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Welcome to "Lessons from the Couch", where we invite you to pull up a seat and join Corina and Mariana—two marriage and family therapists based in Illinois—on a journey through therapy, life, and everything in between. In each episode, we have honest and engaging conversations with therapists and non-therapists alike, exploring their unique experiences in and around therapy. Whether it's the story of a therapist navigating early career challenges or a non-therapist sharing how therapy changed their life, our goal is to show just how accessible and transformative these conversations can be.
We also dive into the diverse career paths and personal journeys within the field of mental health, from seasoned professionals to those just starting out (like Corina and Mariana, who are at opposite timelines of their own therapy careers).
If you're curious about therapy, mental health, or simply enjoy meaningful conversations, "Lessons from the Couch" is for you. Get ready to think, reflect, and discover new perspectives one conversation at a time.
Follow Lessons from the Couch on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts to listen to new episodes.
Co-Hosted by Corina Teofilo Mattson and Mariana Reyes Daza. Show art by Jae Avilez. Music by Brandon Acosta.
If you're interested in therapy services, either in person or via telehealth, and reside in Illinois, visit www.liveoakchicago.com to learn more.
I think we have this innate sense of what it feels like to be me in this space. For me as a drag performer, my drag is very spiritual and ethereal and not of this plane. My journey in drag has allowed me to feel more comfortable stepping into that side of myself, and I think that I totally do bring that side of myself to my sessions. I'm often saying to my clients that you're on the path that you're meant to be. And if you haven't figured out what path path you wanna be on, then let's figure it out together and get on the path, girl.
Corina:Hi. My name is Corina Teofilo Mattson.
Mariana:I'm Mariana Reyes Daza.
Corina:And we are the new co hosts for a new podcast called Lessons from the Couch. Throughout this podcast, you're gonna find us having intimate, deep conversations. We'll be be talking to therapists and probably some non therapists, and we're gonna bring you into the therapy room with us.
Mariana:Are we ready? Are we ready to rumble?
Humza:Let's do it.
Corina:Let's get into it.
Mariana:Welcome to today's episode. Today, we have Humza here with us. Humza is a new founders fellow at Live Oak and has been working here for around seven months. He has a bachelor's in psychology from Brown University and graduated from UChicago with a master's in social work. He had a few years of experience in the nonprofit world before starting at Live Oak this past summer.
Mariana:In addition to being a therapist, Humza is a drag performer and poet. Humza also has a passion for spiritual healing and tries to incorporate that into his therapeutic work as much as possible. Humza, we're so excited to have you here today.
Humza:I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for having me.
Mariana:Today is January 17. In this moment in our world, we are about to go into Donald Trump's first day as president this coming Monday. At the same time, we have just gotten the world news that there has been a ceasefire agreement for the conflict in Gaza. However, we will not know exactly how those actions will take place given that the ceasefire is supposed to begin on Sunday, January 19, '2 days from now. So I think there is a mix of hope, a mix of also just a sense of nothing new at the moment.
Mariana:We are awaiting to see what comes from that. And, hopefully, once we are listening to this podcast in a few months from now, there will actually be some change and some news related to that. Well, I briefly introduced you, Humza, but is there anything else that you wanna share about
Humza:yourself? Of course, my ADHD mind cannot think of anything right off the top of my head. That's why I wrote the bio, and I put all my information in there. I will say I'm queer. I'm trans masc.
Humza:I'm South Asian. Definitely neurodivergent. And I also consider myself sort of, like, gender expansive. I think in my day to day life, I present pretty he him. But in my nightlife and my weekend life and and doing drag and just the my experience of the world, I consider myself to be gender expensive.
Corina:If you could share what you're noticing about what your experience has been of being a therapist from within your particular intersecting identities so far.
Humza:What I have really noticed is that all of my clients have, like, one or more shared identities with me. So I think that people are really, really looking for and needing therapists who have shared identities to them and much love, but there are a lot of white therapists. And I think a lot of POC are looking for POC therapists. And so I feel really grateful for that that clients see that list of identities and locate themselves in that and then kind of feel inspired to work together based on that place.
Corina:What are you noticing about what is fun and what is challenging about that reality?
Humza:What is fun is that I feel like I'm talking to my people. I had a conversation with a client the other day. They talk a lot about, like, social anxiety, and I was like, you seem really friendly and very, like, here when you're here, and you seem very sociable to me. And they were kind of sharing, well, it's because we have shared identities. It's because you're trans.
