No Permission Necessary
No Permission Necessary is the podcast redefining success by putting mental wellness, personal growth, and authenticity first. Hosted by behavioral health specialists Molly Bierman and Jill Griffin, each episode offers honest conversations and real strategies to help you thrive without sacrificing who you are.
No Permission Necessary
Where Healing Begins with Dr. Sheila Shilati
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In this episode of No Permission Necessary, hosts Molly Bierman and Jill Griffin sit down with clinical psychologist and recovery expert Dr. Sheila Shilati for a thoughtful conversation about what it truly means to support people through recovery and life’s more complicated seasons.
Dr. Shilati shares honest insights into the work of assisting people through hardship, transformation, and recovery based on decades of experience. They explore how perspective, cultural awareness, and steady presence shape the way we show up for others, along with the emotional realities of burnout, caregiving, and leading in environments where people are deeply vulnerable.
Through stories, reflection, and grounded wisdom, this episode serves as a reminder that healing develops gradually through moments of genuine care, connection, and intention.
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No Permission Necessary is produced by Taylor LaPointe
Narcissism is a defense mechanism against your own developmental harm, right? So it's developed. It's developed through a way of protecting you from feelings and harm and hurt. And so it's not by accident that a lot of narcissists come from households where either there was a great deal of neglect, there was a great deal of harm, there was a great deal of authoritarian parenting style and just a complete lack of that person, you know, being able to connect in a safe way. So narcissism, like other personality characteristics, becomes this, you know, developing, you know, part of ourselves that allows us to move through life without the fear of harm, emotional or otherwise.
SPEAKER_06Welcome to No Permission Necessary, the podcast that empowers you to prioritize mental health, personal growth, and authentic leadership.
SPEAKER_03I'm Jill Griffin.
SPEAKER_06And I'm Molly Beerman. We're here to help you thrive professionally and personally without ever asking permission to put yourself first.
SPEAKER_03Let's get started.
SPEAKER_05We are so happy to have Dr. Sheila Shilati join us today on the podcast. She is the proud partner at the Malone Collective with Mike Malone in Santa Monica. Her career as an executive owner and consultant has spanned two successful decades with the help of antidepressants and more recently, hormone replacement therapy. As a member of the queer community, she is a fierce advocate of anything in drag, and she uses her life experience as both a cautionary tale and a wisdom for living a full life. Her motto is I keep coming back and back and back and back. We are so happy that you're tuning into this episode. I know you're gonna love it.
SPEAKER_06We're back, guys. We've got Sheila Shilati on today. And guys, we tried to record this episode last week, and it the universe was not on our side. So we're back.
SPEAKER_05Mercury was still in retrograde. Was it? Oh, that explains. I'm just gonna blame it on that. Yeah. Yeah, it was that. Absolutely. But this has been a long time coming. Like we were talking about it was August when we were in California.
SPEAKER_02August or yeah, I think so, right? August or September. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And yeah, maybe somewhere. Maybe September. Maybe September. But we and Sheila and I met at this dinner and we talked about books, which I love. And somehow we started a book club. We started our own book club. And Molly. Yeah, Molly was an unsuspecting victim of the book club.
SPEAKER_06Guys, I'm just gonna let you know. So it is hard for me to read. Okay. So I usually listen to books on Audible. I listen to books on Audible because it's hard for me. I don't know. I feel like there's a potential. Maybe I'm dyslexic in some fashion. Okay. But I don't know. What I do know is that when I read aloud and read at the same time, I mean it's easier for me to process, which I guess makes sense why audibles are much more easily.
SPEAKER_05Maybe that's just how you process. Maybe you process through your auditory senses better.
SPEAKER_06And maybe. But what I know is that I don't I I purchased a Kindle peer pressure from Sheila and Jill because I had to be a part of this book club because I couldn't tell them no. And so I purchased a Kindle and I purchased this book that we're gonna get into a little bit about. And I cannot explain the level of not discomfort I had reading the book. It was just I don't tend to read things that I work in in every day, in the everyday, if that makes sense. So when you work in behavioral health, you hear a lot about the isms and what that means is alcoholism, sex addiction, gambling addiction, mental health crisis. Like that's probably not my go-to to unwind. And so now I'm reading through someone's journey.
SPEAKER_05Train wreck. Train wreck. Let's call it what it is.
SPEAKER_06Dumpster fire of a life with someone who's an active addiction, and I could not be less enthusiastic. Okay.
SPEAKER_02And so I feel like we're gonna have to make reparations for this, Joe. I just feel the sense of.
SPEAKER_06Or let's just find another. Listen, I'm I'm here, I'm committed to the book club. Okay. This was our first, this was our first pass. We will recover. But Sheila, why don't you share a little bit about the book that we read and what the desire of the topic was?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Uh you know, so I've never read Elizabeth Gilbert. I knew of her from Eat Pray Love, and of course, kind of like the blockbuster film that came out. And so there was a New York Times article that came out from a literary journalist that basically ripped into it and described it as just kind of this self, you know, grandizing experience of this woman and just kind of the vomit, you know, the the vomiting that goes on and and over the overarching kind of lack of kind of any real uh, you know, listen, I'm not a I'm not a little literary person, and I can't, I, you know, to qualify what is or isn't good literature, I'm probably not the best individual. Uh it was kind of like when I used to drink and they'd like bring the wine and be like, here, this is wherever. And then, you know, you take a sip and you're like, is it is it good or bad? I don't know. It's just drinkable. Uh so she's gonna get me there. Right, it'll get it.
