The One You Feed - How to Quiet the Inner Critic and Finally Get Unstuck with Michelle Chalfant

Episode Date: July 29, 2025

In this episode, Michelle Chalfant explores how to quiet the inner critic and finally get unstuck. She has spent 25 years developing practical tools for working with what she calls the other wolf. Michelle explains why most of us are making decisions from the emotional age of about 13. And she’ll give you the exact process for transforming triggers into growth. Her motto is “I will let nothing or no one disconnect me from myself.” and by the end of this conversation, you’ll know how to make that your reality too.Discover the six hidden saboteurs that quietly derail your best intentions—like autopilot behavior, self-doubt, and emotional escape. Download our free guide to uncover what’s getting in your way and learn simple strategies to take back control. Get it now at oneyoufeed.net/ebook.Key Takeaways:The internal struggle with inner voices, represented by the metaphor of two wolves (one good and one bad).Negative self-talk and the journey towards self-compassion and self-acceptance.Emotional age and how it influences decision-making and behavior.Techniques for regulating the nervous system and creating space for conscious responses to triggers.The importance of recognizing and working through emotional triggers as opportunities for growth.Distinguishing between healthy anger and being stuck in a triggered state.The significance of owning one’s reality and the discomfort that often accompanies this process.Developmental model of the “Three Chair Model” (Child, Adolescent, Adult) and its implications for personal growth.The five pillars that support personal transformation, including owning the good in one’s life.Practical tools and scripts for managing emotional patterns and the inner critic.If you enjoyed this conversation with Michelle Chalfant, check out these other episodes:How to Tame Your Inner Critic with Dr. Aziz GazipuraHow to Overcome Overthinking with Jon AcuffHow to Harness the Chatter in Your Head with Ethan KrossFor full show notes, click here!Connect with the show:Follow us on YouTube: @TheOneYouFeedPodSubscribe on Apple Podcasts or SpotifyFollow us on InstagramSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

many, many people get into relationships, and it could be with a partner or a parent or a friend where we want people out there to validate us. No, no, that's the cherry on the Sunday. We've got to learn how to do it for ourselves first. Welcome to the one you feed. Throughout time, great thinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have, quotes like garbage in, garbage out, you are what you think, ring true. And yet, for many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self-pity, jealousy, or fear. We see what we don't have instead of what we do. We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make

a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction. How they feed their good wolf. What if I told you there's a script for dealing with that voice in your head, the one that beats you up, keeps you small, and disconnects you from who you really are? Today's guest, Michelle Shelfont, has spent 25 years developing practical tools for working with what she calls the other wolf. Michelle is a therapist and author of the adult chair. Get unstuck, claim your power, and transform your life. And she's going to explain why most of us are making decisions from the emotional age of about 13. And she'll give you the exact process for transforming triggers into growth.

Her motto, I will let nothing or no one disconnect me from myself. And by the end of this conversation, you'll know how to make that your reality too. I'm Eric Zimmer, and this is the one you feed. Hi, Michelle. Welcome to the show. Hi, Eric. Thanks so much for having me. I'm excited to talk with you about your book, which is called The Adult Chair, Get Unstuck, Claim Your Power, and Transform Your Life. But before we get into the book, I want to start like we always do with the parable. And in the parable, there's a grandparent who's talking with her grandchild.

And they say, in life, there are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One is a good wolf, which represents things like kindness and bravery and love. And the other's a bad wolf, which represents things like, greed and hatred and fear and the grandchild stops they think about it for a second they look up at their grandparent and they say which one wins and the grandparent says the one you feed so i'd like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you in your life and in the work that you do it's a great parable i have to say i love it because it's so true and what i love about it though is that it's true, but what's hard about it is I don't think a lot of us know that everyone has

both wolves. I think that people look outside of themselves and they think, well, they don't have that mean wolf inside. It's just me, right? Yeah. Yeah. I'm doing a course right now on the voice of the inner critic and what you do about it and how to really banish that voice or at least learn how to work with it. So that is one of the wolf voices inside that I think about. The first part of my life. I let the wolf that was really the mean wolf inside really was a very big voice in my life. And I'm going to say part two of my life is the more compassionate, loving wolf. And I've learned now how to work with the other wolf. And it's a game changer when you learn how to work with that other wolf. And that's honestly a big part of the book. Well, before we get into the book, I'm going to pull something from the

very end of the book that I thought would be a way of starting. And at the very end of the book, you have a little motto that you use, which is, I will let nothing or no one disconnect me from myself. Talk to me about that. Yeah, I was just thinking about that when you were reading that. That was a journey, I mean, that was such a big part of my life journey, is that I started to have this awareness. And I worked with a lot of teachers and mentors over my whole entire life, honestly. And of course, all the reading that I've done, all the spiritual reading.

And what I realized was I was my own worst enemy. That wolf inside of me was the enemy and it was no one out there. And when I learned how to regulate my nervous system and how to work with that inner wolf, the one that's negative, the one that beats up on me, those voices, it completely changed my life. And I started having experiences where I know this might sound crazy, but it really felt like this to me, where I'd be given opportunities. And I mean that that word is important.

