True Freedom is what allows us to have real love and supportive, healthy relationships. But freedom can be confusing when it’s seen as an external rather than an internal quest. Today’s guest talks about the surprising connection between freedom and commitment, and how you can be free in romantic relationships.
Find out how to have the best love and sex of your life!
True Freedom Creates Real Love: Show Notes
Freedom is an important value people talk about in coaching sessions. And it’s not always easy to figure out how to feel free while dating, or in a romantic relationship.
Freedom is not just about being able to do what you want, when you want, with who you want. That kind of freedom can erode trust and create disconnection.
True freedom is different, and it’s often more internal than external.
Erich Fromm, a well-known German psychologist born in 1900, wrote many books, one of them called: Escape from Freedom. His theory was that there are two kinds of freedom — Freedom From and Freedom To. He describes “Freedom from” as the absence of obstacles or constraints to one’s own action. And by contrast, “freedom to” is the possibility to autonomously determine and achieve individual or collective purposes.
The freedom to be yourself, and to create and co-create experiences that are meaningful to you is something most of us can’t do without. But how do we do that and stay connected with another person who is also doing this?
Today’s Practicing Love podcast guest, Bodhi Aldridge, is a coach and consultant who works to help people find true freedom and have a profound impact. He is both practical and spiritual. He has worked with leaders at Google, Amazon, Netflix, Goldman Sachs and more.
In our rich and heartfelt conversation we discussed:
- The pain of recreating patterns with a partner that we had with our mom, dad, or parenting figure
- What happens when a partner doesn’t feel seen or valued and how to shift that
- The roles we can unconsciously fall into that create drama — the victim, hero, and villain
- The power of allowing your partner to call you into a more mature version of yourself
- The parts of the hero’s journey: wake up, clean up, grow up, show up, open up
- What it’s like to have a relationship where the divine masculine and feminine are embodied
- How to access true freedom through commitment
- One of the fastest ways to come back to each other when you disconnect from someone you care about
- Creating authentic relationships
Bodhi is a deep hearted, inspiring man who does the work in his relationship to become reverent and intimate with his wife. I highly recommend listening to this episode. And if you want more of Bodhi, check out our Man Alive podcast on where to find true freedom!
If you have topics you’d like covered, or aha’s from listening to these episodes, I’d love to hear them!
Links:
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Connect with Bodhi
Bio:
Bodhi guides impactful leaders worldwide on their quest to true freedom. He is on a mission to lead those entangled in life’s complexities toward genuine connection and profound impact. His core philosophy asserts that “everyone has magnificence within them – it just has to be remembered.” He has worked with leaders at Google, Amazon, Netflix, Goldman Sachs and more.
Transcript:
Shana James, M.A. (00:04)
Hello and welcome to this episode of Practicing Love, Have the Best Love and Sex of Your Life After 40. I am really excited today to be here with Bodhi Aldridge. Bodhi, welcome. Thank you so much for joining us. Every conversation we’ve had, you’ve been an inspiration to me because I can feel how big your heart is and how deep your heart is, and how much you love people and your work with people in the context of coaching and executive coaching and personal coaching. Thank you for talking about how true freedom creates real love!
Bodhi (00:17)
Thank you.
Shana James, M.A. (00:33)
So I know that you go deep and I also know that you’re human. This podcast is designed to show that even people who are successful, and have been working in this field, and working with their own relationships for decades, still face struggles – that nobody’s alone in this. So thank you for being here and for being willing to be vulnerable with us.
Bodhi (01:01)
Yeah, my pleasure. Thank you. And to all the listeners, yeah, we’re all on the journey together.
Shana James, M.A. (01:07)
Can you tell us a little bit about your relationship, your romantic relationship, what that’s like? How many years have you been in it?
Bodhi (01:16)
I just realized we’re in 2025 now, so this will be 46 years since we started going out and 41 years we’ve been married. Incredible journey with the goddess Amala.
We have four adult children and 10 grandchildren now. So I’m passionate about relationships and supporting men and women to create what they’re looking for.
Shana James, M.A. (01:21)
Amazing.
Beautiful. You have a pack – a huge family. I remember one time you were talking about being all on the beach together and I imagined how beautiful that is, especially to have a conscious family. I can imagine there are all kinds of dynamics that happen when families get together, but I imagine you and the consciousness you have – bringing these little beings together. It’s inspiring.
