The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Alignment: Move from Internal Chaos to Clarity by Jennifer Cochern

Episode Date: February 16, 2026

Alignment: Move from Internal Chaos to Clarity by Jennifer Cochern https://www.amazon.com/Alignment-Move-Internal-Chaos-Clarity/dp/1504381246 In Alignment, Jennifer Cochern shares stories from her own life and those of her clients using her alignment model. The model makes use of the everyday human system and pairs it with the foundational concepts of accountability, boundary setting, and communication for a life of clarity.

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With expert publishing to strategic marketing, they help authors reach their audience and maximize their book's success. Anyway, guys, we have an amazing young lady on the show. We're going to be talking about her book that she put out in July 25th, 2017. It is entitled, Alignment, Move from Internal Chaos to Clarity by Jennifer Cochran. We're going to have her on the show. We're going to be talking about all the deets. Now you can maybe have less chaos in your life, unless you really enjoy chaos, then you can talk to her about how to handle that.

Jennifer has experienced video roles throughout a life, learner, teacher, parent, partner, therapist, mentor, farmer, energy healer, author, and coach. In each of these roles, life lessons have been studied and increased self-awareness. Welcome the show. How are you, Jennifer? I am so good today. I'm so glad to be here. So glad to be here. We're glad to have you as well, Jennifer. Give us your dot-coms where can people find you on the interwebs. Right now, I'm in the middle of a big transition myself.

and if you go to Jennifer Cochern, if you just Google me, it will send you out to some of the places I am as I make these transitions. Your alignmentcoach.com is where I'm headed. I watch for a link to that on the Chris Foss show as well. Jennifer, give us to the 30,000 overview. What's inside your book alignment? Oh, my gosh. You know, it breaks everything down into the four,

the four parts of our human self, you know, our thoughts, our feelings, how we express ourselves and the actions that we take. But then it went a new direction as I was writing it and realizing that there's more to it than that. And so then it moved me into accountability, boundary setting, and communication. And it appeared that they all, they all work together. It's just this incredible system that we can all use. Yeah. Alignment. So what was the motivation behind this book? What was the impetus that, you know, light went on and you said, you know, I should write a book about this. I was having a terrible time in my life.

It was a big mess. I could not figure out how to, I don't know. It was like I just, I didn't know how to fix the problems. I was in chaos. And so what I often had done in the past when I was in chaos is I would go find a therapist and I would go talk about my problems. I went to this new therapist who went up to her whiteboard. I mean, I had been sitting there maybe, I don't know, five minutes. She walks up to her whiteboard and she draws a stick figure.

And she puts thoughts, words, feelings, actions. And she said, did you know that there was a book written about world leaders and how what they have in common is they're all aligned? And I thought, okay, I'm not sure where this conversation is going. I said, I don't plan on being a world leader. And she said, no, but think about that. The reason that they reached that level of leadership is because they can make quick decisions. They know exactly where they stand on every issue. And all of a sudden, the light bulb went on and I said, oh my gosh, I need to be the leader of my life.

I'm in charge of me. Right? And I could not stop thinking about it. I mean, it like it took over. And I, yeah, I just, I couldn't stop. And so every day I'm seeing clients and I'm thinking about what they're saying to me. And I said, oh, so your thoughts and your feelings are not matching right now. Hmm.

I wonder why that is. So I'm asking questions and I couldn't stop. So I had to write a book. Very? Now, was there, was there, that you got to write a book. Now, is this your first book you've ever published? Yeah, yes, the first book I've ever published. Congratulations, congratulations.

Is there any more coming? Is there any additional part two's or maybe books of other interests? That's funny. That's funny that you say part two, because when I jot down my notes, I put alignment 2.0. because the next part of this is the we're not just physical beings. We're also energetic beings. And so my next book, if I get it written and finished and published, is going to combine all of those pieces. So it's our physical being, but it's also our spiritual being.

Yeah. So that'll be, you have a pending date for that or anticipated maybe? No. Okay. In the works, so stay in touch. So in alignment, you share stories of your own life and your clients using this alignment model. Can you give us some of those stories so that the audience can understand how this alignment

works? Yes. So before we started the show today, I picked up my book and I usually just open up to a page just to remember what I've said. Because I forget sometimes that I wrote these stories and what they were about. So there was a time when I was in my 30s where I just had way too much going on in my life. And that happened periodically for me. I just say yes, yes, yes.

And then there's too much. So I was of the mindset that I really needed some downtime. I had four kids under the age of, I don't know, they were like six to 15 or something like that. Oh, wow. And yeah. So there was a lot going on. And one day I decided to go ride a horse. It was being boarded on my back property.

And I saw the guy that owned the horse and I said, oh, can I ride the horse? And he's sure. So I get on the horse. I'm thinking we're just going to walk through the back field. But this horse takes off at a dead run. And not only is running, but Bucky. It's a big Appaloosa mayor. And she did not want me on her.

Yeah. I immediately, within seconds, knew that I had to get off of this horse. Because she wasn't going to stop. Oh. So I let go. Yeah. I just, I just let go. And I flew off the horse and I landed on the ground and couldn't breathe.