opportunities to make the choice between which wolf was going to, I'm just going to use that analogy or if we can, like, which wolf was going to step forward for me. And I started, I started realizing there is a choice. Like, which one do I choose in this moment? And again, part one of my life, you know, most of my life growing up, I didn't know there was a choice. And as I learned the work that I do now, I realize we have a choice in every moment. And we get to choose, do I want to look at this through the eyes of compassion and stay connected to myself. And when I mean connected to myself, that means I believe that we are connected to something bigger than us. Call it God, source, universe, whatever you want to call it. And it's like a big giant river that's moving

through us at all times. And the moment that I get pissed off, angry, judgmental, whatever those thoughts might be on that end of the spectrum, it cuts me off from that thing. It cuts me off from that thing that we would call God's source, universe, whatever. Not that God doesn't have, you know, anger and all that. I think it's all of the things. But I realized I didn't feel connected to that thing when I got angry, right? When I chose the wrong wolf or the other wolf. And I started having opportunities that would come to me. And I know this sounds crazy, but time would literally slow down. And I remember having these experiences of, what are you going to choose? You're going get angry right now, Michelle? Or you're going to slow down and look at this thing that's happening

in front of you and not let that thing outside of you disconnect you from who you really are from SORIS. And I started choosing compassion, love, staying connected to myself. I chose myself over anyone or anything out there. And that's when my life really, really started to change. And it continues to change every time I choose myself. And it's not a side. selfish act by any means. I'm choosing to stay connected to source over anything else. That's what that means. And I have a million examples I can give you, but it was really a game changer for me as far as like emotional stability, joy, happiness just started going up, up, up, up, up, up because I was not disconnecting myself from that thing. Yep. That makes a lot of sense. There's the famous Victor

Frankel quote about between stimulus and response, there's a space. There is. And And what I've noticed over the years by doing a lot of different things, you have a lot in your book about recognizing some of what happened to us as children, the patterns that emerge, the roadmaps, as you call them, that get ingrained into us, by learning to meditate, by all these different things, the primary thing that I feel like they have done, maybe not, maybe I won't go that far. One thing they have done is they've increased that space. between the stimulus and response.

You talked about time slowing down. To me, the experience is more like there's just, there's more space there for me to consider what, okay, what do I want to do with this? And that's really, really valuable because if we can't start to disconnect our immediate reaction from the stimulus, then it's very hard to make any real progress. Oh, gosh, yes. and I was someone again in my white call act one of my life for the first part of my life where I didn't realize there was a space at all yeah and yeah it literally Eric I mean it completely

changed my life but I want to say even maybe before that you're just realizing wait I do have a choice I'd be like wait you have a choice stop pause Michelle pause pause pause pause I'm like I don't have a choice yes you do and you know alongside of all of realizing there's a choice. I also was doing a lot of nervous system regulations, practicing slowing down, inserting what I call micro moments throughout the day, which means one to five minutes of just pausing or stopping. And I'm very much, I love what I do. I love working. I love, you know, so I go all in all day and my ego would say, you don't have time, don't stop. But I started pausing. And that's when I started realizing, oh, there's that space. Who knew?

Who knew? You know, when I was slowing down enough to recognize there was a space, that's where everything started to change. Because if you would have asked me 10, 20 years ago, I would have said, there's no time. It's just an automatic response that I have. And it's not. There is a space and it grows. You talk about chapter one and chapter two.

What was chapter one like and what was the thing that caused chapter one to end and chapter two to begin? You mean like act, act one in my life? I was not a joyful, although if you would have met me, you know, in college or after college in my 20s and 30s, I looked really happy and joyful on the outside. I was married. I had two kids. I looked fine.

I could dress the part. I was in supper club when my kids were little, all this. And inside of me, I like this parable. It was the wolf that was in charge and that wolf was not happy. it created a lot of thoughts that were negative, beat up on myself on a regular basis, never feeling good enough, low self-worth, all of those things. So that was Act 1 of my life. And I realized, while growing up, I came to this conclusion, based on the negative thinking

that I had, I must hate myself because nobody in their right mind would talk to themselves in this way if they love themselves. So again, this is the beginning of my life. And again, on the outside, I was smiling. You would have never, ever, ever guessed this. But I made that conclusion. And probably when I was 21, I started then, this is back before there were, you know, there was an internet, by the way.

I was at the library and thank God I had just what I call, you know, earthly angels that would come and say, you need to read this book. Why don't you do this and come to this class with me? And I started learning about how we love ourselves, how we build our self-worth. And so when I started that journey, it led to, again, this act too, if you will, which was instead of Michelle, just living by this default thinking of I'm not good enough, I hate myself, I'm damaged goods, all of the negative thoughts. everything started to slowly shift and my awareness started to grow and grow and grow and grow with all the thoughts I was having and I started realizing wait I'm choosing new thoughts now all these things started shifting and now the negative thinking I now I know what to do when that happens when

the inner critic comes up or the judge or whomever comes up and I can work with that very quickly and easily now my life is really I live more from the other wolf the life of compassion passion, the life of grace, it's okay to make a mistake. We're human. Oh, really? Because when I was in my 20s and 30s, I didn't know that. I thought there was something wrong with me because I made a mistake, you know, and I was bad on all these things. So that was like how Act 1 was lived and then just learning and my awareness continued to grow. And I'm a, I am a lifelong learner. I think I'll keep learning until the day I die. I just love to learn and grow. And just the different mentors and teachers that I had just like all came together, Eric, just, it was this perfect storm of the perfect people at the right time,

right, were showing up. And I could just feel this pivot inside. And I started feeling not so bad about myself. And everything started to get better and better and better and better. So it sounds like it was a very gradual thing. You mentioned starting to read these books in your early 20s, but still having some of those voices in your 30s. And so it sounds like just over time, all this work you were doing started to accumulate and started, you know, there may be a point where you can identify a pivot, but if we were to actually watch the moment-by-moment thing, we would see just little by little, you changed. 100%.

Or were there points along the way that felt really big? I wrote about this in the book, actually. I remember the day that I was over visiting my sister. I lived in Nashville for many years, and I was here in Charlotte. My sister was here and my cousin was over it. I remember we're just hanging out. And I did something that was very codependent, which that was my, that was something that I did live with for many, many, many years.

