Healing Childhood Trauma: Releasing Shame & Hidden Anger | with Bronwyn Schweigerdt

Michael: We live in a time in society right now where I think that emotions are at the forefront of the conversation. So many of us struggle with emotions, so many of us don't know how to name emotions, but predominantly this one emotion keeps coming up more and more in the social structures of the society that we're in, and that's anger. Bronwyn, you are an expert at anger, you know it better than probably most. And you've been able to build a career in helping people expose and diagnose anger to be both a tool and a cathartic healing journey for them in their discovery of that emotion. With that said, why should anyone listen to today's show?

Bronwyn: Wow. Yeah. What a question. Yeah. So I actually became a therapist because this is a second career for me. I was desperately in need of a good therapist. And when I say good, I mean like a good enough. And I couldn't find that. And I remember sitting in one of the many therapist's offices on their couch thinking to myself, Bronwyn, you are hardly functional right now, but I still think you would make a better therapist than this person. And so that was part of my healing journey from that particular depressive episode. That was very severe. Is going back to school, getting another master's degree, getting my 3000 hours and becoming a licensed therapist. But looking back now at all of that, at that depressive episode and the subsequent one after that, that even lasted longer, all of it, I see that the common denominator was suppressed or what I call disassociated anger. And I started connecting those dots actually as a therapist seen in my clients. They're depression and anxiety, and I see a lot more anxiety than depression in general. They're mania, they're psychosis. And now I'm even realizing all these somatic symptoms like insomnia, like GI issues, like migraines chronic pain in their bodies, vertigo, so many somatic symptoms, all are disassociated anger. And so I like to say that anger, it's invisible like other emotions, but it doesn't mean it's less real. I believe it's as real as the laptop I am talking to you on right now, Michael. And it doesn't just evaporate when, when the thing happens that, that causes the anger. It actually. Lives in our bodies, and I believe it stagnates in our bodies, and it makes us sick. Thus, the mental illness and the somatic symptoms.

Michael: Can you define dissociated anger for us?

Bronwyn: Yeah, so we dissociate when we don't want to acknowledge the anger when we don't feel maybe like we're entitled to feel angry because maybe we grew up learning don't be angry. That's bad. Or we saw a parent where their anger was just always violent or verbally violent. And so, we may be told ourselves, don't be angry. That's bad. That's dangerous. But we learned in some way. To have a dysfunctional relationship with our anger. And we all have anger, so I don't like the term angry person because I think that's like saying breathing person, we all have anger. So there's no such thing as an angry person. Just there's no such thing as a breathing person. We're all humans. We all have anger. But what matters is our relationship to our anger. And if we have a dysfunctional relationship because we associate it with being ashamed, like a shameful thing, or being abandoned, a lot of us have learned not to be angry because when maybe we went through the terrible twos and we started saying no and having boundaries with our parent, we got the silent treatment. And so we still, to this day. Associate any of our own assertiveness, our own anger with abandonment, so it could be completely unconscious, but it's there. And so we have learned to historically dissociate from the anger. So it just means we're not naming it. We're not acknowledging it. We're neglecting it.

Michael: Yeah, and I feel like that feels so commonplace, right? Because and then you have this interesting juxtaposition in this dichotomy where it's like Especially for girls your show. I'll speak from third party because I'm not a woman but what I've absorbed observed and what I've seen is Young women and girls growing up, they're shown that anger is this really gross, dark emotion that is about, Hey, if you're angry, you're not being ladylike. And then growing up boys, like we're told use anger, be angry, leverage it. And then when you use it, you're a powerful man. And then there's this further dissociation between anger and power, where I see a lot of, and I was this way as well when I was young because I was so hurt. Like I used my anger, which led to violence, which I thought was power, which is exactly the opposite because it's actually really weak. One of the things I spend a lot of time talking with in regard to my clients is control your emotions, control your life. But when you're shown from the youngest age that there's no space for your emotions to even exist, you don't even get the place to acknowledge them to start with which is what you're talking about in this dissociation. Talk me through like the timelines. If I were to want to pinpoint why someone maybe is angry today. Has major anger issues, has these dissociative experiences, the GIs, the headaches, all the things that we're talking about here. Let's talk about how that's ingrained from childhood, what that looks like, and what some people might have been exposed to.

Bronwyn: yeah. From intimacy or from infancy, I was going to say from intimacy that too. Yeah. Yeah. Super. Pretty much from the time we're born. So I agree with you that there are different standards for different genders where little girls are taught not to be angry. And so my clients, Who are women, they cry and I'll say, are those sad tears or those angry tears? And they're like, oh, those are angry tears. I'm like, okay. So you were allowed to have angry tears because that wasn't too threatening to the parent. And then little boys weren't allowed to have tears at all. No sadness, no, their vulnerability wasn't tolerated. And so all they could have was anger. And so there's this. Dichotomy, this discrepancy there, and so I think we bring that right into our adult lives, but also again. If we had a parent whose ego strength wasn't so great, which most of us did, unfortunately, and they did threaten abandonment when we showed anger, then, or, shame us when we showed anger or whatever. Those are what I call imprints in our little brains that create a template that we carry with us. unconsciously the rest of our lives until we become consciously aware of that template and we unlearn it. We have to consciously unlearn it. But you said your phrase is control your emotions or control your feelings, control your life. I want to talk about that a little because that word control, I think I have a little bit of a hard time with, I think I know what you're saying with it. But in general, we use the word control. When I think of someone saying control your emotions, I think don't show any emotion, right? Just keep it all inside. So I wouldn't use the word control. I would say, maybe master. Your emotions and when we name our emotions, when we are aware of them, when we give them names and when we speak them out Hey, Michael, I'm feeling frustrated. We said we were going to meet at nine and it's nine 20 what's up? So when I'm naming it, I am mastering that emotion. That's how we master our feelings is we name them and we give them words. If we don't name them, if we don't give them words, those emotions master us.

