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There was this running joke when
I was growing up that I was 

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terrible at making decisions. 
Every time we went out. 

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To me, I wouldn't know what to 
choose, in part overwhelmed by 

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all the options, and in part 
because I didn't really know 

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what I wanted, what I would 
like. 

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And if I made a bad choice, 
well, I'm sure I don't really 

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need to explain the 
consequences. 

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This indecision was blamed on my
star sign. 

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Typical labor would be the 
mocking comment as they told the

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waiter to take my order last and
forced a panic decision on me. 

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And don't get me wrong, as a 
parent now I get it, the 

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thinning patients thing. 
But what I don't get is why no 

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one asked why. 
It was enough to explain my 

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difficulty away with the 
position of the planets at the 

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moment of my birth. 
What was actually happening was 

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I didn't know what I liked. 
I didn't know what I wanted. 

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I needed to know what everyone 
else was having or have the same

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thing over and over again 
because somehow that would 

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ensure my decision was the 
correct one. 

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Keep me safe. 
Obviously. 

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Looking back it's clear I had no
idea of my preferences, likes or

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dislikes unless they were very 
very strong. 

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I based anything else on what I 
was told. 

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Liking would make me a good 
person, IE the exact same things

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as my toxic parent. 
Until I was a teenager of 

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course. 
And then my acts of rebellion 

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were choosing the complete 
opposite, and the cost of doing 

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so was a level of fallout that 
made it not worth it most of the

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time. 
So when I started actually 

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trying to work out what I liked,
what I actually preferred, not 

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what was acceptable or what 
would keep the peace, or what 

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I'd absorbed from whoever I was 
standing next to, It was like 

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walking into the world's biggest
superstore and having to look at

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every single thing on the 
shelves and rate each one out of

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10. 
Sometimes it was an immediate 

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yes or no, which felt brilliant,
like the system was working. 

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But more often than not, it was 
maybe, I don't know, possibly 

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A5, and I'd move on and get a 
kind of three aisles over and 

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then I'd have to go back because
actually, no, that was a 2. 

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Or hang on, maybe that was a 
nine. 

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It was time consuming and 
overwhelming and easy and 

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bewildering all at the same 
time. 

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And I'm still doing it. 
By the way, I haven't finished. 

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I don't think you ever finish 
because preferences aren't just.

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I like the Vervine candles from 
The White Company, which I do 

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and which they have discontinued
and which I will not be 

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forgiving them for in this 
lifetime or any other. 

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It's a communication style and 
conversation topics and fabric 

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against your skin and colour and
touch and what you actually want

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from a holiday, rather than what
you're supposed to want and 

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everything in between. 
Every single time I've 

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identified one of these, even a 
tiny one, even a candle, I've 

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identified a bit of me. 
Which means you stop being 

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someone who has to check the 
room before you know what to 

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think and before you know what 
you think, and you start being 

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someone who walks in already 
knowing. 

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So if you've ever been asked a 
completely ordinary question, 

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what do you fancy for dinner? 
What do you want to do at the 

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weekend? 
What kind of music do you like 

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and felt your mind go, not 
blank, exactly, but kind of 

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staticky, like you're 
frantically scanning for the 

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answer and the answer isn't 
there and you end up saying I 

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don't mind. 
What do you want? 

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Not as a kindness, but because 
you genuinely, truly cannot 

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locate a preference of your own.
Then this one's for you. 

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Today we're talking about why 
you don't know what you like, 

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which is not a personality flaw 
and not indecisiveness and not 

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you being difficult. 
It's three separate things 

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happening at once, and once you 
can tell them apart, you can 

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actually start doing something 
about it. 

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I know you've been asking 
yourself, am I the problem? 

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Let's find out with me, your 
host Helen Villas. 

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So I don't know. 
What I want is too small and too

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easily dismissed for what's 
actually going on here. 

