Latest / Learned the Hard Way with Kier Gaines / EP 7: What Depression Looks Like When You’re The “Strong” One

Transcript

EP 7: What Depression Looks Like When You’re The “Strong” One · Learned the Hard Way with Kier Gaines

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, real quick, y'all before we start. Yes, I am
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: a licensed therapist, but this episode isn't a therapy session,
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: and I'm not your therapist. We cool, we homies, but
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: I'm not a therapists all right. I'm sharing personal experiences
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: and some of what I know from my own work.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: So nothing you hear today is a diagnosis or clinical advice. Now,
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: if something lands with you, let that be the push
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: to go talk to a licensed mental health professional who
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: can actually sit with you one on one. This is
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: the starting point, it's not the whole answer. Now, with
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: all that said, let's get into it. Welcome to Learn
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: the Hard Way. My name is Kure Games. We talk
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: about purpose, we talk about pressure, we talk about what
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: it actually takes become a full comprehensive man. Welcome back
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: to another episode of Learning the Hard Way. I am
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: your host here Games. I am a licensed therapist. I'm
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: a husband father, I'm a professional speaker. I'm an eighties
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: baby who was raised on ninety Nickelodeon cartoons. I'm a
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: big rock O's Modern Life guy. I'm a huge football fan,
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: and I am a man that got diagnosed with clinical depression.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: That's the thing that people never expect me to say.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: And I think that's the reason that needs to be
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: the topic of today's podcast, because I'm not by myself.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: There's nothing about that diagnosis that makes me special. As
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: a matter of fact, there are more people who are
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: diagnosed with clinical depression than you think, and there are
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: more people who are undiagnosed who have clinical depression than
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: you could ever imagine. I'll go through all of it today,
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: but it just in the therapy world, just nerd out
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: with me for a second, Just vibe with me, nerd
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: out with me for a second. In the therapy world,
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: we have this word that I absolutely love. Y'all know,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: we love therapy language. People call it gas lighter as
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: a narcissist and anxious attachment. We use a lot of
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: this language. It's so much language that people don't even
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: know about, and I'm glad because they're going to just
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: abuse it like they do everything else. But there's this
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: word we use is called incongruent. And incongruency and therapy
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: is when the inside, the way that you feel on
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: the inside does not match the way you appear or
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: present on the outside. Now, y'all, if you've been rocking
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: with me. You know, the past episodes, we've talked about
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: We've talked about masking, we've talked about code switching, all
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: these things that change the way you appear on the outside.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: But depression is different because depression isn't necessarily something you
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: do or perform. It's a mood disorder. It's something that's
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: impacting your mood, your brain. There's something going on there
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: that is negatively impact your mood. And the first thing
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: that people say when they find out that a person
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: like me has depression, because it's not something that I'll
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: ever get rid of. It's something that I'm going to
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: have to manage for the rest of my life. And
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: it's uncomfortable as that may make people. I'm okay with that.
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: I made peace with that. I made peace with that
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: because I don't have a choice. It just is what
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: it is. But the first thing that people say is, oh, y,
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: don't look unhappy. I will never be able to tell yeah,
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: that's that's exactly how that thing works. And especially if
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: you have a variant of what we call functional depression,
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: which I will break down in a minute, but functional
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: depression is always funny to me, not haha funny, but Damn,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: I wish that was different. Funny, because we get so
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: caught up in the functional, the fact that you ain't
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: missing no days at work, you ain't missing no days
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: at school, you turning in your assignments, you showing up
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: for who you need to show up for when you're
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: in public. Hah yeah, all that you're functional. You're managing life,
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: at least it appears that you're managing life. And we
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: get so caught up in the functional that we missed
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: the part about the depression. It's still there, that hasn't
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: gone anywhere. It's just that your performance, at least visibly,
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: isn't impacted to the point where other people may notice.
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: So today I want to talk about that. I want
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: to talk about how when you're incongruent, you can say
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: things like, man, I'm unbothered, I ain't tripping, man, I'm
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: una bothered. Now, don't bother me at all. That's the
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: way you present. But as soon as you leave and
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: you get in a car, you're constantly replaying that situation
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: in your mind. You're almost obsessing over it. You allow
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: it to impact your mood, not just the next day
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: and the next day before a week after that, and
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: congruency is when you walk in the room. Yeah, I'm
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: the man, I'm helm I'm one hundred feet tall. Yeah,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: what's up all of that? You give all that energy,
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: but inside you feel deeply insecure. You feel deeply insignificant
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: and insufficient, like you will never be enough. You present
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: one hundred feet tall, but you feel ten inches tall.
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: Have you ever had a moment in your life where
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: you were incongruent with outside don't match it inside? Because
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: a lot of us have, myself included. So this is
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: not an opportunity for you to feel bad about the
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: way that your brain works, or bad about the way
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: that you've been handling and managing your mood over the
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: past two months, four months, six months, year, two years,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: five years, ten, fifteen, twenty years. This ain't a place
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: to feel bad about that. It's a place to get
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: informed so you can actually do something to change it.
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: So a couple months ago, good friend of mine, my
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: dog do Claude Charles, he is the founder of the
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: Black Health Connect. He called me. He said, bro, I
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: want you to give the keynote speech at I gala
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: this year. And I was like all right. First I
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: said no that I thought about it. I was like,
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: all right, I do it. And I couldn't think of
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: what to talk about. It's like whatever I gonna talk about.
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: But at the time, man, my depression was smoking me.
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: I mean I couldn't. I couldn't feel the world around me.
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: I was sad, Yeah, but more than anything, I just
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: I was. I was in the middle. I was like
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: in purgatory limbo. I couldn't get excited. I couldn't. I
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: just couldn't feel the world happening around me. And I'm
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: at this gala and I'm in front of four hundred people,
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: they all decked out to the nines, nice suit, nice gowns,
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: hair banging, all that, and I tell these people all
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: my business. I decided to tell them that I got
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: diagnosed with clinical depression. And it was not easy. It
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: wasn't easy. Man. My family old school from the South, like,
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: you don't let people know what's going on with you,
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: You don't let people in on your bennit. You're going
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: to tell all these people your business? Yeah, yeah, I am.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: And I thought that's an opportunity to embolden people who
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: feel the same way, to climb out from under that
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: rock of Shae. Because I know I'm not the only one.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Like I said before, but there's a negative thing that
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: happens when you say something like that, especially when you're
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: a therapist. You give the people in that room license.
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: You give the people not only in that room, but
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: I make content out of it. You give the people
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: in that room, You get the people in the world
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: license to doubt you. How are you going to be
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: a therapist and you got depression? How does a therapist
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: get depression? How much sense does that make? And in
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: my mind, that makes a lot of sense. And I'll
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: tell you why do you think that estheticians get in
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: grown hairs? Do you think that an orthopedic doctor is
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: immune from having back issues? No, I have knowledge of
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: how to help people. I have knowledge of how to
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: move people through a continuum and a process of healing.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: I've done it hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of times.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: But that does not make me immune from the human experience.
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: And a part of the human experience is experiencing a
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: range of emotions. Some of them are good and some
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: of them are bad. And I'll tell you the craziest
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: part about being a therapist. If you would have walked
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: in front of me with three or four of the
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: biggest issues in your life. I can walk you through
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: how to solve that problem. That does not mean that
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: I can walk myself through solving these problems. Why, because
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: emotions are a great equalizer. Once they're on top of you,
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: it's like getting punched in the mouth. You had a
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: plan before, but once that thing happens, once emotions happened,
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: it scrambles your brain. You become compromised. And it's almost
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: like a brain surgeon who's very skilled doing brain surgery
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: on themselves. You can't see that thing the same way.