And it turns out after they got me to the hospital, I had a compression fracture in my back. Oh, no. Which then required, oh, yes, I got to wear a plastic turtle shell for three months. Ooh. Yeah, I still had four kids. fashionable. I still had. And you still have four kids to chase.

around. Wow. I couldn't do any of them. I couldn't bend. I had to sleep in this thing for three months. Oh, wow. So this is an example of when your life is completely out of order, something will pull you back in. And sometimes it's not a nice thing. You know, you hear about people getting ill. They get some terrible illness or they lose a partner or someone close to them dies. I mean, you know, those things rock us. They shake us. And all I knew, was I could take one day at a time, you know, to get myself back. I had never been through that. I didn't know what having a broken back meant.

Yeah. And so I didn't know the alignment model back then either. But it's one of the stories that I tell to connect with my reader. You know, like big things happen. And you have to have a way to get yourself back on track, not just give up. And you found alignment is the way to establish that clarity from the camp. then. It is. Absolutely is. Yep. How long have you been doing this coaching thing and helping clients and helping them improve their lives?

I volunteered to help women way back in my 20s, early 20s. Women that were having new babies and were frustrated and didn't know what to do. And I would go and be their coach and their cheerleader. And then later on, I decided to go back to school and get a master's degree in counseling. So I just recently retired from that therapy 28 years of being a therapist. And I decided that I didn't feel like I was ready to quit, you know, working and being of service. So I decided to switch into coaching. Yeah. So it's brand new, just getting started.

Yeah. Brand new, just getting started. But, you know, helping people, you know, chaos is, we need things to be able to bring us down into moments of clarity and be present. One of the things I'm always struggling for, especially with severe ADHD, you maybe have worked with some clients with ADHD. You know, being present, being able to stay focused, not being distracted, really hard. I've got a little device I use that's got a timer on it that I bought off of Amazon. And so when I want to stay on task and not get distracted by just, you know, bells and whistles the thing, I set my timer and I focus on being. present for those moments, doing the task at hand.

And, you know, anytime I get ding or bing or, you know, whatever sort of thing, I go, hey, you're on the timer. You're on the clock. You don't get to, you know, need to see what's going. If the world's, if nuclear bombs got launched, that's just going to be it anyway. So don't, you're not going to, it's not going to help you to check and find that. That's true. That's true.

Yeah. And unless, if it's not nuclear bombs, maybe it's not that important. It can wait. Well, and they're not happening in your yard. You know, there's another, you know, before I said that I had, I had sort of made a connection between accountability, boundary setting, and communication. And that's such a great point that you made. Okay, there's a bomb going off, but am I in charge of it? Did I hit the button?

Is it happening in my neighborhood? No, it's not. What are you going to do about it? You know, so you set your boundary and say, no, I'm going to stick with this task that I'm doing. Yeah. You know how many people don't know what is actually what they're accountable for? They don't know. Do we need to communicate to people that, hey, this is your area.

You're accountable for this thing there. Yes. Exactly right. And wouldn't life be just beautiful if people could do that? I'll say this is not my deal. Yeah. Self-accountability seems to be the biggest problem. have in competition victimhood is is just everywhere and so huge like everyone's and there are people

fighting each other to be the bigger over who's the bigger victim you know i'm a victim no i'm more of a victim than you're right it's like it's like a fist fight nowadays right and what if what if it isn't about being a victim what if it's about you've made choices every one of us has made choices we start making them when we're babies we make choices you mean i have to be responsible for my choices what kind of operation is being run here i didn't get that you don't have to you can be a victim instead that's true it's true and blame it on everybody else everything has consequences and everyone gets tired of the i remember going years ago to uh what was it it was it was Tori Amos. She's a pianist, singer, and a great musician. And I went to one of her concerts,

and she told the story about how she went through a period of her life where she was being an incredible victim. And one of her friends, she had this moment of clarity. She told the story from stage. She had this moment of clarity where one of her friends went to her and said, you know, we're tired of the bitching, moaning, and whining, get off the cross, we need the wood. And basically the implication of that is, is you've put your up on a cross on by yourself. We really need the wood and we need to move forward on constructive stuff and you're just holding everyone back. And so she, you know, she gave that story as a clarification of, yeah, I was putting myself up on a cross, claiming I was a victim and

oh, what was me and the world is, you know, doing this to me. People just sit around going, yeah, we could use that wood for fire and cooking and you've, you put your, you nailed yourself up there. He did this to yourself. And so that's how she learned how to avoid victimhood. Absolutely. And between accountability and communication comes a boundary setting. I mean, I'm from a generation where nobody set boundaries. Like everybody's, you know, especially women, they're busy just being nice.

You know, they don't want to upset anybody. And they, you know, like women communicate really strangely. And so women that are clear, women that are assertive, they get called all kinds of terrible names. They do. And men don't want to set boundaries because then people think they're mean or they're being aggressive or, you know, no, it doesn't have to be that way. But if we, I mean, I didn't learn what a boundary was until I was 40.

You know, that's pretty pathetic. I think in my 40 years. Yeah. Yeah. I was like, oh, my gosh. This is really important. Until then, the only boundary I was ever sitting is, why don't you go F yourself to people that piss me off.

