The Bind: Recent Episodes
Andrea Eriks
This episode works to help listeners think more deeply about one's sexuality and how the systems at large each of us is part of may impact our personal narratives about our sexuality and the concept of sexual agency. As you listen, the hope is that you think through deeper more insightful questions to ask yourself as you desire to learn more about your own "why's" as far is your sexuality is concerned.
Sexuality is complex as it is a part of the self that society often deems as necessary to share with others and sometimes, more specifically, in the context of monogamy. If this is so easy, why do so many people struggle in this facet of identity? Sexuality is complex, sexuality is constantly shifting, and sexuality often holds greater meaning for people.
It is important that we recognize the personal nature of sex. I think we know this at conscious level, but systemically we have learned to be somewhat invasive on others' sexual agency. Is it possible to offer sexuality autonomy without fearing the worst case scenarios are inevitable to occur?
The conversation on sexuality and sexual intimacy continues in today's episode. We begin to dissect how our earliest messages about sexuality may impact our own sense of sexual competence, trust, or intimacy etc. While this conversation may be difficult for some people to navigate, it is an important conversation in which people can begin to explore their individual relationship with or understanding of their own sexuality and how that can have an impact on partner sexual relationships.
Many people live their sexual lives in a kind of private way that is more about prohibiting shame that promoting one's right to sexual privacy. The goal of this series the the Bind is that people can begin to autonomously decipher their own sexual narrative and break down some of the myths that have been associated with sexuality. As we navigate such myths and begin to explore truth surrounding the myths of sexuality, the hope is that people feel more sexually informed or more fantasy informed and as a result feel more secure to explore topics of sexuality in a way that produces a healthier sense of self, reducing elements of fear and shame around a topic that has long been too taboo to have serious conversations about, but far too prevalent to human life not to.
As an attachment therapist I can't tell you the amount of times I process with with adults memories that involve one child to another sexual curiosity. In this session, we will begin to touch the surface on meaning behind this curiosity and, more importantly, ways adults can be helpful and trustworthy in helping children navigate this tricky part of their identity.
The ultimate goal of children and their sexuality is not that they omit the part of their self that is sexual, but learn about it as they grow through a system of resources that are helpful and give kids knowledge about their own bodies, others' bodies, and the importance of boundaries and personal space without inducing feelings of guilt and shame.
Some children may feel shame when talked to about their sexuality or behaviors that needed redirection. This type of shame is not the same as external sources of shame that come from our dominant attachment figures. In this session, the aim is to help equip adults in navigating this with children in a way that promotes a positive learning environment and can also help adult caregivers get in check with their own wounds and trauma around childhood sexuality and sex narratives.
It's one of the most challenging aspects of our children and our own identities - sexuality. Many parents wonder the appropriate way to navigate sexuality with children and when to do that. Many families find their selves at a loss for support when it comes to navigating sexual matters with their children and sometimes the places they seek knowledge and advice from, are outright harmful.
We receive messages about sexuality all around us. In some ways it is the worst kept secret America has ever tried to deal with. Through the stories we read in the news, to the materials we are exposed to on television, to the messages we receive from the pulpits, America participates in a systemic vicarious trauma if not first hand.
In this particular series, we being the difficult but oh so important attachment work that helps us begin the process of navigating our own sexual experiences and how those intersect with the curiosity the arises within our kids.
This session walks through the beginning self work that helps lay a foundation for the ways children can effectively communicate their sexual questions and curiosities and also feel safe to ask for help in the event that is necessary.
Undoubtedly, a major area for anxiety among parents is knowing what to do in order to best equip children to let us know as their parents if some form of sexual abuse is happening to them. As you can imagine this episode of The Bind is merely the tip of a very large iceberg that we will continue to chip away at and tackle from an attachment perspective. As you listen and tune into this difficult and controversial topic, I ask that you approach with an open mind and an attunement to your own body, your own triggers, your own need to not be in this difficult space.
In the work of trauma and attachment, we work to help individuals recognize that healing is not avoiding a storm, but learning how to face it and exist and prevail in life despite it. In response to a question a client asked me about what it would take for her children to be open and share something abusive is happening to them, I felt this topic to be so important for parents everywhere, I wanted to move forward in this next series talking about the layers of opening dialogue with our children so that they can recognize parental/guardian figures as safe harbors for communication. Along with that discussion, we will also address and tackle what it means to be a parental or guardian figure who recognizes their own deficits in holding a capacity to talk about or navigate the hard things. How does one begin building this sense of tolerance to talk about the hard elements of life?
