Why We Say “I’m Fine” When We Are Not: The Psychology of Hiding Your True Feelings
Most of us learned to say “I’m fine” long before we understood what it was costing us. In Episode 11 of The Original Self Podcast, Evet DeCota shares how a childhood bone disease, the loss of her best friend, and a love she was too armored to fight for all shaped her into someone who buried her feelings so deeply she eventually stopped feeling them altogether.
Then she’s joined by Jackson — her 17-year-old nephew — in one of the most honest conversations this podcast has ever held. Jackson lost his mother to colon cancer at fifteen, watched his family fracture in the aftermath, and spent years hiding behind humor, performance, and a persona built to keep people from getting too close. His first serious relationship cracked something open in him that grief alone couldn’t. And in this episode, he finally says it out loud.
This episode weaves personal story with psychology — including Erving Goffman’s concept of impression management, Dr. Brené Brown’s research on shame and armor, Arthur Aron’s self-expansion theory, Helen Fisher’s neuroscience of heartbreak, and Dr. James Pennebaker’s findings on the physical cost of emotional concealment.
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Welcome to the original self podcast. I'm Evet
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DeCota, owner of DeCota Life Coaching and a psychology
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informed life coach. I explore resilience, mindset,
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and the courage to become your authentic self.
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This is a space for honest conversations about
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growth, identity, relationships, and all the
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messy moments in between that shape who we become.
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Between the salon chair and coaching sessions,
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I've watched people move through life in patterns
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they never notice. Patterns that are subtle or
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familiar and often incredibly hard to see from
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the inside. Today, we're talking about the most
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automatic answer most of us give when someone
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asks how we're doing. I'm fine, and how it rarely
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tells the truth. This episode 11, why we say
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I'm fine when we're not, the psychology of hiding
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our true feelings is coming up. In America, We
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greet each other with, hello, how are you? And
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the expected response is supposed to be, I'm
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fine, how are you? Either way, the answer rarely
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reflects what you're truly feeling underneath
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the surface. And it's not really supposed to,
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it's just a greeting. If I had a dollar for every
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time I said I was fine when I felt angry or overwhelmed
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or possibly having a panic attack, I'd be very
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wealthy right now. But why do we do that? Of
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course most of us don't want to unload our problems
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on the cashier or a co -worker and we learn really
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quickly that people are not usually expecting
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a real answer. So the problem isn't fine in casual
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moments. It's when we go home and talk to people
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who we genuinely love or genuinely love us and
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say we're fine or we sit across from someone
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who truly cares about how we feel and the answer
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is still fine. So why do many of us walk around
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saying we're fine when we're actually anything
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but? It's not weakness. It's not dishonesty.
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I think it's something far more human than that.
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I believe I started doing it at a young age.
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Maybe starting with my bone disease. I was born
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into a body that broke easily. Sometimes from
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things other kids would have totally walked away
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from. And every time the message at home was
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exactly the same. You're fine. You'll live. Walk
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it off. Provided it wasn't my leg. So I did it.
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I did it every time. And there's something powerful
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about being told you're fine when your bones
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are literally breaking. It makes you learn at
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a very young age that your pain is not the point.
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What matters is getting up and moving on and
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not making too much of it, right? And if you
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think about it, it wasn't such a bad way of coping
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with it and not letting it define me. Because
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of this though, I learned to minimize my feelings
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at school as well. I didn't want pity. I didn't
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want to be seen as fragile or different. So I
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acted like it was no big deal and people followed
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my lead most of the time. If I didn't make a
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fuss about it, they didn't do it either. What
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I didn't realize was that I was practicing something.
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Every time I minimized my bones breaking, I was
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reinforcing the idea that my pain mattered less
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than how other people perceived me. That's heavy
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for a little kid, and so I didn't get it, right?
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Then came the teasing about brittle bones, my
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weight, about being different. And it was the
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kind of casual cruelty kids can deliver without
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anyone noticing how deeply it lands inside of
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you. I became very good at crying in private,
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pulling myself together, and walking back out
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as if nothing had happened. Eventually, it kind
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of became my template for everything. I'm fine.
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I'll live. Move on. All of this performing prepared
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me for the very big things in my life. My best
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friend dying in our twenties. It severely shut
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down my emotions because I wasn't practiced at
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grieving openly. So I carried it inside alone
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quietly. Or the man that I loved deeply who didn't
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love me enough to choose me. And I chose to deal
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with that in silence because what do you do with
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pain that big when you never learned how to say
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it out loud? The real truth is I just let the
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love go because it terrified me to be that vulnerable
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and needy. The armor that I had constructed had
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protected me for years and it also made me invisible.
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I think even to myself. And here's the hardest
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part to explain. For me, after a while, I wasn't
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performing fine any longer. I genuinely couldn't
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locate the pain. I had buried it so deeply that
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I would have told you honestly that I was okay,
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that there was nothing to talk about. That's
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what long -term fine does to someone, to someone's
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emotions and expressions. expressing their emotions.
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It doesn't just hide your feelings from other
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people, it eventually hides it from yourself.
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Before I bring my guest in for this podcast today,
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I want to say one thing briefly because I think
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it explains what you're about to hear. A sociologist
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named Irving Goffman believed that everyday life
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was kind of a performance. He called it impression
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management. He said that we all have a front
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stage the version of ourselves that we present
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to the world and Then there's a backstage who
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we actually are when no one is watching I'm fine
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is one of the most rehearsed front stage lines
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So knowing that we'll come back to the psychology
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behind that during the interview But first I
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want you to meet someone who is choosing, maybe
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for the first time in his life, to stop performing
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fine. My nephew calls me Annie because when he
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was little he missed the T in Auntie and it stuck.
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He's 17 now, an athlete, a good student, he's
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funny, he's charming, he's super good looking,
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and by most standards the kind of kid who seems
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completely fine. He's also one of the most guarded
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people I know. And I say that lovingly because
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I recognize it completely. I'm not only his Annie,
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I'm also his friend. And I know where he learned
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to perform that fine. He learned it from us.
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Two years ago my nephew lost his mom to colon
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cancer. She was my sister -in -law, my sissy.
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And in the aftermath of her death, the family
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fractured in ways that we're all still trying
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to understand. At 15 years old, my nephew was
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left carrying enormous grief inside a life that
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no longer felt stable. He saw a therapist for
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a while, but through his own admission, he spent
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most of this session avoiding what he actually
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really felt. He hated going. He called it pointless.
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He joked to me that the therapist was a forced
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friend so we started calling her FF. It was our
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own private laugh but underneath those jokes
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his emotions were far too raw to let anyone in.
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Then his first real relationship ended and something
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inside him just cracked open. For the first time
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in his life I watched my nephew Begin letting
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go of the persona that he had built up around
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all the emotions that he couldn't show anybody
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a Few weeks ago during a conversation between
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the two of us. He asked me if he could come on
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this podcast I said yes before he even finished
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the sentence What you're about to hear is a 17
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year old young man choosing Maybe for the first
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time in his life to stop performing fine I'm
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not here to polish it or steer it too much it's
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just going to be his Annie and some questions
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and We're gonna let him be exactly who he is
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So hello my little nephew Jackson when um, how's
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it going? Hi, are you excited to do this? Yeah,
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I am pretty stoked. All right, cool so I'm gonna
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ask you a question and When people ask you how
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you're doing, what do you tell them typically?
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I feel like it's a pretty auto response kind
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of like robotic at this point. It's like and
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I'm fine or and I'm okay or you know if the day
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was better than it normally is it's a you know
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my day was good but it's never like I never go
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deep into like what I actually feel because I
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feel like number one like a lot of people even
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though they say they want to listen to that I
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feel like coming from me it's like I don't know
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I wouldn't when I ask someone that I'm not trying
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to sit there for 30 minutes and like kind of
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full listen sure sure sure sure yeah I mean you
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don't want to like you know tell a perfect stranger
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well I've had a really bad day today right like
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you don't really go into it right um is it ever
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the truth when somebody says like hey how you
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doing is it ever the truth some most of the time
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I would say it is the truth you know a lot of
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time At the end of the day or something like
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I am just fine like it's been a lot of ups and
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downs throughout the day So it's like it's never
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really one emotion But like sometimes there has
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been some low points that I don't speak about
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but normally if there's like a high point I bring
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it up in conversation somehow later in the night
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or during that so you feel comfortable with some
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people Yeah, I mean it really depends on on who
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like for example my last relationship like if
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she would ask me how I was doing I would be more
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honest, you know, there was Some i'm fine some
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i'm okay thrown in there but you know It was
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more if I had a rough day I tell her I had a
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rough day, but I feel like with the parents and
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friends It's more easy in a way to just be like,
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you know, i'm fine and leave it at that Yeah,
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that makes sense It is easier What you just described
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has a name and I talked about it earlier in the
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podcast. It's called impression management, meaning
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it's we all have this performance version of
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ourselves for anybody watching. So most of us
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learn which emotions are maybe feel the safest
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or like OK to put forward, right? We're not people
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are not going to just judge us. So when we say
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I'm fine, that's like one of the most rehearsed
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lines. It's the easiest one to say. The thing
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is, is the more we rehearse it of saying, I'm
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fine all the time, the more it becomes automatic,
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right? And we don't talk about our true feelings.
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Does that make sense? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. All
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right, so before this relationship, Had you ever
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let anyone a friend your family whatever? Had
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you ever let anyone get very close to you? Yeah,
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I have a you know, I kind of see him as a brother
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at this point Like I say his name obviously,
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but he's very close to me and he transferred
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schools This year so that was kind of hard. But
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you know, we still talk like he's one of my mainest
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friends like I've had him since like honestly
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I didn't know him at the time. It was like that
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there's like a Kind of a like a superstition
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is the word where it's like It's like the meeting
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someone twice there. You meet him once They don't
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really mean anything to you. You don't really
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understand it You don't know them and the second
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time you meet him you like connect and you click
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instantaneously and that's kind of what happened
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with us He was on my flag football team As a
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kid and you know, I never thought I would see
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him again then he came to our school and we kind
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of butted heads for the first little bit while
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he was at school and then you know, we just clicked
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and everything went from there and you know,
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he's been my one of my best friends ever since
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and You know, I do think of him as like someone
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I could tell kind of anything I want because
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it's like without him their school would have
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been a lot more rough sophomore freshman year
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and You know that's kind of where The relationship
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kind of like hurt the most is because when he
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left She kind of filled that void in a way like
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she made it seem like What I even made it seem
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like she was my best friend, you know anyone
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I could talk to at school If I was feeling okay,
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like, you know, I could always go talk to her
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See her on break. So it's kind of like the same
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thing like because me and him would always walk
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to class together And even if we didn't have
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the same class, you know just chat the whole
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time and you know That's kind of what we did
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this year. So that's what it makes this one sting
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a lot more Yeah, absolutely Well, I mean not
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that your buddy was your first love But I mean
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when you have a first love or like a first really
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deep relationship it changes you like it allows
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you to be who you really really are and Dr. Brené
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Brown. She's like my favorite scientist. She
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does work on vulnerability and shame she talks
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about how We carry this quiet fear of of showing
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people who we really are right like we just talked
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about so we perform strength instead right and
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there's a distinction where the strength shows
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up as armor not resilience does that make sense
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yeah right so like you know think about like
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in the in the dark ages, the chain mail that
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people wore, right? Like it totally protects
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you. But then that chain mail becomes like a
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skin, like an additional skin. And we just have
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this like what you were saying to me a while
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ago, like this persona that we keep putting out.
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So when you are friends or you still are friends
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with this guy, right? That kind of allows you
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to be the person that you are. And when you were
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with your girlfriend, it allows you To be as
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as as truthful and who you are as as you want
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to be. Yeah Yeah, yeah, so You've told me before
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but you just kind of mentioned that you were
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completely open with your ex -girlfriend You
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know most most of the time I think Transparent
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in a way that maybe you weren't with everybody
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else except for your your buddy What made that
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possible? Um, you know, it wasn't a an all -the
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-time thing, you know, I wasn't always Transparent
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there was a lot of times that actually I wasn't
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Transparent just about you know life in general
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like it'd be over the littlest things. It'd be
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like, you know, like I Don't know how much money
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I had or something It was just it was stuff to
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make me seem like quote -unquote cooler and quote
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-unquote like, you know I had this like unlimited
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like income even though like Obviously that's
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not true, especially as a 17 year old, but it's
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like When I was truthful it was because it was
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so happy that I didn't need to be that way and
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it was like for example, like, you know, we would
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be hanging out and it would just be me and her
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and let's say we're going on like a an ice cream
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run at night and it's like it's just us like
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those are the moments where I am the most transparent
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because it's like that's who I am like Those
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car rides that we would have together like we're
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just like laughing having fun singing the music
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together like that's kind of like who I am as
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a person like, you know and when it wasn't me
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it was because I There's like this term that
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younger kids use it's like nonchalant and or
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full and I have a reputation at school that you
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know, I'm kind of nonchalant kind of or full
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and it's like I didn't want to ruin that perception
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of me because I liked quote -unquote like who
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that was and like looking back like you know
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all I wish I did was like not be nonchalant because
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it's like Nonchalant means that you show that
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you don't care about anything and not caring
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about anything is what makes people cool but
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honestly like Not caring about stuff just makes
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you like lame in a way because it's like you
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don't show any passions You don't you don't show
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any love or interest for others and people because
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it's like you're too busy trying to put up this
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facade that you don't care when really like you
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probably do care. Yeah. What did you say? Or
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oracle? Yeah, oracle. I never heard that oracle.
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It's like, you know, you have like an aura about
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you. Oh, oracle. OK. Yeah. I'm not quite sure
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that's a word, but I like it. I like the phrase.
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So when you said that you were. Like that's who
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you are, like easy. Like that's what I got out
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of that. You didn't say easy, but like you were
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having fun and singing songs and things like
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that. When you decided to put on the cool persona
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or the auraful, I'm gonna keep using it, what
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do you think changed? Like why did you go to
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that? Honestly, it's kind of like, it's like
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a lot of the, like a thing at school, like kind
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of an escape, I would say. Because it's like
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at school. I don't know I really don't know why
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I would go to it and that's something i'm still
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kind of working through and You know i'm doing
00:19:35
it a lot less like the other day. I you know
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me my boy We're just like sitting there And I
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realize like I don't really participate in many
00:19:43
school assemblies or the school games and i'm
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like, you know like why is that like why am I
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afraid to Like go down there and have fun. So
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we just kind of like we just went down there
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We had fun and we won it and like, you know that
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was like way more fun than just like sitting
00:19:58
in the crowd and kind of like Making fun of the
00:20:01
people that do go up there because it's like
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it's like yeah It's way easier to sit back and
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like call them weird because they are going up
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there and they're showing who they are But to
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actually do it it's a lot more fun than you would
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think like yeah, maybe maybe some people You
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know like sat there and made fun of us for going
00:20:18
up there and having a good time But it's like,
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you know who cares like I went up there and I
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had a good time So why do I care about what they
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think and it's like to go back to the question
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about like Why did I put up that facade? It's
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cuz I don't know. I just I wanted to seem Cooler
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I wanted to seem like, you know Nothing affects
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me. Nothing. Nothing hurts me Life's perfect,
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you know, just that that whole that whole facade
00:20:44
I feel like a lot of people put up to this day
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and I feel like if you can break down You know
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your true actions and what you actually care
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about and do those things then you'll be so much
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happier than Putting up that facade because even
00:21:00
if I continue to put up that facade and continue
00:21:03
to act that way, you know Like yeah, I would
00:21:05
seem cool. Yeah, I would you know have these
00:21:09
friends and stuff, but it's like um I don't know.
00:21:13
I just it's it's a lot more Enjoyable to live
00:21:16
life how you actually want to live it instead
00:21:19
of you know, putting up that false front. Yeah
00:21:22
Do you think that? you put that facade up that
00:21:26
cool facade like where do you think that came
00:21:28
from or Did you also have friends that would
00:21:32
judge people for that like you learned from them?
00:21:36
Saying oh, that's lame or that's not cool. Like
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I'm wondering where it came from. Yeah No, I
00:21:41
mean everyone has friends, you know, everyone
00:21:44
does that, you know, you know I love all my boys
00:21:46
like, you know, they're my boys for a reason
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so I'm not gonna like diss them but you know
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that is that is like Boy culture nowadays and
00:21:53
that happens with people that you know, I wouldn't
00:21:55
even say are in my Direct friend group. It's
00:21:58
like you just put each other down for no reason
00:22:00
I'm like and I realize that you put each other
00:22:03
down because you don't want to seem interested
00:22:07
in a thing so it's like that's where the nonchalant
00:22:09
is comes from and that's where that facade comes
00:22:11
from it's because you want to seem cool you want
00:22:14
to seem like You know, you want you want to attract
00:22:17
others by doing that when rather, you know I
00:22:22
kind of wish I had memorized the quote before
00:22:24
I came in here, but it's like there's a quote
00:22:26
That's like like stand out It's better to stand
00:22:29
alone in something you enjoy than to be a part
00:22:31
of a crowd of something you don't like and it's
00:22:33
like That's kind of exactly how it is, you know
00:22:36
I would never trade my friends for anyone else
00:22:38
because you know there my rider dies, but it's
00:22:40
like You know my friends I became into that group
00:22:44
and became very invested in that group by putting
00:22:46
others down like that's how you kind of built
00:22:48
your way up the The pyramid I would say of the
00:22:51
friend group is by you know How many jokes you
00:22:55
can get off how much you can make others laugh
00:22:57
and I feel like a lot of friend groups are like
00:22:58
that. It's like Normally the yeah the the top
00:23:02
friend like the the friend of everyone is normally
00:23:06
the friend that can make everyone laugh and like
00:23:09
make everyone have a good time and enjoy themselves
00:23:11
so it's like to be able to be like that is like
00:23:14
to be the most nonchalant to be the You know
00:23:17
the quote -unquote meanest one and it's you know,
00:23:20
it's like I did that for a while, you know, I'd
00:23:23
I'd not not Happy to admit it and not proud of
00:23:27
it. But you know definitely put others down and
00:23:30
you know definitely made little digs at people
00:23:33
all the time and it's like that's kind of like
00:23:37
I don't know that that's just it's very normalized
00:23:39
for a teenage boy and maybe I don't know about
00:23:42
anyone else but I do I can speak on teenage boys
00:23:44
and it's like that's kind of the norm is to do
00:23:46
that so you know, I do get called corny nowadays
00:23:50
because you know, I no longer do that and I After
00:23:53
these like, you know past few weeks, you know,
00:23:55
I've kind of fully changed how I act especially
00:23:58
in classes like no longer like trying to make
00:24:01
like jokes about people and kind of trying to
00:24:04
make a joke about like the the atmosphere or
00:24:07
like the situation instead of like insulting
00:24:10
someone's like not character because I would
00:24:13
never go that far, but it's like Insulting someone's
00:24:15
actions because you never know how much that's
00:24:18
gonna impact someone like speaking from example
00:24:20
I was driving one of my uh, my friends one time
00:24:24
and like a kind of older song came on and like,
00:24:28
you know It meant no harm, but I loved the song
00:24:30
and it was like he just called that like yo Like
00:24:32
what are you an unc like obviously it was just
00:24:34
a joke, but it like It made me kind of think
00:24:37
more about like what I would play in those situations,
00:24:41
like what kind of music I would play, like trying
00:24:43
to play like the the newer songs, the more underground
00:24:47
songs, because I'm trying to seem cooler. Got
00:24:49
it. Yeah. And just because he didn't like that
00:24:52
song, then then that means that you were. too
00:24:55
old school or yeah exactly enough okay got it
00:24:58
well it was probably a really good song I was
00:25:01
gonna say something to you like you were saying
00:25:03
like about going up and playing this game you
00:25:06
know at school which hopefully they got pictures
00:25:09
of because I never see pictures of you and it's
00:25:12
too it's too bad anyways Theodore Roosevelt he's
00:25:16
you know, obviously an older ex -president, but
00:25:19
he did this speech called man in the arena and
00:25:23
it's about how okay, you're in the arena, right
00:25:28
the spectators are all around you and You throw
00:25:32
your hat in and you you're like Sweating and
00:25:35
blood and and all this stuff and you're fighting
00:25:38
and you've thrown everything in there you thrown
00:25:40
caution to the wind And there's always the spectators,
00:25:45
always the naysayers that are like, oh, I could
00:25:48
do that better. Like, oh, he looks foolish for
00:25:50
doing that. But they've never had the vulnerability
00:25:55
and the courage to throw their hat in. And so
00:25:59
today, when you went up and you played that game
00:26:01
or this week when you did that, that's like straight
00:26:05
up saying, yeah, this is me. This is what I'm
00:26:08
going to do. Yeah, exactly. Ace is for you. So
00:26:13
you did do that with your ex a lot of times not
00:26:16
all the time I would say it was like a Honestly,
00:26:21
it's kind of bad to look back and admit but it
00:26:23
I feel like it is a majority of a facade and
00:26:27
less of you know kind of who I was Because I
00:26:31
felt like I needed I don't know in a way I needed
00:26:34
the facade to keep her but actually that That
00:26:38
facade and not being able to you know be in touch
00:26:41
With my emotions and being touched like why I
00:26:45
feel certain ways about things in my own opinions
00:26:48
it's like not being able to I Don't know. I don't
00:26:52
I can't remember the word for but like not being
00:26:54
able to put my true self out there is what in
00:26:57
turn, you know lost her in a way because you
00:27:01
know, I I wasn't I wasn't the man that I should
00:27:05
have been to her because she was very like loving
00:27:08
with me and I was loving back but in a way like
00:27:11
You know, I think we can maybe get into it later,
00:27:14
but you know Just there was like little stuff
00:27:17
that you know if I done it would have shown that
00:27:20
I cared a lot more instead of that That facade
00:27:23
that you know, I don't care. I'm too cool for
00:27:25
this. I'm too cool for that. It's like It's just
00:27:29
a lot of that. Yeah It's interesting When we
00:27:34
were talking before you we were talking about
00:27:37
you know you being in love and You know, like
00:27:42
I said a part of you emerges right where another
00:27:45
person sees you but it sounds to me like You
00:27:50
didn't let her see the real you a lot of the
00:27:53
time. Yeah. Yeah What's that feel like now? Oh,
00:27:57
it hurts honestly because it's like You know,
00:28:01
we've talked a few times since then it doesn't
00:28:04
it's not like a lot of people might think like
00:28:07
like high school love doesn't really mean much
00:28:09
but It did mean a lot to me and I can see that
00:28:14
by how much I've reflected and changed myself
00:28:19
over the past few weeks. Sorry, what was the
00:28:24
question again? I got lost. It's okay. I said
00:28:27
that you had the opportunity. You know for a
00:28:33
couple years to show her who you really were
00:28:36
and I'm sure you did show her but you know like
00:28:39
you You needed to put up that front and I'm wondering
00:28:43
why with her you needed to put up that front
00:28:45
I don't know I think it all stems back to the
00:28:49
you know trying to be cool because she had a
00:28:51
little brother and her little brother really
00:28:53
looked up to me So I felt like the cooler I acted
00:28:57
Around them around her and even when it was one
00:28:59
-on -one, you know, I'd still try and act like
00:29:00
that cool. Like I don't care facade Because I
00:29:04
think I was so deep into the act of it that I
00:29:08
couldn't even see that it was an act and that's
00:29:12
the biggest thing I think I'm kind of looking
00:29:15
back on right now is I Couldn't back then like,
00:29:18
you know, I didn't know that was a facade I didn't
00:29:21
know I was just trying to act like that. I just
00:29:23
acted like that and You know, I'm not saying
00:29:26
to go get your heart broken to figure it out
00:29:28
But to figure it out is really nice because you
00:29:31
know I can see Who I truly am now and you know,
00:29:35
I'm not the same guy and that doesn't mean that
00:29:38
You know, I'm gonna she's gonna run back to me
00:29:41
because I'm a changed man But it's like because
00:29:43
it's it's not for her that I changed I just realized
00:29:46
that you know, I didn't like the path that I
00:29:48
was on I didn't like who I was becoming and us
00:29:52
that doesn't have to do with you know, my friends
00:29:55
or anything that just it was kind of had to do
00:29:57
with me like Because my friends, you know, they
00:29:59
don't care that you know I'm changed now like
00:30:01
they still still hang out with me still do all
00:30:04
this You know, I'm just I'm no longer making
00:30:07
those digs anymore so that's That's the lesson,
00:30:12
huh that they still like you no matter what exactly,
00:30:15
you know, like you might think That you need
00:30:19
to put this facade up that you know, nothing
00:30:21
affects you You know, you're too cool or the
00:30:24
exact opposite like, you know Because I don't
00:30:26
know about the other end of the spectrum, but
00:30:28
there might be friend groups where it's like
00:30:30
You know you try and act overly happy about something
00:30:35
that you don't like because everyone else in
00:30:37
your group likes it so you know being your true
00:30:41
self and conflicting with your friends is more
00:30:45
important than Trying to be their they're like
00:30:48
robot because you know, no one no one wants to
00:30:51
hang out with Like it's called a yes, man. No
00:30:54
one wants to hang out with a yes, man because
00:30:56
it's like well some people do but you're never
00:30:58
gonna be close friends with a yes, man because
00:31:01
all they're ever gonna do is agree with you and
00:31:04
agree with your opinions and that's kind of the
00:31:07
thing that Kind of lacked was that I didn't like
00:31:13
when others Disagree with my opinions because
00:31:15
I didn't want to disagree with others opinions
00:31:17
and I didn't care about disagreeing with others
00:31:18
opinions It was something I was passionate about
00:31:21
but it's like I would never fully disagree with
00:31:25
like my girlfriend's opinions because I didn't
00:31:27
want to Hurt her in a way, I guess but it's like
00:31:31
when she disagreed with my opinions It was kind
00:31:34
of the same thing, but I would take it a lot
00:31:36
more to heart which is you know something we
00:31:39
can talk about later on about like why I would
00:31:41
do that, but it's It was a lot more personal
00:31:43
than I even realized like why I felt the way
00:31:46
I felt about certain things That I didn't even
00:31:49
know back then so it's like, you know everything
00:31:52
Your true self will find you like that That's
00:31:55
the end of the day thing is like you will find
00:31:58
who you're supposed to be. You know, you might
00:31:59
be 40 when you figure it out and then have a
00:32:02
midlife crisis, which you know isn't the best
00:32:05
but you know, you will Like everything takes
00:32:09
time like not trying to be like preachy but you
00:32:13
know there is a path that you're supposed to
00:32:15
be on and like a destiny and everything happens
00:32:18
for That reason and you know, I could never imagine
00:32:23
losing her Losing her but it's like that helped
00:32:27
me figure out, you know, I didn't like who I
00:32:29
was becoming I didn't like what I was doing with
00:32:32
my time because it was like a lot of my time
00:32:35
during lunch when I should have been you know
00:32:37
doing other things I was you know making fun
00:32:41
of others or you know I'm not trying to be like
00:32:43
the mean kid you know I didn't make fun of that
00:32:44
many people what it was like you know like just
00:32:46
a little insults like if someone did something
00:32:49
dumb or like tripped on the patio like we would
00:32:51
kind of make fun of that a little bit you know
00:32:52
just like as teenage boys do It surprises me
00:32:57
though because I know you as You know pretty
00:33:01
sweet and and you know, yes, we're all sarcastic
00:33:04
in our family, right? But I am surprised by that.