Bodhi (01:46)
Yeah, and to the point of the podcast, it also comes with its challenges. To any of the listeners, in my generation, the Waltons was a TV show. It’s not real. We don’t all sit around drinking eggnog and singing, singing hymns. There’s challenges. Yet at times somebody remembers, has enough awareness to remember that there’s a bigger context and hopefully that person feels heard in the conversation because it is challenging.
Shana James, M.A. (02:42)
Is there anything briefly you want to say about what kind of challenges show up and how true freedom creates real love? Because again, maybe I even have an idealized vision. In my family, there’s constant fighting and yelling and all of that. Your family’s probably not like that because you’re a conscious grandparent, but what are some of the challenges that come up?
Bodhi (02:59)
Yeah. And I think the thing for me and certainly working with clients – I work a lot with, with men as you know, business owners, leaders – is that our family of origin isn’t necessarily the place where we’re going to feel the safest.
It isn’t necessarily the place where we’re going to feel seen in some ways. It’s actually the incubator for the opposite, and I often talk about how you have your family of origin and you also have your spiritual family – Those souls that you connect with and see you, that value you.
And so I think our family of origin is the foundational work to be a higher version of yourself. Yet, working with clients who feel obliged – they’ve got to try and create this happy extended family with their siblings, with their parents and everything.
You don’t have to be obliged. And I say that to my children, particularly my daughter-in-law’s, cause we’ve got two sons and two daughters. I know for myself, as a daughter-in-law coming and hanging with your father-in-law, who thinks he’s got his shit sorted and bangs on about stuff – It’s challenging, as beautiful as they are. And I do my best to offer all of them a choice. Don’t feel you’ve got to hang.
So to turn to your question specifically, there are many, many layers. My oldest daughter just turned 40 last year. She is very much like me. So we clash a lot. So it’s like looking in the mirror. I got control issues. She’s got control issues. I want to zig. She wants to zag. And we’ve done, I’ve done so much healing work on my relationship with her. Not necessarily with her, but my own reflection around the father I was, the guilt that I’ve carried as a father, the shame that I’ve carried as a father, knowing underneath that I did the best I could. Yet also it caused pain and trauma, and that’s part of parenting, to any of the listeners.
And so it’s softened a lot. At the end of last year, I did a deep dive on a retreat and what came up was some healing for me around my oldest daughter and this Christmas has been beautiful and softened. There’s more compassion. But that’s a point of tension, and one of the other things is that each of them have a different parenting style, and as a grandparent of course my style is the right style as you know.
And so when you’ve got 17 people staying for periods of time – 10 grandchildren, a bunch of the kids, it’s for me to be really mindful of how do I respect and honor what’s going on in this system? And I certainly didn’t get it right. But I have a level of awareness around which food does this child eat? How much screen time does this child have?
You know what I mean? What’s appropriate?
What’s the parents’ boundaries on this, or the parents boundaries on that? In the context of compassion, it can be really, it can be really tricky.
Shana James, M.A. (06:24)
Sorry. My God. Thank you for that honesty because again, I see you as a conscious leader. And so my mind immediately fills in that fantasy of – they’re probably sitting around and having these deep conversations. And the reality is, sure that can happen, but different parenting styles, different father / daughter, father /son relationships… So many things can happen. So thank you for being honest about that because I think a lot of people feel ashamed of either not being able to create the family they want, or if they’re not the head of the family, being able to engage in dynamics that actually are healthy.
Bodhi (07:18)
If you think about it, for most of us in the Western world, so much of our life has been focused on external validation. When it looks okay externally, then I’m okay. And we’re constantly striving to get the external world looking a certain way. And particularly when it comes to family, extended family, family, origin, all that, and it’s exhausting.
Shana James, M.A. (07:44)
Yeah, so exhausting.
Bodhi (07:44)
Because all the cultural social norms about what family is supposed to look like, what relationships are supposed to look like. They’re not real. They’re just constructs. The movie, the Disney movies for the little girls wanting to be the princess and all of that. And so part of my journey is that you get to create authentic relationships that work for you — in your relationship, in your family, and the more you can do that and encourage authenticity, in that community, in your family, the bigger chance that you’re going to find what works for you.
Where’s the win-win in this group? And in couples, I know for a lot of couples who listen to your podcast, it’s the same. There’s no one way, or right way, to do this.
