0:07

Hello and welcome to Being Well. I'm

0:09

Forrest Hansen. If you're new to the podcast,

0:11

thanks for joining us today. And if you've

0:13

listened before, welcome back. Over the

0:15

past decade, there's been a growing

0:17

movement of people reexamining their childhoods,

0:20

and particularly their relationship with their

0:22

parents. There's been an explosion of

0:24

content about inner -child healing, emotional

0:26

neglect, and generational trauma. We've certainly

0:28

contributed some to that. And a

0:30

greater willingness to ask what

0:32

are often very emotionally complicated questions.

0:35

What kind of inheritance did I receive

0:37

from my parents? How is it shaped who I

0:39

am today? And what patterns have I brought

0:41

into my adult relationships that I'd like to

0:44

change? The work of today's guest

0:46

has been a major influence on those conversations.

0:48

And I'm very excited to welcome Dr.

0:50

Lindsay Gibson back to the show. Dr.

0:52

Gibson is a clinical psychologist and the

0:55

author of the emotional immaturity series, including

0:57

her bestseller, Adult Children of Emotionally Immature

0:59

Parents. So Lindsay, thanks for joining me

1:01

again. How are you doing? Oh, I'm

1:03

doing great. It's wonderful to be back.

1:05

Thank you for having me. I'm so happy to.

1:07

I love talking with you last time. That conversation kind

1:09

of blew up. It's one of the bigger ones

1:11

that we've done, actually. And I've been really looking forward

1:13

to this one. So for the first part of

1:16

this, I'm not going to assume that people heard our

1:18

first conversation. We'll kind of set the stage a

1:20

little bit. And from there, we'll go into

1:22

some stuff that we didn't have the time to

1:24

cover last time. So I'd love to start with,

1:26

how do you define emotional immaturity? Like, what are

1:28

some of its key characteristics? One

1:30

of the things that that I really

1:32

stress is that emotional maturity

1:34

is just one line of

1:36

development. And we have

1:38

our intellectual development, we have our

1:40

social development, and people

1:42

can be very well

1:44

developed in those areas. They can

1:46

be very popular, they can

1:48

be very intelligent. But when

1:50

it comes to managing their

1:53

emotions and managing their

1:55

relationships or even being able

1:57

to relate to others

1:59

in a connected way, That's where

2:01

the emotional immaturity part comes

2:03

in. I would say

2:05

that the hallmark characteristic

2:07

would be egocentrism, self

2:10

-centeredness. The emotionally

2:12

immature person tends to

2:14

interpret everything through the

2:16

lens of what it means for

2:18

them. All roads lead

2:20

to me. So

2:23

anything that happens is interpreted in

2:25

terms of how it's affecting

2:27

me. Just like a little

2:29

three or four year old not not dissimilar

2:31

to a young cat If you have

2:33

children, you know what this is

2:35

like And it has to

2:37

be that way for little kids,

2:39

you know But there's something

2:41

in emotionally immature people that has

2:43

not progressed to the point

2:46

where they can have

2:48

full empathy for other

2:50

people or even imagine

2:52

what that other person's viewpoint

2:55

is like. They're not able

2:57

to really stand in their

2:59

shoes and look at life

3:01

from their perspective. They

3:04

have low empathy. It's not

3:06

that they don't have any empathy.

3:08

I mean, I'm not calling them

3:10

psychopaths. Sure. This is not necessarily

3:12

an anti -social thing. Yeah. Yeah. Even

3:14

anti -social personality disorder,

3:17

they have empathy that they use

3:19

maybe in a self -serving way.

3:21

Yeah, deliberately. But

3:23

lots of times people think,

3:26

well, because my parent, my

3:28

boyfriend, my wife showed empathy

3:30

when I was going through a

3:32

hard time, they couldn't be emotionally immature.

3:35

But it's not that

3:37

they don't have any. It's that

3:39

it's very low and it's

3:41

compromised by that, that

3:44

boomerang effect of everything very quickly

3:46

comes back to being about

3:48

them. The way I

3:50

think about emotional immaturity is

3:53

on a continuum that a

3:55

person is not 100 %

3:57

emotionally immature or 100 %

3:59

mature. For instance, you

4:01

can have a person

4:03

who is basically pretty emotionally

4:06

mature or sufficiently emotionally

4:08

mature, but if they're sick

4:10

or if they're fatigued

4:12

or if they're stressed, You

4:15

can have people sort of

4:17

slide across the continuum toward

4:19

the more immature kinds of

4:21

behaviors and reactions just because

4:24

that's what happens to us

4:26

when our consciousness is altered

4:28

by some kind of bodily

4:30

state that drains our

4:32

resources and conversely the

4:34

more emotionally immature person

4:37

if they are feeling

4:39

good and there's something

4:41

that they really want

4:43

they are. likewise capable

4:45

of moving in the

4:47

other direction toward looking

4:49

more mature because they

4:51

stretch. So you

4:53

can't necessarily take a piece

4:55

of behavior and extrapolate from

4:57

that that, oh, this person must

5:00

be really emotionally immature because they

5:02

lost their temper or they must

5:04

be very mature because they showed

5:06

empathy for me. It's not like

5:08

that. You have to see a

5:10

person's behavior over time

5:12

to Kind of get a

5:15

fix on where they hang

5:17

out. Another thing I wanted

5:19

to mention is that the emotionally immature

5:21

person reality is really

5:23

pretty optional. Meaning that

5:26

if I'm

5:28

an emotionally immature person, I'm

5:30

going to interpret life through the

5:32

lens of how it makes me feel. So

5:35

if you say to me and

5:37

I'm an emotionally immature parent mom, I

5:39

don't want you stopping by without

5:42

calling first. Okay, to

5:44

me, that feels like I've been

5:46

slapped. That feels like I'm not

5:48

loved. And so I might say something like,

5:50

oh, well, I must just be the worst

5:52

mother ever if I can't stop by to

5:54

see my own daughter. Yeah. Okay,

5:56

which makes you crazy because that's not

5:58

at all what you said and that's not

6:00

at all what you meant. But

6:03

because of the egocentrism and because

6:05

of that, that emotional way

6:07

of interpreting reality, What

6:10

I feel is what I know to

6:12

be true. And then lastly,

6:14

I would just mention that one

6:16

of the biggest problems with emotional immaturity

6:18

is the difficulty that they have

6:20

in reflecting on their own behavior. So

6:24

everything tends to be

6:26

somebody else's fault. They

6:29

externalize blame. They

6:31

have a million ways of

6:33

coming up with reasons why

6:35

something was due to something

6:38

else other than their own

6:40

behavior, which makes it really

6:42

hard for them to change. And

6:44

that can be a problem in relationships. Yeah.

6:47

And also, one of the things I

6:49

really remember from our first conversation that

6:51

stuck with me is the feeling of

6:53

inconsistency associated this. Oh, yes. Thank you.

6:55

There's a lot of research. that

6:58

for kids, one of the toughest things

7:00

to be subjected to is inconsistent parenting. Sometimes

7:03

your parent is emotional and attuned

7:05

and really present for you. And

7:08

sometimes they are just absolutely not. And

7:10

it's kind of that combination of variable

7:12

empathy. And then the effective

7:14

realism that you were talking about, if I

7:16

feel a certain way, it must be

7:18

true, creates this environment where you just kind

7:20

of feel like you're standing on unsteady

7:22

ground all the time. And I just really

7:24

remember that piece of it. Yeah, thank

7:26

you for reminding me of that. That is

7:29

a really good description of the experience

7:31

of the child. So for

7:33

somebody who is trying to figure out

7:35

for themselves, they're going through this process that

7:37

I was talking about in the intro

7:39

of creating a coherent narrative

7:41

or revisiting their childhood experiences.

7:44

How do you think that a person can tell, okay,

7:47

I had parents who had

7:49

some emotional maturity issues

7:51

versus my parents were really

7:53

okay, they were imperfect as all

7:55

people are, but they were fundamentally

7:57

okay. It was just that the

7:59

environment was kind of crazy and chaotic or whatever

8:01

else was going on. What are some of

8:03

the things that you could really point to and

8:05

say, hey, if this is present or not

8:08

present, that's a really good indicator? Yeah,

8:10

that's a really great question because

8:12

let's say those parents are so

8:14

preoccupied with getting a meal on

8:16

the table or finding a home

8:18

in. There's just a lot going

8:21

on in the field. There

8:23

are many reasons why parents could be

8:26

inconsistent or in a bad mood or

8:28

stressed out. All of

8:30

that can have a

8:32

lot of basis in environmental

8:34

circumstances. But let's look

8:36

at the things that a

8:39

person could think about

8:41

in terms of that parent's

8:43

actual emotional maturity level. If

8:46

the parent had half a chance, do

8:48

they have the potential? Are

8:50

they emotionally mature enough? to

8:53

form a good connection

8:55

with the child and make

8:57

the child feel emotionally

8:59

secure. Maybe there's financial

9:01

insecurity, food insecurity, whatever.

9:04

But does the child feel that

9:06

they've got a good connection with their

9:09

parent? And that's going to depend

9:11

on that egocentrism part. Is

9:13

the parent able to take the

9:15

point of view of the child? And

9:18

focus on that. long

9:20

enough to show real interest

9:23

in the child. The

9:25

second thing that I

9:27

think would be a very

9:29

important marker would be,

9:31

is the parent willing to

9:33

reflect on their behavior

9:35

and their impact on that

9:37

child's emotions and maybe

9:39

come back and apologize to

9:41

the child or ask

9:44

the child some more questions.

