Next Level University

#1619 - The 3 Core Wounds

• Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

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Feeling the sting of rejection, the hollow ache of abandonment, or the sharp pain of betrayal is something many of us have experienced, but discussing it openly is an entirely different battle. In this episode, Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros explore how these deep-seated issues can be traced back to the very beginnings of our lives, even touching upon the sensitive subject of childhood trauma and its lasting impressions on our adult insecurities. This discussion delves into the depths of these issues, offering insights and experiences that can aid in the transformative process of healing and growth.

Links mentioned:
Next Level Group Coaching - https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/group-coaching/
Next Level Live - Saturday, March 23rd, 2024 (10:00 am to 4:30 pm) https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/next-level-live/

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NLU is more than just a podcast; we have many more resources to help you achieve your goals and dreams.

For more information, please check out our website at the link below. 👇

Website 💻  http://www.nextleveluniverse.com

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We love connecting with you guys! Reach out on Instagram, Facebook, or via email.

Instagram 📷
Kevin: https://www.instagram.com/neverquitkid/
Alan: https://www.instagram.com/alazaros88/

Facebook ✍
Alan: https://www.facebook.com/alan.lazaros
Kevin: https://www.facebook.com/kevin.palmieri.90/

Email 💬
Kevin@nextleveluniverse.com
Alan@nextleveluniverse.com

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Show notes:
(5:49) Rejection, Abandonment and Betrayal
(9:15) Analogy of an iceberg
(11:32) Seeds of greatness and insecurities
(15:27) Two buckets
(20:23) Meet like-minded people and jumpstart your journey to achieving your dreams while optimizing your life. Join Next Level Group Coaching. https://www.nextleveluniverse.com/group-coaching/
(22:23) Empowerment that came with awareness
(29:01) Active confrontation for inner work of insecurities
(32:29) The role of vulnerability in personal growth
(41:57) Outro

Send a text to Kevin and Alan!

Speaker 1:

Next Level Nation. Welcome back to another episode of Next Level University, where we help you level up your life, your love, your health and your wealth. Excuse me, we hope you enjoyed our latest episode, episode number 1617,. What's your relationship with earning it today? Nope, I lied to you Episode number 1618,. You have to look back to see how far you've come Today for episode number 1619, the three core wounds. So two things. One, I'm a little bit under the weather. I don't know if you can hear it in my voice. Two, this is the episode that I promised I don't know five times and just kept pushing off. Alan and I were discussing how do we want this episode to go, what are the stories we're going to tell? All that happy jazz. And I said at the end of the day I think I'm just nervous that I won't add much value on this episode, because it's these types of episodes where it's not just me riffing on my experiences, where there's like actual data, that always makes me nervous, because I don't really look at data.

Speaker 1:

So I want to be open, honest and upfront before we get into this episode. But you did some research for this one, I know, but not enough. I don't feel you know me. I like to over. If I'm not over researched, I'm not researched enough. So anything you want to add before we get into the three core wounds, alan's going to have a little bit of a different perspective because he's been doing IFS therapy now for however long, and things that Alan does he studies up on. So he'll have a I don't want to say a different perspective, but he'll have a his own perspective to mine and we'll kind of see what happens.

Speaker 2:

The only thing I have to add is come into this one with an open mind and an open heart and see what lands and resonates with you and don't take anything we say or anyone else says as absolute gospel. Obviously. Let it resonate and see what lands for you. The idea here we used to say this all the time at the hyper conscious podcast way back is to shake the snow globe and what lands will hopefully be more self-awareness, more others awareness, more awareness about the world.

Speaker 1:

