Manders Mindset

93: Forgiving the Unforgivable: The Courage to Let Go with Brenda Adelman

• Amanda Russo • Episode 93

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In this episode of Mander's Mindset, I sit down with Brenda Adelman, also known as the Queen of Forgiveness. She shares her incredibly moving story of navigating through unimaginable tragedy and how she found the strength to forgive. Brenda is an award-winning actor and the creator of the one-woman show My Brooklyn Hamlet, which tells the story of her father's tragic act—killing her mother and marrying her aunt. In this conversation, Brenda takes us through her three-step forgiveness process, a framework she developed to help others heal from deep emotional wounds. If you've ever struggled with forgiveness, this episode is packed with insights that could change how you approach your own healing.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

  • The importance of moving out of denial and into acceptance.
  • How to release deep-rooted anger in a healthy way.
  • Why forgiveness doesn’t mean excusing someone but freeing yourself from the burden of resentment.
  • Tools for setting healthy boundaries and embracing self-love.
  • Brenda's personal journey of forgiving her father, and how you can apply her lessons to your own life.

Episode Highlights:

[2:34] – Brenda shares the details of her complex childhood, her relationship with her parents, and the tragic events that changed her life.
[7:28] – How Brenda found out about her mother’s murder and her emotional journey afterward.
[25:23] – The turning point where Brenda realized that hating her father was like hating a part of herself.
[29:25] – Brenda’s three-step forgiveness process and how she began to release her pain.
[41:17] – The role of storytelling in healing and how Brenda transformed her life experience into a powerful message of hope.
[45:33] – Brenda explains how forgiveness doesn’t always require closure from the other person, especially if they have passed away.

To Connect with Amanda:

To Connect with Brenda & Her Resources:

If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to rate, review, and follow the podcast. Your support helps us continue bringing incredible guests like Brenda to share their powerful stories!

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Manders Mindset Podcast. Here you'll find both monologue and interviews of entrepreneurs, coaches, healers and a variety of other people when your host, Amanda Russo, will discuss her own mindset and perspective and her guest's mindset and perspective on the world around us. Manders and her guests will help explain to you how shifting your mindset will shift your life.

Speaker 2:

Welcome to Mander's Mindset, where we explore the power of shifting your mindset to shift your life. I'm your host, amanda Russo, and I am here today with an awesome guest who I am so excited to speak with. I am here with Brenda Adelman and she is known as the Queen of Forgiveness and she absolutely deserves that title. She's got a very tragic story and if you are struggling with forgiving someone or someone is struggling with forgiving you, you will definitely want to tune into this. Brenda is an award-winning actor with a critically acclaimed one-woman show, my Brooklyn Hamlet, based on her life, that she has performed worldwide. She's a speaker, trainer, director, coach and the recipient of the Hero of Forgiveness Award, which I didn't even know was a thing and is so cool. Her book is titled my Father Killed my Mother and Married my Aunt Forgiving the Unforgivable and includes three proven step forgiveness process, and we are gonna get into that and all of her story. Thank you for joining me.

Speaker 3:

Thanks so much for having me, Amanda Of course.

Speaker 2:

So that's a great bio, but who would you say Brenda is at the core.

Speaker 3:

Brenda is a spiritual being, a new human experience at the core. I'm so much more than my circumstances and what I've lived through. I'm tapped into everything and the beauty and the power of the universe.

Speaker 2:

Okay, Can you tell us a little bit about the foundation? Take us down memory lane. Tell us a little bit about your childhood, upbringing, family dynamic. However deep you want to go.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, sure you know I grew up in a household that was very colorful, lots of highs and lows and a lot of definitely emotional pain and some physical pain in the household as well. Yeah, I grew up in Brooklyn and my dad was this big businessman like out of the mail and he used to speak in rhymes, kind of a caricature of a person, but really funny big salesman in New York. I was definitely the apple of his eye. And then my mom was this bohemian artist, didn't really fit into Brooklyn. She traveled all over the world, read Shakespeare to me. My brother was my half-brother. My father was not his father very artistic.

Speaker 3:

My older brother I remember growing up in a household where he was like I think he was Robin, not Batman but Robin. He had a costume and he chased me around and stuff like that. It was a lot of upset. There was a lot of fighting. There was a costume and he chased me around and stuff like that. And it's a lot of upset. There was a lot of fighting. There was a lot of my father cheating. There was a threat of guns in the household. There was some physical abuse. There was. You know, my father left my mom three times, you know, during the time they were married. God boy, I wish he hadn't come back the last time. I killed her. I was an adult at that point. But he did shoot and kill her and then married my aunt, my mother's sister. So that was growing up.

Speaker 2:

Okay, and now? So growing up and leading did you go to college?

Speaker 3:

My mom started taking me to plays from the time I was like three years old Broadway plays and things like that. I went to Hunter College to study media communication. After college I moved to Europe and I started acting in a play that my brother produced in Vienna, austria. When I came back to New York, bitten by the acting bug, I started studying acting and getting into theater companies. And how long were you doing that for Doing theater and things like that? I really was. I was working in retail in New York City. I was at Saks, fifth Avenue and Henry Bendall and I was in acting class and in theater and I moved to Los Angeles I shall not move to Los Angeles Still kind of doing that thing like pursuing acting and doing. You know, I was a manager in retail at that point and then that's when the murder happened in 1995. And that really just stopped everything.

