Ep 45: Reclaiming Your Identity After Addiction (Featuring RJ Zimmerman)

RJ Zimmerman shares his transformative journey from self-hatred to self-discovery after overcoming alcohol addiction and facing the dissolution of his marriage. He reveals how confronting his deepest limiting beliefs allowed him to rebuild his relationship with himself and create a more authentic life.

• Growing up in Wisconsin's drinking culture where alcohol became his escape from self-criticism
• Finding apparent success as a high-voltage line technician, husband, and father while remaining emotionally disconnected
• Starting a podcast about sober living that unexpectedly became a powerful tool for self-understanding
• Discovering he hated himself so deeply he resented his children for loving him
• Learning to challenge his core limiting belief that his existence caused suffering to those he cared about
• Reframing negative self-talk by separating actions from identity
• Recognizing resentments as clues to where we've abandoned ourselves
• Building a coaching practice to help others navigate their own self-discovery journeys

RJ Social Media Links

RJ'S Podcast - Untapped Keg: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/untapped-keg/id1504026399

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/untappedkeg/

Website: https://www.untappedkeg.com/

Chapters

• 0:00 Meeting RJ Zimmerman
• 2:50 Growing Up in Wisconsin's Drinking Culture
• 6:52 Marriage, Success, and Unexpected Divorce
• 12:17 Starting Over Through Self-Discovery
• 17:19 Confronting Self-Hatred and Finding Neutral
• 25:37 Taking Steps Forward After Life Falls Apart
• 38:05 How RJ Helps Others Find Themselves
• 42:03 The Power of Recognizing Resentments

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:09

Welcome to Circumstantially Successful. I'm your host, brennan Millery, and my mission as a lifestyle entrepreneur is to help others become the creators of their lives. Every week, I'm committed to helping you build your power from the inside out. Thank you for tuning in, for believing in yourself and for refusing to be a victim of your circumstances. Hope you enjoy the show. Let's get started.

Speaker 3: 0:34

What's going on everybody? Welcome to another episode of Circumstantially Successful. I'm very excited for today's guest. Today's guest is RJ Zimmerman. So me and RJ met through a networking hub I would say called Synapse Hubs, and RJ has an incredible story. He is a self-discovery coach, he is a dad, he is a business owner and he's just somebody I looked up to. So I'm going to redo that. Hold on, we're going to redo it. I'm going to redo that.

Speaker 2: 1:04

Hold on, we're going to redo it I was out of my zone.

Speaker 3: 1:08

Hold on, oh God, wait, it's fine, I'll just edit it, okay. So Okay, hey everybody. Welcome to another episode of Circumstantially Successful Today's guest is somebody I've come to know over the past couple of months. He is a self-discovery coach, he's a father, he's a business owner and he's a dad. And today's guest is RJ Zimmerman. So RJ has an incredible story and I'm super excited for you all to learn more about him and the work that he does.

Speaker 2: 1:44

Rj, how are you doing man? Rj, how are you doing man? Hey, Brennan, Thanks for having me. I am ups and downs life, I'm just another passenger on that river and navigating those rapids.

Speaker 3: 1:55

Yeah, I appreciate the vulnerability I feel like, especially if you're on a podcast. We have this need sometimes to present ourselves as being more polished than we usually are or feeling better than we usually feel. So let's embrace the highs and lows. And the way I want to start this is getting to know who RJ used to be, because you have had quite the self-discovery journey yourself and the reinvention journey yourself. So, to paint that picture I'd love to talk about, yeah, who was RJ before? Who was the RJ who was just trying to survive, and what happens. Who is RJ now and then? Who do you want to become?

Speaker 2: 2:50

so to start, I think it's important to start I grew up in a small town, uh, in wisconsin, and so I went to school and graduated with 100 people, um 85 to 90 of us went from kindergarten through high school together, so we all knew each other. I went to college in wisconsin and, for those who don't know, wisconsin is drinks the most alcohol the United States, and it's not close. They do a study every single year of the top 50 drunkest counties in the United States. Wisconsin has never had less than 40. They're generally between 43 and 45 out of 50. Out of 50.

