Kristen

Welcome to the close the chapter podcast. I am Kristen Boice a licenced Marriage and Family Therapist with a private practice pathways to healing counselling. Through conversations, education, strategies and shared stories. We will be closing the chapter on all the thoughts, feelings, people and circumstances that don't serve you anymore. And open the door to possibilities and the real you. You won't want to miss an episode, so be sure to subscribe.

Kristen

Welcome to this week's close the chapter podcast. Thank you so much for joining us. It means the world that you're here, and you have an open heart open mind and ready to expand yourself. I am so excited for this conversation. I was just telling my very dear guest, I was on the beach, and I devoured her book, I'm actually holding it up for those that are watching or you're listening. It's called you make your path by walking a transformational field guide through trauma and loss. And Suzanne Anderson, welcome to the close to Chapter podcast.

Suzanne

Thank you, Kristen, it's great to be here. Looking forward to our conversation.

Kristen

I as you can see, well, for those that can see, I have earmarked the book, I literally was on my highlighter and flipping the pages down. Because it was so powerful. And your wisdom came through the pages through your life experience, you can tell you turn the pain into purpose. And you were already on a purposeful mission, it felt like so tell me what it was like to write the book,

Suzanne

right? Well, I would say from the event that I write about in the book, which was a dramatic loss. Basically, there's life before that. And then life after that, the first thing I had to do was complete my first book, which I just completed the research on with my co author and someone I could finally get back to that was the first thing. And that came up in 2016, the way of the mystery, a woman upgrading how you live love and lead. And so the idea of writing this book was just nowhere it was I had this child that I had to get out there, this first book. And that was the first thing that was required. And basically, as the title of the book implies, I was literally making my path by walking, everything was lost in a very short period of time. And for me, all the outer structures, let's say of my identity are just gone. So it's important for me to say the writing and plus, first the living of the experience, and really living it fully. There wasn't a part of me that wanted to quickly go to be offering this some kind of wise ideas to other people. Because I was literally walking this until finally, maybe four years, five years after the trauma, I was ready myself to write myself back together. And I took time I go away to Lopez Island, which isn't someone items out here and stay at a friend's cottage and just let myself walk over the very, very difficult ground that I had been across and let myself write that experience. And after I'd done that it took a couple of years of writing my story in these little moments when I could get away, then I showed it to my editor of the first book. And she said Gail said, this is going to be helpful to others. And I think you should make it into a book. So that's the story that's very different than I'm walking through this thinking, taking notes. I was journaling as I went through absolutely for me, but I wasn't taking notes thinking this will be a book,

Kristen

what I really want to acknowledge as you walk through the pain of losing your husband through suicide, and the pain of that, and then writing about it. How was that for you writing it out? Because some clients I work with say I just didn't want to write it out for you. How is that helpful in your healing process?

Suzanne

Well, I think it's important to say, first of all, I'm in the trauma space. So the work I did and the research I did for years with women was around and still is around finding a developmental pathway like how do we emerge into another could say, the next level of our potentiality on Earth right now as women, what does that look like when we really bring together all the feminine and the masculine aspects of ourselves. And so that work involves the working with the unconscious trauma, we could call developmental trauma. And so I already knew something about trauma in general. And if it's the work I do, long time ago, it used to be you got to go walk right back over that trauma ground right away, which was we'd found and many years ago probably shifted about a decade ago, was that actually could read traumatised. So you don't do that. And I didn't do that my therapist that I worked with. I didn't go back to the moment of the trauma of finding my husband until probably two years actually that I was ready to tell her to actually speak it and then be in and we went Very, very slowly, we didn't even do it all in one session, we went very, very slowly where my nervous system would get recalibrated, as you know, in the work that you do, to just be able to hold myself in that trauma. And similarly, with the writing, I went very slowly, I was away on these retreats by myself, because I felt I needed to be and I had all kinds of tools that make me feel happy, or you know, let's say safe, and sage and music and things that could kind of soothe my nervous system. And then I had friends on the other end, who knew I was doing it and that I might call if I got too far. So I would say I was well equipped to know how far I could go. And I would just write until I felt, you know, I'm beyond what I can actually my tolerance, as we call it, you know what, I've just gone over that edge. So now I'm gonna go for a walk or run or swim or breathe or whatever, because it is hard, and it was hard, was very hard. But there's something so integrating, and maybe even very congruent, where you bring the self that walks through the trauma into alignment with the self today, you don't worry, let's say many years later, that self has got ground under her can really ring that self that went through the trauma into integration. So that was super important for me. And I would recommend it. I mean, you probably do this with clients. Ideally, you're in some kind of container with somebody else because it can be really traumatising.

