Playing a New Game

Marty: playing a new game, telling yourself a new story about your life and having it come

Bill: operating half the parts saying, oh yes, And the other half are saying, oh God, no.

Marty: you have to practice at this new reality I had a vision of my life as an academic and followed that for 16 years. Exactly. And then I realized, wait a minute, this wasn't my idea.

Bill: I was 55 years old before I figured out what I was supposed to be doing. let's see, what's at the bottom of this belief that you're a loser. Whatever the shame-based belief is, all those strategies no longer serve us, and now change is possible

Marty: Hi. Welcome to another exciting episode of the True You Podcast with Bill Tierney and Martin Kettle Hut. we were just talking about ourselves and others who do a kind, have done a kind of reinvention, like started a new, venture or a new way of living. And that's our topic today. Starting a new,

Bill: Starting a new, yeah. Uh, playing a new game,

Marty: playing a new game, telling yourself a new story about your life and having it come

Bill: operating from a fresh context.

Marty: There you go.

Bill: These are all different ways to maybe describe what you might be experiencing when you experience a breakthrough.

Marty: Right. And, and I just at the outset, I think this is one of the beau uh, beautiful things about coaching is that you get, when you work with a coach. and technology in doing what would probably, if you just thought all by yourself, you know, gosh, I'd like to have this all be a diff be different. It'd be very hard. And, and so, uh, I'm promoting coaching a little bit here as, uh, a tool, as a means to, to finding a way to be able to start anew.

Bill: Gosh, my, my mind is already swimming. I guess it jumped in the pool even before you hit record this topic, and I don't even swim. Uh, but you get the metaphor. I, I, I wanna talk a little bit about the, the, the session that I had this morning. Without giving away too much detail, if I can just talk about the concept, uh, just to give an example, uh, um, so in, I'll let the session this morning inform the way, the way I, I present this a client. Brings into the session an ongoing problem that is, that begins, that seems to be shifting internally

Marty: Uh

Bill: and it's, it seems clear that the shifting is occurring because, uh, the work that they've been doing using the IFS model,

Marty: mm-hmm.

Bill: so. Parts of them have been operating for a, from a more accurate context that reflects current reality.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: parts haven't gotten the memo,

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: and so those other parts are still operating from, um, an outdated context from the past.

Marty: And this sounds like something that's bound to happen I mean, I know what's going on in me right now.

Bill: It is bound to happen, especially if we're taking a shotgun approach to helping someone make the changes that they wanna make in their lives. A

Marty: As opposed to a what

Bill: focused approach, a focused approach.

Marty: focused.

Bill: An example of a focused approach would be a clearly stated coaching objective. I am here in coaching because I wanna accomplish this specific outcome,

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: and I'm here in this coaching session because given my specific coaching outcome that, that we contracted at the very beginning of our, of our, of our relationship today, you and I agreed maybe in the last session that we had together. We would focus on this because that, that seems to be the next thing that needs to happen in a, in a, in when, so when sessions are, are focused in that way, all of the parts of the, of the person that are involved in the desired outcome are gonna be wanting to speak up.

Marty: Or in preventing the

Bill: Right. Exactly.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: this is the outcome that we want. That seems to be the most predominant part that got the, the client into coaching in the first place, but

Marty: Chorus of others stand up and say, wait

Bill: right, it might be 50 50 in the system. There might be half the parts that are in, in, um, that are interested in that outcome that are saying, oh yes, something like that. That's what we want. And the other half are saying, oh God, no. No. We can't let that happen. And, and so that's where IFS becomes so powerful because it gives us an opportunity to essentially create a plan for hearing from the parts with the loudest voices first, and then the parts that still have something to say after we've heard the loudest voices, so that we really understand what's happening in internally. Before we take any steps at all to, to try to bring about an outcome that not everybody inside agrees to.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: So this particular client that I'm referring to, we have been more shotgunned than focused she's a group client. and in, in group, we just, we, I don't ask my, my coaching clients to clearly identify a specific outcome. It is more shotgun. We're everybody that's in these groups, men, women, everyone in the group is there because they recognize that the IFS model is powerful and what the one objective that they have in common is. They might say in their own words, in their own way, I want to learn better how to work with my parts so that I don't suffer so much so that I have more power, so that I have more clarity. I wanna develop more self-leadership. And so that's what these groups are designed to accomplish, whereas individual clients will come in and. They're certainly gonna get the benefit that I just named All those benefits, they're gonna learn better how to work with their parts. They're gonna be, have more clarity, they're gonna develop more self, uh, leadership and, and access to more self energy. But because we're going to, it's the same client every session that gets that, that intense focus of the coach, we can focus on a project, a specific objective that we, that, that wants to be achieved. And now it's very focused and, and we get there much more quickly.

