Pillar Four: The Open Wound | Episode 7

In this episode of In Real Time, we are breaking down Pillar 4 of the nervous system framework, The Open Wound.

This is the layer most people skip.

You’ve identified the behavior. You’ve questioned the why. You’ve uncovered the belief.

But if the wound underneath it never got closure, your nervous system will keep protecting it.

And that protection will look like your personality.

In this episode, we talk about how emotional wounds form, how they stay active in the nervous system, and why your reactions are not random. They are patterned protection.

We also break down attachment styles and how they show up as defense mechanisms in real life.

Why some people chase.

Why some people shut down.

Why some people run when things get real.

And why none of it makes you broken.

It makes you patterned.

Tori shares a personal story about repeating relationship cycles and what it actually took to stop the loop, not just understand it.

This episode will help you stop taking everything personally, see your patterns clearly, and begin to separate who you are from what you’ve been protecting.

Because once you see the wound, you can stop calling it your personality.

If you’ve ever said

“I don’t know why I keep doing this”

or

“Why does this still affect me”

this episode is for you.

We are not fixing ourselves.

We are retraining our nervous systems.

And that requires honesty, awareness, and a willingness to see what’s really underneath.

New episodes drop every Thursday.

Watch the full visual experience on YouTube at AMH Network

Follow on TikTok at inrealtimethepodcast or mamamarketingwithadhd

Connect on Instagram at torivictories or amhnetwork

If this resonated with you, share it with someone who is ready to do the work.

And if you’re ready to take this deeper, tap into Choose Differently.

Because healing is not something you think about.

It’s something you practice.

Subscribe, leave a review, and let me know what hit for you.

