Trigger warning: disordered eating, sexual assault, rape
Hey Financial Feminists! Today’s conversation is one that’s going to challenge the way you see yourself and the world. I sat down with Elise Loehnen — New York Times bestselling author and host of the “Pulling the Thread” podcast — to unpack how the seven deadly sins have been used to keep women small and compliant for centuries. We talk about the trap of trying to be a “good girl” in a society that often tells us to stay quiet, how Elise looks to the seven deadly sins as a framework for what patriarchy sees as a “good girl” and why it’s all bullshit, and how to reclaim our desires, ambitions, and freedom by breaking the rules.
Key takeaways:
- Understanding the patriarchal roots of the seven deadly sins: Elise explains how these ancient concepts have been weaponized to control women’s behavior and limit their potential.
- Harnessing envy as a tool for self-discovery: Learn how feelings of envy can actually highlight what you truly want in life, serving as a guide rather than a guilt trip.
- Breaking free from the ‘good girl’ myth: Discover strategies to stop conforming to societal expectations and start living authentically.
- The double standard around ambition and success: We discuss how women are often penalized for the same traits that are celebrated in men, and what we can do about it.
- Reclaiming anger as a valid emotion: Elise emphasizes the importance of acknowledging and embracing our anger to fuel positive change.
Notable quotes
“Women are conditioned to subjugate all of our wants to other people’s needs. Most of us don’t actually know what we want.”
“Envy is interesting because it’s information—it’s your soul knocking on the door saying, ‘Pay attention to this; there’s something here for you.”
“We hate angry women. An angry woman is terrifying because it threatens the status quo.”
“If we could let go of this idea of being ‘good’ and allow ourselves to be whole and human, we’d be one big giant step closer to freedom.”
Episode-at-a-glance
≫ 02:04 The seven deadly sins
≫ 13:50 Envy and ambition
≫ 16:40 Cultural conditioning and gender expectations
≫ 34:04 Historical context of the seven deadly sins
≫ 41:18 Original sin
≫ 43:22 The Seven Deadly Sins: Gluttony
≫ 44:48 Pitfalls of wellness culture
≫ 47:39 The Seven Deadly Sins: Greed
≫ 48:55 The Seven Deadly Sins: Pride
≫ 51:05 The Seven Deadly Sins: Lust
≫ 53:22 The Seven Deadly Sins: Sloth
≫ 57:00 The Seven Deadly Sins: Wrath
≫ 01:04:23 The Seven Deadly Sins: Envy
≫ 01:08:16 How to stop being good girls and start being ourselves
Elise’s links:
Are you registered to vote? https://vote.org/
Special thanks to our sponsors:
Squarespace
Go to www.squarespace.com/FFPOD to save 10% off your first website or domain purchase.
Masterclass
Get an additional 15% off any annual membership at masterclass.com/FFPOD.
Rocket Money
Stop wasting money on things you don’t use. Cancel your unwanted subscriptions by going to RocketMoney.com/FFPOD.
Third Love
It’s time to get your Bra-blems Solved™. Use code PODCAST15 for $15 off your order at ThirdLove.com.
Are you registered to vote?
RESOURCES:
Feeling Overwhelmed? Start here!
Our HYSA Partner Recommendation (terms apply)
Behind the Scenes and Extended Clips on Youtube
Leave Financial Feminist a Voicemail
Financial Feminist on Instagram
Take our FREE Money Personality Quiz
Meet Elise
Elise Loehnen is a New York Times bestselling author and the host of Pulling the Thread, where she interviews cultural luminaries about the big questions of today, including people like Jo Harjo, Loretta Ross, Pico Iyer, Dr. Gabor Maté, and Terry Real. She’s the author of the New York Times bestselling On Our Best Behavior: The Seven Deadly Sins and the Price Women Pay to be Good.
Transcript:
Elise Loehnen:
But I think what happens to women, we are conditioned to subjugate all of our wants to other people’s needs. Most of us don’t actually know what we want, or have any intimacy or comfort exploring that. And so the minute, for example, that your envy comes up, it feels so uncomfortable, so, so bad that you want to deprecate the person who’s making you feel bad to make yourself feel better, to make it go away, rather than just letting it come up and saying like, what is this?
Tori. Dunlap:
Hi, financial feminists, welcome to the show. If you were hearing a different audio than normal, I’m traveling. I’m in L.A. L.A is loud. And also there’s a weird humming outside that I couldn’t tell you what it’s about. I have no idea. Thank you all for being here. As always, if you don’t know me, my name is Tori. I am a money expert, I am the host of this show. We have a community of 5 million women and we have taught them how to save money, pay off debts, start investing, start businesses, and feel financially confident. And if you’re an oldie bit of goodie, you knew that already.
If you are looking for a free personalized money plan, that is the perfect place to start. If you’re stressed out about money and you’re wondering ready to get started, go to herfirst100k.com/quiz, and we will ask you a couple questions about where you’re at in your financial journey, and then give you a personalized financial plan with step-by-step steps to get you started. So herfirst100k.com/quiz.
I’m very excited for today’s guest. We had a really great interview, and I also am a fan of her podcast, so if you’re not already listening, you should. Today’s guest is Elise Lunen. Elise is a New York Times bestselling author, and the host of the podcast Pulling the Thread, where she interviews cultural luminaries about the big questions of today. She’s the author of the New York Times bestseller On Our Best Behavior: the Seven Deadly Sins and the Price Women Pay to Be Good. It is brilliant. It is like she delved into my own brain. It’s so good. It’s everything that’s holding you back from living a beautiful, badass, kick-ass life that makes you proud.
We talk about the trap of trying so hard to be good, a good parsoner, a good wife, a good daughter, a good mother, a good person, and how no matter what we do or how perfect we are, the patriarchy and internalized misogyny finds a way to knock us down. We talk about how Elise looks at the seven deadly sins as a framework for what the patriarchy sees as a good girl, and why it’s all bullshit, and how we can find freedom by breaking the rules.
This conversation just lit a fire under me to interrogate the ways in which I still try to fit into the good girl box, and the way that just absolutely sucks my energy, and our power collectively. So without further ado, let’s go ahead and get into it. But first a word from our sponsors.
Elise Loehnen:
Where are you?
Tori. Dunlap:
I’m in Seattle.
Elise Loehnen:
Oh, I love Seattle. I grew up in Montana, so Seattle was my big city.
Tori. Dunlap:
I love Montana. If y’all haven’t been to Montana, it’s beautiful. There’s nothing there, and that’s the whole point.
Elise Loehnen:
That is the whole point. There are no people. And I was just there last week and I have fantasies of course, about going home, and then LA is, it’s one direct flight away, and it feels a little closer. I used to live in New York, that was definitely less Montanaey, but I have kids and they’re in school. You just get so stuck.
Tori. Dunlap:
LA’s not my favorite. I’ve said that many times on this show.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
But I’m there a lot for work, and I’d rather go to New York than LA.
Elise Loehnen:
Are you in sort of the West Hollywood area?
Tori. Dunlap:
I mean, typically?
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
And I know, I know that… Because my best friend lives in LA for like 8 to 10 years and she’s like, “That’s not the real LA.” And I’m like, “Unfortunately, that’s the LA that I am stuck in for work.”
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah, that’s the LA experience that you’re having. It’s better than that, but it’s not the end all be all. I’m not obsessed with LA.
Tori. Dunlap:
I get to LA and I feel so lonely. Like immediately.
Elise Loehnen:
See, I think that’s why I like it, in a weird way.
Tori. Dunlap:
Really? Interesting.
Elise Loehnen:
Well, I think living in New York, it was just too much energy from other people, plus the schlep. And so having a car and being able to go to Costco and being by myself is a kind of fantasy.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yeah, I get that. I was at Costco, was that yesterday? Two days? It was yesterday. This is where Costco was born, is Kirkland, Washington.
Elise Loehnen:
When Costco came to Missoula, Montana, it was a big day and a big employer, and I realized I think it’s the only club to which I have ever belonged, Tori.
Tori. Dunlap:
I kind of love that though. It does feel like a cult, but it feels like a cult in a way that I’m good with. They pay their people well, you get a good value for your money. There’s $4.99 rotisserie chicken… Name another cult that has rotisserie chickens. I don’t know one.
