Are People Assholes? Or Just Unskilled?
Episode 296
In this episode, we go straight at the question everyone’s thinking but nobody wants to say out loud: Are people just assholes? And our answer is… usually, no. Most people aren’t out here trying to ruin your life—they’re operating with zero interpersonal skills, low self-awareness, and a whole lot of unhealed triggers. We break down why labeling someone as “an asshole” is lazy (and honestly, it keeps you stuck), how conflict avoidance quietly destroys relationships and businesses, and why the real flex is learning to pause, collect data, and take radical responsibility—even when your ego wants to make someone else the villain. #IntegrativeYouRadio #HumanBehavior #EmotionalIntelligence #HealthyCommunication #RelationshipSkills #ConflictResolution #RadicalResponsibility #PersonalGrowthJourney #MindsetWork #TraumaHealing #NervousSystemRegulation #Triggers #SelfAwareness #Boundaries #ConsciousRelationships #LeadershipMindset #FamilyDynamics #HighPerformanceHabits #ValuesDrivenLife #HealingWork #SelfMastery #IntegrativeHealth #MindBodyConnection #GrowthMindset #LegacyLiving 3 Key Takeaways: Labels kill nuance (and keep you suffering). When you slap “asshole” on someone, your brain starts hunting for proof—and suddenly you can’t see anything else about them (or the situation). Most “asshole behavior” is unskilled behavior. People avoid hard conversations, don’t know how to communicate compassionately, and don’t understand their own needs—so they act out, explode, ghost, betray, or sabotage. The way out is radical responsibility + objective “data.” Don’t try to fix people while you’re triggered. Pause. Ask better questions. Create space for real check-ins (like a business would). That’s how you stop repeating the same painful patterns. Quotes: “Conflict avoided is conflict multiplied.” “You’re not the villain in their story—you represent the parts of them that are unhealed.” Find Integrative You Radio On: Website Youtube Apple Spotify 2 Doctors Committed to Innovating the
Topics: behavior, conflict, integrative, unknown, assholes, unskilled, skills, someone
Key takeaways from this episode
- ### Episode Title: Are People Assholes? Or Just Unskilled?
- Labeling someone as an "asshole" oversimplifies complex situations and prevents deeper understanding, keeping you stuck in negative perceptions.
- Much of what we perceive as negative behavior is actually a result of poor communication, conflict avoidance, and a lack of self-awareness.
- The path to resolution involves shifting from blame to radical responsibility, pausing to gather objective "data" rather than reacting from a triggered state.
- The limitations of labeling and judgmental thinking.
Pull quotes
This is the place where you become limitless. **Unknown:** We are covering the latest and greatest topics, of course, in a disruptive fashion, around integrative medicine, mental health, and human behavior.
We will be sprinkling in some truth bombs for our healthpreneurs so they can join us in our mission to evolve healthcare.
If you are health curious and growth focused, you are in the right place. **Unknown:** But buckle up, because this is real, this is raw, and this is disruptive.
Transcript
**Unknown:** Welcome to Integrative U Radio, hosted by Dr. Nick Carruthers and yours truly, Dr. Nicole Rivera. This is the place where you become limitless.
**Unknown:** We are covering the latest and greatest topics, of course, in a disruptive fashion, around integrative medicine, mental health, and human behavior. We are also covering how those topics affect the human and family dynamics. We will be sprinkling in some truth bombs for our healthpreneurs so they can join us in our mission to evolve healthcare. If you are health curious and growth focused, you are in the right place.
**Unknown:** But buckle up, because this is real, this is raw, and this is disruptive. This is Integrative U Radio. Hey, guys. Welcome back to another episode of Integrative U Radio.
**Unknown:** You have the luxury of having Dr. Nick today, as well as myself, and we're talking about a hot topic of are people just assholes? So- I gotta get my note- I gotta get my notebook for this one then. Well, b- I was thinking about this, um, in detail.
