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Want to Stop Gaslighting Yourself? Use This Top Technique.

Want to Stop Gaslighting Yourself? Use This Top Technique.

Released Thursday, 21st September 2023
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Want to Stop Gaslighting Yourself? Use This Top Technique.

Want to Stop Gaslighting Yourself? Use This Top Technique.

Want to Stop Gaslighting Yourself? Use This Top Technique.

Want to Stop Gaslighting Yourself? Use This Top Technique.

Thursday, 21st September 2023
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Episode Transcript

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0:00

Welcome to the Practical Growth podcast

0:02

with me , ebi Johnson . Author

0:04

, nlpmp and cognitive reappraisal

0:07

coach . This is the podcast

0:09

created for people like you , people

0:12

looking for more , more

0:14

health , more peace , more

0:16

happiness . Each week , I

0:18

explore a new topic in pop psychology

0:20

and help you build a better life and

0:22

better relationships . Join

0:24

me for special guests , exciting ideas

0:26

and practical advice that you can use to

0:28

improve your life from the inside

0:31

out . Let's get into it . Hello

0:35

, hello , hello , my lovelies , and welcome back

0:37

to another episode of the Practical Growth podcast

0:40

. It's me , ebi , your

0:42

favorite writer , your favorite TikTok coach

0:44

and , most importantly , your favorite NLPMP

0:47

and cognitive reappraisal specialist

0:50

. And here I am , back , back , back , with

0:52

another great episode . Now , I told

0:54

you guys that we were going to be

0:57

talking Ruby Frank and there was going to be a guest

0:59

this week . I misspoke . That

1:01

is going to be taking place next week

1:03

. We have a couple of big developments in the case I'm

1:05

going to be talking about with a guest and I'm very excited

1:07

to bring to you . But

1:09

today is actually , I

1:12

think , an even more important episode , right ? Because it's all

1:14

about growth . It's all about helping you grow

1:16

and helping you overcome

1:19

a lot of these big emotional obstacles in

1:21

your life , of which trauma

1:23

is usually the root cause , right ? Especially

1:25

those of you listening who have childhood

1:27

trauma . Maybe your parent was narcissistic

1:30

or emotionally immature , or

1:32

you just grew up in a really chaotic environment

1:34

as a kid . Because

1:37

what this episode is going to do is it is going

1:39

to help you with what I find

1:41

with my clients is one of the biggest hurdles

1:43

, and that is the gaslighting . We

1:45

, as trauma survivors especially

1:48

those with a quote , unquote stiff up or lip tend

1:51

to gaslight ourselves , and when

1:53

we do that , we prevent

1:55

a lot of healing . We create roadblocks

1:57

in our relationships . There's

1:59

all kinds of stumbling blocks

2:02

, hurdles that we kind of create for ourselves emotionally

2:04

when we gaslight ourselves in terms

2:06

of our own trauma . So that's what we're going to be talking about today

2:08

, but , specifically , I'm

2:10

going to be giving you my secret recipe

2:12

, my secret formula , the

2:14

technique that I usually only hand

2:17

out to my one-on-one clients . Ok

2:19

, and this technique is going to help

2:21

you stop gaslighting

2:23

yourself in terms of your

2:25

trauma and the feelings

2:28

that you have , even here in the present moment , and that's

2:30

so . That's what we're going to do today . That's what we're going to do . We're going

