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Data Collectors!

I wanted to take a second to talk about what’s actually happening behind the scenes. I’m building out a lot of moving parts right now, and because you all support me here on Substack, I want to make sure you’re getting the “Sanctuary” treatment across everything I’m doing. For my providers, students, and coaches: I’ve officially opened up The Safety to Practice community. This is for the clinicians, the people in their hours, and honestly, I’m opening it to coaches too (even though we know coaching isn’t therapy, the work still matters).

I have the Community Forum for $49 one time payment, but for you all, it’s $10 off and for the Group Consultations, which are normally $65 monthly, I want you to have a real discount. If you’re a Sanctuary member, I’m bringing that down to $40 a month.

Here’s the thing: If you join a group consultation, I’m giving you lifetime access to the forum for free!! Even if you only show up for one month of group, you keep the forum. The forum is there for those of you who don’t want to do the live virtual meet-ups but still want a place to land.

For everyone else (The NSP Academy): If you aren’t a provider, don’t think I’ve forgotten about you. I am knee-deep in building the Nervous System Playground (NSP) Academy. This is taking me more time than I anticipated because I want it to be right— low key perfectionism avoidance 😩. My vision for the Academy is a literal playground for human behavior. I want to provide self-paced learning for people who maybe don’t have access to traditional therapy, or maybe you just prefer not to do therapy. This is about self-development and giving you the tools to navigate your own nervous system at your own speed.

Once the Academy is fully live, you’ll be getting a 20% discount as a thank you for being here with me while I build this.

The Communities & How We’re Meeting

I want to be transparent with you all: I’m building these spaces because they are exactly what I have needed. I’ve wanted a safe place to practice as a clinician—to process, learn from others, and just support each other in this helping field. And honestly, I’ve needed a community like the one we’re starting with Milligram Mondays, too. Sometimes I struggle to get things done just like anyone else, and I wanted a space where we can regulate life and navigate these complexities together.

Here is the breakdown of how and when we are moving:

1. Chasing Milligrams (Free Community for Everyone) This is open to everyone, and we are kicking things off with Milligram Mondays. These are “Action Hours” focused on getting us out of that “Executive Freeze” we all hit sometimes.

• The Science: We’re using the power of Body Doubling. There is real neuroscience behind having another person “witness” your work. It lowers the cortisol and friction that keeps us stuck, helping us stay regulated while we actually get things done.

• The Schedule: We meet the first Monday of every month.

• The Kickoff: Our very first “Meet & Greet” is Monday, April 20th at 4:00 p.m. MST. We’ll do some icebreakers and maybe finish with breathwork or journaling just to feel out the flow.

• The First Official Action Hour: This takes place on Monday, May 4th.

2. The Safety to Practice / Provider Circle (Group Consultation) This is for the clinicians, students, and coaches. This is where we dive into the clinical mentorship and “Provider” side of things.

• The Schedule: We meet bi-weekly on Thursdays at 12:00 p.m. MST. We’re starting with two 1-hour meetups, but we can discuss as a group if we’d rather switch to one longer session.

• The Replays: Don’t worry if you’re seeing clients or life gets in the way. There will always be replay access for the consultation sessions and meetups.

I am so glad to finally be moving with all of this. It’s been a long time coming, and I really hope to see you there—whether we’re processing clinical cases or just holding space for each other to get through the “to-do” list.

Not apart of the Sanctuary?

If you aren’t a Sanctuary member yet but you want to get in on these perks, you can join us by clicking the link below.

Becoming a paid subscriber here doesn’t just give you the current discounts for the Safety to Practice community and the Group Consultations—it’s also your locked-in access for the future. As I roll out the NSP Academy and other digital products or specialized workshops, Sanctuary members will always be the first to know and the first to receive exclusive pricing.

Join the Sanctuary & Unlock Your Perks

1:1 Slots are Opening Up!

I am so excited to share that I’m opening up new slots for 1:1 work, but things are going to look a little different moving forward. I’m shifting my practice toward a more brief, solution-focused approach. I want our time together to be intentional and high-impact so you can actually get moving on what matters to you.

Here is how that looks:

• Clinical Sessions: These now have a max capacity of 12 sessions. We get in, we do the work, and we get you regulated and ready to navigate life on your own terms. While you roam the streets of the wild 😝

• Consulting Sessions: You can grab these as a single intensive session (if you just need to troubleshoot one specific thing) or as a 6-session package for deeper strategy. I will eventually open up a 12 session package.

I’ve put all the details, pricing, and how to book into the links below. Take a look and see which one feels like the right fit for where you are.

Again, I am so full of gratitude for your support, encouragement, engagement.🥰 All of it! Thank you for being patient while I get the NSP Academy ready. I’ll be sending out the specific discount links for the clinical side down below! ⬇️

I hope to see some of you all in our upcoming Milligram Monday register below.

Sign Up & Join the free community Here!

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I was not planning on writing this, but after the day I had, I thought why not. There is something that came up from the depths of the sediment…You know—the suppressed s*hit some of us feel is not necessary to dig into. I mean, come on—I do this for work. I already know what is down there, what it means, yada yada... Then I realized in that moment how much I minimize my own aches. How the loss of a friend having to grieve impermanence in a way that my mind just could not grasp. Object permanence. What do you mean she was here and now she is gone… Just like that—gone. I was in denial… calling her, texting her. Then…

Just stuck…

A week prior to this incident—I could feel something. Remember the cricket I mentioned in a previous article? Yeah... I could feel the essence of that cricket. I could feel something was off in the field, like something was about to happen, but I just did not know what. I was in my people-pleaser era at the time, to some degree. Now, don’t get it twisted—I still had no problem telling random people no or speaking up for myself. But with the people I loved and cared for? I was not pushy. I didn’t want to crowd her or make her feel hover-policed, so I gave her some space. We normally talked at least once a week, and even though I could feel her drifting, I stayed quiet. Around that time, she had already moved away to the East Bay and like all humans, she adapted to her environment. It’s just a part of development, but her new environment was loud. The teens there partied in ways that my sheltered nervous system was coded to recognize as pure danger.

So, my BFF and I were shifting. She was in a place where she desperately needed to belong to her new surroundings, and I didn’t live there—I would just travel in to visit. We were being pulled in different directions by the classic adolescent trap: the fight between staying true to yourself and the desperate need to fit in.

Can you remember what you did to belong during that time?

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There is a particular kind of exhaustion that comes from being the one who sees what is happening while being surrounded by people who refuse to look— yet claim they “see.” Lately, I’ve been thinking deeply about family systems, roles, and how certain individuals become the emotional containers for everyone else’s avoidance. Once you see the pattern, you can never unsee it. I watch these dynamics with a sense of awe. It’s never from a place of judgment, but from a profound observation of the human condition. We all need that sense of awe to truly understand the world.

In my clinical work, I see it repeatedly: the one who notices, the one who names the tension, the one who feels everything first. Often, it is the eldest daughter carrying not only her own pain but the unprocessed grief, fear, and resentment of the generations before her. She becomes labeled as “too much” simply because she refuses to pretend things are fine when they aren’t. What we don’t discuss enough is how often awareness is punished. Naming the truth is frequently met with projection. When you name a pattern, it is interpreted as an attack, an act of harm, or a sign of moral superiority.

Kind of like growing up with our parents.

Let’s pause for a second…

Let’s sit in this presence for a moment and truly reflect…

What if naming the truth really meant: “I see you because I am you?”

The more I work in family systems the more I realize, many of us fall into the role of holding something for others. At least holding that narrative. When you grow up in a system where survival requires emotional suppression, awareness becomes a threat to the blueprint, It isn’t that your observations are inaccurate. You see, that’s the destructive mental trap designed to make you doubt yourself. It’s that your clarity disrupts the illusion of peace. Many families selectively bury their heads in the sand; they are oblivious to their own patterns, yet they are the first to look up and judge when YOU disrupt the status quo. When the child or adult kid breaks the status quo that draws attention to their parenting.

When you break that illusion, you instantly are seen as “difficult.” In my practice with high-conflict or avoidant families, I’ve watched this play out:

• The moment you name a pattern, you are “intense.”

• When you stop absorbing everyone else’s emotions, you are “cold” or “abrasive.”

• When you stop performing happiness, you are “angry.”

The irony is that those criticizing you for being “too much” are often the ones who never learned how to sit with their own discomfort. It pisses me off to see people adopt the language of healing, using words like “boundaries,” “regulation,” or “perspective” without embodying any of it. It becomes a costume— a performance to appear “evolved” while avoiding real accountability internally, and the body knows. It’s like a Scooby-Doo mask; I find myself wanting to snatch it off to reveal the avoidance underneath. I find I need to remind myself at times that some people will convince themselves the mask is the only thing they can survive in.

There is no point in losing yourself trying to convince someone to live.

Real work means acknowledging your own baggage. It is easy to “explain” things using absolute, accusatory language, while positioning yourself as the mature one. Respectful dialogue is often a comedy when it comes from those who have mastered covert power plays. There are undercurrents of energy—invisible highways—that most people cannot see because they are “playing therapy” while living in a distorted reality. We see this when calmness is used as a shield while the language spoken suggests high nervous system activation. In these dynamics, withdrawal is mistaken for maturity, and anyone who questions it is labeled the problem.

This is a setup.

That is the ache.

Many of us were forced to grow up early. We learned to read rooms, manage tension, and keep the peace before we could learn what “peace” even meant. That hyper-awareness made us responsible for things that weren’t ours to carry. When someone tells me I “need to let things go” or that I “think too much,” what I really hear is: “I’m uncomfortable with your clarity.” Clarity asks for ownership, and not everyone wants to pay the cost of acknowledging what they’ve avoided. What hurts most is the expectation that people should shrink themselves to protect others from their own reflection. What does reflection actually mean? Why does the concept of seeing ourselves reflected back to us become so hard to not just accept, but at least hold.

Examine it.

Some refuse too, because to them the pain of discomfort is too much, or because the ego has swallowed them whole.

I am learning to stop trying to be understood by those who benefit from misunderstanding me. I am learning to slow down my “needy ADHD brain” that sees every pattern. But most importantly, I am recognizing that accountability is often treated as a one-way street. Some people will only walk down accountability lane if you hold their hand and walk it with them.

Many of us are out here fighting the world. Myself included. This last week, traveling back to Mexico during a crisis to get my dog emergency veterinarian care. Exploring a city I only ever heard stories about from locals of El Paso. Seeing how people live there. How you are treated because the car you drive and how that mentality spills into the States because— well— group think.

I think about how a woman in the line crossing the bridge entering back into El Paso literally called the Mexican police on us because we merged into the line like other people did— MANY other people. She almost crashed her car trying to prevent us from merging. Now, were we in the wrong? Probably, we are driving in another country and didn’t know what we are doing. Thats not the issue. The issue was the level of hatred in this women. The anger and rage— for what? Enough rage to call the police all of that just so she could feel like she had some control over something. There are women and men alike that have similar frequencies of this nature. Bitter, angry, no control in their own life. These people are working at schools with your kids, working as therapists, they are the lawyer, the judge granting your custody case.

We sit on our high horses from our special kid club groups of marginalization. Screaming about injustice and systemic oppression. Yet, don’t zoom into the narcissism within us all. We don’t bother to examine how we treat each other. We cuss people out on the highway. We take over the highway. We use our cars as weapons for control, and treat people a certain way beucase the way they dress, the car they drive, the side of town they live in. We judge people for being poor or for being rich. If they made a life for themselves we judge them while claiming they aren’t humble people. We make meaning out of anything that reveals whatever we feel we lack in ourselves. We disassociate into activism because it distracts us from the emptiness inside ourselves and the narcissism we use to mask that emptiness. We search for people who validate us because algorithms have conditioned that as baseline. So when we are in reality and the therapist doesn’t take our side or validate us, our kids don’t do what we say, live how we want them to live, we can’t stand our neighbor for getting a new car or remodeling their house—again. “Why does so and so always travel.” This is our life.

All we do is complain.

Why do you think that is?

We don’t ever complain about what we are doing we just complain about what others are doing.

I was once sitting outside having lunch with my brother years ago. A guy in a car pulled up to traffic that was stopped honking and yelling at people to move. He was in his egocentric loop not realizing traffic was stopped so someone in a wheel chair could cross. Did I holler at the guy and say “Hey! it’s sunny outside while gesturing for him to relax!!!” — yeah.. I did🤭 It worked though. He apologized, he got snapped out of his ego loop and back into the present reality where he could visually see the person crossing the road. Now, for me I understand ego-centric loops and how we all— myself included— get stuck in them. But, it’s the grief of how many perform altruism, perform kindness, but day to day behave hateful to people for whatever reason they created in their mind while stuck in the upside down of their ego-centric loop.

This performance is the ultimate systemic bypass. We track the patterns of the world so we don’t have to track the patterns of our own hearts. We want the world to change its “Family System” while we refuse to regulate our own internal system. What we are seeing in these moments—the rage in the car line, the weaponizing of a police call, the judgment of a neighbor’s success—is displacement. When we lack internal agency, we seek external dominance by doing things such as calling the police on others for literally mundane reasons, screaming racist and abuse at people who held a boundary up to you. Americans think we are losing our rights.

What this is Psychoeducationally, this is a failure of Self-Led Regulation. Many can choose to lead themselves to stagnation while blaming systemic forces for their lack of discipline. While simultaneously bypassing harm to people simply because “they were rich” “ they were white” or “they were racist.”

That worries me.

Scares me even.

We have replaced actual human connection with ‘validation loops’ provided by algorithms, which leaves us starving for real intimacy. So when we go looking for real intimacy, many of us don’t know what that is or even looks like— so, we turn to Ai and social media to have someone else tell us if this person is a red flag or not. We go to therapy hoping they will side or validate us against our family or partner. When that hunger isn’t met, it turns into communal narcissism where ‘the other’ becomes a canvas for our own unexamined shadows. We aren’t fighting for justice in those moments; we are discharging the discomfort of our own emptiness, just look online.

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A lot of us are angry because the messaging and modeling that we received growing up was just anger. It wasn’t just anger, it was a lot of emotions that just make you feel “not enough,” and then we end up transmuting that and inheriting it, and then polluting the world. Being on Easter holiday weekend, seeing that level of hatred in a person purely for just what we did... it triggered me to want to be ugly back to her, like, “Oh hell no.” My husband was able to kind of let it go, but for me, it wasn’t about the woman in the line. It was a metaphor for what that woman represents as a collective, and it was creating this level of grief in me that really— hurt.

How are we sitting out here still pointing the finger at the right versus the left, versus the blue versus the red, versus the “you’re an idiot,” “you’re a racist,” “phobic” as we defend ‘our side’ and we’re having tantrums and we’re out here protesting, but look at how you treat each other on a day-to-day basis. Where do we think all of this built-up energy is coming from? Something is stirring it up in us and we’re not reflective at all. It’s the incongruence of the fakeness of it all. It’s Easter weekend and you’re out here hella hatred—she hissed with her teeth, almost about to wreck her own car so she could have control. This woman could be in your family, she could be an in-law, she could be a co-worker.

Now, I want us to really zoom out.

This is how I bring this back to families, because a lot of us are being raised by women who are burnt out, drained, and exhausted. They’re surviving. They’re in marriages they are not happy in (their choice, yes villains exist but it’s still a choice that was made and we all must accept that fact.) Instead of metabolizing that and processing it, it gets displaced on their partners, kids and some of these kids are adult-adults. Some of these adult-adults don’t even want to deal with the parent anymore because all they do is discharge their energy because they don’t know how to metabolize it themselves with healthy habits, healthy skills, healthy diet, healthy sleeping patterns, or healthy mental and spiritual health. Essentially learning to be an individual outside of being a role. Many don’t want to do that. You don’t want to have the discipline; you just want to go to work. You want to come home, you want to b*tch and complain, and then you want to complain about how your kids aren’t treating the world how you raised them—which was basically to circle you and validate everything you think and feel because you didn’t know how to learn how to do it for yourself. This is what so many are going through right now. whether you are the mother in the story or the adult kids in the story.

The transitions in life are what we humans are struggling with adapting to. So we drift.

When there’s somebody in the family who is the scapegoat, who pulls out, who emotionally cuts off, who is tired and isn’t going to deal with it anymore—that’s where narcissistic injuries start showing up. This isn’t about blaming women—that’s your victim schema. It’s easy to say out loud that all I do is side with men rather than actually sit with the message thats being said. I get annoyed because I have to walk this path too. The woman in the crossing line is a metaphor for what we deal with in our mothers-in-law, and our fathers-in-law, and our partners, and our family systems or even at work. It's the shadow aspect of us, the rugrat aspect of us, the child. Everybody talks about communication, and then when you actually do try to communicate:

“Hey, what’s been going on? I noticed that you’ve shifted, did I do something?”

What do you get in response?

…“Oh, everything’s fine,” and then they run to chismé brunch where they gossip and generate more meaning making stories to blind loyalty friends. It’s a pattern I see in my office, in my own life, with peers. So often.

We want communication but are not honest when faced with it.

This is the world that we live in. This is why I always say we cannot care what people are going to say or even think about us. Let them talk. Let them... because if somebody is going to believe information like that from a secondary person... I learned that real quick how fast people gossip, because gossip is the best way to avoid the chaos in your own life.

It is.

It truly is.

The perfect distraction from our own shadows.

The more we gossip, judge, and condemn people for their shadow. We drift further and further away from reaching and facing our own.

The Cost of Clarity

This is the Cost of Clarity.

