Overcoming Trauma and Embracing Healing | with Dr. Betsy Holmberg

Michael Unbroken: I've really been thinking recently about why we move towards coping mechanisms, why it's so difficult to sit in the pain of the healing journey, especially once you start to have awareness. And a lot of it I've been thinking about is like, what role does trauma actually play in the way that we think and the way we operate, in the way that we act?

And today I'm super excited to have Dr. Betsy Holmberg on the show so we can get into the depths of all of this. First, Betsy, welcome to the show.

Betsy Holmberg: So good to be here. Thanks, Michael.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah, I'm excited to have you. Why should anybody listen to today's episode? Why should anyone be like, okay, I need to go deal with this. I need to hear this content. This is gonna be beneficial to my life.

Betsy Holmberg: So this episode is for you if you have felt broken, if you have felt damaged, if you have felt some of your reactions to trauma have been completely overwhelming you, and you wanna get a sense of why they are, what they are, how they happen, and also some ways to stop them.

So we're gonna go into the science of what trauma does to us, and it's really eye-opening and it was incredibly helpful for me.

Michael Unbroken: I'm very excited to get into this. You know, one of the things that you are, as an expert in this field, you're an award-winning psychologist and author, a speaker. You've led services at McKinsey and Company. You have a PhD from Duke, you know, and you have so much extensive background. I'd love for you to share a little bit more about where your expertise has come from and why this has become in many ways your life works.

Betsy Holmberg: Yeah, so it became my life's work. Not for my education or anything, but from my experience.

So I was left by my husband after less than two years of marriage with a 15 month old baby. And in that process I went very, very, very low. And I went on an antidepressant, it helped me immensely. We can talk in the episode about how they do that, and I had family kind of come around me and I got through that time.

But three years later, I was still totally plagued by these negative thoughts that would not stop. And I thought, I am gonna be damaged for life. Like, here's this event. And I was one person beforehand, and now I'm a shell of a person afterwards who can't really cope with anything and how am I gonna get outta this?

And so I went back into the literature and started to understand what these systems were and pieced it all together. And when I could recognize where these voices were coming from, why I was feeling so negative, it really shifted everything and just shifted, made my healing go so much better. And so now I wanna share it with the world. It's great stuff.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah, I, I mean, it's really one of those things that, and I think this has been my experience too, is like, as I learned, it was like I have to go and share this with the world because. This can change my life as a guy growing up, homeless, drug addict, parents learning disability, a score of 10, and I can like get out into the world and feel somewhat normal.

I'm like, oh wow, this can definitely benefit other people. I think that a lot of people feel stuck though, right? Because we live in this time, in this day and age where trauma is this prevalent conversation, I think a lot of people can get into victimhood, which by all stretches of the imagination is fair and reasonable.

Like I don't ever want to take that from anyone. I talk about that a lot on this show, but there are so many things that start to show up in our lives where we just feel stuck all the time. And one of the things that I, I know can be really powerful for people is just seeing other people's lives shift. That can also be this anchor to where they go, well, that works for them and not for me. What have you found in the research that might support that conversation on either side?

Betsy Holmberg: Yeah. So I think that's a great way to get into just the brain systems and what's in our body that gets affected by trauma, which can help explain why we get stuck and why it can be annoying when someone else looks like they're getting ahead.

And then we're still sitting with our same reactions. So, uh, let's look at it in two ways. We have, first of all, the nervous system, which we all know about the fight, flight stress response. Really take that a step further and think about your nervous system as a ladder. So at the very bottom rung, which is our most primal way to handle and cope with stressful situations, is the freeze response.

So this is a mouse who freezes when a hawk is above them and you, you know, when you freeze to death, it's the freeze response. Then we've got our fight or flight, which we all know. And then above that is called the social engagement system. And this is where our nervous system is calm and we feel like talking to people, we feel like connecting, sharing food, things like that.

And so we need to get away from this idea of it's either fight or flight or peaceful and calm. It's not that we're either frozen or we're fighting or running away, or we're hanging out with people. Like that's the latter. And with trauma, what happens is we get stuck in the ladder and it makes it really hard to move from one of the rungs to the other.

And so it's a system that's become inflexible. So if you're someone who has big reactions to something, that is your nervous system being stuck on that fight or flight rung and not being able to smoothly move up to social engagement. So that's one system. The second system is our brain. And what scientists have recently discovered just in the past 10 years is that we have two thought networks, not one.

It feels like it all comes from the same place, but it's actually two separate ones. Our most evolved thought network is called the Central Executive Network. And this is when you focus your thoughts. So when you choose to think about something, when you put your attention on something, you're using your central executive network.

The second network is embedded deeper in the brain, and it's been around with us since our hunter gatherer days. And so its whole purpose was to try to keep us in the clan. 'cause if we got stuck outta the clan, then we would be killed and die. So it is a 100% survival network and it is intimately linked to our stress system as well.

So this voice is fascinating. It's automatic. You can't control these thoughts. So these thoughts happen to you and you listen to them. They're not yours. They're not what you believe, they're kind of what you hear. Another thing to think about is they're very much outward, so this system is looking around you and seeing what everyone else is doing and how we need to be acting.

And it's saying, am I doing that? What can I do to fit in? And it gets a lot of its information from family conditioning, social conditioning, et cetera. So anyone who's struggling with CCP at TSD, there are probably, you've had a lot of experiences with this. Default mode network, it's called, has hooked in to say the, this is how the clan perceives you.

These are the things that's wrong with you. And it will tell, say those messages back to you consistently and automatically. And so when we're feeling like we're broken, when we're feeling like you know I'm damaged, that is your default mode saying that. And when the default mode goes too far, that is clinically major depressive disorder.

It's when the default mode is turned into a bodybuilder and your essential executive network is weak. Because these two networks work like a switch one's on or the other's on. So the more you spend in your default mode network, the weaker your CEN is going to be, the harder it's gonna be able to switch outta that.

So when you're in major depression and you feel like these thoughts are totally overwhelming you, it's 'cause that system has gotten really strong. The same is true for anxiety disorders and the same is true for suicidality. Suicidality is just, this network has gone so far to say, okay, I have collected enough data from the outside to say I don't feel like I belong here anymore.

