Karen Kenney: Hey you guys. Welcome to the Karen Kenney show. I am super duper excited to be here with you today. Thank you for tuning in and spending a little time with
me. If you're somebody who is watching the show, just ignore just ignore those things on the floor over there, I'm in the middle of a wicked, big organization project, which
I love to do. And many of you may or may not know this fun fact, way back in the day, we're talking like 1999 maybe I was a professional organizer for a short period of
time, and I had my own little business, and I called it divine order, and I even still have my first little business card. It was so cute, but I'm in the middle of organizing
my closet back there, getting rid of a ton of shit. And I should do a whole podcast episode on that, about letting go of those things that we have these attachments to.
But that's another story for another day. But anyways, just ignore, ignore that, and we're back. Okay, so buckle up for safety. So you know how last week, the episode was
called, it's not you. And I kind of alluded, I kind of alluded in that episode that there was going to be a pot too, a pot do, and that sometimes it like, so, this is it. This
is the pot too. He is the follow up to this. And this sucker is called, sometimes it is you, boo boo rats. No, no, say it isn't so, but yes, sometimes it is about you.
Sometimes it is you. And we're going to dive into this a little bit, because one of the things that I see more and more in the transformational coaching community, or in
the spiritual community, is kind of this thing where, and whether you call it spiritual bypassing, or you call it, I don't know deflection, or you call it whatever you
want to call it, those are all just like fancy ways of saying that. I'm just going to avoid the truth. I'm going to pretend like this isn't happening, and I'm going to just
ignore what's really going on here. And a lot of times I see things online, so I always, I often say that I don't like a lot of the quote, unquote, spiritual memes that
are put out there, because they're kind of stated as facts, like there's no wiggle room. There's no room for nuance or for situational differences and stuff like that.
And one of the things that I saw happening was that people were kind of doing this hot potato thing, right where, if you were to say something to them about their let's call
it tone of voice, their choice, their action, their behavior. That's a thing that they did, a thing a way that they treated you, like whatever people would start to say
things like, Oh, they're just trying to project their shit onto me. I'm not responsible for their feelings. It's not my fault that you feel that way, or I'm sorry
that you feel that way, or if you've ever said this, that's not about me, that's just your stuff, that's just her stuff, their stuff, right? Okay, then you, if you've, if
you've said these things repeatedly, there might be an opportunity for you to have, you know, a little tongue in cheek here, a little come to Jesus moment with yourself.
You might just want to, as the old song says, you might want to check yourself before you wreck yourself. Because, while we are not responsible. There's truth in that
right. We're not responsible what another person chooses to feel. We are not responsible for the interpretation that they made about what you said or what you did. We
cannot, we cannot control the meaning that people assign to our words and our actions. Because the reality of it is, is that nobody, quote, unquote, makes, nobody makes
another person feel anything. And I'm just talking emotionally. I'm not talking about like, of course, if somebody is physically hurting you, harming you, hitting you,
right, somebody is causing you that kind of physical pain. I'm not talking about that. So while we are not responsible with how another person interprets things or hears
things or whatever, we are responsible for what we think, what we say and what we do, and we are definitely responsible for how we think it, how we say it, and how we do it,
because the content, the intention and the delivery is all about you. It is all on you. And there may have been times in your life when you have acted as if, what's I love
this saying, I want to say it came. Um, I know I've quoted her name before, and I'm it's not coming to me off the top of my head. I want to say Gillespie is in there,
the name, but this word, this word like acting like a volcanic asshole, right? So if you, if you happen to act like a volcanic asshole, and another person happens to
notice, and they come to you to talk to you about it and to say something to you, you don't get to just hot potato that thing back to them. And if you're too young to know
what the hot potato is, just imagine that you've taken a hot potato out of an oven. You know how freaking hot those things can be, and somebody just tosses it to you, but
you don't have any oven mitts on, and you're like, Oh my God. And like, you juggle it, right? So somebody just tries to pass it off to you, this hot, this hot piece of crap,
right, right onto you. It's like, if you've behaved, if you've behaved with a certain amount of, like, douchebaggery, and then somebody tries to come to you to have a
conversation with you about it, or they're brave enough to have a discussion. Like they're not coming to you to, like, attack you or be mean to you or shame you, but
they're just sharing like, hey, when you said that thing, I felt like this. If somebody's brave enough to point something out to you, you don't just get to, like,
Stop, drop and roll like, you don't just get to kind of like, roll away from your responsibility for what you did. And the reality of it is, is that a lot of people
