THE ED MYLETT SHOW - From Trauma To Freedom & Inner Peace w/ Gabby Bernstein

Episode Date: May 31, 2022

TRAUMA and PAIN takes on many forms and is an extraordinary CHALLENGE many of us face daily.  This week, my guest GABBY BERNSTEIN and I are going to talk about PAIN and TRAUMA, digging deep into a subject that’s affected a lot of us. In fact, I talk to a lot of people, and I’ve seen how we’re collectively reeling from trauma more than ever.   That’s why I asked Gabby to sit down and shed light on a topic that remains elusive and damaging for many people.We’re going to unmask the nature of trauma, and Gabby will help you TAKE MORE CONTROL of your life and HEAL from the traumas that are hurting you.Gabby is well qualified because she's no stranger to trauma. She’s overcome extreme challenges in her life, including the difficult battle of beating addiction and getting sober several years ago.Since then, she’s published several NEW YORK TIMES bestselling books on spirituality, personal growth, and radical life change, including her new book HAPPY DAYS, THE GUIDED PATH FROM TRAUMA TO PROFOUND FREEDOM AND INNER PEACE.Gabby explores the disconnect between outward success and difficulties you face trying to reconcile how the world sees you vs. how you see yourself. That CONFLICT is a breeding ground for trauma, and shedding light on it can help ease mental stressors that can easily descend into trauma.One of the most important things we talk about are TRIGGERS AND PATTERNS. Reacting to things that have happened in our past creates triggers like disassociation, shame, or denial, and Gabby does a great job of breaking things down to help you recognize these things in you.She also reveals how we can heal ourselves from trauma by connecting with our INNER CHILD and PROTECTORS. Childhood trauma often carries forward to adulthood, and we develop protectors to do just that, protect us from long-standing traumas.There’s also a physical price to pay for trauma. Gabby has got important insights on THE TOLL TRAUMA TAKES ON OUR BODY.And she also shares exercises we can do to lessen physical trauma, including the “heart hold” and “tapping,” which is a technique I’ve been a fan of for a long time.This week is a HEALING week.Gabby helped me during our talk, and when you listen, I have no doubt SHE’S GOING TO HELP YOU TOO.

This is the end my let's show. I welcome back everybody. I'm pumped about today because I've asked this lady, I think 63 to 163 times to be here with us today. And she's finally graced us with her presence. And the reason that I wanted her today is I think she's so special, so unique, one of a kind in the space that we all exist in here. And she has a book out right now called Happy Days, the guided path from trauma to profound freedom

and inner peace. And man, after reading this book, is she qualified to talk about this stuff? So, yeah, be Bernstein. Welcome to the show today. So glad you're here. I started the show just with this like full-bodied chills because I, when I connect with people after they've read the book, it's almost like kind of like a fight club thing. It's like, I get you, like I understand. Not only do they get me, but if they've said something to me, like you just said, which I want to acknowledge because it's really meaningful to me. Oh, wow, I read the full book. I really read the book and the way that you looked at me, it's as if we've really been through something together. Because if someone's actually brave enough to keep going and really take it in means that they resonate. And that's exactly right, Gabby.

We do connect. I relate to having some trauma. The bravery thing you just said is what I wanted to start to acknowledge you about. It was, it took a lot of bravery for you to write this book. This is not like your other books. Your other books are incredible. But it's not every day that someone that's so successful is willing to be that open and vulnerable about their lives. It's just, it's sometimes I think people can use, not use, but leverage vulnerability to gain attention.

Whereas, you already had the attention and it didn't need to sort of take the mask off. I'm okay. Here's who I really am and what I'm really going through. Even though you really look up to me, you think I've got it all together. I don't. That requires tremendous bravery and I want to acknowledge that to begin. So thank you. I don't know why, but you're making me cry.

It's like very deep from here. I think it was taking that in because you said something so big. It's like people will use vulnerability to be seen in many ways. And in my case, it was almost like I had to see myself in order to have the freedom to be that vulnerable. Wow. Wow.

Okay. Here we go, everybody. This is going to be a good one. You can already feel it. So I wanna read a couple of things you wrote because they stood out to me. You said, well, success is continued to manifest in my outer world. My inner world was hard to maintain.

And I have to tell you, I relate to that so deeply. I know exactly what you mean. And you said, I lived in a constant state of fight, flight, or freeze, always on the lookout for something to go wrong. Man, do I relate to that? Only felt safe when I thought I was in control of my circumstances. Later she says, Gabby says,

buried beneath the successful story I'd created about my life was a terrified little girl. Now you're making me emotional. This is so disassoci associated from her past. Unaware of what she was running from. And then later you go into this word you use about anesthesizing your pain and how you would anesthesize it, whether it was, you know, substances or relationships or whatever they were. It's relate to all of that on such a deep level. And so maybe you could just start out by talking about that,

where did you find yourself where you had all this external success, you're admired by millions of people, yet you're going through this pain. What did the day-to-day life look like for you on the inside in your private moments? Yeah, and I'll go into that and deeply because one of the things that came up when I wrote this book

and I made the decision to be this vulnerable is that many of the people that were closest to me, my husband, my publishers who have published me for decades, came to me and said, this is too vulnerable. And they also were blown away. They're like, we don't even know that this was going on. We didn't even know that this was happening. So, and so much so that my publisher even said, you know, Gabby, we are nervous for you. You're sharing one negative story after the next and you're not showing your true strength.

But I responded and I said, my ability to be this vulnerable is my true strength. Oh, I love that. The stories in this book, they share a story of someone who lived with a dissociated memory, a memory that from a childhood traumatic event that was completely shut down, blocked out, and anesthetized, as you said. We all have that experience. Mine just happened to be extreme, very extreme. We all have that experience in extreme ways, whether it's big T trauma that we experience

as children or small T trauma, big T trauma in my case, the experience of having something that was so extreme that I literally dissociated, that my brain just tucked it away and put it away for 30 years. Whereas for some folks, it's being bullied and having the experience of feeling like they're inadequate or not good enough or they're separate then. So we all have these different unique moments

and time that will really dictate the course of our life if they are not really processed properly in the moment. For me, it was it was this experience and so to answer your question, I I lived for 36 years. I believe that this traumatic event probably happened when I was like five or six or around that time. I don't know all the details So it's called 30 years not knowing and In that time I had gotten sober at 25 began a very big mission driven career to write books give motivational talks be a

Thought leader for my generation as Oprah Winfrey said, when I was on her show at 32 years old. Incredible. And by the time I was 36, I probably had written at least seven or eight books, multiple New York Times bestsellers had had this established audience that really believed in me, had had the bravery to be vulnerable and tell the truth along the way, but didn't actually know the full f*** truth, right? Right.

