The Framework To Completely Heal Past Trauma w/Gabby Bernstein EP 1235

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And now there's a new way to snack strong with unsalted no Shells. holding the salt, not the flavor, for a snack that packs a protein punch. Visit wonderfulpistachios.com to learn more. This is episode number 1,235 with number one New York Times bestselling author, Gabby Bernstein. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. Welcome back, my friend. Today's guest is a dear friend, Gabby Bernstein. And Gabby is an international speaker, podcast host, and of course, New York Times bestselling author who just wrote a new book titled Happy Days: the Guided Path from Trauma to Profound Freedom and Inner Peace. And we've had Gabby on a few times in the past and I've always left feeling inspired, motivated, and with more tools and resources to improve my life. So make sure you check out those other episodes. We'll link to those in the show notes at the end of this episode. And just a heads up as a trigger warning, Gabby and I open up and are pretty vulnerable about the different heavy experiences we've both had to heal and face in our lives. We dive into it pretty quickly right at the beginning of this episode. So just be aware that this is about looking at things that are challenging for people, looking at things that are hard, looking at things that maybe have hurt you in the past, and giving you tools on how to really identify them, be aware of them, and then break through them, how to process and integrate the healing journey that we all get to go on. So in this episode, we discuss the difference between big and little traumas, a framework to begin healing trauma in your own life, even if you don't think you have any. How to handle your response to being triggered in life. How to know if your coping mechanisms are truly helping or hurting you and so much more. I dive into some personal stuff Gabby shares as well in a personal way. So I hope this helps you reflect and I hope it gives you some tools and inspiration to process whatever it is you might be going through, whether it be in your past or in your present. And if you're inspired, please share this with a friend. You can copy and paste the link LewisHowes.com/HealingTrauma com slash 1235. And that'll send you right to the episode. You can take the link wherever you're listening to this podcast on Spotify or Apple podcast or anywhere else and just share it over on social media, text some friends and let them know to check it out and make sure to tag me and Gabby Bernstein as well over on your Instagram stories or Twitter or LinkedIn or Facebook when you share it out as well. And I want to give a shout out to the fan of the week. This is from Marwan who said, I find the School of Greatness not only beneficial but also life changing. I start the episode knowing for sure that I'm going to take something with me or my day is going to be changed. So, Marwan, thank you for your review and for being a subscriber. You are the fan of the week. We appreciate it. And if anyone listening wants to be a fan of the week, just go ahead and leave us a review over on Apple Podcasts right now. Subscribe to it. Let us know your thoughts. Give us some feedback. We just want to hear from you over there. And me and my team go through these and we choose different people every single week. So, big thank you. to Marwan for leaving the review and being the fan of the week. Okay, in just a moment, the one and only Gabby Bernstein. Huge thanks to Edmunds for sponsoring the show and also for being the perfect solution to making the car buying process a little easier this year. The market is already a lot more competitive than in past years with inventory shortages. It might get tricky finding your perfect car. But Edmunds will go the extra mile for you. The current car shortage means that some models are harder to find and more expensive than usual. So it's important to do your research through Edmunds before you purchase. Edmunds goes beyond just listing vehicles for sale. The Edmunds homepage has car rankings compiled by their review editors. Their website is so easy to use and it's packed with 50 years of trusted car shopping advice and price guarantee. all in one place. I don't always know the best car options out there, which is why I love that Edmunds has their own top rated awards for the top cars to get in 2022. This helps take the stress out of the decision making. Car shopping can be overwhelming. Edmunds is here to help. Visit edmunds.com and click on Edmunds Best Car Rankings to research and compare vehicles. That's EDM. U nds.com, edmonds, we drive it like it is. Welcome back everyone in the School of Greatness. Very excited about my guest and my dear friend, Gabby Bernstein in the house. So good to see you. Appreciate you. So grateful we're here together. I feel like a lot of both you and I have gone through traumatic events recently. sad events. And I feel like the world has gone through sadness and trauma. And we were talking about before the difference between the little tees and the big tees, the bigger moments that feel heavy and also the daily traumas that we either put on ourselves or our environment creates for us.

Yeah.

And trauma is something that more and more people are talking about. because I feel like people don't have a solution on how to heal. As an athlete, when you hurt yourself, you can't keep playing until you heal the bone or you heal something. If you tear a muscle, you can't really keep playing. If you do, you're going to hurt yourself more. But whatever. For whatever reason, in our emotional life, when we go through a tear or rip or something broken, we seem to just keep going without healing. If we go through a breakup, we don't really heal. If we go through a business breakdown, we lose our career, we just keep moving without healing. Why is healing so important for everyone at all times to be on that journey? And how do we heal trauma when it's invisible?

All right, going in with the big stuff. And it's all big stuff here. And we are ready to go there. You and I have been talking about our own traumatic experiences. And in fact, I wanna acknowledge that the first time I really spoke publicly about remembering my own childhood trauma was with you.

Yeah.

Because you made me feel safe enough to do it. I, where do I begin? So we run from these impermissible feelings from our past. These are emotional disturbances from our childhood, traumatic events, trauma with a big T, trauma with a small T, a big T trauma is being sexually abused as a child, having some kind of violence, living through a catastrophic event, growing up in an alcoholic home, a small T trauma is being bullied, small T trauma is being told you're stupid by a teacher. Small T trauma could be living and surviving COVID. We've all lived through trauma way before COVID It's just now more present for us. But the traumatic events from our past are the ones that are so impermissible because inside those experiences particularly childhood developmental experiences, is the shame, the impermissible rage, the feelings of inadequacy and feelings of being unlovable. And so we build up all these different protection mechanisms around us to avoid ever having to face those impermissible wounds. And those protections could be achievement. They could be, they could look good on the outside. That's the scary thing, right? So workaholism can be really praised at times. It can look like alcoholism, it can look like drug addiction, and we just create all these forms of protection around ourselves to never have to go there. But what's happened recently is in COVID and when we've been struck with feelings of not being safe, feelings of being out of control, a lot of our typical coping mechanisms won't work anymore.

What are typical coping mechanisms for most people?

Typical coping mechanisms, heading to the fridge, overeating, overworking, not working, like numbing out, vegging out, the sofa, a coping mechanism. And I refer to coping mechanisms as protector parts. I am now trained in internal family systems therapy. And so, In IFS, we talk about these protectors. And what are they protecting us from? Those exiled child parts, those impermissible parts that we don't want to ever touch, don't want to go into.

Those protectors are the coping mechanisms. Correct. The addictive or non-healthy coping mechanisms. Correct.

I'm hearing you say.

Yeah. Those are called protectors. Totally, exactly.

The things that we don't want to go and face the pain. And sometimes we don't even know that they're a problem. Like a workaholic may not yet know that that's a problem for them or codependency. So they're constantly protecting themselves by finding relationship or there's, for me, there was the controller. You were in studio with the controller many times. And you also even went as far as to like almost pick up on that early in our relationship where you're like, You know, it could be a little easier. You noticed it for me. And there's, I have one that's called Knives Out. She's not out anymore, but she was like this, you know, like, if you with me, you with death row. I am done.

So were those your two main coping mechanisms, I guess?

Well, there was my 25 year old cocaine addict. And then there is the, you know, another interesting protector part is even spirituality at times, because While it's a beautiful practice to be on a spiritual quest, and it's what I've been writing about for over a decade, we can at times use our spiritual practice to get above the pain. Give me an example. You're newly sober and you're in every meditation class and you're doing your Kundalini Yoga and you're just you're getting high on your own supply, right?

Yes.

Which is excellent. It's much better than drinking and there's, and it's a beautiful pursuit, but it's also another form of protecting what is deeper. And frankly, that spiritual bypassing, as we would call it, is actually a tremendous gift at times because it's too painful to go to those places. So if spirituality is what you've got, that's way better than the drugs and the alcohol, right?

But you're still masking.

But it's still another way of masking. It's still another way of getting above what is so uncomfortable to face below?

What were the two or three biggest things that you weren't willing to face for so long? So... For the reasons why you had these...

