The Trauma That Hurts People Most (And Never Gets Named) | Patrick Teahan

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27:07Lewis Howes:so how do we resolve the dynamics or the relationship with the work with our parents how do we get to that place let's say someone isn't able to do three years of group therapy Yes. Right. And do you ever get finished with your parents in the work that needs to be done to heal the relationship with your parents? I think you can in a good enough way. Yeah. And my experience, my path was about being in that group. But for people who don't have access to that, or it's a tall order. It's funny when I was 20, I was in such a hole when my therapist was like would you like i have one spot in a group would you like to join it it's three and a half years i was looking around going like i got nothing going on oh right you don't even know free at that time yeah i was you know what i mean so all the time in the world you know like i was just waiting tables and playing the band you know what i mean like and really lost in a lot of pain but it's so funny that you bring that you mentioned that i and i developed a six-month model of that group to give people an introduction because it's a tall order yeah it's gonna get in there three and a half years 20 20 29 you know a lot so it's a lot but it was the best thing i ever did in my life you know um it takes about a good 20 years for us to get really trauma conditioned in an unhealthy family so when you look at it that way three and a half years isn't really a long time um but how do we heal that relationship with our parents what does it take for us instead of saying All right, I'm going to do, I guess the question is what needs to happen within us to feel like we've healed the relationship with our parents enough that it doesn't hold us back from being our authentic selves anymore?

28:55Great question. Like, are you referencing the actual ongoing relationship with our parents or do you mean

29:01Lewis Howes:like the internalized experience that we need to have, heal or feel in order to feel like, okay, I can navigate my past relationship with my parents and my present relationship with my parents now, no matter what happened. If we can do enough work on ourselves where the deep part of us, what I would call our inner child or our subconscious, when that part of us knows that I was a good kid and I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, not from an intellectual awareness place, because anybody can tell themselves that. but when you know in your internal core and you have a good sense of self enough of like my mom and dad were wrong about me you know i don't i don't wish them ill they were just not really well people they did a number on me um but i think also too like with over time getting to that place and in your deepest core self not again it's really people get tripped up they could say well i'm already there do you know what i mean then i'm like how's your love life yeah do you know what i mean like if the proof is in the pudding about sort of like where if when you feel like you're you're done in a good enough way is if you can live your life in a totally different way and that's going to also involve the internal stuff right yeah do you have intimacy now as an adult right and do you have do you have general harmony in your relationship it doesn't mean it's going to be perfect but do you feel peaceful uh enough to have intimacy yeah do you have friends yeah Do you have a good feeling about humanity instead of being so like, you know what I mean?

30:37Like there's I'm not sort of saying it all has to be that. But there's I'm kind of fascinated by this about this like final frontier of like, what does the end result of a lot of work look like? And I still I still get triggered in my life, but I know it's not real. Yeah. And I can it'll last an hour at most, not like seven days the way it used to, you know, so it's like that kind of stuff. But when that internal part of you knows that you were a good kid and you have goodness and you have a seat at the table in the world, that's what the end result might look like. And groups are not like whatever gets you there, like whatever gets you through the night is kind of that.

31:19But I see a lot of people because they don't really know and I'm not criticizing them. I see a lot of people out there convincing themselves that they've hit that point. And then they, it's like Lucy with the football life keeps kind of beating them up a little bit, you know? So.

31:34Lewis Howes:You said there's kind of three parts to this healing process. The first one was, you know, doing the work with your parents and kind of like. Finishing business. Finishing business with your parents. Whether they're alive or not alive, or you speak to them or not. In the therapy room. Yeah. Not with them. With yourself. Right. The second part is reparenting the inner child yep so how does someone learn to build a relationship with the younger version of them who was neglected abused abandoned or had a number of emotions around feeling not good enough shameful guilty and like they didn't belong yes how does someone as an adult connect or reconnect with that version of themselves emotionally so they feel safe moving forward yes in a con that's something i will not take on a tangent in a concrete way um pictures of your younger self there's a tool that i teach called dialoguing which is your you're you're having a you're journaling on paper between your dominant hand and your non-dominant hand oh man geez you're speaking with your subconscious and that's also your handwriting is like a child on your other hand right which is another fascinating very fascinating thing oh my gosh blew my mind a lot of clients have this experience they will write from their inner adult their dominant hand in block lettering in their inner child writes in cursive oh my gosh and there might be wounding around that cursive kind of a thing i i had a client from india this broke my heart where they were not they were they were being schooled in a Catholic school where they were not allowed to use their left hand everybody had to be right-handed so that's like another thing over here about it but pictures of yourself a stuffed animal um um the dialoguing also what is very rrp the the therapy that i do relationship recovery process is very tactile watching the shows that you watch when you're a kid you know like maybe evening some evening the some of the foods um so there's a bunch of things that's a lot like jump-starting this but everybody shows up to that work differently some people you know depending on their trauma they'd be like i do not want to parent my inner child that's somebody else's job some people have an immediate connection and the inner child is just like where you've been my whole life it's amazing you know and there's like a easy way that they don't struggle as much with it.

