In Episode 320 of Through a Therapist’s Eyes, we explore the powerful pairing of acceptance and cheerleading – two emotional forces that, when balanced, can foster deep healing and growth. How do we fully acknowledge someone’s pain without jumping to fix it? And when is the right moment to offer encouragement without sounding dismissive? This episode dives into the therapeutic wisdom of DBT’s “radical acceptance,” while also addressing the risks of toxic positivity and emotional neglect. From real-life examples to practical techniques like the “pendulum method,” we break down how to validate with empathy while still inspiring change – whether you’re in a therapy room, a marriage, or simply showing up for a friend. Because sometimes the most healing words are: “That must be so hard… and I believe in your strength.”
Tune in to see Acceptance with Cheer leading Through a Therapist’s Eyes.
Think about these three questions as you listen:
- When has someone accepted you without judgment—and how did that affect you?
- Have you ever received encouragement that felt too soon or dismissive of what you were going through?
- How do you balance offering empathy with inspiring change in your own relationships?
Links referenced during the show:
https://psychcentral.com/lib/radical-acceptance
https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-toxic-positivity-5093958
https://www.mindfulnessmuse.com/dialectical-behavior-therapy/dbt-validating-and-cheerleading
https://www.throughatherapistseyes.com/category/podcasts/relationshiptoothers
https://www.throughatherapistseyes.com/category/podcasts/mentalhealthtips
https://www.throughatherapistseyes.com/category/podcasts/marriageandfamily
Intro Music by Reid Ferguson – https://reidtferguson.com/
@reidtferguson – https://www.instagram.com/reidtferguson/
https://www.facebook.com/reidtferguson
https://open.spotify.com/artist/3isWD3wykFcLXPUmBzpJxg
Audio Podcast Version Only
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Episode #320 Transcription
Chris Gazdik: don’t know.
[00:02:00] Too relaxed with them. No, you would,
John-Nelson Pope: you remember when I told you that you had to three times, seven times. Seven times? That’s a lot. Seven times.
Chris Gazdik: I can’t do seven times. Yeah. Well three go buy. But check it out and if you have three times, go subscribe onto or go to Amazon and give a review. That really helps us out a lot.
Five stars John wants.
John-Nelson Pope: Five stars because for our, our show here through a therapist Eyes,
Chris Gazdik: you’re an excellent marketer with the five stars, Sean, I gotta say, right?
John-Nelson Pope: And the reason
Chris Gazdik: why, the reason why is,
John-Nelson Pope: is that it it, it brings traffic our way and we’re able to have more viewers and people will be attracted to it.
Because it is very interesting. We like to do
Chris Gazdik: this show for you. We hope we disseminate information. We hope that we blow up stereotypes and myths about mental health and substance abuse. So your job, if you enjoy and appreciate what we do, is really to tell people, of course. And that is how you tell people.
Contact it through a therapist. eyes.com to email us. Do we get interactions? We do enjoy that guys. This is the human [00:03:00] emotional experience, which we endeavor to figure out together. So let’s dance John, let’s really get into this. Let’s, we’re not going to a different direction. We’re gonna stay on point,
John-Nelson Pope: put on your dance and shoes.
Here we go.
Chris Gazdik: Actually, is it, is it early? So you did the internal, do you wanna do the external announcement? Yeah, I, yeah. We have
an announcement about through a therapist eyes going through a change. What’s going
John-Nelson Pope: on, John? Well, I’m with Metrolina, my wife and I are, are leaving. And that’s the parent company by the way? Yeah. We’re leaving the area, Mount Holly, but we’re gonna stay with I am gonna be staying with Metrolina as a therapist, but it’ll all be done virtually.
We’re moving to Florida. Yeah. Back to my home town. And that is in Bradenton, Florida, where Pittsburgh
Chris Gazdik: Pirates
John-Nelson Pope: play preseason baseball. Yes. I’m gonna come see you for that. I’ve promised you, Chris, that I would I’d get tickets [00:04:00] and I’m coming down. Come down. We’ve got a, we’ve got a bedroom for you and all of that, so I love it.
And you’ll just have to put up with us. Hey. You know, but it’s a, it’s a place where Joy and I both went to high school and we married and we my parents are still alive. My dad’s 99. I mean, that’s wild. Yeah. Yeah. And, and my mom’s, so you’re going back home. Going back home and yeah. Helping my, my sister and my, my brother and my mother.
And we’re just gonna
Chris Gazdik: mixed feelings or solid Go.
John-Nelson Pope: I It’s bittersweet. It’s weird. Yeah. You’ve traveled the world. Yeah, I have traveled the world and and I’ve lived on three continents. Yeah. And, and now I’m coming back. Yeah. Yeah. And well, I’ll
Chris Gazdik: tell you formally, I won’t, don’t wanna make you too emotional, but when you told me I said the same thing I’m gonna say now.
Mm-hmm. I’m gonna do it publicly, if that’s okay. Mm-hmm. Yeah. It has been very special to work with you in the way that we have. [00:05:00] And it is almost sort of helped me to revisit a bit of a goal that I have had to where I, I, I originally started Metro Line Psychotherapy Associates, and again, you listener, that’s the parent company too, through a therapist size.
This is A DBA, but I, I, I originally organized it in my brain as such a place that people would want to, you know, start working and, and retire there from. Right. And I kind of had to give that up a little bit. It was some growth, some learning, you know, with different people being you know, an owner and a leader and that type of a thing.
People would come and go and I, I had to get to a place of accepting that. But you have been a big part of sort of reinvigorating that in me by, you know, you’re being able to, I think, ride out with us. Mm-hmm. And it’s really special because I admire you greatly. I, I, I love working with you. I learn so much from you and with you, and it’s kinda like my mom.
Same here. Yeah. It’s kinda like my mom did the same thing. She rode out with with us at Metro Carolina. So it’s kind of cool, man. I’m really glad that we’re gonna be able to keep you. And
John-Nelson Pope: you get Victoria at the beginning of her [00:06:00] career, right? Yeah. And you get me towards the end. Yeah. And, but I’m still gonna be providing services.
I’m licensed and I think we may all ride out, you know, so I’m still licensed. I’m licensed in both Florida and in North Carolina. Oh, well we can expand coming down to Florida. We’re gonna help you down there, guys. Yeah. So
Chris Gazdik: good stuff though. No, I’m, I’m really glad that we’re here to entertain you and I wanna
John-Nelson Pope: continue with with the podcast.
Chris Gazdik: Yes. So you’re gonna be with the podcast. We’re gonna graduate, we’re gonna be virtual things are changing. Mm-hmm. But we’re gonna be staying with you, you and them. Yes. That was definitely, that was to both the cameras. Yeah. And, and
John-Nelson Pope: it’s gonna be very hard to leave the camaraderie and the collegiality and working with the fellow therapist and with, all the folks with DW and Illa. Yeah, and just Allison and even, pardon? Allison. Do you know Allison? Yes. Virtual. Well, I see her out in the car lot. Yeah. She’s in the car. And Neil. And Neil. [00:07:00] Yeah. Yeah. Well, I’m, I’m
Chris Gazdik: glad we’re gonna be able to keep you. Thank you. All right. That’s a special thing and I’m, I’m really happy for you to, to go back home.
That’s, that’s really special. Yeah. That’s pretty cool. At this point in life, did you get
John-Nelson Pope: to, did you get the letter? I sent it to you. Email it. I emailed it.
Chris Gazdik: He just, he just made it public. Oh, okay. Okay. Shall we get to our topics? Yes, sir. All right. Acceptance, paired with cheerleading is really like thi this is a show that you’re gonna use big time in your relationships, like across the board.
