Speaking and Communicating Podcast

00:00

Speaker 1
... the person being late. Why does one person, you know, nothing, and the other person is enraged? These people have different life experiences. They react to this moment differently. The person reacting to this has a trigger and a sensitivity to being mistreated, to not being respected, to not being regarded, to not being valued. The person's just late, and so you get this intense reaction, and so that's why one person, no big deal, and another person, big deal.
00:24

Speaker 2
(instrumental music plays) Welcome back to the Speaking and Communicating podcast. I am your host, Roberta Ndlela. If you are looking to improve your communication skills, both professionally and personally, this is the podcast you should be tuning into. Communication and soft skills are crucial for your career growth and leadership development. By the end of this episode, please log on to Apple and Spotify, and leave us a rating and a review. Now let's get communicating. Now let's get communicating with our guest today. Joining us from Canada, Dr. Tony Iezzi is a clinical psychologist, and he's been practicing for over 35 years. He's the co-author of the book, Reenactments, and he's here to help us break trauma-driven patterns. And before I go any further, please help me welcome him to the show. Hi, Tony.
01:22

Speaker 1
Hello. Thank you for having me.
01:25

Speaker 2
Welcome. My pleasure. Thank you for being on the show. When you were growing up, did you think this is the one career you wanted to pursue?
01:34

Speaker 1
Uh, pretty close to it. I sort of made a decision at 16. Psychology was interesting and I pursued it. Th- I started thinking I was going to be a- an athlete, play football, soccer, and I injured myself. I had pain, and I decided to study pain, and so the psychology of pain is what started me on this path, how they cope, and how they manage, and what does it take to persevere in the face of overwhelming physical and psychological pain.
02:02

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
02:02

Speaker 1
Yeah.
02:03

Speaker 2
Because I think that is usually how they train athletes, right? To persevere, to, in the midst of all the obstacles, go for the win, go for the goal.
02:13

Speaker 1
That stiff upper lip, you know, and this, this mind over pain kind of thing, is what, what I was really interested in. And then eventually, it went from that to people suffering from pain conditions, and helping them try to cope and deal with pain. It's kind of like the pain of life, (laughs) what people deal with, and this, this idea of reenactments was all the way throughout. It gradually grew, and something got recognized, and something started to get targeted in treatment, and started to help people, and noticed, you know, that this was helpful. And it was kind of a different way of thinking about things. I found it to be very, uh, powerful and compelling.
02:51

Speaker 2
So for our benefit, please explain to us what exactly do you mean by reenactments?
02:56

Speaker 1
In the clinical context, in the trauma context, you, um, get in an accident in November, in the middle of a blizzard, head-on collision, someone gets hurt. Then what happens is, every November, all this comes back, you know? Every time it snows, you know, the snow triggers all the memory of ... Every time you see an ambulance, you think of this moment. So that trauma's a reenactment of an event that occurred. What became more clear is, we used to treat people very early on for trauma. We would treat the trauma, everything would go well, they would get over the trauma, and they would leave, and be happy customers. Then two or three years later, they would come back, and they'd say, "I, I don't ... I had an incident. I bumped into someone at the mall. And for some reason, my PTSD, my posttraumatic stress disorder, got lit up because of this encounter." This doesn't look anything like the trauma of the car accident, but this moment of h- bumping into someone has reenactment themes.
04:00

Speaker 1
And so you have a moment, a moment has a theme to it, okay?
04:05

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
04:05

Speaker 1
It has more than one, actually. And the idea is to identify the themes in this moment, because if you can identify the themes, then you can-
04:13

Speaker 2
Right.
04:13

Speaker 1
... target the treatment. You could target, you know, an approach to managing it better. So, back to the accident. Y- you get hit, you hurt. We focus on pain. But what about the themes of becoming dependent? What about the theme of having no control? What about the theme of feeling worthless, feeling like a burden? What about the theme of shame or embarrassment? These are all things that could happen, but these are not the things that people think of-
04:41