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What's actually going on is that
you can perform preferences 

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beautifully. 
You can walk into a dinner party

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and have opinions. 
You can recommend a restaurant. 

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You can tell someone with total 
conviction that you love a 

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particular band and then go home
and realize you're not sure 

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you've ever actually chosen to 
listen to them on your own in 

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the car when nobody's watching. 
There's a difference between a 

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preference you hold and a 
preference you've adopted. 

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And most of us who grow up the 
way we grow up are absolutely 

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fluent in the adopted kind. 
We can produce them on demand. 

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The problem comes in the quiet 
moments. 

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They're genuinely low stakes 
ones. 

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The low stakes ones when there's
no one to read and nothing to 

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perform and the question is just
plainly what do you want and 

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there's nothing there? 
Or worse, there's a sort of 

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swarm of half answers, none of 
which feel reliably like yours, 

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and it shows up in the daftest 
places. 

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The ready meal aisle where you 
stand for slightly too long. 

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The coffee order you change 
every time because you're not 

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anchored to 1. 
The 20 minutes you can spend 

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agonizing over a paint colour 
for the spare room. 

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And then you realizing you don't
actually have a feeling about 

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it, you're just trying to 
reverse engineer the right 

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answer, the one that means you 
haven't got it wrong. 

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Because that's the texture of 
it, isn't it? 

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The constant low hum of what if 
I pick the thing and The thing 

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is wrong, Wrong how wrong, by 
whose standard you couldn't tell

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me. 
But the feeling is real and it's

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exhausting and it turns a 5 
second decision into a small 

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ordeal. 
So that's the glitch. 

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And it's not indecision. 
You're decisive about loads of 

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things. 
It's that it's it's that in the 

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specific domain of your own 
genuine preferences, the files 

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either missing or it's so 
overwritten with everyone else's

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data that you can't find the 
original underneath. 

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Because the why is 3 different 
things and you have probably 

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been treating them as one big 
personal feeling your entire 

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life. 
OK, so the first piece of it, 

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and it's the foundational one. 
The other two kind of sit on top

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of it. 
You know, it's what happens to a

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sense of self when you grow up 
in a toxic environment where 

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your preferences were at best 
inconvenient, at worst maybe a 

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rejection of the parent. 
Anyway, there's a whole thing, 

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But there's a concept in the 
research called self concept 

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clarity, which is just the 
degree to which you have a 

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clear, confident, stable sense 
of who you are, what you think, 

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what you like, and crucially, 
the degree to which that stays 

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consistent rather than 
reshuffling every time the room 

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changes. 
And what the evidence 

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consistently shows is that 
people who experience childhood 

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adversity, including emotional 
invalidation, tend to have lower

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self concept clarity as adults. 
And that this isn't Willy. 

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It is measurable and it mediates
the link between what happened 

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to you as a child and things 
like anxiety and depression 

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later. 
So this is not you being vague 

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about yourself for no reason. 
The reason there's a mechanism, 

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and the mechanism is actually 
really quite simple, which is 

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that a preference is a small act
of being a separate person. 

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When you say I'd rather have the
blue one, you're quietly 

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asserting that you exist 
independently, that you contain 

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information and that the other 
person doesn't, that you are a 

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self with a direction of your 
own. 

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In a healthy home that's met 
with brilliant blue, it is. 

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Or at worst, we haven't got 
blue. 

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Have the red. 
And either way, your preference 

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is treated as real and as 
information. 

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In a toxic home, your preference
is competition. 

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It's an inconvenience, it's a 
challenge to the parents 

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authority, or it's just noise 
getting in the way of what they 

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wanted, which was for you to 
want what they want. 

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And so very efficiently, you 
learn. 

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You learn that having a 
preference costs you. 

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Sometimes it costs you a row, 
Sometimes it costs you their 

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mood for the rest of the day. 
Sometimes it just costs you that

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particular flavour of being made
to feel ridiculous for wanting 

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the thing. 
And a child's nervous system is 

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a brilliant, ruthless little 
prediction machine. 