34:05Other people who might struggle with being dissociative might struggle feeling like, how do I get a toehold in there and get that jumpstarted relationship going? And then to complicate it further, their inner child might be angry. I don't like adults. I don't want to talk to you. I don't want to be parented. Wow. So a lot of that is the nature of that work.

34:25Lewis Howes:If someone is not willing to have a relationship with the younger version of themselves, the inner child yeah what is not available for them the rest of their life if they always that's a great question they always block it out yeah they don't have a relationship with the younger self or they're just angry yep about their childhood um they will get stuck around tenderness that they will not experience tenderness in a way that they might need compassion for themselves compassion for their inner child, a tenderness towards their partner, a tenderness for other children, just general. Like when we think about childhood, like you're a new dad yourself, it's sort of like they need such cuddling and connection or something like that.

35:13But for a lot of childhood trauma survivors that got really wrecked and they're grossed out by it. Like, I don't want nothing to do with it. And that's a stuck place that we, I may have to really press and lean into a client to get them to hit a grief spot about it. Do you know what I mean? To the point where I've had to say somebody like, you know, this is your inner child, a picture of them. Do you know what I mean? Would you tell them that they're worthless or they're not worth your time? So it's a really, it's a problem in a way because what they will stay in, if they can't connect with tenderness, they will be stuck in bitterness.

35:47They will be stuck in brokenheartedness. Do you know what I mean? So like when they're, you'll see it, you know, have you ever known somebody in your life when their partner gives them a kiss on the, on the cheek or there's a wedding or something like that? They make a joke about it. Do you know what I mean? Or they sneak out of it a little bit.

36:03Lewis Howes:They don't embrace it. They don't lean into it. They don't, they may have to, you know, some people, it's almost like I think about like Seinfeld characters. You know what I mean? I'm not saying these people are bad. We're just kind of saying like there is, it's just telling me that in their childhood, the family might've been super sarcastic. you know toxic and acidic about connection so it's one of the hardest things too next to when the inner child when the inner when the person's inner adult wants to connect with the inner child and the inner child is just like i don't know wow and that's another barrier you know but but when people don't do this and one other place that i talk about this is inner child work is just a language vehicle um for people who are like you know child work you know what you know like i just don't it sounds so foofy or whatever or it sounds so precious you know which i get then i would just flip it semantically to say like okay then or even when someone says i don't have an inner child my inner child died a long time ago i don't you know what i don't operate on that kind of wavelength or whatever i say do you have an amygdala do you have a limbic system You do.

37:13You have an inner child. It's just your emotional memory system. And you also have, and other people will sort of say like, I can't find my inner adult. I can barely function. I will never find my inner adult. And I'm like, you have a prefrontal cortex that works all the time. You know what I mean? Like you get triggered for three days and then you rally and get out of it. That's when your prefrontal cortex comes up online. Prefrontal cortex is just your inner adult. It's more functioning part of you. And that's the part of you that's going to start to have a conversation with your limbic system, specifically your amygdala, which is like the file cabinet of all the bad stuff.

37:51Lewis Howes:If an adult has an emotional reaction to something that triggers them, whether it be in an intimate relationship, a friendship, a parent, a coworker, people around the world, normal life, whatever, something they see online, if something emotionally triggers them often. What does that say about them if they're emotionally triggered consistently? That they probably need to do some childhood trauma work. Is it all tied to, like, I think I heard Gabor Mate say, if it's hysterical, it's historical. And if someone is having a hysterical reaction or some type of emotional charge around it, then there's some type of history tied to that feeling that's causing the trigger.

