Speaker 1: Wake that ass up in the morning.
Speaker 2: Breakfast Club Morning.
Speaker 3: Everybody is DJ Envy, Jess Hilarius, Charlamage the guy. We
Speaker 3: are the Breakfast Club. We got a special guest in
Speaker 3: the building because May is Mental Health Awareness Month. Ladies
Speaker 3: and gentlemen, friends to the room. Of course, we have
Speaker 3: Elliott Connie here.
Speaker 2: Welcome, Welcome back. I should say thank you first.
Speaker 1: I'm feeling good. I'm feeling very good.
Speaker 2: First day of mental health aware in this month.
Speaker 4: Man, when when you hear people celebrate Mental Health Awareness Month,
Speaker 4: when you see everybody posting their green ribbon, what do
Speaker 4: you think people really should be getting out of Mental
Speaker 4: Health Awareness Month?
Speaker 1: What I hope they should get out of Mental Health
Speaker 1: Awareness Month is I mean, it's it's almost redundant, really,
Speaker 1: but just an awareness that your mental health is important
Speaker 1: as important as your physical health, your emotional health, your
Speaker 1: your overall well being. And I hope it lasts longer
Speaker 1: than a month. I hope that we can use this
Speaker 1: month as an opportunity to allow people to focus on
Speaker 1: their health, their mental health going forward.
Speaker 3: Okay, now you got a new podcast, Family Therapy, Family Therapy,
Speaker 3: and have a question. I was talking to my wife
Speaker 3: the other day, right, and we were talking about our kids.
Speaker 3: I have six kids, yep. And she was telling me
Speaker 3: that three of my kids feared me, okay, right, three
Speaker 3: of them didn't. The three that didn't, of course, is Logan,
Speaker 3: who is the Diesel agnominious kid. But Logan the baby
Speaker 3: Payton in Brooklyn, which is the youngest seven. The other
Speaker 3: three said they fear dad at times.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 3: It was kind of concerning to me because I've never
Speaker 3: beat them, never hit them, never popped them.
Speaker 2: I am stern.
Speaker 3: I always say I'm fair but firm. But it bothered
Speaker 3: me why they were fearful. And they said the reason
Speaker 3: that they were fearfule is because sometimes I raised my
Speaker 3: voice when I asked him to do things. So, for instance,
Speaker 3: my ten year old, my nine year old, excuse me.
Speaker 3: His job in the house is to make sure refrigerator
Speaker 3: is full with juice, water, sodas, whatever it may be.
Speaker 3: That's his job. So when Dad comes home from a
Speaker 3: weekend and wants a cold soda and there's no soda,
Speaker 3: I'm like, this is your only job, and I might
Speaker 3: get a loud it is what it is. My daughter's
Speaker 3: job is to make a bed and to do the dishes.
Speaker 3: If they're not done, I raise my voice a little bit.
Speaker 3: But as family therapy have in a family, what is
Speaker 3: your take on kids and fearing their dad, not fear
Speaker 3: where they see me to dive under the bed, but
Speaker 3: that little fearful thing.
Speaker 1: Well, first of all, I think sometimes we confuse fear
Speaker 1: and respect. So I think it's a good idea for
Speaker 1: children to respect their father and their mother. In this
Speaker 1: specific instance, I would ask you if your youngest child's
Speaker 1: job is to make sure there's juice and soda and
Speaker 1: things in the refrigerator, and you come home and there
Speaker 1: is nothing cold to drink, and you're frustrated and you
Speaker 1: get a little loud, My question for you would be,
Speaker 1: when you come home and there is drinks and the
Speaker 1: child has done their job, you get equally enthusiastic in
Speaker 1: the praise of them. You're right, I don't, And if
Speaker 1: you did, then that would create a balance and there
Speaker 1: wouldn't necessarily be the fear because they wouldn't associate you
Speaker 1: with the feedback of it has and worked. You have
Speaker 1: to be equally enthusiastic in the praise as you are
Speaker 1: in the criticism.
Speaker 2: So it's just what family therapy is all about. It.
Speaker 4: I listened to the first episode and I forgot the
Speaker 4: couple's name, Jay and David.
Speaker 2: Jay and David Yeah the football former NFL player.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so is just what it would be about questions
Speaker 4: like and we just asked, Yeah. You know.
Speaker 1: The way that I do therapy, it's called solution focused
Speaker 1: brief therapy. It's based on questions, and questions are very
Speaker 1: very powerful things, and we don't we don't really think
Speaker 1: about the questions that we ask ourselves. But questions are
Speaker 1: real powerful and we can't help but change it. So
Speaker 1: my job is to ask people the kinds of questions
Speaker 1: that change the way they look at things, change the
Speaker 1: way they view themselves, and change the way they react
Speaker 1: in the world.
Speaker 3: You know, And the question I do ask. A lot
Speaker 3: of times, we don't give positive and reinforcements because it's
Speaker 3: it's what you should do, right. Yeah, But nobody ever says, Charlemane,
Speaker 3: you were a good dad this weekend.
Speaker 2: He's supposed to be.
Speaker 4: That's not true. My kids could be positive it all
Speaker 4: the time, and I love it.
Speaker 2: But that's what.
Speaker 4: I mean.
Speaker 3: My kids do that too, But nobody will say, Charlomane,
Speaker 3: you took your kids out this weeknd. Oh you were
Speaker 3: being a good day.