And it still pops up every once in a while, but I was deep in it. And I had said something to my sister and my cousin. And they giggled and they said, we love your codependency. And I said, well, you know why I have that? It's because mom became my very best friend and dad leaned on me and I had to take care of everybody. And then they laughed again. And they were in a loving way. They said, you know, that's a story that you can tell so quickly, Michelle.

They said, what are you going to drop that story? And I turned to them when I was like, I didn't know what was a story. I remember I was probably 40 years old and I thought, wait, what? That's a story? That's true. And they said, yeah. And I remember the awareness that I had was, it's time to let that go and put it down because it wasn't helping me at all.

That was a big moment. That was a huge moment I would have to say in my life. And I realized, again, it's what we started out talking about today. We have a choice. And that was the moment I realized, wait, I'm choosing to tell the story over and over again. I'm choosing to stay here. And it wasn't that I was choosing codependency. I was choosing to carry the story around of why I lived the way it was living with a lot of codependency and people pleasing.

And in that moment, there was that space and I said, I'm going to put that down. And I remember when I had a private practice, I would talk to my clients about their stories. And I had in my office a little suitcase. I filled it with bricks and I called it the cement suitcase. That represented the story that we carry around with us because they're heavy. They weighed us down and we don't even realize it. In the moment I decided to let that story go, the reason that I'm codependent is because mom did this and dad did this and if they hadn't, I wouldn't be the way I am today.

And I said, I'm done with that story. So that experience was life-changing. I can see it like it was a day ago. And it was many years ago. And I thought, wait a minute, I felt lighter. I felt hopeful. Everything in my future seemed like it was about to change. And it did just because I let that story, I've dropped the suitcase.

I put that story down. So that was one of the many, many moments in my life. I have to say that really was a pivotal moment for me. That's a great story. Let me ask a question because I think there's some nuance here that I'd like to talk about because a big part of the book, at least the early part, is recognizing that we were patterned as children, zero to six, for a bunch of different reasons. We can go into that a little bit.

So there's that, but those are stories to a certain degree. So how do we work on recognizing what happened? allowing it to be a truth that we work with, but not carrying it around in the way that you're talking about. Because the way you described your mother being, you know, your best friend is probably true on one sense, right? There's a reality behind that, and that did shape you to a certain degree. And continuing to carry it didn't serve you, but your book does encourage us to look at those stories. This is why something I've said for many, many, many, many years, I say, triggers are a gift because triggers help us to identify the programs or patterns or stories.

They're all the same thing to me. They're ingrained in our unconscious mind. So how in the world are we supposed to find them? Now, when we're aware, really aware, you can grab it in that moment at my sisters. It was like sitting in my awareness and I thought, whoa, I got to make a decision here. But what I found over all the years of doing, again, my own work and teaching this to many, many, many, many people is that when we're triggered, these buried programs rise up to the surface. So when we're triggered, it's our stuff. It's our program that's getting activated.

Even though what we want to do is blame the person out there for making us feel bad, what we want to do instead is flip it around and say, wait a minute, what's coming up for me, what belief about myself or about the world? is coming up right now because I'm very activated. So I'm going to look at that. And when we look at that, that is where everything starts to change. That's where everything can change when we're able to look at what is triggering us. So that is one beautiful way. It is free of charge. You don't have to go pay anybody.

But you've got to be willing to look at what's coming up and realize it's coming up for you. Now, I want to clarify one thing because people say to me, Well, what if I'm just angry? Can I just be an angry person? Or if I'm angry, if someone hurts me? Absolutely, yes. So how do you tell if you're angry versus triggered and you've got a program, an old program or an old belief that is rising up?

When you carry it with you and you're still thinking about it after 30 minutes to an hour and you're still thinking about it two hours later or three hours later, that's a trigger. Because when I'm angry, I love anger. Anger's a great emotion. I've taught more people how to feel their anger. We need to feel all of our emotions, especially anger. Most people suppress it down. So I'm not opposed to anger at all.

But if you are angry because someone steals a parking space, let's just say, you're waiting for the parking spot, someone comes and takes it, you get angry, and you go in the grocery store, you start grocery shopping. If you're still thinking about that person that stole your spot when you're leaving the grocery store, that's a trigger. And what we want to do is instead turn towards self and say, okay, hold on a second. it. So I'm mad or whatever, fill in the blank, whatever emotion it might be. I'm frustrated. I'm pissed. I'm whatever. That person took my parking spot. How does it make me feel? Well, I sat there and I was

waiting for my spot and that guy just came in and ripped right in and pulled in and stole it from me. Well, how does that make me feel? It made me feel invisible. Oh, well, how does invisible make me feel? And you just keep going down, down, down, down, and you want to get to the route. Well, it made me feel invisible. Yeah, I felt, well, when I'm invisible, I feel like I don't matter. Okay, well, how does I don't matter feel? And then you keep going down. And then what we find is, oh, my gosh, this is how I felt when I was growing up. You may or may not have that association with childhood.

It doesn't matter. But we know when you hit the bottom because you can't go any further. It's like, nope, that's about it. I just feel like I don't matter. Does it resemble anything from childhood? Yeah. Gosh, when my sister was born when I was five, I didn't matter anymore. I got no attention.

Great. can you feel it? So we feel into whatever that might be, feel the emotion of I don't matter. And that's why when we're triggered, we want to call our friend and be like, can you believe so-and-so said that to me? They made me feel bad. Then our friends will validate us. And that trigger then drops back into the unconscious mind. So we want to not do that. And instead say, how does what that person out there, what they did, how does it make me feel? And we dig into it. We find that that belief is ours. And then we flip it. After we feel into it, we say, so what else is true today? Is it still true that I don't matter? Is it still true? Well, no, I do matter. My dog

loves me. My partner loves me. I have a child that loves me, whatever it might be. My best friend loves me. Okay, so how does that feel? And then we move back up the spectrum. So we go, we take it from the top to the bottom, then bottom, and we rebuild into a new emotion or a new belief. That's how you work with triggers. And I speak from experience right here. I was someone that was triggered a lot. I had emotional dysregulation is what I would call it in my 20s and even my early 30s. I do not live like that anymore. Not at all. So, and yes, I did a lot of personal work, but I also worked like crazy on these triggers.

