[SPEAKER_01]: I'm Julie Kraftcheck and I'm U.A.S.U.A.U.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is the psychology of relationships.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you're into attachment theory and subconscious patterns, prepare to have your mind blown as we chat about your relationship's schemas, the core beliefs formed early in life that silently shape how we show up in relationships.
[SPEAKER_01]: They are the thought patterns like, I'm not good enough, they're going to leave me, or love has to be earned.
[SPEAKER_01]: These beliefs influence everything.
[SPEAKER_01]: who were drawn to, how we show up in relationships, and the emotional cycles we repeat even if it's hurting us.
[SPEAKER_01]: To dive into this topic, we're chatting with Schema's expert Dr. Abigail Lev, who's a licensed clinical psychologist and co-author of three books, acceptance and commitment therapy for interpersonal problems, the interpersonal problems workbook, act to end painful relationship pattern, and act for couples.
[SPEAKER_01]: In this conversation, Dr. Lev breaks down how schemas are formed, why they're so hard to shake, and how they explain the love traps we tend to fall into again and again.
[SPEAKER_01]: By digging into our schemas, we're able to retrain our minds to create healthier, more secure relationships.
[SPEAKER_01]: We can break free from behaviors that no longer serve us and understand ourselves and our partners better.
[SPEAKER_01]: Whether you find yourself overgiving, shutting down, or chasing unavailable people, this episode will help you name what's going on underneath the surface.
[SPEAKER_01]: and more importantly, how to rewrite the story.
[SPEAKER_01]: You may need to listen to this one a couple times because it's so packed with information.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hearing Dr. Lev's speak on this topic has truly impacted our love lives on a profound level and we hope it does the same for you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Remember to go to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast and leave us a rating and review.
[SPEAKER_01]: And better yet, leave us a comment about what you learned from this episode.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is The Psychology of Relationships.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you're listening to an episode that just might change the way you show up for love.
[SPEAKER_01]: Enjoy.
[SPEAKER_01]: Before we get into what schemas are, so Julie brought up this topic of schemas first, and I was like, that sounds so familiar.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I went back through my notes, and I went through couples counseling with an ex of mine where the entire program was around schemas.
[SPEAKER_01]: So we took this schemas test in the beginning, and we had to talk about how it showed up in our relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: And at the end of this counseling session, it was like two weekends, the therapist that led this group was, you know, we reached out to her and said, we really would like to continue therapy.
[SPEAKER_01]: Could you recommend someone?
[SPEAKER_01]: And she recommended a lovely woman named Abby.
[SPEAKER_03]: I said you ate the quiz that you said, and she was like, wait, I found it old email.
[SPEAKER_01]: So this all happened about three years ago.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, and our relationship was already on the brink of just being done.
[SPEAKER_01]: And after this whole, like, couples counseling workshop, I remember going to Julian said this open up this whole other side of me where I want to learn more about relationships and how I can really show up for my partner.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have to say it was probably a little bit too late for our relationship to realize that, but we did schedule a consultation with you Abby.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I remember this consultation so well because after Julie and I had this conversation about schemas, I went back through my email and I was like bam, it was Abby.
[SPEAKER_01]: We had a consultation with you.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was already kind of like I don't know this is the right relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: And during the consultation, you know, I just have to give a disclaimer.
[SPEAKER_01]: My ex was wonderful, great guy, just kind and just a wonderful person.
[SPEAKER_01]: We were not compatible.
[SPEAKER_01]: We were holding on to a relationship that was never going to work out.
[SPEAKER_01]: But on that consultation with you, Abby.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, my goodness.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what I say.
[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, my goodness.
[SPEAKER_01]: You ask both of us, do you want to get married?
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you see yourself getting married to each other?
[SPEAKER_01]: And his answer was, I'll do whatever you want to do.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that right there sealed the deal for me that we were so not compatible for each other.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because I felt like he just wants to do whatever to appease me.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had no idea who he was in this relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: So after we got off the call with you, we broke up.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I remember sending you an email
[SPEAKER_00]: the next day, saying, her face, for anyone living today is just like, I can, I just, I cannot believe this story.
[SPEAKER_00]: I did not know this before.
[SPEAKER_03]: We didn't know it until about 20 minutes before this week.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, exactly.
[SPEAKER_03]: We just, we just put it all together.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because it all sounded too familiar, but our email to you was we've decided to separate, you know, go our separate ways.
[SPEAKER_01]: But we would like to possibly continue one on one therapy with you.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you had responded back and said, I can, I was suggest just doing one of you because it's not, it's not fair to have both of you be my client.
[SPEAKER_01]: So that's basically where we left it about three years ago.
[SPEAKER_01]: I found so much clarity.
[SPEAKER_00]: You broke up your relationship that we're talking to me for 15 minutes.
[SPEAKER_02]: Hey, you know what?
[SPEAKER_02]: As someone who is a by-stander of this relationship, I will again, the second that you as ex was a wonderful person, they just were terrible fit.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it was one of those things that, like, as a friend, you can only say so much.
[SPEAKER_02]: You're just like, are you happy?
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, it's one of, yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think you actually did your job quite right because you probably pinpointed it and made it super clear and gave that clarity you needed.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the funny thing we say in couples therapy, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: We say sometimes in effective couple's therapist helps a couple be happier and more satisfied in their relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: But sometimes, uh, an effective couple's therapist helps.
[SPEAKER_00]: the couple and the relationship amicably, you know, and quickly and effectively, because we, you know, we have to learn how to be good at relationships and maintaining and sustaining relationships, but we also have to be good at saying goodbye and knowing when something's not working for us, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And ending in a way where we do it and consistently with our values and how we want to be the relationships.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, a couple's there, but should never be invested, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And keeping them together.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I tell you, I would have never been able to guess this.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, you were about to come up with this story in a million years.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just think this is the funniest moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: What a small world.
[SPEAKER_01]: What a small world.
[SPEAKER_01]: Everything comes full circle.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I remember telling Julie about schemas.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I wanted you to take this test because I thought it was so insightful.
[SPEAKER_01]: It told me it gave me so much insight to who I am in a relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: So let's first start off with what are schemas?
[SPEAKER_00]: You know before you even say that I want to say I don't remember the session, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: But I I would say that it sounds like your partner either has, he had, he either had a subjugation course.
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course, right.
[SPEAKER_00]: It sounds very like a subjugation schema.
[SPEAKER_01]: Subjugation was his number one.
[SPEAKER_01]: So what is that?
[SPEAKER_02]: Or anyone that doesn't know schemas at all?
[SPEAKER_00]: So schemas are core beliefs, like beliefs that we have about ourselves and about others in relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: And a subjugation scheme of for example, would be a belief that you are kind of powerless in relationships, or that you have to basically, you have to repress your own needs.
[SPEAKER_00]: in order to maintain the relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, a person who has a subjugation schema will have a lot of fear driving their relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: And their fears that if they make their needs a priority, they may get abandoned or they may get punished or they may get, there's going to be some sort of retaliation or punishment or an abandonment because of having a need and trying to get it met in the relationship.
[SPEAKER_02]: So how is this different than Myers-Bit Briggs because it feels very different, but I'd love for you to break it down of why you think this is more of the ideal way to kind of understand yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, well, I want to say the big difference between the Myers Briggs is more of a personality a questionnaire which lets you know very general personality traits.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whereas schemas are actually core beliefs, it's not like a personality that we have, it's just the belief that we have about ourselves.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like for example, somebody could have a dependency schema and actually be quite an independent person, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's really it's just what you believe about yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not really facts about your personality or who you are.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's about what you believe about yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: But what's interesting about schemas and we'll develop them at a very early age.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if, for example, your mom died at a young age, you may have an abandonment schema, or if you were abused in some way, you may have a mistrust abuse schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we developed these core beliefs in early childhood, and then we learned certain behaviors to do with those beliefs.
[SPEAKER_00]: For example, if somebody has an abandonment schema, they believe that others will abandon them and leave them or reject them.
[SPEAKER_00]: They could become very needy, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: kind of seeking excessive reassurance like, do you still love me?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where are you?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where have you been?
[SPEAKER_00]: Right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or they could do the very opposite behavior.
[SPEAKER_00]: They could abandon before they get abandoned and they can become really cold and distant.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the belief, we have to understand the belief, but then we have to also understand the behavior that they do when that belief gets triggered for them in relationships.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so the person with the same schema can actually manifest it in a different way.
[SPEAKER_02]: Interesting.
[SPEAKER_02]: I definitely have a bit of an abandonment schema not like so it wasn't my most prominent, but it was one of them and it's interesting because I feel like my childhood was definitely not like abusive or bad in any way, but my dad would very much like shut down in fights and I saw that right and I think that's where it stems from so There's definitely like I feel like there could be the extremes, but there could also be instances that might not be as extreme that also play into how you perceive relationships.