Kristen

And I find with I don't know, if you've experienced EMDR eye movement, and he's sensitization reprocessing or brains body. And in some of those situations, for example, we had a school shooting here locally, very shocking. And we were on site processing with the teachers, just regulating the nervous system with the tappers just holding the tap are trying to sue the nervous system recenter as much as possible come out of that fight, flight freeze, if we could help gain some grounding in some century. And it was like immediately after we're not necessarily in some wanted to reprocess it, some wanted to tell the story. So I think it just depends to us your point on developmental Nirvana, where your nervous system feels ready and what your window of tolerance is. My love though, right? You use your tolerance. What could you tolerate? It sounds like you're very connected to your nervous system.

Suzanne

Before I was absolutely, I was certainly got more everything I understood and wrote about it in the first book, I really deeply, deeply lived. So what I knew and understood from the teaching I do and my own lived experience was profoundly deep. And I'll say that,

Kristen

in the other piece, before I dive into all the things I really want to highlight today is you immediately asked for support, you immediately had your support system immediately knew I needed support, walk me through that, because a lot of people are afraid to say they need support or ask for help.

Suzanne

Well, I think I am would actually say I grew my capacity to receive, even though I knew right away, this was way bigger than anything I could handle on my own. And I would need what I would call a resonant field. And it came in really around me in the most amazing way. But I did have to open to another level, I'm was more of the transformational teacher, I offered everybody else. And this was very different and I didn't receive so I would say my receiving aperture expanded. But I was very clear that to get through this, I would need a loving support. And my women friends came in very fast right around me. They weren't with me that night. And then my family also amazingly, they took turns a week each and they live all over the world. So it was quite a commitment for people. And they mapped it all out of who would be with me. And so yes, and then I would say then there's the suicide factor, which I know has a whole kind of shame perimeter to it, that and B sometimes call it the sort of toxic swamp of suicide because often people leave because of shame and and David's case my husband's case, I think that is the case. He was his business was going to come tumbling down. And it was it was a real financial failure combined with this terrible tinnitus ringing in the head, which was intolerable to him. So there was shame in the suicide itself. And I had to be very vigilant and I was about not getting drawn into that. And sometimes that can lead to isolation for people, you know, like, this terrible thing has happened, and they just want to isolate and withdraw. And I was very clear. This was not my suicide. I did not choose that. I was very much here alive. David chose to die by suicide, not me. And I had to keep making that differentiation for myself. And part of that was having a you know really I love a love thing embrace around me all the time when you're so broken open as I was the field around you is what you resonate with. And ideally, it's even if it's just one friend, if you don't have the chance to I was, I feel very fortunate to have the community I had. But one friend who is you just know you can count on who's so loving, who's unconditionally present for you. And with you that can make all the difference.

Kristen

It can, I think it's a beautiful way to put you increase your capacity to receive because receiving even someone will give you a compliment or offer their support, did it force you to increase your capacity to receive me in some way did the grief did the shock, what helping,

Suzanne

I think I wasn't even as aware I didn't even know was a wake up call for me about how much of my energy streamed out, I thought I was receptive. But actually, it's like a muscle that's unused I could feel when I was so shattered, I could feel so much coming in. And it took some time to stretch my heart to receive the role I was playing in a very collective trauma. Because it wasn't just me, of course, I was the closest one of my husband, but there was his family, we were at a big community on the island we lived on in Seattle. And there were a lot of people traumatised. And my role, in essence, and the pattern was to be the receptive almost initially, certainly to be the receptive to be able to receive that love because people wanted to give it and it was actually healing for them to give it and it was healing for me to receive it. And that was quite stunning for me to see where I think before I was more comfortable being the one that was extending.

