Speaker 1: Hi everyone, and welcome to the Best Ever Youth Show.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Elizabeth Hamilton Garno here with the marvelous
Speaker 1: Terry Cole, the author of multiple books. Her latest one
Speaker 1: is called too Much. We're going to be talking about that,
Speaker 1: but Terry, welcome to the sixteenth season of The Best
Speaker 1: Ever You Show. Can you believe that?
Speaker 2: Wow? Congratulations and Elizabeth, good for you.
Speaker 1: It's right here, all in the office here with all
Speaker 1: tiny kids. Now they're all grown up. But I want
Speaker 1: to do take a moment, as I was telling you,
Speaker 1: just a serious moment for a second. Mel the podcast
Speaker 1: kitty has passed away, and I put him in you,
Speaker 1: I put my heart. I put a video out on
Speaker 1: Friday and Saturday and Sunday too, I think. But she
Speaker 1: was lovely, a lovely cat that we rescued down in Kittery, Maine.
Speaker 1: And I smile because she would want me to smile.
Speaker 1: I think she was just so pretty and she lived
Speaker 1: in here, and she was a feral cat, and we
Speaker 1: just applied love. You know how you applied love to
Speaker 1: a faral cat and they turn into just your love.
Speaker 1: That was Mel, and she loved our guests and Terry.
Speaker 1: She would have loved you right about there, and she
Speaker 1: would listen. She was like her own master life coach
Speaker 1: in a way.
Speaker 2: So let's just say that we're calling in the spirit
Speaker 2: of mel right now to be with us during our
Speaker 2: podcast experience.
Speaker 1: Yeah, thank you very much for that. And I know
Speaker 1: you like you have a rescue You said you had
Speaker 1: a rescue pitbull. I do special. That's a special breed
Speaker 1: to rescue as well. Right.
Speaker 2: Yes, she was a baby though, so it's a little
Speaker 2: bit easier than you know. So we had her sense
Speaker 2: of puppy. She's turning two in October.
Speaker 1: Oh, so cute. So thank you for being here. I
Speaker 1: know the best ever you network is going to love you.
Speaker 1: I wanted to just start everybody. I always say the
Speaker 1: website up upfront, So we go to Terrycole dot com.
Speaker 1: It's spelled t E r R I c O l
Speaker 1: E dot com and right off the bat you can
Speaker 1: go get a free gift. Well to mention it at
Speaker 1: the end too. Maybe a few times actually get you
Speaker 1: all over to Terry's website. But if you type in
Speaker 1: Terrycole dot com slash HFC, she's got a gift for you.
Speaker 1: Tell us about all about it. Terry.
Speaker 2: Sure, it is a gift for a high functioning codependency.
Speaker 2: So that's what my last book was about. And in
Speaker 2: this little toolkit, I discreted a high functioning codependency toolkit
Speaker 2: because there's usually we talk about so much that can
Speaker 2: be overwhelming. So I have a video and a PDF
Speaker 2: called Simplify and Do Less. I'm also in there that
Speaker 2: package is a self love Meditation and the Power of
Speaker 2: No Meditation, and also a link if you want to
Speaker 2: go by the book Beautiful.
Speaker 1: Now I saw you, I was like, oh, I've got
Speaker 1: to have her on the show. Please, please please. I
Speaker 1: saw you on Good Morning America. I think that was
Speaker 1: the coolest thing ever. I'm like a colleague is right there.
Speaker 1: I was so proud of you in that moment.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: I hope you could hear me screaming because my husband's like,
Speaker 1: what are you doing. I'm like, she's on.
Speaker 2: I was so nervous, but thank you.
Speaker 1: Oh was that just so much fun?
Speaker 2: So much fun?
Speaker 1: You're racking or just every big cool No.
Speaker 2: It was so much fun. I had a fun an
Speaker 2: interesting experience that was like that. Because that was a
Speaker 2: few years ago. Now, that was one of the biggest
Speaker 2: shows that I had done, and I like blanked out
Speaker 2: for a second, like which I had never had happened
Speaker 2: to me ever, Like, and I've done tons of television,
Speaker 2: but this was a big show, you know. And she
Speaker 2: asked me a question. I had just slowly repeated the
Speaker 2: question and then the answer came and I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: thank god. And I did not watch that video of
Speaker 2: me on that show for about two months, like I couldn't.
Speaker 2: My team was like, no, you look normal, what are
Speaker 2: you talking about? And I was like, I thought I
Speaker 2: looked like a deer in the headlights. But when I
Speaker 2: did finally watch it, it was fine. It's amazing what's
Speaker 2: happening on the inside of your body can be very
Speaker 2: different than what's happening to the outside world.
Speaker 1: You know. Yeah, I know. I was really really proud
Speaker 1: of you, and I think those moments are just are
Speaker 1: so important for us as authors to It just gives you.
Speaker 1: It shines a little spotlight on all your hard work
Speaker 1: and everything that you've been doing. And because it's not easy,
Speaker 1: especially during the pandemic and after, to just kind of
Speaker 1: sit alone here in our offices and write books and
Speaker 1: do podcasts and do all these things, and so do
Speaker 1: you get a little lonely every once in a while.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm grateful that I live with my husband
Speaker 2: and my chickens and my geese and my dog, so there,
Speaker 2: and I live near my closest sister, so work wise,
Speaker 2: and I have a great team that you know, So
Speaker 2: I'm interacting with people all day, but I do love
Speaker 2: to get out and travel. I make sure that, like
Speaker 2: I'm going to LA in my two weeks where I'm
Speaker 2: going out to do some podcasts, and I make sure
Speaker 2: that I socialize enough because I really am a social person.
Speaker 2: So when I'm writing a book, I find that becomes
Speaker 2: very isolating even though I'm doing you know, someone on
Speaker 2: my team is helping me. I've got, you know, an
Speaker 2: editor who's helping me. But it's still like that is
Speaker 2: like lone wolf work for me writing books, And I
Speaker 2: know you have your own experience of that. For a
Speaker 2: social gal and for an extrovert book writing, Wow, it's
Speaker 2: like the least natural thing to do in the world
Speaker 2: because I just wanted to be done everything to be
Speaker 2: done by committee, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I hear you. Yeah, I'm kind of the same way.
Speaker 1: I sometimes have to force myself to be like super extroverted.
Speaker 1: But you know, I get what you're saying, though. It's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm really laser focused in on this process. Got to
Speaker 1: kind of be quiet and not a lot of distractions
Speaker 1: and things like that. I actually, I actually just started
Speaker 1: teaching gymnastics and for all the little kids, and it
Speaker 1: is so much fun. I'm in my third week now,
Speaker 1: and that has kind of helped a little bit, just
Speaker 1: to just to get out there and do things a
Speaker 1: little bit more stuff. So yeah, but we do leave,
Speaker 1: so I heard you travel. We leave the East Coast
Speaker 1: actually and leave for the winter and go down to
Speaker 1: South Carolina for three months. Do you ever do anything
Speaker 1: like that? We started doing this in COVID. We're like,
Speaker 1: you know, we can work from anywhere.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's funny. We've been talking about it, but it's
Speaker 2: hard when you have barnyard animals.
