When a person is dealing with a stressful situation, they will resort to many different copying mechanisms. In this episode, the panel dives into Intellectualization as one of those mechanisms. They look at how this can go past coping and will become a defensive mechanism if it is not addressed when it happens. This means that when in a relationship, intellectualization can cause stress to build between two people because the emotions that you are feeling are not properly expressed.
Tune in to see what Intellectualization is Through a Therapist’s Eyes.
Listen for the following takeaways from the show:
- Do you Understand what intellectualization refers to?
- Do you use this strategy as a coping mechanism?
- What bad effects does this have on me and my relationships?
- Psychology Today talks about What is Intellectualization?
- You lose more than you gain with defensive mechanisms.
- Good when we need to be objective and logical.
- Bad when we are avoiding emotions.
- How do people use this in day to day life?
- What are the harmful effects of intellectualization?
- This can lead to rationalization.
- Intellectualizing and internalizing can lead to anxiety.
- What do you do instead of intellectualizing?
- Using an I statement, you take ownership of your emotions.
- What are the payoffs in avoiding intellectualization.
- Defense mechanisms stunt your emotional growth.
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Intro Music by Reid Ferguson – https://reidtferguson.com/
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Episode #207 Transcription
Chris Gazdik: [00:00:00] Hello everybody. Welcome to Through a Therapist’s Eyes. This is, what is the date? November the 17th. That would be correct. That’s correct. It’s the 17th. I’m on point where you get to get personal insights directly from our panel of therapists, directly in your car or in your home. Being aware it’s not delivery of therapy services in any way.
Today we’re gonna be talking about Intellectualization. Victoria was like such a big word, . Is that what you said? I say what you
Victoria Pendergrass: say? I also said that, I’m not sure I know what that is. .
Chris Gazdik: Really? Yeah. That was, I was surprised at that. I was wondering if you were gonna come out with that. I gave you the, I gave you the opportunity and I was
Victoria Pendergrass: like, I’m honest.
I’ll tell you when I don’t know
Chris Gazdik: something. I love that. I love that. That is nothing. But we’ll learn
John-Nelson Pope: everything we need to know.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Well, like I said, man, part of doing this panel is awesome [00:01:00] because I’m learning from you guys. And John, you’ve said a couple things that I’ve just kind of had in my head and in my mind you know, as I’m doing sessions, so this is, you know, partly why it’s so fun to do because we are figuring this out together.
But I’ll say that line in a, in a moment, I guess we have the book out. Re-Understanding Emotions and Becoming Your Best Self. Guess that the title is through a Therapist’s Eyes. Huh? Got the marriage one coming out. I’m working on it. Good. I’m working on it. Trying to start. Quicken the pace up a little bit on it, but I’m working on it.
We are switching a little bit to YouTube live. You could check out our YouTube stream with all of these streams. It’s important for the feedback and the reviews and the, the stars. I know the like in common Yeah. Share. And they help out a lot. Five a lot, not four. That’s right. five. And uh, contact through a therapist’s eyes.com is the way that you contact us.
It’s good to interact with us that way. It’s our email. This is the human emotional experience. Let’s figure this thing out together [00:02:00] is the endeavor. So three questions I want you to think about through the show on Intellectualization, right? Do you understand what intellectualization refers to you?
Victoria Pendergrass: Haha, that’s my question.
That’s what I would like to find out. ,
Chris Gazdik: do you use this strategy as a coping mechanism? Really thinking about yourself as we go through talking about this because Willing to bet John. We do. We do , we do don’t we certainly do. I can imagine you as the academic one. I don’t mean to out you.
John-Nelson Pope: Oh no. I mean I do that.
I, I intellectualize all the time. Right? Yeah. And a lot of my colleagues.
Chris Gazdik: Right. Yeah. And it’s not an academia thing, if you think about it. It’s really just a human thing. Cuz I, I do this all the time. My wife probably laughing her little behind off. If she hears the title of the show, she’ll be like, oh, I know why Chris did that show.
Uhhuh. Yeah. Yep. Anyway, understanding, thirdly, what bad effects does this really have on you when you do this? That’s probably the [00:03:00] crux of what I want to, to get an understanding of. So that, that’s, that’s the things I want you to think about. But, you know, it’s funny because I chose this topic in a way because for, for a little while now.
I don’t know, man. Like a few years I’ve been very aware of the fact that our society uses our buzzwords. You know? Have you noticed this Victoria,
Victoria Pendergrass: like uses, like therapeutic buzzwords? Oh, yes, yes. I literally just saw a video that was talking about how the, this mom, this mom goes let me tell you how I classically condition, like classically conditioned my child to do da da.
That’s, and I was like, do you even really know what that means? Well, it’s, it’s, and she did. She was like, she knew. She knew exactly like, what’s yours talking about? But I was like to actually. I mean, she used the terminology and
Chris Gazdik: everything, so, yeah. And I mean, people are picking up on this stuff. John, I don’t know your careers longer than mine, but have you seen a [00:04:00] recent, oh, it’s a tick in how people do that?
John-Nelson Pope: Well, a aside from Woody Allen Mo movies back in the seventies and eighties that was kind of rare. We’re doing it now, not
Chris Gazdik: so much more. Very, very much so. And I’m, I’m not saying it’s brand new, but I hear this like all the time. Narcissist, my wife is narcist. Oh, that’s every other word. Narcissist.
Yes. And addiction. Oh, I, I’m, I, I was so addicted this week too, you know? Alcohol even, you know, I’m addicted to love . Are you gonna break out in song? That’s Robert Palmer . Y’all know I was sent out on collections. For the first time in my life, I thought I’d bring that up on the show just to let the viewing audience get to know us.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yes. Personal information. I know about it. Cause about it. I was fear What happened when you got off the phone with the people? .
Chris Gazdik: I walked out in the hall, she’s like, is everything okay in there? ? [00:05:00] Cause John DirecTV sent me to collections for $30 and 33 cents. Oh my goodness. Yeah. Pressure in my life. Don’t forget the 33 cents
Never in my life have I been under a collection agency. I’m just like shocked and pissed and offended and like for
Victoria Pendergrass: $30 and 33 cents. Yes.
Chris Gazdik: Ugh. I forgot to take, look at it. See if it was fixed today. But we got Miss Victoria over there. How are you ma’am?
Victoria Pendergrass: I’m good. You know I’ve been sick for like two weeks it feels like.
Oh, okay. When you, when you gonna get rid of this crud? I don’t know. That’s why I kind of sound like this, cuz. I think all the, all the sickness from the past two weeks has affected my, my vocal chords. .
John-Nelson Pope: You don’t feel bad anymore either. No, I
Victoria Pendergrass: don’t. Like, I feel fine. I just sound like
Chris Gazdik: not myself. She’s just trying to get sympathy.
John, she probably sits in there and screams in her car before she gets you. She’s bad for me. I
Victoria Pendergrass: was kidding.
Chris Gazdik: John, [00:06:00] Mr. Pope, how you doing sir? I’m doing
John-Nelson Pope: outstanding. Thank you very much. You have a good week. Yes. Very busy week. Very good week.
Chris Gazdik: I’m gonna give you a public compliment. Uhoh, I already gave you the compliment.
Thank you. Yeah, no, it is funny. I do, I love this panel format because I was listening to him Victoria when I transcribe the shows and to, yeah, written speech for our website, you know, for SEO and whatnot, and for people that can read. By the way, I don’t really talk about that on our intro. If you go to our website, you can read along literally.
The transcription of all the words that we use and, and some people really like that to read along.
Victoria Pendergrass: That’s good for, for accessibility reasons too. I
Chris Gazdik: mean, well, it’s for handicap folks, that type thing. Yeah. Do you use a a program for that? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Think I’m gonna listen to type the thing myself. Oh yeah.