Speaker 3:

I took a leave from my job a couple of months after my mom was killed and I was going back and forth to New York and cleaning up the house I grew up in. And we're trying to find a will and dealing with my love and my hate for my father. And what am I going to do? And then it was. You know, I was depressed for a good six years but I did get into acting class again about a year after my mom died, and it was really the acting that like gave me some kind of salvation, some kind of like I can feel again, because I was so busy just squashing everything and all the pain. And it was in this class, this acting class, a couple of years later, that I developed my now successful one person show. It was a couple of years later where I was hiding and not talking about anything and so scared, and then I got this inner guidance, really from God, something bigger than me, that was like tell your story. And so I told my story on stage in class, a short version, not ever thinking I would do a show and you'd ever say it all, because I felt so damaged at that point. But I did. I put it on stage and I got standing ovation. The director wanted to work with me to expand it into a show, and so there were like three or so people who came over and said that something healed inside them from the story I was telling and so that gave me the impetus to create the full-length show.

Speaker 3:

Now I actually took time off after my very first production of my show and finished my master's in spiritual psychology because I was already an actress. I knew how to do comedy, I knew how to do drama, but people would laugh, people would cry in the audience and I'd go home and be absolutely miserable and literally not even want to live, because I didn't know how to heal the emotions that were coming up, the lack of closure with my father, and so that foundation, what I learned in that master's program, is really what helped me, what helps me, what I teach, where the foundation of my forgiveness comes from, that I teach and what I use to heal myself, to move from. Not only do I want to express myself, but I am safe, I can make good decisions, I can attract really good people in my life, I can set a healthy boundary. One of my boundaries was taking my dad's court for wrongful death after he got out of this.

Speaker 2:

one and a half to five years in prison, wow. Okay. Now, how old were you when your mother was killed?

Speaker 3:

70?, and how old was she? She was 56.

Speaker 2:

Oh gosh, and how did you find out about that, that your mother was killed?

Speaker 3:

I actually was ready to give my notice at the retail job in Beverly Hills because I was like that's it. I came to Los Angeles, I want to act and I had taken a weekend workshop about the business of acting. I was on a high. It was probably the first time I was ever like a day away from him where I didn't call all the time but I didn't. I was networking. I was like I'm putting my notice into my job. And I got home and it was just really quiet in the house. His son was there, I remember, and he was so quiet, which was unusual. And then he told me that my mom was killed and I really went into denial like well, that doesn't make any sense. They were just here in California visiting and I called my home and the police answered and they said I couldn't speak to my father because he was outside on the lawn. They were talking to him and that's when I realized she was dead.

Speaker 2:

And what did you do from there?

Speaker 3:

I went into shock, I guess, but, you know, went to New York the next day, met with the police who were waiting, my brother and I went to see my father. Day, met with the police who were waiting, my brother and I went to see my father, who was not in jail at that point and because he had a lawyer that he had called and a clean up his gun you know, the same gun I learned to shoot on growing up was gone and we went to my father and was and we're like what happens? What happens? And my father just didn't tell us anything, he just basically lied.

Speaker 3:

And then, you know, we went to my mother's funeral and then, within a very short time, my father moved in with my aunt, my mother's sister, and then I really spent a lot of time going back and forth to New York because nobody was dealing with the house, there wasn't a will that was found right away, and my father was, you know, didn't want to talk about anything, my brother was doing his own thing. So, yeah, that was hard, but I flew back and forth to New York for about a year just like cleaning up the house, and then we did find a will. Yeah, it was a tough time.

Speaker 2:

I can only imagine.

Speaker 3:

And feelings, emotions with that, how A year before that, he had left my mother that third time for another woman who had mob relations. At first I guess I was so caught between I love my father, I hate my father, I love him, I hate him. He was lying to us. He was saying they were fighting. The gun went off. He didn't know what pulled the trigger. It was all lies and didn't make sense. But I was trying to believe his lies because I did not want to lose my mother and my father At the same time.

Speaker 3:

My brother pretty much knew that he did this, I guess at that time, when he moved in with my aunt, because I was so distraught because my father was out of his right mind and he was, you know, not talking and not eating and all this other stuff. So for me, because I lived in California and the initial thing was I didn't understand it but I didn't know they were together, I was more like, OK, this is insane, my mother was shot but my father is taken care of because my aunt is there right now. And then it was on my next visit back that my cousin told me oh, they're together. This is insane. And I was like what. And when I did approach my father at first he did not own that. He said you know, my father had definitely had undiagnosed mental illness, but he also was just a narcissist so he would just say what he wanted to. I didn't know about narcissism then, so nothing made sense to me, but I was trying to believe that he was telling the truth, gosh, that must have been very difficult.

Speaker 2:

Now, you mentioned he was a narcissist. Now, that term I hear all the time. What would you define a narcissist as? How would you?

