In this episode about Resentments, we dive deep into the complex and often overwhelming feelings of anger and bitterness that arise from past experiences or relationships. We explore the psychological and physical toll that holding onto resentments can have, from anxiety and depression to strained relationships and health issues. We discuss why letting go can be so challenging, touching on feelings of justification, lack of closure, and fears of vulnerability. Our conversation also covers current events, including the tragic school shooting in Georgia and the debate over banning cell phones in schools. Finally, we provide actionable strategies for overcoming resentment, such as practicing mindfulness, journaling, therapy, and setting healthy boundaries, all aimed at fostering healing and personal growth. You will learn how to transform your resentments into opportunities for peace and resilience.
Tune in to see Resentments Through a Therapist’s Eyes.
Think about these three questions as you listen:
- What past experiences or relationships do I still feel anger or bitterness toward?
- How have my resentments impacted my mental and emotional well-being?
- What steps can I take to begin letting go of resentment and moving toward healing?
Links referenced during the show:
https://www.throughatherapistseyes.com/category/podcasts/mentalhealthtips
Intro Music by Reid Ferguson – https://reidtferguson.com/
@reidtferguson – https://www.instagram.com/reidtferguson/
https://www.facebook.com/reidtferguson
https://open.spotify.com/artist/3isWD3wykFcLXPUmBzpJxg
Audio Podcast Version Only
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Episode #287 Transcription
Chris Gazdik: [00:00:00] Hello, this is Through Therapist’s Eyes on September the 5th, 2024, and we are going to talk about resentments. This is a topic that I think affects most, if not all, of us. You out there who do not have resentments can tune out, but I’m pretty sure nobody turned the dial off.
John-Nelson Pope: On that one. No, and you’re going to give us a five star rating too.
They will, John, because
Chris Gazdik: they want to please you and make sure that you are not upset you are correct.
John-Nelson Pope: And they won’t resent it.
Chris Gazdik: They will not resent hitting the subscribe button. And that John won’t
Victoria Pendergrass: resent them for giving a less than five star review. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: This is where you get through a therapist eyes.
Insights from a group of therapists in your home and car. Not to delivery Victoria of therapy services in any way Got the book out December is coming up Actually, think about your Christmas presents because a book on marriage would be greatly timed.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: just gonna start
Victoria Pendergrass: Like [00:01:00] year is flying by
Chris Gazdik: Like so like way.
I know exactly. I
Victoria Pendergrass: remember reading a book in June and that was
Chris Gazdik: ten books ago,
Victoria Pendergrass: and that was like 30 But I remember thinking then his next book in the series didn’t come out doesn’t come out until September 29th And I remember thinking back in June. Oh my gosh, that’s such a long time. And then now I’m like, oh my gosh It’s September like I have the countdown of like what?
You are getting way
Chris Gazdik: either way too comfortable or way too loose because I haven’t even said and Victoria Pendergrass is well
Victoria Pendergrass: Hi,
Chris Gazdik: Mr. Pope hanging out over there.
John-Nelson Pope: Oh, definitely.
Chris Gazdik: This is
Victoria Pendergrass: like my third Coke today. So probably you
Chris Gazdik: are, you are wired with no energy,
Victoria Pendergrass: no medication.
Chris Gazdik: Listen to that. Wired with no energy contact at through a therapist eyes.
com is how you contact us. Apple reviews are important. That is your part. If you liked the content, hit subscribe, tell a friend. Really and truly help us out with that. This is the human [00:02:00] emotional experience. Let’s get it going. So what past experiences or relationships do you feel anger or bitterness towards?
Have or how have my resentments impacted my mental and emotional wellbeing and what steps can I take? to begin letting go of resentment and moving toward healing. Now, the word I is you, the listener, you, listening to this show, not I, Chris Gazdick, because I have plenty of work to do on my own resentments.
Got a few. I’m working on letting go of them. But we’re going to do a couple of current events first.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yep. All right.
Chris Gazdik: All right. We have. First of all, yet another sad event. I actually have practiced my mental health this week by really tuning out. So I’m going to lean on you guys a little bit, because I know that we are not
John-Nelson Pope: worried about our mental health.
Chris Gazdik: Well, I can only do what I can do, John. I know
John-Nelson Pope: you need to [00:03:00] take care of yourself.
Chris Gazdik: I have had, I have had a week where I am getting nothing but rest. But what Chris
Victoria Pendergrass: is referring to is there was a recent school shooting in Georgia this week, right? Earlier this week, 14
John-Nelson Pope: year old kids were shot by a shooter who’s also 14 and then two teachers.
Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: with
John-Nelson Pope: some other injuries. Nine casualties. That’s a lot of people. Four
Victoria Pendergrass: casualties, nine wounded.
John-Nelson Pope: Well.
Victoria Pendergrass: Right?
John-Nelson Pope: Well, they’re called casualties if they get shot. Oh, gotcha. Okay. Okay, but nine wounded.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: Okay.
Chris Gazdik: Nine wounded, four dead, and it’s an absolutely it’s just, It’s torturous, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s really beyond sad and, you know, we get so egocentric in America to think that this only happens in America when we talk about it.
This is a, a, around the world [00:04:00] kind of an endeavor. We just don’t hear about it in the States as quite as much. And fairness, it happens in the States. Fairness is absolutely thank you, Victoria, because it does seem to happen more statistically speaking in the United States for whatever reasons.
John-Nelson Pope: And the other aspect of this was that.
The FBI had interviewed his father and him year earlier when he was 13.
Chris Gazdik: That’s a, that’s a unique component that I did not know about.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. And so what happened where, what, why were, because he was flagged. So this is
Chris Gazdik: what I want to talk about, John, mental health is a hugely important facet of all of these events.
It is a standard thing that we do. To screen suicidality and homicidality. That’s our job. Okay? When these events occur we end up [00:05:00] having the same conversations
John-Nelson Pope: all the time
Chris Gazdik: all the time and it’s maddening and kind of getting to the point of being over it because the We need to make people have deeper understandings of what our job is in assessing Homicidal and suicidal ideation.
We probably should do a whole show on it Right,
John-Nelson Pope: I think so. We we do that in our assessment constantly constantly Constantly
Chris Gazdik: But here’s the thing. Mental health is brought up in these conversations in a damning way towards mental health patients explaining how dangerous they are and threatening of a persons they are.
It is stereotypical, it is mythical, it is not even accurate.
John-Nelson Pope: Blaming the victim.
Chris Gazdik: It’s blaming the victim, John. Right, you’re right. And the thing of it is, is, when somebody is engaged in mental health treatment, we can all say with very clear eyes, very straight faced, even though allergies got me in a brain fog, I can be [00:06:00] very precise and clear to say that that is not typically when people are engaged in dangerous behavior.
Because they’re engaged in treatment. That’s true. Right. Now I’ve had, I’ve lost a client or two from suicide and it’s after they were engaged with treatment and not actively, I should say, engaged. Mental health people are not dangerous. They’re not a dangerous population because the population generally is pretty much all of us.
With mental health issues. Yeah. Well, and
John-Nelson Pope: there could be some arguments too about people with mental health issues. You could, you could argue that some people that are, are shooters don’t have a, the typical mental health issues. They are, they are, they have personality disorders, which is not considered.
technically mental illness.