Let's explore that very question and begin the hard work of growing in such a way that we can do this hard thing.
While I think we are far from being done with this topic (as systemic religion plays a major part in American culture and unfortunately that means the deficits within those systems do as well), it is time for us to respectfully forge forward and begin unraveling more topics in the realm of attachment which, let's be honest, is pretty much everything. But it it time to venture into other realms that will intertwine with this topic just as those that have come before it.
In this episode, I will bring together a bridge that helps build a greater understanding of the unfortunately bind that has been created as churches and their members have established unhealthy relationship patterns enmeshed in duality. Can I really be nice and break bread with you one moment and challenge your walk with God the next? Can the church hold a tolerance for individuals who desire to make changes when they are not at the top or would that provoke too much liberation for the members and not enough control for the leaders?
In any system, being the leader is difficult. In a church system where the product is marketed through messages of enduring love and eternal life the lines between the righteous and autonomous thought grow weary. Once those lines blur out, there is often a collateral damage left in church systems that may appear to be a casualty of war for leadership but adorn members with wounds and scars leaving a nasty taste in their mouths. This podcast episode begins to speak to that and address why it may be problematic to associate a system that operates corporately with being something hold and "of God".
While this episode continues to point toward the potential of authoritative manipulation within systems, I wanted to be clear this session is also somewhat separate from the current series. As the 20th anniversary of 9/11 took place over this past weekend, I could not help but find myself complexed by the juxtaposition of one national trauma versus another.
This session walks through systemic processes that provoke humans within systems to respond in unique yet collective ways and how in the midst of solidarity there still exists the dilemma of polarization.
In this episode of The Bind, I encourage you to listen with an inquisitive ear and be curious about the questions that arise for you as an individual who sacredly exists and systemically exists inevitably as a mere number.
Hold a curiosity for the degree to which our world moves at an unstoppable pace that gives each of us barely enough time to grasp the gravity that difficult life situations pose to different humans in different ways.
Let our uniqueness be our bridge rather than our breaking point.
This session continues exploring what is means when the systems people ascribe to utilize the power of the system to micro-manipulate individuals who participate in that system. As we explore this from an attachment perspective, listeners can begin to explore the contradictions and human error that inevitably infiltrates systems that rely of religious obedience for control.
Many people wants to "do good" or "be good" and unfortunately, many people also lack that necessary element of self-trust and self-confidence to discern when systemic dogma is unhealthy or false often leading to consequences such as gaslighting or rigidity. We will continue to explore how these micro-manipulations can impact an entire system and also gravely impact an individual's autonomous right to faith and relationship with their spirituality.
Religion can be a difficult system to navigate and is not for the faint of heart. As individuals desire an integration of faith into their lives, those who find themselves becoming more deeply integrated into their faith community also find navigating the complexities of rigid boundaries and transactional interpersonal relationship to be quite difficult.
In this episode of The Bind, we explore some of those nuanced complexities that often leave people with a bad taste in their mouth when it comes to the one-sided expectation and accountability often indoctrinated into church bodies. We wrestle with what it means to be lured into faith systems with grandiose gestures of care and affection only to be met with cold boundaries when push comes to shove. This session is one of a multiple part series in which we will explore the importance of personal value sets, critical thinking, and authority within religious systems.
For any non-believers or those who do nat subscribe to the Christian faith, I invite you to listen to this session with an open mind knowing that while the Christian faith has its own unique complexities, hierarchal systems is not exclusive to this particular religion.
Come, grow, challenge your inner thoughts regarding how to navigate a system that needs you to thrive while simultaneously expecting unquestioned obedience and discern for yourself whether that is a healthy formula or not.
Here we are. Many individuals within the Christian church have reached a crossroads of clinging to the faith and intimacy with God that has brought so much life to the core of their identity and the collateral damage that human folly mixes into the sacred faith journey. As a new subgroup of the harmed and healing takes shape, many individuals finding themselves asking, "what does systemic healing look like?"
As a trauma and attachment therapist, I am offering this podcast as a springboard for thought and intention to explore the journey that is trauma healing to help people understand the complexities that intertwine with human beings as they work to navigate a new system of trust and caution when it comes to sharing one's spiritual life with a "church".
