Good Inside with Dr. BeckyGabby Bernstein Helps Dr. Becky With Her Anxiety
EVERY SPOKEN WORD
35 min read · 6,760 words- 0:00 – 0:00
Intro
- BEDr. Becky
[keyboard typing]
- 0:00 – 1:01
Good Inside Membership: expert-guided parenting support + community
- BEDr. Becky
Why is it so hard to find reliable answers to parenting questions? How is it in 2022 parents still search on Google for answers from strangers? [keyboard typing] Well, now there's a better way. Introducing the Good Inside Membership, an expert-guided, community-powered platform redefining modern parenting. In our library, you'll find hundreds of bite-sized videos, articles, scripts, and workshops tackling the trickiest parenting topics, and it doesn't stop here. We've created a private community guided by me, Dr. Becky, and coaches trained in the Good Inside Parenting method. Here, you can ask questions, connect with other parents, or attend a live event on a topic that matters to you. This is the parenting handbook that doesn't exist. This is parenting advice at your fingertips, where you need it, when you need it the most. This is Good Inside Membership. Hi, I'm
- 1:01 – 3:41
Dr. Becky’s mission + episode setup: asking for live anxiety help
- BEDr. Becky
Dr. Becky, and this is Good Inside. I'm a clinical psychologist and mom of three on a mission to rethink the way we raise our children. I love translating deep thoughts about parenting into practical, actionable strategies that you can use in your home right away. One of my core beliefs is that we are all doing the best we can with the resources we have available to us in that moment. So even as we struggle, and even as we are having a hard time on the outside, we remain good inside. I have Gabby Bernstein on the podcast today, and I am so excited. Gabby is a number one New York Times best-selling author. She just came out with her ninth, that's right, ninth book. She's an international speaker, and she's become a good friend of mine. In today's episode, I do something I haven't really done before. I ask Gabby to help me with something I'm feeling really anxious about, and she walks me through some of her tried and true techniques live right here for you to listen to. Let's jump in. Hi, Gabby. I am so, so happy that you're here with me today.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Hello, my guru. [laughs] I'm here with a cold and a funky voice because I would not let this moment pass me.
- BEDr. Becky
Wow, I feel the exact same way about you, and I have loved connecting with you over the past year. So here we are, and what I'm really excited for is kind of our diving into this topic today of anxiety, which is something I think every single person would raise their hand and say, "Anxiety, yep. I, I have that. I've experienced that." And yet it's also one of those words that I think it, it's so hard to, like, really even understand. Like, what is it? How do we feel it? How do we experience it, and what can we do [laughs] when we're feeling it? So before we jump into that together, can you tell everyone a little bit about kind of who you are and the types of things that you're interested in?
- 3:41 – 4:46
Meet Gabby Bernstein: trauma-to-peace focus and ‘Happy Days’
- GBGabby Bernstein
So I am a author of nine books. My ninth book, Happy Days: The Guided Path from Trauma to Profound Freedom and Inner Peace, is out right now, which is just major for me 'cause it's... I'll, I'll explain more about that. I am a motivational speaker. I have a podcast called Dear Gabby, but most importantly, I am a mama to Oliver, my three-year-old, who is my guru. I joke that, that Dr. Becky's my guru, but my son is my only guru. And I'm a mom to Jimmy Blue, my kitten, and a wife to Zach, and I am also a wonderful employer, I believe. I have really great, a really great team that I know love me, and I love them. So that's actually in my new bio that I just wrote for myself. [laughs]
- BEDr. Becky
I love that. So many, and in kind of internal family systems language, right, so many parts of you that are all so true and so important. So this word, anxiety, I don't know. Let's just, like, riff off that. Like, what, what has that been like for you in your life? When you hear that word, how do you imagine it or describe it? Let's jump in there.
- 4:46 – 8:32
Gabby’s anxiety story: sobriety, spiritual practice, and recovered childhood trauma
- GBGabby Bernstein
Well, I had lived with a undiagnosed anxiety disorder for decades. All the while, I was a spiritual teacher studying yoga modalities, teaching meditation, using my meditation practice as, like, the lifeline because-
- BEDr. Becky
Hmm
- GBGabby Bernstein
... instead of living without anxiety, I was managing my anxiety with my spiritual practice.
