Overcoming Trauma: The Brain and Body's Response to Stress #551

Cody Isabel, a neuroscientist, discusses trauma and its impact on the body and mind. He explains how the brain keeps score of traumatic events and how the body serves as a scoreboard. Cody emphasizes the power of neuroplasticity and the ability to change and grow throughout life. He also explores the role of protective mechanisms and inner critics in trauma healing. Cody shares examples of clients who have experienced healing and emphasizes the importance of compassion and understanding in the healing process.

Takeaways

• Therapy should aim to help individuals become self-sufficient and learn skills to manage their emotions and thoughts.
• Personal growth and change are possible with the right mindset and support.
• Seeking help from coaches, mentors, and therapists can provide valuable insights and support in personal transformation.
• Changing one's environment is crucial for sustaining personal change and growth.

Follow Cody:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/cody-isabel
https://www.instagram.com/mindbrainbodylab/?hl=en
https://www.mindbrainbodylab.com/

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Transcript

Lachlan Stuart: 0:51

Cody, welcome to the show.

Cody Isabel: 0:54

What up, man? Thanks for having me on here.

Lachlan Stuart: 0:56

You guys have a new Super Bowl. Join in from Kansas City.

Cody Isabel: 1:00

Let's do it, dynasty.

Lachlan Stuart: 1:03

And who knows, I've seen, I saw Patrick Mahomes with a shotgun and a beer with Luke Combs at some concert somewhere and I was like what a lad.

Cody Isabel: 1:12

That's one way to play. He's always doing something crazy like that.

Lachlan Stuart: 1:16

I know Well, I was going to say it would be interesting to follow him around, but they did a whole Netflix series on him and pretty much followed him around, so I don't know how much more in his space we could get before it's considered stalking.

Cody Isabel: 1:29

Yeah, I think that he is very happy with the distance between us and him, right, now 100%.

Lachlan Stuart: 1:36

But, dude, we got connected from a mutual friend in my neighbor actually, and we had a call a couple of weeks ago and we hit it off really well and I was like, dude, you're a neuroscientist, I'd love for you to come on the show and just talk more about trauma and a few other things, because everyone experiences trauma in their own own way, shape or form, and having a better understanding around it and some tools to overcome it and even how the body keeps score of it and what it can do to yourself, from illness to all of that sort of stuff, is a cool thing to understand, because then people feel like they're in more control over that sort of stuff, and I think there's nothing better than being in a position where you know you're in control to create a better life for yourself. What got you curious or interested in neuroscience?

Cody Isabel: 2:24

For sure. So it happened as most things do in my childhood. We'll get there. We'll get there. But in relation to brain science specifically, there was this exhibit that came to my elementary school in the gym of my elementary school and it they laid out like this human body on the gym floor and not a real one, it was a blow up human body and you could like walk through. So it was this like enormous blow up human body. That would have been a wild time Trauma. No, I'm kidding, but going into that exhibit you walk into the head, at the top of the head essentially, and you walk through and I remember seeing these yellow things like sticking out from the head or whatever, and I was like what the heck is that Going through the rest of the body? We go through the rest of the tour or whatever.

Cody Isabel: 3:16

At the very end I asked my teacher. I was like teach, why were these yellow things everywhere? They were all over the place. And she's like those were nerve cells, they're from the brain. And I was like what were they doing all over the body? And she's like the brain controls the whole body, everything, and I was just like the thing, way at the beginning, controls everything else. She's like yes. So I was like why would we study anything else? And from that point forward, neuroscientists was born, as they say. So I just always loved it. Since then I was like this is the coolest thing ever. Like it controls all the other body systems. Almost everything else can be traced back to it in some way. Like everybody has one. Like no matter who we are, animals have them nervous systems. That is Like so it. Just from that point forward I was fascinated.

Lachlan Stuart: 4:03

So what's been some of the, I guess, most life changing things that you've learned since studying it? There was two or three things that stood out to you what is kind of counterintuitive.

Cody Isabel: 4:15

That gets me some flack sometimes, but the first one is how much power we have. People don't understand like the nervous system in your brain seems so complicated. But what's really empowering to me? Most people have heard about neuroplasticity and like the brain can change and all this kind of stuff and that lasts your entire life. Your brain can change and grow and shift your entire life. Neuroscience supports and growth mindset.

Lachlan Stuart: 4:41

It doesn't stop at a certain age, because a lot of people think that it's like, once our most developmental years are done, we're cooked. That's who we are.

Cody Isabel: 4:49

No, that's not true. Your entire life. We would not get far as a human civilization if you could not learn your entire life. Neurogenesis, which is the formation of new brain cells, doesn't happen very much as you get older. There's six this is like new research, so this is always shifting a little bit, but there's six, five, six, seven areas in an adult brain that can form new brain cells that they found, which is kind of interesting. It's really cool. Some of you are prefrontal cortex, like up behind your forehead, some of your hippocampus, which is like learning a memory and stuff. But so that's neurogenesis. That's happening way more when you're younger but still does still happen.

Cody Isabel: 5:33

Neuroplasticity, which is learning, growing, shifting, changing the pulling apart of neural, like neural living already living near neurons and nerves, happens your entire life. It has to because we have to learn a whole lives. So that's for sure one of the most important things that I've learned. The other thing is that your brain is in this dark cave called your skull and so what is objective or subjective reality? It sounds like we're getting kind of like metaphysical here, but what is subjective versus Objective reality is something super empowering to start to understand, because your brain people have heard, the brain is a meaning-making machine, and so it is always making meaning of things outside of itself. It is predicting its experience. This is really interesting.

