Full Transcript for S01E10: Anger is the ONLY Path to Forgiveness

lot to mask other feelings, especially shame and grief. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I don't recall being taught anything about, like, a healthy way of expressing anger when I was young. No direct conversation about that that I can recall. Just to kind of boil it down, I think that I grew up in a household with a mom who... was probably more on the passive aggressive side when it came to expressing anger. But the thing that really stands out to me the most is she would leave a room in tears, kind of frustrated with like, I'm not getting anywhere with this and I'm so mad. I'm brought to tears by how much frustration I have and then kind of leaving the room with that like frustration and crying. And then my dad on the other side of things, I can remember like times he would get frustrated, even just like inanimate objects or something. sort of temper tantrums, you know? Like, I can remember a time that he was trying to get something out of a kitchen drawer and kept yanking the drawer and one of the utensils was in the way of it opening properly and so he just ended up yanking the drawer as hard as he could and the whole front of the drawer flew off, the drawer flew out, all the utensils flew everywhere and that wasn't like an everyday kind of thing but like just an example that is, you know, still in my memory from like young. Okay, that's what happens when somebody's mad. Neither this Leave the room frustrated in tears or explode in some way and then don't really do anything to repair those things Mak: think even when we were dating, like I have some memories of you getting frustrated with me or criticizing me for doing similar kinds of stuff. I would get angry at whatever inanimate objects. I would get frustrated and yell at a chair and you would be like, Mac, what the fuck? Chill out. Lindsay: Yes. Yeah. Yeah, that's definitely ⁓ some sort of a trigger for me, just like men, especially getting upset. Yeah. Mak: But I think all of this points at how difficult it is for us to deal with and to manage anger in a productive and healthy way. We don't really have any good examples, right? It's just like, don't get angry. Lindsay: Definitely. Yeah. Totally. It's just not something we're taught. mean, like so many things when it comes to being in relationship with people, if you end up choosing to go to therapy or if you go to workshops or if you get some sort of coaching or something around this, you know, topic of like expressing emotions, cool. That's one thing, but it's not something that's just like included in our education. And for a lot of families, at least still when we were growing up, I think some of this is changing, but our parents didn't talk to us about like, ⁓ there are healthy ways to express anger. There are ways to, you know, get over things. Mak: Mm-hmm. Lindsay: and to repair whatever happened or whatever ruptures there are, whatever the case might be. I am so pleased though, there are parents that I know who do really, really talk about

these things with their kids, who do talk about it is okay to express any emotions that you have and we're gonna stick with each other, you know, we're gonna like talk through it and get over it, we're gonna see what we need to do, which kids at a certain age, young enough, do just express all the emotions. in the moment as they're happening. When it's age appropriate, you know, a three-year-old can throw a total tantrum, full body anger about something, get it all out and can really just go through all of that, really feel it in their body and then just be done with it and go back to doing whatever they were doing before playing what word do I want to use? Just playing peacefully with their sibling or whatever it might be. Yeah, or getting back to like building their Legos after the whole thing collapsed and it's just like, okay, you just, you know, you went through it and now you're onto something else. Mak: Legos. Similarly in the animal kingdom, it seems like we're maybe the only species, adult humans, that have developed ways of inhibiting ourselves from expressing whatever it is that we feel in the moment. And of course, there's a lot of wisdom and utility in that, and sometimes we take it little bit too far, and what was intended to be some kind of useful social tool comes back to haunt us or punish us in some way. Lindsay: Definitely. When you're young enough, we automatically do that. We let our nervous systems do what they know how to do, you know, typically. ⁓ and then we reach a certain age, we start to observe the way the adults around us handle anger and other things. And we start to learn, it's not okay to do this. It is okay to do that. I should do this. I shouldn't do that. But if you have parents who are paying attention and who are aware when kids get to that age, that they naturally start to pretend and hide in the same ways, you know, that we all learned to. if their parents notice that stuff happening and can support them through like, ⁓ it's okay to be angry right now. I see a lot more of that these days and I'm so happy about that. And I think it's going to make a huge difference. Yeah. Mak: That whole model of parenting virtually didn't exist when we were growing up, right? The thinking at the time and for centuries prior was that... Children were basically like small undeveloped adults and they needed to learn discipline and control and so the parenting style kind of developed out of that. It was the British saying, spare the rod, spoil the child. You you are going to do damage to your child by not punishing and discipline and by not teaching them to control themselves from a very young age. Lindsay: Yeah. No. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, sad. So. Just to expand a little bit more on what Brad talks about, instead of being able to express anger in a moment about one small thing to a specific individual person, we build it all up to then have these ideas, concrete ideas that we think are true. Like our way of seeing the world itself