Spiritual healing derived from systemic trauma or tribal pathology is extremely complex and the undertaking of healing is grave and requires intentionality. As many are having to turn to social media outlets to form a community around this intense and important topic, this podcasts sets out to inform listeners of some of the facets of trauma healing and some of the barriers that arise in working to provide assistance to those desiring to heal.
Trauma healing is not linear and for that reason it is definitely not one size fits all. Humans are unique, humans are sacred, and the healing journey is sacredly intimate. Even those invited into the journey must come to grips with their own limitations as an audience member and grapple with one's own experience of the narrative.
This podcast sets out to join in on that conversation as a beacon of hope and alliance to those who are on the journey of the survivor.
Isn't it interesting how individuals who view themselves as leaders within tribes are quick to speak to the necessity for concepts such as accountability yet are often quick to deny their own need for inner-reflection and accountability for self? In this episode, I try to address the issue of thought leaders and how the individual worldview cannot help but impact the messages thought leaders or leaders in general impart to their audiences.
As we are coming to a place in culture where individuals are wrestling with their individual anger toward the systemic hierarchal abuses that occur within tribes, my curiosity leans toward ways individual autonomy and self-empowerment combined with self-trust can cultivate a healthier relationship between leader and community.
As humans I believe we are destined to long for hierarchy and leadership while simultaneously despising it and distrusting it. If this is where we are as a culture, then the place of growth does not derive from merely soaking in the anger, but holding a curiosity for what provokes anger about the abuse of power and what palpable solutions exist to help us as a macro system to "do better" to care for one another and promote greater opportunities for autonomy and trust toward others to "do the right thing" and establish that inner spiritual peace and wellness.
This episode is taking a micro-moment from a podcast regarding a statement made by a thought leader and further dissecting the flaws of the doctrine or the flaws of implication that can lead to macro discrimination due to singular acceptance of an idea promoted by a thought leader.
I will explore the importance of challenging thought leaders and also diving into why it is imperative human beings consider context and utilize critical thinking to explore the applicability and/or truth behind dogmas that are preached by the thought leaders and influencers of our culture.
Please join in on this discussion for an opportunity to stretch your own inner leader and critical thinking self.
When asked about the spiritual space that help individuals align with their internal energy and the energy of those around, the task is far from easy. But we can begin to understand how we relate to others and attune to the degree to which others are or are not safe for us within our own value sets and overall world. This session explores an element of this space in order to help listeners explore their own sense of internal space.
Disclaimer. I did make mention to two specific types of personality disorders as an example in my cast, but I ask that you keep an open mind as this cast does not talk about personality disorder but merely a consequence that is possible within the realm of such disorders.
If you have questions, ask them!
We can't help but be relational. Sometimes, however, being relational may come at the cost of confusion. Oftentimes, individuals walk through very intimate circumstances. Most people want to engage friends, family, and other trusted sources into the process. Though this can be helpful to know one is not alone, it is difficult to garner the answer or support that was actually desired. Today, let's talk about the difference between you as the key character in your narrative and the viewpoint of the "audience" who is invited to participate. Can an audience perspective ever be the same as the key "character's" and how do we navigate the natural distance and felt sense of unsafely when this happens?
John Gottman, the well respected couples and marriage researcher is incredible. In his work he lists defensiveness as one of the "Four Horsemen of The Apocalypse" when it comes to the death or detriment of a marriage. I agree that the constant need to defend is a major hindrance in relationships. BUT, let's take a look at the other side of defensiveness today and explore if the willing to self reflect on one's defensiveness may be a helpful element in growing in autonomy and individuating and learning how to balance the compromise of human interaction.
Marriage... could there be anything so complex in the world of relationships as marriage? While I have been working to provide content in relationships as a whole, I can't help myself but start an ongoing dialogue about marriages and what I notice about them from a system standpoint. In this session today, we are talking about the concept of submission and how that one word has been weaponized within marriages. As an attachment and trauma therapist, I have seen first hand the ways this one word can get in the way of the heavy lifting necessary to grow a marriage in healthy dynamics.
This particular session does incorporate elements of spirituality and religion. Please know, this session is open to everyone and it is my belief that all people be invited into these conversations and that we do not make parts of ourselves such as our spirituality a mechanism of distance but instead make space for it to exist a whole of one's identity. Please join in, listen, and come to the table with your own thoughts that would naturally occur while listening to sessions such as these.
As always I appreciate you, my dear listener! If you are gaining and growing from these sessions, please be sure to visit thebindpodcast.com and join the email list or drop a note!