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: You don't have the same vantage point. You're not coming
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: in at the same ang. Now, when I gave that
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: speech in front of those four hundred people, it was
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: a standing ovation. Afterwards, reun of applause, and when I
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: tell you that, a solid, a solid, maybe fifty sixty
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: people rush me soon as I got off stage. Hey bro,
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: me too. Man, I'm glad you were saying that. Hey dog,
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: can I call you after this? I want to talk
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: through that. Women. Hey, that you put words or something
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: I've been experiencing for a long time. Hey bro, me too,
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: me too, Me too? Me too. A lot of people
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: are experiencing this very same thing. So before you log off,
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: before you click off, because man, kid, I ain't got
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: no depression, ain't not, ain't depressed, none of that. Okay,
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: you may not, but you got a mama, you got
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: an uncle, you got a father, you got a play cousin,
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: you got a friend, you got a sandbox. You have
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: somebody who may experience depression. That's some juncture of their lives.
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: And I want you to be armed with the know
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: how and the understanding of what it takes to not
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: only be there for them, but knowing what it takes
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: to push through depression, what it means. How did I
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: advocate for somebody how to stand in that gap? And
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: if you are a person who says, man, I ain't
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: got no depression going on right now, remember forever. It's
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: a mighty long time word of big crip and right
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: now it's only right now. And I'd rather you have
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: it and never use it, then never have it and
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: need it desperately. So with that being said, let's get
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: into it all right. So before we jump into anything,
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: I'm going to play the clip from my key No
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: speech at the Black Health Connect gala in Washington, DC, listen.
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: My name is Carrie Gaines. I am a husband, I'm
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: a father, I am a licensed therapist, and most recently
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: I got diagnosed with clinical depression. Ohoh, the room fell silent.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: Now for some of you all, I can imagine that's
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: hard to hear, and I deeply empathize with that. But
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: I want you to know that that was even harder
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: for me to say. And if it's hard for me
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: to say, I want you to know that it was
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: even harder for me to admit that to myself. Now,
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: when you tell people you're struggling with depression, the first
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: thing they want to do is feel sorry for you.
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: And while I appreciate your sympathies, I do not need
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: it because I don't feel sorry for myself. In fact,
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: I feel empowered. I've circled the problem. I know what
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: it is now, I have a name for it, and
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: I have a plan for it. So my question to
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: you is this, what is your plan of action for
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: the thing that you're struggling with in this moment? Now.
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: I know some of y'all are thinking, good lord, this
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: brother's keynote speech and then got a real heavy, real fast,
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: But I think that diagnosis is symbolic of what a
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: lot of us go through where the presentation doesn't match
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: the inner experience. No one has ever walked into my
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: office like here, God damn it. My wife is happy,
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: my kids are happy, life is great. I need your help.
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: I've never had to help anybody heal from the happiest
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: moments of their lives, because it's not at your peaks
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: when you discover who you are. It's in the depths
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: of the valley. That's where the truth shows up. So
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: what is depression? We hear about it all the time?
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: What is depression? What does it mean for me? How
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: does this thing work? I'm going to read off the
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: definition from Mayo Clinic, which is the textbook definition of
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: what depression is, and Mayo Clinic says the following says
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: that depression is a mood disorder that causes a persistent
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: feeling of sadness and loss of interest. It's also called
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: major depressive disorder or clinical depression. It's different types of depression,
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: but these are This is what I see most commonly
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: in my practice. Back to the definition. It affects how
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: you feel, think, and behave and can lead to a
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: variety of emotional and physical problems. You may have trouble
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: doing normal day to day activities, and sometimes you may
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: feel as if life is not worth living. Now now
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: with depression, let's talk about the last part. Because when
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: it comes to self harm, we usually shy away from
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: that conversation because I get it, it's so uncomfortable. But
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: I think that's not how it works. You're actually supposed
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: to lean into that conversation. We're doing that wrong as
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: a society. You lean into that conversation you haven't openly
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: and honestly. And when it comes to feelings of self
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: harm or not wanting to be here anymore, it doesn't
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: always sound the way people think it does. Sometimes it
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: sounds like, man, you know if tomorrow morning came and
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: I just didn't wake up, and I'd be alright with that,
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: that same conversation in a different font, you feel me
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: Or sometimes I hear men say this, man, I'm tired
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: in a way that sleep can't fix. When I hear
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: those two, those are indicators to me, and I always say,
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: explain more what you mean? What you mean by that?
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: When you say that, ask how long you been feeling
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: that way? I ask who else knows that you feel
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: that way. These are important follow up questions because sometimes
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: that's a person who does, who may not want to
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: be here anymore, who's thinking that they may not want
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: to be here anymore. Maybe those those it started creeping
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: their head, and sometimes that is the best way that
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: they can reach out for help by saying those words.
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: They're not gonna say eight bro, I was thinking about.
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: They might not give it to you like that, but
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: you hear me say this a lot sometimes where there's smoke,
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: there's fire, and I smell smoke when I hear those
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: two things some to think about. So you might be asking, care,
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: how did you even know that you would depressed? What
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: would the warning signs? I do come to that understanding?
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: I don't get it. And that's a good ask question
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: because it took me a very long time, a very
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: long time to do it to understand. Even now, it's
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: hard to talk about because it crept on me so
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: slowly that I felt like I didn't see it coming,
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: you know, like glaucoma is one of the leading calls
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: is a blindness. And the sneaky thing about glaucoma is
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: it takes your vision away from the periphery a little
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: bit by little bit, and by the time you notice
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: that it's taken your your vision is almost gone. And
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: I feel like depression happened to me that very same way.
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: It was this inability for me to get excited about
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: life like I just I couldn't find enthusiasm. It was
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: easier for me to see the negative. The negative would
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: immediately pop up for me. And you know, I tried
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: to do the try to positive my way out of it.
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: It could be better. You know, these things happen to everybody.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: God gives the biggest war to his strongest soldiers. I
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: gave myself all that. And what I didn't notice is
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: one year would pass, two years will pass, and three
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: years will pass. And I was feeling like that for six, seven,
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: eight years, and I couldn't feel excited. I would feel
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: exhausted just by the thought of things. The thought of
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: going outside and having to talk to people would make
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: me so tired that I could Sometimes all I could
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: do is just sit. And I prefer to isolate because
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: I didn't want people ask give me questions, Man, why
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: you feel so down? Man, you don't seem like yourself.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: What's going on? And they asking me questions to a
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: situation I know they couldn't help me with. At the time,
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: I was single, so I was dating a lot, and man,
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: you know, how do I say this? So when you
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: were a younger man, you don't really understand yourself as well.
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: You think you could solve everything with sex, like you
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: just think you think clapping cheeks is going to get
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: you through everything. And after a while I felt nothing
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: from that. It just I couldn't feel. Nothing felt fulfilling.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: It just felt like life was moving and I wasn't
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: hitting a record button. And I think the biggest piece
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: for me was I couldn't remember certain periods of my life.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: It's still parts of my twenties. I can't tell you
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: what happened. I would wake up, I'll go to work,
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: I talk to people, I do what I need to do.
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: I come home, I wake up, I go to work.
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: I might go out on the weekends, might stand on
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: the couch of the club by an overpriced table. Things
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: were happening, but I was not present for it. I
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: just I was not there. And when I found out
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: that I was going to be a father, it was
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: a life shift because the thing that kept my depression
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: attack was the fact that I lived in my apartment.
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: I was self sufficient. I didn't need anybody for anything.
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: I didn't have any mirror pointing back at me to
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: indicate that anything was wrong. For real, I could feel
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: that something was off. But I'm still working, I'm still living,
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: I'm still socializing. I'm cool. I got a car, I
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: got a crib, I got a little money in my pocket.
