if you're listening to this live. You can call 1-818-572-2910 and join in on the conversation regarding bullying, and we'll get into that in a minute. You can also chat with us if you go to blogtalkradio.com/jetinthebitch. You'll check out today's episode. And be able to chat live with me. As well, just if you listen to this in archive, which many of you do, always go to our Facebook page, Shedding the Bitch, and feel free to leave your comments and questions and stories there. Alright? At the same time, I started this a few weeks ago by your request, I am on Facebook Live during the program. So should you want to make a comment or state a question, You can go to the Facebook page of Shedding the Bitch and post it there, and I'll be keeping an eye on it throughout the program. All right, today's subject is important, so I hope you stick with us throughout the whole program and weigh in. As like I said, weigh in in any way, shape, or form you want to. I've been kind of, you know, of course I'm on top of the whole subject around things that impact shedding the bitch, things that impact people really being secure and confident and have a high level of self-worth within themselves. That's what shedding the bitch is all about, because it's only then can you really pursue and achieve the goals and dreams that you have within your life. One element of all of that, if you think about what really causes a bitch to be a bitch or a bully to be a bully is the fact that there's this lack. There's this lack of security, confidence, self-love for oneself. And it permeates not only on the school grounds, which is the first place people think about, but on the buses, at home, it happens in the office. And it happens— which in the office it's kind of just amazing to me because we're adults. We're supposed to be kind of the example and the representation of how to behave.

And yet—

and hey, I, you know, I'm the one who created Shining the Bitch for a reason, and it's because I wasn't necessarily the most supportive, engaging, and non-bullying type at all. So You know, I'm kind of trying to make up for those things and really use my own experiences to help you. And this subject of bullying is just continuing to kind of escalate in all the areas of our lives, and especially when it comes to the workplace, because that's predominantly our conversations here. We need to figure out— we're never going to change the trajectory of women if we don't change how we approach one another and how we treat one another and how we respect one another and how we work together. So it's creating a lot of buzz, not only in the media but for myself, because I'm just seeing it everywhere. So the month of April is dedicated to putting a stop, putting a ban, call it whatever you want, to bullying, to bitching, to bossy, you know, people at home, at work, at school. And I'm going to have some guests throughout the month that will help us really kind of break it down and come up with some answers, come up with some strategies and tactics, at the same time educating all of us, because I do think that we have some preconceived ideas of what bullying is. And yet we're not necessarily addressing it, you know, the way that we need to and the way that's going to be the most effective and have the longest-term benefits to everybody. So I just want to see what we could do to have that dialogue and discuss it and debate it and then delight in it, because each of us individually can make a change, but bring us all together and we can really, really change the world. So Let's see what we could do right here on Shedding the Bitch Radio. But before we get into all that, I do, I just want to have a few of our typical announcements. Uh, Rich Tip Friday is right around the corner. Put your questions, your stories, your challenges out on our Shedding the Bitch Facebook page. Send them through LinkedIn, tweet them, I don't care. Just, you get free coaching, free tips, free advice. And why not take advantage of it? And you don't even have to kind of expose yourself. What I mean by that— please don't go taking off your clothes— is you don't necessarily need to, you know, reveal who you are, you know, give me any more details than what is needed to address your question or your issue. All right, so take advantage of the free opportunity to get some tips and advice from somebody, I'd like to say, that, you know, has been around the block a time or two. We also— I lost my track. We also have some great guests coming up, one of which is Cheryl Axerod of the Axerod Law Firm. And she and I got in on it on LinkedIn. We were talking about the Ban Bossy campaign. So if you want to kind of educate yourself on what all that is about, just go to banbossy.com and make a note of what your impression is of that campaign. Because I'm gonna throw shit in the bitch right in there with it when Cheryl and I talk, because I think it's important that there are tons of these— whether it's bullying, whether it's women empowerment, whether it's disparity and gender diversity, whatever the subject matter is, there's a lot of opinions and a lot of different viewpoints. So let's get real and honest with each other about what's working, what's not, what's creating an impact, what's not. And if it's not, what can we do about it? And if you're not doing anything about it, then how can we convince you to do something? Anything? Because like I said, individually we can make a change, but as a group and as a community, we can really influence change throughout the world. All right, of course, just go to Shedding the Bitch and join our community. And get all the updates, get all the information, grab some videos and workbooks and other resources that are out there for you. Go to BlogTalkRadio, subscribe to our Shedding the Bitch radio program. You'll get all the notifications of upcoming guests and upcoming subject matters and also upcoming requests for guests, because I definitely love other people's input. As much as I love talking to you about myself, I do love interviewing and really hearing other people's stories.

