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A podcast about creativity as the path from surviving to thriving. Real, authentic, and unfiltered conversations surrounding the creative act—daily practices, small moments, and bold leaps that cultivate a better life.
For those of us who've mastered survival but are ready to do more than just get by. Hosted by Jon Murphy, PMHNP-BC—exploring how embracing creativity in ways both small and large becomes the bridge from enduring to flourishing.
Disclaimer:
This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional mental health advice or treatment. The views expressed are my own, drawn from clinical experience and personal perspective. If you're in crisis, please seek support from a licensed professional or emergency services.
This story is for you.
is for anyone that's ever felt
like they're not good enough.
This is for the outcasts, the weirdos,
the scapegoats, the losers, and
the loners, the sad and the lonely.
It's for the misunderstood.
The ones who were picked on for being
different, whether you were too short,
too tall, too big, or too small,
maybe they were things pointed out to
you before you knew anything at all.
Things to feel confused
about or maybe forget about.
when it all started.
We didn't get to choose who was
around or what we looked like.
That was you.
That was me.
It was us.
What we lived, what we saw, what we
felt, what we heard, our world, our
lives, all unfolding before our eyes.
We grappled with our unworthiness.
You survived.
You grew despite being around people
who couldn't be there for you in
the best way, the right way, the
safe way to let down your guard.
Taken the world through these
bonds, the connections we don't
fully trust, even though we had to.
If you're younger, you're on your
way, but your needs are not the
same as they will be one day.
You are worthy of life.
You matter, and you
deserve to be cared for.
Along the way, we shift our
attention to other places.
We zone out, tune into another channel or
another distraction, fantasy or fallacy.
We make up reasons that make
sense even when they don't.
We do what we can.
Whatever lies within our small
sphere of control, those few
things, the straws we grasp for
primitively, we do it all to survive.
even still deep down, we felt it.
We knew something was not quite right.
Maybe you still feel that way.
Now some of us turn from the pain,
lock it deep down to be who we must be.
Others live with it without any
reason to assume it is anything
other than a normal part of life.
But ultimately, one day
we become mature adults.
Only then have we earned
the opportunity to rest.
we look back now with a new set of eyes.
Our perspective has changed.
We can go back there to know
again, to allow ourselves
to remember at our own pace.
Our needs are no longer built on shaky
foundations outside of ourselves.
Now, finally, they exist within us.
We can learn to trust what we feel.
It is safe to know what we know.
We can show ourselves one step at a time.
We are worthy.
You have what it takes to survive.
You can find a peace
that only safety brings.
I know because.
It happened to me.
So welcome back to Survival Notes.
This is Jon Murphy, psychiatric
nurse practitioner and trying
something a little different today.
I read a little excerpt for you
there from my memoir working on
it, taking my time, part of the
Survival Notes thing line by line.
And I really wanna start sharing that
process, what it looks like writing.
What it looked like for me,
writing that just came outta me.
I've always felt a sort of connection to
the misunderstood, to the people that were
on the periphery, the nerds, the weirdos.
That was me.
They put classes on me.
I was a little kid.
They call me the professor, and
those glasses were cute, but
they're not so cute 10 years later.
But for some reason, I.
I'll come back to it now and then what
we deal with the cognitive dissonance
as a child that's left to their own
devices, we're blamed for doing the
things that we were set up to do.
I was put in front of the TV
and I, as I searched for these
memories, connections, moments of
actual interaction with an adult.
What do I remember?
I remember being a byproduct to chaos.
There were older siblings in
the house, but of course I came
along actually pretty late.
And if there's one thing I've
realized is that I really don't
know how bad it was for them.
Maybe they can't see, maybe they were
reinforced into it, but I was scapegoated.
And for that, I'm thankful to see
the light, to be the truth teller
to survive outside the pack.
It makes you innovative, it makes you
look at things in a different way.
Question those systems of authority.
Yet here I am.
How did I get here?
Well, I was 23 years old, didn't have
a lot of direction in life, and there I
was in a psychiatric unit, $10 an hour
and I thought, Hey, this is pretty cool.
I like this.
I remember the moment I opened
a bathroom door for someone.
Some psych patient, handed him some
towels, got out of his way quickly, and
I thought, wow, that feels pretty good.
I felt good about myself.
Well, Not about myself, but good.
And that voice crept in.
Don't go thinking you're a good person.
Piece of, you know what?
You know the unworthiness.
It was like I had someone
whispering into my ear saying.
Don't go thinking that you're a
good person 'cause you're not.
So this is raw, this is real, this
is universal and it's off the cuff.
That was an intro to the book.
I just thought, hey.
This is true belonging.
This is true inclusivity.
Why?
'cause your story matters.
Your truth matters.