Speaker 1: Yep. Yeah. One of our older sons stays here with
Speaker 1: his dog and takes care of the cats. So I know,
Speaker 1: I know, I get the same thing. I worry about
Speaker 1: him the whole time too. So what I wanted to
Speaker 1: talk about is thank you for the personal personal side
Speaker 1: of things too. I want to go kind of professional
Speaker 1: on you a little bit here, because you didn't always
Speaker 1: do what you do now, And if you could for me,
Speaker 1: We've got a lot of young listeners, can you kind
Speaker 1: of I almost want you to take us back to kindergarten.
Speaker 1: I always ask I always ask our guests what they
Speaker 1: are like in kindergarten. Take us there, but then jump
Speaker 1: a little bit. I really would love to hear your
Speaker 1: career path because I think one of the things I'm
Speaker 1: noticing as people people think, especially kids, they think they're
Speaker 1: supposed to have like all figured out at age seven,
Speaker 1: graduating high school and I'm going to college and I
Speaker 1: know what I'm going to do, and oh man, yeah,
Speaker 1: I just I told our kids, I'm like, you know,
Speaker 1: let it simmer, let it percolate, let it do. Yeah,
Speaker 1: your own thing to get a feel for the world.
Speaker 1: Because yeah, all right.
Speaker 2: So if I went all the way back, I would
Speaker 2: say in kindergarten, I had a crush. I'm Billy Roth
Speaker 2: that I remember very distinctly. I was always I was
Speaker 2: always interested in boys, even as a little kid, which
Speaker 2: is funny. I when someone asked me in third grade
Speaker 2: what I wanted to be when I grew up, I said,
Speaker 2: I wanted to be a stripper and a bilingual secretary.
Speaker 2: So that was an eight year old's answer. I don't
Speaker 2: even know how I knew either one of those things,
Speaker 2: but no idea. I'm like, okay, but what you know
Speaker 2: for me going to school? You know, It's like I
Speaker 2: feel like there was a lot of things that happened
Speaker 2: in my life in a haphazard way. I was the
Speaker 2: youngest of four sisters, and I was the first one
Speaker 2: to go to college in my family. Now my father
Speaker 2: went to college as well, but I mean of my sisters,
Speaker 2: and so there wasn't like some great master plan like today,
Speaker 2: like parents are so involved. It was I think it
Speaker 2: was April of my senior year of high school and
Speaker 2: a guidance counselor who was not even my own, said
Speaker 2: are you going to college? And I said, well, I
Speaker 2: haven't applied to any yet. He was like, do you
Speaker 2: have someone who can pay for college? I said I do,
Speaker 2: and I was very lucky and privileged that my father
Speaker 2: had saved money. And he said, come in my office
Speaker 2: and we applied to colleges right there. That's how I
Speaker 2: ended up going to my undergraduate at Long Island University.
Speaker 2: He chose colleges that you know that basically would accept anybody,
Speaker 2: no offense to me. So I'm not saying it was
Speaker 2: the greatest school, but you know, then I did my
Speaker 2: master's at NYU, so I feel like I made up
Speaker 2: for it. But I was very much in love with
Speaker 2: life all of my life as a little kid. I
Speaker 2: was a kid who was not supposed to be born
Speaker 2: because I was my mother's fourth cesarean section. I was
Speaker 2: born in nineteen sixty four and sixty one, and back
Speaker 2: then they were like, the way that they did cesareans
Speaker 2: was like they cut your whole body open. So they
Speaker 2: were like, we don't think you're going to be able
Speaker 2: to carry this pregnancy to term. And she was like, oh,
Speaker 2: I think I will, but thanks for your advice. So
Speaker 2: they wanted her to a boorn and she was like,
Speaker 2: no thanks. And then I was the you know, this
Speaker 2: is this is these are the stories. This is the
Speaker 2: lure that I was the only one who is breastfed,
Speaker 2: that I was the first one to go to college.
Speaker 2: You know, all of these stories that I heard about myself.
Speaker 2: But what my memories are is that my sisters like
Speaker 2: loved me, you know, and even when they were with
Speaker 2: their friends. They would want me to come with them.
Speaker 2: The friends would be like in Terry Cumbe, they'd be
Speaker 2: like sure. My mother was very attuned to me as
Speaker 2: a child, and so I can remember my earliest memories
Speaker 2: or my mother like bending all the way down and
Speaker 2: being like, what are you saying? You don't know? You
Speaker 2: don't want to wear that sweater? It's scratchy, you don't
Speaker 2: like that, you don't have to wear it? All right,
Speaker 2: we'll just change It's okay. Like So I grew up
Speaker 2: believing with women in particular, that what I think, how
Speaker 2: I feel, and what I want should matter if these
Speaker 2: people are going to be important people in my life.
Speaker 2: On the juxtaposition of that was my relationship with my father,
Speaker 2: who was a very successful, white collar guy from a
Speaker 2: very poor background. So him doing well was a big
Speaker 2: deal and he should have had sons and I was
Speaker 2: his last chance for a son, but I was a daughter,
Speaker 2: so I had the wrong gender vibe going and I
Speaker 2: was doing a lot of proving that I could be
Speaker 2: more successful than any stupid son he could have had.
Speaker 2: So there was a lot of that. And so my
Speaker 2: latest book that comes out next September of twenty six
Speaker 2: is about father wounds. No, that makes sense because I
Speaker 2: grew up with a father wound. Ye and so many
Speaker 2: of my clients as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: So back to you want me to go back to career,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, we have stopped. So we have so
Speaker 1: much in common. In a way, I like my parents
Speaker 1: a little bit different. But it's in one of my
Speaker 1: books too. My parents got divorced at a really young age,
Speaker 1: and then my dad, who who was my dad, was
Speaker 1: my dad forever from like about age three. Amazing, amazing,
Speaker 1: amazing human. But I'm in the middle of kids, and boy,
Speaker 1: my fast eater. But my mom did the same thing.
Speaker 1: My mom was so cool. My my ID never call
Speaker 1: him stepfather. But my father was amazing too, So I
Speaker 1: had two really cool parents eventually started about age three.
Speaker 1: But otherwise it would have been a small nightmare.
Speaker 2: But that secure attachment to your mother, yes, and my
Speaker 2: own secure attachment to my mother always made me feel
Speaker 2: like it set me up to do what I do
Speaker 2: in life, because I always felt like there was enough love.