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It does the maths. 
It works out that the safest 

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move is to stop generating 
preferences at the point where 

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they'd cost something. 
Which over time means stop 

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generating them at all, or at 
least stop letting them surface 

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where they can be seen. 
You outsource the whole 

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function, you become exquisitely
good at reading what's wanted 

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and producing that instead, 
because that's the version of 

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you that didn't get punished. 
So that's the first piece of it.

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And notice, it's pure learning, 
it's conditioning, it's not some

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mysterious damaged in a child. 
It's a perfectly sensible 

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adaptation that worked, that 
kept you safe, and that is now 

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wildly inconvenient in a Tesco. 
Now, the second thing, because 

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if you're autistic, there's a 
layer right on top of that, and 

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it's masking. 
Masking gets thrown around to 

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mean basically anything these 
days, but in the research it's 

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got a fairly specific shape. 
The work by Hull and colleagues 

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breaks what's often called 
camouflaging into a few 

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components. 
The hiding of autistic traits, 

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the compensating with learned 
strategies and script, and the 

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assimilating, the actively 
trying to blend in and be like 

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everyone else. 
And here's where it collides 

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catastrophically with the 
preferences thing. 

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Because if you've spent your 
life performing a more 

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neurotypical version of 
yourself, scripting your 

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reactions, learning by 
observation what you're supposed

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to enjoy, and producing A 
convincing impression of 

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enjoying it, then you have a 
lay. 

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Then you have layered an entire 
second performance on top of the

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one the toxic environment 
already trained you to do. 

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You're not just hiding your 
preferences to keep the peace, 

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you're hiding your actual 
sensory and social reality to 

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pass. 
And the cost of that is well 

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documented. 
It's linked to exhaustion, to 

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anxiety and depression, to a 
really specific kind of identity

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confusion, particularly in 
women, where you've performed so

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well for so long that you 
genuinely lose the thread of 

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what's underneath. 
And that's the cruel bit, 

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because the masking is often so 
good, so seamless, that you fool

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yourself. 
You'll say you love big social 

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events because you've got the 
performance down so well that 

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you can't feel it underneath it.
The part of you that it that's 

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counting the minutes until you 
can go home and lie on the floor

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in the dark. 
The preference is there, the 

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date is there. 
It's just buried under a really 

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competent impersonation of 
someone who finds this all easy.

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Now hang on, because some of you
listening are going to be ADHD 

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and not autistic. 
Or you're going to be like me, 

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ADHD with a stack of autistic 
traits that didn't meet the 

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threshold. 
And you'll be thinking, well, 

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that masking bit isn't me then. 
And it might not be. 

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Not in the clinical sense. 
And I'm not going to sit here 

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and tell you you're autistic. 
That is absolutely not my job, 

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and it's not yours either. 
But the broader thing, the 

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performing a more acceptable 
version of yourself, that's not 

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exclusive to autism. 
That's what the toxic 

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environment teaches all of us. 
So take what fits and leave what

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doesn't. 
Which, incidentally, is a 

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preference. 
So well done, you're on your 

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way. 
OK, so right, let's go on to the

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ADHD piece. 
And it's almost the opposite 

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problem, which is why it's so 
confusing when it's tangled up 

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with the other two. 
So ADHD comes with novelty 

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seeking with interest that's 
driven by what's stimulating 

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right now rather than what's 
reliably yours over time. 

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If you're wondering if you might
be ADHD or autistic but don't 

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00:12:28,120 --> 00:12:30,840
want to go for a diagnosis 
without a good idea of the 

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00:12:30,840 --> 00:12:35,560
outcome, Aperio Profiles now has
an ADHD Screener and an autism 

219
00:12:35,560 --> 00:12:39,200
Screener built on the most 
rigorous evidence there is with 

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00:12:39,200 --> 00:12:42,640
discriminate variables, whilst 
also screening for alternative 

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diagnosis with overlapping 
conditions. 

