The Whole Paradox
Welcome to The Whole Paradox podcast, where we explore timeless wisdom in the modern age to cultivate a greater sense of meaning and belonging to ourselves, our world, and one another. We will integrate the sacred, mythic, somatic, creative and poetic to expand our meaning of truth and our capacity for complexity and nuance.
The Whole Paradox
Oneness and Separation, Lover and Mother with Ashley Batistick
In this episode, depth + somatic psychotherapist and The Whole Paradox Host, Molly Mitchell-Hardt interviews couples psychotherapist and coach Ashley Batistick for the second time, because the first time was so juicy! They talk:
- Marriage on multi-dimensional levels
- Tension around the distribution of the labor in relationships and what lies underneath this dynamic
- Couples therapy and the Emotionally Focused Therapy modality
- Limitations and challenges in navigating relationships in the modern context
- Having a relationship to something greater than us as a way through the present chaos and upheaval
- Romantic relationships as a vessel of individuation and pulling our projections back
- Grief work and ecstatic sense of connection
- and much more...
Find Ashley Batistick:
Follow Ashley Batistick on instagram and substack
Visit Ashley's therapy website and coaching website
Molly's Offerings:
To inquire about 1:1 work or about 1 x per month Cycle-Synced Deep Tide Sessions, schedule a free consultation or email mollymitchellhardt@gmail.com
Follow us @mollymitchellhardt and @thewholeparadox
This podcast was produced in association with Channel the Sun by Kevin Joseph Grossmann. Musical stylings by Kevin Joseph Grossmann.
Welcome to the Whole Paradox Podcast, where we explore timeless wisdom in the modern age. To cultivate a greater sense of meaning and belonging to ourselves, our world, and one another. We will integrate the sacred, mythic, somatic, creative, and poetic to expand our meaning of truth and our capacity for complexity and nuance. And welcome, welcome to the podcast today. So today I get to sit with and hang out with and chat with uh Ashley Batistic, a dear friend and therapy colleague. In our last conversation, we talked about kind of the highlights were uncertainty and doubt in relationship, allowing fantasy to guide you, and allowing the inner lover to court you. So if you haven't listened to that episode, I highly encourage you to. It's season one, episode 12. And I'm hoping today we can just kind of like check in with how things have evolved since then, what's up right now, um, and you know, what's percolating in the psyche. Maybe just to start for people who haven't listened to that episode and don't know who you are, um, if you want to just share a little bit about um about yourself, about your work.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so I'm a I'm a marriage and family therapist practicing in Los Angeles. The majority of my practice, I work with couples. I'm trained in emotionally focused couple therapy. I'm also trained in depth psychology. That's my background, and that's how I know I know how I know Molly. And um, and um, I'm often practicing at the intersection of those two places. Um, and um I help, you know, bulk of my couples that I work with are in committed partnerships with children and um living, kind of trying how to figure out how to, you know, be in committed partnerships amongst, you know, the travails of modern parenthood. And also trying to stay true and um I guess you know, to the individual and who they are. It's a tall order to be in committed partnerships and in this modern world, especially with modern parenting. And so I help couples um, you know, establish, you know, you know, attachment and connection and intimacy, find their way to cultivating that, and then trying to, you know, allow their relationships be the container to live their, live their lives.
SPEAKER_00:I don't I'm figuring out how to ask this, but basically I'm thinking, yes, like being modern day parents and families presents a very sort of specific challenge. Um and I'm wondering like how you kind of hold the cultural paradigm, the breakdown of community and you know people in real time living modern lives that are, you know, some of the ways that the breakdown of community impacts families is beyond our control or you know, power to do anything about, you know, at the moment. Um, and just how you orient to that and are holding that with your clients and you know, for yourself too, knowing that you're also a a parent in a whole yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:I've been I've been um with my partner for almost 20 years, been married for, I don't know, since 2011. We have two gorgeous children. Um, they're young too. So I think, you know, there's a difference between parenting older children and younger children, but it's it's I think that I think the thing that you're naming, and it's kind of just percolating right up, is it's the elephant in the room oftentimes in working with couples. Um, you know, they they they come to me to talk about the uh the distribution of the load. And often cycles were erupt because, well, you know, like I do all of the laundry and you do none of the laundry. And it's a real easy, you know, it's that's content that's easy to get caught up in. And um, I help partners come back to um, you know, establishing really the the the you know in the emotionally focused therapy couple model. Um it might be helpful for me to name that just first before I speak to the concept of modern parenting and within committed partnerships. But um it works to address a cycle between two people. And it um, you know, often there are um there's conflict that arises because there are unmet needs um that we have feelings about, emotions about, but often we don't feel safe enough and we don't have the pathways to be able to speak to those needs or the emotions. And so we're quick to be reactive. And it's in those reactions that you know we you know read or we watch the cues and then we