Lauren Zander on How to Work with Your Inner Dialogue

You can do anything with your life story. Welcome to the one you feed throughout time. Great tinkers have recognized the importance of the thoughts we have, quotes like garbage in, garbage out, or you are what you think, ring true, And yet for many of us, our thoughts don't strengthen or empower us. We tend toward negativity, self pity, ellsee or fear. We see what we don't have instead of what we do. We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking.

Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their good wolf. Thanks for joining us. Our guest on this episode is Lauren Xander, a life coach, university lecturer, public speaker, and co founder and chairwoman of the Handel Group. Her book is Maybe It's You Cut the Crap Face Your Fears, Love Your Life. Hi, Lauren,

welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. It is a pleasure to have you on. Your book is called Maybe It's You Cut the Crap Face Your Fears, Love Your Life, and in it you sort of lay out your coaching method that you've used for years and years and years with people. So we're going to get into a lot of detail about that in a moment, but let's start like we always do with the parable.

There is a grandmother who's talking to her grandson. She says, in life, there are two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. One is a good wolf, which represents things like bravery and kindness and love, and the other is a bad wolf, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandson stops, thinks about it for a second, and then he looks up. But his grandfather said, well, grandfather, which one wins? And the

grandfather says, the one you feed. So I'd like to start off by asking you what that parable means to you in your life and in the work that you do. Wow. Well, I would say that the word work that I do addresses dark and light, like your dark side and your light side. And I would say that I get along with that parable very well because I support people in the concept of choice, and so that whole entire parable is about the choice of what you feed. And so

I think that's um. And then I obviously in my work help people, UM pick light not dark. So I would go dark, you know, bad good, and really making those decisions consciously. So I love that. Yeah, yeah, no, you're exactly right. That is the heart of the whole thing. So let's start with the title, maybe it's you. Tell me about why you titled your book Maybe it's you. And again there's a there's a subtitle, but let's just

stick with the main title. So that is a tagline, and it's you know, maybe it's me, right, So, and that tagline change my life every time and always does anything that's not working and it's my life. The joke I make is, uh, maybe it's me and and then and then when I get it, I cross out the maybe right. And so it's been this joke of the entire method, like that's the that principle built the whole method right for all of us, right, and then it

doesn't make anybody really you know better than anybody. It just it's like, how well can you confront that anything that's going on in your life is because of you? Yeah? I agree, I mean I love that idea that you know, maybe it's you and then you cross out the maybe right. I think that my first experience of that was I got sober from a heroin addiction at twenty four, and you know, it just became so clear that like it was all me, and that principle has served me so

well in my life. And I think it's so critical to anybody who wants to make a change, even if like what you're dealing with is that you were really harmed in a bad way, if you were abused, or you you know, have trauma, at the end of the day, it's still us that has to be responsible for our own healing, and if we don't do it, nobody does. Yeah, I mean, you know, you could say in a good conscience, like I don't really think I picked my parents right, Like I don't know if I was really there right,

like who was there at the picking right? And where I was born and you know, and what my circumstances into life were that I was just basically forced into. And so but no matter what you were put into, the belief that it's meant to be and what you do with it is yours. You can do anything with your life story. And I'm sorry you know of whatever you may have been born into. No, you know, it's

pretty much a ship show, right. A lot of this world needs a lot of work, and so we are the workers, right, and so heading right into maybe it's me and you dealing with nobody's getting you out of here except you. And by the way, you got yourself here, you really did right, No matter who you're pointing at or what drug you're pointing at, right, that was that was your hand right right right? Yep yep. And so you say, I'm just gonna read something you wrote because

I like it. You say, the gap between who you are, your current state, and the dream of who you want to be and all that you want to accomplish. Your desired state is wide. It's width depends on how willing you are to get conscious about what you are currently not conscious. Tell me a little bit more about what you're trying to say. It's kind of obvious, but i'd like you just to, you know, elaborate a little bit.

