Dive into cultivating a sense of safety and peace amidst the chaos of parental alienation. Shelby addresses the common feeling of instability and unpredictability faced by alienated parents, emphasizing the importance of bringing focus back to oneself. Through strategies like building emotional resilience, establishing predictability in daily routines, managing stress responses, and choosing a strong support team, Shelby offers actionable steps to help parents regain control and inner peace. This episode also encourages listeners to practice consistency and implement daily routines as a foundational approach to overcome the ongoing challenges they face. Shelby also stresses the need to evaluate and adjust the kind of media content one consumes and the importance of creating a supportive and mindful living environment.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
You are to the Beyond The High Road Podcast with Shelby Milford, episode number 130. Stay tuned.
Hey y'all, quick. I just, right before I hit publish, I just found. Another review on Apple Podcasts. So I'm gonna read it to you guys because it's lovely and I really appreciate it. So BTHR saved my life. Shelby is the best coach and truth seeker I have ever met. After working with her for a year, I have made the life changes I've always read about.
. It was hard work along the way. I'm not saying it was easy or comfortable, it was frustrating. And yet Shelby continued to support, challenge and empathetically coach me to bring out my best. I could not have done it without her. We did not focus on theory, but put all of her training, knowledge and experience into practice.
I can't say enough about how happy I am that I reached out to her for help. The best part about my journey was that she coached me from firsthand knowledge and experience, which made it all relatable, authentic, and real. She will help you in the same way and customize your program for you if and when you take that first step.
Thank Shelby. I'm forever grateful. Chris, you are so welcome. You know it has been my pleasure to work with you, Chris. I really appreciate your thoughtful Review. I know that took time to write, so I really, really appreciate that. I know that you know that. But um, yeah, it's been my pleasure to work with you and you have grown so, so, so much. Not all my clients, go in for two, six months rounds.
Some do, um, because they find the work so powerful and they wanna keep going. they know it's worth it in the long run,
the second six months. I call that the graduate program. And that's a whole different, , set of skills. And it's actually just like a deep, deep dive into, um, your belief system into some of the sticky beliefs maybe you just wanna excel at,
so it's definitely not a requirement, but some just choose it because they, they're finding the work that beneficial and know that there's room to grow. So anyway. That's that. Thank you, Chris, so much. And I will love, well, I love these reviews you guys, and I know that they're so helpful for other people, other parents like us to find us and also for them to get a feel for what the show is, what these episodes are like.
So I would really appreciate it if you would, um. If you're finding the episodes helpful, if you would also write a review. If you're an Apple user, it's pretty easy 'cause you've already got a a username to just go and scroll all the way down on the show. Hit the little hard to find purple, write a review.
If you're not an Apple user, you can still do it. You just have to do it through the web browser and you do have to create an apple id, which takes about. 30 seconds to do. It's just figuring it out. I know it's an ask, but I would so appreciate it if you, if you, um, look forward to the show each week, you know, so, okay.
I'm with the episode. I.
Hey guys, I have a actually pretty limited amount of time here, but I just got a wild hair decided I wanted to record right now. Because I do have this like 30 minute gap in, my schedule.
And I been a busy week this week, so, um, here we go. I'm just gonna go. I probably will have to do like two sit downs. I might have to finish this up tomorrow. But anyway, I felt. Inspired to do today's episode on actually I had a different something plans, but I know that this is something that, all of us as alienated parents have gone through before.
So I was inspired this morning by a consult that I had with, uh, a mom, alienated mom who, um, her story seems from what I gathered today, quite similar. definitely to my story. I'm sure a lot of you guys would probably identify with her. It just seemed, uh, the more parents that I work with, it seems that there are like four or five story types that I keep coming by, so interesting that as much as we are all so different also too, the tactics are all so routine, by the alienating parent. So the stories
also sort of develop a routine, if you will, some sort of regularity in all the chaos, you know? the alienating parent parents as unpredictable as they are, they are also so predictable the tactics and strategies that they use Anyway, she was talking about that just when she feels safe, just when she thinks that things have quieted down, something else happens, I know that I've talked with you guys about my feelings with that throughout,
Just when I thought the coast was clear, boom, something would blow up again, And take me by surprise no mercy. And that's, basically what she was sharing with me today. She said, I think her words were, They're always upping the ante. He's always upping the ante, And so that's what I wanted to talk about today is strategies or a way for you to feel at peace or creating a sense of safety for yourself amidst all of this chaos. I think it's important for you and me, parents that are going through this ongoing trauma,
just, um, sometimes predictable, sometimes not sort of bombs that sort of blow up. At us, around us, um, for us, um, how you can create that sense of safety and peace no matter what. That is what's so important because coming from what we have, we're now have been basing, you know, our, the rug, if you will, has been pulled out from under us and we're our eyes and our focus is all on the rug.
