126: How to Stop Obsessing Over Someone Who’s Not That Into You

Why do we obsess over people who give us nothing? Why does unavailability make someone more attractive? And how do you break free from this cycle for good? In this solo episode, Sabrina Zohar dives deep into limerence—the psychological trap that keeps you fixated on the wrong people. But this isn't just about dopamine and attachment theory; this episode goes further, exploring: The real reason you can’t stop thinking about them (hint: it’s not because they’re special). How childhood patterns train your brain to mistake anxiety for attraction. Why fantasy and longing feel safer than real emotional intimacy. IFS (Internal Family Systems) techniques to uncover and heal the wounded parts of you that keep chasing the unavailable. How to disrupt the obsession cycle with practical, body-based tools. The question that will break the spell: What am I afraid will happen if I let them go? If you’re stuck in your head, constantly replaying what-if scenarios, or convincing yourself they must be the one—this episode is for you. It’s time to step out of the fantasy and reclaim your power. 🔗 Need more support? The Foundation Course, Breakup Course, and Nervous System Course are here to help. 🎧 Listen now and start breaking free. MERCH IS NOW AVAILABLE! Stuck After the Podcast? Master Implementation in 8 Weeks with Sabrina's Foundation Course HERE! Do you feel like your emotions run the show and react in ways you can’t control? Join the Nervous System 101: Navigating the Unknowns In Early Dating from Sabrina and Masha Kay HERE! Struggling with a breakup? Join the Make It Make Sense: Getting Through a Breakup course from Sabrina and Britt Frank HERE! Get Ad free HERE! Want to work with Sabrina? HERE! Don't forget to follow Sabrina and The Sabrina Zohar Show on Instagram and Sabrina on TikTok! Video now available on YOUTUBE! Disclaimer: The Sabrina Zohar Show, formally known as Do The Work, is not affiliated with A. Z & associates LLC in any capacity. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:30Speaker 01

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• 0:59Sabrina Zohar?

  Hello, hello, hello. And welcome to another episode of the Sabrina Zohar Show. My name is Sabrina Zohar and I am your host. Hello, friends. We're back for another solo week. And this week, I listened, I heard, the videos went viral, the comments pewed in. I got so many fucking DMs. We need another episode on limerence. So we're back, my babies. We're back with limerence at a different angle, though. I wanted to talk about this more than just like, it's dopamine, it's attachment styles. And it's like, blah, blah, blah, blah. Okay, cool. I'm sure we know that. Let's go deeper. Let's understand different practices and different ideologies, different schools of thought. Let's give deeper perspectives and understandings about limerence. And plus always, you're gonna hear my obnoxiously long stories that I always share with you guys.

• 1:44Sabrina Zohar?

  And we're really gonna jam pack this episode. So I am fucking amped. Listen to the whole thing if you want to get the full kit and caboodle experience. But we're here for you, babes. And as always, if you need anything, that's why we have the courses. We have the Breakup Course, the Nervous System Course, or the Foundation Course. Whatever you guys need, invest in yourselves. There are options and you have a lifetime access to them. And all the tools you could possibly fucking need, whether it be me, Masha with the Nervous System Course, or Britt Frank and the Breakup Course. We're here to have your back, babes. Guys, don't forget, follow along on the socials, subscribe on YouTube, listen and rate and review the show wherever you're listening. And as always, please, please just use kindness in our verbiage, right? You can leave whatever you reviews you want. I will never stop you from that. But please don't forget that there is a human that reads it on the other side.

• 2:25Sabrina Zohar?

  And so we are building and cultivating a community of acceptance and love. And if this is for you, amazing, we want you here. And if not, that's also okay, too. We don't take any offense to it. But we're just trying to cultivate a lot of love and respect. So leave comments. Let me know wherever you're listening. I want to hear your thoughts and your feedback. And if you need more help or something didn't make sense, comment us. Let's have the community support you guys. So, without further ado, let's get right on into it, shall we?

• 3:03Sabrina Zohar?

  Okay, so let's talk limerence. I have been there. I have done that. I'm embarrassed by how many times. And truth be told, limerence was the state that I lived in more often than anything else, right? So like, I'm gonna ask you a couple of questions. Do you feel like you're trapped in your own mind obsessing over someone who barely gives you anything back? That's limerence. But the thing is, like, what a lot of us misunderstand, it's like, it's not actually about them. It's about you. It's about your unmet needs and the patterns you didn't even realize that you were repeating. And that's what we're gonna dive in today. We're gonna talk about what comes up? Where did we learn this behavior from? Who taught us this bullshit? And then how to break free? And it's not just for them, but like, also for you, how to break free? Because, oh my God,

• 3:46Sabrina Zohar?

