Taune Lyons
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Taune Lyons
Taune is a licensed therapist and coach devoted to untangling barriers to healthy connection and full-body presence. She holds the language of the nervous system, stories of our bodies and intertwined interdependence with human & non-humans as deeply healing, and is grateful to walk this journey alongside you.
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Transcript of the Podcast
[00:00:00] Erika Straub: This is Return to You Podcast with me, your host, Erika Straub. Each week, I'll drop in with thought leaders and soulful healers for expansive conversations on resolving the conflict trauma created between you living and loving directly and intimately. To be fulfilled and satisfied in this lifetime, you have to bring your true self forward.
[00:00:24] But first you've got to ask the question, who am I?
[00:00:34] It's my absolute pleasure to introduce Taune Lyons to you. She is the soul sister I always wanted, and speaks such a shared language, you will truly enjoy the range of this conversation. Taune is a licensed therapist and coach devoted to untangling barriers to healthy connection and full body presence.
[00:00:55] She holds the language of the nervous system. Stories of our bodies and intertwined interdependence with human and non humans as deeply healing. She is grateful to walk this journey alongside you. Let's drop in.
[00:01:10] How did you get into this? Like, what brought you to the work?
[00:01:14] Taune Lyons: Yeah. Oh my gosh, I feel like there's so many ways to answer that, you know. Um, this, you know, I'm sure you've heard this path called the Wounded Healer's Path. Um, but, so that's what comes to mind for me first is like, My own struggles with intimacy and connection and being a human, but also just, I've always been really, really curious from a young age to try and understand people and dynamics.
[00:01:42] And there was a big part of me that felt like I didn't know how to be in connection. Like everybody else was doing it right. But I wasn't, even when I was like super young, I remember having feelings like that, feeling like a little lone wolf. Um, And then both of my parents are really into psychology and they're both seekers in their own right and so I grew up with a lot of that, uh, and then I just kind of fell in love with psychology in high school and then college, um, but I first went to culinary school because, uh, I, yeah, I, I really was, I was vegan at the time, I was vegan for like nine years and I was really interested in how food can impact your mood, um, Um, so I, I liked that, but then I wanted more than just the food thing.
[00:02:29] Um, and then I really fell in love with attachment theory and there's this class in undergrad called psychedelics and the politics of human consciousness. That was my. Favorite class. My God. Great. Yeah. Just even the title. Yeah. Wow. Uh, and then I got really into meditation and mindfulness and just consciousness in general.
[00:02:52] Taune Lyons: And I feel like it's just evolved from there. And I found the grad school that I went to, um, California into ventricle studies, and they're very trans personal. And it just felt like in many ways at home, Um, but I did feel like it was missing some of the sciencey pieces, , you know, more of the raw data that I feel like attachment theory has.
[00:03:15] That's what I really like about attachment theory when it comes to intimacy and where I really have been in love with it is because it's, it feels both, and I don't know if it feels this way to you, but it feels like scientific and spiritual to me somehow. Mm-hmm . Yeah. When, when something can blend both of those worlds, it like hits the sweet spot.
[00:03:34] Erika Straub: But you know, you can't hit with just one of them. Like that intersection is so like full of life. Yes, absolutely. It feels wholesome. I love that. It's kind of, I don't know if you feel this way, but kind of the intersection of nervous system and attachment system, like that section is like, Everything.
[00:03:58] Taune Lyons: Seriously, everything. And what a beautiful way to depathologize a lot of this, you know, industry of healthcare and psychology of looking at it through the nervous system and attachment system instead of, oh, you have this problem that can't be treated. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if you're like this, I'm imagining maybe that like diagnosis and like the medical model just really fell short.
[00:04:23] Erika Straub: Like it didn't encompass the whole human experience. Like sometimes it gives us language to understand something a little better or a framework, but I feel like it misses like the humanness and doesn't even speak to how trauma impacts our nervous and attachment system. It's just, you have this and.
[00:04:42] Period. Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. I mean, I think for me, I think of it, it's like one piece. It's not the whole piece, you know, like I wish we could have clinics or centers where I could go in and if I was having issues with anxiety or whatever else, I could see a doctor. I could see a psychiatrist. I could see a therapist and a physical therapist and it'd be very somatic.
[00:05:07] Taune Lyons: Like, so you could get every little piece because right now it's like, we're just. We're not looking at the whole constellation of symptoms holistically. Yeah, everything's so separate. And because all the healing is relational, it's like we have to have all these pieces like coming together and intersecting like every piece from food to movement to chiropractor, you know, like a line structure in our body and the deep soul work and it's hard to kind of put our own teams together, so to speak, to meet all those needs.
[00:05:40] Yeah, and it seems like so many of us are doing that. I feel really hopeful about that, too. Yeah, yeah. In our own ways, but it would be nice if it could be somehow funded, you know? That would be beautiful. Yeah. I just remember, like, my entry point into psychology, trauma wasn't even, like, the focus. Like, I didn't even hear the word trauma in my own, like, therapy, me going to therapy for years.