**Unknown:** And usually a lot of the, the times we come up with our podcast episodes is just in real life conversations that we're having with people. And of course, we've navigated things on our own of, you know, just like, gosh, like, that's such an interesting behavior or such an interesting thing that we experienced with this person. And I just think it's a natural thing that we've all navigated to varying degrees in our life. And I was really thinking about the ro- the root of it all, the root cause, and this might shock some of you.
**Unknown:** But I don't think that the majority, I'm not gonna speak for everyone, I don't think the majority of people are actually malicious assholes. Like, meaning they really intentionally want to hurt you and cause pain. I definitely think there are some people that unfortunately operate out of that place, but my theory, and I'm curious to hear Dr. Nick's spin on this, is that I think a lot of people have zero fucking interpersonal skills.
**Unknown:** They have zero understanding of behavior, human behavior. They have zero skills when it comes to compassionate communication. They're usually too wired and, and, and fired up that they don't listen. And I think a lot of people lack the bravery to have difficult conversations.
**Unknown:** You know, something that we said that honestly was introduced to me in the business world was, "Conflict avoided is conflict multiplied." And I sat with that, and I was like, "Shit, that is so unbelievably accurate." If you avoid a conversation, the conflict blows up, and maybe it's for you, maybe it's for the other person, but the probability, it's both of you. Because if there's no communication or there's no true understanding, you, you have the opportunity to create stories. Or if there's hard feelings that don't get resolved, they brew, they brew, they brew until someone explodes. And I know both of those dynamics are happening in families, they're happening in relationships, they're happening in, uh, friendships, they're happening in businesses, they're happening employer to employee and vice versa.
**Unknown:** And so kind of recapping is... And, and Nick, I'm, I'm curious what you have to say about it, but I really... I, I think that the, a large portion of the population is not intentionally malicious, intentionally causing harm, but they lack bravery, and they don't have any fucking skills. They don't have skills to sit and really think outside of the box and see a situation for what it is.
**Unknown:** They don't have the ability to understand why a person might be operating the way they are, because they can't think past themselves and their own feelings, and they don't have any skills. None of us learn skills unless we have to. The only reason Nick and I learn skills of communication, leadership, listening is because we're in business- It's 'cause I want Dr. Nicole to stop beating me.
**Unknown:** Well, there's definitely that. But you probably would still be taking the beatings if we didn't run a business together, because you- I mean, sometimes I- ... I intentionally, you know, cause you pain so that you beat me again- ... 'cause I like the pain.
**Unknown:** Yeah, you are kinda sick. Um, so that's a different topic for a different podcast. But yeah. I gotta keep people on their toes.
**Unknown:** They're listening to this and it's like, "What the fuck are they talking about?" I think unfortunately a lot of... I don't wanna say unfortunately. Fortunately, a lot of our listeners will be like, "I get it." So... Excuse me.
**Unknown:** My first question for you is what is an asshole? You know? If, but I mean, people like- I think it's what I said before ... people like that guy, you know- Like, people intentionally, like-I, I think we use this word asshole, and it's just, you know, a word that we use.
**Unknown:** And like sometimes we use it being... Especially my, my Jersey and New Yorkers, it's like we're being funny. Like, "Ah, you're an asshole." Um, you know, and then sometimes like we're using it like, "That person did something to me, and they're an asshole." Um, and I think it's, uh, you know, if we were to define it, I think it, it has a different definition for a lot of different people, but we might be placing people in this category of they're an asshole, thinking that they are intentionally and maliciously harming us. Like an example is I got, I got cheated on.
**Unknown:** You know, my husband cheated on me, and it's like, "They're an asshole. They're a terrible person. They did this to me. H- they destroyed the family.
**Unknown:** They, they, they, they, they." But on so- on some circumstances, people are looking for a way out, and they cheat because they know that that is a, is a way out. Because if the other person says, "Fuck you, I'm done with you," they make the hard decision because the other person who, the cheater, lacked the bravery to have a really fucking hard conversation. Yeah, I mean, so the reason I... We'll get back to that.
**Unknown:** The reason I ask you that question is because people, including ourselves, um, if we're not conscious enough in the moment, we label. Yeah. And labels tend to be all or nothing, so that person's an asshole. Mm-hmm.
