• Visit Ilene’s website and connect on Instagram.

Joe Sanok 00:00:00  You're someone with a vision for your practice, for your side hustle, and for your personal journey. But when it comes to establishing your path and how to get to where you want to be with your practice, things get a little messy. You're also someone who'd prefer to go in person instead of to groups and listening to everyone else's story. To me, it sounds like you could benefit from one on one consulting with our experienced practice of the practice consultants from 595 a month and up. You can work with a consultant that will give you more direction and practical, tried and tested tips matched to you and your goals. For more information, visit practice of the practice. Com forward slash apply. Again, that's practice of the practice. Com forward slash apply. This is the practice of the practice podcast with Joe Santa. Session number 1180. I'm Joe Stanek, your host, and welcome to the practice of the Practice Podcast, where we help you build a thriving private practice you absolutely love. We want you to thrive.

Joe Sanok 00:01:14  We want you to have those operations down. We want you to have down all just like the marketing and how clients find you. But we don't want you to do that at the expense of, you know, losing your soul to business. We want you to to love your practice. We want you to show up every day and be like, how the heck is this my life? How did I get to do such amazing work that I absolutely love? We know there's tons of ways to make money, and we want you to love the way that you choose to enter into the world, in the way that you choose to do therapy in the world. you know, there's lots of things as we work with clients or even as we we dig into things ourselves as we're, you know, in this series, you know, kind of dead center, middle of this series of the better mental wellness series where we might realize we've betrayed ourselves, where maybe we we gave up our power For other people's agendas.

Joe Sanok 00:02:01  Or maybe, maybe we just realized something about ourselves after we did something and said, man, I, I shouldn't have showed up that way. I've got some regret around it. or maybe it's manifest in a number of different areas, which is why I'm so excited to talk with our guest today, Eileen Smith. Eileen Smith is going to be sharing with us about self betrayal. We'll be digging into what is self betrayal, how to work with clients, and self betrayal. what is that look like for ourselves? But Eileen is a former trauma therapist, author, speaker, and creator of the Truth Method. Additionally, Eileen is a somatic experiencing practitioner, certified professional coach, and holds master's degrees in mental health counseling and exercise physiology. Over the past decade, she's been dedicated to helping others resolve trauma symptoms, alleviate chronic stress, and achieve deeper healing. Eileen, welcome to the practice of the Practice Podcast.

Ilene Smith 00:02:54  Thank you. Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here and to talk to you about what I believe is such a powerful topic that we need to.

Ilene Smith 00:03:05  We don't focus enough on in our healing. So thanks for having me.

Joe Sanok 00:03:10  Yeah, I'm so glad that you're here. well, let's just define what you mean by self portrayal. And then maybe we can kind of dig into that a little bit. So like when you say self betrayal, what do you mean?

Ilene Smith 00:03:23  It's a good question. Self betrayal is really all the ways and all the behaviors that we have where we let our environments control us, rather than our internal being. And our internal mechanisms control what we desire. And often, we betray ourselves because we don't feel a sense of safety within ourselves. So we're more concerned about how our environment is going to experience us. So what we do is we give ourselves up, or we abandon ourselves or abandon our needs in order to be in relationship with someone else or our environments.

Joe Sanok 00:04:05  Now, how does that manifest, like in that you said relationships or in our environment? Like, what does that look like in the work world? What does that look like in, you know, friendships and romantic relationships?

Ilene Smith 00:04:17  That's such a good question.

Ilene Smith 00:04:18  So, I mean, it can look a thousand different ways, like we have a thousand different versions of it. it can be something as simple as saying yes when we mean no or not expressing our emotional needs when, when we are having strong feelings about something, it could be something as simple as self-sabotaging. You know, we we are we're constantly we don't even realize we're doing it, but we're constantly betraying ourselves, even in small ways. Did I eat enough or I didn't eat enough or I ate too much? Oh, hide or wait on a license. Things are so simple or or I'm just going to have another drink, right? That's all. Self-pity. Even the things that we say we're going to do, that we're going to that we we go against our inner, our inner knowing. Those are simple ways we betray ourselves or in relationships. Maybe you stay in a toxic relationship when you know you deserve better. so there's there's maybe you you are going down a career path or staying in a job because everyone else wants you to do it.