9:46

Let the child know that they're

9:48

sorry that they were so

9:50

tired. They couldn't talk last

9:53

night or you know, apologize for

9:55

yelling at them. These are

9:57

classic modalities of relationship repair. Okay,

10:00

so it's not that

10:02

you never do anything wrong

10:04

if you're adequately emotionally

10:06

mature. It's that you

10:08

have enough feeling for other

10:10

people and enough objectivity. that

10:14

you can go back in

10:16

and try to make things

10:18

better. And children are so

10:20

insightful about when a parent's

10:22

heart is in the right

10:24

place and when it matters

10:26

to the parent how that

10:28

child feel. The

10:30

denial and minimization parts of it,

10:32

I think, are great things to

10:34

point to. I think another thing that I've

10:36

heard you say, somewhere else. I forget

10:39

what I was watching at the time. But you

10:41

said something about if the parent is willing

10:43

to say, hey, tell me more about that. That's

10:45

an incredible indicator kind of right

10:48

there. If you're just interested in the

10:50

experience as a baseline of your

10:52

kid's experience separate from your own as

10:54

their own individual being. Really

10:57

good indicator right there. Yeah, it

10:59

really is because it's a capacity. It's

11:01

a capacity. And if you

11:03

don't have it, you won't say things like that. How

11:06

aware do you think kids are

11:08

in the moment, like the experience

11:10

of a seven -year -old, a 12

11:12

-year -old, that their parent desert doesn't

11:14

have that kind of a capacity?

11:17

I think they probably notice

11:19

it instantly. You

11:21

know, little children up until, you

11:24

know, maybe they really get

11:26

going in school six or seven,

11:28

they are mostly in their

11:30

right brains. The part

11:32

that processes all the

11:34

non -verbal kind of

11:36

non -logical ways of of

11:38

perceiving and thinking about

11:40

the world. So they

11:42

hang out in the

11:45

very parts of the

11:47

brain that people have

11:49

to decipher other people's

11:51

intentions through facial expression,

11:53

tonality, body posture.

11:56

That's where children are in

11:58

early life. And they you

12:00

know we've all been surprised

12:02

i think by a child

12:04

who out of the blue

12:06

says something that is so

12:08

true and so observant. You

12:10

know something that maybe an

12:13

adult would never say or

12:15

never make an observation about

12:17

and you just sort of

12:19

stun that you know they

12:21

are that deeply insightful about

12:23

what just happened. But i

12:25

think kids are i think they notice

12:27

it when there's any. you know, like

12:29

they talk in Star Wars about the

12:31

disturbance in the force, right? So,

12:34

if there's a disturbance in the connection, we

12:37

all feel it. But if we

12:40

as adults feel it like that,

12:42

you know, imagine how much more

12:44

intense that is for a

12:46

child who is completely dependent on

12:48

that parent's interest for survival. What

12:51

are some of the consequences

12:53

of this for somebody? What comes

12:55

out of those early experiences

12:57

of not having somebody who is

13:00

so emotionally available or interested

13:02

or empathic or connected, any of

13:04

the things that we've talked

13:06

about so far? The first

13:08

one that comes to my mind is

13:10

emotional loneliness. When I

13:12

was writing the book, this is

13:15

a common writing problem for anybody

13:17

who does this. It's like, how

13:19

do I start this thing? What

13:21

do I begin with? What's the...

13:23

Oh, I've lived that life, Lucy.

13:25

I got to tell you. So

13:28

many pieces where I'm like, I know

13:30

what I want to write about, but I

13:32

have no idea where to start. I

13:34

know. And everything you try to write sounds

13:36

so artificial. The first five

13:38

pages are the worst, absolutely. Exactly.

13:41

So you just get rid of those

13:43

and start down the road when

13:45

it catches your interest. That's

13:47

where I got to in that

13:50

first chapter in adult children of emotionally

13:52

mature parents. It was about emotional

13:54

loneliness because I thought, okay,

13:56

what's the thing that everybody will

13:58

resonate with when they pick

14:00

up this book? How do

14:02

I speak to them about a

14:04

real experience that they're having as a

14:07

result of this? So emotional

14:09

loneliness means that you're having

14:11

trouble having a feeling

14:13

of being seen, being

14:15

connected with. and being

14:18

secure in the attention

14:20

of your parent or the

14:22

loved one. Children need

14:24

to feel that somebody's got

14:26

their eye on them.

14:28

Somebody's watching out for them.

14:31

We don't think about that a

14:33

lot, but if you think back

14:35

in your own childhood, at least

14:37

I know I can certainly do

14:39

this and other people have told

14:41

me this as well, You can

14:43

think of times when you felt

14:46

very concerned because you didn't feel

14:48

like somebody was watching out for

14:50

you, or you felt like you

14:52

were in a situation where there

14:54

wasn't adequate attention being paid to

14:56

you. And it's a very distinct

14:58

feeling of loneliness and of not

15:01

being seen. And of

15:03

course, if we think back to

15:05

early survival, the human species, you

15:07

know, what happens to a

15:09

little person who's not being watched

15:11

over by their parent or

15:13

not very connected to an adult?

15:15

You know, it's a bad

15:17

thing. So they really

15:20

feel it. So that emotional loneliness

15:22

would be one of the biggest

15:24

things. Yeah, I also

15:26

think that the piece of this

15:28

that's about conforming to the

15:30

parental expectations or the parental view,

15:33

a lot of people who come

15:35

from dysfunctional family systems. are

15:37

really good at figuring out how

15:39

to bid for what they

15:41

need from the people who are

15:43

around them, particularly this more

15:45

emotionally immature parent, where the

15:47

child learns how to

15:49

approach the parent at the

15:51

right time, the right

15:53

body posture, the right tone of voice in

15:55

order to get what they need, which is that

15:58

more nurturing response. And you write about this

16:00

really beautifully when you talk about the construction of

16:02

a role -self. And I just remember reading that

16:04

part of it and having it really, really

16:06

land and how I thought about this. Yeah,

16:09

the role self is

16:11

absolutely essential for the child's

16:13

emotional well -being. When you're

16:15

a little kid, you

16:17

need to know what is

16:19

the way into your

16:21

parent's validation, into your parent's

16:24

attention, and into making

16:26

the parent turn their energy

16:28

toward you in an

16:30

interested way. job

16:32

number one. So, yeah,

16:35

it's very important to that

16:37

child that they keep themselves

16:39

interesting to the parent. Also,

16:42

you know, for emotionally immature

16:44

parents, they have to

16:46

be kind of emotionally nurtured

16:48

and held by the child's

16:50

attention, which sounds really upside

16:52

down and it is. But

16:54

that's because of the level

16:57

that they're operating on in

16:59

terms of their own emotional

17:01

needs, which probably been unmet. And

17:04

so the parent expects the child,

17:06

like they expect everybody, to

17:08

help them manage their

17:10

emotions, soothe them,

17:12

make them feel better, and

17:14

also buff up their self -esteem,

17:17

you know, make them feel like

17:19

they're important, make them feel like

17:22

they're okay. And that

17:24

insistence on the parents part

17:26

of being kind of

17:28

taken care of is what

17:30

I call the emotionally

17:32

immature relationship system that you

17:34

are responsible for my

17:37

emotional regulation and you're responsible

17:39

for me feeling good

17:41

about myself. So if you're

17:43

a child, you

17:45

know that you have a very big job to

17:47

do and that it's not going to go well

17:49

for you or anybody in the rest of the

17:51

family. If you decide just

17:53

to be yourself and do whatever

17:56

it is that you feel like

17:58

doing in the moment, because the

18:00

repercussions are going to be so

18:02

severe if you have a parent

18:04

that depends on the child for

18:06

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Now, back to the show. So

20:43

now you have somebody who is listening

20:45

to us talk about this. They're taking

20:47

a look back through history and they're

20:49

going, yellow flag, yellow

20:51

flag, red flag, yellow flag. And they're

20:53

thinking for themselves about some of the

20:55

behavioral patterns that they might have had

20:57

that might come out of this. And

20:59

you can think of different things that

21:01

could make sense. Somebody who has more

21:03

of a people pleasing tendency could possibly

21:05

come out of this. You talk

21:07

about internalizers and externalizers as part of

21:09

your work, people who tend to look

21:11

to themselves to solve all of their

21:13

problems versus people who tend to become

21:16

more dependent on the problem -solving of

21:18

other people. So somebody's looking at all

21:20

of this and they're going, yeah, okay, sounds about right

21:22

for me. Is there a kind

21:24

of process that you've seen people go

21:26

through in your work with them

21:28

where they start to find and reclaim

21:30

more of an authentic sense of

21:32

who they are? And How does

21:34

that work for somebody? What's the normal

21:36

arc to that work? Such

21:39

a good question because it's

21:41

such a beautiful process in therapy.

21:43

It can be an arduous

21:46

process for the therapist anyway because

21:48

the therapist is asking, how

21:50

did you feel about that? What

21:52

was that like for you?

21:54

What was going on for you

21:56

and your body? What do

21:58

you feel that in your body? And

22:00

the client is saying, I don't know. I

22:02

feel it in my head, I guess. Or

22:06

they'll tell you what they think

22:08

instead of what they feel. They're really,

22:10

by the time they come to your office,

22:13

lots of times these adult children

22:15

have been trained to be

22:18

so out of touch with their

22:20

own feelings. And

22:22

the way that things are affecting

22:24

them in order to provide

22:26

this support to the parent, they

22:28

really kind of don't know

22:30

what you're talking about. And

22:32

they really do hear when you say,

22:35

how did that make you feel? They

22:37

say, well, I thought that, or

22:39

it made me start thinking that

22:41

it's like, well, wait a minute,

22:43

let's go back to how you

22:45

felt. And lots of

22:47

times you get a deer in the

22:50

headlight look. Yeah. One

22:52

of the most common questions that we

22:54

get on the podcast is we'll say

22:56

something like, Okay, a great tool here

22:58

is to, you know, connect with your

23:00

values or some act stuff, for example,

23:02

like you connect your values, you let

23:04

your actions flow from what your values

23:06

are, from your sense of what the

23:08

authentic self is inside. And one of

23:10

the most common questions we get is

23:12

like, but I look inside and I

23:14

have a tough time seeing anything. Like,

23:17

what do you mean by authentic self?