But no, boundaries are probably much more healthier. Don't do that, folks. Well, they are. And you don't have to wait until you're angry. That's the other beautiful thing. So you ask what's in my book, there are chapters just about emotions. Like, what are they for? Why do we have them?

You know, emotions are information to us, not to anybody else. Like young people now are saying, you should know what I'm feeling. No, that's not my job. That's for you to know what you're saying. feeling and then and then communicate it. You know, like that's, that's your feeling. It's your experience, not mine. You can, you can share it with me.

I'm happy to hear it. But I didn't put it there. I didn't, you know, nobody makes anybody feel anything. Oh, yeah. Totally. Maybe nobody, you know, there's a lot of people that have that misconception that other people make me feel stuff or I feel stuff because what other people are doing to me. And people don't realize.

feelings aren't reality. They're only reality to the person who's feeling them. Feelings are not reality. You're not logic and reason. I mean, you can, I can look at a, I can look at the sunset and have a feeling of, wow, this is really beautiful and nice. Someone can look at the sunset and be like, oh my God, the world's ending. The sun's disappearing. I'll never come back. You know, and that feeling is valid for them. Very different emotion. completely illogical to the fact that the sun sets and rises every day. Last time I checked.

I mean, I haven't checked in the morning lately, but I'm pretty sure. But again, they're very different systems, right? Where we feel and where we think, they're meant to work together, but they're not the same part of the system, just like your liver is not your kidney. You know, like they're supposed to operate as a system. I was just joking. I was thinking of a vodka joke of if you drink.

I'm not going to have vodka. They don't work anymore. I've seen those movies in the morning. And that's why we don't drink anymore, kids, because hangovers are awful. Anyway, yeah, but you bring a good point. Can you give us a definition of what boundaries are? Because like you and I, we didn't discover until later in life, no one that has sent on this boundary secret. So we got walked all over probably most of my lives. Tell us what boundaries are and let's help educate some more people. Okay. So a boundary We have them when we're tiny, tiny, tiny. If somebody goes to touch a very young child and they push you away, that's a boundary.

Says, I don't want that. I don't like that. You know, you go to feed a baby like with a spoon and they cover their mouth or they spit it out at you. Yeah. So we correct that behavior because we don't understand that they're just giving us information. They don't like it. So what? So they don't like it.

Big deal. Move on to something else. So because that gets shut down from the time we're little, we don't realize that we have our own system and get to choose. So I'm in my own sovereign system. You're in your own sovereign system. And that is why communication comes after boundaries in that order, right? Accountability, I know it. It just happens to go ABC, but it's just luck that that happened.

Accountability, is it mine? Yes, whether I want to eat something that is definitely should be mine, right? If I don't like it, I can set a boundary and I can say, no, thank you. That isn't something I choose, right? It gets faster as you learn to do it. So that is a physical boundary, right? Don't get so close to me. No, don't touch me that way.

A verbal boundary, an emotional boundary, people, they take it. They just take it, and it's hurting them. I heard verbal abuse once described as word bullets. And that just stuck with me. You know, it's because they can hurt. I know, I grew up saying sticks and stones can break your bones, you know, words can never hurt you. But that's not true. Words do hurt us.

They make us small or unimportant or not good enough or, you know, that's not respect. That's not kind. So if we can understand what boundaries are, they're not meant to be mean. They're meant to create some clarity, right? This is me. This is what I like. This is what I don't like. Yeah.

Now, what do you do when someone decides they want to push that boundary or cross it? How do you react to that? Do you lop off their heads or what do you do? You want to. First, it's about letting them know. You're not hearing me. You're not respecting my boundary. If they continue to do it, honestly, I think you create distance with that person.

It means you don't hang out with them either at all or for only short periods of time. You don't give them access to your deeper self because you can't. They've shown you that they can't be trusted. And if they want to change, they can. I can't make them change. I mean, I've had family members. I've had to create a lot of distance with because they, they just kept doing it. And I didn't like it.

And so you let them know, hey, man, you cross the boundary. Do you provide a penalty at that point where you're like, I'm leaving you or I'm never talking to again? Or how do you escalate maybe the boundary violation as? you know and there's some people that they're just kind of broken in the brain and if you give them a rule that you know like my dog's kind of have that i'm raising a puppy right now you kind of have to you kind of have to go you know he's a big dog so he looks he's as full size as my eight-year-old dog at eight months and he looks like a big dog and you you get angry with him sometimes because you're like what the hell are you doing you're a big dog i told you not to do that but then you

You got to go, hey, he's a eight-month-old puppies. You know, he doesn't look like a puppy. That's right. He's still learning. So what you do with your puppy is you repeat consistently. You can't do that. No, my daughter has a Connie Corso that is not allowed to come in the kitchen. So he tries, but he has to stop at the line that he has to stop at.

Because he's big and he knocks people over. Yeah. Yeah. You got to have got it. It's not saying that I don't, I don't care. about you as a person, I'm saying, I care about me and how you are impacting me. Oh. See, that's where we get into this whole thing about, you know, are you being selfish if you set a boundary to maintain your own being?

