Combating Parental Alienation & Estrangement With Dr. Paul Jenkins’ Positivity Model - PART 1 - Episode 32

When hope flickers in the darkness of life's toughest moments, transformation awaits.  Dr. Paul Jenkins, a psychologist specializing in positivity psychology,  joins the conversation today, illuminating the path to emotional wholeness. The conversation includes Dr. Paul's response to the heart-stopping diagnosis of his son's cancer, and champions the resilience that springs from hope, and the relentless pursuit of self-improvement.

Imagine a world where our perceptions don't imprison us but instead liberate us, where the weight of circumstance is but a feather on the scale of our minds. This revelation forms the crux of our conversation, where we delve into the power of positive thinking. We unveil how shifting comparisons, from the despairing to the hopeful, can transform our emotional landscape. This conversation is a testament to the strength we have to paint our experiences with the hues of positivity, altering the canvas of our lives.

As the episode draws to a close, the power of community comes to the forefront. The exchange of stories and questions through email isn't just encouraged, it's vital. It's in the sharing of wisdom where true growth blossoms. So, as I extend this invitation to you, our listeners, to engage and connect, let's remember that together, we're building a bastion of support for each other, a place where hope thrives and the spirit of positivity prevails.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Well, how do you feel if you imagine that what's coming is even better than what you've already got? This is hope, hope saves lives.

Speaker 2: 0:12

There was a time in my life when I was overwhelmed and under water. Those days are the inspiration for this podcast. This is by far the ultimate healing journey for all of us. Healing ourselves emotionally, spiritually and physically is paramount to this journey. From this place of grounding we can all go out into the world and change all our interactions and relationships. We can engage people from an integrated and resourced place. This is a journey of coming home to ourselves. In today's episode we'll start to explore some of these issues. Let's begin the healing journey today. Welcome to the Family Disappeared podcast.

Speaker 2: 0:45

I remember early on in struggling with disconnection, parental alienation, erasure whatever word resonates with you. I didn't have the term parental alienation when I was struggling with this, but I went to my high school reunion. I met some people I hadn't seen for a while and we all went out to dinner afterwards. I just wanted to talk about what was happening in my family. I was just talking about how hard it was what people were doing to me. I was very much in the victim's seat. I wanted people to understand that. I wanted people to rally and be on my team and tell me how hard it was and stuff. Some people in the conversation pushed back in and asked me questions like what's happening with this, what's happening with that, what's happening with this? At that time, in my struggle with being alienated from my oldest story, at that time I wasn't so much pain. All I could do is really identify with the pain, with the struggle, with the unfairness, with the confusion. I couldn't really identify with anything beyond that. As I've stayed around and as I've started to do my personal work and not by choice, if you're out there and you're struggling and you're like I can't do this or this is too hard or I don't get why people are doing that, I don't think any of us come to this work by choice.

Speaker 2: 1:58

At the, pain gets great enough that at a point we have to move in one direction or the other. One of my first sponsors used to say to me that when the flame gets hot enough, you're going to have to move. That's what it was for me. That's when I came to work in on myself as the flame got so hot. I moved towards a solution versus staying in the pain, which would have been the other direction. Once I started doing that, my life started changing. As my life started changing, I started to see some positive kernels of the struggle. Some positive kernels of the struggle was starting to learn who I am as a man, how I function in the world, how I show up, what strategies and coping mechanisms I'm bringing into every relationship and where they came from. Then I started to unpack that and I started to learn new coping mechanisms and life started to change.

Speaker 2: 2:45

And this podcast today is very much about looking for the positivity is taking these really challenging situations and not saying that they're not challenging and they're not painful. But what's the residual stuff that's happening from these situations? Am I growing as a person? Do I have other rich and meaningful relationships in my life? Am I starting to heal some old wounds that I didn't know existed, you know, am I starting to change how I show up in every relationship in my life?