00:33:08
But like you said teenage boys, right and I I
00:33:11
get that I was never like never like makes it
00:33:14
worse actually it was never to their face like
00:33:16
we wouldn't it's like we would like go up and
00:33:18
point and laugh at them, but it'd be like the
00:33:20
the little snarky comments You didn't really
00:33:24
answer it, you said we'd get to it later, but
00:33:26
I am interested if you know, you may not, why
00:33:31
you felt the need to put up such a facade. I
00:33:37
mean, obviously we can kind of Freud it out a
00:33:41
second, you know, like you had a lot of stuff
00:33:43
happen in your family, right? But do you think
00:33:47
that that's a part of it? Do you think that...
00:33:50
You were doing it beforehand. Like maybe when
00:33:53
your mom got sick, like what do you think? I
00:33:56
felt like I always wanted to be Like that kid
00:34:00
I didn't want I didn't want to be you know, like
00:34:03
the the sad kid or the yeah the sad kid So I
00:34:07
felt like I always put up this this front that
00:34:10
I was, you know And I never wanted to be the
00:34:12
dumb kid either and I'm not dumb, but and I didn't
00:34:15
try Lot in my first few years of high school.
00:34:18
I just had a lot going on so you know I didn't
00:34:21
get the grades that my friends were getting even
00:34:24
though I Looking back like especially from this
00:34:27
junior year how I've been doing you know I definitely
00:34:29
could have I could have gotten amazing grades,
00:34:31
but I didn't For some reason I didn't care about
00:34:36
that and I think that had a lot to do with you
00:34:38
know my dad didn't finish college and he's one
00:34:43
of the most successful people I know, you know,
00:34:46
he does all this this like Just has a lot and
00:34:51
you know, I I look at that and i'm like I looked
00:34:53
at that and i'm like, you know, I don't need
00:34:54
to finish college either I don't you know, I
00:34:56
would I always wanted to finish college but I
00:34:58
was like, you know If he didn't need to try I
00:35:00
don't need to try and I could be just as successful
00:35:01
but it's like That's not how it works. You know,
00:35:04
i'm not trying to say that he got lucky but because
00:35:07
he worked his ass off for it, but you know It
00:35:10
does take that it does actually working for and
00:35:13
I didn't Didn't work for it and I didn't try
00:35:16
so, you know, that's kind of where that came
00:35:19
from but back to the main point it's like I Put
00:35:22
that wall up because I still wanted to seem as
00:35:26
smart as I actually was I still wanted to seem
00:35:28
like I was in par in line with everyone else
00:35:32
and So I lied a lot about you know, my grades
00:35:37
to my friends. I lied about You know how things
00:35:41
were at home just cuz you know Never wanted to
00:35:44
be the main thing when my mom got sick I didn't
00:35:48
want to be the the cancer kid and I didn't want
00:35:51
people to look at me and be like Oh his mom has
00:35:53
cancer like feel bad for him, you know feel feel
00:35:57
the certain way for him I wanted people to like
00:35:59
me For you know, not even who I was because I
00:36:02
kind of put up like a fake about who I was but
00:36:05
One of you would like see me and be like, oh
00:36:08
he's doing perfect. You know, he's He never had
00:36:12
anything wrong happen to him and you know, a
00:36:15
lot of people did think that so it it worked
00:36:18
because you know a lot of people when You know
00:36:22
just over these past few years of high school
00:36:24
and I kind of stopped putting up that front,
00:36:26
you know and like I started to know a lot more
00:36:29
people and I started become friends with people
00:36:32
that I didn't know before, you know They looked
00:36:35
at me when I would you know break down in front
00:36:37
of them not even break down But like just get
00:36:39
emotional about certain things and you know,
00:36:41
they'd be like, you know Why are you so emotional
00:36:43
about this? Like you've never had to deal with
00:36:44
that like I remember one of my one of my not
00:36:47
even their friends now but you know that we weren't
00:36:50
that close back then he was talking about you
00:36:53
know, it was a jersey number and soccer and you
00:36:57
know, I just lost my mom and she had always worn
00:37:00
number five and He took number five because he
00:37:04
was a senior and I was like I need to wear that
00:37:07
number for soccer season this year and he was
00:37:10
like You know like why like you can have it next
00:37:12
year and I was like, yeah But I kind of want
00:37:14
to wear it like it means a lot to me and he was
00:37:17
like Like what did you like get your first phone
00:37:20
when you were five or something, you know Just
00:37:21
kind of making fun of like oh my life's been
00:37:24
perfect. You know, nothing is nothing has happened
00:37:26
to me because that's that's who I Wanted to be
00:37:29
I wanted to be the kid that you know That's who
00:37:32
you projected. Yeah, I wanted to be the kid that,
00:37:34
you know, went to private schools all life. And
00:37:36
I don't even know why. I just wanted to I wanted
00:37:37
to be like the like the rich kid, I guess, like
00:37:40
the one that's never had like the nepo baby.
00:37:43
And I don't know why, but it's like and I definitely
00:37:47
am, you know, a rich kid. I'm never going to
00:37:49
say that I'm not. I'm definitely spoiled as well.
00:37:52
But I wanted to. This is true. I wanted to be
00:37:56
that kid. And it's like. You know, I had to tell
00:37:58
him I had to be like, you know, my mom wore that
00:38:00
number and he was like Like okay, like you can
00:38:04
wear it for her next year. I was like, they know
00:38:06
barely my mom passed away like I need to wear
00:38:08
that number and he was like Yo, bro, I'm so sorry.
00:38:10
Like I wouldn't I would have never guessed that
00:38:12
and it's like those are the things that you know,
00:38:15
like really just told me that you know, the facade
00:38:17
is working like keep this up keep this acting
00:38:20
because it's like Nobody knows who you truly
00:38:23
are and it's it's it's way easier that way. Okay,
00:38:26
but wait It's working you say but then when you
00:38:30
told the guy that had the number five that you
00:38:33
needed it and why? Did that feel okay? It actually
00:38:40
felt really uncomfortable, you know, I I felt
00:38:43
like There's a lot of there's like a thing called
00:38:46
trauma dumping and I feel like whenever I open
00:38:49
up That's what I feel like happens, you know,
00:38:51
even when I'm speaking to friends about you know,
00:38:53
just like You know my girlfriend or something
00:38:56
like that Like I just felt like I was trauma
00:38:59
dumping or like when I would speak about how
00:39:01
sad I was like that my family kind of drifted
00:39:04
apart and everything like that like I just felt
00:39:07
instead of Easier instead of it kind of relieving
00:39:11
some of it. I felt like I was putting a weight
00:39:15
onto them in a way that it's like Felt bad because
00:39:20
all I was doing was Yeah trauma dumping I was
00:39:24
like making them sad and making them kind of
00:39:27
quote -unquote Uncomfortable in a way because
00:39:29
you know a lot of people don't know what to say
00:39:31
back to that not not trying to like diss them
00:39:34
but it's like a lot of people wouldn't know if
00:39:36
I just went up to my boys now like obviously
00:39:39
they would know what to say but if I just went
00:39:40
up to like one of my friends and just started
00:39:43
like telling them everything, you know, they're
00:39:45
probably just gonna be like I'm so sorry and
00:39:47
I'm here for you. I feel you, you know, I'm here
00:39:50
if you need to talk which is like the most That's
00:39:52
another auto response people have is like when
00:39:54
someone is going through something It's always
00:39:58
the same three like I'm sorry I'm here for you.
00:40:02
And if you ever need anything like talk to me
00:40:05
Do you think that it made you feel worse because
00:40:08
it was such an un it was such a foreign way of
00:40:12
being to you because you had this you know that
00:40:14
chainmail right like you had been wearing it
00:40:16
for so long do you think that was part of it
00:40:20
and also when your ex was your girlfriend you
00:40:26
didn't think that you could talk to her about
00:40:29
that like let's just say that specific story
00:40:31
about the number five um you know i always talked
00:40:34
to her about it but not in a way that actually
00:40:39
helped me you know it'd be like I'd be mad or
00:40:42
when I'd be You know upset about something, you
00:40:46
know, I'd bring that up. I'd be like, you know
00:40:49
Or if I was just down, you know, I'd be like,
00:40:52
you know, my life kind of sucks right now And
00:40:54
it's like she's like, oh don't say that and then
00:40:57
I would just rattle everything off And that was
00:41:00
never was never healthy because it's like that
00:41:02
didn't help me do anything and actually made
00:41:04
it more Unhealthy in a way because it's like
00:41:08
All I would do is was try and use that to prove
00:41:11
a point instead of to like actually Get it off
00:41:15
my chest and to start healing about it. It was
00:41:17
it was to to kind of help me win that argument
00:41:22
in a way it was never an argument, but like It
00:41:25
was like the I love you more game. It's like
00:41:27
I was I was winning that in a way Between you
00:41:31
and her between me and her And it was never you
00:41:35
know, she was she was actually amazing about
00:41:38
it all like, you know She was like she didn't
00:41:40
do the auto response like, you know, I'm here
00:41:42
for you. I'm sorry It was like she would let
00:41:45
me speak about it. She'd be like like Jackson
00:41:47
like you your family is so amazing and how they
00:41:52
and how they You know kind of still kind of stick
00:41:55
together for you Even if it's not in the same
00:41:58
way it was before, you know they're still together
00:42:01
for you and it's like I never kind of realized
00:42:04
when she would say that and I would because I'd
00:42:08
be I'd be so mad I'd be so mad at them I'd be
00:42:10
so mad at everything and it's like I Should have
00:42:12
just well, there's a lot of I coulda woulda shoulda
00:42:15
so I'm not even gonna go down that path But you
00:42:18
know if I did listen to her more and if I did
00:42:22
You know kind of be more in touch with my feelings,
00:42:25
you know Most likely we'd still be together,
00:42:28
but then most likely, you know, I might not have
00:42:31
realized I didn't like the nonchalantness, so.
00:42:35
Well, yeah, I mean, coulda, shoulda, right? Like
00:42:38
I said, we don't know. It seems to me that, I
00:42:42
don't know if this is a family trait, but it's
00:42:46
easier to be in touch with an anger emotion than
00:42:50
it is, or happy, right? Than it is for sadness,
00:42:55
fear, like we don't seem to. Like those emotions
00:43:00
so much we're not so comfortable with yeah, yeah
00:43:03
No, not blaming anyone because you know, it is
00:43:07
my fault but you know for the first I don't know
00:43:12
14 years of my life the only emotion I kind of
00:43:17
really ever saw from anyone was Anger in a way
00:43:22
because you know besides when My grandma passed
00:43:28
away when people were sad. It's like That that's
00:43:33
kind of the only time I ever saw My dad be sad
00:43:39
and you know, that's It's not his fault. That's
00:43:43
not it's not my fault either. It's it's no one's
00:43:45
fault that it was like that, but it's like You
00:43:48
know, I didn't I didn't grow up and a lot of
00:43:51
boys. I feel like don't grow up learning To be
00:43:54
sad to be in touch with your emotions like that's
00:43:58
not really who I guess quote -unquote men are
00:44:01
is like to be sad, but it's like You know if
00:44:05
that had happened it, you know, I don't know
00:44:08
who I would have been today, but it's like You
00:44:12
would be a lot more in touch with sadness if
00:44:15
you're shown sadness from a young age because
00:44:17
you pick up a lot of traits From your parents
00:44:20
and you know my parents Love all of them, but
00:44:23
you know they didn't have the most healthy relationships
00:44:26
at time. There's a lot of Arguing a lot of yelling
00:44:30
a lot of bickering and a lot of digs at each
00:44:32
other and that that's kind of what I picked up
00:44:35
on instead of you know when they would Rekindle
00:44:38
and when they would be sad together and try and
00:44:41
fix things I wouldn't see that I wouldn't be
00:44:43
there for that because they would they wouldn't
00:44:44
want their kids to see that but it's like all
00:44:47
I would see is that bickering so I'm like Okay,
00:44:49
that's how I display my emotions. That's how
00:44:51
I That's how I do everything is I need to show
00:44:56
no emotion unless it's anger unless it's trying
00:44:59
to put a dig at someone else and winning that
00:45:01
argument winning that fight when it's really
00:45:03
you know, you're You know, it's just like a common
00:45:07
quote, but it's like you're never in a fight
00:45:09
With or against your partner. You're always in
00:45:13
a fight with your partner Because you got to
00:45:15
work it out together. You got to be there together.
00:45:17
You got to fix it together instead of it takes
00:45:20
two. Exactly. You know, it takes the two. Yeah,
00:45:23
because like you could you could put 100 percent
00:45:26
into a relationship, but if they're putting zero
00:45:28
percent, it's always going to be zero percent
00:45:30
no matter what you put in. If they're putting
00:45:33
in zero, then it's never going to equate to anything.
00:45:37
That's right. Do you think that you put in? Less
00:45:42
than your ex -girlfriend because you weren't
00:45:46
being the real you Did you know you weren't being
00:45:50
the real you like sometimes? I think you vacillate
00:45:53
like maybe maybe that the the real you got lost
00:45:56
under the performance you at all times Yeah,
00:45:59
honestly, I would say You know, I definitely
00:46:02
feel like she put More effort in than me a lot
00:46:07
of the time, you know No matter what it was,
00:46:10
you know if I was Upset or emotional, you know,
00:46:12
I would always be there for her. I'd always let
00:46:14
her talk. I'd always let her have her time, but
00:46:16
it's like When I would know when I would be upset
00:46:20
it would be a lot more of her trying to help
00:46:24
me But when she was upset, you know, it would
00:46:27
be a lot more of you know, why do you feel this
00:46:29
way? Like do you think never it was never like
00:46:33
a I don't know. I feel like I'm losing it but
00:46:35
it's like She just put more time and effort into
00:46:39
it than I would and I just think that was kind
00:46:41
of like our personalities You know, she would
00:46:43
always want maybe she explored of the reasons
00:46:46
why you were more upset like trying to help you
00:46:49
Solve it or figure it out where you were like,
00:46:52
well, um kind of in a way I mean, you know neither
00:46:56
of us knew and that's kind of the hardest part
00:46:59
is neither of us knew Why I would get because
00:47:02
I got upset a bunch of little things, you know,
00:47:04
it was never There was never a big argument between
00:47:07
us. It was little petty ones that would turn
00:47:09
into big arguments that would turn into little
00:47:12
stuff like kind of just like let's say one night
00:47:15
she would want to go out with her friends or
00:47:18
something like that and I would want to spend
00:47:20
time in and I felt like if she went out she was
00:47:24
choosing them over me and I felt that way because
00:47:28
you know, I didn't want to be abandoned and I
00:47:30
didn't want to be chosen over because you know,
00:47:33
no offense to my dad, but he chose Other things
00:47:40
over my sister in a way that you know kind of
00:47:43
kind of wrecked me because no matter what I did
00:47:46
no matter what I tried to do for them, you know,
00:47:49
I never brought them back together and What I
00:47:52
realized is they just needed time and they have
00:47:54
come back together. They've rekindled and that's
00:47:56
great, but it's like I kind of never never realized
00:48:01
that and never realized that you know this time
00:48:04
is actually good that we're spending apart because
00:48:07
I'm learning so much about myself and like why
00:48:11
I don't like those petty arguments and why I
00:48:14
felt like I was getting abandoned because you
00:48:16
know my mom passed away and I felt like she abandoned
00:48:19
us and you know just kind of the whole family
00:48:22
split I feel like it was abandoning you know
00:48:25
my childhood in a way so by her doing that You
00:48:29
know the most normal thing, you know Just wanting
00:48:31
to hang out with friends because when I would
00:48:33
want to hang out with friends, you know It would
00:48:34
be a oh my god have so much fun and that's always
00:48:37
what I said to her i'd be like, okay Have so
00:48:39
much fun and then i'd replay it over and over
00:48:42
and over and over again in my head To the point
00:48:45
where it became toxic and to the point where
00:48:47
I became Angry because I would come to the abandonment
00:48:51
conclusion instead of the You know jackson. She
00:48:54
needs to have space. She needs to have fun. You
00:48:57
know, we're not 70 years old married like we're
00:49:00
not doing every single thing together like she
00:49:02
needs to still find out who she is and By me
00:49:07
doing that, you know, it pushed her further and
00:49:09
further and further away every single time That
00:49:12
I would get mad because you know, it wouldn't
00:49:14
even be like just getting mad. It would be like
00:49:17
Just being an asshole in general, you know I'd
00:49:20
I'd bring up past things that you know, I didn't
00:49:23
like when when the thing would happen, you know
00:49:26
It was just it was it was honestly like to be
00:49:29
completely honest. It was when I would get like
00:49:32
that a very very toxic relationship because it
00:49:36
was it was a lot of bickering instead of trying
00:49:39
to help it and You know the worst part about
00:49:42
it is for the longest time. I just thought Jackson,
00:49:47
why are you so angry? Why are you why are you
00:49:50
why can't you control your anger? Like do you
00:49:52
need to go to anger management and? When we did
00:49:55
break up that was one of the things I said that
00:49:57
you know I might try and do is go to anger management
00:50:00
because I didn't understand why I got mad and
00:50:04
why I got So mad to the point where I couldn't
00:50:08
even see it like that's that's the worst part
00:50:11
And you know that that hurt me every time She
00:50:14
said it was like it was like I was two different
00:50:17
people, you know that that's also how I saw it
00:50:19
is There was you know, normal Jackson how I am
00:50:22
right now and then there was like this angry
00:50:25
prideful Jackson that wouldn't let go until I
00:50:30
don't know it was never even an answer that I
00:50:32
was looking for wasn't an I'm sorry because an
00:50:34
I'm sorry wouldn't do anything with it like He
00:50:37
would like poke the bear for some reason. I was
00:50:39
like I would actually get like more and more
00:50:42
defensive and 30 minutes after the argument,
00:50:45
you know, I'd completely forget about it or I'd
00:50:48
have a good time at lunch with my friends or
00:50:50
something like that and You know, I would act
00:50:53
like nothing happened and and then I would I
00:50:55
would apologize I'd be like, you know, I'm so
00:50:57
sorry for how I just acted like, you know And
00:50:59
I hated myself for it and I never let her know
00:51:02
how much I hated myself for but you know, it
00:51:05
was It was one of the things that if I could
00:51:07
cut out about myself, and you know I wouldn't
00:51:09
cut it out now because I've learned to Kind of
00:51:12
control it and be better about it, but you know
00:51:15
I would have cut that out in a heartbeat and
00:51:17
not anything else that I didn't like about myself,
00:51:20
but it's like That just made me you know in a
00:51:23
way kind of a horrible boyfriend because it was
00:51:26
it was just non -stop And it was over the littlest
00:51:30
thing so you know Jackson There's a saying that
00:51:34
hurt people hurt people, you know, and I think
00:51:38
Everything that you just said about how your
00:51:42
parents communicated how You know the bickering
00:51:46
the sarcasm the fracture of your family That
00:51:49
and and then of course the ultimate the loss
00:51:52
of your mother You're hurt, you know, and I think
00:51:57
You know, I'm not a psychologist, but I do think
00:52:01
that You acted out and unfortunately you act
00:52:06
out on the wrong person, you know Yeah, I thought
00:52:08
it was I thought it was the easiest to because
00:52:11
I felt like she would always been there So, you
00:52:13
know, well you probably trusted her in the most
00:52:15
too Yeah, you hurt you hurt the people you love
00:52:17
the most because you love them the most and it's
00:52:19
like you feel the closest to them so you feel
00:52:22
like you can take it out on them which is never
00:52:24
the right thing to do but it's like because I
00:52:28
Loved her so much. I felt like I could Take out
00:52:33
my anger in a way on on her and you know never
00:52:35
physical because I would never do that but you
00:52:38
know Let's talk about your therapist for a second
00:52:43
your FF you said you made things that you act
00:52:47
like everything was fine I think you said to
00:52:49
me like oh you just sat there and brag about
00:52:50
yourself because you know everything was fine
00:52:53
and It was interesting to me that you didn't
00:52:57
have anything to talk to her about when everything
00:53:00
was fine But was it fine um You know speaking
00:53:07
directly about therapy right now. I if I'm gonna
00:53:11
be honest I used to think therapy was a joke.
00:53:14
I thought therapy was You know something that
00:53:17
they made up You know never it never helped me
00:53:20
because I was never me inside of therapy and
00:53:23
not that was the problem is instead of you know
00:53:28
buying in to therapy All I did was push it further
00:53:32
away and I did like an ego thing in therapy where
00:53:35
I just kind of stroked my own ego and made up
00:53:38
things about myself that were completely untrue
00:53:40
and You know looking back now. That's the reason
00:53:43
therapy never worked for me is because I made
00:53:46
up things To feel better about myself to look
00:53:49
better about myself Told her I was fine told
00:53:53
her I was okay told her you know, I'm happy and
00:53:56
I'm I'm fine. I'm doing well when You know honestly
00:54:01
looking back I probably did feel fine when I
00:54:05
would say that I probably did feel okay because
00:54:08
I never It's kind of hard to say I never mourned
00:54:12
My mom in a way. I never I never sat, you know
00:54:17
There was a few nights where I feel a very strong
00:54:20
connection and miss her greatly But I never on
00:54:23
the day that she passed. I didn't cry One time,
00:54:27
you know that the time that I did cry is when
00:54:30
she sat me down and told me that she was going
00:54:34
on hospice and would no longer be here in a few
00:54:38
months and That that night I you know, I walked
00:54:42
outside and I just I just sat outside on our
00:54:45
stairs crying for an hour so Until they came
00:54:50
and got me outside because of how long I had
00:54:53
been out there they thought I had like walked
00:54:55
away because they wanted to give me my space
00:54:57
and They came outside and I just I came back
00:55:02
in and every single time I Looked at my mom.
00:55:07
It was tears. I cried profusely because I knew
00:55:11
that I Was losing my best friend. So You know
00:55:17
That was the hardest night for me and after that
00:55:20
I kind of Dug myself into anything but her because
00:55:25
I couldn't accept the fact that you know, she
00:55:28
was passing and That was kind of the hardest
00:55:31
thing to look back on is I spent a lot of time
00:55:35
with a girl that I didn't really you know, I
00:55:39
cared about her, you know, and you know, it was
00:55:42
I didn't see a long future like how I saw with
00:55:46
my Previous girlfriend. I or my like the most
00:55:50
recent girlfriend. Yeah. Yeah and I saw a long
00:55:53
future there, but I didn't see a long future
00:55:55
with my last one you know, I told myself a few
00:55:57
times like are you just doing this as a coping
00:56:00
thing and Turns out I was because looking back
00:56:04
on it all I wish I did and I think she also knew
00:56:08
it but didn't didn't know how to tell me because
00:56:12
there was a few times that she was like She was
00:56:15
like Jackson like are you sure you want to hang
00:56:18
out today? Are you sure you don't want to spend
00:56:20
time with your mom and looking back like I told
00:56:23
her no I'm fine No, she'll show because I think
00:56:25
I was in denial in a way I was like I didn't
00:56:29
want to accept that that might have been the
00:56:31
last day that might have been the last week that
00:56:33
might have been the last month I wanted to Continue
00:56:37
on like everything was fine because you know
00:56:39
she was this one of the strongest woman or strongest
00:56:42
people I've ever known She fought so hard all
00:56:47
the time and it's um, but yeah, no, I feel like
00:56:50
this was a therapy question I'm just saying like
00:56:59
why you thought you know, you could I don't even
00:57:02
remember my question It was just something about
00:57:04
oh why couldn't why couldn't I like tell what
00:57:07
was really going on? Yeah. Yes. I don't know.
00:57:09
I just feel like it was easier to To fake it
00:57:13
like fake it to your make it it was easier to
00:57:16
act like everything was fine because that would
00:57:20
mean I could stop going to therapy if I acted
00:57:25
like everything was fine it meant no more therapy
00:57:28
and I hated therapy for some reason because I
00:57:32
found it like a pointless point of time and So
00:57:36
there was there was this big thing that I always
00:57:38
bring up when I speak about how I was in old
00:57:40
therapy where I told my therapist I You know
00:57:43
played basketball every day, and I was like most
00:57:46
dedicated I was like the greatest player of all
00:57:48
time basically because you know like everyone
00:57:50
does that everyone does you know? Hypes himself
00:57:53
up, but it went to a point where you know I told
00:57:56
her I would go to the gym Six times a week when
00:57:59
you know clearly by just looking at me you could
00:58:03
tell I didn't Go to the gym six times a week
00:58:06
and that was one of the biggest things I've changed
00:58:09
over the past year now i've i've gone to the
00:58:11
gym very consistently um five to six times a
00:58:16
week for a year straight now and it's it's been
00:58:19
the most dramatic increase of happiness in my
00:58:22
life because I look forward to the gym, you know
00:58:25
a lot of people say that Takes a lot for them
00:58:28
to go to the gym for me if I don't go to the
00:58:32
gym I don't have a good day and that's it's well
00:58:34
not it not even that I still have a good day,
00:58:36
but it's like a Gym is a very happy place for
00:58:40
me. Well, I mean chemically it gets your endorphins
00:58:44
going, right? It's good for your brain, right
00:58:48
to work off stress and and any emotion that you
00:58:54
might be feeling. And then also physically you
00:58:58
feel much better, right? So I could see why that
00:59:01
happens. And what you told the therapist that
00:59:05
wasn't exactly true, you actually made it come
00:59:08
true. So I mean, yeah, maybe it was just something
00:59:11
that you really wanted to be like. Yeah, I mean,
00:59:14
I told her that's a great point is I told her
00:59:17
everything I wanted to be like. I wanted to be,
00:59:21
you know, this Perfect student. I she thought
00:59:23
I was a genius, you know, I told her I went home
00:59:27
and I studied every night and I never I never
00:59:30
said that I played video games and back then
00:59:32
that's all I did it's all I did I would go home
00:59:35
from school and You know looking back it was
00:59:39
kind of bomb activities. I'd get home from school
00:59:42
After you know a practice or something. I would
00:59:45
door -dash fast food I would play video games
00:59:50
until I could barely keep my eyes open and then
00:59:53
wake up super tired in the morning and be late
00:59:56
to school every single day for basically my whole
01:00:00
freshman year and So that was a that was a big
01:00:03
problem is I would never study I would never
01:00:06
do anything because I just thought you know middle
01:00:07
school and lower school came very easy to me
01:00:11
because I'm not trying to brag but and I do have
01:00:15
a base level of intelligence that is Quite high.
01:00:18
So it's it was way easier to You know not do
01:00:23
anything in middle school in middle school My
01:00:25
grades were almost perfect and I never studied
01:00:28
for a single test. I never had to because You
01:00:32
know, I just I picked everything up so much quicker,
01:00:34
you know I was I was one of those kids in lower
01:00:37
school that just knew how to do like everything
01:00:40
while still being good at sports while still
01:00:42
Having a good friend group. So it was like I
01:00:45
never thought I would lose that and I lost that
01:00:47
because In middle school, I didn't prepare myself
01:00:51
for high school and then when I got to high school
01:00:53
And I actually did need to study. I didn't know
01:00:55
how to study. I didn't want to study All I wanted
01:00:57
to do is keep playing my video games. So I I
01:01:01
told my therapist that you know that I would
01:01:03
study every single night and I'd cook home cooked
01:01:06
meals and I was like a Pro chef and you know,
01:01:09
i'm still not even a good chef. I know how to
01:01:10
cook like maybe ground beef and everyone knows
01:01:13
how to cook your own beef, so. Not everybody,
01:01:16
not everybody. There's a researcher named, his
01:01:20
last name is Pennebaker, and he talks about the
01:01:24
long -term emotional toll on performing fine,
01:01:31
right? The suppressed emotions cause stress.
01:01:35
They cause your health to be compromised. The
01:01:42
worst part is your sense of self over time starts
01:01:46
to fade, right? And that's kind of like what
01:01:48
we've been talking about the entire time, right?