Michael: Yeah, entirely. For context and clarity same, but different, right? What you're saying, what I'm saying, same thing, different terminologies, different phraseology. But ultimately that, that came from a place where one day, and this was in my personal journey, I realized like my emotions were running amok. Like I was such, because I went from this person of zero emotional capacity other than violence, which I thought was an emotion, which obviously I've come to find is not, right? And physical violence, emotional violence, mental violence, like it was very dark for a long time. In fact I'd learned to shut off. Because for 15 years, I didn't cry. I didn't cry when my three childhood best friends got murdered. I didn't cry when my grandmother died. I didn't cry when my mother died. I didn't cry when there were breakups. I didn't cry ever because I was so shut off. Then I opened the release valve through. The coaching and the therapy, the personal work, the journaling, the meditation, the yoga, all of the things. And then suddenly my emotions were like this fire hose that were just spraying everything and everyone at all times. And so it's interesting cause there was this pendulum swing. And I think to get to normality and baseline, the reason I use the word controls, cause it's about being mindful of it. When I learned about the 92nd rule, like that changed my life. Forever. Cause I was like, Oh, I don't have to be this emotion all the time. And I can sit in baseline recognizing that there's this dissipation over time. I want to go a little bit deeper into something here because we were talking about what it's like in childhood. ‘Cause I really want to sit in this space just a moment longer. It was a question that I had. I found. That causation and correlation for me as an analytical person, probably more so than I care to be at times, has led to this place where if I can have a foundational understanding and a framework of looking at why something actually takes place in my life, then that gives me the power to actually move through it and create a game plan to be able to overcome it or to heal it or to grow it or whatever the thing is, right?

Bronwyn: Yeah.

Michael: One of the reasons That I'm going to say what I say is because I know that I'm not the only person who has experienced this. Obviously, we're a podcast about childhood trauma. Growing up, one of the turns of phrase that I heard more than anything, that I believe is actually the cornerstone to me shutting off emotionally, that I think a lot of people go through, is, if you don't stop crying, I'll give you something to cry about. I see the reaction on your face here. If you're listening, you're not noticing. What comes up for you in that, in this pathway to anger?

Bronwyn: Yeah. I am having a reaction to that. I know many people have heard that that just, yeah, I'm feeling just disgusted. Maybe I'll start with what that parent or what that caregiver is saying in that moment. What they're saying is. What they're not saying, but what they're saying is, your vulnerability is too evocative for me to tolerate because I am so shut off to all my vulnerable emotions. I cannot handle yours. A. B. The fact that you're crying, I see exclusively as a reflection of me failing you in some way, and I refuse to acknowledge that. And so, you better smile and look happy so I can feel better about me. So that's a narcissistic component there. Yeah, so those are really the two things that they're saying in that moment and what they're not doing is what they need to be doing is saying, wow, you're you're not me. This is not a reflection of me feeling you. This is a reflection of you being hurt. And when someone's hurt, they need a hug. They need to be understood. They need someone to be a mirror to them and reflect back to them what they're seeing and saying, wow, little Michael, like you look really sad. Tell me what's going on. Would you like me to hug you? Would you like to talk about it? I want to hear

Michael: Why is vulnerability, especially in that context, so terrifying to people?

Bronwyn: Shame, because they so let me talk about shame. So shame is not an emotion. So here's why shame is a feeling for sure. Not an emotion. The word emotion, it stands for something that is there to give us. Movement to elicit movement, right? So babies are born into the world with the whole gamut of emotions. They have anger. They have sadness. They have, contentedness and happiness, but they are not born into the world with shame. Shame is not native to humans. It is not inherent. It is a feeling that comes. It is taught. It's a social construct and it's taught through other humans. So shame is not native. I see shame as the enemy of all humanity. We think our enemy is other humans and that can be true, but it's really the shame in those other humans that's taken over them and made them less human because that's what shame does. It strips us of our humanity. It doesn't tolerate humanity because we aren't allowed to be human. We're not allowed to make mistakes and learn for them from them when we have shame. We can't hear someone saying to us, hey, Bronwyn, when you said that the other day it didn't sit well with me. Can we talk about it when I have shame? I can't hear that. It's a liar. It distorts what I hear. And it says, hey, Bronwyn, you suck. You suck really bad. And so I can't hear someone giving me true, genuine, constructive feedback. All I hear is you suck. So bad. I go to a place of all that. And so I just defend it. I just defend that's all I can do because I can't tolerate this distortion that I'm hearing. Shame lies to us and tells us you're not good. You're inherently flawed and inherently defective. It distorts everything and it lies. And so when we have shame, we, it tells us we can't be vulnerable, that our true core self is shameful, is inherently bad. And so don't ever show that to anyone ever again. So it does all these things and it makes us, so we're not really human anymore. We become monsters actually.

