 Everybody, you are live with Dr. Jill and today I have a very special guest. I know you've heard me say that before, but today it is an honor to be here with Erin Carnahan who I will introduce to you in a moment who is also my ex-husband. Yes, you heard me, super excited. This is actually our 100th episode. I can't believe a little backstory on this COVID hit and we all stayed home and I had a little extra time on my hands. And I thought, you know what? If I can't get out and teach on a stage which I love to do, why not start in my own study and get out there to you all virtually and start interviewing people. So it just started on a whim and it's become a popular podcast and YouTube channel. And here we are again on episode number 100. So excited to reach that landmark. If you want to hear the other podcast, you can find me on iTunes or Stitcher or anywhere you hear podcasts. You can also find me on the YouTube channel. And I just ask if you enjoy it, will you please leave a review on iTunes for me that helps us get traction and get out to more people. So thank you for that. You can also find information at jillcarnahan.com on my website and you can find products and services at drjilhealth.com. So any of those places you can find me and like I said, we are an episode number 100 and I couldn't be more honored. My office manager asked me about a week ago, you know, Dr. Jill is actually a few weeks ago. Dr. Jill, maybe you should do a special guest for your 100th episode. And I thought about it and there's a lot of special guests I've had on here. But what I found is, you know, with COVID I just heard a statistic in California that the divorce rate is at now at 70%. Can you believe that? It's been at 50% for a while, but 70%. I mean, that's just obviously more often than not relationships are ending in divorce. And I talked to a therapist who gave me that statistic and I said, you know, why do you think that is? And she said, well, you know, COVID happened Jill and all of a sudden those distractions that people had away from their relationships that kept them in that relationship, but they were very distracted when it was going out with their girlfriends or whether it was doing other things, all of a sudden those distractions were gone and they had to deal with one another. And I don't know if that's true or not but it makes sense to me that COVID's really changed us. And some relationships have gotten stronger than ever and I hope that's you sitting out there listening today wherever you're at in your car or at home. But some of you, I know it's very real that it has brought up conflict and things that maybe you weren't facing before COVID. And now unfortunately you might even be one of those statistics where you have gone through a separation or divorce or breakup. I am gonna be watching your questions. So I wanna just mention here that in a few minutes when we get going, I'll try to watch that feed. And if you have questions live for Erin and I we will be watching those and we will listen to those. So here we are today. I'm gonna be probably as vulnerable as I've ever been with again bringing on my ex-husband here but super excited and we'll tell a little bit about our story to start with after I introduce Erin. But I also wanna frame this in the sense of we're here just because often things in life happen and at the moment, at the time it can be devastating and can be one of the worst things that you've ever experienced or something you never thought you would go through. For me, it was like that I never in the million years thought I would be divorced. But looking back, I know both Erin and I will talk today about the change and transformation that's happened not only in our friendship and in our relationship in business, but also in our own lives and interpersonal space. Just the people we've become because of this divorce has been phenomenal. So sometimes it actually turns out to be a blessing in disguise. Erin, let me introduce you and then I'd love to hear your comments on just welcoming you here. So Erin Carnahan is an award-winning producer and writer who strives to inspire and encourage the world through film, theater and music. He loves to tell stories of inspiring people who live extraordinary lives. Erin has produced four seasons of network television, multiple music videos and feature length documentary to Joey with Love in addition to producing and he co-wrote the award-winning feature film Finding Josephine. He also managed the career of Grammy award-winning musician, artist Joey and Rory. And that doesn't really do it. Justice Erin, you've got so many other gifts and talents. Welcome, welcome, welcome. Thank you for joining me today. Thanks, Jill. Thanks so much. This is awesome. You're welcome. This is crazy. I know, right? We're just talking about for that. And I wanted to frame it. I was telling you before that I was like, I want to honor, we both have partners in life and we're super happy and they've been so amazing with our friendship. And I think that we always seek to honor them and how we interact and get along. But we also, we've learned a lot and the one thing that's been enduring and we'll talk later about what new projects we're working on because we're actually doing some business together. But what I love is that through this difficult last five and a half, six years through the divorce, I think one of the themes that has really allowed us to become good friends who really trust one another is respect, right? Any thoughts on, we'll go back and tell the story in just a minute of like what happened and what led to the divorce and then what we've learned. But any thoughts just off the top of your head on some of the things that you feel like have been the most important in us being able to have a just a respectful honoring friendship that's enduring? You mean post-divorce. Yes, post-divorce. I think the number one thing is above all else is forgiveness. We both have it in us to forgive. We're just kind of forgiving people, but I mean, that is first and foremost is forgiveness and also that humility to ask for forgiveness. And I think that that is the starter is that we forgave one another. We didn't just forgive one another. I feel like we talk through everything. It wasn't just say, hey, forgive me, I did this or I did this wrong or whatever. It was still to this day, I remember last week I called you and I'm like, hey, I remember this, I wanna apologize for that. And so it's almost even an ongoing thing, not because you demanded or anything, but just because it feels right to go to somebody that you've harmed and say, hey, I'm sorry. And through the divorce process, there was a lot of harm done. And so even as things get brought to my attention now, I still wanna be able to say, hey, I'm sorry about that, please forgive me. And I think that is the number one thing. And then the second thing is I believe that we communicate now way better than we did when we were married and we can get into why that is. But I think we have just an amazing open line of communication and I think that's huge. So I love that. So forgiveness and communication, right? And I totally agree with you. I know with the very beginning where we separated and things were not good at that point, there was this piece of me too that like, and I know