Speaker 2: 3:31

So that starts the premise of, you know, growing up I'm the oldest and both my parents were doing the best that they could. However, I was asked to be very responsible from a very young age and taking care of my brother and sister, managing a lot in the house, mentally, physically, emotionally, and so get to high school and there's a lot going on and I decided that you know I'm going to put everything into sports. So basketball and baseball were my sports. I was pretty successful, cut to, you know, my senior year and I go to, you know, my senior homecoming, and I was not a drinker, but I was like you know, this is a special occasion. This first time I get to drink with my peers and I will, because I'm not too worried about uh missing sporting events and so I get drunk, uh, my first time that night, and when I drank it was like putting on active noise, canceling headphones. For the first time, like my mind didn't have so much going on specifically with that critic, with the judgments, and I felt accepted by my peers for the first time in school, like where I was with them, like everybody was talking about how fun I was, how they thought I was a goody two-shoes, all this stuff, and I enjoyed that feeling. I enjoyed shutting my mind up for a little bit and having that acceptance.

Speaker 2: 5:01

So I goes to college, I drink and fall into um, into the you know, into the Wisconsin drinking culture, getting drunk way too much. Um didn't really have any place going in life. I left home, didn't look back, really was lost. And then I looked at my life. One time I got really drunk and I texted my girlfriend at the time. I'm like, hey, I'm not going to be able to make this event that we're supposed to go to. She goes, it's all right, I wasn't planning on you being there anyway. It's like damn, all right. So I was. I looked in the mirror and I had I'd been having a year of of looking in the mirror and being like I'm not gonna be able to drink anymore. I'm not. There's going to be a time where I'm going to have to draw the line that was building up to that point. I can either continue drinking or I can start a family and start a career, and I decided that it was time for me to start a family and start a career.

Speaker 2: 6:08

So a few weeks later, I start my career as a high voltage line tech. There were some bumps in the road. Finally get hired by a utility that girlfriend that I texted that I wasn't going to make it, and she's like, yeah, I kind of figured we end up getting engaged and married. I have a very successful high voltage line tech career. We have two kids. We're starting a business that's really successful it's a daycare have a house. I'm moving up, I'm actually a supervisor, I'm a foreman, um, everything's looking great, everything's looking really successful. And then we have our second kid and we're sitting in the truck after we drove them around the block to get them both fall asleep, to take naps For you parents, you know.

Speaker 2: 6:56

And she turns to me and she says I want a divorce. And I'm like, okay, why? And she explained to me because mentally and emotionally I'm not there. We don't have conversations, I am not doing anything, we don't even really talk anymore. And I was like, okay, give me a year, I'll go to therapy. I'll get diagnosed with ADHD, I'll get on meds. Give me a year, and if a year from now you still want to get divorced, I'll go to therapy. I'll get diagnosed with ADHD, I'll get on meds. Give me a year, and if a year from now you still want to get divorced, I'll sign the papers. I won't put up a fit, just give me a year to work on it with me. She said, okay.

Speaker 2: 7:33

So a year goes by, I get diagnosed with ADHD. I start meds non-stimulants because I was truthful about my story. They're like let's not go with the stimulants in case you're, you know, susceptible to that Um which, if you have ADHD, it turns out you're not. It's not the same thing, but it's. There are things in there where it could be CPTSD. It could be a bunch of different things. You don't know if it's necessarily ADHD, because a lot of it shows up the same and a year goes by. I feel like we're connecting, we're having a really we're doing better.

Speaker 2: 8:11

And it's about a year and a half later, it's spring, the kids are playing in the backyard, we're sitting on the porch having a great chat after we went on a really good vacation, and she turns to me and she says I still want that divorce. And that that was when my heart just absolutely clank. And up until that point I'd been trying to figure out what my emotions were and how to talk about them. I looked, you know, I looked in the mirror and I didn't even know what I was looking at. I'm just like it's just blackness. I just know there's something's not right, something's not good. Well, we talked about it and we wanted to move across the country because we have two kids and we want a better culture to raise them in. And so we decided to wait, move across the country, wait a year, and then just split up.

Speaker 2: 9:09

And so in that year I started a podcast Unsapped Keg. It's really about navigating life without alcohol. I guess I buried the lead. I haven't drank in over 11 years 11, over 11 years and through that podcast it really brought me to the point of being able to understand myself and hear different people's stories and put that onto myself and try different things on and have different perspectives and understandings, and so that was when I started to really make a lot of headway. It wasn't therapy, it was hearing people's experiences and having conversations, putting that on that allowed me to look at things from a perspective of oh, these people have lived it, they understand it Like they're actually and I could take that and I can use it, and that's that's really what sent my self-discovery forward in a major way and I started to understand the conversation.

