Hey everybody. I'm Patrick Tien, MSW. I'm a childhood trauma specialist, and here is a quick video. On eight therapy ideas that really helped me in my recovery from childhood trauma. They're just ideas or concepts that might get you out of a trigger. They might kind of help you just kind of feel better from moment to moment, and they can definitely help you when reparenting the inner child.
So let's just get into it. Here's how it goes. The first one is something called don't sweat. Those who are not in your Inner Circle. What I mean by that is this is for when we get triggered by people who aren't really that close to us, and we give a lot of extra mental energy to the boss that's in your life.
The person online, the friend of the friend who says something when you're out with them, and they can really trigger us and live in our heads rent free. Those who are in our inner circle partners, family, those who are really, really close with or a therapist, is what the concept is about, is really reserve conflict oriented energy only for those people because you care about them and those are the people to kind of work with.
So when you have a boss or somebody that triggers you, especially. With social media online, this is all over the place is we give people too much energy in our head and we're fighting with them in our head, or we're really triggered by them when at the end of the day, they don't really matter. That coworker is gonna be out of your life at some point, and it's just a reframe to get centered around.
Who is worth giving energy to. The second one is something that is a little bit tricky, so try not to confuse this one with toxic positivity. This is called Peria. Peria is a collection of British psychologists that came up with the idea of peria as the opposite to paranoia. And Ponia can be really useful for you because what it does, ponia is a concept of looking for the ways that the world is conspiring for you as opposed to feeling like the world is conspiring against you.
Again, try not to confuse it with toxic positivity that's just like empty platitudes and look at the bright side kind of a stuff. But Peria is an action of really looking for things that are really concrete, primal evidence. Things like you have shelter. If you got hurt, you may have access to a hospital.
And I know that some of these things may not be true for some of you, and I get that, but it's just the concept of looking for where. Things are actually going for you as opposed to going against you. And as a side note, why I love the concept of peria. It was more helpful to me after I did a whole bunch of childhood trauma work and to really get sort of a, an unsafe outlook kind of off the table for me.
So if this one doesn't work for you, I totally get it. Maybe later for this one. So the next one, this one's all over the place where you'll find it in Buddhism, you'll find it in some stoic writing. And it's just simply, is it kind? Is it necessary? Is it true? This one is helpful if you tend to have a reaction and you tend to blurt out things, or you tend to say things in a very defensive way, or if your inner child really pops up and needs to get even with someone or be gets a little bit self-righteous.
So is it kind, necessary or true? In short, this is really helpful to pause. Where before you're about to send an email, before you're about to respond to somebody online, before you're about to engage in your partner in a fight and kind of like up the ante or escalate things or get a little bit upset with them, is to really sort of ground and stop and say, is it kind?
Is it necessary? Is it true? The other side of it is, I'm not sort of saying. Not use your empowered voice is inner children are growing up in, in toxic family systems. We really need to kind of relearn how to deal with people, especially if you come from a very high conflict, very kind of nasty family system.
Uh, we have to learn to really know how to relearn, how to address people and how to speak with people. So it's just sort of, it's also is. Is it true? Is in a way it's also good for our codependency, like in the way that we overly take care of somebody or we let things slide. Is it true that they don't owe you money?
No. They actually do owe you money. Is it necessary? It's necessary to me. Is it true? Yes. Is it kind? I can say it in a kind way. So it's just kind of a really good to keep some parameters around how you want to communicate, to not trigger yourself to shame later in having having a reaction or not be true to yourself.
Moving on to the next one. I love this one is let people feel whatever. When we are triggered as childhood trauma survivor, we usually go to a shame place. I'm bad. I'm bad for not being sensitive enough. I'm not, I'm bad for not taking care of somebody's problems. I'm bad because I cause this person's emotions.
Is it kind? Is it necessary? Is it true? Where usually inner children have kind of a warped perception. About how feelings work in terms of others. So letting people feel whatever can be your coworkers, can be your own children, can be your partner, can be, you're not even part of it, but you witness someone really like being disappointed at a, at a grocery store 'cause they can't get a refund.