Cody Isabel: 6:18

Like people don't understand this I don't think about their emotions a lot of the times is that they predict their emotions. They don't necessarily like have them right. What happens is like you have your past experiences, your beliefs and your values, and then your brain is taking an all this sensory information and every single second, what your brain is predicting. Those sensory inputs mean that prediction. The best guess of what they mean is what you experience as an emotion, as a thought, and so it's kind of Interesting. You're always predicting those things and that also means that I get the meaning of life like what is the meaning of life right from a neuroscience perspective? There is no meaning of life Right, because you're making the meaning.

Lachlan Stuart: 7:01

Yeah.

Cody Isabel: 7:02

Right. So if your brain is a meaning-making machine, there can't be meaning out in objective reality. It doesn't make any sense. Like meaning, we make it and so that's. Some people are like an eye roll, but I think it's really cool because it means you get to make the meaning of everything, like and I just I joke all the time Someone cuts you off in traffic. Meaningless you get fired from a job.

Lachlan Stuart: 7:22

How do you? Could you change that though, for example? So if we're predicting or, yeah, our minds essentially predicting how we want to feel, the emotions that we're going to experience, can we shift that, I guess, conditioning? I'm thinking about an example for myself. I I say this happened all the fucking time. Now I'm sad, I'm like I just wish I could fix it, but I Am introverted by nature and I've developed this idea that I've had too much socializing. I just want to go home and either work or I want to go home and relax, and If I notice that there's something being planned, I'll just start telling myself now, this is gonna make me super anxious, this is gonna run me down, I'm gonna be grumpy for it, and what often happens, 99% of the time, is I'll be a you know, in a sour fucking mood grumpy bugger.

Lachlan Stuart: 8:13

Right up and then, as soon as I get there, I end up having the best time, but, for example, it might be three hours prior that I'm just being bitter because of, I guess, potentially experiences around. What I think I should be feeling about is that I should be doing something else, so is is that sort of an example of that?

Cody Isabel: 8:30

Kind of yeah, I mean we, we suffer unintentionally a lot as humans. Like you're describing is a whole Whole journey up to the moment where you realize, oh, this isn't that bad, like you were suffering where you didn't necessarily have to. It was meaning you were choosing to make, ah, I'm tired, I'm drained, so this means I'm going to suffer when I get to this thing. But you chose that meaning, right? So this is like the central, one of the central themes of cognitive behavioral therapy. A lot, a big piece of it Is he could to choose your feelings, thoughts and actions every moment. So that's could be an example 100% of meaning that you're making you.

Cody Isabel: 9:07

You you're making that meaning and even deeper one is and I know a big focus of what you want hit on today's trauma. Trauma affects the meaning you make significantly, because what I find oftentimes is people's past baggage Shapes their present moment and then they predict forward what's in the present moment. So if you have past baggage, you create present baggage which creates future baggage. Okay, so people predict forward their past and they create the past in the future, which is no bueno, especially when you have like past, especially if it's traumatic past baggage and you make that mean past things mean things they didn't necessarily mean and that creates all sorts, all sorts of problems as you grow up and you end up causing the same thing, the past in the future and you say stuck in these cycles, these circles, I work a lot after abusive relationships. People are like I've been an eight abusive relationships is like no, no, no, you've been in the same abusive relationship eight times. Big difference.

Lachlan Stuart: 10:08

You explain that a little bit more, because I think that's an interesting idea. So you haven't been in eight abusive relationships, but you've been in same abusive Relationship eight times. What's the difference there?

Cody Isabel: 10:21

Yeah. So the difference is that the pattern is the same. Almost always there's past trauma or past baggage. Trauma is a loaded word, we should definitely dive into that a little bit, but there's past, let's just use baggage for now. There's past baggage and what's happening is you're filtering your reality. So let's pretend that I have a girlfriend In high school and she is controlling. Okay, so we end up not working out RIP, okay so. But what's happening is that I've got this new girlfriend that's up here, but I've got this girlfriend back here. That's over my face, and so now I can only see this girlfriend through the filter of this one of my past experience with this one. So now I'm going into this second girlfriend's relationship, thinking women are controlling, clipped, now I'm kidding, and. And so I'm filtering what, what it means to date, what it means what the relationship is, my feelings, my thoughts, my actions, my behaviors, through the filter of that first relationship. Then let's pretend my second girlfriend. She cheats on me. Okay, yikes, rough, right. So now I'm filtering. I've got two filters. So this third girlfriend now women are controlling and they cheat on me. That third girlfriend has no shot, and no shot, okay. And so, after enough time, bring that context over to an abusive relationship.

Cody Isabel: 11:39

A lot of the times this happens in one of the in early Relationships with your parents. I almost always ask this question but like who did you want love from more? Your mom, your dad? Who do you want affection from more your mom, your dad? Like, who did you want you to say, great job, locky? Your dad or your mom? Right, and kind of figured that out, and ask people that question and then start to talk about what was your relationship like with them? I didn't have a dad, or my dad was abusive, or my mom was abusive and she was narcissistic, or Whatever that was, and that's your initial pattern. That's that filter, that first filter, just like the girl, the girl who was controlling, is that same filter. And so now I'm viewing Relationships and I'm viewing what love is through that filter. Okay, and so now, not only Am I filtering what love is through this, I'm my I've got rose cover glasses on, because now what is love? I'm saying, ah, you match the pattern, let's go.

