What up guys, Lisa Bilyu here with another episode that is charmed full of nuggets to empower you to break the toxic cycle and find the courage to actually live your life your way. This is Women of Impact and today I'm joined by none other than the beautifully confident badass Mezra Zavayan and she's on a freaking mission to empower women like you and me to help from past traumas, express yourself fearlessly,

and actually create a new life that you love.

Guys, isn't that why we're here?

To actually love the things that we do in life,

look, I get it, changes scary,

and it can be really tempting to stay with the devil

that you know, rather than face the pain,

set boundaries and make the whole decision.

I get it, in the moment, it is way more comfortable

not to do it. So, Mahumi, if you're ready, it's not only change for a moment, but actually, like, actually be the driver's seat of your life, then this one is for you. Again, I'm Lisa Bilyu and welcome to Weapon of Impact. You have come through so much heartache and betrayal. You've been ghastly, manipulated, you've been caught in a toxic cycle that had you feeling utterly trapped. But not only did you find the courage to finally leave, you've been on your own beautiful healing journey and sitting here right now happy and thriving. So what manipulative tactics did you miss that now you know are just dangerous warning signs? When I meet someone new, if they are overly nice for no reason, or if they are overly complimentary for no reason, to me right now, with where I am, that's a huge red flag. Because I know me, I know I'm a nice person, and I know I deserve to be complimented on everything I've been through and everything I've accomplished. But that person still doesn't know that. They don't know past the surface. So what is it that you are trying to get by being overly nice or over-complimentary? That's the first thing that goes through my mind. Is my mind is this spells danger because it's a big sign of potential love bombing, setting you up for a relationship that's transactional where it's like I'm gonna offer you so much so that you could feel indebted to me one day or I'm gonna offer you so much more than anyone else has ever offered you so that you could look at me always as someone who stood out in that way. And I've just given you so much, or it could be that they are giving you 100% at the beginning, and then they start decreasing that percentage over time bit by bit in very subtle ways. And you're at a point at the end where you're like, what happened? You used to be so nice, you used to be so kind. So that over niceness and kindness and being complimentary for no reason, that's a big red flag for me. Another one is the way I feel in my body. So we've talked about this in previous interviews. Tuning into your body is very, very, very important with people. So whereas in the past, if I was around a person who represented a familiar pattern from my childhood or from my adult years where I get that feeling of safety as in, this is familiar, I know how to navigate it. Even though I can tell it's toxic, my body feels safe because it knows how to survive in an environment like that. Now that I've done the work to tune in to how that familiarity actually feels in my body, because it doesn't good. To be in the presence of something familiar

that's now you're aware is actually toxic, is actually manipulative, is actually narcissistic, is actually abusive. When you are aware that that's what the safety in your body is like, you're like, that's not the safety I want. I want to live a life that's authentic. And to to live a life that's authentic,

I shouldn't be going toward a definition of safety that's not the safety I want. I want to live a life that's authentic and to live a life

that's authentic, I shouldn't be going toward a definition of safety that's protective. Like, I know how to survive this. I should be going toward a definition of safety that's expansive. Like, I can be vulnerable. I can fully be myself and I can feel safe. So now that I recognize that, when I meet someone new and I feel that familiarity from the past, immediately I'm like, no, this familiarity we know feels like tension in my arms. It feels like I can't breathe properly like my chest is collapsing. I don't like this feeling. And so, you know, sometimes people say, well, how can you trust your body? Like what if your body is just scared of something that's really good for it? Like how can you just say, trust your gut when you don't have actual evidence? And this is my answer. The moment you took your first breath in this life, that's how long your body has been with you. Your body remembers things that you don't remember, that you're not conscious of. When you were two months old or a year or two or three years old, you don't remember what your body learned, but your body knows. So if you're in a situation where your body says we don't feel good, we're agitated, we're feeling uneasy, we're feeling like this is way too overwhelming, way too much. Yeah, you can trust it without having physical evidence that there's a reason that you need to slow things down or take a pause, have a conversation. So this was one of the most mind-blowing I learned in therapy. And I actually wrote about it in the only constant. I was in a therapy session and I told my therapist, I know these relationships that are in my life are toxic. I know they're not good for me. I talk to people about walking away from relationships like this. I know they're not healthy for me.

