When One of You Is the Problem (And It's Both of You) w/James & Molly

Tell me a little bit about James and Molly. What are you guys up to? What's your story?

So we're marriage therapists here in Sacramento, and like, I kind of stories. I was pilot in the Air Force and we did the military thing for 25. Well, yeah, I mean, 22 years of marriage before. And then I retired, became a therapist, and Molly is on her way. Well, she's a therapist. She's still under supervision. So she followed me a couple years later. So we're just passionate about marriage therapy specifically?

Yeah. Do you know why? Why are you passionate about marriage therapy specifically?

It is so long to get good help. I don't know if that's why. I'm just passionate about. I have no reason for that. But. But we really did struggle for many years trying to improve my marriage and failing miserably despite doing everything we could. You know, all the people reach out to all the books we read and it basically was useless, sometimes harmful. So we ended up finding solutions that worked. And that really drove my passion to be like, okay, there are solutions that work. Why is the predominant approach so ineffective and what's going on here, and what can I do about it?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I saw in your bio that you think that you've been in therapy together a like a hundred times.

At least.

Oh, over a hundred times.

I mean like seven plus years, right?

Six, seven years that we've been in therapy almost weekly.

6 or 7 years in therapy almost weekly. Same therapist?

No, no. Like we're on number eight right now.

Five years. We had probably six therapists. We would always get to a point where, honestly, you know, it was. I was pretty hesitant to do therapy. I was pretty resistant to the whole factor. And he would not see the results that he wanted. And so he would look for another therapist. Okay. In the beginning, it was very much him trying to get me on board, and I was very like, stop shoving it down my throat. I don't want to do this.

Can we talk about that for for a bit?

Sure.

Yeah. What do you know about why you're reluctant to do therapy?

Why I was resistant. Well, I mean, I grew up thinking that therapy was just for crazy people. Like people who just had no, like, no. Yeah, that was the mentality that I was brought up with. It's totally wrong and messed up. But that was how I was brought up.

Oh man. It was the same way I thought, like, it used to think that anybody who went to therapy was crazy. And now I think anybody who doesn't go to therapy is crazy.

Exactly. I always tell people I'm like, I think every person in the entire world should be in therapy, because it just helps you become a better version of yourself. Yeah, but it took me a really long time to get to that point. I think a lot of it also had to do with he he kind of jumped on the bandwagon first, and there were a lot of things he wanted to change about our marriage. And most of those things had to do with me. And so he kind of started trying to actively pursue or make me interested in what he was interested in, and it was sort of my resistance was me choosing my own path, like not letting him dictate where I went and what I did. So it was kind of my rebellious streak, like, screw you, I can't like, I'm not going to do what you want me to do just because you want me to do it.

And it wasn't until we found the. It wasn't until about five years into it that I felt heard and seen and listened to with our therapists, and I felt validated in the sense that I'm not crazy. The things that I've been tracking in him are accurate. That was a huge moment for me that I started to really invest my efforts in time into therapy, realizing that, okay, this is actually might there might be change because before that it always just been I was the problem.

Interesting. And if I'm tracking with you, you said about five years in which is also about five therapists in or 3 or 4 therapists in at that point, five three of it.

I don't even remember all of them.

What can you. I mean, and James, please weigh in at any time. What can you tell me about why therapy didn't work?

We are an exceptionally difficult couple to work with.

Okay, okay. That's part of the variable for sure.

You know, like, as since we're now both couples therapists, there's a very wide range of difficulty, and some couples are delightful and easy to work with. And some couples are extremely hard. And we were all the way over on the hard side. We were just really difficult to work with. And so it took us many years to find a therapist who could handle us.

Is that. Molly? Is that what you think?

Yeah. That tracks I mean, I still to this day think it took an exceptional therapist to handle him.

I think she's easy to handle.