Mm-hmm. This is a, a really poignant kind of way to think about how do you really want to relate to people? I mean, think about those questions, and thank you for the compliment, right? Like, when, when has somebody accepted you without judgment. Like, that is so honestly rare. Like, I don’t know if people really have that very often.
John-Nelson Pope: I think it’s very, very rare. Very rare, right. Yeah. And I, I guess I could name the. The times on my both [00:08:00] hands maybe. Yeah. When that has been authentically, so certainly I, I feel that way with my wife and my parents. Yeah. But even then
Chris Gazdik: there’s, you know, moments and times and spirit, you know, even seasons mm-hmm.
Where it’s like, no, it’s not. Yeah. Yeah. So powerful reality. Have you ever received encouragement that felt too soon? Or dismissive, like how you engage? I mean, how many times have you complimented your spouse or your kids and, and they feel like you’re just being disingenuous? Mm-hmm. Blowing them off and, you know, it comes off wrong.
Like, we’re gonna be talking about how do you do acceptance with people and then pair that out with guidance. It doesn’t do them a
John-Nelson Pope: favor if you have a premature. Acceptance. It doesn’t, right? Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: It, it, it’s, it’s destructive. Mm-hmm. In, in, in some ways, because you’re cutting them off. We’ll talk about that.
Yeah. So, so let’s get to this. What, what do you think about this topic in general? I, I, I, I’m kind of excited about it.
John-Nelson Pope: Well, I was kind of, I was, like I said [00:09:00] last week, oh, Ricky, you’re so fine. You’re so fine. You, you’re on my mind. Hey, Ricky, you know, Hey, Ricky, he, it’s a song, the cheerleading. Yeah, the cheer cheer the cheerleading song.
Yeah. But because you, you, when you do think of cheerleading, you do think of it like you wanna rally the, the football team or mm-hmm. Or the basketball team, but it’s. It’s something that is something that, that has to be more than superficial. And so when you’re talking about this radical acceptance Yeah, yeah.
It’s, it’s, it’s more than just cheering them, like in a, a cheerleading cheer. It’s cheerleading in the sense of I’m authentically interested in your wellbeing and your excelling and excellence and for your growth. So,
Chris Gazdik: yeah, I, I think it’s I, I chose those words that way really, because people can latch onto some of what we mean about cheerleading.
[00:10:00] Yeah. And, you know, you’re a, you’re, you’re an encourager for your, your kids. Yeah. You know, if you’re buddies with somebody and some buddy’s licking the floor and dragging and in a tough spot in their life, like you’re, you’re, you’re going to pick them up. Right. You encourage them. And people understand what cheerleading means in that regard.
That is cheerleading. That’s cheerleading. Right, right. And, and, and it’s directive also sometimes. Mm-hmm. You know, you’re, you’re not cheering for them to not score. You’re kind of, let’s go, let’s get going. You know, defense. Defense, let’s get motivated. Defense. Let’s get motivated. Let’s take action. Right.
Yeah. It, and that’s paired with acceptance. So there’s a bootcamp. Can be experience well with it. Yeah. Say more about that. Yeah. It was your drill sergeant acceptance and cheerlead combination. My drill
John-Nelson Pope: sergeant. My gunnery sergeant. Yeah. He he would, there, there’s that subtle thing. It was mostly male in, i, in my my bootcamp and experience.
And the gunnery sergeant would say things that were, you could, if, if you were sensitive soul, you might just take it, take [00:11:00] it wrong, or you could see it as a way of, of getting your butt going. Yeah. And, and move it on. Understanding their role in their job and what they’re trying to do. So it’s sometimes a little, ’cause he wants to be able to or he or she, that is the, the drill instructor.
Wants you to make sure you don’t get killed. And
Chris Gazdik: that’s their goal. So, yeah. I can’t tell you how many times people have given me the stories in, in my own life personally with the Marines that I know. Mm-hmm. Kids that are in my family, three of them are current active Marines and then others in work.
Mm-hmm. You know, I mean, they, they would go end up having a beer with their drill instructor after they graduate and whatever. I mean, they, they treat them so badly, so roughly. But they’re doing that for a reason. Yeah. They’re accepting them. Give
John-Nelson Pope: you, give the, the, the drill sergeant a silver dollar when you’re leaving.
Oh, do you? Oh, yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. I didn’t know that that’s a routine. Is that just the Navy or,
John-Nelson Pope: that was Navy. Navy. Marine, okay. Marine Corps. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: No, I didn’t, I’ve never heard that actually.
John-Nelson Pope: So, it’s kind [00:12:00] of a special thing. So they get, they get all these,
Chris Gazdik: they got a bunch of silver dollars.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah, they get us. Oh, that’s
Chris Gazdik: awesome.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Well, they’re appreciated because they’re, they’re really relating to you. And so you wouldn’t think that we’re talking about relationships this way, but they’re, you get the idea that it’s across the board when we’re relating. Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: And, and so, you know, there has been abuse in the past, but when it’s constructive, it actually helps form character, I think.
A hundred
Chris Gazdik: percent. So, so let’s dive into what we’re talking about, acceptance and cheerleading. So acceptance, really fully acknowledging a person’s thoughts, feelings, current reality, without trying to immediately fix or change it. This is, this is what we’re after, right? Mm-hmm. Like, do you think that people know how to accept other people?
Look at his smile on YouTube live. You need to see this guy’s knowing. Look,
John-Nelson Pope: do what you’re saying is you’re asking do you think that people know how to [00:13:00] accept when somebody is giving authentic cheer? Encouragement?
Chris Gazdik: Well, both ways actually. I was actually thinking the other way. Okay. I, I think what I, what, what was going through my head, John, is when you and I are talking, oftentimes, you know, I’m just waiting for you to stop so that I can pick in and uhhuh and talk like you young therapists out there, I like to point out.
Oftentimes you don’t realize the difference in the conversation that you’re having with a client. Mm-hmm. They have never experienced a conversation where they get to be focused on whatever they’re saying the whole time. Mm-hmm. Without interruption for an hour. Yeah. That’s a wild experience in.
John-Nelson Pope: It is unconditional positive regard is what
Chris Gazdik: that is huge.
Where does that come from and tell us about it? That’s
John-Nelson Pope: Carl Rogers and it was one of the earliest of, of the, of the core conditions during World War ii. He [00:14:00] was a therapist for for the, i, I would say for the military or people that were in the, the system or the Veterans Administration and he would have people that had severe PTSD, they would, they would not even be able to, to to express their emotions or feelings.
They were locked in, they were perhaps even catatonic in some ex, and he would just sit with them. And he would listen
Chris Gazdik: and catatonic just means that they’re in a unresponsive state kind of. Right.
John-Nelson Pope: Or minimal responses. Yeah. And so, and when the person felt safe, they would start to talk and he would do this completely without judgment.
And so he came up with the idea of the core conditions, and that’s authenticity, genuineness unconditional positive regard, which was a biggie. And
Chris Gazdik: and so this is a theory modality in therapy. Mm-hmm. But how do we apply that in our relationships with our kids, [00:15:00] in our coworker relationships, in our drill sergeant, training relationships, our marriages,
John-Nelson Pope: and I think my drill sergeant was someone.
That could do that. He was someone that really Yeah, he, he really could. And and yeah, you would want to go get a beer with him after graduation, but during that time that we were doing all that training, you didn’t want to do No. With him, but he would let down his guard and from time to time during the training.
Yeah. And, and, and I think he did it deliberately, probably, yeah. Very much. Mm-hmm. Much so. And so he would that was his assignment basically was to kind of mowed us into officers. And so
Chris Gazdik: I’ll tell you, you know, if you are, if you’re in a struggling relationship that’s, that’s salty or has some unforgiveness or some resentments, you know, think of your marriage.
