Saturn Returns with Caggie - Dr Julie Smith: Why Understanding Your Mind Changes Everything

Episode Date: April 28, 2025

This week on Saturn Returns, Caggie is joined by the brilliant Dr Julie Smith - clinical psychologist, bestselling author, and one of the most trusted voices in mental health online. With over 8 million followers across social media, Dr Julie has become known for her ability to break down complex psychological ideas into relatable, bite-sized content that resonates deepl- especially with younger generations navigating an increasingly overwhelming world. In this episode, Caggie and Julie dive into her journey from private practice to global online success. It all started with a single TikTok video in 2019 - something she wasn’t sure anyone would even watch. Since then, her clear, compassionate insights have offered millions a new language for understanding their mental and emotional world. Julie opens up about the process behind her viral content, the philosophy that drives her work, and the intention behind her best-selling books, Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before? and Open When - a beautifully designed toolkit for life’s most difficult moments. Topics Covered in This Episode: 🪐 How learning how your mind works puts you back in control 🪐 Dr Julie’s journey from therapy room to TikTok 🪐 The difference between introversion and being a highly-sensitive person 🪐 The often-missed signs of high-functioning depression 🪐 Simple tools to interrupt negative thinking patterns 🪐 Why you're not broken—you just haven’t been taught the tools Whether you're struggling with overwhelm, navigating change, or just craving more emotional clarity, this episode is a reminder that support doesn’t have to be complicated. Dr Julie's work proves that healing can start with a single, simple insight. — Thank you to our sponsor, Naturalmat, for making this episode possible! Better sleep starts naturally ☁️ Naturalmat’s handcrafted, organic mattresses and bedding are good for you, your family, and the planet. Experience the comfort of sustainable sleep at naturalmat.co.uk, or visit one of their showrooms! If this episode resonated, don’t forget to follow, share, and leave a review. Your feedback helps us reach more people seeking clarity, growth, and self-understanding. Discover more from Saturn Returns: 🪐 Instagram, YouTube and TikTok 🪐 Order the Saturn Returns book: Click here 🪐 Join our community newsletter: Sign up here 🪐 Explore all things Saturn Returns: Visit our website 🪐Follow Caggie on Instagram: @caggiesworld

Before we dive into today's episode, I want to take a moment to talk about something that's really, really important to me. Sleep. We all know how crucial a good night's rest is, but have you ever thought about how your sleep environment affects both your health and the planet? That is where Naturalmat comes in. From the very beginning, they prioritise sustainability by using certified organic materials like locally sourced organic wool. Their mattresses and bedding aren't just better for you, they're better for the environment too. And everything is handmade with care and craftsmanship in their Devon workshop. So if you want to improve your sleep while making a positive impact on the planet, I highly recommend visiting naturalmap.co.uk. Heading to one of their showrooms, trust me, switching to a natural, sustainable sleep setup makes all the difference. Hello everyone and welcome to Saturn Returns with me, Kage Dunlop. This is a podcast that

aims to bring clarity during transitional times where there can be confusion and doubt. This week I am thrilled to be joined by the phenomenal Dr Julie Smith, clinical psychologist, bestselling author and one of the most trusted online voices for mental health today. With over 8 million followers across social media, Dr Julie has made it her mission to bring the tools of therapy out of the therapy room and into people's everyday lives, offering clarity, compassion and empowerment in bite-size actionable ways. Dr. Judy spent nearly a decade in private practice before sharing her first online video on TikTok in 2019 and since then her content covering everything from anxiety to

depression to confidence mood and motivation has resonated deeply especially with Millennials and Gen Z who often feel overwhelmed by the pace and pressure of modern life. And her book Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before became the UK's best-selling non-fiction book of 2022, spending over 100 weeks on the Sunday Times top 10 list. And her latest book, Open When, is a beautifully designed break glass in case of emergency guide, offering support through the raw, real human moments that we all face, from emotional burnout to big decisions, conflict and fear. And in this episode, we explore the power of learning

how your mind actually works, the difference between being introverted and being a highly sensitive person, high functioning depression and why it often goes unseen, and how we begin to interrupt negative thinking patterns and return to inner steadiness. So whether you're feeling stuck, uncertain, or emotionally overwhelmed,

Julie's approach will remind you that you're not broken, you just haven't been taught the tools and it's never too late to learn. Dr. Julie, welcome to Saturn Returns. How are you? Thanks for having me. I'm really good, thanks. I'm excited to be here actually. I'm so excited to have you. You have been one of my dream guests for a very long time because I mean you've exploded over the last couple of years. How has that been?

It's been way out of my comfort zone to be honest. It's been amazing but it's been way out of my comfort zone, to be honest. It's been amazing, but it's been a rollercoaster for sure. So I think it was 2019 that I started putting videos on, just because it felt like it would be a nice little project. It felt like a good thing to do, to share some of the insights from therapy that people normally have to pay to come and find out. And I honestly thought it would be boring for people and it would fizzle out. It would be one of those projects

you do for a couple of months and then you'd forget about it. And that just didn't happen at all within a couple of weeks. These videos were getting more and more views and people were contacting me asking for videos on this subject and that subject. And so we realized we can't really stop now. People are liking this and they're hungry for the information. And so yeah, we just carried on and what are we 2025 now? Here we are. From working one-on-one with people to what you're doing now

is obviously like drastically different. But why were you surprised that there was such an appetite for this sort of content? I think the surprise came in the ability to communicate stuff in such a short amount of time. Complicated stuff. Yeah. So a lot of these things, I would take, you know, 20 minutes, half an hour to kind of discuss with someone and talk about these different concepts or metaphors. And the idea, I mean, initially, when it was my husband that found the sort of short form video rising up on TikTok and places like that. And he kind of suggested let's do bite-sized videos,