Right. So here I was at 36 and at that time, and this is a very common thing and it's very important for me to share if someone does think that they may have a memory that isn't fully developed. When people make big life decisions, like decision to get married or decision to change a career, decision to have a baby or when they actually do get married and have a baby whatever it is, those are often moments when the cracking into historical trauma may occur. Whether they're aware of it or not, because there's a lot of times the one of the biggest ways that we contain the trauma is by staying in control.

Yes. So when the control mechanisms start to get dismantled, that's when we begin to crack. And that was literally the language I was using. I kept saying it was 36 years old. I had just gotten married. We were family planning. My husband was leaving his job at JPMwork and that he'd been at for a decade to come run the business that I had built up for the past decade. And so all of my ways of controlling my life were starting to be dismantled. So without realizing it, I started to crack. And I literally said that I'm cracking. I can't go on like this. I was having mental breakdowns. My life had

been really controlled and very manic prior to that, even though there was so much good that was coming out of me. And there was, you can still be in the pursuit of greatness and be struggling. So it's important to mention that. But, you know, at 36 here, I am I'm breaking down, breaking down, breaking down. I'm having massive gastrointestinal issues, panic attacks, meltdowns, like tantrums, frankly. And finally, it hit this point where I was 36 having these meltdowns and I had a dream. In the dream, I remembered being sexually abused as a child. And then I saw myself as an adult confronting the abuse. When I woke up from that dream, I was so horrified, Ed. I was in such a terror

because I woke up and it was the most real experience in a dream that I'd ever had. And it was so terrifying that I was like, no f***ing way to shut that down. And I pushed it down and ignored it for a few days, days later in my therapy, opening up a little bit was enough to just blast it open. And so there I was, 36 years old, remembering this dissociated memory

of being sexually abused as a child. The first few moments of this memory, I felt like, wow, okay, that explains why I was a cocaine addict. You know, that's why it explains why I'm such a control freak. That explains why I always feel so scared in my body. That explains why I need my meditation, like a pill to stay sane. That explains why I've been on such a spiritual pursuit of happiness and well-being and explained so much to me, but it also put me into a very dark scary place of being kind of stuck back in that memory. Yeah. Can I ask you about it? I want to go a little deeper. So you said something earlier

that's a big part of the book and I just want to make sure everyone get first off you got to get this book you guys. If you're walking around carrying something and you can't figure out why you're carrying it, there's one of these two teas you're carrying around, right? Like, even for me, like, I produce all these external results in my life, why am I always so worried? Why do I always create so much chaos? Why is it then, for me, you talk about triggers

in the book and you'll talk about in a second, but for me, it's like, why is it that if someone's not honest with me, it affects me so much more deeply than it does somebody else? Because when my dad would drink, maybe he wasn't really honest about where he was or what he was doing. So to me, that's a trigger for me, right? If I see someone super inebriated, like out of control,

it affects me so deeply when I see it because of my experience with my dad. So can you just go to the really go back just a little bit to the two T's because I think this is important. Yeah. Yeah. Just to be able to go, Hey, I'm pretty sure I wasn't sexually abused. I'm pretty sure you know, no one beat me up when I was a child or anything like that. So I'm cool. I think people think that right. Totally. And you know, Ed, first and foremost, I just want to honor you and acknowledge you because having an alcoholic parent is big T trauma. It's it's capital T. Yeah. And often what we have

when we have trauma, we will one of the trauma responses because there's so much shame wrapped up in the trauma. And so we have a lot of different shame responses. And one of them is to deny is to say, oh, well, I wasn't beaten up. It wasn't that. I was straight up would do that. I'd be like, well, you know, I wasn't like living in poverty and like living through a war. You know, okay, but I was still sexually because of the child. You know, these are serious things that occur and minimize our trauma because we want to

minimize the shame that we carry as a result of having experienced that trauma and never processing it. So that, and I minimized it so much that I literally dissociated from it, told a whole other story, created a whole other world about my life that did not, that was not true. So, so whether it's big tea or small T and the fact that bullying is considered being bullied is considered small T trauma is so crazy because that's huge, right? It takes people's lives. But I have seen so many people, I've been on this book tour, I've been having all these interviews and I'll have folks like you talking to me and they'll say, why don't really have trauma? And then within five minutes, she's like,

but my dad was an alcoholic and my mom left us and I didn't really have a safe place to go to at home. I'm like, oh my God, you know, maybe like people, the word trauma has so much stigma because of the shame that's underneath it. And right now we're in this beautiful, cracking open of this of the culture of the dialogue of the lexicon that we are really open and willing

to begin to talk about trauma in a way that isn't so loaded and isn't so shameful and is actually really almost in many ways celebrated. When my social media manager texted me and said, trauma is trending on TikTok. I knew we were living in a different time. And we were living in a different time. Where are you sitting with this now, Gabby, in all honesty? Like all the work you've done, by the way, this book's loaded with tools, and we're going to touch on a couple of them, but I also want you guys to get the book. So we'll touch on a few of them.

But like, as you sit there this morning, you know, how would you describe your state of being now? I am so proud of who I am right now. I, I'll tell you why. Yeah. At 36, when I remembered this trauma, I, I knew right then and there, I need to write a book about this.