[00:06:08] Erika Straub: Like, I feel like a decade and that wasn't even part of the conversation, like how troubling that that wasn't even brought in. Yeah, that is troubling. Yeah, I wonder a part of me is like, did they use other words that alluded to that. I'm not sure like I was so young at the time it's hard to put the pieces together but I remember once trauma got put on the table, and what like post traumatic stress actually is, and you are living in trauma responses.
[00:06:40] It was like, this makes so much sense and it took that like shame piece away from it. It's so beautiful. Yeah, it was like that missing piece that could help everything come together. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if this was your experience and I'm interested in knowing if you feel open to sharing, but it, I feel like a lot of the times psychology therapy has been very hierarchical where it's like, Not giving the information or the jargon to the client or patient and that feels very disempowering to me being on either side of the couch.
[00:07:16] Yeah, well I think like it used to be so much about the therapist being such a blank slate and not bringing anything into the room. Yeah. And like, that's actually, I think, kind of scary for those of us who've had trauma where like the parent or the caregiver doesn't fully show up or doesn't bring like a lot of parts forward.
[00:07:35] Yes. That actually is like re traumatizing in a sense that the other person's not bringing more of their self into the room. Yeah, like where are you at in this? Am I alone here? Yeah. Yeah. Then it's such a weird career and a tricky balance because, you know, there's so many boundary breaches too in therapy and coaching world where if you've been more of a parentified child in the way of caretaking, like I had some of that, you know, as a kid, then you can get into that same role with a therapist.
[00:08:07] Taune Lyons: Yeah. And that's tough. Cause then you need, you need some amount of, okay, I feel safe enough where you're not going to put your attachment stuff on me. Like, I'm still the client, but there's this, like, balance of, I mean, my wish is that everybody, clinician, whatever, could be focusing on the nervous system and attachment work.
[00:08:28] Erika Straub: Yeah. Yeah. I don't know how we can't be, you know, I think it's, it's truly how we start to like dive into relational containers, even just the relationship with ourself. If we don't understand those two pieces. I don't think we can get, like, close to ourself or close to our parts, let alone close to other humans.
[00:08:48] Yeah. Oof. That feels so true to me too. Yeah. Because otherwise it feels like, for me, I, I can remember when I didn't have any nervous system awareness and interception, none, and when I took my first yoga class, you know, it took me a while to build up, um, I don't know, like the image that I have is almost like myself fighting myself.
[00:09:12] Taune Lyons: To become present and then eventually being able to feel all of myself and it's just such a really incredible experience to have and I wish everyone could experience. That's such a powerful image the like fighting myself. I feel like that deeply resonates like if I think back to the journals I used to write in and all of that I think the war, the word that would come up all the time for me is like, I'm at war with myself like I'm in war.
[00:09:41] Yes. Oh my God. Yeah. That makes me want to cry because it feels like such a potent and also common experience. And it's not, I don't know if you, I don't feel like I'm ever going to not ever experience that. Sure. Yeah. But like that inner liberation, that inner peace, that inner cohesiveness, um, that I really see attached to attachment, you know, like how we see the world.
[00:10:12] It supposedly through the lens of attachment is based on our attachment adaptation. And so if we're constantly worried ourselves, like, let's say if that, if I had more of a disorganized attachment, you know, then. Eventually, when I changed my internal working model to feeling safe, feeling that inner peace and then feeling safe with, with somebody else, it's like a total structural consciousness change from the inside out.
[00:10:39] Erika Straub: That just gave me chills because like, I don't know about you, but like thinking back to like pivotal moments where there were those like paradigm shifts that like, I mean, it was a long fight to get to those shifts, but when the shift actually happened, it was so cool. Instantaneous. And then it's like, how do, how do we integrate like this whole worldview and internal view that just like switched?
[00:11:03] Yeah. How do we integrate that? Yeah. Well, that's such an amazing question because now it's making me think of more, um, like psychedelics, but not just psychedelics, all the things that we do that are really intense, like shadow work or. whatever, and having those peak insights. And then maybe there can be a kind of addiction to those peak insights sometimes.
[00:11:27] Yeah. Say more about that. I love, I love where that's going. Yeah. I mean, addiction is a pretty strong word, but, um, I think it can, I've seen and maybe even experienced in myself times where that intensity is what draws me. And so I think if I keep having this insight, if I keep taking this medicine, if I keep this intensity up, then eventually things will, um, will like fall into place.
[00:11:52] Taune Lyons: It's almost like a tough love. version of healing. But then recently, um, I started going to cranial sacral, um, massage therapy and it's so gentle and it's not for everyone. And I imagine later in life, it won't be for me. It's like, it's like, you know, who knows? I'm trying to say like my way isn't the right way, but for me, that kind of gentle gentleness actually transformed me in a totally different way where I was able to integrate a medicine journey from three and a half years prior that was really hard for me.