Marty: So, um, just a comment on the way here. Um, one thing that I heard, which is really interesting and powerful is that using the IFS approach, you are less, much less likely to have a. Scattershot approach because shows up at the mention of this new reality are all the relevant parts.

Bill: Yep.

Marty: Right. Which if, if you were just, you know, like. You came to me and I'm just average Joe, coach and, and you said, I want this new reality. Well, I might just start with something that doesn't even, it doesn't speak to those parts. Doesn't help you at all.

Bill: Well, depending on what kind of coach you are, if you're a coach that says, well, here's the formula that we follow in order to accomplish that thing. Then that, that may very well bypass parts that have concerns about achieving that.

Marty: More than likely it would. Yeah.

Bill: And even, and, and that's not to, to discount that style of coaching. That can be very helpful if the person is in a place where that, that works for them. But with this client that, that I'm thinking of from earlier because. She'd been doing her work, but without the focus of an objective of a desired outcome or a project. some of the parts that were involved in this community, of internal parts around her particular objective had become unburdened. They had, uh, they had more self-leadership. They had more access to self energy and so they just weren't playing the same game anymore. They weren't interested in, for example, um, trying to strong arm her into taking actions that were hard to take. So the, the part, let's just say there was a bully part inside that says, you better do this, or else you're a loser. Uh, it that used to work, let's just say, I'm just making this up, but let's just say I'm a loser, is the identity of the client that they're trying to manage around. They're trying to hide that they're a loser. The context is I'm a loser.

Marty: Right,

Bill: of the management around that is, let's hide that, that they are a loser. Let's hide. Uh, let and let's put forth. Evidence in fact, that they're a winner,

Marty: Yeah.

Bill: that nobody would ever consider that this person might be a loser. And the, and so because of the energy is, so, what's the vision there? What's the, what's the objective? Even though it's not stated? Let's, the, the objective for protective parts is let's make sure nobody ever find figures out that this person is a loser. That's our job. That's the objective. Mission accomplished if nobody figures it out. But the mission fails when those protectors fail. And, and someone might say something like, well, but that is that consistent with what you said last week, let's just say they're in a business situation. And, and a, a coworker says to them in a, in a conference meeting, in a business meeting is, that's not consistent with what you said last week. And now this person. Realizes, oh shit, my cover's blown, they have just figured out that I'm a loser. Well, the person that says that's just asking for clarity, let's just say they, they're not asserting that the person's a liar or that they're a loser in any way shape, or they're saying, oh, I must have missed something. Because what you're saying to this week doesn't match what you said last week. And, and please help me understand. That's it. And if we take that on the service and let's, let's just assume the person that's making that comment. Isn't trying to, trying to draw positive attention to themselves and make them look bad. It's just they want clarification. Doesn't matter what's happened inside is the, the part that believes that they are a loser. Starts feeling all this fear and all this shame or whatever else it is that's been managed all these years

Marty: Yeah.

Bill: and now the whole system falls apart and mission not accomplished and there's a big scramble by. Reactive parts now, firefighter parts that come in and try to put it all back together again and that, that might look like, well, let me tell another lie on top of that one that I told the first time. Let me sew something together in such a way that's, that makes sense. Let me scramble here to maintain the image that I want you to have of me, rather than the image that I just now gave you a peak at that I'm trying, been trying to hide.