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: I'm doing that right. But when I found out I
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: was going to be a father, that was a major
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: life change that my brain man could not handle in
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: the moment. And whatever that depression was sitting on top
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: of real comfortably, Oh that thing broke. It broke, and
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: everything fell down to the bottom. And I couldn't I
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: couldn't avoid or distract myself from these negative feelings that
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: I had anymore. And then I started living with my
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: now wife, no Amy, And now I got a person
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: every day who where I could just be sad all
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: day in my apartment by myself. And I don't feel
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: sad deeply. I don't know if I'm sad. I'm just
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: maybe I'm just down today. Oh. Now now I'm living
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: with somebody that be like, man, you've been said for
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: like three weeks now, and months will go by, and
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: I realized years have gone by and nothing changed, nothing changed,
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: And that's when I decided to go see a therapist
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: for the first time. So I think it's a mix
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: of all of those things happening. Having somebody run back
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: to me what they saw in me, me just man
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: looking at old videos and reading my old voice notes
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: and reading my own journals and realizing, like, damn, I've
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: been down for a minute. And my theory is always this,
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: if you could get yourself out of a tailspin. You know,
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: if you don't know what the tailspin is is when
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: a plane is falling out the sky and that you're
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: just circling down to the bottom. It's not something you
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: ever want to be in. If you could get yourself
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: out of a tail spin, you would have already, and
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: the fact that you didn't means that you can't buy yourself.
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: And that realization hit me like a ton of bricks,
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: and that's when I realized I had to change something.
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: I had to change something. It's in front of a
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: therapist and having somebody tell you that you're depressed, you
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: want to throw hands what you mean them depressed? I'm
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: not depressed. Depressed people do boom boom, boom boom. You
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: don't realize that you do your own version and variation
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: of that same thing that you're protesting against. So that's
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: how I figured out, and now that I'm a licensed therapist,
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: and I'll give the disclaimer like everybody, the person don't
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: look the same way on any two people. It just doesn't.
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: It doesn't look the same way on any two people
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: I attributed. You remember when COVID first hit, And in COVID,
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: some people say like, yeah, man, I got a sore throat.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: Some people are like, yeah, man, I got a temperature
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: of one hundred and five degrees. Some folks was like, man, man,
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: I've been in bed for two weeks straight. Man, I
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: ain't have none of them symptoms. You know what my
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: symptoms were. My little back felt like straight garbage, and
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: my skin was so sensitive to the touch that if
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: I took a shower it was painful. I didn't have
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: the classic symptoms that everyone else had, But that doesn't
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: mean that I didn't have COVID. Do you see what
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: I'm saying here. The symptoms for depression can vary depending
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: on who you are, how you were raised, how your
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: neurochemistry or your brain chemistry works, how you treat aversions
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: or adversity, how you manage stress, how you push through.
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: All of those things can change the way that this
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: thing looks for you. Now here's the really important piece. Now,
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: as a therapist, me here looking at you well, talking
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: to you. If you in the audio, If I am
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: diagnosing somebody with depression, there are about nine things that
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: I look for, all right, and these things have to
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: happen nearly every day and last for a period of
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: two weeks or more. And if I see five out
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: of these nine things, that doesn't mean that you have depression.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: But I smell smoke. Let's get these off real quick.
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: These are the nine things I look for. And if
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: you have five of these at the same time, get
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: real smoky in the room. You feel me. I cans
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: something going on there that we need to explore further.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: Number one. If you have a depressed mood, if you
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: just feel an overall mood of if your mood is
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: just down. Number two, if you have loss of interest
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: in activities that you didn't feel that way about before,
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: or you don't usually feel that way about. Number three,
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: and this is important. If you have significant weight loss
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: or weight gain. Usually I looked at about the five
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: percent mark either way, and you're not working out or
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: doing anything significant. Number four, if you have insomnia or hypersomnia,
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: means trouble falling or staying asleep, or trouble not going
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: to sleep all the time. Number five psycho motor agitation
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: and psycho motor agitation is like fishing with your hands excessively,
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: or pacing or rocking or hair pulling things like that.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: Number six is fatigue or loss of energy. Number seven
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: is feelings of excessive worry or excessive guilt, either one
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: of those or both. Number eight is a diminished ability
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: to think or concentrate, or some type of profound sense
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: of indecisiveness. And number nine is reoccurring themes of death
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: or self harm playing in your mind. If I see
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: five out of nine, I begin to get concerned. Now,
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: this isn't your chance to self diagnose and say, oh man,
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: I got all five. I've realized I got a lot
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: of those. I got depression. That's not a call that
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: you make. That's a call that a licensed clinical professional makes.
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: And I'm going to emphasize that a lot of times
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: this isn't something that you can self diagnose necessarily. It's
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: something that has to be diagnosed by professional in a
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: setting when they already didn't give you a bunch of
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: inventories and they know what's going on with your life,
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: because then they can also help you through it. And
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: it's a lot of different ways that you can't be
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: helped through it. I'll talk about that at the end
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: of the episode. I want to take a moment and
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: jump back to something I said a little bit earlier,
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: because I think we need to expound on that a
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: little bit. I get asked the question all the time,
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: how can the therapist have depression? And one thing that
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: I don't think folks realize is that being a therapist
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: it is just a job. It's just a job. It's
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: a job that I went to school and got trained for,
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: like any other job. And again, that job doesn't preclude
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: me from experiencing with everybody else experience. You'll think I
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: don't get mad or sad, or angry or disappointed, not
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: all those things still apply to me. I am not
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: special in that regard. I deal with the same thing
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: as anybody else deals with. I get burnout, I get anxiety,
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: I have moments when I feel insecure. I got times
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: when I worry about money, I worry about my kid's future.
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: I have to manage my relationship. My wife is dope,
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: but a marriage is constant and continuous work. You think
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: I don't get stressed out about that I deal. There's
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: nothing that anybody else deals with that I don't deal
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: within a similar capacity. And I think there's this idea
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: that therapists are these magical healers and problem solvers and
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: somehow we're just we're exonerated from from feelings. Nah, Sometimes
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: being a therapist sucks because you feel so much more
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: deeply than some other people, and it takes you longer
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: or it's a little bit harder to pull yourself out
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: of those negative feelings. You know, the zodiac girl say
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: that I'm a I'm a Pisces with a jubiter rizing.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: I don't know how that works, but apparently Pisces is
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: supposed to be sensitive. So guilty, your charge man, leave
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: me alone. Now, being a therapist means that I'm very
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: good at recognizing patterns and recognizing behavior, but it doesn't
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: always mean that I can see those things in myself.
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: So I gotta be really good at going out in
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: a listening feedback from people like, bro, what are you seeing?
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: What am I missing? I gotta always be curious about
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: what's in my blind spot or else I will overestimate
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: my capabilities as a healer or a helping professional. And
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: I be out here not doing myself any favors, be
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: out here dumb, toxic and don't even know it, and
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: then be reluctant to hear anybody give me any criticism.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: I never want to be that guy. So I have
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: to always make sure I got my ear to the
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: ground on what's going on with me, and that's not
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: special to me. That's something I encourage everybody to do.
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: Like listen, not saying you gotta go solely based off
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: of the opinions of the world. No, if you listen
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: to what everybody thinks about you scramble what you think
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: about yourself. What I'm saying is their value. There's value
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: in those critiques and criticisms sometimes that you can use
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: the better yourself, or at least become more informed around
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: how you come off and how you move around the world.