[SPEAKER_00]: right we all develop schemas so we all have core beliefs none of us are free from it and you don't have to have a trauma in order to develop a core belief right right these are just little attachment wounds right so we don't necessarily need to be in an abusive home to develop these core beliefs actually uh we we could have schemas that are more maladaptive or more adaptive but we're we're always having beliefs about what will happen to us in relationship with others right
[SPEAKER_01]: So I think that's really important to note with schemas, it's that it's a belief and not reality.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you could have an abandonment schema where you believe people will abandon you, but that's not actually what people in your life do.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that's why I found schemas so fascinating because what you believe is what you perceive as your truth when that may not be reality.
[SPEAKER_01]: So we talked about abandonment schema.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's go through all of the other ones.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to speak to what you said right now before moving forward, which is what's interesting is that a belief doesn't it can be imaginary doesn't mean that it's happening, but if you behave accordingly, you can create a self fulfilling prophecy, making the very thing you fear actually happen and making it real and often schemas occur that way.
[SPEAKER_00]: Think about it if somebody has an abandonment schema and they're calling up and they're going Where are you?
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you still love me?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why didn't you text me?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where have you been?
[SPEAKER_00]: Are you with someone else?
[SPEAKER_00]: Then that person is likely to actually end up getting abandoned.
[SPEAKER_00]: That other person may start making more distance.
[SPEAKER_00]: So what's interesting about schemas is they end up creating these self-affilling prophecies that do end up making
[SPEAKER_00]: it real if we don't change our behaviors around those beliefs.
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like manifestation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[SPEAKER_00]: And what's interesting about schemas too is actually there is a way when you look at a schema questionnaire.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to go over the schemas.
[SPEAKER_00]: But when you look at the schema questionnaire, there is a way and you go, you want to be very careful and you want to make sure it's a psychologist that's doing it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But there is a way that we could get information about somebody's personality.
[SPEAKER_00]: So for example, if you're getting a schema questionnaire and all of the schemas are very, very high and it's hard to distinguish the main ones, that it means it might mean that there may be a personality disorder there if some sort of minor or larger, yeah, and there are certain dynamics between schemas that could suggest particular personality disorders.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like for example, person with a narcissistic personality disorder,
[SPEAKER_00]: may have their top three schemas are usually entitlement, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So entitlement is a core belief basically that your needs are more important than others, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or that you're more special than others?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or it's like a sense of disderving, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Expectation that, you know, what you want is the right way and you will get your way.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, that's an entitlement schema and another schema for a person with narcissistic personality is defectiveness shame and defectiveness shame is the belief that something is very deeply fundamentally wrong with you causing a lot of shame that you're broken right or bad in some way and the third schema in a narcissist that the triad for
[SPEAKER_00]: and narcissistic personality, the third one was mistrust abuse.
[SPEAKER_00]: So again, we would never want to think that somebody that has these schemas has the personality disorder, but we would, if we look at the questionnaire and every one of their schemas is tied, the highest it could be.
[SPEAKER_00]: And their top three are those three.
[SPEAKER_00]: We may start wondering, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: We may start wondering,
[SPEAKER_00]: If it possibly could be a personality disorder, because often, you know, some of our schemas are high, some of them are medium, some of them are low, sometimes you don't have any, and in the time schemas, but if all of them are high, then there are certain triangles that can lead to certain personality structures, like borderline personality structure would be
[SPEAKER_00]: abandonment, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So we have abandonment and emotional deprivation and mistrust abuse.
[SPEAKER_00]: So abandonment is the feeling, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: The belief that others will abandon you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Emotional deprivation is a core belief that you will not get your needs met in relationships.
[SPEAKER_00]: And mistrust abuse is a feeling that you cannot trust others in relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: The people will harm you, damage you.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're not trustworthy that they may lie or deceive or betray you in some way.
[SPEAKER_02]: Got it.
[SPEAKER_02]: What about I think the other one's perfectionism?
[SPEAKER_02]: I definitely got that one.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm curious to hear a word of that and then I think you said the other all the rest but social alienation did you mention that one too or not yet?
[SPEAKER_01]: So there's 10 of them.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you talked about entitlement, abandonment, mistrust, defectiveness, emotional deprivation of self-sacrifice and subjugation.
[SPEAKER_01]: So let's go to perfectionism.
[SPEAKER_01]: What is that?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so I will say that perfectionism right now is the most common schema I see.
[SPEAKER_00]: Mm-hmm.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the most common schema both among men and women.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it makes sense that perfectionism schema or an unrelenting standard schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's when we put really high standards and expectations on ourselves and on others.
[SPEAKER_00]: Most of the time it's both on ourselves and on others, but there's some people that actually it's actually more on themselves than on others.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're always assessing.
[SPEAKER_00]: We don't take a scheme of questionnaire too literally, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: We're always asking questions and assessing and asking if it resonates with the person.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the most common scheme that I see is perfectionism is people putting really high standards on themselves.
[SPEAKER_00]: and putting such high expectations that are not the reason it's called unrelenting standards is because they're very hard to meet.
[SPEAKER_00]: We cannot meet these standards.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're unrelenting.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's a lot of criticism with a perfectionism schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: The feeling that shows up in the most for people with a perfectionism schema is this feeling of disappointment or not enough
[SPEAKER_00]: not a bit better at this feeling of disappointment or wanting more.
[SPEAKER_02]: I could see that being a huge issue in dating to and relationships.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, I know that's been a challenge for me because it's like, you always want more, you always want people to like, sometimes you expect people or a mind reader because a perfectionism tendencies, so I can see how that one definitely shows up.
[SPEAKER_01]: Why do you think so many people have this schema?
[SPEAKER_00]: A, I think our society is becoming more and more perfectionistic, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: We're expecting to live the American dream to have money to have this, to have that right to be successful.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so it's an unrelantic standard to think we could afford to go to college and then buy a home and then have a family and then have this right like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, people aren't even able to pay their debts for school.
[SPEAKER_00]: How, you know, the standards that are put on us
[SPEAKER_00]: unreachable.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we do and look at the messages that we get about what women should look like, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean these are on who looks like a who looks like Angelina Jolie, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and it's like dating like having like it's like having the perfect relationship, having the perfect career, like all this stuff, it's just so much to handle at once.
[SPEAKER_00]: having it all.
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a having an all mentality that's exactly what it is and we can't it's not realistic to have it all and I want to speak to where you're saying Julie because what's interesting about it is that it can show up in different ways like it can show up like feeling like oh my partner's that good enough or it's not enough with this partner or wanting more feeling a sense of dissatisfaction.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or it could show up like, is there a relationship this satisfying like, do others have a better, or it could show up kind of like the people that have difficulty committing, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's like, like a kind of fomal where you can't commit one person because the next person could be better or the next person could be better.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you can't really commit to anyone.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's quicker to again, it could manifest in many different ways.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then when you think about the relationship to other schemas, it changes the whole dynamic.
[SPEAKER_00]: an interesting dynamic is when a person has both a perfectionism schema and an abandonment schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: It could look a little bit like you kind of oscillate between, oh my god is my partner going to leave me, I need them and then kind of moving towards them and then being like, is this the right relationship?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know if this partner's good enough and then moving away from them, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And then be like, oh no, are they leaving me?
[SPEAKER_00]: So there's like, oh that's me.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's right.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's what's interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like it could show up as different attachment styles, a person with an anxious and bivalent attachment style, or an anxious avoid an attachment style, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It could have different schemas or the same schemas with different attachment styles.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's very interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: You always want to think about the schema questionnaire in relation to other schemas because they'll play along together.
[SPEAKER_02]: So what after perfectionism, what's the second most common one that you see?
[SPEAKER_00]: on perfectionism is the most common one.
[SPEAKER_00]: Subjugation is a common one.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would say more for women than for men, but subjugation, if we think about it, relationships are a lot about negotiating and getting your needs met.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so there's feeling kind of powerless or feeling subjugated, and that's the common one in relationships.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would say that one is more common for women than for men, but in general, that's a common one.
[SPEAKER_00]: The schema that I see the most in women,
[SPEAKER_00]: um, is self-sacrifice.
[SPEAKER_00]: So self-sacrifice schema is the one that is most common in women.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the ones that are most common in men are usually entitlement or defectiveness shame.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so it's interesting to think about the standards that society puts on us with the messages that we're getting from society around gender and gender norms and these kinds of ideas and how they impact our core beliefs about ourselves.
[SPEAKER_00]: Interesting.