Yeah. You know, and we're right there right now trying to decide, you know, if we are supposed to be honoring ourselves. You know, what does it say spiritually in Christianity? You know, love, love thy neighbor as thyself, not instead of thyself. That's not what it says. So if I'm loving me, that allows me to then love others, but not instead of. I know. It really breaks the rules, doesn't it? Let me ask you this, though, and, you know, correct me if wrong, because it's a question. But I, I, I, my, my interpretation of a boundary will be, it seems, it does seem a little selfish, but you're also caring about the other person because you're trying to enhance or fix or build a relationship

with that person and you care about them. And to me, you're basically saying, look, I care about you, but what you're doing with this behavior is not healthy for me and it's not healthy for our relationship. And therefore, if we want to keep working on this relationship, for you and I to benefit from it, this needs to get fixed.

And there are some things that are complete deal-breakers. I need you to stop sleeping with everyone in the neighborhood because this is kind of impacting our relationship. And it seems selfish. They're like, I'm having fun.

You're not, that's your problem. But you're like, no, it hurts you. That's the point. It hurts you. to share someone with everyone in the neighborhood, you know, if that's your position. Are you saying I'm wrong? You make, you make, no, you make a great point. I've had to say to people, I don't feel safe when you do that.

Like, emotionally, I feel like I need to go hide. You know, I grew up around some really mean people. And so I learned to stand there but shut down. And I don't like doing that. I like to be fully present. and engaged. So I need for it to be a safe environment. You know, like you said, how somebody speaks to you or how someone shows up around you. And if they can't do that, yeah, you're sharing it with them because you do care. You want to see it change, but you don't have the power to change it

in them. You only have the power to communicate and express what it's like for you. So I say it's self-care, not selfish. That's just the story. the shift that I've made. Yeah, and I would agree with you. It's self-care, but, you know, technically if you're in a relationship, not really but, but I'm saying but, because but's the contrary.

If you're in a relationship and that person is supposed to care about you, they're supposed to have a vested interest in your well-being and in the relationship that the two of you have, you know, that's, you're helping communicate to them in your best interest. There's a few things that make me

more mental when I hear someone say, I need the other person to read my mind in the relationship to, they should just know what's wrong. And you're like, and if you've ever been on the other end of that relationship where then you got to go play 20 fucking questions going, it was the socks on the floor. I didn't pick up the underwear. I didn't wash the dishes. You know, it could be anyone of five million things, especially with people that are unstable or have unresolved trauma and emotional just damage. It could be anything, you know. I mean, I've been, I remember one time I had a girlfriend sit down with me and she's, we're going to, we're going to have a talk, you know. And as a man, you're like, okay, I should either just fake my death and move to a new place and just, just whatever. That's how men are.

We hear we need to talk. We're just like, if we're driving home, we're looking for bridges we can drive off of. We're just like, this is going to be some conversation about how I'm wrong and and yada, yada, yada. And it's always like a breakup sort of ultimatum extortion plot. It's a manipulation. Yeah, that's what you're saying. I love you, man. You're awesome.

Thanks for calling that one out. I was trying to be nice. But yeah, it is a manipulation. And nine times out of ten, it's usually to get them to do something. So I remember that is just BS. Sometimes it has to do something else that they don't even tell you. So I remember one time I had a girlfriend, you know, she gave me his call. work, you know, we're going to talk, we go home.

And I'm just like, fuck. I'm like thinking, is there a bridge somewhere nearby? And so I get home and Chris, we're going to probably have to break up. I'm like, okay, what's this about? And she's, you know, you run three companies that are multimillionaire companies. You have hundreds of employees. But in the morning, when you go to work, you leave your socks on the floor and your underwear. You have to take a shower.

And this is my most heinous crime with every girlfriend I've ever had, evidently. Because this is, this is the, I'm like a great boyfriend or husband. If you talk to anybody in the first six months, three months. And then then after that, everything goes to hell. And I don't change. So I don't know what's going on there. But so, yeah, it was socks and underwear. This is the crisis point of ending to your relationship.

Yes. And so I went, okay, we were going to break up over this. Okay, all right. All right, I'll work on it, you know, because I'm a work on it sort of guy. I'm a man, I try and fix things. So I go, okay, I'll work on it. I'll try it. You know, there's a lot going on in the morning when, you know, there's a few or few guys

at my level, even back then, especially back then, actually. And your mind is somewhere else. In my mind, somewhere else, you know, we got offices in three states, four multi-offices. You know, I got more employee problems. And so, anyway, and we're running three companies at the same time, all multimillion. in our companies, losing my brain. So I wake up the next morning and I go, okay, remember to do the socks thing

and do the thing. And just out of ponderance, I looked into her closet. She owned most of the closet in the master bedroom. And I had, you know, two inches of space or something, you know how that goes. And all this shit was on the floor.

Like shoes, socks, underwear, dresses, you name it. It was like the floor place to be. And it was an open door right into our master bedroom. So I picked up everything off the floor and started making a pile in the front room. I thought, you know, I just, I just have some questions. How come I have got to pick up my little underwear and my two socks.

