The Sabrina Zohar Show - 36: Fear of abandonment and rejection with Masha Kay!

Episode Date: September 22, 2023

On this weeks episode of The Sabrina Zohar Show, Sabrina is joined by Masha Kay to go over the fear of abandonment and rejection! Sabrina and Masha go over where the fear of abandonment and rejection stem from in dating as well as personal experience with both! Get $300 off Mashas course with the code DOTHEWORK300 HERE Want to work with Sabrina? HERE! Stuck After the Podcast? Master Implementation in 8 Weeks with Sabrina's Foundation Course Join the Make It Make Sense: Getting Through a Breakup course HERE! Get Ad-free episodes and 2 Bonus episodes a month HERE! Dont forget to follow Sabrina and The Sabrina Zohar Show on instagram and Sabrina on Tik tok! Video now available on YOUTUBE!  Disclaimer: The Sabrina Zohar Show, formally known as Do The Work, is not affiliated with A.Z & associates LLC in any capacity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's something else here now. Something new. From. Exclusively on Paramount Plus. It's the series Stephen King calls scary as hell. Everything here is impossible, but it's also real. Sci-fi Vision calls it the best show streaming right now. We're running out of time and we still don't know the rules.

Don't miss what the movie blog calls something you need to watch. Saving those children is how we all go home. From binge all episodes exclusively on Paramount Plus. Hello, hello, hello. Welcome to another episode of Do the Work podcast. My name is Sabrina Zohar and I am your host. Guys, this is a great, great episode. I have Masha back.

We love Masha. And this week we talk about the fear of abandonment and the fear of rejection and really how it manifests. And y'all, I cry. I even, I thought into it because I love you guys so much. I am as vulnerable as can be. But I'm super, super excited, guys. As always, if you need anything, link in the show notes. If you want to work with me, dating up audits, you want to work one-on-one, ask me a question,

whatever you need. everything's in there. And Masha's information will also be linked if you want to join her program, et cetera, et cetera. And don't forget, guys, this week we're sponsored. We are sponsored by three of my favorite fucking companies, Hello Fresh, which I use all the time, Better Help, and Olive and June.

So I have some links in the show notes for you guys. Please, please support the sponsors. If you want to continue to get free episodes, this is how we could do it is by supporting these amazing sponsors. And as always, thank you to everybody who gave a five-star review. Please, please, please, please leave review if you feel it's worth it and love it. And if not, that's okay, you don't need to leave one. I'm just kidding, but no, actually.

But anyways, without further ado, let's get right on into it. And here we are for part fucking six. Guys, I have Masha here. Hi, Masha. Hi. How are you? I am good. I am so excited to be back.

I've missed this. I know. I know. And the funny thing is, is if you were with us prior to this, we talked for about two hours about everything. And every time we're like, why don't we just record? So here we are. Super excited.

Let's just talk about any new stuff. I mean, I've been loving the course. I caught up on my course yesterday. Oh, I'm so proud of you. Thank you. Thank you. I've got one more video to watch. I am learning so much, understanding, and now being able to implement a lot of the teachings of the firefighter and the manager and the inner wounded child, all that stuff. But how are you doing with the course? I'm loving it. I'm so excited to have you in it. But I am absolutely loving it right now. We're in rewiring. So I love that you're taking action and starting to implement what we learned and befriending. And yeah, it's been so wonderful to me, the community part has been,

has just been kind of mind-blowing. I've done so much work one-on-one with clients, and I love working one-on-one with clients, but I always think, wow, I wish they could connect with one another. I wish they could see that what they're struggling with, other people are struggling with, and my clients are often so intuitive, so compassionate, so intelligent that I know if they saw others going through that,

it would be so much easier for them to do that for themselves. And I feel like that is kind of the magic of a group program of working towards goals in a community. And so that has been, it's just been really awesome. And I'm just so grateful. And I'm super excited for a new round. We have a new round launching the first week of November. We have officially opened the doors the day this comes out.

Yay. So for anybody, and for anybody who doesn't know, the course is called the mind-body recalibration. I can't talk today. So here I am. But it's been, I mean, obviously you can share a little bit more, but it's been so insightful for me to understand really what the fuck the nervous system actually is. How does it work? How can you actually start to heal? And like, I mean, I've told you this before.

I haven't healed this much ever since working with you and understanding like this was the biggest gap for me because I had intellectualized so much for so long. But I don't know if you have a quick elevator pitch of what the thing courses so that everybody who hasn't heard about it can learn about it. Yeah. Oh my gosh. I'm so bad with elevator pitches. I need to get good at this. Sabrina, you need to teach me. You're so good at this. that. But so the mind-body recalibration formula, it's a six-month group experience, basically. So we have trainings every two weeks, pretty in-depth. So if you like to intellectualize, I promise there is more than enough to intellectualize. But we also have a community. We have weekly check-ins. We have group coaching calls when you get to be in the hot seat and watch other people get coach.

We have breathwork. And the whole program is created in these phases that, yes, we start out by learning and understanding ourselves and developing compassion, but then we move on to taking action, actually rewiring our nervous system and the patterns that are holding us back. And we're doing all of this to move towards our goal. So we're not just learning for the sake of learning. That's really beautiful.

But I really believe that having a goal to work towards, to understand yourself enough to start to imagine the next version, identify goals, and to work towards that goal very intentionally, is so incredibly powerful and motivating. And, you know, the reason I called it, formula is to me, this is a formula for learning to achieve your goals, whatever goal you're working towards, whatever change you're working towards, there's an art and a science to change

in transformation. And that's basically what we're learning. So we're learning a lot. Yes, you know, we're taking all the stuff you already know and intellectualizing, but we're really implementing and embodying and helping you understand how to do that rewiring through repetition. And you're so interesting because when we, when I first got into the course, it kind of like segues us into even our conversation today. When I first got into the course, I think my goal was very typical me, typical human being of I came in going, okay, well, I want to double my business and I want to double plays and I want to do all this. And I was very like, give me a, give me tangible results. Give me something that I can go,

oh, I did this, thus this happened. And along the way, what I realized was that actually wasn't what I cared about. What I was really terrified was learning and like what my new goal has now been is how do I handle the ups and downs? How can I be sure to, how can I support myself in those ways and really kind of bypass like that fear of rejection, fear of other people judging me and other people discrediting me for who I am? And so I think this is such a really great way for us to kind of segue into like this fear of rejection and really like kind of more the ins and outs of it because like I'm cognizant that yes, I have been scared that people are going to judge me and people are going to reject me for who I am.