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00:12:45,360 --> 00:12:48,880
Go to aperioprofiles.co.uk For 
more information. 

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So your preferences genuinely do
shift, and they shift fast. 

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And you can be utterly, 
consumingly obsessed with 

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something for three weeks and 
then feel nothing for it. 

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And that's not you being fake or
flaky. 

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That's how the attention system 
works. 

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It's wired to whatever's novel 
and engaging, and the engagement

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is real while it lasts. 
The problem is what happens when

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that completely normal ADHD 
pattern lands in a toxic 

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household because a shifting 
interest to a parent who wants 

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you predictable and controllable
looks like flakiness, looks like

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00:13:25,320 --> 00:13:28,600
you never finishing anything, 
looks like proof that you can't 

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00:13:28,600 --> 00:13:33,200
be trusted to know your own mind
and so you're perfectly normal. 

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00:13:33,200 --> 00:13:38,200
Neurology gets reframed by them,
and then eventually by you as a 

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00:13:38,200 --> 00:13:41,720
character deficit. 
You learn that your enthusiasms 

237
00:13:41,720 --> 00:13:45,120
are embarrassing, that they'll 
be mocked when they fade, that 

238
00:13:45,120 --> 00:13:48,640
there's no point investing in 
something you'll like because 

239
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you'll only be made to feel 
stupid about it later. 

240
00:13:52,280 --> 00:13:56,360
So you stop trusting your own. 
Yes, and now you've got a brain 

241
00:13:56,360 --> 00:13:59,760
that generates preferences in 
bursts and a learning history 

242
00:14:00,000 --> 00:14:03,360
that's taught you not to believe
any of them, which is a properly

243
00:14:03,360 --> 00:14:07,160
madding combination. 
And if it's yours, I'm sorry. 

244
00:14:07,280 --> 00:14:12,320
It's a lot, and the reason just 
figure out what you like has 

245
00:14:12,320 --> 00:14:16,760
never worked for you is that 
it's actually three different 

246
00:14:16,760 --> 00:14:19,520
repairs tangled together, not 
one. 

247
00:14:19,920 --> 00:14:23,120
So what do you actually do? 
And honestly, this is slow. 

248
00:14:23,240 --> 00:14:25,640
I mean, all of these things. 
I always say that it's so slow, 

249
00:14:26,280 --> 00:14:28,000
but it is. 
It's not a weekend's work. 

250
00:14:28,000 --> 00:14:31,360
It's the superstore, the whole 
superstore, aisle by aisle. 

251
00:14:31,600 --> 00:14:32,880
And you'll be doing it for 
years. 

252
00:14:33,080 --> 00:14:35,960
And that's not a failure, that's
just the size of the job. 

253
00:14:36,280 --> 00:14:40,520
But it's absolutely doable. 
And the doing of it is genuinely

254
00:14:40,520 --> 00:14:42,960
one of the most satisfying 
things I know. 

255
00:14:43,360 --> 00:14:45,440
So let me talk you through what 
works. 

256
00:14:46,200 --> 00:14:48,720
The starting point is lower than
you think it is. 

257
00:14:48,720 --> 00:14:51,640
Don't begin with what do I want 
to do with my life. 

258
00:14:51,640 --> 00:14:54,520
Begin with your own body, 
because the body is the one bit 

259
00:14:54,520 --> 00:14:58,560
that's quite hard to gaslight. 
Temperature, textures, taste, 

260
00:14:58,560 --> 00:15:00,720
sound. 
Is this jumper actually 

261
00:15:00,720 --> 00:15:03,800
comfortable, or do you just own 
it? 

262
00:15:04,160 --> 00:15:07,400
Is this music something your 
nervous system settles into it 

263
00:15:07,640 --> 00:15:09,960
into, or are you just enduring 
it? 