That is how you update your programming from childhood. It is a lot easier than we actually think. When you have the right tools, it's an easy process. It doesn't feel good, but you work through it and all of a sudden it's like, whoa. In fact, in the adult chairbook, I have a whole. trigger script. It's like, this is how you work through a part. It's in the, it's when I'm talking about the inner critic. It's such an important part of how we all need to learn how to live. And it'll change lives. It does change, change lives. I've worked with thousands of people on this. And they're

like, oh my God, this has changed my life. I'm like, it does. If you have the right script, if you have the right tools. Eight years ago, I was completely overwhelmed. My life was full with good things, a challenging career, two teenage boys, a growing podcast, and a mother who needed care. But I had a persistent feeling of I can't keep doing this. But I valued everything I was doing and I wasn't willing to let any of them go. And the advice to do less only made me more overwhelmed. That's when I stumbled into something I now call this still point method,

a way of using small moments throughout my day to change not how much I had to do, but how I felt while I was doing it. And so I wanted to build something I wish I'd had eight years ago so you don't have to stumble towards an answer. That something is now here and it's called Overwhelming, is optional. Tools for when you can't do less. It's an email course that fits into moments you already have taking less than 10 minutes total a day. It isn't about doing less. It's about relating differently to what you do. I think it's the most useful tool we've ever built. The launch price is

$29. If life is too full but you still need relief from overwhelm, check out overwhelm is optional. Go to one you feed.net slash overwhelm. That's one you feed. Dot net slash overwhelm. I know a lot of people listening might be thinking, I'm telling listeners what they're thinking. What I'm thinking is that, yes, what you described is valuable. And it seems like my experience is it's not a one-time thing.

It's an ongoing process. And I'm curious if you think the actual. script like having a process is what makes the difference because I know a lot of people who have figured out that this triggers me because this thing in my childhood. And some insight is useful, but still feels like the trigger is still hooked up. Right. Right. So you have the insight. I feel this way. Like the example I always use is when I'm around men of a certain age, I get mildly intimidated, right? And I know why.

My dad was angry all the time. I was afraid of him. And so when I'm around my dad, so I get it, right? Okay. So that's the insight. Now, let's talk about what sort of script you would use for, well, let's just use that as an example. Sure. Do you want to do the work right now?

Sure. Okay. So you said when you're around men. Yep. Of a certain age. Of a certain age. Of a certain age. You feel intimidated.

Okay. sorry I'm writing it down okay so intimidated this would be interesting to try I kind of feel like I have worked through this a large degree but let's use it as an example yeah why don't we see where it goes okay we'll see maybe another part will pop up who knows or another believe I don't know so intimidated what is intimidated feel like in your body where do you feel it imagine a guy of the certain age right now near nearby or in your awareness and you're starting to feel intimidated It's coming up in your body.

I can't quite get to that. What I can get to is there is a shrinking. Great. There is a shrinking in all aspects. My awareness starts to shrink. Yeah. My desire to do anything starts to shrink. Shrinking is the main feeling.

Awesome. So shrinking. So I feel myself shrinking and you feel your body just kind of shrink and tighten up a little bit. You feel that? Mm-hmm. And then if you were to go below the word shrinking, when you feel like you're shrinking, it makes you feel what? If there is an emotion below it, what might it be, or thought or belief?

Well, I think it's fear. Okay, what I'm curious about. And here's the thing. Yeah. I know you know. I'm going to speak from my adult chair language. We know things chin up. So we very much know.

Like you even said, I know it's my dad. I was intimidated, blah, blah, blah, blah. So here's one life experience. we have from chin up. I'd like to invite you to go chin down, which is in the body. So go like waist to chin. That's a different reality. It can be.

So what I want to invite you to do is to drop down below your chin. And instead of answering quickly from here, which you know, and you said you knew it, it was intimidating. But it's interesting because we started doing the work and you said, well, it's not intimidating. It's shrinking. I could feel your energy drop down to your body. it's a different response so when you go below shrinking

and I would love to invite you to get really curious about under the chin if you could let your heart answer or that little kid inside of you answer whatever that I don't need you to even have a visual allow the answer to rise up the response to my question okay does that make sense?

Okay so feel shrinking again so imagine this person out here you feel your body kind of shrink everything's shrinking got it okay what's under shrinking go with the first thought that comes to you and it's going to rise up it's afraid afraid perfect perfect okay is there anything under afraid alone yeah beautiful is there anything under alone is there anything under alone not that i can detect okay great so if you could just take a very slow deep

breath and you're doing great so you've got alone and when you when you tune into feeling alone is there an age that pops up for you first thought or no it doesn't have to who feels alone back up in my head okay that's okay so take a breath feel your feet on the floor and breathe down in your belly right your belly button area just feel your belly coming in and out it's okay we're not exposing any part. We're just getting really curious. There's some part of you that feels alone. Who is that? I guess I'm going to go with teenager, but that's because I don't, I have so few memories of being anything under 16. Yeah. So there's almost nothing there for me to access. So intellectually, I think, of course,

this started earlier than that. Yeah. But if I have to, if I go back to like what I can remember. I don't want you to, you won't, this is going chin up again. I was talking about like chin up you is trying to remember, chin down. There's a difference between remembering and knowing. It's an automatic knowing. So a number is going to, it's going to rise up sort of like it's coming from underneath

the ocean and it rises up to the surface. It's like, well, where did that number come from? And we don't even have to go there. That's okay. But if you can go back to the feeling, and you're doing so great here, of alone, where do you feel that feeling of alone in your body? When you say I feel alone.

