Ep. 04 - What Trauma Teaches Us (If We’re Willing to Listen) with Jamie Hughes

Jamie Hughes is a social psychologist, certified therapeutic writing instructor, and the author of several mental health books but his real gift lies in helping people feel seen in the middle of their storms. In this episode, we talk about trauma, self-care that actually works, managing anxiety and ADHD, and what resilience really looks like when it’s not performative.

Whether you’re trying to heal, support someone else, or just feel less alone in the process, this conversation gives you more than hope. It gives you tools.

Connect with Jamie: Website | LinkedIn | Instagram

About Pk:
Pratyush has been a designer for more than 6 years. He started creating content to share his knowledge and establish a connection between design and business. He believes that knowledge grows by sharing and he wants to do just that. He is in a journey to help fellow freelancers and content creators make a profitable career.

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Transcript

Hello everyone. I'm Pratyush and welcome to a fresh episode of the underdog protagonist. The guest we have today is Jamie Hughes, a social psychologist, a writer and a certified therapeutic writing instructor with a deep specialization in trauma, resilience and self care. With a master in psychology and years of experience in victim advocacy, Jamie brings both scholarly insight and compassion to the table. He has written several books and his recent ones focus on mental health and ADHD.

He's also a firm believer that healing is not linear, but it is possible. Whether you're navigating your own storm or supporting someone through theirs, this episode will provide you strategies, stories, and a straight up soul. So without any further ado, let's welcome our guest to the podcast. Hi, Jamie. How are you doing?

I'm great. Thank you very much. Before we begin the episode, I just want our listeners to have a bit clarity on who you are, what you do, and what you're generally known for. Okay. Sure.

I'm a social psychologist. I'm also an author. So I I have four books published, working on the fifth now. They're all in the area of mental health. And, so I do speaking occasionally and, do a lot of research.

I am also a certified life coach and a certified therapeutic journaling instructor. So that's interesting. It's actually one of my passions there, among others. And, also a member of the and I'm gonna mess this up, but it's the in The US, it's the National Police and Criminal Psychology Association, I think. If that's not right if that's not right, it's close enough.

Yes. Basically, forensic forensic psychology, which is, wasn't an an area of passion for me until I were, did my master's degree, and we had to not necessarily do an official minor. But one of the professors was a forensic psychologist, so all of her assignments were about that topic. So I got, you know, deeply invested and intrigued and kinda went down that rabbit hole. And now I'm in love with that too.

So Gotcha. I mean, that's such an interesting mix of, you know, passion, career, and what you do to drive, you you know, your purpose. But I want to go a little back, you know, where it all started. The story behind all the studies that you have made and, you have got a rich academic background and in trauma, self care, social psychology, and a whole lot more. But before we talk about the frameworks, let's talk about how did your own story, you know, bring you into this work.

Yeah. Very, very interesting. And, actually, it's kind of a a natural but unplanned path. When I when I first started working on my bachelor's degree, I someone, I don't know remember if it was a professor or a fellow student, made the comment that you know why people go into psychology. Right?

And I'm like, no. Why? Is it to fix themselves? And so anybody you see in psychology, in therapy, you know, psychiatry, most likely they they went into it to try to get a a better understanding of themselves or their lives or something like that. And so that was very true for me.

Very true. Mine my my journey to even to that part, was not very smooth at all. And I think, I think people can can get a lot from my story in that even if you've been through, you know, some very traumatic events, even if you've dealt with mental health issues, that's not the end of the road. You can you can continue and, have be successful. You can continue and and and, complete your dreams and goals.

When I was a baby, probably not even a year old, my parents divorced. And it was a bitter divorce, so bitter that my my mom got rid of all pictures of my dad. So there so when I was a young child, you know, living with my mom, I never even saw a picture of my dad. I didn't even know I had a father. There was no mention.

He was out of the picture. He was gone. And, you know, to me, it's kinda funny because now having been through some life experiences, I know what it's like when you have a breakup and you're just pissed at the person. You get rid of everything. Yeah.

Especially if it was for a bad reason. But, so living with my mom when I was young, she passed away when I was only eight years old. And so, you know, you talk about a traumatic event. Here was a child that only had one parent, only even knew of one parent and lost them. My grandparents who, my mother's parents, who I absolutely loved and they loved me, they wanted to basically adopt me or, you know, have custody of me.

And, the family court said no. If his father's alive, he needs to go live with him. And so I was made to go live with my father. First time I'd ever seen him. He he did not want me.

He already had another life and family and all of that. So I was moved, you know, immediately within I think it was in within three months of my mother dying. I was moved to a totally new city, new school, new family, new everything. And, so that was very, very difficult, very difficult on me. I there was no time to heal.

There was no time to process or even grieve correctly. So, a lot of my a lot of my childhood growing up was just living, trying to survive while grieving under the surface. So then get into my dad's family and living with him. Experienced, emotional and psychological abuse from him that continued pretty much the rest of my childhood, even into adulthood. A little a little physical abuse, but honestly, not much compared to some stories.

And I'm not downplaying that. I'm just just being honest. But the psychological abuse, the emotional abuse was heavy and regular. So that I I grew up as a teenager thinking I was unwanted and worthless. I started noticing that I was having depression, and that went untreated.

Even even when I said something about it, it was ignored. Mhmm. And so I'll I'll also learn very quickly, not to say anything, you know, to keep quiet. So, all through teenage years, very rough, you know, and and I had good times. I had some good friends at school.

