#93 Bilateral Processing Bootcamp | Recovery Secrets Series

Welcome to the Overcoming PTSD Podcast. My name is Brad Schipke, and this is the limited series called Recovery Secrets Daily Coaching. Now, these were private sessions that I originally ran as a paid coaching program, but now for the first time ever, I'm making all 100+ sessions available for free for all of you podcast listeners. And this series is over 100 days of practical strategies that have helped thousands of trauma survivors fully heal. So make sure to subscribe because I'm dropping a new episode every single weekday until the archive is complete, and you definitely do not want to miss it. So without further ado, let's dive on in.

All right, we're live here. Welcome everyone to our Recovery Secrets Daily Coaching Call. It is so good to be here with each and every one of you on this beautiful Tuesday morning. Another start to another amazing, amazing week that we have planned. Now this week is a boot camp week, so we have one topic that we're going to cover in depth that's this week. We also have some fun things coming up, but I'm really excited about this week. We've covered a lot of processing tools already in Recovery Secrets. For those of you who are new, you can go back in the archives and see those. For those of you who have been with us, you'll know that we've covered those processing tools. This is another processing tool that we're going to cover this week. I don't want to call it the big kahuna of processing tools, but at the same time I do for some people, right? And so the reason that we teach multiple tools when it comes to processing is because Just like anything, any skill, people have strengths in different areas and it gives you the opportunity to use them all, but really tailor what tool you use based on how you feel and your strengths at any given time. So I'm really excited about it. This lovely man to my right.

Hey everybody. Uh, great to be here bright and early with you guys. I hope you guys had a fantastic, fantastic weekend. It's great to be back after being gone for last week. But like Kayleen said, this, this bootcamp is going to be awesome. It's something that you guys voted on that you guys wanted to hear. about, and it's bilateral processing. It's changed Kayleen's life in massive ways. It's changed my life in massive ways. And it's something that if you can learn it, basically the same thing with all processing tools that we teach you, if you can learn this tool along with the other processing tools that we teach, you basically get unlimited. You can think of it this way. You basically get unlimited therapy sessions, right? Except better. I don't even like calling it therapy sessions because it's so much better. But basically you learn this tool and you get to unlock the, you Your ability to process the trauma that you've been through at a root level so that it's healed permanently, and this is one of the most powerful processing tools out there. It's going to be amazing for you guys. We have an amazing schedule for this week, and we're going to build it up consecutively. And at the end, you're going to have a very cohesive process that you're going to be able to go through again and again and again to develop this skill further. So I'll kind of just give you a brief overview of what to expect. Not only today, but throughout this bootcamp week before we dive into introductions and stuff. So today we're kind of doing a foundational mindset kind of reminder or check-in for processing in and of itself, and also giving a foundation to bilateral processing, what to expect and what it looks like. So that's today, day 1. Day 2, we're going into the first step, which is identification. So how to identify what to actually process. Because if you, if you're not focusing down on the right thing, you're not going to make the most effective path forward, right? So day 2 is identification. Day 3 is where we walk you through the rest of the actual process, where we talk about processing, installation, and closure, right? So step 2, 3, and 4 of the process, that's what we're doing day 3. And then day 4, we're going to give you some additional resources such as the worksheet that you can go through and complete this on daily day-to-day process, and also some Other additional resources that will make it a lot more easier, a lot easier to go through this process. And also a few other little hangups, you know, like what to do if this happens and if this happens, if this happens. So kind of some, some troubleshooting at the end, but it's going to be an amazing, amazing bootcamp week. It's going to be absolutely transformational. If you show up to this, if you, if you listen with an open mind, you take notes, you're engaged. This one tool has helped me in almost immeasurable ways. I can't really say immeasurable because I'm— it's very— I measure it. It's actually the opposite of immeasurable because I measure it. And we teach you how to measure it. But it's incredibly powerful to absolutely transform your life if you're struggling with, you know, any sort of extreme emotion or extreme memories, which I believe most of us are, you know, if you're here, this is going to absolutely transform you at not just a surface level, but at a deep core level.

So you can let go of this pain for Yeah, I mean, that's quite the intro, right, on this topic. And he's not overhyping it by any means. This is a really, really great tool for those of you who find the butterfly hug really impactful. This tool is really gonna resonate with you. For those of you who don't, this tool is really still a great thing to learn and it is a skill that can be built. So I'm really excited about it. This is the tool that I would say people probably are most apprehensive actually about using, right? And that's why I was hesitant to call it like the big kahuna, 'cause like you can make big giant changes with all the tools, this tool included.

Mm-hmm.

But this tool, for some reason, people are most apprehensive about jumping into when it comes to the protector work. When it comes to the belief work, people find themselves in a position where it's a lot easier to actually go in and do that work. And I think that's just because of the way that it's laid out and we kind of talk about different things when it comes to this tool. But I'm really excited about it. What we're gonna do here today, like Brad said, is we're gonna do a foundation to do this tool to make sure we set you up for success. And to make sure we set you up basically with the right mindset going into this. And that's going to be really important because if you don't believe that you can do this on your own, if you don't believe that this is, you know, something that's safe to do, then you're not going to get any results from it, right? Because in all likelihood, you probably just won't do it. And here's the secret, right? If you don't do it, it's not going to work for you. But it is an amazing, amazing tool. So we're going to talk about some foundational things. And my question for you all in the chat box, and I will welcome everyone if you're joining us live, feel free to say hey so I can welcome you. Uh, my question for you in the chat box is, for those of you who have been with us for a couple tools, and I know a bunch of you have, what are some foundations to processing? Just some one-word answers. What are some foundations to processing that we've talked about in the past? Because those are going to come up again here when we talk about processing with this tool. The foundations of the foundations. So what we're really doing here today, we're laying the foundations for those of you who haven't seen them. And we're refreshing on the foundations for those of you who have seen them. So welcome, Mimi. Welcome, Jeanette. Welcome, Lena. Welcome, Lisa. Great to have you all here with us this morning. And it, I almost, you are all in BTU, so I almost went into my, into my BTU Q&A kind of thing. So maybe sharing, know the tools first. That's a great thing, right? In regard to mindset, what do we think in regard to mindset? How do we need to go forward into this process? Brad had already kind of mentioned one that we haven't really talked a lot about before, but when this, yeah, we probably talked about it with protectors.