It's all along the midline from throat to stomach. Throat to stomach. Perfect. From throat to stomach in the midline. Perfect. And then do you actually see a visual of when you say the midline? Is there a color or how do you know what's in the midline? You just feel it.

I just feel it. Yeah, yeah. So can that part, it's a part of you, it's just an energy, it's just an energy that's kind of lighting up for you. Can it hear you right now or us? Yes or no? What's it say? Back up into head again.

Yeah. You know, it's hard because I know, I've looked at internal family systems. I've done inner child work. I've done all this stuff. So I kind of have this, my brain keeps saying, here's the answer. Right. So it's hard for me to access what it was like before I did everything, right? Because it's easy to fall back on, well, when I did this 10 years ago or 20 years ago, this is what it was.

And the work I do, I've never been, even though I'm therapist and coach and all, I've never been trained in IFS. I've done parts work for 25 years, but it's my own version. It's very spiritual parts work. It's very energetic. it's different than IFS. It is, but there's still a similar idea of asking whether that part can hear you, whether you have access to it. It's similar in that way.

So we could go much deeper and it would take a little bit longer than we have today. But if I could just summarize this for you. Yeah. But wait, there's another part before I say that. Hold on. So can you just do just one more thing? Sure. Put your hands where that midline throat to stomach, wherever that would be on your body.

Just put your hand there. And breathe and let that part of you know in your mind. You can say in your mind or out loud, but like, I've got you. I see you. What did you need when you felt so alone? Don't answer from your head. Go below. What comes up for you?

What did you need when you felt so, when you felt alone? Comfort. So with your hand on your body right there in that midline, let that part of you know in your mind. Just like, I've got you. I'm here to comfort you. it's me it's eric and let it know how old you are today and that it's 2025 whatever word you might need to say to it that's what you want to say to it okay and what happens now with that midline it lessens yeah it eases what's it need ask it what do you need what do you need from me

and let it know how old you are today. What do you need for me? I've got you. I'm here. In my head again. I'm having a hard time disentangling this work from the fact that I'm in the middle of a podcast interview from the fact that I did this before. Yeah.

That's okay. It's helpful for people even listening to this because this is the natural human experiences that we go chin up, chin down, chin up, you know. And what we want to learn how to do is, live chin down. We want to learn how to start making a new connection with our bodies. That's where we resolve triggers. When we do parts work, and I've worked with people for 20-some years doing my kind of parts work, I can nail anybody, anybody I can work with and get them back into their body and help them work through that. But that's the key, is the being in the body.

It doesn't matter to me what your head says because we're so great. I mean, to me, it's the ego. Like the ego needed, and the ego's not bad, by the way, but the ego needed to make sense of your life and our lives when we're growing up, it needs to be there to do that for us to make sense of our reality. It has incredible ideas and theories about who we are when we're growing up and how we turned out the way we did. But we've got to learn how to disconnect from that part and drop below the chin. And I would promise you this, the more you do that, again, do it off air.

I would continue this work. I don't remember. It's in the trigger chapter, I believe, in this book. It is page 190 in the book, if you have the book. You have the book? I have an electronic version of it, yes. I will send you a book. It walks you through how to do this work, but you've got to be in the body.

The body is where the magic happens. That's where we're able to update these things very, very, very quickly. And I've done this with people for so long in their lives, start changing very rapidly. But something that you said is, wait a minute, why does it keep coming up? Sometimes we will clear a belief when it comes up. They reoccur less when we're below the chin and in the body, number one. Number two, oftentimes there are layers of the issue that we're dealing with. So we've got to sometimes, okay, so I did one layer and it's like, how the hell is this back again?

Didn't I already work on this? It's like, yeah, but this is a different angle slightly. So we've got to work on it again. But what I have found is when we do it the right way, they do not come back in the same way. You can, because it's an energy. We have to remember what we're actually working with. It's an energy that we are clearing from the energy field. That's what we're doing.

And it's not even clearing it. It's like it's transforming it. So it's going from a belief that was more of a negative one that's turning into a positive one. So it's going from that light to dark kind of thing. But it doesn't mean there aren't fragments. But I also have found that when we take down one really big belief and really transform that, it's like a tree falling over in the woods and it takes down four or five other trees as well. So the same goes with these beliefs.

So we might clear one and be like, well, wait, I'm not triggered by that or that anymore. That's really weird. It's because you took down a whopper of a belief or a program. Yep. Thank you, Eric, for volunteering, though. That's big stuff. You're welcome. Let's very quickly now talk through the three-chair model that you have.

Your book's called the adult chair. Explain what you mean by the adult chair and what the other two chairs are. Sure. So the model itself is basically a developmental model that every single human walks through. Every human is born. Then we move into what I call the child chair, which is ages zero to six. This is where we learn about emotions. This is where we learn about our true needs.

Like, what do I need? And I don't mean I need a lollipop. It's I need a hug. I need to know that I'm loved. I need to know that I'm lovable. I need to know that I'm worthy. So these are a lot of our emotional needs. They're all, again, it's like our parents sprinkle the seeds for the rest of our life when we are

in the zero to six age time frame. This is where we learn about spontaneity and creativity and fun, all of these amazing things. And this is again where we talked about where the roadmap gets laid for the rest of our lives, which to me is mind blowing. So the issues that we have today are from zero to six. the way that we love another person today is from zero to six. It's like the foundation of who we are is from zero to six. It's a very, very important time.