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
04:41

Speaker 1
... that that's what's going on, and we don't recognize that when we look at these people in these moments. And so we started to ... So this moment of the person bumping into someone at the mall, it became clear that the theme of that moment included this accidental bumping, you know, like in a car accident. It included feeling unworthy, feeling pushed or intimidated. And so, you could tie then a reaction to a nothing situation. In other words, bumping into someone at the mall normally would be a 10 or a 20 out of 100 in terms of anxiety. But if you have some traumas in your life, or you have other experiences where you've been exposed to these themes, then you're, become sensitized, and now your reaction to this nothing moment can be a 70 or an 80.
05:32

Speaker 1
So it looks like a problem-
05:33

Speaker 2
'Cause it triggers that previous one.
05:34

Speaker 1
That's right, triggers.
05:36

Speaker 2
To come back again.
05:36

Speaker 1
But we're looking at different triggers. We're looking at thematic triggers, as opposed to incident triggers. And so in terms of communication, in the business world or in the world altogether, we all have reenactments. All of us. Every day, we have them. We just don't know. We don't pay attention. We're not aware. We're not tuning into it. Again, stiff upper lip. You know, we go on automatic-
05:59

Speaker 2
Right.
05:59

Speaker 1
... and we engage in our habits. We do what we always do.
06:04

Speaker 2
We're on autopilot.
06:04

Speaker 1
... um, if we take autopilot. Let's say the example of somebody late for a meeting.
06:08

Speaker 2
Okay.
06:09

Speaker 1
Some people fluff that off. Doesn't mean anything. No big deal. Some other people get really enraged at the person being late. Why? Why does one person, you know, nothing, and the other person is enraged? That's because these people have different life experiences, and they react to this moment differently. The person reacting to this has a trigger and a sensitivity to being mistreated, to not being respected, to not being regarded, to not being valued. The person's just late, but they are reacting out of these things, and so you get this intense reaction. And again, this is over a lifetime. You have experiences that exposes you to this and makes you sensitive. So, that's why one person, no big deal, and another person, big deal.
06:56

Speaker 1
So, these themes, we need to become more aware of them in ourselves, and really, if you want to get sophisticated about this, you can become more aware of themes in other people, and then that can help you to manage them a little differently, a little more effectively. Instead of having a conversation about why you're late for work, we can have a conversation about, "You know, when you do this to me, I feel really like you're just sort of blowing me off, you know? And it, it's insulting." And then the person has a chance to say, "No, I didn't intend that at all. I- it just happened that this, that, or the other." But it was addressed, and it targeted the specific issue that the person had. Okay? So, we go from major traumas to everyday experiences, but the triggers are similar, and they're shaped by life experiences. That person has had messaging before in the past that said they were stupid, and they develop a sensitivity, and then they react to it.
07:53

Speaker 1
And when they react, it's brain, you know, body, and behavior. That's the reenactment.
08:00

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
08:00

Speaker 1
It's a habit of reacting to certain situations and to triggers.
08:04

Speaker 2
Because there are just-
08:05

Speaker 1
Yeah.
08:05

Speaker 2
... so many similarities. And that's why usually when you go to a psychologist, they always go back to your childhood, because there's something in your childhood that created that theme. And so as you grow older, when the similarities sometimes happen, you go, "Well, I'm feeling disrespected. Why are you wasting my time?"
08:24

Speaker 1
But they don't, but they don't make the connection. They don't make the connection.
08:27

Speaker 2
Is it?
08:27

Speaker 1
So, they see it as 10 separate events when they're 10 connected events-
08:32

Speaker 2
Hmm.
08:33

Speaker 1
... that shape them, you know? So, it's true that it usually starts early. It usually starts with messaging in the environments we grew up in. And you should know, even well-intended comments can have negative effects. So, for example, parents will say to their kids, "You work hard. All right? You be the best you can be. Outwork everybody." Those, that's good messaging, but that can create someone ... And we've seen this on campus. A kid gets a B-minus on an exam, and he's suicidal because he did not perform well, you know? And so he was shaped, this person was shaped into, "Oh, my God, the end of the world, the consequences. What will people think of me 'cause I got a bad grade?" So, even good messaging, like be perfect, lots of us are sort of hit with, "Be perfect." But be perfect is a bad message because nobody's perfect.
09:24

