165. How Your Parents’ Pain Still Lives in You with Mark Wolynn

0:00 [SPEAKER_02]: She brings it close to her skin and all of a sudden, I go, what's that thought? [SPEAKER_02]: What's that feeling? [SPEAKER_02]: Right there. [SPEAKER_02]: That impulse. [SPEAKER_02]: She looks at me and goes, I don't deserve to live. [SPEAKER_02]: Pin on fan, what did you do? [SPEAKER_02]: What have you done, Sarah? [SPEAKER_02]: Did you cause an accident? [SPEAKER_02]: Did you take someone's life? [SPEAKER_02]: She goes, no, nothing like that. [SPEAKER_02]: So I figure one more time. [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know anything about generational trauma. [SPEAKER_02]: This is 30, some years ago. [SPEAKER_02]: And I go, all right, tell me about your childhood again. [SPEAKER_02]: It's not there. [SPEAKER_02]: I figure it's got to be an attachment. [SPEAKER_02]: I start looking no deal. [SPEAKER_02]: Safe, secure, strong attachment.

0:41 [SPEAKER_02]: So all of a sudden out of my mouth comes these words. [SPEAKER_02]: Tell me about your grandparents. [SPEAKER_02]: And boom, she drops the bomb. [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to Men This Way, the podcast for every man who seeks to live his deepest purpose in life, who is committed to showing up fully and giving his unique gifts to the world, because if not you, then who? [SPEAKER_01]: I'm your host and fellow journeyman, Brian Reeves, Brian with a Y Reeves, Men This Way.

1:28 [SPEAKER_01]: There are parts of ourselves that we struggled to understand, the anger that comes out of nowhere, the fear of being abandoned, the way we shut down when someone gets too close, or too loud, or too whatever. [SPEAKER_01]: The same arguments we have with our partners. [SPEAKER_01]: The ways we become our fathers, or our mothers, even when we swore we would never become like them. [SPEAKER_01]: What if these patterns didn't begin with us? [SPEAKER_01]: What if understanding our own lives requires us to look beyond our own experiences and into the lives of the people who came before us? [SPEAKER_01]: And what if the greatest gift we give our children isn't a life free from pain, but the willingness to confront the pain we've inherited so we don't unknowingly pass it along?

2:12 [SPEAKER_01]: Our guest today has spent decades exploring these questions. [SPEAKER_01]: Mark Wolin is the author of the International Best Seller. [SPEAKER_01]: It didn't start with you, a book that's reached millions of readers around the world. [SPEAKER_01]: He's the director of the Family Constellation Institute, something I'm fascinated to talk to you about, because I've done some of that work before. [SPEAKER_01]: And he's devoted his work to understanding how family trauma shapes our lives, our relationships, and our sense of who we are. [SPEAKER_01]: But today we're going to talk about the things that men carry but rarely speak about the wounds we inherit, the futile loyalties we don't recognize. [SPEAKER_01]: The ways our past shows up in the people we love.

2:54 [SPEAKER_01]: And perhaps more importantly what becomes possible when we stop allowing the past to determine our future. [SPEAKER_01]: Mark Wollen, welcome to men this way. [SPEAKER_01]: We're glad to have you. [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm glad to be here, guys. [SPEAKER_01]: So I think we want to just start this conversation off very simply with the question of, what is inherited family trauma? [SPEAKER_01]: What does that mean? [SPEAKER_01]: What is that? [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I think I'll tell it via a case. [SPEAKER_02]: So I'm working with this guy. [SPEAKER_02]: He's 37 years old. [SPEAKER_02]: And he starts drinking out of the blue excessively. [SPEAKER_02]: and at the same time he's driving recklessly, and this is coinciding with his wife being eight months pregnant with their son, you know, he's going to have a son, and I'm thinking, so okay, I've got questions to ask this guy and he's not made the connections.

3:49 [SPEAKER_02]: And so I asked him, of course, about his own [SPEAKER_02]: Wow. [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it's right, it's all right there. [SPEAKER_02]: And you know, he never makes a connection. [SPEAKER_02]: He never meets his father, but unconsciously, he's attempting to join his father in the same fate. [SPEAKER_02]: And luckily, he's in my office because, you know, we need to realize that the reaction to a trauma doesn't necessarily stop with the people who experienced it, the feelings, [SPEAKER_02]: the sensations, specifically the stress response, the way our genes express can pass forward to the children and the grandchildren, affecting them in a similar way even though they didn't personally experience the trauma.

4:40 [SPEAKER_02]: And you know, this idea that our children are our legacy, [SPEAKER_02]: So as parents, we have to ask ourselves, what do we really hand in down? [SPEAKER_02]: Of course, this father doesn't know what he's handing down, but it's trauma of dying when his son is a month away from being born, just drops the template for his own son who begins driving recklessly and drinking. [SPEAKER_02]: So, I see this again and again, we can tick off all the boxes, I mean, [SPEAKER_02]: do the right things, you know, go to good college, good job, have the right partner, but we wake up every morning with panic attacks, or we wake up every morning, you know, with a feeling that we can't trust the lover receiving.

5:34 [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm glad we're speaking the men today, because I have a lot to say about that actually, but what's the next place to go? [SPEAKER_01]: Well, well, you're even what you just shared that story of the man who [SPEAKER_01]: Like the echo of his father's life, revealing itself in that moment, the echo of his own. [SPEAKER_01]: And by the way, my wife is seven months pregnant. [SPEAKER_01]: Now, today, we're going to have a baby boy in two months. [SPEAKER_01]: Restoration, thank you. [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, thank you. [SPEAKER_01]: Our first probably only. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm reflecting on how, I remember in my 20s, I've been on quite a journey with my own father, man. [SPEAKER_01]: We're actually estranged for the last few years in my 20s.

6:16 [SPEAKER_01]: maybe late 20s, early 30s actually. [SPEAKER_01]: I was so angry at him. [SPEAKER_01]: And I judged him. [SPEAKER_01]: And I was so righteous against him, the way that he showed up. [SPEAKER_01]: And he was so arrogant, you know, had my whole story about him. [SPEAKER_01]: And I remember the, in a moment of epiphany. [SPEAKER_01]: And I, you know, had some really good friends, sort of reflecting back to me what they were seeing in me. [SPEAKER_01]: And I realized, oh my goodness, look how arrogant I am being, just like my father. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Look how like only my arrogance could have a problem with his arrogance. [SPEAKER_01]: For example, and it wasn't such a big giant like pattern in my life. [SPEAKER_01]: It was more subtly in just how I was showing up, how my father was echoing through my own being.

7:02 [SPEAKER_01]: And oh, man, it's just so it's just been such a profound journey that, you know, it's not really the subject of our conversation. [SPEAKER_02]: Actually, it is, you know, because you bring up a point here, and you know, women men. [SPEAKER_02]: Bleeders are always asking me what is the most common dynamic I see with men and It's that their mother didn't like their father. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, yeah, and then the son chanted in with his mother Joe kind of joint forces with the mother [SPEAKER_02]: and goes against the father energetically, you know, yeah, you're right, he's selfish, and then what happens is a couple dynamics that happen, they not only lose the father, which is what we were talking about.

7:52 [SPEAKER_02]: But they also become enmeshed with the mother, and then because they were the mother's emotional caretaker, and the mother's support, and needed to make their mother feel okay. [SPEAKER_02]: Now they turn to their woman, the partner, the wife, whoever. [SPEAKER_02]: and they start to feel inundated by her wants and her needs. [SPEAKER_02]: In other words, there's the overlay of the mother unconsciously on the partner. [SPEAKER_02]: So we all of a sudden have the partner and we're feeling, man, you want to much you need too much. [SPEAKER_02]: But we're not, you know, it's not her.