It's called the child chair. Then around the age of seven, it's, again, metaphorically, it's like we take this roadmap and we hand it off then to the ego part of us at age seven. And then that part goes, I got it from here. I'll keep you safe. I'll keep you alive. I'll use this roadmap. I got it.

And then that part continues to develop what it thinks, our identity should be so that we get accepted, loved, included in groups. So it's like, I'll change who I am so that you like me. I want to be on your soccer team when I'm 10. So I'm going to be or do exactly what you think I should do or who I should be. And we continue to grow and then we go into high school and we're teenagers and, oh, you drink a lot. I'm going to drink a lot too because I want you to like me.

I want you to be in my group or, oh, I need to sleep with you because that is what all my friends are doing and I want to be in that group. It's always about including ourselves in groups. So this is what the ego does. It's like, well, if I'm in your group, then I'm safe and I'm alive. It really overlays who we are, and it creates this false self, this new identity for us. And then around the age, and this is what we call the adolescent chair. So it really includes pre-adolescence, adolescence, post-adolescence.

This is where the inner critic is born, the judgeer, narcissism, all of that stuff is happening during that phase. This is the part of us that also says, I can only live in the past or the future. I cannot live in the present moment. It's not safe. I've got to always be on alert. Like, wait, what do I need to do? How do I need to change myself?

All that kind of thing. And then around the age of 25, if we had role models that were healthy, that were in their adult, healthy adult self, then we naturally just slide into this adult self, this healthy adult self, which is what I call the adult chair. this is where we live in the moment we set healthy boundaries we know how to feel our emotions we are strong we are compassionate toward other and self um we are able to speak up for ourselves with no problem uh we go after what we want in life um all of that kind of thing so it's not the perfect chair but it's a healthy chair and this is where we live the rest of our lives

unfortunately though most of us did not have that type of role model or those role models so we default into growing up physically but we live off of that old outdated roadmap from the child chair which is kind of crazy again but from this lens of the adolescent chair so we all are growing up from this adolescent structure instead of from this adult chair so the book is about teaching people how to slide over into their adult chair on that adolescent chair no matter what age that you are today. So yeah, so that's the whole model in itself. And it really teaches people like who they are today and how they got this way without judgment or shame or blame of anybody. It's just it is what it is. You know, some of us had healthier childhood. Some of us didn't. We're somewhere

on that spectrum. Every human is. But I mean, I've worked with people over so many years that just said, I just wish I could set boundaries or why my relationship so unhealthy or why do I live with chronic anxiety or depression? What the heck's going on? It's like, read the book. To me, this is the book I wish we all had probably when we were 13 years old or 18 years old before we left the house and really learned how to navigate life in a healthier way. So that's the three-chair model. Excellent. So you have the three chairs, but you also then have sort of five pillars after that. Yeah. And I'd like to walk through a few of those. We actually kind of did walk through one of them, which is pillar four, which is, you know, owning our triggers. Yeah.

Let's start with the first one, which is to own my reality. And I think we probably hit on this a little bit, too, and we talked about the story you were telling about codependency and your mom, right, that you had to own your reality, meaning like, yeah, that probably all is true to a certain degree. And it's my responsibility. I'm the only one that can unwire this. Yes, absolutely. And the way that I found the five pillars was, again, I was in private practice for probably,

I can't remember, 23 years probably. and what I found was I kept teaching my clients the same thing over and over and over and over and their lives started to change and that's what these the five pillars were the five things that I taught my clients over and over and over so you're right so the first pillar is I own my reality and what I realized was that when people would come into my office and they would say I don't know I just want a different life I'm just not happy tell me about your life and they would tell me everything except the big purple elephant in the room or the pink elephant I'm like, what's the pink elephant in your room that you don't want to talk about and that you don't want to own?

And sometimes people knew what it was. Sometimes people didn't. But a lot of people would come in and say things like, and yes, that example that you said was spot on. I really struggle with codependency and I need to stop carrying that suitcase around. Absolutely, yes. But it was also things like people will come in and say, I think I want a divorce. I don't think I've ever been happy in my marriage. or I think my child has ADHD.

I have heard from the teachers for five years and I don't want to admit it. I don't want to say it out loud because that makes it real. But I'm going to tell you, Michelle, I'm like, okay, well, that's fine. Or people would come in and say, you know, I'm getting high every single day and now it's twice a day. I think I have a problem. Or I'm drinking too much. Can you help me? Or you name it.

It's all the things that we do on it, sometimes even a daily basis. And there's a sense, again, we're living chin up. So we've got to learn how to feel our reality again, and there's something about it that doesn't feel quite right, but we don't want to admit it. The way we change anything is we've got to name it and we've got to own it. I worked with several people with cancer, and this lady would, this woman would come in and she'd say, well, that thing, that thing that I have and da-da-da-da, and I said, I remember saying to her one day, I said, listen, I'm all about law of attraction.

I've taught it for a year. I get it. And I understand, but you are creating it more by pushing against it. Let's own it and you will move through it. Because when we own our reality, different ideas come, inspiration, intuition, downloads of what my next step is. But when we don't want to own what's right in front of us, we are putting up a wall to the solution.

So you've got to own it. So she said, I don't want to say it out loud. I don't want to say it out loud. I said, say it out loud, just once with me right now, so we can move through it together. She says, I have a stage four cancer. I said, okay, take a breath. And she says, wow, why does it feel lighter? I said, we don't have to talk.

We're going to just figure out a plan now for how to navigate it. And she loved it. So there's a huge power in owning our reality and not being in denial of what's sitting smack dab in front of us. It actually moves us through it, but that's the first step. Yeah, and it's an uncomfortable step because we have to then allow ourselves to feel it to some degree, right? Yeah. And that is difficult.

