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261: Healing Our Core Issues (HOCI) in Couples Therapy with Shane Birkel

Welcome back to The Couples Therapist Couch! This podcast is about the practice of Couples Therapy. Each week, Shane Birkel interviews an expert in the field of Couples Therapy to explore all about the world of relationships and how to be an amazing therapist.

In this episode, Shane talks about Healing Our Core Issues (HOCI) in couples therapy. Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and your other favorite podcast spots, and watch it on YouTube – follow and leave a 5-star review.

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The Couples Therapist Couch 261: Healing Our Core Issues (HOCI) in Couples Therapy with Shane Birkel

This episode is brought to you by Alma. Visit https://helloalma.com/dg/?utm_source=podcast&utm_medium=paid&utm_campaign=privatepractice to learn more

Get the Couples Therapy 101 course: https://www.couplestherapistcouch.com/

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In this solo episode, Shane talks Healing Our Core Issues (HOCI) in couples therapy. Hear what Shane learned from the training he went to led by Jan Bergstrom & Dr. Rick Butts, why the HOCI model is helpful, the 6 core birthrights every human being has, how to start working with a new couple, and why it’s healthy to be concerned you messed up as a parent. Here's a small sample of what you'll hear in this episode:

    • How to create healing phrases
    • HOCI training resources
    • The six core birthrights framework
    • How to apply the framework to couples work
    • Defining codependence

 

Show Notes

 

 

 

What is The Couples Therapist Couch?

This podcast is about the practice of Couples Therapy. Many of the episodes are interviews with leaders in the field of Relationships. The show is meant to help Therapists and Coaches learn how to help people to deepen their connection, but in the process it explores what is most needed for each of us to love, heal, and grow. Each week, Shane Birkel interviews an expert in the field of Couples Therapy to explore all about the world of relationships and how to be an amazing therapist.

Learn more about the Couples Therapy 101 course: https://www.couplestherapistcouch.com/

Find out more about the Couples Therapist Inner Circle: https://www.couplestherapistcouch.com/inner-circle-new

Transcript

Please note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.

00:00

It's really confusing for a child when the parent is sometimes providing love and care and sometimes actually the one who's perpetrating the abuse.

 

00:16

The podcast for couples therapists, marriage counselors, and relationship coaches to explore the practice of couples therapy. And now,  your host,  Shane Birkel.

 

00:31

Hey everybody. Welcome back to The Couples Therapist Couch. This is Shane Birkel, and this is the podcast that's all about the practice of couples therapy.  Thank you so much for tuning in. I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist, and the goal of this podcast is to help you learn how to more effectively work with couples and possibly even learn how to have a better relationship. The episode this week is brought to you by Alma. They make it easy to get credentialed with major insurance plans at enhanced reimbursement rates.

 

01:01

Alma handles all of the paperwork and guarantees payment within two weeks. Visit HelloAlma.com or click on the link in the show notes to learn more. Hey everyone, welcome back to the Couples Therapist Couch. This is Shane Birkel. I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist and it's my goal to bring you the best in the world of couples therapy. This show is all about the practice of couples therapy, but obviously if you don't work with couples but you just want to improve your relationship, I'm hoping that

 

01:29

You can learn a lot from the show as well.  Thank you as always for listening. If you have a topic that you'd love for me to cover or a guest you'd like me to interview, definitely reach out through the website.  I love hearing from people. This week, I want to share some reflections from a training I just went to with Jan Bergstrom and Rick Butts, who were both directly trained by Pia Melody.

 

01:58

their model is healing our core issues or H O C I they say Hawkeye sometimes. If you've ever studied PML these work or Terry real's work  on codependency or childhood trauma, you you'll recognize the roots of this. And I remember when I used to go to trainings with Terry real, you know, he, does a really good job teaching about, uh, how to work with couples. That's  what his training is all about.

 

02:28

And I've talked a lot about him. I've had him on the show, but,  um,  you know, he, used to do these trainings where you could observe him work.  Uh, so I used to go down to Boston  and, um, he'd have five couples sitting in a circle and he'd sort of over the course of two days, he would take quite a bit of time with each  couple, kind of doing  a work for them  on, their relationship and

 

02:57

in these situations, there would be, I don't know, maybe 30, 40 therapists surrounding the circle, just observing the work as it was happening. So I used to go  and  observe and it was amazing to see him  kind of dial in to  what was going on with, with the couple and, and start to  make connections to their childhood experiences, to their family of origin.

