EP30: Eyes Wide Open | Shadow Work, Projections, and the Architecture of Conscious Love with Jeff Browning

I’ve spent years realizing that I wasn’t always in a relationship with the person in front of me—I was often in a relationship with a blueprint from my past.
 
I’m so excited to be joined again by my first repeat guest, Jeff Browning, to dive even deeper into the Jungian psychology of why we love the way we do. 

In this episode, we pull back the curtain on why so many of us "self-abandon" in the name of love, why our nervous systems get addicted to the dopamine of chaos, and how we can finally stop asking our partners to carry our "inner gold."

What We Cover:

• Breaking the Mirror: How our upbringing overlays our current reality, making us re-enact our childhood patterns and figures without even knowing it.
• Healing the Nervous System: Why we often mistake "boring" stability for a lack of love, and how to tell the difference between a soulmate spark and a trauma-bonded stress response.
• Archetypes in Action: How the "Warrior," the "Rebel," and the "Witch" live within us all—and how recognizing these internal stories can stop us from trying to control the people we love.

Whether you’re in recovery, navigating a long-term marriage, or wondering why you keep chasing the same "emotionally unavailable" patterns, this episode is a roadmap for staying whole while building a life with someone else.

Full episode + show notes: netanyaallyson.com/episodes/30

Transcript

The Nature of Love

Netanya 0:00

There are moments in life that split us open. By unraveling such frame or truths, we do not need it. Until we have 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 and 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 is the show's first repeat guest, and this time we're sitting down and talking all about relationships. We get into how our upbringing causes us to reenact childhood patterns, why we often mistake boring stability for a lack of love, and how archetypes live within us all, that recognizing our internal stories can stop us from trying to control the people we love. If you want to check out our previous conversation, just head on over to episode 11. Let's dive in.

SPEAKER_03 1:27

Oh, I'm honored. Thank you.

Netanya 1:29

Yeah. I've had, you know, just at this point, I just haven't had anyone on Repeat yet. So I was really excited when you agreed to come back a second time. Anytime, I love it. And I I want to talk about something that we I haven't talked about that much for this week. I released or I will release, I think the 26th episode. And I really haven't talked that much about romantic relationships. And so I'm excited to dive into that with you. But I would love to start from the beginning. Whether you want to you want to define your concept, your version, or youngin' psychology version, how would you define love?

SPEAKER_03 2:06

Yeah, that's a tough one. I mean well, I I will say this one time. Uh you know, I I remember I had a client long ago that was struggling in a relationship and was kind of close to divorce, and he put me on the spot and asked me what I thought love was, and I said love is self-sacrifice and commitment. And something about that really affected him. And I think that that's a good place to start with it, but I think also uh you have to kind of kind of recontextualize what that self-sacrifice means in a way. But I think true love is accepting a person exactly as they are, without putting additions on it. And I think I I know I've heard from different cultures that for whatever reason the English language doesn't have as many types of definitions of love as some of the other societies do. So I think that's confusing sometimes because there's different types of love. There's love you have for your dog, there's love you have for your children, there's love you have for your romantic partner. So there's love you have for a food. So I think it's it's kind of it's kind of hard to define exactly. Um, but I think that's something maybe we can talk about a little bit is how I think our society is kind of being confused about expectations of romantic love and all kind of the baggage that goes along with that. Um, which again, I just see a lot of people I work with suffer with, and I've certainly suffered with it myself.

Netanya 4:00

Um say more about that. I'm already interested. I do actually, you know what, I have a question really quick. When you say self-sacrificing, I want to pause because I think there's the sacrificing of yourself to an extent that you're you're compromising and you're giving with someone, right? To do a dance so that you meet in the middle and both, you know, mutually grow something versus something I personally experienced in self-sacrificing, which turns into the shadowish part of self-abandonment.

SPEAKER_03 4:33

Yeah, and I I I I think that's what's so tricky. Like the it would be m maybe a better term for it would be something like knowing how when to when to put someone else's needs ahead of my own for the good of that relationship or for the good of that person, and knowing that self-sacrificing doesn't mean selling myself out or being untrue to myself. And I think again, that's what's really confusing is you know, uh, because me and my wife were talking about it yesterday that, you know, real early in our marriage, we had to move uh a very small town for her job in order to get her student loans paid back. And uh I certainly wasn't thrilled about moving to this small town, um, but I knew that it was it was really gonna be beneficial for not just her, but for us in our relationship as well. And so I was really willing to make that three-year sacrifice for her and for that relationship. And that's really what I mean more about self-sacrifices, being willing to do those types of things for a partner, and that it it goes both ways, that both people are willing to do that when is needed. But at the same time, I'm not willing to, you know, put myself in emotional or psychological danger on a consistent basis for a partner and and have that be defined as a healthy form of self-sacrifice. So does that kind of make sense?

Netanya 6:16

Yes, I agree with you. And my own experience of that has been where can I give for the good of something, kind of like I spoke earlier, and also what is it costing me? Right? If something is costing me, you know, time or effort and energy versus costing me myself, something that is a core or a or a part of me that I really need to be the full version of myself.

SPEAKER_03 6:41

Yeah, yeah. Can you can you give an example maybe of just what might your experience be? Like where you felt like it wasn't a healthy sacrifice? Or like let me think.

Netanya 6:53

I wasn't ready to answer a question. Nobody ever asks me, nobody ever asks me questions on here, which is great. I always tell people like this is a conversation, but no one ever takes me up on it. Um yeah, I think part of mine historically has been reading a situation or a person, a relationship with a person, and understanding that I have to stay small or I can't grow. I can't level up into the full experience of who I want to become in order to maintain the relationship. And so some aspect of that is self-abandonment of I'm not allowing myself to be me, right? There's parts of me that are not exponentially available to me versus can we move? You know?

SPEAKER_03 7:45

Yeah.

Netanya 7:45

Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_03 7:47

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and and and I think I think for me, you know, when I was younger, that self-sacrificing would be things like stuffing down my feelings or not not really expressing the direction that I wanted to move in in my life and putting pushing that down in kind of that people-pleasing way where I think I have to put someone else's needs above mine.

SPEAKER_02 8:17

Yeah.

unknown 8:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 8:19

And so it's a so again, I think there's healthy sacrifice and sacrifice that's really more in the realm of neurosis than really, really sacrifice.

Netanya 8:29

Well, and I think too, again, just speaking from my personal experience, part of what I think I didn't know any better at the time of when all this happened, and I didn't have language for was communicating, right? This is what this is gonna cost me. This is how I'm really feeling. I just was trying to be a good wife and that that's what I thought that I needed to be at 25, you know, and just to keep the status quo, going, sure, we can do that, sure, we can do that. Yes, I want to support you, instead of honoring the truth of what those things meant for me or what that was gonna cost me in different ways, and and communicating that and talking about the truth of it and how can we supplement that over here or support that over here because it may be a side effect of something.

