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There's No Pill for Shame with Rob Gent · The Trauma Therapist

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Trauma Theriporist podcast. My name is Guimi Ferson,
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Speaker 1: and I interview incredible people who share the story of
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Speaker 1: how trauma has shaped their lives. And a big thank
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Speaker 1: you for sponsoring today's episode goes to my guest and
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Speaker 1: our sponsors. So five four, three, two and one, our folks,
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Speaker 1: welcome back to the podcast. Very excited to have as
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Speaker 1: my guest today, Doctor Robert Gent.
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Speaker 2: Robert Welcome, Yes, thanks Guy, good to be here.
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Speaker 1: Doctor Gent is an accomplished clinician and expert in psychotherapeutic development,
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Speaker 1: with a distinguished career that spans over two decades. He's
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Speaker 1: currently the chief Clinical Officer at Pacific Quest, where he
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Speaker 1: oversees the clinical program and sharing the highest standards of
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Speaker 1: care and leading a dedicated team of professionals. All right, Rob,
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Speaker 1: obviously just a little bit about you, but before we
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Speaker 1: get going, share with the listeners where you're from originally
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Speaker 1: and where you are currently.
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Speaker 3: Dive in terrific guy originally from southern California, a small
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Speaker 3: little town called San Clemente, California. So I've been in
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Speaker 3: the water and surfing has been a big part of
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Speaker 3: my life for a long long time. And then the
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Speaker 3: finished graduate school and moved out to Missouri, of all places,
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Speaker 3: to start a behavioral health company and treating adolescents with
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Speaker 3: trauma issues, developmental trauma, relinquishment histories. And had an amazing
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Speaker 3: career for eighteen years building a behavioral health company. We
1:32
Speaker 3: expanded across the whole US and was living in Phoenix,
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Speaker 3: Arizona for the last seven years. That was our corporate headquarters,
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Speaker 3: and then within this last year have relocated to the
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Speaker 3: Big Island of Hawaii to do focus on integrative medicine
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Speaker 3: and psychotherapy for young adults, in adolescents in their families.
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Speaker 1: Wow, damn, as I say, so, how did this start
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Speaker 1: for you? This passion start for you?
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Speaker 3: I like that, you say that, guy, I early on, I,
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Speaker 3: of course, I think we're all in the business to
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Speaker 3: a little bit try to heal ourselves.
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Speaker 2: So I have a little bit.
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Speaker 3: Of trauma in my life, understanding where my family come from,
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Speaker 3: and it's forced me to become I'm high emotional and
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Speaker 3: high analytical, and so it served me well to really
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Speaker 3: understand what is this thing.
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Speaker 2: We call relationship.
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Speaker 3: And when I started to hear about therapy, and I
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Speaker 3: went to graduate school and I really wanted to take
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Speaker 3: it apart and understand the science around development and what
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Speaker 3: happens in relationship. Of course, that led me quickly to
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Speaker 3: doctor Dan Siegel Lewis cause Alino, these guys to be
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Speaker 3: able to understand interpersonal neurobiology was by really became the
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Speaker 3: foundation of what I wanted to do, and it was
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Speaker 3: really in an effort to I'll just put it this way,
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Speaker 3: after all these years understanding, I've been looking how to
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Speaker 3: integrate my own shame and recognize how much shame is
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Speaker 3: in other people and how trauma impacts that shame. So
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Speaker 3: that's that became my passion. And then I read a
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Speaker 3: book by a man named doctor or His name is
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Speaker 3: Ryan Holiday. He wrote a book called Ego Is the Enemy,
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Speaker 3: and I quickly realized, oh, I need purpose rather than passion,
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Speaker 3: And so I was able to spend the last couple
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Speaker 3: of years really focusing on what is my purpose as
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Speaker 3: a human being, what's my purpose as a therapist, and
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Speaker 3: how do I best serve And that it came to
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Speaker 3: me that my purpose is really about developing trust and
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Speaker 3: creating trust and how important trust.
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Speaker 2: Is and what that means a neurobiological level.
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Speaker 1: Would you recommend that book for those apps trying to
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Speaker 1: maybe rediscover their purpose.
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Speaker 3: I'd gree I think Ryan Holiday ego is the Enemy
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Speaker 3: is a really great place to start, can you know,
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Speaker 3: Simon Sinek, start with why is a good book as
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Speaker 3: well to really understand, you know, what is my why?
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Speaker 2: Start with why?
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Speaker 3: But it really is about understanding where does purpose come from?
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Speaker 2: Lots of times.
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Speaker 3: Our ego and our insecurities get in the way and passion.
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Speaker 3: Passion can actually be a little fleeting rather than purpose
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Speaker 3: gives us orientation.