**Unknown:** And it's like, okay, well, what does that mean is a better, intelligent question, you know? What's, what's making them, my perception, be an asshole? Okay, they're acting like an asshole in that moment. That's not who they are.
**Unknown:** Mm-hmm. That's not how they've acted their entire life with me. That's just this moment, maybe a couple moments, you know? Mm-hmm.
**Unknown:** But that's not all the time. We get... We put somebody in a label, you know? This is why I don't like, quote-unquote, diseases because that's, that's a description of that's who you are.
**Unknown:** That's what this person is. Uh, that's not true. So if we label something, we're already putting somebody in a box that's not true. And unfortunately or fortunately, how the brain works, it's very efficient, is it's always trying to fill in the gaps, the mind.
**Unknown:** So if we put a label on something, we're always unconsciously as well as consciously looking for something to what? Verify that label. Yeah. "Yep, did it again.
**Unknown:** Fucking asshole. Yep, you always do this." Well, and that person also does a lot of other things, but if you're only looking for something to verify your belief system, which is the label, then you're missing out on a lot of what life has to offer you. And we're gonna be connected, we're gonna be attached. Like Buddha always says, "The root of all of our suffering comes from our attachment." Attachment is the belief system.
**Unknown:** The belief system is how we label the moments. Yeah. So really when you think of people being an asshole, yes, coming back to what you said, 100%, you know? Unconsciously, consciously, people will do things out of what they believe will best serve themselves.
**Unknown:** So if they don't wanna have the conversation, you know, this is gonna be an easy way to exit, you know, a strategy, especially in like relationships. You know, it's like, "I don't wanna make it about you. I'll take the blame. You know, what's an easy way for, to get out of it?
**Unknown:** Boom, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be an asshole so you leave me, so I don't have to leave you. I'm gonna cheat on you, so you could leave me, so, you know, I don't have to hurt you," even though you're hurting somebody. Um, you know, people's brains are, are weird. But yeah, there's always gonna be that initial strategy that somebody's using.
**Unknown:** And they might not understand it, but it's, there's always a strategy. Well, kind of like I wanna expand upon this idea because I, I do think that there's a lot of people that have felt betrayed in certain ways. Mm-hmm. And this could be through a friendship.
**Unknown:** It could be through a romantic relationship. And, um, you know, there's obviously so many different versions of it. But the... Going back to what I was saying, is people lacking a very specific skill set, this is not necessarily always about avoiding the conflict or avoiding a hard conversation because in the event of, of say, you know, someone being married, they have kids together, and you know, they, they've developed a life together.
**Unknown:** They own assets together. They own a house together. You know, their lives are very, very int- intermingled. Like, there's a, there's a level of complexity there.
**Unknown:** And the probability that it gets to the tipping point that someone is cheating is that there's been, there's been different things that have been happening and snowballing down the hill for a period of time, but they kept, you know, "Oh, we had the other kid. We bought another asset together." And they're kind of like everything is eating away. So one is it's not just about one person. It's about be- like awareness, you know?
**Unknown:** Because if you're in a s- if you're in a situation that you got cheated on, s- uh, this is gonna piss some people off, but like you shouldn't be fucking surprised. If you're so surprised, and you're so floored, and you're so like, "Holy shit, I, I never in a million years thought that this would happen"-That means that you are not paying attention. You're not aware of the subtle signs. You're not aware of, uh, of, of behaviors that are showcasing that someone's needs are not being met, someone's not in it, someone's not committed, someone's not happy.
**Unknown:** And nobody is saying that anybody is right or wrong, but it's, it's going back to this idea of developing a skill set for a s- a, a great life. Because a great life is, is composed of feeling like you have some type of purpose and mission when it comes to your career. It's having relationships beyond your romantic relationship. It's feeling like you're, you're doing the best you can as a parent, and you're, you're developing great kids.