Stories.

All right, so go ahead and do that. And I had mentioned, I think it was last week or the week before, I had just taken some time off administratively from having guests on, uh, Just My World, with everything, you know, with the screenplay and everything else that I was doing. I don't want to short you, so I hope that the content we've still been bringing you has been of value to you. And from the comments that I get from you, it has. And I hope that it always does, because guest or no guests, I want to make sure that Shedding the Bitch is really making an impact in your life, even in the smallest of ways. All right, that's, that's our goal and objective here. Okay, let's see. Of course, we always have people that just love and support Shedding the Bitch and its community, and a few of those are sponsors of everything that we do, including our radio show. So I wanna thank Total Communications Coach. I wanna thank TSR Tax. It is tax time. You have 15 more days. I have 15 more days to get 'em addressed. So Debbie and her team over at TSR Tax can certainly take care of you as well. All right. And then again, if any of you are out there listening, part of a business, part of an association, wanna be part of the Shading the Bitch sponsor community, feel free to reach out to us at, uh, just email me, bernadetteboas@sheddingthebitch.com. Would love to discuss it with you. Okay, I have gotten back to— I used to kind of play some, some music, uh, in, you know, all sorts of genres to introduce our subject matter, and, uh, kind of fell off of doing that as well over the last few weeks. But I found something that came across at the same time I was doing research for the, for program today. So I want to play for you, as we segue into our next section of our show, I want to play for you a song called Courage. It's from Justin Hines, H-I-N-E-S. You can go to YouTube, he's got a bunch of videos around this song, instrumentally, one with the formal video, one with the words, you know how that goes. But Justin Hines, his song is Courage, and I want you to listen closely to these words and these lyrics as we segue into our conversation regarding stopping bullying of all kinds, whether it be at the playground, in our schools, or at work, even at home. All right, so Justin Hines, Courage.

Won't you come out to play? Come out to play? I've been living it down again. I'mma bring it back someday. Take her out. Won't you come out to play? Come out to play? I've been living it down again. I'm gonna need to call your friends. So here's hoping I find you alone. Go away.

Sweet, huh? Courage by Justin Hines. And the one thing, part of the lyrics that I really like is the fact that he says, after he says courage, why don't you come out and play, he then goes on to say, I need some of your friends to come out along the way. Meaning courage, strength, um, I guess bravery is the same as courage, but the other empowerment, the other power words, power emotions, uh, that, uh, you know, will carry you through any difficult time. And one of those difficult times can be being bullied. And at the same time, I will add, if you are the bully itself or if you know who that bully is, the damage that they're doing to themselves as much as the damage that they are doing to others. All right, so we're segueing in. You're listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio with Bernadette Boas, and I am videotaping today, so I'll make sure you all know when it's up online on our YouTube channel. But we're talking throughout the month on various types of subjects when it comes to banning— let's call it banning ugliness in the world, whether it's through bullying, whether it's being a mean or bitchy boss, whether it's hating on each other. Women hating on each other especially gets, gets my goat. At the same time, I'm gonna give you my kind of my own experience of being that person that created a lot of that drama and kind of what impact it has had on myself, on the people around me, on my career. And then at the same time, other people throughout the month will do the same and provide you their own experiences, because you can probably relate when someone actually shares their story more so than if I was just to give you a lot of, you know, bits and bytes and data facts. All right, but there are data facts and there is some, some resources I'm going to want to forward you to. So we won't get totally serious about it, but it is a serious subject. And now the next step is to figure out how do we get educated about it, how do we become truthful about it, and how do we get the courage, as Justin Hines recommends, how do we get the courage to do something about it? Because that can be also a kind of scary thing for people. Alright, so let me start with— because there's a lot we can talk about, and what I want to do is, like I said, talk about my experience, talk about the areas of bullying that are going on out there, talk about where, where does it come from, how do we put a stop to it, what is the impact on the world, and then what can each of us do in in order to make a difference. Alright? Because that's all we need to do is make one small difference and everything else will fall into place. But it's gonna take each and every one of us. Alright, okay. So, my— the first thing, Shedding the Bitch, just some background. Shedding the Bitch was created, was born out of my recognizing in myself that I was somewhat of a bully.