Speaker 2: Not for my father, but I was so inundated with
Speaker 2: positive regard from my mother and my sisters that I
Speaker 2: just grew up thinking, not thinking I was effingingrat, just
Speaker 2: thinking I was valuable, just thinking I was a worthy
Speaker 2: person and that hopefully I could add value to the
Speaker 2: world in some way, And so I ended up. My
Speaker 2: first career was in entertainment, where I was, you know,
Speaker 2: I became very successful at a young age. I was
Speaker 2: running a bi coastal talent agency in New York. I
Speaker 2: was thirty one, I think, and you know, I was
Speaker 2: literally it was celebrities and supermodels. I was negotiating contracts
Speaker 2: with lawyers, even though I wasn't a lawyer. But that
Speaker 2: was my job and I loved it until I didn't
Speaker 2: and I got too healthy. Right, There was a parallel
Speaker 2: process of my own psychological evolution in therapy. I started
Speaker 2: therapy at nineteen, quit drinking at twenty one. I was
Speaker 2: still in college when I stopped drinking, and I was
Speaker 2: a huge drinker. From twelve to twenty one. I did
Speaker 2: a lot of drinking, very a lot of addiction within
Speaker 2: my family. And through therapy, I had this massive realization
Speaker 2: about my career, like it just started happening naturally, where
Speaker 2: I just didn't care about the movie deal or the
Speaker 2: Panteen deal. All I cared about was the mental health
Speaker 2: of the models and the celebrities that I was working with.
Speaker 2: I was getting everyone into therapy, eating disorder clinics, druggery
Speaker 2: in clinics. Like long before I was a therapist, I
Speaker 2: was doing this, and so I just realized, yeah.
Speaker 1: Cat compassion.
Speaker 2: And it's you know, it's interesting though where to make.
Speaker 2: The decision to leave was obviously a defining moment to
Speaker 2: leave entertainment and to go to NYU to become a
Speaker 2: clinical social worker. Basically, my father was like, what the
Speaker 2: effort you're doing? Like why what is going on? And
Speaker 2: I said, you know, dad, I'm actually not happy in
Speaker 2: this industry, Like I had become too mentally healthy to
Speaker 2: stay in entertainment because it was so misogynistic and a
Speaker 2: million bad things obviously, and he literally said, sounds weird.
Speaker 2: That's what he said, sounds weird. I was like, well,
Speaker 2: good thing for you. I don't need anything from you.
Speaker 2: So yeah, and then I went on to get this
Speaker 2: education that I absolutely love. This second I started going
Speaker 2: to school, I was like, yeah, this is my destiny,
Speaker 2: without a doubt. And that was in nineteen ninety seven.
Speaker 2: I graduated.
Speaker 1: I love it. Yeah. I quit the financial services industry
Speaker 1: started best ever You and everybody did the same thing,
Speaker 1: like what are you doing?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Really seriously, and I'm like, well, I've got this vision
Speaker 1: that I'm supposed to do something else. Same quite honestly,
Speaker 1: And for me, it was really feeling like I couldn't
Speaker 1: be like seven people at once. For me, it was
Speaker 1: like having four small children at home trying to hold
Speaker 1: down a job, then do their sports and do this
Speaker 1: and do that. I'm like, you know, I need to
Speaker 1: be like seven clones. I can't do this. And that
Speaker 1: was with my helping and everything, because my husband's amazing
Speaker 1: and we were both like wow. So we both ended
Speaker 1: up quitting our jobs in a way and working from
Speaker 1: home the whole time the kids were so we never
Speaker 1: missed anything. We felt like if we kept going, we
Speaker 1: were going to miss things and it was going to
Speaker 1: be not good. So we've always worked from home and things.
Speaker 2: Like that and so amazing.
Speaker 1: Interesting. Yeah, but between us, I think you and I
Speaker 1: we have. What I'm hearing is if I do my
Speaker 1: math right, which I'm not so good at me. Seven
Speaker 1: we have seven kids, seven boys between us. Yes, we
Speaker 1: need to do a boy podcast podcast about boys, oh much?
Speaker 2: Seriously?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so, yeah, how old are yours?
Speaker 2: My kids are in their forties now. I love it.
Speaker 2: So when I came in as a bonus mom, right
Speaker 2: because their their mom died when they were little kids.
Speaker 2: So my husband was widowed when he was twenty nine
Speaker 2: with a five to three and a one year old.
Speaker 1: Oh wow.
Speaker 2: And then I came in about twelve years later. Yeah,
Speaker 2: So he did a lot of solo parenting. He had
Speaker 2: a terrible second marriage that was totally brutal, that wiped
Speaker 2: him out financially.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And somehow my husband, through all of this still managed
Speaker 2: to be an incredibly successful political artist that he still
Speaker 2: is today, had a massive career somehow. I don't know how.
Speaker 2: He just never slept for those years because he would
Speaker 2: work while the kids were sleeping. He would work, Yeah,
Speaker 2: and then during the day he would clean the house
Speaker 2: and wash the clothes and make food. And I have
Speaker 2: seven grand babies now too.
Speaker 1: Wow, that's amazing. And boys, girls.
Speaker 2: Grand babes. We actually have two girls and then the
Speaker 2: rest of them are boys. So many freaking boys. But
Speaker 2: it's funny. I grew up in a family of girls,
Speaker 2: and so it's it's interesting coming into a family of boys.
Speaker 2: When I knew nothing. It was like I skipped the
Speaker 2: terrible twos and I just went headfirst into the terrifying
Speaker 2: teens because that was the situation. And I was so
Speaker 2: in love with my husband that I thought he could
Speaker 2: have forty four teenagers. I do not care, like love
Speaker 2: is will find a way, buddy, Like It's all fine.
Speaker 2: And of course it was a crap ton of hard work,
Speaker 2: right and family therapy and all the things that you do.
Speaker 2: But the thing is, to this day, my worst day
Speaker 2: with Vic and the boys is better than any other day.
Speaker 1: Oh I love that. Yeah, I totally agree with you. Yep,
Speaker 1: I love it. I love it. I love it and
Speaker 1: that I can't imagine a worst day and these are
Speaker 1: all pretty beautiful. So right, yeah, now, were you a model?
Speaker 1: I'm looking at you and you look like you're a
Speaker 1: supermodel in your own right.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you?
Speaker 1: Yeah, Oh my god, you're so beautiful and I love
Speaker 1: your girl energy. I can tell you're a huge supporter
Speaker 1: of other girls. I can just feel that vibe. I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: I love yeah, not a mean girl at all. So
Speaker 1: thank you for being the way you are, because it's
Speaker 1: so cool and that neat when we love each other
Speaker 1: instead of like, yes.
Speaker 2: I never and I don't identify with that at all, Elizabeth.
Speaker 2: When people talk about, well, you know how mean women
Speaker 2: are to each other, I'm like, I don't. Yeah, I
Speaker 2: literally don't. I've had the same friend since Nixon was
Speaker 2: in office. This seven friends since I was five, and
Speaker 2: a million other friends along the way. But I've had
Speaker 2: the most supportive women in my life. And I always
Speaker 2: talk about this that my girlfriends, my sisters are as
Speaker 2: essential to my happiness as my husband and my children
Speaker 2: and my grandchildren, like literally as essential. I travel with
Speaker 2: my friends still. We all turned sixty year and a
Speaker 2: half ago, and so we went on a big, massive
Speaker 2: vacation just the girls. We didn't bring our husbands, just us,
Speaker 2: you know, Like that's a part of my identity too,
Speaker 2: is being a part of a tribe of women so
Speaker 2: important to me.
