The Work of Being Human

A candid take on why the holidays can hurt and how old family roles often make gatherings harder. Short sketches of common roles like mascot, scapegoat, hero and lost child and why they persist. Warnings about burnout, perfectionism, and using relationships to avoid loneliness. Practical nudges about boundaries, self-connection, and choosing safer traditions this season.

A recent conversation with a client got me thinking... the therapeutic frame is a term therapists use to describe the elements of therapy that make the relationship and the setting safe and predictable for our clients. Things like length of session, cost, and a non-judgmental stance are elements that our clients count on. This provides the framework for us to do our work. It's got to be predictable. It got me thinking about relationships in general: is there a frame? What elements have to be in place for us to be able to trust that our relationships can hold whatever comes at them? What about our relationships needs to be predictable, reliable? If there is a frame, what exactly do we have to do to uphold it? This week, we dive into the frame that makes our relationships predictable spaces we can count on.

Nancy wrote me about a month ago requesting an episode on how to do the hard, hard work of breaking the habit of people pleasing. Nancy, this week is for you! People pleasing is a behavioral coping mechanism rooted in our response to fear. We fear rejection, anger, and abandonment, so we train our brains to anticipate and prioritize what others want and give it to them. We do this regardless of what WE need or want, and the effect on our mental health is catastrophic. We become distanced from ourselves, we lose our self-respect, and we don't really believe - deep down inside us - that we're loved unless we're being what others want us to be. This week, we tackle the complexities of people pleasing and outline a real path toward an authentic, guilt-free life. Give the gift of the Toolbox for the holidays! https://www.amazon.com/Toolbox-Tools-Build-Relationships-Repair/dp/1736381318/ref=sr_1_1?crid=J9AFQGX3PW70&keywords=vanessa+londino&qid=1668383229&sprefix=vanessa+londino%2Caps%2C244&sr=8-1

In direct and indirect ways, the debate surrounding transgenderism affects all of us. We have family members, friends, coworkers, and acquaintances who identify as transgender. We hear terms like "dysphoria" and "cis-gendered" tossed around online and sometimes around the dinner table. We see celebrities, politicians, and thought leaders polarize themselves on both sides of this issue, and we feel forced to take a side. We're going about this the wrong way... the path forward is not through angry answers but by honest questions. Classic psychotherapy seeks to understand, and instead of uniting around understanding, we're dividing along ideological lines. This week, I address classic and modern takes on the presentation of gender dysphoria in the therapeutic setting and what it looks like to engage this human experience with curiosity, compassion, and care. Differences between male and female brains: https://www.nm.org/healthbeat/healthy-tips/battle-of-the-brain-men-vs-women-infographic Trans brain study: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-there-something-unique-about-the-transgender-brain/ Helena's story of becoming trans and detransitioning: https://lacroicsz.substack.com/p/by-any-other-name Isaac confronts his therapist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pdh62WuXywI

When Marvin Gaye released "Sexual Healing," he crooned and moaned his message into our heads that we could be healed through sex. This week, our guest Dolly Josette leads us into a discussion on how this truly happens. So many of us live without an integrated sexual self. We've banished sexual knowledge of ourselves and sexual pleasure to the outer realms of our consciousness because we've been wounded, traumatized, or simply because we've never been taught. Our sexuality goes underground, out of sight, and we carry on day to day without this vital part of us in our conscious, daily lives. Dolly is here to change all of that! Through steady, gentle, informed work, Dolly is bringing REAL sexual healing to many. So get ready! In this episode, we delve into conversations around anatomy, touch, stimulation, pleasure, seduction, and wholeness. THIS is how sex can heal.  Website: https://www.pleasuremuse.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pleasuremuse/

This week, we continue our exploration of dysfunctional family roles by unpacking the remaining roles: the Scapegoat, the Counselor/Caretaker, the Mascot, and the Lost Child. Our roles develop in an attempt to survive: this is the role we must play if the family unit is going to stay intact. As I've mentioned before, the big problem with roles is that you're rarely allowed to be anything else. Learning our role, admitting what we felt as children, and offering ourselves a conscious choice now - as to how we will behave - is healing. If you want to go directly to each type, here are the time stamps for each. 9:30 - The Scapegoat 32:47 - The Counselor 50:01 - The Mascot 01:03:14 - The Lost Child

A listener of the podcast requested an episode on dysfunctional family roles. It was too much information for one episode, so I've broken it up into two. This week, we take a look at why and how we develop our dysfunctional roles and we dive into the role of "The Hero." Next week we'll round things out by exploring "The Scapegoat," "The Mascot," "The Lost Child," and "The Counselor." We'll also look at what growth looks like for each role. In the presence of chronic dysfunction, our roles emerge to protect us and and to protect the family system. NOTE: In the podcast, I mention that there are 77 waterfalls in TN. Correction: there are 874 waterfalls in TN!

In the wake of my recent nuptials, I embarked on a bit of an emotional roller coaster of joy and sadness that the big day was over! In this episode, I walk you through the experience of complex emotions and the decision I had to make: to sit in it. This week, we tackle one of the hardest skills in the mental health toolbox: the ability and discipline to sit in our emotions and allow them to pass, to really feel them and not medicate, undervalue, or minimize them. This ability - to actually and really feel our feelings - opens us up to emotional maturation in a way that nothing else can. We want to step away from the tough ones AND the good ones and go back to numb neutrality, but we should never, ever do that. This week, we're going to learn how to sit in it.

So many of the struggles we run into in our relationships happen because we don't really know where the relationship stands. We think a relationship is closer, safer, or even more distant than it actually is. We trust when maybe we shouldn't, and we totally miss the golden opportunities for connection that are staring straight at us. This week we dive into how we can organize our relationships in our minds and hearts in such a way that the time and energy we invest will be going to good use.

This week we explore the devastating loss EVERYONE endures and how to regain what we've lost. Hardship in life changes us. We dive into the changes that occur, the loss of childhood innocence, and how we can be mentally healthy people who know how to recapture the essence of who we are and how to live. This week, our focus is on the treasure of simplicity.