Latest / The Trauma Therapist / Living Life Fearlessly with Michelle Smith, LPC

Transcript

Living Life Fearlessly with Michelle Smith, LPC · The Trauma Therapist

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Trauma Therapists podcast. My name is gaming Person.
0:04
Speaker 1: I interview incredible people who've dedicated their lives to helping
0:07
Speaker 1: those who've been impacted by trauma. A big thank you
0:11
Speaker 1: to our sponsors and our guests who are supporting this show.
0:15
Speaker 1: So five four, three, two and one, our folks, welcome
0:19
Speaker 1: back to the podcast. Very excited to have my guest today,
0:22
Speaker 1: Michelle Smith. Michelle, welcome.
0:24
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me guy, It's a
0:26
Speaker 2: pleasure to be here.
0:27
Speaker 1: Awesome. So, Michelle has over ten years of experience supporting
0:31
Speaker 1: individuals through trauma, grief, life transitions, anxiety, among other issues.
0:37
Speaker 1: Trained in EMDR, DBTIFS, Gottman couple therapy, and more. She
0:42
Speaker 1: offers a holistic, client setted approach that integrates mind body
0:46
Speaker 1: practices with evidence based care. She provides a compassionate, non
0:50
Speaker 1: judgmental space for clients of all backgrounds to heal, grow
0:54
Speaker 1: and reach their goals. All right, Michelle, a little bit
0:58
Speaker 1: about you, but before we doing, share with the listeners
1:01
Speaker 1: where you're from originally and where you are currently. Yeah.
1:04
Speaker 3: So originally I'm from Edmon, Oklahoma. I was born outside
1:09
Speaker 3: of Washington, d C. Alexandria but spent most of my
1:12
Speaker 3: time growing up in this area. Went to Florida to
1:15
Speaker 3: get my master's for a while, came back, had a family,
1:19
Speaker 3: so I'm back here. Kind of went around the block
1:22
Speaker 3: a little bit, but I am currently located in Stillwater, Oklahoma.
1:26
Speaker 1: Okay, so let's dive in here. How the heck does
1:29
Speaker 1: this path passion start for you? Yeah?
1:34
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh, it started, I would say my first
1:36
Speaker 3: psychology class, to be honest with you, guy, I started
1:39
Speaker 3: learning about the brain, and I feel like I was
1:41
Speaker 3: always curious about why do people do the things they do?
1:44
Speaker 3: Why did they respond the way they respond? And my
1:46
Speaker 3: first psychology class, I remember taking it in high school
1:49
Speaker 3: and I felt like a whole world was unlocked where
1:52
Speaker 3: I had to know more. I had to figure out
1:54
Speaker 3: how can I get into this, how can I support
1:56
Speaker 3: people who are also curious about this? So really started
2:00
Speaker 3: very early for me and continue to grow from there.
2:03
Speaker 1: Yeah all right, so you do that in high school.
2:06
Speaker 1: You obviously go to college and what do you are
2:09
Speaker 1: you thinking? Okay, this is it. I'm going to become
2:13
Speaker 1: a therapist or what I think.
2:15
Speaker 2: I always wanted to be a therapist.
2:17
Speaker 3: I don't think I ever wavered from that, but I
2:19
Speaker 3: would say, you know, my experience as I went to
2:21
Speaker 3: Master's school was very impactful for me personally.
2:24
Speaker 2: My father was under cancer.
2:27
Speaker 3: He was very sick during this time and actually was
2:30
Speaker 3: one of the reasons why I moved to Florida to
2:32
Speaker 3: be close to him. During my Master's program, he had
2:36
Speaker 3: passed away. I had just gotten married. I was understanding
2:39
Speaker 3: grief and life challenges in trauma in real time in
2:43
Speaker 3: my personal life while I'm trying to understand how to
2:46
Speaker 3: learn how to support others going through that and observing
2:49
Speaker 3: that and understanding that from a personal lens, I think
2:52
Speaker 3: was incredibly impactful for me and doubled down my need
2:56
Speaker 3: to understand connection, understand why we need others to heal
3:00
Speaker 3: and so for me that was incredibly impactful and created
3:04
Speaker 3: a lot of meaning around why I do what I
3:06
Speaker 3: do and how I can sit across clients in those spaces.