I feel like I'm a burden on people. Like you can almost hear the hunter gatherer aspect, clan vibe of the DMN with the kind of thoughts we have when we feel suicidal. So that's what's going on in the brain. Yeah, and one of the things that I found because, and I've shared this publicly at 25 years old, I put a gun in my mouth.

Michael Unbroken: I was done and those voices were so loud and, and for me it wasn't the outside world. It was all the suffering I had been through that had led to this place where I was tired of everything. It had nothing to do with how the world saw me. I didn't really care about that. It was just, I was done with the suffering.

And so when people say, oh, that was such a selfish thing, I go, yeah, but you've never been in that moment where you're so overwhelmed that it feels like it's the only way to turn off the noise. Right Now, what's really fascinating is I look at that moment now, almost 15 years removed and I go, there's a 0% chance that would ever happen.

You talk about this switch, and I do look at it like a light. It's funny 'cause I wrote a light switch on my notes as we were talking, because there is a way to shift that from on to off. It's not easy. It takes time, it takes work, it takes practice, it takes the right, sometimes intervention, whether that's pharmaceutical or personal, like whatever that looks interpersonal I should say, or whatever that looks like.

How do we start to shift and flip that switch to have more control, to get out of rumination, to get out of, um, those thoughts that are impeding every single thing, the shame, the guilt, the judgment, everything that leads down that path where we're like, wait a second, do I ever want to be here? Yeah. How do we start to, what's step one, right? Somebody who's listening, they are in a dire situation. They have tried many things. They're not seeing success, and they're just kind of at the place where they're like, something's gotta give. What is step one to flipping that switch and getting that DNN turned off?

Betsy Holmberg: Yeah. So let's take this in two levels. 'cause the first is kind of, is the more extreme level. So when this DMN is very, very strong and you have been there and I have been there, that's when we need more extreme measures. I think of it like a personal trainer for the brain. So it doesn't mean weakness, it doesn't mean we can't handle it.

It is literally having to restructure your brain. And there are a few ways you can do it. Number one is pursuing a therapy or a group therapy. And it is good to talk through this stuff. It is good to pressure test your DMN thoughts with someone else. Humans have been doing this forever. So if you're like, I feel like shit, and then your friend says, no, you're great for this, this and this.

It can tone the DMN down to get that counteracting feel also. Therapy therapy, dear friends, they also function as a clan and that kind of soothes the DMN when it's super, super, super intense. So reaching out to people, even a suicide hotline, some sort of human connection can help. Secondly, this is a place where potentially medication can be helpful.

So SSRIs have been shown to reduce functional connectivity in the default mode network. So that's that feeling, and I felt it. What absolutely when I went on it is I was just running, running, running. And then it felt like I got these little breaks, like these little p moments of peace in between these awful thoughts, and it helped me.

Get out of that mode. So if you're someone who's just dealing with it on a regular every day situation, then the techniques get a little more nuanced. You have more availability to get to your CEN, so you can use it a little more and build it yourself. So one way to do it is to say, this is my DMN label.

Make it a little, do it with a loin cloth. Like just call the dm, whatever you wanna do. But when you recognize that it is not you, it's not how you feel, it's not your belief system. Ps all of our beliefs are just like really strong DMN thoughts we've just heard over and over. So if as we start to break up with these core definitions of who we are and how we feel about ourselves, then that can help bring some peace too.

Another thing to do is to redirect it however you can. So whether this is listening to music. Singing, taking a walk, being in nature. I mean, there are a bunch of ways to do this, and this is what's kind of beautiful, is that every single person is different. So whatever gets you excited and like you just enjoy doing is something to 100% prioritize because it shifts you into your CEN and it weakens this default mode network.

Michael Unbroken: One of the things I see people struggle with a lot is kind of self intervention. Like this moment in which you're sitting on the edge of your bed and you're like, I know I need to get up and take a shower or brush my teeth, or go on that walk or pick up that phone and call that therapist. And sometimes that very first step, the very first steps that you just laid out, reaching out to the community, having the conversations, the interrupting, what's happening, that almost feels as impossible as telling somebody to go breathe in outer space.

What's happening in the brain in those moments where we have awareness and we're like, I know I need to do this thing, and yet we can't seem to push through the wall to do it. Like what's actually happening biologically and chemically in us. That's kind of keeping us stuck. Yeah, it's that default mode network.

Betsy Holmberg: If it is operating at 90% and your central executive is only a 10% and your central executive is the stuff you choose, choosing a shower, choosing to make a phone call, you know, all of those like good actions we know we should do. If it's really strong, it's gonna make it very, very hard to do that stuff.

I mean, I remember in the middle of the divorce for me, I was literally lying on the ground and the only thing I could do was to push a button for a FaceTime call to say to someone like, I don't feel like I should be here anymore. And like, that was it. I couldn't, I could not get off the ground and that was not happening.

I couldn't eat. Like I couldn't do any of that stuff, but I could do that one little step. And so it's, you know, it's finding that, what is that one? Things you can do. And I feel like for a lot of us, and a lot of the stories I've heard and the people I've worked with, it is that phone call. You know,  that reaching out like a shower feels way too hard.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah. And it's hard. 'cause for me, at the very beginning, it was like, I gotta brush my teeth today. And that was like climbing Mount Everest in a lot of ways. And the thing that I think about a lot in the journey is, there are so many things that we have to take into consideration because we are having this biological experience.

One of the things that I've shared on the show before was the Newsweek article, why antidepressants are no better than Placebos. And that study was done in 2010. The evidence I don't think is overwhelmingly in either direction. I think that there's a lot of conversation to look at the efficacy of that intervention playing a massive role 'cause for you, it helped tremendously for me, did nothing. Right? And so you, you look at this and you go, well, we are so individualized. Yeah. And, and we live in this society where it's like one size fits all. But because we're having a biological experience, the thing that I recognized that was playing such a massive role in my depression, anxiety, all the things that were happening were drugs, alcohol, lack of sleep, no routine, not working out, eating fast food three times a day, constantly being in anger, not knowing how to cope with emotions, not, trusting people. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. And then all of the unresolved trauma, all of the things I hadn't worked on. and people feel. How I felt at the time.

