speaker-0: Welcome back to another episode of Making the Time, where we're continuing to focus on our self-care guide, our wiser elder self. My guest is again Annie Galfand, and we've talked a lot about self-care, self-compassion in our wise elder self and the choices we make. And that love and trust have to be the foundation of. How we relate to people. And but in this episode, we're going to delve into my Oracle deck. And my Oracle deck is made up of self-care cards, wisdom, actions, and internal obstacles. And I just want to share with the listeners that I learned a lot about my internal obstacles. We call them saboteurs then from Annie. So I can't wait to get into this conversation. Welcome back, Annie.
speaker-1: Thank you, Pam. Beautiful introduction. It's lovely, lovely to see you again and to be here again.
speaker-0: Thanks. So we we covered a lot about the inner wisdom. And I think a couple of the things that I want to remind listeners is what you talked about slowing things down and breathing. And to me, that's where we really can get in touch with that wise, wise one within that wise elder self. And if you can embody it, it it it makes an even bigger impact. So in my Oracle deck, I sent you the other three cards. So you had a little bit of time to just kind of think about it. and so I sent Annie a wisdom card, which is a loving kind of statement, an action card, and an internal obstacle card. And the three that I chose were at random. Forgiveness. May I see forgiveness as a tool to deeper connections within and outward? And then the action card was align. And isn't that interesting? You talked about aligning at the very beginning of the our other episode. And I do these randomly. Align. I align my thoughts and attitudes and my expression for my highest good. So let's just play with these two cards first and then we'll of course we'll have to pull in the saboteur of the inner obstacle card. So how do you think that forgiveness and aligning or alignment strengthen our wise elder self, our wise one within?
speaker-1: let's start with forgiveness because I I do feel like that is another foundation, just like self-love. I think what happens a lot of times is over the course of our lives, when situations happen. And I I I I don't know about other people, but I imagine having worked with people for over forty years, that there are a lot of us who do this. We take an action or we say something or we do something that we then judge ourselves for later. I should have shouldn't have done that. And maybe you're one of those who has a really active mind and it goes over and over and over and won't leave you alone. I used to be like that. That's why I started meditating. Thank God for meditation on really. That actually was the way to get to inner wisdom, to quiet all that chatter of the monkey mind. Because as long as that chatter's going on, you can't even how can you know that you have any inner wisdom you need to quiet it down in your mind? So there so there's once you start to slow things down, once you start to Really look within and you and you tune into all the judgment that you've had for yourself over choices that you've made in the past. And you're sitting with them, which isn't going to feel good when you don't like the choices that you've made. And so you again, you're at choice. I can sit here and hate myself for the rest of my life because I've made these dumb choices, but that doesn't feel very good. So What else can I choose? And and the other choice would be, well, I did the best I could. You know, the four agreements. You and I talked a lot about the four agreements. Right? I just did a blank on one most of them, but I I mean you do your best. Always do your best. That's one of them. Always do your best. So whatever we did in the past, we did the best we could then. And if we could if we there are so many tools to get to forgiveness, you and I know quite a few of them. One of them might be to just have that conversation. You know, in it, that's what inner family systems is mostly about is an a conversation within, with those parts of us that made those choices back then. Yeah. And forgive them. Really truly forgive them and forgive ourselves any anywhere that we have hurt another, anywhere where we have hurt ourselves. If we don't forgive ourselves and we don't forgive the other, we're living with that pain within. And that's not a healthy, eventually that's going to hurt your body because the mind and the body are connected. And ultimately, it emotions, stuck emotions, are what causes illness in the body.
speaker-0: Yeah.
speaker-1: So when we can get to When we can get to a place where we can be at peace, that is so important to be at peace within. If you're really gonna be a masterful coach or masterful in your life, and I I sense it in you, Pam. I mean, one of the biggest things I really see, not having seen you and talked to you in such a long time, is there's a peacefulness about you now. Right? There's a lot of self forgiveness and self compassion that's taken. over your life, which is beautiful to witness. And we need it. We need more of that in the world. I'm so glad that's what you're up to.
speaker-0: Thanks, Annie. Yeah. Forgiveness, yes. And I'm so glad you you touched on both forgiving ourselves and you know the parts of ourselves. I remember you introduced me to Peter Gerlach's work. And even today I love to say, you know, there's a part of me that wants it, then there's another part of me, and just learning to reconcile them, listen to them. Listen to that. We will get into that in a minute.
speaker-1: It kind of ties in together with your saboteur conversation because a lot of those parts are what we would call saboteurs. You know, those places like that job I was talking about at the hospital in Montreal, they hired me. It was the first time they had ever integrated a business development for revenue department in a not for profit hospital because It sort of seemed at odds with it itself, but they had to generate, they had to come up with money to supplement their budget. And when I first took that job, no one had ever done it before. It was being done in the United States, but you know their healthcare system's very different than ours. And so I was treading unknown territory and I kept thinking, they've hired the wrong person. I don't know anything about this. Like I'm never how? And then I'm reporting to the VPs and the president of the hospital, and it was very intimidating. And I'm sitting in these ancient old meeting rooms with big oak tables and big chairs. And and I felt like I was five years old when I was sitting at the table with them. It's like running
speaker-0: Five year old was
speaker-1: the meeting. And I didn't realize at the time what was going on. But when I did that work, you know, I studied with Pete for Peter for for Sure, two years, I believe. I really tuned into it. So what happens is different things happen in our younger lives, and we form a coping strategy for that time. And it may have worked to a certain degree. Well, something might trigger as we get older that same kind of situation, that same feeling. And unbeknownst to us, we're that five year old all over again. It feels out of control. It feels out of our control to change it. And we know because our reaction is out of response, out of proportion to the trigger. Yeah. That's how we know. It's emotional hijack, essentially. Pete Pete used to say to me, When your emotions go over your ears, you stop hearing. I love that quote. When your emotions go out of your over your ears, you stop hearing. And isn't that true? You get flooded. Yeah. You get flooded. So Learning how to separate out all these voices of self-judgment, saboteurs, not all of them are saboteurs. Some of them are what they we call inner managers. And those inner managers, when we can quiet, so there's the inner kids, the wounded kids, the guardians that look after those inner kids. And oftentimes a guardian can be like a bully, right? Because that little kid is so shy and They developed into a bully. They have a bully guardian self to look after the kid. And then we have the inner managers who are there when the inner kids, the wounded kids, and the guardians are quiet. And those managers are actually your executive team when you are in true self, when you're centered, grounded, calm, confident, and so on. So these are all kind of related forgiveness, alignment, and saboteurs, because When you are in alignment with yourself, when you are living in alignment with your values, when you are touching on your inner wisdom and tuning in, you've quieted that inner chatter, and you're tuning into your inner wisdom because that's the only place, the only way I believe the inner wisdom can come forward is you have to be able to quiet that self-judgment. You have to get out of it. And that's often coming from the wounded kids. A five-year-old who's expected to be the mother, you know? a ten-year-old who's being asked to take the place of the father when he died. Yeah. You know, there's just so many situations and scenarios that have happened. And they all have happened in order to grow us. It's the diamonds getting shone. It's the butterfly coming out of the chrysalis and getting strengthened wings because of the The the stress of coming out of that chrysalis is hard. Yeah. And you know the story of the butterfly and the chrysalis. The man came along and c snipped the chrysalis and then he handicapped that poor butterfly for life. Thought he was helping. It's why we can never look at another person and judge their struggles, judge their lives. You don't know what's going on for someone else.
