Surprising Benefits of Healing Your Inner Child with Christine Hassler | EP 55

I, like most people, walked around the world not really even knowing I was dysregulated half the time. I just kind of, that was my normal.
And this is why I think this conversation is so important because people's normal is often not their authentic self, not their essence, and also a dysregulated nervous system and a bunch of protective parts that are, you know, protecting an inner child who feels abandoned. Any need that was not met in childhood, we will subconsciously seek out as adults.
And we will do it for the rest of our lives until we actually do the inner child work. It's risky to let go of these survival patterns because they have done a darn good job of keeping us safe.
And I think that's the hardest part of personal transformation. Welcome back to the Healing and Human Potential podcast.
Today, we're talking about comparison and the gifts within it, the truth that leads to burnout and nervous system regulation, as well as how to use relationships as a mirror to heal. I have the honor of sitting down with a dear friend of mine, Christine Hassler, who's a bestselling author, speaker with 20 years of experience in the personal development space.
Let's dive into all the wisdom and hacks we have in store for you today. I'm so happy to have you on the podcast and I want to just give context to my listeners, our relationship and tell some of our story, because for one, I think it's very common.
It'll serve, but I also tell this story in my certification program so that students can really hear how I was really doubting myself if I could be successful as a coach, how I would compare myself to others. And you were somebody that I compared myself to a lot.
And I know we've talked about this and to give people context, we started a master's program in spiritual psychology in 2006. Yes.
Almost 20 years ago. Yeah.
18 years ago. We have grown and evolved quite a bit, but I was in my twenties and I was going the licensed psychotherapy route.
You went full-time coaching and I really admired where where you were in your business, your success. And later, we were friends, kind of acquaintance friends at USM.
And then we started getting closer. And I shared with you that I was positively projecting on you.
And you were like, I admired you too. And there was no realm in my awareness that you would ever admire any part of my life.
I was so stuck in self-doubt and low self-worth, you know, like we've done a lot of work. But what I love about this story is that as we started developing the parts of ourselves that we admired in each other, me and my business, you and your marriage and your relationship, because I know you shared, you really admired my relationships like girlfriends and boyfriend and husband.
So as we started developing those parts of ourselves, we naturally got closer. And so I just want to plug for people, anytime there's comparison, jealousy, envy, it's just feedback that we're looking to express that more fully in our lives.
And our love story and our friendship story is a beautiful story of like how life naturally mirrors that as we do the inner work and not get caught up in the judgment, but really like listen to the feedback. Okay.
I want to express more of my career or more of my relationships and then naturally became closer. So I love that we have that story.
I love that too. And, uh, and it's also such a B it's a beautiful way to highlight that often how we think people see us is totally not how they see us because when you told me that i'm like what in the world like you've got it all going on girl like what in the world do you see in me and like i never would have thought you were someone who doubted yourself at all and so it kind of just shows how we can mask that in in many different areas because i've had my own journey with self-doubt as well.
And still, I mean, I'm still human, so it still comes up at times. But I'm so glad that we had that really honest conversation.
And I wish more people, especially women, would do that, because I think we're still healing a lot of the sister wound stuff. Totally.
And all the comparison, like you said, that comes with that. And it takes that degree of vulnerability to create that closeness and connection and then learn from each other, which is really cool.
And now here we are. I get closer and it feels really natural and beautiful.
Yeah. And I know part of your past story was that you were recovering high achiever, overachiever.
I remember, I mean, I was getting, I can relate to that. I was getting two master's degrees at the same time.
Yeah. One for my head, one for my heart.

And that was a big part of your identity and your story.

Totally, you have totally woken up out of that patterning and have a very different life.

Talk to us about your journey, where you were, where you are now.

Oh my gosh.

Well, I'll try to make this as brief and like coherent as possible.

So in childhood, like so many of us, there were things that happened or didn't happen that created a story about me and my life so there was teasing there was being a late bloomer there was some abuse that happened outside the home there's a variety of things that made me come up with a story of there's something wrong with me and I'm broken and whenever we have one of those big stories of there's something wrong with me or I'm not enough or I'm not safe or I'm unlovable or I don't belong which are all like being feeling safe feeling like we belong and feeling like we're loved are survival needs as humans yeah they're just such core basic self needs I really, like anyone else, had to come up with a way to compensate for where those needs weren't met. I call them compensatory strategies and mine was overachieving.
And I was like, okay, well, if I don't have friends, if I, because I was put on antidepressants when I was 11, so I had this story that I, you know, mentally was not okay. I'm just going to become the smartest kid in class.
And that just stayed with me, you know, and went and graduated from high school early, entered college as a sophomore, moved out to LA when I was, I don't think I was even 20. I don't remember, but, and, and just tried to make it in the entertainment industry, which is great for low self-worth, high achievers.
And it just drove me and I didn't really any different Alyssa and I think that's where a lot of people get tripped up is they don't actually know that their way of being is a survival and a trauma response versus who they actually are I just thought well I'm smart and I'm driven and that's just who I am but now that I actually really know who I am I'm smart and I'm driven and that's just who I am. But now that I actually really know

who I am, I'm smart, but I'm really not that driven. Because the drive was coming from lack.
It was a push drive. It was a motivation.
It was like, I'm going to get something to feel this way. And my true self, like really, unless I'm inspired, I have no interest.
Like that's my true authentic self. And because it was such a, like a way to deal with all the trauma that I just hadn't dealt with, I couldn't let it go.
Like I couldn't stop achieving. It was an addiction.
Just like someone who is drinking or using drugs, they can't stop it because if they stop it, then you've got to feel all the pain. And all the unworthiness.
Right. All of that that goes with that.
And then who are you? And then what do you do? And then you feel like you're just, you don't even know which way to look because all of your resources, your sense of direction, you just don't have it anymore. And so for me, I didn't really see I was doing that until in my 20s when I met my first coach.
And then later when I got into USM and I started actually having more of my spiritual awakenings and my being really seen with love and not judgment and actually confronting those parts of me that were just so scared to let go of the achieving and it took a while like it really took a while because I didn't know how to like get stuff done in the world without that operating system and this was and we can bookmark this because that was more of a journey into a more feminine

approach to living.