you've been the same to me, that we're all human, right? And we're in this game called life. And what happens is the traumas from our childhood, the difficulties, the way we were raised, all of those things shape who we are. And I have a deep compassion for the fact that we're all fallible and that we're all human. And I think even though what I did is I actually jumped right to forgiveness before I went through anger and grief. So I actually did it the wrong way. And I think I've been through all those now, but in the very beginning, I just went right to, first of all, in shock. It was a big shock for me. And then I went to, oh, I gotta forgive. And that's the first thing. And then, but after that, I went through anger and sadness and all of those normal emotions that we would have. And then came back to forgiveness. But I think that's really been the thing that has, like you said, we've been in a process, right? Because I remember you were very numb in the beginning. And I don't think you could have forgiven or even understood what happened until it was probably two years post-divorce where we really had the first conversation where I felt like you understood what we went through. And me too, it took some time because what happened is that catalyzed us to go deeper and say, what's up with me? What do I need to do? What do I need to work on? And again, that's one of the messages today too is like the work we've both done has been immense. And it takes that to go on to have healthy relationships and to also have healthy relationships with your exes, right? Yeah, absolutely. I think that might be why this message of continued asking for forgiveness, not for the same thing, but as things pop up or whatever it might be, or maybe the same thing, even in that case of you were so quick to forgive and I didn't even know what I was feeling at that time all of these things, like it's okay to even, because it's traumatic, like at the time of our divorce, I had also experienced death at the same time to a very dear friend and to my father and then our divorce and my mother as well. So there was like all this death happening around our divorce, but I always tell people I experienced four deaths. I didn't experience three deaths in that couple of year period of time, it was four deaths. And so with death comes a lot of trauma, a lot of reflection, a lot of those type of things. So I think that's one of the reasons why maybe we come back to it a little bit. And it's not, it just feels right, it just feels right. And you're right, I agree 150%. I would say the biggest thing when you talk about the self work that's been done, the reason you and I have a great relationship right now, I believe is that you've done a lot of work on self. And that work on yourself wasn't to point fingers at me, it was to like work on your own things and your own issues within your own life. And I've done the exact same thing with you. And you've got to humble yourself and be willing to say, what the hell did I do wrong there? It's so easy to point fingers at me. And why did I do that? Why did I make those decisions? Where? It's so easy to point fingers, isn't it? And I see this happening all around and we're like, oh, well, you did this or you did that or you did that. But the truth is when we point back here, we all, again, this is two people coming together, two imperfect people. And there's mistakes that are made on both sides. And the only way that we can actually come together in a healthy friendship post-divorce is when we start to look at ourself first and then honor and forgive the other person. And I would love to maybe just tell this like a two minute version of this is what happened. And then like where we got to, but I love this. I literally this morning in Bernay Brown's new book, Atlas of the Heart, I read this quote and I think it frames a lot of what we went through. True belonging doesn't require us to change who we are. It requires us to be who we are. And I think one of the things that I look back like what happened, we were both, first of all, not really able to love and accept ourselves. And I know now and I know you do too until we love and accept ourselves. You're both in cultures where that maybe wasn't right or wasn't accepted. And until we love and accept ourselves and believe that we're worthy of a sustainable, healthy relationship and love, we can never go into a relationship and expect the other person to complete us, right? And so often we do. And if there's a hole in our heart that we expect another person to fill, we're always gonna be unsatisfied and that person will never, ever, ever live up to our expectations, right? They're gonna fail every time. And I think we both came in with wounded hearts and we came in and we tried to be what we thought people wanted us to be. Not only our families, our society, our world, but even each other. And by doing that, what we neglected to do was express needs. We thought, oh, we have it together. I always think we almost had like two parallel lives. And again, we had fun, we connected. We had a lot of really good positive things in the relationship. But what we maybe didn't do so well was what I consider true intimacy, which is truly being vulnerable to one another and expressing, hey, I need this from you. We were two very independent people. And we thought we'd be okay until the, you know what hit the ban, right? Until things fell apart. So, and on our story, like we met when I was 19, we married when I was just one. I just got something on that. Yeah, please, go ahead. I'd love to just piggyback that real quick. I love that you're saying that because I think like our relationship was all about, hey, this person completes me. Yeah. And she's that and she completes me. That's not, that's not where it's at. Where it's coming completely yourself to a relationship when you can bring yourself completely, you are 100% authentically you've got, you're not relying on someone else to fill the gaps. Yes. You've done that, you've come completely and you come to that person. And I think that's what we've done and that's where both of us are at in our current relationships is we've come to those relationships as complete human beings. And the person I'm with, she doesn't complete me. She shares in who I am. And I share in who she is. And we just experience beautiful life together. Also, I just wanted to reiterate real, or just to make sure that people know I've talked a lot about forgiveness and you were the way that you had said that is, yes, it's important that we look at ourselves and see what we could have done better or done differently or whatever it might be and then ask for forgiveness. But I also think the importance of therapy and self-reflection and understanding self and understanding what we did wrong, that's all important. But it's also important because that allows us to get to that place where we're able to say, I need to take care of me by saying, Jill, you hurt me or Erin, you hurt me. But learning how to say that in a productive and a positive way so that we can really get through those issues of hurt and pain and frustration. Does that make sense? Yeah, absolutely. And that's honestly the honesty that we lacked at some points because we weren't really honest with saying, this hurt me. And what happens