**Unknown:** Like, it's not one-sided. If you have a good marriage and everything else is shit, you're not gonna have a great life. So this is about paying attention and understanding the signs, the signals, the, the, the behaviors all around you. And, and also understanding that, you know, if, again, going back to this one particular example, which there are a million examples to, you know, that go along this topic, is if someone cheated and, and it's not, it's not as black and white as they lacked the ability to just have a hard conversation, they might not even know exactly why they're unfulfilled.
**Unknown:** And it's not always because of you as the partner. There could be so many things that are, are happening, but they don't even know how to, how to verbalize it, because there's so many holes, and voids, and wounds. And so they don't have the conversation, maybe not necessarily because they're not bold or brave enough, but because they're like, "I don't even fucking know what's wrong with me." Like, "I don't know why I feel the way I do. I don't know why I'm always looking for something or someone e- outside of my spouse." Like...
**Unknown:** And so this kind of brings us to, like, the bigger picture here, is that you don't learn this shit in school. You don't learn this with, with your traditional therapist. You don't learn this through going to your doctor. Like, you don't learn this unless you commit to learning it.
**Unknown:** You invest your time, your energy, and your money to learn it. Like, this is something that no one's gonna give to you. You have to be curious enough to develop these skills on your own instead of just thinking you're a victim. Well, and the nice thing about it is that it's pretty easy, honestly.
**Unknown:** Oh, here we go. Well, it is. Um, it's, it's, like, a huge lie that we've been told, because, you know... And I, for the most part, I agree 100% everything you said.
**Unknown:** The, the only tiny little part is the, the surprise aspect. You know, it's like- Okay ... it is a surprise, it can be a surprise even if the individual doesn't know where it's coming from- Mm-hmm ... and they've been lying to themselves so long, that there's- Yep ...
**Unknown:** such a strong facade up, that the other person, it'd be very difficult to get the clues. The clues are always there, you know, but if that's not their zone of genius, it's not gonna be an easy thing to pick up on, et cetera. But when I said the easy part is, is, you know, you talked about paying attention. Okay, well, in a business, you don't just pay attention, you collect data.
**Unknown:** That's how you pay attention. Yeah. Yep. And that's, that's how...
**Unknown:** Like, yeah, pay attention in your family, but the way to truly pay attention is to collect data, and that's why having meetings with... Meetings for yourself, meetings for the couple, meetings for the family structure, that's paying attention. That's... Because paying attention, for the most part, is, a lot of it's subjectiveness.
**Unknown:** You know? It's like, "Oh, this person's having a reaction. This person's doing things that makes them happy," et cetera. But to be able to set aside space and time where you evaluate yourself, you evaluate your relationship, you evaluate the family dynamic, and that's objective.
**Unknown:** Mm-hmm. And this is why I say it's not that hard- Mm-hmm ... because there's a fucking million businesses that are doing this. Not a, not a million families, not a million- Yes ...
**Unknown:** couples, unfortunately. 'Cause it's the same process, just different, worded differently. But you have a group of... I'll give the analogy as like you have a group of executives, and what's fun about the executive board is that they're all asking questions, hard questions most of the time, and they're not getting emotional about it.
**Unknown:** They're not pissing each other- Yeah ... off, saying, "Oh, this is... You know, you're fucking hurting my feelings by saying this," or, you know, "I invested a lot of time, and you don't care about, like, what I created," blah, blah, blah. They don't, they don't care.
**Unknown:** They're there for one thing, the growth of the business, and how to grow it as efficient as possible, profitable for stakeholders, et cetera. Or if small business, just profitable for themselves. And you're going through, and you're asking hard questions, and you're going through objectively to figure out what's the best answer, what's the best decision, what's the best action plan, how can I have, quote-unquote, "the biggest return on my investment?" If we looked at our relationship like that, of, you know, "Oh, you said that... You said it like this," or, "You meant this, but I know you didn't," blah, blah, blah, and it's like that's all subjectiveness.
**Unknown:** That's not objective. The objective portion of me is like, "Okay, you said this, you know.A, how can we communicate better? You know, what was the breakdown? Why was there a breakdown?
