EP 437: Get Out of Your Head with Ivy

This is episode 437. Get out of your head with Ivy. Welcome to Over It and on with it. I’m your host Christine Hasler. And for over a decade I’ve been a life coach, speaker and author. Each week you’ll hear me work directly with a caller as I coach them through a goal they wanna accomplish or an obstacle they may be facing.
I’ll provide a blend of practical and spiritual advice, as well as tangible actions you can apply to your own life. Now let’s get on with the episode. Hi everybody. Welcome back to the show. Have a beautiful episode today and those of you that relate to being in your head or very cognitive or thinking your way through things, you’re really gonna connect with this episode.
You know, in my own personal journey, getting out of my head has been such an important thing. Even my current coach interrupts me. It’s like uhuh in your head, in your head, outta your head, like, oh, but my head is so useful. And it is. It is at times and at other times it’s so important and so deeply healing to get into our body and actually get into our inner child,
which I do with Ivy in this episode. And once again, an episode is pointing to inner child work, as they so often do, which is why I am hosting a free three day workshop. I’m co-hosting with my husband called Journey to Joy. It’s all about reconnecting to your inner child and awakening your authentic self. You can join us for free at christinehassler.com/joy.
As you’re listening to this episode, consider, do you have trouble getting out of your head and into your body? Have you been told to do somatic work or body-based practices but you just can’t seem to do it? Do you have a fierce inner critic? Do you carry a lot of shame? So keep these questions in mind as you listen to my coaching call with Ivy.
Ivy, welcome to the show. How can I help? Hi, thank you for having me. I was reaching out because I can’t seem to get where I kind of wanna be in any area of my life, romantically, financially, health and body wise, career wise. And I’ve been in therapy for a few years and I’m slowly learning about myself.
It seems like a major recurring impediment is a seeming inability to, I guess, identify how I feel. And in addition to that, there’s what seems to be an a movable block around doing like the suggested body work and body scans. And I suspect that might have to do with disassociation or maybe some body shame. I’m not super sure. So just kind of hoping for guidance.
Okay. So who’s telling you you need those things? My therapist. Okay. And what’s the reasoning behind that? Well, I’ve been discovering that I’m pretty emotionally unavailable and an epiphany we had one time in therapy was realizing that intellectually I understand emotions and I can speak to them, but in the moment I somehow seem to, to not be able to identify what I’m feeling,
which seems to be pretty difficult when you’re trying to set a boundary of like, I feel hurt when you say X, Y, and Z. But I miss the skill to identify what I feel in that moment. Okay. So can you tell me how this like shows up in your life? Can you gimme an example? Yes. I have a really hard time expressing anger to romantic partners or even identifying anger ’cause there’s so much,
I guess, concern that I’m not worthy subconsciously that it’s this mad dash internally to try and make sure things remain copacetic. And then in familial settings, you know, I have a hard time saying, you know, when you make a passive aggressive comment or when this happens, it makes me feel hurt or angry instead, I wanna say like, that feels really condescending or dismissive and so I,
I can’t seem to crack that code or that soft skill of just drawing those boundaries or protecting myself or standing up for myself in different relational areas. And then additionally it seems to be a struggle because I seem to not be able to, I guess look internally to trust gut feelings or, or use that kind of internal compass at times. So I’m not super sure I struggle with quite a bit of shame and self-criticism and so that might be entwined in this in some capacity.
Yeah. How long have you been in therapy? Since 2016 With the same therapist? No, I actually lived in a different country briefly and that’s when I went through quite a bit there and started therapy there. And then returned to the states in 2018 and I started seeing my current therapist in 2019. So with the same person just over four years. Okay,
great. And what progress do you think you have made? I’ve made some big revelations with this particular therapist. I don’t think I really fully understood the severity to my self criticism previously. Right. I didn’t fully comprehend how cognitively driven I am or cognitively I guess I exist. I seemed to, I seemed to have discovered in combination with therapy and of course reading tons of of books and your podcast has been quite helpful in identifying,
there’s a lot of inner child wounding and you know, I’ve got an anxious attachment style. So those were kind of big revelations we’ve had in the last couple years. Yeah. But I do struggle a little bit. I’m quite direct and you know, when I started going to therapy I was like, there’s some stuff that doesn’t align. There’s some things that aren’t balanced,
I don’t feel super great. I wanna try and compile a user manual of myself to figure out what’s going on. What are our areas for opportunity, what, you know, systems can we put in place to get back on track when we’re struggling. And my therapist is wonderful, she’s been wonderful, but she’s not as direct as I am and I think she’s really been trying to be intentional in pushing me towards non-linear work and pushing me into my body and out of my prefrontal cortex.
