 We demystify what goes on behind the therapy room door. Join us on this voyage of discovery and co-creative conversations. This is The Therapy Show, behind closed doors podcast, with Bob Cook and Jackie Jones. Welcome back to the next episode of The Therapy Show behind closed doors with myself Jackie Jones and the wonderful Mr Bob Cook and what we're going to be talking about this week Bob is working with parental interjects in the therapy process. I love this topic. Oh well leading up to Christmas I've got a lot to say about it by the way but and I do like your jumpers for people on the YouTube. It says Holly Jolly Xmas. But people are just on Spotify or podcasts. You're really missing a treat but you can go over to Bob Cook's YouTube channel and you can actually see the visual, the actual visual representation of the jumper. Lovely. What will really fill you full of Christmas cheer. Because we need to get into the Christmas spirit. It's been one of those years again Bob, isn't it? But we're coming up to the end of 2023. I can't believe it. I've only just got used to writing 2023 as the date and now it's going to be 2024. I can't believe it. Can't believe it. Anyway so what do you love about this subject then? This seems to come up an awful lot in my therapy sessions with people. That internal dialogue and that internal voice you know yeah people refer to it as those voices in my head a lot of the time. Yeah those voices either giving you permissions. Generally the opposite. Or so can because they've usually come to therapy. Yeah. Giving negative messages. Absolutely yeah. And when we look at resilience by way the development of resilience I think what we're talking about is very much in this ballpark. Because one of the aspects of developing resilience. I know the podcast is not on developing resilience. I think is helping the client be aware of the negative internalised messages. And then helping the client make connection with what would develop resilience instead of the annihilation of self-esteem which is what toxic messages do. And what will help a more resilient person if you like is positive narratives where people are kind on themselves and actually have a compassionate narrative from a significant other person which they can internalise in place if you like. Yeah. Toxic narrative and that will help build up resilience so then don't feel so overwhelmed. Absolutely. I love the way that you put that Bob because that's what it's all about is that awareness for me is the key the first step is to notice that voice because often we it's it's been there for that long. We don't really pay much attention to it. We don't notice it's there. We just get the feeling and the message of negativity from it. So here's here's something I don't ask you as a professional therapist. How do you help a person be aware of the negative dialogue amongst that general chatter that they hear inside their you know neurological processes? For me, one of the things I say an awful lot with clients is you just slow the thoughts down. That to me is the first step to being aware of it is to notice the thoughts and to slow them down. And I usually say something to them like whose voice is it? Because I don't know what goes on in other people's heads, Bob, but in mine, I hear my voice in my head. You know, when I'm thinking I hear the thoughts, but then there's another voice that doesn't belong to me that's going on as well. So it's noticing which thoughts are mine, and which aren't mine, which are those parental interjections. And it's always negative with me. So when you say slow the sort of tape down, if you like. Yeah. If I thought of that in practical terms, what would they be doing? To slow down their thought process? I get them to challenge those thoughts. How? I talk about taking the thoughts to court. First of all, you've got to you've got to notice them. Yes. It's the feeling that they get with the thinking. I think is the first thing that often is picked up on. So feeling angry, frightened, stressed. Yeah. Just that negative feeling, you know, the what ifs and I can't do that. I'm not good enough. All those sort of scenarios. So what do you mean by taking the negative dialogue to court? Because that's a really interesting expression I've not heard before. I just get them to challenge it. Things like I'm not good enough, then kind of challenge that thought and take it to court and find of, you know, examples where you have been good enough and you have to cheat it and you have done it. Rather than just taking it as reality. What a wonderful concept. Well, thank you. And do you find that it works? It certainly gives them food for thoughts. It's heightening them noticing the dialogue that they have got. Because I think a lot of this is done out of awareness. We don't even notice those thoughts. No, I was thinking of a client who if she got, if she got bad news, you know, one day, then bad news the second day and bad news the third day, she'd be so overwhelmed that the overwhelmingness led to negative catastrophisation in her thinking. And the negative catastrophisation in her thinking or negative dialogue would mean she felt even more overwhelmed and then she'd have sort of mini collapse