How To Step Into Conflict For Our Personal Growth

So today we're talking about stepping into conflict.

And in no way am I talking about seeking out conflict or finding trouble or anything like that.

I'm just talking about the natural conflict that happens when sovereign beings interact.

It's always amazing to me.

I was married for 20 years and at the end when it was over,

People would ask me,

They'd say,

So what happened?

And I'd always look at them and think,

You've been in relationships before.

What do you mean what happened?

When two independent souls live together,

There's going to be conflict.

There's going to be challenges.

It's really difficult.

How could you possibly say what happened?

A million things happened because there's almost a natural struggle.

For me personally,

I was taught to avoid conflict.

I was taught to keep the peace.

I was taught,

Oh,

Don't cause trouble.

It's not a big thing.

Just leave it alone.

Why would you bring that up?

Why would you make trouble?

It was very clear training.

I remember one time I was counseling a man,

I don't know,

Like 15 years ago.

And he was in a very difficult relationship.

And he was telling me how his wife would be yelling at him all the time and she was really mean and all these things.

And I said to him,

I said,

Well,

Have you talked to her about it?

And he said,

Well,

I don't want to cause trouble.

And I said,

You're not causing trouble.

There is trouble.

You're talking about the trouble.

Why do we believe that if we address the trouble,

We're somehow causing it?

That's like saying my town is being flooded.

And because I'm actually trying to put up barriers or trying to get the water out,

I suddenly caused the flood.

It doesn't make any sense.

I mean,

And there's a lot of reasons for being taught to avoid conflict.

And we've talked a lot in various talks about,

You know,

That we've really lived in a dark world for a couple millennia.

Because of that,

Because of this massive oppression of the masculine energy,

Not men,

Nothing like that,

Just because we've lived in this very curious illusion of separation,

That when we interact,

It's an oppressive act almost always.

We've been taught to avoid conflict out of self-preservation.

If you're being attacked by somebody,

It's often much better to not confront the attacker,

But plan your escape.

If someone's violent,

And you can't get away,

Then why raise any flags?

Because there's no solution anyway.

And this is the world we've lived in for a long,

Long time,

That even if you look into heterosexual marriage,

Which is historically all that was allowed,

Women had no rights.

So you couldn't step into the conflict.

There was no option.

You could be beaten,

You could be killed.

You know,

I mean,

There's a good reason for this training.

It's not a character flaw,

Because we don't go after conflict,

Or we don't step into it,

We don't lean into it,

That we avoid it.

And to even within our own lifetime,

I mean,

I'm only 53,

And I was deeply taught to avoid conflict.

Let's say you're in school.

We're taught to avoid conflict in school from the time we're four years old.

If we don't like something that's going on,

You don't have any say,

You're going to be sent to the principal's office,

You're going to end up in the corner,

You're going to be suspended,

You're not allowed to say anything.

So we're deeply taught to avoid conflict.

Like that is a thing in this curious shadow world.

So that's where we have to start.

We can't beat ourselves up,

Because we avoid conflict,

Because the training is deep.

And so of course,

Because the training is deep,

That also means that our karmic patterns are deep.

When I say karma,

I don't mean punishment.

I don't mean that,

Well,

This is your karma.

What goes around comes around.

You must have been a jerk in your past life,

Or this wouldn't be happening.

None of that.

That comes out of a very curious teachings out of the Brahmins and the Vedas and stuff that sort of makes you feel happy with a crappy life.

It's sort of like,

You know,

The guilt taught in the Catholic Church or that kind of thing.

It's a curious way to kind of just keep you small.

That's not true karma,

Because it's of no value.

Spiritual teaching has to have value.

It has to have value in this moment.

And being shamed or feeling guilty only depletes us,

That only disempowers us.

So instead,

If you imagine karma as simply the patterns that we are repeating,

I don't know why we're repeating them,

But why do we still keep finding partners that look like this or friends that act like that or jobs that are like this?

Why do we keep finding ourselves there?

Like in a world of 8 billion people or however many people we have in the planet,

Why do I keep finding these ones?

Isn't that curious?

And it's not some kind of like,

Well,

You attracted them,

You're a loser.

It's not that.

Like,

Again,

We have to be so careful.

Whenever a spiritual axiom or a spiritual saying is somehow turned around and you feel like a loser because of it,

I'll 100% tell you it's wrong.

It's a manipulation tactic to sell you a course.

How to not be such a loser.

Like,

It's just so rotten.

So whatever we do,

It's never about that.

So instead,

If you imagine how these patterns perpetuate themselves over and over and over again.

Rupert Sheldrake used to talk about morphic fields and how,

It was funny,

I discovered him when I was researching my book,

What If You Could Skip the Cancer?