01:01:52
So I just think it stops you. And I think it's
01:01:55
very interesting that from this breakup, it's
01:02:00
what opened the door for you to say, I don't
01:02:05
want to be like this anymore. Yeah, it showed
01:02:07
me who I actually wanted to be. You know, it
01:02:10
came in the worst way, but you know, still grateful
01:02:13
for her. You know, I actually told her thank
01:02:14
you the other day when we had a little in -person
01:02:17
convo about maybe I think two weeks now ago.
01:02:22
And I just said like, you know, I never wanted
01:02:25
to lose you, but losing you showed me who I actually
01:02:29
wanted to be. So like, thank you for that. I
01:02:33
have two questions. With you just saying that
01:02:38
when your relationship ended I'm interested to
01:02:41
know how you physically felt in your body and
01:02:45
How you feel now? Um, you know that night was
01:02:49
um, you know opening up about this it isn't easy
01:02:54
especially because you know she might see it
01:02:57
later on or like a friend might see it, but I'm
01:03:00
not trying to be corny or anything. It's like
01:03:03
that night was harder Than losing, um my mom
01:03:08
in a way because it was I lost more than Just
01:03:12
like my girlfriend and I lost my best friend.
01:03:16
I lost my companion. I lost This person that
01:03:19
you know, we built our whole Lives together for
01:03:23
all a lot of our high school life together because
01:03:25
we started very start of sophomore year and To
01:03:30
lose her at the very end of junior year, you
01:03:32
know Everyone called us like the married couple
01:03:35
of our school, you know, like the mom and dad
01:03:38
and it was like, you know I kind of saw us as
01:03:40
that too. So that night Not being able to you
01:03:45
know and the days that followed not being able
01:03:48
to text her not being able to tell her everything
01:03:50
I was doing not being able to like get an update
01:03:53
not being able to Say hi not being able to hang
01:03:56
out. You know, it was it was extremely extremely
01:04:00
hard it felt like Well, I did I felt like I lost
01:04:05
a part of myself because You know you always
01:04:08
eat when you when you're with someone because
01:04:10
we were together for almost two years when you're
01:04:12
with someone for that long You're no longer just
01:04:16
You know, you're so you're yourself. You're you're
01:04:19
together You're a lot of your identity is built
01:04:21
with them, especially when you're in your formative
01:04:24
years So, you know going to any spot listening
01:04:27
to any music that we might have listened to I
01:04:29
couldn't there was a lot of movies that we had
01:04:32
watched together and you know I started this
01:04:35
thing with um my mom and my sister where we watch
01:04:39
a movie every night now because you know I just
01:04:42
just want to have fun wanna because I felt like
01:04:44
you know that was a big thing that I also realized
01:04:47
by the relationship ending was I didn't spend
01:04:49
enough time with the people that I loved including
01:04:52
you I feel like we don't spend enough time together
01:04:55
and You know, it's just like that's something
01:04:57
I'm very regretful about because I felt like
01:05:00
me and her didn't spend that much or as much
01:05:02
time as I wanted doing things that we should
01:05:04
have done like She what we wanted to do this
01:05:07
over summer. We were gonna start where it was
01:05:09
alphabet dating So we were gonna like go to the
01:05:12
aquarium and then a bowling alley until we got
01:05:15
all the way down to Z and You know just doing
01:05:19
all that and So I was looking forward to that.
01:05:22
So just, you know, when it ended, I kind of just
01:05:25
felt like my future collapsed as well because
01:05:29
my future, everything had her in it. So it was
01:05:33
harder to let that go in a way. So that night
01:05:38
and I felt horrible sat in my room for four hours
01:05:44
almost because we stopped talking at seven and
01:05:48
I didn't stop. You know sitting in my room until
01:05:51
almost 11 o 'clock just Just crying, you know,
01:05:56
that was the longest I've ever By the end, you
01:05:59
know didn't have tears left. It was just You
01:06:03
know everything and it was it was so sad and
01:06:06
then you know that weekend Was super hard going
01:06:10
to school the next day seeing her first thing
01:06:12
one of the hardest things I've ever had to do
01:06:15
But you know, it's it's gotten better It's got
01:06:18
a lot better still hurts to see her and not be
01:06:21
able to talk to her and I'll be able to do anything
01:06:23
but it's like you know, I am moving on slowly,
01:06:27
but surely and What's that moving on feel like
01:06:32
physically in your body? What's that feel? Oh,
01:06:34
it stings Honestly, that's that's the main thing
01:06:37
is it it stings because it's you know, no matter
01:06:40
how far I've moved on it. I always get a reminder
01:06:46
of her and like um last week whenever we would
01:06:50
even have a class together i'd get weak in the
01:06:52
knees from anxiety of just seeing her just you
01:06:57
know maybe the the hope of maybe you know she'll
01:07:00
realize that night like the night before or the
01:07:03
class before that she misses me so much and then
01:07:05
you know she talked to me all class and we'd
01:07:07
rekindle but you know that that's never going
01:07:10
to happen especially not now to give that a lot
01:07:13
of time and space but it's You know that that's
01:07:16
always what it was. It was the the anxiety and
01:07:19
the hope of everything so it that that's kind
01:07:22
of gone away not fully away, but you know I'm
01:07:26
a lot less hopeful of our relationship and that's
01:07:31
actually helped me a lot more because not not
01:07:35
continuing to like Continuing to have my brain
01:07:40
think about you know, oh You're gonna get her
01:07:45
back. You're gonna get her back. It's it's now
01:07:47
moved on to the You know, how are you gonna be
01:07:50
happy? How are how are you gonna make yourself
01:07:52
happy and it's still a lot harder there's an
01:07:55
artist that we that she actually like put me
01:07:58
on to called Olivia Dean and um III every time
01:08:04
I put on Olivia Dean song. It's kind of funny.
01:08:07
I start to get teary so I haven't been able to
01:08:10
actually listen to an Olivia Dean song but the
01:08:13
other night I was at my gym lifetime and and
01:08:18
Um, they were playing an Olivia Dean song I just
01:08:20
kind of sat there because you know we had been
01:08:22
to that gym a lot, you know She loved that gym.
01:08:25
She thought I was like the best gym ever and
01:08:27
you know just hearing that song just made so
01:08:31
many memories come back and You know, honestly,
01:08:34
that's kind of what it is now is instead of a
01:08:37
painful sting. It's a happy It's a happy sting,
01:08:40
you know made all those memories together made
01:08:42
everything together and you know, maybe We might
01:08:46
not ever be together again, but it's you know
01:08:50
Everything was happy, you know that when it was
01:08:52
good You know, that was some of the greatest
01:08:55
moments that i've had in life was when When me
01:08:59
and her were extremely happy together, you know
01:09:01
It might have been like for example those late
01:09:04
night runs to get yoga fina or It's called yogurt
01:09:07
park and then like grizzly peak and just watching
01:09:10
the sunset was just like just so much fun. Yeah
01:09:13
absolutely, um the We'll have two questions the
01:09:20
alphabet dating i'm wondering what you would
01:09:22
have done for x But that's you know, you can
01:09:24
tell me that later. But anyways, um I asked you
01:09:29
how you felt because I know in your body physically
01:09:32
because I know that like first love real love
01:09:35
like like young love how about that young love
01:09:38
is almost like an addiction it it actually stimulates
01:09:44
the same reward patterns that drugs do like it
01:09:49
boosts the dopamine and so I think sometimes
01:09:53
that's why it hurts so much. Don't even think
01:09:57
that I know it it's it's actually research. There's
01:10:01
evidence of it that the word heartbreak is a
01:10:05
physical Reaction to breaking up. Yeah, so I'm
01:10:11
glad to hear that It's it's not as Devastating
01:10:15
as it was a month ago, right that it's a little
01:10:18
less. It still stings, right? We get that we
01:10:21
get that so So You know, you and I are close
01:10:29
right? We have a lot of fun together But you've
01:10:33
never spoken to me like this or maybe many people
01:10:37
you've never spoken to like this and What does
01:10:42
it feel like to finally just say all of it out
01:10:46
loud? Um, honestly, it feels a lot better than
01:10:50
it was before and for anyone listening like You
01:10:54
know, you might not have a lot of people that
01:10:55
you feel comfortable opening up with and you
01:10:58
know I didn't either even though how many like
01:11:00
so many people told me, you know Open up to me
01:11:03
whenever it's like you might not feel comfortable
01:11:05
doing that and you might not feel comfortable
01:11:07
doing anything But I'm telling you like when
01:11:10
I first Reached out to Annie and just started
01:11:13
talking about everything and I didn't feel exactly
01:11:16
comfortable opening up like that because I'd
01:11:19
never done that before but You know after the
01:11:21
first time, you know, you just it becomes more
01:11:24
comfortable. It comes, you know easier and then
01:11:27
now I catch myself opening up to like everyone
01:11:29
so I do kind of have to dial it back a little
01:11:33
bit, but it's like You know everyone if you have
01:11:37
a good friend group where you have people that
01:11:39
care and support about you They will listen and
01:11:43
I didn't I used to not think that either But
01:11:46
you know, they will be there for you. They will
01:11:48
listen to you They will hear out your problems,
01:11:50
even if they don't have an answer, you know,
01:11:52
sometimes just just talking will be great because
01:11:56
When we'd first broken up, you know, I think
01:11:58
I told Annie 25 times. How do I kid her back?
01:12:02
What do I do? What do I say? And you know Annie
01:12:04
didn't have a set answer because no one has a
01:12:06
set answer but it's like Just being able to speak
01:12:09
about that made it so much easier because it's
01:12:11
like, you know, Annie would be like I don't know
01:12:13
but you know Try breathing try doing this and
01:12:17
it helped a lot and it's like no one is ever
01:12:20
going to be My ex so they're not gonna know what
01:12:22
she wants what she's gonna say and nothing like
01:12:25
that, but it's it's a lot easier To go through
01:12:29
life with someone else by your side that you
01:12:32
know, you could talk to Then you know having
01:12:35
everything inside of my inside of your head Yeah,
01:12:39
where you can just like you talked about like
01:12:41
ruminating over and over again, you know, it's
01:12:43
that's the worst unhealthy and so Debilitating
01:12:48
I think you know super super debilitating. So
01:12:52
All right, so If you could go back Not to change
01:12:59
things change things but just to be more honest
01:13:02
and vulnerable What do you wish people had actually
01:13:07
seen? About you like that you would kept hidden.
01:13:11
I think the biggest thing that I kept hidden
01:13:14
that I wish I didn't was like my love for certain
01:13:18
things or like the ability I had to have fun
01:13:23
because um, I feel like with the nonchalantness
01:13:26
that I kind of kept it hidden like about my truth
01:13:30
the nonchalantness that made me keep myself hidden
01:13:33
was a lot of like fun like for example the assembly
01:13:37
or You know just her asking to do a lot of things
01:13:42
and me saying no because uh I don't know. I don't
01:13:47
know. I just thought they were like kind of Weird
01:13:49
to do, you know, like I wish we went on a lot
01:13:52
more of the fun dates That that's the thing that
01:13:55
I would go back and change drastically is Saying
01:14:00
yes more, you know, that's that's the biggest
01:14:04
thing think is it's the biggest life lesson I've
01:14:07
learned is to say yes more because You know saying
01:14:10
yes at the assembly made me have a blast saying
01:14:13
yes to The hangouts my friends when I would normally
01:14:16
just sit at home and play on my my video games
01:14:19
because I was like my downtime You know, but
01:14:21
saying yes actually allowed me to have more fun
01:14:25
and have Deeper connections like there was one
01:14:29
of my boys. That's like I didn't used to be as
01:14:31
close with but now i'm a lot closer with happened
01:14:34
because You know, I just started saying yes more
01:14:37
and then I started seeing him more and I started
01:14:39
like hanging out more and Now we're now i'm not
01:14:42
gonna say we're super tight But you know, we
01:14:44
talk a lot like we're we're good friends and
01:14:47
you know, like he's my boy He also just lost
01:14:50
his girlfriend. So we've been speaking through
01:14:53
that but you know, like we're we're tight Yeah,
01:14:56
like that's kind of how it started and then you
01:14:59
know, we just kind of realized that We do have
01:15:01
a lot more in common than you know, we thought
01:15:04
right right It's nice to make a new friend, you
01:15:07
know, especially one that you bond with over.
01:15:10
Yeah, and you know, we had always been Friendly
01:15:14
and you know joked around but you know now I
01:15:16
truly think of him like as a as a good friend
01:15:19
You know, I just thought of him as like, you
01:15:21
know, that's my friend, you know, like I'm boys
01:15:23
with him But like now I'm like, you know, that's
01:15:25
like actually my boy like yeah I think as we
01:15:30
come to a close on this. I think the one thing
01:15:34
that I want to say is that your realization of
01:15:40
that persona that you were putting on, that mask
01:15:45
that you were putting on, I think you're figuring
01:15:48
out why you've done it. I don't think you totally
01:15:50
know. And to be truthful with you, I don't know
01:15:54
if you'll know right now everything. I think
01:15:59
if you keep on the path of the reflection that
01:16:02
you're doing, the work that you're doing with
01:16:04
the FF, and just speaking and not being afraid
01:16:09
to be vulnerable, not being afraid to not be
01:16:12
cool, man, I don't know. I think that some of
01:16:17
your realizations are going to really help you
01:16:21
move forward through life. I'm always here for
01:16:25
you. I Mean that you know, I mean that I hope
01:16:28
you know, I mean, yeah, I hope you do. Yeah,
01:16:31
but is there anything else that you would like
01:16:36
To say about what you've learned or how you feel
01:16:41
about anything I don't know. I feel like I've
01:16:45
said a lot of my key points that I've been thinking
01:16:47
about but it's like it really is the But there's
01:16:53
this quote. It's like it's better to Leave a
01:16:58
flower and watch it bloom than it is to pick
01:17:01
the flower and watch it die and it's like it's
01:17:05
a lot easier to You know stop trying to self
01:17:10
-care and because you think you you've done it
01:17:13
all you think you know, you're that flower that's
01:17:15
super pretty but if you let yourself, you know
01:17:19
stay and Stay in the dirt and continue to work
01:17:22
on yourself It's only going to better you because
01:17:26
it's you know, there's i've never heard of anyone
01:17:29
that said self -improvement Didn't help them.
I've never no one's ever said, you know, I wish
I hadn't self -improved I wish I hadn't spent
01:17:38
more time on myself, you know, I feel like a
01:17:40
lot of people Look back and they say man. I wish
01:17:43
I spent more time with with my own thoughts.
01:17:47
I wish I Spend my time, you know bettering myself
01:17:52
instead of throwing myself into other actions
01:17:54
because it's like All anybody wants to do is
01:18:00
be that perfect person and the only way and no
01:18:03
one's ever gonna be perfect but the only way
01:18:04
that you're going to be a person that you truly
01:18:07
like is to Work on yourself enough to where you
01:18:11
don't have many insecurities and that's a big
01:18:14
thing as well as like insecurities Stop me from
01:18:17
doing a lot of things. You know, I was insecure
01:18:19
about how people thought about me I was insecure
01:18:20
about how I looked how I I always because Growing
01:18:24
up and I was an athlete in lower school and then
01:18:28
covid hit And I put on like 30 40 pounds straight
01:18:33
in my stomach It was not that much Well, I gained
01:18:37
a lot of weight and I became very skinny fat
01:18:39
and very insecure about how I looked and So getting
01:18:44
that back Kind of helped me a lot, but I realized
01:18:49
you know, it didn't help me in the best way because
01:18:52
it made me You know, I never have a huge ego
01:18:57
because I still don't think I actually have a
01:18:59
very small ego when it comes to that because
01:19:01
I still don't think I'm anywhere where I Should
01:19:03
have an ego, you know, but it's it's a lot it's
01:19:08
a lot healthier because I just feel healthier
01:19:10
at all times like a Biggest biggest thing as
well. Just speaking on that is like cutting soda
out with no soda It's been a game changer. I
just feel like I'm A lot happier all the time.
That might just be a placebo, but you know. Oh
no, no, it's sugar. It's addicting. Yeah, yeah,
absolutely. That's the next podcast. We'll talk
about your diet, okay? Well, when you said that
you're the flower in the dirt that keeps staying
there through the rain, through everything and
01:19:40
not getting pulled out, I just thought of a little
01:19:42
sunflower or a large sunflower, because you're
01:19:45
very tall, and just blooming. Over and over.
01:19:50
Yeah, there's there's never been a harvest without
01:19:52
a rain. So exactly. I like it. Well, you're wise.
01:19:57
Seventeen year old young man. Thank you. I really
01:19:59
appreciate you being on this and I love you so
01:20:02
much. And I'm giving him hugs now. And it was
01:20:06
it was a blast being on this and being able to,
01:20:08
you know, speak to this and I'd be so happy to
01:20:11
come back any time. I don't know what what other
01:20:12
podcasts I could do. But, you know, I love speaking
01:20:15
about my feelings now. And it's honestly been
01:20:17
a it's been a great time, you know. Thank you
01:20:20
so much. I want to sit with you for a moment
01:20:25
before we close. I think what we just heard was
01:20:31
a 17 -year -old boy doing something that took
01:20:33
me decades to approach. He told the truth. He
01:20:39
let himself be seen. Not perfectly, not without
01:20:44
hesitation, but he did it. fascinated by that
01:20:50
at just his, I think, confidence, you know, maybe
01:20:55
he doesn't think he has it. But I think that
took a lot to be that honest. I keep thinking
about what finally cracked him open. It wasn't
the devastating loss of his mother, although
I do know that that's underneath everything.
It wasn't even the fracture of his family, which
I know completely changed everything for him,
but I don't know, it was the girl who loved him
enough to tell him the truth about what she needed
from him and wasn't getting. And I think losing
her finally made him stop performing. And I hope
01:21:38
it sticks. I think we don't realize what the
performance cost us until you know, something
we love is gone. Before we recorded, I told my
nephew, don't be like me. Don't spend years building
a persona. Because you think people won't love
who you really are. I'm not sure I have fully
learned that lesson myself, but Every time I
have let someone see the unpolished, you know,
the not always fine version of me, nothing terrible
has happened. Nobody left. And for a moment,
01:22:22
I felt lighter. That's what exists on the other
01:22:27
side of fine. Not weakness, not burden, just
01:22:33
the quiet relief of being known. Your original
01:22:37
self the version of you That version of you that
01:22:41
existed before you learned it was safer to perform
01:22:45
than to actually be seen It's still there It's
01:22:49
just waiting for you to decide if it's worth
01:22:51
the risk worth the risk of letting someone in
01:22:56
I'm starting to believe it is and I believe that
01:23:02
you're worth the risk So I'll leave you with
01:23:05
a reflection question and that is who in your
01:23:09
life would make time for your truth But you still
01:23:14
keep giving them fine instead What would it cost
01:23:19
you to tell them one real thing this week just
01:23:23
one honest feeling Think about that think about
01:23:27
who that would be Thank you for listening to
01:23:31
the original self podcast if today's conversation
01:23:35
Resonated with you and you feel ready to explore
01:23:38
your own growth You can learn more about working
01:23:41
with me at decotalifecoaching.com I'll see
01:23:46
you next time
They Couldn’t Do It Without Us
They Couldn’t Do It Without Us: Normalizing Deviance
The Psychology of Normalizing Deviance
CHAPTER 1: Introduction
Welcome to The Original Self Podcast. I’m Evet DeCota, owner of DeCota Life Coaching and a psychology-informed life coach exploring resilience, mindset, and the courage to become your authentic self. This is a space for honest conversations about growth, identity, relationships, and the messy moments in between that shape who we become.
Between the salon chair and coaching sessions, I've watched people move through life in
patterns they never notice. Patterns that are subtle, familiar, and incredibly hard to see
from the inside. Today, we're going to talk about something that I believe is one of the most
urgent and underexamined forces shaping our culture right now. This is Episode 10: They
Couldn't Do It Without Us: Normalizing Deviance.
CHAPTER 2: Opening
Think of something that would have genuinely shocked you ten years ago. Something you would have said, “No, that could never happen.” “That would never be acceptable.” “People would never allow that.”
Got it?
Now ask yourself, is it still shocking? Or have you just…adjusted, accepted?
We used to have a word for when powerful people did terrible things and faced no consequences. We called it corruption. Then we called it a scandal. Then we called it complicated. Then we stopped calling it anything at all. Somewhere between the scandal and the silence, that’s where normalization lives.
Because here’s the part nobody wants to say out loud. You’ve watched the shows. You’ve followed the trials. You clicked on the stories. You shook your head, maybe said something about it to someone, and then you moved on. So did I. So did almost everyone.
And that, not the predators, not the corrupt politicians and billionaires, that is what I want to talk about today. Because they couldn’t do any of it without our willingness to eventually stop being surprised.
That adjustment, quiet, gradual, and almost invisible, is normalizing deviance. That’s what we’re talking about. That’s where we’re going today
REFLECTION
Before we go further, I want you to sit with this. Is there something happening
in the world right now that you have quietly adjusted to? Something that would
have outraged you years ago, and now just feels like background noise? Just
notice. We'll come back to this.
END REFLECTION
CHAPTER 3: The Anatomy of Deviance
There are two ways to define sexual deviance. The sociological definition is what society
considers abnormal or immoral, and that line moves depending on the era, the culture, and who holds the power. The clinical definition draws a harder line: it refers to sexual behavior, fantasies, or urges that cause real harm to others, often without consent, or a compulsion the person cannot control. The first definition is intentionally vague. The second focuses solely on harm.
And most of what I'm going to talk about today depended on us staying stuck in the first definition long enough that nobody asked the second question: who got hurt?
In psychology, paraphilic disorders, the clinical term from the DSM-5, are only designated
when the behavior causes real harm, involves someone who didn't consent, or creates
significant distress or dysfunction. Not every unusual sexual interest qualifies. But
pedophilia and rape fall squarely in that category.
Now here is the part that connects everything. Economic deviance and sexual deviance
are not as different as we'd like to think. They grow from the same soil. Both are rooted in
power, the need to control others, to assert status, to take what feels entitled. Whether
someone is manipulating financial markets or manipulating people, the underlying
psychology is remarkably consistent: entitlement, a willingness to dehumanize, and the
belief that the rules simply do not apply to them.
Sociologist Robert Merton's Strain Theory explains that when people cannot achieve what
society tells them they should have, wealth, status, and power, some do not abandon the goal. They abandon the rules to get there. And when you layer narcissism on top of that, you get someone who genuinely believes the rules were never meant for them in the first place.
Social and political deviance is the category that makes all the others possible. Tribalism
overrides moral judgment. Motivated reasoning means we arrive at conclusions first based
on who we want to protect, and then work backward to find the evidence. And institutional
deviance, when the organizations designed to enforce accountability become the ones
providing cover, is the most insidious form of all.
I know this personally. This happened in my own childhood parish when I was sixteen. The
brothers I knew were molested by my favorite priest, a man I was in awe of, a man I
genuinely believed was spiritual. When the truth came out, the church moved him. They
didn't report him. They didn't protect those boys. They protected the institution. I watched
the people around me rationalize it because the alternative was too uncomfortable. That
was my first real education in normalization. And it taught me something I have never
forgotten: the silence of good people is just as much a part of the system as the actions of
the predator.
Albert Bandura spent his career asking how people do terrible things and still live with
themselves. His answer was moral disengagement, a set of mental mechanisms that allow
us to switch off our conscience when it becomes inconvenient. Perpetrators justify their
behavior. They diffuse responsibility. They dismiss consequences. They dehumanize
victims. But what makes Bandura's work so uncomfortable is that these mechanisms don't
only operate in perpetrators. They operate in all of us. In institutions that look the other
way. In colleagues who stay silent. In audiences who keep streaming the content, buying
the R. Kelly records, and watching the Woody Allen films even after he married Soon-Yi
Previn, his long-term girlfriend's daughter, was around twelve years old when Allen
entered her mother's life. And in voters who still cannot bring themselves to admit they
were wrong, because any other conclusion would demand they confront the cognitive
dissonance they spent years avoiding.
Moral disengagement is the engine that makes deviance sustainable for the people
committing it and for everyone around them who decides, consciously or not, that it is
easier not to know.
REFLECTION
I want you to sit with one question before we go further. Think of someone you
admire, politically, creatively, or personally. Have you ever looked the other way
at their behavior because of how much you valued what they gave you? What
did that cost the people they harmed?
END REFLECTION
CHAPTER 4: How It Becomes Normal
Diane Vaughan studied the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster and found something that
had nothing to do with engineering. The engineers had seen small warning signs so many
times without catastrophe that the signs stopped feeling like warnings. The deviation
became the norm. And then one day, the shuttle exploded. Vaughan named this the
normalization of deviance.
During the incubation period, when things are going wrong, but nothing has blown up yet,
we tell ourselves everything is fine. Jeffrey Epstein operated for decades. Harvey
Weinstein produced films for decades. The banks gambled with the global economy for decades because nothing catastrophic had happened yet. Until it did. And Vaughan's key
distinction is the one that matters most: this is not about bad individuals making bad
choices. It's about systems that slowly redefine what is acceptable, until the unacceptable
becomes policy, becomes culture, becomes just the way things are.
Then there's the research that should have changed everything, and mostly didn't. In the
1980s, psychologists Linz, Donnerstein, and Penrod exposed men to films depicting sexual
violence against women over five consecutive days. With each day, anxiety decreased and
enjoyment increased. And after the five days, those same men showed measurably less
empathy toward a real rape victim in a trial reenactment than men who hadn't been through the exposure. The media they consumed changed how they saw a real woman in a real courtroom.
That is not a theory. That is a documented finding. And it points directly at what we have
been watching.
Entertainment doesn't just reflect culture. It shapes it.
365 Days, a Netflix film where a woman is kidnapped by a crime boss who gives her 365 days to fall in love with him, was one of the most-watched films of 2020. Kidnapping framed as romance. Possession framed as love. No consequences.
Game of Thrones gave us rape as a plot device so routinely that audiences began to accept it as atmosphere, consistently shot from the perpetrator's point of view, framed as his character development, not her trauma.
Or the show
Ozark, which built an entire series around making you root for a money launderer, measuring success not by whether justice is served but by whether he escapes it. That is exactly how we have been conditioned to think about financial criminals in real life.
What all of these shows have in common is that they are brilliantly made, have devoted
audiences, including me, and in every single one of them, the deviance is the draw. We
don't watch despite the darkness. We watch because of it. And that distinction matters
more than we've been willing to admit.
Journalism has a responsibility it frequently abandons. When a powerful person is
exposed, the story follows the same arc: the revelation, the statement, the think pieces,
and then the next story. The monster narrative is journalism's most reliable tool for letting
everyone else off the hook. When we frame Harvey Weinstein as a singular aberration, we
don't have to talk about everyone who knew. The monster contains the damage. The
system walks free. And the language does the rest. Misconduct instead of rape. Indiscretion instead of fraud. Inappropriate relationship instead of abuse of power. When
we reach for the softer word, we are not being careful; we are being complicit.
CHAPTER 5: The Protected Class
These are not aberrations. These are case studies in how deviance gets protected,
celebrated, and absorbed into the culture until it stops feeling like deviance at all.
R. Kelly
R. Kelly wrote Age Ain't Nothing but a Number and we made it a hit. He married Aaliyah
when she was fifteen, and he was twenty-seven, and the music industry shrugged. The
abuse was never a secret. It was hiding in plain sight inside the music, and we sang every
word. It took over a decade, a documentary, and a federal conviction in 2021 before
anyone was willing to call it what it always was: rape, kidnapping, and pedophilia.
Bill Cosby
Bill Cosby was America's Dad for thirty years. I grew up on his recorded comedy routines,
laughing hysterically with my family. I saw him twice in concert and left with sore cheeks
from smiling and laughing so hard. Along with his comedy, he lectured Black America
about pulling up their pants while he was drugging and raping women in hotel rooms. Sixty
women came forward. Sixty. He was convicted in 2018, and then a technicality set him
free. Not because he didn't do it, but because one prosecutor made a promise another
prosecutor broke. He walked out of prison in 2021 while sixty women had nowhere left to
go. That is not justice. That is the system protecting its own comfort.
Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski pleaded guilty in 1977 to the statutory rape of a thirteen-year-old girl, fled
to France before sentencing, never returned, and in 2003, the Academy gave him the
Oscar for Best Director, while the room gave him a standing ovation. If you want one
moment that captures how completely the industry normalized its own deviants, that is it.
Jeffrey Epstein
Jeffrey Epstein was the hub of everything. He pleaded guilty in 2008 to soliciting a minor
and received a deal so lenient it became its own scandal, thirteen months in a county jail with work-release privileges. Then he went right back to his mansions, his private island,
and his black book. The most powerful people in the world kept taking his calls, kept flying
on his plane, kept attending his dinners, because he made himself deliberately
indispensable, financially, socially, and strategically. His network touched politicians,
billionaires, royalty, and celebrities across every party and every industry. Wealth and
access were the mechanisms of his protection. He did not operate despite these people.
He operated because of them.
Michael Jackson
Michael Jackson was the soundtrack to my childhood. The Jackson 5 played in my house
the way air moves through a room: constantly, naturally, without question. When the
Thriller video premiered on MTV. I recorded it on VHS and played it over and over until my
brother, my best friend, and I had learned every single step of that dance. We practiced it
so many times that I heard my dad ask my mom if we were learning it for a school project.
My fourteen-year-old sassy head quickly turned toward him and, in an exasperated voice,
said, oh my god, Dad, we HAVE to learn this.
When he moonwalked during the Motown 25 special, I jumped up from the floor and tried
to do it on the spot. My brother and I practiced until we had it perfected. Michael Jackson's
music and movement were not just entertainment. They were a language. A shared
experience that connected an entire generation to something that felt genuinely magical.
Which is exactly why what came next was so devastating.
When the rumors of abuse surfaced, I did not believe them. Looking back now, I
understand exactly why. I had bought completely into the wealth and hierarchy of protected deviance. The logic was simple and seductive: someone that beloved, that gifted, that important to the culture could not possibly be capable of the abuse of children that he professed to love so dearly. The fame functioned as a character reference. The money functioned as proof of innocence. And I, like millions of others, accepted that without examining it.
It was not until 2020, when I watched Leaving Neverland, that the real horror of his
deviance came into clear view. The testimony of Wade Robson, whom I had admired as a
brilliant modern choreographer, and James Safechuck was specific, detailed, and deeply
credible. I was devastated. My childhood hero had used his fame, his money, and the very
magic that made him untouchable to gain access to children and systematically abuse them.
This particular cruelty weaponizes your love for the perpetrator against your ability to see
clearly. The more you love them, the more the system can count on you to look away. And
the more we collectively look away, the longer the abuse continues.
Elizabeth Holmes
Elizabeth Holmes built Theranos on a costume and a con: the turtleneck, the artificially
deepened voice, the Steve Jobs mythology. She convinced investors, hospital systems,
and Silicon Valley that her company could diagnose hundreds of diseases from a single
drop of blood. This technology didn't exist and never worked. Patients received false
results and made life-altering medical decisions based on fraudulent data. For years, she
was celebrated as the most important female entrepreneur of her generation, not despite
the fraud but because the culture was so hungry for the story she was selling that nobody
looked closely enough to see it was not true.
Bernie Madoff and Sam Bankman-Fried
Bernie Madoff created the largest Ponzi scheme in history, totaling sixty-five billion dollars,
protected for decades by prestige and the assumption that someone that successful
couldn't possibly be a fraud. Sam Bankman-Fried, convicted in 2023, was the deliberately
disheveled grifter who built a crypto empire on the performance of generosity as moral
camouflage. The shield that allowed him to get away with the swindle was this: if you
appear to be giving it all away, nobody asks where it came from.
Donald Trump
And then there is Donald Trump, who did not just normalize deviance but made it a brand.
Found civilly liable for sexual abuse and defamation in the E. Jean Carroll case. Criminally
convicted on thirty-four counts of business fraud. Caught on tape bragging about grabbing
women without consent and called it locker-room talk, and disturbingly, many believed him.
He vilified the media as the enemy of the people while simultaneously using them as
pawns in his malignant game of narcissistic attention gluttony, understanding before
anyone else that outrage is just another form of ratings. He did not need good press. He
just needed press. And they gave it to him every single time.
Then came the payoffs. Foreign governments funneled money through Trump hotels while
Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund propped up his golf courses through LIV Golf. Apple, Meta, and Amazon lined up to genuflect, writing checks, attending summits, posting
congratulations, and calling it business when it was nothing of the sort. It was tribute, the
kind you pay when you have calculated that resistance costs more than surrender. That is
not capitalism. That is a protection racket with a better press release.
He appointed three Supreme Court justices in one term who went on to dismantle fifty
years of established law, and in doing so, he did not just influence the highest court in the
land. He owns it. And the people cheering loudest were the same ones clutching their
rosaries and their Bibles and their Books of Mormon, because somewhere between the
porn star and the pussy grabbing, Donald Trump convinced Catholics, Evangelicals, and
Mormons that God had sent him. A man who has never demonstrated a single authentic
moment of spiritual conviction in his entire public life, selling salvation to people desperate enough to buy it. It is a con disguised as faith. He cynically turned every accusation into a rallying cry, every conviction into a fundraiser, every piece of evidence into a witch hunt. He did not hide it. He ran on it and won. Twice.
REFLECTION
I want to pause here. Of the people and institutions I just named, is there one
you found yourself wanting to defend or qualify? Notice that impulse. Ask
yourself where it comes from. That impulse is exactly how the protection
works.
END REFLECTION
CHAPTER 6: The Cost It Steals from Us
What does normalization of deviance actually cost us? Not abstractly or theoretically, but
the real toll.
It starts with survivors. They share something that doesn't get talked about enough: the
internal erosion that happens before anyone else even knows. There’ question that
normalization plants directly inside the victim: was it really that bad? That question is not
weakness. It is what happens when you have spent your whole life watching the culture minimize, contextualize, and excuse exactly what just happened to you. Psychologist
Jennifer Freyd called this institutional betrayal, the specific, compounding trauma that
occurs not just from the original harm but from being failed by the systems that were
supposed to protect you.
Remember the story I told you about the priest and the brothers at my parish? The church protected the institution and threw the boys to the wolves with a small payoff to their single mother, who didn’t speak English. In the meantime, they moved the predator priest to the Ozarks to probably groom more children
Martin Seligman's learned helplessness research tells us that when people repeatedly
experience that their actions have no effect, that reporting leads nowhere, that speaking up changes nothing, they stop trying. Not because they don't care, but because they have
been taught by experience that caring doesn't matter. Every protected perpetrator sends
that message to every potential survivor: this system is not for you. Stay quiet. It is safer.
The bystander effect, the well-documented phenomenon in which the presence of others
reduces individual responsibility to act, doesn't only occur in emergencies on subway
platforms. It happens at a societal scale. When an entire culture watches deviance remain
unpunished, the diffusion of responsibility becomes total. Someone else will report it.
Someone else will fix it. And no one does. Cynicism does not just make us passive. It
makes us complicit.
Then there are the children watching it all. Research on adolescent media consumption is
unambiguous: what young people consume shapes what they normalize. Children who
grow up watching deviance go unpunished internalize it as instruction for how power
works. They learn that these are the rules, and they are optional if you are the right kind of
person. And that lesson does not stay in one generation. It gets passed down through the
examples we model, the behavior we excuse, the content we consume, and the things we
choose not to name.
Hannah Arendt gave us the concept of the banality of evil: the most dangerous evil is not
dramatic or theatrical. It is bureaucratic and ordinary. It looks like a boardroom, a
courtroom, a studio lot, a church, or a House and Senate chamber. When accountability disappears long enough, people stop expecting it. The vacancy gets filled by someone who points at the wreckage, promises to clean it up, and neglects to mention they helped make the mess. That is how authoritarianism finds its opening, not through force, but through
exhaustion.
And the literal financial cost: sexual violence costs the United States an estimated 3.1
trillion dollars annually through healthcare, lost productivity, legal costs, and mental health treatment. The 2008 financial crisis wiped out an estimated 22 trillion dollars in household wealth. Families lost the homes they spent decades building. Retirements evaporated. And the people who built the machine that collapsed received bonuses. Political corruption is measurable in every school not funded, every hospital not built, every climate bill not passed.
That cost is paid by survivors, bystanders, children, and democracies. And it is not only
paid in dollars but in the eroding belief that any of it could ever change.
REFLECTION
Where in your own life have you felt the cost of looking away? Maybe you saw
something and said nothing. Maybe you stayed loyal to someone who didn't
deserve it. Maybe you consumed something you knew wasn't right and kept
going anyway. You don't have to judge what comes up. Just be honest with
yourself about it.
END REFLECTION
CHAPTER 7: Staying Clear-Eyed
So what do we do with all of this?
If this conversation ends in despair, it has failed. The entire argument is that normalization
happens gradually, quietly, and with our participation. That means we can participate in
making it abnormal again.
The first battleground is language. Words are how normalization travels, through
euphemism, through softening, through the careful selection of the least threatening way to describe something that should disturb us deeply. Misconduct is not rape. Indiscretion is not fraud. A complicated relationship is not abuse of power. Boys will be boys is not an
explanation. It is a permission slip that has been handed out for centuries. Naming things
accurately is not harsh or inflammatory. It is precise. And precision is the first act of
resistance.
The second is refusing the tribal pull. The moment you find yourself defending someone
because of their politics, their talent, or their relationship to you, stop. Ask the question you would ask if it were the other side. Accountability only works when it is applied consistently. The minute it becomes selective, it becomes worthless.
Stop outsourcing your moral judgment to institutions. Courts acquit guilty people. Studios
protect profitable people. Churches protect their brand. The Supreme Court protects its
ideology. These systems arbitrate what they can afford to admit rather than what is right.
Your own assessment of behavior does not require a verdict.
The research supports something most people do not believe: resensitization is possible.
Linz and Donnerstein proved that with sufficient distance from harmful exposure, empathy
returns. We are not permanently altered by what we have consumed. But we must make
deliberate choices about what we continue to put in front of ourselves. Critical media
consumption means asking one question before pressing play: Who is the person served when watching entertainment? If it’s not from the victim’s point of view, then watching differently is the answer.
For those with children, this is the most urgent part. Early education about power, consent,
and accountability is the single most effective intervention available. Not just the
conversation about bodies and safety, though that matters enormously, but the broader
conversation about power: who has it, how it gets abused, and what it looks like when
institutions fail to check it. Children who can identify and name deviance are significantly
less vulnerable to it.
And finally, individual moral clarity is necessary but not sufficient on its own. Accountability needs infrastructure: laws with teeth, courts that are actually independent, journalism that is actually funded and free, HR departments that answer to employees instead of shareholders, and a political culture that collectively determines the protection of power is no longer worth the price we have all been paying.
The history of every social shift tells us that normalization can be reversed. MeToo happened. The Challenger findings changed NASA. Financial regulation followed the 2008 collapse. Society eventually names what it once refused to acknowledge and holds
accountable those who were once untouchable. The incubation period always ends. The
only question that matters is how many people get hurt before it does.
REFLECTION
What is one thing you have been
calling by the wrong name? And what would it cost you to start naming it
accurately? Write these down. Bring them into a conversation you are having.
END REFLECTION
CHAPTER 8: Closing
Let me bring it home.
We started today with a question, not about the predators, not about the politicians, not
about the billionaires, but about us. About the adjustment we make, quiet, gradual, and
almost invisible, every time we decide it is easier not to know, every time we reach for the
softer word, every time we look away and tell ourselves that someone else will handle it.
That adjustment has a cost. We spent this episode accounting for it. 3.1 trillion dollars a
year in sexual violence alone. 22 trillion dollars in household wealth wiped out by
normalized financial fraud. Survivors who learned to doubt their own experience. Children
absorbing instructions about power from content we chose to put in front of them.
Institutions that traded accountability for self-preservation so many times that self-preservation became their only function.
Underneath all of it the same engine runs: entitlement, dehumanization, and the conviction that consequences belong to other people. Moral disengagement is spreading outward from the person committing the harm to everyone around them who decided, consciously or not, that it was easier not to know.
We are in an incubation period right now. The warning signs are not subtle. They are loud,
documented, and sitting in plain sight for anyone willing to look. The question is not
whether we can see them. The question is whether we are willing to stop adjusting.
Because they could not do any of it without our willingness to be entertained by it, to vote
for it, to stream it, to excuse it, to stay quiet about it, and to decide that this particular
person at this particular moment was too important, too complicated, or too powerful to
hold accountable.
That ends when we decide it ends. Not in a courtroom. Not in a headline. In the daily,
ordinary, unglamorous decision to call things what they are. To refuse the softer word. To
apply the same standard regardless of whose side someone is on. To teach our children
that power is not the same as permission.
Leaving the field to the people counting on our silence is a cost none of us can afford.
If this episode stirred something in you, I would love to continue that conversation.
Coaching is where this kind of work gets to go deeper, where you take the awareness and
turn it into something real. You can find me at decotalifecoaching.com. I genuinely love this work, and I would love to work with you.
If you like to read a more detailed version of this podcast, go to either Substack or decotalifecoaching.com for the blog version named The Quiet Permission: How Normalizing Deviance is Costing Us Everything.
Thank you for being here with me today. I'll see you next time.
The Original Self Podcast | Episode 10 | DeCota Life Coaching | decotalifecoaching.com
That's just how the world works.
It sounds like wisdom. It isn't.
It's the moment we cross from bystander to participant. The moment cynicism stops being a reaction and becomes a choice.
And we make that choice more often than we want to admit.
Cynicism doesn't just make us passive. It makes us complicit.
Why You Feel Disconnected from Your Life and How to Come Back to It
Why You Feel Disconnected From Your Life
Welcome to The Original Self Podcast. I’m Evet DeCota, owner of DeCota Life Coaching and a psychology-informed life coach exploring resilience, mindset, and the courage to become your authentic self. This is a space for honest conversations about growth, identity, relationships, and the messy moments in between that shape who we become.
Between the salon chair and coaching sessions, I’ve watched people move through life in patterns they never notice. Patterns that are subtle, familiar, and incredibly hard to see from the inside. Today, we’re going to talk about something many people experience but rarely name. This is Episode 9: Why You Feel Disconnected from Your Life and How to Come Back to It.
Hi, and welcome back. I’m really glad you’re here because I think what we are going to talk about today is something a lot of people have been carrying for a long time without quite knowing what to call it.
Let me start off with a feeling. Not a dramatic one, but a subtle one. The feeling that everything in your life looks fine, and still doesn’t feel right. From the outside, and sometimes even from the inside, things are objectively okay. You have a job, or a relationship, or a functional routine. You’re not in crisis. You’re not falling apart, yet something is off. Something is missing. There is this low, steady feeling underneath everything that you can’t quite name, and because you can’t name it, you tend to dismiss it.
You tell yourself you are just tired, or that you are overthinking. Or that other people have real problems, and you should be grateful for what you have. And so, you keep going. You keep showing up. And the feeling stays.
That’s what I want to talk about, that feeling. Because I think it’s one of the most misunderstood and underestimated experiences a person can have. It sneaks in slowly, sometimes over years, and it tends to live right in the gap between the life you are living and the life that actually feels like you.
As I said, you are functioning, but functioning and living are not the same thing, and somewhere inside you, you already know that.
── REFLECTION ──
Before we go any further, sit with this for a moment.
Is there an area of your life right now where things look fine but do not feel right? You do not have to know why yet. Just notice whether that feeling is familiar to you.
── END REFLECTION ──
THE PSYCHOLOGY BEHIND IT:
So, what is actually happening when we feel this way? Where does this disconnection come from? We know and feel that it doesn’t just appear.
What I’m describing is what psychologists call identity performance, sometimes known as identity work. Sociologist Erving Goffman explored this idea extensively in his 1959 book The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, arguing that we are all essentially performers, continuously managing the impression we give others depending on the social situation we encounter. He called it impression management. What he was describing was not manipulation. It was survival. And it starts far earlier than most of us realize.
Let me break down the three drivers of identity performance.
Adaptation is the automatic reshaping of who we are to fit our environment. When a child’s environment doesn’t support authentic expression, the child builds a version of themselves designed to comply with expectations. That compliant version is not who they are. It’s who they learned to be. And the longer it goes unnamed, the more it begins to feel like the real thing.
Approval is the reward that reinforces the adaptation. Psychologist Carl Rogers introduced the concept of conditions of worth, which is the idea that we learn very early that love and acceptance are not unconditional. They come with terms. Every time you adjusted yourself and received warmth, inclusion, or praise in return, your brain logged that. Do more of that. Be more of that. Those doing the approving are often completely unaware they are doing it at all. But the pattern it creates is powerful and lasting.
Safety is the deepest driver of the three. When belonging feels like a survival need, and in childhood, it genuinely is, anything that threatens belonging can feel dangerous. Showing a part of yourself that might be rejected doesn’t just feel uncomfortable. To a young nervous system, it can feel like a genuine threat. John Bowlby’s attachment theory explains why: children are biologically wired to stay close to their caregivers, and anything that risks that bond triggers a fear response. So, you learned to keep certain things hidden, not because they were wrong, but because keeping them hidden felt safe.
Think about what you learned as a child, not from what people told you explicitly, but from what you observed and what you experienced. You most likely learned what earned approval. You learned what made the adults in your life comfortable or uncomfortable. You learned which parts of yourself were welcomed and which were inconvenient, too loud, too sensitive, too much, or not enough. Children are wired for attachment and belonging. It’s a survival need at early stages of development. So you adapted.
What matters most is that the adaptation wasn’t a flaw. It was your nervous system doing what it was designed to do, automatically and below your awareness, to keep you safe and connected to the people you depended on. The performing, the shaping, the adjusting, all of it made sense at the time. It served a real and important purpose.
The problem isn’t that we learned to adapt. It’s that most of us never received the message that it was okay to stop. We adapted so thoroughly, and for so long, that the performed version of ourselves started to feel like the real one. And the original version, the one underneath all of that adaptation, started to feel foreign. Strange. Difficult to access.
I have felt this way a few times in my life. It always came from trying to fit in with people I admired. I overlooked their negative traits, gradually absorbed them, and, without realizing it, drifted away from my core values. I couldn’t fully see how much I had changed. I became less tolerant of others, less kind, and increasingly annoyed and sarcastic, amusing my friends with a quick, toxic wit that was pointed outward at others.
I have lived my entire life in Marin, a very affluent county known for its money, beauty, and its famous residents. The reason they move here is that the locals don’t care, or at least appear not to care, who you are. Acknowledging a celebrity is considered gauche or beneath us, with many of my transplanted clients commenting on how hard it is to make friends here, and on the distinct aura of indifference we carry.
I once read in our local magazine that the way we speak here is dubbed Marin Speak by outsiders. Marin Speak is a tone conveying that nothing is a big deal, nothing bothers us, and nothing can touch us. It’s sarcastic, slightly dismissive, and I can slip into it in seconds. It is genuinely second nature for me. But because I know I can speak and act this way, I catch myself more quickly now and pull myself out of it.
There is also something important happening at the level of the nervous system; our brains have a very strong preference for the familiar. Not because familiar is good, but because familiar is known, and the nervous system treats the known as safe. So even when the role you are playing is exhausting, even when the identity you are performing no longer fits who you are, your nervous system is still pulling you back toward it. It’s what you know. It’s what has worked. It’s the path your system learned to walk.
This is why change can feel so threatening even when you genuinely want it. It’s not weakness, it’s biology. And understanding that can take a remarkable amount of pressure off yourself.
So, before we move forward, I want to pause here for a moment:
── REFLECTION ──
Think back to the environment you grew up in. What did you learn was acceptable to show? What did you learn was safer to hide? And how much of what you learned then is still shaping how you show up now?
── END REFLECTION ──
WHAT PERFORMING ACTUALLY LOOKS LIKE:
Let’s get specific to help us recognize ourselves clearly in our performance.
Performing is built into the ordinary choices of an ordinary day, and once you start to see it, you will see it in many places.
It looks like saying yes when everything inside you is saying no. Not because you want to help, not because it aligns with your values, but because saying no feels dangerous. Saying no might mean disappointing someone, being seen as difficult, or losing approval that you depend on. So, if you say yes and follow through, some part of you resents it because you didn’t tell the truth. A perfect example of this in my life is saying yes to an event I don’t want to attend, because I don’t want to disappoint the person asking. I think I’m annoyed with them for asking, persuading, or trying to guilt me into going, but I’m really just disappointed with myself for not being able to say no.
Performing looks like choosing what makes sense over what feels true. You make the practical decision, the logical one, the one you can defend and explain. You justify yourself to other people, but the thing that actually calls to you gets set aside because it’s too risky or too uncertain, or too hard to explain. And over time, you stop asking what feels true and you only ask what makes sense, and the distance between those two questions becomes the distance between you and yourself.
It also looks like being liked but not known. Having a full calendar and people who genuinely care about you, and still feeling profoundly alone, because the person they like is not quite the whole person. You have shown them the version that is easy to be around, the version that is agreeable and steady. The uncomplicated version, while the parts of you that really are complicated or raw have never quite made it to the surface. People love you, and you know they love you, and it still doesn’t land the way it should, because what they love is a curated version of who you are.
I have seen this so many times in the hair salon. Stylists who say ‘it’s showtime’ before greeting a client are doing exactly this. And maybe that’s not just performance for its own sake. Maybe it’s a protection against emotional drain. Certain clients and coworkers can deplete you. A persona becomes a safeguard against that.
Performing can also look like living a life that works but doesn’t land. A respectable job, a comfortable home, a stable relationship, a functioning routine, and this persistent, nagging feeling that none of it fully belongs to you. Like you are living someone else’s version of a good life. Like you followed all the right steps and arrived somewhere you didn’t intend to go.
None of these things is a failure. They are patterns. Patterns that made sense once, and that you have never had permission or language to examine.
Before we go any further, I want to invite you to turn this inward:
── REFLECTION ──
Which of those patterns showed up for you just now? Where in your life are you choosing familiar over true? Who are the people who like you for a version of yourself that isn’t the whole truth?
── END REFLECTION ──
THE COST OF DISCONNECTION:
The cost of disconnection is where the stakes become real.
There’s a cost when we perform instead of live, when we spend years and sometimes decades playing a role that doesn’t fully belong to us. That cost doesn’t always look the way you might expect. Rather than feeling dramatic, it feels more like slow erosion or a gradual dimming.
The first thing that tends to go is a kind of low-grade dissatisfaction. Not happiness exactly, though that matters too, but the deeper sense that what you are doing means something to you. That you are in it. That you chose it. Psychologists Deci and Ryan, who developed Self-Determination Theory, identified autonomy, competence, and relatedness as the three human psychological needs for well-being. When we perform and live inauthentically, autonomy is the one most quietly violated. And when autonomy is chronically suppressed, the result is not acute misery but something subtler, and in some ways harder to address: A persistent flatness, a hollowness at the center of a life that otherwise looks fine. It’s the heaviness you can’t explain or the emptiness that settles in at the end of a day that was objectively okay.
I have witnessed this many times in people who don’t feel that enough is enough. They buy something, big or small, something they’ve always thought they wanted, and the thrill fades almost immediately. The flatness returns, sometimes within hours. It becomes so normal to fill their life with things that they barely notice the pattern. It seems like they are filling their lives with anything and everything except themselves. And because it looks like living, because there is always something new to want, or get, or plan for, the cause of the heaviness stays invisible.
The second cost is emotional numbness, or its opposite, a restlessness you can’t quite locate or satisfy. Physician and trauma expert Gabor Maté has spent decades studying what happens when we learn early in life that certain emotions are unsafe to express. Over time, that suppression doesn’t just affect our inner lives. It disconnects us from our bodies, our instincts, and our ability to feel fully present in our own experiences. We can go numb. Joy doesn’t land the way it used to. Things that should matter feel distant. Others feel the exact opposite: a persistent undercurrent of anxiety or agitation, a sense that something is wrong even when they can’t point to what it is. Both responses are the self signaling that something is out of alignment.
Next is what I think is the most honest and least talked-about symptom of a performed life. It’s not rage or bitterness, but a low, steady, barely acknowledged resentment toward your own life. Toward the obligations you agreed to. Toward the expectations you have spent so long working to meet. Toward the choices that seemed right at the time, but have slowly become a kind of cage. Carl Rogers, who founded humanistic psychology and whose work on conditions of worth I touched on earlier, spent years documenting exactly this, and his conclusion was direct: When love and acceptance come with conditions attached, and we spend years meeting those conditions at the expense of our own truth, resentment is not a character flaw. It’s what happens when the self has been overridden for too long without acknowledgment. And because it feels ungrateful or unfair to admit, most people push it down. They don’t examine it; they carry it.
And finally, there is the experience I believe to be the most disorienting of all, the feeling of watching your own life from the outside. Like you are present for it, you show up, go through the right motions, but you are not quite in it. It’s called depersonalization and feels like there’s a glass panel between you and your own experience. It exists on a spectrum, and the mild, chronic version is well-documented in people experiencing identity suppression. No crisis needed, just a long enough time spent being someone other than yourself. And that feeling, more than anything else, is what brings people into my coaching practice. Not the big catastrophes, but this sense of removal from their own story.
I want to stop here and give you a chance to sit with what performing does to your well-being.
── REFLECTION ──
Which of these costs resonates most for you right now: the flatness, the numbness, the restlessness, the subtle resentment, or that feeling of watching from a distance? Just name it. Without judgment. That naming is already something.
── END REFLECTION ──
THE TURNING POINT:
Here is what I want you to know about the moment when people start to wake up to this pattern, because it rarely looks the way we think it will.
We tend to imagine that the realization will come as a breakdown, a crisis, a moment of rock bottom so undeniable that the only way forward is a total reinvention. And for some people, something like that does happen. But for most people, it’s slower. It is more like a persistent whisper that gradually becomes too loud to ignore.
Carl Jung wrote about what he called individuation, the lifelong process of separating the authentic self from the persona, a Latin word meaning mask. It’s the version of ourselves that we construct for the world to see. He believed that the moments that begin this process are rarely thunderclaps of clarity. They are more often small, slightly bewildering instances of noticing that something no longer fits. It might arrive in the middle of a perfectly ordinary day, driving to work, washing dishes, sitting in a meeting, where you catch yourself and think: why doesn't this feel like me? Not with any fanfare. Just a muted recognition that the life you are living feels designed for someone else.
Or it might come through exhaustion. Not physical exhaustion, although that can be part of it, but the deep tiredness of performing. Of maintaining. Of showing up as the version of yourself everyone expects, while the version of yourself that is true stays waiting, unexpressed, in the background.
Sometimes it arrives through envy. You hear about someone's life or someone's choice, and you feel a pull you cannot quite explain. Not because you want their specific life, but because something in their story touched something in yours. Therapist Hillary McBride reframes envy in a way I find genuinely useful: she describes it not as a flaw or something to be ashamed of, but as the self pointing toward something it wants yet hasn’t permitted itself to pursue. In other words, envy is not really about the other person at all. It is self-knowledge in disguise.
These moments are not breakdowns. They are not failures. They’re your original self, asking to be included. They are awareness catching up to something that has been true for a long time.
And the most important thing I want you to hear about that moment is this: it is not a sign that something has gone wrong. It is a sign that something is finally, slowly, going right.
── REFLECTION ──
Have you had one of those moments recently? A brief instance where something inside you said: This does not feel like me? What was happening when it came? And what did you do with that feeling afterward?