develop storylines about what all of that means. And those stories are the things that really get us stuck and that can wedge and drive division and separation between two people. And I think if we're speaking culturally to modern day parenting uh with the breakdown of community, I think it's really easy to get stuck inside a story. Well, I always have to be the one because it is true. You do have to be the one. You know, and and we're talking about, you know, um committed partnerships within the frame of modern day parenting. This is not talking about you know single parents who, you know, are have to go it alone or um all the other, you know, uh ways in which relationships can be formed. Um so this is kind of you know real narrowly focused. But the reality is there is a breakdown of community. And if you have two people inside of a home, the all of the labor, I didn't say the bulk of labor, but all of the labor falls onto two people. And that's just simply too much for two people to bear. But this is the current reality. And so I think it's really easy to get stuck inside of cycles based off of the load, based off of the labor. Um, and we are quick, I think, to develop stories about that, especially when it comes to well, how much do I matter to you? How much do I matter as a whole? Um, so that's that's what comes to mind out the gate.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, I that is so um like I see that too, that that's that can be such a central theme, especially with um people with young kids, um, where the arguments really center around load. But I like that what you're pointing to is that underneath that there's the question of the more kind of like tender and personal question of do I matter and how much do I matter to you? Um, and I'm wondering like, how do you tend to um okay, seeing that the content that shows up and then finding the through line to lifting up kind of the bones underneath that are really about maybe more relationally unmet needs.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think that when we can um challenge the story, right? And we can get closer to okay, what's the feeling? What's the emotion? What's my need? Um, I think that's, you know, just I love the way you're naming, like, you know, lifting the bones or kind of getting underneath. Um I think that when we do, it it no longer becomes me against you. It's now us against the system. And the system is so broken. Um and and and the system actually is a broken, it's actually working exactly the way in which it's supposed to work. We I think we just feel broken inside of it. If this is the paradigm, how on earth do, you know, committed partnerships uh with this level of load, how on earth do they survive? How on earth do we find our way um, you know, stay connected, stay committed? Um and is it even possible for relationships to be the container that would allow for any sort of alchemy? I think we also talked about this on the first podcast, um, to be the alchemy or the container for the alchemy that allow for individual transformation. And I think that that's where I'm kind of sitting squarely right now. Like our partnerships, our partners can be mirrors, our partners can be um, you know, people who we get to project onto and we get to see all of our humanness. And, you know, and that's the the beautiful alchemical thing about them. Um, but how can that even be possible if you're also inside of um this paradigm of being, you know, uh so belabored by the labor, so belavored by the load, so belabored by what it means to, you know, be living in this modern, you know, world of ours.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I mean, those are the real very real kind of uh parameters in which we're like working within. Um and I think it's especially heightened in that you know early childhood phase of parenting. Um and just to kind of like I don't know, lift something up that you said, and and you know, I think different people will have different answers to this, but I I'm wondering in your view and in our modern context, like what is a relationship for at this point? You know, um, what does it serve? Um and what might be like maybe we can get into like the archetypal layer of like why do we even do this?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. I mean, I think that relationships are so relationships are good for so many things. Um I think it's an you know, when we recorded this last, it was um last year, uh, before our political climate really changed. And uh the world, you know, uh it was all the same back then as it is today. It just looks a little, it looks, it looks a little different now or it's uh through a different lens. And I think I think there's this added layer of living in such an uncertain, fraught, tumultuous world. And it's like, how are any of us supposed to be doing any of this inner work when everything just feels so fraught? And this is where I actually I'm like, I'm I'm you know, I might be an I often tell my clients I'm an eternal optimist. And sometimes it kind of gets me into a little bit of trouble. But I will say that I do believe that relationships are powerful places to make change. Um and powerful places to change potentially um, you know, your little slice of uh the ways in which you're living under a, you know, a challenging system. Um because the relationship can invite you to grow. It can invite you to change. And the way that I see it is where if you're working towards this, you know, let's say you're a couple comes to me and they're they're wanting to re-establish connection and intimacy and safety in a relationship. Well, once we land inside of a safe place and we feel attached, then we have the capacity to grow and change. And we're able to start to ask questions like, okay, well, if this is kind of a safe space, what do I want for my life? What do I want for myself? What do I want for my partner? What do I want for the world? Um and um that's that's kind of where I'm sitting right now with it.