Chris Gazdik: Personality disorders are narcissistic personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder. [00:07:00] Those are, and borderline personality disorder. Those are the typical sort of aggression ones where we have to really dangerously assess or carefully assess dangerousness, you know, in homicidal ideation.
Victoria Pendergrass: So basically what you’re saying is the people who carry out these acts are the ones who have. It struggles with mental health, but are not likely or does not engage in active
Chris Gazdik: Treatment or they would refuse it or they refuse
Victoria Pendergrass: it.
Chris Gazdik: That’s what we see So when we’re talking about mental health care in these conversations, we need to talk about Availability.
We need to talk about funding. We need to talk about outreach we need to talk about actual treatment care and what that is. We need to talk about medicinal treatment we need to talk about assessment, but that’s the most difficult piece. Okay. [00:08:00] Here’s the other segment that I wanted to say with this events, we are held to an impossible standard as a clinician when we’re told we have to assess homicidal.
Pre action to moving to action. There are not great scientific research availability of any protocol that I am aware of that you are to search for that will designate somebody as higher risk for acting their thoughts out. Against other
Victoria Pendergrass: people specifically is what we’re referring
Chris Gazdik: to. Correct. Homicidal ideation.
John-Nelson Pope: Volitional, there’s always the, that’s the, the factor that it’s the, the unknown factor is even if a person in all the signs says homicidal, the fact is, is that there’s a volitional aspect to this. That person may decide not to do it. And I mean, there’s always that, that [00:09:00] ability to
Chris Gazdik: choose. In fact, that is a fact.
Highly most likely when a mental health person lays eyes on somebody. We’re engaged with somebody, they’re engaged in talking and treatment, and they’re very likely to not act out on any of the impulses that they have. Highly unlikely. Volitionally to engage in harming somebody else. This is a very, very rare reality that somebody follows through on any kind of homicidal ideation, contrary to the numbers and perception that you have with the news talking about this.
This is highly, highly rare compared to people that have homicidal ideation and are treated, and volitionally so, their own way. Exploration of what’s going on with them. The thing that we need to talk about is what do we do with mental health professionals embedding in police? How do we get mental health professionals in schools to be able to have an outlet more readily available?[00:10:00]
What do we do with training people that are engaging in children and their care? Daycare workers even, because this kid’s 14 years old, John! Like, dude, we need early intervention. What do we do for poverty? What do we do for the risk
John-Nelson Pope: factors? But some schools, the argument is, some schools have school counselors who are, are in the way that schools are set up.
They often don’t get to do counseling. It’s brand
Chris Gazdik: new, John.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. They don’t do Oh,
Victoria Pendergrass: for sure. Yeah. And then It is rare nowadays that a school counselor gets to lead groups, gets to do individual therapy with Kids gets to engage in those different types of interventions with students. Most of the time they’re in school.
Counselors are in charge of five Oh fours, which is a type of jargon, jargon, state,
Chris Gazdik: state broad for those around the world as well.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. But they have a five Oh four they’re in charge of [00:11:00] like.
Chris Gazdik: Paperwork for disability, paperwork
Victoria Pendergrass: there. A lot of times they’re in charge of testing or they help out with testing.
Sometimes they have to cover a class. Sometimes they have to like do all these things,
John-Nelson Pope: junior principals.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. Or like, yeah, like assistant. I don’t know. But like then they don’t have. And as someone who has worked in a specifically in elementary school and for more time, and I’ve been in a middle school and a high school student for short periods of times, like, They don’t have time.
Like, even in high school, a lot of the school counselors are in charge of making schedules for all students.
Chris Gazdik: The point is, they’re not doing counseling. That’s right. It’s a new agenda. Embedded thing that we do have some progressive changes where clinicians are in schools. We do have different units. We have 9 1 1 now being, what is it?
Nine, eight. [00:12:00] Eight, nine. Eight, eight. So that’s the conversation I wanna have guys,
Victoria Pendergrass: but also what I did prior to coming here. is school based therapy, which here in Gaston County, which is where we’re located third party agencies have contracts with Gaston County schools where they implement and have a school based therapist there at a specific school to only do mental health therapy.
Like we’re not doing, when I was a school based therapist, I did not do anything else except for C students.
Chris Gazdik: So, so there’s some things that are out there. There’s some new things that are in place. My point. Before I get on another rant is I want to absolutely, cause I’m, I’m, I’m tired of this guys. I mean, we need actions.
We need things in place. We don’t need the same daggum dialogue that doesn’t get anything changed. We need to have conversations about what we’re going to put in place, what we’re going to fund, what we’re going [00:13:00] to provide, what we’re going to actually prevent so that we can get in front of these events.
Neil,
John-Nelson Pope: didn’t we, didn’t we have a discussion about school based shootings?
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, we did.
John-Nelson Pope: Before we did, we’ve
Chris Gazdik: had it
John-Nelson Pope: before.
Chris Gazdik: I
Victoria Pendergrass: think so. Yes.
Chris Gazdik: And we need to keep on being louder about it because it’s being talked about in the wrong way. When these events happen. I
Victoria Pendergrass: would agree. I’m going to
Chris Gazdik: make that bold statement.
These are conversations about mental health in the wrong way. It’s in a blaming way and it’s in a shaming way. It’s in a horribly. So we’re talking about, you know, taking people’s civil liberties away very preventatively. And it’s, I’m telling you, it’s a dangerous precedent.
John-Nelson Pope: And what about. All the kids and young the children, the teenagers who have, and teachers and staff who have been negatively impacted and their, their mental health is now dramatically hurt and developing PTSD just anxiety [00:14:00] depression.
Chris Gazdik: We need to get in front of these things and we need to talk to the people that know how to do them. And that’s not police.
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, and I think that just all right, go ahead. I feel
Chris Gazdik: like we need to get off this soon I think
Victoria Pendergrass: I also want to point out because only because I mentioned it before we went on air that This is not the, because John mentioned that the FBI talked to him prior, the, the shooter a year before, and this is not necessarily their fault that they did not stop this from happening, and that goes into the preventative, the lack of preventative, like, assessments to be able to say, like, this person is for sure going to carry out something, versus this person isn’t going to carry out something.
You can’t
Chris Gazdik: have. Quote unquote, using this term in our state’s politics, in our country’s politics to now and at days, you can, you can not have you know, witch hunts, Trump loves to use the word witch hunts in our, in our world or two tier justice [00:15:00] systems, you know, like we can’t have people being grabbed and civil liberties taken because somebody somewhere thinks they’re a bad person and we’ll take action.
That’s, that’s dangerous. It’s it’s it’s dangerous To to because you’ll just round up people Randomly that for no reason a large percentage of the time. That’s the that’s the challenge. Yeah, there’s a lot of
John-Nelson Pope: Inner working gears within gears that that’s moving here because we’re talking about the way you put that.
Yeah, we’re talking about societal fundamental societal changes, cultural changes, and interpersonal changes, interpersonal changes, and people take making responsible choices. And I think that’s one of the areas that, and then say, how do we accomplish that?
Chris Gazdik: I would love to see a national. Standard mental health class.
Victoria Pendergrass: Oh yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Right.
