The CBT Dive

CBT Shorts: Can’t Break My Soul - When Dating Meets Grind Culture

• Rahim Thawer, MSW • Season 1 • Episode 16

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In this special Shorts episode, we revisit some highlights from a previous season that dive deep into personal journeys and the challenges of dating apps. Our guest, Terence, believes that everyone is on their unique path. Yet, he struggles with feelings of resentment when judged by people with impressive job titles and comfortable bank accounts.

Join host Rahim Thawer and Terence as they invoke the wisdom of Beyonce to reframe Terence’s feelings of inadequacy. They explore how capitalism and grind culture can be especially tough for those managing trauma and adult ADHD. Watch as Rahim guides Terence through a thought record, helping him reshape his self-perception and view of potential Tinder matches.


ABOUT THE CBT DIVE PODCAST
The CBT Dive is a video podcast that brings therapy skills to the real world. Each episode welcomes a new guest who wants to explore a challenging situation using the most common cognitive behavioural therapy tool: the thought record.

ABOUT HOST
Rahim Thawer is a queer, racialized social worker and psychotherapist based in Toronto. He's created The CBT Dive podcast to support folks who want to learn how to use a thought record and to demystify what therapy can look like.

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SPEAKER_01:

Hello, hello. Welcome to the CBT Dive. This is a video podcast that shows you how to use cognitive behavioral therapy skills in real life. I'm psychotherapist and social worker Rahim Thawar. Today's show is a CBT Shorts episode from season one, where we have collected key moments for you to dip into. Welcome to another episode of the CBT Dive. Today we have Terence. Terence is a special guest. I met him on my travels in South Africa. He is 29 years old, born and raised in Cape Town, identifies as pansexual. Some interesting things about Terrence are that he is an overall creative. He's a published playwright, a screenwriter, and a drama teacher. Terrence is a person who is in recovery. He attends weekly AA meetings. And he shares this information with us because he's open about his recovery journey. And he's felt like the AA meetings are a safe space where people can share their experiences without receiving unsolicited advice. So those have been extremely therapeutic experiences for him. Welcome, Terrence. How are you today?

SPEAKER_02:

I am stunning. It's a beautiful sunny day. When the sun's out, I am always happy, especially in the middle of winter.

SPEAKER_01:

Me too. If this could be Cape Town's winter every day, I would be so happy. I would be so happy. Terrence, a quick question for you. Outside of the AA therapeutic space, have you accessed other kinds of therapy before?

SPEAKER_02:

Before I got sober, I had made a practitioner, a TRE practitioner, trauma release exercise is what I think it's called. Oh, amazing. And I've done some of that. But sobriety also is just shaking off a lot of the bad jujus. And I've found that to be helpful at the time.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay, amazing. You are steeped in the process of reflection, insight, behavior change. So... I don't need to tell you this, but, you know, doing one thought record is, you know, it's probably not going to be life-changing, but it's one of those things that you add to your toolbox of insight. And that would be the goal for us today is to gain a little bit more insight, areas where you experience a certain intensity of negative or difficult emotion. We can maybe... contain it a bit or reduce its intensity. Does that sound like a reasonable goal for today? Absolutely, yes. Absolutely. All right. I am going to go ahead and share my screen. Now, this thought record is a linear tool. It's one of the most popular tools in cognitive behavioral therapy, and it allows us to work through a situation, a very specific situation. So in our initial call, we talked about situations that might bring up difficult feelings for you and we identified um that one challenging situation is when you're swiping on tinder so you're on this dating app and you start to become acutely aware of people's professions and especially that of younger guys before we go and analyze this anything else we need to know about the the setting

SPEAKER_02:

um Well, I'm at the point where I am, and I've put it on my profile also, I'm not necessarily looking for a relationship. Rather just, I guess, social connections, meeting up for a drink and going with the flow and just, you know, becoming maybe just friends or whatever. Yes. But definitely not in a space of wanting

SPEAKER_01:

relationships. Absolutely. I can appreciate that. So let's dive right in. When you think about this situation or you recall this situation, cause it's a reoccurring one, right? It's not one difficult moment you had. It's a recurring thing. Tell me about some of the feelings that come up when you're aware of people's professions.