  I, every time I dated somebody, I automatically would go into Fantasyland. I lost count on how many times. And like, even this was, I mean, definitely in the earlier stages, like, oh, my God, I remember dating this one guy, and he was like, a really big studio owner. I'm not gonna say what it's a very famous, like, company. And it was like, a whole rigmarole. And I met him while he was at the company, but like, we never pursued anything. Both of us were in relationships, like, just wasn't appropriate. And then we matched, like, two or three years later on apps. And we were like, oh, and I remember the first date, just being like, he's so handsome, he's so funny. So tall, he's so charming and like, oh my God, we got, we kicked it off. We really jived. We really connected, I thought, but like, he was just breadcrumbing me like he, he would just

• 4:31Sabrina Zohar?

  give me bullshit excuses. Like I lived alone in my own apartment and he lived in his parents' basement and I would always just be like, do you want to like come over? Do you want to hang out? And he'd be like, oh, sorry, the drive is too much. And it was like, he lived in Jersey and I was in Brooklyn. It was all of like 30 minutes and it was just always something. It would take us two months to get together again, but then he would be texting me of like how I'm amazing and how da, da, da, da. And it's like, until I started to just realize like, wait a minute, I, it took me a few months to realize like I was being strung along. But before I even realized that, I just started to create these castles in the sky. I started to think of like, well, oh my God, because he's super famous and he's popular and everybody knows who he is. So if he likes me, it can help my clothing line, it can help my credibility, it'll help my self

• 5:13Sabrina Zohar?

  esteem. And then him picking me means I am good enough, I am worthy, I am deserving. And it was really more so about what did this represent to me? What did this mean to me? Because here's something that I'm going to say, and I'm going to say this with love. We only obsess over people that don't make us feel safe. And that is because the idea of them is so much sexier than who they actually are. Because think about the people that do create safety. More often than not, I get they're boring. I'm not really that interested in them. But yet, the ones that are causing chaos, that are causing confusion, that are gaslighting, that are causing all of these different aspects, and might not be gaslighting. Maybe these people are just not being honest, right? Those are usually the ones we obsess of, and those are usually the ones that we hyperfix on. Because typically speaking, we're clinging to a fantasy. Because someone asked, why do I keep thinking they're

• 5:56Sabrina Zohar?

  the one even when I know it's unhealthy? And it's like, because you're thinking and clinging to the fantasy because it offers a sense of hope and escape. But realistically, what actually is it? It's a distraction from the real work of meeting your own needs. Yep, I said that. Because more often than not, when we hyperfix on somebody, when we hyperfocus on somebody else, then what we're doing is we're saying, I need them in order to be safe. Putting somebody on a pedestal, putting them into this fantasy. That's why I like the whole delulu. It's like, it's not cute. This whole like delulu thing of like, whatever, just imagine that this is going to be everything you want. And it's like, I, I don't want you guys to be set up for failure. And I was because Disney lied to us. Disney fucking lied to us. Disney sold us a false bill of goods. They told us, well, if you just be a princess, right? You just sit back and don't do a goddamn thing.

• 6:40Sabrina Zohar?

  Somebody, a man is gonna come in, swoop in, knight in shining armor, right? And they're gonna save you. They're gonna take you away from this sadness, right? Cinderella, sad, poor girl was in the fucking basement and no one had ever loved. Jasmine, right? Oh no, she couldn't leave. She didn't have any freedom from her father. All of these Disney princesses were sad, were down, were bummed, were held back. And what did it take a man to come in and swoop and save the day? And this isn't a gender norm, right? So if there are men listening being like, uh, how do I apply this? It's like, you're the savior. How does that feel for you? Doesn't that feel really fucking exhausting to feel like your job is saving somebody? And then to the, to the other side of it, right? Whatever gender norms, whatever gender you wanna put this as, I don't really care. I'm here for whatever you guys wanna do.

• 7:25Sabrina Zohar?

  Put the pronouns in. For the other side of it, right? The person that's gonna be saved, the person that is gonna be the one that they're gonna come and get. I don't wanna be a princess because a princess implies that I haven't done anything and that my father has everything and I have no choice in power and I just have to sit there and wait for somebody. Well, instead I wanna take control of my life. And that's where limerence really starts to come in. And it really starts to, it's a breeding ground of fantasy, of disassociation and an outlet. And it was an outlet for me because that's why I was boy crazy. That's why I would fantasize and hyper fixate. It's the same as like celebrities, right? We think about like, I remember I was obsessed with Heath Ledger. And I'm obsessed. And him, Brandon Lee from The Crow, oh my God, I'm aging myself with that movie. I had plenty.