Kristen

Yes, and so many people can relate to that the givers, the caregivers, right. In the book, you break out these mythical journey you have. And then you break out different chapters of how the journey transcends itself, which I loved. So I'm going to start with page 49, as you're getting into the journey of walking this path of trying to figure out how to heal from this. So the second paragraph on page 49. For many years, I had coached women through deep change processes. First, always to anchor the capacity to be with what is I love this because I say this all the time, to be with what is to be fierce with reality and to be able to accept the situations we find ourselves in. So much unnecessary suffering comes from resisting the change that is trying to work its way through us, right we you go through a trauma, you go through a shock, one of the pieces is kind of denying the reality of what's happening, you don't want it to be there, you don't want to go through it, you don't want it to be true.

Suzanne

Let's say we know the value of denial, there is a value to that initially, or the shock especially is so overwhelming the prefrontal cortex, boom, that's off. And there's a good place for denial, because you just can't take it all in. So that's one thing, but then how long you stay in denial is the other thing. In the system that I work with this development pathway I was mentioning, the very first archetype is the mother archetype. And the mother archetype that's sort of core of that capacity for us is to be able to be with what is like have the grounded presence to say, this is what's happening. And that was enormous ly important for me, I knew that already. I knew as much as I could. Initially, my mind was very busy trying to get out of the situation. I have a longtime meditation practice, and I was able to see it and notice that it was just like, get me out of here. My personal response was flight. I just wanted to go I just gotta go, I gotta go somewhere, I gotta go somewhere. And then I would watch all of that frenzy at the mental level. And no, I couldn't go anywhere there was nowhere to go. And then that settling down, setting my system down to be able to say this is what's happening. Because it's so true that the suffering there wasn't couldn't get bigger for me and the resisting what is adds this other layer that the Buddhist called suffering, the suffering, that just as like turning the volume up, and I didn't need that so if I could just be with what was in the moment. Another important part of this was being able to say it's not my life is going to happen later. When I get through this thing. I'll get my life again. There is that desire, you know, sense of can I get back somewhere I want to go back somewhere, you lose your future. In my case, it was just everything about the future gone, but the more that you can and the sooner the better. Accept that this is actually my life. And that's what I had to keep telling myself and bringing myself back to. This is your one moment, your one day you will not get this back. This is not About some life you're going to have in the future, it's like as much as you can just be here, this is my life right now, this is my life. I don't like it. But here it is, this is my life.

Kristen

I love this so much, because I think of clients even going through a divorce or some other trauma. And they think, well, I'll just, once I meet someone else, then I'll be okay. Or once I have a child, once I have a house, once I meet a certain goal financially, or have this job, and you really had a practice already, but you really seems like you could be aware of your own wanting to leave wanting to flee from it right in telling yourself this is what's happening.

Suzanne

I write a bit about this in the book, I think, a certain point not in the initial days of the trauma, for sure, but a little further down the road. And I work in the work I do I work with what it means to have a clear intention of the future and hold those images of the future. And so there is something to that to being able to envision a possible new life, and at the same time be living in this life? Because the truth is that how you get there to those images, you don't know and you won't be able to know, if you're not here on this lily pad ready to walk to the next lily pad.

Kristen

It ties into chapter eight, the meta capacity embracing paradox, I think so let's read a little bit from this paragraph, the very beginning of the chapter, when we are in the mindset of trauma, or when life events require us to navigate a huge loss or change. The habitual mind will try to orient with dualistic thinking, This is good, this is bad. This is right, this is wrong. But the capacity we are all being asked to cultivate now goes beyond this limited frame and invites us to embrace a more complex and accurate reality. What if factors that initially seemed like polar opposites could be held together long enough to allow something new to arise through their connection. So if we take it a step further, it's not an either, or is what you're saying. It's an right and

Suzanne

that is, and this is a complexity of consciousness. And so this is the idea that is the title of the book, you make your path by walking, that we can go through these incredibly painful, disruptive experiences in our life, they don't have to be like what I did, it can be indeed a divorce or the loss of our health and we get diagnosed with an illness or illness of a friend or family member could be the loss of a pet. There are many losses that we experience as humans, that's just what it is to be human. And that we can go through them in a way that allows us to grow to actually have more capacity, not less capacity. So the idea of getting back to the person I want to get back to who I was before this happened is misguided, because there's someone else you more of you, this is what I certainly found waiting to kind of wake up or come online to come into expression as you keep walking. But that is going to mean you got to hold one of these capacities that might call embracing paradox is you have to be able to or grow the capacity to hold more than just, you know, there are so many paradoxes in the situation I was in and to limit it to go to one pole or the other like everything is I was betrayed. David, let me down, let everybody else down. How could he have done this? I love David, all of the years of our being together gave me the capacity to handle his leaving in the way that he did. How can I hold those together? How can I hold multiple decisions mean real life consequence for me and others around us decisions required me to be able to hold the complexity and then put them in the cauldron you could say and let the knowing about what to do in a situation or what was next come from being able to hold the polarity. You can see how that is useful in the world today.

