Former Secret Service Agent: You Don’t Need Proof, You Need the Pattern | Brad Beeler | S4E13

Former Secret Service Agent: You Don’t Need Proof, You Need the Pattern | Brad Beeler If you’ve ever been told to “wait for proof” before trusting your gut, this episode will set you free. Lisa Sonni sits down with retired Secret Service agent and author Brad Beeler to reveal why pattern recognition is far more powerful than waiting for hard evidence when identifying manipulation, deception, and emotional abuse.

Brad shares practical tools from his expertise in deception detection, explaining how manipulators rapidly build trust, exploit halo and horns bias, use social validation, and rely on push-pull tactics to gain control.

The conversation explores the importance of slowing down, observing consistent patterns of behavior, testing healthy boundaries, understanding the role of neurochemicals in emotional manipulation, and why you don’t need a smoking gun to recognize when something isn’t safe. A powerful, eye-opening episode for anyone ready to trust their intuition, break unhealthy patterns, and protect their peace with greater confidence and clarity.

Join Lisa Sonni & Dr. Peter Salerno in Boston, MA November 13-15, 2026 here: https://lisasonni.com/unbreakable-and-irreplaceable/

Transcript

00:00:00:13 - 00:00:08:18
Lisa Sonni


00:00:08:20 - 00:00:17:23
Lisa Sonni
This is Real Talk With Lisa Sonni: Relationships Uncensored, the podcast they don't want you listening to.

00:00:18:00 - 00:00:40:05
Lisa Sonni
Women are often taught to wait for proof before they trust what they already know, what they already sense. And today's guest is Brad Beeler, a former Secret Service agent. And I'm really excited to have this conversation. And let's look at how this all connects, because I think this is a really different lens. Trained professionals don't wait until something is undeniable, right?

00:00:40:06 - 00:01:06:02
Lisa Sonni
They pay attention to patterns and credibility and stress responses. Evasion, timing. It's an incredible process that we're going to learn a lot about here. But this isn't really about turning relationships into interrogations either. But we are vetting people that were dating that were married to. We need to be looking at these things. It's so important. And I think most women don't just leave an abusive relationship one day out of nowhere.

00:01:06:03 - 00:01:29:07
Lisa Sonni
I think that the truth becomes obvious now. Often we're lacking in information and we're looking for information, and there's a lot of confusion in abusive and toxic relationships. You're seeing two sides of someone, and often we're waiting for proof of something. So today I am talking with Brad Beeler, retired former Secret Service agent and the author of Tell Me Everything.

00:01:29:07 - 00:01:38:23
Lisa Sonni
And the book really is about trust and truth and deception. It's absolutely incredible. So I would love to kind of turn this over to you and tell us a little bit about yourself.

00:01:39:02 - 00:02:01:01
Brad Beeler
Yeah. Thank you very much, Lisa. I appreciate you having me on. As you said, Brad Beeler with the Secret Service for the last 25 years, doing investigations, protection and a large part of my career was credibility assessment. So in our form, we would do that as part of a polygraph examination for our applicants. And then, unfortunately, I had to talk to hundreds of criminals and see them in their worst times, having done the worst of things to people.

00:02:01:01 - 00:02:19:22
Brad Beeler
So I think it's a good conversation to have. Talking about patterns of behavior and stop looking at individual behaviors. That's how manipulators can take advantage. They can use that horns and halos effect by a short term change. And they all of a sudden you attribute that and you have some affinity bias towards them. So definitely would love to get into that.

00:02:20:01 - 00:02:37:19
Lisa Sonni
Yeah. It's interesting. You know, I know when we're in a dating scenario, it's sometimes people refer to the first few dates as an interrogation. You're asking questions. I think you're just vetting if a person is good for you. it shouldn't necessarily feel like an interrogation when you're getting to know someone or when you're in a relationship with them.

00:02:37:19 - 00:03:00:15
Lisa Sonni
But it can turn that way sometimes. And I know women especially, I feel like we're kind of trained and conditioned to observe behavior and assess credibility. We kind of have to for safety reasons. But then you find yourself in a relationship with someone like this and you want to, you know, trust something about your partner, but maybe they've cheated on you, or maybe you feel like they are.

00:03:00:16 - 00:03:23:05
Lisa Sonni
and women don't know what to do because you're seeing two different sides. There's two different parts of this person. Sometimes they seem really honest and kind and sometimes they don't. Now women get trained out of their own perception in relationships. I feel like we step out of our own reality and we step into this frame that they have created, and it makes it really hard.

00:03:23:05 - 00:03:47:20
Lisa Sonni
Women feel unsafe. They are told their too sensitive, that they're making it up, their dramatic. They wait for proof. I know from personal experience I once was cheated on for years and I needed like hard evidence. I knew he was cheating. Why? And I see it all the time. Women are constantly trying to get evidence. Why do you think that's not always the best way to wait for, like, the piece of evidence?

00:03:48:00 - 00:04:02:15
Brad Beeler
Well, we want to trust our gut. Like. Like you said, you know, so many people, not just women, what we do. And in the protection realm, a lot of times waiting for proof is very, very problematic. You saw that in Butler. You saw that in any time the Secret Service has had a problem is you don't want to wait on proof.

00:04:02:15 - 00:04:19:03
Brad Beeler
We want to prepare as much as we can. And when it comes to first impressions, Lisa, the issue that we have, we assign horns and halos very, very quickly. This is an evolutionary principle. 200,000 years ago, we would hear a rustling in the bushes. We'd see a flash in the distance, and we'd wonder, is this is something that's going to hurt us.

00:04:19:03 - 00:04:41:01
Brad Beeler
So we would kind of quickly assign that from the standpoint of our own personal safety and that of our tribe. And that's great when it comes to first impressions, that's what I want you to think of. As far as gut instinct, the issue is, is that in today's society, it's not built for that. Meaning so many people can look at your social media profile and they can look at your likes, your dislikes, your interests, even your dating profile.

00:04:41:01 - 00:05:06:06
Brad Beeler
So many people use the same dating profile photo. They can put that in a face finder app and they can find everything about you almost like a dossier. If we were trying to come up and try to turn another country's intelligence source, and as a result of that, they can become a mythical Prince Charming. And in that initial date, especially if they take you multiple places, you know, they go, take you to drinks one place, they take you to appetizer somewhere else, they take you to the main course somewhere else.

00:05:06:06 - 00:05:38:03
Brad Beeler
And as a result, you attribute that behavior. You attribute that action as I'm safe and familiarity does not equal safety. And once we put those halo upon someone, we always look for that confirmation bias of you know what, I feel safe we almost need evidence, therefore, to prove that we're not safe. So one of the things that I always like to do when I meet people is, yes, I want to make a good first impression, but if time is not of the essence, I want to look for consistent behavior over a period of time.

00:05:38:03 - 00:05:48:03
Brad Beeler
It is very hard for someone over the course of two months to prove consistent behavior. It's very easy over the course of two days, two hours, that type of time.

00:05:48:04 - 00:06:08:13
Lisa Sonni
Yeah, that short window. And I think, I mean, listen, abusers really use speed to get you hooked. That's it's a hallmark of so many abusive relationships where it's moving so quickly. And in hindsight, they're doing it so that you can't see the horns. Right. That's I know chapter one of your book is Horns and Halos, and I love the name.