Humza:You're brown. We have all these shared identities. I can tell that you get it. And so I think that's something that is sort of fun and feels meaningful to me about the work is this sense of sort of getting it that I feel like my clients are able to get from me. Like, I just do get it.
Humza:You know what I mean? When my clients are talking about, for example, oh, another identity of mine is like, being a child of immigrants. Although, technically, I'm one and a half generation, so my dad is an immigrant. My mom is first gen. She's a child of immigrants.
Humza:But just relating to clients from that place, I really feel like truly, it's not just like I get it because I've had experiences with people like that. It's like I get it because I get it, and I've had lived experiences of being in those shared identities. And on the other side of that, there's, I think, a lot of transference and countertransference that ends up happening and projection even to be fully transparent, sometimes I will be like, oh, you feel like this. You must be feeling like this. And they're like, that's not how I feel.
Humza:And I'm like, oh, my bad. That's how I feel when faced with the same concern. But understood that, like, you would feel differently. So being mindful just because I share identities with someone to not make assumptions about how those people are actually living in those identities and how those identities manifest and how they live in those identities.
Corina:Yes. So this is so timely because I just had a convo with another colleague of ours this morning about exactly this. The field teaches us, I think, to never, ever, ever have projection, to never, ever, ever let our own stuff come into the room, which just it's not a thing no matter who we are. And so that's exactly what we're talking about is, like, how can we use it when it happens? How can we just know it's gonna happen and normalize that that's gonna happen?
Corina:And also know that sometimes when we make our best estimation based on our shared identities, we're gonna get it so right, and our clients will feel seen in that. And that happens to me with my clients too, where I make an estimation about what might be happening based on my own knowing from my own experiences, and I get it right. And they're like, oh my gosh, yes, because sometimes my life experience is the best thing I have to offer. And then sometimes my best estimation is, like, so wrong. And what are the conditions that we can cocreate with our clients to make room for them to tell us?
Corina:So I just love when you're telling me the story that your client was like, actually, no. Absolutely. That's not my experience. Because it means they trusted you to be able to take that feedback and to, like, roll with them to some new places.
Humza:I was just gonna comment about, like, the life experience being, like, a huge tool. I absolutely feel that way. Even more so now that I'm actually doing the work, I'm like, oh, my specialties are just who I am. That is, like, what I'm marking down. I just made my Psychology Today profile yesterday.
Humza:And I was like, specialties, these are just my identities and things that I've dealt with in my life. Because, truly, that is my specialty, and I feel really grateful that I've been able to have a lot of access to therapy myself since I was, like, 15 years old. And because of that, I actually truly am able to be like, oh, well, you're having this issue. I had this issue when I was 16 years old, and here's the intervention that really helped me. And, like, that kind of, like, marriage, it really does provide a lot of insight.
Humza:And I would say, honestly, more times than not, I think kind of making that jump and making that leap is beneficial because it will sometimes be something that my clients have not thought about. I end up talking about gender roles and, like, the role of how the gender you're perceived as plays an impact on how you exist in the world all the time because that is something that I have such an intimate experience with having, like, literally trans my sex and been viewed as so many different genders in my life and in my body that I'm able to, like, have that understanding. And sometimes when I bring it up for clients too, they'll be like, oh my god. I didn't even think of it like that, but you're so right.
Corina:I have noticed the same that the longer I do the work, the more that I'm working with people at the intersections of my identity. And so in white cis womanhood, specifically, I came into this field, I think, having some kind of morality framework around saviorism that was, like, work with people of need. And over the course of my life as a therapist, I've learned that people will choose me for lots of different reasons, but what's most important to me is to do what I can in the field to create a world where clients get to choose the person that's right for them versus me seeing myself as anybody's savior. And now in this place of interrogating, am I trying to save the people I'm working with? But when I was new to the field, I speak Spanish as a second language.
Corina:A lot of my clients were very recent Mexican immigrants to this country, and now the vast majority of my clients are cis white women. And just as you said, my life experience, the interrogation around saviorism, the interruptions of hyperperformance and perfectionism are all the work. So it's like who I am is now the work, is my expertise. And I don't know. I find that to be exactly as I would want it to be, I guess.
Humza:And if we're getting real on this topic, I was just on psychology today yesterday. And in general, this is like a phenomenon that I've noticed that I think that there's a lot of white people who are maybe earlier on in their own unpacking of whiteness, within themselves who kind of had this mentality, like, I need to work with black and brown people so I can prove that I'm not racist. Yes. Exactly. I went to school for social work.
