Podcasts about ootify

On this episode, Tom talks with Ravi Sharma, board director and founder of OOTify, a mental health hub that leverages artificial intelligence to provide a personalized ecosystem of resources for its clients. Together they discuss how a multifaceted approach to mental health has gained popularity as an alternative to traditional care, how AI can act as an important tool during the process, and why targeting resources to younger adults is so important.

Speaking Up for Mental Health Awareness: An Interview with Metta World Peace Curt and Katie interview Metta World Peace about his efforts toward mental health advocacy, awareness, and access. We explore what led him to speak up, the challenges he's faced as a public figure, his solutions for prevention, and how his businesses and philanthropy support mental health. Transcripts for this episode will be available at mtsgpodcast.com! An Interview with Metta World Peace Metta World Peace played professional basketball for 19 years. He won the NBA World Championship with the LA Lakers in June 2010 and received the J. Walter Kennedy Citizenship Award – the NBA's highest citizenship and community service honor – in April 2011. He was selected to the 2005-06 NBA's All-Defensive Team, was voted by the media as 2003-04 NBA's Defensive Player of the Year and was the only man with 271 steals in his first two seasons in the NBA, breaking Michael Jordan's record. His autobiography, “No Malice: My Life in Basketball” was released in May 2018 with Triumph Publishing and a documentary on his life in basketball, “Ron Artest: The Quiet Storm” was released on Showtime in May 2019. World Peace is currently pursuing entrepreneurial projects including the XvsX Sports project he cofounded in 2017 and an NFT project, Meta Panda Club, to bring decentralized basketball community to the masses. World Peace is also known as a prominent mental health advocate, pop culture personality, philanthropist, and media favorite. He raffled off his 2010 NBA World Championship Ring with the proceeds going to his nonprofit, Xcel University (now known as Artest University). The online ring raffle raised more than $650,000. Funds were donated to nonprofits in 5 cities that provide mental health therapists and mental health services to their communities, and to provide scholarships to underprivileged youth in the New York City area. World Peace was part of the 13th season of ABC's Dancing With The Stars, a contestant on CBS's first edition of Celebrity Big Brother, as well as the CBS competition show, Beyond The Edge. He is active in entrepreneurial endeavors, serves as an advisor to several tech start ups, and seeks to help other basketball players who have aspirations for a pro career with his app and league, XvsX Sports. For more information, please visit https://www.xvsxsports.com/, https://metapandaclub.com/, and https://artestuniversity.org/. In this podcast episode, we interview Metta World Peace about.. Curt and Katie spent an afternoon chatting with Metta World Peace, exploring his work to reduce mental health stigma. We're excited to share that conversation with you.    Why did Metta World Peace start speaking about his mental health? “I've experienced so many things – you know you're playing basketball [as a kid], and you got to duck under the bench, people shooting. Sometimes you got to go to the game with guns in your bag, you know, different things like that, to make sure everything's cool. And that's just that's just not life. Life is tag. Life is freeze tag. Life is… hopscotch when you're a child… life is learning. That's life. Kids should be outside playing in parks.” – Metta World Peace Metta shared his story growing up The Crack Epidemic and the impact on his neighborhood The challenges of incarceration, lack of education, and access to resources Building a shell to protect yourself on the streets What you learn and practice in the neighborhood he grew up in The role of history and the impact of slavery on mental health of generations of Black people The number of friends who are incarcerated The role of “chemical imbalance” in the mental health landscape and the family members who have dealt with more serious mental illness Metta's desire to give back to the mental health community How Metta World Peace is working to solve the problems that lead to poor mental health The meaning of his name and why he changed it Coming together with all types of people Pushing back on separation and division or divisive statements No guns or drugs allowed in my neighborhood Challenging what has been defined as “life” in his neighborhood The lack of connecting resources (like parks) in all neighborhoods The importance of play and letting kids be kids The challenges that Metta World Peace faces in putting forward his message “I'm a colorful, I love comedy. I like to do silly stuff. It's just fun to me, honestly. But then people want to put me on television to do something silly. But when I want to do something meaningful, they don't want to do that programming... that's why I'm so vulnerable, honestly, because I don't know how else I'm going to get it out to the to the world.” – Metta World Peace Describing self as emotional and colorful Needing to boost his confidence Mental health stigma before his first disclosure (thanking his therapist in 2010) How people perceive Metta versus how he sees himself interacting in the world Metta World Peace's vision for the