I went back to Jiu Jitsu today I promise this is going to connect to the story and I got home and Terrence said how'd it go? And I said, well, you know I got smashed, as I usually do, but it was good, it was really good. And I said I was afraid, I was afraid to go back. And she said why? Why are you afraid? And I said because it's. It's an awkward situation. It can be very awkward when you're you're going and you're grappling with people that you don't know and kind of know some people and sometimes you don't really feel like you fit in, because I'm the lowest belt and a lot of these people have been doing this for decades, or at least a decade. Sometimes I feel like I'm on the outside looking in, not because of anything. Anybody's doing. My gym's amazing, everybody there is awesome, but it's still difficult. And I said I just lost some of that momentum. I lost the momentum of going four times a week where I wasn't. There just wasn't as much resistance, it wasn't. It wasn't as much. I felt comfortable and I was just nervous. And she said where do you think that comes from? And I said probably my childhood. That's most likely it. I think there's a fear of rejection. I go up to someone and say, hey, do you want to grapple? And they say no, that's never happened in the years that I've been doing. That's never happened, so that's a big one. Or the fear of judgment, or me offending someone or me looking bad. I don't really worry about looking at honestly me, somebody perceiving my stupidity. For stupidity I'm using that word. What is the? What is the word you use when, when someone doesn't know something? Ignorant ignorance, my ignorance sometimes, which I think I have very little love because I've studied jujitsu and the culture of it, but I don't want that to offend someone. So Tara and I were having a really good conversation about this and I thought it connects really nicely to the three core wounds, because I have several of the three core wounds in my childhood and they're still stuff I'm dealing with today to the point where Tara and I were talking and she said you said you were going to seek out a therapist to work through this stuff and I said I did. I found someone. They didn't take my insurance and then I just fell off and I got busy with other stuff and unfortunately I'm not saying this is right, but unfortunately it got pushed down to the bottom of the list, as oftentimes the most important things do, unfortunately. So the three core wounds I'll give a little bit of a definition as well.

Speaker 1:

The three core wounds rejection, abandonment and betrayal. So rejection and this I don't know if this is from the dictionary, but well, you know what rejection is, but at least the definition that's given here is a refusal to accept, approve or support something, or a refusal to show someone the love or kindness that they need or expect, the feeling of someone not loving you or wanting. That's rejection. Abandonment, the act of leaving permanently or for a long time, especially when you should not do so. The act of giving something up to withdraw one support or help from, especially in spite of duty, allegiance or responsibility. And then I think this would be a synonym to desert. So when you desert someone, that is abandonment. And then betrayal. And I had me some dessert last night.

Speaker 2:

What'd you have? Boston cream?

Speaker 1:

donut. Oh yeah, you told me about how disappointing yeah.

Speaker 2:

I tried again. Of course, disappointing, yeah, but you know what A?

Speaker 1:

disappointing dessert is still better than no dessert. A world class salad at times, True Betrayal. Number three an act of deliberate disloyalty to be unfaithful in guarding, maintaining or fulfilling, disappoint the hopes or expectations, of be disloyal to the act of not being loyal. So yeah, kind of, I guess, lack of loyalty. So those are the three core wounds. And then in this article I was reading, I believe it said most of these are created before the age of seven. So my dad left before the age of seven and I had some other family stuff happen when I was younger that definitely created at least two of these, One of the Alan. This was interesting for me. One of the things I read was Betrayal is kind of a mix of abandonment and rejection. If you think about it, you feel rejected because the person let's just say, hypothetically for me I felt rejected because my dad didn't want to be around. Quote, unquote. That's the story I'm telling myself and I feel abandoned because he left. I feel like he left because of me, Imagine.

Speaker 2:

So I feel like I have probably all three of these, which is a betrayal.

Speaker 1:

I feel like I probably have all three of these in some way shape or form. The reason I wanted to do this episode, as heavy and as serious as this episode is, is something might connect differently today than it ever has. Maybe after this you'll feel more comfortable seeking out a therapist or a counselor or someone to talk to. I'm just realizing that I know how much stuff I've probably pushed down from my childhood that I've never looked at, that you just either forget about. It's just super, quote, unquote, normal for you, and you assume 27 years later you won't remember it. But you don't ever forget that stuff. You might not consciously think of it, but it doesn't mean it's not running your life in some way shape or form. So as much responsibility as I feel to make sure this episode goes well, I think I also feel the same amount of responsibility to do an episode like this, because this is serious stuff and I think this is something I wish I learned far earlier.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, same, yeah, the analogy of an iceberg comes up and with all the coaching that I've done, and particularly the relationship talks coaching that Emilia and I do together, and I think that, statistically speaking, it's safe to say that women tend to do more inner work than men and I will comfortably say that Not always, but I often talk about how little girls for lack of a better phrasing have a diary, they journal, they reflect, and a lot of guys had the whole rub some dirt in it type of thing we were talking about that the other day we were talking about how, when we were younger, a lot of the girls we knew had diaries and journals, and I was burning ants with a magnifying glass.