I, I was always the people pleaser. Right? I was the one that smoothed over emotions and made things better. And he was not. And so I always felt like I was the good one, even though I know now that like our parts in, in, in our, in this dynamic are equal. Like we both had things that needed to change. But in my mind it was always he was the one that was doing things that and he was thinking the same thing about me. So yeah, it got to a point where we had a therapist who was able to call us both out on on what we were both doing and kind of help us see that that we started to look at ourselves instead of each other.

Interesting. Your first therapist. That didn't work out. Did you fire them or did they fire you?

We fired them.

We fired all of our therapists.

He fired.

Them all? Yeah.

What's that about it? Same. Same thing. You just weren't getting the results that you were looking for.

Yeah. I mean.

We owned that. It was your that you did. You know, at that point by then that you were the problem.

Oh no. No, this was years down the line. I was definitely not.

The therapist was a problem. I was a problem.

Anybody other than me. No, no. We did like a year and a half with our first Arabist. And we like a year and a half, you know, and just tons of sessions and literally no progress. I mean, and we eventually both the thing that broke the camel's back is, you know, he's like, okay, we're not making. He's like, why don't you come in for individual sessions? And so I go in for individual session, and he basically validates all my concerns and validates my view that Molly's the problem she goes into next week for an individual session. He needs the same thing to her. And then we both talk about we're like, wait a second. Like that doesn't make any sense. What is this guy doing? And so that's when we quit.

Right on. And then what switched for like what clicked for you that you started to, like, be able to get it right or started to be able to see the progress that you were looking for? Did something, did something. Was there an moment or a pivot, a specific pivot at all for either one of you?

So we after five years or so, we found a therapist who uses the approach that we knew I use, which is called the Crucible approach. And she was very capable of keeping up with us in session. And so we're pretty good at manipulation. And she was too strong to be able to be manipulated, and she was able to handle me specifically. And we did two years with her, and most of that time focused on her helping me see myself more clearly. She helped Molly to she she didn't put nearly as much effort into helping Molly as helping me, and she had her reasons for that. So it was really helpful.

And that was that was the moment for me was when we went and did an intensive with her for about it was what, three days, four days, days for two hours a day.

Three, three hours a day.

Yeah, yeah. And we it was in that moment, like in those sessions that the way she worked was the way we like to try and work is, is calling things out in the moment instead of like, well he did this back this and this and this. Right. And she could identify the patterns that we were having in that moment, like, well, you just said this, but you're doing this right now, like helping us see how we were interacting in that time. And it was like so validating to me because I would feel something was off and she would be able to say, this is what I see in him. And I wasn't the one poking it. I wasn't like, he did this to me and he did this and like because before that I felt kind of like I was going insane.

Like it was kind of crazy. Making, honestly, is because I was like, well, I don't know. Am I just being judgmental? Am I being one sided? Am I being biased and go talk to my friends? And they'd say, this and this and this, and I'm like, okay, that's not really a fair audience to go to because they're clearly teen Molly.

Yeah, right.

And so I would be telling these things and they'd be saying this and I'd be thinking these things, and I didn't know whether I was just actually being the problem or whether what I was tracking was accurate. And so when she was able to sit down with us both and on her own, identified the same things that I had been seeing. Yeah, that was the moment that I was like, okay, this might actually work. Like we might actually be able to to do this.

Well, I always tell people, I think couples therapy is a different, different discipline even than individual therapy. I mean, I have an individual therapist. She's amazing and I can't do it. She does where she, like, gets inside and helps me understand my feelings and starts to, you know, draw some lines. And that's all really critical. But couples couple relationships are about behavior. How do you show up? What do you actually do. And you can feel things up and down. But if you're not actually changing behavior then I can see how that would be really frustrating. It's frustrating for clients. It's frustrating for therapists when when couples don't change behavior because because their feelings are in the way all the time, you know? So, James, what did you have to face? Like what was your thing that you had to work on for two years before it cracked open?

I mean, basically you could just say I had to face narcissism. I mean, you could call it lots of different things, but that's a decent name for it.

And it's a very, very sexy word right now. Everybody likes to use it. How are you using?

