Kathy Washburn [00:00:01]:
In this, this different world that I live in. Yeah. Hello, David Drake. Welcome. Welcome. It's so good to have you.

David Drake [00:00:14]:
Thank you, Kathy.

Kathy Washburn [00:00:16]:
I am gonna let David, introduce himself. But before I do, I want the people listening to know how I know David. David's work has been nothing short of revelatory for me, both personally or first personally and then professionally. He's the the founder of the Moment Institute. But when I found him, it was mostly the concentration was on narrative coaching Mhmm. Which was just a a door that just blew open. And right after that shortly after that, COVID happened, and he was offering other more immersive programs. And I really think that that year, as terrible as it was, was like the inner greening of my landscape.

Kathy Washburn [00:01:09]:
It was just such a rich, program. I went through a couple of them, with you as you've grown. So it has, David's work has just really helped me be a better version of myself, while discovering so much about myself in a way that was never possible before. I felt like it was only through kind of a a therapy or working with a psychologist or a therapist that kind of withheld a lot of what you unlocked because you helped me understand it intellectually. And that was how I had to enter the this realm. But enough about me. I wanna know a little more about you, what you're doing right now, what you're bringing into the world.

David Drake [00:02:06]:
Yeah. So we're practicing sort of what we preach. We're moving away from these big programs to create more of a learning community where there'll be a library of everything I've ever done in one place that people have access to if and how and when they need it. And then, plenty of opportunity to practice together, collaborate together to kind of bring new things to the world, which is really interesting to me right now. As part of that, doing a lot of work with this new piece on the 5 maturities, like, how do we help ourselves grow in some new ways and think about learning and development? And then I've got a an opportunity with OvidA, which is one of my clients. It's an AI based platform that, and we're now moving to integrate ID into that to, again, help organizations and coaches and whatnot be more agentic and, in their own self directed learning. And so that's an exciting frontier, and I always liked kind of new ways to think about or apply my work. And I think what it what's become really clear to me because we're I'm in the middle of sort of trying to sense a kind of an umbrella term for the new website.

David Drake [00:03:22]:
And, when I reflect back to my on my life, I've never quite easily fit in wherever I go. And so but rather than kinda, like, bang on that door, I just go over here and create something else that I think makes more sense to me, works better for me, and seems more in line with what I believe. And so I think, ultimately, what this all is leading to is the realization that in every aspect of our life, no one has a singular, identity, which I know is our topic for today, or a singular role. So, like, you look at now. You know, teachers in most many schools spend hardly any time actually teaching. They're servicing all the requirements of them around assessments and all the bureaucracies and all that. There many of them are now, many schools are now as much into social work as education because a lot of children are coming to school in need. You think about, you know, my, therapist.

David Drake [00:04:22]:
So when my, daughter was in therapy for a while, I taught some basic narrative coaching to her therapist because I knew something that would work really well for my daughter that a typical therapist would not think to do because it's outside of therapy. And then, you know, this I've stopped even answering the question when people challenge me about narrative coaching. Well, that sounds like therapy. I'm like, yes. And your point is what? Because I feel like we just need new types of practitioners Mhmm. Who can morph ourselves within, you know, boundaries to help people get what they need when they need it, to be able to move forward in whatever that means for them at that time. And, and so a lot of what we do has very much to do with identity and how we see ourself and the roles we play and the freedom we need to feel like we can embody to serve humans in their greatest need.

Kathy Washburn [00:05:26]:
Wow. And that is and has been my experience with your work. You're such a pioneer. Mhmm. And I've I've now responded when people say, well, are you a therapist? It sounds like what you do is therapy. And I my response is that what I do is therapeutic, but I Excellent. Therapist.

David Drake [00:05:45]:
I wonder I've heard that before somewhere.

Kathy Washburn [00:05:48]:
Yeah. I think I might have got it from doctor David Drake himself. Yes. And I never really felt like I could step into that because of imposter syndrome or, you know, whatever other things that would make me believe, like, oh, not a I'm not as worthy as a therapist, but all the mindfulness, the the work that I've done with you in ID, learning about shadow and, attachment theory and diving deeper into those those, things. Yeah. I think what I do is therapeutic. And and I'm happy I'm so happy and overjoyed to be able to carry your torch Oh, thank you. In some way.

David Drake [00:06:36]:
I'm glad.

Kathy Washburn [00:06:37]:
And I'm super excited to talk to you about identity. Mhmm. This is one of the things with a type c, per a person that aligns with type c coping Uh-huh. They tend to lose themselves. A lot of clients come to me lost. They say, I feel lost. And it was actually during one of your one of I I don't remember what program when I learned this, quote from Steven Jenkinson that you brought up. Being lost doesn't actually mean you're not where you wished you were.

Kathy Washburn [00:07:17]:
It or being lost means you're not wish you

David Drake [00:07:21]:
Where you wish you were.

Kathy Washburn [00:07:22]:
Where you wish you were. It doesn't mean you don't know where you are. It means that you wished you weren't there. And I don't know why that was so profound to me. And so when clients come to me and say, I just feel lost. I I don't know who I am anymore. And it's behind all those cloaks. So the more I can do to help them find that sense of self

David Drake [00:07:49]:
Mhmm.

Kathy Washburn [00:07:50]:
In the midst of conflict, the better, the better I think they are internally and externally. So we're gonna dive into this. It's a Excellent. Topic. But the first question I'm gonna ask you is, what is identity?

David Drake [00:08:11]:
Well, it's easy or probably just to describe some attributes. So it's, it's just sort of the intersection of how we see ourself and how others see us. And so we don't form them only on our own, but in response to others from early in life. So I look at it sort of as the overall sense we have of ourself and something that allows us to have a felt sense of coherence, meaning, and purpose, but also has the ability to adapt. And to what you were saying earlier, I think one of the ways we get ourselves in trouble is we assume there's a singular identity, and there's some place else I should be or some other person I should be that I'm not. Therefore, I have nothing. And so being lost is an identity.