[00:12:22] Oh my gosh. And I've tried a lot of other things, you know, and so it's like, it just makes me think of compassion as, as really healing as opposed to for integration, as opposed to more of like the top down, um, inner critique, he kind of dominator. Yeah, yeah. I definitely have been the one that has. Come more into healing through intensity.
[00:12:52] Erika Straub: So like beautiful and powerful to hear this integration that came from gentleness. And I'm curious if, if you'd feel comfortable or safe enough to share a little bit about the ceremony and the integration, like three years later. Yeah. Um, sure. It's really intense, um, themes. But like, I still kind of want to speak like more high level to it just because I think it can be kind of intense and traumatizing in a way is, is a really intense kind of trip could be but the themes for me were very much around the masculine and the feminine.
[00:13:32] Taune Lyons: And in a way, like the right brain and the left brain and a lot of power and domination and how, you know, kind of patriarchy in a way, or more of a dominator culture of living in fear of the harm and, um, and dismissiveness and degradation of one over the other, like specifically, historically, we have had a lot of messages of, um, like men, right?
[00:13:58] Like being in power. And. I think a dominated culture, especially Futurism, has harmed them just as much. But I had this very visceral fear come up in me that was incredibly hard to integrate. Around kind of not just even men and women, but also just everything that's so polarized in our communities, like Republicans and Democrats and, you know, more indigenous ways of healing versus, um, more medicine in the traditional Western way.
[00:14:29] And it was just kind of blown up my consciousness, like this division. So it was this opportunity for me to be able to find a healthier third, but it was really hard because it felt so black and white in my body to fear. And then I started to sometimes feel scared of people in my sober life. Um, and, and, and these like big, scary concepts.
[00:14:52] And I think a lot of people live under that fear of, um, each other, you know? And so I was doing everything that I could to find a middle way. But when I had a, um, just somehow when I had a male practitioner that was doing craniosacral, I had this embodied. Insight of those super integrating of maybe in this specific scene in the journey where I had been on a table and this is really intense, but I'm just going to speak to it, um, had been on a table where men were, um, kind of like the evil, quote unquote, evil forces that were killing me over and over and over and really brutal ways that that's what I had seen in that trip.
[00:15:37] And then in this integration, I was like, wow, what if my understanding of all those needles and blood and all that stuff in that moment was pain and harming, but actually what they were trying to do is heal me. It makes me want to cry right now. Me too. Yeah. And so it's just, there's like been this, and since then I've just had really amazing tender experiences with men and that really just want to nurture and like the masculine in all of us.
[00:16:07] And I feel like that's a really needed reframe of the masculine in our culture as very nurturing too. Yeah, thank you so much for sharing that like so profound, like I can feel all of that in my body and I haven't had that intense of a journey yet. I'm really new to the psychedelic space, but I know that so much of my wounding is that masculine wounding.
[00:16:37] And fear that you speak of, um, and almost like in approaching any dynamic with men as please don't hurt me. Yeah. The, the lead, but then this is intense, but like being so disconnected to my own body at the time that it was like, please don't hurt me, but still putting myself there. And so not knowing how to like, you know, like all that fear and be like, Ooh, there's a lot of fear here.
[00:17:08] Erika Straub: I should, I need to like, tend and take care, not throw myself to the wolves or put myself in situations that don't actually feel safe. Oh my God. Yes, yes, yes, yes. It's just this like not knowing what safety was to begin with. Yeah, and not I think at the time having awareness around like healthy receptivity, like someone really receiving you with such honor and respect, responsibility, and not being really a privilege, you know, just such a dance in that space that.
[00:17:47] It was just so repetitive, repetitive, repetitive, repetitive until, you know, having experiences that were so grounded, it had to collapse the cycle because they were just, you know, like shattering, shattering experiences. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I'm just thinking of you, like your inner child there. You know, and, and yeah, it's making me think of, I don't, I don't know if this is what happened to you when you're saying this, but you know, if we're heterosexual, let's say we're in that male, female dynamic, it can be like, we're projecting our parent that we needed onto that person.
[00:18:26] Taune Lyons: So our little one is like, please take care of me like what you're saying, but that is just another flawed human that's scared of intimacy too. They're not our parent that hopefully signed up to be there for us in a way that a partner really can't. Totally. The unconscious seeking for a parent, that was a long journey, a long journey.
[00:18:55] Yeah, but it's also feels like possible to play with those dynamics with consciousness too. It's, it's, I love that you said that because once there is consciousness, you have so many different options to play with these wounds. Yeah. There actually can be art and play now with these wounds. Oh, and how empowering.
[00:19:18] Erika Straub: Yeah, it's a totally different experience because, you know, the wounding's still there, but I get to choose how to interact with it and who to be in it with, and when to step out of it and look at it. Like, there's just choice comes back. Yes. Yes. Yeah. And like speaking about trauma, right? Like that's where we didn't have a choice.