00:06:08:13 - 00:06:30:23
Lisa Sonni
It's so true. you're making such a good point about we find this person is good, you know, early on they're building trust and dependency and you're putting everything in the I trust him bucket. And you're not putting the evidence into the what if something is off? Maybe I don't trust him. We always kind of rationalize some bad behavior after we've seen good behavior.

00:06:31:02 - 00:06:46:20
Brad Beeler
Yeah, absolutely. And if you want to think of it from this standpoint, it's the same as scammers. Scammers try to do the same thing online scammers, door to door scammers, whatever the case may be. What are they trying to do? They're trying to put things in that trust bank. If you want to think of a bank, they're trying to put little deposits in the trust bank ahead of time.

00:06:46:20 - 00:07:07:10
Brad Beeler
So when they need to make a metaphorical withdrawal, they have a positive balance there in the green. And that's what we really want to be careful about is why is this moving so fast? Do I need to be moving this fast? What's the reason for this? And that's when if you start slowing down, you're less likely to get taken advantage of because you're not thinking emotionally.

00:07:07:10 - 00:07:14:23
Brad Beeler
When people think emotionally, when that amygdala is hijacked, you tend to make much poorer decisions because you're not thinking rationally.

00:07:15:01 - 00:07:34:07
Lisa Sonni
Yeah. You know, it's hard, especially having been through it. It's like, but it feels so good, you know, like, but maybe this is it. Maybe he's my soulmate and maybe, you know, you see it in the movies. You see this like, oh, this sweeping that's probably missing from the interrogation rooms. But in a relationship, what do you what do you sort of see that as like how do you ignore that feeling?

00:07:34:07 - 00:07:51:06
Brad Beeler
in some respects it's a lot like the interrogation rooms. Meaning I'll tell you a quick story. I was working a and it's in the book. It's in it was a homicide case that I was working, and we had a missing female who was dating two members of an outlaw motorcycle gang. One person was a 1%, six four, 240 pounds.

00:07:51:06 - 00:08:10:01
Brad Beeler
The term one percenter is a very old term that these type of individuals tend to be the worst of the worst. They gave the motorcycle clubs a bad name. This guy looked like the metaphorical hit man on a on a TV series. He just looked evil. The other individual they were, these two individuals were best friends. He was five six, about 140.

00:08:10:02 - 00:08:28:02
Brad Beeler
He looked like an accountant. He looked like he couldn't hurt a fly. Right. So my assumption was I'm going to test this guy first regarding involvement, regarding the disappearing female. So he failed my polygraph test and I started interrogating, not from the stints of that he did it, but that the other guy did it. He must have known about it.

00:08:28:03 - 00:08:48:13
Brad Beeler
Let me help you. Let me protect you from this big bad man. And the whole time he kept saying, Lisa, that's not it. That's not it. He wasn't saying he didn't do it, and I wasn't listening because I had that confirmation bias. I was looking for that evidence that he didn't do it. Instead of just looking at the behavior, instead of just looking at the pattern of events that was right in front of me.

00:08:48:13 - 00:09:05:15
Brad Beeler
Brad, I didn't that's not it. Finally, great detective, female detective outside the room walks in and she goes, can I talk to you for a second? She sits down. She says, can I just ask him real quick a question? And she does. She goes, John, you keep saying, that's not it. What is it? He goes, oh, I killed her, cut her up in six pieces and threw her in the river.

00:09:05:21 - 00:09:25:09
Brad Beeler
Five, six, 140 pounds. Look like an accountant. It's the other guy. Looked evil, but I had affixed horns and halos inappropriately. And that's what we have to be so careful about, is, you know, if you look at the world of sharks to, to use a metaphor here, everybody thinks the world's worst shark is a great white, right? It's mean, it's ominous.

00:09:25:10 - 00:09:41:19
Brad Beeler
It's got these real sharp, pointy teeth. And yes, if you dress up like it's favorite food source and a surf zone where it likes to feed, it may eat you. But the world's most dangerous shark is an oceanic whitetip. That's what Jaque Cousteau said. It's a little five six foot shark, but it will go when it hears explosions.

00:09:41:19 - 00:10:06:05
Brad Beeler
For hundreds of years since, mariners have been on the ocean. When it hears explosions, it thinks it's dinnertime. And this is a little cute looking shark. But the USS Indianapolis in 1945, there were 4 or 500 sailors were eaten by these sharks. Because they don't come across as dangerous. So we we trust our instincts, unfortunately, too much. Let's start trusting patterns of behavior over consistent period of time.

00:10:06:10 - 00:10:24:18
Lisa Sonni
I love that, you know, one of my favorite topics is actually like the covert nice guy. And I've used this sort of sarcastic example. And in fact, I used it in an episode with Doctor Abby. But bank robbers want to be they want to get away with the crime, right? So they they wear a mask, they run from the scene, they have an alibi.

00:10:24:19 - 00:10:46:09
Lisa Sonni
They do these things, so do abusers. It's like it seems so crazy to me. They're hiding and we're ignoring the patterns. And we're seeing the stereotype of the bad guy. I mean, even the fact that an abuser is not always male is certainly a topic. My audience is primarily female, but when you look at the nice guy, you think, well, he's not an abuser, it's the scary guy.

00:10:46:09 - 00:10:56:01
Lisa Sonni
That's why there's this stereotype of even like, women are choosing the bad men. Women are getting tricked by the good guy who really isn't good because of confirmation bias.

00:10:56:01 - 00:10:56:20
Brad Beeler
Probably.

00:10:56:22 - 00:10:57:08
Lisa Sonni
Yes.

00:10:57:08 - 00:11:16:13
Brad Beeler
I've had to unfortunately talk to hundreds of child sex offenders, and when you look at the ones that were effective and I hate to say that word effective, but that's the way you have to look at it, is they look like the person next door. One of my worst offenders looked like Captain Kangaroo from the TV series. He was an unassuming man.

00:11:16:13 - 00:11:37:07
Brad Beeler
He was a barber in the neighborhood, and for 40 years he took advantage of that. You look at Jerry Sandusky, you look at all these individuals that are very effective. Once again, sad word, but they blend in. They don't. They have a camouflage of people vouching for them, people saying, oh, he's such a good guy, but you want to be really careful about who you vouch for.

00:11:37:07 - 00:11:58:14
Brad Beeler
A lot of people that are predators use that. They they almost do the same thing that foreign intelligence are FBI or CIA would do to recruit a foreign intelligence person. They look, they spot, they assess, they look for vulnerabilities and weaknesses. They love bomb in. They, you know, in our way. But they're doing from a relationship standpoint, they're doing the same thing.

00:11:58:14 - 00:12:16:17
Brad Beeler
They're creating that dependency and the best predictor of future behavior, bar none, is past behavior. And I always hate it when people in relationships are like, I can't believe this person cheated on me. Okay. Did you cheat with this person to get them into the relationship? Well, yeah, I did. Well, what did you think was going to happen?

00:12:16:18 - 00:12:31:21
Brad Beeler
Right? I mean, they have a pattern of doing this behavior. Trust the behavior. Don't trust. Oh, well, they won't do it with me. They will do it with you. And once you start to see that behavior, there's 8 billion people on this planet, okay. Find somebody that won't do that to you, that doesn't have that pattern of behavior.