2:32

to banish the gaslighting , we're going to put that tune

2:34

in and give you a solid technique that you

2:36

can use to do that intentionally and

2:38

consciously in your everyday life . Before

2:40

we jump in , though , I do just

2:43

want to make a little bit of a plea and a little bit

2:45

of a plug . Ok , A little bit of a plea and a little bit of

2:47

a plug . As most of you probably know

2:49

because most of you probably found me that

2:52

way I

2:54

am a writer on mediumcom

2:56

. That is where I share a lot of my articles

2:59

, a lot of my content . I've

3:01

been extremely fortunate

3:03

for years now , since 2019

3:05

, to have that's

3:07

been my primary source of not only communicating

3:10

with you guys my fans

3:13

, my listeners , my followers

3:15

but that's also been my primary source

3:17

of income . Unfortunately , due

3:19

to mediums new

3:22

direction , new changes that is no

3:24

longer the case . It's

3:26

very hard for me to reach anyone

3:28

there . I've got

3:30

, basically , I have 33,000 followers

3:32

unless than 1% of them see my

3:34

stories , and it's just

3:36

really hard for me now to reach anyone

3:39

on the platform . So I

3:41

have moved most

3:43

of my original content and my whole library

3:46

of old content over to substackcom

3:50

, and I would be extremely grateful

3:52

if those of you listening could

3:54

head over to Substack and

3:56

support me there . There are two

3:58

options . You can pay $5

4:00

a month , just like you would for medium

4:02

, and that gets you not only

4:05

new weekly stories but

4:07

the entire back catalog of

4:09

my work . Everything I ever posted

4:11

on medium is over on substack . So

4:14

you get access to all of that for $5 a month . Plus

4:17

for that $5 a month , you get extra content

4:19

from me . So , for example , a

4:21

couple days ago I sent out a free

4:23

ebook to all of my premium subscribers

4:26

on substack . We've

4:28

got some video series that are going to

4:30

be coming out soon , with some , you

4:32

know , some of my coaching tips , tricks and

4:35

addressing some of the really big topics

4:37

that you guys struggle with in terms

4:39

of emotional regulation . There's a lot of

4:41

goodness there over on substack and

4:44

that is again , yeah , for $5

4:46

a month or $50 a year

4:48

. I would be eternally grateful for

4:50

those who can and listen . I know it's

4:53

rough out there , but for those of

4:55

you who do have the

4:58

change in your pockets or the , you know , a little

5:00

bit spare , if you could head over to substackcom

5:03

, sign up , support me there

5:05

. It's really easy to do . You

5:07

just head to practicalgrowthsubstackcom

5:11

, hit subscribe and

5:13

they'll walk you right through the process . You'll start

5:15

getting my emails every time they come out and you'll get

5:17

access to the entire back catalog

5:20

. So if you've got the time

5:22

, if you've got the means , I

5:24

would love it if you guys could support me on substack

5:27

, kind of help me stem

5:29

the flow of the

5:31

disastrous changes at medium . I

5:34

would be very , very grateful . Again , that

5:36

is practicalgrowthsubstackcom

5:40

to subscribe and listen . If

5:42

you don't have the means , I also

5:44

appreciate you . Go ahead and sign up for

5:46

a free subscription there . You

5:49

still get access to some of my

5:51

articles . They're still send out stuff for

5:53

my free subscribers because I know how it is

5:55

and I want my advice , I want my

5:57

content to be accessible for everybody

5:59

. So , everybody you know , if you're

6:01

listening to this , head to practicalgrowthsubstackcom

6:05

to support me . Thank you , thank

6:07

you , thank you . All right , let's get into

6:09

the good stuff , the

6:11

light stuff , the joyful stuff . Survivors

6:14

gaslighting themselves after

6:16

trauma . What am I talking about ? What are

6:18

we going to be talking about today and how can we

6:21

fix it ? Because I'm sure , if you're

6:23

listening to this , this is a problem that you've had

6:25

. I'm sure that you have

6:27

had that moment where you have thought back

6:29

to something that happened in your childhood and

6:31

then you quickly snap yourself out of it and go oh

6:33

, whoa , whoa , whoa , whoa , whoa , no , no , no , no

6:36

, it wasn't that bad . Childhood wasn't that

6:38

bad . It couldn't have been that bad . We

6:40

have all been there . It's one of the biggest problems

6:42

. You know , when we talk about healing trauma , a lot of people

6:44

point to their issues with

6:47

