HealthyGamerGG - Your Friends Think You Are Too Needy

Episode Date: July 31, 2022

Dr. K dives into friendships, discussing the cycle of abandonment, the two-way street of relationships, catching your thoughts, not letting your mind squash your achievements and more! Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/healthygamergg/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Because for seven years, they haven't had access to that. And then they go to this new place where suddenly, like, I can eat whatever I want to. Like, what's the catch? Like, how are you trying to trick me? Is this a scam in some way? You're just saying that today, but of course you're going to take it away. Hello? Hello?

I'm a little bit nervous, but you can call me Yella. Yela? Yeah. Welcome, Yela. I'm just scrolling again. The prompt was. what do you want to work on in yourself the most? And my answer was, I want to be less dependent on others and lose the always present feeling that

friends could backstep or abandon me. I want to figure out what matters to me and be content without the approval of my friends. I want to be able to help myself like I have my friends. So, okay, so you want to be less dependent on other. people. You want to be able to help yourself, like you help your friends. And you said something after being less dependent, something about constantly thinking about something?

Yeah, thinking about that people could abandon me like. Help me understand that a little bit. That sounds like a, how can I say this? It sounds very stressful to have friends that your mind is constantly thinking that way. Yeah, it is. I think it just roots a lot in insecurities. And a lot of the time, I don't have many friends, but just if people don't text me back a few days,

or just if there's a... if it's not like there isn't a balance between the amount of communication between each other. I sometimes just get the feeling that I did something wrong or people don't want to hang out with me a lot more. And yeah, it's just always, it stresses me out a lot that because I have so few friends, friends that maybe I can lose them as well. Okay, so what I'm hearing, Yala, is that first of all, it sounds like you can't afford to lose many friends. Right? So each one becomes more and more important.

Yeah. The second thing that I'm noticing is that if there's ever a question mark, about a relationship. Like, let's say you text your friend and your friend doesn't text you back in two or three days, that even though there are a lot of reasons why your friend may not text you back,

that your mind tends to think about some really scary stuff. Exactly. And mostly scary stuff about things that put me down. Can you give me an example of what kind of thoughts your mind has? Just a simple example. like if I meet with another person and I'm always after I meet with another person, I feel really attached to them and the next day I text a lot and if they for some reason don't have time on the next day and I think that maybe I said something wrong or that it just wasn't fun when we hang out the day before and Um, yeah. Okay.

And what would you, so what would you like to change if your life was different? If I could give you a magic wand and you could change yourself into something else, what would you change yourself into? Honestly, it's just, uh, it's just, I think it's just my mind that makes a lot of these, uh, um, assumptions. and that I really know that those aren't really what's happening, but they're really taking up a lot of my energy and stressing me out and I just want to live without them.

Okay. So I'd love to try to help you with that today, Yela, and I think I can, but I'm going to ask a couple other questions first. Is that okay? Yeah. So can you also tell me, Yala, Ballpark, how old are you? I am 33. Okay.

So do you have a sense of where this fear that your friends are going to abandon or backstab you comes from? I have some. I'm not sure. I think one reason is that, of course, there were situations in the past. where something like this happens. And also, I, for my part, Ben and a lot of my friends, just because at one point,

I wasn't happy with, it was just a lot of friends going out, partying and I wasn't able to control it and needed to really take a step. back from that French group. And another time when I really had a depressive episode, and I really couldn't, became really alone, didn't leave my house. And that's when I really, like, abandoned all of my friends that were left.

yeah okay and okay so it does sound like you've had a couple of very real experiences where relationships that were important to you fell apart in some way yeah and let me ask you when you let's say you meet someone and as you said you feel attached and then you text them a lot the next day or message them a lot the next day what happens after that uh I don't have really, just because I really just now, I'm really getting back into socializing. I don't have that much experiences. Okay. So when you say you get attached to someone, what does that mean?

I just want to hang out a lot with them. Great. Thank you. So let me ask you one or two questions. So what about that makes you want to hang out with them? How do you feel when you're with them that makes you want more? Just the feelings that I have when I'm alone that people will abandon me are not there because they're right in front of me. And I can see that they're with me, they're having fun with me,

and I don't have to stress about if they really want to spend time with me because they're spending time with me. I see. So what I'm almost hearing is that there's almost a constant voice of doubt in your mind. that people don't want to spend time with you. You may not have friends. They'd rather have fun with someone else. And when you actually spend time with people, that voice actually quiets down

because you get a lot of feedback from your eyes, from your ears, that, okay, this person is having a good time. We are having fun. So like that part of you, the fear of abandonment quiets down when you're actually with someone. Yeah.