This is healin… in real time.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome to In Real Time, where we talk about patterns, nervous system, and the choices that shape our lives from the inside out. Now, this isn't about perfection or performance. It's about being aware, doing the work, executing, and choosing differently. One moment at a time. I'm Tori, and this is a safe, shame-free space to get serious about growth, even when it's a little messy. I'm excited, y'all. So boom. You're not overreacting because you're the drama. You're reacting because something still hurts, even after so long. I know. Most people believe time heals wounds. And I hate to bust your bubble, but that's not true. Time does not heal all, it just puts it on the back burner. It cools the temperature down until you get in a situation that heats it back up again. And then you find yourself popping off. Time only heals what it processes. What would never get processed, that is gonna stay open. And when a wound stays open, your nervous system keeps protecting it. Your wounds, your emotional wounds, they like dependence on the tax return. Your nervous system that I like to call Diva, okay, is claiming your emotional needs and wounds on its tax return, okay? And it's going to protect its assets, even when you don't need protection. So what people are calling personality, you thinking that you just like this, it's a lot of times it's protection around that pain, around that wound. It's not your personality. So let's talk about it. Now, a lot can happen in a week. So I'm glad you're back with me. And if you're just joining us, welcome. I'm Torre. Okay, I'm Audi H D. What's going on? Tell me, tell me, tell me. Okay, but let's recap and revoke this. So bone. Pillar one was the automatic behavior, the reaction we keep repeating, just the pop-off moment. Okay. Pillar two, the initial why. That's where we question the first explanation that our brain gives us. We've deep, we just think this is why we think we did what we did. And then pillar three, the outdated belief, the survival conclusion that your nervous system is having. Why your nervous system thinks it needs to protect you. That's the belief that was created. Now we have reached pillar four. The open wound. This is the emotional injury that made belief necessary. This is what actually happened. Okay. Now, I did take some notes. I got my notes. I got my handy notebook, and I'm ready to go. Because awareness without wound work creates loops and release. And we're doing this so that we can get out of those loops. Okay. This is where we break patterns. This is where they begin. It's up to you to continue. So let's get into the ogre wound is the emotional injury. It never got closure. Okay. It's not just something that happened. It's something that never fully settled in your nervous system. Um, so it forms with moments where we felt abandoned, rejected, betrayed, shamed, invisible, powerless. Ugh, that's the one for me, child. Well, I'd be I'd be trying to fight to death when somebody trying to make me feel powerless. That's an emotional wound. They're not personality traits. You are not actually powerless. You may have not known something. You don't, it's not a reason to be ashamed. You are valuable and worthy. You should not be abandoned and rejected. Things happen in life, but we we have to be able to feel it and not run away from it. And that's what our nervous system wants us to do. Run away from it all the time. That's not your personality trait. These are emotional injuries that our nervous system learned to protect. It is protecting, protecting quote unquote us. And when something touches that wound, your body reacts way before your launch and can't even catch up, can even catch on. It's yeah, it's it's that serious. For example, someone betrays you in a relationship, and years later you find yourself checking phones, questioning loyalty, assuming all the time. Somebody always got something up their sleeve, they always hiding something. Everything is yeah, right. I want to believe it. Sound good. Somebody made you feel invisible growing up. And now you overexplain, you over-explain yourself in meetings and regular conversations and relationships and friendships. So you feel like you have to prove yourself worth just to be acknowledged, like you have to be all the time on performance, performance, performance, performance. Y'all gonna see me now. Or someone abandoned you emotionally, physically, happen to me, and now somebody pulls away even a little bit, your nervous system immediately interprets that as lost or rejection, and that you really pull on your self-worth stream. You start finding yourself doing extreme, stupid things when you stop and think to get the attention sometimes, or sometimes just be noticed and treated like a person. But those are the that's not your personality. Once you learn it, all of these things, except for the betrayal part, I don't ain't never, I ain't never, I'm too slow for the betrayal. I won't be realizing I got betrayed until years later and be like, oh damn, that was that's what's happening. So that was not for me. But some somebody that has that issue. I know people for a fact. Very paranoid. People betray you. You put your trust in these niggas, but you're putting people on the pedestal. It's a deeper, it's a deeper reason why you feel betrayed. Why you giving people so much power to portray you in the first place? Now, granted, trust. You know, I may have an issue with trusting. I mean, I don't think so because I give everybody a clean slate, but it's like I don't once you fuck your slate up, it's like it's gone. I don't know. So sorry, you getting the clean. Like, I don't know. But anyway, the reactions are not random. Your nervous system is protecting a police that once got hurt, it's trying to, it's for your benefit, it's trying to help you out, it is trying to help you. So, another way wounds will show up is through attachment defense mechanisms, which I think the world is starting to understand, but I don't think that they really understand, understand. So let me break it down. Once you see it and see the attachment styles, and you realize people are not just acting crazy, once you start to see attachment styles and you really understand it, understand it, you'll see that it's the same person. It's it's just a few different types of personality types. And it's a few different types of trauma. So you can really, you can see, you can group people together. You once you start, once you understand the information, let me let me just give to them. They're not they're not crazy, they're just protecting something. And that's that's what I'm trying to say. And you'll see that with everyone. Oh, they're okay, they're protecting nice. Oh, okay, they're protecting nice. And you'll get it, but that doesn't mean you gotta, because they have to do their work to get out of that. Because that's not their personality, that's just who the world put on them. So you and I, we're gonna do our work, okay? Because most relationships, reactions fall into attachment styles. That's any type of relationship. And each one connects to a trauma response. So it's like fight, flight, freeze, and fawn. Okay, fawn