- BEDr. Becky
Hmm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Prior to this, this being a spiritual teacher and having a spiritual practice, I was managing my, my anxiety with cocaine [laughs] and alcohol. I got sober at 25 and then decided to find better ways to live and coexist with anxiety but not get to the bottom of it.
- BEDr. Becky
Hmm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Only until I was 36 years old, I'd been over a decade working as a spiritual teacher. I'd authored at least half a dozen or more books at that point, and I had a dream of being sexually abused as a child. And I woke up that morning, and I just said, "Hell no, not touching that." A few days later, I was with my therapist. In my therapist's office, sh- she said one or two things that just really let me return to acceptance of the memory.
- BEDr. Becky
Hmm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Retrieve the memory. And so in my therapist's office, I was just like This is real. This did happen. And when I say retrieve the memory, like retrieve the full body acceptance that this thing happened to me. But I couldn't get all the fragmented pieces put together quite yet, or not even really. I mean, there was images and sensations, but there wasn't a full understanding, but there was a knowing, "Yes, this happened to me." And what that meant to me was, first, it was a lot of relief. It was like, "Oh, okay, this is why I was a cocaine addict. This is why I have an anxiety disorder. This is why I try to control every corner of my life. This is why I'm now a workaholic. This is why, this is why." And then very quickly it became, "Okay, well, I feel like shit. How am I gonna get myself to safety?" But the relief came in knowing why I had that anxiety. So when folks- when we as the collective suffer from anxiety, it's our body saying that there's an unresolved emotional disturbance that is in the way of our natural ability to regulate. And so you can correct me 'cause you're the, you're the therapist, but I am the devoted patient [laughs] who has put hundreds of thousands of hours into this. And what I've come to understand now is that if we manage the anxiety, and there are tools for, for just calming our nervous system in the moment, all of that is beautiful: meditation, breathwork, a lot of what I'll teach today. It's beautiful, it's impactful, it's necessary. But really what I believe underneath it is the deep dive into undoing the patterns from our history that keep us stuck and truncated in this habitual response to unresolved traumas. Traumas with a big T, small t, whatever they may be. Absolutely affect us as parents, as I'm sure you've spoken about many times. And I think that it's a lot safer than you think to go to those places that scare you.
- BEDr. Becky
Hmm. There's so many things that are going on for me as you're sharing. First, and Gabby, you and I have talked about so many different things not on anyone's podcast, but I didn't know about that part of your history until literally this moment, and I really mean this just me to you, like thank you for, for sharing that with me, and it's clearly been like a really important part of your story, so thank you. And one of the things I guess that's coming up most powerfully
- 8:32 – 10:26
What anxiety is signaling: unresolved emotional disturbance + trauma (big T and small t)
- BEDr. Becky
for me now is I have often thought about anxiety as it's kind of like our body's way of saying like, "I don't wanna be in my body right now." And when there are things that are unresolved, right, like you said, or unattended to probably because until, you know, these moments they've been too dangerous to look at. You know, they felt that way. When they surface in any way, even though, like you said, it's never in some coherent story. No one says, "Oh, I remember this thing that was so awful that happened when my, you know, when I was young." No one says that because inherently the things were so impactful because they weren't processed for us and held in our kind of closest relationship, so you can't develop that coherence, right? But when they come up, if your threat system activates, your body essentially says like, "I need to run away from this." But it's really hard to run away from feelings and memories and sensations in your own body. It's like you're trying to run away from yourself in that moment, and to me, that is so much anxiety. And for anyone listening, just so you all know, Gabby said something about like a big T trauma, little t trauma. Big T trauma would be something that we can kind of point to as distinct events, right? So being abused as a child, living through, you know, some civil war, right? These are like big T events. Small t traumas can lead to a lot of anxiety too, which is essentially the feeling of something happened that my body registered with a lot of uncomfortable, distressing sensations, and I was alone with that. Like, right? And small t traumas can be series of feeling misunderstood by your family and feeling unseen and feeling rejected and feeling alone, right? And both of those types can lead to the buildup of anxiety in our body.
