Celebrating 10 Years of TU: Growth, Reflections & the Future (289)

to be in a secure related place is not to feel secure. It is to be able to be curious and discerning and to be able to challenge ourselves to feel discomfort and not disappear. And that's been a spiral, right? Like we're talking about like, and then we got to this place and then we, and this was not a linear evolution by any stretch, lots of flips, arguments, you know, debates, growth. And so I think we're just invading ourselves to reflect on that with everybody and to be transparent about our process and invite everyone else into it. So feeling discomfort of anything you've heard today brought you discomfort. But to stay in that and to not hear it as judgment, but to hear it that we're in there with you and that the questions are not devaluing anything, certainly not psychology. I feel such gratitude for our field right now. I feel like that we're going to be a grounding force therapist out there all over our grounding forces for the chaos that's around that you're speaking of and that we all need as therapists or as active listeners. We need to feel secure in ourselves by also having confidence that we're in all this community together and that we can look at ourselves with care and love and not shame and judgment. So I hope that's the message we're giving, that this has been our journey and we're still there and that we can question it and feel good about questioning it and still hold high value. Welcome to Therapist Uncensored. Building on decades of professional experience, this podcast tackles neurobiology, modern attachment and more in an honest way that's helpful in healing humans. Your session begins now with Dr. Ann Kelly and Sue Marriott. Hey, you guys. While we know relationships are wonderful, they are also really hard. Many of us believe that they shouldn't be, that if we have good connection and good communication, things will just go smoothly. But it's really that belief that can make us feel stubborn and even more hopeless. So relationships take work. It does for Sue and I. We can make it look easy. It's not. And one of the ways is because many of us, we differ. We differ in what activates us, what makes us feel threat, the expectation, and it's these differences that are held in our body, not our thoughts. And they influence how we talk, how we love, how we fight. So holding that belief, if he or she or they could just understand me, if they love me, they do something different, is not really true. And we're talking about relationships with your partner, your teenager, your mother-in-law. So Sue and I have created an online course that can help you understand and yourself and those you love in a different way. This is not just for therapists, it's for everyone. Although the good news is if you're a therapist, you can get CEs along the way and all of you can use the visuals and the worksheets individually, or you could even use them in your own private practice. So while the course is based on our book, Secure Relating, Holding Your Own in an Insecure World, it is definitely not a replication of the book. We talk directly to you. You learn how to understand more deeply your attachment, those you love, the neuroscience behind it, and how to build secure types of connections right now in your everyday relationships. Rather than changing one another, y'all can shift together in very important ways. It's very powerful. We're getting great reviews. Check it out. It's at therapistuncensored.com slash BAS. Therapistuncensored.com slash BAS. The BAS stands for Beyond Attachment Styles, the Science of Growing Secure Adult Relationships. And by the way, the cost of the course is about the amount of one individual therapy session. And yet you get hours and hours and hours of what we think is extremely valuable information. So check it out. Hey, everyone. Welcome back. Hi, Sue. Hey, Ann Kelly. It is fun to record with you again. It's been quite a while. Yeah, I'm excited to look back on last year and then also we're entering our 10th year of doing this podcast. I can't even believe it's been 10 years and I can't remember a time we didn't do it. Like it feels like both. It feels like it zipped by and man, have we been doing this a long time. Which is pretty remarkable. I know. And it's been really a privilege. You know, I don't mean to be all gooey to the major public in this, but like I feel so grateful to have been having this opportunity to do this with you for the last 10 years. And you know, you and I have changed a lot. Yeah, we have. Our relationship has grown. I think individually we've grown and a lot of that has to do with besides just life But one of the things I love about the podcast is that our community that listens to us. Hello I'm talking about you guys Keeps us accountable keeps us as engaged without you all there's no way we'd be sitting here and we I guess we want to launch this with just our real gratitude and appreciation Wow, I know this the ways that we've been encouraged and challenged and like how much content people bring to us too to say, have you thought about this? Have you seen that? And I think that's been one of the most fun parts about doing podcasting is getting a chance to get to know so many people in our community. And way beyond their local community. Yeah. All over the world. And you know, 10 years ago, I can remember when we were just birthing this thing. I remember just all the contemplation about what do we want to do? We both had that in common that we wanted to do something sort of bigger and broader and brainstorming. And part of my motivation is when we went to Dan Siegel, the Interpersonal Neurobiology Conference, and the challenge we got to have a broader reach to get this amazing content out of our office. Do you remember that? Yeah, I do. But I think