There are tools and tips on how to love yourself, how to create your authentic self. If you can build that in your marriage, whether it’s same sex, or whatever it might be, and trust this is what works for us, then it doesn’t matter what the external world thinks.
Shana James, M.A. (08:59)
Right. I love that. Going back to you talking about your wife, I noticed that you said the goddess, and I love that. Some people listening might have heard that and some didn’t hear it.
Some people heard it and were like, hmm, what’s that about? Other people are more like, ooh, that’s exciting and inspiring. For me, what it says is that there’s a kind of reverence and a kind of way that you hold your wife and hold the relationship. And I’m wondering if you can say a little bit about how you hold that, what that means to you?
Bodhi (09:44)
Thank you. Yeah. And there are many different layers. If I talk about my lived experience with Amala, we met very, very young. We met at school. We navigated all of that high school, becoming parents in our twenties. And I’m amazed at how much of my shadow she put up with in her commitment to her personal journey, and also commitment to me.
The one thing in the experience I had was that Amala kept calling me forth to be a higher version of myself. Energetically, if not specifically, it was – I don’t want the little boy anymore. I don’t want the wounded seven year old. I don’t want to be the dysfunctional 10 year old.
I can see a man in there that I want to be. And, for me, many times not consciously but in hindsight, it was a safe space for me to go and do the work, with my therapists, with my coaches, and we’ve done work together.
Very early on, one of the things we both realized, is that neither of us had been in a long-term relationship. So we thought – why don’t we go and get an expert?
So we’ve had therapists, counselors, coaches, all through the last 46 years. Different times, different people, and not necessarily when things were going wrong, but just as a check-in, a tune-in. Roger Federer had a coach right till the end because he wanted to be the best version of himself. And that’s what I say to couples: find someone who has the expertise or the lived experience who can support you.
And interesting Shana, at the time in our 20s, particularly all our friends thought, you guys must be stuffed up. You guys are going to see a counselor. That cultural norm, particularly the Anglo-Australian English, may be different in the US. And we’re like, no, why wouldn’t you talk to an expert? You’ve got a personal trainer or a golf coach. Why wouldn’t you have a relationship coach?
Shana James, M.A. (12:13)
People think something must be wrong or bad in order to do that.
If we want to grow, why wouldn’t you do this? Yeah. I love one of the things you said: that she saw the best in you. She saw who you truly are, and were, and called you forward. And that’s one of the things I often share with my relationship coaching clients is you can see the worst in someone and cut them down, or you can see the best in someone and lift them up.
And which do you think actually is more inspiring for that person to step forward, to step up, to change, to grow? So it sounds like that has been a part of your relationship. And I heard you use the word safety too, that somehow you both created a kind of safety that allowed each of you to grow. And it sounds like that was part of it.
Bodhi (12:54)
Yeah definitely, working with men, what I know is it’s not that men don’t want to be vulnerable. It’s just they need to feel safe to be vulnerable.
Shana James, M.A. (13:23)
Agreed.
Bodhi (13:25)
And in any couple, if we look at the threads of the masculine and feminine energy, which as you know, aren’t necessarily gender-based – yet most men are more in their masculine, most women are more in their feminine. Ultimately, for the men in their masculine, the deepest desire is actually to feel safe and to be called forth. The divine masculine is here to be of service to the divine feminine.
But for any of the women listening, how do you call that forth? How do you create safe space? How do you bring this beautiful man forward? In a lot of ways we are simple.
Pat our heads, rub our tummy. And we need the guidance. We need the direction.
For me as a young husband, and I’d say for a lot of my clients, the only representation of the feminine I had was my mother. And I projected all of that onto Amala. Because I had no reference. I thought, that’s what the feminine does, so hat’s who you are.
And she’s like, I’m not your frigging mother. Step up, grow up, do the work.
Shana James, M.A. (14:53)
Right. And I wonder if this is part of…we haven’t really specifically gotten to a struggle yet, though I can tell that there’s a you who has been carved, let’s say, or chiseled in some ways, over the years, as you’ve stepped up and learned and grown. You’ve alluded to some of the harder times when you were younger.
You said something about the masculine, divine masculine being in service to the feminine, divine feminine.
Some people could hear that and think, what is that?
And then there are a lot of men who identify as nice guys, where there’s a distinction between being in service to the divine feminine versus I’m losing myself trying to make a woman happy.
