When anything potentially terrible happens to a comedian, we're like, how are we gonna make this funny? So I thought it was a joke. There was like, there's no way, my dad's not my dad, So I'm going to find out what's up. But as a joke, I filmed it and I was like, I'm about to find out my family's on my family.
In this week's episode of The Psychology Podcast, I had a really interesting chat with Christina Hutchinson. Christina is an internationally touring stand up comedian, actress, and writer based in New York City. Christina and her comedy partner Karin Fisher, co hosts the critically acclaimed Guys We Fucked, the anti slut shaming podcast, in addition to co writing the book Fucked, Being sexually explorative and self confident in a world That's screwed.
This was a really enjoyable chat with a really interesting human. As you all know, I'm a big fan of stand up comedy, and Christina has a huge interest in the field of psychology and is quite familiar with psychological theory on relationships. In this episode, we discussed her tumultuous childhood, her own struggles with mental health and how she coped with a recent revelation she had about her life. We laughed, we cried. Without further ado, I bring you Christina Hutchinson. Hey, everyone,
welcome to the Psychology Podcast. There is going to be a new era where I wear this jacket and I bring more of my whole self to the table and we have even more interesting and stimulating and maybe even a little edgy conversations that are relevant to everything going on in the world right now. But to kick us off, we have Christina Hutchinson.
Honored to be here as part of your pivot.
Yes, we're so glad to have you here. Yeah, you are many things, so right, I mean I could just start saying things like, you're a comedian, You're a spiritual seeker.
Oh right, just as well of curiosity.
You're a curiosity seeker. You're an adventure You're you host, you co host a podcast I do guys, we fucked or we we fucked? And then there's a subtitle to it as well, right, like the anti slut shaming podcast? Is that the official subtitle of it?
Yes?
It is. Okay, Well let me ask you why do you start that podcast? Uh?
So, my comedy partner got dumped by someone at the time she thought was the love of her life in a Panera bread and that got her spinning emotionally and mentally, and in that spiral, she said to me one day, She's like, we should just do a podcast where reinterview every guy we've ever fucked, and she's called guys we fucked. I'm like, that's amazing, Yesait.
Holy right there, so there's already an assumption that you'll have enough episodes to do that.
So right, so you know our numbers are not that hot. Okay, okay, honestly, Uh yeah. We started branching out because we were like, you know, this is a very vulnerable type of conversation, a conversation we probably wouldn't have had if we didn't have a podcast about it. But when we started, there was no video. So the people that weren't in the entertainment industry and had no reason to kind of promote their vulnerability, they were willing to do it because they
could go under a fake name. But now with the video, it's all about video now, so it's a little a little more vulnerable.
Yeah. So you started that and then you you were in you liked that idea.
I loved it.
Yeah, you love the idea, and it's done really well. Congratulations, Thank you very much.
I'm very proud of it.
Why do you think it has done so well? What do you think it? What nerve does it strike?
The timing of it was, I don't. It was a fly on the wall conversation about two women in their twenties navigating their sex life and their self esteem. You know, the directly corresponds with your sexual and romantic endeavors, and so we just talked as if we were the only ones in the room, and I think we didn't. I think when you do something groundbreaking, you never set out to be groundbreaking. You just want to be honest. And so that was the mentality that we had with it,
and it struck a chord immediately and people. The cool thing was people started writing us and asking us quite and then they started sharing things, really intense situations that have happened in their life, a lot of them being traumatic that they kind of added this caveat of I've never told anybody these things, and we're like, wow, we're really hitting on something like sharing your life makes people introspective and they want to share their life with you, which is a big honor.
It's a big honor. And do you feel like in a lot of ways your show has empowered women? Oh? Yeah, yeah, in sex, sexually, you.
Know, sexually, and with self esteem. My comedy partner is pretty much the only person I've ever met that has one hundred percent self esteem. She just was nurtured in a very beautiful way by her parents. Met anyone like that, I haven't either, And so the irony is I had a very traumatic childhood. She did not. Her childhood was beautiful and her individuality was really encouraged by her parents.
And so as we got older and are in the world now we are in the public eye, she was more traumatized by other people's behavior because she grew up in this beautiful surrounded by like love and understanding. And I'm like, oh, I already knew the world was fucked up, So I'm ready to go.
You already knew the world was sucked up. You weren't at a very young age, right, very young age. Yeah, And you know in psychology, and you're very interested in psychology. Oh my gosh, I almost feel like they need to justify why you're here on this podcast, But like, you are an extremely interesting case study as well as in a highly creative person, and you're a really interested in psychology, so I knew we would have a million things to
geek out. Oh yeah, yeah. So in psychology there's this theory that our early childhood is like a weather forecast. So what if there's a lot of unpredictability and harshness in an environment, our brain kind of wires in a way where that's what we expect forevermore for the rest of our life, and that could be very hard to unlearn.
The we projected onto everybody in life were like, what's your problem? And you're like, well, what is my problem?
Shit? Because that's what your Your brain's a prediction machine and so very young. Do you feel like, personally young in early in your life your brain kind of started to predict something about the world.