Michael: Yeah, and it's funny, I was actually just about to say often shame is masked by anger because it's such a powerful defensive mechanism to be avoidant of that moment of feeling that emotion that doesn't serve you at the highest capacity, by the way, if you look at it in resonance machines, shame is the lowest vibrating frequency measurable by man, right? And if You look at it and you understand it's really funny and apropos to the frequency my life is in right now from a coaching perspective, shame has been coming up with almost every person I'm working with right now and I think it's really interesting that It's this thing that takes from you until you recognize that it shouldn't. Because it's about getting to this place where you can be okay with who you are as a human being. I carried so much shame for years. Masked it with anger and being this big, strong, tough guy. And, it's for me, being 6'4 220, covered in tattoos, people walk past me on the streets and they like clutch their purses and I'm like, Yeah, maybe in a past life I might have done that, but in this life we're good here. And, but I used to feel shame even just about being a human walking down the street. Like, why do they judge me? Why do they look at me like this? What is the thing? And then you insert all this other shame around the abuse that we suffer. And some people, and there's a lot of people who listen to this show because I lead first with my story, my mother cutting my finger off, being homeless as a child, a lot of the really intense chaos I went through. And what's really interesting is I don't feel shame about any of those experiences today. Once upon a time, I was almost haunted by it. It was this thing that felt like a shadow living above me at all times. Where it was like, no matter what I do, this feeling of enoughness, of feeling proud, of love, of confidence, of self esteem, it cannot rise to the surface, because this shame, which, by the way, most of it had absolutely nothing to do with me, as shame generally does, seemed to sit on top of me. So what I'm curious about here is how do we dislodge this? How do we look at this shame and actually acknowledge it, understand that it's not about us, and then actually, for me, I've learned to leverage it as a tool to move forward in life. I don't know that will hold true for everyone, but what do you actually do with it?

Bronwyn: Yeah. I think I'm a big proponent of dislodging it. So on my podcast, I have actually one whole episode where I lead listers in an exercise. It's actually called dislodging shame in an exercise so they can do it for themselves, but I'll tell you what I do and what I, myself, how I learned this. I was actually going for a run one day about four years ago. And I was at a stoplight and I was unconsciously just processing so much of what I was learning as a therapist through my clients, and so I was running and I'm at a stoplight and I closed my eyes and I picture little 10 year old Bronwyn sitting at the dining room table and her father is just mocking her, which is what he did every single night starting at age 10. And I picture my adult self entering that memory, going over to little Bronwyn, looking at her in the eyes and saying, you know what little Bronwyn, I don't blame you for feeling ashamed at him mocking you like he does every single night at the dinner table. But you know what? This is what we're going to do. Let's put all the shame you feel in this big cardboard box and we're going to return to owner. We're just going to say, here you go, dad. You know what? I realized this was never ours. This was never ours. This has always been yours. And we're going to return to owner right now, do with it what you will, but it's not ours. And I did that and something in me shifted that moment so profoundly. It was like I was a different person, but saying that it was like I was me for the first time. And I have learned again, as a therapist, shame lives in our gut, like it literally lives in our gut. I think most digestive issues. People are feeling shame, what else lives in our gut is our self. Our core essence is also in our gut. And so when we have shame, it severs us from ourselves. It exiles. It takes that place. It excels us from ourselves. And so we don't trust ourselves. We don't believe inherently that we are good. A net good, not perfect, but good. We don't believe that and we don't trust ourselves and we end up not being true to ourselves. We betray ourselves. And here's the thing, humans need to believe that they are good. They absolutely need to believe that. And if they don't derive that internally, because they're shame. They will become enslaved and addicted to something outside of themselves that gives them the impression that they are good. So it could be how I look, my appearance, my sexuality, my ability to attract people. It could be my fame, my recognition, my money, my success. It could be all those things. And those give me back that reflection, that mirror that say you are good, but they never satisfied because I know truly. That's not really me. That's not my core. And so as good as it might feel for five minutes to get an accolade, to get recognition, to have someone be attracted to me, it only lasts for a very short window because I know intuitively that's not really me. That person is recognizing or finding attractive. It's not really me. And so we also are easily manipulated by people who will give us that reflection of our goodness in order to get something from us to derive something. And we end up betraying ourselves and then that begets more shame. And so we just are exiled from ourselves. And so when I was able to expel. That shame for me. And I had to do a few more exercises in regards to my mother when I was younger in life. But that day, that big chunk of shame was dislodged. And it was like, I was able to finally connect to me and finally start trusting me and. After that happened, like maybe six months, someone I knew actually tried to gaslight me. They actually devalued me and they gave a whole list of things. And I sat there and in the past I would have taken it all in. I would have been like, Oh my God. It's true. I'm horrible. But I was able, it was like I had this objectivity just sitting there and I was like the whole time I just had a smirk on my face and I was able the entire time to go, Oh, I see what you're doing. You're trying to shame me because you want me to believe all this. But the truth is we both know this actually isn't true. And we both know what you're doing right now. And I had never had that objectivity In my life. So it was like I was shame proof in that moment.