Right. I don't mean to, compare your children or, family life to simplify it down to a rug, but you know what I'm saying? when it's all pulled out from under you, the way that many of us have had it done. Um, I don't even like the way I said that because the way I just said it, , made it sound like that you have way less power than you do.
But that's what it feels like when you're going through it, right? That everything is just pulled right out from under us. And you're like, what, what do we do? And so, naturally, as humans, our focus goes straight to where's the rug? Where's the rug? What, what are they doing with the rug? You know? And so.
Because of that natural tendency to focus outward, we end up losing our own inner compass, as I've been kind of talking about most recently, right? Because we're focused on what's in their hands and how they're pulling. Then we lose our own sense of self and our own sense of power and a ability to create safety from within peace from within.
And so, , that's what I'm gonna talk about today is how to regain that for yourself. it doesn't happen overnight. not, in my experience, It's a practice that you adopt and take with you from now moving forward, probably for the rest of your life. That's my hope for you anyway.
and once you start using the tools and you daily are practicing, I don't know that you'll ever wanna put them down, you know, but it is just more of a way of life in the way that you approach every area of your life from here moving forward.
So the good news with that is, yes, it's something that you must. Adopt and implement on me every day. And it sounds like a lot, if it's something you're completely new to, but if you've been miserable for a long time because you've been dealing with an abusive partner, or you've been alienated for a long period of time, whatever it is, you've thus far have probably been feeling tossed around quite a bit.
Like you're in a. Dry cycle, And laundry. being pushed around your life, as a result of living reactively. at least that's how it was for me. I'm not saying that that's how it is for you, but most alienated parents that I, have conversations with this really usually is it as we've been living so reactively for so long that we don't know how to do it any other way, how to, um, generate like the feelings of peace on our own no matter what.
And that's really, really where it all begins is if you can have whirlwinds of things going on around you, but you're creating homeostasis peace inside you. Then you've got the key of the universe. You know? Now. Now when I said that, I'm a little bit disagreeing with myself.
Yes, that's true. Also people are so used to chaos living amongst chaos, that they, tune out. any sort of stimulus, Any sort of, friction or argument And it really just probably depends mostly on the role that you played as a kid.
But if you were used to chaos as a kid and so now you thrive under chaos That's your view of it anyway. Then don't take it like that. What I'm saying is, hopefully I'm making sense here. if you feel like now that your focus is only on your kids or only on what the alienating parent is doing, or mostly there in order for you to feel happy, then your kids need to come home or respond to you or whatever it is.
If you're basing your. success, your productivity, your happiness, your view of yourself on anything outside of you. Then what I'm getting ready to share with you hopefully should help anyway. Implementing, all of these tools, not just once. Not just twice, not just knowing the tools, understanding the concepts.
And I don't mean to like stand on my soapbox here but not just like knowing and understanding what the concepts could do for you. It's a matter of doing the practice. It makes all the difference in the world. I'm sort of a jack of all trades. Me, myself, like always been my entire life.
It's the A DHD. And so if you have some A DHD, you know what I'm talking about, right? We are very adept at a lot of things and know a lot of things and so for my whole life I really, truly thought that I knew so much more than I actually knew. You know? I knew concepts. I did a lot of reading , I did a lot of, they used to call me when Google was like more new. I, that my friends and family called me Shoogle. I loved all the information, but practicing the information that was, um, for, Any length of time, right. With any, consistency.
That was a different story. And that's really where all of what I'm talking about in every episode, that's where all the, fruits come from, the, regularity, the consistency, the day in, day out, like breathing. That's how it becomes the way that you think. , differently, the approach that you take to your life.