is new, but uh used to be fight, flight, or freeze. Now it's fawn. Fawn is kind of like, oh baby, we don't got it. It's okay. Fuck that nigga, slam you the motherfucking box. Fuck that nigga, slam you the motherfucking box. After slim just knocked her out. Like, you know, it's like, why you you fawn it? Like, tell him, fuck him, and get the fuck out with your dad. Like, but some people gotta make it okay. It's all better now. It's okay. We all good, brother. We everything cool. Some people fawn. That's their trauma response. And I don't want no problem, but I want no beef. That's it's funny, but it's real. Like some people are like, that's okay. It's okay. Let me try to think that it'll work. And let me see what time I think here. All right, so this is live. I mean, it's live. I mean, I'm living what I'm recording it, so um, I'm just gonna look and see. My bounce is at 215. And I got I got this much water left. So I might have to pause the podcast and go do stuff and then come back. So don't be all, don't be all like, she looks different. She sounds different. Like, I'm I might go do something else real quick, okay? Because it gets deep. But for now, let's get into what we need to get in two, because you'll never know if it was paused or not. I mean, you might know, but you might not know. You wouldn't know how long it was paused for, okay. To you, the clip just changed, okay? Ha ha. But anyway, so sorry. Had to put that disclaimer in there. Just trying to be honest. Tell me uh, or whatever, to say it. Um, so boom. Fight, flight, freeze, or fine. That's what we'll be doing. Those are not personality traits, those are nervous system protection strategies, okay? That's what your nervous system will do. That's the play. That's the play that your nervous system is gonna run when it feels that it is under stress, that it's trying, it needs to protect you. This is one of the things, those one of those are the defaults. Everybody got a default. Some people got a combo, okay. Somebody got a favorite combo nervous system like to go to. You know what I'm saying? This um, okay, so let's go to let me go to my notes. Okay. The first one is an anxious attachment. So the response that goes with an ancient attack an anxious attachment. Good lord. It's like a ton to anxious attachment. Ah, I got it. So the response, the trauma response that goes with an anxious anxious attachment person is either usually fight or fun. Okay. The person will either chase they so they chase connection when they feel distant. So they they when you run, they run. You walk away, you look away, they're running after you, okay? They over-explaining, they texting, they overanalyzing, they are seeking assurance. Okay, some people like that clinginess though. Some people do want to feel needed. So just because you have a trauma response, or just because this is your attachment style, doesn't mean it's not a person for you. You never wanted to change ever, and you just was like, because some things, some type of healing, you have to realize it is so much to work on. Some stuff you're gonna be like, you know what, I'm okay with that. All right, so you you being anxious, attachment is not always bad. Some people might, somebody there might be a person for you that I need a clean person because they don't want to work on their attachment style either. And so they that may make them feel like more of a person. They need you to need them, they need you to want them, they need you to to break it all the way down. They might be neurodivergent. Your anxious attachment might be exactly what a neurodivergent need because they need all of the information. What do you paint the picture? And you like, yeah, I'm an overanalyzer. I saw this, this happened, this happened, this happened, this happened, and they want to explain to you. But some neurodivergents, they need explaining, but they don't like to explain, so you gotta pick why anyway. Um, secret assurance. That uh this everybody, uh, there's somebody for everybody, so just I'm not gonna go too deep, but some people do that. They do that why? Because connection once felt inconsistent to them. They might have had a parent who was in and out, in and out, they might have moved a lot, they might have had a parent that wasn't stable, all kinds of things. The nervous system learned if I try harder, love will stay. If I do more, I won't be abandoned. Sometimes they perform, they are performer. The wound underneath was usually abandonment or rejection. So that is I'm gonna give an example later. The defense becomes being clingy or just over functioning, just self-abandoning themselves so much. Yeah, I said self-abandoning. You hear me? And the back, a laugh-abandoning themselves, okay, because you gotta look at stuff from two different sides. You have to look at things from the person and who they are and why they are. Okay, I like clingy. They overfunctional, oh, they're abandoning themselves. So are you the type of person that's gonna be like, all right, chill out? All right, babe, I got it. All right, you doing too much? All right, friend, no, or you're gonna take advantage of that. Then we got the avoidant attachment. Their response is usually flight first. They get the fuck out of there. I don't give a fuck what's going on. They're gonna leave you, y'all on the whole day, they out of there. What'd he say? Then I was gone. Like, what? The caring around here, they is gone. Okay, they got to find them something new to do. Okay, okay. And sometimes the womb shows up the opposite. Someone who flees when things get emotionally hard. Um, someone who shuts down, they disappear, they avoid hard conversations. I hate that. The as soon as the accountability shows up, they be out of there. Oh mama, oh my mama called it. Like, bruh, you hello, hello? Can we have this conversation or what? Yeah, that trauma response. Trauma response. They that is it, it can they do that a lot of times because they may have a shame wound. Shame. A lot of narcissists, some people who lean are narcissist, narcissistic presenting or um higher on the narcissistic scale. Everybody, because there are different levels of narcissism. People just think you're a narcissist. Okay, but what can I? Like, because the fuck? I was a narcissist after I had that baby, and it was about me, Lucius. The fuck? Like, yes, I am. Okay, thank you. Am I being am I being self-centered right now? Oh, good, because that's what I'm fucking going for. Like, I don't give a fuck what you want to do. I just had a baby, bitch. Like, excuse me, I digress. Excuse me. I digress, but yeah, sometimes everybody is a little narcissistic. We all have the traits. So you don't like shut out on making everything. It's that's just the world that we live in. But you don't fuck uh try, I gotta start reading books again because my words are they not rolling off my tongue. You are in control, I don't even know what I was about to say. You are in control of what you believe to be true. So if you think that it's shameful to have labels or to understand yourself or to see these things or to admit things about yourself, that it is so. But if you see that it's just information and it helps you know where to start and where to grow, that is so as well.