Victoria Pendergrass: Like a standard [00:16:00] high school class
Chris Gazdik: ideas and real functional things that we can do. John. All right. I’m going to get anyways. Yeah, let’s move on. Yeah. Okay. Excuse me. On a good note. I got my energy a little bit going. That’s a good thing. All right. A cooler. Current event item that I think is important that I really wanted to talk to you guys about.
Also, there’s about five states in our union. I wonder what we do around the world. But y’all around the world, this is getting interesting because five states in the United States, Virginia have banned cell phones in schools and I love it. Virginia. Love it. Virginia is one of them. One of them. Okay.
Okay. I have mixed feelings. Let me see if I can get, I know where you’re going, Victoria. Are you sure? I think I know where you’re going. And I’m gonna say you’re gonna have to deal with that problem.
Victoria Pendergrass: What is it?
Chris Gazdik: We’ll come, we’ll come there in a moment. Who, who else has got it? I’m, I’m gonna play a game.
Florida’s won. Florida’s won. Virginia’s won. Florida won. You got the other one? No, I don’t. [00:17:00] Ooh.
Victoria Pendergrass: I have no idea. I wanna
Chris Gazdik: say it’s somewhere, Michigan. Michigan. Michigan’s won, I think. Really? Yes. Well, that’s interesting. California’s won also. California’s one
Right. It’s a surprise. It’s a very bipartisan issue because we’re really, really figuring out the damning effects that phones have on anxiety and small young minds.
John-Nelson Pope: Inability to concentrate. They’re not dialed in to
Chris Gazdik: the coursework. Right. Now, at these schools that are banning cell phones, you know what they’re doing?
What? They’re playing Twister! They’re having conversations at lunch with like real people. And you know what they do during these contacts? It’s amazing. They make eye contact, John, right? This is a
John-Nelson Pope: good thing. One of my clients who is a teacher, he teaches sixth grade and he is, and this is not a school prohibition, but.
In his class, and he’s backed up by the principal is [00:18:00] that he has everybody put their phones in a marked bag. Each each kid gets their own bag and they put it in at the beginning of class and they take it out.
Chris Gazdik: Love it.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: So I’ll remind you that these youngsters are really beginning to figure out. That they don’t need nor want these cell phones.
I had a dad that told me when his kid came back from the, the, the, the three week, 18 day event where he slept over like a reap camp or something like that. And he asked the kid what the best thing was. You remember, John, what the kid said?
John-Nelson Pope: No.
Chris Gazdik: They took our phones away right in the first day. Oh, I do remember this.
And the kid loved it. Yeah. He loved it.
Victoria Pendergrass: Okay, so
Chris Gazdik: Victoria. This is all good in my head. What’s your trouble?
Victoria Pendergrass: My trouble is or do you
Chris Gazdik: want me to tell you what I think yeah You
Victoria Pendergrass: first tell me what you think it is for me
Chris Gazdik: You think you’re gonna be? losing your child or not able to contact your child or not be able to get access to your child to do crisis management when People are hired professionals engaged that [00:19:00] you trust to take care of your kids.
That’s what we do with people in schools.
Am I right or am I right?
Victoria Pendergrass: Ish.
Chris Gazdik: Ooh.
Victoria Pendergrass: Ish.
Chris Gazdik: How am I off?
Victoria Pendergrass: My worry is that, and we’re, I’m gonna connect it to the first current event that we talked We need to wrap this up. I know. But my worry is, say my kid is in school. And I know this is probably my anxiety talking, but my kids in school and a shooter does come into his school.
Now he has no way of contacting the, trying to contact the police. He has no way of, look, I’m going to cry. He’s has no way of contacting me to let me know that, like, what’s going on and that he loves me for like the last time before he could potentially die. Like focus one more time, John.
John-Nelson Pope: Bogus. How is this bogus?
It’s bogus because having lived so many years ago, we didn’t have that. And yet at the same time, [00:20:00] there were, there were shootings. Okay. It was not a new phenomenon is publicized. Not as much, maybe unfortunately, but there was a time in which people were going postal, but now they have for kids. They have.
These watches that they can have
Chris Gazdik: TV, you’ll see that he YouTube live, you’ll see that his watches up,
John-Nelson Pope: okay, they have watches and you know, some of these folks can actually use these watches to be able to do emergencies and do that and you can say
Victoria Pendergrass: connecting with your phone.
John-Nelson Pope: So no, no, no, no, it is actually have a little cell cellular
Victoria Pendergrass: You
John-Nelson Pope: can get
Chris Gazdik: one because if we can mass produce these Victoria and it’s a lot cheaper Now
Victoria Pendergrass: the issue is gonna be everybody has kid has a smart watch great It doesn’t they use that doesn’t do the same thing with it on the cell phone It’s
John-Nelson Pope: a heck of a lot harder [00:21:00] to text on that
Chris Gazdik: that doesn’t do any harm to their mental health Health.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: The reality of it is, Victoria, I’m going to join John and be strong on this speaking to all you parents out there that have the same concerns. I am a parent as well, and I understand deeply the fear that we have about such things, but it is fear and you have media
John-Nelson Pope: has. Has engendered their
Chris Gazdik: stoke, the fear made it so much worse.
You do not need to know where your child is. 24 hours. You do not need to know where your child is. When people are responsible for them, you can’t know that they’re safe. If you get a call at 1245, that a shot has happened and your son tells you that I am safe and I love you at 1247, you don’t know if that is going to be the case.
Are you going to check at 1248, No, it’s not realistic. This is an emotional experience that people are having out of fear that’s driving very dangerous behavior for our kids. Feelings are not facts.
Victoria Pendergrass: Here, yes. Here are the [00:22:00] states that have enacted actual legislation regarding cell phones in school.
Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, South Carolina.
John-Nelson Pope: I love it. That’s it. I think, I think the new one is California and Virginia.
Victoria Pendergrass: It says California likely to limit cell phone usage across state in 2026.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. So they haven’t done it yet. I was wrong. So here, here’s the thing. Let’s get off of this. But I think that there is very positive movement on a lot of platforms.
If we pay attention, we work together, we really do have human emotional experiences. And guys, I’m sorry for the energy if we’ve pissed anybody off, but I want people to be thinking. And I’m tired of having the same conversation, dadgummit. I want to have a different conversation that’s more productive and gets in front of these problems that we have.
Alright, let’s go to remembrance. Move on. Resentments. I resent that. We might have to make this a two parter. No, we’re going to fire through this and we’ll bring it up and talk about it again because how do you manage these things are something that we do most every day. [00:23:00] You have had experiences in relationships, you listening to the show, that you still feel anger about or bitterness, I’m willing to bet.
And when you think about those experiences, as we talk today, you have resentments that impact you. In AA, they talk about resentments hurt the person harboring the resentment. They do not hurt the person you are resenting. They may not even know you hold that resentment. And then steps that you can do to really let go.
And to move forward with healing. These are the things we want to talk about. So John, what the heck are resentments, man?
John-Nelson Pope: Well, you’re, it’s not just simple, like simple envy, which is you want, I want this. You asked me that earlier today. Well, I did because. I, I
think we have to establish that envy is, is maybe a simpler form of resentment, but you don’t resent the person having that.
You want what that person has
Chris Gazdik: when you’re envious,
John-Nelson Pope: when you’re jealous, but you don’t want the other [00:24:00] person to have. What they have and a good distinction. In other words, you want them to not have, have it. You don’t want them to succeed. You don’t want them to, to
Chris Gazdik: do harsh. Yes,
John-Nelson Pope: it is. But that’s what it is.