8:34 [SPEAKER_02]: We're saying that to actually saying it to the mother. [SPEAKER_02]: So this is the most common dynamic I see. [SPEAKER_02]: Men feel indated overwhelmed and shut down with their partners because of the unconscious story that got played out if mother and father. [SPEAKER_00]: Mark, one of the things that in these two examples that we've started today with, the first is the guy who's driving drunk a month before his, you know, son is born and the next is just the inherited pattern back. [SPEAKER_00]: that is born inside of a man potentially because we talk about the mother wound is sometimes either she's overwhelming or she's underwhelming, right?

9:20 [SPEAKER_00]: You give it a different pattern, either way. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, folks. [SPEAKER_00]: But what I'm really aware of is how like, [SPEAKER_00]: When you're a fish that's swimming in water, you don't know that you're swimming in water. [SPEAKER_00]: There's not a way for you to understand what's actually at play. [SPEAKER_00]: And so one of the things I'm just present to a market be curious to get how does somebody begin to actually tap into what is the unknown pattern that should be right in front of their eyes? [SPEAKER_02]: No, no. [SPEAKER_02]: So many ways to do that, you know, you know, from reading my book guys, what I do is I talk about trauma language and I'm asking people to come up with their, uh, [SPEAKER_02]: core sentence, you know, the worst fear of the core language.

10:07 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and that's one way to tap in, for example, you know, I'm going to answer your what you brought up tape, which I like, you brought up the two dynamics of the mother that's overwhelming or underwhelming. [SPEAKER_02]: which is true and the way I look at that is both create a break in the attachment where the child is either can't get enough because the mother's underwhelming or the mother's giving too much and so the child is giving or that mother's not giving too much. [SPEAKER_02]: She needs too much so the son is giving rather than receiving both of these dynamics create a break in attachment [SPEAKER_02]: the job of a child is just to receive an expand, receive, expand.

10:56 [SPEAKER_02]: But we don't have that option when our mothers heard, our fathers heard, they didn't get enough, their needy, their depressed. [SPEAKER_02]: So we find ourselves going to work. [SPEAKER_02]: And then when the mother didn't get enough from her mother, let's say, and can't give us enough. [SPEAKER_02]: Now we have a break in the attachment with her. [SPEAKER_02]: And then we [SPEAKER_02]: So if she was overwhelming, our partners are overwhelming. [SPEAKER_02]: If she didn't give us enough, our partner doesn't give us enough. [SPEAKER_02]: If she ignored us, we feel our partner ignored us. [SPEAKER_02]: So, taking it apart, because I like your question, there are many things we can do.

11:37 [SPEAKER_02]: First of all, we don't break off with our parents, but don't break up with them if we can help it. [SPEAKER_02]: If we can help, it's awesome to take time away. [SPEAKER_02]: Mom, I need some space to work on some things. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm sorry, I'm going to take a few months. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I'll get back to you dad. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, we're broken up right now, Dad. [SPEAKER_02]: But, you know, I'm coming back. [SPEAKER_02]: Um, because ideally our parents can do anything to us, but when our core is solid, we don't take it the same way, meaning, um, you know, our mom can be inundating, uh, [SPEAKER_02]: overwhelming, underwhelming.

12:19 [SPEAKER_02]: But when we've done what you guys, I'm sure teach about every day, when we've done that inner work, where we've established this core self, this fluid, energetic feeling inside that we can drop into and feel good about ourselves, then our parents can be any which way and we no longer have a charge or not triggered. [SPEAKER_02]: So I remember on my mom's deathbed, I swear this is funny story, but you know, I'm the only kid out of the five kids that moved to California and it's launched in a way away from mom. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and my mom would have loved me to have moved back and to have, you know, just to be part of that.

13:04 [SPEAKER_02]: Cult in a way in a part. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it is very family is a kind of a cult. [SPEAKER_02]: No family cult. [SPEAKER_02]: And I remember on her death that saying I'm she saying oh honey can you move back and I'm saying oh mom I know you're happy for me my wife's in California My wife's in California and she looked at me. [SPEAKER_02]: I swear she would know [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, but but it was a chuckle at that point. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, you know years earlier would have been You know like that but when we do that in our work it turns into a chuck so I'm going to answer that question I know it's this I've been mandering but the question first off we can look at our core language So I ask and I'll do it with with the listeners right here.

13:46 [SPEAKER_02]: So I'm going to ask you this question [SPEAKER_02]: And you don't have to do it if you don't feel resource, you know, if you feel this is too much to take care of yourselves, but just drop in and answer this question. [SPEAKER_02]: If the worst thing happened to you, if your life suddenly fell apart, if things went south, what's your worst fear? [SPEAKER_02]: What's the worst thing that could happen to you? [SPEAKER_02]: Let me ask it again, if life went south, things suddenly went crap, everything fell apart. [SPEAKER_02]: What's your worst fear? [SPEAKER_02]: What's the worst thing that could happen to you?

14:27 [SPEAKER_02]: I could, they would, my wife would, my children would, the world, you know, I just feel that for a minute and then take it down a little more layer. [SPEAKER_01]: what's the worst part of that and then take it down one more layer and if that happened to you what's the worst part of that and then what you're going to come up with I'm going on the journey with you I'm reflecting on all right you're your question and and and going with it as well I'm happy to share what comes up for me it's helped for sure right yeah go go for [SPEAKER_01]: If my life were to totally fall apart, the initial fear is that nobody would love me.

15:22 [SPEAKER_02]: Brilliant. [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you. [SPEAKER_02]: That's excellent. [SPEAKER_02]: That's a core sentence. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: And there's two types of core sentences. [SPEAKER_02]: What I found out. [SPEAKER_02]: There's generational core sentences, which we'll talk about in a minute. [SPEAKER_02]: And then there are attachment core sentences [SPEAKER_02]: I'll be abandoned, I'll be rejected, I'll be left. [SPEAKER_02]: These have the flavor of an attachment one. [SPEAKER_02]: So, so, Tate a minute ago, when you asked me, what do we start to do? [SPEAKER_02]: We answer that question and see if we've got a generational sentence over here or an attachment sentence, often we have both.

16:03 [SPEAKER_02]: But let's keep going, Brian. [SPEAKER_02]: So, no one will love me is something you already experienced. [SPEAKER_01]: I grew up largely, I mean, look, my mom's amazing. [SPEAKER_01]: I love my mom. [SPEAKER_01]: And she wasn't really, they're emotionally very often. [SPEAKER_01]: She, my dad was gone. [SPEAKER_01]: Mom was busy. [SPEAKER_01]: And nobody was comforting me when I was hurting, when I was being bullied at school, when a friend committed suicide, cousin committed suicide. [SPEAKER_01]: Like nobody was ever checking in on me to see how I was doing. [SPEAKER_01]: Had all my material needs present, [SPEAKER_01]: But, and again, great mom drove me to my games and all that stuff.

16:45 [SPEAKER_01]: And Dad was going chasing gold at the end of the rainbow. [SPEAKER_01]: But I felt, you know, it didn't only knew this in retrospect, but yeah, I felt very alone emotionally and in that sense, yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you for sharing it because you're bringing up something that I really want to stress here and I I appreciate the the depth, the vulnerability if you say in that because this is the most common 85% of the people I work with have an attachment one 50% less than 50% realize it. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, because the mom was there, you know, she drove us to the brawl game. [SPEAKER_02]: She put the food on the table. [SPEAKER_02]: Nobody ever beat me. [SPEAKER_02]: I asked people one question when I work with them in general.

17:28 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to ask it to the listeners too. [SPEAKER_02]: And it's a long quote not too long. [SPEAKER_02]: This is about 30 seconds, but hang with me all 30 seconds. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay. [SPEAKER_02]: Did you feel with your mom? [SPEAKER_02]: Did you feel seen, really seen? [SPEAKER_02]: Did you feel known that she could intuit what you needed emotionally and provide it? [SPEAKER_02]: And then did you feel saved that she could nurture you? [SPEAKER_02]: And you could just rest into her arms and feel nurtured? [SPEAKER_02]: 85% of the people, Brian, they laughed, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, wait, we just finished his lessons.