Like
Victoria Pendergrass: in grad school, holy crap. Where we’re not allowed to use things like that. You have, and we had to actually, we have to actually sit, we had to sit there. Yeah. And like, listen, transcribe your session. Yeah. Yeah. And you have to [00:07:00] transcribe every. Every Exactly. Everything.
Chris Gazdik: Exactly. Hesitancy. Yeah. John, you do not make this an assignment for your students.
Do you manage Oh, no. I don’t
John-Nelson Pope: do that, but Okay, good. When I was getting my doctorate, I, I recorded and of course I had permission and I had the IRB approved and institutional review board. Who? The irb Institutional
Chris Gazdik: review board. Mm-hmm. . Yeah. . They sound like important folks. Well, I did. I’m sure you are.
John-Nelson Pope: Certainly. I did about 20 interviews and they were 60 minutes long. I had to get ’em
Chris Gazdik: transcribed, hand transcribed well, and trans transcribed somebody to do it. Sure. Yeah. Oh yeah. Should have just recorded the voice and used just our program. But anyway, we do
John-Nelson Pope: digress. I don’t think back in those days we,
Chris Gazdik: we were Oh, you said doctoral program.
Okay, we’re going back. Yes. Yeah. Way back. Technology didn’t exist then. That’s right. . That’s
John-Nelson Pope: right. We had Stone Tools [00:08:00]
Chris Gazdik: actually asked somebody, John, I said, are the age jokes getting old? Should we stop that? And she’s like, nah, don’t worry about it. It’s still funny. I’m like, okay, cool. Well, so what is intellectualization?
You know what’s funny? I had to just refresh my brain and then I was pissed at myself that I had to, you know refresh my brain with psychological defense mechanisms. Mm-hmm. , can you list any, John? I hate putting you on the spot, but I’m going to Cuz it’s fun. Psychological defense mechanisms. You remember?
Oh,
John-Nelson Pope: I, I’m, I’m blanking.
Chris Gazdik: Are you? I did too. So it’s
Victoria Pendergrass: not just me. So wait, are we saying that a defense mechanism is different than a coping
Chris Gazdik: mechanism? Interesting question Or statement deflection. That’s one. Repression, repression, suppression. Yeah. Okay.
John-Nelson Pope: These are, so I was thinking the Freudian, I mean, ne Freudian.
It’s
Chris Gazdik: all Freudian. Yeah. Yeah. It’s all Freudian. Yeah. It’s Freud. Actually, Anna Freud came up with this in her father’s. So would
Victoria Pendergrass: that be like projection and like [00:09:00] things, okay. Mm-hmm. . Those are, it’s now you, it a little bit coming back to me.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. And basically back to what we were saying, people are picking up on these clinical terms in our society.
Mm-hmm. and using them, sometimes they’re using them correctly. Like, what did you say? Opera conditioned my son to X, Y, Z.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. Yeah. But inferior inferiority complex was something that, that we spoke about way back in the day. Yeah. Yeah. But again, it was in a Woody Allen
Chris Gazdik: film and that’s like the imposter syndrome.
It’s not
Victoria Pendergrass: really a Well, and I’ve heard a lot of people refer to their it like their ego and super ego recently and like, but
John-Nelson Pope: I think. They get that wrong
Victoria Pendergrass: a lot. I know that. I kind of feel like, yeah, the, the, that’s the point that
Chris Gazdik: may, I mean, when it comes to these terms, I love that our society is using them, but it drives me nuts because they mean something to us collectively, clinically, mm-hmm.
And so part of the show really is to dispel myths and [00:10:00] stereotypes about what these things are and what they’re not. That’s why we did the show on, you know imposter syndrome. Like it’s not really a thing. You’re never gonna be diagnosed with that, but yet people would probably think that to be a diagnosable syndrome.
It’s not, you know, it’s certainly not in the DSM as I, it’s in the dsm, the Diagnostic and Statistical manual and that that is
Victoria Pendergrass: our Bible of
Chris Gazdik: all the diagnoses. And you go all
John-Nelson Pope: the way back to
Chris Gazdik: three. I do. Yeah. I do. I began at, I began at three before three R. But going back to this, so intellectualization is one of these things.
There, there are several defense mechanisms that we do, and I wanted to spell the myths about, you know, how we use ’em and what they, what they even are. So, Victoria, you just asked an interesting question. What was that again? Is
Victoria Pendergrass: this a, I said, is there a difference between a defense mechanism and a coping mechanism?
And,
Chris Gazdik: and, and in a word no, but in a, in a complicated answer, I [00:11:00] would say yes. Maybe. Okay. Because in a word no, like, wouldn’t you say John, coping mechanism or defense mechanisms are kind of ways that we emotionally cope with stuff that we can’t handle? Well, I mean, that’s exactly a way to put it. Yeah. And so coping mechanisms are the same thing, but the component of, of psychological defense mechanisms.
You could ask a question, are they good or are they bad? Okay. I mean, coping
Victoria Pendergrass: skills can be good and bad. Yeah. Well,
Chris Gazdik: generally coping skills are good. I would agree with that. Yeah. Generally coping mechanisms. That’s the weird psychological. Well, it’s how you adjust. Yeah. It’s generally 90 accommodating. We can overuse some coping mechanisms.
Victoria Pendergrass: I mean, I talked to my clients about healthy and unhealthy coping
Chris Gazdik: skills. Yeah. Well, destructive. That’s why self-care is the way I define it. Fun, relaxing, enjoyable activities and aren’t self-destructive in any way. Right. They aren’t work related tasks. [00:12:00] That is the cornerstone of mental health. That’s what I believe.
Right, right. I mean, yeah. So coping skills are generally really good. They generally, 90% of the time aren’t bad. But here’s the thing. Psychological defense mechanisms, I would argue, I’m curious what you would say, John, have a lot more of
John-Nelson Pope: the negative connotation. Yeah. Okay. Well,
Chris Gazdik: outcome. Outcome. So that’s where that difference was.
So not even just a connotation, but like. . There’s a big drawback when our psychological systems get
John-Nelson Pope: stuck. In other words, you lose more than you gain. Oh,
Chris Gazdik: that’s an interesting statement. For a defense mechanism with a defense, that’s a true statement. Yeah, I think I would agree. But with coping mechanism, you don’t lose more than, you ain’t no way.
Very rare, right? But these defense mechanisms and intellectualization, can we say that you lose more than you gain when you do this?
John-Nelson Pope: Well, I think you certainly avoid being in touch with what is your essence, your [00:13:00] center,
Chris Gazdik: your right, right. Yeah. So what is it? Victoria Intellectualization is a defense mechanism at which people reason about a problem to avoid uncomfortable or distressing emotions.
Right? And so, That’s the basic idea of really what it is. As we said, defense mechanisms generally are really ways that people just cope with things they can’t handle. Well. I mean, not to get off on a full tangent, but one of the most amazing to me, like my favorite defense mechanism. John, you think about it.
I’ll ask you what yours, well, both of you maybe is repression, like it is amazing to me. Yeah. How people experience traumatic realities and like, boom, that your mother nature kicks in your spirit. I like to say, kicks in spirit and subconscious to me and just repress it. Memory’s just gone. Cause you, because it, you [00:14:00] interpret your spirit basically says, I can’t handle this.
It didn’t happen.
Victoria Pendergrass: But isn’t that also amazing how the brain can work to like Yes. Make it literally like where it just varies. Yes. That whatever happens so deep in your brain that it takes something like intense therapy or something to like bring it forward and you’re like, oh my gosh, I didn’t, well,
John-Nelson Pope: you know, I, I, I’ve had clients and is sometimes if the father was distant and unavailable or gone a lot the child grown up, an adult would still have selective memories and other words would not remember that that person wasn’t, the father wasn’t available.
