Leah & Dr. Willow: The Missing Piece in Your Relationship - Uncover the Patterns Influencing Your Love Life | #85

So, darling, are you ready to transform your relationships and unlock new depths of intimacy? What would it feel like to break free from old habits that trigger you and your partner and to embrace your full relationship potential? Let’s take a dive deep into the world of childhood patterns and discover how they shape your adult relationships and intimacy. In this LxW eye-opening episode, Dr. Willow and Leah unpack the five key safety strategy patterns that develop in childhood and share game-changing insights on how to break free from limiting cycles and cultivate more presence, connection, and pleasure in your life.

GET READY TO:

• Identify your primary and secondary childhood patterns (Leaver, Merger, Endurer, Aggressive, or Rigid)
• Recognize triggers and how patterns show up in your relationships
• Harness the "light side" of each pattern for personal growth and relationship harmony
• Develop powerful tools for navigating triggers and staying present with yourself and others
• And don't forget to subscribe for more soulful guidance on all things love, sex, and personal growth. Let's glow!

EPISODE LINKS *some links below may also be affiliate links

• Steven Kessler’s Book | The Five Personality Patterns
• Barbara Brennan’s Book | Hands of Light 
• Anodea Judith’s Book | Eastern Body, Western Mind
• Check out SxR Episode #84 with Steven Kessler

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Transcript

Dr. Willow: 1:14

Hey everyone, I'm Dr. Willow Brown. I'm your Taoist expert here at Sex Reimagined.

Leah: 1:19

And I'm Leah Piper, your Tantra expert at Sex Reimagined.

Dr. Willow: 1:23

And today, Leah and I, just the two of us, talk in depth about ways that we keep ourselves safe in intimacy, and in all kinds of areas of our life, and also how those ways that we keep ourselves safe also block us from the love, the sexuality, the intimacy, the true, true desires that lie deep in our heart.

Leah: 1:48

Yeah, and so this is a system that's really fascinating because you get to see how our childhood shapes how we handle getting triggered. So we're going to talk to you about all the amazing stages of development that would teach your nervous system to pick up various strategies. So, you gotta tune in

Dr. Willow: 2:07

Turn on.

Leah: 2:08

and fall in love

Dr. Willow: 2:10

With us.

SxR Announcer: 2:13

Welcome to the Sex Reimagined Podcast, where sex is shame free and pleasure forward. Let's get into the show.

Dr. Willow: 2:22

Leah actually has been studying this for, I don't know, seven years. She did seven years straight, but it's been many years since then and she uses it constantly and it's what makes her so special. Such an incredible teacher and her ability to kind of like read a room is really profound because of this medicine. So I dove into it a couple of years, maybe like four or four years ago. And you know, it's been a profound, it's been a game changer, especially in more triggering areas of life, like in intimacy, in sexuality, in financials, in, you know, home and family. So we wanted to share it with you because we think it is foundational to having a great intimate and powerful love life.

Leah: 3:05

yeah. I mean this has become so useful in partnership, in your relationships at work, in your relationships to your kids, in relationship to your partner, in relationship to your best friends. And so what we're talking about here is a model of pattern typing that allows us to understand how we get triggered and what we need to do to get out of trigger. You're probably all aware of astrology. Maybe you know about human design. Maybe you know about the Enneagram. You know, we've got all these different systems that have found a formula that has patterns that people relate to that help them understand themselves. And so this is a system also that has created a formula that makes sense where people have been able to study. In particular, the originator of this work is William Reich and, Wilhelm, I always screw that up. Wilhelm. I apologize.

Dr. Willow: 4:03

Wilhelm, he, uh, studied with Freud. He was one of Freud's direct descendants and he was brilliant. If you don't know who he is, look it up on Wikipedia and

Leah: 4:11

And he's a little naughty. I mean, he had some really interesting,

Dr. Willow: 4:15

yeah. I mean, he actually, he actually, developed the whole cure for cancer back in the 20s with the Orgone therapy machine.

Leah: 4:24

Oh, really? The machine!

Dr. Willow: 4:25

The machine and like all

Leah: 4:27

for that

Dr. Willow: 4:27

he got thrown in prison and all of his work destroyed. And then he died one year into his two year sentence in prison. Oh,

Leah: 4:36

scandal. But, that doesn't mean this isn't brilliant.

Dr. Willow: 4:40

No, he was brilliant. That's why he got, you know, his shit

Leah: 4:43

So this is part of his legacy. And, and since then, it has different types of iterations and different types of nuances and people have renamed the code, these pattern typing over the years because the original names were a little eek. weak.

Dr. Willow: 4:59

Yeah, and if the word pattern isn't, you're like, what the hell are they talking about pattern? You can think about these as strategies. Strategies to keep yourself safe. Strategies to keep yourself protected. Strategies to keep yourself from getting hurt. To get your, keep yourself from getting hurt physically, but also emotionally. And primarily emotionally. This is a lot of, like, deep psychology. In fact, in psychology, most psychologists will study this a little bit to some degree. So, um.

Leah: 5:26

written, mentioned in so many different books.

Dr. Willow: 5:28

It is. Yeah.

Leah: 5:29

know, so if you, I recommend Steven Kessler's

Dr. Willow: 5:34

Personality Patterns, The

Leah: 5:36

Five Personality. Mm

Dr. Willow: 5:37

Patterns. That's it. That's where you'll get it the most. And then it's also in Eastern Body, Western Mind. It's in Brene Brown's

Leah: 5:45

Hands of Light, Uh huh.

Dr. Willow: 5:46

totally. Not Brene Brown. Sorry. Barbara Brennan.

Leah: 5:49

Yeah. So, you know, one of the things that I think sets it apart from other systems that take a look at, you know, helping us make sense of ourselves. a lot of those other. systems have to do more with our personality. And my experience is that this has to do with the body. It is showing how as we were younger we came up with strategies that helped us survive our childhood. Even if we had awesome parents, there are still gaps and holes that happened in our childhood that we had to navigate in order to grow up. Right? So whether that was a trauma, something really significant like you know maybe there was a birth trauma and you had a hard time coming into the world, or maybe you were left crying in your crib for too long or maybe you

Dr. Willow: 6:39

was sexual abuse from your father or your older brother.

