Well Being With Jim Clifford

[00:00:02] Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of the Thriving Adoptees podcast. Today I'm delighted to be joined by Jim. Jim Clifford, looking forward to our conversation today Jim.

[00:00:11] Great to be with you and great to explore adoption from a different angle.

[00:00:17] From a different angle, yeah. So I think Jim you are the first OBE that's been on the show, so it's a good day right.

[00:00:31] Thriving Adoptees then, the name of the podcast. What comes to mind when you hear this word, this phrase?

[00:00:41] Well, thriving, I guess I would approach it on two levels. The thriving in and of itself, to me conjures up healthy,

[00:00:57] happy, successful, but successful in my eyes. The success that I'm comfortable with.

[00:01:08] I guess if I want to get a little more, I suppose, techy about it, I'd talk about wellbeing, I think.

[00:01:17] That if I'm thriving, I've got enough resources to maintain myself. I've got health and good mental health.

[00:01:29] I've got good relational wellbeing. I've got people around me that will talk to me and love me and care for me and I can love them.

[00:01:39] And I've got purpose. I think purpose and being purposeful is also really important to thriving.

[00:01:51] Humans don't want to stand still. We change constantly.

[00:01:58] And we're either going to change downhill, which on the whole we don't want, or we're going to be moving on and trying to improve and trying to better ourselves.

[00:02:09] And I think that's behind that is a sense of purpose and a sense of flow.

[00:02:15] And I'm going somewhere. So the thriving bit for me conjures up some of those feelings.

[00:02:22] And so it is, it's very specific to me. My thriving may happen to be similar to your thriving, but it may well be different.

[00:02:33] And it's still just as right for me as yours is for you.

[00:02:37] I then put the two words together.

[00:02:43] And like the wise women on Blackadder, there are two things you've got to know about the wise women.

[00:02:50] They're wise and they're women. So you say thriving adoptee.

[00:02:56] And I'm thinking, why are we putting those two together?

[00:03:02] Is it that I'm an adoptee and I'm thriving?

[00:03:11] Is it that despite being adoptee, I'm thriving?

[00:03:15] Is it because I'm an adoptee, I'm thriving?

[00:03:19] I don't know. That really raises some interesting questions.

[00:03:24] I think the bit that certainly does stand out to me, being an adoptee myself and having 10 adopted children, is that by and large, people who've had to be adopted because their birth families haven't been able to provide or care for them in the way they need.

[00:03:51] And carry with them some experiences of the past, which may carry trauma with them.

[00:04:02] They may carry other forms of injury.

[00:04:05] They may carry physical disadvantages.

[00:04:10] So I suppose saying thriving adoptee with that knowledge of the trauma that's carried with them draws me towards thriving despite the background, not the background of having been adopted, but the background of what has happened before.

[00:04:33] And so I think I would sum that up coming in from that perspective is thriving is about the trauma in my past is just that.

[00:04:49] It is experiences in the past, it is experiences in the past, and it no longer defines what I am.

[00:04:58] I'm not a traumatized person or a traumatized adoptee.

[00:05:05] I'm not a traumatized person or a traumatized person or a traumatized person or a traumatized person, but it's not a trauma in my past.

[00:05:35] And often we look at more psychological and emotional and mental health.

[00:05:41] And the physical health somehow gets, often gets left out.

[00:05:48] So I like the broader view that you're bringing to them.

[00:05:55] And a very interesting question, the most interesting, the very interesting question, but I liked was, is it despite you?

[00:06:07] Is it this, you know, thriving despite being adopted, thriving because I'm adopted?

[00:06:15] Were there three?

[00:06:16] Or thriving and being adopted is the other one.

[00:06:20] Is there a causation one way or the other, or is it just that I am thriving and I am by fact an adoptee?

[00:06:31] And I don't have a magic answer for that one, but I'm just pondering on it.

[00:06:36] And the traumatized child and the traumatized adoptee, where that becomes, as you were talking before we hit record, you're talking about our, an experience defining us.

[00:06:54] Yes.

[00:06:56] Yes.

[00:06:56] Well, I, I quite deliberately didn't say, I don't think I'm a traumatized adoptee.

[00:07:04] No.

[00:07:05] Because I think you, that is too defining.

[00:07:12] I, I'm, I'm not defined by the trauma I've experienced.

[00:07:19] I have experienced it and it will never, I cannot just switch a switch and say I didn't experience it.

[00:07:27] It's a fact, um, those things did happen and I may have a trauma reaction.

[00:07:31] I may have trauma driven reactions in this day and age to something I experienced back then, but I don't think I necessarily need to be traumatized in a sense of a continuing defining aspect of my personality and my reactions.

[00:07:55] Um, and that's not a matter of, it's only a matter of choice for the individual.

[00:08:03] I think it's a matter of circumstances to whether you are being helped to move beyond your trauma, helped to get control of it rather than it controlling you.

[00:08:16] I guess the nearest I would get to traumatized is if, um, I was still carrying such a deep effect from that trauma that I couldn't control the effects when it rose to the surface triggered by a current event.