Elise Loehnen:
No, exactly. That’s great. I always go there for a few things and end up spending $700, but that’s a conversation for another day.
Tori. Dunlap:
I got out of there under $50 yesterday. I don’t know how I did it. I legitimately don’t know how. Now did I buy a new iPhone that cost $1,000? Yeah, but we’re not counting that, because that was at the AT&T store inside the Costco. But yeah, I was just like produce. That’s the only thing I bought. I was very proud of myself.
Elise Loehnen:
Berries.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yes, exactly. I’m excited to have you. I’ve been following your work for a while, and so it’s really thrilling to have you on the show. You’ve had a long career as a writer, 12 books, time at Goop and Condé Nast. What drew you to writing in the first place, and do you think that your time spent with people led you to write On Our Best Behavior?
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah, certainly. I mean, so as mentioned, I grew up in Montana in the woods, and truly with books as some of my only companions, and I don’t know if my parents.. My parents did structure it this way, the TV was in sort of a dank basement corner, and reading was the highest value. My brother is a book editor. My mom is an avid reader. My dad, not so much, but I grew up reading and sort of venerating the craft of writing. I was an English major in college, and then went into magazine writing, but really more service journalism, which has no byline and isn’t nearly as voicey, and you’re trying to communicate information in as few words as possible while making it resonant and revelatory. But it was an incredible training ground in doing that, and having to think about the value of every word when you don’t get that many.
Then I started, as you mentioned, I wrote 12 books, but I ghost wrote them, which is a whole nother space because I was convinced, and I don’t know if it’s because I held writers in such high esteem that I couldn’t call myself a writer, even though that’s what I did. So for the first 20 years of my career, I called myself an editor, that felt more accurate, and a ghost writer, and learned a lot through that process about shaping other people’s messages, and using other people’s platforms, and using other people as mouthpieces to have important and interesting conversations, and while insisting to my agent and everyone around me that I didn’t have a book in me at all.
And I write about this in the chapter on pride in On Our Best Behavior, but I felt very vulnerable/humiliating or hubristic to put myself out there as a writer and author of my own ideas, although also I’m a curator of other people’s work as well. So that’s a big part of what I do is pulling all these writers together. There are a lot of women who write, there are a lot of people like you who talk about money and women. There are people who write about women and sex, women and food, et cetera, women and anger. And so I tried to pull them all together into one book.
Tori. Dunlap:
I’ve always wondered with ghost writers, I liken them to backup singers.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
I don’t know how you’re not bitter. No, truly. Maybe that’s a weird question. I just look at, you look at any celebrities’ memoir, and you have to flip to the acknowledgements to find out who truly wrote it, and maybe not even then. I think partially that is my own pride as a writer myself. I wrote my own book and I’m very proud of that. I don’t know if my ego would let me get a ghostwriter for my upcoming books. I don’t know. Is there a bitterness to that? Of just like, I’ve written this beautiful book for this person, yet I’m not going to get any credit. I don’t know. It feels like backup singer of like, okay, I’m incredible and I’m probably more talented than the person who’s in front singing, but I don’t get any of the credit.
Elise Loehnen:
So I think that I’ve managed to sidestep that in part by, I have a rule for myself, which is that I don’t give my own material to anyone else anymore. I can’t say that that wasn’t always the case. I don’t think that I’ve ghost-written a book where I felt like, well, these are all my ideas. So I try to go into this with the mindset of, I’m going to structure a book for this person, there’s no ego in this for me. It’s either their story, ideally told in a better way, because I’m also functioning a little bit as an editor and curator of their story, and have a bit of remove on it, or I can sort of set up their ideas.
Earlier in my career, I would do a lot of research, and that started to feel, particularly if it was slightly or close to areas that I’m interested in, yes, maybe I’m being a backup singer here, and I need to reserve this for myself. And that has been sort of solidified into a rule. But writing a book is really hard, as you know, it’s incredibly lonely. There are moments when you’re sort of like, does this even make sense? You get a little drunk on your own copy, and then you come back to it weeks later and you’re like, I was high. I don’t even know what I was saying.
So to collaborate in the process is a little bit like working with an editor in some ways who can say, “I am not following you Tori, and this doesn’t make any sense.” So it’s a little bit faster, but I respect anyone who is insane enough to go and lock themselves away and write a book. And having done it for… I mean, writing my own book was infinitely harder than writing books for other people.
Tori. Dunlap:
Oh, I can imagine.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yeah.
Elise Loehnen:
Way harder.
Tori. Dunlap:
Of all of the interviews you did, is there a particularly memorable one?
Elise Loehnen:
Oh, man. I have interviewed, and this is sort of across the span of my podcast now, which is called Pulling Thread, and then I hosted the Goop podcast for four years. I don’t know how many… A long time, Tori. I hosted it for a long time. And I think the interview I was most nervous about was Bryan Stevenson, who wrote Just Mercy, and founded the Equal Justice Initiative. He’s just so stunning. That interview stayed with me for a long time.
I’ve interviewed Gabor Mate multiple times over the years, and then I think the people that I go back to compulsively are people like Terry Real. One of the interviews that was a kernel for my book was Lori Gottlieb, who people who are listening might’ve read Maybe You Should Talk to Someone. She’s a therapist, and she used to be a TV writer, which makes her just incredible at story. And in her book, this isn’t a major point, but she has this small aside, which is that she tells her clients to pay attention to their envy, because it shows them what they want.
And I underlined that so hard, and I couldn’t stop thinking about it. This is in 2018 or 2019, and that really became the kernel for my book because I was like, first of all, ooh, envy, gross, I would never. I don’t have any envy, it’s disgusting. And so I knew, obviously there’s information there.
And then the second part of that was, I have no idea what I want. And I couldn’t tell you. I had in many ways just been doing the next best thing, or the right thing, or pursuing a career in part to sort of manage my own anxiety about safety and security and all of those things, which you know so well. And so that insight from Lori sort of shook me to my core. And then I used that to sort of understand actually what I want by using my envy, and the way that I would start deprecating or criticizing another woman almost invariably, and minimizing her work or her achievements because it was making me feel bad.
And that’s how I use that to be like, oh, I actually think I do want to write my own book. Instead of complaining, “Oh, her book wasn’t that good.” And just stuff that I would, as I was saying it, I was like, oh, this feels so bad and disgusting, and I do not like who I am in this moment to say, oh, I think at least you want to write a book. You want to have your own podcast, etc.
Tori. Dunlap:
I’m now having an existential crisis about my own envy, thinking of, what do I want?
Elise Loehnen:
Who do you envy, Tori? Actually, I want to know. Anyone?
Tori. Dunlap:
Yeah.
Elise Loehnen:
I feel like you’re really in touch with yourself.
Tori. Dunlap:
I think I am, but I also, I have my own… God, how long are we going to talk about this? This is a therapy session for me. My ambition is a drug. And so my ambition, I think is a lot of the reason that I am where I am, and it’s also the thing that I frequently overdose on that makes me miserable. So you’re doing such a podcast host thing right now, and I love it. Flip it back on me.
But I think there’s times where I look at people, especially in my space who are doing similar things and I’m like, oh, I want that, and then it fuels me to do more work. And then now I’ve started asking myself, are you willing to do what they’re doing to get the opportunity that they had? If that makes sense.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
Are you willing to show up online multiple times a day and edit videos like crazy like you used to? Are you willing to work 80-hour weeks? Are you willing to sacrifice these certain things? And now the answer typically is no. And so that’s how I have to balance the envy because it happens actually a lot, it does. Where I’m like, oh, I want that or, why didn’t I get that thing? And then I’m like, well, are you willing to do what they did to get that thing? And probably three years ago I was willing to, I’m not necessarily willing to now.
Elise Loehnen:
No, and I think that’s such an essential next step, is to take that wanting, and then put it through sort of the colander of willingness or sort of legitimate appetite.
Tori. Dunlap:
Right. Well, and that was going to be my question for you is I am, I think often the subject of women’s ire when I am talking about the things we’ve achieved, or talking about money openly. And we get a lot of comments from women who are like, Ooh, I don’t know why you need to brag,” or, “I don’t need to hear about all of this.”