Oh my gosh, yeah. I My mother was mentally ill and we never knew which mom we were going to get. My dad had a pretty bad temper and also too spanking fox a kid up like being hit by a parent. It was so accepted when I was a kid, So my parents were certainly not the only ones. Every kid in my neighborhood got spanked by their parents. But as I got older, I'm like, that's messed up to be. Like, you're the trauma therapist that I worked with for a long time. She goes, when you're in when you're a
little kid, your parents are one hundred feet tall. They're like God to you. And so when that type of person who holds that spot in your life strikes you physically, it's so confusing, even though it was like an accepted form of discipline at the time. So there's so much that you could one could do to mess up their kids.
Yeah, true, it's true. But so what else in your childhood that you feel comfortable talking about? Oh yeah, makes you who you are today, I'll talk about all of that.
I The way I summarize my relationship with my mother is really I don't talk to either of my parents. I went no contact, which is really I think people go one way or another when they have a messed up childhood. They either know it's messed up, or they work really hard at convincing themselves that everything's great and if something happens that upsets you, it's my fault. You internalize it, right, And so I internalized it, and I didn't realize things were awry until a couple of years ago.
It was really recent and my world crumbled. For about a year and a half. I would wake up scream crying. I was just so very suicidal. But how I describe my childhood, my mom used, especially my teen years, suicide is a manipulation tactic, and I didn't know it was manipulation.
It's very common among people's borderline personalities.
I do think when I started learning about borderline, I was like, that's what that is.
It's a very common tactic used.
Oh yes, yeah, And my whole family functioned my mom's mood. And so I remember, like my brother. I have an older brother who I love so much. He's like my war veteran buddy, you know, and uh, you didn't, No, I love him. He's thank god I have him as my brother. But I remember all of his girlfriends throughout the years were all they were always like, what's up with you guys?
On your mom.
I'm like, don't talk about my mom that way, but I would defend her because I thought she was the best, my best friend and all this stuff. And so now I'm at a place that was really difficult to get to where I love her and I want the best for her. I want her to be so happy. I'm so glad she was my mother because it maybe the person I am, but my inner peace would be compromise if she was in my life.
Yeah, and there's another reason why you kind of stopped talking to them, because you were a sperm you found you found a surprise me was that. Yeah.
So my mom was adopted when she was about three, and her like her, her biological mother, was so much more mentally than she was, which is usually how it goes. And she got adopted by a lovely family. But we never knew much about our biological side. We knew we had some things from the social paperwork she had from her adoption. But I got our twenty three MEEKID for Christmas one year because I was like, we don't know anything about your DNA, so it wosed to be really exciting.
She didn't want to do it, so I was like, that's weird. So I took the kit and did it. I got all these results. I found out I'm fifty one percent Oshkenazi Jewish. I was like, oh that's cool.
Yeah, that's greater than a chance.
Yeah, my dad was a Jewish. I was like, oh, mom, were Jewish, and she goes, oh, okay. I'm like that's a weird reaction. And I started getting messages from women that were like, oh, we're half siblings. Do you know your dad?
Yeah?
Because I did the I clicked the option where if we do you want a DNA relative to be able to contact you? And I said sure because my mom had simply.
Get like tenth cousins messaging me in there. Yeah, asked hate me up for money.
Yeah.
I'm like, we're not that related and I.
Don't know you that well. But and then I called her, yeah, and I've taped it because when anything potentially terrible happens to a comedian, we're like, how are we gonna make this funny? So I thought it was a joke. There was like, there's no way my dad's not my dad. So I'm going to find out what's up. But as a joke, I filmed it and I was like, I'm about to find out my family's not my family. And then I asked her. I told her about the messages, and I go, is dad my biological dad? Obviously he's
my real dad because he raised me. But she goes. She was hesitant, and I'll go, what go, I'm not a sperm notor baby am I? She goes, and I the thing. You know, I'm still not mad about that part. I think it's very disrespectful that they didn't tell me. I'm mad about all the other stuff honestly that I'm like, I feel like you guys went through great lengths to get me here. It's something to be shamed about. But I get. I get why you didn't tell me. It
wasn't the right choice, but I understand. The thing that upset me is you saw me take the DNA get home. That was your chance to have an honest coversation with me, and you allowed me to find out this way.
Wow, what I mean? That shakes up your world?
It's it's wild. And my I call my brother because their first real their first thing to me was don't tell anybody, which I thought is very unfairer. It's my experience, it's also their experience, but it all it's mine too. And did he know my brother had no idea shocked. Yeah, my whole situation. He's biologically both of my parents, but my whole life. He told me. I was the mailman's baby because I don't look like anybody in my family. My mom is curly hair, and I have curly hair,
but my sperm donor is Jewish. He's the Jewish one has like a jew raw. I'm like, oh, that's where hair it comes from. No, he he passed away. I did. Yeah, yeah, there's one picture of him that I saw that that I was like, I don't look anything like him either. Put we could He he did die. He died by suicide. He died by suicide. And that was an interesting thing to learn because my mother had kind of dangled suicide over me, her own suicide, potential suicide over me, for
so long, and that was interesting. That was like a poetic realization. I'm like, whoa, that's wild.
Oh my god, there's so many letter layers. I don't even know what the word is. Irony or it's all of it. Holy shit, it's all.
And I didn't process this for a year because I was just like what, I just didn't know how to react. I didn't know when people were telling me how to react. And I was trying to be mindful of, like, don't react in a certain way because people are telling you should be mad, honestly not mad about that. Yeah, I think it's cool. I think it's a really unique experience to find out one of your parents is not biologically your parent.