Think of hurt spots. If you wanna really give a gift, if you really want to turn things around, [00:16:00] you can focus on being really, truly accepting. Let me read it again. Fully acknowledging a person’s thoughts, feelings, or current reality. Without trying to fix. Without trying to change it or them. We really get into wanting to change things and control things and suggest things and have opinions.
Fix, certainly fix, fix.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. Now I was wondering about it. It’s like when a person’s in a pit and can’t get out and all the sides. Are, are, are slippery, and I’m talking about this with depression or anxiety or they’re stuck. Are stuck, is that that person would be willing to come down into that level where the person is and just sit with them.
Yeah. And to be able, and at that point that person is strengthened and are able to develop his or her own strategies to be able to get out. And that’s part You did
Chris Gazdik: that [00:17:00] with me. Do you remember that? Mm-hmm.
John-Nelson Pope: I did that.
Chris Gazdik: Do you remember? No. Yeah, true story John and Chris interaction. So I’ll never forget this, John, it’s one of the reasons why you’ve endeared yourself in my heart.
So we were moving, the metro line was moving an office, our parent company, and we were going across town and, you know, we had just, everything was up. Outta wings. And you know, I had stuff in life that was stressing me out kind of anyway. And so I just remember I was telling you about something. You came into my office and I, and I just, and I sat down on the floor because I was tired.
I was, you know, the day was done full day of therapy and I was bagging stuff up and you know, I mean, you remember. Yeah, I remember. And you remember this now? Yeah. Yeah. And, and I, and I, and you sat down on the floor with me. And, and I looked up at you and I laughed, I smiled. I was like, I know what you’re doing.
This is the, this is the, this is the salt of the earth pastor guy and you, isn’t it? And you, you kind of did what you’re doing now. You smiled and knowingly. And, and I thank you for that and I appreciated it. And we talked, joined you
John-Nelson Pope: where you were. [00:18:00]
Chris Gazdik: You totally accepted where I was. You didn’t try to change it.
You sat down with me. I appreciated it. Uhhuh, it did gimme some energy. I think I got a lot done that evening because there was a lot to get done. And yeah, I appreciated that, that that was totally unconditional acceptance. That was really positive regard. Was just, well, you know, pastor did
John-Nelson Pope: that to me.
His name was Jim Mcn. Yeah. And and he did that with me once and when I was, and this was before I became a pastor, and, he just, he got, just went in there and joined with me and I really appreciate that. It’s, I appreciate it.
Chris Gazdik: It’s, it’s so comforting because you feel the, the, the, I mean, answering that question, when has someone accepted you without judgment and how did that affect you?
It gave me so much energy that day that you did that, and I knew what you were doing. Immediately when you started doing it, you started going down. I was like, ah, what this is, that’s cool. And I appreciated it. And we did, we worked out the problem that was there, that you’d come into my office and we, you know, we connected and, and boy, what a gift that is.
[00:19:00] That’s my point. It’s such a powerful gift to give your spouse. Mm-hmm. When you, when you go to your kid and your kid is struggling with something, maybe they just had a breakup with a girlfriend and you just, you’re not trying to give them unsolicited advice. Just listen, just listen. Just be present even.
Yeah. Just be there. That’s acceptance. You don’t have to be anything. You’re not right now. Just, I’m with you.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. Its so comforting, transparent.
Chris Gazdik: It’s very powerful.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Then we pair that with cheerleading. Okay. So let’s move to encouraging someone with hope, positivity, and affirming their potential for growth or change that is radically different than critical people in your life.
Mm-hmm. You have somebody that’s really hurt you, maybe, or maybe you took the adrenaline instructor very differently and, and, and you just got, I mean, there’s trauma that kind of goes on with some people. It really, really sticks with them. They have a hard time with that stuff. [00:20:00] You know that that critical person or it, it’s a death nail, that, that just spawns all kinds of insecurities.
Like I’ve grown to believe that one of the most difficult things to overcome emotionally is a highly, highly critical person. It’s in your life. I mean, we see this in therapy all the time. Well, cheerleading isn’t opposite of that. It’s encouraging with hope and positivity and being creative and, and, and affirming what you are like.
It’s powerful. So
John-Nelson Pope: are you talking It’s a radical acceptance, not necessarily of, of the maladaptive behaviors, and I’m sorry I’m using jargon. No, you’re fine. This show is a therapy show. You can use the jargon, but of the person himself, a radical acceptance of the person as an individual. Mm-hmm. And that is very, very important because I think that it’s an impetus for saying that this person is worth.
Being with. And so that person picks up the idea that with the authentic and [00:21:00] the transparent counselor or psychotherapist, you have the sense that this person thinks I’m of infinite value and infinite worth. Oh man. What a wonderful feeling. Yeah, it is. There’s I, I’m gonna do a little biblical thing ’cause I heard it, it was a sermon that I heard.
Yeah. Recently. All right. So we’re set up for the biblical piece. Go ahead, man. Okay. Gary Roo, the piece absolutely is that there were, Hey, we
Chris Gazdik: could do anything we want on a podcast, right? Yeah. Okay. Can’t necessarily do that in therapy session sessions. You don’t No, no.
John-Nelson Pope: Can’t do this all the time. And if they don’t want to talk about it, that’s okay.
That’s okay. And I don’t push it at all. But if a person’s. But here’s the story. Let’s look at in terms of Jesus as a, as a teacher, okay? As a healer. Okay? Let’s not get into the God stuff. Let’s just talk about his radical acceptance of others. There was Jesus’
Chris Gazdik: radical acceptance of others, right?
John-Nelson Pope: The, there’s the, the leper.
And the leper tries to get into the group, and [00:22:00] he’s not supposed to be able to get to the people surrounding them because he’s unclean. Stay away from me. 30 feet, 30 feet, had to have a bell and say, I’m unclean. I’m unclean, and wear rags. Okay? And he wants to be healed. And so he can’t get into Jesus.
And, and he tries to get in with the group and the, the disciples and the crowd keeping him from, from him, and they’re all repulsed by him. And Jesus says, bring him in. And he says, I, and, and the leper says to Jesus, if you would, you could make me whole, you could heal me. And Jesus says, I do. I would I let you, you be healed.
And, and the leper is healed. And so it’s not just that physical illness, it’s that spiritual or the emotional healing that takes place.
Chris Gazdik: So thank you for that. It’s, it’s a beautiful reality to pull into this. I mean, through a therapist’s eyes, I gotta tell you, [00:23:00] like, we really trained for this. We, it’s not a natural state to be in.
Jesus wasn’t natural. My gosh. He was way better than us. Right. Right. And so we really work hard. It’s part of what makes therapy effective, because we’re purposeful about doing these things. So we’re talking about your relationships with the people in your life, but we’re also doing that from a perspective that we, we work hard to purposefully engage this all day long.
Right. You know, you know That’s hard work though, isn’t it? It’s exhausting sometimes. Yeah. It’s exhausting. You know particularly when people are difficult, Uhhuh, you know, I mean, some of these things when people haven’t, no, we don’t have any difficult clients. John, tell the truth. John, I’m gonna give you a John Nelson.
Tell the truth. Yeah. There, you’re gonna be my cheerleader and my drill sergeant. I have cheerleading you right now. Yeah,
John-Nelson Pope: well, you’re right, you’re right. Sometimes they are difficult ’cause they’re hurting. They’re hurting [00:24:00] and hurt people. Hurt. Hurt people. Hurt, hurt people. That’s right. Even people. And you know, it’s, it’s this thing of the people that they may also hurt is people that would love them the most
Chris Gazdik: and Absolutely.
