What I Didn't Know: Conversations on Resilience, Healing, and Becoming

EP11: Shadow Work & Emotional Sobriety | Finding the Missing Link to Deeper Recovery with Jeff Browning

• Netanya Allyson • Season 1 • Episode 12

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Do you feel rigid and stuck, even after years of sobriety? Many reach this plateau, but the key to moving forward isn't just abstinence—it's emotional sobriety and psychic integration. Jungian Analyst in training, Jeff Browning, offers a revolutionary perspective: the parts of ourselves we push into the Shadow (like anger or old complexes) don't disappear; they emerge sideways, keeping us stuck in cycles we thought we escaped.

Jeff shares his personal path, guided by symbolic dreams, showing how connecting with your inner world is the true path to emotional freedom. We discuss the necessity of Shadow Work—entering a conscious relationship with the darker self—and the powerful Jungian concept of Anima and Animus for balancing inner energies. It’s time to learn how to nurture the inner child, embrace the wholeness of your personality—light and shadow—to move beyond the limiting boxes society created for you. 

This episode is a permission slip to move past the painful idea that you must be "perfect." It’s about finding that deep core of self-love and reclaiming the freedom to decide who you are now, allowing your authentic self to finally emerge. If you're looking to bring the magic back into your life and deepen your healing, this conversation is essential listening. Finally, you can break those old psychological chains and realize, as Jung put it: "I am who I decide to be."

Tune in to find the magic and start rewriting the end of your story.

SPEAKER_03:

There are moments in life that split us open. By unraveling sudden frame or truths, we didn't know what we needed. Until we had no choice. This podcast is about those moments. It's about the turning points that change us. The things I wish someone had told me that I only understand in looking back. Come on in. You belong here. And we're gonna talk about all of it. I'm your host Natanya, and this is what I didn't know. Before we begin, a quick note. This podcast explores themes such as mental health, addiction, trauma, and recovery. While the stories here are honest and heartfelt, they're not a substitute for professional advice, therapy, or medical treatment. Please listen with care and pause anytime you need to. Take whatever resonates for you and leave the rest. Today's guest is Jeff Browning. Jeff was a speaker at an event that I was at recently, and after he was finished, I approached him and was like, Will you please be on the show? Because I was captivated by much of what he said. I think of anything that's helped me throughout the healing process, the just overall concept of psychology and understanding why I do what I do, why other people do what they do, and how I can change myself and have grace for others and compassion as we all move throughout the world has helped me, I think, the most, just just to understand that there's reasons for for why all these things happen and that we can change them in order to show up differently. Jeff's specialty is in young psychology, and so we really dive into that in this episode, and I just can't wait for you to hear it. Here we go. Like particularly for quite a few weeks now. So I'm pretty excited that you're here.

SPEAKER_00:

Cool. Well, I'm so glad to be here. I've been looking forward to it. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

And we um for context for listeners, I first heard Jeff speak at Camp Recovery, which is put on by Cumberland Heights in Nashville. It's a weekend retreat, essentially, summer camp weekend in the end of October that I just went to a couple weeks ago and you were there. And then you finished, and I jumped on you and was like, Can you please be on my podcast?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was fun.

SPEAKER_03:

But before we begin, tell me a little bit about how you got started and kind of what brought you into Youngin psychology in the first place.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, well, I, you know, I I got sober through the 12 steps in 2000, and then started working in the field of addiction in 2002 as a tech at Cumberland Heights in the adolescent program. And then over the years, I ended up getting my license, and I worked at Cumberland Heights and I started uh helped start Still Waters, which was was kind of an all-men's 12-step immersion. And then I worked at the ranch and really got a lot of training on trauma after that, and uh worked in a prison for a little while after I worked at the ranch. And just through my recovery, you know, I've always kind of been a spiritual seeker. Uh I studied Buddhism for a lot of years and study a lot of Christian mystics and anything related to spirituality. You know, my mother read Young when I was little. She was a big reader, and so I had read some Young in the past. I've always been an avid reader. But around 2019, 2020, I kind of had a series of dreams around the time of COVID that kind of led me to get into analysis, into youngin analysis. And I I found an analyst and started working with her. And um, the process was so inspiring for me and so fulfilling that after a couple years, she told me that she thought I should do some training in Youngin psychology. And so I started going to Switzerland uh to the Center for Depth Psychology and have been doing that for three and a half years and have and and now am a Young Yan analyst in training, I guess. That's that's kind of how I got into it. And then I've really I've really come to believe that Youngin' psychology can be kind of a missing link for people in recovery, not just people in recovery, but specifically now that I work in private practice, it seems to address a lot of the issues that many of my clients struggle with after years of sobriety.