Speaker 2: I don't care about the outside validay, but we we.
Speaker 1: Need to have more positive conversations. Like I remember as
Speaker 1: a I was in like the third grade, literally the
Speaker 1: third grade, and y'all remember when you're that young, you
Speaker 1: get a grade for everything, right, Like your report card
Speaker 1: has fifty thousand things on it. Yep. I was so
Speaker 1: happy that I got. I got a's in like English, right,
Speaker 1: I got like five or six a's whatever it was.
Speaker 1: And I remember coming home and I'm like so pleased.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna show my father like this report card, like
Speaker 1: it's got all these a's on it. He's going to
Speaker 1: love this. I showed him this report card and I
Speaker 1: got a very kind of low response, and I was like,
Speaker 1: aren't you gonna And he actually said to me, you're
Speaker 1: supposed to get a's. And I remember thinking as a kid,
Speaker 1: like then why try? Like as a third grade I
Speaker 1: remember thinking, what's the point to put forth effort? Because
Speaker 1: we need to have positive conversations if only to create
Speaker 1: balance for the negative conversations, because the world makes us
Speaker 1: talk about negative things, so we have to create effort
Speaker 1: to talk about positive things.
Speaker 4: And what's crazy we act like as humans. We don't
Speaker 4: already know that, right. Like everything we do every day,
Speaker 4: you're looking for some type of positive reinforcement, whether you
Speaker 4: whether you.
Speaker 2: Say you are or not. That's why with social media
Speaker 2: is the worst of that.
Speaker 4: If you're going to read comments about something that you did,
Speaker 4: it's because you want positive reinformances.
Speaker 2: This is reading for you, yourn helf.
Speaker 1: The whole reason that we woke up today and all
Speaker 1: of us did. We all did some grooming thing. You
Speaker 1: chose an outfit. If you didn't care about positive you'd
Speaker 1: roll out a bit, throw a T shirt and come
Speaker 1: to work.
Speaker 2: That's right, right.
Speaker 1: The reason why we put forth effort in anything is
Speaker 1: we want acceptance and we want positive validation and we
Speaker 1: want feedback. And I'm promising you like your children want.
Speaker 1: When your child does a good job and he's loaded
Speaker 1: all the drinks in the refrigerator, he wants somebody to
Speaker 1: come and tell him good job. And that's not weakness,
Speaker 1: that's just the human condition.
Speaker 4: If humans didn't care, compliments and insults wouldn't exist with
Speaker 4: not exist either one, not at all.
Speaker 3: Now, what do you think about these students dealing with
Speaker 3: everything that's going on with them? Having to think about
Speaker 3: who's going to be the next president, and then some
Speaker 3: of these students protesting on these campuses, how is that
Speaker 3: affecting their mental health? Because I mean, as adults, we're
Speaker 3: stressed out, so I know it has to be either,
Speaker 3: you know, even worse on now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I'm concerned for this generation of kids
Speaker 1: because we're not designed to consume the level of data
Speaker 1: that we are consuming, and these kids are consuming massive
Speaker 1: amounts of information at a time when their brains can't
Speaker 1: really handle it. So I'm concerned about what that's going
Speaker 1: to do to their overall well being. To be very
Speaker 1: honest with you, like we're seeing massive upticks and things
Speaker 1: like anxiety and depression. It's directly attributable to what's going
Speaker 1: on in the world. Having said that, I'm also very
Speaker 1: encouraged to see these kids playing a role in what
Speaker 1: their future will look like. I think I think politicians
Speaker 1: should be more responsive to society, and what I see
Speaker 1: these kids doing is letting the world know what they
Speaker 1: want to have happened in their life. Sure, and I
Speaker 1: hope that politicians listen and pay attention because these young
Speaker 1: people are going to be the ones voting for the
Speaker 1: next however many years, and I think this generation is
Speaker 1: more kind of interactive in the world they want to create.
Speaker 1: I think this generation is more like contributing to the
Speaker 1: world they want to live in. And I think that's
Speaker 1: a beautiful thing actually, and I think I hope politicians
Speaker 1: pay attention to it. They won't be re elected.
Speaker 4: You know, when it comes to family therapy, what is
Speaker 4: family therapy to Elliot Kane.
Speaker 1: Hmm man, that's a good question. I think family therapy.
Speaker 1: It's hard for me at this point in my career.
Speaker 1: It's hard for me to differentiate family therapy versus any
Speaker 1: other kind of therapy because family therapy is really therapy
Speaker 1: that impacts the system. And I think we often think
Speaker 1: family therapy is when the system comes to therapy, But
Speaker 1: I don't really think about it that way anymore, because
Speaker 1: I think anything any kind of therapy I do impact
Speaker 1: this system. And we all know this. If you have
Speaker 1: a super great day and you go home, that's going
Speaker 1: to reverberate through the household. If one of your children
Speaker 1: goes to school and has a super bad day, that's
Speaker 1: going to reverberate through the household. So if one member
Speaker 1: of a family comes to therapy, and that healing does
Speaker 1: something in the family, then that's systemic. I remember working
Speaker 1: with a client one time and this kid was probably
Speaker 1: thirteen years old, and these are the kind of things
Speaker 1: that molded my view of humans. Change therapy and family
Speaker 1: therapy really. But this thirteen year old, I asked him
Speaker 1: what he wanted to achieve. When I do therapy, I
Speaker 1: always ask people what are their best hopes from talking
Speaker 1: with me, which is my way of saying, how do
Speaker 1: you want this to make a difference in your life?