Humza:Right? And so I think a lot of people in that space also had that kind of mentality. And also that's literally the setup of social work. Like, I remember the first day of school, we talked about how that this field of social work is basically white women with the savior complex. Right?
Humza:And going into black and brown communities and often causing more harm than good. And for me, I'm like, we just need to have more POC therapy. We need to either do what we can to figure out what access is because I know that my situation is different from a lot of people's from, like, a socioeconomic place. And just, like, have that access so that people can see people who look like them and feel like them and are like them in a sense. Because I think that to be honest, Corina, like, you're probably doing way better work with the cis white women than you were with people who are not aligning in your identities, who you don't fully get their experiences.
Corina:100, Humza. One hundred percent. So I was
Corina:trained as an MFT, but the same same. The field was created, in my case, by cis white men with white ideas about dysfunction that are almost exclusively oriented from what is my perception of you as an outsider to your experience, and how does the way you live in the world impact me, essentially. So I'm thinking about almost every diagnosis is defined by the experience of someone outside the diagnosis, looking at feeling it, being in relationship to the person with the diagnosis. And more and more, the work that I'm doing is saying this the field's orientation and white womanhood and the ways that that plays out both as employees in the field as well as as clients. But more and more of the work that I'm doing is being with people and saying, what's happening inside of your experience?
Corina:And helping people understand why that internal experience makes perfect sense based on our socialization and also how the ways that we act, especially in cis white womanhood, in relationship to other people has consequences because of the power attached to whiteness in our case. And so the work went from sort of saying, how can I help you on the outside to what do we know about ourselves from the inside, and how do we wanna use that information?
Humza:Which so much I feel I feel like of the work that I'm, like, just doing by nature is investigating what's inside of us. Because I think for a lot of POC who are trans, queer, otherwise marginalized in some kind of way, the world tells us who we are. And they tell us, here's exactly who we are. Like, the for example, the white women of the world are, like, telling us, here's who you are. Here's what your diagnosis is.
Humza:Here's what it means for you. And so what we have to do is actually, like, do the work of investigating. What does it mean to be me? What of these identities do I actually identify with? What actually matters to me?
Humza:What's actually important to me? Because so much I feel like what I talk with my clients about is unpacking the stories that they're just, like, receiving from the world. Even if they're not every single one of those identities. Right? Any kind of person who has had any experience that is outside of the normative experience is going to be impacted by those systems of oppression or systems of power.
Corina:Humza, this is different than what I was gonna ask you before. But based on what you just said, I wonder, for new clients who come to see you right at the beginning of treatment, what is the thing that you would most want them to know about what therapy looks like with you?
Humza:This is something that I'm definitely learning, right, as I sort of take on this new caseload of clients. But I think that one of the most important things that I say to all of my clients the very first session is that I'm a real person, and I'm not a therapist and PC. I'm not just gonna sit here and be a robot in response to your answers. Kind of what you were saying at the beginning. Right?
Humza:We learn to be unfeeling, just containers, empty vessels. And sometimes I'm having a really shitty day. I still have to go into a client session, and my client can tell that I'm off. And they asked me about it, and I don't wanna be like, oh, yeah. I'm totally fine.
Humza:Usually, I'm like, yeah. You know, it's been a day. How are you? And we just, like, get on with it. And so I really am very real with my clients at the very beginning that I am real, and I'm going to show up as a real person, whatever that means, and I'm going to have reactions based on my authentic reaction to things.
Humza:I mean, obviously, there's a balance to it. I'm going to show up differently in a conversation with a friend than I am with a client. I'm gonna take a lot of more step backs with the client and wait to see what is unveiled before I kind of reveal maybe what I'm really thinking. But, yeah, that's one of the most important things. And then I also tell them that I have ADHD and I fidget a lot, so, like, don't take it personally.
Humza:Because I know even me as a client, me as a therapist, I'm, like, really, really watching people's body language on Zoom, and I hate that I do that, but I also can't help it. And so I tell my clients, I'm very fidgety. If I'm moving around, it's not about you.
Corina:Humza, I love that, and I 100% agree with what you said before about how it's certainly true that the work that I'm doing now with people of more shared identities, where choosing into relationship with me is vastly more effective, better, because it's not coming from this idea that me as someone outside of the identity knows something about what you need for yourself. That the work I'm doing now, as you're describing it as well, is helping people go in and trust their own inner knowing. When you're describing having ADHD, and same same, me too, and being in integrity with the reality of who you are, my experience over and over now is that by doing that, we give permission. And I find this to be true as colleagues, as the boss of the organization, as therapists, as supervisors, that when we normalize being human, which comes with with that full range of experiences, that we teach the people around us that it's credible, that their humanity is just fine. And I wonder, what do you notice about what it does for people when you say things like, I'm a fidgeter because I have ADHD.