Speaker 3:

define that A narcissist is someone who has complete self-centered thinking and they have a lack of empathy. I have compassion for it because, you know, I studied about it afterwards, so I understand that they had an attachment disorder. They didn't get what they needed when they were a kid. The thing that was challenging for me is, before I understood that I would not understand why my father could not feel my pain, why he wouldn't answer me, why he wouldn't take responsibility, all these things. And it was very freeing for me to understand the narcissistic tendencies or the sociopathic tendencies with my father, because then I was free. I was like I can stop trying to get him to understand or feel empathy because he doesn't have it, you know.

Speaker 2:

Okay, no, I gotcha. That makes a lot of sense, right, tom?

Speaker 3:

I don't like using just labels, I'm just sharing it because it's a way to understand. People fall into victim and bully mentality, right? People usually identify more with one than the other. I identified as a victim more than a bully for most of my life. Now I, hopefully, am integrated, because sometimes it's like as a victim, you can almost feel like you're such a good person, even though that's not true either, right, it's all interpretation Whereas if you identify as a bully, you got to say I'm doing some things. That might not be nice.

Speaker 3:

It's a fascinating study, all of it, but you know so many people hate narcissists. Good reason People are upset about it because they get taken advantage of. You don't understand narcissism. So also with narcissism, there's always a good part of things like that, right? So sometimes you know, oftentimes, like I said, I was the apple of my father's eye, even when I was an adult.

Speaker 3:

As a narcissist, they're self-centered, but if you are showing like they're your hero, then they're going to be just giving you so much attention. You're going to feel really special. And if you don't have that feeling of being special inside, you're going to misinterpret it and be validated by them. But it's still a little frozen, but hopefully it's fine. It is still living on the end. So I just think there's a way to have compassion for people who have that as well, understanding that they're not like you, they can't have the empathy and that we all probably have some narcissism in us. If you think of it as self-centered, as a victim, we can feel good about ourselves, like, oh, I'm such a good person, like this falls into martyrdom too. But you know, oftentimes we identify more with one than the other, and so someone who identifies as a bully is not usually saying I'm a bully. But it is interesting, isn't it, that people who are victims or identify as that will be like oh, I was a victim to this person, but it's all disempowering and all my work is about being empowered. So if I'm a victim to someone and I'm being disempowered, I'm not taking my power, you know.

Speaker 3:

And then I was just talking about how, with narcissism, you know, when we judge anything, we're disempowered by it. Like you can discern, use discernment. That person is a narcissist. But I was also saying that with narcissism there's a good side to it, or a seemingly good side to it, whereas if someone has narcissist tendencies and they are in love with someone. As long as that person is putting them up on a pedestal, they'll still be so loving to them.

Speaker 3:

If you don't have an inner sense of validation, you're going to think you're worth something because that person is doing that. So the answer is always you know self-love, love yourself more so that you can spot when people don't have the empathy, because, also with narcissists, they can put you up on a pedestal but then as soon as you don't see them as a hero, then they will cut you out, which is kind of what my father did, which I was surprised at because I thought he loved me so much. So it was just, you know, for me a journey of self-love. And then I was thinking about narcissism, because people do use the word a lot. You know. The thing to do is learn. When someone has narcissistic tendencies, understand they can't have empathy, they don't have empathy like you, and move on and also think well, where might you have narcissistic tendencies? Maybe you're self-centered in a certain way, and learn from it.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and now you mentioned your father cut you out. What was that? When was that? Can you delve that?

Speaker 3:

As soon as I wanted answers and I wanted to know what happened, I thought that because we had this loving'm asking him to tell me what really happens the night that my mom was killed by him, why on earth would he ever tell me that? If he's not someone who has empathy, not someone who is going to say, oh please forgive me, I don't know how this happened, if he's coming from a different place, which is unconscious, why on earth would he ever tell me that? So that was just me learning about people's conditions and learning how people operate in the world and what lies people tell themselves, so that they can go on Like if I'm the one in his life that's demanding to know the truth, while everybody else is like, no, let's just not talk about her. Why would he want me in his life then, if he's already that type of person, you know?

Speaker 2:

I gotcha. Now. You mentioned about the victim mentality, about how people can be using that to basically show that they're a good person.

Speaker 3:

I think some of it is learned behavior. I don't think it's even conscious. I think there are a lot of people who feel like a victim and everything I'm talking about is what I've done, like I am a victim to my parents because they did this to me. I'm a victim to my ex who did this to me. First of all, it's not empowering at all, but then there's this inherent in it is like I'm a good person and they're not a good person.

Speaker 3:

But if you're in judgment at all, then that's duality and what's the truth? Or maybe those people were just doing what they do and had nothing to do with you. Like what's the more empowered choice? If you feel like a victim to someone, you're going to attract other people who feel disempowered and like a victim, and that's okay. That's your choice. To not even don't blame the victim either. It's like you do you, but who do you want to be with? Know, probably not the victims and not the bullies, because that's just a level of unconsciousness. Right, my life is about awakening to the truth of who I am, beyond these judgments, beyond these personas.

Speaker 2:

I like how you mentioned that's who you're going to attract. Like, if that's what you want, that's fine, but like that's who it's going to like attracts.

Speaker 3:

Like Right Dovetail, you'll dovetail with people who have the other issue. So if you're a victim you might attract a bully. How many people are in relationships where one person is a victim and one person is a bully? One person is controlling, one person is just, you know, doesn't have it together Because it's a completion in some ways.