It wasn't—

excuse me— it wasn't physical, yet it was very much emotional through my actions, meaning the way I treated people, let alone myself, the way I treated people had emotional impact on them. And so recognizing that after, you know the story, after being handed a pink slip after a 25-year corporate career, I really had to kind of dig deep and understand why it happened, how it happened, how did I get where I was, and/or how did I not get where I thought I'd be as a result of my own actions, as a result of my own bitch, let's call it. So I dug deep and realized that many of my own insecurities and feelings of low self-worth and not fitting in and intimidation. All of those things contributed to my lashing out to the people around me personally, professionally, spiritually, in relationships or not, whatever the case might be. And as a result, I recognized too that bitches really aren't other people or a person. Bitches are the junk that cause someone to lash out in a very cruel, curt, demeaning way and in a bullying type of way. And so as we go through our conversation today, we're gonna lead into the fact that where it comes from is per individual's personal junk. That's where bullying, that's where bitching, that's where being cruel, being bossy comes from. It's almost like a control mechanism, a control tool that people would use. And you're probably sitting there going, well, yeah, I mean, you know, I understand that, I get that. Well, if you do, that's wonderful. And what I would applaud and advocate you to do is using that, educate other people in that. Because when I started going out saying, okay, shedding the bitch isn't about shedding kind of a person per se, and I'm doing like quotations, it's helping other people shed whatever junk it is that they're dealing with, whatever insecurity, low self-worth, negative self-belief they have of themselves, getting rid of it, shedding it so they can then create and accelerate the riches in life that they want. And there wouldn't be bullying if we could help each individual, each child to teenager to adult, to be aware that their own junk, what we call bitches here, get in the way of them being the most productive, the most influential, the most highly integrity, value-based individual. So my experience has been just that, is recognizing that it's those things that create drama and tons of it. And so it's a matter of how do we use our own experiences and our own lessons to help and educate other people. And how it translates is from, from childhood, from the earliest of experiences one might experience one might have, one might remember, one might not even remember, it's subconscious. It's almost like biases. I was doing a lot of reading this morning in regards to the whole gender bias and diversity that exists out in the business world, and I was reading an article that was stating that a lot of our biases are unconsciously execute it. We have biases. For instance, they gave an example of— if you heard of a story of a doctor and his child, or a doctor, right? I just did it, right? A doctor. I just automatically assumed a doctor was a guy. So the story goes that there's those natural biases that we've had for, you know, generations and generations upon generations that then influence decisions we make, not intentionally, not with, with, you know, with malice. It's just, that's just subconsciously the way we're kind of ingrained to think and believe, and therefore it spews out into our decisions, into our actions, into our words, in what we do, what we don't do. So we have to keep in mind that even from the earliest of age everything that is said and done toward us then kind of takes hold in a very conscious and/or subconscious way, and it influences the type of person we become. So, you know, the kids dealing with that in their homes, on the school ground or on the playground, with their teachers, adults around them, the actions and the words and the physical behavior that they see and they're witness to or they're victims of becomes ingrained in their behavior as they, as they develop and as they grow and as they mature into adulthood. So there was a number of— I kind of wanted to look at all the different areas that bullying is impacting. And of course, we all know it from kids to teens to adulthood, but some reference points, whether you're parents, whether you're professionals, whether you're just friends and you, you're doing research, maybe you are the one being bullied, being victimized in some way, shape, or form, physically or emotionally. It's all bullying, and it's all abuse, okay? They just happen to put a— what some people might think is an easier word to digest. It's easier to say that someone's a bully than an abuser, but that's what they are. They're abusing someone physically or emotionally, mentally, spiritually, doing a lot of great damage. So before we get all there, you are listening to Shading the Bitch Radio. This is Bernadette Boas. It certainly is not meant to be kind of a downer type of conversation, more of a learning conversation. And then what can we do about it? Because again, Shedding the Bitch is all about we have to take action to make change. All right, so what do we do about it? So a few reference points for any of you that, um, that, you know, would like to see some readings and use some things to help maybe your situation or or your own kids. In a USA Today article, the article was on how as popularity rises, so as someone's popularity rises, so does bullying. Now think about that. To really understand where bullying comes from, think about that. As popularity rises, bullying also increases. Why do you think that is? That is, well, it is not only because it's the has-nots going after the haves and trying to knock them down. It's more so the has-nots— and that's a horrible way to delineate them— but there's a group of people that are confident and secure and bold and courageous going after their dreams, going after their goals, and they're succeeding. And then there's those that don't have that same willpower, don't