Episode 11: Why We Repeat What We Haven't Healed

Why do we keep finding ourselves in the same situations, repeating the same patterns, and asking ourselves, “How did I end up here again?”

In this episode of No Shame No Filter, we’re talking about the patterns we carry into our relationships, friendships, family, and even the way we treat ourselves. Sometimes what feels familiar can feel safe—even when it isn’t healthy.

We’re getting honest about the things we may not realize we’re repeating, how our past experiences can shape the way we love and connect, why we sometimes romanticize potential, and what it really takes to break a cycle.

Because healing isn’t about pretending the past never happened. It’s about understanding it, learning from it, and realizing you don’t have to keep reliving it.

You are not your patterns. You are not your past. And you are allowed to choose differently.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:39

Hey guys, and welcome back to No Shame, No Filter. I am so happy and excited for this one. I'm excited you're here because this one has been so heavy on my heart. And so I'm excited to dive right into this one. Um, but before we even jump in, I have to ask you a question. Have you ever found yourself saying, How did I end up here again? And maybe it wasn't the exact same situation, right? Like, or maybe it wasn't the exact same person, but somehow, somehow, the feelings felt familiar, the disappointment felt familiar, the confusion, and you thought to yourself, didn't I already go through this? Or didn't I learn this lesson already? I know I have. And there have been seasons that I look back and I think to myself, why do I keep attracting the same kind of people? Why do I keep ending up in relationships that leave me questioning myself and my own self-worth? Or why do I keep ignoring my gut? You know, and maybe it's honestly, maybe it's not even relationships. Maybe it's overcommitting yourself or people pleasing or never asking for help, always putting yourself last. I do that a lot. I forget to fill my cup. I forget that I have to show up in order for me to show up for everybody else, my kids, my business, everything. I have to put myself first, then I can go ahead and pour and pour and pour. Or maybe it's constantly just doubting yourself. Or my favorite. Because truthfully, this has been something that I've very much struggled with. And it's always trying to earn your worth. Sounds sounds funny, right? Trying to earn your worth, like as if someone or something defines our worth. Make it make sense, right? But honestly, whatever it is, we all have patterns, and here's the thing: I don't think we're doomed to keep repeating them, but I do think that we keep repeating them until we understand them, until we dive deeper to see where they're coming from, what this is bringing up, why it's is there something underlying? Because sometimes, no, a more so recently I've had situations come up where history's repeating itself, right? And not only is it bringing up like an old wound, but you know, it's actually much more than that. The wound goes before this person and it goes beyond that. And this person is just like reopening and reopening it that has happened much, much earlier in my life. And honestly, today's episode is all about not blaming ourselves, not blaming other people, but rather because we're going to become more self-aware enough that we can actually choose differently this time. Because having the awareness is where the healing actually begins. And sometimes, sometimes we're looking for familiar, right? It's not healthy. I heard someone say a long time ago that completely changed how I think and how I interpret this, right? They said your nervous system is drawn to what's familiar before it's drawn to what is healthy. And seriously, let that sink in for a second. Your nervous system is drawn to what's familiar before it's drawn to what is healthy. Because I think that's true for many of us. I'll speak for myself because it is absolutely true for me. Um, I assume that will naturally I'll naturally choose what's best for me, right? I I mean, of course, why wouldn't why wouldn't I want what's best for me? Right? Makes sense, but that's not how it works. Sometimes we choose what just feels normal, what we've learned to become the norm, and the norm very much, very, very, very well could not be healthy for us. And if you spent years, you know, thinking and feeling like your love just had to be earned, you might find yourself constantly in situations trying to prove your worth. And if you grew up believing that conflict or disagreement meant that people would leave, then you're in a you're gonna avoid hard conversations at all costs. You will not want to have them. And as soon as someone goes to have a hard conversation with you, you will internally shut down and not be able to continue that conversation because this fear is crippling that this person will then leave if you have a differing opinion than them, right? And if you are always, let's just say, praised for taking care of everyone else, you might feel guilty the second that someone tells you to take care of yourself. And, you know, it's not because you're weak. It's because we've learned a pattern. Our brain has learned a pattern. And patterns do