Marty: Accidentally gave

Bill: Right,

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: So a new game would be, let's see, what's at the bottom of this belief that you're a loser. It's going with the same example. Where did that come from? Where did you get the I

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: idea that you were a loser? And using the IFS model, we can actually hear directly from the part that made that, that imagine that that was true and then made it a belief, get its history and help it out.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: it's open and, and willing to be helped out. So now let's just say that happens. And that, by the way, that was a very condensed and quick way to say what would happen over a, over a long process. It's not something that's gonna happen in a, in one coaching session, which is why it, I mean, it could, but it probably isn't going to. And the reason it isn't going to is because we've got years and years and years usually of, of protective strategies that have been laid down in layers to, to hide this, this. But it feels like a fact. This belief, this, this really painful, shameful belief. So it's gonna, it's probably gonna take a little while to unpack the layers of protection, to understand why the parts are doing what they're doing, and finally to earn enough trust in that process from the parts that they would allow us to help. The part that's ultimately holding the energy, the painful emotion, the belief, all of that ,

Marty: Well, it's occurring to me as you're saying that much as I wanna keep moving forward, that all of that could even be preventing someone who. Uh, you know, can, can't even get to, uh, you know, a, a vision of a new reality and then working with the parts who have something to say about it, because those parts are so blinded me, let's say, to, to even be able to imagine a new

Bill: E Exactly. So how could they, their, their, their capacity is all for imagination, is all being used up with survival.

Marty: how do we, what do we wanna say to that person? It's just like, like, I mean, you hear it actually quite often these days. It's like, well, you know, they, people have given up. You know, like this is the way it is. It's always been this way. There's no hope, like.

Bill: Yeah, and I, again, I just wanna say right now that before I was trained in the IFS model as a coach, in the face of that. There were parts of me, I didn't know there were parts of me at that time, but there were parts of me at that time that wanted to save the client, that wanted to make them feel better and offer, so would do so by either giving advice, offering reassurance, oh, it's gonna be okay. You're not really a loser. Um, look at all the things that you've done. You know, and, and, and unfortunately that just reinforced the, the context of, see, I am a loser. I'm only not a loser if you don't think I'm a loser. And, and for that to happen, I need to do the things that you just pointed out when you reassured me. See how giving you are. See how generous, see how smart, see how productive, see how successful you've been and, and yet, why do I still feel like a loser?

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: So that whole context from the inside out has to change. And before I had the IFS model, I didn't have a great deal of success in helping people shift those contexts. And now that I do, I understand that the context is set by the most vulnerable part of that system. That all the other parts are organized around the part that's, that was hurt. The part that is holding the, the emotional. Energy and pain of, of that original hurt, the wound that's still being nursed and managed all these years later.

Marty: Right.

Bill: the miracle seems to be that once we do get to that exile, not, not by forcing our way in and convincing all the parts that they're wrong about it, but by understanding the parts and understanding what it is that they're doing, the dilemma they've been faced with, what's at stake for them. What they fear will happen, what they're trying to accomplish. Once we really get that and they feel gotten

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: and gradually, we build trust. We earn the trust of that internal system of parts, and we're handed the keys to the exile and get a chance now to help that part.

Marty: And then when we do move forward into, uh, building, maintaining that new vision of the way life could be.

Bill: Well, we haven't gotten there yet

Marty: No, I know,

Bill: be, as you say, the, the system is, doesn't have the capacity for vision yet.

Marty: right? Right. I

Bill: Yeah.

Marty: right. And when we do get there and we are starting that, I would, I would then the structures need to speak specifically to maintaining a, something that, so that we don't fall back. There has to be, you know, a, a, a, a new home. For that part to come to come to. Otherwise, just it. It will revert, I would assume, to the old habits.

Bill: That does happen, and it happens for several reasons. One is that we don't stay in touch. Imagine you, you've opened up a new business, you've been running a car dealership. And you decide, yeah, I'm gonna sell the car dealership and I'm gonna open a furniture store. There's some similarities. Still gonna be sales. I still need to have inventory and I still need to have a staff and I'm gonna take the best of my staff over to the furniture store with me. Sell the dealership, bring the best of my staff with me to the furniture store, and we get along great. 'cause everybody knows me, knows my expectations, and they already know their, their job is sales. They just need to get used, used to selling a different product that fits in the living room instead of the garage. So it's not that hard of a transition. However, because it's a furniture business and I have, you know, 10 other openings throughout the store, I need new employees. So I bring them in from whatever they were doing. Before, and I bring them and I put them in a new position in the store and I say, here's what I want you to do. I need your help and here's what you, what I want you to do. Good luck. I'll talk to you in 90 days when your probation period is over and we'll see what, whether we're gonna keep you or not. And you don't ever talk to them again for that, those 90 days. Now you bring 'em in. How, how do you suppose they did on their new job when they got an orientation and were given the desk or whatever. Now they're just doing the best they can on their job without any further instruction, they're gonna fail. We're setting 'em up to fail. It's the same with our parts.