It's an experience, it is. It's a unique experience to go through in life. Yes, to discover there everything you thought you knew about your life is actually not true. It's wild. Not everyone gets to experience that. Yeah. So in terms of it's when we get just to comedy. Did you like did were you always funny? Naturally? Did you start to use it as a defense mechanism? I didn't.
I wasn't one of those people that used it as a defense mechanism. But I was the most joyful when everybody around me was laughing, and especially my mom because it was just we never knew the mood she was going to be in. When my mom and dad and me and my brother were all together laughing. Yeah, the most blissful moments of my life where even as a child, I knew enough to know in that moment like this is beautiful and I only want this, and so I was always chasing that.
Yeah, there is a high there. I mean, that's why people go into lots of different things related field like entertainment, like rock musicians and I think comedians like you both kind of have this dopamine reward when you get immediate real time because there's something special about real time feedback, right, It's like depressing being a scientist and going through a peer review where everyone tells you suck, and then you have a year before the paper even comes out, after
it's accepted, and when it comes out, you get feed maybe positive feedback from like one person, maybe one person reads your paper. So I'm just like, I can see how there's a real peel there to be able to get real time feedback. But at the same time, do you think there's a certain personality that it almost sort of needs that real time feedback, Like is there a need there that's being fulfilled?
Yeah, I think every person on the planet really enjoys media gratification. But that's why social media is huge. The posting a picture of yourself or doing something and then getting rewarded for it is high and you could see the people that get real high off of that, and I'm certainly one of them. But yeah, there's definitely it's so rewarding to connect with a a group of strangers, and it's also really nice. I've been doing it for
over a decade, so I'm super comfortable with it. I can ride the wave, I can crush, I can annihilate a twenty minute set or an hour set, and it's such a huge accomplishment and it's really exciting. But it's also really nice that like people come together, they pay and arrange their lives so that they can be in a room with other strangers to laugh. That is amazing to me.
Well, I love comedy. I mean I even took a course in Santa Monica performed it under an alter ego. Fine, yeah, yeah.
You're Sasha Fear.
Oh yeah, I have. I could say the name of my alter ego when people googling the set, but it's pretty uh he's pretty perverted, the alter ego. But I loved it, absolutely loved it. Yeah, Like I think that if I didn't do this job, I probably would pursue stand up comedy. Yeah.
Oh wow, yeah cool.
Yeah, yeah, it's it's uh, it's just it allows you to really kind of just like be naked, you know, in front of people and just be like this is me, you know. And I also noticed there's a tinge of self deprecation to almost every comedian I've watched. I it's an interesting phenomen I've wanted to discuss this with a fellow comedian listening listen to me with a comedian. There is that kind of you know, I watched once a really strikingly handsome man do comedy and he wasn't funny.
There was something about like kind of and also he came out with this kind of like I'm the best attitude and that combination. No one was like, people are like, you're not a comedian. It's almost like there's like this implicit thing that to be funny you have to almost kind of be relatable and.
Making and self deprecation is I think it's super healthy and it's it's it's a way to kind of gain control of yourself, and it's a way to accept the things about you while making fun of them. At the same time. It's so cathartic. I have so many things to be self deprecating about, and it's really one of my favorite things in comedy is getting roasted and I'm so sensitive. Oh my god, I've been.
Been roasted one of your Comedy Central roasts.
Yeah, I'm not not a common central roast, but in smaller versions of that. But I love it. It's so that's probably the most Catharsis I've ever received on stages. It's getting absolutely annihilated, my character, my look, everything, because it's like, oh, this doesn't matter, it's all fun.
Yeah, there's a great humility there, but there's also like there's a fragility there I see amongst comedians as well, right, yeah, sort of like you know, like if no one's laughing, it's almost like what the fuck are you laughing? And you have to really miss but you get you know, internally, I can see it and upset, like they're upset, like why are you not laughing at me right now?
That's a newbie. Usually that's usually a sign of a newbie. Yeah, because bombing ruined me for about seven years. I remember one time the manager that I have now, he before we work together. He got me a set at Caroline's on Broadway, which was a huge club, and I bombed so hard. I didn't talk for two days. I left the comedy club, didn'tal I just didn't say any words.
And it's a comic's get immediate gratification, but we also get immediate dissatisfaction, like and and when you bomb, you're like, wow, you don't like what I said or how I said it, that's who I am.
Well, it's almost that you take it so personally, it's like you don't like who I am. There, there's like the comedy and the and who you are so intertwined. Yeah. Yeah, but it's also it is really vulnerable putting yourself out there like that. And so I think that's a I'm and just validate you for a second in that experience. I'm such a psychologist. And but it's incredibly vulnable thing
to go out there and be naked. And I don't think audience is really you know if they're heckling, especially like they don't get like that's a human on the stage there who literally put themselves out there and been like like, you know, I'm going to just say the most intimate things about my life and and and share things, you know. So yeah, it's no, I get it. I can get that way. That would be incredibly upsetting.
Yeah, but then you do it for enough time and you're like, oh, come ha me bro.
And that's the beautiful thing, right when you can handle that kind of rejection. I recently took up a hobby of magic. Maybe I'll do some magic. Yeah. But and I so I set up a shop. I set up a table in Santa Monica on the beach path, and I started to enjoy the rejection. It's good practice. Yes, it's like, you know, i'd be like, hey, do you want to free magic show? No, I'm good.
You know you don't want to see my magic magic.
I feel like I told at both.
But you live through that moment and you're like, oh, I've thrown.
