Podcasts about fresh outlook

When big changes happened in Caleb Wilson-Johnson's life, his reading life shifted, too. Today, he's eager for Anne's suggestions after two exciting changes derailed his previous strategy of choosing his next read. Caleb used to love planning his entire reading year in advance, and especially enjoyed pairing books with the season—sometimes down to the specific month or even day. But Caleb recently got married and moved across the state to live with his new husband. Both of these joyful events shook up his previous reading routine. Caleb's interested in exploring what a new path forward might look like as he enjoys these other new starts in his life. Today, Caleb and Anne explore how Caleb can bring a fresh outlook to planning his upcoming reads, and Anne recommends a handful of engaging and plotty books that will keep Caleb reading until the last page. Find all of the titles we discussed today on our show notes page at whatshouldireadnextpodcast.com/426 Our 13th annual Summer Reading Guide is only a few weeks away from landing in inboxes, and we'd love to invite you to join us for this year's book party. We'll be hosting two live events, both on May 16th, and you're invited. Get all of the details and find out how to get your guide at our at modernmrsdarcy.com/srg. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A Fresh Outlook Psalm 36:9

A Fresh Outlook Psalm 36:9

Transform Your Reality: Unlock a Fresh Outlook on Life by Changing Your Worldview!

Welcome to our Podcast #2,747! Here's a link to our Costa Rica Pura Vida Amazon Products Store! Happy Shopping! https://www.costaricagoodnewsreport.com/costaricaproductsamazon.html We appreciate your listening and hope you find the time to go through the 100's of episodes that we have recorded already. They're short, so listen to a few every day! I promise you will learn all you need to know about one of the happiest countries on the planet! Here's some links that will get you started in learning more about Costa Rica! If you're thinking about moving to Costa Rica, we can assist! Visit "Royal Palms Costa Rica Real Estate". . we are DEDICATED BUYER'S AGENTS. Check out our website at www.costaricaimmigrationandmovingexperts.com/buyersagent.html Here's our NEW Costa Rica Good News Report YouTube Channel. Over 350 Short, Entertaining Videos that will get you excited about Costa Rica: https://www.youtube.com/@thecostaricagoodnewsreport/videos Check out an amazing travel website catering to those travelers age 50 and over! Dozens of incredible expert contributors writing about so many destinations: https://www.travelawaits.com/ Here's our 1st contribution to the TravelAwaits website: https://www.travelawaits.com/2789789/questions-to-ask-if-thinking-about-retiring-in-costa-rica/ Here's a link to our 2nd article on the TravelAwaits website as promised: https://www.travelawaits.com/2798638/tips-for-driving-in-costa-rica/ Here's a link to our 3rd article on the TravelAwaits website: https://www.travelawaits.com/2794704/how-to-gain-residency-status-in-costa-rica/ Check out our NEW COSTA RICA LOVE STORIES! There's ONE THING BETTER than falling in love. . falling in love in COSTA RICA! Here's the link: https://www.costaricagoodnewsreport.com/lovestories.html So many GOOD-NEWS stories coming out of Costa Rica. We'd love to share them with all of you! Way over 100 stories ready right now. Learn all about one if the Happiest Countries on the Planet. . Costa Rica! Here's a link: https://vocal.media/authors/skip-licht Become a "COSTA RICA PURA VIDA" Brand Ambassador & Share the LIFESTYLE with EVERYONE! Here's the link: https://www.costaricagoodnewsreport.com/brandambassador.html --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/costa-rica-pura-vida/message

Dustin Lehrke joins Sam in this episode of Fall Risk, to talk about his time so far in the sport of skydiving. Additionally, he also provides some insight into what the life of a rookie skydiver is like, and reminds us all about what it was like to start out in skydiving as a student--something some of us haver perhaps forgotten over the years.

Laura Thweatt is back on the show! She was first on this podcast back in May of 2020 on episode 247. Laura just announced that she is running the Boston Marathon. She is a 2:25 marathoner. She placed 5th at the Olympic Trials in Atlanta. This past fall, she had a disappointing race at the ... more »

Longtime Central Illinois musician and bandleader Marc Boon said his marriage that brought kids into his orbit for the first time melted the selfishness away.

Longtime Central Illinois musician and bandleader Marc Boon said his marriage that brought kids into his orbit for the first time melted the selfishness away.

Are you ready to live a life you love?Today on the Black Women Rising Podcast, we sat down with author, inspirational speaker, and life and relationship coach Fila Antwine. In this episode, Fila talks about the value and importance of familia female relationships, healing internal battles regarding self-care, and emotional wellness. A big part of Fila's vision for teaching Sacred Self-Care is to help you rediscover your dreams by teaching you how to reconnect with yourself so that you can have deep love, joy, freedom, and fulfillment on a sacred level and actually live a life you love.Key Discussion Points From This Episode Include:[00:02:58] The Value of Familia Female Relationships[00:04:31] Fila's Most Treasured Thing in Life[00:05:56] How to Get Over Internal Battles[00:08:33] Fila's Personal Philosophy[00:10:42] Fila's Greatest Accomplishment[00:13:47] Emotional Wellness Coaching[00:19:28] Fila's Vision For Her Clients[00:23:25] Incorporating Self-Care When Overwhelmed[00:28:43] Tips For Working Wives and Mothers to Put Themselves First[00:24:28] Fila's Black Girl MagicFila Antwine is an award winning Emotional Wellness, Worthiness, and Relationship Coach. She is an individual who serves her fellow human beings with compassion, intellect, and true understanding. Fila's lifelong mission has been to help others triumph over tragedy, just as she has accomplished herself; overcoming childhood abuse to become who she is today: a happily married wife, proud mother of two wonderful children, and an adviser to countless women seeking lives of greater hope and fulfillment. Fila Antwine is the author of two important books: “Strengthening Her Essence: A Woman's Guide To Liberation Through Truth” and a special work for children promoting diversity and confidence called “Curiously Coiled”. Today Fila is an acclaimed life coach and the founder of the Sacred Queen Academy; an online coaching community that offers healing, holistic, spiritual, confidence-building classes, programs, and talks for women emphasizing self-care and healthy relationships. The Wall Street Journal, New York Post, Huffington Post, MSN, The New York State Senate and the Emmy-winning talk show “Fresh Outlook” have all recognized her expertise and ability to help others overcome personal challenges in life. Fila has always believed in the dignity and worth of every human being and that gender equity is essential to a thriving society. She is an inspiring leader to both men and women.Connect with Fila:Instagram: @sheisfilaWebsite: www.filaantwine.com Facebook: Fila Antwine | FacebookSupport the show (https://www.buymeacoffee.com/BlkWomenRising)

Over the last few years renowned choreographer Michael Parmenter has shifted his focus from contemporary dance to the realm of participatory social dancing.

Over the last few years renowned choreographer Michael Parmenter has shifted his focus from contemporary dance to the realm of participatory social dancing.