SPEAKER_03 9:17

That's right. Yeah, absolutely. And and you know, it may seem like a silly example, but it's just something, you know, I I uh uh it comes up all the time in counseling. Well, my partner wants me to go to the to the third wedding of the year for one of her friends, and and and I don't want to go. And that's an area, again, as a partner, we have to do things that we don't want to do a lot. And that's I think that's again, that's what we're supposed to do as adults is know that, yeah, I don't really want to do this, but it's important to my partner, and she does important things for me too, and that yeah, I'm I'm

Self-Sacrifice vs. Self-Abandonment

SPEAKER_03 9:58

willing to not watch the football game so I can go with my partner to this wedding. And again, that that's a healthy self-sacrifice.

Netanya 10:06

Yes, and sort of if you take it from like a micro level of in the moment I'm you know, we're at a date and I put, you know, if someone's on their phone and you're engaging with that, and it means a lot to me for you to put your phone down, something in a moment like that, versus the higher level vision of overall, this is this is this is making her feel more important, right?

SPEAKER_03 10:29

That's exactly right. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, that's that's again, that's that healthy little self-sacrifice that we all do on a daily basis in different parts of our life, but there is that line where it goes into something like codependency or something that's people pleasing, where then I lose myself thinking that I need to adjust my actions always to what this person's expectations are.

Netanya 10:53

Yes, yes. And there's and like I said, I have a lot of experience with this. Um in the space of self-abandonment, like I always have to do this. This is a this is not a rule in my head that I always have to compromise or give instead of voicing what do I need also on the other end of that.

SPEAKER_03 11:11

Absolutely.

Netanya 11:12

And the reciprocity of it.

SPEAKER_03 11:14

Absolutely.

Netanya 11:16

All right, so let's talk about romantic relationships as a whole. Kind of you started to go into that in the future in the beginning.

SPEAKER_03 11:21

Yeah.

Netanya 11:22

Go for it.

SPEAKER_03 11:23

Yeah, I mean, you know, I think of when I would this morning was thinking about talking to you, and what do most of my clients that again, like we've talked about, are in recovery, and what is one of the primary things that causes them a lot of suffering or a lot of uh a a lot of pain in their life, and it's definitely the romantic relationships. And tying that into a lot of the youngin' psychology that I've studied, and was made a really tremendous difference in my life, is just that idea of projection and what projection is and where it comes from and how it affects people's romantic relationships. And you know, just kind of maybe a starting point is this idea that um really asking myself if if I truly see the person that is in front of me, or am I projecting my own stuff or my own psychic material, my own trauma, my own history onto this other person. And I was thinking about trying to get a visual example, and and you know, we still go to movies, but it's not not as much as we used to. But the idea that you go to a movie theater and you have the projector, and the projector is projecting the movie onto the screen. And imagine if instead of one projector projecting that movie, there were three other projectors that were also projecting a different movie onto the same screen, and how difficult that would be to watch that movie and to see what you actually wanted to see. And so it's this idea that what we do with people is we have these projections from our our past and from our own psyche that are overlaying the reality of the person that's in front of us. So that we're not actually seeing the person, we're seeing our own contents projected onto that person.

Understanding Romantic Relationships

Netanya 13:39

Can you give me it it does, but I would love an example. Like if you can give me an example of a person, what she or he may be what what would that look like tangibly if someone was projecting onto someone else?

SPEAKER_03 13:53

Well, you know, kind of the kind of the simplest way. Well, let me let me back up because I thought about this example too. As far as projection, projection is natural, we all do it, it's it's built into us as human beings. But think about when you're four years old and you're given a stuffed animal. And think about how what as a child we project onto that stuffed animal. When we're given that as children, it's a source of comfort. We might sleep with it, we love it, it gives us feelings of warmth, and the reality is it's just material with stuffing inside of it. And so we project these positive qualities onto that, and it gives us it gives us this comfort. And there's nothing wrong with that. Again, it's natural and it's comforting, but that's kind of the idea with human beings is that we project these qualities onto other people that really are inside of ourselves. And so, like a real, you know, when we're talking about romantic relationships, the place that we can always start is most people's projections come from their mother and father, or whoever were their primary caretakers. And so if we have either a negative or positive mother image, then whoever if whoever we date, we're gonna project that onto them in one way or another. And so that can come about if if that's not worked out in a healthy way, as a as a male, as a heterosexual male, that would come out as, well, it's the woman's job to take care of me. It's the woman's job to act like my mother. It's the woman's job to pick up after me. It's the woman's job to treat me like a mother would treat her son. And in some ways, there's a healthy aspect to that, but if that's too one-sided, then it can turn into again making a partner projecting onto her that she is supposed to act like a mother for me, right? And in in the opposite, again, just in traditional relationships, it can go either way. You could say, like, like sometimes that idea that, well, my daughter is a princess, and I need to be treated like a princess. So then I meet a I meet a partner, and that projection says, I'm a princess, and therefore they're supposed to treat me like a princess. So I'm projecting these qualities of the father, of what that father relationship is onto this partner, and I'm unconsciously walking through this relationship expecting them to treat me like a princess or like mom's special, special guy. And again,

Expectations in Relationships

SPEAKER_03 17:07

sometimes that's okay at certain times in a relationship, but that's not a realistic, that's not seeing the person as they are, it's seeing a projection of the mother.

Netanya 17:18

How do you know if you're doing that?

SPEAKER_03 17:21

Well, I mean, I think that's what anything like this or counseling or good therapy should be one of the things that we do is is when when I hear somebody that's talking about their relationship on either side, it it becomes quite apparent that there's an expectation or a projection that this person is supposed to fill some kind of unfulfilled role for them that that person is probably gonna really struggle with. Because it's that idea that, again, if you don't have that that mother complex somewhat resolved, then that's gonna create a lot of problems down the line because most people don't want to be married to their father or their mother.

SPEAKER_02 18:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 18:13

And if that projection is still consistently being carried in there, it's gonna lead to all kinds of resentment. It's gonna lead to feeling like that person isn't fulfilling my needs. And again, the idea is that and we can go into this too, that's one of those ideas about asking other people to carry our gold for us.

Netanya 18:34

Okay. We say more about that.

SPEAKER_03 18:37

Well, the gold is again, and another example I thought about this was this was more for I I mean, most children played with dolls. Like when I was a kid, we called them action figures, but they were still dolls, right? Yes, and my action figures were Star Wars because I'm you know I'm over 50. So we take we take these little action figures, and Luke Skywalker is the hero. And so I project the hero image onto him, and Obi-Wan Kenobi is the wise old man. So I project these figures on him. They're heroic, they're wise, etc., etc. And again, that's there's nothing wrong with having heroes and to and to have people that we look up to as children or adults. But what we do is is we we tell other people that they carry these qualities, these positive qualities for us, and that we don't have them ourselves. And what kind of younging psychology asks us to do is well, you need to reawaken that hero quality in you instead of expecting another person to carry that for you. And that's what the gold is. And the gold in in romantic relationships, and we talked a little bit about this last time,

Carrying Your Own Gold + The Role of Validation

SPEAKER_03 20:02

is that I need to develop those classical feminine qualities in myself instead of expecting the partner that I choose to carry those for me. And again, most men will do that in the way that with women, if men are cut off from their emotions or not in relationship with their emotions, then they unconsciously expect their female partner to carry those for them. Right? Or if it can even act in, you know, in in my marriage, my wife has always, from the time we dated, she's all she's very organized, she's very great at like paying the bills and getting stuff done and organizing things. And that's just not my that's not my strongest skill set. And so early in our relationship, I would kind of hand that off to her and always expect her to do that for me. And what I needed to do was develop that in myself instead of keep insisting that she do that for me. And hence that idea of like asking somebody to carry my gold for me, right? Asking somebody if I'm not assertive enough, then I might I might always expect my partner to come to my rescue or to draw a boundary for me or to take up for me. And then if they don't meet that expectation, then that's gonna lead to a resentment. And so again, it's that idea of watching what I put on somebody else, and what ways am I expecting them to care for me? That's not really care, it's more of a codependent idea of like they're supposed to take care of me. And I think that's where the unhealthiness comes in.