I need to, to do this trauma, I knew right then in there. I need to write a book about this. I need to do this. But there's no way in hell that I could put that book in that pen to paper until I had lived through the journey of undoing and returning to that place of peace. I put my face on this book over at the subtitle is The Guided Path from trauma to profound freedom and inner peace. It would be really, really dangerous for me to put my face on that cover and my name on that cover if I couldn't really stand behind that promise. So as a result of living the practices that we'll touch on, as a result of living through to come through the other side. And frankly, there was times where I didn't know

that there was a way out, but I was committed and on a mission. And now, where am I now? I definitely am living with profound freedom and inner peace. Does that mean that I wasn't totally effing triggered about 13 minutes ago before we started this podcast? Is that right?

No, but here's the miracle. I'm on a call. It's so awesome. You admit that. Like so freaking triggered. Okay, so I'm on a call and the dynamic of my, you know, I, I, I were very closely with people were very close to me. And when you, you know, the intimate relationships in your life are going to trigger you the most.

So I'm on this call and my old triggers are just really there. But the beauty is that today, as a result of particularly one of the therapies I talk about in the book, Internal Family Systems Therapy, which I've now been trained in, IFS is about really respecting all the parts of who you are. And so rather than letting that triggered part, that controller, right, that feels like she's being shut down. So she needs to the shutdown. The girl who's being silenced, right, has this protector part. And the protector part is controlling control freak. It's like, no, let me scream louder than everybody else.

Let me make sure I'm known and heard. Make sure I'm the boss. Bubba, Bubba. And I've set up a world that really, make sure I'm the boss, blah, blah, blah. And I've set up a world that really, it really works for that part, right? It facilitates that. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And so I'm in that moment.

I'm feeling that part come up, the controller that wants to protect me from this feeling of not being seen. And instead of screaming louder and instead of pushing, I muted my zoom. Because I'm like, well, even if I try to talk, they can hear me. And I sat with the frustration. And I let myself be present with the part of me that was so activated. And I noticed it in my body. And I was like, I'm boiling, my face is red. I am so heightened right now. I want to punch the screen. And I asked myself, what do I know? I did all this in real time. What do I

know about this? This is this is the part that feels like she's not being heard. She's not being seen. And what does she need? She needs to very calmly ask the team to not put these kinds of calls in the middle of a day when she needs to be creative and to give her more space to ideate and not force her into a decision in the way that they want. Yes, that's so good. And I did that.

I did that. I was still triggered and I was still in that place, but I was grounded enough to say, hey guys, I need it this way. You know, this is really, this is, I don't even, I'm even able to say like, this is very activating for me. And I'm feeling really frustrated at this time and I don't even, I'm even able to say like, this is very activating for me. And I'm feeling really frustrated at this time. And I would really like the space to be able to do this creative work in a different way. That's so beautiful. Wow. And, you know, and then I got on the phone with my producer and had a quick cry. And then I got on with you. You're showing up,

like, full out here. So I, I it. I love your world out of like. Like I like to kind of show my fragility sometimes well, all the time when I do, because I don't need to be someone's icon. I want people to believe that if I can change, they can change, right? And you see, you talk about IFS therapy in the book, there's so many things like this too,

but you talk about this trigger thing and then your pattern. So let's talk a little bit about triggers and patterns because I think even that terminology may be new to most people. Right. People that have been in therapy, they're probably familiar with that. Or even if they know how they read some of my stuff on changing their state and being a peak performer, they know how to create a trigger and patterns.

But do you feel like, so discuss that for a second, but do you feel like also like just being aware of the pattern, like what you just said, like, all right, I'm doing it again, that to some extent, the awareness of the pattern can help it lose its power and grip over you. Absolutely. And actually, that's actually one of the first ex, that is the first exercise in the book, which is really about witnessing your triggers, how do you feel, and then what are you doing to run from them? triggers, how do you feel, and then what are you doing to run from them? What that's doing is in IFS language, internal family systems therapy. It's nothing to do with family therapy, although it kind of comes from that core model, but it is based on your inner family.

Inside of us, we have multiple different parts. So we have these child parts, the little boy Ed, whose dad was an alcoholic and wasn't telling the truth and, you know, whatever the storyline is. Those little exiled parts, little boy, he's locked up. He's like under lock and key. You know he's there, but he's like, real down there in the dungeon. You know, we're not talking to him. Lock him up. And then we go all these protector parts. I'll speak for my own, right? My little girl, she's locked up in the little girl

that was abused, she's locked up with my protector parts or the controller, the cocaine addict, right? Even though I'm in recovery, that addict part is present. The, the, the out, knives out is one that I got. The outrage part of me that wants to be like, you mess with me, you mess with death, like, I am going to come after you. And so all these parts are very extreme and they're very protective. And often you might consider them bad habits. You might be looking at

it and say, Oh, that's my, my, you know, my, the, the part of me that's that wants to go pick up a drink because I can't feel that or the part of me that just wants to zone out and freeze because I can't handle this. So we have all these different protective mechanisms, but they're really in IFS called Protector Parts. They're not bad. These parts are very valuable. They have had a very important role in our inner system.

And the role is to keep us safe from the extreme terror, shame, and fear of these exiled child parts. Gosh, Gary, so good. It's good. I ask you about that. So like, when you're looking at yourself, everybody, one of the things that I discovered in Gabby's book, and I'm reading the book, and it's pretty emotional for me, because, you know, I sort of trauma I've had in my life. Maybe there were parts of it that were very different than how I thought they affected. Like I give you one crazy trigger stupid example with me for everybody in here. When I go on the road and I'm traveling and I'm speaking and stuff, I often get room service and I'll eat in. And it's just really

weird. I've said this like 20 years on shows and stuff. I'm like, I'm just introverted so I kind of hide out in the room. And then I realized something as I'm reading your book, I sort of had this flash of like all the restaurants we were going. I was a kid if my dad was drunk and the confrontations that would happen in there and the shame and embarrassment of my dad yelling at a waiter or whatever in these restaurants and public restaurants. And I just like, I got emotional reading the book. I'm like, oh my gosh, that's why the restaurants it's triggered for me. I don't want to go in these places.

I've had multiple experiences in restaurants like this in public places where we were completely shamed as a family and I was ashamed of it. And so I've realized these little tiny things about me that for everybody listening to this like, think about what does trigger you. You know, for me, the reason I think I'm such a big communicator is I would talk to my dad and he would be not there, like literally sitting there in the room, so gone with alcohol in his system.