Speaker 1:

That's what I was doing when I was a young boy.

Speaker 2:

There's an excellent self-reflection in that yes thank you, thank you.

Speaker 2:

And culturally, I think it's more encouraged the inner work with women, but also I think maybe there's a biological component too. I don't know, I'm not going to go down that rabbit hole, but what I do know is, statistically speaking, based on what I've seen coaching people from all over the world different countries, different industries, different backgrounds, different cultures Canada, italy, spain, philippines, new Zealand, australia I've seen, statistically speaking, definitely a higher amount of inner work and mental health focus with women. That said, we coach couples, emil and I, and what I have seen happen and again, not always, but what I have seen happen is sometimes the man is under the impression that they don't have any trauma, and rather than they don't have any trauma, they are under the impression they had a good childhood and that their childhood doesn't affect them. And so I'll always keep this anonymous, but I was on the phone with one on Zoom, on the phone on the Zoom on Zoom with a couple, and this individual said something along the lines of no, I had a good childhood, I don't feel like I have any trauma. But it was very, very clear, having coached so many different people and understanding my own trauma, doing therapy, work with myself that underneath the iceberg that everyone else can see, there's definitely a lot of emotional wounding.

Speaker 2:

There's a lot, and I think the best way to articulate this without getting overly clinical and without getting into the psychology and without getting into internal family systems and CBT and all these different modalities of therapy what I do think is important for everyone to understand is all of us are insecure. Every human being is insecure deep down. Now, some of us are more insecure than others. Some of us have overcome our insecurities more than others. Some of us acknowledge those insecurities more than others. Some of us have bigger insecurities than others and not all of us are insecure about the same things. But these core wounds there is no one that I've ever met who is a human being. Ever since, I learned a lot of this stuff the inner work, stuff that doesn't have insecurity underneath their iceberg. And so what you see on the surface is the social media posts. What you see on the surface is Kevin and I right now on this podcast, but what's underneath the iceberg is both, I think, seeds of greatness and insecurity. Both I believe in myself and I don't believe XYZ.

Speaker 2:

So one time, Kevin and I we were at an event this is actually at the venue that we're doing Next Level Live at in Groton and there was a woman speaking named Shana and she brought me up and she talked about these, these core wounds and core fears actually, and one of the fears was of success. And she brought me up and we did this sort of meditation and I ended up crying on stage and Kev shouted from the audience when she was going through the fears this was prior to me crying ask him if he's afraid of success. And at the time I had never really thought of this and when she asked that, I knew that was mine and it's why would someone be afraid of success? Logically, that makes no sense. But if you dig underneath the iceberg, you realize the more you are capable, the more you are empowered, the more you believe in yourself, the more you are confident and smart and doing great things in the world, the more of a mirror you are for other people who don't feel as capable, don't feel as smart, don't feel as XYZ, and so you trigger the insecurities of others, which then creates a negative, maybe a relinquishing of love, maybe rejection and that creates emotional pain, and emotional pain creates insecurity and insecurity feeds on itself when this happens, and so for me I'll just use me as an example, but I want everyone thinking of themselves.

Speaker 2:

I was insecure about some of the challenges in my childhood. Father passed away when I was two, stepfather from three to 14, left my family at 14, sort of lost three families by the time I'm 14. That's a whole other story. But abandonment, rejection, lots of unlovable stuff going on in there and my trauma response to that was aim higher, get stronger, get smarter. And in that trauma response I actually created insecurity and triggered insecurity and other people who maybe didn't feel as capable or as confident or didn't believe in themselves as much. So if you've ever been around someone who believes in themselves at a very high level, it can be very triggering for someone who doesn't. And if that triggering creates a strain on the relationship, the person who feels unlovable me in this case has always felt like socially, things never went well for me. I never felt like an easily likable person. I still don't. I'm not insecure about my own capabilities, but I'm very insecure about relationships. Relationships never came easy to me. It never felt like they worked for a long time. It never felt like they worked long term. I always felt like I triggered other people. I never felt like social situations were safe for me, and so there's two main things that I wanted to share on this episode and Kevin told me I was gonna go down, or told you I was gonna go down a different road the two main insecurities that I try to oversimplify. So please don't quote me on the literature of this with psychology. On that I oversimplify because it makes it simple and it makes it usable.