Corina:Just know that that has nothing to do with you.
Humza:Oh, Corina. You would be shocked and concerned maybe to hear the things that I truly say to some of these clients in session. Like, sometimes I will have to text my supervisor right after a session. I just said this. I might cancel.
Humza:Because in a moment, it just feels right to be real with people. I have said explicit words around sexuality, like, silly things at times. And I really do think something I've learned about myself over time is that I do kind of have the personality type because I'm very genuine. I show up authentically. I think I inspire other people to do the same, and I think it's no different in my work as a therapist.
Humza:So I just show up really real, and I think that does inspire people to be more real with me. And that is, like, the bottom of the iceberg of the things that I have said to clients. I have said some wacko things that I'm like, am I allowed to say this? Our job is weird sometimes, and it truly is. I truly have said things to clients that I am sort of, like, shocked and surprised by.
Humza:But at the same time, it totally makes sense in the context of the conversation. And also, I do notice that the client then opens up more because they're like, oh, well, if my therapist can say something like that, then I can say something like that back to them. Absolutely. I really think of therapy too as this container that we create together. And, like, each of me and my clients has this therapy container that we're building together.
Humza:In that container, I wanna inspire authenticity. I wanna inspire realness, especially when people are talking about things so sensitive like sexuality. I'm like, no. Let's be, like, really fucking for real about this. Let's just get to the bare base and says, I don't know what you're even trying to say when you're starting around it.
Humza:I don't even understand what you're saying. And so when
Humza:we're being really, really authentic, when we're being really, really real, that's also when the real work happens.
Corina:I totally, totally agree with you. I think we could equally call this podcast unlearning from the couch because I think so much of what we're doing at Live Oak specifically is just being honest that the lessons the field taught us about performing some version of therapist that is not me really pull us outside of ourselves. I'm a really big geek for the parallel process. And so if I'm performing some version of somebody else that isn't me, then I'm definitely teaching my client to do that exact same thing.
Corina:I'm teaching them that who they are, who we are isn't okay, and I'm cosigning on the culture's agreement that that's true. So when I swear, when I more fully in my integrity, that modeling has an impact and gives the vibe that we get to be real people. So I I completely agree with you, and I I'm sad to say for my own self that it's been a journey of, like, many years of getting here, and it always just makes me delighted to hear you and other therapists who are newer therapists already starting to trust this. And so when you say to me, Corina, you'd be, like, shocked at the things I say. I'm like, I don't think so.
Corina:I think I'm delighted. I think I'm delighted because a client who wants something else can pick something else. A person for whom that's not a fit, that is okay. So if someone's listening to this and is like, oh, that would be terrible for me. Good news.
Corina:There are many other therapists. And Humza is the right therapist for that, and Corina is the right therapist for someone who could tolerate that I'm gonna forget things. I'm gonna lose track. I'm gonna get distracted. And I will be really honest with you.
Corina:I will stand in my integrity now because I've learned that not doing that is bad for everybody.
Humza:Right. And it's so funny too because I know one of the questions that you had asked before this was, like, what was your vision of you as a therapist, and who are you actually as a therapist? One of the things around that is I think I thought I was gonna be, like, way more serious, and I'm not. I'm just Humza as a therapist. Right?
Humza:I think of it more, like, putting a hat on. Like, I'm not, like, a different person. Right? With drag, I put on the whole faith. I put on, like, a whole outfit.
Humza:It does feel like more of a mask. With therapy, it just feels like I'm putting a hat on where I talk less. Literally, that is the hardest part to me. I don't know if you relate to this as an ADHD individual, but I am such an interrupter. I'm such a, like, let's spitball back and forth.
Humza:And so much of therapy is truly understanding someone's experiences, which does take a lot of active listening. And I noticed that on days where I'm really having, like, an ADHD day, I'm having to work hard to shut the fuck up.
Corina:Absolutely. Constantly. And, I mean, it's we can love these things about ourself, and it's makes it really, really hard to slow down. I talk about this as the tennis or volleyball therapy versus going deeper. It's fun.
Corina:And, actually, a lot of the people who choose to work with me love when we're doing this, like, tennis or volleyball thing. We're like, boom, boom, boom, boom. But I would say that some of the deeper work is when I remember to slow down and be curious and go underneath and be like, tell me more about that or whatever. But, actually, people choose me for both things. You know?