Cody Isabel: 12:31

And now we're in the relationship, even though it was a emotionally abusive or narcissistic relationship pattern. And so Continues to happen over and over and over again. And this past baggage that we've shoved down into our bodies Wants another shot to get released. They want that trauma wants to get released so it drags us back into similar situations, so we can get another at bat. It wants another attempt to release itself. It wants you to complete that relationship in a positive way so that it's no longer trapped in that pattern. So it brings you back to similar type people so you can try again. And then, because you don't know this, you fall into the same pattern, you get in the same abusive relationship and it doesn't work out again. And then you still have that trauma. So then, alright, next up and you go to the next one to try and repeat the pattern and you again, and it you just get people get stuck in that pattern. Does that make sense?

Lachlan Stuart: 13:23

Oh yeah, that was awesome. And for those who weren't, watching on YouTube, watch on YouTube because there's plenty of good Animations there to that, because I love watching things. But that makes no much sense. Is that compounding effect? And it's almost like shining the mirror back on you to be like On a fucking good relationship. You can't walk away from this. You have to face this trauma or whatever it is that's holding you back. It's gonna keep raring its head and, if you want, it's probably the same right for people trying to lose weight or you've mentioned Relationship, but also then trying to create wealth as well. If you keep finding self-sabotaging behaviors, there's something that your body or subconsciously, you need to sort out 100%, 100% agree.

Lachlan Stuart: 14:12

Savage. So how does the body Old trauma? So let's say, for example, we're going back to that relationship example you gave us and you. I've been cheated on, I've Been a abusive relationship. So therefore, there's fear, there's anger, there's a bit of See, resentment. You see them on social media living a good life, but you're still stuck in the pit of it all. How does that impact your body? And obviously, moving forward, you've mentioned the mindset stuff, but is there any physical effects? Yeah, so it's interesting.

Cody Isabel: 14:45

Most people read the or not. Let me just just claim this. Most people have seen the title the body keeps the score and assume the rest of it. Okay, but they haven't a read the book or looked at some of the research from a brain science perspective. The brain keeps the score, but the body is the scoreboard Okay. So the body keeps the scores a bit of a misnomer. Okay, it's science communication. I do a ton of science communication, so I absolutely get it, and I think that book has had a massive effect on helping people kind of understand how inflammation and trauma can affect the body. But it is your brain, ultimately, that is keeping score. But again, your body is the scoreboard Okay, so it can affect the body especially.

Cody Isabel: 15:33

I'm trained in something called internal family systems psychotherapy and that's a form of therapy, that trauma therapy that considers us all made of multiple parts. So there's the part of Cody that's anxious, or the part of Lockie that is depressed, or there's different parts of us, and these parts are little traumatized kids, okay, and so think of them in your psyche a little bit. But our brains are really good at ignoring these traumatized parts and so sometimes, to get your attention, they will go down into your body, into your peripheral nervous system, and say, oh, let's make your chest really tight or your shoulders and your chops really sore and things like that. That's one way these parts can kind of get your attention, for you to go pay attention to them and go do the work with them that you need to do to help that part of you heal, so that it doesn't have to do that job anymore. That's one thing. The other thing too is we can get real deep here but something traumatic happens. It's like it comes in through your body okay, your body takes in the sensory information. It goes through your nervous system okay, into your brain and in your mind, which is like the notification center for your mind, brain and body. It's like a notification center that's like, oh, hey, trauma is happening outside in the body and it, essentially in relation to trauma, is like no, thank you. And goes back to the brain, is like, hey, brain, please hold onto this man. Like can't, no, can do. And the brain's like, well, what do you want me to do? I got nerve cells here. I can't just store these. I don't have all my nerve cells are accounted for. Like, what do you want me to do so.

Cody Isabel: 17:07

Your nervous system, being very smart, is like you know who could hold onto this? The body, so many things. We got fascia, we got muscles, we got skin. We got so much stuff downstairs let's just go down there.

Cody Isabel: 17:19

So it goes to something called your hypothalamus and this is I'm very oversimplifying a lot of this but it goes to something called your hypothalamus, which is half endocrine and half nervous system tissue, and so what it does is shifts this electrochemical message into a neurochemical not neurochemical but chemical and hormonal message, which is the communication pathway of your body.

Cody Isabel: 17:43

Your body communicates to immune cells, hormones, things like that Say your body talks, your different body parts talk to one another, and that electrochemical message is like I can't hold onto this. Get shoved into this now, into these hormones and these neuropeptides and these immune cells. That get shoved down into the cells of your body, in between your muscle fibers, and they get clamped down and locked down into your peripheral nervous system and that traumatic thing that's inside of here is now locked inside of your nervous system and that traumatic memory is locked in here and all of the chemicals and the cytokine or the immune messages are locked in between those muscle fibers and in your fascia and in your skin and IBS and rosacea and all these things that can start to happen. That's how that your body is keeping the score, if that makes sense, or is the scoreboard?