Speaker 2: 10:23

My tech and I started, you know, doing more in the podcast space, went and got a job that was more of an office job, nine to five, so that when I had the kids 50-50. Knew when I was going to be at work, knew when I was going to be off High voltage line tech. Somebody's out of power, somebody's got to come in and work, and so it can be really chaotic. Come in and work, and so it can be really chaotic. Um, I found life coaching and then alcohol free life coaching through actually listening to a podcast, through this naked mind, and so I went through their academy and got certified through them. They have um. They have a couple different branches of psychology they really pull from, and they pull from in a way that it's really scientific and then there's also philosophical, and that's very much in line with myself.

Speaker 2: 11:18

So with that um, I started a coaching business and I'm also working, you know, full time to make ends meet. But what I'm doing is I'm trying to create that business so that I can move forward in a big way. But with that I found Brene Brown. I found so many different people that allowed me to increase the vocabulary that I have so I could have a conversation with myself. There's a lot of what turns out to be shadow work and conflict management instead of conflict avoidance. Internally, that allowed me to understand myself in a way that I never did before understand that I was showing up to be who other people said I should be, I should want to be, and that's where the disconnect in my life was really coming from.

Speaker 3: 12:15

That people pleaser syndrome. Yes, thank you for sharing that, and I think it's so powerful. And there's a theme that I've seen a lot of times, especially with people who struggle with substance abuse, because, as the people on here know, I also have struggled with substance abuse and a lot of it is low self-esteem, you know it's it's we take substances so we can feel like we're good enough to the people around us, because maybe we don't have the natural inclination to gravitate towards the standard or the status quo when we're younger and because of that, we think that there's something wrong with us and we try to numb our brain and numb our emotions and just numb ourselves and try to fit in, try to fit in the box right, every human being wants to fit in and I'm curious to hear from you, because you've obviously learned a tremendous amount about yourself what's one thing that you've learned about yourself that has impacted you the most?

Speaker 2: 13:29

has impacted you the most the fact that I hated myself so much that I held it against my kids that they loved their dad.

Speaker 2: 13:36

And once I was honest with that fact, I could see where all of the communication inside my head about myself was coming from. I could see why I made decisions that I made, like who I chose to be, my partner, who I chose to date before that, to the coworkers that I would gravitate towards at work, to the friends that I would choose um, a lot of self-sabotaging behavior. And it's coming from a place that, like you said, it's low self-esteem. But that low self-worth and I used to joke like it's not that I, I even have no self-worth is that it's so negative? I don't even know what no self-worth looks like. Yeah, and so once I understood that I hated myself and that's the lens it was coming from I could do something to change the talk that was going on in my head. I could do something to become aware of the actions that I'm taking and get in front of them, so I could change and do something different.

Speaker 3: 14:47

What caused you to stop running from that realization? Because we're so good at that. We're so good at avoiding the parts of ourselves that we don't like, and we're so good at running away from the parts of ourselves that we don't like. So I'm just curious what happened to where you finally made the decision to confront that part of you?

Speaker 2: 15:17

So my kids, when my ex and I were together when I was recording the podcast, sometimes she'd take the kids out and they would play, so then I could have the house pretty quiet. This time she took the kids out and I was having a really low mental health day and the kids come running in and they go daddy, I missed you, I love you. And the first thing that my mind went to was how could you love such a piece of shit? And that moment I caught it, it was really quiet. It was so quiet I almost didn't catch it. But I did catch it and I was like where is that coming from? I'm holding it against my kids that they love their dad. What? This is not okay. And so I took that information, information, that realization, put it to the side for a little bit.

Speaker 2: 16:12

Later that night, when I had time to myself, went in the bathroom and I looked in the mirror. When I looked in the mirror I had this slight recoil. This is slight, like back it was. Nobody would have been able to tell it, but. But I was not necessarily looking for it, but I could see it because I was aware of that voice now and I realized I couldn't stand looking at myself because I hated that person, I hated that person's guts, and that's like looking in, it's like I cannot be in a space where I'm holding against my kids that they love their dad, like subconsciously being in a spot where that's going to come through in some way. I can't be that dad. So I looked in the mirror and I'm thinking okay, what can I do, like, what can I do to turn this around? All right, some people would say do the exact opposite. What's the exact opposite of this? You know it's oh RJ you're so great.