have that same focus, that don't have that same confidence and self-belief in themselves and that same courage. And therefore, in order for them to feel secure and in control of their own situation, they need to, um, dismantle, they need to knock down, they need to bully the people that are succeeding, that do have the haves. And therefore, it's again, it all comes down to the inner junk, the bitches that people are carrying around that are causing them to lash out in whatever way, whether it's words or with their fists, or they're doing it, you know, with mind games. I mean, there's a lot of different ways that one can bully or abuse other people. And it can be done online or in person, it doesn't matter. Online cyberbullying is just as bad, if not worse in some situations, which we'll get to in a minute, than, um, than face-to-face. So we have to be aware of that. But situations as simple as one person looking at another person being very jealous, being very envious, creates anger and angst and bitterness and feelings of betrayal and a kind of a victimized behavior and attitude. And therefore they lash out on the other person. Inner junk. Period. Bottom line. Inner junk. Now does that inner junk come from— there's defenses around, well, they've had a bad childhood, they had alcoholic parents, drugs, their parents beat them, all of those things. Absolutely. Absolutely, absolutely, absolutely. And I'm not saying that it's that individual's fault that they were in those, those environments as a child. What can we do is the question. What can we do that as one matures and grows, how do we help them? How do we help them go from being a victim to being a victor? How do we change that? Yes, we You know, we all have junk that happens to us, some more and much more severe than others. How do we get everybody to, to look at those experiences and instead of falling prey to them, they overcome them and be the person that they're meant to be? Okay, and as a reminder, you're listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio, and this is Bernadette Boas, and our topic today and all month is around How do we stop bullying, whether it's in the workplace or at home, in the schools, on the playground, so forth and so on? And we're going to be addressing all different variations of it. You know, how do we look at women empowerment programs, for instance, and determine what's successful or what's not? We'll have a conversation regarding the Ban Bossy campaign, Shedding the Bitch campaign, for that matter. Are these empowerment programs working? And if they're not, then what are the solutions to making them work? Okay, so another area—

excuse me—

another area I was shocked, absolutely shocked to see this. I just mentioned online cyberbullying. Now, the reason why I said it could be even worse is because think about it, now you're online and you could be bullied from every corner of the universe. And not only, you know, one-on-one, or maybe even a group. Like, there was a young man, a sophomore here in Atlanta, and caught on video in, I guess, the locker room of his school, he was beat up by this one guy for no reason at all. No reason at all. The guy just started beating his face in. And, mm, excuse me, and you could see in the video that the people around him, the kids around him, just stood there. No one did anything. And he even afterwards was like, I was stunned to see that no one did anything. Now, in all, you know, fairness to the other people, there could be a number of reasons why, including they were scared themselves. So we can't judge, we can't judge them. Would we like to see them do something differently? Absolutely.

Absolutely.

So what do we do to get people to interject themselves, to step up, to help, to support, and to overcome their own fears, insecurities, and bitches in order to do so? Because again, it's going to take all of us to change the world and how we treat one another. Alright, but this one, like I said, cyberbullying can be, you know, zillion times exasperated, let's call it. And there's an example, I just actually was watching it this morning, or excuse me, reading it this morning as well. But this young girl in the UK at an all-girls school decides to start a feminist program, like a girls' group at her school, all-girls school, keep in mind. And she decided she wanted to start a feminist society. They called it. And her name is Jenan Jonas. Jenan Jonas. I hope I'm pronouncing that right. This was written up in The Guardian if you want to look it up. So it was called Feminist Society, and the backlash she received was not from external— the guys, the boys, her, you know, whatnot. It was from the other girls. It was from the girls that didn't like the fact that they were stepping up, the fact that they were leaning in, if you want to call it, the fact that they were kind of taking control of their own destiny and having big goals and aspirations and wanting to put a stop to how they're treated by the boys in the other schools or by the people around them. And it was other girls attacking other girls, and it totally shocked this young girl because She certainly expected that if she was going to be starting this girls group, women's group, she would have the support of other fellow girls. And she learned very quickly that didn't happen. And that wasn't going to happen. Again, why? Why would other girls, you know, repress and beat up, verbally or physically, other girls for wanting a better world for themselves? Again, it comes to those that are confident, empowered, strong, courageous, and willing to put themselves out there, and those that aren't, those that are weaker, those that are less confident, those that have lower self-esteem. And don't tell me anybody— challenge me if you'd like— but it has nothing to do with shyness or at being an extrovert. Those, those things don't play here. I've seen the shyest of people, the wallflowers of people, being the strongest, most courageous, risk- takers. It has to do with whether or not they're strong in their mindset and their belief