18:12 [SPEAKER_02]: And that is a big tea trauma. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, big tea trauma, man, if we were emotionally met by our mom and they have the hardest job in the world mother. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, of course, for sure. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, for sure. [SPEAKER_02]: But if we weren't seen, known, or [SPEAKER_02]: Then we went into terror, we went into a feeling of a mall alone, and we went into feeling no one loves me, and we went into feeling like I've got to do this on my own, and we went into feeling there's no one there. [SPEAKER_02]: So thank you for bringing that up because it all is straight. [SPEAKER_01]: Exactly what I wanted to bring out.

18:53 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, I think it's so important because I do agree. [SPEAKER_01]: that we did experience kind of overt, you know, trauma with a capital T, but it's to take them out for a second. [SPEAKER_01]: A lot of us are just like, I'm fine. [SPEAKER_01]: I was fine. [SPEAKER_01]: I had everything I needed. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, so what dad wasn't there is probably better he wasn't there. [SPEAKER_01]: I was an asshole. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I did better without him. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, or, or, you know, my mom was a single mom. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: My mom was a single mom from the time my dad left at four to the time my stuff father came in when I was ten years old. [SPEAKER_01]: It's just so interesting, man, because you know, I've done a lot of this work over the years. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I've, I've done therapy, I've been in the coaching world.

19:36 [SPEAKER_01]: I've done, I've, like, I'm no stranger to, to this. [SPEAKER_01]: And still when you talk about it and we talk about it, they're still the part of me that gets emotional. [SPEAKER_01]: I can still feel, they're still sadness in me over that, having you know what I'm asking. [SPEAKER_02]: So, what you just told me in that little details, my parents separate when I'm four. [SPEAKER_02]: Well, you know where I go? [SPEAKER_02]: All right, well, how were they at three? [SPEAKER_02]: and went to, and when you were one, it's an ostrich. [SPEAKER_02]: This is pre-memory, but this is the time where developed neurodevelopment, this is a time when our brain is being wired for safety or lack of safety for calm or hypervigilance.

20:16 [SPEAKER_02]: So before memory-brand, when your mum and dad are going through it, [SPEAKER_02]: There's no support for you because your mom is a wall man. [SPEAKER_02]: She's her attentions this way and you're needing to be seen known and soothe and there's no memory back then but this is the time when you most need her attune and because your brain's being wired [SPEAKER_02]: So it's amazing what you just shared because so many of us don't realize, we think, oh, this happened to me when I was eight, and this happened to me when I was 11, and I'm always saying, yeah, but what happened to you before that? [SPEAKER_02]: Which you don't remember because that's where the real meat is.

20:57 [SPEAKER_01]: And you'll mark what's so wild. [SPEAKER_01]: When I bring you back to how it reveals itself and our adult relationships, I chose women in my 20s, maybe early 30s, that were very much like my dad or my mom. [SPEAKER_01]: very much like them neglectful. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not really attuned to very kind of narcissistic in a way and look at, yeah, I'm not trying to throw them under the bus. [SPEAKER_01]: I was my own catastrophe, you know, in their presence. [SPEAKER_01]: But what's fascinating is the woman I'm married to now for 11 years. [SPEAKER_01]: She's nothing like, she's nothing like, but, but, yes, she is so not like my parents and net emotional, you know, a toolment.

21:39 [SPEAKER_01]: She is so a toolman. [SPEAKER_01]: She reads my thoughts, it's spooky, you know, we're together 11 years because you do what to work, Ryan. [SPEAKER_02]: See, that's just it. [SPEAKER_02]: You pulled in the right partner because you had done the work. [SPEAKER_02]: Just like me, you know, I'm sorry. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm interrupting. [SPEAKER_02]: I know I'm interrupting, but all right, you know, it's like you're describing my life as well. [SPEAKER_02]: In my 20s and 30s, my relationships were a mess because I was choosing the mirror of my early mind, who was inconsistent, erratic and emotionally not present. [SPEAKER_02]: So that's, that describes my early relationships. [SPEAKER_02]: And I, too, and married to an amazing, attuned kind, amazingly sensitive woman that doesn't reflect what, what experience, because you and I Brian and take and many of your listeners and followers have done the work through you because you guys have been there and you guys have done it.

22:38 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it was crazy in the first few years of our life together, though. [SPEAKER_01]: I had, yeah, I'd finally been attracted to and attracted a woman so different from anyone I'd ever known before, not like my parents in the end. [SPEAKER_01]: And... [SPEAKER_01]: I've watched myself for the first few years unconsciously tried to turn her into my mother. [SPEAKER_01]: You're brilliant. [SPEAKER_01]: This is so good. [SPEAKER_02]: One of the things I teach and it's funny because I love, I love how you're like a step ahead of me and then I get to do the teaching. [SPEAKER_02]: Great. [SPEAKER_02]: So the mother, the early relationship and this is probably the most important thing I'm gonna say on the podcast.

23:19 [SPEAKER_02]: Our early relationship with our mother, not our father. [SPEAKER_02]: Our early relationship with our mother. [SPEAKER_02]: What's unresolved is the mirror of who will attract or who will see. [SPEAKER_02]: In other words, we can attract a really good woman. [SPEAKER_02]: But all of a sudden, wait for her to be ignoring, or, you know, so we're already waiting not to trust her because of our early experience. [SPEAKER_02]: And so we can turn a good woman bad, you know, just like that because she's looking at us going, what? [SPEAKER_02]: You know, so I did the same thing. [SPEAKER_02]: I finally, when I healed a lot of it, I still had the template.

24:01 [SPEAKER_02]: So I'm going into the good relationships with the template of, I don't trust you, and yet they were trustworthy. [SPEAKER_02]: So I have a sentence, I always say, trust your partner, and they will become trustworthy. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, curious Mark, you know, we're having a, [SPEAKER_00]: This is really a conversation largely. [SPEAKER_00]: We called men this way, but we do have a lot of incredible female listeners is that you were just talking about the pattern that happens for men as it relates to the relationship with their mother. [SPEAKER_00]: What's the pattern for women? [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you, thank you. [SPEAKER_02]: So the Pat, and I'm glad you pointed that out.

24:42 [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't know who the listenership is, but the Patron is similar. [SPEAKER_02]: So again, there's two breaks in the, many breaks in the bonds, but the two that I'm talking about are the break in the bond that you brought up to, there's a mother's underwhelming or overwhelming. [SPEAKER_02]: So she doesn't get enough from her mother, her mother, [SPEAKER_02]: and then she turns to our dad and doesn't get enough from our dad. [SPEAKER_02]: We don't know what started first. [SPEAKER_02]: Did our dad not give enough or did she used to not receiving enough and not perceiving that she's getting enough? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: So we don't even know what's true there. [SPEAKER_02]: So the mother who doesn't get enough and can't give enough and isn't doing well in her relationship.

25:25 [SPEAKER_02]: That's the break in the bond and it affects us and this is for both male and female listeners. [SPEAKER_02]: Um, when we don't get enough from our mother, we'll go to rats. [SPEAKER_02]: We'll either recoil at her care, like we'll feel repelled and not trust her. [SPEAKER_02]: For example, I write in my book, as you guys know, my mom went to hug me and I'd feel like I was being squeezed by a steel drum because I didn't trust her love, or we'll take care of her. [SPEAKER_02]: So we need a bond. [SPEAKER_02]: looking the bonds broken right so she she's weak she's unhappy she's depressed she not getting it didn't get enough from her mother had a sad life doesn't get enough from her father so we we'd there be contracted from her love pulled away recoiled [SPEAKER_02]: or we'll feel our job is to make her feel okay to be the source of her happiness.

