Ready to breathe a sign of relief? Welcome to Ask Dr. Jodi where you get trauma-informed mental health and relationship advice that you won’t hear anywhere else. Today, we’re exploring the powerful themes of Pixar's Inside Out 2 and how our experiences, beliefs, and emotions shape our sense of self. I’m thrilled to have my daughter, Lily, joining me to share her insights and reflections. Together, we’ll break down the movie’s take on identity, belief systems, and self-acceptance. Let’s jump in!
Today, we’re exploring the powerful themes ofPixar's Inside Out 2 and how our experiences, beliefs, and emotions shape our sense of self. I’m thrilled to have my daughter, Lily, joining me to share her insights and reflections. Together, we’ll break down the movie’s take on identity, belief systems, and self-acceptance. Let’s jump in!
In this episode, Dr. Jodi and her daughter, Lily, discuss Pixar’sInside Out 2and the impactful ways it reflects our journey of self-discovery. They explore how experiences, emotions, and memories create beliefs that shape our identities. Dr. Jodi provides insights into how these beliefs can influence our mental health, self-perception, and personal growth, emphasizing the importance of developing a strong sense of self. Lily shares her reactions to key moments in the movie, sparking discussions on concepts like identity, resilience, and joy.
This heartfelt episode is both fun and reflective, as Dr. Jodi and Lily look at how self-understanding and emotional awareness can reduce anxiety and enhance well-being. They examine the importance of embracing all emotions and memories as part of a whole, multidimensional self.
Thank you so much for listening! If you enjoyed today’s episode, please take a moment to leave a five-star review onApple Podcastsand share it with someone who needs inspiration or help to heal!
Dr Jodi Aman: Hey everyone. Have fun! This is a joy expanding, anxiety reducing lessons, uh, from us, uh, from Inside Out 2. Actually, we're just going to have some discussions about what we thought of the movie, what we have questions about, and, um, what it makes us think of for ourselves and how to think about our own selves and our own belief system.
[00:02:18] Dr Jodi Aman: So what'd you think of the movie, Lily?
[00:02:21] Lily: It was fun. It was so fun. I loved it. It was just, like, clever and easy watch. It was fun, and then it really made me think and made me cry a little bit.
[00:02:32] Dr Jodi Aman: Which part did you cry in?
[00:02:34] Lily: I cried, uh, The panic attack. I feel like that's the most basic part. But no, I think I cried after.
[00:02:45] Lily: I don't know. It was like the whole end.
[00:02:47] Dr Jodi Aman: The whole end. The
[00:02:48] Lily: whole end, really.
[00:02:50] Dr Jodi Aman: So this there might be some spoilers. We'll try not to do too much. But you mean like they're all hugging?
[00:02:56] Lily: Yeah, when they hugged. Okay. Yeah. Spoiler. Spoiler. They hug. They hug inside out. Uh, Yeah, there's a
[00:03:05] Dr Jodi Aman: heartwarming
[00:03:05] Lily: moment
[00:03:06] Dr Jodi Aman: at the end when she okay, the whole
[00:03:07] Lily: thing is gonna be a spoiler alert
[00:03:10] Dr Jodi Aman: Hopefully you've already seen the movie.
[00:03:12] Dr Jodi Aman: If not, go watch the movie I never watched this but some but don't stop watching this Right. Right. Don't stop watching us.
[00:03:22] Lily: Right.
[00:03:23] Dr Jodi Aman: Um, but you, I never mind spoiler alerts, but some people get really hung up on them. Do you like spoiler alerts? Yeah, I don't like them. Oh, I'm like, give them to me. Well, I like
[00:03:32] Lily: alerts.
[00:03:34] Lily: Spoilers. Okay. Good, good
[00:03:37] Dr Jodi Aman: point. Okay. So kind of the premise of the movie for anyone who just was looking at it for the entertainment or hasn't seen it yet is that is this idea that our experiences, our thoughts, our memories create. Beliefs. And that beliefs, all the beliefs together are our belief system.
[00:03:57] Dr Jodi Aman: And that belief system creates a sense of self. And following that as a therapist, I think that's pretty on, is that our experiences create beliefs, our beliefs create our self.
[00:04:11] Dr Jodi Aman: So I really liked that, you know, that basic, um, understanding that was there. I don't know if that came through to everyone, but that is true. You know, our experiences cause us to have beliefs, whether they're, you know, True or not, um, we do create beliefs from our thoughts and from our experiences. And that's, I think, a really important thing that we should talk about tonight is how that happens in ways that aren't good for us and how that happens in ways that are good for us.