SPEAKER_03:

I'm so fascinated. I'm gonna ask you to rewind just a second because I want to know about the dreams.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, it was a very strange dream, but I had this dream where I was carrying the head of Hermes, a statue of Hermes, and I was carrying the head of this statue, and I I walked into this really old kind of medieval shop. And I was in this shop and there was a man and a woman, and they they both looked like wizards. Not that they were dressed like wizards, but uh the woman she was she was doing a motion with her hands where she was playing these this stringed instrument that vibrated with light, and the man was he was working on clocks, old mechanical clocks. They said, Oh, I didn't know you were coming so soon, but I know why you're here with the head of Hermes, and I said, Okay, why am I here? And they said, Well, you're supposed to seek young. And uh I knew immediately what they meant when they told me that. And so that dream kind of catapulted me into the search.

SPEAKER_03:

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Um I've had a lot of fantastic dreams, which I do not need to get into right now, but I I love the truth of that. Um and Hermes is is it the is he the messenger?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, he is.

SPEAKER_03:

Is my right?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. And kind of kind of the messenger between the spirit world, too, a lot of the times.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. That's awesome. That's a hell of a way to get started.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it was it was it was really powerful. And then started having other dreams along with that that kind of kept kept guiding me toward that path.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, and you obviously listened.

SPEAKER_00:

I did, yes.

SPEAKER_03:

I'm curious about you had said at one point that you felt like that this was a missing link for people not only in recovery, but just in the healing process. What do you think that this, like what specifically, and you can expand on the psychology itself if that helps your answer, but like what about the specifically do you think is missing in other things and and that this provides as a solution?

SPEAKER_00:

Well, there's a lot of areas that I that I think that that it's kind of that missing link. One that I kind of talked about in that workshop is kind of the model of the personality that Jung laid out real early in his career as far as the thinking, feeling, sensation, and intuition. And you know, what I know from my own recovery and and really from my experience was that after 20 years being sober and really always being engaged in the 12 steps and on a spiritual path, I had become somewhat rigid in my personality and in my recovery. And that it I'm not gonna say it got dull necessarily, but there was an aspect of that. But that it it that for myself, I just felt that I was I was kind of stuck in in in just a little bit of a rut. And so it was really big for me to kind of understand this idea that there were other parts of my personality that while 12-step recovery was really good at developing certain parts of my personality, there was some missing pieces that were there that that I needed to kind of reawaken. And Jungian psychology kind of pointed me in that direction. And, you know, to you know, and I can be as specific as you want, but in one of those pieces is is the shadow. And I I know what happens for myself, you know, in my addiction, I kind of lived that shadow for several years where I wasn't couldn't exactly call me a good person or even a positive person, but lived in a lot of dark places and engaged in a lot of dark behavior. And when I got sober, I I I swung to the other side, which I needed to do, where I got really grounded in spiritual principles and and um and and really and really kind of pushed an aspect of my personality into the dark, where I was really afraid of uh that part of myself that had been had been active in my addiction. And what I noticed was that that that part of my shadow personality began to come out in other ways. It came out kind of sideways. And again, I s I see this with clients all the time where people stop their alcohol and drug use, but they still really struggle with things like gambling and pornography and uh a lot of those, you know, what they call process addictions that are in the therapeutic world. And and I noticed that kind of typical modes of dealing with those weren't as effective as they needed to be. And for myself, it was the shadow really came out for me in a lot of anger that I experienced in my sobriety. And I did a lot of of course I did tons of trauma therapy and that helped. And I did tons of Buddhism and mindfulness, which helped. But youngin psychology helped me more with my anger than anything else did.

SPEAKER_03:

How specifically did it help you?

SPEAKER_00:

Well, because you know, going back to what I was saying, I I had well, let me say this to you. One of the first things my younging analyst said to me, she said, she asked if I had any other addictions. And I said, Well, I still use nicotine and caffeine, and but I'm not too worried about those. But other than that, I really, you know, I really don't gamble. I really I don't watch pornography, you know. I I don't think I do. And she said, Well, I think you're addicted to being good. And yeah, that's kind of the same response I had. And so it kind of it kind of really challenged me that, well, again, like I, you know, I'm a big believer in leaning toward that positive side, but but again, neglecting that that other aspect of my personality, the Jungian idea is that when you push those parts of yourself down into the shadows, they're gonna come out one way or the other because repression, you know, as we talk about with feelings, doesn't get rid of the feelings, they just come out sideways.