Michael: Yeah, that's so powerful. And, a big part of what I hear there is especially in this moment, you're having this run. There's a moment of processing and letting go and I've had that moment too where you finally come to awareness where you're like, this isn't my responsibility. One of the things I constantly talk about with my clients is trauma is like owning a house and you go outside every single day. And in your front yard is this trash. You don't put the trash there. And for a period of time, you're going to walk over that trash. You're just gonna, it's just gonna be there. You know it's there. You're cognizant of it being there. Maybe you're not fully aware, but in the back of your mind, you're consciously aware. And then one day you go, oh, wait a second. This isn't my trash. And then at some point, you go, oh, wait a second. Not only is this not my trash. And this sucks because this is the part that really sucks about it. You go, I have to actually clean this trash up. I didn't put this trash here, but I have to clean it up. And for me it's part of the acknowledgement and letting go and the cleaning and the removal and then the process of the rebuilding because Where that trash once sat, that soil becomes dilapidated and it becomes tarnished and maybe it's salted. And so now you have to come in and you have to re tend to that soil, or maybe tend to that soil for the first time ever. And then through that, you plant these seeds that ultimately become the life that you live. And that's this process of creating yourself and getting to that place. What you're talking about of allowing yourself to live, allowing yourself to exist, to be who you are without the shame and judgment of who you are. And what's so hard about that, it's all, it almost is like a light switch because I vividly remember this moment in my twenties, my late twenties, where I was like, you know what? Fuck this. I'm going to be me. I don't care if you don't like me because I walk down the path as many people do who are a mesh and emotionally groomed and all the things that we go through who become people pleasers. Yes, people. And maybe even borderline. And I thought this was me for a long time, sociopathic. And then I just realized I needed a hug. And so what happens is you start to play this game with yourself. We're like, can I be me? The most difficult element though of the being you is to reconcile the shame that you have that actually starts at 10 years old at the dinner table Through the mocking and the criticism and this is my personal view on it. The cuts, the scars, the burns, the surgeries, the abuses, the physical things that I went through. Pale in comparison to the criticism. The less than, the you don't matter, the you're not importance. Because that psychological warfare is so much difficult to heal because you don't get to see it. Like I can look at my finger and I can see where the skin is healed where I have the five surgeries where, you know, even though it's discolored, like it's still there and I can visually put my eyes to it. You can't visually see the emotional wound.

Bronwyn: Yes.

Michael: So what let's walk this path a little bit deeper, right? Because. There was a masking that I brought up earlier of the shame with anger because it was like if I cover this with anger, nobody has to see me. How do you become you? Like how do you become you and allow yourself that process of letting? What is the mind game we're playing with ourselves here?

Bronwyn: Yeah. So I think, you give back the shame and the thing is as a child, children do not have objectivity. First of all, I want to say shame. I see. Is the residue of all our childhood trauma and when I don't think I love the word trauma right now because so much of that comes from neglect and most people don't associate just neglect. With trauma, they associate like what you're stipulating right now is the actual physical abuse or okay, that's trauma. I just, experience neglect, but it neglect is you're saying neglect sends the message. You don't matter, which is exactly what you're positing right now. You're saying that was the most hurtful of everything. It wasn't the abuse. It was the you don't matter. And but all of that neglect, all of the rejection, all of the emotional abandonment, all of the abuse, what it all, the residue of all of that is shame because that child. Thanks. Oh, the reason I don't matter is because I'm defective somehow. And so we don't have that objectivity as children. And so when I do that exercise, where I went back and helped little Bronwyn see no, the shameful one right here is him, not you. And we can do that for ourselves. And that's how we integrate. With our inner child is we do that. So I, again, so on my podcast, I walk listeners through what I call an integration exercise where you know, whatever our trigger is in the present triggers are great for leading us back to those early imprinting memories. So for me, I'll give you an example. So a big trigger for me has always been when I'm talking to my husband. And he looks away while we're talking where he doesn't maintain eye contact. And I know that's my trigger. So let's say that happens. Let's say like an hour later, I'm able to reflect on it and process it. And I just sit there and I close my eyes and I imagine he's doing it right now. And I am not. And I just let myself feel what I feel in my body. So again, I'm probably going to feel shame in my gut, but I might feel something else, but whatever I feel, I focus on that sensation. And I now let my mind just float back passively to the first time I ever felt that same sensation in my body. And that will lead me to an imprinting memory. So for me, mine is when I was very young, like three years old and my mom just never made eye contact with me. She never showed any concern. She never looked at me. She never listened to me. Just like very severe neglect. And I picture a three year old Bronwyn and I picture that I go to her. I look her in the eyes. I get on her level. And I say, Little Bronwyn, I know that when your mom never looks at you, or shows any interest, or concern, or listens to you, that you feel like you're not important, like you don't matter. That makes complete sense. And I see why you feel that, but I'm here now and I want you to see what I see. And I need you to know that the reason that she is neglecting you so chronically is not a reflection of you, little Bronwyn. It is a hundred percent a reflection of her. It is a zero percent, a little Bronwyn problem. It is a hundred percent a mom problem. And I need you to see that. And I need you to know. That is true and little Bronwyn, I am sorry that I have actually neglected you too. I have related to you exactly like our mother related to us and I have also emotionally abandoned you. I didn't realize how much you needed to be seen by me. I didn't realize how powerful I am to give that to you. I had no idea, I'm waking up to it now. And my eyes are opening and I need to let you know, little Bronwyn, I do see you and you do matter to me and your feelings are really important to me because they're valid. They're there for a very good reason. They're there to give us wisdom and I am happy to meet your needs. That is a delight to me. You're not a burden to me, but a delight. And I am going to attune to you. Now, as long as it takes in order to win back your trust in me, and I'm here for good, I will not ever abandon you again because you belong to me and I am so pleased with you. I see you. I see the good, bad and the ugly, but in my eyes I see a net good and I'm here with you to feel all of those feelings together. You won't have to feel them alone in isolation anymore. I'm going to share them with you. We're going to feel them together and we're going to let our feelings tell us what we need and we're going to be true to ourselves and we're going to trust ourselves because we're not alone anymore. And so then I imagined that I take little Bronwyn by the hand and I walk her right out that front door of that house and I look at her and I close it firmly behind me and I look at her and I say, look, little Bronwyn, we're out here now in the sunlight where everything is clear. And we have each other now and it's a new day for us.

