If Your Partner Or Parent Is A Verbally Abusive Narcissist... WATCH THIS!| Dr. Ramani

what they're doing to this other person is unacceptable and their backstory is not an excuse in this moment they're harming someone else their backstory doesn't matter you can be empathic and protect yourself you can say they have had they've had a rough life and their behavior is unacceptable [Music] why the hell is it so hard for people to leave a narcissistic person in a relationship even when their lives are at risk so there's a Continuum so it's it's even when in a case where there might be physical abuse or danger and I almost view that as a separate side issue because I think the vast majority of narcissistic relationships are not violent right and I think it's important to make that distinction because a lot of people who are going through a narcissistically emotionally abusive relationship where there isn't physical violence feels like well I'm not going through that so maybe this isn't that bad right so I think that it becomes the physical abuse piece will put over to the side and we'll get to it but the other thing to remember that was unique about narcissistic abuse is that every day isn't bad there are enough good moments in there and that's that nature of that trauma Bond there's enough good moments and the good moments create buy-in they create confusion they Foster the justification so a person's like we had so much fun over the weekend I you know I think he's so attractive I think she's so much fun I I we have um we went on a beautiful vacation uh he got the promotion and since he got the promotion things are going great right so there's something to hang your hat on and I think that what a lot of people get confused with is they think they hear about these relationships I think well if every day's so bad why didn't you leave I said if every day was so bad they would leave every day is not so bad over time even if every day it starts getting closer to every day every moment being bad those justifications that were created by that alternation that might have been there in the beginning become so strong that the person's really in it and they're confused so they're wondering maybe this is me their partner my partner keeps telling me it's me maybe they're right I wasn't as nice as I could have been or I was this or I was that especially if it's a legacy issue if it comes from family of origin issues so I think the complexity is if it's so bad then why isn't it you know why is it so difficult for people to get out of these situations partly it's that partly it's practical stuff you know it's um Financial fear fear of being alone having children um uh culture religion you know all those things are very real and they're not to be shamed in a person prison's like well I guess I'm weak because I'm staying in it for the money and I'm like listen for some people they'll say I don't know if I'd be able to afford to keep saying where I am or I have kids and I have to worry about that or I have a chronic illness and I don't know how I would support that I've I've had people say I'm saying for the insurance benefits and I say to them don't shame yourself be clear on it because what happens is let me give you that example person says this is a mess we have a lot of bad days we have a few good days I've Justified it for years now I see it clearly I've had a chronic illness it's hard I can't work full time I've been in this marriage for 30 years a lot of myself been invested in it I if I don't have these benefits I'm going to get really sick I I oh that's great I say okay understand why you're staying that that that right now there's a need that comes you and you have been hamstrung and whatever else that understand why you're staying so you can see the rest of it clearly and to say and I'm aware that this person is invalidating and cruel and manipulative in gaslighting I am going to commit to no longer deriving my identity from this relationship this is not my fault and so disconnecting the emotion from that person it's disconnecting your sense of identity from that person because when we're in relationships listen we use other people's as people as reference points right and I think we underestimate how important that is the human the human species takes in social cues that's why in part where these big brains is we're able to integrate so much right so I'm reading your face so I'll be frank with you Lisa if you were just sort of like flat-faced not nodding kind of looking away you know just sort of uninterested in me I might my mom my tennis either she not liking what I'm saying does she think I'm dumb maybe I'm doing a bad job right we'd go down this Cascade we get our social cues from everyone you and I aren't in a close clean we're close friends but it's like I'm with you every day I don't derive my identity but I don't drive my identity from you right you know I value you're in a part of me I you know I you're a dear friend so I'm you know I value you in that way and some of my identity has been shaped by you in a good way in a very good way however in a in a narcissistic relationship you're not allowed to be yourself if you bring your real self into the relationship your needs your wants your aspirations your hopes that narcissistic person is like hello are we talking about something that doesn't have to do with me stop you do not need to like don't be a thing in my world unless I need you an example I always give is imagine you're in your kitchen and you're like it's morning oh my God I gotta get a cup of coffee you're interacting with your coffee machine great now imagine if it's 11 30 in the morning your coffee machine starts talking to you you'll be like hello what do you why are you interrupting me oh coffee machine after you got past the sort of psychosis part of it you say um you're a coffee machine you shouldn't be talking to me now that's how the narcissist views you yeah hello do you um I got my coffee from you I don't please do not make your stuff my stuff I I'm not interested in you you don't get to have an identity separate from them in that relationship and so the mistake people make and it's not a mistake it's wanting a normal human relationship is they come in and they be themselves well if yourself is at odds with what the narcissist wants they're gonna shut that down which means the only way the relationship works is if you cut off all those parts of yourself and only live in existence and in line with what they want and people it's not that this happens overnight this happens over years and then one day a person looks up and says who am I and who am I outside of this relationship because you've so trimmed your identity to fit this fit this space and the narcissistic person is very convenient by what you're doing and and because maybe the number of fights drops the number of conflicts drops you're like I'm doing the right thing but what you're actually doing is getting rid of yourself wow I didn't expect that last line oh my God that hit me so hard um you've got rid of yourself God damn okay so how do you in this situation like you've just laid out you've decided I need to stay in this relationship or I've chosen to stay in this narcissistic relationship because of X reason and so you've gone back and you've looked how do you start to rebuild yourself within that narcissistic relationship so there's two sets of reasons right the in some ways the Practical reasons are the easy reasons right because they're kind of superficial right this is what my faith requires this is what my culture says housing is expensive Lisa I cannot tell you how many people over the years I've had to walk through narcissistic relationships in La where the housing is so expensive and they're like I can't we can't neither of us can afford to leave this like so in the way a divorce works right you've got to either buy the other person out so a house they might have bought for three hundred thousand dollars now is now worth two million neither of them has a million bucks to buy the other one out but if they sell the house what they're left with isn't enough to acquire a new residence so some people are saying it's a practicality thing my job's in La I can't you know so they're making these really really painful decisions on the basis of practical things like that now the nice thing about that is you can make sense of that like you're it's very clear I'm staying this in this for the money a person has to break through the shame of that because there is no shame yeah it's like that's a practical reason what's your option you know you know where nowhere to live like it's really to say I get this I also get people saying I'm staying for my kids and then once they get to a point where the kids have more autonomy sometimes it's the kid's 18th birthday that day they marched down to the court and say I'm filing for divorce so people figure that those are the I hate to say easy Parts the harder part is the trauma bonded piece where those good days are making you justify and what in that case you have to give up on the thing that's kept you going for years or decades which is this might get better maybe it will get better maybe if I wait another six months a year till they retire till this till that till blah and so it's been an entire it's been a lifetime of chasing a carrot of chasing a moving goal post so now you're saying you can't it's done like there's no the game is rigged you can't win the game so there's no more hope it'll always be like this and the justification cycle has to end that's a lot harder because that's deeper it's deeper into someone's emotional DNA but the biggest technique in all of this is a understanding the architecture of it B is something I call them write about my new book something called multiple truths we want one thing to be true he's a bad guy he's not he's not not always a bad guy people at work actually kind of think he's a nice guy and then he bailed out the neighbor who had a broken hip and then he did help your sister but then he cheated on you but then he was nice to your kid but then he did he's this idea of the narcissistic person as a simple one-dimensional cartoon villain is just not real I wish it was would make it would make it so much easier but people were like were really nice to my mom when she was sick and they're cheating on me and they screamed at me and and then they're just like and ice and I say to them think of this as a stack of pancakes thing after thing after think they're all true and in the end of it though it's not good for you because they're cruel and validating Behavior that's the Checkmate and that's never acceptable and a person can be nice to your sick parent and be cruel to you and that cruelty to you is taking a toll and if you're staying because they're nice to your mother simultaneously you need to recognize it's not okay if someone treats you badly and that you do not need to get your identity from that you have to be very clear like okay I need the support with my parent right now this thing that's happening in the relationship is bad I need to disconnect from this I need to disengage from this I I have to recognize this is not good for me it's that it and it is that easy no absolutely not how do you do that thing I know you said that it's not easy but because if you're living in the same house as someone and you've decided I'm going to stay in this relationship I've got my reasons we've just done everything that you've just said they understand the identity thing and I'm just projecting I'm thinking about myself living in that house I would feel like okay I know what they're like I know that they can maybe erupt I know that they're you know their tendencies but then I would live on like in tiptoes if you're living with someone that you have to be on tiptoes always worried about if they're going to erupt how do you do you have to be on tiptoes and it's long again I'm taking violence out of this because it's muddies the waters right yes so they yell ain't about you it's about them and they want to tantrum like a three-year-old get up and go to another room take a walk like let them have their tantrum what do we do with the transferring three-year-old we don't engage with them we're like you work this out you make sure the child's safe but I I can't tell you how many times I drank a cup of tea and watch my child flail on the ground until she worked it out read a paper and read a book she had to get it out and then she was done and then I'm like how you doing I accept the difference of narcissists you wouldn't even ask them how you doing so they rage it's not about you it's not personal it's who they are they are a tantruming child so maybe you can the eggshells come from honestly the eggshells come from the idea that you think you can do something about this I'm telling you there's nothing you can do so why are you walking on eggshells live your life I love that um I had a video that you did where it was actually really funny because you're giving these things of like look this is how you get under a narcissist's skin but I'm not telling you so you can go and get under this but this is how it happens right um I think you call it the framework of what is going to set them off now even um as with what we're talking about knowing the framework I worry that I would inevitably slip into the the pattern right because I think a couple of them you say is like they hate it when you're blase they hate it when you um you know you kind of take your own time or that your center of attention like all these things that really are going to set them off if I knew that if I'd chosen to stay in this relationship I worry that I would like oh my God I can't be center of attention because that's going to set them off correct so here's where we talk about that splitting off your identity part of radical acceptance is being okay with them being set off does that make sense now nobody out there welcomes rage people who have had histories of trauma histories of growing up and very verbally violent households that presence of yelling and conflict I I'll own it very personally for myself I'm somebody who gets very scared when I when someone's even like let's say people we're in a place and there are two people over there yelling at each other it had nothing to do with me I would not be able to pay attention to you anymore because that's a that's a um it sort of it plucks my guitar string it sort of it leaves me rattled and that's because of my own history it's with verbal violence so you're absolutely right Lisa that a person who has that sort of wired traumatic history wired emotional history where things like yelling or certain kinds of criticisms would feel very uncomfortable at almost a nervous system level are almost going to unconsciously avoid those circumstances like don't pay attention to me please please don't pay attention to me because I don't want this guy to yell not even because you even care anymore but because it's emotionally rattling okay that's the when that's why therapy becomes so important because then in the work of the therapy it becomes it could very well be that you start to learn as long as I'm with this person being the center of attention isn't worth the screaming right it's not they'll say so I'm not going to put myself in those circumstances I'm going to avoid as much as I can go into social Gatherings with them I'm going to be a bit more like not bring up my stuff so if anyone's complimenting me I may not work invite them to events where I am the center of attention but what that does mean too and it's something where people can sort of take some of their power back is to say are there people in my life with whom I can be the center of attention and nothing bad will happen so in other words you have to cultivate healthy seeing recognizing Human Relationships right you're not getting it from that person that's out then fight so then it might be that you and I've always said this to folks if you're in a narcissistic relationship and you get good news they are never the first person you tell ever because a lot of people think they see how cool I am if they see this cool thing I did yeah what then you think they're going to congratulate you they're going to view you as a competitor they're going to tear you down with contempt they're going to leave you feeling bad about it you never want to tell them first you have your people whoever they are could be a friend it could be a sibling it could be a colleague whoever it is could be