Kathy Washburn [00:09:06]:
Mhmm.

David Drake [00:09:07]:
Right? If you're deep in grief you know? So my my favorite, aunt, my old mom's older sister just passed away a couple of days ago in at 91, I think. Mhmm. You know? And and so people are in varying forms of griefing. But if you're in deep grief about something, that that is not the that's not the totality of your identity, but that part of you kinda rises to that moment and is and and and you can feel not like yourself or no. I've as you know, I've had something in the vicinity of COVID for a year and a half now. I don't know. That isn't all of me, but it profoundly shaped how I saw myself, what I could do or not do. But I was wise enough not to be consumed by and over identify.

David Drake [00:09:55]:
That's who I am now. And to kinda rally other parts of myself to come. So it's just sort of a coherent sense of, the narrative we hold about ourself, which is shaped in response to, to others. And and there's, I think, elements of that that remain, consistent over our life. So I'm going to I'm helping some club friends of mine to plan a high school reunion. And, you know, many of them, you they have the same characteristics that they did 50 years ago. And certain things have changed about them, but there's some core pieces that you can recognize.

Kathy Washburn [00:10:36]:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's interesting. I love this idea of that part of yourself rising to the moment. Yeah. And really allowing that to happen without deflecting Yeah. Or over identifying with anyone one part that rises.

David Drake [00:10:59]:
Yeah. And I think I think of identity sort of as a community. It's a feast of selves. And and I I was sharing with you before we got on the air here about, getting ready to move to Amsterdam. So we have the self that's been in Amsterdam many, many times over the last 10 years who feels quite hope happy and at home there. There's the self in me that wanted to move to Amsterdam, but the timing was never quite right. There's the self of me that made the commitment to, to do that. There's the self of me that was showed up differently to my relationship there so that as she was doing her work to welcome me to Amsterdam, there's the self in me that's planning to move to Amsterdam.

David Drake [00:11:41]:
There's the self in me that's gonna arrive in Amsterdam, which is not the self I am now. It doesn't mean my fundamental identity changed, but all these selves have a lens on or perspective on my present experience. And so, like, the part of me that anticipated and really would wanted to move to Europe several years ago, that part of David got frustrated. You know, why can't I have this now? And but it it wasn't ready because there was a whole bunch of things that we discovered needed to happen first, which we didn't know at the time. And and in terms of our own evolution and, shifts in our business lives, and and so part of it is this, I think, just noticing kind of what parts of ourself are speaking in any moment in time or acting. And, and is that in service of where we are now, here and now, and, recognize that no one of these selves is our entirety of our identity. None of them is David. Right? They're just parts of David.

David Drake [00:12:44]:
And and if and so for me, the the David that wanted to be in Amsterdam, say, 3 or 4 years ago, wasn't actually ready to be the the the David that actually moves. And now that I'm moving, I've noticed myself already changing, and in anticipation of what that's gonna be like. And so it's just kind of always just locating yourself in this community of selves and kind of what is that like and what is that allowing you to see or not see or feel or not feel, And from which of these, selves, is the action you wanna take going to come?

Kathy Washburn [00:13:27]:
I love that that idea, and you had I I think I took one of your practices and spun it a little to make my own, but I I call it my boardroom where Mhmm. I'm struggling with something. I do this meditation where I invite all of those pieces Oh, yeah. To Abel. And I I really mindfully, like, okay. What do you gotta say about this? And it's so it's so strange who shows up. You know, sometimes it's a 12 year old, and sometimes she's nowhere nowhere at the table, and it's my 24 year old or yesterday.

David Drake [00:14:06]:
Well and and for me, the value of doing those kind of practices is that, you know, you know, many of us, you know, we look back at our life at regrets. It's often when we we, tuned out certain parts of ourself and over overemphasized others. So if I, like, if if I had tried to force the issue to try to move 3 or 4 years ago, it probably would have been fine, but nowhere near what it's gonna be now. And so part of the part of this is just checking in with ourself of you know like, sometimes we get really excited by something or enthusiastic or seduced or whatever. And we go, and we lean into that, and and we put too many eggs in that basket. And we realize in the end, oh, that actually blinded me to some things I didn't see. And so I feel like, what you find in thinking about identity this way is life becomes much more fluid and present where you're always just sort of sifting, you know, what what is actually true here and what's actually real for me. And, I'm finding now, having done this work for a while, I'm I'm making better choices.

David Drake [00:15:18]:
I'm avoiding things I would have been, you know, oh, maybe I can make this work. And now I'm like, no. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna do that

Kathy Washburn [00:15:27]:
that day, but can't be fooled again. There's so much freedom in that. Right? Yeah. I think so. It doesn't have to be so hard.

David Drake [00:15:37]:
I know.

Kathy Washburn [00:15:38]:
I wish I knew. Yeah. Yeah. And the idea of starting with self, because you mentioned that the self, there's some there's also an influence on your identity from the outside. And that importance in really being able to have that strong back and who you are and who you know to be, and then shifting the perspective to how, how society and culture and other stories, maybe even ancestral, how that shapes an identity. Yeah. But that that individual work is the first step. Right?

David Drake [00:16:23]:
Yeah. And I know I know I know in what you sent me. You talked a lot about sometimes people in the spaces you're working in, get so caught up in the other, they forget themselves. And, I know that, the, the guy that wrote a lot about mentalization, the ability to empathize and imagine what something is like for somebody else. I always thought we should have self self mentalization. Can we even imagine ourselves? And do we con do we consider that with as as much depth as sometimes we get caught up doing for others? Yeah.