Speaker 2: 3:11

So I'm so excited today for the show. It's really going to be a hoot and interest in and tag on the heartstrings as usual, and please remember to like, share, let people know about the show. You know we need you, we need your support in order for the show to keep growing and flourishing and there's a donate link in the show notes, so we'd love to have your support to be able to keep bringing you the show and the other resources that we offer for free to everyone. So let's jump into the show. Also, we're really excited to have an awesome guest here today, and today we have Dr Paul, who is just a plethora of knowledge, and I'm going to let him actually introduce himself to the community and let you all know a little bit about him. So, dr Paul, please go ahead.

Speaker 1: 3:54

Well, thank you, lawrence. And probably the most important part of the introduction would be that I happen to be a human member of the species and so I get to experience all of the things that I'm coaching and training people about firsthand, and I think that's important. That's an important part of my credential. But I am also a professional psychologist. I've been in practice for 30 years and I've split that career basically in half. So the first half of my career was traditional psychotherapy and I also did a fair amount of yuck work.

Speaker 1: 4:35

I shared this with you just before we started the recording, lawrence, that I spent 13 of those years doing child custody evaluations for the court. This is bitter, angry, forcing people who can't figure out how to share their kids and the court would throw me in the mix to go sort things out and make recommendations back to the judge about what to do for the kids. That's yuck work, let me tell you. But I learned some things in the process. And then the second half of my career, the last 15 years, I am exclusively a positivity psychologist. I write books, I've developed models around positivity, I provide a certification for positivity practitioners and podcasting YouTube. I'm having a whole lot of fun in the second half of my career, so there's a quick introduction for you.

Speaker 2: 5:35

Thank you, dr Paul, and thanks for introducing us to the word yuck yuck work, which I think is very appropriate for the court system and a lot of these challenges that so many of us face. And as, like you, just shared with your audience, I didn't know that you had an experience within the court system and had served your first part of your career in that, and I got to think you as being someone that's working within the court system, that's thrown into the middle of these custody battles and all this powerful energy and stuff like that had to be exhausting and you must have felt somewhat hopeless in that position and helpless at times yourself. Is that accurate?

Speaker 1: 6:11

There's a very limited amount of control that you have in those settings and, in fact, I learned probably the biggest thing that I learned there, lawrence is that the court is a terrible place to solve family problems. It's just an abysmal place to do that, and the reason for that when you think about what the courts are for okay, it's primarily a criminal justice system and defending and protecting people's rights. The judicial system is there for a purpose, but an adversarial system is not an ideal way to approach family problems and, in fact, I've seen many, many cases where it made it worse, not better worse, and maybe, as you're listening to this podcast today, you might be thinking, yeah, I can think of some examples of where it got worse right rather than better. So that's one of the things that I learned in that setting, but I also became very familiar with the fact that some things we control and other things we don't, and it's in our best interest to focus on the things that we do control, and that gives us the best chance to create more positive outcomes.

Speaker 2: 7:36

Yes, I love that reflection because we get so wrapped up in the stuff we can't control and trying to get people to see our sides of what's happening. And as you're talking about positivity, we're going to segue into really what the show is about and, like, how do we stay positive when we're fighting for our kids lives, we're fighting for our lives, for our grandkids lives? Like, what do you tell to someone that's in a situation that just feels so difficult and overwhelming and confusing? Like what's the first thing?

Speaker 1: 8:04

you say, hey, you know, I think in in light of the fact that we're having a podcast conversation today, I request permission to be pretty bold, Is that okay?

Speaker 2: 8:17

Oh, I love bold. Please as bold as possible.

Speaker 1: 8:21

You know what? Some of what I'm about to share with you gets me fired. Okay, people don't want to hear this, but it's extremely important to tune into what I'm about to share with you, because this changes the game, and here it is. Circumstances, including yours, are neutral. Okay, now I'll just pause and let that land.

Speaker 2: 8:47

Yeah, there's a lot of people taking a big breath right now.

Speaker 1: 8:51

Whatever you do. Just keep breathing, okay? Now, when I say circumstances are neutral, I am not saying that they are easy or painless, because sometimes our circumstances are very difficult and painful. But when I say that circumstances are neutral, this ties into a positivity model that I have developed. Consider this for a moment. It is what it is. Okay, have you heard that phrase too? That can be extremely annoying, depending on who's saying it and why, but all it means is that things, the way they are right now, without changing anything, could always.