Sure, sometimes when I'm out with something, there's also some small little thoughts that I think, are they having fun right now? Is this really a good time right now? But it's not so severe as when I'm alone and don't have constant feedback. Okay. Yela, anything else you want to mention? I was going to share some thoughts with you, but I just wanted to make sure that. we covered what you wanted to share? No.

Okay. No, I'm good. So I do think that this can be managed, but I think it's going to be hard. So I think the basic problem is that your solution is actually creating your problem. Okay? So I'll explain what that means. So you have this fear of abandonment. And when you spend time with someone and they,

and that fear and you feel better what do you think that's actually doing to the fear of abandonment? The more time you spend with them, do you feel reassured? Yeah, but also I don't know how to put this, but you said earlier that

I have the feeling that I can't afford to lose a friend and if I spend more time with somebody, they get more valuable to me because... Yep, we'll get to that in a second. But what I want to kind of point out, so I'm going to share with you a story. This is a story.

If you've watched Dr. Kay's guide, you may have heard this before. So when we have anxiety, there are certain things that we can do that will decrease our anxiety over time or certain things that we can do that will calm down our anxiety, but will actually increase it over time.

So I'll give you an example. example. So I have a family member who's very, very anxious about their kid's safety. And so what they do is if the kid isn't home at 8 p.m., they'll start messaging their child. Hey, are you okay? Is everything okay? I'm worried about you. You said you were going to be home at 8. It's now 803 and you're not home. Where are you? You need to pick up the phone. And until the child picks up the phone, the parent is very, very anxious. And when the child picks up the phone and the child says, no, no, no, I'm fine. I just stopped to get gas. I'm five minutes away. The next day, the parent, when the child is five minutes late, again, that day, the child, the parent isn't confident. Their anxiety actually comes right back. Does that make sense?

No, I didn't question. Okay. So this is where, all right, let me give you another example. So this is the one from Dr. Case Guide. So I was once working with someone who was afraid that their boyfriend or fiancé was cheating on them. So what they did is they were like, okay, like, I have no reason to believe this, but they had been cheated on in the past. So they were concerned that their fiancé was cheating on them. And so eventually what they did is they checked their fiancé's phone without their knowledge.

They opened up their phone, checked their text messages, and found that nothing was going on that was like, there was no cheating going on, no, you know, naked pictures or anything like that. And so they felt better for a couple of days. But then the thoughts came back and then they checked the phone again. And once again, they didn't see any evidence of cheating. But the more time they went on, the more they found that they started checking their phone every single day. Does that make sense? Yeah.

So that I get the urge to increase the frequency. see when I see other people. Yep. So there's an interesting thing that happens with anxiety where sometimes giving into the anxiety actually makes it grow. And the way that we give into it is by actually like, you know, reassuring it in some way. So if you're terrified that people don't like you and you spend time with them, what you're

actually doing is feeding that anxiety because you're telling the anxiety, see, see, see, look, if you're worried about it, let me go spend time with someone and then you'll see. But then the anxiety never becomes confident. It just needs that constant external reassurance. Does that make sense? Yeah. I need to be able to reassure myself without seeing them. Absolutely.

Right? And this is the tricky thing because when you go and spend time with someone, half of your mind is still thinking about the anxiety. It's satisfied, but it's not spending time with the person, right? You're thinking about what the person thinks. You're thinking about, oh, thank God, I'm not abandoned. Thank God that this person likes me and enjoys spending time with me. But you're still thinking about the anxiety.

Does that make sense? Yeah, to an extent. Like, I'm still having a good time most of time. Yep. You're also having a good time, but still a part of your mind, it's not like you're all having a good time. A part of your mind is thinking about, oh, good. This, the fact that I'm having a good time means I don't need to be worried. Yeah. But the problem is that even when you do that, we sort of see that pattern is that you get attached to them, right? Why do you get attached to them after one day? It's because they fulfill your need in terms of that anxiety. So you're not even getting attached to a human. you're getting attached to a source of soothing for your anxiety. Does that make sense? Yes. And then the next day goes around and what do you do?

You start messaging them a lot because you need your fix again, right? You almost become addicted to that relationship. And the reason you get addicted, why do we form addictions? Because they make our negative feelings go away. Yeah. Right? Does that, you following me? Yes.