Michael: Okay. Easier said than done. I think you both of us can agree with that. And you're practiced in it. So it comes out very fluently. And that's an experience that I have too. And one of the things that I think about as you're doing this is one, it's very beautiful by the way, because that inner child work is very uncomfortable. It is, especially in the beginning, but in the discomfort, that's where we grow. And that's one of those actions that I, I remember having these moments sitting down in therapist's office, walking through processes like that and just being like, am I really doing this right now? Like it might really do it, and it's, and it was this massive sense of resistance, right? I felt a shame come up because of the fact that I was even having to do that, that then turned into anger. And then I'd be like, I can't believe I have to do this right now. What I'm curious about, because I look at communication, especially internal communication with ourselves. As this framework for creating the space to allow ourselves to sit in discomfort. But I know that people who will listen to this, some, I can't speak for everyone, may feel this immense sense of anger towards themselves. Where they're not even going to allow themselves to walk this path where the resistance to the idea of An internal dialogue being kind might as well be telling them to go build a rocket ship and land it on Mars What do you do with the self anger? What do you do with the self hatred? What how do you sit in those things? To walk the path to a narrative of communication that is actually healing when every day you're starting off with, I hate myself.

Bronwyn: Yes. So self contempt is, and self disgust is shame. Those are all the same thing. Those are just different facets, different terms. They're all the same. So yes, I think that's a really good point before we can get to that place. A lot of us need to. See the shame where it came from and give it back so we can get to that place of vulnerability in order to do the exercise for ourselves. We do that by just, getting that objectivity for ourselves, just saying, what. Who was shameful here? Who was shameful to mock a child every night at dinner? Who was shameful to neglect a child so chronically every day? Who's the shameful one? Whose job is that? Is that the parent's job or is it the child's job to somehow, perform for the parent to win their attention when they're just a little toddler? No. So we can definitely do that through all of that. We do need to be at a place where we're going to be able to give the shame back to the parent. Even in our imagination, we have to be able to differentiate from our parents. Not everyone is, wanting to do that, but we have to in order to integrate, we have to differentiate those things are two sides of the same coin, right? So if we're going to integrate into wholeness, we have to differentiate from our parents. It doesn't mean we have to end our relationship with our parents necessarily. For me, I did have to do that. But it's not necessary for everyone, but we do have to have the objectivity to at least get angry and say, you know what? That wasn't okay. Does it mean we need to confront the parent? Not necessarily because sometimes that would just be counterproductive entirely, but we need to be able to get angry for ourselves on our own behalf and say, Oh my God. What the hell? What the hell was that? Why did that happen? We need to be able to do that. That's where anger is key because we cannot differentiate without the anger.

Michael: One of, yeah, and one of the things that I have my clients do, I'm like, write the most angry and pissed off letter you could ever imagine writing to your parents. Lay out every detail, every time they hurt you, every time they harmed you, every time you felt Neglected, unsupported, every time you've been pissed off, every time you were like, I needed the thing and you weren't there, and then I don't know what you do with it. That is up to you. Sometimes you send it to them, sometimes you burn it. But at least you get that emotion out. I have found that's been a very practical tool for people. One

Bronwyn: Yeah.

Michael: things, because I want to go, I'm going to go deeper just for a second, because what I see the path, right? Because we're talking about these frameworks. So I see the path where it's okay, the thing that we need to do is create this differentiation. Okay. In order to do that, we have to create this acknowledgement and we have to give ourselves. Really has permission to be biased into objectivity and be like, what is true? What is not true? However, what I often see is this wall in front of even objectivity and that wall tends to be, I have been enmeshed and groomed and belittled and criticized to the point where objectivity doesn't even exist because I have been brainwashed. To believe that I am what my parents told me that wall fills more often than not in front of the opportunity to actually create the change when and I know you've probably seen this too with all the amazing people that you've helped in their journey. How do we get rid of this wall? The wall that is I want to come to therapy and have this conversation. I want to go to coaching and be able to write this letter. I want to do these things, but this wall is so intense. I have nothing but the belief that I am what my parents told me. How do we get that wall out of the equation?

Bronwyn: Let me help you see what I think that wall entails, what it really is that wall is denial. Like when you say wall, that's denial and why it's there, Michael, because like you and I don't have any denial about our parents, but a lot of people do. And so it's hard to relate to that. It's there likely because the adult child is still addicted to winning the parents approval. And as long as that is still happening, they will be enmeshed and that wall will be there. So it's lie and deceit begets more lies and deceit, if that makes sense. Yes, so they need to see the futility that they are literally knocking their head against a wall that they are still addicted to finally proving themselves by winning the parents approval. They need to see, oh. This is futile. This is a no go. If it hasn't happened after, 30 years, it's probably not going to happen now. And they need to just, I say, I just did a, my most recent podcast is called wisdom is knowing when to give up. It's time to give up. It's time for me to give myself that approval. And so again, that's another integration exercise. We give ourselves that approval that, that. We have been seeking our entire lives desperately from the parent. So again, it's the same principle where that differentiation and the integration go hand in hand. When we give it to ourself, we're able to go, oh you're like just the guy behind the curtain. You're not the wizard of Oz, you're just the little pathetic man behind the curtain to the parent, right?