00:12:32:00 - 00:12:51:02
Lisa Sonni
I think a lot of women actually get stuck because they're trying to recover the man from the beginning. So they've they've the man has shown you good behavior, kind, trustworthy, all the things. And now he becomes bad. And we try to get back to that, that man, instead of assessing the person that is standing in front of you.

00:12:51:03 - 00:13:03:15
Lisa Sonni
Like we're not putting the new evidence in our mind. And I think sometimes it's like the confidence and charm and we see that as credibility. What do you see as credibility?

00:13:03:18 - 00:13:21:20
Brad Beeler
Once again, it's all about time and the ability to also when there is a boundary, okay, is I think that's a nice test. When you put a boundary in front of somebody or they have something that doesn't work out perfectly, a date didn't go according to something that they wanted, they didn't get. What is their reaction to that? Right.

00:13:21:21 - 00:13:42:04
Brad Beeler
Because to me that's the most telling part, right? Because you need to almost have some artificial tests that you put into this relationship, the early parts of the relationship. Because narcissist individual that may take advantage of this, they are going to have a hard time getting away from their pathology in those situations because they hate boundaries. They hate not getting their way.

00:13:42:04 - 00:13:53:01
Brad Beeler
So that to me is a nice little test to kind of throw in there and see how did they react to that, because that's going to manifest itself once again, it's very hard for people to change their pathology.

00:13:53:05 - 00:14:18:11
Lisa Sonni
Oh Absolutely. say no to someone who has a like a visceral reaction to being said no to. You'll often see somewhat faster, but you have to be paying attention to. Right. Like instead of, well, he only got upset because listen, forget that because and just take note of the fact that this thing made this person mad, or they had a really negative reaction to being challenged or told no, I think that's.

00:14:18:13 - 00:14:39:17
Brad Beeler
The key word there you said is is observe. And we don't do it. We get into this asynchronous communication where we're texting. Texting, it's very easy for me to think, what am I going to say? Oh, shoot, I don't want to say that because she may take it this way. If you do it in person or if you do it on FaceTime, if you do it where you can judge the body language, you're going to see where that message is, not congruence.

00:14:39:18 - 00:14:56:14
Brad Beeler
You're going to see that furrow of the brow. You're going to see that contempt leak out. And that's if you're observant and you're in person. It's much better. It's I always I say that my wife has 57 different ways of saying I'm fine. And in a text I don't use emojis. So in a text it may be problematic.

00:14:56:14 - 00:15:18:02
Brad Beeler
I don't know, I'm fine without an emoji. I don't know if she's fine. If she puts an emoji next to it, I may know a little bit more, but if I see her, is it? I'm fine. Or is it? I'm fine. Right. I'm going to. No one is going to probably require some flowers and, you know, some sit down time, but have those conversations not in text because you're missing out

00:15:18:02 - 00:15:38:10
Brad Beeler
so much. Communication is it's what we say in the form of the lyrics. It's how we say them in our vocal tonality, and it's how we look when we're saying them. You want to get as much information as possible when somebody's across from you, so that you can make a better informed decision. A relationship via text or via email is the worst way to do that.

00:15:38:10 - 00:16:00:07
Lisa Sonni
And it's 2026, so a lot of relationships start that way. You meet online, your DMing, you move to phones. It's a lot of texting. You might have some conversation, you might have a date sprinkled in. But so much takes place in writing now. And I think even the use of emojis. You can say something and put a freaking heart beside it, and then you assume good intentions.

00:16:00:07 - 00:16:19:15
Lisa Sonni
And what really made you think that? I actually really appreciate this idea of sort of stepping back and observing, because sometimes you're assigning a feeling or a motive to something and you've made it up, you know, you're filling in the gaps. And actually in chapter one, I love in your book, you were talking about how nervousness doesn't always indicate guilt.

00:16:19:15 - 00:16:45:16
Lisa Sonni
And confidence may not mean honesty, but we see that. And I think that, you know, people who intend to deceive can be very skilled in creating this positive first impression that we then struggle to go back on because we see them as charming and kind and trustworthy. But what makes them trustworthy? I know for me, when I got into my sort of big abusive relationship, I tell people this story.

00:16:45:17 - 00:17:03:04
Lisa Sonni
He was really honest, and that was something that I really it mattered to me because prior to that, I had been cheated on. So honesty was a big thing for me. So how this works is I said, I need somebody who's honest. And he said, cool, I'm honest. And I went, great. What's the evidence of it?

00:17:03:08 - 00:17:03:15
Brad Beeler
Yeah.

00:17:03:16 - 00:17:05:04
Lisa Sonni
Nothing. Nothing.

00:17:05:05 - 00:17:22:00
Brad Beeler
Yeah. That's that's the tough part is that you've got your expectations and they just make a statement that I have those expectations. I can't tell you how many thousands of people told me I'm not a liar. They turned out to be a liar. It's easy. Yeah, the proof was not in the pudding, so to speak. So don't go by just what they say.

00:17:22:00 - 00:17:40:21
Brad Beeler
And sometimes don't go by what other people say about them. Priming is such an impressive thing as sadly, I've had to work a lot of sexual assault investigations where, you know, wrong time, wrong place, alcohol is involved, but at the start of the night, you know, what may have been is, oh, this is so-and-so and he knows her.

00:17:40:22 - 00:17:59:00
Brad Beeler
And it was as simple as that. They may be in the same class, they may be neighbors, whatever the case may be. But that priming, you think, oh, familiarity. equals safe—familiarity doesn't equal safety. And that's the problem that we have is a lot of times if we go out on our first date I want you to think, well, let me put it this way.

00:17:59:01 - 00:18:04:01
Brad Beeler
Let's say Lisa, do you do you play any sports or. I'm sorry. Do you follow any sports?

00:18:04:07 - 00:18:07:13
Lisa Sonni
Not totally, no, but I can take a sports metaphor.

00:18:07:16 - 00:18:22:22
Brad Beeler
Okay, well, let's say you're a Dallas Cowboys fan, right? Or whoever. Pittsburgh Steelers, whatever that is. You're a Dallas fan and you're in Dallas on game day. You're going to see somebody with a Dallas Cowboys hat, and it's going to mean nothing to you. You may give them a little head nod. You're a Dallas Cowboys fans on a Sunday and you're in LA.

00:18:22:23 - 00:18:42:10
Brad Beeler
You see another Dallas Cowboy hat. Hey man. Good luck today. Whatever the case may be, you're in Azerbaijan on a Sunday or any day and you see a Dallas Cowboy hats. You guys are fast friends. You're in an unfamiliar environment with a sense of familiarity. So the way I point that out is when we go out on first dates, we should go somewhere we are already familiar with.

00:18:42:10 - 00:18:58:15
Brad Beeler
I know we want to go to an exotic place, but when we're an unfamiliar territory, we are going to seek the thing that seems most familiar and that may be the person across from you. That may be your first date, and as a result of that, you're giving them too much credence, too much credibility as a result of that.

00:18:58:15 - 00:19:17:04
Brad Beeler
It's that they haven't earned that. And manipulators take advantage of that. Right? You go, hey, we're going to go to spring break somewhere. We're going to go to some exotic place, and that person is the only person that speaks your language. All of a sudden they've reached this status in your primal mind that they haven't deserved. So let's be careful about that.