I know I don't feel good, but somehow I choose to stay. Why? And I judge myself and I can't sleep at night and I wake up in the morning and I'm like, I can't believe I'm still keeping those bonds in my life. It literally feels like they're chains that are just holding me in place. they're pulling at me and I'm in the center and I'm just like, I don't know where to go.

I judge myself and my therapist goes, I'll never forget this. I remember exactly where I was sitting when she said this to me. And I was miserable. I got a member feeling so down and like I was suffocating and she goes to me, have you considered that your her body also has a choice? And I was like, what? She's like, your body can make a choice. Just like your mind does. So maybe your mind knows that you need to leave or that you need to end these relationships and cut these cords and these bonds, but your body's like, I'm protecting myself by not walking away because your body thinks that if I walk away, really what's happening is you're pushing the limits of your survival mode and your body's like, that's danger. It's what happens when you feel like you really want to physically get up and open the door and walk away, but you feel like you're sinking into the couch. It's because your body is like, no, that's dangerous. Because maybe when you were younger, you learned about unconditional loyalty and relationships. Like no matter what happens, you stay. Maybe you saw your parents go through a cycle like that. So you learn that leaving is extremely dangerous. So even though your mind knows it's the best thing for you, your body is trying to protect you and it shuts down. It goes into one of the trauma responses like fawning or freezing or so that's why you sit there and you're like, I literally feel like I can't move. So the answer is to look at it as we need to bring our mind and body into alignment. So it really is about changing what your body's familiar is. And you use the word comfortable. Like maybe your body's comfortable. Your body actually, if you ask it, what that familiarity feels like, like sitting in a toxic environment that you know how to navigate, you know that you need to be quiet at certain points, you know that you need to reword something so that they don't get defensive or whatever. That's familiar to your body, and it's a way those are strategies to protect yourself. But if you ask yourself, how does this feel? Really, it's not comfortable. It's extremely uncomfortable because you're fighting with yourself, like your body's like shaking sometimes or you're just pushing down what you really want to say or the life that you really want to live. It's extremely uncomfortable. I always ask people this question. I say, what was your snapping point? Like, what was the moment you just you got up and you left? I ask this all the time because people know for a long time before they're going to end a relationship or before they cut a bond they have with a family member or they just they know for a long time and they feel stuck and they feel like they just can't move forward with it. It's too scary. But then there's always that one little event that happens and it's like the blurry thing that was in front of them just disappears and they see things clearly and they're like, that's it, I'm done and they're done. And they never look back. It's interesting how in a moment like that, everything flashes before your eyes. Like all the things in that relationship that hurt you and upset you and the things that you've accepted for so long that it's like you look at you look back at yourself and you say how did I accept that? Like I right now don't accept that and I feel like every version of me that existed in that relationship also didn't accept that but I somehow convinced myself that it was okay for me to accept that or that there was no other option. Like I had to. And it's a truth because if what's more important for you is to keep the relationship, you're going to lower your standards, you're going to overlook so many things. And if you are with them an impulative person, the littlest grievance that you bring up isn't met with openness and acceptance and willingness to understand your feelings and sit with you in those feelings. It's usually met with either defensiveness or they're blaming you for your own feelings or for bringing something up or you're not happy, just leave. And so you know, if you bring something up, there's going to be the threat that this relationship will end. So give yourself compassion and say, my intention wasn't to be manipulated. My intention wasn't to be lied to. My intention wasn't to be put in a position where I have to choose between myself worth and what I deserve and staying in this relationship. I shouldn't have ever been put in a position like that. And so when you give those past versions of you, including the past versions of your body and what it's sought and what it thought was more important, that connection with them, then you're able to, in a moment like that, when you snap, you say, you know what, I'm not judging myself. I'm not going to look back and say, I should have left two years ago or five years ago or ten years ago. This was the right time for me to leave. Wow. That was so beautiful. And so I've never heard of the familiarity thing from a you can use it as a way to say, this isn't right for me because so many, right? We keep repeating, many of us repeat our mistakes because of that familiarity, because it almost feels comfortable. So you haven't gone through all that, been able to then almost articulate, okay, this isn't,