Yeah. To them
Chris Gazdik: or a mother. It’s amazing to me. You get fragmented memory and then memory, that’s just gone. But
Victoria Pendergrass: I, but I, I have it, like when I was growing up, there was a point in my, in. We had moved to this new house and my dad [00:15:00] was, would go to Wilmington to second job site for like a week and then come home on the weekends and then go out for, I do not remember that.
Right. Like I had a conversation with my mom about this, like a couple, like, like in the past couple months or so, and I told her, I was like, I do not remember that. Like, she was like, it was like almost like a significant amount of time that he did that well. And I don’t know, like what it is in my brain and it like, I was like, and I was like, no.
Didn’t, how old were you? How old were you? I was probably middle school.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah, if you were much younger, I could understand that. So this was a very emotionally painful time for you?
Victoria Pendergrass: I’m guessing so. Cause I don’t remember it. Let
Chris Gazdik: me take some notes. . Yeah. Victoria just jumped on the chair. Yeah. Woo. But yeah, that’s like a, so
John-Nelson Pope: I mean, it was a very painful time for you.
Victoria Pendergrass: But I guess I didn’t realize it until my mom brought it up and was like, oh yeah, [00:16:00] don’t you remember when your dad like, would be gone for like a full week and then come home from the weekend? And like, I can totally relate
Chris Gazdik: to that. What? I don’t remember that. I can totally relate to that because when I went through very difficult periods of time in my youth when we were going through becoming a divorced family and listen to the way that I said that becoming a divorced family, that whole time period, like I still, right now as I sit, struggle with, was I eight?
Was I 10, maybe 11? You know, I don’t know what year that was. Like literally, and I could figure it out. But the, the, it’s fragmented a little bit. So the point here is, as we have just discovered with these defense mechanisms, our spirit kicks in when things are tough, and then we just go on. But our, our spirit also knows exactly what happened.
Right. And so when you’re intellectualizing our topic today, you are doing the same thing. And oftentimes you are not conscious even that [00:17:00] you’re doing it. Mm-hmm. , when you’re in the process of intellectualizing, that’s what happens. Does that sound right, John? That
John-Nelson Pope: sounds right to me. I’m, I’m thinking in terms of let’s say if you have a, a couple and they are, one is intellectualizing all the time.
Oh yeah. So there’s, there’s not a lot of emotional transfer or to be able to communication. And so what happens is there’s, it even grows more distance in terms of an estranged relationship. So,
Chris Gazdik: yeah, absolutely. So also by the way, you’ll see on the cameras, we don’t have Casey today, I forgot to mention, she is out sick dealing with some things.
So she’ll be back with us just so that you know, what’s that?
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. She thinks you’ve already brought that up. I’m pretty sure you
Chris Gazdik: already mentioned that, but that might, I may have it before we
John-Nelson Pope: started recording. Are you, are you repressing your
Chris Gazdik: memories? Yes, because I’m so sad, Casey,
John-Nelson Pope: Chris, I’ve also worked with people that were sexually [00:18:00] abused and suffered significant trauma when they were children, and they are missing literally years of their lives.
Oh yeah,
Chris Gazdik: no, and
John-Nelson Pope: absolutely. And they will say, they’ll say, I only remember the good things
Chris Gazdik: now. Now. And so these are, so we’re talking, we’re focusing on re repression, which is kind of a different show. But the, the idea here is these defense mechanisms are powerful. Right. And, and oftentimes necessary to function.
Mm-hmm. strategies that you just kind of naturally come up with. I
Victoria Pendergrass: think what you asked earlier, what our favorite, I think my favorite might be projection.
Chris Gazdik: Oh, really? Oh, it’s another good one. And you talked about that, the other show. John, do you have a favorite? Just curious, real quick. I, I, you like them
John-Nelson Pope: all?
I like
Chris Gazdik: them all. ,
Victoria Pendergrass: totally repressed. You’re trying
Chris Gazdik: not to press. So here’s an totally repressed, we’ve talked a lot about abandonment and engulfment on the show before a lot and, and you know, when you have these emotional realities in the [00:19:00] engulfment world that you’re trying to shut down or trying to internalize or this type of thing, it’s kind of well known to me that engulfment folks will get logical so as to not be emotional, they’ll become logical.
And that’s like an example of kind of how this happens. Oh my gosh, Victoria, you’re, I’m sorry. Kicking off on me.
Victoria Pendergrass: It’s not me. I just, I’m not
Chris Gazdik: projecting my call. The tickle, tickle, tickle. So I noted also with what this intellectualization is. There are good forms of this and bad forms. Kind of like back to our dialogue on are these okay, are these good or not?
They’re really good and helpful when we need to be objective and rational about things and logical. Mm-hmm. , but they’re really, really bad when we’re avoiding emotions. That’s a big component is avoiding, avoiding, avoiding with any of these defense members. Right. Well, you can see that in
John-Nelson Pope: funerals.
Funerals, you said funerals.
Victoria Pendergrass: Like when you say humor,
John-Nelson Pope: No, no, when you’re, let’s [00:20:00] say you’re, you’re at a funeral, if you’ve been, I’ve been to a lot of them, and because I’m getting closer to Jesus, you know, Day Nice. The older I get. But the, the, the thing is that you’ll, you’ll see people that don’t cry. They are very stoic.
Oh, yeah. . And they sit on their emotions. Oh boy, I bet you do see that. And it’s, it’s very difficult. Yeah. Very difficult for ’em. And that was one of the stereotypes of White Egg, Los Sax and Protestants or wasp, which because you don’t show your emotions, your God’s frozen chosen.
Chris Gazdik: Mm. Okay. Right.
I’ve never heard that expression, but, yeah. Well, you’re from the
John-Nelson Pope: mountains. I
Chris Gazdik: am from West Virginia. West Virginia. Yeah. So how do people use this from day to day? Is, is, is is the next little segment I wanted to kick into. Quickly so we can get to the good stuff of how do they really harm us, right? So people use this, as you say, in funerals as a probably a really good [00:21:00] framework to put into your mind, because this happens a lot when times are emotional and funerals are really a time where things are very emotional, so
John-Nelson Pope: people don’t want to feel out of control.
Chris Gazdik: That’s one that’s on the list. That’s right. People don’t want to appear vulnerable. People are trying to appear strong. Yeah. Right. What else do I have?
Victoria Pendergrass: Well, some people might literally just be shocked still. Like
Chris Gazdik: that’s a term for it. Yeah, like shock. I don’t know really what that is, but people get psychologically and they say it’s in a state of shock.
Like frozen almost. Yeah. Yeah. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s the fight, flight or freeze. And so in other words, they’re
John-Nelson Pope: gonna dissociate a
Chris Gazdik: little bit. Yeah. That’s another clinical term, right? Yeah. Well, people use that all the time. It is the, it’s a whole nother show. I mean, you see how we have good content to develop, right?
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. And you know what I mean? Like I mentioned before, like how I listen to a lot of true crime and stuff, and a lot of [00:22:00] times they do talk about like how people’s responses when crimes and things like when their loved ones go missing or when their loved ones are killed or whatever. And a lot of times, you know, they, the host kind of remind people, well, like everybody’s responses are different.
It’s normal. Yeah. Like some people. My not.
Chris Gazdik: Cause you didn’t, you
John-Nelson Pope: didn’t show enough emotion that somebody’s gone missing. Right.
Victoria Pendergrass: And so then they, oh, the husband must have done it because he’s not crying at the fact that his wife is missing. Or, well, maybe he’s just in shock that,
Chris Gazdik: you know, like, so you didn’t follow the show notes, but you followed them perfectly because that’s the conclusion here, right?
How do we do this in day to day? And that’s, I’m glad you brought that up cuz that was the way I was gonna take the mic drop on this segment. Oh, I you did. You’re great. Because that’s, people get very, very confused about that. Mm-hmm. and, and like, listen, FBI agents have been confused about this when they’re doing, you know, mass murder [00:23:00] events and things, you know, this is a normal response system that your psychological system.