All the rejections and it got made a reel of all the rejections. They're funny, you know. But so I think it's like, there's it's great to be able to learn that muscle. Yeah.
And I might have abandonment issues, and so being abandoned by a group of strangers and getting through that improving yourself. You're proving yourself you're not going to die, You're not a bad person. But I had to go through years of tears to build the strength. But the strength that it gives you is huge.
Good on you. I mean, someone of the abandonment issues doing comedies. I'm trying to think of a funny analogy. But you can think of a funny analogy that it's like someone who is scared. I don't know, what do you think of something.
Somebody who's allergic to cats as a zoo keeper?
Thank you for I needed a comedian all the stot to come up with. But I knew that you were thinking what I same thing. I was thinking. Yeah, so good on you. I really do want to talk about the psychology of relationships, the psychology of sexuality. I have a whole bunch of questions related to the sexuality to mean, but let's talk about relationships for a second. Personally. How's that played out for you? Oh? So bad?
So when I'm realizing this, you know, hindsight twenty twenty and especially learning about trauma and the brain. You know, to trauma makes you behave in ways made me behave in ways that I was really ashamed of. And I just blame myself because I didn't understand the neuroscience of trauma and I didn't understand that your brain looks different in a brain scan when you've been traumatized, like you're just your fight or flight. There's nothing I'm wrong with you.
Your body's actually working correctly, and so that was really interesting. So my relationships, when someone would give me a ten, I think when you are neglected as a kid and kind of emotionally abuse, when someone gives you attention, it feels so good and you're like, oh my god, this is what it feels like to be seen that you don't even qualify. Is this person good? Are we compatible? Emotionally? Intellectually? You don't even You skip all that stuff because it's
such a high. It's like heroin, and so you'll do anything to not let that go because I've never experienced that before. So I think when you grow up with an unstable family life, your relationship life is kind of set up to fail in a way. It's not necessarily true, but for me it was. And so a lot of mind games and manipulations with my first boyfriend, and so out of revenge, he cheated on me, which everyone told
me he was. I'm like, no, he loves me and you sheailed me, and as revenge, I was like, I'm gonna date your bassist, and I did. Lovely man. He we dated for three years. He was so sweet. I've never dated somebody who's sweet before. But then after that, I was bad again. So the relationship I'm in now
is the most beautiful, rewarding relationship ever. We started out super Yeah, we started out kind of toxic, but I greatly contributed to that dynamic because I was projecting him hurting me and I didn't realize I was doing that, and I was I was. I think anybody can sense, like an audience consents when a comic's desperate for you to like them. I just kind of projected these insecurities.
And then I also was so desperate for him not to go anywhere, and he was like, I gotta go, and so his body was reacting in a healthy way. So but yeah, we've gone come to a place where it's so beautiful and it's so we feel we're like little kids when we're together, and we've carved out a really safe space for each other. And so I realized, like, oh, this is for you. Thank you. I do too, And he's his in Our little kid comes out when we're together, My little inner kid comes out and it's safe, and
so that's a rare. That's very rare for me. So but my friendships were really There was one the year that I stopped talking to my parents. I also blocked. I blocked them, which is crazy but social yeah, social media, but also the phone number. Like I had I do a bit about it where I'm like, before I press press block, I was like, am I allowed to do this? Because sew up their ass that it was just unheard of, I know, but I stopped talking to them. I stopped
talking to my best friend of fifteen years. Wow, she had borderline and it was just reliving the mom thing, did your mom?
Because I literally diagnosed her at all.
So, knowing everything I know about border life, I've read so many books about it, I'm like, yeah, one hundred percent, it's just she always thinks we're out together. Yeah, yeah, you nailed it, and she always yeah. It's so frustrating. And I would get triggered by my best friend at the time too because she would behave in the same way. So I realized that I was just re You recreate the dynamic until you you overcome the dynamic.
Absolutely, and all caveats aside, We don't mean to stigmatize people with borrowlying, right, there are plenty people borerline who are perfectly wonderful people to.
Have self actualized ye.
But there are people who don't do the work right. And that's kind of what we're focusing on right now.
You know, I try. I don't I like diagnose my my mother because I don't know. But there I have a joke. When I try to talk about our mental illness on stage. I'm still trying to find ways so that the audience isn't like, oh, that's sad. I'm like, oh, really, fuck, but there is one joke that works every time. Yeah, And I'm like I was, you know, I always thought it was my problem. Like growing up, I'm like, why am I so dumb? Because our relationship was so fraught.
And I was in a bookstore one day and I passed by a book. The title, the real title of the book was You're not crazy, it's your mother. And I was like, huh, oh that book has to say And I read the book front to back in three bit days and I learned about narcissistic personality disorders. When I say in the joke and I'm like, I call my brother in the middle of the night, I'm like, DJ, Mom's not bipolar, she's a bitch. I cannot know that. But narcissism is who like people. I thought narcissism was
being full of yourself. That's not what it is. It is controlling, and it's I mean, there's various types, but like like if you how dare you upset me? How dare like? That was kind of the attitude I was met with by my mom and kind of my dad.
Well, usually with borderline you tend to find high levels of what's called vulnerable narcissism, which is sort of like, because I've suffered, I'm entitled to everything around me. It's not a because I'm superior to others. I'm entitled. It's because I am for fragile and I like and no one seems to understand what I'm going through. And usually that's correlated with a victim mindset, so like a perpetual
we called a perpetual victim mindset. Of course some of us are victimized, and it's quite right to to acknowledge that, but we're talking about perpetual Where she was your mother kind of the victim of every kind of situation and your own needs.