264
00:15:10,280 --> 00:15:12,960
These are preferences with 
almost no social stakes. 

265
00:15:12,960 --> 00:15:16,160
Nobody's going to have a row 
with you about whether I'm going

266
00:15:16,160 --> 00:15:18,320
to say this and then I'm going 
to regret it because I did have 

267
00:15:18,320 --> 00:15:21,040
this row as a child, but as an 
adult, not anymore. 

268
00:15:21,400 --> 00:15:23,760
But no one's going to have a row
with you about whether you like 

269
00:15:23,760 --> 00:15:25,880
the feeling of a particular 
fabric. 

270
00:15:26,320 --> 00:15:30,040
And they're a way back into the 
signal. 

271
00:15:30,480 --> 00:15:32,640
You're rebuilding the connection
in between. 

272
00:15:32,920 --> 00:15:36,080
I noticed something, and that's 
something that counts. 

273
00:15:36,480 --> 00:15:40,600
Notice it, let it be there, and 
crucially, act on it in some 

274
00:15:40,600 --> 00:15:43,120
tiny way. 
Give the jumper away. 

275
00:15:43,640 --> 00:15:47,160
Change the playlist, because the
acting on it is what teaches the

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00:15:47,160 --> 00:15:50,400
system that your preferences 
have consequences. 

277
00:15:50,400 --> 00:15:54,640
Again, good ones this time. 
And once you've got that even 

278
00:15:54,640 --> 00:15:57,840
loosely going, you start 
narrating to yourself. 

279
00:15:58,080 --> 00:16:00,480
Not out loud, necessarily, 
unless you want to, of course, 

280
00:16:00,480 --> 00:16:04,280
but you start catching the 
moment of preference and putting

281
00:16:04,280 --> 00:16:06,680
words on it. 
I'd actually rather sit there. 

282
00:16:07,680 --> 00:16:09,800
I don't want another coffee, I 
want water. 

283
00:16:10,160 --> 00:16:12,640
Tiny. 
Almost insultingly tiny. 

284
00:16:12,800 --> 00:16:14,520
But you're doing two things at 
once. 

285
00:16:14,760 --> 00:16:17,440
You're generating the 
preference, and you're believing

286
00:16:17,440 --> 00:16:20,840
it enough to name it. 
And that second part is the bit 

287
00:16:21,000 --> 00:16:24,880
your history broke. 
Now this connects to something. 

288
00:16:25,360 --> 00:16:29,680
Because for those of you doing 
the ADHD version, the shifting 

289
00:16:29,680 --> 00:16:33,080
interest version, the move isn't
to pin yourself down and force 

290
00:16:33,080 --> 00:16:35,560
consistency. 
That's just doing your mother's 

291
00:16:35,560 --> 00:16:38,600
job for her. 
The move is to stop treating 

292
00:16:38,600 --> 00:16:41,680
fluidity as a fault. 
A preference that lasts 3 weeks 

293
00:16:41,680 --> 00:16:45,280
was still real for three weeks. 
This is one of the things that I

294
00:16:45,280 --> 00:16:48,360
do for myself now. 
I get really into something and 

295
00:16:48,360 --> 00:16:51,080
then I lose it and I no longer 
shame myself for it. 

296
00:16:51,320 --> 00:16:54,560
You're allowed to have loved 
something and then be done with 

297
00:16:54,560 --> 00:16:56,600
it. 
The skill isn't permanent. 

298
00:16:56,600 --> 00:16:58,760
It's noticing. 
The difference between this has 

299
00:16:58,760 --> 00:17:01,960
genuinely run its course and 
I've abandoned this because I 

300
00:17:01,960 --> 00:17:04,720
got scared it would be taken off
me or laughed at. 

301
00:17:04,920 --> 00:17:08,520
That's a different question, and
it's a more useful one. 