others . People don't believe me , people

6:49

gaslight me , the flying monkeys come after

6:51

me , all that kind of stuff . But when we're healing

6:53

, we are also one of our biggest obstacles

6:55

and a lot of it comes down to the way we

6:57

gaslight ourselves , talk ourselves

6:59

out of our feelings , dismiss or

7:02

diminish our experiences

7:04

and the effect that they had

7:06

on us . And there's , you know

7:08

, there's there's a few reasons that this

7:10

happens . But before you can understand

7:12

the why , you need to understand the how . So , by

7:14

and large , this gaslighting is done both

7:17

subconsciously and consciously , and it's

7:19

done very subtly as well . When we gaslight

7:22

ourselves , it's not so much of

7:24

telling ourselves we're crazy . It's

7:26

more of absorbing

7:28

this feeling of shame and then diminishing

7:31

our feelings , diminishing

7:33

our experiences , downplaying

7:35

them and denying the damage , denying

7:38

the effects that they have had on our current

7:40

lives or , you know , even our past memories

7:42

, histories , relationships , whatever it is . You will

7:44

see yourself doing this , hear yourself doing

7:47

this , find yourself doing this when you

7:49

, let's say , think back to a

7:51

traumatic memory , a traumatic moment

7:53

in your past or a

7:56

very upsetting kind of critical

7:58

crossroads in your childhood

8:00

or your adolescence , and

8:02

right when you get to the point of thinking

8:04

, wow , that's terrible , that

8:07

other voice kicks in and goes oh no

8:09

, no , no , it wasn't that bad , it wasn't that bad

8:11

. And you'll hear yourself downplaying

8:14

this to people . When you're talking to them Like , for

8:16

example , I

8:18

have a tendency of telling stories from

8:20

my childhood that I don't think are that bad

8:22

. And as I

8:24

tell them to especially my British friends

8:27

they just will get this look of horror on their face

8:29

, like , oh my God , what are you

8:31

talking about ? And I immediately have to comfort

8:33

them . Right , I'm comforting them and saying , oh

8:35

no , no , it wasn't that bad , it wasn't that bad , it wasn't that bad

8:37

. That is , that is

8:39

a form of gaslighting ourselves . We think

8:41

the same way and it's kind of done as a form

8:43

of comfort , but mostly it's

8:46

done to as a form of avoidance

8:48

. Right , we don't want to believe that it was that bad

8:51

, because then that's a whole other bucket of

8:53

fish . We have to cry . So why does this happen

8:55

? Where does this come from ? Why do so many

8:57

of us have this seemingly

8:59

innate ability to

9:01

just dismiss our own suffering out

9:04

of hand ? Because you know , again with

9:06

my clients , you see them , they come

9:08

to me , they're so full of empathy and I myself

9:10

, right , I can feel empathy for a pencil

9:12

. There was a comedian who said that one time Lee , feel

9:15

empathy for a pencil . If you tell me this pencil's

9:17

name is Jim , you snap in half . I'm going to be devastated

9:20

. Very similar to myself . Very

9:22

similar in my clients . We have huge

9:24

empathy for others . We have no problem

9:26

accepting their stories and accepting

9:28

that they are victims of serious , serious

9:31

, horrible trauma that shouldn't have happened to them

9:33

. And then we look at our own stories and we're like

9:35

, oh , it wasn't that bad . Look at you , you're fine

9:37

, it wasn't that bad . Why do we do that

9:39

? Where does that come from ? Starts

9:42

early . For a lot of us , that is a

9:44

type of conditioning that begins in the home

9:47

. If your home was anything like

9:49

mine , you heard things all the time like don't you

9:51

tell people what happens outside of this house

9:53

? That is where it starts . That's where

9:56

the conditioning starts when you have

9:58

parents who are telling you keep this a secret

10:00

, or when you have parents telling you it's not

10:02

that bad , Stop crying , you have nothing to cry

10:04

about . There are children in China who don't have anything

10:06

to eat . Stupid comments like that . That's

10:09

where the conditioning starts . You learn

10:12

to dismiss and diminish

10:14

your experiences because as a

10:16

child that's repeatedly

10:18

done to you repeatedly

10:22

Again . If you grew up in a household anything like

10:24

mine , you felt like an inconvenience more of

10:26

the time than like a welcome invited

10:29

guest in

10:31

the family . That's where it starts

10:33

. Now , as we grow up , we get

10:35

away from our families . We find ourselves

10:37