• 8:09Sabrina Zohar?

  Brandon Boyd from Incubus, I had a thing with the name Brandon. And I'll even give you an example. I had a thing with the name Brandon and I really believed that's my soulmate. You're gonna come, right? That's that limerence. And the first man I ever dated, his name was Brandon. I overlooked every red flag because in my mind I had this fantasy of they're gonna come in and save me. It's this man named this and it's like, sure enough, my partner's name is not Brandon. And at the end of the day, that was me disassociating. That was me saying, they're gonna save me. They're gonna make my life better. If I'm just chosen by them, then maybe my parents are wrong and I, I'm not a piece of shit. Maybe my mom and dad, or my dad specifically, when he tells me I'm stupid and nobody's gonna listen or that I'm too much, or that he hasn't had patience for me. Well, maybe if this person accepts me, all of that will go away. It doesn't.

• 8:55Sabrina Zohar?

  So I want to talk about a different technique. So actually, I'm super excited. In one of my lives, a therapist commented and said, hey, have you heard of NARM? And that's Neuro affective relational model. And I was like, no, go on, because I'm always looking like DBT, CBT, right? So there's cognitive behavioral therapy. There's dialectic behavioral therapy. There's internal family systems. There's NARM, neuro affective relational model. Like, there's multiple different types of therapy. So please, as you guys are looking through, I get a lot of people that ask, like, what should I be looking for? See what works for you. For me personally, like, EMDR does not work. CBT was not my thing. Like, I mean, I liked it, but like, I needed more. And IFS, internal family systems, which is what we're going to talk a lot about today, was really something that resonated with me.

• 9:36Sabrina Zohar?

  So, NARM shows us, if we are going to look at the relational model, limerence often stems from survival strategies formed in early relationships. So when you didn't feel secure or emotionally connected as a child, your brain learned to associate longing and chasing with love. So, it's very similar to like, if we look through the lens of like, the attachment theory, right? It's a lot of same, same, but different. But as an example, like, if you had to earn love through an achievement, or a compliment, or people pleasing, then limerence feels familiar because it's going to mirror those same dynamics. And I was, I talk about guilty of that. I only saw it as like, okay, well, when I'm told, you know, I only get love when I can do something for my caregiver, or when I shut my mouth, or when I'm not too much, or when I get their attention. I started to act that out in my adult life, and I was constantly craving the attention

• 10:21Sabrina Zohar?

  from other people. And I didn't really understand that, like, really where that came down from was like, I was taught that. You know, and that's like, why a lot of the work that I do really revolves around like, what are your patterns? That's why I love the foundation course. It's because I started with, let's identify your patterns. Like, first things first, first week off the bat, we need to understand where have you been? Where did you learn? What did you learn? What are you repeating? Before we can then understand how to undo them, and where you learned it from, and all of those things. We need to understand what they are, right? And something I love in IFS, so internal family systems, is like, that's Britt Frank does, her new book, Align, go get it if you're looking for a new read, it's fucking amazing, but the parts work, right? So in IFS, if we're looking at through that lens, limerence can reflect an internal battle between exiled parts of yourself.

• 11:04Sabrina Zohar?

  Right? So like the inner child who felt neglected and then the protective parts. So like the inner critic that keep you stuck and longing. And that's actually like when Britt was here and we did, she and I were doing like just kind of my own little like IFS thing together. And we were going over everything and we were talking and she was starting to ask me and she was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, who is that? Who has the mic? And I was like, what do you mean, who has the mic? And I'm like, oh, that's true. Who are the exiled parts? One thing she always said that I loved, she was like, whatever photo you look at when you're a kid, whoever you cringe at, that's who needs you. And so oftentimes like, okay, so for me, if I'm going to put myself back into that dating circumstance, when I was like hyper focused and obsessed with people. So the part of me that was exiled was the one that felt like I was too much and that nobody was ever going to love me.

• 11:47Sabrina Zohar?

  And if I just shut my mouth, if I play the cool girl, if I don't ask this guy, like, what is it that he wants? If I didn't hold my boundaries, if I didn't hold, right? And so that was the exile part of me of like, you're too much. You need to stop, you need to stay back. Right? And then the inner critic that was there was reminding me of that to keep me stuck in this loop of like, no, no, no, no, no. Don't you dare try to get out of this. I'm trying to protect you, girl. You've only ever known this, but the reality was that's all I ever did know. But that's doesn't mean that that's all I was going to know. Right? So we have to look at what parts of you, right? If it's a question, my therapist asked me that like blew the lid off of me. What parts of you don't feel lovable? What part of you feels like, no, no one's ever gonna, right? For me, it was that I was too much, that I'm fucking loud, that I curse a lot, that I'm, I'm talk really fast.