38:35Lewis Howes:I'm not saying we go around and we're just numb to life and we have no emotion to anything but if something is constantly triggering you so much yeah to focus on it right you're saying that there's some type of history or trauma that needs to be healed yes and i love what you just the the the government quote it's beautiful also carl jung said neurosis is just evidence of suffering you know so when we think about someone who's neurotic like sort of like you know like like you know we all have our stuff but you know i had a friend years ago he's like i no sharp knives in the sink you know i mean because they have this fear of whatever and that's like more of a for snickety kind of trigger but like i used to get so triggered i was sort of a rager a fight response took everything personally i was so in bad shape that i would take it personally that people were not walking fast enough in front of me on the sidewalk dude i know that you're just sort of like what you know i'm impatient you know i mean like there's just a thing there but like in my it might be part of just my personality i was born with but it's definitely about people being thoughtless and oblivious which is the household that i grew up in so when people are thoughtless and oblivious around me historically not anymore now it's kind of lovely where i'm just if someone doesn't hold the door open for me in a simple way or whatever i'm like oh maybe they have a lot of stuff going on but it used to be like yeah yeah disrespect me or just even being like so nauseated by humanity which is sort of like another kind of thing but when someone is is triggered in a place is first of all do they know that they're triggered because a lot of people who like i don't triggering whatever i'm just i just don't like it when people don't hold the door open for me you know what i mean um so it's kind of it's the hardest thing in my work is telling somebody that they're triggered or asking them or trying to or get them to be warmed up to this idea about i don't i i typically work with people or when I was working that they would I would I started screening like I needed them to know that something was up in childhood because I would hit dead ends with people if they I just want to be better with my boss and if they didn't really know that but when someone is triggered I think more times out of the week than not then they might have stuff to really kind of look at and I'm not saying people are very protective about their emotions like they're in a bad marriage their boss sucks the traffic around la you know like all of it you know when you kind of maybe ask them first of all never sort of say are you triggered because that's that's triggering yes um there's a morality like you're sort of when we ask somebody if they're triggered it's almost like we're asked are you out of control right now you know what i mean or you know so it it really depends on their awareness of it their buy-in to it their defensiveness around it and their shame but like if you're the world is crazy the world is really triggering but i often think with childhood trauma this might be the best way to talk about it is like a spinal tap thing like rms go to 11 where to be a human it's annoying if you're having a bad day like you've got like a six month old and a carriage and someone doesn't open up the door for you and you're on two hours of sleep you're gonna have feelings about it but for childhood trauma, if you were raised by someone who was very narcissistic or thoughtless, oblivious, very selfish, or very just really out of touch or whatever, there's that added energy to it.

41:59There's that added charge to it. And what was wild about doing group work is I had this realization when I started doing it. It's kind of like I would talk to my therapist, Amanda, like, I think I'm triggered like 24 seven. And she's just like, that's pretty common for us. wow you know we're not out of our minds like we still function on a level but like anything you

42:20Lewis Howes:see that bothers you it bothers you and you and i was bothered yeah yeah and you hold on to it and you talk about it and you ruminate about it and you're like how could they do this and i also come from a family of complainers so another strategy was to like you know if i was triggered and i'm still growing out of this is to like to bitch about stuff do you know what i mean and it's just like it's not a great way to connect with people or complain in that way but that's like what my family was like. My friend, I hope you're enjoying this episode. And the School of Greatness drops new conversations every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday around money, mindset, healing, manifestation, and relationships.

42:56Lewis Howes:And if you're not yet following the show, then you're missing all of them. Please tap the follow button right now, and you'll get notified the moment every new episode drops because the next one might be exactly what you need. Now, let's get back to the conversation. So you've always wanted to have a backyard oasis. Here's the thing. If you get smart with your money, you can do things like that. With Empower, you can start making the most of your money so you can go out and live a little. Isn't that why we work so hard? To have some fun with our money, like treating yourself to something special or spontaneously doing something extra for a loved one.

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44:50Lewis Howes:The Range Rover event is on now. Explore enhanced offers at RangeRover.com. if someone has experienced emotional verbal or sexual abuse in childhood how does that shape the inner voice that someone carries with them for the rest of their life yeah um it's gonna affect them in a way of inner voice about am i worthy of protection do you know what i mean like there was sexual abuse am i worthy of you know what i mean you can you can rightfully so get really bitter and really brokenhearted in that way. And the inner voice stuff is my, I learned this from my mentor is that we look at the present through the lens of our childhood.

45:37Lewis Howes:So we look at the present, we look at the present through the lens of childhood. We look at the now what's happening right now through the lens of what happened to us in childhood. Right. Interesting. So that, you know, like I, if, if I grew up in verbal abuse, emotional abuse and physical abuse is, um, this would happen to me a lot is like when I would try to be positive or trying to make a connection with somebody and it just wasn't gelling i would either make that personally or evidence that i was a pos so that's looking at the lens and in a way what's not there is just like maybe there wasn't chemistry with that person maybe that person had something going on it was about me so that inner voice becomes the inner voice is a lot of like confirming the old stuff in the present gosh do you know so healing the inner child is the work that is like because everything about the present yeah if it's if it's if we are experiencing the present day through the lens of all of our memories of childhood yeah and if our memories of childhood were typically focused around the energy of we are bad and wrong or we are not we were taken advantage of or didn't have things like everyone else had them or we were outsiders then that is how we look at our life today.

46:49Lewis Howes:Right. Yes. It doesn't leave us until we mend that relationship. We heal those memories. We reconnect with that and either grieve the things that we didn't have, find meaning in those things, heal that relationship, act now as the adult in the room, like, hey, I got us now. You went through this, but you don't have to go through this moving forward. if we don't do those things what i'm hearing you say is we're always going to be suffering at some level yes i don't want to be sort of like that was well said you know always suffering on some level not trying to attack your language but it's just sort of like as we get older things mellow which is good and we can learn things about awareness about like oh yeah i'm triggered in that way but you're right in the way that there there is some kind of deep primal work i think that needs to sort of happen in that way.