[SPEAKER_01]: I find that those two really conflicting as well, entitlement and defectiveness.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like you feel you are entitled to certain things, but at the same time you also feel like you're defective, so you're not deserving of certain things.
[SPEAKER_00]: What's interesting is that we always want to think with schemas in relation to one another So it could be that the person with an entitlement schema doesn't have defective in shame Like for example, it's more common for somebody with entitlement to have a perfectionism scheme So that the person who has entitlement and perfectionism looks rather different than the person that has entitlement Defectiveness shame, but what's interesting about it is that the person that has defectiveness shame
[SPEAKER_00]: it actually has an entitlement schema as an over-compensation for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you're feeling a lot of shame, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And you're feeling like you're so bad and you need that even more to deserve to get what you want, to prove that you're not that.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's very interesting about it, actually, that narcissism, which is a disorder of grandiosity and entitlement is actually a shame-based disorder.
[SPEAKER_00]: The number one feeling that drives the whole thing is actually shame.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's a very
[SPEAKER_00]: complex issue if we think about it that way.
[SPEAKER_02]: Throw back to like early dateable but I've ever seen one we had someone basically come and talk about this like on again off again I'm not gonna make you my girlfriend I'm gonna hook up with other people in front of you narcissists that she was dating and I remember our co-host at the time Michael for anyone that's been with us for a long time.
[SPEAKER_02]: He had his master's in clinical psychology, and I remember him saying that it was shame.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's where it was coming from.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that was something that she had never thought about because he had the super confident persona and the last thing you would think about is shame.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's funny that all these, the fuck boys out there, there might be something deeper going on is what I'm gathering from this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, but you know what's very interesting about it is we want to be very careful because the shame base, the soldiers, what's very interesting about them, the person that feels a lot of shame, again, in a narcissistic structure, if they have a narcissistic character, they tend to not feel a lot of guilt.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they so shame actually that shame is more about me.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is a very actually it's a very self-absorbed feeling.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, for example, if me and you get into a fight and I say, whatever it is, you're a jerk, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: If I was to feel guilt, I'd be thinking about it later and going, oh my goodness, I said that and Julie's really hurt and she looks sad.
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel really guilty.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why did I do that?
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe I should apologize.
[SPEAKER_00]: She might be crying right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe I ruined her day.
[SPEAKER_00]: Shame does not sound like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Shame sounds like, why did I say that to Julie?
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm so bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: I should be better.
[SPEAKER_00]: I messed this up.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm so awful.
[SPEAKER_00]: I never deserve anyone, but it's really it's it's very interesting to think about because it's very meat meat meat meat meat.
[SPEAKER_00]: Interesting to know.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: guilt will actually guilt actually aids for the person to change their behavior and shame doesn't the person who feels shame is not likely to change their behavior.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was gonna ask you where does guilt fall into all this like which schema does that kind of manifest in the most what does it not
[SPEAKER_00]: That is such a great question because actually the one that that manifests the most in is in self-sacrifice.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what I was going to get.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was going to get that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Self-sacrifice is a guilt driven schema, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And so it's very interesting because self-sacrificeers are literally magnets for entitlements, schemas, and people within entitlements, schemas are magnets for people with a self-sacrifice schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because there are the opposite side of the same coin.
[SPEAKER_00]: the person, it's like it's a schema maintaining relationship as what we call it, a schema maintaining relationship is when you're with somebody who continues to confirm that the core belief is true.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if I have a self-sacrifice schema and I feel guilty putting my feelings in my needs before others and I have a partner who has an entitlement schema and they believe that their needs and feelings come before others were a perfect fit because we continue to confirm the core
[SPEAKER_02]: interesting.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we talked about a bunch how they fit into like dating and relationships, what about I'm curious about emotional deprivation and also I'm curious about social alienation.
[SPEAKER_02]: I can kind of guess that one, but would love your take.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: So emotional deprivation schema and I want to say what's really cool about schemas, but I find really cool about it is that
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, it's kind of like the more that you do it and you see people with a schema, the more you have a good sense of it, and you're able to identify it quickly and kind of be able to make a lot of predictions about people.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like you did for U.S.A. X-boyfriend.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you did pretty much.
[SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.
[SPEAKER_00]: Beango.
[SPEAKER_03]: It's like you described it to a tea.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I also want, I want to distinguish between a subjugation schema and a self-sacrifice schema because those two seem similar.
[SPEAKER_00]: Both of them are driven by the idea that other people's needs are more important than your own, but a self-sacrifice schema like Julie pointed out is more driven by feelings of guilt.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, no, this person is sad if I do what I need or oh, no, I'm hurting them if I, you know, get lunch without them or take a long time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Where's a subjugation schema is driven more by fear.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will, they will punish me if I do what what I want or abandon me.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's very similar flavor but driven by a different feeling.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so do you think self sacrifice drives more resentment than subjugation?
[SPEAKER_00]: I would say actually that both of them, like you said, you're making a very good point because both of them end up with a lot of feelings of anger and resentment.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that what happens is depending on how much awareness the person has.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would say, it may be that the subjugating person feels more resentment.
[SPEAKER_00]: And let me explain it a little bit differently.
[SPEAKER_00]: The person with a self-sacrifice came out has a little bit more awareness that they're self-sacrificing, whereas the person who's subjugating has a little bit less awareness.
[SPEAKER_00]: like if I'm going to a restaurant like the person who's subjugating may actually blame you for subjugating them even if it's their own belief.
[SPEAKER_00]: They may actually feel like you're controlling them or you're making them do something or you've manipulated them even because it's difficult for them to say no.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I guess I would say that both
[SPEAKER_00]: end up in a lot of anger and resentment, but it can look very differently depending on the level of self-reflection or awareness that the person has.
[SPEAKER_00]: A good example of this is like, let's say you're asking me to borrow my car and I say I can't lend you the car and then you start kind of guilt tripping me about it or attacking me over it, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like if it's difficult for me to say no to lend you the car, if I'm thinking about it this way,
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh no, Julie, Julie really needs to get to this job interview and if she doesn't go to this job interview, she might not get the job and I don't want her to miss a job, but then I give you the car.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've just self-sacrifice, I mean, I may feel a little resentful, but I have a little bit of awareness that I did that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whereas let's say you kind of ask me for it and I don't even notice to say no I just go okay here and then later it's so kind of realizing like you're driving it and I'm like that she get gas that she do this I didn't ask her for this why did I agree to this right it's like the subjugating person is not even so aware that they've just done is something they literally kind of feel like they don't they they're helpless that their number one feeling is a sense of
[SPEAKER_00]: That's too.
[SPEAKER_01]: If two people are in a relationship and both of their dominating schemas are subjugation, what happens in that relationship are they just like do they just not know what their needs are and they just keep subjugating to each other?
[SPEAKER_00]: It depends and often that's not very common to subjugators getting together is not so common because
[SPEAKER_00]: But it depends if they have low awareness, it could manifest in many different ways where they feel controlled or like, they may agree to things that they think the other person wants and then the end realized that neither one wanted those, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So that, it could look like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: or it could also look like being really indecisive.
[SPEAKER_00]: What do you want?
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to look like indecisive, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you could manifest in many different ways, it could manifest like assuming that somebody wanted something, it could manifest like being indecisive, or if they can't kind of slow it down and have more awareness, it could actually lead to really listening more and taking your time not to subjugate yourself or the other person.
[SPEAKER_00]: But any, any seem as where you have more awareness, they're more workable, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Wait, so you said it's unlikely that those two would get together, is that because like they're both not really like no one's pushing it forward like what is the reason why those two wouldn't get together.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that's a very interesting question.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know the reason, but it's not something I see commonly, and I think it's because often people who subjugate are looking for somebody that they're just more kind of magnetized to somebody who's a little bit more of a leader, you know, because they attempt to kind of go along.
[SPEAKER_00]: So often you see those with people who are the perfectionists or have an entitlement
[SPEAKER_00]: subjugation and abandonment look like the typical pursue or distance or dynamic.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm like, all right.
[SPEAKER_02]: I feel like I'm like unraveling so much about my own last relationship.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I'll wait for you to diagnose me, but this is all like coming together and making too much sense right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: because the person was feeling abandoned is like, oh my goodness, where are you?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where are you?
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you'll subjugate it, it is like you're taking over my life.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm being overtaken, I'm losing myself, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, the thing with schemas is that they're so tied to each other that the more of a perfectionist you are, the more of a subjugator your partner could be.
[SPEAKER_01]: that like that's what I found in my last relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the beauty of it, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: The beauty is how they interact.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not only with the other person, but also with your own scheme as right.