When you decide to stop being the ‘stabilizer’ for a dysfunctional family blueprint, you become the villain in their narrative. The woman in the line at the border wasn’t fighting a Tesla; she was discharging a lifetime of unmanaged powerlessness onto a stranger because it’s easier than looking at the burnout in her own kitchen. Psychoeducationally, we are looking at Intergenerational Displacement. Working in El Paso, this experiences has granted me the opportunity to see this play out live in so many capacities. When a system—whether it’s a family or a community—refuses to metabolize its own grief and anger, it requires a target. If you aren’t willing to be that target anymore, if you refuse to ‘hold their hand’ down accountability lane, the system will experience a narcissistic injury. They will use gossip, and labels or even guilt and manipulation to regain the control they lack internally.

This displacement doesn't stay behind closed doors; it migrates. When we haven't reconciled the powerlessness in our own living rooms, we take it to the streets, often under the banner of a 'cause.' Activism, in its unexamined state, becomes the ultimate dissociative shield. This is why activist movements frustrate me. As much as I understand the heart behind them. They are riddled with people infected by egoic constructs and noise using that movement specifically as a shield to disguise narcissistic traits, entitlement, and unfazed unhealed wounds. I find them to be psychologically dangerous while in a society being conditioned to process data into polarity. What I mean by this is many of these groups members—trauma bond together due to having the same ache. Yet no skills are being used, many struggle with mental illness, mood or personality disorders, and are walking on eggshells among their own group members. Reenacting the very blueprints they fled creating these small groups that are systems too. We just recreate what we know in new decorative ways. Think about it, we go into relationships as an escape from the childhood wounds, only to find they show up in the relationship. It’s the same concept with friendships, and these activist spaces.

Until we stop using activism and roles as a dissociative shield and start looking at how we hold the ‘hand’ of our own accountability, the system doesn’t change. It just shifts characters. The goal isn’t to be ‘right’ in the line back to El Paso; the goal is to realize that the person you are screaming at is the mirror you are most afraid to look into. Clarity costs you the comfort of the groupthink, but it buys you your soul back.

Sitting across from difference is my life version of exposure therapy, because difference gets me closer to my own truth.

So…

Let them talk.

You have work to do.

They don’t warn you about the guilt trips in modern veterinary medicine.

This past Saturday took a turn when our dog was diagnosed with a severe Ehrlichia blood infection. He went from normal behavior—playing— to sever fever in a matter of hours. Panic was my instant baseline. He was in a severe state, and we were terrified. But as we walked into the clinic looking for a lifeline, I didn’t feel supported. I felt handled.

Gaslighting and guilt trips are built into the culture here. So when they show up at your primary care appointment, dentist, or Emergency vet visit— there is a level of “oh, hell no…” that stirs up inside me. Walking into an American vet clinic too often feels exactly like taking your car to a mechanic when you don’t know anything about engines. It becomes a barrage of high-pressure sales tactics disguised as medical necessity. Weaponizing the heightened emotional state that you are in.“Let’s just run this $1,000 test and see what happens,” they say, as if regular people just have thousands of dollars lying around to “just see.”

Our system pushes you into high-stakes decisions fueled by panic and emotional leverage, rather than giving you an actual, informed choice. It preys on the fear that if you don’t spend every dime you have, you are failing as a pet parent. Had I allowed that guilt to convince me I wasn’t doing enough, I would have spent thousands of dollars in the ER just to put my dog through invasive trauma that likely would have killed him.

Instead, I said “f*ck it.” I decided to look across the border into Juárez, Mexico. Knowing how I feel about having to rely on others. This was an emergency, I was going there regardless, I was ready to raw dog the whole experience with Google Translate in hand.

The Anatomy of Surrender

In Mexico, the philosophy was different. They didn’t immediately push aggressive, wallet-draining interventions just to run up a bill. They gave his body time and space to do what it was naturally designed to do, supporting him without suffocating him.

Key word here is—with space.

Now, to get him that care, I had to break the habit of… well—being me. Rumination and what I like to call emotional self-harm were not going to heal him; they were only going to hurt him and me in the process. While I have a tendency to be a hyper-independent person who has no problem asking questions and challenging opinions. I am also someone who keeps to themselves, stays private, and handles their own shit. My husband and I were both the eldest children, the ones who will “just figure it out.” Asking for help does not come naturally to us. We always give to others, but forget to give to ourselves. Much of the time, that giving is just—grace.

Yet, here I was: accepting help from a friend who crossed with me and served as my translator. I had to drop my pride at the border. I had to blindly trust strangers to translate for me and guide us through the chaos. For the hyper-independent, true surrender feels like jumping off a cliff. My default setting in a crisis is to prepare for absolute catastrophe, but this ordeal forced me to practice a brutal kind of patience. I had to learn to stay open to the best possible outcome, holding space for healing rather than immediately assuming the worst.

My history with pets in crisis is basically sudden death. I have never gone through something where a pet is fighting to stay alive. The level of confusion my body is experiencing had my mind glitching, trying to play movies of healing and health while fighting the doom of death.

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The Village We Try to Live Without

We talk a lot about self-reliance, but the truth is, you do need a village. By refusing to play the game of a broken, guilt-driven system, something unlocked in me. Stepping into that vulnerability allowed me to let people in. It allowed me to trust the kindness of strangers who had no reason to help us, yet did anyway. I had to be willing to not give a sh*t what the American vet thought about our decision. For me, it’s the lack of integrity. This is a vet my other dog, Archie, sees. Have they called to check on the brother of their other patient? Nope, not once. They never followed through with calling the clinic or sending over documents like they said they would. You know that feeling of being gaslit? That’s how it felt. You don’t receive care once you decide to leave the system. Sound familiar?

This is why self-advocating is so important. You can’t worry about how others will feel about a choice that is for you while you swallow your own ache. We can’t self-abandon to feed someone else’s ego, either. I don’t care what profession it is.

To the strangers in Mexico who helped us breathe life back into our dog: thank you. I will forever recommend this veterinary practice to anyone. You didn’t just help heal him; you helped heal a part of me that thought I had to carry the world alone.

To anyone currently sitting in a sterile waiting room feeling pressured by a system that makes you feel like a bad person for not bankrolling their experiments on your dog...

Trust your gut.

You know your animal better than a corporate billing protocol ever will.

The one thing about language barriers:

Love is universal.

I highly recommend Unidad Medical Veterinaria in Juárez, Mexico. They have staff that speaks some English, but over all they are extremely caring. The owner Javier gave us a tour of the hospital. He is a very passionate man and you can tell he loves what he does. He was through in his breakdown of what was happening inside our Charlie’s body. The staff educate you, show you pictures and help you understand what they are doing. Instead of giving you a service list of fee after fee after fee. They take the time to get to the root of the problem. Very grateful we were guided to this Vet hospital.

Hello!

Thank you so much for providing this space, and I hope you're taking care of your mind and spirit this week. I'm dealing with a tough situation with my separated partner (whose pronouns are they/them). We have been legally married for seven years, and they are still caring for my disabled mother while I attend graduate school in another state. This separation is meant to help us figure out what we want to do next (e.g., if we want to attend marriage counseling or are prepared for a more formal, legal separation), but I honestly don’t know what to do. We’ve had some communication challenges since the start of our marriage. We both value our friendships, but we have distinctly different styles of caring for our friends, and I’ve occasionally felt insecure about how they care for certain friends, especially those with whom they’ve had romantic feelings in the past. We have had conversations about it whenever it comes up, but last year, while I was visiting home during winter break, I found out about a recent connection of theirs, initially from a dream they shared with me about this person (and I’ve heard little about this person during our calls). I didn’t see them much during my month-long visit; instead, they spent quite some time at the person’s home and missed dinners at our home. When I finally raised questions, they were defensive, dismissed my feelings over the person’s feelings, and said to our close circle and me that I was being controlling and abusive in the ways I “dictated” who and how they make friends. It wasn’t until two months later, in early February, that they admitted they had feelings for this person and had been going over to the person’s place for morning coffees, evening dinners, and massages while reading to each other nearly every day, all of which felt like a lot of emotional investment. They’ve continued to tell me and others that they felt hurt by my questions, as my questions felt explosive and interrogating to them, and they felt abandoned when I asked to separate. I also found out that, as they were telling our families, they take care of my mom out of love and would feel insulted to be compensated, they’ve withdrawn more than $17K from my personal and our shared savings accounts over a 10-month period. I will be visiting home again in two weeks to celebrate my mom’s birthday, and I really hope I can develop a set of questions and reminders to help me approach this dynamic. Thank you for reading!

The Cost of the Unspoken: Navigating the “Double Bind”

Dear Writer,

Thank you for writing in and sharing your situation with our Safari members.

Reading your letter, I see a deeply layered entanglement. You are in a tough spot: you are away pursuing your goals while your partner is performing the heavy labor of caring for your mother. This creates a privileged vs. labor dynamic that often breeds a “debt” mindset, making it feel impossible for you to hold them accountable without feeling like the “bad guy.”

But let’s zoom out and look at the hard truths here. The core of this conflict isn’t just “the other person”—it’s the avoidance that came before them.

1. The Trap of Implied Assumptions

When we don’t explicitly define the rules of engagement for friendships—especially those with past romantic ties, we fall into a trap of implied assumptions. You likely assumed “friendship” meant one thing; they assumed it meant morning coffees and massages. Because there was avoidance early on, you are now navigating in the dark.

In Buddhist philosophy, we talk about the “Second Arrow.” The first arrow is the event (your partner has a close friend). The second arrow is the one you shoot into yourself: the meaning-making. “They didn’t tell me about this on our calls,” or “They prioritize them over me.” This meaning-making is what’s causing your body to stay in a state of high activation.

2. Emotional Investment vs. Accountability

What you described, the daily dinners, the reading together, the massages—is a significant emotional investment. It looks like a relationship because, functionally, it is one. Your intrusion knows it. I challenge you here. What is the somatic experience you are carrying when you bring up your questions? Is it possible that somatic experience created undercurrents your partner feels and labels “interrogation?”

When you ask questions and they label it as “interrogating” or “controlling,” that is often a defense mechanism. You are finally showing up as a self lead individual holding them accountable, and they don’t know how to adjust to a version of you that is no longer avoiding the truth.

3. The Financial Contradiction

The $17,000 withdrawal is a massive alarm that contradicts the “martyr” narrative. They told your family they take care of your mom “out of love” and would be “insulted” by pay, yet they’ve accessed a significant amount of your shared and personal security. This is an external locus of control—using the labor of caregiving to shield themselves from financial transparency and any accountability of the emotional relationship with this friend.

Your “Homecoming” Strategy (The Mission)

I want you to try and shift from an external focus (what they are doing) to an internal one (what you need).

The Somatic Check-In

Before you speak, check in with your body:

• Locate the sensation: When you feel the urge to “interrogate,” where is that in your body? (Chest tightness? Heat in your face?)

• Find the origin: What is your earliest memory of feeling that specific sensation?

• Projection check: Is it possible you are projecting a past memory of abandonment onto this situation to make sense of the current “fog”?

Questions to Move Toward Clarity

Instead of questioning, try focusing on Needs and Non-Negotiables:

I will attach the worksheet I give my clients here.

• On Boundaries: We never explicitly defined what ‘friendship’ looks like with past romantic interests. My non-negotiable for emotional safety is transparency. How can we bridge the gap between your need for autonomy and my need for honesty?

• On Finances: “I value the care you give my mother, but I am confused by the $17k in withdrawals. Can we look at the accounts together so I can understand the financial reality of our household?” This is where you may have to speak up or limit access to the bank account.

• On the Separation: “Are we both willing to stop the avoidance and look at the actual impact of our actions, rather than just our intentions?”

A Final Reminder

Before you engage in these tough conversations, remember that seeking clarity is an act of self-respect, it’s not control. It may feel that way for others who have never experienced you in your self-respect frequency. You are allowed to take up space in your own marriage, even when you aren’t the one physically present every day.

Trust the data your body is giving you. If a situation feels “off,” it’s because your boundaries are being signaled. Ground yourself in what you know to be true for you before you step into the “fog” of someone else’s defensiveness. You aren’t “interrogating” you are simply coming home to yourself.🫶🏽

Readers…Now, it’s your turn.

Unfortunately relationships don’t come with a manual, but they do come with unspoken contracts and sometimes, those contracts need to be ripped up and rewritten.

Does this story resonate with you? Have you ever felt like the “villain” for simply asking for transparency? Or have you found yourself in a “double bind” where your partners or even your parent or family members labor made it feel impossible to speak your truth?

The Safari wants to hear from you.

Remember we are all humans on a human experience.

Submit your letter to "Okay, Now What?" here

Till next time Data Collectors

Data Collectors,

WHY THIS LEDGER EXISTS

This Ledger exists to document what happens when truth is withheld. During our safari this month we learned what occurs in systems when the voice disappears. This month’s Safari was not focused on villains but the patterns that give oxygen to the villain. We enter relationships with the fear of losing ourselves or being too much. What if we shifted focus and looked at how we lose ourselves because we were never taught how to be seen. So when that suppression reaches its threshold, it does not come out clean. It comes out as blame.
As reactivity.
As “matching energy.”
As burnout.

What looks like chaos… is often accumulated silence over a long period of time.

Let’s get into it.

Primary Artifact: Silence • Agency • Matching Energy • Nervous System Reactivity • Co-Creation

This Months Video:

Safari Theme:
Voice • Self-Abandonment • Emotional Reactivity • The Illusion of Power • Nervous System Drift • Unconscious Contracts • Agency vs Victimhood

This month we explored how silence, over-functioning, and “matching energy” are not signs of emotional intelligence—but adaptive survival strategies that keep people stuck in cycles of self-abandonment, relational resentment, and nervous system dysregulation. At the core: reclaiming agency requires disrupting the patterns we’ve been calling “protection.”

THE DEBT OF SILENCE — PEACE AS A COVER STORY

We’ve been conditioned to believe silence is maturity, that “keeping the peace” is emotional intelligence. What we are learning clinically is that silence is not neutral—it is a storage system. Unspoken truth does not dissolve; it accumulates, and eventually it converts into relational debt. That debt gets paid through passive aggression, emotional withdrawal, sudden explosions, and distorted narratives. The individual believes they are reacting to the present, but they are actually discharging a backlog. Gilligan (1982) and Jack (1991) both identify this pattern as silencing the self a relational strategy where individuals suppress their needs to maintain connection. The paradox is that the very thing used to “protect” the relationship is the exact mechanism that destabilizes it.

PRO-SOCIAL AVOIDANCE — HIDING IN EMPATHY

This month revealed a more socially acceptable defense:

“I just want them to feel heard first” or “I’ll let them go.”

On the surface, this reads as empathy, what many of us know through the undercurrents— its for control. Fearfully avoidant patterns (Main & Solomon, 1986) show that individuals use pro-social behavior as a way to avoid exposure. By letting the other person lead, you control how much of yourself is revealed, you delay vulnerability, and you maintain psychological distance. This pattern does not stop at home; it shows up in therapy spaces, work environments, friendships groups etc.. Yalom’s Social Microcosm (2002) explains that whatever happens in the external world will replicate in the therapy room. So when clients say, “The therapist isn’t helping,” the question is not always about skill—it is often, “What are you not saying here too?”

THE OVER-FUNCTIONING LOOP: CONTROL DISGUISED AS CARE

To truly understand why you over-function today, you have to explore your family. Look at your mothers, your grandmothers, and the women before you where love, cooking, and cleaning came at the direct cost of your own autonomy. We learned early on in those kitchens that our own emotional climate was not important around these individuals. We watched them carry the weight of the world and erase themselves just to keep the peace. Then condition us to do the same. Fast forward to the future. Now you are in work environments and relationships that mirror that exact same blueprint, showing us where it needs to be uninstalled by us in our behaviors. We have to learn not to regress to the panicked child, the suppressed child, or the avoidant child when tension rises.

Remember that your amygdala does not have eyes; it simply feels the undercurrents of the system and assumes you are still that small child who needs to shrink to survive. It is up to us to train the stallion in our minds and in our nervous systems to settle down. Over-functioning looks like responsibility, but it is actually anxiety regulation. Bowen (1978) describes this as a system imbalance: the more one person over-functions, the more another under-functions. This creates dependency, resentment, and exhaustion. The over-functioner believes, “If I don’t do this, everything falls apart,” but what is actually happening is that their control is preventing the system from adapting. Porges (2011) would frame this as a fawn response—a survival strategy where the individual monitors others instead of expressing themselves. The energy is there, but it is misdirected, keeping the system stuck rather than allowing it to evolve. You are not your grandmother’s survival strategy. Stop holding up a broken system and let it fall so you can finally breathe. Silence does not remove expectations. It hides it in the fine print of the contract you did not sign. This creates what Sager (1976) identified as unconscious contracts: you decide how someone should behave without ever telling them. Then when they don’t meet that expectation, you feel hurt, betrayed, or disrespected, even though they never agreed to the terms. Cloud & Townsend (1992) make this explicit: silence is not kindness; it is a form of dishonesty. Passive-aggressiveness is not random behavior—it is the interest you pay on unspoken truth. The relationship begins to fracture not because of conflict, but because of concealed expectations that were never brought into the open.

CO-CREATION — THE PART PEOPLE DON’T WANT TO SEE

This is where the deepest resistance shows up, because co-creation feels like blame. Over on this corner of the Internet though— it is access to agency. You can believe that or not, but it is the portal. We see this play out constantly when people demand labels like “neurospicy” or lean solely on genetics. It takes the responsibility off of them to implement systems, build habits, and remain consistent. It is being used as a green light to drift, and then complain when they get the side effects of that drifting. It is exactly why people reject hard information—even scientific, epigenetic facts about how we can literally rewire our own brains. People simply do not want to hold that responsibility.