And sometimes it feels like we’re speaking different languages and I can get quite frustrated and Right. And yeah. Right. Well a couple things I’ll say right off the bat, there’s no one size fits all approach for anyone. What might have worked for your therapist yourself or for other clients might not work for you. And a lot of the things that you’re talking about,
especially having trouble, you know, boundaries, trusting our gut, standing up for what we need, that’s really, really common. I can relate to so much of what you’re saying personally. So I just want you to know you’re not alone and it doesn’t necessarily mean you are emotionally unavailable. What it sounds like to me, and I’m not disagreeing with your therapist,
I I just also want to like normalize a lot of what you’re experiencing and feeling. Thank you. So with let’s, let’s look at the cognitive thing. First of all, you’re incredibly intelligent. I can tell by how articulate you are. You’re very, very smart. Thank you. So that’s a gift. That’s a beautiful thing now where we tend to be strong,
we tend to spend a lot of time in, you know, so people that are very smart are going to feel more comfortable in their intelligence, in their cognition than necessarily their emotion, their body, their creativity. Because it’s not that those areas are weak, it’s just that we excel in one area. It’s a very well-developed muscle. So like why not use it more?
So that’s very common. But what I’m curious about is what made you have to go so in your head? That’s a very easy answer actually. Yeah. I think it’s a byproduct of how my parents raised me through no fault of their own, you know, as a byproduct of how they were raised. And so as a child, I was actually very emotionally expressive and I don’t think they fully understood how to help me feel and fully process those emotions.
And so I didn’t have that support or space and was actually very shamed for them and frequently called a drama queen or Oh wow. Okay. There You go. Yeah, yeah, Yeah. There you go. So it’s not that your emotions are unavailable, it’s that you carry a lot of shame around your emotions and they just don’t feel very safe. It doesn’t feel safe for you to express in that way.
Absolutely. It was a really alienating experience and so especially in romantic relationships, it’s really hard to bring down that barrier because it’s, it’s associated with that alienation. Yeah, yeah, no, I get that. I get that. So I think what’s gonna be maybe helpful for you because somebody that’s like, so in their head, getting you to lie down and be,
do a body scan is gonna be really hard for your brain. Yeah. So what I wanna ask you is what, what does turn your thinking off or at least mute it or what does actually get you more into your body? Is there anything? It could be cooking, it could be if I’m with friends, it could be, you know, is there anything,
You know, the only time I’ve been fully self-aware enough of it happening has been when I rock climb. Okay. And what happens then? Well, stakes are pretty high when you’re 30 feet off the ground on the side of a rock. Yeah. So I’m fully consumed with where do I put my hands next and it fully takes me out of my head and into the present space and I’ve really enjoyed that.
And the element I struggle with there is there’s a lot of body shame I have and I don’t feel very safe doing physical activities in front of other people or being seen doing them. You know, when I wanna go for a run, I wanna do it at 3:00 AM under cloak and dagger scenario. Do you actually run at 3:00 AM Yeah, anywhere from three to 5:00 AM Oh my goodness.
Ivy, my love. Okay. Yeah, No I’m not, I’m not laughing at you. I’m more, I’m more just like, oh just feeling the tenderness of this human experience and that the extremes we will go to to keep ourself quote unquote safe. So, okay. Let’s begin with the question. What do you think, like what’s your worst fear in terms of what people are going to think of you?
I suppose my worst fear is that they’ll see me the way I see me, Which is how Pretty messy and unlovable. And why do you believe you’re unlovable? I really wanna fall back into like the logic of that. Okay. You know, feeling alienated as a kid for being who I was as a kid, you know, before those, well That’s,
I think that’s more than just logic. I think that’s truth. Yeah. So it seems to me like a very scared little girl is running the show most of the time. Yeah. And what might be most useful is really connecting with that little girl who thinks she needs to run at 3:00 AM and be like, you know what, we’re gonna run at eight.
