Rewire Your Life with Erica Spiegelman

The fastest way to stay stuck is to keep betraying what you already know is true about you. We start with a real-life twist of timing that brought us together, then move into the deeper question underneath so many addiction and mental health struggles: what happens to your nervous system and your self-trust when you ignore your own inner signals for years?

Our guest, Erica Spiegelman, author of Rewired and creator of the Rewired Method, shares how her path moved through traditional 12-step recovery, what she loved about the community, and why she ultimately built a different framework. We talk about “identity evolution” and the difference between being unclear versus being conscious and still refusing to act. When awareness shows up without action, stress rises. When awareness meets action, everything can change.

We also get practical about the body. Erica explains why nervous system regulation matters for healing, and how a healthy routine can create the consistency and safety many of us never had. We dig into the four pillars of the Rewired Method (mental, emotional, physical, spiritual), how to start when you don’t have support nearby, and whether a rock-bottom moment is required for real transformation. Along the way, we unpack shame, compassionate curiosity, radical responsibility, and the childhood narratives that quietly shape adult choices including how we parent and how we repair when we miss the mark.

If you want tools for addiction recovery, trauma-informed personal growth, mindset change, and rebuilding self-trust, this conversation gives you a clear place to begin. Subscribe, share this with someone who needs it, and leave a review with the one routine you’re committing to this week.

To connect with Erica, go to:

https://www.ericaspiegelman.com/

To book a FREE discovery call with Dr. Sam, click the link below:

https://calendly.com/drharte/free-discovery-call-w-dr-harte

Transcript

A Serendipitous Meeting In Recovery

SPEAKER_05 0:14

Welcome back, everybody, to the truth about addiction. Before I formally introduce today's guest, I actually want to start with a story. When I was writing my book and in a massive career pivot, and to be quite frank, an identity crisis, one of the things that I was interested in and pursued was getting my real estate license. And I end up joining Sotheby's out here in the burbs. So I live in Thousand Oaks. I joined a Westlake location. And somehow in the beginning of that, someone said to me, You should meet this woman, Erica. I think you guys would get along. So I got her phone number, sent her a text, asked if we could talk, and we get on the phone. And lo and behold, we both have almost the same amount of time in recovery. And so I want you to know I was writing my book and I had a working title. Nothing was released yet. The manuscript was not finished. She told me she's an author. I said, get out of here. You're an author. I'm about to be an author. And what's the name of your book? The name of her book is Rewired. And that was literally the working title of my book. I was like, okay, so clearly we are supposed to meet. I'm gonna let her introduce herself, but I'll just say this. We are both not in real estate anymore. And I think we have a very, very different purpose that is still very similar to one another. And I'm so excited for the conversation today.

SPEAKER_04 1:53

Erica, welcome to the show. Thank you. Thank you for having me. It's always my biggest pleasure to get to see you. I love seeing you. I know, I know. And we don't get to do it enough. But it's so bizarre how this real estate endeavor on both our behalfs came into play and then left. I mean, just to let the audience know too, I've been in the addiction treatment world as a licensed counselor for over 17 years. So I had a little bit of a crisis after COVID myself. And I was like, you know what? I feel like doing something different. I would love to get my real estate license again. I had it in my 20s in New York City. That's right. Yeah. And I was like, I'll just do it out here for fun on the side. I'll still have my counseling, my private practice, but I'll do it. And that's boom when I met you. And quickly I discovered it was such a great contrast of a, I think, decision that I made in my life to see what I was meant to do or to see really like, okay, this being an author, creating educational tools for people, being a counselor, that is my biggest purpose, passion. And yet, you know, as humans and mothers and people, we can have other interests. But I felt like it was obviously real estate itself has to, you have to give a lot of attention if you want that to grow. But I just think it's an interesting conversation that we have, like as having these identity crises, or just again, like what it is as we label ourselves and we put these labels on ourselves as oh, we're in the wellness mental health world, we have to always be in that world, and that's not true. And so I'm so absolutely that's not true. Proud of us for kind of verging into such a different path. And then obviously we met for a reason because we were both there at the same time.