[00:19:39] Taune Lyons: That's where someone doesn't have a choice. So now getting to, yeah, play consciously with that, those wounds, it's like whole other like levels of healing. Yeah, totally. Was, was your experience also the feeling of being trapped? Was that something that came up in your world trapped? Yeah, it was. Yeah. But in that journey, I mean, that's a theme that you felt.
[00:20:07] Absolutely. Yes, absolutely. Which I just want to share this because I just, um, I was just visiting my mom and my dad. We're not together, but they were near each other for the holidays. And I was just kind of, sometimes I talk like flippantly, you know, and I was like, don't you feel trapped in this room right now to my mom?
[00:20:29] Because I really wanted to go outside. I was like, and she was like, no, trapped is a state of mind. And I don't feel trapped. That's just what's reminding me of it now is yes, I did spend so much of my life in that like flight, like, Oh my God, I need to get out of here. Right now, until recognizing like speaking again to that inner peace part of I can have that liberation right here right now, what needs to be faced or loved or tended to.
[00:20:55] Like that just like God shot right there that this idea that we can liberate ourselves in moments was not accessible at one point, but the fact that like, We can see that pathway now, you know, we, you can have that moment. I often call it like those fork in the road moments where it's like, I know how this plays out if I follow that wounding or follow this familiar, but this other path, actually there's the opportunity to repair and release.
[00:21:29] Erika Straub: And like move something out of me as opposed to like the repetitiveness. Yes, move something out of me. That is what repair feels like to me, honestly. Yeah, but it's so scary to like come to that, that, um, intersection, right? When there's been rupture or disconnection or conflict and to choose repair and lean into repair, like when you're just learning that, Oh, this is, this is a thing.
[00:21:57] This is available because I think for a long time, I didn't, I didn't know what repair was. I didn't know that was available. Yes. Yes. Yeah. So then how, when people don't know that it's possible, where do you even begin? Yeah. It's like people, you'd have to have that felt experience in some way, which takes a risk.
[00:22:16] Huge risk. Huge. Yeah. How would you say someone learns like the art of repair? I mean, I think it is through that risk, but again, speaking to those like Dances of the opposites. We have to have some amount of safety, I think, in order to do it. So, I mean, I feel like people find their first repairs often in therapy.
[00:22:38] Taune Lyons: If they haven't had safe relationships, um, I found them a lot through partnerships and friendships. Um, even just recently I've tried showing up in a dynamic, um, with a partner that. It had been so different in our previous iteration, and I don't know what's going to happen in this one, but I've been really leaning into trusting the repair process, and I've been showing up differently with them, even just energetically, um, by knowing that I have myself.
[00:23:09] So even if he can't repair with me, that I know that I can repair within myself and I can take care of myself. I'm not giving my inner one over to him. And so, I mean, I think the long answer here could also be finding repair somehow in yourself. Mm hmm. Yeah, it is. So, yeah, speaking to the energetic part I think that's, could you speak a little bit to that because I think that is something that if we can really touch into that and understand that like in our own system, it changes.
[00:23:45] Erika Straub: We're able to really surrender. the outcome and kind of release someone else from certain expectations, abilities to take care of us. Yes, absolutely. So I'm going to take a sip of cacao first. Well, with this specific dynamic, I had shown up in previous iterations pretty anxiously, and I don't really run anxious attachment wise.
[00:24:19] Taune Lyons: And so it was very like new to me. Um, and There were reasons for it that were not because of me, of course, it's a dynamic, a push pull dynamic that creates that, but energetically how I've shown up now is I think I've done enough work with my inner child enough to know that I don't need another person to meet those more primal young needs, um, like grasping, I've heard it called, um, Primal panic before, like I don't need somebody else to do that because I know that I can go to myself and my higher self, I can go to meta or prayer or the ocean or whatever to feel that soothing that another human probably can't give me in the way that I need it.
[00:25:07] And so I think how I've shown up energetically different is, and it might sound. Silly, but I can feel my feet more in those interactions. I can take more breaths and see the whole situation for what it is, as opposed to getting sucked into it and thinking that somebody's doing something to me to hurt me.
[00:25:26] And that's just a different kind of, almost like not victim y anymore energy. And I'm trying to think of their other examples, um, I mean I have, I have an example about sex that came up recently that might be interesting. Okay, so, um, I, you know, in relationships, obviously people will be arguing about a lot of things in couples therapy, and sometimes I've found it's about the amount of intimacy, emotional closeness, or sexual closeness, or both, that they want, but they're talking about the dishes instead.
[00:26:04] You know? Yeah. So it's like that. Right? Yeah. Not the dishes. Not the dishes. It's like, how much autonomy do I want versus how much connection do I want? That kind of thing. Um, but also what can come up for me is that, or what used to come up a lot for me is, if you don't want to be in connection with me right now, no matter if you're sick or whatever is happening, then that means that you're not really into me.