It kicks into gear because I don’t know where my wife is. She’s missing, she’s been taken, has she been killed? And you’re just like stoic because your emotions can’t handle that. Like, I, I don’t, I don’t even know what to say.
Victoria Pendergrass: You literally can’t process it.
Chris Gazdik: You cannot process it. So think about our definition of psychological defense mechanisms, right?
Mm-hmm. mechanisms in which people reason about the problem to avoid uncomfortable or distressing emotion, right? So yeah, it’s like, wow. And day to day husbands will look at their wives and see this intellectualization and interpret it. You don’t give a shit about what I’m saying. . Wait a minute. Be careful cuz that’s maybe completely the opposite of the case.
The person cares so much that they’re just, you know, shutting down, not [00:24:00] coping in the moment and just falling apart. , but you just see them
Victoria Pendergrass: aka engulfment
Chris Gazdik: en golf. Right, right. It’s, it’s, it, it appears something very, very different and causes lots of misunderstandings in, in mm-hmm. , not just marriages, but your employee shuts down when we’re doing a performance review.
Right. Right. And the employer’s like, man, you just really don’t give a rip about being here. Oh, you know, I, I, I, I’m making a mental note about that. Hold on a minute. This, this person’s intellectualizing and not really answering your emotional inquiry of whatever format. possibly because of a psychological defense that they don’t even know they’re doing.
Right.
I
Victoria Pendergrass: think you might see that, I mean obviously I known, I don’t have that much experience with couples, so I’m interested to see what y’all might say, but I feel like you might would see that in couple fights. Like when one person says something to their partner and their partner doesn’t immediately respond, and it’s probably [00:25:00] cuz and then you know that one person’s like, oh well you don’t have anything to say.
Well, it’s probably might be because that their partner is processing that what is said. They’re trying to like, they’re like trying to deal with or figure out what to say next.
Chris Gazdik: And couples counseling sessions. Victoria, I am doing that all,
all the time. The time. Okay. So I’m pretty spot on
all the time.
Would you agree, John? Oh yeah,
John-Nelson Pope: I, yeah, yeah. You see how people sit and how I got. You know, you, you’ll see if somebody’s like this or somebody’s like, we like closer Yep. Closer and all of that. There’s sort of that and how they can share a small couch mm-hmm. and still have a, a, a wall between them that’s 10 feet thick.
Victoria Pendergrass: Do you see that in like, where they look like if that, like say if it was John and I and instead of speaking to John, I’m like talking about John to Correct.
Chris Gazdik: Oh listen,
John-Nelson Pope: yeah. They do that all the the
Chris Gazdik: time. Redirect looking at you. I used to play [00:26:00] a fun game. Oh. I still, yes I do. . So if you’re listening to the show and you’re coming to couples counseling with me or any therapist, were gonna make you, you know, crazy in your mind about this.
I would love to see where people sat. . Mm-hmm. . And this office is set up sort of not as much choice as they, people won’t sit in my, my chair, air quotes or, you know, but they’ll still, sometimes, you know, a couple will come in and they’ll sit in this chair, which is an individual chair instead of that chair, which is the, the loveseat.
And I used to have a loveseat, a full on couch, a single chair, and then the chair. Oh, I
John-Nelson Pope: remember that old setup. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You
Chris Gazdik: remember?
Victoria Pendergrass: I would love to see that. Cause in my office there’s no, like, I’m the same. There’s only a couch. And then my chair like,
Chris Gazdik: now let me calm the listening audience down.
We’re, we’re not, I mean, I don’t want you to be fearful. We’re not overanalyzing everything you do, but it is
Victoria Pendergrass: interest, it
Chris Gazdik: is interesting to see. It can be fascinating. Yeah, it can be fascinating. Anyways, so what are the harmful effects? Is, is really an important [00:27:00] component here to understand so that you can be insightful about what it is that.
The consequences of this really kind of become, and if you think about it, it’s easy pick for intellectualization. Mm-hmm. over analyzation. I mean, people understand that very well. You think, you think, you think yo analyze, you get stuck, you kind spin something around
John-Nelson Pope: is this will that goes around, over and over and over again and it’s never ending.
Never ending sometimes.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Maddening. Yeah. So when you get stuck in intellectualization and honestly abandonment people are not any better than en engulfement people, please don’t hear that. But with this particular show you’re gonna hear that side tends to fall in that more, I would say. Well, you don’t operate from that.
John, I was gonna ask you if you agree with that statement or if. .
John-Nelson Pope: Well, I understand what you’re saying.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. And, and I, I do see that, you know, a lot because the engulfment folks get so [00:28:00] internalized and stuck and thinking and then it looks like procrastination or that you don’t care, or Well, I would agree with that.
Yeah. Right, right. Yeah. And that’s not it at all. Cause Victoria, you spoke about that eloquently a little bit ago. Yeah. So be careful about what you are personalizing as a characteristic, right. Of somebody that you care about when they’re doing this. So, like,
Victoria Pendergrass: someone that is abandonment is gonna make, instead of thinking, oh, they just don’t care about me.
Like they’re just not, cuz they’re not responding, it’s because they. Need some time to, need some time. Yeah. Need some time to like process their feelings and their thoughts. What, and before they come to
John-Nelson Pope: their, oh, and that’s another word that people use all the time, is processing that. Oh yeah. You have to do that out.
But, but I, you know, you, in other words, you can accuse somebody of over, over intellectualization. Yeah. But you’re doing it [00:29:00] yourself when you judge the other person.
Chris Gazdik: Oh, believe me. Oh yeah. I, from the abandonment category, can way use intellectualization for sure. Again, my wife is probably laughing her little butt off , you know, thinking about me saying, oh, engulfing people do that more than you.
She’s probably like, oh, really? I’ll probably hear about that in about an hour. , you know, because Yeah, you’re great point, John. When you judge, when you throw your views around and try to analyze and whatever, like. , you’re in trouble. You, you, you get get
John-Nelson Pope: a lot of that in college. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. They
Chris Gazdik: think y’all should, y’all should see his face right now.
He’s beaming either in their heads. Oh, yes. Yeah. Oh, when you get in your feels, as they say nowadays or when you get into your head like we used to say you’re probably getting into intellectualization, you know, for for sure. So procrastination is a topic. Neil, I think you and I and Adam talked about that.
I’ve referred [00:30:00] several people to that show. The intellectualization results in procrastination. I think we can make that. Mm-hmm. statement. That’s a huge
John-Nelson Pope: you do in the self-edit all the time, and that keeps you from really getting in touch with your true self or what’s going on inside of you. If you have the turmoil.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. It, you can just get spinning on that. Keep spinning. You don’t even know what you’re feeling when that happens. You block it. From yourself, you are avoiding uncomfortable emotional realities. And again, with defense mechanisms, anytime it’s in an avoidance phrase, anytime it’s in an avoidance pattern, like be careful about that because that’s probably, you know, what’s happened.
What else we got in marriage. It inadvertently can result in misunderstandings, as I’d mentioned, and even worse than that resistance of facts that you hear or see. And even worse than that, listen to this disrespecting the position [00:31:00] or devaluing the view of your other person. Listen to that aggression.
Right. I see that
John-Nelson Pope: in couples, John . Unfortunately, I see that with a lot of couples. A lot. Right. And they really, I, I, I have a sense that they really care and love one another, but there’s this, if you have this over intellectualization, oh my, it is a hard word to say, isn’t it ? So you, you have that then you’re basically end up setting up this artificial wall and you can’t really respond to the person’s
Chris Gazdik: emotions.