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Speaker 1: M Yeah, love that. So when you were younger, you
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Speaker 1: kind of refer to someone some stuff going on in
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Speaker 1: your own life. How did you manage that? How did
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Speaker 1: you how were you operating?
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Speaker 3: I didn't manage it very well, guy.
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Speaker 2: I barely graduated from high school. I missed a ton
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Speaker 2: of school.
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Speaker 3: I was a wayward soul relationships where I was good
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Speaker 3: in relationships, but I was always insecure in relationships, and
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Speaker 3: I was found myself in a very tenuous place with
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Speaker 3: do I.
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Speaker 2: Go to school? I just was really lost.
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Speaker 3: I was not living up to the expectations. I felt
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Speaker 3: a tremendous amount of shame everywhere, and so I was
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Speaker 3: compensating for that shame. Looking back, now it was like,
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Speaker 3: oh my gosh, I was just I was compensating everywhere,
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Speaker 3: and it just felt I was concerned about what I
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Speaker 3: was seen as and I couldn't live.
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Speaker 2: Up to that.
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Speaker 3: And I was just in this cycle of just really
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Speaker 3: feeling bad and sabotaging relationships. Romantic relationships in particular were
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Speaker 3: very overwhelming, and I would get angry and I noticed
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Speaker 3: that I had just this incredible temper and it was yeah,
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Speaker 3: I compensated it in very destructive ways.
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Speaker 1: Actually was this kind of before college.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, before college, and even through college's I noticed some
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Speaker 3: of those patterns coming up. But college I was able
5:56
Speaker 3: to find a place that I found a place through
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Speaker 3: understanding psychology. I remember taking a few psychology courses graduate
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Speaker 3: level psychology in my undergrad taking some very difficult psychology courses,
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Speaker 3: and it really the light bulb came on for me,
6:14
Speaker 3: to be honest with you, It was so I remember
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Speaker 3: taking my first few psychology courses and being able to
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Speaker 3: You might laugh at this. I sat in one and
6:24
Speaker 3: the teacher handed out he said. The professor said, listen,
6:28
Speaker 3: I take a sheet of paper. All I want you
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Speaker 3: to do is a pen a sheet of paper. I
6:33
Speaker 3: want you to draw a house, a tree in a
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Speaker 3: person and that's it. And I had no idea what
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Speaker 3: that was guy, and he gave me about twenty five
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Speaker 3: minutes to do it. The whole class did it, and
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Speaker 3: he not pointing the finger at me. He totally generalized,
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Speaker 3: but went through the description and it absolutely described me to.
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Speaker 2: A d Wow. It was amazing.
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Speaker 3: So this projective house person we've in the psychological field,
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Speaker 3: it's been around since you know, forty fifty years or
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Speaker 3: whatever it is actually, and it absolutely turned the light
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Speaker 3: bulb ont for me. That's somebody who didn't know me
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Speaker 3: and just completely in this projective test.
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Speaker 2: It was me to a t.
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Speaker 3: And so I became so fascinated to be able to
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Speaker 3: understand what makes people tick, how do we develop these personalities?
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Speaker 3: What goes into that? You know, it's combination of all
7:27
Speaker 3: sorts of nature and nurture. And so it started my
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Speaker 3: path to be honest with you and my interest.
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Speaker 1: So talk a little bit about you reference, like in
7:38
Speaker 1: your interest in the developmental psychology and human development this adolescence,
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Speaker 1: How did that start to forge that.
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Speaker 3: Interest during my adolescence?
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Speaker 1: Your interest in working with adolescents interesting?
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Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't think that it was ever. Initially it
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Speaker 3: was my focus. It wasn't I wasn't going to graduate
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Speaker 3: school saying I'm going to work it out in adolescence.
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Speaker 3: What happened was I was very fortunate we had I
8:11
Speaker 3: was hooked up with a common friend. I was just
8:14
Speaker 3: finishing graduate school and this friend said to me, Hey,
8:17
Speaker 3: I know this acquaintance of mine. They're starting a program.
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Speaker 3: And I was like, what's a program? And they said,
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Speaker 3: it's called residential Treatment center, But it's not adjudicated kids,
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Speaker 3: it's none of that stuff, and they're looking to do
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Speaker 3: something completely different. But what they do is they take
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Speaker 3: adolescence young adolescents and adolescents who have had all kinds
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Speaker 3: of traumatic pass and it's too hard for them to
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Speaker 3: live at home. There's all these symptoms, they're maybe self harming, suicidal,
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Speaker 3: acting out, and would you be interested? So I began
8:54
Speaker 3: to look into it and delve into it, and.
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Speaker 2: So I got in.