[00:26:31] This would especially come up in an open dynamic. So if it was polyamorous or consensual non monogamy, because there was nothing kind of showing me in a way from our monogamous leaning culture that you want to be with me, unless we're consistently in connection and sexually connected and blah, blah, blah.
[00:26:47] Taune Lyons: And so recently, um, I had a conversation with, um, a partner of mine around that and he was like, What is happening here is our needs aren't meeting. And he kind of broke it down for me because I was beginning to enact this. I want more connection, but not speaking to it specifically. So just kind of like.
[00:27:07] almost like a whiny sort of thing, you know, or like a playful sort of thing. And then he was like, this is what's happening. And it was just so helpful for me to see that. And we were actually able to walk through it for more of like a logical place where I realized, Oh yeah, this has nothing to do with my worth.
[00:27:23] Yes. I have these sexual needs and I have these emotional needs and I'm worthy of getting them met. Um, But I don't need to manipulate to get them met. Yeah. And so there was like this felt experience of a reorganization on the inside of like, of course, those needs are worthy of being met. Now's not the time.
[00:27:42] And if this person can't meet them consistently, I get to decide if I want to be in this dynamic or not. So it's not me at the whim of somebody else's. Desires, which that sounds to me more like a push pull dynamic. Yeah. What a powerful, like, coming back into your body and like ownership of your needs because I, I, I super resonate, um, with that experience.
[00:28:03] Erika Straub: 'cause I, I actually typically was more anxiously attached and then moved more into an avoidant as that was healing. And now sort of making my way, like really more firmly rooted and secure as. You know, we, we heal these relationships internally, but that anxious attachment when the primal panic is the perfect word, like it is so disruptive in your body and it is so, and if I'm being perfectly transparent, I was in that this last week and, but, and, but navigated it in such a different way.
[00:28:48] It opened so up for me because that primal panic always comes in that tension gets too big between connection and autonomy space and when when that intersection is like just way off and there's disconnection right and you're in that rupture that primal panic shows up and My M. O. in the past had been to make the needs wrong.
[00:29:14] Your needs? My needs wrong. Like, make them wrong, suppress them, right? Try and over contain them. But really, it's like, these needs aren't the problem. They just need to have, like, communication, and I need to know which ones I need to meet. Instead of this being someone else's. Yeah, then the bad guy, right? Or making them responsible for that.
[00:29:40] That same story we started with with your image is you're hurting me, you're doing something to me and fuck you. Yes. That's the victim story right there. And walking it back to like, what, what changed for me was the receptivity piece of, I need to receive what's happening in my body right now. I need to receive what's bringing up.
[00:30:05] Yes. Like, that's the problem. That's the, like the block is I'm not, I wasn't like willing to receive that thing. Cause like not knowing I had the capacity to receive that. But once we do. Everything changes. The other person is released from this like bondage that we pull them into. And I think that the dynamic can flow again.
[00:30:29] And like you spoke to, we find this direct pathway to communicate. Anytime it's not direct, we're in some form of manipulation. Ooh, oh my god, yes, that's so quotable. I'm gonna write that down. It's so I know! We love that you said that too, because I feel like avoidants often get this really bad, you know, reputation, but what I think I hear you saying is that, you know, anxious anyone can be manipulating the other for their needs.
[00:31:00] Taune Lyons: It's not like there's one victim attachment, or one victim person, it's like, no, there's a dynamic at play. Yeah, and both people are like Baited into it. Like, I don't know about you, but when your body becomes so tuned and it's like you start to feel a level of that primal panic. I'm going to keep using that word.
[00:31:21] Erika Straub: It's like, um, there's this edge that I think you really have to tap into of, is it so primal because I'm abandoning myself? Is it so primal because I'm stepping into that, like chasing? And, and outsourcing. And usually when it gets so big, I find we've stepped into that place. Like I've crossed that edge of now I'm outside of myself, or at least one foot is outside of myself.
[00:31:47] How do I walk that back internally on the inside, all of me, all parts and hold those. It sounds like you, you've really been on the journey of recognizing when one foot is outside of yourself or when you're outside of yourself. I. Okay. I wonder if you have a way that you feel that and notice it. It's, it's literally the level of anxiety that shows up in my sacral.
[00:32:15] The level of it is like this call, like this deep call to come back home. Yeah. And a deep resistance that's like, no, save me. And working through that, that resistance piece. It's such a journey. Yeah. And it's such, it's such deep listening. You're saying that that's what really struck me there is really listening to your body.
[00:32:41] Taune Lyons: And your own energetics. Yeah, I mean, those, those are our codes. That's our wisdom. But I think a lot of us, instead of listening to them, we tell them something. Yes. Yeah, well, I feel this way, or you should do this as opposed to I hear you. Tell me more.
[00:33:06] Erika Straub: Yeah. Juicy place. It really is. Yeah. And it's making me think of the importance of that every single day, checking in with those parts of ourself, even a fast paced world. Yeah, we do get caught up in the pace of everything and everything feels more urgent than it actually is. And I think when we're in those attachment wounds, like a few days feels like an eternity, like time is changes.