[00:08:36] I think that's probably traumatized and that, that is compromising can be debilitating.

[00:08:46] Certainly think challenges the thriving bit.

[00:08:51] Yeah.

[00:08:53] The, the word you used, one of the words you used that is continuous, I think continuous or continual.

[00:08:58] Mm hmm.

[00:08:59] I, I, I was doing a, uh, a workshop with, uh, adoption social workers this morning and it was, I was, as I said before we hit record, I, I was, the message I was trying to get across is that we are not our trauma.

[00:09:19] Um, uh, uh, our trauma does not define us.

[00:09:24] It's not essential to ally, I, I, our identity.

[00:09:29] Um, and the fact that you, we can look at trauma, we can look at trauma as, as in a behavior, trauma driven behavior.

[00:09:41] We can look at trauma as feelings.

[00:09:43] We can look at, maybe look at trauma in terms of thoughts, maybe, but it really feel to me, it feels like a feeling trauma.

[00:09:52] Trauma, trauma is, uh, uh, predominantly a feeling.

[00:09:56] And the idea being, or my experience being that feelings come and go.

[00:10:05] Feelings are not continuous.

[00:10:07] So they're not at our essence.

[00:10:10] And because they're not at our essence, they're not with us all the time.

[00:10:15] That they are not intrinsic to us.

[00:10:22] Trauma like feelings come and go.

[00:10:24] And this, uh, this analogy from, um, I think it's a Buddhist one, but I'm not sure.

[00:10:31] Uh, the idea that the trauma is a, is, is like a cloud.

[00:10:39] Uh, uh, but the, the cloud comes and go and it comes and goes and we are there and we are the sky and just stepping back into, uh, uh, into an adoption specific thing.

[00:10:54] Right. So we talk about sometimes in adoptee land, we talk about coming out of the fog, right?

[00:11:00] So we come out to the fog or the fog lifts.

[00:11:03] What is revealed when the fog lifts?

[00:11:06] Well, the, the, the, the fog reveals the dark storm clouds of trauma.

[00:11:14] And, uh, and then there's, uh, there's lots of thunder and lightning.

[00:11:21] And one of those thunders, you know, the, the flash of lightning becomes a, a flash of inspiration.

[00:11:29] When we realized that we're the sky.

[00:11:34] Not the clouds and that the clouds, uh, that's right.

[00:11:39] The sky isn't, uh, harmed by the, the, the trauma.

[00:11:47] And next time the storm clouds of trauma raise their heads again, it's less scary than the first time.

[00:11:56] Um, because we, we, we, we've, we've been through that, that painful coming out of the fog experience, seeing the trauma, seeing the, the clouds of our trauma.

[00:12:08] That scared the bejesus out of us when it first happened, but then it, it, it diminishes.

[00:12:15] It, it's not continuous to, to, to, to, to harken back to your, um, your work to use your attitude.

[00:12:23] And so it's less scary when, when it raises its ugly head.

[00:12:27] Yeah.

[00:12:28] Yeah.

[00:12:33] It's the less continuous it can be, the more you can thrive.

[00:12:37] Yeah.

[00:12:39] And, and the, the deeper we can identify with the sky and the less we can identify with our trauma.

[00:12:48] The better, because it's one thing to know that we're not our trauma.

[00:12:54] And it's something completely different to be open.

[00:12:59] You know, we talk about feeling whole, right?

[00:13:02] So you could, what does healing mean?

[00:13:05] What, what does healing mean?

[00:13:06] Healing means at one level, knowing our wholeness.

[00:13:12] Right.

[00:13:13] And when we think about whole, the, the it's, it's, it's, it's expansive, right?

[00:13:19] It's, it's a big open sky.

[00:13:23] Uh, and, and that sky as, as we are the sky, we are that expansiveness.

[00:13:28] We're not, we're not perturbed by these trauma clouds.

[00:13:33] You know, traumas, traumas welcome, right?

[00:13:37] You know, trauma doesn't scare us anymore.

[00:13:40] Um, we, we, we, we welcome it in.

[00:13:43] We see it as a blessing, right?

[00:13:45] This is, we're seeing as thriving because we're adopted, because that, that traumatic, uh, experienced was a key point in pointing us on the way to our openness and our expansiveness.

[00:14:02] And if we're accepting our, if we're accepting our trauma, we're not suppressing it, right?

[00:14:10] We're not trying to, we're not trying to, uh, to bury it with, um, with booze, drugs, uh, shopping, uh, any other addictive kind of thing, right?

[00:14:25] We're, uh, biting, biting our trauma.

[00:14:31] We know we don't win.

[00:14:33] We don't win a fight with, we don't win a fight with trauma.

[00:14:37] All, all the fight with trauma does is it prolongs the, it prolongs the war.

[00:14:44] Mm-hmm.

[00:14:44] Mm-hmm.

[00:14:45] Because what we resist persists.

[00:14:54] You, you talked about trauma in the past and, and, and, and yeah, sometimes it feels like we're feeling it in the present, right?

[00:15:05] So how do you put those two things together?

[00:15:09] Um, well, the experiences we, it is a, it's a part of human learning, um, at the cognitive level and at more primitive levels that we go through experiences.