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Speaker 3: We started our very first program in Missouri, and our
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Speaker 3: focus became interesting is adolescents with adoption histories or relinquishment histories,
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Speaker 3: and so that was a perfect venue for me to
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Speaker 3: begin to understand and I climbed into books. I was
9:17
Speaker 3: trying to understand what this development research, what is developmental trauma?
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Speaker 3: What does that mean? Understanding the science and that's what
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Speaker 3: led me to certainly Dan Siegal's work I worked with
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Speaker 3: very closely with. His name is doctor Dan Hughes. Diatic
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Speaker 3: developmental psychotherapy is what he developed and was able to
9:35
Speaker 3: work with those guys. I started to become a member
9:38
Speaker 3: of the ATTACH ATTACH is what it's called the Attached Foundation.
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Speaker 3: They have large conferences. So my life quickly went into
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Speaker 3: this really working with adolescents with developmental trauma. And I
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Speaker 3: quickly saw that the relinquishment in the adoption was significant.
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Speaker 3: But we were seeing some of these patterns with all
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Speaker 3: kinds of adolescents and just turning the screws and doing
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Speaker 3: behavior modification wasn't a super effective guy, to be honest
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Speaker 3: with you, and we wanted to do it a different way.
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Speaker 1: Prior to that time or even during this time, were
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Speaker 1: you had you started like working on yourself, had you
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Speaker 1: were going through your own healing process or what?
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Speaker 3: Boy? Great question, Yeah, I've I've been I would say
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Speaker 3: working on a relationship with my father for the last
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Speaker 3: forty something years. It's been I will often say my parents.
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Speaker 3: Now I can say This gave me the gift of shame,
10:45
Speaker 3: a bit of a tumultuous relationship at times, and so yeah,
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Speaker 3: I was I was becoming more aware of what was
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Speaker 3: happening in me, this sense of shame, how early trauma
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Speaker 3: for me impacted those relationships. So I saw much of
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Speaker 3: myself showing up in these kids, and they had similar
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Speaker 3: family situations and I wasn't adopted, but it was really
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Speaker 3: fascinating to me that I was demonstrating some of these
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Speaker 3: similar behaviors. So I was absolutely working on myself at
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Speaker 3: that time, climbing into books, trying to understand what this was.
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Speaker 3: And yeah, still working on You know you don't forget,
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Speaker 3: is that as you integrate trauma, you don't forget, But
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Speaker 3: it doesn't impact me as much. I'm consciously aware of that,
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Speaker 3: and it's really given me, given me a gift to
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Speaker 3: work with adolescents and families and now young adults and
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Speaker 3: working with couples because it was interesting, as you know, guy,
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Speaker 3: are attachment stories. Everybody's got one, Franklyn, what does.
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Speaker 2: It mean to work on it?
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Speaker 1: Yeah, So before we get into how you transitioned to
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Speaker 1: what you're doing now and why and with the understanding
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Speaker 1: that you know, everyone's different, but what were you seeing
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Speaker 1: in these kids and how were you working with them?
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Speaker 1: How did you find to discover to get to these kids.
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Speaker 3: So, as I was learning and growing and studying and
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Speaker 3: all of that, I had the privilege of being in
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Speaker 3: practice at the same time, and I was recognizing so
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Speaker 3: keenly as I was learning that the structure of the brain,
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Speaker 3: I'll use Dan Siegal's and model the brain, the.
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Speaker 2: Structure of the brain was.
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Speaker 3: Using cognitive talking strategies weren't effective for these kids. Lots
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Speaker 3: of traumatized kids have very high IQs and they can talk,
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Speaker 3: and they can talk, but their behaviors and their emotional states,
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Speaker 3: their nervous systems were still on high alert. I could
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Speaker 3: film my own nervous system on high alert. I knew
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Speaker 3: that I would try to compensate and use my brain
12:56
Speaker 3: to think my way out of my emotions, and it
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Speaker 3: wasn't working. Guy, it just wasn't working. And so for me,
13:05
Speaker 3: what I saw show up with them in particular as
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Speaker 3: I worked with them, that we need to create experiences.
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Speaker 3: And it was such a gift to me to understand
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Speaker 3: that the limbic system, when we talk about the subcortical system,
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Speaker 3: the abigdala below. That central nervous system doesn't have capacity
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Speaker 3: for words, and it needs experiences in order. You know,
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Speaker 3: you can't really you're never going to talk anybody out
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Speaker 3: of their shame because of where shame exists. You need
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Speaker 3: experiences to be able to create and repetitive, reliable experiences.
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Speaker 3: I mean, I know you've had Bruce Berry on your
13:41
Speaker 3: on your on your show, and uh yeah, absolutely right,
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Speaker 3: you know all those.
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Speaker 1: Are what kind of experiences are we talking about here?