[SPEAKER_00]: Somebody, I mean, so I'll get to your question, Julie, around the emotional deprivation team, and I could show you how this could look completely different even in your own scheme as right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It depends on
[SPEAKER_00]: Just like you said, the interaction between the other person and within your own schemas and it could look radically different, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: That's why there's a ton of them, but you could have like so many different dynamics between two people.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's very interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: So an emotional deprivation schema is the core beliefs that your needs won't get met and your relationships.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's your need for, it could be your need for support, your need for validation, your need for care, or it could be your basic needs, your needs to eat, your need, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And the emotional deprivation scheme of fields, like usually when people have this, if there's an urgency to it, like, it's like the deprivation is very, it almost feels to me every person I'm having with an emotional deprivation scheme to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I get an image of a crying baby who just cried and cried and cried and nobody attended to and they who just cried louder and cried louder or they stop crying where they do all of these things to try to get their needs met.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the level of desperation that comes when you don't feel like your needs for survival are met because it does it's it's a very intense schema and it's very urgent and it could oscillate so the person was an emotional deprivation schema and they believe that others will not meet their needs often the most common they oscillate between different ways of being with the most common thing I've seen the common dynamic is that they start out with not saying their needs.
[SPEAKER_00]: They kind of hold in their needs.
[SPEAKER_00]: They think they're needy.
[SPEAKER_00]: They have too many needs.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so they don't want to share them in their free to share them.
[SPEAKER_00]: They hold it in and they hold it in.
[SPEAKER_00]: And by the time that they do share it, they're kind of so they're like a balloon that is just popped.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then they're having all of these needs.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they're like, and it's very overwhelming.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this didn't happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: This didn't happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so at that point, and so both end up kind of creating the same outcome that their needs don't get met, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't share your needs,
[SPEAKER_00]: or if you wait until they are a nine out of 10, right, like of necessary, both strategies end up creating a self-fulfilling prophecy where you don't feel like your needs got met in that relationship.
[SPEAKER_01]: This feels like a very preemptive schema.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like you're basically saying, my partner will never satisfy my needs before you even enter into a relationship.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I was going to say definitely what I probably if I took this test the quiz like a couple years ago, I bet I would have scored much higher on that than I do today.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well that means that you've done a lot of work on yourself, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: That's exciting.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's true.
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like I have some schemas that I've gotten like so good with like they don't even impact me that much like they still show up It's not that they disappear, but your behaviors change and you have this freedom to act different when the beliefs pull you towards old behaviors that only reinforce the schema But then it's it's funny how there's other schemas that I feel of grown
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm like, dearest, others are growing boldly.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's interesting to think about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you know, I would say that all schemas are a bit preemptive, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So this one I agree with you, it has a more preemptive feel than others.
[SPEAKER_00]: But all of them are pretty preemptive.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because we're already bringing in a map of what we think it's going to, how it's going to unfold.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the more that we listen to the stories about how it's going to unfold, the more that the stories are driving our behaviors.
[SPEAKER_00]: The more likely our schemas will come true.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the more we're able to notice the story and that it pulls us to do behaviors.
[SPEAKER_00]: That will only confirm our schema, then we could then notice what our values are and replace those schema driven behaviors with values based behaviors and then we're less likely to continue confirming kind of and repeating right like a self repetition compulsion.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I definitely can see that with all of them.
[SPEAKER_02]: The only one I'm still not grasping 100% and I'd love your thoughts on this one is social alienation.
[SPEAKER_02]: Is that because you basically assume that you're not accepted socially or does that mean something else?
[SPEAKER_00]: No, you're on it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is social alienation to schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a feeling of unbelonging that you don't belong in a community.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's like a sense of loneliness and a sense of kind of
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm different from everyone.
[SPEAKER_00]: It has a very different flavor from a defectiveness-shame schema, because it's not like I'm bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's more like, I don't belong or it could be their bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why are they bad?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why don't, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't have to be that you're bad, but it's a big feeling like a sense of emptiness on belonging, a lack of community.
[SPEAKER_00]: Often, it's very common in people who are immigrants.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you if you come from a certain culture, you move to a different country.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a very common schema to have interest.
[SPEAKER_02]: I could see that showing up in dating like there's no one that either likes me or there's no one that understands me is there any other ways that you see that one showing up.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think that.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're nailing it.
[SPEAKER_00]: One of the main ways that shows up is this feeling I'm never understood.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm never truly seen.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's this feeling like is this partner, the person I meant to be with is this the right person for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's a feeling of sometimes being with your partner and still feeling alone and still feeling a sense of like not belonging together, not connecting together.
[SPEAKER_00]: So there's feelings of distance, but it could also show up in other ways, it could show up like on your family doesn't like me or my family doesn't like you or I don't like your friends so any time that I see couples were there where there's a lot of stuff around friends and family it's usually related to a social alienation schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: Especially if, you know, there's parents that don't like the partner or or like a group or they're not getting along with their partners friends that's most likely a social alienation schema.
[SPEAKER_01]: What about people who really reject traditions who feel like I don't understand monogamy, I don't understand gender roles or people who feel like they just don't, they don't see eye to eye with most people in their life.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's just brilliant.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think he feels alienated a lot of the times because he cannot hold conversations with anyone.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I think the key word that you use is feeling alienated, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because it's a social isolation alienation schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if the feeling that shows up is one of feeling alienated in a lone and distant,
[SPEAKER_00]: than it's most likely a social alienation schema, but if it shows up more as judgment, and that is necessarily alienation, it could be perfectionism or could be entitlement.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like an entitled person could go, well, they don't know anything.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm smarter than them, and I'm smarter than them, and nobody gets me, I'm so special.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so that has a very different flavor than the person who really feels alone and wants to connect with people and feels like they're like in literally an alien.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I'm so excited to go into ours because I feel like seeing how they weave together is going to be really interesting.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we'll let you dissect us, but before we get into that, how were these 12 decided?
[SPEAKER_02]: Like who came up with these should be the 12 schemas?
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'll tell you, it's a funny story, but Jeffrey Young is the first person to really come up with the idea of schemas in the sense of core beliefs.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like we roll it
[SPEAKER_00]: maps of understanding things.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, how do I go to the store and get toilet paper?
[SPEAKER_00]: We have a scheme of for it, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: But Jeffree Young was the first person to talk about the idea of core beliefs in relationships and using attachment styles with cognitive behavioral therapy, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because schemas are really schema therapy is an integration of attachment and psychodynamic therapy mixed with behaviorism, so it's a very interesting treatment, but he started with 10, he started with 10 core schemas and what's interesting is that then, and I hope he doesn't hear this ever, I really do, I've never met the man, he's an active listener, I'll just get out of the sky.
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm just our never one fan.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll say it because I don't think he will be listening.
[SPEAKER_00]: He may have a grandiosity.
[SPEAKER_00]: His own entitlement grandiosity schema kind of led him to continue and bring more and more and more and more schemas.
[SPEAKER_00]: So now I think he's up to like 22.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh damn.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, but in reality, the more that the more schemas he added, the more the less a really some of the added schemas that he added are more behaviors than they are schemas than their beliefs.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like for example, emotional inhibition, which is a person that holds back their emotions.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's also a vulnerability to harm.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think vulnerability to harm is a schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: Actually, it's a core belief, but I don't use it in my work for relationships because it's not an
[SPEAKER_00]: So vulnerability to harm, vulnerability to harm is the fear that you are vulnerable.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like a hypocondriacled disorder, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's like worrying that you might get sick or that you're weaving, that your body is not working well or that you need to go to the doctor.
[SPEAKER_00]: So a vulnerability to harm schema is a core belief that you're fragile in that kind of way.
[SPEAKER_02]: God, so there's many, these are just the 12 that we've pinpointed are more just the ones that are interpersonal,
[SPEAKER_00]: There's 10 that I use and these 10 are interpersonal ones that are in relationships.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's some that are not in relationships, but many of the new schemas are what I would say are not just a core belief because they include a behavior.
[SPEAKER_00]: For example, emotional inhibition is not a core belief, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, there's a core belief in there, but an emotional inhibition is when a person represses their emotions, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: They're kind of blue.
[SPEAKER_00]: right like holding back on their own emotional expressivity.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so basically the dilemma with using that as a schema is that it's more of a coping behavior than a core belief because somebody with an abandonment schema can also use emotional inhibition right be emotionally inhibited.
[SPEAKER_00]: or somebody with an entitlement schema could be emotionally inhibited.
[SPEAKER_00]: Somebody with an emotional deprivation schema can be emotionally inhibited.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's still informative, but it starts getting out of just core beliefs and starts getting into behaviors.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's interesting to look at, but it's not as clean caught if that makes sense.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not just belief.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm like dizzy thinking about all of this, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: Because everything is interconnected.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I also believe that schemas change over time, depending on where you are in life, who your partner is.