[00:04:38] Dr Jodi Aman: I kind of went over that in the movie a bit, but we've had some debates the last couple of days since we saw the movie. So we'll finish. It's been getting heated. It's been getting heated on Inside Out 2. Joy expanding, anxiety reducing, um, Debates. Okay. So, um, I can't think of any of our debates right at this moment.
[00:05:01] Dr Jodi Aman: I have notes here, but okay. So one thing that we're kind of debating is how to develop a strong sense of self and like, what is a sense of self? That's what you want to know. Yeah. I just
[00:05:13] Lily: didn't understand what, Oh, like what's a sense of self versus identity. Like, what is a sense of self?
[00:05:20] Dr Jodi Aman: Our sense of ourself, it's better if you say it the long way, like we have a sense of ourself, like an understanding of who we are and how we are in our position in the world.
[00:05:32] Dr Jodi Aman: Like, so that's our sense of ourself. And really we don't have much of a sense of a self outside relationships. So if you're really isolated, you have a very thin sense of yourself because all of our sense of ourselves is reflected to us. off the people around us. So if you have really mean people around you, you also have a very, um, shriveled sense of self because your reflection off everybody else is like mean stuff.
[00:05:58] Dr Jodi Aman: But
[00:05:58] Lily: what if your sense of self is, is like me? What if you're like, you can be mean and still have a good, like, you can be like, not mean. What? You can be mean
[00:06:10] Dr Jodi Aman: and have a good sense of self. Mostly mean people. People are mean because they don't like themselves very much. Right. So hurt people hurt people or miserable people like overflow and hurt the people around them.
[00:06:21] Dr Jodi Aman: So people who are mean don't usually have a good sense of self. And so that goes back to belief systems, like in the movie, how that, that, uh, premises is that from their experiences in their lives, some things that happened to them, they created beliefs that they may be less than. And so they're always trying to make up for that by trying to.
[00:06:44] Dr Jodi Aman: you know, kind of get control over other situations and they end up judging people or whatever being mean.
[00:06:50] Lily: Yeah. See
[00:06:51] Dr Jodi Aman: what I mean?
[00:06:52] Lily: Yeah. That makes sense.
[00:06:53] Dr Jodi Aman: Okay. So that's how it comes together. So a sense, the, the sense of ourself is how we see ourself or how we understand ourself. And it's closely related to identity.
[00:07:02] Dr Jodi Aman: It's not too different, but our identity is like what we give value to, um, what's important to us. ends up to be our identity. Uh, but sometimes if we have a lot of problems in our life, they become our, we get some negative identity conclusions. Like if you're really sad all the time, you say like, I'm depressed.
[00:07:20] Dr Jodi Aman: It becomes part of your identity. Unfortunately, these negative stories as well. And. That's not helpful at all. Um, it's understandable, but it's really not helpful. It actually makes us feel worse.
[00:07:32] Lily: But do you think, so in Riley's brain, in Inside Out 2, um, she has a sense of like, what is that thing that looks like a neuron?
[00:07:43] Lily: Is that what the, is that even the right word? In the, in
[00:07:45] Dr Jodi Aman: the movie, they have a sense of self. Is that a sense
[00:07:48] Lily: of self or is it identity? Like, is that actually who she is or is that what she thinks she is? It's what she thinks she is because she said the whole thing. There is no
[00:07:56] Dr Jodi Aman: actual, what actually somebody is.
[00:07:57] Dr Jodi Aman: Everything is perception. So a person's identity or sense of themself is all a perception that they might have that's ever changing or perception of the, that person from somebody else that's always changing as well. So it's, it's always, no one has an actual sense of self or an actual identity. That's their truth.
[00:08:19] Dr Jodi Aman: That is not, there's no one truth about somebody.
[00:08:22] Lily: Oh, then I don't know what the difference
[00:08:23] Dr Jodi Aman: between, okay. So, so this, they have this mechanism that you said looks like a, would you kill it? A neuron? A neuron,
[00:08:33] Lily: like
[00:08:33] Dr Jodi Aman: shiny and goes around, you know, shiny and like a flower, but a, uh, like a neon sign. Neutron? 3D flower.