This is exactly where I want to go.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So because I know this hypervigilance, this fear-based operating system, which is also

innocent because it's like, oh, this is the way I feel safe in the world is by trying

to achieve so that then I'm loved and I'm accepted and safe.

So let's unpack some of the, because obviously that leads to burnout if we're pushing ourselves and not really listening to ourselves, which has a, you know, I think suffering has a divine intelligence within it so that we can see where we're operating from. But let's talk about undeveloped masculine and undeveloped feminine.
I talked to David Data and I told him toxic masculine. He said undeveloped, which I really liked.
I appreciate it. That feels more innocent.
So let's talk about the undeveloped masculine, the undeveloped feminine and how that can show up in our lives. Well, for me, sometimes I resist putting it in the context of masculine and feminine because in so many ways they're adaptive strategies like

you For me, sometimes I resist putting it in the context of masculine feminine because in so many ways they're adaptive strategies. Like for me, the achieving definitely would fall in the undeveloped masculine, right? Because it's achieving and being driven from a place of lack rather than a place of clarity and intention.
And as my husband would say, verticality. That's like the developed masculine, right?

Yes.

So that underdeveloped masculine would be more doing it from an insecure place

to make up for where I feel inferior, insecure, whatever.

But for me, since I just love inner child work,

it's more, okay, where's the wounded or child with unmetmet needs sitting and like what protector parts are sitting in front of it to take care of that and so for me the achiever thing it was such an adaptive strategy that appeared masculine because it was a lot of doing but it actually was more a protective part, protecting this scared little girl who didn't

think she was anything without achieving and didn't know how to be any other way. I didn't

know how to connect to people without like an achievement context, you know? I didn't really

know how to live from my heart and not my head. And again, it appears more masculine, but really

inside of me, it was the adaptive strategy. And that underdeveloped feminine would be more like the victim piece, right? And the woe is me piece and the piece of thinking like I didn't have really any power.
And where I've come to in my own development is that discernment is actually way more powerful than the kind of decision-making, directive, goal-oriented approach that I used to take. So in the past, it was like my doing energy led everything.
And my being energy was like, I don't know what it was doing. It was kind of hanging out going, hello.
Abandoned. Yeah, it's abandoned back there.
But that's because I had a very scared inner child and a dysregulated nervous system because inner child, nervous system, subconscious, they all go together. Dysregulated nervous system that didn't know how to be.
I really didn't know how to regulate. And I, like most people, walked around the world not really even knowing I was dysregulated half the time.
I just kind of, that was my normal. And this is why I think this conversation is so important because people's normal is often not their authentic self, not their essence, and also a dysregulated nervous system and a bunch of protective parts that are, you know, protecting an inner child who feels abandoned.
So that's why this work is so important because when we do it, that question of who am I becomes a lot more clear. Yeah.
Who am I when I'm not achieving? Who am I when I'm not helping? Who am I when I'm not whatever it is? And I love the Enneagram as a framework, so I'll tend to use that as a foundation for the psyche, not who we are, but just the coping strategies to look for the safety and survival. I feel like the more I do this work, the more I can see it comes back to safety.
So much comes back to safety. And again, that's like nervous system.
And we, as humans, I don't care what gender you are. I don't care how strong you are in the gym, feeling safe is feeling safe to not only physically safe, but feeling safe to be seen, feeling safe to be vulnerable, feeling safe to express our deepest desires, our deepest fears, to just be uninhibited.
I think that's why so many people, like why alcohol is so popular is because, and drugs too, because it takes inhibitions away and people that feel so stifled feel like some parts of them get to express because there's just this yearning for safety. And, you know, as children, so many people, one, didn't feel physically safe, two as children so many people one didn't feel physically

safe two didn't feel emotionally safe three didn't feel mentally safe and four often didn't feel spiritually safe so you have all of those did I say emotional if I didn't I'm saying it emotionally safe you have all of those and we have like a bunch of adults walking around that are actually just upset, hurt, confused children. Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, when I became a therapist, I was like, I don't want to work with kids.
And then I was working with couples. I'm like, oh, I'm working with kids.
I know. We all have an inner kid.
And those parts are undeveloped and they're still looking for the attunement for the presence and safety that they didn't get younger. And that becomes our work our work now.
The one thing, you know, because one of my core values is growth and I love a challenge and I'm a generator in human design. And I, and so there, for a while I would start judging the part of me that was ambitious, but I found that there's a, there's a way to like, to honor what my truth is, is that I really do like playing full out without any

attachment because that attachment doesn't, it's not about who I am. It's more about the love for

growth. Right.
So I've had to watch myself, not judge the part of me that loves ambition and watch

when it has gone into looking for something through the, in the future to find safety or

success or belonging. So it's been a pendulum, you know, that to, to discern where it's coming from,