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Speaker 3: So it's experiences of acceptance. Really, even when we look
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Speaker 3: at gosh, having some closeness, what does it mean to
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Speaker 3: be able to be close to somebody. Receptivity to physical touch,
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Speaker 3: I mean, eye contact, all of these things that are
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Speaker 3: so hard for a traumatized system to even do. As
14:09
Speaker 3: you know, it's like to reach out to somebody who's
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Speaker 3: been traumatized, don't touch me. They can have a visceral
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Speaker 3: response to that. Their neuroception is just can be on fire.
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Speaker 3: Or we saw I was seeing a lot of the reverse.
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Speaker 3: We would we'd be treating girls and I'd noticed they'd
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Speaker 3: actually come in too close for indiscriminate touch, and then
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Speaker 3: the affectional on the sexual stuff was completely flip flopped.
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Speaker 3: So it wasn't don't touch me, it was like touch
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Speaker 3: me in a way that doesn't match up with the
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Speaker 3: emotion relationship. So those experiences were at that time for us,
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Speaker 3: it was about all this nonverbal stuff. I mean, we
14:46
Speaker 3: would certainly use language, but we were looking to do
14:49
Speaker 3: what be beside them be able to do interventions. I
14:53
Speaker 3: love sensory MOTORCYCLEO therapy. Pad Augden's work is really great
14:56
Speaker 3: about that.
14:57
Speaker 2: How do we.
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Speaker 3: Create movements, how do we even.
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Speaker 2: Do the clasping? How do we do these things that get.
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Speaker 3: Beyond and below that rational brain that is frankly lots
15:07
Speaker 3: of times the lid iss flipped. So one thing we
15:10
Speaker 3: did early on was we looked at canine therapy. This
15:15
Speaker 3: was huge for us, and I love this because canines
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Speaker 3: don't talk to you in verbal.
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Speaker 2: Ways, but what do they do.
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Speaker 3: They are safe relationships, They give you feedback. This is
15:25
Speaker 3: why I love equine therapy. And a horse is as
15:28
Speaker 3: safe as they can go. They immediately tell you where
15:31
Speaker 3: you're at. They get a feel for this. So early on,
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Speaker 3: this was many years ago. We still have this program,
15:37
Speaker 3: but we I think currently sixty Golden Retrievers pure big
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Speaker 3: Golden Retriever in the programs working with the kids. These
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Speaker 3: kids have adoption histories, would actually go in and learn
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Speaker 3: to take care of and we called it transferable attachment.
15:53
Speaker 3: They would take care of them, and then when they
15:54
Speaker 3: left the program, they would actually adopt one of the
15:57
Speaker 3: Golden Retrievers and.
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Speaker 2: Take it home.
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Speaker 1: WHOA, oh my god.
16:01
Speaker 2: Pretty amazing stuff.
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Speaker 1: And we that sounds amazing.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, you talk about experiences, I mean profoundly changing their neurobiology.
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Speaker 4: So so so you you figured out the significance of
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Speaker 4: experiences through or after.
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Speaker 1: Trying to work with words with these kids.
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Speaker 2: The words weren't working.
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Speaker 1: The words weren't working.
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Speaker 2: With the parents. I would always.
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Speaker 3: Say them, you know, mom and dad, you have your
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Speaker 3: rational bat you continue to sprinkle with love and compassion,
16:39
Speaker 3: and we wail away absolutely well intentioned. But they're what
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Speaker 3: I call it, it's well intentioned misattunements.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, let me just remind everyone I'm speaking
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Speaker 1: with Rob jen a pacific quest. So what are you
16:55
Speaker 1: doing now in Hawaii? Why did you switch shift gears
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Speaker 1: in a sense?
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Speaker 2: Great?
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Speaker 3: Yeah, So after many years of working with this behavioral
17:07
Speaker 3: health company, I started to really get into and understand
17:10
Speaker 3: I was. I was traveling around doing conferences and stuff,
17:13
Speaker 3: but I was still privileged to work with families. And
17:15
Speaker 3: I was noticing that therapists at that time, I'd get
17:20
Speaker 3: this all the time, that they'd be frustrated, like, hey,
17:22
Speaker 3: I'm trying to work with his family and they're just
17:25
Speaker 3: not it seems like they're lethargic. Are the meds right?
17:28
Speaker 3: All of this stuff? And quickly I said, I cluded
17:31
Speaker 3: into this. I said, did you ask them how much
17:33
Speaker 3: sleep they've had? Did you ask them what they've had
17:36
Speaker 3: to eat? And no, surprise, Gee, they're not really that
17:41
Speaker 3: engaged in stuff. And come to find out they've been
17:43
Speaker 3: surviving on a bag of tackies and a couple of
17:45
Speaker 3: oreos for the last four days. And I'm like, wait
17:49
Speaker 3: a second. So I really started to get into gut
17:52
Speaker 3: brain health. When we look at these integrative type of approach,
17:57
Speaker 3: how are microbiome actually relates to our cognitive, social, emotional
18:02
Speaker 3: affect type of stuff related to mood?
