How well do you know yourself??- Cele's Reflection Part 1

I know it's been a minute, guys. I hope you watch Link. If you buy Link, you can watch www.njugush.ke. You watch your TNT there. Now we are back. We are back for Celeste Reflection. And so help me God, we chop him back the next day at TNT. Consistently. So today's topic, as you've seen, it's about relationships. Well, everything, almost everything about relationships. I have a guest who's going to be a professional. No, I have a serious professional on set. Reason being, But from where we live, from the social media, what we see. Issues do about. It's like relationships are not working. Like from what we see. It is like, when you start dating, hey, you've just gone there. Let's just wait here and we'll tell you. Even a person who has a lot of hope that his relationship will be good, he's afraid. Because everything out there is just, hmm, you too. We're waiting. A true story. When I got married, at a school, where we used to live in that apartment, We were just four houses, and one was a landlord, so three tenants. So I was fired in 2016, so I didn't have a job, so I was left alone. So one day it happened, I don't know, we were in the same neighborhood, we went to pick up someone, I don't know, the three of us. I never said that, let's just tell them. I said I didn't want to deal with those neighbors. They were not bad neighbors, but they are still good friends, we talk. But there was a whole 30 minutes of celebration to get her to study. You're the first girl with a celebrity, you, you. The girls are the first, you, you. I mean, until I got to Shinduwa, they were waiting for this moment to come, the day they would tell me. I mean, it's like they know something that I don't. That's when the girls started to smile. They started giving me all this negative energy. Anyway, guys, that's a story for another day. And that's the reason why I have a therapist-struck psychologist on my show today. Mr. Kamau, welcome. Thank you. Thank you. I talked to you a lot before. That was fun. No, but I just remembered that. Imagine. Anyway, introduce yourself. Well, my name is Kamu Mwangi, and as you said, I'm a psychologist and lecturer at Tangaza University in Karen. And I'm also a psychotherapist. So those are the two things that I generally do at the moment, yeah. So you are a psychotherapist. So you do both. You can therapy. You're a therapist and you're a psychologist. Yes, yes. So not every psychologist is a therapist. That is what I wanted to ask. Not all are both. Yes, not all are both. But you can be both. You can be both, depending whether you did counseling psychology or clinical psychology. So, but we have very, very many fields of psychology, but not everyone who does psychology can be a therapist as such, yeah. So, yeah, not every psychiatrist even is a therapist, yeah. Well, like, not every, let me give you an example that is home to me. Not every content creator can be an influencer. Oh, that's a good one. Yeah. That's a really good one. Not, I can be a content creator, but maybe me, personally, me ni content creator. Maybe I'm both to you. I don't know if I influenced you. Big time, big time. I was geeking by the way. I was geeking. This is the first time I'm meeting her. I was geeking like mad. And it, but it was. Yeah. So my topic today, especially from that story. Sorry, I just remembered now. Because the society, we have good relationships. We have good banner. We have, well, Margaret Kenyatta and we have Ruto and the, like, we see the good ones, but the bad ones, those, I'm counting you like this, like, I don't know why, until you reach a place, someone, a young girl wants to get married, I'm a young man. But the society, the stories out there, why? Why is it that relationships are not working that much nowadays? There are those that are working, but the problem is... Well, let's start with what we were given, which is called our brain. Let's start from there. Our brain. Yes. So our brain has something we call negativity bias. That means our brain registers more negative stuff than positive. That means the stories of pain you have, you have more details than the good. Because our brain wants to keep you alive. So it is going to remember the danger points more than the positive points. And that's how we are made? Yes, that is now. That's how our brain are. So we call that negativity bias. So we tend, so when... What kind of gossip goes around? The one that marriage is stable and nice? The negative. Because we enjoy that. Our brain likes that. Our brain likes to feed on that. You enjoy that too? Yeah. Personally, well, I'm a therapist, so I listen to these kind of things a lot. When I'm done, I'm like, hey. But we love the negative. That's true. Correct, correct. So we like who is going out with who. Your marriage here, Selena, celebrity, it's a work. Give them some years. Sorry, okay. I don't know. So it's something that is made to happen like that. So we are, yes, we are inclined to work like that. Now, why are so many relationships not working? Number one is how many of us get prepared for relationships? Very few of us get prepared for relationships. How am I supposed to get prepared for a relationship? Like, in the sense that you're a content creator. I'm