SPEAKER_03:

Can you can you explain a little bit more specifically? Because I know what you're getting at, and I use that term a lot, but for someone who doesn't know what that means, then it's coming out sideways.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, so so again, I would work real, you know, just using the anger as an example, sure, I would I would work really hard on kind of the the 12-step philosophy of of, you know, anger is just not, you know, you're just not well suited to deal with it. It's better left to other people. And again, those parts of I'm not saying that those parts weren't helpful, but for me, when I pushed that down, what would happen was I I would still have strong feelings of anger that I would repress, you know, not on a daily basis, but that would come up every couple weeks, and I would push those down, and I would push those down, and then it would show itself in a sudden outburst of temper. Whether that be on the road or whether that be, you know, in a store, or if somebody I just felt crossed me, I would I would be kind of overwhelmed by this anger. And that's because again, I I really found out that I was disconnected from that feeling part of my personality and had rejected it, rejected that that part of myself, that shadow part of myself, instead of what what I was kind of taught to do was to be in conscious relationship with my anger instead of instead of suppressing it.

SPEAKER_03:

What does that look like?

SPEAKER_00:

Well, for me, i it you know, it it looks like just being honest about the fact that because I think this is speaking for people in general, I I think that we that sometimes we tend to lose touch with the fact that we're we're we're in some ways animals and creatures of nature. And that anger is an instinct. And that that to try and repress an instinct, I don't think is healthy. Right? It it has a degree of healthiness in it at certain points, but but anger is part of being a human being. And so I had kind of tried to decide I I wanted to be almost robotic with my anger and find robotic solutions to it. And for me, that just did not work long term.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. No, I can imagine. And instead, what it sounds like you're talking about is just getting in better relationship with the fact that it is real, it's valid, it exists, right? Instead of instead of shoving it like it's some bad thing that you don't want to associate with.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, and yeah, exactly. And that that like, you know, kind of the philosophy in 12 step programs is that it's also it's a power greater than myself. It's an instinct. And again, to like consciously fight against it is fighting against your own nature to some degree. And that the more I fight against my nature, the more that I become kind of immeshed in it. It kind of creates the opposite reaction.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Um, well, and I love that, and that it's it's gonna happen, right? It's an emotion. We all have the human spectrum of all emotions. And instead of making them or labeling them good or bad, or try to only be these, but not these, and even the other ones, right? Instead of not just anger, but resentment, guilt, shame, anything in the quote, darker side of things. Like how do you get to be familiar with them, to understand them, to leave space for them and navigate your way through them in a way that's healthy so that you can continue moving forward and not just stuff them in a in a pile where they explode later.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. No, no, exactly. Well said. Yeah, that's exactly right. And um, and that and that the more that I consciously relate to those parts of myself that either society or other people have told me that I need to get rid of, the more that I become kind of integrated with these parts of myself that have been rejected.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. In the same token of like light and dark, I want to ask about anima and animus. Can we go into that a little bit?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, I love I love talking about anima and animus. And and again, you know, you could you could just as well say dog and cat or yin and yang when we're talking about the anima and animus. But in young psychology, the anima is is for for a male, it's it's the hidden feminine part of the personality. And for women, the animus is the hidden part of the female personality. And so so that the anima in in a male, which is always easier for me to talk about, are those parts of femininity that, like I said earlier, mostly through our families or through society, that on some level we're we're taught to reject and we're taught to not be in relationship with because of what people tell us are the standards of what what either masculinity or femininity is. And so in Yunin psychology, and I believe this, if you think of the symbol of uh of Taoism, the yin and the yang symbol, the idea is to have the male and the female balanced in a personality as much as you can. Nobody's gonna have those exactly balanced because it's just not possible. But but I think that in our society, I know for me personally, that that I had come from my childhood with with actually probably a lot of feminine parts of my personality, that I was always very artistic, which is classically associated with the female part of the personality. I was always very sensitive. I was always very kind of in touch with my emotions. And that as I got older, I was kind of taught consciously or unconsciously by my family or other people to reject those feminine parts of the personality. And that the more that I rejected those, the more that I became distant from my true self. That again, like those parts of myself are healthy and natural and want to be expressed.

SPEAKER_03:

I'm curious what that looked like for you, rejection or familial tribe, whatever whatever the unit that you grew up in. What how did that play out for you specifically?

SPEAKER_00:

Well, I think it I I think it it it mostly and when I was doing I did some real intense anima work the last time I was in Switzerland. And I started thinking about me as a child and how I would how I would just put on songs when I was five or six on the Scooby-Doo record player. And I loved just singing songs. And I love I used to write my own songs when I was a child. I would write songs and poems, and that that was that was as interesting to me, if not more, than the traditional masculine things like sports. Or, or, you know, like I always remember like I never liked fighting. Like I just never liked violence. And so I I started thinking about how, you know, my father was, you know, a very masculine man. He worked for the railroad, he was very blue-collar, and he was a good father, but he was also really cut off from that, from that feminine part of himself. And that in the where I grew up, if you were if you were to were to express a lot of femininity, you would be called gay or you'd be called blur, or somebody would would tell you to reject that part of it. And and so so again, I had learned how to really reject that part of the feminine inside myself, and I think it was very damaging to me. And I think it's damaging to most people.