Speaker 3:

Right, if someone is not fully integrated and owning all aspects of themselves, sometimes they'll attract, sometimes it works. Sometimes they'll attract someone like there'll be two spouses and one knows nothing about money and the other person takes care of everything, and then once the guy, the person, the woman or the man who's taking care of the money dies and then the other person knows nothing, they're not like integrated as a full being. They've given over their power, and not even in a bad way, necessarily. It's just a level of unconsciousness. In a bad way, necessarily it's just a level of unconsciousness and not to say like the person who's better at something should be doing it, but it's like this level of not owning your power fully and just at least finding out what's going on.

Speaker 2:

So how do you suggest people find the balance of that?

Speaker 3:

It's all about self-awareness, like taking an inventory of who you are. What are your qualities? What are your good qualities? What are the qualities that you judge? What would you like to know more of? Where do you think you don't have power? Where do you?

Speaker 3:

I remember this one thing I learned in my master's that blew my mind. I already knew about projections. Like they would say, if you see a lot of people in your life that are angry, you probably have anger inside you that is either unexpressed or you're a very angry person. It's one or the other like because it's projected. Our inner reality is projected onto the outer world. Right, the outer world reflects our inner reality.

Speaker 3:

And I remember learning about positive projections and it just blew my mind because at the time there was this woman in my acting class who was really talented, really successful, and I remember just really looking up to her, knowing that I could even recognize that and see that is because I had that inside me too, like I had that success already inside of me and that was positive. You know that was like oh cool, right, because if you can't even see that like so, for example, I don't want to go into politics, but like in a political climate. If you can't even see the peace, there's no peace anywhere. That's a reflection of your environment. Or sometimes, with social media, I'll talk to people. I'll be like, oh, I just can't be on social media because it's all these toxic posts. I'm like I don't have toxic posts because that's not where my focus is.

Speaker 2:

No, no, that's true. That's even like, if you look at, like I was looking at one of my friends, tiktok's algorithm, because they were scrolling through nonchalantly, but it was so different than, like the things that are popping up on mine and it just goes to show you what they're looking at. Yeah, no, exactly, and it's like like I'm not seeing. It's just based on what you're looking up, what you're looking at.

Speaker 3:

It's fact that you want to know what you're thinking about is the way social media is nowadays. Just look at your feed. That's what's inside your mind, Whether right, wrong, whatever that is what's in your mind.

Speaker 2:

That's true. I'd love if we could transition a little bit and go back to so you mentioned. You took your father to court for wrongful death. What made you decide to then do it?

Speaker 3:

Well, that's how the system works in a way. What happened was when he went to jail criminally. He went to jail on a plea bargain, which was involuntary manslaughter. The reason for that was because there was a cleanup, so his gun was never found. So there was a possibility if he went to court without the plea bargain that he wouldn't have served time without the murder weapon. So my brother actually agreed to that plea bargain.

Speaker 3:

I mistakenly thought that somehow with this civil case he would have to tell the truth and I would get the answer of what happened. But I learned that's not true, that in a civil case the person doesn't have to show up, because he had his lawyer there, but my father wasn't there. So I went to New York and it was like a soccer punch, like in my mind. I don't know why I didn't know, I don't know why my lawyer didn't inform me. But right when we're at the case and we're in court and we're about to start, my lawyer tells me that my father isn't coming. And I just remember thinking well, I don't even know how I kept it together, because then I had to go into the court with the jury that was a smaller jury there and watch the case and go on the stands and, you know, just not get any information from my father.

Speaker 2:

Oh gosh. So you went to court and it was just his lawyer there, His lawyer.

Speaker 3:

Okay, lawyer representing me, and how did that go? So a civil case is about money, and so we, my brother and I were awarded $2 million in punitive damages by the jury, and right before we were dismissed, my father's lawyer contested it and said it wasn't relevant in this case that my father could get such a big judgment against him. So then we had to wait another God knows how long to get a final judgment, which was interesting because the final judgment from the judge was like 10 pages of why it was so depraved what my father did and why the judgment should stand. That said, my father skipped town and put his money into offshore accounts, so we didn't collect the money.

Speaker 2:

How did you start to forgive him? What was your first thing you did to?

Speaker 3:

forgive.

Speaker 3:

There were several layers. When I teach forgiveness it's a journey. Sometimes people get mad at themselves because they thought they forgave and then they're mad again and they're like you're not going back to square one. It's just a journey. I had this big awareness. I'm trying to think if that was before or after I went to court. It was around that time, probably right before I had this big.

Speaker 3:

Around that time, probably right before I had this big awareness that if I hated my father I was hating a part of myself because he gave me life. And that was enough for me to let go of the anger and resentment. Because then I felt like, well, I'm angry and resentful of me. So I also found compassion into my anger toward him and letting it go by thinking of him as a little kid. I had a picture of him when he was a little kid and knowing his background with his mother, how horrible she was, so that gave me an in.