18:05
Speaker 2: Mood is food, as.
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Speaker 3: You guys have heard. So for me, the integrative piece
18:10
Speaker 3: became really pronounced for me, and I think there's this
18:13
Speaker 3: huge need.
18:13
Speaker 2: To do that.
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Speaker 3: So going out to Hawaii, there was this program called
18:17
Speaker 3: Pacific West, and they have been really an amazing integrative
18:20
Speaker 3: physician out there, and we have an integrative psychiatrist as well,
18:24
Speaker 3: and so me bringing the developmental psychotherapy piece allowed us
18:29
Speaker 3: to really bring these three components.
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Speaker 2: And I'm just so excited about a guy.
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Speaker 3: We're doing blood work, we're doing all kinds of genomic testing,
18:37
Speaker 3: doing all the while, we're doing the psychotherapy relational piece.
18:42
Speaker 3: As you know, as good as psychopharm psychopharmacology is right now,
18:46
Speaker 3: there's still.
18:46
Speaker 2: No pill for shame doesn't exist. So this is exciting
18:51
Speaker 2: for me.
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Speaker 3: So this is what brought me to this program in particular,
18:55
Speaker 3: and we're very excited to be building out in the
18:57
Speaker 3: work we're doing to look at really integrative, an integrative
19:01
Speaker 3: approach to health in a different way.
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Speaker 1: So who who are you working with? Individuals or families?
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Speaker 3: So adolescents, young adults and families.
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Speaker 1: Okay, okay, the whole adolescence piece is very fascinating to me.
19:20
Speaker 1: And your story reminded me of an experience I had
19:25
Speaker 1: where I was working in a clinic, multidisciplinary clinic, and
19:32
Speaker 1: we were treating and assessing young kids who were showing
19:36
Speaker 1: early signs of psychosis. And we had to deliver or
19:41
Speaker 1: administer this forty page assessment to these kids, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen,
19:50
Speaker 1: eighteen year old kids. And you know, as you can
19:54
Speaker 1: imagine having a kid sit there for you know, oftentimes
19:59
Speaker 1: two hours, maybe three hours. It was nuts. And we
20:04
Speaker 1: would work with a colleague. So there'll be two of
20:08
Speaker 1: us administering this to this these these kids. And I'll
20:11
Speaker 1: never forget this. You know. I was maybe a year
20:16
Speaker 1: or two out of graduate school, had my degree, you know,
20:20
Speaker 1: I was taking workshops and trauma, and I was so
20:25
Speaker 1: excited to you know, learn utilize all of my knowledge,
20:33
Speaker 1: you know, and I'll never forget as we were, I was,
20:36
Speaker 1: I was giving this assessment to this this young woman,
20:40
Speaker 1: a young girl, and it was just not getting anywhere.
20:45
Speaker 1: She was just not being receptive and she was just like,
20:47
Speaker 1: you know, one word answers. And I had never done
20:52
Speaker 1: this before, and I was thinking to myself, what what
20:57
Speaker 1: is wrong with what am I doing? What am I
20:59
Speaker 1: not doing? I should be able to get to connect
21:02
Speaker 1: with this person. And Rob, I had this assessment in
21:07
Speaker 1: my hand and I just like stopped everything. I leaned
21:11
Speaker 1: back and I closed up the assessment and I just
21:16
Speaker 1: put it down on the desk and I said, all right,
21:19
Speaker 1: you don't forget this, call her Dorian Dorien. You know,
21:26
Speaker 1: I shifted everything. I shifted my position, took my glasses off,
21:33
Speaker 1: changed the whole state just in a very natural way
21:36
Speaker 1: of myself. And I said, okay, forget this. Let me
21:40
Speaker 1: ask you a question. What is it that your mother,
21:46
Speaker 1: your parents out there in the waiting room are not getting.
21:49
Speaker 1: What is the other therapist that you've seen, your dot
21:54
Speaker 1: what do they need to hear? And it was that
21:59
Speaker 1: all of that experience, what you're talking about in the sense,
22:03
Speaker 1: shifted the whole dynamic, disrupted this whole crazy assessment and
22:10
Speaker 1: process and open things up, and not only for her
22:16
Speaker 1: but for me, you know, and it really.
22:20
Speaker 5: Allowed me to understand the value of kind of what
22:25
Speaker 5: you're talking about, is this experience and how we connect
22:29
Speaker 5: with people, especially young kids.
22:33
Speaker 2: I love that guy.