• 12:32Sabrina Zohar?

  And it's like, it doesn't surprise me that I then create a career where I am putting myself on display every fucking day. To have some jackalander respond, comment to tell me, I don't like how you speak. You need to change this because they're uncomfortable, right? A woman that shows up confident in who they are and is saying, well, this is who I am. You're all welcome here, but I don't have to change who I am. That's a threat to other people, right? It's like that one statement's like, I'm not intimidating, you're intimidated. And for me, I could let myself stay in this loop and then I wouldn't be here. If I allowed myself to stay in this conscious cognitive thought process of like, ah, you're not good enough. Nobody likes you, you're too much. But then that would mean that I was exiling those parts myself. That would mean I was reaffirming that to myself. See, you are too much. Look, nobody else wants you, I don't either.

• 13:17Sabrina Zohar?

  So if we're looking at this, the IFS lens, what part of you do you think is coming out to try to keep you safe?

• 13:23Speaker 00

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• 13:53Sabrina Zohar?

  So what I want you to ask, and it's a really important question to ask. What does this part of me think I'll lose if I stop obsessing? What do you think will happen if you stop obsessing? What are you scared of happening? They'll forget about me? Ah, so that's the real fear. That's the real fear. It has nothing to do with who they are. You're just worried that you're gonna get forgotten. Right? Do you see what I mean by when we start to ask deeper questions in a different way? Not, "Why do I keep doing this?" Right? So somebody asks, "Why do I feel like I'll never find someone else if I let them go?" Well, because that's a narrative that's gone into scarcity mindset, not reality. That's your fear. That's the fear space. Think about it. As a kid, you are worried because you don't have another option. You don't get another set of caregivers. Right? You can't just be like, "I'm done with them.

• 14:37Sabrina Zohar?

  Let me swap it out for a healthier pair." You would've probably gotten your ass kicked. I would've, I would not be here right now if that happened. And so we have to start to even get curious of like, "That's true. What am I scared of happening if I let go of this person? I'm never gonna find anybody else." Okay? That might, where do I feel that in my body? Right? Maybe as a kid, I found like I was never gonna meet anyone else. But as the body, as the able-bodied adult that I am right now, do I really believe that there's not one other person out of nine billion? And I understand it. I have the same fears of my, like, in my career. Right? Like, I might get, we could think, "Well, there's millions of podcast listeners." Scarcity doesn't just go away. I grew up feeling scared that we weren't gonna have the money, that I didn't know if my dad was gonna be there. Like, that doesn't leave. And it didn't just show up in my relationships. Then it started to manifest in my career stuff.

• 15:22Sabrina Zohar?

  Always being worried that like, "What if we don't have enough? What if we don't have enough?" To the point where my fucking accountant called me and said, "You're the boy cried wolf." And I literally said, "Excuse me, what do you mean?" And he goes, "You always keep telling me that this is it." Right? We're losing everything. He's like, but then I look and you're doing even better from the month before. And that was where I realized like scarcity doesn't mean it's factual scarcity is just it's a cognitive bias really that's trying to protect you to think this is it you don't have anybody else. And now I want you to ask who has the mic? Doesn't that sound like a child? Doesn't that sound like a kid in a room that's stuck going but you only have mom and dad? So you need to do what you need to do. But you don't. We don't know who these fucking people are. Right? And so I want you to have this reflection. What is this person's behavior mirroring about your relationship with yourself? I said it. I went there. What? So if you're gonna tell me,

• 16:06Sabrina Zohar?

  you know, I hear this every day of like, well, they treated me like shit and they didn't do this and they, they, they, they. What does that say about me? So if somebody is treating me like shit, right? So if we're thinking of if I'm deep rooted in this limerence, this fucking obsession, I can't breathe, I can't sleep, I can't eat, I'm just you're dysregulated, right? That's why Masha and I created the nervous system course as well. That's dysregulation. I am my body is feeling that they're only my body is only safe if they have this person. Right? And so let's even look at the contrast. What is limerence? It's high intensity. It's rooted in fantasy and it creates anxiety fueled by longing. So I would love to ask, right? So when you're obsessed with somebody and you're like, oh, well, I've only known them for three days, right? But yet they didn't text

• 16:48Sabrina Zohar?