But that's never really stopped me from doing work. It's just more it'll help me ruminate in it and like kind of do a, all right, if it works, it works and if it doesn't, it doesn't. But I have, I know that, you know, you're more avoidant by nature. I'm more anxious by nature because spoiler to everybody listening. You don't just heal this. It doesn't just go away. And I'd be curious to hear kind of your experiences with the fear of rejection and how that's

manifested for you and how you see it manifesting for other people because I think there's a lot of confusion about really what it is. And I'd love to kind of hear your personal experience with that fear of rejection and how it's like stopped you or how it's manifested in your nervous system and things like that. Yeah. Can I just say one thing on what you said about your goal? Because I think this is so important for people listening as well. And that is like what you said is true for most people who do the program, but honestly,

most people who are doing any kind of healing work, which is we go into it with some kind of external goal. Like it's so human. Like you said, I'm a human, right? So I picked, I want my business to grow and I want this, this and this. And that's actually not a bad thing. that kind of becomes like an anchor. Sometimes I think of it as like dangling a carrot.

Like, yeah, you want that external shiny thing, right? But when you actually start doing the work, you realize that what you're actually after is something much more internal. And if you work on that internal piece, you become the person who can do the things you want to do and then have the life you want to have. So for example, if you continue and you've done incredible things with this already,

but like as you've gotten so much better at handling the ups and downs, it's created this beautiful foundation to build your business on top of. Like the person you want to be, the next level of your career is going to require you to be able to handle ups and downs like a pro, right? The bigger your dreams, the bigger you got to be, the more you got to be okay with that. And I think that's so beautiful how that happened. And the reason I bring it up before we go into this conversation is that I think a lot of people listening, they also want something external.

Yeah. You know, maybe they want a relationship, a connection. Like maybe it's not a business. but they want something external. They want that like shiny thing. And that's not a bad thing. But I find that the process of going after that goal, that external goal, is understanding what has to shift internally.

Yeah. What's holding me back internally from being the person I need to be to have the thing that I want to have. Because there's often such a big disconnect, right? Between like what we want and the kind of person we need to be to have that. And like where we are is often nowhere near that. don't we expect to have that thing and that's just not how it works. And so your question, you know, about fear of abandonment and rejection.

Yeah. Right. I think it's so relevant here because often the thing that holds us back from that external goal is in some way connected to one of those two to some degree. And you've been so vulnerable about your fear of abandonment on here. And I, and I will say for me, even as we were preparing for this, I was thinking about it. I was like, honestly, like a fear of abandonment hasn't been as much of an issue for me. And I think that really does speak to me leading a little more avoided, you leading a little bit more anxious.

For me, it always comes down to that fear of rejection. And so, like, in my business as like a really simple example, both of us have businesses, I totally see that come through because I'm more afraid of being rejected than I am being abandoned, right? Abandonment is something that happens with someone who's significant to you. Yeah. Like you already have a connection and now you feel like they might walk away. The ride that steals the spotlight every time it hits the road, that's the Volkswagen TIG-1. Its sleek exterior makes a first impression you can't ignore.

Step inside to find available full leather seats and wood accents. Under the hood, the available 201 turbocharged horsepower power engine gives it a fun to drive edge. The refined Tiguan, you deserve more style. Visit vw.ca to learn more. German Engineered for All. Rejection. By definition, I think to most people, they're so scared of abandonment,

and we'll get into this when we get into the fear of abandonment. And I think that's the biggest step, what you said, someone significant in your life, not some schmo that you met on Hinge or Tinder, that you had a shitty fucking drink with. You don't even think they like you, but now you are so hyper-focused on the fact that they're going to leave you.

Very different. So we'll get to that, but I just wanted to clarify, so that people understand, And it's not, fear of abandonment is natural to have, I think, as a human being that you're like, oh, shit, I really care about this person. I don't want them to leave me, but how it manifests and kind of comes out in your life, that is where we can say, okay, that's your anxiety playing.

You know what I mean? A hundred percent, right, that we might have a fear of abandonment of people that are not that significant. And we'll talk about what that actually is today and why that could feel like an issue and is something to really work on. And 100 percent we will talk about that. And yeah, for me, it was always more of a fear. rejection. And that might come up for me as perfectionism, might come up for, you know,

holding back not being as vulnerable. Again, I'm already anticipating this person is going to reject me. And if they reject me, I'm going to feel bad about myself. Right. That, that really is what the fear of rejection is about. It's really a fear of being judged. Yeah. And if you are afraid of someone judging you before the thing that actually happened, right? I'm afraid of rejection before they in any way judged me, that means that the only person judging is me. Right. Right. And what that says is that I am judging myself.

Right. And I am afraid that other people will judge me for the things that I already judge myself for. And so I'm so afraid of that that I'd rather not put myself out there. I'd rather not because I don't want that to happen. Or if I do for me, this is just like one example, it has to be perfect. So perfectionism is something that I am consistently working on. because it feels like if I'm not perfect, it's going to be overwhelming. There's going to be shame.

They're going to see something. But that something is something I'm afraid of, something that I judge myself for. Which makes sense because when we think about the avoidant high sense of self, low sense of others, it's like, well, you're not going to look at me negatively. And I think where the overlap is is, when you have a fear of rejection, it's usually you're not accepting yourself. You haven't actually accepted who you are and saying, this is who I am. Yeah, am I quote unquote, too much?

I'm bitch, I'm just enough for the right people. whereas the fear of abandonment, it's like, yeah, you're scared other people are going to leave you because you continuously self-abandoned. You are leaving you behind. It's like it really, what is the common theme here between all of these fears, intimacy, abandonment, rejection, do-da-do, do. Is it nothing to do with other people and everything to do with what's the story that's coming up for you? And I think we hear it all the time of, you know what? I'm not going to, I don't want to get rejected, so I'm not going to date.