I had some best friends, still friends with today. But by the time I was 18, an untreated an undiagnosed and untreated mental illness on top of abuse and trauma, I had a suicide attempt. And, well, obviously, I survived. I'm sitting here. But, that was the very first time I had any interaction with a mental health professional.

So I went to, you know, a, mental health hospital by I don't remember if it was state law or voluntary or what, but, I had to stay for, like, two or three weeks. And while I was in there, you know, got to talk with some therapists and things like that. So that was that was the first time I ever, you know, had any discussion about that. And, I went through a few more years of just just being lost, not knowing where to go, what to do, you know, just trying to maintain life as best as possible. And then in my mid twenties is when I actually started getting therapy and started going to college for the first time.

And it went for my, associates in in psychology, and then a couple years later went for my bachelor's in applied psychology. So that's when I say it was a, you know, a bumpy and and unintentional path into my my field of study and my experiences, you know, where I'm at now, it was it was it was rough. And it even then, it didn't just, you know, magically go away. You know, I had depression for years and years and years. It took a long time to get on the right medication, the right dosage, to allow the allow the therapy to work, to do what it's supposed to do, and to start learning self care.

And this is something that I think people with a mental illness like depression, or their family members, their friends, Something that you that we don't understand is that just medication is not the only answer. It's need it it's needed at times, but it's not the only answer. Just therapy, just talk therapy is not the only answer. If you can go I've I've known people that have been going to therapy for years. I mean, like, five, ten years, and they're still going to therapy for the same problem.

It's basically become a, you know, talk session, a gossip session for them, and, which is that's not the purpose of it. It shouldn't be. You you have to move into the stage where you can learn self care and self healing. One of the things that that helped me the most, and I mentioned this as being one of my passions, was the journaling. That helped me a lot, I mean, immensely because it was something I could do on my own.

It was something I could do at my own pace. I could talk about whatever I wanted to talk about, whether it was now, whether it was the past, whether it was the future. And I think as you grow and and if you a lot of people, especially if you're an entrepreneur, you know, you're a a budding business person, you've got goals of of, doing whatever you it is that you're passionate about, you naturally have a thought process of here's where I am and here's where I want to go. What do I need to do to get there? But when you're when you're struggling with a mental illness, whether it's depression, PTSD, ADHD, that doesn't come naturally.

It doesn't come naturally because your mind and your body are fighting against those things. They're fighting against them in a way that says, hey. Look. Whatever's going on right now, right this second, that's the only thing that matters. That's the only thing that's important.

So it could be very difficult to think of a future that's positive. It can be difficult to actually make plans and stick with them or be able to envision a path to get to where you want to go. Those things are are not easy, but they're worth it. The journaling, like I said, helped me to do that. And that was something I, funny enough, I started when I was a teenager, but I didn't know that's what I was doing.

I I grew up from childhood loving comic books. And as a teenager, I would start writing stories, you know, copying some of the comic books. You know, Spider Man, for instance. I would kinda write my own stories of of a different character and notice that, some of the issues the characters were dealing with in my stories were my issues. So that was the very early beginnings of self care and finding a way to express the emotions and the thoughts and things, that later, you know, evolved, into therapeutic writing.

And so that's why I pursued that in terms of, and even that was unintentional. I was actually, I bought a book, from an author named Kath Kathleen Kennedy. Is that her name? Kathleen Kennedy. Anyways, and it was on self help and journaling and stuff.

And I bought this book, and I was like, oh, I wanna see what she has to say. And and, it turns out that she actually, ran an organization that provided, credentialing to teach that. And so that's kinda how I came into that. And I took that and got my credentialing there and, have taught different classes and, even taught therapists how to use this as a tool with our clients, things like that. So, yeah, it's it took many twists and turns and a lot of struggling to make progress and took a lot of time.

Mhmm. And I think that's something important for people to remember that healing takes time, just like bodybuilding. If you go to the gym and you wanna build your biceps, your pecs, your quads, calves, whatever, you don't just go in this week, do 20 reps, and then next week you've got, you know, calves that are just popping out of your socks. That's not the way it works. It takes consistent effort over time, and then you see the results.

It's the same with mental health. It can be done. No matter what you're dealing with. You can get to a place of healing and growth. It just takes time and consistent effort.

So give people give yourself the patience and the, the the break that you need, and don't be hard on yourself and think that, oh, just because I've been to therapy for, you know, six months now should be now all of a sudden I'm having this emotional issue. I shouldn't be having this. Yeah. You should. You're you're gonna have emotional issues from now on.

Even when you're healed, you're still gonna have you know, get angry at stuff or there's stuff that's gonna make you cry. You know? I I don't know about you, but I'm a big Walking Dead fan. And, recently, I've been, rewatching The Walking Dead from beginning to end. And just a couple of weeks ago, I got to the season and the part where Carl dies.

And I'm sitting there tearing up, and I'm like, jeez. I've already seen this, like, three times. And so, you know, you're always gonna have that. That's that's normal. Yeah.

But but you can get to a point to where that the the trauma, and the pain aren't running the majority of your life. Mhmm. A lot of times, you know, people misunderstand what trauma is all about, especially the ones who have not faced it or felt it firsthand. Mental health as a topic came into light. I mean, for me, what I came to know more about, like, when it was trending was, during COVID.