I need to thank the Commission of Vinho Verde for hosting this trip to the region and setting up such wonderful experiences that really gave a 360˚ view of this region. Photo: ©Wine For Normal People, Vineyards of Aveleda After talking about a wonderful tasting at Graham's Port Lodge in Vila Nova di Gaia (across the Douro from Porto) and Quinta do Noval, we discuss some important things about Vinho Verde that augment Episode 291 from my time there. This show is not about the base tier wines – fizzy, cheap and cheerful versions, but about the premium wines that are single grape varieties and made in interesting ways. It's a look into the diversity that Vinho Verde has to offer, beyond what you may know!   We discuss some key points on Vinho Verde: There are nine subregions (see below for more detail). Depending on whether they are in the north or the south, closer to the Atlantic or inland, styles and grapes vary enormously.   We talk about the thing that wowed me the most: how very different the aromas and flavors of wines of this region are based on the soil they grow on – granite v. schist   We discuss the main grapes and their general flavor profiles: Loureiro: A grape with herbal bitterness, that's floral, and creamy. It's the top grape of coastal areas. Arinto: The MVP that adds acidity and minerality to blends, this is the base of most Vinho Verde sparkling wine. Trajadura: Although very light in flavor with low acidity, it adds body to blends. I found it tastes like stems – woody but not oaky. It's great with Loureiro and Alvarinho. Alvarinho: The same grape as Albariño from Rias Baixas on the western coast of Spain. Here the grape seems more tropical, but more acidic because unlike the Spanish, the producers in Vinho Verde do not put the wine through malo-lactic fermentation so the acidity is a bit sharper. The grape is from this region and interesting versions show rosemary and other savory herbal notes with salinity. We discuss the various permutations of the grape – there is experimentation with oak, amphora, eggs (stainless steel and concrete), and extended skin contact and what those versions are like. Avesso: An unusual grape, it represents only 2-3% of production because it is so tricky to grow. When it is good it is like pears, red apple, flowers and the texture is creamy, even though it doesn't undergo malolactic fermentation. It's a grape/wine worth seeking out. Azal: A rare grape grown only in some of the subregions, it is like citrus and herbs. It is usually marked for blending but the varietal wines are high in minerality and acidity and not short on fruit flavor. Photo: ©Wine For Normal People, Arinto Grape in Sousa And the reds: Vinhão: In its best form smells good – like incense, violets and lilies, but I found it can also smell like goat poop, band-aid, and dirt. It is lower in alcohol and very acidic (some versions are tannic). An inky, light style red with lots of flavor, this is really a local wine, made in a very local style, not for broader consumption. It is used in rosé but often blended with Touriga Nacional, the famed grape of the Douro/Port. Espadeiro: Another hard to grow grape, it is late ripening and tastes of strawberry and cherry. It is used for rosé. As well. Touriga Nacional: A lighter version of Portugal's star grape from just over the mountains in the Douro.     Regions and their main grapes: Lima: Herbal, fresh and grassy Loureiro is their wine. The wines are lovely.     Ave: Both single variety wines and blends of Loureiro, Arinto, Trajadura, Alvarinho. The Alvarinho + Trajadura blend is common and produces green herb, tangerine notes. Producer: Sao Giao     Cavado: Similar to Lima, with fresh Loureiro and some Arinto for very acidic sparkling wine, Alvarinho that is peachy, floral and acidic.     Sousa specializes in floral, talc-like and acidic Loureiro , Arinto for sparkling and for blending to add body to Loureiro, Alvarinho as the more serious wine that has lime and flint notes, and Trajadura, which is light and rounds out blends. Producers: Quinta da Lixa, Quinta das Arcas (Arca Nova) Photo: ©Wine For Normal People, Quinta das Arcas in Sousa  Amarante is in the southeast. It makes a lot of different grapes but we focused on the Avesso grape, which is floral, like pears and red apples, bready (from lees contact) and creamy, as is the nature of the grape.  I love this grape, it belongs in the full whites category with Rhone whites, Priorat whites, Verdejo, and Fiano. Producers: A&B Valley Wines, Curvos     Basto is in the southeast as well, with Douro on the other side of the mountains. Avesso, Arinto, Azal, and Alvarinho are the main grapes. Azal is a rare grape that is acidic with green apple, citrus, herbal, lemon, grass, mineral notes and and acidic yet savory quality. (I mention that only about 10 -15 pure Azals made in the world, Quinta da Razas in one of them). Producer: Quinta da Razas   Photo: ©Wine For Normal People, Harvest team at Quinta da Raza in Basto Monçao e Melgaço  is the home of Alvarinho! There is traditional Alvarinho and then there is so much experimentation with the grape that flaovrs range enormously. The standard bearers show tropical fruit, lime, and floral notes with characteristic strong acidity because the wines don't go through malolactic fermentation. Granite v schist soils make a difference and any number of styles from sparkling to oak aged, to amphora aged to skin contact wines are being made. Producers: Soalheiro, Adega de Monçao, Quinta da Santiago.   I did not visit the subregions of Paiva and Baiao so we don't discuss them in the show, but they are in the south and specialize in Arinto, Avesso, Azal, with some Loureiro.   All in all it was a lovely trip! The producers are open to the public, so it's an easy and fun few days to plan if you love white wines and want to learn something new!   _____________________________ Thanks for our sponsors this week: Wine Access: Access to the best wines for the best prices! For 15% off your next order, go to www.wineaccess.com/normal   To become a member of Patreon go to www.patreon.com/winefornormalpeople     To register for an AWESOME, LIVE WFNP class with Elizabeth go to: www.winefornormalpeople.com/classes

A Real Estate Broker Associate with Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Huntington Beach, California, Jeb Smith offers his clients the benefits of his more than 15 years of experience in real estate and mortgage lending. He has handled many complex transactions for his clients, including short sales, bank-owned properties, and luxury residential properties. While he was at Re/Max, his previous company, Smith successfully handled a large number of transactions, which helped him to achieve memberships in the Platinum and 100 percent clubs. Smith is a graduate of the realtor institute.Jeb Smith has a work philosophy that is centered around his clients. He strongly believes that his clients should be his top priority and works to provide them with exceptional service at all times. Smith relies on his extensive knowledge and his understanding of both the real estate and mortgage lending industries in order to secure the best results possible for his clients. His attention to detail and service focus combine to make him an asset to both buyers and sellers. In order to offer the most help to his clients, Smith stays current with market trends so that he can make the best recommendations possible. Smith believes that it is important to develop long-lasting relationships with his clients, and he makes himself available whenever they have questions. In our conversation, we discussed:Perspective on what we're seeing in today's real estate marketplaceWhat is 121 exclusion?Overview on the structure of Deferred Sales TrustLack of supply for buyersProviding feedback and guidance on clientsLove the show? Subscribe, rate, review, and share!Here's How »Join the Capital Gains Tax Solutions Community today:capitalgainstaxsolutions.comCapital Gains Tax Solutions FacebookCapital Gains Tax Solutions Twitter

A Real Estate Broker Associate with Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Huntington Beach, California, Jeb Smith offers his clients the benefits of his more than 15 years of experience in real estate and mortgage lending. He has handled many complex transactions for his clients, including short sales, bank-owned properties, and luxury residential properties. While he was at Re/Max, his previous company, Smith successfully handled a large number of transactions, which helped him to achieve memberships in the Platinum and 100 percent clubs. Smith is a graduate of the realtor institute.Jeb Smith has a work philosophy that is centered around his clients. He strongly believes that his clients should be his top priority and works to provide them with exceptional service at all times. Smith relies on his extensive knowledge and his understanding of both the real estate and mortgage lending industries to secure the best results possible for his clients. His attention to detail and service focus combine to make him an asset to both buyers and sellers. To offer the most help to his clients, Smith stays current with market trends so that he can make the best recommendations possible. Smith believes that it is important to develop long-lasting relationships with his clients, and he makes himself available whenever they have questions.Love the show? Subscribe, rate, review, and share!Here's How »Join the Expert CRE Community today:expertCREsecrets.comeXpert CRE Secrets FacebookeXpert CRE Secrets Youtube

On this episode, Anthony and Nicolas had the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Barna Donovan. Dr. Donovan has authored three books and has been featured on BBC, One on One with Steve Adubato, Variety, Yahoo News, CNBC, MSNBC, CBS News, NBC News, Forbes, HLN.com, LiveScience, Science and U, Fresh Outlook, and in various publications from Europe to Latin America. He did his undergraduate studies in communication at Loyola University of Chicago, earned a Master's degree from the film school of the University of Miami, and earned his doctorate from Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey. In their conversation, Dr. Donovan discussed how important branding is for both companies and individuals. He goes on to explain how your public image can make or break you. Connect with us on other platforms here: stanwith.me/commoncentsfinance Dr. Donovan's Books: The Asian Influence on Hollywood Action Films (McFarland, 2008) Blood, Guns, and Testosterone: Action Films, Audiences, and a Thirst for Violence (Scarecrow Press, 2010) Conspiracy Films: A Tour of Dark Places in the American Conscious (McFarland, 2011) --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/common-cents-finance/support

In the Absa Insights podcast series, The Money Show's Bruce Whitfield engages in conversation with the bank's sector experts about investment possibilities in Agriculture, Consumer Goods and Services, Enterprise Supply Development and Telecommunications, Public Sector, and Natural Resources and Energy. In this episode: Is Public Private Partnerships the key to unlocking South Africa's agricultural potential? For more visit http://cib.absa.africa   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