shrink I can't tell you how many times as a shrink I'm the first person they take doc you're not going to believe this da da and I'm so happy because I'm like oh my gosh I'm jumping out of my chair I'm so proud of you and they'll come back with me and say you know my whole life this is what I would have wanted from my mom or my dad and I get it from you and I and I'll say there's grief in that because that's where you deserved it from but I want you to understand you just filled another person with joy with something wonderful that happened to you you slowly learn that people can see you may not be be the people you wanted to have see you but it can be others and then you cultivate that you take them your good news and they're so proud of you and you're like sort of smiling and then after three four five of those encounters where someone's happy for you then you tell the narcissists and they're like Ugh okay fine whatever what is that like yeah okay do we have to go to this thing like and then you know what in your heart those five other people are so proud of you you're so like whatever um oh God I love that and so do you um suggest that people would maybe write a list of the things that they feel like they need um and then have that as like their cheat sheet cause I'm always trying to think about how I can um you know my emotion is to go to the person that I'm with because you want them to show the love and the pride it's never gonna happen right so is it good to have a list of maybe the people to go to a certain situation so that in that moment you don't revert back to thinking that your partner's gonna be you know what I'd suggest I'd say go through your phone who are those five people figure out an emoji for those five people I mean whatever you want it could be fire it could be a heart whatever so what that means is at least I know this on my my iPhone that let's say you have those five people right then when you search the you know search your con like you search even on your contacts your text you put the little symbol and all those those the names are going to come out and then you give yourself even space because you got your people that that makes it easier and then you can get the word out to the people who are happy about you happy for you and I think that there's such a tremendous power for survivors when they're like yeah I'm not sharing this with this person because this is Meaningful to me and I don't want them to ruin it there's there's a taking back you know some people say isn't that a bummer you can't share with them I'm like no that you know what they're gonna say so there's certainly a bummer and a grief that you're in this not so functional relationship I understand that but let the good things in your life still be good I love that so much um as we talk about relationships and you know really identifying because we've never spoken about what to do if you stay like we've never gone in this step so I really love this it's the sort of thing I've never necessarily thought about because I'm always just like how do we convince people to leave because that's you know get away from it but to your point I think you really laid out beautifully um the reasons why certain people don't the shame thing is super freaking important because I assume that that's going to be something that if they decide to stay that they feel shame made because they're looking at another couple in another relationship and so do they perceive that as Maybe weakness on their part do you think and then does that tell them a story about themselves so you're so what you're suggesting is that when they feel Shame about staying or falling for it that they would have to that they feel weak correct yes but by comparing themselves to other people and other people's relationships ah so comparison okay so let's talk about comparison for a minute because I had a fascinating conversation actually with a hair and makeup artist that was working with me the other day for something I was doing and you know she said to me it seems like there's two types of people in the world people who get this narcissism thing and people who don't I'm like yeah and it's very terrible when the people who are in these relationships talk to the people who don't get it because more often than not they're invalidated come on it can't be that bad this is your person they talk nonsense right and I said you kind of got to know who knows what right so that idea of comparison is so tricky first of all we never know what's under the hood of a relationship we really really don't and what's fascinating as a shrink is I you know you you get to look under the hood right and I think God everybody must think these people are the golden couple and this is a disaster right and then you see sort of this chaotic family that's got all these problems and you're like oh my gosh this is a well-oiled beautiful machine so I think first of all nothing we see is true people who are proclaiming all this nonsense on social media are you just it's not it is it is nonsense it's fiction right and so it's getting past that but then I think that people do feel shame they'll say this person isn't going through this and I'm staying in this what does this say about me that's a very very common reaction and people don't know about this when they choose a partner that's a big part of part of the problem is as and and what we're finding is that everyone's like well the love bombing it's only gonna last six to 12 weeks shouldn't have gotten out of this in three months no of course not because after those early three months of your relationship now you've got all the equipment with which to build the justifications and I actually do think it takes about a year to see a relationship is full on toxic short of like you know you're dating someone you're like yeah I'm not feeling I'm not talking about that I'm like people someone's vibing with someone you're feeling it you're actually falling in love but it's also unhealthy many people will want to it'll take them a year before like wow this is just not okay and Heaven blessed those who in the first year or two are like this was just not shaping up cool and they got out and is that because the toxic narcissist person knows that they can't show with their cards at once and they finally show off to a year like what is that one of the biggest fallacies is that relationships shouldn't be work save we put time effort and hard work into growing our careers or our business but love should just happen after 20 years of being married all stars were being willing to ask and answer hard questions I have a free downloadable PDF for you for a happy successful lasting love click the link below for free access to the most important questions you must ask your partner PDF it's not a conscious process with the narcissistic people I think that the whole idea that they're sitting like what oh that's 12 weeks then I could be a jerk now right they've always kind of been a jerk I mean narcissistic people are all about appearances they're very good at The Superficial showing up looking just great and knowing what people want to see but when things start to fall apart it's not because they're like well now I can take you for granted done a conscious process but what's happening is is that in some ways some of their defenses are loosening like some of the things that keep them looking good to the world and if they think they've got you locked down your narcissistic Supply your compliments your novelty is starting to wear off so you're not as you're like a stale piece of bread it'll still do in a pinch if I'm hungry but it's definitely not what I'm going for first and that's what you become you become a stale piece of bread so you may have this relationship and what's happening is it's three months in right life is happening right and you might have more stress at work you may not be like for you might say I'm a huge deadline so for the next month I'm gonna have to work late or I can't do this or I may not be able to do that well now you're not the perfect source of narcissistic Supply again Life starts getting in the way a lot of people say those first six weeks like I was moving things around to make things work I wanted to see them so much it was so exciting la la la I mean unless you really are a very sort of Charmed Life person life happens and when life happens healthy people like yeah I kind of got to be at work at time I can't lie in this bed and call in sick again and when that happens you've punctured the fantasy for the narcissistic person you've inconvenienced them or left them feeling not special and that's where the cracks are going to show and then you're working out you're like oh I'm so sorry you know what like I'll figure it out and we'll have a great time this Saturday and did you have a great time Saturday like cool okay I just made it be great and then but you see that push pull it takes about a year to figure that out and I can see just as you laid that out how much that kind of can water us down um and then at that year mark then how if we don't then maybe identify wow I've been watered down then that's where your needs go to die I've heard the quote that you say like a narcissistic relationship is where people's needs go to die and so is that it after the one year as if you keep going then your needs are just going to get um get obliterated yeah so in a person paying attention will say this doesn't feel good and like it's I can't keep up with their demands and there's a couple of many things then have to also be lining up at least if a person and I see this happening more and more especially for people want children they'll say I'm 35 I want a child oh maybe it's not that bad you know and I'm saying I got two words for you reproductive technology have this kid on your own you would be better off not raising them in this kind of a toxic space and so I have to say that that has changed the game I have talked to five women in the last year who have said enough I am 36 and I'm over this and I refuse to ever have a custody battle or have someone take what's already going to be a hard our journey and they're having children on their own and they're like and if somebody wants to date me as a single mom great I'm going to weed out the suckers but now at least I know I'm not raising my child and I didn't relent and give in to a really really unhealthy relationship it's a it's I am more and more women are stepping up in that way and actually not as many men but some men are I know a couple of men who said I've just I've really dated a bunch of really unsettling women but I want to be a father they find a surrogate their sperm egg they choose baby and they're wonderful single dads that's amazing actually as you were talking maybe you can um like demolish this idea that I have but every time so when we do these episodes I love it so much the feedback is amazing it's usually about I've left my partner thank you but now there's a lot of people speaking up about narcissistic mothers and they want to know how to deal with their narcissistic mother now here's the first question that I just have just selfishly why is it I'm hearing so much about male narcissists stick Partners but I also always hear a lot about female narcissistic mothers I'm so glad you picked that up because everyone's like aren't all narcissists men and I'm like no because how many of you have narcissistic mothers raise your hands right so clearly not um what we do know is that they're grandiose narcissism malignant narcissism much more prevalent in men vulnerable narcissists the more resentful Sullen manipulative passive aggressive that's women you know and in many ways women are not socialized to have those big kind of explosive look at me I'm so great kind of traits though some do so it is obviously in both and they're obviously women who are narcissistic and it's you know it's naive to assert otherwise and so there are narcissistic mothers actually are very impactful because in still the majority of family settings I think this is evening out in some situations but certainly not all women are often mothers are often a primary caregiver so their impact full in terms of their lack of emotional availability and their inconsistency and their cruel barbs and their passive aggression and their superficial needs for their kids to be exactly what they want is basically glorified accessories that messes a kid up a lot because they're really looking to the mom oftentimes like disproportionately they want their mom to be the soft place to land yeah good and then I've heard you say that you know that the child really just starts to question am I enough or like why am I not yeah exactly why am I not enough and then how does that then so take me through that like how does that have that knock-on effect on the child from the mother's or the parents behavior and then how does that start to Echo as the person gets into an adulthood and do they end up mirroring that in the partner they choose yeah I mean a classical representation so when we keep in mind not everybody who ends up in an adult narcissistic relationship originated from a narcissistic family system it's not the case some people actually come from really happy families and they meet this charming charismatic person and they fall in love and they're like what and that that's a different story but quite commonly if a child grows up with a narcissistic parent the narcissistic parents needs take Primacy they're the only needs that are accounted for right and the narcissistic parent in a way resents the child for having needs other than theirs as though it's again it's a coffee machine right that talks to you like really and the child internalizes that parent's sense of subtle resentment for their needs and starts feeling like I need to make myself smaller and smaller so I don't aggravate this parent the child also learns that their relationship with their parent is quite transactional that there are ways to win this parent over look a certain way do a certain activity behave a certain way be perfect be a great student don't be seen don't make noise and so the child in more extreme cases can almost become obsessive and compulsive because these things this high level of control gives lets them feel a sense of control over this parental relationship and maybe I can them over for the rest of their lives they will then wonder what do I need to do to win this other person over they learn that their needs will be shamed so there's never a safe sense that I can express these needs and if I do Express them I'm either going to lose the other person or the other person is going to rage at me those are not nice options so you don't express your needs everything is about the parent If the parents interest so the child May desperately try to take on the parents interests you know saying okay maybe if I could learn to like this then I can do this thing with the parents right so slowly but surely the child is shaving away anything that's truly and natively theirs and becoming and morphing and subjugating themselves under everything that that parent wants but what that does is it thwarts the child's development of identity and of self not to mention that the parents also very manipulative again they're really using the child as a means of getting their needs met so as that child catapults into adulthood they may in most cases will be very anxious in relationships try to win people over feel their needs don't have a space and subjugate their identity under the new partner every so often if I would pull a number out of the air 10 15 of the people grow up like that become narcissistic themselves hmm that was actually what I was going to ask is it the kind of you know you become it yourself you can in some cases yeah and because it's not genetics now not at all in fact you'll look in a family it's very interesting actually because I've worked with you know families where there's four siblings and and I'll be in fact I might be working even with the parent of the adult children the parent will say I have one ragingly narcissistic kid and the other three are just great so and they were kind of raised the same and one thing we do know is something called temperament makes a difference and temperament is sort of our inborn personality you look back at the child and you'll see as a baby maybe they're just sort of a little bit more difficult fussy more difficult to soothe as they came into childhood there were more attention seeking more inattentive