- 10:26 – 16:50
IFS lens: anxiety as a protector part and the practice of compassionate curiosity
- GBGabby Bernstein
That's right. And what you're talking-- I think anxiety, I know anxiety is a part of us that shows up as a form of protection. We can unpack IFS or we can just use it very directly, right? So internal family systems is what we're talking about here. And the, the premise being that we have all these different parts, and the parts of us that were chilled, those inner child parts that were so traumatized or neglected or even bullied, small t trauma, bullied-
- BEDr. Becky
Mm-hmm
- GBGabby Bernstein
... they are just locked up under lock and key in the basement. You know, goodbye, don't wanna feel you. And so anxiety is a protection, with air quotes, a protector to anesthetize that child part. To say, "Nope, not going there, but I'm gonna activate anxiety, or I'm gonna activate worry, or I'm gonna activate alcoholism, or I'm gonna act-" These different-
- BEDr. Becky
Yes
- GBGabby Bernstein
... parts of us that, quote unquote, "protect us" from ever facing the impermissible fears and feelings of those exiled children that we've locked up. With that said, I think if you can see anxiety first and foremost with tremendous compassion and curiosity and just say, "Oh, wow, you've been there trying to help me. I'd like to learn more about you. What are you protecting? And what do I know about you?" And to speak to it in that way, get to know it, be curious and compassionate towards it, it will have a lot to reveal to you.
- BEDr. Becky
That is so powerful, right? This idea that we often talk to our, kind of in again in air quotes, "symptoms" in adulthood with so much anger Right? What's wrong with you? What is wrong with me? Would anyone else be feeling this way? I overreact to everything. I wish I didn't feel this way, right? And what you're talking about is approaching these intense, although often inconvenient and distressing feelings [laughs] in our body with this compassionate curiosity. So Gabby, here's what I'm thinking. You're someone who has developed such a big repertoire of skills. Like, you really have. And one of the things I know you and I love talking about is, like, this balance of, like, deeply understanding what's going on and also understanding we all need really concrete, practical skills to go along with those kind of deeper understandings. So I was hoping you could teach me and, and the community that's listening some of your kind of go-to techniques for anxiety, given we all know it's, it's so prevalent and we could all use to kind of freshen up our anxiety toolbox.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Let's do it. And I think, like, w- what I do want to acknowledge is that while we have deeper work to do to retrieve those ch- small children that we've been [laughs] exiling, we can begin releasing the anxiety today by first and foremost, as we just said earlier, becoming curious, compassionate towards, and really interested in this part of us that's just speaking up loudly because we need some support. The same way Becky teaches us to really connect to that child when they're having a meltdown, this is a way of connecting to a part of us that's a child, that, that protect- is protecting a child part, right? So it doesn't have... It needs a voice. That's the first step. And so just get curious. You know, "What do you need from me right now, anxiety? How could I help you? What could I do to make you feel safer?" And then you can turn to any one of these tools that I'm offering today as an answer, as a response. You know, "Okay, that thing Gabby taught me, and that will make me feel better now."
- BEDr. Becky
So before you get to those other things, just 'cause I wanna make this perfectly clear, 'cause I think some people will hear that and they'll be like, "What does she mean by, like, asking my anxiety?" But this is where you and I, I think, are like, "No, we literally mean that." Like, you're feeling really uncomfortable. Your chest is tight or you notice, right? You're like, "Oh, I'm like totally going to, like, all my worries, worries, worries, worries." And are you saying, Gabby, that, like, there could be something to sitting down and saying, "Hi, anxiety. You're, you're trying to tell me something. What do you need?" Like, is that what you literally mean?