 

03:27

as we say, family of origin just means the family you grew up in and then start doing some inner child work even where he would ask him to imagine a younger part of themself and have it. Then he would guide them through a conversation with that younger part of themself.  And I would observe this and I would be amazed and I would see how much  impact it would have on the person he was working with and how significant it was uh for that person.

 

03:55

So when I was doing his trainings, I was thinking, well, you he talks a little bit about that, but I was like, I need to know more. I need to learn more about how to do that. So I started this two year training program with Jan Bergstrom and Rick Butz going through level one, going through level two, practicing. And I love their trainings. If you go to healing our core issues or if you just Google that, I think you'll find a Jan Bergstrom and Rick Butz or if you, if you Google their names.

 

04:25

but  they still, you know, they're still doing these trainings all the time for, you know, level one, level two. And the, what I went to last week was the level three is the first time they had offered level three. I was super excited. There was I think 15 or 16 of us in the training. And so it's a small group experience. And that's part of what's so valuable about this type of training is because they really, they have us practice on each other. So

 

04:53

At times I was the client for someone else who was practicing and it was like getting really good therapy. I was sitting there, you know, bawling my eyes out. No joke. Like this was just last week, just feeling like coming through that. Like I got such a good personal experience in therapy, but then I also had a chance to practice  on someone else. So anyway, if you're interested in those trainings,  uh, you could definitely look into it.

 

05:21

But I wanted to tell you a little bit about why I think  it's so helpful and what, you know, a little bit more about the model and why I think it, it's very much  part of the way that I work. And even if you don't ever do those trainings, hopefully you can take away some ideas from some of the things I am going to talk about today. But one of the things I think that is so important is that there's like a, a uh philosophical underpinning, right?

 

05:50

in what it means to be a human being. I think that there are a lot of therapy models out there  that teach you how to do therapy, but I'm not sure if they do a great job teaching you why you're doing the things that you're doing or why they work as well as they do. And even if there are good reasons why a particular model works, sometimes it's hard to put into words  why it's working.

 

06:19

Right. We're talking about boundaries. We're talking about  valuing,  uh, human, human beings have value. We're talking about self-esteem. We're talking about all these concepts that I think have different meanings for different people. And it's really hard. You know, I can, I can sort of say, well, yeah, I value myself or I love myself or yeah, I boundaries, but like, what does that really mean? And and do I, how confident am I?

 

06:47

in those concepts  that I, that I really truly believe that about myself. And so  I think as a therapist or someone who works with people or just as a human being, it's good to sort of have  a philosophical foundation for like, like, what are you shooting for?  Or, or if couples come into the session and they have like 10 different things that, that are going on that they're stressed about, like what is, what is grounding you?

 

07:17

in the work, what is making you, what is like a compass  that,  uh, gives you the direction that you're going to go  in the situation.  And you know, that's what this model has provided for me. And that's what I'm going to try to share with you.  And I guess you could say it begins  with this chart  and, uh, there's this chart that, um,

 

07:46

Pia melody originally created and it lists out five core birthrights. Originally it had five, think now it has six, but so there are these core birthrights. I'm going to go through each of them and then those core birthrights. There's a second column where it talks about the way that the issues are presenting today. So like if you didn't get the core

 

08:13

Like the first core birthright is valuable. Like children are inherently valuable.  That's just part of any human being. There's like each human being has value. Right? So then the second column, it says the core issue presenting today, right? So if you weren't  valued as a child,  or if you were made to feel like you were more, more valuable than other people, if you're, you're better than other people, that's also a problem. You might be struggling.

 

08:43

with either  being shame based  or,  you know, being grandiose, either one up or one down, right? Like shame is basically,  I am  not valuable or I'm less valuable than other people, or I'm not worthy or I'm not enough. Right? So a lot of people struggle with shame. A lot of people feel, feel that way about themselves.  Or, you know, if you  have the opposite problem on the other end of the spectrum,

 

09:12

You could be someone who goes up into grandiosity and feels like I'm better than other people. I don't care what other people think. Having a lot of relationship issues for different reasons. Now the third column says the core areas to practice, right? So this is sort of the solution, right? Which on this one says loving the self, right? And it really just goes back to valuing the self, loving the self.