Speaker 1
(laughs)
09:25

Speaker 2
Nobody is, yeah.
09:25

Speaker 1
Nobody is.
09:27

Speaker 2
Yes. And speaking of parents, I think it's the toughest job in the world, because one, you will have two children, you raise them with the same messaging, but they come out differently. And like you said, you give them all the messaging. "You're special. We love you despite what happens, despite what you do," but still, they come out differently. So, is that how they decode the messaging from the parents internally that makes them come out differently despite being raised by the same-
09:56

Speaker 1
It's good.
09:56

Speaker 2
... parents.
09:56

Speaker 1
That's well thought. You have to remember those two parents, they have their own histories. And to some extent, our problems as adults, in part, is a reflection of the problems our parents had-
10:10

Speaker 2
Hmm.
10:11

Speaker 1
... in terms of their lives, and then they bring to us and raise us with their messaging. So, you have parents who might not be so nice. Well, the reason they're not so nice is 'cause they didn't come from a nice environment. Then they treat their kids not so nice, you know, and then not being treated so nice affects kids as they grow up. It shapes them, and then they go on to have, you know, these issues as adults. So, it is a hard job without a doubt. But to a large extent, why it's hard is because those adults themselves are screwed up by their own experiences that they had and have affected them. None of us have a choice in the parents we have, right?
10:49

Speaker 2
Right.
10:50

Speaker 1
You know? So, whatever the consequences are, they are. Later on as adults, we could change that. We could react differently. We could be different. An abusive dad might make one kid react in a way where they go, "No, I'll never be an abusive person to someone else." They go in the opposite direction. But the other kid will repeat pretty much-
11:10

Speaker 2
Cycle, yeah.
11:11

Speaker 1
... the s- same cycle. Those are the consequences that they're gonna have to live as they go down. So, it's very important to understand when you're trying to figure out these themes in the present, what they are and how they go back into the past. So, when you can go, "That, has being late made me feel shame and humiliation. There was this time when I was ashamed and humiliated about something, and then there was that experience at 15, and then my parents when I was growing up, you know, they're always telling me, 'Don't be so lazy. Do, you know, go do something,' and s- and all this sort of information," then you have a, a pathway that shapes. And what happens is when you understand why, you go, "Oh, okay. Let me handle this shame and humiliation. Let me direct.
11:53

Speaker 1
Let me do something in the present that's different-"
11:56

Speaker 2
Hmm.
11:57

Speaker 1
"... than what we did in the past, and create new habits of how to deal with things." If your reaction to shame and humiliation is to overeat-... or drink, as a way to cope-
12:07

Speaker 2
To numb the shame and humiliation.
12:10

Speaker 1
To... That's right. To numb that, if that becomes your pattern, what would be breaking that cycle? What would you do differently? You wouldn't eat, or you wouldn't drink. You would maybe have a conversation and have... sort out what the problem is, instead of just sitting with it and drinking i- and escaping and avoiding, feeling bad ultimately, and doing bad. By becoming aware, you can create these new habits and take better care of yourself, give yourself a different message than the message you got growing up.
12:39

Speaker 2
Let's go back to the pathway that you just explained, that you realize that you're feeling disrespected, and then you go back, "This is the time I remember feeling this way." When you do that... So does that mean, you know how we get advised on watch your thoughts or be aware of your thoughts?
12:58

Speaker 1
Yes, yes, yes. Bravo. Yes. That's exactly it. It starts that way.
13:02

Speaker 2
Because we'd really like to do that, but it's not as easy as it sounds. So is there a way that you can help us in order to-
13:09

Speaker 1
Well-
13:09

Speaker 2
... do these on our own?
13:11

Speaker 1
That's... Yeah, right. So if the reaction to shame and humiliation is to overeat, they go and they see the doctors and they tell others, you know, "The problem is overeat." The problem is not that they overeat. Overeating is a symptom of problems, and you have to figure out what the problems are. Is the problem, you know, a marriage that really is not good? Is the problem an employer who's just mean and abusive? Is the problem something else? And so, what are we gonna treat? The overeating? So now, with all the, the GLP1, it's a shortcut. They take it, but they're not dealing with the problem of why they eat.
13:48