Because I was trying to understand how women would get breast cancer generation after generation,

Like in my family.

And so,

Of course,

Here I found myself repeating my mom's life in many ways,

Even though I'm a completely different soul.

Why am I literally manifesting the same disease that she had?

Not now,

This was 20 years ago.

Why am I repeating the same marriage?

Why am I repeating all of this?

How I interact with other people,

How I take everyone's opinions so personally.

Why am I repeating it?

Instead of just simply going,

Well,

It's genetics.

But we just didn't say anything.

We just threw a word out.

We could say,

Well,

That's the way pillows are.

It doesn't mean anything,

Just because we used a word doesn't mean we explained anything.

And Rupert Sheldrake used to talk about morphogenic fields and how we would actually,

Oh,

What was one of his sayings?

It was like,

We are simply patterns that perpetuate themselves,

Something like that.

I can't remember.

And now imagine these karmic patterns,

That we simply are perpetuating this pattern over and over again.

It's not a flaw.

It's not a character flaw.

We're just for some reason repeating a pattern.

Isn't that interesting?

Well,

If we avoid conflict,

If we avoid the things that bother us,

That hurt us,

That make us feel pain or sadness or anger,

What happens?

The patterns just continue.

There's nothing to stop them from continuing.

There's nothing to stop the morphogenic field from continuing in its perfection.

And what's really interesting about a field of energy,

As opposed to just this one thing,

When you think of a field,

Everything's interconnected.

So it's seldom just the job or just the relationship or just the family dynamic.

All of them are connected in this really interesting field.

So now imagine the role of conflict in our lives.

Why is there conflict?

It can't just be to torture us.

It can't just be to make our life hell.

That would assume that we have a philosophical belief that we came here to be punished.

And therefore,

My life is filled with conflict and I must suffer within this conflict and not say anything because this is my penance.

And you may genuinely believe that on a deep level,

That you're being punished for something,

In which case you're never going to stand up against the conflict because somehow on a deep level,

You believe that you deserve it.

And again,

I'm not saying this is a character flaw.

This easily also could be another field that you are perpetuating.

It's a thing we do.

We just,

Like it's like field upon field upon field.

So what if instead we have this incredibly sensitive being,

We have these incredible chakras that notice things in the world.

Our first chakra notices when something's amok on a security level,

On a survival level.

And that first chakra says,

Hey,

Hey,

Hey,

Hey,

What's going on here?

What's going on here?

Can you imagine on the first chakra level,

This is the grossest,

And I don't mean gross like the fact that my puppy just drank out of my water.

I mean gross like heavy,

Physical,

Dense,

Manifest,

Basic survival.

Well,

We were taught to even avoid that conflict.

Even being in an abusive relationship,

Even being in a situation that we cannot thrive.

We even avoid that.

But you imagine you kind of work up through the chakras and you imagine the conflict in the second chakra with other people,

Meanness and bad behavior and power struggles and all this kind of thing.

If we just let that fly,

When in the world is going to happen?

Then we're just like a pinball machine in everybody else's dysfunction.

It's not even our dysfunction.

We're just being thrown around by crazy people.

And I really mean that.

I actually mean that.

It's like if somebody is in a full grown adult and they have anger issues in the case that they have temper tantrums and they hurt other people in their full adult body,

That's a problem that we've normalized.

Oh,

Well,

They just have a bad temper.

Oh,

Well,

They're just really sure.

No,

They have an issue.

They have a mental issue.

There's something wrong.

They did not grow properly.

They did not evolve.

They did not learn how to integrate their emotions into their life.

They did not learn how to be socialized with other people.

There's something wrong with that.

It's not okay.

It shouldn't be normalized.

Just because they can keep a job and this is one of the most interesting things.

So I got my first degree in mathematics.

That was when I was young and I was a computer programmer and all that stuff.

And then I married a farmer,

For anyone here who doesn't know my curious history.

And then I got sick in 1999,

Complete turn of my life.

And people started coming to me for counseling.

And of course,

All I had was a math degree and some wild experiences.

And so I thought I'd go back to school to study psychology.

So one of the things that was really interesting that I learned when I was studying psychology was so they have this,

The DSM,

Right?

The Diagnostic Manual for Psychiatric Disorders.

And what was really fascinating to me is that you would only be diagnosed through the DSM if you were dysfunctional in your life.

If you couldn't hold a job,

If you couldn't keep a relationship,

If you've been disowned by your family,

Whatever.

That's when you're diagnosed.

And one of the things that actually eventually made me leave that course of study was that I realized that they actually considered you healed if they could find the proper medication to get you back to work.

