Why I encourage you NOT to ‘Let them’ this Christmas…
“If you think you’ve reached enlightenment, go and spend a week with your
family” – Ram Dass, Buddhist & Yogic teacher
Unless you’ve been hiding under a self-help rock since this time last year when the
‘Let Them’ Theory was published, I trust you’ve seen, heard or read about it yourself.
If you haven’t, a quick synopsis is: you should let people be who they are, and
correspondingly ask them to accept you for who you are.
Sounds all peace, love and graciousness, right?
Unfortunately, WRONG. (Hint, anything that contains ‘should’ is at least a salmon-
coloured flag, if not a red one).
I’ve held my tongue on this for a year as I deeply dislike speaking badly about other
women. I hate the implied internalised misogyny in criticising another female creator
who’s putting themselves out there because I KNOW how tough it is to overcome the
self-censorship and tall poppy syndrome that comes with raising your voice or your
head above the pack.
However, what I also cannot stand for as a Trauma-Informed Practitioner is the
perpetuation of psychological and emotional harm, dressed up as ‘self-help’ by a lay
person with NO TRAINING OR QUALIFICATIONS in Psychology, Psychotherapy,
Counselling or Trauma-Informed Care.
You might also be interested to know that the ACTUAL originator of the Let Them
Theory is another female creator with a MUCH SMALLER social media following
who is actively pursuing a plagiarism claim against Mel Robbins… But with the
power of one of the largest publishing houses behind her (Penguin owns Hay House)
it’s a David vs Goliath battle which I can only hope gives some power back to the
person behind the idea.
Whom should let whom in this scenario?! As you can see, IT’S NOT THAT SIMPLE.
The reason the Let Them Theory has mass appeal is because it’s GENERIC. It is
lacking nuance, and provides no safety mechanisms, caveats or buffers for people
living in or having a past that includes abuse, complex relational trauma or
dysfunctional power dynamics.
There’s an EXCELLENT Buddhist teaching known as ‘NEAR ENEMIES OF THE
TRUTH’. One way this can be interpreted is, that with a little bit of information, one
can do A LOT of damage. Why? Because a little bit of information SOUNDS like the
truth on the surface, but when you dive deeper into the teaching there is often
nuance, layers, and deeper meaning that help with how the teaching is applied, and
to whom, under specific circumstances.
As an example, a 200-hour Yoga Teacher Training might teach you how to instruct
and do a downward dog, but not enough to help you make informed judgement
about suitability or modifications for someone with specific physical or psychological
needs.
This matters because, just like if you set sail from Sydney to LA with your bearings
just a few degrees off, over the distance you travel this miscalculation will instead
have you landing in Vancouver, Canada or Baja, Mexico… While both better options
for sure, they are still not the INTENDED outcome!
The Let Them Theory is the same. It gives you a very basic, high-level concept for
‘coping’ with challenging interpersonal dynamics. COPING IS NOT HEALING.
Let me say that again: COPING IS NOT HEALING.
The difference between Coping and Healing
Coping is a SURVIVAL STRATEGY. From a nervous system perspective, it’s
something connected to the fight, flight, fawn and freeze responses. These are
energetically COSTLY places for our bodies and minds to spend time. They are
necessary, obviously, but they are fundamentally there to keep us SAFE NOT
HAPPY. Once again, I’ll repeat that because it’s important: COPING KEEPS YOU
SAFE NOT HAPPY.
There are MYRIAD reasons that we develop emotional or behavioural adaptations to
survive. The human nervous system is primarily designed FOR CONNECTION. That
means most of us will do almost anything to stay connected with people EVEN IF
THEY HURT US. Especially if we are dependent on those people for our
fundamental survival needs e.g. food, shelter, nurturing, and in this economy-CASH
MONEY.
In neuroscience, it’s said that NEURONS that FIRE TOGETHER, WIRE
TOGETHER. What that means from a relational perspective is that if your primary
caregivers as a child or primary attachment figure as teen or adult served you LOVE
WITH A SIDE OF PAIN (or vice versa) you LEARNED THAT PAIN = LOVE (and vice
versa) and it got HARD WIRED into your nervous system as NORMAL.
