Speaker 1: Comeback Stories is a production of Inflection Network and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Welcome back, everyone to another episode of Comeback Stories. I'm
Speaker 2: one and half of your co hosts, Darren Waller here
Speaker 2: with my man, my brother, mister Donnie Starkins. Donnie, how
Speaker 2: are we doing today?
Speaker 3: I'm doing well. I'm excited for what we're going to
Speaker 3: dive into today.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, this is big, you know, for anybody that's new,
Speaker 2: We've been as our show has been unfolding. We've been
Speaker 2: chugging along now for a couple of years. We Comeback
Speaker 2: Stories was built on, you know, stories being told about
Speaker 2: people overcoming adversity, overcoming the challenges in their lives and
Speaker 2: the perspectives taken from that. And that's still a huge
Speaker 2: part of our show, right but we feel like the
Speaker 2: meaning of comeback has evolved in a way. In one
Speaker 2: of those evolutions of comeback is returning back to our true, real,
Speaker 2: authentic selves, coming back home to our centers and who
Speaker 2: we really are. And so the title of today's episode,
Speaker 2: we're gonna call coming back from a life of self abandonment.
Speaker 2: And so, Donnie, I want to ask you first, when
Speaker 2: you hear that title, when you hear coming back from
Speaker 2: self abandonment. What comes to your mind? Is it your
Speaker 2: own experience is talk to me bro.
Speaker 3: Oh man, it's like, it's my whole life. The recognition
Speaker 3: of it happening in my whole life and now, you know,
Speaker 3: most of my life not having the awareness of it,
Speaker 3: but now having the awareness of it doesn't always make
Speaker 3: it easier. Like when you wake up to some of
Speaker 3: this stuff, it's it's really hard work. And as you're
Speaker 3: saying this, like you know, in this topic, like it's
Speaker 3: all in relationships, right, and for me it's people pleasing
Speaker 3: and caring what other people think. And this is like
Speaker 3: again we've talked about the enneagram and I'm an achiever
Speaker 3: on the Enneagram, and achievers can achieve a lot of things,
Speaker 3: but from an ego, false self, it's it's it's not healthy, right,
Speaker 3: You're you're trying, You're I care what other people think.
Speaker 3: And so to watch that still unfolding relationships to this day,
Speaker 3: it's like, well, I guess I'll just be working on
Speaker 3: this my whole life, Like that's what I've surrendered to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no doubt, man, As you say that, I watched
Speaker 2: on Prime Video last night. If anyone doesn't know who
Speaker 2: ram Das is. You guys should definitely go check him out.
Speaker 2: He's a spiritual teacher, one of the most amazing that
Speaker 2: we've seen. But he had They made a documentary. It
Speaker 2: was called Becoming Nobody, and uh, you know one of
Speaker 2: the beginning parts you talked about when he was born,
Speaker 2: and he painted this picture of like when we come
Speaker 2: into Earth and we're born as human beings, we're like
Speaker 2: aliens and we come to this new foreign place and
Speaker 2: we're like putting on our spacesuit and as we learn
Speaker 2: to walk and you know, grab things and all these
Speaker 2: simple motor skills, we're being brought up in this world
Speaker 2: that values our spacesuit and it's like, oh, and he's
Speaker 2: a top paints his analogy like, oh man, all we
Speaker 2: want to do is how people tell us how nice
Speaker 2: our space suit is and that that did it so
Speaker 2: much for me because you know, in this world, I
Speaker 2: feel like we're taught to value the physical. We're taught
Speaker 2: to value the external more than we are our internal.
Speaker 2: And so we begin since young kids that you know,
Speaker 2: what we should value the most is our acceptance by
Speaker 2: the world. We should value results and outcomes more so
Speaker 2: than we should just the process of growing as a
Speaker 2: human being. You know, doing is taught to us more
Speaker 2: so than being is. And I mean I can think
Speaker 2: of how early it was for me when self abandoning began,
Speaker 2: and for anybody that's like, what is self abandonment exactly?
Speaker 2: I see the definition as things that are me, things
Speaker 2: that I love about myself. I sacrifice those because I
Speaker 2: feel like I should be what the world wants me
Speaker 2: to be. I should be what's normal. I should be
Speaker 2: what's accepted. And anytime that we choose to do that,
Speaker 2: you know, we're shutting off who we really are and
Speaker 2: who the world deserves us authentically as we are. And
Speaker 2: I remember doing that as early as elementary school. Like
Speaker 2: I've talked about on the show numerous times, like the
Speaker 2: wound of not being black enough. So that's like, okay,
Speaker 2: like me, as I am, as just this black kid
Speaker 2: who may be different than everybody else, how do I
Speaker 2: push whatever's me to the side so I could be
Speaker 2: more like them? And it shows up all over the place.
