Infidelity, Immaturity, & Relationship Healing - Special Guest Dr. Jill Manning (Episode #3)

There's something about you that I can't help but smile when you smile and laugh when you laugh.

Hello, and welcome to the Human intimacy podcast with Dr. Kevin Skinner. I am so excited today to join be joined by Dr. Jill Manning. She is a licensed marriage and family therapist and certified clinical partner specialist who specializes in treating individuals who've been sexually betrayed through infidelity or compulsive sexual behavior. In addition to her clinical work, Dr. Manning is a researcher, author, consultant, and professional speaker. And maybe more important, just as a person who's known Jill for over 20 years, she is a very kind and caring person who is doing a lot of fantastic work. So I want to welcome Jill to the show today.

Thank you. Thank you, Kevin. It's really an honor and a treat to link arms with you today.

You know, over 20 years ago, we were working with what we were observing is the betrayal trauma piece, and we worked with Dr. Shondell Knowlton in creating an assessment. And that assessment is designed to help people understand the post traumatic stress symptoms they have after discovering infidelity or other forms of sexual betrayal. It's been over 20 years, but that research and that study to this day is influencing a lot of people's lives.

It is. It's been instrumental and I know it's an assessment I use in my own practice, and it is so helpful in really getting exact and focused on what's going on, which then helps us be more exact and precise in our treatment planning.

Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. All right, so, Jill, couple things before we really get going. I'd just love the audience to know something that's fun and unique about you.

Sure. Well, it really started, day one having a unique life. I was born to Canadian parents in a British military hospital in Germany. And it was actually West Germany. It's a country that doesn't even exist anymore. And so that really kick started a life that has been very international in nature. And really I'm grateful how it has broadened my view and understanding of. Of a number of issues, you know.

And you've done a lot of stuff in your life. Right. I mean, you grew up in Canada and. Right. You grew up in Canada.

And Australia.

And Australia. Military life.

Yes.

What is it now that if you look back on how did those early years influence you now a professional who's helping people, literally, you're helping people deal with this sexual betrayal. Just walk us through a little bit of your career and how your early life influenced you.

Sure. I think being in the military as a, you know, a military child had a major influence for good early on. I mean, there's challenges to military life for sure, but one thing that it taught me was I was fortunate to see many men and women from around the world that I grew up with in different postings that we had that really embodied the sense of duty, this loyalty to one's country, loyalty and duty to a higher cause and purpose. And, Kevin, that really influences my day daily, where I have a deep desire and passion for wanting to be part of the solution, to help and to also be loyal and have a sense of duty to something larger than myself. So that's been really instrumental. The second piece, and I don't share this story very often, and I'll try to make this as succinct as possible, but I graduated with my master's in marriage and family therapy. And although this issue of pornography use betrayal was certainly of interest to me, it was not what I envisioned specializing in. And it wasn't until I would say, within three to six months of beginning clinical practice that this issue was an inundated topic. It was an inundation. Children as young as five adults in their early 80s, I was seeing the full lifespan being impacted in some way by the use of pornography. And it wasn't until I worked in a school setting. I was funded by the United Way to work in a school, high needs school, and I had three siblings. I was asked to assess. Long story short, it came out that the father, who had since taken off to the United States, this was in Canada at the time, had used all three children in the production of child pornography. It was then, Kevin, that I knew I wanted to be part of the solution and figure out why is this going on? How do we prevent some of these issues? How do we treat these issues? And so those were military life and that initial clinical experience were two of the major influences in what I do today.

You know, and you've had an incredible career really helping people. And in front of Congress, you testified the influence of pornography on our lives, our relationships. Do you want to talk a little bit about that? Because I think that may be part of this process that you've been through, really trying to understand what is the influence of pornography on society. And I think there's a lot of people who historically have said, ah, it's just, it's normal. It's. It's just what people do. But you have a very different life experience, not only in your chair, but doing the research to look at, really look at how pornography is influencing society. Do you want to Share that experience with us.