Ilene Smith 00:05:32  and the list goes on. I mean, I can I can keep going if you'd like, but I think that gives you kind of a simple framework of of where it starts or, you know, the ways it gets us in trouble. Because what it does is it, it it doesn't allow us to be able to fully be in our authentic selves because we're the piece of self. Betrayal is really that you're abandoning yourself in some way.

Joe Sanok 00:05:57  So why does. Yeah. Like why does that happen?

Ilene Smith 00:06:01  Well, it starts way before we even know it's starting. So when you're born you have no discernment between yourself and your environment. So you're born whole, right? You're born this this ball of love with innocence and and you're and you're born freely. But the moment your environment cues you that there's something wrong with you. Just like a parent saying, you know, why can't you be more like Johnny? Or don't cry, be a good girl. Go to Harvard. Be the best athlete, right? All those things lead you to step, to push it further away from yourself rather than toward yourself.

Ilene Smith 00:06:45  So basically, when the environmental cues, whether it's parents or siblings or peers, I mean, being bullied, all those things cue a child to not feel safe and not believe there enough. So if you have a parent, for example, who only gives gives a child conditional love, right? Johnny got a Johnny got A's on his test. So he's praised and he's loved and he's told how wonderful he is. But if Johnny comes home with a B, you know, why couldn't you do better? Right. All of those things that tell him that that wasn't enough. Even if he tried hard, even if that's that was the best he could do, he's. Then he then forms this idea that I'm only going to be loved if I perform so very early on, those messages start getting imprinted in him. So Johnny grows up never feeling like he's enough, and then he goes out in the work world. And what does he do? He just pushes and pushes and pushes and believes that the only way he's going to be loved is by is by metrics, is by doing, doing well, getting a bigger paycheck.

Ilene Smith 00:07:53  And he may not like what he's doing, but he just continues to believe that the way he's going to get love is through achievement and money. And you see that a lot with successful entrepreneurs. Right. There's a million. There's other versions of it. It's the child who didn't get to have an expression of their feelings. They wind up in an adult relationship and they wind up. And I don't like to use this term, but I'm going to use it here because I think it's a term that we all know. It's that that's the person who winds up codependent, and they've never had an opportunity to even maybe they had controlling parents who made all decisions for them. And so they turn out to be the adult who doesn't even know what they want. They lose all contact with themselves. So those the the idea of where we abandon ourselves starts at a very young age, and it starts from those environmental cues. So if you didn't learn as a child to have autonomy, how would you know as an adult to have autonomy?

Joe Sanok 00:08:53  Yeah, yeah.

Joe Sanok 00:08:55  So, when people start, is there a certain kind of phase of life or when things start to happen when people realize, oh my gosh, I have been self betraying myself for years. Forget this. I'm going to change like other things that maybe speed that up, that make clients start to think, okay, I am now realizing all that I've done to myself or like I guess other situations like I'm thinking of like divorce or you know, having, you know, a parent pass away or are there like, big things that usually trigger this, or is it a slow, steady creep? Like, how does it emerge to realize that?

Ilene Smith 00:09:32  I think it's different for everyone. But I would say this, I think we're we're always willing to make change when we're in enough pain or we're uncomfortable enough. And so maybe somebody goes along to get along until a moment where they're nervous system or their bodies just can't tolerate it anymore. Or maybe they stay in a marriage for years, not getting their needs met until the moment where they can't tolerate it.

Ilene Smith 00:10:04  Or maybe they wind up having an affair, right? Usually right. The changes often happen for people in the discomfort and in crisis. So while everyone is different, I think fundamentally we don't change unless there's some sort of some sort of unsettled ness or restlessness or, or discomfort inside.