Kathy Washburn [00:16:59]:
Right. That that might just be a practice I invite, clients and myself to do. Yeah. As as a type c, I grew up believing that my validation came from the outside. Mhmm. So that mentalization, that overempathetic, almost a spidey sense. I remember when I was younger

David Drake [00:17:23]:
Mhmm.

Kathy Washburn [00:17:24]:
And I could see the tone of my mom, and my sister would poke her, and I would think, can't you see this train coming? It's coming. You know, head down. I I never understood why I had this almost secret vision, and I could adapt myself where she just hit the train full, you know, full on without without that awareness. So to mentalize, self and be able to imagine I myself in the same way that I consider others is it Yeah. Is it practice?

David Drake [00:18:03]:
And so then over time, you just start doing seeing the whole because you you're you're in your own mentalization. You're not mentalizing them over there. You have to mention it's an extraordinary skill to have to be able to do that. Otherwise, it's really hard to be in relationships of any kind. But, they're not you're not isolated objects in this diorama. You know? You mentalize so them so you better understand them, but them is in context with you. Right? So you're in that as well. And so you know? And we we don't know what your sister was wanting at at what and hoping to gain from poking your mom.

David Drake [00:18:45]:
Right?

Kathy Washburn [00:18:47]:
Right.

David Drake [00:18:47]:
And there there was something about her identity or her journey or her psyche that that felt, like a good thing and important thing to be doing. I think about my younger brother who used to pro pro my dad was an engineer, a wonderful man. He's no long gone, but just wasn't he was a big guy. He wasn't very expressive, and, my, you know, brother really needed, I think, a lot more guidance from my dad than he could give and that I needed. So when his one of his efforts, was to just keep poking my dad, which on the outside, we could judge in a certain way. But in reality, it was his sense of self. I need some things, but I too can't articulate that. And I can't ask for what I really need, and so I'm gonna do this and hope you get the clue and respond, which, of course, my dad never did, which then upped the ante on the poking.

Kathy Washburn [00:19:41]:
And, you

David Drake [00:19:41]:
know, I said, I just think identity, again, is is important to understand all of its aspects for us, recognizing it's always in motion. And, at certain times, we, particularly, ones that were very protective of us when we were younger, like you were describing, it's not about letting that go. It's about repurposing it and resizing it so it's there when you need it, how you need it. You know? So, you know, we've all had encounters or even relationships with narcissist personality types. Well, it's not like what they're doing is wrong or bad. You know? They're doing that's how they're coping and getting through the world and seeing themselves, and there's some scaled appropriately. There's some great skills in there, learning how to speak up for yourself and stand for what and ask for what you want and, you know, go first and get attention. And there's all all these strategies we have around our identities have value.

David Drake [00:20:40]:
It's just that we get locked into them when we sort of cement them into place. And this is who I am and how I have to be and how the world is therefore. And, it just really limits what we can do, and a lot of it's just being willing to let go of or kind of decenter certain parts of ourself, recognizing we probably don't need them as much as we might have once in the past. Yeah. I was sharing this story yesterday, a couple days ago in class about there was a, in a a year when I just said that on a whim, just for the fun of it, I took a test and got into MENSA. Right? So the, and then a few months later, I was nearly killed in a car accident and hit by a truck, ran a stop sign. We had a concussion for the better part of 6 months and but about a year to recover. So I went from, oh, look how smart I am, to I knew nothing.

David Drake [00:21:34]:
And it was the best gift ever because I realized 2 things. Wow. There's whole other ways of living besides thinking. And 2, being smart is a is a nice asset, but it's really not who I really am, and it's not really that important in the end anyways. So it just allowed me to put that part of myself to both respect it and take it more seriously and also respect it and take it less seriously. Yeah. So I find it sort of right size in the sort of the the pantheon of my identities.

Kathy Washburn [00:22:07]:
Wow. Sometimes these lessons have to be big. Yes. Or we ignore them.

David Drake [00:22:16]:
Yes. In this case, it was that is dozens of tons of big. Yes.

Kathy Washburn [00:22:21]:
Yeah. And and one of these, the identity when we have that sense of self, versus, when somebody says, oh, you know, who are you? And people say, I'm a mom or I'm a wife or Yeah. Those labels or kind of cloaks that we wear over our identity. Sometimes we think they're chosen for us. Mhmm. You know, I I work with a small group that's expanding, which is so interesting, of mid 20 year old women who are changing their careers because the careers that they're in were chosen for them. Wow. No.

Kathy Washburn [00:23:12]:
To I applaud that they figured that out in their mid twenties and didn't wait till they were 50 7 like anyone else I know. But it it's astonishing

David Drake [00:23:23]:
Yeah.

Kathy Washburn [00:23:23]:
That that we create these identities in service of other people or Yeah. If somebody wants us to do that. So that formation of a strong identity is so important. Yet, I think that these shadows or attachment styles, they can often, when we're not aware of them, they keep us stuck in these old places. And Yeah. When I was doing this work with you, and this was, like, one of those things that I just got so much joy in learning more about the shadow and attachments. You had you have the best slides, by the way. Oh, thank you.

Kathy Washburn [00:24:12]:
The best slides and the best quotes, but you had, introduced Robert Bly's description of the shadow Yeah. Which will you explain that to us? Because it was one of those things. I think everybody on the Zoom call had this visual. Wow. Exactly. Well,

David Drake [00:24:35]:
you know, his his view was that, we're all born a 360 degree orb of beauty and, and beingness. And, but from day 1, unconsciously and somatically and then more and more consciously, we start to figure out that certain parts of the ourselves don't quite work here. They don't fit, or they're not accepted, or they're not validated or valued, or there's no room for it. You know, you often see, siblings, like like these young women you're working with, shift their path because they some another sibling's already on that path. Right? And so there's they they they have to make a space of their own, which could be good, but often means they move away from what they they too might love. And so his whole thing was we end up just like, oh, well, never mind. Ugh. Just apparently, that's not useful here.