SPEAKER_05I mean, that's the same I'm looking for in a book. Like, is it going to take me out of myself and I'm gonna like get into the story? That's what I'm looking for.
SPEAKER_02Exactly, right? And is it compelling enough? So the the part that really struck me was the whole premise of the book was around Elizabeth Gilbert's experience with her lover, who was also an addict, and and her discovery of having uh been diagnosed with liver cancer. What was the most kind of pertinent part was the story emphasized kind of this as part of the journey how it became a rationalization for this woman's woman to go just full-blown back into her addiction and how Elizabeth kind of co-signed on that and what that looked like. And and and again, I hadn't read the book yet. So I found the fundamental question of what would you do if, just as somebody in recovery myself, if I knew I had a terminal diagnosis and would that, where would where would I land with it? And certainly her partner was not the first person to have that happen to them. Um, but really just kind of all these contextual and confounding pieces with it that I posed the question to Jill when we were kind of chatting. I'm like, you know, that's a fucking like really interesting just kind of dialogue around like what would you do and why would you do it? And now here she is writing about it. And it it sparked enough of my curiosity to go, Jill, what do you think? Should we read this? Should we have a one-month, you know, kind of epilogue of it and come back and and see what we think? Uh, and that's kind of what kind of sparked it. So the book itself is about kind of her experience with sex and love addiction, her experience with her lover going through this kind of massive catastrophic relapse, how they kind of both came out of it, the lessons she learned, and and um, you know, and to your point, Molly, it was hard to read because I'm like, yeah, I deal with this shit every day. Everyone who walks through our doors, I'm like, yep, you know, like we get it. So what are we gonna do to heal with it? So here we are.
SPEAKER_05You're welcome. I also think it was hard to take off for me the different hats we wear, right? Because somebody who's not an addict or an alcoholic in recovery, they may read this book and be fascinated in a different way, right?
SPEAKER_01Totally.
SPEAKER_05For me, I'm like, I definitely identify with her lover, Raya. Like, that would be me in this book. I wouldn't Elizabeth Gilbert is not me at all. I don't identify with that. That's that's not me. But I will take someone hostage and bleed them dry of all their resources. That is much more my style, and my history proves that when I'm actively using, right? So, like it was hard to take that part of it off because I'm like, oh, I can totally see this happening actually. And then, but it I'm so far removed from active addiction that it's like, oh, like, I don't know. Like, if I had cancer, would that be the moment where I'm like, maybe I stop now? Not not I restart, like, especially now that I'm in sobriety. I'm like, I can't imagine. But then also taking off my therapist hat was also hard because I kept thinking about all these different intervention points and what the family was thinking. And honestly, that just sums up my problem with the entire book is that it I had to really struggle through picking it up every time I would put it down again. Cause I'm like, this is just making me think too much. Like this is not, this is not relaxing. This is not I feel stressed out when I'm reading this, honestly.
SPEAKER_06Well, I also feel like it captures, and this is when I started generating some questions for you know, for this episode, what it really captures is this ache for connection and loneliness. I mean, there was such this her not feeling connected to her Elizabeth is who I'm speaking about, not Raya, but you know, her not feeling connected to her basically entire life. I mean, she's built such a robust life. And then to be able to sacrifice all of those parts of yourself. I mean, I remember writing an essay in college about how you get into a relationship and the parts of the parts of yourself that you're attracted to are to each other essentially are the first things that are sacrificed in some ways to keep the relationship going. Like, oh, I really like have strong ties to my family or strong ties to my friend group or strong ties to whatever, a a club sport or a hobby. And then all of a sudden you're like, oh, but I don't really have time for that now because I'm in a relationship, right? So these things start to become sacrificed when really those are the parts of each individual that were attractive to begin with, of why you were attracted to the relationship and why you were attracted to one another. And so it was mind-blowing to me how quickly, and look, I have been in recovery a very long time, and so maybe it's hard for me to wrap my head around that, like Jill said, but it was mind-blowing to me at how quickly someone who is not actively using the substances, really, like she had kind of played into it a little bit and partied a little bit with her, but someone who wasn't truly addicted to the substances got sucked in and really I I don't even have words. I mean, it was remarkable how quick that took place and how quick she was willing to sacrifice it all. I understand the grips of addiction in someone doing that when they're addicted to substances. I also have a hard time understanding the other side of it. And so maybe, Sheila, you can kind of speak to that a little bit in maybe what you've seen in your profession, in the people that you work with. What is that? You know, when we talk about codependency and we talk about, you know, sex and love addiction and we talk about all these things, like for for a consumer who doesn't really know anything about this type of space, what is that? What is that, you know, what is that disconnect for people?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, I think as um the lesbian, it's kind of like part of our roadmap to relationships.
SPEAKER_05Let's talk about that because we're not we're not familiar with that roadmap.
SPEAKER_06Right. Because I talked to another friend of mine after a meeting last week, and she she she was telling me, she was like, I'm reading this Elizabeth Gilbert book, and I was like, oh my God. I was like, how do you like it? She's like, I love it. I was like, Kelly, no, what you love the book? I said, why? She said, because this is like a rite of passage as a lesbian.
SPEAKER_05I said, okay, I know so we have different perspectives. All right. So tell us more about this, Sheila. We need to learn about this.