But you’re holding it and it’s almost like a a grudge. Yeah. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. I didn’t really thought of that level of ugliness as you keep going further. Cause I think you got more. Well,
John-Nelson Pope: right. No, I, no, I resemble that remark, but I re reason resentment is something where you let it get a hold of you so much that You get stuck and you’re not able it’s so it’s a, it’s a form of unforgiveness, not being able to forgive it’s, it’s because that person may have done something that was horrible to you, but instead of [00:25:00] being able to say, okay, I drop it or process it, move on, go on, you, you let it fester.
You’re keeping hate,
Chris Gazdik: hurt, fear, various, very rough feelings. What does it do? It. Isolate
John-Nelson Pope: you, okay, and you push people away, and so you become your disposition sours, your outlook in life. This is real rough stuff,
Chris Gazdik: complex, often long lasting feelings of anger or bitterness towards someone or something, usually resulting from a perceived wrong.
John-Nelson Pope: You internalize it. And so much so that your blood pressure goes up, even your cholesterol,
Victoria Pendergrass: physiological
John-Nelson Pope: side effects, it can the cortisol levels go up, you’re unable to sleep, you’re unable to then you say it’s, it’s a cycle. And so people don’t want to be around you. Because all they hear Yeah, [00:26:00] they
Victoria Pendergrass: have too much built up resentment.
I don’t want to hang around this. It
Chris Gazdik: is a slippery slope, John, and I think you’re doing a good job of really nailing the depth of it. You see,
John-Nelson Pope: by letting me know three hours before
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, then he couldn’t resent you for putting this topic on him last minute. John’s
Chris Gazdik: taking shots today, man! Yeah, yeah. I don’t believe in
Victoria Pendergrass: it.
Well, and I think the thing is, is, almost, I can bet you, that almost every single client we have We address some form of resentment at some point in time.
Chris Gazdik: Wow. That’s a bold statement. Say that again.
Victoria Pendergrass: That almost every client we have, we address resentment at least some point in time with almost with, I would say like 99 per, I mean, it may not be the reason that they came into therapy, but it comes up at least at some point,
Chris Gazdik: I don’t know if I’m going a hundred percent, but, but, but I mean, there’s exceptions in the in the nineties.
Victoria Pendergrass: I mean, I think, because I think a lot of times [00:27:00] people, and we may get to this, but people don’t realize that they hold on to resentment or that they have resentment towards things until they bring it up in therapy or with someone else and I’m like, well, it kind of sounds like you have some resentment towards this side of thing and they’re like,
Chris Gazdik: they’re
Victoria Pendergrass: like,
Chris Gazdik: really?
No, do I?
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. And then you kind of see the lightbulb go off above their head, and they’re like, okay, it’s clicking.
Chris Gazdik: And then you know what happens next, is they begin to become aware of their behavior. Because John, you started to lay out, like, this is, you’re actually wishing ill will towards the person when you have resentments.
You want them to fail. You want them to hurt. Misery loves company. I feel like I’ve been wronged and I want you to hurt for the way that I feel. Like it’s rough.
John-Nelson Pope: There good example was I had a client who was a mother who her with with a grown son and he was killed in a, in an accident which was entirely preventable.
And it [00:28:00] was due to inattention by by the, by the driver, he was, he was crushed. She held on to the anger and grief of that so long that it was making her so sick. She was physically sick. She actually suffered what is called the broken heart syndrome. It’s a real thing. It’s a real thing. And she had, she was near death.
Victoria Pendergrass: Wow.
John-Nelson Pope: Because she was holding on
Victoria Pendergrass: to so much resentment.
John-Nelson Pope: Wow. That is a lot. And so, and she had to process through that over a period of months where she started to heal again. Wow. But she damaged her heart as a result of that.
Chris Gazdik: It’s, it’s real. I mean. I have another really good example. I’m very confident he wouldn’t mind me telling the story.
There was a friend of mine. He was an older gentleman that I respected and we formed a friendship. [00:29:00] He was very much into church circles, and he
told me this story of The old church that he was at now. He’s been in our church like forever. So this is going back I’m willing to bet maybe two decades is my guess If not more because he was an older gentleman, and like I said, he’s been in our church for a long time so he told this story of hurts that he endured at a At a church long ago by another church member and it was unresolved, never dealt with and years, years later, a few years ago.
Now he saw this gentleman that he. Had resentments towards, and he made a decision to deal with it that day. And he went up to him and said his name and, you know, connected with him and, you know, said, I, I really need to, to apologize to you. I really need to share with you that I’ve been holding [00:30:00] on to stuff for so long, this whole time.
And as he’s engaging this letting go process, he described his whole body was just releasing all of this energy and he’s just weeping openly. Just all of this is coming out, you know, all at once because he, and he didn’t even know all of that was in there. He just knew that he needed to say something to this guy, like Victoria, to your point, what, what, what makes me most nervous about all the things that we do working with people is when we’re working with people that have emotions and don’t know that they’ve had those emotions.
They get embedded into your spirit, they get into your subconscious. You think that you compartmentalize them away. They silo it. They either get siloed and suppressed and even sometimes not even remembered here, okay? That’s called repression. So we do all of these things and then don’t even know that it’s affecting us and that’s why people are shocked when we say
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
Oh, hey, you look like you’re [00:31:00] carrying some resentment.
Chris Gazdik: Oh boy. Wow. I had no idea. So young therapists learn from that. Teach clients. Help them identify what they’re not identifying. I would say a
Victoria Pendergrass: lot of times it ends up becoming like a teaching moment. You So
Chris Gazdik: common causes are betrayal in relationships.
You know, man, that hurts
Victoria Pendergrass: all kinds of relationships, friendships, romantic, platonic, co workers,
Chris Gazdik: family,
Victoria Pendergrass: family, friends.
Chris Gazdik: How many family resentments do you think are out? I love that laugh, John. I found myself using it. Unresolved conflicts, unmet expectations. We’ll talk about expectations. Be careful about them.
When you perceive that you’ve been injustified, or holding on to past wrongs without those resolutions. These are, these are damning. These hurt.
Victoria Pendergrass: They
Chris Gazdik: really, really, your client, John, man. Almost death. I mean, that’s dramatic. But, I think real. Yeah,
Victoria Pendergrass: I mean, that’s a little extreme, but yeah, it can happen. [00:32:00]
Chris Gazdik: Okay.
Victoria Pendergrass: Crazy.
Chris Gazdik: How does this affect us? There are actual physiological effects, John, that you started talking about. You know, anxiety, depression, chronic stress, let’s just stop there. Like, Victoria, I think you’re right, I’ve never thought of that. What percentage of our clients probably have an unresolved resentment?
I mean, we see anxiety. They’re human. We see depression.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. So, but then that’s the thing is they come to us, Oh my gosh, I’m having all this anxiety. Oh my gosh, I’m having all this chronic stress or all this depression. My marriage sucks. But then when you dig in deeper, you, like, I’m not saying all the time, but
Chris Gazdik: I usually
Victoria Pendergrass: would say that there’s a good portion of that, that it’s because they’re holding on and carrying this some form of resentment towards
their partner, towards their spouse, towards their friend, towards their job, towards whatever.