The premise goes right after that, what you're saying to yourself and how you're relating to absolutely everything in your life and if is the only access to building a life. But if you can't face what's right there right now and how you're talking about everything, men and women, business, money, sex, drugs, rock and roll, like, whatever you're saying, and how you're saying it and how you're thinking about it. If you

can't hear it all, you can't replace any of it. Right, If you really think it's out there, it's not even happening. You don't even know it's you. Right, So the the amount that's possible to dream and build has to start with where you are right now, right and wherever you

are right now. Oh, you may or may not be a present to it, but as president as you're willing to get is the only way to take it over, right, And we're going to get into inner dialogue a lot here in a moment, because it's kind of the whole game, right, and that in action it gets in the whole game, right. Yeah. Um, but I'd like to start off by having you tell us the story about how you sort of had your

first sort of big change. You know, it's a story about about birds, but I was wondering if you could tell a se story. So I did an epic thing, which is I saved a bunch of money and I traveled alone. And I had never been alone. I was nineteen years so I've never been alone, right, with no plan, no have to go, and not that much money and a backpack, and I went and stayed at a kablitz

in Israel and basically no one new English. So I was really alone, which was really healthy for me at that time, because I got utterly stuck with myself and my new and like I had like five tape cassettes. Yes they were tape cassettes, people, I'm that old, And and I just had my time and I read books and I had to deal with myself. And then I had this epic, real interesting moment and I was going very spiritual at that time. I haven't come back, like,

I'm still out there on the spirituality lane. But this is when it started deeply for me, was around this story. Um so a little voice in my head said, look in the bushes. Now you have to understand, all I had was my own entertainment system, right like, So I'm like, okay, look in the bushes, right like who said that? And I even giggled to myself, like who said that? Look in the bushes? And they're literally literally there are two little baby birds, like, and I'm like, oh my god,

save the birds, right Like what do I do? What do I do? Like there're two little baby birds, they have their feathers, but they can't get anywhere, and there's no nast there's no mom, Like what the hell is going on here? And so I panic and I was working in the kitchen at the Kibbutz and I run back. And then there weren't many people who knew English anyway.

So the one guy that did know English, oddly enough, was someone that I was, you know, like I wasn't really a coach at all yet, but I knew his whole life story and he was in an affair for eleven years and wasn't changing his life, and we used to fight about him not going after anything. And so I run up to him and I'm like, there's two and I try to explain it to him and go

what should I do? And he's like looks at me, like me right, you pain in the ass, Lauren, right, same as it ever was, you know, leave them alone. It's nature, right, like just leave it, Like why do you have to fix this? And I'm like, right, you know, maybe he's right. I don't know what to do anyway, And it was cs dettenpt So I'm like going to take a nap. I couldn't sleep as many of you could have, Bradrick. So I run back to save the birds because I'd rather save them or do something. And

I came back. One was gone, one was dead right, And in that moment, I was really devastated and moved and upset and kind of like in my head and made a vow that that wow, I could have saved them or done something, like I gave up my moment, like that was my moment. I could have done something. And I went and checked with someone else, and I didn't check with someone I even respect right, and he

gave me the wrong advice. So in that moment, I swore that for the rest of my life, if I could do something, I will like I. Well, that's the point of being human is I could have changed that. Right. What a gift, what a wow? You asked for a long story. I know, I did. I did. It's a

good story. It's a great story. Um. And then I literally I took that literally and UM, I went back into my life and changed my entire life out of that story because there was so many things I was witnessing, like girlfriends cheating on boyfriends and things not being said and people surviving being liars all around me, and it just made sense to me before the trip. And then when I got home, I was like, this is not okay,

none of it. And I became a little bit of a crazy evangelist blowing ship up, which I don't recommend. I've come a long way since my nineteen year old self, but it was epic and it was very meaningful and spiritual to me. There's nothing like the zeal of a person who has found a path that helps them. I can relate. I can relate, and incidentally, as you and I talked about before we started. We are the same age, so I'm very familiar with cassette tapes and UH had

a lot of them. I want to read another short thing you said. It's going to lead us into another big part of the conversation. You say, much of whatever is plague into person is located in their inner dialogue. So so let's talk briefly about that, and then I kind of want to talk about three of the voices in our inner dialogue that you have identified, So the

plague and our inner dialogue. So there is exactly how a person talks to themselves, look at looks out in the world, sees the world, cares about, what they care about, what people think about them, what they can say, what they can't say, what they're trying to get how there. So there's a strategist in that head of yours, and

that's what I go after throughout my entire book. And I really just I'm trying to take over, like I'm getting a human to wake up to their inner dialogue and how much their inner dialogue they think is the truth about them, right right? They think it is them. You would never not wonder about what it's saying, and most people don't even really hear it let alone. If you had to admit what it just said, you'd be horrified, right, Like, you would not go public with your inner dialogue, right

and then you would have. And then that's where I start at, waking you up to what where did those voices come from? Why are you even looking out at women that way, at life, that way, at yourself that way? Like that's the beginning of untangling what people aren't conscious to, even though it's utterly happening every second, right right. It's amazing that it can be happening all the time and we can be so identified with it and at the same time not really hear it or be conscious of it.