I didn't even know what they were. I got clean and sober at 25 and became extremely fascinated by my spiritual practice and became a spiritual teacher and started writing books on spirituality and personal growth. And then, all the while was writing books and on Oprah and, you know, friends with guys like you and, you know, doing my, moving my career forward and helping a lot of people and losing it on the inside, just cracking on the inside. By the time I was 36 years old, I was, this is about probably maybe six months before that interview I referenced between you and I, I was, just completely overwhelmed with my reality that I had created.

What reality?

The extreme control.

Oh, okay.

So I had authored maybe six or seven books. I'd had all this busyness happening. And you remember I had no team. I had like one virtual assistant running this like business that could have had 20 people at the time. And so I just kept just pushing, pushing, pushing, and all because I was trying to control. I was trying to stay safe. I was trying to stay safe from feelings that I didn't want to feel, but I didn't know that. So I kept looking back saying, why was I a drug addict? Why am I such a workaholic? Why am I codependent? Why am I, why, why, why, why, why? Until I was 36.

Interesting.

And had a dream. And In the dream, I remembered being-- I remembered I was an adult addressing that I had been sexually abused as a child.

In the dream.

Yes. And I woke up and I was like, no way, never talking about that again. I had to talk that night. I was like, no, down. Get down. And a few days later, I was in therapy and my therapist was asking me a few leading questions and One thing that she said in particular just catapulted me into the memory, and not visual or details, but just the acceptance that this indeed did happen to me. And so it turns out that for over 30 years, I dissociated from a childhood memory because it was so extreme. And I ran from it in all the same ways that we run from trauma with the workaholism, the cocaine addiction, the love addiction, All of it.

What's the root of the shame? Or what's the root of hiding or overworking or controlling? Is it shame that I'm not enough or that it's just too hard to face this pain? Or that if people knew this about me, no one would love me? What's the core fear that a lot of us face when that event occurs?

So, I don't think it's necessarily a logical fear that we have in our conscious awareness. It's a sense. It's a underbelly. And the more personal growth work we do, we can see, oh, okay, you know, I worked so hard to be seen, or, you know, you can start to see the map, but when we're in it, it's really hard to recognize. So much so that in the book I write about, I write this chapter about shame, and I tell this whole story about how I'm in this training where I'm teaching, but I'm also with two other teachers. So when the other teachers were leading the workshop, I was in the audience, Just like, oh, let me hook up my friends. I'll sit and listen. Yeah, check it out. Like, the whole workshop is on shame. And I'm thinking, I don't have any shame. 36 years old, you know?

I'm succeeding. I'm thriving. I'm living.

I just, I, it's such a, it's, it's, it's the most difficult emotion to face. And being in that room, that one exercise, I was like, oh, My God, this is what I've been running from. This is what I've been hiding from. This is, you know, decade into my sobriety, and I'm just touching into this now. Wow.

What was the exercise?

It was, I think it was about like witnessing how you respond to things.

And being aware of like how you react.

Becoming conscious of what it feels like.

If someone is a triggered human being in life, maybe not every day, but something happens and it triggers them. what is that saying about the person that they haven't healed something that's allowing the trigger, that those events have power over them, that they're, you know, they have negative coping mechanisms. What is that reactiveness or shutdownness and not standing up for yourself or whatever it is that people do when unhealthy reaction, let's say.

So the trigger. I'm going to speak to this in, in IFS language. So internal family systems was founded by my, my new friend, Dick Schwartz, and it's just the most beautiful therapy.

Internal family.

Systems, yeah. And I now did the level one training. I'm gonna carry on and continue training in this. It's the most incredible practice I've ever used. And I've been in that type of therapy for a decade, and then I most recently got it under my belt. And so what it is, and I could do some with you too today, what it is is the premise that we have these exiled child parts that the young boy who was sexually abused, the little girl who was sexually abused, or just the kid that was bullied, or the kid, I don't wanna just say just, 'cause people are committing suicide over this, or the being told you're not good enough or whatnot, or just a little bit of neglect or whatever it is. Those experiences from our childhood just get so pushed away, locked under lock and key, never to be spoken of again. Then the protectors show up and from a very young age.

Protectors meaning coping mechanisms.

Exactly. And anytime, and the protectors actually have two different forms. There's managers, which are just sort of like, you know, Workaholic, you know, working work. And then there's these firefighter protector parts that are like, F this, cannot go any further. I am going right for the drink, or I gotta go right for the fridge, or just the addiction, the addictive parts, right? So those are all known as protectors. When we get triggered, when there's a moment where that child part gets activated, your father just passed. There's probably a lot of triggers that came up around that. Without any deep awareness of our system, our internal system, we'll get activated. The young part might get activated because we feel out of control, we feel unsafe, something activates that part. When that feeling starts to creep in, the protector comes right in. The protector is like, gonna work, gonna eat, gonna run, gonna run, run, run, run, run, run.

The reaction.

The reaction. Gonna control, gonna, you know, whatever it might be.

Scream, whatever it might be.

Rage, blame, judge, judge. self-attack, attack others, binge on television, anything that that part can do to anesthetize the voice of that, or the presence, even this tinge of feeling, sensation of that exiled child part. And then the beautiful good news is we all have what's known as self. And for years as a spiritual teacher, I would have called this higher self or God or universe. And in this case, I would call it self with a capital S. And self is the compassionate, calm, courageous, curious, creative part of who we are that has always been there. It's the truth of who we are. It's the soul of who we are. And it's a non-physical energy that is us. And when we learn to connect to that self energy, and let that self-energy relate to and support the protectors, then our entire system can relax. So we could demo that today if you want.

Are you talking about like being able to step outside of the emotional reactive self and saying, okay, kind of let me coach myself.

Correct. Yes, very much so. Good listening, man. So you're such an active listener. So it's becoming your own internal parent. And letting self be the leader of your internal family system.

Your highest version of yourself.

Correct.

Kind, loving, compassionate.

The compassionate, courageous, curious part becomes the internal parent to all these other little parts. So it's the internal family system.

In yourself, not your family.

It has nothing to do with your family.

Yourself, your own family. When you were 10, when you were 15. When you were 16 and when you were 30.

Your protectors, your exiles, everything about all the parts. So you, Lewis, are not just Lewis. You are Lewis the athlete. You're Lewis the hard worker. You're Lewis the child who was abused. You're Lewis the kid who lost the guy who lost his dad. But it's not just these characteristics. It's the personality traits, these different personalities of who you are. So who are some of your protectors?

So who are the protectors?

How do you protect yourself when you get triggered? What are some of the ways that you sweep it?

I mean, I feel like I've done a, it's funny, 'cause I was telling my girlfriend Martha this, when we first started dating, I said, I'm gonna be 100% who I am. You know, I'm not gonna change for you or anyone, I'm gonna change for me, in the ways I wanna improve, you know, at the right timings of my life. And I go, there's only one thing, like, you can do anything, and it will not upset me. Yeah. You can talk to, 20 hot guys who are shirtless, I could care less.

Okay.

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What is it?

It's not even really that big. It's not like I'm super reactive or something, but sometimes I can, I, I would say I've improved a lot on this, but in the past, I felt like my word, when I would say something, certain people in the past, in intimate relationships, would not take my word when I just say, Here's the truth.

Oh, see, trusting you.

They were just, they wouldn't listen to me or trust me. And then when they would keep reacting to something that was made up or imagination that wasn't happening in an event or experience. And I was like, no, this is what happen. No, this is what. No. So I'd have to repeat myself over and over again to make sure that someone was listening or someone was hearing because it wasn't.

So when that happened, when you didn't feel. Create a false story about something happening.

Okay. And they were believing so firmly.

Yes.

That was the truth. And I'm like, that's not the truth. Don't attack me.

What's your response in those moments?

My response was originally, you know, like, no, this is the truth. But then if is not believed, then I kind of go in a loop of like saying it over and over again.

Okay.

If someone then, like Martha is now like, okay, I believe you, but then I'll like keep repeating you.

So proving yourself or how?