systems of themselves is what we're talking about here. And that's, again, that's how Shedding the Bitch came about, is it's the bitches that really control us mentally. And those bitches are not a physical being, they are our internal junk. Another one I just watched this one. This was the one I watched this morning. It is a TED Talk, um, actually it's a TEDxWomen Talk, and it's with Anita Sarkanjian. Sarkanjian, I hope I'm pronouncing that right. S-A-R-K-E-E-S-I-A-N, if you want to look her up. It's a TEDxWomen Talk called— let me say, I did, um, it's going to be called Feminist Frequency. That's her That's her business, that's her project. So real quick, it's a 10-minute video, great video, painful video, because as much as she's up in front of a group of people, um, public speaking about her story, you could see the pain, you can feel the pain of this situation just eating at her as she's telling her story, and she just can't concentrate, she loses focus. Not in a negative or bad way. I'm not judging her. It's just very apparent that this subject is just sitting right there on the surface, no matter how long ago it was. So, long story short of it was she wanted to do a series of videos, and she planned to, and she did a series of videos about how women are objectified and how poorly they're objectified in video games. And therefore she wanted to, you know, do something about it. So she started this campaign called Feminist Frequency, and it was a series of videos to talk about how the media and how women are portrayed in things like video games are repressing— again, repressing, beating down, and bullying girls and women. Well, you have to see the video to appreciate it, but she then showed a number of slides full, I mean packed, with people coming out of the woodwork, predominantly 99.9% of them were boys and men, grown men, that were threatening her. They weren't telling her to stay out of their business. They weren't raising their opinion about, um, you know, well, you're wrong and we don't look at it as you know, women being repressed. They weren't having a productive dialogue or debate about it. They were threatening her, stating, we're gonna rape you, you'd be a perfect type of woman to rape or beat up, or I, you know, I'll look forward to seeing you dead. Um, I mean, to the point where, uh, they actually had to take all of her social networks down. They sabotaged every one of her social networks because you know, these gamers, they're very sophisticated, um, techie guys, and they found ways to go in and corrupt every one of her social networks to the point where she was being portrayed as a terrorist, she was being portrayed as a crusader. So they were turning, trying to turn the tables on her to say, you know, she's blasphemy type of situation, to the point where in every aspect of her life She was just absolutely being tormented personally and behind the scenes, you know, face to face and behind the scenes is what I meant to say. They got her name, they got her address, they made a video of her showing her how she would look when they beat her up. So they kind of went from, you know, the progression of being beat. It was appalling. I watched it, and fortunately it was a few slides and she went through them very quickly because she didn't want to disturb the audience. But at the same time, it just was gut-wrenching. So here, you know, it's a person just stating their opinion. It's a person using the, you know, First Amendment to really kind of say, look, women should not be portrayed in those ways. And therefore, let's open a dialogue and let's figure out how we can, you know, make some changes. And yet these guys felt so threatened, these guys felt so insecure, these guys felt so violated themselves that they turned the tables and decided to totally violate her in every way imaginable. And it was just absolutely appalling. And then the last one is a little bit— I'll use the words lamer because that's the words they use. And again, this comes from the source of of media that is so influential in today's social world, in our technology world, in our online world. And this was so absolutely absurd, ignorant, and stupid on the part of this media outlet. And I certainly made sure that I posted that all over the place, um, my feelings regarding it. Here it was Self magazine. Now, for those of you who may or may not read it, Self magazine is a women empowerment magazine. It's a magazine that is always, um, you know, kind of, um, uh, talked about how they are there to lift women up, lift girls up, and not be this stereotypical objectifying, um, female conversation, so to speak. So they have this BS meter, they call it, column in their magazine. It's called the BS meter. And basically what they're trying to do is kind of call out, you know, they want to get dramatic, they want to sell papers, right? So the BS meter is to call out, you know, products that are not, that don't stand up to, you know, how they promote them. Or there are trends that are just absurd, or there are, you know, even antics of guys or girls that are just ridiculous and absurd and not setting a good example for the people around them. So it's supposed to be constructive BS, let's put it that way. And here they, they go out, they send somebody out because they saw that there was this trend, so to speak, of women jogging in marathons, running in marathons in tutus. Now I know for any woman listening to this, you'll automatically go to why they do that. You'll automatically picture a cancer survivor, or you'll picture someone dealing with some sort of tragedy where they go out into marathons, into 5Ks, into walks like the Susan B. Komen, you know, 60-mile walk. And they're wearing funny get-ups as a way to lift their spirits, as a way to be inspired. And so Self magazine sent this photographer out, took pictures, saw this tutu, these girls walking in tutus, called them up and said, hey, look, we'd like to use you in our magazine. Could we use— have the authority to use these pictures? And they said, certainly. They were thrilled