[00:08:41] Dr Jodi Aman: That's what it looks like. Okay. So they have this thing and they're calling it her sense of self. That's what they're calling it. And so that's what I said about the premise of the movie is that experiences and thoughts and memories create beliefs and the beliefs create a belief system, which then creates a sense of self.
[00:08:57] Dr Jodi Aman: And when we're younger, if we haven't had trauma, when we're younger. That sense of self is pretty clear. It's like, there's a lot of joy. Um, hopefully if people around you are telling you that you're really great, um, that's how it's supposed to work. It doesn't work for everybody that way, unfortunately.
[00:09:15] Dr Jodi Aman: But then you feel a lot of joy and you feel really good about yourself. And then things start to get complicated when you go through puberty because you're becoming a more complex person. You understand new concepts, you're understanding your, your, um, prefrontal, prefrontal cortex is developing. And so you're understanding a little bit more about foresight and planning for the future and not having like immediate gratification, but doing something.
[00:09:44] Dr Jodi Aman: So you have better, uh, gratification later, you know, kind of withholding that, um, Till it's working hard.
[00:09:51] Lily: You know how when Joy is like She's all sad and then she's like Oh, I guess when you get older You don't, like, experience joy as much or something. Because when I, I saw that I was like, that's super sad, first of all.
[00:10:06] Lily: And number two, it's kind of true because no matter, like, it's true not even in, like, a relatable sense where you're, like, sad when you're older, but it's true because you have more responsibilities, like, you have more stuff so it's less time to, like, play around. So it's, like, kind of sad. It's like, oh, then what is even the point, like, why do we
[00:10:25] Dr Jodi Aman: Why do we grow up?
[00:10:26] Lily: Yeah. Why do we grow up? But then what you just said about like the instant or versus delayed gratification is like when we get
[00:10:35] Dr Jodi Aman: older, when we're starting to become independent, we have to make those decisions for ourselves. And when we're younger, our parents get to make those decisions, decisions for us.
[00:10:43] Dr Jodi Aman: So we don't have to worry about those like survival kind of decisions. But once we get older, there's this transitional period. through like teenager time until young adult time where you're learning how to make these independent choices for survival. You didn't have to do that when you were younger and our brain wasn't developed enough to do that when you're younger.
[00:11:04] Dr Jodi Aman: And then there's this period of time where it's getting developed and not fully developed that there's a lot of resistance to that. But you know, it was really unfortunate. I remember. I was thinking. People used to tell my son, this is the best time of your life when he was in high school. And I know I work with a lot of high school people and it is not the best time of their life.
[00:11:23] Dr Jodi Aman: I mean, you could be avowed for a lot of people. It's not. Well, it's always
[00:11:27] Lily: like, yeah, even in movies, like it's depicted as like the most embarrassing or something. It's hard. I mean,
[00:11:33] Dr Jodi Aman: being a teenager is very, very hard, uh, especially right now, but there's a lot of things going on, a lot of, a lot of things you have to navigate and a lot of resistance to those things and you'd be, you have to do it anyway and all this stuff.
[00:11:46] Dr Jodi Aman: But, um, It is not. If you are a teenager and people have told you that, don't worry about it. It definitely could get better than this because he used to think like, it gets worse than this. Like, why would I get older? You know? Um, if it, if this is the best time of my life and this is this bad, like how, what are we looking forward to?
[00:12:05] Dr Jodi Aman: But I want to say that that's why I always, I always let people know that you could have joy forever. Even though, yes, you have to make decisions, practical decisions for survival. Um, and that means, you know, you have to go to work to earn money to, you know, to support yourself. That's what I mean. Um, but you, you can definitely still have joy.
[00:12:26] Dr Jodi Aman: Like joy doesn't go away.
[00:12:28] Lily: Well, that's what I was saying about the, the what was interesting about the delayed gratification because, um, like your joy, becomes, it's more val I feel like maybe it's more valued because it's intentional. And then, when you delay the gratification, you're, you're knowing that like, oh I have to pay the bills, but this is good, like it feels good when it's done, maybe.
[00:12:52] Lily: Because, Then you don't, you know, you're not gonna like, not, like you're gonna be able to watch TV or you're gonna, like, you pay those bills so that you can like, live in a house or something, like, so you have, that brings joy to you in your adult mind. So there is like, different ways, like, it's not just like, Miserable.
[00:13:11] Dr Jodi Aman: Yeah, for sure. For sure. If you get the jobs done and you know that means security in other places or the, you know, you, you've secured some of the opportunities or good things that you want.