Marty: Same with their parts?

Bill: When our parts let, their parts have to kind of grieve their old jobs.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: And by grieve I only mean they're wired to do the job they've done for years.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: and so they're gonna wake up in the morning when we do, or maybe try to keep us awake at night, uh, thinking about the context that they previously were operating under.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: so if those parts haven't had a shift in context, the protectors, let's say the exile does. The exile thinks, oh, so I'm not a loser. Great. I'm perfect to hold incomplete. Wow. And I'm letting go of this, of this burden, and I'm healing the wound, and I'm feeling seen, and I'm getting the unmet needs that I. Didn't get met when? When I was a child met finally. So the excel's fine, but how about the protector? If the pro protector doesn't also get a shift in context, a release of their burden, then they're gonna keep wanting to do their old job.

Marty: Yeah, I mean, my very first coach, he

Bill: I.

Marty: to point to three dimensions of this. the structure, how are you gonna get trained in those 90 days? How are you gonna learn the job? And those, there's some structure. Is it a book you're gonna read or a mentor you're gonna, what's the structure that's gonna have that happen? Accountability. So you don't just let 'em go for 90 days. You check in, you see, how's it going, you know, they report there. There's, you know, when you get this lesson learned, you know, from the book, come let me know and we'll have a glass of wine to celebrate, you know, accountability. And then Affinity was a third piece. Like, you don't want to, you don't wanna send that part off or that employee do something that is just not a fit like that. They, they, they don't

Bill: Right.

Marty: Right? There's got, you gotta create that new context has to be one that's welcoming and, and supportive and, and like on, you know. On, on on the right terms, so to speak. Like for me, when I had my knee surgery and didn't wanna run anymore, but needed to exercise a structure for exercise, I needed accountability partners, but. I didn't wanna go to the gym. I don't like, I don't like gyms, you know, just, it's not my culture, but the pool now, I had an affinity for the pool and so I took care of all those, those dimensions of what you're talking

Bill: Yeah, that's great. What a great metaphor. Great, great, uh, example of this. Yeah. So let's go back to the question that you asked. Um, we can easily slip back into the old ways if there's not clarity and, and if, if, if we're missing the elements of integrating the new context.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: So the, one of the elements of the new context would be a vision. So now, now if I'm a protector in someone's system and I've just gotten the update that, oh, the exile that I've been protecting and managing and hiding, uh, and handling is no longer needs me to do that, it's free. It's not suffering, it's not gonna cause problems for the system. Now, what do I wanna do if, if my old job is no longer relevant? What do I wanna do? Well, the self-led person who has me as a part might say to me, well, I've got a new vision. Are you interested in hearing it and seeing if there's a place for you in, in that vision? Sure. What is the vision? Well, I don't know yet, but as soon as I come up with one, okay. I guess I'll just keep doing my old job then. But if even though it's not relevant, it's all I know how to do. Saying, if I've got a hammer, everything else looks like a nail. So, um, if though, if I can, if I, the person with all my parts can provide self-leadership, that includes a vision for the life that I wanna be living, then the part can choose within that vision, can imagine within that vision of how it might serve to help successfully achieve that mission or that vision.

Marty: Yeah.

Bill: So that's a piece of it. And, and then what would accountability look like with the part? It would probably look like, how are you doing? Like what do you need? Where are you struggling? If you are, how can I support you? How's this going? Are you enjoying it? Is this, is this what you, is this what you wanna be doing?

Marty: Yeah. Loving parent check-ins is what we call them in the a CA.