we were already doing the podcast at that point. We were just at the German Asian. I think that was like 2015. And I remember on break. Maybe it was. Maybe we were just starting and it was like an incredible motivator. I don't think it was the cause, but it was like I just remember vibrating with excitement that because podcasting was brand new then. Remember, like hardly anybody knew what it was. And we were like, this is an avenue. We can do it this way. And the goal had been for both of us accessibility, that we got to do all these fancy trainings and had been in school and had been doing our own work and in expensive therapy ourselves. and only the people, the individual people that could, you know, find their way to our office could afford private therapy. It becomes all of a sudden, like we have all this resource and just a few people to impact. So I think we were both really inspired by getting, you know, this idea of accessibility and getting the word out wide. And, you know, we were green under the gills, I think about like, oh, we'll just tell everybody about all of this cool science, this life-changing science will make it accessible. Podcasting was supposed to be a great equalizer where that, like you said, anybody could, you know, with a passion about anything, Pez dispensers or whiskey and cats or whatever, could get on and share about their passion. And so it wasn't gatekept, we thought. And so it was completely equal access. You know, looking back a little bit naive, but enthusiastic launch. and I think another thing we're not like we just thought oh we'll share information everything we get we're just going to share and what the goal was is just to give all the information we had and it wasn't and that we can continue to train on and give out for free but we weren't engaged with it it was more of a sharing process we had no idea how much we had yet to learn in the journey right we were just going to learn and share and learn and share but we didn't know the podcast itself was going to be this incredible learning machine for us. Oh, totally. And, you know, again, just in the beginning, we, because both of us have been in practice for a long time, had had families, have kids, you know, like it's, it's had been in relationships and an out of relationships. And so we had, you know, our expertise and then, you know, we really, I think, headed out of the park by bridging our audience with the original authors, with the original researchers, with actual neuroscientists studying, you know, rats and amygdala and Sue Carter and who, you know, launched oxytocin, you know, and of course, all the names that you all know and familiar with that are important and big in the field, which was also such an honor to have a be a bridge to a wider audience for these a lot of them were scholars and that didn't get out and weren't on the speaking circuit so that was exciting yeah we could just sit and have conversations and deep conversations about their work or our thinking and how they related to one another and i know we've we've learned a lot and we're going to get there but in some ways it especially initially it did involve an equalizing element i mean i think about how many people wrote to us about like, I've never heard this stuff. Yeah. Oh yeah. A hundred percent. Right. Like I know that we've learned so much since then, but there was, that was part of the real excitement at the beginning. Like if I would have only known, how many, how many letters do we get? If I would have only known this win. And one of our goals also was to get out of such pathologizing language. And I think neurobiology helps us do this and attachment and our motivation to people like how people quit feeling like they're just so screwed up, you know, and totally, yeah, I feel so much better. I get it. That we could, you know, use our relationship on air and be very real about it instead of, you know, super academic and that they should know this already or something. So I think all of those things went really great. I'm kind of thinking of this as like the first big phase. And that lasted quite many years, but where that we got to meet people we wouldn't have otherwise met. We got closer with people that we already knew. Publishers, such as Norton and Rootledge, started sending us books, pre-release books. That was kind of super heady and fun to get to see what was coming out. We got to meet great people based on that. 100%. I don't know that we'd have run into many books had we not had those sent to us. And David Elliott, I think a bunch of books. Dackner. It's like if the story ended there, that would be great. But it didn't end there, did it? No, it did not. It's been a journey, just like every relationship, our relationship with the podcast, with our audience, and with ourselves really continued to grow. Right. So I kind of think of it as the reckoning. and for me I noticed that I began to have the same conversations and I kind of were wanting like yeah but um you know this is like I don't know I just I remember getting a little restless and I could begin to feel something was wrong but I didn't know what it was and I don't think that there was like a moment or anything but I began to feel like I knew less and less instead of I was the person in power and I'm going to share it. It was, you know, in our process of writing the book, it was the same thing. We really were looking. I think by then our eyes had been opened some to what we were missing. So let's talk a little bit about that, about what we were missing. About our unlearning, how we had to move our butts from expert to ignorant and novice. Publicly in front of everybody Yeah Let me tell you how much I know and that you need to learn to oh my God how I exposing how much I don know and how much my naivete and my privilege is blocked