speaker-0: No. No. We don't know the story. Yeah. And I I I love that you brought up the different parts of ourselves and there are stronger parts of ourselves that might sound like a saboteur, but they are probably not. I I remembered that Kristen Neff talks about fierce self-compassion and the the compassion that says, Hold on a minute, this isn't gonna work. They don't condemn, they don't name call. Hold on, this can't happen. And I need to listen to that part of me. It's part of my wisdom. But it's not judging. It's like, let's wait and see. Or that didn't work out very well. What do we need to do next time? It's very different than the saboteur. So
speaker-1: Absolutely. And that moment you're speaking to of recognizing that I don't that I need to take some time here. That was actually a huge tool for me coming from and people can't believe this when I tell them the story, but it is so true. I always I al I said yes, even when I meant to say no. Why? Because I cared so much about what others thought of me. I didn't want to disappoint them. I didn't want to let them down. And I'd go home and I go, why did I say yes? And you know when that moment is when you've committed to doing something, you really don't want to do. And so the the slowing that moment down, and I learned how to say this, these words, these saved my life. I need some time to think that over. I'll get back to you. You're not saying no, you're just not saying yes either. You're taking time. So, because if you're like if you were like me and you are used, you have that sort of response, reflexive response to say yes, you know, because you want to please them, you want them to feel good about you. The best friend you can ever form is to just pause and say, I'll get back to you. I'll get back to you. They won't die, they'll still be there. Unless it's a life and death emergency, it can wait. It can wait.
speaker-0: Yeah. Thank you for that. Yeah. That yeah. Take that time and let that that wisdom in if listeners take nothing else. If you're a wiser elder self, just say those words and start practicing from there. Yeah. Let me get back to you. Yeah.
speaker-1: And you can call call it wise elder self or wise self or inner self or highest self. It doesn't mean you're separating yourself out into different entities. When you are in that true self, true self is the term I like the best because that's what I was pointing to before. That's when your mind is quiet. Yeah. It's when you are grounded, confident, clear, calm. You're leading, you're being led by your inner elder self, that wisdom self, because it's just there. You don't have to work at it. It's there. You might have to work to get to it, as I did, as you did. It wasn't obvious to us at the beginning, was it? No. That that wasn't there. Right.
speaker-0: So true. So true. So let let's slide into the obstacle. And the card that I chose was resistor contrarian. It instantly opposes others' views and defiantly resists change. So I want to just remind listeners, if this is the first time you're on this podcast, that these internal obstacles are their saboteurs, or I like calling them inner critics too. They're based on fear, what I've learned. And but they're only trying to protect us. But they point us to our highest strengths, but they apply them too hard, too soon and too vehemently. And two of the highest values, two just two, there are maybe more, of the resistor contrarian, I think, are truth and freedom. They just want the truth and the freedom and they're just gonna And when that it doesn't sh this one doesn't show up too quickly in me, but when I do notice it, it's like, I'm really resisting. I'm really Yeah. Anyway, so how so talk about perhaps do you ever see that in clients or in yourself or
speaker-1: my God. All this every day. Every day. it's such a beautiful moment when I'm working with a client and they're clearly resisting something. And you know that saying, everything that shows up in coaching is an opportunity for coaching. So this is where being masterful is so powerful because in that moment, as you're being masterful, what that means is. You're in non-judgment, fully supportive, loving, creating safety and trust for them to explore truly. You're holding a space of non-judgment and love where they can explore where they would never have gone before. Because in that arena, they can take a chance, they can risk it. And so when you are, let's start with ourselves. Let's say you're noticing in yourself that you're resisting something. You so adeptly pointed out that that's usually an inner child or a guardian, but it's one who is protecting. They have all come into existence not to hurt us, but to help us, to save us, to do what they know best. And that's what they know best. So they're not enemies. They just don't know any better. That's all. So we have to develop compassion for those parts of ourselves that got wounded. That's when they come up. And so when you notice yourself resisting in this case, that slow timed down thing, get present with yourself. Take a moment, breathe, lower your barriers, lower your shoulders, get real present with it. What's this really about? What am I resisting? What part of me is resisting? it's the part of me that thinks that if I take this on, I have to do everything. And I'm not allowed to not do anything else but everything. I'm just thinking, can you think of an example where this might come up for you?
speaker-0: I yeah, it it I'm it's I want to do s something and it's someone someone has a certain way of doing something and I've come up with a different way of doing it. So I resist what they're doing. But it's putting my my ego ahead ahead of what they want. It's I have to be right shows up. Which is part of the resistor contrarian. No, I'm not gonna agree with you because that would make me wrong and I can't be wrong.