Bill: Adult children of alcoholics and dysfunctional families, by the way, they're changing the name of the program, or at least they're talking about that. Do you know that? I've recently heard that they're, they're, they're talking about changing the name of the adult children of Alcoholics and Dysfunctional Families program to something like adult children from disordered families, which would be great because I think a lot of people stop listening after alcoholic. Oh, I wasn't from an alcoholic family, so I don't fit in there. Disordered family. Yeah. So, so many of us qualify for that. Right.

Marty: Yeah, exactly.

Bill: Okay, so back to, yeah. Becoming the loving parent to, to those parts.

Marty: Checking in with your kids because you love

Bill: Mm-hmm. Right, right.

Marty: Accountability.

Bill: When they're left alone, when our parts are left alone, once we discover them, learn about them, realize that they, they've been in internal conflict this whole time, uh, which most of them have been. Like one part is saying, here's how I'm gonna hide that. I'm a loser. And another part is saying, no, no, no. This is how we're gonna hide that. We're a loser. You're gonna hide by trying to say, criticize and shame me every time I want to be seen anywhere. I want to really focus on being excellent at everything. That way. Nobody figures out I'm a loser, so you're getting in my way when you don't let me be out in public. And the other part's saying, yeah, but you're too, you're creating way too much risk when we're out in public.

Marty: Yeah. Right.

Bill: You can't be excellent at everything without making a whole lot of mistakes, and that's not allowed. We can't do that.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: These are, of course, just examples of how parts are at in conflict with each other inside. And so when they're in conflict and we've discovered them and now we understand their conflict. It's up to us now to mentor them, to, to help them sort out their differences and, and unify them with a common vision and a common goal. And as long as that common vision and common goal is aligned with internal harmony and balance, and aligned with the, what I've found is aligned with the unique purpose that each of us has. the parts come alive to that new vision and they lay down their arms and they're, they're really, they, they lock arms and, and walk together toward that new vision.

Marty: They, yeah, they wanna participate

Bill: That's right. That's right. Because just because, just like we feel enlivened when, when we're aligned with our flow, with our purpose, when we're in the zone, that's when we're in the zone. We feel that way because we're blended with parts that feel that way. Our parts feel aligned as well.

Marty: I am just looking up the article that I wrote recently on vi, you know, uh, creating a new vision and, and following

Bill: Oh, great.

Marty: after I talk about it a little bit, I, I say that there, I, I'm using a quotation from , I'm not sure, I don't speak Brazilian, but I, in English, I would say Palo Kello. Paulo Kellow, the Qualo, I'm not sure how to say his name. Um, but he's very popular. Um, a lot of people have read his books, um, and he says, when you, when you can imagine a new story for your life now, believe it. Right? And so I was talking about that portion, like what does it mean to believe your story, right? And I pointed to a couple of things. I said, speak it. Practice it. Structure your life to embody it. Ask confidants to hold you accountable to it. Um, and before all of that, choose one. Choose this vision of your life that is authentic. I think you know that that comes before everything else. I just said really you know. I, I had a vision of my life as an academic and followed that for about 20, well, 16 years. Exactly. And then I realized, wait a minute, this wasn't my idea. Right? And so like, there, there, there needed to be a like, okay, what is the authentic me then, so that this vision comes from there, right.

Bill: I am thinking about what you just said, that that wasn't your idea. I want to challenge that a little bit because I don't think the you that I know would be the you that I know. Unless you had done those 16 years in academia.

Marty: Hmm. Interesting. Well, what I mean when I say that is, um, yeah, I would push back on that a little bit too. That. Um, I went there because that, you know, that's what people said. You're good at do that, you're

Bill: Mm-hmm.

Marty: But it wasn't, it really didn't have two really key elements of what I needed in my career

Bill: Which were.

Marty: to work with people, to organize on a team and, um, in partnership to, to actually. Make a different reality, be making a difference in the world. And, you know, ac as an academic, I spent most of my time working by myself. And, you know, I put more paper in, in, you know, on the shelves of the library, but. The, the, you know, there was no, wasn't like the difference I can make in a client's life and that we can measure in money and time and effort and all kinds of, you know, goodies. They get that that wasn't happening. It was just this silent me alone in the library putting more books on the shelf.