Identity Evolution And Self Betrayal

SPEAKER_05 3:44

But how what a coincidence. I I love it, and and I think that's actually really important. I said crisis because emotionally it felt like one for a while. Yeah, but the truer word is evolution, yes. And frankly, we're all in an identity evolution through the course of our lives, especially if we are on a conscious personal growth journey. Totally. And so what a service to ourselves to have an itch that we felt we needed to scratch, to explore it fully so that you don't get to the end of your day and hit the pillow or the end of your life and go, what if? Yeah, what about that thing that I thought I might really like and I didn't even explore it? Right. Right. And so I'm glad you spoke to that because it is so important. Yeah. I was just speaking to a client, and he's a client who comes to me right now for body stuff. There is way more on the table that needs to be explored. And I think as I build trust and rapport, he may let me. And yesterday was one of the first days we really went there. And he kept saying how stressed he was, and he had all these ideas about what might make him feel better. And then all the roadblocks came in, and it was just gonna be the way it is. Right. And we played an identity evolution game. You know, he didn't know I was using behavioral science on him in that moment, but he talked about, you know, just dropping by the beach as a possible way to start his morning, you know, getting a walk out by the water in Mother Nature. And and I said, you know, there's a version of you that's living that way right now. Yeah. And you actually have access to it, it doesn't feel like it. Yeah. So let's just play a game. If that person existed and he woke up tomorrow, yeah, what time would he have to wake up to brush the teeth? And what's the first thing he does? And and all the things he he he does now are coming up. And so we we created a different identity, yeah, a version, a 2.0 version, and we mapped this thing out, and just him visualizing it made him feel so good. Yeah. I said, Do you think you could just try this, if not tomorrow, someday this week, just and just see how it lands. And don't you know? I woke up this morning and the first thing on my phone was a photo of him. That's awesome on the beach.

SPEAKER_04 6:36

Amazing.

SPEAKER_05 6:37

And I just think one of the things that came up when we talked, I said, you know, I can't say for sure all the things that are causing you stress. I can't. But what I can speak to from my own personal experience is that it is stressful to be in a constant state of self-betrayal. And I know that sounds big, but you have a part of you that is speaking up. You have a part of you that is saying, I really should go to the beach more. I feel good there. We had a part of us that was saying, I might really like real estate. I might get, I should, I should do something. When we have it's one thing not to know, it's one thing to not be clear, it's one thing to be unconscious. But when you have consciousness, when you know there is something on your heart and you don't listen to it again and again and again, you create a cascade of self-betrayal. Of course. You are stacking up moments where you are not honoring the call. Of course. And you start to not trust yourself. Tell me how that isn't going to stress you out on some level.

SPEAKER_01 7:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 7:52

That doesn't take it all away if you're a parent and a business owner and a this and a that. But my God, it puts you in a position to be in congruency with who you really are, with some of your deep values, that is going to create an openness and an expansiveness and a calmness that sets the tone for your day to maybe handle the other stressors differently.

Why 12 Step Helped And Did Not

SPEAKER_04 8:17

Well, once you start doing that and honoring who you are and honoring these calls and learning how to take action towards that and not, you know, we all have fear, right? What if I don't like this? What if this doesn't work out? What if I fail that real estate exam, which we both passed, obviously. But, you know, all these what-ifs, what-ifs, but yet, you know, with years for myself of again, my biggest non-negotiable is no more self-betrayal on many levels. I say this to all my clients as number one, you know, let's start there. If you don't have a number one non-negotiable, let's start with that one. Um, and so for myself, that's just the way I've lived for the past 18 years. And I think because of that, I do honor the intuition, I do honor the curiosity, the intuitive feeling I get, the muse that comes through to write or create. Like I honor it, I listen to it and I hope I find a way to action to it. But I think it's so challenging for a lot of people when they're just starting this journey of self-awareness, self-discovery. Um, they've never had access to like how to, how do I start? So I mean it's amazing that you at least the tool of envisioning is so powerful and just the tool of, I mean, there's just so many ways to get. That's why I always say like there's so many paths to recovery when we're I'm talking about recovery, but there's so many paths to just self-discovery for everybody. And there's there's just again, it's like beautiful to work with others because you can light up a different path for somebody that maybe someone else couldn't be for. Or if you try on your own and you can't do it, ask for help, you know, look around, see, see who you, you know, and so I think that yes, I think we both can relate to him, even probably.

SPEAKER_05 10:01

Yeah, yeah. I'm so curious for you to share your method of recovery. Yeah, right. I have something that sort of was birthed from my own pain in traditional 12-step recovery that I'm now trying to share with the world. And I also tack on to it so many personal development tools and psychological principles, scientific principles into the framework because these are all things that have made my life better.