SUMMARY If you're wearing a mask to hide mental health challenges, why not swap it for a superhero cape and brainpowers so strong they're sure to save the day! Sharon Blady, PhD (comic book geek, former Manitoba Minister of Health, founder of Speak Up: Mental Health Advocates) and Dr. Simon Trepel (a psychiatrist and member of Sharon's treatment team) openly talk about Sharon's multiple diagnoses, what's helping her heal, and how you, too, can embrace neurodiversity and load your mental health toolkit with superpower solutions. They also touch on the impacts of stigma and childhood trauma on mental health, the effects of COVID-19, the need for resilience, and the importance of strong doctor/patient relationships. TAKEAWAYS This podcast will help you understand: Personal experiences from a person with multiple mental illness diagnoses, and those same experiences from the vantage point of her psychiatrist An individual's experiences with post-partum depression, ADHD, OCD, Bipolar 2, and suicidal ideation Challenges and opportunities associated with multiple diagnoses Mental health “superpowers” and how they can help promote personal healing and support others Superhero Toolkit Benefits of neurodiversity (seeing that brain differences such as ADHD and autism are not deficits) Impacts of stigma (structural, public, and private) and reducing its negative effects “Resilience” from personal, professional, and community perspectives Impacts of COVID-19 on mental health Doctor/patient relationships and what makes them work   SPONSOR The Social Planning & Research Council of British Columbia (SPARC BC) is a leader in applied social research, social policy analysis, and community development approaches to social justice. The SPARC team supports the council's 16,000 members, and works with communities to build a just and healthy society for all. THANK YOU for supporting the HEADS UP! Community Mental Health Summit and the HEADS UP! Community Mental Health Podcast.   RESOURCES Speak Up: Mental Health Advocates Inc. Embrace Your Superpowers program Managing Multiple Diagnoses of Mental Illnesses The Importance of a Complete Diagnosis: Managing Multiple Mental Illnesses Neurodiversity in the Modern Workplace   GUESTS  Sharon Blady, PhD Sharon Blady is former Minister of Health and Minister of Healthy Living for the Province of Manitoba, an academic, and a comic book geek turned mental health superhero who empowers others with her fandom-based Embrace Your Superpowers program. Using her lived experience of multiple mental health and neurodiversity diagnoses, she helps others better understand and achieve improved mental health and well-being. Her diagnoses became a source of strength – Superpowers – which she harnessed and directed for personal, organizational, and community growth. Sharon's life experiences range from being a single mom on social assistance, to being responsible for a $6-billion health department budget. She is a survivor of domestic violence, cancer, and suicide, along with being a published author, entrepreneur, and public speaker. Email: sharon@speak-up.co Phone: 204-899-4731 Website: www.speak-up.co Facebook: @SpeakUpMHA Twitter: @SpeakUp_MHA & @sharonblady Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharon-blady/ & https://www.linkedin.com/company/speak-up-mha Simon Trepel, MD, FRCPC Simon Trepel is a child and adolescent psychiatrist with more than a decade of experience assessing and treating kids and teens. He is an Assistant Professor at the University of Manitoba, where he teaches medical students, residents, psychiatrists, pediatricians, and family doctors. Simon is also a clinical psychiatrist with the Intensive Community Reintegration Service at the Manitoba Adolescent Treatment Center. Simon is co-founder and consulting psychiatrist for the Gender Dysphoria Assessment and Action for Youth clinic, and consulting psychiatrist for the Pediatric Adolescent Satellite Clinic, where he primarily works with children and adolescents in Child and Family Services care.​ Simon has worked with Vital Statistics as well as Manitoba school divisions providing his expertise in child and adolescent gender dysphoria. He has spoken to audiences on a range of topics, including gender dysphoria, video game addiction, anxiety, attention deficit disorder, and neuroplasticity.​ Websites: https://matc.ca/ (Manitoba Adolescent Treatment Center) Email: sptrepel@gmail.com Twitter: www.twitter.com/simontrepel LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/simon-trepel-md-619a76b8/   HOST Jo de Vries is a community education and engagement specialist with 30 years of experience helping local governments in British Columbia connect with their citizens about important sustainability issues. In 2006, she established the Fresh Outlook Foundation (FOF) to “inspire community conversations for sustainable change.” FOF's highly acclaimed events include Building SustainABLE Communities conferences, Reel Change SustainAbility Film Fest, Eco-Blast Kids' Camps, CommUnity Innovation Lab, Breakfast of Champions, and Women 4 SustainAbility. FOF's newest ventures are the HEADS UP! Community Mental Health Summit and HEADS UP! Community Mental Health Podcast. Website: Fresh Outlook Foundation Phone: 250-300-8797   PLAY IT FORWARD The move from mental health challenge to optimal restoration becomes possible as more people learn about various healing challenges, successes, and opportunities. To that end, please share this podcast with anyone who has an interest or stake in the future of mental health for individuals, families, workplaces, or communities. FOLLOW US For more information about the Fresh Outlook Foundation (FOF) and our programs and events, visit our website, sign up for our newsletter, and like us on Facebook and Twitter.   HELP US As a charity, FOF relies on support from grants, sponsors, and donors to continue its valuable work. If you benefited from the podcast, please help fund future episodes by making a one-time or monthly donation. Sharon Blady, Dr. Simon Trepel Interview Transcript You can download a pdf of the transcript here. The entire transcript is also found below: RICK  0:10 Welcome to the HEADS UP! Community Mental Health Podcast. Join our host Jo de Vries with the Fresh Outlook Foundation, as she combines science with storytelling to explore a variety of mental health issues with people from all walks of life. Stay tuned! JO  0:32 Hey, Jo here. Thanks for joining me and my two guests as we conduct a brain tour that will take you on a journey of discovery, from mental illness all the way to mental health superpowers and superheroes. This great conversation is brought to you by the Social Planning and Research Council of British Columbia. My first guest is Sharon Blady, founder of SPEAK UP: Mental Health Advocates Inc., and former Minister of Health and Minister of Healthy Living for the province of Manitoba. She knows firsthand how getting mental health or neurodiversity diagnoses means living with stereotypes and stigma associated with those labels. She also knows there's a way to reframe those stereotypes and define assets that empower us instead. Sharon's lived experience, combined with a lifelong love of comic book superheroes, successful treatment with cognitive behavioral therapy, and robust peer support, gave her the perspective and tools she needed to see her mental health challenges as assets or superpowers that she now harnesses and manages for better mental health and success. Helping us navigate Sharon's brain tour is Dr. Simon Trepel, a psychiatrist with more than a decade of experience assessing and treating kids and teens. He's an assistant professor at the University of Manitoba, where he teaches medical students, residents, psychiatrists, pediatricians, and family doctors. He's also a clinical psychiatrist with the Intensive Community Reintegration Service at the Manitoba Adolescent Treatment Centre, and co-founder and consulting psychiatrist for the Gender Dysphoria Assessment and Action for Youth Clinic. Welcome to both of you, and thank you for embarking on this journey of disclosure and discovery with me. SHARON  2:39 Thank you. It's great to be here, Jo. SIMON  2:41 Hey, Jo... yeah... thanks for having me as well. JO  2:43 I know the relationship between doctor and patient is sacred, so your willingness to help us better understand that connection is brave, and so very much appreciated. First, we're going to dive into Sharon's story, peppered with Simon's clinical perspective. I think this is going to give you a whole host of insights. Sharon, let's start with you. When we spoke to prepare for this episode, you talked about being born with quote, "different brain things," unquote. Can you tell us that story, starting with you being an energizer bunny and chronic overachiever right from the get-go? SHARON  3:27 Yes, that was my very articulate way of self-identifying, but that's how I felt as a kid... that there was just something different about me. And it wasn't just that I felt that way. I kept getting told that I was different, and not always in a good way. Sometimes I did receive positive encouragement in school and always did well. The first time my parents had to ever deal with the principal, and my being in the office, was because in grade three I had decided I wanted to drop out because I felt there was nothing more that they had to teach me because I was spending more of my time helping other students. And it all just seemed so boring. That's what would eventually get me into advanced programs and stuff like that. So, it was just that thing where I was always doing things and not intending to be one step ahead of things, but finding myself there and then kind of getting simultaneously rewarded and punished for it. So, it'd be like, yeah, there's a great grade, but then you get the side-eye from your classmates. And then I get my father. His tendency was to say that, on one hand, yes, you're my child, you're so smart. But don't think you're that smart... don't get too confident or cocky. So, there was never 100 percent security in it. It's the way I lived in terms of the university and how I was managing things. I remember a girlfriend and I… the joke was that no one would have thought of giving us mental health or neurodiversity diagnoses. More that the joke was made to zap us both in the butt with tranquilizer darts to slow us down so that everybody else could keep up. That was my childhood. JO  4:57 What were your teenage years like? SHARON  5:00 Oh, a roller coaster. I was always good in school, but I got into the IB (International Baccalaureate) program, and it was the first year that they had the IB program in school. So, I think in some respects, they weren't ready for us. We were that first class... 50 of us kids that were used to being chronic overachievers… outsiders… were all suddenly in one small school that only had a total of 350 students. I was, again, still doing well in school, but I found my own people and then went off in directions that had me going to The Rocky Horror Show and doing all of this wonderful world of exploration and finding like-minded people. That was when my second round of visits with the principals started to happen. But again, that weird place where it's like, how do you discipline the kid that's in the advanced program for doing a thing, because they're supposed to be there as a role model. And also, that thing, like the seven colors in her hair, might not actually be a disciplinary issue. It's just you've never encountered it before as a principal. So, I was all over the place. I was doing really well in school and was the very untraditional captain of the cheerleading squad where we cheered to punk rock songs like Youth Brigade. And then I was also in Junior Achievement and, in fact, was the president of the Company of the Year for all of Canada in my final year. Yeah, so again, chronic overachiever... energizer bunny. JO  6:25 What happened that triggered your first experience with mental illness? How was it treated? And how well did you respond? SHARON  6:34 It was actually a while after my first son was born. I was 25, I was a grad student, I was doing my master's degree. I had been going out with somebody that had been a classmate, but when he found out that I was pregnant, ran the heck away. Of course, he also ran the heck away, because the day I found out I was pregnant, I also found out he was cheating on me, and basically said, "Don't let the door hit your butt on the way out." So, I moved back to Manitoba from BC. I had my son, and didn't feel very well, and I couldn't figure out what it was. Because it was, "I've got this kid, I'm doing my master's degree, I've got support from my family," and then one day, I had... after feeling all of this up and down and trying to juggle everything... the overwhelming desire to drive my car off the side of a bridge. And was really the red flag, and something stopped me in the same moment that my wrist