future Everyone has access to mental healthcare Everyone has a chance to have a good life We try to understand each other and what motivates them, what they are going through People coming together to improve society Parenting and partnership training in schools Putting parks in every neighborhood so kids can play, connect, and be kids What Metta World Peace is doing now “Sometimes it's too much [speaking about mental health], you know, sometimes I'm too vulnerable, and it hurt me a lot. Because I'm telling people where I'm from, I tell people how I live.” – Metta World Peace After retirement, Metta is focusing on spending time with his children, partner Speaking up to address mental health disparities Sharing his story to shine a light on the challenges he has faced His desire to do something powerful to make a difference Partnering with OOTify to support mental health access Business endeavors to support philanthropy for mental health Supporting other businesses to be successful Artest Management Group: Embedding philanthropy into all of the businesses Metta World Peace supports XvsX Sports helping athletes to get discovered, compete, and coach   Our Generous Sponsor for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: Thrizer Thrizer is a new modern billing platform for therapists that was built on the belief that therapy should be accessible AND clinicians should earn what they are worth. Their platform automatically gets clients reimbursed by their insurance after every session. Just by billing your clients through Thrizer, you can potentially save them hundreds every month, with no extra work on your end. Every time you bill a client through Thrizer, an insurance claim is automatically generated and sent directly to the client's insurance. From there, Thrizer provides concierge support to ensure clients get their reimbursement quickly, directly into their bank account. By eliminating reimbursement by check, confusion around benefits, and obscurity with reimbursement status, they allow your clients to focus on what actually matters rather than worrying about their money. It is very quick to get set up and it works great in completement with EHR systems. Their team is super helpful and responsive, and the founder is actually a long-time therapy client who grew frustrated with his reimbursement times The best part is you don't need to give up your rate. They charge a standard 3% payment processing fee! Thrizer lets you become more accessible while remaining in complete control of your practice. A better experience for your clients during therapy means higher retention. Money won't be the reason they quit on therapy. Sign up using bit.ly/moderntherapists if you want to test Thrizer completely risk free! Sign up for Thrizer with code 'moderntherapists' for 1 month of no credit card fees or payment processing fees! That's right - you will get one month of no payment processing fees, meaning you earn 100% of your cash rate during that time.   Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! https://www.xvsxsports.com/ https://metapandaclub.com/ https://artestuniversity.org/ OOTify Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: Therapy as a Political Act: An interview with Dr. Travis Heath Antiracist Practices in the Room: An interview with Dr. Allen Lipscomb Being a Therapist on Both Sides of the Couch: An interview with Rwenshaun Miller Let's Get Political: An interview with Heather Walker Janz Getting Personal to Advocate for Compassion, Understanding, and Social Justice: An interview with James Guay Therapy of Tomorrow: An interview with Dr. Paul Puri M.D. What to Know when Providing Therapy for Elite Athletes (CE podcourse) What Can Therapists Say About Celebrities? The Ethics of Public Statements (CE podcourse)   Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making "dad jokes" and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt's youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Podcast Homepage Therapy Reimagined Homepage Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube   Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/  

Beyond Reimagination: Improving your client outcomes by understanding what big tech is doing right (and wrong) with mental health apps Curt and Katie chat about the big tech “disruptors” in the mental health space and what therapists can learn from their tactics to support clients. We look at who is using mental health apps, what mental health apps are getting right (and wrong), and how therapists can take what is working and work differently to more effectively serve our own clients. This is a continuing education podcourse. Transcripts for this episode will be available at mtsgpodcast.com! In this podcast episode we look at what therapists can learn from big tech disruptors in mental health We have seen more and more tech companies and apps come into the mental health space and have heard more and more folks worried about how their private practices will be able to survive. We are revisiting a topic we covered in a presentation at our Therapy Reimagined 2021 conference to help modern therapists navigate this new mental health landscape. Looking at the gaps in mental health treatment and how big tech is working to “fix” them Exploring the goals from the Rand report on fixing mental healthcare in the United States Mental Health apps (with many broad definitions) Access to lots of different types of services and self-help