which I think is really helpful because in the past it was like, oh, ambition is bad. I'm like, no, not necessarily.
Where am I coming from in it? Is it from that lack or is there just like, I want to grow and say yes to, but I love the, the authenticity of like, what's your truth and who are you beyond these safety strategies without judging them? I think what I'm hearing you say is it's really the come from. It's like, where am I coming from inside of myself? What is truly my why? And if we're really honest with ourself, and this is why this work is so important, because sometimes we're not, and we need someone to challenge us and say say I don't know that you're being completely honest and my best coaches and therapists have challenged me and like really calling me out and saying I don't that doesn't seem like your truth is that really really true for you and if we can be really true it's like our whys and our come from's then it's like we're living in integrity and we're moving from like our natural design or our natural essence and not our wounding.
Because like you said, everything that we struggle with in adulthood, almost everything I guess I should say, but I've been doing this long enough to be confident to say pretty much everything. There are roots to childhood there.
And any need that was not met in childhood, we will subconsciously, and consciously, but mostly subconsciously seek out as adults. And we will do it for the rest of our lives until we actually do the inner child work and meet those needs of the inner child inside of us.
We will play out our childhood with different people in different situations, different circumstances over and over and over again. And, you know, there's a spiritual aspect of it.
Like, you know, as a soul, that's our curriculum and we're growing. And then there's also the psychological aspect of it, of like children have, we as children and have some basic needs.
And if those needs aren't met, we will try to get them met for the rest of our lives. Yep.
Yep. It's like life being that mirror will present us with opportunities and people to show us what's still looking to be resolved.
And then it becomes our job. Then it becomes our job.
Yeah. And that's an empowering way to live.
And I do feel like having examples and other people in our lives that have done the work also is another template. So us doing our own work is really powerful, but also having other people to learn new ways of relating helps us see what's possible, that there's a new way.
Like I can speak my needs in a personal responsible way. You know, it reestablishes new ways of being in conscious friendships or conscious relationships.
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I cannot wait to see you thrive. Are there healthy expressions or examples that you can share around more integrated ways of being if like healthy, masculine and feminine doesn't true for you yeah yeah what would be an example oh and i love i love talking about masculine feminine i just think that's like it's multi-dimensional and multi-layered and i've had so many women especially come to me and be like i'm too much in my masculine yeah and i'm like that's really not what it about balance either.
Yeah, exactly. It's not like being more in your feminine.

I remember when I was on this journey, I was like, okay, so do I need to do like moon ceremonies

and wear dresses all the time?

And like, I don't know, what do I need to do?

And it wasn't that.

It was like really looking at where the adaptive child was really leading.

And so like...

I'm sorry to interrupt you.

I love that you said that because I do think some people think I'm too masculine. I need to be more feminine.
We're all wired differently. Right.
And so like some of us are more wired enough and not, nothing is wrong with any of it. It's just about what's our truth.
Yeah, exactly. That's the thing.
Like I, my passion is helping people not come from the adaptive child place because when we come from that place, we tend to choose partners like our parents. We tend to go into careers that are either safe and offer us security rather than doing what we love or because we think we have to.
You know, our relationship with money is impacted with it. The way we take care of our bodies, like everything is impacted by our own inner relationship with our nervous system and inner child.
And so when we can have an awareness of that and do the work around that, then we just naturally become ourselves, right? And like for me, I would say if we're talking masculine feminines, I definitely have a feminine essence. Like I'm in a female body and I have a feminine essence.
And that's more my nature. That's where I feel the most resource.
That's where I feel the most like me. And sometimes I really like to do things.
But the switch for me is that my feminine leads and my masculine responds. meaning my being energy leads, my intuition, my discernment leads, and my masculine, my directive action-oriented energy responds.
Where in the past, it was just all sort of this masculine energy leading and then a more kind of undeveloped feminine energy of adaptiveness responding. Because that's one of the superpowers of the feminine is being adaptive, but it also can go into underdeveloped or shatter or whatever we want to call it, because we can be too adaptive and become people pleasers and codependent and all those types of things.
Completely. Yeah.
And I think we've been in the game so long. I've seen some of the personal development trends change quite a bit.
Like it used to be all mindset and there was like subconscious reprogram hypnosis. Another buzzword is somatic work, which, you know, I know that we both value nervous system regulation work and it all has a place and we want integrative methodology so that we're meeting our clients and ourselves the way that we need to be met, not just in the mind, not just in the heart.
Part of my journey with that is learning to keep tuning into my heart, not just overdeveloped in the mind, and then creating strategy around what's true in my heart. Because nervous system regulation work is so important in both of our work, I would love to hear just for you to share some of the signs that people are dysregulated so that they can start becoming more aware because we might even be doing healing work, quote unquote, as a way to avoid feeling something.
Yeah. It can be an addiction.
Yeah. Or like to, for the ego to keep thinking that there's a problem.
I know I started tending towards that, like the, I'm not enough and I need to fix myself. But then there was just an identity with a low self-esteem ego.
Talk to us about signs that we can start learning when we're dysregulated just to become more aware. Yeah, well, they're pretty, they can be very obvious and they can be very subtle.
So one of the big ones is hypervigilance. And so we'll break down really what that looks like.
Hypervigilance is overthinking, controlling, wanting certainty, going to worst case scenario, doubting. So if you have a very, very active mind and you're always trying to problem solve and be one step ahead or, you know, want control, want want certainty can't seem to relax until like

everything's okay you know like if you are waiting for a response about something and like once you get it then you can have the relief but until then you can't all of that is versions of hypervigilance and dysregulation which I think a lot of us um just call stress like well so also putting so much on our plate and that being busy all the time is another way we just regulate. I mean, anxiety is an obvious one.
Feeling depressed, you know, it's the other side, right? The hyper arousal of the nervous system or the hypo arousal of the nervous system. That not able to sit still, not breathing into the front and back of our body, not breathing down to our navel, our breath being really short and kind of just in the front of our body, tension in our body.
In some of my nervous system training, there's different tests we do with the body, just like something like this or rotating our body and after we do the nervous system regulation range of motion dramatically increases often because it shows that so often our body is in a dysregulated state and when the nervous system feels regulated and safe it's like the body can move more freely and what a wonderful metaphor? For how much contraction we create in our life when we are dysregulated and how much expansion and range of motion in all aspects we can have, we have access to when we start regulating. Other forms of, you know, a dysregulated nervous system is any kind of addiction, any kind of addict behavior, any kind of, you know, needing something to numb something, having emotions that like spiral, like that emotional spiral that you just can't seem to, you know, like once you get on that emotional wave, you feel like you just, you have no, for lack of a better word, control.
Yeah. What did I miss? No, I think you got a lot of it.
It's like, yeah, going like indulging in the emotions and losing the present moment. Yeah.
And I really like Dan Siegel's window of tolerance where he talks about just for people that don't know, hypo is like under arousal, but it's still big T trauma. Hyper, you know, under arousal, like could be disassociation, like zoned out.
Hyper is hyper vigilant. And also those are big trauma and then there's like the trauma is on a spectrum so like the regular everyday kind of trauma also comes up with stress and anxiety what would you say for people are some of your go-to rituals or somatic hacks that you like for more in the window of tolerance not big t trauma because because, you know, coaches won't do trauma work,

but like for that kind of, you know, support to come back to presence and integrate the energy that's coming up. Yeah.
Well, I will answer that. First, I'll say I think it's harder to do that when you haven't done the deeper inner work.
Yeah. Because, you know, trauma exists on a spectrum in the population and exists in the spectrum inside of us as well.