Sure. And I'll start with a point that I'm embarrassed to. To admit, but I must, because it's part of this story. It's significant. Growing up, and I would say even during my undergraduate college years, I had a very live and let live attitude, Kevin. I did not grow up in what I would describe as a religious family. My dad was not a member of the faith that my mom was, and we had an international upbringing. So I really had a belief that porn was, you know, I didn't really understand it, but I didn't take a strong moral position on it. I didn't think, oh, that's great, or oh, that's terrible. It was just really a live and let live ambivalence and indifference to it. And it wasn't until that case that I described with child pornography and the three children that I could see, I witnessed with my own eyes the devastating, deep impact that that abuse had had on them. I realized that my live and let live attitude had been an intellectual cop out. It had been an intellectual cop out. And I was motivated from that point forward. And this is what partly spurred me to pursue doctoral studies to a PhD in marriage and family therapy with this as a focus to understand, to seek what does the research say? What is an educated, informed view of this topic? And that's really where all of this got started, which led from one thing to another. And in between my second and third year of my doctoral program, I was invited to be a social science fellow at the Heritage foundation in Washington, D.C. which is a conservative think tank, which was interesting at the time because I didn't consider. Didn't consider myself politically aligned one way or another. I was not an American citizen. I've only been an American citizen for two years. So here I was in this conservative think tank with exceptionally bright scholars. And this is what I researched was the impact of pornography, Internet pornography, specifically on marriages and families. And when I was asked by Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas to testify in a hearing that he was organizing, one, it was a deep honor to do that. But it was also the very first time, Kevin, that data had been entered into the Senate record about the impact systemically on marriages and families, there had been hearings up until that point, several actually, but they had always focused on the individual. How does pornography impact an individual? My testimony was the first time that we broadened the look to say, what is this doing to relationships? What is this doing to children in a home and marriages? And that was exciting as a marriage and family therapist to be a part of.

And you're looking systemically what is the bigger influence not just on an individual, but what's it doing to couples, what's it doing to the entire family. And then, you know, you look at your own experience that you shared that story earlier with the dad and his children and you start to see, you start to see the implications. And then you also looking at the other side of this, what's it doing it to marriages? And so do you mind sharing a little bit about what your research at that time, what you found? That was when, what year? 20.

That was 2005. And then I finished my, finished my own Research in 2006. So I testified November 18th of 2005 in Washington D.C. and what was interesting that that testimonies on the Hill for most individuals are limited to five minutes. My five minute testimony had 274 different research citations associated with it. All of that was entered into the Senate record to this day. Kevin, there's been a massive increase in the focus internationally on this topic. We have a lot more countries doing research on this, some very liberal countries, countries that we never expected to be doing research, you know, places where prostitution is legal, things like that are, that are now looking at pornography differently. But all, all of the citations that were used, to my knowledge, none of that data has been refuted and all or most of it has been strengthened and reinforced with more current data over the last almost 20 years. So the main takeaway is that we know and even recent research as recently as just a few months ago shows again and again and again that long term pornography use by one or both partners has a negative impact on relationship quality. So satisfaction and longevity.

Yeah, and I was going to say and if we add that that's, that's the coupleship. But then we look at the individual ramifications. Now we're looking at increase in depression, anxiety, lack of what we would call life satisfaction. And, and again, some people say, well, is it really the pornography? Well, regardless of whether it is, some of the research that I've seen, if you're viewing three to five times a week, you're more prone to be depressed, anxious, or you could say it the other way around. If you're depressed or anxious, you're more likely to be viewing pornography three to five times a week. But again, the concept is it's influencing the individual life, the ability to connect in relationships. And again, some people say, well, it's just pornography, right?

What's the big deal? And what I, my experience has been those that are really pro pornography tend to be more individualistic in their view. And they are looking at individual effect, which there's plenty of data showing negative effect on the individual. But when you look at what this does relationally, long term, this does not have a positive impact on the strength of a bond. Now, I am well aware and I know that you know this too, there is some data out there that shows benefits. I've looked carefully at that data. Most of it has ties to the industry of some kind, companies supporting that research, that have vested interest in research showing something. We saw that with the tobacco industry years ago. And it also looks at one slice in time. And it will ask, it will ask individuals, is this a good thing for your relationship? And people will say, oh yeah, it's fantastic. And they haven't asked the partner, they haven't asked the other person in the relationship. I've seen and for context for listeners, I practice in a private practice just out on the outskirts of Boulder, Colorado. This is very open, liberal area. I see a full swath of people from various walks of life and belief systems, no belief systems, people in open marriages, and very, very orthodox and conservative religious views. I see the whole, whole gamut. I've seen many people come in over the years, Kevin, who initially said, I didn't see any problem at all with pornography. I even used it or we enjoyed it together over time. I've yet to see a couple that stay on the same track with this. Usually what happens is one person will escalate, something goes underground, exaggerates with this issue, and they're no longer on the same page, or someone will develop a compulsivity with it. And so long term, it's really important. If you've seen or heard of data that looks at the benefits, pull up the data that is longitudinal, that looks at parenting quality, marriage satisfaction, even sexual satisfaction. And you will see a common theme of data showing, showing this has negative effects across, across the metrics.