Speaker 2
The root cause, yeah.
13:50

Speaker 1
The root cause. Exactly. Most of those people, at five, they were called fat, most of them. They were mistreated. They were treated a certain way. Right now, I work in a bariatric surgical unit, so all the patients I see are patients who are gonna have surgery for their weight.
14:09

Speaker 2
Hmm.
14:09

Speaker 1
Okay? So, so in terms of when you look at their histories, it's not good. A lot of them have traumas and a lot of them have been mistreated, and they go on to become adults who become mistreated. The word is polyvictimization. Childhood polyvictimization, in other words, being victimized by a range of things, leads to adult victimization. So when you look at choices in partners, if you got used to seeing parents who fight with each other, you know, and a man who, who physically accosts his partner, you grow up and you do this, you know, this is what you know, what are you gonna do when you're with your partner? You're gonna end up in... If you're a guy, you're gonna repeat the aggressiveness. If you're a woman, on the average, you're gonna put up with the mistreatment. All these events in childhood tend to be reproduced in adulthood as well. So this has huge, huge implications.
15:07

Speaker 1
And most of the problems we have in trying to deal with all this, Roberta, is, is we're not dealing with the problems. We think we're dealing with the problems, but we're dealing with the symptoms.
15:17

Speaker 2
Symptoms. Hmm.
15:18

Speaker 1
So here's a medical aversion. If I had a tumor right here-
15:22

Speaker 2
Right.
15:22

Speaker 1
... on my arm, okay? And we cut the tumor along the edge of my arm-
15:28

Speaker 2
Hmm.
15:28

Speaker 1
... all right? It's cancer. Am I good?
15:30

Speaker 2
Where's the tumor growing from?
15:33

Speaker 1
Ah. Okay. So if we do what I just said-
15:37

Speaker 2
Yeah.
15:37

Speaker 1
... we haven't taken to the roo- we haven't taken care of the roots.
15:39

Speaker 2
So it's gonna grow back at some point.
15:42

Speaker 1
So we're gonna have a problem. This is the same. This is a psychological version.
15:46

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
15:46

Speaker 1
We're gonna treat eating, but we're not treating the actual source of the problem. If they're overweight because they were sexually abused as a kid, how is targeting their eating behavior going to change this problem? And the other thing you should know is, we're talking a lot about trauma or bad moments-
16:05

Speaker 2
Right.
16:05

Speaker 1
... but Roberta, you don't have to be traumatized, okay? You can grow up in a family where there was no trauma-
16:12

Speaker 2
Hmm.
16:12

Speaker 1
... you are still gonna have reenactments. You're still gonna have sensitivities. You're still going to be affected in a certain way. Maybe not as bad, maybe not as sensitive to someone who's had traumas-
16:23

Speaker 2
Right.
16:23

Speaker 1
... 'cause basically, the rule is, the more traumas a person's had, the more problems they're gonna have. That's just a fact.
16:30

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
16:31

Speaker 1
Yeah.
16:31

Speaker 2
Especially parents do the best they can. They have kids without a manual, so they just do whatever (laughs) they can the best that they know how. But here's the thing as well when it comes to the reenactments and the stories we tell ourselves.
16:49

Speaker 1
Stories. That's right.
16:50

Speaker 2
Yes. Because it's not necessarily true. I interpreted something when I was growing up that my parents said. If I were to ask them now at 50 and go, "Mom and Dad, did you mean it to..." (laughs) You'll find out it's no.
17:04

Speaker 1
That's right.
17:05

Speaker 2
But why-
17:05

Speaker 1
That's right.
17:05

Speaker 2
... did I tell myself that when I was a kid?
17:08

Speaker 1
Where did that come from? And they're like, clueless. No. Kids don't really get these ideas by themselves. It comes from somewhere. A person becomes an adult, and they think they're not smart. Where does that come from? That had to have been somewhere along the way, some messaging that led to that.
17:24