In today's episode, we are exploring what it looks like for our days to feel scheduled and the burden of expectation weighs on the choices each of us make to "honor our time". Explore with me the difficult task of being caught between the pressure of schedules, the desires to complete, and the need for breaks and rest.
Disclaimer: Toward the end of this particular track I encountered a glitch that led me down a rabbit hole of despair. I did not have the mental and emotional capacity to figure out the situation so you will notice 1-2 places toward the end of this session that very clearly has a mistake. It was a perfect opportunity in my own life to "honor my time" and allow for this session to have very distinct imperfections. Please have grace and compassion :-)
Thank you to each of you who listen to The Bind!
Everybody wants change but very few of us are willing to move ourselves. Introspective change dissects a bit more into negative loops that we may get into with out relationships. Oftentimes in relationships we are faced with personal discomforts or “our own work”. Introspective Change talks about how to identify when the work needing done in the relationship is “on me”. What happens to a system when we start projecting on our relationships that changes they make will be the thing that makes the relationship better.
Within our relationships we often cannot help but get caught up in patterns that tell a “recurring story”. You’ve heard the saying “same stuff different day”. This podcast goes into the deeper science behind what is happening in those relationship exchanges and how the hope of the argument is that there will be a necessary change, but the reality of the argument is that It’s just perpetuating an unresolved need within the individual and/or relationship as a whole.
One of the “necessary evils” of life is decision making. Fortunately all decisions are not created equal and the pressure of “making the right choice” is not as big of a burden as it is compared to other times. In this session, Andrea explores a decision that is not “big” or “life altering” in any sense of the word, but navigating through self-trust was a definite must in this situation where Andrea finds herself challenged to do something brand new that requires her to think through a new territory that she has never navigated before.
Are you navigating the “inbetween” time of your life in a compass driving by your fears far more than your trust? In this podcast, we work through what it does to the self when an individual attempts to navigate the unknown outcomes of life attempting to control the outcome all the while anticipating that “good things won’t happen”. We navigate what that has the potential to do to the body’s memory of the experience in navigating hope for something in the future and how “hope” can be something very scary to put trust in.
What happens to our emotional wellbeing, our body’s response when we build up and anticipate positive, perfect moments, only to experience the disappointment of things not going “perfectly”? The effort that one puts into cultivating a truly memorable experience often comes at the fatigue of the one overseeing the event. In this podcast we work through that dance between the exhaustion that comes from intentional living as well as the conflict of dual emotions that inevitably show up even when we are planning and hoping for a “perfect” moment in time. Let’s work through together what it looks like to navigate and honor the shifting combination of emotions in the midst of a desire for perfection.
One of the most difficult elements of life is learning to be ok with today. Life is hard. In the midst of living everyday life, each of us is faced with struggles. Often those struggles provoke our fantasies to take us to places far away from today in some future place in life that feels safer or easier. Though some people definitely have immediate situations that merit an escape or a distance from, most of us are actually dealing with everyday life challenges that wouldn’t necessarily stop occurring merely because we made it to some destination in the future. Self-worth and bargaining explores the introspective balance between sacred time combining with today being “enough”. If you’re in a place where you wish you were in any other time but today, this may be the right place for you to listen.
Doing the work of getting to a place where you can love and accept yourself can be a lot like joining a gym as a New Year's resolution. There's a lot of inertia in the beginning and then it fades. Over time, our personal growth comes head to head with our human folly and the folly often wins. Self Compassion is an exploration of the relationship you are working to cultivate with yourself while gaining the understanding that you will have to also combat the lies you believe about yourself based on how much "progress" it feels like you are making.
When we choose to consciously grow, that means that we consciously recognize our change. That's great, right? Of course it's a good thing that you are making conscious changes for your personal growth. But that growth can definitely some with some tough inner work which sometime comes in the form of shifting relationships. It's not unusual for individuals who are choosing change to notice that old relationships can become foreign in the process. This session is an exploration of that exact shift.
So many people want to “do the work” and start that incredible journey of believing in one’s self. This journey, while incredibly liberating, can be more difficult to kickstart than you might believe. While there are millions of judges and critics out there to attempt to speak into your identity, the most difficult judge to make it through is the self-judge. The self-judge often breaks down that all important self-worth. Today we explore the concept of negative self-worth and how it may wreak havoc on the individual’s sense of identity. In self-worth we’ll begin to unpack the tip of the self-worth iceberg.
