The Adult Chair Podcast: Healing from Betrayal

Betrayal is one of the worst kinds of pain, it blindsides us, shocks us and leaves us in total disbelief. In this show, Michelle shares her own experiences with betrayal and offers an insightful and useful, 8 step process that walks us out of our pain, and helps us to find trust again.

Transcript

Hello,

Everybody.

Welcome to the adult chair.

I am Michelle Schelfont.

And today I'm going to be talking with you about betrayal.

It has been a topic that has landed in my office and on the phone with my phone and Skype sessions just about every week the past few weeks.

I've had multiple people come in with betrayal and they're wondering,

How do I heal from betrayal?

So today's episode is healing from betrayal.

And I will be getting into that in a very deep way,

Actually.

I've got some good steps to get out of it and we're going to talk all about what it is and how do we handle it actually from the adult chair,

What we do with it from the adult chair.

But first you can find out more about this show at theadultchair.

Com.

You can join the conversation on Facebook or Instagram and make sure to request to join the adult chair private closed group on Facebook.

It is,

As you know,

My favorite group because it's a phenomenal group of people that really want to learn how to live in their adult chair and people throw out ideas,

Comments,

Support.

It's amazing.

So join us in that group.

And the other tidbit of information I have for you guys,

Of course,

Is less than four weeks away,

I will be in San Diego doing the adult chair weekend intensive.

So I'm thrilled.

I will be there October 12th.

It starts at 630 at night on that Friday and I'll be there all day for the 13th and the 14th and wrapping up at six or excuse me at five or six,

I can't remember,

On Sunday.

It's a phenomenal weekend.

So come join us.

We would love to have you.

We just have a couple spaces because I make this a very intimate,

Small group.

No more than 20 people will be there.

And it's just a very beautiful weekend and you learn so much about the adult chair.

You really learn on a deeper level how do you integrate this into your life on a daily basis.

So come join us.

Healing from betrayal.

Boy,

It's a heavy topic.

But I think I have some really good ideas for you guys on how you can move through this and come out on the other side feeling better at the end.

So let's start out with what betrayal is.

So betrayal is when someone you love or trust turns on you unexpectedly in the worst,

Most unforeseen way.

It's the breaking or violation of trust or confidence.

So in a nutshell,

It hurts.

In fact,

It kills on the inside when we are betrayed by someone.

I have had,

Unfortunately,

My fair share of betrayal in my own life.

I've had a mentor that I completely trusted and learned so much from.

He turned on me after I'd referred people to him for quite,

Well,

It was probably over a year I was with him weekly.

He had misinterpreted a very innocent question that I asked him and not only turned on me,

But gossiped.

And when I tell you,

You could have pushed me over with a feather when someone had told me what was happening.

This was someone that I considered not only a dear friend,

But he had like brother energy for me.

And I just adored this man.

I would have done anything for him.

And I felt like he would have done that for me.

And out of the blue,

Just turned on me and then gossiped about me and told lies about me.

Again,

I'm still at this point,

Speechless about the whole thing,

But I have moved beyond it.

So that betrayal that I felt that was so deep in my heart with someone that I trusted so much,

I have moved beyond.

And that's what I hope to share with you today.

And I had,

Gosh,

There's so many experiences,

But I've had a couple of friendships,

Unfortunately,

In my life that have done similar things to me.

I've had people just turn on me for reasons that I still to this day don't know.

I'm not clear about,

But it's so hurtful.

And I hear this from clients,

Whether it be,

I don't know what your experience is with betrayal,

But we have people that cheat on us.

We have people that leave us.

We get fired out of the blue and we have no idea why when we think we're being great employees.

We have people that lie to us.

We have people that again,

Are telling us they're not using some form of alcohol or porn or whatever their addiction is.

And behind our backs,

They're using their affairs that are happening.

There is spiritual abuse.

There is religious abuse and betrayal.

So again,

The list goes on and on and on,

And I'm sure you all have a sense of what I'm talking about.

If you have not been betrayed,

I'm sure you know of somebody that has been,

And it's devastating.