What needs, Yeah, I felt I despised my needs. I despised if I needed help with anything. I despised needing guidance, which is that hurt me.
So how did you learn to trust yourself? Because in that kind of situation, a lot of people grew up and they were and they kind of describe it as like, I feel like I have no bottom, no center, no center of being. I don't know who I am. Did you ever go through that period event?
Oh my god, about five years of I mean I didn't know who I was the whole time, and that was jarring because you're like, was this all I was? Just putting on a mask?
Fuck?
And then you have to do the hard work of excavating yourself from the rubble. But I would cry in my therapist's office so often, like I don't know who I am, and she's like, that makes sense. Of course you don't know who you are. You've been told who you are by your family. They tell you and it's and instead of going no, that's not me that somebody with a sense of self would do, you bought into
it because you wanted to be loved by them. It's survival, so you're these mechanisms were in place to keep you alive. But I am just now getting to know myself. Oh the past year.
Oh yeah, who are you? Oh?
I'm I'm I'm so curious. I'm one of the most curious people I know. I believe in magic. I believe in aliens and ghosts and the transformative power of psychedelic drugs, and I believe that life can be fun all the time.
Wow, yeah, you left something out. You're also into extreme weather.
I love tornadoes. I know they're incredible. I want to do it. I missed out on it this season because the spring is almost done. But you can do tornado chasing with storm chasers, being in front of a tornado, like seeing I least live in Virginia Tonado.
Yeah that's emotional.
Yeah, doc, I mean, you're very correct, But there's something so awe inspiring and humbling. Nature is so humbling, it's so necessary. And I believe plants are sentient. There's all these experiments about this. One guy did an experiment that I learned in a in a workshop with Laurelan Jackson, who's a renowned psychic medium. I'm obsessed with her, where they hooked plants up to an ekg. The guy, the scientist, left his studio and had a timer set where he
found this animal. He wanted to find an animal that only lives a couple of days, and there's a certain shrimp at the bottom of a river that only live about a day or two. So he didn't feel bad killing them, so he dumped them. Once the timer went off, he got out of his studio because he didn't want to affect it. He dumped the shrimp into boiling hot water, and the EKG on the plants was going nuts. And
so there you go. Plants are sentient like they and I think that is the most interesting, beautiful facet of life.
Well, we do discuss in this podcast different theories of consciousness, and I do feel like we're we've opened up fifty different threads at once and haven't closed any.
But that's my mom. Let's say what conscious plants feel? You know? What do you say plants feel?
You know feel? You know? Well, But there is a certain theory of consciounce that consciousness is fundamental, that it's you know, we're It's more that we are tapping into a universal consciousness. It's not like we have our own consciousness that is completely circumscribed in our brain. Right. So there are some really interesting theories that that do We've opened real scientific possibilities for everything to sort of have a certain level of consciousness all you know, biological organisms
and whether plants are conscious. I think it's still open for really legitimate scientific debate and discussions.
So yeah, but can narcissism be cured?
The narcissism and the extent to which it can change really depends on what kind of narcisism you have. So if you score really high in what's called grandiose narcissism, which is like I am, that's like the braggioso kind of narcissist, like the Kanye West, you know, like literally literally I'm Jesus or whatever. If you believe you're Jesus. It turns out those people it's very hard to change them, Like you know, I'm a This is coming from mysts
from Scott Berry Kauffman, who's like a humanistic psychologists. I believe in the fundamental potential for growth for everyone. But with that said, the ones that end up in clinical therapy either tend to be the grandiose narcissists who've been forced to be there by their girlfriends or this is a fact, there's only two types of narcists. You will see it in a clinician's couch. Is the one that the grandiose narcissist who's been forced and and and and
really doesn't change at all. They're resentful that they have to be there, or the vulnerable narcissist who has reached a point of depression and anxiety, because you do tend to find anxiety and depression quite high in those who's high in vulnerable narcisism. We we've done work on this. We've rerit a paper on the clinical correlates of different
types of narcissism. So we know that the real, big, vulnerable, vulnerable one is vulnerable narcissism because if you're not getting that attention and validation, because you you kind of feel broken inside a lot of people scriding vulnerationis they don't feel they're superior at all. They feel like they are fundamentally worthless. It's I call it the entitlement paradox. I coined that love that you like that love the title
in paradox? Do you like the phrase great because on the one hand, you feel like, Okay, Gregg GERALDO, you know the comedian.
We share the same manager share.
Yeah, yes, he's rest in peace.
Yeah, he was a great, great comedian.
I have a quote from him in my new book on I'm writing a book about vulnerable narcissism, and I have a quote from him. He says, my whole life, I've felt like a piece of shit at the center of the universe. And I think that perfectly encapsulates the vulnerable narcisism kind of mentally as well as a lot of comedians I think feel that way. Do you resonate with that?
Yeah, I'm so self aware the years of work that when I get into the victim mentality, I know it right away and I go, we're doing the victim thing again? Does not do this dance?
Amazing?
Yeah, it is. It's great. One other thing a theory that I've kind of come up with that I'm curious of your thoughts about narcissism and borderline not things like sociopathy, because I have friends who are teachers who teach like three year olds and they're like, no, you could show up, you border sociopath. I've seen it. I've seen it, and they've told me stories. I'm like, oh, okay, yep, you can.
