What Unloading Actually Looks Like

Unloading isn’t the same thing as dumping.

In this episode, Michael and Shannon talk about the difference between healthy sharing and overwhelming the people around us.

What does real unloading actually look like?
And what does it not look like?

They explore the difference between honest conversation and trauma-dumping, why checking if someone has the capacity to listen matters, and how choosing the right person or space can change everything.

Because healing doesn’t come from throwing our pain at the nearest person.

It comes from learning when to speak, where to speak, and how to do it with awareness, boundaries, and pacing.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

I'd like to welcome our listeners to the episode six of Unloaded. Uh, this is Michael Seahorn here with my co-host Shannon Morrow. And we hope everybody's had a good week. This episode is a little bit of a tail end to episode five, so I highly suggest all of our listeners, if you have not had a chance to listen to episode five, please go back and do so.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

Yeah, yeah. That that one's an hour long. That's very uncommon. Might be our only longer episode. We work really hard to keep them under half an hour for you all. We know busy days, like yeah, we're shooting for around the 28-minute mark. So yeah, you can keep on moving. But uh that that one's worth was worth um kind of doubling the time.

SPEAKER_01 0:48

Yeah, we we will try our hardest. Uh Shannon and I will both try to keep these uh to a 28-minute time under that 30-minute mark. However, there will be times where we split things in half, which we've done in the past. We try not to do that. Hopefully, not to confuse our listeners, but I think we're doing an okay job on just, hey, this is episode one, it's gonna be a two-part, so you know, we kind of predicate that. We're gonna try not to. However, some of these conversations are just so organic in nature, and I think I mentioned this in episode four or five that Shannon and I do not run on a script.

SPEAKER_00 1:24

No, no, we we don't know where things are going often.

SPEAKER_01 1:28

So, like I said before, we've we've got some notes on on the episode that we're talking about, but we have no scripts, it's not typed out in any way, shape, or form. So it's off the cuff and it's raw. So just want to throw that out there again. So after after episode five last week, um I unfortunately had to uh get our podcast uploaded pretty quick. I I had to head out of town on Tuesday and went down to Las Vegas for four four days for a business thing and had some time to think about that podcast, and you know, I went back and listened to it, which I often do each week so I can make sure our recordings are solid, and if there's any tweaks that we need to do, we'll we'll continue to make those tweaks. But I had a lot of time to think about our podcast in uh early mornings and in the evenings just reflecting on the conversation we had. And I'd be honest with you, the biggest thing that stuck out in my head was listening to your feedback on how my energy and how my body language and the words had an effect on you, not in a positive way out of the game.

SPEAKER_00 2:38

You didn't expect that. You all these years later, you did not know that when I described my initial experience of you, described you being kind of an asshole, pretty bristly, you know, and like oof, that that that that hit you and uh took a little little processing.

SPEAKER_01 3:00

Yeah, and and not in a negative way, and I want I want our listeners to know that. Um I'm I'm in a very different space and time in uh this this in this 2026 year. It's been an 11-year journey on self-help, continuous 11-year journey on self-help. And uh I'm okay sitting with difficult things for an extended period of time, and I I sit with things until I feel comfortable with them, if if that makes sense too. Yeah, and that can take a long time. Sometimes it does. And I think this is a good example, is that you know, I s I sat with that for, you know, a good good four days just reflecting on the person I used to be comparably to the person I am today. And I think it really kind of resets my mind to make sure that I don't ever go back to being that person, to be honest with you. I don't want people to feel that I'm an angry, rage-filled individual, because that's not who I am anymore.

SPEAKER_00 4:01

No, uh, you have you're such a different man today than when I met you more than a decade ago. And I I don't want us to be defined by our emotional state though. You thank you. You you described it as angry, uh rage-filled, you know. You you were very you're caring so much, you were so loaded and pressurized. It was just the the tension and you know, and it was but that was just mostly a result of a lot of previous circumstances, a lot of shit you've been through. Because underneath there I recognized, I I recognize, well, this guy's uh here's a good dude, man. He's he's just he's he's kind of been getting his ass kicked for a long time and hasn't really been able to talk to anyone, hasn't really uh processed much. And so um just providing that opportunity and going going through that with you for years and then the remarkable changes it brought about in your experiences, yeah. That's that's what can leads us to uh here today.