Lachlan Stuart: 18:36

Yeah, and it's interesting when you say like a few of the symptoms of those causes, a lot of people just go, I add, and it's very often overlooked with the trauma. I was listening to a very good podcast the other day with Dr Joe D'Espenza and he was on Modern Wisdom sorry, with Chris Williams I did. It was like two and a half hours and I've listened to a little bit of Joe D'Espenza and I sort of go in and out of listening to his stuff, but he was at a point in this one where he was talking about some of the research he's gotten, the shifts and healings of people, his experiences. I need to get this tested again because I don't believe it. Like it just doesn't seem believable and it was the first time I've really listened to something that he said where it's just like it hasn't seemed super airy, ferri, and I'm not saying that there's like sorry, let's just say it really connected with me for the first time.

Lachlan Stuart: 19:33

And that's when I went back and I was like, well, and we spoke about this when we caught up, like when I did my hypnotherapy and my Neural Inquistant Programming et cetera and timeline therapy and all of those things, like I didn't believe in that stuff in the beginning and I didn't think it had trauma, I didn't think I was in pain, and I went through these experiences and all this stuff starts popping up and I'm like whoa, where'd that come from? I need to look at that. And it was like the most confronting experiences. But afterwards I just felt like a whole new person. I felt like this weight had been lifted and so, as you're saying, all of this stuff, I'm like and there's got to be more to it with not only myself but people who are experiencing a lot of these symptoms of trauma.

Cody Isabel: 20:16

Ultimately, oh yeah, it's one of the most overlooked things ever. Like people come in with all these chronic issues and clinicians don't necessarily they're busy, like they're overwhelmed and burnt out themselves, like, first of all and second of all, they're not necessarily like specifically trained in, like psychosomatic symptoms and things like that that can be caused and led from trauma and from things that you're ignoring and not talking to and working out and having a conversation with Cause you can talk to those traumatized parts of you and help heal them.

Lachlan Stuart: 21:55

What would that process look like? So say, for example, let's use I'm a bloke. I once again never believed in this stuff, but now, as I'm listening to Lockheed and Cody talk, I'm curious right, and I've think that maybe there is some shit there that's leading to some symptoms in my life. What would that process then start to look like for me if I wanted to start healing?

Cody Isabel: 22:21

The sit-back end piece, again sorry, last part If I wanted to start healing. Oh, gotcha. Okay. So there's a couple of concepts. So top down versus bottom up is the first concept to kind of understand, and then safety. We need all warm and fuzzy in here. But top down is like your traditional talk therapy. And if you're talking about like trauma, there's a couple pieces here because, like, what is trauma? And things like that.

Lachlan Stuart: 22:51

But if we're talking about- let's define trauma in this, just for the sake of people.

Cody Isabel: 22:58

Yeah, that'd be super helpful to just lay the framework, because there's a lot of words thrown around now Like everything is traumatic Okay, and while I love to hear that trauma is more in the mainstream, I've been using the word potentially traumatic event PTE Like, if you look in the research and literature, that's what we're talking about. Because what people do not realize is that in any traumatic event any is a big, broad, sweeping term. But in most traumatic events, two thirds of people come out fine, they build resilience and like they're not traumatized. So that's a potentially traumatic event. One third of people get the PTSD, the complex PTSD, the trauma. They're traumatized by this in a varying degrees and things like that.

Lachlan Stuart: 23:48

Sorry to interject. Is there any reason why some people do come out one the other side of that experience, with PTSD for example, and others don't they become more resilient from it and seem to just move forward? Is there any science around that?

Cody Isabel: 24:03

Yeah, it's interesting context. The way that I think about it is event, experience and effect. The three E's okay. So let's pretend the event is a house fire, just for shits and giggles here. And let's pretend your house is on fire okay, that is the experience of your house being on fire for you could be potentially traumatic because you have to run around, find your kids, find the books or find all the stuff it's maybe books, all the stuff you wanna save, like all of the different things that you're trying to get out of your house. You're trying to call the police, right, that's freaking scary. So the effect of that could be traumatic, ptsd, right. All, right, now let's pretend for the same event, you're a firefighter. Okay, way different experience. This is your fifth house of the night, okay, like you're like okay, I need to get this door, I need to make sure the people are out, I need to do this like the experience of that same event is completely different for you as a firefighter and it absolutely would build resilience. So that's just context why there could be a difference on events. To super expense.

Cody Isabel: 25:04

Now let's pretend if you're looking at the family whose house is on fire, the daughter came out completely fine, the sons traumatized the dads traumatized the moms fine, okay, some of that. The difference in that is genetic. There's a huge genetic predisposition to some of these types of things. There's the which is like nature versus nurture, type of concept, and then there's the individual experience as well.

Cody Isabel: 25:29

Did one of those people lose everything? They couldn't get to their bedroom and get anything. Okay, that's like everything gone in an instant, while, as the other sibling was able to go get, grab, go grab some of their stuff and save some of their stuff, so they had one thing to hold on to. One comfort object to hold on to throughout the experience was one trapped under a bed and one got out the front door right away. Like, there's different things in the experience portion of the three E's that determine can help you understand and hypothesize the potential effect, and some of it is. There's just not enough research as well to say definitively. That's some of the stuff that I'm really interested in working on with, like machine learning and AI and things like that, but there's still a lot of research to be done in relation to Y-cell and not others outside of the things I just described. So that's what kind of the research would suggest. Does that make sense?