when you have a relationship? I'm gonna briefly talk about John Gottman's four horsemen of broken relationships because they're so classically studied. I guess I could mention them in a minute, but one of them is this like, it leads to resentment and contempt. And contempt, if you have contempt in your relationship, you are almost guaranteed to fell. John Gottman took couples into this apartment where he'd start research, he observed them and he would note their language to one another and how they treated one another and how they interacted with one another. And when he saw contempt, he could predict with 96% accuracy who is going to end a divorce. So like that's the one thing that will always and often that contempt comes from health in expectations or needs that are not expressed. And you expect the person to read your mind, right? Tell me, I see your face, so tell me more about that, right? Cause they expect each other. And again, we kind of expected, we were just, I always think we're just kids who didn't know any better, right? Like I look back and have a lot of compassion for both of us because we were just young and we didn't really know what we know today. But what do you think about that? Any thoughts on? Well, I think it's interesting because like I would have never thought that I could tell you just that contempt. I'm like, I don't know. But that's almost the root of, we'll get into how everything happened, I guess. I don't know, but the root of the end and me coming and saying, I'm done. It was a contempt. It was a place of, and that contempt was bred out of the fact that I couldn't tell you, I am broken, I am hurting. I wasn't able to get, we weren't able to have that communication. I wasn't able to be, communicate that and a successful way to you to be able to say things. And so rather than me trying to figure out another way or whatever to be able to have a conversation with you to say, I'm hurting here, instead I just felt contempt. And it was like, oh. And then from there again, if you're in contempt. And listeners, please, if you're hearing this and you feel contempt for your partner, gosh, this is a red flag. Please, because it's literally one of the most. And I'll just read these while we're here and then we can talk about them. And again, this is from John Gottman's research. He's a relationship researcher, some of the best stuff out there, data driven. And he's identified four key characteristics that can basically predict the end of our relationship. And then we'll talk about solutions. So don't worry, we're gonna go positive. But criticism is number one. So if you're critical, and it doesn't mean we can't say, hey, I don't like when you do that, could you do something differently? But there's ways to be less critical and to build appreciation. So you need this like foundation of love and gratitude and appreciation. And then you can be, you can ask someone that you love to do something differently. But criticism is number one, contempt is number two. And contempt is the biggest predictor of divorce and ended relationships. Defensiveness, number three, how many of us are defensive? Like, oh, someone says we did something. Instead of owning it and saying, I totally get that you feel that way. I will try to do that differently. We become defensive, right? Because we're like attack, we feel like we're attacked. And then stonewalling. I know a way that I've learned since our divorce and you and I have even used it before, but I definitely use it in my current relationship. I can help some people with a way to maybe help with the defensiveness. Oh, I totally wanna get to that. Cause you've had some clues and you've had some things that you've shared with me that have been helpful. So criticism number one, contempt number two, defensiveness number three, the last one is stonewalling. You're like, what is that? Stonewalling is just, you check out. You check out your overwhelmed, it's too much, you go away, you become quiet, you won't engage your conversation. And there's no way to, and you might need some time that's different. And you can say, you know, hey, sweetheart, I am really overwhelmed right now. Can you give me three hours? I'm gonna take a walk or one hour. You give a time and then you come back. That's okay, that's not stonewalling. Stonewalling is literally checking out no communication. You're like, I don't wanna talk about, I'm done. That's stonewalling. So let's talk about solutions for that. You mentioned that you had one and I think I have an idea where you're gonna save it. Tell us more about the road of criticism and defensiveness. I think one of the greatest things that I've learned, and it was again, the interesting thing is this is through self-therapy, you know? It's learning about myself and my inability to communicate effectively and especially intimately. I always, I wonder why does Jill say that we lacked intimacy? And I understand now it's that, for me, what that means is we weren't able to truly communicate what we were feeling. Yeah. Effort. We could be angry or I could be angry and she could shut down, but like there was no communication. And it was only after I went to therapy and I'm gonna, is it okay if I mention a name like of where I went because it's amazing? Yeah. I went to the biggest part of therapy that I went through personally was at OnSight in Tennessee. And OnSight's just an amazing place with amazing program with just working on your own stuff. Now they also have a program like a weekend retreat getaway for couples. So I'm going to say that because I literally feel that OnSight forever changed my life. And I feel that Jill and I wouldn't be having this conversation today and I definitely would not be in a healthy relationship, healthy committed relationship right now. I agree. Cause that's when like I felt like you, we started like it took us a year or so to really get to when we could start to communicate like this. And definitely I did my work, it wasn't OnSight, but it was the own, my own personal work and you did OnSight. And that was after that when we first started you asked for forgiveness and we talked about those kinds of things. And we, you know, there was a lot of different things that happened that were profound after OnSight. Yeah. So for me, the one of the big takeaways from OnSight was just this little exercise with regard to communication but it fits within this defensiveness and how you can combat that thing of being defensive, you know, when somebody says something that seems like it's critical or whatever it might be. And it's a very, and I cannot stress this enough. I use this in business. I use this in my personal relationship. I use this with friends, anybody where there's any type of conflict or any type of unresolved thing that I need to cover with them. And it's just this and please write it down. I feel blank and it starts with a feeling statement. I feel because what you're not starting with is you did. Correct. You're starting with I feel. And it's not I think. Yeah. Because what you think sometimes your perception might be off and you can get through to all of that but it's I feel, I feel blank, fill in the blank when or because, and it could be because you did something or when this happened or whatever it is and try to frame it in the best way that you