SPEAKER_00:Um yeah. So so it sounds like what you're saying is that in a way to, you know, we belong to each other. We need we need one another, you know, not just really, you know, intimate relationships, but you know, we need to belong um with each other. What the foundation is really like creating safety and creating a sense of um connection and like that my emotional needs are kind of safe to exist here to um make requests of the other person. Um, and sort of almost I'm imagining creating language around how to negotiate that and normalize that as a function of relationship. Um and then that being the foundation from which we grow, the more maybe uh self-actualization piece that's possible through relationship. And um, and I really like what you said too, because I do think I agree that it it highlights it ever more when the world is in such chaos that um what can I do in my little zone of influence becomes ever more important and maybe not ever more important, but ever more important to maybe focus on because otherwise it's like you can so easily spiral into hopelessness and despair.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and I think this is uh kind of bringing me into uh where largely where a lot of my work is headed. Um we can there's such good work that can come out of couple therapy. And there is such good work that can, especially if you're looking through the emotionally focused couple therapy lens, right? Because it's it's rooted in attachment science and it's based off of the emotions, the unmet needs and the emotions and then our actions and our thoughts, right? Like it's a it's a it's a really well laid out map for how to find return to one another, right? But in these turbulent times, I think, you know, and this is gonna kind of maybe kind of walk back what I was just saying, the importance of relationships, right? But in these turbulent times, I think sometimes that can feel like it's not enough. And so this is this is this is this is something that I started working on, you know, before the political climate change. Um but the importance of um rooting in and connecting to something so much larger and greater than ourselves. Like if the couple work is about the dyad between and the attachment too, that's great. But what we're facing needs something much more um, you know, it needs something stronger. Like I like to think of the image of like chain, chain, is it chain, chain metal or like um what the what knights used to wear? Chain meal, right? Like, right? That it's like it's it's it's it's woven in a fabric, right? It moves, it's flexible. You just think of like a singular bond between two people, that's you know, that can be strong. But um, I think the current time is asking us to broaden our definition of attachment, right? Which also includes broadening our definition of attachment to platonic relationships too, to friendships, to family, um, to community members. And that's widening out into, again, something greater than ourselves. And we can we can look at that archetypically as like the great mother, right? That um, you know, the great attachment. And I think that this is where, you know, it's that's hard, that's hard work to do inside of couple work because it's so focused on the dyad. But if you're working on the attachment within the couple, then you feel safe enough to do the individual work. And I think that this is where um, you know, you get to question your attachment to something greater and larger than just you and me. And, you know, it's not you against me, it's us against the, it's we, it's us against the system, which is broadening out into maybe a larger definition of we. So that's a really big bite, or that's a something that I'm taking. It's like a really big bite that I'm taking. But um it's definitely coming up in my work right now because there's a limp, there's limit, there's limitations, I think we're uh we're realizing, and to our relationships too. So there are immense places of growth, but also limitations to our relationships. Yes.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, I really appreciate that piece. Um, I think it's so important to highlight um because I'm thinking about um Robert Johnson's books, um, He, She and We, and especially maybe She and We. Um, but how in the Western paradigm, romantic partnership just is like for a lot of us our sole source of connection to the numinous. And so what power um is suffused in romantic relationship, really starting to look at that and rework where does this fit in the whole scope of you know community and life and um where should it land, you know? Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:I mean, so one of the things that, you know, after uh uh when we spoke about the inner lover, right, or courting the inner lover, I was um just beginning to work on a writing project that was going to be some form of some sort of, you know, couple's self-help book, right? And um, I was particularly working with re-mythologizing the story of Adam and Eve. And the deeper I got into my research around this, um, specifically to the piece around like we're we source the numinous through our intimate partner relationships and like the the grave um limitation in that, right? Um, and how, you know, um how this story, regardless of um, you know, if you're you're heterosexual or you're in a queer relationship, or you're queer and and and no matter how what kind of relationship you're in, um, the story of Adam and Eve is really like it's it's it's one that we all know. It's one that um prioritizes um, you know, commitment within the like between two people. Um it um, you know, there's obviously the element of shame and the repercussions of desire and reaching for something inside of a relationship. And the writing project has actually turned into working, actually, it's a novel now, and so I'm completely re-mythologizing the story. But I like to think of Eve reaching for the apple as if she's trying to reimagine relationships themselves. And um, and um working with the inner lover, right? Um, and we can kind of get into what I mean by that, and it's also in the last podcast episode, but working with the inner lover, um, which is actually the third in a relationship, right? The there is me, um, there is my, you know, if we're looking with, you know, let's say me, my partner, and this lover figure, right? Um, has been an invitation to look at the flip flip side of that arc, like the two sides of the same coin, which is to work towards the mother and work towards um, you know, again, trying to understand the when we source it just as intimate part, you know, intimate um uh partner relationships, we are excluding all the others, which also include our relationship to the all. So again, another big bite, but um yeah, that is a big bite.