00:19:17:07 - 00:19:37:10
Lisa Sonni
That's actually excellent advice for people that are dating. I mean, I definitely am like, try a new restaurant. It's like, no, no, go to the place. You always go. Go somewhere familiar. Yeah. Yes. can you talk a little bit more about this, this idea of the way that priming works kind of on an ongoing basis, like, fast forward to somehow we've married this man.

00:19:37:11 - 00:19:41:11
Lisa Sonni
How do they continue constantly priming you, do you think?

00:19:41:15 - 00:20:10:04
Brad Beeler
Well, they are going to say certain things that are going to allow for that. They are also going to have a group of a wolf pack, so to speak. That is also doing that for you. Wow, you're so lucky. Wow. Brad is such a great guy. He's so wonderful. I mean, you know, you can manipulate this in such in such a way in which I've done it in criminal cases where let's say we're doing a search warrant, and the first person that's going to talk to you is not the first person that pointed a gun in your face, is not the first person that's going to have and cuffed you, but they're going to come to

00:20:10:04 - 00:20:27:21
Brad Beeler
you and they're going to work on Maslow's hierarchy of needs. And we are going to try to make you safe. We're going to make your basic necessities are met. And this is science, okay? This is something that's been proven is that when somebody can get to the base of that pyramid and reaching those needs, then they can start moving up those rungs.

00:20:27:21 - 00:20:46:05
Brad Beeler
So what they'll do is we'll we'll establish those basic necessities food, water, you know, familiarity, those types of things. And then what we'll do is the next person that's going to talk to us, we'll build them up. Hey, you know what? You're going to go talk to Kevin. Kevin is such a great guy. You know, Kevin's the type of person where if my kid got involved in a situation, I would want him to talk to Kevin.

00:20:46:05 - 00:21:08:14
Brad Beeler
Well, what am I doing? I'm putting the halo on Kevin, and then Kevin is going to talk me up if I'm going to be the person that's talked to him. So by this point, I look great as a result of those actions. And this can happen in a lot of different ways. Typically, it happens through friends is that you're going to have that social circle that's constantly telling you how lucky you are to be in a relationship with Brad.

00:21:08:14 - 00:21:26:14
Brad Beeler
And then, you know, once again, that priming and that validation, you start thinking, wow, I made such a good decision. You didn't really make a decision. The decision was made for you. So the overarching theme here is the pathology is going to return back to where it is. It's a big world. And let's start looking at the evidence and not just the words walk the walk.

00:21:26:20 - 00:21:44:18
Lisa Sonni
Yeah. And I think you've made this point several times and I'm so glad the consistency because people think, no, no, I know him and I always want to roll my eyes. Like, how long have you known this person? Because I don't think you do. People who are pathological especially, have this unbelievable ability. We look at Doctor Jekyll, Mr. Hyde, right.

00:21:44:18 - 00:22:07:23
Lisa Sonni
That feeling of who is this person? But if you experience them first as good and then they become for argument's sake and sort of oversimplified bad, it's like, well, maybe they're traumatized. Maybe they lied because of some reason. Maybe their mother didn't love them enough. We assign all these reasons instead of just like, forget the reasons and look at the behavior.

00:22:08:00 - 00:22:12:22
Lisa Sonni
Look at whether or not you see a pattern of bad behavior, especially.

00:22:12:23 - 00:22:33:04
Brad Beeler
I mean, not to say that age leads to wisdom, but when you have that prefrontal cortex, it gets cemented around 23 or 24. You look at I do a lot of stuff at the military, and you see a kid come in 1718, basic training. He can still change. She can still change. You get in a relationship at 27, 28 and you're trying to change that person.

00:22:33:04 - 00:22:48:11
Brad Beeler
There's very little variance that can be made. There's very little you can do to change that person. I'm not saying to give up and say, but that's why people love redemption stories because they're rare in reality. So don't think you're going to change that person because the statistics show that that's just not the case.

00:22:48:13 - 00:23:12:10
Lisa Sonni
That matters. And I have to say, I'm I was never good at math and science in high school, but I'm a I'm a science person. I like statistics because they're very clear. And the patterns have already shown in the statistics of these types of people don't change. But we always want that that emotional love story that we see of like, but I am a good woman and I got him to change.

00:23:12:10 - 00:23:34:23
Lisa Sonni
You think of every hallmark movie plot, right? That little Playboy in comes the nerdy woman, or the anxiety riddled, over functioning woman comes in and they just balance each other out perfectly and he changes for her. We all want that fairy tale, but in reality, those types of men don't change abusers in general. Anybody who's pathological especially, they're not changing.

00:23:34:23 - 00:23:40:23
Lisa Sonni
But we just how much do you think how much we want it to not be? The case plays a factor in this.

00:23:41:03 - 00:23:58:00
Brad Beeler
Absolutely. It's all want. It's all desire. It's all once again, you want the hallmark movie where you come into the small town and the guys working at the orchard and he just whatever, you know, it's it's around Oktoberfest, you know, it's like we could come up and design our own hallmark show right now. Right? But what's the reality of that?

00:23:58:00 - 00:24:19:02
Brad Beeler
And I truly think is that the the online dating world, it's great. I don't know, you would probably know the percentages of the amount of relationships that start now with online dating. It might be over 50%. Right. Is it used to be like, oh, that's strange. Now it's like considered to be the norm. Is that though? I think you really need to get in a situation where you get face to face.

00:24:19:03 - 00:24:38:20
Brad Beeler
You look someone in the eyes and you understand all three modalities of that communication and also change up your profile pictures don't use the same profile picture because those face scanning apps one. And I would use those face scanning apps because I would put that in there whoever the bow is that you're dating, because he may say, oh, I've never been on any online dating platform.

00:24:38:20 - 00:25:01:11
Brad Beeler
You plug it in, you see 72 profiles. So that's going to hurt his, you know, first impression there as far as honesty goes. But also just be careful about what you put out there online. Those breadcrumbs people can take advantage of. They can weaponize. And instead of having carpet bomb, you know, approaches on how they could potentially manipulate you, now you're giving them the key that kind of shows them how to unlock that.

00:25:01:11 - 00:25:11:01
Brad Beeler
And it can be very targeted in their message. And we see that with dating scams. And then we also unfortunately see that with manipulators who are who are up to no good when it comes to females.

00:25:11:07 - 00:25:28:21
Lisa Sonni
Yeah. Sneaky. I tell you, these guys are very skilled and I agree. Now I want to always make this point and I'm just curious what your thoughts are on this because I say some of these things to clients or in videos that I make online. And so many people are like, no, no, Lisa, you don't understand. My guy is not smart enough to be this skilled.

00:25:28:21 - 00:25:48:19
Lisa Sonni
He's not that calculating. He's not cunning, he's an idiot. Listen, I don't know that it's intelligence. I don't think that they all sit down and have this well thought out plan to manipulate. It's. It's learned, I know, on their part, but it's it's natural. It's just happening. Do you see that? That it's not always intelligence.