- GBGabby Bernstein
That's what I literally mean. [laughs]
- BEDr. Becky
I know. Because the first time I tried this with myself, because I did before, I was like, "I can't suggest clients in my private practice do stuff that I'm not, like, at least trialing myself," right? I can't, can't sell something I haven't tried. So I remember a supervisor kind of suggesting something like this, and it was one of my more intellectually oriented supervisors. [laughs] I remember leaving, like, one of the supervision sessions saying, "I wonder what he means by, like, greeting anxiety and saying hi." Like, I wonder what he means. And I remember coming back. I'm like, "What did you mean?" And he's like, "No, no. Like, you're, you're actually thinking, like, way too hard about this. Just actually do that. Like, literally say hi to it. Like, how would you say hi to a friend who came?" Or if you had a friend who was really, really well-intentioned but, like, a little much and a little annoying, but, like, you know they were well-intentioned. If they came to your party and you knew that, "If I don't say hi to this friend now, they are gonna be... Like, they're just gonna get louder and louder and louder, always wanna be the center of attention." Like, you just gotta go and say hi to them, like you would go say hi to them. It's like, think of your anxiety literally as that well-intentioned, totally annoying friend where if you do not greet it, it's just going to take up more and more and more of the party space. And so I remember [laughs] this day I, like, sat in a chair and I was like, "Hi, hi, anxiety. Hi." And it felt super awkward, but it's as if there was a part of me that was waiting for that greeting. And so for everyone listening, like, actually, yeah, actually try it.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Yeah. And it's, you know, we all have this sort of o- overarching understanding intellectually of self-compassion, but what if you just changed it to self-compassion towards all the different parts of me?
- BEDr. Becky
Yes. Yes.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Not just, "Oh, I'm compassionate m- to myself." Like, no one really... The people talk a lot of mess about that, but they don't actually understand how to do that.
- BEDr. Becky
Yeah.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Real genuine self-compassion is noticing, "Oh, I'm up in a place of anxiety right now. Let me check in with that part of me and see what it needs." Or w- or, "I'm noticing that I'm really controlling in this moment. Let me just check in with that part of me and see what it needs."
- BEDr. Becky
Yeah.
- GBGabby Bernstein
I live like this now. It's very freeing. It's truly amazing.
- BEDr. Becky
Yeah.
- GBGabby Bernstein
So it's the self to part connection.
- 16:50 – 20:45
Self-to-part connection: bringing calm, courage, and co-regulation inward
- BEDr. Becky
Mm. Can you explain what that means? Because it's the Self, capital S, Self to, not the number two, like T-O, part.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Yeah.
- BEDr. Becky
The Self-
- GBGabby Bernstein
Yeah
- BEDr. Becky
... is connecting to a part.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Here's the super simplified, uh, answer. So we have these child parts that we've put under lock and key 'cause we don't wanna feel them. We have these protector parts, just like the anxiety or the, the addiction or the, the, the rage or whatever it is that's there in place of the impermissible feelings to just s- to shut down those impermissible child parts. And then we all have what's known as Self with a capital S, and Self is the adult resourced, undamaged part of who we are, the part of us that is so compassionate and caring and loving, and that Self part has all these C qualities, as I've been mentioning. So their courage and confidence and compassion and the things that we wanna bring to our children, that feeling of connection, that feeling of compassion, that feeling of curiosity, and courage too. We wanna be, and be confident for that child. So when we start to develop a relationship between Self, the in- the internal parent, the way that we would wanna show up for our kids, when we start to treat our parts and speak to them with that courage and compassion and confidence and curiosity- We start to help them be less extreme, and that means that the anxiety has a purpose. We can say thank you to the anxiety. The anxiety's been doing a really good job of helping us be safe from big feelings that might, might blow us out.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm-hmm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
But we wanna help the anxiety relax a bit, and we wanna help the anxiety know what it needs more so it can self-soothe, and we wanna let the anxiety be a internal director of the, "Oh, there's something going on here," but not take over.
- BEDr. Becky
Yes.
- GBGabby Bernstein
And so it's about getting it out of its extreme role. And so that self part, bringing more self energy to that protector part, so that ultimately down the road you would begin to help the exiled children. But for now, let's just talk about the protectors, the anxiety. And I, I really wanna make sure that I'm doing my best to demystify this, because it's so profound and it's so healing. It's very simply put. If you can come to your anxiety with more curiosity and compassion and a sense of connection and a really calm energy, let it reveal to you what it needs.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Now I can give you some tools of things you can do for it in the moment, but I would really recommend doing that f- part, first part first, of just connecting.