They like to use it on other people they don't like to use on themselves. But yeah, that was basically it. I mean, I was extremely manipulative. I had a sense of superiority and I didn't care about anyone and especially I didn't really care about modeling. And so that's basically the three components of narcissism right there.

One more time. One, two, three.

Well there's a fourth one two. But I call it so, so fragility, which is you can't take criticism. Right. Superiority. You think you're better than everybody. Indifference is not caring about people. And then just an ability to manipulate which is necessary. So like a narcissist because of the fragility. So if you're fragile then you can't take any negative feedback from anyone. And you need external validation all the time. And so you invent this or you manipulate reality to try to get that. And so you make it seem like you're better than you are. You make it seem like other people are worse than they are, and you create this false reality that feeds your need for validation. So that's kind of what I call like the four components in narcissism sometimes.

Well, and then how did you how did you break free. How did you like what was the breakthrough for you. Like are we still waiting? I mean, like.

We're getting there. Yeah. I mean, they all get so. So what I did couples therapy is much more effective than individual therapy first. Okay, so so our therapist would watch the way I handle myself in session and give me immediate feedback on what was I was doing in the moment. I recorded every session, and I would listen to it 3 or 4 times between sessions, and I would be so angry about how dare she say such things to me? And then I would listen to it again. I'd be like, oh, but she does have one point. And then I listen to it and the third time be like, oh, actually, she has three points. And by the fourth time I'm like, yeah, she's basically right. And so it just it took I mean, it took a lot of work actually.

But I would listen to my voice in the recording. I'd be like, wait, that's not what I sounded like. But that is what I sound like in recording. Yeah. It was like just my mind to see what was actually happening.

You know, it did take a lot of work and people ask me a lot. Maybe they ask you how long, how long are we going to need to do therapy, or how often should we come in or something like that? And I say it's kind of like walking into a gym and saying, how long until I can bench press my body weight? You know, how far apart. Are you how how motivated you outside of the gym? You know, do you have the like fundamental form capacity that will help you do that? Some people don't, right. If they have a let's say they have narcissistic personality disorder and it's and it's a mood disorder and it's untreated. And like they have to struggle with the actual capacity for that sort of thing before they can start to do relationship work.

And that, you know, whether that's ADHD or cancer or alcoholism, who knows? But, you know, it does take work in between in between the work. Right? You got to sit there and listen to yourself three, four times and go.

Oh.

I'm learning, I'm learning, I'm learning.

It was quite it's been quite a journey.

And his his goals were lofty. They they aren't like go to the gym and binge praise. My body weight is go to the gym and like be a top notch bodybuilder who can bench weight everyone's body like it was like this idealistic, you know, thinking where it was just very much like, I want, you know, Outlander relationship. This is how I want our marriage to be. And that was a very overwhelming for me because I was like, what the crap? Like feeling steamrolled. And I didn't believe that relationships could be like that. I, you know, honestly, I still don't believe that 100% accurate representation. It was scripted by someone, you know, this is a play, but I really had the inability. I couldn't see anything other than what we had because that was what it was modeled to me.

You know, that was what I grew up with was a very utilitarian, transactional relationship where the man was supposed to just make the wife happy, and if he didn't, then he was a jerk and he got to sleep in the bathtub, you know? So I just kind of assumed that role. And when we were early on in our marriage and, you know, I look back at it now and it was cruel, but that was what I knew. I had to learn to know that.

How did you learn to unknow that?

Well, to be able to see that pattern was the first step. I had to be able to see that that's what I was doing. And that was a lot of a lot of humility in accepting and being able to see the ugly in me. Like it was really hard because I, you know, it was easy to see the ugly and my family or my parents or my husband. It was easy to see the ugly and the people around me, but to actually self-reflect and see, oh crap, I do that.

That's very brave. Are you all fixed now?

No.

Of course not. Therapy is a is again. It's a process. It's it's an ongoing thing. I don't think we'll ever be all fixed. Right.

We're. Yeah.

