1065. Healing your inner teen

0:00I want to talk a little bit about the difference between healing the entertain and healing the inner child and sort of make sure that what that looks like. Yeah, I would love to share with you an example. Can I share a little story? This is kind of a story of, it looks like multiple people kind of lumped into one. I've seen through dozens of women. So it's this woman named Michelle and she grew up in a family where her parents were like really perfectionistic, not a lot of emotion in the home. I think her mother was like a professor and so everything, the way that her mom talked to her was the energy like, if you don't do this, something bad's going to happen. If you keep eating like that, you're going to gain weight. If you don't do your homework, you're not going to get into a good school. If you don't, it was just like a fear-based kind of relationship really and her mom really

1:09kind of saw childhood as a deficiency. Little things like taking a long time to do homework or being messy sometimes. It was just like a devastation. Like everything was a problem and it was like it left her feeling like I can never be good enough. I am fundamentally wrong. There's something deeply wrong about me. The way she coped with that was through like really trying to prove so she would like go to school. She would do extra overload and then she would fail because she was trying to, you know what I mean, like overshooting to prove but then never being able to market. It was kind of like a self-fulfilling prophecy. And then in her marriage, it was kind of the reverberations where things like, you know, her husband would have a lot of these anger like spells and she would just like cater to him to try to like make it better, please him, but never like being fierce. So she just kind of like accepted.

2:11She didn't really have a voice with her husband. And then in her business, she owned a business. It was flailed for a long time because she had this pattern of like fill my plate and to get this program. I need to do this. I need to learn this thing. You need to get credentialized in that. And so it was just this constant swing between, I'm not good enough. So I have to overcompensate. But then I'm overwhelmed. Then I react to that. You know, so she was just kind of on this roller coaster. And in working with her, we got to kind of what was going on. And there was actually two different things happening. One was her inner child, the younger one was like, Mommy, I want you to love me for me. Like, please love me. See me. You know, so she's looking for the through all this like achievement, looking for that approval. Like kind of like what you were saying, Crystal, like arriving there, like to finally be at that place where she's good enough. And then, but another thing was also happening, which was the teenager had a totally

3:13different experience, all that was happening. The inner teen was like, hissed at her mother. Like, why can't I ever win? Like, why can't I ever just be good? But that's what I really want is just to be good. So there was also this anger and rage of the inner teenager. And it was like the two of them were at odds. The inner child was longing for the mother's approval. But the inner teen was like, F you, Mom, I don't want anything to do with you. So there was like this push pull where the two inner parts were kind of at odds with one another. So in our work together, I helped, we kind of got clear on these two different things that were happening and really giving each kid a different thing from her as her adult self, right? So I talk about this process called validate, differentiate, revalidate the emotions. Whatever they are of the inner child, and then we differentiate, which is meaning that

4:14we kind of differentiate the past from the present because a lot of what's driving the tension with the inner parts is that they're operating on a false conclusion of what will help them feel safe. They're looking for regulations. So they have different needs. So it was a matter of kind of working with both parts at once, but giving them two different kind of developmentally appropriate messages of what they needed. So for the inner child, the younger one, it's about nurturing, it's about affirming her goodness, her love ability, no matter what, differentiating that whatever mom treated us, her inability to accept us for who we were, that's really her stuff. It actually never had anything to do with you. With the inner teen rebelling against that constant control, the message that Michelle needed to give her inner teen was like, I respect you. And yeah, your rage is 100% legit and makes total sense. You have every reason to be angry, right? So really listening to inner teen and validating that rage.

5:18So in so doing different things with each part over time, and this doesn't have to take a ton of energy, but it has to be consistent. The two, they calm down and they start to feel more integrated. And there's less and there's less of a need to reactively compensate with creating problematic habits on the outside as well. Does that make sense? Yeah, I really relate to that because I do feel like when I think about it, it's like, I know deep down that you want, I want love and acceptance, but then there is the layer of the rage. I don't give a fuck part. So it is like the two parts that's like the younger self wanting to be seen, wanting to be acknowledged, wanting to. Yeah, just receive love and attention. And then the point in my teens where I was like, oh, fuck this. You know, it's like this absolutely is not working. So and that's wisdom. Yes. Yes. That's wisdom because you could see the F that vibe is on point because you could see,