- BEDr. Becky
And I think all the listeners here will really resonate with this idea that we talk about with our kids or with feelings, that feelings don't give us problems as much as aloneness in our feelings give us problem. And it's really the same thing you're saying with the part. The part of us, this anxiety part, let's say, will start to kind of be less problematic when we add self to it, because again, it's not alone. It's not kind of taking over our command tower.
- GBGabby Bernstein
And it's co-regulating with yourself.
- BEDr. Becky
Exactly.
- GBGabby Bernstein
[laughs] Your calmness towards the part isn't shutting it down, right? Like, we don't, we never wanna shut down our child's tantrum. We never wanna... I'm, I'm s- preaching to the choir here.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm-hmm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
But we don't wanna shut down those emotional reactions, because those are parts. And so we would come to those children, our children, with compassion and curiosity and calmness. And whenever my kid's flipping out, all I, all I do is just hold him. I just hold him. And we just co-regulate, and he just settles in my arms. And, mm, you know, sometimes it's about getting a little bit more curious or just doing something different. But typically the soother is the best, best move and the most healing for him. So what if we were that to ourselves? [laughs]
- BEDr. Becky
Exactly. So we've done that kind of step, right? We've said something that feels curious and connected. And then-
- 20:45 – 25:26
Heart hold practice: a simple safety cue for the nervous system
- GBGabby Bernstein
And I would do a hold. I hold... I would place, do a heart hold. Put r- your right hand on your heart and your left hand on your belly and just right now, even in this moment, if you're not, as long as you're not driving, close your eyes and just breathe into that anxiety and just allow yourself to be so present with it, continuing with the curiosity and the calmness, just breathing in deeply and exhaling completely as you hold, and extending any kind of love and kindness towards that part, just saying, "I love you and I respect you. I'm here for you. I wanna hear what you need. I'm not trying to push you away." And just take another deep breath in and just breathe into that anxiety, and on the exhale just let it settle a little bit more. And you can open your eyes. And we just did that very briefly, but you can sit with your anxiety for, with a hold like that. That heart hold is a establishment of safety in your body.
- BEDr. Becky
Yes.
- GBGabby Bernstein
And you can sit there with that part for as long as you want [laughs] and just chill.
- BEDr. Becky
Can I ask you a question about that one, and even those, you said directing loving kindness? 'Cause again, it actually makes me think about something that I feel like resonates in a parenting way, right? One of the things I think I, I try to say to my kids, especially when they're really struggling in a meltdown or a tantrum, right, is, "You're a good kid having a hard time," right? And like, I've never thought about this till right now, but if I'm doing my heart hold, like [laughs] could I say to my anxiety, like, "You're a good part having a hard time"?
- GBGabby Bernstein
100,000%, Becky, yes.
- BEDr. Becky
So everyone's listening, nobody is gonna know the exact right words for you besides you and your parts, right? [laughs] Like, there are messages we kind of need to hear, or at least really resonate, that I don't have the words for, Gabby doesn't have the words for. It might be like, "Wow, I just heard that. That actually is exactly right." But give yourself permission to experiment, right? If you heard what Gabby said, "I love you," and you're like, "Oh, my body doesn't want that," but, uh, you're not doing it wrong. That just isn't for you, right?
- GBGabby Bernstein
What comes out of you and your mind when you extend compassion? What comes out of your intuitive mind when you extend calmness? And your own words are exactly the right words.
- BEDr. Becky
Okay, so someone's listening and they're thinking, "I'm doing this, but Gabby, Dr. Becky, all I'm hearing is, 'You're overreacting.' All I'm hearing is, 'Something's wrong with you.' All I'm hearing is, 'This is so stupid and so ridiculous,' which that feels so deafening, I can't, I can't, I can't get to any compassion."
- GBGabby Bernstein
You need to have some buy-in in order to do this work. [laughs]
- BEDr. Becky
Mm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
So if you're just resisting it, that's fine, too. You're, you know, thank you for listening and thank you for not ending the podcast. You're still here. Awesome. So happy for you. And I'll give you another tool, because if you don't have the buy-in to start to speak to those parts, then it's just not your time. It's like, or it's not your modality. There's others. So although I highly recommend it. [laughs]
- BEDr. Becky
[laughs] I love it. You and I both. There are other things, but this is the thing, okay? [laughs]
- GBGabby Bernstein
In my book Happy Days, I write about all the things that I use to really help that little child that was abused get back to safety, and I even have a chapter called Re-Parenting Yourself, which is taking Dan Siegel's work and really turning it back on ourselves. And I really believe genuinely that every single thing you teach us, Becky, we could re- literally just turn upside down, put it on ourselves and- We sh- we should write a book called Reparenting Yourself, you and me. [laughs]
- BEDr. Becky
Love that. You've written nine, so I'll follow suit with you.