Speaker 2: I mean, we can go through my whole story all day,
Speaker 2: but just going back to where it began and where
Speaker 2: I knew that I was making the choice to abandon
Speaker 2: myself but didn't know the repercussions of it.
Speaker 3: Man. I mean, I'm just thinking about both of our journeys, right,
Speaker 3: and just thinking about my path when you talk about
Speaker 3: these things, for me the most, I think, so the
Speaker 3: self abandonment for me is it's like conflict aversion, Like
Speaker 3: I struggle with conflict, and so it plays out in
Speaker 3: self abandonment and just like carrying what other people think,
Speaker 3: right and and and a lot of times it's the
Speaker 3: people that we love the most. So then what that
Speaker 3: turns into, like we start to live with these code
Speaker 3: dependent perfectionists, people pleasing thoughts and habits. Where we define
Speaker 3: being codependent think is like chronically our self worth is
Speaker 3: about external things like you're talking about, right, And it's
Speaker 3: it's we have to find we have to come back
Speaker 3: to our truth. And that's why these these tests, these
Speaker 3: personality tests, and I was so blown away by the
Speaker 3: Enneagram test as it identified me as an achiever was
Speaker 3: my main one, and then peacemaker was my second one.
Speaker 3: But it so much of it for me again was
Speaker 3: conflict aversion and avoiding those things to keep the peace
Speaker 3: because I didn't want to deal. And how does that
Speaker 3: show up still to this day? Avoiding hard conversations. And
Speaker 3: I tell people and I and this is my work
Speaker 3: and I'm and I'm leaning into it and I've had
Speaker 3: a lot of them lately. And Robin Sharma says, the
Speaker 3: conversation you least want to have is the one you
Speaker 3: need to have next. And man, it's a practice, even
Speaker 3: even conversations around money.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: A lot of my coaching that I've got coached on
Speaker 3: is my energy around money. And it's just like breaking dysfunction,
Speaker 3: right because our parents weren't given these tools and these
Speaker 3: resources that we have today. So yeah, man, I'm I'm
Speaker 3: so glad. I love these. I guess you call them
Speaker 3: solo episodes where we don't have a guest because you know,
Speaker 3: Darren and I just kind of flow. We don't have
Speaker 3: a plan or a format. We have guests we want
Speaker 3: to see and if it aligns, it aligns. But there's
Speaker 3: so much that we can dive into. And honestly, for me,
Speaker 3: this is like it's just selfish because it's super it's
Speaker 3: healing for me. And I've shared it before, like, deep
Speaker 3: meaningful relationships is a strong core value of mine and
Speaker 3: the only way you can really have those is having deep,
Speaker 3: meaningful conversations, and so any chance that I'm going to
Speaker 3: get like, you know, a window with you with your
Speaker 3: like crazy schedule, dude, I'm just like, let's let's drop in.
Speaker 2: We don't need a guest, right man. This the flow
Speaker 2: of this is so natural because I mean, it's our
Speaker 2: own stories, it's our own experiences, and I'm just like you,
Speaker 2: I fear conflict as well. And it's like, why do
Speaker 2: we fear conflict? It's because when conflict takes place, I
Speaker 2: fear that it's gonna I'm going to be found out
Speaker 2: for being a fraud or like prof it being proven
Speaker 2: that I'm not worthy of love. I'm not worthy of
Speaker 2: the good things in my life. I'm not worthy of
Speaker 2: what God is blessing me with. So by all means,
Speaker 2: I'm looking to avoid conflict and you know, keep the peace,
Speaker 2: save face in order to so, okay, these things are
Speaker 2: going well externally. That means I'm good internally as opposed
Speaker 2: to showing up, okay, showing up more than enough. And
Speaker 2: but we don't we don't learn that. You know, through
Speaker 2: through self abandoning, you can start to feel like for
Speaker 2: me in high school, it was like I started to
Speaker 2: self abandoned as far as looking for love and just
Speaker 2: being desperate for attention and approval. The self abandoning started
Speaker 2: to work. The self abandoning started to look like me
Speaker 2: being around cooler people. The self abandoning looked like me
Speaker 2: going all in on athletics as my identity and starting
Speaker 2: to see things pay off for me. And that's like
Speaker 2: a lot of people, you know, we can that carried
Speaker 2: on to when I was in the league. I mean
Speaker 2: there's you look at people that have had fifty million
Speaker 2: in the bank and you know, blow their brains out,
Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying. So it's we look at
Speaker 2: things like that. It's like, how is that even possible.