not just disappear when we want them to. They don't. I mean, that would be great, right? But it takes a lot of self-awareness, breaking the pattern, change the changing the internal dialogue that we have in our brain and what we say to ourselves to help change how we think, to help change how we look at ourselves and feel about ourselves. And they change, honestly. The patterns change because we become aware of them, not just because we want them to disappear. You can't make something like that just go away. I mean, we have to learn about it, we have to know where this is stemming from. We have to then put blockers in place to help shut these things down, right? And so this is so random, but I came across this and I'm just going to share this. Um, hopefully you'll pick up what I'm about to put down. But it's the Amazon card theory. Okay. It's my Amazon card theory. And so, you know how Amazon like gets you, right? You buy one organizing bin, and then suddenly your whole home page is storage containers, drawer dividers, pantry labels, acrylic refrigerator organizers. It's like Amazon then decided when you looked up that one thing, right? When you bought that one thing, like this girl likes organization. She likes to be organized. And our brains work a little bit like that. Whatever pattern your brain actually believes, it will look for evidence to support it. And so, you know, a big one in full transparency is my own self-worth has been a big struggle for me. Um I put my self-worth, I used to see that I used to put my self-worth in other people. That if people loved me, then I'm worthy. If people stayed, then I'm worthy. If all these different things, right? And so for me, I was constantly looking for evidence. So if I have a I'll use this as an example, if I have a belief that people always leave, right? Past experience has shown me, I this is me telling myself, past experience has shown me that people always leave. No one stays. And so then that translates into, I must not be worth it. I must be, I must be um too much, or I must, you know, love too hard, or whatever the case may be, whatever those thoughts are, right? But what I'm going to end up doing is now I'm going to without even realizing it, without even realizing it, my brain is actively going to seek out these people who are who can't hold me, right? Like these people my brain's going to seek out people who don't have capacity, who don't have the emotional maturity or anything like that. And so what ends up happening is they end up leaving, right? And so I seek out that. And if you believe, like I said, that people always leave, your brain will notice it 10 out of 10, even if that person is not good for you. And if they're, you know, unhealthy, it's an unhealthy dynamic, unhealthy relationship, whatever the case may be. Your brain notices that people leave. And if you believe I'm not good enough, your brain becomes a detective looking for proof that you are now not good enough. It ignores the compliments. It ignores the people who stay. It ignores the wins that you have. And it literally will zoom in on the thing that confirms a story that you've been telling yourself. It's sick, it's twisted. But the way that we can change this is becoming self-aware and realizing these patterns and like to break them. And that's why healing truly does matter. Because healing will change the story that we are telling ourselves, and it'll help change what our brain is actively seeking out. And so we can not only change internally, but then we can start having healthy relationships. We can start, you know, giving the right people our time and attention, affection and love and all the good stuff that we want to freely give people, but we are then scared to, right? And, you know, for a long time, I was avoiding. Honestly. I, you know, I used to think that healing meant like one day I'm gonna wake up, I'd never think about the past again, I'd never get triggered, I will never cry, I'll never make a bad decision. And it turns out that is actually not even healing. Healing is not pretending that something never happened. Healing is actually responding differently when life gives you another opportunity to repeat the pattern. And so I said that I think I mentioned this on my the last episode very briefly. Had an interaction with someone who was very played a big part in my life for a very long time, right? And so a year ago, last September, October, my reaction to this was so much different. Like, I mean, dang, like I just like literally my reaction to it was like throw the hands up, self-worth out the door, you know, self-love, all that stuff. Like, who cares about it, right? Like, I did not even care, like just throw my hands on this person, all that stuff, and try to make them see me. But fast forward to like a week ago when it happened. That was not the case, right? I was giving another opportunity to repeat that pattern and put myself in a situation where I'm just constantly where I'm like literally fighting for someone to see my worth. And I'm it doesn't make sense, right? Like I'm giving another opportunity to either repeat the pattern or freaking break the pattern. And what did I do? And I didn't even realize I did it until after I did it, was I stuck up for myself, I set the boundary, and I kept it