So there are a couple things. Any questions so far? No. Okay. Go ahead. So next thing is that, well, first thing that I want you to do is the next day, you need to really recognize what behaviors are coming from your anxiety. Whether they're good or bad or whatever. You need to recognize, okay, imagine that you have this hungry beast inside you.

which is your fear of abandonment. And when you send that first message, where is that message coming from? Is it coming from you or is it coming from the hungry beast? Because chance or if you're sending a bunch of messages the next day because you want to hang out again, I think that's going to be coming from the hungry beast. And the tricky thing is that that may drive people away. Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

And then what happens? Once you drive someone away by texting them too much, the hungry beast. gets even hungrier. And now it says, oh my God, another person has abandoned you, Yela. We can't have that happen again. And the next time you go out and you meet someone new, the hungry beast is saying, don't screw it up, don't screw it up, don't screw it up, or they won't abandon you, or they'll abandon you again.

And so then you listen to that and you're like, okay, I promise, I'm not going to screw it up. I'm going to be nice. I'm going to be fun. We're going to have a great time. See, I'm making them laugh. See, they like me. It's okay. They're not going to abandon me, hungry beast.

And then the hungry beast is like, okay. And then the next day comes around, the hungry beast is like message them. If they had such a good time, they'll see you again. I'm tired of feeling this way. And the one thing that can make this feeling go away is if when you spend time with them. So then the tricky thing happens. When a relationship becomes about meeting your emotional needs, that's when the other person no longer exists in the relationship.

Because now the reason that you're texting them is, because you're tired of feeling alone. And now you're placing the burden, the emotional burden of your loneliness on this person. Yeah, of course. Sometimes I really feel like I'm very selfish because when I tell others how I feel, it's just like I'm voicing my needs,

my things that I need and even like mostly I don't know what I was no no it's a good point so this is the thing so it is being selfish but here's the key thing in a good relationship you're allowed to be selfish you're allowed to be selfish 50% of the time the other 50% of the time it's your job to be selfless Yeah. Right? So I don't blame you for wanting, like, you have those emotional needs. It's just you need to be a little bit careful about letting them dictate your interactions with other people.

So I know it sounds very, like, so some concrete advice one is it's okay for you to hang out with someone. But the next day, you know, I would not send them a bunch of messages. Yeah, like I recognize the next day problem. already and like sometimes I try to just not text them but as soon as they text me it's like I text them like five things at once and it's like okay now they've texted me now I can now I have a free pass to text them how much I want exactly so that's all the stuff in your head right so now the hungry beast has learned if we text them first they may abandon us.

But the second they text us, it's like, okay, like, um, gom, gom, give it to me, give it to me, give it to me, give it to me. Yeah. Right? And so, so, and the reason we're getting this far, Yala, by the way, is because you, it's clear to me that you've figured a lot of this stuff out, right? You even told me, without me even asking, yeah, then I feel like I have to text them the next day and I text them too much.

So now what you've got to do is like take it one step further. And I think the key thing is that pay attention to that need. within you and try to figure out, okay, like now I can text them. What's telling me that I need to text them? Even if you can, that's fine. But where is that need coming from? It's coming from like this part of me that feels incredibly alone. Yeah. And then I love what you said is that I wish I could be for myself what I can be for other people. You said something like that, right? I can, I wish I could help myself the way that I help other people. Yeah. And so, So what would you tell a friend who was in your situation?

The first thing would be probably like, don't worry that much. But that also, I don't know, it invalidates my feelings and emotions. So I'm not sure if that's the right thing to say. But yeah. Yeah. So good point. So we can help you a little bit concretely there. So this is what I'd say to you, and you should say this to yourself,

that I understand why you feel so afraid, and just because you feel afraid doesn't actually make it real. Yeah. Right? So if I've been bitten by a dog and I see a dog the next day and I get scared, my fear is completely valid, even though the dog is not dangerous. So this is where you don't want to invalidate your perspective, but you also don't want to live your life wholly based on that perspective.

So what I would really do is have a conversation with yourself and say, okay, how are we going to navigate this? Because on the one hand, I completely understand why you're terrified, because after all, you're me. On the other hand, if we live our life being controlled by this feeling, I don't think we're going to create the healthy relationships. that we really want. So what can we do in terms of texting?