A one stop shop with a full range of services Direct negotiation with insurance companies The types of technology used in mental health apps and the risks and benefits of these advances Algorithms Geo location data Complex payment structures Outcomes and feedback What mental health apps are doing well for clients Getting clients into therapy much more quickly Decreasing costs for consumers Increasing flexibility and availability Not requiring for things to happen in real time (asynchronous therapy) What mental health apps are getting wrong McDonaldization and commoditization Proprietary treatment methods and incentives for specific worksheets or staying within the app Misalignment between the goals of the client and the goals of the corporation Self-driven, leading to folks to potentially getting insufficient resources Individual versus community focus Caseloads and potential for therapist income (as well as burnout and poor care) Concerns about the additional risks that can happen with mental health apps “[In] this profit versus service model… there's this idea that you are not a client, not a patient, you are a consumer and someone to market to. And so you'll be marketed to as a client throughout the app. And as a clinician, you become a marketer for those things behind the paywall. And that is terrifying. Because it's not based on treatment.” – Katie Vernoy The apps are not bound by HIPAA, but instead the SEC Data sharing and Alexa suggesting supplements to address client mental health concerns Additional legal and ethical risks Who is using app-based mental health services? Therapy veterans are moving to apps Access is not actually improved The reasons that clients are moving from a traditional therapist to therapy apps Outcomes across different types of apps and different types of clients Niche apps are more effective than generalist apps What we can do to move our therapist practices forward? “Now I've seen a number of people describe… if these therapy apps are going to be the McDonald's of therapy, well, we're the prime rib! You actually have to consider are you providing actual prime rib? Or are you more like a Carl's Jr?” – Curt Widhalm Using the benefits of technology to decrease friction for your clients accessing therapists Increasing flexibility and creativity Be a better therapist and understanding the digital therapeutic alliance Paying attention to laws and ethics, scope of practice, and treatment planning Our Generous Sponsors for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: Turning Point Financial Life Planning Turning Point Financial Life Planning helps therapists stop worrying about money. Confidently navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. Turning Point is a financial planning & coaching firm that helps therapists stop worrying about money. Dave at Turning Point will help you navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. He'll help you move through that feeling of being stuck, frustrated and overwhelmed... And arrive at a place where you feel relief, validation, motivation and hope. And for listeners of MTSG, you'll receive $200 off the price of any service. Just enter promo code Modern Therapist. Be sure and visit turningpointHQ.com and download the free whitepaper “7 Money Mindset Shifts to Reduce Financial Anxiety” OOTify OOTify. "OOT" or "uth" (उठ) means "lift up" in the Hindi language. OOTify is a digital health solution that acts as an evidence-based hub to unify relevant mental health resources. Community, Connection, and Collaboration are critical to OOTIFY.  As they lift the mental healthcare system, they ensure providers are part of the process. OOTIFY is a platform for providers, built by providers, and owned by providers. OOTIFY is the process of lifting up mental healthcare, while lifting each other up. We need to talk about our mental health. We need to make our mental health stronger so we can withstand the things that happen in our life. We're going to go through trials and tribulations. But if we can work on our mental health, proactively, our wellness, we can handle all that as a community and come together. People are more open to talk about these stories and say, “Hey, listen, I'm going through this too.” Do be you want to be a part of the solution by joining a new web three community focused on mental health and wellness? Join the OOTify community as an investor or mental health provider by visiting ootify.com/contact. You can also give us a follow on social media to stay tuned on exciting updates. Receive Continuing Education for this Episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Hey modern therapists, we're so excited to offer the opportunity for 1 unit of continuing education for this podcast episode – Therapy Reimagined is bringing you the Modern Therapist Learning Community!  