My dad got sober. It's a great story. But those days, like, are you hearing me, dad? And then I have to work on being a better communicator just to get him to hear me. So many of you have all of these patterns and triggers in your life that if you just become aware, like I'm doing it again, where's this come from? You can sort of start to unlock sort of the code,

do you? Why is it matter? And then I want to ask you a question, Gabby, because this is what life's about everyone. There's two things in life. It's understanding more about ourselves and hopefully understanding more about the spiritual parts of our lives of where we're going.

That's why this show today is so meaningful to me for all of you, because as you're hearing Gabby tell her story, I want you thinking about your story and your awareness of who you are and why you operate the way you do. So anyway, I want to make sure I share that with everyone. And I want to ask you about this. You talk a lot in the book about, listen, one of the ways out of this is some sort of, I'm going to use my words and I'll let you use yours because they're better. But like a vision, so to speak, of what like it should look like or what your life should be.

Is that after all the undoing or can someone be doing that right now? Like this is how I want to be. This is how I want my life to look. Before I answer that question, I have to just extend a tremendous amount of what's known as self-energy. just extend a tremendous amount of what's known as self-energy. So we all have this resource part of us that's undamaged and it's the self. It's the part of you that's on stage, the serving souls, right? It's the part of you that's speaking such truth right now. And I just want to extend myself energy

to your little boy because I was very, very moving for me to hear about you being in this. So I don't know why I keep prying with you. I really like you a lot about you being in the hotel room. It's like, that's the little boy, you know, just in the hotel room protecting himself. And then the protector is like the part of you that's the, um, the introvert is a protector part, right?

He's like, I got to go just be in the room. And I got to just protect the little boy from having that shame. And so I just want to extend a tremendous amount of compassion towards that protector part, towards the little boy. I want to let you know, I feel very connected to those parts of you.

I understand them. I've been there. I get it. And thank you. I feel that. I appreciate that. Yeah. And by me extending that self-energy to you is also igniting hopefully some some self within you, what yourself. Because the goal isn't about kicking out all these protectors. It's about helping them become less extreme.

So right now we can be friend that part of you that was that's been kind of the introvert. We can say, dude, I think it's a male part, right? Think of it as a guy, potentially. Yeah. Okay, we can say, we can say, dude, thank you. You've done a really good job keeping little Ed ed safe, you know. And at the same time, just become curious about him and start to befriend him and extend compassion towards him and feel connection to him. Maybe even asking what he needs, you know, when he's in that hotel room. And as we start to establish that self, that resource self, connection to the protector, the protector can calm down.

That's so good, Gabby. Wow, that is so good. Thank you for that. I'm processing that because it is a really interesting question to ask myself, I've had to, since I had this uncovering, I've had like, I've stayed in rooms since I went, and I'm like, I mean, literally when the door shuts, my spirit eases.

I'm like, why is this? And it's exactly what you just described. Like picking up a drink. Yeah, I know, it's right. It's like, for some people, it's picking up a drink or for other people, it's whatever it might be. For me, it's like, oh, my spirit's at ease, and it's because I'm safer in there.

It's such a bizarre thing for me to be a man in the world, and be probably a pretty masculine man, and then know these other things about myself, this contrast, this other parts of me, that I wonder why that maybe that's potentially why I am so masculine in some ways, the compensate. Oh, yeah. Right.

In some ways. Well, your masculinity is a protector part, your, your sort of provato and your presence. But that's why these protectors, there's, they're, they're extraordinary, right? Like my controller protector wrote nine books in 11 years that have saved so many people and given so much light to the world. But now I can still have that controller part without her being so extreme. She can still keep things moving and she can still get everything going and she can also say to her team, you know, guys, I need more creative space, right? So that's that, you know, five years ago,

that there was no dialogue for that, right? So it's it's not that we want to there's no bad parts and we don't want to just shame any of the ways that we are. We want to say thank you for your great service. And let me my adult resource self help you be a little less extreme. And how do you do that with this vision thing I'm asking about like how how does one begin to, I'm using my word vision. To frankly, I don't recall in the book if you actually use that word or not. I did actually. Yeah, create a vision for the life for your new life.

And that sounds so like everyone's like, all right, I got a creative new vision and blah, blah, blah. But like you word it very differently in the book. Like when I read it, it's like, is it doing what you said? Where you sort of accept these parts about yourself and create a vision coming from there? Or is it like complete it? you're trying to create a completely different person when you create this vision? Really, your vision statement, and it's early on in the book, is really designed to, it's not about getting anything, being anywhere, looking a certain way, it's about how you

want to feel. My vision statement years ago when I first got clean and sober was I want to wake up without anxiety every day. That vision is my reality now. And so the vision statement process in the book is really about saying, you know, how do I want to feel in my life? How do I want to be? Not who am I, what am I? You know, it's like, what is it that I want to have inside? And that relates to the parts because we never actually connect to the need. Like, we never, have you ever ever asked yourself like, what is my introverted part need right now? No, no one has that conversation. And a very easy way to sort of guide yourself into this right here

right now is just notice a part of you that's really up right now. You know, maybe it's the controller, maybe it's not you everybody listening, including you at and notice just is there's a three step process notice no need. And let's, let's start by just noticing. Is there a part that's up for you? You're launching this book. You're, you're in this massive way. Like is there something that's up for you right now that you feel like could be respected a little bit? Maybe we can work on it for two minutes. I haven't slept in much in probably three weeks because I feel like anytime sleeping, I'm going to have the book be a failure. So like, I'm going, when I, my protective part was there's one of your things is like, I just go into psycho work mode, like,

psycho work mode. If that's what you, if that answers your question. So like, beautiful, beautiful. Yeah, like I am like, I mean, everyone around is like, are you okay, bro? Like, your energy, you're, you know, and I get up when I'm doing something that I love like this with you, but like the truth is, I'm depleting myself right now to an extent that's not healthy physically at all. So that's certainly there. Beautiful. Would I do have a little buy-in to maybe connect with that part?