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: There is this idea of a good life, and if
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: you're on all the I'm doing the bunny is there's
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: this idea of a good life and what a good
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: life means, and how you're not allowed to be frustrated
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: abut what seems like a good life. But my life
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: is good by all standards, and the at times when
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: I still feel stuck, I still feel disoriented. Me being
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: on your phone screen, don't stop that. There are times
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: where I do feel lost and I don't really know
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: which direction to move in or where to go. And
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: there are times when I have a hard time even
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: processing what's going on with me in real time. You
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: understand what I'm saying like it's happening to me, But
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: I don't know if my brain is picking up up
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: on what life is putting down necessarily, And those feelings
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: aren't always an indicator of how good my life is, nah,
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: And I don't see those negative feelings or just that
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: inability to capture that joy and that happiness. I don't
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: see that as a weakness. I don't see that as
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: a weakness. Man, I see that as a warning sign.
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: It's an indicator. It's in the politics. They say it's
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: the Canarian of coal mine. It's an indicator. It's something
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: that's telling me that the way I am going about
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: my life, I have to change something. Something needs to
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: change because something isn't right. So instead of seeing it
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: as an indictment on myself, I see it as alarm
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: bells bringing. And what it kindles me to do is
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: just jump back and say, okay, okay, mind, okay, body, okay, spirit,
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: what is it that you're trying to warm me about.
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: What is it that I need to be more tuned to.
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: What is it that I need to pay more attention to.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: What is it that I need to lean in on
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: and put a magnifying glass on? And I ain't gonna lie. Man.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: That requires some humility, because you want to feel like
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: you're in control. You want to feel like you're in
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: control of the way you think feeling behave all the time.
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: But some you know, sometimes you crank that soldier boy,
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: and sometimes that soldier boy cranks you. And when the
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: soldier boy cranks you, it's just a matter of allowing
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: yourself to take your hands not necessarily, I don't know,
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: if take your hands off the steering wheel is a
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: good analogy here, because you still want to be in control,
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: but you have to realize that you may not be
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: in the moment and take a half step back to
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: kind of think about, Okay, if I'm not in control,
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: what do I need to do to regain control? Or
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: why am I not in control of this? Why can't
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: I dictate how I feel right now? Why can't I
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: put my finger on it? If from that curiosity, I
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: think you get a lot of solutions growing out of
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: that soil. But the humility is an important piece because
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: it allows you to take the solutions that you get
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: and actually do something about it. And I don't see
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: it as a weakness because I know that there are tons,
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: tons of other people who are going through the same
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: exact thing. There's somebody listening to this podcast right now
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: that has the hand over their mouth and is staring
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: into blank space because I am describing feelings that have
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: been running through their minds and bodies for a very
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: long time, and those feelings do not feel good, and
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: it doesn't make them feel like they're in control of
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: their own lives. And they never had words for it,
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: or never heard a person say it out loud, or
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: never heard a person that looks and it sounds like
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: me not only say it out loud, talk about their
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: own experience with it, because I can tell you, I
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: can tell you with one hundred percent hundred I can
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: tell you with one hundred and three percent, certainly with
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: a three percent marginal era, that your favorite entertainers, athletes, musicians, politicians,
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: they go through the same thing. And congruence is the
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: great misdirection because if you smile enough, you throw people
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: off your sin, if you appear happy enough, nobody questions it.
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: But the way you look and the way you feel,
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: they more often than not have nothing to do with
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: one another. Because the way you look, oh, you can
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: control that. You can control that, you can put on
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: some nice clothes and a smile and throw people off.
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: The way you feel you have far less control over,
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: and control requires way more to kind of keep a
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: handle on in terms of mental health and just men
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: being honest about where we are and how we need
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: to grab help from outside resources. I think it's important
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: when everybody admits what's going on with them and it's
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: transparent about it. But more specifically, most specifically, when rich, powerful,
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: influential men start chiming in on this conversation and humanizing
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: the experience in a way that all of us can
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: vibe with I think it really means something and jay Z.
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: I'm a big j fan. Jay Z has been vocal
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: about this more and I want to cure up an
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: interview that he did, I think around the time the
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: four forty four album came out, which was one of
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: his more personal, transparent albums. I want to cue up
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: this interview real quick and then let's talk about it afterwards,
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: because I think he dropped some serious gems in this
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: joint here go.
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: I grew so much from an experience. The most important
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: thing I got is that everything is connected. Every emotion
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: is connected, and it comes from from somewhere. Just being
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: aware of it. Being aware of it in everyday life
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: puts you at such an advantage. You know, you realize that,
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: you know, if someone's racist to you're not even about you.
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: It ain't about you.
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: It's about their upbringing and what happened to them and
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: how they led them to this point. You know, most
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: bullies bully it's happened. Oh you got bullied kids, so
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: you're trying to bully me. I understand, And once I
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: understand that, instead of reacting to that with anger, I
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: can provide a softer landing and maybe, oh, Man, is
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: you okay? I was just saying there was a lot
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: of fights in our neighborhood that started with You're looking
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: at and then you realize, oh, you think I see you.
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: You're in a space where you're hurting and you think
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: I see you. So you don't want me to look
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: at you. You don't want me to see your pain,
• 33:51
  Speaker 2: so you put on this shell of this tough person
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: that's really willing to fight me and possibly kill me
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: because I looked at you. Knowing that and understanding that
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: changes life completely.
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: Was that a moment that came from therapy?
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, just realizing that, Oh my goodness, these young men
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: coming from these they're.
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: Just in pain. You have to survive.
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: So you're going to survival, moll when you're going to
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: sur bible, Moe, what happened you shut down?
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: That entire interview brings up a question to me. He
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: kind of hit on this point, what does it even
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: mean to be happy? What does that mean? And a
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: few months ago I was listening to the Andrew Huberman podcast,
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: which I enjoyed listening to. He had some really interesting
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: guests on there, and he had this woman on. Her
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: name was doctor Lori Santos and doctor Lory Santos, if
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: I'm not mistaken it with her and doctor Lori Santos
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: is a Yal professor who studies happiness and what people
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: need to do to not just acquire but maintain happiness.
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: And she dropped this bar that I don't think I'll
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: ever forget in my life. I kind of use it
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: as a self reference tool now. She said that there's
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: a difference in Jay talked about this too. There's a
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: difference between being happy with your life and being happy
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: in your life. That's crazy, right, because you don't think
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: you just think happy is happy. But it's two definitions. Now.
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: Being happy with your life is just the overall experience,
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: just the collective sum of what's going on with you
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: from in the present moment, just everything, everything that life includes,
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: just your overall feeling and satisfaction with that. That's being
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: happy with your life. But being happy in your life
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: is different. Being happy in your life is about day
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: to day and moment to moment experiences. Being happy with
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: your life is more like an itemized bill where everything
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: is sparsed out around by line. Are you happy with
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: your job? What about your job? Are you happy with
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: the way it makes you fulfilled. Are you happy with
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: the leadership at your job? Are you happy with your coworkers?
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: Are you happy with your salary? What about at home?
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: Are you happy not just? Are you happy with your spouse?
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: Are you happy with your decision to be with your spouse?
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: Are you satisfied in that relationship? Do you feel like
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: you're given enough? Are you happy with your performance? Are
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: you happy with their performance? Do you have children? Are
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: you happy with the way your children turn out? You
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: see what I'm saying. Being happy with your life is far.
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: It's much more minutia, and it's a lot more touch points.
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: And what I find is that there are a lot
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: of people who are happy with their lives, but not
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: necessarily happy in their lives. Here what does that mean?
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: I don't get it? What's you alling about? Bruhright? I'll
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: use myself as a case study because there are things
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: that I'm happy about with my life, but there are
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: things in my life that I'm not always happy about.
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: There are things that are very frustrating to me, hard
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: for me to overcome, and they're a huge source of
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: anxiety and sometimes insecurity. For me, in security is a
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: hard thing to admit because it's a rare thing for me.