these days try to take spiritual principles and use them as weapons against other people. They try to shed their responsibility. And a lot of people will say
things like, anything that you don't like in another person is just a reflection of something that you don't like in yourself. Now, while that can sometimes be true, it is
not always true. There might be things that I see in another person, the form that it's taking that I don't like, like somebody being cruel to animals, right? That is not
now, maybe in my past, right? In my past when I still ate animals and I wore leather and I did all those things, right? Blah, blah blah, not to blah blah blah that
they're they're not still important. But I don't. I try my best not to do any of those things anymore. You know what I mean. So not everything can be pointed to. And people
will say, Oh, anytime you criticize somebody else, you're just holding up they're just holding up a mirror. They're reflecting back to you something that you don't like in
yourself. So it's like this way of never having to take responsibility for the fact that maybe you did do something like maybe you are the common denominator in a
situation, or a bunch of uncomfy situations where you're just trying to, like, duck and bob and weave right the Fallout or the repercussions, or the consequences of being
yourself, and you don't want it to be you. You don't want it to be you. It's way easier to blame other people, right? People think that it's just way easier to put the blame
out there, to make it about them. You're the problem, right? I'm pointing out away from myself, you're the problem. You're the reason I feel this way. You're it's not
about me. And the thing is, though, if somebody cares enough about you, whether it's a sweetie, a sibling, a friend, a co worker, whoever it is, a coach, a mentor, if
a person cares about you enough to compassionately, like kind of point out some of your black, what I call blind spots, to your own bullshit. It might behoove us, if
somebody comes to you and is like, Hey, can we talk about something right? It might behoove us to put down our need to protect this persona, this identity, this idea, this
this little ego creation that we create, and the ego is always fearful. The ego is like, always afraid of being found out, right, that it's not, quote, unquote perfect, you
know? So if somebody comes to you, it might behoove us to not just try to say, Oh, this isn't about me, that this is them. It's not my fault that they don't X, Y and Z. It's
it's important in relationships and building trust and connection and friendships and building families, etc, that we want to be able to take a solid look at our role and
how things play out. We don't just get to, like, turn a blind eye and a blind ear, as I would also say, because a lot of times people try to use spiritual language to
what's the word I'm looking for to just kind of like,
dodge, dodge, right, dodge, what might be coming at them or they want to. Poor, like spiritual language on top of shitty, narcissistic or selfish or insecure or
transactional behavior. You know what I mean? So if somebody comes to you and they're upset or they're concerned or they're confused about a conversation they
had with you or an interaction or a post that they saw, or something they overheard you say a situation. You know, we don't want to just like, ping, ping, ping, like Wonder
Woman bracelets, ding, ding, ding, and just deflect things and put it all on them. I mean, we do have to take responsibility. Sometimes it is about us. We can't just
always deflect, and just because we don't like to hear things sometimes it doesn't mean that things didn't happen that way, that things didn't go down that way, that
you weren't using that tone of voice. My sweetie and I often talk about it like if there was a camera crew right, following us around all the time. And we just kind of
forgot that they were there. So we were just acting as if we would normally, as we would normally behave and act and speak or whatever. And then later they could go back
and play, you know, you know, in football games or, you know, sports games, they'll say, Let's go to the replay. Cal, right? If we could go to the replay and we had like,
given it like 24 hours to come Calm the down, or to relax or not have our panties in such a bunch, not being so defensive, with our dukes up or whatever, and we saw the
replay of ourselves, we might be shocked. We might be wicked surprised to hear our own tone of voice, to hear our lack of listening, to hear how we are persistent in
our defense, how we do not have patience with other people, right? The way that we roll our eyes these habits and these patterns that we do, and we are no longer
aware of them, so we just walk around thinking that it's everybody else, but one of the requirements for an authentic spiritual life is a willingness to look At
oneself, to be able to sit down and pause and get still and get quiet and take a little, you know, inventory, as they might say, in some 12 step programs right to kind
of look at our own stuff, our own shit, our own again, patterns, and whether those patterns or behaviors or ways of thinking, speaking, acting were created out of trauma
from our childhoods and stuff. I, of course, I have deep compassion for that, and at some point we still have to take responsibility for who and how we are being now. And I just
think that again, this willingness to look at ourselves and PS, that goes beyond just individual humans. I think this is important for governments and countries and stuff to