speaker-1: Beautifully said. Absolutely. So aware, Pam, that you said that because that's exactly what happens. I don't want to be wrong because we've spent most of our lives feeling wrong. And then what was the first thing you said? Remind me?
speaker-0: I don't remember.
speaker-1: It was so good.
speaker-0: we'll have to listen to the recording again. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
speaker-1: I don't wanna I don't wanna I'm resisting what they're saying because ego.
speaker-0: Ego, yes, ego, yeah.
speaker-1: That's brilliant. And that also for anybody who's on the coaching mastery path, ego is our number one obstacle. Because then you're doing your sessions to perform. It becomes about you. And coaching is not about you, it's about your client. It's about who they want to be. It's about who they want to become, not about us proving we know more than they do, that we're an expert of them. And and if you are encountering. I had a I had when I was looking for an MCC coach when I was going through my certification, I got on a call with I I selected a few MCCs and I did some, you know, discovery calls with them. And this one gentleman got on the phone with me and right away he started chant he I'd never talked to him before. I didn't know him from anything. He didn't know me from anything. But he started challenging me right away and started trying to show how he knew what my obstacles were and how smart he was about who I was. And what do you think that created for me?
speaker-0: Tension, defensiveness. I will feeling less than, yeah.
speaker-1: Honest to God, I'll use these words. I was pissed off. I was like, I don't want to work with this man. Things he said might have been right. They might have been right, but I couldn't hear him because he was so hell bent, pardon my language, on being right himself about who I was that it just offended me. It just offended me. So of course I've never hired that man. I never will. Well, he'd have to really show himself to be better than he showed himself that day. But that piece of thinking you know better for someone, that's just a lie. You don't know better for someone. And so being, and this is this is a good just in general with our families, with our friends, with our coworkers, with the world in general, you don't know what's going on for someone else. You just don't know. And making an assumption Of who they are and what they're about, just based on what they look like, or they remind you of someone, is the height of an obstacle in your life. You are cutting yourself off from yourself and from them and from all that is good. And when you can just let that go and be present with what that is, truly, ego or not wanting to be wrong or anything. Changes, you know, the very act of observing something changes it, right? I forget what that's called. Is it Schrdinger's cat?
speaker-0: I've heard it but I don't remember where the source is yet.
speaker-1: But anyway. So observing, that's the key, observing.
speaker-0: Observing, yeah. And I was gonna make a comment, but it's gone. No, no, no.
speaker-1: I'm sorry. I could see see the light bulb come up for you.
speaker-0: Yeah, no, it yep, no, it's fun, that's okay. Swiss cheese brain.
speaker-1: Well, we were talking about the act of observing something changes it. So that moment where you're you have to be present enough with yourself first to notice that you're feeling out of alignment. That's number one. Yeah. And then you start to observe that ability to witness yourself. Because when you're in shatter box mind, you're not present. You're in past or future. The
speaker-0: That's right.
speaker-1: only present is in this moment, in the inner wisdom, in the beings, true self. Yeah, that's it.
speaker-0: Yeah. and now it this is what I was thinking, but what I will share with clients and or in a group discussion is that when I become present in this moment, what I have found now that if I have a saboteur and the other day I was feeling I did not feel I was off. I was not And so I pulled out my cards and I pulled out which five? I found five of these internal obstacles, these ob these critics. But when I become present, it's like the volume goes way down. Now it may not stay down forever, but all of a sudden it just goes way down. And so yeah, it's that awareness in that present moment that we can
speaker-1: Well and and by recognizing them, the very act of observing them changes so that the volume goes way down. But if you really want to go deep, then have a conversation with them. Find out what they're really wanting. I like we I do an interview with parts in our family systems. The inter interview is fairly straightforward. It's basically, what year do you think it is? Because it's not present. yeah. So it's usually back when we were five or six or ten or twelve or whatever. Yeah. And then you get a series of other questions that follow and a conversation where you where that inner child, that wounded child, is trying to do something that kids aren't meant to do. Kids aren't meant to run businesses or families or they're supposed to be kids. They're supposed to run and jump and play and have fun and freedom. What was the other word you used earlier? Freedom and
speaker-0: Truth.
speaker-1: truth. That's what they're about. Kids are in the moment. They live in the moment. They're all about truth and freedom.
speaker-0: Yeah, that's so true. And and and what you're saying, that bringing it back to the forgiveness and the alignment. Being able to have that conversation, forgive myself for judging this part of me, forgive that part of myself for being so frantic. It wants to protect me in in ways that are not good.
speaker-1: Or if it's resisting something, it's resisting for a reason that was true back then, but isn't true today. And it doesn't know that today you're a successful entrepreneur, own your own business, have a podcast, have all these things going on. It doesn't know. How could it know? It thinks it's 1965 or whatever, right? Yeah. So you have a conversation. When you have that conversation, you're shedding light, you're observing what you observe changes, and then you can start to help them be quiet and assign a a guardian that will work with them. Maybe they want to go put their hands in paint and smush all over the walls with their paint. Great, go out to the shed and get your watercolor. Maybe that's what you have to do. Spend a day with your fans in watercolors. Spread them all over. But that's what happens. Like it it's not this strange puzzle of unknown. If you really just take the moment and take the time to be with what's present, you can start to sort out all the voices. And as you sort sort out all the voices and you hear yourself, and I don't know anybody who doesn't say this, a part of me this, a part of me that, we're constantly separating ourselves out. And we want to be whole. And how do you get whole? You integrate all these pieces back. You love them no matter what. Because they're not here to be your enemy, they're here to save you, to help you. And when you get them quiet and you love them and you give them what they're wanting, it's usually, I need to go for a walk in a forest, I need to go for a swim, I need some time to myself. Like it's usually a very valuable acknowledgement of what's needed in the moment for that self-care and that self-compassion. And when you quiet that down, that's when your true self can come forward. And then your inner managers suddenly all the little talents or big talents of each of the managers comes forward and you can use them and you have your executive team.