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: But when it hits me man writing twice big thing,
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: it just hits me hard. But I'm not I'm not
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: ashamed to admit insecurity because that's one of the negative
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: feelings that I grow the most from. So I encourage
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: you to do the same. All right, So what do
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: I mean happy with my life? Well, let's let's run
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: down the list. You probably follow me on social media.
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: I put my business out on the street. I don't
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: mind that I'm an open book. I'm happy with a
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: lot of things in my life. I love my career
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: and what I do for a living. Learn the Hard
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: Way is my favorite thing to do. I love this podcast.
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: I love talking to y'all. I love the house that
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: I live in. I live in a very nice house
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: and a very nice neighborhood, completely different than the way
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: I grew up. I have a loving family. My wife
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: loves me so much, so supportive, she's mad, affectionate, she's
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: mad affirming. My kids are beautiful and smart and funny,
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: both of my girls. I love the car drive. I
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: drive a really nice car. Like I know, these things
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: in material but they do dictate the happiness like we
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: ain't go to school and work for nothing just to
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: have pocket change. You have pocket change so you can
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: buy things that you like and you think represent you.
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: I'm in good shape. I'm in good health. I don't
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: have any health issues. I work out frequently. I'm a
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: gym rat one thousand percent. I usually dress and look
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: the way that I want to. I'm very happy with
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: my life now. In my life, there are things that
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: I'm not always happy with. I'm always tired. Yeah, I'm
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: I'm always tired. I'm always tired. I wake up at
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: five point thirty every morning. I'm not an early riser,
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: but I have two little kids that I get ready
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: for school. And my little baby years old. She decides
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: that her mouth and hands don't work in the morning,
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: so I gotta feed her breakfast. I hate it. I
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: gotta find shoes, I gotta find socks, I gotta find clothes.
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: I just I'm not happy with that part. That part
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: of my life is not a happy place for me.
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: It's profoundly exhausted and frustrating. Another thing, I remember, Pastor
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: Mike Todd said that a long time ago, and I
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: thought it was the craziest thing to come out of
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: somebody's mouth. He said, success can be traumatizing, and at
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: the time, what are you talking about. I didn't experience
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: enough success to experience the trauma. Yet he was right.
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: My job is amazing, but my job is very stressful.
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: I don't get time off. I'm always working. I am
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: building a business and a brand. Weekends, i'm working, vacations,
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: I'm working. Last night, I put my daughter to bed
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: after coming home from New York. I was working on
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: the train and I was working next to her, laying
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: next to her in the bed. There's all ways intense
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: pressure to perform. Some people can't post Instagram posts for
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: three days consistently. I don't think I've missed more than
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: two days in five years. And it's harder than you think.
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: The travel is hard. Coming back home, you never come
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: back to the same house, the rules are different. Things
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: change your kids, like you've been gone for three days
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: and they acting weird around you. I'm not happy with
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: just how hard my job is all the time. I'm
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: thankful for it, but I'm not always happy with the
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: extreme pressure. I'm wanted. I'm not always happy with the
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: idea I gotta share my money. I am a only
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: child I am. I am selfish in a lot of
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: different ways. I'm not happy with the fact that I
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: always got to share my time when you when you're
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: married and you're in the family, your time ain't yours
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: no more. If you want to do something, if you
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: don't put it on the calendar, oh it's a rat.
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: If it's not on the shared calendar and you want
• 40:57
  Speaker 1: to do something, If you do that thing and the
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: family didn't anticipated, you throw off everybody's schedule. I'm not
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: happy with how busy I am all the time Monday
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: through Friday on work, and Saturday and Sunday the kids
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: got activities or play dates or god knows what these.
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: I could go on with the things that don't necessarily
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: make me happy in my life. But do you see
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: the difference. You'll see the house, But what you don't
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: see is how much when you got fifty eight windows
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: in your house. I know other mistakes too, juicee my
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: lobster's too battery. I'll accept that. But when you got
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: fifty eight windows in your house, you not much at
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: costs to put blinds on them joints. And when you
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: ain't got blinds on your toe, it feel like a traphouse.
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: You don't buy a big house to feel like you
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: live in a traphouse. You understand, like insurance for like
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: my kids are we all taken care of, But insurance
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: is crazy. Every month i'd be I think I pay
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: like thirteen hundred dollars a month for health insurance. Thirteen
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: hundred a month for health insurance. And you can see
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: the things that people have. And in my book I
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: talk about this a lot, and my book is called
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: it All Stars when you do And we'll talk about
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: that later, but I talk about that like you can
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: see what people have, but what it takes to get
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: acquired and maintain it can be exhausting to the point
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: where you question whether or not it's worth it. Now,
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: that doesn't just apply for putting window treatments in your house,
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: which isn't a life changing problem. It's not a life
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: altering situation. But what if it is something that's not
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: not as external and material and something that's more emotional,
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: something that's closer to the heart that you have to
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: maintain in your life. And it looks good and people
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: are like, oh, good job, you know, oh you got
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: this hotping in job, but they don't know how you
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: got to grind and appease people you don't like and
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: sit in zoom meetings what they're going on, So, how's
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: the weather? And do all of this bullshit that don't
• 42:49
  Speaker 1: jive with who you are deeply and it bothers you
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: and it affects your mood and it adds to your
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: depressive mood. So those difference is a kind of what
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: jay Z was talking about, especially in the interview, you
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: talked about compartmentalization, and I want you to know that
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: there's a difference between being happy in and being happy
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: with your life. Just give that some thought, man, because
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: that's the first time I heard it. I had to
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: sit with that for a minute and then I started
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: processing it and breaking it down. It made far more
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: sense to me, and it made my life make more
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: sense to me, and I can pick out the parts
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: where I'm happy and the parts where I'm not. And
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: remember when I said, depression is not a weakness, It's
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: about a warning signal. All those things that I mentioned
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: that make me unhappy in my life a warning signals
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: that I need to change, not necessarily change those things,
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: because that's not always possible. And the family, the needs
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: are the many out weigh the needs of the few,
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: and I'm the few. It's just how it goes. But
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: it's a warning that I can change my relationship with
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: those things. I can change my approach to the those things.
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: I can change how much of myself I sacrifice and
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: abnegate for those things, so that I don't grow a
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: level of resentment towards those things and ultimately those people.
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: Don't fool yourself. Don't fool yourself into believing that the
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: people you love you can't grow resentment toward That is
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: not true, And I want to make sure that I
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: stay out of that ministry. You feel me, I don't
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: want any of that now, Believe it or not. The
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: majority of my clients and therapy are women, but I
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: do treat a lot of men. And I remember I
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: gave y'all that COVID example earlier how things look different
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: different people. Depression is like that. And there's certain symptoms
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: in men versus depression and women that I noticed, and
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: I wrote myself some notes because I wanted to stay
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: on track. So when it comes to men, depression can
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: look different. Depression can look like anger and irritability. I
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: notice that a lot it looks like irritability. Sometimes it
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: looks like physical pain. What do I mean by physical pain?
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: Unexplained headaches, chronic pains, and digestive issues. Sometimes depression manifest
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: that way. Escapist behavior is another way that depression manifested men,
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: So over indulging and mood altering substances, over indulging in
• 45:25
  Speaker 1: cannabis and alcohol, or escapist behavior. You escape to the room,
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: to the bathroom, you're in the bathroom for two hours,
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: don't scromb along your phone, or perhaps you end up
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: playing video games for hours and hours and hours on end.