and how much our training has impacted the way we functioned and where that training came from. Totally. So we began to think in terms of, you know, the person who teaches what is to be taught. I'm not saying that well, but the speaker gets to define the science. And that has been true all along. And really, this isn't a diss on psychology or on mental health delivery, because it's really just a mirror of the larger system. But going all the way back to attachment even, you know, these are all theories that were born of Western, very educated, white, often men. And then what happens is you begin to get an idea of this is what human development is. And naturally you project that out into the world. And this is the thing that is healthy. And there wasn't enough representation of most of the world, you know, that the folks that are generating this science and even the subjects of the experiments are all, you know, a very small percentage of the population of the whole world. Mostly, I mean, how many of us that are out there that went to a four-year college and participated in a psychology class and had to sign up for that? I mean, that's our research subjects for so much of our knowledge about how human nature is and how attachment forms and what constitutes secure attachment. Yeah. And I'll tell you one moment I had this, this isn't even related to the podcast, but it was with Carol Gilligan and the Stone Center with their theory of, you know, instead of like independence to, I mean, I'm sorry, instead of dependence to independence as human growth, like that's what defines health, that it was this redefinition and really looking at this more spiral, circular, continuing to grow and need one another in different ways. So it wasn't from at all from dependence to independence, but it's this interdependence and how we impact one another. And that was one of those aha moments that, you know, what we had learned all along was all of a sudden cast in another light. Here's another weird example, random, but there was this thing about what we, you know, in the animal world where when you're looking at, say, for example, a herd of deer. And always the story has been there's a main dude, dude deer that, you know, once he moves, then the herd follows. And so he's the alpha and it just fit exactly our Western model, which is, you know, the buck led the way. He knows. And if you follow him, you'll be good. But women researchers began to watch the same herds of deers differently and started watching what was happening for an hour or so before the buck looked up and walked away. The gist of it was, you know, you're only going to go to your watering hole or your next destination. You know, there's not that many paths to take. And the deer would look up. And once enough began to look up and go in a certain direction, looking into a certain direction, it's like there was a critical mass. And once that started happening, so in other words, that the herd was signaling the buck and then the buck began to move. So when you look at it with a different lens, it's like, oh wait, this isn't just such a simple thing. And even kind of like egg and sperm, that the fastest sperm and gets there and the most aggressive one gets in and everybody else loses, that actually that isn't true, that the egg itself does this dance and chooses which one gets in. So all of these kind of like, oh my gosh, I've never thought of it that way. We began to think of it related to attachment and psychology and mental health delivery in general. Right. What we think our presumptions are, we just had to so step back. And that is the hardest thing to do. And not throw everything out. For sure. You know, not say this is wrong. It's not that. Well, and it's the growth of anything, right? If you're not growing, you're dying. And that needs to be in theory, that needs to be in ourselves, it needs to be in our relationships. And it's like this idea that we can question ourselves or question those that teach us. And that be seen as a positive thing, not a negative thing, like bring on the challenge. That's what we're supposed to do so that we can widen our lens and go, oh, that's what I have been taught, but that's what have been missing. Exactly. And then even if you think about our teachers, teachers are going to be also, you know, it gets very, very homogenous as far as what we're learning. And that's nobody's fault. There's no bad guy here. But then we began, I began to like feel like, oh my gosh, I started seeing myself through the eyes of who it was that we were trying to make this accessible to, which is just everybody else, you know, or, you know, like a wider lens. And when I started thinking about like our trans family, extended family, our folks that don't pass as white. You know, here we are comfortable. We're having this great time. We're having this party on the podcast. We were very likable. I think we were basically a bridge to what already was. So we're perpetuating a story that a lot of people have been left out of being able to narrate. And to have that kind of vulnerability to start to recognize that. How many times did we have this kind of feeling like of a cringe moment when we stopped to think about different people that we were meeting in different communities as we started to expand and started to really recognize, oh, my gosh, we've really been leaving so much off the table. Right. And it was hard. And it was hard because it wasn't like we were choosing between like a black author and a white author and we were choosing the white author. That was never happening. It was that the folks that got to our attention that was on the top of social media, that was on the top of conference brochures, that was on the top of citations were that homogenous. Yes, the head of trainings. It was that homogenous thing. So we