  back now and you're spiraling. It's the inconsistency that is keeping you hooked. Because again, what happens? The cortisol spikes and then the dopamine is the only thing that's being released in the anticipation of them texting. So constantly waiting, waiting, waiting. Anything that you wait constantly for is it gonna happen? Is it gonna happen? Is it gonna happen? But then you're dating people that maybe emotionally unavailable or not. And then what happens? They don't do it. And then it's see, I knew it cognitive bias. I knew it. I knew it. See, nobody wants me. And it's like, well, yeah, but look at the people you're fucking dating. Look at the people that you're trying to get to pay attention to you. And then you come back and tell me as to why they're not paying attention to you. Whereas real love is reciprocal. It's grounded and it creates safety and trust over time. Right? They show up consistently and you feel calm rather than

• 17:31Sabrina Zohar?

  anxious about their intentions. Instead of the like, when I think back on the guy that I was like obsessed with and many of them. The reason I couldn't feel grounded was because he wasn't offering me clarity. And he was specifically not because look how muddy his waters were. Look how his world was. He is still fucking a total hot mess. We don't speak anymore for the best because not everybody is meant to be in my life. So I want you to try this reality check exercise. I want you to list, one first thing, I want you to list three things they do that make you feel valued. So I hear this all the time of like, but I'm so crazy about them and it's love. Okay, three things that make them make you feel valued. Do they make you feel seen, heard, understood? Do they make you feel safe? Do they listen to you? Are they thoughtful?

• 18:12Sabrina Zohar?

  Do they make you feel like you're valued because they're super reciprocal and the love that you're showing as well? Okay, then I want you to list three things they do that make you question their commitment. Mm hmm. Every time I try to have a conversation with them, they divert it. They keep telling me that they're not sure. They're not willing to have these conversations. They're not making like consistent plans with me. I never know when I'm going to hear from this person. They told me that they recently just got out of a relationship. Then I want you to look and say which list aligns more with the reality of the relationship. And that is what I mean by like, we gotta start calling you guys out on your bullshit. Because someone asked, how do I stop confusing anxiety with attraction? And it's like, well, the difference is that attraction that feels like anxiety often signals unresolved wounds, not compatibility.

• 18:53Sabrina Zohar?

  So when we have this, the constant anxiety, we have to stop and say, what are they doing to help this? Or how are they aiding and adding to it? It doesn't always, not everything is your anxious attachment style. Not everything is, oh, what's my attachment style? No, sometimes this person's treating you like shit. They're bread crumbing you, they're giving you one word answers, they're not giving you clarity, which is anxiety inducing. Where that becomes anxious attachment is what it means about you. I'm not good enough, I'm a piece of shit, right? Even the most secure person will still feel anxious when someone is playing games with them. But the difference is they'll say, wait a minute, this isn't a reflection around me. I might feel confused and anxious because I'm a human, but that doesn't mean that I have to make this about my self-worth. Right? And I want you to really reflect, do you feel seen, heard, and understood?

• 19:37Sabrina Zohar?

  Are you constantly chasing their validation? That's why we get stuck on limerence, right? And then we start to think of like, how do we actually start to fucking release this? Well, there's also an addiction aspect. Because your brain isn't just grieving the person, it's grieving the story you created about what could have been. And then let's talk about the somatic practice. Your body then holds on to the relationship as sensations. This is why thinking about someone can trigger tightness in your chest, butterfly in your stomach. All of a sudden, your heart feels like it's because your body doesn't know how to differentiate. It's the same as like when you tell your brain something, your brain doesn't know if it's actually happening or not. Your brain is just believing based on the energy and what's happening within us. Right? And when you're, when you tie your

• 20:21Sabrina Zohar?

  identity to being chosen by somebody, then letting go feels like it's letting go a piece of you. Right? I remember that. I remember those days where I was like, no, no, because letting go of them had to acknowledge like, oh, maybe this wasn't going to be the fantasy. I had to let go of, and when I was letting go of the guy, it wasn't him. That dude sucks. Like, I don't know how else to say it in a nice way. That kid fucking sucks. He is not like, just as a person, like, he's not a good person. This isn't somebody that I'd be like, oh, go to bat for this one. He was treated me like shit and continued to. But the difference would be, and the biggest question that I have is again, what was coming up in my body? If I had to let go of him, for me, what letting go of him would have been having to acknowledge and say, but then I'm letting go

• 21:03Sabrina Zohar?

  of the future of my company, where I thought I was going to be, right? What, who I thought I was going to be, where I thought I was going to have all these connections and people that I thought I was going to have, those were all gone. And it's really, really important to start understanding and getting curious of like, yeah, what am I afraid of letting go? What am I? I want you to guys, write it in the fucking questions. Write it here. What part of yourself are you scared of losing? And so someone said, how do I stop checking their social media? Kay, here's the reality. That's like someone saying, well, how do I make sure I get to the gym every day? It's like, only you can motivate yourself. So block them, mute them, replace the habit with a meaningful action. Journal.