Speaker 1: And this thirteen year old said, I don't think you can.
Speaker 1: And I said how so? And he explained to me
Speaker 1: that his father drank a lot. And he said, there's
Speaker 1: really nothing you can talk to me about. It's going
Speaker 1: to help my father stop drinking. And I said, that's true.
Speaker 1: So let's imagine your father continues drinking like he never stops.
Speaker 1: He just continues drinks throughout your childhood, but you develop
Speaker 1: the ability to achieve your greatness in spite of your
Speaker 1: father's drinking. What kind of greatness do you want to achieve?
Speaker 1: This kid tells me, let's go to college, and tells
Speaker 1: me the career who wants to have and we start
Speaker 1: having this discussion about his future, which, by the way,
Speaker 1: is really important because your future should not be singularly
Speaker 1: determinate based upon somebody else's behavior, even your parents. And
Speaker 1: this thirteen year old starts telling me about this future
Speaker 1: who wants to have the end of the first session,
Speaker 1: he's like, man, this was really cool, Like, I'm glad
Speaker 1: I got to talk to you about this. He comes
Speaker 1: back to another session. I said, what's been better? And
Speaker 1: he said, you know what, my father's still drinking, but
Speaker 1: I'm doing better in school because I'm realizing that my
Speaker 1: future is my future, not really, I don't have to
Speaker 1: wait for my father to heal in order for me
Speaker 1: to grow great. So we have probably two or three sessions,
Speaker 1: and I don't see that kid anymore. The mom tells
Speaker 1: me kids doing better. I don't hear from that kid whatsoever.
Speaker 1: About six months later, the father comes to therapy and
Speaker 1: I said, what are your best hope? Form are talking?
Speaker 1: And father said, my son is doing better and I
Speaker 1: need to figure out how to not ruin it. Wow,
Speaker 1: And that father ended up getting sober. Now how does
Speaker 1: that happen? Because you, like, we participate in whatever is
Speaker 1: going on in the family. So if that is something positive,
Speaker 1: then the family has a tendency to get on board
Speaker 1: with that. If that is something negative, then the family
Speaker 1: has a tendency to get on board with that. So,
Speaker 1: prior to me meeting that child, the dad's drinking was
Speaker 1: creating a negative environment and producing negative outcomes. The kid's
Speaker 1: grades were suffering so on its own. But once the
Speaker 1: kids started getting better, then the family gets on board
Speaker 1: with that, and that father ended up getting clean. So
Speaker 1: when the child initially said, do you don't think I
Speaker 1: don't think you can help me with the thing that
Speaker 1: I want to achieve, I knew he was wrong. Of
Speaker 1: course we can. You are a very powerful force in
Speaker 1: your family. So if you go home and you start
Speaker 1: doing positive things and you start changing your life, then
Speaker 1: the father has to kind of look at himself in
Speaker 1: a different way. And for me, that's what family thinks.
Speaker 1: It's having an impact on how a family system functions,
Speaker 1: it's having impact on future generations within a family. It's
Speaker 1: having an impact on healing generational traumas. To me, that's
Speaker 1: what family therapy is. It doesn't really matter whether there's
Speaker 1: one person there or whole family system shows up.
Speaker 3: I think I ask you this question every time you
Speaker 3: come about society and society being a lot softer than
Speaker 3: when we were kids. Is that changing at all? Because
Speaker 3: I think a lot of times people they don't go
Speaker 3: through the problems that they necessarily have because it's easy
Speaker 3: to be like, I'm having a mental problem, I need
Speaker 3: a mental break instead of dealing with the situations. How
Speaker 3: do you think this.
Speaker 2: Helps the youth.
Speaker 3: Grow up when it comes to dealing with problems, dealing
Speaker 3: with things, and dealing with just life in general.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, I don't know if this generation is softer.
Speaker 1: I know that's a common thing that we say. I
Speaker 1: think this generation is more sensitive, and I think this
Speaker 1: generation has more resources and in available to them that
Speaker 1: we did not have. Like I tell people all the time,
Speaker 1: I took a lot of beatings and abuse simply because
Speaker 1: I didn't know there was a whole organization designed to
Speaker 1: protect me called child Protective Services. I had no idea
Speaker 1: that that was a thing when I was ten years old.
Speaker 1: Your parents exactly these days kids know that. But I
Speaker 1: think the further thing to your question that I think
Speaker 1: is really important is I do think we have to
Speaker 1: face challenges. I do think that we learn a lot
Speaker 1: from overcoming challenges. I think we learn a lot from
Speaker 1: overcoming obstacles that we didn't think we could overcome. Human
Speaker 1: beings are animals in pursuit of comfort, so it's very
Speaker 1: easy to be challenged and then think, ooh, I'm going
Speaker 1: to take a day off from school or a day
Speaker 1: off from work. I need to rest day, I need
Speaker 1: a mental health break, when really what they need is
Speaker 1: to face that challenge head on and to overcome it.
Speaker 1: And I think we should encourage kids to do that
Speaker 1: and remind them that you are capable of achieving things
Speaker 1: even when you didn't think you could.
Speaker 4: You know what's interest than about what and be said,
Speaker 4: you know the illusion that you grow up to be
Speaker 4: an adult with no issues. I don't know anybody from
Speaker 4: our era who don't have issues. Like just like all
Speaker 4: of that, those beatings or whatever, it didn't it did.