23:19

Absolutely, because the self is built and

23:21

comes online and is supported by your

23:23

interpersonal relationships. Okay, so if

23:25

you have a very

23:27

self -absorbed, self -preoccupied parent who

23:29

doesn't really have a

23:31

lot of interest in the

23:33

internal world of that

23:35

child, their world of feelings

23:37

or even reactions, then

23:40

you're going to have

23:42

difficulty getting to know yourself,

23:44

especially your emotions, especially

23:46

your emotional self, because you

23:48

have to learn about

23:50

emotions through somebody older and

23:52

wiser than you telling

23:54

you that this sensation that

23:57

you're having right this

23:59

second is called anger or

24:01

it's called love or

24:03

it's called impatience or, you

24:05

know, irritability, whatever it

24:07

is. We just feel, I

24:09

think somebody once said

24:11

there are like four sensations

24:13

that we feel and

24:16

the combination and intensity of

24:18

those physical sensations, we

24:20

put these labels on. like

24:22

they're real things, okay?

24:24

But they're not. just states

24:26

that we've identified and we teach

24:28

our children, hopefully, to be

24:30

able to identify them in themselves

24:33

so that if I ask

24:35

you, how did that make you

24:37

feel, they feel the sensations and

24:39

they say, oh, I was really angry. Now,

24:42

that really took me off

24:44

because they read the stomach clench,

24:46

they feel their jaw, they

24:48

feel the tension, they feel hot.

24:50

And they know that is

24:52

called anger. But when you

24:54

have a parent who can't

24:57

do that kind of mirroring

24:59

and certainly isn't interested in

25:01

doing the kind of intricate

25:03

parsing of the difference between

25:05

irritability and anger and rage,

25:08

say, then there's a

25:10

blank there. They really kind

25:12

of don't know what you're talking

25:14

about. Now, I don't mean

25:16

to make them sound like

25:18

robots because Plenty of

25:21

people have ongoing relationships

25:23

and do just fine without

25:25

being able to have

25:27

a real discussion about their

25:29

internal experience. We

25:31

might say that the American

25:34

culture is kind of geared

25:36

that way because everything is

25:38

is emphasized for the externals.

25:40

You know like the excitement

25:42

or the thing that you

25:44

do or the activity or

25:46

how you look very external

25:48

world we live in so.

25:50

When a person begins that

25:53

process of reconnecting with their

25:55

feelings and their intuitions, they

25:57

often feel very awkward. I've

25:59

asked people, you know, well,

26:01

can you give me an image

26:03

of what you felt like? Like,

26:05

is there a metaphor that you

26:08

could help me understand your experience?

26:10

And they say, I don't do that imagery

26:12

stuff. I'm no good at it. I've

26:14

tried it. I'm no good at it. It's

26:16

like, yes, you are because you have

26:19

a right hemisphere like I do. If

26:21

there's no way that you're not an

26:23

image maker because you dream every night,

26:26

you know, and you think about the

26:28

future in terms of images, no

26:30

way that you don't have that.

26:32

But they say they don't have it

26:34

because they mean they don't use

26:36

it. And they've been discouraged from using

26:38

it because it makes them more

26:40

individual. It makes them

26:42

harder to manage as

26:44

a child. And so they've

26:46

learned to tune their

26:48

own self out and our

26:50

job as therapists is

26:52

to help them come back

26:54

in and discover what's

26:56

really going on inside them.

26:58

It's such a beautiful

27:00

thing for us to have

27:03

people grow and be

27:05

able to communicate vividly in

27:07

imagery so that I

27:09

and other people. can catch

27:11

their feeling and know

27:13

what is going on inside

27:15

them. And the release

27:17

of energy and spontaneity that

27:19

that brings just opens you

27:21

up for better and better

27:23

relationships because you allow yourself

27:25

to be known really by

27:27

the other person. There

27:29

are so many ways that I could take

27:31

this here and I have so much curiosity.

27:33

There's like so much I want to ask

27:35

you about it. I think maybe a place

27:38

to start here would be trying to get

27:40

kind of pragmatic about this and to give

27:42

you sort of a practical example. So let's

27:44

think about this like a real person. This

27:46

is a real person who

27:48

has a hard time opening up

27:50

and accessing particularly some of

27:52

these more intense emotional experiences that

27:54

you're describing. Probably particularly intense

27:56

feelings of anger and frustration on

27:58

the one hand. and intense

28:00

feelings of sadness and vulnerability on

28:02

the other hand. Those are

28:04

often the two poles that are

28:07

kind of like shunted off

28:09

for a person. They

28:11

tend to take a lot of responsibility

28:13

and kind of blame themselves for

28:15

what happens. Maybe in some ways having

28:17

internalized that from their parent, they're

28:19

probably pretty sensitive and pretty perceptive

28:21

about what's going on in other

28:23

people. But for whatever reason, that

28:25

function like looking at themselves is sort

28:27

of shut down a little bit. Maybe

28:29

they don't have like the same granularity.

28:31

They've been really monitoring the external figure

28:34

for a long time, but they haven't

28:36

necessarily learned how to monitor their own

28:38

internal world. That's beautifully put. Oh, thank

28:40

you. And so this person walks into

28:42

your office. You're working through a

28:44

process with them. Where do you start? Where do you

28:46

want to go? Well, you know, they've

28:48

come into the office for a reason. Yeah.

28:50

And 99 .9 % of the

28:52

time it's got some emotion associated

28:54

with it. I mean, we

28:56

don't come to a therapist's office

28:58

until we're still were bothered

29:00

by something so that's you know

29:02

a very logical and easy

29:05

place to start is start talking

29:07

about what the problem is

29:09

or what's been going on and

29:11

then ask questions about how

29:13

that felt or what was the

29:15

hardest part about that or

29:17

what is the thing that they

29:19

would do differently if they

29:21

could go back what do they

29:23

wish that the other person

29:25

would have done differently. What

29:28

do they want most from the relationship?

29:30

I mean, we start to ask these

29:32

questions that have to be answered from

29:34

the inner world. And that

29:36

begins to turn the person. It's

29:38

almost like you have a person

29:40

facing one way and you're taking

29:42

them by the shoulders and sort

29:44

of turning them to look another

29:46

way. And they're sort of saying,

29:48

well, there's nothing over there. So

29:51

we don't have to worry about that because there's nothing over

29:53

there. I just need to know what to do. Like

29:55

you won't know what to

29:57

do until you know what you

30:00

feel and you have that

30:02

internal guidance that you can trust.

30:04

So we're trying to

30:06

introduce them to the

30:08

idea that their inner

30:10

world is precious. It

30:13

is trying to

30:15

guide them toward an

30:17

emotionally fuller and

30:19

more satisfying life. and

30:22

that this is an awkward period

30:24

in skill building. If you haven't

30:26

done this before, it feels unnecessary,

30:28

it feels uncomfortable, and it isn't

30:30

immediately apparent what good this is

30:32

going to do for me to

30:34

be in touch with my feelings.

30:37

I do think that's one of the things that

30:39

kind of comes up for people is like, well,

30:41

why would I want to feel that? Yeah, exactly.

30:43

anger doesn't feel good, that sadness doesn't feel good,

30:45

that frustration doesn't feel good. I'm pretty well managed

30:47

right now. What's kind of

30:49

the upside for me

30:52

here? Yeah, the upside is

30:54

reconnection with yourself and

30:56

knowing yourself. Self -knowledge is

30:58

one of the first things

31:00

that gets undermined by

31:02

an emotionally immature relationship system.

31:05

The other person will actively

31:07

tell you in so many

31:09

words, it's not worth spending

31:12

any time on understanding how

31:14

you feel or what you

31:16

want or why. That's just

31:18

so much noise in the machine.