But we're more aware of what we're doing and we're more capable of, like, taking a step back and not being so reactive. That was a huge thing in my thing to. So I was super reactive. And so he would say something and I would just get flooded and I would just yell or walk away. I was super avoidant. Super super avoidant, like having a conversation about sex or about relationship. Boom. Shut down. I was completely nope. I'm not having anything to do with this. All of a sudden I had to clean out the closet or busy myself so that I had some reason why I couldn't engage in that. Yeah.

Do you have any idea what that makes you good at? Like this? These avoidance skills or these skills that don't that make it harder to be in marriage? Like, I would imagine you being a little bit narcissistic made you effective member of the military like you. Kind of. This is how you do this, like do the military. You you climb the situation. You can tell me about that. I'd be interested to hear. But Molly, do you know like this, this, this other strategies that you had that made it harder to be in a relationship? Did it make you good at anything else?

Oh, I was I am an incredibly focused and able to accomplish all kinds of things. I have many hands on skills. I just can put my mind to something and do it. It also try and think how else? Like I'm also really good at reading a room because I had to learn growing up to, you know, like, okay, is this a safe emotion to show? Is this a safe thing to be? And and so I would really good at managing other people's emotions. I'm really good at, you know, being able to decide, oh, is this a good thing to say? Am I over, am I being too loud and I'm being just I don't know, just kind of I'm a people person because I have I call it my superpower like I can.

Yeah. So yeah, I mean I found this overall like we have these skills that we learned and we, we denigrate them in therapy because they they do they keep us from intimacy. But it's hard because they're actually part of who we are and part of what makes us amazing and capable in other areas of our lives. And I think we just have to kind of respect that they can be in parallel, and that sometimes you got to tell one of those guys, you got to tell the Air Force guy, hey, not your turn. You got to sit down and and it's time for you to be this other thing. Do you have your own version of that, James?

Yeah. I mean, it's it's similar. I'm incredibly sensitive to other people's emotions. And so, like, I can read people really quickly and I know all of the tricks and manipulation. And so like, I've never been in a therapy office and said, well, I've never seen that one, you know. So it's I know.

You mean as a, as an actual therapist.

As a therapist, just because I've done them all before, like there's.

Always don't you can't bullshit a bullshitter or something like that.

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I mean, I've been there and done that and I'm like, okay, I can see exactly what you're doing. And it's, you know, it's still difficult, but but at least I can see what's happening. And yeah, that's really important in couples therapy because about half couples come in, at least one of the person is going to be intensely set on manipulating the therapist, trying to get the therapist on their side, and trying to pretend that the other person is the problem and all that kind of stuff. And so it's really important to to choose the most important problem in the relationship and not get sidetracked onto something that's not the most important problem.

I don't know if I have that same experience, or at least if I would define it the same way that that at least one person is going to be trying to manipulate the therapist. How do you how does that show up for you? Or how do you sniff that out? Or how do you define that when you see it?

Well, it's only about half the time, like half the couples, that's the case. But yeah. So what I'm seeing is when someone comes in and is trying to make the other person look bad, I would say that's a form of manipulation. And there's a whole range in spectrum to that, but it's pretty common. I tend to work with really high conflict couples, where there's a lot of antagonism between them, and there's a lot of trying, positioning and maneuvering going on, like trying to make it seem like the only thing that needs to happen is this other person needs to change.

Yeah. Did the two of you collaborate in your work together? Do you do you see like, do you tag team couples at all?

We haven't yet. I'm still an associate, so I'm still under supervision. And so I work at a nonprofit right now. Got it. He does send me. He sends me clients that need sliding scale or to take insurance type things. So he will send me some clients, but we haven't we haven't collaborated on anyone yet.

Do we plan to?

I was wondering if you had like a like a philosophy or shared like approach. You mentioned something called the Crucible approach, which I've never heard of. But then you also said, James, I work with high conflict couples. Do you have a what's your what your theory or philosophy on conflict that that people should know about? Like how does how does that go?

