Episode 3 • Who runs the show?
As we dive more fully into our inner voice, Amanda shares about “parts work”...how parts of ourselves from the past influence our current thoughts and try to keep us safe. Talking about 13-year-old Amanda and then 3-year-old Amanda, she reflects on how these parts ran the show in her life for years…and how she was able to finally acknowledge them and move forward. Closing out with a hug and some serious awkwardness, Amanda reflects on how it’s okay to be all of you.
TIME: 15:48
*Episode includes swearing.
Link to Dr. Lynyetta Willis’ website: https://drlwillis.com/
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Welcome back to the podcast! What's the title? You won't get these minutes back! All right, I'm gonna be more efficient in this episode because you won't get these fucking minutes back, but they might change your life. So here's hoping and I am your host, Amanda Perrot, I am so pumped that you are listening to this episode. This episode, we are going to dive more into inner voice. So Alcheme is the company, Alcheme, we look at inner voice and outer expression and the magic that happens when those two meet, we help people, individuals and entrepreneurs and business owners to access their inner voice to create magic and change in their lives. So thank you so much for being here. I'm very fucking grateful. This episode, I want to talk about parts. Parts work, now you may have heard of parts work, you may not have heard of parts work. I hadn't really heard about it until earlier this year.
Earlier this year, I had the honor of working with an amazing coat coach out of the United States. Her name is Lynyetta Willis. And the reason that I'd actually started to work with her was through - Oh, sorry, ADHD, I just got distracted by a text on my phone. I'm gonna put that over. The reason that I started working with her is that she's actually a relationship and family coach. And we started looking at this parts work. And she helped me realize that I have parts to me, that inner voice parts that oftentimes will take over and run the show. I was like, What are you talking about? Like, do we just have like one internal dialogue, right? Like, I don't know, I just hadn't really put a lot of thought to it. And she's like, No, she's like, actually, we have hundreds of 1000’s of parts to us, that make up our, our thoughts. And oftentimes, it's these inner these parts that run the show.
So for example, for me, I have a 13 year old Amanda, my 13 year old Amanda comes in very strongly. Oftentimes when it comes to relationships, like romantic relationships. The reason that she comes in so strongly when it comes to my thoughts are like experiences with romantic relationships is that 13 year old Amanda had her first like official kiss with a boy at a lake party. We were sitting on the pallet by the fire, I may have been tipsy. But I had loved this boy for years. And then we finally kissed and then went back to school the following week. And we went to school together. We went back to school the following week, and he pretended it never happened. He ignored me and ignored the whole situation. And it was mortifying. Because all the kids in my class were there, like they knew what had happened. And I thought that we were just gonna start dating and it was gonna be magical. And like, yeah, I finally got like the guy that I was in love with for so many years through school. And it was so fucking painful. It was so painful to be rejected that way. And 13 year old Amanda hardened, she put a shell around her and then adopted the belief that she needed to lower her expectations when it came to relationships.
From that point on 13 year old Amanda ran the show when it came to relationships. The reason the 13 year old Amanda ran the show was because she was trying to keep me safe. She was trying to keep us safe. She didn't want us to experience that heartbreak ever again. In doing so, in runnning the show, because she was trying to keep me safe. Amanda got into relationships that weren't the healthiest for her. You know, she believed she had to settle. And so it took decades and decades of relationships have failed relationships. And then finally working with Dr. Lynyetta earlier this year, I realized how deeply she was running the show. Like I had known this, like five years ago.
I had actually talked to that guy that I had kissed and we had met up in Saskatoon. It was super, like random how it all worked. But he was gracious enough and kind enough to be like yeah, let's let's like sit down like let's talk about this and and so we did and it was really healing and he apologized and but it's just it's taken years of looking at this looking at 13 year old Amanda for her to heal. For her to understand that she doesn't have to keep me safe anymore that I can keep her safe. Right. And also that we're allowed to have relationships that are extremely kind and beautiful and rich and deep, that I can be taken care of, that I can be valued for who I am, that I am good enough, you know.
And so, so that parts work earlier this year that my current partner, and I, we well, we split up for a few months to just for me to get some space and some time to do some deep inner work. And then through that, I realized that I wanted to get back together with him. So we're back together, and we're taking things day by day, with some good boundaries on what our relationship will looks like, and what our needs are, and it's the strongest relationship I've ever been in. And I'm really grateful for, for Amanda, the 13 year old Amanda to are trying to take care of me and trying to make me safe. And also now knowing the awareness of that she exists and that she's was running the show, and it's okay for me to take over take the reins back.
Now the reason I share that with you that that story, or that part of me is not that I'm not going to, I can't teach you the parts work. I'm not a registered psychologist or therapist, I'm not trained in this stuff. So I'm not gonna pretend to be that for you. I just, I can't and it's not actually it's not fair or safe for me to do that. So if you're interested in the parts work, I highly recommend reaching out to a psychologist or somebody that you know, or like somebody that you like, I'm going to try to do some a bit more digging on this and see if there's people out there and I'll put them put them in the show. I'll put it in the show notes. If I find more, just so you have more resources to do this parts, right. But it's incredibly powerful. Because yeah, that there's no tread that story, it's just it's just so clear, it's a very clear story about how my 13 year old self is running the show. Because these parts of us run the show, run our internal dialogue, which in turn, causes us to take certain action. And so if we're not aware of these inner parts, we are acting out or in ways that might might not actually be serving us anymore, you know.