because we've made a couple of YouTube videos by them. And I said, absolutely not. I just won't be able to say anything worthwhile in 60 seconds. How is that possible? So we thought, well, we'll just give it a try. And it became a kind of creative challenge. So I thought, really, can you do anything in 60 seconds that's going to help significantly? But then you get to kind of realize that often you'll spend 20 minutes talking about something and there's one key message that someone comes away with so if you can you know shave it all the

way at the sides and leave that core message and then people remember it then you know it can be just as useful. But what was the process from taking big quite complicated things and condensing them down? Like do you have a sort of method for doing that? Yeah so often I will write a really long, fluffy, jargony script of this kind of idea. And then my husband and I will sit down together and start chopping away at it and saying,

well, that's a repeat of what you just said, or that's unnecessary, or we need to kind of change how it begins or change how it ends. And we just hack away at it before we even get the camera out. So we'll kind of have a script that we feel is kind of a type in a sense that it has a core message and it doesn't kind of beat around the bush with anything.

It just, it delivers that and says what we want it to say but that it's also engaging. So, you know, when we use the props and the different things to try and sort of visually make it memorable and engaging for people because you're competing against that, you know, the scrolling thumb of if you're, if you're not sort of engaging someone, then they're gone. So in like two seconds. Yeah. So you've got to entertain people to a degree to then slip in a bit of education. So from start conceptualizing something to actually executing the video, how long is that

process? It depends on the video. Some of the bigger ones with sort of, you know, big props, or when we're making lots of mess, that kind of thing, we will refine the script to its, you know, so we might spend a couple of nights or two or three nights on a script of sort of refining it, making sure it's set. And then there'll be, okay, we've got to buy the bits and pieces that we need, we've got to set it up. And sometimes, I mean, there was a video we did, where we exploded an exercise ball, I was sat on the ball, and we were going to blow up and then I was going to fall and, and that took, we started filming that at sort of nine at night, but we didn't

actually do the take until about three, four in the morning because there was so much, you know, it was a bit dangerous. We had to prepare and make sure it was, so we did lots of kind of run-throughs and checking everything. And, and so that, cause we had just had the one take, I wasn't going to do it twice. Things like that can take a huge amount of time but sometimes there'll be a few little one-liners that sound okay and we'll film a couple in a night. So yeah, it depends really what the video is. And in terms of the feedback and the audience that has come off the back of it, the feedback and the audience that has come off the back of it. Yeah.

What has surprised you most? Probably the way that it's touched people because when you're doing therapy with someone, you get to know someone in such in such a unique way, you know, you know, things about someone that they would never tell anybody else. And you work together on some of the problems that, you know, when they begin to address them, it transforms them. You know, it's just this incredible thing that you go through with someone. And I just couldn't imagine that doing this sort of stuff would, you know, even compare to that. And it's, and so it did surprise me that we could kind of impact on people's lives. When it's numbers on a screen, you kind of just think, well, people are watching it

going past. But when I've done sort of live events, or I've spoken somewhere, and then, and then you see a line of people waiting to come and tell you their story and tell you how the book or the videos have had an impact for them, then that suddenly feels a bit, oh, actually, oh, it's having an impact. It's in a different way, undoubtedly, but maybe it's more diluted. Maybe it's more of a sprinkling of an effect, but over lots of people rather than one at a time. And do you feel like for a lot of these people that therapy perhaps wasn't something that was accessible or this sort of terminology or language wasn't something that was in their sphere before and now suddenly they're presented with it in a digestible way that they

can actually take on board? Yeah, I hope so. I hope it's reaching those people. I think it's probably a combination of people who wouldn't or couldn't access therapy. And I think some people do it alongside what they're doing because I hear from a lot of therapists and things that say, oh, we've been using your videos to explain this or that or like in mental health support groups and things I've heard that they're kind of using them to spark discussion about concepts or ideas and stuff which is great. So it's probably a bit of both I imagine. Yeah. And in terms of the work you did one on one with people, do you still have time to do any of that? So I had to sort of close to referrals because I worked from home.

Yeah, so I had a little therapy room in my garden. But once the sort of floodgates opened and people were contacting me to ask for therapy, I work from home, I've got small children, suddenly it all felt a bit difficult to maintain that sort of safety and for the family and things like that. So yeah, I sort of closed the referrals while I was writing the book anyway, and then just kept a couple of people that I had anyway. So yeah, I'm yet to navigate how to return to that really in a professional safe way. I do miss it a little

bit. Because it's quite a unique thing that has only been made possible in the world that we live in today where psychotherapists are becoming celebrities. And it's like you said before we started recording, it was never your intention to be known in this capacity. So it's something you're probably having to balance. Yeah. And I felt like I was good at my job and I got such a high from working with someone and getting to the point, you know, you get to know someone so well and you're so on their

side. And so when then they have a leap forward or something happens it's good for them. You just kind of, you just share in that joy. That victory. Yeah. Yeah. So, so while it can be hard, heavy work when people are really struggling, it's also really rewarding. And I do miss that side of it because a lot, you know, a lot of my time now is spent alone at home. I do love the writing. It's just a totally different thing. It's just different, yeah.