Like, when COVID struck, everyone's talking about mental health because everyone is being pushed inside the houses. And Yep. The sudden shift of dynamics is what made them realize that mental health is something that we need to look after. Mhmm. But that misunderstanding never went, you know, because even though they are kind of feeling what mental health is all about, they are looking at it on a hindsight.

They are not they have not felt it firsthand. They're just feeling like the aftermath of what it might be. Okay. So I just want to get that clarity that what does get misunderstood so often about trauma and mental health? Well, the first thing about trauma, there's a lot of misunderstanding about it.

And we actually, in the in the field of psychology, have almost come a three sixty in our understanding of trauma since the the late nineteen sixties, nineteen seventies, that era. Because prior to that, most trauma was looked at as from soldiers. You had people going into war, and this goes all the way back to I mean, this is hundreds of years, you know, if not thousands, where it's been discussed and and viewed through the lens of a soldier and war coming back, and now they have, you know, these different, emotional problems. And, you know, it wasn't until, globally even I think it was, like, 1980. I think the DSM three, which is the, you know, the kind of accepted one of the two accepted diagnostic manuals for psychiatry.

I think in 1980 was the first time they even had the complete diagnosis of PTSD. But by that time, we had started realizing a couple of things that are very important. One, it's not just soldiers. Anybody that experiences trauma that's severe enough or lasts long enough can develop PTSD, can develop the symptoms that lead to that. So it's not just soldiers.

I worked for many years in a domestic violence and sexual assault agency. And many people that experience domestic violence or sexual assault, that's trauma, develop PTSD, develop those symptoms and diagnosis. So it's that's one thing we've learned. It's it's not just soldiers, and it doesn't have to be, like, super extreme in some viewpoints. And what might be traumatic to you might not be traumatic to me.

So anyone anyone can can develop it. The other thing about trauma, again, coming from kinda from that same era, I think there must have been something going on in, like, the nineteen sixties where, there's, like, these shifts in in thought process because, you know, we'd had from the mid eighteen hundreds up to that point, fraud was the basis of psychology. You know, there were other Adler and those those people, but that was kind of the basis. And there was, like, the shift all of a sudden to wait a minute. It's not just mental.

It's not just repressed emotions or repressed thoughts. So we have an understanding, which is developing now at a beautiful rate, in a in a beautiful way, is that trauma is stored in the body. Yeah. It's not just that, okay. My mom died when I was eight.

That was very traumatic, so I remember that. I actually don't remember much of that. Sometimes when you go through trauma, your mind kind of blocks it out to keep you from replaying it. And there's little bits and pieces I remember, but not a lot. It's it's in the body.

When you go when you experience trauma, your body goes and everyone's pretty much are fight, flight, or freeze. You know? You have these immediate reactions. Well, that's from your nervous system. That's not from your brain, you know, from your cognitive thoughts.

Because if you're walking around a corner and there's a bear there, you don't stop and think. There's a bear. Okay? I've read that bears can kill you. Okay?

He looks scary. I see his teeth and his claws. Okay? I should probably turn around and run. Alright.

Let's do that. No. Your nervous system goes bam, and you're out of there. You know? That's how quickly it is.

So these these things get stored in your body because when those processes are activated in the nervous system, for a child whose brain is developing, it literally reroutes the neural pathways to say, okay. Instead of growing towards comfort, instead of growing towards safety, instead of growing towards love and acceptance and growth and confidence and resilience, it says there's danger emotionally or physically, so we need to reroute all of our systems to danger response. Yeah. So which in your body can look like increased cortisol levels, increased adrenaline. It can wear down your, immunity system, your digestive system.

It can impact your heart, health. All of these things. So we we drastically, drastically need to understand and and jump on this horse jump on this horse and ride it. Physical health is mental health and vice versa. If you have a mental health issue, a thousand percent you have a physical health issue.

Vice versa. You got physical health problems, there's a huge chance they come from trauma. And you may not even think about it in those terms, but it's it's almost guaranteed. So yeah. So the fact that it's physical and not just mental and the fact that anyone can experience trauma and develop symptoms or even a disorder from it is possible.

Recently, I was having a talk with doctor. He has been dabbling into a lot of all sorts of things, but primarily he helps people get rid of the limiting belief. And he mentioned that your physical pain is very much mental, like, as you you just mentioned. He also works, or helps people based on that theory that if you are feeling something mentally, then it's for sure 100% can translate into physical, you know, trauma as well. So once you discard you're discarding that limiting belief and you're clear on your brain that I'm okay, then maybe your body will also accept that you're okay.

Otherwise the trauma that you're feeling mentally will also be translated physically. As you have mentioned a few, you know, lines before that, we have been, educated that trauma is something that works in a certain way, maybe 1960 as you mentioned. But I think, before that trauma is all about physical, you know, and it's a term that's been used medically as well that, the person has a trauma in his arteries or in his brain or whatever. I mean, they define trauma as something very severe of damage in a body part, and we need to walk on that. But as time went by, trauma kind of translated into this both hemisphere, physical and also mental.

And people started to be aware of the fact that, okay, trauma is something that can be mental also, and we need to look out to mental health so that the trauma that mental trauma does not translate into physical trauma, and we don't do not feel that we are being dragged down so much. Mhmm. And you talk a lot about resilience. You have been hinting resilience, throughout our talk right now. It's not in the fluffy motivational sense.