John-Nelson Pope: The body remembers that. And so you can see the stress. Yeah. You can [00:33:00] see it in, in the tension, in the stress. Yeah. So sometimes PTSD manifests itself like that. It’s visible. I think Vandercock talked about the body keeps score. Yeah. I was talking about. Who is, who is Vandercock? I
Victoria Pendergrass: have a client who’s borrowing that book from me.
Well,
John-Nelson Pope: he’s a Dutch guy, but he was is he a psychiatrist or a psychologist? Nah,
Victoria Pendergrass: don’t, I don’t know.
John-Nelson Pope: Okay. But, but it doesn’t matter. Right. It matters to him, but, but the point of it is, is that trauma that you receive in childhood, for example, or you get bullied and incessantly, or, or you basically just kind of internalize it and it goes to certain areas of your body.
You get, you’re tense all the time, and so you start to hunch over, or you’re, you You
Victoria Pendergrass: have chest pains,
John-Nelson Pope: digestive [00:34:00] problems, I like to think of this as
Chris Gazdik: energy, John. I like to dumb it down, and my brain works better that way. There are a lot of physical realities, right?
Victoria Pendergrass: Right.
Chris Gazdik: Okay, when you feel energy about something, that should indicate it to you.
You may feel energy in your head, you just call that a headache. You may feel energy in your heart, you just call that high blood pressure. Blood pressure or you
John-Nelson Pope: top of my you
Chris Gazdik: know what I tend to do I tend to I tend to hunch my shoulders up. Yeah, right and I learned this when I was a young clinician My supervisor taught me that when I was whining about lower back pain, and I don’t know if he knew this I’m sure he observed it.
He was on point. He had me pegged because he’s like if you drop your shoulders You’ll notice a difference and I’ll be darned if I’m stressed out, I’ll, I’ll noticeably drop my shoulders like an inch and a half
John-Nelson Pope: mindfulness and my back feels way better. And, and again, what, what the [00:35:00] bandicoot was talking about was that there’s the, the, the PTSD in that, in his case, chronic stress becomes so overwhelming.
And so he works with people. To be able to process through that so that they can let go of that stress out of their bodies.
Chris Gazdik: That’s a big phrase. Letting go.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. How did he, how did he work with people? He just kind of, did he made this a sort of his yeah, strong awareness or whatever. That’s right.
Cause I’m honestly not familiar with him. Have you ever read the
Victoria Pendergrass: book?
Chris Gazdik: I have not, Victoria.
Victoria Pendergrass: Do you think
Chris Gazdik: lesser of me now?
Victoria Pendergrass: No, well, I’m just, no, I’m interested because it was a required reading for grad school for us. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: How recent is
Victoria Pendergrass: this now? Well, it wasn’t technically the whole book. 20 20 years. Were required.
In
John-Nelson Pope: our drama class. He, he wrote it at the 1990s. It’s a pretty old book. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 30 years, 30 years. But, but if
Victoria Pendergrass: it has a nice blue cover with like [00:36:00] this really funky, like,
John-Nelson Pope: but but follow is another one that, that works in, in that area as well with, with trauma and stress, but. And that’s one of the, the areas that, that, that people don’t think they have the ability to, to do this.
And so treatment would be to process the ability to do what to process and see well to face their stress, their, their, their hurt, the trauma to let go. Of resentments to let go of what happened to them or their guilt or shame in the, in the form of PTSD,
Chris Gazdik: I’m going to make a statement to you guys. I feel like.
Of all of the things, I really believe in teaching and taking a teaching model in what it is that we do. And I have said this before. I’ve never said it out loud or outside [00:37:00] of my head. So I’m really curious what you guys will say about this, to be honest with you. Because I really feel like one of the things I do well, Just a self compliment is, is make complicated things sort of seem much more simple and, and, and, and digestible and, and understandable.
And, and I find that that really is empowering for people that I, that I work with. But I have always struggled. To a certain extent of having a really good way of describing this letting go thing. Yeah, I feel like it’s hard to even describe and
John-Nelson Pope: especially if you don’t know how to do it. You’ve never done it Right.
So I mean that and so part of that might be teaching mindfulness
Chris Gazdik: Well, we’re going to have a whole section at the end of things that we do to let go of sentiments, but I’m just sort of wetting your whistle for that. And the idea that like, this is really hard to understand. And I feel like our clients, people struggle to really grab their arms around what it is when we say, you know, [00:38:00] I want to let go, like, let’s just set that up a little bit.
And we’ll work with that here because. That’s, do y’all find it hard to describe too?
John-Nelson Pope: Yes, and especially if, if you had yourself a difficult time learning how to let go. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: absolutely. I mean when
John-Nelson Pope: somebody says let go and let God, which we say in the religious circles,
Victoria Pendergrass: But sometimes I’m like, what does that mean?
What does that even mean? Yeah, I’m like, what does that even mean?
Chris Gazdik: Are people really able all of us? We live in the Bible belt, you know, big, strong Christians. I’m big Christian, all this, whatever. Are you really able to let go and let God, do you let God take control of stuff? I think Christians struggle with that.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah, people off there again. And I think that’s because of what you’re saying. Like, how do you just like, how, How do you teach it sometimes? How do you describe it? How do you like, yeah, your pastor, preacher, priest, whatever, standing up front in front of you or your friend or family member [00:39:00] saying, well, just let go, let God, I mean, it’s on pillows and everything, but like,
Chris Gazdik: it’s on pillows,
Victoria Pendergrass: but like, what does that even look like?
What does that mean? What do I have to do in order to let go? I
John-Nelson Pope: tell stories and part of that is scripturally. And that’s part, part of the thing is, is that. For example, Elijah. Getting, getting esoteric because a lot of people don’t know that story anymore. They used to, is that he defeated the prophets of, of Baal and they were and basically he feared for his life because the, they had, he had to run away from King Ahab, who was who was having some, really had it out for him.
And it was only until he was exhausted, totally spent, and he could no longer rely on, on his, what he thought was his own strength. Can’t even stand up. Can’t even stand up. That he was [00:40:00] able to let go. And then that’s when he
had no defenses. And that’s when God was able to speak to him or the angel of the Lord at that time.
Chris Gazdik: Right.
John-Nelson Pope: And but so it’s, it’s a process, I think. Surrender. Surrender. Yeah.
Victoria Pendergrass: And I mean, it also does mean giving up control.
Chris Gazdik: Well, Victoria, let me go to that
Victoria Pendergrass: section. Look
Chris Gazdik: at this list. Okay.
Victoria Pendergrass: Why is it hard for people to let go?
Chris Gazdik: feeling justified. Yeah. If you feel that you have a sense of justice that I’m justified my, I’ll hold onto this resentment.
Fear is a hugely. Motivating force a whole cell phone
Victoria Pendergrass: thing and fears
Chris Gazdik: right and fears of being hurt again We’ll lock you down into a resentment state a lack of resolution or closure This could be a marriage or a friendship. You have a conflict that you never got to talk to this. [00:41:00] We can’t fix it
John-Nelson Pope: It’s not gonna come back
Victoria Pendergrass: Sorry, go ahead.
Chris Gazdik: Yes. Feeling a need to be right. Humans want to be right. We’re fearful of being wrong. That can lock you down. My
Victoria Pendergrass: husband would say that I always have to be right.