SPEAKER_00 18:27

So that on that.

SPEAKER_01 18:29

Um was I about to say emotional responsibility can feel like exposure, and that's why the shame wound can be hard and it can really show up in those people that are more narcissistically um presenting and what have you. And if someone learned early that being wrong meant, being criticized or rejected, their nervous system may protect them by leaving before that feeling can happen again. They feel like you want to on that bullshit, quote unquote, but you're really just holding them accountable. It may be too much for the nervous system and they just don't have the capacity to be there with you and they have to leave. Okay. That's why you can't take shit personal. Just ride with that shit. So instead of leaning into repair, those people they will withdraw. Okay, a lot of us got, you know, children's fathers who are very avoidant. Doesn't seem like they can take things seriously or grow up. This is why. These right here, this is why. Um, not because they don't care, because I do believe they care as much as they can. They just don't have the capacity. Their nervous system is protecting them from feeling like they are the problem. And for some people, that it is debilitating, feeling like the problem. So some people that is part of their trauma. That they were always, quote unquote, the problem as a child. So now it's just like it's too much. I'm an adult now, I get to choose my own life, so I'm gonna walk away from this accountability, even if I'm doing something wrong because I learned wrong. I'm not gonna take the time to go learn differently because it's too much for me. Okay. Let that sink in for a second. Okay, next. So the next one is gonna be disorganized attachment style. That's when you um, that's how a person has like fighter-freeze responses. They'll either so okay, let me back up. So I do disorgan, the attachment style is called disorganized attachment style. And they kind of show up as they want to be here, they're happy to be here, then they psych themselves out in their head, and they're like, oh no, this person's trying to set me up, oh no, this person is trying to stop me, this person don't really care for real, this person, and they sabotage themselves. So they will either uh fight you, you know, cause a threat in their head, fight you, or they'll freeze, don't do anything. And it often comes from the violence where they felt safe and they felt unsafe. So like maybe they had a nurture in their past who made them feel safe, but would blow up. Like maybe they was undiagnosed RDHD like me. And so when that person was emotionally charged, they would create an unsafe environment. But for the most part, they were a safe person. This organized attachment style comes from that. Um, as I'm saying it, I'm just thinking about my life. Jesus. So the nervous system, it'll just essentially become confused. It doesn't know what to trust because it can't trust itself. It wants connection, but it also fears connection because these primal people in their life have caused such despair out of no. Nowhere. Like we were just cool. We were kicking it. We was laid up. I remember a time me and my ex were laid up on the couch, cool, chilling, watching some stupid show by some random YouTuber, just you know, just chilling. Something that we didn't really get to do a lot. And out of nowhere, he was like, okay, that's it. And I was just like, what the hell happened? Like, like a timer was on it. And I'm like, what's going on? And he wanted our son. And I'm like, okay, why couldn't we all just like what happened? I'm confused. Because he was probably in his head telling himself something crazy. I was laid on him. Like I nothing is happening. But sometimes people in their head, oh yeah, in their head, that open wound get to talking. They get to talking, okay? And then they react on that. You ever heard somebody see we watch movies, or you ever heard somebody get mad at you because of, or you maybe get mad at somebody because of a dream? It's like it's not real, but I'm reacting based off of the dream. And that's I know that can be hard. You know what I need to start doing as a sidebar. I need to start recording the audio separately. And I used to do that on my first podcast, and I need to start bringing that back because when I tell you, this episode has given me right now, as I'm recording, I cannot see myself. It says that I'm recording, but I cannot see myself, and it's been giving me so many issues. But we're gonna keep it rolling, okay? Because I'm just being obedient. I got a sticky on my note right here on my wall that says, I have a I have a message that matters. You're not crazy. The book, the movement. I will have a tail talk about this very thing. And that essentially is you're not crazy. You're probably neurodivergent or you're not crazy. You're probably conditioned. And that's what all of this is about. We are conditioned. The disorganized attachment person, that attachment style, they're conditioned to a safe, unsafe, hot and cold, hot and cold all the time. So you see them play hot and cold, where they're actually a decent person. Like you wouldn't mind doing life with them. But they can't, they keep going cold. Like, what the hell is going on? It's like my Mr. Jacko, and what's his name? Dr. Jackal and Mr. Hyde. Hot and cold, hot and cold. Yeah, I might not know. That might be a little old. But you know what I'm saying? It's just high and cold. It's one minute you're up, then that's when you're down. Like, what's happening? I'm very confused. And so we a lot of times we say that confusion is the answer. Yeah, sometimes the answer is just that person needs to go do their healing work. So it might not be a no, it might be a not right now. It doesn't, it doesn't matter. Because right now you gotta be focused on you. And if that should come around, cool. If not, cool. This is about you though. This is about us looking at ourselves. If each person did that, then we would actually be able to show up in ways that matter and be able to close those wounds. Because that disorganized person, they they want attention. I mean attention, they want connection. They feel that connection, they pull you close, they push you away, they fight you, they freeze, they pull you close, they push you away because the nervous system can't develop a consistent amount of safety for them. It just is what it is. Then we got our secure attachment. And I feel like I toggle in this the most right now when I'm doing my work. It can toggle to other attachment styles for me, but as I'm doing my work and showing up consistently for myself, I believe I have a secure attachment style. And I don't mean perfect. It means that my nervous system learned the connection and can survive discomfort. I can have the hard conversations with somebody. I can take accountability for when I was wrong. I wasn't always able to do that. People would tell you, oh no, you don't take accountability for nothing. Not if you want me to take accountability for something that I just didn't do, like that just wasn't even, I didn't do that at all. Like you put a meaning to my behavior instead of asking me what my behavior meant. And so I struggle with taking accountability for a story that you put on me. Like I'm not masking, bro. Like that's not what I meant. No, no, that's not why I did that. No, that's not what I did. That's which how you took it. Like you want to have a hard conversation, I'm well and ready to have a hard conversation. And if not, I'm also ready to walk away from the situation because I'm a secure attached. I'm not gonna beg for my respect. You know what I'm saying? I'll I'll create clarity around what how what respect looks like to me. But if you're still not with that shit, then I'm gonna have to go. And it was fun, and I appreciate this and I will remember this forever, and I'm gonna keep on about my day. That's that's really that's really been my phrase line. I'm gonna keep going about my day. Like, I don't give a fuck. I'm gonna say how I feel, and that's it. And that is more secure. It's not, I'm gonna say what how I feel with malice intent or with ego. It's just I'm gonna say what's on my mind or my standpoints, my opinion, and that's it. I'm gonna drop it. I don't need to argue back and forth. I don't need to feel heard. If you wasn't hearing me when I was saying it, then that's a personal problem. I'm not mean, I'm still kind. I'm not necessarily professional because I'm not masky, I'm just showing up as me. And if you fucking with that, hey. And if you're not fucking with that, okay, cool. It was nice meeting you. And that's it. I don't need to go back and forth about it. I don't need to think I'm better than anybody. I don't need who you think you are, none of that. It doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter. I do not have confidence. I do not give a fuck. And that's it. Every time I say that, I feel like I do not like green egg for him. I do not give a fuck, okay? Like Steve Harvey, what? I do not give a fuck what you think. I want to say it like, what? I do not give a fuck what you think. Do you hear me? I'm going to continue about my day. And I feel like that is where that's secure. I'm not afraid of speaking up for myself, advocating for myself. No. I'm no diversion, and that shit is exhausting. Exhausting. Cold switching and shit. Exhausting. Needing accommodations everywhere and actually getting them bitches because I have to advocate like a motherfucker.