Yeah, let's go. I don't want to. I'd love to help them because what we do right now actually could really change the course of your launch and your life maybe. So let's try. Let's go. So right now just tuning into that part, what would you like to call the part? Is it psycho worker?

Yeah, I actually like that. I think it is psycho. There's a connotation in that. Like I know I'm doing damage to myself when I'm doing it. Okay. And it's almost like, this is a really deep, I don't know why I'm just saying this just occurred to me. It's like am I in somehow, wow, that's sort of weird. But this came out of me.

I'm wondering when I say that, like, is there some part of me that, like, feels like I deserve to be kind of beaten down, maybe because this success of the book or something external is more than I'm worth. So I'm just saying this right now. And so you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to beat the **** itself right now. In making it seem as if it's to go get all this work done.

But I am wondering like it's- Self-s this work done, you know, but I am wondering like it's it's. Elf sabotage. Is that what you're talking about? Yeah, maybe no, maybe not because I don't, I don't like plan on losing. So I think it's more like I'm like, no, man, like if this book's really successful, you're going to have all this bliss and success. Let's make sure you don't.

Let's make sure that even though everybody else gets a lot out of this book, you're so tired, so beaten up, so frayed, that you really never wanna do this again. And here's what's really crazy. Right before you and I went on, you're like, isn't it great writing these books? And I almost said to you, I'm not gonna do it again. I almost literally said the worst to you.

I'm not gonna do it again. It's almost like, I'm not gonna let myself enjoy the success of this book. Like, I'm gonna make sure that it is such a painful, difficult experience because that's what I do. What I have a pattern of doing is like producing external stuff for everybody else, but really not getting a lot of enjoyment out of myself.

The only part that I enjoy about it is the fact that I've helped someone else. I don't let myself enjoy the process at all. Okay, so let's talk to that part of you. Okay. Maybe just for a moment, just turn your attention in where you could keep your eyes open or close whatever feels good for you.

And just identify this target part just turn your attention in where you could keep your eyes open or close whatever feels good for you. And just identify this target part as you named it the psycho worker. Is that who we want to talk to? Is that the part that you want to talk to right now? No, I think the part I want to talk to probably is the person who's super familiar and love and gravitates constantly towards chaos. Great job. Okay, the chaos, the chaos.

Excellent. So just take a moment and just notice where it's located around you, is it in you, is it next to you? Where might this part be located? I just felt it literally is a crazy right in my chest. Excellent. Great. Does this part have a gender?

Well, I picture me. OK. So I picture me. So I picture me when you're asking me that question, I see me, but me much younger. Younger male. OK. You younger male, great. Does it have any kind of image that comes to mind? I think he's really sad. And to be honest with you, what I'm doing right

now is I'm picturing something that happened when I was young. I'm actually picturing it. It's crazy. I didn't, I don't think that I remembered that until right now. So there's an even, there's an even younger part here with us who is behind the chaotic part. I'm noticing that, right? Yeah, for sure. So the younger part, I think, would he be okay? for sure. So the younger part, I think, would he be okay? Let's go slow with him, okay? Is there anything else that you notice about the feeling or the parts that are presenting themselves?

Cause I wanna address the chaotic part, but I don't wanna ignore that what else is coming up, okay? I think I just scared. He's scared. Yeah. Okay. He's scared. Yeah. All right. And then how do you add feel towards this young, young part of you? Oh, I'm feel sympathetic. I want to give him a hug. Oh, beautiful. Excellent.

Yeah. How does he feel towards you? Does he know you're there? No, he doesn't. Okay. Does he know I'm here? He does. He does, okay, good. So I just want to let him know I'm, I'm, I'm, I have a lot of love for him. And I have a lot of connection to him and a tremendous amount of compassion towards him. I'm very curious about him.

I'd love to get to know him. Beautiful, okay. and a tremendous amount of compassion towards him. I'm very curious about him. I'd love to get to know him. Beautiful, okay. So we really want to also thank him for showing up today, because it's hard, it's not easy. And I want to just acknowledge that as well. So back to you and how you feel towards him. Is there anything that you want to say to him? Yeah, I mean, I know what this is coming from now. So, like very clearly, just so you know,

like very, very clearly, I know what this is coming from now. So I would just tell him, man, everything's going to be okay. And you're loved and you're special. And you matter. And it's all gonna work out. It's all gonna work out. And he didn't know that. Yeah, he didn't know that. No. If he wasn't in such an extreme chaotic role

to stay safe, what else might he be doing? It's interesting. He, he did it once. I could see him doing it once in a while, but he. Wow, this is really crazy. This is so crazy. Uh, you know what I just pictured? Can I just tell you what I pictured? Yes, of course. I just pictured God. Lee, this goes back and we're just talking about. He, um, I just pictured him going back and hiding in his room. Hmm. Okay. So he feels like there. Yeah, I feel safe there. Yeah.

It's crazy. That's so crazy that we just talked about that. Mm-hmm. Wow. So. Yeah. Yeah. What if he was in the room? What if he knew you were in the room? If he knew me right now was in the room, you're the adult resource. Undamaged. He'd feel really, he'd feel really safe. You'd have excellent. Yeah, I'd feel really safe. Would you be open to sort of just noticing him and where he is right near you or wherever

he is in your mind's eye? Yeah, I can see. And in your own visualization, say, bring him to the room with you. Yeah, he's here. He's here. Yeah, he's here. All right. And anything you want to say to him with him here with you right now.

Say, I love you, you're safe. You're special. Yeah. I can see him. him here with you right now. So I love you, you're safe, you're special. Yeah. Yeah, I could see him. Can he feel you right now? Yeah, he does. It's good. He does. He does.

He feels connected to you. Yeah, that's good. That's really good. Ed, this is this is the work my love. So just first of all, bravo. The little boy is. I wanna do that again and again. We will, first of all, I will,

I'm on your speed dial now, I'm gonna make sure that. And it's like my greatest education in my life was learning this training because what you just did was you retrieved the little boy who showed him that your presence, your self-energy is there for him, the part that you needed when he was little. He needed that adult resource to undamaged father and he didn't have it, but you are here now.