Netanya 21:53

How does that relate to like validation? So, in the sense of like if if I'm expecting you. You to do the thing, right? But then I do develop the thing in myself. We'll say the hero, because it was the easiest one to start with. Um, how does that relate to like needing someone to validate that I've then done that versus knowing in myself that I have then done that?

SPEAKER_03 22:16

Well, I I I think I think again, it's all of us need validation. Right. I mean, that's that's natural too, but I I think I think the trick is is that we really rely on too much external validation. I should be the one, I should primarily be the one to validate myself, my feelings, who I am in a who I am in in my career, in my place in the world, and that other people, anything they give me in that area is kind of a bonus.

SPEAKER_04 22:50

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_03 22:50

And so, and that's one of the things that I think therapy and you know recovery does is that in the beginning, I needed a lot of external validation because my sense of self was so low. But as I, as I develop, and again, this is a healthy, this is the healthy dynamic that should take place in in in therapy, eventually it should be less about the therapist validating the client and more about the client being able to validate and and do that themselves without that much outside stimulus.

Netanya 23:30

Yeah. Um, I always think that like the sign of a good teacher or mentor or therapist or anything is someone who can teach you not to need them anymore, right? In that state of the building your own muscle than you then I know I've done my job. Yes. I'm curious, in in sort of tandem with what we were just talking about, how do you feel about the fantasy that people come up with, right? So not projection necessarily, but when people create the fantasy of someone in their head and they're not actually seeing the truth of the person in front of them, but fall in love with the fantasy of who someone could be.

SPEAKER_03 24:12

Well, I think they're the same thing. Okay, I think I think fantasy and projection are the same thing. Okay. It was kind of feeling like the same, but I just thought I'd ask if it was Yeah, I I I think they're the same thing. And again, like the fantasy is that that the person I'm in the romantic relationship with is gonna fulfill all my needs.

Netanya 24:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 24:35

That's the fantasy. And again, like you go back to go back again to the child in Youngin' psychology. Well, that makes sense when you're when you're two and four years old. That's the job, right, of of the mother and the father is to fulfill that. But again, if if I'm 40 years old and I'm still expecting people consciously or unconsciously to fill all those needs, then I'm probably gonna be off track.

Netanya 25:05

Yeah. Um how do you feel about the concept of mirroring, or what do you know about it, or just in general?

SPEAKER_03 25:16

Yeah, I mean uh certainly no expert in it, but I think mirroring is is vital to the development of any human being. I mean, I know that that's in in young children and babies, like that mirroring is essential to their growth.

SPEAKER_01 25:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:33

And so again, that that in a partnership, that mirroring and validation is extremely important. And that I'm allowed to ask for that from my partner. But I think that's that's kind of that's kind of the difference, is like mirroring someone, but then asking someone to really validate me as a human being is two different things.

Netanya 25:55

Okay.

Mirroring and Emotional Needs

Netanya 25:56

Anything else there that you want to talk about that I don't know what to ask about?

SPEAKER_03 26:00

Yeah, I mean, just a little more on on the carrying the gold is it it's this idea that you know, and we talk about in the recovery world about the expectations we place on people. And it the idea is is that, and I see this all the time in relationships, and again, it's something I've worked on, is that in my experience, most of the expectations that couples put on either of their partners is too much.

unknown 26:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:32

That it's too much, it it is too much. And the carrying the gold is comes from a Robert Johnson book, which is called Inner Gold. And he talks a lot about think about how heavy gold is. And when we keep insisting that people carry this weight for us over and over again, it just overburdens them. You know, especially in this idea this idea that it is the other person's responsibility to emotionally regulate me.

Netanya 27:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:03

And it is it is not the other person's responsibility to emotionally regulate me. It is their responsibility, I think what you said, to mirror me and to validate me. But to ask them to emotionally regulate me or to make them or to insist that they make me feel like a whole human being is just putting too much weight on them, and eventually people will crumble under that weight. And I think that happens in a lot of marriages.

Netanya 27:33

How do you what are your your thoughts on just navigating that of the concept of I cannot be your everything?

SPEAKER_01 27:41

Yes.

Netanya 27:42

Just how do you, in understanding that that's true, when two people come together, how do you determine what you can be for each other and then where you maybe need to outsource something or find something somewhere else?

SPEAKER_03 27:55

Well, I think it starts with just what you said. I mean, I mean, I don't think I don't think the majority of couples say to their partner, I can't be your everything. And in fact, I think in social media world, I mean, I don't really watch it, but what I've heard is that that's kind of the mentality is oh no, you will be my everything.

SPEAKER_02 28:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 28:20

You will be my everything. You will you will be able to tolerate everything I throw at you. Doesn't matter if I'm emotionally, if I'm just out of control or dysregulated, you will accept that and tolerate that. And that's where a lot of that unhealthiness comes in, is I I think that idea of like, no, you're supposed to, you're supposed to just just take everything that I throw at you, and and if you don't, then you're not you're not a good enough partner.

Netanya 28:47

Yeah, like it's your problem, right?

Expectations, Individuation and Self-Discovery

SPEAKER_03 28:50

It's your problem. Yes, exactly. And and I will throw this in because I think it's important, and and this is from that Robert Johnson book and some others. One of the ideas is that I think is true if if we went back 300 years ago, that when our society was kind of contained by really strong religious values, and that there was good and bad associated with that. But one of the positive things about that was that the God image that it talks about in Jungi's psychology, that carried the weight for people in a way that it doesn't for most people now. And so instead of somebody projecting all of all of their expectations onto a romantic partner, some of those expectations were projected onto divinity or a higher power or some higher spiritual aspect of their relationship. And so the idea is that during the starting kind of in the Enlightenment in the 20th century, when people became skeptical about religion and God and the idea of that, that all of that psychic energy was placed on the romantic partner.

Netanya 30:15

That's a large weight.

SPEAKER_03 30:17

It's a large weight. And so, like when people in recovery say things like, Well, don't make them your higher power, that's what they're talking about. But the problem is, because I think about this a lot too, we say that a lot in recovery, but how do we do that?

SPEAKER_02 30:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 30:35

How do we not how do we not insist that somebody act like our God or our mother or our father? How do we stop doing that and withdraw some of that? Because again, even even the idea of romantic love is is really newer than it is older. You know, go you go back a long time ago and there, you know, they were arranged marriages for years.