3:09
Speaker 2: Of course, as a human.
3:12
Speaker 1: It's obviously, as we all know, one thing to learn
3:16
Speaker 1: something in the pages of a book, and another thing
3:20
Speaker 1: you know entirely to go through it. What was that
3:25
Speaker 1: experience like for you, I mean, what was that process
3:28
Speaker 1: like for you? I mean having to deal with your
3:30
Speaker 1: father and then studying that. And then there's also the
3:37
Speaker 1: process of working with others, you know, how we absorb
3:40
Speaker 1: that talk to us about that.
3:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I think I learned very quickly the
3:46
Speaker 3: depths of suffering and pain that people can be in
3:49
Speaker 3: and to really build a quick empathy to that. Like
3:53
Speaker 3: you said, it can be one thing learning this in
3:55
Speaker 3: a book, but when you experience this, you really understand. Wow,
3:58
Speaker 3: how vulnerable that is for somebody to even want to
4:01
Speaker 3: come sit across for me and share their story and
4:03
Speaker 3: be within that emotion. That is incredibly brave, incredibly courageous.
4:08
Speaker 3: And it taught me how privileged this job is to
4:11
Speaker 3: do what I do. It also challenged me to build
4:14
Speaker 3: healthy boundaries and self care and ways to be able
4:18
Speaker 3: to do this work. Very quickly, I remember realizing that
4:22
Speaker 3: this is important not only to take care of myself,
4:25
Speaker 3: but to be the best version of myself that I
4:27
Speaker 3: can be as I sit across clients. And so what
4:29
Speaker 3: does that mean for my life outside? How do I
4:31
Speaker 3: spend time with my grief, How do I spend time
4:33
Speaker 3: with my work, my education, myself? What do I need
4:37
Speaker 3: to be able to process those emotions? And during that
4:40
Speaker 3: time I became very close to yoga and meditation. I
4:43
Speaker 3: started exploring different pathways of spirituality and things that were
4:47
Speaker 3: important for me. The meaning created in that loss, what
4:51
Speaker 3: does that mean? How do I carry on my father's
4:53
Speaker 3: legacy through the work that I do? That was very
4:56
Speaker 3: important for me. So it challenged me to really figure
4:59
Speaker 3: that out quickly, quick quicker than maybe I would have
5:01
Speaker 3: wanted to, to be honest, guy, But I'm grateful for
5:04
Speaker 3: it as I look back on this experience and how
5:06
Speaker 3: it got me here, right.
5:09
Speaker 1: You know for me, And I'm interested to hear your
5:12
Speaker 1: thought on this. I mean, going through an experience like
5:14
Speaker 1: that with your father, A lot of people handle it differently.
5:20
Speaker 1: You know. There are those of us who feel kind
5:27
Speaker 1: of I don't want to say comfortable, but we can
5:30
Speaker 1: quote unquote we can be in that moment, we can
5:33
Speaker 1: be in that fire in a sense, and for others
5:36
Speaker 1: it's like, Nope, I don't want to deal with that.
5:40
Speaker 1: I don't want to get in that fire. Yeah, and
5:42
Speaker 1: deal with it that way. Where did you find yourself
5:47
Speaker 1: in that along that continuum?
5:50
Speaker 3: I think it was very circumstantial. So there were times
5:54
Speaker 3: where I felt like I had the capacity to be
5:56
Speaker 3: with that emotion and I was able to utilize my resources.
5:59
Speaker 3: And then there was time where I remember feeling incredibly
6:01
Speaker 3: flooded and running out of class and crying and being wondering,
6:06
Speaker 3: will I ever be able to be strong enough to
6:08
Speaker 3: support people through this if I myself am not strong
6:11
Speaker 3: enough to manage the eubs and the flows of my
6:13
Speaker 3: own life. And so it was very it was very
6:16
Speaker 3: moment by moment at first, and I really had to
6:19
Speaker 3: hone in on my own therapy, my own resources, you know,
6:22
Speaker 3: understanding how I can make it through this and utilize
6:25
Speaker 3: this as an opportunity to create meaning in the work
6:28
Speaker 3: that I do.
6:29
Speaker 2: So to answer your question, it was up and down.
6:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, of course, So well let's talk about that. I mean,
6:36
Speaker 1: when you say use this opportunity to create meaning, what
6:41
Speaker 1: are you saying there talking about that?