── END REFLECTION ──
THE REFRAME:
Here is something I see constantly in my practice: people take this awareness and immediately use it as evidence against themselves.
If you have recognized yourself in any of what I have described today, the performing, the disconnection, the quiet cost of it, there is a very good chance that some part of your mind has already translated that recognition into something like: I have wasted so much time, or I should have known this sooner, or I’ve made so many wrong choices — I want to gently but very directly say: that is not the lesson.
What you were doing wasn’t failure. It was adaptation. As I said earlier, adaptation is intelligence, and it’s what kept you connected, kept you safe, and kept you functional during the years when you did not yet have the language, the distance, or the support to do anything differently. You were not sleepwalking. You were surviving. And that is an important distinction.
What is happening now, this awareness, this noticing, this discomfort that brought you to an episode called why you feel disconnected from your life, that is not a verdict on who you have been. It is an invitation into who you can be. Awareness is not an accusation. It is a beginning.
There is something I come back to again and again in my coaching work, and it is this: you cannot change what you cannot see. The performance worked precisely because it was invisible, to you as much as to anyone else. It was just the water you were swimming in. It was just life. And the moment you begin to see it, really see it, you gain something you did not have before. You gain a choice. And choice, even a small one, even an imperfect one, is where change begins.
So, if you are sitting with this today and feeling the weight of it, I want you to hold alongside that weight the fact that you are here. You are paying attention. And paying attention to your own life is one of the most courageous and most consequential things you can do.
Pause here, and ask yourself:
── REFLECTION ──
What would it mean for you to interpret this awareness not as evidence of failure but as the very beginning of something? What becomes possible if you choose to start from there?
── END REFLECTION ──
A GENTLE SHIFT TOWARD ALIGNMENT:
So, what do you actually do with all of this? I never want to leave you in a place of awareness without also giving you something real to carry into your week. The steps I’ll offer are not a dramatic overhaul. It is not a list of sweeping changes you need to make immediately. They consist of small, honest steps.
The first step is beginning to notice where you are performing. Not to judge it. Not to fix it immediately. Just to notice. Start to pay attention to the moments when you say yes, and you mean no. The moments when you choose what looks right over what feels true. The moments when you edit yourself before you speak, when you manage the impression rather than offer the reality. You do not need to change all of those moments right away. Just start seeing them, because seeing them is what makes a choice possible where there wasn’t one before.
The second step is to ask yourself a question. It’s a simple one that I have given to many clients, and one that continues to reveal a great deal. The question is this: is this true for me, or is it just familiar? Ask it when you are about to make a decision, when you are about to respond a certain way, when you feel pulled in a direction you cannot fully explain. Ask if this is true for me — does it reflect something I actually value, something I actually want, something that genuinely aligns with who I am? Or is it just familiar — the path I have always taken, the role I have always played, the answer I have always given, not because it’s mine but because it is known.
The difference between those two questions is the difference between a performed life and a lived one. And you will not always be able to answer it clearly right away. Sometimes the honest answer is that you do not know yet. And that is a valid and important answer, because I do not know yet is the first truly honest thing you can say.
The third step, and the one I want you to sit with the longest, is to permit yourself to start very small. Alignment starts in the small moments. One honest conversation. One boundary that actually reflects what you need. One moment where you let someone see a slightly more real version of who you are. Those moments accumulate, and over time, they become the path back to your original self.
── REFLECTION ──
What is one small, honest shift you could make this week? Not something enormous. Not a life overhaul. Just one moment where you choose what is true over what is familiar. What would that look like for you?
── END REFLECTION ──
I want to leave you with a mindset shift that hopefully stays with you.
The disconnection you have been feeling is not a sign that something is wrong with you. Nor is it ingratitude, weakness, or confusion. It’s your original self letting you know that it’s been waiting. That it has been patient. Underneath all of the adapting and adjusting and performing, it’s still intact and very much alive.
The performing was never who you were. It’s what you learned. And everything learned can also be unlearned. Not all at once, and not without discomfort, but in the slow, steady, honest way that real change always happens. One true thing at a time.
You do not have to blow up your life to come back to yourself. Sometimes it starts with something you almost miss. Sometimes it starts with noticing where you stopped being in it.
And if today was the day you started to notice, then something significant has already begun.
If anything in this episode stirred something in you, I would love to continue that conversation. Coaching is where this kind of work gets to dig deeper, where you get to take the noticing and turn it into something real and lasting. You can find me at decotalifecoaching.com. I genuinely love what I do, and I would love to work with you.
Thank you for being here. I will see you next week.
Are You Self-Aware or Self-Absorbed?The Truth About Why We See Ourselves the Way We Do
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Welcome to the Original Self Podcast.
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I'm Evet DeCota,
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the owner of DeCota Life Coaching and a psychology informed life coach who explores
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resilience,
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mindset,
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and the courage to become your authentic self.
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This is a space for honest conversations about growth,
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identity,
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relationships,
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and the messy moments in between that shape who we become.
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Between the salon chair and coaching sessions,
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I've watched people move through life in patterns they never notice.
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I've also, for the record, recognized some of those patterns in myself.
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In this episode,
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we're going to talk about the difference between two ways of moving through the
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world.
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One that keeps you stuck inside yourself and the one that sets you free.
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Today, we'll discuss
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Are you self-aware or self-absorbed?
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The truth about why we see ourselves the way we do.
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Today's topic gets mistaken for narcissism constantly.
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So I want to clear that up right now.
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Narcissism
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is a diagnosable personality disorder.
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It is pathological.
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The narcissist rarely changes even with medication and therapy because real change
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requires something most narcissists do not have and that is the genuine desire to
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look inward and do the hard work.
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So now that we got that clear, what's the difference between self-absorption and self-awareness?
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I'll tell you but first I want to tell you about a conversation that I eavesdropped
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on recently.
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My nephew Jackson loves to play golf and during his spring break I told him that he
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should play golf in the town that I live in and then I would rent a golf cart and
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drive him around.
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That's a win for both of us because he gets to be chauffeured for 18 holes and I
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get to spend five hours with a teenager
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That's usually too busy for his auntie.
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So as he was warming up at the, I don't know, driving range?
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I don't know the terminology, but something like that.
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He was practicing.
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There was a cart parked next to me with four guys maybe in their 40s just standing
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around talking.
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They were talking about making money and their stock market investments.
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One of the men was speaking about his brother and how he had apparently hit it big
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in the tech industry.
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Although he made millions,
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he was an addict and spent all of his money on alcohol and cocaine,
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which landed him in a rehab in Los Angeles.
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Apparently after some relapses and additional rehabs,
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this brother took his sobriety seriously and began working at the rehab.
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He then with the head counselor opened up their own wellness spa rehab for the mega
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wealthy and that made his brother millions of dollars again.
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The other men were like super impressed by this comeback story and one asked a
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pretty pertinent question about how the addicts behavior affected the rest of the
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family.
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The brother answered that it definitely did and that they all had to go to the
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rehab when he was in rehab a bunch of times and talk about how it affected them,
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their emotions around it,
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etc.
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Another man in the Forsen piped in and said he thought therapy was very good for
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women but that men didn't need it so much.
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That's when my superpower hearing became
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as amplified as Jamie Summer's bionic ear for real.
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As their conversation continued from there,
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they all admitted to having had some therapy at some point in their lives and how
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much they got out of it.
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As I saw my nephew heading back towards me, I kept thinking, were they self-absorbed?
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Were they just completely self-unaware or both?
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And then I wondered, did they even know the difference?
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So before we can answer my question of are we self-aware or self-absorbed and can
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we see ourselves as one way or the other,
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we need to know what we're talking about.
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So I'd like to define these phrases.
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Psychology defines self-absorption as an excessive preoccupation with one's own
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thoughts,
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feelings,
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and experiences.
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It's not classified as a disorder, but as a pattern.
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Often learned and often protective.
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The self-absorbed person isn't necessarily selfish.
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They're just often stuck within themselves without the tools to get out.
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It could be temporary.
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Yet stress and anxiety can also trigger self-absorption
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and even maybe so deeply ingrain that it's a way of moving through the world that
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they've adapted to.
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Self-absorption in practice is includes conversations that consistently come back to them.
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They struggle to ask you about yourself and actually mean it.
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They might present
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with difficulty sitting with your emotions or pain without bringing it back to
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their own experience of emotions and pain.
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It's a lack of impulse control or they react before they observe what's really
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going on in front of them.
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They also have a hard time laughing at themselves because there's no distance from
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the ego to laugh from.
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The opposite on the spectrum is self-awareness.
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Self-awareness is the ability to see yourself clearly and objectively through reflection.
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It involves knowing your own values or emotions,
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your strengths,
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weaknesses and how all of those drive your behavior.
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Psychologists split self-awareness into two types, internal
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which is knowing yourself from the inside and external self-awareness which is how
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others experience you self-awareness in practice looks like catching yourself in a
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pattern before it takes completely over or admitting when you're wrong and not
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falling apart when the error is pointed out to you it looks like
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Taking responsibility without self punishment or really long bouts of rumination.
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I could have done it this way.
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Why did I say that?
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They must think this or that of me.
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It is awareness of your effect on the room or the ability to laugh at yourself
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because if you have that,
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that means it requires distance from the ego.
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In the short conversation that I heard
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from the golf guys.
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I noticed especially when they said that therapy was better for women and not men
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and then proceeded to talk about their own time spent in therapy and how it helped.
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I definitely noticed that maybe they didn't practice self-awareness.
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The paradox between the two is very interesting.
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Self-absorbed people are constantly looking inward but never actually seeing themselves.
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they're drowning in self however the self-aware person does observe the self they
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are stepping outside themselves enough to watch what's happening so looking inward
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then isn't the same thing as self-awareness if you think about it one acts submerge
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the other acts as a witness
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I don't know,
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maybe that's why self-absorbed people are simultaneously hyper-focused on
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themselves and unaware of their effects on others.
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There's no distance or observer position so they can't see themselves in the room.
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That observation drives me down multiple question street.
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Are self-awareness and self-absorption
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Is it caused by nature versus nurture?
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I think that nature includes narcissistic tendencies or other personality disorders
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that are present from the beginning of people's lives.
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But nurture is maybe where behavior at the opposite ends of the spectrum such as
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neglect and overindulgence can produce the same results.
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Like the kid that's ignored versus the kid given a trophy for showing up.
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Both can end up self-absorbed just for different reasons.
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One operates from I deserve this and the other one from I'm terrified there won't
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be enough for me.
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I can often hear someone's origin story and how they speak to me.
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The ignored often have to prove how great they are
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At the expense of monopolizing a conversation never pausing long enough to allow a
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back and forth question and answer session or giving off vibes of anxiety and
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restlessness.
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I've seen this many times where the overindulged are only waiting for you to finish
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a sentence so they can launch into everything about them.
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They might not even comment on anything you say or just completely ignore your
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contribution to the conversation Maybe it's a superiority or inferiority complex
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That's a piece of self-absorption The psychologist Alfred Adler introduced these
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complexes and he described them as extreme and distorted ways of seeing oneself
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It's often developed to a response to childhood experiences or social anxiety or
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even a deep fear of failure.
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Both are actually the same defense mechanism just pointed in opposite directions.
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The person who thinks they're better than everyone and the person who thinks
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they're less than are both obsessed with comparison.
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Yet neither see others clearly.
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In an article published in Psychology Today,
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the UK-based contemplative psychologist Dr.
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William Van Gordon discussed ontological addiction theory developed with Edo
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Shonin.
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This theory argues that even people with inferiority complexes
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can be as self-absorbed as someone with a superiority complex.
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The addiction is to your own sense of importance,
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to the belief that you exist at the center of the world separate from everyone
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else.
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The separation is where there's the problem.
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That's where the problem lives because nothing exists in isolation, right?
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There is an interconnection between
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And everything and everyone around us.
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But the more we lose sight of that, the more distorted and smaller our world becomes.
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So basically, self-absorption is just ego with nowhere to go but inward.
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Before we go further, I want to leave you with something to sit with.
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I ask you,
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Are you the person who walks away from a conversation thinking about what the other
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person said?
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Or are you the person who walks away thinking about what you said?
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During one of my conversations with my friend Angie,
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we talked about can you change what you can't see?
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And for me the question I keep coming back to is can a self-absorbed person
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actually become self-aware?
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I believe they can but with one important exception and that's the narcissist.
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The narcissist cannot do that.
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Remember that's a disorder and a different conversation but for everyone else I
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think change is possible.
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Here's what I've observed both in coaching and in life.
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The self-absorbed person usually doesn't change gradually.
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I think it's something that breaks them open.
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A relationship ends or they lose something or someone significant.
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It's a crisis of some kind that forces a crack in the wall.
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But here's what's interesting.
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Two people can experience
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The exact same crisis and go in completely opposite directions.
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One could wake up, the other one doubles down and goes further into themselves.
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But what makes the difference?
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Narcissism, depression, unbroken behavior patterns, those will keep the walls up.
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These are the things that keep self-absorbed people
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Continually searching for outward excuses rather than inward inside themselves for answers.
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In a previous episode, I introduced locus of control.
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It's developed by an American psychologist in the 50s named Julian Rotter.
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Simply put, do you believe you're in control of your own life?
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Or do you believe
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Life Happens To You.
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There are two types of locus of control, internal and external.
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An internal locus of control means you take responsibility for your outcome.
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You believe your actions matter and you work toward change when something doesn't work for you.
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An external locus of control means you attribute
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Outcomes to luck or circumstances or other people.
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Therefore, you're less likely to change.
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So here's where it connects to our conversation.
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Self-awareness almost always lives on the internal side.
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The self-aware person believes they have agency.
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They can look at their own patterns to take responsibility without falling apart.
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And
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Then make different choices.
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That's internal locus of control in action.
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Self absorption tends to live on the external side.
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Not always, but often.
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Because if everything that happens to you is someone else's fault,
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or just bad luck,
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there's no reason to look inward.
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There's nothing to examine.
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And you stay stuck in the same pattern because you don't believe you have the power
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to change it anyway,
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right?
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Interestingly,
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one of the clearest outward signs when someone falls on that continuum is impulse
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control.
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The self-absorbed person who reacts without thinking isn't necessarily doing it consciously.
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They may genuinely not believe they could have done otherwise.
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They say things like, that's just how I am or you made me do that.
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I couldn't help it.
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That's the external locus of control speaking.
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Because impulse control, it requires a pause.
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That pause is only possible if you believe your response is a choice.
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The self aware person isn't necessarily more disciplined by nature.
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They've just internalized one belief that changes everything.
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The space between feeling triggered and their response is their own.
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That's the space where self awareness lives.
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There's something Rotter himself noted about gender which I find very interesting
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Some studies suggest men tend toward an internal locus of control and women toward
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an external one which makes sense because given the conditioning of women to put
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everyone else first when you spend your whole life considering or responding to
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what other people's needs are
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You can lose the belief that your choices drive your life.
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I witness this many times with clients telling me stories of feeling stuck and
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unable to leave bad situations or relationships.
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They name the circumstances that keep them stationary and fail to realize that no
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matter how difficult the situation is,
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they are actually the change agent.
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So with all that said,
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locus of control might actually be the mechanism underneath all of it,
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the thing that determines whether self-awareness is even possible.
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If that's true,
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then the first step towards self-awareness isn't insight,
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it's actually ownership.
(00:19:48):
Two researchers named Ferdi Botha and Sarah Dahman conducted
(00:19:54):
A large-scale Australian study where they found that people with an internal locus
(00:20:01):
of control consistently reported greater self-control better physical and mental
(00:20:08):
health and a higher life satisfaction they also found that an internal locus of
(00:20:16):
control doesn't just correlate with better outcomes it amplifies them
(00:20:23):
In other words,
(00:20:24):
believing you have agency over your life makes the work you do on yourself more
(00:20:32):
effective.
(00:20:34):
The belief and the behavior reinforce each other,
(00:20:38):
which means developing self-awareness isn't just a mental exercise.
(00:20:43):
It has a real measurable consequences for your life and
(00:20:50):
It's attainable if the desire to change is truly genuine.
(00:20:57):
Before we move on, here's another question worth thinking about.
(00:21:02):
When something in your life isn't working, where does your mind go first?
(00:21:08):
Is it to what you could do differently or to everything and everyone outside of you
(00:21:13):
that's to blame?
(00:21:16):
One of the places self-awareness is often tested is how we respond to other people
(00:21:22):
specifically whether we can tell the difference between something that's genuinely
(00:21:29):
about us and something that we're just making about us.
(00:21:37):
I think taking things personally is actually its own form of self-absorption.
(00:21:44):
There's research to back it up
(00:21:46):
People with low self-esteem are considerably more likely to take things personally,
(00:21:52):
interpreting neutral or even constructive feedback as a personal attack.
(00:21:59):
So the person who takes everything personally isn't necessarily thin-skinned,
(00:22:06):
they're just operating from a wound that they haven't yet examined.
(00:22:12):
Behavioral health therapist Ken Alexander
(00:22:15):
says that the minute you begin to personalize these types of behaviors, you're in trouble.
(00:22:21):
He says it sets you up to be manipulated in some way, shape or form.
(00:22:28):
He says that self-absorption disguises itself as sensitivity.
(00:22:34):
That's interesting.
(00:22:36):
Also worth noting,
(00:22:38):
research on self-absorption highlighted in Psychology Today magazine by
(00:22:43):
psychologist Leon Seltzer
(00:22:47):
found that self-absorption undermines our capacity for empathy and a true
(00:22:55):
understanding of others.
(00:22:58):
It's extremely difficult to appreciate the world outside ourselves when we direct
(00:23:04):
most of our focus inward.
(00:23:08):
We have to ask ourselves, is this about me or is it about them?
(00:23:14):
And then patiently, key word,
(00:23:17):
Wait for the answer.
(00:23:21):
Every morning my friend Angie and I have what we call our daily therapy sessions.
(00:23:29):
Though it costs a lot less and the laughs are way better than a true therapy session.
(00:23:35):
It usually starts with a well-placed meme or reel that captures our exact views on
(00:23:42):
various subjects.
(00:23:44):
And then we get on the phone before work
(00:23:47):
And unpack whatever's on our mind.
(00:23:50):
We each swap stories or offer a reframe to the mindset we are currently holding.
(00:23:58):
Whatever's bothering us,
(00:24:00):
whatever happened,
(00:24:02):
whatever we're carrying,
(00:24:03):
we name it,
(00:24:04):
we examine it,
(00:24:05):
and then we figure out what's ours to own and what isn't.
(00:24:11):
And then we laugh.
(00:24:15):
We laugh not because everything's funny because we know that ruminating over our
(00:24:23):
problem unnecessarily is destructive to our well-being.
(00:24:28):
When we bring levity to something that's bothering one of us,
(00:24:34):
it creates or feels like there's more room to breathe.
(00:24:40):
There's room to have maybe a different perspective.
(00:24:43):
Like I said, that reframe.
(00:24:46):
Laughter creates distance from the ego.
(00:24:50):
And distance is exactly what self-awareness requires.
(00:24:56):
Seltzer also talks about how all rumination is not the same.
(00:25:01):
The two kinds of rumination are productive,
(00:25:05):
which is where you actually work through a problem and fix it.
(00:25:10):
And there's also maladaptive rumination,
(00:25:14):
Where you just continually cycle through the same thoughts with no resolution.
(00:25:20):
That second kind is where self-absorption lives and also where depression and anxiety grows.
(00:25:26):
Think about this.
(00:25:28):
The depressed person ruminates about the past.
(00:25:32):
Where the anxious person ruminates about the future.
(00:25:36):
The both of them are stuck in the same loop.
(00:25:41):
They compare themselves unfavorably to others,
(00:25:45):
catastrophize,
(00:25:47):
avoid anything that feels risky,
(00:25:50):
and make their problems feel bigger and less solvable than they actually are.
(00:25:58):
I read research from psychologist Edward Watkins at a university in England,
(00:26:05):
and he points to two ways out of this loop.
(00:26:11):
He suggests that first you get concrete and specific about what's bothering you
(00:26:18):
because if it's abstract,
(00:26:20):
evaluative thinking keeps you stuck in that loop.
(00:26:25):
Second,
(00:26:27):
develop self-compassion because the relentless self-criticism underneath the
(00:26:35):
rumination is what keeps it going.
(00:26:38):
So let's take our daily laugh therapy sessions.
(00:26:42):
My friend Angie and I, having those sessions helps us process and move on.
(00:26:50):
It offers concrete, compassionate alternatives to rumination.
(00:26:56):
And that at its core is what self-awareness looks like in practice.
(00:27:02):
So let's bring this home.
(00:27:04):
If you recognize yourself anywhere in what we talked about today,
(00:27:08):
Whether you're the person who's been moving through life unaware of your patterns,
(00:27:14):
or the person who has been quietly absorbing the weight of someone else's,
(00:27:19):
just hear this,
(00:27:20):
awareness is not a verdict.
(00:27:23):
It's a starting point.
(00:27:25):
The thing is, is that self-absorption is not a character flaw you're born with.
(00:27:31):
It's a pattern that you develop for a reason.
(00:27:34):
And patterns, unlike personality disorders,
(00:27:38):
They can change, but only if you can see them.
(00:27:43):
Only if you believe you have the power to do something more about them.
(00:27:50):
That's the work, not the grand gesture, not the dramatic breakthrough.
(00:27:55):
It's the daily practice of asking yourself honest questions and being willing to
(00:28:02):
sit with the answers.
(00:28:04):
It's the pause before the reaction.
(00:28:07):
The Laugh Instead Of The Spiral The Morning Phone Call That Costs Nothing But Has
(00:28:17):
The Ability To Change Everything I Think Self Awareness Is Not A Destination It's A
(00:28:24):
Discipline And The Good News Is You Don't Have To Do It Perfectly You Just Have To
(00:28:30):
Keep Doing It I'll Leave You With One Final Thought To Take Into Your Week
(00:28:38):
I want you to notice one moment where you feel yourself react to criticism,
(00:28:45):
a comment or to disruptive behavior that gets under your skin or to a situation
(00:28:52):
that stings.
(00:28:54):
Before you respond, ask yourself these questions.
(00:29:01):
Is this actually about me?
(00:29:03):
What am I assuming about this situation?
(00:29:07):
That May Not Be True Am I Making This About Me?
(00:29:14):
Just Notice You Don't Have To Fix Anything Just Notice If You Want To Explore What
(00:29:21):
Patterns Have Been Quietly Running In The Background Of Your Life And What Might Be
(00:29:26):
Possible On The Other Side Of Them I Would Love To Talk You Can Find Me At
(00:29:32):
decotalifecoaching.com I Offer Individual Coaching
(00:29:38):
And I genuinely love this work Thank you for being with me today This one took some
(00:29:45):
living to put together I hope what we talked about stays with you It makes you a
(00:29:51):
little more curious about yourself And maybe a little less hard on yourself for
(00:29:57):
what you find Have a great day
Toxic Positivity vs. Real Resilience: Why Hope Without Action Is a Trap
Toxic positivity doesn't feel like positivity when you're on the receiving end. It feels like shame. In this episode of The Original Self Podcast, Evet DeCota explores the real difference between toxic positivity and genuine resilience — and why hope without action becomes one of the most seductive traps we fall into.
From the phrases we reach for without thinking — look on the bright side, at least you have your health, you're fine, everything happens for a reason — to the deeper cost of invalidating the people we love, this episode unpacks what toxic positivity actually does, why it creates shame even when it comes from love, and where genuine resilience really comes from.
Evet shares the personal story of the years she cared for her mother on dialysis, the moment at the elevator she has never been able to undo, and what real resilience looked like when she finally stopped reaching for a phrase and sat on the arm of the chair with her mom instead.
You'll also hear about the difference between hope that fuels action and hope used as avoidance — with honest examples including Evet's own relationship with the scale, the friend whose body collapsed under years of unopened bills, and Nelson Mandela's twenty-seven-year practice of disciplined hope.
Grounded in the work of Susan David, Whitney Goodman, Brené Brown, and Nelson Mandela, this episode offers a framework for the kind of resilience that acknowledges pain without drowning in it — and the kind of hope that holds reality while still looking straight at it.
If you have ever been told your feelings were too much, too sensitive, or not valid — this episode is for you.
Hi, welcome to the Original Self Podcast. I'm Evet DeCota, owner of DeCota Life Coaching, and I am a psychology-informed life coach who explores resilience, mindset, and the courage to become your authentic self. This is a space for honest conversations about growth or identity, relationships, and all the messy moments in between that shape who we become.
Between the salon chair and coaching sessions, I've learned a lot about the phrases we reach for when someone else's pain makes us uncomfortable. I have also, for the record, said most of these phrases myself. In this episode, we're going to talk about why they hurt more than they help.
So let's discuss toxic positivity versus real resilience and why hope without action is a trap. I'm going to say a few phrases that I want you to listen to and also pay attention to how your body feels when you hear these phrases. These are phrases that people say to you like when you're expressing difficult
emotions or you're telling a story of something crazy that happened to you. And I will give you a warning. Some of them might make your eye twitch, which I feel is the right response. So, okay, here they are. Here's the first one. That can't be true. Or you're too sensitive. It's never happened to me.
You shouldn't think like that. Side note, who loves a shouldn't? Raise your hand. Look on the bright side. Just be positive. At least you have fill in the blank that invalidates your feelings the most. Or, ha, you think that's bad? My experience was way worse. Or everything happens for a reason. The last one, you're fine.
If you just felt your jaw clench, congratulations, you're totally human. You've heard these. You've probably said them. I know I have. And I think no one's getting out of this episode clean. Today, I'd like to sit with what those phrases actually do to us. Because on the surface, I think they sound kind. They sound like encouragement.
Or they sound like someone's trying to help or support you. But underneath it, I think there's a very clear, specific message. That message is, your feelings are making me feel uncomfortable, and I'd like you to stop having them. At the core of that is what it's called toxic positivity.
What we'll look at today is the difference between the toxic positivity and real resilience. We'll also look at why hope without action becomes one of the most seductive traps we fall into. I'd like to share how I learned the difference the hard way and it involved the people I love the most. This one gets personal.
It needs to be. I don't think you can understand toxic positivity from just a definition. I think you understand it from the moments that cost you and I something. So I'm going to start with defining what toxic positivity is because I think the
word toxic gets thrown around a lot and it can feel like we're labeling every kind word as some kind of emotional assault. But that's not what I'm talking about. Positivity that is toxic is the belief that no matter how difficult or painful a situation is, people should maintain a positive mindset.
It's the reflex to skip over real emotions and jump straight to the feeling of fine. You see it everywhere on the coffee mug that claims good vibes only. Which, by the way, I think is a very bold claim for a coffee mug to make at 7 o'clock in the morning. Just saying.
Or it's the self-help phrases that tell you to choose joy. As if joy is on a menu and you've just been very indecisive. Maybe it's the well-meaning friend who, when you tell her something is breaking your heart, says to you, at least you have your health. You smile and nod because what else are you supposed to do?
But I think something closes down inside of you a little bit. There's a psychologist named Susan David. She's a teacher at Harvard Medical School, and she wrote emotional agility or what she calls the tyranny of positivity. She said that at its core, toxic positivity is an avoidant coping strategy.
She says telling someone to be positive invalidates their experience and suppresses their emotions that they need to feel. So it doesn't make the anger or sadness or grief go away. It actually enhances them and then layers shame on top of it. It's another way of conveying that my comfort is more important than your reality.