It's it's very strange phenomenon that happens, you know, because and what's happening is by not by not hearing it and knowing what it's saying, it's still affecting us, you know. I think for me that was a pivotal moment in life when when I all of a sudden went, wait

a second. That voice that's always talking that I assume is me is just a voice that's always talking, and it's not necessarily true and it's not necessarily me and that that alone is such a huge revelation because all of a sudden you go wow, and then we start looking at like, well boy, it just never shuts up, and it says the same boring and stupid and negative things tho times. According to science, for real, over of our thoughts are negative and repeat from the day before,

Like we're not having new thoughts. We don't even know that we are repeating, like we're like, God, these people suck when you drive, or God is always this way? Or God it like did you know my wife? My that like you really think you're discovering the same thing every day versus you're paying attention and repeating yourself to yourself every day. Yeah. I liked a joke like if I had a friend who was is boring, repetitive and negative is the voice in my head? We would hang

out exactly one time and that would be it. I would be like, never again, Right, I overstand, Yes, I I can overstand. I like that you identify a few voices in our head and I'm just gonna read with the three of them are that you identify, and then we can talk about them. You talk about the chicken, the brat, and the weather reporter. So let's let's start with the chicken. One of my most favorite things, which is the only way to truly identify your inner dialogue,

is to get a sense of humor. Really need a sense of humor, because going in is really fun like yucky and ugly and funny and twisted, and you really wouldn't say that out loud, right, Like you really wouldn't, right, but you do to yourself, right, and then you turn it out and you don't even hear it, right, So going in there, you need a sense of humor, and so for me, I did, and it really works on

all of us. Which is the voice of the chicken is how you you know the squatters, the inner squatters that are warning you at all times, you know, and strategizing how to say something, how to not hurt someone's feelings, how to how to not do something because you really might fail, Like you know yourself so well, you just are this way and you've never been good at that, and you don't like trying that, and you know the time you tried that once it didn't work. So it's

incredibly protective. A strategist and always wants to keep you safe, as if that's warm and fuzzy. And then the chicken you know won't ask the girl out, won't talk about a promotion, won't say what someone you know did that upset you. Will you know, it's just shoving everything down or you know, gossiping. You know. It has many ways of dealing with its fear, but it traps so much of an individual into what they think they know about

themselves and who they think they are. Yeah, bock bock bock bock bark and the brat, Oh well, this one I especially needed to address. I'm much less of a chicken and way more of a brat. So the brat. You know, I'll do it tomorrow. You can't make me. I'm not going to. I don't like that. I never

did like. I don't owe you anything. It's not my fault, you know, any form of I'll do it tomorrow, procrastinating, you know, an entitlement, jealousy, you know, lots of dark ways of holding in, being mad, right, being being lazy. It's its own little scene and a half and voice in there and definitely critical right yep. I want what I want and I want it now, and oh my god,

do you see what you did? Right, It's definitely comes back to your child like it definitely has never gone away since your childhood, except for your ability to stuff it and pretend it's mature that it needs a cookie at ten o'clock at night, right to you know, or a drink now. It needs a drink right now, and it doesn't need just one, it needs three. Right. It's definitely anyone who's struggling with their weight, that's not chicken, that it's brat. Anyone who's struggling in their career that's

usually way more chicken, not brat. Right. So there there really are where they reside throughout the you know, your life, in different areas of your life, and figuring out how they're ruling you is an amazing way to take over your inner dialogue because all you have to do is really listen for the voice. Then there's the weather reporter. So the weather reporter is um a bit like are a bigger concept, right, It's oh, it's a narrative in that head of yours, but it's what generalizes I've never

been good at that. I've always been this way. I'm an introvert, right, and you know, so it has sweeping generalizations about your personality, about the world, and about life itself. But it speaks it like a weather reporter. A weather reporter, it's not your fault, right, the weather report of it change, like it said it was going to be sunny and

it's rains. They did the best they could, right, So a weather reporter is always doing the best they can at telling the truth about how it is, except what it's talking about. They were like, you relate to like it's a fact, like I've always been this way, I need this. I've never been good at dieting, right, And then it never looks at the moment to moment choices that you're making because you've never been good at that.