[00:33:40] Taune Lyons: Oh my gosh, yes. Yeah, it's like, it's like little kid time. Probably because we get sent back to that time where it was first wired in us, the attachment stuff where, I don't know if you feel this way, but when I'm in that primal panic, which does happen for every attachment style too, I feel like that's so important.
[00:33:59] Like, you wouldn't feeling that too. They're just not showing it. Um, I, it's like, I, I'm little Tommy and then, yeah, it's like scary. Yeah. You're fine. Like that's where the fear truly lives is in that little part. Yes. Yes. Sometimes I've noticed that come up to after a lot of connection, almost like the upper limit of intimacy or like having so much connection that I'm like, Oh my God, this is going to go away or it's not going to last forever.
[00:34:32] They're going to die. Or they're not, you know, one of us isn't going to want this or whatever. It's like, it's such a fascinating thing to witness. Yeah. I love that you said that, that it really can happen at. Either edge of this like window of tolerance we have where it's like not enough or it's like so much that it takes us out.
[00:34:52] Erika Straub: It's like we're either afraid we're going to lose it or we're afraid we're never going to get it. But if we stretch those edges too fast, it's like we're, we're out of our tolerance zone. Yeah, absolutely. Woo, that's so tricky about intimacy, right? Is like, noticing how much we can have, and then it's not just a one person game, it's with another person who has their own attachment and stuff.
[00:35:18] Taune Lyons: So what could feel really great for me, and really enthusiastic and loving to me, could feel really overwhelming to you. Mm hmm. Yeah, that's the wild part. It's a mystery to me how we do ever find these sweet spots.
[00:35:36] Erika Straub: So tender. It's so tender. It is a mystery, but then also I think like going back to what you said around manipulation and then just speaking to things, maybe it becomes, or I guess in my experience, it's become less of a mystery when things can be talked about. Like, we consciously navigate our power dynamic and how close and far we want to be in a way that is, um, open.
[00:36:02] Yeah. That's such a bridge to like, navigate those spaces. Cause I think that's also where defenses come out the most. It's like pulling away or silent treatment or shutting down or getting bigger. And it makes it so hard to have those open conversations, like how much nervous system work it takes for us to be able to remain open in those spaces.
[00:36:30] Taune Lyons: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And especially what just came up for me is like, if there's two defensive people, you know, which is very common, like if your defenses are the same, it can be especially hard. It's like people with armor that are like have their swords out when what is really needed is like that belly underneath.
[00:36:52] The armor to be seen, but how somebody has to be willing to lay the sword down. Yeah. Someone has to go first. Yeah. What's, what's helped you the most to be, I love that, that image, like belly out or belly up. Yeah. What's helped me the most. In some ways, I don't, I don't advise this for everyone, but I don't necessarily choose easy partnerships, just being really honest about it.
[00:37:22] You know, I think, um, you know, what I mean by that is I find value in having close, intimate relationships with people who have the attachment wounds that match. Maybe some of my childhood things so I can actually work on them. And I think that that's really helped me to discern who's going to be able to have the same level of interest in healing At that level and who can speak To their needs and desires and feelings.
[00:37:48] And it's not always perfect, but, um, I, I think I had a really, um, like armored up personality when I was younger, I think for sure, like just tough, you know, like, and I was often called the rock as a kid, like somebody that everybody could go to. To, to talk to, including, you know, older people in my life. And so I think taking down that sword or taking down that shield was scary because it had served other people so often, actually, but I wasn't really receiving.
[00:38:20] It felt more like I was more of an empty vessel in a way. That's a bit intense way to explain it, but more like giving, but not really receiving. And so I think being able to take it off with people who know how hard it is, who have similar experiences or really honor and respect and value vulnerability has helped me a lot.
[00:38:46] Erika Straub: Knowing someone has like a mutual interest in healing, I think is such a value code that we have to live by. Like if someone can't meet us on the commitment to that healing journey, it's just not it. It's not safe enough. Like I, it just doesn't feel like there's enough safety if their commitment. Isn't equal to mine and like wanting to heal and wanting to be able to mess up and repair and bring it forward and do it imperfectly and Let my protectors be seen.
[00:39:20] Taune Lyons: Yes. Oh my god I love that do it imperfectly and let your protectors be seen and also the other person because sometimes I get I Will sometimes even now get upset Set at people's defenses that are close to me until I am with my inner child again. And I'm like, alright, it makes sense that they're doing this.
[00:39:37] Nobody can be perfect. Nobody can attune all the time. Yeah. And it's so easy to project. Like I, I definitely, the perfectionism piece was like a big part of my armor still is, still is a journey, but projecting that and expecting that of other people and. With like abandonment wounding, I became so consistent and so the same.
[00:40:02] Erika Straub: Because it was like, I can control my environment and I can control manipulate other people to be the same. And then turns out they still wouldn't be the same. And so I think that's, that's a piece two is like how we loosen that rigidity, and let's have their humaneness like they're not going to have the availability for all of our parts, all of the time.