22:34
Speaker 3: Yeah, And it's it's I can't emphasize enough. And you're
22:38
Speaker 3: seeing probably this in your career as well as this
22:40
Speaker 3: diadic experience. This this diadic it's really this exchange between
22:45
Speaker 3: the two. Doctor Dan Hughes labels an inter subjectivity, right,
22:50
Speaker 3: this exchange of oxytocin what happens in this. You know,
22:54
Speaker 3: there's some release a little bit of dopamine, but the
22:56
Speaker 3: oxytocin is just really so connected to between the two,
23:00
Speaker 3: and that's what you're expressing that it shifts everything because
23:03
Speaker 3: what is their homeostasis. I'm going to meet with a
23:06
Speaker 3: professional and they're going to talk at me, have me
23:08
Speaker 3: do this very cerebral cognitive stuff, and it get stuck
23:12
Speaker 3: to my cognitive brain, and yet my nervous system is
23:15
Speaker 3: probably on fire.
23:18
Speaker 1: How do you, with all of your experience, when you
23:25
Speaker 1: step into a room with let's say a young adult
23:28
Speaker 1: or whomever, how do you begin that interaction?
23:36
Speaker 2: That's such a great question.
23:37
Speaker 3: I'm looking to really match their when I would say
23:41
Speaker 3: match their energy and their affect, not if they're so dysregulated.
23:45
Speaker 3: But I'm not necessarily Calm does not always equal regulated
23:50
Speaker 3: for me, you know what I'm saying. There's kids, yeah,
23:53
Speaker 3: and they're depressed, but it could be calm, but it
23:57
Speaker 3: doesn't mean they're regulated. So I need to come in
23:59
Speaker 3: and be able to meet them where they're at. So
24:01
Speaker 3: I'm actually looking for what I call these indicators of coregulation.
24:05
Speaker 3: I'm actually seeing how close can I get to them?
24:07
Speaker 3: And can they give them eye contact? Is their congruence
24:10
Speaker 3: of affect. A big one for me, and you know
24:13
Speaker 3: this is no surprise, is the use of empathy. How
24:17
Speaker 3: do they respond to empathy? Empathy is such a crucial
24:21
Speaker 3: experience that gets below the cortex into a place, into
24:25
Speaker 3: an experience of real acceptance because how many people, how
24:28
Speaker 3: many parents, how many whatever are they're trying to fix
24:33
Speaker 3: rather than be able to embrace there.
24:36
Speaker 1: Can you give me an example.
24:39
Speaker 3: So you know, I'll come in And I always like
24:42
Speaker 3: to say this to parents if your kid gets really
24:44
Speaker 3: frustrated and they fail to test or they didn't do good,
24:47
Speaker 3: and they come in and they say what, Oh, I'm
24:49
Speaker 3: so stupid.
24:50
Speaker 2: And the parents says, what, Well, no, you're not.
24:55
Speaker 3: Oh you're not in right.
24:57
Speaker 2: Many of reasons why you're not stupid.
25:01
Speaker 3: And in that moment, the kid is saying what, it's
25:04
Speaker 3: not about being stupid, He's having it. He's emotionally telling
25:07
Speaker 3: us something. I don't feel smart enough, I don't feel
25:09
Speaker 3: like I'm going to measure up.
25:10
Speaker 2: I don't do this.
25:11
Speaker 3: But the shift of the empathy is to go towards it,
25:14
Speaker 3: because there's a certain amount of loneliness that all of
25:17
Speaker 3: these a lot of people feel, but some of that
25:20
Speaker 3: emotion is really tired. So if I try to change loneliness,
25:23
Speaker 3: it only exacerbates the loneliness. But if I can go
25:26
Speaker 3: towards it and say, if I'm you, loneliness feels like
25:30
Speaker 3: what I'm feeling, just absolutely separate from everybody. I'm feeling
25:34
Speaker 3: a sense of I'm just going to be alone and
25:36
Speaker 3: I don't have value. And if I can go towards
25:39
Speaker 3: it and hold it, now I'm sharing their loneliness. I
25:42
Speaker 3: actually trick their brain. I rea wire their brain through
25:47
Speaker 3: this neural plastic connection. That also I'm tricking them. I'm
25:51
Speaker 3: actually sharing their loneliness without a bunch of contingency, and
25:54
Speaker 3: I'm not expecting a response other than for them to
25:57
Speaker 3: create wonderment, for them to be able to just wonder,
26:00
Speaker 3: oh gosh, And I'm sharing this with them. We checked
26:02
Speaker 3: their brain and now loneliness is not so lonely. And
26:06
Speaker 3: guess what we can do next time, but talk about loneliness.