actually began to really work to look outside the norm. and we worked to actively surface voices that weren't automatically going. And let's talk about podcasting just in general. You know, again, we start out like equity, accessibility, and podcasting is going to be a flat, even thing. All you need is a microphone. Anyone's going to do it. And then we went to, do you remember some of the first conferences that we went to? And it was like, well, I would say 92% male. Yeah. Would you agree? And very traditional male. Yes. And there was very limited speakers. I don't think there was a gay speaker or one. No. And I might be wrong about that, but I don't think so. Not out. Not out. Not like as part of the presentation or something. And it's amazing we got invited to speak. I think the only reason was because we ran into somebody and the guy who was doing it. And we had a really sweet conversation. And he was like, oh, y'all are top 10? Yeah, he recognized we were in the top 10, but actually that sweet conversation involved the fact that they have very limited diversity on their panel. I mean, it was a sweet but yet confrontational conversation. Oh, yeah, no, I made him uncomfortable. As I want to do. By the way, you do realize what's missing. But I was nice. I was like, we can help you out. We can help you with this problem you have that you don't know you have. And honestly, there's another big podcasting conference. There's some that are, I think, further ahead. Not podcasting, mental health conference that I think are 10 years back as far as when you look at their lineup. I'm not going to name names, but it really matters. So we began to really surface outside voices. And that was hard. I just want to, because as you say that, servicing outside voices means now we're having interviews and discussions in a way that also felt extremely vulnerable. Yep. Right. Because. We're nice white ladies. We're good guys. We don't want to get it wrong. We don't want to say the wrong thing. Yep. Yes. That was another enlightening part about how careful and then to learn how much that carefulness ended up being obnoxious in and of itself. Well, it's white privilege. It's like because I feel a little uncomfortable, I'm going to not do a thing or I'm going to start focusing on my discomfort. It's kind of like somebody didn't want to change their pronoun, didn't want to, you know, honor somebody's request to shift their pronoun. And they're like, well, it makes me uncomfortable. It's hard. It's work. And I'm like, are you freaking kidding me? You think it's hard to just shift a little bit of a tense versus, I mean, a pronoun versus, how do you think it is for them to be courageously showing up in the world in a non-traditional way? So, yeah, so our, so, and again, that was one of those shifts. It was like, oh, shit, my discomfort is not a big deal. I'm just so safe. I mean, I'm not really safe, but I think I'm safe. I have the privilege of assuming safety so much that even a little discomfort was intolerable initially. That's kind of why I wanted to slow that moment down because it was not a moment. It was a whole period of time. Well, it's probably not over, to be honest. Well, for sure. Right. But I think what I think about, I mean, even initially, right, to get out and do a podcast where so many therapists are listening, you know, we were excited if 100 people listened to us at the very beginning. Right. So when we started getting, you know, 300,000 listening for, you know, like if you stop to think about how smart and articulate, especially in Austin, all the therapists are and you run into. Shout out Austin, Texas. Yes. Oh, my God. You know, you go to a conference and there's just so many brilliant therapists. And if I was to stop and think about these individuals are listening and evaluating everything, I wouldn't have been able to do it. Right. Like I just kind of like, oh, I'm just going to go in and people can have the feelings that they're going to have. And that was for some reason easier to get out of my head than when we started moving into these directions where the vulnerability around race or gender or cisgender. Like I could remember feeling that that kind of anxiety in the whole process, I think. It was a journey. A lot of conversations. You're so right. um like to me I think the linchpin was instead of letting go of that I that I I mean I guess we said this one I guess I'm just echoing what you said letting go that I already know and letting myself interview these people from very different backgrounds from non-western backgrounds disabled autistic you know the whole route of just worlds that I'm less familiar with and letting myself make mistakes and live on air being corrected and then trying to model like, thank you for letting me know. I remember very early on, we got feedback that I had said something about, I'd call myself dumb or stupid or something like that. And we got a complaint that that was derogatory to folks. And I remember when I got it, it was pre enlightenment. And I thought, what are you talking about? I was talking about myself. Like, how could that be? And now I don't know who that person is. If you happen to be out there, I'm so sorry. I did not respond. I think I just didn't respond. I didn't do anything. I didn't inflate, which is inflammatory actually, but I didn't know how to respond and I felt defensive and I'm like, I wasn't even talking about anybody else. You know, I didn get it Now today I completely understand the point and somebody was trying to help me see that I was saying something that was offensive And one other example of us being really messy is this We haven ever talked about this on air but you know we had that whole we launched the book and we had a whole conference in Austin. And I had learned through the book process, you and I