We saw this heavily in the Jillian Michaels debate. Activist movements and spaces often hold narcissistic behavior patterning—individuals victimizing themselves, using double-bind role reversals, and trauma dumping, all while grandiosity themselves to “sweet lemon” or “sour grape” their way out of the accountability needed to get the very grace we all are demanding from others. Co-creation means you participated in maintaining the dynamic—not intentionally, not maliciously, but through silence, tolerance, avoidance, and delayed boundaries. Yes, That’s on you. Perel (2006) and Rotter (1966) both point to the same principle: if you are only a victim of the system, you have zero leverage to change it. The moment you see your role, you regain choice. Without that awareness, you remain stuck in a loop where change feels impossible because responsibility has been outsourced entirely to the other person. Stop using your biology or your past as a prison cell, and start using your awareness as the key.

NARCISSISTIC INJURY & THE PATHOLOGY DEFENSE

When reality does not match expectation, the ego reacts. Kohut (1971) describes this as narcissistic injury. We see this play out in the most basic, concrete ways at home: see what happens when you stop performing for your family. The moment you stop cooking or cleaning the exact way they want you to, or the moment you actually set a hard boundary, notice the shift. Instead of them examining what was not communicated, their response becomes labeling, moral superiority, or blame. They will use deflection tactics to completely avoid accountability and make everything about themselves, effectively sucking up the entire emotional climate in the room.

McWilliams (2011) explains this as a defense mechanism: pathologizing others protects the self from discomfort. It is easier to diagnose someone else than to disclose your own truth. This creates a toxic dynamic where clinical language is weaponized outward rather than used inward for reflection and growth. I want you to reflect on where you learned this behavior from. Who in your childhood used these exact same deflections? Because that is exactly how it is showing up in your adult relationships today. Stop using psychological terms as weapons of avoidance and start using them as mirrors for your own evolution.

MATCHING ENERGY — THE ILLUSION OF POWER

This was one of the most dominant patterns this month. Social media reframes reactivity as empowerment—telling you “they’re cold, be colder” or “they’re loud, be louder",” to “Let a MFer know.” People love to call this “standing on business,” but that is not what standing on business actually is. Standing on business means owning your own alignment and refusing to allow the external world to pull you into its storm. Now, this is not easy!! especially for those of us navigating in-law, toxic work environments, constant gridlock cycles in relationships, etc. It’s not easy, but that is the point. These are portals into the training arena.

Matching energy is actually a trap designed to keep you a drifter. Clinically, matching energy is emotional contagion (Hatfield, 1993), and when done intentionally, it is pure self-abandonment. Hawkins (2002) frames this through frequency: anything below Courage (200) operates in Force. When you match anger, silence, or chaos, you end up matching the lower vibrations of people—which is exactly how they pull you into the “Upside Down” with Vecna. Napoleon Hill (1938) calls this drifting, allowing external forces to dictate your internal state. True power is standing firm and refusing to let people and their dysfunction pull you into the game, the script, the performance, or the over-functioning. Stop letting them set the temperature of the room while you just react to it.

So let the b*tches at work do what they do. See how your brain is worried about them instead of worried about the little one in you that need your attention?

KEY TERMS

1. Silencing the Self — Gilligan (1982); Jack (1991)
A relational survival strategy where an individual suppresses their thoughts, needs, or emotions to maintain connection. While it may preserve short-term harmony, it leads to internal disconnection, resentment accumulation, and eventual relational rupture.

2. Relational Debt (The Debt of Silence) — (Integrated Concept)
The accumulation of unspoken truth within a relationship. This “debt” is eventually discharged through indirect behaviors such as passive-aggression, emotional withdrawal, or disproportionate reactions that appear disconnected from the present moment.

3. Pro-Social Avoidance — Main & Solomon (1986)
A form of avoidance masked as empathy or consideration. The individual prioritizes the other person’s voice or needs as a way to delay or avoid their own vulnerability, maintaining control over emotional exposure.

4. Social Microcosm — Yalom (2002)
The concept that interpersonal patterns present in everyday life will inevitably emerge within the therapy relationship. Silence, avoidance, or control in external relationships will replicate in session dynamics.

5. Overfunctioning / Underfunctioning Reciprocity — Bowen (1978)
A systemic imbalance where one individual over-functions (takes on excessive responsibility) while another under-functions. This dynamic stabilizes anxiety in the short term but creates dependency, resentment, and stagnation over time.

6. Fawn Response — Porges (2011); Walker (2013)
A trauma-based survival strategy where individuals prioritize appeasement, emotional monitoring, or self-abandonment to maintain perceived safety in relationships, often at the cost of self-expression.

7. Unconscious Contracts — Sager (1976)
Unspoken expectations within relationships that one partner assumes the other should meet. When these expectations are not communicated, they become sources of resentment and perceived betrayal.

8. Passive-Aggression as Deferred Expression — Cloud & Townsend (1992)
Indirect expression of unmet needs or suppressed emotions. Rather than communicating directly, individuals express frustration through tone, withdrawal, or subtle hostility—often as a consequence of prolonged silence.

9. Co-Creation (Relational Responsibility) — Perel (2006); Rotter (1966)
The understanding that relational dynamics are mutually maintained. Recognizing one’s role in a system increases agency and the ability to change patterns, as opposed to remaining in a purely externalized victim position.

10. Locus of Control — Rotter (1966)
A psychological framework describing whether an individual perceives control as internal (self-influenced) or external (controlled by others or circumstances). Shifting toward an internal locus increases accountability and behavioral flexibility.

11. Narcissistic Injury — Kohut (1971)
An ego-level response triggered when reality does not align with internal expectations or identity. This often results in defensiveness, blame, or emotional reactivity rather than self-reflection.

12. Pathologizing as Defense — McWilliams (2011)
The use of psychological labels to explain or diminish others as a way to protect oneself from discomfort, vulnerability, or accountability. This maintains self-image while avoiding internal examination.

13. Emotional Contagion — Hatfield (1993)
The automatic or intentional mirroring of another person’s emotional state. When unregulated, it leads to shared dysregulation rather than differentiation or grounded response.

14. Matching Energy (Reactivity Loop) — (Integrated Concept)
A behavioral pattern where individuals mirror the emotional tone of others under the belief that it represents empowerment. Clinically, it reflects reactivity and loss of self-regulation rather than agency.

15. Map of Consciousness — Hawkins (2002)
A framework that categorizes emotional states into levels of consciousness. States below Courage (200) are associated with “Force” (reactivity, contraction), while higher states reflect regulation, clarity, and agency.

16. Drifting — Napoleon Hill (1938)
A state in which an individual allows external circumstances or people to dictate their internal state, resulting in loss of self-direction and reduced intentionality.

17. Malignant Reflection — Kernberg (1984)
A pattern where individuals derive satisfaction from matching or exceeding another person’s negative behavior. This reflects a shift from defense into active participation in dysfunction.

18. False Power — Hawkins (2002)
The temporary sense of control or dominance gained from reactive states such as anger or pride. While it feels empowering, it ultimately depletes psychological and physiological resources.

19. High-Guard State — Porges (2011)
A chronic physiological state of tension and hypervigilance where the body remains prepared for threat. This includes muscular bracing, shallow breathing, and heightened sensory scanning.

20. Stored Trauma (Somatic Memory) — van der Kolk (2014)
The concept that traumatic experiences are held within the body, not just the mind. Physical patterns of tension or reactivity may persist even when cognitive awareness has shifted.

21. Somatic Discharge — Levine (1997)
The process of releasing stored survival energy through physical movement or body-based interventions. Healing requires completion of physiological stress responses, not just cognitive insight.

22. Allostatic Load — McEwen (1998)
The cumulative physiological impact of chronic stress. Prolonged activation of the stress response leads to wear and tear on the body, affecting emotional regulation, cognition, and physical health.

23. Selective Activism (Nervous System Hierarchy) — (Integrated Concept)
The tendency to express agency in low-risk environments (e.g., online or public spaces) while avoiding high-risk interpersonal situations that require direct vulnerability and boundary-setting.

24. Nervous System Hierarchy — Porges (2011)
The prioritization of safety responses within the nervous system, where individuals may feel more capable in abstract or distant contexts but shut down in direct relational engagement.

25. Agency vs Reactivity — (Integrated Concept)
Agency refers to the ability to choose one’s response independent of external stimuli, while reactivity reflects automatic, stimulus-driven behavior rooted in survival patterns.

📚 WEEKLY LEDGER REFERENCE ARCHIVE

Gilligan (1982) — In a Different Voice
Jack (1991) — Silencing the Self Theory
Main & Solomon (1986) — Disorganized Attachment
Yalom (2002) — Social Microcosm
Bowen (1978) — Family Systems Theory
Porges (2011) — Polyvagal Theory
Sager (1976) — Marriage Contracts
Cloud & Townsend (1992) — Boundaries
Perel (2006) — Circular Causality
Rotter (1966) — Locus of Control
Kohut (1971) — Narcissistic Injury
McWilliams (2011) — Psychoanalytic Diagnosis
Hawkins (2002) — Map of Consciousness
Napoleon Hill (1938) — Outwitting the Devil
Hatfield (1993) — Emotional Contagion
Kernberg (1984) — Aggression & Personality Organization
Van der Kolk (2014) — The Body Keeps the Score
Levine (1997) — Somatic Experiencing
McEwen (1998) — Allostatic Load
Walker (2013) — CPTSD & Fawning

REFLECTION PROMPT

Take a moment to pause and notice your internal response as you move through this work. Where in your life are you staying silent and calling it peace, and what is that silence actually costing you over time? As you reflect, see if you can identify a specific moment where you felt the urge to speak but chose not to. What did your body do in that moment, and what story did your mind create to justify staying quiet?

Now shift the lens. If nothing about the other person changed, what would your next move need to be in order to stay aligned with yourself? This is not about confrontation for the sake of conflict, but about recognizing where your voice has been outsourced, and how to get it back.

As you sit with this, gently ask yourself:

Where am I abandoning my voice… and calling it safety?

Closing This Months Safari — WHERE WE GO NEXT?

This month’s safari journey brought up a lot deep in the sediments of our suppressed wounds.

If you’ve been following along this month, you’ve probably felt the shift. This wasn’t just about behaviors or calling out dynamics. We slowed things down enough to see what’s underneath it all—the silence, the over-functioning, the reactivity, the subtle ways we abandon ourselves and then try to make sense of the fallout. And if you were really paying attention, you probably noticed this wasn’t just about “them.” It rarely is. This month wasn’t about finding villains. It was about noticing where your nervous system learned to survive them and how those strategies are still running your relationships, your voice, and your sense of agency today. What we uncovered are patterns, not personalities. Patterns don’t come from nowhere. They come from something deeper.

As we move into April, we’re taking that next step. We’re going into schemas and archetypes—the internal blueprints and roles that quietly organize how you show up in your life. The peacekeeper. The over-functioner. The one who waits. The one who disappears. The one who holds everything together until they can’t anymore. The structured responses that have been shaped over time through our own doing, and they don’t just live in our minds either—they play out in your relationships of all kinds.

So instead of staying in theory, we’re bringing this into real life. The “Okay… Now What?” advice column is open.

If you’re navigating something right now, whether it’s a relationship dynamic, a family tension, a pattern you can’t seem to break, you can write in. Over on this corner of the internet what you’re experiencing is shared. These patterns repeat across people and systems. Your situation is not isolated. It’s data. We are not alone.

Each week, I’ll be selecting one submission and walking through it. Not just surface-level advice, but a full breakdown—what’s happening in the nervous system, which schemas are activated, what archetypes are in play, and what self-leadership actually looks like inside that situation. Real scenarios. Real dynamics. No hiding behind abstract language.

At the same time, we’re going to slow the pace of the Safari a bit. Integration matters way more than speed. You don’t need to pile on more information if your system hasn’t had actual time to process what you’re already seeing. This space is a nervous system gym, not a content treadmill. Slowing down is part of the work.

Behind the scenes, I’m continuing to build the Nervous System Playground—the asynchronous space where all of this will live in a more structured, experiential way. I’m making something you can return to, move through at your own pace, and actually practice instead of just consume. That’s the long-term vision here—less noise, more embodiment. For those of you craving connection beyond just reading and watching, I want to remind you about the free Chasing Milligrams community. That space exists so we’re not doing this work alone. We aren’t performing there. We aren’t competing or trying to get it “right.” We are just showing up as we are, with enough regulation and reflection to actually learn from each other.

So as we close out this month, don’t just rush past it. Notice what stayed with you. Notice what irritated you. What made you pause, what made you want to argue, and what felt uncomfortably true. That’s your entry point.

That’s exactly where your work is.

The Safari doesn’t end here. It just gets closer to you.

Till next time data collectors.

xoxo

Enjoy.

As I type from my own nervous system activation, I decide to write to shed a little of what I am carrying and explain how this might not be the letter you think it is.

You see, being married into a Punjabi family is one thing, but being around cultures that have gaslighting built into them is a completely different experience. I knew the moment I met my husband; I sat on my bed saying, “Something feels too good to be true.” My husband is a great man, a gift from the universe. Fast forward eight years later: the mother wound enters our home, and the “people pleaser” I had retired came back for an encore.

I am no stranger to narcissistic abuse. I believe I fell into psychology because I was a “why” kid. My whole life, I was manipulated to believe that I was the manipulator. I was the “crazy” one. “It’s all in your head,” they said. Eventually, I realized: no—I was the childhood reflection of the life my mother could have chosen but didn’t. I was the glimpse into a life she could have had, if only she had found the courage to walk away from those who mistreated her.

Now, I am not here to smear anyone, but I damn sure won’t be silent. Working in El Paso has placed me in a pressure cooker of wanting to flip a f*cking table. The amount of avoidance, emotional abuse, and gaslighting that occurs in this city is staggering. Especially in the work place. The amount of fear people have just to speak is palpable; so many walk on eggshells here the workplace, even in their own businesses around their own employees.

I try to sit with this pressure. What is the lesson here? My window of tolerance has been stretched. The same avoidance I see within the dynamics of clients, peers, and even colleagues is now facing me front and center in my own living room.

My mother-in-law.

Read more

As I scroll through social media, I am constantly reminded that these platforms have become a breeding ground for emotional immaturity. Everywhere you look, there are women smearing, blaming, and dissecting men in ways that aren’t just critical they’re malignant.

This is the toxic byproduct of the “blind loyalty” mob. It is exactly why I refuse the “girls’ girl” label: because I know exactly how manipulative women can be.

In my professional world, I work with women struggling with mental health issues and hormonal imbalances. I see firsthand how these struggles are frequently used as a license to be cruel, mean, and detached toward their husbands. Yet, the moment a man mirrors even a fraction of that behavior, these same women collapse. The “hate men club” operates on a blatant double standard that I have zero interest in joining.

As a woman who has no problem saying, "I need my man," I see many women suck their teeth at that. They've been conditioned to think needing a man makes you weak, and that pointing out a woman's toxic behavior makes you a traitor.

Let’s unpack why.

Working with women who are chronically unaccountable and externalize blame is easily one of the most challenging aspects of my career. Especially because I have a mother wound that many women can reawaken with how quickly they split into loving you as long as you validate them.

Women often “drag” their husbands into my office, assuming that because I’ve helped them before, or because I’m a woman I’m automatically an ally for their side. I don’t pick sides. I could care less how many people in my comment section disagree with that. There are always three sides to every story, and I have witnessed a shit-ton of Academy Award-winning performances in the therapeutic space.

When a woman assumes I’ll side with her just because we share the same biology, it highlights that toxic “blind loyalty” expectation. I won’t back down. I will shut a session down, and you will forfeit your fee. Women love to use bullying to force compliance; I’ve seen it professionally and personally. When a woman tries to intimidate me into agreement, it gives me a very clear inkling of what happens behind closed doors at home.

This is exactly why so many men request to work with me. They feel safe knowing I am here to bridge the gap, not to join the mob. Trust me, the amount of professionals that automatically believe a woman’s tears is quite alarming if you ask me.

But it isn’t just about marriages.

Women are frequently the primary victims of other women—in the workplace, in friendships, and within family systems. Many of us have endured the wrath of female emotional volatility. These are the same women who are quick to call you “green” or “unprofessional” because you’re the first person to finally name the diagnosis that therapists before were too afraid to say out loud. Let that sit in.

We have professionals that are too afraid to tell clients important information. I have an issue with that.

I have been bullied by women and I have been hurt by men. Yet, I still refuse to co-sign the “man-hating” mob.

Look at the implications: these women have sons, yet they spearhead a culture of contempt. They watch their daughters find good men and do everything in their power to sabotage it because they feel they had to “settle” or stay in a miserable dynamic themselves. They’ve acquired a debt they never should have had, and now they’re making their children and partners pay it back with interest.

How do women learn to regulate themselves without making it their child’s job or their partner’s burden? That is the accountability my work demands.

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As I zoom out, I see the same pattern everywhere. We can look at the data on Postpartum Depression (PPD) and find ways to twist the science to confirm it’s always the man’s fault—la la la, the refrain goes. But at the end of the day, ladies:

You still chose that man.

Why is that so hard to swallow? Because admitting you chose him means admitting you bypassed your own intuition. You ignored the red flags long before the pregnancy test was positive. You saw the signs, you felt the gut-punch of doubt, and you stayed anyway.

To avoid that soul-crushing embarrassment, women perform psychological backflips to flip the script and keep the focus on the man “harming” them. In psychology, we see this play out through two specific forms of cognitive dissonance:

• Sweet Lemons (Ideation): This is when you convince yourself that the mediocre (or toxic) situation you’re in is actually “sweet.” You tell yourself, “He’s just misunderstood,” or “His potential is so great,” to justify why you stayed when you knew better. You sugarcoat a lemon because you can’t admit you bought a bad fruit.

• Sour Grapes (Devaluation): Once the “Sweet Lemon” act fails, the script flips. Now, everything about him and the commitment you made is “sour.” You devalue the entire relationship to justify your current vitriol, completely bypassing the fact that you were the one who signed the contract.