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: You know what, not only playing video games but working
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: long hours. I think that's a sneaky one right there,
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: because it makes you look like you're productive. But working
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: long hours can also be escapist behavior, trying to escape
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: from the way that you feel. Emotional withdrawal happens in
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: men all the time, so that like lock in culture,
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: isolate that Sometimes that is a symptom of depression. It
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: can be at least and finally lost in interest in
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: your hobbies, your passions, but also sex. A loss of
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: interest in sex can also be a symptom of depression. Now,
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: there are a few questions that I want you to
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: just answer yourself just in reflection, because we I just
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: dropped a lot on y'all. I just dropped fifty points
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: on y'all and a half. And it's a lot to
• 46:30
  Speaker 1: take in. So why you're taking that in and you're
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: processing it? I want you to ask yourself a few questions.
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: Number one, I want you to ask yourself, where in
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: my life am I feeling hopelessness, emptiness, ambivalence or sadness?
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: And I also want you to take inventory how long
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: you been feeling that way? Honestly, this isn't a moment
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: to judge, it's a moment to take inventory. How long
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: have those feelings been sitting on top of you? How
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: long has that fag been resting there? And number two,
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: I want you to ask yourself, when's the last time
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: I felt anything at full volume? Not just the bad feelings,
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: but the good feelings too. When's the last time I
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: felt anything with the volume cranked the tin? And how
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: long has it been since I've last felt that way?
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: The example that I love to use is caffeine, because
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: everybody thinks that caffeine gives you energy. Right, everybody knows
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: that caffeine gives you energy. Caffeine does not give you
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: energy without completely science nerding out on y'all. Caffeine just
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: blocks the neural receptors that lets your brain know that
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: it's tired. Doesn't give you energy. It just trick your
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: brain into thinking that it's not tired, and then sometimes
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: it releases some feel good hormones they give you a boost.
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: I know that's counter intuitive. I'm a coffee drinker myself.
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: This ain't no shame on This ain't no shame on
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: coffee drinkers. But it's true. You can look it up.
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: But it's not just truth for coffee. It's also true
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: for some other symptoms that you feel. For example, sleep, irritability, libido,
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: and jaw tension can be symptoms that you feel. But
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: when we feel those symptoms, what do we do For sleep?
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: We take a melatonin. For anxiety, we may take CBD,
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: or we might use cannabis, or we might do one
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: of those things. For libido, what do we do We
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: pop one of them blue pills or blue chewing gum.
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: The technology is crazy. I don't know what else they have,
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: but we take these medications because they fix the symptoms temporarily.
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: It's not that the symptoms are the problem. The symptoms
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: are problematic for you in your everyday life. It's what
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: you feel most saliently. But those symptoms are coming from
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: a deeper issue. And when you take the melatonin or
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: the blue pill, or the CBD or the cannabis, you're
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: not fixing the underlying issue. You're just kicking the can
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: down the road. It's something that you are absolutely going
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: to have to deal with later. And if the base
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: issue is the depression, the tone is not gonna fix that.
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: The CBD, the cannabis is not gonna fix that. Even
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: just alone, doing things like going to the gym alone,
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: it's not gonna fix that. It's a complex problem that
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: requires complex long term solutions. And I'm gonna get to
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: some of those solutions in a second. But I think
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: it's really important to understand that much like the caffeine,
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: you're tired, it's a quick fix. Your your mind is
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: still tired, it just doesn't know that it is. That
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: problem still exists. You gotta get some rest, you gotta
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: get some sleep. The caffeine just pushes the problem down
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: the road. But when you're traveling down the road is
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: always coming and you're gonna have to face that problem again.
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: And I'm a man, I'm a big proponent of the
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: best way to go through something is to go through it.
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: You understand, you need it squarely, face to face. You
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: wal you find solutions for that thing, and you slow
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: walk through it. Now, it ain't it ain't fun. That'd
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: be the first. It is not fun, I'd be the
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: first to tell you. And it's not easy, but it's
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: always worthwhile, always always worthwhile. So when you're spiraling and
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: emotions of feeling out of control and you exhibiting some
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: of the symptoms that I talk to you about, which
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: all of those symptoms I told you about that we
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: looked for in the DSM, I felt at some point
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: as a therapist those symptoms that we look for when
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: it comes to depression. I experienced all of them at
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: some point within a five year span of time. A
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: lot of them were at the same time. So let's
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: talk about solutions, y'all, normal solutions, guy. Let's talk about
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: solutions in what I do in order to manage depression.
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: Because even though I have clinical depression, but be honest, man,
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: the last what do we have I say, probably the
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: last five to six months, I haven't. My depression hasn't
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: been an issue at all. This is the longest I've
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: gone without feeling any depressive mood at all. I have
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: bad days, and I have bad moments, but only their
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: only moments. I'm able to pull myself out. I'm able
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: to kind of turn that around and move forward while
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: being honest with myself about the way that I feel.
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: That's the big part. Being honest with me. I'm not lying.
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: I'm not doing toxic positivity either. The sun will come
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: out tomorrow. Man, it's all good. I'm not doing none
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: of that. I'm being honest. Yeah, it sucks right now,
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: but it only sucks right now, and I allow it
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: to be and then I can move past it. So
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: here are here's a list of things that I do
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: in order to help me maintain this state, in order
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: to help me manage my depression. Now get rid of it,
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: because I don't know that that's a thing for me,
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: but in order to manage it. So all right, here's
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: a list. I'll go through them really quickly. I go
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: to the gym. I lift weights about three to four time, yeah,
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: three to four times a week. I do two heavy
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: leg days, and then I box I do boxing training
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: twice a week. It's done wonders for my mental health.
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: Now I do all of these things at the same time.
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: The man and so stick with me. I've been doing
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: a good job of spending time with my homies. Well,
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: we'll just go out, no agenda, just hang, we'll talk.
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: We'll talk about life. You hear another perspective. We just
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: you know you love up on the homies. Man, y'all
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: have a good time. Y'all go get some food. Y'all
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: have an experience together. That's really been helping. I've been
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: building community. I build community off of my common interests.
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: I got my folks who who are creators. I got
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: my creative friends. I got my athletic friends. We might
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: go out and hoop. We might go out play football,
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: we might box, might throw the hands. I got my
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: friends on the game system. I got my friends that
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: read the same books that I read. Like all of
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: these different communities that I have. Communities the gun owners,
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: my other homies that own guns and like to go shooting.
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: My homies are like the fish. My homies are like
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: the hunt. I've just found all these different pockets they're
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: not only pull into, but to pour back into me
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: and man, that's been that's been so critical for my
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: mental health, especially because I don't have a lot of time.
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: I have a stronger support system at work. A hired
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: an executive assistant. Shout out to Erica, she's killing the game.
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: My wife is my COEO, my logistics person. No, Amy's
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: been killing the game. That's really helped alleviate a lot
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: of my work stress. I've been indulging in all of
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: my hobbies. I just bought a Lego set, and I'm
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: about to get busy on that. I can't wait. I
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: got a Lego set, I got a bike. I go biking.
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: I just put on my headphones and just hit the trails.
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: I go hiking. I've really been I've been going to
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: comedy shows, all the hobbies and things that I love.
• 53:38
  Speaker 1: I've been leaning into a lot lately. This is a
• 53:42
  Speaker 1: big one. I've been getting something like and I learned
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: this from the Andrew Huberman podcasts. I've been getting a
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: lot of something like. In the morning, i will just
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: sit on my balcony and I'll put my headphones in.