6:20you probably could see the lack of integrity in people around you. You could see that some things were not in your best interest, but you were being told that they were, you know, you can see through the BS, but you're not given the, the, the, like latitude or autonomy to necessarily act on that. Yeah. And it's almost like the, as a child, you are operating out of, I need to survive. And so it's like I need the love, the safety, the nourishment, the shelter that, you know, and then you differentiate yourself a bit as a teen where I think you're just, the consciousness is coming more and more online of like, oh, my parents are people and of it, you know, it's like I am an individual and this reliance on them becomes less and less for like a survivability. Absolutely. So I can see just the, it's such a, there's so much friction there because by society's

7:21standards and family rule standards, you're still under, quote, their roof. And so it's like the parent is like, no, you need me to survive. And therefore I would I say trumps all. And then there's this part of us as a teen that's like, I don't think I need you to survive. But I would love to be, have all of those things like being acknowledged, respected, to thrive, you know, to really thrive. Totally. It's like the teen needs, they do need nurturing, but they really do also need respect and autonomy and a voice. So even if the teen's ideas are, you know, whatever, not, they need to at least be heard. That's what their developmental need is, right? So it's like they're at this precipice of I need, but I don't need. And that half and half needs to be respected by the adults. And often our adult parents, especially, you know, some older generations, I don't know how old our parents are, but they were not raised, were teens were respected.

8:25And even like, like in my case, my parents, they were like, met each other when they were 16 and then they got married, like when they were 22 or something like that. So they were kind of teens when they had me in a way. And like the, yeah, so it's really interesting how parents react based upon what their upbringing was. And a lot of parents, the old school, especially if this is how they were raised, would see things like meeting a voice, being able to be angry at your parents, they would automatically see that as disrespect, instead of, oh, my child is meeting a developmental need. And I need to kind of like, man up and be here for this. Because parenting is, yeah, one of the most demanding jobs on the planet, but also on the larger scale, our culture, I mean, the pandemic is a perfect example of how unsupported parents are with the pandemic and everything. So everybody's stretched then. And I think that's why right now we're seeing entertains acting out across the board. Parents, you know, people are, we're in a time of a lot of division.

9:27There's a lot of reactivity. And so this stuff is coming out. Tell me more about what you're about what you're like. What are some other examples of how you see the entertain activated? Yeah, one comes to mind. I was watching, I was like scrolling on something and I saw a news article about a teenager. An actual teenager was at a town hall meeting and his grandmother had died of COVID. And he went to the meeting because it was, it wasn't a town hall meeting. I'm sorry, it was a school board meeting. And they were trying to decide whether to mandate having masks in school, like making it required or not. And he was just up there saying, I would like to request that the masks be mandated because my grandmother just died of COVID because she was in a place that didn't require that. And I just lost her and I think it's, I think it's we should do that. While he was speaking, all these parents behind him were like making fun of him, jeering

10:31at him, mocking him. And I was like, oh my God, those mocking adults are actually, those are the traumatized entertains that are probably having a hard time with a teenager having a voice. Like think about it, a lot of adults who have not felt respected by their parents or grandparents, that might trigger a lot of their own, like who the hell do you think you are? You get to have a voice when I didn't get to have a voice. So I think that was one big example that stuck with me for like a week. I couldn't stop thinking about that because I was just like, it almost seemed like in normal times, like if this happened five years ago, that wouldn't have happened. But there's something about this time where I think we don't know what's going to happen in the world. There is no clear plan. We're seeing our systems. They're supposed to support us, flailing, just like we saw our parents fail us when we

11:34were teens. There's no real adult at the wheel. And so I think that's why teens are like coming out of the woodwork and freaking out. Thank you so much for tuning in to Morning Micredose by almost 30. We hope you enjoyed waking up. As always, we encourage you to take what resonates and lead the rest. If you enjoyed this trip, tune in to the full episode on the Almost 30 podcast. All episode information can be found in the show. Make sure to subscribe and if this becomes a part of your morning routine, be sure to share it with a friend. We have new inspiring doses Monday through Friday. Follow us on Instagram at Morning Micredose and follow almost 30 at almost 30 podcast. Thanks for listening. We'll see you in the vortex.