Say more about that. You’re, you’re, it is ironic that what we see with relationships. Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: Well I mean, and, and there’s this thing, and I think this has been my wife and I have had some discussions and sometimes she’ll say, you know, you seem to be so much nicer to other people than you are to me.
And I’m going, have you heard that before? The way it works, man, we do it all day. We’re tired and we come home. Isn’t that awful? Right. It’s awful. Yeah. And so I have to, I have to go be mindful. Be mindful of that, you know, not to bring that, that I’ve carried a lot of hurts and, and, and people’s scars and just be able to let that go.
Chris Gazdik: We contain a lot, don’t we? Yeah,
John-Nelson Pope: we do. We do. And sometimes we don’t always act out as therapists [00:25:00] in the most
Chris Gazdik: but we’re human when we go home. I mean, we’re not really on point. We’re not really monitoring. We’re not, we’re, you know, being mindful of that. We, we lose it. You get tired. Yeah. Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: And I guess that’s the thing is, is that that radical, I, I think the difference is between Jesus is, is that even he got tried by, by life so much that he would have trouble.
Letting go. But he was able to do that in very constructive ways. For example, he’d go out and he would practice mindfulness. He’d go out into the W wilderness or go by hi himself to another place and rest and recreate, and then he would be able to engage again.
Chris Gazdik: That’s another topic. Taking care of yourself.
Self-care is the cornerstone of mental health, is what I like to say. But yeah, if you you don’t accept rapist yourself therapist. Oh, here’s a different idea.
John-Nelson Pope: Therapists don’t do that very well.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Sometimes we suck at that. If you’re not paying attention, that’ll eat you up. Uhhuh, you do this for any length of time, you [00:26:00] better get better at it.
Mm-hmm. Or you’re gonna be crazy. So, but, but here’s an interesting thing. How about, you know, we’re talking about relating to other people with acceptance and cheerleading, but it just occurred to me, and I hadn’t taken this route with, you know, the show prep, but what about self-acceptance and self cheerleading?
So, can you pair self-acceptance with self cheerleading?
John-Nelson Pope: Yes. That
Chris Gazdik: becomes important, doesn’t it? Yeah. I think, based on what you just said,
John-Nelson Pope: yeah. I think you have to, yeah. You know, here a good example, okay. Is Jordy laforge on the next generation, star Trek. Okay. Jordy Laforge, the guy with the weird glasses, he was the advisor.
He was blind, but he was the engineer, the, the chief engineer Okay. Of the, of the enterprise. But he would have to talk to himself, and that was one of the things that he would, he did do that, didn’t he? Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And he’d have to encourage himself. He cheerleaded himself. Okay.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: Okay. That’s a good point.
All right. That’s a good example. That was his his, his jam. I guess. He, I think he was a better counselor than Troy. [00:27:00] But counselor Troy did. She was weird.
Chris Gazdik: She’s
John-Nelson Pope: a weird duck
Chris Gazdik: on that show, man. Yeah. So we’re pairing together acceptance and cheerleading, and you’re getting an idea of how full and rich this is.
When you get good at doing this with people, and now we’re adding the component with yourself,
John-Nelson Pope: have, when you were doing exercise and you’re running or you’re doing cycling. Oh, I don’t run. Okay. No, I don’t believe in running. Okay. No, I don’t do running. No running. Well, I haven’t run either. We do hiking, we do biking, we do rowing.
We do all sorts of things. Don running. You don think you’re gonna make the, the goal You’d can doubt. And you Yeah. And you start to doubt and you start to, to waver. What do you do? You give yourself a pep talk,
Chris Gazdik: you got to talk to yourself.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. I think you do that psychologically and emotionally as well.
Chris Gazdik: A hundred percent.
John-Nelson Pope: And, and I think that builds resilience.
Chris Gazdik: That’s what that, that definition of resilience is. Right. Being able to do that when the chips are down? Do you give up when you get [00:28:00] stuck? Do you, do you, do you lose agency? Do you, do you give your power up? Do you lose your voice? Do you stop speaking truth to the world?
You know, a lot of people fall very disenchanted, get lonely, get suffocated by their own self criticisms, and it’s playing bad tapes that they’ve heard from other people. And I can go on. It’s, it’s, it’s real, really rough. The opposite of this is really rough.
John-Nelson Pope: Working with clients that struggle with depression, major depression and dep, major depressive disorder, MDD is that they they’ve given up hope.
And so part of our job, our task, our challenge as as therapists, as cheerleaders is to be able to, to engage them and say, we’re we meet you where you are. We are going to be with you every step of the way and every inch of the way, so that you feel like you have some empowerment and that you develop agency.
Chris Gazdik: You know [00:29:00] what’s funny, John? You’ve been doing this a long time, but you have different hats. Mm-hmm. I’m really curious. I’m listening to you say those sentence or two and what thought that I have is, is that’s you. Mm-hmm. You do that, right?
John-Nelson Pope: Hopefully, but
Chris Gazdik: I don’t think that is a role that therapists often think of themselves as Really, what do you, what do you think as I say that, I.
John-Nelson Pope: I’m surprised, are you? Because I was thinking, oh my goodness, did I lose my counselor identity? And so because I, I think of myself as, as someone that, that wants to join with people where they are. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: And I am too naturally, which is what drew me to this field in a lot of ways. But I’m afraid that sometimes we, in our profession, Uhhuh, get worried about exposing too much of ourselves.
Like we don’t want to spoil the, [00:30:00] the tapestry that somebody’s bringing in. Right. Uhhuh. So, you know, you get a little Freudian, you know, we, we don’t want to tra, you know, bring transference, transference to this type of thing. So we’re, I think people are afraid to do that. Sometimes, well,
John-Nelson Pope: I, I, I have a little different philosophy.
I, I, I’m a Henry Nowan kind of guy. I don’t You’re familiar with the wounded healer? Oh, the woman healer. I didn’t know the name. Yeah. And he was a Belgium actually a psychotherapist, but he was a priest as well. And see, that’s
Chris Gazdik: where I said I think that comes from you. Yeah. They, they blend together nicely.
John-Nelson Pope: So one of the things, the story is basically is, and he talks about a rabbinic tradition where there was a story of someone that it imperfect as he was was able to help people heal because he would actually take on the wounds of somebody. Oh wow. But not, but allow God to transform, [00:31:00] transform it, and heal that other person.
And so that was the idea, is the idea that we are. Imperfect. We can’t carry everything on our own, but we have to trust that this process that we, that we engage in will provide healing for despite our own wounds that people will be healed by
Chris Gazdik: yet again. Another reason why I love the expression, the human emotional experience that we endeavor to figure out together.
John-Nelson Pope: It’s our shared humanity and our shared bro together brokenness, right. That we are healed.
Chris Gazdik: Pain
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Gets transformed into resiliency. Right. And grace and acceptance. It’s,
John-Nelson Pope: it is precisely by our brokenness that we become stronger.
Chris Gazdik: Isn’t that crazy? Yeah. I use a broken bone metaphor a lot. Yeah. You know, when you break your bone, it grows back with calcium and it is stronger in the place that uhhuh [00:32:00] it broke because of the calcium.
Exactly. Built around it. It, yeah. That’s a real science reality. Okay. Well, I wanna get to spending some good time. We have a lot of listed things of like, what do we do to actually do these things? So let me speed up our pace a little bit and suggest that. Yeah. You’ve already mentioned DBT. That is a, that is a therapy mentality that we, we go by.
You’ve mentioned radical acceptance. That’s actually a, a full fully adopted skillset. Skillset in the process of doing dialectical behavioral therapy. Validation and hope must go hand in hand to foster true transformation and emotional safety. So we validate, validate, validate, and then validate, validate, validate some more.