And of course, I’ve figured out that the reason that’s happening is because you see a woman standing in her power and you’re not, and rather than seeing that as an opportunity, you see it as a threat. But how do you know, okay, let’s say you do see someone and you’re like, oh, they’re writing a book, and you envy that. How do you know actually though that yes, I want to write a book, or is it just the general, I want that feeling of pursuit, or I want that feeling of being able to speak with my own voice? Does that question make sense?
Elise Loehnen:
Yes.
Tori. Dunlap:
Okay.
Elise Loehnen:
No, and I think that this is such essential work, but I think what happens to women is the minute that that, because we are conditioned, and I’m a little older than you, so I’m hoping that it’s better with every generation. But because we are-
Tori. Dunlap:
Me too.
Elise Loehnen:
… conditioned to subjugate all of our wants to other people’s needs, most of us don’t actually know what we want, or have any intimacy or comfort exploring that. And so the minute, for example, that your envy comes up, it feels so uncomfortable, so bad that you want to deprecate the person who’s making you feel bad to make it, make yourself feel better, to make it go away. Rather than just letting it come up and saying, what is this? This is interesting. I’m having a big reaction to this woman about her body or about her children, or about her book.
So what is it? So the biggest part is letting it come up and saying, I need to sit with this and understand what’s happening to me right now, because I’m deeply uncomfortable. And so getting comfortable with that discomfort is the first step. And then it’s an interrogation of, is that what I want? No, I’m not actually willing to do that, but there’s something here. There’s information here. This is my soul knocking on the door saying, pay attention to this. There’s information. And then just getting comfortable with that self interrogation. Is it that you feel like your ideas aren’t being seen and validated, and you want to get your ideas across as your own? Is it that you want to be on the Today Show talking about your ideas, because maybe you actually really want to be on TV? I mean, you don’t really know where it’s going to take you, but for women, just the process of doing it is essential.
And it’s also, everything you said is incredibly poignant to me because you mentioned, and this is… So for context, my book, it’s a secular book, but it’s structured around the seven deadly sins, it’s this punch card for what it is to be a good woman. So sloth, pride, envy, greed, gluttony, lust, anger, these are all things that women generally do not allow ourselves to fully engage with or express. So that’s the general thesis.
Then they start crashing into each other. So you just mentioned pride and self-expression and the instinct that we have in this culture, which is so strong and so gendered to put women back in their place. You’re too big for your britches, who do you think you are? Some people call it the tall poppy syndrome. You stick out, you will get knocked down. We watch this over, and over, and over again in our culture with any woman in any industry who dares to be seen, who exceeds expectations.
We celebrate them at the beginning, and then we decide that they’ve had enough, and we need to destroy them. And we experience our shot in Freud. We just do it over and over and over again. Playbook for women. And then women say, “I don’t want to be seen or celebrated because I don’t want to inspire envy because then I will get destroyed.”
Tori. Dunlap:
Which, they’re not wrong.
Elise Loehnen:
They’re not wrong. No, this is a big pattern. We can say, oh, who cares about Taylor Swift, or Jlo, or whomever is getting it at this moment in time?
Tori. Dunlap:
Caitlin Clark.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. This is a playbook for all of us. This is in the 2020 when all these founders who were told that they were bad people, all these women, because when goodness is your primary, that’s what we’re after, being good, good mothers, good people, good coworkers, good citizens-
Tori. Dunlap:
Good CEOs.
Elise Loehnen:
The minute you say toxic, “Tori is toxic, she was mean to me.” The reputational damage is really hard to be undone. Men are conditioned for power, and the only thing that matters is if we perceive them as weak. And they can do terrible things, and it just makes them seem so powerful they’re above reproach.
Tori. Dunlap:
Steve Jobs, everybody’s like, “He was a terrible boss, he didn’t shower, he yelled at me, but he was a genius.”
Elise Loehnen:
Yes. Can you imagine a woman?
Tori. Dunlap:
Never. Never. Absolutely never would that happen.
Elise Loehnen:
No. And then the other thing that’s really important is that these two pride and envy start crashing into scarcity, which is, there’s only room for one. If she has it, I can’t have it.
Tori. Dunlap:
There’s one seat at the table. We got to fight each other for the seat at the table. Yeah.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. I need to destroy Tory, otherwise I can’t talk about money. And men do not have this. This does not infect men the way that… And some of this is realistic.
Tori. Dunlap:
Well, because they built the table.
Elise Loehnen:
They built the table, 100%. But you watch, like in our space, and this really gets me going, but in the world of podcasting, and the men who are dominant at the top, one, they don’t interview any women, and two, they interview each other. It’s just a big circle jerk. And all they’re doing is proving that scarcity is not real. And the bigger I get, the bigger you get and there’s no corollary amongst women. I mean, to some extent there’s some semblance of a sisterhood, but we are not organized like that in the same way. Or comfortable with it.
Tori. Dunlap:
This happens almost every episode where I just get to a point where I’m just like, I’m going to curl up in a ball, and also scream so loud. No, everything you said, I 100% feel, I think it’s 100% accurate. And I think if you’re listening to the show, you might like me enough where you don’t feel maybe threatened by me or threatened by other women, but we keep coming back to this point. Really, the theme of the show has nothing to do with money, it’s all about being comfortable being uncomfortable, or getting comfortable being uncomfortable.
And I think one last point to what you were saying, and I know we’re going to spend the rest of the interview really talking about this in more detail. I think that any sort of self-discovery takes, of course, a lot of uncomfortability, and a lot of grace for ourselves. But it also takes maybe admitting that you’re not happy. And I don’t think we as women are often willing, and able, and conditioned to do that.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes.
Tori. Dunlap:
And I have brought this up a million times, but I think that many women have the experience of going to bed at night, and the last 5, 30 minutes before you fall asleep going, “Is this all there is?” And maybe it’s, is this the relationship I’m in? Is this the job I have? Is this what I’m doing with my days for the rest of my life? And I think that realization of, “I don’t love it, but it’s comfortable.” And I don’t mean safe, I mean comfortable. Because it’s not going to take any self-discovery or self-growth because that’s scary, and that’s change that causes me to potentially blow up my life. I feel like that is what we’re fighting.
And then we’re fighting a system of course, that is so focused on women staying small and hating their lives. Because if you hate your life, the system’s not going to change. If you hate your life, the system has won, arguably. It’s done its job. It’s kept you playing small, it’s kept you depleted, it’s kept you tired, it’s kept you from being restful, and the fullest version of yourself.
So I feel like at the individual level and then at the societal level, that’s what we’re fighting is women not loving their lives. Not loving their careers or their relationships, not feeling like they’re worthy of those things. And then just being like, “Well, it’s fine, so I’m not going to change it.”
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. Tori, the head nodding. I mean, so I’m not doing that uh-huh, uh-huh. I mean, no, enthusiasm. So I want to say two things. One, everything that you said hit. Two, before we move off it, I think it’s really important that you’re modeling for listeners and making them feel uncomfortable with your ambition. One of the people for me who I listen to for this reason is Kara Swisher, because it’s like exposure therapy for me to listen to her sort of flex, and it just makes me so uncomfortable.
And I love her and I’m inspired by her, but I do it in part to be like, okay, this is what it would be like to just say what I know, and without caveatting, minimizing, self-deprecating, and working so hard. And this is somewhat about what my next book is about, but the amount of energy that I’ve invested in trying to control other people’s experience of me by trying to control my behavior, and what a stupid way to spend your time or your life, even though it’s very attached to our survival, and not getting canceled, and trying to be pleasing, and winning, and that fear.
Tori. Dunlap:
And trying to be the version of yourself that everybody has of you, which by the way, you don’t know is completely unobtainable.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
That’s something that I struggle with of having 5 million people who watch me every day of like, you all have different expectations for me. You all believe me to be a certain way. You all think my values are this, or think I should show up in this way. And that expectation is just, it’s heavy.
Elise Loehnen:
And you’re dealing with so many people’s projections, and it’s wild to be, when people tell you they’re disappointed and you’re like, “You actually don’t know me.” In what? I’m being myself.