Leah: 6:42

A severe car accident. Yeah. Cancer. I mean, it could, it's runs the gamut of when you have something in life that's kind of an inflection point and you, and you may not even know it. You may not even have those memories. It doesn't matter. The point is, what I'm trying to get to is that there are times in life where energy hits us. hits our nervous system, and we don't know how to manage it, and so the body has to orient to that, and it creates strategies and ways of holding the energy so that we can get through the crisis and move on. And as an adult, you know, we can all recognize that we get triggered by other people. We get triggered by life circumstances, we get triggered by friends, family, and so on, and that causes a reaction. And if you look back on your life, you can probably see that you've got a pattern regarding certain issues and what gets that reaction out of you. Some people have abandonment issues. Some people hate to be yelled at. Some people don't like really loud environments with tons of people. There's all sorts of reasons why we can kind of get triggered and go into a pattern response. And so as we kind of go on in this episode, we're going to share more and more with you what those look like and then you can start to try them on and go, Hmm. That resonates with me. That's something that really feels like I might do. And what I love about the system is that it gives us ways to come out of pattern because these strategies from childhood stop being effective. Instead of you know, helping us when we were kids, they start to be problematic as adults. And what we want to do is we want to stay out of pattern, right? And the other cool thing about this system is that there kind of has a shadow side that we can work with for our personal growth so that we can stay in harmony as much as possible. But there's also a light side. There's talents and there's gifts that come from these strategies that allow us to give those gifts to the world.

Dr. Willow: 8:48

Yeah, and I think we'll go a little bit deeper into the shadows and the light sides of these things inside of our that we're going to be offering very soon. But as we kind of give you the overview today of these styles of protecting yourself, of keeping yourself safe, and yes, they were working for you in childhood. They did work to you to some degree throughout your life. But you're most likely at a point in your life now where they're actually blocking you. They're actually a roadblock and a barrier to receiving the love and the intimacy that you truly, truly desire in your heart. Because we're so busy keeping ourselves safe, and it becomes this unconscious thing. It's a habit. You could call it a pattern, a strategy, it's a habit. It's now something that's ingrained in you, and it's subconscious. You're not conscious of doing it, but we all do it. And and the best thing we can do is learn about it, understand it, and start to see where we're doing it, especially in our intimate relationships. Because what is the point of being in an intimate relationship anyway? It's to have a reflection, a mirror, somebody that you can see yourself through and go deeper and learn more about yourself through. So, that's what I love about these, this style of personality pattern typing, because it's not so much who you are. It's not your propensity like, you know, I'm an Aquarius and my propensity is this way or that way. It's more like if it's my default. It's my default that I go to if I don't feel safe. And so...

Leah: 11:30

that's true.

Dr. Willow: 11:31

Yeah, so when you're a child, and you experience either an overt trauma or just a moment of like, ah, I don't know what to do with this. I don't my nervous system can't handle this, then you develop sort of this style of keeping yourself safe. And it depends on what age you are. Like, if you're pre verbal, if it's before you learn to speak, it's gonna be a little bit different than after you have that developmental skill. Yeah. And then, you know, as you grow into like five, five, five, six, seven, it's like, Ooh, your ego's coming online now. It's like, Oh, now you're a little person. And so that's going to be a little bit different of a strategy as well. So it's really fascinating to watch, like at what point in your life did your parents get divorced or did you have that overt trauma or did you just, you know, not get nourished in some way.

Leah: 12:25

Yeah.

Dr. Willow: 12:26

and to notice like, Oh yeah, I was about three years old. Oh yeah, I do run that style of keeping myself safe and protecting myself.

Leah: 12:34

And really, like, even the childhood story is not very important. It's, it, what's important is that you're noticing the sort of the pattern that repeats itself when you get triggered because there's certain categories of that. And then once you have that information, like, oh yeah, I kind of do that, then you can start looking for, how long have I been doing that? When did that start? And what is the likelihood according to my parent's style of patterning? of parenting, rather. What their style of parenting will really inform what ends up arising in the way that your patterns end up identifying themselves. I, I notice there's a very significant correlation between parenting and how these get established in our bodies. Although not always. Sometimes it's an outside event that kind of triggers the patterns developing. And also just because your parents have a particular pattern type or strategy type, it doesn't mean that you'll have the same one as them.

Dr. Willow: 13:38

Definitely not. A lot of times it can be the total polar opposite, in

Leah: 13:42

Mm hmm.

Dr. Willow: 13:43

Let's go through them. Without further ado.

Leah: 13:45

Yeah, I, if I just want to mention one more thing and we'll jump in is you have a primary pattern type, the one that you lead with, and then you have a secondary strategy type. And you'll have to forgive me, I'm gonna, I would prefer using the word strategy, but I've been, I learned this using the word pattern, but I, the reason, the significance about using strategy is when we say pattern type, I think that sometimes people over identify. They start calling themselves the pattern as if that's who they are when really it's not. It's just something that we do. So I'm on I'm kind of learning a new way of communicating this. So yeah let's jump in. Oh, I forgot to mention the secondary. Sorry, I got sidetracked. So we have a primary, which is like the one we lead with. It's our go to trigger. And then when that doesn't work, because sometimes your primary, like you roll it out and no one's responding. So then you got to lean into your secondary and see if that'll pull you out of the crisis or that'll somehow solve the problem. Or sometimes your secondary just feels like it's the job for this certain situation. The other cool thing about having a primary and secondary is that you get all those gifts from both pattern types. So, just want to preface that by

Dr. Willow: 14:58

Yeah, absolutely. So there's you know, when I was in the womb, when I was way back when I was in utero, a

Leah: 15:06

I was making eyeballs and elbows and Ha toes.