David Drake [00:25:33]:
And then just we shove it into this bag thing to survive and to fit in and to get what we need, which is safety and love. And and it's then we spend, sort of like with Jung, we spend the second half of our life if we wanna do the work unloading that bag and saying, hey. I want some of that back, because it doesn't it never goes away. It's it it's hidden from us in shadow, but it's it has not left. And because we haven't we pretend like it's not there, and there's often some shame that goes with it or blame or other things would just keep it keep it, sometimes trauma even, keep it trapped there, but it affects us. Mhmm. And it it limits us in ways we often don't appreciate. It holds us back.

David Drake [00:26:20]:
It means we overfunction in other areas because we have the same needs we just need to get met. We keep striving to this time, I'm gonna get it right. And so all the Imago people would say, we just recreate relationships that would replicate those old events. So this time, I'm gonna get it right. And this time, they're gonna I'm gonna win, and then we don't because we're stuck in the same thinking. Mhmm. And so the the freedom that comes later in life, you know, if we do the work around our identity is to really be able to almost, like, pour the bag out on a table. Mhmm.

David Drake [00:26:54]:
Almost like, and to, to this seed, like, what do I what do I think about this now, and what do I want? And I remember years ago when I worked in the church and we there was a young an older man. His wife had passed away, and, they were neighbors of some good friends from the church. And so they called me in the middle of the night and said, can you come out? She's dying. She wants somebody to be with her when she's dying. So I went. Mhmm. And then but the man they weren't religious, and the man was really but not religious, but he wanted he was so grateful that he wanted to come have her funeral at our church. And, he said, well, can I bring some things from home and put it on the that give it that table up upfront? I saw it one time.

David Drake [00:27:35]:
Can I can we put it up there? I said, sure. Great. And, you know, and and did some other things for him to really personalize that experience, and it was just he was so moved by this whole thing. But then the next day, I got so much grief from the building church that, how much? You put his objects on the altar. No. And I said, that's for I said, that's that's that's the exact purpose of an altar. Right? This is the perfect use of an altar. I mean, just to put the the things that are sacred to him as he's saying goodbye to his, and so his wife.

David Drake [00:28:11]:
And, so I think a lot of our identity work is would is again, like, for him, he was spreading the bag of all these things that had been about her and them for, like, 65 years. I mean Yeah. And and spreading them out. And then he got to decide what got to go on the tape on the altar, how he wanted to speak to and there's really, like, 4 or 5 things. How he wanted to speak to them and what parts of her he wanted to bring forward out of many. You know, after that many years of being married, he knew her quite well. And so what about that felt important? So he's almost like consolating an identity for her in dying. And so that he because he wants to really cherish certain pieces to to carry with him in his heart as he moved forward with his own life.

David Drake [00:29:01]:
And, and so I think that's what many of us are doing is we're in especially in the second half of our life, and these young women are they're good on them. They're getting an early start, saving themselves lots of misery.

Kathy Washburn [00:29:13]:
Right? That's what I thought. And there's, there's so many practices that you introduced, in both the narrative release, the ID program, the narrative coaching? Because I I don't think it's easy for people to to dump that bag out or understand what is sacred. It's almost deer in the headlights. Yeah. What do you desire, or what what is sacred to you? And one of the most profound ones for me was the it was a map where you invited us to write down all the places that we've lived. Mhmm. Will you will you explain that? Because I don't think I'll do do a very good job, and having you in front of me is a little intimidating.

David Drake [00:30:08]:
Alright. I can just, like sorry to be intimidating. Is that my intent?

Kathy Washburn [00:30:14]:
No. No. No. That's just because I hold you I hold you at such high regard.

David Drake [00:30:18]:
No. Thank you. So, humans are social animals. As much as we like to feel like we're free to just move, and we don't, you know, pay a lot of attention. But so we just ask when I do this physically in a room with the old retreats, we we would make the the globe the floor, and we'd sort of mark out points. I have I'd have little cards with here's San Francisco, and here's London, and here's, you know, Beijing or something. So people kinda orient themselves, and then we have people go to the map on the floor, and stand where they were born. And and then in that, say, we just invite them to feel what was it like to be born there, and what do you remember about that, and how did that shape who you think you are.

David Drake [00:31:04]:
And and then we give them some time. They take some notes, and then we say usually, I I do this, like, in either 5 minute 5 year increments or I just say, what was the next significant move in your life? And then people go. And then, you know, never do they all end up in the same place because we're doing a, you know, retreat in the city. But and then but we ask them to as they're walking to, from one place to the next, what led you to leave? And as you stand there for as long as you need and we have people that's, like, bursting into tears. Like, oh, I realize. I was only 5, but I I loved my house, and they moved nobody told me we're moving. I and, and so there's this, all these parts of our self that got left behind.

Kathy Washburn [00:31:53]:
Mhmm.

David Drake [00:31:54]:
Because and and, you know, and, but then to feel what it's like to leave and why they left and then to walk with great intention and consciousness. What are you noticing about your identity and your sense of self and your state as you move. And, like, where's the energy? Is it pulling you back? Is it propelling you forward? Is it wishing you could be over here instead? And then, you know, and then as they get close to wherever they move next, what's it like to almost arrive? How does it feel to arrive now and stand there? Turn around, and look back where you came from? But he knows and then people like, woah. Because because, again, we're somatic, physic you know, physical, embodied, social, land based creatures, right, have millions of years of heredity in this. And so, of course, we are very sensitive to space if we stop to look. And so we just get people to do that until they arrive where they live now. And for many people, even though they've thought about these different places to feel themselves moving and recognize what they left behind, what they gained, what they lost, what changed, decisions they made, decisions that were made for them. And they start to realize all the different things that and experiences that led into how they see themselves now and who they think they are.