47:42And that reparenting is kind of like, little Patrick, it sounds goofy, but little Patrick, what did it take you back to when that person didn't open the door for you? Little Patrick, what does it take you back to when she broke up with you after six weeks? Because that's like a pattern for us. You know what I mean? Little Patrick, what does it take you back to when you didn't get the promotion? Do you know what I mean? Because childhood trumps of like, these are things that are like life on life's terms. But when we grow up in childhood trauma, um in my 20s in a breakup that would put me in a hole where i feel like maybe someone who didn't grow up with childhood trauma they'd be sad they'd be depressed for like two weeks or whatever then they might get back out there and whatever we're in it for like eight eight months oh yeah do you know what i mean like years sometimes like right you know and those are all warnings not warning signs but it's just like there's a beautiful crisis that happens to us where trauma bites us in the ass.

48:36And what is it's hard about that, but it's also gives us the answers. Do you know what I mean? Like in, in this, this book that I'm writing about this three and a half year group that I did in my early twenties is I sat down with a fellow waiter and he would just notice, he's like, you know, you're, he's a friend. You know what I mean? Are you okay? What's going on with you? And I just spilled the beans with him. Um, and those, that was a moment where everything was catching up with me. So it feels bad when trauma bites you in the ass, but it's the best moment. It's the absolute best moment. Yeah.

49:06Lewis Howes:And I really believe like the greater the pain you have, the greater the purpose is on the other side of that. If you lean into it, you went through intense pain, you went into the healing journey and you want to be a therapist or learn about human psychology and understanding how to help others going through similar or worse pain than you. Yes. So inspiring to see my therapist. This is what you do. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, Exactly. And super inspiring. Yeah. Do people from dysfunctional childhoods unconsciously seek out partners who feel familiar, who are also dysfunctional, even if familiar means painful or disconnected?

49:48Lewis Howes:How do we break that pattern also if people do that? great question absolutely yes um but it's a weird thing i learned from my mentor that replicating trauma and being triggered is not a choice it's not a choice not a choice so we might you know we might look at the person you know we've all had friends i've been that person too it's like why are you dating your fourth alcoholic who lives in their car you know what i mean like why are you dating beneath you like what is right what is that what is up with that we gotta talk about that it's not a cautious thing we don't have control over that two things it's familiar but the reparenting stuff and the group therapy stuff is sort of no one protected you from those situations so it's not like we're attracting those folks they usually just kind of happen to us in a way so interesting so it's in a way like you know what i mean like it could be wrapped up the inner child might want to rescue a parent the inner child might want to be available to really difficult people, you know, like this is all very patternized.

50:52But what's missing behind it is the parenting around it is, you know, and I got this from my therapist. It's like, you know, what are you doing here? That's not good for you. You know, we need that in our homes when we're kids, not in a controlling way, sort of like, you know, you're 10 years old and it's like, you know what, honey, like you want to be friends with Joe, but Joe invites you over and he's never home. He calls you and then he gets distracted and that's like happened seven times and you get so upset stop going you know what i mean or like i love you so much i i think i want you to love yourself so much that you have friends that show up for you you're like oh you know like it's just sort of like we no one grows up with that so it's not so much that the person is a magnet you know because we can have this nasty belief like i'm always going to be caught with people that attracting bad people or that it never works out or whatever and that there's this it's it's just more about it's very familiar and i think if we ask anybody caught in that pattern these people just show up on your doorstep but it's not that you're a magnet it's that you are too available to it when it happens because no one has taught you it's just sort of like you know i love you

52:03Lewis Howes:so much i don't want you to take that on and that's the message that i had to learn in therapy and then take that to my inner child because i would do that i would date very i mean it's also I was in my 20s and anything goes in your 20s but I was also dating women that I could take care of if they were a little bit messy if I could like if I could make them happy and that's definitely related to mom wow and they would be really out there and really messy and that was my jam and that's very very common you saw the potential of what they could be you're like oh you're beautiful you're talented but if I can help you see it right but if there's a fantasy that woman's She's like, oh my God, you got me to stop drinking and get out of me in my roommate situation, whatever.

52:44But the goal for me is for someone to say, you're an amazing person. You are my savior. Wow, because no one would say that before. My mom, I was trying to do that with my mom, but she could never sort of say that or whatever. You know, it's just like we all have these strategies about how to get love. Wow. You know, so really the real main lesson for the listener, if you have a pattern of people who are difficult or messy or it never works out or whatever, it's not that you're attracting them it's just like no one ever told you you could look elsewhere and i often i'm big on this this last piece is healthy people are intimidating and they should be healthy people to date because in a way like as childhood trauma survivors i don't know if you had this i didn't know what to do with healthy people do you know what i mean like people would be like i'm gonna go play tennis i'm gonna go to the beach this weekend i take take care of myself and you know like whatever and i'm just gonna you know they would be doing healthy things and i would feel oh that's definitely not for me you know what i mean like i would just i would be more um you know it'd be it'd be a funny thing if you were just like i'm going tennis i'm doing doing this gonna go to the beach gonna hang out my friends haven't seen my friend in a while what are you gonna do this weekend patrick i'm like i'm gonna rip butts in a coffee shop and drink