and take time off work. Yeah. And I think that's what I mean by slow it down so that chain reaction doesn't happen of one thing leading to another to another and then getting overwhelmed. If we can slow it down and challenge that thinking, then we've got the opportunity to do something different. I think it's interesting to be, and I think it has what happens with a lot of clients that I used to see, where I was quick as a flash if that's right. Yeah, very quick anyway. Yeah. They went into negative thinking from feeling overwhelmed. Yes. That they feel overwhelmed with the bad news, say, or whatever it is. And that goes straight into negative thinking and catastrophising. Yeah. That leads to feeling even more hopeless, then that leads to feeling anxious, then that leads to more hopelessness, and then there's a collapse. Absolutely. Yeah. That's slowing down right at the beginning when they hear the bad news and they start to feel overwhelmed and going to negative thinking. That's when it needs to be challenged. It's like, well, what's the positive side of this? I can choose to go to negative thinking or I could actually do something else. Yeah. And knowing that there is a choice, that we don't need to chain reaction right to the end. We can stop it at any point when we're when we're aware of it. And where do you think this comes from? This I hear this in so many clients you see over my 30 odd years. So where do you think this pattern we're talking about actually? Where's the origin come from? From our primary caregivers when we're growing up, whoever that might be. So so this is the podcast we're talking about, of course, is they've taken on that pattern. Yeah. The beliefs and values and everything really. Yeah. One of their caretaker figures. Yeah. So they either hear their caretaker figures in their head negatively. Yeah. Or they've got them or they've got a model of that behaviour, or both. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And it. I think, you know, for some, it often feels like it's actually part of them. It's part of the DNA. You know, that they've not inherited it, picked it up, that it is actually part of of who they are. When the reality is often it's not. You think mindfulness would be how would help in the slowing down bit for your talk. Yeah. Being in the here and now, you know, often I think with these, you know, parental interjects, there's a lot of predicting the future goes with it. Do you know what I mean? Well, if I do that, X, Y and Z is going to happen. When the reality is we don't know if we can be in the here and now and practice mindfulness, like you said, that gives us the opportunity to actually. Explore the thoughts. That's all. And I think one of the keys here this podcast and what you've just said is, you know, the question who's negative thoughts could they be? And have we got different options instead of taking them on? Yeah. Yeah. Do you think there's a lot of behaviour involved in that as well? You know, like the nature, nurture debate that's always going on that, you know, to mean, if if you've got quite a negative parent that's anxious and gets overwhelmed and catastrophises, it's all part and parcel of it. Yes, that's what I meant by the question to definitely learn behaviour. Yeah. Definitely. And often, often people have different types of parenting. So one parent could be the way we just talked about. Yeah. Another parent could be another way, which could be equally negative, but might have a positive part to it that they've actually could utilise but haven't done for some reason. Yes. I suppose, you know, the reality of having two parents that are quite different, there will be one that overpowers the other in a physical sense as we're growing up. So that, you know, the two voices in our heads, so to speak, is probably quite the same. You know, for me, one of my parents was really risk averse. And the other one was a really big risk taker. So I've got two completely different parts of me. One that's kind of very gung ho. And yes, I can do it. And then there's another one that goes, oh, I don't think we should be doing that. And the skill on the end of the day is to find your own. Exactly. Yeah. Yes. That is what I think therapy is really good for, is to work out what parts are working and what parts aren't. I think T.A. is particularly good for this. Yeah, because they have the concept of script. Yes. Yeah. In other words, they have the concept that we take on a blueprint, if you like, from our significant other people. And we follow that blueprint or the decisions that we've made in making up the blueprint. Yeah. As an attempt to cope or survive in life. Which in T.A. they call script. Yes. Yeah. People come to therapy really to understand that blueprint, understand who they are and if it's not working for them to find a way to find their own blueprint. Yeah. Not an easy job, but that's No. No. B.A. is quite useful. Quite, I think, useful as an and an accessible model, if you like, to help a person do that. Yeah. I think, you know, one of the the important things for me is kind of when we realise that we have got this internal dialogue that's going on is to differentiate our voice from it. And, you know what I