speaker-0: Wow. Thank you for that. That yeah. I just yeah. Really appreciate appreciating our inner who we are, all of it. Yeah. All of it. Good. And this is it's sort of obvious, but one question I wanted to ask is, what other areas of our lives are benefited when we take care of this inner wisdom? Like, for example, for you, when you take care of your inner wisdom, what else changes in your life? What other areas?
speaker-1: Everything?
speaker-0: Yeah.
speaker-1: Yeah. Everything. Yeah. How how I you know, when I prepared for my master certified coach, it took me a year prep. And that that's why I always say I believe that the coaching mastery path is the secret sauce to making us better human beings. It really is, because we embody respect. We embody that safety and trust. We are maintaining presence. We're present with people. We're we're constantly living in a way that is respectful and honoring, respectful of others and respectful of ourselves at the same time. So when we okay, remind me quickly what question you're asking me there, so I'll make sure I answer it.
speaker-0: The other areas, areas of our lives, areas of self care that improve when we enrich this inner wisdom.
speaker-1: Right. So for example, let's say you're you're impatient. Say that's one of your vices. You just get imp it's it's one of my vices. Let me speak of myself. It was one of my vices. And I worked with a a mentor, a healing mentor for like 30 years. And the constant message was, Annie, you have to develop your patience. You have to be more patient. It's like I like to do something and I want to do it well right away. I'm not patient. I wasn't patient with myself. And I wonder if others can relate to that. And as I was doing the MCC prep, it became so obvious that that was something that had to change. Because if you don't have patience with yourself, you're not gonna have much patience with anyone else either. And so that was kind of came together with compassion because it's having compassion for yourself that allows you to have that patience. Right. Of course I don't have to be good at this right away. It takes people years to get good at things. And so as I went through my prep where I was listening to my recordings of me coaching others and cringing when I would hear them and getting feedback that I was, I hated getting that feedback at the beginning. That's the change was getting my ego out of the way, having compassion for myself and allowing myself to be in that patience. Things come when they come. The things come when they come. It's everywhere. It happens in your relationships. You know, you go to a grocery store and suddenly you're you can see the human being of the cashier instead of just that she's a cashier and she's being grumpy. You know, you see the human being. You see a human being everywhere you go. You look at the homeless man, how easy it is to judge them. Yeah. But you don't know their story.
speaker-0: Yeah.
speaker-1: You don't know their story. So everything changes because you start seeing the world in a completely different way, not with the filters of judgment and you know, judgment, basically. It's yeah.
speaker-0: to judgment 'cause it's yeah, it's usually judgment is not very positive. Although I I have to remind myself that when I say something, isn't that wonderful? Isn't that judgment. Yes. Yeah.
speaker-1: You remember that story of who knows what is good and what is bad?
speaker-0: yes, yes, I do, yeah. Yeah, that's who knows. Yeah, we don't.
speaker-1: Look it up if you don't know it.
speaker-0: Yes, do, 'cause it is it's a wonderful story. It's the and I've heard it as the yeah, the stallion story as sometimes it's called.
speaker-1: okay. Yeah.
speaker-0: So we know a little bit about you in your bio, but i is there anything else you wanna to share about your business or any events coming up that you wanna share?
speaker-1: Absolutely. so I am absolutely honored that Fran Fisher asked me to take over her inspiring competence small group mentoring program that I've been doing for the past three years, but I'm taking it fully over now in the new year. And we have well, we have a group that's starting. I believe it is January something or other. I think I gave you the dates. I didn't keep the link open. Hang on, give me a second. Yeah.
speaker-0: I didn't see the item.
speaker-1: friend. Okay, here we go. Nope, I don't have the dates. wait, January twenty-sixth. I do have the dates. It's
speaker-0: Okay.
speaker-1: every other it's every other Tuesday, an hour and a half. There are 10 group, 10 90 minute group mentoring sessions. there are also four one-to-one mentoring sessions where they get and it's a group maximum size of 10. We don't take any more than 10. And so it's really intimate and every session is focused on expanding the application of the core competencies at the MCC level, even if they're not even an ACC. So we immediately, well, most most of them are at least PCC, but sometimes we get people who aren't even in an ACC. And that's fine because it's never too early to start preparing as a coach at the masterful level. At the MCC level. So we've got that starting in January. And I think I've given you a link that you can include to your viewers, anybody who is on the coaching path. And other than that, they can reach me if they're interested. I love to really help individuals. And I would say women. Yeah, I would say women. You know, I I'll I'll tell you why I'm hesitating. Because I've been in my business for over 40 years and it's changing again. And I'm not sure what it's changing to. I'm a little bit of that butterfly in a chrysalis stage right now. but I have always loved working one-to-one with women and those specifically those who really sense that they have that inner elder inside and just aren't living in alignment with it. they know something much bigger is is at play. There's a bigger game, Rick Tamlyn used to call it. there's a bigger game and they're not living it. And it's they want it. They know it's there, it's alive, and they're and they and they're maybe not living in true alignment with their own values, just in general. So at those and the and there has to be a really deep hunger inner drive to want that to change, because changing is not easy. Changing doesn't happen without a determination and intention. So if you are hungry for that kind of change, please get in touch with me. I'd love to talk to you.
speaker-0: Hmm. And I'll include your your website in in the show notes.
speaker-1: Thank you. The websites have changed in flux too, because at least primarily on based on the summit, I have ten, well, nine years of recordings from the summit, which they're very quite brilliant. but the emphasis now is really on the mentoring. You know that the ICF has just awarded the mentor coach specializ specialization.
speaker-0: I saw that.
speaker-1: So that I have been awarded for both PCC and MCC, which Mentoring coaches is is my that's my dream job. I love doing
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That is that is fun. Yeah. Well, I just want to say thank you as we wrap this this episode up. And thank you for taking the time. It's lovely to just be and talk with you, because it's been quite a while. And and just reinforce this whole idea of wisdom. And I hope listeners will take that slow moment and get in touch with their wise one within. And get in touch with you. If they happen to be a coach and you want good mentoring, yeah, good. All right.
speaker-1: Right. And you'll have the link to my website on that on the show notes, I guess. Essence of master summit dot com. Yeah.