Speaker 2: It's because along the way, I made choices that pushed
Speaker 2: who I was, what I loved to decide in order
Speaker 2: for the dream that I've been sold by the world,
Speaker 2: by society, by my parents, by my friends. And if
Speaker 2: we continue to make those choices and build our lives
Speaker 2: on self abandonment without conscious awareness, we're gonna end up
Speaker 2: in this place where it's like, man, I thought this
Speaker 2: was gonna feel better. I thought this money was gonna
Speaker 2: make all my problems go away. I thought being with
Speaker 2: this person or having the hottest Chicken school or whatever
Speaker 2: it was gonna make me feel like the man when
Speaker 2: if you look back at all the choices that you made,
Speaker 2: it was, you know, at the expense of yourself, you know,
Speaker 2: over extending yourself in ways that doesn't allow you to
Speaker 2: approach life from a place of balance and from a
Speaker 2: place of loving yourself first. And these are things that
Speaker 2: I'm realizing in real time, you know, the struggles that
Speaker 2: come in my marriage, struggles that come in you know,
Speaker 2: in the workplace and wherever you know, at the root
Speaker 2: of it, there's usually always some level of self abandonment
Speaker 2: and the resentment and the bitterness that comes from abandoning myself.
Speaker 3: Man, what you're saying is so relatable and so much
Speaker 3: more profound for me personally than somebody dropping some knowledge
Speaker 3: or research like that's I feel that so hard. And
Speaker 3: I'm thinking back to me as this like brilliant, amazing
Speaker 3: kid who starts to try to do everything to prove
Speaker 3: my significance, to prove that, like you know, you know,
Speaker 3: excuse me, that I that I matter right, And this
Speaker 3: is how this is how I felt safe. It was
Speaker 3: getting validation through external things. And what happens is so
Speaker 3: we practice that our whole lives. And here we are
Speaker 3: as adults with these these deep, deep rooted patterns, you know,
Speaker 3: deep neural pathways with grooves in them that are really
Speaker 3: hard to get out of. But Darren and I are
Speaker 3: doing this podcast so that we can shine the light
Speaker 3: of awareness onto things like share our shit and the
Speaker 3: things we're going through. Like what you just said, I'm like, man,
Speaker 3: this is what I need to hear every day, Like
Speaker 3: this is the medicine, And you know, it excites me
Speaker 3: to see how you can just so naturally drop in
Speaker 3: and talk about this and you know, you'll never really
Speaker 3: truly know how many people you're helping, and like it's
Speaker 3: very clear to me that you're just getting started, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, man, sometimes I feel like I'm just learning how
Speaker 2: to walk again, you know. And for anybody that may
Speaker 2: be starting to feel like you relate to this idea
Speaker 2: of self abandonment, I encourage you not to shame yourself
Speaker 2: because I align with it, like totally completely, you know,
Speaker 2: since I was five years old, and it's not a problem.
Speaker 2: There's nothing wrong with you to feel like you identify
Speaker 2: with this. This is you know something that like I
Speaker 2: said that we're taught, and we're not taught how to
Speaker 2: love ourselves in school. We're not taught emotional intelligence in school,
Speaker 2: we're not taught self care practices. So these are things
Speaker 2: that we're all learning and that's just going to make
Speaker 2: our lives better. That's going to make us more whole
Speaker 2: human beings and come to the table in our relationships,
Speaker 2: in our workplaces, in our friendships as the person that
Speaker 2: we want to show up as as the people that
Speaker 2: we've been waiting on. And So if you're looking for, like,
Speaker 2: what are some relatable, you know, things that you can
Speaker 2: be aware of that would be a sign of self abandonment,
Speaker 2: I would start with low self esteem is one where
Speaker 2: you feel like you're not good enough. It may be
Speaker 2: poor boundaries, You don't feel like you can say no
Speaker 2: to people. You feel like you always have to say
Speaker 2: yes to get that thumbs up from somebody else. You
Speaker 2: may feel dependent on somebody else for your own worth
Speaker 2: and your own value. And a couple for me that
Speaker 2: really stand out are fear of rejection and abandonment, and
Speaker 2: then as well as fear of intimacy. And on the
Speaker 2: fear of intimacy, it's almost like you know, I crave
Speaker 2: deep intimacy. But at the same time, I want to
Speaker 2: push it away. You know, I'm dying for it. At
Speaker 2: the same time, I'm so afraid of it and afraid
Speaker 2: of messing it up that I continue to find ways
Speaker 2: to push it away. And I'm so afraid of that
Speaker 2: potential judgment, rejection, and just being left exiled by myself.
Speaker 2: And it's just so heavy. But I hope that these
Speaker 2: things will allow you to begin this practice of awareness
Speaker 2: in your life and see how these things are showing up.
Speaker 2: Because when you start to see these things as they
Speaker 2: arise in the moment, that's the growth. That's when you're winning.