Which of course wasn't my interest in psychology at all.

I wanted to understand what was underneath it and how could we heal like genuinely from a soul place.

So kind of had my ladder up against the wrong wall.

So I only lasted a couple of years there.

But this is a very interesting part of our psyche that as long as someone can keep a job and they're still married or they're still relatively functional in society,

Their behavior is normalized.

So that means if they're a grown adult that likes to have temper tantrums and yell and scream and upset everybody,

Well,

That's okay.

No,

It's not.

Not okay.

It's not okay.

Or anything like that.

It's actually not okay.

And then what happens if we don't step into the conflict,

If we don't,

If that person comes at us and we don't actually lean into that conflict to change the pattern,

It just continues and our lives become a life of simply adapting to everybody else's stuff they haven't worked on.

So now imagine the excellent role of conflict in our life,

The importance of conflict.

One to actually have healthy relationships with other people.

Because most people have not been properly socialized.

And I really mean that.

We have been taught to treat each other really badly.

We've been taught or for whatever reason,

We've come to a place where everything's a power struggle.

Whether it's aggressive or passive aggressive or through emotional manipulation or whatever,

Like it's crazy.

So if we don't actually start to stand in our truth and actually have sober mind and look at the situations for what they are and start to speak clearly about them,

How is anything ever going to change?

Somebody has to start standing still and not being thrown from pillar to post by the crazy dysfunction of the last couple millennia.

This is really important.

I don't know why else we're here to be honest.

I'm pretty sure we're not here just to get thrown around by people.

It just doesn't make any sense.

There's no purpose in it.

All it does is cause more chaos and more challenge.

It doesn't make any sense.

The other big reason to step into conflict in our lives is for our personal journey.

It's for our personal journey and I'm going to first go into the karmic thing and maybe you don't believe in karma or multiple lifetimes and all that.

It's all good.

We can just shorten it into this lifetime if we want and the patterns we're repeating in this lifetime.

But I kind of believe that we have had many experiences here on the planet.

That's just my perspective.

This is how we break the patterns.

And the beautiful thing is we don't have to throw a Molotov cocktail into the mix to change the pattern.

Because everything in our life is connected through this interwoven field,

All we have to do is make one change.

All we have to do is say one thing and that will create a ripple in every part of our life.

We don't have to walk around just blowing up things.

That's not it.

It could simply be a choice to not attend a gathering.

It could be a choice when someone is saying something to say,

Is that true?

That doesn't feel true to me.

Of course it's true.

I don't know if that's really,

It just doesn't sound right.

Can you explain to me why that's true for you?

Where does that come from?

Well you just know it for God's sake.

Why are you being so difficult?

We know how these conversations go.

But the cool thing is you just are real all the time.

And what's crazy is let's say you say that and it doesn't go anywhere in that particular instance because not everybody wants to be connected.

Not everybody wants to have a deep experience with each other.

There's lots of people like that and that's cool.

But what's really great is the next time that same person says something,

You know,

I don't know,

Maybe they heard it on the news or somebody said it or they're gossiping or something that annoys you and you say,

Really?

I heard this other thing,

You know,

That I,

You know,

There's this interesting study done and you know,

Well,

That's not it.

Well I'll tell you the third time they go to say something to you,

They're just going to skip it.

They're not going to bother because they don't want to have a conversation with you about it.

Sometimes all you have to do is just be honest.

This is the next part of this.

It is kindness.

We need to talk about kindness because standing in our truth and leaning into conflict doesn't mean attacking someone.

It means standing in kindness.

Kindness isn't being a doormat,

It's not going along,

It's not being a peacekeeper,

It's not avoiding or calling out bad behavior or not calling out bad behavior,

It's nothing like that.

Kindness is simply when someone says something or does something or whatever,

That we don't attack them.

That we're not aggressively hurting the other person.

God knows the people in our lives,

Especially the ones that are close to us,

Our children,

Our parents,

Our partners,

Our exes,

Our friends,

We know stuff about them.

If we want to be mean,

If we want to hit below the belt,

Of course we can.

Why?

Why hurt them?

And I get it,

When we've been hurt,

We want to hurt back.

To what end?

To just continue the pattern of hurt.

In this year of 2022,

We're in a different time.

We're stepping into a different consciousness.

We are studying meditation,

We're studying yoga,

We study tantra,

We are hearing about all kinds of things,

We're feeling shifts inside of us that say,

I don't want to live like this anymore.

There's more to life than this.

So we need to step out of these old patterns of an eye for an eye.

And we can actually have these amazing conversations.

And what else,

It's really interesting when we think of,

You know,

When we were talking about the chakras and how like in the first chakra,

These are kind of obvious offenses.