Lachlan Stuart: 26:21

Yeah, no, I was very interested in that because my way of seeing things is not necessarily the right way. It's the right way for me and I was curious to ask that whether there was any research and data. And obviously there's a lot of variables. Do you believe, regardless of which side you're on, whether you become more resilient and you move through, or you are someone that may experience PTSD you can still get to a place of healing?

Cody Isabel: 26:45

Oh, 100%, absolutely, without a doubt. Yes, infatically. Yes, I've seen it myself hundreds of times. Yes, there's always hope that light at the end of the tunnel is always possible to get help and heal from these types of things, and there's really really, really good science and therapies and trauma-based therapies that help people through these types of things. So, 100% yes.

Lachlan Stuart: 27:09

Is there an example you could give us of one of your clients before we dive back? Tie that back into the process of moving through trauma.

Cody Isabel: 27:18

For sure, yeah. So again, a lot of my clients are coming to me after abusive relationships, which is almost always stemmed from childhood trauma. So after childhood trauma and things like that, and so I've had a couple, one big, a huge one was this is a really cool moment, was there's really two moments? One was this moment where she realized that she was telling herself a story from when she was way, way young. She took something in her childhood to mean she made meaning. In a moment, this young version of her made it mean that she wasn't good enough and she wasn't lovable, and it was something that happened between her and her mom. And in that moment there's a part of her that got stuck there and that young part of her thought I'm not good enough, I'm not worthy enough, like my mom doesn't love me, she doesn't wanna be with me, that kind of stuff. And she took that belief all forward for that, all the way up into, I think, she in her 40s now working with me. And so we were able to go back to that young version of her and have a conversation with that part of her and help it understand that that belief it formed in that moment no longer was helping this person, my client or whatever. Let's just call him Jill. It was no longer helping Jill, right? However, that young part didn't know that. It just didn't understand that Jill is older now. Right, jill is like this has been like 40 something years. And that part didn't have to hold onto that belief anymore.

Cody Isabel: 28:52

And so I just remember very distinctly there was a shift in the conversation where she realized, holy, holy shit, I've been telling myself this story, but that is a story Like I am good enough, but I've been saying that I'm not good enough. And the even bigger shift for her was that's a part of me that feels like I'm not good enough, not me. There's a big difference, right, adults are just kids wearing a costume. Okay, well, what's wearing the costume? Okay, that's the self. Right, that's the like. Everybody calls it something different. Ifs Internal Famous System calls it the self, and that's the most you, you can be. It's the internal, like the most cody, I can be the internal parent, the internal leader, whatever you want to call it. And she just realized that this I'm not good enough If this is herself. She was wearing this belief like it was her, but it was not her. There was a part of her that believed she wasn't good enough. And then there was her, who is good enough Because we're all good enough, right, and this moment of separation, and it was just like the tiniest sliver, it was like a huge lightbulb moment for her. And now, all of a sudden, she's having much healthier relationships Because now, guess what, she's going in good enough, as opposed to trying to prove that she is good enough and or needing someone else to prove that she's good enough, meeting someone else to give her attention, to love and affection, when she realized that it was a big, big separation, a big difference for her in relation to understanding that.

Cody Isabel: 30:23

Another one that was kind of that was interesting was in relation to, like, an addiction that stemmed from some grief. Okay, so addictions are a very interesting combination of parts inside of people, and so this human let's let's name this one Bill Jill and Bill Bill. Yeah, yeah, bill Bill lost someone, a family member, like a son, and that grief never really processed that grief, dissociated himself out, wasn't working through that grief. And these big, powerful emotions like grief, sadness, shame, rejection, abandonment, emotional pain, these big emotions, we don't always know what to do with them, so we shove them down. We push them down. Using the process we talked about earlier, we shove these emotions down Because grief feels like it would. It'll never stop. If I let that grief out, it'll never stop. It'll consume me, I'll die. Nothing will work. It'll be super, super bad. We won't survive that. Okay, so we shove the grief down. However, to keep that grief down, there's a couple of things that have to happen.

Cody Isabel: 31:29

Okay, so this is where an addiction comes in. There's a part of you that wants to react and distract. And then there's a part of you that wants to control the future. Like I never will lock you feel that pain again, that grief again. And then another part is like I will react and distract, lock you from ever having to feel that grief again. And so, hypothetically, let's pretend drugs, sex, alcohol, binge eating, binge shopping, whatever the addiction happens to be.

Cody Isabel: 31:54

You do that thing when those feelings and brief start to come up and it's all come on. It's not when you're hanging out with your friends and family. Most of the time it's you're sitting by yourself, you're alone and you're just like shit. I've got to deal with this giant thing that's coming up. That's terrifying. And so this part of you is like all right, well, if I just do some drugs or if I just drink, then I can distract, I can change my state and that emotion will go back down and I won't have to deal with that because I'm distracted from it.

Cody Isabel: 32:22

That's one half. The other half is you got this critical part? Okay, this critical part. That's like dude, are you fucking kidding me? Are you kidding me? We just stopped this, we've been clean, we haven't done drugs in so long, and what is our family going to think in relation to a trauma bond? Are you seriously? You went back to them. You went back to the abusive partner. I can't believe you. How could you do this?