00:25:49:00 - 00:26:11:00
Brad Beeler
It's not. It's not an intelligence driven thing. We're not talking about a Ponzi scheme here. All criminal behavior that I look at. So when I was a criminologist in grad school, we would study why do people commit crime, that type of stuff. So if you want to view manipulation and sadly, some of this manipulation then turns into criminal activity either through domestic violence or sexual assault is you look at it's a mathematical equation,

00:26:11:00 - 00:26:33:02
Brad Beeler
it's need plus ability plus opportunity plus there justification. And that's times by stress okay. So that's the top. That's the numerator. And the denominator is social control. And the chances and consequences of them getting caught. Well a lot of them don't think they're ever going to be getting caught because they can manipulate a situation. Some of their social bonds and social conscience are very problematic.

00:26:33:02 - 00:26:55:14
Brad Beeler
So if they need something, you've given them the ability and the opportunity to provide it. It just takes stress added into that question, into that equation for them to act. So I think sometimes we overthink it and we think once again, hey, my person, my beau is not smart enough to be able to do this. This is an evolutionary drive where sex and or control is from an evolutionary perspective.

00:26:55:14 - 00:27:25:00
Brad Beeler
So that is a constant if you're giving them the opportunity. Access is everything. I can't offend or commit any crime if I don't have access to you. That's why when it comes to the child world, I never have people do sleepovers. I say, you should never have a sleepover. You're giving access to people that you don't truly know. And if you then allow them to have online access, whether it be with Roblox or other games that's opening, that's bringing the candy van into the house and allowing strangers to have access to your kids.

00:27:25:00 - 00:27:35:00
Brad Beeler
So if you want to view it from that standpoint, the need is there. If you're giving the other person the opportunity and access, that's when you open yourself up to the problem.

00:27:35:03 - 00:27:51:11
Lisa Sonni
Yeah, I so agree. And I mean, we need to be a little bit guarded, but I don't think anybody wants to operate in the world in this, you know, constant fear. But if we are observing and vetting and standing back and looking at patterns, we're going to see better anyway. And that's that's huge.

00:27:51:16 - 00:27:52:00
Brad Beeler
Yep.

00:27:52:01 - 00:28:13:18
Lisa Sonni
Shifting a little bit here. Right. Oh I love that phrase actually trust but verify. So chapter nine of your book, preparing for and Weathering the Storm, you talk about people that are trying to provoke this emotional reaction to gain the upper hand. It was just so like, God, that's such an abusive relationship. Tell me a little bit about how you see that happening.

00:28:13:18 - 00:28:14:18
Lisa Sonni
What do you see?

00:28:14:22 - 00:28:37:07
Brad Beeler
Yeah. So one of it's just strictly heart rate, like our ability to assess credibility is so thrown off when our heart rate goes up. So some of the biggest studies on this show that your ability to detect deception, the biggest outlier is what your resting heart rate is. Anytime you're resting heart rate gets over 70 or 80. Now we have what's called cognitive overload where it's almost like on our computer screen.

00:28:37:07 - 00:29:00:20
Brad Beeler
Here is when we get more windows opened up and then our computer bogs down. That's what happens. And as a result of that, we start making rash decisions and we make decisions that are just based upon limited amounts of information, the easy way out, so to speak. So that's part of it, is heart rate. Then you start throwing neurochemicals in there and now you have a significant problem when you throwing cortisol in there. The stress hormone.

00:29:00:20 - 00:29:21:07
Brad Beeler
What do we do when our stress is up. Do we tend to stress eat. Do we tend to you know, we do a lot of things when we are emotional that we later like, I wish I wouldn't have done that. So whether it be oxytocin, cortisol, serotonin, these chemicals when they are released and then when they're released by somebody that has a goal that's very, very problematic.

00:29:21:10 - 00:29:40:15
Brad Beeler
You know, there's tons of studies that Paul Zak has a great book called The Moral Molecule that just discusses how people can manipulate this. When they can get oxytocin and serotonin release from you. It can be manipulated at such a high level, whether it be from a handshake, a hug, or a spoken word. So we want to be once again, we don't want to put fear out there.

00:29:40:15 - 00:30:06:18
Brad Beeler
We don't want to be guarded. You know, in my world, when I was with the Secret Service, I would love to have our protecting in a bubble and have nobody within 300 miles of them. That's just not how it works, obviously. But trust and verify. And if you're in an emotional state and it is not of the essence meaning if you're walking to your car at night, if they're walking down an alley at night and you have a a visceral response, trusted

00:30:06:19 - 00:30:19:00
Brad Beeler
call 911, run for your car, whatever the case may be. But if you don't need to react that way, let that heart rate come down. Let those neurochemicals dissipate into the ether, and then make a conscious decision.

00:30:19:00 - 00:30:41:22
Lisa Sonni
That's hard. I you know, when you're in a relationship and especially when you're like, you're being provoked. Now, I think it's interesting because in a lot of abusive relationships, they provoke you so that you have a big emotional display and then they're recording you, or they're using it in some way as evidence that you're the problem or to create this kind of like, we're both bad, we're both an issue here.

00:30:41:22 - 00:31:02:21
Lisa Sonni
And unfair because the reaction becomes the trial. Now we're going to not talk about what this person did to you. We're going to talk about your reaction to what they did. And it's it's crazy making, if nothing else, in in high stakes conversations. Why do you think the abuser or the criminal is trying to do that? What what's the gain for them?

00:31:03:01 - 00:31:20:00
Brad Beeler
Many times what I saw, and once again, I'm talking from an interrogation standpoint, but this is a learned behavior. And they've done it to set people off to create a reaction. So, oh, hey, I'm not at fault here. That person did it. They did that bad thing. Whether it be they killed somebody, shot somebody, whatever. I was investigating.

00:31:20:00 - 00:31:39:09
Brad Beeler
And by creating that reaction, it gets me off my game. Or once again, hey, I was trying to participate here, but this jerk here lost his mind. And so for me, when I see that type of behavior and it's performative meaning somebody aggressive, but they're not furrowing their brow, they're aggressive, but they're not clenching their fists. Their aggressive, but they're not bleeding their body.

00:31:39:10 - 00:31:54:20
Brad Beeler
Things in which this is performative from a body language standpoint. I'm going to just let them play that out. I'm going to take a second, and I'm not going to match it, because when you match it, that's when they win. So that's when you set the boundaries. I truly believe him not going to have this conversation right now.

00:31:54:23 - 00:32:05:10
Brad Beeler
You know, let's let's, you know, I want to have this conversation. I just don't want to do it right now. And if they are constantly pushing that boundary, there's a reason they're pushing that boundary. They want that reaction for you. Many times.

00:32:05:12 - 00:32:24:04
Lisa Sonni
That is so important because actually when you say that, you know, it's so it's so easy to say from two chairs, wherever we are in the world to be like, just say, I'm not doing this right now. An abusive man will get right in your face and make you have the conversation right now. I think even if you get baited into it, you have to at some point go.

00:32:24:05 - 00:32:34:04
Lisa Sonni
Why was that so important for that person to have that conversation with me in a moment where I asked for space, what were they trying to gain by me not being regulated?

00:32:34:07 - 00:32:53:10
Brad Beeler
Yeah. That they they're being emotionally inconsistent. Let's say whatever you're questioning them about that caused that reaction. You have to sit there and say, was that a fair question that I asked them if that was a fair question that I asked them? And I get that reaction. That means there's something deeper here. That's where I need to dig deeper as to why they cause that reaction.