[SPEAKER_01]: I took this test three years ago.
[SPEAKER_01]: My schemas are very different today.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's fun.
[SPEAKER_01]: But what is so good about this is what you're saying is that your beliefs will ultimately drive your behavior.
[SPEAKER_01]: to change behavior and outcome, we got to change our core beliefs first.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's powerful.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, no, no, no, no.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you've got it backwards, backwards, right.
[SPEAKER_00]: And what's weird, that's the beautiful part about it because changing beliefs could what's interesting actually is a scheme is a very stable.
[SPEAKER_00]: And usually somebody could take the schema question in three, four, five, 10 years later and still have the same schemas.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think if your schemas change, you probably, I don't know, I don't know if you have, but it means you probably have done a lot of work, but in therapy or thought about it, introspected and thought about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But they tend to be pretty stable and pretty rigid.
[SPEAKER_00]: And really the therapy that I do because changing beliefs is much harder than changing behaviors.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just a hundred times harder and the beauty of behavioral therapy actually is that you don't You could believe you could have the belief for example if you're the subjugation schema that you're going to be a tap that you're going to be punished that you're going to be abandoned and you could Still make a request and see if those if that actually happens.
[SPEAKER_00]: You could do a different behavior while still believing it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So actually what we do is we help people change their behaviors.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we go, if you change your behaviors enough, and you see that it gets disconfirmed, if you don't keep doing the same thing that confirms it, you do something different, you pay attention to the outcome, that will change your beliefs.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am such a bad student.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have such a mess, dude.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, because when we first, when we did this, couples counseling three years ago, that's exactly what our therapist said.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're not trying to change each other's schemas.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're trying to change behavior while accepting that your partner has these schemas.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's exactly it.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's exactly it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wait, so you a, I'm dying to know how have your schemas changed.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I want Abby to diagnose both of us.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know what's our problem?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I think three years ago, the ones I showed up the most were self-sacrifice and on-relenting standards.
[SPEAKER_01]: Those showed up as high for me.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wait, where is an enrelenting standard?
[SPEAKER_02]: Perfectionism.
[SPEAKER_01]: Perfectionism.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Perfectionism.
[SPEAKER_01]: And when I took it again today, I didn't have any high schemas, but my moderate one was perfectionism.
[SPEAKER_01]: and then next was self-sacrifice.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I guess it's like still similar, but they're just not as high anymore and they're kind of somewhat flipped and I totally understand why.
[SPEAKER_01]: So they haven't changed though.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's to Abby's point is they still are the same.
[SPEAKER_02]: They're just, yeah, they're not adding them differently.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, yes.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's like you change your relationship with them.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not that they've just appeared, but you're relate, you're kind of holding them in a lighter way.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're not as real.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're not as true.
[SPEAKER_00]: They probably, when they're lower on the scale and the question and they impact their behaviors a little bit less, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because the whole goal is of behavioral freedom.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because the issue is not our beliefs, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: When a schema gets triggered, it's like a whole experience, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's physiological.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's thoughts, there's feelings, there's sensations,
[SPEAKER_00]: urges, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a whole experience, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: We're like triggered.
[SPEAKER_00]: And our goal is not necessarily to change the automatic thoughts, the feelings or the sensations or the urges.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's to be able to change our relationship with that so that we're doing different behaviors.
[SPEAKER_00]: But really, what ends up making our belief stronger and stronger is our behaviors.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when we help people really do different behaviors
[SPEAKER_00]: and with intention and with paying attention to the outcome, often what they find is then the belief becomes more malleable, the belief is not strong.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wait, so UA, you said that you think you know why they flipped and you think you know why they're lower.
[SPEAKER_02]: What is your hypothesis?
[SPEAKER_01]: I really think that like three years ago, I felt like I sacrificed a lot for relationships.
[SPEAKER_01]: So then to overcompensate, I would have perfectionism, schema, thinking that I needed to up my standards about the people I was dating, because I was sacrificing so much.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like that was a narrative I was telling myself.
[SPEAKER_01]: After three years of work and being with a partner who definitely doesn't make me feel this way, I have a different relationship with my perfectionist schema, where I know that I have this schema, but at least I know I have high standards for other people, but if they don't fulfill the standards, these unwritten standards I have for them, I have no right to present them.
[SPEAKER_01]: At least I have this understanding.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I think now my second step from that is to self-sacrifice is that I've come down from being a perfectionist and thinking that I need to almost sacrifice a little bit more in relationships.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think your hypothesis is right on.
[SPEAKER_00]: I would have said exactly that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think you know what's interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to say something strange.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know how it's going to play out.
[SPEAKER_00]: My history of working with a lot of couples and men and women and schemas, I've seen a self-sacrifice schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is the most common for women.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I feel like it's a little bit right now in our collective unconscious or in the zeitgeist, like since Trump got elected, I really noticed a lot of women.
[SPEAKER_00]: It like almost like the me-to movement really impacted the self-sacrifice scheme.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like suddenly women were like, wait a minute.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like no means no.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have the right to say no, not the only I'm apologizing.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I love it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's it's interesting because like what you described there and kind of the path that you took.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've seen a lot of my my clients and other women that I know kind of going through this path.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a way that our environment is impacting quite like I would say like collective schemas, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like our collective schemas are being impacted.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think of anything that we might have like swung too far over.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think like what UA was saying is like in relationships you kind of need some self-sacrificing.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like it can't be so much self-sacrificing that you're losing yourself clearly.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's what it really becomes the schema.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I think we, we're in a world people don't want to self-sacrifice at all therefore it like never goes anywhere.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, entitlement and perfectionist.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, it's, I think what your season's a very interesting discussion.
[SPEAKER_00]: I, I completely agree with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you know what I think is interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that when I work with clients on any schema or on any new behavior,
[SPEAKER_00]: What's interesting about it is that often what happens is we go from one extreme to the other like whatever behavior we're doing if we're at a zero and we start doing a different behavior we go to like a 90 or if we would have been doing something at a 90 we're going to the opposite direction to a zero and we kind of do that for a while until we get kind of in the middle of a 50.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like it's emotional deprivation scheme and they haven't been making requests or sharing their needs and then we talk about it and they start noticing it more and more before they get to an even outplace they get to an extreme place.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I could say that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, I think the other side of that could be people with an entitlement scheme going on an extreme place, right, because the opposite of that would be empathy and perspective taking and consideration, right, especially empathy, but I agree with you that we
[SPEAKER_00]: when you have been self-sacrificing for a while or if you're kind of noticing as a whole that you're doing that as a collective, then yeah, I think that there is a lot of truths of the thought that we are heading now to another extreme and it becomes, it turns into a power struggle.
[SPEAKER_00]: rather than realizing that actually there is a way to have win-win scenarios.
[SPEAKER_00]: And like neither person needs to subjugate the right.
[SPEAKER_00]: Both people need to compromise.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can't have entitlement and self-sacrifice.
[SPEAKER_00]: Both people need to be willing to compromise.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that means neither person gets their ideal situation.
[SPEAKER_00]: If there isn't entitlement, the neither person falls into an intolerable situation.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's the big difference, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like the perfectionism is expecting.
[SPEAKER_00]: I get my ideal all the time.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know what you cannot be in relation to another person and have your idea all the time.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just not life or your partner's going to be a zombie, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So we have to be able to tell the difference between what is self-sacrificing and what is compromising and what is not getting my way exactly as I want.
[SPEAKER_00]: and I'm not in an intolerable situation and I also care that my partner is not in an intolerable situation.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not willing to get my ideal situation if it means that my partner is going to be in an intolerable situation.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, I mean, before we get to Julie's, that I want to diagnose her too in her work.
[SPEAKER_01]: This idea of this journey and how your schemas show up so does it look like this where you still have these dominant schemas no matter where you are in your journey is just that some are more intense than others and then they kind of go back and forth or is it if you let's say you have one schema that dims a little bit does another one come to light.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, no, no, not necessarily, you know, the thing is is that it all depends on how it manifests.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like for example, somebody could have a very, very high self-sacrifice schema and yet if they're aware of it, they could do the behaviors that where it does not impact their relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: So what matters is not necessarily whether our schemas are high or dim, what matters is how much they impact our actions.
[SPEAKER_00]: God, for example, the number one thing I tell people with a self-sacrifice schema is I say, learn to say the word never say no and never say yes.
[SPEAKER_00]: Definitely never say yes.