You know, it's very real. Right. Right. But someone who is in the thick of it, you know, resilience kind of feels very hard to acquire. For someone who has been through a lot of traumas, maybe has developed PTSD along the way, They have kind of developed a thick skin and, you know, kind of have this barrier placed around them that they don't easily accept things or they don't want to accept things.

And I just want to talk about that resilience that how do you develop that or if at all you have developed so much resilience that you are just not ready to accept anything or not letting anyone be closer to you because you are afraid that what if if I am committing to this action, whether it's a relationship, personal life, professional life, whatever that might be, will cause me trauma instead. So people are kind of, you know, as I've said, building barriers around you just because of that resiliency. Maybe in a good way, maybe in a bad way, but it's affecting their lives. So how to identify that and build resilience in a good way? Yeah.

I would say that if someone is afraid in some sense or or resistant to a situation, that that's not resilience. That's avoidance. Resilience is no matter what happens, I'm gonna be okay. If, I play this game with you, if we play cards, I might lose, and that's okay. I, hope I'm gonna win.

I'm very competitive. But, you know, if I if we if I lose this game, it's alright. It's just a game. We'll keep we'll keep going. I'll get better next time.

Resilience is the ability to learn from experiences and grow from experiences. So people that have a healthy resilience then are more equipped or better equipped, stronger in a sense to handle new situations, to go into new situations. And that is something that parents can teach their children. It's something that people learn from their environment, growing up. Someone just yesterday asked me, when you have two people in the same situation, let's say soldiers, they're in a war, and they come out, one develops PTSD and the other does not.

Why? They were both in the same situation. The two the two answers that we know of and, again, we don't know everything. So if if you haven't figured out that the medical industry doesn't really know everything they say they know, we're still learning. You know?

But the reasons that we know is, some people have more resilience, and some people have a better care and support system after experiencing trauma. And that's the two differences there. So if you're trying to build resilience, there's a talk therapy is probably, honestly, one of the best tools for that. If if that's an issue, you know, you don't have resilience, you wanna build it, you can tell a therapist, hey. This is specifically what I wanna work on, and they can help you with that.

And it's they kind of do, like you mentioned, is help you change, limiting beliefs. Limiting beliefs would be like, well, nobody loves me. Okay. Well, that probably comes from trauma, so let's work on that. Let's change that.

You know, and there's different types of therapy. There's CBT, cognitive behavioral therapy, that works on negative beliefs and changing those into positive beliefs. And the whole purpose of that is to build resilience. And you should be taught, not just talked to, not just me telling you, oh, you're gonna be okay. Yeah.

You're you'll be alright. You know? You should be taught. Okay. When you have this thought, let's write it down.

Now, write down the opposite of that thought. Next time you have that thought, try to catch it. You know, it's not a matter of judging yourself or thinking bad because you have that thought. It's something that's grown there for probably many years, but try to catch it. Then, when you find yourself able to catch that thought when it happens and be like, oh, I just had that thought again.

Instead of going down into, you know, self deprecating, you know, feelings, you catch it. You're like, I just had that thought that nobody loves me. The next step is, you know what? One, that's not true. And two, there are people that love me.

You learn. You learn just like anything else, any other process. You learn this to build resilience. And you do another way is to, build work on your social support. If you've got close friends but not close family, don't worry about it.

You don't owe them anything. You don't owe them, you know, going you don't have to go do things for them. You know? If it's important to you, sure. If it's not, don't worry about other people judging you or whatever.

If your friendships are closer, then work on those. Spend time to make appointments. Do something to work on those because that will naturally build resilience. That will naturally build a support system. Do things that you enjoy.

Find the hobbies that you enjoy. And no sleeping for twelve hours a day, to cover up, you know, pain and trauma and and depression is not a hobby. Sitting and watching TV for six hours straight is not a hobby. And I I'm, you know, huge huge TV and movie fan. So that's what I've had I had to learn, like, years ago.

I was like, oh, yeah. I can just sit here and watch this movie two or three times in a row. And no. No. It doesn't work that way.

You're hiding. But finding things that you enjoy because that boosts the, chemicals going to your brain like dopamine. You do something you enjoy. You're, okay. All those things help.

Again, that kinda goes back to the physical. You're you're sort of tricking your brain by giving it something that it wants and needs physically, but it has an emotional impact. So yeah, resilience can definitely be learned, just like any other skill. As you mentioned that sleeping or watching TV is, does not help you at all. I mean, it's, it's all, it's all you mentioned earlier.

Also, it's what making you avoid stuff. You don't want to face it. And you only build resilience when you, once you have accepted that, okay, this has happened. Now I need to work on myself or maybe can I change the situation now or do I need to, block these thoughts? Do I need to talk about these things?

Do I need to seek therapy? What do I need to do to get past this trauma? But that only comes into our mind once you have accepted that this has already happened and we need to work on something so that we are on the brighter side and not doomed for life. And I think if you want to get past and, you know, lead a healthier life, you need to have a purpose in mind. I mean, just there might be years where people have spent in solitary watching TV, ordering food online, not never going out just because they haven't faced the trauma that they can them they can never overcome and can never forget.

And the only way where they have or the only scenario where they have overcome those traumas is by, you know, going out of the way even though it's out of the comfort zones. But once they have tried, you know, to work on that thing, to find the root cause and then cut it from there, then only they have found the inner peace. So, yeah, I just want to talk about that phase where we get serious about the purpose and work on ourselves. As you've mentioned, self care is something very important here. And you being a comic book fan, I am being a comic book fan and a movies fan.