53:58Lewis Howes:way too much coffee and read my self-help books yeah yeah yeah do you know what i mean and like people eventually I started to warm up and be more involved with healthy people doing healthy things, but like, I didn't, didn't grow up like that. Yeah. I guess the question around that is why does a healthy relationship often feel wrong to someone who grew up in a dysfunctional home? Yeah. Like why does a healthy person feel scary to someone who grew up in a dysfunctional family? Love it. Cause from, in my case, hypervigilance hates the absence of a threat. like it hates safety hates calmness it hates peace peace and harmony i don't like it isn't that interesting yeah i don't i don't like it i mean like it's where i felt that way most yeah like where i don't it was you know eventually that group was so good for me because it started to really kind of train me to be like hey you don't have to be reactive to people's moods so much do you know what i mean but hypervigilance is such a big part of us you know like i would if If anybody listening in the audience want to make a comment is, how much do you watch your partner's emotions?

55:06How much do you watch the emotions of others? How much do you focus on that? You know what I mean? And that's telling us. But in a way, in a healthy relationship, we can feel bored. We can build stories in our head that things are going too good. Are you cheating on me? All that stuff is really, I think, the inner child who is hypervigilant.

55:29Lewis Howes:their job is to look for a threat you know because my wife she's always like we've been together for i don't know five years now uh married last year but been together five years and she's always like god i wish i would have met you like 10 years ago like i wish i'd met you because we would have had so much fun together and you know and i said i always tell her like i wouldn't have been ready for you yeah you would have been too peaceful for me you admit like i want i wanted peace in my mind but i never i never went for peace yeah i wanted to make something that was chaotic more peaceful but i never went for peace if that makes sense yeah like peace felt boring to me it felt like i'm not really into this and i didn't know how to communicate it i just thought like something's wrong with this person i don't know because i didn't understand it right i didn't understand What do you mean you're fine?

56:22Lewis Howes:Yeah. You're always happy. Yeah. Right. And I always tell that I'm like, I wouldn't have been ready for you. I would have seen you 10 years ago before we met. I would have thought maybe you're like, yeah, you're pretty, but I wouldn't have been attracted to you. Yeah. So it's attracted. That's fascinating. Right. A different energy. Right. And now I'm attracted to her because peace is the thing I crave the most. It's what I want as my baseline. Right. This stuff is so powerful. I love what you just sort of said. I wasn't attracted to healthy women. No. And the attraction, I think, was coming from, that's for other people over there.

56:59You know what I mean? Like, in a way, but I was attracted if things could get kind of messy. If you could be mad at me and I could convince you, that was like a familiar place as well. But it's a fascinating thing. Like, in a way, I've said to many in these conversations with clients who are talking about their dating, with like sort of like i might sort of say i would love to see you with somebody who you're intimidated by who you feel might be a little bit unattainable who you feel might be a little bit too calm and there's not enough crazy going on there or whatever for that reason like there's a fascinating thing about sexual attraction related to replication of this stuff interesting

57:43Lewis Howes:yeah i want to shift the two relationships with loved ones and parents and family members sure i feel like there's this big movement or maybe more people are talking about it now about going no contact with a parent a sibling a family member when do you know if going no contact with a loved one or a family member is the right thing to do yeah wow yeah i have thoughts about it in a way, ideally, is when someone is really struggling with a toxic parent, is they're trying to grow and change. They're trying to heal this stuff. And I find that there's usually this pattern that when they go home for Thanksgiving, when the mom texts them like seven times in a row, like, why aren't you getting back to me?

58:29It is a major barrier to their healing. Like no one can really heal fully if they're in an abusive relationship. Constantly being triggered. Yeah. And it's complicated because there's a present relationship with the parent now and so much history behind it. So ideally, like on paper, in the way that I did no contact was the idea around I need to this was the case for me. Like I was spinning my wheels. I was lacking progress in my therapy that I was spending money and time on because my mom would do her usual stuff and it would really just trigger me for a week straight. It was just a very, you know what I mean?

59:04So my approach to no contact and I got help around it was, I need to just do this work right now and I will let you know when I'm done with this work. And I made it kind of about me. Wow. And that was in my case that worked. How did she take it? Which is indignant and defiant. And you know what I mean? How dare you? Like usually how usually they all do. It's not in anyone's defense. You know what I mean? Getting a letter like that from your child is like, who's going to react strongly?