Kristen

It really is. And I think what I find is this all or nothing thinking good or bad, right or wrong when we can go down that I see it as they didn't even know that you could have an and and both? Is it because the what we were taught or we never even thought about it in a different way. And trauma can keep us stuck even a certain age, right emotionally. So maybe there was a trauma that happened younger and you just didn't even see that it's possible to have look at it differently, that there isn't this duality, in other words,

Suzanne

right. And that is something too I often I think I don't know if you know the work of Robert Keegan, who's a developmental psychologist at Harvard. And he has written a number of books that I love that I've worked with him studied with him. Basically one of his books called in over your head, which is speaking about the way in which people in organisations or parents or we want differentiated employees are we want our 14 year old or 15 year old to be differentiated at his point from a developmental perspective. And that's my trainings. Developmental Psychology is No, that's the teenager doesn't have that capacity yet to be able to have themselves and another in terms of differentiation, let's say, or the employee hasn't yet grown that capacity. And you're asking them to lead this initiative that they're supposed to have it, then they don't have it. So they're in over their heads. So how do you grow those capacities, and often, it is through the difficult things that happen in our lives where we have the chance, I wish there was a way for some of these profound growth moves to happen without being so painful, but it often just seems to come through events that require us kind of shake us up, shake up our status quo, and ask us, as you read earlier, in the piece I wrote to be ready to change what needs to change here, now that you're and for me, if the shattering was so complete, because I lost my beloved, our future, my home, all the resources I had was, everything was swept away, I lost my community and lost my cat, they shut down my business. I mean, literally, everything was gone. So the shattering was enormous. And from my perspective of like, I never want to go through anything like this again, I've been so shattered here, what do I need to see? Or what can I see about my own shadows? What can I grow here in terms of my capacity, because hopefully not that there won't be other difficult losses, but there will be something of this magnitude.

Kristen

Okay, so is this so good one differentiation, for those that don't know what it is, I did a whole episode on it. But can you explain it to the LEA

Suzanne

differentiation is basically where the capacity I call it mindful differentiation in my first book, because there is a mindfulness to this, it is the capacity to have a relationship with yourself to know what you think what you feel what you sense to know that and to be able to take in what another person thinks feels and senses without it prefiguring you because it's different from you. So in other words, I can let you have your experience without it robbing me of mine. And that's really important. Like, I can still have myself, I'm landed in my own in relationship to me, and I can take you and at the same time now, obviously children can't do this. This is a developmental move that happens. And it really comes online. In the best case scenario, the brain soul wired up and starts to happen in the teen years where there's that identity to the group is really important. But it's very hard there, of course, because mostly, you just want to do whatever the group is doing. But that's one end of the spectrum where you for the first time can start to know what other people have, wants and needs, not just you. And then later in the 20s, you start to build the fabric of what that could be. But many adults, sadly, it's something we don't really teach or we don't keep reinforcing. Obviously, you're doing your practice, but this we have to grow. And this is something we just keep growing more capacity to differentiate

Kristen

you to fall. I love how you worded that and explained it because you're able to have your opinion, someone else could have their opinion and you're okay, you can tolerate that you're not less than and you're not disconnected. It's okay.

Suzanne

And something new comes because in a Creative Conversation, when you can regulate yourself, and you don't get dysregulated, which is when you and we all get triggered still I get triggered. So we all do that's human, we're in the human body. First of all, we recognise it faster when we done some of our own personal work, you know, whoa, I'm getting dysregulated here, something is really bugging me here is really and you know, to address that. And if you're able to do that, and the other person is able to stay regulated, something new and a conversation, let's say or in a relationship can emerge when you're not leaning in too far. Or leaning out too far.