Dr. Willow: 15:12

My dad fell off the roof. He was, he's a contractor and so he was working on the roof and on our house and he fell off the roof and it caused my mom a lot of stress. You know, it caused her a ton of just like, her whole nervous system got all her panties in a bunch, right? So she was stressed out. So of course there I was in the utero receiving all of that cortisol, receiving all of that stress to my nervous system. And my mom, God bless her, tends to be a professional warrior in general, right? So not only was that kind of the, one of the things in utero, but it carried on throughout my life. So there was this feeling that I got in the womb of like, Ooh, I don't know if it's safe. I don't know if it's safe to be in a body. I'm not sure if I want to be coming into this world. And so it's very interesting because a lot of the clients that come to me have had that experience at one point or another where they're like, I just don't really wanna be here. I don't really wanna be in this body. I'm not sure about

Leah: 16:15

never felt like I belong.

Dr. Willow: 16:17

Yeah, I don't belong. I don't feel safe. And so it's taken me a long time to really drop into being confident in my body, safe in my body. That's just been part of my life's journey. And, you know, I'm so grateful to be where I am on it. I'm a very embodied woman at this point in my journey and have been for a long time, but that experience in utero kind of set me up for a strategy. for keeping myself safe, which was to, you know, if things got overwhelming to my system, I would leave. I would flee. I would either in my mind or in my body, I would physically leave. So throughout the years, into my teens, like if I was getting into a sexual experience, that was overwhelming or not working for me, I would disassociate. So that's one of the first strategies for keeping yourself safe that I think a lot of people identify with, especially a lot of people who come to Leah and I because, you know, they're trying to find their embodied sensuality and sexuality and really you have to be in your body to open up your sexuality. And, and it.

Leah: 17:32

to feel all the beauty that's what they're waiting

Dr. Willow: 17:35

So much pleasure and joy and bliss, and we have to be able to stay present to our physicality in that state. So,

Leah: 17:44

So although everyone disassociates, this particular pattern type, the leaver, that's the name of it, the leaver, has a a closer relationship oftentimes to disassociation. It's just it's kind of like they go to their safe place. It's um, And people do this even if you're not a leaving pattern. One of the things if you've noticed that you've experienced disassociation and it's a brilliant thing that the body knows how to do, thank God we know how to, you know, go away. When we are in a traumatic experience so that our psyche stays safe. And so some people, they go up, some people, go to a place in their mind. I noticed that I go to a tree, usually outside of a window. And so when you have the leaving pattern, you may have a more, you might have more awareness to your habit of being in a stressful situation and just going away. That would be the thing to tune into is your go to just to leave when you are in fight, flight, or freeze, you choose to leave, scatter, get out of there. someone who tends to be intense, you might avoid that person. So avoidancy could be part of it. You might, what's the word you might be more introverted. A lot of people who have the leaving pattern just naturally are more comfortable by, their introvertedness, and one of the things that identify that, and I'm not saying that all introverts have the leaving pattern, but, a lot of leavng patterns get drained very easily

Dr. Willow: 19:26

By a lot of external activity.

Leah: 19:28

External activity can be a major drain, so they have to take care of themselves differently. And they also need to restore and really give themselves peace and alone time.

Dr. Willow: 19:41

They need more of a quiet time. And often this this protective strategy style, like, at some point had some kind of physical thing where they were like, oh, don't, you know, waif like. Like, don't want to be here, not strong in my physical body. I was anorexic for years, you know. I had, a lot of health issues. And, you know, very kind of weak and fragile. So I had to work hard to rebuild my constitution, my original constitution. And, I think that, you know, one of the beautiful things about this strategy style is there ability to kind of go up and out. Like the energy runs through the body in each one of these pattern styles in different ways, so maybe we'll touch on that a little bit. So the energy for this one, it's like, okay, overwhelming situation. I don't feel safe or just too much, like too much input to my system, the energy will go up and it will go out. Sort of to one side or the other, up and out. And so there is also this, beautiful connection to, heavenly energy, higher consciousness, spirituality. Psychic energy that we have. So we have this ability to, if we can kind of mend and heal and understand this, we can bring that psychic, you know, higher conscious energy down through the body and actually channel it. It's a really,

Leah: 21:07

talent for that. Yeah, there's, it's like one of their superpowers is they're able to go out to like the collective everything that's out there in the universe and they are able to bring it back in. So we have a lot of people who do the leaving pattern who are scientists, who are mathematicians and also artists who are dancers who are in spiritual leadership roles. So there's a way with which they're often connected to the mystical realm, or they're connected to really complex realms of shapes and science and mathematics. And I always recognize these people they're the ones who like, I don't know, I always think that they get the easiest test scores, like they don't have to study as hard as the rest of us.

Dr. Willow: 21:50

my case.

Leah: 21:51

Oh, that wasn't your case, okay, okay.

Dr. Willow: 21:54

ass Off in school.

Leah: 21:55

I also noticed that like a lot of leavers, they'll ask me a question. And then they'll have the answer before I can come up with it. It's almost like they go and pluck it out of my head. So they're pretty fast processors,

Dr. Willow: 22:07

Yeah. Yeah.

Leah: 22:08

And and when they are embodied, like I've, I know so many leavers who are in the tantra world. And so sexually they can be very connected and intimate, but it's always in relationship to how safe they feel. So, anything can bounce them out, but when they really are there, they're some of the most beautific of people and they have a certain body type. A

Dr. Willow: 22:35

There's a real ange

Leah: 22:37

slim, willowy

Dr. Willow: 22:41

Mm

Leah: 22:41

Elegant structure in their

Dr. Willow: 22:43

sort of like an angelic vibe to them.

Leah: 22:46

Very angelic. Yes. Yeah. Very kind of

Dr. Willow: 22:50

Whimsical. Fairy

Leah: 22:51

have a whimsy about them. Yeah. I, I would like to come back and and maybe be a leaver because

Dr. Willow: 23:00

And

Leah: 23:00

I like their look. I really like their look.