Once you've listened to this episode, to get CE credit you just need to go to moderntherapistcommunity.com/podcourse, register for your free profile, purchase this course, pass the post-test, and complete the evaluation! Once that's all completed - you'll get a CE certificate in your profile or you can download it for your records. For our current list of CE approvals, check out moderntherapistcommunity.com. You can find this full course (including handouts and resources) here: https://moderntherapistcommunity.com/podcourse/ Continuing Education Approvals: When we are airing this podcast episode, we have the following CE approval. Please check back as we add other approval bodies: Continuing Education Information CAMFT CEPA: Therapy Reimagined is approved by the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists to sponsor continuing education for LMFTs, LPCCs, LCSWs, and LEPs (CAMFT CEPA provider #132270). Therapy Reimagined maintains responsibility for this program and its content. Courses meet the qualifications for the listed hours of continuing education credit for LMFTs, LCSWs, LPCCs, and/or LEPs as required by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences. We are working on additional provider approvals, but solely are able to provide CAMFT CEs at this time. Please check with your licensing body to ensure that they will accept this as an equivalent learning credit. Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! TR 2021: Beyond Reimagination - Moving the mental health field from thought to action (video course) Thrizer (payment and billing platform) Economides, M., Ranta, K., Hilgert, O., Kelleher, D., Arean, P., & Hoffman, V. (2019, November 1). The impact of a remote digital health intervention for anxiety and depression on occupational and functional impairment: an observational, pre-post intervention study. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/rhfpa McBain, R. K., Eberhart, N.K., Breslau, J., Frank, L., Burnam, M.A., Kareddy, V, and Simmons, M. M. (2021). How to Transform the U.S. Mental Health System: Evidence-Based Recommendations. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2021. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA889-1.html. *The full reference list can be found in the course on our learning platform.   Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: Special Series: Fixing Mental Healthcare in America Fixing Mental Health in America: An interview with Dr. Nicole Eberhart, Senior Behavioral Scientist, and Dr. Ryan McBain, Policy Researcher, The RAND Corporation Online Therapy Apps Why You Shouldn't Sell Out to Better Help Non-Traditional Therapy Series: Part 1 and Part 2   Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making "dad jokes" and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt's youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Podcast Homepage Therapy Reimagined Homepage Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube   Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/

The Risks and Consequences of Failing to Report Child Abuse Curt and Katie discuss the CA Board of Behavioral Sciences case against Barbara Dixon, LMFT who failed to report child abuse for Gabriel Fernandez and Anthony Avalos who both subsequently died from abuse by caregivers. We look at what this therapist missed as well as appropriate child abuse reporting, including the nuance of when to report. CW: details of child abuse discussed. Transcripts for this episode will be available at mtsgpodcast.com! In this podcast episode we talk about the importance of child abuse reporting We talk about the failure to report abuse by Barbara Dixon, LMFT that has recently been in the news related to the deaths of Gabriel Fernandez and Anthony Avalos. The case related to the child abuse death of Gabriel Fernandez Content Warning: Details of the case, including the actions taken (and not taken) by Barbara Dixon, LMFT The decision-making process with child abuse reporting Who is responsible to decide to report child abuse – the clinician or the supervisor? “I hear [prelicensees] wrongly state that ‘I'm working under somebody else's license; this falls on them' … I cannot emphasize enough that decisions like this, in [Barbara Dixon's] case, really do indicate that it is your responsibility, no matter what your agency says… People can and do get punished for not following through on their individual licensee or registration responsibilities as mandated reporters.” – Curt Widhalm When supervisors or agencies tell clinicians under supervision not to report child abuse report The individual responsibility that each clinician holds The myth that you're working “under” your supervisor's license How do you decide whether you should report child abuse? “It's these gray areas where there's this nuance that I think feels really overwhelming. And for some folks, they'll lean towards reporting or consulting to identify if it's reportable. And for other folks, they use that as cover to not report when it feels too uncomfortable.” – Katie Vernoy Clarity from child abuse reporting laws Hesitation based on systemic response, the therapeutic relationship, and the paperwork hassle Where there are gray areas and nuance The consequences of failing to report child abuse or adequately document services or risks Your agency or supervisor may not be held liable for your actions (especially if you don't document what you did) Incomplete documentation hurts – it doesn't help you hide from liability Appropriate Child Abuse Assessment and Reporting Interviewing the child separately Following up on what you've asked for Understanding at what point it becomes our responsibility (i.e., having sufficient information) Documenting each stage and make sure to appropriately close out treatment file when needed Consultation and not making the decision on your own Defining the injury and assess from there Understanding normal childhood response to typical life events (and noting changes) Navigating the gray areas in child abuse assessment Looking at impact, intent, and