and the people in it, it just becomes distorted by all of this anger that we're holding onto, Brad claims. Mak: Mm-hmm. And I would say when Brad is talking about anger in this way, included in that definition would be disappointment, irritation, frustration, even at a lower level that most people would not naturally call anger. All of those things are kind of being thrown into one basket called anger slash resentment. And that... Lindsay: Thank Mak: mode of thinking, I believe he gets from old school Gestalt therapy from Fritz Perls, who had this very kind of simplified practice of expressing resentments and appreciation. Brad learned that from Fritz and made that kind of the basis of a lot of what is taught at the workshops. I think the basis of a lot of his one-on-one therapy and a lot of his philosophy about honesty and how to deal with anger. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Brad actually starts the chapter by reminding us of a story about someone during some war, maybe a grenade was thrown into a group of soldiers and, you know, within a split second, one of the soldiers decides he's going to run and cover the grenade with his helmet and sacrifice himself so that the others can survive. And Brad talks about how a lot of us do that with anger. We cover our anger. ⁓ sacrificing ourselves for the good of the group or to spare or save others. We think we're being heroes by doing that, but really we end up causing more harm. Mak: It's kind of interesting. kind of retro-engineer anger in the sense that it's so unacceptable or uncomfortable for us to be with our own anger that we assume then that it's going to be equally, if not more uncomfortable for everybody else. Rather than taking a risk for ourselves and feel some discomfort or shame or whatever in response to the expression of the anger, we turn it into this big grenade that we must Lindsay: Thank you. Mak: then sacrifice ourselves for the sake of others around us. And then we, like you say, then we get to play the hero rather than the asshole, which is a lot more comfortable for the ego to live with. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, I've saved you from this dangerous, harmful thing that is my anger. Mak: I remember Brad saying that that's a very condescending attitude to take that like my anger is so difficult for you to take that I have to sacrifice myself on your behalf. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Yep. So I'm going to send you something to read. Mak: When anger is not expressed directly, is expressed indirectly. So it gets expressed but not experienced. If anger is not expressed directly, it is not experienced directly. Unless a person experiences anger in the body and acknowledges the experience, the anger does not complete itself, does not discharge, subside, and go away. When anger is expressed indirectly in ways that are calculated to avoid the experience of anger, anger gets stored up rather than dissipating. The experience of anger is converted to thoughts about the resented person, judgments, complaints, conclusions, and imaginary conversations. Anger of this kind is dangerous. much more so than the short-term explosive kind. This is the form of anger with which we have been poisoned and with which we continue to poison our children. This form of anger accumulates and is the direct cause of the frequency of physical abuse in our society. You know, we spent so many years dealing with this very same thing. I think that the basis for this is very sound. If he were to just hedge or soften it a little bit by saying most of this is true, oftentimes likely this is the thing, or possibly one of the whatever, all this is great. You know, but I do take issue with the way that he says this thing is this basically all the time. Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah. Mak: The only way to solve this problem is via this thing. If you don't do this, then necessarily this is the result. The world is not that simple. There's some real great ideas in here and taken dogmatically, this becomes problematic. Lindsay: So he goes on to talk about how direct expression of anger one instance at a time as it comes up. like each time I get mad at you throughout a day, I tell you that in the moment so that it can come and go and pass through me. Expressing anger in that way is a healthier way to deal with anger in order to protect from harm. The more that we suppress it, the more that it comes out in backwards ways or through the cracks, the more explosive it can be and all of that. Mak: Yeah. Lindsay: He also claims that we can get over that more easily and thoroughly by directly expressing and that we can genuinely forgive. Yeah. And forgiveness, and when the other person isn't changing anything, isn't apologizing for anything, they could just keep doing exactly what they're doing. The thing that made us so mad, but we, by processing it in this way, we can get to real forgiveness and the other person doesn't need to change a thing. Mak: I think that. Mm-hmm. Yeah. I think that this message mostly is for people who repress anger, pretend that they don't feel it. This message is not so good for people who have anger management issues or who are explosively angry often. Then this message is not so great because it can be like justifying explosive. Well, I must be doing it right. I feel angry right now I'm just being honest with you. know, if someone says like, yeah, I mean, I'm already too honest or I'm already too good with it. expressing anger or something like that. They need a different kind of approach, a different kind of message. Like what is being said here is not for them. Yeah. Lindsay: Yeah, some of us come into this work having no practice directly expressing anger. And then some of these messages here at the beginning of the chapter can, be really helpful and can start to open up the possibility of like, maybe there is some benefit to expressing this directly. People on the other side of the spectrum. can also share ourselves the ideas that we have at this point with

all of the experience that we've had about how that can go wrong for people who already tend to be loud and angry. Mak: Yeah, might be a little bit too early in the game to be pumping the brakes and pointing out pitfalls and stuff in the thinking. I'm sure there's going be plenty of opportunity for that later on. Great. Lindsay: Indeed, there will be. Okay, so I'm gonna send you another bit to read. Mak: So this is what happens with anger. As children grow, constantly overpowered, cared for, and controlled, childhood expressions of anger against stronger adults are punished. As children, we do the best we can to copy approved ways of dealing with anger to avoid getting punished for it. The result, at least in our culture, is that most people don't express anger directly. It's not that they don't know they're angry or that they won't talk about their anger. They do, and they will. Most people, won't express their resentment in person to the person at whom they are angry. Instead, they gossip, complain, criticize, fantasize about telling the person off, and let it out in other indirect ways. Suppression and displacement to ideals, indignation, and judgments against others and ourselves usually work well enough that by the time we males reach 18 years of age and some elder asshole tells us to kill some—oh my god. Lindsay: Yeah. Mak: Wow, okay. By the time we males reach 18 years of age and some elder asshole tells us to kill some people to defend some bullshit principle, we run right out and do it. Yeah. Yeah, pretty good stuff. By and large, we're really bad at expressing anger directly, productively. We're really bad at getting over ourselves. Lindsay: That's. Brad, after that portion about displacement, Brad goes into talking about undoing the learned suppression of anger. And he talks about how it's so ingrained in us to handle anger the way that we do that it's almost impossible to shut that down. And that with a lot of like concentrated effort, some of us can become better at expressing anger in a way that's healthy, but that a lot of people just don't really end up wholeheartedly taking it on. We can come up with so much justification, rationalization reasons for not wanting to do that. You know, there's so much about direct expression of anger that is scary and can sometimes be dangerous. Mak: Yeah And I would say that I don't know if it's fair to suggest that people are just resistant to choosing not to do it for whatever reason. I think that people have a very good reason and many people are simply incapable of doing that or it just won't work for them because of their nervous system, makeup, their trauma background, whatever. Lindsay: I agree with you, and Brad would say that's all bullshit. He pretty much doesn't think there's like any good reason for not expressing what's so. And so he talks about how whoever might try on, like, okay, I'm going to do this, I'm going to try expressing anger to someone directly. Their first attempt at it

goes terribly. Things feel so much worse. And then they just never try it again. And he claims that if you stick with the person, if both of you can express everything that's there for you, all the anger and everything, you can get through it and your relationships will actually benefit from this. Mak: I don't know, you know, I want to argue the principle a little bit. A lot of psychotherapeutic models, at least a lot of somatic models do say that it's good to name the emotion that you're feeling, to actually feel it, and to allow your body to digest or process it. That doesn't mean that it needs to be expressed directly in the moment to the person that you feel that thing about. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Mak: Some models would call that acting out there's some value some of the time and expressing the thing directly to the person and there's plenty of other instances where that's contraindicated It's not necessary. There are plenty of other ways that you can get over it that aren't Repressing it and letting it you know quote-unquote build up over time Even that pressure cooker model of anger being built up like a you know Like a hydraulic press or something over to like that that whole model has been debunked for decades Lindsay: it is. Mak: So it's interesting. Like on the one hand, I think that there's a lot of value in this having this I-Thou relationship co-regulating with the other person by saying, I am angry at you right now. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Mak: I think Brad basically claims that it's necessary and I don't think that it is at all. It's a way to deal with anger and it's way that you and I did lots of it for a long time and we got lots of benefit out of it we got ourselves stuck plenty of times by doing it that way as well. Lindsay: I like hearing you simply say there's some benefit some of the time. It's one way to go about things and it can be really beneficial for some people in some situations. ⁓ I'm going to read a little bit from the book here, just a paragraph. The transition from being a foolish hero or heroine to being free of the fear of anger is a therapeutic process you can engage in by agreement with people with whom you have committed relationships. Expressing resentment directly is a requirement for creating an authentic relationship between two human beings instead of an entanglement of two minds. It is a way of losing your mind and coming to your senses and experiencing yourself as a being rather than as a jumble of morals gleaned from whatever your sad story may be. Yeah, and then he says, is a way of growing beyond primitive foolishness to a more advanced form, a more advanced form of foolishness. Mak: So condescending. Lindsay: Yeah, so I mean, simply put, I like this. In a committed relationship, you trust this person, you are committed to working through things. Awesome to like come to some sort of agreement about how do we want to deal with anger together? Can we handle trying on like really telling each other straightforward when we're mad at each other? So yeah, just in a very simple way, I like this. Like, let's have a conversation with each other about how we want to deal with our anger. Sweet, you know, like not enough of that kind of thing happens. And, you know, then there's all the insults in here along with, along with what I just said. Well, just the way that he talks about, like, you're a foolish hero or heroine if you basically, if you aren't, you know, expressing anger in this way and, Mak: All the insults. Hahaha Right. And I love that. You know, I loved that attitude when I came across this years ago. Yeah. Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and we fully took it on. There's some way that I want us to talk about for a moment what this looks like expressing anger in this way. And I don't know if it would make sense for us to like role play something to give an example of it the way that Brad intends for it to be. Mak: I wonder if we could come up with an example of when that worked well and when it didn't and we were using the wrong tool. Lindsay: Yeah, let's think for a sec. Mak: What were we just being mad at each other for three hours a day about? Lindsay: I mean, I probably was mad at you more than you were mad at me. And in general, I was mad at you for things that were going on in your relationships outside of ours. So we had a non-monogamous relationship and I would often get mad at you for things that you would share with me about your interactions with other women. You know, partly... No kidding. And partly... Mak: Why did we do that? Why did we just not do that? Lindsay: I don't know. And partly because that, do you mean why did we do the open relationship or why did we do the processing with each other about it all the time? Mak: Both. Why did we do the open related? Why did we have to tell each other every single fucking thing that we did, everything that we're thinking, every moment that we spent with another person? How do you really? Lindsay: Cause we bought into this. Yeah. And for some reason in this moment right now, I did just get this kind of heavy feeling of like, I it's my fault. I'm the one who brought the idea of open relationships to you. I'm the one who brought the idea of radical honesty to you. Like, we're laughing about it now. I'm laughing. And there is like a part of me that's like, ⁓ fuck like shit. Mak: Ha ha ha! I feel like, is this true? feel like I was also at some point like, why don't we just stop dating other people? And then you'd be like, no, no. Okay. Lindsay: No. No way. I don't think so. Well, I don't know. It's hard to say. I was gonna say I'm pretty certain that I would have taken you up on that if you had offered it, but I'm also pretty- Mak: I'm not so sure. I'm not so sure. Lindsay: No, me neither. I'm also pretty clear at this point in my life that part of my being drawn to open relationship was in my mind at the time. Then you can't really be cheated on, you know, if like you're in an open