Corina:And I'm sure people choose you for both things as well.
Humza:Yeah. I mean, I can definitely get real and get deep in ways that are probably uncomfortable at times for people, but I think so much of my own healing journey has inspired my work as a therapist and even my drive to wanna do this work. And so much of that self work for me has been around going deep and sitting with the parts of myself that I really don't wanna sit with, that feel so uncomfortable and just, like, not my favorite parts. And I think being able to sit with other people in those parts and still show up with love and integrity and authenticity and all those things that we're talking about is really meaningful for people. And I know that too because it's been so meaningful for me to have had therapists in my own life who have been able to sit with me in those moments.
Humza:And I love this job, honestly. I I think it's really meaningful work.
Mariana:Live Oak Chicago is a primarily queer trauma informed therapy practice located on the North Side Of Chicago, offering both in person and virtual therapy consultation and workshops. We are committed to the practice of becoming a model of a community of diversely identified humans working together to transform the emotional, psychological, and spiritual well-being of individuals, families, and communities beginning with ourselves. To access therapy, training, or consultation, please visit www.liveoakchicago.com.
Corina:But what would you say about the specific ways that your own healing journey comes in with you with your clients?
Humza:Thank god. Truly, I have done so much therapy in my life. I have been going to therapy since I was, I think, 15, and I'm grateful that I had access to it at that time and that my parents were, albeit reluctant, open to the idea. And so I did a lot of, like, traditional CBT with that therapist, and then I kinda grew out of that. And then I went to college, and I had some therapists in college.
Humza:And then sort of in the middle of college, I did, like, a DBT program. That changed my whole life. Truly, DBT, I backed DBT all day long. I think DBT is amazing. It seems so basic, but it is truly for someone who is really going through it and just doesn't know how to cope with stuff.
Humza:It is so helpful to just be, like, stop. Take a step back. Observe. Proceed. That stuff can be so, so helpful, especially, I think I did that when I was around 19.
Humza:And so my brain was fully developing. And so to have my brain have been developing and receiving all those coping skills, I feel so grateful for that. So I definitely have used DBT sort of sparingly. I'm not doing a DBT program with anyone, but I'm like, hey. I think this skill might be helpful, that.
Humza:And then I also one time did, like, this mindfulness based harm reduction therapy group, which is really awesome. So I'm, like, literally pulling things that I've done in therapy, in my therapy with clients has been really helpful. I've also put a lot of work into my spiritual healing journey, and so pulling from that as well. And, specifically, I have done a lot of meditation that's sort of like visioning, and I think that I sometimes step into that with clients. I'm like, okay.
Humza:So if we close our eyes and have a vision of the version of ourselves that's, like, sitting with us in that moment, that has also been really inspiring work. So different elements. Those are sort of more specific answers in that moment. But just anything also that I'm like, oh, this was helpful to me when I was going through x y z, and why don't you try it? Like, that one client that's struggling with social anxiety stuff, they're like, I never know what to say.
Humza:And I'm like, what if you just say something? And they're like, woah. I mean, that's what I do. Like, I just yap, and I feel like it people think that I'm really socially confident. People say to me that I'm well versed at socializing.
Humza:I just say stuff for real. Like, I'm just saying stuff, and it seems to read well.
Corina:Misty Major was on our first episode of the podcast, and I don't think we actually talked about DBT, but she is a person who also says that DBT changed her life. And when Misty was the clinical director here, she really brought in this, like, DBT informed vibe at the intersection of black womanhood. And so it was, of course, through her very specific lived experience. So one, I'm like, you should totally talk to Misty about your love for DBT because it's something that she shares.
Corina:And it is my firm belief at this point in my life that our own experiences in therapy deeply inform the credibility with which we can invite people into doing this work. It is not enough to say, I wanna invite you to do this because I'm a practitioner of this thing. Instead, I think we should be saying, what do I know about the credibility of this thing as a human who's been a recipient of services?
Humza:As someone who is in the therapy world, I have also encouraged people in my life to pursue therapy, and so I have people in my life who have been in eating disorder programs or have dealt with, like, pretty serious bipolar disorder who I can't necessarily pull from that lived experience, but I can also pull from the experience of having supported that person. I also was gonna say my early experiences of wanting to be a therapist was because I had therapists, and I was like, I could do this.
Corina:Tell us about your favorite therapist.
Humza:Yes. Okay. Well, my favorite favorite therapist, I think, is my current therapist because I don't feel like I could do what they do. They are slaying it. They never fucking tell me what to do.