almost turned to do that. Another part of my brain went, "That's not the rational thought that you think it is, that's not going to save you or your child the way you think it is." And that's when I sought out help, and would end up with a postpartum diagnosis. And then that would go on to being diagnosed as chronically depressed, and then I spent some time on Luvox. The GP that was looking after me… I wasn't receiving any therapeutic care… I wasn't receiving any kind of counseling or supports that way… it was just medication. I was eventually on the maximum dosage, and it was making me physically ill, so I did a very unsafe thing and I went cold turkey. I was lucky to then connect with a psychotherapist that helped me and introduced me to Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. And that's where my really first positive journey happened. But I have to admit, I probably lived the first three, four years, five years of my eldest son's life in a real, foggy, ugly place. That's where the journey started. And it's led to other things and seeking out care has been intermittent and based on things like addressing being assaulted by my ex-husband. Other basic traumatic events have triggered seeking out care. And it's now working with Simon that I've really had that opportunity to go back and dig through a lot of stuff and learn more about myself. And she's like a superhero geek kind-of-way retcons my narrative in the sense that I've realized my understanding of things has changed, especially as we've dug deeper and I've learned more about my brain and what my diagnoses are, as opposed to what I thought they were, and what others had told me they were in those shorter forms of treatment and care. SIMON  9:12 That might be a nice place for me to maybe step in a little bit if you guys don't mind. Sharon's covered a lot of things simultaneously… I'm going to try to have a foot in Sharon's side and to be preferential and biased in Sharon's behalf. But, I also want to take a bit of a meta sense, as well and take a look at what Sharon has said through the lens of maybe how people with mental health challenges or superpowers are sometimes treated by the system or by their families or even by themselves. So, we backed up a little bit to the beginning when you asked Sharon about her childhood. She talked about having lots of energy and being an overachiever. And she was told that she was different, which is an ambiguous message. “Difference” doesn't let a child necessarily understand that that's good or bad. And the child is left to struggle with, "Am I special? Yes. But do I fit in? No." That is the mixed message that a "different" label gives us as children, and we struggle as well to make sense of that. And we are, simultaneously, as Sharon mentioned, rewarded for our special features, our cognitive abilities, but at the same time it isolates or sometimes distances us from other connections that we can have in social circles and with peers and things like that. So, Sharon felt ahead of others, which then makes her feel separated from others, which then makes her aware of pure jealousy. And then she mentioned this mixed message from her father to be, “Hey, you're good, but don't become arrogant.” And I think that's a big understanding of Sharon's struggle to really understand, "Am I a good person or not?" And this is ultimately what leads us to struggling with our sense of self-esteem and sense of identity. You then went on to talk about the teen years and, again, Sharon is propelled to this academic special status of IB program. But you hear her own worries about the school's ability to contain and nurture that in a good way by her own misgivings about it being, quote, "the first year the IB program is in effect." And so again, the theme is, "I'm not sure the adults can handle us... I'm not sure the adults and the systems and the parents can handle us special kids." And you hear the same thing when she talks about getting in trouble, and the rebel phase of, I think it was, pink hair, and getting into trouble despite good marks. And she remarks, "Yeah, it was really tough for the principal because he'd never encountered it before." But he had, Sharon, many times. The principal had encountered many rebellious yet academically talented kids who weren't getting clear messages at home about who they were, and letting them shape a  foundation and identity that gets stable over time, then becomes something for them to fall back on in later years. When they struggle, or even fail at things, they're able to tell themselves, "Hey, that's okay, I'm good at stuff." But when you get a mixed message for so much of your life, and so many systems, you end up falling back on yourself, and you're not sure if you're going to catch yourself. So, you start to wonder if you're able to get helped by the adult authority or systems that are supposed to be catching us. And then we move on to university degree, and we hear Sharon talk about these awful experiences with a partner, and yet she glosses over it very quickly. And you hear the avoidance in her about talking about that very traumatic rejection and separation that happened abruptly at a time when she needed help the most. And see here, there's no ability to process that trauma. And so, when she gets home, all of a sudden, she wants to drive into traffic, and she doesn't understand why. But yet it's the lack of processing that trauma that sits in the basement of our mind and the sub-cortex and waits like a monster until we are at our lowest, and then it shows and rears its ugly head and attempts to take everything from us because we don't feel like we have anything there. JO  12:47 Sharon, I know that you have had multiple diagnoses with different mental health challenges. Can you explain to us how that unfolded? SIMON  12:59 How about, “Sharon, how you doing?” Because we talked about a lot of things just now. And I think an important part of doing these type of interviews where we are laying bare our souls and our histories is that we can go too far. And we can open up too much. And I took Sharon's lead from how far she went in hers. But I think at this point, I'd like to sort of check in with all of us because we've really unloaded some very heavy things. And we don't have to act like it wasn't heavy, Sharon? Well, it's not just for sharing. It's also for our host. JO  13:29 I love this back and forth. I think it's brilliant in that we combine lived experience with a clinical perspective of that lived experience. And I think that's very, very positive. And as you mentioned, Simon, it must be positive for Sharon as well. SIMON  13:48 Exactly. And when we unload things like this, we feel exposed. When we feel exposed, really, again, the sub-cortex of our brains, our basement where our amygdala (which is our fear and emotion center) sleeps beside our hippocampus (which is our library), and that retrieves our memories. And when those two get intertwined in the dance of trauma, they end up opening up these boxes again, when we're not always ready. And so, I always make sure whenever we're talking about traumatic events that I take the lead of the patient, but then when I do the step that seems like I'm being asked to do, we stop and we take a breath, and we reregulate our nervous systems, to make sure that we're still on the same page, and it still feels safe, because therapy doesn't always feel safe, but it should always feel caring and kind and make sure that you are checking back with people. So, you're walking together. And I hope I've given you some time now, Sharon to sort of articulate what it is that you want to maybe say at this point. SHARON  14:47 Thank you for the processing time. I want to thank Simon for how he picked up on how I had said things. And so that in that time to process what I recognized was, for example, that tendency to gloss over things or to say things quickly and sort of dismiss the traumatic aspect of it. And that I've kind of conditioned myself to just telling that story, and that sometimes it has left me raw and open and vulnerable. And that I would just keep moving on not recognizing that it was effectively taking a psychological or a mental scab, and leaving it open to possibly getting infected. And so that's one of the really interesting processes. SIMON  15:31 Oh, I like that. I like that metaphor. SHARON  15:33 Well, that's what I've loved about this process, and about being able to share this today here in this manner, because I've come to realize that so many things that I had taken as normal... they were my normal, they were my habits, they were my whatever. But they weren't. And they maybe got me through the thing at the time, but that they weren't the way things had to be... they weren't a mandatory default setting… that they could be changed. And that even some of the language that I use is, again, a process or part of that, again, what I had internalized. And so that's what I always love about feedback. And the support that I get from Simon is that recognition of, oh my god, am I still using that language? Oh, really? Okay. I thought I'd made some growth here. Yes, I have made some growth, but I'm still carrying around some baggage that I didn't realize I had. I thought I dropped that emotional Samsonite back two weeks ago, but somewhere along the line, I decided to pick up the carry-on version of it after all. And, so what can I do to process that... SIMON  16:35 I hate to interrupt you, Sharon at this point, but we often talk about again, in trauma, this idea of a win-lose or black-white, or yes-no. But when we get into this idea you are doing it again, you're selling yourself short when you say, "I thought I made some growth, but if I made a single mistake, I obviously haven't." SHARON  16:47 Again, and that's what I appreciate, because it's a black and white thinking that I've normalized. So, I'm enjoying the growth. I appreciate the reminders. Jo had the question about the different diagnoses, and I have to say that, because I've been given a variety of things over time, I didn't view them necessarily as negative. Some people will look at mental health labels and neurodiversity labels as negative and other, and I found ways of reframing that, but I still found them as identifying mechanisms or filters that I would run things through. And what I've come to realize in the time that we've worked together is that while those were, I guess you'd say, things that I could use to ground and navigate with. I think it's Maya Angelou that said, "You do the best you can, and then when you learn more, you do better. Some of the diagnoses that we've talked about that I ascribed to at one point, and then realizing that they were mislabelings. I'm glad that I had them for the time that I was there to get me through the thing. It's nice to go back, and that's where I use that term about retcon and go, "Oh, that wasn't really the thing that I thought it was. And now I can adapt to it differently having a better sense." And I would have to say that the one thing that I was most surprised to sort of learn about myself, was just how much of my own mental health has been shaped by trauma of all the different things that I've been dealing with. That is not one of the ones that I would have put near the top of the list or is having had the most influence. SIMON  18:26 That's powerful, and it's because we as a society demonstrate one of the symptoms of trauma, which is avoidance. In my clinical work, and in my everyday life, we are all desperately trying to avoid talking about traumatic things. And that's the reality. JO  18:41 Simon... a question for you. A few of the diagnoses that Sharon had were ADHD, OCD, bipolar two, PTSD. Do you often have patients with multiple diagnoses like that? And if so, isn't it incredibly difficult to diagnose if a person has more than one problem? SIMON  19:05 Well, yeah, but we're not textbooks. We are complicated things. And so, there's many, many reasons why somebody may or may not have a diagnosis at a certain time, and maybe why someone might look like something at one point, but they'll change over time. So, for instance, children, children to teenagers, teenagers to adults, our brains are qualitatively changing over that time, not just in size, but in how they work. A child is not a mini adult... a child is a qualitatively different animal, so to speak. I think that's first of all. So, really, what we're learning is that the brain undergoes incredible amounts of development over our lifetime. And we know that, for instance, in ADHD, while 7% of children are born with the psychological diagnosis of ADHD, according to our latest studies, by the time you reach 18 years old, we know that only 50% of people are going to have ADHD, which is about 4% of adults. And the reasoning for that is because we know as the brain develops and matures naturally over time, if given the right supports and the right conditions, and you will naturally