John, you know, when you’re raising kids, this is huge, right? You know, you’re, you’re wanting to be an encourager. You’re wanting to accept them and then direct them with cheerleading. But they’ve gotta know that you accept them and that you validate what they feel without [00:33:00] fixing it. That’s one of my biggest challenges as a parent, by the way.
Yeah. Is getting out of the way and not giving unsolicited advice. Even now my kids are 23 and 20 and I still find myself doing that. My
John-Nelson Pope: kids are in their thirties and early forties.
Chris Gazdik: And you still do that?
John-Nelson Pope: I still do that to a certain extent. Yeah. I’m a lot better than I was.
Chris Gazdik: I, we’ve been working on it for 15 years, I guess.
Right. I’ll get there, I guess because they, you know, people don’t want unsolicited advice. They don’t want to be told something. They just wanna work it out with you. Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: I learned, I learned as a parent, and this is the more I would say, would you, you, you might want consider going this way and, and I would, but I would use feely wheelie terms and what kind of terms?
Feely wheelie terms and and, and so, but they, they caught on to my. My ruse basically. And they know I wasn’t accepting them. Mm-hmm. And so I wanted them to, oh boy. They started reading through it. Huh? Reading [00:34:00] through it. Oh, wow. And so it took a while for me to say, you know, have to do some real soul searching and it’s gotta be genuine If my kid wants to, to drive a truck and then he drives a truck.
Yeah. You know, so you don’t get a vote. Yeah. Guess what? He goes, he’s ended up going back to what he wanted to, what he originally wanted to do. Which was, which was he’s drive a truck? No, no. He, he really wanted to, to do study classics and, and, and do Greek and literature and Oh, wow. Not be able to make a living with it, but that’s what he wants to do and so, right.
Okay. It’s good. Yeah. And, and my son’s a plumber. Okay. Okay. So, so, but he went to it, it was a long trek for him, but I think things improved when I stopped pushing him and saying, well, you need to go back to college. Yeah. You need to do this. Yeah. You need to, the the need, need, need thing. [00:35:00] You must do this.
Mm. I was doing that to him. I was playing a trip on him.
Chris Gazdik: Wow. Yeah. And it’s, you know, that, that’s a perfect segue. I’ll do the second one first instead of the first one. Okay. I mean, that is why cheerleading alone isn’t enough. Okay. You know, can feel dismissive. Mm-hmm. If you’re just cheerleading. Mm-hmm.
And not doing acceptance, that’s what we’re talking about. And then we’ll do, if you’re doing acceptance and not doing cheerleading, ’cause they work together really well. Mm-hmm. But alone, they’re not really enough. So when you’re doing what you were doing with your son, you know, that can feel dismissive or invalidating or pushy.
It can, there’s, there’s, there’s this term, we have toxic positivity. You hear that like mm-hmm. You know, that’s what, that’s where this is. Like, if the pain isn’t acknowledged first and it isn’t just like, you are enough. I’m with you. You know, that type of peace
John-Nelson Pope: he was hearing. John Daniel, I’m yeah. I’m not accepting you for who you are.
And I was, I was saying, this is [00:36:00] what I think you should be, but I wasn’t acknowledging his own self doubts. Yeah. And his own
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. You, you know, we wanna encourage, we wanna say like, I have a great idea. I think this would be great for you. You know, you can do it. You know, this is what you need to do. You, you will get there.
You know, but it skips over. Someone’s need to feel heard, uhhuh, you just run ’em right over. Yeah. You know, when you want your spouse to lose weight and you tell them how to lose weight and suggest this diet and, and give them an article to read about this diet, and you’re like, you just ran over them.
You’re cheerleading without accepting. I would fancy come
John-Nelson Pope: from when I was growing up on my on the refrigerator. I said, do you really want to eat this? Really? It was aimed at me, you know? I was like, oh my gosh. So, okay.
Chris Gazdik: You could do the opposite too. You can do acceptance. Without cheerleading. Mm-hmm. And that’s not ideal.
It’s not enough. Mm-hmm. Why? Because without encouragement, [00:37:00] acceptance can feel like resignation. Mm-hmm. So if your buddy is on this down, out of his luck, he maybe just got divorced and you’re concerned about him and you just go and you sit with him and just accept them, you know, you miss some like, like it’s you and I when you sat down on the floor with me Uhhuh and you didn’t have the conversation that we had Uhhuh, that would be just like great.
Yeah. Well, I’m tired now. You’re tired now. We’re both tired and thanks for accepting me, but dang, what are we gonna do? Like this sucks. Yeah,
John-Nelson Pope: I remember that. You
Chris Gazdik: know, you know. But no, you encouraged as well. I was so brilliant. You were brilliant. It was a good moment.
John-Nelson Pope: No, it was a good moment. You know, it’s esprit de corps.
That was the other thing. And, and, and I learned that by the way, I learned that in the military. And sitting down on the floor, not necessarily sitting down on the floor, but in the sense of being, with, being with, and being with. And, and that’s the idea is one of the things that in the Marine Corps, for example, is that the [00:38:00] officers the commissioned officers will, will sleep and eat with the men or the women that are in that squadron or not squadron, but anyway, their their group.
And that’s the idea is, is that you’re one. You’re with them all the way.
Chris Gazdik: So we are a here for a cause greater than ourselves together. And that esprit
John-Nelson Pope: de corps. So you develop a, an a an esprit de corps with your client, with your, that authenticity.
Chris Gazdik: I love that. Yeah. I love that word. That’s a new word. A street of core Espree, esp, esp spirit
John-Nelson Pope: of the body.
Yeah. Oh, wow. Cool. That’s
Chris Gazdik: How will I remember that? You’re gonna have to tell me that again. Corps. So if you’re just doing acceptance without encouragement, you also risk helplessness and especially, you know, in clients or loved ones that are in self-doubt or when they’re in a state of pain or something’s not going well.
So, I mean, have we made the point like you gotta do ’em both together? Yeah. You can’t do [00:39:00] just one. You’re much more effective when you, when you combine these things an example like a therapist, right, who first listens deeply and then says, Hey, you know, that makes total sense. And and I believe your ability to handle this.
Like, what can we do? Exactly. It’s just a nice combination of I see you, I accept that it’s wisdom. We’re encouraging and we’re engaging. How are we moving? Mm-hmm. Right. I like that. And I think we do that all day long. I don’t know that I do that in my parenting though. Mm-hmm. As we were saying,
John-Nelson Pope: because you, is it almost impossible to do this 24 7 because we’re human,
Chris Gazdik: John?
I think that’s probably a really true statement. You know, I, I, I’m hedging a little bit on the word impossible, but it’s certainly not likely. I think it was hard. It’s certainly not likely. I don’t think it’s very human, because being human is failing. Being human is, is suffering and struggling, you know?
And [00:40:00] so to do that 24 7, which makes a point in my eyes, think hearing you say that and playing off that, you know, I do a lot of marriage counseling. Mm-hmm. I, I enjoy joint couples counseling and. One of the things I try to do is help to facilitate each person understanding that they need to facilitate themselves first before they engage in a process.
John-Nelson Pope: Precisely.
Chris Gazdik: We, we don’t do that naturally. Something comes up, you get hot and you throw it back and forth. This hot potato banging each other, blaming each other, crushing each other, and not practicing acceptance, not practicing encouragement, just practicing crisis mode. No. If you sit back and you facilitate yourself first.
And you, you, you, you, you foster an environment, then you can really engage and be productive.