These aren’t just quirks; they are tools used to roll-reverse your way out of accountability. By making him the ultimate villain, you never have to face the woman in the mirror who let herself down. You make it a “tit-for-tat” war because if you can keep him on the defense, no one is looking at your lack of discernment.

So, when will you be accountable for your choice? It’s easier to externalize blame because it allows you to bypass the shame of your own participation. But until you own the choice, you’ll keep making the same one— just with a different face.

The Traitor Within and the Narcissistic Pivot

We have to talk about the “traitor within.” As Jessica Anne Pressler identifies in her work, many of us—myself included—have had our fair share of abusive partners and cheaters. Why? Because that internal traitor guides us toward people who mirror our own limiting beliefs. When you don’t believe you’re worthy of more, you subconsciously match with a partner who confirms that bias. I remember first hand before I married my husband. I guided myself to emotionally unavailable partner that confirmed the way I felt about myself. Cheated, lied, and was even emotionally and physically abusive.

This is how you end up with an algorithm of unaccountable women mobbing up in the comment sections. They aren’t just “venting”; they are actively sabotaging their own ability to ever find or sustain a relationship with a good man. Women are trauma bonding with other women who also hate men and creating an emotional frequency of emotions that don’t serve them at all. but…. Zoom out, how are women Mobbin’ online against men but still swiping right? You are literally looking for a man in a frequency of anger, rage, resentment, hurt, etc. You meet a man in that emotional frequency AND get pregnant?

Think about that….

How we keep bringing children into this world without understanding this is beyond me. Giving birth and raising children changes a woman fundamentally—biologically, emotionally, and spiritually. But we have to acknowledge that the good men in our lives are watching this transformation from the outside, often with no map for what is occurring within the women they love.

We cannot demand grace while refusing to give it.

This is where the behavior becomes undeniably narcissistic. Many women I work with harbor a deep, simmering resentment because their birth was traumatizing or because they were scared and the man didn’t have to “go through it.” They use that pain as a lifelong justification for emotional volatility.

Let’s be clear: Hormones may create confusion and instability, but your character is what decides whether you allow what is happening inside of you to harm those outside of you. Using your biology as a hall pass to be a tyrant isn’t “feminine empowerment”—it’s a character flaw. A character flaw we must learn to own if we ever wish to ascend out of the basement and into the levels where better quality people live. The catch. You have to do the work to get the higher levels.

The Path to Worthy Love

I don’t speak from a place of judgment; I speak from experience. Before I met my husband, I was in a volatile, abusive relationship. I know the darkness of that “traitor within”. But even in the wreckage, I never gave up on the belief that a good man existed. Finding him wasn’t a stroke of luck—it was work, interpersonal work. Especially as a military spouse, that work started with burning the scripts that didn’t serve me. I had to step into radical accountability. I had to learn the skills and tools to pull us out of the mud in seasons where communication failed and emotions ran high.

This month, we celebrate eight years together. 🥰 The “mud” we’ve waded through was worth every second, because we didn’t use our pain as a weapon—we used it as a catalyst to grow. We learned to pause when conflict starts, and I had to learn that despite fights in the past experiences being weaponized against me, used to control me. Conflict with my husband didn’t mean it was over. It meant that we were both authentically showing up as ourselves and learning to work through those differences with compromise instead of control.

To the women who believe there isn’t a “good man” out there: That is a lie. The truth is, we have to develop into the women that a good man deserves. That is the price of a healthy life, and it’s a price many have become too entitled to pay. You don’t get treated well simply because you are a woman. You get treated well because of your character and how you treat yourself.

Stop looking for a mob to validate your bitterness. Start looking in the mirror to find your accountability. The bridge to a better life is right there, waiting for you to stop performing and start growing.

I say this with love.

Till next time Data collectors.

Come as you are where you are.

Let me take you all on a little journey.

Based on the title…

How fast did you click this essay?

How quick did your mind stop and create a story? ← That’s the pattern we focus on.

This work involves us to all learn the skills to find the safety to speak regardless of what others may think, feel, or whatever about it. Haven’t some of us finally realized the level of “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” that lives in this world? Was experiencing it from the parents and elders not enough?

Anywho,

It’s learning how to be in the frequency of truth regardless if that is not true for others or makes them upset.

Now let’s begins.

In typical Sav style, somatic is the way through this Safari. Let’s pretend this is the magic school bus safari style. First stop, Emotional Frequencies.

Emotional frequencies are nothing new.

Just peep The Hawkins Scale of Consciousness which proposes that every human emotion has a specific emotional vibration that emits a frequency measured on a algorithmic scale from 1 to 1,000. Low-frequency emotions like Shame (20) and Guilt (30) represent states of suffering and contraction, while the “tipping point” occurs at Courage (200), where an individual begins to shift from destructive to constructive behavior. High-frequency states such as Love (500), Joy (540), and Peace (600) reflect an expanded state of awareness that Hawkins claims can positively influence the collective energy of the world.

The data point I’m noticing through my studies of human behavior, is that these frequencies are felt before even coming into contact with a person.

I reflect onto why…

Well, going back to my foundational pillar of perception. Social constructs and the hippocampus archives— do a good job of filling in and perceiving people in a way that is not necessarily based on truth itself— it’s based on perception. When we are perceiving people based on constructs, group think, or what the world told us to believe (these days our TVs and our phones.) We rob ourselves of access to the very frequency needed to connect with others.

The Love frequency

Last night I was out with my aunt for her birthday. She had her friends and we were at a cantina in Cali with karaoke. For me, it has always been hard to be in social settings. But, when I am in the room, I am in THE ROOM. I can observe behaviors in everyone, not by choice, but by the frequency of presence. I know, I know the crunchy language for some of y’all. There is a method to my madness. In presence, you notice everything: body language shifts, unspoken truths or feelings, micro expressions all swallowed.

I watch how the regulars come in, hugging the bartender, coming to support his surprise baby shower.

I see people.

Adults, children, kids, seniors.

Everyone is in the frequency of love, connecting, hugging. The group I came with and everyone else in the restaurant, too. A woman in her late 70s, maybe early 80s, sang “New York, New York” by Frank Sinatra. The frequency of her voice catapulted me to the memory she was in— within that moment. The years when she was the heartthrob men chased. The queen she was, right there in that moment.

The gift of time travel.

Watching her sing her heart out, she closed her eyes to access the moment, the memory, the feeling. I was right there with her, surrounded by a loud bar, people talking, laughing, enjoying themselves. The moment I got to share with her. Did she notice? Wrong question. She was embodying presence, embodying love. She was not in the loud bar. She was with herself. And in that moment, I was with her too.

Frequency work honestly brings me to tears. As a woman of color to say “ I Don’t See Color” the part of me that is purely just here with myself in this moment writing these words can confidently say. Yes, I said what I said. I do not see color.

Does any of that mean injustice because of color does not exist? Did any of that say prejudices and those who judge over color doesn’t exist? No. It simply said that’s what I see.

Go to a playground…

In a non-creepy way and observe children.

They live in the love frequency.

They bond and connect with other kids, not other cultural backgrounds. They are in the purest form of connection because there are no constructs living in their mental garden yet, unless they’ve been placed there by parents or, these days, teachers (a discussion for another time.) Most kids live in the frequency of love because they are in the now.

Now, let’s pause.

Can the eyeballs see a difference in skin color? yes.

The moment our eyes glance at the world, the meaning of what we see is filtered. This filtration system isn't universal; it is uniquely shaped by our past imprints, our life experiences, and the constant narratives we feed ourselves. When someone lives primarily within the stories of their own mind, those stories trigger physical sensations in the body. Consequently, if they encounter a statement that contradicts their internal 'rumination loop,' the speaker of that truth is immediately perceived as a threat.

I think of Erik Erikson’s developmental stages and how some are stuck in what he called the Integrity vs. Despair stage. I have met my fair share of despair-ridden adults vibrating in the emotional frequency of regret. Now bring in the consideration of the mind-body connection and Dr. Joe Dispenza’s work. A chronic state of regret. Could you imagine its toll on the physical body, let alone the mind? These days, color is not the only issue that blocks us from accessing the frequency of love. Individual beliefs and opinions do. Can you believe that? We are actually being trained to feel unsafe with our own belief systems and original thoughts, making it harder to strengthen the muscle of discernment. Why do you think that is?

Do you know how sad my heart feels when I am in a conversation with someone who is stuttering over their words, not because they don’t know what to say, but because they are fearful of my perception — of them..

Harriet Lauler tells Amanda Seyfried’s character in the movie The Last Word…

I notice this to be true with humans. It's something for me I can feel when people are dancing around their truth in their mind, while struggling to find the words they think won’t upset me. That’s where I tell them “You're emotionally managing” Say what you need to say. The ability for someone else to speak their truth about something in the presence of me. I am honored for that. These days it’s rare to find other beings safe enough to process what’s heavy on your own mind. Without the nagging urgency of being cautious with your truth. Its exhausting. I know many of you reading these words right now are silently suffering in what you don’t feel safe to release.

I see you.

The image above is a scene from While You Were Sleeping. A 1995 film where a Sandra Bullock saves a names a man from the railroad tracks, while he is in a coma is invited into his family. She herself does not have a family. So she observes, takes it in, The presence of love between each member as they share excitement and joy.

I observe the frequency of everyone in this way. Especially when in public. People watching is such a favorite activity for me. I just love watching humans exist in their own ways. This is the state I was in last night at the karaoke. I go in and out from different areas, outside in the parking lot to the women drinking Buzz Balls. (Which by the way are disgusting) but to each their own. I have never been an alcohol enjoyer, and my body tends to inflame up like the nutty professor when I do indulge. So take that with some salt.

Just watching everyone enjoy themselves. Brings me joy.

Now, a bit of a story time from that evening. At the time of me writing this was last night. When this is posted it will be the future and this night will have becomes the past.

As I make my rounds to different areas of the nights event. I walk passed a woman who had a foreshadowing moment with me a hour earlier. She came in with a man and there was — let’s say—energy between the two of them. I walk past that same woman with a different lady she met inside smoking a cigarette outside. As I walk passed them I enter into her emotional frequency. For me it feels like That’s So Raven getting a vision. 🤭 For such a quick seconds, I experience her field.

“Fuck him, fuck this shit dude you think lalalala …”

Clearly she and the dude she came in with have some business to sort through. I touched heart and smiled because what I felt wasn’t necessaryily an ache. It was love. Love coming from a woman experiencing fear, anger is a secondary emotion. The frequency she was in underneath all the F bombs. That was fear. A fear many and I mean many of us women have faced in relationships. Sure enough when it was that womans time to sing 45 mins later. She chooses The Wreckers- Leave The Pieces and sings it directly AT her man.

My face was priceless.

I said to myself “oh, we doing that here? right now?”

I feel a sense of “touch heart” as we say in the Sign language interpreting world.

Because we are all so similar in our melodrama’s, our avoidance, and our fear of saying what we really want to say. Especially to the people we are closest to. What ends up happening is many of us. Women especially, don’t even know what we are mad or upset about. We just know how we “should” be responding. The way society conditioned us to respond.

And we don’t question that.

That level of unquestioning compliance does not sit well with me.

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Now

I am back home in California for a bit. It’s diverse here. That’s perception.

People in El Paso think it’s diverse there and all I can do is…. 🤨

Is it? Or do people mostly look like you and that makes you feel safe? Many of my clients that leave their safe areas of sameness go somewhere else and become nervous. I see this a lot in the black community. Where scanning for the other black person in the room is a mechanisms we train. These days if we are being truly honest with ourself. We train it, not the environment. We stay with the same culture background, with people that look like us. But guess what. Check the stories that group talks about?Listen closely, what is being shared, discussed, believed? How is repeating the same cycle narrative cycles that leave us feeling unsafe around white people, men etc. When will we ever feel safe? Is the goal to never feel safe?

its not about arguing the facts of injustice and racism. Wrong arena if thats what you came for. This is about what being in those arenas constantly, what symptoms is that behavior silently reinforcing in the background that you do not see?

In this restaurant everybody was so many different shades of skin completion, cultural background, and age. There were white people in the room. There were Black people in the room. The bartender was black. He probably was the owner. People loved that guy, he would say hi to families, kids, elders. He would hug and connect. Do you think anyone was bringing up politics? no. Because politics does not live in the love frequency. It's a construct, and constructs are drifting agents. The devil in Napolean Hills work Outwitting the Devil. Block you from the love frequency powers of connection.

One of the things that I’ve learned through this work and over 15 years of experience with children. Children are teachers and models of the love frequency. Observe kids outside playing. In the state of play.

Are they discussing politic?

Are they discussing why you voted or believe a certain way?

Are they judging you for your way to choose how to operate your life?

For how you dressed, and the way you did your hair that day?

No.

Kids teach us something so valuable about presence because you cannot access the Love frequency without it. That’s why play is so valuable to our sticky little brains and accessing the inner child within, instead of losing it to the noise of being an “adult.” Adults lost sight of play— some, really. We get lost in drifting. What Napoleon Hill would call the devil, to add my flare to it— the devil energy. This frequency is what causes us to “not feel like it” so we start scrolling, and dissociating through drinking and partying. Can you wonder why we don’t feel like it?

Sure, it’s fun, but it wreaks havoc on the body’s ability to get back up in frequency, especially with alcohol, due to it being a downer. According to the text Uppers, Downers, and All Arounders:

• The Chemical Anchor to Fear (100) and Grief (75): The text identifies alcohol as a Central Nervous System (CNS) Depressant. By increasing GABA (the brain’s primary inhibitory neurotransmitter), alcohol creates a “false peace.” In Hawkins’ terms, this isn’t the true Peace (600) of consciousness, but a chemical suppression that keeps a person trapped in the lower, non-integrated states of Apathy (50) or Grief (75).

• The Depletion of the Reward Pathway: According to the text, chronic use of downers disrupts the mesolimbic dopaminergic system. This is the pathway responsible for the “natural high” children experience during play. When this system is hijacked by substances, the brain loses its ability to generate the high-frequency energy required for Love (500) and Joy (540) without a chemical trigger, making the “portal” feel further away.

• The Hysteria Feedback Loop: Uppers, Downers, and All Arounders discusses how societal stress and “all-arounder” environmental stimuli (like constant digital noise) trigger the sympathetic nervous system. This keeps the body in a state of hyper-arousal or “hysteria.” When an adult tries to “quiet” this hysteria with alcohol, more noise from the program boxes (phone, TV, computer) they enter a cycle of “rebound anxiety,” effectively locking them into the frequencies of Fear (100) and Anger (150), preventing the rise to Courage (200) and beyond.

• Loss of Neuroplasticity (The “Sticky” Brain): The “sticky little brains” of children possess high neuroplasticity. The text notes that alcohol and certain drugs can lead to neurotoxicity and the shrinking of the hippocampus. This physically limits an adult’s ability to remain “present,” which Hawkins argues is the only state in which one can calibrate at the level of Love.

This leads me to my next point and from what I have learned being multiracial woman

Black

White

Native American (Muscogee🥰)

I can say this with pure love in my heart despite knowing it will upset others.

I don’t see color.

Yes I know I know you can SEE color with your eyeballs. 👀

But you can not see color with your heart, because Love is a felt frequency. It’s the frequency of healing. It’s the frequency of presence. It’s the frequency by which so many gaps get bridged through repair. Love is a frequency that is so powerful. We take that power for granted and give it to the devil energy that drifts us apart from it.

Let’s pause really quickly so we can each individually reflect:

What is our perception of love?

When you see the word:

LOVE

What comes up? What do you feel? What images or stories does your mind play?

Take a moment, real quick, and sit with that.

For me, love is an essence. You become so engulfed in that moment that you are locked into a frequency—almost as if time ceases to exist. I know we have all experienced that.

What does this look like for you?

This specific night mentioned in this essay, it looked like what happened at this restaurant: watching everybody love and share the collective energy of enjoyment without bringing politics or racism into the room to try and ruin it. Now, some people will bring it up, but that only demonstrates their inability to access the safety within. the same way women can’t surrender to trusting that men that do not cheat exist. Think about it: if the energy is softening and someone in their own private life has not accessed that frequency of softer energy—one that is safe and flowing—then, especially these days, that softness can feel like a trap. It’s giving “ A black river, perhaps it is not too deep” As winifred Sanderson touches the black road thinking it’s a black river.

This is especially true for those of us who linger in the corridors of the “Fear Wing” in the emotional frequency mansion.

I don’t fault these people; I worry for them.

Just like exercise, we need the ability to access the Love frequency (500). We can’t get there if the garden of the mind is full of drive-in-movie-sized stories about “XYZ.” That blocks us. It’s just like when we are in our relationships and we’re trying to bridge repair with our partner, but we can’t because the other person is still stuck. They are still upset, ruminating on a “mind-movie” story; making meaning from their distorted story. They are at a frequency that makes them unable to access the repair. This happens all the time.

Think about how many bids for connections left to hang there. Simply because the individuals were not on the same frequency to touch that love together.

I challenge you. See if you can access the inner children—the ones who can access the innate power of the Love frequency (500). This is especially vital now, with everything that infiltrates our minds, keeps us up at night, or keeps us in a constant state of worry.

I challenge you.

To the minority communities: the next time you see a white person, I want you to notice the story your mind creates for them. See what it tells you and how it impacts your body. Then, ask yourself:

“Is this true about that person?” Most likely not.

To the White, Caucasian however you identify community I challenge the same. How much of our beliefs is being shaped by information we gained through breaking bread with people or being told how to feel about people…

My gripe with the “race war” is the amount of POC who think the reverse prejudice that is taking place towards those who are white, or seen as “privileged,” is a behavior that aligns with our deep ancestral being. Truly, this is mother willow energy. The greats before us I truly feel knew something we didn’t. They tried to teach us in ways they thought would reach us. It was never about the division noise. It’s about the illusion of fear we all have which is why we create the division noise, to distract us from that fear.