Someone's obviously hurting you or it's really damaging.

Those are things that we generally take action about.

We talk,

We figure out,

You know,

Is this person going to change?

Is this a safe situation?

Am I going to stay?

Am I going to leave?

Am I going to make change?

It's sort of big things in the lower chakras.

In the chakra,

You know,

We have to communicate better.

We have to actually not be in these power struggles.

We need to step outside of them,

Things like that.

But what's really fascinating to me is when we keep going up in the chakras and we start to pay attention to the subtleties in relationships.

And what's interesting about that to me is that subtleties are when someone says something,

But it's not brutal.

It's not so offensive.

It's not violent,

But there's something in the tone.

There's something in how it was said that you feel like,

Oh,

Like it's like,

Oh,

Right in the heart.

This is one of the most beautiful places to step into conflict because what's beautiful about it is people aren't amped up,

But there's a lot of stuff hiding inside of our voice,

Inside of the things we say to each other.

There's sarcasm.

There's like an edge of something.

So now imagine you're in a relationship.

Now this only works when two people actually really want to have a close relationship.

So subtle cues don't always work in big family drama.

They might,

But what I want to talk about right now is the intimate relationships that we really care about.

Maybe it's with our children.

Maybe it's with our parents.

Maybe it's with an intimate partner.

We're both people actually deeply want to have a heart connection with each other.

So it may not be your aunt or a sibling or a friend or a coworker or a boss,

Like that's none of that stuff.

And it's not going to be a partner who doesn't really want to connect.

They just want to control you or whatever,

Like none of that.

I just want to talk about really,

I want to say quality relationships,

But that sounds kind of judgmental,

But the relationships in our lives that real connection is possible.

This is where we get to play in the subtle realm.

And this is one of the healthiest places to look at conflict because this is when you're in,

So let's say you're in love and the other person does something,

Says something,

And it just doesn't sit with you.

These are the ones that we definitely are taught to avoid.

We definitely don't bring this up because now you are just causing trouble.

They didn't hit you,

They didn't steal from you,

They didn't cheat on you,

They didn't do all the big things.

They just said something funny.

This is where we actually have the potential to go very deep with each other and find out something maybe about the relationship,

But even more importantly,

Something deep inside of one of us wants to get out.

What if that's why conflict arises between people?

And again,

I'm not talking about the big dysfunction out there.

Big dysfunction is whole,

Completely different.

I mean in a really intimate relationship.

So imagine conflict is a message.

It's static on the line.

It's a little message that says,

Talk about this.

This is important.

And what's really nice is people aren't amped up.

So you sit there and you say,

Hey,

That thing you said,

Can we talk about that?

Just didn't feel right to me.

And so very often,

As soon as you start doing this,

As soon as you start leaning in to the subtle conflict,

As soon as you start leaning into that,

Not everybody's used to it.

So the other person says,

Well,

But that's not what I meant.

I mean,

Okay,

Here's what I meant.

Now this is what we don't want to do.

We don't want to try to explain something.

We don't want to try to explain what we meant.

And because what we're basically saying is what you're feeling is not true.

You're misinterpreting this.

And now this person,

Maybe they were well-trained to avoid conflict and they say,

Yeah,

Whatever.

So we'll just forget about it.

But then what happens between you?

Distance.

The distance is there.

The person calling it out is saying,

Distance was created by what you said.

We need to talk about it.

I know,

I know,

But you're just,

You know,

It's like,

No,

We need to talk about it.

This thing I feel is real.

This truth is real.

And for some reason it's hit me and I want to talk about it.

So then you sort of start this dance.

And so maybe the other person says,

And it's really interesting again,

And this is where a sober mind is so important.

I'm talking about drugs and alcohol.

I mean,

Sober,

Clear,

Because emotions are so dangerous.

On the one hand,

We have to listen to our emotions because that's when we know something's amok.

That's how I knew to say,

Hey,

Something's not okay.

Because an emotion rose,

A sadness,

An anger,

A need to protect myself,

Something.

So the emotion's important.

But then we release it and we come into that center.

This is why we meditate.

There is nothing interesting about being able to sit and meditate for an hour,

Unless we take it into our life.

And in the difficult moments when those emotions rise,

That we aren't able to find that quiet center inside and take a deep breath in.

And we instantly go into that meditative state like Pavlov's dog.

Because as long as emotions are on the wire,

Because as long as they're present,

We can't think straight.

It's the number one way that we're manipulated by other people.

It's the number one way that we continue our karma.

Because as soon as those emotions are flowing,

There's no serious thought coming.

So we breathe deeply.

This is the beautiful balance,

Right?