[00:40:25] And that happens to be okay. We have to be able to build capacity to be in that. Yeah, that just gave me chills because of how, like, true and real that feels. It feels so true in my world right now, for sure. But then I wonder, like, do you have certain things, like, are they, if they're non negotiables or aligned values, where you come back to when that person can't meet you, that you're like, oh yeah, this is why, or is it something totally different?
[00:40:58] To me, part of it is who I allow myself to, whether it's intimate or like real, like romantic intimacy or platonic intimacy. It's like really discerning who I let that close. And for me, it's like, there has to be a certain level of integrity that that person values like I do. And, and the value for me is always how can I put vulnerability above validation that has to come first.
[00:41:25] And so that's what I always bring myself back to like that's my belly up moment is what would be the most vulnerable thing that I could do or say right now. And maybe that's space. Right. Maybe it's like not doing anything, not trying to fix it, but it's that value of, do we value vulnerability over validation?
[00:41:45] And are we willing to be able to name our protectors? Like, the protector piece has been super important. Like radar much more this year than ever of like, I didn't even want people to see my protectors were so good. They were like pretty invisible. I hear you on that. They were so good. Like, she's so strong.
[00:42:12] She has it together on and on and on but like what's actually happening below that. And then when you have people come into your world who can actually see those protectors that are so invisible. It's like. Oh my God. The world of shame gets released, but also like so much intimacy then. Yes. Yeah. It sounds like you've had people in your life that really can see you.
[00:42:38] Taune Lyons: Yes. More than I was maybe ready for, which is confronting, you know, when, when people can see things in you that you haven't yet seen fully in yourself. It's super confronting. Yeah. It's hard not to be defensive sometimes. Yeah. Being able to receive that I think is, is a lot, it's a lot to be able to receive what someone sees, like that, that mutual feedback we give between each other.
[00:43:12] Yeah, yeah. It's very naked. Yeah, totally. I'm, I'm curious for you, like, what role has shame played in your dismantling of armor? Yeah. Totally. Ooh, that's a big one. I think of, uh, I think about shame a lot. And so glad that you asked that question. Um, yeah, I think what comes to mind for me right now is we're talking about the armor and shame is Terry real talks about how he sees shame and grandiosity.
[00:43:46] Like a part of the same coin that we swing from grandiosity to shame, but that like from being, um, not just shame on the other end, but it's like this kind of belittled, almost like a victim, maybe martyr. Those are all kind of intense words, but you know that kind of energy and then grandiosity. And so I think when I'm unable to take off my armor is generally when I'm in that place of needing to be super strong or not wanting to be seen as like that weak woman or anxious woman or too much.
[00:44:18] Um, but that's also a kind of randios, um, place to be. It's a positioning of you can't hurt me. And so when it takes a while for sometimes for me to realize that I'm in that space. Because it can just feel so much like me, if that makes sense. Like, no, I'm just a strong woman. That's just who I am. Um, but I guess some of the ways I realize if I'm in shame are if things feel more black and white.
[00:44:49] Um, and if I feel like they're bad or I'm bad or they're wrong, um, or when I'm starting to really nitpick things, I also noticed like, is it because I'm nitpicking myself, am I totally in a shame spiral right here? Um, and. And then what's often needed for me is just like so much self empathy to be able to see the other person.
[00:45:16] Sometimes I have to give myself a bunch of self empathy, like give myself that own validation to use your language there. That's so powerful. Those resonate for me too. Those all show up in my field when I'm in shame and shame is what puts me in like push pull. And especially when you sense someone else's shame and they're in shame, I've historically really been push pulled by someone else's shame and learning how to like stand and feel my feet on the ground.
[00:45:52] Erika Straub: Not leaning in or leaning out, but just standing and not matching anymore, not doing this push, pull in out dance with them as they're navigating their own shame at standing. And that always, um, always might not be the right word, but that brings up a lot of shame for me to stand close to someone else's shame, because I feel like, oh my God, I should be doing this dance with them.
[00:46:17] But it's like, no, my truth is. here. They're doing this and that's okay, right? Like hopefully we can find an intersection to co regulate, but my work is like right here. How do I stay right here and not my own shame spiral dance? Yes. That's so powerful. Yeah. Because it's in so many family systems we're taught.
[00:46:40] Taune Lyons: We're not allowed to have different feelings. If I'm in shame, you're in shame. And so that kind of, Security that I hear from you now sounds intergenerationally healing even. Thank you for saying that it feels that because definitely in my family of origin, it's like, you know, someone's energy would shift and like the whole fucking room would shift and and you were expected to go down with it and be at those eggshells.
[00:47:09] And then how powerful it is. I'm just like struck by this. Cause it reminds me of the beginning of the conversation too, of just being in your own security and just showing up energetically different and how that actually transforms a room. Seriously, to me that like, that is. Intimacy. Like, that feels like one of the most intimate things we can do with ourself when we are so attuned to energy, but like our own, and we can stay in our own frame and in our own energy as things shift around us or might be different energies.