Speaker 3:

So I was not like I couldn't get rid of my anger toward the man who did this crime, the personality. But I could let go of the anger inside me when I thought of him as a kid and his innocence as a spirit and then I started really loving myself, and if I love myself, I'm not going to hold on to that anger, right. So my definition of forgiveness is letting go of the anger and resentment I hold inside myself towards someone or something that has hurt me or someone I loved. So then in my master's program they had us measuring like how do we feel on a scale. It's something I teach too if I think about him. So I would have days where my days were wrecked because I was going to talk to him or because I thought about him and I didn't want to do that. That's what I have control over. I cannot do that to myself, you know.

Speaker 2:

Okay, no, that makes sense. I like how you mentioned thinking about him as a kid and like his innocence and Basically like removing this, removing that situation, because, man, I can't even imagine. But now you mentioned a scale of how you feel. What is the?

Speaker 3:

scale. It can be done differently. So, for example, I should teach this more. It's basically, you can have a scale one to ten or one to five. Let's say one is I effing hate this person. I hope they die. And five is I feel completely at peace regarding this person and what happened. And then there's the things in between.

Speaker 3:

So, as your day goes on, or let's say you're having to deal with a family member it's how you take control, instead of giving control and your power over to someone else let's say I'm supposed to call. I'll do this like with exes, because a lot of times people have exes and they have to raise a child with them and stuff like that, and they don't want to talk to them, which might be, you know, someone can relate to more than murder. So it's like you know you have to call the person. Well, where are you on the scale of one to five? And let's say you're at a four and you can do things to bring yourself up to a different level.

Speaker 3:

Or, after you get off the phone, you can do meditation, you can go to your therapist, you can do sound healing, you can do movement so that you move it out of your body, and then something super cool too is something called self-counseling. So you're just giving voice to the emotions, so you're not splashing them. It's like you know. I mean I've had clients that were yelling and they pull over the side of the road and yell, you know, before they had to go do something just so you can move the energy. So it's not like a spiritual bypass, so you accurately saying where am I? But then you can also say, like later in the week oh wow, I'm at a two. Today I don't have that power has not been taken from me. This is great because I've been doing my meditations, because I had a healthy release of my, you know, energy.

Speaker 2:

Okay Now. I like that too, in terms of like how things are working, like if you've started implementing sound healing or meditations, and then even comparing the scale to like before, after, and seeing yourself like if you see a difference Right Okay, okay. Yourself like if you see a difference right okay now.

Speaker 3:

I'd love if we could get into your three-step forgiveness process, okay so the first step that's in my book my father killed my mother and married my aunts, forgiving the unforgivable which is on kindle now. The first step. So what happened was I was doing workshops and then I had these workshops and people were like, what do I do next? And that's why I wrote the book years ago. So the first step is moving out of denial and into acceptance of what it is. This is for someone who, like me, was like my father couldn't have done it. I'm going to believe his life, but how it would be, you know, like people I've worked with, it's like you have someone who is an addict in your family and you're like, no, they're really getting better. Actually, look at that and if that's true, so it's about moving out of denial into acceptance of what is, or someone's cheating. If they're cheating, don't be in denial. Move out of denial, because you can only make self-honoring choices if you move out of denial. Really, All my work is about self-honoring choices. If you have added denial, really All my work is about self-honor, making self-honoring decisions.

Speaker 3:

So in this section, one of the exercises is the healthy release of the emotion and embracing the victim. So many people don't want to be the victim, that they end up being the victim. So this means that if you have anger, instead of lashing out on people who don't deserve it or I say lashing in, which is more like what I did, which was I isolate and I would overeat or overexercise because I wasn't dealing with the real level of anger I had toward my father I could do something like I talked about with the self-counseling which is on the top of the. It's not journaling, because you're never reading the stuff over. You are kind of exorcising these feelings out of your body. To identify and release the emotions in my body that I haven't been able to deal with grace and ease. You set aside 15 minutes to two hours, no less than 15 minutes. Because if it's less than 15 minutes, if you're doing free-form writing, you might be writing a laundry list of everything that has to be done versus what's something real. 15 minutes you can have something real come forward. No more than two hours, because it's not about indulging in the emotion. Right, there are people who can indulge, indulge and then it loops and it's again that's not empowering. So you also finish the exercise with grace and ease.

Speaker 3:

I give thanks that I gave myself this space to explore these emotions. But in the middle you have a conversation, first person present, 10th, with the energy, the emotion that you're dealing with, whether it's anger or maybe it's grief. So I would say something like I would write something Brenda, I am really upset, but I don't know how to get in touch with my feelings around my father. Then I'd write A for anger and first person present tense my heart is beating really quickly, I'm sweating. I feel something in my gut Like you're having this conversation back and forth. None of my work is about beating yourself up. So if you find this anger part angry at you like I'm so angry because you didn't set it all down, why did you take that phone call today?

Speaker 3:

So do free form writing. You would bring in your inner guidance, you know your God self, that part that is not hurt, harmed or endangered, and that part comes in and can take everything. It doesn't matter. And you know it's your God self and not your ego, because the kind of things it says are things like I hear you, You're precious, I love you. It's not directing anything and it's not giving advice and it's not, you know, censoring anything at that. So that's the dialogue. Then you just dialogue back and forth and then you do things like open-ended questions. Can you tell me more about that? I love you. Things like that, Okay, Any questions about that?