SPEAKER_00:I wanna like almost pick apart every piece of that.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Um so maybe defining the transcendent third as a start, um, and we can do that together, but you know, maybe just take a path at that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Um, I think that, you know, well, we had had kind of you and I were kind of riffing on this, um, starting with the in in Jungian psychology, there is the ego and the self, and that the ego and the self are on some sort of access, right? And the whole role of individuation is for the, you know, for us to seek wholeness. And that's coming into the self, that is coming into um the seat of the soul, right? And uh the way that I've been looking at it, I mean, I imagine other Jungians who are far more educated on this than I am, right, has been you, you, you need a third, right, in order to um I would imagine uh try to understand or try to get to the wholeness, right? And so the ego needs uh an image, and the ego needs the intermediary between the ego and the self, right? And um that can be, and this is where my work began, well, um uh an anima or animus figure, right? And I like to just refer to it as the lover because the anima-animus figure feels so binary and so limiting. But um, if you're being courted by the inner lover, right, which would be this third, right? Um we start to get closer to who we are, what we desire. And the lover represents um fractured aspects of ourself that live in the shadow, which would be another union term that we could define, introduce and define, which is all that we cannot see, right? Personally or personal shadow, all that we do not know, all that we kind of um siphoned off when we were maybe younger and we were told, oh no, I don't like that about you. Right. And if we go back to the Adam and Eve myth, it was like, oh no, I don't like you reaching for that apple. I do not like you reaching for knowledge. So absolutely not. I'm you're you're banished, but you know, I don't like this, so it gets cast off to the shadow. Yeah, right. Um the the where I was sitting at when we last spoke was you know, the lover returning, right? The lover showing up in dreams, the um, you know, the the parts of self that you desire to integrate, which help you seek wholeness, which help you the self-integrate into the seat of the soul. So that's where I would start with defining the terms.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and and you know, I guess just to like take it a step further, how um predominantly we project that inner lover figure on somebody else and then um desire them to carry all of the contents of that, and right, like just to to reiterate how um how much we expect from romantic partnership, um, how much we expect romantic partnership to hold, to heal, to solve for us, to create wholeness for us, and how interesting that is to really recognize a lot of those things as projection of our inner lover that we need to be courted with in our own kind of uh intrapsychic relationship.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Yeah. It's you know, it's it's interesting the way you're naming it kind of feels like a paradox too. Because it's like, yes, like our relationships can't, our partners can't be the one to hold all of that psychic energy. They collapse underneath that. It's just too much of a demand. And then of course you think about the demand demand of being in modern relationships now in a modern world. Um, yeah, uh the and this is where the relationship is so important too, because inside of you know, a safe, secure, loving relationship, we then can are invited to do the work to call back that projection. And if we can allow ourselves to be quartered by the inner lover and to, and to, you know, you know, play with desire, play with this sensation of, well, what is what is pleasurable about me? Right. Like, um, you know, however that character shows up in your dreams and what you like about them is what you actually like about yourself. Right, possibly, right? Um, and um, you know, they and I think it was Marion Woodman who was talking about this. She does so much of this in all of her uh her prolific collection of works. But um you know, your these figures, you know, start to, they they look unsightly to start. And as you start to, as you as you start to get courted and as you start to start paying attention to your dreams and you start paying attention to this, they start to change and take on these, you know, uh, I guess lover-esque qualities, right? And so if we can do the work to reclaim it for ourselves and to integrate it, um, you know, we are better for ourselves, we're better for our partners, we're better for the world. Um and I think there's just something to be said. Um again, it's like a paradox. Like we we can't, there is no one, right? There's no one perfect partner, but um there is, you know, perfect archetypal images for ourselves. And if we can integrate that, I think we become more uh integrated, uh multifaceted beings. Yeah. Right. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Wow. I'm I'm really reflecting on how um the opportunity that is available in safe partnership to pull that projection back. Whereas I know for myself, like when single, that projection is just everywhere. I mean, it is just like it's it's my just my my fantasies, my, you know, what I'm calling in, what I'm the list, you know, of boxes I want to check, you know, in partnership. And then when you act have an actual human partner in front of you and their limitations, you kind of have that option between do I um stay married to the projections, you know, or do I marry my human partner and um pull the projections back and start to integrate them? And as you were talking, and and this is the same thing that struck me last time we talked, but how how incredibly multifaceted we are. And I'm I'm reflecting on that based off of my own, you know, my own fantasy images and my own, you know, um inner lover figures. And uh man, like what incredible, what a be it's just such a beautiful mirror, you know, to look in and just it's almost like I think I said this last time too. It's like it's almost like too much for one life, you know, too much multifacetedness to integrate in one life.