[00:15:25] And we then take those forward as part of our framework for dealing with experiences in the, in the future.

[00:15:31] So if we've encountered a traumatic event, that becomes part of our learning.

[00:15:40] Um, we may frame it and moderate it and adjust it, but it's still part of our learning.

[00:15:47] And we've then got that available, if you like, as our library of experiences and responses for when something comes up again.

[00:15:54] So then if we come up with an event, which makes us feel something of the same feelings, we then latch in to the previous events that went on that made us feel the same.

[00:16:10] And those all come back and load on top of the one we're currently feeling.

[00:16:14] We're actually reacting to the chain of experience of that rather than just the current event.

[00:16:20] And that is, to my mind, why, um, as a, as an adoptee and in my children, um, we sometimes feel more deeply or feel disproportionately to the current event.

[00:16:42] Um, the, the, the, the hurt and upset that is there.

[00:16:48] Um, so to my mind, that that's what we're doing.

[00:16:52] And it's part of why, um, current events can be more feel more of a disaster than, um, they might do to somebody who hadn't been through that in the past.

[00:17:04] It's the same as, you know, a, uh, vehicle, vehicle backfiring in a road to somebody who has, um, fought in a war zone or experienced a war zone or something and experienced gunfire.

[00:17:18] And that real feeling of, um, that will take them back to that event.

[00:17:24] And we see, um, veterans, um, falling to the ground, um, to get out of the firing line and so on.

[00:17:34] Uh, it's linking it back.

[00:17:37] Was, was there a time when you felt that you were, uh, that you weren't riding?

[00:17:46] Yes.

[00:17:47] Yes.

[00:17:48] Um, and some of that was events at the time going through very difficult times.

[00:18:01] Um, and some of it was linking back to the past experiences.

[00:18:06] So for example, um, whilst it's quite a long while ago, my, um, I was, I was adopted, placed at the age of one.

[00:18:17] I was nearly two when I was adopted through the courts.

[00:18:22] And then my adoptive father, who I adored, died when I was six, died very suddenly when I was six.

[00:18:30] That was a shock.

[00:18:33] Just is, is a, an inadequate word for it.

[00:18:39] It rocked us all, my mother and my brother and me.

[00:18:43] Um, and at that stage I wasn't thriving.

[00:18:48] Definitely not.

[00:18:49] Or not on all fronts.

[00:18:52] Um, so I, um, certainly experienced physical difficulties.

[00:18:58] I was undoubtedly way beyond sad.

[00:19:02] Um, I had mental health difficulties as we would describe them these days as a result.

[00:19:08] And it was really very challenging.

[00:19:11] Yeah.

[00:19:12] Um, some of the other stages where we've had huge challenges with our adopted children, which we've come through.

[00:19:26] But at the time we've felt very, um, clouded.

[00:19:34] Um, and I would question whether we were thriving.

[00:19:38] We will throw, we, I think always knew we would thrive again afterwards, but at the time it was really rough.

[00:19:46] So I think at these times we don't thrive and maybe it's the, it's the relational wellbeing and the purposefulness that we retain.

[00:20:00] So if we can go through some of these times when it's tough with a sense of hope and that this is tough, but it will be okay.

[00:20:14] Yeah.

[00:20:15] We will get through this.

[00:20:16] Then that's, that supports us hugely.

[00:20:20] Exactly.

[00:20:23] So, yeah, I, I read something about the, your, your, your father's death when you were six, um, in an interview that you did with the guardian, I think it was.

[00:20:34] Um, and it, I think you talked about going within becoming very withdrawn.

[00:20:40] I think that was the, that was the thing that, that stayed with, stayed with me.

[00:20:45] And, um, and I'm, I'm wondering if, is it, is it, is it, is it loss on loss?

[00:20:55] Um, you know, one, one of, I did a, I did a one-to-one training with a fellow adoptee called Pamela Caranova, who's doing a, she's, she's trying to get a, a, she's done some, she's done some,

[00:21:11] some grief recovery work for herself and she's trying it out with fellow adoptees as she becomes, um, trained or accredited in this, in, in this area.

[00:21:26] Um, and, you know, the, the, the, the grief, the loss of our, uh, our, our birth mothers as a, um, as a way of, as a parallel, as a way of thinking about loss or a way of, a way of, yeah.

[00:21:44] Yeah.

[00:21:47] I, yeah, I think, yes, it was, I'm sure it was loss on loss.

[00:21:54] Um, it's an interest, it's a question that I've pondered on at various stages.

[00:22:01] What was the loss when my father died?

[00:22:05] Was it him as a person, which I think it was, he was a very special person.

[00:22:13] Um, but it was also his strength and support, um, that he was consistent.

[00:22:23] He was very gentle, but very strong, emotionally very strong and was always there.

[00:22:30] So I think I was grieving that loss as well and felt this huge vacuum, which my mother's, my mother stepped up amazingly and, and filled.

[00:22:42] But nevertheless, at the time, it was a huge staring vacuum.

[00:22:45] So it, it was the person and the relationship.