Yeah.

Right. And that's keeping an open mind, right? Ella, nice, nice. Good morning. Releasing emotions. Amy, that's a great one. Awareness, that's a great one. Something we'll talk about today, beliefs surrounding processing, right? Your beliefs about processing. Some people feel like, even believe that processing is, is dangerous or something they can't do or shouldn't do on their own. And I can tell you it's a lot more dangerous than processing. Is ruminating. I promise you, you're doing a lot more dangerous things already.

Yeah, that's the truth right there.

Right.

And that was a big turning point for you. And I know for me too, it's like, it's a heck of a lot more dangerous to not do the processing than it is to do the processing, to live with the trauma for the rest of your life, than to actually face it and do something about it.

To be in that pain. Right. And so we're going to talk about pain and discomfort today, but to be in that pain, what can happen when you're in that pain, right? When you're triggered, when you're in a really painful state, You can do damage to yourself physically, mentally, emotionally. You can do damage to your relationships. That's a dangerous place to be in. So I promise you that the processing tools are not dangerous. I used to think this too. Honestly, I don't really know where it comes from that we believe that these are things that we can't do or that are going to hurt us further or anything like that. I promise you the things your brain is naturally trying to do when you are hurt, before you do all this mindset work, before you do all this work on yourself. Those things are hurting you. Ruminating is hurting you. Having all those negative thoughts—that's hurting you. Negative self-talk—that's actually doing damage to you. Now, no damage is irreversible, which is good news. But these tools are not going to do damage, and there is nothing irreversible that we can do in our minds really that we can't reverse if we can do something. That's the whole premise of PTSD and healing, right? If something can happen, it can unhappen, or we can change it. Now, for a long time, it was believed that once you had PTSD, that was it. And you can't heal and you can't change it, right? Because your amygdala and your hippocampus and all these things, right? But what can be done can be undone. And that's really, really super good news. So I don't want anyone to go into this process with any apprehension in regard to danger. There's no danger in this process. We're going to talk about what to do if this happens, if this happens, if this happens. And You know, it's up to you to know your limits at the end of the day, but you have the tools, you have Recovery Toolbox tools, right? You have all the tools in The Art of Trauma Relief. You have those tools at your disposal if you need to get yourself into a different state.

And this whole, this whole shift that we're trying to get everybody to make here is to go from a state of dependent healing is what we call it. You're dependent on somebody else for your healing to a state of independent healing where you are empowered with the tools and the skills so you can heal on your own time and spend as much time as you You need to, to heal because really at the end of the day, that's the only way that you can heal anyways. Like no one's going to come in and, you know, with a cape and save you, you know? So that's kind of the big transition that we're trying to make here. But foundationally, knowing that it's a safe process, that knowing that going into this, it's safe. You get to go at your own pace. No one's going to push you to go further beyond your limits. And that's a very big concern that a lot of people have. There's a lot of fear. So just going into this, Know that you get to go at your own pace, right? It's important to, you know, get outside of your comfort zone and push yourself a little bit to the places where you, you, you're a little bit scared or uncomfortable, but it's safe. And that is so important because a lot of people out there, people who get paid for, for their services and their time, tell you that if you do these things without me, it's very unsafe and it's very dangerous. And if you, if you try to attempt these things without the help of a professional, You're just going to hurt yourself more. And that, that's the message that I got. And immediately I knew it was, you know, just like, I, I did not believe it for one second because I remember asking therapists or professionals to be like, hey, could you teach me this thing so I can, you know, you know, get your help here, but also spend time at home? Cause I really want to fix this thing in my life. I really want to get better. And I don't just want to spend whatever, a half hour a week processing. I want to do more. But there wasn't anybody out there who would teach those things. And what I found was that it's not dangerous. And it's exactly what Kayleen said. It's dangerous not to do these things. It's dangerous not to learn these tools. It's dangerous not to learn these skills because then you're just stuck. You're stuck with no power and you're dependent on somebody else to come and heal you. So everything that we're teaching here and the mindset that we want to help you develop is that independent mindset that you can do this, that it is safe. That it is the only way to actually get to where you want to go is to learn these tools and implement them on your own. So that right there, that foundation and that belief in yourself that you can do this, right? That you can get better and that we're all here to help you and support you. Kayleen, myself, everybody in the community. And there's tons of people in the community who have already made huge strides, but you don't have to, you can lean on other people in the beginning, but it's not going to be long before you actually see results in your own life. So it's not, it's not going to take long. When you start to implement this, you're going to start to see the difference. You're going to start to see the change, and you're kind of going to get addicted to the process to healing. And like Kayleen says, you're going to get greedy. You're going to want to feel better and better and better and better.