It’s a hard word to say, but when you say it Well, you sound so intellectual. Thank you. See how I did that, Victoria? Yeah. But up. You’re not impressed. I can tell I feel like you No, but boy, I could, we could have played that out. Yeah. And when I just did that, if we played that out a little bit longer and I started to get like [00:32:00] upset and critical of your response, right.
Analyzing it. I could, I could have modeled there. Yeah. A moment of intellectualization with you. Boy again. Okay. This happens all the time. Mm-hmm. like we fall into these things and part of our goal is to understand really why we want to acknowledge that and, and, and avoid doing those things right. As much as possible.
Little bit goes a long way. These things are gonna happen, but when you really get into using these regularly, this is where these drawbacks come into place. How about this? Especially in marriage, I noted in my thoughts, right, does Intellectualization block empathy? Oh, oh yeah. I would
John-Nelson Pope: agree. I would, yeah, for sure.
Agree. One of my earliest marriage counseling was in Waynesville, North Carolina. And there was a man who had married a woman that was from Ja from Japan. And the culture was very reserved that she came from, [00:33:00] and he was very much into his head. And he would, he would come and he would just come by my office and we would talk about philosophy and he would talk about and, and, All sorts of things.
He would, and he wouldn’t, he would not be in touch with his feelings about his dad or his mom or his family. And he was feeling very frustrated in his life about his, his employment. His wife came to see me as well. This was when I was a pastor, and he said there was no communication. He, he didn’t know how to say he loved her and she didn’t know how to, to respond to him because she was also having this golf.
Perfect.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Victoria, when you start doing more couples counseling, yeah, you will hear all the time this idea that at my spouse doesn’t communicate with me. And literally you’ll see the eyes roll of that person who has been [00:34:00] accused of not communicating, right? And they’re sitting there thinking, I told you this, I told you that I told you this.
Again, I don’t understand why you’re saying this. Well, listen, the reason as I look directly into the camera, cuz this is an important port like point, you are feeling all sorts of things and not saying them. And the result is you are giving an intellectual, logical statement and therefore the other person doesn’t receive what you’re feeling, therefore, so they communicating your
Victoria Pendergrass: needs, how you’re feelings, right?
Or you’re communicating other things. You’re specifically your feeling
Chris Gazdik: making. It’s meta.
John-Nelson Pope: It’s meta. You’re talking about something that you’re not talking about. The real essence, right? The essential nature of the feeling itself. You could talk about it, but it’s not authentic. .
Chris Gazdik: Because why?
John-Nelson Pope: [00:35:00] Because you’re, you’re avoiding by doing that, you’re, you’re intellectualizing,
Chris Gazdik: you’re intellectualizing the word.
Right? Right. And, and listen, I know that these are very emotional conversations and I know this happens all the time and it’s going to, we need to embrace that and be okay with that to a certain extent, right. But we want to identify when that’s happening because essentially ends up what happens isn’t John, I do this all the time.
I’m sorry. Unfortunately you would say, I’m not authentic. And that’s probably true. You know, cuz I just get, make a statement and I forget. Like, okay, wait a minute. Let me think. What am I feeling? How do I identify that? I need to let her know how I’m feeling. Like who wants to do that all the time? Right?
It’s not, it’s, it’s difficult. This takes energy to be aware of. Well, intentionality. It’s intentionality. And that takes energy and to be purposeful. Yeah. , right? Oh yeah. It definitely takes a lot of energy. So another big drawback with this is rationalizing things. When you get into intellectualizing, you will find all kinds of [00:36:00] rationalizations for what you’ve done.
And let’s face it, you probably shouldn’t have done what you’ve done. Mm-hmm. , you know, and then you get in your head, and then you can think of all the reasons why you did what. And it, it
Victoria Pendergrass: just, well, I did it because blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. And there we go to another defensive defensiveness, right?
And then you go back and forth and you become defensive. You do that until you get
John-Nelson Pope: a plate thrown at you
Chris Gazdik: or something. It never happened before. John has Joy gone?
John-Nelson Pope: No. No. That was when I was at seminary. That was one of the first memories that I had because of a young couple. And they were up on the floor above me and I was very idealistic and the couple, and I said, well, everybody’s gonna have perfect marriages at seminary because we all love the Lord.
You know, and that didn’t happen. Right. And she actually she threw dishes at him because he was very intellectual. Oh, wow.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. That’s that’s an intense strategy to break [00:37:00] intellectualization, that’s for sure. Right? Yeah, for sure. Maybe I wouldn’t suggest that y’all were getting to the next Do not when he with anyone.
I do what do we do instead? Okay. And the last thing I’ll point out that I thought about was that it’s also an easy pick. I think I began here in all in here with this little segment of, you know, when you intellectualize you fall way into having a lot of experience with anxiety. Mm-hmm. , I mean, you
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah.
No, I think, yeah, if you kind of dig, dig into those people that come to you with anxiety, they’re probably intellectualizing.
Chris Gazdik: That didn’t sound very intellectual. Inte.
Victoria Pendergrass: Intellectualizing. Yeah. There you go. Yeah. And like, that’s probably, might be, I mean, not a hundred percent of the time, but I would say
Chris Gazdik: probably a good bit of the, you know, I’ll honestly draw this out in a, in a, in a whiteboard in my office for people.
A lot of times when, you know, if you can visualize ahead and then a colored marker has an X with the [00:38:00] original thought that bounces around the head. Mm-hmm. . And then you get another marker and you get an X and you just draw that bouncing around the head. Right. And then a third and maybe a fourth. And that’s all you need because you have like crazy lines that are just bounced around with no outlet, right.
Because they say,
Victoria Pendergrass: yep.
Chris Gazdik: And then the next picture is the same one with an X in one color with an exit and then another one with another exit and you compare the two pictures. Oh, it’s amazing. Because when you intellectualize and internalize at the same time, probably is a good component to add to that.
You will become anxious.
John-Nelson Pope: What a, A great illustration of a feedback loop,
Chris Gazdik: right? Yeah. Oh, it’s exactly what it is.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. Right. Just keeps resonating.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, because it has no outlet. Nah, no exit. Boy. A and this is an original thought in the [00:39:00] moment, the combination. Intellectualizing and internalizing will cause anxiety.
Now, that might be a quote on a t-shirt. I don’t think it’s cool enough, but it’s clinically cool enough for real. That’s why you get cel
Victoria Pendergrass: counselors .
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, indeed. Okay, next section. Let’s move. So what do we do instead, guys? Okay, so we’re identifying this and we’re realizing, yo, this really does have some significant consequence to me in my life.
Okay. So what do we do in response? I mean, just off the top of your heads, what do you, what do you think? I mean, well, we have to
Victoria Pendergrass: deal with our emotions, I mean, right. Well, before you deal with them, you have to identify them. It’s
Chris Gazdik: huge. I mean, it’s right. It’s, it’s a no brainer. And, and. A lot of my therapy experience with people like, I am doing this all the time.
You know? Okay, so you just made this intellectual statement. I don’t use that word, but I said, okay, well, so, so what are you saying there? What? What do you mean by that? Mm-hmm. . And then they’ll say it again and maybe it’ll be [00:40:00] another intellectualization statement. I said, you know, I’m still confused. I don’t, I don’t really understand what you’re saying.
And they’ll say it again and trickles in. What do you think into what they’re actually feeling? Right. Because you have to repeat and then you repeat, and then you kind of get into what we’re after, which is John, I think you eloquently put it the essence of what you’re experiencing and that is a genuine revelation sometimes to the person’s self.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. So that, I have a question. What do you say to someone who says that they don’t know how to identify their emotions?
Chris Gazdik: Oh God, that’s a lot. .
Victoria Pendergrass: Can you give the, the, a quick answer to that? ?
Chris Gazdik: You know what, I can that question, question, I’m gonna, it’s, it is, but it’s not. So I’m gonna go to what I means . Huh?