**Unknown:** Was it you or was it me, or was it both? How c- how can you learn how to better speak to me so I'm not triggered? How can I learn how to not be triggered because I'm only triggered because of I was hurt in the past. And I'm triggered to what?
**Unknown:** Protect myself. That's what a trigger is. A trigger is something, your unconsciousness coming up online saying, "Hey, you were hurt in the past. You better protect yourself-" Yeah.
**Unknown:** "... 'cause you're gonna get hurt again." Yeah. That's, that's what a trigger is. If you don't, what?
**Unknown:** Heal the trigger, balance that past moment out, you're gonna continually having that prot- p- protective mechanism come up- Mm-hmm ... which is gonna be reactive, not proactive, subjective and emotional, not objective and balanced, and you're never going to allow yourself to be able to, what? Have the best action plan, be the most productive, have the most return on your investment, grow the relationship, grow yourself, grow the family. So like, like you said before is there's never one thing.
**Unknown:** There's always a lot of reasons why somebody does something. But what's great about that is every moment has the potential for both parties involved to use it to grow. Yeah, and I, I think what you're saying is really important because a lot of times when we are in relationships or we are an employer of employees, like, we... I don't know what it is necessarily about, you know, the human nature, but we tend to think that everything is outside of us and that, you know, we need to help the other person see differently.
**Unknown:** We need to help them. And really at the end of the day, the only thing that we can control is ourselves and how we show up, how we communicate, how we collect the data and think about the situation. So it's okay for you to be, you know, uh, emotional or triggered in the moment, but it's just the opportunity for you to take the pause. Sure as fuck do not have a conversation when you're in that state because it will go nowhere.
**Unknown:** It's, it's pretty much a feedback mechanism to showcase the parts of you that are out of balance, and then for you to sit with a series of, of questions in order to get clarity on what's the root of this? Where is this coming from? Because this is... A- at the end of the day, when we get these triggers, like, we move into that victimization, but we're the first people to judge when other people are acting like a victim.
**Unknown:** You know, we hear it in their verbiage of, "This happened to me. They did this to me. This... They did that." Um, but we still will act that way when we, you know, quote unquote, "have bad things happen to us." You, you- Yeah, I mean- ...
**Unknown:** look like you have something to say. Well, no. I mean, I... Part of it's just realizing that nobody's better or worse than anybody else, that we, we all have traumas, we all have problems, we all have shit.
**Unknown:** They look different and et cetera. They're packaged differently. I wanna say something about that though, because I know that there are people in very specific situations where they're being villainized. They're, um, they're, they're the villain in someone's story all the time.
**Unknown:** And, you know, anytime they speak to that family member or that person, you know, it's... There's always something to be said about, you know, "You did this, and you said that, and you act that way, and you did this on this holiday," ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba. Um, and I want people to understand that you're not the villain of their story. You just represent the parts of them that are unhealed.
**Unknown:** You're representing their most polarized emotions. So I, I want people to understand this, and I want you to see it in yourself too. If you are villainizing someone else in your story, someone in your family, someone, you know, in your, in your friends group, someone even in your business, if you're villainizing, "That person always fucks up. That person always does this.
**Unknown:** That person always does that," that's a representation of your own shit that you have not navigated, you have not healed, you have not thought through, you have not worked through. And the same thing is happening on the vice versa. So use this as an opportunity and stop... Like, you can give just as much energy of either villainizing someone or being the victim, or you can spend energy actually collecting that data, as Dr.
**Unknown:** Nick said, and understanding that the only thing you can control is yourself, and understanding the root of why these certain triggers, emotions come up for you. Yeah. I wasn't gonna talk about it, but- Mm-hmm ... can I expand on that?
**Unknown:** Yeah, sure. So speaking of, like, the, the villain aspect, I always break things down, um, into the polarization aspect of it. So there's the emotional and the non-emotional. So it's like if you think somebody is a villain, 99% of the time, the person connected to it is emotional, um, that the villain is all bad, not good, not a hero, the opposite.