Bill: So let me summarize what I think I just heard you say when you say that. That wasn't my idea. You're saying that. You heard other people encouraging you to get into academia because they said that you're, you are good at it.

Marty: I had a part that responded to the feel good of being complimented on, know, my academic

Bill: Yeah. Yeah. This reminds me of the woman from the book, the, the E Myth that baked the pies. You read the book? Yes. And she loved baking pies and whatever it is that your client, your, your friends or family noticed about you that you loved, they put two and two together and came up with a, a different sum than you, than you 16 years later did.

Marty: right. Yeah. The academia was my pie shop.

Bill: Yeah.

Marty: And I'm not, you know, I didn't, I didn't wanna run a pie

Bill: Right. You like baking, but you didn't wanna run, run a pie. Yes, exactly. So, and, and it only took you 16 years to figure that out. And I, I don't mean that sarcastically, that's not very long. I was 55 years old before I figured out what I was supposed to be doing.

Marty: uh, no, take me back. Where, where were we in the conversation?

Bill: Well, I, I really like that we, we shifted away from talking in, in the language of IFS and spoke more in, in just more. In terms that anybody, whether they know about IFS or not can, can understand. And that that is, that when context changes,

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: can change everything, that can provide a breakthrough. What you mean I'm not a liar or, uh, a liar or a loser or a, whatever it would be that I've decided I am. Um, and then all the strategies that we have employed around the assumption that it's true that I'm a loser. For example, or that I have no value, no worth, people don't care. I'm not lovable. Whatever the shame-based belief is, all those strategies no longer serve us, and now change is possible.

Marty: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I guess I was, uh, right, so what I was saying in that article was when you go to create this vision for your future, you know, the life more in alignment with, with your true self, with the true you. You have to give yourself some space and time to do that because don't want that new vision to be written by all the old parts.

Bill: Yeah.

Marty: So there the right to, to, to get this off on the right foot, you have to be to let, I don't know, there's, there seems like a, to like to let some new light in the room.

Bill: Yeah. Yep. And my experience has been that when the urgency behind the, the survival strategies softens back. When the context changes so that, oh, maybe I'm okay, and now the survival strategy and urgency and intensity softens back. What, what emerges is what was always there in the first place, but that was shrouded or suppressed and, and that is innovation, creativity, possibility. All of that begins to emerge.

Marty: Right. See now what happened to me personally in that story that, you know, where I was had this other career first in academia. Um, I get, I started to hit the wall and it, like, it wasn't, this was not gonna be sustainable and, and it was just becoming more and more of a. place a headache. Then I, I did the landmark form. I was invited. I wasn't like, I knew what I was getting into either, but I was, it, it, you know, destiny sent it right at the right moment, I guess.

Bill: Well, and you had to say yes to it though.

Marty: yeah. But my, my, my point about that is that it was a tra, it was a big clearing. I mean, it can, you know, it has many effects, but one of them is to, to clear a person out so that I could come up with a, a, an authentic vision. And when I did so, I saw, I, I saw that part, I what had attracted me to academia, right? That, that, Asking questions, thinking about tough stuff. That's what I liked about academia and I wanted to take that with me, but I wanted to do it in the context of business.

Bill: and people. And being, being front facing with people. Yeah. And making a difference in the world. I

Marty: Right, exactly right. So, so it wasn't, it wasn't like I had been totally duped. There was a reason why I had gone that way for

Bill: sure.

Marty: years because I was getting a lot of satisfaction from thinking about tough things. Right. That was fun.

Bill: And using your words when you hit the wall, when you found, found that it wasn't sustainable, that you weren't enjoying it,

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: uh, a willingness began to show up that maybe wasn't there before. Maybe it, maybe that willingness replaced previously a persistence. Even though I don't like it, even the, it's what I do got replaced by and I'm willing to be cracked open. I'm willing to be cleared. I'm willing to look, to try something new, to see if I can see something that I can't see. See if I can actually get access to my blind spots.

Marty: Right?

Bill: And that's what happened was for, for you with Landmark,

Marty: it is.