Dr. Willow: 23:03

Well, let's talk about the pattern you run, darling, which is the next one. Okay, so, so if you're, okay, let's see, you didn't have a trauma in utero or around age one or, you know, in that age range, kind of like before you really were like, whoa, a body. Okay.

Leah: 23:18

Yeah. Pre verbal.

Dr. Willow: 23:19

Definitely a pre verbal and almost kind of pre physical, but it's coming into your physicality. Um, And then we go into like age two, two, three, where it's like still kind of, you know, kind of getting language, it's starting to come, a little taller, you're like just kind of, your brain is just like open and wide open and you're like, I am in a body and wow, there's so much to explore. Let me put it in my mouth and figure out what it is, you know. Mm

Leah: 23:45

Yeah. You're still very much dependent on your caregivers. But you can start to move around on your own. You are starting to discover the world. And you're starting to discover your physicality much more. Your, your body and your, you know, all that stuff. Talking and,

Dr. Willow: 24:02

This is, this one's called the Merging Pattern.

Leah: 24:04

yeah. The merging pattern. And so, this is a pattern that, I mean, As an adult, what can often happen with this pattern when they get triggered is they can oftentimes feel lost. They look outside themselves especially like when it comes to getting the answer that they need, or getting the love that they need, or getting the validation that they need, or getting the approval that they need. They're always sort of outside trying to get the answer instead of being able with the skill of self referencing looking for the answers that they need within. So they have a oftentimes have a struggle with feelings of worthlessness and am I loved? Am I lovable? And so there's almost like There's this well that can never feels like I can get full sometimes it feels bottomless. Sometimes the emotions feel bottomless. Sometimes the hunger feels bottomless. So, these people are also kind of called the pleasure loopers. They're the ones who will, you know, they'll be there for you in the middle of the night if you're struggling with that divorce. They are, they pick up the phone. They are good listeners. They're good friends. They give you the shirt off their back. They really care and they want to take care of those around them. If they're the host of the party, you know, are you cold? Let me change the temperature. Are you hungry? Let me fit you a sandwich. does your neck hurt? Let me rub your neck. You know, they're just kind of the hostess with the mostest or the host with the most, in terms of their desire to have connection. And their split, when they developed the strategy, it was usually because a need went unmet. Something happened around that age of being a toddler where we were left when we needed

Dr. Willow: 27:31

Nourishment of some

Leah: 27:33

nourishment, we needed to be protected because we were too small to protect ourselves. And so there's this feeling of, if I can just merge, I can finally get safe. If I can get close enough, I'll be okay. And,

Dr. Willow: 27:48

Yeah, this is really the person you'll recognize them in yourself or in your life and people in your life. They're the people who are like you'll be like, do you want to do this or do you want to do that? And they'll be like, well, what do you want to do? You know, they'll ask well, well, whatever you want. You know, they have this amazing ability to go with the flow because they

Leah: 28:10

They have the disease to please like nobody else.

Dr. Willow: 28:14

Yeah.

Leah: 28:15

Total pleasers.

Dr. Willow: 28:16

know how they feel once they know how you feel, you know, so they're always looking outside of themselves to reference somebody else's feelings to know how they should feel. And you see this in toddlers, whether they develop this strategy or not. It's like they fall down, go boom, and then they look up at their parent and they're like, oh, should I be, should this be a trauma? should I start crying or should I be okay? And if the parent is like, Oh, you're fine. Then the kid's like, okay, yeah. And they just get up and keep going around. and then if the parent's like, oh my god, you poor kid, then they will start going into crying. And so it's just that age range, you know, it's just that developmental place that they're in, their process. And if they need a strategy, if they develop that protection style at that age, then they play it out in the rest of their lives. Now, how does it show up sexually?

Leah: 29:10

Well, it can be really fun because of their pleasure looping gifts.

Dr. Willow: 29:14

Yeah,

Leah: 29:15

You know, they bring, I think a lot of beauty to sex.

Dr. Willow: 29:18

they do. They're amazing lovers, amazing partners. They have

Leah: 29:22

very generous.

Dr. Willow: 29:24

just incredible ability to love.

Leah: 29:26

And their bodies tend to be very curvy and sensual, and because they love the senses. They love to taste, and that is a symbol for everything in life. It's like, they love to taste all the things, and then they like to feel all the things. If you go to like a workshop, this is the person that brings all the stuff. They've got a sheepskin rug and a cozy chair and all their drinks and tons of snacks. And then they offer you a snack. Yes,

Dr. Willow: 29:55

Lavender spray for your face.

Leah: 29:57

Right. It's like they have all their comforts. So if you looked in my pantry, you would see a great example of a merger pattern it's like, I'm going to be safe if I've got comfort and so it's like there's this thing we want to even merge with the taste of food. We want to merge with that cozy blanket. We want to merge with comfort. We're seeking comfort.

Dr. Willow: 30:19

Mm.

Leah: 30:20

all the time. It seems like and yeah. And so. But, like, again, also sexually and in intimate partnership, when we get triggered and we feel lost and someone is blocking us from merging with them, we get scared and then we can often puddle. And it's like the puddle never ends. There can be a neediness. Oftentimes that comes with the merger strategy because we lose ourselves. And so one of the best things you can do for a little merger that's puddling is just stay with, what do you need? And they're not going to have the answer. So you just stay with that question until they can resource it.

Dr. Willow: 31:02

Find their way out of the

Leah: 31:03

I hate that question, by the way.

Dr. Willow: 31:05

Of course you do.

Leah: 31:06

When I'm upset, screw it, just tell me the answer, man. Can't you see I'm suffering? This is how you walk yourself out.

Dr. Willow: 31:15

Yeah, exactly. So, let's, let's bypass, there's a, there's another strategy style that, that blends with this,

Leah: 31:23

Yes, because there is a nuance to this pattern.