SPEAKER_03 10:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 10:34

So for you, were you exposed on the front end of getting into recovery to traditional 12-step? How does that sit with you now versus the framework that you use with your clients? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:46

How has that evolved over time? Yeah, wow, it's it's a great question. And it's such an evolution. It really I mean, where do you begin? Um but yes, when I when I first got into recovery, I was, you know, 27 and a half years old, almost 28. Um, I definitely um was exposed to the 12-step program first through a treatment center that I attended, and that um again I had never heard of any other way because back then, 18 years ago, there really wasn't a lot of other modalities and paths that were known in terms of books. Like I was an avid reader, I was a literature major in college, I have a BA in literature, I was always a writer. I was a writer with my first journal. The minute I could write, I wrote. And I loved to write. And it's it's funny how those two things came together, you know. But um I think with that being said, it was a beautiful experience for me to go to 12-step meetings to to witness them, to see the community, to feel understood, to be related to. Um nothing but good things. Uh, I really have nothing to say but good things. However, or I should say, and um, it wasn't for me. It wasn't my path. Um, I definitely tried. Um, I moved to LA um when I changed my life and went back to school at UCLA and was getting my degree in counseling and this program at UCLA that they had for addiction counselors, and um I met a lot of people on similar path then. So I think I found my own community in some ways. I was running at that point in my life and had fellow runners I was close with. I found like-minded people that were on healthy paths. I have a big family that I'm close with, they were enough support, um, a couple really amazing friends that supported me, you know. So um I didn't feel I felt very satisfied in my own program I created for myself. And I didn't know I was even creating a rewired program at the time, but I was calling that, calling it that to myself. Like I was like, I've just rewired my life. I just go to bed at this time, I get up at this time, I run, I eat differently, I have boundaries, I communicate better, I've learned how to take care of myself emotionally, I know how to reframe my thoughts, I know how to, and these were all things that were growing. It wasn't like I figured it out, but I understood I have to redirect, redirect. And it was like up here, the minute I changed my life and changed my thoughts about myself, the world, um, that I had some control over that, everything changed for me. And I just I felt like it was a rewiring. I'm not a neuroscientist, but it is about repetition, repetition, repetition, repetition, repetition. If you smoke every day, you'll be a smoker. If you get up and 7 a.m. and you eat healthy and you run, you know, right, you're gonna be a healthy woman. And so it's gonna eventually change your identity and how you see yourself and how people see you. Um, and so that's where Rewired came from. And I started to then work at a treatment center in Malibu, and I was it was a huge treatment center with three houses on a property. I had 35 clients in group three times a day. Like I so I was writing groups and workbook worksheets, and this is before iPhones, this was before AI, and I just I had a work, I had a this huge binder of all my groups that I created. And then I looked at that one day and I'm like, that's the book. Wow, that's the book, these are the chapters. Like, this is what authenticity, like how it helps me finally to understand that word, and it was my my northern star of like being authentic, honoring myself, no more self-betrayal, taking off the mask. You know, the word itself means you are the author of your life in Latin, authenticity. So, anyway, that's that's how it all started, and then it evolved from there, and people started reading the book and it became a bestseller, and people started using the book at treatment centers. Treatment centers from all over the US were you know reaching out like a counselor. Oh, I use your workbook for groups, I use your book for this, I you know, and so from there I got feedback, and that feedback gave me more information of what people were looking for. So then I created like what an affirmation book that I wrote. People need people were like, you know, do you have anything I could use daily that kind of resonates with the rewired stuff? Like it, and then there's a group called the Sobertown, and they're they're online meetings, and they do a rewired meeting, and that came organically. I don't run them, but there are people out there that now are rewired coaches that run them. And then I started a coaching, you know, certification program recently. It's an online course, and I have online courses, so it's evolved. The method is now called the Rewired Method. It's another book that came out recently, and so now it's just evolved into that. Yeah. I wish I could I love it. There's more to it, I just don't want to go on and on. But yeah, it's think now I'm really focusing on the online courses, and like my company is called the Rewired Academy. So it's it's an online academy where there's three courses up now. Um, and their most recent one's called Rewired for Growth, and that is for every single human out there. It's the rewired method has helped thousands of people, and so now I'm bringing it to the general public so that people can have the tools. So you don't have to have anything to do with recovery, you could have never even heard that word before, and yet still um learn how to change your mindset and honor yourself and live your best life. And I have the tools.

Healing Through The Body And Four Pillars

SPEAKER_05 16:27

So what is your understanding this far into your own evolution of what the body has to do with our healing?

SPEAKER_03 16:36

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_04 16:38

Well, it's everything, it's connected. Your body's connected to your mind, to your heart, to your spirit. It's I think we have to like regulate our nervous system. It's so it's so important. I mean, the dysregulated nervous system of somebody that has been using poisoning themselves. Um, and not just it doesn't have to be with drugs and alcohol, but just again, these these self-deprecating behaviors and thoughts and you know, the negative self-talk, and I mean, everything affects you on a cellular level. It's everything, your body. I mean, you have you can't just work on your emotional health and not look at your physical health. You can't look just at your physical health, but not also address your mental health. I mean, it's and that's why in in the rewired method, it's the four pillars. It's the mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual, and there's tools for each. And that you never go without it. It's the foundation of my method, is the four pillars. Yep. And I mean, it's it's obvious, right? And and I I would think it is, but but I guess it's not because a lot of people maybe intellectually know it, but they don't practice it, like you're talking about your client. Like I could know something, I could want something, but if I don't have the tools of how to get there, then you know, then it's just suffering, really. Yeah. So yes, I think the body is an essential part to address.