Reflect on this.

The Biology of the "Story"

To tie this into the technical framework of Dr. David Hawkins and the physiological impact of “reverse prejudice”:

• The Frequency of Neutrality (250): Hawkins teaches that the first step out of conflict is Neutrality. This is the level where we stop judging others based on “stories” and start seeing them as individuals. When we project a “drive-in movie” story onto a stranger, we drop back into Anger (150) or Fear (100). This creates a physiological “armor” that prevents us from ever reaching the healing of the Love frequency.

• The “Us vs. Them” Neural Loop: According to Uppers, Downers, and All Arounders, the brain is wired for tribalism when it is in a state of survival. High levels of cortisol (the stress hormone) make the brain rely on stereotypes to “shortcut” safety. By pausing and asking, “Is this true about that person?” you are manually overriding the amygdala and engaging the Prefrontal Cortex, which is the physical gateway to presence and empathy.

• Heart-Space Energy as a Bridge: When I mention “heart-space energy,” what I am describing is what Hawkins calls the Calibration of Power.

  • Force (prejudice, fear, division) always requires an enemy to sustain itself.

  • Power (Love, Presence) requires nothing but the truth of the moment.

  By dropping the story, you aren’t just being “nice” to the other person—you are reclaiming your own frequency and allowing your body to exit the “Fear Wing” of the emotional mansion.

Here is a concrete example of what this would look like in practice.

The Example: The Unreturned Text

The Scenario: You send a thoughtful text to a friend, and they don’t reply for two days.

1. The Melodrama (Living in the Story): Your internal “filtration system” kicks in. You tell yourself, “They are ignoring me,” or “I must have said something wrong.” This is the rumination loop. Understand, some of us have loops that are pretty— intense and emotionally self harmful, where is all that built up going? Consider that data okay loves.

• The Result: Your body reacts with tension or a sinking feeling. Because you are living in this story, your friend has now become a “threat” to your peace of mind. To sustain this story, you might start digging up old “imprints” from the hippocampus archives of times people let you down (confirmation bias.) This is what your image calls “Force”—it requires an enemy (your friend’s perceived coldness) to sustain the drama.

2. Dropping the Story (Heart-Space Energy): Instead of feeding the loop, you choose to stay in the “truth of the moment”. The truth is simply: The text is sent, and there is no reply yet. * The Result: By refusing to assign a negative meaning to the silence, you aren’t just being “nice” to your friend; you are reclaiming your own frequency. You stay calm. You exit the “Fear Wing” of your emotional mansion and stay in a place of “Power” (Presence).

3. The Outcome: When the friend finally calls and says, “I’m so sorry, I had a family emergency,” the person in the melodrama feels exhausted from two days of imaginary fighting (looping). The person in the heart-space is already balanced and ready to actually be there for their friend.

Reflection: The Library of Life

I am not here to convince anyone of anything, but simply to share my brain and heart with the world in a way that is even scary for me at times. I am here to be Sav and to operate from the frequency of Love, because connecting with the “libraries of life”—which is what I call humans—is so important to me. It is what brings flavor to this world. If we can all learn to accept each other instead of dividing and letting the “devil win”, we can access the Love frequency effortlessly. Yes there is darkness. Yes, but light always shines through. Remember that.

I leave you with these questions:

• Has our obsession with inclusivity created the very division we claim to be fatigued by?

• How has our collective need to be empowered swung the pendulum in the opposite direction?

• Does empowerment come from pushing others under? So we can be on top?

In my heart, it does not.

That’s why I don’t represent flags, movements, or noise designed to cloud the collective’s judgment. I serve people—beings who are struggling. I hold the ache of those unable to metabolize. If I represent one flag, others may deem themselves unwelcome, and that is something those stuck and attached to ideologies can’t grasp because their minds have weak muscles for nuance.

My work starts with perception.

If you haven’t watched my YouTube video on perception and did the quest plus collected your 10 page reinforcement— you can do so here

Now, to tie this all up with some evidence to leave our sticky little brains in marination mode. We can look back at why my perception of Love being felt aligns with a lot of Hawkins teachings.

• The Trap of Ideology: Dr. David Hawkins noted that Pride (175) is often the most dangerous block to the Love frequency (500). Pride is the use of “flags and movements” it feels like empowerment because it is higher than Fear, but it is still based on “us vs. them.” As I said, it lacks the “muscles for nuance” required to reach the higher states of Reason (400) and Love (500).

• Metabolizing the Ache: In Uppers, Downers, and All Arounders, the inability to “metabolize” emotional pain often leads to the “drift” of substance use. When people cannot process their trauma, they cling to rigid ideologies as a shield. So, by staying neutral and refusing to fly a specific flag, we are creating a “low-cortisol environment” that allows others to finally lower their guard and begin to heal. This will feel very unsafe for some of you. Because the very flags we fly, ideologies we cling to, and beliefs we default to the world. Those become unconscious shields of false protection. Disconnecting you further from the world and presence around you.

• Effortless Love: Hawkins taught that Love isn’t something you do, it’s something you are when you stop resisting the truth of the present moment. By seeing people as “libraries” rather than “labels,” we start to manually shifting our nervous system out of the “Fear Wing” and into the frequency of repair.

When we shift our focus to stand in this neutral, heart-centered space, we do more than just share an opinion, we act as a biological and energetic 'tuning fork' for everyone around us. By refusing to get lost in the 'drift' of substances, political noise, societal division, or the gridlock of family dynamics and the desperate need to belong, we preserve the 'sticky,' present-focused brain of the inner child. In doing so, we transform the 'Fear Wing' of the emotional mansion into a sanctuary. A place where others can finally put down their flags, quiet their minds, and remember how to play.

The Neurology of the Narrative: Training the Dendrites🤗

To move from immediate reaction to discernment, we must understand that the brain is a pattern-recognition machine. When we focus on historical trauma or societal division, we are physically strengthening the neural pathways (dendrites) that look for those specific patterns.

Reflective Questions for Deep Analysis

• When we prioritize the search for ‘proof’ of division, are we observing reality, or are we training our dendrites to ignore the frequency of connection in favor of the frequency of conflict?

• If you feel offended when someone connects with your soul instead of your skin, what is the 'why' behind that offense? Are you defending your true frequency, or are you defending an assigned story that requires division to feel real?

• How much of our current outrage is a biological ‘echo’ of a past we did not personally live, and how does carrying that echo limit our capacity to inhabit the ‘Heart-Space’ in the only moment that actually exists— the presence?

Challenging the “Why” of the Offense

Questions to audit your own “Fear Wing” in the emotional frequency mansion.

• Why does the presence of a neutral ‘Tuning Fork’—someone who refuses to engage in the war of labels— feel like an act of violence? Does the peace others choose for themselves feel like a dismissal of your pain, or does it simply highlight the exhaustion of your own loop?

• Does focusing on the ‘constant injustice’ of the past provide a solution, or does it merely provide a familiar ‘flavor’ of adrenaline that the body has become addicted to?

• If we stripped away the stories, the news cycles, and the ancestral gridlock, what would actually be left between us? If the answer is ‘Love,’ then why is ‘Love’ treated as a dissociative statement rather than the ultimate embodiment of truth?

Practice: The Discernment Audit

To train the brain for this shift:

1. Notice the Trigger: When you hear “I don’t see color,” or any statement that typically trigger a nervous system shift notice where the heat rises in your body.

2. Identify the Story: What “loop” just started? (e.g., “They don’t care about my history,” or “They are privileged, they don’t understand.”)

3. Check the Frequency: Is this story serving your “Heart-Space,” or is it keeping you in the “Fear Wing”?

4. The Choice: Can you put down your flag for one minute and simply see the flesh as flesh?

Let me know what surfaces for you all. Even if uncomfy. We are here together. 🫶🏽

Till next time Data Collectors.

As a clinician, I spend a lot of time teaching people how to find their voice. For people-pleasers, over-functioners, and chronic “shrinkers,” this work is necessary, a part of the life mission we must face; otherwise we risk being a drifter in the loop. Many of us were conditioned to make ourselves smaller in order to maintain peace in relationships. As a result, learning how to speak up, set boundaries, and advocate for ourselves becomes a crucial developmental step in reclaiming agency.

But—big but… there is a side of this conversation that rarely gets explored.

Sometimes the pendulum swings too far in the other direction. The person who once struggled to speak at all can move into a state where they feel the need to respond to everything. Every interaction becomes something to analyze, challenge, or defend against. At that point, speaking up stops being an act of sovereignty and starts becoming a symptom of an unregulated nervous system. Think rescue dog that is afraid of a bag blowing in the wind. It’s not scared of a bag? It just has to learn the rhythm of the wind. When the nervous system is stuck in what I call the Activated Survival Self (ASS), it stops behaving like a calm observer of reality and starts acting more like a narrative architect. It begins scanning the environment for threats the same way a safari guide scans the horizon for lions or the way a sniper stays locked in searching for the target. The problem is that when the nervous system has been trained to expect danger everywhere, it will often begin painting lions onto the faces of people who were simply walking through the grass. In other words, if the brain expects danger and cannot find it, it may start inventing it. Creating it out of thin air because, sitting in the truth that it was just a mirage created by their own internal world. That would require self-ownership, accountability of the untrained stallion of the mind and nervous system. Work that belongs to them that they have neglected.

This is how the reactivity trap forms. People move from people-pleasing into advocating, but the shift overshoots the mark and lands in hyper-defensiveness. When every bag blowing in the wind feels like a threat, you are no longer practicing advocacy—you are living as a hostage to hyper-vigilance. A large part of this process happens through the lenses we wear in our minds. Psychology calls these lenses schemas. Schemas are mental templates built through past experiences that shape how we interpret the present moment. They help the brain make quick sense of the world, but they also have a powerful bias built into them.

If you are wearing red glasses, everything looks red.

If someone enters a workplace already carrying the schema that “people here are judging me,” their brain will automatically filter the environment through that expectation. The colleague who admires their work becomes invisible. The neutral facial expression becomes suspicious. The person who didn’t hold the elevator suddenly becomes proof that the environment is hostile. What we are witnessing in those moments is confirmation bias amplified by the amygdala. The brain’s threat detection system is wired to notice anything that confirms its predictions while ignoring evidence that contradicts them. Neuroscientists call this predictive processing, where the brain constantly uses past experiences to guess what is happening in the present moment (Barrett, 2017). So basically, in Sav language. We are sitting in the hippocampus archives projecting the collection of events we find in there onto the environment and people in it. Painting the faces onto the lions.

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When the nervous system is activated, the brain doesn’t just observe reality. It begins directing a movie about it. Our committee in our minds (think inside out) They are up there directing each scene. This is where energy begins to leak into the environment in ways people rarely realize. Human beings are extremely sensitive to emotional signals. Research on emotional contagion shows that we unconsciously mirror one another’s physiological states through subtle cues like posture, tone, and facial expression. If someone enters a room carrying the energy of suspicion or defense, other nervous systems pick up on it immediately.

You cannot emit the frequency of “stay away from me” and then feel confused when people keep their distance.

When others sense that guarded energy, they often respond by giving space. But here is the painful irony of our human behavior. The ASS interprets that distance not as respect for a boundary, but as confirmation of rejection or prejudice. In that moment a feedback loop is created (schema). The person’s hyper-vigilance pushes people away, and the resulting distance becomes proof that their fears were justified. What started as a protective strategy ends up creating the very isolation the person was afraid of.

I see this dynamic appear it’s pesky head across cultural lines as well. Whether the narrative is built around race, gender, class, or social status, there is a human tendency to turn entire groups into symbolic stand-ins for personal insecurity. It is far easier for the mind to say, “They are the problem,” than it is to acknowledge that the nervous system itself may be overwhelmed. True psychological resilience involves the ability to pause long enough to question the story the mind is telling. Sometimes the person in front of you is simply another human being with their own internal world. Sometimes the reaction you are feeling is less about the present moment and more about a memory archive your nervous system has not yet processed.

The hippocampus is basically the archive center. It stores past experiences that the amygdala then uses to detect potential threats in the environment. Imagine opening a memory box of picture all holding the image of painful events “imprints” from your time line. We basically throw those events onto the present moment. When those memories are unresolved, the brain can begin projecting old pain onto new situations. What feels like an immediate reaction to the present moment is often the nervous system sitting inside of that memory box. In psychology, this process is closely related to projection and cognitive distortions. Mind-reading, for example, occurs when we assume we know what another person is thinking without actual evidence. Labeling occurs when we assign a global negative trait to someone or an entire group based on limited information. Both distortions simplify the world into easy categories so the brain can feel more in control of uncertainty.

Stephen Porges’ Polyvagal Theory also helps explain this phenomenon through the concept of neuroception, the nervous system’s unconscious ability to detect safety or threat. When someone has experienced repeated trauma or exclusion, their safety meter can become miscalibrated. A neutral glance can register as hostility. A moment of silence can feel like rejection.

Pause for a moment.

As a multicultural woman, the situation I see A LOT is the concept of white people being unsafe. Since being back in California visiting. If I had a dollar for every time I heard “ugh they are so racist.” It drives me bonkers because how the hell do you know that simply by walking past a person who looks different than you? It’s such a statement of ignorance and reveals your ASS. White people have become the scapegoat for many people and their own unhealed and unacknowledged fears. Fears that quite frankly are being perpetuated by the media. How will you feel safe with people who do not look like you if all you ever do is hang around sameness? How are we so entitled to demand grace for our fear of coming out of our comfort zone. Yet, do not extend that grace outwardly? How can you come in with an energy of judgment, emit that outwardly than snap at people for becoming tense around you? Feels like waking on eggshell energy and I wonder how many of use feel that way.

If the ASS inside say “yeah but white people—-” shhhhhhh inner child, what has a white person done to you that you are not already doing to yourself?

The nervous system reacts before the thinking mind has time to investigate.

Over time, if someone only spends time with people who reinforce their existing worldview, this hyper-vigilance never gets challenged. Social psychologists refer to this as the absence of intergroup contact, a concept first studied by Gordon Allport. His research showed that meaningful interactions between different groups significantly reduce prejudice and fear. When we remain in self-segregated environments, the nervous system never has the opportunity to retrain itself to feel safe around difference. This contagion even impacts people within the white community. As someone who is white, black, and Native America (Muscogee 🥰) I have seen it with my family. Those who are white no longer feel safe around people who look like them. This is due to the need to feel belonging with their family and if they have family that are POC they choose to belong there and adopt the schema of that group whatever that is.

Many times I believe, the judgment we feel is really just the vulnerability of feeling naked— being in a different environment and around difference. That naked feeling goes away the more we practice and train the nervous system to learn there is no threat around difference.

Avoidance keeps the schema alive.

This is why developing discernment is so important in psychological growth. Advocacy and awareness are essential, but they must be balanced with curiosity and self-reflection. Otherwise, the brain’s survival system can quietly transform into a narrative machine that interprets every ambiguous interaction as confirmation of danger. That’s exhausting for you. When that happens, the world begins to look like a field full of lions—even when most of the people walking through it are just trying to get through their day. A simple practice can help interrupt this pattern. Before reacting or “calling something out,” pause long enough to perform what I call a reality audit. First, notice what is happening in your body. Are your shoulders tight? Is your chest constricted? Is your mind racing ahead of the evidence? Naming the sensation helps bring the nervous system back into awareness. You can name it… “Ahh the ASS is online…”

Next, identify the story your brain is telling. What assumption are you making about the other person’s intentions? Once the story is clear, challenge it by imagining at least three alternative explanations for the situation. (if your mind rejects those truths, note that down, you just discovered the entrance into your limiting belief realm. Understanding that perhaps the person is curious rather than judgmental. Perhaps they are distracted by something happening in their own life. Perhaps they admire you and simply feel intimidated. There are so many other possibilities besides… “they’re a racist, they're phobic, they are jealous.”

Finally, take a slow breath and consciously soften the defensive posture your body may be holding. Allow yourself to make brief eye contact without the shield of assumption. This is softening the field allowing yourself to be seen as the softer you and not the hypervigilent ASS. Often the “lion” that seemed so threatening disappears once the nervous system stops projecting the content of the hippocampus archives onto the people in the environment. None of this means ignoring real prejudice or injustice. Those realities exist and deserve to be addressed with clarity and courage. But psychological maturity requires the ability to differentiate between what is happening in the present moment and what the nervous system is replaying from the past. What is real injustice, and what’s truly you creating injustice for yourself by disconnecting you from connection.

If we never learn to question the stories our survival system tells us, we risk becoming people who judge others before we truly know them. In that moment, the lion we were so certain was standing in front of us may have been something we painted there ourselves.

Let me know what came up for you with this time.

I love seeing your comments, your shares of what was challenging. Thank you all for sitting in the muck with me. My heart is so full 🥰

Till next time.

Come as you are where you are.

References & Further Reading

For readers who want to explore the psychology and neuroscience concepts referenced in this essay, the following works provide foundational research and accessible explanations of how the nervous system, perception, and social cognition shape human behavior.

Predictive Processing & Constructed Emotion

Barrett, Lisa Feldman. (2017).
How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Barrett’s work explains how the brain constantly predicts what is happening in the present moment using past experiences stored in memory. Rather than reacting purely to the external world, the brain constructs emotional experiences based on prior learning, which helps explain why unresolved memories can shape how we interpret people and situations.

Extended Reading

Barrett, Lisa Feldman. (2020).
Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

A shorter and very accessible explanation of predictive brain theory and how perception is shaped by prior experience.

Polyvagal Theory & Neuroception

Porges, Stephen W. (2011).
The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation.
W. W. Norton & Company.