develop the ability to regulate yourself in unique ways as you develop more skills, have good experiences, and accomplish things, and believe in your ability to manage yourself. And we see those things. You can be diagnosed as ADHD as a child, never having been treated or medicated and end up not having ADHD as an adult just by the power of development of the human brain and neuroplasticity. But there's also other things that happen. For instance, you might learn skills that allow you to be more organized, and so you no longer meet criteria for ADHD because you've learned skills that compensate for it, the same way maybe somebody with diabetes might learn how to regulate their diets. They don't have to rely on as much insulin. So, I think we're all regulating our chemistry in different ways all the time. And lastly, we're not in Star Trek or the Jetsons yet, so we don't have the ability to scan a human brain and say, "Okay, well, now we know exactly what this is." So, if somebody comes in talking about hearing a voice or feeling delusional, or being disorganized, and it looks like something called psychosis, well, psychosis is a really a general term that can be many, many things… anything from a bonk on the head, to paranoid schizophrenia, to somebody using math for the first time, to somebody having an autoimmune disorder that's causing an inflammation of the cerebral arteries in the brain. So, there's many reasons why we present the way we do, and sometimes it's not clear in the beginning. Lastly, PTSD and trauma is a great imitator, it can look like almost anything in medicine. We talk about lupus sometimes looking like many, many, many different types of disorders from many different areas. And I feel that in psychiatry, in particular, child, adolescent and young adult psychiatry, I see that trauma looks like many things before it finally gets figured out to be what it is. JO  21:52 Sharon, how did your understanding of the diagnoses and yourself change as your treatment with Simon unfolded? SHARON  22:01 I would have to say the greatest thing was that recognition of what he just explained about PTSD. And I love his comment about the societal avoidance of trauma. Because when I think about my childhood, or the way I used to think about it in terms of or even how well I was in it, it was that… well, you know, my folks are together, I live in a nice house, I've got my brother, I've got my cousins, I've got this, I'm doing well in school. I never would have thought of things necessarily as trauma... trauma was for somebody else that lived far away, that didn't have a stable roof over their head, that lived in a warzone, that kind of thing. So, it was again, not that eight-year-olds necessarily have the clinical or academic understanding of adverse childhood experiences, so the notion of trauma didn't really enter my life until I got to things like dealing with an abusive ex, dealing as an adult recognizing what I had experienced with my father, and what he considered discipline, was, in fact, abuse, and that it was both physical and emotional, psychological, that kind of thing. But that was like, again, in retrospect. So, I understand now exactly how the labels... I go, okay, that's the thing. If that's what I've got, at least I know what I'm up against, at least I know how to deal with it. And so, the understanding that there was something actual masquerading, and that my trauma responses, I think that's the other part, was things that I thought were other things were now like, "Oh, that's a trauma response. Okay, I didn't realize that. Well, that shines a whole new light on it." So, I have to say that's the one thing is that it's given me a lot more, or an ongoing sense of self-reflection. Not that I ever figured out, I never thought that I had it all figured out, but it's encouraged me to keep a growth mindset about my own mental health and neurodiversity. And that there are things that I can always learn about myself so that I can really learn better, healthier ways of coping and adjusting and just moving through life. JO  24:08 Simon, what are you learning about Sharon's unique brain during all this? And is her response to her trauma similar to other people's responses who have experienced similar trauma? SIMON  24:23 I'll take the second part first, if that's okay. What's really fascinating to me about trauma is that every single human being that's ever existed, has experienced something traumatic, but not all of it becomes something that we call PTSD, or a fundamental change in how your brain works after that event. And that's what separates it. We can be scared, and we can struggle by something for a few days, and then our brain essentially gets back to factory settings. Or we can have a really horrific event happen and our brain can then change. And they can do two different ways. And so often people think of trauma, like somebody has been to war or has been raped, really something we think about something truly savage has happened. And that is one type of trauma. And that is the classic type of PTSD you think about. But we are now becoming very aware, our eyes have been opened to another type of trauma called complex PTSD, where it doesn't have to be savage, at least not savage through the eyes of an adult, but is savage through the eyes of a child. So, for instance, if you are a harsh parent to a child, you are a big, much larger individual. And if you scare, intimidate, or otherwise terrorize a child in the act of trying to be a parent to teach something, you are actually in some ways putting that child through a savage event, and that can be scary. And when the person that lives with you scares you, that can easily become something we call complex PTSD, and it fundamentally changes how our brain works. And so that's something that has to be recognized. And it doesn't recognize that, as Sharon said, "I didn't realize how much trauma affects me," but it's like putting a lens over your reality from childhood. And so, you start to recognize that when we see this happen in other ways, for instance, in religion, or even in more severe things like cults, for instance, where children are very young or sort of shaped in a certain way, it becomes very difficult for them to disentangle themselves from those perhaps bias messages from their childhood, or perhaps healthy messages. I'm not going to moralize on these things right now, but my point is, what we learn early affects us, and sometimes it can affect us for a very long time. So, savage or harsh, either one can create trauma. And so that's the first message. The second one is Sharon's brain is unique, but I don't know where to start, actually, like we've already mentioned lots of things. And so, I honestly think that the most unique part of her brain is simultaneously the ability to experience everything she's been through, and then be able to look at it and really allow her to renegotiate who she is, again, looking back, which is the power we all have. And so, I really am honored about and privileged to work with somebody who is so strong and doesn't know it all the time, but is so strong, they're willing to walk back and say, "Let me look at my childhood, again, with my kinder eyes, with my more neutral, healthier eyes, with eyes that aren't afraid, in the same way anymore... and let me see what was truly there. And let me look in the shadows, then find out they're not as scary. Let me look into my eyes and see that I matter all the time, not just when my Dad's in a good mood." And these kinds of things become extremely powerful moments for anybody, but in particular, people willing to risk the discomfort of therapy with somebody who's willing to go there with them, but also take care of them along the way. And that's what Sharon and I have been able to create. JO  27:56 Sharon, what have been your biggest challenges along the way?  SHARON  28:01 Wow. I'd have to say that it's been breaking belief cycles and habitual cycles that reinforce the trauma behaviors. So, whether, like I said before, it's the use of language or the comparative competitive thinking, or even recognizing, as I'm recognizing my own strength, because I have to say that there's a lot of things where I would describe the situation or thing that I'd accomplished and kind of felt that it's like, well, anybody would do that under those circumstances, and not allowing myself to recognize the specialness, of maybe something that I had done or accomplished the uniqueness of it. And whether that was academically, politically, it was just oh, this is what I had to do at the time. Or, gee, anybody in my shoes could have done it. And so, I think the biggest challenge will be in that assignment. Okay Simon... I'm curious what you have to say, cuz you're always good at reminding me when... SIMON  29:02 Well, again, when you are putting yourself in the crucible of your own personal accomplishments, you have to remember that earlier on it was compounded into you that you can't get cocky. Yes. And so, what you end up keeping with you is that what seeming like an innocuous message from your father when you brought home 105% on that math test, and he said, "You know, don't get too full of yourself because no one likes an arrogant person," and you didn't know what to do with your accomplishment. And you see how long you carry that. And so, what I challenge you to do is to put that down and say, you don't have to worry about the backhand when you do a perfect forehand. Yeah, I just made that up. But that sounds great. SHARON  29:41 Yes, it does, I agree, and that's probably the biggest challenge right there is living in those things.  SIMON  29:48 Or maybe you should not have to worry, because that's not reasonable for me to suggest that you shouldn't worry when the person there perhaps is a vulnerable narcissist and needs to extract his self-esteem from you in some way. And as a child, we are unequipped to even imagine that as possible from the gods that we sort of worship. Right? Yeah, sorry to be so powerful. I'm just in that kind of mood today... loving it! JO  30:15 Sharon, you touched on your challenges. What have been your key moments of personal growth and resilience? SHARON  30:23 Well, it has been the aha moments like those and recognizing that I'm allowed to celebrate these things. And in fact, I should be encouraged to celebrate them. And that it's okay, and that I'm not being cocky and celebrating. Yes, I was the Health Minister dammit, and I was responsible for the $6 billion budget, and I think I did it well. People are allowed to have another opinion. That's their opinion and their business, but I don't have to diminish myself anymore around those things. Earlier on in my own experience, like I said, I've learnt to get through things by reframing them. And that came from experiences with my son and finding the assets. So, I have been able to go, "Yeah, you know what, you might say I have this thing, and that makes me difficult to manage or whatever. But I've also got this other positive aspect of it." So, it was that process of the reframing, which would turn into that superpower language that I use, because being the Energizer Bunny can be very useful and productive. And being somebody that gets told that they can't sit still, and they can't focus, also means that, you know, I pulled together pretty damn good master's theses, and I connected some really interesting dots in some other places, both in my academic and political life that other people hadn't got to. And that in some respects, I was surprised that, "Why is it taking me to do this? How come nobody else thought of this, because once I got here, this seemed really obvious.?” So that reframing is health. SIMON  31:55 Or, how about one ever talks about Steve Jobs and Elan Musk never sitting still. JO  31:59 Yeah, exactly. SHARON  32:03 Yeah, well, and that's the other part of it, too, is that some of it's even been gendered, in a way.  SIMON  32:08 In a way... some of it? All of it! SHARON  32:10 Yes. Yes, I was the Chatty Cathy doll that was a know-it-all and this and that... but I'm sure boys... SIMON  32:16 No, you weren't, you were a woman with an opinion. SHARON  32:18 Yes, but that's how I was... SIMON  32:20 ... like a human being. Yeah, exactly. SHARON  32:22 But that's how I was labeled when I was growing up was that it was... SIMON  32:25 ... no, that's the microaggression. SHARON  32:27 And that's the thing that has to be unlearned, because I'm watching my granddaughter right now, who's also recently been diagnosed with ADHD. And one of the messages that came home was that we need to get her to learn to be quiet, and to behave herself in class. And I was just like, "Oh, you do not tell a young girl who has got a voice and an opinion and is able to articulate thing well... you don't put baby in a corner.” SIMON  32:55 Particularly in 2021. SHARON  32:57 Yes, exactly. SIMON  33:00 I thought we just learned these lessons.  