It's just like, let's just say, if someone doesn't feel like, I mean, it's, I don't know if it's proven myself, it's just feeling respected for my word. Like, this is the truth. This is how I'm feeling.

Mm-.

And making sure that, you know, It's respected and honored is really what it is.

Okay. Yeah. So do I have some buy-in to check in with that part of you?

Sure.

Okay. So when that happens and gets activated, what are you feeling in your system? Or what do you notice?

If it happened right away, it's more like if I feel like after like, I don't know, 10, 20, 30 minutes, like it's not landing with the person, then I feel like, oh, I'm on I need to protect myself.

Okay?

I mean, so I have. I. I kind of Loop sometimes. It's only happened twice in the last, like, year, but I'm just.

What's the loop? What? How would you define the loop?

It's to protect myself from someone not believing me.

Okay.

Yeah. So. Or my. That's my perception. They might believe me.

If you had to Define how you, like. Like, is it. Are you trying to prove yourself? Are you trying to. Like, is there a specific name of this reaction?

I'm not sure in this moment what that would be, but it's, I guess, proving myself. I don't know if it's proving myself. It's more like, I just don't feel like, yeah, my word is honored or something.

Okay.

Yeah. So I don't want someone to think I'm out of integrity.

Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. And so what do you notice about that part in your body, in your mind. Is there an image? Maybe even close your eyes if you want to, but just. Is there imagery or a sensation physically in your body?

It doesn't, if I think about it from the past, because I don't feel like a much of a physical reaction now, but in the past, I think I did where it feel like tension in the heart and, like, closed throat.

Okay. Okay.

But I feel like I've done a lot of the integrating healing work where I don't feel that it's more just kind of like a. habits still.

Okay, cool.

Okay, so it's just still coming. It's less physical and, like, stressful.

It's more like mental now.

So it's just being aware of it. And I'm even, like, I was even telling you the other night, I was like, I'm aware I'm doing this now, but it doesn't mean I'm gonna stop doing it.

Like, I'm aware in this moment that I'm in a loop in this moment. Well, let's help that part. Let's help that part.

Okay, so. So anything else that the part wants to reveal about.

Is it, does it have a gender?

I'm not sure if it does or not, but it's probably just like a, it's probably just like a scared little boy, you know?

Okay. Okay. So, the scared little boy.

Probably, yeah.

Beautiful. And is there anything that he wants us to know before we keep going? Is there anything that he wants to say out loud?

He just wants to feel loved and safe and protected.

Yeah.

Trusted. Yeah. You know, I never felt like I was. People believed me when I was a kid. Yeah. So it's kind of like, well, why tell the truth if no one's gonna believe me? You know? So I might as well just do whatever I want. Right. Type of thing.

Right.

I broke that pattern eventually. I think I got, you know, how.

Do you feel towards him?

I feel very loving and compassionate towards him. Beautiful.

Yeah. Does he know that you are here, that your adult resource, undamaged self, he knows you're here? Absolutely. Yeah, okay.

Because I practice it like daily, you know, the indication of it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. What might he need from you in those moments when the loop is up for him?

Just a pause, like a break.

Okay.

Yeah, that's why I told Martha, I was like, when this happens, if you feel like I'm doing this, just tell me, hey, I'm gonna take a pause and that's what I need, you know?

Right, what does he need?

I think he needs a pause. He needs to breathe. He needs, you know, just to walk and clear his Clear his mind and feel safe. Feel like I've got him, you know? Like I'm protecting him. I've got him. You know, we're in this together. That he doesn't have to worry.

How does he feel towards you?

I mean, he feels pretty safe.

He does feel safe with you.

Yeah, of course.

He loves you. Yeah.

I mean, I think he's like, wow, you're doing all the emotional work that I wish I could have had the skills or the tools, the ability from a, you know, childhood brain development stage. that I didn't have those skills. It's like, okay, you're doing the work for me, so I trust you.

We're gonna be okay. Now, if you could. So he wants to go for a walk when he's activated, right?

Yeah. Where would you guys walk?

Just around the block.

It's fine. Around the block. Okay. Just the one time around the block.

Or just sit in some grass and just breathe and look up at a tree. Can you just take a moment to.

Talk a little bit more about what. Where you might want to take him, like, a safe place that he could go with you? We just moved into a new place, so I don't know the surroundings.

Okay.

The parks, but I would just go around the block in a quiet neighborhood and just, you know, see the dogs walking by with their owners and, yeah, just, it's peaceful.

How close is T to you when you're walking? He's inside of me.

He's connected. He's in you, okay?

He's walking with you.

He's not like next, I'm not like holding his hand.

He's like within me.

Oh, yeah.

And is there anything that you want to say to him if you just sort of visualize him in that walk?

I would just say you're safe, you're loved, you have nothing to worry about. You know, even if someone, even if you feel like someone isn't trusting you or isn't believing you in this moment, I believe in you.

So, no, just one last...

It's at all, you know, it's not a... And maybe, you know, I'm using the example of my girlfriend. It's not that she didn't believe me or not, but it's like...

But it just triggered it.

Yeah, it's just like... And maybe she did believe in me, but I just felt like she's not going to if I don't do this or something. So it's more of a perceived feeling than an actual truth. Maybe sometimes or not. Yeah.

So now we have this process of retrieval where when you notice that he's there, instead of getting in the loop as you referred to, which it literally is a neural loop, what if you could take him for a walk?

Yeah, literally, I thought at last, I was like, I might just need a pause. Let me just go take a pause.

That's right.

Take a walk. There's nothing against conversations.

You could literally take him for a walk. You could visualize taking him for a walk.

Yeah, and I do that with, I do other exercises with the little Louis inside of me. And you know, I showed you on my phone, I still have a photo of my five or six year old self. And so I do practices on a daily basis where I'm just like, I got you, I got you.

You clearly do. I do it all the time. 'Cause you, what you have, okay, so let me tell you what you've got going on, man. You're, you're such a testament to your listeners and viewers. of someone who has done such deep transformational work. It's so profound. It almost made me cry. Thanks. You have a direct line of access from self energy, the compassion, courageous, caring, undamaged adult part of you. Right. Has a direct line of access to him.

Right.

To the little boy. Now, listen, not everybody can even go to the little boy, because the little boy was an exiled part.

Right.

Okay.

For a long time.

And I was just trying to talk. Remember I kept trying to be like, well, is it protection? And it's like, no, you went right to him. Okay? And so you've already done so much work in your therapy of retrieving him, bringing him into your workouts, bringing him into your phone, all these things. And so he's very intertwined and he's very much so, has direct access to you and to self, and self has direct access to him.

But in those- Capital self.

That's right. And that's why we were so easy to get there. But there's still more work to do. The triggers are gonna be, so there's still a trigger that you even were so aware of that you brought it to to her from the get go. And that trigger, when it gets activated, gets into a protector part, which is defending myself. Defensive, that was, I didn't want to say it for you, but that's the word. So defensive. And that makes a lot of sense because it's likely you were not believed as a child. And that is a horrific thing.

Which, I mean, there's so much emotions around it because it's like, you know, a lot of it's all parental stuff, right? Parents and then siblings and then peers, you know, kids and all that stuff. and it's like I was able to process a lot of this healing work in the last two weeks when my father died as well, to kind of go back and have conversations with my father, you know, it's like, and witness, you know, and also be grateful for the transformational. It was kind of when I was 13, he started to transform emotionally to where we had a different relationship. Before then, I didn't feel like I was believed by either him or my parent, you know, either my parents.

Yeah.

Whether it was true or not, that was my perception.

Totally.

They may have, but I didn't feel it, right?

So that little boy, while he's had so much work and so much love and so much care in therapy and so much care from Marta and so much care from adult resource Lewis.

Has.

Still got some unresolved suffering and it may go even deeper. And so for now, the next step would just be focused on giving him direct access to self. whenever you notice him get curious. -KRISTEN: yeah. -DEB: oh, little Lewis, what do you need right now, man? Exactly. How are you doing? Like, what notice, what you notice about him and the physical sensations. -KRISTEN: yeah. -DEB: you- know, ask him if he's aware of your presence. -KRISTEN: that's good. -DEB: and then whenever possible, you can remove him from the situation, take him for a walk. You know, when a child is having a moment or a tantrum or feeling really out of control, what we do as conscious parents is we connect and then redirect, as Dan Siegel says. -Connect. -JEN: and then redirect. And then redirect.