No, and I think that sums it up well. And and you know today we're just talking about that foundation, but this is such an important piece of the foundation that you're not in danger doing this. You're basically you're in danger not doing this, and that's the message that often gets. Portrayed. And so to hear it from a different perspective, not just hearing it from us, who's going to be teaching you this tool, Dr. Francine Shapiro, who's the inventor, curator, I'm not sure inventor is the right term, but she is founder of EMDR therapy, which is similar to what we're— the tool that we're going to use, is a huge proponent or was a huge proponent of basically teaching people how to do this on their own. Now, she was an outsider to the field. I believe she was like an English major or something, struggled a lot in her own life, had a terminal illness that she was able to heal and kind of stumbled upon this practice and then got into the field of psychology. Really, really interesting kind of story there. And she, when she was alive, was a huge proponent of teaching people basically how to heal themselves, right? And she was kind of the beginning of, and really the only person I really found out there at the time that was like, here are some things you can do on your own.

Yeah.

And has this amazing institute, the EMDR Institute, where they teach people all over the world how to do this. And what they'll do is they'll do certifications in like disaster areas. So they'll basically quickly certify somebody on this so that they can help people in disaster areas when disaster strikes. And I think that's like a really cool thing. And a really cool thing that we're building off of here is that they have this— this— the concept that we're going to be talking about is the same concept of EMDR. And They, the EMDR Institute, right? The people that invented it and her, what she kind of created as a result of that, can at the drop of a hat teach somebody how to be a practitioner of this and use it to help people. It's that not dangerous. Okay. It's that safe where it's at the drop of a hat. Here you go. Here's your certification. Go and help people. Okay. And so we're going to be doing, you've already done a lot more work here to make sure that you have your mindset right, to make sure you have tools and skills that you learned in the Art of Trauma Relief or that we've taught on The sessions here, you already have tools and skills at your disposal so that you can feel better, so that you can be in control of your emotional state. You have a ton of different things that we've done mindset-wise, routines-wise, tools-wise. Okay. So you're already in a real, like, way better position than anyone just for the first time, you know, thrown upon this. And I really want to hone that in here. Okay. So this is something you're going to benefit so greatly from all the processing tools. You don't have to have any fear around it. It is much more dangerous to live in the state that for most of you, you have been for a very long time. For me, that I had been for a very long time where it's triggered and then it's drugs or drinking or whatever it is. And then it's some sort of— even if it's emotional self-harm, physical self-harm, destroying relationships, screaming matches, all of that is way more damaging. This isn't going to be damaging. It's going to be healing.

Yeah.

So, that is kind of the The biggest thing that I want you all to take away from our session here today, honestly, is that you can do this. You can do this. You don't have to have a PhD to do this. You don't have— you, you are going to learn these tools, and it is, it is set up in such a way where you can just follow the process and follow along and get the results. And then you can self-direct your healing. You can spend as many hours as you want doing this healing instead of being, you tied to someone's schedule, right? Then at least you're only tied to your own schedule and you can do this as much as you want. Just like any of the processing tools that we use, you can do this as much as you want. And that's a really, really, really cool, beautiful thing.

So we're going to throw a lot at you this week. Just take it in. Don't get overwhelmed because we're going to tie it all back into an extremely simple process and know that, you know, even children have learned how to do this, right? It is so simple. It is so easy. So I don't want you to get confused with any of the The topics or the concepts that we talk about, because we want to give you enough depth in the topic so you fully understand it, but know that at the end of the day, it's a super simple thing that you can do it. Like you can do that, that this has been proven literally with millions of people, literally millions. I'm not exaggerating. Literally millions of people have done this and it is incredibly helpful. So you are more than capable of doing this, of learning this skill, of implementing this skill, of doing this, of facing the facing these things in your past and overcoming everything. The power though, and the big difference that, you know, we, we teach is that independence and bringing that forward. So believe in yourself, know that you can do this again. Don't get overwhelmed. This is a simple process at its core. We're just going to go deep into it to help you understand it at all levels.

Yeah. So go step by step through everything that we do here. So good morning, Lorena, or good evening, Lorena. Good morning, Dana. Great to have you here. Good morning, Kim. Great to have you here. Yes. In the chat box there, I can do this. I can do this. Not too many letters there, right? I can do this. Let me know in the chat box. Just say it. I can do this. I was thinking about this this morning. I was playing F-E-T-C-H with Shiloh. He can't hear me. And every time he brings the ball back, I say an affirmation to him, which I didn't realize. And I'm like, you're such a good fetcher. And like, oh, that was such a good run or whatever it is. And I'm constantly pumping him up, like constantly. And I'm constantly pumping myself up as well. And that's a result of all the work that I did on the journey. But if you're like, I want you to pump yourself up, pump yourself up, beat on your chest. I can do this. Good morning, Pat. Great to have you here. Good morning, Judy. Awesome. I love it. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. Say that in as many different ways as you can. I am capable. I am worth it. I am smart enough. I can do this. Okay, now some of these processes, we're gonna talk about some different words that we haven't really used before. I just want you to go step by step throughout this week and understand that this is a skill that you build. If we threw everything at you today, it would be a lot. Even at the end of this week, you might be like, okay, that's a lot. And you might need to refresh on these topics. Just go piece by piece by piece, and I promise you're gonna get there. So let's talk about some foundational pieces. And I love that. I love all that. I can do this. I'm capable.

Yeah. I love it. I love it.

I love it. I love it. Good morning, Barbara. Great to have you here. So some foundational, if you want to just start to kind of jump in, I call these mindset— bless you.

Excuse me. Yeah. Kayleen loves this. It's very cheesy, but we love cheese. Ah, see what she did there?