Speaker 2
Bullies. Some teachers.
17:25

Speaker 1
Yeah. Exactly. That's right. Yes. All of those. Peers. Not smart. Not attractive. Not worthy. Not good enough. These are all the messages that some parents convey without even realizing that that's what they're doing. So it has a profound effect. And I think in the business world-
17:44

Speaker 2
Hmm.
17:44

Speaker 1
... you'll see a lot of people try to overcome these paths and compensate and be assertive and be directive and be, you know, problem-solving and put on airs, but it's a cover. Underneath, there's a fragility. It's not that difficult to sort of scratch at it and notice that fragility.
18:05

Speaker 2
And speaking of the workplace, can you imagine all the different levels of trauma that you've just described? You have this one bubble where everybody comes together, bringing their traumas (laughs) and having to communicate-
18:19

Speaker 1
No, it's true.
18:19

Speaker 2
... with each other.
18:19

Speaker 1
You're right.You're right. You're right.
18:21

Speaker 2
Yeah.
18:22

Speaker 1
So, what I see is, um, a selective sample from the big picture. But I can tell you though, as I said, even good families, for example, in the book, uh, of a family of accountants, and their daughter supposed to be an accountant at the firm, and it turns out that, uh, no, she wants to be an artist (laughs) . And so, pursues-
18:42

Speaker 2
Some parents' nightmare (laughs) .
18:44

Speaker 1
... a f- exactly, exactly. Some parents' nightmare. "Why are you doing that? What are you going to pay the bills with?"
18:50

Speaker 2
You're going to pay the bills. They're going to depend on us for the rest of your life.
18:54

Speaker 1
This is, this is, "Come and work for us. Come and work for..." "No, I want to be a painter." They don't go to her shows. They... So even what appears to be reasonably functional families have expectations, have hopes, have... It's the nature of the children and the adults to never really be quite in sync. We become our own people and we choose, and then we sort of, um, have to deal with that. Just feel... Just because there's no trauma, don't think everything's cool. It's still we are affected by all that early messaging and we develop those old habits, we cope with them in a certain way. So for example, in the business section, what about the managers who are working 80 hours a week? Why are they working 80 hours a week?
19:39

Speaker 1
You could say, "Well, the job demands it."
19:41

Speaker 2
Yeah, I was about to say. Yeah.
19:42

Speaker 1
Or they're busy, or they're busy trying to prove they're tough, you know. They're busy trying to prove, you know, that they can handle this. It's like an ego thing. And so, they might be spurred, not necessarily by wanting to excel, but they're spurred on by the messages they got about having to prove themselves to the world, and so engage in behavior that's not healthy. Most of us agree, it's not good to work (laughs) 60, 70, 80 hours a week.
20:07

Speaker 2
It is unhealthy, that's right, yeah.
20:10

Speaker 1
It's unhealthy. It's not a balance, it's not a balance. But we still get that messaging, right?
20:13

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm. And we call it-
20:14

Speaker 1
We know this, but-
20:15

Speaker 2
... the pits if somebody works that hard-
20:17

Speaker 1
Ah, exactly.
20:18

Speaker 2
... and the perks that come with it.
20:19

Speaker 1
There you go, there, there you go.
20:21

Speaker 2
(laughs)
20:21

Speaker 1
There you go. So then how far do you go?
20:23

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
20:23

Speaker 1
And in the case I just gave you, if the painter is a child of accountants with a home firm, there's... Now it's just the pressure. That's... Pressure is felt by everyone in a variety of ways regardless of backgrounds.
20:37

Speaker 2
Yes. I've heard of those stories where they have this whole corporation and hope the kids take over when the parents retire, and the next thing, the son goes, "I wanna make cake. I wanna be a baker." (laughs)
20:49