You, yourself, energy becomes the internal parent to your entire inner family system. That's incredible, Gabby. That's incredible. So when you notice your, I am a little emotional. Sorry. I don't just don't know how this is such big stuff. And it's just so profound. And it's gorgeous to have someone so, um, who has done so much personal growth work

to demo with because it's so easy. Like they're all the parts are right there and like your self-energy, your self-energy has all these sea qualities. Compassion, courage, curiosity, connectedness, calmness, all of these sea qualities, you already own men, like you've done such great personal growth work to be really

living in a place of self. And so the work is really just about noticing when the chaotic part is keeping you up at night. Notice where he is in your body. What do you know about him? And what does he need right now? And what does he need right now? And that's a book. Can I ask you the body part? Yeah. Why do I have to about the body? So, and again, most people are just listening to this in audio, but so if you're on video,

you know, my face doesn't normally look like this. So, I really want to thank you for that. I'm going to go back there already today. I can tell you that, but I feel it when we're talking, the most things in my body, like I feel them, and you talk a lot about the body, like the total trauma can take on your body, what about using your body to create change, too?

I want to ask you about that. When you were just asking me, probably the thing that resonated the most is, what do I feel in my body? Because I can actually feel it. It was centered in my chest, near my heart, probably my heart. I don't know why that makes me so emotional, but it just does. It's crazy. But what about the toll that trauma could take on your body and anything you can do

with physically your body, not just your thoughts, but with your body to help create profound freedom and inner peace? What you're referencing about the emotion that's coming up is that when we have trauma, we have the inability to be present with our emotional state or physical state or experiences. The presence that you're bringing right now to that part, that heart-centered place, is almost like throwing out the shame-freeze, throwing out the trauma-freeze. And then emotions, big emotions can come up.

And we can even shake physically, like sometimes we can have tremors, when we're moving energy out. So what I'm referencing right now is called somatic experiencing therapy. And it's founded by Peter Levine. And Peter Levine is the one who said that trauma is the inability to be present.

Because when we are traumatized, as I write in the book, it's almost as if our soul departs. And we become these different fragmented parts of who we are. And we break off from that self, that God within us, that love within us. And so we get frozen in time, or we just go, you know, like fly away, right? And so when we start to tune into the body, what happens is we don't actually have to focus on the storyline and the drama and the all the chaos, but we can really just touch into the physical experience that has so much to reveal. a goal experience that has so much to reveal. And by even just directing focus to the somatic experience, it begins to thaw, it begins to experience your presence. It can begin to settle. And in that chapter, there's bunch of practices I can give your listeners

right now for self-suiting. And I really want you to take these with you on your book tour, okay? Okay, give me a book. So a big one is when you notice you're in that chaotic state, a heart hold. So placing your hand on your heart and your other hand on your belly. For me, I put my right hand on my heart, but some people, it feels more connected to put their left hand there. It sort of feels more connected.

And then the opposite hand on the belly, and just breathing deep belly breath. So on the inhale, extending your diaphragm, and on the exhale, you just allow it to relax. And you inhale out. Exhale, relax. Do one more. Inhale out.

Exhale, relax. That heart hold sends a message to your nervous system that it's safe to calm down and it activates the parasympathetic nervous system to start to settle. And that it doesn't have to be so extreme. Another thing you can do is tap. Yeah, let's talk about tapping. I love this topic right now. This 99% of folks don't know what this is. So this is huge. So tapping is known as emotional freedom technique. And it's tapping on different energy maridians.

And for the sake of this, it's just in this case, there's one point that is called the gamut point. I call it the holy s*** mate. Like when when when when you're, you know, like everybody's going to dinner and you're like, I gotta go to my room but I have to sit at this dinner. You know, this is when I want you to tap right here.

So it's right between the pinky finger and the ring finger that part of your skin right on top of the hand. It's your tapping on the top of your hand between your pinky finger and your ring finger. And when you tap there, this is the gamut point. And this is the point that really settles the whole system. And all I want you to do is tap right there and just say to yourself, I am safe. I am safe. I am safe. I'm safe. And just anything else that you want to say, you can say, this is a soothing tapping point

bringing you back into the body. So good. Because sometimes the body is the easiest pathway in. And for some people like myself, it was the hardest pathway in. But it sounds like for you that that body-based therapy would be really extraordinary. And that's that's in the book. It's called somatic experiencing really, really amazing work. What is, guys, I know you're like, oh my gosh, I've never heard one of these podcasts before,

right? And by the way, for those of you that are like, I don't have a ton of trauma or you're one of my guys that are watching, like, hey, man, you're going a little to the, to the nether world here on me. Well, let me just tell you something, a lot of these things you have in your life, you are using to sort of compensate. And by the way, they may not be massive big tea trauma. They may be little tea trauma. Little tea trauma can be this stuff like where your dad's like, yeah, pipe down. You don't know what you're talking about, right? And you just feel these things in your life. It could be that you've had a divorce. It could be that there's a breakup. It could

be that, you know, you've had a business setback. Listen, life is filled with difficult things. And our ability to have tools and resources are huge. And one thing I want to say to everyone listening and I wanted to say this to Gabby too, because again, I opened up with this. The courage to do this when you're already on top. Oh my gosh, right? And something occurred to me recently, the most important

decision of my life that happened in my family was my dad's decision to get sober. And I want you to speak to this because I think you more eloquently than anybody I've ever met can talk to this. But I want to share this with everyone in you. So about two weeks, I wrote this book and a lot of it's about lessons I learned from my dad about one more. And I woke about 315 in the morning, Gabby. Pretty emotional. And I'm emotional, dude, in general. And I wake my wife up.

I said, Christian, I said, listen to me, you know, because this decision my dad made is why you and I are talking. It's why I've reached millions of people. My dad doesn't make that decision. I'm pretty sure we're not here. And I said, in my case, and I said, babe, someone helped dad. And she went, what honey? And I said, someone helped daddy.