 

09:42

having healthy self-esteem, right? I'm not better than anyone else. I'm not less than anyone else. I have full compassion for myself. I have full compassion for other people.  So this is uh just taking you through number one, which was valuable. uh so there's three columns. I'm going to go through each of the six core birthrights. Another phrase that PML used to use for this is

 

10:10

the nature of a child.  The child is valuable. The child is vulnerable. The child is imperfect. I'm just starting to read down through the list, but uh Jan Bergstrom and Rick, Jan and Rick sort of came up with core birthrights, which I think is  a good phrase for it too. Yeah. So I'm going to go through each of these and I think, you know, one of the  most important things that I think about, so let's say for any of us as adults,  you know, if you're

 

10:39

20, 30, 40, 50,  no matter how old you are as an adult, you're experiencing things in the present. It just feels like I'm going through my life. This is reality, right?  And  sometimes I'm going through stressful situations. Sometimes  I'm  happy. Sometimes I'm scared and we experience a full range of emotions. Now there are the healthy present day emotions like

 

11:06

If I'm in danger,  you know, like if there's a car speeding towards me, right, then  my, my healthy fear in the present sort of helps me move away from the danger. Now what happens is we have carried emotions that oftentimes we don't even realize we have, or we don't even realize what they are, you know, so a carried emotion could, you know, and these are connected to beliefs that we have limiting beliefs.

 

11:37

So  that could be something that's more like the world is a dangerous place.  If there's a lot of things that could hurt me in the world, if I go outside, something bad could happen to me. And so when that, when someone grows up with that kind of belief, uh, based on something that they went through, then that, that would be a number two, an issue with vulnerability. Then

 

12:03

they're going to experience that fear all the time. It's going to take a toll on their nervous system  and they might come into therapy saying, well, the world is just a dangerous place. Of course I'm afraid. Right? what I think as therapists that we can provide is sort of instead of, know, the other thing that that person might say is how do I change my environment in order to be more safe?

 

12:31

Right? How maybe I can get more locks on my doors. Maybe I can move to a safer part of town. Maybe I can, you know,  I don't know, wear a bulletproof vest as I go around. Like,  so those are external things and that those are all fine. Right? Like if you're unhappy in your job, maybe you should explore looking at getting a new job. Like those can be solutions that are helpful for your life.

 

12:58

or if you're in a really bad relationship, maybe, you know, you want to explore couples therapy, right? Like there could be things you can actually do to change and to  help the situation that you're in now. But what I, but I think in therapy, what we can offer people is not just figuring out those external things that they can do to change, but also taking a look inward, right? Like if I believe the world is a scary place,

 

13:27

and I'm going around with a lot of anxiety and fear all the time. Sure. You can get more locks on your door. You can move to a safer part of town, but are you also  taking a look at the beliefs inside of you that are informing why you're reacting to the world in this way? And this is a big deal in couples therapy because  a lot of times  we question or I might question somebody, why are you reacting to your

 

13:56

partner this way. Right. For example, let's say physical touch is a really important thing to someone  and  it's not a big deal for their partner. Right. So I might have a belief that each time I come home from work, I'm hoping that, that like, I feel loved when we give each other a hug. Right.  Um, there's nothing wrong with requesting that or asking for that, but

 

14:23

If I'm coming home every day, if I had, especially if I haven't asked for that, I'm coming home every day. My partner doesn't give me a hug because maybe it's not that big a deal for them and that's okay. But I start making up that there's something wrong with my relationship. Maybe then I start getting resentful and moody and upset  and my partner's like, what's wrong with you? They don't, they don't even know what's going on for me. And I might think to myself, if my partner just gave me more hugs,

 

14:52

I could be happy in my life. Right? So that would be one solution, right? You, and there's nothing wrong in relationships to ask for something like that. So to ask for reasonable requests, right? To say, Hey, it makes me feel really good.  If you know, when we come home at the end of the day, if we could give each other a hug, does that work for you? Right? And, I can make a request now, if it doesn't work for my partner, it's something uh we can work through.

 

15:19

something that we can listen to each other about and understand each other's perspectives and  work through.  what happens is people bring a lot more meaning to the situation than  perhaps is true, right? Like I might start bringing the meaning to that of my partner doesn't love me and care about me, right?  Or the belief that if my partner truly loved me, they would want to give me a hug at the end of the day.

 

15:49

But the meaning that I'm making up is based on beliefs that I took on during childhood and based on, you know, the things that I experienced during childhood. So we always want to look for these clues, right? So if I'm a, if I'm a couple service, I'm working with this couple. Sure. I could help them,  uh, figure out how to give each other more hugs. Yeah, great. But like, am I really looking at the core issues that are connected to that?

 

16:18

And it's interesting, the more people you work with, the more you see how  variable this is, right? Like hugs certainly aren't  a prerequisite for a loving relationship. Maybe some,  so I've known people who never give each other hugs, like in both people are good with that and they feel like they have a great relationship.  Um, because there are certain things that certain people want or need, and there are certain things that other people want or need.