And so I'll. because you know trauma exists on a spectrum in in the population and exists in the spectrum inside of us as well and so a lot of us can push our big t trauma like really really really deep down so it's actually more the little t trauma that we're aware of and that we're triggered by so it can be more the like i have kind of mild anxiety all the time i overthink you know I I get nervous when I walk into your room people like all that kind of stuff and what I have found is that we do want those tips we do want those quick resets but since the intelligible soul to is to evolve and since the mission of the inner child is to communicate with us through the body through sensation through any kind of discomfort until we start to heal it, it does keep coming up.
So what I like to say is like, let's do the inner work. Let's do the deeper work.
And then how that part of the integration process is these practices that we can add in. So I think breathing is really underrated.
I know it's in the breath work. It's another thing that's trending out there.
But taking a really nice deep breath is just, yeah. It's just like, oh, and having, and sign on the exhale with sound, like taking that nice deep inhale all the way into the back of the body too.
And then it's going, ah, and letting our shoulders drop. It just, it just feels like, ah.
And our body's like, okay, if you can take a deep breath, you're safe. Because if you think about any time we haven't felt safe where we don't take deep breaths.
So that's a really good one. Humming is another great thing that we can do to just regulate that vagus nerve and give us like a sound and a visceral experience that isn't something mental but it's definitely something more somatic even doing this is another way to do it touch grabbing our body like doing squeezes where we're like squeezing and releasing and just moving up the body tends to do it as well i really like presencing myself so being like i see alissa and i see this green sign i see this mic this microphone microwave microphone great job that's really helpful and i see this with my daughter she's two and i see when she has because she has her meltdowns because she's two and she doesn't have prefrontal cortex and that's all part of their development and one of my passions as a mom is to have a nervous system that imprints upon her that's more regulated than not because we don't as children learn how to regulate our nervous system well, we just can't regulate our nervous system until about the age of seven.
And so it's the family nervous system, particularly the parents, particularly the mothers, that's imprinting upon us. And so I see when she's upset, I don't go to – well, I definitely don't go to trying to calm her down.
I go into regulation practices. I take deep breaths.
I hum. I blow horsey lips.
I squeeze and release. And mostly I'm doing that inside my own body.
And I see how quickly it calms her. And I don't do it with the intention to try to calm her because I believe in emotional expression.
I do it with the intention of having her feel a regulated nervous system when she's having big emotions. Because I think that's what gets so many of us off track and so many of us into dissociation and into emotional suppression and then depression, is we have these big feelings and have no anchor point of regulation to come home to.
and their feelings feel really, really, really scary. So if we're just using the metaphor of my daughter again, like imagine her having this tantrum and me going, oh my God, are you okay? I don't know what to do.
You're crying so loud. Oh my God, can you breathe? Like it wouldn't have like any kind of freak out or if I had gone totally numb or if I'd been like stop crying and just shut her down.
Any of those things are going to imprint upon her that emotions are scary. Or bad.
Or bad or not okay to feel or whatever. And so then, you know, another way we dysregulate is by suppressing emotions because we've got all this emotion, all this energy in our body that we're depressing that takes a lot of energy and a lot of work and that does throw us into dysregulation as well so those practices again very simple deep breathing into your navel and your back noticing naming things around you grabbing your grabbing yourself tightly not too tightly but you know enough to just feel the pressure bringing you back back into the present moment.
Bringing you back into the present, humming, all those things, just simple. I love that with your daughter, you are modeling and she's co-regulating, you're co-regulating with her so that yes, it's allowed and here's the safety.
Because I think a lot of the time when we are dysregulated, we may judge ourselves for addiction or for overthinking and any of the behaviors, but really all we're on a nervous system looking for is safety. Exactly.
And so if we can let go of the judgment and just create safety and insource that safety, then that's everything else will dissolve. Right.
The critic, the people pleasing, all of the strategies and tendencies. Yes.
I'm curious. I've heard you talk as a friend, I've heard you talk about paying attention to the back of your body.
Talk to us about because I think that may be helpful well you know the back of our body is often ignored but if you think about like if you really wanted to feel supported you'd want to like lean back against something like someone having your like the phrase someone has my back or I got your back we know it means we're supported you know and so when we're just in the front of our body and like the front of our brain and the front of our breath our breath where we we naturally will tend more towards dysregulation and a hyper vigilance when we can breathe into our back or even put our back up against the wall and just like feel our back and be aware of our back or lean back into a chair, it's like we bring the awareness more to the subconscious, to our body, and out of this kind of like looking ahead, not in the present moment, hypervigilance way of being. And again, we're back to safety.
Yeah. Right.
So like, you know, if you think about chairs, if you're on a really, really high chair, you're going to feel way safer if there's a back to the chair versus if there's not. Because, all right, something's going to get you, you know, something's going to catch you if you start falling.
And so the metaphor of that is profound because we often don't think that anyone has our back and we often don't know how to have our own back, you know, make ourselves feel supported. So those physical practices, thanks for reminding me of that, those are also really great things you can do to come into regulation.
I love when my husband holds me from the back or just those pillows that hold you, like that somatic hold is really healing and nourishing. So there's all so many things that people can do.
And I want to move the conversation a little into relationships because I know that they're so challenging for people. And I would say one of the things that has really changed the game for me is taking a hundred percent personal responsibility, not as a defense, because I think some people can be like, you know, your emotions are 100% up to you and not really take responsibility for how they affect the whole system.
But to wake people back up to their power that they can really get out of blame and shift whatever dynamic they want in their life. And I think if people really got that, it would change their entire life, their businesses, their relationships, anything that they're creating, using relationships as a mirror to help illuminate.
What is the pattern that's playing out that I'm not seeing inside of me? And how do I shift it at the root? And so I would love if you have an example of this or any advice for people that want to take more personal responsibility or want to use relationships as mirrors. Well, I'll start first with the inner child context because this is what I think is like so valuable to get.
So as children, we couldn't stand up to our parents too much. Like we couldn't be like, you know what? You're kind of being a crappy mom, so I'm going to go down the street and find a better one.
Or dad, like you hitting me like that, not going to happen., I'm gonna call the cops and like you're a shithead and a narcissist and goodbye. Like we didn't have that voice as children.
So often we will then project all of our anger and our grief and our dissatisfaction with our parents onto our partner. And they will become annoying and they they will become the reason we're upset, and the reason our life is hard, and if only they changed, things would be different.
But really, that's the inner child wanting mom or dad to be the mom or dad that they always wanted them to be. So when we can stop projecting our parents onto our partner, that's when the game really starts to change.
And when we're aware of that and we're aware that we're doing that, it's like, oh, wait. Well, one, I choose you because you're kind of like my dad or you remind me of my mom.
And like I chose that. And the exact things that really were hurting me as a child are hurting me in this dynamic right here and it's often in relationships that we feel like we can have a voice and where it's like easier to go you you you you or behind the person's back like if only my partner then things would be so much better so when we can really get that like you said they're they're not only mirrors of ourselves and our own unresolved stuff but they they literally are our family of origin standing in front of us on many levels.
Then we can go, all right, well, you know, the grass is not going to be greener. Like this is going to come up in whatever.
Any partner I choose. Any relationship.
I know. My husband and I recently had this conversation because we went through a rough patch and we're just looking at each other and we're like, oh, we gonna have to go deal with this shit with somebody else so like we're both willing like we love each other let's just do this because that's the reality of it you know and i'm not talking about abusive toxic situations that you just need to leave i'm talking more about the relational dynamics of like this is just hard right now and i just want my be so much different.
And if they would be, my life would be better. So it's getting out of that blame and really seeing what you're projecting onto your partner and what unmet needs from childhood you're expecting them to fulfill.
Because that's the root of most of our suffering in relationship is I have an unmet need from my family of origin you're not fulfilling it for me and so I'm mad and I'm not getting my needs met and I'm not happy in this relationship and someone else is going to be better for me when really it's not our partner's job in fact the way most in coaching couples for years the most setups that I see is the person actually doesn't do the thing