Bodhi (15:39)
Mmm. Great awareness. The hero’s journey, which I talk a lot about, is for any of the men listening, and particularly the nice guys, as you say, is the beautiful overlay. The hero’s journey is the integral work (the Ken Wilber work). If you think about it as wake up, cleanup, then grow up, then show up and then open up.
It’s not linear, but these are the parts of the puzzle. If you don’t do your own inner work, you can never truly serve the divine feminine..
Shana James, M.A. (16:22)
I love that. What was it? Clean up, grow up, show up, wake up?
Bodhi (16:25)
Wake up, clean up, grow up, show up, open up.
It’s a map through the hero’s journey. Waking up is really getting a sense of who I really am, not all of the constructs and false identity. Cleaning up is doing the work, the shadow work, all of the beautiful work that you do with men and couples.
Growing up – we don’t have rites of passage like in traditional cultures. There you’re initiated into a man. You go from little boy to a big boy, from big boy to young man.. Showing up is really getting clear on your purpose, your WHY – what am I here for? Who am I as a man? What am I making a stand for?
And then opening up in the hero’s journey you touch the holy grail, which is what we’re searching for. You have to integrate the five aspects of your feminine. And that’s the opening up, the integration piece.
So that’s a little bit of a map. So when I say being of service to the feminine, it’s about my divine feminine. And again, there’s another whole podcast around staying in my masculine energy and accessing feminine traits.
I’ve got seven granddaughters. What a beautiful, beautiful experience it is. And then, at this stage of our relationship and marriage, more and more, I want to be able to support Amala to be her highest version.
Shana James, M.A. (17:47)
Wow. Amazing. Can we speak about a particular struggle that you’ve had in a relationship, and we’ll get to how you’re practicing with it now, but what’s been a struggle or a theme for you?
Bodhi (18:01)
The thing I can talk specifically about, something that’s just happened, we’ve been working through as well.. just to give listeners the idea that 46 years of marriage and we are still working on stuff. And that’s the context of our relationship. Amala’s been amazing as part of my life journey.
So one of the particular struggles…my parents separated when I was seven, with a single mom, living in social housing. For me, one of the real challenges was the only way I got to feel safe was to try to control the external world. And so I became a control freak.
Basically, all through our marriage, my default under pressure is to control. How do I control the external world? How do I control the situation?
And that’s been a huge challenge for Amala and the children because I would come home and want to control the household and all of those sorts of things. The journey for me, and this theme still plays out. When we’re under the most pressure, we go back to our old ways.
So when I’m scared, tired, feeling under attack, I launch externally and I want to control externally. And I like to think I’m better at that, but I know it still comes up when I get triggered. The flip of control, as I’ve done the work on myself, therapy, and with my coaches, is that the flip of control is the ability to trust.
Bodhi (20:15)
And to really trust – trust myself. Not blind trust. Trust myself, trust my intuition. Trust it’s all going to be okay. Trust that the people around me are working for the highest good, that I don’t need to micromanage, that I don’t need to control the external world. And that’s been a constant thing.
Shana James, M.A. (20:32)
I imagine that’s not something you could do as an island, right? If you’re navigating that with other people, there are conversations you have, or moments where you’re not just figuring it out on your own.
Bodhi (20:49)
Yeah, absolutely. And going back to relationships and to your listeners. One of the first things when I, when I talk to couples is I ask: what’s the context of your relationship?
Shana James, M.A. (21:02)
Most people I ask that say: what do you mean?
Bodhi (21:07)
Exactly. What’s this container about? Because as you say, as householders, we don’t live in a vacuum. We’re not monks. We’re not living in a monastery.
We’re living in the cut and thrust of the Western world, and marriage, mortgage, and kids. And for Amala and I, we realized that the container, the context of our relationship, is about supporting each other in our personal and spiritual journeys.
And again, I’m not always the best at that, but if people get clear why we’re together, what is the context?
Is it about just having fun and traveling the world? Is it about bringing up children?
Or is it about supporting you, ourselves, in our personal and spiritual growth? Then that context can become the anchor when you’re going through tough times.
Shana James, M.A. (22:04)
Yes.
Bodhi (22:04)
We can remember that’s why we’re together, and let’s go back to that.
Shana James, M.A. (22:07)
Right, and actually show up in service of why we’re together as opposed to, thinking: why is this happening to me? We can ask: How can we use this to actually move toward our context?