Like, I don't think we should send them six different texts. What would you really want to send them? What do you really feel like you want to, like, because it sounds like maybe getting together with them is really useful, like you really enjoyed that. So maybe we can send them one or two texts, one about how we had a lot of fun yesterday. And a second one about, hey, maybe we can get together sometime soon. How does that sound? Yeah.

Right? So it's kind of weird, but like you almost want to have a conversation with yourself where you're not stupid, you're not crazy. The fear of abandonment is absolutely there for a reason. And also, we don't want our life to be dictated by that fear. Because the problem is when the fear of abandonment controls our behavior, we actually end up driving a lot of people away. Yeah, and it's just not driving people away.

At the moment, I'm really... I have fear of getting to know new people because they would just stress me out more because it's another person that I want to keep, or most of them I want to keep in my life. And I have to struggle with myself that I keep them. Yep. And that's really dangerous, right? Because I mean, I think some of this is maybe a translation issue, but, you know, when you use the word keep, there's a certain possessiveness to that. Right. And what I'd love for you to be able to do one day, Yela, is recognize that you bring value to any relationship.

And also that that may not be the value that some people are looking for, which is actually okay. just because someone doesn't want to spend time with you doesn't mean that you aren't worth spending time with. Yeah, that makes sense. But it can be hard for that to sink in. When that really sinks in, you'll be completely better. But it'll take time to get there. Yeah, for sure.

Especially if you have like nearly to know friends, you want to um you're glad for everyone that spends time with you and um shows interest in you and um yeah yeah and that's that's where the attachment kind of comes in because i think all this gets you know if you're if you're thirsty and in the desert and there's you finally find water you're going to be very possessive of that water and so i think the challenge that you face is that you genuinely have a need which you is so severe that you're not going to want to let any opportunity for getting that need met. You don't want to let it go.

And that creates problems. Can I share a story with you, Yela? Yeah, so. So, you know, sometimes when I worked as a psychiatrist, I would work with kids who were in orphanages or foster homes. Do you know what that means? Yeah. Okay. Like people but no parents.

Right. So they lived in this home, right, where there's like one caretaker and there's 30 kids. kids. And oftentimes there wasn't enough food. So, for example, like the meals were like very limited. There wasn't a whole lot in terms of snacks. You know, it's like one person kind of cooking, and they're also trying to like money, so they skimp on meals and things like that. And so one of the kids that was in there ended up getting adopted by a family. So they moved to their new home, right, where their parents are there. And the parents feed them whatever they want. So like, or not whatever, but they have meals and there's a pantry and they've got snacks in there.

And they tell the kid, you know, like, you can come and you can get whatever food you want. And the parents kept on finding ants in the child's room. And so they were confused about why they're ants there. And what they see is that like there are portions of food from dinner and snacks and things like that that have been like wrapped in paper towels and like kept in drawers, kept under the bed that the child. was storing food in their room, half-eaten food. So when the parents, they eat dinner and there'd be some bread, and the child would like take the bread, wrap it in a napkin and put it in their pocket. And then they'd go and they'd put that food kind of in the drawer. Does that make sense? Are you following me? Yeah. So the parents come to me and they're like, we think the kid has some problem

because like he's like hoarding. Like they thought he was a hoarder where he's just like not letting stuff go, it's causing problems and things like that. And that's where like, you know, we spent some time talking to the kid. The kid was like seven. So, you know, I talked to him some. But we sort of realized that this child basically has an insecurity where they've gone hungry for the first seven years of their life. And so when they've got hungry, they've created certain kinds of adaptations to survive. But those adaptations aren't really healthy, right? even though there's like a bunch of friends, I mean, sorry, a bunch of food in the pantry, the child still for their own safety has to like take the food and store it because they don't know,

they don't know how long this magical pantry full of food is going to last. Because for seven years, they haven't had access to that. And then they go to this new place where suddenly like I can eat whatever I want to. Like, what's the catch? Like, how are you trying to trick me? Is this a scam in some way? You're just saying that today, but of course you're going to take it away. And so in that same way, I almost see an element of this in you, that you're so hungry for friendship that you're going to hold on to whatever you get your hands on.

Even though you don't realize that, Yela, there are hundreds, thousands of people out there who you can form friendships with. Yeah, but it's not only like I'm afraid of that the friends will go away. It's like I worked a lot on myself like personal development in the last year. And right now I have the feeling like I can put so much energy into relationships and I have like to feel like there will be times when when I'm will be worse off again and don't have that much energy and like I fear that when when when that they that they comes that that that I can put that much energy and And like, then they will abandon me. So it feels like I need to, yeah, bond like extra hard.