Dr. Willow: 31:26

a pretty big

Leah: 31:27

Big one. I would actually consider it a separate

Dr. Willow: 31:32

style.

Leah: 31:33

on its own. Yeah. But it's definitely rooted in the merger.

Dr. Willow: 31:37

Yeah, in the interest of this podcast, let's move it forward. after that toddler period of development, then you're like, you know, you've got some words, you've got some language, you're cruising around, you're maybe like four, three, four, four, five, something like that. And then you drop into like, Oh, I'm not getting my needs met, or I'm not safe, or I experienced some kind of trauma. At this age, at this developmental stage, you go into this pattern. It's called the Enduring Pattern. And it's a strategy whereby you take the energy all down and in. And oh gosh, you're going to recognize these people. These are the ones who like, if something's bothering them, they'll just Go sit in the corner with it and kind of brood and figure it out inside of themselves and work it this way and that way until they can find their own solution. But they often didn't get enough time and space to do that as children. So a great example would be like, you know, the mom who's always finishing the kid's sentence for them, or the mom who's always kind of over or the dad or whatever, the caregiver who's overly always overriding what that child authentically wants or desires or thinks that they need. They'll be like, oh, you don't really need that, you need this. And so there's the concept of their own authentic needs and desires gets overridden quite a lot.

Leah: 33:06

Yeah, there's also a way with which, how they deal with problems is they just hunker down. And, it's like, enduring is such a great title for this particular strategy, because they endure. They're good at letting things roll off their back. Going with the flow. They're probably the most accommodating out of all of the strategies in my opinion. They're also really grounded. Naturally. It's one of their gifts that they're the be the person that you kind of naturally feel safe to, everyone wants to sit next to an endure on the bus. So it's like a lot of teachers have this strategy type because they're pretty, they don't get upset very easily. They're not, ugh.

Dr. Willow: 33:53

They're kind of naturally non reactive.

Leah: 33:56

Non reactive generally is a, one thing that's A great gift of theirs. Here's where they can get in trouble is they let things roll off their shoulders. They let things roll off their shoulders. They let things roll off their shoulders over and over and over and over and over until suddenly they're backed into a corner and there's nowhere else to go. They are in a corner and their only option left is to push out. And so there's something, there's an enduring anger. That is a suppressed part of their emotional system. And so then they push back. And when they push back, they're often turn around and never look back. And so if you've ever had a relationship or friendship or somebody in your life who you're like, well, gosh, they sure overreacted. And then they just disappeared. What the hell? It's you press the last button of an endurer.

Dr. Willow: 34:53

mm

Leah: 34:54

Possibly. And so that's one of the things you'll see in an endurer. Also, endurers tend to have a propensity towards depression. And it's like, and how I would describe their depression would be to be pressed down. To be sort of that, that repressed part of them that when they comes to a problem, they have to sort of brood like Willow said. And if you're in a relationship with an endurer, you got to give them space.. Their processing system is a little bit longer. And they need the time in the right to have boundaries. Because a lot of times they became an endurer because what was around them, people were in chaos and they had to sit still and endure the storm, weather the storm. And so they've learned how to sit still, sit quiet, and, be left alone.

Dr. Willow: 35:51

Mm hmm. Yeah, I think. And on that note, they do have a, an incredible ability and talent for, you know, meditation comes a little bit more naturally, a little bit more easily to them because they can just be in that stillness and that quiet space. It's comfortable for them. I would say probably a lot of endurers also can be very introverted. But when they do, when they can't take it anymore, you don't want to be in their way. It's like, you know, you finally get that bull going with the plow. And when, once it gets going, look out because the energy and the force behind it is really strong. So they have an incredible, down and in energy system. And so they, they are able to ground so easily. They're so, you know, when

Leah: 36:36

So embodied.

Dr. Willow: 36:37

So embodied when you see people who are like, they're so grounded, you know, it's potentially they run this as a strategy. I definitely run it as a secondary

Leah: 36:46

Yeah, both Willow and I, these are our secondary strategies. How would you say the endurer, um, is sexually? What's their jam?

Dr. Willow: 36:57

Oh God they're fun sexually because they're so in their bodies, right? They're for they have I feel like they have a lot of access to their first and second chakra. And then if they're confident in that I mean fuck it's game on.

Leah: 37:09

Yeah, I think also they're good at holding space. They're good at being present. So, so one of the things they really bring to the table in intimacy and in sexuality is a feeling of safety and feeling of like, this is natural. And so you tend to find your comfort zone really quickly, like intimacy tends to be pretty quick with an indoor because they already feel good in their skin.

Dr. Willow: 37:33

Yeah, they're good in their

Leah: 37:34

Yeah. They're not tripping on it. Yeah.

Dr. Willow: 37:37

It's really beautiful.

Leah: 37:38

And their body types are very strong. They tend to be more, bottom heavy. And so you can kind of feel like when they're walking in their body, they're really walking in their body.

Dr. Willow: 37:50

they've got, like,

Leah: 37:50

Where like, I think of leavers as sort of being, having a lovely prance.

Dr. Willow: 37:55

Prance, yeah. Very light on their

Leah: 37:57

Uh, Where, where a merger kind of swings their

Dr. Willow: 38:00

yeah, yeah, yeah, they're like dancing all the time,

Leah: 38:03

And so, you know, Willow mentioned that with leavers, the energy goes up with endures the energy goes down and with mergers, the energy goes to the heart.

Dr. Willow: 38:14

mm hmm. That makes sense. Okay, so, beyond the enduring, we go into, the age range of more like, five, I'm six, I'm a person. okay, now I'm, now I'm a, like a little person, yeah. so this will be the, what we call the aggressive pattern. And this style is, they really orient to the truth. So what are the facts? This is really important for them because usually this age range they were parentified in some way where their caregiver, their parents, didn't have the knack for parenting, or they couldn't hold the container, whatever. Like, maybe they were alcoholics, or maybe they were workaholics, or maybe they just weren't there at all. And so the kid had to step up and be like, okay, I'll take care of it. You know, this is the kid who took care of all their younger siblings, because the parents weren't available. My grandparents had 15 children. So there's a lot of

Leah: 39:19

With no birth control.