SPEAKER_03:

Do you can you speak a little bit to the opposite to the animus as well? I know it's not your personal experience, but I'm curious, just for people listening.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, it it it yeah, it again, it's really hard for me to talk about the animus not being female, but but I think I think the way that it comes out classically in well, let me put it to you this way. Kind of the easiest way that I think to to kind of conceptualize how the animus comes out negatively in women would be the classic, would be the Karen. The meme of the Karen is w is kind of like you might even call it like an animus-possessed woman. And and that is that is kind of like where where a woman might have lost touch a little bit with that with the nurturing, creative side and has become lost in the rigid rule following, I've got to teach somebody a lesson side of themselves. And so it and so like it's the idea that as far as we've come in the 20th century, and I'm glad that we did in all the ways that that women have have gotten out of how they were oppressed by the patriarchy so much, which is true, that also that there's been some disconnect from kind of a woman's natural femininity in a way. Right? That women that women aren't allowed to kind of keep both of those things in balance. Like they have to make a choice between either being the career woman or they have to be a housewife that takes care of their children. And again, like Jungian psychology is uh about bringing those two into integration so that a woman doesn't have to be put into a box and neither does a man, that they can be truly like who they are without all all the ideas that we have to do what the collective tells us to do.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Um, I've also had the experience of in younger years being like I can't be too assertive because then I'm bitchy. But then I'm you know, and then you go into things where I'm trying to stay in a box based on social expectations or whatnot. Um, and try like just finding your way through that. It feels like in in my visual that I'm seeing, it's like a jungle of like, where can I go? Can I do this? I don't know about that.

SPEAKER_00:

So not surprisingly, you said it better than I did, right? That example you gave of like telling telling an assertive woman that they're bitchy is a great example of how society would kind of cut off women from their natural, again, kind of healthy masculine traits of being assertive and saying like, no, I'm my own individual person, I can do whatever I want. And so that example you gave is a great example of that.

SPEAKER_03:

Thank you. Um I'm curious if you know, we're talking about male and female, and there's obviously been a lot in recent years with gender identity, whether it's, you know, trans changing genders that you know you were at assigned at birth or non-binary. Do you feel like the masculine, feminine yin-yang cycle is still applicable no matter how you identify, or do you think that changes at all?

SPEAKER_00:

I I'm sure it changes. And I I and and under I'm under no illusions that I have any idea about what it's like to be in that situation either. But yes, I do think it is still, I I think there is something there that everybody could benefit from. And I think again, like like what I work with people with to kind of stay out of that debate, and what what I really look at is that what Jungian psychology is talking about, not the external so much as the internal. So it's talking about the internal psychic state more than what's going on in in the body. I mean, the body is part of it, but it's more talking about the masculine and feminine forces inside you. Right. And again, and I think it doesn't matter what you identify in, because again, like the idea that yin and yang idea or the dog and cat idea, we're just talking about these emotions and these psychic states that are in people.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And so so I think, you know, I I think that answers it a little bit, but again, like what what I would say again, working with a lot of young men, it is that I think there's been some of that push that I think is unhealthy in our society is that idea that all masculinity is toxic.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes. Say more about that.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, I don't think all masculinity is toxic at all. I think that there's a very healthy masculinity. And I think that I think part of what's happened is that there's a pseudo-masculinity in our culture. And the pseudo-masculinity with the with the conquests, sexual conquests, and how many steroids can I take, and how buff can I be, and that, you know, I don't take any shit from anybody, and da-da-da. That's kind of a pseudo-masculinity. But a healthy masculinity is calm, gentle, supportive, but it also has a strength to it, right? And that strength is something that, and it's assertive in the same way. And I work work with a lot of young men that I think are very confused about whether or not there's even such a thing as a healthy masculinity. And and again, I think there is in the same way that I think there's such a thing as unhealthy feminine behavior and healthy feminine behavior. And that's up to the individual to decide. But again, I know that's true. And healthy masculinity is something I'm really big on because I think it's one of the ways that our culture is so polarized between these two ideas, as they're polarized between everything. And again, like kind of one of the one of the fundamentals of Jungian psychology is the union of opposites. Right? Yeah. In our society and in the individual himself. And so again, it's that idea of like uh a healthy masculinity is gonna be something that other people are gonna want to aspire to, and that they can be okay with who they are as a man, and that who they are as a man doesn't have to fit some kind of formula that's laid out by a society or somebody that's on YouTube talking about kind of that toxic masculinity, which I do believe exists. There is such a thing as toxic masculinity.

SPEAKER_03:

So I'm curious if you have someone who is in this face of willingness to look at this in themselves and work on it, and they start to change, or maybe are afraid of changing because of the responses or potential responses of the people around them, right? Their family, their friends, the people that have only known them to be the way that they have been. They have an expectation that this person is gonna keep showing up the way that they have always been, and that person is really looking to change. How do you how would you help them just just how to start thinking differently about the fact that you are gonna show up differently and other people may like or not like that response?