Kristen

Yeah, no, I love how you put that. And I think the other thing is it's not threatening to your sense of self and connection and belonging, you know, you're okay, they have a different opinion. And you're still okay, it's not threatening to the bot right connection,

Suzanne

right. And the threatening would be, again, you'd know that by the sort of triggered experience you might recognise or individuals recognise I tend to want to fight I tend to want to flee these fight flight freeze, I just go frozen or fawning, this tendency to just make you feel better if I possibly could, you'll notice the more mindful you are, the more you'll notice what your particular strategy is. And the thing is that it's a great strategy. The point of that strategy was to keep you safe, right to get you love safety and belonging. When you were younger, call it an adaptive strategy. It was wise child, okay, I'm going to take my voice and put it back here because it's not safe. I have my point of view, and I get in trouble. And then you get to be an adult and you want to have your voice and there's no way you will be able to have your voice. For example, if you aren't willing. It's first of all, don't notice how you get triggered when somebody has a strong powerful expression that you're sitting with someone with power, and then you are able to regulate yourself and slow yourself down and not just withdraw in this example, but actually go what do I think right now? And maybe sometimes you have enough to go away from the powerful person with a strong voice to find your own voice, you know, but that's a move in the right direction, for example of differentiation.

Kristen

Yes. I love that. I was curious, when David died, how differentiated Do you think you were? And then what has that been like in your healing process? When we look at differentiation,

Suzanne

I think I was pretty differentiated. In fact, I would say, David, and I had a very beautiful relationship actually, and respected each other a lot. So we were both able to, it was rare that both of us would get hijacked, let's say, the amygdala hijack, when you get emotionally overwhelmed by something, you know, when you get into a fight, and you're both blown out, usually one or the other of us would stay the adult when the other one would go into the child. So we were pretty good at that. But what I'm noticing now is this is the spoiler alert for the book. But I do meet somebody else in the many years later, and in that deepening relationship, and we've been working on the next layer, I'd say of my own differentiation. And I think maybe there are ways in which we're the David our lives were so sort of we had our very own worlds. I ran my women's leadership business and did my programmes in the universities and David Rana, Indonesian antique furniture business, and they're very different. And I can see that I'm growing. And I personally feel individuation and differentiation and becoming more myself that's individuation in relationship with others differentiation is a lifelong journey. And I'd say with my new partner, it's good work for me when I bump into is slowing myself down to really hear him and the part of me that just wants to roll right over and just keep on moving. And that comes out of I think of fear that I'm going to hear something I don't want to hear. So I think I'm growing more of that capacity now to bring more of myself and really take in more of the other.

Kristen

Yeah, that's beautiful. One of the things that I love about you is your insight and your self awareness. And then the gift that keeps on giving. I think that's you can teach from that. And I don't mean teaches in a hierarchy, I mean, it comes naturally and flows through you. And I did get that sense in the book, just to kind of acknowledge what you're saying that you were differentiated from David. So that's interesting how new relationships can bring out right? We all know this different relationships can bring up different parts of us, there may be more undifferentiated part that comes out relationally with different people.

Suzanne

Totally, absolutely. And that can happen in work that can happen in a new collaboration. And the main thing, the big thing is not to see it as wrong. It's like, oh, wow, this is a new field of growth, a new opportunity, you could say, we're working with my partner and are working with a couples therapist. So we're actually getting the container. And they're developmentally oriented, which is what I love, that you can really grow more, that you become more whole in how you are in relationship. And I know from the trauma, I've been through the reconnecting with another person and for people that have been through divorce or some of those difficult losses, loss of a spouse, it is something to come back into connection again, it will do it mindfully.

Kristen

It really is. Okay, so my daughter just called just to update everybody for school. She's 17 and was upset about friendship situation. So Suzanne is tying this in together with differentiation. Okay, go ahead.

Suzanne

Well, at this age, there's the synchronicity, let's say of this happening to Kristin, right, as we're talking about differentiation, and the normalising that I'm sure she is doing as a mother of this is hard. This is really hard right now, but you're growing the capacity. And this is what a 1716 1718 year old is doing. They're growing the capacity to have themselves and love somebody else and come into being the love, no love, let go of love. And those sort of probably all remember that was our first love that ended or all of that or developing the muscles could save differentiation, where the invitation for her courses to just keep coming back to herself the self regulation that like I'm okay, I'm all right. It's okay. There's that person over there that just say as an example of that age, it could be the boyfriend that was is now with somebody else. And or at least looks like that. How do you stay connected to yourself and stay at sometimes I call it stop playing on both sides of the court where I hit my ball, I'm on this side. And then I got to run over and I make up old stories about what the other person is experiencing on the other side and just stay with yourself. And sometimes it's so intense that you do have to not be in the space a little bit while you're building that capacity.