John-Nelson Pope: Here’s the question to me, and I’m just go into this, but is that, what if you practice that, but the spouse or the partner doesn’t do that, is resistant to that. [00:41:00] Yep. ’cause even though you’re, I’m prepared for this.
Go ahead. Even though you are practicing it and you’re wanting to make this into an authentic part of yourself, the, the partner doesn’t, and so do you just keep doing that?
Chris Gazdik: I think that, I’ll answer that this way in my mind, John, I, I feel like a lot of times I’m doing marital counseling when I’m doing individual counseling in reality.
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So when one person in that environment, and you know this. I think you’re leading me nicely. You know, the leading
John-Nelson Pope: you nicely with this song. Is that a song? Yes. Oh
Chris Gazdik: my
John-Nelson Pope: gosh. I didn’t know that was the word. No, he was kissing me softly. I, I was gonna say, I think, I think he messed the words up there, buddy.
I changed the But you’re, you’re
Chris Gazdik: leading me in point out the idea that, you know, you, you, you, you change the dynamic uhhuh when you change yourself. Mm-hmm. So it’s a bit [00:42:00] of a paradox. Mm-hmm. We realize you can’t change your spouse, but when you focus on yourself and you facilitate yourself, that was my point.
It actually paradoxically changes the other. Yeah. Right. That’s what you were getting at. Right.
John-Nelson Pope: It’s equilibrium. It’s and, but basically you, in a sense, it’s a de deliberate dise equilibrium where you throw it out of, out of equilibrium and you find a new equilibrium that will move the. The partner, the spouse, into changing in himself or herself.
So,
Chris Gazdik: so we need to get to spending a good bit of time. We have a last segment here where we want to get to a lot of these techniques that we’ve listed. Okay. I don’t know how to do this. I don’t need that and condense it. So I want you to hear this list. John, stop me when you want to hit one that you think is loud.
We got like seven here and, and we’ll go down and, and we’ll talk about them. Alright, so first of all, mirror feelings before motivating change, mirroring, [00:43:00] right? And, and, and we, we talked about being in, in attunement with each other, okay? Right? Start. Secondly, start with reflective validation. You wanna reflect back to this person and validate, validate, validate, like we talked about, layering in gentle empowerment.
And that kind of speaks to the combination of acceptance and encouragement in and of itself using anchoring phrases. Connect emotion to encouragement. That’s complicated. Mm-hmm. Combining two modes in one sentence. Right. Right. Because it’s I hear that you’re scared and I see you. It’s both. And courage to show up.
John-Nelson Pope: It’s both and it’s not. Yet. It is. And yet it’s not yet. So this is anchoring. Anchoring. Yeah. Okay. It’s seeing potential.
Chris Gazdik: Fourth or fifth give tangible, helpful steps without fixing tangible suggestions. Helpful. Steps. Steps.
John-Nelson Pope: Solution focus is what we do in solution focus. So let’s, that’s a theory. How we [00:44:00] get, yeah.
How do we move from one step to a higher step? Ask before
Chris Gazdik: uplifting. You gotta ask John, would you like some encouragement? You’re gonna do this? Move one. He shook his head. The listening on the audio version.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: You are gonna do well with this move. It’s going to be okay. You’re going to get through this.
Take it, you’ll take it piece by piece. I had to ask to give you that encouragement. Right. Do you ask your kid, oh, am I supposed to ask my kid? What?
John-Nelson Pope: When you read, so when you tell your kid this, even though you’re, you’re seen as an authority or the, the parent figure, right? You’re actually saying you’re getting down on the floor with them like I did.
Right? You did. And, and you are in a sense being in communion with them. Mm-hmm. What At union, being union with them.
Chris Gazdik: So. Fifth or sixth [00:45:00] practicing the pendulum technique. You could think of this as a pendulum. You move between validating and then motivating in conversation. All throughout that conversation that is hard to stay focused on, use written affirmation for long-term encouragement.
Do you write things down? When’s the last time you left your, your kiddo a, a surprise note in their book bag of encouragement for the today. That is an amazing thing to do.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. My wife is brilliant at this. Yeah, she does that for you. Oh, she does that for me. She does it for the kids. Yeah. It’s, it’s beautiful.
Her, her 40-year-old daughter, she sends a card every, every week. I get to sign it. Oh, that’s awesome. Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: that’s what mom does. Lastly, in therapy or in coaching, we, we, we assign reflective homework. So these are some of the brainstorms that I had. John. How, how do we go through these? Let’s kind of go back and look, I guess, which one do we wanna kind of highlight or focus on?
What, what of, what of those do you, do you maybe [00:46:00] like the best or, you know, that we want to highlight a little bit?
John-Nelson Pope: Okay. Well, well, why don’t we just do the, the mirror to, again, I,
Chris Gazdik: mirroring is a weird concept.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah, yeah. So I’m thinking of mirror neurons, but I’m just Absolutely, yeah.
Chris Gazdik: I don’t think we understand them, but we have them.
We’ve talked about them on the show before. It’s fascinating.
John-Nelson Pope: So, so basically what you’re doing is you’re reading that person in a sense. Read the room, read the room, and you’ve seen where they are. And so you. You’re actually, you, you’re not speaking in a way that in a, in a language that they cannot understand.
Chris Gazdik: Truly, this happened in a therapy session just today, where somebody got feedback from their sibling that their boyfriend, when she was getting a procedure, was annoying the hell out of people. They did not like him. Mm-hmm. [00:47:00] Because he was talking about himself. He was using I statements about what he has done well and this and that.
He’s trying to get to know these people, I guess. Mm-hmm. So, but he, he didn’t read the
John-Nelson Pope: mm-hmm.
Chris Gazdik: Like, they don’t want to be around him. It was uncomfortable. It was awkward. Right. So mirroring means you really read the room, you play off of the people that you’re with. You encourage them, you accept them, and you interact with them back and forth.
And it’s, it’s an emotion.
John-Nelson Pope: It’s an emotional intelligence.
Chris Gazdik: There’s a reality there. Yeah. What do we, what do we do if we don’t have emotional intelligence and we can’t read the room? John, what
John-Nelson Pope: do we do? Well, I, I, I, for some reason, and I, I work with young adults a lot of times that are on the spectrum, and that’s part of their frustration is that they don’t know how to read the room.
Chris Gazdik: It’s maddening when you struggle with this, isn’t it?
John-Nelson Pope: It’s so artificial to them. It’s like, it, it’s an alien nation or alien language rather. Mm. [00:48:00] And so part of it is, is, is, and you
Chris Gazdik: mean with people that have Asperger’s or autism and Right. But
John-Nelson Pope: you know, the thing is, is that once they begin to express it, they begin to develop the skill.
Absolutely. Yeah. Because
Chris Gazdik: that, that leads perfectly into, I was going to ask you,
John-Nelson Pope: can you develop
Chris Gazdik: this or do you only
John-Nelson Pope: have it or not have it? I’m wondering if it’s something, I think you can develop it. I think even, even if it’s something that is not a natural thing for you because of your wiring. Mm-hmm.
You can rewire your brain so that you can Yeah. Have that. And the other thing is that somebody can, they can talk to and could hear ’em. And, and say, okay, well, he understands You
Chris Gazdik: grow.
John-Nelson Pope: Yeah. You grow.
Chris Gazdik: You grow. That’s our whole industry. Yes, it’s totally possible. And this happens with anxiety. This happens with, you know, like you mentioned, people that are really depressed people that are grieving, people that have trauma.
You, you grow and you, you, because [00:49:00] when you, when you get consumed by something like that, how about addiction? Not much more consuming than addiction. Right? Right. You get self-centered, you get consumed with yourself. Egocentric. That’s what narcissism is. By the way. You, you can’t call your spouse narcissistic.