It does, it is, it's just, it becomes like breathing and that's when you know that you've done the implementation. Okay. Now I've just made that huge intro. I said I didn't have that much time and I just made that intro very long. So moving along.
also, I had another client this morning, just a little bit ago actually. Brand new client said something about that it's taking so much out of her, like to do the constant, steps, one after the other, like showing up when she knows she's going to get, um, rejected or talked down to or looked.
At wrongly, you know, which we all have experienced, and it sucks, right? But she's telling herself that it's taking so much out of her, in order to not have it feel taxing on you, like emotionally depleting on you, these steps will super help. But
showing up during those times when you're not getting the responses that you want can be emotionally taxing. It can feel like a lot, like too much sometimes, like what's the use, but. Not if you're placing your focus on where your, your driver is on what is internally set for you, like what your end goal is, not what your end goal for them is, but why you're doing it.
I'm doing it because I wanna show up as a, a present mom no matter what, because I've pre-decided that this is how I will do it. That I will show up for, you know, 10 baseball games. Uh.
10 baseball games a quarter or whatever it is. I don't know. That didn't really make sense, but you know what I'm saying, um, to, maybe it's that you will show up for.
90% or 85% of the baseball games this season, right? And so you're doing that because you wanna keep your word to yourself and you wanna keep, uh, presence, an active presence for your kids. That should always be the focus. Not should, but If you want to feel less taxed, then that is always your focus and not so much.
On how they respond when you're there, which is again, not an easy task. I'm not, this is what I'm asking you to do is not, at first, it's not easy, especially because there's all these secondary challenges when you get to the field, you know, and you're facing in your mind. There's, um. Maybe there's looks, maybe there's some catty women, or there's like the ex that's there and or the kids are giving you dirty looks and you're up in the stands and you don't know who to talk to.
Or weather wave when they flip you with a bird, So there's a lot of challenges to go with it. , nobody's gonna ever, I will never claim that any of this is gonna be easy, but in the long run. Showing up the way that you've preci to show up the best.
Showing up the way that you pre decided, barring that there aren't any major changes and. it's not gonna be a safety hazard for you is going to cause you to feel the best in the end. So yeah, there may be some challenges along the way, but you not going and not showing up the way that you said you would for yourself in the end is gonna cause you a lot more likely is gonna cause you a lot more grief, regret, shame, be wise for you to constantly be reminding yourself of why you're doing it. Oh, because I said I was going to, I'm building trust with myself and secondary, I could be building trust with my kids too. It can't hurt to show up say what they will now, the worst years down the line that they can say about you is that you showed up to love them.
they can make up their stories about why you showed up, but the deal is, is that you showed up, and now again, if you were the parent that's not showing up to those right now, and you have your reasons, that's okay too. What I think is most important is that you focus on what some, what you preci , coming from a mindful place, taking all things into consideration.
You've made the decision on that, yes, I will show up. No, I won't show up. I'll show up to this many during this time. Whatever it is, you decide that now and then follow through on your word to yourself. That's what's important. That's what's gonna cause you to feel proud of you and who you are as a mother or father, Okay, so I just needed to get that out of the way. Creating safety and peace is always gonna start with building emotional resilience and building trust with yourself. Because you are gonna feel not safe and not at peace, when you also have the bully inside of your own head telling you they're right, they're right.
Maybe you're not a good mom or dad, I. Maybe you're not safe or whatever it is that you're saying to yourself you're believing part of that, because you're not showing up when you said you would already, because you're letting them get the best of you or whatever you're telling yourself, you know?
Mm-hmm. So, building emotional resilience, you wanna identify and reframe negative thoughts, Replace your catastrophic thinking. With more solution-focused alternatives, So from, I can't handle this, I can't handle them rejecting me to, I'm gonna find support. I'm gonna seek support elsewhere. While I'm doing this, I'm gonna support myself. Or even it's their rejection of me, but it's doesn't say anything about me, So just reframing your, fears, what you're telling yourself that you can't handle or that you're not built for. That it's too much, too taxing. Saying, okay, is this too taxing? Is it taxing at all or is it the way that I'm looking at it?