302
00:17:09,040 --> 00:17:11,839
And for the ADHD brain 
specifically, you'll forget 

303
00:17:11,839 --> 00:17:14,040
you're even doing this. 
The whole project will fall out 

304
00:17:14,040 --> 00:17:16,119
of your head by Tuesday. 
So externalize it. 

305
00:17:16,119 --> 00:17:17,720
Keep a note on your phone. 
A running list. 

306
00:17:17,960 --> 00:17:21,040
Not of goals, not of goals, not 
of goals. 

307
00:17:21,240 --> 00:17:23,880
Just things you've noticed that 
you liked or that you didn't 

308
00:17:23,880 --> 00:17:26,200
like. 
A scrap, you know, hated that 

309
00:17:26,200 --> 00:17:28,079
meeting format. 
Loved that walk. 

310
00:17:28,840 --> 00:17:32,480
You're not building a system you
have to maintain because you 

311
00:17:32,480 --> 00:17:34,760
won't. 
You're just leaving yourself 

312
00:17:34,760 --> 00:17:37,040
bread crumbs. 
So that future you who has 

313
00:17:37,040 --> 00:17:40,280
forgotten all of this stumbles 
across evidence that you are in 

314
00:17:40,280 --> 00:17:44,560
fact a person with a pattern. 
And for those of you who mask 

315
00:17:44,880 --> 00:17:48,840
and you'll know, probably you'll
know if this is you, there's a 

316
00:17:48,840 --> 00:17:52,320
harder, more specific thing, 
which is that you have to start 

317
00:17:52,320 --> 00:17:55,200
finding the low stakes places 
where you can drop the 

318
00:17:55,200 --> 00:17:57,160
performance and see what's 
underneath. 

319
00:17:57,440 --> 00:18:00,480
And that's frightening, because 
the performance has kept you 

320
00:18:00,480 --> 00:18:03,880
safe so you don't RIP off the 
mask in the middle of your 

321
00:18:03,880 --> 00:18:06,200
workplace. 
That is not safety. 

322
00:18:06,440 --> 00:18:08,600
That's a different kind of 
danger. 

323
00:18:09,040 --> 00:18:12,360
You find the one relationship, 
or the one hour alone, or the 

324
00:18:12,480 --> 00:18:16,160
one corner of your life where 
the cost of being unperformed is

325
00:18:16,160 --> 00:18:20,440
low enough to risk it, and let 
yourself find out what you 

326
00:18:20,520 --> 00:18:23,000
actually want. 
When nobody's getting a show, 

327
00:18:23,480 --> 00:18:26,720
it's slow, and it can feel like 
grief finding out that a thing 

328
00:18:26,720 --> 00:18:30,200
that you thought you loved was 
just a thing you'd got very good

329
00:18:30,440 --> 00:18:33,800
at pretending to love, and let 
that be there too. 

330
00:18:34,280 --> 00:18:37,720
The grief is real and it passes,
and what's on the other side of 

331
00:18:37,720 --> 00:18:41,840
it is yours and the thing that 
holds all of this together. 

332
00:18:42,160 --> 00:18:45,520
The bit that I think matters 
most is that you're allowed to 

333
00:18:45,520 --> 00:18:48,640
need input. 
Knowing yourself doesn't mean 

334
00:18:48,640 --> 00:18:51,480
you arrive at every preference 
alone in a sealed room. 

335
00:18:51,760 --> 00:18:55,280
Sometimes you'll genuinely not 
know and you'll try the thing 

336
00:18:55,280 --> 00:18:58,080
your friend loves or the holiday
your partner suggested and 

337
00:18:58,080 --> 00:19:01,840
you'll find out by doing it. 
That's not outsourcing yourself.

338
00:19:01,840 --> 00:19:05,200
Again, that's just being a 
person among people. 