Joe Sanok 00:10:26  so then where do you see the work really kind of start to take off when people realize self betrayal? Like what? What's that process look like for people to undo some of that?

Ilene Smith 00:10:36  Well, I mean, I think it all starts with awareness. I you know, how many times, you know, I know for myself, I've had clients come in and they're like, I don't understand why I'm, you know, saying yes when I mean no or or I'm doing something that I don't want to do right. In the first part, the thing that we have to start doing is I don't think you can really know where you're going until you understand how you got to where you are. And and so I like to think of it as when you can start putting the pieces in place and making meaning or making, you know, sorting things out that didn't make any sense to you.

Ilene Smith 00:11:17  So once that foundation is laid and the light bulb goes off to see where the origins of all of it started, it sets up the platform for that person to start observing their own behaviors in their own patterns and their and to be able to see what their experience is. And I think the work really starts there.

Joe Sanok 00:11:43  And what does it look like after that.

Ilene Smith 00:11:46  Well again everyone's different. But there's a you know when it has to happen slowly the unwinding has to happen slowly. And what I often see is people be being, more having more capacity to set boundaries or be able to state what they need or share what their emotions are. And a lot of times, you know, it becomes, you know, when it first begins to happen, I think that people get a little risk and get rigid in their boundaries. And and there's a big adjustment period when you start awakening and coming online and understanding all the ways that you haven't taken care of yourself. And remember, you know, a person didn't get there overnight.

Ilene Smith 00:12:33  So the changes aren't going to happen overnight. It's really a slow process to to build enough safety within, within the body, within the within the self. Then slowly those pieces of of betray seems to they, they start melting away because the person has a little bit more resilience each time. They don't betray themselves.

Joe Sanok 00:13:04  Yeah. Now I think there's some modalities. We talked about some of them before we started. what are some kind of direct ways that people start to really work on these things and dig in.

Ilene Smith 00:13:15  Well I mean there's, there's, there's so many different ways to do it. you know, there's all the ways that are top down, which is the intellectual process of understanding. And then there's all the ways that you have to be fine. Find a space in your body to be uncomfortable and feel the discomfort of of what's new. Because that's the hardest part is people don't. People betray themselves because it feels easier than tolerating their environment. not feeling safe? Does that make sense? So I can unpack that a little bit when I see what I.

Ilene Smith 00:13:58  When I say that is, for example, let's take the person that doesn't express their needs because they're worried that they're going to disappoint their spouse or everyone else around them, and all of a sudden they express their needs and there might be a reaction from a spouse or their children or whatever, but they have to be able to stand firm and tall in themselves to say, it's okay if I'm not loved because I express my needs in somebody mad at me. And that's a very hard part of this, especially if if they've been doing it a certain way for so long.

Joe Sanok 00:14:43  Something always comes up when you're running a private practice. Well gusto is payroll and HR services can make it a little easier. Gusto is designed for you the small business owner. They take the pain out of running a business, automatically calculating paychecks, filing payroll taxes, setting up open enrollment. Gusto. Does it all want more time tracking health insurance? 401 K onboarding commuter benefits offer letters, access to HR experts. You get the idea.

Joe Sanok 00:15:12  With gusto, you can focus on the joy of running your private practice. It's super easy to set up and get started, and if you're moving from another provider, gusto can transfer all your data for you. Here's the best part because you're a listener, you get three months totally free. All you have to do is go to gusto.com/joe again. That's gusto.com/joe. I'm telling you you're going to love gusto. Get started today. Yeah. and when I think about the average clinician, they're probably not necessarily, you know, thinking through this lens of self betrayal. what do you wish the average clinician had eyes for when they were sitting there in sessions.

Ilene Smith 00:15:58  What do I think that they, the clinician could see? Is that what you're asking?