Speaker 2: 17:12

I love you. Like look at everything you've done in your life, all the success that you've had. You are incredible. You are such a gift to exist and be there for people. You know I was thinking about no, no, that's not going to work. Like saying it now. There is a little bit of truth in that, but I'm still not at the point where I can give myself that much credit. Let me ask you that, yeah.

Speaker 3: 17:40

If you could distill it down into, because what I've, what I've seen with this is is what you uncovered is, like you uncovered the, the thought pattern from the belief, right, the limiting belief that, like, you adopted at some point. That's not yours, but you adopted it because, typically, people with low self-esteem there's like five or six really, really common limiting beliefs that aren't true but that we make to be true. What would you say that limiting belief was? I say was very intentionally, by the way.

Speaker 2: 18:24

So being able to follow this down and find patterns, it's like, okay, where did this start? And I mentioned how I felt accepted by my peers the first time I drank and how that was very alluring. Um, I tried to be the best that I could at sports, why I wanted to be accepted, tried to be a good student class clown, not hide how smart I was. Um, you know, taking care of my brother and sister for that acceptance.

Speaker 2: 18:57

Um, what it boils down to is number one I was made to believe that, uh, my very existence is the cause of the people I care about most suffering, and I just seek safety outside the home, yeah, and so, because of that, there was no way I could accept myself. So I had to search for that acceptance and then, when I would get it to a point, I'd start caring about that person. Well, my existence is the cause of the people I care about most suffering. Right, got to pull back, right, yeah, and so, with that, of course, I hated myself. I'm causing the people I care about the most to suffer.

Speaker 3: 19:42

And it's it's. It's crazy how they always say that perception is reality. Right, but what forms our perceptions, our belief systems about ourself? And it's so crazy that we can have this belief that says, basically, it's not safe, being myself isn't safe and it hurts the people around me. And because of that being ingrained in us, then we start having those thought patterns that has come as a result of it, which is what you experienced, it sounds like. And then from there, then the decisions that we make reflect that thought pattern and then that's what we create for ourselves. So what did you do to start Because I resonate a lot with what you said about shouting affirmations in the mirror doesn't work If you still believe the limiting belief. So what are the things that you started to do to start replacing that belief with one that's more empowering and more of a reflection of who you really are?

Speaker 2: 20:46

Well, because I realized I couldn't just say I love myself, because that just had that flavor of like it's so untrue, there's no possible way I can even say it. I can't even lie about that. There is no faking it. Until you make it with this piece, it's like okay, what is something different that I can get? That's getting me away from the fact that I hate myself. And I looked at him. I'm like do I really believe that I'm a bad person? Like, honest to god, believe I'm a bad person? Like, okay, there's moments I've been a bad person, but am I overall a bad person? No, absolutely not. I'm, I would say, the majority of the time I'm actually a really good person. So I'm like okay, if that's the case and I can't really look in the mirror and say you're such a great person, can I at least say you're an okay person? Can I get to neutral? Can I get to-.

Speaker 3: 21:43

You're okay yourself where you are. Yeah, to yourself where you are yeah.

Speaker 2: 21:47

Can I just say that you're okay. You're not bad, you're okay, and that was the key. Taking all of the internal dialogue, that was these diatribes that anybody said to anybody else you would get your ass beat, but I would say it about myself. How can I take that to neutral? Yeah, so as soon as I heard the criticism starting to come in, I would be like, okay, is that true? Like yes, I did mess that up. Does that mean that I'm a motherfucking idiot who can't do anything, right? No, it doesn't. Just means that I'm human and I get to make a mistake. Okay, and ending everything with the I'm okay, and so what? I think the best thing to be able to do, like the most tangible thing here, um, is your self-talk. Separate yourself from the outcome, from the thing that happened, take your identity out of it, no longer use.

Speaker 2: 22:54

I am, in a way, with that negative and just saying that was and that wasn't. Like I tripped and I fell and I broke a glass bowl. Oh, you're such a freaking moron. What is wrong with you? Right, it's like wait, I'm not a mor bowl. Oh, you're such a freaking moron. What is wrong with you? Right, it's like wait, I'm not a moron, that was not a good thing, or that was moronic, or that was not your best moment, right, or yeah, that was stupid. That was Not. I am that was, and now I can start to look at okay, I can pay more attention when I'm carrying a glass bowl. That's something that I can do.