[00:13:21] Lily: So that you can experience joy in a more, like you can watch whatever shows or you have free time to do your hobbies or something.
[00:13:26] Lily: Or you, you
[00:13:27] Dr Jodi Aman: don't have to worry about stuff. And they're deliberate.
[00:13:28] Lily: They're deliberate. Times of joy.
[00:13:30] Dr Jodi Aman: Exactly. So you could also have joy, you know, a spontaneous joy when you're older and you could also have really fun relationships and you could also do a lot of fun and creative things. Um, there's a lot of ways you could bring joy into life.
[00:13:43] Dr Jodi Aman: It's not like just getting your chores done and you have joy. I didn't want to think that either, but yeah, for sure. Yeah. When you get the jobs done that you know you need to do, um, then it's such a relief. And a lot of times we have resistance. And that resistance is totally biological. You know, um, I say this a lot, but I'm going to say it again in case this is the first video you've watched of mine is that our brain has two functions.
[00:14:05] Dr Jodi Aman: One is to survive and thrive. And the other is to conserve calories because we evolved, uh, through times when there wasn't food, we had to find food every day. And so our brain stops us from doing anything that we think we don't need this. to survive today. And it puts this biological resistance. It makes us feel like in what happens, it's the felt experiences.
[00:14:28] Dr Jodi Aman: I don't feel like doing that. And we put meaning around that feeling that there's a reason why I don't feel like doing that, or I'm lazy or something's wrong with me, or I'm tired all the time. And we really question and wonder about this resistance, but it's, it's the most natural thing. And we could override it with our mammalian brain and say, yeah, I want to do this.
[00:14:48] Dr Jodi Aman: I'm fine. I have enough to eat. If you do. Um, And so, so that's important to recognize is that we could see that as a problem and we have a problem or we could see that as that's resistance and we could override it. I know, I know we're a little off the movie, but this is joy, um, joy, uh, expanding because to understand, because that really devastates people when they have that resistance and they think something's wrong with them.
[00:15:16] Dr Jodi Aman: That really devastates people.
[00:15:17] Lily: And it's kind of devastating the movie too, but you I feel like what after we walked out or something you said Or even in the movie, you were like, oh, and the part when, when Joy's being like called to the control center. Oh, that's my favorite. Because that's your favorite part?
[00:15:33] Lily: Like, we could call Joy to us. I love that. And that's what happens when you're older. Well, I guess that's like the deliberateness of the movie. The joy.
[00:15:43] Dr Jodi Aman: Yeah. Yeah. You know, um, happy people, they have to generate their own happiness. There's not just happy people and then sad people or happy people and anxious people or people who've had, you know, unlucky people or something.
[00:15:56] Dr Jodi Aman: Happy people actually generate their own happiness every day and they might be so used to it that it's like integrated and it doesn't look like it's that hard work. And so if you haven't done that and you have to do it, it feels unfair. It's like, why do I have to work so hard to be happy? No one else has to work that hard.
[00:16:10] Dr Jodi Aman: Right. Right. But really everybody has that resistance. And if you've over overridden it and get used to overriding it, it does get easier. I promise you. But also happy people generate their own happiness. They take action every day to bring happiness into the life. And it looks like getting rid of things that bother you, bringing in things that bring you joy and practicing that every day.
[00:16:36] Dr Jodi Aman: You don't do it once, get rid of all the bad things in your life because we're living in this world and things happen and we're getting information all the time. Um, so we have to keep doing that.
[00:16:45] Lily: Yeah.
[00:16:46] Dr Jodi Aman: I think that's the biggest thing. If you're sad, you feel like, what, what did I do? Why am I so sad? And why did I do something wrong?
[00:16:52] Dr Jodi Aman: You know? Mm hmm. Um, but you could pull joy to you. You could like, like, think about these emotions as personified actually. I always think of anxiety as personified. I love this idea and it helps kids really externalize because we internalize these emotions. We think they are part of us. We think what they say is truth because we think there must mean something, right?
[00:17:19] Dr Jodi Aman: And when anxiety lies to you and you realize it's anxiety and not yourself telling yourself a truth or protecting you That's another thing we should mention. It's it makes it easier to separate yourself and your identity. Like I'm not anxious I have anxiety, right? I have anxiety. Anxiety affects me instead of like, I'm an anxious person or I have an anxious brain or my brain's wired this way.