Tori. Dunlap:
In the version of me that you came up with, that’s what you’re disappointed in.
Elise Loehnen:
But this is why what you’re doing is so important too, is that you’re also modeling what it is to be really close to yourself, and expressive of that. Because when there’s a chasm between, and we all sense it, we sense the dissonance online of, this is who I say that I am, and I’m going to show you this version of myself, and there’s a distance between who I actually am. Into that chasm is where everyone goes to be like, what’s real? I’m going to pick and pull this apart. And I think it makes you deeply unsafe, even though it’s very scary to be yourself in the world, and it feels like you don’t have any armor on, or clothing.
Tori. Dunlap:
And I think, again, most people listening are not going to, they don’t have millions of followers and they’re like, “Okay, boo hoo.” But there is a version of this with you. It’s what your parents expect you to be, what your partner expects you to be, what society expects you to be, what your boss expects you to be, what your friends expect you to be. And I think that especially for women, again, we have the weight of everybody’s expectations to a point again, where we get to the end of our evening and our head hits the pillow, and we don’t know what we want. We know what everybody else wants for us. We have no idea what we want, yet we know we’re deeply unhappy.
Elise Loehnen:
And this is an acculturation process that starts for women when we’re children.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yes.
Elise Loehnen:
And then it’s fed back to us as nature. And this is what a good woman is, and this is-
Tori. Dunlap:
Altruistic, giving, self-sacrificing.
Elise Loehnen:
This is who you’re supposed to be. Yeah, all of those things. Natural, “natural mother.” It goes back to the mythology that men were out there being valiant with their spears, and women were in the caves with the babies hanging off their boobs. And as we get more and more developed technologically and scientifically, we know that our prehistory was far more complex and creative, and much more aligned with who we’re showing ourselves to be today. Women were hunters, women were Vikings. Women, I write about this… They went back into this grave site in the Andes, I think it was 26 warriors were buried there. They had assumed they were all men. And then when they went back in with better technology, they realized that 10 of the graves were women.
And yet we’re told these are not your values. And so that’s the first dissonance. I write a fair amount in the book, and I write a lot about her in an ongoing way in my sub-sac. But this woman, Carol Gilligan, who’s now 87 years old, she’s still publishing, still teaching, and she is a developmental psychologist.
She’s at NYU, and she wrote the first study of the psychological development of girls, because they had just been left out, unsurprisingly, of all research. So all the Piaget and Kohlberg were only really studying white boys. And so she does the first study of girls, and goes into the famous morality study of, how do you perceive the law and morality? And girls saw it in relationship, and boys didn’t, which shouldn’t surprise really anyone, but that’s a cultural value. And so she wrote this study, which became a book called In a Different Voice, which is very… It’s not that many pages, it’s so profound, Tori, and accessible.
And essentially what she’s saying is that at the age of around 11, girls come to not know what they know, and they develop a different voice, a secondary voice, which is their cultural voice to cover over their deepest feelings and intuitions, and that’s how we come to function. And now when she listens to girls, she listens for the words, “really,” and “actually,” and “If I were to be honest,” for that second voice that’s actually who we are.
There’s a woman, another researcher who was her student named Niobe Way, who has a great book coming out shortly, who studies boys in the same way. And they talk about how for boys, it’s age 8, for girls, it’s around age 11, the word don’t enters their vocabulary. For boys, it’s I don’t care. And for girls, I don’t know. And these are cultural interventions, and of course, girls and women know, and of course, boys and men care. And yet this is what starts to happen to us as we are put into this gender-obsessed culture, where gender is becoming weirdly, as much as we’re trying to overthrow it as this core defining concept of who we are, we’re saying we’re way more than our gender. It’s not irrelevant, but it’s kind of irrelevant. But we’re becoming more reified also culturally as like, we see this with tradwives, and all of these shenanigans. Anyway, women know, but we lose that voice. We have to reconnect to it.
Tori. Dunlap:
If I keep going into this, I’m going to just fall apart and cry. So I got to move on. No, the amount of, it absolutely breaks my heart. I’m really going to try to get through this with her crying. The thing that breaks my heart, I think the most in the world is when a girl starts doubting herself. And it’s, yeah, age 11, she starts wondering if she’s too much, because she’s been told she’s too much. She starts not raising her hand in class, she starts not performing with her instrument, or on her sports team because she’s afraid of standing out. And it’s so hard that it starts that early.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes. And here’s the thing though, Tori, because one of the revelations when I was working on my book was like, I just assumed that somehow culture and power and the way that it’s reflected back to us as, sort of goes to kindergarten.
And when you actually look at the research, girls and women have been outperforming boys and men in school for a century. We have more physical endurance. Like in the ultra, ultra marathoners, it’s like 100% of them are won by women. In fact, I was just talking to Soraya Chemaly, whose new book is great, called The Myth of Resilience, and she talks about this woman who won this 268 mile run race, and she beat the guy who came in second by like 14 hours. She was already home in Scotland by the time he finished. And she broke a world record by like nine hours, I think.
And, guess what? She was doing on her breaks, Tori, breastfeeding her newborn. So women are incredible. We’re out-earning men in MDs, PhDs, across the board. It’s lost to us. We don’t quite realize that this is happening, but we’re like boxers training at high altitude. We are amazing. And if we could really get behind each other, watch us roar. And men need us too. Let me tell you, they are in tough shape. I’m more worried about boys and men than girls and women.
Tori. Dunlap:
I am too.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
I am too. Speaking of patriarchy and how it hurts everybody, you call the seven deadly sins the patriarchal paradigm of goodness. What does that mean?
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. So as I was working on this book and wanting to understand what was in me, and what is this part of me that’s the cattle prod that makes me feel like I’ll never be good enough, never smart enough, never make enough money to be safe and secure, all the things that women feel, that at the time I thought maybe were just me. Was it just me? I don’t know. Everyone seemed to be doing quite well, but I realized that these are universal ideas.
I really wanted to understand what this was. Where does this idea of goodness come from within patriarchy? And then to that point, I was like, I don’t even know what… I use the word patriarchy, and I say they, and them, and it, but I don’t actually really know where it came from. Has it always been this way? That’s what I thought. And then is they, them, is that like Mitch McConnell? Who is driving this thing?So that’s really where I started was, what is patriarchy? And then also, where did these ideas about goodness come from that are so lodged in the minds of women, and yet don’t seem to really rate for men?
And I started with envy with that comment from Lori Gottlieb, and then I went and I was like, what is… I like doing etymology videos on Instagram, like what’s the etymology, and where did it come from? And then I realized, oh, it’s one of those sins. And what are those again? And then as I looked at the list, I was like, holy shit. This is, every single one of these is something that I struggle with. And yet my husband, my brother, my father, even though they’re sort of feminist men, don’t at all. None of this resonates for them.
And so then I wanted to understand, where did this start? And it became a Dan Brown mystery where I realized actually the sins were never in the Bible. Not in the Bible. They came out of the Egyptian desert in the fourth century, this desert monk named Evagrius Ponticus, who’s also credited as an early father of the Enneagram for Enneagram fans. And there were eight thoughts. They weren’t sins, they were daimons in the sense that they would bring you, distract you and keep you out of prayer.
And then they traveled through the Egyptian desert. And in 590 Pope Gregory said… Mary Magdalene is referred to in the New Testament as, “The one from whom Jesus cast seven demons.” Again, different definition, but it’s never clarified what those are. And some people say he was clearing her chakras, which is what I prefer to believe. And Mary Magdalene fans will know that she had this incredible gospel that was deemed heretical. She was really the first apostle, Jesus, if you believe any of this, Jesus resurrects to her gives her this profound teaching. She brings it back-
Tori. Dunlap:
And if you’ve read the Da Vinci Code, she is.
Elise Loehnen:
She’s it. She’s it. She is the rightful Peter. She is it. So Pope Gregory says these are the seven cardinal vices. He kicks the eighth out, which is sadness, which I include in the book in the context of men. He says, it’s these seven.
Tori. Dunlap:
Why did he kick it out? Do we know?