339
00:19:05,600 --> 00:19:08,680
The difference, and it's the 
whole difference, is that you're

340
00:19:08,680 --> 00:19:13,080
gathering data to decide what 
you think, rather than scanning 

341
00:19:13,080 --> 00:19:15,800
the room to find out what you're
allowed to think. 

342
00:19:16,040 --> 00:19:20,040
Same action on the outside, 
completely different engine 

343
00:19:20,040 --> 00:19:22,320
underneath. 
And if the masking strand is one

344
00:19:22,320 --> 00:19:25,600
that landed hardest for you, 
that's exactly what I've gone 

345
00:19:25,600 --> 00:19:29,840
deep into over on Is This a 
Thing, the companion episode to 

346
00:19:29,840 --> 00:19:34,480
this episode, which is up on the
hub or available for subscribers

347
00:19:34,480 --> 00:19:36,120
now. 
It's called the Self You 

348
00:19:36,120 --> 00:19:38,680
perform, and it goes properly 
into camouflaging and the 

349
00:19:38,680 --> 00:19:41,440
masking and the compensating and
the assimilating. 

350
00:19:41,760 --> 00:19:44,640
Why it's so specifically 
exhausting what the research 

351
00:19:44,640 --> 00:19:47,280
says it costs and what it 
actually looks like to start 

352
00:19:47,280 --> 00:19:50,520
letting it down safely without 
blowing up your life to do it. 

353
00:19:54,400 --> 00:19:56,840
If you've been listening to this
and thinking right, lovely, 

354
00:19:56,960 --> 00:19:59,760
well, I've got absolutely no 
idea how to start finding out 

355
00:19:59,760 --> 00:20:01,800
what I like without it taking 
the next decade. 

356
00:20:02,280 --> 00:20:03,960
That's pretty much what the hub 
is for. 

357
00:20:04,000 --> 00:20:06,480
It's a community of people who 
will challenge you, celebrate 

358
00:20:06,480 --> 00:20:08,480
you, but most of all just get 
you. 

359
00:20:08,480 --> 00:20:12,200
And right now there's 90 days 
free access to the foundation 

360
00:20:12,200 --> 00:20:15,600
tier, which gives you a monthly 
live call with me and access to 

361
00:20:15,600 --> 00:20:19,600
the community as well as Is This
a Thing and early access to this

362
00:20:19,600 --> 00:20:21,080
podcast. 
Go to 

363
00:20:21,080 --> 00:20:26,800
liberationacademy.co.uk/the 
Hyphen Hub to find out more. 

364
00:20:30,560 --> 00:20:34,680
So here's the uncomfortable one.
And it's not about your mother. 

365
00:20:34,680 --> 00:20:35,760
I promise. 
We're past her. 

366
00:20:35,760 --> 00:20:38,040
She's not in this bit. 
It's this. 

367
00:20:38,200 --> 00:20:42,160
At some point, knowing why you 
don't know what you like stops 

368
00:20:42,160 --> 00:20:45,160
being a discovery and starts 
being a hiding place. 

369
00:20:45,680 --> 00:20:48,840
And it's such a comfortable 
hiding place because it's true 

370
00:20:49,160 --> 00:20:52,040
and because it explains so much 
and it because it lets you off. 

371
00:20:52,720 --> 00:20:55,800
I don't know what I want because
of how I was raised and now how 

372
00:20:55,800 --> 00:20:58,480
my brain is wired is completely 
accurate. 

373
00:20:59,120 --> 00:21:03,320
And it is also, if you let it, a
really sophisticated way of 

374
00:21:03,320 --> 00:21:06,200
never having to risk wanting 
anything. 

375
00:21:06,800 --> 00:21:09,760
Because the moment you say I'd 
rather have the blue one out 

376
00:21:09,760 --> 00:21:13,960
loud to a real person, you've 
made yourself findable, visible.

377
00:21:14,160 --> 00:21:17,360
You've put your, say, a stake in
the ground that someone could 

378
00:21:17,360 --> 00:21:20,240
ignore or override or just not 
care about. 