I felt like it was weak to have to try to talk about the bad things that were happening in my life. And what I've come to realize is that's actually where your growth is. Like that's the thing that creates a shift in your life. It's the same way as picking up the phone, hitting FaceTime, making that first step, I will never forget the way that I felt the first time I shared my story with somebody. At 27 years old. I had kept all the secrets, all of them, and I finally, I. And I was like, holy crap. Like I feel like a different human being. Do you find that, you see that to be true for people, that if they can kind of reconcile this idea that they're weak with understanding that it's actually like a superpower to talk about their life, do you find that actually helps them create more space to grow, to heal, to move through the depression and the anxiety?

Betsy Holmberg: 100%. So here's that. I love that your question, because this adds another layer to the whole trauma picture, and it's always so complex, which is that when we go through trauma, our brain goes into, you know, how your computer goes into a safe mode when it's had some bug and like only like two little applications will work.

And you're like, ah, it's in safe mode. Well, the brain does safe mode during trauma experiences, meaning it, the CEN has gone offline. The DMN has gone offline, the hippocampus has gone offline. I mean, it is barely there and it's very protective at the moment. It does serve a purpose, but it means that trauma is not stored as a normal memory.

It's stored as sensory fragments and now you've talked about this probably a lot. So it's stored as sense. It's stored as an image, it's stored as a feeling of a hand on your shoulder. and this means that the trauma can come back absolutely. At any time. And so you add that component to the brain and you can see between a caveman voice that is constantly telling you that you're damaged and you're broken and everything.

And then sensory fragments that are coming in and bringing, revisiting those memories. It feels very overwhelming and it feels like the brain and the body are very out of control. And so when you start sharing your story. It helps to put those pieces together. And there are other methods if you wanna talk about doing that as well, like EMDR therapy.

But it starts to bring those sensory fragments into a cohesive hole. And since your hippocampus campus is back online, it can then store it as a memory and then it doesn't. The brain doesn't succumb to them as easily, like it is stored as a memory. It is put in the past and then you're not gonna be haunted by them as much. So telling your story is incredibly powerful for bringing those pieces together and getting them out of control of you in a way.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah, the fragmentation is so real. That's something that I don't think I actually got goosebumps 'cause it's been a while since I actually talked about this on the show.

The fragmentation is so real because people don't understand that the core experience is so displaced that it becomes this leverage point that leads to them being triggered all the time. This was my experience. So I'll tell you a quick story 'cause I think it'll be helpful for where I'm gonna lead the next question.

Growing up in Indianapolis, there was a barbecue joint around the corner from one of the houses that I was abandoned in. And. I would drive past this barbecue place and I would get triggered so hard. I'd get straight into tunnel vision. I feel like I'm having an anxiety attack. I'm like literally freaking out.

And then I noticed it would start happening anytime I was near a barbecue place and I was like. What the hell is happening right now? What I would come to realize now years later, because I understand things like we're talking about in SI and sensory fragmentation, is that that stint just the smell triggered the core memory.

And one of the things that I tell people a lot, especially when they come into coaching programs with me is I'm, I ask them, do you still live in the neighborhood you grew up in? Do you still live in the town you grew up in? Do you still live in the city you grew up in? Because sometimes you can't step into a full healing journey when you're constantly being triggered.

My experience and what really helped get rid of that, 'cause there were things about places I was seeing, billboards that were familiar, the exit ramp, all of those things I realized kept my body constantly. Fight or flight. And so while from 26 to 30, I'm doing therapy and coaching, I'm doing like the results aren't coming 30 years old, I moved to Portland, Oregon, and went completely across the country.

New environment, new surroundings, new people, new smells, new touches, new ideas, everything. And it was like, oh wow, there was this huge growth period. And that was because I wasn't constantly in that space. And so I always encourage people to leave your home. Now I realize that's not as easy for everyone as it is for some people, but it's really about creating a container for growth because I think that people don't recognize how unresolved trauma shows up in their daily life.

They can't see it. So I'd love to actually explore this a little bit more. What if somebody right now, in this moment, they're like, wow. That actually makes sense because every time I go past X or I experience Y or this Z thing happens, I'm triggered. I'm in fight or flight. I'm in that sympathetic nervous system. What do they do with that? What do they do with the overwhelm of the day-to-day life of unresolved trauma?

Betsy Holmberg: Yeah, so the number one is taking care of yourself in that moment and whatever that looks like for you, in terms of trying to bring that stress system down. And honestly, it's really, really hard.

You know, sometimes you just have to take deep breaths, go through a panic attack, whatever it is, and get to the other side. but the second is to use it as a data point. Like you just learned something incredibly valuable there, and there was something in that environment that was a trigger and it's starting to like, it's almost like the puzzle pieces and the mystery of you.

Like what was it that was in that moment that did it for you? And then it's having that self-compassion because you're gonna have that. Experience and then the DMN is going to go off on you and it's gonna say you're weak. Like you are completely outta control. You can't handle it. You can't even handle the smell of barbecue, like what the f is wrong with you.

It will just say all of this nasty stuff and it's to then see that and go, you know what, I'm not gonna listen to that either. Like, I get what's happening. I am so powerful that I survived it and I am starting to understand it and I'm going to get through this. And it's to not let the DM n be so mean and to believe any of it, because it, it's automatic, it's trying to make sense of all this and then it doesn't know what the f it's talking about.

Michael Unbroken: You can say quite honestly. So I'm, I'm curious. DMN turns on. We're heavily in this default mode network. We're in disgusting, negative self-talk. We are beating ourselves up, belittling ourselves. Then we're finding all of the supporting evidence why it's true.

My mom said this. My dad said that. Look at me now. Of course they were right. Society said this. Society said that. Look at me now. Of course they're right. I need to quiet this noise. Insert coping mechanisms. Why do we have coping mechanisms? Why do they feel really good at the moment? The sex, the drugs, the rock and roll, and then immediately after whatever the high is that DMN turns on a hundred fold of what it was, what is happening there?

Betsy Holmberg: this part blew my mind. Um, so let's drink alcohol. So alcohol feels so good because it disrupts the functional connectivity of the DMN. It essentially takes it offline. So you get this rush of freedom and of not hearing any of it, and it's like a liberation and it's so good that. That's okay. So then let's say afterwards you then come out of it, the DMN comes back online and is like, what did you just do?