injury Using the context to help decide when there isn't a definitive line Adequately documenting, even when you aren't sure you're making the right decision, is important and necessary Looking at what needs systemic intervention and what needs family therapy Getting past the discomfort to report child abuse report It is your responsibility Taking a moment to understand the purpose of reporting Reducing your own liability Obtaining resources for families Understanding the risk for families of systems getting involved Our Generous Sponsors for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: OOTify OOTify. "OOT" or "uth" (उठ) means "lift up" in the Hindi language. OOTify is a digital health solution that acts as an evidence-based hub to unify relevant mental health resources. Community, Connection, and Collaboration are critical to OOTIFY.  As they lift the mental healthcare system, they ensure providers are part of the process. OOTIFY is a platform for providers, built by providers, and owned by providers. OOTIFY is the process of lifting up mental healthcare, while lifting each other up. We need to talk about our mental health. We need to make our mental health stronger so we can withstand the things that happen in our life. We're going to go through trials and tribulations. But if we can work on our mental health, proactively, our wellness, we can handle all that as a community and come together. People are more open to talk about these stories and say, “Hey, listen, I'm going through this too.” Do be you want to be a part of the solution by joining a new web three community focused on mental health and wellness? Join the OOTify community as an investor or mental health provider by visiting ootify.com/contact. You can also give us a follow on social media to stay tuned on exciting updates. Turning Point Financial Life Planning Turning Point Financial Life Planning helps therapists stop worrying about money. Confidently navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. Turning Point is a financial planning & coaching firm that helps therapists stop worrying about money. Dave at Turning Point will help you navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. He'll help you move through that feeling of being stuck, frustrated and overwhelmed... And arrive at a place where you feel relief, validation, motivation and hope. And for listeners of MTSG, you'll receive $200 off the price of any service. Just enter promo code Modern Therapist. Be sure and visit turningpointHQ.com and download the free whitepaper “7 Money Mindset Shifts to Reduce Financial Anxiety” Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! Los Angeles Times Article: Counselor who didn't report abuse of Gabriel Fernandez, Anthony Avalos put on 4-year probation Citation/Enforcement Decision on Barbara Dixon LA Times Article: Charges dismissed against social workers linked to Gabriel Fernandez's killing Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: Now Modern Therapists Have to Document Every F*cking Thing in Our Progress Notes? Do Therapists Curse in Session? Toxic Work Environments Giving and Getting Good Supervision Make Your Paperwork Meaningful: An interview with Dr. Maelisa McCaffrey Hall Noteworthy Documentation: An interview with Dr. Ben Caldwell, LMFT CYA for Court: An interview with Nicol Stolar-Peterson, LCSW   Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making "dad jokes" and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt's youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Podcast Homepage Therapy Reimagined Homepage Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube   Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group   Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/

Should Therapists Correct Clients? Curt and Katie chat about whether therapists should correct clients who use offensive language. We look at what we should consider when addressing what clients say (including treatment goals and the relationship), how therapists can take care of themselves to be able to treat clients who hold a different worldview, and how (and when) therapists can address problematic language appropriately. Transcripts for this episode will be available at mtsgpodcast.com! In this podcast episode we talk about whether therapists should call out their clients on words they find inappropriate We decided to address the language that clients use in session and what to do when we find the language offensive or harmful. Should therapists correct clients when they use language we find offensive or harmful? Blank slate or “join your clients” approaches Whether the language should be addressed when it doesn't align with a client's stated treatment goals Showing up as a human and addressing the therapeutic relationship Judgment or shaming that can happen with clients What should therapists consider when addressing what clients say? The relationship between the therapist and client Relevance to clinical goals The impact on trust in the therapeutic alliance The importance of using the client's language to affirm their experience The power differential between therapist and client How can therapists show up with clients who see the world differently than they do? Addressing objectification of therapist's identities Assessing when therapists are centering their own experience versus responding to what is in the room Using the relationship to process client's perspective “I