Chris Gazdik: He would say that about Victoria. Trying to control things that we cannot control. Ding, ding,
Victoria Pendergrass: ding, ding, ding.
Chris Gazdik: Begin. Serenity prayer. A fear of change.
Again, a fear. Poor self esteem I had in my brainstorm. Because when you’re really not feeling good about yourself, you can’t be effective in most other things relating to other people. And forgiving them is going to be very difficult. Did I miss anything? What makes this so hard?
Victoria Pendergrass: When you were going to say lack of resolution or closure, literally every single, like, breakup that a couple had, All the couples go through where you don’t have the opportunity to, [00:42:00] like, ask those questions to get the closure for whatever reason.
Like, and then, you’re, it’s like ten years have passed and you’re, like, still can’t let it go because you haven’t, like, quote unquote, gotten closure. The closure from that person. And ten years is not an exaggeration. Yeah, like, heck, they’re, I’m happily married and I still think about, huh, I wonder kind of what led to that thing that happened, you know, like,
Chris Gazdik: Years ago.
Victoria Pendergrass: Years ago.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, like, literally, people, like, this is so important because What we’re talking about with high blood pressure, tension, and sleep problems that you pointed out, John, and barriers to emotional intimacy, and tear and trust down. These are some of the other impacts that this has. A lack of personal growth.
Like, you know, these are, this really impacts you. And if you have any level of chronicity with this, that means you’ve lived 27 years like that. Mm hmm.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. I mean, what does that do to
Chris Gazdik: a person?
Victoria Pendergrass: Weighs you down every time. Because then it’s not [00:43:00] the, the thing that I think to remember is, is it’s not, Oh my gosh, words.
Words are hard. It’s not, it’s probably not the only thing. That you’re holding resentment towards. So it’s like you hold on to this one resentment thing
happened 27 years ago. Well then, 3 years after that, this other thing happened that weighs you down even more. And then 2 years after that, this other thing happened.
And then 5 years after that, this other thing happened. Guess what now? And so then now Guess
Chris Gazdik: what now? I don’t trust anybody
Victoria Pendergrass: right or like
Chris Gazdik: or I’m all alone.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah, I have my walls are like the as high as like skyscraper selling right. And so then I think it’s also it’s not just that you’re carrying this one thing that happened 27 years ago, you’re carrying that one thing plus the countless other things that you are holding on to or that have happened to you over the last 27 years.
And now you’re like. The humpback of [00:44:00] Notre Dame, like, walking because you can’t, like, stand up straight because you’re holding on to all this crap that you can’t deal with. I mean, Victoria,
Chris Gazdik: you are on fire right now.
John-Nelson Pope: Pilgrim’s Progress written over 300 and some years ago by John Bunyan is the, is the story that, that Victoria just told.
So yeah, so that’s the first thing that came to my brain. Then yeah, I’m doing the hunchback of Notre Dame actually the me account of Mount Muddy Christo. Yeah, just we had lots of sat
Chris Gazdik: about this.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. A lot of literature talks about this and so if, if you can’t go to a therapist, read a book, read a good book.
Victoria. Yeah,
Victoria Pendergrass: don’t read the books I read.
John-Nelson Pope: So. Because. Can I just
Chris Gazdik: pause us all for a second? That’s bibliotherapy. For a lack of energetic group, I feel like we’re, like, going crazy. What is going on? Neil, did you put something in our drinks? Like, what did you do, bro? He just, his eyes just got [00:45:00] wide open behind the curtains.
He is drugged. He’s drugged us today. Let’s get to the good part. Yeah, and let’s spend a good bit of time on this notion of how do we? Handle this how do we let go? How do we operate? To let go and let God Because I think that’s a really important component. This is really hard to do. So these are strategies of letting go.
It really impacts you. How do we do this?
John-Nelson Pope: So to take it out of the realm of being a hackneyed phrase, how do we make it real?
Chris Gazdik: So, first of all, a quick little list on, you know, overcoming a resentment. You’ve gotta be self aware. Again, you can’t overcome this if you don’t know you’re harboring it.
Victoria Pendergrass: Example I used from earlier,
Chris Gazdik: right?
You just it’s [00:46:00] impossible.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: how do you let go of something? You don’t know you’re holding on to so you have to be really really careful and a safe bet is If you’re listening to this you can sit there and say right now in your car. Okay, you know what probably so Guilty as charged now. What am I guilty of resenting?
What, whom, when did I develop some sort of energy about somebody? And all you have to do is think of their name, think of their name, think of some interactions that you’ve had and see what kind of energy you have, because if you notice your blood pressure going up, your cortisol level raising, your adrenaline going, your face turning red, guess what?
You probably got John, you got resentment, big fat one.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Every time you go, you’re about to go visit that certain family member, you get that energy. Yeah, your blood pressure
rises. You start sweating. You start getting anxious. You’re feeling dread. [00:47:00] Like,
Chris Gazdik: that’s a sign. Like, you, you, pay attention to that.
You do have these things and you, you, you have to become aware and then we’re going to talk about what you do when you become aware, but they’re there. Recognizing that they’re there is super important. So that
Victoria Pendergrass: means like empathy and understanding.
Chris Gazdik: Okay, go. What is that?
Victoria Pendergrass: So like, trying, trying to understand the other person’s perspective or point of view.
Or like approaching the situation from a neutral standpoint. You’re avoiding taking things personally. I mean, we literally just did a whole podcast episode on empathy
Chris Gazdik: and taking things personally. Empathy
John-Nelson Pope: and understanding.
Chris Gazdik: It’s the age of Aquarius. John’s breaks out on song if you’re listening to us for the first time.
I don’t know. Something’s going on. Yeah. No, it’s just. Something’s going on. It’s the age of
John-Nelson Pope: Aquarius when the moon is in the seventh house.
Victoria Pendergrass: I’m checking the moon for today. Good old fashioned forgiveness. Yeah, just [00:48:00] boundaries.
Chris Gazdik: Setting them, holding them.
Victoria Pendergrass: Any client of mine knows that we probably, they’re probably sick of the word boundaries coming out of my mouth.
Because we talk about them all the time.
Chris Gazdik: Look, two main ones that I really feel like go a long way is first of all, that, that idea of really not taking things personally. You need a high self esteem. You
John-Nelson Pope: need self, you need humor, humor, self effacing humor.
Chris Gazdik: That is a wonderful tool, John. I didn’t even have it on my list anywhere.
Beast mode you’re in right there with that one because it’s huge if you can learn to laugh at yourself You don’t take things personally you relax on things. I mean you’re You’re going to be so much more light of spirit, right? And the other one is expectations that we’ve talked about on the show That if you do not come to expectations properly, you are doomed to develop resentments and that is either [00:49:00] agreements that you make with the person or persons or long term norms.
You’re right.
Victoria Pendergrass: Which we’ve talked relentlessly about on previous podcast episodes. Pay
Chris Gazdik: attention to that because you will get yourself into an unforgiveness state and the other person doesn’t even know that they have to meet an expectation because there was no agreement and you’re gonna hold them.