Kristen

Exactly. That's beautifully said. And I want to talk about how you do that because you talk about grounding in the book section on where you talked about grounding and you quoted David, who did you get the quote from about the grounding? I'm trying to find it in my little notes here, because how does somebody be able to differentiate individuate and come back to self and self regulate? And you talk so beautifully about it you had to do throughout your grief journey? Oh, part of the book. Yeah. And how you did that?

Suzanne

Right. So the thing is, what we forget is that the nervous system is everything in any kind of a trauma situation, right now your daughter's going through her nervous system is overwhelmed. And what happens is the prefrontal cortex just has stories from the past or fears for the future, if it's been hijacked by that overactive nervous system. So the first order of business is to really subtle, literally at a, from a neuroscience perspective, just subtle, your nervous system. And I had to do that again. And again, because I had many decisions to make, there were things I needed to figure out. But I needed my prefrontal cortex to be useful, and not just give delivering me lots of fear thoughts. So North is very, very valuable. Obviously, there are many breathing practices, but the breath is one of the key ways that we can switch from the sympathetic nervous system, the overwhelmed to the parasympathetic, longer, exhale than inhale, just you've probably all heard from your mother, take 10, deep breaths, we know the neuroscience of that really take 10 deep breaths, I want your daughter to go into the woman's bathroom, and take 10 deep breaths, and just settle her nervous system, you know, that's what I had to keep doing. And then you have moving the energy, which I would do every day in the morning. And this is very hard when you're going through something difficult, because sometimes you don't want to go anywhere, or do anything that actually moving energy in your body. So for me that was running, or fast walk or some way in which the for whatever was going to come into the day, I was actually able to move my energy. Those are probably the two key things that we could start with.

Kristen

I love how in your journey, you're transparent in how not only did it affect you emotionally, but you did talk about your nervous system throughout the book. And we really talked about how it impacted your nervous system. And how connected you were to your nervous system. How did you figure out because for some people, this is brand new work, they're not kind of trauma can take us away from the body and connecting to the body. How did you like know what your body needed and what you needed? Well,

Suzanne

it's the work I do with women, I'd say it is to come back into the body to be embodied. And that was a journey for me because I was a management consultant, working in a leadership space, you know, very much in my head, and very good at what I did, I was working with the top teams in Fortune 100 companies, and really not that aware of what was happening in my body, I was like, I had this big head that was smart, and the body is something underneath there. And it was a wake up call for me, and the number of factors that go into it in the book about what turned me from that work into the work I'm doing today. And it was a journey of realising because at first, I think when I switched from just doing this more generic leadership work for top teams, I started to work with women, and opened a private coaching practice, I thought it was going to be giving them new ideas, maybe new behaviours. But I discovered Whoa, we're in a whole nother category. There's a whole lot of information in this body. And emotional intelligence was just coming in. It's something everybody talks about now. But then it was in the 90s. It wasn't so common. People didn't really respect or even understand emotions, social intelligence, that wasn't really understood. These are all things now we have the neuroscience behind and we value, but I was learning that. And so I myself kept coming into my body and discovering all sorts of feelings and sensations and learning to find my intuition. And what is intuition? And how do I know in my body so I'd say for any of your listeners for whom this is a new idea, I guess we could say there's an evolutionary imperative and the my first book, The Way of the mister woman, I really go into this, there is an evolutionary imperative to grow this capacity. Einstein made that famous quote, We can't solve the problems of today by the consciousness that created them yesterday. So that's an evolutionary move. That is we have problems in the world today and in our own complex families and communities that we cannot solve without emotional intelligence without learning how to be in relationships in a new way. This is just simply what's required now. So for me, that was a learning then I will say during these years post trauma, I was committed because I do feel David did a kind of what I call spiritual bypass. He He and left and he had a very deep meditation practice was not afraid of dying. I know he wasn't able to handle everything that was going to happen. And I was not going to do that. So for me, it was like this waking down, I was obviously going to wake up, this was a wake up call, but it was going to be a waking down and into my body, make sure that I included all of myself and of others around me when I to get through this,