mean, to kind of identify it. So that we can then observe it as opposed to actually feeling like it's as if that makes sense. No, I totally agree. And I think that somebody taught me a long time ago that the therapist needs to be more potent than that negative parent voice. Yeah. Now, for the therapist, listen to people who listen to this podcast and maybe have a different view, in other words, staying behind the client and not stepping in or whatever frame we want to come from. I'm not saying I disagree with that. What I'm saying is that I think it's useful for the therapist to have a more potent voice than the negative internalised parent that the person's often adopted. Yeah. Me too, particularly in a therapeutic setting. It's kind of like somebody's got your back. You're not in the fight on your own, I think, when you've got a potent therapist. Yeah. And in TA, they have the idea of what's called a parent interview. Where you might ask the client to role play or be that internalised negative parent, even if it's only for a few minutes and the therapist would have a dialogue with the internalised parent to find out or help. Find out what it's all about. Yeah. In other words, how come there being that way with their son or daughter. Which I think is really powerful. I've observed that being done in my, you know, when the training or whatever. And it was really powerful. I mean, the trick in that, of course, is that the therapist really needs to avoid getting into competition with the internalised parents. And I need to I need to find a way to come us alongside the vulnerable part of the parent. Because that's where the negative script will come from. Yeah. Yeah. It's an extension of what we did a podcast on, actually, years ago, a long time ago, 15 or 20, which is to check what you they go backwards and forwards to parts of themselves. Yeah, absolutely. I'm going off soon to teach some therapist in. Lubeana, which is part of Slovenia, on I'm going to do a demonstration of a parent interview. And then teach of it. Wow, they are extremely powerful that the technique on me. Absolutely. Yeah. It helps most more more than anything else. It helps empower the client that's a technique. But as as important, it helps them. Differentiate out from their own voice. And whose parents voice they're actually hearing. Yeah. Yeah. And then there's something about it, you know, to me being able to to reframe that or to replace that negative dialogue with a more positive self dialogue, I suppose. Yeah. So I think the therapist needs to use nurturing nurturing channel. Yeah. Increased empathy to contact the vulnerable child and to get to a negative dialogue, if you like. Now, interestingly enough, even in the most dysfunctional families, usually somewhere, you'll find a positive, internalised voice. Could be the grandmother. Yeah. Grandfather. Could be a cousin. Could be an older sibling. You will find that somewhere. Could be even Father Christmas. Given what we're talking about here. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The absent parents or the absent person. Yeah. Or the fantasy Father Christmas. In other words. What the client desired would happen. But actually, perhaps never did. Yeah. Do you think his therapists were in there somewhere? At a later date? If they're not, find another therapist. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Because if the therapist isn't modelling a different type of internalised significant other person, then what will happen is the continuation of the old blueprint. So the internalisation of positive role models doesn't just happen like when we're forming our script. This is like a lifelong thing that people that influence us or that are a positive have a positive effect on us throughout our life are kind of internalised. Yeah. So I met Richard Erskine when I was 35. I'm now 73 next week. I'm 73. So it's like a long time. And he played a very important part in a lot of my professional development as a very important mentor. Yeah. As you are with me, Bob, you're in me somewhere. Very much. But I was thinking in your job, you know, on your fostering. Yes. Yeah. This is a good example of what we're talking about. You will provide a very important interjected positive other for those people. Those kids growing up. Yeah. I'd like to think so. One actually knocked on my door last week, which was lovely. Yeah. And how many times do you hear people say, oh, that person had a really positive impact on my life. That person will never realise I took this first job with XXX and they showed me the way round and they took me under their wing. In fact, I was just listening to this today. Somebody who was a footballer talking about his first coach. Yeah. Who took him under his wing and helped him develop his football skills. And 10 years, 20 years later, they still remember those kind words. Yeah. Which contracts the negative bias or that negative internal dialogue that we have a lot of the time, which is good. I like it when there's hope, you know what I mean? It's not like this happens to us and there's nothing that we can do about it. When we're aware of all this psychological stuff, then we've got the choice to do something about it moving