SPEAKER_01:It is too much multifaceted facetness to integrate into one life, absolutely. And I think that um there can be anxiety about that, right? Um this is where you see, you know, I do a lot of it, and we talked about this last time too. I do a lot of a lot of work with clients who struggle with relationship anxiety, right? So is this is this partner right for me? Is this the one, right? But again, it could be multiple ones, right? Thousands of ones. We're multifaceted. And, you know, I will say when couples come to me and they're in trouble, you know, the escape hatches, and listen, this isn't true for everyone because sometimes there are some serious ruptures and there are, you know, red flags that didn't get addressed in the beginning of the relationship. And so this is not to Pollyanna over or somehow minimize legitimacy of some real, you know, real problems in a relationship. But sometimes the escape hatch will be, well, this isn't working with this person. I might as well just go find somebody else. Right. And um you'll find yourself exactly where you're at with the next partner, right? Because you are human. Because um we aren't godlike. We like to pretend we are, but um, we aren't godlike. That is for the gods, that is for the archetypes. And those, it's for for us, it's why their images exist. Like that's for us to integrate and to find our divinity. Um, and it's it's just it's really, really challenging to do that in modern relationships. And so if we can break it down, right, if you kind of work to create safety and intimacy and attachment inside a relationship, you have a better shot inside a partnership, right? Again, you don't have to do this solely in partnership, although I know I've been speaking to how the benefits of it. But if you have a safe relationship, right, and you're attached, um you are able to do this work. And you do get to wrestle with your humanness and the ways in which you know you you um don't want to be human. Um and I will jump to that once, and this is where I'm kind of at in the work, once you're able to integrate the many faces of the lover, right? Then that's where another third comes in, where you're no longer kind of debunked the myth of the one. Right. And you get to come to the other one, which is this archetype of the mother. Right? You you find yourself there. And I think we have a lot of work as humans to do around this.
SPEAKER_00:I would love to like uh linger here if we can. Because I want to like get my fingers underneath this, you know, and like really uh be able to lift it up a little bit. Um I'm wondering, like, because I hear, I hear, let me see if I get what you're saying, that once you're kind of um really in relationship with the lover and you're integrating kind of the multiplicity of that, um, and there's some integration that's happened, then there's sort of this meeting of a different third, which is the mother. And so tell me, tell me about what that means. Like what are what what qualities are within meeting the mother that are different from the lover? Maybe we can start there.
SPEAKER_01:Well, the mother is not sexy, okay. So I mean, mothers can be sexy. Duh. I think mothers are sexy, but I think when we're I think we have some resistance to it because it doesn't feel sexy. It doesn't feel pleasurable in the way that the lover might, right? And this is why we have again jumped to like why we put so much focus on our intimate partner relationships. But um I can say my own work around this, there's there's there can be a lot of resistance. And I think some of that has to do with what it what it means to be held, what it means to be absorbed. We're talking about oneness. We're not talking about separateness here. And and again, like when you're in the didactic relationship of the lover, there's a lot of separateness, and that's where the fire is. But this is like oneness. This is getting absorbed, this is allowing yourself to um get composted into the earth to become the earth. And the ego doesn't love that. Especially a developed ego, yeah, a really developed ego. Right. Doesn't want that. And then I think we see that reflected back in um the lack of community we have right now. We've had for quite some time. Um that's real.
SPEAKER_00:So what are what are maybe some more tangible examples of because like you said community. And so I'm also wondering, right, like just our web of interconnectedness, like the kind of uh secret link between us all. Um yeah, I'm wondering like how we can bring this archetype more into like how can people feel that or know they're grappling with the mother and not the lover.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, let me sit with that for a minute. Um well, I think it I think it starts with resistance.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:I think you know you're closer to the mother than the lover because you you run after the lover when you're with the mother, it's like, no. Oh no, I don't know if I want that or not. Right. Um, and that might not be true for everyone, right? Um, but we all, regardless of the the types of relationships we might have with our own mothers, right? We are there is a there is a fractured relationship with the larger archetype of the mother. So we all struggle with this from that through that lens. And I think we're we it's able to be to access tangibly is it's like, oh no, no, I don't want to be held. I don't want, I don't, I don't, I don't want um to move toward because when we're held, we actually have to allow ourselves to be received in in that in in in that reception we are invited to to be more intimate with our feelings. And I think the the feelings that are generally there are grief and loss and sadness and I think we work really hard to avoid all of those.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, yeah. It makes me think about the layers of like our own personal relationship with our mothers, you know, and how perfect or imperfect those were, but how the deeper roots underneath that are the kind of archetypal great mother and the separation that it is to be an individual human being on the planet, and that almost like root wound of you know leaving the womb.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's again, it's such a paradox. It's it's it's oneness and separateness. It's the individual and the collective. And we have such an allergy to not being individuals. It's like we just panic. Like if I don't have my, if I don't, I wouldn't say self because we all, I think we all, I know we all have selves, capital S self, right? But it's talking about egos. It's ego, it's ego death, it's ego obliteration, it's like ugh, I don't, I don't have meanness. And you know, in infancy, that's where the attachment is formed because yes, there is the individual, but there is the the oneness that comes from holding, being held, being fed, being nurtured. Um and so I my work for me personally right now is just moving towards that, moving towards some other. And you'll see it if we talk about tangible examples, you'll see it in couple work when we start to create more safety inside of the relationship, and then and then the client has to drop down into a feeling. Oh, I don't know, no, no, I don't want that. Oh no, you you're gonna see that. I have to I have to fold into you. I have to fold into myself.