Speaker 1: 9:36

Now, lawrence, my editor tells me to always avoid the word always and never use the word never, but I just used it. What it is could always be better and it could always be worse. So notice that for a minute. I know there are times when our circumstances seem like it couldn't be any worse than this. This is the worst thing that could ever happen to me, but then, if you pay attention, usually right after that it gets a little worse. I'm not here to be a pessimist, I am the positivity psychologist. But the root of understanding positivity starts with understanding that circumstances are neutral. It could always be better, it could always be worse. So maybe I can give you just a personal example, lawrence.

Speaker 1: 10:33

I shared some of this with you before we started the recording today, but I am currently at my son's home in Chicago. About four months ago, I get a call from my son and it sounded something like this dad, I have cancer, okay, boom. Well, that hit me like a ton of bricks and it I'm happy to say that I practice what I preach. Okay, and I only preach what I practice. And I heard my mind doing this as I got that call from my son. I was realizing I'm so grateful that I didn't just get a call from my daughter-in-law saying that my son had been killed in a head-on collision. Okay, now, what just happened in your mind? We've got cancer, we've got a head-on collision. Which one do you want? I don't know. You don't always get to pick right.

Speaker 2: 11:29

Right.

Speaker 1: 11:29

Sometimes your what it is just lands in your lap because of the choices of somebody else or because of natural circumstances or acts of God. It is what it is. Here you go. This is your life, and mine includes. Right now, my son has cancer. It doesn't include. I went to a funeral for my son two months ago Now. Will I attend a funeral in the future? Yeah, probably for him. I don't know if I'll survive him or not. The spoiler alert Lawrence, nobody gets out of this alive.

Speaker 2: 12:04

Right.

Speaker 1: 12:05

Are you okay? You handle him that News all right. So I sharing this personal example with you, because here's what I invite people to notice. My job, my whole job, is to illuminate the obvious. This is so cool. I get paid to tell people things they already know, but there's obvious things that are completely unnoticed. Obvious but unnoticed. Let's go there. Your shirt, can you feel it?

Speaker 2: 12:40

Yeah, now Now, you Now.

Speaker 1: 12:43

Right, could you feel it? Just before I said something? Well, technically, yes, your neurology is functioning, but you don't notice it. See, it's obvious. Now that I call it to your attention, you can feel your shirt on your skin, but before I mentioned it it was unnoticed. Or the fact that we're speaking English, did you notice? It's obvious. Now, that's my point, and most of what goes on in our psychology is in that space. It's totally obvious once it's called your attention, but completely unnoticed up until that point. So I share with you the call I got from my son. Dad, I have cancer.

Speaker 1: 13:24

Okay, what is our brain doing? Here's what I want you to notice. It's called judgment or evaluation. Okay, evaluation is a nicer word, that's the one that I use in my model. Evaluation is where your brain is constantly judging, evaluating your what it is. So you can't just leave it alone. Your brain has to judge it. And notice this you are constantly judging yourself, pretty harshly sometimes your family, your circumstances, coworkers, a spouse, your kids, people in your community, people at your church, your synagogue, the government, the economy. You judge the weather, you're judging me. It's cool, I'm judging you. But just notice this we're constantly judging. Well, psychologically. Okay, remember, I'm giving you the psychological mechanisms behind positivity.

Speaker 1: 14:29

When we judge, we have to compare what we've got to something. We have to have some standard of comparison in order to make the judgment. And if we don't have one, we'll make one up. And we've got a really great imagination, okay, so when I share with you my son has cancer, you can imagine how that hit me, because you know how it could hit you to hear that. Now, when we say that that's bad, it's because we're comparing it, whether we notice it or not. I'm inviting you to notice, okay, illuminating the obvious. When we compare my son has cancer to my son doesn't have cancer, well, this sucks, right, and it really does. I mean, compared to something better, like my son doesn't have cancer, this sucks. But then I switched it for you a little and I didn't tell you the part about it hasn't spread to other organs in his body, it hasn't metastasized. There's a treatment plan in place.