Yes, of course. You don't know how long that pantry is going to be open to you. You better, you better get as much food as you can now. You have to bond extra hard, right? Because in the future, it's not going to be possible. Yeah. Like, so. So, I know.

Yeah. So I get you. So what do you think that's doing to your desperation? The neediness. It becomes bigger. Absolutely. As the need becomes bigger, the attachment becomes bigger. As the attachment becomes bigger, you're going to send six messages because the need is that much greater.

I can't afford to just send four. It needs to be five. It needs to be six. I can't let this person slip away. It's all the same thing, Yala. Yeah. And I know it's really hard. That's why, like, I'm not, I can't argue with that part of you, right?

If I said, oh, Yela, you've got 40 years to make friends. That part of you is not going to listen. Even though technically it's like you've got your whole life to make friends. Yeah, but making friends without them. Yeah, but like you. Keeping friends as hard. Yeah, right? So, so, but that's your experience.

So for me to say you've got 40 years to make friends, like, that doesn't matter because in your experience, the time is running out. And that's where like, really, it's, it's hard detachment, man. That's where it's like, okay, if the time is running out, it's going to run out. And if I'm going to be lonely, I'm going to be lonely. But in this moment, I have an opportunity to spend time with one person and I'm going to make the most of today. And interestingly enough, when you start thinking that way and you start not worrying

about whether this person will be available tomorrow, a week from now, a month from now, a year from now, oh my God, if this person, if I don't act nice enough today, this person won't be my friend, and then two years from now I'm not going to have any energy to make friends. And then I'll be 35, and then I'll be 41, and then I'll be 46. And if I'm 46 and I have no friends, then no one's going to want to be my friend. And all of these thoughts will come bubbling up. But the core thing is still, when you sit with someone, they can't fix all of those problems for you.

Yeah. But to some extent, I also feel like sometimes I feel like maybe it's better for myself to be alone because it's so much harder when I engage with other people that sometimes I just think being alone would just make things a lot easier. Oh, definitely. Right? If only you could be content in being alone. Well, I think I can, but I don't know.

Yeah. Yellow, my heart goes out to you, my friend. I think that it's, how can I say this? One of the most horrible adaptations that a human being can have is to be okay without something that they need. And so the humans, humans are resilient. You'll learn how to be alone. But I really hope that you don't have a life where you're forced to learn how to survive with loneliness. I hope so, too.

And I think the key thing here is just acknowledging every moment that those thoughts are telling you to do something. And as best as you can, resist it a little bit. And the one thing that I can tell you is that the more you resist it, the easier it, the easier it will be to resist. Where in the same way that you feed it every day and it grows, the more that you let your anxiety go hungry, you don't give into it by sending the text message, it'll actually start to shrink. It'll be a painful shrinkage because any time it's shrinking, it's hungry and it's not getting

what it needs. And it's going to like give you hell. But it'll eventually shrink and shrink and shrink and shrink and shrink and then eventually it'll disappear. Yeah. It's hard because it's always on my mind. I want to make sure. And in the morning, I think about it. Throughout the day, I always think that I need the reassurance from others. Yeah. So it certainly sounds hard. It sounds like it's a very dominating part of your mind. Yes.

And it sounds, honestly, it almost sounds like torture to me. At the moment, it really feels like this. And it really made me also doubt, doubt what I did over the last year, because I, this feeling is new to me. Like I was, like you said, I was content with being alone. I was miserable in other ways, but yeah, it's really hard right now. I hear that, man. I'm so sorry. I don't know if I've been able to help you so far, but what do you think?

Yeah, a little bit. Honestly, it feels good, but I haven't really. really taking it all into my mind. But yeah. No, I mean, just if I can disagree there, I think you did take it into your mind. I think it's just it's just not enough, right? Yeah. What I'm really, the more that I listen to you now, I'm just noticing how big the mountain

you have to climb really is. Oh, it's big. And I don't know what else to say besides. even if it feels kind of hopeless to you, it doesn't feel quite as hopeless to me, but at the same time, I also acknowledge that you know it better than I do. Right?