I can see this scratch post behind you. You also love cats. I also love cats. So, yeah, I think there's a lot of similarity that we can explore right now that how does this aspect of it, the interest, how can we explore this and find our calling? How can we balance this, you know, passion or our likings and find the purpose so that we are driven enough to fulfill that higher purpose?

But at the same time, we are also giving ourselves that self care so that the past trauma is not a big deal anymore. Yeah. So and pursuing your passions is something that I think, you know, we might take for granted if if you're, like, not in the middle of of struggling to even make it to work or make it out of bed every day. You're not pursuing any passions at that level. So you have to start with the basics, the needs.

You know? If, I don't know. I was trying to think of an example like a fire. If there's, you know, if your house is on fire, you don't just put out the fire in one room. You know?

Because if you do that, you might be successful, but the rest of the house is still on fire. So guess what's gonna happen? It's gonna keep burning. So you have to, you know, you have to treat what's necessary first, but that's not the end of it. Once you find that you're in a position to grow and to heal, then you can you feel more like pursuing some passions.

You feel like doing something that you enjoy. And we're you know, we'll take comic books. If comic books is something that you enjoy, you know, superheroes, the movies, whatever, start writing about it start drawing if you're artistic Start talking about it get on, you know, get on YouTube or tick tock and start a channel and say hey, yeah, I'm just here talking about comic book characters Guess what? There's thousands of people every single day listening and watching and creating content about something like that. Or else there's a lot of people that that enjoy that.

So you just you just pick something that you like, something that you feel good about, and just start doing that. Start doing it and say, you know what? No matter what stage I'm in in my healing and growth, I'm I'm going to do this. You know, there's obviously, there's gonna be some days you just don't feel like it. Even with me at this point, you know, I know the importance of physical health, and I'm still a slacker about going to the gym.

I know it. There's no pretending. I'm a slacker. I just am. I'll go, you know, go two or three days, and then the next thing I know, it's been, like, a week or two, and I'm like, I need to go to the gym.

I need to go for a walk. But, there there are some days that I may be like, you know what? Regardless of my personal goal with this, I today, I just feel like crap. I I'm having a a rough day today. I can tell that my depression is just it's knocking on the door, and it wants to come in.

I I just physically don't have the energy to do that. That's okay. You just accept that. You say, yep. This is part of the process.

This is part of the process. So you accept it, and you keep moving. And then tomorrow, when I feel better, I say, yeah. Today, I feel better. At 02:00, I'm going.

Even if I just go for a walk, I'm going. So you you have to allow yourself, like you said, acceptance of what you're dealing with, the the reality of it. And but at the same time, just keep moving forward. In some way, one small step forward is still a step forward. Mhmm.

So when you find those passions, you find what you enjoy, work on that and keep working on it. You have, you have been, you know, in the trenches for so long that you have made yourself learn these fantastic, you know, insights about how self care, you know, can help you redeem your soul. I have been, you know, in the fences of depression as well. And, as you just mentioned that you start to do or you pursue what you really like. Like, example that you gave was so on point.

I like sketching. I love sketching, and I'm a very creative guy through and through. And, whenever I felt like I'm slipping into that darkness, I'll try to do something that makes me feel enjoyable. Either I'll start to play video games, I'll listen listen to music, I'll start sketching, I'll record a new podcast or so. Who knows?

I mean, the things that I love most is what I feel like there's an escape in. Mhmm. And partly the reason why I started the podcast, not this one, I had one focused on mental health back in the day, and that was just because I was depressed. I lost two family members, both of my grandparents, and, I was so connected with my grandfather, and it was COVID back then, that I could not handle the trauma, and I still could not believe that I have lost his whole day. Everyday, it felt like he's sitting right there in front of me.

We used to share a room. He was under full time care. He was home nursed and he was having all sorts of, you know, medical things going on. He had a stroke and he went away, you know. You know, but we are we were never able to accept that reality.

And just because of that, I slipped into this depression. And whenever I felt like I don't have anywhere to go, I just sit in silence, lock myself in the room, and start sketching on hit hit record. Mhmm. And in a way, even though I was trying to avoid the, fact that I have lost someone just because I was working on myself, maybe it's for a higher purpose or not. Back then it was not.

But just because I was enjoying what I was doing in a way, I was helping myself heal. Yes. You know? And as I went on doing that, I noticed that this podcast is acting, acting, like a, path for me to open up my brain, whatever I'm feeling like you are doing journaling. I used to utter those things and through my podcast episodes, I used to rant in a way and that helped me relieve those stress.

Yes. Just like, I mean, it's different for everyone. Right? Some some people like journaling, some people like to speak to others. Some people tend to go for therapy, and some people like me open start a podcast and hit record.

I don't know if anyone else that does that. I think you're the only one. No. I'm just playing with you. Yeah.

Yes. But you're right. Yes. Yeah. I mean, that kind of helped me, you know, re reroute myself and find that calling.

And, you know, again, made me work on myself. I discovered my where I'm lacking. I certainly was not a good speaker. I did not know how to go around the microphone, the technicalities, the posting, the SEO, and a lot of stuff. But I stuck with it because I enjoyed it.

I did not care about the metrics. I did not care about how many people are tuning in, downloading that results, just stuck with it. And after a couple of months, I felt like I'm healing myself. And through that journey, I'm also helping others do the same. I spoke with a couple of friends.