379
00:21:20,600 --> 00:21:24,240
And that's the actual fear. 
Not the candle, not the dinner, 

380
00:21:24,520 --> 00:21:28,120
the being a self that another 
person might not accommodate. 

381
00:21:28,920 --> 00:21:31,240
So here's what you owe yourself,
and I do mean owe. 

382
00:21:31,560 --> 00:21:34,160
You owe yourself the risk, not 
the boundary, not the big 

383
00:21:34,160 --> 00:21:38,360
confrontation, just the small, 
ordinary, terrifying act of 

384
00:21:38,360 --> 00:21:42,000
letting a preference be visible 
and seeing what happens. 

385
00:21:42,600 --> 00:21:46,320
And sometimes what happens is 
the other person goes, oh sure, 

386
00:21:46,440 --> 00:21:50,000
blue and the world doesn't end. 
And you bank that. 

387
00:21:50,280 --> 00:21:52,440
And sometimes what happens is 
they override you. 

388
00:21:52,680 --> 00:21:55,840
They get their own way, and they
make your preference disappear 

389
00:21:55,840 --> 00:21:59,000
to suit themselves. 
And look, that's not always a 

390
00:21:59,000 --> 00:22:01,240
personal attack. 
Sometimes people are just 

391
00:22:01,240 --> 00:22:02,960
thoughtless or stuck in their 
own stuff. 

392
00:22:03,440 --> 00:22:07,360
But it is always information. 
It tells you something about how

393
00:22:07,360 --> 00:22:11,040
much room that relationship 
actually has for you to exist in

394
00:22:11,040 --> 00:22:14,600
it, and you get used. 
So you get to use that 

395
00:22:14,600 --> 00:22:18,320
information calmly to decide 
what to do next, if anything. 

396
00:22:19,120 --> 00:22:21,840
That's the whole point of 
getting your preferences back. 

397
00:22:22,080 --> 00:22:25,280
Not so you win every paint color
so that you can tell finally 

398
00:22:25,280 --> 00:22:28,880
from the inside where you're 
safe and where you're not. 

399
00:22:29,240 --> 00:22:32,960
And stop calling that hyper 
vigilance and start calling it 

400
00:22:33,400 --> 00:22:35,760
knowing yourself. 
You don't have to do anything 

401
00:22:35,760 --> 00:22:39,640
with it today, but you can't 
keep using the explanation as 

402
00:22:39,640 --> 00:22:43,320
the destination. 
It was always meant to be the 

403
00:22:43,320 --> 00:22:45,120
start. 
There we go. 

404
00:22:45,600 --> 00:22:49,840
So next week we're talking about
why you can't say no without 

405
00:22:49,840 --> 00:22:52,960
your whole nervous system going 
into the red, the panic that 

406
00:22:52,960 --> 00:22:56,760
comes up around boundaries when 
no was trained into you as 

407
00:22:56,760 --> 00:22:59,480
something dangerous. 
So before then, I want to know 

408
00:22:59,480 --> 00:23:02,360
something specific. 
What is the smallest preference 

409
00:23:02,360 --> 00:23:05,200
you've got? 
The daftest, most low stakes 

410
00:23:05,200 --> 00:23:07,720
thing. 
You actually have a real opinion

411
00:23:07,720 --> 00:23:11,440
about the hill you'd quietly die
on that nobody would ever guess.

412
00:23:11,840 --> 00:23:16,480
Tell me on Instagram. 
So tools in the comments or 

413
00:23:16,480 --> 00:23:20,760
wherever you find this episode, 
I genuinely want to understand 

414
00:23:20,760 --> 00:23:22,680
them. 
So thank you for listening. 

415
00:23:22,680 --> 00:23:27,080
And as ever, all that remains to
be said is take care. 

416
00:23:27,480 --> 00:23:27,720
Bye.