When I was reading your book, I was thinking a lot about the parallels and the themes that you've spoken about in it as it relates to Saturn returns and especially for women navigating the sort of late 20s, early 30s. And these things around friendship and confidence. So I'd love to dive into some of those themes. Yeah, the one firstly is the friendship piece, which I think can be really painful. And we don't necessarily have much. I mean, we talk about romantic breakdowns or breakups a lot of the time, and there's a lot of support around that. But when a friendship actually sort of diminishes, we don't know how to cope with that.

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Naturalmat is fully committed to sustainability, using certified eco-friendly materials for every mattress, bed and piece of bedding. Plus everything is handmade with care and attention to detail in their Devon workshop. If you want a sleep experience that's better for you and better for the planet, head over to naturalmat.co.uk or visit one of their showrooms for a healthier, more sustainable night's sleep. It's interesting actually because when I was sort of thinking of the chapters, I was really thinking

of things that I'd been through, things that people I love have been through and clients. And when it came to the friendship stuff, I thought there doesn't really seem to be much out there on it. You know, people either talk about intimate relationships or, you know, self development and stuff like that. But there's this whole kind of social world that's really difficult to navigate at times. Signs of the problems that can come up can be really subtle and hard to decipher and leave you just feeling a bit confused about what's going on or what to do next. And there just didn't seem to be much out there. I thought that was quite key to put in because we all face it, right? We all go through difficulties with friendships at any age and it really affects your quality of life. I think if you're

not in a good place socially or you're transitioning from one chapter of your life to another and then your friendship group is changing, there can be periods of real loneliness or worrying about whether you're going to make new friends or not and stuff like that. So yeah, I'd love to talk about that sort of transitional period because I think that's something a lot of people that listen to this podcast might be experiencing now or have done. And I kind of describe it as a self-inflicted isolation that's kind of necessary when you're kind of going from one friendship group that perhaps is not really allowing you to flourish into who you're trying to become or they want you to stay in kind of toxic behaviors because it enables them.

They might be friends from school or university and there's a safety in that false sense of belonging. And we know that it's not really a group that we want to be part of because I always feel like if you feel afraid to get up from the table because you think there's going to be like a dagger in your back that's stuck on the table you should be sitting at. But at the same time, it's part of our wiring that we want to fit in. And sometimes we want to fit into places that aren't really helping our own progression.

But then there is this sort of in-between, that's this awkwardness of, well, I know that this isn't really where I belong, but I don't yet have evidence of where I do. And I don't have the people that make me feel how I suspect friends should. What is your advice for people kind of in that particular moment? Yeah, I think that's when you have to come back to yourself, isn't it? And be a friend

to yourself. Because if you are, a lot of time we'll hold on to friendships because they're old. History. Yeah. Yeah. So how could I not spend this time with this person because actually we've known each other since nursery school and we've gone through school together and our families know each other. And it might be a really unhealthy friendship. It might do more damage than good to you on a day-to-day basis. And so your wish is to have something different, but that involves this difficult period of breaking free from something and

the idea of even, how do I meet new people? That's a scary thing for a lot of people. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So there can be these periods of sort of loneliness if you do. And I talk in the book actually about not making these decisions impulsively. I think there's a tendency online to, you know, there's sort of content that sort of, you know, if your friend isn't, you know. If he wanted to, he would kind of the one liners, they're very binary. Yeah, that sort of, you know, if your friend isn't supporting your dreams, then ditch them that kind of thing. And, and actually, it's definitely more complex than that, because they're also friends that will yes man you and tell you what you want to hear. But that's not

always necessarily what you need to hear as well. You know, it takes a brave friend to say, I think you're on the wrong path and you need to re-evaluate. You know, if you're on a sort of self-destructive path, for example, that that takes a lot to say that to a friend and say, I think we need to, you know, have a think about this. Especially if you're sort of harming people by your behavior for someone to actually sit down with you and say, I want to help you and support you. Yeah, yeah. Not that easy to come by. Yeah, absolutely.

So I think it's really important to think about what we want from friendship at that point. And that will change, right? And that's why it's good to reevaluate because what you want from a friendship when you're at school is different to what you want from a friendship when you're out there in the big wide world or when you're a parent or later in life. So at different stages of life, depending on what your values are at that point, what you want from a friendship and what you're willing to give a friendship will change too. And that's something else I say in the book, again, sort of shifting

from that, you know, are they being a good enough friend to am I? Yeah, so what am I bringing to this? And am I reinforcing the behaviors that I say I don't like by, you know, colluding with it in a way. And so it takes a brave person, I think, to kind of look at a dynamic and look at our role within it and what we're doing to contribute to it or what we're doing to keep ourselves stuck. Yeah, because there's a co-creation at play. When I was in my 20s, I definitely would, I was like a chameleon by nature. I would adapt to any situation, any person that I was with.

That was my means of survival because it meant that I could, well, I thought I could be liked by everyone if I did that. But it ended up meaning that I really had no sense of self and I constantly self-abandoned in order to please other people and compromise my integrity and my values. And then the discomfort of having to kind of remain as one version of me and let the friendships kind of fall by the wayside that needed to was incredibly painful, but then I've managed to form the most beautiful friendships that's a lot smaller and a tighter group, but they definitely hold me accountable.

And I think that that's something that a lot of people crave. And I wanted to know from your experience, because I speak with my partner a lot about friendships and his experience as a man. And I wanted to know from your work and also from your audience and the feedback you get, do you notice big differences between male friendships and female friendships, both the positive and the negative?