SPEAKER_00:

So, um, I'd say, yeah,

SPEAKER_02:

first off, there's embarrassment. There's resentment.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, resentment.

SPEAKER_02:

There's frustration. And there's anger. And a lot of it's internal

SPEAKER_01:

towards myself. Of course, yeah. Look, this is a good list of feelings that have come up and it wasn't too hard for you to identify them, which is good. So we've got embarrassed, resentful, frustration or frustrated and angry. I'm going to ask about a couple more feelings because sometimes it's nice to have to thicken it up a little bit or to fill the bucket, as it were. So let me know if any of these feelings resonate with you. Sadness?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, there's a degree of sadness, definitely.

SPEAKER_01:

Is there any cynicism

SPEAKER_00:

or skepticism?

SPEAKER_01:

It's nihilism. I'll put that down. I mean, that is, I don't know if nihilism is a feeling, but I, I guess, you know, we'll, we'll go with it. How about ashamed or inadequate?

SPEAKER_02:

Inadequate. Inadequate is a nice one. I think ashamed goes with embarrassed. Definitely inadequate.

SPEAKER_01:

Is there any Worry or fear or anxiety? There is definitely anxiety.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay. There is fear as well, yes. There's fear.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. Anything else?

SPEAKER_02:

There is a degree of... excitement when one swaps because it's you know there's that that that there's hope there's excitement and there's hope hoping that you um you know you find a match

SPEAKER_01:

yes look even if the excitement is the smallest slice of the pie chart when it comes to your feelings in the situation it's still worth putting down so i've added excitement and hope our next task is to rate each of these emotions on a scale of one to 10. So 10 is the most intense that you feel it in this particular situation, and one would be not intense at all. So how would you rate embarrassment?

SPEAKER_02:

I'd say a

SPEAKER_01:

seven. Okay, and resentful? An

SPEAKER_00:

eight.

SPEAKER_01:

Frustration or frustrated?

SPEAKER_02:

Also an eight.

SPEAKER_00:

Angry? Seven. Sadness? I'd say defeat. Okay.

SPEAKER_01:

Nihilism?

SPEAKER_02:

Currently a seven.

SPEAKER_01:

Wow. Okay. Inadequate or inadequacy? An

SPEAKER_00:

eight. Anxiety? Six. Fear. Five. Excitement. Five. And hope.

SPEAKER_01:

Four. Okay. So when you're swiping and you feel this range of things, what do you tend to do? We're in the next column here that says behavior. Do you keep swiping? Do you stop? Do you go for a jog? Do you have a snack? you send angry messages to people what do you do it

SPEAKER_02:

ranges so there are times when thoughts are fleeting you know these are essentially the intrusive thoughts so and i'm able to recognize that so i try to not ponder too much but obviously there are days where they affect me more than others so um yeah on those days actually i'm currently i don't have an app I deleted it. So I go through these phases where I'll delete it entirely because I also find when I procrastinate, then I do want to go on there. And usually I'm procrastinating because I'm supposed

SPEAKER_01:

to be

SPEAKER_02:

doing work.

SPEAKER_01:

So tell me about the intrusive thoughts. Now we're moving to the next column, which is called automatic thoughts. These are things that, you know, you don't have to work real hard to come up with. They pop into your mind. What are those thoughts in this situation? You know, it's thoughts of

SPEAKER_02:

inadequacy, feeling like I'm not good enough. feeling like I am a failure. Inadequacy creeps when I see other people that are, even though I don't know anything about them, I know it's really silly, but yeah, I don't know anything about their life, I don't know anything about their struggles, but I see this profession that they've done this and they're doing this and working for this company and immediately I'm just like, whoa. So also to lead back to why it is, so I have a job, but it's not a very stimulating job. So I work as a translator at a dubbing studio where we translate Turkish shows into Afrikaans, which is one of the languages here in South Africa. So it's a simple job. It's not difficult. And it includes a form of writing, but it's not so much. I don't really get an opportunity to be creative. It's more technical. So it's a job that becomes quite tedious. And when I started, it was nice, it was fine, but I'm just finding myself at a place where I'm not really stimulated at the moment. And I'm doing this while I'm still busy with a few creative projects. I'm busy writing a feature film, busy writing a short film, and busy working on a theatre play. So I am doing these creative things, but I do find that they're not, that I'm not as passionate as I used to be. So I'm feeling a loss. And so all those things kind of like muddle into one that adds to this whole sense of existentialism.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. You've said a lot of really helpful things in terms of like helping me understand where you're coming from. Okay. So the creative parts of your life, so not the translation job, I guess that sounded cool to me, but you're saying it's not stimulating. It's tedious. So I hear you. So are you finding enough time for the creative work or is the paid work getting in the way of the creative work?

SPEAKER_02:

The paid work is getting in the way of the creative work. Okay. So

SPEAKER_01:

my paid work gets in the way of my creative work. And your creative work is the thing you love. And if you're, let's say magically, you didn't have to do the paid work and you could focus a lot on the creative work, which from what I understand is, would pay off in monies later on, potentially. If you could devote more time to it, would you feel better about being on Tinder or Grindr or whatever it is? Like, would you feel more accomplished? Would you feel like you're comparing yourself less negatively to others? So

SPEAKER_02:

devoting all my time to my craft and my writing and editing would didn't necessarily result in financial stability in the short term. It could open doors and create opportunities later down the road, but in the short term, not so much. And so I asked myself, this is what you want to do. And I'm kind of finding myself in a space where I actually can't answer that, where I feel like I've kind of lost my passion and my drive a bit. And I think that also results in the feelings of, and I took some feeling a bit lost career-wise because this thing that I always thought I wanted, I'm not so sure I want anymore, but then I don't actually know what it is in that I want. So when I talk about comparing myself on Tinder, it's actually not so much about this other person, it's much more about me and my own feelings because I want to be successful in what I want to feel. Yeah, I want to feel good about what it is that I'm doing and I don't at the moment.

SPEAKER_01:

So, okay. I don't feel, I'm a bit lost career-wise and I don't feel good about what I'm doing at the moment. Now, you did say that on the one hand, there is a comparative element. You compare yourself to these other people, but it's not like you're saying, I want what they have. You're more. No, you're more like, I want to have, I assume they've got some kind of happiness and I want to have that too. Yes. All right. Let's go back to the first couple of things you had said, which was I am not good enough and I am a failure. Those are those are bold things to say. And they were the first things that came out of your mouth. So when you say I'm not good enough, is that is that in terms of the money in your bank account? Is that in terms of your capacity for dating? What is that about? Tell me more.

SPEAKER_02:

I feel like I've accomplished a lot of things. I definitely have acknowledged that I've won awards. I have been nominated for things. I've been finalist in things. I've published play. The work is respected. I have a very high standard for myself in the sense that I know what I'm capable of. And I've never reached that standard because I've always gotten along with doing the bare minimum. I feel like I've managed to bamboozle people. I'm one of those people that leave things to the last minute. So when I deadline, I will leave it to the last minute. And that's where I thrive. But that's not how I want to do it. as an artist, I want to do things differently, but I've just always struggled with time management and with executive functioning. I have ADHD. So yeah, I'm on stimulant medication now, but I haven't always been, and that's been a real struggle.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. I'm just rearranging some of your thoughts here. Cause there's a lot of them and they're all very, they're all poignant, right? Like they're all so relevant and they're really getting me to think as well about the system we live in. So you say, I struggle with executive function and task management. So that is a barrier you experience, but then you say, I'm not a hard worker, right? And that's where we get, I'm not good enough. I'm a failure. I should be working harder. So when you say you're not a hard worker, is that because you've gotten by at some points where, doing the bare minimum or because you did something last minute as opposed to giving it your full effort? Yeah, I've gotten by with

SPEAKER_02:

last minute and doing the bare minimum.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. So if you have a block that you can't push through, what do you think that says about you or what do you think that that says about your future? Because I think there's a deeper fear or anxiety there.