SPEAKER_05 17:56

When I think of my own sort of remodeled 12-step framework, people have asked me this before. Is there a thing or a step that was the cornerstone, the turning point? If you had to pick something as even a a jumping off place for somebody who's at the beginning of their journey, yeah. I know what that would be. I know what that sort of life-changing moment was. Do you have that for you in the sense of those four pillars and a place to begin?

SPEAKER_04 18:30

Yeah, I mean, I routine. I I think for me, like to just a base, like uh honestly, to start giving yourself the gift of a routine. Um and whether you want to use the word and I'm, you know, with language discipline, people don't like that word, or people, but but really it's so if you think about when I was a teenager, I think a lot of these, well, these behaviors started with, you know, exploring and acting out and things like that. And it was because I don't think I had a sense of consistency and safety in my life at the time. I think emotionally, physically, yes, I was always in a loving, safe place. But I think for me emotionally, it was there was a lot going on in in my life. And so um I, you know, through now I'm aware of it. I didn't, I don't in the moment I wasn't aware, but when I started my path of recovery and changed my life, I gave myself a sense of safety and consistency that I had never had. And that's what felt so good. That's what kept me when you asked me what is the one thing, that's what kept me on the path for all those years. Was it feels good for my nervous system to feel safe finally? And maybe it wasn't provided for me when in in certain parts of my life, but guess what? I'm an adult now and I created it for myself. And so there's so many layers to recovery, or everyone's, you know, anyone that wants to change their life in any way, I hate using just that word, but but what I mean is is again, there's layers to it. It's not just a one size fits all, but I do think for the majority of people it is helpful to put yourself on a routine where you wake up, you're proud of yourself, you feel good, you know, and I mean healthy routine, not an unhealthy routine, you know?

SPEAKER_05 20:18

Yeah, yeah. Do you think it's possible for somebody who uh is at the very beginning of their healing, has come from trauma, doesn't feel safe? Yeah. Is it possible for them to create a routine without the guidance of someone trusted who's perhaps either an expert because of what they've studied and or what they've lived through and or both? Can they create a routine that is a healthy routine when they have no reference point?

Building Support With Books And Groups

SPEAKER_04 20:52

Yeah. I think, and I'm not plugging my books, but I'm sure there's no, I'm just saying there's there's there's many books out there, but yes, that's why I wrote a like especially there's the books that I've written in the in the most recent years. I try to give that framework because of what you just said. Can someone do it on their own if they can't afford counseling or therapy or they don't they're in they're in far-to-reach places? There's there's a lot of people that write me that um live in the I mean, and I also work with treatment centers. People come from Arkansas. There is no meetings in their town, and there is no AA, there is no, you know, there's no access to people sometimes in hard-to-reach places. So yes, I think there are books out there that can help people start. And if they need a little bit more handheld holding, there are groups online. Um, you know, with technology, there's the good, the bad, the ugly. But one good thing I found for people that want to change their lives are there's incredible communities of online support groups out there. And yes, some of them, you know, you want to make sure they're led by the right people, but again, learn from others, lean on others. Others but we have access to just more information these days. So I think someone can do it. Um if they you know, can they find an afford a therapist? I think yes, even better, you know, to do both.

Do You Need To Bottom Out

SPEAKER_05 22:15

So then the next question from that question that comes up for me is how important do you think it is or not that somebody bottoms out? And and what I mean by that is not necessarily the harrowing tale of my own life of a cocaine overdose that almost killed me. But in the sense of bottom being that place where you don't want to die, but you can't go on living the way that you've been living. Yeah. So it it if someone's not there, can they still create and stick to some version of a new routine where they are slowly stepping into a new version of who they are.