SPEAKER_00:

Well, it's a good question. And I but I think, you know, as you know, I I think that I think that's true in any kind of change in an individual. I think that that's true anybody that goes that gets in recovery and starts to change, or goes to therapy and starts to change, is that, you know, there's certain roles that our families in society, they would like to keep us in these certain roles.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And so and so I I'm just really big on the work with my clients that I do is that is really breaking some of these psychological chains where I'm too dependent on what other people think I'm supposed to be.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. And then that's a great way to put that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, and that really that that a healthy individuality too, like we all care what people think, everybody does, but that ultimately the self or the higher self is what I should rely on for who I am and not other people's opinions of me.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. And what would you tell people, again, like you said, whether it's masculine, feminine, or just change in general about the way that they've expected you to be if you've chosen to start showing up differently, how do you have them to let go of what other people think and sort of embrace that more? Like what what helps the most in terms of in some spaces you will lose people completely.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. Yeah, I think that's true. Sure. I I I think it's I think sometimes it's a grieving process. I mean, sometimes sometimes it is about really setting completely different boundaries with individuals.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And and you know, I I work a lot on healthy communication and assertiveness with clients. And it's just saying to people, I understand that this is the way it used to be, but this is who I am now and this is what I'm comfortable with. And I I really hope that you'll accept that.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And and I always tell clients, and if they don't, then I've got decisions to make.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

And have done that. Yeah. And that's been there have been people that have come with me, absolutely, and like couldn't be my biggest cheerleaders. There are people that have stayed somewhere in the middle ground and maybe the relationship has changed a little bit, but they're still there. And there have been some that I've chosen to to let go of, you know, because it wasn't good for me anymore.

SPEAKER_00:

Can you add a little bit about how you did that, about how you were kind of Sure.

SPEAKER_03:

Um I think I think the first thing is I had to get right with me before I approached anyone externally. And I had to make those choices about, you know, answering those questions, who who have I been if I'm being honest about it? How have I showed up? What have I avoided or not dealt with? And what parts of those things no longer serve me, right? That I need to let go of. And in the process of that, then you kind of move towards, okay, now if we've decided these are things that aren't doing me any justice, you get to sort of, I I always I had fun with it in the sense of like a blank canvas. Who do I want to become? And and you can just pick anything, right? We're just the dream version of me does all these things. This is kind of what she looks like. Um, and then I went to work on on what does that actually look like? Where is this old parts of me showing up? Where do I need to sit with that, address it, make different choices, right? Where do I need to, you know, this person used to walk all over me. How do I learn to set a boundary? What does that look like? And then the bigger part of that specific thing for me was how do I uphold the boundary?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

And then sort of as I'm navigating that, the things in me are showing me how people are responding to those changes as I go. But it really started with who do I want to be first? And then in the navigation of that, once I sort of committed to me, noticing who's available for that change. Um, and it was some of it was uncomfortable, some of it was direct conversations. I'm a fairly direct human. So I would sit down and be like, hey, you know, this is a thing, or I don't do this anymore. Or um, and then there's the other, you know, and I think everyone is different, but sometimes there's like what they call the slow ghost, which is where you just sort of make yourself less available for someone and you're not, you know, you just sort of back out of the room, as it were. And those a lot of those I found took care of themselves because anyone that really wasn't committed didn't really miss you anyway. So yeah, I think it was case by case, but it really started with me before I had to get who do I want to be before I ask anyone else what they think. And what do I think? Right. I spent a long time asking that other question instead of asking my own opinion.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, yeah, and that that's well said too, because I I think, you know, that's again, that's one of the things that attracts me to young youth psychology too, is that that it it is, it begins with what I think and not what other people think I should be or how they perceive me, and really looking at for myself that people-pleasing part of me, which I know was a survival skill, but knowing that that part of my personality no longer serves me anymore.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

That was needed at a certain time in my life. I understand the I understand how that behavior comes from my parents in society, but I don't want to live the rest of my life that way because I don't think I can live the kind of life that I want to live by doing that.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes, that was great. Yeah. Um, and yeah, and it was really it there was a lot of freedom for me in asking and answering those questions. What do I like, like to be a little bit dramatic, like this is my one, you know, wild and precious life. What do I want to do with it? And who do I want to be? And really to sit with that and to, I think first also give myself permission to change. Like this is I've been functioning for so long on how what I think other people think I should be, which is a lot of assumptions.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

And, you know, which of these, what do I actually want to be? And what does that look like?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. Yeah. And again, the Jungian psychology is really big about, you know, of course, we're all in the collective, we're all in society, we all have rules we have to abide by. But it's kind of this idea of like part of that that individuation process is kind of asking myself, now what do I really believe about myself? And what have I just been told that this is expected of me?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Right. And and looking at that from a lot of different ways, do I really believe this, or is this just something I've repeated for the past 30 years because I was told that?