Michael: Yes, and some tracking, but I think there's still one part of the equation that we have to expose. I think we're almost there, because I've been playing this out in my head for a long, really my whole life, to be honest. Okay, so the wall is this idea of denial. Copy that. That makes sense to me. Alright? The denial is the addiction to winning our parents approval, right? That becomes subconsciously embedded in us, right? I think that subconscious embedding comes from If I do not get their approval, then I will be abandoned. And since I have the fear of abandonment, I have to stay in this chaos.

Bronwyn: I don't think it comes

Michael: Does that?

Bronwyn: I don't think it's from abandonment necessarily. It definitely is, close to abandonment, but I think it's so I can prove to myself that I am good because going back, all humans need to believe that they are good. And if we don't do that internally, we're still addicted to getting it from others. And so also, honestly, A really good parent, which is so rare, will give their child that approval enough that the child does internalize it. That's how it's designed to work where the parent sees that child, that the parent hears that child, the parent acknowledges the child enough and goes, wow, that's interesting. I hear what you're saying and that child then internalizes that. And so they have that. I am good. I am seen, I am heard, I am important, but most parents don't do that. And when they don't do it, we're still as adults trying to get that from them. And that's the enmeshment. But when we can pause and go, Oh, I can do that for me. That's when we're free. That's when that wall can come crumbling down. We have nothing left to lose.

Michael: And that's what, there, you hit it, because that's the part where it's like the freedom only comes from the moment that you recognize that you're a sovereign being.

Bronwyn: Yes.

Michael: That's the part people get lost in. Because the fear of the idea of abandonment, neglect, continuation of abuse, like it doesn't go away until you give yourself permission to walk away from it. It's like being within a cage. That has a door on it.

Bronwyn: Yeah.

Michael: And you sit in that cage for 45 years, but it never occurs to you just to turn the handle and you can walk out because there's no lock and I think that's what it really becomes is you're standing in front of it and you're like, wait a second, I can actually let go of this and I can walk out the thing that's interesting to me though, is when the anger comes up and you fight yourself against the reality that you've been brainwashed and I had this moment, and I've shared this on the show before, I was 18 years old. Again, I'm 6'4 220. I was even more fit when I was 18 because I played four varsity sports, and, I was doing whatever I was doing. My mom was about 5'7, 5'8 raging alcoholic, manic depressive, suicidal, schizophrenic, married six, seven times, she would just disappear, super violent, and I never touched my mom one time. And one night, I'm in my bedroom, And I'm, like, listening to music in bed. I'm, like, totally disconnected from the world, just trying to have some space of peace, living in a house with ten other people. So it was a rare moment. And she barges in the door, trashed, and starts attacking me. And that night, I kicked her to the ground. I did not strike her. I just kicked her to I stood over her, and I said, if you ever touch me again, I'll kill you. And I meant it, because she had beat the crap out of me alongside my stepfather pretty much since day one. And what I realized, in retrospect, going back to that moment, the thing that I was doing, I was giving myself permission to be free of the tyranny of her experience as a human. And I would not be here without that. Now, a moment of anger became a catalyst for me that was parlayed with survival and the instinct kicked in of being like, you know what, I'm done with this. There's a moment that I think everyone needs in adulthood to create the separation. And I'm not saying that you have to do what like you and I did, which I'm so curious if you want to share your story in this too. But I don't know that everyone has to be like, I'm never talking to you again. But I do believe that everyone who has walked down this path, who now have these major anger issues, who have shame, who have guilt, who feel dissociated from themselves, who are trying to, move away from their parents but feel the addiction calling to them in the wall that keeps them blocked in the framework of change. I think you have to have that moment where you're like, I'm done with you guys, I need to be me.

Bronwyn: Yes, that's it. It's like that aha. Oh my God, I am going to be a reincarnation of you if I don't separate from you. And that separation isn't about physical separation as much as it is about it's like that objectivity oh my God, there's no hope. You know what that was? You know what I'm hearing you have is there's no hope. I can't, you're a monster. That was definitely what I had with my father. It wasn't that long ago. It was like a couple of years ago, actually. My mom, I knew was a monster, but she had just died and I was playing therapist to my dad. At the time and he got mad at me because I don't know, I didn't read his mind on something and he like changed what he said and he started yelling at me on the phone. It was the day my mom was dying and I just hung up and I felt bad, but I'm like, I'm sorry, you don't get to yell at me like that. And it was also very reminiscent of when I was. living with him when I was a teenager. And I'm like, no. So I hung up. I get an email later that night and I open it and I'm thinking, okay, he'll apologize. And instead of apologizing, he basically was like, I really appreciate you being there for me during this time. But when you hear the grit in my voice, you need to recognize it and learn to back off. And I'm like wait. Oh my God. I know your wife of 50 years is dying, but she's also my mother of 50 years. And why is it only about your feelings right now? Why are only your feelings important? Do you ever think I might have feelings and you want me to be better at attuning to your feelings? That's what this email is about. And it was like all of a sudden all these lights came on and I'm like, Oh wow. It's always about your feelings. It has always been about your feelings and so sick because you know what? My feelings matter. And so, I basically, Wrote him an email because I knew he'd never listen on the phone. So I wrote him a bunch of emails and just saying, this is the pattern in. Our entire life. Like this has been the pattern. It's always about you and your feelings. It always comes back to you. If you don't apologize, if you don't own this and do better to become a safe person, we're done he didn't apologize. So we haven't spoken in a couple of years now, and we probably never will again. And I'm fine with that. And the longer it's been. The more fine, I am because the more objectivity I have I just, memories will come and I'm like, I can't believe he said or did that. I can't, I have just more clarity. And let's hope, but it's also the first time in, I had insomnia for 30 years. And when that light came on about my dad and I started feeling the anger and starting having that objectivity and created that ultimatum, which ultimately led to the boundary, I was able to get off all my medication and I started sleeping like a baby and that's how it's been now for two years. So I see this in my clients where they have insomnia, where they are physically sick. We get better. It was like my body, it was like my body was trying to tell me for 30 years. Wake up, Bronwyn, wake up. You know that your mom's a monster, but you need to see your dad is too. So you can have a boundary. I didn't listen for 30 years and I want other people to not go through the suffering that I did. I want other people to wake up. It was like, my body was like. Don't be dormant. Don't close your eyes. See what I see.