It's difficult to recognize, to feel, okay, I really do want a divorce. Now I have to feel that. And that feeling is actually part of the energy that drives change, right? Yep. It's something inside feels really wrong about this. that's part of the energy that drives the change. It needs to be there. It's why, you know, I'm a recovering alcoholic and addict.

And, you know, in recovery circles, they talk so much about, like, you know, hitting a bottom. And I don't like that word very much. But it points towards there has to be a certain amount of uncomfortableness. Yeah. That drives the change. And we have to be willing to go into that discomfort to a certain degree in order to change. And that's kind of what you're talking about with owning it. But owning is very often, very uncomfortable.

You're absolutely right. And here's the thing. And again, I heard this so often, like, I don't want to say this out loud, but I'm going to say it to you, Michelle. I'm like, okay, go ahead and say it. And what the ego or what we do in our adolescent chair is blow up a story or assumption that by owning it and what's on the other side of owning it is going to be the worst thing ever. So, for example, and here's a great example. I remember working with a woman that she came in. And she said, I think that I want a divorce.

I can't believe I'm saying this out loud. I'm going to say it to you, Michelle. I said, okay, great, let's talk about it. And she cried and she was feeling it like you're saying. And when we feel it, the emotions or the energy, replace that word with energy, start to move again. I want to give you an analogy. I think about our human body system, like a big, beautiful flowing river. Think of you yourself because quantum physics has proven that we are energy being.

So think about yourself like a beautiful river. and then a log, which is a thought or something that scares us or doesn't feel good or a thought like I want a divorce, right, or I'm drinking too much, whatever it might be, is in the river and it's trying to move through this river. When we say, I don't want to feel that, I don't want that. We stop that log. Another log comes and another log and another log. And before you know it, it's like a big beaver dam.

It's a big dam in the middle of the river because we're not willing to feel it. When we feel it, all those logs can move through. does it feel good sometimes no sometimes there are tears and anger and frustrate and all of those things but here's what i also learned about feeling emotions they do move through yeah in fact without a story without the story they move through in 90 seconds grief is a little different but they do move through and what what we do though as humans is we start to feel an emotion and then we go back to the ego and the ego builds a story about why we're feeling that emotion yeah but if we can just feel the emotion. It's an energy that moves through no different than a log moving down a river.

Let me go back to my example. So this woman came in and said, I need to tell you something. I think I want a divorce. I'm not happy. I haven't been happy in years. My husband, I don't remember what was going on with him. Something was going on. If he worked too much, you're an alcoholic, something like that. I said, okay, tell me more. She started talking about it. I said, okay, Well, I remember inviting her. I said, have you shared any of this with him? Well, no. That would be hurtful.

And I said, let's start there. Let's start with just sharing your reality with him. And she says, well, that's going to be uncomfortable. It might hear his feelings. I said, yep, that's okay. But not as much as walking out next week. Right. Unexpectedly.

Right. Well, again, I'm not going to bore you with all the details, but she came in every week and we came up with a plan of how she's going to speak up, which again, that's a boundary. That's just a boundary is not only teaches other people how we want to be treated, but a boundary oftentimes is just speaking up. It's a simple request. So anyway, I worked with her on that.

I said, let's tell him high level what's going on. And anyway, so we came up with it. We'd go talk to him, that she'd come back. What she learned how to do after admitting, I want a divorce. Again, you've got to think about it like this, too. Our ego doesn't want you to be in pain, doesn't want us to be in pain. So the solution that the ego is going to come up with, which, by the way, that's the adolescent share, which we all live from, is the average emotional age of a 13-year-old.

Hear that. That's where we live from. Even though my body is older, however old you are on the outside, we are making decisions from an emotional perspective of about a 13-year-old. Okay? So in her mind, she said, I want a divorce because she wanted the pain to stop. I taught her how to set boundaries. How do you speak up?

How do you feel your emotions? We went through all of the things in these pillars. And guess what? They learned how to dialogue together. He eventually came in with her. Their marriage became stronger because she was willing to own her reality. So they learned how to have a new relationship, but they had to talk about it. And that's another thing that I worked with people on a ton.

Like, we don't know how to communicate as healthy adults, so we just avoid instead. I did a whole course on that. It's called the Relationship Reset Course because I said, people just don't know how to communicate in relationships. But you got to do that from your adult. Yeah. But that happened time and time again with all kinds of different things, whether it be, you know, partnership issues or, again, like that person that came in and said, I am drinking too much,

I don't know what to do. Okay, let's talk about it. You got to own it. So owning is powerful. It starts changing everything. In the section where you talk about owning things, you've got sort of this three-step piece. And I'd like to ask, we sort of talked about one and two here, honest with yourself, get honest about your past. But the third step is own the good.

What does that mean? Yeah. So what is good? And this is the thing. The ego looks for what's not good. The ego looks for what's wrong and wants to fix it. But we want to own the good of what's going on in life too. and people, they don't see that.

So let's just use this woman for an example. I said, I'm really proud of you for speaking up for yourself. You're owning your reality. This is really good stuff. What else is good? You know, from our adult, we have to look for what's fact and truth in the very moment right now in this very moment. And I remember saying to her, tell me about what's good about your relationship with

your husband because she was so focused on what was a negative thing. I said, we got to own all that stuff too. So there's that. The other way that we own the good is we just don't look for. for what's wrong. Again, we're looking for what's right. So I don't want people to think, oh, I'm just owning the bad stuff. We're not great at owning what's good because, again, the ego is looking for what's wrong. Where is something out of place, you know, all of that kind of thing. So I want to look out in our world and become our best cheerleaders and go,

well, maybe I'm not so bad. And maybe this is like for me. Okay, yep, I'm going to own that I have all these codependency tendencies, and I'm still a good person. And I'm going to work on it. I'm really proud of myself. Good for me. We're not great at doing that. I've said this time and time again, you must become your best cheerleader. You must do that for yourself first. Many, many people get into relationships, and it could be with a partner or a parent or a friend where we want people out there to validate us. No, no. That's the cherry on the Sunday. We got to learn how to do it for ourselves first. Yeah. If we're talking about owning our reality, our reality is nuanced. Right. That's what reality is. It's nuanced. It's not simple. There's good and there's bad.