So even if you do feel hopeless, I think it's actually like okay to feel that way because you're the one who's had to struggle with this. Yeah. And if you can, I'd say, you know, sit with that hopelessness and don't necessarily give him. into it. But it's very easy for me to say, oh, no, there's lots of opportunities to make friends. Believe

in yourself, Yalla. Believe in yourself and make friends and everything would be okay when like, what I'm really noticing is that it's very heavy what you carry around. Yeah. It feels like I'm at the moment climbing the mountain and like at the half halfway point, it's like it gets so much harder and I think maybe I should just roll down back into the valley and go to sleep. I don't think you should do that, but I think you've earned yourself a break. Right? So you've climbed halfway up the mountain. I'm surprised you said halfway. I was expecting I just started climbing the mountain. But I... No, I did a lot of other things besides social things. Like I, I, I, I did.

I lost 40 kilo. I don't know what that's in. That's awesome. American units, but I improved my health by a lot. Like a year ago, I wasn't able to really leave my house that much. And yeah. The fuck? Yeah, but it's hard right now. I know that I did a lot of stuff and like my mind always tells

It tells me, I know that it's really awesome, awesome what I did, but there's always these thought in my mind that it only made it worse, or it's way harder now. And sometimes I have the feeling why did I even start? Because maybe I was just more content playing video games all day and just not having a life than having a life of struggle. Wait, Yellow, you weren't leaving the house a year ago and you lost 40 kilos? Yeah. What do you think about that? It's nice.

It's awesome. Do you really believe that it's awesome? Yeah. Like, yeah. but it's also like it's halfway the mountain and really awesome

is when I'm up on the mountain Okay one last thing I'm going to share with you because apparently you're a Giga Chad too you just pretended to be a noob this whole time so I don't want to devalue your friendship struggles

but there's one other thing that I want you to understand about the mind Yeah sometimes when there's a part of ourselves who hates us. Okay? So when we get abandoned by people,

what do we start thinking about ourselves? If we are not lovable? Absolutely. And then if you start putting your life together, what is that part of your mind going to do? I don't know. It's going to panic. And it's going to start launching nuclear weapons.

Because this whole time, we've built my life on the idea that I'm unlovable and I'm a piece of crap. And then if you start putting your life together, that part of your mind will fight you with every weapon it's got. Because suddenly, you're about to, this whole thing exists because you are worthless. That's its lifeblood.

It's its energy. And if you start having confidence for yourself, it's going to fight you as hard as it can. Does that make any sense to you? a little bit so what you're saying is that it wants me to have no confidence it wants to stay

yes right what it wants to do is it's trying to convince you roll down the mountain and go to sleep in the valley like what the fuck man you're halfway up and it's telling you to throw away all of your work

it's telling you to go back to where you were a year ago yeah that's really I don't want to be there. But this is what you've got to understand is that that part of you wants to survive too. So there's one thing that I'm going to share with you before we kind of wrap up because we've got to get to another caller. So one thing I've noticed is when people put their lives together and they really don't believe in themselves.

There's something that I call the rubber band of self-development. So it's like I'm tied to a tree and I'm tied by a rubber band. And the harder I walk away from the tree, the rubber band snaps me back even harder. So I'll run and I'll run and I'll run. And then I'll get like 10 feet away from the tree or three meters away from the tree, four meters away from the tree. And as I get four meters away from the tree, the rubber band's elasticity pulls me back. And I come sliding back to where I started. And I've seen this time and time again with people who start to put their lives together.

You get out of your depression. You clean your house. you apply for a job, you go to work, you stay there for the first two weeks, you get hired, two more weeks go by, and then suddenly you're like, something panics, and then you stop showing up at work. You stay at home, you play video games, you eat a bunch of junk food, and then you go back to your misery. Yeah, these things happen, but the band gets more, it's easier the next time when you get back. Are you giving me words of hope and encouragement about continuing to move forward?

Because it's going to get easier next time? Yeah, sometimes you move backwards. But it's okay because it's easier the next time. All right, if you say so. I made the experience. You had something like if an alcoholic first gets sober, he's like sober for one day, the next time he's sober for two weeks, and then he's over for a little months. Like it gets better every time.

You can't get it all right the first time. Okay. Do you think that applies to making friends too? Yeah, but it's hard every time it doesn't work out. Okay, so Yella, this is what I want you to do. you said that you want to help yourself the way that you help other people. Yeah. All you need to do is go watch the VOT of this conversation.