00:32:53:10 - 00:33:10:00
Brad Beeler
They are covering up for something or trying to get me off the scent, so to speak. I've just seen it hundreds of times in the criminal realm and in a relationship realm. I think when you see that once again, set the boundary. If you're wanting to be in a relationship with somebody, it should be fair to say, look, I want to have this conversation.

00:33:10:00 - 00:33:26:20
Brad Beeler
I just don't want to do it right now. If we would do, we would do a lot of search warrants at six in the morning. We do a lot at six at night. When I would do them at 6:00 in the morning. It was always problematic to obtain information because, you know, there's there's people in the house, they may lose face in front of their kids or from their significant other.

00:33:26:21 - 00:33:47:12
Brad Beeler
They're just waking up. People don't like to have conversations early in the morning or late at night, 10:00 in the morning, at 2:00 in the afternoon, the best time to have good sensitive communications. So if I was ever in a situation where I didn't want to have a, you know, a conversation at a certain time, I would just try to, as best I could, put it off for another time.

00:33:47:12 - 00:34:07:01
Brad Beeler
And some people say, well, that's nice, Brad, but you can't do it. Why is this a life or death situation? Well, it's just he wants to have the right. He wants to have the conversation at another time or doesn't want to have it at another time. He wants to have it now, set those boundaries and their reaction to the boundaries, I think especially early in a relationship, is what is going to be so telling.

00:34:07:05 - 00:34:29:23
Lisa Sonni
I agree so, so much and especially early because I think, you know, my brain automatically goes to like somebody in this seven years. She already knows that if you don't have the conversation when he wants to, he's going to punish you in some way, stonewall you for days and make it feel urgent for you. His desire to have the conversation will outweigh anything that's after conditioning happens.

00:34:29:23 - 00:34:47:04
Lisa Sonni
So the goal, of course, is to not get into a marriage like this and sort of back up and do the vetting in the beginning. But when you find yourself years in, just notice these things. And I want people to also use some of this knowledge to go, yeah, this is abuse. This is this is a good question.

00:34:47:04 - 00:35:10:00
Lisa Sonni
Why is it so urgent that I have to have this conversation right at this moment, you're always giving in to their needs. And I think women feel very responsible for their own safety, even emotional safety. But to make that, to give in so that you can make yourself feel safer and it's hard because they're pulling you into their frame and then you're defending your tone, your tears, your whatever.

00:35:10:01 - 00:35:23:20
Lisa Sonni
You know you're defending, why you're angry, why you ask the question, why you don't want to have the conversation right now. And the original abuse disappears like the original crime disappears. And they're talking about the angry interrogation officer in some way.

00:35:23:21 - 00:35:45:02
Brad Beeler
Yeah. No, absolutely. They're thinking about the way it went down, the procedure they're not thinking about did it actually take place? What's a good defense attorney do? And I don't and I don't mean this as a, you know, somebody that does a DUI. They should be punished for that. But what is it? A lot of times the DUI attorneys do, they focus on how the breathalyzer was managed, how this was not that their client was drinking or not drinking.

00:35:45:02 - 00:36:03:10
Brad Beeler
They're trying to find an out. Okay. So that's what defense attorneys do. And they have a job to do, right? They want to make sure that we as investigators do the right thing. But they're looking at the technicalities. And a lot of abusers are having you focus on the technicalities that are trying to get them off instead of the original behavior that led to this situation.

00:36:03:13 - 00:36:21:17
Lisa Sonni
Yeah, that's why the arguments are so circular. You know, they put you in this double bind where no matter what direction you try to take the conversation and you're wrong. This way, you're wrong that way. And then you're like, forget it. And you just give up altogether. Which investigators can't do, of course, because you have an investigation to run.

00:36:21:17 - 00:36:27:00
Lisa Sonni
But I feel like we're the same. We should be like, hey, I haven't completed my investigation.

00:36:27:04 - 00:36:47:12
Brad Beeler
Yeah, correct. And it's tough to do, especially the longer you're in that relationship. You know, you've got kids in this situation so very, very difficult. So that's why it's so important that that first couple months where we choose correctly. All right. And I think that's when it's easier to see once again, by setting those boundaries and seeing those reactions and being able to walk away at that time before your two pot committed.

00:36:47:16 - 00:37:09:09
Lisa Sonni
Yeah. It's it's I hindsight's 2020 as they say, right. So one thing that I think is so interesting is, you know, these arguments, if we want to have a conversation, but we want to have it when we're regulated, what is the point of this conversation? And I'm telling you, for women in abusive relationships, it's it's accountability. I want this man to admit what he did.

00:37:09:09 - 00:37:36:11
Lisa Sonni
And this is chapter 14 of your book, which again, just, oh, people have got to go out and get this book. But getting them to admit it, you write that the hardest part of uncovering deception is not just spotting the lie, but getting the person to admit the truth. Yeah, and I think people's, you know, when they're confronted, the natural instinct if you're lying, especially doing something bad, is to resist, deny, rationalize, whatever.

00:37:36:11 - 00:37:57:20
Lisa Sonni
But this is not a matter of getting women to interrogate men into accountability or interrogate abusers, because a that's dangerous. Don't anybody apply these tactics if you're afraid physically. But how can women do that and or let go of needing that? Because again, prosecuting a crime is one thing, but in these relationships you can't. That's not how it works.

00:37:57:20 - 00:38:07:02
Lisa Sonni
But we're not maybe going to get the admission. But I do want them to understand some of the tactics and the denial and rationalization and why that's happening.

00:38:07:05 - 00:38:23:18
Brad Beeler
Yeah, definitely. That's a great question. So two ways to kind of unpack that is that many abusers are also very good liars. And when I say good liars is they look you in the eyes, which is not statistically backed as far as being deceptive or not. Actually, a lot of liars will look at you with these, with these soft puppy dog eyes.

00:38:23:19 - 00:38:41:05
Brad Beeler
Right? And it's just not backed by science. And there's a lot of people that are very they're telling you the truth, but they look deceptive because of what we've been taught. What is deception? So the best thing for me first is just a real quick riff on detection of deception is I want to ask people questions in which they answer yes or no questions.

00:38:41:05 - 00:38:54:06
Brad Beeler
That's the best way to get to. The truth is that I'm going to ask you something, which you have to answer yes or no, because if you can take me wherever you want to take me, and you can tell me a long, tall tale, you can omit whatever you choose to omit, and you can accentuate whatever you want to accentuate.

00:38:54:06 - 00:39:11:11
Brad Beeler
And you can tell me things in which are truthful statements as part of that open ended statement. But if I say something that's yes or no, it is going to force them. And what happens many times is you're going to get a slight delay, so you're going to get yes, yes. No. And you're going to get no with an upward inflection many times.

00:39:11:11 - 00:39:28:08
Brad Beeler
So it's not. No with an exclamation point. It's no. Those are two different nose. That's when I asked my daughter did you clean your room. Yes. Okay. That's that's a problem. You didn't clean her room or liars lies. Pacifically. Hey, Sydney. Did you get all your homework done? I got all my math homework done. Well, that sounds to me like there's some other homework that needs to be done.