SPEAKER_01 5:14

Yeah, it's it's been a it's been a a good ride, it's been a great journey, and it'll continue to be a good journey, but it's been a journey that's been filled with a shit ton of ups and a lot of downs and a lot of sideways and over and under and all these great things, but you know, sitting with the fact that you can have such a negative impact on people purposely too, and I need to throw that out there because there's a lot of times where I purposely knew that I wanted to have this ridiculous effect on people in not a good positive way just because of the things I was struggling with. So as I look back over the last four days on listening to our recording, it just it's just a good friendly reminder of my journey so far.

SPEAKER_00 6:01

Yeah, you know, and again, they say pain perpetuates pain. Hurt people, hurt people. And it's if you can just kind of see it for what it is, and how it's just this this great entity of whatever is so uh painful that we all experience in our different ways being human beings and how that moves through us, how how it affects us, and then how we affect others, but it's um just kind of how things go, and eventually to with that understanding to have even a little more compassion for others, for ourselves, when we find ourselves being how we don't want to be and toward others, or if when others are being probably how they don't want to be uh toward us, you know, it's mostly just a result of a lot of old ouchy in there that's really needing to come out.

SPEAKER_01 6:58

Yeah, which ironically now, as I look back, is you know, what was I doing? Unloading. Yeah. I was unloading with myself.

SPEAKER_00 7:04

Uh in uh a less healthy way. It because when it is directed toward others and anger and rage and aggression, that's that's when we're topped off, pressurized, and have really no other choice. It's involuntary at that point, and we're just popping off. And it's um, and so that's a big point of this podcast is to like, hey, we recognize kind of where you're at, what you're going through, how you're feeling, and there's better ways to deal with this, to unload in more healthy ways and aren't so hurtful to others.

SPEAKER_01 7:40

Yeah, so you know, as I reflected this week being in Vegas, you know, unloading in my you know, hotel room by myself is just sitting with that knowledge, if you will, looking back, thinking about how I was, thinking about some of the things that we talked about on that on episode five's podcast. That is unloading. It's it's sitting there by yourself. I do a big journal, I'm a journaler, uh, I write a lot. It helps me get some things out of my head, it helps me get some things out inside of you know myself. So, in a way, you know, and we've talked about this before that what does unloading actually mean? What does that look like? It can mean a lot of different things, and I don't want to be too specific on one or the other because I think it's such a broad stroke.

SPEAKER_00 8:28

Oh man, there's so many different ways. So yeah, yeah. We we really find uh yeah, journaling, of course, we've covered that a lot in the past. But uh yeah, in most uh creative outlets, any kind of man, if you're creating anything really, you know, that can be quite healthy movement, exercise, just energy, everything's energy really. And this if we're whether you know, pushing weights or running or swimming or anything, you know, that can really just that that can also be very useful.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

Leading into that on unloading, unloading is a very precarious thing, it can be a very precarious thing depending on the person that's listening or that is on the other side of the table, right? Or a couch or chair or whatever the case may be. And what I mean by that is we have to maybe be cautious sometimes that unloading trauma in any way, shape, or form, you have to think about the other person that you're talking with.

SPEAKER_00 9:42

Yeah, yeah. When so we are now narrowing in while there are a lot of different ways to unload kind of by ourselves, whether journaling or exercising or out in nature, um now we are speaking more specifically about likely the most effective way of unloading is with others, with another, right? The the connection we experience in relationship with other human beings. And that happens regularly, it's all around, you know. I mean, strangers in a coffee shop, just a glance or a holding the door for someone, or a nod, or a you know, and you keep moving in and it's with coworkers, you know, just a quick conversation, or oh, yeah, how's it going, man? And you know, and you you you keep moving in and family members, people in your household, and keep moving in. You know, there's there's so many different degrees, and we're gonna explore these various degrees here in this episode.

SPEAKER_01 10:53

Yeah, or trauma is a an interesting thing because it's it's I think trauma is both physical, it's both mental, it could be spiritual, it could be a lot of different things. It could all it could be all of them. It affects on all levels like that, yeah. It might only be one. Yeah, sometimes when I broke my ankle and I had to have a rod stuck in, right? That that that was a physical, very physical pain.