Porges introduces the concept of neuroception, the nervous system’s unconscious process of detecting safety or danger. When this system becomes dysregulated due to trauma or chronic stress, neutral interactions can be perceived as threats.

Extended Reading

Porges, Stephen W. & Dana, Deb. (2018).
Clinical Applications of the Polyvagal Theory.
W. W. Norton & Company.

Provides practical applications of polyvagal theory in therapy, trauma recovery, and nervous system regulation.

Cognitive Distortions & Schema Theory

Young, Jeffrey E., Klosko, Janet S., & Weishaar, Marjorie E. (2003).
Schema Therapy: A Practitioner’s Guide.
Guilford Press.

This book outlines how early life experiences create schemas, or mental templates that shape how individuals interpret relationships, safety, and belonging. Schemas influence perception, often operating outside of conscious awareness.

Extended Reading

Beck, Aaron T. (1976).
Cognitive Therapy and the Emotional Disorders.
Penguin Books.

Beck’s foundational work on cognitive distortions explains mechanisms such as mind-reading, labeling, and confirmation bias, which influence how people interpret social interactions.

Emotional Contagion & Social Signal Transmission

Hatfield, Elaine, Cacioppo, John T., & Rapson, Richard L. (1993).
Emotional Contagion.
Cambridge University Press.

This research explores how human beings unconsciously mirror each other’s emotional and physiological states through facial expression, posture, tone, and subtle cues. Emotional states can spread through social environments without conscious awareness.

Intergroup Contact Theory

Allport, Gordon W. (1954).
The Nature of Prejudice.
Addison-Wesley.

Allport’s work introduced Intergroup Contact Theory, which demonstrates that meaningful interaction between members of different groups significantly reduces prejudice and fear. Avoidance and social segregation tend to reinforce stereotypes and perceived threat.

Extended Reading

Pettigrew, Thomas F., & Tropp, Linda R. (2006).
A Meta-Analytic Test of Intergroup Contact Theory.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

This large-scale study confirms that intergroup contact consistently reduces prejudice across cultures and social contexts.

Fear Learning & the Threat Detection System

LeDoux, Joseph. (1996).
The Emotional Brain: The Mysterious Underpinnings of Emotional Life.
Simon & Schuster.

LeDoux’s work explains how the amygdala processes threat and fear, often reacting before conscious thought has time to evaluate a situation.

Extended Reading

Sapolsky, Robert M. (2017).
Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst.
Penguin Press.

A comprehensive look at how biology, culture, and environment shape human behavior, including threat perception, bias, and group dynamics.

Trauma, Perception & Nervous System Conditioning

Maté, Gabor. (2022).
The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness, and Healing in a Toxic Culture.
Avery.

Maté explores how trauma and social environments shape nervous system responses, influencing perception, health, and relational behavior.

Extended Reading

van der Kolk, Bessel. (2014).
The Body Keeps the Score.
Penguin Books.

Explains how trauma becomes encoded in the nervous system and body, affecting perception, emotional regulation, and interpersonal relationships.

Additional Psychological Foundations

Kahneman, Daniel. (2011).
Thinking, Fast and Slow.
Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Kahneman’s work explains cognitive shortcuts and biases that shape human decision-making and perception.

If You Want to Explore This Topic Further

If this essay resonated with you, the areas of psychology worth exploring include:

• Predictive Brain Theory

• Polyvagal Theory

• Schema Therapy

• Cognitive Distortions

• Intergroup Contact Theory

• Trauma and Nervous System Regulation

• Social Signal Transmission and Emotional Contagion

Each of these frameworks contributes to understanding how the human brain interprets safety, threat, and social relationships.

The key takeaway across all of them is simple but profound: The brain does not simply observe reality. It interprets it through memory, expectation, and nervous system state. Sometimes, the lions we see in the field are not actually there.

Sometimes they are projections from the archive we carry within us.

How come humans today can’t have conversations? Just say what they feel? Mean what they say? We can’t make statements to what is true for our own lived experience anymore. Losing out on flavor for this world.

Why?

I have come to believe it’s due to the fear of someone else implying a meaning behind what is true for us. That then meaning is defended against by that very individual who demands you be accountable. Remember, accountable for what? What did you do besides express what is true for you? The meaning they made with your truth became what they punish YOU for..

Let that sink in for a moment.

We as a species do not feel safe to communicate with each other. Language, the very ability that makes us vibrant beings…It vanishes... We tiptoe, bite our tongue—Swallow… We have been conditioned to believe. Speak and you risk being punished for not being in sameness as the rest of the group. You get called labels. These are really glorified rumination loops of people who never trained the stallion of their mind to…Settle. Down.

Is the world ugly. yes

Is there injustice? yes

But riddle me this.

What are we doing in the mind with what we see in the world?

How often do we reflect on our own mind activity and whether it is being casted on to others as definitive truth because we “feel that way?”

Disagree = you must be a racist?

Really? or is that your protector part holding the mic?

The polarity is so extreme I can’t help but scream to myself.

How is this not a Cluster B crisis.

HOW CAN THE COLLECTIVE NOT SEE IT?

I feel these days some conversations are bait traps for people — tests to see how far someone can push you. You can pick this data clue up in the tone: hostile, instigative, agreeable but clearly from an ulterior motive or agenda. This energy is not pure. This energy is what dictates the emotional climate so the collective can’t reach each other. Can’t speak.

It mixes with the wounds from past lovers, caregivers, friends.

I have seen it in the way strangers comment to strangers online, responding as if the other person’s words, work, performance, etc., is a direct attack against them. Because their amygdala sees the ghost of what really wounded them, not what is actually happening. Many of us never sit with those wounds, which makes it easier to cast that part onto others.

One truth I have known to realize through my work with others.

Most of us have our heads so far up our own ass to make things a personal attack against others intentionally. Majority of us are stuck trying to untangle the loops in our own mind.

Till next time

🫶🏽

See you in the next one data collectors.

For those who need clarity. Here is a goat head. Not fun to step on 🥲

Blame feels sharp. Sticky. Painful. Like stepping on a goat head in the desert — it hooks into you and won’t let go. The mind tells us the only way to get relief is to throw it at someone else.

But relief through projection isn’t freedom.
It’s transfer.

We explore:

• Why blame is neurologically easier than self-examination

• How egocentric loops protect identity at the expense of growth

• The illusion that “giving blame away” equals liberation

• Why alchemizing blame requires dissection, not discharge

Instead of flinging the goat head, we smash it.
We examine it.
We ask: What’s inside this?

Under blame, there is usually:

• Unmet need

• Boundary violation

• Fear of loss

• Ego injury

• Attachment panic

• Shame

Blame protects the nervous system from collapse.
Pattern recognition builds the nervous system’s capacity to evolve.

We also introduce the Pendulum Visualization:

Right now, many conversations swing wildly between extremes because nuance has disappeared. Without nuance, there are no “pause slots” along the spectrum — no places for reflection, only reaction.

Nuance creates micro-pauses.
Micro-pauses create choice.
Choice interrupts loops.

But before we can interrupt the loop, we have to see it.

Key Concepts

• Blame is a protective reflex, not a solution

• Pattern recognition requires ego tolerance

• Externalizing blame reinforces neural loops

• Naming a loop is the first act of agency

• Nuance slows the pendulum

Reflective Questions

1. When I feel blame rise, where do I feel it in my body?

2. Do I want relief or do I want understanding?

3. What does it cost me to keep holding onto this blame?

4. If I smashed this “goat head,” what might I discover underneath it?

5. Is this a one-time offense, or is this a pattern?

6. What part of me feels threatened if I let go of blame?

7. What boundary needs reinforcement without character assassination?

What to Listen For in the Next Conversation

In the next episode, we’ll move from recognition to interruption.

We’ll explore:

• How to train the ability to see loops in real time

• Techniques for slowing down reactivity

• How to interrupt narcissistic and egocentric loops in family systems

• Boundary reinforcement without escalation

• What to do when someone refuses accountability

This isn’t about becoming passive.
It’s about becoming precise.

You can’t interrupt what you can’t see.

Invitation to Engage

I’d love to know:

What loops are you noticing in your own life right now?
Where does blame feel hardest to release?
What would you like me to unpack next — boundaries, family dynamics, narcissism, nervous system regulation, or something else entirely?

Drop a comment and let me know what you want this podcast space to explore.

We’re building this together. 🫶🏽

I want to start of by saying this topic was inspired by a safari member of ours who wrote into my DM with a very amazing question. I want to share it with you but I will protect the identity of the person.

What you read below is based of this response.

Are we ready?

Let’s get into it.

The Mirror of Fear: The Anxious, The Avoidant, and the Gap Between

“Allowing someone to pass” I love this. This right here is radical acceptance. Is this easy to practice? Not in the slightest. Especially, in a society today that is conditioning narcissistic and borderline personality traits in people who need their wounds named in order to be safe. No.

The reason this work is not easy is because the oppositional force to healing is resistance and well— resistance is being conditioned pavlovian style in the micro (us). The resistance to accountability, responsibility, and ownership of where you are NOW, instead of pointing the finger at the elders or parents who have harmed us.

To me, “letting someone pass” is an act of unconditional love for yourself. It’s the visceral realization that if someone insists the sky is green, you don’t have to litigate the blue. You don’t have to prove, you don’t have to fix, and you don’t have to convince them of anything. Zoom out…

Haven’t you noticed. We are nothing but beings stuck in loops of feeling “not good enough” “not worthy enough.” So we over perform, over function, or over induldge to cope with the pain of “not being enough.” We’ve become a society that is constantly “proving” ourselves at work, in our families, and in our relationships. We are bleeding out our life force energy trying to be “seen” by people who won’t ever notice us because they are just a reenactment of a lesson we needed to learn, maybe 5 years ago so we can finally ascend.

Think of it like Iyanla Vanzant’s In the Meantime— if we are starting in the basement, the goal is to move up the floors. We can’t do that if we’re weighted down by litigation. "That policing behvaior that came from a whole year of being stuck at home in isolation with hysteria fill and a sickness that was infecting everyone. Was it COVID or was it this very emotional contagion? thats up for you to reflect on. Look at the psychological implications of what happens to humans when stuck inside fo far too long?

The birth of:

Hall Monitors,

“You aren’t politically correct” police

What society calls “Karens”

Don’t be fooled. These hall monitors, mob mentality members are the ones who have no control in their own life so they are out in the world controlling others. This provides the mob mentality member (we have all been there by the way) an escape into the illusion of control, so it can distract them from their own internal feelings of hopelessness.

See the loop?

If I can correct you I get dopamine. Now we have a bunch of dopamine addicted hall monitors running the streets instead of policing their own habits, routines, and mental health.

If someone wants to be wrong, let them. That’s the “Let Them” theory in action. When we are actually at peace within ourselves, we don’t need to control the external environment or the people in it. We can just allow them to be exactly where they are.

What will you do with all that extra time from hall monituring it up? OMG, maybe you can get to that walk you have been wanting to do for age, or make some bread, watch that show you wanted to…

Time becomes available when the mind is not fixated on the behavioral change others will not do. Focusing on them while you do not do what you could be doing is the hypocrisy loop we don’t see.

The Shadow of Survival: Identification with the Aggressor

Now, let’s zoom back in.

We point a lot at the older generation, but lets remind ourselves they still raised us. What survival adaptations did we inherit simply for being in proximity to them?

This is self-assessment.

We often identify as victims of communal narcissism, but we rarely discuss the Narcissistic Survival Adaptations (NSA) we adopted to endure it.

• Identification with the Aggressor: This Freudian concept explains how a child adopts the traits of a controlling caregiver to feel a sense of power rather than helplessness.

• Proximity as Leverage: We may find ourselves using proximity to a partner’s internal world as a way to bend or influence them—the very habit used against us as children.

Let’s unpack the last one because I myself have had experiences where that very proximity leverage has been used against me in friendships with women. These women are typically the ones that dictate emotional climates within their own family. I correlated some of the harm done to me by being a people pleaser. Now, Some people get close boucle they want to know the shadow aspects of you so they can feel better about themselves. This is very common. This Is where the need for discernment comes in.

The “Huge Child” and Arrested Development

Clinically, many adults we encounter (including ourselves) are functioning from a state of Developmental Arrest.

• The Puer/Puella Aeternus: These Jungian archetypes represent the “huge child” in an adult body someone who was never safely mirrored and thus never moved into functional adulthood.

• Adaptive Child vs. Functional Adult: Pia Mellody’s framework describes the “Adaptive Child” as the part of us that uses manipulation or control because it doesn’t believe in the safety of the “Functional Adult” boundary.

In Pia Mellody’s framework, this is the distinction between the Functional Adult and the Adaptive Child. When we are “allowing them to pass,” we are operating from the Adult; when we are trying to fix the external environment to feel safe, we are operating from the Child.

We cannot complete our missions in life from the operation of the child.

In this section of your Field Notes, we’re looking at the hard truth of the “Mission Block.” If you’re stuck in the Adaptive Child loop, you aren’t just stressed you’re essentially “offline” drifting is what Napoleon Hill would call it from your own destiny. You can’t reach the higher floors if you’re busy fortifying the basement.

The Mission Block: Survival vs. Alignment

When you operate from the Adaptive Child, you are trapped in the Activated Survival Self. In this state, your nervous system is “firing and wiring” in a loop of hypervigilance. You think you’re in a place of power because you’re controlling the environment, but clinically, you’re just in a state of high-functioning panic. Over time this consistent exposure raises your baseline for functioning.

• The Amygdala Hijack: Your brain is stuck in a survival loop, which means you literally cannot access the Prefrontal Cortex, the part of you required for vision, mission, and long-term creation.

• The Alignment Problem: You cannot complete your mission in life from a survival state because your “authentic self” isn’t the one driving. The Adaptive Child is an expert at surviving the past, but it has no idea how to navigate the present.

• The Schema Trap: You can’t advance to the next mission if you’re still playing by the rules of the child’s schema. It’s like trying to run new software on an old, corrupted operating system.

Debunking the Myth: What is a “Functional Adult”?

I myself find myself looking for the “adult ADULTS” 😂 We’ve been sold a lie that being an “adult” means having a mortgage, a job, and “shoulding” yourself into submission. But as we see in the field, many of these “adults” are just huge children with bigger bank accounts, more toys, and kids.

In our work, Adulthood is not a chronological age; it is a regulated state.

1. Presence over Performance: A Functional Adult lives in the present moment, not the “In the Meantime” basement of past reenactments.

2. Internal Agency over External Control: An adult doesn’t need to “litigate the blue” because their reality isn’t up for debate. They have nothing to prove.

3. The Anchor: Adulthood is the ability to stay okay within yourself even when the external environment is falling apart or someone is insisting the sky is green.

4. Relational Equality: The adult operates from a place of “equal to”—not the “superiority” or “less than” dynamics that the Adaptive Child uses to feel safe.

The Ascension

If the goal is to move up the floors, the “Functional Adult” is the elevator. You have to be willing to sit in the neurosis of adulthood, the discomfort of not controlling others—so that you can finally have the energy to complete your mission.

Your mission requires your presence and the Adaptive Child is always somewhere else, trying to fix a past that’s already over.

The Adaptive Child: The Survival Expert

The Adaptive Child is the version of you that stepped in when the actual adults in the room were “huge children” themselves. It is a set of behaviors, thoughts, and feelings that you “adapted” to survive a communal system that wasn’t safe or sane.

• Motivation: The primary goal is control as a form of safety. If I can manipulate the environment or “fix” the narcissist, then I won’t be hurt.

• Behavioral Traits: This part is often “less than” or “superior to” others. It’s the part that engages in the “What About Me?” sticker behavior or uses proximity to influence others.

• Reality Perception: It sees things in polarities (black and white). It’s the part that feels a “Narcissistic Injury” when the world doesn’t name its pain.

• The “Fleas”: This is where we harbor our Identification with the Aggressor. We use the same controlling tactics we learned from the narcissist because, to the Adaptive Child, power is the only alternative to powerlessness.

The Functional Adult: The Grounded Anchor

The Functional Adult is the part of your psyche that lives in the present moment. It is the “you” that has moved up from the basement to the higher floors.

• Motivation: The goal is connection and self-regulation, not control.

• Behavioral Traits: It operates from a place of “equal to” others neither a victim nor a perpetrator. It recognizes that its value is inherent and doesn’t need to be proven or litigated.

• The “Let Them” Theory: The Functional Adult is the part that can “Allow Someone to Pass”. It understands that someone else’s insistence that “the sky is green” is a reflection of their developmental arrest, not a threat to the Adult’s reality.

• Boundaries: Instead of trying to change the other person (external control), the Functional Adult sets a boundary on what they are willing to tolerate (internal agency).

The Balancing Act in the Field

The “neurosis of being an adult” is that we are constantly toggling between these two. We go to work as the Functional Adult, but the moment a boss or a spouse triggers an old “narcissistic injury,” the Adaptive Child grabs the steering wheel.

The work of “ascending” is learning how to notice when the child is trying to “fix the environment” and gently bringing the functional adult back online to keep the Prefrontal Cortex from checking out.

The Cognitive Tax of the “Green Sky”

Every time you try to change someone else’s distorted reality, you are paying a Prefrontal Cortex (PFC) Tax.

• Amygdala Hijack: Arguing with a narcissist triggers your survival brain.

• Top-Down Regulation: “Allowing them to pass” is a conscious choice to keep your PFC online. If you spend your life “fixing” the narcissist, you develop a chronic mood that eventually becomes a temperament and a personality.

Conclusion

The balancing act is realizing that we only try to fix the environment when we are not okay within ourselves. When we lack internal agency, we resort to external control. The work is to move from External Control to Internal Sovereignty.

Your manipulation was once your medicine, but now it is your poison.

If you are waiting for the environment to change so that you can finally start your life, you are being held hostage by your own Adaptive Child. This part of you thinks that controlling the “green sky” is the path to power, but it’s actually the anchor keeping you stuck looping in the basement.