[00:22:49] It was also the, the support that I'd lost.

[00:22:53] And I guess the, it's probably the support loss that linked more directly to my loss of birth mother.

[00:23:04] Be it.

[00:23:05] I was, I was really very young when I was taken, when my birth mother relinquished me.

[00:23:13] Um, but those, those factors absolutely do stay with us.

[00:23:19] However young we were at the time, indeed prenatal, um, I think science tells us.

[00:23:26] Yeah.

[00:23:27] Thank you for helping me out.

[00:23:28] I was stumbling with the, stumbling with the, the questioning there of, uh, of, uh, but you picked one out.

[00:23:35] What was going on for me is I was remembering the, uh, the loss of my grandfather when I was about seven.

[00:23:45] And all I can remember from that was lying on my bed and confiding in my teddy bear.

[00:23:54] And that, you know, the teddy bear that I later found out that was from my birth mother.

[00:23:58] So Teddy was important here again.

[00:23:59] Like I was confiding into, in Teddy that, that the pop, as I called him, my dad's dad, my adopted dad's dad, my dad's dad, um, had died.

[00:24:10] And telling Ted that he wasn't going to be around anymore.

[00:24:13] Um, and I was thinking, well, did I, was, was it, uh, was pop a supportive figure, uh, such as your own dad's?

[00:24:23] And I couldn't, you know, it was a nice guy.

[00:24:26] We saw him every couple of weeks.

[00:24:27] He, he ran a toy shop, which was, was interesting for a kid.

[00:24:33] Um, but, uh, you know, was he, did I feel he was that supportive guy?

[00:24:37] Did I listen?

[00:24:37] And I don't, I'm not sure.

[00:24:39] Um, but I, I, I, but I was thinking about another loss that happened later on.

[00:24:45] So when I was 30, I bring it around.

[00:24:49] When I was 33, my, my best friend died and that absolutely floored me.

[00:24:55] Um, and that, that, that was the relational, um, the, the, the relational strength.

[00:25:03] And he was a guy that I knew without a doubt was on my side.

[00:25:14] He was, he was with me.

[00:25:17] He was definitely with me.

[00:25:22] How has your, um, so yeah, but the, the, the,

[00:25:30] at that time also stuff was other stuff was going on.

[00:25:33] Some business stuff was going on for me as well.

[00:25:35] So I was probably at a lower ebb.

[00:25:37] And so that loss hit me at a, at a, at a tough time.

[00:25:47] Was there a, the, was there a time when you thought you were thriving despite being adopted?

[00:25:54] As you alluded to as one of the three.

[00:25:57] Hmm.

[00:25:58] Um, I, the reason why I ponder on that one is, um, yes, I do.

[00:26:15] Um, yes, there have been times where I've felt that.

[00:26:20] Um, but as time has passed, I've gone even beyond that point.

[00:26:32] And to the, any issues from the losses of adoption, from the, um, trauma around it,

[00:26:47] parting, all, all the other sorts of things, I think have been so resolved in my mind and my feelings,

[00:26:57] that it's, it's become, um, it doesn't really affect, I think, how I'm responding and feeling today.

[00:27:10] So there are certainly, um, I think there was a first stage where I was, you know, through a lot of my childhood,

[00:27:21] I was undoubtedly deeply affected by it and my responses were colored by it.

[00:27:30] Um, I then gradually came through to a point where I had resolved a lot of those hurts and questions and what have you.

[00:27:41] Um, and that's the bit where I would say that was, I was thriving despite where I'd come from.

[00:27:49] And that would probably be my early, early to mid twenties through to thirties and maybe into forties.

[00:27:57] And then I got to a stage where I, all the time I was further thinking about and further resolving it from time to time,

[00:28:08] that I got to a stage where I'd moved beyond that, um, to, yeah, I was adopted.

[00:28:17] Um, and it was on balance an overwhelmingly good thing in its overall net effect.

[00:28:27] Um, but I'm, I'm certainly defined by the relationship I had with my adoptive mother and adoptive father,

[00:28:39] even though dad was around for a shorter time.

[00:28:43] But I think the traumas of the adoption, uh, and the, um, separation before that and so on don't really,

[00:28:56] they're not really still there now.

[00:28:59] Yeah.

[00:28:59] What, what are the, you talked about resolving, um, and you talked about resolving, uh, I think you used the word question and, and, and hurts.

[00:29:15] I, I can see resolving questions as in getting answers for questions, kind of brain logical kind of stuff.

[00:29:23] I can, I can, I can see that.

[00:29:26] Um, what, what do you, what do you mean by resolving hurts?

[00:29:34] Um, well, with, with hurts, they're both, it can be both physically, physical and emotional.

[00:29:45] They can be both emotional and challenging to our sense of self.

[00:29:53] Um, I think resolving them in my mind is putting them back in their proper place and framing that, um,

[00:30:07] okay, so I had that physical hurt, for example.

[00:30:14] Um, and I, you know, that happened through a, I don't know, a car accident or whatever.

[00:30:21] Um, that doesn't mean that there was a relational hurt behind it or a deliberate act by somebody.