SPEAKER_03:

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

And you sort of like, at least I, I it was sort of a sponge at different points, and I realized that I I literally had to ask what you said, which is, is this mine?

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Is this, is this mine? Do I actually think this? Is this true? Or what have I absorbed from what I've been told or what people told me that I should or shouldn't do or be? And a lot of it, just to be clear also is well intended, or was at least for me. It's not always, you know, people shaming or berating or those kinds of things. It can be, certainly. But a lot of my experience had been just people who came before me who didn't know what they didn't know. And it can be as limiting beliefs about yourself or what's possible for you in the world based on the people around you. And so I got in that seat of what is sort of the pace of the life of the people that I grew up in, whether that's um, you know, demographics or financial situations, like what kind of seat in society do you have and are you living at? And what do I think about that? Can I, can I do more with that? Can I do something different? You know, this is kind of the way it's always been done in my family or in my neighborhood or in my church or whatever, you know, whatever thing you want to go with. But to sort of look at which of those things are maybe up for do up for negotiation. You know, can I change?

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely. So yeah. And and some of those, some of those traditions and some of those beliefs I took a look at and said, no, I do want to keep those.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes.

SPEAKER_00:

And some of them I said, no, I I I don't think I don't think I really I don't think that is really who I am. I think that's who I thought I was supposed to be.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes, I did the same. And then some of that led me till physical changes where I moved out of state to a place where I didn't know anyone. I like literally, not a single person, and thought, you know, and I had I was not sober at that time. I was dealing with some other stuff. But that was kind of my first step into change, even though I hadn't dealt with the sobriety part yet. And then later came the sobriety part. I had gotten a little bit more stable in in things there. I was like, I think, I think it's time for me to go look at that too.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03:

And then, yeah, and then it was it's been cool. Like I say that very intentionally, like the stages of things in phases, it's not, it's not just a straight line or all uphill. It's like, oh, I got this part, and then kind of like a tree. Like there's the foundation, and then you can grow into different branches once you have a more solid foundation. And sometimes you go back. Sometimes I'm like, oh, there's a thing still down there that I need to go back to.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, sure, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03:

But it's been a really cool experience in in terms of asking those questions and then building the muscle, muscles that helped me to actually lean into doing the things that have taken me to become more of that kind of person that the previous version of me didn't know she could be.

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, and for me it was really watching too how much, because you know, these are part of those those complexes, how much at a certain point the society or the family puts those beliefs into my psyche, but then I had to look at, well, I'm 50 years old, and really these things are still in my brain telling me who I should be.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Right? Some of those people aren't even around anymore. Yes. But they still exist inside of me, telling me these things. And again, that's that's where I think the the the real progress starts, is where I see that it's not the external things that are that I think are oppressing me anymore. It's my own psychological condition that keeps telling me all these things over and over again that may or may not be true.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes, I love that. And I like in my brain, it works like if I'm a computer and I have some outdated software. You know, I'm like, oh, this is still an old program that's running over here. And my you know, when I grew up, there were floppy disks and other things and comp, you know, which is not a thing anymore. But I just like to visually think of it like that, like, oh, that's just an old it's just an old part of my program I need to update. That's right.

SPEAKER_02:

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03:

But instead of taking it to be sometimes it can feel really heavy, like I'm carrying this thing that I've always been this way, that whatever, and sort of lightening it to be like, I don't I don't I don't have to do that anymore. That's a joke that I can work through that that process.

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03:

Um something else I want to ask about, which is one of my favorite things to talk about in recovery world in general, is emotional sobriety.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. Well, yeah, I I mean it's all connected to, again, for me, the youngin' psychology and my whole journey, you know, all the therapies I've done too, for me, I think being emotionally sober just means that I'm being my authenti authentic self as much as I can.

SPEAKER_03:

Well, and can you explain a little bit more about the actual definition of it, just in case anyone doesn't know?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of I mean, there's a lot of different definitions of it. I mean, you know, as far back as in the 1950s, you know, Bill Wilson, the founder of AA, was talking about emotional sobriety because he noticed that after AA had been around for a lot of years, and he noticed about himself that people were still really struggling with a lot of other issues. And, you know, I've thought about it a lot, and I'm I'm working on a book about emotional sobriety right now. And to me, emotional sobriety is just that you keep trying to evolve. And it's not a state that you get to, such as like I'm sober or not sober. But I think emotional sobriety is just being willing to stay on the path of evolution. And I I think that again, what people in recovery struggle with is thinking that emotional sobriety is about being perfect. And emotional sobriety is not about being perfect because you know they they used to, when I got sober, they would what they would talk about was people being dry drunks. And when they were talking about dry drunks, they were talking about people that weren't emotionally sober. But the truth is, anybody, if you've like me and have been sober for 25 years, you're gonna be a dry drunk sometimes. All of us are gonna be emotionally unsober sometimes. Again, that's just part of being a human being. But I think the people that can get closest to that emotional sobriety place is is refusing to get to a place of self-satisfaction. And you know, my you know, one of my one of my favorite quotes from Buddhism that is kind of the name of my my private practice, kind of stems from this is that you are perfect exactly the way you are, and you could use a little improvement.