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: I'll listen to some music. I've been listening to Urban
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: Flora or I'll listen to a sports podcast, and I
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: will let the sunlight hit my face. I'll go for
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: a walk. I try to get at least thirty five
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: minutes to an hour sun like every single day. And
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: I also get darkness. So at night, I make sure
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: everything's completely black. Everything's completely dark, not being stimulated on
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: my phone or nothing. I try to get good amount
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: of darkness at night. I've been doing good with my
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: sleep hygiene. I don't just pass out on the couch
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: as much anymore. I'm not perfect. There's plenty of days
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: where I pass out on the couch with food with
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: a plate in my lap. It's terrible. It's a bad look,
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: but it is what it is. I'll be tired, you know,
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: sue me whatever. I've been purposely going to sleep and
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: going to sleep at a good time, laying down, preparing,
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: brushing my teeth, floss, getting the water, pick, floss my teeth,
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: lay down and go to sleep on purpose. I've been
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: increasing my sleep hygiene. It's been very helpful. I've been
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: reading a lot more, not just I read a lot
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: of self help books. I love The Big Leap by
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: Kay Hendrix. I love Atomic Habit by James Clear, I mean,
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: I got all the joints. I got Balancing Act by
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: Nedra Glover touav right here. But I've also been reading
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: a lot of fiction lately. I've been reading a lot
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: of fiction books that tie back into some of my
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: childhood experiences, like Black Boy Smile by Dee Watkins, A
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds, thrillers like King of
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: Ashes by Sa Crosby. I've been just reading Even the
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: Beautiful in a While by Peggy Townsend, random book I
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: picked up. That joint was amazing. Reading has really helped
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: me not just escape, but helps put a mood on
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: me that I didn't have otherwise. Help should bring process
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: a story in a different way than it would audible
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: or visual. I've been listening to music. I've been listening
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: to different types of music. I've been listening to a
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: lot of Miles Davis, a lot of jazz, a lot
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: of urban flora. Like I said my wife from Jersey,
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: I've been listening to Jersey club music tremendous. I've been
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: listening to this Colombian artist named Joe Arroyo, and the
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: music is alive, it's stumping. I don't know what he's saying,
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: but I don't need to. I don't need to. I've
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: been listening to a lot of Ahsoka, cheers for life,
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: just music. I wouldn't typically got out of the trap
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: music game. Only I got to listen to something besides
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: trap music and NAIs R and B. That's been helping
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: my mental health a great deal. And a really slept
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: on component of what keeps me all together is doing
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: community service. There's a women's showter that I do community service,
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: and there are a ton of different community based organizations
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: that I like to donate my time to. And that's
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: actually something that's known to help with your mental health.
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: When you are a part of or a service to
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: a mission that is greater than you, that's known to
• 56:52
  Speaker 1: change your perspective. They're doing work with Saint Jude around
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: cancer research. It's known to change your perspective. Even starting
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: my own nun profit, it's been, man, it's been humbling, y'all.
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: It's been humbling to the point where I feel like,
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: and I said this in that speech about depression. It's
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: one thing to say that you have depression, and it's
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: one thing to circle the problem, but it's another thing
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: to have a solution. To it. It's another thing to
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: have a solution to it, to know that there's something
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: that you can do, something that's within your control to
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: help get you out of that tail space. And it's
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: not one thing that I do. It's a collection of
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: all those things, including going to see my therapist. That's
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: that's the that's the biggest thing that I do. I
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: stay in contact with my therapist, and I'm making sure
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: that I'm in touch with a licensed professional. That's not
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: only you know, affirming the things that I'm doing right,
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: but telling me what things in my blind space, what
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: I might be missing, what I might not be seeing. It's, man,
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: it's shout out to the to the bag of tools
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: that I deploy in order to keep my mind in
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: a good space. Because when I wasn't doing any of that,
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: I wasn't feeling good and life didn't feel good, and
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: life didn't life didn't feel good on my skin, it
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: didn't feel like it was mine, it didn't feel like
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: it was something that I deeply wanted, just something I
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: was kind of managing and surviving. And that's never going
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: to be a good feeling. And now that I know
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: what this feels like, I'm doing everything to make sure
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: that I don't have to go back there again. All
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: that if I do go back there, I know where
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: tool's deployed, so I don't have to stay there for
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: too long. Now, with all of that that I said,
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: there's another component to helping people through depression. And it's
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: one of the more contentious conversations that I have, especially
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: with people in black and brown communities, or even like
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: more rural or lower income white communities. They don't be
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: rocking either, and especially especially with black men. And that's
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: men's medications. And you can go to another podcast and
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: get a breakdown. You can go to YouTube university get
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: a breakdown of an SSR or SNR ride or MAOI.
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: It's different types of antidepressants, but it's whenever I mentioned medication,
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: some people feel like it's a betrayal to their own
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: like their own hood, spot their own gumption, their own
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: ability to make themselves well, which I don't agree with.
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: Some people feel like they'll become too dependent on the medication,
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: which is a good thing to talk to your doctor
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: about because they can give you some really comprehensive information
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: that can just make you more informed of how that
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: thing works. But if you need to take meds because
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: sometimes we act like meds are forbidden. If you need
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: to take meds because, oh, take your meds, big bri,
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: take your meds. We are in the age of miraculous
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: scientific advances. I know Black folk don't trust the medical system,
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: and the medical system don't deserve our trust. I ain't
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: gonna hold you. They've done everything wrong that they could
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: possibly do wrong. But science has given us a brilliant
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: gift of medicine, and it's there for a reason. And
• 1:00:07
  Speaker 1: if you've been feeling this way for a long time
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: word or what I said earlier, If you've been feeling
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: this way for a long time and that has not
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: changed no matter what you've been doing, I think that
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: medicine could be a good alternative for you, something to
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: talk to your doctor or your therapist or your psychiatric
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 1: nurse about. And if you don't like the way your
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: medicine makes you feel, tell your license health professional so
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: that they can give you other treatment options. Take your mads,
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: because oh, they there for a reason. It's okay. You
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: ain't betraying yourself. You're making sure that you're okay. That
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: self care and highest order one. I didn't want to
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: do this whole episode and not talk about mads just
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: because it's uncomfortable for folks to talk about. Don't mean
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: it ain't necessary. Take your mads, because oh take your mads.
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: They there for a reason, big dog. So let's land
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: this plain because I want you to jump inside of
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: your mind and body a little bit more comprehensively so
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: that you have better wherewithal you know what's going on
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: with you, because once you know the problem, you could
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: better figure out what the solution is going to be.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: So whenever you're around people or you're doing an activity,
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: I want you to do what I call a light
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: body scan. I want you to assess how you feel.
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: Do I feel lighter or do I feel heavier? After
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: leaving this activity or leaving these people. I want you
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: to do what I call a light body scan. So
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: do I feel lighter or do I feel heavier after
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: leaving these people? Do I feel more tense or do
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: I feel a little bit more free after leaving these people?
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: Does it feel like work or does it feel like pleasure?
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: Do I feel like my jaw is clingching? Do I
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: feel more tense or do I feel looser? These are
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: good things to just ask yourself. You don't necessarily to
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: write them down on journal, but just take inventory of
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: how you feel feel because that again is a warning sign.
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: It's a signal to let you know, perhaps this isn't
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: working for you. Even if it has in the past,
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 1: perhaps it's not anymore. And it gives you a real
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: good indicator of where you may be in this moment,
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 1: not just physically, but mentally and emotionally. Another thing, another
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: thing I want you to do is kind of do
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: simple tests to figure out what works for you. Because
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: out of all the things I said, all of that's
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: not gonna work for you, but I separate them into
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: different categories just so you can sample them. You know,
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: like how you go to the store and they might
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: have an orange chicken on a toothpick and you sample it.
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: You didn't buy the whole bag. You just try it
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: to decide whether or not you want more. So this
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: sampling is the same as that I want you to
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: do something movement based. So do something for your body.
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: Maybe you take a walk, maybe you take a jog,
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: maybe you do like a dance to some music, something
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: to get your heart rate up. Do something for your body,
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: move your boy, get the heart rate elevator, get the
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: blood pumped through the circulatory system, and then take inventory.
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: Does that work for me? How do I feel laughter?
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 1: Do I feel more rejuvenated? Do I feel more sluggish?