Dr. Willow: 39:20

yeah, there's a lot of aggressive pattern style in my, in that great big family structure because they were all taking care of the younger kids. You know, they all got parentified young, the young age, not all, but many. And, um, And so it's very interesting to watch this pattern style. This is also a challenging one for me, and I tended, in the past, to attract them in intimacy, in intimate relationships. And so, of course, whenever they would get into their strategy of keeping themselves safe and protecting themselves, their energy goes out, kind of like, out directly at you. So it can feel really overwhelming for someone with the leaving pattern, such as myself.

Leah: 40:04

Big charisma. And also big when they're upset, boy.

Dr. Willow: 40:08

Oh god, big charisma, right? When you walk into the room, if you're in their glory, if you're in their limelight, like you are going to feel like the star of the show. Like they shine a really big light.

Leah: 40:21

the

Dr. Willow: 40:21

so bright,

Leah: 40:23

man. That's why they're so attractive. It's like when they're present with you, it's like they're shining the sun on you. And when it's nighttime they're shining the moon on you. They are so delicious because they're powerful and they're competent and they had to be. They had to be, they had to learn super fast. So they got good at a lot of things because their survival depended on it. And their core wound is, I don't trust anybody. Because they couldn't trust their caregivers to really keep them safe. And so they had to grow up fast they got incredible street smarts and they are able to know where danger is. And they're kind of, they have great, they're the type of people who jump out of airplanes, you know, they might join the military and be super successful in it. They have this adrenaline connection. They can do super scary things and make it seem so easy. And they have a struggle with asking for help. Asking for help is like meaning death, you know. It means weakness.

Dr. Willow: 41:31

Yeah. It's hard for them to trust that anyone can do it as good as they can, because they learned early on, nobody can do it as good as I can. I have to do it myself.

Leah: 41:41

Yeah, so when they're vulnerable, they can sometimes have a knee jerk reaction to fight. You know, it's that we don't, we do not flee, we do not freeze, we fight. And so they often have had parts of their childhood where there's been considerable violence. And as someone who's oftentimes in relationship with an aggressive pattern type, they're great protectors. They watch out for everybody and they watch out for the little guy. They really can be the hero, but sometimes they can have hero complexes and you know, they want to always rescue the damsel in distress or they want to be the knight in shining armor. And because of this not being to ask for help, oftentimes their adrenals burn out. They go, go, go, go, go. And then they flatline or they'll get in an accident that forces them to ask for help, you know, like the hospital and where, where the choice to ask for help is taken away from them because they refuse to pay attention to the signs. So then it's forced on them. And that's a health crisis right there. Don't let that happen.

Dr. Willow: 42:58

Don't let that

Leah: 42:59

Yeah, get comfortable with vulnerability

Dr. Willow: 43:01

that's the beauty of like understanding and knowing these styles the rigid pattern we go into, the age range of more like, okay, now I'm, now I'm a, like a little person, like 7, 8, 9 I'm, I'm getting closer to like the transformation of teens, Yeah, you've got more of a persona coming online, more ego coming online, yeah, exactly. And so,

Leah: 43:25

expectations are coming online for you. You know, like, you start to learn how to pick out your clothes and you know, you might start having homework and those things like that. You got a little teeny bit more responsibility.

Dr. Willow: 43:37

So this pattern style is like, if they don't feel safe, their strategy to get themselves back to safety is to hyper organize. It's the rigid pattern. So think about like type A kind of people, you know. They're like, don't put that there, put it right here, two inches away from where I just had it. You know, it's like, they can be they can be very critical of themselves and others. That's that's

Leah: 44:04

They struggle with judgment.

Dr. Willow: 44:05

painful for them. You know, it's really not comfortable. They don't want to be stuck in that judgment place. But it's just, it's how they are keeping themselves from getting hurt. So,

Leah: 44:16

Yeah, Yeah, well, I would say that, like, oftentimes this gets put into place because of parents expectations and then what they don't give. So for a lot of rigid pattern strategy types, the parent is, You have to be perfect. You have to do well. Our expectation for you is you have to hit this benchmark, and if you don't... So, what they learn is that when they're perfect, they get love. And so they become very, oriented to play by the rules. If you play by the rules, you'll be a success. So they become very good at structure and putting things in order and towing the line. So they're also going to be, you know, the kids and the adults that are upholders of rules. Rules mean safety. And because approval was often stingy in their childhood that is what has caused them oftentimes to have this propensity to judge. And one thing you have to know is that if you have someone in your life who does the rigid strategy and you often feel judged by them, a place that will lead you to more compassion is that whatever they're judging you for, they're turning that around on themselves and they're judging themselves three times worse. It's that inner dialogue that they have in the private moments of their psyche where they're really hard on themselves as if that's the motivation that they need to be perfect. And one of their core wounds is not being connected to their emotional body. So it's like their core is there, but if you think of like bamboo, it's a strong core, but it's hollow on the inside. When they're in a pattern and they're triggered, it's more difficult to connect to what they're feeling. And if they can start to learn that, that's helpful, you know, then they want to use the strategy differently.

Dr. Willow: 46:19

I've noticed in coaching people with this pattern, it's one of the more challenging ones for me to coach because of that disconnection from emotions and from feeling. Because I am always doing some out of emotional release with people. So I'm like, where do you feel it in your body? What's

Leah: 46:37

yeah.

Dr. Willow: 46:38

And they're like, I don't know. Like they

Leah: 46:40

What do you mean?

Dr. Willow: 46:41

yeah, they don't have access to it. So I've had to, you know, kind of do some workarounds with that pattern style. It's

Leah: 46:48

They're very cerebral

Dr. Willow: 46:49

very, very in their heads.