[00:30:31] It was just something that happened and it hurt at the time.

[00:30:36] Um, I think the resolving it is, is defining, well, it was only that.

[00:30:45] Um, and similarly, um, where, yeah, my birth mother wasn't able to keep me, um, and bring me up.

[00:30:57] That's not about me and me being a lesser person or me not being wanted by her or something like that.

[00:31:05] Quite the contrary.

[00:31:05] That is about the circumstances at the time and a decision, a very brave decision, I think, with hindsight,

[00:31:15] that she took in the best interests of me and her.

[00:31:21] So I think that's the resolving it.

[00:31:24] It is that it is only that she made a decision to relinquish her child.

[00:31:29] Okay.

[00:31:31] That doesn't mean she hated the child.

[00:31:34] That's resolving.

[00:31:36] Yeah.

[00:31:40] And, and you, you put it in so few words, but it's so big, isn't it?

[00:31:47] Yes, it is.

[00:31:49] It's, it's, it's a big issue to tackle and a big thought process to go through and an emotional process because it's not just,

[00:32:00] I can intellectualize, yes, I've read it in a book that statistically said X, Y, Z number of mothers and X percentage,

[00:32:08] um, didn't feel they had an option when relinquishing their child or whatever it might be.

[00:32:15] Um, to go from that to, and I believe in my case, and I feel in my case that it wasn't about me and me not being cared for.

[00:32:26] That's a massive jump.

[00:32:28] Yeah.

[00:32:29] Yeah.

[00:32:31] Because it seems to me, I don't know where I picked this up from.

[00:32:36] I don't think it was my, I think it was me when I was chatting to one of the, we've interviewed a few adoptees who are therapists and specializing adoptees on the show.

[00:32:46] I think it was maybe for one, from one of them.

[00:32:49] They were talking about the two sides of this, right?

[00:32:51] So there's the, uh, the, the words that came out of my mouth, uh, at 40 was she didn't love me enough to keep me.

[00:33:04] So I was making it about her not loving me.

[00:33:10] And then the flip side of that is I'm unlovable.

[00:33:15] So yeah.

[00:33:17] You've got two.

[00:33:18] That's just the core of this resolving it.

[00:33:23] Um, I don't know what journey you've been on with regard to that, but think of how I might have felt, um, on it.

[00:33:32] It's resolving it from I'm unlovable.

[00:33:35] No.

[00:33:36] To she didn't love me.

[00:33:39] No.

[00:33:39] To that.

[00:33:41] She felt she felt she was doing what was necessary and what was right at the time, which with hindsight, in my case, I think was right.

[00:33:52] Um, but even if it wasn't right with hindsight could nevertheless have been a right and caring decision in the time.

[00:34:00] And that's all it is.

[00:34:01] It's a, it's a parent, a very young parent making a, a hugely difficult judgment in the interests of a child out of love.

[00:34:18] How has being a dad, how, how has that impacted your view of what, or how has that impacted your thriving and what your view of thriving is?

[00:34:39] Um, well, it's.

[00:34:45] Getting, getting married or having a long-term partner and then subsequently taking on this amazing responsibility of another human life, at least for their minority.

[00:34:58] Um, I think has been one of the most life-changing things possible.

[00:35:08] Um, it's.

[00:35:13] In order to parent those children well, and they're all placed as slightly older placements.

[00:35:20] So the youngest we ever took was four and the oldest was rising 11.

[00:35:25] Um, you, you, you need to look at the world through their eyes, understand where they are, um, and reframe the expectations they could hold for themselves.

[00:35:49] Um, I remember, um, years ago, I heard lovely, um, image explained about this.

[00:35:59] Um, well, there are two.

[00:36:00] One is that with regard to where you've got a child who's experienced trauma, you need to go into the trauma, hold their hand and help them walk out of it.

[00:36:17] And, um, which itself is, is, is a challenging place to go since you experienced trauma yourself.

[00:36:25] And the other one, which I think such a beautiful image is that you need to learn the song in their hearts and dance it when they can't remember it.

[00:36:47] Um, both of them, both those images, of course, are, are about being with comforting, but experiencing together the trauma and sadness that they've experienced, um, to help support them through it.

[00:37:19] And to find the silver lining in their clouds, mixed matter.

[00:37:26] Um, so I think, um, I've redefined thriving through their eyes because I've gone in and heard their song, got close to them and heard something of their song.

[00:37:49] Um, and then getting them to thrive is getting them to be able to hear their dance for themselves and dance it for themselves, even when I'm no longer around.

[00:38:09] So I have certainly developed my thought about what thriving means for them.

[00:38:15] They've been, they've been, the experiences they've been through, uh, will never leave them, but they need not control them.

[00:38:27] They can choose, choose the dance they dance.

[00:38:34] That's beautiful.

[00:38:36] Um, the thing that popped into my head, I was listening, was this counterpoint between freedom, freedom, freedom,

[00:38:49] from trauma and freedom with trauma.

[00:38:52] So freedom from trauma, we're going to, we're fighting to get rid of it.

[00:38:57] Mm-hmm.