6:44
Speaker 2: So I remember, you know, being in graduate school.
6:46
Speaker 3: One of the first things that we learned as we
6:48
Speaker 3: read man Search for Meaning, and that's a book by
6:50
Speaker 3: Victor Frankel, who was this incredible psychologist who was spent
6:54
Speaker 3: time in Auschwitz, and he talked about how we always
6:56
Speaker 3: have a choice to perceive, to perceive and to recognize
7:00
Speaker 3: how you want to look at things and how you
7:02
Speaker 3: want to think and how you want to behave And
7:05
Speaker 3: so that was pivotal for me to think about my
7:08
Speaker 3: grief journey in that way. And my father was somebody
7:10
Speaker 3: who really taught me to love and understand people's stories.
7:15
Speaker 3: He was somebody in the aviation world, but became a
7:17
Speaker 3: big leader and would give time of day to anybody,
7:21
Speaker 3: anybody who crossed the street. He wanted to know their story,
7:24
Speaker 3: he wanted to learn more about them, and that was
7:26
Speaker 3: such a beautiful thing that I always admired about him.
7:29
Speaker 3: And that's what honestly made me interested in understanding the
7:32
Speaker 3: brain to be honest guy. And so I wanted to know,
7:35
Speaker 3: how can I carry that legacy with me? How can
7:38
Speaker 3: I transform this grief into meaning? Because we know that
7:42
Speaker 3: that is a part of the healing process with grief.
7:45
Speaker 3: We know that eventually we want to carry on the
7:46
Speaker 3: best parts of the people that we've lost, And so
7:49
Speaker 3: that was a question for me.
7:50
Speaker 2: I don't know if I knew it at the moment.
7:53
Speaker 3: I think I was curious about it, and eventually it
7:55
Speaker 3: continued to grow. But for me, that kind of was
7:58
Speaker 3: an anchor, that was an ink through it is that
8:00
Speaker 3: eventually I will be able to carry this legacy on,
8:03
Speaker 3: and I want to do that every moment I sit
8:05
Speaker 3: down with clients, every moment I do something that's intentional
8:08
Speaker 3: with my job.
8:09
Speaker 2: Right, you want to.
8:13
Speaker 1: Understand the meaning of the situation or what I.
8:16
Speaker 2: Want to carry on.
8:17
Speaker 3: I think I wanted to carry on an empathy, a
8:20
Speaker 3: connection of value to people's stories.
8:22
Speaker 2: That for me was the meaning is that every story has.
8:27
Speaker 3: Value, even when we feel like we have shame attached
8:30
Speaker 3: to it, or we feel like there's negative emotions or
8:34
Speaker 3: difficult things to process, that we can learn from those stories.
8:37
Speaker 3: So I wanted my clients to feel that hopefulness that
8:41
Speaker 3: maybe something positive or maybe something meaningful can come from
8:44
Speaker 3: the story. Maybe you're experienced felt super icky, but you
8:48
Speaker 3: can look back and say it created this meaning for me.
8:50
Speaker 3: And so I think that's what I meant. If that makes.
8:52
Speaker 1: Sense, Okay, move mind everyone, I'm speaking with Michelle Smith.
8:58
Speaker 1: So what does that look like when you're working with someone?
9:02
Speaker 1: How do you work with that? How do you interject
9:07
Speaker 1: that into the relationship.
9:09
Speaker 3: So it's really a sense of presence, building a sense
9:13
Speaker 3: of presence and doing the work outside of my sessions
9:15
Speaker 3: so that I can be fully present with my clients.
9:18
Speaker 3: I think a lot of the work that we do
9:20
Speaker 3: is sitting across from folks, but it's also every single
9:23
Speaker 3: moment outside of that, Right, How am I getting myself
9:26
Speaker 3: to the place where I can really listen and be
9:29
Speaker 3: curious and understand what does that mean to them?
9:32
Speaker 2: Right?
9:32
Speaker 3: Being able to approach things from a non judgmental standpoint
9:35
Speaker 3: and expand my education of different culturals, sensitivities, and backgrounds,
9:41
Speaker 3: and really recognize also the similarities that we all.
9:43
Speaker 2: Have as humans.