As I was singing
John-Nelson Pope: feelings
Chris Gazdik: as an idea directly from my book. So this, this is [00:41:00] the last segment that we wanted to do, that I wanted to do, and then we’ll come back to this. Okay. Because the last section is like, what are the payoffs really? Like how does this really get going? What do we want to do instead Leads to like, why do we really wanna change this?
What are the payoffs? And, and your question really kind of speaks to that, I think. Mm-hmm. . So this is chapter 18 from through a therapist’s size, re-understanding emotions and becoming your best self. Chapter 18 is when we are the angriest, the more powerful I statements. Right, and there’s a do and don’t in it.
I didn’t write it down so I won’t misquote it, but this sets up an exploration. So how, how do you identify your feelings? I get that question all the time from clients, right? Mm-hmm. , when you use I statements instead of you statements, think about what that forces you to do. And I write about this in my, in in the book, in chapter 18.
It forces an exploration. [00:42:00] It forces you, you know, rather than getting into a situation where you’re blaming the other person, you’re internally exploring and answering the question because you’re making an eye statement. What am I seeing in this? What? So instead
Victoria Pendergrass: of saying, you made me angry, you say, I feel angry because,
Chris Gazdik: It forces you to come up with the rest of the sentence.
Yeah. Cause you have to own it. Yes. That’s the power of I statements and, and, and a lot of people don’t. I have to own it. I have to say what I am thinking or what I am wanting or what I am experiencing, running I statements basically, what am I feeling? Mm-hmm. . It’s a powerful reframe that you can just totally avoid simply by saying a you statement.
And, but if
you
John-Nelson Pope: use the I statement, you actually reclaim
Chris Gazdik: your [00:43:00] power. Let’s go further with that, because that’s fantastically true.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. Well, the reason why is because you take you take ownership of your emotions, your feelings, and you’re actually. This is what I authentically believe and think and do.
And so you’re being able to stand up as a mature individual.
Victoria Pendergrass: That’s the goal. I tell all my clients though, everybody has their own remote control. And when you all of it, when and when you, and when you give, say like, when you say, well, so and so made me feel this way, you made me feel this way. You’re giving that person your remote control and then they now have control over you.
Chris Gazdik: But when you, I will so use that. I have the talking stick. Yeah. But when you have Lord of the Flies,
Victoria Pendergrass: when you use, but when you use I statements, you’re giving that, you’re taking your, your remote control back and then you now have the [00:44:00] control back
John-Nelson Pope: over. And you’re saying that, that you have rights and you have you have some agency in your own life.
Right. And when you say you. You’re giving that, like you said, the remote control
Chris Gazdik: to another person. Yeah. I love that. And, and, and, and that’s such a powerful metaphor, Victoria, that you’ve come up with. And I’m serious. I will use that. I think because Go for
Victoria Pendergrass: it. Cuz I didn’t come up
Chris Gazdik: with it myself. I do not want to give up my remote control, yo.
Right, right. You know, like, who, who wants to say, oh sure, here’s the remote control. Right. You know, or I mean, how many times have you gotten into a fight with your kids? Hey, where’s the remote control? They’re sitting there saying, I know exactly where it is, but I ain’t telling you . You know? Mm-hmm. . And, and, but that’s exactly what you do when you, when you get to use these usage.
So I Statements are powerful. Other questions naturally come around when you said angry. Right, right. You make me so angry. Oh geez, that sucks. Well, I feel so angry. Well, the questions, why am I so angry? [00:45:00] What has gotten me so upset? What does this situation really mean to me? Mean to me? Right? Mm-hmm. , I use that in therapy all the time too.
Do I feel angry or do I feel something else? Right. Hurt, scared, anxious, confused. What, what really is there? You see? Mm-hmm. , it just turns everything around. Yeah. So I, I love chapter 18. So does that answer your question? Yeah. What do people say when they say Yeah,
Victoria Pendergrass: no, that, yeah. I think that’s a great start.
Chris Gazdik: So the easy get here is what do we do instead, of course. Is, you know, identify the emotions that you have. That that sounds, you know, so simple. And I think our brains and Victor years immediately went there. Mm-hmm. , it’s an easy pick, but really hard to
Victoria Pendergrass: do. Oh yeah. I have to remind my client, like no one said it was gonna be easy.
I don’t know what you like,
why you differ.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah, no, no, no. I just, I’m just thinking that I have some clients that said I didn’t think change was gonna be this, this [00:46:00] challenging or this difficult or hard. And that in order for something that’s worthwhile you, right. Yeah. It’s no pain, no gain.
Chris Gazdik: I guess, listen, one of the things I say in therapy is I am not a passive therapist.
I do not sit back and just listen and, you know, I’m pretty active as a style shocker as much as I talk. Right. But that’s purposeful. Right? Right. It fits my style and it’s done in a, I think a very kind and loving way. Not gotten much feedback otherwise, but like, I believe in attacking this stuff, right?
Like, identify this stuff and you say, no pain, no gain, man, let’s attack it. . Like if you’re beginning, figure it out. Yeah. Even listening to this and thinking about how I use intellectualization and then really getting in touch with like the serious drawbacks that this creates in our life. Well, let’s freaking attack it, right?
Let’s go after and figure out [00:47:00] how do I really do different? Like your question, Victoria, how do I really identify what I’m feeling? You know? And that’s what we’re doing here with this segment of, well, what do I do instead? Let’s attack, let’s be purposeful, let’s take agency. I love the way you put that, John.
Yeah. I
Victoria Pendergrass: tell people I’m a very direct client. I mean, not client, a direct guy, probably that too, right? Yeah. I’m probably, yeah. But that I don’t beat around the bush kind of thing. That like we, same thing. Attack it head on. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: I mean,
John-Nelson Pope: so this is just the question. Yes. So you’re less roja, right? Yeah. So what would you say your, your reason to be, modality, modality, fallback, are you using,
Victoria Pendergrass: I mean, I don’t
Chris Gazdik: know.
Can’t say eclectic.
John-Nelson Pope: Don’t . Oh, trigger. There. Don’t trigger me. Oh, y’all gotta see on the video, the YouTube with John. When
you’re, when you’re a, a young therapist and you say you’re eclectic, you’re not,
Victoria Pendergrass: I mean, [00:48:00] I usually just say I’m a, a cl a patient centered therapist like I’m there for, that’s thing. And so, I mean, I don’t know.
You’re client centered.
Chris Gazdik: Client centered or, right. Oh, patient. She can’t say patient. I said person Boy, you got triggered twice. results.
John-Nelson Pope: No, no. That’s, that’s the teacher in me. Yeah.
Victoria Pendergrass: So, but I mean, I’m that John here for the I was treating you and so, I mean, I don’t want someone, I was just talking about this, so about this like, time is valuable.
I was just talking about this with another client and like, I am not here to waste someone’s time either. Right. I wanna be productive. Exactly. So I’m not just gonna sit here and let you, and like you said, passively let you do these things. So I’m gonna
Chris Gazdik: You
John-Nelson Pope: show your love and care. Yes. And unconditional positive regard.
There’s another one. Unconditional positive regard. Yep. And you’re showing that by actively engaging and telling that and saying and [00:49:00] transmitting to the client mm-hmm. , you really care. Yeah. You really are interested in their improvement. And so there is not the intellectualization, which a lot of therapists engage in too.
I think so.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Just a little bit of a note. There are other modalities that are more, you could say passive. There’s, there’s point and purpose to all that. I don’t want anybody thinking we’re crashing on that, particularly you mentioned, but
Victoria Pendergrass: each therapist has their meat
Chris Gazdik: or whatever. There’s also gestalt there’s au and stuff for that matter.
I mean, there, there are things going on. Cause I, but I, you’d see that more in the humanistic. Yes. So
Victoria Pendergrass: I was gonna say, so John, what would you label the type of modality that I
Chris Gazdik: Oh, you’re excellent. That that’s a modality , that’s not a, we’ll talk about that later. Yeah. But John, go further in what you just said cuz that’s, people might not understand.