Speaker 2: That's when you're starting to see the change. Because until
Speaker 2: we're aware of these things and how that self abandonment
Speaker 2: shows up in our lives, it's tough for us to
Speaker 2: get some momentum going. It's tough to get the tires
Speaker 2: out of the mud. And we want to see you
Speaker 2: guys back on the road, back on the path of
Speaker 2: really flourishing and thriving in your lives.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And if you've been following our show and listening
Speaker 3: to all of our guests, I mean every guest just
Speaker 3: drops some nugget that I hold on to and then
Speaker 3: I pass along and then people are like, oh, that's
Speaker 3: so profound. I'm like, it's not mine, Like nothing's mine,
Speaker 3: there's no original thought anyways. You know, I just might
Speaker 3: put my own little spin on it. But so many
Speaker 3: just legends as far as like wisdom that I've learned
Speaker 3: in our podcast, a lot of mine, when you're talking
Speaker 3: about this, comes down to, you know, sitting with our
Speaker 3: friend Don Bergeron who leads plant medicine ceremonies, and ultimately
Speaker 3: getting to this place which I could never get to before.
Speaker 3: So the reason that I did this was to gain
Speaker 3: more spirituality and to get closer to God. And he
Speaker 3: had asked me the question, he said, do you believe
Speaker 3: that you are worthy of love? And I said yes?
Speaker 3: And he's do you believe that you are love? And
Speaker 3: I said yes, and I truly felt it in that moment.
Speaker 3: And then we were talking about a certain situation that
Speaker 3: I was like, really not surrendering the outcome, and he
Speaker 3: just basically said, if it's not going to be this,
Speaker 3: it's going to be something better because you're worthy of it.
Speaker 3: And so you if you know that you're worthy of it,
Speaker 3: you don't have to sacrifice for anybody or anything, and
Speaker 3: anybody that comes into your life and sees that, like,
Speaker 3: if you're seen from that place, you know you're going
Speaker 3: to attract the right people. So I just think this
Speaker 3: self abandonment cycle, it gets activated off like years of
Speaker 3: pent up feelings of not feeling seen or appreciated, which
Speaker 3: might be total bullshit, but we've been telling ourselves that story,
Speaker 3: and so then they come they start to come out
Speaker 3: sideways in our adult relationships. And I will tell this
Speaker 3: story and I'm not afraid, like I have. A person
Speaker 3: asked me at my retreat. They said, Donnie, do you
Speaker 3: like handle your situation when you get in a conflict
Speaker 3: with a partner or a parent or a family member?
Speaker 3: Do you just like talk the way you're talking now?
Speaker 3: And you know, it's just it's it's funny, because no,
Speaker 3: I don't. Sometimes I turn into a five year old kid,
Speaker 3: and that's literally what's happening, you know. So it's understanding
Speaker 3: that and making sure that it doesn't start to come
Speaker 3: out as resentment or irritability or we're annoyed. Right, It's
Speaker 3: kind of like this little bullshit protest behavior I think
Speaker 3: they call it, you know, trying to make the other
Speaker 3: person feel guilty or blaming them, you know, or shaming
Speaker 3: them if we're not happy, so we're not feeling fully seen,
Speaker 3: right and then so we prochecked it out. The bottom
Speaker 3: line is like it's all about figuring it out and
Speaker 3: knowing that we're the only person that can give us this,
Speaker 3: nobody else. And if you keep trying, even though if
Speaker 3: you know that truth, if you keep trying the other way,
Speaker 3: like you're the only one that can give you whatever
Speaker 3: you're looking for. So like whatever you got to do
Speaker 3: to surrender to that and do the work to trust
Speaker 3: that and find what ever God that you believe in
Speaker 3: that's going to get you to that place.
Speaker 2: Man, you get that had nail on the head on
Speaker 2: so many things right there. I mean, you talk about
Speaker 2: we're the only ones that can give us what we're
Speaker 2: looking for. We can go to the ends of the
Speaker 2: earth searching for things thinking that they can give us
Speaker 2: what we're looking for. You know, money, romance, success, like
Speaker 2: whatever the metric may be, it's all in empty longing.