• 21:42Sabrina Zohar?

  Call a friend? Every time you check their social media, every time you look to see where are they? Have they gone on the apps? Are they on Hinge? What you're doing is you're reinforcing the cycle. You're letting your body know, see? I'm just waiting for this. And we have to change that. The first thing Britt Frank said in the breakup course, the first fucking thing she said is, "This is going to suck and it's going to hurt and I need you to know that." Because getting off an addiction loop, I want you to see this person as a drug. Every time you're waiting for their phone call, when are they going to choose me? What's happening? And you get all up in arms, you sound like a fucking addict. Who is waiting for their next hit? And then if you don't get it, you fucking freak out. Until you get it and it's just enough to get you, until the next moment comes where you're like, "Now I need more." Right?

• 22:23Sabrina Zohar?

  And so I want you to ask, what am I afraid of will happen if I let go of this connection? Is this rooted in reality? Or is it an old narrative of I'm scared of duh, duh, duh, duh? Because rarely are the people that you're obsessed with that fucking amazing. Because if they were, you guys would have a relationship.

• 22:40Speaker 00

  Life is all about making decisions. Sometimes you make questionable ones. Like buying a new TV that's too big for the wall because the electronics store employee was a little too good at their job. Then sometimes you make great ones. Like protecting your home and auto with Progressive. You get customized coverage options so you can be sure you have the right coverage. Get your quote today at progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company affiliates and other insurers. Not available in all states. Life is all about making decisions. Sometimes you make questionable ones. Like buying a new TV that's too big for the wall because the electronics store employee was a little too good at their job. Then sometimes you make great ones.

• 23:24Speaker 00

  Like protecting your home and auto with Progressive. You get customized coverage options so you can be sure you have the right coverage. Get your quote today at progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company affiliates and other insurers. Not available in all states.

• 23:39Sabrina Zohar?

  Now let's get into some tools. So, one thing I really love is IFS self-talk. And so, something I get really curious about, and like, that's when we say a part, hey, you guys have all been doing this, you don't even realize it, when you say a part of me, right? And that's why I love Inside Out the movie, it's all about IFS, a part of me. And that's why also, I was saying today, the episode on limerence, it's not about, like, we know about what limerence is, it's an obsession. We know that it's this, this high that your brain is going through. It's not actually about the person, it's typically unmet needs, it's the parts of you that you're ignoring. And now, let's talk about the parts, right? And so, I want you to ask the part of you that's obsessing, like, what are you trying to protect me from? What are you trying to protect me from? You're obsessing over this person. So, for me, when I was obsessing over the guy, what are you trying to protect me from?

• 24:21Sabrina Zohar?

  From being alone, girl, and from being that somebody that nobody's ever gonna respect. I was scared that I was never gonna find anybody that would love me enough to help me grow my business. I was scared that I was always gonna just be waiting for somebody else, okay? And then, how can I help you feel safer without relying on them? Well, how can I show up for myself, right? I don't need somebody to come and create everything for me. I could do that on my own. But you know what I do need? I need someone that'll support me. I need someone that answers my fucking phone when I have a moment. I need somebody that genuinely has the bandwidth to show up for me. I need somebody that's gonna be consistent, and that's somebody that's gonna be thoughtful, and someone that's gonna be empathetic, right? And now, does that match? No, because that person needs to be me. I can't always be waiting, like, there was the video I stitched that went mega-viral, and the girl was like, fucking losing her shit,

• 25:04Sabrina Zohar?

  having a hyperventilation panic attack. And she's like, I hate this about myself, I hate this, I always obsess. And it's like, okay, you hate that part of yourself. Now, let me ask you, the more you hate something, do you think you're gonna get over it? Do you think you're gonna heal through if you fucking hate something, and all you keep saying is how much, I'm so tired of this, I can't stand this? Now, let me ask you, as a kid, imagine your parents, your caregivers were saying that, I can't fucking stand this about you. Was that gonna make you go, oh, yeah, I feel better about myself? No. Instead, it's gonna make you hate and shame and blame even fucking more, and go deeper and deeper into the loop. Instead, now, we're looking and going, how can I love those parts of myself, right? How can I help myself feel safer, instead of relying on other people? So, do I really need this person to text me, "Good morning"? Or can I create

• 25:47Sabrina Zohar?

  that safety that no matter what, I'll be okay because I have me? And that I don't know who these people are, and the only reason I want that is validation, and I can create that validation within myself. And so, okay, I want you to take out your journal, and I want you to write down the story you've been telling yourself about this relationship, right? I want you to think about, like, and I want you to rewrite it. So, the example might be, they're the only one who gets me. Really? Right, the new story might be, I deserve consistent love that matches my needs. They're the, they're the only one, they're the one for me, really? They might embody characteristics of a partner that I'm interested in, but they don't have all the desired needs that I actually deserve. Right, we have to start to look at, they're the one, they're the only, right? When these big words, I want you also ask, who has the mic?