more disruptive um tantrumy difficult they're difficult kids the tough thing with difficult kids is the world doesn't like them even their parents don't really like them because they're always you know they're not sweet they're just sort of like look at me look at me pay attention to me and the parents will burn out as we'd expect I'm not even mad at the parents for that um they may not know how to manage them well and they find it hard to set limits with them because they have to do it repeatedly repeatedly repeatedly whereas with another child it might be once or twice and the kid's getting it so that kid with that really difficult temperament gets lots of negative feedback from the world not just from parents but from Preschool teachers kindergarten teachers up into primary school so what is this child learning you're no good you're bad it can breed a real sense of insecurity lack of safety fast add a couple of other ingredients fast forward you've got a narcissistic adult wow almost every narcissistic adult I know where I've been privy to getting an objective look at their history access to a parent or something sibling in almost every single case someone who knew them as a child said this kid was a freaking handful like just really not like not a fun kid not a nice kid um or not even not even they were a nice kid it was they were difficult kid sometimes a very Charming kid that like when this kid was like kept it together everyone was Charmed by them but it was just like they were they were sucking all the energy on this one kid and parents have said that siblings have said this that this was the tough sibling this was the tougher child and when I work it backwards on like I said it's a luxury when I am able to talk to um sometimes I'll even bring in video they'll say this is my narcissistic brother as a kid and you're like what you know and I've had narcissistic clients who've shown me video from their kids and you guys all it was all there it was all there so if it's not genetic then can a parent do something different different when their kids freaking out and all of this to help them not become a narcissist in the future yeah because I think that you know it's parenting is a long game right I think that it's not I mean I think that that's what's so hard about parenting right we we want to do something once and have it be done and parenting is like you you knock the whole Tower down every night and you have to build a dump again the next day and it's decades and Decades of that right and if you have anything else going on in your life I mean here's the thing that's why parenting is so challenging people bring all kinds of their own stuff into parenting their own mental health histories their own trauma histories their own business their own stress their marital problems their work problems it's hard to have all that going on and be on point with a little person it really really is I don't think we talk enough about how difficult parenting is and instead we criticize parents all the time or we give them the absolutely most ridiculous advice in the world so parents can't win so all of that said though that it is what do you do with that child who's having that moment it is about it's about consistency it's about routine it's about predictability it is about empathy it's about tone it's about presence it's about mindfulness and what does that all require that the parents got their stuff together and I say this as a parent it was not easy I made I mean I could write a five volume book on the number of mistakes I made nothing but mistakes and and I did a lot of things right too and each generation hopefully we do a little bit better than the one before as you're talking help me then put a couple of things together because if not genetics and they become an adult and they are a narcissist how come then you cannot change them because I've heard you say narcissists are like the weather you you just can't change the weather so you have to accept them how then is it not a behavior that can be unwired because the person doesn't want to change it and so you're saying that a narcissist in and of itself they don't want to change and so that's why they can't change so it's purely because the nurses can't see that they should sure they have no self-awareness whoa I've had you like talk about narcissism and why they cut like they're just really here yeah they don't have anything so it's that peace yeah that they don't want to not like self-awareness it is uh lack of self-awareness it's lack of empathy it's entitlement it's a it's a stuntedness you know it's a real immaturity to narcissistic people um but they can't be bothered I'm blaming you're you know why I'm having a problem it's your fault Lisa do you know why there was traffic today because you've scheduled this interview at this time that's why I was like it's your fault why couldn't you schedule that at a different time instead of Romney why didn't you leave on time I'm not going to take responsibility for that it's Lisa's fault it's his fault it's her fault it's their fault it's the TV's fault it's the it's the social media's fault it's my parents fault it's my shrink's fault it's my teacher's fault it's everyone so if you're always doing that and if a therapist a therapist tries to come on take some responsibility you know what that narcissistic client might do not show up the next week I don't want to hear that from you and you know what if you got enough money you'll find someone you can pay to tell you what you want to hear you're right it is Lisa's fault whoa that was so powerful okay so let's go back to actually the parents because this is really interesting and I know my audience really want to hear from you about how to deal with those situations when you have maybe an narcissistic parent um walking away obviously is an option so for some people it is for some people it is an option for some it isn't an option for others I've heard you say though the thing that gets a lot of us trapped is the notion of like blood is thicker than water and you only have one mother and yeah I mean that's that stuff is it's ancient and that ancient stuff has done a lot of harm it's a really interesting thing Lisa because this idea of a strangerment familial estrangement families that are cut apart and don't talk with each other has become sort of a bit of a hot button issue in mental health in the last 10 to 15 20 years there's one camp that says all estrangement is bad I ain't buying that I was reading a woman's book recently this woman named Stephanie Foo and she was on my podcast and she wrote a book on her experience of complex trauma and she and as part of her journey in this book and everything she talks to some journalists and some researchers who talked about estrangement there was something so smart in her book she said that nobody out there wants to be estranged from their family nobody's like Yay I'm a strange for my family I feel so much better they say this is devastating I'm estranged for my family however it was destroying me to remain in touch with them so it's that ability to have that point of it's not like I'm gonna cut them off and I'm going to teach them or it nobody when done correctly this process of estrangement is one where a person has said I am starting to completely lose myself that they cut themselves off and I think estrangements on a Continuum I mean I think there are some people who go fully no contact they're like I might I have nothing to further to do with my parents they were never able to take responsibility or accountability it is harming me to be in touch with them and they're out and I fully respect that then there are people I call them sort of they're physically present with their families but they've almost become I call them almost Soul estranged their soul is just they said I I'm these are people who if in any other world Universe I would have nothing to do with these people I find them to be absolutely awful people I'm embarrassed that this is my family however there's a cousin here like as a grandparent I like and I I don't I'm not gonna upend the whole system but I can't stand them and so they'll go as infrequently as they can they won't have meaningful conversations they won't share that much they won't share their lives they won't share their accomplishments they've learned to put that barrier there right that's its own form of estrangement right because they're really not in it with the family they really avoid them at every cost so it's again it's on a continuum but a lot of people say I want to find a balance and the challenge with parents is when we're with them we shrink down into children again and it's how to bring your adult self into that relationship with this person who may trigger tremendous feelings of inadequacy that I've had clients say I'm going through the world and I'm on it and I'm running my business and I'm killing it and I'm doing it and then I see my parents and I become the most insecure it's like my parents are like Kryptonite they're like I go from being this really successful strong person in the world into this trembling Leaf why would you want to be with that right and they're like I want to figure that out and you know that depends on the nature of the relationship therapy trauma-informed therapy some people do you know therapeutic work like called internal family systems like they figure out how you've internalized this whole dysfunctional system and it continues to harm you and then there's a point and I've seen it happen Lisa I've seen it happen so I know it can happen when a person's able to say this is what I came from it is a mess I am not defined by these people I will show up as my authentic self and if these people disrespect me I'm going to turn around and leave I'm gonna walk out the door and say bye I gotta go not mean not not I'm out of here nothing like that but when you sense that that they they cannot see you and they're going to disrespect you they give themselves permission to leave and they really and they say but however like I remember one woman telling me I write about this in the new book too is how she said her mother was so cruel to her whole life her whole life she comes into adulthood a couple of her siblings had passed so it was just her her mom was sort of in a substandard situation like nursing situation whatever her mother's like you know you're just a useless daughter and the woman had a job a career and all that you're useless daughter you don't help me this that and the daughter thought I'd be well within my rights to walk away from this situation the substandardeness didn't mean her mom was being abused but it really wasn't like she wasn't getting healthy food like it was just not good so she invested the money to get a better set up for her mom but it required her to go and check in and check and make sure that the system she created was working and she did and she put a lot of her money and she put herself into it and checked made sure calibrated the people working it made sure her mom like wasn't getting like you know sores on her body whatever when I asked her why did you do it because every time this woman showed up like you be word you know you just left me like you you you know what these people working there stupid and on and on and on and on and I said you know it was what you've set up it's gonna it'll last you why don't you hire someone to oversee it no she said you know what this mother of mine left me feeling my whole life that I was a monster that I lacked all compassion that I was a terrible person and she grained that into me she said I spent my whole adult life thinking that and I did the work I did trauma therapy I worked with great therapists I did the work and I'm not a bad person I'm actually deeply compassionate person and she said I will be damned if this woman on her deathbed by me feeling that the only way I can make my point is walking away that I am going to be compassionate to the end she's like I wouldn't engage with it she'd said my mama talk to me I would ignore it but she said this was my mother my bad luck was this is the person I got assigned to and but I will see this through and when she passes I will know with whatever dignity in terms of her care was seen and she said and then I'll quickly throw together a funeral and I'll be relieved as hell when she's dead that's the honesty and that's what people if they could get to that she said I wasn't going to let her Rush that wasn't she said it was an unkind thing to leave this woman sitting in her own filth half the time I'm not doing it she said she kind of deserves it but I'm not doing it because that's not who I am it's not about her it's about me it's about how I think human beings deserve to be treated it's about how I think a person could step up but it's not about it's and yes it will result in her being comfortable but I'm not trying to get her approval wow what's the difference in those situations How Could you um process it to make sure that you're doing it because okay this is how I want to feel and this is about me not about them versus the guilt aspect of like well God I can't let my mom walk by herself in the home like that that makes me a bad daughter even if you've been treated badly it's the guilt that makes you go back so it's the if somebody said to me said I'm a bad daughter I'd be like nope go backwards let's say that again you are because you said you're a bad daughter so that's the wrong answer and we're gonna go back to you can say it the right way it's it's it is about intention it's about leaning into it it's about recognizing that you're never going to fully strain the guilt out of this right never but you can be somewhat intentional right because in a way especially as a narcissistic parent gets older they're pitiful they're pitiful people and people feel sorry for them right I'm like I said and I'll say to them it's okay to feel sorry for them they are they're pitiful they're absolutely pitiful okay you're not responsible for that and it's helping them pull it to to be able to sign again the stack of pancakes simultaneously say this is so pathetic this person what their life is that they sit here they talk angrily to the television or whatever yep it is that is they are pitiful and I feel guilty about that you know then we have to break that did you cause that are you responsible for why they talk to their television no but so it's that take and that's what people have had narcissistic parents do they take responsibility for things that are not theirs and so I almost view the therapy then it's almost like you threw a bunch of blocks on the floor I'm like can we now separate the Red Blocks From The Green blocks from the blue blocks it's like can we separate all this stuff out so you can see what's theirs and what's yours I like that block of energy that's really good and then the pancake thing actually really did make sense because I think we often get trapped in one narrative yes yes and this is very all these things are true and that's what makes it complicated and they can alzheim because I think we want it to all be bad see they're so terrible they're so terrible that's why so many people who are narcissistic relationships says I hope they hit me I hope they cheat on me because then I'll have a reason to leave I'm like but them emotionally abusing you criticizing you lying to you doubting your dreams pissing on your aspirations that's not a reason to leave you but having a little you know having an inappropriate relationship on one night stand in Vegas that's the grounds for leaving that's a legitimate reason to leave and all this other stuff which is far more legitimate they're eating up your soul not legitimate why why that's how our society regards it oh come on all relationships are hard oh really like oh what does that mean they're shaving away your soul oh come on everyone criticizes people but like oh well he he banged a waitress in the back of the car you leave him I can see people who are sweet people make the mistake right they get drunk they kiss the stripper I don't know what they do it's not the circles like go in but another really nice person like and then they'll come home and say I can't believe I got caught up in the moment and I'm going to therapy and I'm going to do the work you got a better chance with the back seat back seat guy then you're gonna have with the narcissistic person who's cutting you down dude this is so strong this is so powerful it never thought of it like that oh my God how