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YOU CAN'T EXPLAIN YOURSELF TO EVERYBODY · The Karen Kenney Show

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Unknown: It's the Karen Kenney show.
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You guys, welcome to the Karen Kenney show. I'm super duper
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excited to be here with you. And look, today's episode is just
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like a little love letter
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from from my over explaining heart to yours. So maybe you're
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like me, like when I think back, not so much anymore. These days,
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I've really put some effort into this thing, but this little part
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of my personality,
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and I did it because I don't think it really served me, and I
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certainly didn't need to be exhausting myself anymore. But
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if you've ever felt like you should join over. Explain. Is
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anonymous.
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Just, just go ahead and raise your hand right now, along with
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me, double Amen, hands right? Oh, my God. Ova explain is
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anonymous, which comes from, right? This desire to it's
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really less of a desire. I think it's actually has roots in fear,
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like being afraid of being misunderstood, all right? But
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we're gonna dive into this. And here's what I was gonna say,
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like, I saw this really funny meme, so something happened last
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week that kind of made me think, or like, was it last week or two
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weeks ago? And I was like, Oh, I kind of want to do an episode
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about this around this kind of incident, right? And then I was
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like, and then I saw this meme yesterday, and this is kind of
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how my spiritual team works, or the universe works, or whatever
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you want to call it, divine timing. I just got the little,
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the little universal nudge, and I saw this wicked funny meme,
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and it's, it's from an account called just, instead of saying,
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just forget about it, it was just frog, get about it. So it's
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like using the word frog instead of forget. And this person draws
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these really cute little frogs, right? And there's basically,
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I'll hold it up real quick for those of you who are listening
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and not watching, I'll explain it. So there's like, a little
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frog laying in a field on his back and his legs across his
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arms are behind his head or her head, whatever, and and their
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eyes are closed, and they just look really peaceful laying out
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in this field, right? Just forget about it. And this is
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what it says. Explaining myself is too much work. Just Judge me.
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You it.
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I was like, Oh, my God, definitely been hands to that.
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Okay, so let's get into this. Let's get into this. Here's the
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bottom line, guys, we cannot explain everything to everybody.
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We cannot explain ourselves to everybody, especially in this
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day and age, one of the things that I cannot stand about social
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media, and you know, some people love the challenge. When Twitter
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first came out, everybody loved that challenge of like, oh, 144
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characters I have to write in a really succinct way to get my
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point across, whatever. And Instagram, same thing, like
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Facebook allows you to be a little bit more of a long form
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writer, which I am, right? So, yeah, I can write short, punchy
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little one liners if I have to. But the way that I like to
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communicate is, I like to make sure that what I'm trying to
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convey is actually understood. You know, Tolstoy Leo. Tolstoy
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has this quote, I'm paraphrasing, but it's basically
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like the heartbeat of it is, is like at a at is transferring
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feeling from one heart to another. And when I'm
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transferring things from my my hat or my mind, I want them to
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kind of be understood. Now, message sent right my and I've
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mentioned this before on my show, my my first year at BU, at
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Boston University, my communion community, it was like my third
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year, my communications teacher,
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my first class with her. She said, the message sent when
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you're communicating, the message you send is almost never
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the Message received. And I've never forgotten that, and
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obviously, because I keep talking about it. But what I
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think about is I imagine these two people. So just imagine two
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people standing facing each other, right, and one is sending
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words across the void between the two of them to the ears of
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the other person. Well, you're not just communicating to this
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person. You're communicating to their history. You're
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communicating to their trauma. You're communicating through
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their stories, their beliefs, their culture. You're
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communicating to what they think of themselves. You're
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communicating to their subconscious and their conscious
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mind, right? That's a lot of layers, that's a lot of filters,
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that's a lot of interpretation between what you say and what
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they actually hear, right? So it's it's as human beings, it
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really is helpful to like and this is why, like a daily
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spiritual practice, can be so powerful, because it teaches us
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how to Slow the fuck down. So we can actually pause. We can put a
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little pause in between what we think and what we say, what we
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think and what we do right that that that little gap is Viktor
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Frankl talks about in between stimulus and response.