She goes, oh my gosh, I said, I had never occurred to me that there's some precious soul out there and my dad's darkest moment of his life when he was the most down, the most destroyed, the most ashamed was about to lose his family. And some coffee shop somewhere, some room somewhere helped my dad get sober. And she goes, Oh my gosh, I said, this person's changed millions of people's lives and our children's lives. And I said, here's the kicker. Do you know what qualified

them to do this? Their own shame, their own trauma, their own guilt, their own alcoholism, their own drug addiction, the things they're the most ashamed of and embarrassed in their lives is the very thing that qualified them in my father's darkest, most important moment of his life to change his life. And most human beings think these are the things that disqualify us from being happy. Disqualify us from helping other people. Disqualify us from making any difference in the world. To manage our value, when in fact the complete opposite is true. And so I want to acknowledge you for doing it, but why don't you speak to everybody about

that who's carrying some form of shame about whatever it is. Maybe it's even trauma you've inflicted onto another person. You're carrying some shame about. Well, one thing I think that's really valuable to acknowledge for you in this moment also, sorry to keep bringing it back to you, but you are just deeply moving me. And I cannot wait to hug you and hang out with you. You're so profound. But there's a story about Dr. Wayne Dyer, who I know you know, and he was a very

good friend and mentor to me. And Wayne talks about his dad who was an alcoholic. And his father was an alcoholic and was very not so safe. But in Wayne's perspective, his soul decided to come back into the Earth in this body at that time to learn, to be, to really learn and teach forgiveness and self-reliance. And when he got through his journey, he really was able to look back and see that almost in a way his dad took one for the team. Yeah, gosh. And I think this is very much the same for you.

You said it. If my father hadn't been an addict, and if your father had not been an addict, and if he hadn't found his way to that coffee shop and that basement in a church somewhere, you would not be who you are doing what you do. No question. So I believe from a spiritual perspective

that we have sole contracts with our parents and we sign that contract and we say, okay, I'm gonna have these experiences and have this type of attachment bond to you that's gonna help me go through whatever I have to go through to be whoever I have to be. So good. Of course, we can always have free will.

You know, you could have been like, I'm gonna go be an alcoholic, but instead you decided to be whoever I have to be. So good. Of course, we can always have free will. You could have been like, I'm gonna go be an alcoholic, but instead you just decided to be at my let and just show up for the world. But it is a really profound way of being able to extend forgiveness and compassion towards your father because you can say, well, if it wasn't for all of this,

I wouldn't be who I am today. Yeah, yeah, that's so good. of this, I wouldn't be who I am today. Yeah, yeah, that's so good. But speaking to the alcoholic and the part that we get to and what it means, there's a lot of people listening that are struggling with addiction or they're in early recovery or they're in recovery and maybe one out during COVID, I've been clean and sober 16 years. It has given me life. It has given me. My husband's never seen me use. My son will never see me use. My, my, my readers have never seen me in addiction. And the commitment that I made to get clean

and sober was the commitment to not just show up for myself, but to show up for others. And that's why it works. That's why your dad got sober. That's why you are who you are today. There's a ripple effect. So when we think about that from wherever we are in our life, the value and the strength of showing up for ourselves means that we have it within us to show up for others. And that's how this really crazy chaotic place that we call this world can actually change. It has to happen with each individual.

Yeah, and it started with you in this book for me. You can tell everybody, you know, people on the right books, and I always find something in everyone's work that I believe can make a difference for you and share it with you. Then there's very rare times in my life where the entire content of their work affects me deeply. And frankly, change my life.

That's Gabby's work. And even today, you got a little glimpse into a few minutes of that for me. Like that whole event that I was picturing in my mind is very different in my chest right now than it was before. Yes! It really is.

There's a peaceful feeling as opposed to a tightness. And it's kind of cool. I can't wait to go back there later in a private moment and talk with that little dude again. Well, I hope that you start to do it all day, right? It's like, I will. I can't actually literally can't wait. I'm going to be driving a couple of hours from here.

And we're going to have a great talk. That's it. I love that. And let's, we got, I can literally go with you. I'm not exact. We could go nine hours for sure. Oh, definitely 100%. But I want to maybe a couple last things just because I want everyone to get as much from

this as they possibly can. You talked about two things. One was like, you said, bringing little Gabby back to safety. And so maybe this for some people when they hear it, you know, is like, all right, that's a lot. But what does that mean? Like everyone listening to this, maybe listen to you and how you phrase this and frame it for themselves. Just go back because you say in the book something so profound, you say, listen, unresolved trauma that continues to come back is often more dramatic, more traumatic than the initial trauma itself when you trigger it over and over and over again. And I have to say, that's gotta be true. I've had thousands, if not millions, of traumatic emotional responses to things that were really bad that happened when I was a kid, but the cumulative blows that I've hit myself with

with this stuff over and over is far more dramatic and painful than the initial event, even though the initial event is horrific, right? And so that's why this must be a result. But what does it mean to bring her back to safety? How does, give us a couple of tools, a couple of thoughts about doing so. What we did with little Ed who wanted to go into the bedroom and who used to just go into the bedroom by himself and kind of, you know, hide. But instead bringing him into the bedroom with you,

feeling that safety with his adult resource in her dad, right? The self dad that was there is exactly that. It's that process of retrieving that young part and saying, oh, little Gabby, you're good. Like I got you right now, and I'm gonna speak up for you and I can care for you. And I can call and ask for help. And I can be vulnerable with Ed right now, you know,

so that you can express yourself. And whatever it is that that part needs. And so being in that dialogue and in that self-to-part connection. So the adult resource, undamaged, curious, compassionate, courageous, loving, kind, connected part of us, being in direct contact with that child part is how we bring him or her back to safety. I also believe that all of the therapeutic processes that I share about in this book, all the practices, all the spiritual practices, or a journey of bringing little Gabby back to safety. But the biggest thing is, is that little Gabby is no longer alone. Does she get triggered? Yes, she got triggered an hour ago.

But she's not alone in that trigger. Just like I have my three-year-old son, Oliver, he's never going to be alone in his meltdowns. I'm never going to walk away from him. I'm never going to shame him for it. I'm never going to shame him for it. I'm never going to say stop. I'm going to allow and be a presence for him. And so now I have that same adult parent parental presence for my little Gabby.