[00:17:44] Dr Jodi Aman: That's something that people used to say, a metaphor people used to say that actually is not really true. Everybody has a sympathetic nervous system. So has that ability to release adrenaline and getting in this process of having it. anxiety a lot. Sorry, I'm talking so much. I gotta let Lily talk, but
[00:18:04] Lily: getting into
[00:18:05] Dr Jodi Aman: that, you know, that it, it could happen to anybody because having anxiety is so scary and so confusing and so mysterious.
[00:18:14] Dr Jodi Aman: And you wonder why that it makes you feel out of control and it just kind of stonewalls from there. And that really, I see it could happen to anybody and it actually happens a lot more people than you think.
[00:18:25] Lily: Yeah. I mean, cause anxiety, anxiety is just like, All for Riley. She thinks she is. Yeah. She's just wants it.
[00:18:34] Lily: Think she's helping Riley. She, she's good. Like she really is a good character in the, in the tv. She's not good. She cares. I know.
[00:18:40] Dr Jodi Aman: She, she, she cares, about's cares happiness
[00:18:43] Lily: and like, but they, they depict it as like at the end when Joy is like, what if some things we can control and then anxiety's, like RI has a, has a paper.
[00:18:54] Lily: To a test or yeah a Spanish test and and she's like, okay like when I was watching that I was like, oh, yeah There are some Things that anxiety is good for. But then I feel like you've told, like, you've told me that there, that there's nothing anxiety is good for. Because, yeah.
[00:19:13] Dr Jodi Aman: Which I don't, so. So the way I think about anxiety is, anxiety, it depends on how you define it.
[00:19:20] Dr Jodi Aman: Because some people define it as like, sometimes it's helpful, um, I find that people want to hold on to it because they really believe that anxiety protects them. They really believe this lie that anxiety protects them. And so it's really hard for them to let go of it. Why would you let go of something that protects you?
[00:19:37] Dr Jodi Aman: So that because they have so much trouble letting go of it, I've kind of redefined it as something that was totally not helpful at all. So it's a leftover fear response. If you're not in physical danger, it's a leftover adrenaline response in your blood. Like when the adrenaline adrenaline's in your blood and all of those symptoms, when, when you are literally not in physical danger, I call that anxiety so that we could say, There's no need for it whatsoever, and we want to help it go away.
[00:20:08] Lily: Because there's other things that like another person might define as also anxiety, but there's other things that would, that are actually helpful in something like a Spanish test where you're like, Oh, I, an incentive to work or like incentive. Yeah. That's the worst when anxiety
[00:20:23] Dr Jodi Aman: says, if, if I, if I got rid of my anxiety, you wouldn't be motivated.
[00:20:27] Dr Jodi Aman: Like if anxiety tells you, if you got rid of me, you wouldn't have any motivation. Anxiety gets in the way of motivation more than anything else. It's like such a crock because if you didn't have anxiety, but you had will, right, you had want or desire, um, you had, you knew cause and effect and you knew that if you studied, then you got a better grade, right?
[00:20:51] Dr Jodi Aman: So you've, we, if we had work ethic, we wouldn't need anxiety to motivate us. But we've kind of lost work ethic and that's the whole other issue. I talked about it last week in the episode with Jared and his mom. I talked about my theories on, on how we've lost this idea of cause and effect, which is totally spiraled our anxiety.
[00:21:13] Dr Jodi Aman: But we've Common sense makes you wear a helmet. You don't need anxiety to do that. Um, you know, we know a lot of stuff intuitively. Our bodies know like, that feels like really risky. I'm not going to walk on that log over the water. I'll probably fall in. But if it's a really hot day and it's really shallow water, it doesn't matter.
[00:21:29] Dr Jodi Aman: Like we're making judgment calls all the time. That doesn't have to be anxiety to help us keep us safe. It could be other problem solving and common sense sort of things, you know, assessing situations.
[00:21:42] Lily: So to you, anxiety is just, what do you say, the leftover fear response when you don't need it anymore?
[00:21:51] Lily: Interesting. Yeah. But then it just suffering. So inside out doesn't really do that though, because inside out there, everyone has it and you need it a little bit. You need all of the emotions and inside out. So
[00:22:03] Dr Jodi Aman: yeah, I mean, in some ways we all have a parasympathetic, parasympathetic, I mean a sympathetic nervous system.