speaker-0: I will. I will. Good. Thank you, Annie.
speaker-1: Thank you, Pam, for the opportunity to to talk with you especially and to see you again after such a long, long time. It's been really truly delightful to be here with you and I can't wait to hear more of what you're up to.
speaker-0: Okay. All right. Thanks.
speaker-1: Okay.
speaker-1: Thank you, Pam. Beautiful introduction. It's lovely, lovely to see you again and to be here again.
speaker-0: Thanks. So we we covered a lot about the inner wisdom. And I think a couple of the things that I want to remind listeners is what you talked about slowing things down and breathing. And to me, that's where we really can get in touch with that wise, wise one within that wise elder self. And if you can embody it, it it it makes an even bigger impact. So in my Oracle deck, I sent you the other three cards. So you had a little bit of time to just kind of think about it. and so I sent Annie a wisdom card, which is a loving kind of statement, an action card, and an internal obstacle card. And the three that I chose were at random. Forgiveness. May I see forgiveness as a tool to deeper connections within and outward? And then the action card was align. And isn't that interesting? You talked about aligning at the very beginning of the our other episode. And I do these randomly. Align. I align my thoughts and attitudes and my expression for my highest good. So let's just play with these two cards first and then we'll of course we'll have to pull in the saboteur of the inner obstacle card. So how do you think that forgiveness and aligning or alignment strengthen our wise elder self, our wise one within?
speaker-1: let's start with forgiveness because I I do feel like that is another foundation, just like self-love. I think what happens a lot of times is over the course of our lives, when situations happen. And I I I I don't know about other people, but I imagine having worked with people for over forty years, that there are a lot of us who do this. We take an action or we say something or we do something that we then judge ourselves for later. I should have shouldn't have done that. And maybe you're one of those who has a really active mind and it goes over and over and over and won't leave you alone. I used to be like that. That's why I started meditating. Thank God for meditation on really. That actually was the way to get to inner wisdom, to quiet all that chatter of the monkey mind. Because as long as that chatter's going on, you can't even how can you know that you have any inner wisdom you need to quiet it down in your mind? So there so there's once you start to slow things down, once you start to Really look within and you and you tune into all the judgment that you've had for yourself over choices that you've made in the past. And you're sitting with them, which isn't going to feel good when you don't like the choices that you've made. And so you again, you're at choice. I can sit here and hate myself for the rest of my life because I've made these dumb choices, but that doesn't feel very good. So What else can I choose? And and the other choice would be, well, I did the best I could. You know, the four agreements. You and I talked a lot about the four agreements. Right? I just did a blank on one most of them, but I I mean you do your best. Always do your best. That's one of them. Always do your best. So whatever we did in the past, we did the best we could then. And if we could if we there are so many tools to get to forgiveness, you and I know quite a few of them. One of them might be to just have that conversation. You know, in it, that's what inner family systems is mostly about is an a conversation within, with those parts of us that made those choices back then. Yeah. And forgive them. Really truly forgive them and forgive ourselves any anywhere that we have hurt another, anywhere where we have hurt ourselves. If we don't forgive ourselves and we don't forgive the other, we're living with that pain within. And that's not a healthy, eventually that's going to hurt your body because the mind and the body are connected. And ultimately, it emotions, stuck emotions, are what causes illness in the body.
speaker-0: Yeah.
speaker-1: So when we can get to When we can get to a place where we can be at peace, that is so important to be at peace within. If you're really gonna be a masterful coach or masterful in your life, and I I sense it in you, Pam. I mean, one of the biggest things I really see, not having seen you and talked to you in such a long time, is there's a peacefulness about you now. Right? There's a lot of self forgiveness and self compassion that's taken. over your life, which is beautiful to witness. And we need it. We need more of that in the world. I'm so glad that's what you're up to.
speaker-0: Thanks, Annie. Yeah. Forgiveness, yes. And I'm so glad you you touched on both forgiving ourselves and you know the parts of ourselves. I remember you introduced me to Peter Gerlach's work. And even today I love to say, you know, there's a part of me that wants it, then there's another part of me, and just learning to reconcile them, listen to them. Listen to that. We will get into that in a minute.
speaker-1: It kind of ties in together with your saboteur conversation because a lot of those parts are what we would call saboteurs. You know, those places like that job I was talking about at the hospital in Montreal, they hired me. It was the first time they had ever integrated a business development for revenue department in a not for profit hospital because It sort of seemed at odds with it itself, but they had to generate, they had to come up with money to supplement their budget. And when I first took that job, no one had ever done it before. It was being done in the United States, but you know their healthcare system's very different than ours. And so I was treading unknown territory and I kept thinking, they've hired the wrong person. I don't know anything about this. Like I'm never how? And then I'm reporting to the VPs and the president of the hospital, and it was very intimidating. And I'm sitting in these ancient old meeting rooms with big oak tables and big chairs. And and I felt like I was five years old when I was sitting at the table with them. It's like running
speaker-0: Five year old was
speaker-1: the meeting. And I didn't realize at the time what was going on. But when I did that work, you know, I studied with Pete for Peter for for Sure, two years, I believe. I really tuned into it. So what happens is different things happen in our younger lives, and we form a coping strategy for that time. And it may have worked to a certain degree. Well, something might trigger as we get older that same kind of situation, that same feeling. And unbeknownst to us, we're that five year old all over again. It feels out of control. It feels out of our control to change it. And we know because our reaction is out of response, out of proportion to the trigger. Yeah. That's how we know. It's emotional hijack, essentially. Pete Pete used to say to me, When your emotions go over your ears, you stop hearing. I love that quote. When your emotions go out of your over your ears, you stop hearing. And isn't that true? You get flooded. Yeah. You get flooded. So Learning how to separate out all these voices of self-judgment, saboteurs, not all of them are saboteurs. Some of them are what they we call inner managers. And those inner managers, when we can quiet, so there's the inner kids, the wounded kids, the guardians that look after those inner kids. And oftentimes a guardian can be like a bully, right? Because that little kid is so shy and They developed into a bully. They have a bully guardian self to look after the kid. And then we have the inner managers who are there when the inner kids, the wounded kids, and the guardians are quiet. And those managers are actually your executive team when you are in true self, when you're centered, grounded, calm, confident, and so on. So these are all kind of related forgiveness, alignment, and saboteurs, because When you are in alignment with yourself, when you are living in alignment with your values, when you are touching on your inner wisdom and tuning in, you've quieted that inner chatter, and you're tuning into your inner wisdom because that's the only place, the only way I believe the inner wisdom can come forward is you have to be able to quiet that self-judgment. You have to get out of it. And that's often coming from the wounded kids. A five-year-old who's expected to be the mother, you know? a ten-year-old who's being asked to take the place of the father when he died. Yeah. You know, there's just so many situations and scenarios that have happened. And they all have happened in order to grow us. It's the diamonds getting shone. It's the butterfly coming out of the chrysalis and getting strengthened wings because of the The the stress of coming out of that chrysalis is hard. Yeah. And you know the story of the butterfly and the chrysalis. The man came along and c snipped the chrysalis and then he handicapped that poor butterfly for life. Thought he was helping. It's why we can never look at another person and judge their struggles, judge their lives. You don't know what's going on for someone else.