 

16:45

you have to learn how to communicate that you have to value yourself enough to communicate what you want. First of all, but these, um, core birthrights or the core issues sort of give us that compass, which is why I'm going to read through them  and, um, sort of give us, uh, again, a way of looking at, as I'm meeting with a couple or I'm meeting with even an individual, I'm sort of trying to pick up clues of like, why are you struggling with whatever the thing is that you're struggling with?

 

17:15

Right? Cause a lot of times people come in, you know, the way, the way I start therapy, it's really simple in some ways, or I'll say it in a simple way. I asked them, what do you want? Right? And, and usually someone's coming to therapy because there's a reason why they're, you know, they're struggling with something. And so I'll say, what do you want or what are you hoping for or what's your goal? Right? And so they say, they try to talk about what they really want or

 

17:44

You know, you could ask a miracle question. Like  if everything was  great and amazing in the way you would want it to be in a month from now, how would your life look different? Right. And start to get people thinking about what do they really want? And then the next question is what's getting in the way of you feeling like you're getting what you need and want. Right. So if someone says, I'm not getting enough hugs, oh

 

18:12

I think that's a limited amount of information that that's the story that they're making up about it. But in my mind, it's more about the emotional reality. It's more about the feeling. If you were getting more hugs, what would you be feeling? Right? Cause then they could say, well, I'd be feeling loved. I'd be feeling cared for. I'd be feeling like I'm in a good relationship. Right? So  now those are, that's it. Those are different things  that you want.

 

18:42

It's not just about the hugs. It's about those deeper things, the deeper meaning, right? And then we can be more creative with it. Like, all right, what are some other ways you can feel loved? What are other ways you feel cared about? How can you love yourself? How can you care about yourself? How, what are you going to do if there is no one there to give you a hug? How can you begin to,  you know, take responsibility for your own healing? It's really helping people move into a sense of empowerment  and

 

19:12

This will create a healthier relationship  for both partners. If we teach people, the more we teach people how to take care of themselves and to take responsibility for themselves, the more  their relationship will feel healthy and happy and good for both of them. Building a private practice can be challenging. Filing all of the right paperwork is time consuming and tedious. And even after you're done, it can take months to get credentialed and start seeing clients.

 

19:40

That's why Alma makes it easy and financially rewarding to accept insurance. When you join Alma, you can get credentialed within 45 days and access enhanced reimbursement rates with major payers. They also handle all of the paperwork from eligibility checks to claim submissions and guarantee payment within two weeks of each appointment. Plus, when you join Alma, you'll get access to time-saving tools for intakes, scheduling, treatment plans, progress notes, and more in their included platform.

 

20:10

Alma helps you spend less time on administrative work and more time offering great care to your clients. Visit helloalma.com or click the link in the show notes to learn more. So I'm going to start going through  the core birth rights.  I'll just start by kind of listing them all off  and then I'll go through each of the three sections. Okay, so  like I said, there's six, each child

 

20:38

is valuable, right? And also this first one is also called the nature of a child.  A child is inherently valuable. Number two,  a child is inherently vulnerable, right? They need protection.  A child can't take care of themselves, especially  thinking about really young children. A child is imperfect or human.

 

21:06

Number four, a child has needs and wants every child has needs and wants number five. Children are spontaneous and joyful. And number six, uh, children are, it says attached.  They're talking about attachment, you know, secure attachment.  Children are wired for, I would say children are wired for secure attachment. Okay. So

 

21:34

No, I already did. I did talk about the valuable one, but I'll just start with that again. So if let's say a child isn't valued growing up, right? So let's say that, um,  I think, you know, a common way that this happens  is  in like emotion with emotional neglect. And, know, you know, if you listen to the podcast, you know, I talk about emotional neglect a lot, right? So let's say that, um,  there's a little child,

 

22:05

I'll use an extreme example. This is kind of sad, but just to make the point, like let's say that there's a little like eight to 12 months old child  and their parents are super busy and their parents don't have a lot of time. So they just stick them in the play pen  all day and the kids like playing by themselves in the play pen. They wet their diaper and they cry really loud.

 

22:31

And the parents are just sort of too busy to even notice. And the kids sitting there in a wet diaper for hours, you know, the parents don't respond when the child is crying and they don't pick them up and ask them how they're giving them that love and care and come to,  take care of them. That's a, that's an example where they are not valuing  the child. They're not making the child feel worthy and valuable and loved, you know, where

 

23:01

that child will grow up and either feel that, um, you know, the probably be really shame-based, uh, like I'm not worthy, like my needs don't matter. And they'll have a hard time loving themselves or having compassion for themselves. They'll feel like, well, I'm just a piece of shit. I'm not worthy. I'm not, you know, able to say what I need. And by the way,  a lot of these go hand in hand, right? Because

 

23:29

As I'm saying this, I'm looking at number four, which is every child has needs and wants. This would also fit really strongly in this category where the child's needs aren't being met. The core issue of that would be the child becomes needless and wantless. Anyway,  I'll get to that. But uh as you hear me talk through these, you'll see a lot of uh intersection between these different categories. But number one is the value valuable. That's an example of not valuing a child.