They approached me, and they're like, I'm listening to your episodes, and I feel like you're talking with me directly. And this resonated so much with me that I made my, relatives, my family listen to the whole episode. I just took my phone there, put it on speaker, and made everyone listen to it. And that was such an amazing moment for me because I felt like even though I am trying to heal myself in the process, I am healing a few other souls as well. Yes.

Yes. So, yeah, you're trying to survive by, you know, opting for self care, but you're also helping some other souls survive as well. So that's the beautiful thing about this, you know, purpose and this journey. And just because you have been doing that for years, I mean, professionally as hugely admirable and I'm just I have tons of respect for that. But, you know, managing the mental load, being diagnosed with diagnosed with ADHD, anxiety, and having that inner dialogue within you that you are not enough, maybe you can never heal is what keeps people, you know, from working on themselves, even though they have interest.

Let's say let's take an example that if you are fully pumped to work on something, let's say you we want to start a new project, but suddenly you had a fight with maybe your spouse, maybe your relative, maybe your siblings, and suddenly you have lost all that energy, all that interest to, you know, start that thing. Even though you are about to start, you can't anymore because you had that, you know, disgusting feeling in within you that, no. I have lost all it. It's not because of that small petty fight. So managing that mental load is really tough.

So do you have any strategies on how we can reroute, you know, that that is something that does not affect my current situation? I was prepared to work on x y z just because that happened. That need not influence what I was trying to do right now. Yeah. So, yeah, and you're absolutely right.

It it's, you can you can have a goal to work on something and, you know, whether it's intentional self care or if it's just doing something that you enjoy, which as you stated is self care. But and then something happens, you know, just everyday life, and something happens to kinda reroute that, because it's emotionally heavy. And, yep, now you're thinking about it. Now you're feeling it. And so what do you do?

A couple of strategies. One is learn breath work. I think learning breath work is free. So jump on YouTube, and watch the videos. You can learn breath work.

And I don't mean, you know, the kind where you're, you know, polar plunging, jumping into negative 30 degree water and and trying to breathe. I just mean learning to breathe as a way of bringing down your nervous system, that response, that emotional response. Learn that breath work, because that's something that you can do in that moment to just kind of okay. Just kinda deescalate a little bit, and that will help. Another thing is do something physical.

So, again, engage your body. Go for a walk. Go for a swim. Go play tennis. Whatever you like to do, whatever you is available to you, just do it.

You don't go to the gym? No problem. Put your shoes on and go for a walk. The same thing. When you move your body, when you put it into motion, it will start regulating it the nervous system.

It will start regulating the hypothalamus, the adrenal gland, all those all those parts that are kicked in in this fight or flight, whether it's mild, moderate, or severe, your body will naturally start to kind of regulate that. Because you're you're making your body focus on something else. You know? Oh oh, crap. We gotta do this now.

We got muscles moving. We need to burn, you know, glucose for energy. We need to do that. Your body gets engaged, which kinda takes the the focus off whatever's going on. If you have a support system, a friend or family member that you you trust and talk to and you your relationship is one that you allow venting, you know, for each other, give them a call if you can.

So, hey. This just happened. Here's what happened. Blah blah blah. The only thing I would say, though, is just be wary of that in that if you if you have a friend or or someone close to you that you can vent to, if when you do that, they always always give you platitudes and always take your side and say, oh, yeah.

That person yeah. You're right. That person's, horrible. That person's evil and blah blah blah. If they kinda join in with criticism, there's a difference in that.

And someone that listens says, oh, yeah. I I hear what you're saying. Yeah. That sounds, yep, that sounds rough. I I can understand that.

I how are you feeling about that? You know? You know, there's there's a difference in good listening and bad listening. That's all I'm saying is be wise. Be wise.

And then, my favorite again, journaling. And I keep pitching this like I'm, you know, running for journaling president, but I'm not. Journaling allows you to say whatever you want and need to say, and it doesn't go any further. So it gets it out of your system, but it doesn't have to have any effect on anybody else. It just allows you to pant, just allows you to cry, just allows you to curse.

It just allows you to whatever you need to do. So those are some very practical things that people can do in that moment that will help, again, kinda deescalate their own emotions. And it will give you a chance to sort of, I wanna say, cool off, but we're not always talking about anger here. It could be sadness too. But it it gives you a chance for your mind to kinda come back to balance and whatever that is for you, and give you an opportunity to then move on.

And then say, oh, yeah. Okay. Well, this project I started, I'm gonna I'm gonna hit it again tomorrow. And then tomorrow, if there's one thing you can do, one, do it. You don't have to do the whole thing until you're, you know, back to that flow.

Once you get back in the flow of of the creativeness of the work, Every single person, whether you have a mental illness, whether you have grief, whether you no matter what, every single person on earth goes through constant fluctuation, constant up and down in life. The most successful people that you can see online, they have all these programs and these businesses and, this celebrity and this and that, blah blah blah. They had learning curves. They had things they did things that, you know, that you would never even imagine, that they did. I've seen it.

You can watch sometimes, especially with actors that are like, you know, the super famous ones, the high level ones. You go back and watch their early career. There are some of them that they did, like, hamburger commercials, like, for McDonald's. And you would think there's no way they would ever do that now because there's not. But in the beginning, they did.