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: Do I feel different? Do I feel is it unremarkable
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: the way that I feel? Take that inventory after moving
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: your body. Number two is do something creative. I got
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: a coloring book on my iPad. I know that sounds crazy.
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: Coloring is bad relaxing for me. Do something creative. You
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: might want to write a verse to a song that
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: you like. You might want to actually build something. Do
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: a puzzle of any creative endeavor, anything that you could
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 1: think of, even something as simple as played in your
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: hand and making something. Don't have to be high effort.
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: Do it. See how you feel laughter. Number three, I
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: want you to do something that connects you with other people.
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: It could be a low effort hangout with friends. You're
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: not expected to bring a bottle and talk to a
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 1: whole bunch of people. Just meeting up and just talking,
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 1: or just sitting with somebody, or taking a walk with somebody.
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: I love walks and talks, meeting up with somebody for lunch,
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: and in person life, in person connective piece. I want
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: you to try that and see how you feel afterwards.
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: Make sure somebody who don't stress you out, man, make
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: sure somebody you don't feel like you have to perform
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: for who you could just relax and be yourself for
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: you can listen to them and they can listen to you,
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: and you're having an equivalent exchange between one another. Shout
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: out the Full Metal Alchemists. And lastly, this is something
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: I had to learn. This is especially for my work
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: from home folks, but even if you work in the office,
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: change your scenery wherever you work, typically go outside and work,
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: or lay on the floor in your living on and work,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: or get on top of your exercise bike, put your
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: laptop up and get the movie your legs so you
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 1: can get a two four one special. You could do
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: the first thing and this at the same time. Change
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 1: the environment around you and see what that does for you.
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: You don't have to always miraculously like in order to
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: change something. You don't have to burn everything that's existing
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: to the ground. Sometimes you just gotta make tiny tweaks
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: and give it if you try and see how you
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: like it. You don't have to like everything or benefit
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 1: from everything. But that's always a good sign because the
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: more things that you realize don't work for you, the
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: higher the likelihood is that you're moving towards something that
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 1: actually does. And if you do find a thing that
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: works for you, that's amazing. Let's add on top of
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: that so we can stack. You found something that works
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: for you moving your body cool. Let's find out something
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: that works for you communially with other people. You found
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 1: those two things outstanding, Let's figure out something that allows
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: you to have a change of scenery or to be
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: able to be in a different space throughout your day.
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: Something that I got to mention is the fact that
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 1: I need you to be aware of what isn't working
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: for you, or be aware of I think a better
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: way to say that is be aware of the things
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: that you avoid. More importantly, be aware of why you
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: avoid it. Does it challenge you in a way that
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: you find unexpected and maybe a way that don't feel good,
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 1: like it's unpleasantly unexpected or shocking. Is it a way
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 1: that challenges you to adjust in a way that doesn't
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: really vibe with who you are. Is it something that
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 1: triggers you, Is it something that brings back a painful
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: memory from the past. It's one thing to be avoidant
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: of something. I don't think being avoidant is inherently a
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: bad thing. But what's important is you know why you're
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: avoidant of that thing, because if that's the case, you
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 1: got more context. You're not just like I'm side stepping
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: this joint. You're like, I'm side stepping this because of ABCD.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: You know your why, and then you can you can
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: make sure that you move and maneuver your way around
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: similar things that bring up similar feelings. That's how you
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: get to know yourself better. That's how you get more
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 1: in tune with your mind and your body, and you're
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: able to be more congruent where the outside is reflective
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: of the inside and the inside is reflective of the outside,
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: because that's really how you find peace in your life.
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: As always, I appreciate y'all rocking with me. Y'all know
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: we've been building this community brick by brick, brick by
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: brick Son and we appreciate every last one of y'all. So,
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: if there's something you want to tell me, if you
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: agree with something and you want to share a story,
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: or if it made you think about something, especially if
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: you have a question for me, If you have anything
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: you want to ask me, I encourage you to do that.
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: I want you to go to learn the Hardwavepod dot com.
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: Leave me a voice node, ask your question, and we're
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: going to do a couple of episodes where we take
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: a bunch of them and we just we knock them out.
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: We're addressing your questions. We're community, man. This is what
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: this space was, this is what is made for. So
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: I encourage you to do that. Learn the Hardwavepod dot com.
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: Leave me a message. Yeah, I might ask some of
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: the chinks. I'm trying to answer all them joints. Only
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: the good ones though, so make sure it's a substance
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: and value. But yeah, drop me something. I love that.
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: In conclusion, depression doesn't always look like not eating and
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: laying in a bed all day and crying your eyes
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: out and having an inability to even get up and
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: take a shower. It can look that way, but it
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: may not look that way for you. I don't want
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: us to become overly dependent on these textbook symptoms to
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: decide whether or not we may be dealing with depressive
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 1: symptoms or depressive mood. You might be feeling dog tired,
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: just less energy, or you may be feeling a bitter
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: apathy towards things that you used to like, or you
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: just might not have the same zeal for life that
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: you used to and it might not be something you
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 1: could put your finger on. It might be inexplicable. Hear
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: me out, That's okay, that happens in life. What's more
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 1: important than beating yourself over the skull about the symptoms
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: is what you decide to do about them. And in
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: this episode, we talked about a lot of different options.
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: We talked about a lot of different treatment options. We
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 1: talked about a lot of different frame of minds that
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 1: you can jump in in order to make the path
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: between where you are and you want to be a
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: lot more clear. But overall, I think that we have
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 1: to be more aware of what's going on with us,
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 1: even when it's not ideal. I know you don't want
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: to be there, nobody wants to be there. But the
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 1: fact that you are there, the fact that you are
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: in a state of depression, or you may be in
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: a state of depression, that's saying something. And I think
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: that not only is that worth paying attention to, I
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: think you're worth paying attention to and if we don't
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: take care of these things in our life, we go
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: from building brick houses out of the lives that we live, maintain, create,
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: and man live within. They go from me and brick
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: houses to a house of cards. And a house of
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: cards is fragile because it seems like it's one unit
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: and then it's erect and standing up by itself. But
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: take away one piece and the whole thing ellapses. And
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: not only do I not want that for you, I
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 1: fully understand. I understand on the cellular level that it
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: doesn't even have to be that way. But it doesn't
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: matter what I understand. None of that matters. It matters
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: what you understand and what you act on and what
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: you feel deeply in your body. I want you to
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: take a moment after you finish this episode to check
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: in with yourself. Just see where you are, see how
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: you think and how you feel about everything that was
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: said today, what applies to you and what doesn't, what
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: maybe has in the past, what maybe what may in
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 1: the future, And I want you to just sit with it.
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: You don't necessarily have to change everything everywhere, all at once.
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: That's not how healing and change really works. Sometimes you
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: just need to make minor adjustments and don't learn the
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: hard way. That's what we're here for. We're here to
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 1: help you figure out how, when and why you should
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: make these minor adjustments. And I'll be here every week.
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 1: Every Thursday, we drop a new episode and we be
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 1: here to support you through it. Man, it's not just you,
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 1: It's not just me. It's not just your play cousin
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 1: or your mama, your little brother twice removed is it's
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: many of us, even those of us that don't realize it.
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: So here's to being more aware. Take care of yourself,
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: take care of the spaces around you, go where your
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: loved go, where you're celebrated. But most of all, man,
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 1: you've got to love and celebrate yourself. Til next time,
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 1: be good, job, well done, Learn the hard Way. As
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 1: a production of iHeart Podcasts, I'm your host Ker Gaines.
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: We're produced by Courtney Deans and Cason Alexander. Ashley. J.
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 1: Hobbs is our senior producer. Our executive producers are Will Packer,
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: Doctor Joey Harden, Bradford, Alex Balden, and Carla will Marris