9:44
Speaker 3: More so, I mean, that's another reason why I got
9:47
Speaker 3: into this work, because I truly believe that humans we
9:49
Speaker 3: have so much in common.
9:51
Speaker 2: Of course we have differences, but we have these experiences.
9:54
Speaker 3: Of pain and meaning and loss and love and connection.
9:58
Speaker 3: And how can we hone in on that?
10:00
Speaker 1: Right?
10:00
Speaker 3: So that's something that I'm always considering as I'm sitting
10:02
Speaker 3: across from a client. How can I bridge this gap
10:05
Speaker 3: of humanity between us?
10:08
Speaker 1: When you first started out, you seem to have a
10:17
Speaker 1: very kind of inspired and inspiring palette of emotions and
10:24
Speaker 1: feelings from what you draw when you're working with your clients.
10:27
Speaker 1: Was was that always present or did that? Did that
10:31
Speaker 1: grow and evolve as you've been in this field.
10:36
Speaker 3: I think it may have been present, but I had
10:38
Speaker 3: to do the work to be willing to grow it
10:40
Speaker 3: and evolve it over time. Right, So I had to
10:43
Speaker 3: look at that and I had to be willing to
10:45
Speaker 3: work through maybe any shame or old belief systems or
10:49
Speaker 3: pillback layers that may have told me that that doesn't
10:52
Speaker 3: have value. Right, we have so much that society tells
10:54
Speaker 3: us vulnerability as weakness that how much is fair to share,
10:58
Speaker 3: especially as a therapist being vulnerable? What does that look like?
11:02
Speaker 3: While also aligning with my ethics and things like that?
11:05
Speaker 3: So I really had to challenge that. I had to
11:07
Speaker 3: think about who do I want to be, what type
11:09
Speaker 3: of practice do I want to show up? What would
11:12
Speaker 3: I want from that therapeutic dynamic and challenge that? And
11:16
Speaker 3: so I had to break down a lot of barriers
11:18
Speaker 3: to get there and be brave enough to do that
11:21
Speaker 3: type of work as well.
11:22
Speaker 2: Right, Well, you.
11:24
Speaker 1: Just opened up an amazing question here. So how do
11:28
Speaker 1: you answer that question? What do what kind of therapists
11:31
Speaker 1: do you want to be? YEA, Yeah, how do you
11:33
Speaker 1: want to show up? And to what do we are
11:35
Speaker 1: you sharing your vulnerability or being vulnerable within it within therapy.
11:43
Speaker 3: I think the most important thing is I want my
11:45
Speaker 3: clients to feel safety, you know, and as we know
11:48
Speaker 3: with trauma, we really struggle with feeling an internal sense
11:51
Speaker 3: of safety. Right, We don't even sometimes we don't even
11:53
Speaker 3: know what feels safe or what's the difference between safety
11:56
Speaker 3: and survival.
11:56
Speaker 2: And so part of that is modeling that.
11:59
Speaker 3: For my client and showing up with an essence and
12:02
Speaker 3: a presence of safety and being able to mirror that
12:05
Speaker 3: and being able to support them. And so part of
12:08
Speaker 3: that work is being understanding about what creates safety for
12:11
Speaker 3: me and how can I show up and create an
12:13
Speaker 3: environment of safety for my clients, creating a sense of belonging,
12:16
Speaker 3: a connection where maybe they haven't had a safe one
12:19
Speaker 3: in a really long time.
12:20
Speaker 1: Right, So how it get specific? How do how does
12:23
Speaker 1: one create a safe environment with it? What do you do? So?
12:27
Speaker 3: I think when it starts in the therapeutic process, I
12:30
Speaker 3: want to really hear, once again, hear someone's story. I
12:33
Speaker 3: want to understand where are you coming from? What lenses
12:36
Speaker 3: are you what lenses are you looking at the world
12:38
Speaker 3: through without its lens of judgment? Right, putting my own biases,
12:42
Speaker 3: putting my own experiences, aside and really challenging those with
12:46
Speaker 3: my own therapeutic work and making sure that I'm staying
12:49
Speaker 3: open and present.
12:49
Speaker 2: So I'm hearing your story. I'm understanding.