And we're looking over time, right? Because in, in the, in the snapshot of the moment, sure, we're enjoying it, but like you said, what happens to this relationship over time? And we often forget to look at that longitudinally because we just look at these snapshot moments. Because part of this, what we really are looking at, whether we can call it or whether we even agree or disagree on the concept of addiction, what we should be looking at is what's it doing to the chemicals and the amount of chemicals of dopamine, for example, that these people are getting and they're creating an alternative high to their experience. And when you get that, when is it enough? And what happens when I try to walk away from it? And then what happens to me when I am not getting it? Do I get frustrated? Do I go through withdrawal symptoms? What happens when I'm not able to act and get that dopamine high that I'm accustomed to?

Well, and it's also something that for most consumers of pornography, was introduced in old, older childhood. 7, 8, 9, 10 is a common window of exposure when this starts to pick up. And then by early teens, mid teens for a growing number, this is already starting to show signs of compulsivity. And that's significant, Kevin, because this gets woven into the psycho, psychobio, spiritual development of a human brain and personal. And so the whole understanding of bodies, relationships, gender roles, sexuality gets very distorted and skewed and gets woven. It gets braided in with this, this highly charged content. That's important because when I look at the topic that we're going to discuss here today, my observation and what I have seen the, the research bear out, as well as it gets people stuck emotionally, they get stuck in very immature ways of approaching life, relationships and the world around them. It's a maturity binder, meaning it gets them stuck. And they don't learn a wider range of coping skills to deal with strong emotions like sadness, anger, loneliness, boredom. That's a big one. And they, they learn from a young age to turn to that as a way to regulate emotion and release emotion. And it becomes this one hammer in a toolkit. And they don't learn a wider repertoire of how to cope and manage and regulate life. And then they get stuck in very detrimental scripts for how to interact with members of the opposite sex or same sex.

Yeah, and I've seen that a lot because when we have couples come to my office, which I do a lot of couples work, I often hear a partner say, they just don't hear me. They don't understand, or it's all about sex. And that's all they really care about. And when they're stressed, the only thing that calms them down is being sexual in some way. And so they've come to rely, as you say, the one hammer, which is the only tool we got. And that's part of the challenge is it limits the emotional expression and the ability to be with an underlying emotion. Sadness, as you say, shame, loneliness. And what do I do with that? Well, the only way I know how to cope is my sexuality.

And so you're going back to the question you'd asked me of, you know, what are some of my key takeaways from my time in D.C. and researching this. And there's a sentence and I'm going to read this quote. It's my own quote, but I like to read it so that I get this exact. And this has really held true over, over years that I, as a researcher and as a clinician, as a person, understand pornography to be a mood altering, belief changing relationship, damaging, sexually hampering, potentially addictive, socially harmful, spiritually deadening and exploitive practice that I do not believe can be engaged in responsibly or without risk to oneself or to others. And that really sums it up, Kevin. That is what I see in my clinical work and also when I review what the data says, that that sums it up right there.

So to our listeners, I'm going to tell you this right here now, you can go to our webpage and I'm going to have that quote there because I think it summarizes exactly what we're trying to talk about today. We aren't as a culture, I think we've become so accustomed to pornography that's just a part of our society that we're not pausing to really reflect on what it's actually doing to our society. Just as an example, recently I was looking at some of the research of why people are filing for divorce and they said somewhere between 55 to 60%. There was one study that showed up to 60% of people filing for divorce today are it's sexual betrayal or sexual infidelity related. So again, whether we, 6 out of 10 are now saying there's something sexual, sexually deceptive that happened in this relationship. So we can't turn an eye to it as a society and say, eh, it's normal behavior or it's acceptable behavior, it's common behavior. Really what we need to be able to do is educate people so they understand what it's actually doing to them. Because I don't think our culture is talking about the emotional limitations that it's actually putting on us.

I couldn't agree more. And that data is alarming. It should be alarming. There's such a focus in our culture on sexual education. I'm a proponent and I support sexual education. But you know what we're missing and which the data you just shared underscores. We're missing the education about how to love another person, you know, to, to step back from the mechanics of sexuality and really look at the, the spiritual bonding and connection of not just Sexuality, but just how to love another person in a way that sustains a bond. And I. I don't think that's education that we're talking near enough about. Right. And I know this. Your whole podcast and vision of right intimacy. What. What does that mean? And how do we develop the skills to really engage meaningfully and in a way that sustains us and feeds our souls?