The underlying theory is that conflict is good and most couples need more conflict. The key is to have conflict without anger. And so Molly and I are both extremely conflict avoided. And so we did the first 20 years of our of our marriage with basically no overt conflict in all sorts of like subdued conflict under the surface that was really harmful. But we almost never told each other what we really thought we would go years without telling each other what we really thought. And when we did tell each other what we really thought, we were really mean about it. And so what we didn't do is, you know, can I tell you what I really think in the kindest way possible and with true love in my heart and still say what I really think.

And that's something that neither of us knew how to do, and we're still learning to do right now. But that's what I think is the key more conflict with less anger and less antagonism.

That's an interesting sales pitch. It's probably not something you want on your on your website. Hey, come see me. I'm going to help you have more conflict.

Yeah. People don't. People don't want that. They want the conflict to go away. But two different people living together, I mean, conflict is inevitable. There's going to be conflict, and you either deal with it or you don't. But when we deal with it in an angry way or a mean way, it makes more conflict, not less. And so to resolve the conflict, you have to be able to face it and interact yourself as you do it right.

Molly, you use one of my favorite words differentiation. How are you using it?

You know, just the idea of kind of tagging on what he just said is that can you be okay if the other person's disappointed in you? Can you be okay if they're angry with you? If they think bad of you, can you still function at a higher level despite how they're functioning? And that's kind of the idea that we bring into therapy is that if you can do that, then growth will happen. Right? And it's it's not about getting him to back off. It's about can I be okay saying what's true to me? Like, I want you to back off. I don't want I don't see things where you see things and then not crumble when he pushes back. Like if he says, well, you just you're just trying to avoid this. You're just not wanting to do this. And I can look at myself, self-reflect and say, is that true? Is there not true? If it's not truth, then then am I okay? Holding on to myself and not crumbling to his pressure?

I think you guys are probably a little bit younger than me, but do you remember transactional analysis? It was. It was pretty famous in like the 70s, and it was all based on this idea of I'm okay, you're okay. Like that was the yeah, that was the premise. And so you had four, you had four expressions of that, which is I'm okay, you're okay, I'm okay. But you're not okay. I'm not okay, but you are okay. And then neither one of us is okay, you know, and what you're describing is this idea of I'm okay, I'm okay. And if you're okay, that's great. I'm okay. You're okay. That's amazing. I'm okay. You're not okay. I guess there's a version of that that's really contemptuous. Like I'm okay, but you're not okay.

But I'm going to stay, okay? Even if you're not okay. Is it really the work? And I guess my question is, in your experience of doing couples therapy, and I don't I don't know that you've confirmed me one way or the other whether you've done any individual therapy, but do you feel like the work of differentiation is easier or harder in the context of couples therapy?

I think couples therapy is a lot more effective, much more effective for building differentiation, because differentiation is a relational concept. So if an individual comes to me and says, you know, I want to get more differentiated, we're going to have to basically use my relationship with them to build differentiation. That's not ideal. If a couple comes to me, then I have their relationship with each other and I can I can reflect and say, this is what I see you doing. See, this is how I see you positioning your wife right now in relation to you and a more differentiated I wouldn't I don't really use a word differentiation, but basically a more differentiated approach would be can you treat your wife as if she were an equal and not as if she were inferior to you, which is what happens a lot of the time.

And that's a much more differentiated approach. So I prefer to work with couples because there's a lot more data to work with, and there's more things that happen in the therapy office that I can work with. And I don't just have the relationship between me and the individual, which is something that I would much rather have, you know, the three relationships in the room all at the same time. I find it much more effective, interesting.

Yeah.

But I would I would add to that, like I do have an individual therapist and I've seen her for years. I would say learning what we learned in couples therapy and then processing that with her was hugely impactful for me, because it would I would do kind of the same thing. I'd be like, I can't believe our therapist, blah blah, blah, blah blah, and he's doing this and he's doing that. And then I'd be like, okay, take a deep breath. Can I look at this and see how much of its accurate? And in the end of the session, a lot of times it would be like, okay, but they're not wrong, right? Can I handle that? And so I think that was really instrumental in me helping see myself that self-reflection. But I don't think I would have done that if we hadn't had that couples therapy or that that interaction.