But if I could give you ten grand, if you kept your diet every day right, all of a sudden, being on a diet would be fun. Right. So when how you test a weather report is if I could, if you can change it, like really, you have power to change it. But if you have no power to change something, it's like, can you make it rain? Right now? The answer is no. Can you make yourself an extrovert? Ready?

Everybody answer is yes? So it's a lie that you're telling yourself, because it's not a weather report, except your weather reporting about many areas of your life where you're generalizing like you know yourself, but it's not true. So I think it's interesting what you said. They're about the money test, right, which is you know, a way to tell is to ask yourself if if somebody gave me, you know, ten thousand dollars or five thousand dollars today

to do this and that, would I do it? And and if the answer is yes, I would, and you jump right up and you're ready to do it, it shows it's something that you are able to control. It's a lie, right, Like it's the person that goes, I'm not a morning person and so therefore I can't get out of bed and exercise early or meditate. I'm never good at this or that. So there's the sweeping generalization that the person repeats and repeats and repeats. But I could bait you out of it, right, I could. I

could get you out of it with a good prize. Yeah, right, Which means if it can change in an hour, what you have your case about that you can't change is so suspicious, which so empowering. Yep. And so this sort of leads into the idea of beliefs and theories. So let's talk briefly about what what beliefs and theories are and how they play into this whole inner dialogue thing. So how I break it out is, I'm like, you have an inner dialogue, and your inner dialogue can get

put into these big buckets of chicken brad negative. Inner dialogue can be put into buckets of chicken brat and weather reporter. But if you're like, well, what's making my chicken different than your chicken or my brad different and then your brat, you would go to the next column, right one before that one, and it would talk about

it has three things in it. It has your lineage, your heritage, Like that's everything where you came from what I call your epies, your epigenetics, like how your parents and like how your culture totally influenced how your chicken bad or weather reporter, and how you're conducting your personality. But the other two areas are your beliefs and your theories about life are conducting all of your inner dialogue

in a macro way. And so how beliefs form and theories form, they also form from your family and how you were raised or reactions to that. But once you have a belief or a theory, um, they're informing you at all times. So the belief I'm I'm not athletic, I never have been, it becomes pervasive as a belief. A belief is something that you just believe to be true, like you accepted it. It's it's like hardcore fact about life. It doesn't need proof anymore. It just is true. I

love you, Right, I am great at this. Right. It doesn't really go into question. You don't question it. You know, you're not wondering about it. It's yours and you think you possess it. A theory is different because it's something you're speculating that you believe, like it's turning into a belief. It's becoming something, but it's strung together. When I was a kid, I was really good at this, and then I did it later and then this happened, so therefore right,

So the theory is a is a much longer. Over time, you've come to know something about yourself and you speculate that it's true, so you're proving it and it's informing your chicken Bratton weather Porte and also what's going well in your life? Right? Mostly I'm just focusing on how people can get access to what's you know, what's negative. But you know, there's also lots of good things you're saying to yourself that I wouldn't change. Now, keep that belief, no,

keep that theory. But the premise goes that you're conducting all of them, and if you can figure out what they are, you can really change them. And there's a question you you write in the book that I think is a very interesting question. And I often think about this, which, as you say, which comes first the theory, belief or the evidence of that theory or belief, And and most of us would say, without thinking about it, well, the

evidence is it comes first. I base my theory on evidence, and then, like you said, it turns into a belief. But but let's talk about when that's not true. Once a person has an incident, a moment in their life, and I do study, I make people work on their haunting memories, because you're haunting memories create beliefs and theories.

They could be positive or negative. But obviously, again I go after what's negative because that's what's stopping us, right, But so so you have a theory or a belief, but what's really happening is you know your mother's not home, and you come up with she if she loved me, she'd have been home by now, right, And then the minute your mother walks in it's eight minutes late. You're like, see, so I really am Like something can happen. But your ability to make what happened into a theory or a

belief is epic. Right, And then you came up with it and then proved it and there or if that's true, and then it becomes even more and more true in that relationship with your mother or your career, right, good or bad. It goes to show you that if you actually have any theory, you can make anything happen. Right, You're just making some ship happen. You're making good ones, bad ones, anyone's happen. But it's more the arc type of it that's brilliant. Right. We talk a lot on