had learned so much about this topic that we're talking about now, about who's left out and how human development can look different. Even, for example, in the black culture, what is what is security and what is not security and it can look different and if you don't know that and you're working with child protective services or something and you start judging so we have this conference and you know we have this bright idea of like i wanted to teach some of that about the cultural differences but i thought i can't as a white person do that so we decided to bring in a couple of black therapists that were fantastic and it went you know it was mixed it was mixed it was Well, in my mind, what was going to happen is they were going to teach what I had in my mind about just what was being left out of the conversation of attachment. But I also didn't want to say this is what I want you to say. You know what I mean? Right. Right. And so it was more of like we just handed the mic, which also is something we've trained a model of like, I'm not trying to get you to, you know, I'm just off. I'm just sharing this big platform. And then they were beautiful. They did great. They talked about their experience, but it wasn't covering the stuff that I wanted to cover. And so it was just a really extremely public, awkward thing that was just like that was our learning curve. That's part of hearing what you said. OK, you know, we haven't talked about that, but I totally get your point because we because then I think the audience was like, why? What is happening? Right. And we had like really important material that was really important to make kind of to understand attachment from that lens and broadening it. And we thought that whole I know what you completely what you mean. We thought that section. But of course, they talked about whatever what they what felt relevant and important to them. I do remember that because then there was the, oh, my gosh, right? It kind of threw things off because there was still really important content that we needed to cover. It was so painful. That is so funny. We haven't talked about that, but I remember that feeling. That's just one super public, like what were we doing? We got off talking about podcasting, but we did talk about that first conference. But one of the things about podcasting we've learned now is that if you think about it, three quarters, at least three quarters of podcasts right now are who? It's white cis dudes with a lot of influence, with a lot of influence. And who do they invite on? White cis dudes that are like them. I mean, I'm saying this. This is actually true statistically. I'm not just whining about something. And even female led podcasts invite more male guests than female guests. And then, of course, that traditional stuff that what you're used to hearing, people want to listen to. And men are much better at saying, like, this is what you need to do. So, you know, if you're going to do that, this is how you need to do, like very authoritative. And you and I are not like that. But people are drawn to like, oh, yeah, tell me what to do. What are the three steps, man? Oh, God. Yeah. You're so buff. You look so good. You must be great. You know, and it's very appealing. It's appealing to me. We listen to that stuff, too. Oh, yeah. We were really into it. And when you go to podcast movement and things like that, we got to meet Andrew Huberman and, you know, the whole thing. So, yeah. How to grow your podcast. You know, do six habits to make it insight. Tell people what to do. take their anxiety away. And so, you know, that gets clicked, that gets recommended, money follows clicks. And all of a sudden, we're in this incredibly not flat podcasting world, you know, where discoverability and stuff like that is very difficult. So that was an awakening. Before you move to mental health, the thing about it is not just access. It's also the style of interviewing, you were mentioning how it's like the style is five easy hacks, but it's also could often be driven in a different way than I wanted. I remember my brother, we were driving home from Houston and he's like introducing me to Joe Rogan. I literally had not listened to Joe Rogan. This is years ago. And I'm like, why is he number one? I had no idea. So he said, let's listen to the podcast. And he was interviewing Amishi Jha and it was, I loved the topic. So I was like, okay, I want to hear it. Oh my God, I cannot tell you how pissed off I was by the end of it. He kept interrupting her. Not that I don't, I know I can be like, but what I felt like it was like this leading the witness to try to help a point be made about some products. And she was, I don't know, she had so many interesting things to say. I got home from that trip, I think around midnight and I went to my computers as one of the things I love about podcasting. And I looked her up. I didn't even know who she was at this point. She ended up being a professor at our daughter's university, but I didn't know that at this point and contacted her and said, come be on our podcast, would you? And I didn't say why. I just, I was listening to you and I really wanted to hear more and she jumped on, loved her. So it's not just the access, it's the manner at which podcasting, which I think it's grown a lot since then. I don't know about Joe in particular, but we have a lot of individuals that we listen to that do have a tendency to, you know, have a more relaxed nature to it. But I just remember being so stirred up. So you went and got her as a guest. She was actually a very popular guest. Yes. Yeah. She was wonderful. You did a wonderful job letting her talk. It was, it was fun, but I didn't tell her. I didn't tell her why I jumped on. Okay. Here's another thing that we have learned is that, you know, we're socialized as women, of