sure you have taken several classes. Before I became a psychologist, I was trained for so many years for that, right? But oftentimes, let us look from the church perspective. When someone wants to get married, how many classes are you given? Those classes, marital. Marital classes. Since we did, I think, two weeks. Two weeks, okay. So two weeks. Tell me one job, one respectable job you can get after two weeks of training. Hakuna. Hakuna. So that's one of the problems that we have. Very, like your, the engagement is so intense, forever, but the training and the preparation is so small. And then we are coming from broken homes. Okay, oftentimes you're coming from places where we didn't see what love looks like. You ask a lot of people, would you want your marriage to look like your mom and dad? They're like, nope, nope, I don't want that. Ah, that's a very good sign that these people's template of love is also not very good. Because it works like this. Our brain loves the love that we receive from our parents. The system that our brain uses to receive love from our parents is the same system it uses to love our spouse. So what you're saying is the way I am loving my son. Yes. The way I'm loving Tugi. Tim. The way you're loving Tugi. No, the way I'm loving Tugi is the way he will love his wife. Yes, yes, correct. Oh, so I am teaching him. Yes. You are teaching Tugi how to love. How to love. Remember, you have a... So brain is your hardware. The mind is the software. So let's say this is the brain. All the apps inside here is what we call the mind. Okay? The brain... When I'm at Israel before you're 10 years, it's done, the hardware is done. But the mind takes 27 years. Do you know what that means? It means that you are still, the brain is still like absorbing still, absorbing and learning and learning. It's a learning machine. So Tugi is watching you and Tim. He's watching you fight. He's watching you reconcile. And he's going to do exactly the same, right? So if he doesn't see a lot of fighting and then someone fights him at church, he does not know how to deal with that because he's not a fighter. He has not seen conflict. So he's well protected in that sense. You see what I mean? So we are constantly absorbing the manner in which we saw love happening. So it's very fascinating things for parents to know that they're constantly modeling who their children are going to love. They're the biggest influences of their future child's relationship. So Tugi, for example, Tugi is more beautiful than the wife. Wife to Tugi is something else. Yes. So this too, when they meet, you'll have problems. It will be a problem, but the good thing is, because Tugi grew up in a stable, loving place, he is very alert to red flags. More than the person who grew up. So what happens is we have what you call attachment theory. So I'm going to explain that a little bit. So in psychology, the attachment means that, as I was mentioning to you, the way your parents loved you, with a certain amount of love, you are going to look for someone who loves you the same amount of pain. Let me explain that. So we have what you call avoidant attachment, okay? So let's say your parents are not very consistent in responding to emotional and physical needs. They avoided responding to that, okay? You realize that crying doesn't do anything to my mom. She's not going to take care of me. You realize that when you try to say you have a problem, your dad is like, shut up, what's wrong with you? So you realized, okay, so people are not usually emotionally available. I should not expect it. So when you know you're an adult, you are in two places where you want to love. And at the same time, it freaks you out to love. Do you understand? So you are in this place of loneliness. You want to be in a relationship. And yet when someone wants to love you, you push them away. Because that's what you do. Yes, you push them away. But the desire to love remains. You see? And so these kind of people can be very, very independent. The idea of relying on someone scares them because they know that that person is not going to be there tomorrow. So they become radically independent. I don't need anyone in my life. They can be very wealthy. They can be very good, but they don't know how to sustain a relationship. The other side is, sometimes your parent would respond with love, sometimes they would not. Sometimes they would ignore you, sometimes they would be there. So you don't know whether your parents tomorrow are going to respond or not. So you become anxious. When you grow up, you go into a relationship as an adult, you're always anxious. Will he call tomorrow? Will he love me? Who are you hanging out with? Why didn't you talk to me yesterday? Are you mad at me? Should we break up? You're constantly anxious. Then the other person is like, yes, yes, yes, yes. Oh God. So people with anxious attachment, they have a very poor self-esteem and they always think they are the problem in a relationship and they think the other person is the best. And people with an avoidant attachment, they think they are the best and the other person is the problem. And often these people end up in the same relationship. So one abuses the other. Now we have the secure attachment where your parent