Bodhi (22:22)
Exactly, exactly. You know, and just again, to give the listeners some real time, we had all of the family over Christmas and in Australia here, Christmas is summer. It’s beach time, so we had 17 people staying on and off, coming and going. And Amala does a lot of the heavy lifting. I do a lot of the cleaning and kitchen cooking. I love that. She does a lot of the heavy lifting. But at the end of it, she’s exhausted.
Basically, one of the themes in our relationship is that, and I think this is often for the feminine, she doesn’t feel seen, and she doesn’t feel valued by me. I’m happily giving to everybody else, to the grandchildren or kids, but when it comes to her and she asks: can you just move this mattress for me or can you just lift this for me?
In my world, I’ve been giving, giving, giving to everybody else. So a few days after everybody left we were tidying up, and Amala does a lot of the heavy lifting – the laundry, the beds and all of that. And it was just a simple request that I didn’t respond to. That really triggered her.
And I went into a lot of fear as well. Since then, we’ve had three sessions without our therapist, our couples coach. And the common theme, which is an old thing, as many of the listeners know, these old chestnuts keep surfacing.
Shana James, M.A. (24:02)
It goes very deep into these old wounds.
Bodhi (24:15)
Yeah, with my control issues, and my narcissistic tendencies, she doesn’t feel seen and heard and valued. It wasn’t about the mattress. But it was just that, here it is again, you still don’t see me. You still don’t value this. And one simple request I have: can you just move this? And you’re happy to give everybody else your time.
Shana James, M.A. (24:26)
Right, it’s never about the mattress. It’s about the true freedom that creates real love.
Bodhi (24:42)
And so it’s a tender wound and I take responsibility for not meeting that need in a loving way.
Shana James, M.A. (24:52)
How do you hold that without, and maybe this does happen, the shame spiral? Because a lot of people are quick to defend. And what I hear you saying is, No, I actually do take responsibility that I’m not really seeing or valuing her. How do you do that for yourself?
Bodhi (25:13)
Well, one of the things I teach and certainly my journey, Shana, is that if you really accept that the external world, particularly in a committed relationship, is only ever mirroring back a part of you that you haven’t loved… So whenever I get triggered, whenever I get defensive, whenever I get scared, whenever I get angry, it’s not about Amala.
It’s not about the kids. It’s a part of me. That’s my context, and that’s what I teach my leaders. And not just in committed relationships, but also in the workplace. If you can treat the world as a mirror that’s offering you an opportunity to heal a part of you.
Shana James, M.A. (25:45)
Yeah, you hold that that’s part of your context of being in a relationship.
Bodhi (26:09)
Yes, and you’re actually, at a deep level, creating those opportunities through the frequency and vibration. Then all of this becomes the self-hero’s journey fundamentally. And again, one of the fundamental beliefs, whenever we get triggered, defensive, scared, the meaning we’re giving the external experience in that moment is “I’m not good enough.” Or “I’m not valuable and lovable.” In this moment I don’t feel that.
And so for me, and I’m not saying I do this all the time, but when I have awareness, when I get defensive, I just remind myself – this is my stuff. It doesn’t mean we don’t have an honest conversation about boundaries, expectations, needs, because we’re in a relationship.
Shana James, M.A. (26:54)
So you’re taking responsibility and looking at the co-creation of how are we doing this?
Bodhi (27:09)
Exactly. Relationships are really simple. Communicate your expectations and have them met.
Shana James, M.A. (27:15)
Communicate your expectations and have them met? Okay, interesting, because many people I talk to say expectations are the death of a relationship.
Bodhi (27:24)
Yeah, people talk about expectations and needs and there’s lots of nuance in there. But if you really create a safe container in a relationship, and you really can give and receive honest feedback and communication – and I obviously teach this in work as well as marriage – if you think about it, as enlightened as we are, at some level, we all have expectations.
Shana James, M.A. (27:51)
Most of us, I would say, are not very enlightened, even though we try, but okay. Ha ha.
Bodhi (27:55)
Exactly. So why not, with love, communicate your expectations? Why not, contextually, communicate it and have it met in a win-win way, not in a manipulative way, not in a needy way?
Shana James, M.A. (28:00)
Right. Well, that’s a good distinction. We can explore how we communicate an expectation. Maybe I’m curious what you would say without attachment, or with a willingness to be curious? Recognize I have this expectation and ask: Is this a real expectation? Is this from my heart? Is this from my past? Is this from my wound?