Speaker 2:

In my coaching I try hard to put everyone in one of two buckets. One bucket is unlovable, meaning you are, you probably have pretty high self-belief, you probably believe in your own capabilities and when you're alone by yourself, you probably like yourself and you believe in yourself and you dream. And when you're alone, you're in a good place, you're in a good energy, you're in a good space most of the time not always, but most of them. But you've never really felt easily likable. You've always felt like you have to dial yourself down for other people. You've never felt like fully safe with relationships and around crowds of people, that kind of thing.

Speaker 2:

Then the other bucket is not capable enough and that's the insecurity is, you probably don't believe in yourself that much. You probably are afraid you're not gonna end up somewhere great. You're probably afraid you can't achieve your goals and dreams. You probably don't feel confident that your career is gonna be what you really want. You probably maybe don't feel smart enough or attractive enough or good enough or capable enough.

Speaker 2:

And this is yin and yang and we're all on one side of this pendulum or the other and unfortunately we trigger each other and that triggering of each other, if not handled with emotional intelligence and understanding and empathy, it creates these, these insecurities that actually get bigger, not smaller. And so, fortunately, kevin and I are the yin and the yang on two different ends, and fortunately we grew and matured together to understand each other at a deeper level, which now allows us to hopefully, you know, help. All the listeners do that as well, but I had no idea about any of this in my early 20s. No clue, no claim, and I'm just grateful. We're kind of figuring some stuff out now, can I be?

Speaker 1:

yang or am I? It's a yin, it's yin and yang correct. Which one am I?

Speaker 2:

whichever one you want, let's be yin. Okay, then you are yin, sir, you're yin, yin and, by the way, it's yin and yang can't have just one. You can't have just one. It's called the genius of the and and is important, not just or it's not yin, or yang. It's yin and yang. You need both, and that's that's the important thing, because we need each other, even though we trigger each other.

Speaker 1:

I tell this story often on two thoughts. One I think deep down, this is one of the reasons I started this whole thing in 2017, because when I started listening to podcasts, when I started listening to audiobooks, when I started watching YouTube videos, I never resonated with the people who said, well, just don't worry about rejection, just go get rejected. 999 times and a thousand times, somebody say, yes, that's the dumbest shit I've heard in my life. I hate it. It's just literally the dumbest thing I've ever heard in my entire life. I hate it. It doesn't make any emotional sense and it doesn't even really make logical sense. Honestly, I don't think it does. It never resonated with me. It never, ever, ever resonated with me.

Speaker 1:

And here is why because that's a really good layer, one awareness. It makes. It makes sense. It makes a really good bumper sticker, maybe a really good social media post. But here's the thing that's not gonna help you. If you're a dream chaser and your dreams require you to go convince someone of your product or service, that advice is not good for you, because where did it come from? Where did the thing that is holding you back today actually come from? I don't really think you can heal the wound until you figure it out. And I tell this story when I go on podcasts the first time the first time I ever went to therapy, the first time I ever went to therapy was based on the fact that at the time and you'll probably laugh through this I just want to Alan laughs at these things now it's not because it's funny.

Speaker 1:

It's not. We don't again. When I get uncomfortable, I smile, so I'll be smiling through this. I'm not saying it to make light of anything. It's that's just my thing. That's my. That's what I do when I'm overwhelmed, that's what I do when I'm uncomfortable it's only funny because you've made it here. That's fair, but I don't want to lessen anybody else's experience. Yeah, so, and it's because I know you're gonna laugh, that's, that's a piece of it too, is you and I?

Speaker 2:

you probably think you funny.

Speaker 1:

Well, I appreciate this story isn't super funny though, okay, so I just want to put that out. I'll lock it up, yeah, well, again, it is what it is. I just want to make sure anybody watching knows that it's not. It's not from that place. Okay, at the time, I lived in Boston with what? With my girl yeah, there it is with my girlfriend. At the time, I lived in this sketchy apartment. It was my first. It was my first place by myself, so I moved to the sketchy apartment. I was never home because I was traveling for my job. I was making a ton of money, I don't really care. It's like I'm never gonna be here anyway. Let me just pay. I think it was like 800 bucks a month.