26:25 [SPEAKER_02]: In either case we're not receiving one we don't receive two we're giving and not receiving because we're giving the direction of tending goes from us to her. [SPEAKER_02]: That's a break in the bond because we're not receiving and expanding we're giving to make her feel okay so we can [SPEAKER_02]: So, female listener, often what I find is women feel that they either didn't get enough from their moms. [SPEAKER_02]: or they had to take care of the monks and be her support, her caretaker, and then they the same, either in the relationship with the male or the partner what happens is they get into relationship and if they didn't trust the mother's love, they have a hard time trusting the partner's love.

27:17 [SPEAKER_02]: Or if they took care of their mother, they'll feel inundated overwhelmed because they'll be givers, over givers. [SPEAKER_02]: So, how many of the female listeners here feel that they're over givers and give too much in relationship? [SPEAKER_02]: And then my question to you, as a giver, is where did that start? [SPEAKER_02]: Who did you give to, which parent? [SPEAKER_02]: Did you give to your sad dad? [SPEAKER_02]: it starts off and there. [SPEAKER_01]: And I would say just because I've been in contact with a lot of the female, the women that have been following my work for many years have written books on relationships.

27:58 [SPEAKER_01]: And who cares more about relationships? [SPEAKER_01]: Women. [SPEAKER_01]: 80% of my audience historically has been women. [SPEAKER_01]: And I believe that most of them are going to be in your overgiver category. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, the over care taking. [SPEAKER_02]: And so wait a minute. [SPEAKER_02]: So as you're saying, and I'm interrupting him, but I swear, I'll just do one sentence. [SPEAKER_02]: We've there a job, their responsibility as an overgiver is to source that. [SPEAKER_02]: Where does that come from? [SPEAKER_02]: Did I give to my mother who was unhappy? [SPEAKER_02]: did my energy go out toward her like I needed her to feel okay survival strategy so I can feel okay that's often the source Brian of our overgiver over caretaker partners.

28:48 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm curious, Mark, a bit about the science, I mean, I'm a science guy, I have an engineering degree, but also part of me doesn't care about the science, but I know some of our listeners hate loves the science, my wife loves the science, and so I am curious to hear a little bit about that, because you know, one thing that kind of blew my mind many years ago, I was in a [SPEAKER_01]: I remember the facilitator is a landmark education, which was a pretty, you know, pretty confronting and pretty good rest of, yeah, you've been there. [SPEAKER_01]: Ta-ta as well. [SPEAKER_01]: I remember the the teacher, the facilitator kind of leaning into this, this woman who was rejecting one of her parents, you know, she had her story about her mom or dad.

29:33 [SPEAKER_01]: I can't remember exactly what it was, but I remember [SPEAKER_01]: the facilitator saying something like, the challenge, the sort of the cutting into her was like, you know, you're rejecting yourself, you are your, you're literally came from your mother's body. [SPEAKER_01]: You are her. [SPEAKER_01]: And I thought, oh, wow. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that, that, that lands. [SPEAKER_01]: And I was in my 20s, I think, at the time, right? [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm about to have a child, a little boy walking around, you know, I've heard all the poetic things, you know, having a kid is like having your heart walk outside of your body and all that. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm curious, because that's, I mean, it's biologically true. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I am my father. [SPEAKER_01]: Even when I do videos, I look at my screen right here, even right now, and I'm like, I kind of, I see him there, and I end as a still part of me is like, I don't want to see him.

30:20 [SPEAKER_01]: It's still the part of me that's like, no, and yet he's here. [SPEAKER_01]: So can you tell us a little bit about what is the actual science behind this transmission between generational trauma and pain and patterns? [SPEAKER_02]: That's okay. [SPEAKER_02]: So first of all, we're literally biologically physically [SPEAKER_02]: living in this trauma. [SPEAKER_02]: So when our grandmother has five months pregnant with her mother, all the eggs, our mother has, would be in her body when she's a fetus. [SPEAKER_02]: And one of those eggs is us. [SPEAKER_02]: So literally, grandmother's trauma is felt viscerally and energetically and epigenetically, which I'll get to.

31:01 [SPEAKER_02]: in our mother and fell in some bizarre way through us, you know, so that's number one. [SPEAKER_02]: Number two, our fathers, traumas enter the sperm cell, our mothers, traumas enter the egg cell and the zygote from which we will be formed. [SPEAKER_02]: will have wisdom, knowledge, information about those traumas because technically when a trauma happens and let's talk about our parents first or grandparents, that matter where we go. [SPEAKER_02]: When a trauma happens it changes them, it changes us. [SPEAKER_02]: Literally it causes a chemical change in our DNA.

31:43 [SPEAKER_02]: And this changes the way our genes function. [SPEAKER_02]: Sometimes for generations, because that's what I'm talking about. [SPEAKER_02]: Grandma, grandpa, mom, dad, us, were all feeling the same way. [SPEAKER_02]: Why is this? [SPEAKER_02]: Because technically, there's chemical signals from the trauma in ourselves. [SPEAKER_02]: They're called chemical tags or epigenetic tags. [SPEAKER_02]: After the trauma, they attach to the DNA. [SPEAKER_02]: And they tell the cells, this is for all the generations, to use or ignore [SPEAKER_02]: certain genes enabling them or us or the next generation to better deal with this trauma, even though we in the next generation didn't experience it, we've got that same [SPEAKER_02]: For example, we can become sensitive or reactive to situations that are similar to that original trauma, even if it occurred in a past generation, so that we have a better chance of surviving it in this generation.

32:55 [SPEAKER_02]: The best way to explain it. [SPEAKER_02]: Um, let's say our grandparents come from war, they're born, uh, drug, the World War II or the Korean or wherever. [SPEAKER_02]: And, and they come from a war torn country and, uh, people are being shot, bombs are going off. [SPEAKER_02]: uniform men or lining people up in a square, taking people away, and everybody's freaked out. [SPEAKER_02]: So because of this trauma that they're experiencing, they're going to develop a skill set, both positive and negative. [SPEAKER_02]: On the positive side, sharp reflexes. [SPEAKER_02]: quicker reaction times, you know, reactions to the violence to help them survive what they're going through.

33:37 [SPEAKER_02]: Hypervigilants, hypervigilants, but the problem is what they're passing down is a stress response with the dial set to 10. [SPEAKER_02]: And here we are ready for this catastrophe that never arrives and and we don't make the link with that hypervigilance or this anxiety that we're feeling with this depression. [SPEAKER_02]: make the link that it's connected to our parents and grandparents, we just think this and I hear this all the time, this is how I am, this is the way I am, I'm just wired this way, you know, and then all of some they're at a cocktail party or something and somebody drops a glass and they dive under the couch for cover, right, you know, right, not realizing that they're done and Vietnam was in a fox hole.

34:23 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: My wife is Armenian. [SPEAKER_01]: I'll seem that very very up and up close, you know, the genocide barely a hundred years ago. [SPEAKER_01]: The echoes of that through a lot of anger and rage and pain and all man, it's so present in the lineage. [SPEAKER_02]: totally, and I work with tons of Armenians who are drawing to my work for that very reason, like you said, that there's this pain, this loss, this terror. [SPEAKER_02]: I worked with an Armenian woman yesterday who told me that sometimes she can fall into this dark hole, and I go, so what happens [SPEAKER_02]: And she's waiting for the next shoot drop.

35:17 [SPEAKER_02]: And I said, and if, you know, that course sentence thing I do with you. [SPEAKER_02]: That's right. [SPEAKER_02]: I said, and if it ends, what's the, I mean, and if that shoot drops, what's the worst part? [SPEAKER_02]: She says, it's all gonna end. [SPEAKER_02]: And I turned her in the session. [SPEAKER_02]: And I said, like it did for all your people who were rounded up and killed and starved and murdered. [SPEAKER_02]: They were waiting for it, but just end. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I said this is really a profound conversation because I think for most of us, I might part of my story is that I, it was probably, I was 40 years old and I was a part of a week long training experience.