SPEAKER_02 31:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 31:03

You know, going back thousands of years. And thank God it's not like that anymore. But again, like in that dynamic, some of those expectations were a lot different. Whereas now the expectations on romantic love through movies and media and songs, especially songs, which I love a sad love song too. But it really is that idea that this person is my everything.

Netanya 31:30

Well, and even the con the um the concept of like the other half, right? Whether you use a term soulmate or um you what is it? Was it Jerry Maguire? Yes. That's like you complete me, or you know, so that like I'm not whole, or some part of me is missing without that other person.

SPEAKER_03 31:51

Perfect example. And I've used that before, the Jerry Maguire example. And again, two half people coming together is not gonna turn out well most of the time. It's just not gonna turn out well. Not that people can't meet as half people or have, you know, growing people and move toward that, but again, the longer that relationship goes on, that projection is gonna have to alter or change because two whole people are the only ones that can really stay together.

Netanya 32:22

What are some things if you were to paint a picture that help identify whether or not you're whole? And I don't want to like black and white it so much because there's lots of nuance in there, but just signs or or indicators might be that you're you're more you're more individualistic in that or whole in yourself versus half or seeking or sourcing things from outside yourself that um just again, if someone were looking at where am I, how am I doing on this and what might I need to look at.

SPEAKER_03 32:50

Well, I I think one of the ways that you access that is just in your feelings. And and again, in the feelings in the way that if if I have an intense, strong feeling that whoever I'm in relationship with is not giving me something that I should be giving myself. If I can't validate myself in the way that I need to, and I'm constantly going to that other person to try and get them to make me feel emotionally safe, then I'm just not centered. Right. And we talk about that a lot about being centered, but I know for me, and I'm not always centered, but when I'm centered, the the the desire that I have to insist that people act a certain way or give me things up to my expectations is very, very low.

Netanya 33:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:47

Right. It's it's a more of a self-contained way. And when I'm in that space with my wife, it allows us both to function in an autonomous way and yet come together for the good of the relationship.

Netanya 34:01

Can you talk a little bit about the concept of individuation and being true to yourself?

SPEAKER_03 34:08

Yeah, I mean, again, we talked about it uh last time a lot too, but it's this idea of those parts of myself that that I'm expecting someone else to hold for me.

Netanya 34:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 34:23

And so individuation is goes into the persona. Who is the who is what is it that I present on a daily basis and that in a way that I present a mask or how I interact with the world?

Karmic Relationships and Soul Connections

SPEAKER_03 34:38

How do I how do I relate to my shadow? Those parts of myself that I've cut off, that I'm ashamed of, or that I'm afraid of. And again, depending on any individual, you can call it the masculine or feminine, or you can just say, what are those parts of my personality that that for a male, again, it's the anima that I've just neglected, that I've repressed, or what that have kind of gone into the unconscious and need to come out.

Netanya 35:12

But this is gonna seem somewhat random, but it came up in my head while you were talking earlier, so I'm gonna ask about it. And I don't know if Young Ian psychology talks about this at all, but even if not, what is your thought or opinion on karmic relationships?

SPEAKER_03 35:25

Uh yeah, I'm sure it does relate, but tell me what you mean a little bit on karmic relationships.

Netanya 35:31

Um the concept of things being faded or people coming together, or some people would say past lives that you've traveled, souls have traveled with each other. I'm curious about thoughts on that. If you have any opinion or experience with it.

SPEAKER_03 35:48

Yeah, I mean, I think I love those kind of I love those kind of topics, and you know, I I think there's something to it. But again, I think it's also one of those things where people can get a little too hung up in that in thinking there's that one person.

SPEAKER_02 36:05

Yes, agreed.

SPEAKER_03 36:07

Right. Yes. Because uh because I I think again, you know, there's I I don't know how many people are on the planet, but I think there's billions, there's you know, billions, millions of people. And I think that I can form if if there's a healthy foundation in place, if I meet someone and our interests are aligned and it produces that feeling, I think that that that initial spark with somebody is just the beginning of the relationship. And it could be something karmic or could be something past life, but that's kind of like the responsibility of the individual is like, well, what do I want to do with this connection?

SPEAKER_02 36:48

Yes. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 36:50

Yeah. And how do I consciously want to work with it?

Netanya 36:53

Yeah, I love that. I love what you said there about again, the the idea that there's just one person for you, or first of all, that's exhausting just to think about trying to find one person out of millions. No doubt. Also, just I've I've had experiences recently, which is what made me think of it, with people that and again, I I don't know that I will ever have evidence whether someone has whether past lives or souls, you know, traveling together is is true or not true. I have my own beliefs about it, but I don't know that I'll ever have tangible evidence of it. But I have had the experience of, you know, my understanding of the definition of a soulmate is not the fantasy version that that kind of we're talking about, but more that you

The Illusion of Romantic Love

Netanya 37:36

have many, right? You can have many and that they can be friends, they can be romantic or not, they can be family members, but they're people that kind of come together with you repeatedly that you fall into place with that you journey with like throughout your lifetimes. And then there's things like other types of karmic relationships, again, just to my understanding of it, where people come together for the purpose of growth, but it may not be steady, like it might be tumultuous to an extent because they're here to to you know show each other their shadows or mirror or things that are um dark things for you to learn and grow. And so it may be spaces where you come together for a little while and it's intense, and then you have to separate because it's not sustainable to keep going.

SPEAKER_03 38:21

Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I think that's true. And I I I again I think that's part of what has been a lot of my work was that there's all people that we feel just a certain like strong connection with for whatever reason that that again, in like in in Jungian psychology, they might call that arrows, right? It's just this real strong, intense feeling. But also, you know, that Youngin psychology would also say that that's also part of the projection, too. And that that when that happens, those real strong intense feelings like love, like romantic love. I need to pay attention to that because also what what it would say is that those that's pointing you, that person is pointing you back to an aspect of yourself. That again, like that that that that real intense emotional tone to that is about that person, but it's also about what is it you see in that person that you need to reawaken with you. What is what is it about that person that just sparks that quality that you think they have that's really in you? And once you get past the physical appearance, then it's usually something in the realm of they're artistic or they're so compassionate or they're just so full of life, or whatever it is. And again, like the idea is like those things are in that person, but it's the soul's longing to reawaken that part of myself that I see in that person.

Netanya 40:02

I love that. And I love something you touched on just momentarily a little bit ago, about no matter what, whenever you come together in any type of these relationships where you're brought together with someone and there's some element of some of the things that we're talking about here, it's the the thing that's important about it is the choice factor, right? What do you do with it?

SPEAKER_03 40:25

Yes. So something I something I say to a lot of my clients, I said it to one last week, is do whatever you want, but do it with your eyes wide open.

Netanya 40:38

Oh, I like that.

Chaos vs. Stability in Relationships

Netanya 40:40

Yeah, that was good.

SPEAKER_03 40:41

And so, and so again, that's part of like separating out some of these projections is the idea of like I I want to help people get clarity about what are you really doing right here with even like in a romantic relationship. Yeah, I know you've got all the feelings, I know that it's everything stirring up. I love those feelings, I've had them before too. But those feelings can also blind me from like what is the reality of this person? It can blind me from the red flags.