And like, did you say something stupid? Did you do something stupid? Because the DMNS also are behavior police. It kind of keeps us in line with norms. So, the fact that you were, that you, was out of control of you for a little while, it makes it flare. And so then the DMA gets stronger because of the flare.

And then we want the alcohol even more to shut it up again. And so this is one of the pathways to addiction with alcohol. Cigarettes do the same thing. Cigarettes have an interesting nuance in that they actually activate the CEN as well. Mm-hmm. So it's a double punch. It's like, I'll turn this off, but I'll make it even easier for you to focus on other stuff.

So that's why that became highly addictive and pretty much anything else. Overeating, you know, having sex, all this stuff can stop this and calm this DMN and it is. So delightful when it's been running your life for so long that it's so easy. It makes so much sense why we go into addiction, you know? It's like, of course we do. It's a coping mechanism and it's a damn effective one, you know?

Michael Unbroken: Yeah. And it's so effective. It ruins people's lives. Yes. Because this is where, this is where you find people who sit in these spaces and they're like, I know I'm addicted. That was me too, by the way. Like this was the biggest thing that I had to overcome. And it was not drugs. It was not alcohol, it was sex. And it was a thing that in my twenties, I could not have a stable relationship. The whole process of the hookup was exhilarating. Right? And, and it was one of these things where it was, the noise would be so quiet, but then the chaos would be so loud.

And I found myself loving the chaos. You know, one of the things I, I talk to my clients about, I'll hear them say, I thrive in chaos. And I'm like, that's dumb. Wouldn't you rather thrive in peace and harmony and love and joy and high vibrating energies? And they think about it and they go, oh yeah, that makes sense.

And you know, I look at life now being in an unbelievably healthy, stable relationship removed from all of those coping mechanisms, sitting in deep sobriety of all capacities, right? And probably working too much. But that's probably just my nature. And I look at it, I go, okay, you can take control over these mechanisms.

You can quiet that system. You can get into this place where you can take control of your life. I think a lot of it is environmental support, but I also think that a ton of it is awareness, because I would be willing to say it, some people can't actually connect the dots on why they are addicted to coping. How do we help them figure that part out?

Betsy Holmberg: I think a major part of that is that we feel we are escaping ourselves. We feel we are getting freedom from ourselves. We have so owned this DM and voice to be the voice of us. And it feels like it, like, you know, we're not stupid. I mean, this thing comes up, it comes up on its own.

It feels like it's us narrating our lives and so the addiction becomes such an appeal because it feels like it's the one thing that helps us escape ourselves and all of whatever craziness we perceive in ourselves. And so being able to take that separation and to say, I am not my, I'm not, whatever these beliefs are that I've been holding forever.

I am not these awful thoughts. I am none of this. I am actually, you know, I always a big part for me was going spiritual. It's like, you know, I am a soul underneath this that is doing this incredible work and this is really hard work. Trauma work is hard and I am, none of these things I'm experiencing can help us not feel we need the coping mechanism to get rid of our, to stop ourselves. You are beautiful, you are powerful, and it's this other noise that you have to address.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah, and what I found to be so difficult in my journey was the self-talk narrative and transferring that into self-worth. Because when you grow up, which many people listening to this show have under the assumption that you don't matter, you're not important, you don't belong, you'll never be successful.

Now you're playing a mind game with yourself, right? And you're playing this game where you're effectively trying to update software that is like. Effectively hardwired to you. It's like having a hard drive soldered into a motherboard. You can't get the damn thing off, but you have a new hard drive you want to put in, and so that self-worth thing about creating this space of understanding, I think is really difficult because now you're talking about disrupting negative self-talk and overthinking and coping mechanisms, right?

You're talking about the action side of things, and I think people get stuck here more than any place in the journey because it's really, really easy to beat yourself up, and it's a lot harder to be kind. When we look at this, this kind of transition and we step into the healing part, we step into the overcoming part.

We're going to take our power back to the sovereignty agency part of this. Many people get stuck in this space in the healing journey. Why does this happen and what can they really start to do to move forward? Because I don't know that affirmations are enough.

Betsy Holmberg: No, I totally agree. I don't think they're enough at all. To me, they're like two sumo wrestlers and your DMN is a big guy, and affirmations are a little weakling, and it's like, this is not, this is not gonna happen. Um, a wonderful piece of the puzzle for that stage of the journey is to find people who have gone through it before. So this is where things like you being a trauma coach, I mean, when you see evidence of people who have had as hard backgrounds as you, and then you see them step into agency and you see them step into living fully then, and you honestly for your default mode network, you turned those people into your clan.

If you're like, okay, Michael's part of my clan, and like, you know, take all of us as part of your clan and then that will, you'll start to see that you can do it too. Like, and that you are not alone. And that can help build some of those pieces when you're feeling stuck.

Michael Unbroken: Okay. So then, because I wanna battle test this a little bit 'cause I know this is where people are. Yeah. Let's go. Okay, Betsy, I hear you, but I'm not worthy about being around other people.

Betsy Holmberg: That is your DMN. Your DMN is telling you that there, it has this picture of what a clan is out there and it has taken all of the things you've heard your whole life. And it is saying, this is how the clan feels, and you are not worthy of being part of the clan.

So this is a voice to say fuck off, essentially, that is not a real thought. PS that is not real, you thought if you're looking for who you really are, you wanna look for those thoughts that coincide with things you love and people you love, and experiences you've loved. Because bizarrely, the heart, actually, has a set of neurons. It connects to the CEN, the default mode, neurons connect to the gut. And so it's a stress system, whereas the heart is where you're gonna find who you really are.

Michael Unbroken: You know, I was actually just coaching my men's group about this the other night. Getting to that place that we call agency, we call sovereignty, that people throw these buzzwords around, like take your power back and, and look, I'm guilty of it too, by the way. 'cause I think it makes sense to people. It only actually works if you do things that are in alignment with who you are as a human being.

But finding the alignment requires you to kind of stress test your life in a lot of ways. To go and effectively be you. And I always teach people the hardest thing you ever do is become you. And for many of us, especially, I mean, if you're banging out four or five ACE scores, you know, or tens like me, becoming you is fucking impossible.