12:51
Speaker 3: We're creating treatment goals, right, we're collaborating on this. We're
12:55
Speaker 3: talking about, Okay, what if you could you feel the
12:58
Speaker 3: sense of healed, if you could feel connected? What would
13:00
Speaker 3: that be like? Right, let's talk about that. And then
13:03
Speaker 3: we're making treatment plans together, and we're making sure and
13:05
Speaker 3: I'm checking in right, and I'm saying, how are things going?
13:08
Speaker 2: Is this helpful? Is this not helpful? I'm checking my
13:11
Speaker 2: own self.
13:12
Speaker 3: You know, I'm opening a collaborative relationship with a client
13:15
Speaker 3: to say, hey, if something doesn't stick with you, or
13:18
Speaker 3: if it feels icky, you tell me that.
13:20
Speaker 1: Right.
13:20
Speaker 3: This is a relationship where I want to create safety
13:23
Speaker 3: where you may have never been able to do that
13:25
Speaker 3: in your family system, or you've never been able to
13:27
Speaker 3: challenge somebody and say, you know what, Michelle, this doesn't
13:30
Speaker 3: seem like it's working. So let's move, let's pivot. And
13:33
Speaker 3: I welcome that. I talk about that a lot, right,
13:35
Speaker 3: I'm calling that out. I'm noticing, Oh, you responded this way,
13:38
Speaker 3: Does that mean something right. So I'm really trying to
13:41
Speaker 3: build this constant awareness of my clients and every moment
13:45
Speaker 3: and every second in their sessions and beyond right, in communication, beyond,
13:49
Speaker 3: and I think that that builds trust, that builds a
13:51
Speaker 3: sense of safety, and hopefully over time that opens up
13:54
Speaker 3: a sense of vulnerability for their stories to be heard.
14:00
Speaker 1: When you first started doing this, when you first started
14:03
Speaker 1: working with individuals who maybe experienced trauma into personal trauma
14:10
Speaker 1: more specifically, what was it like for you?
14:16
Speaker 3: It's it's difficult because of course you can't take yourself
14:19
Speaker 3: out of your experience with the work that we do, right,
14:22
Speaker 3: We're always going to be a human, and this idea
14:24
Speaker 3: of like leaving yourself at the door, I think is
14:27
Speaker 3: a little unrealistic as a human as a therapist, and honestly,
14:31
Speaker 3: people want human humanity and.
14:33
Speaker 2: Their therapies, right.
14:34
Speaker 3: So I'm also recognizing that and thinking that you know,
14:38
Speaker 3: if you want to talk to your robot, you could,
14:41
Speaker 3: but you're not. You're here with me, right, So what
14:43
Speaker 3: level of honesty and integrity and vulnerability can I bring
14:48
Speaker 3: to you and understand and share what self disclosure is
14:51
Speaker 3: appropriate when is it not appropriate?
14:53
Speaker 1: Right?
14:53
Speaker 3: And so also finding avenues to share my story I
14:56
Speaker 3: think that are outside of my therapeutic work. Like this
14:59
Speaker 3: itself is very valuable because I can share these resources
15:02
Speaker 3: with my current clients, and I can let them in
15:04
Speaker 3: to different parts of my inner world so that they
15:06
Speaker 3: don't feel so alone. I think it could feel so
15:08
Speaker 3: one sided with a therapeutic relationship where they're spilling their
15:12
Speaker 3: guts and then I'm not even telling you anything about myself.
15:15
Speaker 3: So if you are curious about that, here's all this
15:17
Speaker 3: avenue to understand me as a human, because that also matters.
15:21
Speaker 3: You want to you want to believe me and understand
15:23
Speaker 3: me as a human as well as a therapist. Right,
15:26
Speaker 3: A lot of people do at least.
15:28
Speaker 1: Right, and that you know there, I guess it was
15:31
Speaker 1: a time and a place for that one sidedness, right
15:35
Speaker 1: with sechon analysis. I mean that certainly was present for
15:39
Speaker 1: a long time. People still practice that. But how did
15:46
Speaker 1: you learn the importance of being vulnerable within the therapeutic relationship?
15:52
Speaker 1: Were there moments or experiences you've had were like, oh
15:56
Speaker 1: my god, you know, yeah, I can share this, but
16:01
Speaker 1: not that.
16:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know.