You see that more in humanistic theory. Well,
John-Nelson Pope: in other [00:50:00] words, like existential, you would get somebody that would help somebody search for meaning. And so there is a tendency for some intellectualization right. Within that with existential, yeah. Yeah, definitely. Gestalt, however, is more like getting into the real gut of the situation, but it’s humanistic in the sense of, of, of that’s there.
I think what the psychoanalytic is that you get not as much feedback from the therapist on certain levels. Mm-hmm. , you, you would get the interpret. Right. That
Chris Gazdik: would would come there. Okay. Professor Pope, you just like created three whole new shows,
Victoria Pendergrass: and one those architect come at a later
John-Nelson Pope: date. It are come at a later, later date.
That’s
Chris Gazdik: okay. I just point that out that cause listening people are like, wait a minute, what does Psycho, what did he say? They’re psycho people. They’re getting Googling. Kal, what can you ? It’s okay that way. Let’s go a little [00:51:00] further.
John-Nelson Pope: I’m, I’m just
Chris Gazdik: teaching it this semester. So that’s, oh, that helps .
Victoria Pendergrass: So it’s like crush on your brain.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Yeah. So the second thing that comes to my mind with what do you do instead is, you know, finding a way to express them. And again, , I pointed that out in the, the, the head and the marker thing that I described just a little bit ago. And when I do a professional speaking engagement I call it methodical management of mental health.
Hey, free plug for myself, I too can come to you and speak to your company. I love doing it. And it’s a professional talk that I gave called Methodical Management of Mental Health. And we talk about all of these things on there. And one of the things that I use in there is this I will give a direct challenge in that talk to everybody that I meet.
So, and the challenge is, you know, simply being able to express what it is that you’re experiencing, you literally have an attempt or an experience every single day for an opportunity to do that. Mm-hmm. . And that opportunity comes when somebody asks you the question, Victoria, that [00:52:00] I probably ask you this morning, Hey, how you doing?
Yeah. Right. What do people respond with? . Good. Okay.
Victoria Pendergrass: Hey, I’m alright.
Chris Gazdik: How are you?
John-Nelson Pope: Oh, it’s transactional. It’s
Chris Gazdik: transactional, yeah. Mm-hmm. . So what I wanna challenge everybody that’s listening to this show to begin changing the intellectualization and the transactional aspect of this is answer that question the very next time that you get that question.
Mm-hmm. with at least three sentences. Oh, crap. Right? I have to think about that. , right? Yeah, it well, it does. Oh, you’re, oh, I see.
Victoria Pendergrass: I’m just saying like, yeah, if someone asked me if I had to give three seven,
Chris Gazdik: yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: I mean that would mean you should have to think about it and you’d have
Chris Gazdik: to sort of, but not really.
And you practiced that. John, how, how you doing today? Three sentences.
John-Nelson Pope: I am feeling on the top of the world, . I, I am. I feel good about my [00:53:00] life. I feel fulfilled. Not I,
Chris Gazdik: dude, are you gonna say that tomorrow morning when I ask you the question? No,
John-Nelson Pope: no. I’ll say yeah. Okay. , I’m, I’m
Chris Gazdik: awake. Well go further with that.
John, how you doing this morning? I’m awake. I’m awake.
John-Nelson Pope: I am planning my day. I’m looking forward to it. I want to interact with you and, and talk to you.
Chris Gazdik: There you go. So, yeah, it, it’s funny, it’s, it feels candid and a little robotic and whatnot, and it might be for a little while, but generally when I get that question, I’ll be like, oh, I’m doing pretty good.
I mean, you know, I actually slept well and but I’m looking at a busy day. So I’m kind of like, you know, this is, I have noticed that
Victoria Pendergrass: when you give responses, it’s not. . I’m like, it’s not Chris, I just asked a quick question. It’s purposeful
Chris Gazdik: and you’re giving me this not okay. Yeah. It’s purposeful. It’s not like an eighth grader un unless, Victoria, you’ll notice when you ask me a question and you get less.
Yeah. It’s because I, I’m not ready to engage. Yeah. I think when you walked in and were preparing for the show, what did you get out? Me, but nothing. [00:54:00] So it’s like, cuz I ne was the only one that talked to me. Oh, I’m so sorry. .
John-Nelson Pope: I was, I was saying, you know, going real quickly with her, you’re, I, I see C B T, I see r e B T with you.
Mm-hmm. . And there’s that engaging yeah. Aspect. So
Victoria Pendergrass: I literally tell my people I person centered or clients in and a cbt. Yeah. That’s what I do. You solution focus. Yes. Do you think Well that comes from being in schools. Yeah. Because we have to be very brief solution focus. Brief
Chris Gazdik: solution focus. Victoria John’s trying to add three additional shows that people
Victoria Pendergrass: need to be seriously.
Okay. Anyways, the next thing,
Chris Gazdik: speak to those who claim I’m just not an emotional person. Have you heard this before, right? Mm-hmm. , I
Victoria Pendergrass: think like five people I know just popped into my head immediately. ,
Chris Gazdik: I hear this all the time and it, it’s, listen, it’s just not true. [00:55:00]
Victoria Pendergrass: Everybody is an emotional person. 20, put it on a t-shirt
Chris Gazdik: 24 hours a day at all times.
Even when you’re bored, even when you have nothing to say. Even when you’re unmotivated, even when you’re just napping, do you not dream when you sleep? The fact is, even when you’re asleep, you have emotions going, right?
John-Nelson Pope: It’s like a, a, a, a roiling cauldron of things that bubble up and burst and it’s beautiful.
And so it’s not just a it can seem like a veneer and glazed over and it’s not true. It’s that we’re all sorts of things going on all the time. At the same time, many of them contradictory,
Chris Gazdik: well, interestingly
John-Nelson Pope: enough, are co and many complimentary, but
Chris Gazdik: different, honestly. Is it possible to have one motion at a time?
Okay. [00:56:00] Probably, frankly, not. You know, like we talked about Aary and stuff. Sorry to add another Google for people, but we actually did a show on that one recently. It’s the Stew Uhhuh, you know, it’s the stew goes back to the stew that you have and all the different components of your personality and your experience.
Yeah. And your, your day to day and the momentary changes up and down, back and forth. Like, can we really be a, Hey, I’m not really an emotional person.
Victoria Pendergrass: Like, and I just had a client who pointed, she looked at my feelings board in my office. Oh gosh. Yes. And she just point, like listed all these things that she was feeling and I was like, that’s a first step.
Like you’re actually identifying what you feel. But then she was like, you know, I feel like I shouldn’t be feeling this many things at one time. I’m like, oh really? She said that? Yeah. Yeah. And so then I had like, we kind of had to start that conversation about like, . No, that’s okay. You can’t not, yeah. You can be like, you can feel this way about this situation and [00:57:00] this way about this situation.
Like there’s all these at the same time.
Chris Gazdik: At the same time. Yeah, yeah. You know, it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s amazing to me that there’s so many,
Victoria Pendergrass: she’s listening to this. She’s gonna know I’m talking about her, but my, yeah. I mean,
Chris Gazdik: but that just happened this same, but again, we get into intellectualization, we try to shut that stuff down cause we don’t wanna feel all this stuff, you know, and stuff.
And, and listen back to your original or your question a little while ago, you said, well, how, how do you help people feel their feelings or identify what your feelings, what you said? Well, look, most of my people are struggling to figure out, am I mad, happy, glad, or sad? Like, those are the primary things.
And, and listening audience just start there. I I have no problem with that. Don’t think you’re gonna be, you know, all highly emotionally intellectual and understand all this stuff and have Well, and I
Victoria Pendergrass: usually tell my clients that like, Under on said feelings board under each feeling. It gives the definition of that feeling.