And if we don't do that as a society, where are we learning it? I often ask a question when I do courses. I'll have, you know, therapists, religious leaders, and I'll ask a question. On a scale between 0 and 10, how effective were your parents at teaching you how to have a healthy relationship? I've asked the question worldwide. Inevitably, I get below a 5 average. So 10 is great parenting, great role model. I learned what healthy relationships look like. Zero. Not at. Well, they didn't teach me at all. On average, we. We usually score somewhere between a 3.8 and a 4.5, which means that we aren't learning social skills, we aren't learning relationship skills. And when we have distractors like infidelity and pornography, we begin to realize that we can easily get distracted. We can get on that hedonic treadmill of pleasure seeking. But relationships, where we really get life satisfaction, we are. We aren't learning how to do that very well. So, yeah.

And to build off that, I think it's very easy. And even in a podcast like this, it's easy to focus on pornography as the problem. Pornography use is the problem. You know, as you said, infidelity is the distraction or the problem. Those are symptoms. Those are all symptoms. And what are they symptomatic of? Right. If we dig into that, one of the key things I've seen it be symptomatic of is developmental and emotional immaturity, of mental illness, of our deprioritization of relationships generally across our society.

Yeah. And so let's talk about this idea of emotional immaturity. That's really one of those things you and I were just going back and forth about, a core concept we wanted to talk about today. I really want to introduce that and really let people think through this, because if we can really get the word out here, I think we might start to see a meaningful conversation around, you know, the influence of our sexuality, pornography, infidelity, these types of things, how they actually influence our emotional growth and maybe create a immaturity. So let's talk a little bit about that.

Well, I'm going to start in an unusual place and I'm going to reference holy text, the New Testament, not in a religious context, but in a clinical context, because there's a lot we can glean from sacred ancient texts, whatever faith source they come from. And in First Corinthians, which was written by the apostle Paul, he this is, this is the statement that. Shared quote. When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But when I became an adult, I put away childish things, and I've swapped out the word man for adult there. Now, that verse, we've heard that in different variations, you know, basically of we're growing up or we need to grow up, that the placement of that idea, Kevin, is so significant because it is placed immediately after Paul's discourse on charity. And he's describing at length why we need charity, why charity is so important, and really that it's the core of us being relational as humans. If we're going to have quality relationships with other humans, we must, it's not negotiable. We must learn how to be loving and charitable people. And I think it's so significant that this is tied in with growing up, that we, if we're going to grow up and be mature, that that's an absolute prerequisite for really healthy relationships. Now, going to a marriage relationship that is arguably the most complex and maturity demanding relationship that we will have. Would you agree with that, Kevin?

Not only would I agree with that, but I think that's where we really get tested, because when we're growing up, we, we observe our parents, we observe people, but never are we more vulnerable than in this relationship that we're, you know, where we're choosing to be with this person in every way, we're saying, I commit to you. Yeah.

And so the maturity demands of that cannot be understated. And our relationships will suffer unless we learn how to be emotionally mature. Now, what does that mean? Well, today I am really pulling on the stellar work and thinking of both Pia Melody, who's focused on developmental immaturity and the recovery context for decades, and Also more recently, Dr. Lindsay Gibson, who has focused on emotional immaturity specifically. And so I'm going to pull on five key traits because I love how Dr. Gibson breaks this down. Emotional immaturity is defined and explained by five key things. First, egocentrism, where we're focused on the self, that kind of selfish core which we need when we're little human beings, you know, and even little animals that humans have the longest dependency period of Any creature on earth. We have a lot we need to learn. Our needs are great. So there is naturally an egocentrism to that. But if we don't get past that at some point where we're able to put ourselves in someone else's shoes, we're going to run into trouble. The second quality is affective realism. Now, that is a fancy clinical term for basically meaning reality is what we feel it to be and that we will deny or distort any evidence that's contrary to what we want it to be. Now we'll come back to that because that's a big part of how porn works. And it works in quotation marks, air quotes. The third quality is difficulty with self reflection. The fourth quality is lack of empathy. And the fifth quality of emotional immaturity is struggling to be emotionally intimate. That means we have difficulty sharing deep emotions and strong emotions and we have difficulty receiving them from someone else. We don't know what to do with them. So those five things, egocentrism, affective realism, difficulty with self reflection, difficulty with empathy, and difficulty with emotional intimacy. Those five things together really help tease out this broad topic of what, what do we mean when we say someone's emotionally immature? Now let's share. Kevin, if you're open to this, how we both see this show up in our clinical spaces. Just this last week, I had a joint conversation with another therapist and a couple. There were four of us in this conversation. The husband who struggled with compulsive sexual behavior disorder had relapsed just less than two weeks ago. Major relapse, big breach in sobriety. This was devastating to his wife. We had no sooner finished discussing some appropriate response actions and steps to this major relapse. But what this husband started talking about, and I'm almost quoting verbatim, when do we get to focus on my needs? Why is this always focused on what she wants and her safety and what she's asking for and her boundaries? When do I get basically a stake at the table here to focus on how she hurts me and what's wrong with the marriage for me? When do I get my day in the sun? My jaw dropped. And this is a classic example of emotional immaturity in action. The inability to see how one's destructive behaviors are impacting other people and even caring about that, not even being aware of it, but caring and really having empathy for how we're impacting other people. And you know, the data that he had really caused trauma with this, that was just an annoying sideline detail that he wanted to store it and deny and. And really, the driving motivation was when do we focus on me? Because it's all about me. This is emotional immaturity to a T.