• 26:32Sabrina Zohar?

  Doesn't that sound like a teenager? You might think of like a teenager, like, I came, oh my God, he's the love of my life. I'm gonna marry him. And you're like, oh, okay, girl, yeah, yeah, tell me how that works in five years when you get to college, right? And it's never actually that, but yet we're coming from that place still. And I want you to really think about, how can I rewrite the story? I need them to, I need them in order to feel safe. How can I create that safety within myself? I'm safe because I have me, not because I have other people. Actually, you're more safe because you have you more than other people. Right? And then I want you to start to use some somatic practices to tap into your body, to disrupt the parts. And that's why I love the five, four, three, two, one method. Five things you can see, four things you can hear, right? That keeps you present, scanning for safety, checking in even with your body. Where am I feeling it? I'm feeling it right here.

• 27:16Sabrina Zohar?

  Okay, what is this part trying to tell me? And then I want you to replace the time you'd spend thinking on them with intentional actions for fucking you. Right? Go learn a new hobby. Go, go on Eventbrite and start to see what's happening in your community. Just do something for you. And someone asked, what if I don't feel strong enough to let go yet? Well, the thing is, you don't have to feel 100% ready. You just need to take one small step because healing isn't linear, right? It's a process. What does it look like for you to feel strong enough? I'd be, I'd wanna get, what does that look like to you? What does strong enough look like? Okay, well, that person wouldn't have texted that person. Okay, what do I feel like I don't have, I don't embody for me to achieve that? Right, maybe it's tools, maybe it's, maybe it's that I'm scared of acknowledging the parts of myself

• 28:00Sabrina Zohar?

  that'll actually need the healing. I, more often than not, that's really why people don't start to do this work is because they don't want to see those parts of themselves. Another question was, how do I stop making excuses for their bad behavior? Well, I'm gonna put it this way. Every single excuse you make delays your healing, right? So I want you to look at, do the actions and words align, right? Not your hopes, not what they could be, not what it... Every single time, right? And then we want to see, is there progress, right? Like Ryan and I, we've had, we've had the same conversation quite a few times. His stuff, his stuff, his stuff. We have my own, right? And he and I work through it. I'm specifically talking about me to him, not him to me. I can't take, I can't talk about that, I'm not him. And we've had, we've had a lot of the same issues, but I see progress. I see him trying. I've talked to his therapist, like, there is a...

• 28:44Sabrina Zohar?

  Versus, it's just, this person keeps telling me they're busy. Well, okay, are their actions and words aligning? This person keeps telling me that like, they don't have the, they don't have the bandwidth, they don't have the priority, or they keep canceling plans with me last minute. It's like, then stop excusing their behavior because you're so fucking scared of being alone. I'd ask you, this is a question I used to ask myself. If you had somebody that was all the things that you could dream about, would you give a fuck about this person anymore? And more often than not, people are like, no! It's like, that's why. Because I could have, I could have the king of Sheba show up and I'm like, but I do love my partner and they've got all these qualities that I think are amazing and I'm really happy with them. Versus, if my partner weren't fulfilling any of my needs and I was just so limerent and obsessed with them, well then, anybody else that would come and listen to me would satisfy a need more than this person. So two different things.

• 29:29Sabrina Zohar?

  And we have to also look, like, limerence exposes where you've been outsourcing your value. We want to talk about high value? This is it. It's your opportunity to stop relying on others to feel worthy and start finding that shit within yourself. And this is where it's also really important to heal your inner story. Because if love has always felt like chaos, now is your chance to rewrite the script. And someone had asked, my heart broke, does limerence mean I'm broken? No! Limerence just means you're a fucking human because it's progress, not perfection. But I want you to also look at this, like, someone else had asked, how do I stop feeling ashamed about falling into the pattern? Well, the shame is gonna keep you stuck, right? And again, why do you think I have the foundation course? Recognize the pattern. Recognize that this pattern has developed as a way for you to cope. And now, you have the tools to change it.

• 30:12Sabrina Zohar?