course. And we initially were doing a whole lot of the, oh yeah, you know, all the stuff that our editor was just like, shut up. Lots of affirming statements, as I interrupt you. Lots of affirming statements, right? And that is so obnoxious in podcasting. I have to like sit on my hands. I can hear myself. Oh, I love that point. That's such a good point. Yeah. But yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So learning how to, yeah, even more learning how to let people speak, finish their thoughts. Yeah. It's been a learning curve. Oh, yeah. We're still. Yeah, yeah, yeah. For sure. As therapists, Sue and I both know the powerful impact of therapy. Well, we all do, or you wouldn't be a listener of Therapists Uncensored, but sometimes we need more and finding a psychiatrist, especially one that's well-qualified and has availability, can be so hard. You know, it's common to be on a waiting list for months. And with so much going on in the world, Sue and I, I'm so glad we've discovered talkiatry. Talkiatry is 100% online psychiatry. You see a medical provider who does comprehensive evaluations, diagnosis, and ongoing medication management for conditions like ADHD, anxiety, OCD, and more. So what I love is that all of their clinicians, while they're well-trained and are in network with major insurers, so you can use your existing insurance instead of paying either monthly prescriptions or the high out-of-network fees. So you have access to experienced licensed psychiatrists. They're going to take the time to do a personalized treatment plan. And if right, prescribe medications that's right for you. Good news is getting started only takes moments. You complete a short online assessment and it helps you get matched with, again, the clinician that meets your needs, schedule and insurance. And guess what? You can be seen in days, not months. So to get started, head to talkiatry.com slash tu. Complete the short assessment to get matched with an in-network psychiatrist in just a few minutes. So that's talkiatry, T-A-L-K-I-A-T-R-Y dot com slash tu to get matched in minutes. Okay, let's jump back in. What we're also saying is this sort of parallels the mental health profession in some ways, right? This isn't particular to anyone. I mean, it's the medical profession, et cetera, right? Right. And I think I had started talking about, yeah, just the split financially that can end up happening so that therapists that are charging more and seeing more private pay clients can afford the expensive certifications and leveling up and all the things that are very seductive and wonderful to do. And we're putting ourselves in that camp, right? We're not talking about therapists out there. 100%. That's the reckoning, right? That is the reckoning. That is the reckoning. But people who are working at nonprofits, at universities, at agencies that have a different idea about it. So, for example, just a – oh, wait. Now I'm interrupting myself. So first thought is that there is a tier, there can be a tier difference that gets wider and wider and wider as you go. Where that you start charging more and then you go to more training and then you're attracting a different clientele. Guess what kind of clientele, right? It's going to be probably more of the status quo. people that have been typically as a group financially able to pay a lot of money for 45 minutes or four you know and do that regularly it is you know the the population that we're serving gets smaller and smaller we're making more and more money that again that's not i'm not giving anybody a hard time that it mirrors what's happening in the world in the medical world in the medical world, yes. With attorneys, with just about what we're speaking of. Well, our culture, our culture. Yeah, the divide, the divide between access and non-access. So as we're sitting there talking about accessibility, yes, I 100% thank you for saying that, that we are part of the problem. We have benefited tremendously by being in private practice and by our zip code that we live in and so many privileges that have come to us unearned. And that has also been a sticking point because it's like, what do we have to say about this? Because, you know, we didn't want to be the liberal white woman trope of trying to do good, but really, you know, a Karen or something. Yet at the same time, we have a platform. So we really began to think in terms of we've already mentioned surfacing outside voices. I think all along we had done pretty well with the inviting women. I haven't done any kind of account, but I can tell you that I think for both of us, we've intentionally really sought out not the mainstream voices. Part of what you're saying is that, like, again, going back, this is not just in the therapeutic world and just with us. And I think, you know, it's not like we just started reckoning with that. I think we reckon, you know, that was part of the reason we started the podcast, right? Like if we can do this in our private practice, then we can't because we said that podcasting is an equalizer because anybody can turn a microphone on. Podcasting is expensive and takes a lot of time. So in reality, you have to have the ability to keep it going in order to be successful. Right. Like we started taking sponsors. We were really controversial about that. And that doesn't it doesn't support us. Right. Like the truth be told, I mean, it helps for sure. But that adds to this idea, like what other ways are people out there contributing and integrating in a broader way? We're not saying that being in private practice bad, being in community good, both are important aspects of our field. It's understanding and recognizing the impact, though, without judgment, but with insight and not splitting ourselves with judgment between bad and good. Those in private practice bad Those like