And you're talking about that egocentrism where I literally. I can't see outside of me. When do we get to focus on my pain and what she's done to me? In my mind, I'm going to put this in a couple different things, because I think that concept of it shows also that lack of empathy. Right. Because I can't feel the pain I've created. I'm feeling pain. So can we focus on the pain that. That I'm feeling right now from maybe her rejection or something that I feel like she's done to me?

Yes.

Now, interestingly enough, when I see cases like this, it takes a bit of time for that individual to, so to speak, mature, because they don't have that empathy at that point. And especially when I find people in the early phase of the recovery process, they really struggle with empathy. And so when I sit with them, it's like, okay, so you want to focus on you. Well, we're not going to be doing couples work right now, because right now you're. You're wanting this to be about you. Right? And. And if you want to damage your relationship, try doing couples work with that, because they're not ready for couples work. They need to do some individual work. So even if I was just sitting with this person who said that, I'd say, what is it that you want to. You're feeling? Right. Well, she won't do this or she won't do that, or she did this to me. Why do you think she did that to you? Why did she pull away? Was she safe with you? Did you. Did you send a message to her that made her feel afraid or were you emotionally present and then they started to realize, oh, my gosh. Right. If we can get them to that point of awareness to say, are you considering how your partner's feeling? It's so easy. Well, what about me? What about me? What did she do to you?

Well, and. And to help and educate people to understand, there is a massive power imbalance that occurs anytime there are secrets. And I'm not talking secrets like I'm hiding my husband's birthday gift. I just went through that. My husband had a birthday last week. I hit a gift. He found it, and I had to tell some very quick, you know, ninja stories there to, like, why that was there and what it was for. Now I'm not talking about those kinds of secrets. Anytime there are secrets in a relationship, whether it's secrets around money, secrets around our behavior choices, communication with others, pornography, whatever it may be, sexual behavior, it creates a power imbalance. And so I applaud you, Kevin. I applaud you as a couples therapist who sees the wisdom in not having couples jump into couples therapy immediately. Because we're doing a lot of harm out there with people prematurely getting couples work because they think they can focus on the relationship, but they need a lot of intensive individual work first, partly to help them emotionally get educated and also some maturity on board to be able to come together for effective couples work. And as long as there's that big power imbalance, we have to work with that power imbalance so that we have more even ground when people get to couples therapy. And my experience has shown there's five key things we need for that to be more balanced. We have to have truth on the table. We cannot start couples therapy with secrets in the closets. You have to have even a working level of empathy for that to work. You have to have mental illness stabilized and on its way to being treated, Trauma stabilized and on its way to being treated. And, and I'm embarrassed to say the fifth one is. Is totally escaped me at this moment.

It will come to you while you're finding that one. While you're finding that one. Let me just address what you just said. When. When couples attempt to find or a connection prematurely before safety is established. I'm going to use the word safety here. Safety means that I'm able to relax in your presence. Safety means that I feel like you understand me. Safety is not that you're going to physically hit me, but emotionally I can't determine because I can't read you anymore. Maybe you looked at me in the eyes and you lied to me. Maybe you're gaslighting. Your deceptiveness makes it so I don't know how to be in your presence because I don't know if I can trust you. And when that's occurring and we try to create a relationship connection, it's like we're asking someone to say, I want you to ignore your senses, that you don't feel safe and attempt to connect right now. That's why it doesn't work. There isn't a sense of safety. All human relationships are found founded on one principle, and that is safety. Your body can't connect with another person emotionally, physically, mentally. You can't do that if you don't feel safe.