Joe Sanok 00:16:04  Yeah. I mean like there's things like when it comes to like say anxiety, or working with kids, there's like baseline things that maybe we're like, yeah, if you're not getting enough sleep, if your kids aren't, you know, eating decent food, you know, if they're overstressed and have a ton of screen time.

Joe Sanok 00:16:19  Yeah, they're probably acting a little bit crazy. Like, we we probably could like reduce, you know, some of those intakes and their brains could simmer down a little bit and, you know, otherwise those things are going to amplify any pre-existing symptoms for whether it's anxiety, ADHD or whatever, like for that sort of thing where there's just like you would love, you know, with this mindset to help other therapists, like, what would you want them to know.

Ilene Smith 00:16:43  is that it's more about helping the client see what they can't see in the origins of their behaviors, and to really start deconstructing and helping the clients deconstruct and reconstruct reality.

Joe Sanok 00:17:05  And what does that look like for them to reconstruct reality?

Ilene Smith 00:17:09  Well it's to help them I would say create new evidence for a new reality. Right. Like nothing changes until you're willing to facilitate some change. Right. Like. So it's about helping a client go out in the world and start building new evidence that challenges their their current belief system.

Joe Sanok 00:17:33  Like what are some examples of someone doing that.

Joe Sanok 00:17:34  I think that I, I'm kind of struggling to figure out like how does that actually look for a client. So like, you know, someone's working with you or with a therapist and you're like, we're going to challenge your belief system. Like, like what does that look like in the next week between.

Ilene Smith 00:17:49  Well, it's it's okay. Let's say it's let's take the same person who, who's constantly saying yes when they mean no. And so the challenge becomes, is to to go into opposite action and say no if you mean no. And then to be able to sit with that experience regardless of how other people react, and then to really notice what it feels like to take care of your own needs versus give up your needs. So it's basically.

Joe Sanok 00:18:25  Do some experiments, like to figure out like, oh, okay, this is what came up for me when I did the opposite of what I want to do.

Ilene Smith 00:18:31  Correct. And to be able to witness both sets of experiences. And because you can't really change anything if you don't have something to compare it to, to.

Ilene Smith 00:18:46  Right. So if something felt and I'm sure, you know, saying no one you mean know feels uncomfortable, but what does it feel like on the other side of it, when you actually don't go out for dinner with the people you don't want to go out with? Right. So maybe the initial piece feels uncomfortable, but what did it feel like to then go do what you want? And maybe you want to take a yoga class instead of having the obligatory dinner. So helping them see that the new reality, there's going to be pieces of it that feel beautiful, and other pieces that initially are going to feel so uncomfortable because for the first time they're not abandoning themselves.

Joe Sanok 00:19:27  Yeah. I think then it's like that seed that's just starting with them.

Ilene Smith 00:19:32  Exactly. And so it's building that muscle that new muscle. Right. And you have when you go let's say you're, you know you're starting a new workout. You're not going to go full force head in first. Right. It's not going to be an immersion.

Ilene Smith 00:19:47  It's going to be the small steps that you take. Right. It's going to be lifting the £5 weight then the £10 weight, then the £20 weight. And it's the same thing with it. With working in this realm, with self betrayal, I don't expect somebody to come in and all of a sudden they see the whole thing and like, oh my God, they linked their childhood to it. And they see where the patterns, where they started to betray themselves. And all of a sudden they're not going to wake up tomorrow and do everything the opposite. So it's basically helping them take those small steps to be able to reconnect with themselves and be in a much deeper relationship with themselves. And that takes time. Just like just like having an intimate relationship with another person. You don't just meet someone and have an intimate relationship. A healthy, intimate relationship takes time and trust. So it's learning to trust yourself and that. And if you had, if you spent your whole life not trusting yourself, you can expect that just because you understand something that you're going to change that quickly.