this show about how you know all this stuff? Are there just stories by and large? Right? I mean there are nuggets of a fact in there if it's an observable like oh I saw that person walk out the door at seven pm. Okay. Faction why they did it and what it means about me and means to me all made up and how they left and what you know, Oh my god, it's how much? How much is interpretation and invented? Right? And you know, I love an idea that um is a belief or a thought instead of

thinking is it right or is it wrong? Is it useful? Right? That's the measuring stick because you're making it up? So why if we are making a lot of it up, not make it up in a way that empowers and strengthens us. Yeah, And that what arises in your mind is a is like a word or like until you consent to what arose, right, It's it's a lot like a radio station. Right. You're like, I don't want to hear that song. Right. That was one of my jokes early in my career was like, I think my love

life is playing one long bad led Zeppelin song. Dude now, right, Like I was like, this is so melandramatic, Lauren, Right, you do need a cigarette? Right, Like this ship is bad? Right? And and so it was like and it would it would arise and I had, you know, as if I had nothing to do with what I was thinking about or who I was chasing or dating or not calling back or I couldn't help it, right, not true. Let's

talk a little bit about working with our thoughts. And there's something that you say that I think is interesting and I want to have you explained it before I start to potentially disagree with it. Um, you talk about five basic steps to reclaim your mind, right, you observe it, you name it, and then the last one is you stop it. And so talk to me about the stopping it, because anybody who sat down to meditate for a little while realizes you're not stopping the thoughts coming, right, You're

not even generating them, they're just showing up. So talk to me what you mean by stop it in regards to a thought pattern. So, first of all, I do believe you can take over your narrative and manage having thoughts arise, because you change your whole life, right, So I do think you can take over way more than just getting a grip on what you're doing, fixing what you're doing, breaking in there, and changing what you have

into what you wish. It was, the most important thing I care about is that a person has their vision and their dream in all areas of their life. You have to know what you're working towards, because that utterly interrupts and shows you the gap between you know, what you need to be saying in that head of yours versus what you are saying in that head of yours, which then ultimately takes over what are you doing in

that mind of yours? So I give your mind something much like, yeah, you have to have a vision, right, right, And then your vision says I want to have a better sex life with my husband, right, you know, and then your actions and how you talk to yourself about your husband, then you can now hear it because you understand.

Like if you have a vision like I want to get up every morning at six am, you know, then you know you better set your alarm and you can hear the voice in your head the night before you have to set your alarm. Right, So, the only way to break into actually even hear it is to know where it wants to go, right, to have a purpose, Okay,

and then you can hear how annoying you are. So now imagine you can hear how annoying you are, right, Like, so I was incredibly annoying when I had to take over learning to love exercising, right, because I've had a very cute body. You know, I was sporty, but I didn't know I was eating. I didn't know anything until I stopped being as sporty as I was in high school and then gained those fifteen pounds everybody talks about,

and then getting rid of them. I had to take over my mind, and I had a love exercising and eating, right, you right, at nineteen that was not that fun. But having that vision lets me hear my inner dialogue. Right, So then my inner dialogue, it's very clear, right, it gets it gets to eat this, it gets to have these things. This is this is what I want to be doing, and this is what the voice wants to do. So now you hear your voice. Go get a cookie.

You deserve one. You you worked out, you went an extra ten minutes on your run, Come on, cookie, right, or drink or whatever your thing is? Right? And who's saying that that is not in my best interest? Like shut up voice? Right? Like shut up right? So when you get you're not going to eat the cookie. Not only do I get a person to dream, I get them to make promises that they want to keep. Because my whole method is about personal integrity and keeping a

promise to yourself. So I engage you in your higher self by making you have a vision, make a promise. And now listen for the little criminal in the head trying to get a cookie. Right now, we know you know where that wolf is? Hi wolf? Right, how do I get in the cage? So you have to start to fight with that voice and go get an apple. And that's the real work. And developing that voice becomes possible. After you hear your voice, you can then kick its ass.