Yeah.

Not just say, Go to your room or something. Or just be like, I'm gonna deal with this and just make Marta believe me. It's actually, Hold on, Marta. I'm gonna take Lil Lewis for a walk. And so it's actually unbelievable she's sitting in the room, everybody. But it's truly amazing.

I mean, this is so life-changing for this.

For this marriage.

Oh my God.

For this relationship. And which, you know, I officiate weddings. Okay, so I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. No pressure, people. But really, it's transformational work. This is the work that my husband and I do. And it's life changing when you can start to see each other as your child parts or in a protector part, then her self-compassion, her capital S compassion can be a direct access for you.

Absolutely. And that's why I told her early on, I go, she's incredible because she just kind of allows me to, she's very peaceful and calm in those moments. She's like extremely spiritually advanced. And so she's able to just like kind of listen and not like make me wrong or judge me and kind of say, I hear you, I'm here for you.

I got you. She has a lot of self-energy.

She calms it down. Even if I might go for a few more minutes, she's like, I hear you. I want to say, I hear you, I've got, you know, then I'm like.

Okay, I just need to take a.

Break, and then I can come talk to you. That honestly is the most beautiful gift.

She's been like saying, you are bad, you know, so it's incredible. She's in her self, she's sitting in the seat of self when you're activated. She doesn't get triggered. And it's not always gonna be like that. So the most important thing is, and not everybody's gonna be a Martha in your life, you know? Luckily, one of the most intimate relationships is her, but, There's going to be people at work that may not, you know, or situations where you get, you know, called out online or whatever happens, and you're going to be like, they don't believe me. And, and that's when you, we want to go right into direct access from self with a capital S right to little Lewis and take them for a walk.

Now, here's the thing. You know, I started a healing journey of 30, not eight and a half, nine years ago of talking about the biggest shame that I faced, which was the sexual abuse when I was a kid. And that started unlocking a healing journey. As my therapist says, healing is not an event, it's a journey. It doesn't just like, oh, I have this awareness, I feel good now that I released it.

It's like a constant integration of exercises and practices.

My journey's right here. Exactly. And so I thought I was a lot better. I mean, I thought like, okay, I figured this out. Because after like two years of talking about the abuse, with, you know, friends, family, therapists, and then opening up publicly. Not that I see. I don't suggest people do it publicly about their shame, but I feel like it was a responsibility for where I was at. I felt like, okay, I can talk about this, and it doesn't trigger me. Right. But I still haven't healed things from intimate relationships. Yeah. And so the last year was really doing therapy every week.

Yeah.

Integrating the lessons. the healing that I was feeling, the tightness in my chest, my throat from intimacy.

Yeah.

And reconnecting with the little child in that part of my life. 100. Not just sexual abuse. But now what? Let's talk about relationships.

Yeah.

Parent stuff, everything else. And I feel like there's obviously going to be more, you know, that I'm uncovering, you know, every few years, probably. Right. Most people, number one that I've interacted with, don't, aren't even aware of their traumas.

That's correct.

Right. They're not even aware of that they have a broken bone in their body.

Or a broken leg. They've been running with a broken leg for decades.

Yeah, they've been running with a broken leg. And they're not even aware. They're just taking medicine or they're masking it or they have a cast on or whatever it is. And so I'm constantly doing the practice to be like, what else do I need to be aware of? What else do I need to be aware of? And then I'm holding myself accountable with therapy or friends or, you know, partners or things like that to be like, okay, where are my triggers? How can I keep growing? And then I'm trying to integrate the lessons I learn into a daily practice to. To heal and hopefully not have any triggers at all is the goal, is to be triggerless or reactionless.

Yeah.

We're more. More responsive, you know, responding for those that aren't aware of their emotion traumas and also those don't have tools in a healthy way to.

To.

To navigate those, what would be the process, would you say? Let's say give it a framework. Yeah, it's a healing trauma. Is it like a, if you could simplify it, not that you can simplify it, but if it's like there's four steps to healing trauma, three step, one.

Be aware, two, like, because it's really hard to do it on your own. So I'm going to read you the chapter titles, okay? Because this is the journey. Yes. It's my, this is, this is my journey from recovering from trauma. In that process, I share many, many methods and tools that one can use immediately and also introduce the therapeutic practices that changed and saved my life. And in introducing those practices, I actually give ways that you can do them in real time so that you can say, oh, this was really soothing for me, or I just listened to Gabby do some IFS with Lewis. I wanna look further into IFS. But the journey looks to me like this, and then I think we all have our own individual journeys. But my hope in this book and the intention here is to help the reader, one, know that they're not alone, and two, know that there is a guided path from trauma to profound freedom and inner peace. There's no way I would put my face on that cover if I couldn't stand behind that.

You're right.

Okay, so here we go. So the first chapter one is become willing to be, willing to become free. Willing to become free means You can't even open this book if you don't have a desire- To want to be free. To want to be free, to look more closely, to even just have a mustard seed of hope that there could be a better way.

How does someone start the willingness process?

Well, if they're still listening, they're willing.

Okay, good. Yeah. If you have a curiosity, you're willing.

If you're here, you're willing. And if even if you tuned into this episode, you're willing, 'cause I'm sure there'll be trauma somewhere in the title or, you know, or whatever you decide, but it'll be something that's it's gonna be an acknowledgement, yeah, there's something in that for me. Many, many, many more people are willing these days than ever before. I think that if I'd written this book five years ago, I'd have a half the audience that I have now. I mean that, okay, for this specific content. Chapter two is Become Brave Enough to Wonder. So in my case, I literally didn't remember and had to be brave enough to wonder what was there. And in other people's cases, they just have to maybe wonder, not that they don't necessarily remember what to them, but to wonder what could be behind these triggers? What could be some feelings behind these triggers? What could be, I did a podcast with somebody the other day and she was like, I have, she's like, my co-host has so much trauma and she's so open about it. And she's like, I have no trauma. Within five minutes, we were like the neglectful father and the this and that, you know, like it was just like instant and everybody's got it. Everybody's got it. So you just have to become brave enough to wonder and it might be a little tea.

But becomes big T over time.

Oh, it's interesting. She's like, I guess I just have little T, little T. And then she started to describe her story, and we were both like, that's big T trouble. So chapter three is why We Run.

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Is it just so it's so painful for us to face it? That's why we run most of the time?

That's right.

It's just so hard for us to, what, mentally, emotionally, emotionally, underneath all of.

The unresolved traumas, big T, small t, from our past is the belief system that we are unlovable and inadequate. How, and we did not, you said beautifully that now little Lewis has big Lewis helping him process this stuff that he wished he'd had when he was little, but when we're young, we don't, and if we don't have a caretaker, or a primary caretaker that has a secure attachment to us, helping us in those young moments to feel safe and seen and soothed and secure, as I talk about later and I'll get into that, then we literally have to rely on the protectors. All those storylines that we build up. The parts. Yeah.

The challenges, I mean, how many parents have tools, are healthy in their own emotional, yeah.

Sad.

How do you raise a kid who's healthy when so many people are struggling with their own challenges?

Read the book. I'm so serious because then we get into, if you fast forward to chapter nine, it's about reparenting yourself. But so much of this book is, if you go through this book, you will be a better parent without a shadow of a doubt. I mean, I've got a whole, I've got a chapter in here about hiding behind the body that we have impermissible rage locked up in our back pain, in our headaches, in our gastrointestinal issues, in our insomnia, eczema, And I talk about the psychosomatic effects of the mental disturbances that have not been resolved and how they affect the body. And then speaking about shame and then going even further and IFS and all of the somatic work that we can do and then it carries on. So I take you through, this is the playbook. This is the playbook. And now one thing I'm really cautious of with the reader is not every chapter is gonna be right for where someone is right now. For you, you could pick this up and be like, yeah, I could do all of that or I've done half that and I'm gonna do more. and for Marta at the same, it could be somebody on the street could be like, okay, I just have to.