forward. Yeah. I think that's one of the most important parts of going into therapy. Yeah. As we can develop different options and choices and enhance our life and take ownership and destiny of a new way of being. Absolutely. Yeah. That's the really important part of therapy, I think. And you need a powerful, potent, nurturing, positive therapist who will be more powerful in those negative interjects that my clients often live their lives. Yeah. It's true that and, you know, being potent enough to challenge that negative parental interject when it does rear its ugly head. I think it's important to therapist, does that? Yeah. Often a method I developed a lot and used was I would talk to the parent as if they were in the room. Say, look, I hear you talking like that and I don't believe that is actually what X is saying. How come you're being so negative with your son and daughter here? Please, I don't want you to be like that and if you're going to continue like that I want you to leave this room. And that I would imagine for your client is so powerful. Because they may never have a purpose. Absolutely, yeah. They may never have heard that before or even believed that was possible. Yeah. So you talk to the parent as if they're the third person in the room. Which they are. They are. So therefore, the therapist could do it, couldn't they? Yes. If they thought about it that way. Yeah. Somebody once said to me, it might have actually been your darling wife, Steph, Stephie, that, you know, it's like an amphitheater sometimes. There's that many people in the therapy room. Do you know what I mean? There's our parents and our parents' parents and their parents and everybody. And it's like there is a massive amphitheater of ancestors that are in there with us. So we must make sure that the client takes the spotlight. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. I like that. And not continues to get buried under the avalanche of all these figures. Yeah. That's the positive empowering part of therapy. Absolutely. And it finds, you know, especially I've found out in assessments, well, and you before, of course, do a lot of what they call overthinking. Hmm. And in the overthinking, they do what you started to talk about 25 minutes ago, which is what I call negative catastrophisation. Yeah. They go to if I, if this happens because of that happens, because of this happens, then this could happen. And before they know where they are, they're in the past. Yeah. Talking just like they did when I was a kid. Yeah. Yeah. I survive the actions that might follow from their negative parents or attempt to take some control over the, you know, in the process. So if I do this because of that, because of this underneath it is a desire to take control so they can get a successful outcome. Absolutely. Survival mechanism. Yeah. If I can control this, if I can work out every scenario, then I'll know what to do when it happens. Yeah. And I'll be safe. Absolutely. Yeah. I think that's the crux of 99% of my clients at the moment is that, you know, having a thought and kind of bringing it to life and making a story around it, that then it becomes a thing and it grows legs. It's kind of got its own entity. Yeah. It's exhausting, though. Absolutely. It's tiring. Yes. It's overwhelming. Absolutely. And can lead to depression, darty, a feeling of hopelessness and a justified collapse. Yeah. And the the interesting thing is that it's not reality, Bob. All of that. Reality we create, isn't it? It feels that the feelings are real that comes with it. But we've created this reality from our thoughts, from that internal interjection or whatever you want to call it. Yeah. Yeah. And what happens, of course, we regress to a younger style of thinking. Yeah. And in that process of a younger style of thinking, we are able to see the adult reality of choices. Yeah. We move to a place of limited options. Yeah. And then we overwhelm ourselves and all these things I've just said. We're there at the head. Yeah. Which is worth for me if we can slow all that down back into our logical thinking and in our adults, then we can make better decisions and better choices. Absolutely. Yeah. And I still think the trick is what we talked about right at the beginning of this podcast when I asked you what you mean by slow, you know, what is the practical implications of slowing down? The first step, I think, and you said it anyway, is to be aware that you are overthinking, to be aware that you're not the negative thought. Yes. Be aware that you do have options. Yeah. And then you said, well, one big signal would be feelings. And I agree with you. And they're often feelings in the body. Yes. Absolutely. They're tight stomach. Yeah. Or they're tight calf muscles. Or they're a headache. Yeah. All these things are signals of this process we're talking about. Yeah. And again, it's being aware of those changes when they're happening. You know, they happen so subtly and out of our awareness that we're kind of 50% in it before we even realise what's going on. And it's habitual as well. For me, I think it's habitual behaviour. Whenever I've got a decision to make, it's often habitual stuff I go through. You do. And in TA today, which is a