this is very familiar to me. Okay, is that good or bad? It doesn't serve me. Okay, how do I change that? Then I think a big part of what you're saying is you've put words and language to all the things that had happened. Right? Is that, oh, he did like to me. That was manipulation. manipulation and now having putting words is the thing I hear a lot.

So once I put words to it, people don't feel like they're going crazy.

It doesn't feel like it's just them. And now they feel almost have that validation in themselves. It's like, this is why you left because it wasn't good for you. The tactics that people use with us, I think it's harder for us to see the more deeper in the relationship we are. So if we can see it from the get-go, then maybe we don't end up going down a spiral that ends up becoming harder to get out of. What other forms have you seen and heard that we can start to really look out for? The silent treatment is one of the first things that comes to me when When you're really trying to be heard by someone,

when you're really trying to be seen by them for the pain that you're in, that they took part in, when you're trying to express to them how their actions or their words affected you hurt you, made you feel betrayed. Instead of them responding to you, they will just completely go quiet and hope that you either retract what you just said or that you never bring it up again or that you have a battle with yourself over whether you should have said it or not, whether you're overreacting or not. And sometimes the silent treatment is also intended to make you feel even more attached to that person. Why is that? Because you begin to try harder to prove your worth to that person. So sometimes they'll use the, I don't want to say it's indifference, I want to say it's intentional in difference to make you feel like you need to try harder. Like maybe if you scream loudly enough, they will listen to you. Maybe if you try hard enough to be or mold into the person that they want you to be who is, you know, quiet and never brings up these issues and is okay with them, then they will be like, oh, she deserves that I stay with her or that I give her attention or that I marry her one day or whatever. So the silent treatment is a huge red flag because the silent treatment is literally telling you, like if I give you the silent treatment, I am telling you, I don't see you. Like you're right there and you know that you're right there, but you feel like I'm looking at you but I'm seeing right through you. That's devastating when we feel that.

So... And you know that you're right there, but you feel like I'm looking at you, but I'm seeing right through you. That's devastating when we feel that. So, it puts you in a very weak and vulnerable position, and you're seeking comfort or support or to feel seen or to feel heard. And if that's the person in your life that you love, that's your partner. Obviously, you want that from them. So they become the person who's hurting you and in your mind the only person who can heal you. So they become the person who makes you feel like they are blind to you or like you don't deserve the time of day with them. And at the same time they are the person whose time day you want, and they are the person who you want to be seen by. So becomes like a, the relationship becomes more addictive. That's how trauma bonds work. So the silent treatment from a very early on, I would definitely say that's a huge red flag. I also should say for for many people listening, they might think, well, I was with someone who was amazing for the first six months or for the first year and I, there were genuinely no red flags. And then out of the blue, once we settled down together, everything changed. Don't blame yourself for not seeing it sooner. They could have done that good of a job because they knew that that's what it took to get you. So don't blame yourself for falling for that. Don't blame yourself for not seeing it any sooner. But once you start seeing it, start registering it as this is who they really are, not as an exception to my image of them and what it is. It's not an exception. If there's a behavior that's completely off and it comes a year in or two years in, you really have to pay attention to that and not file it under like it's a one-time thing. Well, where did that come from? And sit with that. Because I think what happens is once you're so invested in someone, it's harder for you to look at the bad things that happen as signs that you need to leave. You might see it as a sign of, you know, we've been together for two or three years or 10 years, we've invested so much in each other, we've started a business together, we've started a family together, maybe this is just something that we work through. And there isn't even an option in your mind that maybe this is something that needs to not be in your life altogether. So I just needed to say that because I know some people are like, I really didn't see

it.

There really were no signs.

...