responded consistently with love to your emotional and physical needs and you attract someone similar to you. And that's the beauty of it, in the sense that if you are loved properly, you will attract someone who is loved properly. Then this will work. This will work. So there's a very, very low chance of someone who is securely attached or someone who is loved consistently to end up loving someone who is inconsistently loved. Because when it comes to this, like attracts like. So does it mean the avoidant one, like you meet the liked one, the one who's raised well, they can work out? They can work out. Chances are lower. Chances are lower. Simply because the secure person is very available. It's going to be checking on the avoidant person. Hey, how are you? How was your day? But remember, the person with the avoidant personality will keep on pushing. And you know, we say, what they do is, before you leave me, I'm going to leave you. Oh. I don't know, but let me ask you something. So, I can't tell you which person. And I'm sure most of us. After watching this, well, it's okay to generalize. But because most of my life, I was in boarding school. So by the time I grow, either my dad was working far, and I'd come Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and I'd share. He was there. It's not that he wasn't there. I was in boarding school, and I was in one week of registration. So I can't tell you. Which, which, I know we were going to church and we were eating ice cream, we were passing by the studio, we were taking pictures. It was nice, it wasn't bad. So now when you tell me where I am, I can't tell you exactly which person I am. It wasn't. They were not fighting, there were no fights between my parents, so I didn't see that. They were, like, it was just a normal home, if I may say. Dadi ya kuje, na maka, na nini, tupike, githeri, tulale. See, these are bedtime stories. We didn't have bedtime stories. But that was enough for me. So, if you ask me what kind of person I am right now, and I'm sure most of us, we don't know. So, sisi, maybe we translate it to a relationship as you work. I don't know, how can I know what kind of a person? Right. Am I? Well, there are assessments that we do. Like if you come to me for therapy, I can do an assessment to see what's your attachment style. I'll give you a sort of an assessment, a series of questions. You'll answer them. And then from there, we'll be able to figure out what kind of attachment style you have. But you're also looking at your own situation. You might find that in your relationship, you are pretty much like how you grew up. You're okay with a bare minimum. You don't have too much expectations because that's how you also grew up. So you can also observe that. But then also understand that attachment is not written in stone, okay? You can come from a broken home and you know what broken home is. And you can be very, very intentional. With now your home. Yes, with your own home, with the way and manner in which you love. The problem is these attachments, we are not aware of them oftentimes. We are not aware of them. But I can look back at my series of relationships and I can find a common thread in the girlfriends I've been dating and breaking up with. I can look at the common thread in my sexual life. I can look at the common thread in maybe the boyfriends you've dated and you can see what is consistent about them. You might find that, oh, all the girlfriends I tend to date are very emotionally unavailable. Right? Who was like that in my family? Was it my mom or dad? Is that how my family was? People were emotionally unavailable, right? So maybe the people I break up with, they're very, very much available. And I cannot tolerate it. Like you're into my space too much. Was that the way it was in your family that you find when someone loves you too much, you're like, you know, consistently you're like, it's too much. Are you too much available yourself? Because you're always worried, well, this person might leave me. Maybe I'm not good enough for this person. So you have an anxious attachment. You're constantly asking yourself, does this person really love me? I don't know what to say. You're constantly anxious. That's your thinking pattern. So those are signs that, yeah, there is something not working here. And possibly it is you. You need to examine and look into that. So are you telling me, you don't know all this? Is it curable? You can come out of it like you can come out from being an avoidant person to when I'm all grown, I'm just a good person. Okay, it's not that I'm a bad person but I'm just a secure person. Yes, I can. Because you see, our brain has something called plasticity. That means our brain can grow. If a neuroscientist did a brain scan of your brain in the beginning of this conversation, and then you learn something new from me. And the neuroscientist does a test after this. They can tell the difference that you have learned something new because your brain has changed, literally by learning something new. So your brain has plasticity. We call that neuroplasticity. That means it can constantly mold itself to new information. And start using the new information. So intentionality. Intentional. You can be very intentional and tell your