SPEAKER_01 41:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 41:15

Right? It can blind me to a lot of different things because the truth is, again, I've been with my wife 25 years. The truth is, is that ecstasy is gonna fade, that projection is gonna fade, and then you're left with the person that throws their socks on the floor or leaves hair in the sink.

SPEAKER_02 41:34

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 41:34

And then the Jerry Maguire stuff, they don't show Jerry Maguire, you know, 10 years later when they're married and kids are throwing up or whatever it is, you know. Yeah. But that's that's really where now you're getting into more of like past this feeling of love and more of like a genuine love that has to do with really relating to and seeing that person.

Netanya 41:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 41:58

And again, our culture just gets those gets that really mixed up in people's heads.

Netanya 42:04

Well, and even the concept of chemistry, right? And that that chemistry and or intensity signifies that this is this is the one, right? When in fact it can signify many other things, or even a red flag.

SPEAKER_03 42:19

Well, sure. And I mean, I'm sure you're familiar with that term trauma bonding, you know, and and it's a real thing. And and again, if if if my experience with early caretakers and with early relationships in my life has an element of trauma or dysfunction to it, then when I w brush across that emotionally, that intensity is gonna is gonna really confuse me and make me think that that that's love.

Netanya 42:48

Can you say more about that or define it a little bit further? I don't know that I've talked about it on this show before.

SPEAKER_03 42:53

Which one, the trauma bonding?

Netanya 42:55

Trauma bonding.

SPEAKER_03 42:56

Yeah, I mean, it's just this idea that what you said, like a a super intense emotion when you meet somebody does not automatically mean that that's attached to love. Because if if you have somebody that grew up in an abusive environment where they said they loved them one moment and then five minutes later they were they were hitting them with a wooden spoon, then those two things are getting getting confused in in the brain.

unknown 43:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 43:26

And so again, a lot of people believe that love has a lot of pain attached to it. A lot of people believe love has a lot of chaos attached to it. And and again, that that if that's normal to you, then you're gonna have those things mixed up.

Netanya 43:44

I had in my own experience growing up with male figures, male father figures that were like emotionally unavailable, and then finding out like later that I would chase men as an adult woman. I'm chasing men who are emotionally unavailable, not understanding that that doesn't make it healthy or right for me, that I'm chasing a past pattern because that's what feels normal or safe or like home.

SPEAKER_03 44:13

Sure. My father loved me. He demonstrated being emotionally unavailable most of the time. So of course I'm gonna, if if a partner is emotionally unavailable, that's just normal. That's that's love too. And again, this this is this idea of like cutting through some of these projections, right? Is once I get through those, then I can decide for myself, well, maybe that was normal, but maybe I want something different in this romantic relationship.

Netanya 44:44

Can we talk about, because this is related to what we're talking about in romantic relationships, but also recovery, the concept of chaos and how we can read chaos as being exciting, you know, and things like steadiness we can read as boredom, even though it might be really healthy for us.

SPEAKER_03 45:03

Sure. No, I mean, because what does what does chaos or even violence do? They heighten the nervous system and release cortisol and a lot of other a lot of chemicals in the body. And so, of course, those get confused with that intensity again equals love to some degree. And so we start thinking, especially if you grew up in a chaotic environment, we think that those environments are are healthy and normal when in fact they're just draining our nervous system at all all times. Because boredom, I mean, again, working with people in recovery, a lot of people say they're bored when they're just content.

SPEAKER_02 45:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:50

Or when there's just an absence of chaos.

unknown 45:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:53

And so uh so again, it's what we were talking about earlier. Like if you're in a committed relationship, there's gonna be times when it's it's it's just doing the dishes and paying the bills, and it's not that exciting. But if I'm used to that dopamine hit of always being excited, that's gonna seem boring to me, and that that's not gonna seem like something I want.

Netanya 46:18

So if you're having that experience, the first step would be to notice the pattern, to notice that I'm in a situation like this and I'm reading chaos as, you know, a good thing. How would somebody go about like recognizing that they're in it? How do you break patterns like that?

SPEAKER_03 46:35

Well, you know, I think it's I think a lot of times with people, they they talk from both sides of saying, Well, I want peace and harmony in my relationships, and then asking them, okay, but does your behavior and your actions are you moving toward that or are you continuing just to stir up that chaos?

SPEAKER_02 46:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 46:57

Not because it's what you even want to do, it's just because it's what you know. And so it's just this idea, like I think in in all good spirituality, the idea is like I I can choose peace as an option. Like you just think about think about changing the channel on on your television or going to a different website. Like, I don't have to go to the chaos channel all the time. I don't have to go to that and and make that a way of life. I can try the peace channel and see what that feels like. And see how you hit the system reacts to it.

Netanya 47:30

Yes. And how do you hit up against because it feels like I'm feeling into what it would feel like to be in a state of doing this? And I've done this so I know the seat that I'm talking about. When you're feeling the pull, right? The craving, the the habit kick in of like the juiciness of going in this direction. You know it's not good for you. How do you like get yourself to pull back and make a different choice?

SPEAKER_03 47:55

Yeah, I mean, I I I don't think there's an easy answer. I mean, I think things like therapy are really good. I think things like journaling are really good. But I think it's like stepping back again from from those strong, whenever that's really strong emotion is there, like that's an indicator of some trauma or some complex or some projection. And then trying to step back from that and going, going back to that eyes wide open thing, like, is this what I want to do, or is this something unconscious or something from my past that's just telling me that's what I'm supposed to do? And really trying to discern which one of those am I in my true self? Am I in my am I centered, or am I just acting out of like a dysregulated nervous system or some kind of complex? And most of the time we need somebody that can help us give some perspective on that.

Netanya 48:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 48:53

Until we can do it for ourselves.

Netanya 48:55

Yeah. Um, and in my experience of sitting in those moments, it actually feels very similar to me to what it was like for me when I was new in recovery, which is like sort of riding the wave of feeling the craving or the pull, making the choice to not lean in that direction and either going a different direction, finding a distraction, you know, finding something to do until that wave passes so that I can like recalibrate and then keep going.

Finding Supportive Relationships

SPEAKER_03 49:24

Yes, I agree. I agree. And and again, I think any type of spirituality is really good for that. And I think having, you know, recovery is really good at this, of having people in my life, whether it's a counselor, a therapist, a best friend, but that can tell me things like, hey, I'm I'm not sure that is really you. Like, are you sure that's what you really want? I mean, it sounds like you're going in this direction, but you're saying that you want this. And just having people that can really like give me perspective on myself and kind of pull me out of those, out of those complexes.

Netanya 50:03

For people that may or may not have people like that in their lives, how do you go about finding people that are good, that have good perspectives that aren't like throwing their stuff on you, right? I've seen that with I had a friend that kept going to her mom for advice for stuff. And her mom would put kind of her own her own lens through the responses. And so she's not getting genuine, like, and and I mean, aside from an actual therapist, which is obviously a therapist or a counselor, is a great way to go. Um, but if you're looking for that in people in your life, how do you know if someone's a good space, like a safe space for you to go, to go talk to about that or ask questions where you get like a clear response versus someone giving you their own junk?