Cody Isabel: 32:42

And so this inner critic is just beating the shit out of the part of you. That's like wait a minute, if I didn't do this, all of this grief would have come up. This giant, powerful emotion would have come up, overtaken us. We would have died. And so this part is like what the hell? Do you not get what I'm doing and how important this is? And then this part's like dude, screw you. Like you're fucking everything up because society hates these behaviors. I don't pathologize any of these behaviors, because all of them are little children that are just trying to protect you from this giant, powerful emotion. And even that giant powerful emotion has wisdom in it, and it's a traumatized child too. And so this system of kids are just running around causing mayhem that we call life now.

Cody Isabel: 33:23

And the inner critic puts whatever the addicted part is into a shame cycle, which then acts out again and, surprise, surprise, you relapse or whatever happens. And until you go to these parts and become the inner leader of your inner world and be able to go to the addicted part, be able to go to the inner critic and go to that exiled emotion, your bound to repeat the same thing over and over again. And so I had a guy that we did that with. First and foremost, we went and realized, hey, do you realize, bill, that this giant emotion, it actually it isn't forever. I promise. I've done it with hundreds of people. I promise that.

Cody Isabel: 34:00

And we were able to update these two parts, the inner critic and the addicted part. I was like, hey, we literally talked to them. I was like, hey, do you realize you're both doing the same thing? And they're like, wait, what do you mean? And I talked to them both what's your ultimate purpose? And what's your purpose? Well, we want to protect Bill from this thing, from the grief.

Cody Isabel: 34:17

And these parts were like, oh shit, you mean we're trying to do the same thing Because they never knew that about one another. They are just butt in heads. So we got these two parts on the same team and then we were like, hey, bill, bill's parts, right, inner critic and binge drink or whatever. Did you know that actually you don't have to do these jobs at all. We can go to that part, release that, that like unhealed trauma and go rescue that part so you don't have to do these jobs anymore. And they're like, holy shit, you can do that. And we're like, yeah, we can. And they're like, oh, my God, let's do that when release this and boom, right, this addiction, which is actually a cycle of parts beating the shit out of each other, disappears because now this, this deeper wound, has been released and healed and there's no longer any reason for them to do their jobs because there's nothing to protect, because you feel that that was a long wind of response.

Lachlan Stuart: 35:09

So I appreciate you. You touched on stuff so my wife's but you touched on the heap of stuff that I was going to continue probing about, which was awesome. So for the man who is like wanting that change, now they obviously there was one part where you mentioned those things to stop cutting heads. But what would that actually look like for the individual? Like, is there a process that you go through or how does that operate?

Cody Isabel: 35:42

Yeah, so the deeper, exiled emotion, like the big big stuff like shame, grief, anger, sadness I highly, highly, highly recommend not trying to talk to those by yourself at first. Work with someone like an IFS therapist or practitioner that can help you through that, because those can be kind of scary at first. So just big disclaimer about like exiled emotions, the super deep stuff, protective mechanisms though those protectors, the addicted part or the inner critic. I do a lot of work with inner critics, so let's just use that. You can go talk to them. Okay, and it's. There's even meditative meditations, if you will, on YouTube where you can, where you can listen and go have a conversation with these parts of you. And when I'm working with someone, for example, I would literally say, okay, let's sit back, let's get present for a second. I want you to feel your shirt, close your eyes, go inward, feel your shirt on your shoulders, start to notice your breath going in and out of your nose or your mouth or whatever, and get them present for a second and then put the intention in your mind hey, what the intention I want for this, I'd like us to have for this conversation, is to just shift our relationship with this inner critic and just make that the intention, as and as they're kind of winding themselves down. And then we start to have a conversation with that part, first and foremost by saying where, when you think about this part of you, this inner critic, where do you, where do you see it, where do you feel it, where do you hear it in or around your body, and help them find it, somatically somewhere. And some people feel it outside inner critics especially are notorious for being like right outside their face or right above their head or in somewhere in their head or their forehead, somewhere like upstairs. And once they have found that part, it's like okay, focus your attention on that part, okay, and let's just have a conversation with this. Can you open up, can you be curious towards this part, can you be compassionate towards this part?

Cody Isabel: 37:34

For a couple minutes, while we ask it some questions, and you start to get to know that part by asking it what do you want me to? What's your intention for me? Mr Park, mr Inner Critic, what do you want from me? Do you, do you like your job? How long have you been doing your job? Where did you learn this from? Where did you pick up this behavior? Do you remember the first time you did this? Hey, do you realize that I'm actually like 27, 27 now, not six Like, did you know that? I just want to update you? And you're starting to ask it some of these questions?

Cody Isabel: 38:06

And you start to ask it the big, a huge question to ask it is what are you afraid would happen, mr Inner Critic, if you didn't do this job? Do you ever feel appreciated for doing the job? Are you ostracized? Are you beat up by other parts, by me, by society? And you're starting to get to know it and the goal here is to give it some attention, some love, some affection, listen, understand and validate it. That's the only thing you've got to do Because, essentially, this part has been ostracized and has been doing this job.

Cody Isabel: 38:36

It's a parentified child that's been doing this job for years and years and years. And you've got to remember it is a single digit year old child, right, that like let's pretend you were four or five in elementary school. You raise your hand, you ask a stupid question and you start to get humiliated because people are laughing at you, calling you stupid, calling you dumb, and that boom, instantly that inner critic took on the role I'm going to beat the shit out of everything Cody thinks and says before it gets out of his mouth, so he never gets criticized like that again. So I'm going to boom and that's like one random way an inner critic could get made. And it took on that role at four and it doesn't realize. Hey, did you realize, actually, that I can handle this type of stuff?