59:33Lewis Howes:like you know like i spent my whole life yeah poured it into you this and this yeah unless that parent is just like insightful and aware do you know what i mean if they were insightful and aware they'd probably would have had a different relationship with their child that wouldn't cause no contact true but we've had people who um the parent was an active alcoholic got into recovery changed everything but their child was an adult now and they paid for the therapy so that you know like that's there's all kinds of stuff you know what i mean in the zeitgeist of this stuff there is just sort of like that still means they weren't aware and conscious at the time when they're growing up but talking about a living amends you need to talk about making good on something right so um so how long did you go no contact for with your mom three years wow and then I opened up the door and then she, I changed.

1:00:25She hadn't. Of course. More abuse, more stuff. I was much more in, more in my body, more empowered. Wow. Needed to cut her off again. And then a pattern I had, you know, I'm in my third no contact episode. Now. Yeah. Wow. That's pretty much the final one. Sort of it's been since my son was one and it was around my son.

1:00:46Lewis Howes:Wow. Around that time. So there's usually for the childhood trauma survivor, like they have tried. And there's just like there's, you know, to be blunt, in the zeitgeist of mental health, the conversation, I'm happy to talk about it with you, but the overall conversation is like there's just such an impasse that it's almost dumb. Not almost dumb. It is a dumb kind of a thing because the estranged parents are over here. The adult children are over here. Do you know what I mean? And there's not a lot of no matter what articles or episodes come out, there is just profound, deep understanding. understanding usually on the estranged parent side from you can hear it in the indignant kind of a thing one thing that i would like to see is i personally believe when it's safe i personally believe that estranged parents should know why but that's complicated because that parent may not be safe to know why so that's what i mean about the impasse kind of a thing like you know i would want to know why.

1:01:47As a parent. As a parent. But there's this dumb story of just like, I don't know what I did. My kid just cut me off. And then they won't even talk to me. And then they make them that to be a moral issue. They don't even talk to me. They must be weak and brainwashed and that kind of stuff. So that's what I mean about it being kind of a complicated thing.

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1:03:49Lewis Howes:Yep. And then you reconnected with your mom and then a period of time went by and you did no contact again. Yep. And then you reconnected again. How long was that time period? The second time? Um, I don't remember. It was like Less than a year, more than a year. Post 9-11, my sibling got married. And there was just, I had changed and she hadn't. But what was a weird thing and a good thing about it, as we get more and more healed, your tolerance for abuse from other people really gets lessened. So that was, you know what I mean? There's just like the road becomes more narrow around that stuff, which is both a good thing, but - You're good at creating boundaries.

1:04:31Lewis Howes:Yes. As you heal, hopefully you learn the ability to create a boundary when something is unsafe or unhealthy. And there's probably a gray area of, they continue to say these things that are kind of maybe not fully abusive, but I just have to put up with it. And do I want to have my parents or parent in my life, knowing they're going to say things that I need to accept them? Maybe I don't accept them, but I can deal with it to have them in my life or so that they have grandkids in their life. But what is the line that's crossing where it's a boundary that now it's unsafe or it's emotionally abusive, not just mom or dad is kind of like a jerk.

1:05:10Lewis Howes:Yes. It's learning to like navigate that problem, which is tricky. Super tricky. That was really well said. And that's really the crux of it in a way that, you know, if you've changed and your parent has changed, if that was math, the equal sign after that would be superficiality. And some people, we can do enough work on ourselves and we can accept that it's going to be superficial. If they haven't changed, your parent has not changed. If your parent has not changed in any way. If you have, then it's like, okay. You go home to Thanksgiving dinner, mom is still slamming things, dad is still drinking in the basement, the siblings, everything is superficial.

1:05:45First of all, that's going to feel worse now that you're healed, which is a good thing. But some people, in a way, they can accept that and they can go to Thanksgiving dinner and being able to be loving in a way, knowing they're not going to get the family that they need from them. Right. That's the superficiality thing. They're not going to. In any relationship, whether that's romantic or whatever, it's sort of like you always hear like, well, we broke up, we were together for five years, but we're friends now. And if there's bad blood or there's no changing or that kind of a thing, it's not going to really go that deep.

1:06:19Do you know what I mean? Yeah. So it's just in a way, but there are, it's also to point out that no contact is not for everybody. it is not i personally view it as just a a place and time for you to get some healing work and then you can go and try like in my experience but some people have such horrific abuse that

1:06:40Lewis Howes:that's not even a thing you know what i mean so is there ever a place or what would it take for you to go back into contact with your mom like what would need to happen yeah and that's a beautiful question and without me forcing it or controlling it or whatever but i would need my parents to um this is a fascinating question when i when i think of people you know reconnecting with a parent i would just simply need my mom to tell the truth i wouldn't really need her to maybe get sober i wouldn't need her to maybe change in a way but i would be able to open up the door and have a dialogue if she's honest if she's just kind of saying you know what you know you were after me about my drinking for years and i know that things were really up and i defended myself forever or whatever and i know that that's why you needed to do what you need to do just honesty in a way i think what's tragic about all this no contact stuff is you know in a way there would be more connection without all the taking it personally with all the defensiveness do you what i mean like of sort of there's also the power dynamic um estranged parents kind of like to say okay i'm not perfect but you were a hard kid of course do you know what i mean and it's just kind of like there was a power dynamic this doesn't how it works it's not helpless yeah it's a little bit like it's like a little it's a weird analogy but it's a lot like the ceo who's just like yeah i was steering this ship but bob from accounting was a real up yeah so that's why all that embezzlement happened.