SPEAKER_03 50:45

Yeah, I I think it's I think it's where I just would encourage people to really trust their intuition and feelings. And and I think if I'm I'm really in touch with myself and I'm really talking to someone, I can tell whether they're really acting from a space of of what is my best interest, or when, like you said, about the mother, when they're kind of projecting some of their own stuff into that. So like I think that objectivity is so key. Like somebody, and I think that's why usually parents in a lot of ways are probably not the best source of advice for adults, because they cannot be objective. And they can't because they're they're always they're always gonna have bring their own stuff in that relationship with the child in there. I talk so much to clients who are getting married or in a partnership. One of the first things I tell them is to, or I suggest to them is to stop going to your mother and father complaining about your spouse or asking for relationship advice. Because there is no way they can be objective, and now you're bringing a you're bringing a third party into a relationship that's supposed to be about the two of you, and you're setting that up for resentment.

Understanding Resentment in Relationships

SPEAKER_01 52:09

Yeah. Yeah.

Netanya 52:12

Can you speak to resentment for a minute?

SPEAKER_03 52:16

Yeah, uh I I think because it's so corrosive in relationships. And resentment, you know, one of the things I say to clients all the time, if you want to know how to build resentment in a relationship, start by scorekeeping.

SPEAKER_02 52:33

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 52:34

Scorekeeping is is one of the the most toxic things in a relationship. And again, a lot of that is learned from our family of origin or other places where we're taught that it's a tit for tat idea with everything.

SPEAKER_02 52:50

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 52:51

And it and again, to really be conscious of I do things, I don't go to the wedding with my wife and then file that away of like now she owes me.

Netanya 53:02

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 53:04

And and that type of scorekeeping leads to resentments. The biggest thing, again, like we talked about earlier, and and this is you know, again, where that projection comes in. When I've done when I've done couples therapy before, it's always one of those things of one person or the other will keep saying something like, Well, you should, you should be this way, or but you should know anyway, or you should be able to figure that out, or you should know what I'm thinking. And I always kind of take a breath and I'll say they they they can't do that. They've they've shown you for 10 years, you've been insisting for 10 years that they are this way. And they've already told you by their behavior and actions that they cannot do it. So if they're giving you this information, you have one or two choices. You can either accept them for the person they are or you've got a decision to make. And the decision to make is if this person, we all can set out expectations for our partner. But if that person shows me over a period of months or years that they can't do it, the worst mistake that I see people make is to continue to stay in that and insist that that person does something that they've already shown you they're incapable of doing.

Netanya 54:29

Yeah. Well, and then you're asking them to be something that they can't ever meet, and then you're constantly disappointed because they can't meet the thing that you need to be met because you're looking for it in the wrong place.

SPEAKER_03 54:42

And there's the resentment. And and I don't think I said this to you last time, but I say this all the time because I've got trees outside my window, and I say, What we do as human beings is like me walking up to that tree outside of my window and insisting that it grows six feet in ten minutes.

SPEAKER_02 55:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 55:05

It's it cannot do it. It depends on the causes and conditions, it depends on what was at the core of that seed. It depends on so many factors. But what we do with human beings all the time, and especially in romantic partners, is we walk up to them and and insist that they grow six feet in 10 minutes.

Netanya 55:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 55:26

And they can't do it. And again, the we all should go into relationships with a real clear set of, hey, I expect this, I expect to be treated this way, I expect that this is done. But if somebody shows you repeatedly that they can't do that, and I just keep going to that over and over and insisting that they change, the problem is not in that person, it's in me.

Netanya 55:54

Yes. Yeah, absolutely. There's a Maya Angelou quote when people show you who they are, believe them the first time.

SPEAKER_03 56:03

I say that to people all the time. And again, and it's not like I I totally, my everything I do is based on the belief that people can change. But again, the one of the best things somebody ever said to me working in addiction was when I worked in a treatment center and they said, Jeff, all we do for people is provide them fertile soil for recovery. And I think you translate that to relationships. Like my responsibility with my partner is to make sure that I'm providing fertile, fertile soil for her and for our relationship so that it can grow.

Netanya 56:40

Um, I'm writing this down because I wanted to say it also was when you said that believing that people can change. I was talking to a friend about this last night. Um, he is dating a girl, and we were just talking about how he feels about where this is currently going. And and I'm curious of your of your thoughts on sort of holding space for the belief that people can change. I very much believe it, I've seen it, I've done it, and I've seen people change drastically, especially in the in the realm of recovery. But I think that people change for themselves. I don't think that people change for other people, not truly or genuinely, or if they do, if you're changing for someone else, I think that it has an expiration date.

SPEAKER_03 57:21

Yes.

Netanya 57:23

And so go ahead, reuse them.

SPEAKER_03 57:25

Well, I I think that's true. And I also know, and this is hard to transmit to people too. My wife, by who she is, makes me want to be a better person.

SPEAKER_02 57:38

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 57:39

She doesn't insist that I be a better person. My love for her and who she is makes me want to be a better person. And so that's that fertile soil for change. Right. And again, I think that's how a healthy relationship should function. People should strive to be better. They should want to change and listen to that. But it's the insistence that somebody changes over and over that is not really love, it's control.

SPEAKER_02 58:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 58:08

And and if you really want to, again, going back to resentment, if you want to build resentment in a romantic relationship, look at your control. Look at your desire to control that person.

Netanya 58:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 58:21

That's that's where that love will be eroded so quickly, is with that control.

Netanya 58:25

Yeah. Um, well, and what we were talking about was like whether or not, where do you give room for people to change or show up differently or learn because they want to or they're trying to get better at something? And where is it that you have you're not seeing the truth or avoidant about what this really is?

SPEAKER_03 58:47

Yeah, I mean, uh I I think I have to going back to that communication, I have to be really clear with the request to my partner.

unknown 58:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 58:57

Like, hey, I would I would love it, you know, my wife said this to me. I would love it if we did, you know, more kind of different things as a couple, went to different restaurants, did more social things. She makes that request of me. And then it's my responsibility to really engage with that and take some steps to make that happen. And again, like that's not a big deal, but I think that's where people really get in trouble, is that they keep on thinking that this person is just gonna automatically change because I have it in my mind that they should. Yeah, and I have to be real clear with what those expectations and boundaries are, and then I look for slow, steady progress. Not insisting that they'd be perfect with it, but are they willing to grow with me or not? And if when I work with couples and they're both willing to grow, they're gonna be fine.

SPEAKER_02 59:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 59:56

You know what I mean? They're gonna be fine. But both people have to be willing to grow.