And this is the rich guy who takes you the oyster bar two to three times a week. And, you know, I'm the big Satan in the home. Then I go in the, I just have to peek in the daughter's bedroom. She had this cute little three-year-old daughter. Mess everywhere across the floor. So I pick up everything off the floor because I'm a good partner. And I take and I add that to the pile in the front door where I placed everything. Then I go into the son's room who's 11 years old and pick up all the shit that's in there.

And then I take the time to hand count everything. It was 130 items that were on the floor from everyone. And four of those items. None of them yours. Three of those items were mine. Two socks. One underwear. Okay.

I put the three items of mine next to the 130 pile there and said, and then I left a note saying, explain to me why I have three items on the floor and I'm getting the ultimate man to break up. And who picks up all this stuff that you and the kids leave on the floor? Who, who does that? And she called me laughing and she goes, you busted me, you got me. She goes, I usually pick up all the kids stuff. So let me get this straight. You pick up a hundred pieces of kids stuff when you get home from work,

but I'm the one that's the... Yep. Pretty wild, huh? Yeah, pretty wild about those boundaries. So some things, you know, you enforce some things. And, you know, it turns out it wasn't about the socks and whatever. No, it's never about the socks. Yeah.

Nope. No. That's not. You know, once again, you have to read some of the socks. mine. So then I'm going, okay, this is really you have to ask. You have to ask. You have to be curious. And they go, you should just know. It doesn't seem like this is really about the socks. What else is going on here?

If you really love me, you should just know. And you're like, yeah, I'm just sitting over here with my Ouija board and my and my seance, whatever. I'm, you know, I'm sacrificing a goat over here. I've got Ashburn and got one of those globes. I forget what they're called that the psychics have. And, you know, I'm paring into the crystal ball. Mirror, mirror, tell me what's wrong with her today.

So do you begin to see then why alignment is such a, it's not one size fits all, it's unique to each individual. How one person aligns may not be how the next person aligns. And when you, you know, but it's each person's responsibility to do their own work. Not to read the mind of somebody else. If you're curious about what's going on with them, then you ask. with curiosity, not with blame. So can I still say what the F is wrong with you today? Is that blame or curiosity asking for a friend?

That's blame. Yeah, anytime you say you, if you were to say, I'm really confused about what's happening with you. Is that something you can share with me? Why are we acting crazy today? Maybe you should use we instead of you because then you's not blaming, but we would kind of infer that one of their multiple personalities might be responsible. Maybe, maybe, yeah.

You know what? Again, when you talk to anybody, whether it's somebody at work, somebody at home, I mean, I've done it with complete strangers before. Me going to the bank and the bank teller was just rude. I mean, I'm just standing there like trying to cash a check or something. And she was not nice. And I looked at her and I said, I'm sorry. Did I do or say something that upset you?

And it was like I had held a mirror up to her nastiness, you know. And she just stopped and she said, oh, my gosh, I am so sorry. Something just happened. And I guess I was still in it. I said, yeah, you know, that isn't a good idea. You know, take a minute and get yourself settled again before you come to the window, you know, because I didn't do anything. But rather than call her names and say, I'm not coming at this bank anymore because you're this or you're that, you know, it's just like saying, what's happening? What, did I miss something?

Like, yeah. Help me understand. I had a professor in school that used to say that. Help me understand. And he scratch his chin, you know. And curiosity is really different than blame and being mad at somebody. It just is. Can I say, help me understand why you're a dummy?

What about this are you not getting? Right? What are you not getting? Yeah. So again, once we say you, that's like a, it's like attack mode. So people become very defensive, right? You attack, they defend. And then you're stuck in that power struggle thing.

You can't have any, you can't have any good conversation from there. You're not going to have positive or helpful communication ever. You do you. What's your experience? What's going on for you when you're being asked to pick up these three things in the bathroom? When everybody else gets to be, you know, pigs. Complete slot. Yeah.

It's a legitimate question. Why are you? Why? Maybe she wants to do it to her kids, but she's conflicted about that. So she takes it out on you. Yeah. You know, but that's not right either. Yeah.

I don't think I ever figured out what that was about, but it didn't matter anyway. But at least she admitted that you got her. Yeah, she was laughing when she called me. I mean, some people would be angry and they would double down on that. She was at least laughing when she called me. And she goes, yeah, I pick up all the things. And I go, so let me get this straight. You love your children more than me, which is fine.

But I just, it's good to know where I stand here. You're willing to break your back to bend over and pick up 100 things on the floor every day that your kids left. But God forbid, you know, I'll just remember that next time you want to go to the oyster bar. So I'm going to go back to that story. That's beautiful. It's a beautiful example. So what if she's got all this resentment buildup because she's not having her kids take responsibility for their stuff? And because she's full of all this resentment, it projects onto you over three little things that are not a big deal.

But that 11-year-old is perfectly capable of picking up everything. And even the three-year-old. Three-year-olds are really good at wanting to put things away and organize if you do it with them. Yeah. So really, there's no excuse. It was a funny thing. I mean, she had a drinking problem too. So there was that. So some of that may have.

Yeah, some of that may have. She was a good woman. She just addiction and, you know, inherited alcoholism is, is an awful thing. You know, people are doing the best they can sometimes. And I was, too. I wasn't the perfect boyfriend either, just so people know. I believe you and I come from the world where when there's problems with people, we just go, takes two to tango and 50-50.