  I have one of my clients and I love her and I, I'm sure she's listening. She listens to all the episodes. And she always tells me, but I'm scared, Sprenger, I'm scared that when I go back into dating, I'm gonna turn back into the same woman that I... And every time I ask her, and I'm like, what's changed this time? And she's like, well, I have you. And I'm like, okay, not about me, but what else? And she's like, well, I have tools. I have this. I have this. I have this. And so I'll go again, are you still scared about not trusting yourself? And she'll say, and she's like, you're right. I actually do trust myself. I do know a lot more than I thought. You're more aware now. That's how you're going to stop these patterns is by go, wait a minute. I know now. I know too much. And now, once I know, I can't undo it. And then I want you to ask, what does this experience teach me about how I want to show up in relationships? You know, like I said, I get written every single fucking day. Uh, this person's treating me so poorly and they're treating me like shit.

• 30:57Sabrina Zohar?

  And they're doing all of these things and everything is about them, them, them. But what we're not looking at is, well, how are you showing up in the relationship? Don't give me this bullshit of like, well, I'm showing amazing. I'm trying to give them love. I'm trying. It's like, no, then you're trying to control the outcome. Because you're trying to give it to somebody that's not reciprocating that to you. Because limerence, it feels all consuming. It touches the deepest fucking parts of you, the parts that crave love, validation and safety. But the truth is, the love that you're searching for, it's not external. It starts within you. And every single fucking step you take towards choosing yourself is you going towards the love that you deserve. And I want you to take action this week. I want you to prioritize one thing. And whether that's setting a boundary and saying no, whether that's journaling, whether that's reaching out to someone that makes you feel safe.

• 31:42Sabrina Zohar?

  I want you to really get curious. How can you show up for yourself? And of course, as always, we have the courses. You need more support. You've got the foundation course. You've got the breakup course. You've got the nervous system course. You have tools. And the, uh, the reality is, is that you don't need more, right? Like this whole episode, even when Ryan and I was, I was formulating the episode. And I kept saying, bah, come on, I want to go deeper. And Ryan looked at me finally and said, yeah, but Sab, you say it yourself. He's like, how much more could you possibly talk about the same thing before it's now? Okay. Well, what are we going to do about it? Right? We know that limerence is the dopamine. We know that it's an addiction. We know that your brain, you're not broken. You're on a fucking addiction loop. It's the same as having the needle in your arm. That's them. Now you get to choose. What am I going to do with it? Right? It's the same as an addict coming and going, okay, well, how do I get rid of this? It's like, oh, you don't. We got to figure out what's causing it to begin with.

• 32:28Sabrina Zohar?

  What's the root issue? What needs of yours have gone unmet? And how can you show up for yourself? What boundaries can you place? What patterns can we break? How can you change the way you speak to yourself? This takes time. The girl I was to the girl I am now took me seven years. Now we're in 2025, so seven years to become this version. Give me another seven. I'll be a version I won't even fucking recognize now. Because it's a progress. But I want you guys to know that it starts with make them a real person. Take them off the pedestal. Take the fucking shine off these people and start seeing them for who they really are. You don't know who these people are. And when I say you don't really know, no, you don't get to know people over text. You get to know people by spending time with them and scratching the surface, asking questions

• 33:09Sabrina Zohar?

  of depth and seeing if they have the bandwidth to show up for you in the ways that you deserve and need. But I need you to show up for that way, too. Who else is going to? My mom always used to say that. She was like, you don't do it yourself, ain't nobody else going to. And it's the same shit with this. No one's responsible for your healing and no one is responsible for dealing with your bullshit, right? Not even me, as much as I'd love to. Same with me, right? My own stuff. It's nobody else's. You guys don't have to be responsible for my fucking insecurities. I don't need to project those on to you. It's mine to work through, but that doesn't mean that they don't still exist. So if you guys are going through limerence, rest assured, there's nothing wrong with you. You're not broken. You're not fucked up. You just got some shit to yield through. And that's what we are working towards. So guys, I hope that this was able to help.

• 33:54Sabrina Zohar?

  Realistically, when it comes to limerence, there's not as much more to really go over because it's kind of gets repetitive, right? Okay, we get it's dopamine. We understand that it's the addiction loop and we understand that's the brain. So now it's about implementing these tools and getting curious with IFS parts work of like, yeah, what parts of me are coming out? How do I feel like I'm trying to protect myself? What do I need from myself right now? And how can I show up for that for me? These are powerful questions that if you ask yourself that every day and you commit to this practice, you'll start to see your fucking life change. So guys, that's it. That's it for me today, babies. Thank you, guys, for everything. Thank you for showing up. Thank you for hanging with us and thank you, guys, for sharing the show, rating and reviewing it and just listening along. It means the fucking world. As always, guys, I love you and until next week, babies.

• 34:47Speaker 00

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• 35:16Speaker 01

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