Speaker 1:

Flashback to 2016, whatever that was. I meet someone. We start dating like the foolish person that I have been in my past life. I move in with this person like three months in maybe four months, I don't even know too soon, but we moved in with another couple in this amazingly nice apartment in Boston. It was a three-floor apartment. It had cameras. It was amazing. It was a very, very nice place and at the time I had this facade of success. I had a nice car, I was in really good shape, my girlfriend was a model, I had all the all the things, a lot of money, all that stuff.

Speaker 1:

And I remember everybody was out of the house one day and our bedroom was in the loft. Our bedroom was at the very top and I was home and I was playing Call of Duty video game and I remember thinking, if this is what life is, I don't know if I want to do it. It. The best way to explain it is it was just gray, it was just dark, it was just bland. I wasn't excited about anything. It felt like groundhog, but not a good groundhog day, not a groundhog day that was increasing in terms of happiness, joy, fulfillment, impact, all of that stuff. And I told my partner when she got home that night that and she said I think you should go to therapy and I said absolutely not. No, I don't need therapy, I'll be fine. Fine, I just had a moment. There's not a moment today, it's not a big deal and we discussed it more and more and I ended up going to therapy. And the first time I went to therapy I had a parallel park in downtown Boston, which is the most anxiety inducing thing of all time, number one and I walk into this building and I don't know if there was an elevator. I took the stairs but it was the spiral staircase, like five floors up, and the stairs are creaky and the whole way up. I'm thinking I don't want. This is gonna suck. Am I gonna cry? Is this person gonna laugh at me? What is gonna happen?

Speaker 1:

And I remember learning things in that first hour session about myself that I didn't even know, and I remember leaving that day feeling so much better. I felt heaviness in a certain light, because things were revealed to me that I didn't really I didn't really fully know the weight of them, but also I felt very Empowered. It felt really, really empowering to know things about myself that were creating things in my life that I didn't understand. And then I ended up going back to that place for a while and then, when I moved, I got a new therapist and then I was traveling so much. It was just I was gone every weekday. So I couldn't really I Couldn't work with a therapist unless they were willing to do weekends, and a lot of them just didn't do it and there was no virtual at that time.

Speaker 1:

This was 2016, 2017, 2018. So I Remember the Empowerment that came with the awareness and I think that's why I'm so big of what? Big on awareness? Because, yeah, awareness can be heavy and it can suck. Oh this, oh that thing that happened to me when I was a child. That's what's, that's what's creating this and this, and that's why I'm really struggling in my relationships and that's why I don't feel like I can hold down a job, and every time I get given the potential of a new opportunity, I always turn it down because I'm afraid I can't handle it. That's where all that comes from, my goodness. But I Think it's better to know. I Think it's better to know because at least if you know, you can go to battle for lack of better phrasing against it. And I, the reason I always try to tell that podcast, I tell that story on other podcasts is because I don't think a lot of people, especially a lot of men, that don't really talk about therapy and I've admired you for that, you've talked about therapy a lot and I got to get my crap together and get another therapist.

Speaker 1:

It's not that I'm afraid to do it, I just Genuinely, it's just got pushed to the bottom of the list. Unfortunately, now again, I'm not saying that's right. So the reason I went on that entire story is because I Think the better you know yourself, the the more opportunity you'll have to give yourself grace when you need it, the more opportunity you'll have to give yourself a kick in the butt when you need it, because you know you'll know more about yourself than anybody else does and You'll know what feeds you and you'll know what bleeds you and you'll know what ignites you and you'll know what drains you and You'll know why certain people trigger you in a certain way. I'm sure, alan, I'm sure at some level, the reason you triggered me is because there the people like you would never give me a job when I was trying to get jobs If I walked in and you were in the office. There's no way. There's no way I was getting the job. Somebody else is gonna get the job. That's probably a piece of it.

Speaker 1:

I didn't really do well with the intellectual type. So again, I think awareness is the most important thing in the world. I really, really, really do. That's why we started with the hyper conscious podcast. That's why we do episodes and we say this is gonna be a hyper conscious episode. I just think awareness is a powerful, powerful opportunity, and that's why I felt the responsibility to do this episode, as much as I really didn't want to do it because I'm super uncomfortable. I Feel the responsibility to you, a heavy episode like this, because you just never know, maybe you, maybe you know this, maybe you know this better than I do, maybe you know this better than Alan does. I won't I wouldn't argue with that, especially about me but maybe you never heard it before and maybe one thing in this will break something loose, that's, in a new awareness, and it'll all be worth it. That's my thought.