00:39:28:08 - 00:39:49:14
Brad Beeler
And so little things like that. Equivocating statements using lie statements, usually, normally, typically those are the types of things that I want you to look at. And it's not 100%, but think of it as a check engine light where you know what, something's not right there. So let's say there could be a text message that we want to look at, whatever the case may be, and we feel as if our significant other is not being truthful with us.

00:39:49:14 - 00:40:08:13
Brad Beeler
So how do we get them to, quote unquote, give us the evidence? That's what's very, very hard sometimes. First off, understand it's very difficult to get the evidence and it may be staring you in the face. So trust the preponderance of the evidence instead of just searching for the confession. But I want to be there, buddy. I want to give them an off ramp.

00:40:08:16 - 00:40:25:04
Brad Beeler
The situation is everybody needs to save face. Why do we have what's going on in Ukraine right now with Russia? Well, it's very hard for Putin to save face because if he walks away, it says, I did all this for vain. All these millions of people died for no reason, and he's probably going to get overthrown. So we have to give people an off ramp.

00:40:25:04 - 00:40:40:10
Brad Beeler
So my analogy I use in the book is called Be There Buddy. And it's blame outside forces. It's understand but don't agree. We understand it is not mean agreement diminish the impact but not the culpability. So you made a mistake. You screwed up. But it's not. The end of the world is a fair statement. So I want to be there, buddy.

00:40:40:10 - 00:40:59:09
Brad Beeler
I want to diminish impact. I want to focus on the why and not the what. So I may, if it's a relationship issue, be like, look, we all make mistakes. There's no perfect people. I just want when we're moving forward here, I just want you to be perfectly honest with me, because if you made a mistake in the past and that's in the rearview mirror, I want to focus on the windshield moving forward, because you got to understand the situation I'm in.

00:40:59:10 - 00:41:20:06
Brad Beeler
So by doing that, you're saying I'm not judging you. All right. We're almost that Catholic priest where we're creating a private environment where we're not around their friends. We don't have our phones, we're ventrally fronted. So we're showing. I'm here to listen. We're leaning forward slightly. We're giving them soft eyes. We're not giving that contempt look. And we're coming off like that Catholic priest.

00:41:20:06 - 00:41:36:11
Brad Beeler
If in the confessional, in the in the Catholic faith, if there was one of these fancy microphones in the confessional, no one would talk. If when you were talking to the priest was looking or you could look at the priest, that would be very that would shut down communication. If you said one thing in, the priest immediately said, really?

00:41:36:12 - 00:41:52:07
Brad Beeler
Why did you do that? You know, very judgment oriented. That would be problematic. So it is hard. You're going to have to bite your tongue when I'm talking to a trauma list or a murder. And I'm being there, buddy, and I'm rationalizing, projecting and minimizing the behavior. It's very tough. But what's my goal? To get a clear picture of what transpired?

00:41:52:07 - 00:42:10:20
Brad Beeler
And if you're in a relationship where something has happened and you're trying to get closure on it and you're trying to get more information on it, think of how would a Catholic priest talk to your significant other in order to obtain that confession? It wouldn't be like you see in the movies with that, you know, the the light over the top and pointing fingers.

00:42:10:20 - 00:42:24:00
Brad Beeler
Then you'd be like, look, you made a mistake. It is what it is. But in order to move forward, I got to understand I can trust you moving forward. In order to do that, I got to go backwards a couple pages and understand what led to this. And if you. Do. This, if you do that, people, you'd be surprised at

00:42:24:00 - 00:42:42:02
Brad Beeler
how many people will tell you. I've had people admit to mass murder the most horrific things on the planet, and I had nothing in common with them. But what is the number one thing that people don't have right now? Your attention. It's the most valuable resource on the planet. We're sucked into the virtual world. We're looking at our phones.

00:42:42:02 - 00:42:58:10
Brad Beeler
If I can ventrally front, and I can look at somebody in their face with undivided attention and I can say, just, just talk to me. That is priceless. And if you do that one, you're going to be better in relationships, but you're also going to be better in situations in which somebody made a mistake and they stepped in it.

00:42:58:10 - 00:43:01:02
Brad Beeler
And you're providing them an opportunity to explain the why.

00:43:01:04 - 00:43:18:15
Lisa Sonni
I love that it's so interesting. You know, I immediately picture they're always making excuses. So kind of help them make the excuses. You know, it's not okay. I wasn't sleeping with you as often as I should have. I know I'm failing as a wife. Tell me what happened. I'm not perfect. You're not perfect. Let's do this. Let's just tell me.

00:43:18:15 - 00:43:36:04
Lisa Sonni
I just need honesty. If you kind of own that, just one thing I'll say is like. Don't actually step into that frame. You're stepping into that to get the evidence. But then you need to do something with the evidence, not stay there and continue to believe that that's hard but important.

00:43:36:05 - 00:43:50:22
Brad Beeler
Yeah. I mean, it's the last puzzle piece that you're looking for, right? And now you've got a clear, you know, you've got all the who, what when we're wise and now you can make an informed decision. And at that point that's that's free. Well that's what but now you have all the information that you need. And I always love it.

00:43:50:22 - 00:44:06:16
Brad Beeler
And I think juries love it when somebody says, here's what I did and here's why I did it. Now, if you don't have that at a certain point I got these text messages, I've got this, I've got this, I've got this. I think he's cheating on me. That's when you got to sit there and say, that's not my gut saying this.

00:44:06:16 - 00:44:23:08
Brad Beeler
That's what any rational person would say. This meaning if I wrote this down. Okay, you got this text from this female. He always saw him here. He said this. We haven't had relations for this amount of time. Whatever it is. And you throw that in. You did one of those old I know back in the day we do those plus minus little ledgers on.

00:44:23:09 - 00:44:39:22
Brad Beeler
Should I make this decision or not? Take your emotions out of it and just put those things down here and say, if I was a prosecutor and I was prosecuting this case, would my husband, boyfriend, whatever the case, would he be guilty of doing this act in a in with a jury or in a civil jury? Preponderance of evidence.

00:44:39:22 - 00:44:49:13
Brad Beeler
And if you answer in, any normal person's answer would be. Oh yeah. Then you need to sit there and say, I don't need a confession. But if you do be there, buddy.

00:44:49:16 - 00:45:16:01
Lisa Sonni
Yeah, I'm an advocate for not needing the confession because more often than not in a relationship, because it's interesting, again, like evidence and the legal system and that, you know, innocent until proven guilty, I get it. That's not the same in a relationship. It's still it's like you need the evidence because your brain tells you you have to have it, or he's telling you if you don't have concrete evidence, if you don't have a video of him doing it, then it never happened.

00:45:16:01 - 00:45:24:22
Lisa Sonni
But I think this repeated denial is interesting. What do you think repeated denial or evasion can actually tell us even without that confession?

00:45:25:00 - 00:45:43:01
Brad Beeler
Well, I mean, it's tough to say not knowing the specific circumstances, but, you know, once again, best predictor of future behaviors, past behavior. How many points of reference do you need before you sit there and say, you know, and that's the problem. That's what love is clouding. That's what the relationship is clouding. It's staring you in the face.

00:45:43:01 - 00:46:07:06
Brad Beeler
And I know I've talked to so many of my friends and outwardly I'm like, I can't believe he can't see these signs. Right. So you almost have to, like, get outside yourself and almost view it from someone else's perspective because it's perception versus perspective, right? I know you mentioned perspective earlier is that we have a perception of things, but what's more valuable is another person's perspective.