Not the victim blame, but you know what I'm saying. Maybe there's another way that I can, another perspective I can take. Maybe if I was focusing on my side, like I was just talking about, then this wouldn't be as taxing. What's causing me, exhaustion right now is this thought that I keep doing these things and they're not working.
What if none of this is about it working Maybe this is just about me building consistency for me, doing what I said that I would do for me as a mom, right? Because I'm building trust with me. Don't make it about them Okay, so reframing your thoughts is key in building emotional resilience.
Also, like I kind of just mentioned, seeking support from your friends and family, right? And mental health professionals, coaches, um, so that you can process your emotions properly. Like hopefully that you're going to somebody, like if you are seeking support from a professional, hopefully they're able to walk you through how to process an emotion.
That's super important, okay. To be able to. For your own self, on your own time, not just in session with them. Learn how to process through your emotions and if you need help with that. I know in the earlier, very early, um, episodes like. Way back, maybe episode three, managing your emotions, three or four, whichever one that is, that teaches you I believe, how to process an emotion.
I'll link the actual episode. I'm not sure which one it is below in the show notes, I will actually put the link. Sometimes I forget, but I, I'll remember today, if you need it. Okay. So learning how to process your emotions so that you can do that on your own time, not just have to wait till you get into a session with somebody so that you can manage your stress or manage your thoughts around things that you think are stressful, on the fly, on the spot.
Um,
number two is to establish predictability. When we're in a situation where we're thinking, just when I think I'm safe, boom, the world blows up. They blow my world up. That is an awful place to live, and I know it because I lived it. You know, I was constant head on a swivel. I mean, I feel that dis-ease going on inside me.
Unease, unsettling feeling going on inside me right now, just thinking about where I was before. Constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop, always on edge. What's gonna happen next? How is he gonna try to take her away from me more than already? You know, what, email am I gonna be getting?
What cop is gonna be showing up at my door? And for what charge are they gonna be following me? I mean, you name it, what claims are they gonna be making about me? Rumors and all the things, but again, when I'm focusing on them and the rug, that's been pulled out from under me, or the way in which they're doing it, it's always gonna feel unstable.
I'm always going to feel unsure of what my next move can be, how I can create a feeling of safety and peace inside because I'm still focused out there. And when we're focused on that, we start telling ourselves stories and making up conversations and it becomes very delusional. You know, and I'm not saying that you are delusional, but that is just what happens when we're working from fear, And usually with fear or anger or some. Uh, emotions stemming from either of those emotions. Wow. Shelby, I can't talk. It's either, usually either fear or anger that we're living in when we're thinking about them and what they've done to us. Sadness, you know, and coming from there, it's very hard to create a safe world for yourself.
Damn near impossible. So you must bring the attention back to you. And I know that seems counterintuitive in the moment when you're going through. Such upheaval, especially if this is just N new or if things have just come back around and things started blowing up again in your world. It does. It seems so counterintuitive to bring the focus back to you and back in the day, if I'm being honest, bringing the focus to me felt really uncomfortable because I didn't wanna sit with me back in those days.
So I get that too, if that's what's going on with you. It's was too anxious feeling for me. If I, if I brought attention back to me, then I would actually bring attention to my emotions, and what I was trying to do was run from my emotions back then. I couldn't deal with them. I kept telling myself that I wasn't able to handle slowing down because if I slowed down, then I would start pouring out and it would never stop.
I was so scared of allowing any little emotion. To take over, quote unquote take over. Because once I did that, who knows how long it'll be before it came up for air, you know? And if you've been listening to the episodes for a little while, then you already know that. I tell you, share with you a lot that emotions are actually nothing to solve for and they will not actually take over you unless you have a story that they will, you know, that's just your survival system.
Telling you that because it doesn't wanna be uncomfortable, . Also, another thing I always talk about is you give your brain something to do and it will go to work and figuring out how to make that true for you. So if you think you're gonna go to the point of no return, well guess what?
Your brain will follow. Well, well, I guess we're going to the point of no return, then let's go folks. You know? But if you just allow like. Okay. There's a lot of sadness going on right now, or a lot of anxiety or a lot of whatever it is. Just name it and allow for it. Give it a time even, you know, if you're like doing something, okay, I'm gonna allow this anxiety.
it's just here. It's here. I can bring it along for the ride with me for the day. It's okay. And if I do cry, people cry. What's the worst that can happen? So I cry in front of somebody. Maybe it's a little embarrassing. It's still gonna be okay. Keeping it moving is really what's going to help you more than anything.