Joe Sanok 00:20:55  Yeah, I think that when you're in a relationship like you just mentioned with someone else, whenever you change those relationship dynamics, even if you're the only one changing, it changes the whole thing. I mean, I remember reading the book The Scream Free Marriage, and they used this, example of like a campfire where if you start putting wood on it, you stop giving it air or you stop providing a spark, it changes the entire campfire, you know? So if you add wood to it or if you add air to it, that's going to change it to the one element. You don't have to have the wood agree to be lit on more fire. if you're just adding more air to it or, you know, like one element can change the entire, kind of dynamic. And so I'm, I'm interested to know how do couples manage what you're talking about when, you know, they've been going along a certain way, and maybe one person, maybe both of them feel like, okay, we're doing okay.

Joe Sanok 00:21:47  Like it's, you know, we have ups and downs, nothing crazy. And then, you know, one person says to themselves, oh my gosh, I've been self betraying. I haven't been speaking up or I whatever. The thing is like, how do couples successfully manage that?

Ilene Smith 00:22:02  I think it depends on the couple, right. So if both people want to heal, then you know there's support, right? If one person whose needs are being met the way they are, all of a sudden, let's just say the rules of the game change, then it can really disrupt the ecosystem. And, you know, it doesn't mean that it won't work out, but it requires both people wanting to get healthy. And that's that, you know, as you know, that takes that's going to take two people in a relationship being able to attend to one another's needs.

Joe Sanok 00:22:40  Yeah. And so I think understanding that disruption to, you know, I was just, you know, talking to my therapist and, you know, he was talking about different phases of, of relationships.

Joe Sanok 00:22:51  You know, there's the initial kind of infatuation. We're all into each other's phase, new relationship energy. Then usually couples have to kind of differentiate from each other, like, who am I within this relationship? And then, you know, after that kind of finding that reintegration, and even for myself, when I look at, you know, I was in a 17 year marriage and, you know, many people in this show know that, you know, my ex chose to live in California, and I have near full custody of my kids now. And major disruption. But over the last three years, post-divorce, like to look at my role in that 17 year marriage. Like, I really, unfortunately see that I did, you know, kind of quiet myself more in that area than I do almost anywhere else in my life where, you know, I had some self betrayal, where I was so scared being raised, you know, Catholic, and in my, you know, Polish Catholic family, the only people that got divorced, were the ones that were married to people, that it was like just such a, you know, disruptive relationship.

Joe Sanok 00:23:50  It's like, of course you're allowed to get divorced if it's that bonkers. But but the people that didn't were those people that were just, like, quietly unhappy. and so that idea that I just kept my mouth shut on things that I now see as like I betrayed myself, like I, I muted what was appropriate and normal in a relationship. and I don't know that there's necessarily like, regret around there, like where I've landed on the other side like that taught me a lot of things. But it's like, you know, to heal from that. It's like I had to swing into the other direction where in my new relationship, sometimes I'm so dang rigid and speak up so much. It's like, you know, and that's I am a person just in life that can I usually know what I want. I usually advocate for it. you know, I tend to be pretty decisive, but, you know, I'm not always as soft as maybe I was in this, this previous relationship and that that's just like such a swing that I'm working on my therapist with to just figure out, like, okay, I did betray myself.

Joe Sanok 00:24:47  I didn't do these things that, you know, I knew and I believe. But for some reason, like my past, you know, history made me not want to speak up over these things. Like, what does that bring up for you hearing me, you know, vomit up a bunch of my life history?

Ilene Smith 00:25:01  No, no, no. Well, well, but it's a great example. And that's what I was saying earlier, how once you start setting boundaries and speaking up like there's often a swing the other way. and there's a, there's there will be a swing back to and where you find the a soft way to be able to share. Because really what happens is I like to think of it as if you look at the physiology of it, your body's coming out of a freeze, right? They're not they're not speaking up. Is your body really shutting down? And when you find when you start finding your voice and you start, you know, tapping into your needs and being able to express them, you're often what happens is you come out of the freeze and you're thawing.