**Unknown:** So the emotional part is the reflectiveness showing that you have something that's not healed, hence the trigger, the past, protect yourself. The non-emotional part of that is that person may just not be in a hierarchy of serving one's values.So- Yeah ... that's when people are like, "Oh, well, you know, I don't like hanging out with this person." That doesn't mean they're a bad person. They don't have to be a bad person just because you don't wanna hang out with them or be around with them.
**Unknown:** You wanna be around people that are serving your highest values, what's most important to you. Mm-hmm. Because that's what builds you up, that's what makes you a better person. That's- that's like, that's the alchemy of turning something from lead into gold, you know?
**Unknown:** It's like you wanna... You don't wanna put energy on, on the lead, the problem, you wanna put energy on the destination, the gold, what's most important to you, what you value, your worth. Can I plug in- So- ... an example?
**Unknown:** 'Cause I, I think it's just short, sweet, and relevant. Um, like a, a great example when it comes to what you were just saying is, like, I know for us a- as a, as a couple, because our values are actually somewhat similar, is we enjoy being in a group, like a, a, a social circle, like a- at a, a house with, you know, friends, acquaintances, and we actually invite challenging conversations. And, you know, they could be intense conversations, but if the root of it is for growth. But if people are having challenging, intense conversations, but it's like for the sake of just like talking poorly on behalf of, of something, someone, politics, et cetera, I have no interest in that.
**Unknown:** I'm fine with being around people with differing values and differing opinions as long as the reason why we're, we're inviting the conversation is for, you know, for us to learn and grow and be curious. But if people are having these like intense conversations 'cause they want to push their political views down my throat, I don't care what your political views are. That's not the point. The point is, is that for some reason you think that I should subscribe because your belief system and your values are, are more superior to mine.
**Unknown:** And so this is kind of what we're, we're talking about, is like I could walk out of a party and be like, "That guy's a fucking asshole." And it's not that he's an asshole, he's just... it's just not in alignment with my values and what I wanna be around. I'm sure multiple people have thought that I'm an asshole. So back to the villain really quick s- as we're gonna probably wrap this up sooner than later, is that when you think about villains, and it kinda goes back to intentionally hurting somebody, you know, what a villain truly is, quote-unquote "a true villain," not that anybody is just a villain because we play all traits and we have both sides of every trait, is that the part of the expression of the villain i- is the expression of someone that's been hurt.
**Unknown:** And what's, what's great about life, not always fun, is that we want other people to feel how we feel. If we feel great, guess what? We want other people to feel great. Right.
**Unknown:** If we feel shitty, guess what? We want other people to feel shitty. It's, it's a form of empathy. Or, or what people desire is they wanna be- It's- They want people to empathize with them.
**Unknown:** They want people to share- It's the law of resonance ... uh, common struggles. Laws of resonance. It's just the law of resonance.
**Unknown:** Uh. It's one of the universal laws, principles. But, you know, I, I'll be honest- So we attract- ... and I don't ...
**Unknown:** we attract what we feel. Yeah. So- But I will say that it's... there's a level of, I don't wanna say difficulty, it's just when you are always trying to be a better version of yourself, um, it feel...
**Unknown:** I- and especially in the beginning phases, it can feel a bit isolating and, and lonely. Um, and, and I do- I would be curious your perspective on this, but I, I actually saw a post the other day, and I was like, "Hmm, that's really interesting," and it was saying, "Isn't it funny how you had such a big friends group when you were the shittiest version of yourself, and now as you're o- one of the better or best versions of yourself, your friends group is so much smaller?" And I was like, "Gosh, that is so fucking accurate." What's the, um, um... blanking out. Gay, Gay Hendricks?
**Unknown:** Gay Hendricks. The leadership guy? Yep. Um, haven't listened to his podcast in a long- Or Maxwell.
**Unknown:** Yeah, Max- John, John Maxwell. John Maxwell, yeah. Um, haven't listened to his podcast in many years, but he had a podcast and it was titled It's Lonely at the Top. And, you know, he talked about, you know, "Please join me, it's, it's, it's lonely up here." Yeah.
**Unknown:** Um, and, and it is. And it, it is and it isn't. Um, initially the perception is that it's lonely because you're going from... talking about universal principles and laws.