Speaker 1: 15:36

Okay, you see what your mind's doing with it now. It's like, oh, compared to something far worse. I'll take this. So when I said circumstances are neutral, all I mean is it could always be better, it could always be worse, and your brain is judging it the only way your brain can judge it is in comparison to some standard. So I'm not here to tell you how to think. I don't have that kind of authority. I just want you to see that you are and, as you call that to your attention, to your conscious awareness, it puts you back in choice, because we're not done yet.

Speaker 1: 16:16

By the way, there's two processes, okay, that are obvious but unnoticed. I just shared one with you. It's judgment or evaluation. You can't turn it off, you're constantly doing it. So notice that you're doing it. Are you in a good position with your family? Well, that depends on what you compare it to, doesn't it? Okay, notice that, and I'm not saying it's easy, I'm not saying it's painless. Remember, this is important because whatever energy we create in judgment or evaluation mode goes on with us to the next step, which is creation, creation of what is to be. And that doesn't exist yet. We haven't created it yet. So notice this, lawrence the only place that it can exist because it doesn't exist yet, what is to be doesn't exist yet. The only place it does exist now is in our imagination. Now, I already established that we can always imagine something better or something worse. So go with the feelings for a minute, when you imagine because you don't know, actually, let's, let's test that. How are you doing next week?

Speaker 1: 17:34

Okay you don't know, no, definitely not I mean, I have people who tell me oh, I'm doing great next week, dr Paul, and I'm like you don't know. You hope, you wish, you imagine you have something to do with it, so don't forget that. But you don't know, so all you can do is imagine, right. Okay, when you imagine or predict or expect that what's coming is even worse than what you've already got, how do you feel?

Speaker 2: 18:11

Right, a lot worse.

Speaker 1: 18:13

Yeah, this is anxiety. Okay, that's 30 years of clinical experience in a nutshell, right there. Anxiety is when we imagine worse things to come. We don't know. Well, how do you feel if you imagine that what's coming is even better than what you've already got? This is hope. Hope saves lives. Did you know? The number one risk factor for suicide is hopelessness?

Speaker 2: 18:44

No.

Speaker 1: 18:45

Since you don't know. Choose a position that serves you well and then that gives your brain the blueprint to go create an upgrade. I don't care what your family situation is. I know the name of the show is the Family Disappeared Podcast. Right, I've got a lot of experience working with families who have experienced separation, alienation, estrangement, all of the nasty stuff. You can imagine that I saw in 13 years of clinical work in the courts. Okay, I've seen murder, incest, abuse. You can't shock me after 30 years of clinical experience. Whatever your situation is, you have the power to create an upgrade. That's good news, but it comes with a warning too, because you also have the power to make a mess. Have you noticed this?

Speaker 2: 19:55

100%, and if we just like take this back and scale it back a little bit, like, hey, I'm a parent, I'm disconnected, I'm alienated from my daughter, and it sucks and it hurts and it's really painful, and you're saying like, I'm gonna imagine that there's gonna be something different to happen, but it doesn't. It can be any form of difference, right imagination, as long as it's a positive form of difference. You're saying that creates Hope, that creates some different, new, new neurons or something happening within the brain. Is that what you're saying?

Speaker 1: 20:28

Yes, there are actually studies that show the impact the positive thinking can have. But you hear it all the time just think positive, right? And that is a tri-fluffy motivational speaker trick that doesn't serve anybody well, until you realize what it actually means. I've broken it down for you into two separate processes evaluation, or judgment, and creation. And when we understand that it's our own mind that is creating our position in both of those processes. That's what enables us to put our brain to work for us instead of against us, and it doesn't matter what the circumstances are. Remember, that's the part that gets me fired sometimes.

Speaker 2: 21:22

Totally, but in your circumstances, which sound incredibly challenging and a little bit scary, what's your creation process? What does it look like? What does it sound like? I like what. What is that for you right now, with what you're going through with your son?

Speaker 1: 21:35

if you're okay with me asking that, Absolutely, and I'm happy to share that because the personal examples are what brought it home for me. In my book I talk about my bankruptcy. That happened over a decade ago and that's another example of a what it is. That you would think is bad. It's not bad, it's neutral, and there are upsides and downsides to everything. So let me share a couple of things about my current situation. I told you I'm in Chicago right now at my son's house where he lives.