SPEAKER_00 28:57

Exhausting.

SPEAKER_01 28:58

Advocating for my son, because I now have a little person to watch over. Exhausting. Like, it's exhausting. But I'm gonna show up and do it. I'm secured, I'm not gonna run away from the fight or the challenge, rather, because that's what needs to be done. So I'm gonna go out there and do what needs to be done, hell? And you know this. Like, so I see all of that as the secure attachment. The conflict is is not, it don't equal, uh, conflict don't equal abandonment to me. Like we can have a hard conversation, I can come advocate, and you know, I'd be all in the administration's office at my son's school. Like, look, I'm not doing that, I'm doing this, I'm not doing that, I'm doing this. Whatever the case may be. And um it does not cause me to feel like I have to quiver or make myself smaller or that I'm gonna get abandoned, or that you know, sometimes in the back of my mind, I'd be feeling like, are you are you doing too much? Because you don't want these people to be like, you know what, we're gonna turn y'all away. However, you don't want nobody. People respect people to have boundaries. You may sometimes the world may tell you, like, oh, people respect the nice girl. And I used to think that for a long time I would be the nice girl. I would be the girl that just let everything go with the flow. The reason my son is here today is because I thought, like, all right, we're in a relationship, so like I give you my body. Like, I'm just here for you. I'm just here. Whatever. It's like, no, no, no. That's not self-love, that's not self-worth, that's not self-value, that's not boundaries. You have to have boundaries. You can be able to tell somebody, no, I'm not with that, I don't want to do that. You cannot do that to me. That's a boundary. Hey, you can't do something to me. That is a boundary. And then, and if they're not with it, being able to walk away on that boundary. The boundary is the rule, it's the law. And if they don't, if they don't, if they don't respect the rule, the law of your land, you leave. Get the fuck on. Don't ever like, it's something that you have to build up, but keep telling yourself I will never abandon myself, regardless of whoever abandoned me in the past. This that takes skill, that that takes time to build up. Everybody, most of us were not taught that. We're not taught what self-worth. We think self-worth is looking nice. Like where we as women are told like we have to look nice all the time, and if we don't look nice, we don't love ourselves. That's not what the fuck it is. I don't I don't be doing my edges. I'm sitting right here like I did my hair today. I did my hair just in a style. Okay, I got it up. Got a little swoop right here. You know what I'm saying? Who do? I styled it. I took the time to style it. I did not do my edges. I still don't do my edges. I don't be doing my edges. I don't know why. I only do my edges for events. I'm not just about to do my edges on a what's today? A Wednesday. I'm not about to do my edges. The Wednesday before my birthday. But anyway, I don't. For me, that doesn't take away from my value because I have values, because I know I have standards. Um, I know I have principles that I live by. I know that I have boundaries. People can't just say and do anything to me anymore. People can't just have access to me just because they called my phone or just because they said they want to see me or wanna, whatever. I'm not available. You can't just be like, oh yeah, I'm pulling up. Oh, what you doing? Call me or something like that. Like, I may not be available. If I don't like the way that you're talking to me, the the the lack of something, if I don't feel like I'm being heard, if my body feels uneasy around you, I'ma go.

SPEAKER_00 32:58

Boundaries.