that you need the most. And that's the rub, right? That's the work because then you have to do it.
You know, I'm thinking of one couple that we work with and what the, this is a heterosexual couple, what the female wanted more than anything is to feel adored. Like she just wanted to feel adored and cherished and, you know, really seen and all of that.
And what the man wanted to feel more than anything was not controlled. Right.
And that was their dynamic. She's like, well, he's like, well, I would adore you more if you would just stop controlling me.
And she'd be like, well, I stopped controlling you if you would just adore me more. It's like, okay.
And so when we started to unpack that, what was at the root of her control was an emotionally unavailable mother who was verbally abusive on many levels, emotionally abusive, not really there. And father who only loved through validation, right? And so she never felt safe and she never felt loved and she felt like she had to control every aspect of her life to not get in trouble with mom and to get some degree of dad's love and she couldn't ever be in that to bring it back feminine essence right because one she didn't have a model and two she never felt safe enough to do it so her only way to love was through control because that's the only way she knew how to love herself was to kind of control everything, control her emotions, control everything that she did.
And she didn't really even see it as control because it was her adaptive strategy. It was her survival skill.
He's like, no, it's really controlling. She's like, no, this is just me loving you.
So to her, it felt like love., to him it felt like control and suppression and all of that. Now his side of it, you know, of like I just want, or her side of wanting to be like adored and him not being able to do it, well he really came from again an emotionally suppressed family where he didn't really know how to like express love and how to like really cherish someone.
He didn't see that with mom and dad. And like he never felt that.
He never felt cherished. He just felt like he was, you know, one of five kids and just had to survive.
And neither one of them had huge, as we'd say, big T trauma, but needs weren't't met yeah in childhood right and so these patterns were playing out because it was their family of origin stuff trying to work it out and so what we had to do what what they chose to do and what we guided them through was her really relaxing into surrendering like helping that little feel safe, not wanting her partner to make her feel safe through the adoration and the cherishing, but actually doing her work around that. And his work too, especially coming from a family where he felt like not seen and not heard and like he didn't have a voice is when he felt like that to speak up and have limits around it and to open his heart and work on his vulnerability so that he could feel like he could cherish and adore her.
And obviously there was more to it than that, but that's just one example of how it's like, I want this, but I want this. And often the thing we're asking for from our partner is the thing we need to give ourselves.
Yeah. And I think there's a lot of schools of thought of like, you're 100% independent or you heal it in the relationship.
And I think you and I both align with, yes, we heal it within ourselves and from that place that we can also repair in the relationship. Yes.
And hearing like when I was getting licensed as a therapist, I studied Amago psychotherapy, which kind of created some of like everything you're projecting on your partners from your parents that helped give that framework. And then there's no longer blame.
It's like, oh, the filter I'm looking at this through is so that I can heal. And so like that softens all of that.
And it's like, oh, if I'm picked the person that would be the hardest person to give it to me so that I could learn to give it to myself. And I love, I think you were such an exceptional guide to hold that safe space for people to really come home to themselves and feel empowered in relationships.
And then it's so much easier for our partners to show up and mirror what we're offering ourselves. We're not blaming or thinking that we need them to be a certain way.
We have needs, but we honor those needs inside of us. And I think too, when we understand our partner's childhood, like when in this couple I was talking about, when he understood what her controlling behavior really was, like it's a scared little girl, and he could see her as a scared little girl, not this wife who's trying to emasculate him, it changed, it shifted how he saw her, which helped him cherish her more and adore her more.
So when we know our partner's inner child stuff and we can see that, we can see that little boy or little girl in them, it brings more compassion. Yeah.
Yeah. Another topic that I know is really big for a relationship is trust issues.
And so for those people that feel like they have to do it all themselves and they have a hard time trusting, can you talk to us a little bit more about what's happening potentially under the surface, the kind of subconscious programming? Well, the whole like, I'm not safe. No one's there for me.
I have to do it all on myself is protecting us from the letdown of someone betraying us, someone hurting us. And so these operating systems start very young, as again, a survival pattern of someone we trusted, violated us, hurt us, betrayed us, abandoned us in some way.
It was so painful that we make a vow subconsciously. I will never let that happen again.
And so we never do. Bottom line.
You'll be super self-reliant. Yeah, I'll just be super self-reliant and I won't trust anybody and no one's getting in and I won't be that hurt again.
And the only way through that is through that, is actually feeling that initial heartbreak, that initial violation, like really moving through that, helping the inner child not be frozen in that place so that we can gradually