16:03
Speaker 3: In my early work, I did a lot of community
16:05
Speaker 3: mental health, so I worked in like high schools with
16:08
Speaker 3: at risk youth or like teen treatment centers, things like that,
16:13
Speaker 3: And I especially found with that population the realness, the
16:17
Speaker 3: genuineness created this bridge of connection. Right, So if I
16:21
Speaker 3: sometimes the self disclosure, like for example, I remember a
16:24
Speaker 3: girl that I had, I worked in an at risk
16:26
Speaker 3: youth I did groups all the time, so that was
16:28
Speaker 3: like my first job as I would just do group
16:31
Speaker 3: after group, seven eight groups a day and being able
16:34
Speaker 3: to understand those group dynamics, and maybe there was I
16:36
Speaker 3: remember there was one student that really struggled with the group,
16:39
Speaker 3: so I'd pull them aside and I'd say, hey, what's
16:41
Speaker 3: going on here, right, like what are you struggling? And
16:44
Speaker 3: they actually had a death in their family and I
16:46
Speaker 3: was able to solve That was one of the first
16:47
Speaker 3: times I self disclosed about my father and my loss.
16:50
Speaker 3: And after that, that relationship with that with that particular
16:55
Speaker 3: group participant was amazing. She started showing up, she wanted
16:57
Speaker 3: to participate. She's like, can I come to two times
17:00
Speaker 3: a day? Miss Michelle?
17:02
Speaker 2: And I'm like absolutely. So, you know, it's sometimes.
17:04
Speaker 3: You have to give a little vulnerability for someone else
17:07
Speaker 3: to give back and create this ping pong effect.
17:10
Speaker 2: And I think I learned that through that experience.
17:13
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I love that. Several several months ago, when
17:17
Speaker 1: I was ready to get back into therapy, I had
17:21
Speaker 1: moved and I called the therapist i'd been working with
17:25
Speaker 1: in California and I emailed her and she said she
17:29
Speaker 1: was no longer seeing clients and I was like, oh
17:33
Speaker 1: my god, but she could recommend some She recommended three
17:36
Speaker 1: other people. Yeah. I was like, all right, I'll check
17:38
Speaker 1: these people out. So I did. And the first person
17:42
Speaker 1: and they were all competent, I'm sure, but the first
17:46
Speaker 1: person I contacted, I emailed and we ended up having
17:49
Speaker 1: a video chat and she spent like fifteen minutes telling
17:53
Speaker 1: me like what modality she was gonna use and what interview.
17:57
Speaker 1: I was like, I don't care. I want a friggin
18:01
Speaker 1: human being. Yeah, you know, I want a human being.
18:05
Speaker 1: And I think there's oftentimes a tendency for therapists to
18:12
Speaker 1: feel like they're walking on eggshelves. You know, I can't
18:16
Speaker 1: share this. My god, I'm going And what are your
18:21
Speaker 1: thoughts on that? Do you feel that, first of all,
18:26
Speaker 1: do you agree with that? Do you think that's changing?
18:28
Speaker 1: Do you feel people or the therapy the therapist's landscape now
18:32
Speaker 1: is shifting. What are your thoughts.
18:35
Speaker 3: I totally see that shifting, especially with the types of
18:38
Speaker 3: clients that are attracted to me. And I've noticed that
18:41
Speaker 3: as I step more into my authenticity, the right clients
18:45
Speaker 3: find me. Right, So I'm trying to set those precedence
18:49
Speaker 3: in the beginning that it is a safe place.
18:51
Speaker 2: Please let me know.
18:52
Speaker 3: I always say, like one of the first things that
18:53
Speaker 3: come out in my mouth is I'm a human.
18:55
Speaker 2: I'm gonna screw up.
18:57
Speaker 3: Please utilize this as an opportunity to practice calling me out. Hey, Michelle,
19:01
Speaker 3: this is wrong, or hey, by the way, right. So
19:04
Speaker 3: I'm always constantly giving that feedback to clients and hoping
19:07
Speaker 3: to open that door. And I'm noticing that as I
19:10
Speaker 3: step more into my authenticity, the right client seem to
19:13
Speaker 3: find me and attract me. So it's almost a mutual process.
19:17
Speaker 3: It's almost like a magnet. Is if I step into
19:20
Speaker 3: my authenticity, the right things are going to attract and
19:22
Speaker 3: the wrong things are going to repel.
19:23
Speaker 2: Right.