can, I feel blank when or because blank, I need blank and you fill in, this is what I need. Now, here's the powerful thing on that is the other person might not be able to fulfill that need. But I cannot even begin to tell you the power in just expressing your need. It's like when you ask for forgiveness and the other person doesn't even know if they can forgive you and they might not forgive you, you already feel better because you asked for forgiveness. It's kind of the same thing, just saying I need and hearing yourself express that verbally, it's so healing. And then sometimes that person can immediately do that need. Now, if you're in a relationship, the beautiful thing is that person can say, I don't know if I can do that but then they can do an I feel statement back right now in my current relationship, anytime there's an argument or we're in a difficult position or for anything and we can start raising our voices or whatever, we're human and like, that's what happens, right? One of us inevitably now says, I need an I feel statement. I know I love it. And what happens is like that, it de-escalates the argument because what that is saying is it stops everything and it just slows everything down. And I cannot be given to tell you what this little thing does for keeping you from being defensive about something because all of your doing is telling someone that you're feeling a certain way and you have a need. And sometimes it might be just most of the time, it's just a communication breakdown. I don't know, I'm thinking something differently than what actually happened or what was actually said or whatever it might be. Usually it's communication breakdown but it's a beautiful thing. If you find yourself getting defensive and arguments escalating and or arguments never resolving, it's a beautiful way to resolve. Sorry, that went a long time like this. It's such a simple thing that changed my life forever. I think this is one of the most important things we could give to listeners because truly like that, I feel and maybe give an example and it doesn't have to be personal just randomly but just so someone could like walk through what it might sound like. I feel maybe sad when you forget to tell me you're gonna be home late and I need you to just maybe text me next time if you're gonna be late. Would that be one that that's just random? But is that like- Yeah, and it could be something very simple like that or I feel hurt. Yeah, and I feel like it looks important to me. Yeah, I feel hurt. Say I hadn't told my partner about this call that's happening today, right? And then she finds out about it later. You did a podcast with your ex wife or whatever. Like as you could say, I feel hurt that you would have that important of a, that's out into the world, right? Or whatever, I feel hurt that you didn't talk to me that you did that podcast without talking to me first. I need you to communicate before doing something on a social platform. I don't know, something like that. That could be like a bigger one. Oh, that's great. That's so, so helpful. And embedded in that is like we said, mutual respect. One thing that goes very close with that is this, there's a name for it. I'm probably not gonna say it right, but it's this assumption of goodwill, assumption of goodness. And the other, again, this can be business. It can be at work. It can be in your partners. It can be children with parents, parents with children or family members. But when we come to the table and I assume, Erin, that your intent is good towards me as a friend or I assume my partner's intent is good, that assumption of goodness and giving them the benefit of the doubt also, right? Because so often what we do is our monkey minds go down in tangent. Oh, he's late, he must not love me. He must not believe I'm valued, my time is valuable. We make assumptions and 99% of the time they're freaking wrong, right? And then we're down this rabbit hole assuming like, oh my gosh, the life is over because they don't love me and this and that. And it's like total false anyway. And again, as long as we have a fairly healthy foundation most of the time we want to do good for our relationships, right? So we're right in assuming the best about another person. And even with us, with the downfall of our relationship both of us I think we had a rough little patch in the very beginning because it was so traumatic but in general the last five years we have almost always assumed goodness in the other person. Like I assume that you mean well even if you say something that hurts me or like, oh, he meant, he didn't mean that or same with you to me, right? Like the ways that we assume and that really it's like the opposite of contempt. It is this assumption of goodness, assumption of kindness, assumption of and that goes a long way too, doesn't it? Yes it does, it absolutely, and that's a hard one. It is, because our monkey minds will make stories, right? Actually even doing reminders for yourself. Like I have my reminders list it's never like get the groceries My reminder lists are I feel blank when it because blank I need blank. So that's another reminder, like assume the best, assume good, like those are great reminders to give yourself. So we said that I feel statements huge and that's really the opposite of criticism here. Contempt is building the opposite would be building a culture of love and appreciation and assuming the best about your partner or your family member or your business co-worker or whatever, assuming the best. Another thing is taking responsibility, right? That's a hard one, that's where defensiveness can come in. But if we just, if we hear someone and instead of going usually what happens is the parts of ourselves, the younger parts of ourselves that were maybe hurt or belittled or shamed, they go automatically to, oh my gosh, I can't be, you and I both, I'm gonna say this and I hope it's okay Erin, but we had things around like we wanna be good, right? We wanna be good. We wanted so badly to be good and to be perceived as good, but also to be good. Like we wanted to be good people. And so if anyone would ever say you're bad or if we would infer to one another, you did this and I'm upset and inferring, that's a big wound we both had, right? So I can guarantee before I did all the work, if you would have said something that made me feel shame, I probably would have been very defensive. So if we can be aware of those triggers and be like, oh my gosh, that's my little girl part that's afraid of being bad. He didn't mean to, you know, but that's a big one, isn't it, the defensiveness? It's so huge. And I think that's still a big one for me. There's so many, just so you know, like all of these things, I never get them all 100% right. Absolutely. Of all of them, that is the one that I have to remind myself more and like more than anything else because catching myself being angry because I perceive that somebody thinks I'm bad. Yes. It's just like a, it's a huge one. It's a huge one. I joke, I joke with my friend the other day, we're talking about shame and how, and I have a best friend who's a neuropsychologist and she's, you know her, she's amazing. I always say I get secretly terrified all the time. I'm so lucky. But we talk about shame openly and it's so beautiful. We have this joke, we have