There's a particular phrase for that, because you don't label those kids a little psychopaths. It's called like a you know, like like impulsive avoid.
Yeah, sure, but yeah I can say that. But borderline and narcissism is a response.
We don't want to self fulfilling prophecy with these kids?
Is that why I behave? It's like if you think your boyfriend's cheating and you keep asking them, he's like, well, now I'm going.
To put a label psychopath and a three year old they won't grow up.
But borderline and narcissism are response to an event or to being treated a certain way.
Right, Oh well, everything's a nature nurture mix everything, So you can't put some things in a box that's like purely socialization and not genes and say those are just purely genes and not everything.
Actually, would you argue narcisism is genetic? Can it be genetic?
Everything including narcissism? One percent? There's a genetic basis to it, everything including your introversion, extroversion, your You can go down the list of all your personality traits, whether or not you're open to new experiences or not, they all have a genetic basis, which just simply means a temperament. You know that you you certainly, certainly you can acknowledge that there's a continuity of temperament you've had your whole life,
even though you word and grow traumatic. Yes, you know, even though you've been on this amazing journey, there's still a temperament. There's still like an inner core to you. And when narcissism is true, it shows it shows itself very early. Really yeah. Yeah, some of these clusters of traits tend to show themselves very early in life and can be amplified by the environment.
Then if you are raising a child and you see signs of narcissism in your child, can you steer them in the other director?
You can? I really do think you can through nurturing and off and uh and real firm parenting.
Yeah, and showing them, like I think, proving to them how good it feels to connect with people, and how good it feels to like, you know, my girlfriends and I we always just pump each other up. We're like, yeah, page, you're two any bait Like that feels so good?
And when you wait, I want to be one of your girlfriends.
Yeah that no, But my group of friends are amazing badass I believe, like truly, like I've one of the one of the biggest modalities of healing that I've engaged in for myself is getting a group of friends that see me and hear me and go up and be a little psycho today. But hey, girls, sometimes psycho like it's okay.
I have my friends like that too, And there you've got a treasure.
Yeah.
Yeah, But psychopathy is an interesting one because you can have the brain of a psycho path and not develop any outward behaviors that are bad or moral because you had a really caring, nurturing family that you grew up in. It's the combination that's particularly bad.
Can I ask you another psychology question?
To ask me anything? This is something that's this is the psychology podcast.
Okay, perfect, I'm so glad I'm here. I don't have a therapist right now.
By the way, this is a chill pill and you can have this at any point.
Thank you so doing. Guys, we fucked for ten years getting all the emails from people. I almost felt a little silly for being naive to this, but we we just get thou I mean, we probably have hundreds of thousands of emails. That's not an examination. I exaggerate everything from people who were raped or from people who are abused as children sexually abuse. Pedophilia fascinates me because I can look at the people I know in my life. Eighty percent of them were affected by pedophilia. It is
so rampant. Yeah, they either as somebody in their pedophile in their family. Really yeah.
Yeah, the base of the population, it's.
Crazy high to the point where I'm like, this is wild. And so it's been happening since a lot for a long time with the history of humanity.
It was normalized in the Greek era, right, a little boy, you know that, the status social status.
Yeah, and and like, well, you know Alice in Wonderland, that's one of my favorite books. But the Lewis Carroll wasp like he was in love with Alison. Yeah you sorry, Well no, I didn't know that when I fell in love with Alice in Wonderland and I was talking about holding opposites, right, sorry, but you can still enjoy it. You ruined it for Well, my brain isn't a trauma brain anymore. So it's not black or white. It's not
you're either good or bad. So I can hold that, like somebody can write this beautiful book and also be a better vile But I'm like, this is such a rampant thing, and it's so interesting. I think one of the reasons why it's so rampant is because everybody's so scared to talk about it. And I think I find that very interesting given that so many people in my life are affected by it.
Right, Well, I'm really sorry that many people in your life have been affected, But I didn't. I didn't. That's very high. I have noticed a very high number of comedians joke about pedophilia. Just topped the other day, I went I went to the Naked Comedy show. I was telling you about that. Yeah, first time I've ever been to such a comedy show. And I thought they were so brave to go. I was like, I'm not that I admire them, you know, like, but but but the penephilla.
That was a topic that's just like it seems to be something. It seems to be like we use humor in a way to really process and well, what is it?
You can explain it to me, Well, and you look at the psychology of a joke that's like kind of you know, a joke that's edgy or you know, from a comedic standpoint, from a writing standpoint, the victim of whatever you're talking about can never.
Be the butt of the joke. That's just because that it's not. And that's why you know, people get pissed off,
comedians will get canceled. But it's but if you take zoom out from the canceling and the politicizing, you go, it's not funny when you're just kicking someone when they're down right, But when you can make when you are the victim of something really tragic and you make a joke and you put the perpetrator in their place in a way that makes other people feel validated who've been through that, it's the most healing I think it is. I could think of.
Yeah, it's a great point.
Hurt people. Hurt people is kind of bullshit because most of the cases I was hurt and I I mean, of course we're all going to hurt people in our lives, but nowhere near the damage that was done to me, because because being hurt made me feel so bad, I would never want.
So that's a myth that hurt people, hurt people think is a myth most people. There are a lot of myths about like trauma, and I'm actually writing a whole book on this right now.