19:24
Speaker 1: Oh well, yeah, I love that. That's very interesting where
19:26
Speaker 1: you have a very open, accepting presence about you. You know,
19:34
Speaker 1: you have a very quick smile that certainly puts me
19:38
Speaker 1: at ease and I can. I'm sure it puts a
19:40
Speaker 1: lot of clients that he used too. And also, I
19:44
Speaker 1: think what you do when you say, you know, I'm
19:47
Speaker 1: a human, I'm going to screw up what that does? Really?
19:52
Speaker 1: It also shifts that dynamic right from the therapist being
19:57
Speaker 1: up here to the client being way down here. It
20:01
Speaker 1: levels the playing field in a sense. Oh yeah, because
20:04
Speaker 1: power is the client.
20:06
Speaker 3: There's such a power dynamic when you're stepping into a
20:09
Speaker 3: dynamic for therapy. And I always tell my clients too,
20:12
Speaker 3: like you are the expert on you. You know yourself better
20:15
Speaker 3: than I ever, will that anybody else?
20:17
Speaker 2: Ever? Will you have the valuable information here?
20:20
Speaker 3: So I might say something and it might not fit
20:23
Speaker 3: with you, and that's your opportunity to say yeah, no
20:27
Speaker 3: or yeah, actually we need this right. So leveling the
20:30
Speaker 3: playing field and decreasing the power dynamics can help in
20:33
Speaker 3: so many ways, especially with other medical professionals. I know
20:36
Speaker 3: a lot of clients struggle with that too, advocating for themselves.
20:39
Speaker 3: So I'm like, let's use this as the practice realm,
20:42
Speaker 3: you know.
20:42
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, So would you say, let me put the
20:47
Speaker 1: question a different way, who do you work with? Who
20:50
Speaker 1: do you love to work with and within that, do
20:54
Speaker 1: you have a particular element that you feel like is
21:00
Speaker 1: zone of genius, like I love working in this way
21:03
Speaker 1: or what?
21:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, I would say like I So trauma is my
21:07
Speaker 3: focus mostly, but my main focus is to support folks
21:11
Speaker 3: who are wanting to rewire their subconscious brains.
21:14
Speaker 2: So those who are.
21:14
Speaker 3: Like maybe they've tried different types of talk therapy before,
21:17
Speaker 3: maybe they've recognized, you know, different patterns, but they still
21:20
Speaker 3: feel very stuck. They're like, you know, these circumstances come
21:23
Speaker 3: up and it's almost like this volcano erupts and I
21:25
Speaker 3: feel like I'm not in control.
21:27
Speaker 2: A lot of the.
21:27
Speaker 3: Times that's based on subconscious belief systems, challenges, what have you.
21:33
Speaker 3: So that is what I'm really passionate about, is being
21:36
Speaker 3: able to help clients rewire their subconscious brain. And I
21:39
Speaker 3: always talk about when you do that, when your belief
21:41
Speaker 3: system shifts, everything shifts, right, my lens of perception shifts
21:45
Speaker 3: so the way. So maybe nothing changes externally, but I'm
21:48
Speaker 3: waking up, I'm thinking differently, I'm behaving differently, I'm responding differently.
21:52
Speaker 3: I'm not focusing so much here, but I'm focusing more here.
21:55
Speaker 3: So I love to work with clients who maybe have
21:58
Speaker 3: had a little bit of challenge with their to be
22:00
Speaker 3: honest before and are like, I don't know, this is
22:02
Speaker 3: my last resort, like let's do this.
22:04
Speaker 2: And I'm like, okay, I'm up for this. Let's do
22:06
Speaker 2: this together.
22:07
Speaker 1: Right, So me interrupted there for a second. So I
22:11
Speaker 1: love that. So rewiring someone's subconscious beliefs. So you're talking
22:18
Speaker 1: about if someone gets in these like maybe uh, dysfunctional
22:24
Speaker 1: patterns or debilitating patterns, or have limiting belief how that
22:29
Speaker 1: How the hell do you do that?
22:32
Speaker 3: It's a process, right, I'm sure it is, yeah, because
22:36
Speaker 3: I have so many limiting beliefs.
22:38
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, And we all do, right, we all do.