[00:38:58] Whereas freedom with trauma, it's there, but it doesn't bother us as much.

[00:39:07] Yeah.

[00:39:08] And I've seen, all of my children have moved forward in that at different speeds and in different ways.

[00:39:19] But there is, it is so uplifting when you see them take another step through it and be that little bit stronger, that little bit more confident, bit more self-sufficient at each step.

[00:39:36] And that's, that's a big source of delight to me and something that I crave.

[00:39:46] I love to see them developing and becoming the people they want to be.

[00:39:54] Yeah.

[00:39:59] I can't, I can't think of a follow-up to the song question because it's just so powerful, right?

[00:40:05] Um, you, you, I don't, I don't think it needs, it doesn't need to be, uh, it doesn't need to be examined any, any closer because it's already perfect, right?

[00:40:21] Um, it's like dissecting the joke doesn't become funny anymore.

[00:40:25] A dissect, you know, if, if you've got to explain, got to explain the joke, it wasn't funny in the first place.

[00:40:31] Yeah.

[00:40:34] The, uh, you talked about reframing expectation for them, expectations for themselves.

[00:40:41] Can you, can you put some skin on that?

[00:40:49] Yeah.

[00:40:50] Um, yes.

[00:40:55] Um, one of my daughters, um, had appalling experiences with men in her past.

[00:41:06] Um, and I have seen her go from, how do I deal with being in a situation where there might be a man behind me out of my sight?

[00:41:24] Could be a perfectly all right man.

[00:41:28] No question about them being, uh, being awful to her, but man behind me and her anxiety was through the roof and, and she was be in tears with fear over it.

[00:41:45] Um, through to a gradual realization that, first of all, I'm not a danger to her.

[00:41:58] Indeed.

[00:41:59] Indeed.

[00:42:00] Indeed.

[00:42:01] I might be okay.

[00:42:03] Indeed.

[00:42:04] I might be one of her greatest supporters.

[00:42:08] And then to thinking, it's not just one man in the whole world that is okay.

[00:42:19] It's his brother.

[00:42:20] My brother was the second one she identified as okay.

[00:42:24] And then it's her own adoptive brothers.

[00:42:29] And then it's, oh, and there's another man over there.

[00:42:32] And there's some friends of mum and dad's that are okay.

[00:42:35] And there are quite a few of them around.

[00:42:39] And then to a much more balanced, objective question when meeting or seeing any man, um, of they might not be okay, but they might be perfectly okay.

[00:43:00] They might be unpleasant.

[00:43:03] They might be really lovely.

[00:43:06] Um, let me sense that, but also let me judge it on what I see and hear.

[00:43:17] And that's, that's a huge journey and a massive emotional, um, journey to go on, but so liberating.

[00:43:30] Liberating.

[00:43:32] Where you can start to look at a group of people and think there's going to be some that are nice, some that are not relatively few that are bordering on evil.

[00:43:46] Um, similarly, relatively few that are close to heavenly.

[00:43:51] Yeah.

[00:43:51] Um, but, um, more balanced view.

[00:43:56] So liberating.

[00:43:57] So liberating.

[00:44:00] The sense that came to me is that there can't be this many exceptions to prove the rule.

[00:44:08] Right.

[00:44:08] If there's, if there's you, there's, that's just one exception to all men are evil.

[00:44:13] Right.

[00:44:14] There's, there's, there's a dad.

[00:44:15] Yeah.

[00:44:16] Yeah.

[00:44:17] It's the exception that proves the rule.

[00:44:19] And then, then, then there's your brother and then all these different.

[00:44:24] Yeah.

[00:44:25] Eventually you get a tipping point that actually.

[00:44:28] A tipping point.

[00:44:28] Um, maybe there's some different pattern here.

[00:44:31] And, and the use of intellect and analysis and reasoning paired with feeling both physical and emotional is, is amazing when you see that sort of thought and that going on.

[00:44:53] Yeah.

[00:44:53] And there's, and there's clarity, right?

[00:44:56] Right.

[00:44:56] So we've got, we can't see white snow through orange glasses.

[00:45:02] If we've got our trauma glasses on, then the world looks trauma inducing.

[00:45:09] It looks, it looks.

[00:45:10] Yeah.

[00:45:11] And there's something really, a great, great quote from Einstein says the most, one of the most significant questions we'll ever ask ourselves is,

[00:45:23] is the world for me or against me?

[00:45:27] Hmm.

[00:45:29] Uh, and the, and, and so she's, she's got the, the, the, the trauma was, uh, and the, the, the, the male induced trauma was, what, what, that was her lens.

[00:45:46] That was her lens.

[00:45:47] Yes.

[00:45:47] And that was the, uh, those were her blinkers.

[00:45:51] Blinkers.

[00:45:52] They were, that, that was her projection.

[00:45:55] Um, and, and, and so it changed.

[00:45:58] Hmm.

[00:45:58] And I've had that conversation with her about, uh, don't, when sometimes she's saying, I was so wrong in my judgment.

[00:46:08] No, you were absolutely right in your judgment based on your experience.

[00:46:17] Um, so that was your experience.