 

23:59

And then when that person shows up into your therapy office, you know, they might be somebody who has a hard time having a voice about what they want. And they, you know, a lot of times as a kid, we'll make up this fantasy in our mind, you know,  I mean, especially that kid who went through a lot of emotional neglect and physical neglect in that case, they'll make up this fantasy in their mind where someday I'll meet the perfect person who will just know

 

24:27

exactly what I need and want. And I'll never have, and I won't have to say it because what happens is they be, that child becomes disconnected from their own reality. They become disconnected from what they need and want.  And they're hoping that they'll meet this Prince charming or, or something like that,  who will be able to tune into me,  uh, make me feel loved and cared for, and we'll know exactly what I need and want. So that, that can be an issue in relationships.

 

24:55

because most people are not mind readers. And you know, a lot of times when I'm working with someone in therapy, if I noticed that that that's an issue, then I ask them what they went through as a kid. I'm trying to check where they valued as a child. And if that's an, uh, an core issue for them, you know, we can do a lot of work on them sort of, uh, do you know, in, in,

 

25:20

I won't get into a lot of detail about the inner child work in this episode. can, could do another episode on that if you'd like me to, but it's really helpful  to  walk people through some guided imagery. And this is what, you know, some of the stuff we did during the training where you have them close their eyes and imagine bringing out that little child into the room and having a conversation and you know, really giving them love, taking care of them. And that can be really reparative work for people. Again,

 

25:49

It's empowering them to give themselves what they need and not to be waiting for someone else to give it to them. Uh, cause you know, we want to teach people how to have a voice. number two, the number two core birthright is children are  vulnerable. Now this is really  important. Again, when, when kids are really little, they need protection from their parents.

 

26:18

A child will not survive if they don't have protection from their parents. And in a healthy  family environment, obviously that parent  is loving and caring  and protecting that child from external threats. Now it's really confusing for a child when the parent is sometimes providing love and care and sometimes actually the one who's perpetrating the abuse.

 

26:46

I mean, the most obvious example of the vulnerability of a child being taken advantage of  is, physical abuse, right? A child learns that  I don't deserve to have boundaries for myself.  And it goes back to number one, the number one core birthright value valuable. If a child's being physically abused, they're uh being devalued. They're, being taught that you're not, your body is not worth valuing.

 

27:15

So the way that that could show up in the present is  either you become really boundary lists  or you become really walled off. So,  you know, this is like a classic, you could imagine the classic pursuer distance or dynamic, you know, where  if you have poor boundaries, you're sort of like, for one thing, you're looking to the world for reassurance.

 

27:45

or appreciation for yourself about like, I'm doing okay. So like if someone's mad at you, then you kind of crash and you're like, Oh no, I'm a terrible person. If someone's happy with you, then you're like, Oh my gosh, this is great. I am, I'm, I'm enough. I'm people like me,  know,  and that you're constantly dependent on that feedback from other people to know whether you're doing a good job or not. in our healthiest state, we were sort of live

 

28:13

with the feeling that I'm enough and I matter no matter what somebody else says or does, whether it's good or bad. And I'm also  imperfect,  which is the next one as a human being. So like, it's like, I'm enough and I matter, I'm valuable  and I make mistakes cause I'm imperfect. And this helps people stay in that compassion for themselves  and for their partner. I was describing boundary lists, but

 

28:42

the other side of  that spectrum is being walled off where you're just going through the world,  completely  not listening to anybody else's feedback, not taking in, you know, so it would be like, I learned how to deal with stuff myself, right? Like I learned no one was going to be there for me. And so  I just became sort of walled off.  I don't ask for help. I don't ask for what I need.

 

29:10

I feel safer that way, but it's a very hard to be in a relationship with a walled off person, as you can imagine. The core area to practice in the third column for this one is protecting the self. Like you have the right to protect yourself. You have the right to have healthy boundaries. That doesn't mean that you're walled off. That means that you're willing to take it. Like a healthy boundary would look like, let's say my wife says, you know, I'm really sad because you didn't hug me today.