Michael: Yeah. And that's an intense moment, right? Because when you cognizant, cognizantly recognize that and bring your awareness to the moment, you're like, why didn't I do this sooner? And it's so difficult because of all this conversation and that anger that gets held in our bodies for me, what it turned into, because here's the reality. And I say this on the show all the time, more about me in 50 minutes than people who knew me for 27 years, right? People who knew me, I lived with my best friends for almost a decade. They knew nothing about me. My girlfriend, we were in a relationship for seven years, knew nothing about me. And one day I realized as I'm having five panic attacks a day, it was crippling, ruined my business, ruined my health, ruined my relationship, Six to 30 were the four hardest years of my entire life because it was like every single day. I'm getting my own body is attacking me and it was because I held on to everything. It just sat there constantly and like it would come to the surface. I could feel the words like want to come out of my mouth sometimes. And be like, Oh my God, I was abused. I was molested. All these things happened to me, blah, blah, blah. And it was like, I could just never get it out. And what was wild is as I started really diving into the work and sharing, it lost its power over me. And now I'll be 40 shortly. Since I was 30, I've had one, maybe two panic attacks, right? In a decade and they've almost completely dissipated because it is your soul screaming at you. It's like you've got to deal with this stuff, but then again, and we're gonna circle back into it We feel angry at ourselves because we're like, why didn't you do it sooner? And one of the things that I always try to remind people is like the timeline is a timeline It takes awareness to get to the moment of dealing with it, but then once it's in front of you now it becomes responsibility. One of my beefs and we're gonna go here because we have a bit of time, is that I find I have found the vast, I'm going to get so much trouble for this. I already know. The vast majority of therapists don't know how to actually help people.

Bronwyn: No, they don't.

Michael: And you are a therapist. So I'm going to give myself a get out of jail free in the context of this conversation, but I know I'm going to get the emails. It's Michael@thinkunbrokenpodcast.com by the way.

Bronwyn: Bring them on.

Michael: So my experience was that the vast majority of therapists don't know how to help people in part one, because the human experience is far too complicated for people to actually understand when you get into the nuance of the individual and you're given these blanket approaches to be able to help navigate the experience and two, because they're still fucked up themselves.

Bronwyn: And it's two. It's two more than anything.

Michael: Let's go into it, right? Because I know that you have this moment where you're sitting in therapy and you're like, I could do this better. That was my experience in coaching. I was like, I can do this better. Track that for me. Where are the therapists missing the boats? What do people need to be aware of? Are there services like better help that are actually beneficial. Again, I'm going to get flamed for this. It's fine. But tell me just from your experience, because you had the same thing I had, where I was like, I could therapy myself better than this guy. Why am I here right now?

Bronwyn: Yeah. So there was one thing I heard consistently throughout my graduate program. That from all my instructors, no matter what theories they adhered to, which was the best therapist have done their own work. It's I think there's actually a book called the wounded healer. It's about that.

Michael: Yes. Great book.

Bronwyn: Okay. Yeah. So it's like that. And I feel like I lived that in that I went searching for a therapist. I had to become a therapist to be my own therapist and all of my own depressive episodes. I had to figure out on my own. I had like climb out of the pit myself. I think you did something similar. And when we do that, when we learn experiential knowledge cannot be taught in a classroom, it cannot be taught from anyone else. We have to live it. And that's what wisdom is. Wisdom. is experiential knowledge. You only can live it to know it. And so even getting back to your, when people say, why didn't I do this sooner? There just weren't all the right factors. Like there, it wasn't the right time and it wasn't the right time. Like things weren't right. But we go through things and our eyes, if we allow our eyes to be opened, if we're allow ourselves. To feel our feelings if we're we say, okay, this is going to hurt, but let's do this if we're open to that. We learn and we get wisdom and we get wisdom every step we take fighting for our own lives to climb out of that pit and that's the only way we actually learn it. Now, can you do that in therapy? Sure, but can you do that just depending on that therapist to do it for you? No, we participate in our own deliverance. We participate in our own deliverance. No one can deliver us. We have to do that. And as we do that. We get wisdom and those make the best therapist. Unfortunately, those are few and far between, but that's it. So you can go to a therapist and they, you might say something that's so wise and they look at you and they're like, I don't know what to do with that. And they're going to try to save face by saying what about this? And they're going to use one of their, methodologies, but it's really about them saving face. It's not about them understanding and learning from you. And as a therapist, I, you have to have a humble posture and you have to be like, let me learn from you. Tell me more. Why do you, when do you think that began? Why, what do you think prompted that? You have to just be a learner and have that disposition. So I would say those two things make for the best therapist. Yeah.