partner, Hey, look. This is how I grew up. I understand my personality. I tend to be very avoidant. So when you see me acting like this, I may be trying to push away, but this is what is happening. But I'm trying to work on it. So the other person knows. So a certain vulnerability. Yeah, so this, now this brings me to the point that you don't have to come from that bad, or rather not bad, from the way your nini was, from what you saw when you were young. It doesn't have to be exactly what yours would be. Yes, it doesn't have to. Because I feel, so you can change it. It's like we're using it. We call that land helplessness. Learned what? Learned helplessness. The action of them saying, you know, because I grew up, my dad was like that. Yeah, my dad drinking, abusing my mom. So that's why I'm like that. I feel like home to a shaggy valve. So that's why even me, I'm like that. So you just change it. If you didn't like it, if you can change it, change it. Let me tell you about a fascinating experiment in psychology. So there is this psychologist called Martin Seligman. What he did is he took a dog, put it in a cage, And then made, so the floor of the cage had electric shocks. Okay, and then the dog could not jump out. Okay, so it would get electric shocks all over. And he could not run out because he realized there's no way he could run out. Then he would take the dog and put it in a new cage where it can actually jump out. And then put electric shocks. But the dog is already in the mind. In a cage. Yes, it's in a cage. That is exactly what happens with this kind of attachment. Even when we can run, our brain has already convinced us. We can't. We can't. And so someone else watching us from outside is like, why can't you just leave that bad relationship? But you're like, I can't. The person can't. Because our brain prefers to be hated than to be ignored. Because if you hate me, you see me. If you ignore me, you don't see me. You don't see me. And the brain hates that. We hate being ignored. So I'd rather be in an abusive relationship where at least a person sees me than in none at all. Which should not be the case. It should not be the case, but loneliness kills. Loneliness kills at least 5 million people annually, globally. It's not a joke. It's not a joke. And loneliness is increasing big time in our world today. Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? Now what do we do? It will be the best more than the shows we've done. It's going to blow out the most. On AT&T, we do it, we sell it, we feel cured. It still doesn't get much. That's when you want to have something. Like a scandal. Because when you're doing it good, even the society, it's like it's normal. We don't see that. But something bad, like bad. You haven't even heard his story or her story. Whatever you saw, you took that. You blow it out, like completely. Partly one of the reasons that scandals like this work is If my life is not working out very well, right? And the people who are admired and their relationship is working, suddenly it does not seem to work. You know, you just feel, ah, I feel good. We are so many. You comfort yourself. Yeah, you comfort yourself. We call that crab mentality. There is this idea that if you put crabs in a bucket, you don't even need to cover them. Because as soon as one of them tries to get out, the other ones will pull it back down. So they will remain there because none will get out. So we call that crab mentality. So people enjoy that, those kind of scandals. But it's a problem because everybody's enjoying that. Yes. To go angry, to enjoy scandals. Negativity bias. We love those kind of conversations. We love those kind of gossip, office gossip, whatever gossip it is. It's always on the negative side of things. And our brain constantly looks out for that. It wants to hear that. Gossip played a role in human beings living together. So it's a huge part of our history. So it's very difficult to get rid of gossip. Right? So when we are able to, someone is up there, we enjoy it. Just remember when you're in high school and you are given results of your exam and you open it, you're like, man, I'm 27. You open it. Then you look at yourself, you're 21, 15. You open it yourself. Right? We're a lot, right? But when someone is, the one student who is doing very well, what do we start saying? Because it's challenging us. We're a teacher and an impender. We hide their books. You know, we want to show you you're not so different from us. You know, you are that prophet hated in their own home. You know, stop calling us forward. So we like to kill the prophets who are reminding us that we can be better constantly. Yeah. So that's something about the dark side of human nature, unfortunately, where... We have created an environment where it's very, very competitive. And when we realize we can't get to the top, we start pulling the ones who are the top down instead of realizing, okay, there is enough for everyone. But there's a huge scarcity mentality that there's not enough. And so we're going to make everybody who tries to look better than us look bad, you know? The other challenge is... We have idealized romance and relationships, okay? You go to IG, you go to, you watch movies, right? And you look at these perfect relationships. I