This is why complex trauma is so tricky to untangle. And why shitty, basic advice like
‘Let Them’ CAUSES HARM.
It perpetuates retaining established abusive dynamics or brushing off disrespectful
behaviour and boundary violations under the guise of maintaining relational
harmony.
HEALING is a process of UNLEARNING previous neural programming at both the
somatic (bodily) level and the mind (beliefs/identity) and LEARNING NEW, BETTER
THINGS that actually help you live life on terms that align with who you are NOW or
who you’d like to grow into. Thankfully our brains are also NEUROPLASTIC, so we
CAN LEARN NEW THINGS! You don’t have to stay stuck with the crappy old
programming you got or developed once upon a time to survive. Just like an App,
you can UPDATE!
It requires the courage to meet yourself with radical honesty, and a hefty dose of
COMPASSIONATE CURIOSITY. Sure, it might be hard, BUT YOU CAN DO HARD
THINGS! Enduring the consequences of crappy relationships is also pain, so healing
involves the opportunity to MAKE A CHOICE about the pain that you want to
tolerate/participate in.
Often healing is short(er) term discomfort/pain for long term gain (the best kind of
pain!) and the gains include: discovering your power and agency, reclaiming and
mastering your boundaries, finding and using your voice as an agent of positive
change and feeling LIKE THE BOSS OF YOUR OWN LIFE. As your therapist, I give
healing 5 STARS.
From a nervous system perspective, HEALING INCREASES YOUR WINDOW OF
TOLERANCE. That means that as you HEAL you develop MORE CAPACITY to deal
with the monkeys in your life (and yourself!) with compassion, have more balanced
access to both your rational and emotional brain structures giving you the ability to
make WISE decisions, not just habitual, reactive ones, and more space before
getting ‘triggered’ by things that once used to fire you up. Now that sounds like
peace to me!
So what do I do instead of LET THEM this Xmas?
Well, obviously if this resonates, book a session with me!
But in the event that’s not possible my suggestions are:
- Consider journaling on what’s important to you this season. Yes, this requires
some time which might be in limited supply. But there are plenty of ways to
optimise this if you’re into technology. (I’ll leave you to make what you will of
that because I don’t condone using clean drinking water to power basic tasks
your brain can already do but understand others feel differently about
emerging technology). Why does this help? Prioritising means you know
when to PICK YOUR BATTLES. Not everything is worth your energy. When
you know what’s important you, you save your energy for that and let the rest
go through to the keeper so you’re not thrown off-course.
- On the topic of picking your battles, the pathway to happiness is paved with
people who are WILLING and CAPABLE. Before you beg someone to meet
your needs, consider assessing for these factors first. It may indeed mean you
have to learn to tolerate or recover from hearing NO, but news flash, that’s
emotionally mature adulting folks. Your energy is best invested for high quality
returns in people who enthusiastically signal they are capable and willing to
see, hear, listen, understand and respond with reciprocal care for you.
- Move from your INTERNAL LOCUS OF CONTROL. You’re the boss of you
(yes, even when you revert to being your teenage self in your family home!).
That means as much as you’d like to, you can’t control others (how they think,
what they say, how they act). If they’re close to you, and as noted above -
willing and capable - then when you use your words and communicate
effectively what your needs are, you’re likely to INFLUENCE these people to
connect and supportively engage with you to at the least discuss these needs
and ideally, take the required actions to meet them. All your power lies with
YOU. Don’t waste your precious oxygen or energy trying to change people. If
this is a habit you regularly find yourself in, it’s a sign you might be stuck in
something called repetition compulsion, where you’re trying to get a different
result from someone to disprove a deeply embedded belief YOU have about
yourself. Sadly, it rarely works. You know what does though? THERAPY! Here
to help heal your inner child when you’re ready!