Nowadays, it's always, I didn't do anything wrong. I was the Jesus Christ, perfect one in the relationship and the other person was Satan. No such thing. I will tell you, after an 18-year marriage that I finally just threw the flag up and got out of, the father of my kids, it took me a long time to see my part in what had happened in marriage a long time. Oh, shoot, I did that. Oh, that's the message I gave. I didn't, I didn't know immediately. It took some more work. And it, I mean, it helped, you know, but I wish that everybody, and my clients have said this to me, too, in the past when I was doing therapy. You know,

like, they don't understand why everybody doesn't just go talk to somebody, you know, like, why don't people do this? You don't have to be diagnosed with a mental health issue. to have somebody to just work things out with. Yeah. You know. And it helps keep you grounded in reality. Like I, even in business or my person,

I ask my friends for time to time, be honest with me. I mean, am I, am I, where am I, am I living in my own private Idaho? That's a song,

if you don't know, you live in Idaho, that's why. But am I living in my own private world that I built that I'm going, you know, hear no evil, see no evil,

speak no evil. or am I on my on point? And I try and get people around me to not be my yesman and they'll tell me when I'm wrong, which is what they do all the time now. So I guess that backfired. I'm wrong a lot. So long as you can hear it. I mean, hearing feedback is hard, right?

I'm still not going to change, though. I'm kidding. Okay. You know, some people like that. You'll still tell them they're wrong. They're like, yeah, I'm just going to keep doubling. Yeah, that's how I roll. Yep.

So let's get some good plugs in here as we ran out at the end of the show on your website and coaching service you offer. What sort of client is your ideal client? What qualifications they have to have? Maybe net worth, minimum spend. What sort of issues maybe they have, etc., etc.? Yeah. I have decided that I'm not interested in being one of those $50,000 executive coaches.

I like to help everyday people with everyday issues, just like I've always done. Somebody who has read the books and done the classes and, you know, taken the, I don't know, taken the, done the self-work. And it's still not working and they're confused. That's my ideal client. That's who I was. I've done all this stuff. Why isn't this working?

And that's who it is. Absolutely. And these are, like I say, they're everyday people. They might be parents. They might be people transitioning. You know, their kids are off to college or moving out. They might be people who can never get ahead at work. Like, things are going okay personally, but their job is never what they want it to be.

Because we're back to that. Can't access their own internal stuff. Like I worked with a woman who was making a lot of money. She was a consultant, but working for people above her. And we worked together for about eight weeks. And she came in the very last time I saw her. And she said, you know what I did? She said, I decided to have my own consulting business.

She says, I don't need to deal with these other people anymore. I know what I know. And she went and did it and already had clients. I mean, she was so excited. Wow. Yeah. It is a game changer. It was like a small thing.

But it just shifts everything. Oh, yeah. You can do a self-check with yourself. Am I in alignment or am I still off? You know, you can feel when you're off because things aren't matching. Have you ever seen those little wooden architectural figures that you can move the arms and legs and the heads? I used to have one of those in my office and people would say, oh, yeah, I'm not lined up. The head was turned backwards and the arms were going all over and yeah, they knew or they're sick all the time.

Yeah. A lot of people to make them sick if they are not self-actualized, you know, living chaos is, you know, And some people, correct me if I'm wrong, from your experience, but some people, they grow up in chaos. So it's their blueprint that they learn from their parents, their parents' relationship. And, you know, so they have a lot of trauma, defense mechanisms from that. They respond. Sometimes it was the trauma response to it. You know, and for some people living in calmness and peace and alignment, as you put it, feels wrong to them.

because there's the attention of chaos, there's the tension of victimhood, you know, instead of going, maybe if you put the fire out, you know, I'm kind of thinking in my head, have you ever seen that meme where there's a dog and he's in his kitchen and the whole kitchen's on fire and he's holding a cup sitting at a table going, this is fine. And that's how it kind of says. You know, the house is on fire burning around. And if they don't have it, we'll create it. Yeah, exactly. Yep. And you're right. Yeah. You're right. And we see that in dating and relationships now. I see that a lot. You know, people will create, I have to feel something. I don't know, maybe if you weren't living in chaos so much, you know, you wouldn't have this drive to go to the extremes. And, you know, it's okay to be peaceful. Well, that begins to feel like being alive. Yeah. That survival mechanism that people get into, they just, that's all they know. And so that. life for them. And if it goes away, they don't want to do with themselves. Yeah. Yeah. I'm a nature lover. I'm bored. I'm bored. You're bored because the house isn't on fire? This is just. They don't know

what else to do. Yeah. I just recently had that with my puppy, not to, this is becoming the Chris Foss puppy show. And I got him at eight months from a family, wonderful family. They really tried hard with this dog. But it's a husky. Huskies are high energy, high demand. You've got a fucking husky. You have to have a backyard. And they didn't have either of those. They had this house that was stuck to eight other houses, no yard, just a garage. And they kept them in a crate most of the time.