It's absolutely devastating.

And it takes us down and it takes us down hard when it happens.

So I want to talk to you a little bit about how do we transform and heal this wound?

Because it's a deep wound.

It really hits us hard.

And then again,

How do we learn to trust again and feel safe and reconnect and recognize if it's going to happen again?

And that's the most terrifying thing I think for us is that,

Oh my gosh,

You know,

How do we engage in another relationship?

Is this going to happen again?

We don't know how to move beyond it.

So today I'm going to talk to you about again,

How we move through this betrayal using this adult chair model.

So I think you're going to like it.

I've come up with some steps.

I'm into these steps lately.

So I've got some clear steps that we can take in order to move through this betrayal.

So anyway,

I'm going to jump in with step number one right now.

Express yourself.

Just like Madonna says,

Express yourself,

Number one.

Or we can even say it in another way,

Express your pain.

Sometimes when we are betrayed,

It's so embarrassing.

We don't want to say anything to anybody.

We hold it in.

You know,

I find this when maybe someone,

When their partner maybe betrayed them with an affair or something like using alcohol or porn or some other thing like that,

When they are so embarrassed,

They don't want to share it with anybody.

And trying to manage this sort of pain in the mind is virtually impossible.

We cannot do it.

So it's really important that we express ourselves and we get it out.

So if you're not wanting to tell a friend or family member,

Find a therapist,

Find a coach,

Find a priest,

Find a rabbi.

I don't care who you find.

Find somebody that can listen to you,

Someone that you can trust,

Someone that can hold your secret,

Your betrayal close to them and they won't share with anyone.

But we really want to find a way to share this with someone.

So you know what?

Sometimes it is a therapist that would be best because it's in confidence and you know that they're not legally allowed to share it with anybody.

But it's important that we express this.

We have to get it out.

Keeping that sort of energy inside of us is not healthy for us.

So that's the first one,

Express yourself.

And this is key.

So when we do this from the adult chair model,

If we have someone that we can trust and we can share this with,

Remember what we want to do is say,

Hey,

I have something really important I need you to hear me say.

I may cry.

I may scream.

I may swear.

I don't know what's going to happen,

But I need to get this out.

And this is called the setup.

And we do this from our adult,

But here and then we say this,

Something like this.

So here's what I need you to do.

I need you to sit there.

I need you to just listen.

Please don't try to fix me because I've got to get this out.

And then at the very end,

If you want to hear their opinion,

You can ask for it then.

But the most important thing is to get it out.

Let yourself express it.

So that's number one.

Number two is grief.

I want you to understand that when we have something like this happen to us,

What we thought was real and true and we thought that would never ever happen to us has now happened.

So what we thought was real and true is not true anymore.

And there's a grieving process that happens with most of us.

So allow yourself to grieve.

Allow the emotions that are tied to this grief to come through you.

This is a phase of our healing,

This grief.

This is a phase of the transformation out of this betrayal,

Grief.

But remember,

While we're feeling the emotions around this betrayal and grieving what was,

We want to make sure we're not tying that grief to all kinds of stories,

Okay?

Or adding stories to the emotional pain.

That is what keeps us stuck.

The stories,

The emotions themselves come right through us.

And you've heard me say this before.

These emotions come through us in 90 seconds.

We keep the emotions stuck.

And when we have been betrayed,

Boy,

It's easy to jump into stories.

I'm not saying not to go into what's fact and truth about what happened,

But the stories that we're building around what happened amplify the emotions and oftentimes make that betrayal worse than it was.

Or we want to blame that other person and punish that person.

So we tell people even worse stories.

And the more stories we tell,

The more we believe that that's true.

So we just want to feel the emotions.

And predominantly,

There's so much grief.

We want to let that happen and let that come through.

You might have a lot of anger.

It doesn't matter.

Just feel the emotions.

Let them through.

A lot of people ask me about grief groups or groups that they can sit and express themselves.

And these private groups.

My personal opinion,

Again,

This is my opinion,

Take it or leave it.