start to open up and trust again. And, you know, human being is risky.
Like it's risky to let go of these survival patterns because they have done a darn good job of keeping us safe. And I think that's the hardest part of personal transformation is really coming to the the choice of like okay I know this has kept me safe my entire life and it's not getting me what I really truly truly desire and it's hard to let go of because it is like okay I'm walking across a tight rope tight rope of life, and I don't have a safety net anymore.
And it worked to a degree. It worked, right.
Exactly. So it's harder to let go because it's like, oh, I'm afraid that I won't get what I want.
Yes. When I really let go of my high achiever, I had this moment where I saw the whole identity and brand of Christine Hassler just dissolving and at first it felt like a tremendous relief and but then it was like well but how do I do stuff like how do I get anything how do I care about anything like how do I get anything done and so often there's like this in between when we let go of the survival and the coping skills and like move into like a new way of living, you know.
And for me, I'm a projector. If we talk human design, I am not a generator.
I don't have boundless energy. And my health really started getting better when I stopped working so hard and so much because it's not the way I'm wired.
It's just the way that I survived. And I have big inspiration and compassion and care for things, but the whole drive and ambition has really, really shifted.
And the past me would have panicked because it would have been like, what, like, what, who am I? And now I sit with that like younger part that still is like, am I going to be okay? Like, am I going to be okay if I just pee? Like, am I going to be okay if I'm not doing all the time? Like, is that really okay? I have to sit with that part of me and say, yeah, it's really okay. I got you.
I really got you. It's really okay.
And sit in that and sit in that and rewire and integrate. It's not like a light switch.
It's a reprogramming. Such a reprogramming.
Yeah. And I just, I love it.
It's like anything that we're struggling with in life is just pointing back to something from a past that's looking to be met with presence and love. And what I hear you saying is not just jumping to the safety strategy, supports us in actually meeting it with the presence and the safety that it needed, that we can find our authentic expression and harmony.
And I know inner child work is so big in the work that you do and some of the work that we did at USM, and it's so powerful for healing. And I'm curious, what are some of the common wounds of inner child wounds that you see play out in adult life? So people can start maybe waking up to some of the patterns they haven't seen.
Not belonging is a big one. So never feeling like you really belonged either to your family or to your friend group or to your culture or whatever it is like feeling separate is a really big one so that shows up like feeling like you you have social anxiety you don't have your people you don't know where you fit you feel really separate you feel really alone um not feeling safe we talked about a lot and there's many ways we don't feel safe you know people often think of like trauma as being abused on some level like really chaotic big things but it can also be too little for too long you know not getting the compassion or love that you really wanted and needed from your parents so safety has so many different dimensions of of it but if we really look at you know as a child, like did you feel safe? Did you feel physically safe? Did you feel mentally safe? Did you feel emotionally safe? Did you feel spiritually safe? And if the answer is no, then that's impacting you as an adult because it's still there.
Feeling validated, like every kid wants to feel like they matter and like someone's proud of them and what they did is really great feeling really seen and heard they acknowledge like my voice matters my opinion matters all of that so if you didn't have those things if you didn't have belonging if you didn't have safety if you didn't feel like you were validated if you didn't feel really seen and heard and most of all you didn't feel unconditionally loved validated, if you didn't feel really seen and heard. And most of all, you didn't feel unconditionally loved.
Because I think in relationships, unconditional love is a tough one. But in parenting, like parent to child, there should be unconditional love.
That doesn't mean tolerance of like anything, but definitely unconditional love. And if we didn't feel that from a parent, which is not easy to do because to unconditionally love another you have to love yourself and not many of us do so we either can't love the child or we project all of that onto the child and we create a measurement and codependence so having like that healthy unconditional parent to child love is another big one so if we didn't have those things we're going to be seeking them out as adults.
Yeah. And to be graceful and compassionate with ourselves as we play things out in the physical world so we can see what's playing out inside and then learn the tools and have community and get the coaches and the support to actually rewire and change these things.
I think in the beginning, we focus on the big boulders, the more obvious patterns. And then we start getting into the more subtle things that are playing out just under the surface.
What do you see are some of those things in terms of just to help highlight to people, like some of those subtle ways to, that play out some of the patterns and blocks, but also how can we continue doing our inner child healing so that it's not just when we need to, but it's proactively helping us change our life and find more peace and harmony. Yeah.
Well, the more subtle ones would just be like looking at your life and going, okay, like how is my life set up in a way that's causing me some stress or isn't desired? You know, and I have a client right now who like her mental load is crazy and she has an insane amount of stress and what really is going on is she's an enabler like she's kind of set that up right and again she didn't really see it because that's just the way she lived so like really look at how much are you holding in your life? Like are you an enabler? You know are you kind of the one that's like I'll just do it myself? Are you a people pleaser? Do you operate with anxiety of any level that you somehow medicate yourself for? Either actual medication or food or alcohol or just really being busy because distraction is a form of medication. It's a form of, you know, we can be addicted to distraction on some level.
Ways that you don't feel comfortable in your body, any place you're inhibited either sexually or physically where you just don't feel like safe in a body. The subtle things that, you know, I would say most people come to me with, the way I'd word it is I have a sense that nothing's terribly wrong but nothing feels really right either it's like okay I can't point to what exactly the problem is something's off but I know there is one and that's where it's like okay what's what's going on in the operating system there and you mentioned compassion and compassion is like my thing like i just think it's the most one of the most important things when it comes to healing and we in the personal development world i think have gotten too much into the fix it yes mentality and the inner critic plays a big part in our personal development work like if i just fix this thing then this is going to be better and when we don't have compassion for ourselves then it's we're just reinforcing the wound and i think when we have awareness sometimes we lose compassion so for example if we know that being reactive is not great like it comes from our wounding it's an inner child that didn't feel ever expressed we don't feel safe so we we just go zero to 100 we just are reactive okay we have that awareness we know where it comes from the next time we're reactive if we're like oh my gosh I got reactive again I know I need to stop doing this and we the inner critic comes out okay we, we just reinforce it.
So compassion would sound something like, oh, of course you got reactive. Like, of course.
This has been a pattern for 42 years of your life. Yep, it's still there.
And just really making it okay. Not in a, I'm just going to give myself a permission slip to continue acting like this.
But when we move into that energetic of compassion, then the inner child is like, oh, I'm getting what I didn't get as a kid, which is compassion for my big feelings. And then we can actually move into more of the transformation piece of it.
Yeah. I think people think if I'm compassionate with myself, then I won't change it.
If I accept it, then I won't change it. But actually it's the opposite.
It's like offering ourselves, that was the best way I knew how to take care of myself at the time. I'm learning differently now.
Because when we don't judge it and we don't identify with it, it moves on. And ironically and thankfully, what feels good is productive.
It's actually helpful. And I love that you are an embodiment of this, that, you know, you continue to live the work, you know, I just, there's so much alignment in the way that we live and think.
And another thing that I just wanted to weave in, because one of the things you were coined was expectation hangover and just like so many people just live with disappointment and in challenges. Can you just talk to us high level about what an expectation hangover is