31:20

We ought to be doing something. We

31:22

ought to be deciding something. We

31:24

ought to be moving toward. We ought

31:26

to be getting. And

31:29

they convinced some of their

31:31

relationship partners and children that

31:33

it's not worthwhile to try

31:35

to go inside and understand

31:37

how it is that we

31:40

feel. What I try to

31:42

bring home to people is

31:44

that if you don't know

31:46

yourself, especially your emotional

31:48

self and what your emotional

31:50

needs are, you will

31:53

have trouble with self -confidence, you'll

31:55

have trouble with decision -making, and

31:57

you're probably going to have trouble

31:59

with having a of belonging, because

32:01

they seem unrelated on

32:03

the surface, but self -knowledge

32:06

and self -awareness underlies those

32:08

three things in a

32:10

very big way. And

32:12

once a person you

32:15

know, gets a taste of

32:17

how that self -knowledge leads to

32:19

a sense of security and confidence

32:21

and a feeling of finding

32:23

the people that they belong with,

32:25

then it all makes sense

32:28

to them. But it doesn't at

32:30

first. Do you think that

32:32

if somebody hasn't necessarily done that work

32:34

up to a point for whatever reason, most

32:36

of which are totally understandable, including that

32:38

it's hard, it's long? be a real pain

32:40

in the ass in a bunch of

32:42

different ways. Do you think that

32:44

they're more prone to landing in

32:46

adult relationships with people who tend

32:48

to be a little bit more

32:51

emotionally immature? I think so,

32:53

yeah. There are a

32:55

couple of other things too. It's

32:57

that people who are emotionally

32:59

immature have a lot of qualities

33:01

that the adult child of

33:03

these kinds of parents is attracted

33:05

to. It's sort of like

33:07

catnip to them. I hear you've

33:09

got somebody who seems to

33:11

know themselves very well, knows exactly

33:13

what they want, has no

33:15

problem with decision making, knows

33:18

that they're right about everything,

33:20

blows off considerations and worries

33:22

that a lot of people

33:24

have, apparently,

33:27

live life with zest, which

33:29

is another way of

33:31

saying sometimes being impulsive

33:33

and ill -considered. That's

33:36

really attractive to somebody who has

33:38

had to live their life, you

33:40

know, very carefully through a role

33:43

-self. It's a breath of fresh

33:45

air. The other thing

33:47

that appeals to them

33:49

is that the emotionally

33:51

immature person, the potential

33:53

partner, oftentimes will go

33:55

through a period of

33:57

latching on in a

33:59

very intense way. Oftentimes,

34:02

maybe a little too quickly, maybe

34:04

a little too intensely. that

34:06

might be a red flag to

34:08

somebody who didn't have some

34:10

of these vulnerabilities but to the

34:12

adult child of the emotionally

34:15

mature person it's like this is

34:17

what i've been looking for

34:19

all my life you know somebody

34:21

that's interested in me somebody

34:23

that wants to get very close

34:25

to me and of course

34:27

people who have strong narcissistic qualities

34:29

will move in with that

34:32

love bombing thing or that idealization.

34:34

The adult child this feels like

34:36

a repair to their soul

34:39

to get that kind of attention

34:41

from somebody makes them very

34:43

vulnerable to that and because a

34:45

lot of the internalizing adult

34:47

children are overly ready to. Over

34:49

identify with the other person's

34:52

point of view and also to

34:54

take the blame for things

34:56

because they like to take stuff

34:58

in and process it and

35:00

you know wonder about whether or

35:02

not they did something and.

35:05

That is like a perfect set

35:07

for the externalizing emotionally immature

35:09

person because they're happy to tell

35:11

them what they did wrong

35:13

and how they're lacking by not

35:16

making their life better. So

35:18

it's unfortunately, yes,

35:21

it really does sort

35:23

of create these

35:25

fast apparent connections between

35:27

people that over

35:30

time. really become

35:32

very, very difficult. Yeah.

35:35

Is this something where just being

35:37

aware of it is enough? Or

35:39

does somebody need to do more

35:41

of a process around it to

35:43

not get so sucked into those

35:45

relationships? Yeah. Well, I mean,

35:47

it depends on a lot of things.

35:49

I mean, think of the things that make

35:51

people attractive as partners in our culture. Now,

35:54

a lot of those things such as

35:56

appearance, income, social

35:58

skills, These are things

36:00

that people can become very

36:02

highly developed in. We're

36:05

attracted to certain things and

36:07

we will continue as long as

36:09

the human race exists, probably

36:11

to be attracted to those things.

36:13

It's just that it's the

36:15

best argument for dating a long

36:18

time that I've ever thought

36:20

of, which is that person may

36:22

be stretching and you won't

36:24

know that until two things happen.

36:26

One is you've been through

36:29

a stressful time with them, you've

36:31

seen how they react to

36:33

real stress, really not getting what

36:35

they want or really being

36:37

up against a big problem. That's

36:40

one thing. And the other

36:42

one is you won't know what

36:44

they're really like in the

36:46

realm of emotional intimacy until you've

36:48

been together long enough to

36:50

see if they can be available

36:53

to you in your emotional

36:55

need. because

36:57

all of us are so well -fed

36:59

in the early part of a relationship

37:01

just from the thrill of being with

37:03

this new person. Including just

37:05

in terms of neurotransmitter function, serotonin,

37:09

dopamine, it's all going crazy.

37:11

Absolutely. Yeah, sure. Our tanks are

37:13

full. So it's

37:15

only after time has depleted

37:17

some of that that you

37:19

begin to see the underlying

37:21

function. So that's why

37:23

I think it's it's not

37:25

just you're trying to gather information

37:27

about somebody over time. Because

37:29

I think you can actually gather

37:32

a lot of information about

37:34

people in a short amount of

37:36

time if you know what

37:38

you're looking for. But it's that

37:40

you want to live through

37:42

enough experiences with the person that

37:44

you found that your initial

37:46

hypothesis. This is reminding

37:48

me a little bit of some of

37:50

what we talked about last time when

37:52

we talked about healing fantasies. And letting

37:55

go of the feeling that

37:57

a person can have where

37:59

if they were just able

38:01

to find the right person,

38:03

if they were just able

38:05

to be a little bit

38:07

different inside of themselves, they

38:10

would be able to finally get the experience

38:12

that they're really longing for, which I think

38:14

for many people who come from these kinds

38:16

of backgrounds, is that feeling

38:19

to use an imperfect word, they're like slightly more

38:21

narcissistic partnered, love bombing and so on. They're

38:23

giving you kind of a facsimile of the experience

38:25

that you're really longing for inside. So

38:28

there's a part of you that's kind of

38:30

very vulnerable to receiving what feels like all

38:32

of that authentic interest and love because you've

38:34

got this dream inside of you of getting

38:36

there and you write a lot about releasing

38:38

that healing fantasy. Yes. I

38:40

mean, the healing fantasy is

38:42

the basis of hope for

38:45

children with emotionally immature parents.

38:47

or any kind of parent

38:49

that is really not able

38:51

to give that child what

38:53

they need. So

38:55

without that hope, the child,

38:58

I think it would affect

39:00

their development. It would

39:02

affect their willingness to keep

39:04

engaging in the world. And

39:06

that's when you get the

39:08

really tragic circumstance of childhood

39:10

depression, which used to be

39:13

practically unheard of. And

39:15

now we're beginning to see it younger

39:17

and younger. but it is

39:19

a feeling that the

39:21

person has to feel like

39:23

they are worth the

39:25

love and the interest of

39:28

that other person. And

39:30

if you can't get it for real

39:32

or you can't get it easily, if

39:34

you have a fantasy that one

39:36

day you will get it or remember

39:39

that time last year at the

39:41

beach when you got it, that's all

39:43

you need is just a little

39:45

glimmer of hope to keep that Alive

39:47

to keep that good spirit alive

39:49

and not get depressed. What

39:51

do you think helps people let go of

39:53

that over time? Well, it's

39:56

like that old behavioral thing about

39:58

intermittent reinforcement. Meaning that

40:00

if you get rewarded

40:02

every once in a while

40:04

with no predictable pattern,

40:06

that forms some of the

40:08

most powerful links between

40:10

behaviors, between stimulus and response

40:12

of anything. Yeah, we're

40:14

back to that inconsistency. Yeah.

40:16

Yes. So the inconsistency and

40:18

the fact that sometimes I

40:20

get some empathy, sometimes I

40:22

see a warm look in

40:25

my mother's eyes, that

40:27

proves that it's there, that

40:29

there's the hope of it

40:31

there. And if there's a

40:33

little bit of it there, there's a

40:35

spark, we could feed it

40:37

and it could become a warming fire.

40:40

The problem is that because

40:42

of their defensiveness, and

40:44

by that I mean real

40:46

psychological defensiveness, meaning that that

40:48

parent won't open up to

40:51

engage deeply enough at an

40:53

emotional level because they can't.

40:55

It's too scary to them.

40:58

And so the child learns that

41:00

once in a while I

41:02

can get them to connect with

41:04

me and I'm going to

41:06

keep trying. And even, you

41:08

know, when the parent doesn't respond for

41:10

a long time, if they just

41:12

give them a kind look or pat

41:14

them on the back, I mean,

41:16

that's all you need to start it

41:18

up all over again. Totally. Yeah.

41:21

So with healing fantasies, I tend to

41:23

be very understanding of them. I'm

41:25

not pressing the person to get rid

41:27

of that, you know, because if

41:29

they get rid of the healing fantasy,

41:31

they'll do okay. All I want

41:33

to do is I want to help

41:35

them get in touch with their

41:37

feelings. That's all you

41:39

got to do because

41:42

if you feel it genuinely

41:44

enough when someone treats

41:46

you badly, that's really all

41:48

you need because it's

41:50

like training the person to

41:53

take in their own

41:55

signals and believe in them

41:57

and in a way

41:59

suffer them. That's

42:01

what over time tends

42:03

to diminish the healing fantasy

42:06

because that hopeful idea

42:08

or continuing investment that one

42:10

day they'll see me,

42:12

they'll listen to me, if

42:14

you start tuning into

42:16

what it feels like to

42:19

be not listened to,

42:21

not seen, not connected

42:23

with, over a little

42:25

bit of time, that

42:27

will become really noxious

42:29

to you. It won't

42:31

really matter as much about

42:33

the healing fantasy because you

42:35

will be impressed or affected

42:37

by the other person's behavior

42:39

in a way that will

42:41

make you step back a

42:43

bit and look at what's

42:45

really going on. Is

42:47

that maybe then one of the answers

42:50

to the question, when should

42:52

I take some distance from people?

42:54

When you need the space to

42:56

start to separate out from some

42:58

of those healing fantasies or more

43:00

to create enough room for you to

43:02

start exploring who you are separate from who

43:04

these other people are. That's a great

43:07

way to put it. That is a great

43:09

way to put it. I think a

43:11

lot of times that is what people need.