much it's the society that we have brought into the belief of what is a reason quote unquote to leave a relationship wow so there's things that are legitimized like she left because he cheated you're my hero girl you go but if she said I left because I was chronically invalidated and devalued and gaslighted like oh maybe I need to guard a couple's therapy but he bought you flowers flowers you a ticket to Hawaii and I'm like okay so she's been invalidated for 15 years and a mai tai is supposed to make this better I don't think so so actually speaking about invalidation I freaking love when you talk about the invalidation game where if you know you're going to be in an environment with somebody who's going to invalidate you maybe do a point system where if they invalidate you five times you're now you you owe yourself an ice cream and so like giving the the plus turning into a game like I think that there's a couple of things too there though it's turning into a game like came out of actually something I had done once I did an event where that happened and so it became a game I was like because and I was almost like earning points something say invalidate me two more times then I can actually get a milkshake so I'm like yeah you don't know so they're like they actually was they must have thought I was going off the deep end because I was you know saying when they finally did the fifth invalidation I was thinking oh my gosh on my way home and stop the place I'm gonna get them so I looked very cheerful I looked super cheerful because I was gonna get this thing I never got myself so you were at an event yeah I was at I was at a gathering of people do you mind explaining it was just like basically it was a gathering of people there's someone there who's traditionally just sort of been and like oh yeah I was like do you really think that's true and like oh come on that just sounds like a waste of time and money like it was just all these digs and the problem was other people at the event were asking me some something about something I was doing I knew the invalidator was there typically going back to something we talked about earlier in our conversation my stance has often been if I knew I was going to be around this person I would actually avoid him being in a conversation where other people were hearing these nice things being said about me because I didn't want to deal with it but I couldn't avoid it so I'm like I've got to turn this into a game or I'm going to completely you know it's gonna just be too jarring and and then it happened again and I tried it again another time and it was the same thing like how many times is this person going to say something dismissive contemptuous invalidating and so I'm almost smiling right because I'm thinking like it's like it's you know back when I was a kid there were these things called Green Stamps you could collect them and turn them in for like household items and I'm like well if I get like five more I can get a sewing machine you know I'm thinking or it's like frequent flyer miles other people gonna buy okay if I get another 100 feet on fire miles I can go to Paris so I'm think I'm a kind of cheerful as this is happening I don't want to be flippant because I think people are hearing that like oh gosh if I'm being validated that doesn't feel good but the idea of being more narcissist resistant is that you understand what you're going into if that makes sense right and so if I know this person people are going to be there and I know what the circumstances I can gird myself a little more so I don't feel completely caught off guard right where if I go in and think everyone's going to be so happy for me here and then I start getting these invalidating comments I might be a bit rattled sad and thrown off but if I'm prepared it's almost like going into a like if I'm going into a when I was back in school in a difficult exam I knew what I was going into if I didn't prepare I would have been well I don't know what I'm doing but if I was well prepared still be difficult but I would get through it because I had prepared for the test it is like preparing for a test and so I think being prepared at some level like sitting with yourself and saying okay this person's gonna invalidate me maybe I can sort of get through the room in a different way I could avoid these topics you can prepare for these interactions and then when they do do their what they do in validate whatever the heck they do you're thinking to yourself of course they did you know that's what they do instead of oh I suck because they they said I'm not this and I'm dumb and I shouldn't be doing that it's not going to work every time their days were more vulnerable there's things were more vulnerable about but we can catch ourselves and I think the more we stop and say I don't feel good right now what is happening we can take we can be self-reflective and say oh I see what's happening this is bringing up a feeling of ostracism from the past this is bringing up that feeling of foolishness in the past this is bringing up I would have felt like when my father criticized me in the past like people can start identifying and recognize that person sitting across from me is not my father and I am not six and I actually don't really like this person and I can figure out a way to detach either literally physically get up leave or change the subject or in some cases I even tell some folks kind of do a it almost sounds like a forced dissociation but let's say I was bothered by you and you were we were at a party and we're sitting on couches like this and you were going on about something nonsensical and it was leaving me feeling bad and criticized you're like saying well let me tell you about how I raise my kids and I don't think people shouldn't do this and it just felt uncomfortable to me I would actually start describing the area around you and so while you're talking it would be like two velvet pink pillows flanked her as she sat in her black boots and pants which quilt you know I would literally start describing the scene so now you are assuming and I'm being polite and I'm like and I'm looking at everything and like and the fluffy pillows that resembled a Persian cat so now I'm kind now I'm sort of like seeming like I'm really listening to you but I'm also bringing down my anxiety oh I love that and that was actually why I wanted to bring up that invalidation game is because in these moments where maybe people are just feeling like something yeah where you feel so knotted up and like I'm just like what are the things that they can go to in those moments and then even just talking about family if you're in a situation where let's say you have a narcissistic mother but you still want to go to family gatherings because you love your sister exactly in those situations I'm only gonna like think about myself that I would get anxious about being around my mum which is going to make me not enjoy the event which is not going to make me connect to my sister to all the people I want to be around so in thinking about what tours can I use in those moments where I still want to go I know I'm about to have these comments hit me and I know what that how it makes me feel how do I have a different tactic and so the validation invalidation thing was so genius especially because you were like and I'm gonna buy myself an ice cream or even something silly things like okay now I'm actually gonna let myself get that extra thing a Target or I'm gonna buy a book or there's all kinds of you know I'm gonna let myself watch the half hour of TV like it was really a reward mechanism but what it did was it lightened my mood and then that lightening of my mood actually sends a signal to my entire nervous system of like we be chilling we good instead of like like that you know it's a very different thing and those kinds of um than when it's happening I think one of the things that throws people off in this situation I was thinking about a recent scenario I'd gone through it was a workplace situation and it sometimes people doubt their judgments like maybe I'm reading this wrong maybe I and that's a very common in survivors of narcissistic abuse even when they're being invalidated to think maybe I'm making too big a deal maybe I'm the problem it's that again that self-doubt and self-blame it's really hard to give yourself permission for something that doesn't feel good imagine you're at a big dinner okay and there's all this food on the table everyone's focused on this one dish everyone's got to have tried so everyone's like oh my gosh this is the best time oh this is so good and you eat it and you're like I don't like this right and I I very I remember having once like people gave me this this chocolate and I almost looked like a little kid I was like that's disgusting like isn't this the best raw chocolate you've ever had I'm like oh my God like someone find me a Hershey bar this is gross and the thing is though most of us and even in that scenario I was actually thinking someone gave me a Hershey bar and I was trying to find a way to like I'm pretending to sneeze so I could spit the chocolate out but we in those circumstances everyone's enjoying the dish or enjoying whatever that thing they gave me to eat was you think I can't be the only one who's wrong it's very hard and one of the challenges is is that so many people are like we can all find a way to get along with everyone and there are no toxic people and you shouldn't say that and all that Sunny nonsense pay a trust this body of yours it's just like this beautiful honest thing that walks around the world with you and you let your brain I mean I think your brain kind has the best seat in the house but your body's actually doing more of the work for you and so if it doesn't feel good in your body stop and ask yourself this isn't gonna lie to me something's happening right now I must trust this this thing's holding all my pain things holding my memories in a very different way because your what your brain does with a memory is it's almost like Photoshop it Reddit it's a memory to make it sort of workable but your body's like no girl you really did look that bad and we are not fixing this picture so it's there's a truth here so and I think of this workplace thing was like for a long time this person had bothered me from the first time I met them everyone else is saying they're great you're gonna have to make this work I'm like okay I'm gonna need to be a grown-up but I literally felt sick and I felt so sick when I had to interact with this person and actually cause some of the wheels to come off the train because without that collaboration I was actually taking on 200 of the work myself 200 more than I needed to do and I was exhausting myself but I was doing anything I could to avoid the terrible person it was almost 14 months before anyone would fess up to yeah she's actually a really awful person because at work especially we have to play nice we can't say don't you think that person's a jerk you know because they're like hey hey hey like let's be respectful in the workplace I get that we have to be respectful we can trust our bodies and in that particular case it was a confusing workplace situation but my body didn't lie to me from the jump and when finally that person left the job became a lot more it became a lot more pleasant I felt that too so it is but all of this that's where everyone talks mindfulness mindfulness mindfulness mindfulness is actually that minute where you're like I don't like how this feels at least I had a conversation the other person the other day I liked them well enough but like I didn't fully feel in my body while I was talking to them have you ever had that experience where you're sort of like we're dancing are you're dancing like a salsa and I'm dancing a waltz and like it's just nothing I'm doing and there's weird pauses and and I had to pay attention to that and say this is not a she wasn't narcissistic she wasn't a bad person but my body is like you know like whatever this is this is sort of a c-lister in your life not in a bad way but like you're not being natural something here there's a block and again it's not an indictment of this person but it was a moment where I could learn and not make it about me that there's something wrong with me I'm like something about the dance didn't work we tried him we try to dance two different dances sometimes with a dance partner and we just end up getting our feet stepped on it doesn't mean you reject that person it just might mean that you choose to interact with them in a different way wow and is it because in that situation where you were saying you started to spot and everyone's like oh he's lovely and you were like even something's not right is it the fact that we just want to fit in that we just ignore the body sensation absolutely and in fact if you look at some interesting research so there's a real push in research in the sort of the 1960s post-world War II the world was sort of shocked at how people could have conformed and obeyed to the such horrific human rights crises that happened during World War II right and so some of this was interesting work by a guy named Solomon Ash and I'm going to give you this I'm actually probably not going to present this the right way but the long story short was in Solomon Ash's research and we learn about this in every introductory psychology class they'd show people three lines one line is clearly longer than the other lines right so clear and everyone's like which is the longest in there you would have said the line B I would have said line B would have said line B then there's like a person that the researcher kind of stuck in the group to say line a and it's amazing how many people change their vote yeah it was a it was clearly shorter right so we are we this is why marketing works if we didn't have that tendency to conform and shape nobody could sell anyone to anything because you're like yeah no that doesn't work for me instead of like you need this everyone else has one of these why don't you have one of these like well everyone else does have one you don't have to think do I need that probably not but everyone else has one to how could I be the only one who's wrong our entire economic structure is based on Conformity and do you think then that's why almost a narcissist is somewhat a sheep what is it yeah because they show one side to people and it's like oh my God lay and then they show you another side and you'll or you get the sense that you see the other side and other people only see one thing and so they're saying this person's amazing you get this Sensation that hang on a minute maybe something isn't right right so you ignore you ignore it or you talk yourself out because everyone's saying he's tired especially and they're Charming they're cool they're amazing look at all these things they're doing what's your problem get over yourself who knows what they'll say to you and if you have a history of this in your life of having been narcissistically abused especially in childhood self-doubt is your first language you're like I how and it is that's why the body becomes a really important place to focus on because if you do it from up here all the rationalizations and all the old scripts just kick in instantly but if you say this doesn't something about this is just not feeling good let me sit with this for a minute um we just don't do that a lot and we are very suspicious of people who do what up homie I got something free and new to share with you right now how often are you visited by that negative voice in your head telling you that you're not smart enough that you're not good enough experienced enough not fill in the blank one of the most powerful things you can learn to do in life is to turn that negative voice into your bestie and I want to teach you how to do that and so much more in my four steps to becoming confidence workshop and guys the most amazing thing is you can actually register for completely free for this Workshop so click the link on your screen and I see you on the inside okay so you said something earlier I do want to interrupt you but I would love to hear you said like a c-level friend or say you know I talked about I have a video about it I know I was gonna ask you a b and c boundaries let's go okay so let's talk about our asbc synaptics I think this is very useful this came out of a couple of conversations interesting some of them I did this with my clients and then this woman I met at an event a woman had said like