I call these mindset reminders for processing. And this is a, right, because it's all about mindset, a really important start. And we always want to start here. We always want to start here because we want to make sure the foundation is set. The foundation is solid. So before we even go into any reminders, for those of you who are new or just listening to this for the first time, one thing I want you to know before doing any processing tools are some Recovery Toolbox tools, some relief tools. So if you have The Art of Trauma Relief, there's 9 amazing tools in there. We teach those different tools. I don't, I don't know that we've covered every single one in Recovery Secrets. If not, we've covered like 8 out of the 9 in Recovery Secrets. I think we've covered most of them, if not all of them.

Great book regardless. It's a great reference.

It is a great reference. Very simple. I actually reference it all the time when I'm teaching. It's a great reference, and you can go into the platform and there is a little tag under all the videos, or rather on the side of the videos, and you can click recovery tools. Yes, and that's right. It will bring up all of the recovery tools from the art of trauma relief that we've taught in Recovery Secrets. Okay, so that's I always like to preface that. Know your recovery tools. And it's honestly, it's not even because you're going to need them. I want you to be practicing those anyway. It's because that can give us kind of a safety blanket, a safety net to know, hey, if I feel like I'm getting into a place where I don't want to be, I have tools at my disposal to get into a different headspace. Right. So more than anything, it's just the knowledge that you— it's like carrying a first aid kit. It's the knowledge that you have if you need it.

Yeah. That's the foundation. That's the first thing we teach everybody is those relief tools, because it gives you that sense of control. If you haven't learned them, go back, learn them before you attempt this. But it doesn't mean you can't learn this, but I would learn the recovery tools because it will give you that sense of control and safety and comfort and just trusting in yourself that, that you can go through this entire process and you know how to get relief, right? Because if you, if you go through this and you get distressed and you don't know how to control yourself down and you don't have your mindset down, you're not thinking correctly and all that. That's when it can get scary. Even then it's not dangerous, but it's, that's when it can get scary. And it, so it just gives you that level of comfort and that confidence moving forward. So make sure to know those before going in.

Yeah. And I think with all the processing, what I, I use the words pain and discomfort and I try not to use them interchangeably because they're different. Pain is not something that we want. Discomfort is something that we want. But I, again, they're so similar that it's gonna depend on your definition of them. And my definition might not always come through, so you might hear me Use them interchangeably. And here I'm going to use the word pain in 2 different ways. The pain of you doing processing, which I would normally term discomfort, it's going to be uncomfortable. So that sort of pain is way, way different and way better than the pain of you not doing it, meaning the pain of getting triggered and putting holes in walls, drinking, drugs, lashing out, you know, being depressed, whatever it is.

Mm-hmm.

There are 2 different types of pain. And again, I like to use, when it comes to processing, the word discomfort. But for example, here, there are 2 different types of pain. And so for me, again, because this is all about mindset going into processing, something that was really, really important was somewhere along the line I was like, well, I'm already in pain, so what if this is painful? If this is painful, at least it's painful with a purpose. At least it's painful with some sort of reward. And that reward is there's going to be less and less and less pain.

Yeah.

So I want you to think about that. It's either going to be pain of being triggered and pain of being— just having PTSD and having trauma and trying to just live with it, or it's the, the temporary pain of facing it, processing it, and healing it so that you never have that other type of pain again. So that was a really important thing for me mindset-wise. Along with understanding, I can do this, I'm smart enough, I'm capable enough. None of this is rocket science. You're going to see that we try to break everything down really simply. Like Brad said, we try to give you depth, we try to give you an understanding of these tools to understand what's happening in your brain, but nothing is rocket science here. And I want you to know, even if it was rocket science, guess what? Piece by piece by piece together, we could do this. We could figure this out. We work off of foundations. You could probably go into an elementary school classroom and you would probably ace every first grade math test. Now, when you were in first grade, that stuff was hard. Okay? You could probably go back to third grade and ace every third grade math test. Why? Because you've learned those foundations. Now, in third grade, you probably didn't ace every one because you were still learning them. Okay? So the foundations are really, really, really important and they're skills that you build, but all that it is, And here's my point. Even if it was rocket science, and it's not, we just have to go piece by piece by piece by piece. That's all that we have to do. And that's all that we're gonna do here this week.

And it builds on itself. It's a skill, right? And that's important to, to understand that none of us are like, we didn't develop this skill overnight. We, we fumbled, we struggled, we didn't understand it at first. So as Kaelin was saying, it's a skill. It develops in time. Don't worry if you don't get it. Don't worry if the first time doesn't go well. Keep going. You're normal if things don't go perfectly. That's how normal people develop skills. Just like Kayleen was saying with the math test, it's like you didn't ace it because you're learning it. You don't get on a bike and, you know, ride it the first time, right? Maybe for a little bit, but—

So I love what Mimi is saying here, right? So the pain of processing— and Mimi is someone who's done a ton of processing, right? The pain of processing is so not comparable to the pain of actual trauma when living through it. It is a different kind of pain, which is why I like the words pain versus discomfort. It's uncomfortable process. But it is such a good thing. It's like going to the gym. It's like you're working out. It's like, oh man, I hate running. This is exhausting and taxing. But then you get the results of it. I actually feel good about myself. I'm losing the weight that I want to lose. I'm gaining my endurance. You get the endorphins, you sleep better, right? So it's all of those things that are happening. And what I want you all to know, and again, we're going to get into these reminders here. What I want you all to know is when I learned these tools, We just cowboyed it, meaning we just, we just shot from the hip, right? We just, we're winging it. We have a process now that is designed to keep you in the best state possible and still get the outcome. It's designed with some kind of boundaries, some borders in place, so you're not going in blind and just trying to do this all with no information. We've created processes, step-by-step guides. We didn't have this step-by-step when we were going through it. We just learned it and just went for it. Right. And so my journey was an absolute chaotic mess and it still worked.