We all have narcissism. That is a very normal state. Be careful using our word out there, guys. Oh yeah,
John-Nelson Pope: please. If I keep hearing, oh,
Chris Gazdik: he’s a narcissist. Yes. I’m like, I’ll do my job. No, they’re not. Okay. It drives me nuts. You’re human. Yeah. We have narcissism as a human characteristic here.
John-Nelson Pope: There is a real personality disorder.
It’s called narcissism narcissistic personality disorder. Right. But the great majority of people do not have it. Don’t have it. It’s very rare. We all have narcissistic tendencies. Tendencies and traits. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, absolutely. Reflective validation. Let, let’s, let’s go there and, and layer in gentle empowerment.
So let’s combine these beginning by, [00:50:00] you know, reflective validation. You know, go, go ahead.
John-Nelson Pope: One of the most, and I don’t know, you must know my therapist, but of course you’re tired. This has been nonstop for weeks. You said that. Oh, as a, as an, oh, did I? Yes. When did I say that? Well, you said start with reflective validation.
That’s one of the things that’s on the Okay. On the list. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean one of the I had a therapist that said, you know we had a little shortcut. I was, I’m a, I was a sensitive guy, and and his name was Chris Kler. He’s gone on to be with the Lord and, Oh wow. Okay. And he said he said, you’re a ke eater.
Aqui eater. Yeah. And I thought I was insulted, you know, I’m supposed to be a macho guy. And no, he was basically, that was shortcut. He was saying, it’s been rough couple of weeks, but you, you, you’re very sensitive in terms of the needs for others and you want to help people.
Chris Gazdik: So he was [00:51:00] seeing your space.
He was seeing my, he reflectively validated that. But use the key sheeter to sort of, yeah, that was our gently empower you with a comical way of saying a you got this, is that what you’re saying? That’s right, that’s what he was saying. Nice combination.
John-Nelson Pope: Nice combination. So, you know, if it, if it came out from the blue or something like that, we say he’s calling you a wimp.
But no, that’s not what he was saying. Saying I was anything but that. He was
Chris Gazdik: layering gentle empowerment. Right. We, we mm-hmm. We, we, after the validation lands, which he landed with you in the session and greeted you and all that, and then he shifted into a support mode with affirming language. Mm-hmm.
Again, encouraging you. It was during
John-Nelson Pope: a time that my, my children were little and my wife was undergoing one of many of of surgeries that did not turn out well for her on her back. She had a
Chris Gazdik: lot going on,
John-Nelson Pope: lot going on. And then also the pressure of my church that I had at the time. And and I was frustrated and he was able to.[00:52:00]
To, to help me.
Chris Gazdik: It, these statements don’t seem natural and normal, but you know, John, somebody could say to you, and even though it’s been hard mm-hmm. I know that you’ve got, you know, that the moxie in you to get through this. Mm-hmm. You know that you’re not the kind of person to give up. You don’t have it all figured out today how you’re gonna move to Florida in such a short period of time.
But you’ll just keep going. Right? Right. You’ll take it one step at a time. You see, these are sentences that are powerful statements when you can get used to using them. Hey kiddo, I know that you didn’t make the football team, but you have such an educated or such a, a, a persistent desire to get better that I’m sure that you’re going to continue working it.
Those are, those are
John-Nelson Pope: beautiful life moments. Definitely are, definitely are. I was, I was thinking in terms of illustrations. That one is Winston Churchill talking to the, my favorite
Chris Gazdik: quote, are you going to My favorite quote?
John-Nelson Pope: Yes. [00:53:00] Never Give up. Is that your favorite quote? Pretty close. Go ahead. Okay. I interrupted you.
He, well now he was talking to, to some I guess a, I think it was a boys school or something like that in Britain during the war. And he had had as he was growing up Winston himself, Winston Churchill, yeah. He was considered slow and prodding and he just was not considered witty or anything of this sort.
And he was not, not popular and his teachers didn’t like him. And how’s this loser
Chris Gazdik: gonna lead our nation? Yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: And he would, and this was by the time that Britain was, its back was to the wall with dun Kirk. Dun Kirk and all of that. And he was addressing these kids. And he’d get up and he’d say, never give up.
And he’d sat back down, wait a second, got back up and he said, never give up. Sat down, got back up and said, never give up. Oh, wow. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Powerful. [00:54:00] Powerful.
John-Nelson Pope: And
Chris Gazdik: his favorite quote that I live by now with some struggles that I’ve gone through and everything. Mm-hmm. If you’re going through hell and keep going.
Mm-hmm. Right. Keep right on going. Don’t walk in circles. Don’t turn back. Keep one foot ahead of the other. Keep right on going. I love that Uhhuh. You know, I mean, you can go through, hell just don’t stop.
John-Nelson Pope: It’ll make it worse. Yeah. Did when everything looks real dark, I mean, that was one thing that kept Viktor Frankl going when he was in concentration camp and he was,
Chris Gazdik: Oh wow.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
John-Nelson Pope: And it was, he had to be on a work party and he was, and his task was one in which he had to keep people alive as long as possible so that only for them to die. He, and so they gave him just enough to live and they were at a work camp and it was very cold and it was in winter, and he was ready to give up and just fall off to the side because if you fell off on the side of the work gang, you got shot.[00:55:00]
And he was ready to just despair and he saw a light at a farmhouse out in the distance. And it was just beginning to dawn, but it was dark otherwise. And he reminded of something that he heard luxe, lucid in Interbus, the light shines in the darkness.
Chris Gazdik: Oh,
John-Nelson Pope: wow. Yeah. And that just helped him screw up his courage and continue on those stories.
Give people power and hope.
Chris Gazdik: I love movies of a true story that is based on survival, right? They, there’s something in the human spirit, John, that just doesn’t allow us to sit down, that doesn’t allow us to give up even when the chips all seem down. Now we do have things like suicide. I’m saying, I’m not saying, I know that we get stuck and we get, we fail and we fall and we even, you know, remain in that space with depression and all this type of thing.
But I think that that [00:56:00] if we, if we’re paying attention to our true spirit, do you think it’s inherently put in us that we have this don’t give up mentality, right? Is that a true statement?
John-Nelson Pope: I think people have to find it. In other words, I think that some Yeah, but it’s, there is my point. It’s there. It’s there.
Okay. And that was one of the things, we had a a marine shoot himself at a post. He was, he was dumped by his girlfriend. This was in the Philippines. And he was at his, at a, at, at his post, it was oh boy, out on the perimeter and the wire, and he shot himself in the stomach. He didn’t shoot himself any other way.
And I’m, there was a thought that maybe he had done that so that he, he wanted to suffer. You know, people just speculated on that stuff. That was, I, I thought that was ridiculous. But anyway, we, I had other marines say, well, he couldn’t be a real marine if he did that. And then I said, yeah, he could be. And, but then I had a couple other Marines come to me [00:57:00] and said, I’m thinking about.
This too. Hmm. And so basically my task was, I felt, was to encourage them because we had very limited psychiatric accessibilities at that there and you know, mental health treatment. This was in the Philippines of all places, you know, and yeah. So part of my task, I felt, was to give them hope.
Opportunities. I’m super,
Chris Gazdik: super encouraged and proud of, of, of my son who’s currently serving. Mm-hmm. Similarly, albeit not a chaplain like you, assisting y’all, but still, nevertheless, to think that he is there to help our men and women in the forest is just no. I’ll assure
John-Nelson Pope: you that as a religious programmer, I don’t know if they, they still call him that they do, but as a, as an rp he would be doing that because of they’re, they’re trained specifically to be able to listen.