36:02 [SPEAKER_00]: And in that experience, we were given what with later be revealed as a trauma egg. [SPEAKER_00]: And that exercise was starting at the very beginning of life. [SPEAKER_00]: And this was only in the first 18 years of life. [SPEAKER_00]: Like put down every single trauma that you know, [SPEAKER_00]: I got stuck in, you know, the vaginal canal, my shoulder was stuck. [SPEAKER_00]: I was stuck in there. [SPEAKER_00]: They pulled me out, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Like from that to falling out of trees. [SPEAKER_00]: And what got revealed to me was the 40 years of age. [SPEAKER_00]: It was the first time that I realized the physical, mental, emotional, spiritual trauma that I had gone through.

36:46 [SPEAKER_00]: And I remember sharing it. [SPEAKER_00]: and having the biggest vulnerability hangover that of my life. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I was shaking with so much anxiety after revealing all of this. [SPEAKER_00]: And it was like the soup that I had been swimming in and you're what you're helping to reveal is like the lineage of this. [SPEAKER_00]: And yet, where's the fine line? [SPEAKER_00]: Between understanding what has happened to us [SPEAKER_00]: and using things as an excuse for who we have become. [SPEAKER_02]: I love that question. [SPEAKER_02]: Let me tell you where I'm going with that.

37:27 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to finish talking about those core sentences. [SPEAKER_02]: I gave the abandoned ones, but I didn't give the generational ones. [SPEAKER_02]: So first of all, let me back up a bit here, and I'll give the generational sentences, because they're very cool, and they tell you right away, if this is a linear issue. [SPEAKER_02]: So let me back up here and talk about, we have to discern what type of trauma we have. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, we're walking around. [SPEAKER_02]: We want to heal our trauma, but trauma of what? [SPEAKER_02]: And I threw a number at you earlier. [SPEAKER_02]: I said 85% of us have a break in the attachment, and we don't realize it.

38:07 [SPEAKER_02]: meaning that if we ask that core sentence, and that core question and get to that core sentence, which I'll be alone, I'll be left out, be abandoned, I won't matter, I won't be important, I'll be no one there. [SPEAKER_02]: That gives us an indication that our work is probably breaking the attachment, either us with our mom, keep going, our dad with his mom, or our mom with her mom, [SPEAKER_02]: So we've got to be looking there when we get that sentence. [SPEAKER_02]: But then through these other sentences tape that are very strange, but a lot of people have them. [SPEAKER_02]: I'll hurt someone.

38:49 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll hurt a child. [SPEAKER_02]: I'll be hated. [SPEAKER_02]: I'll be ostracized. [SPEAKER_02]: I'll do something terrible. [SPEAKER_02]: It'll all be my fault. [SPEAKER_02]: I won't deserve to live. [SPEAKER_02]: Because a lot of our listeners here have those sentences, too. [SPEAKER_02]: Those are generational. [SPEAKER_02]: If you turn to somebody and say, hey, what did you do? [SPEAKER_02]: That you don't deserve to live, though, go. [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know, but it's not them here, let me tell a case because I think this is pretty important and it'll light people up because it's also the very first case that taught me how to look for inherited trauma.

39:39 [SPEAKER_02]: So I'm working with this woman, she's this is like 30 some years ago [SPEAKER_02]: and I'm working with a lot of self-injurers back then. [SPEAKER_02]: People burn themselves with cigarettes, bang their head, a lot of cutters, and I'm working with this one young woman. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to call her Sarah for this talk. [SPEAKER_02]: And she would cut herself in an extreme way. [SPEAKER_02]: So deep that she would almost bleed the death into her arm, her abdomen, or her thighs, and her parents freak out, and they take her to the, and she's bleeding, and they take her to the emergency room, and of course they commit her to the psych ward.

40:24 [SPEAKER_02]: and she's been in the psych ward several several times. [SPEAKER_02]: So she comes back into my office and I'm flomics. [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know anything about inherited trauma. [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm saying, all right, Sarah, let's talk about this again. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I looked at her childhood, her childhood's great. [SPEAKER_02]: So, she's in my office and I go, okay Sarah, here's a pen. [SPEAKER_02]: Show me how you cut and she takes the pen and she starts to cut and I see her eyes glaze over and she's dissociating and I go, there, right there, there. [SPEAKER_02]: What, what, what's that emotion, what, because I'm wondering what's trying to be communicated here in the way she's cutting and she brings it close to her skin and all of this sudden, I go, what's that thought?

41:10 [SPEAKER_02]: What's that feeling right there that impulse? [SPEAKER_02]: She looks at me and goes, I don't deserve to live. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm here. [SPEAKER_02]: I am looking at a 24-year-old and I'm saying, what did you do? [SPEAKER_02]: What have you done, Sarah? [SPEAKER_02]: Did you cause an accident? [SPEAKER_02]: Did you take someone's life? [SPEAKER_02]: Did you break up with someone who killed himself? [SPEAKER_02]: She goes, no, nothing like that. [SPEAKER_02]: So I think you're one more time. [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know anything about generational trauma. [SPEAKER_02]: This is 30 some years ago. [SPEAKER_02]: And I go, all right, tell me about your childhood again. [SPEAKER_02]: It's not there. [SPEAKER_02]: She can go to her dad. [SPEAKER_02]: She can go to her mom. [SPEAKER_02]: The nurturance and love is incredible that she gets me.

41:51 [SPEAKER_02]: I think her it's got to be an attachment. [SPEAKER_02]: I start looking no deal. [SPEAKER_02]: Safe, secure, strong attachment. [SPEAKER_02]: So all of a sudden out of my mouth comes these words. [SPEAKER_02]: And boom, she drops the bomb. [SPEAKER_02]: The father's mother was an alcoholic, but doesn't become an alcoholic till later in life. [SPEAKER_02]: begins drinking and kills the grandfather in a car accident. [SPEAKER_02]: She crashes into a pole, the father's twelfth. [SPEAKER_02]: Check this out, father's twelfth. [SPEAKER_02]: She crashes into a pole. [SPEAKER_02]: She lives, but her husband [SPEAKER_02]: on the clouds before the ambulance arrives.

42:38 [SPEAKER_02]: And in that moment, my mouth drops open, and I go, oh, there's the whole case, there's the case. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, who doesn't deserve to live a grandmother? [SPEAKER_02]: who got cut and bleeds to death, the grandfather. [SPEAKER_02]: So luckily I was a student of John Nulti, psychodrama at the time, I knew what to do. [SPEAKER_02]: I stuck two chairs in the office and said, closer I Sarah, look over there and see your grandfather and tell them how you cut. [SPEAKER_02]: She goes grandpa, I cut myself really deeply. [SPEAKER_02]: I go, tell them how deep. [SPEAKER_02]: She goes, well, I nearly bleed, bleed to death, bleed out. [SPEAKER_02]: And then I said, add the words like you did grandpa.

43:20 [SPEAKER_02]: Like you, she's crying. [SPEAKER_02]: I said, what's he, she, cogerize, what's he showing me? [SPEAKER_02]: What's he telling you? [SPEAKER_02]: And she said, he doesn't want me to cut anymore. [SPEAKER_02]: He's telling me that when I go to cut, to feel his spirit there supporting her, I go, okay. [SPEAKER_02]: Look over in that chair. [SPEAKER_02]: Tell your grandmother exactly what you told me, grandma, I told Mark that I don't deserve to live. [SPEAKER_02]: And then, say, tell her, that's how you felt grandma, taking a life the life of your beloved. [SPEAKER_02]: In that minute, she's crying. [SPEAKER_02]: She looks over the grandmother saying, in the spirit world, the grandmother saying, when you cut, I too will be with you holding you supporting you.