Elise Loehnen:
We don’t know. We don’t know. I think because sadness is feminine, really. It’s passive. So he says these are the seven vices. These are what were in Mary Magdalene. Mary Magdalene is the same woman as the one who anoints Jesus’ feet with her hair. Different woman, but no matter. And that woman is a penitent prostitute. And that’s where that story started. And it was in the 80s that whoever was Pope at that time said, “You know, we kind of got that wrong. She wasn’t a prostitute, he just made that up.”
And then in 2016, Pope Francis made her the apostle to the apostles. But as we know, reputations die hard. And she was painted, because he lifted the edict on iconography as well. So she was painted compulsively as this prostitute clinging to Jesus, and she became the carrier for these deadly sins. And here we are. And meanwhile, it’s kind of the reverse. She was the carrier of his wisdom, and he was a total feminist. So that’s how culture is translated though. We just whisper it into each other’s ears, we take it as fact. We don’t really understand where it started or where it came from.
Tori. Dunlap:
We spin powerful women into something that unfortunately has been largely disgraced, which is sex work.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yeah.
Elise Loehnen:
Exactly. And here we are. And so I don’t know. It was fun to sort of not know that and just be like, here’s this structure. And then to find its beginnings and be like, oh, wow, this is even deeper than I thought.
Tori. Dunlap:
Oh, I hope you have more time, because I have so many questions for you. Okay, so I grew up Catholic. I went to 18 straight years of Catholic school.
Elise Loehnen:
Tori, Tori, Tori.
Tori. Dunlap:
18. 10 years of parochial school, 4 years of Catholic high school, 4 years of Catholic college. I got confirmed, I did the whole thing.
Elise Loehnen:
Wow. You even went to Catholic college?
Tori. Dunlap:
Oh, I chose that.
Elise Loehnen:
Wow.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yep. Had my own fun little, 2017 was like, okay, are we still doing this?
Elise Loehnen:
So is that your year of deconstruction?
Tori. Dunlap:
It was prompted by what was going on in Philadelphia at the time, which was another, I’m not going to call it sex scandal. Rape, sexual assault of minors. Yeah, I was just like, okay. They said in Boston in the early 2000s that this was not going to happen again. It’s happening again. So we’re still doing this shit. And I was becoming more and more radicalized. I identified as a feminist in college, but it was after Donald Trump got elected, which was the same year I graduated college. I was 22. And I was like, okay, this is pissing me off. And I realized that a lot of what the church stood for was completely a lot of friction between that part of my identity and every other part of my identity.
Elise Loehnen:
And it’s a structure that’s not… It’s like, Jesus had 12 followers and was essentially homeless. This wasn’t the vision.
Tori. Dunlap:
No. And my family was always, we are more Catholic in our church community. And it was, most Catholics are what they call a la carte Catholics, where they’re picking and choosing. My family beliefs in-
Elise Loehnen:
Cafeteria-
Tori. Dunlap:
… Christians.
Elise Loehnen:
Right.
Tori. Dunlap:
Queer rights, women’s right to choose, there’s things in there that we had never really subscribed to. But then it just got to a point, and actually, I don’t want to talk about this too much because it’s her private journey and my mom’s not a very public person. But my mom had a very similar thing in 2017 where we were both just kind of like, I have largely, I mean, I’ve completely exited. She goes to church online, she refuses to go into a church now. She’s like, I don’t feel comfortable here anymore.
Elise Loehnen:
Can I just say though, that some of my favorite women, and most of them are closer to my age, but are Jesus feminist. Like women, like Jen Hatmaker, people who grew up evangelical and are in that reconstruction phase of their life. And there’s something really profound, I think about their journeys, and sort of sharing from the inside out.
Tori. Dunlap:
No, and I appreciate you saying that.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
I just more, I’m giving context to what I was taught as a Catholic about Mary Magdalene about… And one of the questions I have for you, which I think lends itself well right now, which is Adam and Eve, and especially as a Catholic original sin, we were told you get baptized basically as an apology for what happened with Adam and Eve, and the apple, and the tree, and the snake. You assert that the idea of sin is a disempowering concept, is that because the control of what sin is and isn’t largely rests in patriarchy?
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. And I think that sin, which originally sort of the etymology is missing the mark.
Tori. Dunlap:
Oh, not as dramatic.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah, much more powerful idea of this. And I write about, I could have written this book as sort of a stunty, I’m going to go and be really sexual for… That would’ve been a fun book to write. That’s not what I wanted to write. It’s more about this idea for women that sinning requires the opposite. It requires complete self-denial and abnegation, self-abnegation.
Tori. Dunlap:
And that it’s the worst thing you can do.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes. Rather than using your engagement with the world. These are completely, this is what makes us human. Our appetites, our desires, our wants, our instincts, to use it as like a GPS or refining tool to get closer to who you are. What do I want? What am I hungry for? These are all beautiful, valid questions. And so I think the way that women have been taught, you need to deny this, deny your appetite, be as small as possible to worry. If your body is not completely under your own control, you lack discipline, you lack self-worth, you’re ruinous to culture.
Tori. Dunlap:
Well, maybe let’s talk about seven deadly sins. Let’s talk about the examples of each one. Because you’re talking about gluttony right now, right?
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. Talking about gluttony.
Tori. Dunlap:
So diet culture, the focus on being thin above all else. The way we treat fat people in our culture. The pressure that we as women feel to fit a certain body type, which by the way changes. The measuring stick changes all the fucking time for what is considered beautiful. Anything else with gluttony? I mean, just not eating.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah, I mean, it’s just a good body is a moral body.
Tori. Dunlap:
Right.
Elise Loehnen:
And we talk about ourselves in that way too. I’ve been good, so I can be bad. I’ve been bad, so I need to be good.
Tori. Dunlap:
The cheat day.
Elise Loehnen:
And right now, thinness is equated with class, power, and this idea of discipline, or that you care about yourself. And if you don’t abide, then really who are you as a woman? And our value is demonstrated by the goodness of our bodies in a way that is deeply fucked up. And for me at least, has taken a massive amount of energy and mindshare, and it’s so boring. Ultimately, it’s such a poor use of our time.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yeah. Can I ask you a question that is going to sound more scary and got you than I mean it, but also we can cut it if you don’t want to.
Elise Loehnen:
Okay.
Tori. Dunlap:
My relationship with Goop has largely, I feel like been focused on that. Which is, it’s a different version. It’s not diet culture, but it is wellness. Is that your experience? Do you feel like that? Because I look at that, I look at Goop, and of course Goop has been satirized a lot, but I look at that and I’m like, isn’t that just wolf in sheep’s clothing in a lot of ways?
Elise Loehnen:
I think it is closely related, certainly. And as with all of these things, it’s so complex and it can go way too far. And yes, I think cleansing and stuff like that can certainly become that for people.
Tori. Dunlap:
And I just mean Goop. I think just wellness in general right now. And I’m putting wellness in the quotes that it’s not diet culture, it’s wellness. And I’m like, it’s the same thing. It’s just got a rebrand now, guys.
Elise Loehnen:
It’s wild. And it’s a really, I think, powerful example. One, it’s an interesting industry because it was sort of started by women, and then co-opted and commercialized by men primarily, particularly now. And it’s become quite bizarre with the tracking, and the hacking, and this whole longevity game.
And the thing about all of these things is they might have a good intent. Like when you hear Peter Attia talking about how you want to sort of have a long health span. You’re like, yeah, that makes sense. I don’t want to have seven chronic diseases. But it becomes, it tips into shadow very quickly. And wellness too, where it sort of originally started with like, should we really be raining glyphosate in the Midwest, and we’re poisoning our environment, and we’re poisoning our bodies, and what’s happening? And it starts in this sort of a really beautiful place, and then it becomes localized in the body in a way that starts to have the same aesthetic, purity standards. Dirty and clean, and-
Tori. Dunlap:
Ridding your body of toxins. I’m like, no, that’s why you have a kidney and a liver. Your body is detoxified.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah, and then seeing your own body as sort of this microcosm of the whole world, and how do you keep yourself safe?
Tori. Dunlap:
Yeah, thing that needs to be fixed. Yeah.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. So these things start sort of having… On one leg and end up on the other in a way that you’re like, that was unexpected. And they all have this light side and shadow side, and the shadow side is intense and hardcore. And I don’t think it was intentional how quickly it sort of got there. So yeah, no, I definitely, and I felt that way too where I’d be like, I am ultimately talking about this as a cleanse, but really I’m drinking bone broth, or whatever it may be.