because they thought thought that good things will come for their cause as a result of this, the, this magazine having their pictures in it. Well, it turns out that totally deceiving them, never even mentioning that these pictures are going to be used in their BS meter. And their BS meter basically said that these girls are lame if they think tutus are going to help them run faster in marathon. That was their story. It wasn't about the fact that if the person taking the pictures went around back, which I think they did, went around back and took pictures from their back, you know, on their t-shirts, they would say the cancer cause that they were raising money for and running in tutus for. And the fact that this girl had— they talked to her in any way, shape, or form. This girl makes tutus for cancer survivors to use whether they run or walk or whatever they're doing to inspire and lift them up. It's almost like giving kids, you know, those superhero capes going into hospitals. There's that young boy or girl who started, you know, making these capes so that young kids felt like superpower dealing with their illness and their cancer. And here, Self magazine of all the magazines out there was ignorant enough not to do their homework, and then just to sell papers in a BS meter, they go and they demean other women, which is what they're supposed to be totally against. Those are all forms of bullying, whether you like it or not. It's words, it's actions, It's pictures. It's just, you know, even when you're creating characters, how you're portraying each other is bullying, whether you're a kid, a teen, or an adult. And you have to hand it to the adults, I mean, that's it. There's just no reasoning for it. There's just absolutely no reasoning or excuse for it. Excuse me. And this is not to say that there aren't bullying going on with young boys and men. We're not dismissing that in any way, shape, or form. But this is Shedding the Bitch Radio, and a good majority of my audience is women, although I do get a lot of male followers. And I'm not eliminating them, I'm just— right now we're addressing bullying as a whole, but specifically to situations where girls and women are involved. You're listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio, and this is Bernadette Boas. I am spending the month talking about how we can stop bullies and mean bosses and just cruel people as a whole, so all of us can look forward to getting up in the day, going out, and living our lives without, you know, anyone else adding to the stress and the pressure that we already have in our own lives. You know, bottom line, that's what it's all about. Is we've got enough stuff, we got enough junk, we have enough bitches going on in our own heads, in our own worlds to deal with, let alone for other external environmental societal pressures to be adding to it. And we weren't put on this earth to, to be cruel to one another. Yes, history shows wars and gladiators and whatever you might want to call it, but that's That's not really what we're supposed to be doing with one another. We're supposed to be building a community that takes care of one another. So that's what we're talking about in coming up with both, you know, the education and the situations that are being encountered and then the solutions that can help us overcome, let's call it. Alright, so what is the impact of bullying? We talked about the fact that bullying is emotional, spiritual, it's physical, you know, it can come in so many forms. And the impact is that much greater. The impact is not only even on the person being bullied. Just think about it. Yes, the person who's being bullied is impacted, and then that individual goes home, whether they're, you know, kids, teens, or adults, they go home and it impacts their life. It impacts their family. It impacts their community. Not only because they're being bullied and people can see it, but because they're not the optimal person that they're not— that they're supposed to be. They're not the most productive, the most effective, the most courageous, the most empowered individual. And therefore, when they suffer, everyone else suffers around them. It's also about the bystanders. It's almost like that young kid in 10th grade who got beat up here in Atlanta and all his bystanders stood around. Well, the bystanders are impacted. They're sitting there, they're questioning whether they should jump in or not. They're, they're scared. Uh, some of them might be arrogant and fellow bullies, but their lives are being impacted too because all of a sudden there's this other kid who's typically bullied as well, standing as a bystander, watching this other person in whatever form it's taking and they're all of a sudden saying to themselves, "Hmm, am I next?" And, you know, so all of a sudden there's this trickle-down effect of one action being made, whether it's on one person or on a lot of persons, or if it's from one person or a lot of people. The bystanders are impacted, the person being bullied is impacted, the bully himself is being impacted. And let's not talk about what the end result can be from being bullied. You know, whether that's— forget the depression, the anger, the bitterness, the revenge. Think about the suicides and the drinking and the drugs and the murders that take place as a result of it. I mean, turn on the news at any time and hear about these kids going into schools with guns and shooting the school up. You know, you don't have to be a rocket science scientists to realize where and how that's coming from and why it's coming. It's not very difficult to understand, which leads us to the really big elephant in the room. And the big elephant in the room is we talked to the fact that all of these things—bullying, bitching, bossy, you know, bossy individuals, It comes from a lack of security, comes from a lack of confidence, it comes from a lack of self-worth, it comes from being depressed, it comes from, you know, just being beaten down physically and mentally. And all of those things are mental situations. All of those