43:14

Anybody needs space

43:16

to process

43:18

something big. We

43:21

just can't be available

43:23

for everything that life

43:25

throws at us or

43:27

you know social things

43:29

or activities whatever when

43:31

we're processing something big.

43:34

So we just have to

43:36

keep in mind that that

43:38

processing is necessary and if

43:40

the other person is not

43:43

able to tolerate any change

43:45

in your behavior or they're

43:47

not. able to respect your

43:49

wishes for space or your

43:51

boundaries or whatever, then sometimes

43:54

people will decide that they

43:56

need to take a break

43:58

from contact with that person.

44:00

I'm not talking about full -on

44:02

estrangement here. I think it

44:05

gives the person the time

44:07

and the grace period to

44:09

check out how it feels

44:11

to be able to process

44:13

their own material without somebody

44:16

else telling them what they

44:18

ought to be thinking and

44:20

feeling. Yeah. Well, as

44:22

you are extremely aware, there has been

44:24

a huge conversation about estrangement and boundary

44:26

setting with parents and how much space

44:28

is the right amount of space and

44:30

all of that going on these days.

44:32

And I was really interested in talking

44:34

with you about that a little bit

44:37

more during this conversation because we didn't

44:39

really quite get to it last time.

44:41

Yeah. If you're just talking with a

44:43

friend or somebody you know, kind of

44:45

peripherally, and it comes up that you

44:47

have more distance from your family. A

44:49

message that you will often receive is

44:51

some version of, well, can you just

44:53

have more compassion for them? Because if

44:55

you had more compassion, you wouldn't need

44:57

to have such a strong boundary. It's

44:59

kind of the implicit communication in there.

45:01

Just appreciate that they were doing the

45:03

best that they could, see things from

45:05

their perspective. They really loved you,

45:08

even if they were kind of imperfect. I'm

45:10

sure that you have had clients come in

45:12

telling you about all these messages. And then

45:14

often, people say those things to themselves too.

45:17

I was just going to say. So

45:19

that message is landing on kind

45:21

of very vulnerable ground for people when

45:23

they hear it from the outside. For

45:26

starters, I'm just wondering what you think about

45:28

all of this, having been so in this territory.

45:31

And also, if you're talking to somebody who

45:33

came into the office and they're getting

45:35

that message from people, how do you have

45:37

a conversation about it? Yeah.

45:39

Well, again, I'm always going to bring it

45:41

back to how they're feeling. That's

45:44

like the original data that

45:46

we want to be processing. Yes,

45:49

other people think it's a good

45:51

idea for them to have more

45:53

and more compassion or to tell

45:55

a narrative to themselves about their

45:57

parents that aligns with the, you

45:59

know, sort of the societal ideal.

46:02

So, yes, we will hear those

46:05

kinds of things. But if

46:07

you bring it back to, yes,

46:09

but how did it feel

46:11

to you last night when you

46:13

were over there for dinner? and

46:16

this thing happened with your dad

46:18

or your mom, what was that

46:20

like for you? And

46:22

how do you feel now

46:24

about that? And what

46:26

do you want to do? And

46:29

the person oftentimes has, that's a

46:31

lot for them to process upfront.

46:34

And when I say, what would

46:36

you like to do? I'm not

46:38

hinting at, wouldn't you like to

46:40

estrange yourself from your parent? I

46:42

would never, never say that. for

46:46

many reasons, but among

46:48

them, because it's a

46:50

decision that that person

46:52

has to come to

46:54

and they will come

46:57

to it if they

46:59

have enough, I call

47:01

it like specific interpersonal

47:03

emotional injury from a

47:05

person. They experience enough

47:07

of that. They will

47:09

want some distance once they

47:12

start feeling their feelings because

47:14

it hurts. i'm not

47:16

interested in jumping the gun

47:18

to maybe you shouldn't see

47:20

so much of them because

47:22

then i would be directing

47:24

them according to what i

47:26

think my job is a

47:28

therapist is to get you

47:30

to know what you think

47:32

really and what you feel

47:35

so we explore that the

47:37

only time that i have

47:39

explicitly explored with clients whether

47:41

or not. the relationship is

47:43

good for them is when

47:45

they are actively showing emotional

47:47

or physical harm health reasons

47:49

as a result of the

47:51

stress of that relationship and

47:53

i've had just a handful

47:55

of people over the years

47:57

that i had one woman

47:59

she would come in my

48:02

office she would just go

48:04

like this like i can't

48:06

talk i can't can't deal

48:08

she would curl up on

48:10

my sofa in a little

48:12

ball. She couldn't even speak. She

48:15

was so overwhelmed with the

48:17

way that her father was

48:19

really commanding her life and

48:21

using up her energies and

48:23

his kind of insistence that

48:26

she make him the center

48:28

of her world. Now,

48:30

in situations like that, I'm

48:32

going to raise the question of

48:34

what do you think it's

48:36

doing to you? What's been your

48:39

experience in this relationship? Do

48:42

you think that you might

48:44

need to create a little bit

48:46

of space so that you

48:49

can get your health back or

48:51

you can, you know, refill

48:53

your energy reserves? But

48:55

the idea that therapists are

48:57

out there like encouraging people

48:59

to leave their parents or

49:02

estranged themselves from their parents,

49:05

I don't know if there are people out there

49:07

doing that or not. I haven't taken a poll. But

49:09

I do know that I

49:11

think a responsible therapist would be

49:13

trying to help that adult

49:15

come to a decision on their

49:17

own based on their own

49:19

experience. Check me on this,

49:21

Lindsay. It's just something I've been thinking about, and you're

49:24

just so much more in the weeds of this

49:26

than I am. But I've always found the sort of

49:28

argument, just have this

49:30

emotional experience that would be helpful. A

49:33

kind of silly argument. Like, of course,

49:35

if you could flip a switch, and

49:37

activate an authentic feeling of love or

49:39

compassion or anger and frustration as might

49:41

be appropriate and helpful for a person.

49:43

Like we were talking about earlier, if

49:45

you could flip a switch and feel

49:47

all the sadness, like, wow, yeah, that

49:49

would be really great. That would be

49:51

really helpful. But that's not how people

49:53

work. That's not how our brains are.

49:57

And trying to force compassion out

49:59

of a feeling of obligation,

50:01

I just don't think is how

50:03

it works bottom line. And

50:05

so that's the piece of it

50:07

that I've always kind of

50:09

raised my eyebrows at. As caring

50:11

people or people who are

50:14

interested in having relationships with other

50:16

people, compassion is, you know, like

50:19

primary. Yeah. I mean,

50:21

it's, where would we be it?

50:23

Love some compassion, totally. Yeah, really. So

50:25

there's no question about

50:28

that. But what happens

50:30

with emotionally immature people

50:32

is that they kind

50:34

of often commandeered that

50:36

issue of compassion and

50:39

take it over into

50:41

the realm of I'm

50:43

entitled to your compassion.

50:46

And you owe me

50:48

this certain attitude of

50:51

permissiveness toward my bad

50:53

behavior because this happened

50:55

to me as a child or

50:57

I've got this problem or I'm

50:59

too tired or whatever. I perform

51:01

these functions for you as a

51:03

parent. Oh, yes. Yes, definitely. So

51:06

that can be promoted

51:08

to create a sense

51:10

of moral obligation in

51:12

the adult child. That

51:15

somehow doing what that

51:17

emotionally immature parent wants

51:19

is somehow making you

51:21

a good person, that

51:23

selflessness. You know

51:25

putting others first is the

51:27

key to being a

51:30

lovable worthwhile person who's not

51:32

going to be abandoned

51:34

okay and that. Trade

51:36

off or that that

51:38

kind of setup is

51:40

something that makes people

51:42

really feel like there's

51:45

a moral component to

51:47

doing whatever that emotionally

51:49

immature person wants them

51:51

to do and so.

51:53

When compassion is demanded,

51:56

I think the person

51:58

needs to think about

52:00

whether or not they

52:03

want to be controlled

52:05

by that if it's

52:07

at their expense. You

52:09

know, the other thing, this is

52:11

kind of a different way to think

52:13

about it, emotionally immature people want

52:15

you to understand what their intention was,

52:17

not what the impact was. Oh,

52:20

yeah. Yeah, there's a total

52:22

intention impact thing here for sure.

52:24

Yeah, it's like, sorry, I

52:26

shot you. I didn't intend to.

52:29

But don't make such a big deal

52:31

out of it. Yeah, the whole

52:33

deal with intention is that it's great

52:36

to have good intentions. But

52:38

if you always had good intentions,

52:40

but the impacts are always bad, then

52:42

it actually doesn't matter what your

52:44

intentions were because having a good intention

52:46

is about correction. You know, if

52:48

we have a conversation, Lindsay and

52:50

you say to me, hey, Forrest, you messed this thing

52:52

up. You spoke to me in a way that I

52:55

didn't like. You didn't treat me kindly, whatever it is.

52:57

I could say to you, hey, I just want you

52:59

to know off the top, that's not what I meant

53:01

to do. And I can do that as a joining

53:03

act. I can say, wow, of course, it was my

53:05

intention to not harm you. So that way you know

53:07

my heart's in the right place or whatever it is.

53:10

But from there, the next

53:12

sentence is, and I'll change it in the

53:14

future. That's the next sentence. So

53:16

if the next sentence isn't there, then the

53:18

intention kind of stops mattering at a certain

53:20

point, right? I can't say

53:22

anything better than that. It does stop

53:24

mattering. It just feels like people

53:26

get trapped by that a lot. They

53:28

really do because in our logical

53:30

mind, we say, is there a

53:33

reason for compassion here? Yes. Okay,

53:35

therefore, I should forgive them for whatever

53:37

they do because they've got a

53:39

good reason for it. Did they intend

53:41

to hurt me? No, they're not

53:43

willfully trying to make my life miserable.