still doing that . You'll go to work and horrible

10:40

things will happen at work . You'll take on

10:42

way more than you should . You'll be talked to

10:44

horribly by bosses or whatever it is

10:46

. Maybe your

10:48

friendships are like that or your romantic

10:50

relationships go that way and you downplay

10:52

it . You start downplaying it . Maybe you're in an abusive relationship

10:55

. Your partner hits you and your friends are like , why

10:58

what ? You're like , oh no , no , no , it's

11:00

not that bad , it's just a little bruise on my

11:02

neck or something like that . That

11:05

continues because of fear

11:08

and shame . Fear and shame

11:10

those are the two mechanisms that build

11:12

from that early conditioning and childhood . You're

11:15

fearful that if you speak up , it's going to get worse

11:17

, or that if you speak up , you're going to lose the only

11:19

way of life that you've now grown

11:21

uncomfortably comfortable in . And

11:24

then there's the shame of it all . I let these

11:26

things happen to me , or I feel shameful

11:28

for having these emotions , having these thoughts

11:30

in the first place . So I should just shut up and get

11:32

on with it . Those are the mechanisms

11:35

that lead us to continue this

11:37

pattern of gaslighting ourselves , diminishing

11:40

it , telling ourselves we're crazy , telling ourselves

11:42

that we don't have it bad enough to complain , yada

11:45

, yada , yada , yada yada , which then

11:47

just keeps us silent , shut

11:49

down , locked in the pattern , taking

11:52

up zero space in our own lives . I need

11:54

to be really , really clear here as well , before

11:57

I go on to explain

11:59

kind of my story

12:02

and how I developed this tactic that will help

12:04

you stop gaslighting yourself . There

12:07

is a serious cost if you don't stop this

12:09

behavior and I don't think

12:11

I reiterate this enough in these topics that

12:13

I talk about . It's just kind of like ho , ho , hee , hee

12:15

. Here's some advice . But I'm

12:17

being very serious right now If

12:20

you don't stop gaslighting yourself , if you're someone

12:22

who tends to do that , who tends to downplay stuff

12:24

and just act like your problems aren't real problems

12:26

. You're going to

12:28

crash and fail . Okay

12:30

, because you're going to burn yourself out , not only

12:33

on your own end , just

12:35

trying to keep your head above water , but

12:37

you're going to burn yourself out for others because

12:39

the nasty

12:42

, controlling , abusive , toxic

12:44

element , selfish , corrosive

12:46

people in your life . They will sniff you out

12:48

from a mile away and they will take

12:51

advantage of the person who

12:53

can downplay being wronged

12:55

over and over and over again . So

12:58

this comes with a serious cost . If

13:01

you keep gaslighting yourself , you're going

13:03

to feel like you're not worthy , like

13:05

your emotions aren't capable of being

13:07

dealt with , like you are weak , like you are a

13:09

failure , like you are anxious , like you are hopeless

13:11

. That's what you're going to do to yourself In

13:14

terms of your relationships . You're going

13:16

to become a doormat to others and

13:18

that's going to reinforce a cycle of

13:20

worthlessness , of hopelessness

13:22

, of poor behaviors , of a

13:24

wrecked nervous system . So

13:27

there is a serious cost If you

13:29

don't start taking action

13:31

I'm serious taking conscious action

13:34

to

13:36

stop thinking this way , to

13:38

stop allowing yourself to

13:40

dismiss and diminish your

13:42

experiences . Okay

13:45

. So keep that in mind as

13:47

we move forward . So where do we go ? How

13:50

do we stop this behavior . This

13:52

is not something that they just teach you openly

13:54

in classes , right ? They don't just hand

13:57

out this knowledge when

13:59

you're on an NLP course or a psychology

14:02

course or anything like that . This

14:05

is something you have to learn to kind of

14:07

do on your own , and that's exactly

14:10

what I had to do . I

14:13

was probably the queen

14:15

, the champion of gaslighting myself

14:17

. I mean , I was an absolute warrior for my

14:19

mother , basically until she died . Until

14:22

she died , because I was so good at

14:24

gaslighting myself , gaslighting

14:27

myself out of my experiences in the name of her . Every

14:30

time I spoke to my mother , it was absolutely

14:32

exhausting . Right , the last three

14:34

or four years of our relationship , I lived 6,000 miles away in

14:36

another country . We

14:40