SPEAKER_04 23:02

Yeah. I don't think you have to have a bottom per se. I've had clients that, you know, again, every story is so different. I've had clients that were in a I had someone that was in a really toxic marriage who was, I think, drinking to get through that part of their life. And once the drinking stopped, the blind came up, and there was a lot to learn about that. And so that was one of the issues. But she didn't have to have a bottom, she just had to take away the numbing agent. So I think there's there's so many different, I don't, I would never want to say you can't do it, um, because no matter where you're at, how can we judge what is your bottom? Or how could you sometimes people can't even judge that maybe that was her bottom, was this really, you know, right? But yet nothing happened to her, right? She didn't have a DUI, she didn't lose her kids, she didn't, but it and and I say this to myself, you know, I never had a well, I I guess there were consequences in my life at the time when I decided to change my life, lost a job because of the, you know, things like that, but never um, you know, something where I was in physical danger. Um, but it doesn't matter. I had an internal bottom for myself. Like I reached a point where I've never been more internally depressed and spiritlessness. Like I felt no more spirit, no more who I used to be was gone. And I asked God for help. And so to me, that moment, and I remember the moment in San Francisco at 7 a.m. I remember it vividly, and I will never forget that moment because it's what keeps me on this path. But I think to me that was my bottom. Um, but I think there was a possibility of change even without that. So you know, I think it's different for everybody.

SPEAKER_05 24:56

Yeah, I I love this conversation, and and I think when I talk about bottom or whatever the vehicles have been for me that have created the greatest change, right? I it's almost always from a painful place. So there's that. Yeah. But if I were to use different language and maybe more accurate language, there is the pain of living unconsciously inside of the patterns that have shaped us. Yeah. Right? But maybe we don't feel it because we're still asleep, whether it's because we're numbing, yeah, or we're continuing to use the pattern because even if it's hurting us, it's still really working. It's familiar. Yeah. Then there's the conscious awakening, but perhaps I'm also still not ready. So now I'm aware, yeah, like my client was the other day.

SPEAKER_02 25:54

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 25:54

I am aware that I'm living out of alignment. Yes. And it sucks. Yes. But oh well, there's nothing I can do about it. Right. And he has come in that way for three months for whatever reason. Only yesterday, I was able to say the right thing and he was like, I'm gonna do that. No, I don't know if he'll stick with it. So there's an awakening without change, which can be almost more painful. Right. And then there is a consciousness coupled with action. Yeah. Yeah. And that is when magnificent things can happen. Yeah. Right. And I think that whatever bottom, whatever it is for you, whatever the pain places, the beginning of the possibility of change happens when consciousness is coupled with pain. Yeah. And the hope is that the pain doesn't have to get so great, yeah, or so dangerous, yeah, that something even worse has to happen before you have consciousness coupled with change and action. Yes. Right? I think that's what what there's there's phases to this. Totally. And so you could be in any one of those phases before you make a change. You could spend your whole life in some of those phases. Yes. And not necessarily change and be, you know, I think I think people the people who get to the end and do have those regrets were sort of stuck in that limbo middle place. Yeah. There was a con there was a knowing there was something that was supposed to be different, better, or more beautiful than this, whatever this is. Yeah. And they didn't quite actualize it. Yeah. Yeah. For whatever they were afraid to step into. Right. Right. And yeah, I think, I think that maybe it's, it's a for me, it's always been that the pain gets big enough that it almost zaps me out of a sleeping state. And I start to see my patterns. I have this pattern recognition of the way I've been living. And once it becomes a place that I can no longer live inside of, I will step into. Change.

The Curiosity Shift That Changes Everything

SPEAKER_04 28:08

Change. Yeah. Yeah. No, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. But you know what's interesting? I was just thinking of in my own path. Um I I think I was I was in a I got into a relationship sober and healed, working on myself, a conscious person, and it wasn't a healthy for emotionally healthy, it wasn't going anywhere, but yet I couldn't get out of it. And I was conscious of it, but I wasn't ready to go. Uh-huh. But I wanted to go because I knew I need I wanted to find love and have a family and get married and have kids, you know. And this person was not it and knew it, but I couldn't get out. It went for years, it went for years, it went for years. It was like I was, you know. So I think that there was an and it was a familiar feeling, but it wasn't a healthy feeling. And and and and I won't want to get too far into it, but my point of it is, is like the minute I went from why can't I get out of this, this judgment of myself? Why can't I, what is wrong with me? Why is this still going on? What and I stepped into, I had a conversation with someone, she said, Why don't you look at it with curiosity? Like, I wonder why. What is this supposed to teach me? What, what is it, why is why do I keep going? What is what is that feeling about? And I was like, I put on this, like, this, these sunglasses of curiosity, and boom, I was like, oh, I'm out of here. Like that was it. And and I started like, oh my God, it's because my own self-worth, and it was my own, I this is familiar to to be with an untrustful person instead of why don't you find someone who's trustworthy? Because that was too much, you know. Like, how could I how could I heal that narrative that men aren't to be trusted? How can I heal that? Right. And I healed it with stepping into my power and removing myself and finding obviously someone to trust eventually. But it's just, it's amazing when you just said that. I was thinking of like, even within our conscious journeys, we're still going to have experiences that are going to teach us and that require us to heal and to look at, oh, I still have more healing to do. Yep. Over here. Yeah. And but you know, it's funny. It was like, how come, how come I can't figure this out? I'm helping other people figure this out, you know. Um, but it's it's I love okay.