and just unpack it for us just a little bit?

Yeah.

I wrote a book about it because I had so many of them.

Expectation hangover, the way I define it, is three things.

Either something doesn't go according to plan,

something does go according to plan, but you don't feel like you thought you would,

like you finally get married, yay, but it doesn't solve the unhappiness that you have or life just throws you an unexpected undesired curveball where it's just like whoa I just got laid off or I just got diagnosed with something that I didn't see coming and so it's a disappointment and and I wrote the book because I see that most people when they have any kind of expectation hangover they just want to feel better. Just want to get out of it.
And my whole thing with expectation hangovers is no go into it. Like don't avoid it because this particular expectation hangover it's not the first time you felt this way.
It's not the first time you felt shocked. It's not the first time you felt grief.
It's not the first time you felt like betrayed or like things weren't fair or you worked really hard for something and it didn't turn out like you planned. And so the question to ask ourselves when we have one of those is to say, okay, what is this reminding me of? When have I felt this way before? And that's when we really start to do the work is using any kind of expectation hangover as an invitation into oh wow okay we've all heard the saying this is happening for me but instead of just kind of doing a spiritual bypass and going this is happening for me um really going all right it's more this is happening again okay so this is happening again what what didn't what didn't learn? Like what didn't I integrate in terms of the other times I felt this way? And the thing with expectation hangovers is it's not the same thing.
It's not like, oh, I got broken up with, so this is triggering every other breakup. It's no, when have you felt not enough? When have you felt like the rug got pulled out underneath you? When did you, have rejected before all those things so it's not like an exact match but the feelings are significant and that's when we you know do all the work that we're talking about and what I found is that in my own life and working with people for as long as I have the we can't ever make expectation hangovers go away they're just that's just like it's just how we grow It's just part of the human deal.
But we can make the length of time in between them get longer and not have as many because we're healing and stuff. And so we don't need to have the same lessons repeat over and over and over again.
And the length of time we spend in them is a lot shorter. So in the past, I'd have an expectation hangover.
It'd take me out for like a while. And now I have one.
It's like, all right, I got my tools. I know what this is bringing up.
And I'm, you know, gonna work on it. And I think an important thing to remember is that oftentimes we feel done with something.
Like, oh, I've totally healed my mother's stuff. Like, I'm done.
And then something will come and a coach or a therapist or even our own inner voice will be like, oh, like this is mom stuff. It's like, no, I've worked on that.
Like I'm, I'm complete with that. Well, oftentimes there's, there's other layers and it takes an expectation hangover to have us really look at that.
And I love the invitation to look inward and go into it with compassion, with presence. And I think from the perspective of this essence of soul, it's like, how do I love this? And the perspective of ego is like, how do I get rid of this? And so you're just saying yes to it.
Yes to the full human experience. And I really love the frame of like having clear agreements versus unspoken expectation, the Steve Chandler.
I think that's really beautiful because doing the inner work and then the outer work. Right.
You know, it's like, I love the, just being really clear and upfront, you know, cause there's, there's practical things we can do and there's the inner work and we always do inside out. And so I love that you're really inviting people to go where we want to avoid.
Cause that's usually where the nuggets and the gifts are. I know it's true.
And like the more the resistance, the bigger the breakthrough, you know, and in, and sometimes I know these things and then there's a deeper level of integrating it head, heart, and go deeper into living it in the gut. And the stronger I attach to something, the deeper the pain.
So life's like, oh yeah, oh yeah, I remember that one. So like deeper integration, just being