Speaker 4: It didn't make us tougher. We didn't grow up in
Speaker 4: life and not know how to be able to deal
Speaker 4: with our issues better.
Speaker 2: Everybody's fragile. I got no forty plus year old people
Speaker 2: right now that are fragile.
Speaker 4: Y know they are Instagram crying, they're in interviews crying
Speaker 4: like they are.
Speaker 2: You can look at them and tell that they need
Speaker 2: some real work done. Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1: I that's why I don't. I understand what the env
Speaker 1: you're saying, understand what you're saying fully, but I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't know that it's softer. I think to live
Speaker 1: is to struggle, and I don't know anybody that doesn't
Speaker 1: have anything to heal from.
Speaker 2: I think we suppressed more.
Speaker 1: I agree.
Speaker 4: I think these kids they just express it like they
Speaker 4: have no and they have the language for it.
Speaker 2: They know what they're dealing with and they know what
Speaker 2: they're going through.
Speaker 4: That's why I hate when people say things like therapy
Speaker 4: is a trend now or talking about our mental health
Speaker 4: issues is a fad.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 4: I feel like there's a generation that just feels open
Speaker 4: about talking about.
Speaker 1: These issues right, which I think is a good thing.
Speaker 1: Absolutely to your point, Charlotte Mane, like I've had in
Speaker 1: the past, I would say five maybe seven years, I've
Speaker 1: had more therapy initiated by a child in the family
Speaker 1: than ever before that. Like I've had people say, my
Speaker 1: child saw one of your videos, my child saw you
Speaker 1: lecture at the local school, my child saw you in
Speaker 1: somewhere and wanted me to contact you for therapy. We
Speaker 1: wouldn't have done that as kids like that wasn't something
Speaker 1: we would have done in our generation. And I think
Speaker 1: this generation is just more expectant of having these things
Speaker 1: addressed as they should be.
Speaker 2: You know what I thought it?
Speaker 3: It was like I was thinking, sorry to cut you off,
Speaker 3: like one of the students.
Speaker 2: We were at clock University, right, and.
Speaker 3: It's finals week, right, and we've all been through finals. Yeah,
Speaker 3: we all been through final week and how difficult that
Speaker 3: is to prepare it to study and it's a semesters
Speaker 3: full of work, right, Yeah, but we all know that
Speaker 3: we have to study and we have to get to it.
Speaker 3: We have to take those tests. Yes, I've seen the
Speaker 3: students say it's too hard for me. I need a
Speaker 3: mental break. This is too difficult. I need to take
Speaker 3: a week off. Now when you get to that level,
Speaker 3: is it do they really need a mental break or
Speaker 3: is it still overwhelming? Because it's the same issues in
Speaker 3: the same studying that we've been doing that my I've
Speaker 3: been doing, your parent's been doing, my parents been doing.
Speaker 3: So why is it now that it's too much?
Speaker 2: Because we've been doing it.
Speaker 3: And even if we if we fail or we pass,
Speaker 3: if we get an A, A B or a C. Like,
Speaker 3: we still do what we gotta do, what we try
Speaker 3: out our hardest, but I feel like sometimes it takes
Speaker 3: kids away from trying their hardest.
Speaker 1: But I don't. First of all, I agree with you.
Speaker 1: I think if kids look at how hard it is,
Speaker 1: it takes away from them being able to try their hardest.
Speaker 1: But I also think we somehow romanticize the past because
Speaker 1: I remember taking finals and I remember kids saying I
Speaker 1: need a week off, I need a mental health break.
Speaker 1: I remember that we just didn't really give it any attention.
Speaker 1: Because there's equal amount of kids saying they just got
Speaker 1: to get through this, and I'm sure that's true today
Speaker 1: there are kids that are just like, I got to
Speaker 1: get through this, and then there are other kids saying
Speaker 1: I need a week off because it's stressful for them.
Speaker 1: It's anxiety provoking for them. That's life. But that's life,
Speaker 1: and it was life in nineteen ninety five when I
Speaker 1: went to college taking these tests, and it's life in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four for these kids now.
Speaker 2: And some of.
Speaker 1: These kids like this might be too much for them,
Speaker 1: as it was for some of the kids I went
Speaker 1: to college.
Speaker 4: It was too much for us. But I didn't go
Speaker 4: to college. But life is too much for people. Why
Speaker 4: are we acting like that. These kids are going through
Speaker 4: anything that we didn't go through, and we didn't come
Speaker 4: out of it clean.
Speaker 2: We're crazy, Actually, we're crazy.
Speaker 1: I actually think life is way harder now because we
Speaker 1: had to go through all of that without social media. Yes,
Speaker 1: I think life is way harder because I had no
Speaker 1: idea whatsoever about what was going on politically. I did
Speaker 1: not understand international war. I didn't understand any of that.
Speaker 1: And these kids right now are very aware.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my dad told topic.
Speaker 4: My dad told me in twenty eighteen. You know when
Speaker 4: I started I start talking about my issues around twenty sixteen,
Speaker 4: book came out shook when he told me that he
Speaker 4: tried to kill himself thirty plus years ago. He's been
Speaker 4: on ten to twelve different medications for his mental health.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was going to a therapist three and four
Speaker 2: times a week.