[00:22:09] Dr Jodi Aman: And so we do have the adrenaline that's able to go and we could call that a fear response. They already have fear. They have fear and anxiety in there. And I feel like fear is something that we need to survive. But when our sympathetic nervous system goes off 98 percent of the time, like we're not actually in danger and don't need it.
[00:22:29] Dr Jodi Aman: Um, so the anxiety is those 98 percent of the time where we're not in physical danger. We don't need it, but our brain is going, but you feel bad. So something must be wrong. Keep pumping those hormones out. And then you feel more helpless because you're like, I don't know what's happening. Um, this doesn't even make sense cause I'm not in danger right now.
[00:22:49] Dr Jodi Aman: I don't know what's happening. And that mysteriousness makes you feel helpless. It makes you feel more out of control, which perpetuates the anxiety you see. So that's why I've defined it like that. Because the fear response is great. If you needed it, that'd be great. And, and also like, I, I have that script that I tell everybody.
[00:23:06] Dr Jodi Aman: It's like, if you, if you know, you're safe, but you're feeling the adrenaline, Acknowledge that it's that. It's not mysterious. It's adrenaline. And if you say, um, thanks amygdala, amygdala is that part of the brain that releases the adrenaline. I would say thanks amygdala. If I needed you, this would be great, but I don't need you right now.
[00:23:24] Dr Jodi Aman: Right. I'm going to override it with my mammalian brain. And it's hard because you can't be, you can't. Be scared of it. Like if you're scared or bothered by the anxiety, you're, you're kicking off the, yeah, you're, you're telling your amygdala, give me more, give me more hormones. So, um, so it's a practice that I help.
[00:23:42] Dr Jodi Aman: I mean, get my book, get my book, anxiety. I'm so done with you. Um, I'm sorry. It's a mirror. I couldn't turn off the mirror. And of course, I don't have the book in front of me right now. It
[00:23:53] Lily: says, Anxiety, I'm so done with
[00:23:55] Dr Jodi Aman: you. Anxiety, I'm so done with you. Um, you could click up into the cards up here and, and grab a copy of the book.
[00:24:02] Dr Jodi Aman: I'll put it in there.
[00:24:03] Lily: It's kind of a shame they made her character so likable. Like,
[00:24:07] Dr Jodi Aman: the Anxiety character? I mean, she was, no, she's like,
[00:24:08] Lily: I guess she was kind of evil for parts of it, but she was like I mean she was evil like anxiety is not good, but I just she's just so lovable. I know you kind of feel
[00:24:18] Dr Jodi Aman: bad for her
[00:24:19] Lily: Yeah, it's like tame.
[00:24:20] Lily: I like the idea of like
[00:24:21] Dr Jodi Aman: taming anxiety, calming anxiety down. got me
[00:24:24] Lily: in the panic attack is just Anxiety when she like was just frozen in fear. Like that was the part I was like, Oh, you get it. Like, it's just sad kind of. Yeah. I don't know. Cause that's like how, that's how it feels like you're just trapped, you know?
[00:24:41] Lily: Yeah. And so then I was like, I understand you anxiety.
[00:24:46] Dr Jodi Aman: No, I mean, if it helps to think about it as a creature that's, you know, pathetic and sad and you need to tame and make feel better. So it can't, it's. Stays calm and doesn't get triggered. Great. That's fine. Um, I love it being a character. 'cause you could be like, get away from me, you know, or something like that.
[00:25:07] Dr Jodi Aman: But um, but yeah. Do we need it as one of our emotions? I don't think we need it. Um, we need the fear, like we need fear because it calls our attention, like, is this something dangerous and gets involved the prefrontal cortex so we could survive, right? It gets involved involuntary, involuntary, uh, responses to that stimulus.
[00:25:30] Dr Jodi Aman: And also we could see if there's no danger and then we could stop it, but it doesn't work so well. We have to, we have to do the heavy lifting on that one.
[00:25:39] Lily: Yeah, can we pivot to Inside Out 2? Well, yeah, but that is what we were talking about before, so. Um, two, one thing that I disagreed with you about that we've talked about is that the um, I don't understand why those, those, The memory she puts in the back of the brain need to be, like, part of her sense of self because I feel like that's, I feel like if I have a really embarrassing memory, that's fine being in the back of the brain.
[00:26:11] Lily: It doesn't need to be, like, who I am. Like, I feel like if something really embarrassing happens, it's like, oh, that's not who I am. It was just a bad moment. You know? So I didn't understand why they need to do that. Because in the first movie, they already established that you need sadness. Like, you need all of the emotions.