I teach how to do talkbacks. I explain all of my inner dialogue because you're developing an inner dialogue that you respect and love that is you. There is no is you until you consent to what is you. And trust me, that voice that gets the cookie was not me. I was miserable. So that's the basic gist of that

section in the book. And so what you're saying, essentially is a variation on you can't stop your first thought, but you you stop what comes right after it, and you notice it and you redirected, and you may have to do that five hundred five thousand times. When I think stop it. It's one of those things. It's like,

well they don't stop. But we used to say in recovery, Like I just said, you know, I can't control your first thought, but you can control what you do with it after it appears, right, Yes, And I do also love that over time, once I've mastered, I really mastered that, and it and like a child who's never getting their pacifier again, it shuts down some it it becomes funny, it doesn't even try anymore. It's like a catch twenty two. If it could stay there forever and never get a cookie,

it will disappear. But if you think it disappeared, it'll come back, right. I refer to it. I refer to it as like stay stray cats, Like if you stop feeding them, they stopped coming around, right, you know. It's like you've got to stop feeding those thoughts and and then eventually they will go away, you know, whether it's a craving or whatever it is. It it will disappear if you don't feed it, you know. And and and

that relationship building, that ability is self love. Yes, absolutely, And and so I want to go back to a little something you said in the middle of that, because I think it's when I describe my coaching program to people. This is what I say, and you said it almost exactly, which is, you know, the skill ultimately that we're after here is the ability to make and keep a promise to yourself. If you can do that, the sky's the limit, it's the best. And then feel trust yourself. Right, it

feels so good. You know. You talk about it as personal integrity, um, and you know, but that ability to make and keep a promise not only leads to success, it leads to an inner stability and well being. I think it connects you to your soul, like that is your soul walking on earth, that that came to live and to fulfill on lots of fun. Right, And I wanted to follow up with something else that you wrote because I thought this was a really interesting statement and

ties to this exactly. Say, what if integrity is spirituality? I do think that. I think your ability to say and do something makes anything. And then it means say do and believe right, say like, believe in something, say something, do something that they're all aligned. Yeah, that is sacred. That's being sacred, it's seeing sacred, it's being wholly to yourself and the purpose of your life. Whatever your purpose is. Yeah, yeah,

I couldn't agree more. I could not agree more. And and you know, I think any of us if we look in our in our life and we look at the places and the times we have done that where we make and you know, like you said, you know, think about what's important and then you know, decide to do it and then actually do it. If you look at the times in your life when that has happened, you you notice an internal congruence that is really really good. And when you don't, there's this inner turmoil that never

really goes away. You keep reinforcing the same thing and working with people, we get off to a good start, they're doing well, and then you know, something happens a day or two, right, and and what immediately comes up is the voice that says, see, I knew you couldn't do it, right, yeah, Well, and then that conveniently gets you a drink. It conveniently gets you to not talk to your boss about that, right it has and then you're sad about yourself. And then feeling bad is one

of the things. Like feeling bad I have always considered one of the darkest like it when people feel bad, it's as if they're guilty and they understand they should have done it differently, And it means so much that you like you better feel guilty if you don't do it, whatever it is. And I think that's one of the darkest phenomenas and human is being able to feel really bad. Is if that makes you still a good person? Like I said I would do is something I feel terrible,

I didn't do it. I'm still the good purpose and maybe I'll do it tomorrow. And I wish a human would just go I said i'd do it, I didn't do it. On it just be true about it, right. I don't need you to feel bad. I don't need you to guilt yourself. I don't need you to suffer because I promise it leads to a bag of potato chips, right, like I'm telling you it's getting you a cookie. Right. Why are humans suffering feeling bad and still not doing

the action? Right? So I'm very into breaking into that narrative. So a person wakes up to that they give it up all for feeling bad and some way to wallow. That's right, that's right, and that you're exactly right that the the wallowing or the feeling bad or you know, the guilt or even in some people the deeper you know, this goes so deep. The shame is what secretly is

reinforcing the habit you're trying to break. I mean, I've I've done so much work, you know, over the years and observe so many people and you know around addiction, and you know that really is the heart of it. You know, the heart of it is you. You use, so you feel really bad about yourself, and you guilt yourself and you talk about how bad you are and when an awful person, which just leads you needing to medicate more, yes, and blame, even if the main person

you blame is you, Right like that? Don't that don't impress me? Right? So let's talk about We're nearing the end of our time here, but I want to talk about consequences. This is something you talk a lot about about. You know, you design a promise yourself, you keep them and if you don't, you pay a consequence. And so let's talk a little bit more about this. And then I have a specific question in relationship. So this originally was from my brat, you understand, and it works incredibly

well on the chicken. So what happens is is I wanted to make my vices right, whatever, my cookie, whatever I was going to get like, I had to earn advice right now, it's you know Netflix, right, so if I so? For example? Right, so, I have a promise. I've been with my husband for twenty two years. I love that man, but I could blow off sex in five like, are you kidding? For good TV? I love