SPEAKER_01 33:01

My standards. I'm not gonna allow that. Who was that at the other day? I don't know, just let me stay off the child. I digress. Essentially, the conflict doesn't equal abandonment in a secure person. Secure people, we we still have our wounds. Like, I could regress if I stopped doing my work, my healing work every day. It's a healing is a practice, it's an everyday thing. Like these wounds, they never just go away and it doesn't bother you anymore. If you find yourself in a position where, like earlier today, I was listening to a song from 2006, and it I it triggered something in my body, and I had to hold my paper that I was reading really tight and just kind of ride that feeling for 90 seconds and allow it to go through my body. And then I recorded a video in real time, just speaking on how I was feeling and what happened and why it happened that way. Like this the wound is still there. It may not be activated, but it's still there. We just learned how to continue to live and not just exist. We have more capacity to process now. I can process in the moment. Soon as I feel it. Some people can't do that. Some people gotta stuff it down, smoke something, stuff it down till later, and then come back and bit by bit. And if we start feeling too deep in their body, then switch it up and do something different. So which attachment style are you? That's that's the question, so we can move on from there because they change. As you develop, get more better in your healing, heal through more things, process through more things, your attachment style can change for sure. So let me give you some a little bit of this science, homegirl science, homegirl neuroscience style, because you know that's what I like to do. So when something painful happens, the brain records it. The amygdala flags the emotional threat, and which is to me, emotional threats are like the deadliest of the threat. And then the hippocampus stores the memory and the context like a cabinet. So your nervous system is then scanning for similar experiences, and then years later, something small happens, and you have a delayed reply, or you have a trying to think of an example, um, like a shift in tone, like excuse me, and then it'll make you feel like, oh, they're trying to play me, or they're trying to, you know, somebody pulls away, you start to feel like you're gonna be abandoned, or um your body will suddenly react. Like today, me listening to that song years later. Those songs came out when I was 14 years old. Years later, I'm listening to that song, and it took me back to that time when I was 14 years old, and my body, my body had a reaction. My heart rate increased, my chest got tight in this area. My chest, my belly was tight. I wasn't really defensive in that moment because I was sitting in the car by myself, but you could become defensive if you're around people. If it was a person that made those responses come about, you could become defensive. Um your brain, your brain is in the present. Like you, you are you're logically here in the moment, but your nervous system is guarding your past. Your nervous system see the person in this, I mean your brain sees the person in this moment, but your nervous system is the one that's actually responding. That's why I call it nervous system devo, because your nervous system is really in control of that situation. Like when your nervous system comes around, everybody be quiet. And it's whatever your nervous system says. Like, yeah. Um, let me give you like a personal little example. Um there was a period in my life where I kept dating the same person in different forms. Like, and it always be fine ones, like they'd be fine, they'd be fine, they'd be handsome. And it seemed like, like I said, the world teaches us to take care of our outer, like to look good, but our character be fucked up. And so I wanted out the first person I dated, I wanted, I was looking for character, but I didn't really know what to date. I didn't understand that I wanted character, but I knew that I was on the journey of character, but I didn't know how to ask that of someone else. And I didn't really think that I was worthy of getting like this great guy on paper type of shit. Like, you know, so I stayed where I was comfortable and I was dating in the hood. But my mind, I I don't think in the box like that. Like to be in the hood, it's like I live in the hood, but I'm never outside. It's like I met somebody that I was dating somebody that I met outside in the hood. I ain't had no lens being over there, but you know, I'm a weed smoker, so I know where to go find my weed in any city. You understand what I'm saying? And I was in Atlanta, okay, and I met a friend, and we was cool. He was cool. But I needed some weed, and he didn't have none. He was like, all right, we can go to this place. He took me over there one time, and then my little ass started going over there, and he was like, Don't go over there by yourself. And I was just like, nigga, I'm from DC. And yeah, you know, I mean, you know, they was in more danger than I was. Uh we can get into a storytime later, but I allegedly ran somebody over, so you know, I wasn't out here playing either. However, that that that wasn't for me. And I didn't know that that wasn't for me. And then I dated it again, and it's essentially the person, it was like the person looked better, it started to look better on paper, the person, but inside they were the same person. They were still just a little hoodoo, you know, all this baggage, paranoid, they hadn't done any work on themselves. They had different names, different personalities. One was a little more ambitious than the other. And I thought it was just like, all right, it's a compatibility, a kind of compatibility issue. But I knew it wasn't, I could I just couldn't put the word, like I don't want to. It's like I want to date somebody. I don't like date somebody where they chilling, laying down, and I'm out here working, I'm constantly working, or I leave and you sleep, and I come back and you still sleep. It's like, man, what? Like I need ambitions, but I also ambition, but I also need like communication and support because I'm a little, it may feel like I'm a little airy. It's not that I'm airy, I have ADHD, so I just I forgot, but I'm gonna remember, but I'm remembering like a million things. And I'm very thoughtful, but also I gotta, you know, I gotta remember once it's on my radar again, it's like, yeah, I got it. I'm good. But sometimes you gotta be my buffers. Like it um it comes with that, which one person had issues with, the other person didn't. But anyway, my point is um when I slowed down and I really started processing like these people and their actions and their behaviors, and I could see the patterns that I didn't like in them. In the relationships, it was always about these patterns that I kept seeing where they just weren't accountable or um they weren't ambitious or considerate, some more than the others, but it wasn't what I needed. Okay, it wasn't what I needed. My nervous system was just operating from an abandonment woman, and I kept running to what was familiar. It was it it looked like it was working for me, you know. I mean, it looked like it was working to my nervous system. So my nervous system kept going for that, even though that's what I did not want. I did not want to be in those situations. And then every time someone, the person that I was with, would pull away, even a little bit, my nervous system would react by trying to smooth out the issue or make it better. Now I have ADSD too, so I decided out of mind for me. So sometimes it's just a matter of like, okay, what I what I needed was the exposure. I needed to be with somebody intensely. They leave, and I have this time to see like you're you didn't die, you're still killing it, you're still doing all the things that you need to do, you're still showing up, you're still responsible, you're still figuring it out, and then they come back and then they leave again, and I get that exposure to like what I can do by myself, and you got this, and you don't need anybody, and you're not gonna, you know, abandonment is just some bullshit, like it's all in your head, and then they come back, and so when they finally leave, it's like I'm good, I know I'm good, I'm straight. Like, I'm I'm not worried at all. And so before it was like I'm trying to fix the relationship, or I would lower my standards just to keep the connection, knowing that this is beneath me, I don't like this, we don't talk about shit, you don't read, you can't teach me shit. Like, I'm just in here just being big mama, and I don't like that. What you know, we say that in a joking way, but it's like I don't want to have to be Big Mama all the time and like come on, like what you doing? In my nervous system, there was a belief that if this person leaves, I lose something important. And that wasn't like a weakness, it was my nervous system trying to protect me. But the protection can keep you stuck if you never update it, you never update the belief that your nervous system is operating from the womb keeps asking that same question Am I gonna get left? Like, is this person gonna leave me? Am I good enough? And then I Had to gather all that evidence, all that exposure, and see myself and choose myself and know that I'm gonna still be okay so that I can stop repeating that loop of all right, just this last time, or let me ease the pain, it hurt too much. I'm a I'm afraid, I don't know what's gonna happen next. Didn't matter because I was choosing myself now. My nervous system had evidence because we had separated and came back together. Separated and came back together. I knew that I was doing everything in my power to communicate and to show up in a way that would be received, and it was the other person that just didn't have the capacity. And so I kept going after these people that didn't have the capacity for my growth, and then was making myself smaller so that I could stay in their lives. But I was already, they met me on a higher level than them. We were just crossing paths. And I kept staying, over staying my welcome while I was just crossing paths. Because I kept because I spent my whole life making myself small. These open wounds that I had that nobody ever talked to me about, or that I couldn't see within myself. That I was supposed to make myself small. So this is I'm doing small, small bitch activity. Like, let's call it that. Yeah. You think it's small, so you start doing small bitch activity. I'm not doing that shit. Then you find yourself with small bitch problems. Like, like, why are you even dating this man to even be going through this shit? Because of the beliefs that you had on your own life. Yeah, is that real? But I have the evidence, I gathered up my little evidence, and I saw that I could survive and let this person go, and anybody else who was treating me in those ways, and I chose myself, and that didn't mean that I would end up alone, right? But that means that I have the honor of continuing to work on myself, put myself first, put my son first, and allow a man to go out there and do his work. I can't do that shit for him. He goes and does his work, and then he comes and gets me.