What concerns me about groups,

Well,

I think that there's a benefit because we can get out again,

Our inner truth.

We can get out and express to these people.

These people then can relate to what we've gone through.

And that feels good.

It feels good to be validated and mirrored.

No doubt about it.

The problem I have with groups for an extended amount of time is they can keep us stuck in the vibration of betrayal,

Of victim,

Of the betrayal.

So we really want to be careful.

So the way to know what's going on again is to check in with yourself.

How does it make you feel to keep going to the group?

If it's benefiting you and they're helping you move through the grief and through the emotions and through the betrayal,

Fantastic.

If this is a group where you're sitting around and bitching about the same thing every single week,

And I don't say that lightly because I bitched about my betrayals too.

I'm not judging anybody,

But get it out.

But if you're stuck in it after a long amount of time,

It might be time to move out of that group.

Again,

This is my opinion.

I've had a lot of people come into me in my sessions and they say,

This group doesn't feel good anymore.

I've been there for so many months and it just doesn't feel good because all we do is talk about our problems.

To me,

Michelle Schelfant,

That does not tell me that that's a great group because you're not moving through it.

So get the emotions through you.

Keep feeling what's going on.

Let the crying come.

Let the emotions come through.

However,

We don't want to stay stuck in the emotion.

The amount of time that we need to linger in these emotions is personal.

I don't know what's true for you.

I only know what's true for me and you only know what's true for you.

Number three is all about being easy on yourself in order to reconnect with yourself.

So drop any self-blame.

If you're doing this,

You might not be doing this,

Or maybe you're being projected on by another person,

Drop it.

We need to,

Again,

Move away from the story.

It wasn't your fault.

Let it go.

This is a time where we are easy on ourselves.

Watch the stories.

Begin to really observe the thoughts during this time.

We want to work on self-care.

Are you doing your journaling?

Maybe you write poetry.

Maybe you're doing some art.

Are you spending time in nature?

Are you going out with your friends?

It's time after,

Again,

We're going through a few of these stages,

We're at number three now,

To start reconnecting with the self.

Okay?

Very,

Very important.

And every single time you're with your friends,

You don't want to sit and talk about the betrayal over and over and over.

I'm not saying you never talk about it.

If it's up for you one day and you just need to express,

Honor it and express it.

But what's your focus?

Let's bring the focus back toward you.

What I find happens when we are betrayed,

We go and blame the other person.

We point our energy out to the other person.

And what we want to do at this point now is to bring the energy back toward ourselves for the purpose of reconnecting with the self.

Okay?

This is really important because when we're in that horrified,

Oh my God,

Betrayed place,

We're living chin up,

We're in a very sometimes hysterical place,

We're living from the mind,

We're trying to understand what happened,

We're trying to fix it,

We're very much in the mind.

We want to eventually start to drop below the chin and reconnect back into the body and the heart.

This is where your intuition is.

As you move forward,

You're going to want to make decisions from your heart and your intuitive place,

Not from the mind.

That egoic part of us that sits in the adolescent chair is not going to be able to give you an adult perspective on what to do next.

And the next steps require us being more in the body,

More in the adult perspective than in this adolescent,

Hysterical,

Upset,

Living in the past and future perspective.

That's not going to help us move forward.

Again,

Take your time getting to this step number three.

There's no rush,

But when you get here,

We really want to make the decision to drop below the chin,

Stay in the heart,

Stay connected as much as you can to the self.

And when you start feeling your emotions,

It's really bringing the energy back down into the heart and the body.

So that's a good step,

Which is the step prior to the swim.

Number four,

I call it dropping the suitcase.

Drop the suitcase.

I have a lot of clients that will come in and they'll be talking about the betrayal that happened a long,

Long,

Long time ago and they're still bringing it up with their partner or their husband or their wives.

This is the thing.

Did you make it part of your story in your everyday life,

Even though the betrayal might have happened a while ago?

You have to make a choice to leave this very heavy suitcase.

Now what's in the suitcase is the betrayal and it's very heavy.

It's like carrying around a cement suitcase.