 

29:40

Uh, if I don't have good boundaries, then I might go into, I might feel like, Oh my gosh, I'm a bad husband. I forgot to do, I forgot to give her a hug and then I'm going to get defensive. Then I'm going to explain it away. Then I'm going to try to fix her emotions. might say, well, I've been really busy. Don't you understand? Uh, well, well, you shouldn't even want hugs or blah, blah, blah. don't know. So

 

30:06

If I have a healthy boundary, I can listen to the pain of another person. I can even listen if they're upset at me. And if my wife says I'm really sad because you didn't give me a hug today, I, I, if I have a healthy  boundary, I can say, Oh my gosh, but like I can say, like, this doesn't make me a bad person. Maybe I made a mistake that I can be accountable for. It doesn't make me a bad partner. I can take in the feedback and I can say, Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry you're upset.

 

30:37

Right? My, I'm not going to that shame, that place of shame  about it. I'm just being accountable, uh, being loving and caring. You know, I have a healthy boundary. If I was walled off, I would not even be willing to listen or uncaring, but a healthy boundary allows me to take in that feedback without  personalizing it and, know, feeling like I'm a bad person because of it.

 

31:04

So number three, the number three core birthright is imperfect. The way that this happens to children would be like, if you grow up in a family that's  like perfectionistic where, you know, it's like, you have to get straight A's  and you have to be good at sports.  And every time we go out into public, you have to  look a certain way. You have to  have your hair.

 

31:34

a certain way and you have to, your clothes have to look a certain way. You have to look perfect all the time, right? Everything has to be perfect.  And what that teaches a child is that my value is connected to being perfect, right? So there's not a lot of room for  maintaining love for yourself and making mistakes. Those, those become very hard to hold at the same time. And you'll see it in adults. You'll  see, you know, some adults that you work with,

 

32:03

are still living out this sort of good and perfect. They're still getting a lot of their self-esteem from being good and perfect in the world.  Or they can be really critical of their partner if they feel like, my partner's not living up to being good and perfect like me.  Or the other thing that happens if you grow up in this kind of family is that, and maybe this would be more like,  by the time you become a teenager, you start...

 

32:30

realizing it's impossible to live up to this  good and perfect standard. And so  you start to act out  and there's a lot of rebelliousness  and you become  sort of like the black. Sometimes people become like the black sheep of the family, right? So  those are the two  ends of the spectrum. When we're talking about perfection,

 

32:56

the core area to practice like what needs to happen for somebody who grows up in either one of those two situations  is  knowing the self. It's like knowing your truth. The saddest thing, let's say that  a kid comes home from school and they've just been bullied and they say, Hey, I'm feeling really sad. And that doesn't fit in being good and perfect for the parent. So the parent says, Oh, you'll be fine. Don't worry about it. Just,

 

33:26

keep your head up. It sort of really devalues that child's experience of being bullied. So what happens for the child is they start learning from a young age. My experience doesn't matter. It's more important to show my parents that everything's fine  and to have a mask to the world that looks good and perfect than it is to honor what I'm really feeling inside of me. You know, so

 

33:53

I'm not going to talk. If I'm feeling sad or afraid about being bullied, I'm just not going to talk about it. I'm going to pretend like everything's fine.  And so  you lose a sense of yourself. You lose a sense of like, what's really going on for me? What am I really feeling? And so you could be uh in an adult relationship  and  you're having a really hard time knowing how you're feeling, knowing what you need. So this is a really a sense of owning your own reality. And I think this is

 

34:22

very much connected to emotions like,  um, giving yourself permission or acceptance to feel whatever emotions are coming in. Like part of being good and perfect is like, if I'm feeling sad or afraid, I'm going to pretend like I'm not, I'm going to bounce back up into my head and solve the problem and avoid going into these difficult emotions.  Um, number four  is every child has needs and wants. So,

 

34:53

Children are super dependent. mean, if you've ever had young children, you know,  they're they are very, very dependent, right? I mean, until they're in elementary school, they basically need almost your full attention all the time. You know, so there are a lot of issues that come up with this where, you know, children's needs aren't being met growing up in their family. They learn to be needless and wantless. That would be the second column,  you know, in their present day relationship.