That's an interesting question. You know, obviously, from a personal perspective, I only have the female perspective on that. But actually, my husband has fantastic friendships that he's had his whole life. And so my husband and I went to school together. So we met when we were about 12. And we were kind of in the same sort of friendship group as we went through school. And then I went off to university, and he worked in his business. and then we kind of got together when we were about 21. And so even now, there's a group of people that we knew from school that we stayed in touch with, and it's a small group, but we know each other inside out. And we know, we've known each other since we were children. And so there's that real sort of deep trust that comes with that. In terms of the difference between the friendships, I feel like women's friendships

are more complicated. That would make sense given the sort of an even-lutrient perspective around women needing to, depending a lot on their social group, to care for offspring, to share that load with other women. Now we kind of isolate ourselves in houses, which isn't great for us. But historically, women got together and helped each other with babies and children and looked out for each other. And so it makes sense that women would be more sensitive to each other's intricacies or behaviors in friendship. We needed to trust each other. Whereas I imagine men's friendships appear to be not so complicated with those. A bit more straightforward.

Yeah. But apparently that's a bit of a guess because I don't I'm not a man. So And in terms of the complications with female friendships What about jealousy? those sort of women being like, you know, you could be incredibly close to someone but then there's this feeling of I Don't know jealousy Competitiveness. Yeah, and I think Jealousy, competitiveness. Yeah. And I think jealousy can become hugely destructive to a relationship or to a friendship.

Or a relationship. Yeah, or a relationship, yeah, without anybody really realizing it. And because it's one of those feelings that we don't like to acknowledge, we don't like to acknowledge that we've had it or that someone else is having it, then it sort of goes unchecked and it starts to influence behavior towards each other in a negative way. Like what kind of behavior? So let's say, I don't know, let's say you've got one of those friendships that you've had for years that you hold on to.

You hold on to it because it's an old one, but you know that you can't share. If something good happens to you, you can't share if something good happens to you, a little personal victory or something good happens in your career, you know you can't share that because it's met with maybe a sarky comment or praise that kind of sounds like praise on the surface, but feels very underhand or insulting under the surface, you know, that sort of feels cold. Or you walk away thinking, oh, they're not going to be talking about me. Or you stop getting invited to things if you're doing well, or it could be the other way around.

So let's say something bad has happened to you, and you're disclosing that to your friendship group. And what you're doing is you're seeking support, right? You're seeking connection. And that bid for connection might be shut down with, oh, well, I had something much worse happen to me. And then that's gone. There is no further conversation about what you were trying to seek connection for. And those sorts of things can indicate that you're in a competition you didn't realize you were in. And so whenever something happens to you, that puts you in the center of things or at the forefront or be it sort of personal success, if that feels like a personal threat to them, then jealousy will influence their behavior towards you. You don't see how they feel. You just see the behavior. You just see the cold reaction or all these

little subtle things. It will be because you know that person so well. You just notice there's a little change. When you walk away from them, you just feel different. That doesn't feel... or you feel unsafe. You know, when you say that idea of kind of walking away and feeling like there's a could be a dagger in your back and you don't want to leave first because you feel like everyone will talk about you when you leave or those sorts of indications, those feelings, I think you have to trust those. You have to pay attention. Yeah.

Also, when you share something with someone that's vulnerable and then you have a feeling that it might be weaponized against you, or they might share it with other people to kind of make themselves feel better. I think everyone can be guilty of doing that, but I think women are particularly... Yeah. The sort of reputation destruction method of aggression. Yeah. And it's that sort of reputation destruction, method of aggression. Yeah, and it's that sort of like Schadenfreude kind of, oh well, you know that this is happening to her and it kind of momentarily elevates the other, but it's a really, yeah, it's really

not a nice thing. And the shift in trust is often very subtle. It's a feeling, isn't it? And you're not always fully aware of why your trust has shifted. You just get that sense of, I don't want to share this with that person. And you find yourself kind of censoring yourself almost when you're around them. And again, those are signals for reevaluation about what's going on here. Why don't I trust that person anymore? What am I bringing to the friendship? What am I getting out of it?

And you know, what, because the feelings might be in the, you know, person in question. Why do I feel jealous of my friend? That's a tricky one to look at as well. And I also noticed not even beyond friendships, that there seems to be quite a scarcity mentality amongst women that if we see someone being successful in a way that perhaps we aspire to be, our immediate reaction is to kind of like want to put them down. And I don't know whether I don't know whether men have that I can't speak for them. But where do you think that comes from? And if someone notices that, I can't speak for them. But where do you think that comes from? And if someone notices that,

because I know you've also written in your book about turning envy into inspiration, rather than letting it take over and have a good bitch about someone, which might feel great in the moment, but then you feel really awful afterwards. Yeah, yeah. And it's kind of short-sighted, isn't it? Because it's sort of like you say, it makes you feel a little afterwards. Yeah, yeah. And it's kind of short sighted, isn't it?

Because it's sort of like you say, it makes you feel a little bit better in that moment, but it's really not addressing the sense that if you feel jealous or envious of someone else's success, it's usually because you kind of set up the playing field in a way that means you can't both win at the same time. If they have a success, that means you're failing or vice versa. And if you're in competition with someone, that's going to disrupt the friendship, isn't it? And when it's based on things that

really matter to us as well, it's one thing, you know, playing tennis with your friend and beating each other or, you know, whatever that sort of a simpler competitive environment. But when it's based on something that you're resting yourself worth on, then it's going to have a really destructive impact on the relationship. And that can happen within friendships, like you say, within relationships, or within even families, you families, or extended families. And where you could have a decent relationship, that could be really destructive if you're setting yourself up against those people in terms of if someone makes more money or if someone is the center of attention or if someone has lots of children or if someone,