26:10
Speaker 3: I love this stuff because I'm like experience through all
26:14
Speaker 3: of these nonverbals, getting close to doing this and kind
26:17
Speaker 3: of hitting them with empathy. And that's so when I
26:20
Speaker 3: come into a room I'm looking to do all of
26:23
Speaker 3: that with a person.
26:28
Speaker 1: When you first started doing this work, did that come
26:34
Speaker 1: naturally for you?
26:39
Speaker 2: That's a great question.
26:40
Speaker 3: It is a It's a skill to be practiced and learned.
26:45
Speaker 3: I will say that because lots of us have a
26:47
Speaker 3: lot of compassion and want people not to suffer and
26:52
Speaker 3: to change, which is really great.
26:55
Speaker 2: But it's.
26:57
Speaker 3: It's been a long road to learn how to what
27:00
Speaker 3: actually creates empathy, what actually creates this ability to we
27:07
Speaker 3: can say, I'm not a big fan of the term connect,
27:10
Speaker 3: but it really is to create this sense of safety
27:13
Speaker 3: and intimacy with somebody else where. It's creating experiences of acceptance.
27:18
Speaker 3: That's been a lesson to learn because that can be missed.
27:22
Speaker 3: That can absolutely be missed because lots of people they
27:25
Speaker 3: get rooted in their sense of I'm not acceptable and
27:28
Speaker 3: they have this force field up, you know what I mean.
27:31
Speaker 3: There's people who are just like I'm hurting in my
27:35
Speaker 3: place of being non acceptable. But I've learned to build
27:39
Speaker 3: that up and protect it because it kind of hurts
27:40
Speaker 3: so good. How many people hold on to their pain
27:42
Speaker 3: so tightly. So for me, it's been it's been a
27:46
Speaker 3: long practice to be able to get to this place
27:49
Speaker 3: to understand that my empathy.
27:51
Speaker 2: Let me give you a quick example.
27:53
Speaker 3: Empathy is only as effective as a person's boundaries are
27:57
Speaker 3: reliable and predictable. It took me a long time to
28:01
Speaker 3: learn this, and I'll give you a little bit more.
28:03
Speaker 3: Have you ever received or tried to receive empathy from
28:07
Speaker 3: somebody who didn't trust m How does that feel?
28:14
Speaker 1: Nope?
28:16
Speaker 2: Guy, you said it. I actually I don't want it.
28:18
Speaker 3: It feels patronizing, It doesn't do all this. How many
28:20
Speaker 3: kids don't trust their parents? How many parents don't trust
28:23
Speaker 3: their therapists?
28:25
Speaker 2: Say? How does that make you feel?
28:26
Speaker 3: Come on, mom and dad like, just give them a
28:29
Speaker 3: little bit of empathy, and the kids are like, I
28:31
Speaker 3: don't trust you. So I made the mistake early in
28:33
Speaker 3: my career trying to push parents to be empathetic and
28:37
Speaker 3: there was no foundation of trust because parents might have
28:39
Speaker 3: been enmeshed, they don't have clear boundaries, and so the
28:43
Speaker 3: empathy was actually not effective. And we all know this.
28:46
Speaker 3: What is Berne Brown? Actually, Dan Siegel says it to
28:50
Speaker 3: empathy is the antidote to shame.
28:57
Speaker 1: You had mentioned coming back to that word trust. As
29:00
Speaker 1: we kind of wind down here, you had mentioned that
29:03
Speaker 1: was one of your did you say purpose? I think
29:07
Speaker 1: developing it is.
29:08
Speaker 3: My purpose statement is to create experiences of trust so.
29:12
Speaker 2: We can build up of trust, of trust.
29:15
Speaker 3: So belonging creativity is huge for me. That that is
29:20
Speaker 3: now I've refined it over these That is my purpose
29:23
Speaker 3: statement is to create experiences of trust with people.
29:27
Speaker 1: And trust Because why why? I mean I understand when
29:32
Speaker 1: you were just talking about empathy and trust, but why
29:35
Speaker 1: why trust?
29:38
Speaker 3: After all these years, I've learned that this ability to trust.
29:44
Speaker 3: Am I a reliable, trustworthy person caregiver? That actually I'm
29:49
Speaker 3: a safe I'm as the case we talk about secure base.
29:54
Speaker 3: You know, all my so much of my attachment, my experience,
29:57
Speaker 3: my PhD, all of that is an early developed little
30:00
Speaker 3: attachment and all of that stuff. But I think about
30:02
Speaker 3: John Bowlby, who really was the father of attachment, talking
30:05
Speaker 3: about that life is about moving from a secure base
30:09
Speaker 3: out and exploring the world and back to the secure base.