And you're as highly sensitive people. We're overly feeling for that if you identify with that problem. So letting them feel whatever is a really good inner child parenting idea of, and this will relate to another one down the road of the three Cs. Is we can't take on people's emotions too much. We can't fix their problems and just in a really beautiful way is just to say, they're just feeling their feelings.
We're we're safe. We're safe for them to feel their feelings. If your child is disappointed and your inner child is like, oh my God, they're having a child like I have, they're sad. It's just letting your child be disappointed about something that's natural and appropriate and normal, or it's just really a hard.
Feeling is it's better to be present with somebody and what they're feeling as opposed to that we caused it or that we're taking it on. This one is tough when it really comes to real time. So it's really, it's almost like a little bit of a practice of it is if your partner is really disappointed or frustrated at work, that can trigger you.
'cause it's just like having a, it's like growing up with a nasty parent, although your partner's not a nasty parent, but the the body is sort of saying, I'm in trouble and I caused it. So it's actually quite beautiful to just let the partner be in a negative mood and to remind yourself that you're safe in that and just let them go through that process.
Moving on to the next one. I love this one is the three Cs. I didn't cause it, I didn't cure it and I can't control it. This is from the 12 step world, specifically the Al-Anon world, where the three Cs are really helpful in terms of our codependency related to the prior one about letting people feel whatever in the toxic family system, let's just call it an alcoholic parent, an alcoholic.
Parenting or an alcoholic family where we're raised in that system to believe that we cause their drinking. We've burdened them and that's why they're an alcoholic and we feel like if we are special enough or kind enough, then maybe they won't drink that day or. We try to control the parameters of getting rid of their alcohol or hiding it all that kind of stuff that goes in with an alcoholic family system is we didn't cause the alcoholism, or you can flip that to a parent's mental health problem.
We can't cure it. We're not sort of doctors and we can't control it. This is also a very sobering idea around. Notice how cause cure and control, they're very action oriented, almost things about trying to fix somebody else's problem or feel responsible for someone else's problem, and they're really good emotionally sobering ideas.
The three Cs. To realize that we don't have the power to get somebody to stop drinking. We don't have the power to get a parent to take, um, medications or go to therapy. We don't, we can't cure them as well. Especially what I really love about it is, especially when the person with the problem who's struggling with their mental health or alcoholism or whatever, they're not interested in changing.
And I think that that's what really drives our want to kind of control it or cure it or believe that we cause it. So I love that one. Moving on to number six is something that I came up with. I said it somewhere in the video, is just simply to know your audience. What this means is that when you are getting criticized by.
Somebody hypocritical, maybe a family member. You know that uncle that's like, you know, you're breaking your mother's heart by not talking to her. Knowing your audience is about thinking about where and who that feedback is coming from. Growing up in childhood trauma as children, we never had the power to talk back or we never had the power to think about is that really valid or whatever.
Kids need a lot of help with those things and usually. Abusive parents abuse that power of just telling you who you are and what you did and whatever. But now as we are adults and we're working on our childhood trauma and we look, we're looking at abusive family systems, it's almost like for us to think about, well, what about that person saying it?
What about them? So that uncle that's like, you know, you're breaking your mother's heart, is know your audience. Is that, is that uncle codependency? Is that uncle understanding what happened to you? Is that uncle sort of like the bastion of mental health? Chances are that person is also greatly dysfunctional in their own life.
So it's part of our inner adult that can kind of go, wait a minute. You know what I mean? Like who are you to tell me? And that's part of knowing your audience, knowing who you're addressing, knowing who. You're having this dialogue with because they have a lot of problems too. And just because they have big opinions of you, it doesn't mean that they're right, but more specifically, think about what is going on in that person's life.
And this is all over the place online when, when people kind of are saying, you know, oh, going no contact. I could never do that, but you know, she's your mother, is that person doesn't know your history. That person probably doesn't even know that they're saying a very codependent sort of statement. That person.
I always think about it, just like I would love to know about that. How is that person's love life? How is that person's relationship with their children? In other words, people are full of advice, but often their lives are on fire. So that's what I mean by that one. Moving on to number seven, one of my favorites is don't bring your inner child.
And this is a visualization that when you have to do something difficult, like have a hard conversation with a roommate, like when you have to have a hard conversation or you have to ask for a raise or have a hard conversation, or you have to advocate for yourself in a, in front of a care provider or something like that, say a doctor or something like that.