53:46

Okay. Therefore, I have to spend

53:48

a lot of time with them. I

53:50

mean, sometimes it's helpful

53:52

to, in a journal or

53:54

even just talking aloud

53:56

to yourself, lay out

53:58

some of these assumptions and listen

54:00

to them or read them

54:02

to give you some distance and

54:05

perspective on the kind of

54:07

logical, curly cues you're having to,

54:09

you know, get yourself into

54:11

to have this work. Yes, it's

54:13

good to have compassion. It's

54:15

good to think about other people's

54:17

intentions. But then what happened

54:19

after that? Yes. And just

54:22

to broaden this out, we're focusing

54:24

on the parent -child relationship here for

54:26

starters because it's a huge part

54:28

of your work. And it's also

54:30

a very common space where this

54:32

kind of relationship is created. But

54:34

you see this in just friendships

54:36

all the time too, with varying

54:38

degrees of emotional maturity and the

54:40

kinds of Sometimes well -intentioned, but

54:42

frankly often not well -intentioned, like mechanisms

54:44

of control that people have to

54:46

keep on doing what they're comfortable

54:48

with and keep on sucking somebody

54:50

back in to their emotional black

54:52

hole. I'm just thinking

54:54

of examples I can think of in

54:56

the lives of friends where they've

54:58

had a longtime friend who ran some

55:00

of this game that you're describing

55:03

on them effectively in terms of like,

55:05

well, can you just see it

55:07

from my perspective? And I intended this,

55:09

what do you mean? Why aren't

55:11

you being more compassionate to me over

55:13

and over? And it just really

55:15

does keep people trapped for a long

55:17

time. Yes. And again, that's because

55:19

it depends on which part of our

55:21

brain we're processing that through. If

55:23

we're processing it through our

55:25

left brain, our rational, logical,

55:27

step -by -step brain, it kind

55:29

of goes, it leads you

55:31

to a conclusion that may

55:33

be logical, but it may

55:35

not make any sense. We

55:38

need our right brain to

55:40

remind us what it felt like,

55:42

whether or not this does

55:44

make sense, how many times this

55:46

has happened, what's the big

55:48

picture, the logical picture is great,

55:50

but what has happened over

55:52

time, is there a pattern here?

55:55

You don't get that with your

55:57

logic brain. What advice would you

55:59

give people who want to maintain

56:01

some kind of a relationship, particularly

56:03

with their family, but it could

56:05

also be with friends or co -workers,

56:07

whatever it is, people they have

56:09

to be in relationship with, but

56:11

they also don't want to perform

56:13

that act as much anymore. They

56:15

want to move into that more

56:17

authentic way of being that we're

56:19

talking about, but they don't want

56:21

it to just totally torpedo their

56:23

relationship with their family system. What

56:27

happens if they start

56:29

in little ways being

56:32

more authentic by, I

56:34

mean, it can be tiny, like

56:37

not pushing yourself to

56:39

say or do the thing

56:41

you know will ingratiate yourself

56:43

with that person, not

56:45

acting out of fear by

56:47

not saying something that

56:49

you want to say or

56:52

not asking for something

56:54

that you need because you're

56:56

afraid What their reaction

56:58

might be or even that

57:00

you might just make them

57:02

a little uncomfortable even I

57:04

mean this gets very very granular

57:06

in terms of what people

57:08

are concerned about I think

57:10

one of the best things

57:12

that I can tell people

57:14

is try to think of it

57:17

as. That you are there

57:19

your main job is to

57:21

stay connected with yourself and

57:23

your own emotional reactions your

57:25

own emotional needs. And your own

57:27

perspective on the situation, like,

57:29

what do you think is going on? And

57:32

stick with that. You can

57:34

take other people's input into account, of

57:36

course, but really, how do you see

57:38

it? What do you think has happened?

57:40

Do you think that's right? And

57:42

you help them to detach

57:44

and step back a little

57:46

bit because, I mean, the

57:48

whole thing about emotionally immature

57:50

relationship systems is that everybody

57:53

needs to be enmeshed. You

57:55

know and everybody's behaviors taken

57:57

very personally and there's a

57:59

lot of reactivity going on

58:01

a lot of insistence that

58:03

they be comforted all that

58:05

happens. So to

58:08

become more objective and to

58:10

step back a little

58:12

bit and observe what's going

58:14

on in a more

58:16

detached way from the emotional

58:18

demand of the situation

58:20

is very helpful. While

58:22

simultaneously staying in touch with

58:24

your own feelings your own perspective

58:26

on the situation and lots

58:28

of times i'll suggest that

58:30

people do things to ground

58:32

themselves in their body like

58:35

you know try just rubbing your

58:37

arm cross your arm you

58:39

know feel your body flex

58:41

your feet. Have an awareness

58:43

that i'm still here because

58:45

the emotionally immature person. will

58:48

effectively erase your connection with

58:50

your own self with your

58:52

own body with your own

58:54

reactions in order to pull

58:56

all of that into their

58:59

own need satisfaction. So

59:01

it's very helpful

59:04

if you can create

59:06

some distance, set

59:08

some boundaries. And

59:10

I always call, I always suggest that they

59:12

say, I'm asking for space. Not

59:14

I'm setting a boundary. That seems

59:16

to be less inflammatory. I

59:18

need some space. I need some

59:20

time. We'll

59:22

be back to the show in just a minute,

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in store. Now,

1:01:26

back to the show. So

1:01:29

something that we've talked about on the

1:01:31

show a lot is how when we start

1:01:33

to change, that puts an inherent kind

1:01:35

of pressure on the systems we're a part

1:01:37

of and on the people around us,

1:01:39

right? Because we have these very familiar social

1:01:41

scripts and different ways of interacting with

1:01:43

each other. That parent or that

1:01:46

friend is very used to you being a

1:01:48

certain kind of way. And you

1:01:50

step into this slightly different way of being,

1:01:52

you're staying reconnected with how you feel, how

1:01:54

you think, all the things you just detailed

1:01:56

Lindsey. most

1:01:58

of the time, they're going to have a feeling

1:02:00

about that. They're going to put a little pressure on

1:02:02

you. They're going to ask, hey, what the heck

1:02:04

is going on here? When somebody's in

1:02:06

that phase of it where they're

1:02:09

receiving that kind of social pressure, have

1:02:11

you found things that help a

1:02:13

person stay connected to authentic self, what

1:02:15

they want from it, all the

1:02:17

things that you were describing? Yeah.

1:02:20

The biggest idea is

1:02:22

that you want them

1:02:24

to see it as

1:02:27

managing the relationship as

1:02:29

opposed to trying to have

1:02:31

a good deep fulfilling relationship.

1:02:33

You've changed your expectations a

1:02:35

little bit, yeah. Yes, exactly.

1:02:37

You have changed your expectations

1:02:39

because you've learned that if

1:02:41

I ask for empathy, if

1:02:43

I try to get close,

1:02:45

if I try to explain

1:02:48

myself, that that

1:02:50

often makes the

1:02:52

emotionally immature person very

1:02:54

uncomfortable. and makes

1:02:56

them push back even

1:02:58

more or get more controlling

1:03:00

because now you're asking

1:03:02

for something from them like

1:03:05

understanding. That doesn't

1:03:07

usually have a really good effect.

1:03:10

It just unfortunately doesn't.

1:03:13

So what we're trying to

1:03:15

do there is help

1:03:17

the person get some healthy

1:03:19

distance and if the

1:03:21

other person doesn't seem to

1:03:23

like it that they're

1:03:25

being different, that they expect

1:03:27

that. That's part of

1:03:30

the process. And you

1:03:32

also expect an extinction burst,

1:03:35

which, you know, in an

1:03:37

old lab animal. Behavioral

1:03:39

psychology, yeah. Behavioral psychology means

1:03:41

that before you eliminate

1:03:43

a behavior, the

1:03:46

animal or the human

1:03:48

will try even harder. That's

1:03:51

the burst of behavior. they

1:03:53

will have an intense effort

1:03:55

made to get you to

1:03:57

come back into the old

1:03:59

pattern. Just expect

1:04:01

it. That's what's going to

1:04:03

happen. Be prepared. Totally. Be

1:04:05

prepared. Yes. It doesn't mean that

1:04:07

you'll always remember that or

1:04:09

that it feels good, but you

1:04:11

can keep asking yourself, did

1:04:13

I do anything wrong? Was

1:04:16

I selfish? Was that

1:04:18

unreasonable to set that limit? Am

1:04:20

I a bad person? You

1:04:22

know, you can ask yourself, you

1:04:24

can dialogue with yourself about

1:04:26

some of these things that come

1:04:28

back on you when you

1:04:30

change so that you get a

1:04:32

healthier, more objective perspective on

1:04:35

what you've been doing with them.

1:04:38

So, Lindsay, as we get toward the

1:04:40

end here, something I've been meaning to

1:04:42

ask you about is there have now

1:04:44

been, I don't know, how many million

1:04:46

pieces of content that have been produced

1:04:48

that are tangential to your books. Million

1:04:51

videos on TikTok, people

1:04:53

talking about different aspects of this, trying

1:04:55

to find the right boundaries for themselves. What

1:04:58

do you think are

1:05:00

some of the biggest common

1:05:02

misunderstandings that still exist

1:05:04

about this notion of either

1:05:06

emotionally immature people or

1:05:08

the things that can support

1:05:10

somebody in finding more

1:05:12

personal healing here? I

1:05:15

would think probably the

1:05:17

biggest misunderstanding would be that

1:05:20

somehow it's supposed to

1:05:22

make you feel better because

1:05:24

what often happens is

1:05:26

that you're going back into

1:05:28

yourself to look at

1:05:30

and change and repair patterns

1:05:32

in your life that

1:05:35

you may have really counted

1:05:37

on in a big

1:05:39

way for much of your

1:05:41

life. So the misunderstanding

1:05:43

may be, I'll go in,

1:05:45

I'll set some boundaries with my

1:05:47

parents, I'll learn to say no, I'll

1:05:49

learn to stop people pleasing, I

1:05:52

will stand up for myself.