And it comes up also as visions too. I had the story in the book about that I suffered from very serious postpartum depression that I even read in the book about how I chose a medicated path, which is really important to share as a result of when you having a biochemical condition, you need help. And in the early days of trying to get my sleep back, because I had insomnia from this anxiety disorder

from the postpartum, I was trying to get my sleep back. And I was struggling to fall asleep. And so I did this practice. I just noticed in my body, where's the suffering? What's going on? What do I know about this part? This is the part that's little girl scared to fall asleep. She can't fall asleep by herself. What does she need? And I just started to breathe. She needed to breathe. And as I continued to deepen my breath, this image came into my mind's eye where I was in my son's nursery holding him as a baby and just rocking him back to sleep.

And then very quickly, that image of my son was little Gabby, it was the baby version of me. And I was able to just rock myself back to sleep and within moments was fast asleep. Oh, love that. I love that. I love that. See, I love that. I love that. See, I love that. That's sort of very similar to what you just did with me. It is the same thing. It's the exact same thing. And by the way, everyone can give themselves the gift of

this. And you seem to say, well, maybe you don't have a super dramatic event that you're aware of. But I know that you can have another level of peace and freedom. I know you can have another level of bliss in your life. And many of these things just feel good to do. You just feel good to give yourself the gift of. It's like the work is created. And by the way, most great work comes on the other side of pain. Napoleon Hill says and they can go rich that if you can survive the temporary pain, and all pain can be temporary, then on the other side of pain. Napoleon Hill says and they can go rich that if you can

survive the temporary pain and all pain can be temporary, then on the other side of it you could introduce to your other self. And so whatever the level of pain you've gone through is, if it's little T or big T, on the other side of that, there's this other self. If you'll work on these things that were the Gabby's talking about, not that we're talking about, the Gabby's talking about. No, we, we are talking about it, you're doing it. Well, I just think that, like, this is the work of this time, everybody. Like, there's a consciousness change,

I think that's sort of been shifting in the world and that people now, yeah, they want a jet, yeah, they want a mansion. And by the way, and if you want those things, I encourage you to get them, right? I have them, they're cool. But I gotta to tell you something. You're still going to find yourself at 51 years old needing to go back into that room with the fourth grade you if you don't do this work. This is a time where there's a premium price tag on peace,

on bliss, on happiness, on fulfillment. We all need more resources and tools to achieve it. And so, and just remember this, you were born to help other people, each of you. You were born to make a difference in other people's lives, just like Gabby was, and is, just like I am. And your shame, the things that have been painful for you, that's where the other self lives, and where you can help other people find their other selves. So don't hide from it. Be vulnerable. There's any lesson from Gabby and I.

It's be willing to be open. You're the perfect you serves nobody. The perfect you makes no difference in the world. It's unapproachable. It's not true and it makes no difference. And that ought to make you feel great because you keep trying to be that person. And it's so damn hard to be. And then you feel less than because you're not that. And so the very thing you're trying to project is the thing that would make no difference anyways. It's the flawed you who overcomes and improves and grows that changes yourself and the world.

So last thing Gabby, by the way, I don't know that I've had a conversation that I've enjoyed more or that frankly, maybe even more importantly, I will reflect on over and over and over again than this one on the show. So I'm very grateful. Right back at you. I want to reflect that right back to you. I'm deeply moved by you in your presence and I'm really excited to be your friend. I'll keep saying that. We're going to be great friends now. It's the, by the way, this was just the right timing

for when it was supposed to happen. So someone runs into Gabby Bernstein right now at Starbucks and says, I was so moved by this conversation I heard that you had with Ed Mylett. You know, and maybe this sounds like a simple question. I've got your book. It's on the way, but I don't have it yet. Where do I begin? Where would you recommend? I just begin the process of my profound path to freedom and interpeace.

What would you just say that you didn't say on the show that just a simple place to begin? What would you recommend that I do? I would celebrate them in that moment and let them know that they have already begun. Whoever is listening to us now, however an hour and five minutes into this conversation, you've already started. Because the first step is to have the bravery and the willingness to open up your conscious awareness to the reality that there's some deeper stuff that we need to look at, that this is no small conversation. And to have listened and to have made it to this point

with us means you are brave, you are awesome, you are courageous, you are ready, you are open, you are willing and you can expect many miracles if you just stay connected to that willingness. Wow, so beautiful. You are, I opened up by saying Gabby is one of a kind and extremely special. And I knew that from reading the book,

but that's been confirmed and multiplied 10 billion times today in our conversation. I cannot wait for us to meet in person. And I'm grateful for you. I'm grateful for you. And literally the world is better grateful for you. I'm grateful for you. And literally the world is better because of you. And I'm better because of this hour with you today.

And I have to believe that millions of people are better for getting to participate and share this conversation that you and I had. And by the way, everybody, I hope you share with people that you love and care about because this could affect and change somebody's life so deeply. So Gabby, thank you for being you and thank you for being here today and thank you for what you do in the world and the difference you make, your magnificent. So thank you. Thank you, my love. And I wanted to ask you, is your, is your dad still alive? No, my dad passed last year. Yeah. And that's why I'm by the way, I was sober for 35 years. Yes. Yes. And I watched him live magnificently the last 35 years. He's my hero. Yeah. I can say this to you. This is the biggest piece of love I can give you.

Yeah. My dad loved my show. He listened every single one. Yeah. I can tell you for sure this is my dad's favorite show. Because you know, I'm one, I can hear spirit. And I was like, I think his father's past, and I didn't know the story, but I kept wanting to send him the book. Yeah, I love that. So I know he's reading it somewhere.

This is my dad's jam right here. My dad is smiling down on us. Like, my dad loves all my shows, loved all my shows, but this one, these topics, this part of life, my dad is smiling bright, and that's the biggest compliment that I could possibly give you is that my hero loved the show today. So, I don't know. All right, everybody, you got to go get happy days, the guided path from trauma to profound freedom and interpeace. You have got to share this show today, my goodness, there's a spirit in the show today that I don't want to leave, to be honest with you, I wish we could keep going.

So, Gabby, thank you, I honor you, and I am so grateful for you today. So thank you. Right back at you. All right guys, God bless you. Max out your life. This is The End My Let's Show. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ you