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Listen to Stories That Changed the Relationship People Have With Themselves
The Bodyway Intuition Podcast, hosted by author Eboni Banks, features grounded conversations with everyday people reflecting on the lived experiences that shaped how they learned to trust themselves. Through stories of intuition, direct spiritual experience, healing, and the intuitive Clair senses, guests share how they noticed, questioned, ignored, or eventually learned to trust the guidance available through the body.
Each conversation offers a personal perspective on the experiences that changed how someone understood themselves, the world around them, and the choices they made. Together, these stories help us better understand experiences we don't always have language for or acknowledge while encouraging listeners to recognize and reflect on their own.
New episodes are released every Wednesday.
Learn more about Eboni Banks, her lived experiences with the senses, sensuality, intuition, and the services she offers at bodywayintuition.com.
Read Eboni's book, Your Intuitive Nudge: A Step-by-Step Guide to Connecting with Your Intuition, available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and other bookstores.
Okay. We can do check ins now.
Speaker 2:Hey, everyone, and welcome to Bodyway Intuition Podcast. I am your host, Ebony Banks, and today's guest is Jennifer Stafford, who is a licensed psychotherapist, mental health choreographer, self love teacher, resilience hustler, author, and philosophical poet practicing in New York and California. She's also my therapist. Practical, passionate, and genuine, the dedication to her own self discovery is an endless excursion that constantly keeps her on her toes. She received both her master's degrees and psychological counseling from Columbia University and a bachelor's degree in psychology from San Diego State University at a Gates as a Gates Millennium Scholar.
Speaker 2:Her approach is loving, I can attest to that, open, understanding, and compassionate. In addition to practicing privately, she is also a mental health consultant to the Brief Strategic Family Therapy Institute at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. Hi, Jennifer. Hi, Ebony. How are you?
Speaker 2:I am good, and I'm so happy to have you here. You're kinda one of my favorite people in the world.
Speaker 1:I'm happy to be here. I'm so happy to be here.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm so I'm so glad. I was kinda nervous to ask you because, you know, boundaries between because you were my therapist and actually still are. Whenever I need therapy, I come to you. You know, you're the only person that I've ever gone to for therapy. And it's surprising to me actually when I'm thinking about it right now how long our relationship is because I came to you in 2017 for the very first time.
Speaker 2:I remember. Wow. Wow. It's almost been ten years.
Speaker 1:Whole decade.
Speaker 2:A whole decade. And I just like you so much, and you're one of my favorite people because you were just so integral in my healing journey. And when I walked into your office, I was against therapy. I was like, I don't need this. I don't need this.
Speaker 2:I'll be fine. I can just do all the things. You know?
Speaker 1:I'm not ready.
Speaker 2:And I remember my very first session with you, I was in tears, literally in tears. Like, I mean, I was ugly crying that first session with you. And after that, I was like, okay. I need therapy. Like, this was so good and so healthy.
Speaker 2:So how did I guess well, one thing I wanna say to brag about you a little more before we jump into our conversation is that I also like you so much because you told me when I didn't need to keep coming. Yeah. And, you know, I know people who go to therapy for ten plus years, and their therapist doesn't say to them, you know, I don't I don't think you need to keep coming. I mean, there are multiple reasons for that, but it just gave me so much self assurance for you to recognize that I was in a healthy space that I didn't need to keep coming for therapy.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Yeah. We we worked on your self operation, and you have a deeper knowledge about yourself, and you already came in with a great deal, you know, the intuition. We just had to have some conversations to get you clearer on things. And then once you sounded clearer, it was all about check ins from there.
Speaker 2:Are you or do you consider yourself a spiritual person? And what does that mean for you personally, and how does that translate into your work as, you know, a therapist?
Speaker 1:And so this is this is the different. Right? Like, feels like the shoe's on the other foot a little bit in this conversation because now you're talking to me
Speaker 2:a little bit. You know? I'll be gentle.
Speaker 1:I I think that my question, and this is you seeing me not as a therapist, as a human being, and that's how I intend to show up here, but being mindful of the confidentiality piece even though you're telling everybody I'm your therapist. I I believe that human beings are spiritual beings just because of the nature of being a human being. And so for me, the answer is yes, and it's because I come from that foundation of we're human beings, and there's something in us that we just cannot explain. There's something that happens for us, processes, things that the science it's just hard to say that the two plus two equals four always within the human being. There's this essence, this soul.
Speaker 1:So then, yeah, I do. I do believe that I'm a spiritual being as I believe all human beings are.
Speaker 2:Yes. Yes. And and can you are you comfortable sharing how you bring that into your work? Because I found our sessions to be so highly spiritual. You know?
Speaker 2:Not that we were talking about spiritual things, but the way that you framed my challenges and how I experienced the world because of those challenges. I remember saying to you one day that when I am in a healthy state, right, like, I this was really early on when I was, like, in the trenches in 2017, 2018. And I was saying to you, I I recognize that when I'm mentally and emotionally balanced and healthy because it's almost like I physically see out of new eyes Mhmm. Physically looks different to me and around me. You know?
Speaker 2:Right. And, like, you understood what I was talking about.
Speaker 1:Because it's true. Right? And and it's it's it's not only true for you physically, but when we look at the brain, a lot of what I do is neuroscience. And neuroscience has a beautiful way of bringing spirituality together with different words. Right?
Speaker 1:And so the harmony that is required within the human system requires you to regulate and be in a healthier place. Yes. And so when that is lacking, you literally are foggier. You're foggier in your head. You don't have as much access to your prefrontal cortex where you have strategic thinking and decision making.
Speaker 1:So you being able to regulate your emotions and integrate it into your humanity allows you to see clearer.
Speaker 2:Thank you for that because it was I was so it was such a profound sharpness in my vision out of my eyes. You know?
Speaker 1:And I
Speaker 2:was like, what's on earth? And Yeah. And that sharpness, recognize because even in my work with my clients, like my intuitive work, sometimes my vision changes there too. Mhmm. Like, it it it's like my eyes become like a camera lens or something.
Speaker 2:You know? And it's like I go in and out of focus. Right. So I was able to recognize that in my own experience of myself after having therapy with you because it was already happening. I work with my spiritual clients.
Speaker 2:Like, that happens. Mhmm. And I hope I'm explaining it well because it's not like anything is literally happening to my eyes. They're not changing.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Because it's happening within your being, within your brain, and your experience of self. Right? Like, we were talking when you said that, it's because we supported you with incorporating your emotional world Mhmm. Into your own experience.
Speaker 1:The work that you've done when we work me too, because I'm therapist. When I do the work with other people, it's easier to see where they are versus looking within because I have the filter of my emotions blocking my view. Right. And so when we sat together, that's that's where the clarity sat with me for treatment for you Mhmm. Is that we have to help you incorporate your emotional being Mhmm.
Speaker 1:In a healthy way Mhmm. To your self operation.
Speaker 2:I just didn't even know that was a thing, you know, that like, you can reach a state of, I guess, wellness, for lack of a better word to describe it right now, where where your emotional and your mental being missed, I guess. You know, it impacts it impacts how you physically experience the world. And what's funny is as I say these words, I'm thinking, of course, it does. Mhmm. Of course, it does.
Speaker 2:But I guess because it's the eyes and it's like the sharpness that I that I like into the lens of a camera and, you know, no one else can see it but me.
Speaker 1:You know, I
Speaker 2:can't, like, be proven. Right. It's it's really abstract in that way. But, of course, because we know that this is true in other parts of our lives and we feel emotionally and mentally. Right.
Speaker 2:So, of course, it would, you know, it would happen in other ways too.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I that's the neuroscience piece. It's something that I've been fascinated with since, like, a very young child trying to understand how the brain works. And so when we understand that we've got a right brain mode, a left brain mode, left brain is logic, very literal. Right brain is the emotional piece.
Speaker 1:And so that's where a lot of us, we start to have wounds in early childhood years. And that right brain, we really start to suppress activity there in that right mode. And that's what happens, and that's really the functioning of therapy from the way I see it is that we've got to help you integrate your right and left brain modes. So it's more more harmonious. And so that wellness equals harmony.
Speaker 1:That's called coherence. That's you operating most optimally as the being that you are.
Speaker 2:Right. Thank you so much for saying all of that. I don't know if I ever thought about it that way before. So therapy is essentially supporting me in balancing my use of my right and left brain. Yes.
Speaker 2:Yes. Yes. I love oh my goodness. That is great to know. And you mentioned intuition very early on.
Speaker 2:Are do you consider yourself an intuitive person?
Speaker 1:This is another part of me that you're about to learn, Ebony. Like, these labels, this is hard for me with this language. I I I wanna say yes because I believe that we all are at some point until it gets stolen from us.
Speaker 2:Stolen in what way?
Speaker 1:Like, the
Speaker 2:trauma, the childhood stuff you were talking about?
Speaker 1:Stuff. Right? Like, because our first senses as the brain develops, right, zero to two, we're usually nonverbal. Some people start speaking sooner, eighteen months and stuff like that. But zero to two, the only part of the brain that has developed, that first part of the brain that comes online is the right hemisphere that has a direct connection to our emotions.
Speaker 1:And so when babies they're not telling you,
Speaker 2:I have to go pee. I have to go do the bath.
Speaker 1:You know, they're not saying all of that when they're babies and infants. You are having to attune to them. You're having to pay attention to the difference and the cry and all of that. And so once the left hemisphere starts to come online, 18, two years old, we start talking at that age too. So now you just ask me, do I have to go to the bathroom?
Speaker 1:You don't have to pay attention to my internal world like you used to have to. So we get pulled from paying attention to our internal world, but that's how we start. So being able to know when a baby's crying, like, that's intuition. That baby is understanding that there's discomfort within them. Yes.
Speaker 1:There's right? And so I do believe that we all have access to this within ourselves, just different degrees, and some people more inclined than others. So my answer is long winded yes.
Speaker 2:Thank you for saying yes because I was gonna I was like, is she trying to avoid answering? Where is she going with this? So your answer is yes. Yes. I'm sure.
Speaker 2:Because, I mean, I just I just really, you know, connected with you so deeply that I can't imagine that you wouldn't be. You know? Like, the person who would be my therapist would naturally be someone who's who's maybe spiritual and maybe they don't call themselves that, you know, intuitive and understands those kinds of things. And so are there any ways that your connection to those things that you just spoke of and you can use me as an example. You know?
Speaker 2:I'm an open book. Are there and I give permission because, you know, I know all of the HIPAA laws and things, so I'm giving
Speaker 1:it Everybody heard you? Yeah. Yes.
Speaker 2:Alright. Are there ways that you bring your awareness of yourself in that way to the work that you do or that you that you do with me?
Speaker 1:All day every day even now.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Right? Like, it's for me, it's sitting in my heart. Oh. You know? Like, I come from sitting in my heart.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And that's my intentional practice. You know, there's a look there's a little brain in there. There's a nervous system in the heart when you break down. I get I can get into the science deep, but right?
Speaker 1:So the I come from the heart. And so that's how I hold space from you. Compassion. Compassion. Compassion.
Speaker 1:I hold space for you from my heart. Yeah. You know? And I do not waver. And whatever you're sharing with me, I'm following you with my heart.
Speaker 1:Holding it.
Speaker 2:You know? That's exactly what it felt or what it I haven't been we haven't had a session in, I don't know, maybe a year, so I'm having a hard time talking past tense or past tense. But that's what it felt like to me Mhmm. When and all the sessions that I've ever had with you. You know, when I was coming more regularly and and when I come more sporadically, that's what it always feels like.
Speaker 2:Like, you are somehow guiding me to what I already knew.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:I had a hard time admitting, saying, acknowledging, whatever. You know?
Speaker 1:Right. Right. Right. That's right. Yeah.
Speaker 1:The right brain, the right brain communication. I'm talking to your heart. When I talk to you even right now, I'm talking to your heart because I my clinical perspective, human perspective is that is the essence of you. That's the beauty of you. And so I like, I'd like, let's dance there.
Speaker 1:And if you're struggling to dance there, come here. I'll lead you, and we will figure out how to get you dancing there.
Speaker 2:Yes. Oh, that's so beautiful. I mean, that just says everything because even, you know, when I was coming regularly, I was like, I really I want her to be my friend. I really I know that that's, like, totally against all the therapy rules. You cannot be friends with your therapist, but I really wanted you to be my friend.
Speaker 2:I wanted you in my life outside of sitting in your office because you gave me so much love that I was like, I want more of this. So I can't imagine what it is like to be your friend. So your your friends must love you dearly.
Speaker 1:I'm probably annoying to them. Do you hear how I answer questions? I don't know. I mean but I do hold big love. Right?
Speaker 1:Like and and I also acknowledge that that didn't just that doesn't just come from anywhere. I I've got the capacity to hold big love, which means I also have capacity to hold big other emotions. Right? Even the unpleasant ones.
Speaker 2:Yes. Yes.
Speaker 1:And so I take ownership of all of that. And I also know that in my earlier years, I came from a immigrant parent, primary, hands on Rastafarian enthusiast father from Montego Bay.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:And I was in a random part of California where we were maybe three or four of the black people there, and my mom is biracial. Like, it's just so much happening. Complexity. But it was the love. It's love, love, love.
Speaker 1:Bob Marley, like, Like, that was drilled into me. Uh-huh. And so that colored my view. Yes. You know?
Speaker 2:Yes. I do know, but I'm learning this for the very first time about you. I never knew about your Rastafarian dad. I don't think I knew you were biracial. So wow.
Speaker 2:That says so much. You were raised by a Rasta.
Speaker 1:You can't get information from me, Ebony. This is different.
Speaker 2:You were raised by okay. So can we talk more about that? Tell me more about that. So what because you are such a loving human being and you you led it's led you into this beautiful work that you get to do, How did you go from being, you know, the child of Arasta to being a therapist? Like, what what happened?
Speaker 1:I get there. You know? My dad didn't have his working papers, all of that stuff, my mom was the breadwinner and had to go to work. He was hands on with the the baking, the PTA, all these things. He was like, what is this?
Speaker 1:And he'd come in with his dreads, and all the white ladies would be like, what's happening? And and be like and they were all we were it was it was so beautiful to see how accepted he was just for being himself. Mhmm. And so that was what really carried me all throughout my education. I had such a blast because there was such a difference.
Speaker 1:You could hear the reggae music coming. When I was in elementary school, kids would be like, your dad's outside. I hear him. I know he's outside because the music would be so loud. You know?
Speaker 1:Like, this joy and Oh, wow. The feeling of celebration all the time. Every time he came to school, the principal, it didn't matter. It felt like I'd say it felt like it didn't matter what color we were. Yeah.
Speaker 1:It felt like everybody was connecting on a human, the human level. Yes. And so that that's like the soil that I was, like
Speaker 2:Raised in.
Speaker 1:Reared in. Yeah. Wow. And so having that, what got me to become a therapist, he died at 16 unexpectedly. Who died?
Speaker 1:My dad 60. When I was when I was 16.
Speaker 2:Oh, were 16. How old was he?
Speaker 1:He had just turned 40. It was a few days after my birthday.
Speaker 2:Oh my goodness. What was his name? Do you mind saying it?
Speaker 1:No. Roy. Roy.
Speaker 2:Roy. Okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Mhmm. Derek, but Derek, but Roy. We called him Roy. And so that's what got me because I my whole world, everything shifted.
Speaker 1:I was spun around. He was my protector and also the person who let me see all of my anger when I was restricted, I couldn't do sleeping sleepovers. There were so many things I couldn't do that American kids could do. Yeah. And I was really mad because I was having a very American experience.
Speaker 1:You know? And so it was it it pulled the carpet from underneath me to lose him, and I had to find myself again.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And that journey, you know, to see Wow. That.
Speaker 2:So okay. So a couple of things I wanna ask. So you said a small town in California, but California is a big state. Can you give me a sense, like,
Speaker 1:normally trying to get this information.
Speaker 2:Where? Where in I wanna know where in California. And I also wanna know, was it a predominantly white community? Because it sounds like it was. Because you mentioned, like, how the white women responded to him.
Speaker 1:Uh-huh. It was Fresno, California. So it's very agricultural. Okay. It was it it was very diverse in the sense of a whole bunch of different kinds of people.
Speaker 1:But depending on where you lived and the neighborhoods that you lived, then the demographics would shift. So we had a lot of lot of lot of Mexicans, a lot of Asians, a lot of white people. Like, was very mixed, you know? It was very diverse. But in terms of the parents that were staying home, the Jamaican father was the random person who was in all the classrooms, the classroom dad bringing the Capri Suns.
Speaker 1:So they were like, your dad's here? Everyone else there, all their moms were there, you know? So it was a very I always felt othered in my experiences Mhmm. But with a positive skew.
Speaker 2:You know? Yes. Do you have siblings?
Speaker 1:I do. I do. I have an older brother and a younger sister.
Speaker 2:So you're the middle child. Okay. That's also very interesting. And was also I I feel like I have something healing to offer you in this moment because I love how when you spoke about Derrick Roy's passing, you said 16. You went right to your age.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah.
Speaker 2:Not to his age, which I think is a little unusual. Right? Most people say, oh, the person was they don't they don't give the age that they were when the person transitioned. So that tells me a lot about your emotional connection to him because you went to, you know, oh, I was 16. Deep.
Speaker 2:Yes. And so This
Speaker 1:is this is too much for me. I have to go. Bye. No.
Speaker 2:I mean, I just noted
Speaker 1:I just noted it. No. It's beautiful because it's true, though.
Speaker 2:I just Right?
Speaker 1:Like, as I as I shared, he died a couple days after my birthday, and so we dance together. I talk to him often. It's a it's a powerful connection that I experience that it really helps me ground in love. But you caught it. Yeah.
Speaker 1:You caught it.
Speaker 2:Well, also because that is you know, you still you are still that 16 year old girl. Just this very this work that you're carrying all this this this soul and the spirit and the energy and love and the joy and the color from your father. Mhmm. This is how you're carrying it forward. That is did you know at 16 what you wanted to do, or did it come later?
Speaker 2:Like, you went to college and then you figured it out later.
Speaker 1:Oh, I knew. I knew. Because you you because you picked up on the other thing, me being a middle child.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And so I grew up in the country where my brother would be randomly on the roof with a firecracker, and I could get hit at any time. You know? Mhmm. And so I grew up in a way where I had to I chose to bring harmony and calm situations down often. So that was a part of when I knew I want to be a therapist because I recognized that I was able to be I was the one that would bring reason, calm things down, help my brother and sister come together.
Speaker 1:If my parents were fighting, help them come together. Classroom, playground, everyone would come talk to me.
Speaker 2:What did that look like when you were helping your parents come together when they were fighting? And how old were you when this was happening?
Speaker 1:It looked like jokes and laughter and Okay. Playing around, stinking, and being told
Speaker 2:to them that you mood.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Okay. Okay. But there was a question I asked a little while ago. We kind of went another direction, but I think I was asking you how you bring well, you said you bring in your heart and you bring in your so when you're with clients, do you, like, do anything to, like do you personally do anything to prepare yourself for a session or to attune with them or to come to your center before this other person sits in front of you with all of their stuff?
Speaker 1:Before every single session. And before I start the day of sessions, I've got, like, a three hour intro into my day just to make sure that I come with my presence Mhmm. To hold space because I give so much of myself. Mhmm. I give myself me in the mornings so that I can slowly slowly ensure that I'm here.
Speaker 1:And I'm here, and I'm attuned to me so that when I'm sitting with you, I can feel where you are, where I am, and I can be present to that dance.
Speaker 2:Yes. I'm glad you used the word feel because I was going there because, you know, I don't know I you've seen me on such a trajectory, so I don't know what you know about me present day. I mean, woof. Ten years. I've I've I've been probably four people in ten years, and I'm about to be a fifth.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love it.
Speaker 2:So you you have seen a lot. So I don't know if you know about my work and how I think everyone is Claire something. And because you are, you know, so so so sensitive to feeling, have you ever thought about or explored the fact that you may be clair clairsensitive in some way? You know? I'm sure.
Speaker 2:Just from what I have experienced with you, I'm sure you experience clairaudient, which is clear hearing. And and it's not hearing like you hear my voice. It's like you can hear from your body. You hear in that inner ear. Right?
Speaker 2:Although sometimes it can be your outer ear as well. And clairsentient, which is clear feeling, which is you, you know, you can feel the feelings of other people, and you can understand that and get information from that. Because we had some I mean, I just I've been in your physical presence many times, so I know. I just can't imagine that you're not. So have you ever thought about it or explored those ideas?
Speaker 1:Not until this moment. No. Really? Yeah. No.
Speaker 1:No. No. I never I've never thought about it, but when you said it and as you were speaking, I was feeling it.
Speaker 2:I'm sure. I'm sure. And you're so I mean, like I was speaking of earlier, the way you it feels to me just in having conversation with you when I'm, you know, in therapy, it feels like like your heart is literally guiding mine. Like, that's how it feels. You know?
Speaker 2:I can't imagine that you wouldn't to be able to connect with someone at that level and for me to be able to feel that, and, also, I'm hypersensitive. Right? So I'm I'm gonna feel it more than somebody else would. But to me, that just tells me that you are. And I don't think I ever thought about you being that either until this conversation.
Speaker 1:Really?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And I will I'll share this with you. I did after our first session, I think that you would ask for a hug, and I didn't have any other clients do that. And I was like,
Speaker 2:Did it make you uncomfortable?
Speaker 1:No. It made I was what it did was it highlighted for me how precious the way in which you hold your heart is. Like, there's just so much openness and love there. You're like, I want a hug. And I was like, I'll hug her.
Speaker 1:When I have certain clients who really come with their heart, everyone doesn't come that way. Mhmm. You know? Mhmm. And so then it it really excites me because then it feels like, oh, we can dance.
Speaker 1:Yes. You know?
Speaker 2:Yes. And that's probably why, you know, you ended up telling me after I I think I came consistently for about two years, maybe a little long. I don't even remember. I think it was about two years and why, you know, you were telling me how I how much progress I had been making
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Because I'm in that space, because I had to and be but because you guided me, you helped me be in that space too.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Because I wasn't in that space about some of the issues that were coming up at all. You know?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Well, what we really did, we pointed you towards you, kinda like what you just did with me a little bit. Right? Like and that that's the beauty of it's called, like, heart entrainment, where we are dancing with our hearts together. And this is a different dance because we've done it before, but it's been me having my heart a little bit more protected because I'm the therapist and I'm holding space for you.
Speaker 1:But right now, I'm coming with a little bit more openness with my heart. And so even in that openness, you see you were able to dance with me in a way, and I was like, oh.
Speaker 2:Yes. You
Speaker 1:saw me. You know?
Speaker 2:I know, but I didn't keep going. Did you notice how I
Speaker 1:kind No. I I appreciate that. Thanks.
Speaker 2:I took a step back, but we did dance for a little while. Yeah. And see the fact that you even recognize that. Some people wouldn't even have recognized that. Right?
Speaker 1:And you
Speaker 2:even felt that. So, yeah, I would definitely I mean, I don't know how this would show up in your work, but because you're just such a beautiful sensitive soul, and I didn't even know all this other stuff about your background and how your childhood, this is just me with you professionally and Mhmm. This and seeing who you are. It makes so much sense. So would you would I guess for for therapy, the key is really to come with an open heart, Haddin.
Speaker 2:That for for the client for the client to show us with an open heart.
Speaker 1:That's the key. Like, we highlight that. That's the key.
Speaker 2:And can you describe more about what that looks like? Because, you know, you gave a little bit of a description with me, but I'm also generally open hearted. So for someone who maybe is not open hearted, what does that look like to show up in therapy with an open heart?
Speaker 1:It's challenging. Right? Like, it's it's it's challenging for a person. That's what I meant by you. You came in with it, I was like, okay, we can go.
Speaker 1:You know? And so we just start and we just go. There are other people. You know? Like, no, no, There are just other people who don't they don't even know what going means.
Speaker 1:When I started therapy, I always say I started off as a street therapist because I used to go door to door almost for home based therapy for kids who were locked up and Rikers and all this stuff. They didn't want therapy. Right. Like, I would have to chase them around the bodegas, wait for them, knock for the they would lock me out the doors. It was I had to force my heart upon them because they had so much hurt.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. But how do you force heart? Right? Like and it was just I waited. So sometimes it's a person if you are knocking on my door and saying, hey.
Speaker 1:I want therapy, that's where we start. Wow.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Welcome.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:You know? Just that.
Speaker 2:And when you say you waited, you mean you just wait for the person to be ready to be in their heart?
Speaker 1:Mhmm. And and I dance slowly. I dance slower. With you, I danced quicker. Right?
Speaker 1:Like Okay. My feet were moving. Okay. But with them, I'll take a step forward in the heart, say something. If they throw it back, it's like, okay.
Speaker 1:Not ready yet. That's okay. I'm right here.
Speaker 2:Okay. You know? Yes. I love is that something that you were taught? Like, is that what all therapists are taught to do or how they're taught to practice, or is that just your own thing?
Speaker 1:I think that that is the intention of the teaching. Okay. But we have to take it away. We take we you know, the individual takes it away differently. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And because I'm inclined to poetry and music
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I do it. I see it like that, and I recognize it as a dance.
Speaker 2:Yes. Yes. I remember one of the appointments we had. I hadn't seen you in a little while, and you you told me how different I appeared. You know, like, just my walk and the way I carried myself, way I walked in a room seems so different to you.
Speaker 2:And I'm wondering if when you're with, you know, myself and other clients, do you do you when that conversation first starts, you know, they're they're they just sit down on the sofa, do you start to, like, tune into them at all? Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Right? Like, once you sit on the sofa or even once you pop up on the screen, there are people that I started with in the pandemic that I had never met. And when we meet in person, I forget that we never met in person. Wow. Like, I really have a hard time thinking, and I just and I know that we haven't, but the way in which I've been feeling you
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:For you know, I've been feeling you, and we're feeling each other energy. I'm you know, the whole piece of energy, we're transmitting. Yeah. And so when I when I see you in person, we just keep transmitting. Little different, but you know?
Speaker 1:This is this
Speaker 2:is this is again why you have to be experiencing clairsentient. And I wonder if this is true of other therapists too. You know? Because I would imagine that because the work is so personal and it's so much in the heart space and so energetic because people are experiencing a range of emotions, you know, While they're with you, emotions that they may not experience ever, so they're probably, like, really heightened intense emotion.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Because of all of that, I can't imagine that the therapist is not getting guidance from their intuition about how to like, what's the next thing to say to talk about how to move forward with that person in the moment when all these things are coming up for someone.
Speaker 1:I agree. I can't imagine. I think that that would be hard to have a therapist that didn't. Like Yes. You know?
Speaker 2:Yes. I never thought about therapy as being intuitive until right now. This is all just going to me right now.
Speaker 1:Really?
Speaker 2:Yes. So and and it's because I've had you. Like, I could be sitting here with another therapist, and it could be a very different conversation.
Speaker 1:I gotcha.
Speaker 2:You. And I'm I'm you know, love to believe everyone's clear something, and you're, like, clear sentient and clearaudient. Wow. I never thought about that. So so I think that's helpful for anyone to receive therapy to kind of look out for that kind of a therapist.
Speaker 2:To look out for that kind of therapist. You know?
Speaker 1:Yeah. You wanna feel safe. Right? Like Yes. In a lot of the therapy books that talk they talk about the parent child relationship, the way in which you when you go into a therapist, client, therapist patient, depending on the language they use, when you go into that relationship, it's mimicking the parent child relationship, the level of vulnerability.
Speaker 1:Right? You're coming in saying, I need some support. I need some help. Mhmm. And that's what you used to do when you were a child.
Speaker 1:And so the way in which you learned how to ask for support, receive, be open to support and help, it more than likely was templated from your childhood. Yes. And you know?
Speaker 2:And when you say the parent child relationship, it's a healthy parent child relationship because some people don't have a healthy parent child relationship and they couldn't ask their parents. I guess if that person becomes a client, I mean that's how do you navigate that relationship when their parent child relationship wasn't healthy and you're mirroring that for the person.
Speaker 1:Well, we're supposed to mean, from my belief, and all of this is from my belief as a clinician, it's my responsibility to model unconditional compassion and love and support. There's research that says that people, humans, babies, seen, soothed, and heard. That's what people want to be and feel. People want to feel seen, people want to feel heard, and people want to be soothed. And so that's what I feel the therapeutic relationship is so that we can let whatever you've been hiding, holding on to, what's been weighing you down, you can release that and let your essence soar.
Speaker 2:Yes. And and I can say that's exact that was my experience because after a session, I would be high. Similar
Speaker 1:to the
Speaker 2:high that I would get after doing a yoga class, but different. Similar but different. Yeah. The and, again, and my eyes my eyes would be sharp, and I would feel high. Like, it was I was I was accessing a different, like, energy and frequency and dimension.
Speaker 2:You know? So much of me shifted during those sessions. And it's also coming up for me that it it might be helpful for the client to prep themselves before therapy. You know? Like, for people who have a hard time getting into their heart space Mhmm.
Speaker 1:To kind of before you go,
Speaker 2:an hour, thirty minutes, make some time. Don't just, like, rush in after work when you
Speaker 1:haven't Right. Right. To prep.
Speaker 2:Yes. Actually, try to prep yourself to get in your heart space when you go to your therapy session because then you will get so much more out of it.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Mhmm. Yeah. That's I mean, that's with anything. Right?
Speaker 1:Like Yeah. If you're gonna have a dinner party, like, you don't, at the last minute, start to prepare the food and they're gonna be there in ten minutes. It's you this and that's the modeling of taking care of yourself is you have intention pre and post. Mhmm. Because I also say at the end of the session, don't have to jump into a meeting immediately.
Speaker 1:Always. We understand in this life that there are gonna be times where you have to jump into something, but that means you just jumped out of you and into that but didn't ground yourself.
Speaker 2:Yes. And
Speaker 1:so we wanna make sure that you allow yourself to return to yourself pre and post the session.
Speaker 2:And for for clients who have, like, this high vibe experience with you and then they have to go home to maybe environment that is, you know, doesn't where they're not seen and soothed and heard. How do they maintain? What are suggestions you have for how people can maintain that? I guess that's the work. Right?
Speaker 2:That's the work they have to do in their therapy.
Speaker 1:It's the muscle to build. Right? It's the neural pathway to create. And I I look at it as it's the neural pathway to create, but really you're just reengaging something that you stopped engaging in so, so very long ago. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's that I matter. I matter. I'm seen. I'm heard. I I feel like I matter.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And so the homework it is. It really is. I I give homework. You know, I give homework. Yes.
Speaker 1:Book reading or, you know, you have a mantra, an affirmation. If that's not your style, we figure out some kind of unique way. We've got people slowing down and washing their face as a way to practice mindfulness. If you wash your face fast, slow down and allow yourself to give yourself the nourishment of cleansing your face.
Speaker 2:And to recognize that as a nourishing act as a form self care, as a as a way of you sending loving positive messages to yourself even
Speaker 1:if it's
Speaker 2:just in that one simple act.
Speaker 1:Right. Well, because it makes a difference.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:It it makes a difference. The big piece is self talk. Right? Like
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Being mindful of how you're talking to yourself. And so that's, you know, the homework is when you said how do people keep that, you have the tools. The tools can be self talk. Talk to yourself how you want people to talk to you. If you are not talking to yourself in a way that you'd be okay with other people, you wouldn't be okay with other people talking to you that way, then don't speak to yourself that way.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And it sounds so easy.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. And so like, oh, duh. Of course. You know what? But we but who does that?
Speaker 2:Right. You know?
Speaker 1:It's challenging.
Speaker 2:It's challenging. It has to be very intentional and conscious and practiced.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:You know?
Speaker 1:That's the practice. Yeah. Practice is hard. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:So back to being in, like, your heart space or and, like, the work that you do and how important it is for the client to be in their heart space when they're showing up. I've always kinda felt like you know, I know people like I I think I said this few minutes ago or a while ago that I know people who will see the same therapist for ten plus years, and I think that's unhealthy. But I'm coming up on my tenth with you, and I'm definitely not going anywhere. So maybe so maybe that is not as unhealthy as I thought, but it's also because of who you are. And I don't know if other you know, I wouldn't have the same experience with a different human being.
Speaker 2:Like, I just know that. You know? So was I going with that? So I think I wanted to ask you about how you personally like, what is going on for you in a session when you're with a client? So when you are witnessing somewhat me, or you can use me.
Speaker 2:When you're witnessing me and I'm, like, snotty nose and in tears
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:What's going on for you and your body when all of that is happening?
Speaker 1:Well, so first, I'll say, I I hear you on the ten years with the therapist thing. Yeah. But I I think that it it really depends on where you are in those ten years. You see how you said that you've been four and heading to five, the different versions of yourself?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Because there are sometimes where because I've got clients that I've been working with for ten years, but it's the the evolution. As long as you are growing and evolving and the conversations are changing, if you keep talking about that same person that you don't know if you want to be in, be out and be in or be out, like, for ten years, then that's different. Yes. Right? And so as long as the conversation is evolving, as long as you feel like you are experiencing growth, then keep rocking with it.
Speaker 1:You know?
Speaker 2:Okay. Thank you for that clarity because I was just having this conversation the other day with a friend of mine who's married, and he and his he and his wife have been going to the same person for so long. And I'm like I told him. I said, I don't think I don't I think you guys need to find somebody new. You know?