Speaker 1
As a coach, you're just sort of trying to talk to people, you know. What do you do with the moments where they describe peers or coworkers and they think their coworkers are behaving out of a certain way, but really it might be some other way and they're not making the right read? What do you tell them? How do you help them navigate those circumstances? Is that employer hitting on me? Is that employer just being nice? Is that employer trying to manipulate me? How do you help people make a read in everyday life at work?
21:22

Speaker 2
That's very tricky. That's definitely tricky.
21:26

Speaker 1
So what we're talking about here is, is what happens in the world, and so I see it clinically, you see it in the business world, you know, and other people see it in other circumstances. But this is the nature. Wherever you have human beings-
21:40

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
21:41

Speaker 1
... you have programming, you have programming. They've all been shaped.
21:45

Speaker 2
Yep.
21:46

Speaker 1
And it affects their behavior and it has consequences. What I haven't mentioned is, there are major physical psychological consequences of this programming; keep working, be successful. 20, 30 years of being successful gets you what? A drinking problem? Substance abuse? Medical problems? A heart attack? People smoke, people do whatever they... There are consequence and all those things look like they're the problems, but they're all the symptoms of programming and symptoms of messaging, and, and performing according to the messaging and thinking that's what they're supposed to do, not knowing they have another choice. And as a coach, I would imagine that's what you would be trying to teach them, is, don't react this way in this moment, but react in this other way which is more adaptive, and is more direct, and actually might lead to a resolution of whatever the real problem is.
22:40

Speaker 2
Right.
22:41

Speaker 1
Again, messaging. You know, men who do this, cool, strong. Women who do this, ugh, just nasty, mean. You know, but it's the same behavior.
22:49

Speaker 2
Hmm. So the distinction-
22:51

Speaker 1
So, so this is-
22:51

Speaker 2
... is between you realizing that they have a problem and it's not me, but also-
22:57

Speaker 1
Right.
22:58

Speaker 2
... you don't want to have an extreme case where every time something happens, I always think, "Oh, they are the problem, I'm not the problem." (laughs)
23:04

Speaker 1
You're right, you're right.
23:04

Speaker 2
Being able to evaluate each-
23:05

Speaker 1
You're right. You're right.
23:06

Speaker 2
... situation on merit.
23:07

Speaker 1
But, but regardless, you first start with looking at yourself. Is it me? And so... Then you go, okay, is it them? Then you do an analysis. If it's you, and you go, "Just, he reminds me so much of my dad. He's such a bully, you know, and I just freeze. I c- I'm not good at handling it. I can't say what I think." Well, then that is you, you know, and you have to work on yourself to correct that moment.
23:32

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
23:32

Speaker 1
And so instead of just being shy, quiet and mild, you go, "Excuse me, we had this meeting this morning and I thought I would want to talk to you about what happened, and when you said this, I felt this. Is this what you meant?" And what that does is, in power ba- imbalance, it evens it out now because this person is addressing in that moment. I don't know-
23:53

Speaker 2
Can I ask you this 'cause this is the second time you said, you know, approach the situation and, and create a conversation?
23:59

Speaker 1
Yes.
24:00

Speaker 2
Have you realized that sometimes if you feel disrespected or e- whatever trigger, that person's lateness or what they said, what it brings out of you, that's when your chest sort o- it swells up and you get angry and you can literally feel your body shaking (laughs) ? How do you have the-
24:18

Speaker 1
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
24:19

Speaker 2
... the wherewithal to actually have a conversation that's reasonable? Because now you're just gonna come out screaming. (laughs) Have you felt that when you-
24:27

Speaker 1
No, that's a good question.
24:28

Speaker 2
... "Oh, Tony is disrespecting me." 'Cause it-
24:30

Speaker 1
The thing about re-enactments, if you miss dealing with the moment, don't worry, there's another moment coming. It's gonna happen again-What you try to do first is recognize, are you in a reenactment? That's the first thing. Is he dissing me, disrespecting me? And if you feel all funny, you know something's wrong. You're in the reenactment. Okay.
24:51

Speaker 2
Hmm.
24:51

Speaker 1
So the second thing you're trying to do then is, what can I do to calm myself down in this moment or after the moment passes? So I might have to go think about it. I might have to go for a walk. You know, I might journal and write about it, talk to s- a partner and exchange and process. And then you go, "Okay." And then the third step is, okay, in that moment, what were the reenactments?
25:13