Speaker 1: And we have four there's four of us that have
Speaker 1: hung out since we were ready. Betty, we just got
Speaker 1: in a zoom the other day and A're like, we
Speaker 1: need to go somewhere, yes, So where do you guys
Speaker 1: go when you take a trip that my Puerto Rico
Speaker 1: overseas I'm.
Speaker 2: Like, okay, whatever, right, Puerto Rico Costa Rica and then
Speaker 2: we then we gather throughout the year too. So a
Speaker 2: lot of my friends live down the Jersey Shore. I
Speaker 2: grew up in Jersey, so I just get I literally
Speaker 2: just got back from I handed in my manuscript of
Speaker 2: my book. My husband was going to Quantico to do
Speaker 2: some kind of work with the military because he draws
Speaker 2: live wars for whatever reason. And I left my house
Speaker 2: and went down the shore to see my girlfriends. I
Speaker 2: was like, this is how I want to celebrate.
Speaker 1: That's so fun. All right, I'm pivoting again. How how
Speaker 1: do we go from all of that to like the
Speaker 1: topic like codependency, Like what what's the draw Where's that
Speaker 1: coming from? Because that's a that's a word. There's a
Speaker 1: couple of words that people throw around, and I am
Speaker 1: always cautious. I'm like, please don't throwd around anxiety, narcissism
Speaker 1: and codependently codependency. Lately they get like used in everyday conversation,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, we need to know what these words like,
Speaker 1: even me, Yes, So yeah, take it away.
Speaker 2: So let's let's start with right the way that the
Speaker 2: trajectory happened about the topics that I write about. So
Speaker 2: my first book is called Boundary Boss, and it was
Speaker 2: about women and boundaries. Why don't we know what they are?
Speaker 2: Why don't we know how to set them? Why don't
Speaker 2: we know how to enforce them? Why are they so terrifying?
Speaker 2: Why is it a language we are not fluent in help? Right?
Speaker 2: And I knew there is no definable there's no book
Speaker 2: that makes it easy where you just go because people
Speaker 2: talk about boundaries, but nobody knows what the hell it means.
Speaker 2: So I changed. I just made the definition be what
Speaker 2: I think it is, which is which is your boundaries? Right?
Speaker 2: I want you to think about your boundaries as your
Speaker 2: own personal rules of engagement that let other people know
Speaker 2: what is okay with you and what is not okay
Speaker 2: with you. That's but according to Terry Cole, your boundaries
Speaker 2: are comprised of your preferences, your limits, and your deal breakers.
Speaker 2: I love it so not all boundaries are created equal,
Speaker 2: because a preference is less important than a deal breaker, right,
Speaker 2: And we need to know what those things are. And
Speaker 2: those things don't just make up your boundaries. They make
Speaker 2: up who you are. Your preferences, your desires, your limits,
Speaker 2: and your deal breakers in life. They make up who
Speaker 2: you are as a person, and many of us were
Speaker 2: taught that to be the cool girl, to be easy breezy,
Speaker 2: to have no preference. Whatever you guys want, you know me,
Speaker 2: no fuss, no muss. And what we're doing when we
Speaker 2: do that, right, is that we're denying the people in
Speaker 2: our life the privilege of intimately knowing who we are.
Speaker 2: I'm interested in my friend's preferences. I'm interested in my
Speaker 2: husband's preferences. It's not everything has to be a problem.
Speaker 2: It's I'm interested, do you like this or this? There's
Speaker 2: nothing wrong with that. So I created this entire step
Speaker 2: by step process where people can become fluent in the
Speaker 2: language of boundaries. I give a million scripts, but like
Speaker 2: everything I teach, we have to go in before we
Speaker 2: go out, because we have to understand why is it
Speaker 2: so friggin hard? Why don't we know? Why are we
Speaker 2: so conflict avoidant? Why are we afraid to rock the boat?
Speaker 2: And for women in particular, because that is what I know.
Speaker 2: You know, lots of men read my books, and I
Speaker 2: super appreciate that, and yet and they're like, well, why
Speaker 2: do you write it from the lens of a woman.
Speaker 2: I'm like, because that's really what I'm an expert at
Speaker 2: that's the female experience, and gaze is what I understand
Speaker 2: that we were. Most of us were raised and praised
Speaker 2: to be self abandoning, codependence. This was socially sanctioned behavior.
Speaker 2: Be a good girl, where's my happy girl? Turn that
Speaker 2: frown around. If you don't have anything nice to say,
Speaker 2: don't say anything at all. So we start from this
Speaker 2: deficit as women when it comes to boundaries, because we
Speaker 2: were taught that if you had boundaries, you were bitchy,
Speaker 2: you were mean, you were selfish, you were self absorbed,
Speaker 2: you're hysterical, you're all of these things, which of course
Speaker 2: is not true. So the myths about boundaries come ahead
Speaker 2: of the boundaries. So the way that I teach it
Speaker 2: is that we we deal with people. You have boundary
Speaker 2: first timers. These are people that you've never asserted a
Speaker 2: boundary with. You have boundary repeat offenders.
Speaker 1: Boundary okay, boundary first timers yep, okay down, and we
Speaker 1: have repeat offenders repe defenders. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And then we have boundary bullies oh yeah. And then
Speaker 2: last but not least, we have boundary destroyers yeah, amplers. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And you know, so in the book, I just walk
Speaker 2: you through, And I also have a course where just
Speaker 2: walk you through the process of understanding that you like,
Speaker 2: it's not enough for you to know your preferences, your limits,
Speaker 2: and your deal breakers. You have to know them and
Speaker 2: then have the ability in the language to communicate them
Speaker 2: when you so choose. Yeah, therein lies the rub for
Speaker 2: most people because they don't They might know it, but
Speaker 2: they don't know how to say what it is. They're
Speaker 2: afraid of being confrontational, they're afraid of being mean, you know.
Speaker 2: So that's what I walk you through in the book.
Speaker 1: I love that, you know. I have an experience with
Speaker 1: a boundary. I'm I have chosen from a really young
Speaker 1: age to not drink alcohol ever, but one bad year
Speaker 1: in college, my freshman year of college not so good.
Speaker 1: But other than that, just was like in high school
Speaker 1: and everything. And it was just kind of a boundary
Speaker 1: for myself because I know I'm similar to you. I
Speaker 1: probably almost wasn't here really. I was born with meningitis
Speaker 1: and premature and all these things just never made my
Speaker 1: body feel very good, and so I'm like, I can't.
Speaker 1: I just it feels like poison to me kind of thing.
Speaker 1: And so I was just like I just am not
Speaker 1: doing that. So I've gone through my life with like
Speaker 1: no drugs, no alcohol, really not prescription drugs unless it's
Speaker 1: something for like strep throat or something like that, really
Speaker 1: really super clean in that regard, I do like ice cream,
Speaker 1: I will tell you, but anyway, ice cream with my drug.