SPEAKER_00 11:17

But you're gonna try trauma and right, it affected you a little bit mentally, it did, even emotional.

SPEAKER_01 11:22

It did, yeah. It did, but the physical portion definitely was the top of the list, right? So I think that trauma in itself is uh a lot of different things and it can mean a lot of different things for a lot of different people. But when we feel that weight, which was what we've been talking about for the last five episodes, when you feel that weight and it's filling up, you're safe as full inside of yourself, it's leaking out and you're ready to unload some of that weight, we have to make sure that when we're doing that, that we're choosing the right person or the right space for that.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

And it can be uh fairly organic, you know, um sometimes. Other times we want it to be very intentional, um, and we will explain. So as Mike, you know, um sometimes if we're just having a rough week, we're just kind of getting our ass kicked, and we're just uh and we're but we're we're toughen it out, we're moving through the week. But you know, our our coworkers who are around us a lot, they can kind of notice, and they, you know, one of them, you know, they we we generally care about those. We spend a lot of time with who we work together with, and like, yeah, ooh, you know, so-and-so is seems like they're going through it a little this week, you know. Hey man, how you doing, man? You know, uh, I'm I'm okay, I just have having a hard week. Okay, okay, yeah. And and even that, you know, just is can can be very helpful to just like ha, someone sees me, someone just noticed, made a little comment, and like, and I was able to release a little, like, ha, I'm thanks for noticing, man. And and that can occur, you know, quite often all around, you know. But and then continuing in more to the degree of which Michael is talking about to choose, like, fuck, yeah, I I am still fairly traumatized from that nasty shit that happened many years ago, and I've never been able to really talk to anybody about it. And that is when you will want a lot of intentionality around. Um, probably, I don't know, often not as appropriate with uh family members or friends or especially co-workers. This is where we enter, you know, more the mental health realm. This is where professionals are so valuable to set aside the time, the space, they have the training and education, and uh yeah, then it it can really uh you can really go there in in that what what Michael has he just recently taught me the phrase of uh trauma dumping.

SPEAKER_01 14:14

Yeah, trauma dumping is an interesting thing, and I I've heard it thrown around a couple times. I didn't know really what trauma dumping was technically. I have my own definition in my brain about that, but I looked it up and the old internet, as wise as it is, says that trauma dumping is an intense, unsolicited and one-sided sharing without their consent.

SPEAKER_00 14:42

Interesting. Without their consent, yeah. One one of my favorite new concepts that actually one of my brothers um taught me uh unsolicited information. And I I had to wait, what? Like, oh, and to really even like fully allow for that concept because it's all around it unsolicited information, information that we aren't even really wanting, that does uh, you know, but but you take that a lot further to where it's coming from the roots of trauma, you know, and it it it can be um too much sometimes, it can be inappropriate, and but to have some understanding of grace for that, because by the time people are to that point where they are so pressurized, where they are in so much pain that they they can't even contain themselves anymore, and they just start it starts leaking out or or popping out, you know, in anger or you know, whatever mood, or you know, then um yeah, the that's hopefully uh what this podcast can provide some of is just a little more awareness to like, ooh, okay, that's that's not as healthy. How there are more healthy ways in which to direct a lot of this energy, um, so it's not can I mean creating vicarious trauma.

SPEAKER_01 16:13

Yeah, absolutely. And for those who might have missed it, when Shannon is talking about unsolicited uh information, that would be billboards, that could be your phones, social media, um people randomly telling you things that you don't want to know, or people just coming up to you and talking to you. That's all unsolicited. You're not asking for that information, it's just being given to you. Trauma dumping is very different in this in the aspect that you could just be talking to a friend or a coworker or an employee, and you can just ask them a simple question how was your weekend? And they just start dumping. Could be you're never gonna believe what happened, and then they just go into it, and then it's just this crazy story. I you can fill in the blanks, because I'm sure people have experienced this at some level at some time. I've experienced it as a boss and a manager and as a vice president, where I've asked an employee, how are they doing, and man, they the water work start, they start crying, and they're just they're just letting out all this raw, unloaded weight and emotion. And you're just like, Wow, I I didn't know. You know what I mean? And uh Shannon and I've talked about it in the previous um days is that it's attention, people need attention and sometimes they don't have that person that they trust, they don't have a person where they feel comfortable telling certain things to, they don't feel they have an outlet to unload the weight. And that should never fall on deaf ears. If if if you find yourself in a position where people are comfortable with you, they're confident in you, they trust you, you trust them, and they're sharing some vulnerable things, honor that. You have to honor that.