SPEAKER_03:

I like it.

SPEAKER_00:

And that's kind of the best mentality, I think, for emotional sobriety is is truly loving yourself, which I think is a huge part of emotional sobriety. Is truly loving yourself. And then also continuing on the path to self-improvement, individuation, knowing the self, whatever that is. But I think emotionally sober people are the ones that keep trying.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I would say that I didn't if anyone ever asks, I always say that being sober didn't make my life get better, the sobriety in and of itself. But it gave me the space to create the time, effort, and energy to put into the things that did.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, definitely. I mean, I I I mean, again, like sobriety gives us the ch we've got a fighting chance to do the sort of things that you're talking about, you know. But again, it is it is just the beginning. And uh I know for me, you know, I I've said this many times to clients, the the path for me toward emotional sobriety has really been about learning to truly love and accept myself. That that's been a huge part of it. And I think that's one of the most difficult things for people in sobriety is truly loving themselves.

SPEAKER_03:

How do you yeah, go ahead.

SPEAKER_00:

No, no, go ahead, Est.

SPEAKER_03:

I know that's a big struggle for people.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Um how do you help them work towards that? I thought for many years that liking myself meant I had to do more yoga or meditation. And while those things are good, I think that what helped me the most to like myself so much more directly related to the choices that I make.

SPEAKER_00:

Well, I think that's a huge part of it. I I think it again, it's hard to love yourself when you're doing things that cause you continual shame. And so I I can't, you know, again, I see this a lot with clients too, is that you know, if if using drugs, not using drugs, but if I engage in behavior that continues to reinforce that shame core inside me, that love of myself is going to be really, excuse me, hard to achieve. But but if I can if I can operate by first starting not to do things that reproduce that shame over and over. And then kind of what I talked about earlier, that loving myself is also what I found for me is re-engaging with those parts of my personality or parts of myself that I felt like I had to reject or that someone told me were not good or were not wholesome. And of course, anybody that grows up has a history of trauma, you know, trauma by itself is is gonna cause people to have great difficulty loving themselves. So we have to split those people away from their trauma and make them see, help them to see that they are not the trauma and not the things that happen to them. And so that they can really realize, you know, and this is a process too, of like who I am at my core, right? Who I am with all aspects of my personality shining through. And for me, that includes that spiritual aspect too. That I had that I believe, you know, in my experiences that again, like a person's spirit or a s or their soul or their higher self is untouched by all the trauma and all the things that they go through. And that I want to I wanna know how to connect with that.

SPEAKER_03:

What has helped you the most, or what would you tell people if they don't feel a great connection there? What helps the most in terms of learning what it's like to develop a connection with spirituality?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I think it's I think it's all kinds of things, you know. I d I I don't know any any one good answer. I mean, I think for me early on in my recovery, it was that thing of I was told in in 12-step recovery of like, you know, we're gonna love you until you love yourself. And so I had to be around people that could see who I was apart from who I was in my addiction. And that was a huge part of it was being around people who loved me unconditionally. And then over the years it's kind of evolved into into certain other areas where you know, part of my journey in in young psychology was I I realized how disconnected I was from my own body. And how how starting to exercise and run and eat healthy was a huge part of me learning how to love myself by learning how to disconnect from the shameful dialogue that would spin in my brain and how to talk to myself nicer was a huge part of that journey. How to connect with that inner child that's in all of us. And knowing that there's a little kid in me that is wounded and that wants me to come rescue him.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And that that child still lives in me and is waiting for me to connect with him or her.

SPEAKER_03:

That's really beautiful the way you said that. What is spirituality look like for you today? Just in general, ongoing relationship?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it's a lot of things. I mean, I I pay attention to my dreams. I think that I think there's spirit in dreams. I think the unconscious speaks to us. Spirituality is again, in Young psychology, it's looking for synchronicities. Where do I where where do I get these glimpses that maybe there's something bigger than me that speaks to me through coincidences or chance meetings with people, with friendships? And, you know, I I I read a lot of books on spirituality. I pray, I meditate. I think being out in nature is a huge part of it. So it again, I think, you know, kind of something I'm really passionate about, especially in in times of like AI and kind of computer generated spirituality, is the truth is, is there's not there's not like a here's ten ways to be more spiritual. Here's you know what I mean? Like here's here's three ways that you can become more look inside yourself and see what feeds your spirituality. What what is what is it that you do that makes you feel like you're connected with that higher part of yourself and then engage in that and then also for me it's paying attention to like I said before, what are the things that that when I do them, I get that feeling of like I don't think that's probably a good idea, Jeff. Like what things seem to disconnect me from myself. And then the longer I stay sober, I I'm just I'm just very sensitive to things that that don't feel right to me. And I'm really sensitive to the things that do feed my spirituality. And I just pursue those. I pr pursue those almost obsessively.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