Bodhi (28:30)
Yeah, we talk a lot about Win/Win or no deal. Yeah.
And the distinction between context and content. So the content is the stuff. But the context gives meaning to the stuff, and there are layers of context.
An example I use is, a husband and wife and the inability to tell our whole truth. So the wife says to the husband, let’s go out for dinner Friday night. He’s like, great. What a great idea.
And this is on Monday, and Tuesday, she asks, have you chosen a restaurant? And he’s like, ⁓ no, and then Thursday she asks, where are we going for dinner? And then three o’clock Friday, an angry, resistant husband chooses the restaurant, and they go out to dinner.
What sort of night do you think they had, Shana?
Shana James, M.A. (29:42)
Not a very exciting or connected one.
Bodhi (29:45)
Exactly. The piece that’s missing in the communication is, let’s say, on the Monday when the wife says, “let’s go out for dinner.” And in a long-term relationship, hopefully the husband would realize this, but the context is, “and I’d love you to pick a place.” I don’t care where it is, but it just shows, you know.
Shana James, M.A. (30:09)
…that you care. I could see another context, which is I’d love to go out for dinner. And then asking who is the one to take responsibility for this?
We might say that for some, the masculine role could be to be the leader here. But I think there’s also an opportunity to say, who’s gonna take the lead on this one, versus having an expectation!
Bodhi (30:36)
And to your point, exactly. So the content is, let’s go to dinner on Friday night. But one week the context might be, “I’d love you to choose the restaurant I’d feel really valued and seen.” Two weeks later, it may be, “I don’t actually care if you come, because I want to try this new Indian restaurant. I’ll go with my girlfriend.”
But neither have been fully communicated. And the husband, might go, I want to watch the football Friday night. I don’t actually want to go to dinner, but doesn’t communicate that exactly.
And also he may be thinking, I’m busy making decisions all the time. Why do I have to choose the restaurant? All of these unsaid things. If you create the safety that it’s okay if I don’t go Friday night, that’s fine. She may want to go out with her girlfriends anyway to this restaurant. Can you see the nuances?
Shana James, M.A. (31:40)
Yeah, and I often suggest, when I’m working with couples too, that if we’re going to say no to something, that we either create another offer, or that we don’t just have a hard no, or “that’s not me. I don’t like that. I don’t do that.” But more, “this is what I’m noticing. I notice these are the parts that I’m struggling with. These are the parts that I am a yes to, and who’s going to do this part?”
“If it were you the choosing the restaurant, I would feel really relaxed. If it’s me, I notice this week is just crazy for me, and I don’t even know if I’m gonna have time to look for it.”
All of those nuanced conversations to be connected, instead of making ths somebody’s role and I just expect that without talking about it.
Bodhi (32:34)
Exactly, exactly. And it’s about telling the whole truth, not part of the truth, not most of the truth, not manipulating the truth, with loving intention.
It’s like, let’s go out to dinner Friday night., I’d love for you to choose a place. I don’t really care where. I’d just feel seen if you can do that. And the husband gets to respond:
“You know what, I’ve got a crazy deadline Friday,” or “I’d love to do that, but…” It’s the nuances of it.
Shana James, M.A. (33:09)
Yeah, “I’ve got a crazy day on Friday. I think I would actually be able to be more present and connected with you on Saturday. How would Saturday work?” This is the win-win like you said.
Bodhi (33:17)
Yeah, exactly.
It’s the win-win or no deal, but it comes from the whole truth. And it comes from context. Do we want to have time together this weekend? That’s the context. If yep, great, does it matter if it’s a coffee on Saturday morning or if it’s a lovely walk on Sunday or dinner on Friday night? No. Okay, so Sunday suits me. And the context is, we have time together. Does that work?
Perfect. Win-win.
Shana James, M.A. (33:48)
Yes. I’ve been talking with my partner about creating a date next weekend. And we’re in the middle of the conversation of, what’s the best environment for what we want to create?
Sometimes getting to the point of, where are we going? What are we doing? What are we creating? What do we each want? What’s important to each of us?
Then we can look at how do we create that, and who creates which part of it.
Bodhi (34:02)
Exactly. I had a client recently. She and her husband were bumping heads about a holiday. She wanted to go to palm trees. He wanted to go ski. And taking her through the layers of context: do we want to go on a holiday together?