Ilene Smith 00:25:49  So if the if the if the freeze response is on thawing, you're going to have a little bit of a fight or flight response until you find complete regulation in the system. So I would say it's a good thing right now, and that your system will go back to some balance with it when it's ready, but it's got to it's got to find the equilibrium.

Joe Sanok 00:26:12  Well, I'm really glad you said it, because I think that, like, one thing I've been studying is the Daoist principle of non-action. you know, in the world today, you know, we can make a great case for why people need to stand up for in action for the things they care about and whatever that looks like in regards to the world they live in. and the Daoist approach is that a lot of the things that we take action on, we feel like we have to have conversations on we, you know, dig in with our friends or partners or we're pissed off about many of them find that equilibrium on their own.

Joe Sanok 00:26:43  you know, they often point in nature as being something that just, you know, tends to find its equilibrium. And so That idea of not pushing as someone that tends to be, you know, pretty type A, pretty like, you know, decisive is actually refreshing to say. Yeah. Like, let me just let this unfold and see where I land. And like, that release of of the outcome is actually probably healthier for me than just about anything else.

Ilene Smith 00:27:08  Yeah. No, it's it's listen, it's like everything else. It's a process.

Joe Sanok 00:27:13  Now, Eileen, the last question I always ask is if every private practitioner in the world were listening right now, what would you want them to know?

Ilene Smith 00:27:22  I think that that this is a really that self portrayal is a really important part of any human being's process. And if you're not, working through this lens and considering it as an element of healing, that it might be something really powerful to explore. And, you know, I invite every therapist to explore it for themselves because, you know, we can only take our clients as far as we're willing to go ourselves.

Joe Sanok 00:27:53  So true. well, thank you so much. If people want to connect with you, if they want to follow your work. I know you have some, some new trainings that are coming out, some retreats and mastermind groups and things like that. Tell us a little bit about how people can follow your work.

Ilene Smith 00:28:07  So the best place to follow me is on Instagram. And my Instagram handle is the Eileen Smith and Eileen is Iliana Smith. Or go to my website which is Eileen smith.com.

Joe Sanok 00:28:22  so awesome. Thank you for being on the practice of the Practice podcast.

Ilene Smith 00:28:26  Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Joe Sanok 00:28:36  Well, this is the even better mental wellness series. we are just moving in a direction of just helping ourselves as therapists. Helping our clients. just working on all these different areas. So if you missed any of this series that kicked off on March 4th, episode 1174. we're doing this all month long, and we're really enjoying doing these series. if you missed the beginning of the year, back in January, we had the even Better Year series.

Joe Sanok 00:29:07  so we talked about a bunch of things that can just move you in your practice towards a little bit better direction. And it kicked off. Oh, Brian Solis, kicked it off with this with Mind Shift how to Transform leadership, Drive innovation, and Reshape the Future, episode 1148. Just so awesome. But we covered so many different things that month. In February we had our marketing month, so all sorts of interviews, they're just all about marketing. so you're going to want to make sure you check that out. And then we've got this one that you're, participating in today. So thank you so much for hanging out with us today. We could not do this without our sponsors. Gusto is the best payroll solution out there. You know, I'm working with a consulting client right now who has their accountant doing all of their payroll. It's a couple hundred bucks a month, and I'm just like, the quality of the data that he's getting from his accountant is so much worse than what you can just pull up with gusto for, like a quarter of the price.

Joe Sanok 00:30:04  With gusto, you can focus on the joy of running your business. It's super easy to get started. it's who we use here at practice. The practice. It's totally worth the price. As a listener, you actually get three months totally for free over at gusto com slash Joe. Again, that's gusto.com/joe to get started today. Thank you so much for letting me into your ears and into your brain. Have a great day. I'll talk to you soon. Special thanks to the band. Silence is sexy for that intro music, and this podcast is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is given with the understanding that neither the host, the producers, the publishers or guests are rendering legal, accounting, clinical or other professional information. If you want a professional, you should find one.