Read this right now and just take it in.

Yeah, I can't even get started. I gotta come back in a year.

To do the exercises. Now, okay, so once we're aware and once we have the willingness and we're starting to wonder and look at some of these things and we say, okay, here's two things from my past that I haven't been willing to tell friends, partners, husbands, wives, spouses, parents, like I've neglected to talk about these things. They're so shameful, I'm so afraid to talk about them. let's say it's one thing, two things, whatever. What is the next step? Once you become aware of your trauma and you know there's something you want to heal, is it, well, there's a number of different therapeutic experiences you could go through. Here's a few to try. Is it everyone does it differently? Some people are more introspective and they do journaling prompts. Others need to speak to someone. Is what are the best ways to heal? and really integrate the healing. Because I think it's, again, I don't think it's like, I'm aware and I'm healed. It's like you got to integrate the.

Practice and every time you're triggered, can you breathe and respond differently? -IntegratIon is the word, actually. -It's the word. And, well, like I said, everyone's going to resonate with different methods in this book that are appropriate for them at this time. You can trust your own internal system. and intuitive force to know what's safe enough for you today. You'll feel it in your body. So for me, I wasn't going to be able to do the somatic experiencing, the body-based work until X period, like, you know, two years ago, because that was when I could feel safe enough in my own body and almost back in my body. Like, I would just departed my body and I was like back in my human body.

-What somatic experiences you mean, like just body work or physical.

So, ESI, which is somatic experiencing I write about in this book, it's invented by Peter Levine, is built on the premise that trauma is the inability to be present. And when we have deep-rooted trauma, yes, it's activated in our thoughts at times, but primarily body based. So we have these triggers that then-.

Store in the body. The body keeps the score, yeah.

Correct. So they send these messages, these triggers send a message to the brain that says like, fight, flight, freeze. And so what happens as a child is whatever you were unable to do, like in my case, let's say I needed to push someone off of me, that became, I was not able to complete that full blown, you know, so fight, flight, and then it froze, right? So if you freeze in time, you're stuck, that energy gets truncated in your system, and you become stuck in the neural loop of fight, flight, and then you get stuck, and then fight, flight, stuck. And that repetition, repetition. And so the beautiful process of somatic experiencing is about no storyline. It's not about what happened, where were you, it's all about the body. And going right into the body, going right into the presence of the body, and allowing the body to show you what it needs to do to fully reprocess the experience.

That's powerful.

And so in some cases it's very slow, right? So it could be like if you wanted to punch somebody, it's like a really, really slow movement. And I give, and this is body-based work, so the practices that I give in that chapter are also things that you can do right now to start to ground your body. So a heart hold, like putting your right hand on your heart and your left hand on your belly.

Actually, interestingly, hugging yourself.

Try this out. Put your right hand on your heart and your left hand on your belly.

How does that feel? It feels good.

Okay, switch hands. Left hand. Does that feel better or worse?

Different, because I'm used to putting my right hand over my heart.

So not as natural. There you go.

Okay, so it's important.

I just learned this. I interviewed Dan Siegel and I was doing this and he's like, well, you put the right hand on your heart, but I do the left. And he's like, 70% of people put their right hand on their heart and they feel that safety, and the rest kind of do the left, so you have to check on which side's right for you. But the heart hold or a head hold, these practices are really profound for settling your nervous system. Breathing in for two strokes out, one long stroke if you're feeling overly anxious and activated. So, tapping EFT, which you've talked about, tapping on the gamut point. So there's a point between your ring finger and your pinky finger. And if you're in that stressed out place and you're getting in the loop, tap, I am safe. And tap and just repeat, I am safe. I am safe. A power pose, like standing like Superman, you know, Superwoman, that can change your nervous system. So these practices are really body-based practices for letting your system settle in the moment. And then of course, I say in the book, if you want to find a somatic experiencing therapist and here's how. Yes. And all of the methods that I was guided to for my recovery were all spiritual therapeutic practices. I can say this because I'm not in the clinical space, but I believe that they're all extraordinarily spiritual, the specific. So EMDR, which is eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, that's designed again to help you reprocess that loop So once we.

Figure out which therapeutic experiences are best for us, right? Because it's gonna be different for each one of us. What would you say, you know, can we fully heal something? Is it, how long does it take? You know, is it based on the trauma and how long we've set it stored? Is there hope for people to say, I don't want to have this trigger for the rest of my life. I want to feel like peaceful.

Well, let me ask you when things.

Happen, I don't want to be reactive.

Let me ask you this in general, how do you feel?

Incredible.

Yeah.

Yeah, I feel good.

Me too.

Yeah, but for 25 years, I felt a lot of inner stress, you know, inner conflict.

So thank you to the 25 years for all that it offered you to get you to where you are now.

Right.

But you feel awesome.

Yeah.

So do I. So while it's been a good, committed, devotional practice, we are living proof that there is a guided path from trauma to profound freedom and inner peace.

Absolutely.

We're living that.

Right.

And it doesn't mean that we don't still have triggers. It doesn't mean that there isn't like more of the crystal to shine. It doesn't mean that I still don't go to therapy every single week and sometimes twice a week. But because I want to continue to care for and honor and respect all of the parts of who I am. Yeah.

I mean, I come from the sports background, which you know, and I'm a big fan of doing, having accountability for your goals, right? If I'm talking about a sports background, it's like, and I know I can't do it alone in athletics. So why try to do it alone in my emotional, you know, growth or my mental growth, my spiritual growth. I can do, I can go pretty far on my own, but I think it's just good to have the accountability for whatever that looks like for people. I'm not saying they need therapy. every week or they need to invest in something, but it's good to have accountability however you find it. I agree. Yeah, I think it's really powerful. It's one of the reasons that the.

12-Step program works so well. It's because of the fellowship. It's because you have a sponsor. It's because you have meetings. People are looking for you. Where is that person today? You know, just got a text message from one of my friends who have been sober. We've been sober for 16 years. He's been sober 17 years. And I was the first, first person I met in AA and he texted me today and he's like, Check it in.

You still good? Yeah.

Check it in.

How long were you in AA for?

I'm still in AA. Really?

Yes. So once you start it, you never stop?

Some people stop.

So is that once a month?

Is that once a week? What is that? Well, really depends on who you are and what you need, right? So I go to meetings now. You can go to Zoom meetings. I go to meetings in person sometimes, but mostly Zoom since the pandemic, unfortunately. Right, right.

Is it hard for people who started AA to not need it anymore? Or are you kind of like... Well.

I think that... Can you transcend that? You can move into a different type of program. You can move into a different type of therapy. There's plenty of people when they get long-term sobriety that they start to feel less resonant with some of the meetings and things. But it's suggested and I think recommended to stay close to it. because you don't wanna forget where you came from. I think everyone's path is different. Sure. I actually share a story in the book about sharing about, I believe, and Gabramattei would say this and other folks in this trauma. I've been watching his stuff. I love his stuff.

He's incredible.

I gotta interview him. Yes, you do. He looks amazing, yeah. What he would say is that, and I agree with this completely, is that trauma is the root cause of addiction.

That's what he says a lot.

100%. couldn't agree more.

Because if you're not, yeah, if you're not, you don't need addiction if you're not traumatized by something, right?

If you feel peace inside, why would you need to reach for some coping? Correct. And we all have trauma, and so we all have reactive ways of acting, but the bigger the trauma, oftentimes the bigger the coping mechanism, aka the firefighter part. Yes. And that's an addiction, right? So addiction is a way of a.

Huge way of putting out the fire. So the root cause, or so the root of addiction is trauma, or unresolved trauma, it sounds like. That's correct. -So, if you want to eliminate your addiction, your negative addictions, the key is to figure out where's the trauma and start healing that trauma.

-Yeah, that would be the goal. But I noticed in my own, with a lot of sober people in my life, that they all have had similar experiences to myself and to you and big T traumas. And even being clean and sober, it's still terror. I mean, I was sober 11 years before I was ready to face into my trauma. Trauma.