And so people always ask me, what is a sign that you're good to date? I'm like, when you know that rejection doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with you as a person, it's natural and it's part of life. They're not judging you. They're just saying, I'm not picking up what you're putting down. Yeah, 100%. And maybe we just break this down

because I think you said so many valuable things there. We are kind of throwing around, you know, anxious and avoidant, right? And I think one of the ways you and I talk about anxious burst avoidant is someone who is leans anxiously attached will often have a very negative perception of themselves. Yes. and a very positive perception, notice the word perception that I'm using,

of others, right? Which makes them hypervigilant about the other person. They are incredibly focused on what the other person is doing, what they're saying, because they don't feel good about themselves. They feel like they need the other to feel safe. So they need to be constantly thinking about them, worrying about them,

which is why someone who's anxiously attached tends to feel more of that fear of abandonment because a fear of abandonment is very focused on the other. I am afraid they are going to leave. me. I'm not afraid of how I'm going to feel. I'm afraid they're going to leave me, right? Versus someone who's avoided and tends to have a negative perception of others and a positive perception of self. And what I mean by that, it's not that they actually think so positively of themselves. It just tends to be the way they think and talk about themselves is like,

no, I'm good. Other people are the problem. Other people are going to leave me. They're not reliable. They can't be trusted, right? And so, again, that positive perception of self tend to come up as their fear of rejection tends to be focused on themselves. Rejection is not about, I'm afraid they're going to walk away, abandonment. It's I'm afraid of how I'm going to feel when they reject me. It's not about them. It's very much about how I'm going to feel. And I'm afraid I'm going to feel shitty about myself.

And I think what's interesting that you said is at the core of this, both of them, you know, insecure attachment styles feel insecure. They both don't feel worthy. They both don't feel good enough. The avoidance is trying to avoid that. that feeling by never getting rejected by never being imperfect, whereas the anxiously attached person feels that and just like, okay, but if you stay with me, it makes me feel calmer. It makes me feel safer. I don't have to really think about that because you like me, right? So I must be okay. Right,

that low sense of self, high sense of others. And it's so interesting because I think, you know, when it came to the fear of rejection for me, at least personally with the anxiety that I had, I was so scared of being left that I didn't care about the rejection component. I didn't care about saying, you know, being like, oh, I don't want to say how I feel. I don't want them to judge me based on this. And what if they think I'm crazy? I didn't give a fuck. That hell went into a handbasket.

All I was hyper-focused was on, you can't leave me. Please don't leave me. Please don't fucking leave me because I was scared of what? Being alone. I was scared of coming back to myself. And like, how did that manifest within me? like, whof, I don't know. The laundry list, it was like hypervigilance.

Like I, to the point where I would hyper focus on like a text message, I would be like, wait, but he didn't put a comment here or a smiley face. So that means he's not like me. Okay, he's not into me. So now I have to overcompensate. Now I have to play the cool girl. Now I have to do this. I had all this arsenal of things that I was using.

And I would end up acting in ways that I truly wasn't proud of. But here's also the difference in my healing. instead of rejecting myself for it and instead of shaming myself for the way I acted, I have now learned to have so much love and compassion for myself because I know very well that the reason I acted this way was because as a child, I was actually being abandoned by my father who would leave all the time. He didn't see it that way. He in his mind knew he was coming home.

I didn't know that. And so I would like when we were talking about one of my examples was like as a kid, because actually right before we talked, Masha said, well, when did you feel this? And I said, oh, I can go back as early as when I was a kid. And I used to cry. My mom, the whole running joke was I was so thin growing up because I would throw up after every meal.

And I remember recently I stopped my mom and I said, bitch, come over here. I don't talk to my mom like, oh, sometimes I do. But I love my mother. But I said, what happened prior to me throwing up? You know, I'm curious. What was the pre? And she said, oh, your father would put you in the crib and walk out and you would cry, cry, cry, cry until you threw up.

Yeah. And I was like, this is valuable information. I said, because what happened, I learned, I only can get attention if I act out. That's the only way that my, and what happened? My father didn't come back in. My mother would. So I always learned, okay, he's abandoning me. He left me here and my mom came back, but not my dad.

Yeah. And I would literally, I just remembered as we were talking, when my dad used to leave, I would hold on to his feet and he would walk out of the house while we were holding on. And we have photos of us doing that. And I was like, my parents thought, how innocent, you know, like, I'm even getting emotional now because I can think about that little me watching him walk out, holding on to dear life thinking, just please don't leave. And he would do something.

He would always take shaving cream and put it on our hands to distract us so that we'd have it and we'd play. And then I would remember turning around and being like, looked at it. And he was gone. And just feeling so, like, everybody was going to leave me. and I was so scared because I was alone so much and I'm so young. And I remember just feeling scared being alone, but also fighting solace in being alone because I could only trust that you weren't going to hurt me if you weren't there.

It was this crazy dichotomy of always feeling like you're just going to walk out to the point where now, oh, excuse the tears, to the point where now like I keep having these crazy dreams that tech guy, you know, we don't see his name, keeps leaving me or keeps turning out to be somebody I didn't think he was or that he's going to abandon me or he's going to leave me. And it's now become so clear, I'm just so scared of somebody seeing me for who I actually am and saying, I can't deal with this. I don't want this because I always just felt too much for my dad. And that fear of abandonment showed up in every fucking dating situation to the texting too much

to be super hypersensitive to following their facial expressions to make sure that I was on point because if they walked out that door, all I saw was me. with the shaving cream, hoping that somebody was going to come back and help me. It just didn't happen. Yeah. Wow. And I'm just so grateful that you're willing to share that. I think very few people are.

And I think it's leaving a lot of people confused. And I think the way you're able to connect the dots and talk about your journey, which I think is something you do so beautifully. You talk about your journey, where you were in the past, where you are now, how that connects to what happened to you, right? And like in what I'm hearing is there was a time when, you know, there were certain behaviors you were exhibiting that you were really not proud of. And I actually think you might have even had shame around the behaviors, right? Because you already had shame about who you were, which you were just now you're aware of.