Well, absolutely and the fifth, the fifth one that I had forgotten and now it's back, is sobriety. We can't feel safe if a person's compulsively acting out and they're not sober because their primary relationship is with whatever drug of choice they're acting out with instead of, instead of the person or partner. So sobriety is needed for safety. We don't feel safe. I've yet to meet a partner that feels deeply safe when their partner is at risk or is actively acting outside the relationship to, to mood stabilize.

And, and if we look at that, Jill, if we just keep going along that pathway when couples, they'll often call up, they'll want therapy and they'll say, we need couples work, we need couples therapy. And, and as a therapist we train as a marriage and family therapist, we might naturally say, oh yeah, they need couples therapy, sure. But until we understand the dynamics, we really have to assess is this couple ready for couples therapy? And yes, we do need components, what I would call safety building. We need the core foundation, which we can create a foundation, but we're not going to be working on deeper emotional connections until we have trust and honesty and some sobriety and we can show some empathy and understand one another on a deeper level. That's where couples therapy really begins. That's why we do things like disclosures to help couples get to a foundation of safety.

I couldn't agree more. And I, I'm just delighted. As I said, I have deep respect that you have that perspective, Kevin, because there's a lot of premature couples work going on where there's massive power imbalance. I, I do support, when it's absolutely necessary, some initial, almost containment, you know, a safe place to at least talk about some day to day life things. But repair work, actually repairing the relationship, that in my opinion, and I am a licensed marriage and family therapist, cannot occur unless those five things I mentioned are stabilized and in the mix. And going back to the topic of emotional immaturity, I'm sure you encounter this as regularly as I do, Kevin, where I'll be sitting with someone and emotionally I'll say, pretend your birth certificate that we ripped that off up. How old do you feel and how old do you experience your partner being? It's shocking the ages that people will identify. Just this last week, someone said, I often feel that my husband's showing up emotionally, like a five or six year old. I often feel like I'm 10 or 11, you know, this person said, well, imagine doing couples work with people that are in Those developmental emotional stages, that's not going to work. In fact, I actually think it puts the relationship at high risk of dissolving. So slowing couples down, acknowledging there is couple damage and harm that's been done. But can we individually really drill into some key foundational things that must be accomplished before we can come together, do that repair work? It's essential.

Yeah. And I have found, and in my training as a, I train therapists all over the world and one of the interesting things that I find is when I, I do a role play, what's called the Cartman or drama triangle, and I will often ask about age and we'll talk about different stages. And it's very common when I'm working with a person who has been acting out, regardless of whether it's sexual behaviors or substances, we will typically say, how old do you feel here? Inevitably we're looking at a four year old, a five year old, a seven year old, a ten year old. When, when some event or events have occurred, heard, and this is one of the critical things I want to tell people, look, you might have got stuck there, but you don't have to stay there. And if we can do some of this reparative work and help you metaphorically grow up, then we begin to see that maturing that you're talking about. So we grow out of this emotionally immature place into this maturing place where I begin to see, wait a second, what my actions hurt another person that's going, moving away from that egocentrism or that egocentricity into a place of awareness. I work through my shame because I recognize that you have feelings and I develop empathy.