Speaker 2:

That sounds in-depth, but I like that.

Speaker 3:

You never reread it, because then you're anchoring back in those emotions that you just let go of.

Speaker 2:

I was just going to say I like how you mentioned that, because I hear frequently about journaling, writing it down, but I've never heard anybody say don't reread it.

Speaker 3:

Not only don't reread it, but get it out of your house. Set it on fire safely, Shred it, Put it in your garbage. Get it out of the house. It on fire safely, shred it, put it in your garbage. Get it out of the house Because otherwise that's why I think sometimes with people with all these journals, they're holding all that energy because it's still there in their space. So in that stage you're also a victim, You're embracing it. I hate you. You did this, you did that. You get it out so you don't live with the victim in your life.

Speaker 3:

And then the second stage is giving up your step, giving up your need to be right. So you were really righteous or right in that first step. Second one is giving up the need to be right. You have to Believe me. I know anyone who's grown up in a hard household can be very righteous. I was very righteous when I was a kid because I knew what was right, what was wrong. There was a lot of stuff that wasn't right, that was going on. But as an adult you do not need that righteousness. So to give up your need to be right, that is where you.

Speaker 3:

One of the exercises, certainly in my book, is about getting into the shoes of the other person, and I'm not even saying you have to go with the person who's the worst, because I have worked with so many clients over the years who have been abused as children and stuff like that, so I wouldn't be like, oh, you must have compassion for that abuser. No, go to a therapist. You know I'm not working with you one on one, so do what you need to do to heal yourself. This is just my process. If it works for you, and sometimes you don't go to the person who hurt you the most, you practice with other people. There was a teacher that said something to you and they stopped you from going on your path sooner. Do something like that, because it will still help you with that. And anyone who has PTSD go to your therapist. Deal with your therapist. And there's a lot of people hundreds who have used this. So it is, you know, literally.

Speaker 3:

I have an exercise where you put yourself in that person's shoes and say I don't remember if in front of me, otherwise I'd take it from there Something like you know what was your life like when you were growing up? What were your parents like? What was your greatest hurt? Did you trust anyone? Did you lose anybody? Like you're giving, you're finding out who that person was and it's really designed for you to get an in into your compassion, Because you're the one that holds the compassion or the hate or the fear or whatever. So that's one of the exercises in there. So it's getting everything to be right.

Speaker 3:

And then the third stage not everybody gets here, but it would be a really good stage for everyone to get to, and that's probably why I teach so much about storytelling, healing from a story and sharing others, because it's about being of service, getting the lesson and then sharing it. If you're resilient, share your resilience, share your story to show somebody that there's hope. So one of the exercises in that stage could be volunteering at a hospital, because there's always going to be people worse than you and better than you. So realizing that you can get out of your own way, out of your own head, you are not the person who had the worst thing happen to you, Even though I have worked with people about horrible things happen to them. There's something about giving and not focusing on yourself that helps heal you.

Speaker 2:

Okay, wow, I like that, I like that process and wow, how did you officially develop this as a process? Obviously it was through your own process of forgiveness, but when did you like make it an official process? I guess? No, it makes a lot of sense to me and my story very different and not nearly as severe, but I struggled a lot with forgiving my father and you had mentioned this process to me when we talked before and like reviewing it. I definitely already feel a sense of forgiveness by like working through this. So I'm very curious how you officially developed this, because nothing has helped me have a sense of forgiveness with him, to be honest, with you nothing.

Speaker 3:

So, oh, okay, yeah, so well, there's two things. I wrote this book but I also have a 30-day forgiveness process and that was channeled, because that is four weeks, seven days of lessons and then a couple more, and the first week is forgiving yourself, the second week is forgiving your mother, the third week is forgiving your father and the fourth week is forgiving God, is forgiving your mother, the third week is forgiving your father and the fourth week is forgiving God. And that is really what was channeled for me and that was channeled after the book. But it's all the things that I've learned, getting my master's degree in spiritual psychology for two years. It is not only that, but I volunteered at that program for about four years so I held the space for other people to heal. So I was coming from a healed place, not in it, I was, you know, reading material. I was holding this massive space for a rule of 200 people to heal. It was going to soul retrievals and having the cords cut and, you know, getting acupuncture and going to an anger workshop and doing conscious breathing. And I became a prayer chaplain for Unity Church and you know being on the wisdom council of two different spiritual communities and my writing and my inhabiting the characters that I play. So what my process is very much specific to me Because of the depth of the darkness I went to, and it was my fierce commitment to feeling better and then be able to help other people feel better.

Speaker 3:

The book came about because I was already doing my one woman show, and in the one woman show I include the ceremony that came to me where I took my dad's hat and went to the top of a mountain and I threw it off. It was a ritual to anchor in the healing, to let go of the burden of carrying that resentment. And on the talkbacks after my show people would be like oh, and what else did you do? How did you forgive? Like, oh, and what else did you do? How did you forgive? And actually my first workshop came about because there was a minister in Sedona who knew my story and saw my show and he's like you need to do a workshop and tell people. So I started to develop my three-step process.