Kristen

that is a really helpful way you just articulated that, because what I just add a visualisation because you do talk about grounding in the book quite a bit. And that is I see you wanted to ground into your body, instead of bypass your experience, right

Suzanne

feet on the floor, it's like this was a practice every single morning, I would do this one thing that I required of myself. And if anyone's going through a real trauma, this will be helpful. It's like a real dramatic, shocking trauma, you come out of the unconscious, and it's like, Oh, my God, this can't be my life, you just want to go back, pull the covers of your head. And I would require myself to get on the side of my bed, put my feet on the floor and say, I am grateful for this embodied life. And I got my human here, feel my feet on the ground, May this day, be a blessing may every thing I do be filled with love, I would say different things every day. But the basic essence was gratitude for being alive. And David was not I was, and I didn't believe it necessarily with my mind. But it oriented me too. I am here in a body. And once I'd done that, and I'd sort of told myself that, then I could make the next move and into the day. That's so helpful.

Kristen

It seems basic to people, but it really isn't when you're in the middle of it. It's not this is taking over everything to even get out of your bed. Exactly. Even do the next thing. So that is so helpful to say, Okay, I could talk to you for hours. I feel like this is just a feeling. I feel like, Have you thought about writing a book on individuation and differentiation? It's a bit like

Suzanne

saying your second child is not even born yet. Have you got a third one in mind?

Kristen

There's some Yeah, I'll leave you there.

Suzanne

Well, thank you, I'd really appreciate that. That is 100%. The work I do. I mean, that's the core of the work that I do with women. So it is something that matters deeply to me. And because I do think we need individuated differentiated in this case, my work with women, women in the world agents of change in these times, we have to be able to show up in our families and in our communities in the world in our jobs in really different ways. And that requires that work. So hopefully in the first book, you get a sense of that. And in this book, you kind of get my lived experience of it. And then maybe I'll write a blog about it now that I would

Kristen

love that. I just would like to hear more if it's not resonant, if not flowing, no big deal. I just feel like there's something there. Because even if you're talking like we could go so deep into this topic, because I'm not to go on a tangent with it. I was even thinking with my daughter when she was calling because she has not done that before. I was feeling my feet on the floor. I was trying to breathe and regulate sound like I'm in the middle of a podcast, I need it. I don't want to leave Suzanne in the lurch. You know, I'm thinking I'm like no, just be here now. So I was breathing through my feet. And even then you can feel like I could feel my body responding to her aches. So I was practising feel my feet breathing into that, just to model what that looks like. It's sometimes you think, Well, you just breathe and you do this. It's like no, it's really mindfully being aware of your own experience in the moment. And differentiation. When we looking at that I even want to go okay, as a parent, you have to really see is this taking you into a younger part that is needing some attention, some nurturing some healing? It wasn't today. But I mean, it was more or less me going oh, timewise and trying to balance her and this. And I think it's such an important conversation that people don't know about. So I need to be encouraging and soak. No,

Suzanne

that's great up. And you know, it's not that there's one and I think you just expressed that beautifully, because it isn't that if your daughter calls, obviously you're doing what you're doing. You're not going to be disturbed. You know, like, oh, that's differentiation that I never respond. When I'm doing my thing. I do my thing. It's having the capacity to use your intuition and sense as you did. This doesn't happen for her. She doesn't usually do this is what is needed here. And that's differentiation. Now, then it might be needed. The next level of that is where she wants to talk right now. And you say I cannot do that. I will talk to you after I'm done. That's differentiation. And then differentiation is when you do not take on her anxiety. Now have that running in the background. Like you can come back to yourself and that is a grown capacity and you probably had to work it you probably had to keep bringing yourself back. Come back, leave her with her. And then you'll address it later. Oh

Kristen

my gosh, this is so good. You just walked through this real life example that I I think it's gonna be so helpful for our listeners, because it's really the practical application of differentiation like individuation, I really think but differentiation relationally. And I'm really glad you shared how it's been different in your current relationship, because that piece gets overlooked. And in writing yours, though, somehow, each have right different parents, siblings.