Right. That's the important piece.

That's the important piece. It still worked. It didn't do me any more damage. It did so much, so much help. It helped me at such a high level. And then as we were able to dial that in more and more and more, it got less and less chaotic and I was able to get to my goals a lot faster. I was able to get to that healing part a lot faster. Yeah. So that's the benefit of, of being here. You get to skip all the cowboy stuff and you just get to go into, okay, here's how you do it.

Yeah. And also it's okay to not be perfect is the lesson, right? So we did not do this process perfectly and yet we still healed. We still got better. So no, you don't have to be perfect, right? Because that's a big thing. People coming in is they have that, that need for perfection and they get overwhelmed with trying anything new because they think they have to, you know, You know, be perfect from day one, which just isn't the fact. And you don't need to be perfect to to to win at this, to get good at this, to succeed at this. You don't need to be perfect. Not like you. You don't ever once have to be perfect for this to work. You can be imperfect and will likely be imperfect for every step of this process, and you will heal, right? So in your minds, a shift that I would recommend making is you know having like the global in the macro goal be like I want full recovery. I want In that sense, like perfection. But in the micro, in the day-to-day, my goal is imperfection. My goal is just to get this done and to do it imperfectly and move forward. Imperfect action will be perfect action 100% of the time.

Say that again.

Imperfect action will be perfect action every single time. And the goal when doing this processing or any other processing is imperfection. Your goal is imperfection. If you did it and you were imperfect, that's the goal. You achieved the goal. You did it. You won. You succeeded. If you did this and it didn't go right, you succeeded. If you do it again and it doesn't go right, you succeeded. If you do it again and it didn't go right, you succeeded.

And then you did it again and it goes right, you still succeeded. Here's the whole thing, right? And I wish the education system was different for this reason. Points off. You not getting something 100%, you not being perfect at something does not make you less than. You are not supposed to know everything. It is a process of constant growth, which is why when you were in 1st, 2nd, 3rd grade, maybe you got Bs. Right? You got Bs on those math tests and those spelling tests, and now as an adult, you can go back and you can ace them. Now you know 100% of what you were learning, but you were growing in that, right? And so it will— it does not have to go perfect. You do not have to cross every T and dot every I for this to work. And that is the ultimate thing I want you to walk away with. This isn't dangerous. It doesn't have to be perfect, and it is going to be fine as long as you take action. There's literally no such thing as perfect either.

So the first thing you said, I just want to kind of write these down. Not dangerous. 2, pain or discomfort can be good, right? So pain can be good if you're releasing emotions and you're letting in, you're processing that, that can be good. 3, the goal of all this is imperfection because to succeed, you need to be imperfect. Who knew? Who knew you just needed to do it and do it poorly? You can do it poorly. And you can still succeed and be good.

I mean, that's kind of the whole thing is you, you know, your brain knows how to do these processes. We're setting it up for success, so we are just pushing it in the right direction and it's gonna, it's gonna bump around. I want you to think about, we're just throwing a bowling ball down an alley blind. We're, we're like shutting our eyes and we're throwing it down, but there are bumpers on it. And that's what this process is going to be, bumpers to get you to the ultimate end result. So it's, it's gonna be messy. It's going to be imperfect. It's not every now and then you will probably blindly throw a perfect strike. That happens. And that's great. But imperfection is such a good thing. It's going to show you, it's going to show your brain exactly what's going on, exactly what needs to work on. So just know that there literally is no perfect in this process. There are too many variables in this process for it to be perfect. And perfection, it doesn't, it doesn't matter. So I want you to not be striving for, for. Perfect. And what you're going to see when we actually talk about the process, we're going to talk about your distress level, and we're going to talk about that's something that we want to go down. It is not going to be this perfect process where you start with a distress level of 10 and then it goes 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0. That is not going to happen. I guarantee it. I guarantee it. Because guess what? If that was going to happen, your brain would have naturally done it and you wouldn't have developed PTSD. That's what happens with the rest of things that happen in our life that our brain is naturally processing. Hey, you drop the coffee off the roof of the car and you're mad at yourself. You're frustrated. You spilled it all over. You have to change whatever it is right now. You're at a distress level of 10 in this example, and then as the day goes on, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0. You wake up tomorrow. Not a big deal. Okay? That's what is normally happening with processing. That is not happening here, and that's not something that's you know it's going to go down, but it's going to be like 10, 8. 8, 8, 4, 4, 5, 3, 1, 0. Okay. It's going to be a mess and it's supposed to be a mess.

It's supposed to be a mess.

So not dangerous. Pain can be good. Goal is imperfection. It's going to be imperfect. There's no 4.0 here. A 4.0 is you doing it imperfectly. I'm going to get, I'm going to give you points off if you do it perfectly. Okay. And then some other reminders for processing.

I want to say something, just a good analogy to bring this forward with processing is like processing is like you doing processing. It's like a baby learning to walk, right? How many babies do you know that just are human beings, right? How many humans do you know that crawl around on the ground, right? How many adults do you know out there that crawl? And we all were crawling at one point or another. Every single baby in my, my nephew, he was a little bit of a late bloomer when it came to walking.

A late walker. He did.