I got you. You’re safe. No one’s gonna tease you, nothing’s gonna happen to you, no one’s gonna shame you. And if anything like that happens, I got you. I think what a big part of you needs is to find that compassionate parental voice inside of yourself that never was there. Because if you keep doing things to get in your body but you actually don’t feel safe in your body,
then it’s kind of counterintuitive. Like I wouldn’t wanna do a body scan if I don’t feel safe and comfortable in my body, why would I wanna get deeper in my body? Exactly. Yeah. Right. It’s an eloquent way of raising it. Yeah. I understand why it’s difficult and why it’s challenging. So what, what did you get from that?
From what I just said, I think there was a succinctness with which you said that it’s hard to get into my body when I don’t feel safe in my body that I wasn’t able to comprehend previously. Yeah. And yeah. Yeah. Letting it sink in. Sorry. That’s okay. No, no apologies necessary. So where are you right now? Are you in your house?
Are you in your car? Where are you? Yeah, I’m in my house. Okay. So I just want you to, are you on a phone? You can move around. Yes. Okay. So I just want you to just go stand in front of a mirror somewhere. It doesn’t have to be full length, I don’t care. Just any kind of mirror where you can see your face.
Okay. We’re there. Okay. So I just want you to feel your feet on the floor, take your shoes off if you can. So your barefoot and I just want you to feel your feet on the floor. And how does it feel to feel your feet on the floor? It feels sturdy and a little tingly ’cause I was sitting on top of my feet.
Yeah. Yeah. So just feel your feet on the floor right here, right now in this moment. No longer a child, no longer living with your parents. And then just feel the clothes on your body. How does it feel to feel the clothes on your body Feel warm and soft? Yeah. Yeah. Alright, so just notice right now your body is feeling warm and soft by the clothes you’re wearing.
And then I just want you to look in the mirror and just make eye contact with yourself and just take a deep breath. And I actually don’t want you to see your current day self. So I want you to look in your mirror and hold eye contact long enough until you can see or kinda imagine seeing you as a little girl. Yeah, I see her.
Okay. And there may be some emotions that are coming up, which is great. Yeah, She’s great. Great. So I just wanna ask if there’s anything this little girl wants to say or anything she wants to express. She seems kind of lonely. Yeah, I’m lonely. What else? Bit invisible. Yeah. Don’t feel seen. Yeah. Yeah.
What else? You can use a hug. Okay. So you, I know it’s maybe difficult ’cause you may be holding a phone, but if you can, you can wrap your arms around yourself, give yourself a little hug. Yeah, I can do that. Yeah. And what I would just like you to be aware of right now is your emotions are very available to you and this little girl is,
is safe now to express them and to be seen. So I just want you to kind of hold the reference point right now for me being with you as emotions come up and you being with yourself as emotion comes up. And is there anything that you’d wanna say to this younger part of you? I wish she just knew that in the face of a world where others are responsible for teaching her about things,
she knows quite a bit more than they do about some stuff and that she didn’t abandon that knowing. Okay. So tell her directly in a way that it would make sense to her. I mean It sounds something like you’re very wise, trust yourself. Yeah. Trust yourself when what the grownups are telling you doesn’t seem to make sense internally. Right, right.
Anything else you wanna tell her? I’m not sure. There’s still just a lot in processing. Okay. You can just be with that then. Yeah. I wish I could tell her to ignore some of the opinions she’ll encounter from some of the you can folks around her that are insecure and dunno it. You can. So right here, right now,
what do you wanna tell her is not true that maybe she believed was true? That her dreams are worth the investment. What else? She’s worth the investment. She’s worthy, her dreams are worthy, her emotions are worthy. Yes. All of that. Yeah. Yeah. What do you notice in your body now? I feel a bit warmer and my face is quite damp.