So you get to choose,

It's your choice to carry it with you or leave it and move on.

I'm not saying to forget about that betrayal.

I'm saying the energy of that betrayal.

You cannot move on in your life carrying that suitcase.

I promise you.

The suitcase,

Which is the story,

Is not keeping you safe.

You have to drop it and it's your choice as to when you do that.

If you're afraid to do that,

I would say to open the suitcase and journal about what the heck is in that suitcase.

What needs your attention?

Why can't you drop it?

What's going on?

You can't drop it because there's some sort of message for you that you might not have gotten yet.

So sit with yourself and go ahead and try and get that message.

If the idea of dropping that suitcase scares you,

It's very important.

It's a very important step.

Next thing,

Number five,

Unpack the suitcase.

This kind of goes with what I was just saying and find the other parts that need you to listen.

When we're betrayed,

Remember when we sit in the adolescent chair,

There are a lot of parts inside of us.

That ego has created all these different personas and they're all freaked out.

So they might need your attention.

This is key to the adult chair work.

Remember we're made of parts and we need to examine and listen to these parts.

Then give yourself like a 200 piece puzzle.

Maybe 10 of those parts were thrown by this betrayal.

They need to talk to you,

Get your journal out,

Give them a voice with your pen and paper.

Or just sit quietly with your eyes closed.

When you think about dropping the suitcase and moving on or unpacking that suitcase and you get knots in your stomach or tightness in your throat,

Inquire with yourself,

What do those thoughts or excuse me,

What do those tensions mean?

What do they need to tell you?

There's probably a message for you that you're not getting yet.

So let's get the message so that you can move on.

Draw the images out.

You can get creative with this.

There's no right or wrong way,

But we do want to get in touch with the parts that are blocking you.

Okay?

I remember when I had a friend that had betrayed me,

It was an out of the blue.

I said something innocent and there was a rage that came back on me.

When I tell you,

It felt like the big bad wolf and the three little wolves like,

Or the three little pigs like blowing me down.

I was so thrown.

This was someone I spoke with every day,

Hit me out of left field.

It threw me so hard that I was shaking on the inside.

So I had to go get in touch with those parts.

And I remember quite clearly that I had to connect with my little girl.

There's a little girl that was inside of me and she was shaking.

She was terrified.

I grew up with a rager.

My uncle was a rager.

So that brought up some old wounding that needed to be unpacked,

Frankly.

So I got in touch with that old wounding and this little girl inside of me that was shaking because of it.

I also had another part that felt really unsafe.

Like how are we going to go on if this person that was so close to me turned on me so quickly,

The world must be really unsafe.

So that part of me was curled up in a ball in the corner.

And I had to sit from my adult and just observe these parts and let them know I was there,

Dialogue with them.

And I really did some good work with these parts.

They were then able to relax.

And I let them know that I'm here,

I'm in charge,

I'm going to take over.

It's all okay.

I also let those parts know that I heard them.

That's really important too.

And this is about staying connected to myself.

I had to get in touch with myself.

What's going on?

These parts were very upset.

I stayed connected,

Let them know it was okay.

I'm here with them now.

And that I was going to really take things really slowly moving on.

And I was going to stay connected to my intuition and we will see what happens from here.

So I really loved this person and I wanted us to still have a relationship,

But I didn't know what to do moving forward.

So the next step was about setting boundaries.

And we need to really slow down and get in touch with what are our boundaries?

What do we need in order to move forward?

This is not going to come from the mind,

Although some of it might.

The ideas come from the mind,

But ultimately it's going to come from the body.

So it's like,

What do I need from you?

It's checking in with ourself.

So for me,

I ended up actually reconnecting with this friend of mine and I had to let her know.

I said,

Here's the thing.

I said,

You hurt me very badly with this rage.

And I said,

If we're going to try to do this relationship again,

I really need you to let me know and talk to me if you're upset with me,

Because I don't know and hitting me with rage is not appropriate.

And it's so hurtful.

That's what I had to say to her.

So find out what do you need as far as boundaries go.