David Drake [00:33:15]:
And, what many people and last thing I'll say is what many people discover is a move that was more disruptive than they remembered, particularly if it came in an inopportune time in their development, or wasn't handled well or didn't end well for them, they realize that oftentimes they that there's they've left a lot behind, and there's scar tissue there, and there's things that they've kind of sort of sealed over that are going back to your bag metaphor. I need to bring that city and that house and that relationship or that whatever, and I need to put on the table. I need to figure out what I wanna do with that now. Mhmm. And it's why in, like, in our work, we don't set goals very often because the person who's gonna set the goal is not the person who's gonna complete the goal. Otherwise, they would have already done that. And you don't really know of, what something means or is gonna be like until you do it. And so, yeah, many of us would ex you know, there's many well, I don't know anybody that doesn't have things in their life that they wish hadn't happened.

David Drake [00:34:23]:
And in the end, to not take away from whatever that cause that was, adverse for us, they also become our greatest gifts. Like, I think about tragedies and traumas in my life that, you know, I spent so much time being outraged at and, ashamed of and all kinds of things, which is it's fine. It's a we're it's a human process that we're in. And I I don't know that I would be who I am and what I do if I hadn't had that. If I had followed the that one of my first moves took me in a direction that, Papa would have made a nice life and, a good career, and I would be a fraction of who I am now. And it wasn't always easy to get here. There's parts, but, yes, I wish I could do over. But I, life life life is what it is.

David Drake [00:35:17]:
And the, you know, the bottom line in our work is all of our attention. And my friend Caroline and I, we've trivialized it's all about returning to situate again and again and again. Mhmm. Every moment of time. And, being cognizant of how we got there, but it's all going back

Kathy Washburn [00:35:33]:
to the beginning again and again. Mhmm.

David Drake [00:35:35]:
Who do I choose to be now, and what am

Kathy Washburn [00:35:37]:
I bringing with me, and what am I not bringing with me, and who

David Drake [00:35:40]:
do who gets to play with me and who doesn't? And yeah.

Kathy Washburn [00:35:44]:
Yes. You're and the and the revelatory, work that you do, that was one of the biggest gifts is walking away with some grace of all that came before Mhmm. And really embracing and realizing how that has shaped Yeah. Who I am.

David Drake [00:36:05]:
Yeah, man. And you were one of our early adopters because you went on this massive road trip.

Kathy Washburn [00:36:10]:
Yes. My The

David Drake [00:36:11]:
same Western health care.

Kathy Washburn [00:36:13]:
Yes. And what turned out as my son clearly articulated it from the day day 1. Mom, that sounds like you're on an eat, pray, love tour. Nicked it. It took me a year to figure that out by getting it from the very beginning. Yeah. Well, good for him. But what you know, a lot of what brings, people into this work can sometimes be considered a rite of passage.

Kathy Washburn [00:36:40]:
Right? Yeah. It's something that either happens to them or is happening with them. Can you talk a little bit about rites of passage and how that's changed kind of over time and maybe even where coaching might fit in with that?

David Drake [00:37:03]:
Yeah. So my first degree was in sociology. Wasn't that useful for a career, but fundamental to what I do now. And one of again, I I I always have this capacity to, with love, look for what's missing. And now this is scarcity thinking or, you know, judging. It's just like I noticed in coaching from day 1, people were obsessed by the individual as if their psychology was the only factor in what they were dealing with. And I realized we, didn't take into account any sort of social dimensions of the social narratives in from which they came and the social narratives to which they return. And a lot of in the beginning, particularly, almost all of coaching was white privileged people.

Kathy Washburn [00:37:51]:
Mhmm.

David Drake [00:37:52]:
And, you know, thankfully, that's different now. And we're starting to see there's many realities, and there's many ways of living. There's many perspectives. And but, the rights of passage is really helpful because it comes out of anthropology and, looking at sort of more traditional cultures, Aboriginal indigenous cultures in particular, but even before that in in some western cultures where they recognize that your identity was very much a function of the collective. And so many religions have some of these traditions and, and cultures have these traditions where when, like, a boy is on the cusp of becoming a man or girls and women or in, like, in the Mexican culture, they have a a tradition around when a girl turns 15. And it's a it's a rite of passage. Right? So the and it's a recognition that, you're leaving one role in your community and taking on a new one. But, and I was reading about this yesterday about how one of the challenges of growing is that we're we we're constantly being we've become an expert at being this, and then we have to bam.

David Drake [00:39:08]:
That's gone. We have to be become a beginner again. Right? And, so the rites of passage are basically, taking you from the outer world in which you are now. I'm a boy. Right?

Kathy Washburn [00:39:19]:
I've been all things about being

David Drake [00:39:20]:
a boy or a girl. Drop you into a a a collective experience in the more sacred space and put you through rituals, through rites, through ordeals, through celebrations, through acknowledgments, whatever, taking away some of the, you know, the the the elements of what you left behind and but then reincorporating you back into the community in this new space. And so for me, again, a lot of the work in coaching is that we don't take into account enough of where people came from because we're told that's therapy, which is garbage to me. But and so we don't have any appreciation for what they're leaving. We're just, like, trying to make something magical happen and then send them off. But even more so, we don't pay enough attention to what they are facing when they go home. So in our model, it's around sustained, which and and this work I'm doing with Aveda and others, the vast majority of change that actually sticks is done in sustained, not in the coaching session. And the coaching session just catalyzes something or reveals something.