only spoke on the phone , but we did speak on the phone

14:42

every day and it was

14:44

exhausting . It exhausted

14:47

me every single time , even

14:49

if we didn't get into a fight which usually there was

14:51

some kind of disagreement , some kind of fight but

14:54

it was just negative . She's just a negative person . It was

14:56

negative all the time , exhausting , exhausting

14:58

, exhausting Every encounter

15:00

I had with her . Essentially , I don't

15:02

have any positive memories with my mother after the age of

15:04

maybe 8 or 9 . She

15:08

was just an exhaustive , argumentative

15:11

, corrosive , depressing

15:14

personality in general

15:16

, and

15:18

I gaslit myself . I told myself , all

15:20

of these terrible experiences that I had with her

15:22

, all this negativity that she exuded around

15:25

her , not that bad . It's not that bad

15:27

. She wasn't hitting me , right . She

15:29

didn't call me a whore every day , right

15:31

. She would go

15:33

and splurge

15:35

in her shopping addiction and buy me a bunch

15:38

of random shit at random points

15:40

in her life . So that was good , right

15:42

, because sometimes she'd get something you liked

15:44

, so that made her a good mom , right . I

15:49

did this for years and years and years , and it wasn't until

15:51

she died , which I'll be discussing

15:53

. I've

15:55

got an article coming out about this , so make sure you're following

15:57

me on Substax . It's

16:00

a pretty powerful revelation . It

16:02

wasn't until after she died that

16:04

I was able to stop doing this , but it came

16:07

at a cost and it came with a fight , and

16:09

it came because I got angry . After

16:11

she died , I was finally able to look back

16:13

at specific experiences and

16:16

as I was looking back at these experiences

16:18

, I realized like , oh

16:20

my God , there was no excuse for them . There

16:23

was no excuse for them . And what was worse is

16:25

I realized all

16:27

this time when I was diminishing these experiences

16:30

, diminishing the way I felt , telling myself

16:32

I was crazy for having

16:35

so much disdain for my mother . I

16:38

realized that I was kind of repeating

16:41

relationships similar to her around

16:43

me and making similar excuses for myself

16:45

and for others in my life , making

16:48

the same excuses , and

16:50

it stopped me in my tracks and it's also

16:52

what has led to this technique that

16:54

I am about to teach you now . So

16:57

this technique is essentially my

16:59

. It's not a Rolodex

17:01

of hate , as Bianca says , but it's very , very

17:03

similar . It's a Rolodex of powerful

17:05

memories . It is a

17:08

righteous anger , reinforcing

17:11

memory bank of

17:13

sorts . Okay , and this is what you

17:15

are going to use to stop gaslighting yourself

17:17

, exactly the way I learned to

17:20

stop gaslighting myself . You ready , if

17:22

you need a pen and paper this is the point pulling out , let's go

17:24

. Here we go the tactic

17:26

that you're going to use , the technique that you're

17:28

going to use to end this pattern

17:31

of gaslighting yourself , and

17:33

we're going to start just with childhood trauma

17:35

and we're going to build from there . You can use this

17:37

in terms of romantic relationships

17:40

, friendships , whatever it is

17:42

that you're trying to weigh , get the big picture

17:44

of and figure out the

17:47

truth about , so that you can stop gaslighting

17:50

yourself . Here

17:52

we go Step one , you need to create a memory

17:54

bank . Create a memory bank so

17:57

it's really powerful if you feel comfortable

18:00

doing this in a journal , but you don't have to

18:02

. It's a kind of meditative process

18:04

. If that's something that's more comfortable to you

18:06

, you

18:42

need to look back at your experiences

18:44

with this person . So , for me , I looked back

18:46

at these experiences with my mother , which was the relationship

18:49

I tended to gaslight myself about most

18:51

. So

18:53

I looked back at those experiences . What

18:56

are the biggest memories that you can remember ? Okay

18:58

, how did they make you feel ? I

19:00

started doing that . I was seeing things like

19:03

you know , little EB sitting

19:05

outside by herself , struggling to get the training

19:07

wheels off of her bike by herself

19:10

, pedaling up and down a little porch and

19:12

the winter , cold is raining

19:15

and gray skies up and

19:17

down this little porch teaching herself how to ride a bike

19:19

by herself , running inside

19:21

by herself to tell her mother how excited

19:23