Netanya 1:00:02

Yeah. I love that. Anything else you want to touch on under the umbrella of relationships before I switch topics sort of tangentially, but not really about relationships anymore.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:13

Yeah, I mean, I would just I would just end with, you know, I say to people all the time, it's a learn as you go process. And you, you know, and and again, I I don't I don't come from the school, from the recovery school of don't date for a year your first year of recovery. I didn't do it. And and and I didn't either. Yeah, and I don't think most people do. But what I say to people, the the mistake that people, especially in recovery, make is they never really date the person or get to know the person.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:45

They go way too fast. And what people do a lot is they don't know somebody, and then they they they take an action that is going to bind them to that person for the rest of their life. Whether that be a pregnancy or they get married too soon or they move in together too soon. And so again, like I just always say to people, go super slow and get to know that person, not that projection. Because the first six months of a relationship, you're what you're dealing with most of the time is their persona and the projection you have on them. And once that goes away, then you're left with the real person. And a lot of times people are left with the real with what's behind those projections and that persona, and they don't like it very much.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:36

Yeah. Um, thank you.

Exploring Archetypes in Recovery

SPEAKER_03 1:01:39

Yeah, I love that.

Netanya 1:01:40

That was I love that whole tangent and the the just rabbit hole we went down on relationships there.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:45

Me too.

Netanya 1:01:46

I love talking about so other question, and we kind of touched about on this a little bit earlier when you were talking about the hero and the um, you know, wisdom. Can we talk about archetypes and how they speak to people in recovery?

SPEAKER_03 1:02:02

Yeah, you know, I I I thought about this because I uh kind of bring it into like a a modern a modern twist. And I was thinking about I watched uh one of my favorite shows, Game of Thrones, recently.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:17

Mm-hmm. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:18

And probably most people have seen it, but there's a lot of good archetypes in that.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:24

Yes, there is.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:25

And I was thinking about in relation to the masculine and feminine, you the character Sansa, for those who haven't seen it, she she is uh a young woman, a teenager, and all she wants to do is find her king and be a princess.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:46

That's all that matters to her. And as a result of that, she ends up she ends up being the queen to a tyrant and a psychopath. And that show does a great job of she's in that archetype of the princess. Right? And through her progression, as she matures, she learns that she cannot seek from that this man what she needs to find inside herself, which is strength, resiliency, assertiveness, toughness, and all those things through that she finds she finds that to keep going from man to man looking for that is an exercise in futility. And so I think she's one of the most powerful archetypes in that show. And then you have uh Tyrion, who is the little person, small in stature, who is the archetype of the Pueriturnus or the Eternal Child. And in the beginning of the show, the eternal child is always he's always interested in pleasure.

Netanya 1:04:00

Yeah. This is like Peter Pan, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:02

He's Peter Pan. That's the Peter Pan is the archetype for the eternal child. He wants pleasure, never never land, where you never grow up. And again, the character in Game of Thrones, he moves from being someone who's only interested in pleasure and who is kind of tied to that that that unconscious mother, dark mother, which repr which is his sister in the show, to being somebody who moves towards something higher and has to take on more responsibility and more responsibility. And in that, he in the same way that Sansa does, he comes back to, he matures into a healthy adult and comes into himself. So he's the archetype of the eternal, of the eternal child, and that's the individuation process that he's kind of demonstrating. And then the last one I'll say, which is one of my favorite characters, is the hound.

unknown 1:04:58

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:59

The hound is he's the warrior, he's the knight, he's the king's protector, and he's kind of that he's kind of that archetype of uh the warrior masculine.

Netanya 1:05:12

Right.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:13

Almost, almost he's the he's the toxic masculine, super violent, no contact with his his emotions, big, tall, strong, but no empathy for people. And in the show, he's redeemed through contact with the feminine. And that that starts with rescuing Sansa, who's the princess, and then with Aria, who is the feminine and also the child herself. And so what his arc through that show is, is through that feminine, he makes contact with his emotions. And he develops into somebody. Well, and actually, there's a scene where actually he gets beat up or he loses in battle to Brianna of Thomas. Who is the feminine warrior? And so, but through that process and through the show's arc, he becomes more compassionate. And he also starts caring for for things that are bigger than himself. And there's a scene where where he he finds two a dead, a dead father and a dead child, and he goes out in the snow and buries them out of compassion for them. And so again, he's demonstrating how that that masculine energy has to combine with the feminine to create that whole personality in the same way that Sansa did the same thing. And so those are how the archetypes kind of operate in consciousness. And the idea in Youngin' psychology is those are hardwired into us. And that's why shows like that speak to people so much and become so popular is because they really hit on something psychologically that's inside of us and that's pulling for us.

Netanya 1:07:07

I love that. And um I loved the and I think you again, you just kind of relate to what speaks to you personally. What I've always loved about I d and I don't know what you'd call her archetype, but um the like inner listening, the rule breaker of like she didn't want to be Sansa. She didn't want to, you know, find a husband. She wanted to pick up a sword and go fight. And, you know, um, and she did that enough to get to the point of going out on her own. But then when she's out on her own, she sort of runs into trouble of like trying to be someone else and then having to to in the in the whole section with the it's been a while since I've seen it. Um the where she like doesn't have a name. And she and she's in the scene of I don't I don't remember what they kept saying, but like the the man without a face or I don't have a name. And then she she gets to the point where she says, like, I have a name and it's Arya Stark.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:11

Yes, that's right. She came back.

Netanya 1:08:13

Oh, I love it. But yes, and that the coming back to yourself is just one of my favorite things. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:19

Yes. Well, I think she's the I think she's the she's a couple different archetypes, but number one, she is that rebel archetype.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:28

That rebel archetype. And but and I think it's interesting because I think I have that archetype strong in me too. But I think if we follow that archetype too strongly the way that she did, I think we do lose ourselves.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:43

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:44

I think we do, and I certainly did. And I think also she's she's also a good a good a good image of of shadow integration.

unknown 1:08:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:56

She's also one that, again, like she really faces her shadow and is almost overwhelmed by her shadow.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:04

Because that there's that there's that line in the in the end where uh actually the hound saves her because she's about to sacrifice her life so that she can go kill uh Cersei, the queen.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:20

And so she's almost overtaken by the shadow is that revenge, right? And she's motivated by revenge. And again, it's that idea that if if we're not conscious of that shadow in us, it will overtake us and destroy us.

Netanya 1:09:36

I have always loved that that any topic, right, but also internal um experiential parts of yourself have a light and a shadow. Even like can control, right? You and aspects of control that are healthy. You need to be controlled to pay your bills, to drive a car, right? There's levels of that that are healthy or good, to be on time, to raise a child. Like you have to have some semblance of how to function throughout the world. And then the shadow side of control being gripping or controlling things that are not yours to control, um, obsession, right? Um and I it's just always a fascinating thing to me to look at what parts of myself are healthy and what parts of myself have tipped over and where do I need to kind of balance out.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:23

No, I that's well said, very well said, and I think it's so important. One of the things I like about Young Psychology is they really talk about the healthy ego, and not that ego is just something that we're always supposed to reject. You do have to pay bills. I do have to get up and go to work, that there is a healthy aspect to that ego. And for people in recovery, and this is part of that emotional sobriety piece that that that I like to talk about, when I came into recovery, I had no healthy ego. And I I used the container of 12-step meetings to tell me things like, go get a job, go pay your bills, go brush your teeth, because my ego was so weak in that way that I couldn't even function and function in the world. But like you just said, you know, what happened to me was I became too rigid in that ego. I became too one-sided in that it ended up being more about control than about doing daily tasks. And that's where again, like for my journey has been kind of coming back to the middle of like that that natural sense of letting energies flow through me and not being just totally run by the ego all the time. Because the ego is always about control, and that's a good thing sometimes, but it can be too much.