SPEAKER_00 46:36

And that's when the womb starts closing.

SPEAKER_01 46:40

Now, the uncomfortable truth, okay? Lave you, don't shoot me, okay? I'm just the messenger. But everyone does not have the same defense mechanisms, right? Sometimes you'll see, um, sometimes you'll see somebody grow up quickly in an area where you struggled in. Not because they're better than you, but because their nervous system may be protecting a different wound than what you were protecting. That's why we gotta stop judging each other and really learn from each other's stories and share more. I was telling my mom this the other day. Like you don't want to share your story, but with me, she had she went through IEP stuff, and I'm, you know, she I as I'm looking, she okay, she was telling me that she got me tested for autism, ADHD, and they said no, I didn't have it. And so that's always her line of defense. When I'm like, yeah, these are like, you know, I don't blame her anymore. I just be trying to educate her. This is why I do this, this is why I do that. For years, I was telling her, like, this is the way I have to do stuff, and she would get mad at me for the way that I needed things done or clarity or whatever. And so now it's actually like I can tell you exactly what it's called and why I need it. And I know that sometimes it makes it make her feel bad, but it's not to it's you didn't know, and now that you know, I want you to tell your story because I know there are other parents who didn't know, is not used to, they don't want to put labels on their child. But these resources may be available. Being able to get your child an IEP so they can get the resources that they need for whatever, or that just simply the accommodations. Maybe they need additional accommodations, they're smart. Most neurological uh diagnoses they have nothing to do with intelligence and everything to do with how you process your energy level, how you take in energy or expel it. But people don't understand it. And so once you understand that, and then understand that you can go hire advocates to go hire these things. So I wanted my mom to do that. Like, show up because people need to know your story. It matters. But anyway, I digress. Everybody has those defense mechanisms, they have everybody has a wound about something. So I just want you to know that you are not alone. Like, we all, even the person that you think just got it all together, their life is so great. They're dealing with something, they go through something that you might be like, what? That's a problem for you. Just because that's not your wound. And they may look at you and be like, what? You can't leave the person, you can't stop letting them disrespect you, or you can't, whatever it is. People may look at you and judge, but please, please, please believe that they got a wound.

SPEAKER_00 49:55

Please. Clip that. Clip that, okay.