Right. Well, and we, we must work through that to have empathy. Because when shame is high, empathy is low physiologically. Even if someone says no, I want to have empathy in the brain when they've done images of this. When a brain, human brain is in a high state of shame, that's the very part of the brain that's needed for empathy. It goes on a blackout, it's black on a, on a brain scan. So when shame's high, empathy is low. So that maturing process is just, it's so key. And, and I realize for some listeners, they maybe think, what are Jill and Kevin talking about? 4 and 5 year olds, 11 year olds. What we mean by that is that when relational traumas occur, big traumas like abuse, sexual abuse, for instance, a divorce that was really ugly and high conflict when we were little, or it can be small t traumas too, constant criticism, not getting affection not being praised or encouraged in key areas, bullying. Some of those things that some people don't readily recognize as traumas, those can get us emotionally stuck. Because to bring to completion maturity, there's things that humans need to be able to move through the milestones of development. Well, when something happens to us that is really detrimental or something that we needed that we didn't get, sometimes traumas, good stuff that we didn't get, not always bad things that happened. That mixture of relational trauma, the big T stuff, the small T stuff, the stuff that happened and didn't happen, can get us emotionally stuck at different ages, emotionally. Now you can have someone be a star athlete, a CEO of a company. They excel in certain areas of their life, but relationally they are stuck. They do the dumbest things. You think, how can this brilliant person in this area of life be so tone deaf relationally? Well, this is why. This is why. And, and all of us, I mean you and I as well, Kevin, will have areas of our life where we'll be more emotionally stuck or immature than others. So all of us are in this together. Where to really grow up, spiritually, relationally, emotionally, we have to be awake, we have to be willing to grow and to be looking at those areas. I love what Dr. Lindsay Gibson did because she's, she sliced this thinner in ways that we can say, hey, I really need to work on that, or this is a tough situation in my life. How do I. If I'm my highest self and I want to approach this maturely, it gives us a roadmap of how we do that.

Yeah. And then what happens is we begin to form what I would refer to as truly intimate opportunities. Not necessarily the relationship, but opportunities. Because when we're present, when we're growing up again, when I can work through my shame, I'm not living in this place of self, self centeredness. I'm actually tending to see other people. And so I can see how my actions influence another person. I can also see my own actions and I don't like the way that makes me feel. So the image and the maturity is when I recognize I want to be a different person. Not because other people are telling me to, it's because I want to. And that's where I see the maturity growing up. No longer AM I this 8 year old, 9 year old, 10 year old. I'm actually seeing myself as a person who can be making decisions. Just today I was sitting with a person and talking with him and he said, you know what, what's so interesting is for so many years, I found myself as the victim every time I was this person where I was hurt by whatever the actions are. You don't care about me. You don't want to pay attention to me. And as we started exploring it, the attention wasn't the way that he had perceived it should be. As a little boy. And when you start to recognize as an adult, I see your intentions differently. So when your wife reaches out, when your wife does this, when your wife does that, why do you think she does that? And it's a different interpretation whether than this victim stance. It's an awareness of, oh, she actually does care in a non sexual way. Which is important to see it that way.

Well, and to build off, you brought up the topic shame, which that's another one of my favorite topics. And I just want to tie, kind of weave these together a little bit. Shame is actually an emotion like any other emotion. It's a gift and it can be a real asset to our healing because it's shame that lets me get in touch with my limits and my humanity. Shame only becomes deeply problematically. If I don't believe I have inherent worth, if I don't believe I have value at a deep level, inherent level, and that there's nothing I can do in this world that increases or decreases my value, then shame will be problematic. But if I can grow, and this is part of developing and maturing too, is realizing I have inherent worth. I am valuable and so is my partner, so is everyone else around me. They have inherent worth as well. How am I treating them and how am I showing up in the world? Then shame can be a gift and an asset. In fact, I have a colleague who is 30 years in sobriety from alcohol and she refers to shame as the shaman. She's like Jill. It wasn't until I really looked at my shame that that's when my relationships were able to heal. Because that's what let me realize I'm human, I have limitations and therefore I need a power greater than myself. My own thinking is not going to get me where I want to go. And so I wanted to tie those together because I know there's a lot of people out there struggling with shame load. Connecting to their worth is key, right? For maturing and also dealing with this in recovery.

And so let's be specific for a second shame. I'm not enough. I'm unlovable. There's something wrong with me. Listen to the language. How old does that feel? I'm not enough. It feels young, right in Contrast, I am worthy of love. I am enough. I am good. Right? You can hear the difference in those phrases. Somebody who comes to that recognition. I think we are all born with high self worth. And it's really only life's experiences that make us question our worth. And when we come back to our true selves, whether we are the person who is acting out or the person who was betrayed, because both experience their version of shame, it just is a different version. When people realize their true worth, boy, that's where I see the greatest healing. And they, and they create boundaries for themselves and for the relationship. And that's the lovely part of healing and recovery.

And they do. They create boundaries when they connect with that inherent worth because we protect what we value. Boundaries are what protects my core values and identity. It's not about controlling someone else. It's about protecting and being feeling a sense of responsibility to protect, protect my core, not in a selfish way, but in a responsible way. And I protect what I value. So if I don't value myself, I'm going to really struggle with boundaries.