compassionate with ourselves. And like you said, it often is the outer action too.
Like I see a lot of people do all the inner work in the world, but then they're not setting the boundaries. They're not having limits with people.
They're not actually doing the things that reinforce the integration because that's how the inner child, like I had somebody on my podcast a couple of couple weeks ago and she was with another narcissist in a relationship and she's like I'm doing the work like I'm doing I'm doing the work I'm not getting this trigger I'm doing the work and I'm like but your inner child is not going to feel like you're doing the work unless you leave you're not protecting her that's. It's great that you're writing and journaling with her and talking to her and telling her you're safe, but you're doing the exact same thing your mother did, which was not get you out of the abusive situation.
You've got to go. And that can apply to anything.
It's like putting ourself out there in terms of work or finally taking care of our body or going after the things that we really want to do. We have to.
And I think for so many people, like speaking up is huge. You know, I know that's been a big one for me, especially as more like a people pleaser.
Perfectionism, that's another subtle, subtle one. And just not wanting to like, you know, ruffle anybody's feathers, not wanting to be seen in a certain light has kept me just like internalizing things.
But when we internalize things, there's like this bucket of resentment that just gets higher and higher and higher. And so all the inner work in the world isn't going to take that away if we're not holding our boundaries, setting our limits, and speaking up to people and telling our truths.
Yeah. Yes.
And inner and outer. Yes.
And I love this term from University of Santa Monica, the high involvement, low attachment. I think it's brilliant.
Would you share a story of your own life or a client where you felt like there was a navigating of a challenge, but in a healthy way and like as a template to be like, this is also possible. To embrace the hard parts or the inner child that felt disappointed and then moved on.
Is there a story that comes to mind that you can share as a... Well, I can share becoming a mom and my first year of that.
And there definitely was an expectation hangover because I thought it was just going to be blissful. And I was going to love it.
I was going to have this baby that slept like I was a baby that slept. That was not what happened.
And I definitely had some postpartum depression and anxiety and my daughter just really wasn't that into sleep and it was really hard. It was really challenging.
And people would be like, oh my gosh, isn't it blissful? Aren't you so happy? And I was like, yeah. But inside I'm like, no.
You're like a prisoner in my home. I never sleep.
I never leave. I don't know what I'm doing.
I feel like a beginner. It was like all these things that I just wasn't voicing, you know? And I also was like trying to fix her.
Like trying to make her gas go away. Trying to make her sleep trying like running to different experts about her and then finally I was like I put my own coach hat on and I'm like oh my god this is all me it's just me she's having her experience and it's me like I need to get support for me good like I like forget not forget but you know what I mean first handle your own stuff you know you're eight months old but you can figure it out but and I got an amazing maternal maternal wellness coach and I really like dealt with my like stuff that was coming up my stuff with my own mother my stuff in childhood my stuff with being a perfectionist stuff with because I had really surrendered control in my business but then along came this baby that I loved way more than my business and it was like all kind of that fear because I had worry and love very intertwined as a child I got them very confused so to my subconscious and my inner child sometimes I get confused about like the distinction and worry and love go together in like my subconscious programming and I've had to do a lot to unravel that and so all the variations of worry the hyper vigilance the controlling the worst case scenario thinking the anxiety all that comes with it and so when this being came in that I love so much it was like all this worry came in as well and I had to really work on like unhooking those things regulating my nervous system doing my inner work not seeing Athena as a problem I needed to solve but really letting the love in and that kind of gives gets me to the answer to your question of sometimes it's as easy as realizing that we are so consumed by fear because we're scared to really let love in.
Like we're actually really terrified to let the good in. Because if we do, it was overwhelming.
I remember the first time I actually allowed myself to feel how much I love my daughter. And it like completely overwhelming I'm like oh my gosh like this is amazing and holy shit this is a lot of love and for so many of us who have had loss or grief or anything happened when we've been that wide open and we just got slammed shut, to open up to that again can feel absolutely terrifying.
So for me, having to really allow myself to feel all this love instead of all the fear that was distracting me from all the love was it. And then to do the work from that place, to really do the work from love and not fear, switched things so much for me.
I love your vulnerability and your courage to keep your heart open regardless. And you are such an example in this world and such a sister to me.
And I just love you and I'm grateful for your stories, for the way that you live, for you sharing here. And I know that we're gonna keep talking and I just love you and I'm grateful for your stories for the way that you live for you sharing here and I know that we're gonna keep talking and I know there's so much more that we can dive into and I'm just moved by your courage and your willingness to to say yes to the good yeah and to keep your heart open and and I know that people are going to want to stay connected and to dive into what you're up to.
Share with us where they can stay involved and what you're up to. Well, Christine Hassler is where everything is, Instagram and my website, and then my podcast, Over It and On With It.
So there's two episodes a week. One is an interview, which you'll be on.
And then the other episode is coaching, like unscripted, unedited, unproduced coaching people. It's called Over It and On With It.
And I've been doing it for 10 years. And it's really beautiful.
People really come on and share really vulnerable, amazing things that are so helpful to hear. And the biggest feedback I've gotten from listeners over the years is, wow, I get so much more when it's not about me because my defenses are down and two like I'm not alone somebody else is feeling the exact same way and that's so comforting yeah to know we're not alone and that was another thing that was really helpful for me in any in any transition whether it was after my first divorce or having Athena or challenges in relationship, whatever it is,

like when I can let go of the,

what are people going to think of me and really go,

this is what I'm struggling with and help and have other people go,

yeah,

normal.

I felt that way too.

And it's like,

Oh my gosh,

I'm not alone.

Beautiful.

I love you.

I love you too.

Thank you so much.

Thank you so much for doing this work that changes the world, starting with yourself. It truly does make a difference.
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