speaker-0: No. No. We don't know the story. Yeah. And I I I love that you brought up the different parts of ourselves and there are stronger parts of ourselves that might sound like a saboteur, but they are probably not. I I remembered that Kristen Neff talks about fierce self-compassion and the the compassion that says, Hold on a minute, this isn't gonna work. They don't condemn, they don't name call. Hold on, this can't happen. And I need to listen to that part of me. It's part of my wisdom. But it's not judging. It's like, let's wait and see. Or that didn't work out very well. What do we need to do next time? It's very different than the saboteur. So
speaker-1: Absolutely. And that moment you're speaking to of recognizing that I don't that I need to take some time here. That was actually a huge tool for me coming from and people can't believe this when I tell them the story, but it is so true. I always I al I said yes, even when I meant to say no. Why? Because I cared so much about what others thought of me. I didn't want to disappoint them. I didn't want to let them down. And I'd go home and I go, why did I say yes? And you know when that moment is when you've committed to doing something, you really don't want to do. And so the the slowing that moment down, and I learned how to say this, these words, these saved my life. I need some time to think that over. I'll get back to you. You're not saying no, you're just not saying yes either. You're taking time. So, because if you're like if you were like me and you are used, you have that sort of response, reflexive response to say yes, you know, because you want to please them, you want them to feel good about you. The best friend you can ever form is to just pause and say, I'll get back to you. I'll get back to you. They won't die, they'll still be there. Unless it's a life and death emergency, it can wait. It can wait.
speaker-0: Yeah. Thank you for that. Yeah. That yeah. Take that time and let that that wisdom in if listeners take nothing else. If you're a wiser elder self, just say those words and start practicing from there. Yeah. Let me get back to you. Yeah.
speaker-1: And you can call call it wise elder self or wise self or inner self or highest self. It doesn't mean you're separating yourself out into different entities. When you are in that true self, true self is the term I like the best because that's what I was pointing to before. That's when your mind is quiet. Yeah. It's when you are grounded, confident, clear, calm. You're leading, you're being led by your inner elder self, that wisdom self, because it's just there. You don't have to work at it. It's there. You might have to work to get to it, as I did, as you did. It wasn't obvious to us at the beginning, was it? No. That that wasn't there. Right.
speaker-0: So true. So true. So let let's slide into the obstacle. And the card that I chose was resistor contrarian. It instantly opposes others' views and defiantly resists change. So I want to just remind listeners, if this is the first time you're on this podcast, that these internal obstacles are their saboteurs, or I like calling them inner critics too. They're based on fear, what I've learned. And but they're only trying to protect us. But they point us to our highest strengths, but they apply them too hard, too soon and too vehemently. And two of the highest values, two just two, there are maybe more, of the resistor contrarian, I think, are truth and freedom. They just want the truth and the freedom and they're just gonna And when that it doesn't sh this one doesn't show up too quickly in me, but when I do notice it, it's like, I'm really resisting. I'm really Yeah. Anyway, so how so talk about perhaps do you ever see that in clients or in yourself or
speaker-1: my God. All this every day. Every day. it's such a beautiful moment when I'm working with a client and they're clearly resisting something. And you know that saying, everything that shows up in coaching is an opportunity for coaching. So this is where being masterful is so powerful because in that moment, as you're being masterful, what that means is. You're in non-judgment, fully supportive, loving, creating safety and trust for them to explore truly. You're holding a space of non-judgment and love where they can explore where they would never have gone before. Because in that arena, they can take a chance, they can risk it. And so when you are, let's start with ourselves. Let's say you're noticing in yourself that you're resisting something. You so adeptly pointed out that that's usually an inner child or a guardian, but it's one who is protecting. They have all come into existence not to hurt us, but to help us, to save us, to do what they know best. And that's what they know best. So they're not enemies. They just don't know any better. That's all. So we have to develop compassion for those parts of ourselves that got wounded. That's when they come up. And so when you notice yourself resisting in this case, that slow timed down thing, get present with yourself. Take a moment, breathe, lower your barriers, lower your shoulders, get real present with it. What's this really about? What am I resisting? What part of me is resisting? it's the part of me that thinks that if I take this on, I have to do everything. And I'm not allowed to not do anything else but everything. I'm just thinking, can you think of an example where this might come up for you?
speaker-0: I yeah, it it I'm it's I want to do s something and it's someone someone has a certain way of doing something and I've come up with a different way of doing it. So I resist what they're doing. But it's putting my my ego ahead ahead of what they want. It's I have to be right shows up. Which is part of the resistor contrarian. No, I'm not gonna agree with you because that would make me wrong and I can't be wrong.
speaker-1: Beautifully said. Absolutely. So aware, Pam, that you said that because that's exactly what happens. I don't want to be wrong because we've spent most of our lives feeling wrong. And then what was the first thing you said? Remind me?
speaker-0: I don't remember.
speaker-1: It was so good.