Speaker 1: But anyway, so very interesting. But when when I when
Speaker 1: you do something like that and you're like, Okay, this
Speaker 1: is just kind of one of my things, you get
Speaker 1: all sorts of comments, You get alienated, you get are
Speaker 1: you are you with this? Are you with that? What's
Speaker 1: wrong with you? I don't want to invite you. You
Speaker 1: don't you know, just as funky behaviors towards you. That's
Speaker 1: one of the reasons why people might be afraid to
Speaker 1: set boundaries. Where does that fall in? Because I know
Speaker 1: people feel that way. They want to they want to
Speaker 1: stop doing something, or they want to change their life
Speaker 1: or whatever it is, but they get met at every
Speaker 1: turn with somebody something or here it won't hurt you
Speaker 1: have a drink or like.
Speaker 2: I think that fear of rejection, right, is probably the
Speaker 2: biggest reason why we don't set boundaries, right. So from
Speaker 2: a biological point of view, we don't want to be
Speaker 2: excommunicated from the tribe right, right, because back in cave
Speaker 2: people days, you would die if you were kicked out
Speaker 2: of the tribe. You needed the tribe to live, So
Speaker 2: it makes sense. But I think that part of what
Speaker 2: I teach my clients and my groups is like now
Speaker 2: is not then, right. You can be uncomfortable for a moment,
Speaker 2: you can have an uncomfortable conversation, and nobody's going to die,
Speaker 2: because ultimately we're all going to die. But I'm saying
Speaker 2: that uncomfortable conversation is not going to kill anybody. And
Speaker 2: so I think that allowing yourself to be a little
Speaker 2: bit uncomfortable, when you start putting boundaries into place that
Speaker 2: have not been there, when you start putting limits on
Speaker 2: things that you hadn't put limits on in the past,
Speaker 2: obviously people are going to notice, right because our relationships
Speaker 2: are dances, as doctor Harriet Lerner talks about them in
Speaker 2: the Dance of Anger, the Dance of deception, the Dance
Speaker 2: of intimacy. And so when you start doing a new
Speaker 2: move on the dance floor with these people you've been
Speaker 2: dancing with, especially the people you've been dancing with the longest,
Speaker 2: which is usually family of origin. They're going to be like, hey,
Speaker 2: now I do this, Now you do that? Why are
Speaker 2: you not doing that? So we have to expect that
Speaker 2: as we start to change our boundary dances that people
Speaker 2: are going to notice, and we just have to stand firm.
Speaker 2: It doesn't mean they're me and it doesn't mean they're jerks.
Speaker 2: It means they feel threatened because if you change too much,
Speaker 2: maybe you won't love them anymore. Right, maybe maybe you
Speaker 2: will reject them or whatever their unconscious fears of your changing.
Speaker 2: So expect they.
Speaker 1: Might have to change a little. Huh.
Speaker 2: And actually, but Elizabeth, they will change. The thing is
Speaker 2: when you change your boundary dance, the people that you're
Speaker 2: in relationship with have no choice but to also do
Speaker 2: something different because you're not doing the same old dance.
Speaker 2: And so you know, the pushback is real. You know
Speaker 2: you'll get some pushback. But we always start with lower
Speaker 2: priority people, So you're not going to start with like
Speaker 2: your most difficult and most important relationship, Like, no, how
Speaker 2: donut we just start send the friggin salad back when
Speaker 2: it's wrong?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: Why don't we just start with like basic easy stuff
Speaker 2: and it gets easier and easier. I feel like for
Speaker 2: people if they're wondering, you know, first of all, how
Speaker 2: do I know where I need a boundary? Because this
Speaker 2: is a question. I get a lot. We can you
Speaker 2: can do a quick resentment inventory.
Speaker 1: What's that mean?
Speaker 2: It just means bring it to mind. Yeah, bring to
Speaker 2: mind people right now. You can and I probably could too.
Speaker 2: Anyone you're feeling any kind of like residual resentment towards
Speaker 2: and then write down why what is the situation? And
Speaker 2: then you're going to write down what is your fifty
Speaker 2: percent right, like what could you do? What have you
Speaker 2: not done? So I give an example in the book
Speaker 2: that my sister and I both lived in New York
Speaker 2: City for many years. We each had keys to each
Speaker 2: other's houses and we would share closets. But I would
Speaker 2: always tell her if I was going over and telling
Speaker 2: me asking her can I borrow this kind of bar
Speaker 2: and that? But she would just go into my house
Speaker 2: and take what you want and not tell me. So
Speaker 2: then I'd be like looking for the thing that she
Speaker 2: had because I didn't know she had it. So I
Speaker 2: had to finally put a consequence and say, hey, this
Speaker 2: is the third time I've asked you to tell me
Speaker 2: if you're going to borrow something, and if you don't,
Speaker 2: if you do it again, I'm going to take my
Speaker 2: key back and then we can't share closets anymore. And
Speaker 2: my responsibility in that was for the first few times,
Speaker 2: I didn't say anything, yeah, right, So I just was
Speaker 2: pissed off about it or made a snarky comment, but
Speaker 2: I didn't make the boundary ask hey, please let me
Speaker 2: know so that I'm not looking for some shit that
Speaker 2: you have at your house. That would be great, you know, yeah,
Speaker 2: And we need to be able to say that exactly
Speaker 2: where is my scarf is what I want to know.
Speaker 2: So that's something that you guys can take away right
Speaker 2: now to do, which is just do a resentment inventory
Speaker 2: and then decide you don't have to take action right now,
Speaker 2: but look at it, and what you're going to see
Speaker 2: is that there is an empowered action that you can
Speaker 2: take to resolve that resentment, right to do something to
Speaker 2: make it better. Sometimes it means we need to have
Speaker 2: less contact with people. And I'm not saying go no
Speaker 2: contact with everyone in your life. I am saying if
Speaker 2: someone doesn't respect your boundaries, if someone hurts your feeling,
Speaker 2: if someone doesn't appreciate you. Certainly have a conversation about
Speaker 2: it if you can, But we have to be very
Speaker 2: mindful of who we allow in the VIP section of
Speaker 2: our lives, because not everyone belongs there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that that close circle around you is so important.
Speaker 1: I'm like, surround yourself with love. People surround yourself with love.
Speaker 1: I mindes are really nice. Spin on that, like who's
Speaker 1: in your room? He's been really good, Like who are
Speaker 1: you closest people? Who's there? You know kind of kind
Speaker 1: of thing. He's pretty clever, he's the head of B
Speaker 1: and I. He's really nice. He's been the best ever
Speaker 1: you for forever. So I love this what if fun?
Speaker 1: What a what a fun and enlightening conversation. Actually, I
Speaker 1: like how you put it into real life terms too,
Speaker 1: So it's not like some some concept that people have
Speaker 1: to really go go googling and figuring out more So
Speaker 1: that's really practical and thank you for that. Do you
Speaker 1: want to I know we have we're kind of funky
Speaker 1: on time. We said a half an hour, but we're
Speaker 1: kind of going on. Do you want to keep going? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I'm kind of with it, so I would love to.
Speaker 1: I would love to know on your book did you
Speaker 1: feel personally where you're like, oh, I need to learn this.