going. Did it feel icky at first? Yeah. Looking back, dude, I'm proud of myself, right? Because that me, that version of me last year would not have done that. I would have lost myself in this. And today I'm not doing that anymore, right? I know what I bring to the table. I know myself forth. I know what I know all this stuff now. Because why? I'm healing, not healed, because healing is an ongoing process, guys. Like you're not just like instantly healed and you're cured, and it's just you're that's it. Like you're not just done. And you know, the truth is, like, life has a funny way of just giving us those pop quizzes, like I mentioned. And it's not because it's just punishing us, but because it's asking us like, hey, have you learned what you needed to learn in this situation or in this dynamic or relationship, friendship, whatever the case may be? It's almost like life literally hands you this same test, maybe with different names, maybe with a different job, maybe with a different friendship, maybe with a different opportunity. But it's the same lesson, just a different classroom, right? It's so it's actually crazy, right? Like if you can sit back, and even if you pause this episode for a minute, and you sit back and you think about something that you've handled just differently, you will, I promise, see where the opportunity was given again to do this differently. And it's actually pretty cool. And another thing that has just been heavy that I think goes with the flow of where this episode is going, because half the time I have no clue where this episode is going, and we're just we're just here, we're just hanging out and just I'm just talking about what's relevant, right? Um, and hopefully it resonates with somebody. But like another big one is romanticizing potential. And I just want to talk about it for a minute because I think that women and some men deserve an Olympic medal in seeing potential. Because here's the thing, right? We see one green flag, and suddenly we're writing the entire movie. And I'm gonna be honest, like full transparency. If there's one thing that I've learned about myself over the past few years, more so very heavily this past year, um, and I've become very much self-aware of it, and I very much shut it down now, is that I can take potential one good thing about someone or one good interaction with somebody, and I can go and run off and live in fantasy land. Like removing my reality, removing the reality of the situation or the gravity of it completely out of the factor, like just gone. And I can just uh I get stuck in like dreamland, right? Like of oh, like this is what I really want. And like, you know, they showed me this, so like let me paint this whole beautiful freaking picture of what life is and could be and would be, but like, dude, that's not reality, right? And so, like, it just here's some examples I'm kind of thinking about, honestly. It's like, okay, oh, he smiled at the waitress, and then it's like, he's so kind, he's so thoughtful, he's so generous, he's so this, so that, so that, so that. Or like, he remembered my coffee order, or he texted, good morning. And it's like those little things that are like normal, and like we rem then take that and like just completely freaking romanticize it. Now listen, okay. The bar has been in the basement. Seriously, the bar has been in the basement. We have got to raise it and we become attracted to who someone could become instead of asking who are they consistently showing me who they are, who are they consistently showing me that they are, right? Like those questions, like we need to see consistency in how someone shows up before romanticizing the potential, or not even, we don't even want to romanticize the potential at this point. We want to see people, we want to see them for who they are. Because here's the thing: don't get me wrong, potential is beautiful. Like, I can look at anybody, my friends, my uh like uh anybody, friends, family, if it's an intimate relationship, whatever, whoever, right? And everybody has potential because potential is beautiful, but potential does not build a healthy relationship in the present moment, right? And we need to stay present because when we run off to fantasy land or dream land of like just all these different scenarios, we it gets messy. It gets messy because while potential doesn't build healthy relationships, character does, consistency does, effort and accountability does. But here's something I honestly did have to learn. You cannot build a future with someone's potential. That is not a foundation. That is not a foundation for a solid, healthy dynamic, whether it is a friendship, a relationship, a just whatever, any kind of relationship, okay? You have to build it with who they choose to be today in the present moment. And you honestly, when it comes to healing, this is such a big one. And I'm gonna wrap this back around to Amazon because Amazon apparently is my hot topic of examples today. But I wish healing worked like Amazon Prime, right? Click, order, delivered by APM. Now that'd be fun, right? That'd be cool, that'd be amazing. But instead, healing is really, it's hard. It's not easy, you know? Um, it's deciding to say no one more time. It's going to therapy, it's reading the book, it's praying, it's the uncomfortable