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Response. There's a space. There's that little moment where
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you get to choose, right? But here's the thing, no matter how
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mindful you're being, sometimes other people just are not gonna
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get the message. So some of us who are really sensitive, or
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some of us who have felt, and this was me, right? I often felt
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misunderstood growing up, I always felt like I shouldn't say
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always, there were a few handful of people who saw me, who got
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me. My mother was one of them, Miss Lefebvre, Kayla, Feb, miss,
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totally got me. You know, there were certain friends and people
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that you had in your life that they just saw you, they
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understood you, they got you. You didn't have to over explain
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yourself, but those relationships are usually few
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and far between, so I often felt like I had to explain myself to
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be understood, and I was so afraid of people
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misinterpreting, misunderstanding what I said or
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what I did, and they weren't curious enough to follow up. And
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that's the thing, if you're talking to another person who
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doesn't really care about you, doesn't really like you, doesn't
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really want to put in the time, they're not they're not somebody
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who really gives in relationships. They're not going
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to lean in and give you the benefit of the doubt and say,
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Huh, I don't really know what she meant by that. And instead
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of writing some story about you, like, Oh, she's an asshole or
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she's mean, or she's this, she's that, they ask you to clarify.
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They ask you for more information, like tell me more,
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so that they can truly understand you. But think about
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right now. Just pause and think in your adult life, who are you
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in continuous or constant relationship with, like a person
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or whoever, who you feel like this person really, really gets
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me. And here's what I want to say to you, if you can think of
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at least one person, take some time the next 24 hours, to call
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them, to write them, send them a handwritten note, text them
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something, communicate to them how much you value the fact that
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not only have they taken the time to truly get to know you in
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your heart, but that they often, I always say to people, we're
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always writing stories about ourselves and each other in the
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world, right? What if we started writing stories in each other's
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favor? What if we just don't assume that person's being an
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asshole, that person is this way or that way, right? So here's
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the thing, I was an over explainer, and I'm sure to other
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people, it could be exhausting. They'd be like, Why are you
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saying this three different ways? I got it the first time,
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right, but for me, for a long time, I was like, I just didn't
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want this to be misunderstood. And there are still times to
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this day where if I'm speaking on a stage, or if I'm like,
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having a conversation with somebody or whatever, you know,
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and if my sweetie is there, I will often turn to him later. I
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do this with my best friend, Katie, too, and I'll always go
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like, this, was I mean? Was I just mean? Because I've all
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like, I never, I never want to be mean. I never want to be
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unkind, right? I do like to be clear, and I don't mind being
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loving and firm, right? Loving, but firm, that I can do with but
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I never want to come across as as being like, unkind right?
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That just doesn't feel good in my body. But here's the truth.
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We can do our best to try to explain, but there are going to
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be times when you you just can't You can't explain, you can't
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explain why you feel the way that you feel. And there have
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been times I'm going to give you a couple of personal examples.
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There have been times in my life when I just knew that I had to
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do a thing, and I knew it was going to be misunderstood. I
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knew the other person wasn't going to be happy. I knew the
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other person was probably going to be upset. And so there were
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these two collaborations that were possibilities. And the
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first one, it goes way back. I'm talking like 2003
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a wicked 23 years ago, when I was first thinking about opening
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up a yoga studio, and I was friendly with this woman, and we
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were talking about doing it together, and we were looking at
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spaces, and we were going back and forth, and I finally found
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this space, and I realized, like, just something in the
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deepest part of me was like, you Need to do this on your own,
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like this is your thing to do, and to figure out on your own.
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And and so I found the space, and then I had to communicate
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with this person that, and it was fine. They went on to open
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up their own space, and I think that was great. And over time, I
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think I can't speak for her, but I can tell you for myself, I
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came it became very clear to me that our styles and our
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approaches to things were really different. So thank God, thank
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goodness, right, that we didn't do it. We saved ourselves that
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cluster fuck. But in the beginning, it was really
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uncomfortable. And if, especially if you were a kid who
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kind of grew up in a household or a world where what you wanted
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didn't matter, right? There are a lot of things when you're a
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kid. This is the thing I always try to remind adults and parents
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sometimes, is that when you're a little kid, so much is out of
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your control. And that can be really frustrating, because
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you're told basically, when to get up, when to go to bed, when
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to brush your teeth, when to eat, what to eat, how to eat.
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People are deciding your food.