Bill: someone suggested it. They caught you at just the right time. When, when. You recognized that what you were doing wasn't sustainable and you became willing to do something that maybe the year before, two years before you wouldn't have been willing to do.

Marty: I guarantee I wouldn't have been, I mean, I had been asked to do similar things in the years before and pooed them.

Bill: Yeah. Boy, I I, I've got so many stories of, of the exact same thing. There's no way, absolutely no way that I've been, would've been willing. To drive four and a half hours to see the wor, to see Byron Katie. This, because what I heard about her was very little, and what I heard was not very remarkable to me. But, oh, well, I had nothing else going on that day. And my friend said, do you wanna go meet this crazy woman who, who, uh, claims to not suffer anymore? Eh, okay, sure. Whatever. And, and we went over there and, uh, man. Yeah, man. It changed, like that day my life changed. Same with, uh, you know, 1982, November 15th, alcoholics Anonymous. I go to an AA meeting. It's the second one I've ever gone to. The first one, I went with my brother and I felt like he tricked me into it. And I just wanted nothing more. And then to do with that, and then four months later I get asked to go again. But the circumstances now have changed, not, and I, it's not still, it's still not because I think I have a problem with alcohol, but now I'm beginning to realize that my wife thinks that I have a problem with alcohol. So I was willing to say yes to something that I'd sworn I'd never do again. And, and the timing was perfect because when I went. I was able to really receive and enjoy and appreciate what was being offered to me at that time, and I, I made it my new addiction.

Marty: So and so we could use that as an example because the, the next piece that I talk about in the article is you have to practice at this new reality. Like you had many of, like, I had 16 years practice being an academic, and you, you need structures, you need people, and you need to practice at maintaining, sustaining the new reality, you know, or, or. It goes away. That's how the old reality got established was with

Bill: That's right. That's right. I hated the taste of beer. First time I ever drank it.

Marty: Right, right.

Bill: I hated that first hangover. I had to work really hard to.

Marty: Interesting. Yeah. Right. Yeah.

Bill: And then I loved it. I didn't love the hangovers that never got used to that, but, but you know, chasing after that change in how I felt inside thanks to, to the alcohol, you know? That's what, and then I got to a point where I realized it wasn't sustainable, just like you did. I came to a point where things changed inside and I was willing to try something different.

Marty: I was recently shopping from a new men's group, and I noticed as I was leaving one of these meetings. Man, I just, I just sort of snowed them with all my usual stories about me told in all the usual ways. I'm like, oh my God, how do I expect to get a new kind of friendship or new community if I'm doing my old show?

Bill: Yeah.

Marty: That's what I mean about you gotta practice at the new reality.

Bill: I am, I'm chuckling because I just had had a vision of you with a top hat and a cane doing, doing a dance for the men's group.

Marty: Right. We all have those stories. We, we've told them a million times. We, we, you know, we don't, we're not even present when we tell them anymore because we know exactly how to tell that story.

Bill: Yeah. Over your right shoulder On the top Shelf is a, looks like a red, white, and blue book called Getting Real by Susan Campbell.

Marty: Mm-hmm.

Bill: that's, my eyes are drawn to that right now as, as we're having this conversation. That's

Marty: Red, white,

Bill: black. Is it black? Okay. I, I couldn't tell. It's to your left a little. There you go. Yeah,

Marty: Yeah. That's one of my

Bill: it's fantastic. Susan Campbell, that was written I believe in the nineties.

Marty: Oh, that's

Bill: Yeah. Yeah. But, but boy, okay. All right. Yeah, that was still the nineties, wasn't it? I'm just kidding. So, yeah. But Susan Campbell basically says, is say the scary thing.

Marty: That's right.

Bill: Be, be truthful, be aware of your old shtick and, and operate outside of it.

Marty: This is such a good book. Oh my God, you're not crazy. You're complex. When you have mixed emotions, she's like, oh, you're not crazy. You have, you're, you're

Bill: Yeah. Yeah,

Marty: You have parts. In other words.

Bill: Alright, Marty, we need to begin to wrap up here. Uh, how would we summarize what we've talked about just now?