While allowing for your emotions, not pushing them out, you pushing them out is going to exhaust you like my new client this morning. She's trying to just keep going, keep going, just keep doing, doing, doing, doing. Of course, it's exhausting 'cause you're trying to, it takes so much energy for you to stave off and push down those feelings, you know, and the, the fears that you're trying to resist right away.
Mm-hmm. So. You wanna establish predictability. You wanna create consistent. I keep looking that way because somebody's coming to my door in a few minutes and I keep hearing noises. Um, you wanna create a consistent daily schedule to reduce your anxiety, okay. And promote a sense of stability for yourself.
Okay? Predictability to help can help you to regain control amidst all of this mess. You know, you following through with what you say that you're going to do from beginning to end, even when, especially when you tell yourself that those things aren't that important, like you're looking at your calendar and, and things aren't as crazy as they were yesterday, and you have a list of things that, like, things that you don't really care about,
there are things you just kind of filled your calendar in with , but something else comes up. You're like, oh, things aren't that bad. I don't need things to be stable today. So you just ignore the laundry and calling contacts for work or whatever.
You just decide it's fine. I've made enough money for the week and you put those on the back burner and ignore the things you've already committed yourself to. Doing that , the act of dismissing things in the moment is going to cause you to feel unstable. Maybe not right then, because you're gonna get instant gratification from the thing that you choose over it.
But long term and at the end of the week, trust me, probably the next day, right after you do the instant gratification thing, you're gonna kick yourself for not following through on what you said you wanted to do. Okay? So you want to create predictability. In your own world because having that, then when things do pop up, you already have a home base.
I know that this is stuff that you guys probably already know, but I think it's a really great reminder when you're in the middle of chaos and it's a great, , routine to create for yourself now, even if you're not in the middle of chaos. So that if and when chaos does. Come up again, and let's just be real folks.
Chaos is bound to come up in all of our lives Again, you've already created this stable structure for yourself of how you move throughout your world.
There's regularity, you know? Okay, so number three is to manage your stress response. Your stress response is right. Practice grounding techniques. Have them in your back pocket. You guys, I shared with you right around the holiday time, a lot of techniques that you could just pop into like a, you know, like a bowl.
Or , jar. Write a bunch of grounding techniques , on pieces of paper and just pick one out each time you walk by that little jar, and then you will have learned all those grounding techniques. In your jar, put like 15 or 20 of 'em in there. And also you're developing a daily practice for yourself.
Each time you walk by that jar, you're doing another one. This in the end, it's the compound effect of the regularity of the day in, day out. Doing these little routines, communicates to your nervous system that things are okay, that you are okay. No matter what, little things like this make all the difference.
So, um, breathing, exercises, in order to regulate nervous system. Dance parties, you guys, I cannot talk enough about them. Dance parties are amazing for to pull you out of a freeze, pull you down out of a stress response.
Okay?
I have a whole section here on like, for your children, what you should do, but I actually feel like mostly I, I think I need to. Do that, a separate episode just on that. And I kind of just recently did, um, a couple episodes addressing your children. So I'm gonna leave that section for now and skip to your support team and by support team if you're still going through it, like or you're still in the legal part, right?
Litigious section of your custody battle, if there is one that your fight for your children. make sure that you're hiring a skilled legal team. And I know coming from experience how hard it is because you sometimes we don't have the money to hire the people with clout, and so we hire somebody that's , easier on the wallet in the short run.
But in the long run, you end up paying for that many times. I'm not gonna give you advice here on , who to hire and for what, and it really just depends on like what your case is and what you're going back for, if it's just a modification or whatever. What I'm saying is just make sure that you have somebody, a legal team that has your back.
I know for me, coming from what I did, even though I would always claim to have a great judge of character when it came to other people, when it comes down to coming from chaos and trauma , and we're desperate to get our kids back, our judgment is flawed. So.