And they had three or four little kids. And I'm sure there's a lot of chaos, you know. And three or four kids is chaos. You know, there's a lot of wringling. You got to do those kids. And young kids aren't good with dogs either. They tend to grab. I don't know.

And then they get bit. the dog bit me and you're like I saw you grab them with your little fingernails you just took like a fist of fur and yeah you do that to me I'll bite you and boundaries yeah that's my number one boundary right there don't bite me unless I that's right you don't grab the pets no yeah you don't grab the pets when he first came he was just chaos he was just crazy I think he ate like everything he possibly could and I think he was unnourished and and threw it up the next for the next day or so. And he was just so desperate for food. And he would, he would really steal the treats out of my other dog's mouth. If it was a little bit sticking up, he would go steal

it. And he was just so desperate. And you could, he was trying to get in everything. And you could just see how much chaos he was used to being in. And my home is very peaceful. It's very calm. There's boundaries. Don't bite me, basically. And, over the net last month he has slowly learned that it's okay to be calm it's okay to be peaceful and we're having food his nervous system is calming down yeah his nervous system thank you that's the that's the reference i was looking for but it is and you know a lot of people feel that when they're out of alignment their their nervous system is is is all jacked up and crazed and so over the last month he slowly calmed down.

And what I've had to do is, you know, I used to watch a lot of the, I know he's that guy, the dog whisper. And some people don't like him for whatever reason. Seasoned a lot. But I learned some really good stuff. And part of it was my energy

and how I communicate with him or am around him is really important at setting the frame and the standard. And so even when he's chaotic, I have to try and be peaceful. if he's, you know, I've had him buy me. And when he first came, he had food anxiety. So he was like eating everything. Like I swear to God, if I gave him a hundred pound bag, he would have ate at that night.

And that's not good for anybody. And so we've slowly changed that. And a bunch of my friends, you're never going to be able to get the food anxiety gone. You're never going to be able to leave out food. And I'm like, I've left food out for 25 years with all my dogs. I'm not going to do this feeding crap because this creates food anxiety. the feeding, withholding food. And so I'm like, we'll get there.

So it took about two weeks. And he just finally realized, hey, these guys are always going to feed me. It's okay. It's safe. We got rid of the crate that he was always being stored in because there's no reason to do that. You know. And now he's really calm. He's being a lot of calmness.

Last week, he's really changed a lot where we kind of have the crazy zoomies. But then the rest of the time he's calm. He can sit. Yeah. Yeah. And it's healthy for him. It's healthy for all of this. It is.

It's such a gift. I mean, what you're, you know, what you're saying is you, that's what you bring. Okay. So if you bring that to your relationships and you bring that to your friendships and you bring that, you know, to your driving on the road, I mean, it doesn't matter where you are, you're in charge of you, right? What are you bringing? So even if somebody else is flipping out, does that mean you have to flip out?

No. No. It doesn't. And, you know, when I watch people listen to this idea of being in charge of your own being, your own being, your own system, you know, and they, and they may get something. And they're like, oh, oh, my gosh. Like, it changes everything. It just changes everything. I don't have to be reacting. I can, I can just, you know, I can feel it. I can think about it. I may even want to say something. Like this is really uncomfortable for me right now. I'm going to need to step away.

And that's okay. Yeah. It is perfectly fine. Because sometimes you're not. I used to do that with my daughter and say, what are you doing walking away? And I said, I told you, I'm not having this conversation right now. Yes, I am walking away. Yeah.

You don't have to like it. I mean, sometimes you're just not in the mind space for that. And you've got to change gears. I mean, sometimes I've got, you know, I easily have endless, you know, problems of, you know, this needs to get fixed, that needs to fix, this is gone. And so your brain is in a totally different place. When someone jumps you with like, all of a sudden, I've got this. And that's why I always tell people, this is kind of, I don't know, maybe a boundary thing.

But I tell people, look, if we need to talk about something that's really important and needs my focus, you've got to, number one, schedule it. Number two, you can't just jump me as I'm walking out the door and be like, you know, crisis. center time. And it's not, it's not how this works. And, you know, some of the games that get played with that sort of stuff and delivery of the crisis time is, is an edge to give a win to them. And they hope you just roll over for it. And so I tell people, like, you just did, you just did a beautiful job of explaining accountability boundary communication. Like, you don't, you don't even realize you just said that to me. You're in charge of your time. You're in charge of how you have a conversation with somebody. So you set this boundary. Don't hijack me in the hallway, right?

I want to be able to focus and have time to think about what you're saying to me because I'm sure it's important. Right. Like that's beautiful. That's you being the leader of you. See, Bravo. Yeah. I'm learning. I think everybody can learn to do that. Yeah. And it's so much, it's so much different. I just have to point it out so you know you do it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, telling people look, if you know, and sometimes people, one of the problems people have is they play that game where they don't tell you what's wrong and they just keep loading up the gun and they're just like the mental gun and they're just like, hey, yeah, yeah, and then when they do decide to hit you with an open up about you, you know, you're getting both barrels, right? Suddenly this person is screaming, yelling at you and you're on the way out the door to work. and this is not the time, number one. That's not. And usually any time someone is.