All the time. I just did a project with the Tao De Ching. And I mean, that's one of the core underlying things of that entire book is you don't get good without bad. You don't get high without low you don't get light without dark so reality is to own reality is to in a sense see the whole of it all and so if you leave out the good you're missing a key part of reality yeah when i work with people on building their self-worth or their self-esteem i'm like what do you do that's really good in one day and they can't see it i said did you do you make the bed start making your bed every day let's just start there and i love for you to praise yourself every day like good job making that bad you killed it. Do you get up and you take your kids to school? Oh yeah, but who cares about that?

I'm like, no, you take your kids to school. Good job. Do you get up and you, you know, so I go through this little tiny things. Do you feed your dog? Yes. Great. Good, good for you. You're not, you know, starving your animal. Like it sounds so silly, but we take for granted all the stuff that we do that's so good every day. And we just go, ah, who cares? No, no, no, no. It's not who cares. It's like, you did a good job. Claim it, own it. celebrate it. A hundred percent because I think when we do that, we can also reflect on what is the value that is underneath that and then we connect to it and we feel like we're whole. Oh, one of my things that I value is care. Well, look at all these instances of care because we often

think we need to do more. Whereas what you're saying and I agree is yes, sometimes more is required. But I also think another way into well-being is to own the good that we already do and learn how to feel it and see all the ways in which I am making choices that reflect who I am in a positive way. 100%. Yeah. Yeah. You've got to own the good. You've got to look for it. Yeah. Look for it and then claim it. What I mean by that is, again, it's owning it. Like, wow. I'm really good at podcasting. I'm really good at asking questions. Hey, I wrote a book. I'm really proud of myself.

If nobody bought this book, I'm proud of myself. Right? I did it. And I'm so proud of Michelle for writing this adult chair book. Go, Michelle. I don't have to put that on social media. I don't have to tell another living soul.

I'm telling myself because I am proud of myself. We have to learn how to become our, like I said, our biggest cheerleader, but our best friend too. 100%. I'm a little bit further behind. the new in the book process, but the book's entering copy editing with a publisher, and it'll be out next April. And it's really easy to get caught up in all the things that need to happen in order for this to go right. But a friend of mine told me, and I try and think about it often, he's like,

you already won. Like, they paid you money to write this book. You already won. You've written a book. And that's really, you know, that's a version of taking on the good. And that's something that I try and do a lot is like literally I wrote the book like I'd work for 30 minutes I'd take a break I'd work for 30 minutes at the end of each 30 minutes I would try and give myself a very small but still distinct like good job yes right because every time I did it was was valuable and important that's exactly it Eric that's exactly what I'm talking about and I'm glad that you did that a lot of people wouldn't do that yeah I took so many weekends out of my life for probably the last to write the book maybe a year and a half. And sometimes I would go on a writing trip for a

week or two somewhere. When I was done, I'd say, good job. Look at you go, girl. Like, good for you. Again, at the end of it, it takes so long to get the book out of the world. I'm like, I don't care if anyone buys this thing because I'm so proud of myself. And I know that the people that do read it are going to be the ones that feel drawn to it because they're ready to change their lives. Those are the people that will read it. But whatever, I'm really happy about this book. I'm proud of it. congratulations on yours. It's exciting. It is exciting. Like I said, you're a little further along. I can see a book behind you. So congratulations to you. As we wrap up, I want to ask you a question. One of the things we talk about on this show very often is little by little, a little becomes a lot.

And I'm curious, like, what's one little by little way someone could put something from your book to work today? What could somebody do in five minutes today? Yep. When you are, I say you, to anyone that is listening when you feel overwhelmed or sad or depressed or anxious or whatever the heck it might be when you're having a bad day we can generalize that by just say when you have a bad day when you're having a bad day ask yourself what is fact and or truth right now in this very moment and it's got to be a hundred percent fact and truth and that's how you move over into your adult chair so it could mean I'm looking out my window and I see trees okay or this sky is blue. Great. It also could mean, wow, I have this book right here in my hand. Isn't that

great? The adult chair book, here it is. It could be that because what happens is when we go into anxiety or depression or overwhelmed or, oh my gosh, my kid's not going to do this or whatever it might be with our women in our lives. When we can anchor into the moment of the now, it's a game changer and everything starts to change. But often, because we're human, not because anything's wrong with us, but this is most humans. We fall into story or assumption about something that may or may not ever happen. And I remember, I wish I could remember where I read this, 97% of our stories and assumptions don't come true. They do not manifest. So all the things we worry about, they don't happen. So if we can anchor into the moment, it is a true game changer. What is fact

and truth right now? Not what is probably going to happen, but what is fact and truth right now in the moment. Excellent. Well, Michelle, thank you so much for coming on the show. I've enjoyed talking with you, and we'll have links in the show notes to where people can find you in your book. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. Thank you so much for listening to the show. If you found this conversation helpful, inspiring, or thought-provoking, I'd love for you to share it with a friend. Sharing from one person to another is the lifeblood of what we do. We don't have a big budget and I'm certainly not a celebrity but we have something even better and that's you just hit the share button on your podcast app or send a quick text with the episode link to someone who might

enjoy it your support means the world and together we can spread wisdom one episode at a time thank you for being part of the one you feed community