things are mental tragedies, traumas that have taken place, big or small, doesn't matter. And they started when they're young, and they started when they could be starting when they're older. As a matter of fact, one of these studies— I want to make sure I get it right— one of these studies, it's Mark Dombek. He's a PhD, Mark Dombek. And this, this article, you should go out and read it. This article is on American Academy of Experts on Traumatic Stress. That's the website. I think there's an acronym of like AETS, you might find it. American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress. So basically what Mark also highlights in this article is kind of with— at what stage in life does bullying have the biggest impact. And some of it, he says, is actually more so when the bullying starts older. So say you never really had schoolyard bullying. Probably my first bullying bully came about, let's see, I had a knife, I had someone try to knife me in, I think it was 7th grade, 7th grade. 7th and 8th grade was probably the hardest. I had a young boy and my teacher in 2nd grade used to say, oh, when boys kind of, you know, fight with you, it's because they like you. Well, I don't know, this guy, kid would come up to me and I had these really dorky glasses and he'd smack the glasses off my face. So I'm not sure if, you know, Sister Clare had it quite right there. And, you know, he should know never to mess with a Boas girl. I have 6 brothers and I have 5 very strong sisters. So I won't tell you what happened as a result. But anyway, so Mark was pointing out that Younger kids can actually get over bullying. It's if the bullying starts in their teen years and/or older. So say you don't even get it through high school and you go into the work environment, the next thing you know you do have a bully of a boss. And, you know, then they start beating you down physically, mentally, emotionally— hopefully not physically— mentally and emotionally, you know. And, and therefore they say that the older you are actually is the harder it is to overcome it than it is should you deal with it very young and then you can kind of grow out of it, as they say. Mentally, I'm not sure. I mean, I know, you know, I can recall the very first little kind of insecure, low self-worth type of junk I started carrying around with me and it was at a very young age. But anyway, so it's a mental health issue and yet it's a subject that many people don't want to get into. And I am certainly not an expert in mental health, psychiatry, psychology. However, I am an expert in knowing that the mind, you know, and your mindset has everything to do with your daily, everyday, every minute, every second actions that you take out in the world. Even— not even out in the world, you could be sitting on your couch and the fact that you're overeating or you have a bottle of wine sitting on the table, or God forbid, a bottle of, um, liquor, pills, heroin, whatever the case might be. Or you're putting yourself out in very, uh, dangerous situations out in the world by yourself. You're on the streets, you're, you know, being promiscuous, whatever the case might be. And I am not here to judge anybody. I'm just here to say, if we can all recognize, if individually as a community, as a society, even from a government perspective. And I know some of my friends who, you know, have a whole thing about the government. However, wherever it has to happen, we have to recognize that there has to be a focus on mental health. There has to be us overcoming the stigma, overcoming the fear, overcoming the insecurity. The vanity that comes with discussing mental health. I'll mention that I went to my first psychiatrist, and I had a bias of it too when I was younger, but I went to my first, uh, I was 28 or 29, and a friend of mine had just died. And, um, beyond the fact that he had just died, I had learned that he was gay. Now, it— I didn't have anything against the fact that he was gay. I was just very hurt in that even through college— I met him in my freshman year of college— and, you know, through college and after college, I had no idea. And I felt just betrayed that he didn't trust me enough, or that he judged me, or he thought that I wouldn't accept him because the fact that he was gay. So when he died, that was very traumatic for me. It wasn't the first death I had had. I had my next-door neighbor, my best friend's mother, die when I was 10. So it wasn't the first death I had. It was more so a death of someone I trusted and I endeared and I loved for a long time, and I just felt betrayed. So I said, okay, I need to work through this kind of anger. I need to work through this feeling of betrayal, lack of trust. I had lack of trust issues as it was with guys, and here this just kind of added to it. So I went to my first one, and I never I never felt ashamed of it. I never hid it. I told, you know, people knew it. Unfortunately, it wasn't a good situation. He started stalking me, so to speak. But he started following me out in my social life, which I didn't care for. That's a whole different story for a different day. But the point is, we have to get over the stigma of whether or not someone's going to a therapist, whether or not we fund therapy, whether or not we acknowledge it in the workplace or in the schools or at home. People need to work through the junk that's going on in their head. They need to talk about it. They need to write about it. They need to exercise through it. They need to do something because if they don't, it just sits there and just wreaks havoc within themselves. And sooner or later, whether it's quietly through just depression, through anorexia, through some other form, you know, or through just downright depression, you know, living on their couch for years and years on end, or it's through drugs, or God forbid, you know, something worse like murder. All realities, people, all realities. Simply because someone is not willing to own up to the fact that they've got issues We all do. And that was something I had to get over over the last 5 years. My