It's not very respectful. Yeah. Yeah. So I, you know, I'm like, you schedule a time. You know, if you need to call it, let's sit down and talk. You're welcome to, but, you know, I mean, it really shouldn't be that way because that's really extortion tactic. Most of the guys know that when we sit down and talk, this is the breakup conversation.

In fact, if I'm not in a serious relationship with it, They dropped down on me. I go, let's just break up because this is what this is about. It's some sort of extortive thing you're doing here. I'm not vested enough into this to deal with your bullshit right now. But schedule a time. And you already know that. In fact, I've often said that if I get in a relationship, again, a serious relationship again,

I'll do preventative psychotherapy. So I'll do couples therapy where we go in maybe once a month or every quarter. And we go, hey, I know we're fresh. I know this is new. Everybody's still got good feelings. We're still in the honeymoon phase. But what's going on? Anything we need to address tears?

Any weirdness going on? Any, you know, things that my psychic mind needs to read. What am I doing? It'll change, you know? And just before it turns into that explosion. And this is probably a great point for everything you and I've talked about. And the reason why you need to do this alignment is you don't want to get to the point where you're going to explode on somebody. That's right.

That's right. Meet the issues and deal with them. Yep, agreed. I worked with couples for a while, and then I realized it was just, it was terrible. But I did for a couple of years. And the one thing that came up again and again and again is they did not know how to listen effectively. One would be saying something. The other one would be getting ready to fire back. And so I would say, I'm going to teach you reflective listening. This is what it looks like. And I would be getting ready to fire back. And so I would say, I'm going to teach you reflect on. of listening. This is what it looks like. And I would describe it. And I would do it with each of them individually. And I'd say, okay, what did you hear them say?

That's all I want to know right now. What did they just say to you? What are you going to come back with? What do you think they just said to you? And it just blew my mind that nobody knew how to do this. What did they say? I was busy forming my answer. Exactly.

Exactly. And you know what? We're taught that as children. We're not taught. to reflect on what our parent just said, we're just supposed to stand there and take it. You know, and then they say, look at me when I'm yelling at you.

You know, it's like, why would anybody do that? Yeah, that's like a riot. Let's do that. That's terrible. Someone waving a belt at me. It sounds like my whole childhood. But I learned a few things. I have so much more hope for humanity.

You know, I've always been a very hopeful person, and I know that people can do this. I just know they can. Hope is one of our most endearing forms on top of all the other negative ones. But yeah, hope to be better people, to build better. And people can read it in your book. How can people reach out to you? How do they find out if the two of you are willing to work together and a fit?

Because I'm sure you qualify your clients. How can that whole handshake take place and get to know each other? My understanding, I just got a new website. And it's through a company called Paperbell. So if you go to Paperbell, just like it sounds, P-A-P-E-R-B-E-L-L, dot me, then there's a semicolon, or is it a colon, two dots. And then Jennifer underscore Cochern. And Cochern is C-O-C-H-E-R-N.

It gets misspelled a lot. Yes. You can even Google me. I mean, if you're just not sure. You know, you'll find me out there. Find her out there. Yeah. I guess it's been a fun.

Fun and wonderful show, the longer shows are the better shows. You know, we have people with novels, and you can't talk about the middle or the end, so they're usually shorter shows. But, you know, we're talking about nonfiction stuff. We can dig into it. So we had a lot of fun here, Jennifer. Thank you for programming on the show, and hopefully we change some lives and get in alignment for people there. I hope so, too. Thank you for this opportunity.

This is fun. Thank you. We have lots of fun on the show. We told all the horror stories of Chris's relationships with his dogs and girlfriends. That makes a great show, doesn't it though? Anyway, right now my dogs are like probably peeing on my floor. He's talking about us on the show again. Anyway, order up Jennifer's book.

Puppies. Anyway, order up Jennifer's book. Alignment. Move into, I'm sorry. Let me recut that third time. This is the ADHD working. Alignment. move from internal chaos to clarity out July 25th, 2017.

Thanks for audience for tuning in. Go to Goodreads.com, Forge, that's Chris Foss. And one caveat I'll put here, we talk with Jennifer on the show about how the healthier natural state for your human being is to be in alignment and not chaos. So please, if you're someone who is raising chaos, if you have to bring chaos and drama into your relationships, there is a better way. and you may not know what that way is because you've never lived it, but being in a healthy, non-chaotic, yeah, it's boring.

I'll be honest, it's boring. It's boring not having chaos. At first. It's boring, getting stuff done. And yeah, you're just like, but it's very beneficial because then you sit around and go, oh, what can I do with my time to maybe make some more money or maybe spend more time with my family or kids? And you're not spending all that time just in the pity.

party of victimhood or creating drama or creating problems and then your life is suffering. Yeah. If you don't have peace in your life, you need to go find peace. So go call, Jennifer. Thanks for tuning in. Be good at each other. Stay safe. We'll see you guys next time.

You've been listening to the most amazing, intelligent podcast ever made to improve your brain and your life. Warning. Consuming too much of the Chris Walshow podcast can lead to people thinking you're smarter, younger, and irresistible sexy. Consume in regularly moderated amounts. consult a doctor for any resulting brain bleed. All right, Jennifer.