And then you speak the boundary to that person to help you to feel safe.

Only you know what you need.

Moving on to number seven.

If you're going to choose to stay in the relationship with your person,

You have to reach for trust.

At some point we reach for trust.

Reach for it.

We need ways in which we can trust that person again.

So we have to look for those ways.

You know,

How can I trust them again?

Let's start noticing from the moment from our adult,

Are they trying?

And are you noticing that they're trying?

What I notice with people is that they don't let things land.

We as humans don't let things land.

And what I mean by that is someone might be doing something good,

But if we're focusing on when they screw up,

We miss the good.

We don't let it land on us.

So we have to really be open and start paying attention to times when they're actually doing something good and we're missing.

So shift your focus on how can I trust this person?

Are they showing up in a way that,

And they're showing me that I can trust them?

Am I missing it or not?

Are they respecting my boundaries?

Okay.

Are they showing up and doing what they're saying that they're going to do?

Oh,

I didn't even notice.

I was focusing on when they're going to screw up again.

So where's your attention?

So we got to reach for the trust and notice where we're putting our attention.

If we're looking in the past and keep reaching for the betrayal,

Okay,

We're going to miss it.

I'm not saying to forget about the betrayal at all.

I'm saying if you're choosing to stay,

Again,

We're driving the suitcase and I'm going to move forward.

I'm going to look for trust.

We want to move forward with awareness around it.

Okay.

So you got to say to yourself,

You know,

I know such and such happened to me,

But I'm choosing to move on for me because I want this relationship and I'm going to reach for trust because I want it.

I want to be able to trust.

And this person is telling me I can.

It's taking a leap of faith.

You guys,

I get it.

But we want to reach for trust.

You know,

You got to remember this.

We have to go,

Which is number eight,

By the way,

One day at a time.

And we want to stay really,

Really present.

Don't stay in the past,

But also don't go too far in the future.

We want to stay connected to the intuition.

We want to allow ourselves to be guided by each day and each moment because people get scared and they say to me,

What if he does it again?

What if she does it again?

What if this happens again?

What if,

What if,

What if we could sit all day long and come up with all of the what ifs?

The way that you are best going to figure out or notice if they're doing this thing,

This another betrayal is about to happen,

Is to stay present with yourself and connected to your own intuition.

This is no,

There's no guarantee it's going to,

It's not going to happen again.

But if I'm connected to my intuition,

There's a better chance I'm going to notice something is off in our relationship.

Okay.

When we feel uncomfortable,

We're going to check in with ourselves.

We're going to check in with our partner.

We're going to check in with whomever and we're going to ask them what's up.

I'm trying to trust here.

I'm trying to stay in trust,

But something's off.

I can feel it.

The way that I do that best is to stay in the moment and stay with myself,

Stay in the moment,

Stay present and slow down.

The mind wants us to go so,

So,

So fast.

That keeps us out of our intuition,

Out of our bodies.

We want to live chin down in the adult.

And if we're choosing,

Remember that's an adult word.

I choose.

If I'm choosing to stay,

If I'm choosing to stay,

I'm going to live in the moment and I'm going to do my best to trust.

Okay.

For me and my relationship,

I set the boundary with my friend.

I said,

Please don't do that to me again or I cannot be your friend.

And within a month it happened again.

And then I had to choose.

I chose to walk away.

I gave her one chance and I chose to walk away and it hurt.

And I was on guard and I caught it because I was below my chin.

I felt it coming.

I knew something was off intuitively and I was right.

So we want to release our fear,

You guys sit in the moment and breathe.

Okay.

When we're in this space,

We catch things like this.

We want to stay connected to ourselves.

If that person betrays you again,

It might be time to go.

But holding onto that betrayal and carrying it with you day after day after day does not help you.

And by the way,

You cannot live with the betrayal story.

I'm not saying it was not real,

But you cannot live with the betrayal and trust at the same time.

You cannot do both.

You have the memory of betrayal and what you learned from it and how you're going to enhance your intuition.

But if you're going to sit and keep looking at the betrayal,

It's like a big giant elephant in the room every day.