But it's the only way that I think that you genuinely step into the healing journey because that creates the space for you to say, this is who I am. You can either accept it. I can accept it or not. And that becomes really difficult because most of us have never been there before. And the idea of becoming, you think about this.

This is what I think about a lot, right? We were playing this game in which our brain is built around survival. We know this. It's always about that. How do I survive long enough to procreate, to watch my procreation procreate? Like that's the game. And if it's survival, then when we tap into the unknown, we want to revert back to what is known, because then we're not in this stressful fight or flight state.

The idea that being in community with someone or some, or a group of people, IE your clan is unknown, makes your brain be like, that's gotta be fucking dangerous, man. What are you doing? Don't you remember when you were 6, 8, 14, 19? And it's like, wait a second, you're. My understanding and the thing that I've discovered is that the very thing that we resist is actually the very thing that will push us forward in the journey.

I resisted therapy, I resisted coaching re I mean, that's probably an understatement. I was like, I'd rather fucking get set on fire than walk into a therapist office. Right? And then you find, and you discover that changing the self narrative about who you are is only going to come through the spaces where it's like you gotta do the thing that you're scared to do.

Because I think it, you know, we talk about neuroplasticity a lot. On the journey, I'm gonna use this word intentionally. Where in the journey does forcing yourself to do the thing that you're scared of come into play?

Betsy Holmberg: Where in the journey is forcing yourself? Honestly, I feel like it's probably almost every step of the journey, but mostly in that very beginning when we are at our lowest, when we feel like it is completely not worth it anymore.

I mean, that is the major forcing ourselves moment to take that one little step and, but then honestly, we're going to be forcing ourselves forever. I mean, there is a place where, you know, you have a bad night's sleep, this stuff comes raging back, and you're gonna, you're gonna be forced to look at yourself and say, I have had a bad night's sleep, and like, I need to get better sleep next time.

You know, it's shifting those health habits to say, yeah, I felt really crappy after drinking so much last night. I, I like, I need to stop that. I mean, I think there's a place where we're constantly watching ourselves, seeing what's working, seeing what's not working, what gets us lower and shifting it.

Whatever it is. I mean, one thing for me that I needed very much was I got a dog. Because dogs don't leave you. And so, like everyone's situation, it will be so unique. Like what is that thing that will be that support for you that will help? And like ps a dog doesn't have A-D-M-N-I, you know, you look bad, you look good, you're upset.

The dog doesn't care. The dog's there for you if you're screaming and crying, you, you know, your dog loves you no matter what. And it's an incredibly powerful, uh, force against nasty DMN thoughts that are putting you down all the time. 'cause they don't. Yeah.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah. No, I mean that's a, that's a really great point. Let me ask you this, 'cause I think that as we're looking at and kind of unfurling so much of this. Unfortunately, I believe that a lot of what we understand up to this point, I don't wanna use the word archaic, that feels so incredibly unfair, but it's not necessarily as relevant as it once was. The data, the research, the information 20, 30 years ago.

Today we're getting so much more data, so much new information. This idea of the impact of C-P-T-S-D and long-term detrimental health outcomes. Like we're seeing the research, we're understanding how pharmaceuticals do and don't play roles in certain lives because we're individuals. As you've continued to go deeper into the research. What surprised you? What are you like? Wow, I had no idea. Everybody needs to know this. What are some of the really key aha moments you've had in the last couple of years that would really surprise people about the research around trauma?

Betsy Holmberg: For me, it's that people can enter it at any point in the trauma ladder, if you will, and can start their journey by poking any piece of it and it can start to unravel and create healing.

So for example, for some people it's starting with the body and it's doing somatic therapy. It's starting to get into the body and you know, processing, dissociation and starting to feel everything again. And from there they then can go on to, you know, what am I thinking? And things like that. So that's an entry point for some people.

The entry point is going into the memories and doing EMDR therapy to then take those sensory fragments, make them memories, have them go away, you know. So you can enter any way. For other people, it is just taking a look at their DMN thoughts and saying that none of these are real. I'm actually not broken.

I'm not damaged. I'm having a completely normal reaction to an abnormal situation, and I can start to be a little kinder to myself. So. whatever, wherever. I didn't realize it was gonna be as nuanced as it was, and that people could individualize it as much as they wanted to in terms of how they started therapy and what they chose to pursue first. There are a lot of ways to skin this horse, you know?

Michael Unbroken: Yeah. Are there, are there interventions that you find have perhaps been more successful than others, or does it really come down to the individual level? Because when I look at it, EMDR, huge game changer for me, huge family systems not so much, right?

And so I look at that, I kind of go, okay, so are there things that work better than others? Does it matter? Is it just individualized? Does everybody just need to try everything?

Betsy Holmberg: No, I mean, for me EMDR is number one. Because the power of that is in taking it makes the body much more yours because you've then processed the memories.

And so I, that one is just a juggernaut. And so I would hope anyone in their journey would do EMDR in order to walk through and turn all of those experiences into memories. But for some people, it's too hard to start EMDR too quickly. Like they're not in their body enough to benefit from EMDR. So for people like that, doing more of the body work stuff can help them get their feet underneath them a little more before they start processing those memories. So that's where the INDIVIDUALNESS comes in. What are we ready for and how much do we wanna tackle?

Michael Unbroken: Yeah. 'cause sometimes you can open Pandora's box. And for me, the very beginning of this journey, it was somatic in a lot of sense because it started on the yoga mat. Like it was the first time my brain and my body were ever connected doing yoga.

Like, because that was the first time within that flow of the physical meditation I actually like, I'm a human being, right? And so EMDR in the beginning would've been overwhelming.

Betsy Holmberg: I movement desensitization reprocessing to reprocessing.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah. So, that whole experience can be so powerful for people because it, it, and I'll, I'll butcher it. I'm not an EMD expert, MDR expert, but effectively it's doing the same thing that's happening during the rim cycle of your sleep and what you're starting to process. And that can be really, really powerful.

One of the things I'm thinking about is as we're moving towards this new frontier, for lack of a way to phrase it, there's a lot of things happening in the cutting edge of this research, of these healings, of these things. What, what's happening? What do you see the future looking like? what is on the edge that we all need to know about right now?