Speaker 3: 23:32

That's powerful. And the reason why that's so powerful it's just it's reframing the way that yeah, the way that you're talking to yourself, and it starts internal. And then, from there to your point, then you start making different decisions. You actually start using your mistakes as a way to give you feedback and to improve, instead of as a way to reinforce the limiting belief that was keeping you stuck. And it's so interesting because there's like one mega belief that I've seen. It's like almost like when the ratio of limiting beliefs in our lives is higher than the ratio of beliefs that are true about us, and what it is is the world is happening to me.

Speaker 3: 24:23

So that's the mecca victim, disempowering belief. That's the biggest one that I've identified, and then, as a branch of that one, there's all these other little ones, like who I am isn't good enough, things like that. And it's interesting because once you start to rewrite those beliefs, from my experience, you start to start getting glimmers of the belief that's actually true, which is the world is happening for me, these things are happening for me, and then, all of a sudden, you start to leverage challenges and opportunities and the things that you go through as a way to actually help you, instead of as a way to just keep you stuck. So that's really powerful reframing that from I am to that was and for you. How did that start to play out in your own life when you started to learn how to rewrite your own belief systems in that way and you start to reframe it and improve your self-talk? What are some things that happened in your life as a result of that?

Speaker 2: 25:38

First thing that started to happen was I allowed myself to make mistakes, and it wasn't the end of the world. It wasn't saying that I'm a terrible person or I'm a moron or I have no idea what I'm doing. It's just that I'm human and I'm allowed to make mistakes. Human and I'm not allowed to be, I'm allowed to not be perfect. Right, it's a lot of allowances. And then I started to look at situations where I would show up and I'd be like, okay, how am I showing up? And afterwards, do I like the person that I was? So I started to sift through those masks that I would wear, the different RJs that I'd show up as, depending on the situation that I'd be in, and I just stopped being somebody that I'm not right Like. I'd stop being this massive hard ass that nothing can phase me. I would stop, I would just like. There were moments where, yeah, like there is a lot that doesn't phase me. That's hard earned. It's not necessarily something that I should expect of other people, because not everybody has had that self-talk to make you as numb as you should be or could be. Not should. There is no should. That was not as numb as I am, I was.

Speaker 2: 27:11

Another thing that started happening was my emotions started to open up to the point where I could actually feel and realizing that I went through a lot of my life in a dissociative state, and that's not because I was trying to, it was not because of anything else other than survival and ADHD response right, like there's a lot there that that is working together. And so, the more that I learned and I understood that it's okay, my nerve, my nervous system, absolute wreck, fight or flight, pretty much my entire life I'm going to need, I'm going to have to allow myself to rest. So I would say, like those things that started to happen, and allowing myself to for that to happen and for me to be different than how I was because how I was was how I was told I was, I should want to be That'll make me happy. That's how you should show up.

Speaker 2: 28:16

This is all of these, all of these things that um were given to me, me. It gave me space to find who I was, how, who I wanted to be, how I wanted to be, and understand where a lot of my reactions, where a lot of my cycles, where a lot of my automatic behaviors were coming from. And now, once I could understand that. Okay, now I can see what's automatic and I can get in front of it so that, instead of reacting or the automatic behavior, I can put some time in between it and I can start to respond and start to behave more consciously and use that awareness to build me to be able to show up how I actually am to be able to show up how I actually am.

Speaker 3: 29:09

Yeah, building that connection with yourself, building that faith. Faith is a muscle that you can build and I talk about this all the time. It's building that relationship with you. And there's a lot of people, myself included especially if you're overly sensitive and sensitive, not in a weak way, just sensitive as in a I feel extremely way.

Speaker 3: 29:38

It's so easy for us to be scared of our own emotions, not realizing that our emotions are the way that we connect with ourselves and the way that we experience life. And what happens when we run away from those emotions is we're rejecting and abandoning a part of ourselves, and that's a trauma response. And it's because we, yeah, have a dysregulated nervous system and we're not taught how to feel safe and who we are in our body, and so we walk around just feeling extremely uncomfortable being ourselves. And it's just so crazy how deep that rabbit hole goes. And we could talk a lot about somatic healing and all of those things and how that all ties together.

Speaker 3: 30:23

But to simplify it for the people listening, if somebody is listening to this right now and they are at a point in their lives where their world's just a wreck, they're losing everything. Everything around them is falling apart. Now, with the love of their life, somebody is going, maybe as a family member who is really ill, somebody who maybe just lost their job, someone who just maybe had their awakening for the first time and they realize they have no idea who they actually are. What are some steps that you feel that person can take to start moving forward from that?