**Unknown:** Quantity. Y- you're going from the law of one to the many. Well, you're going from the many back to the one. Yeah.
**Unknown:** So you're, you're going from- Going from quantity to quality. Yep. And the, the quantity is all of the emotions. Yeah.
**Unknown:** Well- And the one is unity, not the diverse, the breakdown, the duality of those emotions, but back into gratitude, unconditional love, joy, you know, back into being whole instead of being broken. And there's not many people that are more whole. There's more people that are more broken. Yeah.
**Unknown:** And this is why we can look at people and be like, "Oh, you're a villain." The villain is just another description for somebody that's broken, somebody that's hurt, and they feel hurt, so they attract-... people that are also hurt around them, events that are hurt around them, just as a feedback mechanism to create more awareness of the broken part so that we can bring it back into a state of balance to heal it. When we do, that's when we ex- experience gratitude, love, and joy, and that's when we're whole again. That's when, quote-unquote, "true healing occurs." So- And also, I think that, you know, some...
**Unknown:** there's very specific- ... and easy-to-implement tools that can help you through this, this process to get more to, you know, this joy, love, and gratitude that, that Dr. Nick is talking about. And I, I wanna give this to you, uh, and keep it very simple.
**Unknown:** Obviously, as you master one layer, you can expand upon this, but for the simplicity of, of this starting point is some of the solutions really just lie in thinking, taking some time to think and ask yourself one major question, and Dr. Nick might have his own question. But think it... The reason why I'm saying this is because if you are emotional because of a person, a situation, that is not the time to have a conversation.
**Unknown:** It's not the time to make decisions. It's the, it, it's the feedback mechanism to say, "You need to take a fucking pause, and you need to go sit with yourself and give yourself the time and space to think," but you have to ask very constructive questions that are gonna give you that objective data and give you a place or an opportunity to make a decision out of inspiration and not out of a chaotic, "I'm emotionally triggered," desperate, desperate state, okay? Because people make way too many fucking decisions from that place. So one of the questions I ask my clients very often when they're telling me the, the story of how this person did this to them or this person's an asshole, et cetera, and they, they usually are very confused with the question, is what if you took radical responsibility for this situation?
**Unknown:** Like, think about it. If someone just told me, "I just found out I was cheated on," and someone tell... a- asks you the question, "What if you took radical responsibility for this?" Automatically, most people are like, "How fucking dare you? He did this to me." How did I...
**Unknown:** How did- "She did this to me." Was it a guy or a girl? Yeah. Can I join? Oh, my God.
**Unknown:** There's, there's Dr. Nick. Um. I had to make you smile.
**Unknown:** Go to town. We can't get too serious all the time. But this is a- ... really, really fucking important question to ask because if you had to take ra- Well, just to interrupt ...
**Unknown:** yeah ... I ask the same question, just probably more simple, uh, 'cause I'm a man. Go. Let, let me hear it.
**Unknown:** Radical responsibility. I'm like, "Ownership." Yeah. "Where have you done the same or similar?" You know? Yeah.
**Unknown:** You know, because- Where have you done the same or similar? Because that's... We only judge someone who we think, what? Is worse than us- Yes ...
**Unknown:** or better than us. Yes. So as soon as we can see that- No, I think both questions are, are key because I, I... the way I'm thinking about it is different.
**Unknown:** So- Soon as we can see that we're the same, there's no judgment. Yes. And it's not always, uh, black and white. This is why you have to spend the time really, really thinking, and sometimes it could take weeks, months.
**Unknown:** It could take a while. Um, w- based on what you just said, I, I wanna throw in a quick example. I... It took me years.
**Unknown:** I- in the business, we had a value that was how you do anything is how you do everything. I couldn't wrap my head around how employees would cut corners that would compromise a patient's, uh, experience or a patient's outcomes. I couldn't fucking wrap my head around it. It was like grounds for termination in our business.