 

35:22

they either are super dependent or needy, you know, like codependent,  or they become needless and wantless. They've learned it's not even worth asking for what I want. The core area to practice is like, how do I take care of myself? Right? I'm not looking to my partner to take care of me. I think first and foremost, people need to learn how to take care of themselves. And then like I said, like,

 

35:52

your partner can be helpful with some of these things, but you're not dependent on them in order to feel okay in your life. So I might, it's important that I learn how to feel loved and cared for for myself within myself. And then from that place I can say, Hey, can I have a hug? You know, and I'm, it's not like a neediness. It's not like, well, I'm going to break down and get angry if you don't give me a hug. It's sort of like, I'm taking care of myself and

 

36:21

I understand that sometimes you might want to give me a hug and sometimes you don't,  and I'm not going to punish you one way or the other. You know, I'm willing to, I'm willing to face the rejection of saying, can I have a hug? And if my partner says, no, right now is not a good time that I can say, Oh, okay. That's totally fine. Right. And this is like, how do I take, you know, I might feel a little, Ooh, ouch, that hurts. But how do I look inward to take care of myself?

 

36:50

to learn from that, to understand like, what's going on for me? What am I making up about that? Why does that feel hurtful? What can I do for myself to feel better in this moment?  I'm learning how to take care of my own needs and wants,  and maybe next time  my partner will  want to give me a hug, you know,  and that's great. So  I think codependence can be hard to define for some people. It's like, well, how much of this is just healthy connection and how much of this is codependence and

 

37:19

We could probably do a whole episode on that, but I hope what I just said is a little bit helpful in explaining that. So the number five is children are spontaneous and joyful. And this is, um, similar to being good and perfect. Like obviously if a kid is spontaneous, they're not falling into that definition of perfection for some parents, but this is really more about control.

 

37:48

Like in a lot of families for kids, they're either overly controlled  or there's no one in control of what's going on. So that's the core issue presenting today  is  that that adult becomes too controlling or it could look like being out of control. An example of growing up in a family  like this on the control side would be, I've seen situations where there are parents like they have

 

38:17

let's say they have like a kindergarten age kid, you know, and the, you know, kindergartners are really spontaneous and all over the place. You know, it is, it is a parent's job to maintain safety or to start teaching the children about boundaries. But some parents are like way over the top with that. So the kid will be just sort of normal, like making normal comments. Or,  uh, I, I saw this situation one time where a kid was in a grocery store.

 

38:46

And they started singing like it wasn't inappropriate or anything. I thought it was really sweet. It was nice like hearing this little voice singing and the parent was like, you gotta be quiet. There's other people around and there's like a lot of anxiety with the shushing. There are these parents where it's like every five minutes they're sort of shutting down the child. Like it's super controlling. It's like, Oh, you can't do that. You can't touch that. You can't say that you shouldn't do that. And again, you may have seen parents like this in the world.

 

39:17

That little kid is being controlled all the time. There's no ability to be spontaneous. There's no ability to  just sort of be joyful and feel free. That's going to have huge impacts for that child as an adult. They're either going to become a controlling person who needs to control everything that's happening in their environment,  or they're going to become sort of hopeless and feel like,  uh, I'm not in control of anything. It doesn't matter what I do.

 

39:45

Uh, it's always wrong or like really shut down, you know, like not willing to take risks.  So in the third section, like the core areas to practice  are  moderating the self.  So, you know, move, moving into moderation, right? Like, like it's also a problem if you're an adult and you haven't learned like an appropriate filter, like if you, if you're an adult in the grocery store and you're singing as loud as you can,

 

40:14

right next to people's ears and like you're, you're, you're just sort of bothering people. Like that, that's, um, being a little bit out of control. And so  the key is like moderation, right? Like how do I find that healthy middle where I, like I deserve to have a voice and express myself, but I also am not allowed to violate other people's boundaries.  Uh, cause some people have

 

40:41

the problem on the opposite end of the spectrum where they don't have a sense of other, you know, being considerate of other people in the world.

 

40:49

So, and that could be too, like, as far as like  what the family looks like, the family dynamic looks like growing up, that could also be the opposite end of the spectrum where the parents don't give the children any feedback about boundaries and the kids are kind of like, just like creating chaos every day and throwing it, know, terrorizing the house and the parents never have any structure or consequences or, you know, so that's also a problem. Like there's no control by the adults.

 

41:18

which is also a problem. And then the last core birthright is attached, right? And this was added recently by Jan and Rick, you know, it has to do with attached. There's so much great stuff written about attachment these days. There was a recent study that was done.  It was probably a survey that just asked people themselves. So like they directly reported what they thought, but it asks like, you know, are you secure securely attached? Are you anxiously attached? Are you avoidantly attached?