Humza:Last week, I asked them specifically. I was like, so when you have people who are just friends oversharing to you and trauma dumping, what do you do in that scenario? They did not give me an answer. They made me think about it for myself. They made me answer my own question, and they're always doing this.
Humza:They almost never in the two, two and a half years I've been seeing them will not tell me what to do. They will make me think about it for myself. And I think for me, I'm actually not really like that as a therapist. Even more so than I'm realizing, I kind of do tell my clients what to do because I have an opinion. And so I'm gonna say my opinion.
Humza:And I'm like, have you tried this? But my therapist, I think that's actually not supportive for me as a client because I'm already thinking about it. I'm already figuring out here are the 15 things I think I could do. I'm therapizing myself. That was my original entry into psychology.
Humza:It was like, I need to figure out what the hell is going on with this brain because I do not understand. And I love my therapist right now because they make me think about stuff for myself. They will not give me the answer. Even now, I get very sensitive to my clients looking for an answer from me, and I will be reluctant to give them an answer, so to speak. And usually, when people are very specifically looking for an answer, I say, I don't have the answer, just so you know.
Humza:I believe that you are the expert in your life, and we can figure it out together, but I don't have the answer for you. Yeah. I've had many great therapists. I think that I actually realized that I take on more characteristics at this point of early therapists that I had who are very friendly with me and very much like I think that I stopped seeing a lot of them because I was like, this feels like friendship, not like therapy. And many of them would also overshare about their own life, which I try to be mindful of.
Humza:Specifically, I had one therapist. I was like, oh, I don't need to hear about your husband and your kids for the nine hundredth time.
Corina:Humza, I hear that from people
Corina:all the time. So it's interesting because I think it could be that someone could hear our conversation and not know the difference between the things you're differentiating right now. That, like, you and I are talking about very much being ourself, which is different than making therapy about ourselves. And I've had a number of people come to do therapy with me who have said that their former therapist did exactly the thing you're talking about, talked a lot about their own life and how harmful that was for them and how much that made them feel unseen. So I really feel what you're getting at.
Humza:I try to be really mindful of that, to be honest. I'm constantly checking in with my supervisor like,
Humza:hey.
Humza:Do you think I overshared? Because for me, like, I think just the way that I connect with people too is being like, oh my god. My shared experience of this, and what do you think about that? And that's just how I build connection generally too. And so I try to think of that as, like, the rapport building section of therapy too.
Humza:But also sometimes, yeah, I will just have clients say something, and I'm like, okay. Well, here's my experience. What do you think about that? You know what I mean? And I just sometimes am not sure if that's oversharing, but I'm trying to be more mindful about even just now, I did not say who in my life deals with eating disorders and bipolar disorder.
Humza:You know what I mean? Because I have said that in public or two clients before, and I'm like, oh, nobody consented to that. Like, the people in my life did not consent to that.
Corina:This is such an ADHD struggle, and I really also have worked on this exact same thing is learning to ask consent before sharing people's stories because the ADHD life for me, anyways, is just like, oh, this thing that you're talking about, I have a relatable piece of information that might make you know that you're not alone on this journey and then completely forget that I have not gotten permission to share. So I really feel that. What's something you would want to share for someone who's listening about something unexpected about becoming a therapist, something you didn't predict about what it would be like?
Humza:This is not maybe the most unexpected thing, but it is the thing that's coming to mind. I, like, really care about my clients. I didn't expect to not care, but it's truly, like, I don't have a lot of space in my life right now to be building new relationships because I'm building new relationships with every single one of my clients. I think of them. I'll be scrolling through Instagram, Instagram, and I'll save a post that makes me think of them and then share in session later.
Humza:It's, like, definitely a very particular kind of relationship, but I do really think about my clients outside of session. I don't know what other people's their therapists' opinions are on that. Trying to be mindful about the work life balance of it all. But it's more just a general, like, oh, you're kind of a person in my world now, and now you're kind of being integrated into my thoughts about people in my world. And, yeah, that sort of, like, personality aspect.
Humza:I think maybe it's not so unexpected that, obviously, I care about my clients, but the way in which it feels like there are just more people in my life that I care about, it's just a very particular kind of relationship.
Corina:Well, I can offer that I really relate that the people who come to therapy with me, I care a lot about that I feel have a sense of being that we're in community together. The piece about thinking about people outside of session, I really relate to both pieces. On the one hand, I would say when I was a new therapist, I was thinking about it all the time, and it was sort of all encompassing, and that is no longer true for me. Because I think over time, I've developed, and I'm certain you are developing and will develop more trust about your skills. I feel like almost every time you and I talk, you're asking me if something you did is fine, and I'm always like, it's totally fine.