SHARON  33:03 This was it. So, it was like, we work with her on how to focus, manage, empower, but do not make her quiet, because that would be doing to her in 2021 what was done to me in 1971. SIMON  33:17 Well, yeah, talk about a replay. JO  33:20 So, what you might be saying, Sharon, is that your granddaughter... her ADHD may be a superpower for her. SHARON  33:27 Oh, it honestly is. Like this kid, it blows my mind, honestly, sometimes the things that we'll watch her do, and then process and be able to articulate back. When they went to Drumheller, guess who came back like the little dinosaur expert, and that she was, again, connecting dots and doing things. She's now a big sister, and I think one of the things that she's also got is a sense of compassion there, where she understands her little brother in a way that while he's not even two weeks old, I mean, she wanted to sit down and read all of these books so that she could be a good big sister, and she read some bedtime stories. And I think that there's a compassion that she's acquired because she knows what it's like to be treated particular ways, to make sure that she's going to be her little brother's defender. She's going to be a good big sister. SIMON  34:21 Let's not do that to her.  SHARON  34:22 Okay, that's a good point. Let her be her. SIMON  34:25 Let's not sign her up for a job without discussing it with her first, because we've got all sorts of great plans, but John Lennon had some song about that or something. I'd like to challenge us, as well, to circle back the last two minutes and let's reframe something. What is the school telling her by saying she needs to learn to be quiet… what are we actually missing in that message? Because, if we see it as a pure criticism, we might be missing some wisdom in there that is helpful for us to think about. Because superpowers... when you discover heat vision as a child, you don't make microwave popcorn for your parents, you burn a hole in their curtains is what you do. And so, we're not talking about that... we're acting like the superpowers are easy to handle, and the person who has them knows how to wield them. But I think what we're hearing the school say is that she has something cool that makes her unique, but it also interferes at times, and we don't want that to hurt her. JO  35:25 Before digging in deeper was Sharon and Simon. I'd like to acknowledge a major HEADS UP! sponsor... the Social Planning and Research Council of British Columbia. SPARC BC is a leader in applied social research, social policy analysis, and community development approaches to social justice. The council's great team supports 16,000 members, and works with communities of all sizes to build a just and healthy society for all. Thanks yet again, to all of you great folks for your ongoing support. So, Sharon, let's circle back... we've been talking about superheroes and superpowers. And I'd like to hear the story of how that all got kicked off for you. SHARON  36:17 Well, I'm a comic book nerd. I fell in love with superheroes at about a year-and-a-half when the Spider-Man animated show came on TV, and I found myself fixed on the screen. And I just never broke away from that, and it's gone down into other different fandoms over time. So, I've got a whole bunch, I'll spare you the list, but what happened was in raising my kids, especially having two boys, we were surrounded by comic books and action figures and Marvel movies. So, it was just familiar. We had favorite characters, and this and that. And, so what happened was when my second son was born in 2003, I noticed some things about him very early on, especially once he started school, it became really obvious. He was not interested in learning to practice his writing, he would just scribble, he had a very strong auditory sense, like, go to a movie with his kid, do not ever try to debate script with him, because he will have picked it up. And he can come back, like literally with the phrasing, the cadence, the tone, that kind of thing. And that was his gift. But he was struggling in school, and he always had problems. He was told that he was daydreaming. He was having problems with reading and math. So, they would just send him home with more stuff, and he just was super frustrated. And as much as I'd asked for psychological assessments, I was told that he was too young and will get by. And they kept passing him from one grade to the next, where things just kept getting progressively harder and harder, because he didn't have the skills. And he was eight years old, and he just melted down one day and said, "Mommy, if you love me, you wouldn't send me to school anymore. Because I'm a failure, I'm broken. And I'm not going to do well there. And it's just it's not worth it." And I found myself saying to him, as he rattled off each of these different things that were wrong with him. I found the flip side. "Oh, so what you're telling me is that you think you're oversensitive to this and that, well, I see empathy there, I see caring, I see strategic thinking." And we flipped all the things and found assets. And I said, "Sweetheart, you're not broken... you're like an X-Man... you have mutant superpowers. And it's just a matter of figuring them out and figuring out how to harness them. So, we're going to do for you what Professor X does for the X-Men," and I use the example of Cyclops with laser vision. I said, "Think about Cyclops... you can blow up buildings and save his friends to do all these things and take down the bad guys, whatever. But if he doesn't put his visor down in the morning, guess who's gonna set his underwear on fire while he gets ready for school?" So, we use the example of Cyclops, and what I found myself doing at first I was like, "Oh my gosh, did I just blow smoke at my kid?" And then I realized how I had been coping and managing since that diagnosis of postpartum, and the different tools that I had been given intermittently, and what I had learned on my own... taking those tools and then researching and doing things further on my own,... was that I had been reframing, and I had been finding assets, and that actually previous to that diagnosis the thing is like the kind of thinking that I had with ADHD... well, that had been an asset. As long as I was checking off the right boxes and I was getting rewarded, that was an asset that was a spidey sense that I was hiding. And that why is it as soon as things helped out on me at a diagnosis of postpartum, that suddenly there was like, “Whoo, I've got a thing wrong with me… it's a diagnosis...  bad, broken.” And I saw that it's stigma, that kind of thing. That's what I started doing, and that's where we started really trying to Identify within our own family, what were the assets that we had. And it was things like hyperfocus, it was creativity, and that's just the language that we started using, because we also found that it was neutral. The superpower is inherently neutral... it's what's done with it. It goes to Simon's comment about burning the hole in the drapes or making the popcorn, right. It is what it is... now, am I going to be stigmatized and end up someone like Magneto, who becomes the antihero and become reactive and defensive? Or am I going to become someone that's more like a Professor X and the X-Men and use my powers for my own benefit, but also for the benefit of others. And that's where I realized that a lot of the things that I had been doing were about using those powers to help others. So that's where it came from. It was basically me trying to parent my little boy who was broken, and to help him build a toolkit until he could get proper clinical diagnosis and support. It was our way of getting through things. JO  41:06 How have you evolved that program? I know now that you're offering the toolkit, for example, to other people. Tell us about that. SHARON  41:15 I guess it's been about a decade now or so since that originally happened. I was using that language with my kids, which crept into my language at work. So, you want to see political staff, which have the minister in a meeting, use the word “superpowers.” That was on the list of words that the minister wasn't allowed to use. And also, not allowed to talk about neuroplasticity, or anything else that will get the opposition a front-page headline where they can call me quirky or a flake or something. And they tried, but it was a case of going through that and deciding that after coming out of office, and after working at another organization, that I wanted to share that, because as I encountered different people that went, "Oh my gosh, that's an interesting way of looking at it." And so, I realized, and also watching my son and other people I'd  shared it with, that it had a destigmatizing approach. I'm not a clinician, and I'm not someone that's trained as well as Simon is... I'm someone with lived experience who has trained in things like peer support, and, that for me, it's a language that I find helpful in taking these big complex ideas and making them relatable, and making them a conversation that we can have, without it being again, scary or distancing. So, I can talk about anxiety and talk about Spider-Man. And we can have conversations around Peter Parker, and Spider-Gwen, and Miles Morales, and find out that people have empathy for those characters in a way that they might not have for themselves, or someone they know what that diagnosis is. So, it creates that little bit of a safe space. I guess how I put it is I take mental health seriously, but I don't always take myself seriously. And if I can share stories and do things and introduce people to tools and perspectives, or especially introduce kids to ways of handling their emotions, because a lot of times it manifests more emotionally, where they see it as positive. I've seen the results with my son, who specifically has got some powerful reframing tools. That's what it is. And so now it's a program called Embrace Your Superpowers. And I've since encountered another fandom that I've been dived way too deep into, and I have another program based on the music of Bangtan Sonyeondan (BTS), and just published an article in a peer-reviewed journal out of Korea on the mental health messaging within their music and how they model things like CBT (Cognitive Behaviour Therapy), peer support, and some other therapies. JO  43:43 Wow, that's amazing. Simon, can you put all this into clinical/neuroscience/neurological context? SIMON  43:54 You mean, as assistant Professor S? JO  43:56 Yes. SIMON  43:59 Like that one... Sharon... Professor S? SHARON  44:00 Yes, yeah. SIMON  44:01 Pretty close... yeah... not bad. And as a psychiatrist, I didn't want to say sex because then I have to say something about my mother... it's embarrassing. So no, I really can't summarize it in some perfect way. But I can talk about Sharon's use of superheroes as a way for her to lovingly and empathically discover herself. And I think that when you think about how difficult Sharon's life is… especially early on was, maybe not so much now, which is awesome… but as a child, she didn't have a hero that was safe to look up to. And when kids don't have a hero that's safe to look up to they find them. They find them in teachers, or they find them in pop culture, or they find them in rock and roll, or they find them in fandoms. And Sharon was really lucky to be able to find such an awesome fandom that gave her such positive messages, that allowed her to start to say, "Wait a minute, different is unique." It gave her the idea that adults could be nice, that they could do things that were selfless that did not have to hurt other people. That adults could do big things and handle things. That they could be role models. That adults could be strong, and that people could look up to them and still be safe in doing so. And these are all contrary to the messages that Sharon had been experiencing in her own life. And so, this was a very much a place for her... a cocoon for her... to be able to develop safely in her own mind and her own psyche to survive how harsh childhood was with all the adults in her life that were not sending her comfortable messages. In fact, they were quite mixed, and they were quite barbed. So, I think that I would start off by just saying it's awesome to think about this way, and in Sharon, teaching other people how to have more empathy for themselves. We always work on the idea that what we do for others we're actually doing for ourselves. And so, it brings us back to the idea that Sharon is doing this, in fact, for herself, which then makes me wonder if I'm doing this for myself, and it makes me feel good to help other people. So perhaps, I'm selfishly also baked into the system here and doing some of the same things. But that's okay, because you can reach a point in your life where you can give to others without taking anything away from you. And that's the other idea about how things are not a zero-sum game, things are not black and white. In fact, we can generate kindness and love on the spot as humans, and we have this beautiful ability to do so. And that's, as well, what superheroes do... they love the human regardless of the situation, because they know the person's always trying their best. And that's one thing that I always make sure I work on with everybody... I will truly believe that everybody is trying to be as successful as possible at every moment, including when we don't want to get out of bed, we just calculate that. That's all we have that day, and that's the best we can do. And I just want to make sure Sharon continues to embrace those parts of her because they are easily the most powerful parts that really do have the ability to generate almost infinite abilities to believe in yourself. JO  47:02 Sharon, you mentioned earlier… neurodiversity, and I'm really interested to know, first of all, from you Simon, what that means, and what that means to people like myself and like Sharon, who have mental health challenges. She may not be considered, quote, "normal" unquote, from a mental health perspective, but look at who she is. Look at what she's accomplished. Look at how she's helping people. So, can you just respond to that? SIMON  47:37 Absolutely. I'll back you up a little bit. Sharon's as normal as anyone else... there's no such thing as normal. This is the lie that we've all been sold very early on in our lives, that there is something called "normal." And, by the way, that normal is also perfect. And that's also the thing we all wanted to aspire to be. But it's really a story of conformity... the language of normal or perfection is actually language of conformity. And so, the reality of it is, we are all so different. If you go into a field and look at 100 cows, but then you put 100 people in the field beside them, you look at the people, humans are really unique. I'm not suggesting cows aren't unique...  