44:08 [SPEAKER_02]: And in that moment, I learned to ask about an heir to Trump. [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I'm so glad I'm telling this case, because historically for me, it's the turning point, guys. [SPEAKER_02]: It's like the light comes on and I go, man, we need to ask about the generations. [SPEAKER_01]: No, it's profound. [SPEAKER_01]: I love all my conversations with all our guests and with T-9 and I can't say I really get emotional much, but man, this is the second time in this conversation mark like I'm feeling deeply touched and start an emotional man, the story that you just shared of that young girl is. [SPEAKER_01]: It's a really profound man. [SPEAKER_02]: We've got as a lot of you guys are beautiful because you know I'm sitting in front of guys that have done so much deep work that have found themselves.

44:55 [SPEAKER_02]: And then they can be the pathway to lead other guys as they've been through it. [SPEAKER_02]: So, you know, we're sitting here three men on the other side of all that stuff. [SPEAKER_02]: and we're looking back, but we're also looking forward to how these conversations can help others and thank you for the emotion Ryan. [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you for being touched. [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you. [SPEAKER_01]: There's a 30,000 rabbit holes I could go down in the time we have left. [SPEAKER_01]: What are you, what are you picking up on man? [SPEAKER_01]: Where do we go with this conversation from here? [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, man, into 17 more conversations with him, Mark. [SPEAKER_00]: That was, that was, you know, that was exactly.

45:38 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I know where to go, hold on. [SPEAKER_02]: I've got a good place to go. [SPEAKER_02]: I do. [SPEAKER_02]: People always ask me this, and I think it bears talking about. [SPEAKER_02]: They're always asking me, what are the signs? [SPEAKER_02]: How do I know if I've inherited trauma? [SPEAKER_00]: Similar to what I was asking in the beginnings, like how do you know that you're swimming in water that needs to be cleaned? [SPEAKER_02]: Many of us like that guy driving at 37 who starts to drink and drive recklessly. [SPEAKER_02]: He doesn't know what he's doing. [SPEAKER_02]: He doesn't know why he's doing that. [SPEAKER_02]: But the key could have been his age. [SPEAKER_02]: It wasn't in this case, because his father was in his 20s. [SPEAKER_02]: In other words, his dad could have been 37.

46:20 [SPEAKER_02]: But the key was the event being a month away from your child being born. [SPEAKER_02]: So this is what I want to talk about. [SPEAKER_02]: Ages, events, milestones, because I've discovered we can begin experiencing a fear or a symptom or a behavior. [SPEAKER_02]: that strikes suddenly or unexpectedly when we reach a certain age or we hit a certain milestone. [SPEAKER_02]: For example, as soon as we get married, so I'm going to give like four milestones here. [SPEAKER_02]: The first one is we get married. [SPEAKER_02]: It's everything's cool, life is great, but now we're married and we're shut down and we can't explain it. [SPEAKER_02]: Well, first place I'm going to look is where we the caretaker of our mother's emotion.

47:04 [SPEAKER_02]: And if that's not true, then I'm going to look at what happened to our mother and father when they married. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, our dad died. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, our dad had to go to jail. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, you know, our dad, my mum cheated on my dad and my dad got shut. [SPEAKER_02]: You get it? [SPEAKER_02]: So that shut down could be reflective of the generation or two before. [SPEAKER_02]: So that's one. [SPEAKER_02]: I'll give you another one. [SPEAKER_02]: We move to a new place. [SPEAKER_02]: We move across to them. [SPEAKER_02]: We literally just move across to them. [SPEAKER_02]: But all of a sudden, we're depressed. [SPEAKER_02]: And we can't explain it because our ancestors were persecuted and forced out of their home.

47:44 [SPEAKER_02]: And suffered or got killed, it went to camps, concentration camps, or whatever it was. [SPEAKER_02]: And then we're reliving that being forced out of a home, even though we just are moving around the corner. [SPEAKER_02]: Um, another one is we get rejected by our partner and we've only been dating her for three months. [SPEAKER_02]: But all of a sudden, no, I don't want to live anymore. [SPEAKER_02]: My life is over, you know, I'm going to be good. [SPEAKER_02]: You've been dating her three months because it's reflective of the earlier grief, the break in the bond. [SPEAKER_02]: that was insurmountable with our mother. [SPEAKER_02]: You see, so the break with this person for three months is taking us back to the earlier break.

48:26 [SPEAKER_02]: Or I'll give you one more. [SPEAKER_02]: We have a child. [SPEAKER_02]: Everything's cool. [SPEAKER_02]: But all of a sudden, we have a child. [SPEAKER_02]: I remember I was working with this woman, and she had never struggled with anxiety attacks, but all of a sudden, she's pregnant, and she's going through the room. [SPEAKER_02]: She's consumed with anxiety. [SPEAKER_02]: And I said, whoa, whoa, let's unpack this. [SPEAKER_02]: So you've been anxious since you've been pregnant. [SPEAKER_02]: She was, [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's right. [SPEAKER_02]: I go, and then I ask the chorus sentence, which is a key tool. [SPEAKER_02]: One of the key tools in my book, I've got lots of them, but that's a key one. [SPEAKER_02]: I say to her, what's the worst thing could happen in this pregnancy, or if you have a kid, Gioce, and she immediately says, I'll harm my baby.

49:17 [SPEAKER_02]: and I look at her and say, did you ever harm a baby? [SPEAKER_02]: She said, no, and I go, did any one in your family ever harm baby? [SPEAKER_02]: And she goes, no, and also, and click here comes the story. [SPEAKER_02]: She goes, oh, my grandmother is a young woman in her first marriage, had a child, and had a baby. [SPEAKER_02]: And she was lighting a candle on the curtains, kind of fire the house, kind of fire the baby's upstairs. [SPEAKER_02]: She can't get the baby out. [SPEAKER_02]: And then she says, we were never allowed to talk about. [SPEAKER_02]: you see that's the thing with family trauma. [SPEAKER_02]: We're on egg shells. [SPEAKER_02]: We're not allowed to bring it up because no one wants to relive the pain. [SPEAKER_02]: So finally she makes the link we can heal it to her anxiety goes away.

49:59 [SPEAKER_02]: All that stuff we have her talked to her grandmother kind of like what I had her Sarah do with the other grandparents, you know, and then all of a sudden it results. [SPEAKER_02]: talk about the traumas in our family. [SPEAKER_02]: It's parents, we've got to talk to our kids. [SPEAKER_02]: We have to tell them things that happened to us and things that happened to our parents and things that happened in our family because traumas relive when they're silenced, when they're silenced. [SPEAKER_02]: That's how they relive. [SPEAKER_01]: yet I'm thinking about, you know, my parents are worse when I was four and I'm about to have a boy.

50:45 [SPEAKER_01]: And I already know that when he's four, that's going to hit something that's going to be an interesting season for me. [SPEAKER_01]: And I want to make sure that my son doesn't carry forward the pain. [SPEAKER_02]: I wouldn't worry about that one Brian, I'll tell you why because your wife is so attuned, [SPEAKER_02]: the generational trauma. [SPEAKER_02]: From the stories you're telling me, you know, I'm gathering all these pieces. [SPEAKER_02]: You're wife being so attuned. [SPEAKER_02]: This will offset the generational trauma because your son will have a core. [SPEAKER_02]: So at age four, it won't be as big of a concern as with someone whose mom wasn't attuned.

51:26 [SPEAKER_02]: Right. [SPEAKER_02]: And then they're like a pin cushion for all the pins in the generation statistic. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, you know, and just to speak to my wife too, she's been doing therapy for 20 years. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, she's been working at this stuff. [SPEAKER_01]: Do you clearing her own generational trauma or just working through her own stuff? [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, she has been the... [SPEAKER_01]: The, you know, as funny when you shared Mark, you were the one in the family system that moved out to California. [SPEAKER_01]: So was I right from the East Coast. [SPEAKER_01]: I was the one that moved out to California. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, my wife was the one that left. [SPEAKER_01]: I call it the family business. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I think you said the, what did you, would you like the cult family cult? [SPEAKER_01]: I call it the family business.