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Choices for you, like everything, your clothes, like
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whatever, right? So much when you're a little kid like you
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have no say, right? And you do feel that's why little kids,
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once in a while, will go, You're not the boss of me, because
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their own agency and their own authorship and their own
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autonomy is like rising up, right? But they're just going to
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be times when you know you don't have a lot of control about
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things. Okay? So there are going to be times when, and I'm back,
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there are going to be times when you can't explain why you feel
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the way that you feel, and you just have to do a thing. And I
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knew I was going to upset that person, and they were upset with
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me for a little bit, and I was like, but I just knew, like, I
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had to do this thing, and I'm glad I did it. It was wicked
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uncomfortable at the time, you know. And here's what I was
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going to say when you were a kid who didn't have a lot of choice,
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right? When you were when you were younger, you know, when you
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get older, like, you kind of want that autonomy and stuff
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like that. But what you also end up doing sometimes when you
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when, how do I say this? When you're a kid who grew up with,
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like, trauma, let's stop there. When you're a kid who grew up
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with, like, a lot of trauma and stuff like that, and you just
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wanted to make everybody around you happy, right? When you
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became a little bit of a people, please? Because that deep, deep,
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deep, like, subconscious fear is, if I do something they don't
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like, I'm going to be kicked out of the tribe, right? I'm going
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to be kicked out of the family. I'm going to be sent to Siberia.
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As my sewing teacher used to say, when she didn't like you, I
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was gonna, she would threaten to send you to Siberia, right? And
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that's a truly primal, like deep fear is that I am going to get
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ousted from my family, from my group, from what keeps me safe,
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or what I know, right, what's familiar, or whatever, and it
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can be really scary to stand up to us for yourself and to claim
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something and to say, this is what I want, right? When you
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weren't taught that what you wanted mattered what you needed.
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And that goes back to when you're a little kid and you feel
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out of control. People are always telling you, this is what
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you're getting. You didn't have a choice. So, you know, in order
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to feel safe, you would just kind of like, try to make
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yourself irreplaceable. You would, I always say, I would
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Cirque de Soleil myself. I would contort myself into all these
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shapes. I'll be whatever you need me to be. Just love me,
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right? And as I got older, I was like, No, like I had to start
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exercising that muscle. Was like, I have to trust my inner
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teacher. I have to trust that inner calling, that inner voice.
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Call it gut instinct, intuition, divine intelligence, loving
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intelligence, spiritual team, Holy Spirit, whatever you call
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it, that inner nudge, that inner voice, that's like, no, you've
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got to do this, and it won't be fucking comfortable. It's not
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going to be comfortable when you start making choices for
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yourself. So that was the first time. The second time is that
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there was a workshop that I was that I wanted to lead, and
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in the beginning it had been talked about possibly doing it
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with this other person. And then there was some things that
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happened. I don't want to get too much into it. There are some
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things that happened and in the in the end, I was like, I got an
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opportunity, brought to me. I didn't seek it out. Somebody
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reached out to me. They offered the gig to me, and I took it,
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and I just knew. And I lamented over this. I literally cried
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over this. And I was like talking to my sweetie about it,
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and I was just like crying, and I'm like, I just need to do
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this. And he agreed with me, he's like, You should do this.
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And I know that I upset that other person, and things were
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strained for a bit afterwards, but I just knew that I was doing
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what was right for me, and that was really, really hard to
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exercise that muscle when you were a person who was always
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thinking about other people first, partly Yes, because
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you're a nice person, but partly out of survival instincts,
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right? It wasn't always because, like, Oh, I'm just such a nice
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person. Like, part of it was like, desperation, right? And so
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that was really, really hard for me, because the hottest part not
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only was having other people be upset with you or whatever that
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you were, that they were like angry or felt hurt or whatever,
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because I hate hurting people, but my inner critic voice. You
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know that inner critic voice can be really loud, and it's like,
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you know you are so selfish, they're going to be mad. They
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will like you. They're not going to understand. And then you try
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to over explain, and they're still not getting it, and the
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whole thing just gets mucky and messy and sticky and icky, and
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the whole thing was just so not soothing. But here's what I've
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come to accept as a grown ass adult, right in 2026
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you just by the nature of being human, you cannot please
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everybody all the time. You can't make everybody happy, and
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you will let people down. You will disappoint people.
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Sometimes you'll even disappoint animals, right? This is the
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nature of being human, is that there are going to be times when
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we need to do something and say.
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Sometimes we can explain ourselves, but other times we
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can't explain ourselves. We don't know. It's just like, I
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just have this feeling that I need to do this thing. I can
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tell you story after story after story, right? But I think about
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like, let like, let me give you an example of how like, you
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can't explain yourself to everybody. You know, when little
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kids are sick and you have to give them a medicine, and the
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medicine tastes like shit, and they don't want to take it and
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they're crying. Or you take your kid to go get a shot, right? Or
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something like, whatever it is, or they have to go get stitches.