you know, whatever those parameters are that you're setting up as the measuring stick, it's bad news and nothing is going to matter more to you in your life than the people you love. And so if you're putting competition into that equation, it's only going to do negative things to that relationship as far as I can see. How can people take out that aspect then, the sort of negative competitiveness in life? Because it's also part of our wiring, isn't it? To kind of compete against each other or want to strive to be better. Yeah, yeah. And I think that's where it comes to that kind of being really clear on your

own values. So understanding what you want your own life to look like, and not in terms of what you want to happen to you, but the kind of person you want to be and how you want to show up in those different areas of your life. So, you know, it might be that you want a career in this area, or you want, you know, to learn everything you can in that area, you want to sort of focus on your health in that way, or you want to parent in a certain way, or you want to be this kind of, and it's just thinking about all the different areas of your life. And having a clear sense of who you want to be in those areas. And, and using that as your sort of guiding light almost, that all the, you know, I always talk about the difference between a goal and a value. So a goal is something you kind of achieve.

And once you get there, it's done. And a value is more of a path that you always follow. And it never ends. It's just something you always want to stay close to on your journey. What about desire? Where does desire fall into between goals, values? Does desire play a driving force in people's life and how much should we sort of balance out those three things? Because I feel like the society we live in is very goal-orientated. And also

I see a lot of stuff online that's very pleasure seeker, follow your desire. I don't see that much about really knowing your values and sticking to them as your North Star, which actually when you think about it should be the most important thing because that is, that defines the character of a person rather than the external gains. Yeah, absolutely. And the thing is with desire for short-term pleasures or short-term gains is it's really sellable. You can pick something and if you can make someone desire it in that moment then you're going to make some money after them. And so that's why we see that everywhere. We're bombarded with it. Everywhere. But it's really hard to sell values, right?

Because they're different for everyone and they change even through your life. So the sort of values exercises that I've put, I think they're in both books actually, because I just feel that they're so important. And it's probably the one thing that I do on a fairly regular basis myself. it's really quick and easy. You just get pen and paper and you sort of write out the different areas of your life. So you might have, you know, marriage, friendship, family, education and lifelong learning, creativity, career, whatever it is, all these different areas, health and stuff. And you put in each box sort of who you want to be in that area. So what are your values in that area? So in

parenting, I might put patience and love and presence or something like that. So keywords or thoughts of who I want to be in that situation and in the area of my life, what I want to represent those people in that part of my life, how I want to show up in good times and bad. Then you can rate it on a sort of 0 to 10 scale. So 10 being the most important thing to me, 0 being not at all. Then I'll rate it again. This time it's not only how important it is, but this time it's how much I feel I'm living in line with that right now, or in the last couple of weeks. So then you end up with this kind of big grid, these different areas of your life, all these scales on them. So if something is 10 out of 10 important to you, but you notice on the how I'm living in line with it, you've put a two out of 10, then you circle that one, that one's something to look at. So it's not a tool for self-criticism, but it's a tool for looking at which areas of my life are sort of out of balance. Reflection, really?

Yeah. Because life will pull you away from different values. You can't do it all at once, right? So it's looking at what needs my attention right now. And also the world that we live in is constantly distracting us and showing us different versions of how life could be lived. So if you don't have that as your North Star, then you're gonna constantly feel like, I'm not doing enough, I'm not going in the right direction.

Because it's so unnatural the way that we see millions of people living lives that all are possible and available to us, but then it constantly feels like, I don't know if I'm doing it right. So with the exercises, different categories of different aspects of your life and words within them. Yeah. So you just separate your different areas of your life into different boxes, and then you can just pop little words or phrases, you know, thoughts in there about the values you have in that area of your life, you know, how you want to show up for yourself.

Do you think that people have can have quite like simple values that are overarching across all aspects of that? Yeah, yeah. So you might have a sort of core value of courage or enthusiasm. And you might, you know, that might carry across all of those different areas of your life. You might want to always be courageous and enthusiastic in terms of what you're doing, which is great. But there might be certain areas of your life that you're showing more of that enthusiasm and courage than others. It's just an overarching look at, okay, if I've been pulled away. Because often people will come to therapy

and they won't know what the problem is. They'll just say, everything just feels a bit pointless and I don't really know where I'm at or what I'm doing and why, and I feel terrible for it. And often it's when we've been pulled away from what's important to us, what matters most, by just life. So it might be that, so I got three children, but obviously everything career-wise went wild in the last few years. And I know when, you know, lots of opportunities, which is fantastic, but

I know when I'm starting to be pulled too far away from being the present parent I want to be, because I feel it. Yeah. And being a present parent is like 10 out of 10 on the important value system for you. Yeah, it's just huge for me. And so I will notice that when I'm being pulled away by work too much, I feel this, I feel unhappy and I lose my motivation. I lose my kind of drive to do any of it. And it's because I just need to redress the balance.