[SPEAKER_00]: Always say let me think about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just start with let me think about it and buy yourself time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because the self-sacrificeer is always like, yes, the entitled person is always like, nope, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And you help both people more so the self-sacrifice or say, let me think about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then you do little exercises to help them really connect with what they're actually needing, because often when you've self-sacrifice for a long time, when you could work on the behaviors, it gets really hard to still be able to identify what you're actually needing.
[SPEAKER_00]: You've sacrificed for so long.
[SPEAKER_00]: You've lost the kind of,
[SPEAKER_00]: barometer of what you're needing.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you kind of help them do the behaviors that buy them the time because when they're no longer afraid to say no or when they could do that behavior they get more in touch with what they're actually needing.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's like some some are some are dimmed already like somebody could have a dimmed schema which impacts the relationship hugely and some could have a very high schema which impacts the relationships very lightly, what really matters is how aware of you of this voice right there's a narrator in your head and there's these stories.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's selling you the stories, this narrator is not selling you these stories out of nowhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not created in a vacuum.
[SPEAKER_00]: These things actually happen to you, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: You've got certain messages that if you don't put other people's needs before you're on your selfish or you're not good, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Or if you trust people, they'll betray you and they'll use you.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the fact that you've learned these schemas was adaptive at some point.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now the behaviors you learned what to do when those get triggers were also adaptive in your early childhood environment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like a perfect example of this is the person with an emotional deprivation schema may become really hysterical when they have a need.
[SPEAKER_00]: They may just go, ah, I'm falling apart and I'm hysterical.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm falling apart.
[SPEAKER_00]: I need you to help me, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And this may actually push other people away and not get their needs met.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it must have been that at some point in their life, maybe for example, their mom was depressed.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if they fell or they had an issue, they had needs.
[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't attended to, but if it was like a 10 out of 10, it was attended to.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so they learn.
[SPEAKER_00]: They learn that I have to be really bad at a ton at a ton to be attended to.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's like we learned certain behaviors and they have always those behaviors have always been adaptive in our origin family that's so fascinating.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's less, it's becoming aware of your schemas and then how to like manage it in a way.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like there's a voice and that voice as soon as you get triggered, everything that voice says to you pushes you to do an older behavior.
[SPEAKER_00]: And every feeling that shows up, if you don't want to have that feeling, it will push you to do an older behavior.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're willing,
[SPEAKER_00]: to notice where that feeling is in your body, to love that, you know, to kind of treat it like a crying baby, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Each schema is a crying baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we could go, oh, here's guilt.
[SPEAKER_00]: It makes sense.
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel guilty.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it feels really bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now my mind is going, you're not going to feel guilty.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you just agree to give them your card, just give them your card, your bad person, yourself, fish, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And you just go, it makes sense that I feel this feeling in my stomach.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I feel this tightness in my throat.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's this,
[SPEAKER_00]: right old feeling and experience of this guilt and fear not being good enough and then the more that you're willing to go I could have this and it's so can it makes sense I feel this way and where is this in my body and even take your hand and put it exactly I'm where you feel this feeling the most intensely
[SPEAKER_00]: And you rub it, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Just like a crime baby, and you go out here, you when you're able to relate to it differently, and you're not trying to push that experience away, then you have all of these options.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do I want to say maybe, maybe I want to say yes, but I want to say yes tomorrow, or maybe I want to say no, or maybe I want to say, I'll say yes.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you do this, right, there's all of these options open up, these behavioral options.
[SPEAKER_00]: when we're able to stay with the experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I hope people stay with the experience, but we also identify what are your values because our values are a compass.
[SPEAKER_00]: Our values tell us about what we want to be about.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if I values around being compassionate, being assertive, being fair, it's a question.
[SPEAKER_00]: clearer that I am about the stories and where they pull me versus the values, the more I'm able to stay with this uncomfortable feeling, the more I'll be able to choose the behaviors that move me towards values rather than choose the behavior that might give me an immediate relief but lead to long term pain, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Cause it's almost like an addiction.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like if you feel guilty and you say yes, you feel less guilty in the moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: But in the long run, you end up feeling resentful.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's so fascinating.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I think like for me because this was the first time I ever did the schemas like you A you had experience in the past with it, and I can't believe I still can't believe That story is just theoretical.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I do actually remember you like telling me to take the quiz And I can't remember if I actually did it or not then it's a pretty long quiz.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you might.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I might not
[SPEAKER_02]: But I know you did, you did!
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I did it this time after you saw how I was, and I think what was really interesting for me is I know I'm a perfectionist in like work and in other, I just didn't realize like it showed up in relationships.
[SPEAKER_02]: But it all makes sense.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we talked about it earlier, and I think all that fits me to the teeth, that I have very high expectations for people in my life.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, like, sometimes I would expect a lot from people, and I would also, I have, I think my second one, so my high, I'd high perfectionism, moderate entitlement, and then moderate abandonment, and then the rest of mine were low, dependence was the next one.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think what you were saying earlier, Abbey, like I definitely have that experience with a band in mid, and it's something that I became very aware of in therapy too, and I had to change the stories in my head about that.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I do see how it plays into perfectionism as well, that sometimes all pull away, because I don't want to get hurt first, or they'll be like, I'll hold someone to this high standard and then they can't meet it because I'll be afraid to be abandoned.
[SPEAKER_02]: the internet.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think though the part that really stood out to me is like I literally read my description and like a light bulb went off and I was like Oh my god this explains my last like serious relationship.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it was
[SPEAKER_02]: Basically what I got was you tend to be attracted to partners who have difficulty meeting your standards, including those who have a failure schema, a dependent schema or a defective discema, and then you tend to seek out partners who are willing to equate to your needs, including those with a self-sacrifice schema, a subjugation schema, or emotional deprivation schema, a dependent schema, or abandonment, or effectiveness.
[SPEAKER_02]: which I think like I haven't done this quiz for my acts but I think a lot of the ones that I just mentioned summarized I think that he would score high on those.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it was very interesting to me why perfectionism attracts some of these more you know like and I think you said it well about just
[SPEAKER_02]: Like subjugation, for example, like you're looking for maybe more of like a dominant person or someone to kind of take the lead, I don't know any other thoughts you have, but I'll let you assess me those are just my My two cents.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think that looking at the way those two kind of relate
[SPEAKER_00]: that there could be a finding partners that are like, I guess, that are not up to your standards, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's kind of just easier to find that partner that doesn't meet the standard, what kind of like a failure schema, but what's interesting about it is that there's like a flavor of ambivalence, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because when you're fearing being abandoned,
[SPEAKER_00]: in the feeling it's kind of like, oh no, right, like this person is leaving me and mind not good enough.
[SPEAKER_00]: What's wrong with me?
[SPEAKER_00]: And the feeling of perfectionism is a feeling like, is this the right person for me?
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know, right, that there's criticism, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, what's interesting is that criticism can function as a way to make us feel safer about a band in mid, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, let's say somebody's leaving me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I go, I love this person, no, don't leave me, but then if I start going, well, they're kind of messy.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they're not so smart and they're kind of boring and they're kind of this right like the more that I criticize them the the more it kind of alleviates the fear of abandonment right because they're well as that person that great anyways maybe they're doing me a favor right and so there's this it's like a kind of it's like being on the fence kind of feeling or ambivalence with wondering is it that I'm afraid of this person leaving me or is it that I want to be with them or do I not want to be with them or am I afraid of them leaving me.
[SPEAKER_02]: Interesting.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow, check her out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god.
[SPEAKER_02]: This is like, maybe by headspin of all the different, like, they're so much.
[SPEAKER_01]: Really, I'm really conflicted about Julie's perfectionism.
[SPEAKER_01]: This scheme is very high for her.
[SPEAKER_01]: She's attracted to partners or tend to be attracted to partners who have difficulty meeting her standards, including those with a failure, dependence or defectiveness scheme.
[SPEAKER_01]: Why is that?
[SPEAKER_01]: So first of all, people with perfectionist schemas are definitely gonna be attracted to anybody who will never live up to their standards because they're perfectionists.
[SPEAKER_01]: But why is it almost over the other part of the spectrum basically, why would she be attracted to those with failure scheme or dependence or effectiveness?
[SPEAKER_02]: It feels like a total 180, like it doesn't feel just like, yeah, it doesn't feel like you're setting yourself up for semi-success.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, what's interesting about it is that we tend to actually be pulled towards those opposites, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because again, they confirm our belief.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the person who feels like a failure when they find a person with a perfectionism scheme, they know that they're failure.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when the person with a perfectionism scheme, right, finds the person with a failure scheme, they know that the person's not good enough.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: What's interesting about schemas is that schemas are beliefs that are really painful for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: They torture us, but they also make us feel safe, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: They make us feel safe in the world, because if my beliefs are confirmed, then it's like, if I believe I'm gonna be abandoned on one level that's really devastating and painful, but on another level, when that person abandoned me, I feel this like the world is known.