That's great because the Instagram community trauma influencers know, there's some.
Really trauma is such a shit show.
It's like, it's not an excuse for you to be a piece as ship.
Well that's the that's the main thesis of my book.
Yeah, that's that's very much needed.
Thank you. I can't wait to share it with you. Yeah, not because you, Yeah, I think you enjoy this. But I mean everything is a combination of nature nurture, right, So, I mean I think there are certain you know, genes contribute to urges, you know, just like there's genes for alcohol urges, right, Like, but what can all these people who overcome all sorts of tendencies and urges they have for you know, those who are predisposed genetically towards alcohol
tend to have family who were addicts. No shit, you're getting their genes.
Yeah, so you have it genetically and you have a model, and you're.
Getting the environment. If you get both the genes and the environment, that could be really tough. Ye. But but the most the hurt people hurt people. Think I think most people who have been through terrible things tend to have develop a greater empathy and sensitivity. Usually the siblings of those who have the full bown illness tend to have a watered down version of it that is more caring and empathetic. And you see that with creativity as well.
I've studied the mental illness link to creativity for twenty years. I've studied that topic, published neuroscience papers on it, and you do find that children descendants of those who had a full bown mental illness, as particularly schizophrenia. Yeah. Yeah, but the children get a water down version called schizotippy, which is a personality trait. It's like schizophrenia light.
Oh that sounds fun. He's just cookie.
I got a little of that myself, to be honest.
Oh really, yeah, schizophrenia is no joke. Man.
Well I don't have schizophrenia, but schizop schizotippy I think has really fueled my creativity and imagination.
Yeah, because you could be goofy, you could be a little off, which I love people.
With imagination as well.
Totally totally.
Yeah, I may have a really rich imagination. That's schizophrenia full blown cases. Your imagination is so great that you can't differentiate. If you haven't light, then that means that's kind of fun. I can go through I go into like a real fantasy world and be able to know that it's fantasy.
Yes, and get yourself out of it. So Laura l and Jackson was talking about earlier. She has two books that are just amazing. I was introduced to her from the Netflix docu series Surviving Death. That show changed my life and got me on the wormholes that I'll be on for the rest of my life. But I've taken a lot of workshops with her. I've seen her do readings.
She integrates a lot of science into her abilities. She's had ekg's while she's giving a reading, and her brain scan reads as if she's in a coma while she's reading, which is really interesting. And she co taught this workshop that Oh, they shared one thing. I want to I would love to see what you think of this, but she said schizophrenic. This is her spiritual explanation. So well,
you know, we'll never know. But she's like, we're all, well, we're born, you know, we're spirits incarnating in a body. We have to like lower our vibration to be in a bot because the Earth is just a very low, heavy dense energy. But with skits of a lot of times when people are born schizophrenic, we're all born with a Dunce cap that kind of caps all this universal knowledge because if we if we had it all at the same time, we would be completely overwhelmed our nervousys and
would be fucked with schizophrenia. The Dunce caps tipped a little bit and stuff's getting it and it's just a extreme overwhelming of the nervous.
Well, that's actually really scientific accurate. It's called reduced lead and inhibition.
To tell her the techniculture, Oh, I don't know, you talk about it. I'm seeing her in a couple of weeks.
My whole dissertation was about, well not the whole, but a big part of my PhD dissertation was on the link between reduced lean inhibition and creativity. And it turns out that those with full blon and schizophrenic episodes, they're leading inhibition is solo that they really can't filter out things that they should be filtering out as irrelevant. So there's lots of things in our environment that are relevant to the goal that we have in our mind. But
people with schizophrenia they find meaning in everything. Everything becomes relevant. So that that thing's talking to me over there, Suddenly it's relevant that Corona is what corona? Why you look at me like that, you know what I'm saying. But there, you're you're, you're, you're kind of drowning and meaning. Oh quite put it that way. But there is beauty in finding greater meaning. So if you can lower the dial, basically, don't throw the baby out in the bathwater, is what
I'm saying. I don't like stigmatizing people, right, and a lot of the ones that.
I've met, I'm like, you're sweet and kind and totally God. I bet you would write a killer script if you could just dial it down for a second.
What we want to help them do is not become someone else, But we want to dial that down a little bit. Let them be able to ground themselves in reality. It's called reality monitoring. They suck it reality monitoring.
Yeah yeah, But.
If we can help them with that, then they can still keep their rich imagination. They can get they get to keep, you know, seeing life with a sense of meaning because being able to infuse your life with such meaning can be a source of transcendence.
Oh my gosh. Yeah, And we're the only creatures on the planet out of all the animals that like need meaning the way that we do. Another fascinating thing that I'll remember until I died that I learned in this exact workshop. She co taught it, like I said, with a scientist. I have his name in my email if you're interested. But I'm like, this is worthy of looking into on a large scale. They did a study of nonverbal autistic children, and they showed video footage from their study.
This woman has had three kids. One of them was non verbal autistic. They taught that son a communication method with a It was a piece of paper that looked like a keyboard, and he could spell out words. He could totally communicate. He was super smart, very funny, like his personality came out once they had this. And her youngest son, who does not have he's neurotypical. Right is
the word? She goes, Mommy, Mommy, I forget what the autistic child's name was, but let's say, Dan, if you go upstairs on the third floor of our house and write a word on a piece of paper, Dan will tell you what the word is. He's like psychic And she's like what, So she did it. She went upstairs, or he said, if you word. She was like, okay,
this is weird. So she went upstairs and wrote a word on a piece of paper, came down to her nonverbal autistic son in the kitchen, and he told her exactly what the word was, and they they from there did this study where they tested it wasn't psychic abilities, but they're so sensitive. Nonverbal autistic people have such a beautiful sensitivity. And I'm like, whoaoa, whoa. They can pick up what you said. That is mind blowing. That's mind blowing.