But then you just had shame around the behaviors. But what's so interesting about that, if we could almost like map it out is these behaviors of texting and obsessing over the comma and being hypervigilant and maybe even I know you used the word like hyperstimbing. sensitive before to me, right? All these behaviors like, oh, why I shouldn't do this. Every coach says I shouldn't do that. That's bad. That's not good. No one likes that, right? But then think about that memory. You know, I did. I asked you before, like, when did you feel that way? When was the youngest you felt that way? And it went back to very clear memory. The sensations in your body were exactly the same to when you were a kid. And in that memory, something really painful was happening. There was a lot of painful things happen, right? And those same behaviors that when you were exhibiting them in your 20s that

you would shame around, you were exhibiting then, but they kept you safe. You would get loud. You would cry. You would try to get attention, right? You would obsess and be hyper-focused and where is your dad? And what do you have to do to the point where you couldn't eat and you would try to do all these things? Even as a kid, your attention was on the other person. Because at that time, they were your source of safety. They were everything. You would not survive. without them. That's a fact when you're a child. And so you found brilliant ways and you shared this with me and I hope you don't mind saying this, but you said, you know, I asked you. I'm like, if you didn't do that, do you think your mom would have come? Do you think you would have gotten

the support you needed? And you're like, honestly, I don't know. There was a lot going on. Probably not. Amazon presents Jeff versus Taco Truck Salsa, whether it's Verde, Roja, or the orange one. For Jeff, trying any salsa is like playing Russian roulette with a flame thrower. Luckily, Jeff saved with Amazon and stocked up on antacids, ginger tea, and milk. Habaniero? More like habanier, yes. Save the everyday with Amazon. I had a troubled brother. I had the sit-de-pickle. My brother fucked up. Joe was a fucking tyrant. He loved him, but he caused a lot. All I remember is, my parents tending to Joe.

When Joe got arrested at 17, going with my parents to get him out of jail at 9. Then having my brother beaten by my father in the house buck into a pulp because he would act out like an asshole and he would punch the walls and he was super aggressive and he was ADHD and no one knew how to handle him. And then there was my sister who was little Joe and she was just trying to,

so by the time it came to me, I was like, great, if I scream the loudest, you'll hear me. That was my coping mechanism. Then as an adult, how it manifested in my relationship it was no longer, that abandonment no longer came from, oh, you're going to abandon me. Who the fuck is this person?

Some schmo that you met? I'll give a shit about this person. But my nervous system went, oh, that's dad. That guy's going to leave. He is now your father. He's going to abandon you. And I had to challenge myself and so, but are you actually being abandoned?

Nah, this guy just doesn't want to go on a date with you. But the coping mechanisms I created in that early childhood of, okay, act out, text a bunch, be hypervigilant, be obsessive with where are they? What are they doing? how did they look at you? You were looking for signs that he's going to leave because you knew he would. And if you caught the sign early enough, then you might be able to get him back by screaming,

by acting out, right? You had to be that hypervigilant. You had to get loud. You had to get attention because that was the only ways your basic emotional needs would get met. And if you didn't do that, much worse things could have happened. Oh, I don't even want to know. Exactly. And I think that's really important for everyone listening to recognize.

These behaviors that you're frustrated with now, that protected you then. If you did not have them then, I'm not sure you'd be here. That emotional pain would be too overwhelming and much worse things could have happened. Right? And so, yeah, now your nervous system,

your nervous system is brilliant, but it's really inaccurate. And like you said that beautifully, that it, anything that sort, kind of sort of looks like the past, your nervous system projects the past onto the present. It stops seeing some random guy I went on one date with

and it starts seeing dad. And that's all it sees and it says, wait, last time when this happened, what did we do that work? Because it did. It worked. What did we do that work? Let's do that as much as humanly possible, which is what those behaviors were. And I think it's so beautiful how you describe your journey of like when you started healing was when you started recognizing, wait, I am projecting the past done to the present, but this is not my dad.

And those coping mechanisms that I had to use then to survive that were actually very needed and brilliant. They're not going to work here because if I get this random guy to stay, that's actually not going to keep me safe the way it did if I would get my mom to come over to me and give me a hug, right? Like that's not actually true. You're separating the past from the present, which is where healing actually happens. And I loved how you said, you know, now those fears still come up, right? You said you shared that you, you're having dreams about it sometimes. But I think what's so beautiful is you're no longer being like, oh, it's him. I need to focus. It's fine.

I'm so sorry. That's okay. I no longer need to focus on tech guy and what he's doing. It's actually not really about that. It's my nervous system. Oh, I love these poofs. Oh, the audience gets to enjoy our laps. My nervous system projecting the past onto the present.

And actually, it's about me and how I relate to myself and how I feel about myself. Because in those, you know, earlier times in your 20s, you didn't know, about you not feeling confident. Yeah, maybe you didn't feel great about yourself, but you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, but if I keep him and this guy, this random guy, I'll feel better. Now you know better than that.

Now you know, this is about me. This is about my wounds. I need to tend to those younger parts of myself and nourish them and let them know that we are safe. Right. And what I learned too, which was like a huge realization for me. And it was I was like, huh, sphere of abandonment.

I was like, I'm not scared of that this person's going to abandon me. I was like, I'm more scared that I'm going to abandon me. I always self-abandoned. My wants, needs, and desires didn't, I don't even know, I didn't know what a boundary was. I didn't understand what that was. To this day, I always asked my best friend Raquel, you met Raquel, and we talk about it. There's one guy, one guy I'll never forget.

And she said, you dated differently after him. She's like, everything changed. And I said, you know what I did? I said, a boundary. I'll never forget. I told him, get out of my house. And that was it. I was done dealing with being, even though I was, talk about kukukukukukoo over this guy,

I would have been married to him if I could have after the fucking first week of being together. But there was that old and new part of me, the old part of me being like, okay, be a good girl, shut your fucking mouth, let him do whatever he wants. You don't have needs. You don't have boundaries. Girl, do anything you can. Then the new part of me was, no, I don't need to do that anymore. And I needed to show up for myself.