shame lip glosses, like makes the shame okay to talk about. So like, get out your shame lip gloss. I have a story to tell you. And then we'll share. And when you bring shame to the light, it takes away its power. The power of shame is when we're alone and we think we're the only ones that have the shame about this feeling of someone said something that hurt our feelings, that or we, you know, something went wrong and we're like, we feel really bad about how it ended up. The shame that we feel is gonna be more powerful if we don't share it. But if we have a close friend or relationship where we can talk about it and literally say, I've got a shame story for you. I do that all the time with her. And she does that with me. And what happens when we talk, we laugh and it totally takes away the power of shame because shame, when you look at the data again, Bernie Brown's written, if she's the researcher on shame, the data shows some of the most horrific crimes and people who've done really awful things come from shame. Shame is not a motivator, it's not a good thing. And all of us have it, it's human, right? But that shame, so back to relationships, if you can notice and be aware enough of yourself to notice your triggers. And again, before I think we didn't know that now that we've done the work, now we know, oh, this is a trigger for me. Like I want to, I struggle with perfectionism, right? So if I view that someone thinks I'm not doing things right or good or perfect, which I never do anyway, right? We're all human. That can be a trigger for me. And now I'm aware of it. So I'm like, no, no, no, good is okay. I did my best and that matters. Another trigger might be worthy. If someone makes me feel unworthy or someone, another trigger for me might be like performance. So if I get a poor grade or if I don't do a great job, all these things for like each of us we have our own triggers. And if we can become aware of those, then a partner might say something that's totally innocuous. It's not meant to hurt us at all. But if it hits our little girl trigger that we were wounded, right, then we get all defensive. Yeah, and it's super, super easy. I've got an example of that one. And the irony of shame is for me, a lot of times I could have that shame without anything of, it could be something I'm thinking about the future that could happen. And I've got shame for it. And I'm like, what the heck is my problem with that? I had a situation the other day when I got frustrated and short with my partner. And it came down to the fact that I was stressed. And I felt shame because I didn't feel like I was doing a good enough job with my job. Oh. And she never said anything. It's just this story that's playing in my head. And for whatever reason, I twisted it around so that she's saying that I'm not good at my job or something. And she never said anything about my job. It was all internal in my mind of what if I fail at this or what if I fail at that? I know that doesn't make a lot of sense because it's everything that was playing out in my head. But my point is it doesn't even have to be like, if you can be so worried about your performance and about not being good, but it can mess up things that have nothing to do with. They weren't meant to. And I love that you said that. That's the other piece of communication is we can actually talk to our partners, those close to us, whether it's friends or love romantic relationships and say, you know what, I really struggle with this and I need you to help me. And actually you can give them the power to help you be accountable for your areas of weakness where they might actually say, oh, I bet, like they start to notice and help you not go down that path, not go down that path to assume the worst or to assume, you know, whatever triggers. So it's great if you're in a relationship to know your partner's triggers and know the areas where they maybe don't feel good enough in this area or they feel valuable or they feel but all the things that we all have as humans and because you can help them, you can actually be their cheerleader in that time where they go down a slippery slope and think something that's maybe not true at all. The way that was resolved, I actually was leaving and getting in my car after that without resolution. I recognized what happened. I recognized the trigger. I recognized that I just had some internal things going on, some fears about how I would be perceived and how I perceived myself. And I went back in the house and I said, I'm sorry. And this wasn't an, I feel statement for, I needed for her, like my, I feel my I need was, please forgive me, but it was like, I felt this when you said this and I know it has nothing to do with this. But when you said this thing, I can't even remember what she said, my mind went to, I'm not good enough. And she knows that that's one of my things, right? And I said, I just need you to forgive me. I'm sorry for that. Completely resolved. And it's because of two things, recognizing that trigger around Shane and not feeling good enough and also going in and helping her to understand why I got so upset and helping her to know that she did nothing wrong and I know that, but also revealing to her what it was that got me all twisted up. Yeah, yeah, cause again, cause we all have these triggers. And so if we can, and you really can't share with your partner, part of our downfall was we didn't know our own triggers, right? We were just living life reacting. And so we didn't understand these old shame triggers, trauma, the things that we dealt with. So we had no awareness. So one of the things I wanna leave, if you're listening that you really super important, there's so many ways to do the work. You can read books, you can do it on your and you can get a professional therapist. You can go to onsite and there's more than that. And if you're in the chat box and have some ideas, you can suggest them too. But the truth is until you become self-aware and start to understand your own self, your psyche and your childhood and what led to being, creating the being that you are in the world, you can never really show up in a relationship because you're just reacting, you're reactive. And you can't take ownership of your own self and trauma and triggers until you know yourself, right? And again, if I look back at you and I almost 20 years before our divorce, so a lot of years together, we did a lot right. We played together, we had fun together, we were kind and we were respectful in general, all those things were there. But we didn't know how to express our needs. We didn't really allow the other to really see ourselves. We put on a mask and said, this is the perfect version of myself, but don't go too close and don't see too much because you'll see my flaws. What else would you say were things that we learned since but at the time maybe were things that led to our divorce? Well, the interesting thing is we were really, those years, right? The year or two leading up to the divorce, like if from the outside world, we looked like we were both very successful. We were being, we were successful. We were doing well. And on the outside, it looked, everything looked beautiful and wonderful. I would say one of the biggest things is we began, we started living parallel lives. And we would give one another