[SPEAKER_00]: The world is predictable.
[SPEAKER_00]: I knew that, look, of course you abandoned me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I knew you were gonna abandon me, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like a conflict between not wanting that pain from our schemas, but the safety that it gives us when relationships are predictable and reliably, and up the way we expect them to, it's very comforting, it's very safe, even if it's very painful.
[SPEAKER_02]: Sometimes we prefer that.
[SPEAKER_02]: So okay, I'll use myself as an example here.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's I'm going to be a perfectionist.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's part of my DNA.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like you said you can't change your schemas.
[SPEAKER_02]: How do I work out of this that I'm not either attracting people that have this failure tendencies or like all the tendencies that basically would be the opposite of the perfectionist head to sees.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's not working for them either, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not a right.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I want to say that the beautiful part of that us finding where we're kind of pulled towards our polar opposite in some way, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And in some way, it could be bad, but in other ways, it could actually be really helpful.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like it could lead to emotionally restorative experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's not about what schemas the other person has necessarily.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's more about how willing they are to do the work on them.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the person, so two people who are willing to see their schemas and who are willing to do the work on them and who are willing not just to start identifying and recognizing their own beliefs, their triggers and their old coping behaviors, but to also notice their partners.
[SPEAKER_00]: core beliefs and their triggers and their pain.
[SPEAKER_00]: When both people are committed to that process, that's what really matters.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because the person with a self-sacrifice schema, for example, has a lot to teach the person with an entitlement schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the person with an entitlement schema has a lot to teach the person with a self-sacrifice schema.
[SPEAKER_00]: If they could be able to call each other out and do the different behaviors, they could both together meet towards the
[SPEAKER_02]: Interesting.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's not that you're going to change like that.
[SPEAKER_02]: And just might be the people that are like I'm attracted to and are drawn to me might have those underlying schemas.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think there is something about just the way some of them sound that sounds more negative than others, but at least what I'm writing from you is that it's not that way that there's positive and negatives in all of them.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's about kind of getting to that 50% opposed to being more on the extremes of them.
[SPEAKER_02]: Is that correct or?
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that exactly everything is good in moderation but anything like it's great to be sacrificing and consider it of other but if you do that at the cost of yourself it's not good and entitlement is good to feel like your needs matter but when you feel like your needs matter more and come at the cost of other people feeling harmed then that's not good anything in moderation it could be good but anything you know the more extreme it is of the
[SPEAKER_00]: But for example, I could give you some tips, for example, of what people with perfectionism can do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, please, sense of the number one, probably some other people listed.
[SPEAKER_00]: They can identify.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right, I'll see you at this.
[SPEAKER_00]: So one thing that's really helpful for perfectionism is to share appreciation and gratitude.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that doesn't mean to actually share it with your partner.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it's good to share it with your partner, but to connect with it yourself, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: To really be like, everyday look at what, how did this person contribute to this life to my life?
[SPEAKER_00]: What were the moments where they did satisfying me?
[SPEAKER_00]: What did that feel like, you know?
[SPEAKER_02]: I love that.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I was like, I think also just like to speak to my, like, I don't want to paint my ex in a bad way.
[SPEAKER_02]: He obviously had many great qualities as well.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think
[SPEAKER_02]: making taking those time to be considerate of those and appreciative of those is really important with anyone is going to have flaws in a relationship some glad that you said that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well also the the thing with perfectionist is that they focus on the fall and focus on the lows and then you forget.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because you're in a really happy with the person for.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: Exactly.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like the yeah it's like easy to complain about things but you're not like you have to really take the time to appreciate the person as well.
[SPEAKER_00]: Mm-hmm.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to make sure that I'm also I'm not saying that that means you accept a bad behavior Right, so finding gratitude for it doesn't mean somebody's doing bad things to you and you go Oh, okay, I don't want to be perfectionistic.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me let this go.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not what that means
[SPEAKER_00]: because I really want to point out when we were talking about the idea of perfectionism being a bit of an overcompensation for self-sacrifice, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Is that if you start telling yourself and I'm being perfectionistic and being perfectionistic, you might start self-sacrificing or letting behaviors go and that's not the goal.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the other piece around what perfectionist can do is really identify in general, what are your values in relationships?
[SPEAKER_00]: For example,
[SPEAKER_00]: So there's two pieces.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's identifying your values in your partner, and then there's identifying your ideal situation versus intolerable situation.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna talk first about values, and then I'll get to the next one, yeah?
[SPEAKER_00]: But you wanna be thinking about what are your values in relationships and yourself and in your partner?
[SPEAKER_00]: And one thing that people with a perfectionism schema can do that could help them
[SPEAKER_00]: notice this is like you can draw out a sheet where you put values.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's say we write values and then we write importance from zero to ten and then we write me and then we write my partner.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right about ten values but I'll do three to keep it simple.
[SPEAKER_00]: So my value is gratitude, assertiveness and collaboration.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, those are my values and let's say a fiction and then the next I rate importance from zero to ten this one's important at a ten this one's important at a nine this one's important at a nine the next thing is I then measure myself either for the day or for the week from zero to a hundred percent how close am I to being let's say collaborative.
[SPEAKER_00]: Was I 80% collaborative was I 70% collaborative was I 40% collaborative so you rate yourself and then you rate your partner today was my partner You could either do it every day or every week this week my partner was 70% collaborative or 80% collaborative And then you go to the next one assertive how assertive as I was I 80% 20% and nobody's 100% maybe 98%
[SPEAKER_00]: And then you rate your partner.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now as a perfectionist, I do this exercise with each ski might tell them to focus on different things.
[SPEAKER_00]: As a perfectionist, what you want to focus on first, you want to focus on the importance rating.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you notice that you write 10 values down, and each one of them is a 10 out of 10 of importance, you realize that you're having some unrelenting standards.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, like if you have things like humor, maybe humor is like an eight and honesty is like a 10 right or maybe humor is like a 9.5 and honesty is a 10 But if you've got 10 values and everything is a 10 out of 10 of importance, you want to say hop
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not able to distinguish that there are things that are higher or lower prices.
[SPEAKER_00]: Things I could let go of, and there are things that are non-agosable.
[SPEAKER_00]: So for perfectionists after really clarify, what is non-agosable?
[SPEAKER_00]: What are the values and levels that become a done deal?
[SPEAKER_00]: versus what is a situation that's not my ideal, but it's good enough, like I'm not satisfied at a hundred percent.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the next thing you want to look at is the ratings of your partner, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So then you want to look at MI being as consistent with my values as my partner, like as my partner and my rating, my partner is like 70, and I'm upset with them, and I'm all 20s, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, you're like, I've been like loving and kind or collaborative or honest at like 2034.
[SPEAKER_00]: You might partners like a 16 on like, why are you a 60?
[SPEAKER_00]: And then you got to kind of work on yourself first.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then you check in on where your partner is, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: I think that's a really good point, too.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think it's a good segue to takeaways, because I think there is like, you know, it's, I definitely can identify that with the perfectionist standards, is that like you want to have it all.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think we're learning from all of this whole thing.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's understanding yourself clearly by seeing what your schemas are, what those beliefs are, and then using that information as power.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not a story, something right wrong, or one is better than the other, even though some might sound better than others depending on how you interact with it, but it's really not about that.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's about just how we can do it.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I love this idea of like holding yourself to the same standard.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, am I actually stepping up in the way that I need to be opposed to blaming someone else?
[SPEAKER_02]: Or if there's another schema that you have, it's like, how do I work with this schema to get to a place with a relationship?
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, I can totally see this situation if you're always saying, yes, I love this idea of taking a pause and saying,
[SPEAKER_02]: Let me think about things, like I think there's just so many different ways that you can handle your schemas.
[SPEAKER_02]: So yeah, I guess knowledge is power.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think it's probably like my biggest takeaway.
[SPEAKER_00]: And also then using that knowledge to then impact your behaviors and being intentional about your actions as if there is power, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yep.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think just with schemas in general is you have to decipher what you have control of and what you don't have control of.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think we know control of is how you digest your schema into a behavior and that's what it is ultimately in your hands.
[SPEAKER_01]: But some things are out of your control how you were brought up this shit that happened to your in your life external factors are out of your control.
[SPEAKER_01]: So even if you come out with, after you take this very long quiz, you'll learn so much about yourself.
[SPEAKER_01]: But even if you come out with like an entitlement schema, like Julie what you're saying, there's no positive or negative on any of these schemas, you have to first understand where that comes from.