yeah I know I kind of like level my friends up and down and I thought oh how interesting it was it was so conformed and the reason I use ABD and ABC dnf is because I used to be a professor so I'm used to grading right and I think that what happens is we have people in our life and I wish everyone has some what I call AAS in their life your A's are the people where you can be yourself you don't feel like you have to keep everything buttoned up you don't feel like you have to really censor yourself you just show up as yourself okay that you know that if you called them at an odd time like can you talk and it's all and it's safe and it's good right but your A's may drop the ball right they you know you may have an experience with them or you don't feel safe where they may be gaslighty they may be manipulative they um something about it stops feeling good a lot of people say oh screw this friend I'm like I mean it seems like you've had some things you like about them can you bring them to a b bees might be a little bit more tentative not that full you you might hold back the vulnerable parts of yourself thinking these people are not responsible enough you know it's like you might not you don't always loan your car out to everybody right so it's a psychological equivalent of not loading your car out to them so you hold some of yourself back your bees may screw up too even more you might think oh my gosh like now you're getting dark this does not feel good and then you can level them down to seize the reason this is important is a lot of people are feeling like well as soon as I find out someone might be a little bit gaslighting or narcissistic I gotta get rid of them I'm like no you don't have anybody in your life right and so yeah and F would be someone who really betrayed you lied to you betrayed your trust in a way that you're like I can never trust this person again right and then I guess under an F is somebody just completely removed from your life but having that ability to say you know this it's like I have to trust them they're my good friend they just did something that really betrayed your trust and let's say you tried to talk to them about it say hey what happened and they deny and they deflect and they blame you saying okay this does not feel safe anymore bring them down to a b you don't say get rid you might even take it for an a to a c that's a drop but it's a way of saying that just because you're sensing patterns in a relationship that leave you feeling uncomfortable you can try to communicate about it if that doesn't change it doesn't still mean you have to say I'm out it can say they're here on a more limited basis you know I there it's just and they're not going to stay at my house for a week but maybe we'll have one lunch it's that it's it's a it's and you can then see that this isn't about throwing everyone out but having enough self-respect to be able to move that you know move that boundaries you need and I know culturally this is hard for people some people say it's my family we're all supposed to be like we're supposed to be open blah blah blah so how we do things in our culture I get that I came from that kind of a culture and I say you can still do it you can still show up and in your mind I mean as strange as it is you can imagine there's an a they almost like little letters over their heads like I'm gonna go oh this cousin I trust fully and I'm all in and we're just in it and loving it but then one of our C's comes in and the conversation May restrict you like compassion you're sitting on sofa you're sitting with your cousin you're like yucking it up and then the this your sip your sister comes in you know really your sister you don't trust and you're like oh hey what are you guys talking about nothing you should have just shown me this new game on her phone no she wasn't she was telling you something about her relationship she showed me this new game on her phone it's a silly thing and you know oh okay well you guys are laughing so much like I felt like I was three playing this game and so now you are you kind of being just I don't think you're being deceitful I think you're protecting your cousin and your conversation where you were talking about something that you knew your sister would judge sister's still there you're still at the family gathering but you don't have you can see and then another person may come in and we are even more careful and then another a may come in and you're now sitting together we all do this I don't think I think people need to be aware you're already doing this you are going to those fluid boundaries it doesn't mean you have to give everyone up and I think that's what's getting contorted honestly Lisa in The Tick Tock of the narcissist world and people are trying to simplify too much get out girl work away girl and I'm like oh my God at a minute and a half does not get this subtlety of I had a history with them they betrayed my trust I'm not losing them but I'm going to be careful with them really careful and that may not be as pithy but I do think that people have to recognize that some people say well I don't want to be the sucker who keeps the toxic person around no you had a wake-up call one of them in your life have them in your life but be careful be aware and catch yourself if you're justifying and self-blaming oh God I love that and then also not to do out of the punishment right like it's not like I'm gonna show them so I'm gonna take them from an A to a c and see how they like it it's based on what their behavior it's based on how safe you felt with them it's based on you know you again it's giving yourself permission to gauge your own safety and make decisions accordingly and I think the world pushes us to treat everyone like an a oh that's actually really interesting so why then do we or is our inclination to take someone from an A to an F if they've done one thing wrong is it out of self-preservation that you've opened yourself up you've trusted this person and now they've done it so I can't ever trust them again it's a black and white right that makes it so much simple you did that you're terrible right versus they this person show me what they're capable of right it was a um I was working with a client recently and we were talking about that sense of like when you show me something bad that you could do to me you've now shown me what's in your behavioral repertoire and the only absolute in psychology is that past Behavior predicts future Behavior so if you did that to me again I would be naive as hell if I thought you couldn't do that to me again okay so that's where we almost need to gauge things from like you could do that to me huh doesn't mean I need to reject you now this per this person this client said to me why can't we why why shouldn't we be able to do the same on the good things they do and I said because the good things in some ways are easier for a person to fake right like it's easier for a person to fake the good beef here hey how are you like look I bought you this this beautiful fruit basket and I'm gonna come over and you're sick so that's almost easier but the fact that you were able to stick it to me that that that that almost feels like there was no regulation I wasn't worth you catching yourself or you don't think this is bad and that's a problem so I I know this sounds cynical but in a way it's you gotta make some of these judgments on the basis of the bad thing someone's done to you and if they showed a capability for them some people say well hurt people hurt people that's true then that means they're going to hurt me again because they sell a hurt person so what then and I and again this gets this bigger philosophical issue of there's such an unwillingness to talk in an open way about narcissistic relationships and toxic behavior in relationships that I really truly believe and maybe this is my sort of tinfoil Hat part of me talking that there is a there's a belief in the World At Large that well you're just you know maybe there's some people out there who behave badly and there's a group of you that we're just going to sacrifice in the name of that like it's almost as though some people just that's just your bad luck that you're gonna have to put up that toxic stuff but please don't make me call it out as toxic because then I have to change my whole little world view and I I believe that so many people are literally imprisoned and we're letting them stay imprisoned because we're so uncomfortable in having this discourse that some people behave badly and then the the turn is they've had a tough back so I said and I will say I'm sorry I really am sorry they had a back bad backstory I hope to Heaven they're able to get the help they need and they are in what they're doing to this other person is unacceptable and their backstory is not an excuse in this moment they're harming someone else their backstory doesn't matter how many people's empathy um really does impact letting narcissists get away with things oh a thousand percent the more empathic you are the more likely narcissistic people are going to further down the track in your life because you think they didn't mean it they've been through a lot they had a rough mother they don't have that much money they have too much money they are balancing so much with work and family that empathy means we'd make allowances we attempt to understand the emotional experience of course you're going to understand a person's history you can be empathic and set a boundary you can be empathic and protect yourself you can say they have had they've had a rough life and their behavior is unacceptable those two things two pancakes they can co-locate and then one of those words that you can say with empathy instead of accusation um because I think that's going to be important you almost like can't I assume you can't tell an empathic person to not be empathic never but to then word things in a certain way like if somebody then if a narcissist then goes to an empathetic person and um crosses that line is verbally abusive what are the things that that empath can say to the person to defend themselves but still feel good about themselves they can't say anything that's the problem don't get into it somebody's abusing you especially if there's again well first time sure get into it with them a little but if it's if this is the 50th time hundredth time you know where it ends up so you don't get into it with them you don't you don't have to scream at them you don't have to call them names you don't have to store them away you can look at them and say I understand and you and and there goes you and say in an ideal situation you can get out you can't always if the narcissist is Raging at you in a car what are you supposed to do and that narcissist favorite place to rage is the car you can't get out and there's no one else to see oh I'm just yeah assuming there's no one else to see but assume if it's only two they love it because you really are stuck and it's really kind of a bit of a gangster move to get out in a red light if you're 50 miles from home right I mean you'd have to find a way home it feels it might even feel dramatic like if you did that even though I don't think it is if somebody's raging at you and you could safely get out of a car at a red light or a stop sign and it's a safe place to get out more people than not would judge the getter outer of the car as being the problem than the rager in the car why because it's labeled as dramatic quote unquote going back to societal interview I think it's gaslighting you're a dramatic fan obviously if you're the driver you can't really do that can you like if you're driving the car the passenger is yelling at you that would be a little bit I mean and I and I don't think you'd be in a position to stop the car and tell them to get out that would probably wouldn't right right they wouldn't no so I do think that the challenges is that at those times you can listen and Lisa as I say this there's a recognition that some of these times there's a no win right that's the Trap it's the car it's about it all right you can't defend yourself you can't explain you can't even be that reassuring because narcissistic people don't like when you reassure them it's too much because then they feel weak you can't cry because then they'll make fun of you or tell you you're weak so you're literally in this cauldron of panic what do I do under if it any kind of circumstance if you can physically get out of the situation that's the way to go right but in those cases you can't you have to recognize that this is having a massive toll on you there's no other that's it because there's no Escape it's like somebody punching at you and you're hunched over and you can't get out of the situation you're going to be bruised up before this is done okay and it will mess with your sympathetic nervous system you are going to be frazzled and rattled and the best you can do in those situations is then do the postmortem say that wasn't okay how does this person fit in my life how do I avoid being in these circumstances anymore and I need to allow myself to rest not take a nap but like my nervous system needs a minute to get back online and how do you rest that nervous system literally stop like stop breathe deep breaths that oxygenation in the system really is sort of like it's assigned to your brain like everything's okay right we're not running away because that's if you're running you're hyperventilating okay that deep breath is like it's a sign it's a recalibration um you could sometimes find your heartbeat like you could just put a hand at your neck your pulse like you're connecting with your body hug yourself hold yourself okay get into a physical position that feels comfortable some people it might be lying down be at a temperature that feels right some people find it useful to get into a shower or something like that that can be a big really you and you go into it it's not like I'm doing this like this I'm saying I need to come down from this interaction this hurt me this felt unsafe it took a toll on my system I'm gonna be okay but I'm hope but I'm not just sitting here like this and just staring off into space I'm really talking myself down that's in the worst case scenario but it but there's no getting into it with them and I think that's the hard part for people and and some people may say you know what I want to get into it I'm trapped in a car with them so I'm gonna go all in go all in be prepared they're going to tear apart everything that matters to you but some people say that's easier than enduring the blows at least I'm throwing I'm landing a few punches of my own I respect that just be ready that they're going to punch back 10 times harder God yeah um I'm actually you know glad that you added that last bit because that's like part of I think for me to feel like I'm being pushed around to feel like I have no defense I'm just a punching bag like that makes me already feel weak correct and to even punch you back even though I'm he may Punk or they may punch back harder knowing that I feel like I've stood up for myself would mean something to me and I'm glad you said that because some people say is that it we just have to lay down and and just sort of lay down in front of them no the challenge is Lisa that people go into sometimes that I'm gonna I'm getting into this with you and they want to be heard you got to go into this knowing you're not being heard that's it so I want to be here I want them to understand they are not no none of that's happening but if it helps you to get in it with them they're not listening to you they're not learning from you they're not having empathy from you they don't care but it may like you said it may be more authentic to yourself you're saying I'm going in because this is authentic to me I am not lying down and listening because I'm not listening to them insult my kids or insult my work and you're going to go in and they're good guess I guess like manipulate abuse manipulate abuse criticize criticize contempt contempt contempt right no apology no responsibility taking but you feel like at that moment I was authentic to myself doesn't matter what they were saying I honored myself this is all about honoring yourself but if you have an agenda I'm going to say this they need to listen then keep your mouth shut so have that reasoning ahead of time to know whether you're actually going to be able to achieve it or not like this is a pointless Endeavor yeah and you know unless we all slip I there's some narcissist