basic TA book by Ian Stewart and Van Joins. And it's got many additions right up to date. It doesn't really matter what addition you buy for what I'm going to say now. One is a good textbook of learning, a personality model to help you in what we're talking about. But also in the back of that book is a wonderful poem. I can't remember who it's by, Nelson Porsche, I think, where she talks about or they talk about how as the person stops, how can I explain this? Start to take charge of this process and take on a new script. They won't take the same road. Yeah. Again, it's a process. It's actually a process really. Yeah, absolutely. It's six chapters to it, six verses to it. But you might find yourself going down the same road. The first step is to be aware that you are going down that road. Yeah. Then you go down that road again and you realise that you are actually going down that road. Yeah. Then you can realise maybe I can go down another road. Yeah. And then you go down that road and then you see a big hole in the road and you fall in. Yeah. And then you realise, well, maybe I can get out of that hole and you get out of that hole, go down another road, still see the same hole, fall in it, but this time you don't stay in the hole so long. Yeah. You get out quicker, go down another road, which in fact has no hole in it at all. Yeah. It's a process, not an event. Absolutely. I love that poem. Yeah. T.A. Today. Good book to learn to transactional analysis. Yes. That poem is in the, that whole poem is in the back of that book. Yeah. And it describes it perfectly, I think, the awareness and then, you know, we do the behaviour, then we're aware that we're doing the behaviour, then we have a choice to change the behaviour and then we do something different. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, because I can often find myself going to default patterns that perhaps I haven't changed, but this time round through a lot of therapy and through a lot of age and many other things, I get out much quicker and go down another road. Yeah. I think for me, it's knowing when I'm in it now. I know when I'm in my script and sometimes I'm in that much of a funk, I want to be in my script and other times I step straight out of it, but it all depends where I am in that moment. The thing is, you've got awareness and choice haven't you, Jackie? Absolutely. Yeah. And that's thanks to therapy. And yourself going to therapy. I met somebody today for an assessment and they have some social anxiety. They couldn't get out of the house and you know, you could say social phobia if you like, but she'd managed to pick up the phone and she'd managed to get out of the house and managed to come to the therapy room and managed to see me. And I thought, oh, you know, whatever you achieve in therapy, it was you that took the first step. Absolutely. And that's why we need to do the therapy. That's not discounting the importance of the therapist, but there's two of them. Yeah. Well done to them. I love it when I hear stories like that, Bob. Yeah, it's humble. This profession is very humbling, I think. It certainly is. It certainly is. So thank you for that. So what we're going to be talking about next time is what are the most successful elements in the therapy process? Great. I think, before Christmas, isn't it? It is the last one. The penultimate one of this year. I'm telling a story. I'm going to do it. I might go overboard. It might take you two minutes more. I used to have a place at home in Gambia, which is in West Africa, which is near Senegal. And we stopped going about, when my daughter was about 12, we stopped going for lots of different reasons. But I always remember when we went the first time. And I had to get used to the poverty, extreme poverty there. And I remember coming back, and I said to Steph, my wife, next Christmas when we came, because we were going on most Christmases, I'm going to bring a wonderful Christmas dinner with sprouts, turkey, roast potatoes, stuffing, apple. I'm going to put some sixpences in, and I'm going to bring a wonderful Christmas cake. I'm going to bring it so that they can really feast, because that's beautiful, because they've level-starved. And my wife looked at me as if I was mad. And she said, you can't do that, Bob. And I said, well, I'd like to do it. I mean, they'll be able to have a feast, won't they? And she said, well, their stomachs are so small and shrunk, they'll be sick. Yeah. And that's a metaphor for therapy. In other words, if you beat people too fast, I want to talk about sequences of therapy, which we're going to do in this podcast. Yeah, they'll be sick. So therapy is a process, never an event. And it needs to be, Bob. I think, yeah, it does. And the older I'm getting, and the more experienced I'm getting, it's so much better. It's like a fine wine, if it's just left to mature and age over time, rather than, you know, these, you can have massive shifts in a short space of time, which is brilliant. Absolutely. The deeper longevity of it, it needs to take the time. It's a good place to start the next podcast, what we're just talking about. We better stop then, Bob. See you next week then. Oh, until next time, speak soon, Bob. Bye-bye.