you know we both did systemic work for many years and me and the juvenile justice system so like you know you called it the reckoning in and by the way you called it the reckoning i believe in this very beautiful article that you sent out in our newsletter so if you didn't have access to that you know right katherine no no it'll be well and it'll be in the show notes oh it'll be in the show notes read it it's it's it's so beautifully written i know that i am biased But I am telling you, you will appreciate reading this so articulate and well-written. And it just was very meaningful. And I was very grateful. No, I mean it. It's very sweet. But you called it the reckoning. And the reckoning isn't, right? Like I think, and especially in today's day and time, right? We talk about the liberal left, the whatever, right? The reckoning is not about judging anyone along this continuum. It's about all of us reflecting, no matter what we do out there in the world, what positions we have, whether we're therapists or nurses or physical therapists or anybody, like where does this sit? And then how do you challenge the system? How do you use your privilege in a way that's super important? How do you broaden your influence for those that don't have access so that you serve both populations if you can? Like it's just a reckoning for us to think more deeply. if you're listening and you're a therapist and you don't think about this a lot it's an invitation to kind of light a fire a little bit and to push you right if you're too that was part of what happened with Anna and I we got too comfortable and it was there's something about it that was too easy and it began to feel kind of vanilla like we were saying the same things so instead of just teaching for example polyvagal theory or whatever which is great it's still good but looking at what are you know what about autism and polyvagal? Or what about, you know, the specific things and really thinking in terms of widening perspective and thinking about your fee and thinking about who's being left out. And there are lots of creative ways to both continue your practice, but also to kind of wake up to this widened world. And you and I certainly haven't figured it out so far, but you mentioned sponsors and ads. So one of the things we definitely wanted to not just be rhetoric, you know, what's the actions that we're taking. So for the last 10 years, we've, we've donated at least half of our ad revenue to organizations and agencies and sometimes private individuals, honestly, that provided access to mental health care for those that have been traditionally been excluded. That we live in this patriarchal, overtly racist, community and country. And that's just so obvious right now with everything that's happening, just so blatantly obvious. And we are a part of that. So the reckoning you're talking about is both, you know, not just feeling bad for somebody, but like, no, how are you contributing to the problem? And so you and I are still reckoning with that. And then what can we do about it? So half the ad revenue, I think that we have a number of 90,000. Which is an underestimate, I believe. Yeah, I think it's an underestimate because I didn't want it to not be true, but almost $91,000, I think, that we've counted that we have given to all kinds of organizations that, you know, really reach out. They train BIPOC therapists specifically for trans community who are just so under attack right now as well. Unhoused musicians, you know, those are also kind of outsiders, artists, and really thinking about their mental health care. And you can see if you're interested in that at therapistuncensored.com backslash donations, you'll see a page of all of those organizations. We hope that you support those or that you support something locally if you're able to do. And I love what Tim Waltz said about what's going on right now. It's like we've got to show up. We've got to do something, even if that is shoveling the snow off your neighbor's driveway, that we really want you to go into action. and also not feel bad that sometimes we just get into normal routine, even with everything's falling all down around us. Like sometimes, you know, we've got to handle our nervous system and doing something predictable, you know, that's one thing. So we want to be able to handle things and take care of things. And normalcy can sometimes do that. But we also want to push everybody into action in their own way. And then we're pushing ourselves, I promise you. And to do something, and particularly if you're not sure, to do something local because that's much easier to kind of tap into, into your neighborhood, into your city, into your state, volunteering for a campaign. There's so many things. Just help, you know, checking on a neighbor, checking on somebody you haven't heard from in a while. We need each other. Our whole mission has been about spreading the word about secure relating and how contagious it is to be in your safe mode, which is in your authentic self. It's in your, you know, ventral vagal green zone, as you and I call it, that as we really protect that and try to stay there, that doesn't mean being nice. It really is a way of being bold, seeing truth, including truth in ourselves and how we can be too comfortable. Well, I like what you're saying at the very, at the, I mean, everything you just said, I liked. Thank you for that affirming statement. it. Like a good woman. Oh, now you made me forget my point. No, wait, give me a second. This has also been 10 years, right? It's a little bit more weight. I got to hold my point. I think what's important is you're giving lots of examples of how to invite yourself into a secure place to to get go into action but and and security and secure relating like i think that's what we're trying to represent and what you did in