00:46:07:07 - 00:46:26:00
Brad Beeler
There's our significant others. But in this sense, what would someone else's perspective that was outwardly looking at this situation? Would they sit there and go, oh yeah, he's doing this bad thing. He's he's a narcissist. He's manipulating you. Or worse, he's he's cheating on you. He's abusing you. If you look at it from someone else's perspective, what would it show?

00:46:26:00 - 00:46:53:04
Brad Beeler
And it's tough to get into other people's shoes, but it's a nice little thought exercise, and I always do it before I go talk to bad guys, because I want to talk to them from their why. And if I talk to them from there, why? It almost becomes an echo in their own head, and it allows them to come forward with those words of why they did what they did, versus if I come from my perspective, I'm pissed, I'm upset, I'm emotional, and it makes it a lot easier for them to just keep denying.

00:46:53:06 - 00:47:14:02
Lisa Sonni
Yeah. It's hard. You know, I'm so big on emotional regulation. Tickety breath because you go into it hot. If you go into all these things angry and and or you go into it calm and then this person can wind you up, it's like you're going to lose what the goal is. So we don't need confessions in abusive relationships.

00:47:14:02 - 00:47:31:20
Lisa Sonni
I know. Well, you don't need them in the law either. You just need enough evidence to prosecute. But the confession is not the thing. Sometimes we just need to trust ourselves. But I feel like we're telling women in so many cases, you know, like, trust your gut, but then he's telling you you're making it up. You're just insecure because your last boyfriend cheated on you.

00:47:31:20 - 00:47:54:12
Lisa Sonni
I'm not cheating on you. You're traumatized. You're crazy, your dramatic, and you lose touch with reality. I think confusion in a relationship is actually a perfect sign that something's wrong could be abused, but that something is wrong. Because in healthy relationships, you can be mad at your husband and not confused about whether or not he's abusing you. You can just have a disagreement.

00:47:54:13 - 00:48:09:20
Brad Beeler
And it's similar to when you ask people and they give you the truth. So when something happens, you don't have to have a very good memory to tell the truth. Mark Twain said that a long time ago is that it's just one real of film that people are speaking, but when somebody is telling a lie, they have to create an alternate truth.

00:48:09:20 - 00:48:28:12
Brad Beeler
They have to sit there and say, is it believable? Then they have to say, with this new truth, is there any way that she she could determine if that's not truthful. There's so much mental processing going on there. That's why, as you said, you're sitting there taking a step back, going, this just doesn't make sense, right? Because truthful people do not talk like that.

00:48:28:12 - 00:48:40:16
Brad Beeler
It just and that's what it's almost like. The question you need to ask yourself is like as an outside observer, does this make sense? And once you get your emotions out of the way, it's going to you're going to get a much clearer decision.

00:48:40:18 - 00:48:44:19
Lisa Sonni
Yeah, absolutely. Do you trust your gut instinct?

00:48:44:23 - 00:49:00:20
Brad Beeler
Only when it comes to personal situations? Because I've been I tell the story about the war and the pit bull as well, is that my partner Ryan and I were doing a search warrant, and we came into a house and we came into the kitchen and there was a pit bull, and there was a Chihuahua. And most people would say, well, what's going to hurt you?

00:49:00:22 - 00:49:19:14
Brad Beeler
It's a mad, bad very, you know, what society says is a, you know, scary animal in the pit bull. And now that's just a little Chihuahua. It's a little 6 pound animal. Right. So my front sight focus of my firearm, I don't want to shoot an animal was on the pit bull. What happens that comes around behind me jumps up and grabs me by the testicles and my partner's laughing.

00:49:19:18 - 00:49:33:19
Brad Beeler
I think the bad guy in the room's laughing. I've got a holster up. I've got to secure it. Thanks to the Duluth Trading Company for the fire hose material pants. I'm speaking in the octave that I'm speaking to you now as a result of that. But I had put horns and halos, affixed them too quickly to the wrong thing.

00:49:33:19 - 00:49:51:20
Brad Beeler
So you do trust them in those situations. Because if you think about it, if I would have been worried about the war, but the pit bull would have turned on me, it wouldn't matter about the fabric of my pants. I would have had a big problem if that would have been the pit bull. So trust it when your safety, your security of you or your family is on the line.

00:49:51:20 - 00:50:10:07
Brad Beeler
Because that's what it was meant for. We didn't have social media 200,000 years ago, right? To protect our tribe now biases are so prevalent with what's out there. Is that what I want you to do is let's almost skew when we say trust our gut. I do want to trust it in the negative, but I don't want the.

00:50:10:08 - 00:50:31:20
Brad Beeler
And I'm dating myself here, but the Eddie Haskell effect to kind of kick in here where we have someone especially early on in a relationship, we put that halo on them too quickly. And then the affinity bias, cognitive bias, all that kicks in and it's so over, it's so difficult to overcome that. And they almost have to do so many negative things before we finally start believing it.

00:50:31:20 - 00:50:43:00
Brad Beeler
So let's be vanilla a little bit. Let's be Switzerland when it comes to throwing out horns and halos to quickly, especially in our personal relationships when we don't have to trust your gut when your life depends on it.

00:50:43:04 - 00:51:09:08
Lisa Sonni
I love that such good advice. And to me, in an abusive relationship, our lives are always dependent on this. Even when you're not being physically harmed or physically threatened because this is your life. You know we live one life, and being stuck and trapped in an abusive relationship is a form of dying in so many ways. Not to be dramatic, but it really, like you get so stuck in your life, is wasting away with a bad person that does nothing but hurt you.

00:51:09:09 - 00:51:20:23
Lisa Sonni
Fundamentally, we want to get out of these relationships. There's so much good information to take from this conversation and from your book. Tell me everything. Where can people get to your book?

00:51:21:00 - 00:51:37:15
Brad Beeler
Sure, they can get it on Simon and Schuster. It's also most people order books now on Amazon so they can get it on Amazon, or they can go to my website at BradleyBeeler.com Also on the socials @BradBeeler1865. That was the year the Secret Service was founded. So on Instagram and also on LinkedIn at that moniker.

00:51:37:15 - 00:51:42:00
Brad Beeler
So I like to put a lot of content out there. So if I can help you in any way, please feel free to reach out.

00:51:42:05 - 00:52:08:21
Lisa Sonni
That is phenomenal. I think really what I'm taking from this conversation is noticing matters and information matters. Your gut notice their reactions. Definitely be paying attention to patterns and if they're evading things, trust your gut when it really matters. We don't need courtroom level proof because you're the investigator, not us. We're just trying to understand our own lives and our own relationships much better.

00:52:08:21 - 00:52:17:18
Lisa Sonni
So he might control the story, but you can always return back to the pattern. So thank you so much for being here. It was absolutely such a great conversation.

00:52:17:22 - 00:52:20:18
Brad Beeler
Thank you so much. I appreciate the opportunity.

00:52:20:20 - 00:52:30:08
Lisa Sonni
If this episode gave you clarity. Share it with someone who needs it. Thanks for being here and for being honest with yourself. And remember, you're stronger than before.

00:52:30:10 - 00:52:33:12
Music
Stronger than before.