conversations. I mean, gosh, like they're awful, right? Because even though I have so I have learned that having those hard conversations feel god-awful, right? But just because they feel awful in the moment doesn't make them wrong. It doesn't make them not important, any less valuable, or anything. It's they're just uncomfortable because we're not used to saying these things or sticking up for ourselves or anything like that. And not only is it having uncomfortable conversations, but it's apologizing. It's uh forgiving ourselves, forgiving ourselves and choosing differently. Again and again and again. And funny enough, nobody posts that part, right? Social media is so funny, like healing and how people talk about healing on social media. And I probably do, I probably have done it in the past, like highlight the great that the great things that come out of healing, right? And minimizing or not even reflecting on the things that that messy middle part because it's not glamorous, it's not at all, but that's where life changes, right? And then, you know, it's so crazy because I'm definitely in the thick of just some motherhood, and I've been thinking about it. A lot lately because becoming a parent definitely changes the questions that we ask ourselves. Instead of asking, like, what kind of parent do I want to be? I have recently started just doing a lot of self-reflection when it comes to being a mom and like how I'm showing up for my kids and what I'm teaching them and all that different stuff. But I've been asking myself, like, what kind of adult do I hope my kids become? Because they're watching, right? And they're learning, they're learning from me. They're watching how I handle stress, how I speak to myself, how I speak to myself. They are watching that. How I treat people, how I let people treat me, right? And most importantly, how I apologize. And another thing that really just my kids have seen over the last more so year is how I recover after hard days, right? Because we're allowed to have hard moments, hard days, but it's how do I change how do I bounce back from that? What does that look like? And honestly, it takes some pressure off, right? Because that's the thing. Like, I don't have to be perfect. I just have to be willing to grow. I had that willingness is key because if I'm not willing, then nothing will change. I've learned that in recovery, you know, like that's what got me into the rooms. That's what got me clean and sober is like having that willingness to just do something different, having that willingness to open my mind up to a power greater than myself, having that willingness to sit back and accept and acknowledge and admit that I don't know everything. And, you know, circling it back to our children, it's one of the greatest gifts that we can give them is not perfection. It's not. It I mean, being a perfect parent sounds great. I mean, yeah, I would love to not mess up or, you know, to not get frustrated or what, you know, anything like that. Um, but it's showing them that people can learn that change is actually like people can change. Change is possible. Healing is possible. They need to learn those things, right? For when they're adults. And then uh to wrap it back up, because in regards to like relationships and everything, kind of where I went with this whole episode. Um, I will say that I think the hardest relationship that we will ever have, and some, you know, you might listen to this and be like, yeah, no, Cam, like, no, I'm not, I'm not following you. But it's for me personally, my belief is that the hardest relationship that we'll ever have is the one that we have with ourselves. Because nobody, nobody, here's the way that we talk to ourselves more than we do. Imagine if your best friend, right? Your best friend followed you around all day, just hanging out, just following around and repeating everything that you've said about yourself. That internal dialogue, right? I'll never figure it out, or I'm failing, I'm not good enough, I'm unworthy, I'm I'm not beautiful, I'm behind, right? You'd probably sit down. Hopefully, listen, you maybe you'll stop being friends with them. I don't know. Hopefully not, because that's a little aggressive. But but seriously, like you'd want to sit down and have a conversation with them. And like, dude, like what are you doing? Like, why are you talking to yourself like that? So why do we allow ourselves to speak that way? Because healing isn't just changing who has access to our life, it's changing the voice that has access to our minds, right? Because self-talk is deadly. The things we tell ourselves, we end up believing. And once we believe something about ourselves, it is then pushed outwards into the world, towards other people, into our relationships, into work life or you know, just parenting, anything. It's push outwards then. And honestly, what's changed for me is realizing that I had spent so much time. And I'm gonna be honest, um, this is more so recently is because something had come up, and I've just been, I spent a lot of time asking myself, like, why is this happening again? Or, you know, in the past, like, why did this happen? That I wasn't sitting there and asking, like, what is this trying to teach me, or circling it back to the beginning of this episode, you know, like