pride is gone. I used to have it. I used to have a lot of vanity. I used to have a lot of walls up, not never wanting to show and reveal all of my faults, all of my bitches. And yet there came a day that I absolutely had to. I owed it to everybody around me, and I owed it to myself. And ever since then, it's like the most freeing freeing thing in the world because it doesn't mean that I don't have junk still. It doesn't mean I don't get new junk. It just simply means that I'm willing to acknowledge it and work through it whether or not it takes 5 minutes or takes 5 decades. I'm willing to do that. And if that means going to a therapist, then that's what it will be. And I think what we need to do as a society is not only teach— so these are some of our rich tips for the day. We not only have to teach our young children to be more confident, secure, belief in themselves, we have to work on ourselves in order to do that. It doesn't really help an insecure, low self-worth, tormented adult who parents a child. It doesn't help if they're parenting a child and only passing on their stuff, passing on their junk. That doesn't help. But yet, if we can do it at both sides, if we can come in at the adults taking care of the adults, and then the, you know, kids getting help externally if need be until the adult gets the help, and then the adult infuses into the process, or the adults start it and overcome and look beyond their own issues to really ensure that they're their kids have the best life that they can have, and then they work on themselves. And hopefully they get to the point of working on themselves because, you know, I have a lot of friends and family that are parents, and I can see, you know, the lack of time they have to ever concentrate on themselves. We just have to get to be a very selfish, self-inward type of society to where we're taking care of ourselves first, recognizing that if we do that, then everyone else around us benefits as well. We really, really need to do that. And ladies, we are the perfect individuals to help ourselves and the people around us. We typically are the first ones to kind of see it and feel it and sense it, you know, our intuition, our gut, our nurturing, you know, the traits and the qualities that women possess tend to pick up on those things faster than men. No, no disrespect to men, It's just reality. And therefore, I'm not putting the burden on us women. I'm just saying we could be doing something to help the situation. And one of those things is to recognize that it exists, how it exists, why it exists. And that's talking about bullying and talking about the bitches that exist as a result and the impacts, and then the solutions. And the solutions is Help each other be strong, help each other be confident, be secure, have a high level of self-worth for one another, and then get the help if that doesn't work. And interject the help that doesn't work, because all, you know, bullies are just like anybody else. They want to— they want to feel safe, be secure, and be in control. Unfortunately, when their issues go unaddressed, in order to find those things, they have to lash out. And that lashing out helps them feel safe and secure. It's almost like the person, like myself used to be, who had all these walls up and had their guard up and appeared rigid and frigid and a lot of other things. It's simply because they're building walls to protect them from being hurt, from from being disappointed, from being disrespected, from being repressed, from being objectified, from being whatever the case might be. So we need to help them break those walls down, okay? And one other way that you can do that for your kids, for yourselves, is to help them set goals for themselves. Help them have something to aspire to, have something to, to, to go— goal against, have something to dream about, have something to create for themselves. Have them set goals that will get them energized, get them focused, get them confident and, um, excited about something, with the reality check that all of those things— when you go and pursue your goals, there will be struggles, there will be challenges, but that's okay. It just means that you're learning new things and you're overcoming other things in order to then push through and reach your own objective. It doesn't mean that, "Oh, it's not going to work," and you throw up your hands like many people do and you give up. But one way to overcome the people being bullied, the person bullying, and all the bystanders around them is to provide them goals that will energize them, get them focused and confident and excited, and then help them kind of, you know, go through the ebbs and flows of that pursuit. All right, so our conversation today and throughout the month of April, it are going to be all kinds of things regarding how do we stop, ban, and shed the bullies, the bosses, the bitches that are out there that are preventing all of us from having the most productive, the most successful, and the most prosperous life that we can have. All right, and I want you to come right back here next Tuesday at noon Eastern time to continue that conversation. And then Cheryl's with us the following Tuesday, Cheryl Axlerod of the Axlerod Group, and she's with us the following Tuesday to talk about the Ban Bossy campaign, talk about the Shedding the Bitch campaign, what's working, what's not, and what can we do about it. All right, and then Rich Tip Friday is this Friday, so send me your questions, send send me your stories, your challenges, put them out on our Facebook page, and I'd be happy to address them for you throughout the program. Okay? So for everybody here at Shedding the Bitch Radio and our community, I want to thank you so much for joining, and I will talk with you soon. Thanks everybody.

Bye. Thank you for listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio with Bernadette Boas. Join Bernadette every Tuesday at noon Eastern as she helps you shift your bitches to Riches. And the dialogue is always going on at sheddingthebitch.com. See you next week.