just enough, but our lives, they split and they went completely parallel. And I think that was one of the biggest things is we quit being partners and we quit being a team and we became more, I'm over here applauding you as a solo artist and I'm over there applauding you as a solo artist rather than us, like being a part of one another's lives. And we did rose-colored glasses all the time. Oh yeah, because, oh, that's briefly, it's so discerning to interrupt you, but I was just like, this is hilarious because when we know enneagrams, if you're listening and you don't enneagram, find out your type, get to know that, but there's something that I think is so funny because Erin, you're a seven, which is amazingly fun, excitement, loves adventure, hates missing out. You don't like fear and I'm a nine and I am very spiritual, sees all sides of the story, hates conflict and I don't like conflict. So we have no fear, no conflict. Guess what? That was part of the problem too because we both didn't know how to navigate. I hated conflict and I thought it meant end of the world. Like I was catastrophic with conflict. Now I know when you resolve and repair in a relationship, that's the best way to grow. Did you know that? It's the best thing you could have in your relationship as long as you know how to be respectful and avoid the four horsemen and know how to actually be kind and respectful because you learn, but I avoided it and fear and was there anything else that I missed there? But like those two things, the Enneagram seven and nine, we had a lot of fun, but we avoided fear and conflict, didn't we? Yeah, absolutely. And that's, I think that's part of it. Like when you're talking about wearing a mask or whatever, for me as a seven, what that looked like is I'm feeling pain. I'm experiencing pain. Pain, that's what I meant, not your pain totally, yeah. Yeah, fear is right as well, it's like you do not wanna feel bad. You wanna feel only good. So like that's why a lot of sevens have a lot of issues with dependency on different things, substances or whatever. And you just wanna be having fun all the time, which it's not, I mean, if you're gonna have a flaw to wanna have fun all the time, it's not that bad. No, it's not. That's a pretty good one to have. But when you're in a relationship, that's just, you're never, you're not going deep. Like intimacy, like I agree with you and it's weird because I'm talking about my current relationship at the same time we talk about the failure of our relationship, but that it's part of what's making this one successful is the fact that when we have conflict, we go deep and we understand one another and we allow ourselves to be real and honest and authentic and tell one another our needs. And it's crazy, the difference. And every time you come out of it you're like, we are stronger. I love that. You're a perfect example. Cause that's what, if it were me five, 10 years ago, I've been like, oh, conflict means like really bad things happen. And that's just not true, right? Conflict is, and what I love is the repair, the repair process. If you can do it respectfully with all the tips we just talked about, it will almost always lead to closer intimacy. Instead of, and you and I weren't avoidants, we were in this pattern of avoidance. Anything difficult, we just kind of avoided and we went to our happy, you know, let's pretend let's paint it all good. Intimacy, I write in my book about this, into me see, right? It's kind of like letting someone see into yourself. And we both had a mask on. And again, it wasn't like our marriage was all bad, but we kept a distance. We didn't really let the other person get to know us because we were afraid and we thought we weren't worthy and all these things we just talked about, right? Yeah, I think if you wanted to distill it down, the root of everything was fear. Yes. Like fear drove everything and fear was the thing we were afraid of, right? Like it's this really weird thing, like we feared intimacy, you know? We feared being alone, but we were alone when we were together, which was an interesting thing. It's an insane, insane thing, but yeah. And I love, that's why that Bernay Brown quote, I'm gonna read one more time. True belonging doesn't require us to change who we are. It requires us to be who we are. And we all long for belonging in the world and relationships and family. And so often we don't feel like we belong or feel like we have to be something else, but the true belonging is where we can actually be the most ourselves, right? And if anything should have true belonging and partnership, it's in an intimate relationship. Wow. If you want intimate relationships, think about your friendships before and after our divorce. Like for me, my friendships, I've always had, I've been really, it's easy for me to make friends as a seven, like I have a lot of friends. But like, you can be a lot more real. You'd be a lot more honest. And it's, and sometimes you scare people away because you're so, you know, but you can really get to some depth with your friends. And that's huge. That is huge. It really is. And I think our society now, especially post pandemic, being isolated and now people are sick and there was a lot of fear. Now more than ever, we need belonging. We need acceptance. We need kindness. We need forgiveness. And this is where we model for the world. I mean, our world is in chaos right now. There's a lot of conflict. There's a lot of evil going on. And if anywhere where we can model, it's in our relationships. This is where it starts. We practice here. And then we can go out in the world and try to do the same thing on a bigger scale. But it really, really starts in our own relationships with friends and family and loved ones, doesn't it? Yeah. So we kind of talked about what we did right, what we did wrong. What would you say, Erin, is some of the best advice? You might have already given some tips. If we had to boil it down to some of the best advice, you could give someone who's maybe struggling in a relationship. What kind of advice would you give? I would say, look internally. Yeah. I would say, ask yourself what you're feeling and why you're feeling those things and acknowledge what you're feeling, know what you're thinking, and then be open and honest about what you're feeling. And if you're in red alert, if sirens are going and everything else, communicate, communicate, communicate, let it be known, red alert, I'm hurting, I'm falling. I think that's a huge thing. That's something that I was not able to do. And I regret that, but I wasn't able to do that. And I don't ever want to be that anymore. I want to be able to reveal this is where I'm at. But I think that's a really, really, really big one. I love that. I think that's so true. And we didn't talk much about the downfall, but just very briefly. I had had mold related illness. I was way sicker than I knew. One of the things about mold that's so weird is it almost takes away your ability to understand how badly you're really hurting. So same thing. So that contributed as well. That's not an excuse by any means, but that actually made me even more disoriented and numb to what was actually happening and more unavailable to you as a partner at that time, Erin. So the mold related illness and things were changing because