And so I've got much better at that sort of, saying yes to things that are worth saying yes to and that I know I can balance with the family. Yeah. I'm not compromising that. I always like to think of it as adjusting the sales rather than, I think historically when I can't identify what's wrong, I just want to capsize the whole thing. Just like, yeah, erase everything and start again. We're just getting older. It's

not actually a very effective coping strategy. But for people that come to see you that have these feelings, but perhaps it isn't a case of simple adjustment because their life is so out of alignment with their innate value. Perhaps they don't know what that innate value is. It's just a discomfort that they feel, but they may have the success, all the things society tells them that define success, how do they kind of reconcile that? Yeah, and sometimes you get it where people have been in a relationship where they've been the, I don't mind person, and they've just gone with the other, they've been totally

led by the other person, and try to sort of people please their way through a relationship. And, and what happens is over time, then they forget who they are and what their preferences are. And, like you said, you kind of, at one point, you weren't sure sort of what you you know, with certain friendships and things, what do I want? And who do I want to be hanging around? And And I think when that happens, you then it's a process of rebuilding and discovering. So it's almost a process of naturally maturing, isn't it? That when you work out, I don't know what's for me, but I know this isn't it, is a really scary place to be because then you've got to turn in this new direction where you're kind of facing forward and discovering yourself. Yeah, through trial and error, through taking it. And that's, I guess that's the beauty of life, isn't it? Every chapter is this new discovery

about how you want to show up and who you want in there. And I guess it's about paying attention to how you feel when you are sort of testing and trying things out, whether if you make one adjustment, that makes you feel a bit more alive or a bit more present or a bit more related. In the context of relationships, there's a term that someone told me, I can't remember what it is annoying me, but it's, I'm sure you've experienced from your work that can be quite gender specific, that often women will be the ones that are the, I don't mind, people pleaser. And then after a certain amount of time, they suddenly feel like they've lost their sense of self and identity. And then they blame their husband

or their partner because they're resentful and they're like, I followed you and I haven't done what's right for me, but they also haven't told their partner what they wanted. It's not really their fault. What is your advice for people to stop that happening basically? You see it a lot in women. And I think we're generally taught to people please and girls are very astute at from a very young age, reading the room and seeing what and who they need to be in order to be approved of. And that's then carries through into adult relationships. So women can end up blaming a partner for, like you say, being maybe something that feels controlling or overbearing and the really difficult brave work that is required. It is often to look at how have I contributed to this in its unfolding. So not in a way of self blame, but in a way

that says, I don't want to do this again, whether that's with the same person or a different relationship. Because you will repeat it with this, you know, if that's a pattern you haven't addressed, it will just come up again and again, right? Yeah, lots of people feel like they've been in the same relationship again and again with different people. And when that happens, it's usually because of some sort of pattern there that you're kind of reliving and going over. And there's definitely work you can do to when you uncover that pattern and you see what you know, how the role that you take in a relationship invites the other person to take on the reciprocal role. And then you're bouncing off of each other. And, you know, so if we're together

as friends and whenever an option comes up, I always say, I don't mind, then you will start to take the lead and make choices for us. Yeah. And then, you know, a few years down the line, if I say, well, you're always choosing, why? He always gets to decide what we do. And so, and the difficult part of that is, it's not just the other person relinquishing some control, but also the person who's not been used to the responsibility that comes with making decisions, having to step into that. And it's not easy. It can be, you know, difficult, scary, new, stressful. And so yeah, there's

a whole kind of balancing act there. On that, because I feel that there's this sort of trend on social media that identifies femininity as being sort of subservient and letting men just take the lead. And it's very much romanticized as, you know, oh, I'm so happy that now I can just, and no, not throwing any shade on this. Like if this is what people want to do, but I think it's problematic to associate those characteristics with being feminine.

That it's like, let men take the lead, be assertive, and I can just make sourdough. Yeah, and it's finding some balance, isn't it? Because, so, you know, my husband and I have been together for 20 years, and we found ourselves in a place where there are certain things where he takes responsibility and control for things, and there are certain things where he takes responsibility and control for things, and there are certain areas where I do. And we've had to sort of find our way there. There's no- MS There's no blueprint at the moment. MS Yeah, and there's no hard and fast rules about the ways in which men and women do that now. And

so that requires some negotiation between every couple. But it does take some thought and it takes the awareness of and empathy for the other person to ensure that you have mutual respect. So it's okay to take different roles. Because inevitably the person who is, you know, making the sourdough is probably doing lots of other stuff as well. That, as long as men and women have respect for each other in their different roles, it works really well. You know, value them. Yeah.

I mean, my husband and I have really different strengths. And so we're almost like two arms of the same body. We each take care of our different things in our life and it works because he's using his strengths, I'm using mine and the whole thing comes together really well. And because we respect each other for the different roles that we take on and the pressures of each, that they're different but a lot, then no one needs to be resentful, because we can actually appreciate each other and feel grateful for each other. Whereas if we don't necessarily have an appreciation or respect for the other person's role, whatever

it might be, that's when you get the resentment which just becomes toxic. It seeps into everything. We spoke about assertiveness sort of in relationships, but I know that's a chapter of your book or part of the chapter about assertiveness. And I feel like that is something, again, that as women we struggle with. We don't want to, and you know, it happens in all aspects of life. It's like we don't want to be seen as difficult or for people not to like us and therefore it feels uncomfortable asserting ourselves. What are

your thoughts and sort of tips on people that want to be more assertive? Yeah, do you know it's a big part of the work that's done in therapy is sort of assertiveness training and assertiveness skills. Not only the skills in terms of what to say and how to say it, but also dealing with the emotion that comes up when you say it. Dealing with the sometimes fear of, oh gosh, I'm going to say no to this. Often there's an anticipation of the other person's reaction or disapproval, all those sorts of things. So the minute you start to try and be more assertive, it opens this sort of box of emotions. Pandora's box, yeah.

Yeah, because- It's disproportionate to the situation at hand, right? I often have such a historical, obviously, response to something that's really quite minor because of the fear of asserting myself. And I know you speak about like trying to bridge the gap between thinking about the thing and then doing the thing because the more time you give, the more you procrastinate and ruminate and then it becomes this huge thing that you're like, oh no, I can't do that.