also take a look at themselves and their brutal histories and their deep, you know, systemic racism, all the systems that keep oppression and racism and other things in
place, misogyny, hate, all of it, right? It's important that as a collective, as a collective of a bunch of individuals that make up a community, a neighborhood, a
business, a company, a country, you know that's also important. And so if we can accept that sometimes it is you, sometimes it is about you. And I jokingly say to my
clients, sometimes, you know, I hate to break it to you. I hate to break it to you, but sometimes it is about you. Sometimes you are the problem. Sometimes it is your lack
of self awareness, or your lack of willingness to shift your perspective, to look at something differently, to let this person out of this prison, this box, this
idea that you've created about somebody else, to to not let yourself out of some identity that you created for yourself as you were kind of growing up in the
environments and In the with the experiences and the beliefs that you created, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right, just the way that identity gets created. And you know,
one of the one of the requirements right, is to take a look at yourself. And I always say we've gotta be willing to own both our brilliance, because we gotta be willing to
celebrate our light as well our goodness and the things that we have strengths in, but we also have to be willing to like, own our bullshit and own those places where maybe we
do have some some call them weaknesses, call them areas where we could grow, where we could maybe get stronger, where maybe we could like again. And stop being so
defensive and put down our Deuce and stuff like that. So if we're, if we're going to do this, it means sometimes we have to be willing to own it, and we have to be willing
to say, if somebody comes to you and it's, can be really tempting, right? It can just be really tempting to go, Oh, that's not mine, that's yours. And I often say to
people, you do gotta know what's yours and what's not yours, but you don't know what's yours. If you're not spending any time doing some self reflection, if you don't have a
DSP in a daily spiritual practice where you have some moments of rigorous and vigorous right vigilance, some vigilance of honesty with yourself, we gotta be willing to own
it. And there has to be some version, there has to be some version of you that is willing to say, some version of like, I'm sorry, or you're right. I fucked up, I made
a mistake. I was clumsy, I was selfish, I was scared. I was being insecure, like I acted like a phony, I lied, I cheated, I copied, I was competitive. I blew it right,
like some part of us has to be willing to own that. And then if we can go even a step further, a step further, and say thank you for telling me, thank you for telling me.
Thank you for caring enough about me to, like, bring this to my attention. I'm sorry, right? And then, like, please forgive me. Please forgive me. And the reality of it is,
you know, there have been some friendships, I can just speak personally in my own life, there have been some friendships that you know, eventually fell apart, drifted away
like whatever. Because if you're not able in a relationship to go to another person and say, Hey, this, this event happened. This is how I saw it. This is how I felt, you know,
I don't I don't like when you speak to me that way. I don't like when you xy, like whatever the person is going to say. You know, we have to be willing and different
points in our life, and whether that's in school or at our internship or from our softball coach or from our spiritual mentor or from your lover, your best friend, your
sweetie, your whoever, anybody you're trying to have a real relationship with right, real connection, you know, we gotta be able to receive some sort of compassionate feedback.
And that word compassion, you know, is really important. People don't usually like, you know, you think about it. People don't like to receive feedback because they're so
afraid of what the other person is going to say. But if somebody really loves you, if somebody has proven themselves to be gentle and tender with you, and you know them not
to be cruel or mean, you know, again, it, it's important that we able, that we're able to listen and to hear and you know, part of this is, is that if we can't handle, if we
can't handle having, like, some honest dialog, We're not going to get very far in our relationships. You know, we have to be open. We have to be open and to being wrong
once in a while. I know Ill, Ill, and I understand because for a lot of people, especially the perfectionist, right? And the people pleases and stuff like that. It can
feel like a threat. It can feel like a true, physical, emotional, whatever threat. But it feels threatening when you hear, when you're afraid that you've done something wrong,
because if you were a child that grew up with abandonment issues, with being afraid that you got rewarded all the time, for being the intelligent kid, for being the
smart one, for being the one who was easy, for being the one who X, Y and Z, and then somebody comes to you and says, You're not doing it right, or you screwed up, or
Whatever. There's this terror that can be, this terror, this alarm in the body that's like, Oh, my God, they're going to leave me, I'm in trouble, like, you know. And it's
like, no, sometimes, you know, sometimes, if you're willing to have those conversations with people, when they come to you and they say, you know, can we talk about this? Can
I, can I share a little feedback I like about what my experience was.