[00:46:29] That's, that's your learning and that's your survival mechanism.

[00:46:33] You are an arch survivor.

[00:46:35] Yeah.

[00:46:36] Um, but as your perspective gets wider, it's, it's wonderful when that, when you can accept that your original worldview can be changed further by experience.

[00:46:53] And actually may, may, once you get outside that narrow sphere in which that was so true, may actually be false in the wider sphere.

[00:47:05] And that's, that's, that's where she's come to.

[00:47:11] One of my earliest mentors, and I still speak to her, not so often these days, but, um, she was, she was abused in all ways possible by her, by her father.

[00:47:29] Uh, and hearing her story, uh, I thought, well, if, if a human being can get through that, we can get through anything.

[00:47:48] Um, and, and, and, and when, when those, it was a humbling, a humbling moment for, humbling moment for me, a perspective, a perspective shifter.

[00:48:03] Hmm.

[00:48:06] And I, what, um, and I, you know, a perspective, I've just made that word up.

[00:48:14] I think I quite like that.

[00:48:15] A perspective shifter.

[00:48:17] Um, I guess one of my little phrases is,

[00:48:21] time isn't the greatest healer.

[00:48:23] It's, uh, or what, you know, if, if time isn't the greatest healer, what is?

[00:48:29] Uh, and I'll, I'll ask you that question before I give you my, my, my answer.

[00:48:38] I, my view.

[00:48:40] Um, I agree.

[00:48:46] Time isn't the greatest healer, but time gives us the opportunity for the greatest healing because it can't be done in an instant.

[00:48:57] Um, I think.

[00:49:00] Um, I think re-examining expectations is part of it and re-examining worldview.

[00:49:06] What are my deeply held assumptions?

[00:49:09] Are they right?

[00:49:10] Why do I feel that?

[00:49:12] And understanding what's behind them, um, is important.

[00:49:16] Um, certainly, um, talking about what I'm seeing, how I'm feeling, and what I'm doing about it with those closest to me that I trust.

[00:49:36] So, with my mother, with my wife, with my brother, with close friends, and with God, um, the faith aspect's very important to me.

[00:49:49] Um, those getting their counsel and their take on it has been very helpful because they're close enough to validate that I feel like that.

[00:50:07] Um, which is important to giving me a platform from which to examine my own thoughts and feelings and reactions.

[00:50:17] But also to be able to ask me questions that help direct my inquiry so that I can then unpick the right bits of it.

[00:50:28] Um, and I think that's been really very helpful.

[00:50:34] Um, the other thing I think about the time point, time in and of itself, no.

[00:50:42] However, changing pace, which is a time thing, definitely does help.

[00:50:50] So, at his very simplest level, um, if I'm traveling somewhere and get lost and I'm a bit worried, maybe I'm feeling under pressure, I've got to get somewhere.

[00:51:05] Or as a younger person, I might have got very scared because I didn't know where I was.

[00:51:11] Um, slowing things down.

[00:51:15] Um, taking myself out of the scariness of being lost, um, going for a little, you know, short walk or something or just sitting down and looking at something that is pleasant.

[00:51:30] Changing the pace helps hugely.

[00:51:34] Um, so I think all those, the other one I would say is hard work.

[00:51:45] Um, with the encouragement of others, not giving up on it.

[00:51:51] If it needs challenging, it's, it's actually much easier to fall back into your sadness, fall back into your fear than it is to clamber out and, um, take another path.

[00:52:08] So you do need to work at these things.

[00:52:10] And I've seen my children working really hard at coming, coming to terms with where they've been rationalizing it or whatever.

[00:52:20] Yeah.

[00:52:23] Have when, uh, just one extra thing I want to add to some of this that I was thinking earlier on about this.

[00:52:30] Um, the, I don't know if you, um, as a child or as an adult came across the, um, the American children's books about Pollyanna.

[00:52:41] Um, she's, it's, it's, it's one of the, it's a series that is rather.

[00:52:50] Miss on can be a bit misunderstood.

[00:52:54] Um, because some people couch it as this little girl.

[00:52:58] She's in the, in the book, she's the daughter of a rather, a poor parish priest.

[00:53:04] Um, and she plays what she was shown by her father, a new game that would enable her to cope with most things, which is called the glad game.

[00:53:18] Now it's misconstrued as being, um, ignoring anything bad that happens and, um, always assuming that everything's lovely.

[00:53:29] That's not what it's about.

[00:53:31] What it is about though, is that experiences are real and the pain of them is real, but there is always another angle to it that can, that you can be glad about.

[00:53:48] Um, and so whilst not running away from the reality and putting on your rose tinted spectacles, um, you can nevertheless recognize the positives in something and use those to balance up some of the pain of the negative.

[00:54:06] And I think that's a really important lesson and quite a big virtue that comes through that book series.

[00:54:14] Yeah.

[00:54:16] Um, as you started explaining, I thought, I know something about this Pollyanna.

[00:54:20] So she's based, she was often kind of derided as delusional, I would say.

[00:54:26] Yes.