• The Adult Reality: Being a “Functional Adult” means realizing that your mission is independent of other people’s dysregulation.

• Radical Acceptance: When you stop litigating, you stop giving your power away to people who aren’t even in the room with you.

The Work: The next time you feel that pull to “fix” or “prove,” ask yourself: Am I trying to move up a floor, or am I just decorating the basement?

Let them pass, so you can finally arrive.

Let me know what comes up for you with this one. Thank you to the person who wrote in. ‘Allow them to Pass’ is my new Mantra 🥰

Till next time Data Collectors.

Reference List

• Dispenza, J. (2012). Breaking the habit of being yourself: How to lose your mind and create a new one. Hay House.

• Freud, A. (1936). The ego and the mechanisms of defence. International Universities Press.

• Jung, C. G. (1959). The archetypes and the collective unconscious. Princeton University Press.

• Mellody, P. (1989). Facing codependence: What it is, where it comes from, how it sabotages our lives. Harper & Row.

• Schwartz, R. C. (2001). Introduction to the internal family systems model. Trailheads.

Till next time.

Before we begin, due to the society we live in and the amount of polarity and "whataboutme" toxin plaguing the planet.

Let’s ground in the reminder:

Think every time you plug your brain into the work. You are now in connection with yourself. We are all in the room—together. When those of you share, bear with me, okay? I love to see it. The gridlock moments, the frustrations, the realizations—the "shift" is what my clients have been collectively calling it. Sharing helps not just me, but those in the background silently watching, listening, and reading.

In my work with humans. Please trust me when I say:

As someone who has worked in many different settings living in El Paso has ignited a level of emotion in me for the clients I serve here. Let me be frank here (not sure why its frank, but thats for another day…)

For the women or men who have been harmed by family members who have engaged in SA acts, coercion acts etc. While their parents, family etc covered it up—kept it silent, and told their child to stay quiet about it. These cases always make me wonder why.

I bring that curiosity into the room.

For many, MANY, having these conversations is extremely uncomfortable. I mean, on the uncertainty scale you’re talking UN.CER.TAIN.TY… Are you catching what I’m throwing? This is scary for the generational roots of some of these families. I know we love the Costco style of things sometimes, but this work gets heavy. Especially if kids, or even the adults, fear that the family will collapse once they share the information or emotions that are heavy on their heart with the family.

What do you think the issue with this is, long term?

Keeping it a secret

Because over time keeping that secret is essentially the muscle you teach the family. Silence, Swallowing, aching alone. Can you imagine what little kids feel when their parents “don’t believe them” simply because believing them puts them at risk of danger.

Zoom Out…

This happens in the workplace all. the. time.

Can you imagine if you are navigating this in the workplace AND at home. Which one are you going to prioritize? Well if we look at the hierarchy of needs.

If your job is at risk, what provides your physiological needs: water, food, sleep, shelter? Your brain can only focus on those needs until you can achieve them. Now, see where "Love & Belonging" is on the image above? Many of our own parents, elders, colleagues, etc., choose belonging because their amygdala, just like ours—considers the concept of belonging a physiological safety need. It is the biggest threat to self. So much so, we lose track of ourselves and maybe can’t even hold a job, stable relationships, etc. The job represents a level of commitment that (like Leonardo DiCaprio and his dating age rules 🤭) some people cannot access or are unwilling to. This simply can be because the level of comfort associated with being committed to something, even a job, long-term is terrifying for some. "Am I going to be stuck here forever?"

Now, consider the concept Napoleon Hill coined as “drifting” from his book Outwitting the Devil. When we lose track of ourselves, sometimes we end up prioritizing relationships over our children. We prioritize ourselves over our children.

So, when we pick that need to belong. It could be belonging to a work system, it could be the feeling of needing to belong to a side (a parental side, a political side, a friends' side) that side could also be choosing the side of yourself. Every single one of those decisions is polarity, which we have to be careful of because the mind is sticky and rigid. If we train it to be consistently that way without adding the flavor of new ones, we are weakening our muscles of critical thinking and our ability to learn discernment. What ends up happening is we stretch our window of tolerance.

We stretch our window of tolerance.

Looking at the image below, being stretched into the different color zones. The red zone or the brown zone happens because the environment or other people are stretching you outside of what is the optimal arousal zone. The zone we want to aim for. Understand that even having days where we end up in the hyperarousal zones, but we make it back into the optimal arousal zone, those are still fantastic wins. If we have days where we're stuck in the hyperarousal zone, let's see if we can work on our level of metacognition here— so we can train our ability to notice when we drift into the red zones.

When we stretch our window of tolerance, we are basically telling our "little self" as we hammer that square peg into that round hole: "This is not sustainable for us." We say to the subconscious, "You can’t handle anything else but the pain and discomfort of this round hole we do not fit into." We dismiss our nervous system; we dismiss our resiliency of what we have already endured and survived; we dismiss our brain's magic ability to rewire. We keep hammering away, chipping at ourselves, not realizing the long-term effects this will have on our sticky little brain.

Teaching that silencing what happens is safer than speaking up is a lie. Also remember: every knowing being of what information is forced into silence, their body knows the lie it is holding. Think of the mind-body connection here. It almost makes us reflect on recent research by Dr. Michael Slepian (Columbia University), which has shifted our understanding of secrecy. It isn’t just the “hiding” that hurts; it is the cognitive load of living with the thought. We often talk about “carrying” a secret or “weighty” regret as if it’s just a metaphor, but the biology to that story tells a much grittier version.

When we hold onto a lie or a deep-seated regret, our brain doesn’t just store it in a quiet folder; it treats that information like a constant, low-grade threat. Dr. Michael Slepian (2019) found that the real damage of secrecy isn’t the “act of lying,” but the exhausting mental loop of thinking about it. This “cognitive load” keeps the body in a state of high alert, which eventually shows up physically.

Now, zoom out. Where are you looping in the same way, keeping you on high alert? Women? Many of us feel our partner needs to change his behavior, delete his socials, and do what you say in order for the relationship to be at “peace.”

Think of it as a "Body Tax." When you’re stuck in the Hyperarousal Zone the top part of Dr. Dan Siegel’s (2012) Window of Tolerance your nervous system is red-lining. You see this in the field as chronic jaw clenching, "mysterious" digestive flare-ups, and a heart rate that won’t settle down. I see it in my clients' sleep patterns, inflammation in the face, back pain, and irregular or missing cycles for women. Roese and Vohs (2012) point out that chronic regret acts like a glitching program in our hardware; we keep trying to "fix" the past, which spikes our cortisol and creates systemic inflammation. Essentially, if the mind refuses to process the pain or tell the truth, the body starts screaming through symptoms to get our attention. Do we listen? Probably as much as the parental wound listened to the little you…

As the saying goes, the body keeps the score.

Internalized Patriarchy Is a Survival Strategy

Now, one of the patterns I have been seeing and holding for many clients in this city. Across workplaces where men act inappropriately toward younger women, a consistent pattern appears again and again. There is almost always an elder woman in proximity to power who minimizes complaints, discourages reporting, reframes harm, or “handles it quietly.” She may scold the man privately. She may offer vague reassurance. She may advise the younger woman to “let it go,” to “be careful,” to not cause trouble. What she rarely does is confront the system or side publicly with the vulnerable.

Is this a coincidence?

I think it’s conditioning.

Research in feminist psychology and sociology consistently shows that women who came of age in rigid patriarchal systems often internalize male-dominant norms as a means of survival rather than their true internal belief. Deniz Kandiyoti famously described this as "patriarchal bargaining"the unconscious negotiation women make to secure safety, resources, or status within male-dominated hierarchies. Um… Tyra Banks? Perfect example of that. Can we see how silent we as a collective get when the label of "villain" gets placed on someone that looks like you? Hmm… Now we start reaching for justifications. I call this the selective outrage.

For elder women, proximity to male authority often became the price of stability.

Speaking up historically meant:

• loss of income

• social exile

• retaliation

• moral condemnation

• or becoming the “difficult woman”

So silence became framed as a wisdom many chase and even are honored for. Endurance became framed as strength. Compliance became reframed as well…Maturity.

What do you think this does to the collectives sticky brains?

They adapt into the belief that compliance is safe and demanding it is the mature thing to do.

Why Younger Women Are More Threatening Than the Man Himself

From a systems perspective, younger women are considered dangerous because they are unconditioned. Divergent much?

They haven’t yet learned to override discomfort.
They haven’t yet traded safety for belonging.
They haven’t yet normalized harm as “just how things are.”

Family systems theory shows that individuals who disrupt homeostasis even by naming truth are often targeted more harshly than those causing harm. This is something even I have experienced first hand being online. And guess what, it’s the women who are the most aggressive in the DM’s.

Now, In these dynamics, the man is predictable. The younger woman is destabilizing to the predictable system. So the system responds by silencing her, not stopping him. Raise your hand if you have been silenced in the workplace? Shit, over 10 years ago, I had a whole orthodontist demand I take my review down, tried to bride me with services to do it. This shows up everywhere

Now I want you to reflect briefly for a moment. Any of this sound familiar for you?

Attachment, Power, and Identification With the Aggressor

Clinical psychology adds another layer.

Anna Freud described identification with the aggressor as a defense mechanism where individuals align with power to reduce their own vulnerability to what is threat to their safety. Elder women who endured sexism, harassment, or exploitation without protection often unconsciously identify with male authority rather than with younger women whose pain reactivates unresolved grief, rage, or helplessness. Protecting the man protects the psyche from confronting what was never protected in themselves.

Grief…

Why “Handling It Quietly” Feels Safer Than Accountability

Organizational psychology research on institutional betrayal shows that systems often prioritize reputation management over individual safety. Elder women placed in supervisory or gatekeeping roles are frequently tasked explicitly or implicitly with containment rather than justice.

This creates a role conflict:

• Confronting the man risks destabilizing the institution.

• Supporting the younger woman risks exposing systemic failure.

• Silencing preserves order.

Order becomes confused with ethics.

Cultural Context Intensifies the Pattern

In collectivist or reputation-based cultures including many medical, religious, academic, and tight-knit ethnic communities, hierarchy is protected at all costs. I have seen this in therapy sessions and in clinical behavioral health capacities, especially with children and the loyalty binds to the parent, even if that parent is harmful. Research on honor-based systems shows that whistleblowers are often treated as traitors, regardless of what the truth is. Elder women, having survived within these norms, may view silence not as a form of harm, but as responsibility.

Also, zoom out a bit.

This is what helps us lead with curiosity instead of blame, because those of us that are accustom to living in chaos waves, the moment we reach the calm waters of the lake, we begin to feel unsafe. Why? Because the waves are familiar and we built skills adaptations to survive those waves. This is the same concept of the generations before us that do not know how to adapt to a world with "boundaries" and "safe spaces." Often, especially here in this city, I will see the older generations of women weaponize those very terms to get back the control that worked for them, but disconnecting their family from themselves in order to manage the women's emotions. This is what outsourcing is. In cultures where we scapegoat "The Culture" to justify harm, this is why you see it in the workplace; it spreads there.

The younger woman is framed as reckless.
The elder woman is framed as realistic.
The man remains untouched.

Sort of the same dynamic when they were kids right? (now, pause. We know if we are exercising our dendrites for nuance this is not the case for all correct?)

Just checking…

Think about it. Many times when I work with clients who have been cheated on, the woman turns on the "other woman" instead of turning on the man who was unfaithful. This in itself represents the very pattern these young women, as kids, watched their mothers do. They would hold the daughter accountable while bypassing what the son does. I saw this within my own family dynamics growing up, but also my husband’s family. I married into a Punjabi family; the hardest part about being in cultures that use religion and "this is how we are" is how often I watch little girls get bypassed. Little girls get slapped, or even their lip gets busted, because their little brother was never taught respect, boundaries, and the word "no." Many times in families that do not have the skills on how to navigate these complexities, they laugh when incidents happen. Many mothers also feel unsupported when faced with challenging boys with bad behavior and aggression. So how do they even get support? Especially if the elders are telling them how to parent.

This Is How Patriarchy Replicates Itself Without Men Having to Enforce It

How do you think patriarchal systems survive? Truly? It didn’t survive because men are powerful. They survive because women are trained to manage harm quietly, absorb discomfort, and redirect accountability downward. This does not make elder women villains, but for many who have not exercised the cognitive muscle of discernment, they will see this as blaming women. That is quite the contrary to my work. I speak about these patterns because someone has to.

For many who grow up in abusive environments with a mother or father who would allow the brother to get away with being physically harmful to the daughter,and only intervene with the son screamed for mom. If mothers and son cultures are being scrutinized for the way in which they are parenting, especially their boys. They are going to do what they need to do in order to survive that dynamic. Not understanding the unconscious dynamic they're creating within their children.

Field Note: The Metabolism of Harm and the Body Tax

This conversation is not about bashing men, and it is definitely not about bashing women. I want to go on a brief tangent real quickly about this because it is probably one of the aches I have experienced the most being online publicly. The amount of people who discharge their own unhealed wounds onto you, simply because they never learned how to metabolize them, is the same ache that shows up in the workplace. I myself have experienced workplace dynamics: being ambushed, having women threaten my license—all of it. Working in a school setting in this city really opened my eyes to selective avoidance: how we bypass harm depending on who did it, yet hold others accountable simply because we don’t like them, or because they said something we misperceived, or better yet, hating you because of how much others love you.

It’s easier to frame discussions that are difficult by externalizing blame, yelling “victim blamer.” But the one thing I have learned about those who scream that? They often suppress, hide, and cover up harm. This suppression isn’t just a social habit; it’s a physiological burden. As Slepian and Moulton-Tetlock (2019) noted, the “cognitive load” of keeping secrets or hiding harm drains our mental resources and keeps the nervous system in a state of constant, low-level threat.

How are families supposed to heal if the older generations shut you down from talking? Meanwhile, they still expect you to honor what they need you to honor for them because it regulates them. But have we ever asked what makes our parents and the generations before us so activated to begin with? Avoidance and suppression do so much to the body. Chronic regret and unresolved trauma act like a “glitching program” in our biology, spiking cortisol and causing systemic inflammation (Roese & Vohs, 2012).

Substance use gets manifested as a coping means because to live with harm, an ache, or a breach of safety—without being protected by your own parents—feels like a level of abandonment. It leaves you feeling safer to just mimic the same adaptations they keep trying to instill within you. This is the core of the "mind-body" trap: when we are forced out of our Window of Tolerance (Siegel, 2012) by a lack of protection, our bodies begin to "keep the score," manifesting that emotional abandonment as physical pain, fatigue, or addiction. It is about understanding how certain people repeatedly get away with harm inside cultures and systems built on avoidance and why that pattern persists across generations.

Because when harm is never named, it doesn’t disappear.
It mutates and spreads.

This Happens to Men Too and Often by Other Men

Men are also harmed in these systems. In workplaces, institutions, teams, fraternities, religious settings, and medical hierarchies, younger or lower-status men are often subjected to boundary violations, humiliation, coercion, hazing, or sexualized misconduct by more powerful men.

And the response is often the same:

• minimize

• normalize

• joke

• redirect

• silence

“Don’t be dramatic.”
“That’s just how he is.”
“You’ll get over it.”

The system protects the offender because he holds power and the culture has learned to orbit around it. The same way it learned to orbit around the woman in the other example.

Avoidance Is the Root, Not Gender

Cultures that are organized around avoidance prioritize:

• harmony over truth

• reputation over repair

• stability over safety

• containment over accountability

In these systems, naming harm is more threatening than the harm itself.

In these systems, naming harm is more threatening than the harm itself. So the response becomes managerial in nature. This is how people “get away with things”—not through conspiracy, but through collective discomfort with confrontation. If I had to point the finger at the culprit of what I see in the community I serve in El Paso, this is the pesky culprit: Fear of confrontation.

It Starts in Childhood and It’s Not Subtle

What I have seen in my clinical practice, especially at the time when I was working with children... Unfortunately, due to the amount of subpoenas you get when working with kids, it just became so problematic for my other clients to work with kids because now we pull systems in. But what happens if the system the child’s family is in is also the same system that the city operates in? Now you have school staff, judges, therapists, and doctors that condition the same avoidance. It’s probably why me working here ruffles feathers, because I have no issue with confrontation, because I don’t see it as confrontation; I see it as communicating.

In many families, little boys are allowed to:

• hit

• bite

• spit

• rage

• break boundaries

Behaviors that would be swiftly corrected in daughters are reframed as:
“He’s just energetic.”
“He doesn’t know better.”
“Boys will be boys.”

Meanwhile, daughters are taught early to:

• self-regulate

• anticipate others

• manage emotions

• be agreeable

• take responsibility

This is not because parents don’t love their sons; it is because many mothers do not feel safe enforcing consequences on boys the way they do with girls. Why is that, I wonder? Who is watching? 👀

That discomfort matters, but so does the need for inquiry.

The Invisible Tron Highways (A.K.A: undercurrents of energy)

When Avoidance Meets Puberty, the Body Carries the Cost

When behavior is never named, limited, or metabolized, it doesn’t resolve, it discharges. This discharge becomes the invisible Tron highways of undercurrents the eyes can’t see but the body can feel. When that incongruences is named gaslighting starts. We see this at the macro all the time, we DARVO: Deny, Attack, Reverse, Victim, Offender.

Unaddressed aggression, entitlement, shame, and confusion often convert into:

• hypersexuality

• compulsive sexual behavior

• substance use

• emotional numbing

• risk-seeking

This is what happens when we regulate the wrong way because no one taught us the healthy way. Avoidance doesn’t create peace it creates pressure. What happens to people under pressure with no release valve?

They implode on themselves. If you are in the cross fire that means you too.