she was because she finally taught herself how to ride

19:25

a bike , and her mother who's

19:27

just rotting on the couch saying uh-huh

19:30

, that's great . And going back to watching

19:32

her . You know her

19:35

daytime television . So

19:38

that was a pretty powerful memory that came up right

19:40

away . I thought let's

19:42

find some positive memories . Were there

19:44

any cooking memories ? Did she ever teach you how to cook anything

19:47

? No , were there any memories ? Positive

19:49

memories , like cleaning

19:51

or going somewhere together or

19:54

taking a trip together that was good

19:56

, or a hobby None

19:59

of those . So what's another

20:01

one ? Maybe she came to a band

20:03

concert ? That would be a positive one . Oh wait

20:05

, no , she didn't do that . Okay

20:07

, there's another memory not showing

20:10

up there . What about when you went to the hospital ? Nope

20:12

, didn't show up there . You see

20:14

what I'm saying here . You create a

20:16

memory bank of core

20:18

times that

20:20

you know you had an experience

20:23

with this person that should not have happened

20:25

. Okay , and

20:28

as you form this memory bank , this

20:31

concrete memory bank , you

20:34

are forming a

20:36

clearer view of the situation

20:39

, which will empower you to

20:41

cut through the gaslighting . Step two

20:44

if you are using

20:46

this to stop gaslighting

20:48

yourself in regards to a toxic relationship

20:51

or your childhood trauma or narcissistic

20:53

abuse , then the second step

20:55

is to leaning

20:58

into that memory bank , allowing

21:00

yourself , in little timed

21:02

bursts , to go back to that place

21:05

. You need to foment

21:07

a righteous anger , and

21:10

this is one of the big things that so many of my

21:12

clients struggle with , because anger is the number

21:14

one emotion that you were never allowed to feel

21:16

growing up as a child , and

21:19

if you are in a narcissistic family

21:21

or narcissistic relationships as an adult

21:23

. Narcissists cannot tolerate anger

21:25

. They are happy to see you be

21:27

sad , they are happy to see

21:29

you be frustrated , they are

21:32

happy to see you be disappointed , but they will

21:34

not allow you to be angry , because every narcissist

21:36

knows that your anger is motivating

21:39

your anger , is a threat to

21:41

them , because your anger will motivate

21:43

you to act against them , to stand up

21:45

to them , to speak out against them

21:47

and to , most importantly , leave and strip

21:49

their power from them . So

21:52

for you to stop gaslighting yourself , more

21:54

than just having these memories that you know were

21:56

shit and shouldn't have happened , you

21:58

need to actively embrace

22:01

righteous anger , a sense

22:03

of there's no effing excuse

22:05

for that . There's no excuse

22:08

, there's no justification , and

22:10

if I haven't gotten justice for it , I'm allowed

22:13

to be upset about it . I'm allowed to be upset

22:15

about that little girl who

22:18

couldn't even get a wow , well

22:20

done , congratulations , let

22:22

me see you ride the bike . That little girl's allowed to be

22:24

angry that her mother didn't

22:26

care to

22:28

teach her any skills , to

22:30

show her any real fundamental form

22:32

of love outside of her shopping

22:35

addiction . So

22:38

you gotta foment this righteous anger . And what I tell

22:40

my clients a lot is you almost you

22:43

can imagine it as like a centurion or

22:45

like a warrior of some

22:47

type , a soldier that's

22:49

there to protect you . Your anger

22:52

exists like any other emotion , exists

22:54

like your happiness exists when good things happen

22:56

, like your grief exists

22:58

when you lose something that's important to

23:00

you , be it a person or an opportunity

23:03

. Your anger exists

23:05

because something around

23:07

you is not right . Maybe it's your reading

23:10

of a situation , or maybe it's because

23:12

something in the environment is truly

23:14

going against your

23:16

boundaries , your values , your beliefs

23:19

, your needs . So

23:21

you've gotta foment this anger and allow yourself

23:23

to be in that anger and

23:26

the understanding of none of that should have happened

23:28

and it was inexcusable . And

23:31

when you can hold onto that , that's

23:33

when you are able to set boundaries and say never

23:35

again . And at that point of never

23:38

again we get to number three . You

23:40

have to start consciously and

23:42

intentionally countering

23:45

that gaslighting voice

23:47

with that anger and

23:50