Compassionate Curiosity And Radical Responsibility

SPEAKER_05 30:35

This is very cool because I don't know that we've ever gotten into this much detail. Yeah. But because I'm in the world of public speaking now, I've had to take what I'm trying to do and pull out and extract the most important things. Yeah. What is it about a modern trauma-informed 12-step framework that could be revolutionary, not just to addicts, but to people at large? What are the things and the two things that I have reduced it down to are compassionate curiosity and radical responsibility, and that you cannot have one without the other. Yeah. And I feel like in traditional AA, my overall understanding was that you are a self-centered addict who has caused a lot of wreckage. You are literally the problem at this point. Yeah. And we're gonna we're gonna let you see all the things that happened and recognize some of your own patterns, you're gonna say you're sorry, and you're gonna take responsibility for your life.

SPEAKER_04 31:49

And that may work for some, which is part of it.

SPEAKER_05 31:53

Yeah. But the the piece for me that was missing was the compassionate curiosity. Yeah. And when this woman said, Have you ever made an amends to yourself? Just that question was compassionately curious. Yeah. I was like, what are you talking about? Yeah, yeah, yeah. What do you what do you mean? I mean that's not even that's not even a thing people do, right? That's not, it's definitely nothing I do.

SPEAKER_04 32:20

It's not a way to teach it, but I think some people do have that conversation that yeah, you know, I forgive myself.

SPEAKER_05 32:26

Yeah. But that was that shift created a starting point that I would find myself at, as you've said, yeah, again and again and again, because I really believe the most dangerous thing we carry with us is shame in our lives. Totally. It will just corrode our spirit and our desire to change if we are a person who isn't worthy of that change, which is what shame tells us. Right. So the reverse engineering of shame, which is now I am a bad person, is why did I make that supposed bad decision? Right. I'm not that if I'm not that person and I get to be separate from that thing, then how can I become curious about all the things that went into me making that decision in the first place? Right. What was I scared of? What was I numbing? How did I learn that? How where did it come from? Where did it come from? Right. How is that playing out in other parts of my life? What would it look like to have to shift into something different? And as you said, right? Shame is constrictive, shame is a stamping of who you are. Yeah. Shame is a final stop on the identity evolution train.

SPEAKER_02 33:41

Right, right.

SPEAKER_05 33:41

It's the end of it. That's the end of the story. You can't rewrite something. If you become curious, you expand, you open, and all of a sudden you have all these choices. Right. And your mind can, and it really is shame, it's so dysregulating. Yeah. And curiosity is the opposite. Right. So so not just even on a spiritual level, but truly on a science level. If curiosity is regulating, then what's actually happening when we become curious? We're calming the system down. Yeah. We're bringing our prefrontal cortex back online. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 34:17

So we can actually use some logic and reason, reason aligned with our God-given intuition and go, huh.

SPEAKER_02 34:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 34:25

Right? We can dream up a whole new set of possibilities for our lives. Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_04 34:30

And I think it and I think also, too, another, you know, term that I I've been writing more about is the narratives, the narratives that we're the, you know, we could call them core beliefs, false core beliefs, narratives of where did the shame come from? Like, you know, it's you we feel like it's ours that we've carried, but maybe, maybe it was created a long time ago. And we've just, you know, someone, you know, I I write about this in Rewired. Um, when it comes to narratives as an example, I had a teacher tell me I was bad at math when I was in third grade and that I should focus on reading and writing and history. That's my stronger. Don't worry, you'll never really. She said something along the lines of you won't be good at math, right? So, what did I do? I believed on narrative and I skipped my my SATs, I just skipped math sections. I never tried to learn. I never, because I listened to an adult, and that adult, not that I didn't try, but I remember that it was a pivotal moment in my life where someone I trusted as an adult figure in my life told me that I was bad at something. So I went with it. And that's just a small example of something versus can you imagine even on an emotional level, you're told that you're a bad boy or girl because you're feeling a certain way, or you you are a certain way, or you like a certain type of person, or you're, you know, again, and those levels of, and so sometimes when I'm doing work with people, this will come up of like, oh, that's where that narrative came from. Oh, I don't trust women because my mom cheated on my dad. Oh, that's where that came from. Now that's getting in the way of my adult relationships with women, right? Like I've had a client. I mean, it's very powerful to unpack the stories we tell ourselves and then give people the tools to rewrite them. Yep. But it but again, I think without the awareness that they're existing, that they they exist, is really interesting. So when I do groups, I always I always do a narrative group and I teach people, we have narratives around what it is to be a man, a woman, communication, love, education, sex, um, family, being a parent, like all these things, because they exist. And so it's just something too, I think, when it comes to the shame and the the curious compassion and awareness is true. There's also narratives that exist that keep us stuck sometimes.