Sit with that for a second. My comfort is more important than your reality. What's actually happening in those moments? It's not always with cruelty or on purpose, but I think it can have the same effect. She also gave a TED talk. It was called The Gift and Power of Emotional Change. David shared research.
from a survey that she did with over 70,000 people in it. She states that a third of them reported harshly judging themselves for having bad emotions or they actively tried to banish those emotions because they did not feel that they were socially acceptable. There's also a therapist named Whitney Goodman who wrote the book Toxic Positivity
keeping it real in a world obsessed with being happy. Goodman says that the pressure to stay upbeat, no matter how dire the situations are, she points out that that forced optimism actively harms healing by not allowing the individual to move through the difficult emotions because they aren't allowed to feel them in the first place.
Toxic positivity skips that step entirely. It rushes past the grief and straight into the lesson. It jumps past the anger and straight into gratitude. Or it rushes past the fear and straight into the reassurance that everything is going to work out. The worst part is that the person that feels this and receives it
they are deemed a problem. Their reality is inconvenient. Or if they can't smile through it, then they're doing something wrong. Before we go any further, I would love for you to pause and think about this. When was the last time someone dismissed a real feeling you had with a phrase that sounded kind?
What did you actually feel in that moment? Not what you were supposed to feel or what you pretended to feel, but what actually landed inside of you when they said that phrase or words. The part about the toxicity that nobody names out loud is that it creates shame. Brene Brown, my favorite scientist,
has dedicated her career to studying shame's cause and effect. She defines it as the intensely painful feeling that we are unworthy of love and belonging. The installation of shame in people comes from the people whom we trust telling us that our feelings are wrong, that we're too sensitive or too much. We're not accurate or it's not warranted.
I don't think we arrive at shame all at once or in one conversation. I think it's a thousand small moments where we bring something to someone that's very real to us and they hand us back a phrase instead of their presence. Each of those moments teaches us that my feelings are a problem.
I should hide them and not share them. I should figure out how to stop having them. the tyranny of the shits done messing us up. But the wild thing is the person handing you the phrase seldom means to hurt you. I've said that many times. I mean, we all know that one person who truly does intend harm,
but hopefully once we figure that out, we stop hanging out with them. But the ones that have no intention to hurt you are reaching for a sentence that makes the moment easier Not for you, but for them. I think it's important to point out that something that took me a long time to see clearly.
Toxic positivity often comes from people who are themselves drowning. It's not only a personality flaw, but it's a survival reflex. For maybe when we don't have the emotional capacity to sit with someone else's pain, because our pain is already at the brim or past the brim. That reframe matters because if we only understood toxic positivity as something
others did to us, we will never catch ourselves doing it to the people we care about. Here's something to think about. Who in your life taught you over time that your feelings were a problem? The harder question, who have you taught the same thing to without meaning it?
I have been on both sides of the coin in my life many times. I've been told that my feelings were too much, but I have in moments told others that the same thing, that their feelings are too much. This example that I'm going to tell you about
taught me more about toxic positivity than any book or class I've ever taken. So for many years, my mom was the receptionist at my salon. And for over three years at the end, she was on dialysis. She was the person that made everyone feel welcome. But most importantly, she was my person. She was my best friend.
As she became sicker, she came in less and eventually could not come in at all. And suddenly I was running every part of the salon, doing her job and mine alike, and coming home at night and taking care of her. There was a specific evening that I am not proud of,
but it defines how toxic positivity can also come from a place of love and fear. It wasn't from a stranger or some bumper sticker mindset, but from a daughter who was doing everything she could and still reaching for a sentence she wished she could take back.
I had worked a very long day with no breaks and my knees and hips were really hurting me to the point of where I could barely walk. I hadn't eaten and when I came home, my mom told me that she wanted to go to the store.
I didn't want to say no to her because she had been stuck at home all day long. So I got her wheelchair and I helped her into the car and I lifted the heavy wheelchair into the back of the car, drove to the store,
walked around to find what she had wanted and did the reverse when I arrived home. This is all to say that I was even more tired and in pain by doing all of this. I still needed to get her something to eat, help her get into her nightclothes,
and clean up her apartment because I was so terrified of bacteria getting into the open wounds in her legs caused from edema that the dialysis didn't remove that she could get sepsis and... That would be the end. The point of telling you all of this is that while I was wheeling her to the elevator,
she told me she was angry. She said that she couldn't believe that her kidneys didn't work and how unfair it was. She told me she didn't understand why she had to suffer. I didn't have the patience to just listen I firmly said to her that many people suffer but don't have loved ones around to help them.
I told her that many suffering people do not experience living their full lives. The minute I pushed the down button on the elevator, I regretted saying it. My mind was saying, why is she not allowed to vent? Why couldn't I let her feel sorry for herself? Why didn't I show her compassion?
ask her more questions so that she could process what she was feeling. Why did I blurt out that bullshit and shut her down? The truth of my why was that I was too tired and too scared. If I let her be furious, I had to be furious. If I let her be heartbroken that her body was failing,
I had to sit with the fact that I was losing her. I didn't have the room for that on top of the wheelchair, the wounds, the work day, and my own body breaking down trying to carry hers. So I reached for a sentence that made her feeling smaller because making her
feeling smaller was the only way I could keep moving. That's toxic positivity. delivered not with intention and cruelty or intentional cruelty, but delivered with exhaustion, delivered with love even, but still delivered. And then it landed on me as shame. The part that broke me later when I was,
was when I learned my mother confided her feelings to my really good friend. She would often visit my mom when I was working, and my mom was able to express her fear, exhaustion, and grief over her own body to her. She could tell my friend the truth because she wasn't me.
My friend wasn't scared to death of losing her and was able to receive my mom's emotions. My mom protected me from her feelings because she loved me. But if you've ever watched someone you love hold their pain from you to keep you comfortable, you know what that costs. They are sparing you,
but it's your loss of the sacred and honest confessions that they would have shared with you if you only were able to open the door and invite their emotions in. The thing is, is I knew what that felt like. And I turned around and did it to someone who was not only my hero,
but also at a very low point in her life. I learned quickly that she couldn't tell me how she truly felt. Fortunately, I never did it again. I never dismissed her. Not that I got everything right, but I never reached for an easy phrase again. And then one day, closer to the end of her life,
she knew she had to go back to the hospital and she started crying. My mom was not an easy crier. It was a very rare emotion for her. And she didn't have any power at this time. But this time I didn't panic at her emotion. Instead of reaching for a phrase or a sentence,
I just sat on the arm of the chair that she was sitting in and held her as we both cried together. That's the moment I choose to remember, not because it redeems me from my behavior at the elevator or whatever. It's because it's genuine resilience. Not the bounce back version, the Instagram version. It's the real one.
It's letting yourself feel scared enough to cry with the person who's dying. Instead of trying to fix it, fix their fear with a sentence, It's letting the moment be as big as it is while holding space for both of you inside of it. Listener, is there someone in your life right now whose feelings you have been managing
because their reality is too hard for you? What do you think it would look like to stop managing and just be present for them? I was thinking about how my actions turned toxic positivity into real resilience, which made me think how the word resilience has been hijacked. Like the way the world speaks about it,
it sounds like it must have to have a silver lining attached to it, or it's bouncing back, it's turning lemons into lemonade. Or maybe it's a slogan on a pillow that you'd find at that store, HomeGoods. You know that store? It's like a hoarder's dream store filled with unorganized items steeped in chaos.
That's how I feel about that store. It makes me panic. Anyway, that isn't resilience. Resilience to me is acknowledging that things may be bad, really bad, and knowing that I'll get through them. Not because the bad part is not real, but because I'm real. My capacity is real. And my history of getting through things is real.
My resilience came from my life, not a book. When I was a kid, I broke a lot of bones, leading to many timeouts from my daily life. Hospital stays. A cast on some limb. stretches where I couldn't walk, couldn't play, nor could I hang out with my friends at school.
I would watch the other kids learn how to cruise down the street on their bikes and skateboards. But what I learned is how it felt for my body to continually take me out of my own life without warning. But slowly, I also learned that I was still me on the other side of it. The body would heal.
The world would be waiting. And I wasn't the only breakable thing. And I wasn't broken in a way that lasted. I was also a kid who became heavier than other kids my age. At that time in history, kids noticed the weight gain and never hesitated to comment on any difference between me and them.
I spent years being pointed at for looking different. But what I did with that teasing and harassment is what built my resilience. I don't think I could have survived it if I let all the criticism in at one time. So I let in what I could handle in small pieces.
And in between, I reminded myself of what was true about me. I was smart, I was funny, I was a really good friend. But what I didn't realize is that I was actually pattern rewiring at the age of 10. Somehow I was able to take the hurt in in small doses that didn't drown me.
But in between those confidence chipping insults, I was building a version of myself That was big enough to handle it. That's resilience. Not pretending the pointing didn't happen. Not telling yourself the mean kids were just telling the truth, which is what they said to my face a few times. Or not always looking on the bright side.
There's nothing wrong with that. But in order for me to build up my resilience, I had to let the hurt be real. while also letting in what was true and real about me. This pattern has carried me through my whole life. I had a doctor once tell me that my knee hurt because I was obese. Now look,
I know that the more weight someone carries, the more pressure you have on your joints. That's not news to me. But this doctor was very gung-ho about it being my fault and very sure that the fix was going to come from me walking more and watching what I ate.
It's all very good advice, yet I still demanded an MRI. I stayed in his office until he agreed to order one. What were the results, you ask? The results were a bone-on-bone knee joint. no traceable meniscus, no ACL, no MCL, many cysts and bone spurs. He never apologized, said he was wrong.
He never said anything remotely human about how he acted in that appointment. And he didn't have to. By then I had already learned the most important lesson in my adult life. I have to believe myself. when the room won't. Another reason or experience for building my resilience is I have been a woman in a
male-dominated industry my entire career. Yeah, even the beauty industry, the decisions at the top, the distributors, the brands, the business side has been predominantly owned by men for decades. In my career and in my life, I've been told that my experience wasn't real.
I've been told that a man who acted unkindly to me must have been having a bad day because he's always nice to the person saying it. I've heard a thousand versions of the phrase, well, I've never had experience with him. Each of those phrases has asked me to erase myself a little.
And I have chosen over and over not to do that. So when I say that genuine resilience is knowing you will get through, even when it's bad, I mean it. This is the thing that I've been building since I was a kid in a hospital bed.
The reason toxic positivity lands so hard on me is that the exact wound I have spent my whole life healing Every time someone tells me to look on the bright side, they're doing a smaller version of what the school kids did, what the doctor did, what the friends said.
They are telling me that my reality is not real. I don't buy it. I think what saved me every single time was that somewhere deep inside, deep down inside, I kept believing myself anyway. And that's what I want for you. So I ask you, where was your resilience forged? Not the slogan version, the real one.
What did you live through that taught you that you could live through anything? And are you giving yourself enough credit for it? Or are you still explaining it away? So far, we've talked about toxic positivity as something that happens between people. One person says a phrase and the other person receives it as shame, right?
But there's another version that occurs inside of us and it may be more damaging to our well-being. It's when we use hope on ourselves to avoid reality. There are three examples I want to share of Hope's role in avoiding reality. One of them is mine.
I have lost 40 pounds, give or take, more than once in my life. That's not a small thing to say out loud, but it's true. Every single time I have done it, there has been a moment when the old eating habits slowly creep back in. The thing is,
I'm conscious of it, but in order to avoid it, I won't step on the scale. Because the scale would tell me the truth, right? I will negotiate with myself. If I gained, it's probably only one or two pounds. And I can easily lose that. But mostly I hope that I haven't gained any of it back.
I hope I got away with it. I will go for months hoping. not stepping on that scale. And every single time when I finally face it, the weight is back plus more. That is not hope. It's avoidance dressed up very nicely. The second example is we all know someone who always says everything will work out.
They say it over and over. But Self-indulgence, struggling to pay bills, and then panicking about money while never changing your mindset or the circumstances that are actually in your control don't create different results. It's a pattern exhibited by many, and a version of it is in all of us.
It's when we get into a bind, we say the universe will provide. Or we just go back to doing the thing that created the bind in the first place. There's nothing wrong with hope if there's action behind it. Some people call it faith mixed in with gratitude and a positive mindset.
I'm all for that as long as we change the negative behavior. I have seen with my own eyes that when hope becomes the permission slip to not change, It's not hope at all. It's just a cage with a pretty little name on it. My last example is the truth, but it's more dramatic.
I had a friend who avoided opening his bills for months. He avoided paying his taxes for many years. And the weight of all that avoidance built up such stress in his body that it started to take over his vagus nerve. Once that vagus nerve was activated, he would just pass out randomly, hit his head,
like it was very horrible. It seemed that his body was doing the work of what his mind refused to do. The envelope stayed closed, but his nervous system was paying the bills instead. The body always knows what the mind is avoiding. You can keep the envelopes closed. You can skip the scale. You can continue destructive behavior.
But your body keeps a record. And eventually, I guess the record comes due. As I said at the start of this episode, hope without action is a trap. Hope is supposed to be the fuel and the thing that keeps you walking when the path is long or winding or actually unclear.
But I think when you use hope to not walk at all, it stops being hope and starts being like a wall that keeps you stuck. Nelson Mandela, he spent 27 years in prison. 27 years of reality that he couldn't pretend was anything other than what it was. But somehow, He emerged without bitterness, without despair,
and without denial about what had happened to him. Now, obviously, I don't know him, but what I've read of him, about him, that is what everything says. No bitterness, no despair, and didn't deny what had actually happened to him. In his autobiography, he wrote about his own optimism. He said,
part of being optimistic is keeping one's head pointed towards the sun and one's feet moving forward. That's not one thing, it's two. Your head is pointed toward the sun. Let's call that hope. And your feet are moving forward. Let's call that action. hope and action together in the same sentence, in the same practice.
The Nelson Mandela foundation says it even more plainly. They say his hope was not passive optimism, but it was disciplined and active and strategic. That's the kind of hope that produces resilience, hope that looks at the scale, and still believes you can change your relationship with food.
It's hope that opens the envelope and deals with whatever is inside of it. And it's also hope that acknowledges your mother is dying and still sits on the arm of the chair with her. The other kind, the kind of hope that keeps your feet still, No matter how pretty your view of the sun is, it's not hope.
It's paralysis. Let me give you something to think about. What's the envelope you're not opening? Or what's the scale you're not stepping on? What's the phone call you're not returning? And what's the version of hope you've been using to justify not doing it?
I want to make sure that anyone listening to this doesn't think I'm the evolved one in this conversation and other people are the ones who need to work on themselves. So here's my own piece. Throughout my life and especially my childhood, I heard the phrases that you're fine, you're okay, you're all right. And to be fair,
I was sometimes. Sometimes I was fine. Sometimes I was also bleeding and broken. The Venn diagram definitely has some overlap there. And then, of course, because we become our own influencers, I have caught myself using the same phrases on people I work with.
When a hair color has gone wrong in the salon, a stylist may start to panic. And I have been known to look them dead in the eye and say, you're fine. I use it as a reset, a little electric jolt to their nervous system.
It gets the panicker, not a word, back online so we can solve the problem in front of us. It's not the worst tool, but it's also not the best one. Honestly, a quick you're fine in the middle of a high pressure salon moment is not the same as telling your grieving mother to be grateful she's alive.
There is a difference and the difference matters. But the phrase is still a phrase. It's still doing the thing that phrases do. Telling the person in front of you that their distress is unwarranted. When what I actually mean is we can fix this. Those are two different messages. The first one shrinks the person.
The second one expands the walls in the room, allowing breath. I'm still learning to reach for that second one. I think the work of noticing what we reach for is not pass or fail. But it's not about becoming the perfect person who never says the wrong thing. It's about catching yourself. Each time you catch yourself,
you earn a little bit of space between the reflex and the response. Allowance for the ability to choose something different. That's what I'm trying to practice. So think about what is your go-to phrases or phrase? What's the one that you reach for when someone else's feelings are making you feel uncomfortable? Name it, just name it.
You cannot change what you have not seen. Okay, now let's turn this into something that we can actually use. The following are a few things that you can try this week, just a handful of practices. The first one is to notice the phrases. Notice the ones other people reach for when you bring them something real.
Notice the ones you reach for when someone brings you something real. You don't have to fix them yet, but you just have to see them. Awareness is the open door. The second one, when someone you love brings you something hard, Try saying nothing at all at first.
That sounds really hard, but try something like, I'm so sorry, tell me more. Or try, what do you need right now? Ask a question instead of offering a phrase. A phrase can create shame. A question can create presence. The third one is stress. to let people be furious or heartbroken. Let them be scared.
You don't have to fix them. You don't even have to match their mood. You don't have to talk them out of it, which is something I do very often. You just have to stay because that's the whole gift. Not many know how to stay. The fourth one is to let yourself be furious too.
You're allowed to be angry about the unfair thing. You're allowed to be scared about a hard thing. You're allowed to not be grateful in the moment where gratitude has not earned itself yet. If I had a dime for every time somebody said to me, you have to be grateful, but I couldn't feel it, it annoyed me.
It made me feel less than. If someone tries to talk you out of your own feelings with a bumper sticker phrase, you're allowed to notice that. You don't have to say anything. You just have to recognize it for what it is. The fifth one's the hardest. I will tell you, open the envelope. Step on the scale.
Return the call. Make the appointment. Whatever it is that that hope has been letting you not do, do the smallest version of it this week. Not the whole thing, just the first step. Because that first step is the whole thing. The first step is how you know that hope is real. So here's where this lands.
If you recognized yourself anywhere, in what we talked about today, on either side of it, like the one who has been shut down or the one who does the shutting down, just hear this. Noticing is not the same as being stuck. Noticing is actually the movement. Noticing is the first thing resilience actually asks of you.
Toxic positivity tells you that your reality is a problem to manage. Genuine resilience tells you that your reality is the only honest place to begin. Hope, the real kind, is not something you hold instead of reality. It's something you hold while you're looking right at it. My mom died.
I never got to undo what I said at that elevator. But I did learn what she was trying to teach me. Even when she was angry, Even when she was scared, she was trying to teach me that love is not the same as comfort. That being present for someone is not the same as trying to fix them.
That sitting on the arm of the chair is sometimes the most resilient thing a person can do. I carry her with me in this work. I carry every version of myself who had to learn to believe her own story when the room would not. So here's your final reflection question.
It's just one, and I would love it if you could just sit with it. Where in your life have you been reaching for a phrase when what the moment is actually asking you for is to be present with someone else, with yourself? Name one place, just one. And then this week, try staying instead.
If you'd like to explore what is quietly holding you back or what patterns have been doing their work in silence, or actually what might be waiting on the other side of them, I would love to talk to you. You can find me at decotalifecoaching.com. I offer individual coaching and I truly love this work.
Thank you so much for being here with me today. This episode was not an easy one to put together and I do not take it lightly that you spent this time with me. I hope something we talked about today stays with you.
I hope it helps you be a little gentler with yourself and a little more honest with the people you love. I'll see you next time.
When the “I” Is Everything: The Cost of Only Seeing Yourself
We live in an era where everyone has a platform, an opinion, and a filter — and somewhere in the middle of it all, we stopped seeing each other. In this episode, Evet explores what happens when the "I" becomes everything: how hyper-individualism is quietly reshaping our capacity for connection, patience, and basic human decency across every generation. From loneliness and polarization to empathy erosion and othering, this episode names what so many are feeling but struggling to articulate, and then asks what we are willing to do about it.
A friend mentioned she’d seen a music show about an hour away. What stayed with her wasn’t the performance but how friendly everyone was, staff and patrons alike. That struck me as unusual, but shouldn’t it be the norm?
The more I sat with it, the more I noticed: over the past five to ten years, patience, tolerance, and presence have, somewhere along the way, become the exception, not the rule. But why? Is it the “I” phone? Social media? A lack of in-person socializing? Is it othering, hyper-individualism, or empathy erosion? Maybe it’s all of the above, and if it is, what is it costing us?
There’s a reason this shift didn’t happen gradually over generations; it happened very fast. The iPhone launched in 2007, and people changed somewhere in the years that followed.
We stopped noticing what was around us and became little versions of Spielberg, documenting everything instead. Selfies, photos of food, filtered versions of real life, and then, everyone felt they needed to post their opinions about everything. Stated with the confidence of a New York Times editor, whether the facts backed them up or not.
Today, with each opinion liked or hearted, the “I” obsession grows, and so does disconnection. It sounds counterintuitive: more connection, more disconnection. But the more praise we receive through algorithms, the more real connections fade.
The psychological term for what happens when a culture tips so far toward the self is hyper-individualism, and it isn’t just a theory. In their book The Narcissism Epidemic, psychologists Jean Twenge and W. Keith Campbell identify online attention seeking as one of the key drivers of rising narcissism in American culture, and it’s not hard to see why.
Research points to three specific costs: loneliness, polarization, and a slow erosion of empathy. Not because people become bad, but because the lens narrows. When we filter everything through “I” – my experience, my opinion, my image – there’s simply less room for anyone else.
You can see all three playing out across the last three generations, just in different ways.
Gen Z is the first generation to grow up entirely inside the “I” era, and connection, in every form, has paid the price. They date less and are significantly less sexually active than the previous generation was at their age. They are slower to get their driver’s license, less likely to spend time together in person, and more likely to consider gaming or scrolling through social media as hanging out.
AI enters the room. Teachers and professors across the country are frustrated and failing students who submit papers written entirely by artificial intelligence. Often, nothing is their own voice or reflects their own thinking. But the deeper loss is the disappearance of something that used to happen naturally: sitting with a question long enough to form an opinion, debating ideas with friends, being curious out loud, writing something, and discovering what you actually think in the process of writing it. AI doesn’t just do the work for them; it removes the struggle that builds a mind. It is the ultimate “I’ tool. Instant, frictionless, and entirely without the discomfort of genuine thought or human exchange
Millennials came of age in the era of participation trophies and unconditional praise, also known as the self-esteem movement. They were raised to believe that showing up was enough, but research by leading self-esteem social psychologist Roy Baumeister shows that this didn’t build confidence so much as it built fragility that follows them into adulthood. Combined with the rise of the “I” era during their formative years, hyper-individualism took on a particular shape in this generation: my feelings, my boundaries, my truth became the primary framework for navigating the world, sometimes at the expense of discomfort that real growth and real relationships require. Many are still living at home, working remotely, their most social interaction a Slack message. There’s comfort in the arrangement, and without the friction of real workplace dynamics or in-person relationships, they may have less urgency to develop the resilience that comes from navigating them. It’s not laziness, it’s what happens when an entire generation was never quite asked to be uncomfortable, and then handed a phone that confirmed their worldview with every scroll.
Gen X, my own generation, stays home, streams, and, if we’re being honest, doesn’t put much effort into maintaining friendships the way we once did. I feel like the pandemic pushed us toward aloneness quickly, and we settled into it like a warm bath. Soothing for a bit, but stay in too long, and the pruning bleeds into the oncoming wrinkles of old age.
Gen X’s version of hyper-individualism looks different from the generations that followed us. It doesn’t look like fragility; it looks like detachment. We are the ‘suck it up, buttercup’ generation. We don’t particularly care what people think; we handle our business, and we have very little patience for what we perceive as coddling. I watched it up close when I went back to school and was significantly older than my classmates. I worked full-time while carrying a full course load. I was accountable to myself because that’s what I knew how to be. Sitting next to students who couldn’t turn in assignments on time, who were overwhelmed to the point of not being able to attend class, was jarring. There was even a woman in my class who told me and then the professor that she was going to be late turning in her midterm essay because she had a date and had to get her nails done. The gap between us felt enormous.
Here’s the thing about judgment, and I say this from a lot of experience: it is its own form of the “I.” When we decide that our way of handling hardship is the right way, that our threshold for discomfort is the standard everyone else should meet, we stop being able to see people across that divide. We separate and separation, whatever generation it comes from, leads to the same place; less connection, less empathy, more alone.
Three generations with three different expressions of the same withdrawal
Yet by every measure, we are more connected than any generation in human history. That’s the paradox. The more we curate and perform our lives for an audience, the less we actually let anyone in. In 2023, former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy described loneliness as an epidemic on par with tobacco use and obesity- not a personal failing or a phase, but a public health crisis serious enough that the World Health Organization created an entire commission to address it. Loneliness, in his diagnosis, doesn’t just make us sad, but underpins violence, addiction, and extremism. Murthy states that human connection is the antidote, and that is the very thing the “I” generations have replaced with a screen.
Loneliness doesn’t stay private for long. When people stop truly connecting, they start dividing, and nowhere is that more visible right now than in our politics.
Us and them is where we are. I live in one of the most liberal parts of the country, and I won’t pretend I’m above it; my blood runs blue. I watch what is happening to this country under this administration, and I feel the heat of it. I have many friends, clients, and coworkers who won’t give the time of day to people who voted red, nor are they able to have a productive debate about their thoughts and opinions; they won’t even sit long enough with an opposing point to actually consider it. Where I live, supporting MAGA isn’t just a political difference of opinions in its purest form; it’s a moral failing, a conscious stripping of civil rights. And on the other side of the country, people feel the same way about us. That’s what is known as polarization. Two groups, both certain they’re right, both increasingly unable to see the humanity in the other. The “I” doesn’t just isolate us from individuals; it isolates us from entire groups of people who don’t reflect our tribal worldview to us.
A lot of this is by design because we are no longer consuming the same reality. The digital algorithm doesn’t show you the world; it shows you a mirror. It feeds you more of what you already believe until your feed becomes a closed loop, and everyone outside of it starts to look like the enemy. Fox News and One America News Network versus CNN and MS NOW viewers aren’t just disagreeing; they’re living in entirely different versions of what’s true. Those living in small towns versus living in cities might as well be living in different countries at this point, not just in politics but in daily reality, in access, in values, and in what they’re afraid might be the real truth.
Class is another big, yet rarely spoken about, polarizing divide that is fueling hyper-individualism. It is crushingly expensive to exist here because there are the ultra-wealthy and lower-income residents receiving tax or government program assistance, and then there’s the middle class, quietly failing, hanging on by their nails, too much to qualify for help and not enough to actually breathe. I am always very close to that edge, and I can tell you it creates its own kind of isolation. The unhoused crisis here is overwhelming and heartbreaking, and even that has become a polarizing issue; compassion on one side, frustration on the other, and very little willingness to sit in the complexity of both being true at the same time.
This is what hyper-individualism produces at scale. When my experience is the only lens, my truth becomes the only truth. When my truth is the only truth, there is no shared ground left. Not politically, economically, nor humanly. We stop asking what someone else is living through and start deciding what they deserve.
The culmination of loneliness and polarization leads to a spectrum of empathy erosion. We stop imagining how someone feels, and we stop caring about what’s happening to others. Psychologically, it grows out of living in the “I” reality, layered with stress, fear, and the dehumanization of others, so we can emotionally detach and ignore them, whether temporarily or over long stretches of time.
A comedian friend of mine posts funny stories and observations on social media. In many of her posts, she performs this exaggerated outrage at human behavior, but it’s clearly sarcastic and playful. Hundreds of people get the joke and love her content. But there’s always a small, stinging group that shows up with personal attacks that are shocking, ugly, and brutal.
She’s a beautiful woman, and yet people attack her appearance and, most relentlessly, the fact that she’s a female. It appalls me that people don’t pause to consider how those comments would feel if someone directed them back at the hate slingers, or at their own children and loved ones. Somehow, sitting alone behind a laptop permits us to say things we would never say face-to-face, to people we don’t know and will likely never meet, who will probably never affect our lives at all.
When did the person on the other side of the screen stop being a person?
The scholar, john a. powell, a Professor of Law at UC Berkeley and the Director of the Othering & Belonging Institute, has built his life’s work around a similar question. He asks: What happens when we stop seeing people as fully human? When interviewed on For the Wild Podcast, powell defined “othering” as any practice that denies someone their full humanity and dignity. That very denial is rooted in the belief that certain people are beneath us or simply irrelevant. Powell stated before this current administration that, at its extreme, it casts the other as a threat, warning that violence often follows. Hear that again, and tell me that doesn’t feel like a current headline.