Cody Isabel: 39:16

Now, I don't have to believe everything. People call me short, I'm freaking. Six, six, come on. Like, you don't have to believe everything, you don't have to believe everything, and so. But that four year old doesn't know that because you have to grow up, fashion and emotionally mature, and so that's what that conversation ends up turning into is a realization that this is a three, four, five, six year old part of you that's been beating the shit out of you, but for really no reason. But it has a good intention, it has a positive intention. There's never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever been a part that I've talked to that's like yeah, I want this lock you do to fail, I just want him to not succeed, like when you get down to it.

Cody Isabel: 39:52

Okay, there are parts of people that are fear success and they don't. They'll sabotage your success, but for a positive reason, right? Success meant you were in the limelight because and that that made your mom abuse you more and push you harder, because she was a narcissist and wanted you to succeed to make it look good for her. To make it look good for her, oh, okay, so success was traumatizing. That makes a lot of sense to a four year old, and so that's what these conversations turn into. Is by being inquisitive and curious and compassionate with that, with these parts of you, find them in your body and then being inquisitive with them. That's what it like literally looks like I would do that with someone. All of those questions, one at a time, and much slower than I am, because I'm excited right now.

Lachlan Stuart: 40:36

But you're getting group situations as well, though, right.

Cody Isabel: 40:39

Yeah, yeah, you absolutely can.

Lachlan Stuart: 40:41

We might have to get you in for our Caterbie members. I think. I think that would be a fucking awesome. So does it roughly take those? So, for example, I used to believe for a long time that it took years to overcome setbacks, traumas, beliefs, et cetera. From your experience and your knowledge like, how quickly can you shift a belief and let go of all the trauma?

Cody Isabel: 41:07

So when you get to those exiled emotions, it can happen in the course of a session with someone, maybe an hour, 90 minutes or whatever, however okay, the problem is that and this is the issue with psychedelics at times, or spiritual bypassing or all of these different things or whatever the problem is that these protective parts, they've been guarding those exiled emotions for a very, very, very long time. So if you just go right to that exiled emotion and rip it out of that cage, it's been locked in and now that cage is empty, all your protective parts see as an empty cage and that is dangerous, and that to them it's dangerous. So they start to criticize you more, they start to self harm, suicidal ideation, dissociation, anger, rage, and so going directly to an exiled emotion. Sure, you could rescue it and release the trauma in a session, but that's not at all good for your psyche and for the rest of your system, because it's not. You can't act without thinking about the effect of one thing on the rest of the system. Once you get this, that you're made of many parts and they all interact with one another, one thing that you shift over here, shift something over here, and you've got to understand that effect. And so, ideally, what you're able to do is go talk to these protective parts.

Cody Isabel: 42:22

Every exiled emotion we have, whether it's shame, abandonment, rejection, all the ones we talked about they have a system of protectors around them guarding these exiled emotions. So, ideally, what you're able to do is go get to know these protectors and have conversations with these protectors and be a hope merchant for those protectors and be like, hey, did you know? Actually I could go save that exiled part. Would you be cool with that? All right, inner critics on the bus cool, all right, now we're going to keep chugging along. All right, let's go over to the bin shopper. Hey, bin shopper, let me listen, understand, validate, love you up. And then, hey, did you realize I could go to this exiled part and we could. You want to get on the bus? Okay, you're on the bus too and you go drive around and you get all these protectors on the bus and then you bring them with you to help you talk to that exiled emotion, because they know it best. They've been guarding it their entire lives and then you can go to the exiled emotion and that can happen in an hour or two hours where you start to really go rescue that exiled emotion.

Cody Isabel: 43:19

Sometimes those exiled emotions are so, so deeply ingrained. It takes time. Sometimes it's just about sitting next to your, the self, the bigger version of you, that internal parent, and just getting some of that self energy, that love, that compassion, for the first time. Then the next session, maybe they're willing to kind of step out of their cage a little bit and they're willing to look up at you. All right, I've had, I've worked with an exiled shame exiled inside of myself that when I got to it it wouldn't even look up at me.

Cody Isabel: 43:48

Like it was just like this little boy that he just caught looking something up on the internet. He shouldn't have been looking up at a young age and he wouldn't even look up at me. And it wasn't until I was able to love it up a little bit and be like dude, you're just curious, they'll do it Like it's okay, Like it's going to be fine, you're not going to hell. Like I was raised Catholic. That it finally was able to look up at me and release some of that, just a tiny bit of that shame. But it took a session or two to get to that place.

Cody Isabel: 44:17

So once you're there and it's ready to leave, that moment, boom. It can happen instantly, but it does take some time. From my experience, three, six, nine months is usually the length of time I'm seeing people and then they're able to, and that's going through the protectors and then finally getting to the exiled emotion. Oftentimes, as you're doing that exiled exploration, there's other exiles that come up and so people need some extra help and we need to find and work with some other protectors and things. So six to nine months is what I've seen, if we're zoned in on one specific thing.

Cody Isabel: 44:51

So and I personally don't believe that therapy needs to be for a whole lifetime that's why I love internal pain systems is because it's like, okay, how can I help Locky learn the skills to do this for himself inside of himself, so that one day he can not have to be dependent on someone else and then when the big, huge stuff comes, you can go get help, because it's hard to read the label from inside the bottle. Okay, so there's always going to be a place for getting help. I mean, you run a community of awesome guys that are all helping one another. That's huge. There are things that just by simply because you're outside the bottle, you can see and help me with, but that doesn't mean that I have to be in a therapist every single day for the rest of my life, forever. There's a lot of maintenance that can be done by yourself as well, once you learn some of these basic skills.