David Drake [00:40:34]:
In our in our world of narrative coaching, we experiment with some things. But, ultimately, they need to take those first steps just like when you were a child learning how to walk. That's where the real coaching happens, and that's why I created ID to kind of make that happen. And so we live now in a time when everything is commercialized and everything is monetized and everything is labeled and everything is every. And so these, like, embedded cultural, iconic processes of rights are are just not present as much anymore Mhmm. Outside of certain ethnic communities or in certain cultures. But and what it means is that we're on this endless hamster wheel of life and just going round and around, then we fall off, but we get not quite sure where to get back on. And, you know, we use the image in the class about, helping people realize that even though they might be enjoying their horse or riding, it's on a carousel.

David Drake [00:41:28]:
It's going in circles.

Kathy Washburn [00:41:29]:
Oh, wow. Oh, wow.

David Drake [00:41:30]:
Look at that. And, and and and as practitioners, we get caught up in fads and, oh, well, this year, the in color is pink, so we're all gonna paint our horses pink. So we so people will choose our carousel. But we're all in carousels. We're all in these sort of states of delusion or illusion or whatever. And part of our job is to free the horses to go run and play with each other

Kathy Washburn [00:41:54]:
and be free.

David Drake [00:41:55]:
And, and so the rite of passage for me is creating these, again, the the need for, new ways of thinking about and describing ourselves as practitioners who can be in a sacred space with people, see what shows up, see what they're actually ready for, see what they actually need, and bring bring that into the mix. And for me, that's very much a crucible, very much like in a rite of passage so that people have some scaffolding coming in, scaffolding while they're being while they're processing and scaffolding while they go back out, and scaffolding to integrate that back into their life. And so all that process can be contained in the work if we free ourself from, like, you you would know this because you're in class, but the most common advice I would give narrative coaches is please stop coaching.

Kathy Washburn [00:42:49]:
Mhmm.

David Drake [00:42:49]:
Because you're missing most of what's actually happening, because you're trying so hard to be a good coach. And that's not really what the person's looking for, and that's not what, seems to be happening. And if you were just to relax a bit and not worried about so much yourself, you might actually see what they actually need from this moment in time, which is probably not coaching.

Kathy Washburn [00:43:14]:
It's been such a such a paradigm shift for me, your work, and it was immediate. I think you invited us to practice on current clients. And I just remember feeling like, wow. I feel really guilty that I've been monopolizing this person's time and ability when really for them to have that internalization, what's happening inside, and just kinda throw it up and be seen and heard in a sacred space. And even just speaking the words that they spoke so that they can hear it in their own ears. Yeah. And then that was that was the breakthrough that they could then go out, you know, try to externalize it in some way. Mhmm.

Kathy Washburn [00:44:13]:
And then practice, like, okay. How are we gonna do that out here?

David Drake [00:44:18]:
Yeah.

Kathy Washburn [00:44:18]:
You have this beautiful and I again, your slides and your imagery, they just get super sticky. Yeah. You have this Mobius Yep. Mhmm. Mobius strip Mhmm. Which made so much sense to me because the left hand side is that capability of ourselves, like this identity and and the stories that we're telling ourselves. And then you start going out into the world Yeah. And how that changes.

Kathy Washburn [00:44:48]:
And if if that's scary or if you get shut down, you come back over to the left, and you're smaller. Yeah. But if you can experience it and that's a little bigger, then you come back a little bigger. It's this beautiful imagery of what's possible when you're in a place, when you're actually going through a rite of passage and somebody's holding that sacred space

David Drake [00:45:16]:
Yeah.

Kathy Washburn [00:45:17]:
For you, which I as you said, those places don't occur anymore. We just stay on the on the merry-go-round and keep spinning, wanting to to run free Yeah. But having no idea how to undo ourselves.

David Drake [00:45:37]:
Yeah. But and what comes up for me and what you're saying, what I was hearing is, in many ways, our primary role is to serve as a loving mirror.

Kathy Washburn [00:45:45]:
And A mirror. Yes.

David Drake [00:45:46]:
Yeah. A loving mirror to see can this person see themselves? And if not, that's our first order to help them see and hear themselves. But now that you see yourself, what do you notice about that, and what would you like to do about that? And, but so much is just witnessing what's happening for them, kind of right in front of us. But yeah. And and so so much of it is that we don't have any safe places to practice or to try things out. And and, you know, I think, you know, even it's like a simple grievance from rightful grievance for many for many women of men who get caught up in mansplaining all the time. But if you don't know how else to be in the world, right, and that's you don't mean necessarily to do that, but that's how you just are ingrained. That's who you think you are and how men are supposed to be.

David Drake [00:46:39]:
And you're not even aware you're even doing it. Or even if you are, like, what's the point? Of course. Well, I'm being helpful. Right? You know? But but then so then but then if they go out and, like, try to speak to that in a workshop, then they get shut down. And, again, rightfully so. And then they but they're not mature enough to hear that yet. So then they kinda retreat, and then and so then we we're just mirroring them the whole way. Like, I noticed that you you pulled way back.

David Drake [00:47:06]:
So what's happening now? Well, I feel judged. Now can you imagine how others might feel about that? And so no. Oh, great. So now now we so we you're just, like, moving the mirror around. What can they what can they see now or experience now or experiment with now in a safe place to actually because, for example, if you just said them, stop mansplaining. And even if somebody said, yes. I will do that. Then they're sitting in the meeting like, well, what am I supposed to do now? That's all I know how to do, or that's how I got my validation, or that's how my identity was affirmed, or I felt good about myself because I was really smart and I was being helpful.

David Drake [00:47:44]:
And, and so then going back to all the way back to Robert Bly's bag. So what else is in your bag that's hidden because you're so busy mansplaining everything? And what what if you didn't have to mansplaining? And so then we would create experience of them. So, I'm waiting to sit in this conversation for 5 minutes and not say anything and just listen. And you watch them fit they're, like, fidgeting, and oh my god. Great. So so your addiction to mansplaining is just really a function of your discomfort because you don't know what else to to do. And you're worried that you won't have any value, and people will overlook you. And, and so great.