SPEAKER_00:I have to let you be a container. There you go.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah. I mean, that sounds like very much where the juice is, where the fun starts. I mean, I'm like, I love that. I love that for myself too, you know. Um I'm just thinking about like part the the pieces of somatic work that I really revel in are the experience of being held and being able to drop into um being mothered, like deeply, you know, on a felt sense level, being attuned to and mothered in ways that feel like they meet a deeply um held need. And and you're right, like when you've said that that's where the grief is, I'm like, yes, that is where like the deep wells of grief are that shake through your system. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then on the other side of that is like joy and connection and gratitude, at least that's my experience.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. I mean, you get to see it, it's it's you get to see it from the somatic and physical level, right? And also emotional, right? But like the the the deep release and reverberations of that when you're held. And then the the joy, the ex the ex the ecstatic sense of connection. And I think that that's yeah, where the juice is for me, because when we're so singular about the one and the binary, we don't get the the opportunity to be in the the vibrations of connection.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Just what it feels like to be connected to everything. Everything, it's you know, it's not and it's not a I don't know. At some point, maybe our ancestors, you know, deep time ancestors, uh knew this this sensation. And I think the word for it is awe. I've heard other clinicians use the word, and I'm thinking of the late um Joanna Macy.
SPEAKER_04:Yes.
SPEAKER_01:Right. This was the this was the the crux of her work. Right. Um in terms of uh building community, world community, um, the resiliency that comes from community. Um so yeah, uh the word awe feels super important.
SPEAKER_00:But yeah, and I'm just I'm present to how incredibly defended against not that experience necessarily, but getting to the place where that vibrational field of connection can happen. You know, I mean, that's like what our defenses are, in a sense, it's like because they're protecting us from the hurt that can happen in those really open spaces or vulnerable spaces. Um but that yeah, I just like as you were talking, could really feel how in our aloneness, um, oh, there's just so much pain there, so much pain, so much grief. Um that you know, so powerfully heals in the space of connection, like true, you know, vulnerability and connection and like heart-to-heart holding.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Yeah. Something that I've I've been deepening in my EFT work um is I'm I'm I'm now remembering this is uh we gotta be intimate with ourselves. This is not to say that you gotta heal yourself before you can be in partnership. This is the opposite of that, right? This is concurrently inside of a container with two people, right? The invitation to actually be intimate with yourself, your body, coming home, coming home to the feeling, the wells of grief, right? The wells of loss, right? Um, or, you know, just what it feels like to be lonely or sad, right? Regardless of the depth. Um the mother invites us to be intimate with ourselves because it's not just with ourselves, it's to another, right? And from that place we get to source, we get to share, right? We get to share it with our partners and be in the sense of connection.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I was thinking about kind of going back. I mean, I guess we're kind of more in the field of the mother right now, but I'm kind of circling back to the function of um so it's almost like I guess I'm just wanting to like walk this path again. And and maybe there's no uh like order to this, but in your experience, is it more like you um court the inner lover and then the mother? Or can it happen?
SPEAKER_01:I think it's all concurrently.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:You know, it's it's just it's it's there's no linear path for it, or there's no sort of order, right? It's it's it's whatever whoever shows up first. Yeah. There's so much of my own individual work that I I started with working, when it was parts work, right? Reparenting myself, learning to come into relationship with who I was, and then learning to root into something of power greater than myself. Right. Um, and so I could say that I started with the mother, right? And I found attachment to myself, and then also worked up, you know, um, you know, I'm not just somebody who, you know, is a couple therapist. I've been in couple therapy before with my partner, and like we've worked hard to um create wonderful pathways of connection and attachment and intimacy. Um and in that I think I found the ability to come into myself, which is, you know, courting all, you know, courting all, you know, the inner lover, but then also the mother as well. So it's just been it's been kind of a serpentine path. And I would say that beat that's true for anyone else.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:My clients.