Speaker 2: And you know what you also said that I think
Speaker 2: is so profound is that feeling like you need to
Speaker 2: sacrifice yourself who you are. And that's a reality for me,
Speaker 2: and I feel like for a lot of people that
Speaker 2: are listening, like I felt like I had no choice
Speaker 2: but to sacrifice myself or else I would just be
Speaker 2: alone my whole life. I would nobody would want anything
Speaker 2: to do with me. Women wouldn't want me, nobody would
Speaker 2: think I was cool enough to just hang around and
Speaker 2: kick it with. I felt like I had no choice
Speaker 2: as that little kid, when really today, I feel like
Speaker 2: the ultimate goal is to find a balance between standing
Speaker 2: in my truth, knowing who I am, not sacrificing my needs,
Speaker 2: my wants, what makes me feel alive, while at the
Speaker 2: same time not going extreme with like not wanting to
Speaker 2: please people at all. Like it's the balance between being
Speaker 2: who I am, being authentically myself while also wanting desiring
Speaker 2: to impact people in a positive way but not just
Speaker 2: one or the other, not not impacting people at the
Speaker 2: expense of myself, and not being so fixated in the
Speaker 2: truth that I just use the truth as a weapon
Speaker 2: on people. You know. It's that balance, and it's such
Speaker 2: a tough place to get. I don't think we ever
Speaker 2: fully get there or just arrived to that point and
Speaker 2: it's like all right, like I'm here, I'm enlightened. I've
Speaker 2: got this thing figured out. It's always work, it's always
Speaker 2: constant awareness, it's always you know, being anchored in our
Speaker 2: practices because the minute I'm not aware, the minute I'm
Speaker 2: not conscious of of my desire to sacrifice in order
Speaker 2: to feel okay, I'm gonna be right back in the pattern.
Speaker 2: And that over self sacrificing was such a part of
Speaker 2: my reality for so long that you get to a
Speaker 2: point where you don't even you're not even able to
Speaker 2: tell that you know, the difference between the self sacrificing
Speaker 2: version of yourself and the person you really are, Like
Speaker 2: I would just sacrifice and think that that was me
Speaker 2: and not even challenge it and not even question it. So, yeah,
Speaker 2: we just want to offer an extent compassion and love
Speaker 2: to all you guys as we go about this, and
Speaker 2: we talk about this because it's real in our lives
Speaker 2: and we know to some extent it's real in you
Speaker 2: guys as well. But there is a solution, There is
Speaker 2: a way.
Speaker 3: There's a way, and you can't do it alone. And
Speaker 3: if you are kind of feeling like you're doing it alone,
Speaker 3: there are so many recent if you can't afford a
Speaker 3: coach or a therapist. First, I would ask, like if
Speaker 3: that's really true, and where you're spending your money and
Speaker 3: where you're placing your value, because I mean, when shit
Speaker 3: gets bad enough, you'll pay for a therapist if you
Speaker 3: need it, you know, But we want to be proactive
Speaker 3: on that. But I think it's it's just you know,
Speaker 3: I think it's a lot of shining the light of
Speaker 3: awareness because if if all of these things we're talking about,
Speaker 3: like if you don't realize that you're actually angry at
Speaker 3: yourself and actually these these broken down systems that actually
Speaker 3: taught you to behave this way, you know, for for
Speaker 3: actually overgiving this is like ownership. You know, Darren, we
Speaker 3: talk about this all the time, and you're listening right now,
Speaker 3: and you might have you might be going through some shit,
Speaker 3: like a lot of shit, like maybe you feel like
Speaker 3: nobody's ever experienced the level of whatever pain and trauma
Speaker 3: you're going through and and just understanding that, like there
Speaker 3: we are talking about this to to to bankrupt that story.
Speaker 3: And the reason we're doing this, the reason Darren and
Speaker 3: I are talking right now is because of pain. It's
Speaker 3: because of of but it's also these broken down systems
Speaker 3: that we had and it's why we talked so much
Speaker 3: about a lot of this work. When you can shift
Speaker 3: to like undoing and unlearning and letting go and not acquiring,
Speaker 3: it's just it's just freeing ourselves from all of this stuff.
Speaker 3: It's like in the Four Agreements of really, you know,
Speaker 3: we agree upon these certain things when we were younger,
Speaker 3: and it's so outdated these days, right, So we have
Speaker 3: to we have to get clear and write our own
Speaker 3: tenants for our life today. Otherwise you're just like you're
Speaker 3: living a life that I don't know whose story might
Speaker 3: it might be. It might be one of your parents,
Speaker 3: it might be one your third grade boyfriend who said
Speaker 3: you weren't pretty and you ran with it and have
Speaker 3: been telling yourself you're not enough since. But I think
Speaker 3: I just want to come back to being balanced and
Speaker 3: compassion but also like take ownership of your life. I'm
Speaker 3: telling you, when you stop blaming everybody else, even if
Speaker 3: somebody really did some damage to you, to be able
Speaker 3: to see it as an opportunityy to heal and maybe
Speaker 3: help others through it or find a way. Because you
Speaker 3: know that person who hurts you, they're not thinking about
Speaker 3: you every day the way you're thinking about them. So
Speaker 3: free yourself from that. Do yourself a favor, and you
Speaker 3: know there's ways that you can do that you can
Speaker 3: get on the internet, and there's amazing stuff I was
Speaker 3: thinking about early on as a coach, even this exercise
Speaker 3: like what we talked about today, right like I didn't
Speaker 3: I kind of wanted to learn a little bit more
Speaker 3: about it. I know I do it, like that's obvious,
Speaker 3: but I don't have like a specific coaching exercise, and
Speaker 3: so it was fun to kind of dive in and
Speaker 3: understand this. I did this early as a coach, where
Speaker 3: like maybe when I first started, somebody talked about boundaries
Speaker 3: and I'm like, oh, like we'll get that next Well,
Speaker 3: let's dive into that next session. And then I wasn't
Speaker 3: really prepared with a session or felt like I had
Speaker 3: the knowledge to teach it. But then I would dive
Speaker 3: in and just re like go on the first page
Speaker 3: of Google and you won't get past the first page
Speaker 3: of just like amazing content. So my point is is
Speaker 3: like you might be making some excuse, but the resources
Speaker 3: are there. You just have to be willing to take
Speaker 3: a little action.