cows are pretty neat, too, but humans are exponentially more unique. And because of the freedom that we enjoy, because of our prefrontal cortex to imagine ourselves in almost any scenario we like, we're walking around with a holodeck in the front of our skull. So, we all have that. But what neurodiversity truly speaks about, it's recognizing that in the great, great ghetto blaster of Homo sapiens, the equalizer is spread uniquely throughout all of us, all of Homo sapiens is a spectrum. And so, we do cluster sometimes around some tendencies such as gender, but we're learning that not everybody experiences a “normal” quote/unquote, as we've been sold, gender. In fact, there is intersex conditions, there is agender, there is gender fluid, there is genderqueer, there is non-binary. So, there is no such thing as normal. There is just this incredible adventure called being a human being. And the only limitations we're going to put on that are the ones we put on ourselves. JO  49:16 So, Sharon, how did your understanding of neurodiversity help you to see yourself in a different light? SHARON  49:23 Well, it goes definitely to what Simon said... one of my favorites expressions around this is "normal is just a setting on a dryer." That's the only place it's a useful term. SIMON  49:34 And it doesn't always work for the clothes in the dryer either. SHARON  49:37 Exactly, exactly. It might not be the setting you need. Again, when my youngest one was finally tested and given diagnoses that said that he had discalculate dysgraphia and dyslexia, these are things that are called learning disabilities. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, he just learns differently, and that he learns in ways, that again, it's this idea of along a spectrum, and so it's a case of wanting to take the stigma away from it. There is all of this diversity. And that somewhere along the line, somebody came up with some sort of liberal, conformity-based normal in the supposed center, and that the rest of us were put out on the margins. And we have a disability or like with ADHD, the idea that it's a deficiency, and I'm like, “Okay, no, no, I don't have a deficiency disorder. I can hyper focus. My ability to focus is divergent, and it can be hyper focused, it's not deficient.” The term, variable attention stimulus trait is one that I've come across as an alternative. And I appreciate that one, because it's the idea that I just have greater variety in my stimulation range. It's not better or worse, that idea of positive or negative. So that's why I tend to use the term neurodiversity, where other folks would tend to use terms like a learning disability or some kind of a challenge or something, again, something that implies other or negative. It's like, no, there's this wonderful spectrum that exists. And that's what we need to understand and appreciate. And then the other thing that I've come to realize, especially, I guess you'd say, in real time with my son's experience… and then I'd say, in retrospect, with my own on this journey with Simon… has been that those of us that have that kind of a diagnosis or a label, will inevitably have some kind of traumatic or mental health issue. Because you're going to experience anxiety, you're going to be stressed out, you are going to overthink and self-judge and do all of these things. When you are being treated as other in the classroom, because you're not reading the same way, you're not writing the same way, you're not allowed to hand in a video presentation instead of an essay. And so instead, you're beating yourself up for two nights trying to get two paragraphs on a piece of paper. Whereas if you had been left to give an oral presentation, or maybe my son had a geography assignment that by God, if you'd been able to do it in Minecraft, to build this world that he created for this class, he would have knocked their socks off. But instead, it was knowing we need five paragraphs on a piece of Bristol board and a picture. And that just wasn't his thing. So that's for me, neurodiversity is about we need to challenge how we see each other, how we teach, how we work, because we're missing out. There's a lot of us that I call sort of shiny sparkling stars that, you know, you're trying to take those shiny, pointy stars, and that's what you're trying to shove into the round hole, not just a square peg. But you're trying to shave off all of my shiny pointy stars to stick me in a boring round hole. And we all lose. SIMON  52:44 And I think really the other thing we have to mention is that we need to treat education like fine dining, but instead we treat it like the drive thru. Yes. And so, if we don't talk about that, we're going to blame the teachers for everything. And it's not their fault. Schools, education has been undervalued, underfunded, and quite frankly, is not sexy or cool. Even though I think it's the best thing ever. SHARON  53:07 Yes. SIMON  53:09 We don't look at teachers as heroes, yet, they are probably one of the highest skilled and the most patient and most saint-like versions of humans that have probably existed in our society. And I'm not joking, the ratios are too high and unmanageable for teachers to spend the qualitative time to actually help kids learn in the best ways they learn. So, what they do is they bundle kids… and I know sounds like a [Bell] MTS package…but they bundle kids into packages of classrooms where the median learning style will get served the best. But what we have to start doing is recognizing there might be seven or eight unique learning styles, and then streaming our children into those enriched learning environments. So, they simultaneously get to enjoy their easy way, while working on the other seven types of learning that they're not good at. So that everybody starts understanding that there's no deficit for those people. We all have deficits, because we don't have everyone else's skills, but that's a qualitative aspect about being human. We're all capable of learning to greater or lesser degrees, but we're all capable of learning, period. And we're gonna find some ways that we do it easier across the board, which is going to work in many environments, but it's not going to work in all environments. So, the challenge for all humans is to enjoy what you got and flaunt it, and be celebrated. But at the same time, celebrate learning the other things you don't do well, and we're not going to blame the student because the school doesn't know how to approach their unique learning challenges. We're going to help fund the school, we're going to elect people that take education seriously, and we're going to start to really give our kids a fighting chance to develop self-esteem and identity and an actual career that they feel fulfilled by. JO  54:53 Simon you mentioned that we can all learn. How does neuroplasticity play into that? SIMON  55:00 Our brains have changed dramatically since the beginning of this podcast. That's how our brains are a dynamic ocean of neurons and waves that are sending electrical signals to each other all the time. Every single thought you have is like playing a single note or several chords on a keyboard at the same time. That's why people say we only use 10% of our brain, because if we used all of it at once would be like playing every key on the piano at the same time, and you would not make sense of what that was. Neurodiversity and neuroplasticity, in particular, talks about the idea that our brains are shaped by our genes that sent templates for them, but then having great amounts of potential to be shaped in dramatically unique and different ways. By our experiences, in particular, if those experiences are harsh, they can hardwire in some ways and rigidly keep that template baked into the system for sometimes decades at a time. And on the other side of the spectrum. If our young brains are nurtured… like an orchid in a garden that understands the conditions under which they will thrive the best… then the human brain doesn't seem like it has limits, and we see that in our neurodiverse populations that are allowed, because they're so separated in so many other aspects. If you have severe autism, for instance, we see human abilities that are beyond anything we could ever imagine. And that's all within the human brain. JO  56:29 You can't discuss mental health without talking about stigma. Sharon, what kinds of stigma have you experienced? Be it structural, public, personal? And if you have experienced that, how have you reduced the impacts of that in your life? SHARON  56:46 I might not have identified it as stigma as a child. But there was definitely that sense of being othered. I wouldn't have had that word. I remember when I was first given the postpartum diagnosis, and I remember the doctor asking about if there was any history of mental health issues. And then going back to my folks and being given this adamant, "NO," that there was nothing. Okay, they're very defensive. And yet, at the same time that I was given this adamant "NO," it was then followed up with my mother's explanation about how she and her two sisters all spent some time on Valium in the 70s, while six of us peasants were all young and growing up together. There's been a lot of self-medication on both sides of the family, and how those that had nothing to do with those behaviors, nothing to do with that. And there was this real sense of denial, and, How dare I ask these questions? And I still have some family members, from whom I am estranged because, How dare I talk about mental health? How dare I be the crazy person? And as I said, I had been given a diagnosis of bipolar which again, through work with Simon, realize that behaviors that were seen in there, it seemed like the thing at the time, but we're realizing those because trauma hadn't been addressed appropriately. So, my son, his father to this day still asks, and because my son lives with me predominantly, has had the gall to say... my son would come back, and this is pre-COVID, would come back from a visit. And you know, so how did your visit go? Oh, well, Dad asked, "What's it like to be raised by a bipolar mom?" And, "Am I okay?" And, "Am I safe?" And then, when I went public with my mental health, as the Minister of Health, part of the reason why I did that was because I wanted people to know that I was somebody with lived experience, I wasn't just a talking head. And it had to do with a particular situation, where we had just lost someone to suicide, and that the system failed this person, and hadn't been able to meet his needs. And as a result, we lost this wonderful artist. And that broke my heart, because I always looked at that job as if the system can't look after me and my family, then it's not good enough. And if we lost this person, I saw the situation, I guess, from both sides. I saw myself as the potential parent in that situation, and also the potential adult child who was lost. And I remember my staff, people were flipping out about how the minister cannot discuss this, because we're gonna have to deal with peop