[SPEAKER_01]: So asking why you feel the way you do, why you believe the way you do, and how you can change your behavior,
[SPEAKER_01]: based on your schemas, I think that's like the ultimate takeaways, knowing what you have control of.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think this whole notion that you said Abby, that schemas are purely a belief, and it's really up to us, and that's the training, the cognitive therapy, is to like understand how much does action support the belief?
[SPEAKER_02]: Is this a story I'm telling in my head or is it a reality?
[SPEAKER_02]: And then how do I change my behavior knowing that this is a story that's gonna keep popping up in my head?
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm not, you know, making myself like putting myself at a disadvantage with relationships, because like, I don't know, but you guys, I don't want to have like standards that no one can meet, because that basically is worrying that you'll be alone forever.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's like, how do I work on
[SPEAKER_02]: Accepting people from where they are while also obviously not accepting bad behavior right and that's what I wanted to say There's no bad schemas, but there is bad behavior No, there's no bad humor.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, there any schema There's or is neutral, but a behavior could be hurtful or harmful or or helpful So yeah, or effective or ineffective
[SPEAKER_00]: And I agree that the most important thing is really, really recognizing what is in your control.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, the schema you're belief, the thoughts that pop into your head are out of your control.
[SPEAKER_00]: Our mind is popping 8 million random thoughts that are out of your control.
[SPEAKER_00]: And our sensations are out of our control.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, if a lion jumped on top of us right now, we would have a lot of sensations that we would not be able to control.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we'd have a lot of feelings that thoughts about it that are completely out of our control.
[SPEAKER_00]: our behaviors are completely under control and that's why working behaviorally with beliefs is the fastest way to having an effective relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: You could have the same exact belief and still do something that will make your relationship better.
[SPEAKER_01]: I also like the other takeaway that I meet a tactical way to deal with all of this is mapping your reality against your beliefs, I love taking kind of record of I mean I think for example Julie and I are both perfectionist and we've had friends tell us why don't you talk about the accomplishments
[SPEAKER_01]: And we both been like, ah, we're just not there yet.
[SPEAKER_01]: And a friend literally had to sit us down and show all the stats of our accomplishments.
[SPEAKER_01]: I look at how much you've done.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that's when we shifted our perspective, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, that we were like, okay, we are just such fucking perfection.
[SPEAKER_01]: We forgot to celebrate our own win.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that that speaks to Schema's specifically towards women.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I'm working now.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm talking about gender schemas.
[SPEAKER_00]: This idea, right, of being afraid to kind of put your accomplishments out there, or kind of, um, I guess, right, talk highly of yourself promote yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a very gendered based on women are really conditioned.
[SPEAKER_00]: to feel very ashamed of doing something that we have not been in the workforce for as long.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have not had evolutionarily speaking as much practicing of this, we're very new at it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so yeah, I think that that's very, very much related to a female schema, right, women.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I could totally see that.
[SPEAKER_02]: I think the one other takeaway I have is I definitely now see why you lean more to schemas over Myers-Bringes.
[SPEAKER_02]: I feel like Myers-Bringes is interesting, but it like scratches the surface and it doesn't really give you as much actionable things you can do.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like I feel like I have so many things I can go out and do now that's going to like actually directly impact how I date and have relationships.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I say to that I prefer schemas over attachment styles too.
[SPEAKER_00]: I prefer I think again schemas are more practical and they give you specific advice and you can make real changes.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to add another thing for perfection is to do after you fill this out is also you want to look at where your partner is from zero to 100 and you want to look at it through several weeks.
[SPEAKER_00]: So for example, if your partner is like 60s one week and then 80s another week and then 90s another week and then 70s another week, you have to realize actually that's a good relationship right you so so if if you know like you and then you also want to look at whether they're the whether they score high on the ones that you rated the most important.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you want to actually start looking and seeing that even if you're feeling dissatisfied, look at the paper and ask yourself, because I tell, I tell my clients, if you and your partner are rating the other person at an 80 or higher, you think about that as an ideal relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that is an ideal relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah,
[SPEAKER_00]: always going to be at 80.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're never going to be at 100.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're wanting 100, I don't know what to tell you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not your couple therapists because I can't get you there.
[SPEAKER_00]: But 80 is very good.
[SPEAKER_00]: 80 is fantastic.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's not 80 every single day.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, sometimes they'll be at a 20.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then you want to think about, are they a 20 at something that's important at a 2 or they a 20 at something that's important at a 10?
[SPEAKER_00]: Are they a 20 for a week or they are 20 for three months?
[SPEAKER_00]: I love this.
[SPEAKER_01]: Abby, the perfectionist in me and the Asian in me just went, is an 80% of B-minus.
[SPEAKER_03]: I was too late thinking to, like, I definitely expect 100, but this is where I went to, like, I like, I like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like,
[SPEAKER_00]: But you know what?
[SPEAKER_00]: The thing is is that think about it this way if it was just you taking the test You could get an A plus when there's you and another person and you're both taking the test You got it right.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's got to be more leeway.
[SPEAKER_02]: That is such a good point though like 80 like there's this
[SPEAKER_02]: My god, don't blank in that show.
[SPEAKER_02]: Remember the show with Aziz on, sorry.
[SPEAKER_02]: What the hell was that?
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, master of none, do you remember that?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, like when they asked to rate each other and they say like a seven and they decide to break up.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then like he goes to his married friend.
[SPEAKER_02]: And they're like, that's pretty damn good.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, sometimes I get my wife a two.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like you just fucked up.
[SPEAKER_01]: It just shows you that you can't treat your relationship like you do with y'all group use.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because people only write when they have an extremely great experience or extremely bad experience.
[SPEAKER_01]: No one's ever writing a review for a restaurant where they were like, the meal was pretty good.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was so good.
[SPEAKER_01]: I came out of it pretty full like that you never hear that review, but I think that's what sustain a healthy relationship is that things are pretty good, you know, like that your your needs and your values are being met.
[SPEAKER_01]: So fascinating, fascinating.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much for enlightening my life for the second time.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: I swear this is like the most like I opened my past relationships.
[SPEAKER_02]: So thank you again for all such a schedule.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it takes a while.
[SPEAKER_01]: It takes a while to wrap your head around.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I'm done.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to have to sit with this for a little tonight.
[SPEAKER_01]: But we'll post all of this information, including the link to the quiz in our show notes.
[SPEAKER_01]: clarity.
[SPEAKER_00]: How can they find you?
[SPEAKER_00]: You can go to Bay Area CBT Center.com.
[SPEAKER_00]: So CBT like Catboy Tom cognitive behavioral therapy.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then there's also a CBT online dot com and CBT online dot com has I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm
[SPEAKER_00]: creating a lot of new resources and they'll be work sheets like non-violent communication worksheets and worksheets that people could fill out right like related to schemas and looking at your triggers and your thoughts and your behaviors or even this worksheet I just told you about right now is all available on CBT Online.com to fill out right on your computer or your phone.
[SPEAKER_00]: Awesome.
[SPEAKER_02]: It will link all of this in the show notes too for everyone and on the website.
[SPEAKER_02]: So they can all find it.
[SPEAKER_02]: But definitely recommend taking the quiz to start off.
[SPEAKER_02]: And probably listening to this episode a couple times.
[SPEAKER_02]: I feel like there's like so much to take in.
[SPEAKER_02]: It might be one of those ones that you got to repeat a couple times to get it all.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I love this idea of using workbooks and really looking at your own stuff in more depth.
[SPEAKER_02]: So thank
[SPEAKER_01]: Don't go to Bay Area CBDCenter.com.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's a huge difference.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, don't occur.
[SPEAKER_01]: Bay Area CBDC.
[SPEAKER_01]: Huge difference.
[SPEAKER_01]: But Abby, I think, you know, like I do want to mention this for our listeners, if you were, if your mind was blown by this episode and you loved having Abby on as I guess with us, please give us a rating and Apple Podcasts.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_01]: This deserves a five star rating of A-ving ELSE.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think this is like what's been so enlightening about my life and my relationship with my partners and how I show up.
[SPEAKER_01]: So definitely don't forget to do that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it would be fun to do, like, have random people call in and we, we diagnose their schemas.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
[SPEAKER_00]: fabulous.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, thank you for having me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just, I just really enjoyed this shot and I just really am amazed at the fact this, your story is just amazing.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm just really, it's, I had a lot of difficulties.
[SPEAKER_02]: But thank you so much for joining us at taking the time.
[SPEAKER_02]: This was so, so I'd like to thank you for having me.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was fun.
[SPEAKER_01]: And if you haven't done so yet, subscribe to the psychology of relationships today.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you don't miss an episode.
[SPEAKER_01]: And we'll see you all next week.
[SPEAKER_01]: Bye.