30:12
Speaker 3: That that sense of trust to be able to trust
30:15
Speaker 3: a kid. They can be dysregulated, they can be untrustworthy,
30:20
Speaker 3: but they can still trust that I will do what
30:22
Speaker 3: is developmentally best for them. That's what it means to
30:25
Speaker 3: be a parent. That's what it means to be a
30:27
Speaker 3: secure based caregiver. They can push and pull it, but
30:30
Speaker 3: if they can trust that I will, I am absolutely
30:33
Speaker 3: committed to doing what's developmentally best for them. Guy, I've
30:37
Speaker 3: seen it with even really traumatized kids acting out, kids,
30:42
Speaker 3: kids who have avoid an attachment. That has been the
30:45
Speaker 3: one single point that's been most effective. That they knew
30:50
Speaker 3: that I would follow it. They could trust that I
30:52
Speaker 3: would do what's developmentally best for them. Maybe that means
30:55
Speaker 3: I'm not their friend, their pal. Maybe we go through
30:57
Speaker 3: some really tough stuff, But what's the most loving thing
31:00
Speaker 3: you could do for a kid? Provide them reliable and
31:03
Speaker 3: predictable boundaries flat out. So for me, that's trust. It
31:08
Speaker 3: came from my own experience as a child for sure,
31:11
Speaker 3: for sure, but I've been I feel like I've been
31:15
Speaker 3: gifted this just you know, if they're reading and perseverance
31:19
Speaker 3: to be able to understand. Wow, people who can actually
31:23
Speaker 3: trust somebody else, what that does for their nervous system,
31:26
Speaker 3: their limbic system, and their cognitive integration is just unbelievably effective.
31:33
Speaker 1: And just quick, very quickly before before we leave it.
31:36
Speaker 1: So you're getting so many things here. I want to
31:38
Speaker 1: touch base on You said, uh, connection, not really big
31:43
Speaker 1: on connection? We say more.
31:48
Speaker 2: So connection for me.
31:49
Speaker 3: I always ask people people say I want to connect.
31:53
Speaker 2: I said, that's great.
31:54
Speaker 3: How many definitions of connection are there? If you've dealt
32:01
Speaker 3: with people who have some kind of developmental trauma or
32:04
Speaker 3: abuse in there, connection might be I got hit, Connection
32:08
Speaker 3: might be I was sexually abused. Connection might be have
32:12
Speaker 3: we have a visceral lower response? We can have a
32:15
Speaker 3: neuroceptive response if you will, to what connection means. And
32:19
Speaker 3: I just don't want to go into connection to doing
32:22
Speaker 3: therapy and using this term connection with presuppositions because we
32:27
Speaker 3: just a lot of us, even as therapists.
32:29
Speaker 2: We've been doing this for a long time. We use
32:30
Speaker 2: the term connection.
32:31
Speaker 3: We have assumptions of what that means.
32:34
Speaker 2: It's sort of like the term respect.
32:36
Speaker 3: How many parents are like I demand, like a boundary
32:40
Speaker 3: is we respect each other in this household? And all
32:43
Speaker 3: I can do is kind of smile guy, And I'm like,
32:46
Speaker 3: do they even know what that means? Do they have
32:48
Speaker 3: an experience of what respect means? And it's filled with
32:52
Speaker 3: all this assumption. So it's not that I don't like
32:54
Speaker 3: the term. What I like to do is work towards
32:56
Speaker 3: a work building a experiential definition of what connection and
33:01
Speaker 3: intimacy is.
33:03
Speaker 2: How about that.
33:03
Speaker 1: Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful? All right, Rob, how do people learn
33:07
Speaker 1: more about what you're doing? Best way to get in
33:10
Speaker 1: touch with you?
33:11
Speaker 2: Great?
33:11
Speaker 3: Yeah, so you can email me, but go on to
33:14
Speaker 3: our website, Pacific quest dot org. You can look up
33:18
Speaker 3: what our program is, what we're all about. Please reach
33:20
Speaker 3: me at doctor Robjent at Pacific Quest dot org. Email me.
33:26
Speaker 2: I'd love to yeah, be able to talk.
33:29
Speaker 3: There's some videos out there, I've done some podcasts, I've
33:32
Speaker 3: done some other things. But yeah, feel free to reach
33:35
Speaker 3: out look at Pacific Quests and I'd love.
33:37
Speaker 2: To talk to you more for sure.
33:38
Speaker 1: All right, and we'll have that all that linked up
33:40
Speaker 1: here at the show notes page at the Traumath Therprist
33:43
Speaker 1: podcast dot com. Rob awesome, love to have you back
33:47
Speaker 1: at later date. You just you're so inspiring, man, appreciate you.
33:52
Speaker 3: Oh, thanks for having me feel pleasure to be.
33:54
Speaker 1: All right, man, we'll be in touch all right. After
34:01
Speaker 1: of the two ated the moment possible fo