relationship. But yeah, I don't know for sure if I would have taken you up on that or or not back then. Mak: ⁓ I remember we did actually spend a few months at least and it was like, ⁓ well, let's give ourselves a break and kind of feel more secure or whatever, but it didn't do any good. Yeah. Lindsay: Yeah, I think we were already too fucked at that point. Yeah, well, so yeah, it's really like so much of my memory is of how poorly it went to express our anger in this way so often. And I don't know if that's because we were just creating new stuff to be mad about over and over again all the time because I had such a struggle with doing the open relationship with you. And so was like almost on a daily basis, some new painful thing came up and there was just like no. Mak: Mm-hmm. Lindsay: getting over it because it was like being reopened and like poked on you know ⁓ a daily or weekly basis. But I like to think that there surely there were times that we did this successfully and those don't stand out as much. Mak: Yeah, I think that the main issue was a value misalignment, something kind of more foundational to just processing emotions that come up in the moment. There's something more important, foundational, that is, what are we doing together? What is our future? What are we building towards? What is the purpose of everything that we're doing? Why are we trying to get over our resentments toward one another? Lindsay: Yeah. Mak: If you don't have like a critical level of agreement on those things, then you can, sure, you can always get over whatever emotion comes up in the moment. But if you don't resolve the foundational issue, you're just going to be constantly, you're going have to invest too much time processing the little stuff that comes up in the present. Lindsay: Absolutely. Yeah. And of course we're going to keep getting mad at each other when we want opposite things in a lot of instances. So yeah. Mak: And it's funny that it didn't really occur to us that, if this is supposed to work so well, why do we have to invest so much time doing it? You know, we really missed that. Lindsay: Yeah, right. We did. And we were two people who already really liked to talk a lot about everything though, too. So like, what we were doing with each other was hanging out and talking. That was what we liked doing with each other. That's how we spent the vast majority of our time. Not like going out doing things or whatever, but hanging out and talking, so. Mak: Yeah. And I imagine you and I both have this belief kind of deep seated that anything worth doing is gonna be difficult and it has to be hard earned. If I wanna grow, it's gotta be really painful and I have to invest lots of time and energy into it. Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah, that was definitely a belief of mine at that point in my life. I feel pretty different from that at this point, but yeah, that is in me for sure. Yeah, well, so I still want to give the listeners an idea of what it looks like, because

we're just talking kind of around this. Why did we keep doing it that way? But we haven't given an example of what way, like what does this way look like? So in the past, when when Mac and I were together, if I was mad at you for something, the way that I would express it would be to say, I resent you for or I am mad at you for specifically that beginning I resent you for or I am mad at you for. blank and the blank is filled with a thing that was actually said or done. So not my story about something, not the meaning I made out of something, not like not my imaginary whatever, but you said this and I'm mad at you for saying that or you did this and I'm mad at you for doing that. So it would maybe look like I resent you for telling me that you So a specific thing, like if Mac had said to me, and he said it with kind of a smile on his face or whatever, I would. Mak: Can we pick an example? Okay. Lindsay: Yes, that I was just kind of thinking of an example that seemed real from our past. yes, I can definitely do that. Let's see. It would look like me saying to you, Mac, I'm mad at you for saying that you don't want to go out to eat food and that instead you want to stay in and cook potatoes on the bus. Mak: Yeah. Hehehehehe Lindsay: So that might sound silly and it's a way of communicating it that is saying, I am mad at you for, I resent you for a specific real thing that was said or done that we can both point to as an actual thing that was said or done. So in that instance, there was some experience where I probably was saying like, can we go out to eat tonight? And Max saying like, I don't really want to, don't really like to, I'd rather just stay in and make potatoes. And then I felt grumpy or frowny about it. And so that would be an experience of then me pointing to the thing that Max said in the idea. is, I'm the one bringing this up. Mac for the most part would sit and be my audience, know, listen to me for a moment, get this stuff off my chest and that I'm not just saying this thing to you, I'm not just like staying in my mind and just spitting this out to you in a very surface way, but I'm ideally being very in touch with my body and my whole experience and you as I'm doing this. So sometimes when we would express anger to each other, we would also report to each other to also say, out loud like, ⁓ okay, I just said that thing to you and now my heart is pounding, you know, like I'm paying attention to my body as I'm doing it. So if I'm noticing my heart pounding, I say that