in my life I have to deal with regularly and there's a bandwidth issue too you know like but you know I always say like everyone eats egg whites at breakfast and has a chocolate chip cookie smeared on their house they're faced by 5 PM right why because somewhere between 7 A.M and 5 p.m the day got the your bandwidth got depleted with the nasty phone call with the phone bill and and then the toilet stopped up and then you had a thing at work and so by again you wake up ideally repleted that bandwidth goes by five and you're not the same egg white eater that you in the afternoon right you're like just get me what I want like ah so you might be more likely to say something snipey back at the narcissist and have an argument like it's my fault I was doing so well at the beginning of the day keep in mind your bandwidth is going to deplete over the course of a day over the course of a relationship so you might say I got it right nine times and then the tenth time I slipped I said actually to me nine times you got it right and you didn't get into it and you only slip once Bravo that wasn't a loss that was bandwidth you were that bad width of yours was getting depleted with each of these encounters people go through this with family all the time Lisa because what happens is let's say they go see their family for a week day one day two day three they're keeping it together by day six they're like shut up okay just shut up and then you're thinking oh I was doing so good and I don't think you did great you got to day six oh my God I love that and then also even just your hormones if you're a female and depending on when it is in your cycle you'll probably be way more sensitive um you're gonna be more responsive to it thank you I always love it when you correct me within this sort of thing so you're going to be more responsive to it depending on when your cycle is so maybe even knowing when your cycle is absolutely so like okay this week is the week I definitely shouldn't go see my mom see my mother or maybe you shouldn't go for a week right right right right and so I'd say to people like maybe you go and do your three days and maybe there's other people you know in that area give yourself a two day break out you're oh my mom's gonna scream and guilt at me how could you leave me how could you leave me you choose your battles either she's going to yell at you for leaving for two days or you're going to get into it while you're in the house which one do you prefer pick yeah definitely not in the house yeah um and then there's an analogy that you said that really hit me and I think this is really beautiful for people to keep in mind when they're in these situations where he said that the narcissist is trying to play tennis and you're playing a game of Solitaire yeah or soccer or just entirely different games yeah but like I really like that analogy because it's like the person is trying to react right they want you to hit the ball back yes they're ready to keep going that's their game but the game of Solitaire is like it's you it's me I'm playing this with me yeah no they they want you to interact because for them this is a very interesting thing it's part of the reason narcissistic people I think are so successful they're not afraid of conflict right and conflict aversion is very common in trauma-bonded people they don't like conflict so you often Give In You capitulate you rely like you're saying I like to take the fight sometimes you're also an incredibly successful woman and it doesn't surprise me like you're like I'm not gonna sort of lay down but someone else would say I can't I can't do this it is completely shreds me to do this so they're more conflict diverse and in the way our economy is set up if your conflict diverse it's actually harder to get things done right it's harder to fire people it's harder to negotiate a deal it's harder to you know put your put your put a boundary down when someone's taking advantage of you right if you're not willing to get into the fight and someone else will be like fine just pay them just pay them if you do that enough you could be out hundreds of thousands of dollars just giving in on stuff right or keep a really bad employee around for another five years or something like that so I do think that people who in our society in the United States who are more willing to have take a fight to have a fight do you succeed more in narcissistic people Conflict for them doesn't bother them because it's all about ego and it's about them flexing their ego they're not thinking about you they don't care about your nervous system they don't care about your feelings they don't care if you're hurt they just don't care this feels good for them you're in it and you're thinking this is really uncomfortable for me and you don't want to have that conflict it doesn't feel good so they like it they like and you know what and this is something that comes up all the time that someone was asking this recently is how this person said such terrible things to me it was like they were gunning for a terrible fight and yet I saw them a week later and they were acting like things were normal or regular and I was still like and that's a very common kind of a pattern in narcissistic relationships where they will just go off on you and then the next time they'll see you it's like everything's fine and you feel very unsafe in their presence you don't feel uncomfortable you're walking on eggshells narcissistic people are really good at compartmentalization and they use that conflict as a place to regulate it's like they just let it all out they feel good they don't stop to think that this was shattering for you and if you were to say I'm still struggling with last week they'll be like gosh like Get over yourself so it's almost like a not a perfect relationship for a narcissist is to find someone who has had the trauma so that they don't want the conflict bingo and they do that all the time who do you think they pick because they're the people with the trauma bonds are the folks who stick around as a very trauma-bonded person I will attest to that because you are scared you're scared of disappointing them you're scared of their rage you're still the child cowering in front of the narcissistic parent and it's not like narcissistic people are walking around saying let me find the weakest person in the room not by a long shot and I don't want people to think like they pick me because I'm weak no they picked you because there was something quite fabulous about you that's what grabbed them about you whatever your fabulosity was your maybe it was because you're lit up the room maybe because you were gorgeous maybe because you have this incredible ability because you're smart narcissistic people are fussy like they but they didn't and so they don't they just they picked you because you're lovely right then once they've got you they mistreat you if you don't walk away then they're going to keep mistreating you and you're going to turn your light off right so the very thing that might have attracted them to you initially Fades because that was all you but you had to give up you to be in the relationship and then they have contempt for you but they're the reason you're light faded but even if they're shiny I assume analysis doesn't want your light to shine when you're around them so why did you initially because you made them look good but then they don't want it oh my God yeah what the hell that's a trip to get your head around especially if you're thinking of yourself as the victim or my God I'm weak that's why they chose me and actually it's the opposite oh girl Mike drop there I I can keep talking to you forever that was so freaking amazing this episode has blown my mind where can people find you everything is environment so I you can find me on YouTube and Dr Ramen is my YouTube Channel please listen to my podcast navigating narcissism we've been nominated for an Ambi which is like the Oscars for the podcast so it's really a critically acclaimed podcast you'll learn from it's conversations I have with people survivors experts you learn so much about the the nuts and bolts of narcissism um you can if you're people really working on healing from narcissistic abuse go to my website dromany.com d-o-c-t-o-r Romney r-a-m-a-n-i put my name in narcissism you'll find it if you go to my website you could if you wanna if you're interested go to my healing program I have books out there you can learn about all of that on my website and so yeah and then follow me on social media Dr Romney because we're always putting out new stuff but trying to really kind of wrap the world in this knowledge so at a minimum I'm never going to stop people from being narcissistic Lisa but what I can do is help break people from these cycles of self-blame and turning off their own lights to make these relationships work keep watching to learn the science that he's not the one for you I want to ask how on Earth do we end up in relationships that we just settle for but that we actually know deep down wasn't right to begin with oh there's so many ways to go with this um first the fear that we won't find better you know even though we know it's not for us even though we're not fully happy you know a lot especially women women have been conditioned to believing that while all guys are trashed and all guys are gonna hurt you and so better to deal with the trash you know than to put yourself out there for new traps to deal with and so that leads a lot of women to settling you know um as well as just validating the what's lacking in that relationship due to what they saw in their parents relationship a lot of people saw their mothers settle you know saw dysfunction in their in their childhood and so now I've seen situations where a woman has told herself well I still have it better than my mother so I shouldn't complain you know I I should just be happy that it's not as bad as she had it you know so much of a a lack of healing causes people to settle and it's just a it's just a horrible cycle that so many people are in can I just jump in on that thing that you said because that's so strong do you think that there's something about the fact that if we've had a dysfunctional relationship in the past or if we've seen it in our parents that part of us doesn't necessarily know if there is going to be better and so it's I don't know if this is the best so for instance my ex-boyfriend before I met my husband he would tell me on the daily you're never going to find someone that loves you as much as I love you and I believed it and so it was the fear of can I even find better than him so maybe it's better just to stay with him so that I don't end up by myself with nothing absolutely and that's the thing it's like women are settling for a piece of a man rather than hoping they can receive a whole man and so you know they'll deal with the the nonsense not to mention you have a lot of women who are surrounded by other women who also accept settling so essentially I always tell women if you go to another woman and ask her should I stay or should I leave and she has held on to a relationship that she doesn't belong in she's gonna tell you to stay because she has to validate why she's still there she can't tell you to leave when she couldn't look at herself in the mirror and take that step so so many people are being given bad advice and like you said uh been brainwashed in various ways is your example it may have been their partner who drilled it in their head you won't find anything better and they really start to believe that and it's just it gets too scary to take a chance so to speak on putting yourself out there being alone again and hoping you can find better yeah good that's amazing okay so let's start unpacking all of this where do we need to start from right because there's different elements there's somebody of making the choice now they're single they're trying to find someone that they you know want to fall in love with so what are the I'd like to go over the fundamentals that you believe that every single relationship must have um to give us that Fighting Chance if you will what do you think are the absolute fundamentals that a relationship needs that you've never heard of any successful relationship ever working out without these things okay so one and let me first uh to put it in proper context when we say successful I want people to understand staying together does not equate success a happy fruitful relationship equates success all right so you see a lot of people who deal with the damage are miserable but they're still in the relationship let's not you know congratulate that let's not glorified in any kind of way so now that we understand it's about fruitful happiness purpose in that relationship the number one thing is healing having to heal from your past I think most people even if they got in their relationship without killing first at some point had to do the work if they were going to survive and be able to stay together they weren't going to be able to push it all the way through and again be happy fruitful purposeful without healing and so much of the dysfunction that we experience in our relationships stem from previous experiences whether that be childhood a previous relationship there's always something that we're dragging into that relationship and you know firm believer that because of the whole boyfriend girlfriend Dynamic we've made it harder on marriage because by the time people even get to someone that they could marry they've been beaten down so much emotionally that some people don't have the energy and willingness to fight at that moment and it seems too scary because the person that you is truly best for you makes you feel more vulnerable than anyone else will and so now if you are still holding on to trauma you are more than likely going to run from that sabotage that like you you have got to really have a strong support system to even weather that storm if you have yet to have uh heal so healing is a huge huge part of it um the other Foundation I would say is finding and loving yourself you know the reality is if you don't know who you are then you don't know who belongs in your life you don't know who's the right fit you don't know who you align with properly As you move forward and so too many people are dating or establishing relationships trying to be something they're not or not tapping into their true self and so now you get this and to put in the context of women you get this guy to fall for you but who he fell for is not a woman you can sustain because you're not really that woman and so now at some point the true colors come out he gets mad you're frustrating with him and now the whole thing blows up so better to save yourself that headache by being your true authentic self from the jump and then see who's the guy who truly Embraces that and loving yourself because without loving yourself you are more than likely going to sell you are more than likely going to accept dysfunctional relationships you're going to entertain and tolerate men who don't belong in your life so it's important to not just know yourself but love yourself as well and be confident in knowing that listen the the true you is going to be embraced by a man who truly loves that woman you know and so you don't have to try to fit into everyone else's box but let me add to when it comes to knowing yourself and loving yourself that doesn't mean accepting a flaw as if it can't be correctable all right it isn't oh well I just have a bad attitude or I'm just super blunt no you're rude and you're negative okay like don't don't play this that's how I am no that's a correctable issue that needs Improvement so let's identify what are the actual flaws that need to be corrected versus who we are so and just to put it give an example who you are maybe a woman who loves nature you love to go outside you like traveling that's who you are but again that bad attitude that's who you became because you haven't resolved past trauma because you haven't flushed all the negative energy from your spirit so recognize the difference between who you are and who you become due to all these outside influences or negative influences and so the the last thing I would say and we can name a lot of different things but the biggest foundational piece after that is connection and I believe that again I'm a firm believer that women know connection but unfortunately they they throw it out the window when they see something that they like or when they want a reason