Actually it was a no. I’m happy to go to the palm trees with my girlfriends and he goes skiing with his mates. Great. But they were arguing because they wanted to do different things until they went up to the higher layers of context.
Now, if they wanted to go together, it’s a different conversation. But again, we often don’t unpack that it wasn’t about going together this holiday. She wanted to go and sit by the palm trees.
Shana James, M.A. (34:43)
He wanted to go skiing.
Bodhi (35:10)
Exactly. Yep.
Shana James, M.A. (35:10)
So if we come back to your struggle, what are a couple of things you’re practicing, as far as letting go of control, or working with that need to control, that the listeners can get a sense of that they could practice too?
Bodhi (35:27)
Fundamentally, as you teach, when I talk about relationship, the key to a successful relationship, if there are two or three keys, is to unconditionally love yourself. You got to do the work. And then bring your best version to the relationship. And so the work for me, I know the control is just my scared little boy…
The listeners may know that until age seven is the foundational time when our trauma occurs, our not good enough occurs, our fear occurs. It’s not good or bad. It’s the human experience.
And so for me, I have many, many different ways to self-soothe my little boy. It’s part of my practice. Obviously I’ve got my therapist and my coach as well, and I know when I get triggered and when I get defensive, he’s just scared.
Shana James, M.A. (36:26)
Yeah. Which that is such a loving act toward yourself to recognize, There is this part of me. It is a younger part. I can self-soothe or ask for what I need, or get some support. But I don’t have to make myself wrong and beat myself up, which then creates the defensiveness or the stonewalling or all the other stuff we can pull.
Bodhi (36:38)
Yeah, exactly. In the drama triangle it is so tempting to jump into and be the victim or the persecutor, or the rescuer, instead of jumping out of it and going, okay, the big me, the adult me can soothe the little me. And again, I don’t know this all the time.
Yet I have awareness and it’s one of the tools I use is to go, Ah! That’s all I’ve got to do. And for me, that can be going for a walk, can be coming to my room, sitting on the meditation cushion. And literally, I’m quite a visual person, I can literally visualize that little boy and give him a hug. I literally soothe him and everything settles. Because then the big me, the more aware me, can hold the conversation for a while.
Shana James, M.A. (37:23)
Amazing. Thank you. I appreciate you. And again, being a man in the world who is willing to share about the vulnerability and what it’s like to not have it together all the time, or not be your best self all the time…I think we all need to hear that, men especially. And, no matter what gender we are, there is a sense of, we’re all doing our best and trying to be our best selves in relationship, and we’re going to fall down and that’s why the podcast is called Practicing Love, because then we’re going to practice. And we’re going to humbly, hopefully, come back to each other and say, “that wasn’t my best. I’d like to try that again,” or “can you forgive me?” or any of those things.
Bodhi (38:10)
Yeah. And one of the fastest ways, and certainly when I work with the men, the saying is: if life is a school, a committed relationship is the university.
This is the work. And again, we’re householders. Most of you listeners are not monks. And as a householder, in a marriage, a committed relationship, children, whatever it might be, often, particularly men don’t understand that true freedom comes from true commitment.
I’m all in, I’m all in, and as soon as you go all in, all your stuff is going to come up, but that’s the work. That’s what the university is about. You want to love yourself, go all in, commit fully energetically to the safe container, and then that’s where the freedom is, true freedom.
Shana James, M.A. (38:58)
Right. And if it’s not a safe container yet, then you actually have the capacity to create that with your partner, and to set that up. That is often what happens in some of my sessions where I say, we’ve gotta go meta. We have to back up a little bit and see – how are you speaking to each other and how are you thinking of each other? And what are those, those foundations and context?
Bodhi (39:41)
Yeah, and fundamentally, it’s actually not about the other person. If you can hold that as a point of reference for yourself, that’s so powerful. They’re just mirroring back a part of you.
Shana James, M.A. (40:05)
So powerful. Thank you. Thank you so much for being here and for people who want more of you. Where do they find you?
Bodhi (40:06)
Thank you. I’ve got a podcast called True Freedom. It’s on all the podcast apps, so please look for that. And my website, Bodhi Aldridge. com. And there are free meditations there, and any of the men listening who want to dive deeper into the hero’s journey, those sorts of things, there’s plenty of resources.
Shana James, M.A. (40:38)
Awesome, thank you so much for talking about how true freedom creates real love.
Bodhi (40:41)
Thank you. Thank you to the listeners.
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