If you love a good framework, I hope what I share this week resonates with you. If it does, rate this newsletter. It helps other people find us.

—Gonzo/David

Mindy and I have been together for quite a long time. Our time together has had so many different hues and textures in our day to day experience. A lot of that time felt like our default feeling tone was fraught and anxious. Enmeshed, we played the dance so many partnerships know well, where no matter how many time we practice the steps to this dance we seem always to be stepping on one another’s toes. 

I know that we both came by our clumsiness in this regard honestly; neither of us were given an example of healthy self-esteem, boundaries, or self-governance. We were both the object of intense focus from fathers who turned to their religious community for validation, sought added validation from us and control over us to distract from their complete lack of self-esteem, self-soothing skills, or boundaries. While our mothers were quite different in temperament, hers hypercritical and mine lacking capacity to be present, they both seemed unable to show up to hold their husband accountable for how they were with us.

It is impossible to understand the experience of another, but I feel deep compassion for Mindy and myself for the myriad ways in which we perpetuated what we were taught. Sometimes in exactly the ways we were taught but, always with the same boundariless fear and anxiety that permeated our formative years as children.

We did not want to be like our parents but we lacked any perspective that could help us find a much better way. We did not know how to experience our feelings without moralistic judgment. It is really hard to find happiness when everything you feel gets judged so harshly by your partner and by the voice inside your head.

I was on a walk-and-talk date with a long-time friend, Kent, two weeks ago. He’s one of my favorite people to chat with because he loves to noodle on frameworks with me. One of our favorite conversational topics is to find frameworks for frameworks. So, I wasn’t surprised when he told me he had a new framework he wanted to share with me. He had recently been involved in a sales training, and they introduced a framework for preparing for a sales call that is reminiscent of the concepts in parts work; we do not have a singular internal voice or felt experience rather we are composed of many parts.

Kent told me: “You have a cast of characters you can bring to the table: The Adult, The Critical Parent, The Nurturing Parent, and The Child. What we learned was that you should be intentional about bringing The Adult and The Nurturing Parent. Leave The Critical Adult at home. And children don’t belong in a sales call.”

Sometimes a new framing just tickles me. I was so curious to see where we would go playing with this framework. I like being lazy and mnemonics matter–this was so simple. A framework that requires too much mental bandwidth to reconstruct is unlikely to make it into how you show up, which is ultimately why Kent and I love frameworks so much. It has been a reliable path to seeing past our own limited worldview and get a glimpse of the unknown unknowns we all know are the key to growth.

What we taped out during that chat I have been going back over and over in numerous conversations the past two weeks.

• Being an adult is fucking fantastic. I want to show up as an Adult. Being a kid was fun but being an adult means travel, adventures, a body of work, sexual ecstasy, intellectual exploration, personal growth, and so much fun and joy. Of course, it’s not one uninterrupted party, but nothing beats being a happy and fulfilled adult. Nothing!

• While we want to be The Adult, when The Child shows up, and it will show up, usually at the most inopportune times, what we do in that situation will decide how much time we get to enjoy being an adult vs. how much time we spend as a parent.

• No matter how nice of an adult you are, when The Child shows up you really should just call their parents.

• Which parent shows up to talk to the child matters if you want to spend more time as an adult.

  • It is impossible to misidentify which parent showed up because nothing the Nurturing Parent says or does ever makes us feel terrified. There is always this sense that there’s space and time enough to get things sorted. The Nurturing Parent can sometimes frustrate The Adult in us: “How long is this going to take?” The answer is: it will go slowly at first but then suddenly pick up speed and we will reach unimagined heights.

  • No matter what we tell ourselves, the Critical Parent has never helped us make progress. It takes credit for what we are already capable of doing and robs us of the joy that ought to accompany our lives most of the time.

• We can model Nurturing Parent to anyone in our life, but the intimacy and richness we crave in our life can only be satisfied by having adult friendships.

• Boundaries are not rules or principles as much as they are a recognition of feeling triggered into reactivity (a childish behavior) and making space or separation from the irritant. Learning to do this in your closest relationships is just as difficult as learning to do this with yourself.

• As a fully-formed and practiced Adult I can hold onto myself and show up in the lives of everyone I meet with loving awareness because this is how I show up for myself!

I wish I could go back in time and take more responsibility for how I felt. It is so easy to get defensive when I spend time with my Critical Parent reacting to everything I’m doing and everything everyone in my life is doing.

I do not have an elegant framework for regret. I have regrets. I seek to have compassion for myself for how I showed up.

My biggest regret is that I mapped an interaction cycle from my relationship with my parents to our relationship that kept me stuck. When I see Mindy struggle, I get triggered into a loop that starts: “The adults in my life don’t have their shit together; I need to step up and take control...” I hope that I now better understand this loop and that I can integrate it into my Adult experience, and instead of feeling triggered into Childhood and struggling to hand the baton to the Nurturing Parent, I get to thrill in the experience of being a kind and loving Adult who is fully capable of holding onto himself while being entwined in the life of the person he loves most, Mindy!

—Gonzo/David

NEAT!

• Thank you Scott and Natalie for going through this framework with me and helping me see it more clearly!

PARTING

WORDS

PIC

That’s all for this week! If you’re into this, share this newsletter with all your friends. Connecting with new subscribers is magical! 🧚🏻‍♀️

Forwarded this email? Subscribe here.

DISCLAIMER: This newsletter is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional medical advice.