Speaker 1: Where were you Did you have any of those moments
Speaker 1: where you're like, I'm going to do a deep dive
Speaker 1: on this or that because this would be really helpful
Speaker 1: for my own life too, or we're like, I'm just
Speaker 1: going to teach this to everybody who have moments like that,
Speaker 1: because I know, like one of my books, the Change Guidebook,
Speaker 1: Well Perkolate. Even when my dad had his stroke, it
Speaker 1: threw me for a loop, really for a loop, and
Speaker 1: I'm like, ah, I don't know how to navigate change
Speaker 1: very well at all, really, and this is a big
Speaker 1: one and I didn't ask for this at all, So
Speaker 1: how do you navigate this? And so I just kept
Speaker 1: going on the topic of change right to the point
Speaker 1: where I'm teaching all about change now and how to
Speaker 1: deal with change, navigate change. Were you like that with
Speaker 1: this book or or was it something you just innately knew?
Speaker 2: No, I did not innately know. And every single thing
Speaker 2: I've ever written about you know, you teach what you
Speaker 2: most need to learn, is what they say. I think
Speaker 2: so too, and for me it's extremely true. So I
Speaker 2: struggled mightily. I was a boundary disaster in my young life.
Speaker 2: And it's the same thing with the book on Codependency
Speaker 2: Too Much, the latest book. I was so highly codependent,
Speaker 2: but because I was so highly functioning, it didn't look
Speaker 2: like codependency. That's the irony of high functioning codependency, which
Speaker 2: is a phrase, a term that I coined because nobody.
Speaker 2: My therapy practice was filled with extremely capable women just
Speaker 2: like me, just like you, who when I would say
Speaker 2: to them, Hey, what you're describing this is a codependent pattern,
Speaker 2: they would immediately reject the notion of codependent. Immediately. They
Speaker 2: would be like absolutely.
Speaker 1: Because that sounds like taboo words like anxiety, narcissism, and codependency.
Speaker 1: It's like, what do you mean exactly? And wow? And
Speaker 1: how are they? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yes? And with codependency they were like, Terry, I'm making
Speaker 2: all the money, I'm making all the moves. Everyone's dependent
Speaker 2: on me. I don't know what you're talking about. And
Speaker 2: I realized that my clients did not know what codependency was. Ye,
Speaker 2: So let's let's talk about the definition. How I define it.
Speaker 2: It means that you are overly invested in the feeling states,
Speaker 2: the decisions, the outcomes, the circumstances, finances, careers, relationships of
Speaker 2: the people in your life, to the detriment of your
Speaker 2: own internal peace, interesting, could be to the detriment of
Speaker 2: your financial wellbeing, could be to the detriment of your
Speaker 2: mental health. So what does that mean that that's the
Speaker 2: difference between your best friend calls you up and she
Speaker 2: has a crisis. How quickly does that crisis become your crisis?
Speaker 2: Probably immediately, right, Which is different than saying, of course
Speaker 2: I'm going to help my friend. It's different than saying,
Speaker 2: of course I have compassion for my friend. What happens
Speaker 2: when you're a high functioning codependent is that now you
Speaker 2: take on that problem, you feel responsible for solving and
Speaker 2: fixing that problem.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So the behaviors that we see in HFC is because
Speaker 2: for me, when I went back to my therapy clients
Speaker 2: after coining this phrase and really doing lots of research
Speaker 2: on it, and I was able to say I think
Speaker 2: you're a high functioning codependent, they would go, I am right,
Speaker 2: they I'm the problem. It's me. Not to quote Taylor Swift, but.
Speaker 1: I will Okay, right, good company, there we go.
Speaker 2: I love it. So what does it look like, right?
Speaker 2: What does it look like to be a high function codependency.
Speaker 2: A high function codependent, it's feeling responsible to fix other
Speaker 2: people's feelings, like immediately right. It's feeling exhausted, resentful, kind
Speaker 2: of bitter when people don't take your advice.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: We give all, we put all this time and energy
Speaker 2: into other people's problems, and then they don't do it really.
Speaker 1: Right for other people. It's like here it all.
Speaker 2: Of course for you, right, we know what you should do,
Speaker 2: Just bring and do it please. So we have auto
Speaker 2: advice giving, we have being overly self sacrificing. We have
Speaker 2: auto accommodating, where you find yourself out in a situation
Speaker 2: and it's not even your situation. Two people want to
Speaker 2: sit together, You're like, I'll move right. We're managing our environment,
Speaker 2: not just our personal relationships. So I saw this as
Speaker 2: a different quality than the regular garden variety of codependency,
Speaker 2: which with regular garden variety is not, you know, high functioning.
Speaker 2: The problem with high functioning codependency is that the more
Speaker 2: capable you are, the less codependency looks like codependency, but
Speaker 2: it's still codependency. Yeah, so nobody thinks of you, right
Speaker 2: if we say garden variety. If we're talking about codependent
Speaker 2: no more, we would say it's somebody involved with an
Speaker 2: alcoholic waiting at home and yeah, calling the hospitals. Yeah right,
Speaker 2: So it's there's the dependency. We are desperately trying to
Speaker 2: control someone else's behavior, which is present in both high
Speaker 2: functioning and regular codependency. We well, at its core, if
Speaker 2: you were going to take one thing away about codependency,
Speaker 2: high functioning or otherwise, at its foundation, it is a
Speaker 2: covert or overt bid to control other people's outcomes.
Speaker 1: Interesting.
Speaker 2: We don't want you to feel bad, We don't want
Speaker 2: you to fuck up your job, we don't want you
Speaker 2: to get fired, we don't want you to marry the idiot.
Speaker 2: We are constantly trying to control what other people do,
Speaker 2: and we think we're doing it out of love, and
Speaker 2: we are, but we're also doing it out of fear.
Speaker 1: What I hear right now is the world of a helicopter, Like, like,
Speaker 1: does it go into parenting as well?
Speaker 2: Of course that's what you know it does.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because you know you we all want our birdies
Speaker 1: to fly, but we want them to you know, fly
Speaker 1: and be okay and fly, and you know, don't.
Speaker 2: Make that yep, but would anyone who's identifying with this
Speaker 2: right now, If you're identifying with this, if you're like,
Speaker 2: oh my god, there's me, don't worry. I'm going to
Speaker 2: give you one thing that you can start doing right
Speaker 2: now that if this is the only thing you changed,
Speaker 2: I sincerely believe it would change your life. If if
Speaker 2: you are I have functioning codependent, if you are an
Speaker 2: auto advice giver, if you are an auto fixer, instead
Speaker 2: of doing that, you're going to ask expensive questions. So,
Speaker 2: whether this is a six year old, a sixteen year old,
Speaker 2: or a sixty year old, if someone comes to you
Speaker 2: they have a problem, before you weigh in, and I'm
Speaker 2: not saying you're never going to give anyone your opinion. Again,
Speaker 2: that's ridiculous and unrealistic. But it shouldn't be the first
Speaker 2: stop on the bus. So the first thing you're going
Speaker 2: to do is say, all right, before I say anything,
Speaker 2: tell me what you think you should do. Beautiful, six,
Speaker 2: sixteen or sixty, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: You just lobbed it back. Yep. Falls in your court.
Speaker 2: And then what happens you learn about your six year old?