Speaker 4: You know how many stories I started hearing like that
Speaker 4: once I started having conversations. So this whole notion that
Speaker 4: we just went through everything in the eighties and nineties
Speaker 4: like it was nothing, lie.
Speaker 1: It's not accurate the past. Yes, and I think times
Speaker 1: were hard times are always hard, it's actually harder now
Speaker 1: because social media is real. Social media is a thing,
Speaker 1: and these kids' anxieties are through the roof. And that's
Speaker 1: not weakness. We're actually introducing more to their brains than
Speaker 1: they can handle. I don't know how I would have
Speaker 1: studied for my finals if I also had to worry
Speaker 1: about a war. There are multiple wars going on right now. Actually,
Speaker 1: but if I had to worry about all that stuff,
Speaker 1: it's too much. It's literally too much.
Speaker 4: What do people do to protect their minds, their mental
Speaker 4: against social media? Because I always say it's a lack
Speaker 4: of emotional iq for people to care so much about
Speaker 4: what other folks think about them. Am I accurate? Am
Speaker 4: I wrown?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 1: I think that's pretty accurate. I think what people should do.
Speaker 1: But I really want to say, get off of it, right,
Speaker 1: But I think it's too late, Like it's too late.
Speaker 1: The easiest thing is to remember that that's not real life.
Speaker 1: I think we have to train our children to understand
Speaker 1: that that is not real. That does not matter. That's
Speaker 1: monopoly money, essentially, like what's going on in social media.
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. It's not it's not really real. It's
Speaker 1: not really important, and when kids realize that, they tend
Speaker 1: to do way better.
Speaker 4: It's not just kids though, it's adult I'm watching some
Speaker 4: really intelligent people, people that I know are some of
Speaker 4: the most well read, book smart individuals who care more
Speaker 4: about their relationships online than they do it their their
Speaker 4: relationships offline.
Speaker 1: I think that's true. But I was focusing on kids
Speaker 1: because that we were talking about. But everybody, like, we
Speaker 1: need to remember that, like that world is just not real.
Speaker 1: What's real is your friendships, your connections, the people you
Speaker 1: talk to, your family, your loved ones, Like that's what's real.
Speaker 1: How many likes and followers you have? Like that is irrelevant.
Speaker 1: Data that is not That is not real. But people
Speaker 1: get caught up in it.
Speaker 3: But I also tell I tell my kids and I
Speaker 3: tell my friends. Use social media as a tool.
Speaker 2: That's exactly what it is.
Speaker 3: Not Not as an educational piece, not as a friend,
Speaker 3: not as something where you're looking for approval. Use it
Speaker 3: as a tool. Like my daughter does, she just graduated
Speaker 3: from myu IS. She does she works with her hand
Speaker 3: and she does real estate. I said, you use it
Speaker 3: to do your real estate. That's exactly what you use
Speaker 3: it as a tool. My other daughters do dance. You
Speaker 3: do it for that, you do it for tool. But
Speaker 3: most people don't say it, And like Seanamay said, they
Speaker 3: look for acceptance from people that are not going to
Speaker 3: give them the acceptance that they're looking and they try
Speaker 3: try again until we see them self.
Speaker 1: Distruct That's true. I absolutely think it is a tool.
Speaker 1: That is all. Social media is a tool. Where we've
Speaker 1: gotten into trouble is social media has turned the world
Speaker 1: into like that high school popularity context correct And I
Speaker 1: remember being in high scho school and you know, you're
Speaker 1: upset because the girl you like doesn't like you back,
Speaker 1: or you're not sitting at the cool kid table at
Speaker 1: the cafeteria whatever, and the adults would say, you know,
Speaker 1: in a few years, it's angle matter because it's isn't real,
Speaker 1: And they're right, that's one hundred percent truth. There are people, adults, celebrities,
Speaker 1: like I've seen people all over the world like they
Speaker 1: just get too wrapped up in what social media is
Speaker 1: saying about them because we've allowed it to become like
Speaker 1: the world's cafeteria. But if you use it as a
Speaker 1: tool and if you remember like this is not real,
Speaker 1: you tend to have much healthier lives about that.
Speaker 4: Stuff, and how can a bunch of stranges tell you
Speaker 4: about you? And more importantly, how can a bunch of
Speaker 4: strangers tell you about somebody you actually know. Imagine if
Speaker 4: I interact with a person every day in real life,
Speaker 4: but on social media, it's a whole other narrative about
Speaker 4: this individual. Yeah, who am I supposed to believe my
Speaker 4: real life experiences are these books on social media?
Speaker 2: I don't even know you.
Speaker 1: These people on social media, they don't know you. They're
Speaker 1: just spitting out whatever they heard. I just think it's
Speaker 1: crazy that we've allowed this to happen, and we have
Speaker 1: to remember or it's just not real and personal relationships
Speaker 1: still in fact matter. I have friends in the entertainment
Speaker 1: industry and I see stories about them that I know
Speaker 1: not to be true. There have been times that I've
Speaker 1: been hanging out with people like Tiffany Has and I'll
Speaker 1: see stories about her and like, I know that's not true.
Speaker 1: I was there with her that particular night, And to
Speaker 1: your point, like, I'm not listening to that story, Like
Speaker 1: I'm gonna believe my own real relationship and interaction with
Speaker 1: this person. And I think too often we let social
Speaker 1: media determine and define what our experiences are and it's
Speaker 1: just not real.