What you feel matters.
And it's the only thing that is gonna
move you closer to peace and safety.
Along the way, we just gotta reckon with
these hard truths, you feel what you feel.
And it doesn't matter who we're
looking at, we could be looking at the
nicest people in the whole wide world.
They could never do wrong and do
nothing but good, but we don't feel it.
In fact, we feel hurt, we
feel shame, we feel guilt.
You feel like you're walking in eggshells.
That's not normal.
We're designed to pick up on these things.
So what do we do about it?
We hold it.
We sit with it.
We do not run from it.
' cause running is no longer
required, but somewhere, sometimes,
somehow, when we're calm.
There's something to move toward.
There's a goalpost.
It's communicate in a healthy way, in a
way that our parents couldn't, in a way
that no one else around us did, in a way
that we were told we would never would.
Because if you grew up in a toxic
family, these are the facts.
You weren't allowed to be normal
and your normalness was a threat.
Now, what's The myth of
normal there isn't normal.
There's a healthy and a healthy is.
We're in alignment.
We're able to direct our thoughts,
surrounding our feelings and actions.
We're responsive to what our body
tells us and how we feel, and we
allow that to dictate our comfort.
When going outside of
ourselves, it's vulnerable.
It's extending extreme vulnerability
to even talk about how we're
feeling if we're not ready.
And I know that because here I am,
all of this stuff I've purged out and
I'm seeing things on a different side.
Being able to move past.
Those toxic people.
It was as if, as a scapegoat, I
was used to socializing with people
that I had to suppress myself.
I couldn't be myself at the
expense of someone else's delusion.
So there it was punished for being myself.
I felt bad about who I was, like
there was something wrong with it.
But from no contact two to three years
later, every door slowly closing one
by one, gradually backing away till
that last single door clicks click.
And I know it wasn't for lack of trying.
You don't get to choose if other people
are gonna be what you need them to be.
If you're looking for a friend.
You need people to
treat you like a friend.
You know they've treated you like a friend
because the next day you wake up, you feel
good, you feel renewed, you feel restored.
That's how you know that's
the name of the game.
When you feel invalidated, when you feel
gaslit, when you're projected blame,
when you're made to feel it's your fault,
all of this stuff tells us something.
How do you feel about it?
Start there, respond to it, and then we
can find our own pocket of the world.
Our own pack of losers.
Our own pack of weirdos.
It's a beautiful thing to care.
And if you can experience the selfless
act of caring about someone else.
I know that's been restorative for me.
When you live in shame,
you feel worthless.
You feel like you can't do anything
and you're the best you can
do is deal in personal simple.
Individual pursuits, but
why were you scapegoated?
What is it that was so threatening?
Maybe it's your ability, maybe it's your
capacity, maybe it's your intelligence.
Maybe it's what you represent.
Something that they'll never experience.
Toxic people of the
world, they'll never know.
But here I am, I go on rambling
on the show Survival notes
conduit to keep the faucet on.
With creativity, it's keep that faucet on.
Every time you get the notebook,
you take out the pencil.
Let me do it.
Now I got a notebook in front of me.
See, I'm gonna practice what I preach.
And what you do is you get
the pencil going and you
write, and what do you write?
You write anything and I'm writing it.
The way to go.
Universal love and truth
can be yours if you trust yourself.
So as you write, as you get
this sort of thing that.
It happens to us.
We start to express language.
Something comes through us and you
feel that uncomfortable urge to
say, stop that negative voice in
your head that says You're so dumb.
And maybe I am dumb 'cause I just
wrote anything is the way to go about
universal love and truth, anything.
the way to go about
universal love and truth.
Can you trust yourself?
Okay.
To start, we can also
start a different way.
Once upon a time, there
was a girl named Bonnie.
And Bonnie.
What do you think?
See?
Bang.
Just like that.
The faucet turns off.
So here we are.
I'm keeping the faucet on, and
this will keep me writing, keep
me talking, keep me engaging.
I want the faucet to
turn on for all of you.
If we can initiate creativity daily
in whatever small way, and the moment
you feel that resistance, you don't
push through it, you just, you get up
and walk away and you get on with your
day and another page, another day.
And slowly but surely you craft your
story, your survivor's story, your
life story because you survived.
And now you get to editorialize and
contextualize everything you've been
through 'cause you've earned that, right?
And you have the greatest perspective.
And that's it for now.
So if you're listening, whoever's
out there, my name's Jon Murphy,
psychiatric nurse practitioner.
You can check out my private
practice@ at myfocuspath.com.
I got a blog, my Focus path.blog,
and of course the Compass Point
Institute YouTube channel with my
good friend and buddy James Kennedy.
Lots of good stuff coming
and until next time.
I'll see you later.