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Who knows what it is, right? Little little kids, little
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babies, or whatever like, they don't understand why you need to
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give it to them, really. They don't understand that what
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you're doing is is good for them, and it's awful. I can only
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imagine, as a parent, you know, watching your baby cry because
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they're getting a shot or they're getting some sort of
15:47
procedure or whatever, and they're just like, why? Like
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taking them to the dentist or whatever the thing is. And when
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you think about dogs, when dogs get neutered or spayed, it's,
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it's good for them, it's the best thing for them, right?
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Like, you have to do it. You know, it's how we keep the
16:03
populations down in the shelter so animals aren't getting
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euthanized. It's good for their health, it's good for
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aggression, it's good for mocking, it's good for, like so
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many things, right? And but they have to wear that cone of shame,
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or they have to wear the little bodysuit, so they have to wear
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the little donuts, and they don't like it, and you can't
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explain to them, because they don't always understand, right?
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You can't say to them, Look, I'm doing this because I love you.
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It's what's best for you, right? Like, sometimes you just can't
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explain it, and it happens with adults, too, sometimes, and the
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you know, I had a situation recently. I'm not going to go
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too much into it, except to say that there was a really big
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misunderstanding with somebody that I was communicating with,
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and they got really upset. They got really angry, like, yelling
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angry, and they had misinterpreted something that I
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was doing with my face and a sound that I made, that's all
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I'm going to say about it. And they were yelling at me, and
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they I let them, like, get their feelings out and say how they
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wanted to feel. And at some point, because we don't know
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each other that well. We had recently met, and just at some
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point, I just said
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they're like, You did X, Y and Z. And I said, Yeah, I did do
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those things, but that's not how I meant it. That's a
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misinterpretation, right? So here's my greatest fear. Here's
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my greatest fear happening in real time. It's not my greatest
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fear. Here's one of my big fears, that I am being
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misunderstood, and I'm being misunderstood in a way that
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doesn't reflect who I truly am, which is unsoothing on multiple
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levels. But you know, it was frustrating and I also got
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angry. But what happens when I get angry and frustrated is I
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cry so it looks like I'm sad, which on one level, I am,
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because I could clearly see that this was a breach of like this
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is a big miscue, miscommunication and
17:50
misunderstanding.
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But I was also frustrated because I was being seen in a
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light that wasn't true. But we both felt that way, right? In
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fairness, we both felt that way, and what I finally said to this
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other person was, you don't know me well enough yet to know that.
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That's not what I was doing, that that's not what I meant. I
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said, You don't know me well enough yet. And I said, if you
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knew me, you wouldn't think that about me.
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If you really knew me, you wouldn't think that about me,
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and this is just something that I'm like, oh yeah, this, this.
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This is something that I can, that I can, I can see how things
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go really wrong when we're trying to communicate. And
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sometimes we just have to say, like, Look, you don't know me
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well enough to make that assumption about me, because
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here's the truth, and I'm not saying this next piece about
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that person. I'm just talking about humans in general. Now,
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some people are going to insist on misunderstanding you. Some
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people are going to insist on being offended, and some people
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and this is why I believe because some people need to keep
18:59
the story they've written about you true in their own head. They
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need to keep it alive. They need to keep it true in their head so
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that they can keep making excuses, so they can keep making
19:11
you the bad guy, so that they don't have to take
19:14
responsibility, so they don't have to own their part of
19:17
things, and they don't have to look at themselves. And that's
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just facts. Some people want to put you in a little box and see
19:24
you in a very particular way, and they are not open to
19:27
software updates. They're not open to new information. They're
19:30
not interested in different perspectives, putting themselves
19:33
in your shoes, or looking at things from a different point of
19:36
view. They're just not into it. And how they think of you is not
19:40
open to change. They're just not willing to do it. And this is
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what I would say to you, don't waste your time trying to
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convince them otherwise. You can tell them, just judge me.
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Like this little frog. Explaining myself is too much
19:53
work. Just Judge me. There's certain people that it is not
19:57
worth your time. Don't waste your time.