[00:26:26] Lily: That makes sense to me. But I don't understand how they, you need all of your memories, like, as a part of you.
[00:26:33] Dr Jodi Aman: Yeah. All right. Well, well, I mean, I mean, I don't know what was behind the writer's ideas, but this is kind of my take on it is that, um, if you have, it's so joy tries to, tries to banish any negative memory to the back of her brain so that she doesn't have to think about that, or that doesn't create a belief.
[00:26:56] Dr Jodi Aman: in her belief system. But by the end, Joy realizes that you need all of the memories and, uh, and they could all become part of your belief system, but there needs to be more of a balance. And I think the message was, and I don't know, um, what they wanted to write, but I think the message was like, you don't have to be perfect, right?
[00:27:19] Dr Jodi Aman: So not expecting yourself to be perfect. So in the beginning when she's young and she has only good memories creating a belief system. The sense of self was like, I'm a good person. I'm a good person. And later her sense of self had all of these different things about her. We're like, we're multi storied.
[00:27:38] Dr Jodi Aman: We're multi, our, our identity is not so thin as like one thing. I'm a good person. There's all these things that are part of us. And I like the idea of like, I'm not just a good person. Like I'm a whole person. So yes, I have mistakes and they might create beliefs, but we actually, if we have this balance of knowing that we're basically good and having, uh, engaging, being able to engage our choices or learn from our mistakes and those kinds of things, then we don't have to feel perfect and that we have to like, Put herself on a pedestal and we can't fall off.
[00:28:15] Dr Jodi Aman: We have to be perfect or else. Um, so when you think you're just a good person and there's nowhere else to go, and if you do anything remotely wrong, it's, it'll like knock you down, you know? And so a more robust sense of self is knowing that I'm imperfect, but that doesn't make me a bad person. It makes me a whole person.
[00:28:35] Dr Jodi Aman: I'm good. Um, and you know, not good in a dichotomy good. Goodon is like whole good. Does that make sense?
[00:28:44] Lily: It makes sense. I think maybe it's just turning into like a, maybe a movie critique. Because I was just thinking like, I don't know, then, I don't know, that's not that important. But I guess just like, I feel you can be a good person.
[00:29:00] Lily: a good person and have all of the other things and you're still a good person, but you think that that means that there's only, only good or bad.
[00:29:10] Dr Jodi Aman: Yeah, like could you be good, you could be good or bad. So nothing
[00:29:14] Lily: is good.
[00:29:14] Dr Jodi Aman: But if you have, if you're believe, if you're, all your memories come from good, bad, and benign memories and everything in the middle.
[00:29:22] Dr Jodi Aman: Then you realize that life has, like, when you have a bad moment, you're not like devastated, like, this is horrible. This is
[00:29:28] Lily: the thing is that she has bad memories. Like they, there's, and this is where it gets into critiques, but like they have. She only sends like the worst bad memories to the back of the brain.
[00:29:39] Lily: Anyways, so yeah, I mean, yes, but I see, I see your point. You explained it well. Like, I understand how whole no one's just like, just good.
[00:29:49] Dr Jodi Aman: But this is the thing that we were going to come back to what I said in the beginning is that we could control. What kind of beliefs come out of the experience? How we make meaning around the experience solidifies what the belief is, like what we believe.
[00:30:02] Dr Jodi Aman: So if something bad happens to us, and we think that we caused this somehow, that's the belief is that we are not good at whatever setting limits or whatever it was that happened to you, like that we somehow were unworthy of, you know, being treated good. Um, and so we could create those kind of beliefs, which don't help our sense of self, right?
[00:30:25] Dr Jodi Aman: Cause they make us feel like we're worthless or hopeless or flawed. Um, but if something bad happens to us and we say that wasn't okay, that that happened, I might, I was at the wrong place, the right, wrong time. And I, you know, and that doesn't have to define me. Um, and I'm going to find Who I am by being around people who reflect back the good in me.
[00:30:46] Dr Jodi Aman: Like it, it could be there, but we don't have to set like these truths, these negative truths about ourselves. Yeah. Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. I see. So whatever happens to us, or even if we like, we get an F on a test or we hurt our friend by accident, hurt our friend's feelings, um, cause we were crabby that day or something like that.