He actually didn't really crawl. He scooted. He was the first grandkid. Yeah. So he could take his time, but he like butt scooted. Until he was pretty old. But it was, it was funny, but it was cute because it wasn't a crawl, but he'd like, he'd like sit and kind of like, like cross-legged style, almost like his legs were like this. And then he'd like bounce up and like scoot himself. And that's how he'd just get around very fast too.

And it was a good use because he had his hands free and his younger sister will crawl, but she'll one-handed crawl, which is very impressive. So she can hold stuff in her other hand. It's, it's, it's amazing what kids can do.

But. The point is processing is like you learning to walk when you were a baby. It's inevitable if you keep going, right? It's inevitable that you will heal, that you will get better. And the whole time what's happening in a baby's brain when they're learning how to walk is they're learning, okay, at a subconscious level, okay, I need to hold my muscles or tense this muscle in this way to hold my support and support myself up. Oh, I fell then. Like, Okay, I need to avoid that or change this next time. And your brain is constantly making those, is constantly learning from mistakes. And that is the only way that we really learn. Well, I guess there's 2 ways we can learn from other people's mistakes or our own mistakes. But at the end of the day, it's like there is a level of you having to go through and make your own mistakes, even if you learn, like right here, you're learning from us and our mistakes, which is like brilliant. I'm serious. Like that's one of the smartest things you can do. But at the end of the day, it's like you can only learn so much and then you have to put it into action. And when you put into action, you're going to naturally make mistakes. But if you keep getting feedback from us or from somebody who's, who's done it, that is how you'll make the progression the fastest. But at the end of the day, you have to take the action and you will do it. And if you do the action, you will get the result. It's that simple. It's cause and effect. It's guaranteed. It's inevitable. The only reason why you wouldn't heal is if you don't take the action, period, end of statement, done. That's it. Or if you decide that it gets too hard. Or that you can't do this, or you're different, or you're special, or what you went through was special, or whatever it is. You decide for some reason that it's not possible for you. That, that's the only reason why this will not work for you. And that's an important mindset to bring forward. If you give up, that is the only way that you will be able to fail at this.

And I wanna point out a really important word that, that you said. Brad used the word decision. If you make this decision That you can't do this. What's the decision? Something we choose, right? It's something that's within our control. Right now, I decide whether or not I swear. I don't know, right? I'm making the decision right now in this example not to swear. Okay? I'm making the decision to be here. I'm making the decision to present this information. I'm making the decision to continue. Processing, and that's a decision you're going to have to make again and again and again. Yeah, you have to decide that you can do this. You have to decide that you're worth it. That healing is worth it. Okay, along with all the other work that we're doing, I just wanted to point it out because I thought it was the perfect word to use. It is a decision. If you get to the point and and people get here, and hopefully no one in recovery secrets, right? Because we're working against this, or we're working to right this wrong. where you decide it's not worth it, or you're not worth it, or you can't do it, or it won't work for you. These are all decisions that we make, right? And we do other work.

Or I don't want to face my fear. I don't want to face that, right? I don't want to accept that. I don't want to whatever, which is a decision, right? And I use that, I use that word and I've built that word into my vocabulary very intentionally because almost everything that we do is decision. And I never try, I try to never say I have to do this, or I was forced to do this, or this made me do this. Because that's just not the case. It's like I've decided to do everything in my life and taking that responsibility. So I'm gonna write this on the board, but healing, healing, the 4th thing I'm gonna write down is healing is inevitable if you never give up, if you keep taking action, if when you get knocked down, right? And you might get knocked down, you might face a problem where you process it and you're like, ah, I'm not making any progress. I'm not making any progress. I'm not making progress. But it just feels like you're not making any progress. 'Cause every time that you go in there and you try, you are making some progress. The only way that you will fail is if you hit that wall and you give up. Because I promise you, I've hit so many freaking walls in my life. It was unbelievably painful at certain times. And the only reason why I'm standing here is because I didn't give up. And the same thing with Kayleen. I know, I've seen it. She's hit so many freaking walls and everybody hits so many walls. It's a normal part of this. You have to expect it, but you also have to know deep at your core when you're doing this work that healing is literally inevitable. It is literally guaranteed for you. You can, you can do this. It's there waiting for you as long as you don't give up, as long as you keep taking action and moving forward. And it might seem like we're kind of digging this in, but this is the mindset and you just hanging out with us and being able to hear this. This is a huge part of it in us. We're trying to, with all these different things that we're saying, the different analogies, the different stories, the different things that we're saying, we're trying to shift the beliefs in your mind. We're trying to get you to adopt these beliefs because these are the beliefs. This is the mindset. And really a mindset is just a collection of beliefs. So we're trying to imbue you with these beliefs so that when you are facing that hard moment, you don't give up. You keep going because that is the moment that will predict whether or not, or decide whether or not you make it.

Okay. So let's see if he can spell that. I bet he can. He's a good speller. And then we actually have to wrap up a little bit early here today, cause I have an important meeting after this, but I want to go through a couple more things in regard to reminders for processing. Right? So we already covered not dangerous. Pain can be good, right? Pain, discomfort is a good thing. Remember, there's the pain of not doing it or the pain of doing it. Your goal is imperfection. Healing is inevitable. That's so funny. I'm like, let's see if he spells it right. I have no idea. I know.

I thought you were going to pull it up.