SPEAKER_02Listen, I don't know the genesis of it ultimately, but I do think there is just, I mean, I think the process of just kind of being in a marginalized pop population and working towards like what connection looks like, and the modeling for what connection is, is a bit skewed because, you know, we don't necessarily have as much accessibility or information or just, you know, two women together with our own kind of emotional, you know, it's emotional processes and and our needs and the nurturing and all that. So it kind of like it's a it's like a perfect setup to recreate kind of those depths of what we feel like we get from our partner. Now it happens in heterosexual relationships, but I think in like, you know, lesbian relationships, I feel like it gets there, there is a reason these jokes about us like getting you-hauls, like they're very true. I mean, I there at one point my mom's like, are you gonna move in with this one too? And I'm like, I don't know, you know, like we've been dating two weeks. So I think there is just kind of element of just kind of the coupling and the part of like, okay, this is my person. I need to rely on it. To me, part of it felt age-related because like I think it's just also a demonstration of what we know about ourselves and relationships and differentiating and who we identify as, and kind of this experiment of, well, if I find you, then you see me and I'm seen. So therefore, you're my world. And I think Elizabeth speaks to that, you know, particularly with Raya about how she kind of created Raya as the the god for her and what what Raya did or said created this element of who she thought she was supposed to be, or just even a feeling or a sense of safety. So some of that might be tied into like I think the LGBTQIA plus community, perhaps seeking safety. So when you find a place you feel seen and heard and taken care of, and that's just from kind of our own relational understanding. But codependency and what I call lovesickness and and meshment and all of these things, Elizabeth Gilbert, you know, referred to. What was interesting to me in the book for her was that I found it interesting that kind of she kind of came to these realizations a little bit later in life about her interrelation relational patterns, the sex and love addiction, the healing around it. And even this, I mean, I want to say she was what in her mid-40s, late 40s with this relationship with Raya. So to me, again, maybe because I've been doing my work for so long, maybe because I've been in the rooms, it just feels like a late-stage growth period.
SPEAKER_05But I also have questions about that because I never read Eat Pray Love. Or if I did, not memorable. But my understanding is that she left her first marriage for this guy in India. That was working. I never read or I don't know if she left him and went on this journey and then met somebody.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_05But either way, there was a it seemed like that that was celebrated, right? That was celebrated publicly. She made a lot of money off the book, off the movie, you know, this whole thing. So now she's married and and to the to her second husband, while she's carrying out this relationship with her best friend, I'm putting in quotations, turned into lover. And so the way she described it in the book is that people started kind of noticing that she's showing up to all these things and her husband's not around. So there's a question about like, hey, what about your husband? Like, that would be like if Molly and I, we just started doing all these things on our own and our spouses weren't coming to any of them. People would and we were just posting ourselves, but no, no husbands were around. There would be questions, and she's on public tours at this point. She's publicizing her book, she's going international things, TV appearances. So it's not like I don't, I don't know. Like I question, was there not anybody along the way who like said, hey, this seems a little off or chaotic? Or I mean Molly and I speak to that all the time. Like having people in your circle that are gonna call you on your shit, right? Is really important. And and I kind of question, because she doesn't talk about it in the book, but was there that per was there a person that was like there had to have been. There had to have been. But her not speaking about it in the book kind of is like, that's the annoying part to me.
SPEAKER_02Because it's like, is this or just I don't know. Or even just the part in the aspect because she didn't speak about her ex-husband out of respect. Not really. Right. Not a respect. But probably because he's like, what the fuck? Like this whole thing is cringesy. But for all we know, he may have spent two years like being like, What are you doing? And why, you know, and she may have been navigating this in a way that just kind of took Raya hostage and fed her with all of this, you know, the element of kind of, I don't know if it's just even the caretaking, but whatever the element of friendship was, there's a whole host of, yeah, there's a whole other half we don't know. And had we gathered that information might give us a different lens.
SPEAKER_05I just think that that now that we're talking about it, is what really bothered me about this. Is like she wants to kind of position it as this profound moment, like you said, this late stage. Oh, I'm a love and sex addict and I need to be in 12-step recovery. Yet the whole time you're kind of witnessing this thing, nowhere along this journey did you say, like, this is kind of a little messed up, like I'm obsessed with this person. Like, nowhere along this journey you questioned just giving somebody a house to live in. And I mean, she went a she went to these extremes. Yeah. Yeah. So, and to be clear, to be fair, right? I think the delusion of alcoholism and drug addiction is similar in the fact where I lived certain a certain way for a long time, not thinking there was any problem with it, right? Where other people around me were kind of saying, something's wrong. So I do also identify get uh with with that disconnect.
SPEAKER_02But it's also if you don't receive any consequences for your actions up until that point, it's only, you know, allows you to keep doing what you're doing. And she strikes me as someone that was high functioning enough. And wasn't so messy that other people may not have noticed because that there is kind of a thin line between sex and love addiction, I think, and this element of it all kind of can m meld together codependency, self and love addiction, but also just how we as a society view like what are the rules of like dating and being with somebody. And it's not, I'm sure it's not uncommon. You may have friends that may be married or may have a partner, but like still yearn for other people or still have feelings or still get attracted, you know, and maybe they don't talk about it as much, or maybe they talk about it with you. But I think it's fairly easy because I feel like sex and love addiction, unlike alcoholism, which can be a lot more kind of outwardly and prevalent, but sex and love addiction can really take a very kind of concealed, you know, look to it. And you could probably hide it for much, much longer.