Oh yeah. I feel a little steadier on my feet on the ground. Yeah. Yeah. And I think we can both agree right here, right now you are not emotionally unavailable or totally in your head. There’s plenty of emotion and feeling happening. Yeah. And when you look in, when you look in the mirror ivy and you just look at yourself,
what do you see? I still see that sassy little kid. Yeah. What would that sassy little kid wanna say to your inner critic? She’d probably tell it to get out of my way. Yeah. Yeah. We’ve got stuff to do. People to see. Yeah. And she, she may say something like, I’m not gonna believe you anymore.
Yeah. I’m curious, do you ever see a connection between this, this I guess inner child ignoring or inner child abandonment that we might have and an inability to be self-aware with your inner narrative? Because I, you know, in cognitive therapy a lot of the conversation is around like stopping harmful narratives as they happen. And I also really struggle with identifying when it’s an inner narrative and not truth.
You know, in my world the sky’s purple and everybody else says it’s blue, but it’s about me. And, and I’m wondering do you see that between a connection between this inner child abandonment and that, I guess skill? Because hearing you say that my, you know, my inner child is telling you not to believe some of that is, is that helpful in also being able to identify that harmful self narrative and not believing it?
Yes. Yes. So I’ll say it maybe in a different way. Okay, great. This is what, well first of all, before we go on, I just want you to put a hand on your heart and just thank little Ivy for coming forward and just internally or out loud, just tell her like she’s welcome anytime. And you’ll be checking in with her more.
And then in your mind’s eye, just put her in a, a safe place. It can be a place you make up or it can be a familiar place that you know in your life now or in the past, grandparents’ house, best friend’s house, a tree house, a park you make up. And when you feel like she’s there and she feels like hard and acknowledged and thanked for what she’s shared,
then just let me know. Yeah. Thank you for making me do that. She’s safely baking cookies with her Oma right now. Great. Perfect. Perfect. Because we don’t wanna abandon her child after they come forward in a process. So here’s what I’ll say. And I, I know you really like to understand things, so I will explain this and that’s a beautiful thing and I’ll explain this the best I can.
I don’t know that you necessarily have quote unquote in her child abandonment. You seem very connected to her. She came forward pretty easily. I think more of what happened is you actually never got to be a child. Children are allowed to have freedom of expression, freedom of dreams, unbridled self-expression basically. And you didn’t really get that from what I’m hearing.
You had to go in your head kind of be a little adult, no drama, no dreams really early. Yeah. I don’t think I fully understood that until you just said that. Yeah. So that to me is why they’re such a self critic too. Because when a child doesn’t feel safe to be a child, which is our natural, you know,
inclination Right? You had to suppress all the things that developmentally were appropriate. You had to suppress them. Yeah. Having big dreams, being dramatic, all the expression things, that’s all developmentally appropriate childhood. And you were told that was wrong. And so because you were told just you being wrong, just you being you was wrong. You basically decided something’s wrong with me.
’cause all these things I naturally feel I wanna do are squashed and shamed and judged and criticized. So that’s very, very confusing for a child. And so you had to, the, the, the inner critic was developed as a way to protect yourself because if you are harder on yourself than anyone else’s, then you’re safe. And I know you know that cognitively,
I mean most of us know that about our inner critic. Yeah. So it’s not about making the inner critic wrong, but what’s happened is instead of developing a, for lack of a better word, parent voice inside of you that says things like, you got this speak your truth. I’m here. You know what you need to say? What is your gut feeling?
You’ve developed an inner critic voice and that’s basically become your parent. Yeah. ’cause it’s sounds similar to your parents as well. We internalize the voice, we internalize and then amplify the voice and messages of our parents and that becomes their inner voice. Yeah. That was said really succinctly. So what comes up for you as I say it? Well, I immediately wanna ask what action steps can I take going forward to repair this?
Well I mean my biggest, my biggest recommendation would be inner child work. Yeah. Because, and I say that not just because I’m passionate about it and love the work, but I also experienced, and I could be wrong, you, you clarify for me, I did experience a beautiful shift with you when we did that. I did experience you dropping out of your head.