And what you just did over the last five minutes is you helped like everyone who's listening. Okay. So I think you're going to be fine. I think it's going to be hard. I think you've had a lot of suffering pile up in your life. and the weight of that is very heavy. And you wouldn't be able to carry it unless you lost that 40 kilos.

But without those 40 kilos, you could carry this crap and keep moving, buddy. I hope so, yeah. That's all we can ask for, right? Yeah. Good luck to you, my friend. Yeah. Thank you so much for having me.

You showed up here having lost 40 kilos We're like a shot in a year ago I'll take I mean I'll take credit for what I do But I think like honestly 95% of it 99% of you has been you bro Okay Yeah Thanks for giving me the opportunity to present myself I guess

Thank you very much Yalla Okay Take care See you, thanks. What? I don't even know what the hell happened there. I mean, I It is what it is.

Like, I don't even know what to say. Like, so clearly, Yala has had a lot of stuff not go their way. Right? And also, they're absolutely crushing them.

And who knows? I, I don't know what to say. Like, this is why, like, it's hard to describe. So in a live conversation, like, sometimes these things happen. So when I work with people, right, we see this in coaches, too. Well, like, work with people. Like, we don't know exactly what we're doing.

We don't really know how it works. But, like, I just don't know how to say it. Like, this is why we started this program. Like, this is why we have live interaction with other human beings. Because you can spend a lot in time with someone. And it just feels like nothing's working. And then suddenly, like, something weird happens and then you start thinking about things in a different way.

I don't know how to explain this. You just have to see it. And like, this is the cool thing is that this can happen consistently. It's all about what's up here. The thing is, it's just weird, man. I'm blown away by that guy. One piece addict is saying, his abandoned fears don't get fixed by him losing weight, though, well said. right? So the fear of abandonment is different. The thing, though, is that the fear of abandonment

is rooted in self-worth. Right? So, like, where does the fear abandonment come from? It comes from this idea that I'm not worth other people sticking around. Putting your life together, climbing halfway up the mountain. He's the one who said it was halfway. And losing 40 kilos absolutely affects self-worth. And then even at the end, when I ask him, well, like, but how do you feel about he's like every time you you lose ground like it gets easier the next time but I was like but what about friends right I debated him

I was like hey part of you that wants to be abandoned this is your chance to say yeah that's true for weight but it's not true for friendships I gave him I gave him the opportunity to say yeah that's like it's completely apples and oranges but he didn't

take it he was like well I have some hope right and this is the thing like Good point. But I think when we get stuck in our own heads, we do not realize how awesome we are. Right? I don't think, and for the record, I don't think the mods like screened that, right?

Like, do you all get that? They send like a prompt and they read it out at the beginning. It's not like the mods are screening people, by the way, who's had a 40 kilo weight loss in the last year, we're going to pick you to come on. I'm pretty sure mods had no clue. This is the thing, is that each and every one of you who thinks that your life is absolute crap, and each and every one of you,

that is weighed down by all these fears and negative emotions and stuff like that, you don't realize, you'll get that with these call-in streams, we call in random randos from our community. It's not like we pick the 5% of gigacads. The whole point is that we're all gigacats, right? And you just don't see it. Each and every one of us is absolutely amazing. I believe that. And I'm not saying that because I'm some frigging Dr.

optimist, like, oh, like Dr. K, like, believe in all people. No, crap like this happens where I'm like, man, this guy is screwed. And then he's like, by the way, I did this, this, this and this. And then you work with people time and time and time again. And you expect them to be like, you know, because they say something, right? So like, oh, I'm like, I'm struggling and I'm pathetic and I'm depressed. And you're like, oh, okay, so I guess that means you're struggling and pathetic and depressed. And then you're like, wait a minute. No, hold on a second. This person is none of those things. This person is resilient, they're strong, they're intelligent, they're capable, they're compassionate. We've even had some people who have been reviled by the internet.

So we did an interview with a Trump supporter. And everyone was expecting this person, oh, because everyone like vilifies Trump supporters, right? So clearly this person who's a diehard Trump supporter must be a terrible human being. No, amazing human being, incredibly inspired. And this is the thing. The reason I have faith in humanity is not because I'm an optimist. It's because I've spent a lot of time with a lot of humanity and each and every person is amazing in some way. Like that's not like me being optimistic.

That's me just being surprised over and over and over again. And I still get surprised. I got surprised today. I don't know what to I. And so what keeps it interesting for me, I guess, but.