SPEAKER_00 18:09

Yeah, right? Yeah, while at the same time honoring yourself. I I I know where this is coming from more than our listeners do. Sure. You, Michael, as a vice president of this good-sized company with a lot of employees, and you you really care about them. That's what one of the main things that makes your company successful. You care about your employees, and them recognizing this, and then when they have a few minutes with you, especially if they get and get a little privacy with you in your office or something, and they they uh they do need to be heard. They do, they are going through some things, and the care and attention that you can provide in their moment of distress, they often don't recognize I'm there, they're just trying to at that point they're just good, you know, releasing a lot of stuff. Um, and it's you you have that fine line, that balance between like providing that for your people in balance with yeah, okay, and we man, it's it's the work day. We we gotta kind of keep at it. You know, I started you're going through that, I care about you, and um maybe we can talk about this more later, or maybe, you know, if that what just happened, oh man, that here's here's a number of really good therapists I know. You this this kind of the higher level of care, you know. Um but yeah, it's uh sometimes it we uh we will need to care for ourselves uh even so we are able to still care for others.

SPEAKER_01 19:57

Yeah, and that kind of leads into what we were just I was just gonna talk about is that you know when you're talking to people, it doesn't matter what the relationship is, you have to make sure that they have the capacity to listen to what it is you want to tell them. Sometimes you can you know unload on somebody and they might not have the mental capacity themselves to even listen to it. Right? Yeah, and that comes with a lot of practice, in my opinion. You you have to know your audience, you have to know that where you are, what the setting is, right? Like I I'm not gonna be in a a crowded coffee shop talking about very personal things because I don't want to share that with every single person in earshot of my conversation, right?

SPEAKER_00 20:44

No, no, of course not. We don't appreciate it when we hear others doing that. And this is such an interesting conversation because our first few episodes were about our tendency, many of us, to just keep it in, keep it bottled up, don't show what we're going, just keep toughing it out and you know, be being silent, and and then but what that can create, you know, when we do get to that point where we can't really contain ourselves anymore, and it starts coming out in those unhealthy ways. Um, just hoping to provide some more awareness around our self-awareness, really. Where am I at? How am I feeling? How am I, you know, um being experienced by others, and what little adjustments can I make for myself, most of all, you know, is great. Here's oh good, I have this cool boss who I can talk to for five minutes. Oh, I have this friend who's asking me how I'm doing. We can go to coffee and just have a good little conversation, and then sometimes, okay, I I need to have my hour set aside for myself, scheduled at this time, at this place, where I can go sit in front of a professional, pay them money, and let them do the head. Heavy lifting.

SPEAKER_01 22:00

Yeah. I'll give you a r a real world example. Then it just happened and it just dawned on me while I was sitting here listening to you. Is when we were down in Vegas, we went to lunch. Three of us went to lunch. We were in a very nice uh resort area. Uh we were in a great sushi, by the way. Haven't had sushi in a couple couple months. Man, kudos to the cats at that restaurant. Your tune is off the hook. Sidebar conversation. But so there were three of us sitting in this quite large booth enjoying our lunch. Three people came in. Now this was early in the day, like 11:45, 12. Wasn't very busy. It was two women and a gentleman. Uh one younger woman, one older lady, and uh a gentleman. And my assumption is just by listening and seeing, is it was a uh couple, the man and one was a couple, and then the younger one might have been a daughter. Okay. As soon as their butt hit the seat, the lady went off on this dude. Okay, now mind you, uh, I'm looking towards the door. A shocker. I'm looking towards the door. I'm looking towards the door. So their booth is connected to our booth, and I'm literally looking at this lady in her face with this weird, like three-foot wooden thing on top of the like a separator, if you will, and it had slats. It was very fancy, but I could see her playing as deck. She starts going off on this dude about his gambling. You should do this, and why did you lose $900? What the heck? And I'm like, okay, first of all, this is inappropriate. Wrong place, wrong time. We we can hear you just like we're talking, me and you. Uh the two people I was with was kind of looking at me, and they were uh obviously hearing the same conversation. And the guy's like, listen, we can talk about this later.