I have no idea, right? Some other reminders for processing, right? I want you to stay aware of the way that you're feeling. Stay aware. You're going to know the tools and skills, right? That's kind of Before we even get into all this, you're going to know the tools and skills, the recovery toolbox tools to get you relief, to get you into the state that you want to be in. So I want you to stay aware of the state that you're in. We're going to talk about that during this process, how to keep that awareness. And this process is specifically designed to help you keep that awareness and help you stay more in the present. But stay aware, you're the one that needs to know your limits and make the decision for you. What feels good and what is good discomfort and what maybe you want to back off from for now. Okay, so stay aware. Do you want to write or do you want to write these ones down?

Yeah, sure.

Do you want me to write them?

No, I got it. Awesome.

Okay, so stay aware. And again, this process is specifically designed to help you stay aware. Next one, stay positive and love yourself. Now, we already kind of covered that in the chat, right? Just me asking you to say, I can do this. Remind yourself of that. These are reminders for a reason. Stay positive about this process. This discomfort is a good thing. Love yourself through this process. Nothing is off limits here when it comes to processing, which means no matter how you feel— listen to this— no matter how you feel, love yourself through it. You could feel something that you very logically know is— and I hate to say the word wrong, I hate to say the word wrong— but you very logically know does not align with who you are morally.

Or who you— it can be wrong, just wrong, wrong, right?

But you might feel different.

Something that's not true.

So love yourself through it because it's going to get you to the point where you can process it and you can feel the way that you want to feel. You can align with yourself morally. You can have the thoughts that you want to have and the feelings you want to have about that specific thing, right? So just love yourself through this process. There, during this process, is no right or wrong. So try not to fight the feelings that you have. Because facing them and working through them, that's how you're going to get the feelings that you want. Fighting something that you don't want, it's like quicksand. It's just going to bring more of it. Facing it, acknowledging it, that's the way through it. Okay, so love yourself throughout this process.

And allowing it and releasing it and relaxing through it. Fighting it a lot of times means pushing down, being like, oh, I don't feel that. I don't want to feel that. I'm going to push that away. And the opposite is allowing it basically for you to experience whatever that is, release that, emotion and relax yourself into it and let that go versus holding onto it or pushing it down. You think about letting it go and love.

Okay. Along the lines of this, keeping an open heart and an open mind. So what that is really, I want you to keep an open mind throughout this process and the fact that you are capable of doing this initially. I want you to think about like a new skill that you learned that initially you were like, oh my goodness, this doesn't make any sense. And then eventually It's like second nature. I have that experience every single time I have a new application, maybe on my computer. We do a good amount of video editing. When I first opened iMovie, I was like, this is overwhelming. And then I got really good at it. And then I got another processing software called ScreenFlow, right? And at first I was like, this doesn't make any sense. I was very frustrated. I was like, I'm overwhelmed. And then piece by piece by piece, and now I know how to use all the elements of that system. Maybe you've had an update on your phone. And we have iPhones, so Apple has just overnight literally changed the way everything looks, and you're like, none of this makes sense. And then a couple days later, everything's even faster for you. Okay, so I, I want you to just keep an open mind in that regard, that it might at first look overwhelming, but you are so capable, and we're going to go step by step. And then keep an open heart to this process, which is also going to be about, you know, pain being a good thing. And I know Ella mentioned it earlier in our chat. That feeling is a good thing. Okay, feel these things, love yourself through these feelings, and understand that nothing is off limits here in regard to these feelings. And the more you open yourself up, the easier this process is going to be, and the less you're going to be fighting these feelings. And so it's going to be easier to walk through it. And then last, and I would also, I would really also say most important. I mean, I really would say most important, and I know I say most important for all these, which is obviously why they're all up on the board, is to stay patient and consistent. Mm-hmm. Consistency in healing is the only magic pill. Consistency in healing is the only, only, only, only, only magic pill. Again, so they're, they're all important, and, and maybe there really is no number one, and that's again why they're all up on the board. You need to be patient with this process. You need to be consistent with this process. Understand that this is not an overnight fix. Now actually, this tool for a lot of people will give you very fast results, but this is still not an overnight fix. I mean, you're, you're not just For most of you, you're not just dealing with one thing that you need to process. If you were dealing with one thing, honestly, this tool can be an overnight fix, and some of the other tools can be an overnight fix. But that's not what we're going for. We're going for a full, wholesome healing of everything that you've been through. So you want to be patient with yourself, with this process, and you want to be consistent, which is why your healing routine is important. Your healing routine is important. Mm-hmm. When are you going to do this work, right? Because if you don't take action, Nothing's gonna happen if you don't actually do the tool. Nothing is gonna happen. And that's why I'm saying like, this is arguably the most important thing, because if you don't do it, none of this else matters.

Yeah.

Nothing else matters because you're not, you're not taking action on it. You don't need these reminders if you're not taking action on it. So, patience— nope, patience and consistency. I read, I read your comment, Dana, at the same time as I was talking. Patience and consistency. So those are reminders going into this new tool that we're learning. This week for our boot camp week.

So what'd you guys think? Pretty great, huh? Pretty great. The mindset stuff is so, so important. It's it's the missing piece that so many people who are suffering are are missing. It is just the way that they think about recovery and healing. Because honestly, if you just if you lock these things in and this mindset in, you don't need anything else. You'll get there if you believe in your ability. to figure things out and your ability to heal and believe that recovery is inevitable for you. If you never give up, you will heal. How can I tell you that's true? Because that's what we had in the beginning. All we had was a conviction that, hey, this is possible. I believe that if we never give up, we can do this. So if all else fails, you just lean back on the belief on these beliefs, but we're going to give you everything else as well. We're going to just—

We're going to give you it all.