SPEAKER_06So when we talk about, you know, when we talk about the, you know, the need for intimacy and the need for connection and the sacrifices that people take to get to that, I think that's really what I would love people to understand a bit more. And what how does somebody create more of a healthy self so they're not desiring that?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. You know, listen, I don't think any of us are devoid about the desire to want to connect and what that means to us and how we relate to that and how we relate it to intimacy. And I think a well-evolved and matured point of view does really kind of look at the ways that we've done it in an unhealthy way. And we go, ooh, that's problematic, or someone shows us it's problematic, or your therapist helps you see where it's problematic, and you're working towards kind of healthier decision making, better friendships, better partnerships. But, you know, the thing I did appreciate, because I don't, I don't want to, you know, poo-poo on her book entirely, is that she did speak a lot to the relationship with God in the end and how that really shaped how she was thinking about her decision making and recovery. That, and I do think that that element on just the spiritual aspect, and we'll certainly we know how big it is in part of our own community, but I do think this kind of development for her and the integration of a power greater than herself that's outside of like the earthly pleasures and the earthly wants and needs, and this kind of way that we satisfy those empty parts of ourselves, you know, we don't know until we know. We don't think it's a bad decision until we're destructive in it. We don't realize, you know, uh unless there's a consequence. And having had my own consequences in fairly fucking dramatic fashion that, you know, has its own intrigue and salaciousness. Um, yeah, I could probably fall into that group fairly easily. And maybe I was one of the luckier ones that, you know, this shit happened to me. And, you know, by my early 30s, I was like, I better fucking do something about this. Otherwise, it's really gonna like, you know, it'll be another 20 years of wreckage. So, you know, I I do think that it's kind of like how the how-to. Part of it is like you can give the guidebook to anybody, but we until we go through what we don't know, what we don't want, it's like we're not gonna see the value of the better parts of it. Unfortunately.
SPEAKER_05Well, I also think, you know, when you look at, I can look at my own recovery, but also many other people's, like some people really need to crash and burn. I mean, I talk to a lot of families and clients, like, unfortunately, you might not have reached your bottom yet. I actually said that to somebody this week. This might not be your bottom. That's right. And we can't you can't take that away from somebody either, because that's the moment when somebody gets into their own recovery, right? Whether it's their mental health, whether it's her substance use. It's like, you don't know your limit until you get there. And that that part of the when she finally got to the point after she drained all of her resources, after her, you know, Raya's has relapsed. We have we're at the needle exchanges, we're we got drug dealers coming to the house. I mean, it the picture of chaos that she described after she started using again was like wow. This is tremendous. This has really, and I think Raya, well at least, you know what, Joe?
SPEAKER_02It's funny because Raya is that dating app for people that are like in entertainment. I think her name is Raya. Oh, Raya.
SPEAKER_04Oh, yeah, but Raya, appropriately so. Is is the is the dating app. Also didn't know that. Yeah, but I think it's Raya, right? Isn't it Ray? Raya? I don't know. I just I that's how I was saying it in my head. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02No, that's how I would think of it too. But I'm I I think it, I think I because I remember I looked this up once I was like, what's the correct pronunciation? And I think it was Raya. Raya.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, but Raya is a very who looked up, who looked up what these people look like. Okay. I I didn't. I certainly did. Definitely did. I certainly did. I was like, I need some context.
SPEAKER_02I need like, yeah, I need to know. I need to vision this in a way that's like, but yeah. No, or is it Raya? Yeah, Raya's a, yeah, it's a it's a hot dating app. Raya's the dating app. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Raya is characteristic. I didn't mean to interrupt you, but I was just I was like thinking.
SPEAKER_06But what do you say, what do you think when in terms of, and maybe both either of you could answer this, right? You're in a relationship, you're feeling excited, it's lustful, it's all the things, right? There's this desire to want to spend time and connect and do all the things. What would you say is a good takeaway for people who are either dating, have had issues dating, or are getting ready to date? Like, what's the difference between what someone would call chemistry versus what someone would call a compulsion? Because it felt very much that she had a compulsion with this person rather than I mean, chemistry was there, yes, but it became a compulsion. It became a compulsion.
SPEAKER_05They were friends for years before they ever crossed that barrier, too. So there is that. But I will, I mean, there are a whole bunch of studies around this that our chemistry actually changes as we fall in love with somebody. So that feeling of lust is actually chemically connected. The oxytocin, when you, you know, touch and hug somebody, all the love chemicals. And so when you first meet somebody, I don't know the exact time, maybe you do, Sheila, but there's a period of time when you feel the most connected, that excitement, that lust, that that feeling. And then over time it goes away. And I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, because I don't, I don't work with sex and love addicts, but I would imagine that people who are compelled more to that compulsion and that sex and love, they want to feel that. Just like we chase that first high when we get when we use that drug the first time, we always want that back. You'll never get it back. Except I think in sex and love addiction, you can recreate that with other people because it's new chemistry. So the other person's chemistry is is making your brain fire. But when you're in a long-term relationship, you don't get as excited, it's not the same. It just chemically will never be the same.
SPEAKER_06But that desire still exists, right? So I think a lot of times, even in relationships, I mean, you look at the divorce rate. I mean, it's astronomical. So I think there is still this desire for people in their relationships to feel something new, to feel that spark. So I'm not it, I think that that still exists. I mean, how many times?
SPEAKER_05But you have to work at that. And somebody who has sex and love addiction, they don't want to work at that. They want that cheap high. They want that, they want that. Sure.
SPEAKER_06That's we're here to learn from Sheila.