that my clinic was moving, it was chaos in my life. You had unbeknownst been bit by thousands of ticks in Virginia and got contracted Lyme disease, which affects brain and body as well. And then you lost your father. Your mother was very ill the year we separated. And then you're one of your dearest friends who you managed the career. And I remember what's interesting. I just recently read about this and I think I shared it with you. You were numb at that time, weren't you? And if your partner's in a place where they're in massive trauma and I was too, I didn't know it, we were both numb and these things led to us being completely numb and really not able to connect. Even if we had wanted to, there was so much trauma with both of us at that time. I don't think we could have, if we wanted to, but because our foundation was kind of shaky, it didn't take much for things to really collapse under those circumstances, right? Absolutely. And you don't wanna make the excuse of Lyme and mold, but it's interesting because I'm working with a lot of people with Lyme and mold issues right now. And the interesting thing is they're almost always in relationships where the spouse, it is so huge for the spouse to be there for them because it's such a difficult journey. And here you and I are both in this place where we're needing the other to be there for us. We were sick really, if we're on it. Both of us are needing the other person to do it. So like it was a really weird thing. So there was that, but I 100% agree but I wouldn't blame it on the mold on Lyme. I think we didn't communicate. We hadn't dealt with our stuff, you know? We had the mask on and to the world we looked amazing. But inside I was a little boy that was hurting greatly or a little girl that was hurting. And we needed to get to that. We needed to get to those issues and deal with them. And I'm really, really, really glad we did. I know that's the thing now, if you're out there listening and maybe you're in the process of divorce, you've just gotten divorced, your relationships in crisis. What I didn't know, divorce wasn't part of my vocabulary growing up, something I never in a million years thought would happen to me. And I grew up a very conservative Christian family and that just wasn't part of what I believed in. Now I know sometimes there is expiration dates and I won't go into the spiritual where I'm at as far as those details, but what happened was I actually felt like there was an expiration and there was a reason. And now I look back and God did so much healing in my life by taking us apart. And again, now we can show up much more healthy in our relationships, but that would have never, never, never happened had we stayed. And that may sound contrary to some of you, what you believe, and I respect that, but I'm just gonna say it was the best thing that could have ever happened for me. And I think for you too, Erin, as far as growth and development for us as humans and for us in the world and for us in relationship and even now our friendship, and I wanna end in a few minutes about what we're doing together as far as projects, but what's your thoughts on that? It's interesting you say that because I mean, you can carry a lot of guilt around from that, especially when you're talking about values and belief systems and those type of things. And I understand and respect it so much, but I think when you're brought up in that tradition and that tradition says, no, you're in it forever or whatever it might be. And a big part of that tradition is you are one, you've become one and I understand that. I would say that we said the vows and we lived a life that appeared that we were one, but we weren't two separate little children on separate little islands. Yeah, yeah. That hung out together a long time, right? I would say, post-divorce, once we did the work on our own, you and I are more one than we ever were our 20 years married. I feel because we feel so much connected not only to one another, but the world. And we have so much more love to give because we receive it now. Yeah. And it doesn't take away from our current relationships. I'm not saying in a sense that you and I have something that, no, that relationship is different. That's that more intimate relationship and everything. It's not meant to take away from my relationship because my goodness, that's what that is. And just for the record, I love and respect your girlfriend so much. I love your girlfriend so much. I almost know one another and we have the utmost, utmost respect. But that's an interesting thing because I care about you more. I love you more. I trust you more and I serve you more. But it's because it's out of a right heart. So I don't know. I don't think that's an interesting thing. I think people have a box or what it uses. This is supposed to be live. For example, soulmates. I really believe there's these soul connections we have that we have work to do in this life and God brings those people in our life. And I always thought soulmate was like a lover. And I realized, like, again, I talked to my best friend, she's a soulmate. And I was like, oh, you can have friends that are so, that you have purpose in common and a common mission in life and common connection. And some of these relationships transcend a definition of what the world says it should be. I think that's how we feel is the sense of like, we have work to do together. We have a purpose. We've learned so much and we have deep respect for one another and gratitude. But we also have our own relationships and they're very different. And again, we have respect for that in the sense of just honoring them as well and, you know, in our lives. Julie, I think this relationship now, our relationship now is such an active service to other people. And hopefully this podcast is an active service to people. Hopefully you get love out of this and that you don't get that we've done this perfect thing outside of, you know, on the other side of divorce or whatever it is, just that- No, we're at work in progress, right? We're at work in progress. The main thing is what our relationship now is about loving and serving other people. Yeah, yeah. And we can encourage one another to do that. And so hopefully we can do that. And maybe this podcast will save your marriage. Maybe it will save you. Like that you can finally get your own stuff together, whatever it might be. But I feel that that is, that's the beauty. That's the beauty, you know. I love it. Yeah, like I said, I hope this has been helpful to you listening. I would love feedback, comments anywhere, anytime you're listening, please share. And what I want to end with though is, what are we doing? We're doing something pretty crazy now. I'll maybe frame it and then I want to hear what you have to say. But about a year ago, I just was sitting in my chair, was in the beginning of 2021. And I had this thought, you know, I'm writing a book and that's great to reach people with a story of functional medicine and some of those healing things. But people were switching to screens because of COVID and that we need to be on screens. And obviously you have the background. I introduced you with lots of production and film and experience in the entertainment world. And you're very, very good at what you do. But I had this thought