The masculine feminine,

The wild and true emotional state and that beautiful stillness inside of the masculine that we learn through meditation.

So we know something's wrong and we're going to honor it.

We breathe deeply.

We come to our center.

We say,

We need to talk about this.

The other person goes,

Bah,

What,

What,

What?

And you sit in your center and you say,

I know,

But we need to talk about it.

So we start talking about it.

And we start wondering,

Is it this?

I wonder if it's this.

I feel like that.

What was really under when you said that?

Well,

It didn't mean anything.

Of course you did.

Every single thing that comes out of our mouth comes from a thought.

What were the thoughts that were underneath what was said or what was done?

None of us run without thoughts.

Maybe we're running on autopilot.

Then look at what the program is that's running the autopilot.

It has to be programmed.

And what's fascinating is if we can do it,

If we can honor the subtle cues and go deep and this isn't like a five minute conversation.

It might be an hour conversation or a two hour conversation,

But you keep going deeper and deeper and deeper and deeper.

And sometimes you might get angry and you might kind of like,

Oh,

I'm so frustrated because you think you've talked about it to death.

And then you check in with yourself and you think,

Is this result?

Do I feel close to this person again?

Like,

This is the question to listen.

Do I feel close to them again?

No.

Darn it.

We haven't touched it yet because we're treating the conflict as something important.

We're treating it like a messenger.

And then we keep going and we keep going and keep going and inevitably,

And it's something funny to me in my experience with this is like when you meditate,

When you choose to start to meditate,

Let's say you can really only sit still for maybe three minutes,

But you set your alarm for eight minutes and you sit and you breathe and you allow the thoughts to go through.

And there's a program in your brain that fights you.

It says,

Your back hurts.

You don't want to sit here anymore.

Oh my God,

I forgot.

I think I left the fridge door open.

This is stupid.

I gotta get groceries later.

And your brain tries to distract you from the silence.

Why?

Maybe there's something in there that's been packed away.

Maybe there's a sadness that's been locked away.

These traumas,

These difficulties have been pushed down and locked in with heavy emotions,

Like heavy emotions at the door going,

Don't open this.

But of course they sit there and they chew at us and they poke at us our whole life.

We do have to get there.

So we're meditating and we're meditating and we're getting closer and it's like almost those voices are like,

No,

She's coming closer.

She's coming closer.

Tell her to go for a drive.

You know what?

This is stupid.

No,

Her back hurts.

Give her neck pain.

Do this,

Whatever we do,

Because we don't want to get into this thing.

But if you promise yourself you're going to sit until that alarm goes off,

Something weird happens and all those sentinels inside,

All of those defenders go,

Damn it,

She's actually going to sit here for the whole eight minutes and it doesn't matter how much we fight her.

And all of a sudden you relax and maybe you just enjoy a quiet moment or maybe a truth rises that you didn't want to look at.

But we have to know that we're going to stick it out to the end.

We have to know that we're going to stay in the arena until it's actually resolved.

And it's the same in this subtle conflict.

If we come to a point and we're like,

This does not feel right yet.

It's the same thing as knowing that I am going to see this through to the end for both partners to know we are going to sit here or we're going to walk or we're going to do something until we actually resolve this.

We are not putting this under the carpet.

And then all of a sudden something happens between the two people that those defenders drop.

And it's always in this weird final hour that you're going to give up because you can't get to the thing.

You can't get to what it is that's really under it.

And you've just talked about it so much you're sick of hearing your own voice and you just sit there and you're like,

No,

It's not resolved.

We have to sort this out.

And then the fences go down and somebody says something.

And it's the magical thing that says,

I remember when I was nine years old and someone said this to me.

And I think it really messed me up.

And then all of a sudden the gap is closed.

And what's beautiful about it is a revelation happened in one or the other person who knows which person it is.

And this is the beautiful thing about this subtle conflict,

Like listening to this subtlety.

We don't know when we start it,

Who's at fault.

There's no such thing.

Maybe this is the person that said it,

But that may not be where the revelation comes.

They maybe were just the catalyst that the universe set up so that we would have this conversation so that we would get to the bottom of something.

And then what happens in that relationship,

And again,

It could be an intimate partner,

It could be a child,

It could be a parent.

It has to be someone where there's a heart connection.

It's like even with parents and children,

As difficult as that one can be,

Often deep down there is a desire for connection.

There is a heart connection that we want,

Even if there's been huge issue.

But it's easier to talk about it in an intimate relationship.

Because then what happens is the next time something subtle happens,

You can sit down and say,

Something wasn't quite right in that.

Something in our exchange there really bothered me.