If you're going to choose to stay,

You have to move it with raised awareness.

Okay.

So this is all I've got for you.

Eight steps,

You guys.

Just remember,

Stay present.

Stay present.

I hope this helps.

No doubt it is a tough subject.

I am in no way making light of a betrayal.

No way at all.

It hurts and it can be devastating,

But I really feel like we can survive it.

And it's up to us to decide to move on or stay put.

It's up to us.

Only we can decide.

When we're ready,

We just keep living our lives either with or without that person,

But it's up to us to decide.

This was heavy,

You guys.

Really heavy,

But I hope I have helped you with these eight steps.

They have been so helpful for me and helpful for many,

Many,

Many clients in moving through this.

It is a process.

This is not something you're going to do in a day.

So I'm going to move on now.

So we're ending here,

Everybody.

Don't forget to check out the San Diego class.

Go to theadultchair.

Com forward slash workshops for more information.

And I've got a great book coming,

So stay tuned for that.

This is all I've got for you for today.

I will see you right here next week seated firmly in the adult chair.

And today's podcast is sponsored by audible.

So get a free audio book download and a 30 day free trial at www.

Audibletrial.

Com forward slash the adult chair.

I think this book is perfect for today.

It's called Living and Loving After Betrayal,

How to Heal from Emotional Abuse,

Deceit,

Infidelity and Chronic Resentment.

It's phenomenal.

I really loved all the reviews.

I've not listened to this book yet,

But go get it on Audible.

It's by Stephen Stasny,

S-T-O-S-N-Y.

Phenomenal reviews.

I was really impressed with what I read about this book.

So again,

You can get it for free,

My favorite thing,

At www.

Audibletrial.

Com forward slash the adult chair.

All right,

Everybody.

I will catch you seated right here next week in the adult chair.

Reviews

Always a podcast that helas internally. Thoughts provoking, a blessing

great talk. all the steps are wonderful guidance to get me pointed in a healthy direction 🙏

Really needed this wisdom! Is there somewhere that the 8 steps are written out? I'd love to see them in a list, if possible.

Another great show Michelle! I will definitely follow the steps. I’ve been through a few, now I have to to get through the rest❣️Peace☮️

Very helpful. Thank you.

Very helpful. Thank you ❤

Having been betrayed by someone I thought was a dear friend I could connect with this talk. It brought to light some things I never thought of and has made me realize there is still work to be done.... even after 3 years. 🙏🏼 always a work in progress😃

I just recently have been betrayed. I appreciate hearing what you shared. I will use these tools to get me through my pain and keep moving forward.

I just adore you Michelle! You speak on my level, so easily and naturally. For an empath to hear another empath describe things so familiarly feels so comforting. Loved this one on my morning run. Thank you.

Excellent advice. I will save this one and refer back to write down these much needed steps. Thank you again Michelle!

These 8 steps has helped tremendously threw an aweful breakup just last night thank u so much I have been meditating so much today but my mind is obviously wandering around I was happy to come across this podcast xoxoxo

Wow I am so grateful I’ve come across this podcast!

Really enjoyed this lots of great guidance and advice and makes you think about your own actions and next step.

That was great!! Very relevant to how I have been feeling and what I have been dealing with. Definitely bookmarking in case I need a reminder.

Excellent. Some great ways to approach this topic. Thank you.

I found The Adult Chair two months ago. You have helped me heal my broken heart and learn that I can trust myself. This is a wonderful session.

These are Golden Words, and I needed every one of them 🙏🙏🙏🙏 this podcast actually helped me release a 3 day neck tension headache 🙏🙏🙏🙏

Thank you. I will try to follow the steps. This has become very painful.

Excellent as usual

Great podcast Michelle. Very good points and thank you for giving the ‘how.’ Too many people tell you to get over it, move on, etc., but don’t tell you how.
Much appreciated.
💕🐾🙏🏼🌸💔🙏🏽‼️🌺💖🌷🍁🌸🌹✨💘🍄🙏🏽💙💜💞❤️