- GBGabby Bernstein
But really taking that work and, like, why not use it on yourself?
- BEDr. Becky
Yeah.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Because you need to get yourself back to safety before you can bring your kid back to safety, 'cause they are just picking up what you're putting out.
- BEDr. Becky
Yes. And this heart hold, before you move on to the next thing, though, Gabby, like, it's so simple, right? [laughs] Like, I think there are so many really kind of, like, fancy techniques out there. You do this and you... Uh, you know. Yeah, so for everyone listening, this is incredibly powerful. You find a time, and it might not be right now. You might think, "How could I do that when my kid is, you know, pulling at my leg and tantruming?" You probably can't do that now. Okay. Like, you can do it later. You can revisit it. You put your hand on your heart and a hand on your belly, and you direct compassion inward.
- GBGabby Bernstein
I would say do it when the kid is on your leg having a tantrum, 'cause, like, who cares? Everybody will be like, "What the hell are you doing?" [laughs] You know? They'll get curious. What's beautiful about that is that you know you can't help your kid if you're freaking out, too.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm-hmm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Bring yourself back to safety, and then they'll come back with you.
- BEDr. Becky
Great.
- 25:26 – 31:11
EFT/Tapping walkthrough: identifying the MPI, rating intensity, and practicing live
- GBGabby Bernstein
So the next one that I know you wanted to touch on was tapping.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm-hmm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
And I've been teaching emotional freedom technique for years, and it's something that would be really cool for therapists that are listening to bring into their practice as well. When we tap on these different energy meridians while we talk about a memory or even just a feeling, like we could just tap for anxiety, which I wanna do with everybody today, it really opens up the brain's window of tolerance to, in the moment, reprocess that experience rather than let it take over. EFT, emotional freedom technique, otherwise known as tapping, is one of the most profound and practical ways to undo anxiety. You could just come back to this recording at any time and do it with me right here, right now, because you can learn to do it for yourself safely. So let's tap. Okay? So when we tap, we first identify the most pressing issue, the MPI. In this case, the most pressing issue is, "I'm so anxious." And then you rate the most pressing issue from a scale of 0 to 10, 10 being the highest. The reason that you rate it is because there's this thing called the apex effect, that when you're done tapping, you can forget that you were ever at a 10. And so you wanna remember where you were. Okay. So right now, assuming you're not driving, and if you are, just come back to this portion of the audio when you're home, rate the most pressing issue from 0 to 10, 10 being the highest. And I'm sure there's a lot of 8s and 9s and 10s out there. You seem pretty low right now. Where are you at?
- BEDr. Becky
Right now, the thing I am most anxious about is that my kids, I got an email a little while ago that their school is closing early today, and my husband, which was so supportive, 'cause he know I was talking to you at this time, said he would leave work early to go home to be with them. And yet still, I'm like, "Oh," like, "Is that okay?" Like, you know.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Great. We got something good to work with.
- BEDr. Becky
Great.
- GBGabby Bernstein
So 0 to 10, where are you at with that anxiety?
- BEDr. Becky
I would say right now it's, like, a s- like, a six and a half.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Okay, that's a good one. Okay. And everybody else listening, rate your MPI, most pressing issue, I have so much anxiety or whatever, I have anxiety, 0 to 10. I'm gonna tap with Becky, but you can tap along with us and borrow the benefits. In your show notes, Becky, I can give you a transcript from my book-
- BEDr. Becky
Oh
- GBGabby Bernstein
... a script for this, and with the tapping imagery. Okay?
- BEDr. Becky
Amazing. Thank you.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Okay. So, like, we begin by tapping on the karate chop point, that side of your hand.