what is this? Is this trying? Is this trying to give me another opportunity to do things differently? I wasn't asking myself those questions. And those, like, why did this happen, or what is this trying to teach me, are two totally different questions. One keeps us stuck in the past, and the other one moves us towards the future. And every single difficult season has taught me something. And, you know, I'd be, I'd lose at life if I did not look back in hindsight at situations, at um relationships, dynamics, friendships, whatever it is, whatever. I would lose at life if I didn't realize that each and every single one had taught me something. Because some has some has taught me, they taught me boundaries, right? They taught me to stick up for myself, resilience, or patience, or some taught me that I deserved more than what I was actually accepting, that I was no longer willing to tolerate anything less than what I know for myself that I deserve and want. And I here's the thing: I wouldn't choose every hard season again because if I'm being honest, some of them were god-awful. Like, couldn't even see the light at the end of the tunnel, right? But I also can't deny that they actually shaped me. So to circle, to bring this all back, right? To close it out, let's start with one, let's end this, I should say, with one simple question. What am I tolerating that no longer aligns with the life I'm trying to build? And that, like, honestly, like that question is very simplistic, but like it is so much deeper than that. It is because your answer right there might break your heart, right? Because it might be a full-blown relationship, or it might be that negative self-talk we talked about, or it's chaos, it's burnout, it's constantly saying yes when you mean no. Or my favorite one is maybe it's just waiting for someone else to validate you, right? But like whatever that is, you have got to notice it, you name it, you have to self-reflect on it, and then you have to seriously ask yourself if I believed, if I truly believed that I was worthy of peace, what would I do differently? That question has the power to honestly change your life. And here's the thing knowledge is power, right? But knowledge doesn't mean that change will come with it. Change will come with it when we have the knowledge and we choose to do something differently, and so I feel like this episode was like heavy. I don't, it just kind of all flowed together, and honestly, I love talking about relationships and dynamics and friendships and just anything to do with that because I've had the had the pleasure of just experiencing a lot of shit, you know, and just different dynamics and situations and everything, and so I feel like this is always a topic that I will have so much to say. I just need to shut up sometimes, but I want to leave you with this, and then I will shut up. We are not the mistakes that we've made, we are not the people who walked away. We are not the beliefs you formed while trying to survive. We're not our worst day. We're not our old patterns. Those things that I just said, like they might explain a little bit of our story, right? A little bit, some parts of our story, but they don't actually write our ending. Like it is like healing isn't becoming a different person. It's becoming more aware and it's more, it's becoming more of who you were before fear and heartbreak and disappointment and self-doubt told you and convinced you to settle for less. So honestly, just pay attention, right? Notice the patterns, notice the stories you're telling yourself, notice what feels familiar. And is what feels familiar, is it healthy? Is that dynamic doing something good in your life? Is it is it bringing goodness into your life? Is it bringing you peace? Is it just does it feel good? Then ask yourself like, does this actually align with the life I'm trying to build or the person I want to become, who I'm striving to become? Because maybe I don't know, just maybe. Maybe it's a season where the cycle ends, you know, and it's our it's our choice. Like we are given choices. We get to decide stuff for ourselves, and no one can take that from us unless you give them the power to, then that's a whole other conversation. But we're not gonna go into that today because I can talk forever on that, and we're not gonna do that. We'll say that for another day. But anyway, thanks for hanging out with me today. And if this episode just spoke to you, send it to someone who needs to hear the reminder that healing is not and it never will be, about being perfect. It's about being willing and having that willingness to see what's actually happening in front of us in real life, in reality, accepting it, acknowledging it, and then doing something about it. And if you I'll wrap it up with this if you were to take one thing away from this from this episode, from today's conversation, just let it be this. You can't change what you don't acknowledge, but once you acknowledge it, you have the power to choose differently. So choose differently, get uncomfortable. And if you're too uncomfortable, reach out to me. Let's chat. But until next time, give yourself the grace, keep growing, keep showing up. There's no shame in healing, and there's definitely no filter around here. I'll see you guys on the next episode. Bye.