Why Elder Women Protect Men Later in Life

When sons grow into men without ever encountering meaningful relational limits, the system adjusts around them rather than asking them to adjust or at least learn to adapt.

Elder women often step in as buffers:

• smoothing conflicts

• explaining behavior

• discouraging complaints

• reframing harm

Psychodynamically, this is linked to identification with the aggressor, a defense described by Anna Freud, where aligning with power reduces one’s own vulnerability. Protecting him feels safer than confronting the system that failed to protect anyone. Have a son and your mom will start interfering with your parenting because her old operating system can’t understand the new age princinspae of accountability. Also, please note. there are many mothers who step into the identification role with their own daughters. This could be due to wanting access to grandkids, or fear of losing the relationship. We also want to consider the intrinsic motivation behind those fears and attachment regardless if valid. Validity is not the point here. Inquiry is. The goal is to understand the why behind the behavior within ourselves. So if you are playing the role as the mother of the daughter who you fear will cut you off, take the grand kids, etc. That message is for you. Reflect, How did my daughter learn this. Not from the lens of blame. From the lens of investigator of patterns.

Now, Circling Back:

We have to circle back to where this begins: the family system. When silence shows up as a means of safety, it creates a devastating bind. Imagine a little girl coming forward to her mother, letting her know, “Hey, your boyfriend touched me,” or “So-and-so did XYZ.” If that mother has unhealed attachment dynamics, if she hasn’t learned how to advocate or voice her truth—she is paralyzed. She may be too afraid of rocking the boat with the family member whose son did it, or she’s terrified of the fallout within the family structure or her own partnership. The reasons don’t matter when we look at the impact long term. In that moment, that mother may unconsciously silence a real, visceral trauma in her daughter. The harm gets minimized because of the mother’s fear of facing a discomforting conversation.

This is exactly why, when I train my clients through effective communication protocols, I tell them: It is not about doing it perfectly. It’s about getting it out. That is the real work just getting it said. Because if you don’t do it now, the world will eventually put you back into that exact same position. You’re going to have to do it at work for yourself, or you’re going to have to do it somewhere else to advocate for your own child. The “Body Tax” and the systemic pressure will keep rising until the silence is broken.

The Conversation That Needs to Happen

The real question is not "Who is the villain?" It is:

• Why does confrontation feel more dangerous than harm? Especially a harm that many of us are already silently suffering in?

• Why are daughters expected to tolerate limits sons are not given?

• Why does silence feel like safety? Who taught us it? Where do you think they learned it from?

• What would accountability look like if it wasn’t confused with punishment?

This is not a gender war (despite the algorithms plot to turn the genders against each other. ) This is a systems inquiry, and systems only change when what was once unspeakable becomes discussable. All my work asks is…. Let’s put it on the table.

Like kinetic sand that we dig our hands in— Feel and explore.

Reflection for the Reader

1. Where have you seen harm redirected instead of addressed?

2. When has “keeping the peace” required someone else to carry the cost?

3. Whose safety was ultimately protected?

What came up for you with this?

Our corner of readers is growing and this is so so exciting for our corner of the internet! 🥰

As always Safari members.

Come as you are. Where you are. 🫶🏽

📣Don’t Forget: Advice Column is available.
For questions, patterns, or situations you’re carrying write in.

Link here.

References

Kandiyoti, D. (1988). Bargaining with Patriarchy. Gender & Society, 2(3), 274–290.

Roese, N. J., & Vohs, K. D. (2012). The Visualization of Regret: A Functional View. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 21(3), 172-177.

Siegel, D. J. (2012). The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are. Guilford Press.

Slepian, M. L., & Moulton-Tetlock, E. (2019). The Cognitive Load of Secrecy. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 148(2), 217-232.

Van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Viking.

Data Collectors,

For The Month of: February
Primary Artifact: Series on Communal Narcissism & Differentiation

Safari Theme: Roles • Communal Narcissism • Differentiation • The Jenga Effect • Protecting Your Partnership • Mental Health as Shield • Macro ↔ Micro Mirroring

WHY THIS LEDGER EXISTS

This Ledger exists to document what happens when stability is threatened.

Not to diagnose.
Not to villainize.
Not to collapse complexity into good vs evil. right vs wrong.

This is a field log.

A record of what unfolds when one piece in a system decides to move.

This month’s Safari did not reveal a narcissist.

It revealed a pattern.

And we unpack that here.

Provided below is a compiled archive of the clinical references used throughout this month’s work for further exploration.

THE JENGA EFFECT — STABILITY OVER TRUTH

This month focused on a quieter form of narcissistic adaptation: communal narcissism.

Not the overt grandiosity.

The moralized version.

The version that hides under:
“This is how we do things.”
“Respect your elders.”
“We’re just protecting the culture.”
“I’m fighting a good fight.”

Family systems and institutions do not primarily organize around the truth. They organize around anxiety regulation. The unconscious priority is not “What is accurate?” but “What keeps this stable?” for some household this looks like keeping mom happy. Or not upsetting dad. Predictability lowers threat. Familiar roles reduce uncertainty. Even unhealthy dynamics can feel safer than disruption because they are known. When anxiety rises, flexibility drops. People move toward whatever restores equilibrium quickly even if that means protecting a distorted narrative instead of correcting it.

This is why predictability is often prioritized over accuracy, and hierarchy over repair. Accuracy requires accountability, and accountability destabilizes power. Repair requires someone higher in the structure to tolerate discomfort and redistribute influence. In rigid systems, that threatens identity and control. So instead of repair, you see minimization, reframing, guilt, or scapegoating. The goal becomes restoring order not resolving harm.

When one person stops absorbing tension. They stop overfunctioning, stop staying silent, stops carrying the emotional weight the tower shakes. Not because they caused instability, but because their compliance was stabilizing something fragile. The shaking reveals what was already imbalanced. The system experiences exposure as threat, and differentiation as betrayal, because regulation was built on their self-abandonment.

THE IDENTIFIED PROBLEM

In family systems theory, chronic anxiety does not disappear it gets redistributed. When tension rises and the system lacks tools for repair, it is often displaced onto one member who becomes the identified problem (Bowen, 1978). This person may be labeled the scapegoat, the “too sensitive” one, the dramatic one, or even the truth-teller who refuses to comply. The role serves a regulatory function: by locating the distress inside one person, the rest of the system can preserve its image of stability. The anxiety is no longer structural — it is personal. René Girard’s work on scapegoating similarly describes how groups stabilize themselves by concentrating collective tension onto a single carrier (Girard, 1986).

This is where the Jenga metaphor applies. The identified problem is often the load-bearing piece — the one absorbing emotional overflow, overfunctioning, or challenging inconsistencies. When that person begins to differentiate — meaning they emotionally step out of the assigned role — the system does not usually respond with curiosity. It responds with pressure. Guilt. Moral appeals. Reframing. Gaslighting. These are not random reactions; they are attempts to restore equilibrium. Minuchin (1974) noted that rigid hierarchies resist structural change because reorganization threatens the existing power balance. What looks like “you’re being difficult” is often “you’re disrupting regulation.”

The goal in these moments is rarely truth. It is re-stabilization. Differentiation increases anxiety before it increases health (Skowron & Friedlander, 1998). When the Jenga piece moves, the shaking reveals the fragility that was already there. The system experiences that exposure as betrayal because its nervous system was organized around containment, not repair. Understanding this mechanism reframes the response: the backlash is not proof that differentiation is wrong. It is evidence that the role was regulating more than anyone realized.

DIFFERENTIATION AS METAMORPHOSIS

Differentiation is rarely loud. It does not usually look like confrontation or a grand exit. You won’t see people announcing when they are differentiating. More often, it is quiet and behavioral. It looks like not arguing values just to win. Not over-explaining yourself to people committed to misunderstanding you. Not reacting when the old script is trying to pull you back in. It looks like protecting your partnership from inherited dynamics and stepping out of triangulation instead of managing everyone else’s emotions. In Bowen’s terms, differentiation is the capacity to stay connected without becoming fused (Bowen, 1978).

What makes differentiation so destabilizing is not the behavior itself, but what it interrupts. In fused systems, loyalty is often built on self-abandonment. Silence equals safety. Compliance equals belonging. Remember these items are currency for family systems. When you stop performing the role that regulated the system, it can feel like betrayal because the bond was organized around you shrinking. Research on differentiation consistently shows that when one member increases self-definition, system anxiety temporarily rises before it reorganizes (Skowron & Friedlander, 1998). The discomfort is not evidence of wrongdoing. It is evidence of change.

Growth destabilizes systems built on fusion. That is not cruelty. It is developmental law. Autonomy increases anxiety before it increases health. The nervous system prefers the familiar, even when the familiar is limiting. Differentiation asks you to tolerate that surge without collapsing back into the old role. Over time, the system either reorganizes around a healthier structure or reveals that it depended on your self-erasure to function.

MACRO MIRRORS MICRO

This pattern does not stop at the family. The same mechanisms that regulate anxiety inside a home can scale into institutions and political arenas. Group identity reduces uncertainty. Shared moral language provides cognitive closure. Collective outrage can function as a regulator for internal discomfort, creating a sense of purpose and belonging that feels stabilizing. Social Identity Theory explains how alignment with a group strengthens self-concept while increasing polarization toward perceived threats (Tajfel & Turner, 1979). When certainty is fused with identity, disagreement can feel like destabilization rather than dialogue.

Mental health language, in this context, can become either a developmental tool or a protective shield. Psychological frameworks are meant to increase self-awareness and accountability. When they are selectively applied outward to explain others but never inward to examine one’s own reactivity, they function as insulation rather than growth. Defense mechanisms protect the ego from discomfort, often by redirecting it (Vaillant, 1992). Avoidance scales. If repair is avoided in intimate relationships, the energy can relocate to public arenas where moral positioning feels safer than vulnerability. The nervous system does not care about titles or roles. If anxiety is driving the behavior, the pattern remains consistent across contexts.

PROTECTING YOUR PARTNERSHIP

Marriage does not override attachment scripts. As much as Disney prepped us for the “fall out of a tree into a prince’s arms and live happily ever after” narrative (Enchanted), the nervous system does not reset at the altar. The amygdala responds to tone, facial expression, proximity, and relational memory before the prefrontal cortex has time to interpret context (LeDoux, 1996; Porges, 2011). If early survival required shutdown, compliance, rage, or dissociation, those responses can activate automatically in adult intimacy. The partner may not resemble the original attachment figure, but the emotional cues can feel similar enough for the body to react as if it is back in that earlier environment.

Protecting your partnership, then, is less about winning arguments and more about updating inherited patterns. Attachment theory explains how internal working models formed in childhood shape expectations and regulation strategies in adulthood (Bowlby, 1969). When stress hits, people often default to those early scripts. The work is not to blame the partner or relive the past, but to consciously interrupt the reaction, slow the physiology, and choose a response that reflects who you are now rather than who you had to be to survive. That is how you protect the relationship from repetition rather than from each other.

WHY SOME RESIST THERAPY

Therapy destabilizes rigid systems because it interrupts the roles that kept the system regulated. It invites the identified problem to step out of the scapegoat position, the overfunctioner to stop absorbing everyone’s emotional weight, the fused member to tolerate discomfort without collapsing into compliance, and the hierarchy to reorganize around accountability rather than image. From a systems perspective, increasing differentiation in one member raises anxiety across the entire structure before it improves functioning (Bowen, 1978; Skowron & Friedlander, 1998). What looks like “therapy is causing problems” is often exposure of patterns that were previously contained.

Change, in that context, can feel like betrayal because loyalty was tied to maintaining the role. When belonging has been secured through self-abandonment, stepping out of that position threatens attachment bonds. Trauma research shows that autonomy can be experienced as danger when connection has historically depended on compliance (Herman, 1992; Freyd, 1997). The deeper fear is not change itself. It is the loss of the identity and safety that were built around shrinking.

📚WEEKLY LEDGER REFERENCE ARCHIVE:

This section serves as a reference list of books and theories that were discussed in this month’s work all in one space for those who want it

1. Communal Narcissism — Gebauer et al. (2012)
Describes a form of narcissism expressed through perceived moral superiority, helpfulness, or altruism. Individuals maintain a grandiose self-image not through dominance, but through being seen as uniquely caring, ethical, or socially conscious.

2. Narcissistic Fragility & Ego Threat — Miller et al. (2017); Kernberg; Kohut
Refers to hypersensitivity to criticism or perceived invalidation beneath a grandiose exterior. When ego integrity feels threatened, defensive reactions such as projection, moral reframing, or victim positioning may emerge to preserve self-image.

3. Stability Over Truth in Systems — Bowen (1978); Minuchin (1974)
Family and institutional systems prioritize emotional equilibrium over factual accuracy. Predictability reduces collective anxiety, even when it requires distortion, denial, or maintenance of dysfunctional hierarchies.

4. The Identified Problem & Projection Process — Bowen (1978)
In anxious systems, distress is displaced onto one member who carries the system’s unresolved tension. The “identified problem” absorbs projection so the larger structure can avoid confronting its broader dysfunction.

5. Scapegoating as Tension Regulation — Girard (1986)
Explains how groups unconsciously unify by designating one individual as the carrier of conflict. The scapegoat stabilizes collective anxiety by absorbing blame, restoring temporary cohesion without true repair.

6. The Jenga Effect of Differentiation — (Family Systems Integration Model)
When one member differentiates emotionally, the system destabilizes because its tension distribution shifts. The collapse is not caused by the differentiating member, but by the exposure of structural imbalance.

7. Pecking Order Restoration via Guilt & Moral Framing — (Systems Hierarchy Theory)
Hierarchical systems attempt to restore order through guilt, moral appeals, reframing, or character attacks. These mechanisms function to reassign the dissenter back into their original tension-bearing role.

8. Amygdala-Based Relational Threat Detection — LeDoux (1996); Porges (2011)
The amygdala reacts to perceived relational threat before conscious reasoning occurs. Tone, proximity, and historical memory activate survival responses independent of present-day context.

9. Default Mode Network & Stored Scripts — Buckner et al. (2008)
The default mode network supports autobiographical memory and self-referential processing. Under stress, individuals often revert to familiar cognitive-emotional scripts encoded during earlier attachment experiences.

10. Repetition Compulsion & Survival Reenactment — Freud (1920); Herman (1992)
Unresolved trauma may drive individuals to unconsciously recreate relational dynamics in an attempt to master earlier helplessness. Without awareness, reenactment feels justified rather than repetitive.

11. Overfunctioning/Underfunctioning Reciprocity — Bowen (1978); Gottman (1999)
In fused systems, one member often overfunctions while another underfunctions. This dynamic stabilizes anxiety but prevents maturation, creating chronic resentment and stalled development.

12. Enmeshment & Covert Control Under Care — Minuchin (1974); Siegel (2010)
Enmeshment blurs emotional boundaries under the guise of closeness or care. Influence may be exerted subtly through guilt, obligation, or moral positioning rather than overt domination.

13. Moral Grandstanding & Identity Regulation — Jordan & Rand (2020)
Public moral expression can function as status signaling and identity stabilization. Outrage or virtue signaling may regulate personal insecurity rather than advance constructive change.

14. Social Identity & Polarization — Tajfel & Turner (1979); Iyengar et al. (2012)
Group belonging reduces uncertainty and strengthens in-group cohesion. Under threat, polarization intensifies as identity becomes fused with moral and ideological positions.

15. Defense Mechanisms as Image Preservation — Vaillant (1992)
Psychological defenses protect self-esteem and coherence. Projection, denial, rationalization, and reaction formation serve to preserve identity when confronted with disconfirming evidence.

16. Attachment Imprints & Internal Working Models — Bowlby (1969)
Early relational experiences shape expectations of safety, worth, and connection. These internal working models influence adult responses to intimacy, conflict, and perceived abandonment.

17. Trauma as Stored Physiological Memory — van der Kolk (2014)
Traumatic experiences are encoded somatically, not just cognitively. The body can reactivate survival states even when the present environment is objectively safe.

18. Differentiation & System Anxiety — Skowron & Friedlander (1998)
Higher differentiation increases short-term system anxiety before increasing overall health. Emotional autonomy disrupts fusion and forces structural recalibration.

19. Loyalty Binds & Self-Abandonment — Freyd (1997)
When attachment depends on silence or compliance, individuals may suppress awareness to preserve belonging. Betrayal trauma theory explains how self-abandonment protects relational bonds.

20. Development Has No Exempt Arena — (Integrated Systems Principle)
Psychological development applies across domains. Political identity, professional roles, activism, or relational status do not override nervous system patterns or exempt individuals from self-examination.

21. Narcissistic Defenses — Kernberg; Kohut
Defensive structures that protect fragile self-esteem through grandiosity, projection, idealization, and devaluation. These defenses preserve ego cohesion at the expense of relational accountability.

22. Borderline Personality Traits — Linehan (1993); Kernberg
Characterized by affective instability, fear of abandonment, identity disturbance, and intense relational reactivity. Traits often emerge from attachment trauma and chronic invalidation environments.

23. Generational Empathy & Trauma Transmission — Bowen (1978); van der Kolk (2014)
Patterns of emotional coping, regulation, and defense are transmitted across generations. What appears as personality may reflect inherited survival adaptation.

24. Egocentric Loops & Self-Referential Bias — Buckner et al. (2008); Kahneman (2011)
Under stress, cognition narrows toward self-protection and confirmation bias. Repetitive self-referential processing reinforces rigid narratives and moral certainty.

INTEGRATION

Remember, data collectors:

You do not need to label anyone.
You do not need to diagnose anyone.
You do not need to collapse this into sides.

Just notice:

Where stability was prioritized over truth.
Where guilt attempted to restore your role.
Where activism felt regulating.
Where differentiation felt like betrayal.

That’s the pattern.

And once you see it
you can choose differently.

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