- Lose the ‘I’ statements. Yep, you might have learned this once upon a time in
some 1990/2000’s emotional intelligence course, however I’m here to let you
know that that person who’s ACTIVELY HURTING YOUR FEELINGS ISN’T
GOING TO CHANGE when you tell them one more time how their actions are
impacting you. Your feelings are YOUR INDICATORS. They tell you where
your values, beliefs, needs or desires are being met or not. Once you can
identify what they’re trying to tell you about your needs, you can then figure
out A SOLUTION: What fixes your feelings? And how much of that can YOU
DO (see internal locus of control above!). In short this is DOING YOUR OWN
EMOTIONAL LABOUR (see emotional maturity above!). Now you’re a bone-
fide grown-up, it is sadly no longer anyone else’s responsibility to figure out or
fix your feelings for you, and if you think it is because you do it all the time for
other people, let me hold your hand when I tell you this: that hypervigilance
and emotional over-functioning are learned survival behaviours and not
everyone lives like that… (maybe book a session so we can explore!). Once
YOU know what fixes your feelings you can then INVITE someone using ALL
THE RIGHT DETAILS they need to actually DO THE THING that helps you.
Telling someone how they made you feel is often NOT ENOUGH
INFORMATION for them to 1) care (though this is also a RED FLAG – see
willingness above) or 2) to know what you what them TO DO about how you
feel. This is honestly at the root of MOST relational misunderstandings and
the core of the couples (and individual) relationship therapy I do. The more
difficult step is accepting when someone RSVP’s NO to your invitation. That
can be a tough and hurtful pill to swallow. But not always a dead end. If we’ve
learned anything about consent since Me Too it’s that NO MEANS NO so if
there’s no willingness, that’s a no that you have to accept. Depending on the
circumstances, there might be opportunities to try differently and try again
(just like when you invite someone over for Sunday roast this week and they
say no, doesn’t have to mean THEY HATE YOU AND NOT EVER, they might
just have plans already on Sunday!). However, there comes a point where
knocking on the same door asking for a different answer becomes a form of
self-harm (and in extreme cases coercion and stalking). We don’t do that.
We’re in our healing era.
- Mainstream nervous system nourishment – pick a practice that intentionally
FILLS YOUR ENERGETIC CUP and DO IT EVERYDAY. Yes, I said EVERY
DAY. If that means it has to take one minute, PERFECT. I am a HUGE FAN of
micro tasks. What you’re looking for here is ongoing capacity building (see
window of tolerance above!). This is like plugging in your phone overnight to
charge. If you don’t do that… how does that work out for you the next day?
PLUG YOURSELF IN! My top 5 micro nervous system nourishers are:
o Bilateral eye movement
o Bilateral tapping
o Physiological sighs (longer exhales than inhales)
o Face dunk in ice water
o Looking for GLIMMERS (the opposite of triggers!)
- Know your safe people and places. If things get hot, hard and heavy know
who you can lean on and where you can go to take a little time out to gather
yourself and be reminded how awesome you are. Remember connection is
healing for the human nervous system, especially connection without
conditions/expectations. It’s ideal to have at least one person in your life you
can fall apart with who will listen and love you regardless. And yep, it’s totally
ok if that’s your therapist.
Wishing you a happy holiday season full of HEALTHY BOUNDARIES,
COMPASSIONATE COMMUNICATON, and some quality down time letting go and
preparing for the final month of shedding the Year of the Snake before we ramp up to
a Yang Fire Horse Year starting in mid-February! It’s gonna be a doozie! Giddyup!
If you’re looking to let go of 2025 with Gratitude and get clear on what you Goals you
want to focus on in 2026, I’d love for you to join me on Sunday 20 December on the
FINAL NEW MOON of the year to Reflect, Review and Reset your inner compass at
my annual Gratitude and Goals Workshop! 9am-12pm AEDT $88 includes Workbook
and recording if you can’t make it live. Email ramonebisset@hotmail.com to join.