Corina:And I trust that you will over time trust that even if it was not fine, it's fine because the juiciness and the work is, like, messing up together and then being human together, and it's all great. So for me, I trust that even if I mess up, it's fine. I'm not feeling like that is high stakes. And so as a result, I think I'm not thinking, like, did I do it right? Did I do it wrong?
Corina:And so I'm thinking about the work a little bit less, and yet the other piece of what you said still totally feels true. I'll see an Instagram post, and I'll save it for when I meet for my next session. Every once in a while, I'll even email someone in between sessions and be like, hey. This made me think about you, because the people who see me for therapy are part of my literal community, but they're also part of my internal community. And I don't know.
Corina:I think that's actually one of the advantages of working with me personally, with you personally, is, like, I'm gonna think about you and I'm gonna shoot you an email because that's how ADHD works. It's on my mind now. And if I wait until we see each other, then I probably won't remember.
Humza:Oh, yeah. It's totally gone. I mean, I'll, like, have a thought in the middle of the night, and I'm, like, tabulating that in my brain because that's the thing about it being ADHD stuff too. Also, sometimes at work, I'm thinking about not work stuff. And so sometimes I have to make up for that by a not work time thinking about work stuff.
Humza:So
Corina:I will schedule an email whenever at two in the morning to go out at eight in the morning because I don't wanna invade on people's boundaries. But I know that if I don't do it, then it will be gone, or I put it on my calendar. But either way.
Humza:Yes. Schedule send is truly a safe A gift?
Corina:A gift. Yeah.
Humza:A gift. Yes.
Corina:What would you be willing to share about your background that made you want to be a therapist?
Humza:As many Indian Pakistani children of immigrants, I was on the path to be premed, and that was my parents' dreams for me. And I'm the oldest child. At the time, I was the eldest daughter as well, so there's a lot of pressure on me. I got to, like, my second year of college, which I also had a disjointed college journey, but we're not getting into that right now. Around, like, my second, third year of college, I realized how many physics classes I would have to take to be pre med, and I don't like physics.
Humza:I like biology. Chemistry is, like, okay. But physics? No. And at the time, I think I was studying sort of like a biology neuroscience thing, and I realized I remember the moment.
Humza:I I remember the distinct moment. I was, like, in the student center. I, like, took a break from school and went to a different school. And I was in the LGBT center, and I was having this big realization about my college future. And I was like, I can't take all these physics classes.
Humza:And I then came to the understanding that what I was looking for in biology and neuroscience was what I think psychology is, and even like sociology to some extent and just like social sciences in general. And so I switched my major to psychology. I think even at the time, I was planning to go into mental health care. When I was pre med, I was planning to be a psychiatrist. And my vision at the time was like, I've had really shitty psychiatrist.
Humza:I need to be a good one, which I think, unfortunately, I have not done much to change that. But that being said, then I finished my schooling. I did psychology. Towards the end of school, I was like, okay. What's the best way to become a therapist?
Humza:At first, I thought I was gonna do a PhD because, you know, I was raised to be extremely ambitious. Every time I talk to any one of my family members, any one of my uncles, they're like, so when are you doing a PhD? I just got a job. Like, I literally just secured a full time job. But, yeah, maybe one day.
Humza:And then I realized the PhD is, like, the longest, most grueling way to become a therapist. And so I found social work. I had talked to a bunch of, like, alumni of the school that I graduated from, and a lot of people had done the social work route. And they were like, I think you as someone who likes social justice. And like I said, I bring into my sessions a lot as social positioning and how that affects us.
Humza:And so a lot of people were encouraging me to go down the social work route. I still very ambitiously, to my parents' proudest, went to an elite university for my social work education. That was just, like, what was emphasized, in the environment that I was in. But, yeah, here I am being a therapist now, and this is, like, really I think, honestly, I'm really, really glad that I made it here and I'm not still in medical school because that's where I would be if I was pre med, like, if I went through with that.
Mariana:I have to say, I am so excited for new therapists specifically to be hearing all of this podcast because I think, Hamsa, you've spoken so much about the reality that schools don't give us that you get to carve your way into the kind of therapist that you want to be because there will be somebody, as you all said, who will need that at some moment in time. And I love everything about, like, there is not a clear path to get to this point. Sometimes you need to first just be doing the things that you love and you care for and then find out, wait. Actually, the things that I love and I care for clearly lead me to be a therapist and not a doctor. Whereas often, I think the messaging that we are receiving is, like, choose the thing you wanna be first and then make everything fit into that.