SPEAKER_00:I think that's my experience too, very much so. Like, you know, in a sense, for me to access um almost like my side of things in my relationship. I first had to um even within relationship encounter my own aloneness that's you know, again, paradoxically sort of inherent. It's like our interconnectedness and our aloneness, you know, they're they're just both truths. Yes. Um, and I think there can be a fantasy when you're single that um a partnership will be a solve for my aloneness. And then relatively quickly, I think you find, you know, once you're in a secure relationship, um, that that's not true, and that there's very much aloneness still um deeply woven into partnership. Um and so yeah, I think I I too had to kind of do that reparenting work um and grief work that can't comes up around that.
SPEAKER_01:Um yeah, it's a yes and it's it's it's oneness and separateness.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, um, aloneness is aloneness is your own, right? It's lives with it lives within. So you're you're either gonna be single or you're gonna be partnered and you're gonna be faced with it, and you can you can tackle it with your partner, and then you can also tackle it within. And then there's also again broadening out to the larger archetype, right? To the all. Um I think there's something that I I think I I think I found the thread that I lost, which was we're sold this, there's just this the story, right? And I think I named us earlier too, that like um that uh it it the that it is really just about, and I think I might be repeating myself again, but like it's about it's just about the one, it's about our partner, it's sourcing it outside of ourselves. And it's just it for me, it keeps coming back to the invitation to come back into the all. And uh the all is is is is needed so much right now. Um, and so I think that this is why this work has been so invaluable to me as a human and then also in my work with my clients. And I myself am trying to find a way to kind of synthesize it in couple work. It's it's it's it's become more synthesizable in working on the novel itself because you've got you've got characters and you can do a lot of fun things with characters. But in the practical real world application of all of this, um I think we're in a period of time where we're debunking the myth and working to find our way towards, okay, well, if the myth is false, then what does this mean for us? What does it mean for what does it mean for ourselves, our relationships in the world? And um I think it's a big, you know, TBD. Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_00:Ooh, just what an evolution. You know, I'm just thinking about since we last spoke too, and also just collectively, you know, since we last spoke, how much has sort of evolved, unfolded. Yeah. I'm I I'm wondering about like the people who well, okay, I have this theory that um you know the idea of repetition compulsion and um that you know there has to be kind of enough juice at the beginning when you meet somebody to create attraction and spark. And I and I think a lot of that is um it's actually like the wound, right? So like we're unconsciously attracted to probably like whatever attachment wound was deepest for us. So whether that's like an emotionally unavailable person or a really engulfing and um kind of overwhelming personality. Um and that uh where I have landed is maybe the best we can hope for is some really healthy iteration of that, you know, because it it is it just that thing that is what is attractive to us in the first place for some kind of unconscious trying to sort because it's psyche is just always trying to kind of bring us where we need to go and what we need to lean into.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think that this comes back to we're not gods, right? And we're not um, you know, I'm thinking like if psyche in Eros right now. Like we're not some love story. I mean, yes, we live without love stories, right? But we're not um we're not gods, and so it's not some sort of like romantic, it's not some rom-com, right? It's not some idealized version of life. We are um human beings, and we we are uh magnetized towards patterns. There's patterns all throughout nature, right? And we do re we do repeat ourselves um to learn and grow. And so I think the bulk of this work for me is coming into the reality and limitations, right? And recognizing like, okay, this is what I'm I'm here to work on right now. And this partner whom I'm with is bringing this up in me. And it's for me to, you know, integrate it bit by bit. You know, again, in a lifetime, I don't think that we're gonna be able to integrate it totally. Like it's certainly seeking wholeness.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Great. And I think a lot of people who are repeating painful patterns come to therapy to stop repeating those painful patterns. You know, you know, and I'm thinking right now, predominantly um like relationship patterns, seeking these types, these like kind of archetypes of partners that might not be like the healthiest for them or that um constellate certain, you know, attachment dynamics. Um and on some level, like of course, right? Like we wanna do that deep attachment work and and what I think is a lot of reparenting that's necessary, you know, to kind of meet that part. Um, but again, I'm kind of like, I don't know that you can ever really fully move out of that pattern because I don't know that there would be attraction there.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Um I'd have to, I would I would want to sit with this around like around around attraction in particular. Um, I think we are attracted for a lot of different, I think a lot of different reasons, right? The good, the bad, and the ugly. Um it makes me think about you know, the the wisdom of the EFT model that we're not going to stop cycles from happening. Right? All we can do is learn to weather those storms better and also hopefully lay down some good pathways to get back to one another another quicker. And yeah, specifically you're asking, like, would we still be attracted if if it wasn't attracted to the wound? I'm not sure. Because I think it's a broader question around like attraction itself. Um I think the place that I land is, well, if that's true, right? If that's true, then um how are we how are we gonna meet it? How are we gonna, how are we gonna, how are we gonna how do how are we gonna sit sit with it? Um, what can I learn from it?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I mean, I think what I like kind of overarchingly feel and also like kind of am affirmed with through our conversation is in a way, just how deeply humbling being in a real human relationship is when um the charge goes away, when the numinosity sort of fades from that initial part, and when you're left with like the sober reality of sharing a life with another imperfect being. Um and how um it just brings in so much humility because I think it also reflects back our own humanity, you know? And it's like, oh fuck. Like, I guess we just have to be two humans trudging through the mud together.