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, it is. That's where the anxiety comes in because I have this fear that, you know, I'm heading into a point in my life where I find kind of like I need to stop instability and I just feel like it's never going to come. And that's kind of where the nihilism comes in because I'm like, well, what is the point? If no matter what I try, I'm just always going to run into this wall. And that maybe even if I change industries, if I change jobs, if I change, you know, that I'll keep running into the wall.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. So I've gotten by with doing the bare minimum, but I want to work, but have a block, right? And we're describing the block as this wall. And the consequence of that or your fear is that I'll never have stability or the wall will always be an issue. Or I don't know what the point of trying is if I keep coming up against the wall. I'm going to move over to some of the other things you had mentioned. When you talk about you not necessarily being completely financially independent, if people you were looking to go on dates with, if they found out about that or if you shared that with them, what do you think they would think about you?

SPEAKER_02:

I think most people wouldn't care. What do you think about that? Well, that's where my feelings of failure stem from. Yeah, it's my pride, essentially, that makes me feel less than inadequate.

SPEAKER_01:

When you talk about pride and you also talk about these specific milestones, age 29, I'm on my way to 30, this is what should be the case. If it's not the case, does it mean that I'm not properly an adult? Is that the thought or the belief? Yeah. If you're not properly an adult, what does that mean in terms of your capacity for making decisions, employment, and being in relationships? Is there an impact?

SPEAKER_02:

Well, definitely. That's one of the reasons why I, at this moment in time, don't want a relationship. I feel like there's a lot of internal work that I need to do and I need to figure out. And I'm aware of all of these thoughts and I don't want to put all of this uncertainty into a relationship and take all that baggage with.

SPEAKER_01:

so yeah let's go slow here for a minute so you're no because i know you're aware of that i know you're very aware of all the things that are going on but i think we're getting to something that maybe we haven't yet articulated so i'm not properly an adult and therefore i'm not ready for a relationship or if i bring this into a relationship what will happen help me help me connect that

SPEAKER_02:

I feel like I have a lot of baggage also related to past traumas. And so I feel like I need to deal with the traumas first. And my past relationships and what I call them fail is because I feel like it started off great. There's the honeymoon phase. And then I got to a point where I felt trapped, where I felt I felt suffocated and I felt like I didn't want to be with this person anymore.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. So there's a new thought emerging here and it's a thought that has to do with the story you're telling me, which is of course a different situation than swiping through Tinder, but I'll write it out and you let me know if it fits. So I'm thinking one of your more subconscious thoughts is includes or is i'm not relationship ready i'll feel trapped and then i'll sabotage it i need to do trauma work and be financially more stable first it sounds to me like these are the different pieces that are going on in your mind yes okay terence i'm going to read out some of your automatic thoughts and what i want you to do is i want you to think about this particular experience on tinder So you've told me we've gone in two directions. We've gone in the direction of your past relationships and we've gone in the direction of how you feel about your career. Tinder is a place where these things come together. So let's find one automatic thought or one statement here that you feel is most prominent and it's driving a lot of the difficult feelings. So I struggle with executive function and task management. I'm not a hard worker. I'm not good enough. I'm a failure. I should be working harder. I've gotten by with doing the bare minimum, but I want to work, but I have a block. I'll never have stability. The wall will always be an issue. I don't know what the point of trying is if I keep coming up against the wall. I'm still struggling with financial independence at age 29. I'm not properly an adult. I'm not fit to be in a relationship. I need to do trauma work and be more financially stable first. I'm not relationship ready. I'll feel trapped and then I'll sabotage it. I need to do trauma work and be financially more stable first. Of these, what stands out to you as really capturing the difficult feelings you have?

SPEAKER_02:

I'd say the I'm struggling with financial independence at age 29. I'm not probably an adult and I'm not fit to be in a relationship. I need to do my work and be financially more stable. I'd say that whole section.