SPEAKER_02We're here to learn. Let me tell you how it is. Uh uh, yes. So it is that, right? I think, listen, let's be honest. Healthy relationships and and working in a healthy way in your life is like, it's boring. Like her related boring. It's boring. I have these sessions with my therapist, and she's like, How are you? I'm like, I'm bored. Mind you, if someone looked at my life, they'd be like, How? You have this and this and this, and you're doing that. And I think it is that internal, like, how do we surrender to that like boredom, if you will, or call it peace, that you're like, yeah, my life is not getting on it. Oh, this is what this is. I talked to my best girlfriend, and I'm like, and I'll text her out of just like humor, but be like, today, today's the day I'm gonna relapse. I just want you to know. So when you get the call, it's no big deal. And she's like, let me know how that turns out, you know? And I'm like, I need some. And and it's true because we know we know the consequence of that, and we get it. But yes, so that kind of innate spark and that innate feeling and the oxytocin, it's everything that hits the midbrain. Take that and then translate into like social media. How many of us fucking start? I had to put an app on my fucking phone because I'm like, I can't be on social media for more than like 15 minutes a day, and it does, it cuts me off, and then I have to make a choice. Do you want to continue in this black hole that's not serving you?
SPEAKER_05Or do you I do nine out of 10 times I still press the button? Fuck this. I'm an adult.
SPEAKER_02Yes, right, right. But at the end of the day, it's the consequence is not gonna be as catastrophic as you stepping out on your partner, you know. But yet But is everything that you see, right?
SPEAKER_06So even, you know, the reality TV shows, let's just let's right there, it it it hard stop at the reality TV shows because they have these what I understand are these like avid followers of these reality dating TV shows, right?
SPEAKER_01Yes.
SPEAKER_06And um Bachelor Nation, if you will. Okay. And that's what they call themselves. And so they do they they live in this.
SPEAKER_05They want to be part of the show. They they think they're living vicariously through the show.
SPEAKER_06But then I'm like, okay, maybe that's a healthier thing for people to be watching that versus acting it out in their own life, right? I mean, I don't know.
SPEAKER_02I listen, I mean, I think it's it is that kind of fine line between this experience of. I mean, listen, uh, this is a great example. I think just because before I was unhealed, my wife may say otherwise. She's like, hmm, tell me, tell them more about how you'll do your work. It's gradaceous. It varies. But before I really did the work and I was unhealed, I think my ability and my way of hypersexualizing everything was really accessible, was pretty rampant. It was just, it became this object of, you know, like the thoughtfulness wasn't behind it. It was just something my brain needed and something I had to kind of, and and uh, and many points along the way, getting to some really unhealthy, unreasonable, even like the chase of straight women became sport, right? And that's another topic for another day. But the idea and the experience of the seduction and the game playing and the and that hit of like finally you got what you wanted, and you're like, okay, that was good. Now where's my next high? You are kind of searching and this compulsion to search for that, you know. And so what's really dramatically changed, and that kind of shift is like, yes, I can still admit, I think it's healthy to admit, like you could still find other people attractive. You could still find and go, wow, they're really beautiful, or they're, you know, and but I think the difference is is that when you remove and you actively work on the removal of the fantasy around it, or what you think you need from them, or what you feel like you you're missing, because this person is going to fulfill that, or this relationship is going to fulfill that, then you've kind of transgressed into something that's a little bit healthier and you have awareness around it. Like I'm I'm somebody that even the mere thought of like sexualizing somebody feels like a boundary crossing that's unhealthy, you know, even though they don't know it and they may never and they'll never know it, but even that mere thought is like, ooh, it really is like is is terrifying. And if it ever were to come up, I go, whoa, what was that about? Like that was, you know, so but that took a lot of work, that took a lot of energy, that took a lot of therapy, that took a lot of being held accountable, working the steps, doing the things. So, you know, I think as a society, we propel fantasy as a way of an escape. And we go, it's okay. Oh, the hot bachelor, you know, or the batch, you know, and the and all of that. At the end of the day, the bachelor is a game of seduction, and we're enthralled with it. Romanticy is a game of seduction. It all feels very safe to be into because we're not acting out these elements. And I think there's a real truth to that. You know, I'm not an I'm not an expert per se on it, but I think it is kind of a an internal question of what does and doesn't feel safe when we're acting out emotionally, you know, and and we're trying to seek those those mid-brained hits.
SPEAKER_06Uh, you know, but I what does that mean for you as far as consequence? I mean, you shared that you know, some of your consequences we talk a lot about on this, you know, on this podcast. We talk a lot in general when you're working in the behavioral health space, that the consequences eventually have to outweigh the relief, right? And so what does that look like for you in whatever form you're able to share?
SPEAKER_02Or yeah, I mean, for me it was a really big professional consequence, you know, and one that I had managed to participate in my life in an unhealthy and and again, I think that's why I can relate to some of Elizabeth's experience. I think I was, I've always been kind of high functioning, I could conceal well, you know, it was hard to kind of gauge whether or not where my sickness landed. And I was able, I was able to easily move through things, um, either through charisma or or or manipulation or whatever it was, but I was able to control my narrative in a certain way so that it always kept me at a distance. And whatever lessons I thought I learned or spiritual awakenings were just kind of like thinly layered covers, you know, for my next act of harm. Right. And that's something that I it's really hard to come face to face with your own potential for harm when you think you're a good person. And and both can be true. You could be a really great person and you can also be really harmful. So for me, it finally took a consequence that required me to ask myself a very specific question, which was am I finally going to wake up and choose to make better choice, you know, choices and and and actually do the work that I needed to do? Or was I just could I have still kept doing what I was doing for another 10, 20 years and probably sure. But the public consequence and the public uh persona and the public self was now being challenged in a way that I couldn't escape if I was gonna continue doing what I'm doing. Right. So for me, it was financial consequences, it was professional consequences, it was relational consequences, it was a complete loss and a grief that I could not think my way out of. And that for me was my bottom. That for me was the spiritual two by four. And I had to move through that deliberately. And I think probably two years after that, I probably engaged in some really good self-destruction as a way of, and I think Elizabeth, again, Elizabeth alludes to that as well. She's like, I just, you know, I just took them off and needed to feed that need. So it it didn't happen right away. It took a real kind of process to then come back to and go, okay, all right, God, I I'm on, you know, I'm on my knees. What do I need to do? Like, tell me just, you know, tell me what I need to do, tell me what I need to surrender to, tell me, you know, because I don't have the answers and relying myself is incredibly uh poor choice of direction. And and it really allowed me to get humble, to remove ego, to take ownership, to have accountability. Um, I think I still kind of have narcissistic traits in certain ways, because I sometimes I feel like I have to in certain ways, but I'm it's so much more in check in relation to how I truly value the lessons and how I am still held accountable to those lessons.