You know, even if it's uncomfortable in the moment, that can be a really powerful and healing conversation. In fact, you might find yourselves being even closer because
you can realize that there can. Be a misunderstanding, there can be a disagreement, there can be some turbulence and some upset. It's kind of like, you know,
on a plane, when you're on the plane and the plane starts to shake, and there's all this turbulence, and some part of your brain goes like, oh shit, we're going down. We're all
dead, Holy Christ, you know. And then it levels off, you know, and you realize you're holding the hand of the person next to you who was a stranger, like five seconds ago.
And then you everybody just kind of smiles and laughs, and it's the moment has passed, and then you feel more connected because you've been through a thing, because you
realize that your relationship and your love is strong enough to actually be wrong. Have a disagreement, kiss and make up, you know what I mean? So if we're not willing to own
that, there are going to be times, just by the nature of our own humanity, where we are going to screw up. We are going to get it wrong. We are going to act like a prima
donna or a selfish jerk, or we weren't paying attention and we misspoke, or we were impatient, or we were short with somebody, we're going to, we're going to step on some
toes and some other person's feelings, right? They might, they might feel hurt by that. Again, we can't control what they do with it, but we are. We are responsible for
how we're saying things, how we're thinking things, the choices we're making, the actions we're doing, our tone of voice, our quality of attention, all those things, and
if we're not willing to do these things, you know, we might end up with less compadres, right? Less comrades, less close confidants. You might you might not have as many
clients, you might not have as deep connections. You might not make as much cash, right? It can affect your business. You might lose your clout, the respect that
people have for you. You might lose your credibility, if we're not willing to say to ourselves, yeah, that was me. Sometimes it is you. Sometimes, Houston, we have a
problem. Sometimes you are the problem. And if you look in your life, I often jokingly will say to somebody, when somebody's complaining about everybody in their life,
they're like, this one does this wrong, this one does this wrong. And I'll say, okay, but who's the common Deno? Like, what's the common denominator here? They're like, uh,
me. And I'm like, Yeah. And it's not always like, Oh, you're the problem. But it might be that your your way of framing things, your your your perspective, might be off,
because remember the ego, mind, right? The brain. We've talked about this before. The neuroscience of this, we kind of have this, we have this negativity bias, where we're
always looking for what's wrong, and our brain thinks that it's it's keeping us safe, you know. But the one place we don't go looking sometimes is within ourselves, and
maybe some patterns or conditioning or behaviors and ways of being that we have that are actually no longer serving us, you know, I've known people in my life who
cannot answer a damn thing straight. Everything has to be tinged with sarcasm, with some sort of joke, you know, and I'd be like, I don't know if I, if I can take you
seriously, like, there's, there's this thing. And if you said to them, like, Hey, can you try being serious? Or can you take that tone of voice out? Like, I really want
to connect with you. And they're, they're, they're not able to do it. So first and foremost, we always I mean, the other thing I want to say, though, is this, there are
people who never want to look at themselves, because they never want it to be about themselves. And then, on the flip, this is like a little, I'm making a little hot
little Love Letter. Love Letter from my heart to some of you. There are some of us and some of you, some of we, who have a tendency to make everything about
themselves, meaning that you always think that you are the problem. And if that's you, like go listen to my previous episode. You know, it's not you. Sometimes it is us.