22:41
Speaker 3: And I always talk about you know, as long as
22:42
Speaker 3: you're breathing, you get a chance to keep doing it
22:44
Speaker 3: and keep rewiring. So what a privilege for us to
22:47
Speaker 3: be able to connect to that gratitude. It starts with
22:50
Speaker 3: understanding the story, right, It starts with that process of
22:53
Speaker 3: me really understanding how did these things come? How did
22:56
Speaker 3: you learn a lot of times it relates back to
22:58
Speaker 3: safety with trauma, learn to protect yourself through these responses.
23:02
Speaker 3: And now they don't fit, but they are the most
23:05
Speaker 3: they're ninety percent of your brain. They are the most
23:07
Speaker 3: automatic part of ourselves. Is most of our lives around autopilot, right,
23:11
Speaker 3: So I'm helping you acknowledge that, and then I'm teaching
23:14
Speaker 3: different treatment modalities that may allow you to shift in thinking.
23:18
Speaker 3: Whether that's AMDR memory processing, clinical hypnosis, bringing in positive
23:22
Speaker 3: suggestions based on your treatment needs and practicing those, or
23:26
Speaker 3: maybe it's doing some IFS work that's deeper and understanding
23:29
Speaker 3: those subconscious connections to the safety or interweaving.
23:32
Speaker 2: A lot of these things. I'm very eclectic in my
23:34
Speaker 2: approach based on the.
23:35
Speaker 3: Client's needs, but that is what I'll be doing, is
23:39
Speaker 3: helping them understand it and then rewire it in a process.
23:43
Speaker 1: How did you talked a little bit about your father's
23:48
Speaker 1: impact on you and what he stood for. Was that
23:52
Speaker 1: the impetus to move in that direction?
23:57
Speaker 2: Yeah? Absolutely.
23:58
Speaker 3: I mean I think my value of understanding people and
24:02
Speaker 3: knowing that there is no bad people. There are people
24:05
Speaker 3: who bad things have happened to and they've learned how
24:07
Speaker 3: to survive bad ways.
24:08
Speaker 2: That's truly a belief of mine.
24:10
Speaker 3: I do not believe that you know there's good and
24:12
Speaker 3: bad or trying to not have attachment to those types
24:15
Speaker 3: of labels, and so I think that that allowed me
24:17
Speaker 3: to look at people who struggle, or people who get
24:20
Speaker 3: into addiction or challenging behavioral responses, or have shame around that.
24:24
Speaker 3: Looking at that from a lens of compassion versus a
24:27
Speaker 3: lens of judgment is so perative for me in the
24:30
Speaker 3: way that I'm looking at people's stories.
24:32
Speaker 2: Right, I love that?
24:35
Speaker 1: All right? Michelle? How do people learn more about you?
24:37
Speaker 1: First of all? Do how do you work with clients?
24:39
Speaker 1: Do you do you working solely online or what?
24:44
Speaker 2: Yeh? So I'm solely virtual.
24:46
Speaker 3: I am currently licensed in forest States, Florida, Oklahoma, Oregon,
24:50
Speaker 3: and New Hampshire. So I do do individual psychotherapy, intensive therapy,
24:54
Speaker 3: couples therapy, and group therapy, all virtual. If you're interested
24:58
Speaker 3: in learning more about my practice, are scheduling a free
25:00
Speaker 3: consult with me? You can visit my website at www
25:04
Speaker 3: dot Michelle Smith, l m HC dot com and you
25:07
Speaker 3: can find all the information on my website from there.
25:10
Speaker 1: Okay, we'll have all that linked up here at the
25:13
Speaker 1: show notes page at the Trauma Therapist Podcast dot com. Uh, Michelle, awesome,
25:19
Speaker 1: you are very inspiring. I mean, you have you have
25:24
Speaker 1: you have this. I don't want to see you have
25:29
Speaker 1: an essence about you and are about you. That's very
25:32
Speaker 1: it is. It's very calming and I love it. I
25:36
Speaker 1: love to have you back at a later date.
25:39
Speaker 2: Yes, I would love to be back as well.
25:40
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for your your dogs.
25:42
Speaker 2: I'm so sorry.
25:43
Speaker 1: Oh don't worry about it, please, my dog's here. Don't
25:46
Speaker 1: worry about it.
25:51
Speaker 2: Yes, thank you, Sorry, bye bye,