In the beginning, they did. They just took that one step towards their goal. And when you when you're dealing with these strong emotions and things, if you can get to an equilibrium and then just take that one step tomorrow or later today even, Just take that one next step, then you can start going back uphill, and that's normal. I mean, we we know that healing is never linear because we always have this ups and downs. Some days might feel good, some days might feel low, but it's really important to understand.

And I point out this, identify those lows and really be aware that, okay, I'm feeling low. Maybe I need to take things slow today instead of pushing it. I've found this tip to be very helpful, obviously coming from a creative, but it might apply to almost everyone dealing with mental health issues is that if you're not feeling to do something or start something or get back to it, just start. Even though you're not feeling it, just start. See if you are getting the flow.

Give yourself just five minutes. For example, if you want to sketch daily, but you're not able to bring yourself to open up the sketchbook, just try your level best to open the sketchbook. Try to scribble for the first five minutes. If you're getting the flow, stick to it. If you're not, close the book, get back to what we were doing earlier.

But 95% of the times, what people have seen is that once they start, they get the flow. Even though they're not feeling it, they will get the flow because the act of starting, you know, has an inertia, and that motion kind of takes them forward. And they have now forgotten, like, what was keeping them or holding them back. And this is small act of, you know, trying to push yourself forward, even though you're not feeling it, is very brave. But that is all that is required, you know, to get started, get back, get bounce back on what you were trying to do earlier.

So, yeah, this is what I feel emotional recovery starts from. And, there has there's a lot of myths that go around and how people navigate those setbacks. But, I'm afraid that we don't have a lot of time to explore that. We are almost end of our session, but I want to keep it very much insightful for the listeners. So we'll explore a few, maybe a couple more topics right now and we'll try to go fast with it.

But I won't I'm very curious to know about how you, who was journaling to get past off this mental trauma or those, you know, depression ended up being an author. Well, so I coming from the the writing I did as a as a teenager, it was something I enjoyed. I just enjoyed doing it. So, you know, some people just don't like it at all creatively. So that's just something I I did creatively enjoyed.

So it's kind of, in a sense, always been there, but not always a goal, not always something that, oh, you know, I wanna be a a writer. I wanna be an author, this and that. But over the years, even with, you know, growth and healing, I explored poetry. So written some poetry. When I was, working on my bachelor's degree, I ended up working with a writing institute and submitting a couple of articles, and they got published.

And so they were just little thing. I was just kinda trying it out. You know? I was just like, okay. Well, here's this this group.

They're asking for articles on on mental health and personal stories. So I why not? And, you know, and these these publications probably maybe 50 people saw them. I don't know. I've never seen them in a bookstore, but, you know, it's just trying out the little things.

And the thing that, I guess, really kind of turned the corner for me was when I was working on my master's degree. Hours was primary and I didn't go into it for therapy, talk therapy. So I wanted, you know, I wanted to learn more that I could apply in other ways. And, so most of our the course was research and writing. Research and writing.

Every single week, we had to read, like, you know, five to eight scientific articles and then write a paper on blah blah blah blah. It was a lot of work, but I loved it. I loved the writing. So when it came time to do my thesis paper, I wrote the paper. Well, it's a little more complicated than that.

It took a long time, but submitted the paper. The professor really loved it, and he came to me privately and said, hey. Look. I got two questions for you. You can say yes or no.

It's just a question. Number one, the I I showed your article your paper to, my, associate dean in the department. The school would like to publish your paper. And I was like, oh, okay. Sure.

That's great. And he said, question number two, I'd like to also, use it and include it in the curriculum for my classes. And I was like, oh my gosh. This is awesome. So I was like, yeah.

That'd be great. And I was like, you know what? I I have two years worth of research and writing. I would like to help people. Here's a way I can do it.

I can write these books. They're short. They're to the point. They describe the each one, you know, each of the four so far, it covers a different mental health issue, anxiety, depression, PTSD, ADHD. They describe the the, condition.

So you get a little bit of background and understanding of what you're dealing with or what your family member is dealing with, and then it goes into very practical steps on how to manage it, how to know when to get help, how to know what getting help looks like, what are you what should you expect in therapy, What does breath work? How does your diet, your physical all those things. So that's how I kinda got to the author stage was, a little bit of passion, a little bit of luck maybe. I don't know. And just a realization that this was something that I enjoyed and it could help other people.

For creators and creators, you know, they tend to go into this path where they self sabotage themselves. Maybe these are thoughts, maybe these are actions, but they ended up. They end up making them regret on a lot of things. And for these people who are dealing with anxiety or neurodivergence, what's that one mindset shift that you can advise those people that can stop them or help them stop self sabotaging? That's That's a good question.

Yeah. Self sabotaging is is rough when you when you have an issue and you have, you know, your own body and mind, like, doing this to you even when you have something that you want to do. An idea to help stop self sabotage is to, one, accept the fact that no matter why you have this these thoughts, no matter what you're dealing with, every single successful person has gone through the same thing. You don't see it. You only see the finished product.

You don't see the struggles that they went through to get there. And if you listen to people speak, they'll tell you this. But you kinda have the sense that, well, they're just saying that. No. They're not.

They're a person that wants to sell you a product or an, an image or something. They don't want to share the dirty parts, the failures. Failure is just part of life. You know, and there's so many famous examples. You know, we could name hundreds and thousands.

But just, you know, just get online and Google and say what you know, who's a successful person that met failure at first? And you'll see so many examples. So even though you're struggling with a an emotional or a mental issue, you're okay. That actually what you're dealing with is normal. Just just keep going.