Betsy Holmberg: The edge honestly, of all of this is this DMN understanding, because that is still so deep into the psychological literature, it's stuck with a lot of academic jargon at this point. So it's not accessible to the public. And so we're still in a place, like think about it with the, the parts therapy has become a huge thing, and it's when you take a voice that's in your head and you see it as a part, and then you have it start to have a conversation with other parts, and like that it's a different way of getting into a DMN idea, which is that you are not your thoughts and you separate from them.

And so it's like he just came on it because that's how Richard Schwartz was just in session and found that this tended to work. Well, when you kind of talked to pieces of yourself, he, without understanding the neuroscience behind No, we have a very primitive thought network and it is self-directed.

It is highly negative, it is survival focused and like, so as we all start to become more aware of that, as we start to, recognize the need to separate from this thought network, both in therapy and in everyday life, I think it's gonna start to revolutionize how we do stuff in therapy in psychology.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah, that'll make, that makes a lot of sense because we really don't even understand us right now. You know? It is such a crazy idea. 

Betsy Holmberg: I mean we still talk about the subconscious, like that kills me, right? Like, we're like, oh, well my subconscious made me do but there is no subconscious.

What do we even, we're not talking like you have a nervous system. And so if you're going into a fight or flight that can feel like you're subconscious, there is nothing like that. Mm-hmm. And the default mode network thoughts pop up. There's no subconscious directing everything. There's nothing powerful underneath you. It is truly how these systems interact with each other and how we choose to manage them.

Michael Unbroken: So that feels super tangible to me because I can look at that and I can go, that makes sense. Because it's system based. It's not idealized. Right. Some people may be hearing that for the very first time, we're gonna do them a disservice if we don't break that down more.

What does that mean? What are you talking about and why is it important for people to start to maybe wrap their head around the idea that the subconscious isn't a thing and why is, why does Carl Young hate you?

Betsy Holmberg: Right. So yeah, in freshman psychology class we were shown an iceberg and this reflected a human.

And it was that 10% of a human is all the things that are above the water AKA what you say, your behaviors, your facial expressions, et cetera. And then 90% of who you are is underneath. And it's your thoughts, your values, your beliefs, your subconscious, all of these pieces that, and I feel like we've also kind of connected this subconscious with some like soul version of ourself of like who we really are. And this is the thing that's running all of us outside of our control and outside of our awareness. Well, it's not outside of our awareness. This is the thing that killed me as I started to see all this, is that the DMN is 100% in your awareness.

You can, you can sit there and in five minutes you can tell me everything your DMN is telling you. You know, you're hearing these thoughts. It's not out of awareness. It's right there. Your nervous system. So when you go into a freeze response, that's in your awareness. You know, when I sat on my bed with a pint of ice cream, I was completely aware I was doing it.

And so all of these things and like are, are in our awareness. There is no subconscious driving the car that is you. You are driving the car and yeah, sometimes these brain areas will take over. Sometimes your nervous system will take over. But it is, but it's not some unknowable, intangible thing that you cannot control.

Michael Unbroken: So let's go in this a little bit deeper. 'cause this to me, connects a lot of dots. 'cause I've always, I remember even being very young and looking at my mother as a drug addict and being like, she's making this choice right now. I know that she's choosing this, whether she's making the wrong decision now with the understanding of the DNM like DM and really playing a role in that decision making mechanism.

But when I hear you say that. You go. Okay. Well I'm rebuking hundreds of years of Jungian psychology. Um, not to mention we're starting to get into Rebuking Freud. We're rebuking Socrates, and you know, even all the way to the point of pretty much everyone ever in the history of the world until the last 20, 25 years.

Where in the research, 'cause here's what I'm always looking at, where's the data point in the research that disproves this idea of the subconscious? Because I want people to really sit in evidence. And I think that's a really hard conversation to have in mental health. 'cause people do not like that.

Betsy Holmberg: It's not that it sits in a specific paper. What it sits in is no one has ever proven the existence of a subconscious. There's never been a paper that has identified this is the subconscious, this is where it is, this is how it works. So often people will point to implicit biases and beliefs to say, oh, well those are our subconscious beliefs.

They are absolutely not. They are things that we have been, we have learned and we've been acculturated and conditioned to in our environment. The DMN has taken them as clan norms, and it pushes those back to us. So. There's nowhere where. Okay, so if they started that, 150 years ago? No one has ever done a paper being like, I finally uncovered the seat of the unconscious.

Like it just doesn't exist. We just have finally come to the place where instead of seeing the DMN and thinking, woo, whoa, like that seems, like this seems like it's something that's outside of our control that's running us. Well, no. We actually know exactly why it's running us because we see where in the brain it sits.

So we see where in our evolution it started and why. And we also see where it connects to. So where it's pathways, it connects right to the amygdala, it connects to the stomach, it connects to the other survival networks. And so we can now understand that system. It's not a black box anymore. So to me, the subconscious is that idea of that big green thing in the Wizard of Oz that we thought they were talking to the wizard. They thought like the subconscious, but actually it's this little dude over here in the corner making all that fanfare. That's the default mode network.

Betsy Holmberg: Yeah. It's not something big and scary.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah, and it's something that you can see right in a literal sense, if you look at the nervous system and the connectivity, it's there, I mean, from the brainstem all the way down to your toes.

And I think that's a really hard sell for people because when I hear that the association I make is accountability, even if it's accountability for the things that are not working in my life, and people hate that. People would much rather be like, it's my subconscious that made me smoke these two packs of cigarettes, right?

And I go, well, maybe, or maybe it's actually this nature versus nurture, these dynamic experiences of life that inform who you are, that then create tendencies and, and that being analytical in mental health is like trying to fly a spaceship. And show people that the world is round. 

Michael Unbroken: I get so much pushback about this same thing.

Maybe not the best analogy in the world, but that's what comes to mind and, and it's like this idea that the subconscious exists is easily disproven. But at the same time, well then how do you explain meditation? How do you explain the idea that then if I'm meditating, I'm doing something, and this is not to, uh, rebuke his work, but look at someone like Dr. Joe Dispenza. He's built his entire career on the backside of the subconscious and reprogramming it through meditation.