2021 --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/joseph-douglas2/support

What will you do the same or different in 2021? A new year, a (technical) new decade, a chance for a newness in your life? What will the next ten years bring us in computing and media? Send your project questions/ideas to neshcom@gmail.com, subject line “After Things.” Picks: Justin: “Matt Drudge Logs Off” from Tablet […]

I believe that Philippians 4:8 gives us a call to see things with a fresh pair of eyes, even with all that's going on around us. Tune in for Mountain Moving Monday! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/reachandteach/support

Beth shares a helpful tip to guide you to a positive 2020!

Kami Semick was at the top of her game 10 years ago, ran for a few years, then stopped completely. Now she's back at it, but with an entirely new outlook on racing. The post Kami Semick | Ten Years Later and a Fresh Outlook on Running appeared first on Ultrarunnerpodcast.com.

A Breath of Fresh Outlook is a four part mini series on the topic of business and entrepreneuring. Delving into the bedrock of what is needed in order to succeed. Physically, mentally AND spiritually. https://faithisstrength.com/ --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/faithisstrength/support

A Breath of Fresh Outlook is a four part episode on the topic of business and entrepreneuring. Delving into the bedrock of what is needed in order to succeed. Physically, mentally AND spiritually. https://faithisstrength.com/ --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/faithisstrength/support

A Breath of Fresh Outlook is a four part episode on the topic of business and entrepreneuring. Delving into the bedrock of what is needed in order to succeed. Physically, mentally AND spiritually. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/faithisstrength/support

A Breath of Fresh Outlook is a four part episode on the topic of business and entrepreneuring. Delving into the bedrock of what is needed in order to succeed. Physically, mentally AND spiritually. This is part 1/4. I hope you enjoy. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/faithisstrength/support

Joann DeVries is the founder of the Fresh Outlook Foundation. It was a real honor to host Joann for the podcast, as we introduce As We Speak to the community. https://freshoutlookfoundation.org/  

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This episode discusses a change in thinking in order to change your situation.

Have a Fresh Outlook