Parenting Repair And Emotional Attunement

SPEAKER_05 36:54

Yeah. That makes me think about motherhood because there is so much that I am doing really well, and everything that I'm doing differently. And then there are the times that I screw it all up, right? Yeah. And I think what gives me so much solace when that happens is the ability to repair because some of the most dangerous narratives that I carried with me were from moments that didn't have any. So you know, you're a child, you you experience something, and then you make meaning of it. You have to. You're it's strange. It goes, I don't know why that just happened, why mom got so angry. It must, it must be me. Right. It must mean this about me. Most of the time it's going to be internalized because, well, then you have a way, a place to put it. Yeah. As opposed to, oh, I don't know, maybe it was mom, maybe she was having a no, a kid is gonna go. If you walk in and you repair, the messaging doesn't you have the possibility of your child going, wait, mom's coming in and saying I'm sorry. She's saying she wished she would have handled it differently, and that it, you know, I'm I'm a great kid, and she just got really frustrated. So I just went and had a whole story queued up about what I was gonna believe about myself from what just happened, but she's challenging that now by coming in and trying to repair it, right? And there is this possibility of not imprinting these narratives on our children the way that they were imprinted on us. Yeah, so powerful. So, how do you how do you do that in your own journey as a mother?

SPEAKER_04 38:48

Yeah. Just like you said, uh it's like I try to do my best, I'm trying to be very aware. Um, I try to to create safety and consistency. Um also, you know, I was coming from a divorced household. We don't have that in in our house. We have two parents that, you know, have a happy, you know, healthy relationship and we treat each other with kindness and love. And, you know, so there's that that that obviously is different, and that was a chosen um, you know, that was a chosen person. That was a decision I made, you know, not lightly. Um, but I think day to day, like you're saying, um, I see for me, like the not listening to me after I have to say something over and over. I I'm I'm now kind of more aware of my triggers of like, oh my God, it's I'm feeling the heat. Yeah, like I first feel it in my body. And sometimes I can take a deep breath and then I try to lower my voice because I will yell. I'm a yeller, and I will raise my voice, I should say. Not yell, but I will raise my voice. And and my son will be like, Why are you yelling? I'm like, I'm not yelling, I'm just gonna raise my voice down right now, right? Because he'll be like, so I'm like, and it's not even a yell yet, but he knows because I am I am usually very like mellow mellow mellow, and you have to really push me. Um, but even in those moments, I say, I I apologize. I'm sorry that I raised my voice. I'm trying to let you know I'm frustrated with this, I'm not frustrated with you. You know, like I've asked you many times to clean up your toys, I've asked you a million times to come in the bath. I will try to do better to explain that to you next time. You know, whatever I have to do, I try and repair. But we're human and it happens. Um, I tried like the biggest thing for me, I think growing up, I was told like that's enough a lot. Like that emotion is enough, like the crying or like the I'm upset about stuff. That's enough. So the I'm very aware of allowing them to express themselves emotionally, whether it is they're crying, they're angry, they're having a frustrated tantrum, whatever is going on. I'm not gonna say ever that's enough. You know, I'm gonna ask them, can I help you?

SPEAKER_05 41:08

What was the narrative you took from your parents saying?

SPEAKER_04 41:10

Yeah, that's enough. Um, well, it wasn't, it was, yeah, it was I think my grandfather used to say that a lot, and I made my dad, you know, it wasn't it wasn't all the parents, but it was some people that were adults, and um, yeah, it it was I have to put on a mask of being happy all the time. That's what I that my negative emotion was not not needed, and I wasn't lovable if if it was there, right? Like I I'm not gonna get a a loving reaction from the people that I so want to please so much. So I think that that was definitely the messaging of put on a mask, and that's what I did, and that's what I did through my teenage years, my college years. Uh just figure out which mask you want me to wear, yeah, so that you could love me and like me and I could please you and things could be things could be okay and safe. Yeah. I just wanted can safety, you know, and so it's you know, I'm a Libra, I don't know if it's balanced, but like, you know, but it I definitely am someone who was a people pleaser from a very young age and but innate to me. Like I have I have a boy and a girl, and my boy is definitely more into listening and pleasing because it he's he really likes peace and and in and harmony and and not loud noises, and he's just very more like attuned to to the world and the earth and things like that. And then I have a little girl who she is like, I don't care to please you. I don't want to like I I I will tease you, I will like, you know, she's the opposite, you know, and it's just so it's so funny seeing my own kids and just their innate personalities. Yeah, so I think it was nurture and nature of the way I was as a kid. I can't blame my parents for being sensitive, but I think it was just who I was. I was sensitive to the adults and and what was going on around me, you know, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 43:05

When you've unpacked your journey into addiction and whatever it was you were numbing, yeah, does that narrative play into it? Because if if there isn't space to feel something other than happiness, yeah, then drinking, I imagine, would be a place to put those gross feelings.