Leah: 46:51

and then you want it linear and They can get annoyed by emotional people real easily.

Dr. Willow: 46:57

Yeah. I would say sexually too. There's sort this kind of like,

Leah: 47:02

They can be a little rule bound.

Dr. Willow: 47:03

Yeah, a little rule bound, like, it's gotta go in this direction, this timing, and this, you know, this needs to be there and that needs to be in place, so there can be a bit of a but that can also be really fun, right?

Leah: 47:16

There's some hot parts right, because they're good at discipline. So there

Dr. Willow: 47:20

like they make great dominatrixes.

Leah: 47:23

There's a, there's definitely a place where if you, can eroticize the power of discipline, that's a place where one can really, really powerfully expand with this pattern type. Not to say that you have to go looking for BDSM or that's going to be a thing for you, but where you can use discipline in your life, both in your intimate life, like getting healthy and eating good. There's no better accountability buddy than a rigid. If you're looking to improve a sector of your life that requires discipline, they are such good role models in that.

Dr. Willow: 47:57

Mm

Leah: 47:58

Um, and they thrive on, I mean, I was just hanging out with two rigids the other day and they do the light side of rigid so beautiful. And I was like, I want to like discipline. You make it look so good. It just doesn't, that doesn't sound pleasurable to me. Like, What I'm whining like a classic merger and and they're like, well, no, the reward comes after, they love the reward that comes the high that comes from doing something really hard. And some people think, Oh rigid, because they have a way to organize things, that means they're a clean freak. And only some

Dr. Willow: 48:37

No,

Leah: 48:38

You know, they'll be, but there'll be areas in their life that they're super methodical about. They make incredible managers and leadership roles and that kind of thing. Great at delegating.

Dr. Willow: 48:49

They really have an ability

Leah: 48:51

Good system making

Dr. Willow: 48:52

Yeah, to take like a messy situation and just put it into an organized, like cohesive, understandable structure. Structure feels safe to them. Like they really feel like they can, be in their true essence and in their true glory when there's a good structure in place. That's the beauty of like understanding and knowing these styles and these strategies of keeping yourself safe and then really understand especially if you're getting into a new relationship you start dating someone new and you understand what their strategies are then you can you all of a sudden you have a lot more leeway with them. You're like, okay, that's just the way they are gonna keep themselves safe and protect themselves from getting their heart hurt and that's cool. Okay, then they run the enduring pattern. Great. Well, let me give them plenty of time and space to come to their own truth and their own conclusion. Or, oh, look they run the aggressive pattern. That means I can really give them the facts, give them the truth straight up as I see it. The truth about the truth is that there's as many truths on this planet as there are people. It's perspective, right? But, facts. Like, they want to know. So, my ex runs this aggressive style. And you know, it's always about, well, this is what you said.

Leah: 50:14

Oh,

Dr. Willow: 50:15

said these words. You know, and it's like, okay. Yeah, okay, maybe I did. I don't remember I said.

Leah: 50:21

My ex too was always like, always remembered word for word the conversation and I'm like, I was emotional. Give me break

Dr. Willow: 50:30

Yeah, yeah.

Leah: 50:30

to just be with what was true then. You know?

Dr. Willow: 50:33

Yeah, it's different now and in

Leah: 50:35

What I feel matters, man. That interpretation of what I feel really matters. I mean, that happened. That's a fact.

Dr. Willow: 50:42

Yeah, totally, totally.

Leah: 50:44

he was like, no. That actually was not factual.

Dr. Willow: 50:48

Yeah, they love, they love

Leah: 50:51

They will win the argument.

Dr. Willow: 50:52

Yeah they'll, they'll totally like, well, this is the info, this is what happened, these are the facts, or these are the stats, these are the, you know, they'll look up you know, my ex was always looking up, like, stats and info. Like actual facts around it, scientific evidence, you know, that was how he understood the truth. And so, you know, So, you know, it's really, it's a powerful, powerful pattern actually. I really love that pattern, and it's taken me a while to love them. But

Leah: 51:23

Well, I think it's easy to love them. It's when they're triggered.

Dr. Willow: 51:27

It's challenging. For me, especially as a leaver

Leah: 51:30

yeah, Leavers and the Aggressive pattern type, they, when they are both triggered, the aggressive can be so overwhelming that it's really hard for a Leaver to stay in their body and hold it because it just pushes them right out.

Dr. Willow: 51:45

Yeah.

Leah: 51:45

so part of the mastery is for the aggressive to have enough self awareness so that, and this is true for all the patterns, then you start to learn the skill of what I like to refer to as energetic responsibility. Because what what these triggers feel like is the impact of energy. It's, I am in overwhelm right now. And now my energy is not contained. It's not centered. I'm not connected to my core. I'm now in a state. My heart rate is going up, which makes it harder to really hear and listen and to gain perspective from somebody else. And so we have a way with which our direction scatters. And when we can start to learn how to contain our energy and take really exquisite good care of ourselves when we find ourselves in a triggered state where our pattern wants to take over, if we can start to learn about those sensations, those feelings and what those signs are. It doesn't mean you stop going into pattern, but what it means is you start having things in place, tools that will help you come back from that patterned state, so that you're less triggered, and the more practice you have with that, suddenly you can go, wow, I'm not going into pattern, even though I'm triggered. I now have a different strategy for helping me stay present, for helping me stay connected to my body, for checking out what's going on, and for my ability to be in compassionate partnership to resolving conflict with the people that I'm in conflict with. And when you have this, these tools, then you're also able to see the people that you love in pattern and you're able to facilitate the right kind of communication and language and create an energetic field. I know not everyone knows what that means, but be able to energetically hold you and at times hold them in a particular way that assists them in coming out of pattern or no longer needing their strategy to be in harmony with their environment.

Dr. Willow: 53:55

Yeah.

Leah: 53:56

pretty powerful.