Speaker 2: Hm. That's always the answer. And I don't know if
Speaker 2: you're like me, But I've always wanted a path that
Speaker 2: didn't take action, to where the answer could fall right
Speaker 2: into my lap without me having to do anything or
Speaker 2: stand up to anything, or deal with any type of
Speaker 2: conflict or conversation. So that's a real thing. And uh,
Speaker 2: something that you just said that I loved. I'm reading
Speaker 2: Michael Gervais's book Shout Out to to Doughter g Yeah,
Speaker 2: and it's talking to the theme of the book is, uh,
Speaker 2: you know, stop worrying about what other people are thinking
Speaker 2: of you and the idea of FOPO. And he has
Speaker 2: this section in the book talking about the spotlight effect
Speaker 2: and how like we as people, we shine the spotlight
Speaker 2: on ourselves and we think other people are judging us
Speaker 2: so hard and strictly in way that we're judging ourselves,
Speaker 2: when really these people are so caught up in how
Speaker 2: they look, how they feel, what they're afraid of, how
Speaker 2: they're going to get through their day, how they're going
Speaker 2: to perform at their job. And there's to the extent
Speaker 2: that we think people are thinking about us, they are
Speaker 2: it's not even close like they're thinking about themselves and
Speaker 2: how they're they're just going to get by how they
Speaker 2: feel like they're self abandoning, you know. So it's this
Speaker 2: idea of it's not about showing up for them, it's
Speaker 2: not about doing anything for somebody else, it's doing it
Speaker 2: for ourselves. And what I've learned is the people in
Speaker 2: my life, the people that love me unconditionally, they want
Speaker 2: the real me. They want my truest self, whether it's
Speaker 2: it isn't the greatest thing in the world to hear
Speaker 2: or it's the most amazing feeling in the world to hear,
Speaker 2: but showing up as our truer selves, that's what people
Speaker 2: are from us, and that's what ultimately we want from
Speaker 2: ourselves desperately, you know, all the time to commandon we're
Speaker 2: you know, giving our power away, giving our peace away.
Speaker 2: And that thing that we feel inside that just doesn't
Speaker 2: feel right, that's our spirit yelling out like, hey, like
Speaker 2: this this ain't it? Like Like when are you going
Speaker 2: to start to do things for us in here? When
Speaker 2: you're gonna start to do things for your inner child
Speaker 2: that that younger version of you that's so desperately just
Speaker 2: wanted to show up and say this is me. But
Speaker 2: you know, things happened and it's it's okay. That those
Speaker 2: things happen. And it's okay that you feel the way
Speaker 2: that you feel today, but we cannot stay here, like
Speaker 2: Donnie said, we have to take action that we cannot
Speaker 2: choose to stay here or a time will come where
Speaker 2: we're approaching our last breath and we'll look back on
Speaker 2: our lives and uh and there might be a regretted
Speaker 2: to And by no means do we want that to happen.
Speaker 2: We want to. We want to be able to just
Speaker 2: come back to who we are.
Speaker 3: Dude, so much there I feel like when we get
Speaker 3: caught in this self abandonment cycle, we don't realize. Like
Speaker 3: everything you're saying is that we're blocking ourselves from receiving love,
Speaker 3: care and kindness and support and all of these things,
Speaker 3: not only from ourselves but from everybody else. It's so
Speaker 3: whether you know a lot about the subconscious and conscious mind,
Speaker 3: you can just even google that and understand the difference
Speaker 3: and understand that if you can't get a grip on
Speaker 3: the subconscious mind, So just really basic, your subconscious mind,
Speaker 3: they say these days it hijacks ninety percent of your life.
Speaker 3: So so it's when you're in your mind, you're thinking,
Speaker 3: you're you're not in your body. That is where the
Speaker 3: subconscious is. And they say that that is formed from
Speaker 3: ages zero to seven, So it's conditioning. It's things that
Speaker 3: like you don't even remember that are happening that have
Speaker 3: hijacked your whole life. I don't remember a lot from
Speaker 3: those ages, but that's what's running the show. So you
Speaker 3: have to take a step back and understand what is
Speaker 3: all this old narrative and these old stories, and then
Speaker 3: how what are the practices? What do I need to
Speaker 3: do to first get willing to dig it out and
Speaker 3: do whatever it takes to like free yourself from it?