52:07 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, the business of the way we shame and blame and don't talk about the difficult things. [SPEAKER_01]: Right. [SPEAKER_01]: And I call it getting out of the family business. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think, you know, as I think about stepping in to becoming a parent, and I'm so grateful. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, my wife and I were 11 years in the being with each other. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, we, the first, it took us seven years to get really good at being with each other. [SPEAKER_01]: And we're, we're in a great flow. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, we're older, we're more mature. [SPEAKER_01]: All the things. [SPEAKER_01]: I think that I, you know, I'm really excited for us to be Paris, so this little boy. [SPEAKER_01]: I know we're going to make all kinds of mistakes and so on and so forth. [SPEAKER_01]: And is it a myth, though, to think that my son isn't going to inherit some family, you know, generational trauma or that I could we can.

52:57 [SPEAKER_01]: completely clear and it never go away again or is like new traumas are always coming up and really the it's you know it's more a question how do we work with trauma when it arises versus trying to eliminate it completely and be done with it forever. [SPEAKER_02]: No I trust that child's in the right hands because of the work you've done and the work you wife's done which is one of the things I emphasize in my book and I teach in my book how to you know to do this work so that [SPEAKER_02]: for the next generation. [SPEAKER_02]: Now, you're a guy about to have a son who's done all this work, done all this clearing. [SPEAKER_02]: It's looked at the way he was entangled and meshed with his mom, his healing, his relationship with his dad, which will have to be healed further, you know, that a strange minute.

53:44 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, let me actually ask you about that because [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not angry at him, you know, people ask me about our strange men. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm quick to clarify. [SPEAKER_01]: I haven't cut him out of my life. [SPEAKER_01]: This isn't about cutting him out of my life. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm just, I'm not fighting for relationship that he's not fighting for. [SPEAKER_01]: And because that's what I did for so many years. [SPEAKER_02]: He doesn't know how because of whatever happened. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, he's all he had with his mom. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that. [SPEAKER_02]: So in a sense, I would suggest and don't listen to me, but I'll listen to you, but I may not follow what you suggest, but I'm totally listening. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm totally, I love to hear what you have to say. [SPEAKER_02]: You have the skillset that he doesn't, because of all the work you've done.

54:30 [SPEAKER_02]: So you know how to not be triggered, you know how to not be charged. [SPEAKER_02]: And you might just say, it dad, just just giving you a text, everything's good, you know, we're having a son, you know, my daughter, she's playing basketball, you know, just stuff like that, just to let you know we're okay. [SPEAKER_02]: to keep the flow going so that the pathways clear, there's something in that relationship with us and our father, the male and the father, that needs that path, get the boulders out, just so that we can pull that male, that, this sort of like a stream and energetic stream, particularly because you're having a song.

55:14 [SPEAKER_01]: I will confess, I feel some fear around inviting his energy into our dynamic of this. [SPEAKER_02]: These dangerous, you don't do it. [SPEAKER_02]: So here's, you never throw yourself in front of a moving train. [SPEAKER_02]: First thing I'm going to say, yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: And if our parents put us in danger, then we don't do it. [SPEAKER_02]: We need the break. [SPEAKER_02]: But if it's just that we have a trigger because he's a narcissist or we have a trigger [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's more than that. [SPEAKER_01]: There is an element of a lack of a real safety and then that's different. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's different. [SPEAKER_02]: Most people I work with were not talking about an element of safety. [SPEAKER_00]: Well, and Mark, just to be clear, really for our audience more than anything else, I think one of the things that we think about as men, maybe this is not true universally, but I think one of the things that we think about as men is that the only danger that actually exist in the world is the physical danger.

56:16 [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not going to hit you, but that's not, that's not the fullness of safety that you mean. [SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, I'm inserting myself in this just because maybe I'm wrong, but I don't sense Brian's dad dangerous physically. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't feel like no, but he has a different lack of safety beyond the physical realm that that needs to be considered. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, there's like a sickness, a sickness that I don't want infecting my wife, my family, this, like, it's, it's nuanced and there's, you know, when, you know, I really appreciate those.

56:58 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to give you a nuanced answer and it's a two tier answer. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: That which we push away. [SPEAKER_02]: reemerges what what we resist for cysts yeah and other way of saying particularly way of being whoa i want that sickness that's in the family here um in a way if we push it reemerges so the dot so if that's gonna be given a place now the nuances is what kind of place [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, no right now. [SPEAKER_02]: Hey, son, let's draw a picture. [SPEAKER_02]: I have a dad. [SPEAKER_02]: We don't seem a lot. [SPEAKER_02]: But let's draw a picture. [SPEAKER_02]: My dad's very much in our family. [SPEAKER_02]: He's our dad.

57:38 [SPEAKER_02]: And here's his picture. [SPEAKER_02]: And let's draw a little girl playing together. [SPEAKER_02]: Even though we don't see him much, you know, me, my dad, I want you to drop it. [SPEAKER_02]: You get the idea that he's very much part of the family. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: And the behavior that is that we try to push away, we try to give it a place by acknowledging it and doing it differently. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: I actually got a tattoo a couple years ago. [SPEAKER_01]: After my dad and I had our final final falling out. [SPEAKER_01]: And on this tattoo, I wasn't really thinking about him at all. [SPEAKER_01]: And it's a pretty elaborate tattoo. [SPEAKER_01]: And I only realized a few months after I got the tattoo, there's this one little symbol that I put on the tattoo that doesn't have that much meaning to me.

58:26 [SPEAKER_01]: And I was unconscious about it. [SPEAKER_01]: And I realized after the fact, that's a symbol. [SPEAKER_01]: That's, that symbol means a lot to my father. [SPEAKER_01]: And I was really glad, actually, I was really glad that that got incorporated into this tattoo or my body because I really, I'm not trying to reject my, there were so many beautiful gifts that he gave me as a man to tell them that I'm telling that I'm going to talk about the three magic sentences right here that I talk about a workbook, throw them away or use them. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: If your dance unsafe, I get the boundary. [SPEAKER_02]: Do not make your family unsafe. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: If it's because of a charge or a trigger, work the charge or the trigger.

59:09 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: The magic sentences that I teach are how to repair a relationship with a parent. [SPEAKER_02]: When the parent is we're estranged or there's not, you know, a desire to make much contact. [SPEAKER_02]: We can do it through text. [SPEAKER_02]: We can do it through an email. [SPEAKER_02]: We can actually say these words out [SPEAKER_02]: Now that's not true, he knows you're not close. [SPEAKER_02]: But imagine the effect of your dad hearing a sentence like this. [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm not just talking to you, Brian, I'm talking to old listeners here. [SPEAKER_02]: Like dad, I like that we're getting close or dad.

59:52 [SPEAKER_02]: I like that we're close. [SPEAKER_02]: And a father knows that the not close will go, he thinks we're close. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, and all of a sudden, something in him moves toward close. [SPEAKER_02]: I'll give you another one. [SPEAKER_02]: I'll give you another one. [SPEAKER_02]: Dad, I'm sorry I've been so distant in the future. [SPEAKER_02]: I promise not to be. [SPEAKER_02]: Feel the effect of it. [SPEAKER_02]: Don't need me to do anything different. [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, I call these magic sentences because they create energy. [SPEAKER_02]: And the third one is just what you said a minute ago. [SPEAKER_02]: He had a lot of beautiful things and gifts. [SPEAKER_02]: Watch this sentence. [SPEAKER_02]: Even if you do it through a text or an email, that you're a good father.