**Unknown:** I was like, "You... Like, that's not how we operate here. We give 100... We give 1,000.
**Unknown:** Like, we do not cut corners." And then I w- I was doing something actually more recently, and I was like, "Oh my God. Remember how Dr. Nick always says that, like, you know, the, the thing that you judge the most, you own?" And I was doing something in the kitchen, and I fucking, like, threw something somewhere. I threw a bunch of shit in the dishwasher like a f- like a fucking raccoon on drugs.
**Unknown:** And I was like, "Oh." So pretty much my whole life, the whole idea of how you do anything is how you do everything, so I gave 1,000 when it came to business. But when it came to things in, in the home and domestic, and I was like, "I'm not gonna fucking iron. I'm g- I don't care what detergent I use. I'm not...
**Unknown:** I don't care if my kitchen's clean." Like, so it's, it's not always black and white, and it literally took me years to finally own the fucking trait that I judged so much. But radical responsibility for this, what I mean is if you can only control yourself, and if you think about how did I contribute to this circumstance, this conversation, this outcome, then that's the only thing that you can work on to change. So if you were distant, if you were mean, if you were whatever it was, if you were not, uh, aligned in values, if you were, you know, playing a certain role in the situation, what can you do in order to work on yourself, be more true to your values, and not relive the circumstance in the future? That's one of the best things that you can do.
**Unknown:** I think a lot of times when we have these conversations, people will say, like, "They don't care. They don't... They never call. They never do this." And like, the question is, is like, do you?Oh, well, no, but they should.
**Unknown:** A- and it, it's... So you don't do it, but you expect them to do it. That doesn't make any sense. So if you're looking for something in a relationship, out of an employee, et cetera, then you also need to exemplify that.
**Unknown:** Like, you, you know, you don't, you don't... Stop waiting for other people to do shit or... And stop waiting for people to read your fucking mind. Like, just stop.
**Unknown:** Either say, "Let's have a conversation about this," get on the same page, get aligned, or you do... start doing the very thing as like, um... How do... what's the saying?
**Unknown:** The olive branch? The what? I've always fucked these sayings up. Lend, like lend the olive br- I don't know.
**Unknown:** Whatever, like, ruined that. I think it's time to wrap this one up. Okay, we're gonna wrap this up. The point is, if you- Lend the olive branch.
**Unknown:** What is that fucking saying? Anyway. Yeah. So the moral of the story is, is take some time, think it through, ask yourself, "What if I took responsibility for this asshole, this outcome?
**Unknown:** What if I... Where do I also own this very thing that I'm judging?" And like you said before, is if this is relational, if it's a re- a- a- again, employee to employer, if this is husband/wife, wife/wife, husband/husband, if this is kids, parenting, consistency, communication is key. AKA, it's people. Families always think it's crazy when we invite them to this.
**Unknown:** You need to have a meeting. Like, you don't just fucking wing it. Like, if you want the exact framework, we will give it to you. There'll be a link in the show notes of exactly how to meet with your partner, your life partner, and then it gives you an idea of how to translate that down to the kids.
**Unknown:** Because if you don't do this, you just are playing the game of they should re- we should read each other's minds. Oh, I'm frustrated. Oh, it's chaos. And guess what?
**Unknown:** You're the ones creating it. Yep. It's, uh, something I never wanna do is try to read your mind. It's scary.
**Unknown:** Oh, yeah, it's terrifying. Don't do that. All right. All right.
**Unknown:** See you next time. Ciao. We thank you so much for being an avid listener of Integrative U Radio, formerly known as Integrative Wellness Radio. We appreciate all of your support.
**Unknown:** We love your comments. Please visit us on social media as well as our website to see all of the fun things happening behind the scenes and the new amazing content and courses that is being rolled out on a monthly basis. We hope to see you there.
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About Integrative You Radio
Integrative You Radio is a root cause medicine and integrative medicine podcast hosted by Dr. Nicole Rivera and Dr. Nick Carruthers — two integrative doctors who build personalized wellness protocols from your DNA, minerals, hormones, gut, and nervous system rather than from a population template. Looking for an integrative doctor who reads your labs together instead of in isolation? This is the show.
Further reading
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