Coffee Chats w/ Dr. D

Hey, Cadre, it's me, Dr. D. And I got my coffee today on the go, because I'm at my real office. Just got out of a really powerful session, as usual, and I wanted to share something with you guys about connection, the power of connection. But as I'm waiting for a few people to join, I just want to check in and see how everything has been going for you this past couple years of couple of days, because I have noticed a transition for myself, and I just feel like there's a lot of energy and, like, vibrance in my life right now that I'm really excited about because I know that something great is coming soon.

And so I'm just enjoying the moments between. And I don't think we always pay attention to that sometimes. You know, when we're in transition, we always look at what was bad, you know, maybe feeling stuck. And we're always looking forward to what we're expecting to happen, but we don't always pay attention to what's happening right in the middle. And so I feel like I'm in that middle space right now, and I just. I want to take it all in and enjoy it. But. Hello there, Dr. Green. I love your talks.

So I want to talk about the power of connection. And I took some notes because I was scrolling through. I have tons of notes on my phone, y' all. It's ridiculous, but there were some that caught my eye recently that I wanted to revisit. And so I wanted to share one that I came across this morning. But it's really looking at this idea of us being mirrors for each other. And so the question I want to ask you to think about is, if we never came into contact with another human, how would we know who we are?

So I'll read that again for you. If we never came into contact with another human, how would we know who we are? So if I sit with that, how do I know who I am? I have to think about my identity really comes from the connections that I have in my life. I think about my identity attached to the roles that I play. So I'm a mother, I am a friend. I am a sister, I am a coach. I am a therapist. I'm all these different things, and those are roles that I play in other people's lives, right? And because of those roles, I get to see myself in different ways when I show up in those roles.

And so I want you to think about this, too. Who is your mirror? So we are mirrors for each other, and I even think about that as myself. Being a therapist, I always tell my clients that I'm your mirror. My job is to sit here and reflect back what you're showing me about yourself so you can see yourself better. And I think the same thing happens in relationships and with any connection that we have, whether it's a healthy connection or toxic, the people that we are connected to are our mirrors. So who is in your life that is a reflection of the good and the not so good parts of you?

So when I think about those who reflect the good in me, I don't always see it until someone else tells me about myself, if that makes sense. I'll give you an example of. And this was maybe over 10 years ago where I was just in this go mood. Like, I just have to keep going. I got things to do. I have important work to do. I just wanted to help everybody. And I didn't necessarily pay attention to me, but the people in my life would often slow me down and tell me how great I am. And I would hear it and be like, okay, and just kind of move along doing the things that I needed to do.

But I didn't sit with what they were saying about who I was. And so some of the words that they would use were very encouraging. Some of the things that they would say would really shock me when I heard it about myself, because I didn't see myself the same way. And so we have to think about people in our lives and how are they mirroring who we are? So the people in our life will see us in a way that we don't always see ourselves. And even the concept of using a mirror, you don't know what you look like until you look at yourself in the mirror.

How are you going to know that? So people are our mirrors. And there are some people in our lives that will reflect the ugly parts of ourselves. And sometimes that doesn't come up until we're triggered. And that person maybe behaves the same way that we're behaving in response to our behavior and how we're treating them. And that's a pivotal moment where we can stop, reflect and say, well, what is in me that is showing up in this way that that person responds to me that way? So that's tricky. Sometimes.

We don't always like to do that, but it's definitely necessary. So this week, I want to challenge you to think about who is your mirror? You know, who are these people you're connected to that are reflecting the beautiful parts of you that maybe you don't see? And who is reflecting these ugly parts of you that arise in moments that you're not really expecting. But when you see it, you do need to pay attention. You do have to reflect and you do have to stop and think, do I want to keep showing up in this way?

Okay, so that's the power of connection. And, Dr. Green, you say being mindful of company you keep. Absolutely. I think that's a lesson we learned early in life, but. Well, we're taught that. Let me rephrase that. We get taught that early in life, but we don't always learn it until something goes wrong or until we have a really negative and hurtful experience from the company that we keep. So thank you for sharing that, but I just had a quick coffee chat today. I didn't really have a lot to say, but I do want to thank you for joining me.

And if you're watching the replay, please drop a little coffee mug in the chat. So I know that you were there. Let me know where you're joining from. For those of you that don't know, I'm in the St. Louis region, but I'm on the Illinois side, so if you know anything about the border there. So I'm about 20 minutes from downtown St. Louis, but in Illinois, so not in Chicago. But thank you guys for joining. Hi, Brittany. Welcome. I'm getting ready to sign off, girl, but I'll catch up with you later.

But y' all enjoy the rest of your day and don't forget your coffee. All right, bye.