Someone like you had a, a thing that where the work was, and then you had to go over here and figure out how to process the work. Right. You know. Right. Interesting.

Like his process was relisten to the tapes over and over again and kind of do it on his own. And my process was I needed someone to help me through that, because I was.

Just.

Not as willing to listen to the tape over and over again.

Yeah. Why, James, were you willing to look at the listen to the tape over and over again? Most, most people who are grappling with narcissism, whether that's diagnosable or just a trait itself, don't cross the threshold into I want to do this work, I want to I want to grow in this space. Like what was what clicked for you? Or how did you decide to do that? Because let me tell you this, there are a lot of women out there right now listening to this episode going, how do I get my husband to do what that guy did? How did how does that happen?

That's a good question.

My husband would never listen to the tape 3 or 4 times like, that's absurd. You know, like what opened up for you?

I think one of the determining factors was that that therapist cared about me, that that was the degree to which she cared about me, was something new that I hadn't experienced before. I'm tearing up just thinking about it. But she cared about me, and she was really blunt with me, like, extremely blunt with me. But she cared about me. And there's a balance there. If I'm going to tell someone what I really think of them, I have to care about that person enough to to support them while they hear that. And that's what happened.

Yeah. Which hadn't happened in the previous ones, that you'd fired the therapist that you'd fired before. There wasn't. There was no care.

It wasn't. There was no care. Is that. I'm not an easy client. And they didn't look forward to working with me. We were not the couple. That was like, oh yes, the Christensen's are coming in. I can't wait to see those two. That would that was not us.

So it makes me think of another matrix that I use sometimes. And it's the idea that a therapist needs to be able to use truth and love like truth without love is abusive, and love without truth is just convenient. You know, neither truth nor love is, you know, we're not even in a relationship, but truth. And love is where change can really happen. Both, let's say in a therapeutic relationship. But I think also in the marriage, like the two of you probably have learned a little bit about how to stand up for each other. I would imagine, given the journey that you've been on with both truth. This is what I'm really thinking, but also love meaning. Can I talk to you about it in a careful way? I think you've already kind of painted that picture, James, a little bit earlier.

Well, and I think like he's, he's like talked about how love is on a spectrum. Right. Caring is on a spectrum. It's not as black or white, I either do or I don't. And that was something really helpful for me because I looked at that and I was like, he would paint me in this picture. That made it sound like I didn't care about him, and I did, but I didn't care enough to do certain things right. And so there really is a spectrum of can I care about this person and not care about them at the same time? Can I hold both truths and then what am I going to do about that? Do I care enough to do something about it? Or am I just going to sit there and be like, screw you, I don't want to do that.

Yeah. I think anytime you get into a situation where you do or you don't care about me like it's binary, then you're missing something. Like anytime I get into like, this is either that or that, I'm like, something's missing. Some data somewhere we don't have. This has been fascinating. I love talking to therapists about therapy, but is that what you wanted to come on and talk about? What did you. Did you guys have anything you wanted to talk about as you answered all my questions? What's on your mind?

Right. Yeah. You're you're an early therapist, aren't you? Aren't you? I am, yeah, yeah. So that's a very close cousin to crucible therapy, to what we do. It's very close. Yeah.

Yeah, I came up through the Gottman Institute, so I was. I'm certified Gottman therapist. So I have all this research going to kind of empirical data side of the equation. And that's important. It's valuable. I think people ought to know what the research says. I think you ought to have like a almost like a relationship 101 that everybody is required to take in college. But, you know, you guys know that you, you know, tools which they got an institute has tons of and they're amazing are useless if you put them in the hands of people who are incapable of using tools, you know, or people who are inclined to weaponize those tools. And so part of what I think relational life therapy does, and maybe the Crucible method is, is it gets underneath the kind of what what is keeping me from being effective in using these tools, what is keeping me from being able to use them with care.