those concrete memories that you identified

23:53

. Every time that

23:55

voice pops up , you have to consciously

23:57

, actively confront

23:59

them . And what I tell my clients

24:01

, what I tell my readers , what I tell my followers to do

24:04

, is that gaslighting voice , turn it

24:06

into a person , imagine it as a person

24:08

and when it comes up , you need to imagine

24:11

another person yourself , someone

24:13

big , brave , courageous , whoever you really respect

24:15

, confronting that gaslighting

24:17

voice with

24:20

that memory and

24:22

with that anger that you know is righteous

24:24

, that you know is justified . So in my case

24:26

, when I

24:29

have doubts about

24:31

because it does occasionally still happen when I have

24:33

doubts about my experiences with my mother

24:35

, I look back at

24:37

her sitting on the couch when that little girl was outside

24:40

, taking off her own training

24:42

wheels on her bike and

24:44

peddling up and down a 12 foot porch

24:46

Probably wasn't even that big Over

24:49

and over and over again , while cars pass

24:51

by , while other kids ride

24:53

by with their families on bikes and

24:56

I'm freezing in my little

24:58

cheap gloves and my mother's sitting inside

25:00

watching Sally Jesse Raphael , I

25:05

give that memory to that gaslighter

25:07

voice and say okay , it wasn't that bad . Explain

25:10

that . Or I tell the

25:12

gaslighter about the time that

25:14

my mother found a rock CD she

25:16

didn't like and so she

25:18

hit me with a belt until I vomited on myself

25:20

and I asked the gaslighter how

25:22

bad it was that . Did you do

25:24

that to a child ? There's

25:27

usually no response from the gaslighter . They usually shut

25:30

up at that point . And

25:32

that's how you have to intentionally counter

25:34

that gaslighter with that anger

25:36

and those inexcusable memories , to

25:39

back that voice of doubt

25:42

down . Because , make no mistake , that voice is

25:44

the voice of your abusers . It

25:47

is the voice of people who

25:49

wanted you to fail or

25:51

who wanted you to stay beneath them . It

25:53

did not come from a good place , so

25:55

you don't have to treat it well . You need to counter it , you

25:57

need to shut it up , you need to silence it . There's

26:00

no making friends with it . You need to shut down that gaslighter

26:03

inside of you . And that's it in a nutshell

26:05

. That is my technique . That is my way

26:07

to counter the gaslighter . You build

26:09

that concrete memory bank , write it down

26:11

in a depth journal or

26:14

whatever you want to call it , the journal

26:16

of doom . If you can tolerate

26:18

it , allow yourself

26:20

to be in that anger and then counter that

26:22

gaslighting voice with those memories and that

26:24

anger . Just let that gaslighting voice

26:27

absolutely have it . I mean , why not

26:29

? You don't need that voice

26:31

there . Again , it doesn't come from a good place . It

26:33

serves no good purpose , save to keep you below

26:35

somebody or to keep you short

26:38

of your goals . So don't

26:40

let it happen . Thank

26:43

you so so much for listening . Hopefully you've gotten

26:45

something great from this episode

26:47

. I hope it inspires you . I hope it motivates you . Next

26:50

week will be something totally different , but this week

26:53

this was the message that I felt was really really

26:55

important to address . So thank

26:57

you again for listening . Thank you for those who

26:59

are still supporting me on

27:02

Medium and TikTok , but , if you could

27:04

remember , follow me over at substackpracticalgrowthsubstackcom

27:08

. And for anyone else

27:10

who's interested , I have a couple of spots

27:12

opening up for my next round of coaching

27:14

, which will be starting up in a couple of weeks

27:16

. So if you want to be a part of that

27:19

, you've got less than a hundred

27:21

days left . Basically , by

27:23

the time this program , the next program , starts

27:26

, you will have less than a hundred days to

27:29

the year and

27:31

then it's the new year . So you can either go in

27:33

the way you're feeling right now and the stress and the

27:35

chaos and the exhaustion , or

27:37

you can work with me . So if you want to do with that , head

27:39

over to the reallybejohnsoncom , click

27:42

on Working with Me . And for everyone else

27:44

, again , follow me on substack and

27:47

keep your heads up , keep your

27:49

eyes on the stars and keep moving forward Until

27:52

next time . Bye , bye .

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