was about to say, I was about to say actually what you were saying, because you see, they see, they only see, I think you see only, let's say 70%, I don't say 70% because they know my house, they know my kids. I can say they see a lot, but there's 30% They don't know at all. Or let's say even 50% they don't know. Possibly more, yeah. They don't know Sele. Well, guys, I think you know me because I'm always here. Right. But there's that one woman, Tugi, that Sele. I can't even tell her. But because you see all this nice stuff that we post, nice life that we post, you start feeling like this is a couple goals. Yes. Actually, we don't make couple goals. And you see her, you don't know, she posts two in a day. But in your head, That's what a couple goal is. But behind the scenes, how do we... Yes, you have not seen the work that maybe you and Tim have put in place. And we don't know the culture of your house, of your home. We don't see all that. We see the finished product. And so there is the finished product that is healthy that we see, but I think there's so many exaggerated finished products out there. And that is impressing on people. It's impressing on a lot of young people. And they're going into relationships with a movie expectation, with a series-like expectation. And I get to tell them, I'm going to eat every day. Right. Right? I said we used to. I haven't done that. Or even there's a conflict, just a normal conflict. And they're like, but you're not supposed to fight. We love each other. Oh, yeah. How can we fight? But one thing we tell couples when we are preparing them for couples is, the best thing you can do is not to think that you will never fight. The best thing that you can do is to learn how to fight well, because you will fight. Yeah. So how do you fight fairly? Across everything else. Oh, yeah. So what do you do? So how do we fight? Okay, we don't fight maybe when our emotions are very high. Okay, we don't fight when we have maybe taken alcohol. We don't do that. We don't fight in front of anybody. We don't fight in front of our kids. Okay, you don't say abusive words. Okay, so if there's something, if you're a difficult conversation, we have a date to go and figure that out. So we figure out the parameters of how we fight. How to fight. Yes, because you will fight. Fighting is a must. Yes. So the best thing is not to wish there will never be floods. The best thing is to have a knack ready when floods come. It's a better thing of looking at it, you know. And how do they take it in that class? You know, it's really, it's very interesting. Do you know how our, what are they called? Those classes, they're called? Premarital classes. Premarital. I was. We were with a pastor who took care of us. So you don't expect in-depth or a lot of stories. So I was reading a verse. The one where he spoke to the disciples. David? Down to the beard. I don't know who was that. Who was that on Roby Billia? I knew he spoke to the disciples. So imagine, this is our class. That's true, girl. Yeah, pretty much. Even now I don't know if he spoke to the disciples. It should be David by Samuel. To his beard. Yeah, Samuel something. Guys, I go to church, but... I was actually thinking a pastor would be much better because he has a wife at home than me. So? But massage, by the way, I think it's really good. I agree. But it cannot be everything. It cannot be everything. It's just the icing on the cake. I don't know why my husband doesn't have a beard. So you're not finding what geeky you end up being? Yes! I'll keep that as a cue. Anyway. Anyway, guys. Right. I'm not trying to say, at least you say, I still remember your story, but I feel like if now I was going for a pre-marital class, I would see a psychiatrist. Psychotherapist. Psychotherapist. Marital therapist. Psychotherapist. Psychotherapist who gives medication. Oh, medication, yeah. So, a psychotherapist. Because, according to Pasi, I feel like this couple is coming They're using the same template. Yes, and like you, you'll ask Tim, where do you come from, where do you come from? You'll dig deeper. That is true. We are very intentional about... See, one of the mistakes that I find people making is, you know, you're married to your wife and you're loving her like as if she's like any other woman, right? And you're saying, Okay, there's some similarities. I'm not refusing across women, across men, surely. That's why some jokes work, you know, when someone makes a joke and you're like, my wife does this and you're like, oh yeah, even mine does that, right? But at the end of the day, your husband is not everybody. So what works for one couple may not work for the other. But you've got to figure that out together. Figure that out together. Now, don't figure that out 10 years into your marriage, five years into your marriage. Sometimes that's a bit too late. Already there's one, two, three children present. That's where dating and courtship matters. Like have those difficult conversations during dating. And I have one difficult conversation that I want us to have. All right. Guys, this is part one. Bye-bye. We tell them bye-bye. Then we do part B. Bye-bye. Been a pleasure. Pleasure see ya. I love that difficult conversation. Now we talk about money. Money, money, money.