Interesting. Do you feel like if you would have faced it year one or two, do you think you would have?

I wouldn't have been able to, and I'll explain to you why. So I said to my therapist when I remembered that trauma, why now? Why am I remembering this now? And she said, because you're safe enough to remember. You've been enough therapy. You have enough spiritual foundation. You're safe enough.

You've got a good support group. You've got a good partnership. yeah. Interesting.

That's right.

But if he is saying that the root of addiction is trauma, wouldn't we want to start going to the trauma first? But if you're saying, if you don't feel safe enough to face it, it may take years.

So that's the point. So I think going to the trauma is so delicate and gentle, and it's like peeling back those layers of the onion. And anyone that's listening right now, still listening, because many people might have just been like, I'm so activated, you know, this is a lot for me. then they'll come back in a year and a half a year or whatever, a year from now and listen again. But the bottom line is that we all have these traumas and we're running from them. And to go head first into them would be like ripping off the Band-Aid or just being in the dark and all of a sudden walking into the brightest light you've ever seen. And it might blast you out. And that can happen. It does happen. People do remember when they're not ready to. And even when you are ready, it's terrifying to remember these things or accept things. But yeah, you have to go slow.

Okay.

So.

What about if someone is suffering? Do you feel like addiction is tied to suffering as well? Like inner suffering? And so if we feel suffering or inner pain, then we reach onto these coping mechanisms we call protectors.

Yeah, yeah. So I was in getting my nails done yesterday. They look really cool, right?

Cool. Yeah, very cool.

So I was getting my nails done. I was talking with the nail artist and she was really lovely. And she said, she's like, I'm like, you,'re really relaxed. And she's like, Yes, the building could be burning and I would be fine. Like, I would be like, okay, let's get out of the building. And then she said to me, the next sentence was, But I'm dying inside.

Wow.

And I said, oh, okay. So that numbed out. person is your protector. Oh, like, oh, she's doing a good job. She's keeping you safe right now. And then I handed her a book. Yeah, because, yeah, because I always carry books around during my book launch. I just recognized that everyone is suffering. Those of us who had the privilege of going to the places that scare us and coming out the other side and doing the deep work, are suffering less because we've been through and continue to work on.

We have tools to get out of it quicker.

And we actually have retrained our brains. So neuroplasticity shows that you can literally change your neural pathways. So you and I have the loop. You now are aware of the loop. Five years ago, you wouldn't even have known the loop was there. So, Don't try to change me. Exactly, it's who I am. I'm gonna prove myself, right? And so we defend, but the more work you do, the more you change your brain and your nervous system and your reactivity and all the ways that you run. And so there's everyone's suffering, some less than others, primarily based on your willingness to go to the places that scare you.

Now, Martha was telling you before we jumped in this about you know, I was doing pretty much weekly therapy and reconnecting to the inner child and a lot of different stuff. And at the end of the year, my therapist gave me an exercise. She said at the beginning of the year, she said, what is your intention? The first session I did with her.

Love her.

For this session. Right. And what's your intention from wanting this therapy, this experience, coaching? And I said, I Clarity, peace and freedom. And every time she asked me before our calls, what do you want? I said, Clarity, peace and freedom. And at the end of the year, she was like, have you found this? I said, I became this.

Yeah.

I was like, I didn't find it. I didn't create it. I became.

That's exactly right.

I integrated it. I became it. I am peace. I am clear. I am free. I haven't found it and grabbed it.

It's not something you have to find. It's something you have to release the blocks to the presence.

And she said, great, I want you to do an exercise. You know, I want you to give yourself, you know, write in a card that you've created this, like you've become this, and put each one of those in a box, you know, tie a bow on it, and then open it up on Christmas morning to receive the gift that you're giving yourself.

So beautiful.

Right. So it's this beautiful ritual. And then she said, also, I want you to. Martha was in on this conversation as well, so we both did this. she said also, what's the gift you want to give yourself next year? Like, let's plant the seed for what you want to step into, because this was a big year for you. You created these things. You became them. What's the gift for next year? And I thought about it for, like, a minute. I think I said one thing, and she was like, I'm not sure if that's what it is. And I was like, okay, I know what it is. It's ultimate courage. You know, it's ultimate courage for just everything that now that I've created this Foundation, it's a kind of stepping into more things, right? It's like what am, what have I been afraid of or maybe resistant to in the past? And now I'm going to step into with, with peace and Clarity and with freedom and not feeling afraid. Right. And so I did that ritual and that practice, and then, you know, the next week, I was like, we should, you know, I was telling Martha, I was like, I think we should move in together, you know, which I would never do in the past. You know, I never was, like, curious about that. It was kind of a resistant waited as long as I could. so that was one thing that happened in the first month. And then my. My father passed away, which was like this 17-year journey of kind of wondering how long he would last and all these different things from his accident. And I remember I did a session with my therapist maybe two days after he passed that was already planned on the schedule. And I was like, you know, I wanted this, but I didn't know it was gonna happen as quickly, right? You know, it's like, be careful what you want. right, because the universe, like you said, will bring you things to see if you're actually going to step into that, right? Like how you respond to it. I'm curious based on, and I feel like it's been a beautiful journey, sadness and grief, but also like awareness of the beauty from these experiences, right? My father passing mostly. I'm curious with what happened in your life, losing your child recently, What was that, how have you been able to practice and integrate the lessons you've learned through the journey of something you're just very sad to go through?

Yeah.

A big loss for you and your family.

Yeah. Well, first of all, I'll say that I think that having been through and come out the other side on so many different benchmarks throughout my journey, gave me the felt sense and the energy of knowing that that's possible.

To get through it.

To get through it. Correct.

It's just gotta be. Yeah.

So just for the listener that's not aware, I was pregnant three and a half months ago. I was five and a half months pregnant three months ago. And I'd worked a year with IVF. And I say worked, it was work.

It was daily, daily grind.

It's a lot. and I did nine IVF treatments to get one healthy embryo. And we kept saying, All you need is one. All you need is one.

Oh my gosh.

And my son, Owen, was his name, was in my body for five and a half months until my 20-week scan when I found out that he was still alive, but he was not growing because my placenta wasn't giving him what he needed. And so I had to do a D&E, which is an abortion pretty much, and have it. Oh my gosh. Have him, yeah, I mean, it was, that was horrific.

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And.

The days following, really it was the lead up that was the most terrific that I still have a lot of PTSD that way. That's weight.

You mean the weight.

Carrying a baby in you that's alive.

Yeah.

And then once everything was complete, and I went home to my three-year-old beautiful, amazing son, and I had my little kitten on the way, right? I was like in the hospital, like talking to the cat guy being like, Get me that cat now. And so I, I went, I came home and very quickly it was beautiful to witness all my work right there, all my personal growth work and spiritual work right there in place for me, like this soft pillow I landed into. And there was my IFS and it was like, oh, okay, my girlfriends would be like, why aren't you feeling more things? Shouldn't you just be upset right now? And I was like, no, I have a dissociation part that's doing a beautiful job keeping me safe right now. I don't want her to stay there forever, but right now she's doing a great, she's kicking it. Okay, so I was checked out for a little bit and then I would dip into it and check out and dip in, but I was aware of that. I didn't get stuck in that dissociation. And then there was this faith part that is so much stronger than my fear from 20 years of spiritual development. And I just know in my heart that this soul came to me in this way at this time to experience what it's like to be with me and my body and to feel loved by me. And then that was enough for him. And I have faith that the soul will come back or can come back in a different form, different than I expected. I believe, I've always believed that we have spirit babies and our spirit babies choose to come into our life at the divine time. for them and for us. And sometimes they come to teach us lessons, and sometimes they come to just experience the love in our system or to experience what it's like to be in a body. And then they wanna go. And I'm glad that I could facilitate that for him. And I feel-- and I asked him for a sign, which was a blue butterfly to show me he's around. And the first thing I saw when I walked in the door was Marta's his phone screen is a blue butterfly.

Oh my gosh.

And there's blue butterflies all in my life everywhere.