Speaker 2:Like, try to help.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And he had a very different, you know, opinion. He thought, oh, no. I think it's great that we've been going to the same person all this time. And I was like, oh, no. I think it's awful.
Speaker 2:You know? But so you just cleared that up for me. It's about how the conversation evolves and how you evolve as a person as a result of the conversation. That is very, very good to
Speaker 1:know. Mhmm. And so when you say, how do I sit? What's happening within me? Yeah.
Speaker 1:When I'm Witnessing all of this. I it really depends on what I'm witnessing, but I really stay present. Sometimes, depending on if the person's really having a hard time, I just keep in my head reciting love, love Aw. To keep me present. And because I believe in my electromagnetic field around, like, what my heart can send and if we're sitting across from one another, and you're hurting and you're in pain, I want you to be as surrounded by love energy as you can.
Speaker 1:And so, you know, I'm I'm usually trying to be in compassion, love, even if a person I had a client the other day yell at me while in session. I said, let it out. Get it out. And they're apologizing. Don't apologize.
Speaker 1:Not right now. You're like, hey. Directly? Yeah. Because it hurts sometimes.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:When people are having a hard time. And I'm asking you a question because I you know, since when we first started and I still do now, but, like, I challenge a little bit. Mhmm. But I'm challenging you to encourage you to grow so that you know that whatever hurt you're in is not fixed. You can get out of it.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And so you're hurting, and I challenge you because we've been talking about this hurt, and you're like Yeah. Defenses come up. But it's okay because this is a safe space. You throw your defenses.
Speaker 1:I hold it compassionately
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And work through it. You know?
Speaker 2:And they probably can't get that out anywhere else in their life.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:You know?
Speaker 1:So it's
Speaker 2:beautiful that you hold that space. Wow. I never even thought about that happening. I've had a lot of therapists experience people yelling at them. Wow.
Speaker 1:Right. Right.
Speaker 2:Is that an indication to you that, like, you're doing the right thing? You're on the you're on the you are triggering. Is that it? Is it I don't know. That has such a negative connotation, but this is positive.
Speaker 2:You're positively triggering this person even though they're having what could be deemed as a negative experience, but it's actually a positive experience.
Speaker 1:I mean, it depends on what they're yelling about. Right? Like, if it's if it's about me being chronically late, then that's a different conversation. Right? If it's a if they are in a space where I'm pushing them and because I I intentionally push.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Right? And so if I'm pushing you and I recognize that we need to get this reaction out of you so that we can work through this because you're holding on to this and it keeps us at this stopping point. And what you're seeking is beyond the stopping point, so let me push you in this safe space. Mhmm. And I hold the space of grace for you.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Where you let it out. By the end of the session, the clients apologize and you let it out because your emotions are valid. Right? Your emotions are not you.
Speaker 1:They are what you experience, and I understand that. You know?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Woah. So you just let it just let the person have at it. That's beautiful. And that even is intuitive, like, knowing when to do that and when not to do that.
Speaker 2:I cannot believe how intuitive therapy is. I'm from a family of social workers, and I never thought of them as intuitive people. You know? And so now you're just giving me a whole another level of awareness in the work that just people who give therapy to. They're both clinical social workers, my dad my dad and my sister who Mhmm.
Speaker 2:She's retired now, but she was as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's, you know, it's it's your if you're choosing to help people and in there, you know, we're all human, and that's the piece is that Yeah. We help people as much as we can help ourselves. Then sometimes, where we can't help ourselves, we struggle to help people, which is why I talk about I'm ever evolving and always trying and changing and doing things. Because people are.
Speaker 1:Humans do that. And so if I stayed the same, you would have not been sitting with me for ten years. Right? And so I continue to grow and pursue and learn. And that's the other piece of it is me experiencing that for myself.
Speaker 1:I understand that that is possible for you.
Speaker 2:Ah, and you bring that into your work, then it just, like, expands. Mhmm. It's like a Right. Little equation.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Well, I guess, in closing, is there anything that you wanna share around, you know, that your experience with me? And I I shared earlier, I'm an open book, and how I you know, anything that you witnessed in your experience with me that you think could be helpful for people. I mean, you mentioned the open heart, but I don't know how else could be maximize their therapy, you know, their therapy sessions that they're really getting full benefit. Because all the things that have changed in my life since coming to you ten years ago, I I don't think I would have had all this change without you.
Speaker 1:And you're giving me permission.
Speaker 2:I am.
Speaker 1:Yeah. 100%. I think that allowing yourself to feel your feelings and sit with your feelings, not just acknowledge them, but sit with them. Hold your hand when you hurt. Allowing yourself to do that catapulted your clarity.
Speaker 1:That that happens, and that happens with all human beings when we learn how to sit with ourselves in the hurt and not try to run away or just, okay. Yeah. No. I know but and and and it's like, come here. Stay right here.
Speaker 1:It hurts. Hold yourself while it hurts and be with yourself for a little bit. You doing that is when I saw that, okay. She we can do check ins now.