Speaker 3:

So what I realized is I was so depressed for so long because I hadn't tapped into the anger, because, especially as women were not supposed to be angry, or angry against my father, like we're so conditioned that even though I went through a two-year master's degree in spiritual psychology, I only tapped into this much anger, you know, because I'm the good girl. Then it was thankfully that anger worship I went to, where I was able to really get in touch with the primal screams and how angry I was in a healthy, safe container. So I realized that I needed to put that anger into the first step, because it was not actually facing that caused me to be so upset for so long. So then, naturally, the next thing for me well, well, really was a God thing. I channeled that 30-day program afterwards because the book can only. You know, the book is like I've coached people separately with the book and then there's only so much that can be contained. It's like a 100-page book. And then, yeah, the program is very deep, very transformative.

Speaker 3:

That's amazing yeah.

Speaker 2:

I love that you're doing that. That's wonderful that you were able to tone this tragedy into something so powerful to help people. Thank you, thank you.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, no, that it's really inspiring, but I into something with you so that you could realize that. You know, it's really sometimes semantics. You don't have to forgive your father. It means letting him off the hook for something, because I don't know what he did and it could have been horrible, and anyway it's always for listeners too. It's always horrible to you, no matter what.

Speaker 3:

It is right, there's different gradients, but it's letting go of the burden of anger and resentment and like this sense of not trusting or fear of intimacy, anything like that. That's what forgiveness does for you. You know what I'm saying. So it has nothing to do with him. It's like you're forgiving for you. You never have to see him again. I took my dad to court for wrongful death, never saw him again. Right, it's about you. Because also, once you let go of that anger, you can start like embracing those masculine qualities that you might still be judging, right, oh, I hated that, that strength, because it was toxic. But what if I could embrace the strength of the masculine and really give myself that gift by embodying it, you know?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's interesting that you said you haven't tapped into the anger, like I think a lot of people may not have, in terms of starting to forgive.

Speaker 3:

That's where you should go, but do it in a healthy way, like the woman who ran the anger workshop. She's retired now. She was just like an earth mother. She was amazing. I don't Anger workshop. They do have them still. It's primal scream workshops. I recommend them, but do your research and I couldn't even get in touch with my anger until I started seeing other people get in touch with their anger. So they're primal scream workshops. I recommend them to anyone who just can't let go. Okay, and do your due diligence.

Speaker 2:

And you said you didn't tap into yours until you saw other people.

Speaker 3:

So the master's program. I did tap into some of my anger, but not really not to what came out afterwards. So I was guided to do this primal scream workshop and it was there where other people I saw other people releasing their anger in the context and container of this healthy workshop, with this woman who was running it, and that is what allowed me to unleash what was inside.

Speaker 2:

Oh, now how? When did you do this? When was this workshop?

Speaker 3:

It was like it was right after I graduated. I graduated from my master's program in 2001. So that was probably 2002 or 2003.

Speaker 2:

Okay, and that was like six, seven years post your mom being killed. Eight years, seven, okay.

Speaker 3:

Wow, oh gosh, I'm uniquely committed to my healing. So, for the people who are watching, how committed are you to your healing? Or how committed you know, or are you just too afraid to let go of the anger? The other thing is I learned about healthy boundary setting, which I teach. The other thing is, I learned about healthy boundary setting, which I teach. I don't think I would have been able to forgive if I didn't understand what a healthy boundary was right, because people go to forgive because they think they should, but then they get walked all over. They have other unhealthy relationships. They don't understand about self-love. That's why, in Phoenix Rising, I teach about that. Because you want to make self-honoring choices. You want to fill yourself up with self-love. That's why, in Phoenix Rising, I teach about that. Because you want to make self-honoring choices. You want to fill yourself up, like, with self-love. You don't want to need anything from the person that you're forgiving, even whether they're in your life or not. It's all about you.

Speaker 2:

Okay Now do you have any suggestions for anybody who might be trying to forgive somebody, regardless of what they're trying to forgive them over, but who is passed on and they maybe can't talk about it with them, maybe can't get what they consider as closure because they're physically not here.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, First of all, I don't think half the people get closure with people, even when they are here, because oftentimes we're like but if that person would just say they're sorry, then it would be fine. A lot of people do that with people who have cheated and stuff like that. Would that be okay or would how they say it not be sincere enough for?

Speaker 2:

you.

Speaker 3:

There's so many different levels of it and, seriously, everything is an inside job. So that's why the good news is that when someone's passed on, it's still an inside job. I got the healing around my father not from talking to him, from doing his inner work, from doing the ritual, from talking to his spirit, from doing my anger work, from doing a self-counseling. I didn't get it from him saying I'm sorry. So I'm really a fervent believer that you do not need to, even if the person's alive, believer that you do not need to, even if the person is alive, ever speak to them If you don't want to get what you need from them. You can do a process where it's like you're sitting at a table with them. The Gestalt is in different chairs. It's a therapeutic thing, but you're sitting in different chairs and you literally say dad, I need you to say you're sorry, and then you switch chairs. I did this with him and his essence. I channel his essence to say I'm sorry.

Speaker 2:

Incredibly healing okay, I never would have thought of something like that. Wow, to physically know that makes a lot of sense because, like you, physically, even if it's not them, like acting it out, seeing it, hearing it, wow, here's the thing.