And again,

The truth in my experience,

There's still a,

Like a,

Oh my God,

In one or the other person for a little while.

And maybe it takes three or four times of sitting there and realizing,

All right,

Then I guess we need to have a conversation.

And we trust it.

And it's not easy.

Don't get me wrong.

By definition,

Conflict,

Right?

By definition,

It rubs us wrong.

It bothers us.

We have an emotional response.

And we all have stuff that we want to heal.

And even if it's not great trauma,

Maybe it's hopes and dreams we buried,

That we gave up on,

That we grieve every day that we're not trying that thing.

And what if conflict is here to help us wake all that up?

And the beautiful thing is,

It's just about sitting quietly and listening.

And navigating our feelings in a brand new way,

Navigating our thoughts in a brand new way.

So if anyone has any questions,

I'd be happy to answer them.

Can you give some examples of this more subtle conflict to step into?

And how to do it without it becoming a full-blown emotional argument?

Sometimes in families,

There's a huge challenge where people don't hear us.

I was talking to one woman a few weeks ago,

And she was really struggling with her father.

Because no matter what she said,

Her father just didn't hear her.

And they were in business together,

So it was really important that they actually interact.

But there was always this sort of father-daughter relationship,

Where he was the boss,

This is his way,

But she's a full-grown adult,

Financially invested,

And all that kind of thing.

And he would just kind of keep on doing stuff that was not okay with her.

But he would just do it because,

Well,

He's the dad.

And no matter what she said to him,

But we never agreed to that,

Oh,

Well,

Da-da-da,

And it would always be debated.

But in the end,

When you really kind of sit with it and you realize the problem isn't the content that can be debated,

The problem is that you're not listening.

In order for us to have a partnership,

We have to listen to each other.

And we actually have to take it in,

That it matters.

And this happens a lot in family.

It happens a lot in intimate relationships,

That we're not listening.

So it's an interesting thing to kind of change the conversation to say,

I'd like to talk about our relationship here.

Because we have conversations,

But what I say,

You nod,

But you don't actually hear me.

And I really want to talk about that.

Oh,

That's not true.

It's like,

Well,

It is true.

There's this one situation where we talked about this,

And then you just went and did that.

Well,

That's just because it's like,

No,

I'm not talking about what you did.

I'm talking about the fact that I said this,

And you disregarded it.

It doesn't matter what the content is.

What do you think that is?

We don't have to attack.

We don't have to attack each other.

But it's like,

What is that dynamic?

Would you act the same if I was a friend,

Another man?

Is it a male-female thing?

Is it a father-daughter thing?

What is it?

It's like that we actually look into it as a curiosity,

That we look into it personally,

Too.

It's not that they're wrong,

That they have a character flaw that is causing conflict in our relationship,

That for some reason,

We are sharing a pattern of behavior.

And I don't know why I'm in this either.

I don't know why I'm playing the role.

I'm playing either,

And I want to get to the bottom of it.

And for some reason,

The universe has put us together to figure this out.

And very often,

The other person might just be like,

Oh,

For God's sake,

Bulb on.

But that's okay.

They can respond and react in however they want,

Because maybe they don't really want to address it or whatever.

But again,

We look at it,

It's like,

But this is my path,

And we're going to keep running into this.

And this again,

Is this requirement of this sobriety inside.

I love the word sober.

I just mean it emotionally.

It's just so important to actually be able to have that,

Because that's what the other person will like fly at you,

Emotionally,

Physically,

Whatever,

And that you kind of are like that Taoist master that just sort of lets them fly by you.

And you say,

Okay,

So that thing we were talking about,

Let's get back to that.

Oh,

You're still on that?

Yes,

Because it was never resolved.

It's an interesting thing.

And when we're playing in the subtle realms,

To trust your subtle guidance also,

That in those moments that we really sit there and we listen within too,

And we say,

I wonder why this isn't working,

And you close your eyes and you ask for guidance.

Is anyone else finding that becoming stronger and better makes you not nice anymore?

It's an interesting dynamic,

That especially if we come out of difficult families,

That when we become stronger,

It means that we actually start to,

And I'm going to say fight back,

But I'm going to put it in air quotes,

That we actually stop allowing bad behavior.

And sometimes,

Depending on how hyped up the family is,

If they're very emotional,

If they're very angry,

If they're very loud,

We end up responding with great loudness and anger and emotions also.

And maybe there's time for that.

Maybe that's important at some point.

But it doesn't have to be like that.

We can eventually back off and speak from a quiet place.

But again,

Not always.

I remember I was staying with a family in Italy when I was traveling,

And they yelled all the time.

If you've read my book,

You Don't Have to Eat the Eyeballs,

This was a huge turning point in my life,

This one particular time.