The discussion and treatment of immigrants in this country is not a policy debate; it is othering in its most institutionalized form. When we accept othering as a justification for violence, belonging becomes conditional, and no one is truly safe.
In his 2024 book Belonging Without Othering, powell argues that we can build community without requiring an enemy to define ourselves against. We can belong without pushing someone else out. It sounds so simple, yet it is anything but.
Empathy erosion doesn’t stop at rudeness or political division. Follow it far enough, and you arrive at addiction and mental illness left unaddressed, and at children being trafficked and abused; the most vulnerable among us are rendered invisible by a society that has turned so far inward it can no longer see them.
That is the full cost of a myopic view, so the question becomes, is there another way?
Thinking back to my friend’s experience at the music show makes me realize that we have to try a little harder.
It starts with something as simple as being present. What would it be like to actually put the phone down at dinner, to look around at the people seated with us, or to notice what we are eating and recognize the work that went into making it? Presence is not a grand gesture; it’s a decision made in small moments, over and over again.
And when we’re present, we start to notice what we’ve been missing. Ask yourself, what gets lost when we’re half present? Maybe it’s your life when you use a crosswalk, staring down at your phone the entire time as traffic whirls nearby. Or maybe it’s something quieter, the unhoused person sitting on the same corner you pass every week. What would be the harm in smiling, saying hello, or even stopping to ask how they’re doing? Extending our circle of concern doesn’t require a grand gesture; it only requires looking up and seeing what’s in front of you.
Looking up also means being willing to see people we’d rather avoid. What if we actually sought out the discomfort, such as I don’t know, spending time with the other team? Open, honest conversations with people who see the world differently than we do. I know many people would say that’s not an issue for them, yet when it comes to political differences, I have a gut feeling the percentage who wouldn’t do it is significantly high, but can you imagine seeking it out rather than avoiding it? I will say this: I do it almost every time I work in the salon with MAGA-aligned clients. It may be uncomfortable, but it’s also the only way I know how to keep the circle from closing entirely.
Discomfort requires accountability, and accountability is simply owning what you do and say, and sitting with the consequences without looking for someone else to blame. It’s not being a passive participant in your life or in the lives of the people around you. Psychologists call this your internal locus of control, the belief that your choices, not your circumstances, determine your outcomes. It’s also one of the greatest builders of resilience. What you say lands somewhere, and what you do affects someone. Therefore, accountability is the decision to care about that, and caring builds trust, empathy, and respect. It slowly dismantles the ‘us and them,’ opens communication, and makes real resolution possible.
For me personally, accountability in how I show up in relationships starts with truly listening, not waiting for my turn to speak or forming my response before the other person has finished, but actually hearing what someone is saying to me. It means walking the talk and talking the walk; the values I speak about on this podcast, in my coaching, and in my life have to show up in the room when it’s inconvenient, when I’m tired, or when the person in front of me is difficult. That’s when it matters most, and although I wish I could say my accountability is absolute, it’s a trait I’m willing to continue to work on.
And sometimes accountability looks like something even smaller than that. Years ago, on vacation, I met a couple from the Netherlands who were baffled by something Americans do constantly. People passing by would say, “Hello, how are you?” and keep walking without waiting for an answer. I laughed and told them it was just part of the greeting. They paused, then said: “So you don’t really care about how we are, it’s just words?” My amusement faded quickly. They had just described an entire cultural habit in one sentence: self-absorption.
I realize that I can’t fix the country or the world, but I can attempt to make my small circle a little nicer. I start with small acts of kindness: a smile, eye contact, a compliment, a thank you, or asking someone how they really are, and then sticking around to hear the answer.
Which is exactly what my friend experienced at that music show, and it moved her enough to tell me about it. The world changes one circle at a time.
Whose circle could you step into this week, and what might you find there?
Baumeister, R. F., & Tice, D. M. (2022, February 16). Ego depletion is the best replicated finding in all of ... Ego Depletion is the Best Replicated Finding in All of Social Psychology. https://lupinepublishers.com/psychology-behavioral-science-journal/pdf/SJPBS.MS.ID.000234.pdf
Jabbour, R. (2025, January 18). Empathy is dying and so are we. The SMU Journal. https://www.thesmujournal.ca/editor/empathy-is-dying-and-so-are-we
Kennedy, D. (2024, April 8). The role of personal accountability in Changing your life. Kevon Owen, Christian Counseling Clinical Psychotherapist. https://kevonowen.com/clinical-psychotherpy/the-role-of-personal-accountability-in-changing-your-life/
Othering & Belonging Institute (Ed.). (2025). American Press Institute: Designing gatherings where everyone belongs. Home | Othering & Belonging Institute. https://belonging.berkeley.edu/
Othering & Belonging Institute. (2026). John A. Powell. john a. powell. https://www.johnapowell.org/
Twenge, J. M., & Campbell, W. K. (2009). The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement. Atria Books.
The Hidden Pattern Behind Procrastination: How Your Brain Turns Discomfort into Delay
The Original Self Podcast Episode 5: The Hidden Pattern Behind Procrastination How Your Brain Turns Discomfort into Delay
If you have ever cleaned your entire kitchen, reorganized a drawer for the third time, or started a four-season show instead of the one task that has been sitting at the top of your list for weeks — this episode is for you.
Most of us have been taught that procrastination is a discipline problem. A time management issue. A character flaw. But that understanding is incomplete. And in this episode, I want to give you something more accurate — and more useful — than shame.
What we cover:
We start by getting precise about what procrastination actually is — and what it is not. Not all delay is procrastination, and collapsing them into the same category is part of why we end up punishing ourselves for situations that were never in our control. I break down the difference between purposeful delay, inevitable delay, and emotional delay, and why each one deserves a different response.
From there, we explore the four distinct types of procrastination — hedonistic, arousal, irrational, and psychological distress delay — because recognizing which one you are dealing with changes how you respond to it.
At the center of this episode is the work of Dr. Timothy Pychyl, whose research makes one thing clear: procrastination is not about time. It is about emotion. We are not avoiding the task. We are avoiding the feeling attached to the task. And avoidance works — which is exactly what makes it so hard to break. I also explore the neuroscience behind why the brain chooses avoidance, and what it takes to override a nervous system that has learned to treat your most meaningful work as a threat.
We then look at what actually gets us unstuck, drawing on David Allen's Getting Things Done methodology and James Clear's argument that action comes before motivation — not the other way around.
The conversation deepens with Self-Determination Theory from psychologists Edward Deci and Richard Ryan, whose three basic psychological needs — autonomy, competence, and relatedness — reveal exactly why certain tasks feel nearly impossible to approach. I also bring in Dr. Kristin Neff's research on self-compassion, and why self-judgment does not correct the pattern of procrastination. It reinforces it.
I share a personal story about a period in my own life when procrastination had less to do with laziness and everything to do with shame — and the moment I realized the shame did not belong to me.
We close with the identity connection: how repeated avoidance builds a story about who we are, and how the Pygmalion and Golem Effects — the psychology of high and low expectations — shape not just what others believe about us, but what we have quietly come to believe about ourselves.
The reflection question to sit with:
What is the one thing you have been putting off that, if you are being honest with yourself, matters to you more than almost anything else on your list? And what is the very first physical step — not the whole thing, just the first movement — that you could take toward it this week?
I have, on more than one occasion, cleaned my entire kitchen, reorganized a drawer I have already organized three times, and once, very proudly, alphabetized a shelf of CDs I have not touched in years, all to avoid sitting down to write something I told myself I was going to write. If you are smiling, it is because you have your version of that story too. Maybe yours looks like scrolling instead of starting, answering every email except the one that actually matters, or starting a four-season show instead of the one task that has been sitting at the top of your list for weeks.
We call all of this procrastination, and most of us believe it’s a discipline problem, a time-management issue, or a character flaw. That understanding is incomplete, and what I want to offer here is something more accurate and more useful than shame.
Not All Delay Is Procrastination
Collapsing every form of delay into procrastination is part of why we end up punishing ourselves for situations that were never in our control, so it is worth getting precise about it. Procrastination has a specific definition: the voluntary delay of an intended action, even when you know that delay will make things worse. That word voluntary matters because it means you could act and choose, consciously or not, to avoid it.
Three other types of delay are not procrastination and deserve their own category.
Purposeful delay is intentional, the act of scheduling something for a time that genuinely fits your life based on practical reasoning.
Inevitable delay is when life intervenes in ways you cannot control, whether that is illness, an emergency, a canceled flight, or the internet going down in the middle of a deadline.
Emotional delay is avoiding something to escape a feeling, such as anxiety, grief, insecurity, or fear of failure. Emotional delay brings short-term relief but tends to carry a long-term cost in stress, guilt, and reduced performance.
Before you label yourself a procrastinator, it is worth asking honestly whether this is voluntary avoidance or whether something is genuinely in the way.
The Four Types of Procrastination
When something is actually procrastination, understanding which type you are dealing with changes how you respond.
Hedonistic delay is the most familiar: choosing immediate pleasure or gratification over a long-term goal, the show over the project, or the donut over the workout planned for later.
Arousal delay is waiting until the last minute for the thrill that urgency creates, and it is worth asking honestly whether you genuinely work better under pressure or whether it has simply become the only gear you use.
Irrational procrastination is putting something off even when you know clearly that the delay will make the outcome worse, with no pleasure or thrill involved, just avoidance despite knowing better.
Psychological distress delay is perhaps the most compassion-worthy of the four: the inability to begin, not because you are undisciplined, but because grief, overwhelm, or burnout has used up the emotional capacity that starting requires.
Why the Brain Chooses Avoidance
The psychologist, Dr. Timothy Pychyl, who has spent a significant part of his career researching procrastination, arrives at a conclusion that is deceptively simple: procrastination has nothing to do with time and everything to do with emotion. More specifically, it is what happens when the brain prioritizes feeling better right now over doing what we actually intended. In other words, we are not avoiding the task, but we are avoiding whatever the task makes us feel.
The reason this pattern is so hard to break is that avoidance works. The moment you set something aside, there is genuine relief, your body relaxes, and the discomfort lifts. Your brain logs that result and now has evidence that avoidance resolves the problem, so the next time that same feeling surfaces, it offers you the same solution. Eventually, the choice disappears entirely, then avoidance simply becomes your default.
The neuroscience behind this is worth understanding. When a task feels threatening, the amygdala, which is the part of the brain responsible for detecting danger, can effectively take the wheel from the prefrontal cortex, which handles rational thinking and decision-making. Once that happens, willpower is largely beside the point because you are no longer dealing with a logic problem. You are dealing with a nervous system that has categorized this particular task as something to be escaped.
That is what Pychyl means when he calls procrastination a negative reinforcer. It removes something unpleasant, in this case, the emotion, and that removal becomes the reward. This is not irrational behavior because, in the short term, it is actually quite effective, but the problem is accumulation. Every time we let avoidance handle the feeling, we make it slightly harder to face that task the next time around.
What Actually Gets Us Unstuck
David Allen, the author behind the Getting Things Done methodology, builds his entire framework around one central insight: overwhelm and uncertainty are not problems of willpower; they are problems of clarity. The way through is not motivation but identifying the very next physical action. Not the project or the goal or the full picture, just the first immediate and concrete step. Not 'work on the presentation' but 'open the document.' The brain can act on something specific and freeze in the face of something formless.
James Clear argues that action comes before motivation, not the other way around, and we sit and wait to feel ready or inspired or like the time is right while waiting for something that can only be created by beginning. Newton's First Law explains exactly why: an object at rest stays at rest, and an object in motion stays in motion. Procrastination is inertia. The task does not get harder the longer we wait, but starting does, and once we are in motion, even slightly, the next step becomes easier than it looked from the outside.
Self-Compassion and Procrastination
The connection between self-knowledge and the psychology of procrastination is a layer, I think, that often gets overlooked, and it may be the most important one.
Psychologists Edward Deci and Richard Ryan developed Self-Determination Theory to explain what genuinely drives human wellbeing and motivation from the inside out, and at the heart of their work are three basic psychological needs. The first is autonomy, the need to feel like your choices are genuinely yours and freely made. The second is competence, the sense that you are capable of handling what is in front of you and that you can grow within it. The third is relatedness, the feeling of belonging and connection, and that what you do and who you are actually matters to someone else.
When all three of those needs are present, people tend to function well, and when any one of them is missing or under threat, motivation quietly erodes. So, when you find yourself stalling on something, it is worth asking which of these feels most compromised, because the avoidance is rarely random and tends to point directly at something specific.
Dr. Kristin Neff, whose research on self-compassion draws from both Western psychology and Buddhist practice, offers what I believe is the most underused tool in this conversation, and it is not a more disciplined or stricter system. It is the act of treating yourself the way you would treat someone you love who was struggling with the same thing. The research is consistent on this: self-judgment does not reduce procrastination, it deepens it. When we avoid something and then criticize ourselves for avoiding it, we layer shame on top of the original discomfort, and shame is one of the hardest emotions to sit with, so we avoid that too. The task now carries two layers of feeling we are running from instead of one, and the self-criticism that was meant to push us forward actually digs the hole deeper. Brene Brown speaks to this as well, describing procrastination as often less about laziness and more about self-protection, a way of shielding ourselves from the vulnerability of judgment, of trying and falling short, instead of truly being seen for our efforts.
A Personal Story
Many years ago, I had a bad accident which resulted in many broken bones, six months off of work, followed by another twelve months of physical therapy and part-time work. In those eighteen months of physical healing, I lost control of my hair salon. When I say control, I mean the vibe, structure, and peace I wanted everyone to feel while spending time and money there. I worked very hard to create an environment that was beautiful and welcoming, where anyone could come regardless of status or appearance. I hired talented stylists, installed systems to help the salon flow effortlessly, and was ever-present to keep that vision alive.
When I could no longer work or worked far less, that feeling disappeared. When I would walk in, I could sense the stylists not caring about anything but themselves, not coming to meetings, and disrespecting everything I had built. I no longer wanted to be at the salon I had built from the ground up, and still, I kept procrastinating on speaking about how I was feeling because I knew it would not be received with understanding or compassion.
It was not until I recognized that feeling angry and undermined had taken away my initial reason for building the salon environment in the first place that something began to shift. I slowly realized that my sense of competence and relatedness was not gone. I had just buried it in the shame of self-judgment and avoidance. Once I recognized what was actually happening, everything changed. I had thrown my hat in the ring and put everything on the line, taken every risk and absorbed every cost financially, emotionally, and personally, and shown a level of vulnerability they had never dared to come close to. The shame I was carrying did not belong to me because I had confused their resistance with my failure, and once I stopped doing that, the clarity came back. The procrastination loosened its grip, the vision for the salon resurfaced, and I finally made the changes I had been resisting.
The Identity Connection
Procrastination, at its most stubborn, is often an identity problem as much as an emotional one. When we repeatedly avoid something, we build a story around the avoidance: I am someone who cannot finish things, I never follow through, I am not the kind of person who does this. And when a story about ourselves gets repeated long enough and goes unchallenged long enough, it stops feeling like a story and starts feeling like a fact.
In psychology, this dynamic is captured in two effects that sit on opposite ends of the same spectrum.
The Pygmalion Effect is what happens when someone genuinely believes in us and communicates a real expectation that we are capable, and studies show that belief alone can shift performance. When someone holds a high bar for us and makes that visible, something in us tends to reach for it.
You can see this play out in sports as clearly as anywhere. This season, the Golden State Warriors, my all-time favorite NBA team, have won 21 home games compared to 15 away. That means they have a 40% higher win rate at home than on the road. While Steph Curry’s extraordinary skill and the thousands of hours he has put into his craft are undeniable, I believe the crowd at Chase Center is part of that equation, too. I have taken part in thousands of people on their feet, believing in the players, expressing that belief loudly and without reservation, which fuels the team’s fire. Confidence has an audience, and the Pygmalion Effect suggests that the belief others hold for us doesn’t just feel good; it actually changes what we are capable of.
The Golem Effect runs in the opposite direction: when doubt is the message, spoken or unspoken, direct or delivered through a telling silence, we tend to shrink to fit it. Low expectations have a way of becoming self-fulfilling, not because we are weak, but because the nervous system is extraordinarily sensitive to what the people around us believe we are worth.
The free-throw line in an NBA away game is one of the clearest illustrations of the Golem Effect in action. The shooter stands alone, and the pressure comes from every direction at once: their coaches and team are counting on them to make the extra points, while their own mind runs commentary on their success or failure. However, the loudest pressure often comes from the crowd that doesn’t want them to succeed. Fans seated behind the basket swirl rally towels, clash noisemakers together, and boo with the kind of sustained intensity designed to make the shooter doubt themselves in that single unguarded moment. In some cities, the crowd is even incentivized with free chicken tenders if the away player misses both free throws, which gives thousands of people a very personal reason to make as much noise as possible. The message being sent is clear and collective: we don’t believe you can do this, and the research on the Golem Effect suggests that message, delivered loudly enough and by enough people, can actually work.
The question worth sitting with is not only what others have expected of you, but which of those expectations you have quietly made your own, and whether the voice driving your avoidance is actually yours or belongs to someone who decided a long time ago what you were and were not capable of.
Where to Begin
The next time you catch yourself avoiding something that matters, try getting curious before getting critical. Ask yourself what feeling this task is asking you to sit with that you have not yet given yourself permission to feel, which of your three psychological needs feels most at risk, and what the smallest possible physical action is that you could take right now before the feeling resolves. You do not need to feel ready or have the whole picture. You just need one concrete next step taken before the amygdala gets the final word, because patterns, once seen clearly, lose some of their grip, and some is always a starting place.
What is the one thing you have been putting off that, if you are being honest with yourself, matters to you more than almost anything else on your list? And what is the very first physical step, not the whole thing but just the first movement, that you could take toward it this week?
Helping you reflect deeper, grow stronger, and walk confidently back to yourself, through coaching, podcasts, and blogs.: decotalifecoaching.com
What Loss Leaves Behind:
Grief, Identity, and Who You Become When Someone or Something Is Gone
Welcome to The Original Self Podcast. I’m Evet DeCota, owner of DeCota Life Coaching. I’m a psychology-informed life coach exploring resilience, mindset, and the courage to become your authentic self. This is a space for honest conversations about growth, identity, relationships, and all the messy moments in between that shape who we become. Whatever brought you here today, you’re in the right place.
I’ve noticed over the years that, standing behind a salon chair and coaching individuals, people rarely come in for just a hair service or a single topic. They come to me carrying doubts, fears, dreams, and questions about who they are becoming.
Over time, I’ve realized that beneath all the noise of expectations, criticism, and life’s pressures, there is still a version of ourselves. Let’s explore What Loss Leaves Behind: Grief, Identity, and Who You Become When Someone or Something Is Gone.
Every loss changes the shape of the life around it. Some losses are announced with funerals and flowers. Others happen quietly, without ceremony, and nobody thinks to ask how you are doing.
Loss is not just about death. It’s about the absence of something or someone that once helped define who you were. Today I want to talk about all of it — the losses we name and the ones we never do. And I have brought someone with me who has lived through many of the same ones I have.
Stefan DeCota is my older brother by almost three years. We were very close as small children, drifted apart in our late teen years the way siblings sometimes do when they are busy becoming themselves, and found each other again in our mid-twenties in a way that has never wavered since. Our mother taught us to value one another and to be each other’s best friends. An argument has never lasted more than a few hours — it simply wasn’t allowed.
Stefan is a strategic business advisor with 25 years of experience at large startups and data-driven companies across marketing, finance, and fashion. But his real talents are not seen; they are felt. They are felt by everyone who knows him and everyone he takes an interest in. He celebrates people, he loves deeply, and because he loves so deeply, loss has hit him hard and often. He has carried a great deal, and yet he still stands. He doesn’t break, and that is exactly why his voice matters today.
When we lose a friend, through a huge rupture, a ghosting, a slow drift, or a death where circumstances kept us from being present, we are left holding a grief the world doesn’t have a name for.
Dr. Pauline Boss, a family therapist and researcher, developed the Theory of Ambiguous Loss. Ambiguous Loss describes grief that has no clear ending and no social recognition — the grief is real, but receives no permission to exist. Losing a friendship fits this perfectly. There’s no formal goodbye, and the world does not stop to acknowledge it. But the pain is real, and a shift in identity often follows. People often blame themselves or minimize it because there is no script for how to grieve someone who is still alive.
The Grief Nobody Names: Losing a Friendship -Ambiguous Loss
Questions:
• Have you ever lost a friendship that mattered to you — not through a fight or a clear ending, but just a slow disappearance? What was that like?
• Did losing that friendship change how you saw yourself at all?
I recently read research published in Nature Reviews Neuroscience that confirmed unacknowledged grief registers in the brain as genuine pain. The same neural regions activated by physical injury are also activated by social disconnection and loss. The fact that no one brought flowers does not mean the wound was not real.
Research presented by Duke and Yale Universities showed that friendships are biological. The bonds we form are governed by the same neural and biochemical systems woven into our health and survival. Stronger social bonds make us live longer and carry lower levels of cortisol, our stress hormone. This means losing a friendship is not just an emotional loss but one that the body registers and carries long after the conscious mind has moved on.
• Do you think men grieve the loss of friendships differently from women? Is it something men even talk about?
• Is there a loss in your life that did not fit neatly into any category — not a spouse, not a parent, not a traditional friendship — but hit you just as hard? How did you make sense of that grief when the world did not have a name for it?
• Is there anything harder than watching someone you love grieve, especially when you are grieving the same loss, and there is nothing you can do to take it away from them?
Romantic Relationships and Who You Were in Them: Identity Enmeshment and the Loss of the Relational Self
Psychologists who study relationships argue that our sense of self is partially constructed through our closest bonds. When a significant relationship ends, we do not just lose the person; we lose the version of ourselves that existed inside that relationship. The habits, the routines, the way we saw ourselves reflected in their eyes. This is sometimes called loss of the relational self, and it is why breakups and divorces can trigger a full identity crisis even when the relationship was not a healthy one.
Questions:
• When a significant relationship ends, do you think people lose more than just the person — do they lose a version of themselves too?
• How did you find your footing again after a significant relationship ended?
• Is there a version of yourself from a past relationship that you miss, or one you are glad is gone?
Losing Parents: Stages of Grief vs. Continuing Bonds Theory
For a long time, grief was understood as a process of letting go — moving through stages until you reached acceptance and release. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross gave us the five stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. They were never meant to be a linear checklist but are often treated as one.
More recent research, particularly Continuing Bonds Theory developed by Klass, Silverman, and Nickman, challenges the idea that healthy grieving means detaching from the person you lost. Instead, it suggests that we can and do maintain an ongoing relationship with those we have lost — carrying them forward in how we think, how we make decisions, and who we are becoming.
Losing a parent also removes the people who have known you the longest, the witnesses to your own story, and that particular absence reshapes identity in ways that take years to understand fully.
Questions:
• When we lost Mom and Dad, how did it change you — not just emotionally, but in terms of who you are?
• Did losing them make you question anything about your own identity or the direction of your life?
• Was there a moment after losing them where you felt completely untethered — like the people who knew you best were gone?
• How do you carry them now? What does that look like for you day to day?
The Unexpected Grief of Outgrowing People: Ambiguous Loss
Outgrowing someone you love falls into that same territory. There is no big fight, no funeral, no moment you can point to and say that is where it ended. You look up one day and realize the distance between you has become too wide to cross, and nobody permitted you to grieve that either.
Questions:
• Have you ever grown in a direction that took you away from people you once felt close to? How did you handle that?
• Is there guilt that comes with outgrowing someone, even when the growth is healthy?
• What would you say to someone in the middle of that right now — outgrowing people they love but unsure how to move forward without them?
Loss and the Original Self
Questions:
• Looking back at all of it — the people we have lost, the relationships that ended, the versions of ourselves that changed — who are you now that you might not have become without those losses?
• Do you think loss ever brings people closer to their original selves?
• What is the one thing about grief that you wish more people understood?
Personal Reflection:
Well, there you have it. One man’s perspective on loss and grief, and how we walk through it, carry it with us, and can become more from experiencing it.
For me personally, loss shows up in many ways and scenarios. I’ve had close friendships end, causing my confidence to diminish.
I feel that deep grief, that’s always just right under the surface, over my mother’s sickness and ultimate passing. When I lost my mother and father, I realized that I was an orphan, but after time had passed, I realized a type of power in having to count on myself rather than following a familial and cultural construct.
I know that loss left behind part of my innocent original self, but merged most of her with a stronger and more able self.
Mindset Shift:
What Stefan and I shared today is the kind of insight that doesn’t come from a textbook. It comes from living, and I hope that somewhere in our words, you heard something that sounded like your own story. Loss and grief are some of the most isolating experiences a human can have, and yet they are also the most universal. You are not alone in what you are carrying.
Reflection Question:
As I prepared for this episode, a quote by C.S. Lewis has stayed with me: Grief is like a long valley, a winding valley where any bend may reveal a totally new landscape. That is loss. That is life, so with that, ask yourself:
What loss are you still carrying that you have never given yourself full permission to grieve?
Thank you for listening to The Original Self Podcast. If these reflections resonate with you and you’d like to explore your own growth, you can learn more about my coaching at DeCota Life Coaching.
The Authentic Algorithm: Can AI Enhance or Hinder Who You Really Are?
Welcome to The Original Self Podcast. I’m Evet DeCota, owner of DeCota Life Coaching. I’m a psychology-informed life coach exploring resilience, mindset, and the courage to become your authentic self. This is a space for honest conversations about growth, identity, relationships, and all the messy moments in between that shape who we become. Whatever brought you here today, you’re in the right place
I’ve noticed over the years that, standing behind a salon chair and coaching individuals, people rarely come in for just a hair service or a single topic. They come to me carrying doubts, fears, dreams, and questions about who they are becoming.
Over time, I’ve realized that beneath all the noise of expectations, criticism, and life’s pressures, there is a version of ourselves that still exists. Let’s explore The Authentic Algorithm: Can AI enhance or hinder who you really are?
Over the last month or so, I have been speaking to clients and listening to podcasts and news about how AI is taking over just about everything. Advertising and marketing to news, songs, and audiobooks, and to the obvious AI-generated content flooding social media reels and stories. It’s fun to watch media reels of dogs dancing in synch or barking out a sentence, yet no one is fooled by it. But watching celebrities, athletes, or politicians say something they never said, voices and mouths perfectly matched, is where I start to feel unsettled. People fall for these falsities, and as misinformation has shown us over the last decade, when we start to believe a false narrative, a small divide becomes a chasm between people, viewpoints, and feelings.
I have a heightened concern about businesses increasingly pressured by wealth and power to abandon any guardrails that companies may want to install on the use of AI. I worry about American jobs becoming extinct in a mere decade or less. What would we do for money? What would we do with our time? How will we learn new things that make our minds and bodies stronger? How will we connect, either empathetically or in real life? Will we all become like the characters in the Apple TV series Plur1bus, where AI merges all of humanity into a single collective consciousness, peaceful on the surface, but stripped of every individual thought and impulse that makes us who we are?
And then a thought turned me inward. Hadn’t I used AI for prompts, spelling, and grammar checks? Didn’t I rely heavily on AI to build the first rendition of my website because the whole field was new to me, and I felt very unsure about my ability to communicate who I was and what I wanted to present to the world? I wondered whether using AI would quietly erode everyone’s creativity and critical thinking abilities, and whether leaning on it the way some people lean on an emotional support dog for comfort, rather than capability, might do more harm than good.
In case you have been living under a rock in the last few years, AI, at its core, is a technology trained from an enormous amount of human-generated information, designed to learn from it, reason with it, and communicate in ways that can feel surprisingly human. It doesn’t feel, intuit, or originate. That distinction matters enormously when we are talking about authenticity.