SPEAKER_01:

That whole section. Okay. I'll tell you now that is a very loaded thought and it's, it's more than one thought, but because we're only doing one session, we only have one kick at the can, so to speak. So, um, in a, in, In a more typical cognitive behavioral therapy treatment or setting, we would break the standard and do multiple thought records. But here we're going to take this whole thought, this whole big thought, and we're going to work with it. Now, can you give me some evidence that supports that thought? We're going to call it the hot thought. It's the one that's most salient. So you could even give me evidence that supports each piece of it. So evidence that supports that. you're not properly an adult, you've told me that, right? Not financially independent. Yeah. What tells you, what's evidence that you're not fit to be in a relationship?

SPEAKER_02:

My history of sabotaging relationships.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. And so in being self-aware and doing therapeutic self-reflection and even you know, being in recovery, like you're not you're not drinking anymore, right? Does has that shifted the way you're able to be in connection with people?

SPEAKER_02:

Well, yes, my sobriety has become worth a sense of awareness of myself. I mean, one one really positive part of it is that I feel like I know who I am. I have a better understanding of myself and I continuously I'm learning new things about myself. This is, and yeah, it definitely shaped, I guess, the way I perceive relationships and friendship. And yeah, I think if I wasn't sober, I'd probably still just be falling for someone after the first date and telling them I love them after a

SPEAKER_01:

month or whatever. Okay. So here's evidence that supports that. your hot thought. One, I'm not financially independent, right? And like it or not, that's how you've constructed in your mind what adulthood is. So you say, I'm not properly an adult. I say, why? You say, I'm not financially independent. I won't argue with it. That becomes a kind of evidence that supports that thought. The other big thought here is I'm not fit to be in a relationship. What's the evidence? Well, my history of sabotaging relationships. If somebody said, hey, Terrence, do you think you need to sort out your trauma while you're in a relationship, or is it a prerequisite? You know, you might say, okay, well, my evidence here is that my therapeutic self-reflection and my sobriety has helped me with understanding myself, which of course would be better for a future relationship. And also if I wasn't sober and the way you do seek the current therapy is, you know, you go to your AA meetings. So if you, if you weren't in that space, you'd be in unhealthy relationship patterns, right? So all of this evidence supports the way you've been thinking, right? Now, I want you to come up with some evidence that does not support these ideas. So give me some evidence that you are properly an adult. So I'm an adult when I do what?

SPEAKER_02:

I'm an adult when I pay my bills, when I'm looking for work, when I'm looking for jobs. Taking the time to self-reflect and to grow.

SPEAKER_01:

And if I may add, when you stick with the job that feels tedious because it pays your bills. Yeah. That doesn't bring you joy, but that's adulting, isn't it? Yeah, that is adulting 101. When you say you're not fit to be in a relationship, give me some evidence that suggests you are fit to be in a relationship.

SPEAKER_02:

a strong sense of self-awareness.

SPEAKER_01:

And how does that help in a relationship? When there is conflict. Exactly. This idea that you need to do more trauma work or you need to be more financially stable as prerequisites for a relationship. I want you to challenge that just a touch. I'm not saying go on a completely different path, but is there some evidence in your life that that relationships are possible and other people will be interested in you even when you haven't done the trauma work or you're not super financially stable

SPEAKER_02:

oh definitely um all i mean all my past like all my past relationships happened when neither of those things when i you know when i wasn't financially stable

SPEAKER_01:

so I'm just going to write lots of people were into me before. All right. So you've got this amalgamated hot thought. I'm not properly an adult. I'm not fit to be in a relationship. I need to do trauma work and be financially stable before I'm in a relationship. Right. And then you've got evidence that supports that idea. And then you've got evidence that does not. And the evidence is that does not says, well, I'm an adult already. When I pay my bills, seek employment, invest in personal development and stick with a tedious job. I have a strong sense of self-awareness. That's a relationship quality. It helps me resolve conflict. And I don't necessarily need to do a bunch of things before I'm relationship ready. Lots of people were into me before. So look, what I'd like for you to do now is come up with an alternative thought. Something alternative while you're swiping on Tinder specifically, and you're thinking to yourself, I'm not properly an adult. I'm not fit to be in a relationship. What can you say to yourself in response to the hot thought? Something that's a bit more affirming, but balanced. The fact that we're all on an individual journey. And so if people are on an individual journey, I just want you to go a bit deeper. So the people who've got the fancy jobs and presumably cushioned bank accounts, what does that mean? So for all I know, they've