Speaker 2:

If so, kevin and I have done this before. I think it's important. Let's say, kevin and I are giving a speech in front of a thousand people and I said, kev, you have to get the majority of these people to like you. Zero to ten. How certain are you you could do that I?

Speaker 1:

Do think it's getting harder. I Do believe I would say it's probably getting harder. Let's say probably.

Speaker 2:

Okay, zero to ten. How certain are you you could Get them to think differently and add value to their life, where their future is bigger, better and brighter?

Speaker 1:

see, I think this is a. This is a anomaly one for me, because it's just as high, but it wasn't the beginning. Let's go back to the beginning.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, in the beginning so can we go back to the very first speech? Yeah, yeah, okay. Imagine that version of Kevin very first speech zero to ten. How certain are you you can Get the majority of the people to like you, at least not not dislike you at? That point I probably say like a nine Okay, how certain are you you can help them build a bigger, better, better future with the deeper understandings you delivered?

Speaker 1:

I Think I was fairly delusional At what I knew at the time, but I probably say of five, when in reality it was probably. Yeah, I would say five. In reality, I don't think it matters because, yeah, let's say five.

Speaker 2:

So if I answer the same questions, minor, the opposite. So how certain am I that I can get a thousand people back then to like me? Very, very low. Probably lower than five, definitely lower than five, and Again, it's not a thousand people, but the majority of the room to resonate and like me, not dislike me Very low, but my belief in my ability to help them think differently and create a bigger, better, brighter future. It's ten, very high if they really listen. That's the irony which, if they dislike me, they're not gonna listen. So therefore, it's funny, you can't do it. I, kevin and I now have.

Speaker 2:

It's important for us to understand that and and for the listeners, rather than this being about you and I, kev, which one, which one is easier for you? Which one comes more naturally to you? Because, kev, you mentioned maybe that's the reason why you didn't like people like me is because people like me never hired you. But what if people like you typically don't like me? I would say that's accurate. And what if that has triggered and created this massive insecurity inside of me? Because that's, you know, I think I grew up in an environment that had a lot of people that were maybe less intellectual, not, maybe definitely less intellectual, and so, at the end of the day, all I want for everyone listening is Reflect on this. Which one you know is it? Do you feel easily likable? Do you feel relatable? Do you feel like you easily get along with others? Or do you feel kind of unlovable, unlikable? You don't. It's tough for you to get along with other people, but you maybe feel really capable, maybe you feel really smart, maybe you feel Like more than enough when it comes to achieving your goals and dreams, and maybe it's neither, maybe it's both. I don't know.

Speaker 2:

But what I do know is every single human being I've ever met has insecurities. Some of us are just less aware of what they are and how big they are and how to overcome them, and what I do think is really powerful and what I've come to understand because I used to be Insecure, not know it, not realize that I was insecure, and then chase big goals and dreams to try to Maybe run from those insecurities without even knowing I was doing that, to now doing the inner work and realizing oh so I'm not really insecure about giving the speech. I'm not insecure about whether or not I'm gonna add value. I'm insecure about whether or not, I can get anyone in this room to resonate with me as a person, as an individual, and I feel like there's gonna be some people in this room that villainize me, don't like me, hate me, talk behind my back, and Now that I know that, now that I know that that bothers me and I can just sit with that and be okay with that bothering me, in a way it controls me less. It doesn't control me as much because now I can make a conscious choice and say, well, what's the alternative? Just never give a speech, no, all right.

Speaker 2:

So if that's the inevitable consequence that someone here might not like me and that does trigger me, I'm gonna have the courage to show up anyway and give my best effort, and I feel like that is Is more empowering than trying to pretend you're not insecure, and that doesn't mean to make up insecurity. You don't have to be relatable. I've done that too.

Speaker 2:

That's not what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is genuine, authentic. I'm gonna feel what I'm feeling and I'm gonna choose to have courage to give it a shot anyway, knowing that maybe the rejection will affect me Rather than oh no, I don't care about rejection at all, I don't. That doesn't bother me and I feel Very strongly, and I think very logically, that all of us would be better off getting to know our own insecurity and make friends with it. And ironically, it will get smaller, not bigger. And it gets bigger when you try to hide it and keep it in the closet, and keep it in a dark room and pretend you're not. It actually gets bigger, not smaller. So you know, go at your own pace, but try to get to know what you are insecure about and where you are insecure, and then when you notice that coming up, you can respond instead of react automatically. That's vulnerability.