Yeah. And it, and so I love having my clients. [00:58:00] Read the definition because there is a difference between feeling frustrated and feeling angry and feeling overwhelmed and feeling, you know, all those things. And so when you understand, like us approach it as, when you understand the definition of the, the feeling, then it becomes slightly easier than to identify.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. What are these different things?
John-Nelson Pope: So in other words, you’re teaching, you’re an English teacher in a sense, an emotional, an emotion teacher. Yeah. You’re giving greater definitions and nuance. Right. And a richness to that stew.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. So then that, that way mm-hmm. when that, especially with the kids that I work with, that way when they are feeling frustrated or when they’re feeling upset, they can identify to their parents or who to themselves even, okay, I’m actually feeling annoyed.
I’m not feeling angry, I’m not feeling frustrated, I’m feeling annoyed. And so then they’re able to know the
Chris Gazdik: difference. Interesting. John. Are therapists, teachers? Oh, I would think so. A hundred percent. A hundred percent. [00:59:00] Hundred percent. Hundred percent. Young therapists listening out there like, look, I believe this is just my opinion.
Chris Ga speaking for what it’s worth, Victoria
Victoria Pendergrass: Pendergrass feels the same way. .
Chris Gazdik: Okay. You know, one of the primary things that we do, particularly in the developing therapeutic relationship that you have with a client is to teach. Yeah. I think that’s oftentimes,
John-Nelson Pope: and good teachers learn from their clients.
Oh, absolutely. From
Chris Gazdik: their students. And you’re a person. It’s a
John-Nelson Pope: give and take. It’s a dynamic.
Chris Gazdik: Yes, John. You know, we’re figuring this out together. Yeah, right. That’s exactly right. I’m still growing. That’s another reason why I say that before. Every show begins. Okay. Victoria, what else do we do instead of intellectualization?
Wanna know? Wanna know? I got an idea. I would love for you to tell me mindfulness. Mindfulness, huh? My favorite. It, you know, it. It’s something that people are talking about and thinking about and
Victoria Pendergrass: it’s [01:00:00] definitely on the rise in the last, it is couple years and I love it.
Chris Gazdik: Good. Doesn’t it go directly against
intellectualization. Yeah. Have you thought about that?
Victoria Pendergrass: Because mindfulness is about being in the present, being in the now, being aware, being there. And you know, there’s
Chris Gazdik: some good
John-Nelson Pope: apps too. Are they for their Yeah. Yeah. Mindfulness app, which
Victoria Pendergrass: is literally type in mindfulness in your apps or, and like your, like you’re like stores and they’re gonna get, you’re gonna have
Chris Gazdik: something.
The va I love the world
John-Nelson Pope: We live in Wonder. The VA actually has veterans and administration has for, it’s veterans military. They have a, it’s called a mindfulness app. And you can download it. It’s free. You don’t have to pay for it. You don’t have to do a, a subscription though, I guess that’s fine.
Chris Gazdik: But yeah, there are apps.
We should probably create one too. Yeah. Enabling the idea of, oh dear. Grasp your chair or your car seat, or your steering wheel [01:01:00] for help. . What do you wanna do instead of intellectualizing? Do you really wanna be emotionally advanced? Then you ask. Oh gosh. Right? Like, again, grab the chair. I know. Cause it requires vulnerability.
It requires trust. It requires some faith in people. It requires, you know, some things. But holy cow, if you can identify, oh wow, I’ve just gotten into intellectualization. I’m avoiding probably the way that I’m feeling. Mm-hmm. , I need to
Victoria Pendergrass: ask for help. Take a deep breath. Yep. And you get some support. My favorite thing to tell people other than taking a deep breath, because deep breathing is free.
You do not have to pay to take a deep breath. How cool is that? But I tell people, I like to tell people to take their shoes off and put their feet to the ground. Whether that’s, I specifically like to tell them if they can put it on like sand or grass or something like that, but like physically ground themselves by like connecting their body to the ground.
John-Nelson Pope: You feel connected. ,
Victoria Pendergrass: [01:02:00] and that can bring you into the present mindfulness.
Chris Gazdik: So why do we really wanna do this again, Victoria took me to a book chapter and I, because the, the book that I wrote, I really was preparing for today, and I thought, oh my gosh. Like, these are things that I’ve totally hit in the book in a lot of ways.
Here’s another example of really the payoff of this to get excited about. Like, wow, I really want to get better at not intellectualizing. Well, chapter 25 in this thing I wrote 25, we are constantly a new or reconstituted self. We are not our old self, right? So do allow for change in self. Don’t be that old dog with new tricks, with no new tricks, I should say.
Right? And I, I was like, wow. You know, as I, as I was thinking about it in the context specifically of what I wrote and then tied it into intellectualization, it was like, wow. Eh, directly from the book in the text. I, I, [01:03:00] I had this statement, resist change, and you’ll find yourself crazy with lament and laden thoughts and full of frustration.
John, how frustrating, honestly, is it when we find ourselves intellectualizing it, it can be maddening, right? Oh, yeah. And you don’t even know that you’re doing that to to yourself. Right? I,
John-Nelson Pope: you, there’s a, there’s an aspect where you’re so self isolated that when you are intellectualizing and overdoing it, you’re not able to, to, to allow people to come into
Chris Gazdik: your life.
There’s natural consequences. Also, it occurs to me, can we say, John, that intellectualization creates a resistance to change? Oh, yeah. You know, can we say that intellectualization, as you just said, More eloquently than my statement [01:04:00] Cramps. Your growth. You people want emotional growth. That’s a fundamental aspect of the, the goals of therapy.
A lot of times. Well, you know, unfortunately, the drawback to this and the other psychological defense mechanisms, that is that it completely stunts that emotional growth. And again, what what breaks my heart sometimes is people do this so much and they don’t even realize they’re doing it. Right. Yeah.
Right. So I’ll sum this up here in 10 seconds, but closing thoughts, comments. What do you guys think? Pretty
Victoria Pendergrass: cool, eh? See, now that, now that we’ve talked about it, I know what it is. I just didn’t ever Exactly. You did. I put the word to what it is, but yeah, I think if, you know, if we can identify when we’re doing it, then I think that’s a big first step.
Chris Gazdik: Well, you know what’s funny, Victoria, as you say that, you’re right. I. You, you, you have all of the conceptual stuff, but what you develop with, with a little more experience and stuff is that, that ability to put words on it and that gut reaction when you see it, [01:05:00] and that just, you know, yeah. You can only know it intellectually so much before you begin understanding.
Yeah. And, and, and like experiencing something.
Victoria Pendergrass: Yeah. I’m just thinking of all my clients right now that Yeah. I ha that talk. I now, like, now I have a word to put with like what they do, .
Chris Gazdik: Right. And we, we
John-Nelson Pope: all do it. That’s it. You could, you could have 24 years of education or you could have six years of education.
It doesn’t matter. We all over intellectualize
Chris Gazdik: or No education. Or no education. I’ll spin off on that to say goodbye guys. John’s totally right. Listen, this is a very normal thing. I hope that what you’ve heard and understood and listening to us a little bit, thank you for hanging out with us, is that this is a very normal part of life.
It does have some destructive characteristics to it. Mm-hmm. . But part of what you are able to do, I hope now is, is, is I. Kind of be in the moment, be mindful about [01:06:00] it, have some alternative ways to kind of cope with things. I mean, that’s really what we’re doing on this journey is understanding how do we handle these uncomfortable things and I’ll hold the hope and knowledge and belief.
I’ll say I’ll hold the faith for you if you don’t have it, to develop the confidence in being able to handle these uncomfortable things that we have with emotions. So you can do that. You can do that with us. We’re really all in together trying to figure it out. All right, take care. Have a great week, and we will see you soon.
Bye all.