And authority is very triggering. Um, the idea is that you don't bring your inner child with you into that space, into that room, into that conversation, and you imagine that they're being babysat by someone that you feel is safe. Someone like a therapist that you're connected with. You can even visualize that you, you know, Patrick's babysitting my inner child while I go ask for a raise because when my inner child that's with me, I tend to freeze and lose my words, and I don't, I lose my power.
So the idea is to just really imagine that you've got this little kid that's coming from all this wounding and has those reactions. They're not bad. That's the part of us that takes over and we become codependent or we lose our words, or we say, oh, forget it. I was dumb for bringing it up. And we only approach the difficult situation from our inner adult place.
Without kind of having the inner child popping up and kind of taking over. It really works if you're, tend to be a visual person. It really works if you have a connection with your inner child. It might not work so much if you haven't kind of had a connection yet with your inner child yet, but it is a concept and for those who are really don't like the idea of the inner child or that language is simply think about the same thing as instead of saying.
Don't bring your inner child into that situation. Or I would say if you don't like that language, just go into the situation with your prefrontal cortex online and intact. Not go into it from your limbic system and the trauma brain, specifically the amygdala. If that's what you, if you prefer that language, that's kind of like what I would say as well.
So I really love that one. It's gotten me out of so many jams and it's gotten me through a lot of difficult things. And lastly, number eight, can you be a diplomat? When we think about a diplomat as a person who can deal in a sensitive and effective way, can, they can deal with a problem, deal with people in a sensitive and effective way?
My mentor said this to me years ago, and she voiced it as, can you get political? And I've switched it. Can you be a diplomat? Because the word political, just it that takes our brain somewhere else right now, and she said this to me like 20 years ago, how my mentor said it to me when she said, can you get political?
The situation was I was working at a restaurant with a highly abusive restaurant manager and that restaurant manager would be verbally abusive to you. And it was, I had to get outta this job and I was so triggered and so upset. Anybody would be with the way that this person was. And I was so ready to just walk out, but I didn't have another job lined up and I was so self-righteous and ready to just, you know, part of that's valid, part of that's my trauma.
And I was so ready to just kind of give my notice that day. And I had therapy that day and she said, can you get political? And just bear it until you set up another job. And what she meant by that, she kind of taught that being political or being a diplomat, is you're going into a nasty situation with your best self for your own best self-interest.
This one is really about not shooting ourselves in the foot by becoming reactive or when we're so dysregulated and we're so triggered that we can find our inner adult and just go, okay, I can deal with this for, I don't, I hate it, but I'll just deal with this for another two weeks until I can find a new job and apply for a new job and give my notice.
So I don't burn any bridges and blah, blah, blah, blah blah. Like all that kind of BS that happens with it. So if you have to go into a roommate situation that went really bad and you still have to go pick up your stuff and you're really triggered about, am I gonna have to have a conversation with them, can you be a diplomat?
Can you go do the hard thing anyway and get your record collection and get your mono sergeant pepper? 'cause you don't want that roommate to kind of like escalate and blow the thing up and not let you in. So that's kind of the situation there. It's stuff that we don't like, but there is stuff that we just have to do.
You know, can you be a diplomat and have a difficult conversation with a family member? Um. Let's just say you're in no contact and then the, the someone in the family has gotten sick. I would sort of say, can you just go be a diplomat and do the really, really hard thing on a mission and get in and get out instead of being really dysregulated and getting into nasty conversations kind of about that.
So it's really about. Doing something that you don't wanna do, but kind of doing it anyway because there's something in it for you that is at stake in a diplomat. They might hate the person across the table. They might hate the country. They might hate the war. They might hate everything going on with it.
They have to go in there and have a civil conversation and keep the best interest of what's going on at heart in an effective way. So those are the eight. I hope it was helpful to you. I'm gonna be doing some more short form videos to give you guys some quick answers as well as my long form videos as well, and I would love to know what you thought about that video, which one really struck out to you.
I would love to hear how these. Go. And again, these are just kind of mental concepts to get your inner adult in place so that you're not so triggered with your inner child and being dysregulated and blah, blah, blah. So that's it for me. I hope this was helpful to you. And