Yeah.
Have you do you know anything.
About Oh yeah, I do quite quite amount of work with twice exceptional kids who are gifted and autistic. Scientific director of Bridges Academy, which is a special school for kids who are twice exceptional. And these twice exceptional kids are extraordinary in they hold together paradoxes that society tends to treat people. You're either gifted or you're orning disabled. Yeah, but you know a lot of kids are so not just sensitive, just so brilliant at connecting dots and seeing patterns.
Pattern detection seems to be a real a big plus from autism.
Yeah, you know, I think autistic people could save the world. Actually, yeah, And I'm like, look, can we all not sleep on that, Like, let's look into this more and figure out how.
They feel body on musk. But he's certainly on that autism spectrum. Yeah, he's done a lot for this world, right, Yeah, And and uh Zuckerbergo is openly autistic. Oh is he?
I didn't know that, I think, so it makes sense, yeah, not to diagnose people, but yeah, and.
Then there are and then there are plenty of women who are on the auto spectrum, but they have shame over it because it's not as like accepted if you're a woman in this a mask a lot, and I think that's really sad that they have to they feel as they had the mask.
Yeah. I I there was a point at one point in my life where someone was like, are you autistic or I'm like.
I don't know.
But then I looked at all these videos of me as a kid. I would always flap my hands and it's almost like I'm autistic, and that's like the marker. I'm like, oh, okay, But and I try to take an online test, I'm like, that's not the way to go an online.
Honestly, only almost every commune I've ever met, eventually, after talking to me, becomes convinced there yeah, Neil Brennan.
Yeah, but you can make a case.
But he took a test, right he I we got him to a whole panel of things.
What is the Is there a marker for autism in terms of because there's such variations of it, but like, is there one or two things that if you check off these things?
Like it's more complicated, there's a lot of it's a big checklist. Yeah, it's not just I would never mention just yeah, it's thorough. I would never just mention one or two things. You know, But you are good at looking me in the eyes. Oh yeah, I don't. I don't get it all just to GI vibe from you for what That's where I get a little neurotic, a little do I know what I get from you?
Yeah, let's.
I get a little neurotic. I get a little insecure, but but like immensely confident at the same time. I feel like you're a parent walking paradox. You walk around like I don't know which side is going to come out when you know.
That's true.
But maybe a lot of that comes down to who you're with and whether you feel comfortable. You know, I feel like if you don't feel comfortable around someone, you probably like shut down.
Oh yeah, I'm a totally different person.
Yeah, that's my prediction about you.
Yeah, that's accurate.
It's it's been such a delight talking to you today. I know, I know, we don't have much more time. There's just one one more thing I want to bring up because I've been really enjoying watching your stand up and I feel like there's a lot of psychology. I really recommend people watch you who are interested in psychology because you bring up a lot of psychological insights that just off the cuff, like you don't realize it, but but you I'm like, she nailed it. You know. Cool
this one, I I thought you nailed it. You talking about how are boys and girls? How do they raise differently? Right? Yeah? And then you made this joke about how the wires got crossed. Oh yeah, it kind of points to the socialization processes as we have as boys and girls. Can you talk a little bit about that?
Yeah, so the joke. I love this joke.
I love it too, I really love it. I say, you nailed it.
Thank you. I appreciate that, So I say, I go, I talk about like, I'm a straight woman, and if anybody in here thinks people could pick their sexuality, talk to them. You're a straight lady. We wouldn't pick this. We're tired. And I talk about how I think it's a miracle that straight people get along and let alone find love, because we're raised to be such polar opposite people,
even though we have so much in common. And I go, you have little boys growing up being told by the world you can be mad, but you can't be sad because that's chickshit. And then you have little girls growing up being told by the world you could be sad and cry, but don't get mad because that temper will scare everybody away.
True.
And then as a result, you have these men walking around going, oh, I'm so sad, and these women are like, I'm so angry.
What do I do?
And the wires are crossed?
And that's that explains social media content. Gendered content. Yes, all the all the you know, the bros. You're you're not fulling anyone, bro.
Grow to a drug store. Look at the deodorance. The man's deodorant is called wolf thorn and the women's deodorant is Lilac.
Yeah yeah, Okay. See that's why I like, I secretly want to be a comedian because like when I call out things like that, people I get pounced on. I made a joke I made. I tried to make a joke on my Instagram about like, you know, most of Instagram are well, guys trying to convince each other they're strong, like saying they're strong, and women saying that they're worthy. Yea yes, And I was like, that's basically what I'm seeing on my feed. Yeah, you know, but I got trouble from that. Yeah.
Only good people cause trouble. You're like leading edge people cause trouble. Yeah. And also it makes sense for you to be a comedian because you actually have a front row seat to the human condition.
I do, and it's absurd.
Yeah, And so you see the absurdity for your job under a micro scope, and that's what comedians are trying to do, so you can live a double life.
Should well. Thank you so much for being on the Psychology podcast. Thank you were awesome.
Thanks