And by showing up for myself, I'll never forget even that whole weekend. People were so shocked that I was so calm. And they were like, didn't you just get like break up with this guy? and I was like, he didn't abandon me. I didn't abandon myself. I showed up for myself and I gave her a big hug and said, you matter most to me and that's what I need to prioritize. Yes.

Oh my gosh, you said that so beautifully. It just could not be more true, right? And so as much as I'm kind of wanting everyone to recognize that the behaviors they're struggling with now are protective mechanisms that serve them that kept them safe, that their nervous system is projecting the past onto the present, and that's why they're acting this way. You just said the key, right? And the key is the only way to heal is to recognize that external

situation, the person, the job, the thing, that external thing can no longer heal me. I'm trying to fill this void with something external, whether it's validation or the person or whatever. And actually, it's about me giving myself a new experience. It's not about them showing up differently than my dad showed up for me. It's about me showing up differently than my dad showed up for me, right? That's where the healing experience is. It's no longer external. When you were a kid, yeah, you needed your parents to do that. And that was true. But healing now as adults is recognizing we have to show up for ourselves. And so if you're freaking out that this person is abandoning you, are you abandoning you? You always need to flip it. The thing you want that person to do for you is

what you need to do for you. And what does it look like for you to not abandon yourself in that moment and your story is such a beautiful example. And I love how you said like you felt so good afterwards because it's like you experienced real healing. You gave little you the experience of I'm here and she's no longer freaking out because she was freaking out about abandonment. She didn't, it wasn't directed towards him. It was directed towards you, which is why those behaviors go away once you start showing up for yourself and making those hard decisions. Like and it's about taking action. I think you talk about that really beautifully, but honestly, very few people do it, like with the commitment that you do in terms of taking new actions.

Even if it doesn't feel good, even if it's not 100%, you fucking do it every time I see you. Well, you know, you've talked about this a million times of like, you know, your nervous system's not there to help you grow. Your nervous system is to merit to keep you safe. Same with your brain. That's what Dr. Britt, I can't wait for you to read her book, loving it, by the way. You're going to love science stuff. What's up, Britt?

I love it because she talked about the brain as well. The brain isn't designed to necessarily part of your brain aren't designed to help you grow. They're helping to you to keep safe. And by connecting with the nervous system, again, how you always talk, you know, words of the thoughts of the mind, right? Thoughts are the words of whatever. You know what the fuck. Yes, yes, yes. Your emotions are the language of your body, your thoughts are the language of behind. Thank you. That. So we can connect the two. And I think what I really, like for me, even, same with fear of rejection. What I would always have to stop and I'd be like, well, I'm really so scared of, well, I'm to be rejected. Like when I create a new video even, I went through that for a long

time where I was like, oh, I'm scared I'm going to be judged for who I am. I was like, well, you're really being judged or making a fucking video. And I know you and I have talked about this because I've been pushing you to get content out there. Let's go. And that's where your fear of rejection comes out. And it's like, okay, what's under the hood then? You know, what are we so scared of?

I mean, I'm happy to talk about it. Yeah. I mean, it's a good question, right? Logically, nothing. What's going to happen? I won't get as many likes. Someone will leave a mean comment. to like, that controls.

Exactly. Exactly. That's just the reality. I talk to you about that all the time, right? And support you and that. So what actually is it? And honestly, for me, I know that my fear of rejection is about I'm afraid of kind of like uncovering those feelings of not feeling good enough.

So for me, in the behavior is like in day to day life, how does it come up? Not putting out the TikTok, not completing something, being a crazy perfectionist of I can't, I need to work on this. hours, every little detail matters, getting really hard on myself with one small mistake, right? Not being able to like show all parts of myself always kind of like, how do I show it very perfectly? How do I show it very composed, right? Those are my protective mechanisms. And like, yeah, talk about going under the hood when I dive into them. It's funny, even when I was creating this group program, as I'm creating, you know, the trainings, I take myself through them. Yeah. Right? Because like I said,

it's a formula. So I continue to use this formula. So some perfectionism came up as I was creating it and I took myself through it. And I was like, when did I feel this? Now this feeling that I'm feeling right now, freaking out about this, these slides not being perfect or this content not being perfect. And it took me right back to when I first immigrated to America. So I immigrated here when I was six, seven started school here, didn't speak the language. And I so clearly remember just like feeling there's something wrong with me.

And I didn't really understand what was happening. No one really talked to me about what was happening, like that we moved to a new country. Like I don't remember even having conversation with anybody. just one day I'm in a new country. I don't speak a word of the language and just kind of feeling like there's something wrong with me. Right? Like, I'm not enough.

And not communicating that with anybody, just kind of feeling very alone in it. Like it just didn't, I knew my parents were stressed and didn't want to bother them. So I held it all in. And so how did I cope with that? I coped by that by excelling at school. Yeah. I coped at that by being perfect. And in my mind, it was I just need to be perfect to get on that level because I felt

subpar, right? So to me, perfection isn't like above and beyond. Perfection is like a baseline. Yeah. So it doesn't anything below that feels like I'm going to feel probably what I felt when I moved here. I mean, it's hard. I don't have as many memories of that. They honestly start coming back to me over like the last five years of doing healing work. But like these little moments come back to me of like feeling unworthy, feeling there's something wrong with me. Right. And so I now understand when I'm being perfect, quote unquote, or trying to be perfect, that younger part of me is coming up. And I've done a really good job being more avoidant at kind of blocking her off. And that's the thing about being an overachiever. It's like, you can kind of stay away from that pain. If you keep achieving, keep excelling,

you're like, I'm good. And that happens to a lot of my clients. And the second they're imperfect, they're like, I'm insecure. I'm like, yeah, that has been there your whole life. Right. It's not like a new thing because this thing didn't pan out. You didn't make this amount of money. You know, so like I, I know where it's coming from. And I know that now in today's world, when I'm afraid of rejection, I'm rejecting myself. So interesting you say that as you were talking, this light bulb came on for me. I was like, I know this feeling. And I'll shout out.

I want to share a very quick example of how it's your perception. Your perception plays into everything. The narrative, the core. The narrative. Because when I lived in Venice, so I have a clothing line, plug, plug, it's called software. You guys get 20% off. He was going to do the work. Anyway, but when I started software, when I started software, I was nobody, you know, like my ex was the editor and he was a piece of shit, but he was the one, fucking hate that guy.