SPEAKER_06What do you mean by narcissistic traits? Because I think this is a very hot topic right now. There is a lot of individuals who throw around my ex-boyfriend was a narcissist, my wife is has borderline personality disorder, this person has uh antisocial and antisocial personality disorder. So when you say narcissistic traits, I think there's a lot to share with listeners. So they have a because there's a lot of clickbait, right? So whenever people see, you know, a rabbit hole about someone talking about, you know, this I'll give paint a picture. Woman sobbing. It draws you in onto Instagram. You see her story talk about her her husband who had a narcissistic personality disorder and destroyed her life, right? Like that's a very viable clip that you would see on Instagram, on TikTok, on any social. So can you better explain to people what it means to have traits and how that actually is more common than uncommon?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, listen, it's right. I do think it's a very widely used term and something that may not be fully understood because I think where this kind of personality at, listen, narcissism is a defense mechanism against your own developmental harm, right? So it's developed. It's developed through a way of protecting you from feelings and harm and hurt. And so it's not by accident that a lot of narcissists come from households where either there was a great deal of neglect, there was a great deal of harm, there was a great deal of authoritarian parenting style and just a complete lack of that person, you know, uh being able to connect in a safe way. So narcissism, like other personality characteristics, becomes this um, you know, developing uh, you know, part of ourselves that allows us to move through life without the fear of harm, emotional or otherwise. So once you strengthen that muscle in In a way that now feeds a recurring narrative around you're a good person, you can't, you know, you can't do any wrong, you're great at these things, like your opinion is the most important, you're the most important person in the room. That it kind of distorts how you think about yourself because you didn't get a feedback mechanism growing up that properly like validated you in a healthy way and afforded you the ability to make mistakes in it to be okay, you know? And so the development of narcissism as a personality trait, you know, is one that keys into a removal, a disconnect from a lack of emotional integration. So that's why a real, do you truly, truly, truly know a narcissist or metanarcissist or assess a narcissist, there is a complete devoid of that is, and I think that's the key characteristic trait, you know, is that they may be able to feign or they may have learned to kind of learn social mores to pretend like they care. But at the end of the day, the reality is the only person, the only value system they have is within themselves. So when I talk about it on a personal level, when I go, but some of it is healthy, you know, because I work it on boards, I work in business arrangements, I work in interactions that may require me to be devoid of those feeling states, you know, because you're gonna, you know, because I have to make hard decisions. I have to, I may have deep empathy for certain things, but the narcissistic part goes, but this is now survival in this way. And if I'm not seen or perceived in this way, or don't have, you know, the perception of my ability to be effective in a room may shift and change. That's why you see a lot of high-powered individuals, um, executives, you know, people in primary uh, you know, kind of powerful positions generally will present with some level of kind of narcissism, you know, because it's almost a prerequisite to go into what are otherwise incredibly difficult interactions. And so there has to be a part of you that goes, yeah, I'm coming in to communicate in a way that's devoid of like, I'm not trying to go after your intent, you know, your emotional self. I'm trying to declare and and debate and inform you that this is what's right. And and that's just one slice of looking at how that can be informative, you know. But it's it's an interesting way that I've come to kind of redefine it within myself because I do feel very tapped into empathy and it enables me to have deep connection or what have you. But then there is this other kind of like, I think deep narcissistic way that I've grown up thinking I could do no wrong. And that was reinforced by my parents. So it just got recreated over and over again.
SPEAKER_05But you mentioned narcissistic traits. And I think I have had conversations with clients that will come in my office and say, Oh, I think I have this personality disorder. I looked it up online, and it's like, okay, well, at any, at any given time, uh, we may have traits of certain things, but that does not mean that we have a disorder. It doesn't mean that that's a persistent way that we behave across all circumstances and has this like, you know, ability to affect our our functioning in the world. So there is, I always make that distinction because, like Molly said, people throw around that, you know, they're a narcissist. It's like, well, yeah, they may have some traits and they might just be an asshole. That could all be true. Sometimes I'm just a dick. Right. Yeah. Sometimes people just I don't, there's no disorder for that. They just are not a great person.
SPEAKER_02I'm just being a dick. Like in some, yeah, yeah. It's a totally a thousand percent. Yeah. My wife reminded me that last week. I said something and she's like, don't be a dick. And I was like, fair, fair. Okay. Fair.
SPEAKER_06Do you did you did you create that accountability for yourself post-consequence, or did you have the accountability during the harmful behavior?