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Because, here's the thing, tell them just judge me, because
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they're going to anyways. This is what the ego mind does. The
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ego mind judges all day long, right? We look at people outside
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immediately a thought comes in your head. You're making a
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comment about their glasses or their clothes or their whatever,
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or how they're talking or what they're doing or why they doing
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it that way, right? The ego mind loves to separate. It loves to
20:25
make us special, either by making us superior or shittier.
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It loves to play that comparison game, right? All this judgment,
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right? There's a difference between judgment and
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discernment. There's a difference between judgment and
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observation. There's a difference between judgment and
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then just kind of making your report about what you're seeing,
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but people are going to judge us, or just let them do it. And
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all you can do, I'm going to wrap this up now. All you can do
20:50
is to do your best to be clear in your communications.
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Remember, message sent is almost never the Message received. But
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all you can do is do your best to be clear in your
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communications, be kind in your delivery. If there's one thing I
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would say to people, and I had to say it to myself 1000 times
21:09
over the years, is you got to watch your fucking tone of
21:12
voice. You got to watch what it's like right when you're
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talking, when you're saying things, and try to put yourself
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on the receiving end of your own message, your own words and your
21:23
own tone, right? Oh yeah. Like, once in a while you have to go
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like, Oh yeah, I could. I can see how you would have perceived
21:29
it that way, right? What was my face doing? What was my tone of
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voice doing? This is how misunderstanding happens, and if
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people don't know you, a lot of times, they're going to assume
21:39
the worst. Okay, so be clear in your delivery. Try to be kind.
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Watch a tone of voice and the rest is kind of out of your
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hands. Sometimes, though, it is worth explaining yourself when
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there's a genuine misunderstanding like I recently
21:54
had, right? And you care about the person, or you care about
21:57
the relationship, and you want to repair it, and you want it to
22:00
be, you know, to feel good, and you want there to be like, you
22:04
know, you you like you care enough to make the friendship or
22:07
the relationship work. It's important that you take a little
22:10
bit of time, but you also have to use discernment, because the
22:13
rest of the time you just got to let go of it. You get it's out
22:17
of your control, and you got to say, to say, let them judge me.
22:20
Right? They're going to judge me anyways. Just Judge me. I don't
22:24
have the time and the energy. And what I was saying about
22:27
social media earlier, I don't know if I finished. My point is
22:30
that, you know, there was never like long form content is why I
22:34
love is because I can be clear and there's enough room so to
22:38
not for there to be nuance. A lot of times on social media,
22:43
they're trying to force you to communicate in these little
22:45
quips and these little snippets and these little catchy things,
22:48
because, for whatever reason, people can't read longer than
22:51
two sentences, right? I am not a TLDR person. Too long, don't
22:55
read. I'm a reader. You know, who reads things? Readers do,
22:58
people who love words, people who love books, etc, right? So
23:02
we're often being forced into these little containers, and we
23:07
can't be. How do I say it? It's really this is the best way to
23:11
say it, where it's really easy to be misunderstood online,
23:14
because there's not enough characters that are not enough
23:17
room in a post to hit all the different ways. And that's why I
23:21
always say on the podcast, hey, I reserve the right to change my
23:24
mind. I reserve the right to be smarter next time. I reserve the
23:27
right to have learned something on 357 episode than I did on
23:32
episode 62 I might become a little smarter, a little better,
23:35
a little kinda, you know what I mean. So that's my thing to you
23:40
guys. You can't explain everything to everybody. You
23:43
can't explain yourself to everybody. Some people are going
23:46
to insist on misunderstanding you, because that's how they
23:48
want to look at you, and that's how they want to see you when it
23:51
matters. Take the time to do it. But other than that, just tell
23:55
them, just judge me, right you guys. I hope you have a
23:58
fantastic rest of your day, wherever, whatever time you're
24:01
listening to this. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you
24:03
for helping me to celebrate seven years of the Karen Kenney
24:06
show. I super duper appreciate it wherever you go out in the
24:09
world. Please leave the animals, the people, the places yourself,
24:13
the planet better than how you first found it. Wherever you go,
24:17
may you and your energy and your love and your presence and your
24:21
communication be a blessing. Bye. Hey, thanks so much for
24:27
listening to the show. I really love spending some time
24:30
together. Now, if you dig the show or know someone that could
24:33
benefit from this episode, please share it with them and
24:37
help me to spread the good word and the love. And if you want to
24:40
be in the know about all of my upcoming shenanigans, head on
24:44
over to Karen kenney.com/sign,
24:47
up and join my list. It'll be wicked fun to stay in touch.
24:52
Bye. You.