Accountable to it. For the next 10 years like that’s not that’s
Victoria Pendergrass: like if I resent my husband for not taking out the trash But I’d never communicated to him that I would like for him to take out the trash
Chris Gazdik: mind reading Yeah, no, or you think that you’ve communicated and you haven’t done it effectively because you only said it once seven and a half years ago
Victoria Pendergrass: Headphones on while he was playing a video game.
So he wasn’t even listening to me, you know Yeah, and then i’m like but I told you the one time and he’s like No, you didn’t look take
Chris Gazdik: accountability when you notice you’ve got energy going on about something Something is hurting you or you’ve been holding on to something and you become aware of it take accountability for that Do what my [00:50:00] friend did and go to that person and you may find an equally valuable release of energy.
And then you feel peace.
John-Nelson Pope: What do you do when you have a client that actually progresses further than you’ve already progressed? It happens all the time. Yeah. I love it. They surpass you. I love it. I love it.
Chris Gazdik: John. That’s why I say we. I don’t resent it. I don’t resent it. That’s why I say we figured this out together.
Yeah. You, we’re not going to figure these things out isolated alone and resentments do. You’re right, John. The whole world’s isolated. So I think that happens all the time and people say things that I learned from in therapy. I mean, it’s a bonus of the job.
Victoria Pendergrass: Also, it’s not a full moon. It’s a waxing crescent.
So,
Chris Gazdik: I don’t
Victoria Pendergrass: know what’s going on. Oh, you looked,
Chris Gazdik: you looked it up? I
Victoria Pendergrass: looked it up. Next full moon isn’t until the 17th. Blue
Chris Gazdik: moon. Neil did it, man. Neil’s got this stuff in our water. So
Victoria Pendergrass: now we’re gonna move on to strategies of letting go.
Chris Gazdik: How do we deal with this, guys?
Victoria Pendergrass: Mindfulness. [00:51:00] My favorite thing.
Min
Chris Gazdik: Why is that your favorite thing?
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, I mean like, heck, I end every single session of mine with a deep breath. Really? Sometimes, yes. Now, I do have some specific clients who have told me that they don’t like it, so we don’t do it. Okay. And usually I try to inquire. Why they don’t like it because usually there’s a reason.
But yeah, basically all of my clients now, every single session, I, we end with a deep breath. And sometimes I’m like, do we need to take another deep breath? And they’ll look at me and they’ll go, yeah. And so then we sit and we take another deep breath. Recover
Chris Gazdik: a little bit more.
Victoria Pendergrass: And I do it with them too because sometimes like, Therapy’s a lot and we need to kind of like ground ourselves a little bit before we go back out into the world for the rest of the day.
I love that. And so, yeah, feel free to take it if you want to. It’s nice that you do. I
Chris Gazdik: mean it.
Victoria Pendergrass: But anyways, outside of my therapy sessions mindfulness and meditation are gonna be great for focusing on the here and now, focusing on the present. Focusing on like where we’re feeling things in our bodies, which is kind of [00:52:00] what you’ve been talking about.
Like the energies, am I feeling that every time I go see this cousin, am I feeling like chest pains? Am I feeling anxious? Am I feeling stressed? So on and so forth.
John-Nelson Pope: I can’t improve on that.
Victoria Pendergrass: Okay. Great. Well, I’m going to pat myself. It’s a pretty good compliment. That’s a
John-Nelson Pope: pretty freaking good answer. Yeah. I think she was very thorough.
I
Chris Gazdik: mean, for
Victoria Pendergrass: real, my favorite thing. Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: These are a few of our favorite things. We also have
Victoria Pendergrass: things like journaling, which is another one of my favorites.
John-Nelson Pope: Okay. The other thing that I would like to add on to that, and I haven’t gotten that far down, but I’m only on the second one. You rehearse, you rehearse.
The forgiveness and the letting go practice practice. Okay.
Victoria Pendergrass: Because practice makes progress. Practice is not, this is
Chris Gazdik: another really good and important point, John. Yeah. Dramatic pause. Cause you’re, you’re touching on something, but I want to take it a little bit of a different
John-Nelson Pope: that, [00:53:00]
Chris Gazdik: that really has a lot of misperception wrapped around this.
There is a belief that if I. Actually become self aware and I have the internal resiliency to deal with this and I acknowledge that I have a resentment and then I even go so far as to take an action and maybe I make amends or I forgive or I have a conversation or I do this mindfulness or I do journaling, whatever it might be, and we’ll have more that we’re listing here.
Is that a one and done?
Victoria Pendergrass: Absolutely not.
Chris Gazdik: No. The fact of the matter is, you grab back onto your resentments when you let a resentment go sometimes, or you only partially let go. This is a multiple time kind of thing. It’s
John-Nelson Pope: a process. It is a process. It’s lifelong. And I, I like, I like to [00:54:00] think of it as like an upward spiral.
And in other words,
Victoria Pendergrass: it doesn’t really stop. It doesn’t
John-Nelson Pope: really stop. But so you’ll have other events that remind you of a past event and then you have
Chris Gazdik: to do it all over again. That’s not
John-Nelson Pope: a bad
Chris Gazdik: thing. Not all over again. I don’t want to put it that way because people will hear that and be like, Oh, that sucks.
I, this is never ending. No, you get to add to. You get to join with, you get to grow with. It’s stronger and stronger and stronger.
Victoria Pendergrass: It’s the same reason why I have, I literally have a thing in my office. I don’t want
Chris Gazdik: to jump off, John. No, no, no.
John-Nelson Pope: I, I, I, I would have been able to clarify that. I re, no, I don’t resent any of that.
No.
Victoria Pendergrass: Sorry. No, you keep going. I’m sorry.
John-Nelson Pope: The, the thing is, is that it’s, it’s something that you give yourself grace upon grace upon grace and you, you able to do this and that you feel like, and you think you feel like you can’t [00:55:00] make any progress. But the reality is if you use some self deprecating humor.
Or you stand outside of yourself a little bit, you can see that you have made progress and that you’ve grown.
Victoria Pendergrass: Well and,
Chris Gazdik: even if it’s a little bit. Just a little bit. Cause the first time that you do this, you’re gonna be clumsy. The first time that you really work towards working something out with somebody, it’s going to be awful.
Awkward
Victoria Pendergrass: first pancake girl
Chris Gazdik: going to have great trouble with you know feeling comfortable This may not feel good at first, but the payoffs are Tremendous. What’s the first pancake
Victoria Pendergrass: which I’ve talked about the first pancake rule or on The podcast, but the first pancake rule is with this expectation that your first pancake is never right.
It’s never perfectly round. It’s all messed up. You burn it. You don’t cook it right. It’s a mess, but you can eat it, but you can still eat it and [00:56:00] you improve. Each time you make it. So we give ourselves the first pancake roll to allow ourselves to have that grace To know that like we’re probably gonna mess up the first time we try something new or the first time we attempt to do something Which is again what I was trying to say earlier Well, I have that sign in my office that says strive for progress not perfection because we’re not We’re not trying to be perfect here.
It’s not a one and done It is like you’ve said, a progressive thing.
John-Nelson Pope: Adler. Adler was one of the original fathers. We do. But he, he said, act as if. In other words, live into that, that thought or that higher Attitude of what it is that you what it is that you want and you will grow into it So it’s not prophecy works that way too, right?
So if it works negatively it also works positively, right?
Chris Gazdik: Love this.