Speaker 2: 31:14

So number one is you have to be honest with yourself in a way that you've never been before. You've been taught that it's okay. You're okay no matter what. Things are okay. But kind of like how I started this off and I said you know, I'm just, you know, following on these rapids, those ups and downs, and getting through it. Right, I'm on that river. Know that it's okay to look at it and say that right, that it like. And especially, I want people who have been the strong friend, who have been the strong person, and like men, people raised masculine, like I want you to hear this it's okay to not be okay, even if the people around you tell you it's not, especially if people around you tell you it's not. And so, with that self-honesty, you can really start to look at the areas that you can change.

Speaker 2: 32:24

One of the biggest and fastest ways that you can change, One of the biggest and fastest ways that you can make a change in yourself, is changing your environment. Where do you put yourself in? Because you've put yourself in the environment that has created the outcome that you're at. So, instead of that victimhood, instead of that things are happening to me, you take that responsibility and that accountability on of. I put myself in this environment that doesn't give anybody a pass. That doesn't say that the people who have treated you poorly you deserve it, Because I have not said those words and you should not believe those words. You don't deserve that and what you deserve is to be able to take your power and make changes in your life. So what environments do you want to be in? Whether it's a more people growing environment, people looking to better themselves, people open-minded at how other things happen, Okay, what are some environments I can put myself in that have that.

Speaker 2: 33:35

Whether it is a Saturday morning meetup for coffee with other people like, let's say, you're going through a divorce, I'm sure there's a single father's meetup for coffee on Saturday mornings. Go to it right, Hang out. You don't have to talk at first, you can just listen and absorb. Another thing is you know what you're listening to, Like who your friends are. Are those friends actually people who want to raise you up, want to see you do well, or are they people who keep make it seem like they want you to do well until it's time to do it and they kind of knock you down a little bit or they tell you you can't or you know, and it's under the guise of I'm just scared of what this outcome is going to be.

Speaker 2: 34:22

Um, those are some really powerful things. And then don't believe the first thought, two thoughts, three thoughts, four thoughts, five thoughts that come to your mind. Believe the thoughts that you are consciously making those first. I mean. Sometimes it's more than five thoughts. If it's an automatic thought that just came in there and you didn't actually think about this thing, that's not actually you. It's not yours.

Speaker 2: 34:56

There you go that is somebody put that there, whether it was on purpose, whether it was deliberate or not, doesn't matter. That's from somebody else, that's not you. And when you can recognize that, oh, now I can start to not follow that. Now I can start to see who I am versus what the beliefs made me Right. And then now I can start to see who I am versus what the beliefs made me Right, and then now I can choose what person I want to give power to.

Speaker 3: 35:25

Yeah, so it sounds like step one is get honest about what you really want. Confront, and it's when you've spent your whole life not being honest about that. Sometimes that's really hard. So starting with what you don't want is a good first step, because whatever the opposite of that is is probably what you do want, right? So I don't want to keep feeling like I'm not valuable in this relationship, okay. So what you do want is you want to feel valuable in the relationship that you're in. What I don't want is to keep having a drink every single night to relax and feel okay. So what you want is to be able to feel peaceful when you're sober. And, yeah, getting clarity on that's so powerful. And then the second thing you said is also so powerful, which is your environment is a reflection of what you believe to be true, and so chances are your environment is limiting you from being the person that you want to be. Really looking at that and being like, okay, how can I make it easier on myself to become this person, become this version of myself? I know is going to better serve me. And then the other thing that you mentioned is support.

Speaker 3: 36:48

The third step is hold yourself accountable through the people that you start surrounding yourself with, and you also touched on. When you start doing this, fear comes from a perceived threat of safety or identity. So when you start doing this, because you are stepping into a different identity, you're going to feel super uncomfortable physiologically, mentally. Your story, you tell yourself, is going to follow the state of being that you're in, so your old patterns are going to come at you and just try to pry you back into what's comfortable for you. Even if you're miserable, even if you feel awful, it's comfortable because you've been in it for a while. So it's so important to understand that that's not you and you can choose to go a different way. That's awesome. So I want to learn more about who you help, how you help them and how people can really start connecting with you so that they can learn from your lived experiences, so that they can become a better version of themselves experiences so that they can become a better version of themselves.