Speaker 3:

Most people, if they're still how they are in their personality, they're not going to give you what you need, especially because, like what I said in the beginning, my father didn't tell me why he murdered my mother. Probably not, probably never would have. How do you justify that, unless you are deeply spiritual and you're taking a lot of responsibility? But most people who hurt people not all, but most people are in that place.

Speaker 2:

So did you never speak to your dad again?

Speaker 3:

post from Long Island where he and my aunt were living and my aunt had lived for like 40 years. I do the court case and all of a sudden I call the number and it's disconnected. This is a whole nother story in its own, but anyway, I got a message to him through my cousin and he called me and he was like oh, it's all okay, you know we're gonna talk after the case, not telling me he wasn't showing up for the case and then he skipped town. I never saw him again, or maybe the case would go in his direction and then he'd talk to me Wow, that must have been very tough.

Speaker 3:

I can't even imagine it was all very tough, but what I'll say is what I did is I committed to having closure with him before because he died a few years later. But I committed like I understood that my father was never coming back. I could stop hoping and dreaming and thinking he was going to take responsibility. So I had closure. That's part of the, you know, going up on the mountain that time and just letting him go. My father's never coming back the one that I wanted. So that when he did die a few years later, I was, I grieved him. But I wasn't like like I've had clients who have not had closure with parents who are very abusive, some elderly parents, but then someone, one of them, dies and then they feel guilty or something Like I didn't have guilt, it didn't. I just had regular grief and in some ways I was free because still that little part of me that in a child that was like maybe my dad will be back, even though I didn't consciously think that, knew he would never be back.

Speaker 2:

Then Well, thank you so much for speaking with me. I really appreciate it.

Speaker 3:

You're welcome. That was very deeply beautiful.

Speaker 2:

It was. Thank you so much for sharing everything with me and the listeners, I hope some of it is something that you can use as well.

Speaker 2:

Have you heard of a man named Jay Shetty? Yes, so he's got a podcast called On Purpose and he ends his podcast with two segments and I incorporated that into my podcast. Both segments is the many sides to us, and there's five questions and they need to be answered in one word each. Number one what is one word someone who was meeting you for the first time would use to describe you as Spiritual? Number two what is one word someone who knows you extremely well would use to describe you as Amazing? Number three what is one word you'd use to describe yourself? Deep Number three what is one word you'd use to describe yourself? Deep Number four what is one word that if someone who didn't like you or agree with your mindset would use to describe you? Bossy? What is one word that you're embodying right now Presence. Then the second segment is the final five, and there are five questions and they can be answered in a sentence. Number one what is the best advice you've heard or received? Be yourself.

Speaker 3:

Why is it the best? Because there is nobody else but me.

Speaker 2:

Number two what is the worst advice you've heard or received?

Speaker 3:

There's only one way to do something.

Speaker 2:

Why is that the worst?

Speaker 3:

To the core of my being. I don't believe that, so it puts me in a box, and I'm not someone who experiences joy in a box.

Speaker 2:

I know I agree with that 100%. There's multiple ways to do anything you want to do. Number three what is something that you used to value that you no longer value?

Speaker 3:

Wow, this sounds bad, but Huh, I'm just going to say what it is. I think there's different layers of it, but I was going to say my family barge in.

Speaker 2:

Okay. Why do you say you don't value it anymore? Okay, why do you say you don't?

Speaker 3:

value it anymore, Because in a lot of ways it's a dream.

Speaker 2:

It's been so long since that poor family was together.

Speaker 3:

If you could describe what you would want your legacy to be, as if someone was reading it, what would you want it to say? I help the planet by sharing my story and helping people heal from their own stories.

Speaker 2:

If you could create one law in the world that everyone had to follow, what would it be? And I want to know why.

Speaker 3:

Be kind, Because if everybody was kind, then the world would be a kind place.

Speaker 2:

Well, thank you, I really appreciate it. And now, where can the listeners connect with you? They want to get in touch. I'll link your book and the show and all that, but if they want to get in touch with you and work with you, Okay, I'm always on Facebook.

Speaker 3:

facebookcom slash Brenda Edelman. I have a free group also on there called Unforgettable Speaker Society. That is my main social media, and then my main site is forgivenessandfreedomcom.

Speaker 2:

Awesome. Thank you so much, and I do like to always just give it back to the listener. No pressure, but any final words of wisdom you want to share with the listeners, anything you want to say, whatever it may be.

Speaker 3:

I'll just share this. It's in my one woman show, my book on Hamlet as well. I referenced Shakespeare, hamlet saying this above all else to thine own self be true, stop living in the identity that you may have been in the past. Stop living in the roles of who you think you are in your family, and be true to the essence of who you are, that goodness, that good part, that loving part. Be true to that.

Speaker 2:

That was beautiful. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. Thank you, guys for tuning in to another episode of Mander's Mindset. In case no one told you today, I'm proud of you, I'm booting for you and you got this, as always. If you enjoyed the show, I would really appreciate it if you would leave me a five-star rating, leave a review and share it with anyone you think would benefit from this. And don't forget you are only one mindset. Shift away from shifting your life. Thanks, guys, until next time.

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