He was the one that had all the accolades. He knew all the people. He introduced me to everybody. So I always felt less than. And he was the narcissist. So he was great at manipulation and gaslighting me. He was a shell of a fucking human. And when COVID hit and like, oh, after we broke up and everything, the business was plummeting down.

And so when COVID hit and the business completely wanted. and we were fucking killing it. And then what I started to kind of realize was I was like, okay, I could do this. Like, oh my God, I can make this business something. Then like true business. The next year it wasn't as great. And I remember when I lived in Venice and talking to my friends and talking to one friend specifically and telling him, you know, I'm scared.

Like, what's going to happen? Do I do this? What I do that? And he was like, you know, before I sold my company for $100 million, he was like, you don't know this. I had a clothing company. And he's like, it didn't do that well. He was like, it, you know, whatever.

It wasn't that great. and he was like, you know, you're not a failure if this doesn't work, right? I couldn't accept that. In my head, I was like, if this clothing company doesn't work, I'm done for. That's it. Then we fast forward to now where I'm at with my success and this new business, that the thought of closing software, if I had to, you know, if God forbid, it was like, I look in it and I'm like, it was a great experience.

It brought me to where I'm at because I am not that, I don't identify with the rejection of, oh my God, I'm fucking a loser and I'm an idiot and I can't believe I didn't do this. because I was able to prove success in other ways. So it really does. It's that perception of the situation of to other people, it's, holy shit, dude, glass half full. You opened a company. You did it.

You had it for five years. You should be very proud of yourself. Whereas I came into it as a, I'm a fucking loser. I'm such a lame mess. I couldn't hold. Here we go again. Something else I couldn't do. Instead of, because I didn't believe I could do it.

And so now that I've proven to myself and I've done all this work on myself and I've come so far, that rejection, I don't give a shit anymore. I don't identify with it anymore because I'm not being, I'm not scared that you're going to reject me for who I am. I already accepted that, that it might not work. There's more to life than finding the perfect car. But finding the perfect car can help you get the most out of life. Like the SUV that handles everything from drop off to off road. And the car that hulls groceries and hockey teams or the van that's gone from just practical to practically family.

Whatever you want, wherever you're going. Start your search at auto trader.ca, Canada's car marketplace. I think that's so incredibly true. And honestly, it's like, you know, we were saying with fear of abandonments, you abandoning yourself, with fear of rejections, you rejecting and judging yourself. But what both of them have in common, kind of beneath the surface of both is,

I'm not worthy. Yeah, I'm not good enough. And like your stories, your narratives, your thoughts, your beliefs, they're going to be a reflection of the past. They're going to be a reflection of these, like, core wounds and traumas and beliefs that say, I'm not good enough. Who do I am? I'm too much, right?

And so, like, your perception of your business was a complete reflection of your past and your childhood and everything that happened to you, not at all reality. But it was a reflection of beneath the surface, I'm not good enough. I don't feel good enough. And then when you started healing, when you started working on yourself, when you started building self-trust, which is a huge component of healing, you're recognizing. nice thing. The truth is what really changed between then and now is how you see yourself. You started to believe you are worthy. Now, there's probably still areas of your life where you don't feel fully worthy.

I know there's areas of my life. I don't feel fully worthy, right? But that area got better because you had experiences. You had disconfirming experiences and you really start to believe in yourself and see your power. Ultimately, that is healing those core beliefs about yourself starting to change, going from, I'm not worthy, which is what all the, you know, insecure attachments have in common. We beneath the surface, we don't feel worthy, good enough. The verbiage may be different, but it's the same. Right. Once that starts shifting, those beliefs about yourself, that is healing, you know?

And I think it makes so much sense. And again, with like the rejection piece for me, it's so interesting because my narratives were different. And here's where it comes up. And I think this is fascinating to think about for people who are really interested in, like, anxious versus avoidant and understanding. it not just like on a behavior level of my thoughts are typically not I'm not good enough. I'm a failure. This is never going to work.

If this fails, I'm bad. Right. I'm almost, my fear of rejection shows up as me doing everything in my power to avoid that from happening. Right. I would, and this is where like my healing work started when I changed careers, I would avoid doing anything that I wasn't perfect at. And what was I really avoiding?

I was avoiding feeling not good enough. So the thought didn't go through my head. I would just like make decisions to only be in situations where I knew I could be quote unquote perfect and overachieve and excel, right? Because I was afraid of even having that thought. But trust me, that thought was there. Those same beliefs were there. It's like for you, they're more accessible and you're constantly battling them.

For me, I'm like, my manager part is like, we don't even want to get there. only do things that you could be the best at, only do things that you could overachieve at, that will keep you, quote, unquote, safe. And so for me, that manifested for a long time as picking careers and paths and situations that weren't serving me because they made me feel safe. They didn't make me feel bad about myself. You know, I couldn't see any imperfection. And so changing careers for me was like that big thing of like, that's the first time I

really had to face it. Yeah. I had to come face to face the face. Oh, I don't think I feel great about myself. and I don't think I ever knew that before. And what's interesting is, because I'm sure you're going to relate to this when I say it. I was reading in Brits' book,

and it's like, what people don't really want to hear is like, you staying in that behavior served something for you. That was serving you in a way because it allowed you to stay where you're at. I can relate to that. Like, I used to be big on procrastination, even though I'd always call my mom and I'm like, okay, I have to make invoices. That's a good thing. You're invoicing, which means you're making money, right?

You know, Copman to human beings, that would be one plus one equals two. I would have this overwhelming panic and fear. And I like didn't, I would literally get dysregulated thinking about going to an appointment or doing something. And I was like, oh, because if I accept that, oh, wait, you are doing a good job, goes against my core belief. That's not the narrative that I've created for myself. So instead, I am going to find other affirming beliefs, which is, see, you're a fuck up. Yeah, because you're crassinate, you lazy piece of shit. You just sat on the couch all day.