 

41:48

Or I think fearful avoidant is  the third one. Used to be disorganized. I think that's a less,  uh, valuing  phrase to use. think a lot of people are trying to move away from  using the phrase disorganized attachment because it's kind of blamey and shamey. So there's the anxious attachment, avoidant attachment, and then fearful avoidant.  Uh, again, we could do a whole episode on attachment, but

 

42:17

basically, uh, oh, when they did the survey, it was something like, um, 60 % or more of people reported having secure attachment, which I think is just ridiculous, uh, almost humorous. Cause I wouldn't say it's like, do you have secure attachment? would say it's more like a, again, like a spectrum of, you fall more on the anxious attachment side or more on the avoidant attachment side?

 

42:47

or the fearful avoidant.  And again, this has to do with the vulnerability. This connects to the vulnerability. It connects to the needs and wants. It connects to the boundaries, but it's really about like how you show up in the world. It's not like, you know, even if people had healthy, wonderful, great parents, like you're going to have issues with some of these things, some of these core birthrights or the core issues that are presenting today, everybody has them, right? I I don't want people to think that like,

 

43:17

you know, there are people  who grew up in these healthy, perfect families and they don't struggle with any of this stuff. I just don't think that's true. I think all of us have some characteristics of each of these categories or things that we went through as a kid that have a huge impact on who we are as adults. And it's really good just to be curious about that and interested in that. And again, it's not to say anything bad about your parents or, or if you're a parent with children,

 

43:46

I've had a lot of people who  get really  sad, who feel really guilty and sad because they're like, Oh my gosh, I've messed up as a parent. And what I would say is like, if you're feeling that, that's like a really good, so that's a really healthy experience. That means that you care. That means you probably didn't mess up your children nearly as much as you think you did. There's, Oh, even if your children are adults at this point, but especially if they're kids, like there's so much.

 

44:14

opportunity and potential to keep doing your own work so that you have a positive influence on them. But just to finish out the number six,  the core area to practice is like the connection of self to others, right? So again, it has a lot to do with the boundary stuff. Like how do I feel that secure attachment in relationship with other people? Yeah. So as I said, I hope this was

 

44:43

helpful.  I hope there are ways you're thinking about and it doesn't always fit perfectly. Like I like to capture some  theme from a person's childhood, but the more that I understand these, the more it helps me capture those themes. And I wrote down a few recent examples, you know, as I've been working with people,  you know, we sort of explore what's going on in the present, like where they're feeling stuck. Like I said, at the beginning,

 

45:13

And then  oftentimes we start getting into  like understanding some background information and what they went through growing up in their family. And then, you know, we try to come up with  or I often try to come up with a phrase or a couple of phrases that sort of capture the feeling of where they're being stuck.  Sometimes  like we can make this super complicated and

 

45:40

you know, each of you has an extensive history that there could be books written about you  as an individual human being and everything that you've been through. But like when we start thinking about it in that way,  we can get into our head and sometimes it's really helpful to simplify it down into like one phrase or to simplify it down into one feeling or to really slow down.

 

46:09

If you're working with someone to help them slow down and kind of like stay present in their body.  like, here's three examples  of  things I've come up with with my client. Like it's, it's a team effort. Like I'm working with my clients. These are things that they would say to themselves,  things that that inner child needs to hear or they need to hear for themselves. What the one was you can relax now.

 

46:37

Right. And it's, can feel the, the deep breath  dropping into it. You want to really slow that down. There was one guy that was really struggling with things and, um, you know, just worried about things as, as he's trying to go to sleep at night.  And he came up with, you've done enough today.

 

47:03

You've done enough today.

 

47:06

And just sort of like feeling the energy as you say these types of things to yourself. And this is a big one for people. You deserve to have a voice or, or it could be, you deserve to set boundaries for yourself and, just sort of, again, capturing some kind of simple concept that sort of captures like what they need, uh, right now as they're going through life in the present.

 

47:34

but it's also connected to probably like some part of their history. So again, I hope this was helpful. I just want to mention the healing our core issues again.  It was a great training with, with Jan Bergstrom and Rick Butts. I should probably try to get them on the podcast coming up here pretty soon. Cause I'm just really excited about that kind of work right now. But if you have anybody else that you'd love to see on the podcast or any topic you'd like  me to talk about,  definitely reach out.

 

48:03

And I hope all of you have a great  rest of the week and I'll see you next time. The episode this week is brought to you by Alma. They make it easy to get credentialed with major insurance plans at enhanced reimbursement rates. Alma handles all of the paperwork and guarantees payment within two weeks.  Visit HelloAlma.com or click on the link in the show notes to learn more. And thank you again, everybody. This is Shane Burkle and this is The Couples Therapist Couch podcast. It's all about the practice of couples therapy.

 

48:32

I hope you have a great week and we'll see you next time.  Bye everybody.

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