- BEDr. Becky
So as a little interlude before we jump in to Gabby leading me through this exercise, I wanna make sure you all know exactly what's happening. So when Gabby refers to tapping, what she's having me do is take two of my fingertips, I'm using the second and third, and literally tapping on the point in my body she names. So maybe right now, take two of your fingers and look at them. Could be the second and third. And you can actually experiment with tapping on a part of your body, maybe around your hands, so you have a sense of exactly what I'm doing during this exercise. Okay, let's get back to it.
- GBGabby Bernstein
So you're just gonna repeat after me. And I'm gonna, for the sake of the listener, just say, "I'm so anxious," but you're gonna really be, "I'm so anxious about my kids getting home." Okay? Even though I'm so anxious...
- BEDr. Becky
Even though I'm so anxious...
- GBGabby Bernstein
I deeply and completely love and accept myself.
- BEDr. Becky
I deeply and completely love and accept myself.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Even though I'm so anxious...
- BEDr. Becky
Even though I'm so anxious...
- GBGabby Bernstein
I deeply and completely love and accept myself.
- BEDr. Becky
I deeply and completely love and accept myself.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Even though I'm so anxious...
- BEDr. Becky
Even though I'm so anxious...
- GBGabby Bernstein
I deeply and completely love and accept myself.
- BEDr. Becky
I deeply and completely love and accept myself.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Eyebrow point, and this is the point right where the hair meets the bone on your eyebrow. Tap on that eyebrow point. I've got this anxiety.
- BEDr. Becky
I've got this anxiety.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Side of the eye, right on your temple. I've got this anxiety, and it's, uh, in the background.
- BEDr. Becky
I've got this anxiety, and it's in the background.
- 31:11 – 35:24
Results + why tapping works: from 6.5 to 2, and making ‘new’ feel less awkward
- GBGabby Bernstein
Now take a deep breath in and let that go. [sighs] Now, zero to 10 with the anxiety about whatever it is for the listener, and for you, Becky, about your kids, where are you at now?
- BEDr. Becky
Like, a two.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Yeah. Yep.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm-hmm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Yeah. Works.
- BEDr. Becky
Wow. I, uh, I've known about EFT and tapping. I, I really mean this, I've never, ever done anything like that before. I've never been led in anything like that before, so thank you for giving me that experience. That was really powerful and really grounding.
- GBGabby Bernstein
It's so grounding, and it's important that you... You know, when you're doing those negative rounds, it's good because it lets you feel the feelings and tap with them so they can be reprocessed, or they can be released.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm-hmm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
And then with positive rounds, you're reprocessing them.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm-hmm. In those, uh, if that's the term, negative rounds, there's just also something kind of similar in some ways to some of the underlying, I don't know if it's mechanisms or approaches in IFS. Like, I'm relating to the feeling. I'm naming it. I'm connecting to it. I'm kind of saying, "I'm not afraid of you," 'cause I'm talking about it.
- GBGabby Bernstein
You're in a safe place giving it a voice.
- BEDr. Becky
Yeah. And just so everyone knows here, for me, when I started it, I was doing it. You know, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do the things Gabby tells me to do. You know, she knows her stuff. And it felt awkward. It felt totally awkward. I had this voice a little bit like, "What am I, what am I doing here?" And, you know, one of the most liberating, I think, thoughts that I've learned to kind of [laughs] access is anything new feels awkward and uncomfortable because it's my body carving out some totally new circuit, right? It's going down a totally different path on a snowy mountain. So when I reminded myself kind of, right, like, new things always feel awkward until they feel familiar, that allowed me to kind of not see that as a sign of wrong, but just for what it was, a sign of new.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Yeah, totally, and that awkward feeling, let's say you were doing tapping on your own. You could just start to say, you could notice that, "Oh, now I feel awkward," and keep tapping. [laughs] You know, "Oh my God, this is freaking weird." And, like, you know, you can even curse a little. Like, "What the fuck?" You know? [laughs] Like-
- BEDr. Becky
Yeah, yeah
- GBGabby Bernstein
... yeah.
- BEDr. Becky
What is it about the tapping that, like, d- what, what is it about it that, that's really helpful?