Lachlan Stuart: 45:35

I think that's such a powerful point because I feel, when I didn't feel like I was in control of understanding my emotions and my thoughts and shit that I was, I guess, simmering on for a long time, I did have that feeling of helplessness. I didn't think I could change my life. I thought that who I was, the way I thought, that was set in stone and that really bothered me because I didn't like where I was at. I didn't like how I was thinking. So when I started investing in coaches like yourself and doing courses, reading books, listening to podcasts and actually just building a better relationship with myself, I started recognizing that that could change. And obviously, when I started changing people, you know I was changing in other people's world as well, and there were some people who were all for that and there was a lot of people who didn't like that. And that was one of the other challenges that I experienced was like lucky can't change. He used to do this, this, this, this. Don't forget that. It's like, yeah, fuck, I did do that, but I want to learn from that, I want to grow from that and if you try to hold me to where I once was, you're never going to get the best of me, and I feel a lot of people experienced that.

Lachlan Stuart: 46:40

The things that I've taken away from our conversations today and I definitely love to have you back on in a couple of months and we'll definitely be getting you into our speak to our Academy members was just the power of it.

Lachlan Stuart: 46:52

Doesn't matter the situation, in which way you interpret it, or whether you do have trauma or experiencing PTSD or various other things as a result of that, or if you're someone who just feels like you've come out stronger. Regardless of that, you still have the power to get back in control of that and feel like you're in control. And the thing you said was like you can't read the label from inside the bottle. That's fucking genius, because when you feel like you're in control, that's awesome. But even myself, I'm like I do this for a living, but I still see help. I still have coaches and mentors who point out my blind spots and when it gets a little bit too much, I say, dude, I need some help here because this is going to help me level up. But just, you're going to see something that I cannot yet see, and the fastest way to overcome something or break through something is with that third party.

Cody Isabel: 47:46

Yeah, 100%, 100%. And the other thing you were mentioning too and I love because you run a community is you're absolutely right that there are some people that are gonna be like, oh yeah, new lucky. I call it. My programs are the Me 2.0 programs, because you've got to get where you're never been. You gotta do what you're never done. You gotta become who you've never become, and so we call it the Me 2.0 version of you.

Cody Isabel: 48:08

And so there's this 1.0 version of you. Like, imagine, the 1.0 version of you is this little square and you've got all these other squares that are connected to you, and those squares are predicting you they're the people, places and things that are around you, and they're predicting your behavior into that 1.0 version of lucky. And so then you become 1.5, and you become a circle. However, and this is the big key you become a circle but you still have the squares around you, the people, places and things around you, and so your environment is the largest predictor of your future success your behavior, your emotions, your, everything, okay, your behavior especially. And so what happens, like you're saying, is you start to realize you have to go tell these squares hey, should I get off the pot, bro? This is me now. I am now this circle.

Cody Isabel: 48:55

You can either become a circle with me and know that in the future lucky's gonna be like this and help predict me into this new version of myself, or peace out, man, no contact, like I can't deal with this. You gotta cut people out, people, places and things out that don't support this new version of you. And this is the biggest failure point in behavioral change and healing that I see is that people heal them, they do the work to become a circle, but then they go back into an environment that is all squares and they get predicted right back into a square, as opposed to actually crossing the threshold and becoming that circle and creating circles around them to support the new version of themselves. So I just want to I was cool. I just wanna highlight how important the work that you do in your academy is and how important the point you just made is, because it is the literal breaking point of we'll heal over time or won't.

Lachlan Stuart: 49:53

Yep, I appreciate you highlighting that, because for me it was. I was doing a lot of immersive experiences and when I'd follow up with clients who came to our workshops, like two, three weeks later they'd fallen back into that same habit that had them in the shit in the first place. And I'm sitting there scratching my head going. I kind of want to maintain this like the environment influences us so heavily. But what then compounds on top of that is the and we start associating to the fact that I will never change.

Lachlan Stuart: 50:21

I've tried that people will be listening to this Cody and they'll go oh fuck, not another thing. It's like I've tried everything. It's like, okay, there's so many people that I watch dude and I'm like just, you gotta change your environment. I'm gonna watch you do everything else, but until you change your environment, you're gonna keep being like a slingshot. You'll get pulled away and then come flying straight back. 100%. I want to respect your time. I've really valued you coming on here today. I know the feedback's gonna be phenomenal. Where can people follow along or get in touch with you?

Cody Isabel: 50:55

Yeah, everywhere is MindBrain BodyLab. So any social media platform is just at MindBrain BodyLab and then the website is mindbrainbodylabcom, and then if they want to email me or reach out, it's Cody at mindbrainbodylabcom. So everything is MindBrain BodyLab, all one word, anywhere that you wanna reach out.

Lachlan Stuart: 51:16

I'll have all the links in the show notes so you can just scroll on down and click the link in, have easy access. It's super, super well done and, for those of you who have stayed to the end, really appreciate you following through. I'm sure you got immense value. Make sure you share this episode with someone that you know will get value. Leave a rating and review and once again, do something today to be better for tomorrow.