1:08:14That's how that sounds. You know, no accountability, no accountability. No, like I was leading the thing. It was under my watch. I take full ownership. I wanted this whole CEO job or whatever. And what it's a reflection upon me, what other people do.

1:08:30Lewis Howes:Yes. What is healing your inner child due to your nervous system? And does this have physical health benefits when someone does that inner child healing work it definitely can what it does to the nervous system is around i think space and time in a way that our triggers are just like a hurricane you just have to wait it out or a snowstorm you just have to wait it out you know like ask anybody who has childhood trauma it's just like i was triggered by this email from my boss and even when they're insightful they're like fuck i'm not going to be in this for three days wow they're admitting that one word sentence where's the thing on the share drive and they're just like uh you know what i mean they know i'm going to be probably in this for three days obsessing about this upset my stomach's going to be upset do you know what i mean i'm going to be dissociated i'm not going to know where my keys are you know what i mean like all of this stuff but inner child work takes that three days to a half hour yeah 20 minutes yeah by you have to understand what your child is about do you know what i mean like that that's a lot of insightful work that a lot of it took me a while but you that's something people can really practice what does it take you back to what does it take me back to when my boss sends me an email that's just one word there's no thanks there's no an exclamation but there's nothing you know what i mean like it takes me back to always being in trouble it takes me back to having to read somebody's mind it takes me back to all this stuff and a lot of people out there aren't aware of what it takes them back to and a lot of people are like well does it always have to go back there it usually kind of does if you grew up in weird stuff it usually does because your inner child is like i'm in trouble again now i gotta figure out how i'm in trouble and why i'm in trouble and then forget why and then find out again you know always have that feeling like i'm bad i'm wrong i'm in trouble like oh that was like day-to-day life yep i didn't even know how to get out right but what's beautiful and effective is to do some inner child dialoguing as that person is sitting down at their job is you're not in trouble our boss is just that kind of one sentence kind of guy yeah and at the end of the day you know if you can if you can connect with the charge about a narcissistic parent or things going bad or whatever, or reading somebody's mind, if you can put that over here and you're just like, well, my boss, Mary is just busy and that's how she rolls.

1:10:58She's not a great communicator. Like there's no harm, no foul in it. And you're not in trouble. Um, that's what I really love is when people would start to kind of say like 20 minutes, I was triggered for 20 minutes, not four days, three days.

1:11:11Lewis Howes:it's great um i have a couple final questions for you how can how can childhood trauma affect someone's ability to manifest and create the life they want um it when i i often had this analogy at the end of that group that i did i was at sea level with the rest of the world meaning i wasn't drowning in the deep end of the pool flailing around but not i had so much shame i couldn't ask for help you know i mean i felt very like when we started the beginning i felt very separated from the rest of the world yes and it's been a lifetime journey to like sort of like as i'm sitting here with you do you know i mean like there's a place for you in the world patrick and you can say and and do good things so childhood trauma really separates people from that but it feels really good to just know that you're just another bozo on the bus in a good way but also that you you have a seat at the table of of opportunities that your inner child used to say oh that's not for me that's for people who are smarter or brighter or whatever you know yes yeah so it makes you believe you have a seat at the table which is good too yep and what is the link between childhood trauma and imposter syndrome um rooted in shame kind of the same thing imposter syndrome it's often i think you know the radio hit song creep you know i'm a creep i don't belong here that really kind of is like you you we identify with that song so much because i just picture a guy on the date with a beautiful woman or something like that and he's like i just don't belong here you know that's to me trauma Imposter syndrome is just really kind of where the inner child is sort of saying, see, I don't belong here.

1:13:00And what I tell clients when I was practicing about if they were going to be about to join a group, I was sort of saying, pay attention to what your inner child says in the first group. Because usually the inner child says, I'm not messed up enough to be here, or I'm too messed up to be here. Meaning they will find ways to say, that's for other people. I don't belong here. I'm not good looking enough, smart enough or whatever. I don't come from the right pedigree, you know what I mean? Or whatever. But like, I grew up in bars. Do you know what I mean? And I lived that way my whole life of just sort of hiding and masking and I don't belong here, that kind of thing.

1:13:38Or just trying to pretend that I belong here when I really didn't. Right. So when you really feel in your core, not from a narcissistic place or an egoic place that you are just a person in the world afforded the same things. I mean, there's also privilege wrapped up in that. So it's complicated for other people as well. But that's kind of like what I think about it, that you, it's a, and it's a beautiful arrival when you're like, I deserve this job. Do you know what I mean? Like I'm capable. I'm, you know what I mean? I nailed the interview or whatever, but the inner child used to sort of say, they didn't like me.