[00:54:26] That's how she, um, um, uh, but the other thing I was thinking about is that end of, uh, the, um, Monty Python film, uh, always look on the bright side of life.

[00:54:40] And the singing that song.

[00:54:42] Um, and I'm instantly thinking about the religious, uh, some religious backlash to that.

[00:54:48] Um, I was also going to, uh, have you ever heard of a woman called Byron Katie?

[00:54:56] You heard about her?

[00:54:58] No.

[00:54:58] She's American, American woman.

[00:55:00] Um, she's got a process called The Work.

[00:55:05] Um, and, uh, you, you described, uh, very eloquently, uh, a kind of self-reflection tool.

[00:55:14] And, and, and she's, she's got, uh, uh, uh, it's called the, the, the, the, I think the website is the work.com or the work.org.

[00:55:23] And, and it's, it's four questions that we can, that we can look at, that we can use to explore a, yeah, to explore a belief.

[00:55:39] And it's, it's, it's very powerful and you can do it on your own as well.

[00:55:46] Um, so if you, I, I love, I love the community, you know, the, I loved you bringing in your, um, your, your friends and your family and friends into that perspective.

[00:55:59] I was thinking about something that was more of an entry level thing.

[00:56:03] You know, if that's too scary for the listeners, then you can have a look at this, uh, Byron Katie's The Work.

[00:56:09] And it's just a questionnaire to, to look at stuff.

[00:56:12] Um, just one last thing before you go.

[00:56:15] You, um, did, you mentioned your mum.

[00:56:19] So your mum's still alive, right?

[00:56:20] So she must be in her age.

[00:56:21] No, no, she's not still.

[00:56:23] She's long gone.

[00:56:24] She died in 1993.

[00:56:26] Oh, wow.

[00:56:33] Yes.

[00:56:34] That was quite a while ago.

[00:56:35] My father died in 1967.

[00:56:38] Wow.

[00:56:39] My mother in 1993.

[00:56:42] She saw, she saw us take on the eldest of our two, the eldest two of our 10 children.

[00:56:51] Although I think, um, she's, um, she would have been very down to earth about the whole thing of adopting 10 children, which some people, some people feel is a little unusual.

[00:57:06] Um, and, um, she'd have said, well, if it's working all right, do it.

[00:57:13] It's perfect.

[00:57:14] It's going fine.

[00:57:16] What's the big deal?

[00:57:17] Essentially.

[00:57:18] Yes.

[00:57:19] Um, all power to your elbow.

[00:57:21] Um, so, yeah, she was a, she was very, very positive support with taking the initial two children and they were, they very much loved her and have benefited, um, through into adult life from her influence, even though she died when they were not so old.

[00:57:46] Yeah.

[00:57:48] Yeah.

[00:57:48] Wow.

[00:57:49] Is there anything that I've not asked you about that you'd like to share with the listeners?

[00:57:57] Um, yes.

[00:58:02] It's the one thing that I think has made thriving for me easier, easier to achieve.

[00:58:19] And it's not always easy, Bernie means it isn't in my life or in anybody's.

[00:58:23] Um, but I, I was taught by my adoptive mother early on and repeatedly taught throughout her time with me that, um, there's actually very few things that are truly impossible.

[00:58:44] Um, and we far too often constrain ourselves and our actions by believing that something is impossible and getting almost, yeah, in some cases brought down by it.

[00:59:00] Um, when actually if we set that fallacy to one side, um, we'd find it a lot easier.

[00:59:10] Um, so I, I look back over the things that I've, I've done and I've experienced, and there's a lot of the bigger things or more exciting things and things that have brought me great joy afterwards.

[00:59:27] Um, so I think that I know I went into them, not without analyzing carefully what, what was going to go on and planning a bit, but with this deep belief that it's probably not impossible.

[00:59:42] It's just until we have a go, we will never know.

[00:59:47] Um, so I think the thing I'd want to leave with your listeners listeners.

[00:59:55] Um, is the, whether they're adoptees or, or not is impossible is far rarer than you think.

[01:00:07] Brilliant.

[01:00:09] Thanks Jim.

[01:00:10] And, uh, it's anywhere.

[01:00:12] If anybody wants to, um, get in touch or check out what you're about, is there, do you want to point them at LinkedIn?

[01:00:19] Cause that's got a lot of businessy stuff.

[01:00:21] Is there anything, anything comes to mind?

[01:00:23] Um, well, you can get hold of me certainly through LinkedIn.

[01:00:28] I'm on LinkedIn as Jim Clifford.

[01:00:31] It's imaginative, isn't it?

[01:00:32] Um, and, um, you can also on the, um, by web searching me, you can find me through my company, which is Sonnet Impact.

[01:00:44] Um, yeah, always, I'm always interested in conversations and learning from others' experiences.

[01:00:51] Fantastic.

[01:00:53] Link, there'll be links in the show notes, listeners, if you're driving or walking the dog, so you can check them out.

[01:00:59] Thanks a lot, Jim.

[01:01:00] Thank you very much, Simon.

[01:01:02] Great to talk to you.

[01:01:03] All the best.

[01:01:03] Thanks, listeners.

[01:01:03] Bye.