that God see it forever. We're gonna we got this right, I'll screen you tomorrow, right, right word, baby, I didn't shower. I went for workout. I'll smell right. I got good reasons not to take a five minute shower anyway and get to my Netflix. Um so, anyway, I wonder how many sex moments have been interrupted and postponed by Netflix. I wonder what the numbers. I just love to know. I would like right, it's it's it's embarrassing and it doesn't and it doesn't even match what people feel, right

because I really would much rather get it on. It doesn't take that. I still get to the television right, Like, It's like, it's not such a right and I like myself so much better and he likes me better, and I like him better, and it's like a workout, right, It's like really good. Like a workout is good for the body, sex is really good for the connection with your partner. It still works. Right, So here's how a consequence works. I swear to be Jesus that I have

sex twice a week or else. If I don't, I you know, I lose my television, right, I do not get to like you know, if I haven't done it by Thursday, I'm in trouble, guys, right with my Netflix? Right, it's over right, and I have to get it done to get it back on so I could get on on Saturday. Do you understand? So Netflix is off the table, right if I haven't kept my promise. Guess who keeps a promise? Right? It makes my my funny dark side,

which isn't really very dark keep like it doesn't. I don't get my cookie unless I kept the promise I really want to keep when I wanted to. Here's another great example is this works really well on me. I want to meditate twice a day. Ready, how do I do that? No coffee until I've meditated or in the evening I want to meditate later in the afternoon. No screen fun time until I've meditated. Guess who meditates? Right? And I don't keep that to myself. I keep it public. Well,

I die without coffee? No? Maybe? Um would I die without my Netflix? No? Would I die without? Do you understand? So? Consequence is not a punishment. It gets your vice, your dark side. You're like, give me that write your drink to work for the for the good guys before it earns it's you know cookie, You know, I think those can be very, very powerful, and I've seen them work

and I've used them. And but my question is, in certain cases, we don't have enough of a grasp on things in general that we're even going to make ourselves do the consequence. We say, oh, well the consequence is this, but we don't do the action or the consequence right because that basic muscle isn't even there. Well, it's in my program, right, in my digital program and in my coaching program. Everyone owes their promises to someone who's going

to help be accountable for them. Like I have three children, and I have a promise that I do not I do not get to get hot, like I do not get to scream, nothing loud comes out. I have to use my words, right, I have to really talk if I'm upset, Right, I do not get to act like my mommy and scream through the house and scare the living but Jesus out of people. Right, And if I scream or get pissy like that, hot, anyone in earshot gets twenty bucks. Right, you know it happens like once

a year. And trust me, I scream out before I scream. Everybody will could hear this is gonna have to do. And then I'm like, you know, and it makes it so funny that my kids never actually believe the scream right right there, Like mommy went off a deep in right, and I made twenty bucks because she lost her ship, right, And I love that, Like God, I wish my mother

did that. Right, And so that art it is like your heart like holding you to the behaviors you want to be, right, like so the sex and the don't scream at my kids and even go to bed on time, Lauren Xander, right, like I need a bedtime. Right, So all of these things need promises and consequences for me and in my practice with an accountability buddy, right, and trust me, use your kids right, just tell them if I don't go to the gym, you make twenty bucks

and they'll be like, did you go? I'm going today? Right? And you deserves you right because you don't want to lie to that kid and teach them you don't keep promises or tell excuses. You can almost you can hear your excuses when you to look in your kid's eye, right, right, right. Accountability is so critical, you know, it's it's such a big piece of the post. It's also a great way to love each other. Even most most friends are not

they're drinking buddies, not accountability. Buddies is our joke, right, and we teach how to truly um you know, take like work together humans right, Like to really love each other is to support each other, right, and so I want that to change for humanity too and make it fun and deep. Yep, yep. Well, this has been a wonderful conversation. We are at the end of our time. You and I are going to continue in a post show conversation where we're going to talk about the eight

basic brands of excuses. Listeners, if you want to become a member, get access to post show conversations like this one. Add free episodes and a weekly mini episode I do call the teaching song and a poem as well as feel good about supporting the show. Go to when you Feed dot net slash join. So thank you so much, Lauren Again, it's been a it's been a fun pleasure and I've enjoyed the conversation is great. Okay bye. If what you just heard was helpful to you, please consider

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