I I really do. Uh because again, my life just is much, much better when I'm pursuing that.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I agree. And mine has gotten a lot more magical over the last few years for lack of a better word that feels accurate. Um and all of literally everything you said is part of that, whether it's nature or things I read, or I also I write down dreams. Um mine are a little bit more metaphorical instead of specific. Um but I just have gotten better at understanding what that means to me and sort of developing my own language and listening to it and following it. And I sort of had to get out of my head the idea that there's a right way to do this.

SPEAKER_02:

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_03:

And follow what makes sense to me and kind of like um things that I think society terms like a coincidence or a synchronicity is a lot bigger than that, usually. And I I take it as such, and I think when I take it as such and I say thank you, yes, please, then there comes more because I'm listening. Um and I just I have a lot of evidence to support that that is real and true and exists, and it's really powerful.

SPEAKER_00:

Very powerful, yes. I love how you said that too, because I you know, uh when you said magical, and and I and I think again, like that that's something that really is sick in our society, is that is that the magic's taking away. And again, that's that's something that's really I want the magic in the world. I don't want everything to be rationally explained to me because I know that there are things that are completely irrational that have been some of the most beautiful experiences that I've ever had. I don't want somebody to I don't need to know like every single thing that the happens in the brain when you're in love. Do you know what I mean? I would much rather experience that than have that broken down into some kind of formula.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And I And I think that that's something with with the just the age that we're in, that some of that magic has been taken out.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Does that does what you describe fit your personality type? I don't know as much anywhere near as what you probably know. But like, does that fit who you are in terms of it?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, well, yes, it does, because I'm I'm an intuitive introvert.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay.

SPEAKER_00:

So my world is is kind of like the inner world is is as real to me as the outer world.

SPEAKER_03:

Fair.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

I love that.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, and and again, like that's not to say like I'm extremely grateful for rational thinking and medical science and everything that it does. But at the same time, science is not meant to explain the spiritual.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

That has to be that that's supposed to be experienced more on a different basis. And I think again, that's part of where we get in trouble is we've c society's kind of like wants to get in everybody else's space when they'd probably be better staying out of it.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

If that makes sense.

SPEAKER_03:

It does. It does. Is there anything else that you want to share that we didn't talk about?

SPEAKER_00:

No, I mean, I think, you know, again, I I think we've talked about a lot. I've really enjoyed it. And, you know, I it it it's the thing that we talk about, and and this is part of it too, is, you know, I I think every individual just has to really find what works for them. I don't think I don't think younging psychology is everybody's path or that's what everybody should be doing. I don't think recovery is. I, you know, I think really like the individual just has to find for themselves what really speaks to their soul and their spirit and pursue that. But I do think that again, in my studies in analytical psychology, I think it's something that can really help people with with their sobriety and their and and kind of getting into the ballpark of what emotional sobriety is. Which is which is again, to me, it's just being my true self.

SPEAKER_03:

Mm-hmm. Yeah, that was really well said. And I think again, just if if anything has helped me the most in all of this, it's I think getting to know me more in all of the ways, wh whichever tools you use, being honest about that, and then giving myself permission to sort of re- rewrite the end of the story, you know.

SPEAKER_02:

And yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I'll I'll kind of, you know, leave you with this quote, you know, that you know, Young often said, you know, I am who I decide to be. You know, and I think again, I like that. I like that too, because I I think that that I can get lost in this idea that that you know that I'm powerless to decide about what my life is like or what it's not like. And to some degree we we're all powerless over what life does to us, but I think I think the human spirit does have the power to say, no, this is the life I want to be, and this is the person that I want to be, and we can move toward that.

SPEAKER_03:

That was very well said.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you.

SPEAKER_03:

Thank you so much for just being here, for saying yes to this, for spending time with me on a Sunday to to just go into all the things. I appreciate that greatly.

SPEAKER_00:

Sure, no, I love talking to you and uh anytime. It was great.

SPEAKER_03:

Thank you so much for being here. It means more than you know. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend or leave a quick rating or review wherever you listen to podcasts. It helps more people find the show. If you want more of me, head on over to nataniallison.com and enter your name and email for behind the scenes updates in between shows. New episodes air every Tuesday. We'll see you next week.