Because for a couple of weeks,

They were having huge issues with someone,

And they would yell and yell and yell.

Yelling in a way I've never yelled.

I've never even yelled at the top of my lungs before.

And these guys would yell at the top of their lungs at each other for hours every night.

And after about two weeks of this,

Because I was living with them,

I was helping them with their English,

I snapped.

I absolutely snapped.

There's a million things going on inside of me,

But I completely snapped.

And I sat with them.

I was lying in my bed,

And they came in and they sat down and they said,

You know,

Katrina,

Are you okay?

And I said,

I'm not.

I can't handle this.

I can't handle all the yelling.

I can't handle it.

And they actually said to me,

They said,

Oh,

Katrina,

The only reason you teach all of this happiness and love stuff is because you're alone.

If you lived in family,

You would understand that conflict is completely normal.

I don't know whether they just thought I'd always,

That I'd never been married or had children or had businesses or whatever.

And it was a very interesting revelation that on a very core level,

What they were experiencing,

They believed was completely normal.

Screaming and yelling was all there was.

And I sat there and I listened to them,

And a great realization fell inside of me that wow,

This,

You know,

Whether it's the Catholic Church,

The mafia,

Whatever oppressive forces they'd lived with for centuries,

They really believed there was no choice.

It was fascinating.

It was just a fascinating experience.

And it dropped me to my knees and I had great realizations about self-love and all kinds of things.

But I don't believe you have to get angry when you become stronger.

Now I become stronger,

I become quieter,

And I actually argue much less in my world,

In my relationships.

I mean,

You guys know me,

I'm really chatty.

And if there's a problem,

I'll probably try to explain it to you 500 ways before I give up.

And if I have given up,

There's a huge problem.

If I get silent,

Wow.

The other person's like,

Why aren't you talking?

Well,

Okay,

Okay,

Okay,

I'll talk about it.

Let's talk about it.

I'm not doing it to be manipulative.

I just almost recognize when there's no point in this one.

Like if there's no point to the argument,

Then there's no point to the argument.

I don't step into conflict with people who absolutely do not want to resolve this.

They want to maintain their power position.

I'm not going to argue with them.

Why would I waste time like that?

How does inner child work play into this?

If your younger self is triggered and you operate in distress as your younger underdeveloped self.

This is why it's so important to meditate.

And it's so important to do some kind of practice like yoga or something like Kundalini.

I love Kundalini yoga because it gets into those corners.

It gets into that inner child and starts to heal it.

Because the only way to be able to work with the inner child is to have a witness mind to observe the child.

The child can't just flail.

It's the same thing.

You're just going to continue the patterns and everyone's going to get hurt,

Including us.

We have to develop the masculine inside,

That sober adult self that says,

I see myself acting from my hurt child.

Maybe I hold that child.

This is where it's so important.

This is the doing of the work.

And as soon as I see myself going there,

That I've meditated enough to breathe deeply and instantly be transported into that meditative state.

Meditation is a tool.

It's a tool for being human.

It's a tool for evolution.

The meditation practice itself isn't the point.

The point is that we rewire our nervous system so that in those times when we are emotionally triggered,

That we have the balance point of the witness mind,

That we can still be emotional.

We can still honor the inner child.

We can still honor the fact that we're angry or hurt or pissed off or whatever it is.

But we also have the witness mind that is present saying,

Aha,

Where do we move forward from here?

It's really important to be conscious.

So with a very loving partner,

How do I handle when he gets defensive about almost anything I bring up and I don't bring up a lot?

Eventually he thinks about it and will change behavior,

But the conversation is predictable and it's defensiveness.

I think we need a listening couples course.

Well,

And it may be actually to be able to have a conversation about the defensiveness.

Like to really sit down and say,

We have this epic relationship.

We have such big hearts and we're so connected and so loving with each other,

But we have a pattern and we have a pattern because we have to include ourselves in it.

They are defensive,

But for some reason we are there too.

And that's very important that we are in a pattern of this.

And I'd really love to get to the bottom of it.

Oh,

I'm just,

It's like,

No,

But this is really important.

Where is the defensiveness coming from?

It's just so important to just talk about the thing.

Don't talk about the topics and to talk about it when we're not loaded.

And to say my only intention here is to make us closer than ever,

Because no matter what the topic is,

This seems to be the only fly in the ointment.

And if we can get to the bottom of this,

We're smooth sailing,

But there's something deep and hurt here.

And I'd really like to talk about it.

What if they get really angry and defensive?

How to keep it from blowing up?

That's a good question,

And I think it's different in every situation,

Because sometimes it's important to just let it blow up.