Speaker 2: 38:05

So the you know people that I help are people who are ready to start diving into why they are making some of the choices that they're making, and they don't know where to begin. And sometimes this is around alcohol. Why is it that I choose to drink alcohol to the point that I black out? Why is it that I drink alcohol every day? Sometimes it's, you know, marijuana, and why do I keep smoking and I have to smoke to feel calm. Other times it's why do I have to be in a relationship in order to feel like I am worth something? Or you're looking in the mirror, you're like there's got to be something that I can do to change, but I don't know what that is. I don't like feeling like change is needed, like there has to be more life than this. I just don't know what that is. I don't like feeling like change is needed, like there has to be more life than this. I just don't know what it is right and that can be really powerful too. And you know I do one-on-one coaching. I have a 12-week course on self-discovery and it starts from self-honesty, self-discovery, and it starts from self-honesty. It goes through. Um, you know the self-exploration. Then you end with that self-acceptance and notice I didn't say self-love, and it's because you don't have to have self-love to get to those things. Those things can lead to self-love to get to those things. Those things can lead to self-love, though, and the way that you know it's just, it's about being human. It's using different ways to look at your patterns and identify them, and then this is this is something I can do. Different, and a way that you can get in touch with me is you can look me up on Instagram, like on Untappd Keg. Tap into the podcast. You look at Untappd Keg on any podcast platform on YouTube.

Speaker 2: 40:09

Brennan's been a guest. Look at his episode. It's really good and you know there's just. There's so many ways that you can go about this journey. There is no cookie cutter way. There's no. You follow this one, two, three and you're going to get to where you want to be. It's about trying different things on and figuring out where you are in yourself so that you can understand what might work for you and what has worked for somebody else that is gonna not work as well for you, or maybe not work period, or maybe make things worse.

Speaker 2: 40:49

Yeah, um, and honestly that I a lot. I've heard so many people say, like the most important relationship you'll ever have with your life is with your parents, is with your siblings, is with your kids, is with the mother of your children, is with your spouse, your partner. There's all of these relationships that people talk about that are the most important one that you're ever going to have and honestly I don't say this often, I don't use always or never, but every single one of those is wrong the most important relationship you're ever going to have is the one with yourself. And so if your relationship with yourself looks like shit, if it's completely disconnected with yourself, looks like shit, if it's completely disconnected, you're never going to be able to find that connection outside of you that allows you to feel that way, that peace about yourself. Yeah, so, connecting with yourself, building on that foundation that you can build on to find those relationships, to get to the place where you can look and be honest with yourself and in all situations, you can say you know what?

Speaker 2: 42:16

Here's a good one that is? It seems like it's deep, it's fairly simple, doesn't make it easy. But resentments when you start to look at resentments, you can really use it to discover a lot about yourself. Resentments are comfortable. It's comfortable to be angry at someone else for how they treated you. It's comfortable to hold a grudge and keep them at an arm's length and put all of your anger and animosity there. It's really comfortable to be there and because of that it grabs hold of you and it's difficult to let that go.

Speaker 3: 42:55

Yeah, and people pleasers are some of the most pissed off people I've ever met.

Speaker 2: 42:58

Exactly.

Speaker 3: 42:59

Because they abandon themselves so consistently.

Speaker 2: 43:03

Exactly. And if you dive deeper into resentment and you just give yourself a second and you look at it and you say what is it I'm really angry about? Who is it I'm really angry at? Is it that person and what they did? You look at it and it's no, it's not that person and what they did. I'm mad at myself because I didn't give myself permission to do something that they did. I didn't stand up for myself. I allowed them to walk all over my boundaries. I chose a person that never really loved me and I knew it and I chose them anyway, Right. All of a sudden, you start to take your power back and you start to understand these areas that you can show up for yourself and places that you can build on and show up for yourself and places that you can build on.

Speaker 3: 43:59

That's incredible and that's what you do. You help people connect more with themselves and that's a powerful, powerful thing, and I thank you for your work and thank you for doing that for you so you can do that for others, because I know firsthand how difficult that is, and I highly encourage anybody who's listening to this, who wants to learn more about who they are and who's ready to stop settling for the life that they know is not meant for them. Then hit up my friend, rj here and I'll put his links to how you can get connected with him in this podcast description. Rj, thank you so much for being a guest on this podcast. I'm glad I was able to pay you back for being a guest on yours and you have a good night, my friend, and I'll talk to you guys next time.

Speaker 2: 44:51

Thanks for having me, brennan, it was an absolute treat.