And so, yeah, I've enjoyed kind of adding that into my kind of portfolio. And, you know, couples come in across the big spectrum and not every method is right for every couple. I'm always like, what's what's best for the couple? And a high conflict couple is really different than a couple who's just coming in and looking for, let's say, more to more intimacy, you know?

Yes.

Do you like that work? Do you like the high conflict work?

I don't really use that.

Does it happen to be your wheelhouse or is it something that you enjoy?

I do enjoy it a little bit. I like the excitement of it. Yeah, I, I mean, the way I do therapy is that if the couple is not in conflict, I introduce conflict because conflict leads to growth. Yeah.

It is a website like.

It's just like they're coming to me for a reason. You're not going to get to where you want to go without the courage to have the conflict necessary to that courage and saying what you really think and revealing your true self to your partner, it's difficult. We learn not to do it for a reason. I just don't think that way of living is compatible with having a good marriage.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's almost like back to that gym metaphor. If you go to the gym and you don't, you don't hurt a little bit. You don't, you don't, you know, strain some muscles. Maybe there's no growth there.

Yeah. If you just go to the recovery lounge every.

Day.

I know.

Recovery loungers is like massage chairs and a sauna. And she's like, I would do okay.

Yeah, I'm at the gym. Yeah. You go to the gym on your friend, scroll on your phone for an hour. You've accomplished nothing. Yeah.

And that's what we did for the first five years of our marriage was Recovery Lounge.

Yeah.

Therapy. You know, it was. There were bits and pieces that were good and helpful for us, but they didn't change anything.

Yeah. All right, so here you are. Do you have you have a family, have kids. Like, do.

They have four kids? How old are they? 16 and 24.

Have they. Do they know the difference between like an unhealthy you and healthy you? Have they been able to observe it and appreciate it?

They've noticed.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah. Our family has healed significantly since he and I have healed, which is really one of my motivations for doing what I do is is helping heal families and kids. And so they don't have to go through.

Yeah.

Sorry.

Yeah. Yeah, there's I mean, generational trauma is a big deal. And generational like patterns, you know, unless somebody says, nope, we're not going to do that anymore. We're going to do it in a different way. There's no reason not to expect your kids to struggle. And I was going to say in the same ways, but they'll find new and creative ways so that they don't have to. They don't have to look like you when they're struggling. Because whatever I'm going to do, it's not that.

Yeah, they're going to have their own things, but if we can at least provide a good foundation, you know, like it's so much more impactful for them because they're, they're, they're jumping off of a higher board than we were. And hopefully their kids will jump off a higher board. And they'll keep figuring this out and it.

Just.

Keeps improving things.

That's lovely. Very cool. Well, listen, thank you so much for talking to me about all this. I think it's going to be really helpful episode for folks. Is there anything else that you want to talk about or ask about before we shut it down?

No, you can you can look me up. I'm on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, all the good things. And how do we do that? Jane. Well, my website is James and you can usually on most of the platforms that you search for. James Christensen therapist you'll find me.

Right on. Cool. I'm not a marketing guy, but you can have that marketing tip for free where you put come in and I'll help you have more conflict.

Like right. Exactly.

The splash page on your website. Tell me the traffic to your release.

I'll try.

That one time. Yeah.

Are you fighting now? I can make it worse.

I mean, sometimes it's not more go that way. So.

To be fair, and I've heard you say, it's not worse. It's more. It's more and better. Yeah. You know, it's better people have. It's just when people have conflict that goes well, you get more intimacy on the other side. You get exactly the public speaking. I would say you get makeup, sex and makeup sexism, best sex because it's it says we've come through something to something closer than whatever we had before. So that you can have that one. I'll help you have makeup sex. You can put that on your on your.

It's effective conflict.

So it's.

As a point as opposed to pointless conflict.

Yeah, I got you, I got you. Thanks so much for visiting with me, you guys. It was a delight to talk to you.

Yeah, yeah, it's great talking to you.

Thanks for having us.