SPEAKER_00 23:58

Uh, he even recognized that it was a little loud, not the right place.

SPEAKER_01 24:02

She says, We're gonna talk about it right now. And they went into it. That's what I'm talking about. Know the the space that you're in, that there's an appropriate time for that right now. As a married individual, I would never, ever have that in a public space and time. If the person didn't want to talk about it later, I just want to talk. That's just me. That's just how I operate. I wouldn't respond and I wouldn't feed it. It was a very uncomfortable. She was loud. I could literally hear everything she was saying. Um, he was obviously embarrassed at some level. And the two people I was with was like, Are you effing kidding me right now? Like, this is what we're listening to. We're just we're trying to enjoy this amazing sushi right now, right? So that's what I mean by right time, right place. And yeah, you know, think about who's around.

SPEAKER_00 24:50

And that woman was so topped off, she was so angry. She her emotions, because I imagine even when she's in steady state, that she would recognize, oh man, I don't want to be ruining everyone's else's lunch, making them listen to my irate conversation. But she, that's why emotions, they begin to shut down the prefrontal cortex, and then all the normal things we normally value start to go out the window. When we become too heightened or too pressurized emotionally, then um we start behaving in ways that often even re that we regret.

SPEAKER_01 25:32

Yeah, I was I was embarrassed for him. I was because he tried to curtail it and it didn't happen. But anyway, that's a real real world example that just happened last week. Uh huh. Well, I'm sorry, it happened yeah, last week.

SPEAKER_00 25:44

Yeah. And you've told me other stories how you have been that individual who has been overcome by emotion and done some fairly embarrassing things in public settings a long time ago, before we really started working together for an extended time.

SPEAKER_01 26:02

Yeah, maybe maybe one day we'll talk about some of those things. But for this episode, I just want to make sure that our our listening audience, uh, Shannon and I are really just trying to tell you guys that you know unloading is this entire premise for this podcast. It's about unloading the weight. But you have to remember and remind yourself that Shannon is correct when he says that there are times where it's appropriate to talk to your friend, your boyfriend, husband, wife, whatever the relationship is, but then there are critical moments where you need to reach out and get some professional help. Get the hour booked. If you're scared, book 30 minutes. I don't know if they do 30 minutes, but not as much. Maybe you could ask. I don't know. Book your time, sit down with somebody, and let it go. And it's okay to just unload for 59 minutes and 59 seconds. It's okay to do that. Yeah, yeah. If it takes that long, let it rip. Yeah, yeah. We've had episodes or we've had sessions like that.

unknown 27:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:15

Where Shannon's like, how's your week, Mike? And I'm like, okay, well, here we go. Prepare yourself. Right? And for 50 better part of 55 minutes, it's just me just letting her rip and unloading the weight. And Shannon, to his credit, is just listening.

SPEAKER_00 27:34

You know? Yeah, yeah. And to be able to release that energy and to be able to do that. It's amazing. It's amazing, uh, just because that's a powerful form of energy, just speaking to things, hearing ourselves say things, processing things, moving through, it's done with the breath, right? And through through our voice and you know, and putting it out into this physical realm. It becomes real and seen and heard for us by whoever is listening, by ourselves, and um it can provide such an immense uh relief.

SPEAKER_01 28:12

Yeah, so for all the listeners out there, that's that's our hope that um if you need help, reach out and um seek some help, call somebody. Unfortunately, we're out of time this week. Unfortunately, yeah. Unfortunately, it goes quick. And and unfortunately. That's right, and fortunately, so we can move on to our next episode next week. But for the listeners out there, uh, we appreciate all of you for um listening to Shannon and I. I hope everybody has a great week. Um, just a quick reminder, um, if you are in that state of mind or if you're feeling that weight and it's just too much, please, please, please just reach out to somebody just for an hour. Just go talk for an hour and uh hopefully that works out for everybody.

SPEAKER_00 28:52

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just even reaching out, you know, it's we'll we'll get into that more uh ways to do that.

SPEAKER_01 29:00

Absolutely. Well, this is Mike Seahorn signing off this week. I'm Shannon Mora. And we'll catch you on the next episode.