Betsy Holmberg: No, let's talk about it.

Michael Unbroken:  And I wish you were here and I'm not throwing you under the bus, but I love Joe. No. Like I'm a huge fan. I've met him. I know Joe, like, and I'm not rebuking his work, but I'm just saying. Well then if you're saying this, but his work is that, how do people make up their minds?

Betsy Holmberg: Yeah. So let's talk about meditation 'cause this one is fascinating. So if you look at most meditations, you let your thoughts go by, you know, don't pay attention to your thoughts and focus on your breath. Focus on a chant, focus on guided meditation, et cetera. So what does this actually mean? What you're doing is you are tuning out the DMN ak, your thoughts going by and you are focusing using your central executive network to focus on your breath or the chant or whatever it is. So the whole process of meditation and why meditation works is it is an action that shuts off the DMN and activates the CEN.

The more you do it, you feel better. Why? Because you are weakening the DMN and you are strengthening the CEN. You are getting more control of your thoughts, of your mind, of your world. And so Joe is speaking of it as a subconscious. Sure. But he also speaks of it in connecting to other types of energies in a more quantum capacity, which I'm totally here for as well.

But if we're just looking at the brain, it is shutting down the default network and getting us all into the CEN. It's simpler.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah, that makes perfect sense to me. So then, because I wanna go deeper into this, this idea that we can rewire ourselves through meditation. You see people like Sam Harris talk about this a lot as well.

What is actually happening in this quote unquote we rewire through meditation, is that simply bringing up awareness. Like what is actually transpiring in that space?

Betsy Holmberg: What it's doing is it's making its increasing dendritic branching and the growth of neurons in the central executives. So it's making it a bigger and stronger structure.

It's also making the connections between the neurons faster, like the more you think the same thought, then that connection, that pathway gets very, very fast. And so you're quicker to do that, whatever that thought is, and so it's increasing the speed of those connections and it is. Helping the CEN, it's giving it, uh, it's making it stronger to also shut down the D-E-N-D-M-N 'cause these places are connected to, and the CEN absolutely can shut off the DMN. And so what studies show of very, very serious meditators, they actually say, they call it a new default wiring of the brain because they've, these systems have become so opposite.

Like we all, because we don't know about the DMN, we listen to this all day long and we pay attention to it, and the brain says, okay, you're paying attention to it, I'll give you more of it. And so it gets stronger and stronger and stronger. And so what serious meditators do is they've just spent enough time saying, I'm not gonna listen to that.

I wanna spend time in my CEN. And they flip those two networks and they see complete structural changes in the brain as a result.

Michael Unbroken: And so tell me if I'm wrong, 'cause I'm not a scientist, but what I hear here is this space where attention goes, energy follows. And so the thing that we focus on, that becomes the thing that we put our energy towards. And then is that also triggering the reticular activating system? Like is that a part of this process or is that somehow separate and I'm colluding the two.

Betsy Holmberg: That feels a little separate, but it's absolutely true that what you focus on gets your energy. And the beautiful thing about this system is you can focus on anything.

It's not like it has to be your breath, it doesn't have to be meditation. The more you choose where you put your focus, the more you control your thoughts and you control where that goes. Then, you're having the same effect that meditation would have. You're just taking more, you're taking the stage away from your DDMN and you're owning it a little more.

Michael Unbroken: So in the context of everything we've talked about leading into this moment, then if I'm a person listening to this, I have trauma. I'm seeing that everything suggests the idea that the subconscious doesn't exist. So I'm actually in control. I'm hearing all these ideas about where to focus my energy, where to focus my attention, the idea of rewiring, turning on the central executive network, all of the things that we've talked about. And yet I'm still stuck. What am I missing?

Betsy Holmberg: So the b*tch of this entire thing, and I felt this deeply as I was writing this book, is if you go into a stress response, um, this, like if you have an amygdala hijack, so the amygdala, if you see a normal threat, the amygdala will ask, your central executive will say, Hey, are we cool?

And the central executive will look and say, yeah, we're good. And it will tamp down a stress response. But if the amygdala deems the stress. Whatever it is. Scary enough, it just hijacks your brain and it says, okay, I'm shutting the CEN down. You'd have no access to this. And I'm shutting down digestion. I'm shutting down reproduction, you know, I'm shutting down these extraneous systems, if you will.

The one thing that doesn't get shut down, of course, is your DMN. So if you are tired, if you are stressed, if you are emotional, there will be, it will feel physically impossible to focus on something else. And it's tough and it's hard, and those are the moments. When you start to look at it as like, okay, it's here and I'm in it, but I'm not going to believe it.

So for me, when I'm exhausted and I use my DMN and it gets nastier and nastier, the more tired or stressed you get. Which also sucks. I have had to say, you know what, this is the real housewives of me and I treat it and it's ignoring, and this works for humans. We do habituate to stuff. So if there's a TV in the background and you can kind of, not even, but not pay attention to it, or if you're living in a city and you're not paying attention to all the noise, we can habituate to stuff.

And so there will be times when I've, no, my DMN is running. I'm not gonna pay attention to it. And I'm not gonna believe anything it's saying. And it, it just helps me not go down as deep into the DMN spirals as I used to go. And it helps me recover afterwards because then afterwards I used to be like, that really sucked.

I really was thinking all these awful thoughts. Do I need to be doing more self-care? Do I need to go back to therapy? What do I need to do? And now I can wake up the next day and be like, whew. Like I'm glad. I feel like my essential executives kind of back online and I don't have to take any of those thoughts, uh, to be meaningful about me. You know, they're not, they don't say anything about me. They were DM n thoughts. I can just let them go.

Michael Unbroken: I think about this a lot because I've said it on stages. I've said it on this podcast, I say it all the time. There's something about being human in which we love suffering, And, and again, that's, I mean, that's a, a blanket statement, but the reason I've always said that is because if you look at that DMN, it's about this idea of being in negativity, to create survival, to like live and all that. Like in some weird way. It's almost like we seek it, we almost seek the negativity,

Betsy Holmberg: We're wired for it, and we're wired to seek it 'cause we think it's somehow protecting us. And that's why I always listen to it. I thought this thing's protecting me. It's telling me what I'm doing wrong. It's telling me how I suck. You know, it's telling me like what I need to do. And, and we are stuck with this hardware and we are stuck with our software.