- GBGabby Bernstein
When you tap on these different meridians while you are talking about the emotional disturbance, it sends a message to the amygdala that it's safe to just relax and-
- BEDr. Becky
Mm
- GBGabby Bernstein
... let it process rather than fight against it.
- BEDr. Becky
And again, anxiety is kind of a fight against something. It's running away. Kind of like, "Oh, I wanna run away from this thing that feels scary." And so the first step is some version of noticing, sitting with, greeting, the opposite of running away
- GBGabby Bernstein
... traumatic, soothing experience while you're doing it, so that, that's a powerful... That's why I love the hard hold. Like, you know, doing the IFS with the hard hold. And we're kind of doing IFS now with EFT. Like, I'm just... Listen, I'm an experimenter. I will get a degree one day, but you know what? I've gotten a life degree. I do wanna be a ther- I don't want to be a therapist, but I wanna get a degree. I just wanna do that for myself. But, uh, nonetheless, I have lived these practices day in and day out, and they're all, they're all outlined in detail in, in this book, Happy Days, because my intention for this book was really to give people the guided path from trauma to profound freedom and inner peace. I can literally sit here to you, and if you'd asked me, "Gabby, zero to 10, where are you with your anxiety?" I would've said zero. Well, maybe, like, a thr- like, a two or a three.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
Only anxious because my voice is funky and I have, um, some, a lot more podcasts today. So that, and my book coming out, right? So it's, like, only that, but it's low.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
How is it that low? Because I, I've lived the processes in this book.
- 35:24 – 39:20
Resources and closing: Happy Days, Dear Gabby, IFS + Good Inside sign-offs
- BEDr. Becky
Wow. So Happy Days is available. Tell everyone else who's listening where else they might kind of find you and, you know, learn with you.
- GBGabby Bernstein
I have a podcast called Dear Gabby, where I workshop people, just like I did with Dr. Becky just now. But, uh, uh, people come on, and I do Q and A's and, and workshop them. And I have a Instagram, @gabbybernstein, where I love to share my methods and tools as well. And the, the best beginning, I, I really pray for every parent to read Happy Days because while it's not a parenting book, it's a re-parenting yourself book.
- BEDr. Becky
Mm.
- GBGabby Bernstein
And I really believe that if I hadn't done all the heavy lifting for myself, I wouldn't be as good a parent as I am today.
- BEDr. Becky
Well, that really resonates, right? We cannot give out what we- Do not give in, right? So I think that's, that's exactly right. Well, thank you so much for spending so much time with us, and I know you and I will continue to have so many meaningful conversations and what just happened, experiences together. So thank you for being here, and look forward to talking to you soon.
- GBGabby Bernstein
We are gonna sit by the pool and have a chat about whatever. [laughs] About all the nerdy shit that we're into. [laughs]
- BEDr. Becky
Sign me up. See you there. Thanks, Gabby. There are so many important things that came up in today's conversation, and I wanted to share a few resources with you if you want to take a deeper dive. You can learn more about Gabby and check out her books at gabbybernstein.com. You can also do a deeper dive into internal family systems at ifs-institute.com. Gabby and I share such a deep love for Dick Schwartz and his IFS approach, and I highly recommend learning more about it. Last, you can Google Emotional Freedom Technique to learn more about the tapping exercise Gabby led me through during our conversation. Thanks for listening to Good Inside. I love co-creating episodes with you based on the real-life tricky situations in your family. To share what's happening in your home, you can call 646-598-2543, or email a voice note to goodinsidepodcast@gmail.com. There are so many more strategies and tips I wanna share with you. Head to goodinside.com and sign up for Good Insider, my free weekly email with scripts and strategies delivered right to your inbox. And follow me on Instagram and Facebook, @drbeckyatgoodinside, for a daily dose of parenting and self-care ideas. Good Inside with Dr. Becky is produced by Beth Rowe and Marie Cecile Anderson, and executive produced by Erica Belsky and me, Dr. Becky. If you enjoyed this episode, please take a moment to rate and review it, or share this episode with a friend or family member as a way to start an important conversation. Let's end by placing our hands on our hearts and reminding ourselves, even as I struggle, and even as I have a hard time on the outside, I remain good inside. [outro music]
Episode duration: 39:32
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