You were still there a little bit in answering some of the questions, but it wasn’t a hundred percent just cognitive. Yeah. I was definitely emotion there. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. That’s beautiful. So the how would be more of that inner child work and also like finding ways. ’cause again, what you want to be, it’s so funny ’cause I’m about to give you advice and tell you don’t take advice from people,
but what You, What you want to be mindful of Ivy is it sounds like growing up you were told a lot what to do and what not to do. And so even though there’s a part of you that like wants to rebel and wants to do whatever you want, there’s also a part of you that’s consistently looking for someone to tell you what to do.
Yeah. Or how to be. And so what I wanna encourage you to do is find ways and things that really work for you. So like instead of forcing yourself to do a body scan, be like, okay, what would feel good to me? Maybe going out and putting my feet in the grass or like doing an ice bath for my feet or rubbing a rose on the inside of my arm and feeling what that feels like.
You know, like find things that help you connect to your body but that are in your own way. Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. I’m curious, do you see somatic work help with that also? I mean I think somatic work is great. I do. It’s a beautiful way to trace feelings for someone who’s very heady. It can be challenging to do somatic work.
Okay, cool. Okay. No that’s, that’s helpful to, that’s clarifying. What did it clarify for you? Well I think, yeah, what you’re saying is there are these kind of textbook answers for people of like, here’s how you get into your body, here’s what you do. But because I don’t feel safe in my body, that’s just another list to a column of things that might not necessarily work and therefore might,
you know, feed into that moral failing inner a narrative that I don’t think will suit me as much as brushing my hair in the sunshine for 20 minutes or something. Yes, exactly. And the more you do that, the brushing your hair in the sunshine example, the more you’re going to feel safer and safer in your body. That in addition to letting that inner child come forward and finally giving yourself the childhood you never had that is gonna help you then do the somatic work or the breath work or any of these other things that can take you to deeper levels.
But if it feels like too much of a stretch, then I encourage you to do things that feel like they’re gonna get you where you wanna go. You know, there are many roads to Rome somatic work is awesome. It is. And it might not be the best place for you right now, but I really trust you to make that decision on anybody else.
Thank you. That feels very freeing and I feel very seen and to have a little bit of renew to hope that I haven’t had in a while. So thank you. Oh, It’s my pleasure. Love. Just wanna say again, a lot of what you’re sharing is so relatable and so very, very common. You know, I remember, I’ll tell you a quick story.
This was years ago when I was working on really connecting more deeply to my sexuality and femininity. And I hired this coach who was like an expert in that. And we were doing, we did like eight sessions and she would tell me to do stuff and it just wouldn’t land for me. And I, it finally, a light bulb finally connected when I realized like this particular coach had been a very sexual being since she was a kid.
She would tell me stories and I was like, this isn’t the right coach for me. I hired her because she kind of has what I want, but I actually need someone who struggled with this because someone who this has always come easily for doesn’t understand how hard it is for me and is giving me practices that are just too far out there for me.
Yeah. And so I found someone who was very open in their femininity and sexuality, but wasn’t always and had to get there by getting outta their head and everything like that. So I share that with you because you know, when you are reading a book or going to therapy or even listening to the podcast, if someone’s kinda giving you advice from something that’s been easy for them and then saying,
oh try this, it’ll be easy for you too. It may not be. And that’s okay. Yeah. Does that help? Totally. I wish you could search therapists in your insurance by that. I know, I know. No, I know. I know. It’s important to, you know, feel safe with someone. It sounds like you’re doing really,
really, really beautiful work with your therapist and your therapist sounds like a great therapist and part of how you trust your gut and advocate for yourself is like, okay, the body scan thing is a great suggestion. It’s not working for me. Here’s what I did instead. Or do you have any other suggestions? Yeah. You know, Yeah. I was really stuck in the body scams are the only way to do this.
And I think that you were able to see that connection between body safety and that not, I guess communicating well. Right. To break that down a little bit more for me, which I needed. Yeah, Yeah, yeah. You’re doing great. Thank you. We’re definitely committed to keep trying. Yeah. Yeah. Well and even, ’cause when you say keep trying,
it’s sort of like, you know, you’re at, you’re trying to get a free throw in the in the basket and you’re just shooting and shooting and shooting. It’s less about a goal but more about like, I’m committed to loving myself, really committed to loving myself and understanding myself and giving myself the childhood I didn’t have. Yeah, absolutely. Because You’re not broken.