Tori. Dunlap:
Putting a jade egg in my vagina.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. I never put a jade egg. I never did that.
Tori. Dunlap:
Oh, I was going to ask you how it felt.
Elise Loehnen:
But it’s really just a kegel weight, to be fair. It’s like-
Tori. Dunlap:
Yeah, yeah, sure. Okay. So that’s gluttony. Greed is probably pretty obvious, especially on this show. Can’t want money, can’t want, can’t pursue money. You’re gauche if you talk about it. You are greedy if you want more of it. But of course, as we’ve talked about so many times on the show, and in my work, you don’t want to get a stack of government-issued paper, you want choices, and freedom, and flexibility. Anything else with greed?
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. And just this idea of scarcity, where men really see money as infinite, ones and zeros, where women are conditioned to see it as finite and boundaried. And if I get more than you get less Tori, and that’s bad. And it’s base.
Tori. Dunlap:
And I spend less, so I hate myself more in order to get more money because again, this is like a huge thesis.
Elise Loehnen:
And just this lie, this idea that women can’t budget. That women are… The word economy comes from house, but that it’s our job to support and to keep the American economy running. And don’t buy that latte, Tori. It’s sort of this, such a weird, perverse mindfuck.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yeah. It’s the gendered spending myth of, that’s the reason you’re not rich. But for men, it’s expand. It’s make more money, it’s invest in the stock market. For women it’s that Dior purse in it, you fucking cow. Pride.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. So you talked a bit about pride, but it’s this idea that women shouldn’t want any affirmation, or attention, or praise, that that’s unseemly. And that you should find someone else to take your idea and march it into the world, and if you are seen, you will be destroyed. And what does that look like?
I write about, I use Anne Hathaway and Jennifer Lawrence as a cultural example of one, the Hathahaters. So Anne Hathaway had sort of reached her peak, and people were out to get her, she could do nothing right. While Jennifer Lawrence was sort of bumbling her way to the top, and has since fallen. And just sort of pointing out how obvious this playbook is. And yet we fall for it every time, and celebrate the destruction of these women until we can buy their merch on their comeback tour, and put up the “Free Britney” hashtag. But I participated in the demise of Britney Spears. We all do it, and we don’t do it to men. And what happens is we don’t have any women to celebrate. I mean, we have some, but not for very long.
Tori. Dunlap:
Right. And women also don’t get second chances. They maybe only get first chances. And that’s maybe. And I’m thinking, especially with entrepreneurship, Adam Newman can start as many companies as he wants. But women, you get one chance. And you mentioned in your book too, this example of boys are often socialized to be comfortable with pride, but your parents in particular were worried about success getting to your head.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes. Don’t get a big head. Be humble.
Tori. Dunlap:
Be humble. Oh, the word humble for women.
Elise Loehnen:
The word humble.
Tori. Dunlap:
Serena Williams, why isn’t she… “She just needs to sit down, and just play her game.” And I’m like.
Elise Loehnen:
No, and that’s because for women, this idea of losing relationship. Again, this is part of culture.
Tori. Dunlap:
And likeability.
Elise Loehnen:
Likeability, and that if you lose that, you’re lost. You’re isolated, you’re alone, you’ll die.
Tori. Dunlap:
Okay, lust.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes. I mean, this one needs little explanation, but as a woman, you need to be sexy, but not sexual. Desirable, but not desiring. And of course, we have this horrible cultural double standard, or this idea that boys and men can’t control themselves, that girls and women are the most more responsible party. And that whatever happens to you is your fault. And that men and boys can’t be expected to be responsible for their own actions, and if you were to make them responsible, then you’re ruining their life. Tori, do you really want to do that to someone? How bad could it have been for you that you would want to sideline some dude on a path? It doesn’t matter if you’re traumatized, that doesn’t mean anything.
Tori. Dunlap:
On a Stanford swim team. He’s got a life to live.
Elise Loehnen:
He’s got a life to live. And to be fair, it’s like this is bigger than any single individual. This is a culture where there’s no accountability except for girls, and it’s totally messed up. And then we live… Also it goes into this, and we can debate this, but when I talk to younger women about this I’m like, I would like you to be able to walk around naked. I don’t care. Do whatever. But we do not live in a culture… I don’t want you to be one of pretty much every woman who’s sexually assaulted. I don’t want you to suffer through that trauma, or feel responsible for drawing the attention of the male gaze. So keep yourself safe is really what it comes down to. But that feels-
Tori. Dunlap:
It’s on you to do as the woman.
Elise Loehnen:
And nobody wants to hear that. But I’m like, this is how our culture is. Until we fix it, you’ll be blamed.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yep. I just got a comment on my Instagram yesterday. “Feel like this account has lost its focus, all she does is show her cleavage now.”
Elise Loehnen:
Oh, wow. Tori put those boobs away.
Tori. Dunlap:
From a woman. From a woman. And I said, “Am I showing off my boobs or do I just have boobs?”
Elise Loehnen:
It’s all so meta.
Tori. Dunlap:
I just have boobs? I just have boobs.
Elise Loehnen:
You just have boobs.
Tori. Dunlap:
They’re big. They’re going to come out. Sorry. Can’t hide these away, nor should I, because they’re great. Okay. Sloth. Sloth, I imagine relates to capitalism very, very well.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes. Sloth, definitely… This is this idea that there’s always more doing that needs to be done. And for women, and I don’t know how many listeners or moms, this really comes to a point, because you need to subjugate what you want to other people’s needs. And once you have kids, their needs become on your plate. Regardless of whether you work in the home or out, you’re still going to be doing a vast majority of their maintenance. And I shouldn’t talk about a kid like a car, but it’s true. You can live in the most… I have a husband who has far less demanding career than I do, and I still do far more than he does. And he would recognize that. And he gets commended at school drop off for showing up. People think he’s an amazing father. No one is complimenting my parenting, let me tell you.
Tori. Dunlap:
You babysitting your kids today? That’s so great.
Elise Loehnen:
I know. Babysitting. Exactly. I heard a friend of mine who’s a democratic socialist. She is so hardcore talking about her husband, that he was going to babysit. And I was like, “You? You too? He’s their father. Stop using that language.” But yeah, sloth, this idea that there’s something that needs to be done is so pernicious, and obviously leads to burnout, and exhaustion, and all the things that we know so well. And it’s hard to change culture when you’re tired.
Tori. Dunlap:
And I think the focus on, I could also see this as rest being a bad thing.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes.
Tori. Dunlap:
Or that you need to make sure everybody else is taken care of, and then you get the scraps at the end of the day.
Elise Loehnen:
What I think is important about this chapter, and this was a revelation that was in there but really came to me after as well, is that this idea that I need to uphold all these standards as a wife, and a mother, and a woman in the world, is an internal cattle prod. And I used to have so much anger and frustration that I would direct towards my husband. And then I realized there’s nothing in him that’s like, “I expect our house to be perfectly clean. I expect nutritionally-balanced meals every night. I expect that every vacation is planned six months in advance to a T.” Like, this is my own shit. And I was sort of blaming him, but there’s something in me that feels so anxious if I don’t achieve a standard that’s externally mediated, but alive in me.
And I broke my neck two summers ago, I fell off a horse, and I was totally fine, except I had to sit on a couch for six weeks in a neck brace. I couldn’t lift anything, I couldn’t drive. And it was so, the most powerful meditation I’ve ever had of being present with my own anxiety about not being able to do things.
And man, it was hard core to be sort of in a timeout like that, and to just be present with how incredibly anxious I felt about not being able to busy my way through life so that I didn’t have to feel my feelings. And God, I felt terrible. Guilty, in a way that my husband was like, “Well, you did break your neck in two places, so I do think you just need to sit the fuck down. What are you doing? Stop it. Stop trying to superwoman through life. Sit down.”
Tori. Dunlap:
Yep. Wrath, we’ve talked about a bit, but I literally experienced this yesterday. My therapist was like, “Why do you not feel like you can own your anger?” And I was like, “Thank you.”