Speaker 3: And then I think that's like our purpose, right if
Speaker 3: you really want to simplify your life, just free yourself.
Speaker 2: So when you say free yourself, that may seem overwhelming
Speaker 2: to somebody that's listening right now, Like you, what would
Speaker 2: you give as like the first step, like a practical
Speaker 2: thing that somebody can start tonight before they go to
Speaker 2: bed or when they wake up in the morning, like
Speaker 2: to be on that track to freeing themselves, to be
Speaker 2: on that track to coming back to their truest, most
Speaker 2: authentic self. Like what's a just something that somebody can
Speaker 2: just take that first step forward?
Speaker 3: Well, as you were asking that, what I did was
Speaker 3: I took a deep breath, and for me, that is
Speaker 3: like what brings me back into my body. And you
Speaker 3: might say, okay, so just take a deep breath. Well
Speaker 3: start there. If that's as intimate as you are with
Speaker 3: your breath, is you'll take one deep breath a day.
Speaker 3: But I'm telling you, at some point you're going to
Speaker 3: understand that like when you can grab a hold of
Speaker 3: your breath and you have practices, whether it's you know,
Speaker 3: because you can control your breath. And that's why I
Speaker 3: love teaching yoga and kind of dancing with the breath
Speaker 3: where you can connect the breath and the mind and
Speaker 3: body together as one, you know, so it becomes like
Speaker 3: this dance. But yeah, I mean I could go on.
Speaker 3: There's there's something I want to circle back to because
Speaker 3: I don't want to lose it. You talked about carrying
Speaker 3: what other people think, the fact that Michael gervea a
Speaker 3: human performance like guru, that he would write his book
Speaker 3: and take time focusing because he works with so many athletes.
Speaker 3: Carrying what other people think is like and he was
Speaker 3: the one that said carrying what other people think is
Speaker 3: the modern days saber tooth Tiger. So shout out to
Speaker 3: Michael Jerma. He said he'd come back on, So we'll
Speaker 3: get him back on to promote the book and talk
Speaker 3: about it. And I mean, this is what we're talking about.
Speaker 3: So much of it comes rooted in carrying what other
Speaker 3: people think.
Speaker 2: No doubt, and I feel like adding to what you
Speaker 2: just said, the best way to begin on this journey
Speaker 2: of no longer choosing to self abandon is looking directly
Speaker 2: at your self care practices, like the smallest things of
Speaker 2: your day, like when you wake up, Like what are
Speaker 2: you doing that is catered towards your well being, towards
Speaker 2: your peace, towards you know, how you want to live
Speaker 2: your life that day? And that fuck it starts with
Speaker 2: some type of meditation practice, some type of breathing practice
Speaker 2: to center yourself. What about journaling are you finding a
Speaker 2: way to if it's not journaling, just a way to
Speaker 2: express what you're thinking, what you're feeling in the course
Speaker 2: of a day, Like what you're proud of yourself for
Speaker 2: situations that you wish you could have responded to better?
Speaker 2: Like what are the ways in which we're getting those
Speaker 2: things out? Things as simple as hydrating choosing to keep
Speaker 2: yourself hydrated is a way to fuel your body and
Speaker 2: is an act of self care. Is an act of
Speaker 2: saying I am valuable, I'm worth it, so I'm going
Speaker 2: to take care of everything that is me. Another thing is,
Speaker 2: even if it's for five to ten minutes today, are
Speaker 2: you taking the chance to do something that you enjoy,
Speaker 2: to allow yourself to be in a playful state, to
Speaker 2: allow you to be excited about what you're doing and
Speaker 2: just take a break and smile and laugh and dance
Speaker 2: whatever it may be, Like, how are you structuring that
Speaker 2: into your day? And at the end of the day,
Speaker 2: I don't think we can outrun sleep ever, So it's
Speaker 2: just like simple things that we can start to implement
Speaker 2: in our day that we don't even know are subconsciously
Speaker 2: reinforcing the fact that I value myself. I'm gonna do
Speaker 2: the necessary things to show up and to allow myself
Speaker 2: to function in my highest vibration. And like Donnie says,
Speaker 2: the non negotiables and keeping the promises that you make
Speaker 2: to yourself, those things go a long way, those subtle messages,
Speaker 2: because then those start to translate into relationships where it's
Speaker 2: like I'm making the choices to value myself, because then
Speaker 2: once I can start to see the reality of when
Speaker 2: I start to value myself, I am then able to
Speaker 2: pour into somebody else. You know, if my cup isn't full,
Speaker 2: how I'm gonna be pouring nothing into somebody else, like
Speaker 2: literally nothing, And you know, and then we could possibly
Speaker 2: get to the point where, you know, I fill my
Speaker 2: cup up so much that somebody may come up and
Speaker 2: need to drink themselves and I'm able to give that
Speaker 2: to them because I've poured so much into myself and
Speaker 2: having myself to be in a position where it's healthy
Speaker 2: for me to give I found myself in so many
Speaker 2: situations relationships work where I pour so much into other people.