[00:47:46] Erika Straub: Like how do we stay in our own safety, security, inside our body and not be just like sent to the moon by everything going on around us. Yeah, that's beautiful. What's your definition of intimacy? How do you encapsulate that? I mean, I love I think I mentioned to you this before that I love the title of this intimacy because that really does feel like intimacy to me of being able to have All parts be seen, um, by both parties or all parties.
[00:48:28] Taune Lyons: Um, and I also think there's the dance here because there's so much conditioning that we all have away from being seen away from being in close connection. Uh, like power dynamics, right? And, um, you know, even, you know, the patriarchy and different ways that we've learned to dominate each other instead of be in connection, like whether it's emasculating somebody or objectifying somebody, all these ways to keep us separate.
[00:48:53] And intimacy to me, I guess I would probably define it differently every day, but right now it's feeling like, um, Like interdependence and like a two solid or more secure whole people that are working to ignite the fire within each other and themselves, but not. At the, you know, not by hindering their own fire.
[00:49:23] Erika Straub: So good. And I love that you said today, this is what it is. Cause it does feel like this thing that moves and dances and it's so alive. Yes. Oh, alive. Well, yeah. Right. Because if we, I don't know, I guess if I just. define intimacy in one way it reminds me of what you were just saying around Somebody can't meet you all the time So if I define intimacy in this one way if that person that i'm with doesn't meet up to that level of intimacy Then what you know?
[00:49:57] That is so good. That is like I'm going to be sitting with that for a minute because it is true. Like where are we at? What are we feeling? What is this thing when we're not attuning to each other? Like there's still intimacy alive. It's just looks different. It's, it's coming back to like self intimacy.
[00:50:16] Right. And, and I don't know, I think about intimacy a lot as having its own rhythm where there's like an in and an out and it like pulses. All these, you know, other indirect ways are either like always, always, always in or always, always separate and intimacy is just this like beautiful, like, how do we find this rhythm of like closeness and spaciousness that like both of our nervous systems have capacity for?
[00:50:42] Taune Lyons: Yes. Oh, that is honestly like medicine to me to hear you say that. And to be in it with you and just, you know, knowing that you are devoted to this and that, you know, there are people that are devoted, it's just, it feels like such a salve to our sick systems that we live within right now. When we get to drop in with someone, it's like the greatest gift.
[00:51:11] Yeah, it really is. It's, it's worth like everything. I, I mean, I can speak for my experience, like all the things that led me to the space to honoring intimacy so much and seeking it, wanting to cultivate it and, you know, wanting to open even deeper and truly be seen so I can be held and hold. And like me in that participation, but it took a lot.
[00:51:37] Erika Straub: It took a lot to get there. And there's still so much more. There's so much more depth available and so much more potential available. Yeah. Well, that's exciting though. slash scary, slash exciting, I don't know. All of the above. All of the above, yeah. Probably a lot of grief still left, some rage. Yes. All of it is, all of it belongs.
[00:51:59] All of it belongs, it's all welcome at the table. Mm hmm. Yeah. Well, where, where can everyone follow you and find you and get connected to your work? Yeah, mainly on Instagram, um, right now. So it's just my first and last name, Taune Lyons. Um, and I also have a website. Sometimes I post and write things. Um, and sometimes I take on individuals and couples if I have space and sometimes I teach classes,
[00:52:33] make sure that all that information is linked, um, with our talk, but I'm so honored we got to sit down and just. Drop in and connect on this. Like, I literally feel like this time went by so
[00:52:47] Taune Lyons: fast. Me too. I'm like, wow. I didn't even realize. Yeah. I just feel like I can feel your
[00:52:53] Erika Straub: heart and you're so easy to talk to.
[00:52:56] I feel that from you too. Like, just such openness and I feel like you've been to the depths. Like you've been to those places, but also that you're now like, Navigating this lightness and this playfulness and this joy and like being on the receiving end of someone who has such range is such a gift like that creates so like so much safety in my system and so much permission.
[00:53:22] So I just honor your journey. It's so beautiful.
[00:53:27] Taune Lyons: Thank you. That is music to my ears. I'm just receiving that and I feel so warm and happy right now.
[00:53:33] Erika Straub: Good, as you should, as I offer you. Well, thank you so much, Tonya. This was lovely, and I know everyone's gonna absolutely take so much value from it.
[00:53:45] Taune Lyons: Thank you so much, Erika.
[00:53:46] I really appreciate you and all that you are.
[00:53:49] Erika Straub: Thank you.
[00:53:50] If this podcast feels in resonance with you, I would be so grateful for 30 seconds of your time to follow or subscribe to the return to you podcast to leave a five star rating and review and to share this episode with someone you love who's on the journey home to themselves too. Thank you so much for being here.
[00:54:13] I see you.