of, what if I make a documentary? But then I'm like, who am I? I don't know anything. But what I find is when I go into that place and talk to God and he reveals the direction to go, he brings all the people and resources. And within a week or two, we had talked, you had a friend who's a director, Dan, who you're currently working with. And we all said, let's do this, right? And then within a long story short, we're creating a documentary together. You and Dan has embarked features and Mia's story and different pieces there. But I'm so excited now to work with you to bring this story to the world about not only functional medicine, but environmental toxicity and relational toxicity, trauma and all of these things that really, really impact our health, probably even greater than the toxic load in our environment. Yeah, and it's exciting. And to talk about that oneness thing again, if you remember right, like I called you, you're thinking those things. I called you and I'm like, I think we're supposed to do something together. And I was thinking more, I'd been watching a lot of masterclasses throughout the pandemic. And I think I said, I called you and I said, maybe we're supposed to do something to get this message out. It's too important. And I said, is it a masterclass? And I remember you're on the other end of the phone and you're like, this is crazy, but I'm thinking about it. And then you said, you mentioned the documentary. I'm like, oh my gosh. Yeah, and again, you're a producer, director. You've got so many talents in this and I don't have any of that. I have a story to tell, but it was so neat how that and we've been working together for the last 18 months. And actually, yeah, it's maybe 15 months because it was January, but what was neat is as we came together with this common goal of really reaching the world with love and compassion and transforming healing, transforming people by even introducing them to functional medicine, everything came together. We had funding from a brilliant, amazing investor who has become a friend to both of us. We had a timeline. We had amazing as we got crewed together when we were filming here in Colorado. I mean, what's amazing is we both said as we've been doing this, it's those day-to-day interactions that are what this is all about. The end product, we're gonna get a documentary, but tell me just a little about what you're perspective because I know I've seen every single time we get together and film with the crew and all the stuff we've been doing, it's amazing what happens. It's like magic. Yeah, I think that's the biggest part of this is being present and every single day and every single aspect of this film. And we've got a goal and we've got a desire and the biggest desire is to love and impact people, to love and impact people, right? Yes, say that again, Erin, but that's really important. Say that again. We want to love and impact people, to love and impact people. Like Daniel and I, when we started in Bark Features, we said we wanna make films that just encourage people to step out and make a difference and love people so that they go love people and on and on and on. And that's why we're doing this. But if you're doing that and you're not treating people right in the process or treating yourself right in the process, sometimes I have a harder time with, I mean, why are you doing it? All we have guaranteed is today. And so through the process, we've just been trying to love on the crew and encourage them and one another. Daniel and I, I'm in a house right now. Dan came to New Jersey and we've been... You guys are editing right now, right? Like, we're in the middle of editing. Like we've stopped work for the day. Like we've been working like really long days and we've been doing a lot of editing. We just stopped. So we're a little house right next to the ocean doing some pretty intense editing. But even in that, like, you'll get frustrated and like, why isn't this not going the right way? And even for ourselves, just being able to have mercy with one another and mercy for ourselves and just loving ourselves through this process. And it's been teaching me so much as I go through this. So, so, so much. And so I'm excited to bring it to this. I wanted to say that because I don't know how many people, you know, kind of do a project like this with an ex-spouse. And again, our partners are so supportive. It's been amazing because on all levels that we've had really, it's been really special. But I feel like... She said to me, she goes, I said, hey, I've got to go. I'm going to jump on this podcast with Jill. And she goes, oh, is this your BFF podcast? I love it. I love it. That is so awesome. I wanted to share this as we end or just about out of time, but we've even seen like, even you and I and how we interact, people don't know, well, they know our names. So they're like, Carnahan, are you brother? Is that your brother? I've gotten, well, no, but oh, you know, my ex-husband is producing the movie. So, but I was going to say there's been two specific things I remember and you might even remember more. One in particular was I'm talking, you guys are filming and interviewing me and you had got to part about what happened with the divorce and I shared some deep hurt and some difficulties. And literally the crew, hour later, they're like, Aaron, you're behind the camera, right? And they're like, looking at you like, you were the ex-husband? Because they had basically seen us interacting together and then I'm telling just the hurt part, you know, that we got through and got over and they're literally like shock that you're her ex-husband, the one she was just talking about. And then the other thing I remember, we did a climate special event and it was really, really cool. It was scary for me and it was so awesome, the support I felt and everything and one of our climbing film crew afterwards, she was like, I want to know more about this, how you guys after divorce, she was in the middle of a, I know now more a crisis, literally a crisis in her relationship. And she looked at us and just we were being friends like we always are kind and respectful and working together. She looked at that and said, this document is great, but I want to know your story, what happened that you can work together so respectfully and kind after a divorce? You remember those two things? Yeah, yeah, I do, I do. And I think that's, that's the, that's how you get those moments where you're like, we're doing something right. We're doing something right. We're doing something right. And so I feel that it's gonna be, it's gonna be really special. I feel that this is right and I hope it's a blessing to people as well. Yes. And if there needs to be any clarifications or questions, you know. Yeah, we might have to do a follow-up. We'll see how people like this and then we might have to do another Q and A. Or they're gonna be like, oh my gosh. Not again. And the other thing is stay tuned because we'll keep you posted about the documentary. Maybe I'll have you and Dan on to share as we get closer to the process. But yeah, thank you for taking time out of your editing. Thank you as always for being here today with me. It is truly my honor and privilege and I'm so thankful for that. All mine, all mine. It's beautiful. Thank you so much. Thanks.