Mariana:The message that I would want a new therapist to take away from this conversation is so much about, like even here, there's three of us are very different therapists, and we are all doing fantastic work. And that is good for somebody out there, and it's okay to break the molds that you are given. You know?
Corina:I love that, Mariana. I'm actually really curious. Of the things that you heard today, Mariana, is there anything about your own story that you're like, oh, I would love people to know this about me because I I am thinking about things you've told me before.
Mariana:One thing related to the whole how are we as therapists, I do think I personally feel myself as a therapist being a little bit more serious. And I think that that's very different to who I am with my friends, but it still feels like a very genuine, vulnerable place to be in. And, yes, I will laugh and I will share things about myself. And at the same time, something that brings me comfort is to pull up a worksheet, and that works for some of my clients. Another of my clients have been like, oh, that worksheet doesn't work for me, and we will shift and we will let just.
Mariana:But it was even just interesting to reflect on the fact that as you two were sharing, I had a moment of like, oh my gosh. Should I try to be a little bit more genuine in quotations with my clients? And then I was like, I think actually being a little bit more serious feels genuine to my therapist hat, as you said, Humza. Like, that is the hat that I wear. And maybe that partly comes from what I shared with you, Corina, of, like, having a theater background.
Mariana:So much of my emphasis in that moment is about entertainment and, like, being yourself. And maybe the same ways that Humza for you, it's like when you're doing drag, it's like a full costume that I kind of find comfort in this opposing more, like, seriousness in my therapist self.
Corina:I'm really glad you shared that because it reminds me. Humza, how does drag inform your work as a therapist?
Humza:Well okay. So here's what I was thinking to say as my final ending bit is that I think if people were to take away one thing from listening to this podcast, I would hope that they take away to listen to your intuition and trust yourself and trust your intuition. Because even as Mariano was just saying, right, you thought about it and you were like, no. Actually, this is what it feels like to be me in this space. And for all of us, I think we have this innate sense of this is what it feels like to be me in this space.
Humza:And so for me as a drag performer, my drag is very spiritual and ethereal and not of this plane. And I think that my journey in drag has allowed me to feel more comfortable stepping into that side of myself. And I think that I totally do bring that side of myself to my sessions. I'm often saying to my clients, everything's working out the way it's meant to. It's going how it's meant to be.
Humza:Like, ethereal spiritual element, but that is still grounded in the reality of, like, trusting yourself and trusting that you're on the path that you're meant to be and that you have put in the work to be on this path and going in the directions that you've meant to be. And if you haven't figured out what path you wanna be on, then let's figure it out together and get on the path, girl, because who are we waiting for? I think all of us do kind of have these dreams and ideas of who we would like to be, and I think it's so much more within our reach than we think to become that person.
Corina:This was amazing. Thank you, Humza.
Corina:Thank you so much for having
Humza:me. This was so much fun and definitely felt like an ADHD conversation. Now, of course, now they're at the end, I'm like, oh my god. And here are some more things that I could have said at the beginning that are different from what I actually did say. But I'm glad that I was here.
Humza:I'm glad that we got to talk. And, yeah, this is really nice. It it was a good check-in for me too of, like, where I'm at and where I'm going to.
Corina:Will you come back in the future?
Humza:Oh, I would love to. Yes.
Mariana:And maybe in the future, our new name will be unlearning from the ADHD couch.
Humza:Oh my gosh. Mariana, I
Corina:think I I owe you, like, repair for having to cope with my ADHD in all of the ways. So
Mariana:I believe that I am, like, very high functioning emphasis on the hyperactive part of ADHD. It's always comforting to find that and see that, especially in, like, colleagues and you, Carino. I and I love the ways that I think that that informs how comforting it is to have you as a boss that it's, like, easier to bring our full selves because you're doing the same. You know?
Humza:I'm glad.
Corina:I'm very, very glad. Thank you both.
Mariana:Next time on lessons from the couch.
Jordan Dunmead:My practice lately is really just allowing and noticing what's coming up in my body and listening. Let's say we're talking about the recent election, are feeling that screaming inside or that silencing. What does it mean if we just lean in and trust the messaging there? As we know, we can't fix this. We cannot fix what's happening.
Jordan Dunmead:We cannot make it go away. And so what does it mean to not do what we are being led to do, which again is just cutting off from our experiences and actually lean into it with curiosity and compassion versus fear and avoidance.