Marty: well, I think one of the things that we could say, and by way of summary is that there, there's, there's, um. The recognition that you want a new vision, there's the creation of the vision and then there's the implementation of the vision. And in all three stages you wanna, you wanna be aware of your parts,

Bill: We also discussed that even though we may not be consciously aware of it, there was a mission or a vision. Place before the new vision, and that's also gotta be acknowledged and addressed.

Marty: Right.

Bill: What, what has been the driving force behind all that we do? And don't do What? What has been the vision or the hope? And many times it is the avoidance of something painful. And with this new vision, once the avoidance of something painful is resolved. In whatever way you do it, whether it's the IFS model or another powerful coaching mode or a book that you read, or in therapy, you shift from, oh, no longer is my life focused on avoiding pain and suffering. It's now, now I need a new vision That's more empowering and inspiring and, and once that the, the depth of that previous mission that's now been acknowledged has been resolved all the way down to the its core. Now there's room for a new context, a new vision, and we also talked about how important it is to treat the newness, the new strategies, the new approach, the new values, the new clarity, like a new employee where,

Marty: Right. That's good.

Bill: where there.

Marty: Just go back for one second to the, it might not be like, in my case, it wasn't, uh, a pain that I was avoiding. It was the ins, it was the immediate gratification of a, of a young part. Like, oh, you're good at

Bill: Mm-hmm.

Marty: Right? That's what kept me going for, for 16 years was that, that I kept getting those dopamine hits. Oh yeah, you do this.

Bill: Uh, yes. Okay. So the pursuit of a pleasure that was not really not sustainable. Uh. Yeah, yeah. The avoidance of paying the pursuit of pleasure and now this new vision could very simply turn into another pursuit of pleasure. And that's, that's probably gonna not last nearly as long as the, let's just use your example, 16 years that it took you before, or 55 years for me. Um, because we'll recognize, oh, this is another temporary unsustainable thing and they're, and it's being driven by another avoidance mechanism inside, I'm pursuing pleasure so I can avoid something else. Once that context clears again in whatever way it takes to, to whether it's life, just serving up life in the, in a way that helps us to expose our blind spots and then move beyond them. Then we, we continue to develop another vision and another vision and another vision, and it just continues to expand and, and broaden, which is, feels like a daily process for me. It just,

Marty: I know is. It is.

Bill: yeah. And I love it. I absolutely love it. So, um, let's go ahead and say goodbye. This has been a great conversation. I've really appreciated it.

Marty: As

Bill: Yeah, and I love that we, we had five minutes of planning before we hit record and, and just explored and discovered and improvised as we went along. I also wanna acknowledge that, you know, I've listened to those two, um, episodes that you came very prepared for, and. While I was in the experience of those presentations, I felt a little awkward and off because I hadn't expected those. As we discussed a couple weeks ago, um, when I listened as a listener later, it was just so informative and I, and I think I forwarded you Cheryl's comments about what a huge difference that it made to hear your presentation on meditation. And, and she said she took pages of notes. So I thought, well, okay, great. Cool. Maybe there's room for us to be prepared and to, to improvise in these conversations.

Marty: Thank you.

Bill: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. Thanks for preparing.

Marty: Yeah, well we had talked about those two topics and I thought, well, important topics. I wanna know what I'm gonna

Bill: Yes, and I, I would, let me just.

Marty: I'm sensitive to that. You know, a prepared talk does it, you receive it differently.

Bill: Yeah.

Marty: And so I wouldn't want, you know, to do preparation at the expense of whatever attraction there is to the spontaneity of our

Bill: Yeah. By the way, this is another example of my being willing to shift from what's comfortable. To something new, not only in, in recognizing the value of your prepare, being prepared and, and doing a presentation, but as a coach, when I'm doing a new group of workshop, I trust myself that if I'm not, if I don't plan ahead, it is probably gonna go fine. But what I have found is that if I will plan ahead. And notice how much time I have to work with, how many people are gonna be in the group, what I wanna have happen, what outcome do I wanna achieve? And I plan it out. It goes so much better. It still leaves room for improvisation.

Marty: You can always

Bill: Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, that's changed. Me too. Okay. We need to say goodbye so I can go to my men's group. Thank you, Marty.

Marty: Alright, enjoy. Bye.