1:05:55

And there's this sense that

1:05:57

all of this will feel

1:05:59

good. Okay. And

1:06:01

then you try it and

1:06:03

it feels worse. And

1:06:05

you feel worse. And

1:06:07

then you're wondering, was it

1:06:09

even worth it? but

1:06:12

if you have gotten far

1:06:14

enough along the path

1:06:16

of becoming intrigued with getting

1:06:18

to know yourself and

1:06:21

getting to know your own

1:06:23

inner world, it's real

1:06:25

hard to go back. Once

1:06:28

that growth process starts

1:06:30

of getting to know

1:06:32

your own soul and

1:06:34

feeling like, well, maybe

1:06:37

I am. just as

1:06:39

important as this other

1:06:41

person. Because that's

1:06:43

a foundational construct for emotionally

1:06:45

immature relationships. I,

1:06:47

the emotionally immature person, am the

1:06:49

most important person in the relationship.

1:06:51

Let's just get that out there

1:06:53

and accept it because that's how

1:06:55

it is. They may not

1:06:58

say that, but all their

1:07:00

behavior and their complaints and

1:07:02

their requests are issuing from

1:07:04

that foundational view of the

1:07:06

world, the view of the

1:07:08

relationship. So, to

1:07:10

help the person be

1:07:12

realistic about there's great

1:07:14

good to be gotten

1:07:17

from your own self -knowledge,

1:07:19

from your own self

1:07:21

-growth, that's where your

1:07:23

satisfaction is going to come

1:07:25

from. And boy, there is

1:07:28

true satisfaction that people feel

1:07:30

when they've been on this path

1:07:32

for a while. But

1:07:34

to expect that the other

1:07:36

person is going to be

1:07:38

able to be changed by

1:07:40

your growth by your authenticity.

1:07:43

That's where you're really out

1:07:45

on a limb and

1:07:47

have less and less control

1:07:49

the more you think

1:07:52

that way because we just

1:07:54

can't control other people. We

1:07:57

can be an advocate for our

1:07:59

own growth and we can learn

1:08:01

to pursue things that are good

1:08:03

for us. Yeah, losing

1:08:05

the expectation that I'm going

1:08:07

to be able to change

1:08:09

this person is probably a

1:08:11

huge thing. Lindsay, thanks

1:08:13

so much for doing this with me today. I've

1:08:15

totally enjoyed talking with you. It's been a great

1:08:17

time. I feel like we took a great journey

1:08:19

together. Yeah, no, absolutely.

1:08:21

There was like a really beautiful arc

1:08:24

to this, but I just thought that

1:08:26

your last comment there about the boundaries

1:08:28

of What change inside of ourselves is

1:08:30

able to create inside of our relationships

1:08:32

with other people and having managed expectations

1:08:34

around that is just a great summary

1:08:36

of a lot of what we were

1:08:38

talking about today and I think a

1:08:40

good place to leave it for now.

1:08:49

I love talking with Dr. Lindsay Gibson today

1:08:51

about emotional immaturity. I really appreciated that

1:08:53

she was up for coming back on the

1:08:55

show. And I feel like I've learned

1:08:57

so much personally from her work. And her

1:08:59

work has really changed the lives of

1:09:02

thousands and thousands of people. I mean, you

1:09:04

just see how many people make videos

1:09:06

on TikTok or Instagram about adult children of

1:09:08

emotionally immature parents and about her other

1:09:10

books as well. And we

1:09:12

started today's conversation with defining what

1:09:14

emotional immaturity means. Emotional immaturity

1:09:16

is when an individual functions emotionally

1:09:18

at a much younger developmental stage

1:09:20

than their chronological age. That's kind

1:09:22

of the technical way to put

1:09:24

it. So somebody can look like

1:09:26

a 55 -year -old. They can have

1:09:28

all of the academic knowledge that

1:09:30

a 55 -year -old has accumulated. They

1:09:32

might have the social knowledge of

1:09:34

a 55 -year -old. But on the

1:09:37

inside, they're kind of more of

1:09:39

a 15 -year -old or a 16

1:09:41

-year -old. And this is particularly the

1:09:43

case when they're under pressure. One of

1:09:45

the things that Lindsay started with is the

1:09:47

idea that there's a continuum here. It

1:09:49

is normal for us to

1:09:51

exhibit some emotional immaturity when

1:09:54

things are particularly tough for us.

1:09:56

We've all had a bad day.

1:09:58

We've all had moments in time

1:10:00

where we haven't showed up quite

1:10:02

the way that we would like

1:10:05

to. The difference here is that

1:10:07

people who are chronically emotional immature

1:10:09

are that way most of the

1:10:11

time. Maybe they can stretch into

1:10:13

more maturity when everything lines up

1:10:15

for them. But as

1:10:18

a baseline, they've got these key

1:10:20

characteristics, and those characteristics are that

1:10:22

they're egocentric. they're self -preoccupied and they

1:10:24

have low empathy. They

1:10:26

have limited emotional regulation. This means

1:10:28

that they have some challenges with

1:10:30

managing their own emotions and this

1:10:32

can lead to impulsivity and explosiveness

1:10:35

on the one hand and then

1:10:37

withdraw the silent treatment icing you

1:10:39

out on the other. Another big

1:10:41

feature of it that Lindsay emphasized

1:10:43

is called effective realism, and this

1:10:45

is when a person interprets reality

1:10:48

based on their emotions rather than

1:10:50

on objective facts or, hey, what

1:10:52

actually happened. The person

1:10:54

is creating this story about

1:10:56

where the problem lies based

1:10:58

on their experience. Guess what?

1:11:00

Most of the time, it's not them. This

1:11:03

all comes together to create an

1:11:05

environment, particularly if you're a kid who

1:11:07

grew up with a parent who

1:11:09

has some of these characteristics of inconsistency.

1:11:12

You just don't really know what you're going to get from

1:11:14

day to day because on a good day, you're going

1:11:16

to get one parent. On a not so good day, you're

1:11:18

going to get a very different parent. And so I

1:11:20

asked Lindsay, what differentiates emotional immaturity

1:11:22

from a parent who is just in

1:11:24

a situation where there was a

1:11:26

lot of stress on them? They were

1:11:28

managing a lot of different demands.

1:11:30

They had to work really hard. They

1:11:32

didn't have as much emotional availability. Maybe

1:11:35

they're coming from a background where there wasn't

1:11:37

a lot of money in the picture and

1:11:39

they're working two jobs. You just can't show

1:11:41

up for your kid in necessarily the same

1:11:43

way that that person might really want to.

1:11:46

And what she emphasized is how willing

1:11:48

the parent is to consider, for

1:11:50

starters, the kid's emotions at all and

1:11:52

to consider their perspective at all,

1:11:54

and then the denial and the minimizing.

1:11:57

So if a parent is willing to say, Hey,

1:11:59

yeah, I see where you are coming from.

1:12:01

I get it. And also, here's all of this

1:12:03

other stuff that was in the field that

1:12:05

a child might just not understand as well, right?

1:12:08

This is a very, very minor example

1:12:11

of this, but I remember growing up

1:12:13

and having plenty of times where my

1:12:15

dad was very busy. He worked long

1:12:17

hours, he was not always available, and

1:12:19

I as a kid who loved my parent

1:12:21

and wanted my dad to be around, sometimes

1:12:24

was frustrated or disappointed by this.

1:12:27

But I also really knew deep down inside that my

1:12:29

dad really loved me and he really cared about

1:12:31

me. And when he was around, he was doing the

1:12:33

best that he could to really show up for

1:12:35

me as a parent. And then

1:12:37

10 years, 20 years later, I can look

1:12:39

back over that and really have an understanding of

1:12:41

everything that was going on and why things

1:12:43

were the way that they were. And then that

1:12:45

was laid on top, a lot of really

1:12:47

positive experiences with my dad and being a great

1:12:49

guy, us having a great relationship and adulthood. That's

1:12:52

one story. But if I went to my

1:12:54

dad today and I said, hey, this was

1:12:56

my experience back then, what he would lead

1:12:58

with was, yeah, man, sorry. You

1:13:01

know, that's where he would start. He was like,

1:13:03

wow, yeah, I totally understand that you had this

1:13:05

experience. And also, here's all the other stuff that

1:13:07

was going on. Most of the time,

1:13:09

an emotionally immature parent is not going to be

1:13:11

willing to do that. There are

1:13:13

two key consequences of this for

1:13:15

people who grew up with

1:13:17

emotionally immature parents. First, Lindsay talks

1:13:19

a lot about emotional loneliness.

1:13:21

This is this deep sense of

1:13:23

emotional disconnection. Children of

1:13:25

emotionally immature parents often feel emotionally

1:13:27

isolated, which tends to lead

1:13:29

to a lot of self -parenting

1:13:32

and hyperindependence. You can also read

1:13:34

more about this in Alice Miller's drama of the

1:13:36

Gifted Child. It's one of my absolute favorite books.

1:13:38

It is a very, very short book. You really

1:13:40

only have to read the first chapter of it.