1:14:11They didn't, they didn't make eye contact. Exactly.

1:14:15Lewis Howes:Like you said, we, um, what was the quote you said? We look at the present through the lens of our childhood. That's Amanda. Yeah. This is your mentor. Yeah. Yes. Um, I've got a couple of final questions again for you, but I want people to, to check you out on social media and your website, Patrick T hand.com. They can get more information. Also, you have a great YouTube channel with a lot of great content they can check out as well. Yep. Patrick T hand official on social media, Instagram, YouTube, Tik TOK. And again, your YouTube has been a really helpful resource for so many people. So I want to acknowledge you for, man, the trauma that you've been through, but also turning that into a healing journey and the lessons you've learned on how to share this with others who've gone through similar things or less or worse things than you on how to interpret these things, heal these things, and live a better life.

1:15:07So I want to acknowledge you for the work that you're doing and all the content you

1:15:11Lewis Howes:share as well. Thank you very much. Of course. Yeah. This is a question I ask everyone towards the end, Patrick. It's called the three truths. So imagine hypothetically, you get to live as long as you want, but it's your last day on this earth and you get to create anything you want from this moment until that last day. But for whatever reason, this hypothetical question, you have to take all of your work with you. This episode is gone. Your videos are gone. Books you create, gone from the world. Yeah. But on your last day, you get to leave behind three things that you know to be true. three lessons that you would share with the world i call it three truths what would those things be for you i think the the thing that i said earlier about tenderness about really being able to sort of um for everybody out there to know that they were just like a beautiful spark and a good kid like what you see in your own daughter you know i think sort of like when you see that innocence and whatever because it's sort of like everything kind of is dialed into that you know what I mean?

1:16:11Like that we, if we can sort of lean into that, that would be one thing. Um, another lesson would be, it's just kind of funny. Um, when I was 13 years old and having a strategy and trying to cope with things, um, I grew up with alcoholics, but I learned something from alcoholics and that is this kind of like, it, I'll try it. And in a way, like I had that same attitude, whether it was like a bong hit or acid or drinking in the woods or whatever. But that same energy was sort of like, I'll try undergraduate. You know what I mean? Like, I'll apply for this job. So there is, you know, it's not like you can wait until you feel like you can take a risk.

1:16:59You just have to sort of throw something against the wall. and even if you look foolish is being able to do that and that's something i weirdly feel grateful for the trauma that i went through is yeah i'll try anything you know whether that was like when the therapist was like you know you know a few years later is like do you want to try you know when i'm 14 do you want to try blood or acid i'm like yeah you know when the therapist like you want to do a three and a half year childhood trauma yeah why not try it out yeah yeah okay And I'm big on this. And I think in social media, I think social media does things to us that is dark.

1:17:35And in a way, I want childhood trauma survivors, and they may not be ready, which I get I wasn't ready. I was not ready to hear things like positivity. I was not ready to hear things like energy work or spirituality. sexuality, I had such a reaction to that stuff for many different reasons. But what I'm trying to say is, and I don't think it lands well, but I want childhood trauma survivors to look for the good in humanity in a way, because to their experience and their right, humanity got ruined. Trust in people and that kind of a thing. I think social media really amps that up with the way that we go after people.

1:18:19And sometimes it's good to go after people or whatever but it's a device that it becomes entertainment for the downfall of humanity where i want people to sort of you know look look around for people's smiles as goofy as that sound you know look around for the nice and i was walking out of starbucks right out of here and it was just like inner interchange of this woman coming in and i was coming out and she held the door she was just sir you know it was really like whimsical it was like really fun kind of a thing you know what i mean like i love for that i love that i love seeing families out there enjoying each other.

1:18:52So do you know what I mean? But like when I was really wounded, that was just like evidence that I couldn't have that or something like that. Right. So I want people to lean into it and force themselves a little bit.

1:19:05Lewis Howes:That's beautiful. And Patrick, the final question, what's your definition of greatness?

1:19:13um the definition of greatness is not just knowing that your parents were wrong about you however that looks but surpassing how you feel about you so greatness you know what i mean like there the work that i do is i love i love sitting with you i love talking about this stuff but my real joy comes from, again, knowing that I was a good kid. That's beautiful. Patrick, thank you so much. Thank you.

1:19:43Lewis Howes:Powerful. My friend, I hope you're enjoying this episode right now because we are on a mission to impact 100 million lives every single week. And every follow here on this podcast helps us reach more people. Make sure to hit the follow at the top of this show's page right now. It's the single biggest thing that you can do to support the show and the impact of us reaching you every single time we have new episodes. I appreciate you and I can't wait to see you in the next episode. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and it inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a full rundown of today's episode with all the important links.

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