Mm-hmm. So he’s got some of those things I know. And it makes me
Chris Gazdik: just all bubbly and happy that he’s there. For our [00:58:00] sailors. Yeah. Our Marines and soldiers. All right. We need to move on and wrap it up ’cause we are pushing time. I don’t know. Yeah. Hopefully, you know, these, these ideas and techniques and these, these phrases that, you know, you can think about, how can we say things differently?
How can we really encourage things differently? Man, it’s, this is powerful stuff to institute into your relationships. And the more that you’re able to do it with, with encouragement and combining a a, a, a cheerleading and, and really being radically accepting it, no matter what your kid does, they need to know you’re gonna love them.
I mean, if your spouse screws up, man, they need to know that you’re gonna be with them. You know, you’re gonna leave at the first sign of heat, then, dang, that’s it’s so debilitating. You know, foster kids struggle. My parents just dropped me. You know, my adoptive parents love me and accept me unconditionally.
It’s a game changer. Like, this is good stuff. This is powerful stuff. So,
John-Nelson Pope: in other, do a. [00:59:00] Reversal. In other words, that the adoptive parents chose me. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, I’ve heard that before. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. So how do we wrap up? Did we, did we wrap it up? Are we ready for the shrink wrap up? How, how we, how we doing in your brain?
John-Nelson Pope: Okay.
Chris Gazdik: What do you what do you see with these? Anything that we missed that you wanna highlight with the, well,
John-Nelson Pope: the homework.
Chris Gazdik: Okay.
John-Nelson Pope: Okay. Give me an idea of what your homework is and then let’s wrap it up. Oh,
Chris Gazdik: you’re asking me? Yeah. What do you mean you’re putting me on the spot to create homework?
John-Nelson Pope: Ask clients to write two lists.
What do I accept about myself or my situation and what I still hope to change or grow to grow? Okay. I, I find homework very daunting for, for my clients because that’s, sometimes it is not, you don’t do this too early. You don’t give them all this homework and, and, and for them. To do. I think I, I tend to give them very simple [01:00:00] homework to begin with, but brother,
Chris Gazdik: I, I, I see you handing these five page forms out to these people.
Are you sure about that? Yeah. I, that could be overwhelming to some potentially. Yeah. It’s, it’s gentle pushback at you junk. Okay.
John-Nelson Pope: No, I think you’re right about that. I think it depends on what it, what it is. I think. What you say is Okay, it’s all right if you don’t bring it this week. And if you have, you get stuck, we can do it next week.
And then you’ll bring it up again, maybe in a different way and say, okay. Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: You know, it’s funny, I’m, I’m glad you put us here because I mean, I purposefully in working with people in all sorts of ways and looking for action points mm-hmm. That people can take. As a matter of fact, just today a lady made a, a cool statement.
We, we agreed. What was she gonna do? That she was gonna say a sentence that she said in session to her, ex-husband [01:01:00] whom she’s dating. Mm-hmm. Okay. And she looked at me, she’s like, oh, well this homework’s a whole lot easier. I appreciate it. I’ve had a tough week. Thanks for the easier assignment.
And I thought, you know, that’s cool. And it felt, it was a nice moment because it was still something that we’re looking like, what can you actually do Uhhuh, how do, what do you take from here? And I, yeah. I think that people do get intimidated with homework, but some people want it as, again, you gotta read the room.
Right, right. You know, and, and kind of be in proper attunement so that you can really be engaged in, I don’t
John-Nelson Pope: give this, I don’t give everybody the same homework. Okay, why not? Because everybody. Different and every, everybody’s is at a different place. And so, but I do give them a sense of what to look forward to next week for them to or, or growth edge for them to maybe slightly push themselves a little bit more.
Chris Gazdik: You know what’s funny as a natural progression, John, why do you think I kind of was drawn to creating three questions [01:02:00] to think about through the show. Yeah. Right. Yeah. It’s, that’s part of, that’s a, that’s connected to what you brought up here at the end. I thought those were probably some of the best questions you’ve ever asked.
Well, I think we’ll read ’em again then. As a wrap up and then we’ll do shrink wrap up. When has someone accepted you without judgment and how did that affect you? ’cause I know that was a powerful experience. Have you ever received encouragement that felt too soon or dismissive of what you were doing what that you were going through?
And people inadvertently do that. And they don’t mean to hurt you. Mm-hmm. But they’re just running over you. They, they misreading the room. And then thirdly, how do you balance off for empathy and inspiring change in your own relationships? ’cause that’s pairing down the, the grouping acceptance and encouragement or cheerleading.
Who’s going first
John-Nelson Pope: with the shrink wrap up? Well, I’m going to, because I don’t think, I, I think this was something [01:03:00] that is such a natural part of, of who you are, Chris, that I think you’d be able to sum it in a succinct way now, my, my shrink wrap. Okay. Go. Okay. I, I think it’s in, it is essential for therapist to be actually a non-anxious presence.
To be totally as authentic as one could possibly be, and do that with an intensity and openness and vulnerability to be absolutely present with the client. That’s hard work, but it’s essential and we can’t do it all the time, but we, we can focus ourselves so that it can be accomplished more often than not.
Wow.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. I have to follow that, Neil. No, you can Well done, well done. Truly. [01:04:00] I, I, I wanna maybe just highlight the, the natural sense that you, the listener have in your life. This is permeating through relationships all throughout your life and people that get really good at combining these two concepts are great leaders, great teachers, wonderful partners, and just rare.
People you know, when you get good at this. So pay attention if you wanna improve yourself. Look at a couple of these skill sets, anchoring statements, self-talk. Start with loving yourself and accepting yourself and encouraging yourself. And then you encourage others. People don’t revolt from that. Like people are drawn to you when you do that.
Being a camp counselor was something that I enjoyed, and the kids just learn and soak up that energy. So, as John said earlier in the show, be that light that shines in the dark. Now that might be a phrase that you think corny, but it’s powerful because the world is full of a lot of darkness. The [01:05:00] power, the world is full of a lot of darkness at times.
And, and when you can be that encouraging, powerful, uplifting person, you’ll never be forgotten because you’ll change lives.
Neil Robinson: Yeah, you guys gave me some hard ones this time. Sorry. Not, sorry, I, yeah. Well, I hope you’re not sorry. I want the, I want you guys to give your honest wrap up of the conversation. I think honestly, I, I like Chris’s more today. I like, ’cause I know John Drew focus kind of on the therapist side, but I think the fact that from Chris, you kind of hit it from just the normal person side and that anyone can do this.
And I like the fact that you talked about accepting yourself first, so then you can start accepting others. I think those are key pieces and, and when you start accepting yourself and cheerlead for yourself, it really, people see that as you stated. So I think Chris and I really enjoyed Chris. I got one John.
Chris Gazdik: But
Neil Robinson: you’re,
Chris Gazdik: thank you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Radical
Neil Robinson: self-acceptance.
Chris Gazdik: Yes, sir. But honestly, I got a retort because [01:06:00] I think that that, that that non-anxious presence is an added piece that you brought in the end, and that that is, that is something that I endeavor to create in my personal life. It’s hard, and I think you do that.
I appreciate that. I do it professionally, privately. I wanna improve, man. I want to improve, but we’re always on a journey to improve. Listen, this is through a therapist’s eyes. This has been a really, hopefully good show for you to hear, and I hope that you really soak it in. It’s almost like, listen to it again, because some of these specific phrases, I want to invite you to really incorporate this in your life and tell a friend, get them to listen to this one because boy, if we, if we employ these things together, we, our, our world is a much peace, much more peaceful place.
Alright. Thank
John-Nelson Pope: you brother. Chris Gazdik: Alright, man. We’ll see you soon. Take care. Stay well. See you next week.