So, to tie it back to voice, I realized that there's a part of Amanda as part of me, my three year old self, who when I was three years old, that's when I really shut my voice down. I don't fully know why or how I get the sense that it's not some big traumatic thing. I think it's more of a people-pleasing tendency that I had. So my mom says that I shut my, shut myself down. My like lively, vivacious young Amanda who would talk a lot, shut myself down when I was about three years old. She said that that I was at a wedding. And normally, at this wedding, it was my Aunt's wedding. And normally I would be like out there dancing and all that stuff. But she said it was odd because at that wedding, there was like tons of kids out dancing on the dance floor. And I was just sitting sitting on my grandma's lap in the corner, and she said that was just she was just so weird. And I remember it so clearly. And she said from that point forward, I shut down and I wasn't my lively self. And I was a lot quieter. And I asked her I said, “Well, do you know what happened? Or like why?” And she said, “No, I really don’t.” And I don’t, I don't know what happened. I think there's something to do with my grandma in that, because I always really resented my grandma. I remember growing up and just like this, like weird resentment towards her that I couldn't put my finger on. And she's since passed away and she's not here you know that I can like ask permission to share so but I think in terms of sharing so I can help you look at your parts perhaps that I think she'd be okay with that because we're also human, you know, she's not perfect. I'm not perfect. And that's okay.
So three year old Amanda shut herself down for whatever reason that was and three year old Amanda then, it was definitely a people pleasing thing. It's like I don't want to create, cause a stir, cause ruckus. I don't want to make anybody uncomfortable by being led by, like, by talking or by being my, like lively self, I just I can sense when people get annoyed, and I'm going to shut that down. I don't want to hurt anybody by speaking up, I don't want to annoy anybody. So I'm going to dampen myself. And so for fucking decades, I've done that. For decades, three year old Amanda has run the show and trying to keep me safe. And it's fascinating. It's been a fascinating ride. Because if you wouldn't know me in high school, you would have known me as quite shy, and very introverted. And yeah, and then to know me now it's, it's like, it's almost a completely different person, because I've done the work to know that it's actually safe to be me, it's safe to use my voice, it's safe to speak up. And yes, I'm going to annoy some people. I might hurt some people. And I will work through that. Right?
I do have the strength and resilience now to have the conversations to work through that. If I do, so, I need to, I can't stop speaking out of fear. I need to speak up because that's me. It's me speaking as me and to connect with and connect so many people and to support people in in moving through their, the part of them that has shut down in terms of speaking, speaking up for themselves for others, you know. So that's, that's what this episode is about is just like, acknowledging that there's parts of you that didn't feel safe, that went through some stuff. And maybe they're still running the show. And that's okay. If it's time for you to look at that part, though, maybe we'll you know, right, you know, if it's time. Again, I'm not trying to like give mental health advice, or I'm not qualified for that. But I just want to share my stories, in the hopes that it might encourage you to access just take the time to be with the parts of you to be with your inner voices voice. And to do that through light through the last episode, where I talked about your medium, what is the medium through which you come home to yourself? What is that? Take the time, elbows out, take the time for you, right? Because in taking that time, there's so much healing that happens. There's so much magic that happens. And you get more access to you. Which is incredible, and beautiful and powerful.
So yeah, I'm going to leave it there. I don't have a question for you today. Normally, I do but today I just want to give you like - so I used to be a big hugger. But then when COVID hit, I was like, oh fuck, people don't want people really want hugs. Or maybe they still do. But I just to be more mindful and respectful of like, just not getting all over people. So I just wanna leave you with, like, if you want a hug, then I'm sending you a hug. People say that I give really good hugs. So there's that. If you want just like an awkward high five, I'm sending you an awkward high five. If you want, I don't know, like, so then in my mind, I'm like, Oh man, well, there's like creepers that are listening to this. And they're like, Oh, I want you to fuck me! Sorry, that was harsh. This like very soft episode of like, honest, real raw episode with very little humour. And then just that. So, my instinct is to like, is to ask Jacqueline who helps me with this to delete that part. But you know what, we're just gonna leave that in. Because that's how I roll. And also to know, for you to know that it's okay to use your voice and then to be awkward. And to you know, like, it's okay. Don't let that stop you. Because there's also parts. There's also people that will like be like, Oh my God, You're ridiculous. And that's amazing. And please don't stop, right.
So the things that we second guess ourselves, about our stuff. There's things that we second guess ourselves about that people actually just really love and value. So throughout this podcast, there's gonna be a lot of like behind the scenes like my internal thoughts that are coming out. And normally, if I was doing a podcast about anything else, I wouldn't I wouldn’t say those other thoughts, but I'm trying to show you and show myself that these inner voice, the inner voice comes out often. It's the self doubt, the second guessing and that's okay. We don't have to push that stuff aside. We can acknowledge it, and then keep moving forward, right? Even if it's awkward and just like - oh my god, and I'll look back and be like, why did I say that shit?
But anyway, okay, yeah, cool. I'm just gonna leave it there. I love you guys. Thank you so much for listening to this and until the next time, talk to you soon. Bye! See, so awkward!