Speaker 2: Maybe your six year old says, I think I should
Speaker 2: go intomorrow own punch Timmy in the face. You can
Speaker 2: go Okay, So let's think about that critically. What would
Speaker 2: happen like what we're getting when we ask expansive questions
Speaker 2: and then create the generous space to really listen and
Speaker 2: be present with our people. Because here's the thing about love.
Speaker 2: People think that, you know, being there for everyone and
Speaker 2: fixing all the problems like that, that's some big flex
Speaker 2: on love, and the truth is the biggest flex when
Speaker 2: it comes to love is being with someone during a
Speaker 2: dark night of the soul in the fox hole and
Speaker 2: being willing to compassionately witness them, ask them, Hey, babe,
Speaker 2: what can I do? Is there anything? How can I
Speaker 2: best support you right now? I can do nothing. I
Speaker 2: can just lay here with you. I can make you
Speaker 2: a cup of teas or anything I can do instead
Speaker 2: of assuming.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: What they need, which you don't. Yeah, you know. And
Speaker 2: what happens when we start asking these expansive questions and
Speaker 2: we listen with our whole heart is that we deepen
Speaker 2: the intimacy in our relationships so much. It's so beautiful.
Speaker 2: Because your attention is the most the most expensive coin
Speaker 2: you're ever going to spend. That is the greatest gift
Speaker 2: to give someone. Get off your phone. I have a
Speaker 2: basket in the front of my house. Everyone walks in.
Speaker 2: I'm like, put your mother phone in that basket. I
Speaker 2: do not care. I'm not looking at the top of
Speaker 2: my niece's heads while they're visiting me. I could be
Speaker 2: doing something else too, So I don't need to you.
Speaker 2: You don't need to be scrolling Instagram while you're in
Speaker 2: my presence. You don't I need you to listen with
Speaker 2: your ears and your eyeballs call me extra. I don't care, no, no, no,
Speaker 2: I agree.
Speaker 1: We have these discussions all the time. Like I've literally
Speaker 1: seen our entire house in the living room with everybody
Speaker 1: on their phone at once. I'm like, whoa, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: time out, everybody hand them over, you know kind of thing.
Speaker 1: Everybody's home and just for a little bit, you know,
Speaker 1: it doesn't have to be too crazy, but you know,
Speaker 1: are working or whatever.
Speaker 2: Of course, but even just making sure dinner time.
Speaker 1: Just hey, we're all right here. Let's let's look up
Speaker 1: on smartphones.
Speaker 2: Okay, if you're watching a movie, watch a movie, yeah,
Speaker 2: watch it. Don't watch a movie and scroll Instagram.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's pretty crazy. These little things are all the
Speaker 1: time everywhere. I'm going to take this just for our
Speaker 1: listeners because we have a lot of parents out there,
Speaker 1: and I want to talk about who had a lot
Speaker 1: of parents and I've been going through this too, and
Speaker 1: we've all been talking about it when the kids are
Speaker 1: out of the house where I met this moment in
Speaker 1: my own life where the kids are twenty four, twenty six,
Speaker 1: twenty eight and thirty. And one of the things that
Speaker 1: COVID did was it brought everybody back for a little bit,
Speaker 1: so had some bonus time and they went back and
Speaker 1: everybody was kind of back and forth a little bit
Speaker 1: because they were all all in college at once and
Speaker 1: then all at home on college on zoom at once,
Speaker 1: and yeah, just all sorts of stuff. And now they're
Speaker 1: really actually all out but for one and it's a
Speaker 1: real big change that we really literally have empty rooms.
Speaker 1: I mean there's empty rooms. There's there's I noted the
Speaker 1: laundry the first time when everybody went to school, but
Speaker 1: now it's really actually like quiet. Everything's just changing and
Speaker 1: so forth. And you it's it's really interesting because your
Speaker 1: relationships with your adult children shift as well. They don't
Speaker 1: need your advice for every little thing. You know, they
Speaker 1: don't need shopping, they don't need you know, there's all
Speaker 1: sorts of things that change. Any advice there for us wonderful.
Speaker 1: I don't I don't love the word empty nester. It
Speaker 1: bugs me. But you knows got be a better term
Speaker 1: than empty nester. It's so so like. But because my kids, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I love Gretchen Rubin.
Speaker 2: She came up with a new term, I need it
Speaker 2: called open door.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like that's what I feel like. I'm like, you're
Speaker 1: welcome back anytime, come for dinner, right, launch, but laundry,
Speaker 1: whatever you want to do. But for the most part,
Speaker 1: we're real, like you're good, you know, flying And because
Speaker 1: we had one son who was a professional baseball player,
Speaker 1: he was overseas for a year with his fiance and
Speaker 1: just they're all over the place. So canny because boundary,
Speaker 1: because you can really muck that up.
Speaker 2: You can. Yeah, I think you have to have you know,
Speaker 2: part of it is realize that you're going to have.
Speaker 2: You know, there's going to be what I call the
Speaker 2: in between right when we're in transition things. What happens
Speaker 2: is we have homeostasis in the family system. When the
Speaker 2: kids were all home, even though it was crazy, but
Speaker 2: there was a certain amount of equilibrium there. Then they
Speaker 2: start moving out and you're you know, the apple cart
Speaker 2: gets toppled, and then we come and find our new normal,
Speaker 2: our new equilibrium. So give yourself a minute if you
Speaker 2: feel sort of disorder oriented around having your open door
Speaker 2: as we'll call it now, and start really focusing on
Speaker 2: reconnecting if you're if you're still partnered, you know you
Speaker 2: want to focus on reconnecting with your partner and planning
Speaker 2: things because when we raise children, we spend our lives
Speaker 2: prioritizing children just naturally. Good parents just do it naturally.
Speaker 2: Like a healthy family system when you have children is
Speaker 2: that it is children focused, but not children obsessed. And
Speaker 2: those are two different things, right, children focused meaning if
Speaker 2: you have something to do in school, we're aware of it.
Speaker 2: We will drive you where you need to be. You
Speaker 2: will have the right clothing and the right food, and
Speaker 2: everything will be clean and all those things exactly.
Speaker 1: And project is your science project, even if it's correctorrow.
Speaker 2: That's right, I guess you're going to be tired. Good luck.
Speaker 2: Here's some aluminum oil. I hope you can figure it out.
Speaker 1: Did you have kids ever do that to you, of
Speaker 1: course do tomorrow. I'm like, what if you see my
Speaker 1: own science project, Like you're barking up the wrong tree, sweetheart.
Speaker 2: That's like, trust me, I'm sure my husband and I
Speaker 2: stayed up until two in the morning to finish that
Speaker 2: friggin thing. But but now that you have your open door, though,
Speaker 2: YE see it as a time to reclaim because here's
Speaker 2: the thing, and I feel like a lot of parents
Speaker 2: are missing this. This is another transition, another life transition.
Speaker 2: How do we relate to adult children. You have a
Speaker 2: lot of parents who want to be perennial parents, and
Speaker 2: they don't respect the adult child's right to autonomy. And
Speaker 2: they have a right to autonomy. I expect Mike started
Speaker 2: getting married and started whatever. I was like, here's the thing,
Speaker 2: Joyce is now your first family. Me, Dad, and your brothers.