SPEAKER_02:

had quite easy and they've had it. Yeah. They've just had a slightly different life and they've made different choices and that's, impact the life that they're living now.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. And how would they think about you? Would they understand you as an adult? Do you think they would see you as being fit to be in a relationship? Yeah, I guess they think so. What would they appreciate about you? Or how would they arrive at this idea that, hey, Terrence maybe doesn't earn the amount I do or doesn't have the kind of job title I have. But he's a good bloke. I'd date him. What would get

SPEAKER_02:

them there? I think self-awareness, my personality. I like to think that I am a kind person, an understanding person, empathetic person.

SPEAKER_01:

And do you think that you're worthy of a relationship, even if you haven't done the trauma work? I definitely think that I'm worthy.

SPEAKER_02:

Without a doubt, it's just a case of maybe not being ready as opposed to being worthy.

SPEAKER_01:

Okay. So I'm worthy of relationships, just perhaps not ready. Now, Terrence, if somebody says or somebody is put off or not that interested in you because on paper, you're not accomplished in the ways that they are with the job titles, the professions, what do you tell yourself? I

SPEAKER_02:

would think it's unreasonable for this person to think that because that's just one part of me. Well, saying that a lot makes me realize that I've been unreasonable.

SPEAKER_01:

And if they're judging you unreasonably, are they a good candidate to be in a relationship with you? No. No,

SPEAKER_02:

no, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_01:

Cause then you're not reject. They're not rejecting you. You're rejecting them. Oh yeah. Okay. We've got four really strong alternative thoughts. I'm going to read them out. And as I do, I want you to think about which one rings most true to you, but also like not just most true, but which one do you believe in? What do you find most helpful in your body? Okay. So, So we're all on an individual journey. People with nice job titles may have a different struggle. Other guys will have to appreciate my self-awareness, personality, and empathy. I'm worthy of relationships, just perhaps not ready. If I were in one now, I'd approach things differently than I have in the past. If I'm judged by others about my career, that would be unreasonable. I don't want to be with them anyway.

SPEAKER_02:

Definitely the first one.

SPEAKER_01:

The first one. All right. So as you think about these alternative thoughts, but particularly the first one, right? I want you to just meditate on it for a moment. Think about yourself scrolling through Tinder or swiping on Tinder. And you really embrace this idea that you're on individual journeys. How would you rate your intensity of embarrassment? Two. Okay. How about resentful? One.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay.

SPEAKER_01:

What about frustrated?

SPEAKER_00:

One.

SPEAKER_01:

Angry. One. Sad. One. Okay. Nihilism. One. Inadequate. One. Anxious. Fear.

SPEAKER_00:

Excitement. Hope.

SPEAKER_01:

Did you say eight? Okay, cool. So you completed the thought record. Are there any new feelings that come up for you as you embrace the alternative thought?

SPEAKER_02:

A sense of hope, to be frank. Yeah. In realizing that I think a lot of my thoughts have been unreasonable. Yeah. I think when I started... When we got to the point of evidence that does not support our thoughts as well as our alternative thoughts, it really flipped on its head how I've maybe thought of myself, how I've been maybe a bit unreasonable and to be a lot kinder to myself and acknowledge the fact I have Made it through a lot.

SPEAKER_01:

If I can quote Beyonce, it won't break my soul. Like you're not going to let it break your soul, right? I think you're actively resisting grind culture and how the world makes you feel bad and you just can't let it break your soul. Release, I'm releasing it all. Terrence. Thank you to you and thank you to our listeners. This has been an episode of the CBT Dive. See you next time. That's our CBT Shorts episode for today. I'm Rahim Thawar and thank you for joining us. Please subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. If you want more content from us, check out our other social media platforms. The CBT Dive is intended for educational purposes and not meant as a replacement for therapy.

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Rahim Thawer, MSW

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