Speaker 4: As a therapist, is social media the number one thing
Speaker 4: you see affecting people's mental.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 1: I think social media is absolutely, especially in the younger generation,
Speaker 1: is the number one thing contributing to a mental health
Speaker 1: crisis in this in this society. Wow, for sure.
Speaker 4: And the only the only explanation, I mean only uh uh.
Speaker 2: I guess cure for it is to just get off.
Speaker 1: I would love to say that, but they're not going
Speaker 1: to get off. The only cure for it is to
Speaker 1: realize it's artificial, it is not really, it does not matter,
Speaker 1: and the reason why we have to be limited with it. Again,
Speaker 1: your brain is influenced by the data it receives. So
Speaker 1: if I envy hell to all of you six ft
Speaker 1: six foot, this is how susceptible your brain is the
Speaker 1: information If every now he knows he's six foot I
Speaker 1: asked him, and in a second he was like, this
Speaker 1: is the answer. If I train everyone in your life
Speaker 1: to start calling you five foot ten, eventually he's going
Speaker 1: to be like, you know, maybe I'm five foot ten.
Speaker 1: Everybody's saying it gets them five foot ten, Like that's
Speaker 1: how susceptible your brain is. So imagine if you are
Speaker 1: on social media and everybody's saying such and such about you,
Speaker 1: whether you know it to be true or not, becomes
Speaker 1: irrelevant because the onslaught of data influences the way your
Speaker 1: brain thinks. And the only way to combat that is
Speaker 1: to stay off of it. You know, I have a team.
Speaker 1: I run a large therapy training organization, and we post
Speaker 1: a lot of content on social media, and not all
Speaker 1: the comments are kind, not all the comments are useful,
Speaker 1: and every now and then and I get a notification
Speaker 1: on everybody comments, I get an invocation on my phone,
Speaker 1: and if I say anything to my team, they all
Speaker 1: say stayhead of those comments because they're trying to protect
Speaker 1: my mental health because they know if you see that
Speaker 1: stuff constantly and onslaught of it, your brain accepts it.
Speaker 1: So we have to limit that stuff. And what did
Speaker 1: I do to limit is I just don't look at
Speaker 1: the comments.
Speaker 4: So a question like, let's say you're on social media
Speaker 4: and it's it's a bunch of positive comments, right like literally,
Speaker 4: it might be ten to fifteen positive comments and then
Speaker 4: there's just one negative comment. Why are our brains wired
Speaker 4: to focus on that negative comment.
Speaker 1: Well, it's a survival really, like we we are very
Speaker 1: good at determining threat that's that's what human brains are
Speaker 1: designed to do, and a negative comment is associated with threats.
Speaker 1: We're much better at holding on to a negative comment
Speaker 1: because we perceive that as a threat, and that keeps
Speaker 1: us safe. We have to work against that and actually
Speaker 1: give weight to the compliment because it's actually true. Like
Speaker 1: if a hundred people tell you you're the greatest, or
Speaker 1: one hundred people tell you you're the greatest, and then
Speaker 1: one person says you're the worst, we have a tendency
Speaker 1: to hold on to that, and we have to counter
Speaker 1: that by realizing we're no longer in a survival situation.
Speaker 1: We can actually enjoy the loving comment that we've gotten.
Speaker 1: We can actually give weight to that loving comment just
Speaker 1: as much, and that improves your mental health. That makes
Speaker 1: life better.
Speaker 3: I was going to ask, when you're dealing with people
Speaker 3: that's been on social media, how do you Because most
Speaker 3: people are not going to get on social media no more,
Speaker 3: they're not, you can say, hey, get on social media.
Speaker 3: Even to myself, like I do limit the amount of
Speaker 3: time that I own. I don't look at comments. There's
Speaker 3: certain things that I don't do because I'm getting to
Speaker 3: the point where I don't care, right, And I think
Speaker 3: that's one of those things where you've been beat up
Speaker 3: so much you just don't care. So how do you
Speaker 3: explain that to people, especially celebrities who they live off
Speaker 3: of this and sometimes they might change who they are
Speaker 3: based off of a comment. They might change their inside
Speaker 3: based of a comment. They might change through their living
Speaker 3: is based off of a comet. So how do you
Speaker 3: talk to kids, adults, and celebrities about.
Speaker 1: That by explaining to them the goal should be happiness.
Speaker 1: And I don't know anybody, literally, anybody that spends a
Speaker 1: lot of time caring about what people think about them
Speaker 1: that are happy. So if the goal is happiness, then
Speaker 1: the pathway becomes very very clear. We know what we
Speaker 1: need to do to be happy. I don't have to
Speaker 1: actually tell them what to do. I just have to
Speaker 1: ask them, what is your goal that you're trying to achieve.
Speaker 1: I'm trying to achieve happiness. You tell me what you
Speaker 1: need to start doing differently in order for you to achieve. Like,
Speaker 1: we know we shouldn't be drinking, we know that we
Speaker 1: shouldn't be out late at night. We know we shouldn't
Speaker 1: be using drugs. We know we shouldn't be on social
Speaker 1: media extreme amounts of time. And when I say, like,
Speaker 1: what do you need to do in order to achieve happiness?
Speaker 1: They tell me I probably need to stay out of
Speaker 1: the comments because I've noticed when I'm in the comments
Speaker 1: more i'm happy, I'm less happy. I notice when I'm
Speaker 1: out drinking, I'm less happy. I notice when I'm out
Speaker 1: super duper late a night at the club, I'm less happy.