David Drake [00:48:20]:
So now can now imagine how some people who are mansplained might feel. Oh, crap. They probably feel the same way. Ah, so everybody's now in this system where nobody's really very, you know, happy or, fulfilled. And and so the Mobius the the developmental threshold zone is really just trying to expand the capacity to be aware of yourself, aware of how you're showing up, what are you willing to try in that space, coming back and reflecting that, what does that say about yourself? And like you said, how did myself get bigger? Like, what if I could just be a man and just sit there and listen? Oh, well, I know. And then they they hyperventilate. What did what he noticed about that? Well, it was better, but then I was self conscious. So then I pulled right.

David Drake [00:49:02]:
So now what how would you have to grow yourself to not hyperventilate? Oh, well and so then you could just sort of see this growing, and then we're just following them. What do they need next? An awareness of themself, awareness of their action, to get to a place where they're, may not always be ridden of man's planning, but they become aware of it as it's happening. Yeah.

Kathy Washburn [00:49:26]:
Yeah. And I love this idea of the Mobius because it it speaks to what you said at the very beginning. It's our identity is always in motion. It's not just Yeah. Thing, and it it's this internalization, externalization, exterior, and it has to move when you hold it in place. It just feels icky when you're when you're frozen in that version.

David Drake [00:49:54]:
Well, I was telling the 5 year old skier story in class this week.

Kathy Washburn [00:49:58]:
I love that one. That's a favorite.

David Drake [00:50:00]:
It's my it is my favorite slide, I think, of that. But, I was just showing the story about a friend from way back in my earlier in my life who had never skied and went skiing for 3 days and was when I asked him what it was like to learn how to ski and do it for the first time, he said it was great. I never fell down. And I said, well, you know, that's not the point of skiing. But I said to the class, I said, the reality is that, he, learned how not to fall down. He did not learn to ski. And, but that was important to him. His identity was 1.

David Drake [00:50:35]:
I can't make mistakes. His father was a very well known commander of a very large military base. And and, and so he was there was no room growing up in his identity. His bag was crammed full of tremendous fear of making mistakes. So, of course, the last thing he wants to do on a ski slope is make a miss in his view, a mistake even though the only way to learn is to make mistakes. And so I I tried a number of times to get him to not he he would just get into, like, a death grip snowplow and just go down the hill. And he he he never fell, but he also never skied.

Kathy Washburn [00:51:21]:
And You know, your this this skiing story, has played out in a number of ways in my life. I did not learn how to ski as a 5 year old where you just flowed with the go. Yeah. And when I came to Vermont, I met up with a woman, Miranda, who I met in your group. And she convinced me to take skiing lessons Mhmm. At, at this little hill called the Dartmouth Skiway. And the first I got into the group and, you know, they had us do a couple of things, and the guy said to me, oh, no. No.

Kathy Washburn [00:52:00]:
You go with that group. You know, you're fine. You can go. And I said, no. I I don't wanna go with that group. I wanna start from the beginning. I wanna relearn as if I've never learned before.

David Drake [00:52:12]:
Yeah.

Kathy Washburn [00:52:13]:
And he kinda looked at me funny, and I said, like, I know how to stand on skis and get to the bottom of a hill. I wanna actually enjoy skiing, so I wanna be a 5 year old.

David Drake [00:52:27]:
And Excellent.

Kathy Washburn [00:52:28]:
He did not know what to do with me. Everything that he did, he kept looking at me and say he said, you really should be with the other group. The next week I go up, he's not there. There's this older man. And, again, they start splitting us up, and he sends me and I said, I'm not going in that group. I really wanna learn how to ski. And he said, oh, actually, you wanna unlearn. Yes.

Kathy Washburn [00:52:51]:
I've learned. And I said, yes. That's exactly what I wanna do. And he took me from the very beginning. Oh, wow. It was so extraordinary. And then he disappeared, and I kept getting thrown into this group. And then finally, I said, I'm gonna do cross country.

Kathy Washburn [00:53:10]:
I just but I was such a stressed skier. I did not enjoy one second of it, and both of my sons were competitive snowboarders. I wanted to ski. I wanted to be with them, but learning to professionally snowplow, you know, makes my whole body was just if I did fall, I think I would have broke everything because I was so rigid.

David Drake [00:53:36]:
Yeah. When you think about, like, in, training and organization. So people are at work. They're bringing their professional identities to the workshop, which includes, I don't wanna look bad in front of my peers. I wanna get promoted so I gotta I gotta show off and look good to my boss. I gotta just do this well. But they sort of play they play training. But, so they don't they don't really expose their actual self for the most part.

Kathy Washburn [00:54:03]:
The part that and that

David Drake [00:54:04]:
would like you, I wanna go back to the core and start from the beginning, and I wanna be changed by this so I can enjoy skiing. Well, people in companies can't take that risk mostly. It's too politically liable for them. Mhmm. And then secondly, even if they did, then they they've gotta go back to the same workplace and be a different person. But all the narratives that are coming at them the minute they leave that room are all about expecting to be their old self. So there might be a little bit of uptick for a while from a training, then mostly it kinda dies back down again because they're not actually bringing their learn their it's it's like that we wanna send all of our trainees into the other group you didn't wanna go to with the pretension that we actually know how to do some of these things. Right? You want to go back to the as we as needs to happen to make big changes, we need to go back to that 5 year old self who is raw and more open to learn or unlearn.

David Drake [00:54:59]:
And, yeah.

Kathy Washburn [00:55:02]:
That's another quote that I always attribute to you. I know it it wasn't your original quote. I think it was somebody in work for GM or something. But it's really hard. GE. Yeah. Yeah. Really hard to be a changed person in an unchanged environment.

Kathy Washburn [00:55:18]:
Yeah. So how do you make your trainings different?