Netanya 1:11:54

Is there a list of archetypes somewhere? Or how do you, if you wanted to explore this more, how would people find that, not only in general, but also as a supplement or support to their recovery journey?

SPEAKER_03 1:12:06

I'll see if I can find one for you. I don't have one off the top of my head. I mean, they're all in Young's collected works, and there's a lot of them. I mean, there's countless number of archetypes. He has like he has like four or five basic ones. But I'll I'll see what I can find and send you one. Um yeah, because I'm sure there's a really good list of them. I think I've made one before, but I'll see if I can send you one in the next week or so that has a list of them.

Netanya 1:12:33

Thank you. And I just I was thinking about like just what I know again, and it's not based in Young Yin, just the concept of archetypes. Like for women, you get the child, the maiden, the mother, the crone, the sage, the mystic, the queen. You know, there are so many, and that's just that's just one realm of them. But I've seen, you know, the prostitute.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:58

Yes, absolutely. All those. It yeah, and again, like, and I do a lot of work with my clients, like that's that idea is that all of those exist in us. And so again, it's this idea of like, if they exist in me, how do I want to be in relationship with them instead of like what we tend to do? Yes, is push them back into the shadow. So, like, like I I think it's so cool what you said, like, where is that witch in you?

Netanya 1:13:30

Right?

SPEAKER_03 1:13:30

What what where does the witch come out? And the witch isn't always evil, like the witch is that nature part. It's the it's kind of the it's it's the one that that can take the ethereal and make it material, right? It's yeah, and that that is a powerful archetype in women, and again, that is one that society would tell women to reject.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:56

Yeah.

Balancing Power and Compassion

SPEAKER_03 1:13:58

Right. And it in men they have different archetypes too, or and whatever, but men have the same arch I had I had several witch dreams when I started analysis.

Netanya 1:14:09

Did you?

SPEAKER_03 1:14:09

Yes.

Netanya 1:14:10

Did we talk about this? I remember we talked about dreams last time. I can't remember if it was specifically witch dreams.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:15

Well, I had a couple of them, but one I I kept having this dream where there were I would wake up and I would know that there were witches in the basement. And I I kept going down there and I would get so terrified by them when they would approach me that I would wake up. And my analyst said, Well, the next time you have that dream, I want you to ask the witch what she wants from you. And so in my dream, I asked the witch what she wanted from me, and she said, I want you to make a place in your bed for me. And what that meant to me was that like for me, in myself and in the real world, there there was a real fear of what I perceived as like the critical woman, right? Or the or the powerful woman, that there was a real fear of that. And again, like we can go back, won't go through all the history of that, but again, think about like a a a mean teacher for me would have been that kind of archetype. Or or or an overly critical person that I would encounter through my life. And that that I had really like put that into the shadows, and that also there was part of me that didn't want to look at in myself that I could be very witch-like too in a lot of ways. Right?

unknown 1:15:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:46

So there's that healthy, kind of like in the Wizard of Oz, that white witch and then the wicked witch.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:52

Yes. Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:54

Which that movie I know does a good job of showing that, the wicked especially. But that again, like both of those things can work together, and I can be in relationship with both those without without having to cast them into the realm of like evil or shadow or anything else.

Netanya 1:16:12

Yes. I love this so much. And where my brain went was like similar to what you were saying about the witch, but sort of the the queen archetype, right, has the dark queen or the benevolent queen. And again, I'm being sort of dramatic black and white there in the two polarities of it. But whenever you're near any, you know, or embodiment of an archetype, how do you take the parts of it that resonate or that are healthy that are good for you, and then leave the rest? Right. Because it's like when I I pick a word of the year every year, and a couple of years ago, my word was fiercely. And specifically the the angle on the word that I wanted or I was approaching the understanding of was how do I like I had watched so many people build careers and work in places that are um loving and kind and caring, and they would get run over. Right. And I would also find people in places of power that um don't have heart. So my definition of the word fiercely that I I hung on to and spent time with for a year was with heartfelt and powerful intent. Right? How do you have both? I want to have heart and compassion and be powerful and strong and have those spaces coexist, which I think is, now that I'm saying all of this out loud, is the merging of those two archetypes, right? How do you have parts of this that are good and embody both as a way to to grow and to lean forward?

SPEAKER_03 1:17:48

Yeah, no, I th I think you're exactly right. And again, you know, I would say again, going back to that kind of Game of Thrones reference, it's that idea with the hound of like the turning that that violence into a protective energy.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:05

Yeah. Right.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:06

And also having the compassion at the same time and the empathy and the caring. But that again, like in our society, there's not much of a time where there's any any need for violence. But is there a need to protect something? Is there a need to stand up for people that that need protecting? Is there a need more most importantly, is there a time when I need to let that warrior out if somebody is trying to to run over me or violate my boundaries or anything else? And that there is a healthy aspect of that.

Netanya 1:18:40

I love this.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:42

Yeah, it's really interesting stuff.

Netanya 1:18:45

You could just go down rabbit holes forever with it because it's so interesting.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:49

That's what I love it. And again, like talking about that, like, you know, that emotional sobriety and people in recovery, it is how do I reclaim those parts of myself that were active in my addiction that I pushed into the shadows?

SPEAKER_01 1:19:05

Yes. Well said.

Netanya 1:19:09

And that's really, you know, that's a question that you get to live into.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:14

You have to. Yeah, you have to. And and it's tricky too because not everybody in it depends on where a person at is at in their recovery. Not everybody is ready to do that.

unknown 1:19:28

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:29

You have to be really strong in your recovery and have done a lot of work to where where you can even start to integrate those parts of yourself. I'm not gonna try and do shadow work with somebody that's one month sober.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:43

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:44

It's a bad idea. You know, that they're just trying to get a hold of that shadow and to develop that ego strength. So you don't want to throw them back into that shadow yet.

Netanya 1:19:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:56

You know?

Netanya 1:19:57

Yeah. Yeah, you want the foundational piece first.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:00

Yes, for sure. And that ego strength. That can that can because the idea is like can I get to a point where I'm more regulating these forces that are coming at me versus they're they're regulating me.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:16

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:19

And you have to have a certain sense of stability to be able to do that. Or it'll just overwhelm you.

Netanya 1:20:26

Mm-hmm. Thank you.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:30

Yeah, of course.

Netanya 1:20:31

For spending time with me today. I loved this conversation.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:34

Me too. I've talked about it all day. I love it.

Netanya 1:20:37

Yeah, I was like, I have to stop this conversation because we're gonna run into well over well over the allotted time that I try to do this with. And I want to be respectful of your time as well. But I just greatly appreciated this. I loved this, I loved this journey that we just went on.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:53

Me too. It was fun. Yeah, I love it. Goes fast.

Netanya 1:20:59

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.