SPEAKER_01 50:03

You can change the belief. That's the bottom line. You have to just see it first. If you the thing is, you can change the belief all day. But if the wound is still active and you haven't processed through that emotional wound, the nervous system will build the belief to keep protecting you. It's going to tell you whatever it is. You you can go back and forth all day. If somebody believes something to be true, it doesn't matter what you say, that's what they believe. If your body believes that you're in danger, because you haven't actually done your wound work to show that that was a moment in time to show yourself that you trust yourself, nothing else is gonna matter. Okay? So wound work matters. We have to do this. So, with that being said, our practice and integration this week is observation. And I really hope that if you're listening to this, you've also listened to the other podcast. Because these pillars are gonna help you with everything else. When I tell you this is the most sophisticated part of the damn podcast, you're gonna always be able to come back and look at these pillars and be able to go through these pillars. And when my book comes out here pretty soon, you'll be able to really have a snapshot right in your hand to go through these pillars so that when you see another emotional wound come up, you can go through it. But right now, I want you to be able to use the practice and get comfortable with whatever practice it is. Use it fully, not just know it and intellectualize, like, oh, I gotta process or oh, I gotta do this. Do it. Take time, carve it out, put it on your calendar, set an alarm, and observe. Give yourself a word to think about, a time to think about, a year to think about. 2019 for me was pivotal. I feel like that was the me changing from like little girl energy, like cute and cuddly, to like, yeah, I'm an adult. Like I used to be like, I feel like a kid, I feel like a kid, I feel like a kid. 2019, I was feeling like a fucking adult. And now here, so more recently, I've been feeling like, I don't know, like a bad bitch emerging, but I don't ever I don't want to really want to be a bad bitch, but I want to be like something else in between that, like, you know, but it's not giving. I don't know, but anyway. This week, your practice is observation. Notice one reaction that you keep having. Um, and we've been doing this, we've been doing this with every pillar, but I want you to kind of do it differently. So notice the whatever the reaction is, like I give you the example of me in the car, and then ask yourself what situation usually triggers this reaction? What happened? When when is the first time you like okay, first what thoughts come up? What thoughts and emotions come up when you think about fully immerse yourself in that feeling that you're having in the in your body? What thoughts come up right off the bat? What emotions show up in your body? Where does it show up in your body? What part of you feels hurt in that moment? Is it your body? Is it your mind? Emotionally, do you feel overwhelmed? And then sit with that. Sit with those answers for 90 seconds. Notice where the feelings live in your body, in your chest, your stomach, your jaw, your jawtight, as your eyebrows down, are you mad? Are you feeling tense? A lot of times I have to like even out my take a deep breath. So that my face will look tense. I look mad. I have the wrinkles on my eyebrows. I'll look like. And I just have to relax and allow myself to be soft in that moment. And then ask myself, what did I need back then that I didn't receive? Earlier, when I did this with myself in the car, holding on to the paper, I noticed the feeling. I noticed that the song made those feelings come up in my chest and in my stomach. And then as I spoke out loud and asking myself questions, I said verbatim, it made I didn't feel seen during that time. Like I didn't matter. Victoria, the teenager, was a problem. She had an opinion, she wanted to do her own thing. She didn't necessarily want to eat with the program. She needed more accommodations, but we didn't call them accommodations. She was just needy back then. She just act like she don't understand what's going on. But she did. She needed more clarity. It was too much riff-wrap. Like she needed straight. I need you to do A, B, and C. All the extra stuff made her forget. She didn't have a voice during that time. I didn't have a voice during that time. So all of that came up for me by simply observing what I was feeling. That question reveals, those questions reveal your wound. And then it's up to you to see what you're gonna do with that information. Are you gonna work on those wounds? Are you gonna reach out and find resources? Like now remember, like, we're not diagnosing ourselves. This is not about you feeling like, oh, I don't I might have ADHD, or I, you know, you may. And if you are, I definitely think that you should go make sure that you have your accommodations. If you need accommodations and you're neurodivergent, and you need some type of assistance, go seek that, go get that for real. This is how self-awareness becomes leadership, self-leadership. You gotta start learning and being comfortable with advocating for yourself, even to yourself, because that's how you confront yourself and dig deep and healing those open wounds. Now, let's take a deep breath because that was a lie.

SPEAKER_00 57:10

Inhale for four exhale that for four. Heavy is not harmful.

SPEAKER_01 57:37

Sometimes it can feel heavy, emotions can feel heavy, situations and circumstances, our circumstances feel heavy on us. We have to do so much is exhausting. But heavy doesn't always mean harmful. Heavy can mean stretching capacity, heavy could be an honor to be able to hold this, to be trusted with this responsibility. Transparency can feel like exposure. Just sharing your story, just sharing what actually happened, especially when it didn't happen in the way that you wanted it or expected it to happen. Sometimes it can feel shameful, it can feel like exposure, but that's your story.

SPEAKER_00 58:34

We can't change it. That's what happened. Right? It can feel it can feel like exposure in the worst way, but it is regulated exposure, you're in a safe place, you want to be in a safe place whenever you're opening up and being transparent.

SPEAKER_01 59:00

Understanding that that is a regulated practice. Transparency is how wounds close properly. You have to give, you have to like, you know, say say their name, like they say in all the all of the shootings. Say their name. Right? The same thing. You have to say your trauma's name. You have to acknowledge that that did happen to you, that you did go through that, and that was not right. A lot of men are sexually abused by older women, and it's like, oh, I my first time was with this older lady or whatever the case may be. No, that was abuse. Call it what it is. Somebody took your childhood from you too early, and now you're hypersensitive. Call it what it is, being transparent about that isn't exposure. It may feel daunting, but it is actually you know being set free to tell your truth and your why clip that. Bottom line, increasing our capacity does not mean the hurt will just disappear. It means we move through it faster. I process so much faster now. Four weeks become two weeks of processing, two weeks become one week of processing, one week become two days of processing, two two days become two hours of processing, and then you process in the moment. You you think to process in the moment while you're thinking this is pissing me off, I'm getting overwhelmed, or whatever, whatever. Both thoughts come together simultaneously, and you can process in the moment and slow yourself down and say, Whoa there, whatever, buddy. In the moment, a lot of people cannot do that. That's a flex. A lot of people cannot do that. Okay, but you can, or you get in there and you're gonna get there. Continue your practice. This is effort, this is intention. This is transformation. This is healing. Okay, this is healing in real in real time.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:37

Peace of hell, y'all.