Speaker 1: So what do you need to do? They always say
Speaker 1: the exact same thing. More time with family, more time
Speaker 1: with my partner, more time in the gym, more time
Speaker 1: doing healthy things. I don't know anybody who spends time
Speaker 1: doing those things and isn't happier or at least a
Speaker 1: happier version of themselves. But we just waste our time
Speaker 1: doing these other things, mostly because vanity is real, Like
Speaker 1: vanity is really really real, and people want those vanity metrics.
Speaker 1: I want my followers up, I want people interacting, But
Speaker 1: what you should want is happiness.
Speaker 4: That's why meditation is so important, That's why time with
Speaker 4: yourself is so important, because you really got to be
Speaker 4: aware of the energy your body is feeling like there's
Speaker 4: certain people, certain circumstances, certain things that you can automatically
Speaker 4: make your energy feel love. And then there's certain people,
Speaker 4: certain things, certain circumstances that make your energy automatically go down.
Speaker 2: So which one should you stay away?
Speaker 4: But you can't under you won't understand that if you're
Speaker 4: not really into une with your your emotional and mental
Speaker 4: well being.
Speaker 1: That's absolutely true. Like the there's so much I want
Speaker 1: to say about the podcast about the podcast Family Therapy,
Speaker 1: and I can't really because you gotta watch it, experience,
Speaker 1: you gotta listen to it. But the big lesson that
Speaker 1: I hope people get is the woman focus on this
Speaker 1: podcast is one of the most incredible, inspiring, well achieved
Speaker 1: women that you could possibly meet. But when she looked
Speaker 1: in the mirror, that's not what she saw. And when
Speaker 1: you spend time with yourself and when you meditate and
Speaker 1: when you fully assess, we have a tendency to assess
Speaker 1: ourselves and only be aware of the negative things. And
Speaker 1: I think sometimes therapy is enforced that because you got
Speaker 1: to figure out what's wrong with you and fix it.
Speaker 1: But what if, at least in part I would actually
Speaker 1: go farther, but at least in part, what if we
Speaker 1: have to figure out what's great about us and own
Speaker 1: that too? And throughout this you're gonna see You're going
Speaker 1: to see how that impacts people. And I hope if
Speaker 1: I could make one contribution to society, I hope I
Speaker 1: would be helping people to see their greatness within themselves,
Speaker 1: because I just don't think we spend enough time doing that.
Speaker 1: I don't think we spend enough time celebrating ourselves. I
Speaker 1: don't think we spend enough time looking in our history
Speaker 1: realizing that I'm kind of awesome. I got through that.
Speaker 1: I overcame that, I achieved that. We spend a lot
Speaker 1: of time saying I should have been like social media right,
Speaker 1: I thought it'd be a millionaire by thirty or I
Speaker 1: thought I have one hundred thousand subscribers by this data,
Speaker 1: and we really need to just change the way we
Speaker 1: think about everything. We need to look back and have
Speaker 1: a positive assessment of ourselves.
Speaker 3: You're right, And you know one thing, my big headed
Speaker 3: coho said to me that he don't think I'd be listening,
Speaker 3: but I'd be listening. One thing he said that I
Speaker 3: finally got a couple of years ago, and people hate
Speaker 3: me for it, but I don't care. It's being comfortable,
Speaker 3: right sometimes I'm not gonna say sometimes, but before I
Speaker 3: would make myself uncomfortable, or I would be uncomfortable because
Speaker 3: of other reasons. Right, and now I'm in a position
Speaker 3: and I think everybody should be this way if they can,
Speaker 3: just to be happier in life. Meaning if something doesn't
Speaker 3: make you comfortable, mesic, if you're going somewhere, or somebody
Speaker 3: in your house or somebody around you, change it because
Speaker 3: it makes you happier. Right, Because a lot of times
Speaker 3: we get to the feeling of somebody apologizes and you
Speaker 3: forgive them, and still you just don't want them around you.
Speaker 3: I forgive you, but I just don't want you in
Speaker 3: my vicinity. I just don't want to be there. If
Speaker 3: I don't want to go to this function, I'm not
Speaker 3: going to the function, and I don't care who thinks
Speaker 3: anywhere around me, because I realized that that makes me
Speaker 3: happier in life.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: I used to throw it. I think my big head
Speaker 3: co host was an asshole. He'd be like, I ain't
Speaker 3: going because I just don't want to go. I'd be like,
Speaker 3: I'd be like Charlamage's being Charlomagne. But then when you realize, nah,
Speaker 3: he's protecting his mental because he don't want to deal
Speaker 3: with them people.
Speaker 1: Correct, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: And I know this.
Speaker 3: Once I started doing that, life is even better like
Speaker 3: it is what it is.
Speaker 4: That's why he loves going to get profect exams A
Speaker 4: lot makes me he likes that. Right, You've got a
Speaker 4: few of them, you too. I'm gonna be here for
Speaker 4: this one. No, but I think that's absolutely true. When
Speaker 4: you protect your own piece, and if somebody invites you
Speaker 4: to do something and you know that would interrupt my piece,
Speaker 4: that's right. You don't have to go.
Speaker 1: The only reason we go is because I don't want
Speaker 1: them to think this. No, no, no, you need to
Speaker 1: prioritize yourself. We need to do that much more often,
Speaker 1: and I don't think we do very often as a
Speaker 1: as a collective. You know, we do a lot of
Speaker 1: things because we want other people to think, you know this,
Speaker 1: that or whatever.