speaker-0: we'll have to listen to the recording again. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
speaker-1: I don't wanna I don't wanna I'm resisting what they're saying because ego.
speaker-0: Ego, yes, ego, yeah.
speaker-1: That's brilliant. And that also for anybody who's on the coaching mastery path, ego is our number one obstacle. Because then you're doing your sessions to perform. It becomes about you. And coaching is not about you, it's about your client. It's about who they want to be. It's about who they want to become, not about us proving we know more than they do, that we're an expert of them. And and if you are encountering. I had a I had when I was looking for an MCC coach when I was going through my certification, I got on a call with I I selected a few MCCs and I did some, you know, discovery calls with them. And this one gentleman got on the phone with me and right away he started chant he I'd never talked to him before. I didn't know him from anything. He didn't know me from anything. But he started challenging me right away and started trying to show how he knew what my obstacles were and how smart he was about who I was. And what do you think that created for me?
speaker-0: Tension, defensiveness. I will feeling less than, yeah.
speaker-1: Honest to God, I'll use these words. I was pissed off. I was like, I don't want to work with this man. Things he said might have been right. They might have been right, but I couldn't hear him because he was so hell bent, pardon my language, on being right himself about who I was that it just offended me. It just offended me. So of course I've never hired that man. I never will. Well, he'd have to really show himself to be better than he showed himself that day. But that piece of thinking you know better for someone, that's just a lie. You don't know better for someone. And so being, and this is this is a good just in general with our families, with our friends, with our coworkers, with the world in general, you don't know what's going on for someone else. You just don't know. And making an assumption Of who they are and what they're about, just based on what they look like, or they remind you of someone, is the height of an obstacle in your life. You are cutting yourself off from yourself and from them and from all that is good. And when you can just let that go and be present with what that is, truly, ego or not wanting to be wrong or anything. Changes, you know, the very act of observing something changes it, right? I forget what that's called. Is it Schrdinger's cat?
speaker-0: I've heard it but I don't remember where the source is yet.
speaker-1: But anyway. So observing, that's the key, observing.
speaker-0: Observing, yeah. And I was gonna make a comment, but it's gone. No, no, no.
speaker-1: I'm sorry. I could see see the light bulb come up for you.
speaker-0: Yeah, no, it yep, no, it's fun, that's okay. Swiss cheese brain.
speaker-1: Well, we were talking about the act of observing something changes it. So that moment where you're you have to be present enough with yourself first to notice that you're feeling out of alignment. That's number one. Yeah. And then you start to observe that ability to witness yourself. Because when you're in shatter box mind, you're not present. You're in past or future. The
speaker-0: That's right.
speaker-1: only present is in this moment, in the inner wisdom, in the beings, true self. Yeah, that's it.
speaker-0: Yeah. and now it this is what I was thinking, but what I will share with clients and or in a group discussion is that when I become present in this moment, what I have found now that if I have a saboteur and the other day I was feeling I did not feel I was off. I was not And so I pulled out my cards and I pulled out which five? I found five of these internal obstacles, these ob these critics. But when I become present, it's like the volume goes way down. Now it may not stay down forever, but all of a sudden it just goes way down. And so yeah, it's that awareness in that present moment that we can
speaker-1: Well and and by recognizing them, the very act of observing them changes so that the volume goes way down. But if you really want to go deep, then have a conversation with them. Find out what they're really wanting. I like we I do an interview with parts in our family systems. The inter interview is fairly straightforward. It's basically, what year do you think it is? Because it's not present. yeah. So it's usually back when we were five or six or ten or twelve or whatever. Yeah. And then you get a series of other questions that follow and a conversation where you where that inner child, that wounded child, is trying to do something that kids aren't meant to do. Kids aren't meant to run businesses or families or they're supposed to be kids. They're supposed to run and jump and play and have fun and freedom. What was the other word you used earlier? Freedom and
speaker-0: Truth.
speaker-1: truth. That's what they're about. Kids are in the moment. They live in the moment. They're all about truth and freedom.
speaker-0: Yeah, that's so true. And and and what you're saying, that bringing it back to the forgiveness and the alignment. Being able to have that conversation, forgive myself for judging this part of me, forgive that part of myself for being so frantic. It wants to protect me in in ways that are not good.
speaker-1: Or if it's resisting something, it's resisting for a reason that was true back then, but isn't true today. And it doesn't know that today you're a successful entrepreneur, own your own business, have a podcast, have all these things going on. It doesn't know. How could it know? It thinks it's 1965 or whatever, right? Yeah. So you have a conversation. When you have that conversation, you're shedding light, you're observing what you observe changes, and then you can start to help them be quiet and assign a a guardian that will work with them. Maybe they want to go put their hands in paint and smush all over the walls with their paint. Great, go out to the shed and get your watercolor. Maybe that's what you have to do. Spend a day with your fans in watercolors. Spread them all over. But that's what happens. Like it it's not this strange puzzle of unknown. If you really just take the moment and take the time to be with what's present, you can start to sort out all the voices. And as you sort sort out all the voices and you hear yourself, and I don't know anybody who doesn't say this, a part of me this, a part of me that, we're constantly separating ourselves out. And we want to be whole. And how do you get whole? You integrate all these pieces back. You love them no matter what. Because they're not here to be your enemy, they're here to save you, to help you. And when you get them quiet and you love them and you give them what they're wanting, it's usually, I need to go for a walk in a forest, I need to go for a swim, I need some time to myself. Like it's usually a very valuable acknowledgement of what's needed in the moment for that self-care and that self-compassion. And when you quiet that down, that's when your true self can come forward. And then your inner managers suddenly all the little talents or big talents of each of the managers comes forward and you can use them and you have your executive team.
speaker-0: Wow. Thank you for that. That yeah. I just yeah. Really appreciate appreciating our inner who we are, all of it. Yeah. All of it. Good. And this is it's sort of obvious, but one question I wanted to ask is, what other areas of our lives are benefited when we take care of this inner wisdom? Like, for example, for you, when you take care of your inner wisdom, what else changes in your life? What other areas?
speaker-1: Everything?
speaker-0: Yeah.