Elise Loehnen:
Why would you think you can own your anger, Tori, is what I would ask. We do not like angry women.
Tori. Dunlap:
We do not.
Elise Loehnen:
It is unacceptable. And they’re shrewd-
Tori. Dunlap:
I don’t like myself when I’m angry, which I think is so interesting. I will describe it as anything else other than angry. And I forced myself yesterday to say, “You know what? I am angry.” I was like, “I’m frustrated. I’m bummed. I’m upset, I’m sad.” And then finally, I was like, Tori, we’re not going to do this. We’re going to say we’re angry because that’s actually how we feel. So I was like, “You know what? I am angry.” And I think I did, “I’m a little bit angry.”
Elise Loehnen:
“I’m a little bit angry.”
Tori. Dunlap:
Yeah. That was my stepping stone. I couldn’t get to full like, you know what? I’m really fucking pissed. But I was just like, “You know what? I’m a little angry.”
Elise Loehnen:
Well, I think most of us are really comfortable with the low grade anger of impatient, frustrated. But the anger, I think women are fucking furious, and yet, and I think that’s why we’re so sick. Honestly, it’s all that subsumed rage, which often can sort of be a cover for shame or sadness as well. They all are related, but we hate angry women. We have a million words to describe an angry woman. Shrew, bitch, castrator, whatever it may be.
Tori. Dunlap:
Hysterical.
Elise Loehnen:
Hysterical. The words that we have, this is Harriet Lerner’s work, but she wrote The Dance of Anger which is a great book. The words that we have for men still blame the woman. Bastard and son of a bitch. Great, right?
Tori. Dunlap:
Also, I’m going to say, and we can bleep it. Cunt.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
In Britain it means something a little different than it in United States, but the way we use it here, cunt.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. No, I mean it’s an endless list. We cannot… And I think it’s just because an angry woman is terrifying. It goes back to goddesses. We could burn it down. And in some ways it suggests sort of the ultimate creative power of women and how terrifying I think that we are to men, if they were to actually really think about it.
But anger is so vital, so important. It clarifies, one, it can clarify needs and boundaries, but most of us can’t even let it come up. It sort of sits in us, as that low-grade, unresolved frustration. And I think it makes us sick. And there are, to be fair, and this is another thing that I think is really important about the gendered nature of aggression, which is that humans are aggressive, it’s just part of who we are, boys and girls are too. And you look at a baby boy and you look at a baby girl, and they’re both perfectly capable of being really fucking pissed off.
It’s not that the girls are compliant, and obedient, and like, “Mom, I’d like some milk” or, “Mom, would you mind cleaning my diaper?” They’re enraged. And then at a certain point, again, and this doesn’t matter how you parent, culture is so much bigger than any single parent’s ability to raise a child. You see what happens to boys and girls. So boys are allowed to be overtly aggressive, they’re allowed to push and yell, be violent with their bodies and their words. Boys will be boys, Tori.
Meanwhile, girls, and this is modeled by other girls, it’s also modeled by our culture. Girls don’t do that. Girls don’t push and yell. Girls are compliant, and sweet, and obedient, and all that aggression has to go somewhere, and so you see it come out of girls in covert ways, backstabbing, alliance building, whisper networks, and so on and so forth. And then women are told that’s just who you are. That’s just how girls are, catty bitches.
Tori. Dunlap:
Well, and you talk about the witch trials as this. It’s like the perfect example of this, and I did my high school production of The Crucible, your girl knows your witch trials. Yeah. Because again, we’re back to scarcity of one seat at the table, or somebody else getting attention and I’m not, somebody else getting what I want and I’m not. Yeah. And so it turns it into everybody, every girl against each other.
Elise Loehnen:
Every other girl. And this is so… I feel like as a culture, we’re starting to become far more literate about intergenerational trauma and the way that these things, we carry these things forward culturally and repeat these patterns. But you go back to the witch craze in Europe. So here in America, Crucible, I think 35 people died. And in Europe, the witch craze went on for centuries. It followed, I’m trying to think of the actual, it followed the crusades, but essentially 200 or 300 years.
We don’t really know how many people died. And some people were like, “It’s a million,” and it’s probably around 100,000, 80 to 100,000. Mostly women, mostly older women. Some villages were left with no women at all. But this became this, to save yourself, you would point fingers at other people, typically women. Often outsiders, but sometimes it might be your friend, your mother, your daughter. And I think about that as sort of the long tail of that as, I wonder what the implications are for women in terms of trusting each other not to sort of throw each other under the bus, and to save ourselves out of just pure fear and survival. I don’t know that we really know how that shows up.
Tori. Dunlap:
Well, I think it’s the only way we feel power as women.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. Interesting. Say more.
Tori. Dunlap:
I was bullied pretty heavily growing up. And so the whole… Fun fact, if you guys didn’t know this. Mean Girls, the movie is based on a nonfiction book by a psychologist, and it’s called Queen Bees and Wannabes. That was my Bible growing up. Because my mom bought it for herself, and then I read it even as a kid, and half of it I didn’t understand. But she literally talks about the social hierarchy in a click.
And you have the queen bee, and you have all the wannabes, and then each wannabe has a certain task. There’s one that’s like the informant, where information is then power. There’s one who distributes the information. There’s the sidekick. So I realized very young that information was currency for girls, and that information was then currency, which meant power. And I think that I’ve experienced my own… You think it leaves, you think you’re done after middle school, high school. You’re never done. Experience my own version of this in the past couple years. And I think you start realizing that, I think because we don’t have normal power, this is the only agency we feel like we do have, which is getting more information, gossiping, taking down other women who we don’t like, or don’t want to see succeed, or are threatened by, because it makes us feel important.
Elise Loehnen:
It goes back to the beginning of the conversation and envy. And that bad feeling needs to go somewhere, so I will put it on you to make myself feel better.
Tori. Dunlap:
And that’s the last one, which we talked about a lot, which is, yeah, I feel jealous, I feel envious of somebody else, I want what they have, and that feels dirty and wrong. And I would argue maybe when I’m looking at all of these, I can make cases for every single one that no, greed isn’t bad. No gluttony in how it’s traditionally defined around diet culture is not bad. Anger’s not bad. Rest, but getting labeled as sloth is not bad. Lust isn’t bad, pride isn’t bad. But something about envy still feels weird.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah, no, it’s the one where there’s sort of no thrill to it. You know, there’s no upside. Whereas gluttony has great promise. Actually, what am I hungry for? Could I get in touch with my body again in a way, and nurture it, and love it, and experience the world? Envy has no such promise of thrill, but it to me feels like the gateway, this idea of wanting becomes the beginning-
Tori. Dunlap:
It is the only one that I guess it is, well, is directly wanting what you don’t have.
Elise Loehnen:
And self-authoring your life, and using that as a way, a divining tool of like, is this what I want? Maybe I want part of this, but I don’t… I don’t know, but I want to watch Tori and learn from her, and some parts of her experience I want, and maybe some parts I don’t. But that’s so much more information than most of us are taught to take from the world, and to sort of see you, this is Lacy Phillips’ work. But to be like, Tori is an expander for me, right? I’m curious about what she’s doing.
Tori. Dunlap:
Or anybody else.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
Right. Yeah.
Elise Loehnen:
It’s all about you, Tori.
Tori. Dunlap:
It’s not, but thank you.
Elise Loehnen:
No, but what you built is actually really incredible and real. So I hope you can take that in. It’s not easy to do.
Tori. Dunlap:
No, I appreciate that. No, but I do feel like we all have either people or social media influencers we follow where you’re like, I want that. And then you feel bad for wanting it. Maybe that’s the version. Maybe that’s why you feel guilty is the want. Not necessarily wanting, because that’s what I’ve realized… Ooh, this is a… If I do say so myself, this is going to be a good point. Because what I’ve realized about my own envy, it’s not that I don’t want that person to have the thing. It’s not that I want to take it from them so they don’t have it, it’s I also want that.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah.