Speaker 2: We are your family of origin. So all the decisions
Speaker 2: you make now you make together with Joyce about what
Speaker 2: is best for your union with Joyce is before they
Speaker 2: had three kids, you know. And then.
Speaker 1: I really love it because that's what I'm trying, you know,
Speaker 1: that's what like we're doing. But that's a really good
Speaker 1: way to put that into words, because I can feel
Speaker 1: I can feel us doing that and like he'll call,
Speaker 1: like somebody will call home, So what do you think
Speaker 1: you should doing? Like that decision does not belong.
Speaker 2: With me, and I'll yep yep, which is great because
Speaker 2: what you're what you're saying though, when you do that, Elizabeth,
Speaker 2: is your saying I have faith in your capability. I
Speaker 2: have faith in your ability with your partner. But to
Speaker 2: decide what is the right thing for you?
Speaker 1: Why, well, yeah, it's like this. It is a dance
Speaker 1: like when do you need me? When do you not?
Speaker 1: When do you You know, it's really interesting. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm learning. It's and and they're pretty young still. So
Speaker 1: they're in their twenties, and I think the twenties are brutal.
Speaker 2: I think twenty I agree, And I would call twenties
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh my god, I call them young adults.
Speaker 2: So right in the in the twenties at least till
Speaker 2: their mid twenties for sure. Yeah, you're still young adults.
Speaker 2: So it isn't about abandoning kids. It's about giving them
Speaker 2: the tools they need to negotiate life, which means we
Speaker 2: have to let them fail and we have to let
Speaker 2: them fall, and not too far you can still be
Speaker 2: a safety net. Of course, we still helped kids out.
Speaker 2: We still would now if they need help. You know,
Speaker 2: it's not that, but it's not centering your adult child's life,
Speaker 2: not expecting them to center their life on family of origin.
Speaker 1: Beautiful, beautifully put. Thank you, this is so much fun
Speaker 1: have and you on. Thank you for doing this, and
Speaker 1: thank you for sharing so much time with us. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's fabulous. Do you want it to?
Speaker 2: I loved it.
Speaker 1: People. A little bit of your new book? And are
Speaker 1: you in pre order yet? With the new book? Everybody,
Speaker 1: we're gonna we're going to put all the links to
Speaker 1: her books up. We're gonna put her by over webs.
Speaker 1: Don't worry, we'll get you in a blog and get everybody.
Speaker 2: Yeah, fine, I love it.
Speaker 1: New one? Where are we at with that? Are you?
Speaker 1: Are you?
Speaker 2: The new one doesn't come out until September of twenty sixth,
Speaker 2: yet I don't even think it's pre ordering now. I'll try.
Speaker 1: Yeah, please get one behind you? Yeah?
Speaker 2: How too much? Definitely? Is it's too much?
Speaker 1: It's too much? Out right, it's it's out.
Speaker 2: It came out October of twenty four.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, so it's been around for like a year,
Speaker 1: almost a year. You're about to have a birthday for
Speaker 1: your book. I sure am book birthdays. All right, there
Speaker 1: is there anything else? So I'll put all your links
Speaker 1: up and I'm going to go get your books too,
Speaker 1: and I'll leave little Amazon reviews fun stop.
Speaker 2: Thank you, I did. I want to make sure that
Speaker 2: your audience gets the free gift free Terry Coole dot
Speaker 2: com forward slash h FC for your free gift.
Speaker 1: Okay, and maybe we'll do a little book club with
Speaker 1: your book or somebody. We'll figure it out over on
Speaker 1: best Ever. You great because our audience wraps around people
Speaker 1: and their books and so forth.
Speaker 2: Well, I super appreciate you having me on.
Speaker 1: Thank you for being here. Is there anything else?
Speaker 2: I feel like we covered it all?
Speaker 1: Okay, all right, everybody, thank you so much for being
Speaker 1: here with us in both video form and audio form
Speaker 1: and social media form. Will make sure that's what we
Speaker 1: should do. We should let people know where you are
Speaker 1: on social media. Oh yeah, you like Instagram or LinkedIn?
Speaker 1: Where are you?
Speaker 2: I hang out on Instagram the most. It's just at
Speaker 2: Terry Cole. Okay, that's really where I go. And it
Speaker 2: may I also have my website Terry Coole dot com,
Speaker 2: which you said at the top, And I have a
Speaker 2: podcast that I've had for ten years called The Terry
Speaker 2: Cole Show. You should come on there, Elizabeth.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I would love to be on there.
Speaker 1: If people want to get a hold of you. Do
Speaker 1: you like people to DM you? Email you put a
Speaker 1: go through your contact form on your website. What do
Speaker 1: you Where are you on that?
Speaker 2: I'm in contact? Go to the website contact form. And
Speaker 2: I have a really amazing community that people are welcome
Speaker 2: to join as well called TCM, where we meet every
Speaker 2: single week and just I answer questions. I do live
Speaker 2: coaching every week in my community.
Speaker 1: Is it how much does it cost?
Speaker 2: Twenty nine dollars a month?
Speaker 1: I think something like that. That'd be fun.
Speaker 2: And I go live every single week.
Speaker 1: Oh neat. How many people are in a group.
Speaker 2: Like, meaning in that group? I think probably the whole
Speaker 2: community is probably three hundred people.
Speaker 1: Oh that's lovely.
Speaker 2: That's but the people who show up live though, you
Speaker 2: probably have like forty to fifty people every week live
Speaker 2: on the calls. So every I answer every single question,
Speaker 2: like every question gets answered me.
Speaker 1: Okay, beautiful, all right, Well, big hugs, Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: For being here. Thank you everybody in our sixteenth year,
Speaker 1: and thank you. I wanted to just really quick shout
Speaker 1: up Mel again too, and then we'll do your free
Speaker 1: gift again one more time too. But you know you guys, really,
Speaker 1: I have thousands of messages from you all in my DM.
Speaker 1: I read every single one of them over the weekend
Speaker 1: and yesterday, and we had gifts showing up at the
Speaker 1: house here.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, baby, god, my baby.
Speaker 1: So thank you all, because she really she was like
Speaker 1: her own life coach. I swear by the end of it,
Speaker 1: she would come out here and like what she would
Speaker 1: have listened to this whole conversation, Terry, the whole entire thing.
Speaker 1: She would have been right here, going she's cool, we're
Speaker 1: honed in. I could always tell you I had a
Speaker 1: cool guest on because she'd be like, yeah, I'm right here,
Speaker 1: I'm listening with you. You're kind of thing. Or she'd sit
Speaker 1: here on the armchair. So it was pretty fun. But anyway,
Speaker 1: all right, enough about Mel and me and stuff. But okay,
Speaker 1: we're gonna go get your free gift everybody. Terry Cole
Speaker 1: t E R R I C O L E dot
Speaker 1: com slash h F c for the free gift. All right,
Speaker 1: thank you everybody, Thank you. Take care,