Oh my goodness.

Yeah, that's my sign for my son. And I do believe that an angel incarnated into my kitten because that really helps. And having my profound child, Oliver, who is, you know, holding me, just providing me with the most incredible opportunities every single day to be the best version of myself for him.

Where do you feel like you're at in the process? Do you feel like you're, you know?

Well, you know, it was interesting. For decades, I've had this experience of counseling women and men, but particularly women, through this type of grief. And I realized when it happened to.

Me... Like you would coach other people. Yeah. They would have to abort it. They lose a baby.

Countless. I mean, at least in one person in every audience. you know, women struggling to conceive, women struggling with fertility, but mainly miscarriage or loss or full-term loss. There's horrific stories. Two of my long-time coaching clients, two of them that were, I mean, I used to coach 20, 16, 15 years ago, but two young women that I coached both lost babies full-term. And so this, what I, the first phone calls I made was to and I just was like, remind me what I said to you.

Oh, wow.

And the truth is, is that I really looked at the grief counseling that I had offered these women, even having not experienced it, and it was spiritual counseling, and said to myself, wow, this is what you've been training for. I knew it was true. I knew it worked, but I now is really living it. and it was really profound to just be the witness of how strong my faith is and how strong my center is and how I am so resilient and also so vulnerable too and willing to just continue the journey of grief in its natural order, not forcing.

Not forcing like... What's been the biggest lesson? I mean, it's only been a few months, it's still so recent, but what's been the biggest lesson for you with taking on the grieving process that you've been teaching for others and just experiencing it all mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically. I mean, it's a big physical transformation, obviously.

Yeah, that was tough. That's tough being 20 pounds overweight and not having your baby there.

Right.

And, well, some of it has been really understanding that the a journey, a path through grief could look like titrating in and out of feeling so that you could be completely fine and normal and dissociated or just in happy in the moment and then feel into it and then be doing great. And then I did a podcast the other day and a woman shared her story with me. It was just, you know, and then I, but it was beautiful and we were able to hold each other in that same experience and to just be able to dip in and dip out. But the biggest opportunity was for me to see how my faith is so much stronger than my disbelief and my fear. I have such a strong certainty that this happened exactly as it was meant to and that there's something else coming.

How do people get to that place, though, that maybe haven't had the training or the coaching or the, you know.

-Kristin: well, you know, -JEN: I think.

It'S a place of certainty and a belief and not living in fear about anything, not just of like, -KRISTIN: It's.

Really my life's work, truly. My book, the Universe Has yous Back, is Transform Fear to Faith. This whole book, Happy Days, is all about reclaiming that serenity that you were just speaking of. And I've always loved this quote from A Course in Miracles. I'm not here to teach you the meaning of love. I'm here to teach you how to release the blocks to the presence of love. And so we all have that core sense of self with a capital S. We have that love, that compassion, that courage in all of us. We just have built up so many walls against it. And the more we tap into books like this, listen to podcasts like yours, the more we go into therapy, the more we spend time in spiritual settings or in therapeutic processes, the closer we get to that presence of self within. And that's the answer. That is the straight up answer. Nothing outside of us is going to be the source of our safety or security or happiness or worthiness. It has to be something that is restored within ourselves. And it's a process. And that's literally why I wrote this book, because, Louis, I care so much about this reader. I was having a call with my therapist, and She's like, you know, you're working so hard and you're back to back. And I said, you know, I've never felt more on mission than I do right now. Because I think about how much suffering I've experienced in my life and how committed and courageous I've been to come through.

Yeah.

And I just want to be a power of example for every human that wants to heal to know that that's possible for them.

Wow.

And I'm so, if I spend six hours in the ISO booth recording podcasts, it's for a reason. It's not about some credential. It's about making sure that whoever needs this is gonna hear about it.

What do you think your life's gonna be at a year from now from all the things you're gonna go through and the process of grieving and growth and learning and service, where do you think it'll be? I guess is tomorrow 2222222? Where will you be, I guess, you know, a year from that date, you think?

222-23?

Yeah. Emotionally, spiritually, physically, you know, where do you think you'll be?

So. I guess I would say I'm just continuing to shine the crystals. So I would hope that the steadiness I feel now is just even more magnified and my ability to witness my triggers and smoothly transition and take my little girl to the bedroom and cuddle with her just is faster and quicker. And that direct line access to self is stronger and just more and more developed. I want to continue to educate myself. I want to get I want to go further and potentially even see if I can get some credentials at some point.

Really?

Not really, but the credentials, but just go do deeper training.

Therapeutic trainings, yeah.

That's cool. And just to really give my, I mean, I definitely want to go as far as I can with all the IFS training. And most importantly, you know, somebody said to me like, oh, okay, what's next for Gabby Bernstein? And I said, what's next is next week. I can't wait to see my book in the hands of all these people and just witness their transformations and see them have the experiences. And, you know, so many people throughout my career have written to me and said, oh, this book changed my life, or this book changed my life. And I always say, I didn't change your life. The book didn't change. You changed your life. Like, I told you a story. You did the practice. You changed your life. And so I've always felt that so strongly. And now more than ever, I feel this sense of urgency that this is so necessary. This is like required curriculum to be living in the human condition, whether it's my book or somebody else's, Bessel van der Kolk or, you know, your book or whatever it is that you find that's your path to recovery of whatever that means to you. And I just-- what's next for Gabby Bernstein is right now, tomorrow, witnessing people hold the book in their Yeah.

I'll never experience labor or childbirth or anything like that. But I'm curious, what has been a powerful spiritual practice for you since over the last three months? Are you able to have conversations with your child's soul? Is there something you hope other moms could do if they go through this experience that you really recommend it's been helpful for you? Because I don't know the statistics of miscarriages or things like that.

Oh, they're insane. Like it's like 80% of people have some kind of real care. Yeah.

Do you feel like it's, I mean, I don't know. Do you feel like it's powerful to have a spiritual conversation with the child once the child is no longer physically there? Yes. Because I'm not sure if moms do that or not or if they just kind of like move on to the next.

It really depends on where you're at. I think that sometimes the safest thing for somebody to do is just move forward or get pregnant again and that that's totally understandable.

Are you having conversations?

Yeah, so I hear spirit guide, I have spirit guides and we all do, I believe, and I can hear that presence and I can feel that guidance. And I also know that my guides work through people and friends. And I was kind of, I have, right when I lost Owen, I had this immediate psychic knowing that there was another soul, that the same soul was coming back. And then as I mentioned to you, it was kind of really overly reiterated by every psychic in my life. And so that sense of knowing was so strong and then it was really reinforced for me. And there is a path forward that doesn't require that much of my body, but it's a path forward to this child potentially coming through. And I wasn't really taking the actions on it. I kind of took an action, made a phone call to the doctor, and then just like, they're like, oh, he'll get back to you in January. They never got back to me. sort of just like hanging out. And then out of the blue, I got, it's the same doctor that my friend used for her son with IVF. And ultimately, she did a donor egg. Now has this most incredible child ever with her husband. So she loves this doctor and she just texted me out of the blue and she said, listen, I just texted the doctor. and asked him to fast track you forward. And I was just like, that is my baby in action. I was not sure. I was overwhelmed. I was feeling, Should I do this? Do I want to do this? You know, it was just a lot to go through. And so then you, God will do for you what you cannot do for yourself. And God works through people, and my spirit baby works through people, and he was Jamie, knock, knock, knock, you know, get this going. And she said, yeah, I know, I know.

Wow. Well, one of my triggers is I laugh when things are really sad.

Yeah, I do the same thing. I do the same thing.

I'm not laughing at stuff. I'm just like, this is heavy stuff. But I think it's important for us to all look at that because heavy things are going to happen to all of us. You know, we're not getting out of here alive. No one's getting out alive. Like, there are things just sad things are going to happen. And I think it's prepare ourselves for. Yeah, staying peaceful.