Speaker 1:

That's what vulnerability. That's where vulnerability actually starts. It doesn't start. It doesn't have to start with you having a conversation that scares the crap out of you with someone you care about. I think for most of us it starts with why do I feel this way, that I feel when does that come from? Or why did I get insecure? I love the why. I think why is such a powerful question? Why did I get insecure? Why did I feel comfortable? Why did I make that joke? Why did I agree with that person when I didn't actually believe in what they said? Those are some vulnerable, vulnerable questions. So if anything, it's okay.

Speaker 1:

If this is super hard, I think it's to be expected, especially if it's not something you've practiced a lot. I would say that's one of the best benefits of being surrounded by self-improvement. Self-improvement is pretty much our company and our life at this point Is I've had the opportunity to look in so many mirrors that I just didn't want to. I just didn't want to. But I have a big enough reason, excuse me, a big enough reason to do it because I wanna be the best husband and business owner and man that I can be, and business partner and friend and all that stuff. I wanna be the best I can. I think the people around me deserve that. I genuinely do. But that also requires more feedback. It requires looking in those mirrors. But what happens at the end of that?

Speaker 1:

When you can be vulnerable with yourself, it's far easier to be vulnerable with other people. It's still challenging. When I say far easier, I don't mean you just snap your fingers and it's done, but if you can do it with yourself, that's a really challenging place to start and it's a really powerful place to start. So give yourself some credit. If you're doing that, it might never be seen, it might never be recognized. I doubt it. I doubt it'll never be recognized. But nobody's really ever gonna know the inner work you're doing Really, unless you choose to tell people. Or somebody might say, yeah, I don't know, I could just sense it. It's different, energy's different. Hopefully you'll get that. But I know doing the inner work can be lonely.

Speaker 2:

But I think you will get that from people who are also doing the inner work. That's fair People who are doing the inner work can tell the people who aren't. And as I've gone down the therapy road more, the inner work road more over the last nine years, because the first quarter of my life I didn't do a ton of inner work, I was mostly achievement at the expense of fulfillment and I flipped the script and I focused on the inside. I used to say I was successful from the outside in and I flipped the script at 26 and nine years later I'm successful from the inside out. It's kind of the story that I say on other podcasts and that's how I really feel.

Speaker 2:

But when I'm on, the RTC calls to bring this full circle, when the person hasn't done the inner work and the other person has, it is very clear to me, but it wasn't. In the past. I had one couple where I told Emilia afterwards I said, sweetheart, in the past I would have thought the opposite. I would have thought he has it together and she doesn't, because on the surface that actually looks that way, but underneath the iceberg he's the one who's way less developed, even though he's more successful externally, and I think that that's why we need to get in Yang this thing, so that we can be internally and externally successful, because that's holistic and that's how you have great relationships and a great career. It can't be one or the other, in my opinion, if you want to be fulfilled.

Speaker 1:

I would agree. I would agree. One of them is easy to show off. The external stuff's easy to show off and if you think that's gonna get you the love and validation and all of the approval that you're seeking again, I've been down that road. I understand, I have a deeper understanding of that. I spent a lot of time doing that. And then this journey, we started from scratch all over again into your point. We did Inside Out. I'm glad we did this.

Speaker 2:

This was one of my favorite episodes for sure Same, and we both did fall for that. The outside 100% In thing, for sure.

Speaker 1:

I thought it would fix it.

Speaker 2:

We flipped it, so did I I thought it would fix it.

Speaker 1:

More, more, more, more, more, more. But none of those mores were self-awareness, it was all money or whatever.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, for me it was external awareness of, yeah, achievement Achievement at the expense of fulfillment versus focus on fulfillment in the inner work and then allow success to be a byproduct of that. But you do, you need both. I hope everyone has a magnificent career and a magnificent relationship and a magnificent relationship with yourself, and it makes sense, because most of us focus on one or the other, not both, and I fell for that. So did you 100%.