if I'm noticing sweat in my armpits, I tell you that or at least I need to be aware of it. depending on how he did the exchanges or whatever Mac is feeling about it, after I get some of that off my chest and feel through some of my stuff, then maybe Mac would have something to say in return. Something lighter like that, like the example that I just shared, it could be that Mac will just like kind of sit with that and be like, okay, you know, thanks for telling me. And that'll be that. I go through the process. I go through feeling the sensations and the experience comes and goes and I'm back to neutral or whatever. But the idea is sort of that we've like gotten it out into the open and we've experienced the experience and gotten over it. When it's a situation where it's something that we both are feeling a lot about, like something that would come up in our romantic relationship with, with seeing one of our other partners or whatever, that conversation will look a lot more drawn out and there will be expression of anger on both sides and a lot more heated and a lot more emotive, like just a lot more expression from both people. But sometimes it was just small little things like the meal thing I just said. And that can be pretty quick and easy and like, okay, cool. I feel better now that I said that out loud. The bigger things. Mak: Yeah. Lindsay: can take a lot more time and be a trickier. Mak: Yeah, I think it can be quick and easy, but in order for that to be the case, it has to be firmly understood by both parties that you, Lindsay, in this case are expressing this thing. in order to get over it and that there is no expectation that I do anything different or that the next time you wanna go out that I need to appease you in some kind of way. And it's, I think it's very difficult oftentimes for people to get to that point where I actually trust that what you are saying about yourself has nothing to do with me really. It's about you. Lindsay: That's it. Mak: when I say nothing to do with me in the sense that like, it's not my responsibility to change what it is that I want or even to change what it is that I decide based on you being upset about it. What I am doing actually is simply helping you to co-regulate. In other words, I'm helping you to get over the emotional trigger that you're experiencing right now. The kind of side benefit for me is that you're likely to be less sour the rest of the night or to like hang on to this later or whatever. Lindsay: Yeah, Mak: I wanted to mention that one of the ways that this might go, and maybe did even go with us, would be something like, yeah, well, I'm mad at you for every time that you asked me to go out to eat dinner at a place that I don't want to at. Why are you always pressuring me? And in that case, the idea, when this works well, is that both of us are Lindsay: Totally. Yeah. Mak: revealing some new layer of internal experience to each other, rather than doing the dance and pretending and playing nice, but then like when I can't muster the niceness any longer, then it turns sour and I'm kind of shitty with you for the rest of the night or week or month. That we're on the same team about simply revealing what's going on in an effort to get over that stuff more quickly and be neutral and clear with one another. Lindsay: So you kind of just said it there, but I don't know that you actually mentioned the word forgiveness, but like the idea is we're going through

all of this so that we can get to forgiveness with each other. Not some idea of forgiveness, not like I should be a good and accepting and forgiving person, so I'm going to tell him that I forgive him for doing this thing, but full body forgiveness. I'm not deciding that I forgive you with my mind. My body is telling me I have forgiven you because I'm no longer clenching my fists, my cheeks aren't hot anymore. tense in my shoulders and it's like ⁓ I've told you what I'm mad at you for I went through the whole experience I felt through all of the things you sat there with me while I did it you maybe responded in whatever way you did and now I can feel I have gotten to forgiveness with you I forgive you for this thing Mak: One thing that I often do to make the distinction between this kind of full-bodied forgiveness that Brad is talking about there is to separate the concepts of forgiveness from ⁓ pardoning someone. In other words, the idea is that pardoning comes from on high. It's a judge who says, were wrong and bad, but I, out of the goodness of my heart or whatever, I pardon you and release you from your sins or trespasses. That is the mental process. Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Mak: that we're not talking about here but actually the the full-bodied forgiveness refers to like you said no longer having anything in you that is still hanging on to that past event you have digested it so fully that it's basically no longer there it is passed through you Lindsay: Yeah. Yeah. And we have talked about a good way of testing yourself on that, you know, just checking in with yourself about like, if I were to encounter this person in the store or on the street, would I be happy to see this friend of mine? Would I be happy to see this acquaintance and go up to them and want to talk with them? Or because of whatever this, you know, past anger is, what I want to avoid that person, what I choose not to talk with them. Cause I'm holding onto this like, ⁓ they said that thing last time and I just don't really like them anymore. I just don't really want to, you know, whatever. I'm not going to go out of my way to say hi when I see them. Mak: Mm-hmm. Right. Lindsay: Have you actually forgiven that person or have you just had the idea of I should pardon that person for their terrible behavior or whatever? Mak: Mm-hmm. Lindsay: Yeah, and I want, I do want to jump back just a little bit more with that particular example that I gave about the food. A way that it would not look would be to say something to you like, I'm not really mad at you. I just, I'm really irritated that every time I want to go out to dinner, you never want to. You're too frugal. You're too stingy with your money. You're not any fun. First of all, me starting with like, I'm not mad, but, you know, because clearly everything that followed there are all of these ways that I'm irritated, mad, upset, that we can just put all under the umbrella of mad, resentful. But then also like all of the things that I stated after, I'm not really mad at you. I'm just upset that. were all opinions, all just like stories that my mind came up with about what sort of person you are and how you always are and how you never are. And so it is like preferable to be able to say what the actual specific thing was that was said or done, rather than telling you that I'm mad at you for all of the stories I have about the thing that you said or did, and that we have a much better chance of getting over those things that are the real things that happened. Mak: Mm-hmm. Different parts ⁓ ⁓ The brain are activated when you state things in a simple way using language that describes an emotional experience from when you go into the explanation and the story about that thing. The more you retell and reactivate the story, the more that you keep yourself trapped rather than giving yourself the opportunity to digest it and let it go. In some models, it's called name it and drain it. You just say, I am mad. Then you feel the anger in your body in order to drain it or tame it. Lindsay: Mm-hmm. Hmm. Mak: some people say name it and tame it. When you say, yeah I'm just a little disappointed because you always do this and that, then you're not naming the emotional experience you're telling the story. Telling the story leads to regeneration of the emotional experience rather than a digestion of the emotional experience. Lindsay: Also just like simply put If somebody's coming at me telling me I'm just upset that you are always so stingy with your money, you never want to go do the things I want to do, you're not fun or adventurous enough, I'm going to immediately hearing those things just feel like, whoa, you you're coming at me with all of these ideas that you're stating as if they're fact, you know, that I never this, I always that, I'm no fun, I'm blah, blah, blah. Like, we're not going to get very far with that. know, Brad would always say, think he would maybe even say all, but like most of what couples are arguing about is their stories and ideas about things and not about reality, know, but like fictions were just... Yeah. Mak: interpretations of reality rather than reality itself. Lindsay: Yeah, and that we're both trying to sell each other on these different ideas of what the of what reality is. And we're just making a case to each other. And we're not even trying to come together on this thing, get it out of my system. We're really just stuck in this loop of here's how I see it. Here's how you see it. We're butting heads about that endlessly. Yeah. Mak: Yeah. Yeah, if you want to take an extreme example, look at American political culture right now. There's absolutely no interest in understanding the other, hearing the other. It's simply we have demonized the other side. We're continually telling the story about how virtuous we are and how evil the other side is, how dumb and wrong and bad. Lindsay: Yeah, totally. Yeah, very convinced and very attached and not at all attempting to get over it. Yeah. Mak: No. In fact, we go out of our way to look for reasons to reinforce and justify the story and re-experience the anger, the outrage, the indignation. We've become addicted to the indignation and we feel a little bit weird about it so we need to find like some more, we constantly need to be on the lookout for more justification for feeling this, the intensity. ⁓ Lindsay: Absolutely. Yeah, more evidence. Mak: Because we know somewhere that like, it's probably not good that I hate this person or this group so intently, so I better have a damn good reason to do so. And so there's a whole lot of incentive to be reinforcing that story, to find all the evidence that you can that the other is wrong, bad, evil, stupid. Lindsay: Totally. Right, and right now you're talking about the realm of politics, but really everything you're saying does also transfer to how we show up in relationships. You know, probably not when we're in the honeymoon phase of any of our relationships, but especially if we've been with somebody for 10 years and we're like, yeah, yeah, after a handful of years, you know, we're in this place of like, I'm just building up my case against you at this point, you know? Mak: Yeah. Five months, Yeah.