SPEAKER_02I think I always wanted, I think I always wanted it. I always had cries for help, and I think I always needed it. And I think those cries for help were deeply missed. And because I could recover so quickly and make it look like it was no big no big deal. But I had several instances where I think were severe cries for help for accountability. And again, you know, I grew up without boundaries. I grew up without rules. I grew up, you know, thinking I was the best and I can do no wrong. And then and in Were you an only child? I was just gonna ask. No, I was I have a younger brother. I'm I'm Persian. So in Persian culture, you you are you are like the sun and the earth and the moon, the stars, and and and really as the daughter or as the sun, or as the moon actually has greater even leniency. There's a saying, this is a bit fun, but there's a saying in Farsi where the sun carries what's called like the golden penis. Interesting. Wow.
SPEAKER_05So we don't know this much about Persian culture. No, we're learning so much today. Lesbian culture, Persian culture.
SPEAKER_02I'm here for you. Uh and so I think for me, my parents, like I grew up exposed and in a way that was just there were no guidelines, there were no rules. There were no, you know, I would go out drunk uh as a teenager. I would, my parents knew I would go and get fake IDs. They knew I would like go drink. And I would just call them, be like, come pick me up. You know, I would have, they would come home, there'd be parties at the house with alcohol, and they're like, oh, look, you've you've made this beautiful pyramid made out of beer, you know? And I was just like, yeah. Uh and I think it was just important because I was like a good student and I was a really good athlete. I was a really good, so it was kind of like I was, I wasn't getting in trouble. So like the and my parents, you know, uh immigrated here, like they were kids too. You know, they just they were out partying and having a good time and doing their thing. So they weren't bothering with like what I was up to. So all that to say, um, I lost my train of thought, but you know, yeah, how that shaped into the consequence piece was I just had to get hit so hard that I couldn't, I couldn't get I yeah, you couldn't deny it. I couldn't deny it. It was it was the first time in my entire life that my mom actually said, What were you thinking?
SPEAKER_06And I was like, Okay, this is serious. So and almost probably what you had been yearning for is some structure and some accountability.
SPEAKER_02I had, yeah. And so then once I really kind of understood the benefit of accountability, I've just it's never stopped, you know. I've got a couples therapist, an individual therapist, I have, you know, my best friends in recovery, you know, like I have, you know, I'm in weekly groups, I do, you know, so I fundamentally ensure that harm in this way will never happen again.
SPEAKER_05You know, I may do it enough quick. I so I'm curious, do you hold your you have one child? I have two. Two. So do you hold your children to different standards of accountability than you were how you were raised?
SPEAKER_02Thousand percent. Now, again, my wife will say I am the more lenient one, and that's fair, and that is accurate, you know. But it's it, I do know the devastating effects of them not having that. So having gone through what I've gone through and and working through a better balance in that, but I am for sure the like the one they come running to that's like, Mama, can we watch TV right now? You know, and it's all subject to like my own need of needing like an extra half an hour or needing extra as long as you can find a example. I mean, as I'm lenient on are reasonable and what we all experience as parents, but um, but there is this funny way I do channel my mom in certain things, and I have to be very cognizant, or my wife reminds me of that because it does kind of get channeled through. And then and I have to like Yeah, of course. For sure. For sure.
SPEAKER_06I was thinking about when you were sharing, just kind of going back to the inception of like this idea of the podcast, and there was or having you on our podcast, and there was some hurdles I think you had to jump through internally throughout your time paying your consequences in your career, opening up a program, all of the things that have come with, and having a being exposing yourself, essentially, right? Coming back into a career that's forward-facing in the limelight. You opened up a program. Tell us in just a few sentences what that looked like for you and how you were able to not ask for permission. Not ask for permission. Like everything metal podcasts, like kind of you know, it's necessary.
SPEAKER_02I have stopped using the word sorry as a as a regular thing. Because it it I think as women, I think there is a way that we're kind of predisposed to just be sorry, be sorry. You know, it's like you'll cat I'll catch other women. I'm like, like, get that out of your vocabulary. I think where I was asking for redemption was external and not realizing that the redemption was all an inside project and a spiritual one. So it doesn't mean I don't still encounter incidents where people try to weaponize, right? They try to find your weakness and go, oh, you are morally unfit, you are professionally unfit, you are, you know, and and sometimes before where it used to injure me a lot worse. Now it's kind of like okay, you know, you're gonna have your opinion either way. That's okay, you know. And and so I've been fortunate that I think through the work and through the exercise and through people not only learning who I am, but people understanding like the integrity that I have now, like the and this is 15, you know, I I'm I'm yeah, I'm getting into like 15 years later, right? I'm 15 years involved, I'm 15 years in the work, I'm 15 years having accountability, I'm 15 years of responsibility and and the seriousness with which I take that. So I think no matter what, when you're front facing, or if you own a business as I do, you know, with my business partner and at the Malone Collective, and and and I am still front-facing, you know, I definitely engage in a way that I have a responsibility to ensure that we are ethically sound, that we're ensuring, you know, quality care, that we're showing up a certain way. I'd be lying if I said it sometimes doesn't still sit underneath my skin, like waiting. And and I I wish I could have this kind of, you know, what I did appreciate about Elizabeth Gilbert is like she literally like had nothing to lose by just kind of putting it all out there. And she's like, I'm famous anyways. Whether you like it or you don't, you know, it's like you're gonna, you're gonna read it and you know who I am, and she's gonna make money, right? Like I that kind of like, whether it's fearlessness or shamelessness or you know, whatever it is. And I think I still kind of tow that line between, you know, I've had moments of like, oh my God, I just want to run with this and have and put it all out there so I can get in front of it. So when people find out, it doesn't become this, oh my gosh, what is, you know. Um, and I think I've just kind of have no longer given permission for what people think affect because it's none of my business. What you think of me is none of my business.