to hold on to something that they don't belong in so essentially it's like break those two down because those are super powerful all right so what when it's something that you like so for example women know and and to give some context to connection to me that is a deeper spiritual occurrence it's like your spirit recognizing its match and it's that person you can truly be yourself with be vulnerable with it's it's a Next Level type of vibe type of energy because again we can meet a lot of people we like we may love a lot of people we do not feel a connection with everybody all right it's a very unique experience and women again because you guys are so in tune emotionally spiritually like women have a great uh sense of or a great ability to sense to feel things so you guys can feel when that connection is there when it's not but now she meets a guy and let's say his resume is exactly what she wanted let's say just to give an example he's be successful he's tall he's looks great an amazing guy on paper and this woman says oh my gosh I cannot pass this up I want this and so even in your interaction with him the this is not there but your desire for him is so strong you're just falling for the the hype in the moment okay all the smoking mirrors right now but once that goes away you're not gonna be happy here and then in regards to ignoring it when it's something that you want to hold on to and not leave again it goes back to women being in those relationships where they're settling where where they know this guy's not for them they now ignore the fact that they know a connection does not exist because again the fear of being alone the fear of starting all over uh the fear of Aging let's be real a lot of women due to the fear of Aging rush into relationships and hold on to a minute don't belong in their lives and so all these different fears causes her to try to rationalize past connection and even more uh more importantly she rationalizes past her intuition because in knowing connection for women they know their intuition they know their intuition is saying this guy's not it but they want so bad to make this work so they give themselves all the reasons to push forward anyway oh my God I love that so much and I heard you say that um connection cannot be built and connection cannot be destroyed it's one of those you either have it or you don't can you take me through that because I think people and I've also heard you say people try to rationalize the connection on if they don't necessarily have it and why they're with somebody um and so explain to me that on like why we can never rationalize it and then also how we rationalize our intuition that's telling us that we should be settling so okay so now with connection being there or it's not so again there's a couple ways to look at this one for anyone who's spiritual you know there's a belief that says things happen in the spirit before they happen in the physical okay and so if that is a true a true dynamic then it would make perfect sense that the connection already existed there is it didn't come about physically first it existed in the spiritual and again that's why I said it's our Spirits recognizing the match recognizing that person it can uh bond with so to speak and so there's that aspect of it but also the fact that if you sit down and you speak to people who have experienced connection the story is always the same it's always this something that they felt very quickly it didn't take months years for them to figure it out it was very initial you know first maybe conversation first day first week it was very in the beginning and again these people can have stories where they fall apart because having final connection doesn't guarantee two people are going to be together because there's so many things that throw the situation off but these people can fall apart it could be 10 20 years they come back together and it's like they never stop talking there's nothing that you can do to change that you can run from it you can be in denial of it but it's still there you know and so when we try to rationalize past connection well unfortunately Society has taught us or taught many people to have relationships for business purposes to have relationships just for the sake of family structure and not saying that these things don't play a role but they don't teach people about connection you know even when people come to me and say well arranged marriages are the way to go because they have such a low divorce rate and I'm like listen have you ever sat down with women in arranged marriages I can tell you I've seen communities of them where they look like their spirit is gone where they're not happy now I'm not saying that's every arranged marriage but what I'm saying to you is is you can't force two people together and things that's gonna be happy and great yes they may find a way to manage and cope but I am not here to encourage people to just tolerate a relationship I want two people to flourish within a relationship and that means getting with that person that you truly connect with and so a lot of people just don't understand the concept that it's foreign to them and many have yet to experience it so it's very hard to fully grasp this when you haven't been hit with it yet but anyone who's experienced connection this resonates with them I say it's like having an orgasm for a woman it's like once you've had it you know I can't believe it exactly it's like when it happens you're gonna go plain and simple all right and and now which brings me to the rationalization past intuition what happens now is women confuse intuition and fear all right and they allow fear to overrun their intuition now I explain to women listen the difference between fear and intuition is that fear requires logic fear requires you to analyze well I can't do this because I might you know this might happen I can't take this jump because I might fall I can't invest here because I might go broke it's the logic that's making you fearful of the the negative consequences intuition requires no logic intuition is independent of any facts you could be in a room the whole environment could look great and something in you in your spirit says believe you don't belong here you need to go something is wrong intuition and so what happens with a lot of women is they might meet this man they might feel this connection but now the analyzation comes in now the the logic of well wait a minute what if he's just playing games what what if I'm wrong I've been wrong about these men before how can I trust this guy all of this starts to overrun them and now they allow that to pull them out of the situation or to sabotage it because they can't allow themselves to believe it and again that that stand from that lack of healing that has now contaminated their thinking and that's why I tell women or I encourage women stop analyzing start feeling A Woman's power is in feeling like just quiet yourself for a second visualize the moment visualize what's going on and tell me what you're feeling because when you start to get in your own head women will drive themselves insane getting inside their own head and coming up with all these different possible conclusions no what do you feel what do you sense because I've yet to find a woman who says her intuition is wrong so the key is we need to learn how to remove the fear tap into the intuition and walk confidently in it I love that because you you're not just saying feel it because there is something to like write the intoxication of Love or the intoxication of Attraction you know if you're just like okay I feel it oh I'm really turned on by him and then you go into it but there's a big difference between that and then sitting and listening to your gut intuition okay so let's let's assume someone's found the connection and they've gone through it and they've analyzed they've analyzed but they've also allowed themselves to feel their um you know in in touch with their um intuition and everything seems great and you really believe this one's this is the right person and then you get into the relationship and then five ten years down the line you end up being completely splintered what are the hurdles that you find in your practice that you when you you know speak to people where people just like they keep stumbling over these things and this is what ends up splintering the relationship five or ten years down the line okay number one a lack of emotional maturity so what I have found is with men and women we have not learned how to manage our emotions and especially in today's society it has become even more reactive people get offended they react people see something react there is no processing there is no taking a step back so now when you when you act that way within a relationship imagine your partner does something you could interpret it wrong you react you now say something hurtful in that moment because you're mad you don't really mean it but that's how you felt in that moment now they're hurt by it now they're damaged now they retaliate and then boom this cycle goes from there and what we have to understand is especially within relationships where two people have a connection this is the person who can hurt you the most and make you the happiest that that's the the scary thing about it it's like they have the power in a sense to crush you but to make you feel like no other person can and so I always say the person that a woman loves most has the least room for error so like when you see relationships where a woman is constantly being mistreated but she keeps going back to him and she says because I love him no you don't love him you have an unhealthy attachment to him your ability to continuously take that mistreatment and that toxic behavior and go back to him shows me it's not love when we're loving someone and we're really into them one little mistake Can Hurt Like No Other and again going back to the emotional maturity if you don't learn how to not just react how to communicate before we assume before we come to our own conclusions that can easily derail the relationship things so I definitely think a lack of uh emotional maturity I I also think lack of him lack of healing is going to always be a thorn in the side of relationships all right because again sometimes our partners do things that trigger us but that trigger stems from past trauma we haven't resolved all right and they're not even aware sometimes of what they did or how it's impacting us and so if we don't learn how to let go of our past traumas and issues and hurts we run a high risk of things going left in that relationship especially with someone we have a connection with it like I said the person you have a connection with everything's magnified I hit harder with them so the third thing is unrealistic unrealistic expectations of people and our partners and what I mean by that is this idea of it's like you said uh someone meets a connection they think okay we're good now we're going to succeed no no no you're still two human beings you are still two people who can fall short at any time at any day if we don't give Grace to each other we are going to have a big problem here we've got to recognize the difference between the person who does not belong in our life and continues to do wrong and the person who does belong in our life but makes mistakes yes and so once we know listen we have a connection I know with you you're the person I'm supposed to be with now let's remember that in our moment of struggle because again everyone's gonna make a mistake you're gonna do something especially the longer you've been together you're gonna mess up some way somehow you may say something you shouldn't have you may insult them in a way you know something something it happens but there needs to be grace and understanding we are human beings we're gonna fall short we gotta Embrace that forgiveness always with our partner and again communicate and that's the other thing communication would be the other Pitfall a lack of proper communication can deruff any situation and so you you've got to be willing and establish very early on a willingness and a a safe space for both Partners to be able to talk about anything we should not have to hold on to how we're feeling with each other because if we do that is a recipe for disaster you you said that a problem sometimes in Long relationships is you are not maintaining who they fell in love with dude I was screaming when I heard you say that break that down on what that means and let's do live deep okay so one let me say that that whole premise started with a long time ago I was having a discussion about monogamy and Pinot there are people out there who argue monogamy isn't natural and I've always argued no monogamy actually is natural if it was unnatural then we wouldn't even be able to embrace it for a period of time and when you examine relationships you realize that most people are able to go a year two three five whatever being completely monogamous and being happy but then at some point there tends to be a falloff with most people so I said okay the issue is not monogamy it's maintaining monogamy and the reason why we struggle to maintain monogamy is because we don't maintain who they fell in love with and so essentially you have these situations where people in the beginning are bringing their best selves or at least bringing a best version of something okay and we can't act like physical attraction is not a serious part of romantic relationships plain and simple it is the actual final ingredient like if if we didn't need physical attraction there would be a lot of friends getting together right now okay plain and simple but the and the only thing that stops them is you're not attracted to them like that so now when you have physical attraction that helps bring two people together and then you have one or more parties saying well it should not matter for me to have to maintain myself what do we expect to see happen and you'll hear a lot of these couples say well the flame is gone in most of those cases the flame left with the attraction plain and simple but there was something in the beginning that made it good enough or or strong for those people to be happy and again it's not just the physical part it's the emotional part it's how we talk to each other how we treat each other we have to get back to where things were good so whenever someone says to me how do we get the flame back I say what was in place when the flame was there what was what was going on at the time when everything was feeling good we had to identify all the factors how are you two looking how are you two treating each other everything and now let's do our best to recreate that environment and you will see a huge difference in your relationship I love that so much because so I've been with my husband now for 20 years we've been married for 18 and this is something we talk about a lot we we don't um expect to have the same amount of fire or electricity that we did when we were first met I think if you do a brain scan of someone that's just met there and it looks like they're on drugs right because they're so intoxicated with the love potion and also want to add that there's something as you were talking I was like you know what like if it was me and I was letting myself go I don't think like for Tom it would even be the the visual change it would be that that would have a knock-on effect on how I show up every day so I think I would be less confident I think I would feel be more insecure so it's not about just the like if we're talking about looks for a second where it's like people just kind of let themselves go and they're like I've been in a marriage for 20 years he just needs to love me for who I am I've never done that or said that ever because it's not just about the eye attraction to the physicalities it's how you show up Tom loves it that I'm a bit of a badass and I don't take from him when he gives it to me right and so it's like but now imagine I shop and I'm super insecure and I'm very um in um very sensitive because I don't feel good about myself right so now it's not just hey I've changed physically it's as an interaction where he likes to tease me and I'll give him one back right and we have like this banter but now imagine he teases me and I get insulted and I'm all upset and I'm more sensitive so it really does have this massive knock-on effect that people think is superficial because it's like oh they don't have the six-pack abs that you fell in love with let's say and