Suzanne

Often I say, when women enter into my programme, sometimes they come in thinking, I've got to leave this marriage, or I'm already it's falling apart, or the job or something. And I always say, if you don't have to do anything, right now, don't do anything. Because often wherever you go, there you are. And so if you don't use the fire of this circumstance, which could be say, very heated in your marriage, or heated in a job to differentiate to find out use it now, then I not had many people, women who I've worked with do that. And that was still may be correct for them to make the change at the end of the programme that I run, but they do it in a completely different way without burning down the whole barn at the same time. And also, sometimes it wasn't the thing to leave that it was actually they were trying to wake up, something was coming alive and into them, and then make it about the person out there that's keeping me from being me. But once you discover you more, then you can see if you can have often the partner actually does want more as well, if you've grown yourself up a little bit, so no trill,

Kristen

because oftentimes I'll tell people, you're just going to take that into other relationships is going to be a pattern, if we don't stop centre start really getting connected to what we're we're feeling that if I don't please this person, or they are XYZ, then I can't speak my truth. I mean, sometimes right would be the case. But some people will say, Well, I just can't do that with this person. And maybe that's true or not true. But the exercise of exploring the depths within the cell is what I hear you say both have some insight unless there's obviously domestic violence or something along those lines. Yes, this has been so powerful. Is there anything we didn't cover that you thought would be important for the listeners?

Suzanne

Well, a lots of things. That's why you should buy the book, everyone

Kristen

definitely need the book. I mean, I've got the thing highlighted, and we didn't even get to everything.

Suzanne

We certainly did not know. It comes out in on June 13. I don't know when we're going, this will come out. But you can preorder it now. Or you can get it when it comes down to 14 is when this Yeah, oh, yeah. Okay, so the book will be available, you'll be able to go right away and get it. That's awesome. I think we're we've kind of gone in our conversation, I would just want to underline which is, these are just such incredible times, and incredibly difficult times on the planet, but also incredible times, asking us all to grow up. And if life brings you a situation that difficult traumatic one or loss, which is what this book is about, then really there is and this is what I hope this book can be, I call it a field guide. Like I'm not telling you exactly where to go. But it's like with a birds Oh, there's that kind of bird. There's that kind of bird and feel that. So to show you some trail markers on the way, and that you could use that times to really be a kind of evolutionary updraft like wind under your wings kind of helping you to, in fact, become more whole and have a life that you maybe wouldn't even be able to imagine. And in the time of the sorrow of the loss of that is understandable. But it's possible. And you're very commitment to making your path by walking in this kind of way that I would say a way of staying true to yourself a loving open heart to the world is making a difference in these times. Just that you don't need to write a book about it. You just need to live it, honestly. So that's probably what I'd say. And then I maybe just say, to be so compassionate with yourself, we tend to be compassionate with everybody else. But when you're going through something really difficult, and I did that every day, just this handover heart into like, Oh, this is so hard right now this is really difficult. And can I be gentle with myself? Can I be kind to myself is a beautiful thing to remember.

Kristen

Really is thank you so much. Where can people find you? If this conversation listeners they they read your book? Where can they find you?

Suzanne

My website is mysterious. woman.com m y s t e r i l woman.com? Instagram is Mr. Woman, Facebook, Mr. Adelman light those are obvious mister woman everywhere. And you can find out in the first book and the second book what the word Mysterio I am can proudly say I invented it. Because I didn't have a word to describe what I was seeing this beautiful new way of being that I was seeing arise and women that I'd worked with her through our programmes and this ability to bring together the mystery and be with ambiguity and all these things. You can find out more about that. And on June 22. I have an event of a sort of book launch workshop at East West bookshop and it'll be online so available to anybody anywhere. It'll be on the website, you'll see a link to that. And you can sign up for that. If you're interested to just drop in with me for 90 minutes a little bit deeper, get on my mailing list and see what's coming.

Kristen

I love that. That's exciting. Congratulations. I loved the book. So go out and grab you make your path by walking. You want to get it I'm so excited. This is launching the day after that was on sale as perfect. So I am so grateful for your energy or love you share it on your wisdom and being on the close the chapter podcast thank you from the bottom of my heart. This was a powerful conversation for me. And I know it will be for the audience too. So thank you so much, Suzanne.

Suzanne

Kristen.

Kristen

Thank you so much for listening to the close the chapter podcast. My hope is that you took home some actionable steps, along with motivation, inspiration and hope for making sustainable change in your life. If you enjoy this episode, click the subscribe button to be sure to get the updated episodes every week and share with a friend or family member. For more information about how to get connected visit Kristin k r i s t e n d Boice b o ice.com. Thanks and have a great day.