SPEAKER_06And there's the permission slip.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, there is a permission slip. Yeah, and it's taken a lot of work to get to that point. I recently had a who I thought was a colleague and and dear friend, you know, weaponize that, which was like it was like a really unusual bizarre thing. I don't even want to give that that much time. But I did find myself, yeah, again, feeling that little because it's like the moment that comes up, it's like that cross-section between who I am now and the pride and the joy and the non-boring parts that come up and my kids and my how I'm involved with my community and my my dear friendships is a value system that is unequivocally the most precious things in my life, and including that that you know, in integrity of who I am and and how that gets portrayed and how that gets felt and how that emanates from everything. So when it bumps up against that old self or that old narrative that just tries to edge its way in there, yeah, it can have a moment of like, ugh, you know, and I've learned instead of being like, okay, you need to go away now, let's go, go, go away. I just that little girl and I go, come here. It's okay because what happened was not your what how you felt and what drew you to those behaviors was not your fault. That that work, the trauma, the whatever. You know, and and I care for her now. Like I could take care of her and I nurture her the way that she she needed back then. So it's it's translated into something deeply spiritual, and my faith and my work with in within my faith and within my um value system is all I really need to know. And that's my truth. So thank you so much.
SPEAKER_05I give you a lot of credit. Yeah, thank you so much. And I give you a lot of credit because we talked about this with Brad Sorty too, about in our field and in behavioral health in general. There's all these whispers behind the scenes, right? Because somebody has a mental health crisis, somebody relapses, somebody has things happen, right? And we're human. We are not exempt from these things happening just because we treat them or we're the experts or we're the professionals. And I think we do, as a whole, a really poor job in our profession for as much empathy and compassion that we have for the clients that we serve, we do a really shitty job sometimes supporting our fellow colleagues when they are going through hard times.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And so I think one of the ways that we combat that is we start publicly having some of these conversations of like redemption and what that looks like. Because for me, what what my work in in the 12-step community shows me is that redemption comes from doing that work, right? From the accountability, from the amends process, from the spiritual process. And that's what I would like to be highlighting, not the mistake, not the thing, not the not whatever happened. It's like, but what did you do after that? Because that's the example that our clients need to see. That's the example the community needs to see. Um, you know, you see it in all industries, but I just think it's highlighted for me in our behavioral health community because we should do better. We we know better, so we should do better.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I think it would be different had I, if I'm doing this a year, and and this is something I was talking to my girlfriend. She is an expert in sex and love addiction, Brianne Davis. She wrote a best-selling book on sex and love addiction. And I said, I'd love to hear your feedback, you know. And she's like, Oh, I have so many thoughts. But the main thing that came up was that she felt the book was written too soon. And she said, When you're working through sex and love addiction, when you're going through these things, it is imperative that you're also showing how you are now in a relationship and how you can experimentally work through that the recovery process. Right. And she, and she like, you know, and and she wasn't um, you know, poo-pooing it all together. She's like, I'm glad it's getting out there. I'm glad Elizabeth's like kind of, you know, holding a torch to it and showing people where this lands and opening up a dialogue and conversation. But I think something that's given me more anchoring is that, you know, as I'm as I'm gent gently broaching this experience of telling my story, I, you know, I don't, I don't think like, I don't say it outwardly publicly. This is probably the most public it's it's been. But gently being cognizant, you know, again, we're talking 15 years later and in the work, you know, so I do think it's different for somebody that's like just had complete destruction and now they're like, I'm healed, we're good. Now I can go back healing other people. And there is a truth to like a lot of bad actors who kind of actively don't do their own work, but claim that they can help other people in a certain way. So I think there is an accountability thread in that. But but you're right, like I think the salaciousness, the the way that, you know, we all have our story. We all have a redemption story, we all have, you know, hopefully one that serves a a tail of uh for others to to not to mitigate their risks. Um, but yeah, I think as an industry, we just love to cut down where we can cut down, judge where we can judge, you know, highlight. Maybe as a society, right?
SPEAKER_03Like I think it's broader, right?
SPEAKER_02I have learned to have such extraordinary compassion for everybody, even people that are just vile. I found this way to go, yeah, I need to know more. Like I can have compassion for why you're such a horrible human, right? But I'm also like, and you also have a choice to be better, right? So, anyways, but thank you. I appreciate that, Joe.
SPEAKER_06Thank you so much. If people would like to find you, we will have your information in the show notes. You are the co-founder of the Malone Collective based in Santa Monica, California. We so appreciate you coming on, sharing your experience, and hopefully this will uh spark some conversation for folks and get curious to learn a little bit more. As always, you guys can drop us a comment on our Instagram, on our website, send us an email, and if we can do anything to support our listeners, we will. Thank you so much for tuning in. And Sheila, thank you so much.
SPEAKER_02Thank you, ladies. Appreciate you. If you want a full um text exchange just to watch. Our next book will be and Molly. Oh, okay. We'll let you Molly. Are you picking?
SPEAKER_06No, I'm not picking. I'm just here for the ride. But don't make me go on the last ride that we went on, okay?
SPEAKER_05No, we're off that ride.
SPEAKER_06You guys are the while speculating.
SPEAKER_03All right. Bye. Thank you for listening to No Permission Necessary. If you enjoyed today's conversation, please subscribe, leave a review, and follow us on Instagram at No Permission Necessary for more insights and inspiration.
SPEAKER_06Remember, success is personal and greatness never asks for approval.
SPEAKER_03And neither should you.
SPEAKER_06No permission necessary is produced and edited by the team at Palm Tree Podco. The content for this episode was created by Jill Griffin and Molly Beerman, social media support from Social Chaos, and PR support from Ghost Pepper.