Speaker 1: 22:10

We live in in Utah, my wife and I, and over the last three to four months, she, my wife and I have spent more quality time with our oldest son and his family than we have in over a decade Before that. Oh, I'm just tossing that out there. Okay, now, does that mean that the cancer is good? No, cancer is neutral, but it's in the context of the cancer that we have created opportunities to connect with and reconnect with our son and his family that we didn't have over the past decade. Now we didn't have an estranged, alienated relationship with him. We just had a lot of geographical distance and everybody gets busy with their own lives. And we have connected more over the past four months and we have in a decade. Okay, we created that.

Speaker 1: 23:08

Now what's gonna happen with the cancer? We don't know. And the doctors have opinions and their statistics and everything else, but all of those things are simply somebody's best guess and we don't know what's going to happen. So we could get lost in oh my gosh, things are gonna get worse. Or we could get really intentional about what can we do with what we've got, to create some upgrades. That's the strategic implementation of the whole thing. Everything has upsides and downsides. What we're doing with positivity is choosing on purpose To get good with what it is, get to peace with the way things are without changing anything, and then create the upgrade.

Speaker 2: 23:56

And the clarification I would ask you for right, like your, your son's sick, you show up, you support him and by doing that, it creates space for creation and change. And now you've had this, this really deep Connection, over the last three or four months. But did you have that intention before? Or you were just open to what would happen next? And that's the positive thing that you found out, because it feels like you just stayed present and something positive happened. You, in contrast to having a positive thought and building something out that happened from your creation. I'm confused about that delineation of time.

Speaker 1: 24:31

Well, what it triggers for me, lawrence, is that realization that we can't turn off our creation. I think it's in our divine nature. I think we are creative beings and that we have to create something. So the only question is what are we going to create? We create from and with whatever landed in our lap, so it's not always you know. Oh, I'm going to go out and create this particular. Have you noticed? You make plans and then it's like, oh surprise, something else happens instead. Right, that happened with my bankruptcy too. It's like I didn't plan on this, I didn't sign up for this, it's just. Here you go, this is what you've got. Well, that is the material with which you're going to create what is to be. You can't create your future with something you don't have. You get to create it with what you do have. And that's why I said that those two steps are important coming to peace with what it is and then moving forward with that to create what is to be.

Speaker 2: 25:51

And in creating the what is to be, we still have to be an acceptance of what is and basically let go that we have no control over Like that, like you started the conversation, and we just let go into the creation and stuff just keeps evolving and unfolding, as long as we stay within the positive outlook instead of the negative outlook, correct? Wow, Dr Paul is a hoot. I am learning some new words, some new ideas. I love his interpretation of positivity and how to find it, how to stay in it and how to kind of like expand it. And like part one was great. I really enjoyed also that he has experience in family court and coming out of that really negative yuck work that he said. Like I like the idea yuck work because we get stuck in that yuck place and that yuck work and it becomes really limiting. And coming out of that really yuck work into this positivity and working with his own personal life experiences to like live what he's talking about, not just talk about it. So I really really appreciated that. And part two is really cool too. It was really fun and some really neat new terms and ideas that he introduces to us. So please stick around for episode two next week and remember to like share let folks know about this.

Speaker 2: 27:07

There's a bunch of links in the show notes. There's a link to parental alienation anonymous, which is our free 12 step program. There's links to the family hope project, which is a virtual online art gallery and advocacy platform. There's a link for the family disappeared Facebook groups and other Facebook groups. My email is down there.

Speaker 2: 27:23

If you have any questions, anything you want to ask, share. Please click on the email address. Send us an email. If you have a question for any of the guests to send us an email, we will make sure we get it out to the guests and we get you some answers. And, yep, we hope to see you at the next show and have a beautiful day. Thanks for taking the time to join me on this episode of family disappeared podcast. Do you know someone who can benefit from what we're discussing on today's episode? If so, please share this podcast with them and anyone else in your community that might be interested in changing their lives. Together We'll continue the exploring, growing and healing journey. I will see you on our next episode. Until then, happy days to all.