Just do it anyways. What's what's gonna happen if you don't do it? If you don't do it, you're gonna sit there the rest of your life wishing you had. You're gonna sit there regretting that you didn't take that chance. Even if you fail at it.

Okay. Guess what? The fact that you're sitting here right now tells me you have survived 100% of the things that have come against you in your life so far. A 100%. Self failure, situations, circumstances, genetics, environment, you're 100% successful in your, 100% in your success rate against things that have come up against you so far.

Yeah. And most of the times, these people feel like living the life feels like a chore right now, and they don't want to do that. And, they're just trying to survive with what means they have and with the bare minimum they should do so that they're not affected by additional traumas. And for those people, you know, I just want to know what progress looks like and how can they know that, okay, I have started healing and this is what healing looks like. Oh, yeah.

Good point. Yeah. Sometimes it's that you get to a point where you can talk about the trauma that you experienced without breaking down or it not being as strong. You know? Whether it's to a therapist, whether it's to a friend, or or whatever, or like this.

Oh, lord. When I was, when I was taking my, back getting working on my bachelor's degree, I actually, at that time, wanted to go into therapy. I wanted to do therapy. And I did an internship, at a boys' shelter working with teenage boys who were, possibly some of them were homeless. Some of them were in the juvenile system, you know, committed crimes.

Some of them had parents that had abandoned them. Those kinds of things. And I would go this I would go home every night and cry. And so at the end of the three month internship that I was doing, I knew 1000% I was not ready for that. That that was not the path for me at that moment.

Now fast forward, another, you know, ten, fifteen years or something like that to when I was working in the domestic violence and sexual assault agency. Even though I wasn't doing one on one therapy, I was doing program development and management. There were still times where I I had interaction with clients, because we were all on call. So if there was an emergency on Tuesday night, that was my own call. I would deal with it.

But I knew then that I was at a great place, that I had made great progress in my healing because I could go talk to someone. I could listen to them, what they were going through without, like, literally breaking down in the middle of it because of my own trauma. So it's those little things. It's those little things that you notice. Like, wow.

You know what? That used to really set me off. I you you have to become a student of yourself to know what's working, what's going to work for you, what is working for you, and how much progress you've made, or when to change directions, when to change focus. You know? But being a student of yourself and and recognizing what's working and what's not, that will help you, and it will also encourage you.

Because then you'll start seeing those little things like, oh, yeah. I can I can do this now or I could do that now, and I couldn't use to do that? You know? That was very tender for me. And it's not a not a matter of, I used to be weak or I I was weak.

I wasn't worthy. I wasn't this. I wasn't that. It's just a sign that, hey. Look.

I'm growing, and I'm healing. So, yeah, it's just become a student of yourself and and notice those little things. Mhmm. I think you need to be hopeful that you will get past this and progress or approach this with an optimistic, mindset that, yeah, you'll pull through. Mhmm.

Yeah. Almost at the end of our podcast session. And, before we part our ways, we have this segment where we ask rapid fire questions to our guests. And Oh, boy. The catch is you can't take long to think.

You can't be very descriptive for the answers. It's rapid fire. It's going to be fast. I'll shoot four questions, and you have to shoot four answers right after. Okay.

Alright. Okay. I'm ready. First one, one belief about trauma you wish everyone would unlearn. That it's only in your mind only in your mind.

Gotcha. A self care practice that costs $0 but gives the biggest return. Journaling. Journaling. Not may maybe not $0, but, like, a dollar and 50¢.

Yeah. I I think I had that coming. A quote that got you through a hard season. Other people have survived, through trauma and through mental health issues. If they can do it, I can do it.

Awesome. The last one. What would your superhero name be, and what would that power be? Dang it. K.

I need I wanna take someone else's superhero name. Oh, gosh. I don't know. This is stupid. The time wizard?

Because I wish I could freeze time. More like Doctor Strange, is it? Yeah. Kinda. Sort of.

Yeah. I I wish I could freeze time and do stuff with every there everything else and everybody else frozen. So that would be my power. Definitely the name. I'm not a 100% sold on, but we'll go with TimeWizard.

Gotcha. That just ends our segment for the rapid fire. Thank you so much for spending your time with me. I mean, this has been a real wonderful session. I certainly learned a lot.

I had a lot of fun, you know, talking with you as well. We had humor. We had reflections and a whole lot more. I think this is what people need and they need to if they want to work on themselves, they need to be aware of these stuff so that Yes. The healing is something that they can work on next.

Yep. But before we end our session, do you have any final message to our listeners? Don't be afraid of working on whatever you're facing. It is scary, and it is difficult. I, by no means, wanna sit here and say, oh, look.

I'm I'm this and that, so it must be easy. It's not, but it's worth it. You're worth it. And the rest of your life is worth it. And you you can make it through the storm.

I promise you, you can make it through the storm. Just take that first step. Awesome. Thank you so much again, Jamie, for spending your time with me, for giving your time and upgrading appearing on the show. I'm really grateful.

And, Yeah. Hopefully, we can do this in the near future as well. Yep. I enjoyed it. Thank you very much.

Thank you so much for tuning in. I hope you learned something new and the experiences that has been shared can help you get past or help you in a healing journey as well. I'll leave links to Jamie's socials and also his recent books down the description for you to go and check it out. But I'll catch you in the next one. So until then, take care.