Have somebody that's close to you that can help you make this decision, have some key questions that you write down and ask your legal team and make sure they have your back. I screwed up four or five times and got screwed out of a lot of money. Thousands of thousands of dollars of money for people that didn't even show up.
Some mental health professional guy that completely.
Okay, so where there was this guy that I hired. He was a mental health professional. That's what he called himself, I knew something was telling me on the inside. I don't always believe in, intuition. I mean, I believe in intuition, but I, like I said, when you're coming from trauma, it's really difficult to differentiate what's your intuition and what's your survival system talking, you know?
And so that's why I think it's always helpful to have somebody else help you, to judge a few different people, impartial parties, to help you to determine, um. Discern, who you wanna pick to have on your team, and that could be a different team for different. Portions of your case, , this doesn't have to just pertain to any civil suit going on.
Um, this can pertain of course, to the rest of your life. But so back to what I was saying. I can picture myself driving in my car when I was talking to this quote unquote mental health professional who was. Bamboozling me into, hiring him to intervene in my case and be the go-between, from my attorney, And the reunification therapist in my case, which was Lisa, Fu.
He was gonna work behind the scenes in the way that he described it in order to serve me and better, more efficiently move the case along. I found him by Googling one time. I found some, writing of his actually. He spoke about how the lawyers that you have are not always on your team and sometimes they're colluding with the other side.
And I know that sounds, well, probably not to you guys. I felt a little crazy even thinking that my lawyer could do something like that. But it turns out, you know, we just like anything else in the world, there are corrupt people, entities, you know. Lawyers. no offense if any of you guys are attorneys, but you know, it happens just like in any other field.
There are those people who lack, , morality or clarity of judgment. You know what I'm saying? There are people that, don't play by the rules and they play dirty. anyway, the way that he made it sound was that he was gonna intervene and make the whole case go faster because he knew what to say.
He knew how to light a fire under their ass, whatever. I asked him for references I knew at that moment that I shouldn't have hired him, but I was so desperate at the time to have this case figured out because at that point I had just gone through the last, last hearing, and it was every single time it was just a shit show, right?
It was a clown show, and I was , consistently having to go back into court to have the orders rewritten or re Stated by the judge I don't know how many times that I requested clarification of orders, my judgment was highly impaired at the time, and I knew it because when I asked him the question about whether he had references or not, he sort of, what's the word I'm looking for? Like strong armed mate. He got a little bit aggressive, very assertive and dismissive of my request for him to provide me some references, right?
some people, some other, alienated parents that had gone through this, that he had helped and gotten results from, That's all I was asking. And he was like, no, just know this. your case will be much better once I'm done with it than where you are sitting today. And I was like, well, anything is better than where I am today.
And so I gave him the five or $10,000, whatever it was. I think it was maybe five. And that was the last five I had to spend the last. I, I mean, I didn't even have it. I had to, I had to get it I had to borrow it from a family member, That was it. That was like my last phone home, you know, in the whole sales process, he was very communicative. And then I hired him and I heard from him twice while he was going over some of my files. I talked to my lawyer and me and I believe he was like, actually, no. He told me, I don't believe he was on pain medication when he was talking to my attorney and he was out of it and then I think falling asleep.
Anyway, it was turned out to be a disaster, and then I never heard from the guy again. He didn't do shit with my case. In fact, he did end up leaving it worse than when it started. I don't mean to tell you all that for any other reason than to convey that my desire to trust him so much and trust in somebody coming to rescue me, my need for this fairytale to live on It just impaired my judgment. It screwed me up and it cost me, thousands of dollars, that I didn't need to spend. I knew it. I knew it when I was on the phone with him. I was like, this guy, something's up with him. Something is not right. And I did it anyway, and it caused me to feel very unsafe moving forward.
That story I took with me for a really long time, probably up until about a year ago, went a whole nother. Series of events happened around that guy with me. Um, and I ended up getting my own closure with him because he, It's a story for another time. But needless to say, it caused me to feel very unsafe for a very long time, and it was my own misjudgment, which it's okay.