SPEAKER_04 43:32

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 43:32

So have you connected? Totally. Okay.

SPEAKER_04 43:35

Yes. Thank you, Doctor. We could sit and talk about, but yes, for sure. Yeah. I mean, it was to feel those feelings, to feel sad. I used to drink and cry. I used to write write and listen to sad music. It was i isolating. Like I I was going out and having fun and this and that, but d definitely later on it was to it was to feel. It was to feel more um Human emotion and negative emotion is part of that, I think. And um, yeah, when I drank, you know, back then with all this emotion that was repressed and things like as a teenager and in my 20s, it was it was definitely one of those people that would like be super emotional or super angry or super loving. It was just the highs that I could allow myself to get to because otherwise I had to be, you know. So yeah, I definitely think it it it was why I fell in love with it at first. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 44:37

And I say that because I'm I'm just uh trying to uh attune to everything that you're saying and understand your particular story. And I just I just want to make sure that for whoever's listening, because this part of the conversation started by talking about motherhood and the things that sometimes, or parenting or grandparenting or whatever it is, that come out of our mouths that land inside of the child and can leave potentially a dangerous imprint. And I think all of us, especially who are consciously walking on a healing path, are aware and and sometimes afraid of is that gonna be the thing? Yeah. You know, is that gonna be the thing that gets my so I I say that to say please don't use what we're talking about as a a way to blame yourself about something you did that you're not proud of or something that you said to your child and and try and trust that the more work you're doing on yourself, which is really what this is all about, talking about our own journey towards self-actualization and healing. And so long as we're doing that, we can bring that into how we parent. Right. So that inevitably when we say something we're not proud of, or we do raise our voice to level eight or nine and we wish we hadn't, we can come to them and have a discussion. Yeah. And that's the stuff we can change and do something about. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 46:05

The tuning in. So, like when I first got into this field and had therapists around me all day long, we talked a lot about attunement with your children and attuning to them emotionally, like you tune a guitar. Like I could look at you in the eyes and say, you know, which which maybe I didn't get, which was, I see that you're sad. What's going on? Can we talk about why you're sad, you know, versus just like, I see you're sad, let me buy you an ice cream. I see you're sad. Here's a doll. You know, I have no space for you. I can't hold your sadness. And and they were that's yeah, that's how they knew to fix, you know. I'm not blaming, but I'm just saying we are now hopeful. So the more we can attune to ourselves, exactly. I think the better we could then tune into our kids. So, yes, and I know we're we're running out of time, but I wanted just to make yeah, I love this talk so much.

Rewired Academy And Where To Start

SPEAKER_05 46:54

Me too. I could talk all day with you. What? Yeah, what are you doing right now in the world? What's the latest project? Where can people find you and get in touch with you or work with you? I just want to get super present before we wrap up. Okay, thank you.

SPEAKER_04 47:12

Um, so it's Rewired Academy, is my new, it's not a new business, but it's an official website now. So it's rewiredacademy.com. There are wellness courses on there, online courses. So there's journal prompts, videos, readings. I love courses, educational courses, because it's kind of like you know, immersing all these ways of learning into one place. So if you like to read, there's a little reading. If you like to watch and your visual, you could I I teach the course a little bit. And then there's also which I love self-reflection. I think it's a really important um daily act that I do every day of just how am I feeling? Even if I don't write it down, I I do self-check-ins. Yep. How was today for you? How did that feel? That interaction, you know, and I check in. So I love that about courses. So that's really what I'm focusing on is the newest course. It's called Rewired for Growth. It's on the Rewired Academy. And then um, yeah, just doing, you know, same things, teaching and counseling and writing and all the other things. Yeah, and it's ericaspiebleman.com. Well, the world is a better place because you're in it. Thank you. You two.

SPEAKER_05 48:22

Thank you. Yes, always so grateful.

SPEAKER_04 48:24

Our hands crossed when they did. Sure have.

SPEAKER_05 48:27

Yeah, thank you, real estate. Exactly.