Michael: It's funny. The therapist who helped me the most. Was the guy whose own mother had cut his throat. And I sat across from this guy and it was so life changing for me because there's no way that man could sit there in front of me, having not walked down the path of hell. And that's what, that's betrayal at the highest level. The mutilation from your own parent, the same thing that I experience. And I think that when I see the clients that come in to work with me through coaching, while we do two very different things that are, they're apropos to each other, they're parallel. And I think per, in my personal experience, I think you need both. I really do think there's a tremendous amount of benefit in having, this coaching side and this therapy side. And as I sat with him, one of the things that felt and rang so true was honesty. Because what it was and what I experienced experience was he's not trying to relate to me air quotes. He relates to me. And that's the thing that I felt was missing. And it's not that I ever felt like some of the people that I attempted this healing journey with and therapy didn't have my best interest in mind. It's just, how do you, I'll never forget this. I went to a therapist five years ago. Because my guy and we had moved on and we had done our work together and I don't want to be in the same place forever. I felt like I was spinning my wheels, but something happened in my life and I was like, actually, you know what? I need to deal with this. I wonder if someone else can give me a perspective that he did that. And I go to this guy's office, we have our first session and it's more of this intake general formality thing or talking. And at the end of it, and I, this is my God's honest truth. He says this to me, he goes, I don't think I can help you, but I'm willing to give you a try. And it was like, I'm good. No, thanks. And I think one of the things that people have to actually leverage is the willingness to ask the potential person they're sitting across real questions about their life experience. And I feel like there is such an easy access to therapy and mental health wisdom that there's no way you're getting served at the highest level. ​and I'm wondering if you feel that to be true in consideration that basically it's like, Hop on an app, pay 20 bucks, and I'm, by the way, Thank God it's there, because I know that's very beneficial, But are people getting served at the highest level when therapy has now become fast food?

Bronwyn: Yeah, that's a good point. I will say, I don't need to relate to what my clients have been through in that I went through the same or similar things, but if I am willing to sit and listen, I can identify with it. I can just, so a good therapist is just a good friend is just like a good parent who we empathy. It's when you, it's an act of the imagination. It's an imaginative exercise. Empathy is I haven't been through what you're describing, but I'm going to leave my body right now. I'm going to build this invisible bridge to you. I'm going to imagine that I am in your body going through what you went through at that age in that scenario that you're describing. And I'm going to allow myself to be vulnerable and feel what now I'm feeling in my body. So I can relate to you. I don't have to have lived through anything similar to in order to really relate to you. But if you don't know how to do that, it doesn't matter what you've been through, what you haven't been through. You're not going to be a good therapist. So, you have to really cultivate. That empathy. And that again, takes a humility. It takes a willingness to be vulnerable and feel things that maybe, are going to be hard to feel.

Michael: I think that's called being a human. And I think that, yeah, and I think that we can forget, even, in my own experience coaching thousands of people, even I have to bring myself back into that and being like, wait a second, even though we can sit in this analytical process and then carve the path and look at the roadblocks and the obstacles and here's the end goal in mind and all of the things, it's like there's still the human element to it where it's yeah, Let's relate. Let's connect. Let's talk deeply about truth and that hold the space where if you can expose shame and guilt and sit across from someone and talk about your anger and look up the way it's impacted your life and make a decision to take a different path. And sit there within the context of an environment that allows for it, which I don't care what social media says, you're not allowed to be a human outside of the realm of very fine, finely tuned containers, because generally speaking, it's frowned upon. Even in light of what we are being spoon fed online. And if you can do that and you can sit in these containers and have these difficult conversations, holy crap, will your life change? And so I want to say thank you for sitting in this container with me today. It's been really beautiful and wonderful conversation. I know that people are going to get a ton out of it. Where can people find you? Where can they learn more about you? Where they can, where can they connect with you if they want to walk down a path with you?

Bronwyn: So, my podcast is where I would channel everyone. So that is for people who will never be my clients directly, so they can do this for themselves. They can do these exercises, learn these things, apply it to themselves, and that is angry at the right things.

Michael: Do you guys have a website too, or your social media?

Bronwyn: Yeah. So I have a website. I'm on LinkedIn and Facebook and Instagram and YouTube. Yes.

Michael: Okay, great. So guys, go to thinkunbrokenpodcast.com. Look up Bronwyn's episode. We're going to put that link and more in the show notes. Make sure you check it out. My last question for you, my friend. What does it mean to you to be unbroken?

Bronwyn: Yeah. To be unbroken means to learn to be true to yourself, that life is too short to betray ourselves and to give up on betraying ourselves, learning to trust ourselves. And there was a time in my life where I thought that sounded really selfish, but now I look at it as, when a tree flourishes, it creates habitat for thousands of little people. Beneficial critters, insects, and birds when a tree flourishes, it creates shade and even fruit or humans. And so when we flourish, we actually make the whole world a better place. So we need to not see that as selfish, but trusting herself being true to ourself as benefiting the whole world.

Michael: I could not agree more. And as the old adage goes, Self-care is not selfish, so make sure that you take care of yourselves, take care of each other. Thank you for being here. Unbroken Nation, thank you for listening. If you found value in today's conversation, please subscribe. Follow us on YouTube. I'm @MichaelUnbroken on Instagram.

And Until Next Time,

My Friend, Be Unbroken.

I'll See Ya.