speaker-1: Yeah. Everything. Yeah. How how I you know, when I prepared for my master certified coach, it took me a year prep. And that that's why I always say I believe that the coaching mastery path is the secret sauce to making us better human beings. It really is, because we embody respect. We embody that safety and trust. We are maintaining presence. We're present with people. We're we're constantly living in a way that is respectful and honoring, respectful of others and respectful of ourselves at the same time. So when we okay, remind me quickly what question you're asking me there, so I'll make sure I answer it.
speaker-0: The other areas, areas of our lives, areas of self care that improve when we enrich this inner wisdom.
speaker-1: Right. So for example, let's say you're you're impatient. Say that's one of your vices. You just get imp it's it's one of my vices. Let me speak of myself. It was one of my vices. And I worked with a a mentor, a healing mentor for like 30 years. And the constant message was, Annie, you have to develop your patience. You have to be more patient. It's like I like to do something and I want to do it well right away. I'm not patient. I wasn't patient with myself. And I wonder if others can relate to that. And as I was doing the MCC prep, it became so obvious that that was something that had to change. Because if you don't have patience with yourself, you're not gonna have much patience with anyone else either. And so that was kind of came together with compassion because it's having compassion for yourself that allows you to have that patience. Right. Of course I don't have to be good at this right away. It takes people years to get good at things. And so as I went through my prep where I was listening to my recordings of me coaching others and cringing when I would hear them and getting feedback that I was, I hated getting that feedback at the beginning. That's the change was getting my ego out of the way, having compassion for myself and allowing myself to be in that patience. Things come when they come. The things come when they come. It's everywhere. It happens in your relationships. You know, you go to a grocery store and suddenly you're you can see the human being of the cashier instead of just that she's a cashier and she's being grumpy. You know, you see the human being. You see a human being everywhere you go. You look at the homeless man, how easy it is to judge them. Yeah. But you don't know their story.
speaker-0: Yeah.
speaker-1: You don't know their story. So everything changes because you start seeing the world in a completely different way, not with the filters of judgment and you know, judgment, basically. It's yeah.
speaker-0: to judgment 'cause it's yeah, it's usually judgment is not very positive. Although I I have to remind myself that when I say something, isn't that wonderful? Isn't that judgment. Yes. Yeah.
speaker-1: You remember that story of who knows what is good and what is bad?
speaker-0: yes, yes, I do, yeah. Yeah, that's who knows. Yeah, we don't.
speaker-1: Look it up if you don't know it.
speaker-0: Yes, do, 'cause it is it's a wonderful story. It's the and I've heard it as the yeah, the stallion story as sometimes it's called.
speaker-1: okay. Yeah.
speaker-0: So we know a little bit about you in your bio, but i is there anything else you wanna to share about your business or any events coming up that you wanna share?
speaker-1: Absolutely. so I am absolutely honored that Fran Fisher asked me to take over her inspiring competence small group mentoring program that I've been doing for the past three years, but I'm taking it fully over now in the new year. And we have well, we have a group that's starting. I believe it is January something or other. I think I gave you the dates. I didn't keep the link open. Hang on, give me a second. Yeah.
speaker-0: I didn't see the item.
speaker-1: friend. Okay, here we go. Nope, I don't have the dates. wait, January twenty-sixth. I do have the dates. It's
speaker-0: Okay.
speaker-1: every other it's every other Tuesday, an hour and a half. There are 10 group, 10 90 minute group mentoring sessions. there are also four one-to-one mentoring sessions where they get and it's a group maximum size of 10. We don't take any more than 10. And so it's really intimate and every session is focused on expanding the application of the core competencies at the MCC level, even if they're not even an ACC. So we immediately, well, most most of them are at least PCC, but sometimes we get people who aren't even in an ACC. And that's fine because it's never too early to start preparing as a coach at the masterful level. At the MCC level. So we've got that starting in January. And I think I've given you a link that you can include to your viewers, anybody who is on the coaching path. And other than that, they can reach me if they're interested. I love to really help individuals. And I would say women. Yeah, I would say women. You know, I I'll I'll tell you why I'm hesitating. Because I've been in my business for over 40 years and it's changing again. And I'm not sure what it's changing to. I'm a little bit of that butterfly in a chrysalis stage right now. but I have always loved working one-to-one with women and those specifically those who really sense that they have that inner elder inside and just aren't living in alignment with it. they know something much bigger is is at play. There's a bigger game, Rick Tamlyn used to call it. there's a bigger game and they're not living it. And it's they want it. They know it's there, it's alive, and they're and they and they're maybe not living in true alignment with their own values, just in general. So at those and the and there has to be a really deep hunger inner drive to want that to change, because changing is not easy. Changing doesn't happen without a determination and intention. So if you are hungry for that kind of change, please get in touch with me. I'd love to talk to you.
speaker-0: Hmm. And I'll include your your website in in the show notes.
speaker-1: Thank you. The websites have changed in flux too, because at least primarily on based on the summit, I have ten, well, nine years of recordings from the summit, which they're very quite brilliant. but the emphasis now is really on the mentoring. You know that the ICF has just awarded the mentor coach specializ specialization.
speaker-0: I saw that.
speaker-1: So that I have been awarded for both PCC and MCC, which Mentoring coaches is is my that's my dream job. I love doing
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That is that is fun. Yeah. Well, I just want to say thank you as we wrap this this episode up. And thank you for taking the time. It's lovely to just be and talk with you, because it's been quite a while. And and just reinforce this whole idea of wisdom. And I hope listeners will take that slow moment and get in touch with their wise one within. And get in touch with you. If they happen to be a coach and you want good mentoring, yeah, good. All right.
speaker-1: Right. And you'll have the link to my website on that on the show notes, I guess. Essence of master summit dot com. Yeah.
speaker-0: I will. I will. Good. Thank you, Annie.
speaker-1: Thank you, Pam, for the opportunity to to talk with you especially and to see you again after such a long, long time. It's been really truly delightful to be here with you and I can't wait to hear more of what you're up to.
speaker-0: Okay. All right. Thanks.
speaker-1: Okay.