[00:31:06] Dr Jodi Aman: Like, yeah, you can feel guilty about it and you could restore the relationship, but if you get stuck in the guilt. And you believe I'm a bad friend and you create a belief out of that one event that makes you feel really bad about yourself. It'll affect how you act in the future. And you don't want that to happen.
[00:31:24] Dr Jodi Aman: Yeah. Get it? Yeah. Totally. Yeah. It's like the sense of self is more 3d. You know, instead of being just, I'm a good person, it's like this more three dimensional as we get older, our brain is becoming, our concept development is becoming more three dimensional. We're becoming more complex beings and really understanding the world a little bit more and, and seeing that foresight.
[00:31:49] Dr Jodi Aman: So our sense of self does have to develop in these, you know, three dimensional ways. You know, unless there's like a trauma along the way, it does affect that, but we can do that. Also heal from that,
[00:32:02] Lily: too.
[00:32:02] Dr Jodi Aman: It's not a death sentence or life sentence.
[00:32:05] Lily: Even though this happened to Riley in like two days.
[00:32:08] Dr Jodi Aman: Yes.
[00:32:09] Dr Jodi Aman: And she recovered because joy was on her side and she had good friends that helped her. And good family. And good family. I mean, yeah. I mean, a lot of people don't have such a supportive family, but yeah, yeah. And so if you're struggling, you know, there is people out there look for an adult that you could trust.
[00:32:29] Dr Jodi Aman: Um, look for a friend that you could trust and, um, and let them know that you're struggling and you need somebody like, don't go through it alone. That's not what we're supposed to do. We're social beings.
[00:32:40] Lily: Yeah. Exactly.
[00:32:40] Dr Jodi Aman: And I like the, I like the movie too because it, there's a sense of community, right? They all care and look out for each other inside your head and, and everything.
[00:32:48] Dr Jodi Aman: So that's kind of, it's kind of so human.
[00:32:51] Lily: Yeah. That's nice. It's fun to see the emotions. And like the original emotions are all like teamwork. The whole movie as opposed to the last movie saw this film.
[00:33:00] Dr Jodi Aman: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yeah, we all have anger. Like we embrace all of ourselves. Like, we embrace all of ourselves, the good and the bad and the ugly, and know that it's all human and it's all accepted.
[00:33:13] Dr Jodi Aman: I think that's when we really become self actualized, when we think all of it is included and all of it is whole. Mm hmm. And then we're not, like, when we resist anger, we get more angry. Because there's a, we get mad that we're being oppressed for not being able to express our anger. And then you, it come out sideways, it comes out sideways and then we get embarrassed that it came out sideways.
[00:33:33] Dr Jodi Aman: Like it's so much worse. Like, just like you're, you know, people get angry.
[00:33:37] Lily: I loved embarrassment. Oh yeah,
[00:33:40] Dr Jodi Aman: embarrassment. And ennui. That was a great addition. So yeah. Well, um, I don't see any comments, so I'm, I apologize if, oh, there is comments. Keisha. Oh, thanks, Keisha. That's so nice. You've been listening. Um, thank you so much.
[00:33:58] Dr Jodi Aman: I'm so glad that you're here and I'm going to read all your comments. Um, yeah, bad memories create a learning process. Exactly. That's what we said. You must have wrote that before we talked about it. Well, thanks, Keisha. I'm so happy that you're here and everybody who watched us live. Um, we're really grateful, but we're going to go so you don't have to keep listening to us.
[00:34:18] Dr Jodi Aman: So we could talk for a really long time, as you could see.
[00:34:21] Lily: Yes. Yes.
[00:34:24] Dr Jodi Aman: All right. Again, if you have any questions, give us a comment below and I will see you next week at eight o'clock. Thank you for listening to this episode of Anxiety. I'm so done with you. With me, Dr. Jodi. Here, I give trauma informed advice to parents, educators, counselors, and teens.
[00:34:41] Dr Jodi Aman: Please leave me a comment and give me five stars on Apple Podcasts. If you wanted to catch me live, I stream this talk show on YouTube at Dr. Jodi, at D O C T O R J O D I. I go on every Monday at 8 p. m. Eastern. And if you're there, you could ask me your questions in real time. Get on the list for reminders at jodiahmond.
[00:35:03] Dr Jodi Aman: com slash guide, and you'll get my Generation Z Mental Health Resource Guide. I'll talk at you next week, but in the meantime, be present and let that you that you want to be shine through.