Victoria Pendergrass: So we also got [00:57:00] things like you know, we just go
Chris Gazdik: through you got what you got more ideas. These are
Victoria Pendergrass: yours No, I was just going to read the list.
Chris Gazdik: Oh, okay.
John-Nelson Pope: She, she wants, we’re just talking.
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, we talked about journaling. We’ve got therapy, which we’ve obviously talked about relentlessly today.
Practicing gratitude, communication. I will say effective communication rather than just plain old communication. Yelling
Chris Gazdik: and screaming. Well, yeah, I could punch a hole in this wall and that’s going to
Victoria Pendergrass: communicate some things to you, but that’s not very effective. Conflict resolution, prioritizing self and self care.
Talk about that a lot.
Chris Gazdik: We do. I like self care. Putting
Victoria Pendergrass: ourselves first sometimes. It’s okay to be selfish occasionally. Relaxation techniques. Which kind of hits back to like the mindfulness. Connecting with others. Community. Yeah, community. Slowing down. I think that’s an important one. Slow down.
You’re moving too fast. You gotta make
John-Nelson Pope: the morning last.
Victoria Pendergrass: What he [00:58:00] said. It doesn’t have to be. Well, we live in this world where it’s like go go go go go all the time. And it’s sometimes okay to like press pause, take a step back, and like slow down.
Chris Gazdik: Reckless abandoned is not usually a good option.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Impulsivity is not usually a good option. Going with your gut. feelings when it’s based on hurt, fears, and angers is not usually a good reaction. Now,
John-Nelson Pope: some people, granted, might have more difficulty with the impulse control. Let’s say they, they are someone that, that has been gifted with ADHD or ADD.
Chris Gazdik: Victoria is gifted. She raises her hand. Indeed.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. So.
Chris Gazdik: I feel like one of the big things with this in all of these pieces really relates around fear. You know. What was it Kennedy right like It’s so ironic. We we get so driven by fear. We get so [00:59:00] wrecked by fear. We get so Stuck by fear. We get so numb by fear and you know, the statement is, you know, we have no fear but fear itself No, that’s Roosevelt Roosevelt Teddy Roosevelt.
That’s right. I said Franklin Franklin Roosevelt. I have allergies, John.
John-Nelson Pope: No, I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to correct you. Thanks
Chris Gazdik: for saving me on that one. No,
John-Nelson Pope: no, you, they were, yeah, you said Kennedy, Roosevelt, Democrats.
Chris Gazdik: We have no fear, but fear itself. There is nothing to fear. And our fears definitely drive these instances.
So I feel like if we can attack the fears that we have, we will realize that That what’s been plaguing us with this unforgiveness or this situation or this person, there’s, there’s just, if you, how would you feel if you replaced fear with confidence? How would you feel if you replaced fear with agency or empowerment?
Or [01:00:00] replaced fear with resiliency.
Victoria Pendergrass: I might not have as many clients. I know I
Chris Gazdik: can handle this situation coming up tomorrow. I have the ability. I am enough. These are, these are powerful statements. Positive
Victoria Pendergrass: affirmations.
Chris Gazdik: Right? You heard that
John-Nelson Pope: before. Perfect love casteth out all fear. That was scripture. So love.
Love. Love. In other words, fill the.
Victoria Pendergrass: All
John-Nelson Pope: you need is love. It fills the void. So replace. So, replace the fear with love.
Chris Gazdik: And that doesn’t mean passivity. No. That doesn’t mean doormat.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: That doesn’t mean do gooder and not ever standing up. We’re not talking about losing assertiveness. Yeah. Loving is action.
We’re not being
Victoria Pendergrass: a pushover.
John-Nelson Pope: So it’s a muscular love.
Chris Gazdik: Right. Yeah. Strength. Resiliency. Right. Right? Absolutely. But you said something that’s interesting. You used a word there. [01:01:00] And you’re, you’re using the word replace.
Victoria Pendergrass: Oh, okay. I was like, you use a lot of words.
Chris Gazdik: I’m keying in on the word replace. So it’s interesting that these states of resentments are because of unresolved conflicts, where you feel justified in your anger that you’ve been, you unjustly treated or wronged in some way, and you just hang on to that.
Well, if you, if you acknowledge, I have negative energy, that’s about me. I’ve identified it might be about this person or situation. You can think back at your memories. Literally, the way that you remember that event or person. And you can examine that in your frontal cortex. We have abstract thinking ability.
And we can look at those long term memories and literally reframe, you can rewrite your history.
John-Nelson Pope: Yes, that’s the whole point of Viktor Frankl existential logo therapy. That is, you [01:02:00] can, jargon, jargon time. What a moment! In other words, you can reexamine your life and those activities and you can say, henceforth, in this memory, I’m not in denial.
I see things as they really are and I’m able to, to reframe it, reconceptualize it and reinterpret it and give meaning. And
Chris Gazdik: these are powerful statements, say, say them again. Can you? Yeah, I can. You know that. Just rewind,
Victoria Pendergrass: rewind the podcast and listen again.
Chris Gazdik: You don’t get a redo. You can’t change your life.
You can’t change the events, but you re examine this and you re understand. This is one of the reasons why I like the title of my book, re understanding your marriage and becoming your best as a self, as a spouse. That’s the subtitle. Re understanding your emotions and becoming your best self. Those [01:03:00] are, those, that’s what we’re talking about.
Victoria Pendergrass: You’re, you’re,
Chris Gazdik: you’re digging into things that you’ve assumed. You’re digging into things that you’ve just allowed to stay stuck. And, and, and re examining literally what it means to you. What happened to you. And that’s beautiful to watch someone go through.
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, you know what they say about assuming.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, you wanna, you wanna do, you wanna do the word? You really do, don’t you? It
Victoria Pendergrass: makes an ass out of you and me. There you
Chris Gazdik: go, Victoria. Few other things to add. Creating a vision. I think you mentioned slowing down. Being mindful of how you talk to people. How you touch. How you yell. How you Your voice tone, you know, being gracious, you said, John, I mean, there’s, there’s a lot of facets to this and it’s still hard.
To understand letting go. And I think it might be hardest because you don’t know that you need to, if you hear anything today, I think really, I want to encourage you to be calm, more self [01:04:00] aware and take actions to give yourself some, a break. Isn’t
John-Nelson Pope: that the
Chris Gazdik: greatest
John-Nelson Pope: adventure,
Chris Gazdik: right?
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. What
Chris Gazdik: do you mean go further with that?
Well,
John-Nelson Pope: you know, we, some people try You know, the great story is, is everybody, they go on a journey, but the greatest journey, I mean, they want to go to places. I want to get out of this town because it’s a one horse town. There’s no future. Well, the reality is at least in my mind now, looking back after 71 years is that the greatest adventure is that internal inward journey where one gets an opportunity to grow and make relationships and you can do it here.
And now in the present and, and, and that’s a gift I’m, I’m better at it than I used to be. I’m not where I want to be yet, but I’m, I’m on that journey. You’re on the way. I’m on the
Chris Gazdik: way. John, that is a [01:05:00] beautiful way to take us out. I think I really just want to stop there. Well said, listen, be good to yourself.
Let go, be careful about how this hurts you because you can live a different way. If, if you would want to as John. Just taught us. Take care, stay well, we’ll see you next week.
Bye