Speaker 1:

The world is a weird place. You know what I was thinking of last night before I went to bed. This has nothing to do with the episode. This is just one of Kevin's weird thoughts. I said this to you when we were in. We were either in Wisconsin or we were in Pittsburgh, pennsylvania, and I said you know what's strange man? You look at a skyscraper and you think to yourself my goodness, that thing is heavy. I want and again, maybe not you, but I think of it. I wonder if that weighs the world down. And then you think to yourself that skyscraper was already on the world somewhere. It was already here on the planet. We just had to put it together. In the way it's put together, the world probably weighs exactly the same. Pretty cool. What are your thoughts on all that?

Speaker 2:

Side tangent. That's fairly funny, but immediately the other night she was talking to me about how she visited China once in.

Speaker 1:

Shanghai.

Speaker 2:

And there was a building that at the very top of it there was a really nice restaurant, and she said that they were hanging art from the ceiling and that because of the wind, you could see the art swaying. I don't like that and I said, yeah, that's gonna be a no for me ever. If the building is tall enough to sway in the wind, it's gonna be a no for the kid.

Speaker 1:

They build those in now. So it has a certain play, a certain amount of play.

Speaker 2:

I'll shout out to there's.

Speaker 1:

I mean, the earthquake buildings in California have a certain amount of give that they can move. No, yeah same, I don't even like elevators. Real quick story before we go, alan. You have a podcast in five minutes, so I'll make it quick. Alan and I we went to Toronto when we interviewed Evan Carmichael and we stayed in this Airbnb in this high rise and the parking garage was like six floors underground and I thought I'm not even kidding, I was fighting off a panic attack.

Speaker 2:

I was like it's getting.

Speaker 1:

it's getting thin. The air is getting thin down here, I don't know man, and then we get into this elevator and the thing is whipping up. I think it was on like the 26th floor or something, and I would. There's no way. There's no way I could live in a building like that and do that.

Speaker 2:

So if you live in a high rise in the city, the elevator was not that stable.

Speaker 1:

It didn't feel sturdy.

Speaker 2:

to me at all, it felt fairly sketchy.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, same. So again, these have nothing to do with the episode at all, but Nothing against anyone in Toronto or Pittsburgh.

Speaker 2:

I'm not a city guy. That's all I have to say. It's not a city guy.

Speaker 1:

I don't think city Pittsburgh is that big. Toronto is a very large city.

Speaker 2:

I realize that it's 2.7 million people. That's how many it was.

Speaker 1:

All right. If you have not purchased tickets for Next Level Live 2024, please do so. The link will be in the show notes. March 23rd 2024. We're 30 people in person, 30 people virtual. In person, you get a free catered lunch and it is very, very good food. We've eaten there before and you also get a free Next Level Dreamliner. We hope you all will join us again. We'll be talking about stuff similar to this, not all of this. We'd like to break it into health, wealth and love, whether it's mental health, physical health, emotional health, spiritual health, whether it is relationship with yourself. All of that. If you're not consistent with us for any amount of time, you have an understanding of what we're going to talk about.

Speaker 2:

Tickets are in the show notes. Kevin and I did the entire curriculum and we have all of our very best. We've accumulated over the last six years, based on 1,600 episodes, hundreds of interviews, thousands of coaching sessions with people all over the world, different industries. We've condensed everything we can into this one day self-awareness, how to succeed on your own terms, how to design a life that's unique to you on your own terms. It is our very best stuff all condensed into one day. Please get your tickets as soon as possible. We are officially 30 days out, it is game time, it is peak month and we are super, super pumped. We will not be doing another event like this until another year, so please do not miss this Again. It is $47 for virtual, $97 for in-person and the value for the price point is $47. It's the best I've ever seen.

Speaker 2:

I hope you join it. Like I said, if, for whatever reason, you do not absolutely love it, we will give you your money back.

Speaker 1:

Tomorrow for episode number 1,620, hopefully, because I've been screwing up the numbers here. Yes, I would say so. Dealing with trust issues, I thought it would be appropriate to do an episode on trust after talking about what we talked about today, and I was looking back at our old episodes and I remember we did an episode on trust. This is 2017, I think or 2018. This is a long time ago. I like to revisit things from a new perspective. That's what we're going to talk about tomorrow. As always, we love you, we appreciate you, grateful for each and every one of you At NLU, we learn of fans. We have family. We will talk to you all tomorrow. Talk to you soon.

Speaker 2:

Thanks for watching.

People on this episode

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Alan Lazaros

Host
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Kevin Palmieri

Host