The first time I used AI, it seemed similar to a Google search, but now it feels like it’s a totally different beast. The more it starts to reason and communicate, the more my psychology-informed, curious brain hears the faint beep of a dying smoke alarm.
I’ve had many conversations with friends, family, and clients about how they use AI in their personal lives. A few have told me that they use AI as a makeshift therapist in times of need, and believe that it is better than actually speaking to a licensed professional therapist. As a coach, that kind of thinking made me do a deep dive to find out how empathetic can AI truly be? I found a study by researcher Victor Frimpong called Empathy and the Human-Moment Gaps of AI Chatbots: Insights from Empathy Displacement Theory
The study speaks to how psychologists describe empathy as having three dimensions. The first, Affective empathy, is the ability to emotionally connect with what another person is feeling, including unconscious automatic mimicry. The second, Cognitive empathy, is the capacity to understand someone else’s perspective. And the third is Compassionate empathy, which moves us to actually do something about another person’s suffering rather than simply observe it.
The thing about empathy, though, is that it develops through trust, timing, tone, and the kind of presence that tells another person they are truly being seen, which is exactly why it’s so difficult for technology to replicate. Empathy assumes that both people in the exchange have actually felt something.
Frimpong identifies three ways the absence of genuine AI empathy does not just leave a gap, but actively changes how humans experience empathy over time. The first absence of empathy in AI is called Affective Surfaceism, meaning that people begin to prefer the predictable comfort of a chatbot over the messier reality of human connection. The second absence is Memory Fragmentation, which shows that a lack of any relational history distorts how we value empathy in our human relationships. The third part is Moral Framing Mismatch, which showcases how organizations begin to prioritize efficiency over genuine care.
Together, these three gaps form the foundation of what Frimpong calls Empathy Displacement Theory. AI-simulated empathy doesn’t just fill the space where real empathy used to be. It gradually retrains us to accept the imitation as the real thing, until the most pressing question is no longer whether AI can care about us, but what happens to us when we become used to the version of care it offers.
So even though many feel truly heard, supported, and seen by the AI therapist, it’s not programmed, YET, to know how the person feels through their own similar experiences, and it can’t mimic facial expressions, gestures, or tone to allow the human on the other side of the screen to feel really connected.
Reflection Question:
Take a moment to consider this: Think about a time you felt genuinely heard by another person. Not just agreed with, but truly heard. Could that moment have happened with a chatbot? If your answer is no, what does that tell you about what you actually need from the people in your life?
On my quest to find out if AI enhances or hinders our real selves, I reached out to two people who live and breathe the world of AI. The first works for a major AI company whose mission centers on safety and honesty. The second is my brother Stefan, a strategic business advisor with 25 years of experience inside large startups and vast data companies, AI included in all of it.
My contact at the major AI company and I have talked many times about it, specifically around the eventual programming and processing of emotions by chatbots, which is his main job. I know, frightening images straight out of the film iRobot, of thousands of enraged anarchist robots standing on shipping containers ready to strike while plotting the ultimate takeover of the human population, come to my mind.
He told me that AI will get closer to replicating human emotion, but it will never be a one-to-one match, and oversimplifying that distinction is part of the problem. If some form of independent intelligence does emerge, it will have developed from an entirely different set of parameters than humans, with no microexpressions, no physiological cues, and no instinctive sensitivity to the subtle signals we read in one another constantly. He said that AI may actually surpass us in objective decision-making because of how efficiently it processes information, but it can’t gather emotional data the way a human does. As he put it, ‘I might say one thing, and my body language will tell a therapist something completely different. There is no way for AI to know that piece.”
Stefan sees AI as a force that gradually erodes self-creativity and breeds reliance, making people increasingly dependent on it across nearly every area of life. He also points to mounting evidence of how quickly it is eliminating jobs, and while he believes a bounce back will eventually come for those who learn to master it creatively, he warns that AI will largely wipe out what remains of the middle class and drive poverty rates significantly higher over the next one to three years simply by making entire categories of human work obsolete.
Reflection Question:
Listener, consider this: What is the one thing you do, either in your work or your personal life, that you believe only a human being could do? And how certain are you that it will still be true in five years?
Those are some of the ways AI can work against who we are. But can it also enhance our original selves?
A client recently told me she was struggling with her family and had turned to a chatbot for support. After several conversations, I warned her that AI is the ultimate people-pleaser and may not challenge your thoughts and beliefs the way a therapist or coach would. But what she described was something different. She was using it to journal, to identify her own thinking patterns and ruminations, and to get to the crux of her emotional distress so she could frame it clearly, both to herself and to a professional. She used it as a sounding board for deeper self-reflection and to clarify what her core values actually are. It even suggested a psychological concept that she completely identified with, which led her to a course that she is now working through. The way she uses it offers her a glimpse of her original self, and that, in my book, is a win.
Personally, I use it to get unstuck, whether it’s a word I dropped out because I type too slowly, a jumble of words that are a complete run-on sentence that could use a little help from the concise tab, or amplifying my message without diluting what I meant when I wrote it the first time. In coaching, or heck, all communication, the clearer I project, the quicker and deeper someone can reflect on the subject.
Reflection Question:
So, I ask you: Think about how you currently use AI, or how you might use it. Are you bringing your own thoughts and questions to it and letting it help you go deeper? Or are you handing it a blank page and asking it to fill it in for you? The answer to the last question matters more than you might think.
So where does that leave us?
AI is not going anywhere. It will get more sophisticated, more convincing, and more woven into the fabric of daily life than most of us are prepared for. The question is not whether we will use it, but whether we will use it with enough intention versus abdication to keep ourselves in the equation.
What I have come to believe, through my own experience, research, and through the people I have talked to while preparing this episode, is that AI becomes a problem for the Original Self the moment we ask it to think for us instead of with us. The moment we hand it our voice and call the result our own. The moment we turn to it for the kind of comfort and connection that is only built between two people who actually have lived experiences.
But when we bring our own ideas, our own questions, our own half-formed thoughts, and let AI help us shape them into something clear, that is a tool in service of the original self and not a replacement for it. The ladder, not the climber.
My brother Stefan, along with many scientists and economists, sees the devastating financial consequences coming; they are real, and they are very serious. My contact inside the AI industry sees the empathy gap widening, and the very possible ability to eventually learn emotions on its own terms, and that deserves our utmost attention.
So notice it now. Use the tool, but stay in the room with yourself while you do. Remember, AI can hold the ladder, but you have to do the climbing. The tool doesn’t make the work yours, your intention, your voice, and your willingness to show up and think does.
Reflection Question:
Final reflection question to contemplate: When you use AI, are you bringing yourself to it, or are you slowly letting it replace you?
Thank you for listening to The Original Self Podcast. If these reflections resonate with you and you’d like to explore your own growth, you can learn more about my coaching at decotalifecoaching.com.
Source:
Frimpong , V. (2025). Brain. broad research in artificial intelligence and Neuroscience. Empathy and the Human-Moment Gaps of AI Chatbots: Insights from Empathy Displacement Theory. https://www.edusoft.ro/brain/index.php/brain/article/download/1934/2417
The Quiet Power Of Small Steps
In this episode of The Original Self Podcast, life coach Evet DeCota explores why big changes so often fail and why the smallest, most consistent actions are the most powerful path to lasting transformation. Drawing from personal experience and the science of habit formation, Evet unpacks the neuroscience behind why the brain resists dramatic change, how micro-habits quietly rewire behavior over time, and why motivation is not the starting point for change but rather the result of it. This episode is for anyone who has ever felt overwhelmed by the gap between who they are and who they want to become, and needs a reminder that one small step is always enough to begin.
The Original Self Podcast
Welcome to The Original Self Podcast. I’m Evet DeCota, owner of DeCota Life Coaching. I’m a psychology-informed life coach exploring resilience, mindset, and the courage to become your authentic self. This is a space for honest conversations about growth, identity, relationships, and all the messy moments in between that shape who we become. Whatever brought you here today, you’re in the right place
I’ve noticed over the years, standing behind a salon chair and coaching individuals, is that people rarely come in for just a hair service or one single topic. They come to me carrying doubts, fears, dreams, and questions about who they are becoming.
Over time, I’ve realized that beneath all the noise of expectations, criticism, and life’s pressures, there is a version of ourselves that still exists. Let’s explore The Quiet Power of Small Changes.
For the last couple of years, I have watched a woman who works in the building next to my salon really struggle as she walks up a small incline in the street. She looks about twenty-five years old, with a very pretty face, and a body that I recognized, because I had once carried that same weight myself.
I previously worked in that building on the floor above her, and we often rode the elevator up together. I would listen to her try to control her breathing as she gently wiped the sweat from her face. I knew instinctively that if she were alone in the lift, she would be breathing very heavily. I feel an abundance of empathy for her, and I use the word empathy intentionally, because I have been extremely overweight, and I know what it feels like to conceal heavy breathing after nothing more than walking up a slight incline, as if I had just run a 10k.
I was so overweight that walking 300 feet made me see black spots and feel dizzy. I sweated constantly even in 40° weather, got easily winded, and lived with many aches and pains all over my body, severe reflux, and a constant stomach ache. I went on like this for a couple of years until one day, in 90°degree heat, I walked home from the salon and almost passed out while only moving at a snail’s pace. I sat down for ten minutes when I got inside and thought about my family history of heart disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes, and knew all three were coming for me quickly. That was the moment I made the first very small change and texted my doctor for help.
What I didn’t know in that moment was that I had stumbled onto something science has been telling us for quite a while about sustainable change. Sometimes the smallest step, taken at the right moment, can quietly rewire everything. And understanding why that works begins with understanding how the brain responds to change.
Here’s the fascinating part. Our brains are actually designed to resist change, not because we are weak or lacking discipline, but because the brain’s primary job is to keep us safe and to conserve energy. When we attempt a dramatic lifestyle overhaul, the brain can interpret that sudden upheaval as a potential threat. The part of the brain involved in detecting threat, the amygdala, can trigger a stress response that shows up as procrastination, anxiety, or exhaustion. We end up quitting before the new behavior ever has a chance to take hold.
Maybe that’s why every time I decided to lose weight and eat healthier, it would last anywhere from two to four months and then fade out. I would start to feel bored and frustrated, my focus would shift entirely to the end goal, and when the results didn’t come fast enough, I would quietly give up.
Habit Formation:
The problem was never my desire to change; it was that I was trying to change everything at once. Small changes work very differently. They slip past the brain’s resistance almost undetected, and when you repeat a tiny action consistently over time, the part of the brain responsible for habit formation, known as the basal ganglia, begins to automate that behavior. What once required effort starts to feel natural and almost effortless, not because we forced the change, but because we allowed it to take root gradually. And perhaps that is why one of the most powerful things ever said about change has nothing to do with grand gestures at all. As Martin Luther King Jr said, “Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.”
In other words, lasting change rarely begins with a dramatic overhaul. It begins with a small decision repeated often enough that it quietly becomes part of who you are, so trust in the process. That is not just a philosophical idea; it’s actually backed by research.
The author James Clear wrote something in Atomic Habits that has stayed with me. He describes how a one percent improvement each day, something almost too small to notice, can compound into remarkable growth over a year. When I think about change through that lens, it stops feeling overwhelming and starts feeling completely possible.
I remember the moment I realized something had genuinely shifted. For a long time, my body would crave sweets at night, and I would immediately get up and find something. So, I made one small change. I started waiting five to ten minutes before acting on that craving, just sitting with it instead of immediately feeding it. What I discovered was that most of the time, if I waited for that short window, the craving would quietly pass on its own. Over time, I realized that on many nights, I hadn’t thought about it at all. I had simply waited without reminding myself to wait. It had stopped being a strategy and become something else entirely; a part of who I was.
Before we move forward, I want to offer you this question to reflect on: What is one habit you have tried to build before that faded out, and looking back, was too big to stick with?
Micro Changes:
So how do we make changes without getting frustrated, bored, and eventually giving up? I think many immediately picture a complete lifestyle overhaul that starts on Monday (insert incorrect buzzer sound), wrong! What we can make are micro-changes that are so small the behavior feels almost effortless, but will immediately make you feel like you are actually moving forward.
A micro-change I began in the beginning was drinking one extra glass of water per day and swapping one highly caloric meal out for a more nutrient-dense one three days per week. As I continued throughout the months, those micro-changes became a habit that I increased throughout the whole week and for each meal. Around the same time that I was implementing micro-changes in my diet, I was also micro-changing my mindset by replacing one negative thought with a neutral one, making a list, mental or on paper, of one thing I was grateful for every morning, and pausing before reacting negatively in a difficult moment. I will admit that the reaction change is an ongoing work in progress.
Clear also makes the point that habit formation is not just about doing something differently, but about becoming someone different; a change in identity. For me, exercise looks nothing like what you might see on social media. I have a brittle bone disease that limits what my body can do, so I had to completely redefine what movement meant for me. I used to tell myself that if I could not do a real workout, there was no point in doing anything at all. That story kept me completely still for a long time.
The micro-change was simple. I started stretching for five minutes before I got out of bed. Not at the gym, not in workout clothes, just five minutes of gentle movement before my feet hit the floor. It felt almost too small to count as a change, but I kept doing it, and somewhere along the way, something shifted. I stopped saying I am not someone who exercises and started saying I am someone who moves her body in the way that her body allows. That identity shift changed everything, because it was no longer about what I could not do, but about honoring what I could do.
Changing how I define myself is not so much a “fake it ‘till you make it” attitude, but more of a connection with my inner self, coming back to my original self. The part of me that never doubted my actions and my ability.
Pause here for a moment and consider this: What is one change so small it almost feels too easy that you could begin tomorrow?
Consistency vs Motivation
Understanding micro-changes is one thing, but putting them into practice over time is another. What actually determines whether a small change becomes a lasting habit has very little to do with how inspired or motivated we feel on any given day.
There is a belief that most of us carry around without ever questioning it. We treat motivation as the prerequisite for change, the catalyst that has to arrive before we can move forward. “Once I feel motivated, I will start; Once I feel ready, I will begin; Once I feel inspired, I will take action.” But behavioral psychology tells us something that completely challenges that assumption. Motivation does not create action. Action creates motivation. Let me say that again: Motivation does not create action. Action creates motivation. We have it completely backwards.
This is not just a philosophical idea; it is rooted in how the brain actually works. When we take action, even the smallest and most unglamorous action, the brain’s reward system responds. It registers that we followed through, releases a small amount of dopamine, and suddenly, we feel a little more capable, a little more like someone who follows through. That feeling is what we call motivation, and it was generated by the act of starting, not the other way around. Which means that every time we sit and wait to feel motivated before we begin, we are actually waiting for something that can only be created by beginning. Consistency is not what happens after motivation arrives. Consistency is what summons motivation in the first place.
I know this pattern intimately because I have lived it myself. When I first started promoting my coaching business, I had so many ideas about how to do it that I would become completely overwhelmed before I ever began. I thought that if I wrote a blog, I would need to cite every source like a college essay. I was uncomfortable with the idea of being on camera, and I secretly wanted to do a podcast but had no idea how, plus I convinced myself that nobody would care anyway. So, I ruminated on every idea I had and implemented none of them.
The mindset shift for me was not dramatic or sudden. It did not arrive with a lightning bolt moment of clarity. It arrived quietly, sometime around Christmas, when I simply stopped swirling around which idea was the right one and decided to try them all. I stopped waiting for the perfect plan and started treating every idea as worth attempting. Because the truth is, you can’t know what will resonate, what will feel natural, or what will actually reach people until you begin. The pursuit of perfection can become a very convincing form of avoidance. The shift from thinking to doing, from planning to starting, from waiting to beginning. That is where everything changed for me, and it can change for you, too.
Consistency for me has never looked particularly glamorous. Some days I write at my desk, other days I am typing on my phone, or voicing an idea into a notes app on a break, or talking to myself in the car because a thought arrived that I did not want to lose. Sometimes consistency looks like catching the idea wherever it finds you.
There are days when I sit down and feel like I have nothing new to say. On those days, I have found that the answer is not to push through the resistance but to move toward stillness. A little deep breathing, a moment of rest, and the thoughts begin to find their way back.
I have skipped days of writing, but I can’t remember a day when I did not jot down at least one idea. I have written things that were, to put it plainly, should have never seen the light of day, but I keep coming back. Not because every day feels inspired, but because somewhere along the way, writing and speaking, whether it’s a blog post, a social media caption, or this podcast, became less something I do and more simply a part of who I am.
I still see her sometimes, the young woman at the building next to the salon, making her way up that small incline. I no longer just feel empathy when I see her; I feel something closer to hope. I know that change doesn’t begin with a dramatic overhaul or a perfect plan or even the right amount of motivation. It begins with one small decision, made quietly, on an ordinary day. A text to a doctor, five minutes of stretching before your feet hit the floor, one glass of water, or one idea jotted down in a parking lot.
I don’t know her story, I don’t know what she carries or what she has already tried or what small changes she may already be making in ways I can’t see, but I know this. The most powerful transformations rarely announce themselves; they slip past the brain’s resistance almost undetected. One tiny action at a time, until one day you look up and realize you have become someone you almost did not believe you could be.
The science is clear, the research supports it, and if my own experience has taught me anything, it is that the smallest decisions made consistently over time are far more powerful than the grandest intentions made once and abandoned. That is the quiet power of small changes
The last reflection question I want to ask you is: Where in your life are you still standing at the bottom of the staircase, waiting to see the top, when all you really need to do is take one step?
Thank you for listening to The Original Self Podcast. If these reflections resonate with you and you’d like to explore your own growth, let’s talk.
Who You Were Before The World Told You Who To Be
Welcome to The Original Self Podcast. I’m Evet DeCota, creator of DeCota Life Coaching, and a psychology-informed life coach exploring resilience, mindset, and the courage to become your authentic self. Each week, we’ll explore the stories we tell ourselves, the patterns that hold us back, and the small shifts that help us move forward.
The Original Self Podcast
Welcome to The Original Self podcast. I’m Evet DeCota, owner of DeCota Life Coaching, and a psychology-informed life coach exploring resilience, mindset, and the courage to become your authentic self. It’s a space for honest conversations about growth, transition, identity, relationships, and all the messy, meaningful stuff in between that creates the small shifts that help move us forward. Whatever brought you here today, you’re in the right place
Today, we are talking about how, for many years, standing behind a salon chair and coaching individuals, I’ve noticed people rarely come in for just a hair service or one single topic. They come to me carrying doubts, fears, dreams, and questions about who they are becoming.
Over time, I’ve realized that beneath all the noise of expectations, criticism, and life’s pressures, there is a version of ourselves that still exists. Let’s explore Who You Were Before the World Told You Who to Be.
Earlier today, I was thinking about something people have said to me for most of my life: that I am a chameleon, someone who can adapt my behavior to other people’s personalities very quickly.
When I was younger, I used to think that was a talent that served me well as a hairstylist. Possessing pieces of many different traits allowed me to connect with a wide range of people and to appreciate the differences in personalities, cultures, perspectives, and the unspoken rules that shape how people move through the world, and it certainly can be.
But about 10 years ago, I noticed something that gave me pause. I realized that the benefits of adaptation did not always outweigh the masking of who I am authentically and what I might be losing in the process. The easier it was for me to shift to meet other people’s expectations, the less certain I felt about who I was underneath all of it. At different moments throughout the day, a quiet voice would interrupt my thoughts with questions I hadn’t seriously asked myself before: “Who are you?” “What actually matters to you?” and “Where are you in this narrative?” and over time, I realized that this experience wasn’t unique to me. And in many ways, it reflects something psychologists have been describing for decades
The psychologist Donald Winnicott had an idea of what he called the True Self, something I think of as the Original Self. Beneath the masks we wear, and the roles we play, remains a version of you that was never lost, only quieted. That is your original self, the part of you that existed before fear, before criticism, and before you learned to shrink yourself to fit into the expectations and boxes that people, culture, and society place around us.
For instance, even an infant will begin to change their behavior the moment a parent responds to them, positively or negatively. From the beginning, we are learning what’s expected of us. It’s not just taught by our parents, but by everyone we encounter and nearly every circumstance we move through. With each verbal, physical, or visual correction we absorb, a small piece of our Original Self quietly steps back. I think of it as a folder that’s moved to the back of the filing cabinet, a little further from reach each time.
So, what fills that filing cabinet? What are the forces doing the filing?
There are three that do the most work, and they often operate together so seamlessly that most of us never notice them as separate things. They are family, culture, and fear. And what makes them so powerful is that all three tend to do their deepest work on us before we are old enough to question them.
Let’s dissect how family affects us. Family is the first world a child ever knows. Before you have any frame of reference for who you are, your family is already communicating, through words, silences, reactions, and expectations, who you are supposed to become. Most families do not do this out of cruelty. They do it out of love, out of habit, and out of the unexamined beliefs they themselves inherited and never thought to question.
I have observed this across cultures and across generations in my work. The messages vary in their specifics but tend to rhyme with one another in their effect. For many women, the message arrived early and without discussion: you marry, you have children, you build your life around the people you love, and that is enough. Going further — going to college, building something of your own, wanting more than what was modeled for you — was either not encouraged or quietly discouraged, not because anyone wished them harm, but because that was the shape of the world they had been handed, and they were simply passing it along.
Religion adds another layer to this, and I want to be careful here because faith is a genuinely meaningful source of strength and purpose for many people. But there is a difference between a faith you have examined and chosen and a set of beliefs that were handed to you as a very small child, absorbed before you had the capacity to evaluate them. Many people spend years carrying a version of their religious upbringing that feels more like judgment than grace, more like a set of rules about who is acceptable and who is not, before they finally pause long enough to ask whether what they were taught actually reflects what they believe. That examination is not a betrayal of where they came from. It is part of the process of becoming who they actually are.
What all of these family messages share is that they arrive when we are too young to weigh them. A child cannot say, I appreciate your perspective, but I would like to form my own. They simply take it in. And what gets taken in early enough becomes the wallpaper of the self — so constant, so familiar, that most people never think to ask whether they chose it or whether it was chosen for them.
The second part that forms identity is culture. Culture operates the same way, only on a larger scale. If family is the first world, culture is the second one, and it moves in almost simultaneously. Culture tells us what is beautiful, what is valuable, what ambitions are reasonable for a person like us, and which ones are considered overreaching. It tells us, with remarkable consistency and very little apology, how much space we are allowed to take up.
For young people, the need to fit in is not vanity. It is closer to survival. At a certain age, belonging feels like a biological necessity, and the self gets shaped around that need in ways that are genuinely difficult to undo later. You learn which parts of yourself are welcome in the rooms you want to be in, and which parts make people uncomfortable. You learn to lead with the version of yourself that is acceptable and keep everything else somewhere quieter. And if you do this long enough, you can lose track of which version is actually you.
Youth is particularly vulnerable to this because the brain is still developing the capacity for the kind of self-reflection that would allow a young person to say, I am changing myself to belong here, and I want to notice that. Most young people do not have that yet. They are simply adapting, the way humans have always adapted, and the original self is filed a little further back with each adaptation.
Finally, there is fear, which I think is the most honest of the three, because at least fear does not pretend to be acting in your best interest, the way family and culture sometimes do. Fear is direct. It says: do not go there. Do not try that. Do not love that person or want that thing or step out of what is familiar, because something bad might happen if you do.
For me, fear arrived in some of its most formative shapes through loss. Losing people I loved deeply did something to the way I moved through the world that I did not fully understand until much later. Grief has a way of quietly tightening the radius of what feels safe. You become more careful. More protective. And sometimes, without realizing it, you start to make yourself smaller in ways that feel like wisdom but are actually just fear wearing a more acceptable coat.
Fear also arrives through the body, through hormones and aging, and the ways our physical experience shifts beneath us in ways we did not ask for and cannot fully control. The body is one of the places the original self lives most honestly, and when the body changes in ways that feel like loss, many of us respond by pulling back rather than leaning in. We quiet parts of ourselves that once felt natural, because they no longer seem to fit the version of ourselves, we think we are supposed to be at this stage of life.
I want to say something about that directly, because it is something I have lived. I have quieted the feminine part of myself over the years in ways I am only now beginning to examine honestly. Not because anyone told me to, at least not in so many words. But because somewhere along the way I absorbed the message that softness was vulnerability, that expressly feminine ways of moving through the world were less serious, less credible, less safe. And so I filed that part away too, the way we often do with parts of ourselves that we’ve been told, either directly or indirectly, don’t belong.
The original self does not disappear under the weight of family, culture, and fear. It waits. It gets quieter, and sometimes it gets very quiet, but it does not leave. And one of the things I have come to believe most deeply, both from my own life and from the work I do with others, is that the hunger to return to it never fully disappears either. It shows up as restlessness, as a feeling that something is missing even when everything looks fine, as a quiet voice asking questions you have been too busy or too afraid to answer.
That voice is not a problem to be solved. It is an invitation.
And one of the clearest ways to understand what I mean by the original self is to look at a young child.
If you watch a very young child, before the corrections have fully accumulated, you are watching someone who is almost entirely their original self. They want what they want without apology, feel what they feel without editing it first, and have not yet learned which parts of themselves need to be managed. And then, slowly, the shaping begins.
Now, I want to be clear, I’m not suggesting we skip the shaping entirely. I’m not trying to promote Jodi Foster as Nell because we know exactly how that turned out. Raise yourself in the woods with no outside influence whatsoever, and you end up saying “tay in da win” in your own language that works beautifully in the forest and absolutely nowhere else. Some correction is necessary, but the goal is not to become feral. It’s simply to notice how much of what shaped us was genuinely useful growth and how much of it was someone else’s fear or expectation wearing the costume of wisdom.
What I find so striking is that if you watch someone who is very old — someone who has truly lived long enough to make peace with most of it — you often see something remarkably similar. The same unguarded quality. The same willingness to say exactly what they think. The same absence of performance. I believe the elderly, at their best, have done something that takes an entire lifetime to accomplish. They have worn out their need for approval, outlasted most of their fears, and in that clarity, the original self has room to resurface.
I also think — and I hold this more as a feeling than a certainty — that something else may be drawing the very old back toward who they truly are. When we are close to the end of a life, things loosen. What felt urgent for so long begins to matter less. I wonder sometimes whether that loosening is the self preparing to return to something it always was, beneath everything it learned to be. I do not think it is a coincidence that the two groups most in touch with the original self are the ones closest to the beginning and the ones closest to the end. What the rest of us are doing, in the middle of our lives, is trying to find our way back without waiting that long.
And that is where so many of us find ourselves as adults, sensing that something essential is still there, even if we have not quite figured out how to return to it. Everything you have been through — the corrections, the expectations, the fear, the loss, the years of adapting yourself to fit into spaces that were not always built for who you actually are — none of it was wasted. All of it taught you something.
One of the most important things it taught you, even if it has taken a long time to see it clearly, is that the version of you that exists underneath all of that shaping is not only still there, but is the most capable, the most honest, and the most resilient version of you there has ever been. You did not survive all of that by accident. You survived it by being exactly who you are, even when you did not fully know it yet.
The original self was never the problem. It was never too much, or too soft, or too ambitious, or too different. It was simply waiting for you to stop apologizing for it and start accepting it instead.
And accepting it does not mean returning to who you were before the world got involved. It means taking everything the world has taught you and bringing it home to the truest version of yourself–the one that was there at the very beginning, the one that will still be there at the end.
So the question may not be who you need to become, but what parts of yourself may be ready to rediscover. And that, my friends, might be the quiet work in front of you.
Thank you for listening to The Original Self Podcast. If these reflections resonate with you and you’d like to explore your own growth, you can learn more about my coaching at decotalifecoaching.com.