Speaker 2: You too much explain it of why. But it could
Speaker 2: be because I don't.
Speaker 1: Want to, or just no, no, I don't want to,
Speaker 1: the best thing I can do tonight is spend time
Speaker 1: with myself. So I'm not going to go to the
Speaker 1: thing that you've invited me to, whatever it is.
Speaker 4: I wanted to ask you too about you know, you
Speaker 4: recently did work with Fredo Bang.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: You you were on fred Bang's y'all did a therapy session.
Speaker 1: We did. We did a session that he's going to
Speaker 1: use for the release of his newest album and for
Speaker 1: the song Yes I'm Sad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it was a deluxe album. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: what was that?
Speaker 1: Like? Man? That was incredible? Man, shark man, It's hard
Speaker 1: to even put into words. First of all, have a
Speaker 1: tremendous amount of respect for him. Uh in a very
Speaker 1: short amount of time getting to know him. He's been
Speaker 1: through a lot, Like he has been through a whole,
Speaker 1: whole lot, and in just the decision to want to
Speaker 1: address that and to have a conversation with a therapist,
Speaker 1: in my opinion, is a profound decision. But to expose
Speaker 1: his audience to that because he wants to spread healing,
Speaker 1: that is that was an incredible thing to be a
Speaker 1: part of. And for me, like at this stage of
Speaker 1: my career, like I want to make healing go viral,
Speaker 1: you know, I want to make healing and I mean
Speaker 1: true healing. I'm not talking about talking about it or
Speaker 1: you know, fixing what's wrong with you. I mean, like
Speaker 1: to your point earlier, I don't know anybody who's been
Speaker 1: a live longer than ten minutes that doesn't have something
Speaker 1: to heal from. And when I look at social media,
Speaker 1: you know, you see someone with a super positive mental
Speaker 1: health message and they get this many views, and someone
Speaker 1: doing a food review of a cheeseburger stand gets this
Speaker 1: many views, and that's fine. Like I'm not hating on them,
Speaker 1: like you know, have your success, but I want the
Speaker 1: world to be equally interested in mental health and healing.
Speaker 1: And for someone like Fredo, with his positionality in the
Speaker 1: culture to prioritize that, I think that that's massive. I
Speaker 1: think that that that's the kind of thing that will
Speaker 1: have a rippling impact and will likely save people's lives.
Speaker 1: Like someone's life. I can guarantee you someone's life will
Speaker 1: be saved because they look up to Fredo and they
Speaker 1: recognize him as a as who he is in the culture.
Speaker 1: And if he thinks therapy and mental health is important,
Speaker 1: then someone somewhere in Baton Rouge, Louisiana or wherever, is
Speaker 1: going to think mental health is important and they're going
Speaker 1: to seek therapy too because Fredro made it cool. So
Speaker 1: to be a part of that moment was It's hard
Speaker 1: to put into words how appreciative I am for that
Speaker 1: and how much that means to me. It's a very
Speaker 1: very big deal, I think.
Speaker 4: And make sure y'all subscribe and download Elliot Khanyi's podcast
Speaker 4: Family Therapy with Elliott Kanie. You know, the day is
Speaker 4: the first day of Mental Health Awareness Month. Man, So
Speaker 4: if you're looking for a new mental health awareness podcast,
Speaker 4: a new mindfulness podcast to add to your rotation, Elliot
Speaker 4: Kanye Family Therapy is the one.
Speaker 2: And if they want to participate, what can they do? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Look, so follow me on social media at Elliott Speaks,
Speaker 1: spell my name with two l's and two teas at
Speaker 1: Elliott Speaks and leave a comment, leave a rating like
Speaker 1: really help us reach more people, Like I tell people
Speaker 1: I really do want mental health and healing to go
Speaker 1: viral and have a moment and impact lives, and I
Speaker 1: can't do that without help. So if you want to participate,
Speaker 1: listen to the podcast downloaded on i Heart radio app,
Speaker 1: the Black Effect Podcast Network website, wherever you listen to
Speaker 1: podcasts iTunes, Spotify wherever you listen to podcasts and join
Speaker 1: the conversation, like and when you listen, this is like,
Speaker 1: how do I describe it? It's like this epic reality show.
Speaker 1: There are multiple characters within this first family that we're
Speaker 1: doing this with. Andna, you're gonna really resonate with David
Speaker 1: or Jay or Jay's father who's a part of the process,
Speaker 1: whose name is Freddie. Just just allow yourself to have
Speaker 1: access to it, and I think I think you're gonna heal.
Speaker 1: And and one more thing I will say too. Questions
Speaker 1: are such a powerful thing. You're gonna hear me asking
Speaker 1: questions to the participant family and you're gonna find yourself
Speaker 1: answering those questions and it's gonna impact your life. So
Speaker 1: just expose yourself to it, follow it, follow me on
Speaker 1: social media. We'll be posting clips and I'll be doing
Speaker 1: some cool things there. But help us spread this word
Speaker 1: because we need Jaihill.
Speaker 3: All right, well, thank you for joining us. Its Elliott Connie.
Speaker 3: It's the Breakfast Club. Good morning, Wake that ass up
Speaker 3: in the morning.
Speaker 2: The Breakfast Club