And it's like, no, that was protecting me from something. That was protecting me from acting differently. A hundred percent. I don't know if you did the last training video, but that's actually the last one. I told you, I was like, I'm moving away. That's the last one because I talk about this because to me, you know, we often refer to these as like limiting beliefs. Yeah, but they're not limiting beliefs. They're regulating beliefs. Your beliefs are there to keep you in the familiar. And what's familiar is what we're used to. It's not necessarily what we want. So our nervous system wants our life to stay very familiar, meaning our beliefs are trying to keep us doing this. the things that, you know, we consciously think, like, that's not serving, like, procrastinating. Like, yeah, procrastinating is going to keep you in the situation you're in. It's going to hold you back from getting to a new level and achieving certain things. And your nervous system's like, I don't know what's going to happen when she achieves them. I'd rather she stay here in the familiar, doing what she's always doing. So you're 100% right. These beliefs, they're regulating you.

They are serving you and protecting you by keeping you in the known. Yeah. Because the unknown to the nervous system that's scary, to your higher self, to your authentic self, that's where all possibility lies. Yeah, but that's where the struggle is with growth and change and why I always say it's both an art and a science.

That's why it's like, it's wild to say this. I never thought I'd say these words. That's the only reason, like I talk to Clem all the time, that's the only reason that I'm grateful that he left me was because I would never have done any of this.

I would never have pushed myself to the points that I pushed myself, because I was so used to the comfort that I had. The devil I knew was the dysfunction that I had been in. And when he passed away, my world was turned upside down. I didn't know which way was upright, left or center. So to me, I said, fuck it, what do I have to lose? I got nothing at this point.

I just have myself now. My one fucking ride or die, the only thing I ever gave a shit about is gone. And I think that's where I was able to just surrender and be like, you know what? I'm going to show up as myself. If it doesn't work, fuck it. I'll be single.

If it doesn't work, fuck it. I'll find a new career. because when I think when you finally just accept, I can't control everything, and these are all these behaviors have not been serving me in the way that I'd like them to, I was finally ready to say, I've had so much change in one moment of my life,

that moment that I took him to the vet and walked out without him, I could handle anything at that point because that was the scariest change. So then now making all these changes and saying, you know, let me start to do more work, let me try this, let me try to feel it, let me try to do it was no longer scary. Wow.

You know? Yeah, you said that so beautifully. Completely. It's almost like, yes, growth is all about stepping into this unknown, right? And I think a lot of times we are so afraid of the unknown because we're afraid of the worst thing happening. Oh, if I step into the unknown, the thing that I care about the most disappears. And so I'm just going to stay in my little corner because at least I have this thing.

And I think you're so right that sometimes when the worst thing happens and you are pushed into the unknown, you're like, wait, this is the worst case scenario. I'm good. I could handle it. You know what I mean? And I think that's so incredibly true. We're so afraid of the unknown. But where we really recognize our powers when things don't go our way and we recognize

like, wow, I'm still okay. Yeah. Meaning it could only go up from here, meaning the rest of the unknown is actually probably like a bunch of good stuff that could happen, which is even harder when you don't believe that you're worthy of it because now you have to be like, oh, fuck. I have to, I actually, like, even now for the first time my, our reader, what she told me was, you know, I said, I'm still scared, I'm still scared. I've got all these fears about, you know, am I going to go back?

That was my own limiting beliefs of childhood because my dad used money to control us. So money has always been weird for me because I'm like, oh God, I'm scared, I'm going to lose it. And she finally said, that's who you were, not who you are. And she said, it's time for you to accept finally that you are going to be okay, that you do have the money, that you built this career. And all she said was, I want you to know, you've done enough.

It's time to enjoy it. And it was this realization for me of, holy shit, I've been waiting for this day. We talk about all those milestones. I've been waiting for this day. And now to receive it means I finally have to accept.

You did it. You did it. You didn't need all of these crutches. You didn't need all these vices. You didn't need all these people. You can do it. I mean, first I need people, you know what I'm saying.

But you can do it. And that's always why my first question when people are like, I'm scared of being abandoned. my first thing is what's so scary about it where are you feeling that in your body can you actually for a second i used to do this i'd be like when i was doing all this work i'd close and visualize what if that person leaves me how does i feel because when i faced it and i was finally able to say oh i guess that's not that's not that's not that bad right you know feeling it for two minutes

and then being like wow oh okay i guess yeah it would be okay if they left then i was able to release the out time and be like because the pain of clem leaving me was worse than anything i'd ever experienced my entire life up to this point. But it wasn't enough to break me. So what else? Anything else? Fuck it. I can handle that. I think that's such a good point that and I know we've spoken about this in the past, but we're really afraid of the emotion. Yeah. Right. The emotion, the emotion of being abandoned or for me, the emotion of being rejected and feeling bad about myself, right? We're really afraid of the emotion and our nervous system works hard through our beliefs and our actions, habitual actions, to avoid new emotions and keep us in the

familiar emotions, right? Which is why we keep doing the same things, thinking the same thoughts, having the same beliefs. And so I think it's just really interesting. The example you gave about your business, you know, that now it's time you've done enough because it's kind of the reverse of clam, which is, if it is enough, you have to feel very new emotions of feeling stable feeling grounded, feeling safe, and those are actually unfamiliar to your body. And just as much as we could be afraid of the negative emotions, trust me, your nervous system will be afraid of the positive ones because it's not about feels good or bad. It's about what's familiar.

And I think those emotions are not familiar. So your thought patterns than you and I've spoken about of like, it's not enough, I need to do more or the anxiety, those are all things that are regulating, quote unquote, in terms of they're keeping you in the familiar. So if you keep feeling stressed and panicked and not enough, that's familiar. It's how you felt your whole life. And your nervous system would rather that than, wait, if I accept that it's enough, there's going to be a whole host of new emotions that are unfamiliar.