I mean, every single one of us. But I think we're getting to a cool stage in human evolution, that we now understand why we are prone to suffering, why we want to pay attention when we go past a car accident. Like why do we. Why do we focus on the pain? And now that we're starting to understand all of these systems, we can start to say, you know what? I don't care anymore. I choose not to care. Like, sure, my brain's gonna go there, but I don't wanna go there. And that's a huge shift.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah, and we haven't got a software update in a long time. You know, if you look at this, I mean, you're talking about the idea of homo sapiens being somewhere in that 300,000 year window, hominins being, you know, six to 7 million years ago. When are we gonna get upgraded? We upgrade our stupid iPhone every year.

And it's like these small tweaks and it's like, can't, what can we as humans do to upgrade ourselves, right? If I'm, we're sitting here, we're listening to this, it's really making sense. We're like, okay, I wanna not shift in, I wanna shift out of negativity. I want to get more into this, this central executive network.

I want to take care of myself more. Quit smoking, quit drinking, quit partying, quit hooking up. Do the things I know I need to do. Make the phone call, brush my teeth, do all the things. And they're doing all that. Like there is. I hate using this 'cause I know it probably doesn't exist. Is there some kind of upgrade? Is there a shortcut? Is there something that we can leverage? Like now, because like, I'm in pain, this sucks, I need help, I haven't gotta upgrade in 300,000 freaking years since homo sapiens. Like what do we need to do? Right.

Betsy Holmberg: Yeah. What I try to do with myself is I try to get into my heart as much as I possibly can, as frequently as I can. So when I start to, like recently I've been waking up, it's been 3:00 AM and like that's the DMN loves to go off, then that's like one of its favorite times and it's, I start to get really scared and the heart actually cuts through all of it. Like the second you start engaging with, you know. With the love that is inside you, um, for things around you, for the parts of this planet.

And I know there've been a lot of crappy parts of this planet for you guys, but um, there are those things, um, that are wonderful, um, to, so it's starting to connect with that can upgrade us out of this and out of all of this struggling. And I mean, it sounds kind of cheesy, but the more we spend in that place of love, and then also putting that back on ourselves. I mean, if you look back at your journey and what you've survived, you know, they often do this, this is a thing we do in therapy a lot is, you know, to look at your younger self and like, what would you say to them? And you imagine yourself as a little kid.

And most people burst into tears because they, because it is so natural for us to love that little kid and want to protect them and hug them and tell them that they're wonderful, you know, and that they didn't deserve any of this. And so the more we connect in that way to ourselves and to others, and to the world around us, um, the more we will kind of evolve ourselves out of this struggle machine that we seem to all be stuck with.

Michael Unbroken: Yeah. Powerful. And this is why I always tell. Anyone who will listen is if you're in a dark place, you're mad at yourself, you don't feel good, the world's collapsing around you. There's, it's a twofold question. One, you ask yourself, what would a kind person do for themselves at this moment? Like, that changed my life forever.

And then two, because you've gotta get into the nuance of it on the backside of that, am I taking care of myself or am I taking it easy on myself? Because so much of this journey is about the awareness and the understanding and the why and the really getting into like, why am I doing the thing? What is the purpose of this function?

Because you'll see, 'cause this is how I actually quit smoking. I smoked. Since I was like 12 years old and when I was 28 I was like, I can't do this anymore. And I realized that the reason that I smoked is because it was tied back into this connection where I felt like I had a community. Like what a crazy thing to create, right?

Betsy Holmberg: 100%. It's your clan, all these smokers, you suddenly have a clan. Your DMN is loving this. Like yes, of course. I get it. 

Michael Unbroken: Especially if you're ostracized, abandoned, neglected child to grab that cigarette behind the school with the other abandoned, neglected children, you create a home. And the moment that I was like, wait a second, dude, you're doing this so you're a part not to be cool, by the way, let's be very cool, clear about that. It wasn't about that. It was about, I feel connected to people. The very thing that we kind of started this conversation around. And so to get to that place of like, I'm not gonna do this anymore. I was like, what would a kind person do? And I was like, well they're not gonna smoke cigarettes 'cause they're gonna get emphysema or CPTSD or COPD and they're gonna die a very slow, painful fucking death.

And I was like, oh, cool. But I have a community over here with other people who are good people, right? Yes. And so I think getting into the whys are so, so important. Bessie, this has been just a phenomenal conversation. I appreciate you greatly. Before I ask you my last question, I wanna encourage people to learn more about you.

Definitely pick up the new book, connect with You any way possible to learn more about what you do. Where can they find you? Where can they find the new book?

Betsy Holmberg: You bet. So the new book, it's getting dropped June 1st, anywhere books are sold, Amazon, et cetera. And it's called Unkind Mind 'cause that's what we all got. And so please go check that out. Go read it as exercises. It goes into all this stuff a lot deeper, so you'll get a much better candle on your DMN and how to shut it up. And, um, otherwise you can go to betsy holmberg.com and I'm on Instagram. I don't post much, but you'll see all the news and updates there. So feel free to check me out there too.

Michael Unbroken: Awesome. And guys, go to thinkunbrokenpodcast.com for this and more when you search Betsy's episode in the show notes. My last question for you, my friend, what does it mean to you to be unbroken?

Betsy Holmberg: To be unbroken for me is to understand why I do the things I do. Why sometimes I cry, why sometimes I can't get out of bed. Why sometimes, sometimes I rage. And then to feel self-compassion for it to understand that it's not a broken situation, it's a normal situation, and I'm human and I'm figuring it out as I go. And it's being gentle with myself as I do all the normal, crappy human stuff. We all do. You know?

Michael Unbroken: Beautifully said. And we are human. Even though it breaks my heart. 'Cause most of the time I'm like, I wish I was a robot. It'd be so much easier. But we're humans so much easier and we're having a human experience, my friend. Thank you so much for being here, unbroken Nation. Thank you guys so much for listening. If today's episode brought any value in your life, share this with one person because I know that it's gonna bring value to their life. Take care of yourselves, take care of each other.

And Until Next Time, My friends.

Be Unbroken. I'll see ya.