That's a nice point, right? So it's like doing a, let's say you're not having an acute crisis. Someone's in acute crisis right now. It's like, that's my book. I want to read that book right now. Someone that's just like, oh, like, I'm doing some things I don't like. read the book now because it's- Prepare yourself. Yeah, it's setting the foundation for a steadier system and the resilience is creating a life of resilience. Absolutely. So that no matter what you face, whatever it might be, you can really be present and move through things with grace.

Absolutely.

Grieve with grace. And the thing I really wanna mention, Louis, is that while we talked such deep stuff and it's, we only go to big talk here with you. And it may feel like, oh, you know, that's a lot. You can have a lot of fun along the way. And you and I can both really speak to that. We've done the past 20 years, 25 years, we've been working on ourselves really diligently with a lot of devotion. But we've had a lot of fun along the way. Absolutely. And we've had so much, so many miracles. And someone once said to me, how do I live a miraculous life? I just said, add up the miracle moments. Mm-. So all those miraculous moments of relief when you add them up become a life of relief.

Yeah. Here's one I want to ask a couple more things and we'll finish up here in a second. If someone is not willing to face their trauma, can they truly live an abundant manifesting life? If there's stored traumas, there's defensive guards, are you able to accomplish, accumulate, achieve, but still feel a lack of inner peace if you're not willing to do the deeper work?

That's correct.

So you can manifest and accomplish, but then it's still gonna feel like something's missing.

Correct. And so you can manifest a lot, you can work your off and produce to a certain level, and you can attract a partner, but there won't be a sense of worthiness. Still, you won't believe you're worthy of what you attracted, or you won't be able to keep it, or you'll sabotage, or you'll keep looking for more. So it can never be, our happiness can never be something that we get. It has to be some one that we are.

Ooh, yeah. So up until three years ago, I guess for you, because you were, you know, number one New York Times bestseller back to back to back and building this massive business and you've got a great, you know, marriage and newborn son at the time, Did you feel like you were able to, and you were like the manifester, you know, you're like the attraction manifester teacher, and you were doing it for yourself, but did you feel like you weren't, something was still missing?

Well, I think that there is definitely periods in my early career where I was manifesting a lot, but I wasn't, I was holding it and manifesting it because career-wise it was all in the pursuit of good. But these other parts of my life were just like, totally falling apart. So my career always believed and I always had complete full freedom because I knew I was on a mission.

You were on a mission based, yeah.

I was full service in love and have continued to be. And so my career has never been, it's just, you think it and it will be.

And that- what parts of your life.

Were kind of- oh, I was dramatically struggling in my intimate relationships with friends and my, prior to my husband, but with my husband and just relationships were a struggle. Not so much like he and I, but my ability to really enjoy what I had manifested. Really? Yeah. And even the struggle to conceive, and there's just a lot of things I wanted in my life that were not coming easily because there was more that I needed to heal.

You had some blocks or some traumas in that area. And so those things were more difficult to manifest.

And if they did manifest, Yes, they were difficult to manifest. And I believe that one will block the manifestation if we're not in an energetic alignment with it, or we will get it and not be able to believe we're worthy of it and look for more. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: Exactly.

How do we get into energetic alignment of something we want? Do the inner work.

-Sabotage IT.

-Jen: yeah.

-Sabotage IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT.

-Jen: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT.

-Jen: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. -JEN: yeah. -SABOTAGE IT. - work. Listen, I wrote a book called Super Attractor, and it's the methods for manifesting a life beyond your wildest dreams. But what is that book really? It's a book on how to feel good.

That's it.

It's a book on how to feel good.

It's a foundation of gratitude, appreciation, acknowledging.

Yourself, loving yourself in order to attract. And every single one of my books, no matter how forward-facing the promise of manifestation may be, are all books on personal development. because spiritual development is personal development. The closer we get to that self-energy, the more spiritual we are, because we start to be able to dissolve all boundaries with the presence of that spiritual self energy. Yeah.

I want people to get the book, Happy Days: the Guided Path from Trauma to Profound Freedom and Inner Peace. This is some of the journey that I've been on the last few years that I think is helpful for everyone. I think inner peace is the ultimate key. And you don't get the inner peace without facing the trauma, the hurt, the pain, the sadness, the resentment, the angers, the frustrations, the whatever it is, feelings you have about yourself or others, the world. You've got to find a way to heal and process in order to get to that place of inner peace. And I think that is the game we should all be on, figuring out how to find inner freedom, inner peace, no matter what circumstances are happening. on the outside because they're going to keep happening.

I find it fascinating that your therapist said, what are the gifts that you want to receive? And two of them were peace and freedom.

Yeah.

Clarity was the other one.

That was my mantra as well. Yeah. Peace and freedom. Because I didn't feel peace. I felt peace and freedom in certain areas of my life, but not an intimacy. And so it was, how do I get, you know, why? And I'm the common denominator of all these relationships breaking down in some way and choosing in a certain way and.

Attracting a certain type of person. Exactly.

I don't blame anyone else. I've taken responsibility of me being the one at the center of all those choices.

And all that beautiful 25 years of work has gotten you to a place of just profound grace. And look what you attract. I know. It happened fast, too. I remember when we did the interview.

With you, you were like, Louis, now you're like the most eligible bachelor in the world. I was like, I'm the most eligible.

Bachelor in the world.

He's like, about that, you know?

I'm actually dating someone now, but yeah.

That was your outing moment. Yeah. Well, I'm super grateful for you. I appreciate you. I think this book is very needed, so I want everyone to get a copy for yourself and a friend. Happy Days are here and are coming if you're willing to do the work. That's what it is. It's willing to do the work.

Do you want to know why I named it Happy Days?

Sure.

So, when I was a kid, we would sit around the table and raise our glass. Instead of saying cheers, my family would say, Happy Days. And in retrospect, I really wasn't happy then. And now, sitting here with you with our lights camera action, I am happy, truly, truly happy.

That's good.

And living happy days. Happy days. That's beautiful.

That's beautiful. I want to acknowledge you, Gabby, for the constant work. I think I've known you for 12 years. I remember a time when you were dating your husband now, but you guys were dating. I saw you, I think I met you once before, but I saw you, I think it was off of Houston, and like Lower East side.

That's where I live. Yep.

There was a music event and you were at, and you were in the stairwell and I saw you, you probably don't remember this, but you were with your husband, your boyfriend at the time. And I was going through all my own stuff, you were going through stuff, And I was just like, I remember was like, I really hope a lot of good things happen to this person. Oh, wow.

Because I knew you were doing so.

Much good work then. This must have been 2010, 12 years ago. So I've known you for at least 12 years. And it's been a beautiful journey to, you know, you've been so helpful for me and supportive of my growth and there for me in a lot of ways emotionally and spiritually and just, you know, I wish we could spend more time together, but, you know, whenever we catch up, it's always a beautiful. So I acknowledge you for constantly doing the work. work because you've been teaching this stuff for so long, but going through what you've gone through, I don't even know what that feels like. And so I acknowledge you for the challenges you've had to face, the loss, the sadness, but also the profound wisdom and grace that has come from the adversities and your willingness and ability to keep teaching in a graceful way, which I think is really challenging when we go through hard yeah. So I acknowledge you for constantly showing up. It's beautiful.

Right back at you.

Yeah, I appreciate you. I've asked you this question these last two questions a few times, but I'm curious where you're at now. So this is called the three truths. If you could only share three lessons with the world and all of your work was gone for whatever reason, all your books were eliminated and this was your last day on Earth and you could only share three lessons with the world, this is all we would have to remember your information What would those three truths be for you?

Everything you're looking for you have. Trust in the presence of love and courage and grace within yourself and focus on the good stuff.

Yeah, of course.

Don't sweat the small stuff.

I know the book is so powerful. Final question, what's your definition of greatness? Freedom and inner peace.

Gabby Bernstein, thank you so much.

Appreciate it. Love you. Appreciate you. I love you.

Thank you, sweetheart.

Thank you so much for listening. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's show with all the important links and also make sure to share this with a friend and subscribe over on Apple podcast as well. I really love hearing feedback from you guys, so share a review over on Apple and let me know what part of this episode resonated with you the most. And if no one's told you lately, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great. [Blurb:.

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