Unlock the gates. Let the, let the dogs out and I'm going to stop talking. That's the end of my analogy.

Because analogies start to get a little weird.

I do have one other good analogy, but I don't need that. It kind of applies, but it doesn't. I'll say it. So if you think about like a stream with no rocks in it, right? So you just have a stream and you just imagine that water flowing and it's undisturbed, right? It's a very smooth flow on top. And what happens throughout your life is that rocks get thrown into your stream. Right? Some of them are little rocks. Some of them are big rocks. Some of them might be boulders. Some of them might be dams where the water has to rise up and go over it. Right? What I wanted to say when you said, you know, some things can be an overnight fix, sometimes you'll do a tool like this or you'll do one processing session and you'll take one of those massive rocks out and you'll take it out of your stream for good and you'll be flowing so much more smoother. But like Kayleen said, The goal is not just to take out one rock or one boulder. Yes, we want to take that out and we want to take it out as efficiently and as quickly as we possibly can. We want, we want, when we say full healing, a way to think about it is removing all the rocks that exist so you can have smooth water, smooth water, no matter where you are in life. So you can go to any scenario and not get triggered from anything, and you can just bring peace into all areas of your life. So that is, I believe, a good analogy. No, I really like it. A little better than my letting the dogs out analogy, mainly because the stream analogy isn't really my analogy. I heard it from somebody else. Dog analogy is my analogy. So, I mean, there you go.

I feel like 40 years ago that would have applied, but like 40. Yeah. I don't feel like people just like let their dogs out anymore. I thought you meant the song Who Let the Dogs Out.

I was like, that's in the '90s. No, I know that for sure. So we have one request.

To see Shiloh, so I'm going to turn the camera around.

Yeah, I can pick him up if you want.

No, I want to leave him sleeping because I have a meeting. Don't want to disturb. No, we don't. We don't disturb him. He's in a really good sleep. Really important. So I'm going to turn him around and then we'll just say goodbye and end the session. Amazing job here. We have an amazing week planned out. Now I also want to point out we have some awesome events coming up, so check the events section in Facebook. This week we are having our community's game night. There's going to be prizes. It's going to be a ton of fun. That's Thursday night. At least for, for us. I know different time zones, different things.

That's gonna be fun. We have— are we giving prizes?

Yes, we are. Wow. We're doing our 100th.

Do I get to earn a prize?

I, I, you remember we said yes?

I know. I, I, I keep asking. I just want you to keep saying yes.

Okay. And so we have our 100th session coming up. We have a session with Ryan coming up, and then we have another community social hour coming up. Well, so check out the event section on Facebook for more information about that. I'm gonna turn 'em around and then I'll let you end the session and we have to hop off.

Yeah. Also, quick update. You can do your thing. I'm just gonna talk over. This. So enjoy looking at Shiloh. Also, I've been working on, you know, this past week, this past month, whatever, on a new platform. So when Kayleen was talking about, you know, when your phone gets an update, you guys are going to be getting a really big update to the program. And there he is. There's the guy, the demon. Did he wake you up this morning? No, he didn't. He's been real lazy lately. Look at that. He's as soft and cuddly as he looks. He's like, he's just, you can just imagine like a big, massive pillow around him. So you just like feel it. It goes in like, what, like 4 inches, his fur. Like when he gets wet, he looks like a, like nothing, like a rat. So I guess that's my cue. Kayleen's giving me a kiss goodbye. So thank you guys so much for showing up today. Hope you guys had a fantastic time. Again, the rest of the week, here's what you can look forward to. Tomorrow we're talking about the very first step of processing. So today was all about the mindset. Tomorrow we're talking about how to identify what you need to work on, right? Because when you're getting started, you might have One very specific trauma you want to work on and you know what you want to do, but you may have a lot of traumas or you may have, you know, a more complex trauma or traumas and you may not know where to start, right? Or maybe you, you've, you've already processed a big trauma, but now you need to identify some of the little rocks in your stream. Maybe you took out the big rock, but now you need to identify the little rocks. Tomorrow we're going to talk about how to identify those things and what to focus on, right? Because that's the very first step. What do you want to process? And then, so that's day 2. Day 3, we're going to talk about how to actually go through and process it, right? How do you use bilateral processing to process that trauma that you identified in the first step? And then how to install, which we talked about, it was 2 weeks ago, I think, how to install a new belief and everything that goes around installation. And then how to close out that process. That's what we're talking about on day 3. And on day 4, which is Friday, we're going to talk about some different resources, some tools. We're gonna give you the worksheet to go through this and then some, some tips on if You know, something doesn't go the right way, or if this happens, or something bad happens. So that's what you can expect for the rest of the week. Hope you guys enjoyed it. This tool absolutely changed your life. And today, just remember to bring these things just into your life. Start to bring these into your life more. And kind of like what I was saying before, a mindset is just a collection of beliefs. And our goal today was to hopefully pass along some of these beliefs that have been absolutely transformational for us. So I hope that these beliefs have been able to Make some sort of impact on you today and throughout the rest of your recovery. And I know you guys are going to do absolutely amazing. You know, Pat, I see you. Dana, I see you. Lisa, all you guys are going to do awesome. Joanne, Lorena, I have to go. Kayleen's telling me to wrap up. I love you guys. Hope you guys have a great week and I will see you later. Hey everybody, thank you so much for listening to this podcast. If you want to learn more about how you can coach with me directly, There's a link in the description you can check out. There's absolutely no pressure. The main thing is I wanted you to get value from this episode here, but I hope you have a fantastic day and I'll see you in the next one.