1:13:42

If you're interested in these kinds of topics and

1:13:44

you haven't checked it out, I would really strongly

1:13:46

recommend it. Then the second big

1:13:48

consequence is the development of what

1:13:50

Lindsay calls a role -self. This

1:13:52

is a particular version of who

1:13:54

you are. It's often not

1:13:56

totally inauthentic. It has aspects of

1:13:58

your true self in there as

1:14:00

well, but it is a very

1:14:02

thick mask that allows you to

1:14:05

get what you need from that

1:14:07

parental figure. So you learn how

1:14:09

to approach your parent at the

1:14:11

right time, right space, right angle,

1:14:13

right tone of voice, right all

1:14:15

of those things in order to

1:14:17

trigger a nurturing response from them.

1:14:19

And this generally happens somewhat

1:14:22

unconsciously, particularly the development of

1:14:24

this is pretty unconscious. The

1:14:26

behavior of it can sometimes

1:14:28

be deliberate. And we

1:14:30

learn that these are behaviors that work in

1:14:32

life because they worked for us when we were

1:14:34

growing up. And that was the Petri dish

1:14:36

that we were experimenting on. But

1:14:38

we extrapolate that relationship, that

1:14:40

relationship with that parental figure,

1:14:42

to our relationships with other

1:14:45

people generally. And

1:14:47

we particularly apply this learning in

1:14:49

our relationships with people who are loosely

1:14:51

similar to that parental figure. So

1:14:53

what does this mean? That means people

1:14:55

who are in positions of authority

1:14:57

and also people who are at a

1:14:59

level of emotional closeness, that's kind

1:15:01

of similar to what we had with

1:15:03

our parents. So what does that

1:15:05

mean? This means our romantic relationships often

1:15:07

get affected by these patterns. We

1:15:10

then talked a lot about the

1:15:12

work that Lindsay has done with

1:15:14

people to help them explore these

1:15:16

tendencies and let go of some

1:15:18

of these patterns. And it's kind

1:15:20

of difficult to talk about, unfortunately,

1:15:23

because it's such a specific process

1:15:25

and it's often quite a long

1:15:27

process for people. The starting

1:15:29

point of it that Lindsay really

1:15:31

highlighted is the importance of feeling your

1:15:33

feelings. Connecting with

1:15:35

your authentic emotional experience, you ask

1:15:37

somebody who has been parentified,

1:15:39

who has been in one of

1:15:41

those positions where they were

1:15:43

really functioning as Rick has said

1:15:45

during some previous episodes on

1:15:47

similar topics as a kind of

1:15:49

plug -in module for the parent's

1:15:51

personality, where the child learns

1:15:53

to really define themselves by their

1:15:56

relationship with the parent. They

1:15:58

often have a really hard time telling

1:16:00

you what's true inside of them. They

1:16:02

have a tough time looking inside and

1:16:04

seeing that clear authentic sense of what

1:16:06

they feel like, what they care about,

1:16:09

what emotions were they experiencing in

1:16:11

those different situations. And

1:16:13

so part of the therapeutic process is about

1:16:15

reconnecting with that and asking a lot of questions

1:16:17

along those lines. Well, what did you feel

1:16:19

when that was going on? And

1:16:21

what Lindsay said is that a lot of the time the person

1:16:23

leads with what they thought. Well, I

1:16:25

thought this. Well, it seemed like that.

1:16:27

you know, these very cognitive responses. And

1:16:30

part of her job as a

1:16:32

therapist is to increasingly get people back

1:16:34

in touch with that more emotional,

1:16:36

self -connected aspect. This then

1:16:38

gets complicated by our continued relationships with

1:16:40

people who have some of these patterns.

1:16:42

A lot of people want to maintain

1:16:44

a relationship with their parents even if

1:16:46

their parents are complicated people, even if

1:16:49

their relationship with their parents is not

1:16:51

a super smooth one. Some

1:16:53

people do move up to full estrangement

1:16:55

and Something I just want to

1:16:57

get in here because I didn't say it during the

1:16:59

episode is that I think that we have a

1:17:01

real misunderstanding of that a lot of the time. 99

1:17:04

% of people who become

1:17:06

estranged from their parents

1:17:08

don't do so flippantly. They

1:17:11

don't do so just because

1:17:13

they woke up some day,

1:17:15

rolled out of bed and

1:17:17

said, today I'm going to

1:17:19

become estranged. This is the

1:17:21

end point of a lot

1:17:23

of difficult decisions and a

1:17:25

lot of painful experiences for

1:17:27

a person. And this

1:17:29

is why I think the compassion conversation that

1:17:31

we also talked about during the episode a bit

1:17:34

is such a fraught one for people, right?

1:17:36

The idea of we'll just have more compassion for

1:17:38

your parents, have more understanding for their experience. Yeah,

1:17:41

if you can just roll over and

1:17:43

experience more compassion, great. Compassion

1:17:45

is a generally good thing, but the

1:17:47

feelings that you have are based on

1:17:49

your lived experience. And

1:17:51

the intensity of those emotions

1:17:53

is often directly directly

1:17:55

connected, in direct proportion to the extent

1:17:57

to which you've been suppressing them

1:17:59

for a long period of time. Lindsay

1:18:02

and I also talked a bit

1:18:04

during the conversation about how some of

1:18:06

these moral messages about obligations and

1:18:08

requirements and what do we owe our

1:18:10

families, what do we owe our

1:18:12

parents, which to me I think is

1:18:15

an incredibly deep question. And

1:18:17

my personal moral framework is that

1:18:19

we owe our parents a lot. We

1:18:21

owe our families a lot. And

1:18:24

it takes a lot for a person to

1:18:26

get to a point where they say, you

1:18:28

know what, I'm just not going to engage

1:18:30

with that anymore. That's a serious choice. That's

1:18:32

a serious decision for somebody. And I think

1:18:34

that even though we do have a certain

1:18:36

responsibility to our parents and our families, if

1:18:39

for nothing else, then the kind of general

1:18:41

gift of life. And

1:18:43

at the same time, I think we need to be

1:18:45

really careful about the weaponization of that morality. So

1:18:47

many emotionally abusive relationships, parental

1:18:49

or otherwise, leverage that

1:18:52

kind of moral cudgel

1:18:54

to perpetuate these incredibly

1:18:56

unhealthy systems. Moral

1:18:58

obligation is not a blank

1:19:00

check. At a certain

1:19:02

point, it's about behavior. It's about what

1:19:04

you do. It's about what your relationship

1:19:06

really looks like with this adult person

1:19:08

who is standing in front of you

1:19:10

and is asking for something really very

1:19:12

different than what you've had in the

1:19:14

past. I then asked Lindsay

1:19:16

toward the end of the conversation about the advice

1:19:18

that you would give people who want to

1:19:20

maintain some kind of relationship. You know,

1:19:23

some slightly more emotionally immature people in their

1:19:25

lives, but they also don't want to perform

1:19:27

that act anymore. And she

1:19:29

had a great line about this.

1:19:31

Your main job is to stay

1:19:33

connected with yourself, your own reactions,

1:19:36

your own needs, your own perspectives,

1:19:38

and your own emotions. What do

1:19:40

you feel about what is going

1:19:42

on? And do you feel comfortable

1:19:44

expressing that even just inside of

1:19:46

yourself? And I think this

1:19:48

is one of the ways that people can

1:19:50

really draw some healthy boundaries in a way

1:19:53

that can actually allow them to stay in

1:19:55

relationship with people if that's what they want

1:19:57

to do. Where they can start

1:19:59

saying, look, I know

1:20:01

I'm not going to get everything from

1:20:03

this relationship. This relationship is never going

1:20:05

to be what I truly want it

1:20:07

to be. And that is immensely sad. But

1:20:10

it's also just the reality of it. and

1:20:12

for me to stay in it, I need

1:20:14

to understand that this person is not going

1:20:16

to be really that interested in meeting my

1:20:18

emotional needs. And you know

1:20:20

what? For whatever reason, because it's

1:20:22

not so bad, because I can handle

1:20:24

it, because I feel a sense of moral

1:20:26

obligation that doesn't destroy my life, I'm

1:20:29

going to choose to stay in relationship. But

1:20:31

I'm going to do it from that

1:20:33

stance of clear seeing. I'm going to

1:20:35

do it while getting. It's never going to quite

1:20:37

be that way. And that's actually what's going

1:20:39

to give me the freedom that allows me to

1:20:41

stay in touch with myself. And you know what? Sometimes

1:20:43

I'm going to choose just to smile and not. But

1:20:46

inside myself, I'm going to know, hey,

1:20:49

I feel a certain kind of way about

1:20:51

this. That's not what I think. That's not

1:20:53

an alignment with my view of the situation. But

1:20:55

I'm just going to let you kind of keep on doing

1:20:57

your thing over here because it's frankly not worth it. I

1:21:00

hope you enjoyed today's conversation. I always

1:21:02

love talking with Lindsay. I'm sure

1:21:04

we'll have her back on the show at some point

1:21:06

in the future. If you've been enjoying the podcast for

1:21:08

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1:21:36

of our episodes. I think that we started doing

1:21:38

the transcripts three years ago, something like that.

1:21:40

So if the episode is from before then, unfortunately

1:21:42

we don't have a transcript for it. I'm

1:21:44

really interested in what people have to say about

1:21:46

this episode. If you are watching on YouTube,

1:21:48

a great way to let us know is by

1:21:51

leaving a comment down below. You

1:21:53

can also leave a comment, a rating, a

1:21:55

positive review on Spotify or on Apple Podcast.

1:21:57

That also really helps the show out. Until

1:21:59

next Thanks for listening, I'll talk to you soon.