Well, Jill, I think you and I could keep going on and on today. It's so, so much fun in this conversation. Right? Anyway, real quick, is there anything else you'd like to add on to this emotional maturing process? Anything else you want to add before we get on to a couple final questions?

I want to leave a message of hope that I know in my own life, in my own growth as a parent and as a clinician, maturing and growing are choices and they're possible. Aging is going to happen to all of us. But growth is a choice. And it takes being awake and having the humility to realize, hey, I don't have this all figured out and to be open to learning, but I think it is. It's so exciting that there are roadmaps and from new texts to ancient texts to so many examples around us of people that are walking that healing path of growing up emotionally, addressing and releasing their trauma that's keeping them stuck in young ages and learning the skills they need to to have rich and satisfying relationships. That is possible. I see it weekly when I go to work. And just what a fascinating ride our own healing walk is too, right? It's never ending.

Yeah. I love the idea of giving hope. Right? We can all mature, we can all learn and we can. That concept of humility, right? I'm willing to learn. I don't know the answers. Not this concept of I should know the answer, I'm an adult, but more realistically of what can I learn from my own emotions and from these types of experiences?

Well, and as Pia Melody highlighted, part of being a functional, immature adult is recognizing that we do have needs and wants, while most of those we can meet on our own. Recognizing the limit of where we don't know something that's mature and strength to say, I need help. I don't know what I need to know to get where I want to go. And so getting needs and wants met in healthy ways is a question core piece of maturing.

Yeah. Fantastic. All right, a couple of final questions. If you could give the advice to the world on how to have healthy relationships, this is Jill101. What would you say? These are some of the things that I think, if we're really talking about how to have healthy relationships, what advice would you give the world?

That's a. That's a broad question, Kevin. And before we. We started the podcast today, I did a search on Google and I looked up best relationship advice that people have received, and there's almost 10 million different answers out there. And when I looked at some of the top things coming up, it was really terrible advice. You know, things like never go to bed angry. That's terrible advice. Really, truly, physiologically is terrible advice. It can take up to three, two, three days to metabolize all the neurochemicals that get dumped in our system when we're really upset. So that would not be it. But I think from what I see, it really ties in with our topic today of what are we doing to grow and mature and to be awake, to be consciously awake and present, really actively a participant in our life and like you said, having the humility to recognize where we may be immature, where we need to grow, where we're stuck. I think being awake and present and actively choosing to grow and mature is the best thing we can do for our relationships, our families, and also our own health.

Outstanding. My last question for you. What is the best relationship advice you have ever received?

Well, what's coming to mind is kind of just the flip of what I just said about worst advice. I really do believe actively maturing and growing is the best thing we can do for our relationships in dealing with our shame and our trauma is that's the work, right? That. That's, that's the key. And, and what. What also comes to mind. But I realize, you know, this is a diverse audience in my own personal life. It's. It's adhering to principles of my faith and walking that as authentically as I can Yes.

I love that last part, being authentically as we can now, at some point, there's. There's an interesting thing that I'd love to continue this conversation another time with you. We've talked about individual maturity, right? This emotional maturity, this growing up. I would love to put that in the context of a coupleship maturing. I think we have couple dynamics where the couple is acting immaturely. And it would be a really fun conversation to talk about how couples can mature in their lives together. And really, you see a coupleship maturing where they learn to see each other in a different way, they learn to interact in new ways. I'd love to talk with you about this coupleship and how they can mature. So maybe we'll have you back and do a podcast again, if that's okay.

That'd be a great topic. I'd love that.

All right, well, to our listeners, Jill, thank you so much for your time. It's just absolutely delightful talking with you.

Likewise, Kevin. Thank you.

All right, thank you. One more shout out to Dr. Jill Manning. Thank you so much for sharing your insights. Now, many individuals have been asking for extra ideas and support. Let me begin by saying, recently I completed an online class, the Essentials to Healing After Sexual Betrayal. It's a comprehensive online course designed to provide support and guidance for betrayed partners who are seeking to navigate the complex path of healing after experiencing sexual betrayal. If you're experiencing the PTSD symptoms and you would like additional support, not only is this an online course designed to help you understand the PTSD symptoms and how you can reduce them, there is also a drop in group where you can get group support to help guide you in your healing journey. Feel free to join us@human intimacy.com you can find additional courses on healing after an affair. Now, thank you very much for taking the time to be with us today. May you be blessed in your pursuit of finding trust. True, deep human intimacy that I can't.

Help but smile when you smile and laugh when you laugh Something surround you it's like you're shining, you're a siren.