Sometimes it isn't us. And the work is in figuring out what is ours and what is not ours to carry, what is ours to apologize for, what is not ours to apologize for where
we blew it and maybe we didn't right and collectively, too to keep in mind that when we exist in structures and systems that are designed to keep everybody attacking one
another, so that you're not looking at the system itself. Sometimes it's not either of you. Sometimes it's that. It's the man, it's the thing. You know what I'm saying. So we
have to be careful sometimes too, to look where the responsibility really lies, because we've been deeply conditioned. And in our childhoods and in our young
adulthoods, and even into our adulthoods and even into our collective consciousness thinking, you know, there's a bigger things at play, sometimes so, but all we can be
responsible for is ourselves, and we have to be really again. I hate to break it to you, but sometimes it is about you, sometimes it is you. You might the calls are coming from
inside the house. You might be the problem. So if somebody kindly and compassionately brings it to you, maybe it's important that you sit your ass down and listen right and
sift through it and try, try not to be reactive, try to really listen to what they're saying. And a lot of times, people aren't complaining or bringing something
your attention, to shame you, to blame you, to make you feel bad. It's because they actually want a situation to work. They want the relationship to work. You know, when you
think about corporate jobs, when they give you your review, they're trying to let you know. Here are the things that you're doing really well. I mean, at least I hope that
letting you know the things you're doing really well. And then here are some things, some areas where maybe there could be some improvement. And if we think about that,
it's like, who doesn't want to improve, who doesn't want to get better? You know? I mean, maybe I should only speak for myself. I mean, I want to be the best version of
myself that I can be, and a lot of times that means we have to let go of these old patterns of survival mechanisms, these things that we cultivated and created and
ran with as children, right as young people, that now kind of get in the way. So what used to be, I might do a whole podcast on this. You know, what used to be adaptive is
now maladaptive. So I hope this is helpful in some way, and I hope it encourages you to be willing to take in the wholeness of yourself, right where none of us are
perfect. PS, none of us are perfect. We all have some we all have some refining we can do. You know what I'm saying? We all have some rough edges and some places where maybe
we're not aware, you know, of the way that we always talk to a particular person. And I see these patterns in action, right? I just spent some time with my family at an event
for a celebration of life. And all you have to do is step into a familial situation, right? Not just familia, because, yes, but these family situations. And if you can just
kind of like, zoom out and stand back, kind of like float above, float above, the room as an observer, you will even see yourself dropping into particular patterns of
behavior, these ways that we do things when we get a little too comfortable and a little too familiar, and we're not watching our tone of voice, we're not watching how we're
speaking to one another. You know, they can be a lack of caring, so interesting in families and in groups when you get wicked comfy. Now, I'm not saying you can't Josh
each other and rib each other and, you know, give each other, you know, pick on each other a little bit. I mean, New England is we're famous for that, like, where we rib
you, we give you a hard time, we bust your balls because we like you, right? There's a certain amount of that for sure. And if you can recognize that it's coming from true
love and genuine affection, that's fine, but there are times when it crosses a line, and it can be cruelty disguised as I'm just joking. Get a thick as skin. You're a little
too sensitive, don't? You know how this works? Blah, blah, blah, so I'm not, I'm not in it for the mean stuff, but it's more like the Wink, wink. You know? I'm just, I'm just
pulling your chain a little bit kid, because I like it. You know what? I mean? Okay, I hope this has been helpful in some way. I've been thinking about this a lot because, you
know, you see a lot of it just out in the world and online where people are not willing to take responsibility, and they use a lot of this spiritual mumbo jumbo and this
bullshit to just kind of say, oh, it's not me, it's them. They've got the issue, no, motherfucka, sometimes it is you take a look in the mirror, take a look in the soul
mirror. Like, let's have an honest come to Jesus moment with ourselves. Like, you know, as they say, like, I said, you gotta take a personal inventory. I always say you gotta
look in the soul mirror. You gotta go, like, Ooh, yeah, I was kind of clumsy there. And, you know, ideally and hopefully, you know, it's, it's it's not it's an opportunity for
growth. Let me just stop right there. It's an opportunity for growth, and
it's yours for the taken, if you're willing and brave enough to do it. So just know, though, no matter what, you are worthy, even if you've bloated, even if you have been
clumsy, you are worthy, you are good, you are lovable. You are enough. Okay, just because, just because you make a mistake, you're you're still lovable, but it's a lot
easy. I shouldn't say but, and it's a lot easier to mend some things when we're willing to take. Responsibility and say, Yeah, you know what, you're right. That was
on me. That was me. It is me. In this case, it is me. Alright, you guys. I love you. I appreciate you. Thank you for tuning in and anything you want to find out about I'm
wicked easy to find. You guys. Karen Kenney, K E r, E n, k e n, n, e y.com. You can find me my website, if you want to join my spiritual mentoring group, the nest, if you
ever want to work together one to one in the quest, if you want to do a hot to hot day, which can be wicked fun, if you want to come to a yoga class like whatever, all the
shenanigans are online, easy to find. You can also find me on social media. Most of you already know where to find me. There. Come be my friend over there. It's kind of
fun. All right. Have an amazing rest of the day wherever you go. May you leave the people, the animals, the place, the environment and yourself better than how you
found it wherever you go. May you and your energy and your presence and your love and your willingness to be you know, honest with yourself be a blessing. Bye, bye.