SPEAKER_01:Like a thousand percent two humans trudging through the mud together. A thousand percent. And I think that this is where I come back to. We're not gods, yeah. Right? We're not supposed to be on Mount Olympus. We are it's funny that I was like, we're not psyche and arrows, and yet there's such a beautiful metaphor in that. And like, absolutely we are, right? Like psyche goes to the underworld, and like there's two humans that get to go to the underworld. Yeah, and more often than not, we are seeing our humanness rather than our divinity. More often than not. And there is, and this is the kind of the paradox, there's actually such divinity in our humanness. And this is where me being an eternal optimist can sometimes get in the way, right? If we are doing our work around coming into uh courting the lover, being with the mother, we find our divinity inside of our own humanness, and that helps us soften towards our partners. Yeah. Right? Yeah. And yeah, just the humility to like really, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Well, I think it's interesting. I'm thinking when we're uh, you know, creating our checklist of what we want in a partner, you know. Um, there's like there's an inflation in it, right? There's almost this sense of like um. I wonder if I can figure out a way to wrap words around this. But I don't know. I just think the I think the experience of dating and of seeking partnership can often be a very inflated experience, right? Because you're like selecting and somehow you're placing um not just self above other, but also um, I don't know, like that person you choose has to be imbued with specialness, which means you're kind of imbued with specialness. I hopefully. Yeah. Yeah. And then somewhere along the way, right? That that that's the charge that kind of starts to go away. And then you're you're just not like covered in god dust anymore. You know, yeah, yeah, yeah. And you're like having babies and you know, whatever, whatever you're doing. No, whatever you're doing. Yeah, but it's rugged. You you I think you meet just this like incredible ruggedness of life. And I think like, I know for myself, like that was a really inflated time and experience. Um, and it's almost like the process of being in a decade-long relationship is coming down to earth.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. I love that image coming down to earth because I think that that's the global, the global invitation right now. Let's get into the soil. Let's get into the soil. There is again, there is divinity inside of compost.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:There is divinity inside of breakdown. And can you find a charge? In the middle of breakdown, do you find a charge? No. No, absolutely not. There's no way. But on the other side of that breakdown and the rich earth that comes from it, um, I think there is potential and possibility to find this is what it is, to find the charge within. Yeah.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Right? You're not outsourcing it. Right. That and that in that instance of inflation that makes it feel like you're on fire, right? This is this is amazing. I've found the person who meets all the things on the checklist. Like again, that's the that's the debunking of the myth of the one. All of that gets composted if you're lucky. And you find your charge within and you get to share that. But there are still limitations. You are still living with the the the rugged sense of humanness that or what have the brilliant thing that you just said. Um there's still there's still humanness and limitations. And like the world is hard. We live in such challenging turbulent, we live within such challenging, turbulent times, and inside of a system that is absolutely 100% working. Against us. Right. So um it's a yes and yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Wow. I feel like we traversed quite a bit of landscape. Yeah. I'm wondering, just kind of as we reflect back, is if there's anything else that you feel like you want to name or you know, really put the flag down around.
SPEAKER_01:Um like, watch me put the flag down and it gets moved tomorrow. That's allowed. Good. Um, I know I it's just it's like what a wild time to be alive. What a wild time to to be able to even get to sit here with you and to be able to talk about these themes and to to pontificate and to to get curious about our relationships and um you know what what they mean for our our lives. Um it's an interesting, unique period of time that we're living inside of. So it's just a really rad opportunity to get to sit with you again and explore these themes and um come back to some of them.
SPEAKER_00:So yeah, I really so deeply appreciate your mind and just um, you know, playing tennis. Yeah, it's so beautiful. Thank you so much for being here. Yeah, it's a good time. Thank you for listening to the whole paradox podcast. Follow us on Instagram at Molly Mitchell Hart and join us for our next episode as we continue to remember who we are together.