Yeah. Yeah. I think that in a C child work will help with that perspective. Yes, absolutely. And as we wrap up and if nothing comes through, that’s totally okay, but are you aware of anything you’re feeling in your body? I feel a little knot in my lower back and between my shoulder blades and I feel a little lighter than I did earlier.
Great. So with those knots, instead of interpreting them after we hang up, just go stretch or get a tennis ball, lay down on it between your shoulder blades, move your body in a way that helps loosen those knots. Don’t make ’em mean anything. Just do what would feel good. I can do that. I know you can. Thank you.
So thank you Ivy for sharing your story and your experience and for being courageous enough to let me guide you through a little inner child process. So there are lots of things we could have unpacked in this episode. Lots of roads we could have gone down. Shame one was a big one. The inner critic one was a big one. The one I chose to go down was helping her actually have the experience of being emotionally available and connecting to her inner child.
As I felt that that was at the root of many other things, including being able to take a run, not between three and 5:00 AM Oh what we do to protect ourselves. The lengths we go to, to protect ourselves. And what ends up happening is all we do is hurt ourselves more. But until we realize that so much of what we’re doing is protective patterning and until we find another way to get that quote unquote protection,
we’ll we’ll keep doing the things that make us feel safe, even if they aren’t the healthiest things for us. So for Ivy, she was using her head to try to get into her body and that never works. That never works. And she had this beautiful therapist that has been suggesting these things, which are great suggestions, but for Ivy just may not work because she doesn’t quite feel safe enough in her body.
So how we start to really feel that safety is nervous system regulation, which I’ve talked a lot about on the show, but secondarily, really reconnecting to that inner child is often why we don’t feel safe in our body is because we left our body at a very young age. ’cause it didn’t feel safe. We didn’t feel safe to be ourselves, we didn’t feel safe physically,
we didn’t feel safe mentally, we didn’t feel safe emotionally. And so we checked out. So I wanted to give her an experience of coming back into her body. Of course our work today, which is the taste of that. But I hope it reframes some of her thinking around, I’m emotionally unavailable. I wanna speak to also what I shared about hiring that coach that I realized wasn’t the best fit for me because she hadn’t gone through something similar.
Now, now I’m not saying that every practitioner, coach, therapist you hire has to have the exact same journey you have. But I find it is useful if you are working with someone who has at some level struggled with some of the things you’re struggling with. So for example, if you are a super, super heady person working with someone who always has been super connected to their body and their emotions and everything can be great because it can be so inspiring and those people are really good at that.
However, there can be a disconnect because they haven’t ever experienced how hard it is to get out of the head into the body. And I’m not saying that that is the case for a therapist, but I, I do see this in a lot of client practitioner relationships. And so my encouragement to any of you when looking for someone to work with is to not hire someone based on being aspirational.
You know, they have what you want, there’s that, but you also want them to be experiential. Meaning they’ve would walked in your shoes. It doesn’t have to be the exact shoe or the exact route, but there’s enough of a shared experience where they can help you get to the other side. You know, I see my work as a coach of the people that I help or coach,
even any of you listeners, you’re on the same path too. You may just be a few steps behind. So my role is like, oh yeah, I’ve been on that path. I I know to turn here or go there or watch out for that rock or watch out for that ditch because I’ve walked the path. That’s why I get so frustrated when I hear aspiring coaches or even current coaches going,
oh, I haven’t figured out my life. Or I still have all these things I haven’t figured out. How am I ever gonna help people? And I always say, you are so beautifully qualified to help other people because you’ve walked your version of the human path and human experience. None of us are perfect. None of us have it all figured out.
Some of us are just a little farther down the path than know the route. Alright everybody, that’s the show for today. So you so much love and many blessings. Until next time, Thank you for listening to Over it and on with it. I love hearing from you. So please post your comments or questions at christinehassler.com/podcast. That’s also the place you can sign up to receive coaching from me in an upcoming episode.
And if you love this show, please share it and subscribe in iTunes. You can find all my social media handles and sign up to be part of my community at christinehassler.com. Until next week, here’s to getting over it and on with it. Much love and many blessings.