Speaker 2
Hmm.
25:13

Speaker 1
Oh, he disrespected me. He tried to use power over me. He minimized. He made me feel stupid. These are all the themes. Okay. You know, you pick the one or the two that's most prominent, then you identify a plan. And in that plan, do anything, anything, so long as it's different from how you would l- usually do it. If you usually, when bullied, you just go soft and quiet, then the opposite would be indicated. Find your voice. And honestly, that's the most common thing is you have a- the world that tends to swallow and avoid, or find your voice and approach and deal with it. So in general, as a rule, avoid is bad, approach is good. Even if it doesn't quite work out, an approach, dealing with it, you stepped up, you stood up for yourself.
26:09

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
26:09

Speaker 1
Even if you don't change the other person, you're sticking up for yourself. You know, you're saving face.
26:13

Speaker 2
Hmm.
26:14

Speaker 1
If you don't do this, you're going to go, walk away, and you're gonna sit in your bedroom and go, "God, I can't believe how stupid I was today. I really let him mistreat me. What's wrong with me?" You know, like, you start to spin all this programming, and it goes to a bad place. So then you have a plan. I'm gonna go and talk to him. That's right. I'm gonna go talk to him, and I'm gonna say this, this, this, and this. Sometimes we tell people, write it down.
26:37

Speaker 1
(laughs)
26:37

Speaker 2
Yeah.
26:37

Speaker 1
Take your cue cards, look at your cards. Whatever you need to do, do it. Today, I asked someone to consider just putting an elastic band on your wrist. And when you talk to your partner and you want to end this relationship, remember, look at your r- rubber band, and remind yourself, this is happening. This is happening. Because the guy's a nice sweet guy, but he's not the right guy. She's a nice lady-
26:59

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
26:59

Speaker 1
... and it's really hard for her to affirm herself. It's really hard to say, "I want more of a life. This is not the life I want." It seems like a silly thing, but it was just like a, a yellow sticky, you know, like anything-
27:11

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
27:11

Speaker 1
... write it on your hand, anything to cue you to, this is what I need to do. So you take your plan, put it in action, and then once it's all done, you can go back and go, "Hey, did that work?" You can evaluate, "I could have done this a little better. I could have been a bit more this way, a bit more that way." Okay.
27:29

Speaker 2
Right.
27:29

Speaker 1
The world has something for us every day when we least expect it. Periodically during the day, check in with the awareness. Like at lunch you have a break, just go and check in and be quiet with yourse- or go for a walk. Someone today said, "Oh, yeah, I practice bagpipe." Well, I said, "No, that's not checking in." (laughs) You're just distracting yourself from work do- And he's a performer in a band, in a bagpipe-
27:55

Speaker 2
Right. Yeah.
27:56

Speaker 1
... you know, playing very high level pieces.
27:56

Speaker 2
The Scottish bagpipe, yes.
27:58

Speaker 1
Yeah.
27:59

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
27:59

Speaker 1
So he's like, no, this is not fun. You know, you need to chill and sit with yourself and process, okay, I didn't do too badly in this moment. Now you start to have some momentum, you start to find your voice, you start to refine the process, you start when you coached him in terms of how to be better performing and how to talk to people, this is all that stuff. It's- it's not a package how to communicate. You know, they start to take some of that on and get better. And then all that, they have confidence.
28:27

Speaker 1
They feel more assertive-
28:28

Speaker 2
Yeah.
28:28

Speaker 1
... they feel better about themselves. All right? So they are taking care of these old programs with new programs that helps them feel better about themselves. And even when they get all good at this, once in a while they're going to have a reenactment. They're gonna get caught-
28:46

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
28:46

Speaker 1
... they're ni- they're gonna be caught off guard. None of us 24/7 are on alert.
28:50