Speaker 2: You know, you look back at the cup, there's nothing
Speaker 2: for me there, and that's not the way that we
Speaker 2: want to live. And so I went pretty far down
Speaker 2: the road as far as explaining what self care could
Speaker 2: lead to and lay the foundation for. But to get
Speaker 2: back just to the practicality of it, and the basics
Speaker 2: is the choices that you make in your day and
Speaker 2: the things that you do to add value to yourself,
Speaker 2: to fuel yourself to choose a greater wellbeing for yourself.
Speaker 2: Those things go such a long way in the direction
Speaker 2: that you're trying to go.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I would just add I mean, you nailed it all.
Speaker 3: There's a couple questions for all the people pleasers out there,
Speaker 3: like myself asking that question, like is there perfection is
Speaker 3: in people pleasing or codependent thinking at the root of
Speaker 3: this act of giving that I'm doing, Like, that's a
Speaker 3: big one, Like what's my intention? Am I saying I
Speaker 3: love you to hear I love you back? Or am
Speaker 3: I saying I love you because my heart is feeling it? Like?
Speaker 3: What is your intention? And then the other one is
Speaker 3: like am I giving with the desire of trying to
Speaker 3: get someone else to think or feel a certain way
Speaker 3: about me? You know? It's like those that's all I
Speaker 3: did my whole life, my whole life growing up as
Speaker 3: a kid. It was just like so I was so
Speaker 3: concerned and so you know, as I say that as
Speaker 3: we wrap up this episode, this is deep conditioning, so
Speaker 3: meaning we have to be patient, we have to be compassionate.
Speaker 3: This is deep rooted. There's nothing wrong with you, it's
Speaker 3: just a pattern of thinking and you're feeling something maybe anxious, afraid.
Speaker 3: That's information that there's change that needs to happen. All
Speaker 3: of this we're feeling is it's to activate change. And
Speaker 3: I think a lot of times even in self abandonment, right,
Speaker 3: won't we want to keep the peace, will stay in
Speaker 3: the relationship, or will avoid the hard conversation. But meanwhile,
Speaker 3: like I'm having the conversation in my head twenty times
Speaker 3: a day, so I think it's just getting clear. And
Speaker 3: you know, daring the way that you articulated things, and
Speaker 3: I just want to acknowledge you for your your vulnerability
Speaker 3: and the way that you flow and man, the way
Speaker 3: that we flow. I mean, I know we could talk
Speaker 3: about this all day long, and I know people are
Speaker 3: listening that are that are relating to this, and that's
Speaker 3: all we wanted to do is just to relate to y'all.
Speaker 3: So we appreciate you staying consistent with us. And it's
Speaker 3: a big deal to leave reviews on the podcast, and
Speaker 3: even you know, a five star review or comments or
Speaker 3: whatever is going to help us get this out to
Speaker 3: more people. That's all we care about. And yeah, that's
Speaker 3: why we drop.
Speaker 2: In no doubt, man, I feel like you have left
Speaker 2: people with a lot to take away and as you
Speaker 2: go on this journey, as we close. I hope that
Speaker 2: you don't think that you have to be perfect in
Speaker 2: this process, or that you have to be free of mistakes.
Speaker 2: You know, I've always felt most of my life and
Speaker 2: I'm one mistake away from being a band and then
Speaker 2: being rejected, being fired. And that's no way to live.
Speaker 2: Because at the end of the day, we're human and
Speaker 2: we're going to make mistakes. We're going to drop the ball,
Speaker 2: we're going to miss the mark. But it's about showing
Speaker 2: up and valuing ourselves enough to the point where even
Speaker 2: when I do make that mistake, even when I do
Speaker 2: drop the ball, even when I do miss the mark,
Speaker 2: I'm still worthy of love. I'm still me, I'm still okay,
Speaker 2: I'm still enough, And that's the ultimate goal. And we
Speaker 2: just want you guys to know that where wish you
Speaker 2: every step the way when you get there, however long
Speaker 2: it takes, and past that and beyond and even as
Speaker 2: you live your life past that point, because we need
Speaker 2: each other and we need you guys, So thank you
Speaker 2: for tuning in. We appreciate you, and we'll see you
Speaker 2: guys next week.
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