your your blog and what we're trying to represent with the book and with the course and with the podcast well in this tenure specifically yes and the podcast but this 10-year kind of retrospective thinking and that is to be in a secure related place is not to feel secure. It is to be able to be curious and discerning and to be able to challenge ourselves to feel discomfort and not disappear. And that's been a spiral, right? Like we're talking about like, and then we got to this place and then we, and this was not a linear evolution by any stretch, lots of flips, arguments, you know, debates, growth. And so I think we're just invading ourselves to reflect on that with everybody and to be transparent about our process and invite everyone else into it. So feeling discomfort, if anything you've heard today brought you discomfort, but to stay in that and to not hear it as judgment, but to hear it that we're in there with you and that the questions are not devaluing anything, certainly not psychology. I feel such gratitude for our field right now. I feel like that we're going to be a grounding force therapist out there. All over are grounding forces for the chaos that's around that you're speaking of and that we all need as therapists or as active listeners. We need to feel secure in ourselves by also having confidence that we're in all this community together and that we can look at ourselves with care and love and not shame and judgment. So I hope that's the message we're giving that this has been our journey and we're still there and that we can question it and feel good about questioning it and still hold high value. That sounds great. I agree with everything that you said. And if this is of value to you, we really want, you know, we have kind of not asked a lot, I think. And so, you know, it would be a great time for you to go on and give us a rating, a review that helps other people find us. Become a Patreon member. That's right. Therapistsuncensored.com. Join as little as $5 a month. You can become part of this community. You get extra resources and access to training, you know, a little bit of early access to some of the trainings that we do occasionally. And really, it's just to support this work. And by the only way that we've been able to give away half of our corporate money is literally the only way is that we've had patrons just in these small donations supporting us so that we could just basically the corporate stuff pays for our very small team. And then that's it. So it's great. And I want to do – you did this in the beginning. I want to – as we're wrapping up, I want to echo this. It's like this 10 years has been about this community and it is so enriching. Like we have these different meetings. For those of you that have done the course, we've got a live presentation coming up, a live Q&A. Come join us. But, oh, my God, we have the best listeners ever that have challenged us and cheered us on and been part of it. And it feels like one great team. It doesn't feel like the Sue and Ann thing. It feels like all of us together, all of our just the people that have taken the time to be on our show, how much gratitude I feel for that and how much privilege to get to engage in conversations with so many amazing people out there. So I think in this tenure and then what's next kind of feeling is we just want to also express gratitude and that as we go through this journey of what's next for us, we're still figuring it out. Like we've got some great stuff coming for you this year. Yeah, before we say that, I really responded when you said, you know, you brought in the course. And it's like, hey, you know. So it's funny because this is us holding ourselves accountable. Like, oh, here we are. Now we're mentioning our course, which is a paid course. And how is that not marketing or using these relationships for us to make money? These are things that we think about a lot in the book and the things that we do. And this is part of our solution was we're going to just keep sharing the mic and trying to walk the walk and giving the money away as much as we can so that this isn't about us becoming wealthy or anything like that. We're still both working full time. Yeah, so it's really a labor of love. But I want to just call that out because it can seem funky. If we don't name it. If we don't name it. But having said that, I will say that this course is, I think, a really good, comprehensive, if you need CEs, it's six CEs. And if you don't, then that's fine, too. It's very accessible for everybody. And we've gotten such great feedback. And what Ann was just mentioning is we meet periodically live with anybody that's taken the course. And also, we've begun to include our patrons. so if you do join you can join this live q a and the conversations will be you know right up your alley because you'll be a you'll be a neuro nerd and you'll meet all these incredibly cool people that are really into this and into their personal growth and using this material to be more secure and make the world a better place and and uh you know create these ripples of security that we talk about well and out of that they've created ripples of their own groups that are free and collective and they meet and they do book clubs or they continue to talk about secure relating that's all free we've got one group that went and did a vacation together i think it was like 10 women or something like that it was yeah it was a reading group that had been together reading group that had yeah so all kinds of fun ways to connect if you're interested all right well um like i said uh share uh rate review that helps us be found and thank you thank you. Thank you. All right. Thanks for joining us and we'll see you around the bin. Therapist Uncensored is Ann Kelly and Sue Marriott. This podcast is edited by Jack Anderson.