Because oftentimes that's part of the manipulation of the situation.

If people are going to get angry and defensive and blow it up like that,

They're blowing it up.

You're not.

That's how they back you off.

They know you well enough that you're enough of a peacekeeper that this will quieten you,

Because you're going to believe you caused it.

That avoiding this conflict is more important than getting to the bottom of it.

So if they blow it up,

Then that's what happens.

And maybe we let them scream and we let them flail and we let them get angry and we let them do whatever,

Assuming nothing's abusive here,

Physically abusive.

And we just let them go.

And then maybe Christmas is ruined.

Right?

Like,

Oh well.

It's a curious thing how we have been trained that people don't have to live with the consequences of their actions.

If they blow it up and everybody leaves and they're left staring at a great big turkey and no one to eat,

Well,

Maybe they'll think twice next time.

It's so funny how we can so be manipulated into people being allowed to act however they want with no consequences.

It's very interesting.

Family is very interesting that way.

How do you address conflict without sounding like you're attacking or victimized?

Would it be better to stick to talking about the behavior itself?

The funny thing is,

It's being clear in your heart that you're not attacking.

Because if people are accustomed to getting away with bad behavior and you say no,

They are going to project onto you that you are attacking them.

But that's their reality.

It was like that saying about empaths,

That it's important not to absorb the emotions of others but to project your emotional state on the world.

People can believe they're being attacked all they want.

But if you're really clear with your intention and you're like,

This doesn't feel right,

I feel really distant from you right now,

I don't want to,

I really want to resolve this,

Why are you causing trouble?

And you're like,

I don't know why you're freaking out,

But I know that I just really want to be close to you.

It's so important to be clear inside.

And again,

People will freak out.

Like children,

That's what I mean.

I don't mean this in a really mean way.

We were not taught how to process our emotions.

We were not taught,

We were sent to our rooms when we were emotional.

We were punished if we were emotional.

We were punished if we were angry.

When did the lesson come in to teach us how to handle hard emotions?

And that includes everyone we're interacting with.

Parents,

Children,

Friends,

Lovers,

Nobody learned.

So somebody has to start and it's not by being mean and it's not by making them wrong.

It's about just standing in everything we learn here in our meditation,

In our yoga,

In our spiritual studies,

Everything.

We stand in it and we say,

I really want to be close to you.

And if they are flailing and flailing and flailing,

Well,

They flail for a while and maybe you walk out,

Maybe you stay,

Maybe whatever.

But eventually,

This is what I mean,

The importance here is that it's the relationships with people with a heart connection that you genuinely,

Genuinely want to maintain that heart connection.

Because even if they flail and freak out,

Once they calm down and they've cried it all out and punched pillows and done whatever or gotten drunk and gotten sober,

Whatever,

They might call.

They may start stepping into the relationship themselves,

But they have to go through whatever they have to go through.

When you reach that point of silence,

It's almost like you find yourself in a sense of peace resides.

Although the conflict may not be resolved with another,

It's resolved in us.

Exactly.

And this is the most interesting thing to me is that we change.

Every time we find that centered,

Peaceful place inside,

Inside of conflict,

Our soul grows.

We start to really see clearly that this other person is a catalyst for our deepening of self.

Do you know what I mean?

It's really different.

It's not that they're wrong.

They did something that pushed us,

Triggered us,

Something.

We were triggered and we sit there and we think,

And this isn't absorbing other people's bad behavior.

It's not that.

It's this deep thing that says,

What does it take inside of me to be the eye of this hurricane?

We become so strong inside of us.

Still he claims he's not being defensive.

He thinks it's fine for me to do soul work,

But not him.

Deep inside,

I think he thinks about it later.

And the hard thing is there's something about having a loving relationship.

And if no matter how hard you try,

The other person just does not want to step into the arena to allow the truth of the relationship to be.

That it's very possible that often we are afraid that if we don't resolve this,

The distance will become big enough and we won't be able to be together any longer.

And that also may be a sober truth.

And there's something even about being able to swallow that sober truth inside of us that creates a conviction inside of us.

Because we aren't going to give up on this.

We aren't going to give up on it until the relationship is over.

Because it's almost like we know that if we don't resolve this,

It will end the relationship.

So maybe not now,

Maybe years from now,

But it will be the end.

This is the point.

This is the problem.

So we don't give up on it.

We stay in the arena.

And either eventually they're like,

For God's sake,

I'm sick of that and they leave.

Or at some point we will go,

Wow,

The distance is now too far.

Or maybe one day they say,

Oh my God,

You're right.

Whatever it is.

But to really be okay with whatever it is.

So thank you so much for being here.

I hope you have a wonderful day.