Many of us struggle with knowing whether or not we are loved by those people close to us in this world. Love is a vital lifeline. Not only is the love of others crucial but self-love is absolute oxygen to the soul. In our session today, we will explore the self-depredation that breaks down and wreaks havoc while incorporating the self-talk tools that walk individuals into a healthier relationship with self, emphasizing the absolute importance of self-love.
Sometimes within our “tribes” or communities, there are rules (spoken or non) set in place that assumedly keep the tribe “safe” or “moral”. Often these most likely well-intentioned standards have detrimental consequences that lead people to have to navigate internal guilt and shame. This session begins to open up the realm of thought surrounding systemic moral rules and how the individual must process and navigate the rules that do not necessarily align with individuals in the tribe. Let’s explore this complex topic and begin some of the self-reflective work of exploring how one can navigate this at the individual level.
I don’t know about you, but many times I feel like I hold back from moving forward in my dreams of fun because I feel like I don’t have enough information to do fun well. Doesn’t that sound so funny? But I think It’s true. Many times as individuals, I think people get caught up in the desire to predict most situations in life. Fishing is a journey through what it looks like to let go despite all of the internal battles and dare to live life to the full despite the fears that attempt to paralyze. Explore what it looks like to take on those spontaneous adventures and push against negative self-talk in the midst of an adventure that surely will make a memory to look back on.
In this session we circle back to an earlier podcast in which Andrea was navigating having to make a tough family choice to now walking in the consequences (good and bad) of making the choice. Andrea walks through what it means to be on the other side of a life choice coming to fruition and the opportunity for self-reflection and ultimate growth that can come from that.
Explore through story what it means to go deeper into the rebel part. Often this part of us feels so frightening and the rebel represents a part of self that may lead to a grave sense of loss in the community one has built. Isn’t it ironic that every system we connect to for a sense of safety also contains a set of rules that are bound to be broken or lines that surely will be crossed? Explore the story of the rebel more intensely and then apply this part to yourself exploring if it is worth it to speak up and speak out or if it feels safest and best to stay put and consequently confined yet “safe”.
Many of us hate the word: Rebel. To be the rebel insinuates something about oneself is “bad” or “unacceptable”. But it’s within you. It’s the part of you that gives you that little tinge in your stomach when it feels disaligned from the other members of “the tribe” as a whole. Explore with me what it is like to experience the rebel within and how that part challenges one to explore parts of the self that don’t exactly “play well” with the expectations of the larger tribe. Explore whether or not you’re in a place in which your rebel is peaking its head and how you wrestle with such a seemingly conflictive part.
In this session we journey through the different elements of anxiety and learning the harsh reality that anxiety is elusive, meaning we don’t always get to know how it will show up and furthermore how the body will react toward situations.
This podcast is so much fun! Here, we dive into what it looks like (and feels like) when an entire tribe shifts. Every person in that tribe is subject to a different response to the changes that will naturally rock the “anticipated normal” of that culture. While some individuals are numbly unaware of their own role or behaviors in such a change, others are so aware that it is painful to be at the crossroads of having to choose which direction to take as the system shifts. Sometimes, situations as such pose hard questions like “Do I stay the way I’ve always been, or do I trust that if I change along with the shifts occurring will be safe for me?”
Today we journey into what it looks like to hold another’s distrust whether at an intimate or a macro-level. Every personal must grapple with that conflict between the self as a member of “the tribe” and the self as an individual. Let’s talk through what it looks like to navigate being in relationship with another in the midst of their process of being true to self in the midst of making sense of their connection to the greater aspects of culture.
Ah, yes, love. Love in action, meaning those things we do to keep our relationships in tact, can be extremely tricky. Today we talk about the breakdown that occurs when individual relationship needs tug on the relationship system and individuals within that system. This podcast talks through what it means to let go of the control within relationships and make space to trust that individuals will walk to become their best self despite our desire to hold onto what it is “supposed” to look like. Can you make peace with letting go of your need for another to “become” in a way that makes you feel most comfortable?
What do you do when you have a plan and then the plan changes outside of your control? The following podcast takes a look at the process of accommodating a change in plans when you thought you knew exactly what your next step was going to look like. How does one manage the balance of trying to hold the family in tact while life is shifting all around you. Let’s dive into a real life situation happening in the midst of an uncontrollable worldwide pandemic and explore what it means to both sit in and move through the tough choices that are presented when life appears to have very little in control.