David Drake [00:55:24]:
So when I can when I have a client who's courageous enough to use ID, we, we don't we don't teach them hardly anything in programs. We don't we, tend to work on actual actions, activities, decisions, that are part of their daily job, and they work on them together. And and we basically teach them a lot of mind mindfulness awareness skills. Like, what do you notice about the process you guys created for yourself? What do you know about the people that you serve? What do you notice about yourself and each other? And and then most importantly, what would have to be different for you to be at your best more often? And so people are cocreating their environment while they're developing themselves. And so if we ever do training of any kind, it's when they've decided they need this, but they're now well down the road of working on something.

Kathy Washburn [00:56:21]:
Mhmm.

David Drake [00:56:22]:
Our first response is, what do you already know about this? And which they actually know more than they realize they know. They just don't have the courage to use it yet. Who else around you is really good at this? And then if worst comes to worst, I can teach them something, but that's always the last resort for me because I want them to create a learning community for themselves. But what we find is that, in most organizations, in the end, on these bigger projects, maybe half the people involved can do this. The rest, like, are are like their 1st ski instructor. They play like they're getting this, but, or they don't play at all because they wanna be told what to do. They wanna just play workshop as opposed to actually doing their real work on themselves and with each other. And so, I was on a call right before this.

David Drake [00:57:11]:
I was sharing, really, my fundamental mission now is to create new categories of practitioners who can help people get what they need in real time and, and have have status recognition, naming for that so that clients know how to hire us. Right now, those of us who are pioneers like yourself or myself and and others, we can go by virtue of who we are, but we it's hard to, and to make our way into other environments that are not quite ready for that. But, ultimately, if we're gonna survive as a species and as a planet, we've got to find, better ways to develop ourselves. And we don't need that for, we need to be,

Kathy Washburn [00:58:00]:
a lot we have

David Drake [00:58:01]:
to you need to have a lot more of those beginner ski schools. Yeah. Where we're allowed to be 5 and make lots of mistakes and fold out a lot and and recognize that's an an essential integral part of learning and growth. And there are there are no mistakes. There's just outcomes we don't like.

Kathy Washburn [00:58:23]:
That t that have teaching, you know, those Exactly. Moments. Yeah. And the the other thing that I think you do so well is, you know, there's so and I know you're a you're a doctor and scientist and researcher. You you have this knowledge that you're able to articulate in a way that is accessible Yeah. To those people who are not in the in the research world. I often say I give science legs, which I take what you've done Yeah. And I help people, access it because it should be accessible by everybody for for us not to understand we have a bag of sacred parts

David Drake [00:59:16]:
of my shoulder hurts so much. Now I know it was this 50 pound bag I've been dragging around for 40 years. Right?

Kathy Washburn [00:59:21]:
Right. And that was the face. I remember there had to have been 40 people on that call if if there were not more. And I just every single one of us, I'm looking around at the squares, and everybody was just, wow. Wow. That's that's what I'm doing? Yeah. And just that broken opening that allows somebody to access something inside of themselves and realize they're they have some agency to do something about it. Such a gift.

Kathy Washburn [00:59:56]:
Yeah. Thank you. And I'm I'm learning something from this too.

David Drake [00:59:59]:
I I'm we're in the middle of reformatting all of the work into these smaller blocks, and, I organized them by topic. But I think now after this call, I'm gonna organize them by sort of, like, message.

Kathy Washburn [01:00:17]:
Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you. That's, I'm I'm seeing this now

David Drake [01:00:23]:
as a better way to organize this. So, otherwise, people may be more prone to go back into old mindset thinking around, teaching, and I've gotta now learn this content. But if I just put it on message, then which is what I think I do it when I teach, but we can just put all the slides in, in service of, grounding or providing a foundation for that message. So I'm thinking what was coming to mind in this was, you know, that this the distinction in that one slide between the guy carrying the 80 pound backpack up the hill and the young girl with, like, the 5 pound knapsack. Yeah. Yeah. You can yeah. Yeah.

David Drake [01:01:01]:
Those are choices. Pick 1.

Kathy Washburn [01:01:03]:
Right.

David Drake [01:01:04]:
They're both available to you.

Kathy Washburn [01:01:05]:
Right? And you'll probably get to the top of the hill eventually, but one will be so much easier to carry. Yeah. Yes. That's what you've offered me, just that lightness, and I'm so grateful. Thank you, David. I I feel like there needs to be another another call schedule to dive into something else.

David Drake [01:01:26]:
But, well, I would

Kathy Washburn [01:01:27]:
be happy to come back. Mhmm. Yeah. I'm so grateful for your work. I I always end my podcast with this question, and I did send it to you before. If I were to crush your essence up and put it in pill form, what effect would you have on someone taking that pill?

David Drake [01:01:51]:
I go back to, a poem my daughter wrote about me once. She just marveled at my kindness, and I'm not always that way. I'm not that evolved yet, but, I think my appeal would be, being kinder to ourselves and, and therefore, being kinder to others. Yeah.

Kathy Washburn [01:02:15]:
I've taken that pill. Yeah. And I know a lot of other people have, and the circle of influence that you have, I just marvel at. We all learn the same things, but we're all teaching it in different populations, and you have changed so many people's lives. I hope you can see that that huge map of your influence. And your ears must ring constantly. I can't even imagine. You must have that what do they call that tingling in your ear if you have it? Tinnitus.

Kathy Washburn [01:02:51]:
Tinnitus. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for your work, and thank you so much for your gift of time.

David Drake [01:02:59]:
You're most welcome, Kathy. Yeah. And reach out, and let's do this again sometime, and we'll, yeah. But for now, thank you.

Kathy Washburn [01:03:07]:
Thank you, and good luck with the move to Amsterdam. Thank you. Okay. I'm gonna stop the how do I do this? The recording.