1:00:33 [SPEAKER_02]: I remember when I was six, eight, three, nine, and you blah, blah, blah, blah. [SPEAKER_02]: You don't have to do any more than that. [SPEAKER_02]: You could send it as a letter. [SPEAKER_02]: Dad, your good father, I remember was six and you took me to Little League. [SPEAKER_02]: I remember when I was nine and I broke my leg and you got me that ice cream. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, back it up was a memory. [SPEAKER_02]: And then let the effect of it happen in that camp. [SPEAKER_02]: While you do your life. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I'm not saying you do any of these by said these mostly for the listeners, but they are magic one thing that I've realized is you know my father still alive and I know there's a reconciliation coming one day it could come over one of our gravestones [SPEAKER_01]: But I know that, you know, again, there's a lot of, without going into the story and details of it.

1:01:31 [SPEAKER_01]: I know that there's another chapter yet to be written in our relationship. [SPEAKER_01]: Again, whether it's between two actual living humans or it's between a human and a spirit or whatever. [SPEAKER_01]: I see that. [SPEAKER_01]: And I just appreciate your giving me some things to think about. [SPEAKER_01]: Because I know that when I first found out I was gonna have a son market fucked me up for a couple days. [SPEAKER_01]: Even after all the work I've done, man, it fucked me up for a couple of days, because what I realized is I could only hear the words my son in my father's voice, and there was still, I couldn't say my son without hearing it, and without using his voice. [SPEAKER_01]: And so I could ask you one of the reasons I want you even possible, [SPEAKER_02]: to let that reconciliation happen sooner than later because I see the pattern of an estranged dad over here repeating the strange met here and is the last thing we want.

1:02:31 [SPEAKER_02]: Sometimes this patterns play out, for example, I'm going to say you the words, if my father goes without me, I unconsciously could go without my son, because these are systemic patterns. [SPEAKER_02]: If my father's out of communication with me, I could be out of communication with my son. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_02]: I'll give you an example. [SPEAKER_02]: It's a crazy example, but I want you to hear it in a crazy way. [SPEAKER_02]: I'm working with the statistic kids family and I'm allowed to tell the story the mother has given me permission.

1:03:12 [SPEAKER_02]: So the boy's name is Elliott and he doesn't communicate. [SPEAKER_02]: He doesn't speak. [SPEAKER_02]: And the mother, so I'm working with her and I said, tell me about your dad. [SPEAKER_02]: She was, oh, I don't [SPEAKER_02]: And I say... [SPEAKER_02]: And your son doesn't speak, right? [SPEAKER_02]: Because, yeah, tell you what, why don't you consider seeing your dad, or I haven't seen him since I'm six months old. [SPEAKER_02]: I said, I get it. [SPEAKER_02]: Why don't you consider reconciling and see what happens? [SPEAKER_02]: And she doesn't listen to me, but she's driving the car, Ellie, it's in the back seat.

1:03:56 [SPEAKER_02]: And she goes, Ellie, it, would you like to see David? [SPEAKER_02]: And all of a sudden he goes, yes, and the kid doesn't speak. [SPEAKER_02]: No, wow, she turns around and says, would you like to see Steven? [SPEAKER_02]: No answer. [SPEAKER_02]: Would you like to see Bob? [SPEAKER_02]: No answer. [SPEAKER_02]: Would you like to see David? [SPEAKER_02]: Yes. [SPEAKER_02]: She brings the little boy to the estranged father and recognizes that the father is an amazing painter. [SPEAKER_02]: And she says, well, Dad, you did this to my magas. [SPEAKER_02]: No, that's the story because history's written by the winners. [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't do that. [SPEAKER_02]: History's written by the winners.

1:04:37 [SPEAKER_02]: No, I loved your mom. [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't want to break up. [SPEAKER_02]: She gets a whole other version. [SPEAKER_02]: All of a sudden, the kid in his grandfather painting together. [SPEAKER_02]: couple months later I get these postcards with beautiful art and I write her back and I go while your dad's a great artist. [SPEAKER_02]: She goes, that's not my dad. [SPEAKER_02]: Those are my sons. [SPEAKER_02]: Vive your whole boy. [SPEAKER_02]: And he's, no, he's painting. [SPEAKER_02]: and talking. [SPEAKER_02]: So, you know, it's just one of those ways in which, um, if it all possible to keep the pathway clear, and if he's not safe, do not, but if there's a way in which you could keep something going, like just through emails or texts, a dad thinking about you.

1:05:24 [SPEAKER_02]: A dad, um, I'm going to keep writing you. [SPEAKER_02]: A dad, you know, um, I just had a son, you know, son, then we don't have to see each other, but in your soul, you keep the pathway open. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for that. [SPEAKER_01]: No, really. [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for that. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Ah, I just can breathe. [SPEAKER_01]: Breathe that in and let that, let that reverberate and see what that inspires, um, mark, wow, man. [SPEAKER_01]: What an incredible time with you, just really moved and touched. [SPEAKER_01]: I love the work that you're doing. [SPEAKER_00]: We didn't even get to talk about constellations. [SPEAKER_01]: I got to do a family constellation with a dear friend of mine.

1:06:06 [SPEAKER_01]: One of the most profound things I've ever experienced. [SPEAKER_00]: Can we have you back to do an episode on family constellation work? [SPEAKER_00]: Of course. [SPEAKER_00]: course. [SPEAKER_00]: Let's do it. [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I like working with you guys. [SPEAKER_02]: This was fun. [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you. [SPEAKER_02]: You know, and it's really, you know, the way we went deep, this is probably the deepest podcast I think I've ever done, but it's reflective of who you guys are and how deep you're willing to go and then how deep your audience can go, which I can feel kind of out there, because of what you guys are doing, sharing your vulnerability, your stories. [SPEAKER_02]: So, [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't expect to go to his deep eyes. [SPEAKER_02]: I expect we'd be on the surface talking about epigenetics. [SPEAKER_02]: And here we are, healing fathers and, you know, yeah, I know, I know.

1:06:51 [SPEAKER_00]: I will say one of the things that I believe our listeners are constantly asking themselves is ultimately related to, you know, what am I willing to heal inside myself so that the people I love experience something different, something new, something [SPEAKER_00]: that wouldn't be available otherwise if I wasn't willing to do my work. [SPEAKER_00]: People don't listen to podcasts like this unless they're willing to do work. [SPEAKER_00]: And you're being a beacon of light and hope in the world. [SPEAKER_00]: And just like we can't thank you enough for your presence here today, for your wisdom, for your heart, for people in this world. [SPEAKER_00]: So thank you so very much, Mark.

1:07:32 [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you, you know, this is I'm just going to say one more thing. [SPEAKER_02]: This is why I wrote the work book. [SPEAKER_02]: I can't work with millions of people one-on-one, so my editor said, all right, you got to write the workbook, which is like working with you, which where I pulled those three magic sentences out of there in my workbook. [SPEAKER_02]: I updated my book last year, so it was current with all the new science and new exercises. [SPEAKER_02]: And then I wrote the workbook, which is like going deep deep deep in [SPEAKER_02]: I had to do what you're saying, Tate. [SPEAKER_02]: I had to find a way to work with the world. [SPEAKER_02]: And I feel like I achieved it with that.

1:08:15 [SPEAKER_01]: And people can get your book and the workbook. [SPEAKER_01]: It didn't start with you and the official it didn't start with you workbook thing. [SPEAKER_01]: I am Amazon anywhere they get books. [SPEAKER_01]: Where? [SPEAKER_01]: Every year. [SPEAKER_01]: We'll link it in the show notes as well. [SPEAKER_01]: Mar, I'd rather thank you so much. [SPEAKER_01]: So well, really, man. [SPEAKER_01]: Pleasure to talk to both of you. [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you. [SPEAKER_01]: Like Ross.