Yeah. Yeah. And when you kind of, when you're trying to be assertive, when you haven't been being assertive in the past, it will be around a safety strategy. So it's not, it's often people have the skills or they know what the skills are, and they know what they need to do. And the reason that they haven't been doing them is often a safety strategy, right? We learn early on in life what we need to do in interactions with key people in order to stay safe or be approved of. And so if that involves putting everybody else's needs first, or always not minding what you do next, or what the other person wants to do, or staying small and withdrawing, then that pattern will be laid down quite firmly because you will have had to do it repeatedly.

You could lay out in a textbook idea of this is what you do when you when to say no and how to say no or yeah there'll often be a sort of template set up in often early childhood around how you need to behave in your relationships and if that template that was set up involves not making use of any of those assertiveness skills that's not your role to take on, that's what other people do, then that template doesn't disappear just because we're adult now. It's still there to be used and it worked in the past, that's why it stayed, right? Because it was helpful before. But what changes is when we're then in adult relationships is it's this different set of reciprocal roles. So instead of parent-child, instead of adult-child, it's adult-adult. And so you can be at risk if you're not using

those assertiveness skills. You're at risk of exploitation or abuse or those sorts of things. And you don't any longer need to be vulnerable to those things as an adult. But making that change and doing something different compared to what you've always done will always feel stressful and new and novel and often, and I've been working with people on assertiveness skills, a huge part of the challenge is the anticipation of other people's reactions and imagining what other people will feel and the judgments they will make and those sorts of things. And so a lot of it is learned through sort of gradual behavioral experiments, essentially, you take a situation and you'll test out this new behavior, this assertiveness,

and then you'll see how it went. And then all the time, it's the anticipation is huge. And then the realization after is, it wasn't as bad as I thought. Nobody died. Yes. Yeah. We're okay. You know, let's take an example. So maybe someone who is always the person to work late and never goes on time, because they just think everyone would think they were selfish if they left on time. And then, you know, they have a go at saying, I need to leave on time today, without giving any kind of

excuses or too many reasons. And then other people go, okay, see you later. And so what you do is you can't mimic that by sitting in the room and convincing yourself to be stronger or more assertive. You have to practice it in action because from each experiment like that, your brain gets evidence that this is a safe process to take, this is a safe path to take, and I can do this. And it goes okay. And then I sort of build up a new template. So you can't remove the early templates that have been set out. But what you can do is create new ones, new pathways. Yeah. But part of

that is accepting that it's going to be scary. It involves taking responsibility for whichever way it turns. And for that, you have to commit to having your own back, I think. So if it goes well, great, if it doesn't, I'm not going to use that to kick myself while I'm down. I'm going to look after myself through it. And that's why doing these things in the context of therapy is really helpful because you've got a sort of a safe place to go back and hash it out and work out and to remember that it's not me the problem it's here's this problem I'm trying to tackle that's separate from me. Rather than use it as evidence to kind of critique yourself.

Yeah. So I have it with something quite I feel like it's quite unique maybe it's not but with largely work opportunities or if someone, if I've connected with someone and I really like them and like we're becoming friends or even if a friend like gives a gesture that's very vulnerable and like loving, I find like it. So all of those things are good things, right? Yeah. Really good things, really exciting things, lovely things. But it's almost like I don't feel like I have the capacity to hold them. That's the only way I can really describe it.

And so I often will be like, oh, no, I'll get back to it tomorrow. So whether that's an email from an exciting potential partnership, I will go into this kind of free state around it because I don't know what's going on. And then same with, you know, people sending me messages or like other opportunities. And I guess it's a form of sabotage, but I've always, yeah, I feel like it's quite unique.

Or is it not? I guess, but also it's, it could be sabotage if you then didn't do the thing that matters to you. Yeah. Or is it just a process of taking that time? I take time. To consider. I feel like I take too much time.

Okay. And that in a way is a sort of sabotaging act sometimes. In a sort of hope that it goes away? It's not a hope that it goes away, but I think how long it takes for me to get back, you know, can then make the other person feel like, oh, this clearly wasn't a priority and little do they know how it actually made me feel. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And does that feel like a self-protection? I guess so. I guess so. I think what I'm trying to get at is the sort of physical sensation that

occurs for me. It's both exciting, but it just feels like too much for me to hold. I don't know how else to kind of... So it's a self-regulation thing, right? Yeah. So it's, I need time to come back down. Or do you then seek reassurance about your decisions about things before you commit? All the time, too much. So I often subcontract my sort of own authority in a way or ability to assert myself in. Because I'll go and like ask someone

else and run it by them. Yeah, yeah, get the reassurance. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And reassurance is tricky one because well, you know, we're social beings, we're supposed to live in groups and do that for each other. If we do that a lot, what we're doing is sort of we can lose confidence in our own judgment, right? Because if we seek reassurance in times that are really difficult or confusing, that can be really, really helpful. If we seek reassurance every single time we have a decision to make, then we're sort of building up evidence in our mind that that person I seek my reassurance

from knows best. And that I'm not capable of making the decision. Yeah, yeah. And so when they're not available, the fear of making a decision by myself feels sort of frightening. And you can see how that develops in really decent relationships and marriages where people depend on each other and discuss everything and make joint decisions, which are all really good things. But then when people can't do that for whatever reason, it creates this need for a real shift in confidence and that idea of taking the plunge with I'm just going to make a decision and seeing what happens and knowing that I'll cope with the fallout,

whatever it is, decisions big or small, if the worst happens I'll deal with it and I'll take responsibility and I'll move through it. But none of that's easy. Because that's the final thing I wanted to ask you about was confidence. Because I feel like that then, you know, the behavior that I just explained that I do probably doesn't encourage confidence because I'm constantly doubting myself, thinking that I said the wrong thing or I'm not capable of making the right decision. And then of course, if the result for whatever reason is what I feared it would be, then I use that as evidence to kind of beat myself up.