I know why I did it. And yes, there are people out there that do prey on our desperation and on our weakness, you know? Yeah. They're out there. I think we all know that. But today the difference is, is I don't use stories like that to further victimize me. To further victimize y'all.
the more that I'm out here telling you guys what trash kind of people are out there and how, how we have no resources and the people that are out there, you have to beware the more
dis-ease that I spread to everybody that listens, Moral of the story here is know your legal team. Know your circle of support, choose them wisely. Don't choose them out of desperation or out of a fear of hurting their feelings, or, their rejection of you. You know, like I'm talking about the legal team, not your kids.
Now, you know. , legal support, and also your, um, mental health support. And then , I'm wanna just include in there too, like your family members who you're, leaning on during all these times. creating safety . Really starts with what you're saying inside your own vessel. What you're believing, the thoughts you're choosing to repeat and believe on a day-to-day basis. And then of course, the second next thing is who you're surrounding yourself with, what you're surrounding yourself with, what you're watching on tv, what you are.
I have so many clients, you guys, I feel like every one of the alienated parents that I've ever coached, That's embellishment, but you know what I'm saying? It's so common for parents like us to be crime junkies, Dateline junkies or like, horror movies, things like that.
So addicted to the, the drama and the unease, causing. Programs that you watch, look at all that shit. It really does affect your whole ecosystem of safety, non-safety, feeling threatened. How you, what you dream at night, what you're basing all of your rule sets on as far as like how the world works.
And if you're watching horror movies every night, and one client, you know who you are. It will seep into the way that you look at your world. Same thing with watching you know, the documentaries about cults and what have you.
Now I will say that that can be interesting. It just really depends on your mindset going into some of that stuff. But if you ask me, this is a strictly opinion, no, I think it does have , some solid backing to it. Filling your brain with violent, demonic, content, you know, via movies and whatever else that you watch it can't be good for your nervous system, looking at all of that. When you're assessing your safety level, your feeling of peace and safety on the inside , is very important. I consider all of that stuff like your activities, your, hobbies and all that. It is your support system it's an integral part of The makings up of, of your beliefs that on your day to day, you know what you're choosing to spend your time on and invest your thoughts into. Even if it's the no brain, like at night, just want to turn off and watch something, what else could you be spending your time on?
I'm not saying don't watch tv. I mean, partly because I know that I, that is my thing at night. I turn off and I watch, you know, some shows I'm not, there's probably better things I could be doing with my time than watching something on the tube, , . anyway. What are you spending your time on?
what are you allowing into this? Mental, emotional, physical temple of yours and in your home, who are you allowing in your home? And not that you need to look at everybody as you know, stranger danger or as you need to weed people out. But think of your home and your, your world as something that you truly value, like it's a, you know, a sanctuary.
you do just wanna allow. The people and the things and the thoughts and the, ,
keepsakes, even photos, everything that you decorate your inner world with, really do it mindfully in with your safety and your sense of peace in mind. So that's what I have for you. , there was probably more, but since I split this up into two days, two sessions, , I can't really remember what, where I was going with it yesterday, but that's okay.
I have my notes. I, I covered everything that I, I wrote down in my notes. So anyway, yeah, that's what I have for you, you guys. and as you know, Facebook live on Friday at 1215 Eastern daylight time. And please too, if you haven't already, I would love if you would rate and review the show if you're enjoying it. If it's working for you. If you listen on Apple and if you don't,
I would really appreciate you going and taking the five minutes to write a review if it's helping. Okay. Bring that four, eight or four nine up to a five. Oh. Again, but also I, yeah, I would really appreciate it. It does really, really, um, influence my, the way that. My experience of recording these episodes for you guys too, and I'm, you don't owe me anything, but it is, I would really appreciate it.
So anyway, that's what I have for you. I'm a little tired today. I can't get my words out. Okay, I'll see you next week. Bye.
Move Past the Pain Of Alienation By Allowing Your Emotions
https://open.spotify.com/episode/4l2U2h48NBSMNt6F9inUX1?si=H-iJdIdOTxGRkc2SFt1sAg
00:00 Introduction and Listener Review
01:49 The Graduate Program and Client Experiences
03:24 Navigating Alienation and Creating Safety
06:51 Building Emotional Resilience
17:59 Establishing Predictability and Managing Stress
25:57 Choosing the Your Support Team(s)
37:11 Final Thoughts and Call to Action
#parentalalienationrecovery #alienatedparent #podcastforalienatedparents