Speaker 2
Yeah.
28:51

Speaker 1
But people who have been traumatized, they- that's how they live, on alert the whole time. There are people who live in certain circumstances, if we're talking about food poverty, if we're talking about home s- insecurity, if you live on the street, you can't be going around casually, "I got this." (laughs) It's a- a state where a per- has to be aware of what's going on or otherwise they're going to be in trouble. This alertness is exhausting. So we want to be more in control of when it's on and when it's off.
29:19

Speaker 1
So we have people in the business-
29:19

Speaker 2
Where can we find your book Reenactments? Because I think this is really powerful and it's something that I think a lot of us would like to practice, especially, you know, the pathway going back and realizing the patterns. I- that will be really helpful.
29:35

Speaker 1
Is it bad form to show you the cover?
29:37

Speaker 2
Of course. Yes.
29:38

Speaker 1
This is it.
29:39

Speaker 2
Yes. Reenactments.
29:41

Speaker 1
And there's a co-author, Melanie Duckworth, and so she's in the States. Uh, we've known each other for, like, 30 years. I learned so much from her about microaggressions. And, you know, people who live with microaggressions every day, those are all reenactments. On the surface, to the rest of the world, nothing moments. Nothing moments. But to people who live that life, those are big moments.
30:03

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
30:04

Speaker 1
Right? Most of us leave the front door and just go out the front door. Some people who go out the front door have to look left and have to look right. That's their life. They've been shaped by circumstances. So-
30:14

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
30:15

Speaker 1
... she had a lot to do with the idea of reenactments. That's why I'm bringing that up.
30:18

Speaker 2
Right.
30:18

Speaker 1
In terms of website-
30:20

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
30:20

Speaker 1
... it's Tony, T-O-N-Y-I-E, or Z-Z-I.com. Tonyezzi.com. T-O-N-Y-I-E-Z-Z-I.
30:32

Speaker 2
Tonyezzi.com.
30:34

Speaker 1
Instagram, at yezzi. You'll have everything there, and there's some blogs. There's lots of stuff. But the idea of reenactments has been recognized in general. So that's not new.
30:44

Speaker 2
Right.
30:44

Speaker 1
What might be a bit more new is this emphasis on thematic triggers, thematic triggers, and targeting the themes specifically.
30:55

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
30:55

Speaker 1
So I see people one on one, we do this, and I have right now a group of nine women, bariatric program, doing reenactments group. It's powerful.
31:04

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
31:05

Speaker 1
It's intense. It's one of the things I say in the book, if you want an easy answer, then the book's not for you.
31:11

Speaker 2
(laughs)
31:11

Speaker 1
If you're looking for three steps to joy, don't even bother. You know, if you're looking for six steps to-
31:16

Speaker 2
The quick fixes are not in the book. Yeah.
31:18

Speaker 1
There are no quick fixes. Even when some people talk about transcendence.
31:24

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
31:24

Speaker 1
What happens when they've reached transcendence the day after? Life continues.
31:29

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
31:29

Speaker 1
It never ends. There's still something else around the corner, you know, and I think this is where people get focused on the goals is to be better and all this, but really, you need to have a process that is with you, whether things are going well or not. And the process has to be, I want to exercise and take better care. I want to eat and be healthier. I want to be in partnership or in social support. You know, I want to be having a creative life. I want to have a purpose in my life.
31:58

Speaker 1
The- this is the process that helps you get through-
32:02

Speaker 2
Mm-hmm.
32:02

Speaker 1
... the thick or thin. And when you work and do better with m- reenactments, what happens is they don't happen as often, they don't happen as intensely. You recover more quickly, but once in a while you'll still get caught.
32:14

Speaker 2
So that's why be aware when you do get caught, especially. Thank you so much.
32:19

Speaker 1
Be aware. For s- Thanks.
32:20

Speaker 2

Thank you.
32:20

Speaker 1
Good to meet you.
32:21

Speaker 2
Good to meet you, too-
32:22

Speaker 1
Bye.
32:22

Speaker 2
... Tony. Thank you so much for being on our show today. Don't forget to subscribe, leave a rating and a review on Apple and Spotify, and stay tuned for more episodes to come.