How can we work on our confidence? So I would say confidence is not so much a destination that you aim for, it's a byproduct of being willing to put yourself in the situations where you don't feel confident, being willing to be vulnerable and committing to having your own back if the worst happens or if things go wrong and when you inevitably encounter failure. And so, you know, it can be really situation specific as well. You know, if you took me somewhere that, you know, you go every day and do your thing, but it was totally different to mine, then I would feel like a rabbit in headlights. Butally, if I took you to the nearest inpatient unit

and you might feel, oh gosh, this isn't... Anything that's novel on you, your brain is set up to give you a stress response because your brain can only automate for you what it does all the time or what it's done a lot of. So the first time you do something, you're going to have that stress response. And when you're in that stress response, your brain is set up to then look for all the things that could go wrong or where you're not going to be able to live up to this. And that's to keep you safe, right? That lack of confidence is your brain trying to keep you safe. And so the only way we can then build confidence is through evidence of being in situations

that feel vulnerable, that we use the skills that we want to build our confidence in, whether it's assertiveness or decision making or whatever else. And we look for small victories. So we start with that. We don't do the worst case scenario first. We start with something small that feels manageable, but a challenge. And we do that and we do it again and again and again. And if you do it enough times, it will become the comfort zone. You'll say, oh, that's just a decision I make every day. So you know, it's not, it's not one of the scary ones anymore. And then you move on to

the next one and the next one, and you sort of, you work your way up this sort of graded hierarchy of scary situations. And, and what happens then is, is the sort of the scariest ones that would be at the top of that hierarchy kind of fall away. They don't seem as scary as they once used to. And, but it has to come with action. So confident, we couldn't sit here in the room and convince you to suddenly feel confident about a certain thing. You have

to live it and your brain learns from the evidence of doing it. Would it be valid to say that people feel or lack confidence around the areas that they also feel most vulnerable? Yeah, when the stakes are high. Yeah, paradoxical trickery of all, isn't it? Do you know what, I honestly think that's how I've coped with doing all of this kind of public stuff that I never really aimed to do before, was that I already, when it all started, I already had a decent relationship, children that I loved, a career that I loved.

I wasn't resting my self-worth on any of it, on any likes or numbers or any of that stuff. So while it was a lovely positive thing, I didn't think that if and when this stops, I'm worthless. that if and when this stops, I'm worthless. And so when you kind of don't attach your self-worth to something, you're able to... It's easier to do, I guess. Yeah, yeah. It's much easier to be vulnerable in a situation when you're not putting your entire estimation

of yourself on the line for it. I mean, there's so many other things that I want to talk to you about, but I'm aware that you probably have to go. But is there any final things for our listeners? Obviously we'll direct them to the book, but that you would like to leave them with if they have been kind of struggling

with any of these things, perhaps seeking support. Any final words? Yeah, I think something that I wrote, I think it's in the beginning of Open When, where I talk about this idea of your inner world is a bit like a sauna. Like it's, it's, there are lots of benefits to being there, but only if you don't stay too long. So, you know, people might think that I would encourage people to always be kind of reflecting and doing that in that stuff. Not until I think when you're struggling with anything, reach out to someone you trust someone that you have a relationship

with or a connection with. We are the best thing for each other's nervous systems. And so you know, if you've got someone in your life that always seems to say the right thing or manages to comfort you or, or reassure you or, or just set your attention on the path that is most helpful, then speak to that person. But we have to acknowledge that there are times when that person is not around or maybe we don't have that person in their lives. And that's when I think people kind of reach for books or podcasts even or those sorts of things where they can kind

of hear the words that they need in the moment to kind of set them on the right path. I love that. I think that's so powerful because I think I definitely can get a little bit lost in my own inner world and good for a while, but then sometimes you've got to get back out into reality. I mean, it's weird for to hear from a psychologist, but the more time we spend focusing on ourselves, the more miserable we become. but the more time we spend focusing on ourselves, the more miserable we become. That's probably why everyone's so miserable. Yeah, exactly. I think there needs to be this shift in focus, so sort of outwards towards other people and towards what we can do for the people we love.

And often that creates this kind of huge shift in how we feel. Do you notice that that has got worse because of the landscape of social media? I don't know if, you know, I don't have any data to kind of make that suggestion, but yeah, certainly if someone is consuming lots of content that is just sort of inward looking all of the time, things can be difficult. You know, friends and family and loved ones are really good at just re-centering us and repositioning. We can become kind of weird if we spend too much time alone and by ourselves. We're constantly, when we talk about the comparison thing, that's what we're good at.

And that's where it can be good for us when we're with real, you know, with real people in our social group, is we're kind of adjusting. We'll say, okay, this is what people do and this is how people behave and, and so we, yeah, it kind of shift our perspective to make us much kind of easier to live with, I guess. It gets us out of our own heads as well. Yeah. Well, thank you so, so much for coming on the show. I loved it. Like I said, there's a million other things I could ask you, but perhaps we'll save it

for another time. Yeah. I'll come back again. Thank you. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Saturn Returns with me and Dr. Julie Smith. I hope you enjoyed it. I loved having her. She was such a joy to me. I've been a

really big fan of her work for ages, so to get to have the opportunity to sit down with her was such a privilege and to get her wisdom on the show, so I hope you enjoyed. Thank you so much for listening and as always remember, you are not alone. Goodbye.