Dr. Willow: 53:57

It's so powerful. Instead of being in a trigger fest with your partner, like ping ponging back and forth, my trigger, your trigger, I'm in pattern, you're in pattern, I'm keeping myself safe.

Leah: 54:07

No, you're a

Dr. Willow: 54:08

you're keeping yourself

Leah: 54:09

you're a pattern.

Dr. Willow: 54:10

safe this way. You take responsibility for your own energy system, and you find your way to presence. Really? I do like to say like you're in pattern or you're in presence. And you can be present to the fact that you're in pattern, sure, but you're still not in presence because when you're truly, truly in presence that there's, there, there is no space for pattern. Like it's not, you're in a non dualistic place, so there's not an I'm a this or an I'm a that.

Leah: 54:43

Well, one of the things you can do is use presence, and one of the first things that can help you connect to presence is tracking sensations in your

Dr. Willow: 54:52

yeah, sensuality, baby.

Leah: 54:53

that your heart rate's actually elevated. You know, noticing where you feel tight and contracted.

Dr. Willow: 54:59

You're noticing that heat rising up from your belly. You're noticing, like, and if you're looking at your partner, you're noticing their pupils dilate. You're noticing, like, their capacity to be present with you is limited. So, their amygdala is... on fuego, and you want to be able to read, you know, your own system, get yourself into a state of presence. And then you can be with your partner who's clearly in a state of trigger and pattern as well. What our teachers often will say, like, you know, 90% of people are in pattern 95% of the time. So our goal is not to ever, like, completely eradicate these patterns, but rather to learn how to live with them and maybe to live outside of them, like

Leah: 55:44

To have over them?

Dr. Willow: 55:46

70% of the time, that would be a great goal.

Leah: 55:49

Because the light side of the strategies are so spectacular. And if anything, the goal would be, how can I adopt the light side of all the patterns? How can I be more skillful at adopting the genius zone of these various pattern types because they're all skills that we can learn and the more that we understand the patterns, the more compassion, the more love, and the more skill we have in our partnerships with everyone. Because everyone is going to have these childhood strategies that take them out of presence and that take them out of their heart and out of their ability to be grounded and to stay in the loving. So, this is just fascinating, ways of understanding ourselves. And I find it so interesting how the bodies end up developing, like, with the aggressive pattern type, they tend to have really muscular strength. They have strong cores, musculature, very athletic, comes super natural. It's a skill that they have. That's kind of a talent. And so let's run through them and we'll just kind of give you the names again and just give you just a couple words to highlight what they do when they're in patterns. So the first one is the leaving pattern, which is an easy one to remember because they... they leave.

Dr. Willow: 57:11

They flee.

Leah: 57:12

And the second pattern is the merger and what do they do? They puddle. They fall apart when they go into pattern. Then we have the Endurer and they go down. And they buckle in. I'll give you just another metaphor for the Endurer. It's almost like when they get triggered, they've got tent stakes, right? And they drive those tent stakes deep into the ground and they are not gonna budge. They're just gonna, they're gonna sit and they're gonna endure it. Now we have the rigid.

Dr. Willow: 57:47

Rigid.

Leah: 57:49

And they go when they get triggered, they're gonna go to their head and they're gonna go super analytical and they're devoid of their emotional connection. Aggressive is going to see it as a competition and it's going to be something they must win. So they're going to go forcefully into the conflict and they are, they're going to get bigger than you. You know, they're going to get so big that no one else can fight back. So even in the smallest of bodies people tend to go, forget it. Winning isn't, this is useless. I can never win with you.

Dr. Willow: 58:27

Mm

Leah: 58:27

Um,

Dr. Willow: 58:29

Yeah, so the value of, this is an absolute game changer for intimate relationships, for all of your intimate relationships. That includes your relationships with your parents, with your children, with your dearest of friends, with yourself, yes, with your partner. And and people that you're close to at work. It is absolutely going to turn your perspective on its head in a good way so that you can actually move your relationships forward in a way that feels healthy, in a way that It feels nourishing to both sides and really brings forth more love in between you. More connection. More understanding. It's about understanding. It's like, let me understand how you keep yourself safe so that I can understand you and I can bring you to

Leah: 59:22

so I can contribute.

Dr. Willow: 59:23

Yeah, totally.

Leah: 59:24

There is it's a beautiful system if you're a facilitator, if you're a teacher, if you run groups, if you are in a manager or leadership position, if you are an entrepreneur and you've got staff, it's one of those things from where you can really hold the group and get underneath the entire group. Where you are modeling how to be there for people when they find themselves stuck. And if you're doing that from a group standpoint, how you model that ends up being a model for other people so that the culture within your working becomes more harmonious, more useful, more collaborative. So one of the things we're really excited about is we've got a coming up and we're gonna take it to the next level for those of you who really are piqued, your interest is going, huh, I love personality systems. I love understanding ourselves and our psyches and our emotions. And I want to be really good at this thing. I want to get really good at loving.

Dr. Willow: 1:00:33

Yeah, so come to our class, and you're going to learn so much more about how you can apply this to your intimate relationships to your sexuality. Plus, you're going to learn about that extra one that we had to gloss over in the interest of time. And you're going to want to know that one because a lot of people run it.

Leah: 1:00:48

Well, and I do. So I really want you to know about all the nuances this extra, extra merger. So, you definitely do not want to miss on that because a lot of people

Dr. Willow: 1:01:00

Yeah.

Leah: 1:01:01

this one.

Dr. Willow: 1:01:02

We'll put the link in the show notes, and we'll see you there!

Leah: 1:01:05

Yeah. Love, love, love.

SxR Announcer: 1:01:08

Thanks for tuning in. Leah Piper is a tantric sex master coach and a positive psychology facilitator. Dr. Willow Brown is both a Chinese and functional medicine doctor and a Taoist sexology teacher. Don't forget, your comments, likes, subscribes, and suggestions matter. Let's realize this new world together.