Tori. Dunlap:
I watch my friends succeed and I’m like, it’s not that I don’t believe you’re deserving or don’t believe that you should have that, it’s that I also want it.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes. And I think that’s where you start. If you can recognize that the way that scarcity would turn that into some sort of triangulation. It’s actually interesting, jealousy and envy are synonyms culturally, but they’re very different because they’re jealousy requires a third. And envy is one-on-one, it’s very intimate, which I think makes us incredibly uncomfortable. But it ends up being more of a mirror and less about, I’m going to take that boy from that girl.
Tori. Dunlap:
Right, it’s back to your original point.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah, and more just more opportunity to actually really look into yourself and say, I want that, or I don’t. And then you get into a whole nother world, which is in a whole nother conversation about things like upper limit problems. And for me, similar to you, when I look out at people who are in the same lane and I’m like, I don’t actually want that because I don’t want to be more visible, or I don’t want a bigger life. I want to be in the corner of my bedroom writing books. And then sort of saying, is that what I really want? I don’t really know, but I think it is. I don’t know. I don’t want to make 50 videos a day.
Tori. Dunlap:
At all.
Elise Loehnen:
Trying to be in my sloth era.
Tori. Dunlap:
Great. That’s fantastic. I’m trying to learn myself. Okay, how do we stop being good girls and start being ourselves?
Elise Loehnen:
Oh, Tori. I mean, this is your life’s work.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yes.
Elise Loehnen:
And for me, being a few years ahead, and writing the book, and sort of thinking about this deeply, I have had to peel this onion over, and over, and over again. And writing this book was a big act of therapy for me. And hopefully that’s what I’m hearing mostly from readers, is that they’ll come to a chapter on greed, for example, and say, “I don’t have money stuff.” And then they read it and they’re like, “Oh, I do. Oh, I do.”
So to me, it’s this ongoing iterative, oh, I’m not going to solve all my body stuff in a month, but I’m going to get a little bit closer and a little bit closer, and then it’s going to come back around. And the biggest lesson for me has been instead of being repulsed, disgusted, shocked, ashamed of that inner voice in me and all of the things that come up, just trying to get closer to her and to say, it’s okay, let’s be present with this rather than making it go away. And I think if we could somehow let go of this idea of being good; again, I’m not talking about an internally mediated idea, this is a cultural idea of goodness, but let ourselves be whole and human, we are that one big, giant step closer.
Tori. Dunlap:
And I think when you get that tinge of a feeling where you two feel threatened by somebody or you resisted the donut and you’re like, “Oh, I’m great, I did it.”
Elise Loehnen:
“I’m such a good person.”
Tori. Dunlap:
Why? No criticism, no judgment, just go, why? Why do I feel this way? And then when you come to an answer, why? And just ask why until you get to it.
Elise Loehnen:
Exactly.
Tori. Dunlap:
Elise, you’re breaking my brain in all the right ways. I can’t believe somebody hasn’t thought of this sooner. I wish I had thought of it.
Elise Loehnen:
This book.
Tori. Dunlap:
I’m a little envious. But it’s so good, it’s so right.
Elise Loehnen:
Thank you.
Tori. Dunlap:
And especially, I now want to do all of the… Because I loved Dan Brown growing up, that was my shit, of just like how history and especially religion has changed, and we’ve adapted stories to suit whatever narrative we have. And so even that, I wanted to go do more research of how have we branded women, especially in religious settings.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. And this goes to, I was listening to your recent episode and you were talking about sort of originality. It was with Ashley, TEDx.
Tori. Dunlap:
Oh yeah, Ashley’s Stahl. Yeah, yeah. You’re on top of it. Thank you. We just released that this morning. Thank you.
Elise Loehnen:
Yeah. But I think it’s really important for people. There’s nothing, in many ways there’s nothing original about my book. In fact, I learned this amazing word, it’s called agnosia, which is revealing what’s present. And that’s what I wanted to do was just to one, bring all of these ideas together into one house, and then just to say, oh my God, is this not the most obvious thing that was invisible to all of us? And then you’re really cooking with gas, because then it’s so accessible and available, and people can see it everywhere. I just put it together, and that’s really the work that any of all creators are doing.
Tori. Dunlap:
Yep.
Elise Loehnen:
Nothing is truly original. We’re all in conversation with each other.
Tori. Dunlap:
Nope. Me telling you how to pay off debt, that’s not news. But I like to think the way in which I do it, or the metaphors I use might be new to folks.
Elise Loehnen:
Right. They need to hear it from you, specifically in that way. 100%.
Tori. Dunlap:
Thank you. I’m so excited to read your book. I’m so excited. If someone takes one thing away from your book and for your work, what do you hope it is?
Elise Loehnen:
I’d say that it’s that insight that we lose that connection to what we know, and you know. And if there’s one big piece of work to do, it is to get closer to that knowing, rather than dismissing that voice.
Tori. Dunlap:
Thank you so much.
Elise Loehnen:
Thank you.
Tori. Dunlap:
Where can people find about you, and your work, and your book? Plug away.
Elise Loehnen:
Okay, so the book is On Our Best Behavior: The Seven Deadly Sins and the Price Women Pay to Be Good. I host a podcast called-
Tori. Dunlap:
Hold on, pause. The book is a New York Times bestseller.
Elise Loehnen:
Correct. Thank you.
Tori. Dunlap:
No big deal.
Elise Loehnen:
No big deal.
Tori. Dunlap:
So go read the book wherever you get your books.
Elise Loehnen:
Yes. My podcast is called Pulling the Thread. It’s available wherever you get your podcasts. And it’s conversations with people like Carol Gilligan, and Niobe Way, and Terry Real, people we mentioned in today’s conversation. And then I also write a Substack under the same name. It’s called Pulling The Thread, but it’s at eliseloehnen.substack.com, and that is my Instagram. If you like dorky word videos and things of that ilk, then you will enjoy my content.
Tori. Dunlap:
I love it. Thank you. I could have talked to you for another seven hours, so thank you so much.
Elise Loehnen:
Anytime, Tori. Thank you.
Tori. Dunlap:
That was so good.
Elise Loehnen:
That was so fun.
Tori. Dunlap:
Thanks to Elise for joining us. You can get her book, On Our Best Behavior, wherever you get your books, please support your local independent bookstore if you can. You can also follow her Instagram, E-L-I-S-E, L-O-E-H-N-E-N. We appreciate you being here. Thank you for listening to the show. Give us a five-star review. Share this episode with someone in your life who you think you would appreciate it, and we hope you have a kick-Ass day financial feminists, take care of yourself.
Thank you for listening to Financial Feminist, a Her First $100K podcast. Financial Feminist is hosted by me, Tori Dunlap, produced by Kristen Fields and Tamisha Grant, research by Sarah Sciortino, audio and video engineering by Alyssa Midcalf, marketing and operations by Karina Patel and Amanda Leffew.
Special thanks to our team at Her First $100K, Kailyn Sprinkle, Masha Bakhmetyeva, Taylor Chou, Sasha Bonnar, Rae Wong, Elizabeth McCumber, Claire Kurronen, Daryl Ann Ingram, and Meghan Walker, promotional graphics by Mary Stratton, photography by Sarah Wolfe, and theme music by Jonah Cohen Sound.
A huge thanks to the entire Her First $100K community for supporting the show. For more information about Financial Feminist, Her First $100K, our guests and episode show notes, please visit financialfeministpodcast.com. If you’re confused about your personal finances and you’re wondering where to start, go to herfirst100k.com/quiz for a free personalized money plan.
Tori Dunlap
Tori Dunlap is an internationally-recognized money and career expert. After saving $100,000 at age 25, Tori quit her corporate job in marketing and founded Her First $100K to fight financial inequality by giving women actionable resources to better their money. She has helped over five million women negotiate salaries, pay off debt, build savings, and invest.
Tori’s work has been featured on Good Morning America, the New York Times, BBC, TIME, PEOPLE, CNN, New York Magazine, Forbes, CNBC, BuzzFeed, and more.
With a dedicated following of over 2.1 million on Instagram and 2.4 million on TikTok —and multiple instances of her story going viral—Tori’s unique take on financial advice has made her the go-to voice for ambitious millennial women. CNBC called Tori “the voice of financial confidence for women.”
An honors graduate of the University of Portland, Tori currently lives in Seattle, where she enjoys eating fried chicken, going to barre classes, and attempting to naturally work John Mulaney bits into conversation.