And that's actually what we're running from. 100%. I think, what was I going to say? That's like even when I think about like, how is this serving you to stay where you're at? It's like, because I think for a lot of people, like if you're the type of person that, like, it's narrowed by somebody after one day, and it's all in this. It's like, yeah, you're, because you know why? It feels comfortable to you. You know this. You get to stay in victim mode. You get to stay in. Everything's happening to me,

not for me. And you get to perpetuate the siren song. Sorry, I hate to say it, but I'm going to call you on your shit. Because I know I've been there. I remember fucking perfectly two years ago, probably to this day, my sister's saying, you know, sad, I might not be a dating expert because she's been, you know, with her husband kind of like you forever. But she said, you sound like the common denominator, though. And I remember volatile being like, you. don't understand dating and I'm not doing anything wrong. Oh, the bitch is right. I, because it allowed them to stay where I was because if I didn't stay there, I'd have to

make changes. I'd have to do work on myself that was gut-wrenching. Versus now, you're like, oh, Jen. You could not be more right. I think the truth is most of us are avoiding exactly that. And you're right when we're afraid of that person abandoning, that person rejecting a rejection an abandonment. Both of them go hand in hand here. You know, the same issue. It's like, as long

as I'm worried about them abandoning me, I don't have to do anything. I don't have to show up for myself. I can keep blaming them, focusing on them. I don't have to look at the stuff I don't want to look at. I don't have to take ownership. I don't have to take responsibility. Oh, yeah. Right? And responsibility is really the key between going from life is happening to me versus life is happening by me. You have to take responsibility. But like, that sounds easy. But taking responsibilities, take responsibility for all of it. You can't pick and choose, right? Otherwise, you know, you don't take responsibility. You get to be in victim mode.

And there are certain benefits to being in victim mode. And by the way, like, I can call myself out here too. The rejection is the exact same thing. As long as I'm afraid of rejection, I don't have to take uncomfortable actions. I hold myself back. And I don't actually have to do anything. I could just sit there in the fear. It's so funny. It's a cop out. They're both a cop out. We understand why they're a cop out. we have a lot of compassion for it, but in reality, they're both a cop-out from taking intentional aligned action that is aligned with your goals. Yeah, we're not here to coddle people. That's why when people like, you're harsh. I'm like, I'm like, I'm sorry, I'm not fucking, a teddy bear. The intensive pair of bear. But it's like, because sometimes we need to hear it.

Like, so our mutual friend, she messaged me yesterday and she was like, Jesus fuck. And she was like, I referred your podcast to somebody I know in this woman's in her 40s. And the response was, it was so clear. It was like this woman was bitching and she's like, fuck this guy and what a piece of shit. And he stole six years of my life. And I will be angry at him for it. Oh, it's all a victim.

Everything is poor girl. And then our friend said, well, hey, my friend has a podcast. I really think it would help you. And the woman went, I've been doing the work since I'm 30. I don't need this. And it was so obvious where I was like,

stuck is an understatement for this person. But no, you know what this is? It's serving you. By being able to. to blame everybody else and not take accountability of, yeah, I wasted my time. I wasted six years. I allowed shit behavior.

I didn't walk away. I didn't have boundaries. I didn't have fucking standards. And I allowed to be treated this way. That's too overwhelming. Instead, it's, well, fuck him. Oh, my gosh. I think you are, this is the crux of where people are staying stuck.

Like, the truth is. And I think this sometimes feels harsh to people when they're not ready to hear it, where they're still in the learning, intellectualizing, processing, phase of the work, which is completely fine. Completely fun. But the only time things will change in your life is when you take 100% responsibility and ownership. 100% responsibility.

That means that even if you're in a relationship, when someone is doing bad things or guys aren't treating you right or life isn't working out, you still go back to what did I do to contribute to this and what do I need to do to change this reality. Oh, yeah. Right? you no longer focus on what they did. It doesn't matter what they did. Life is unfair.

Shit happens. Like, you focusing on that isn't helping. The only time people heal is when they take that 100% responsibility. That is my responsibility to respond to things differently. 100% mine. And until then, people stay stuck. And that's okay. But I think it's, it is important to be honest about that part of the work because I think some people

are and they're like, oh, you just learning about. about it and reading about it and being kind to yourself. That alone is enough. And I'm sorry, that's the beginning phases of it. Right. But that's not enough. It's the action and it's the taking responsibility where truly transformation happens. So somebody asked me the other day, why is DBT call it like radical acceptance and radical

accountability? I'm like, because it's all. It's not just I take some accountability. It's like radical acceptance, radical accountability. Fucking do it all. Commit or don't. I'm very much that kind of person. Like, you see, that's why.

I've come to where I'm at because I commit to my growth. I commit to things because at the end of the day, I know that's what's needed. And I think, God, if anybody is learning anything from this entire episode, you're not broken, as Mosh always says, there's nothing to fix. But if we can start, get curious, start to ask questions. Every time my new rule is, anytime I have a client, the minute they say, why does he, if she, anything that's he, she, I'm like, what about you? Turn it back.

Bring it back to you. How, what's the saying about you? Why are you, here we go, because every time you put it on to them, you're taking it away from you, then you can continue on in the same shit that you've been going. But, dude, what an amazing episode. Thank you for fucking bestowing your wisdom, as always and watching me cry like you normally do. Give us a little bit of some more info on the course and what's happening November 1st. Yeah, well, first of all, thank you for this episode.

This was amazing. I so enjoyed this, truly. Yeah. But so the mind-body recalibration formula, which has my. group experience. It's a six-month group program starts again on the first of November, the first week of November. And doors are officially open today, which I am so excited to say. And for the wonderful listeners of the Do the Work podcast, I am super excited to offer a discount code that no one else is getting. Because no one else is as committed as your listeners. Can I say

that? If it could not be more true, no one is as a discount. committed as your listeners. So for those of you who are interested in the group program, the group experience, if you use the code, do the work, 300. So do the work, all capitals, 300. 300, 300. 300. 300. You will get $300 off the six month program. All right, cool. And we'll link it on the link in the link in notes. It'll have the code there is for anybody who forget. And please don't forget, if you liked this episode, if you like the podcast, please leave it a five-star review. to the people that leave a one-star review, fuck off. But please, please, please.

It helps me more than you could know. Leave a review. If you need anything, I'm going to link Masha. If you ever want to work with her, talk to her. I'll have her links in the show notes. If you ever need me, same thing. Link will be on the show notes. And as always, guys, thank you so much.

And Masha, thank you for another fucking amazing episode. And I can't wait until our next. We already have a plan. Yes. Thank you.