it's like it's not about that it's about everything that you just said and I just encapsulated like it's so strong and people don't talk about it people don't talk about it enough because they get defensive absolutely and that's such an awesome point because it reminds me of another situation where uh this one woman she did gain weight husband had no problem with it but what would happen was she became insecure in the bedroom where she did not want to have sex because she didn't like the way she looked and even though he would tell her you're beautiful to me I still I don't have any problems with this she had an internal conflict so like you said it it goes beyond the physical and the impact it will now have and I don't think people understand how much when we deviate from that person how much that now affects us in all areas of our life and again now are you that energetic woman anymore are you positive anymore and that's why it's about not just how you look but how you treat them how you talk to them the energy that you bring to the table all of that needs to be maintained if we want to see the relationship continue to thrive and get even better and I know at least just from my husband these are things that make him confident right like that when he feels good about himself and when he feels good about himself he's in a good mood so like everything has this knock-on effect that even in the reverse with the guy I think that the insecurity would come out and the um you know oh were you looking at him because they're insecure about themselves yes they're not satisfying their per their woman absolutely absolutely and the last thing I want to add to that is there's a lot of people who say well I would never leave somebody if they let themselves go physically or whatever the problem is yeah you stayed but you don't touch them the same you don't talk to them the same anymore you don't respect them the same anymore your treatment of them has deviated because the attraction and again especially for women attraction encompasses More Than Physical like if he doesn't if you loved his ambitious drive and hit that ambitious Drive is gone now that's going to impact your attraction to him and so staying with him you don't get an award for staying if you can't still bring your best if you're not going to still pour into your partner the same then you can't you can't think it's a good thing like I'll hear even men say well I wouldn't leave her okay great but will you still love her the same and when I say love her will you still pour into her the same if you will great but if you're gonna deviate from that we still have a problem so true but how do you then go about having that conversation so letting my audience is primarily primarily female so let's assume a female has a husband or a partner that hasn't got that drive anymore as part of what they fell in love with him you know he really loved um you know going to the gym so he can pick her up and be strong for her or whatever it is and slowly slowly over time he's let go of the drive he's let go of his uh whatever it is that we fell in love with him for how do you even approach that in a way where that your partner can still feel loved can still hear hey I love you but everything's an improvement like how do you even approach that and then how do you help them or in fact do you help them okay so a few angles to cover one if you are not in a relationship yet this is where you need to understand establish this kind of dynamic as early as possible we have to have discussions while we're getting to know each other and date reading how about how we're going to handle a scenario like this I really believe people don't dive deep enough into each other and and visualize okay how are things going to look if we're in a relationship together how do we handle this kind of scenario let's talk about all these things but let's establish that hey if we're unhappy with something we should be allowed to talk to each other about it and not be offended we have to be one to listen to constructive criticism on both ends now if you're already in the relationship and you have not established this the the best way because there's no easy way but the best effective way in my opinion would be via a letter and the reason why is because if you come to them verbally number one verbal communication of deep concerns issues feelings tend to not go well people get defensive they deflect you can get distracted you may not give everything out so much can go wrong that can derail the purpose of the conversation all right some people end up talking for an hour and never got to the root of the issue that they were supposed to talk about okay whereas via a letter you're able to get everything out you're able to check your tone to to make sure that you are also adding love to the criticism so you don't want to just say listen I think you've fallen off and I don't like the direction this is going you got to start with saying listen I love so and so like it's a compliment sandwich so to speak and open yourself up to theirs as well you you gotta come in because the one thing I've learned with relationships is or one of the things I've learned is that people don't like to be singled out no one likes to be told dare to partner with the issues they're the partner that fell off so you want to be able to come in and recognize okay you know what maybe there's some things I need to improve or I'm open to hearing any issues that you may have that you haven't expressed but I want to make sure you understood where I stand and what how I'm seeing things all of these uh pieces of it will help soften it to where they can receive it more all right but I have to say this and some people may not like this but I might have to say it anyway that's like so exciting for me I want the no BS stuff on absolutely so I I believe that in a lot of cases I'm going to say most cases where people let themselves go again whether it's in treatment physically whatever and especially if they know it's an issue for their partner or more specifically when they know it's an issue or having an impact it's a sign that you're just not in love with that person it's a sign that there may not be a connection there and the reason why I say that is because of this you find a woman and and let's please understand the difference between going through a rough patch versus we just don't care and it's probably been years all right and we're not doing anything about this women who are into their man want to look good for that man and if how they're looking or or letting themselves go is having an impact on this minute they they you know value so much they'll want to do something about it many women when they don't care is because they don't look at him like that it's the same way with men where when a man's with a woman he loves he's inspired there's this natural inspiration this fire that's in you because of this woman where you want to go harder for her you want to accomplish more also for her she is part of your drive okay when that's non-existent then I do have to question were you really in love now again nothing's 100 it's acceptable to every rule but from the situations I've seen it's rare to find a couple who lets themselves go doesn't care no it's having an impact on the relationship and the relationship is not healthy and happy but yet you're telling me you guys are in love with each other and there's a connection oh Stefan okay so I'm gonna push back here all right but why why do you think that that's the case because for me I would actually go to there's something going on with them they're insecure they're losing their selfish self-esteem they're losing their confidence and things are happening to them where they're not prioritizing it and then it becomes a I'm struggling right now and so they just need to love me right they need to love me for how I am but it's interesting that you perceive as it's about them versus about the person that's going through the emotion so this is why I met I want to make sure I said there's a difference between going through that rough period which I do think people go through like we all go through moments where we may be a little depressed we may have lost motivation we don't have the same energy we're going through some things I think all of that is understandable and that's why I want to make sure I added like such an example where it may be years because people who are truly into each other who love each other we're gonna have our rough patches but we're gonna be able to get through that and get to something better when you've remained in that and there's no desire to push past that there's no attempt to work through this that to me says no this is not struggle this is no motivation whatsoever from the fact that this person has inspired you and consider it like this to a woman it's like well why should I go ahead and hit the gym for a man who doesn't even listen who a man who doesn't even talk to me anymore who doesn't treat me to say so again his lack of pouring into you keeps you unmotivated all right same way I've seen some men who feel like well why should I do anything about it she doesn't have sex with me anyway she doesn't listen to what I say I don't get any respect in this house why should I be better for her but again so that speaks to is there really love here and and to be honest with you I want to say this the majority of people are not with the person they most love the majority of people are not ready to have a connection with so it's not surprising to me when I see this Dynamic happen all the time and again show me two people who have a connection so many two people who truly love each other and I'll show you two people who at some point will fight through and get back on track if if not even not fall completely off track when it comes to maintaining themselves for their partner you know what I'm saying like they have a different fuel allows them to try push pies whereas when that connection is not there it's like man forget them I don't care good I love how raw you are about your feedback because it really like I just want to know the truth right once we know the truth then we can assess but a lot of people do um you know they protect their own emotions because they don't want to feel badly about themselves and for me I always go back to what's the goal like what's the goal in my relationship is the goal for me to always feel great or is the goal for us to always get through issues and keep connecting because let me tell you I don't know any relationship where you you have that real talk and you always feel great like you don't feel great because you're assessing the things that you may have done wrong the things that you've maybe let go of and I made it a point maybe about five years ago that I turned to my husband and we made this list of questions when we'd go on vacation we'd just ask each other a bunch of questions and there was one question that I found so powerful for myself and it I asked him this on Valentine's Day in fact I said what's the thing that I used to do for you that I've stopped that you wish I started doing again that's an awesome question now here's the thing he's gonna say things that may upset me right it's like oh you used to do right like you used to do this for me and used to do this for me and so in going into that I said to myself in asking this question I need to be very open to the answer because it's gonna it may upset me okay well if it upsets me then why am I asking the question I'm doing it because my goal is to make sure that I have a long lasting happy successful relationship and so once I've kind of told myself why I'm doing it I then my my guard gets down and then also like you said it gives me an opportunity for him to then ask me so I've asked him and he's like okay babe what's the thing that you wish I now start doing and because I've left myself open to that I now have the space to be able to tell him absolutely absolutely and you see how when him now putting himself out there in the same way like that makes things so much easier when both parties are willing to be open to the criticism that makes both parties more receptive to it and it helps no one wants to be the only one saying well you're wrong you need to do this and then we end it there it's like no let's share with each other what we can be doing better how we can be making each other happier that should always be the goal and I honestly think like people should have relationship checkups so you know you said you do it on vacations whether it be maybe once every three months or six months or once a year at some point we need to sit down and have an understanding this is the day that we sit down and get everything out what's missing what needs to return you know what needs to be adjusted if we kept doing that I really believe you would see more relationships succeed idea they should be like a plan of like all right on this day every six months because if you set it up ahead of time when there's no problem now there's not that like oh God he wants to talk to me what's wrong oh my God I like that Panic so if you just go every six months we agree we're gonna have a meet a meeting and we're going to sit down kind of like what you do with the business right you go over the piano you go over the data you see what's working you see what doesn't I love this idea and here's the other part of that psychologically that happens you know how at work if you know your review is coming up you tighten up because you don't want to walk into that review so if we know we have the relationship checkup coming up people will start to naturally tighten up because nobody wants to come in being the one who wasn't doing their job so it has a positive impact in various levels oh my God I love that so much that was hilarious and there's one thing actually I also want to touch upon that you said is when I take care of myself when I put on my knee-high boots and when I put on lacy underwear I feel a different way and so I do it for myself right like I obviously do it because I like the way my husband looks at me you know when I'm wearing that outfit but it goes back into once I start to go what makes me feel good and then I show up by feeling good then it has that knock-on effect so I'm not just thinking I'm dressing this way for him it's like I'm just in this way for me to feel good about myself so that then we can get together and you know what and I'm glad you brought that up because that that is a very important part and this is where I think it kind of goes with the connection in the sense that we this is where people have to be their true selves so I'll use me for example I like a woman that likes to look good come to the realization that not every woman cares to have to do the whole dressing up and nails or whatever some women don't care for that that's not their thing and so now if if we get together not being honest about who we are and what we like we we have this mismatch to where now I'm trying to get you to dress up and that's not really what makes you feel good however if we have that connection or we're on the same page and now you enjoy looking good I enjoy you looking good now it's easy because when you make yourself look good for you I still benefit because we're on the same page here we wanted the same things you know and I think this is where people have to recognize okay yes we we have to make sure we are creating that happiness within us because that's what's going to pour out to our partners into our lives but we also want to make sure that we're with partners that align with us all right that Embrace what we Embrace so now to maintain and sustain those things as we talked about earlier maintain the person they fell in love with become so much easier because I love that person too so the person you love I love okay now we're good but if I don't love being this person but you want me to be that now we have this huge disconnect and things won't work in the long run to learn the Key signs that you're dealing with a narcissist and how to set boundaries click here you can be the total package at the wrong address so just because you're single does not mean that there is something off within you if you're not careful

Channel: Lisa Bilyeu

Views: 351,710

Keywords: women of impact, woman of impact, lisa bilyeu, tom bilyeu, impact theory, quest nutrition, motivation, inspiration

Id: yxCvBYlzVlQ

Length: 131min 24sec (7884 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 15 2023