feel like just living in the client's world without honoring my own experience at all doesn't feel quite right. But centering my experience feels wrong.” – Katie Vernoy What can therapists do to appropriately address problematic language with their clients? Process what is being said before correcting specific words Address within the relationship and within the treatment goals Using our own coping skills to be able to navigate what our clients bring to session “I'm very worried that therapists don't have enough of their own coping skills to deal with these things coming up in sessions. Where they feel that they have to shut these clients down for the protection of themselves. You know, their only coping mechanism seems to be – I need to escape working with clients that don't already agree with my worldview.” – Curt Widhalm Where social justice plays a role (and maybe shouldn't) Education and supporting the client's whole development Assessing the impact of these interventions (both positive and negative) Assessing the harm in not pointing out bias or harmful language   Our Generous Sponsors for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: Turning Point Financial Life Planning Turning Point Financial Life Planning helps therapists stop worrying about money. Confidently navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. Turning Point is a financial planning & coaching firm that helps therapists stop worrying about money. Dave at Turning Point will help you navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. He'll help you move through that feeling of being stuck, frustrated and overwhelmed... And arrive at a place where you feel relief, validation, motivation and hope. And for listeners of MTSG, you'll receive $200 off the price of any service. Just enter promo code Modern Therapist. Be sure and visit turningpointHQ.com and download the free whitepaper “7 Money Mindset Shifts to Reduce Financial Anxiety” OOTify OOTify. "OOT" or "uth" (उठ) means "lift up" in the Hindi language. OOTify is a digital health solution that acts as an evidence-based hub to unify relevant mental health resources. Community, Connection, and Collaboration are critical to OOTIFY.  As they lift the mental healthcare system, they ensure providers are part of the process. OOTIFY is a platform for providers, built by providers, and owned by providers. OOTIFY is the process of lifting up mental healthcare, while lifting each other up. We need to talk about our mental health. We need to make our mental health stronger so we can withstand the things that happen in our life. We're going to go through trials and tribulations. But if we can work on our mental health, proactively, our wellness, we can handle all that as a community and come together. People are more open to talk about these stories and say, “Hey, listen, I'm going through this too.” Do be you want to be a part of the solution by joining a new web three community focused on mental health and wellness? Join the OOTify community as an investor or mental health provider by visiting ootify.com/contact. You can also give us a follow on social media to stay tuned on exciting updates.   Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! Therapist–Client Language Matching: Initial Promise as a Measure of Therapist–Client Relationship Quality Feedback Informed Treatment   Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: Do Therapists Curse in Session? How to Fire Your Clients (Ethically) How to Fire Your Clients (Ethically) part 1.5 When is it Discrimination? Conspiracy Theories in Your Office   Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making "dad jokes" and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt's youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Podcast Homepage Therapy Reimagined Homepage Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube   Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/

Is the Counseling Compact Good for Therapists? Curt and Katie chat about the brand-new Counseling Compact and what therapists may not know or understand about these interstate agreements. We explore the proposed benefits as well as the potential risks and complications like regulatory discrepancies and a lack of consumer protections. We also look at how big tech can benefit while individual clinicians may be left unable to compete in a larger market. In this podcast episode we talk about the new Counseling Compact and Psypact The counselors got their 10th state and officially have Counseling Compact to practice in other states. We thought it would be a good idea to talk about what that means (and what we might want to pay attention to). What is the Counseling Compact? Opportunities for practicing privileges (not licensure) in other states The complexity of putting together these interstate compacts Implementation and regulation hurdles Scope of practice discrepancies and concerns Law and Ethics practices across states Benefits of Interstate Compacts for Mental Health Providers Continuity of care Ease of meeting with clients who are moving around the country Bringing clinicians to areas where there is a workforce shortage Potential Problems with the Counseling Compact “This very much goes against, according to the FBI, any sort of patient protection – that any of these licensing boards are put into place in the first place: to protect consumers.” – Curt Widhalm Not bringing more clinicians, if only states with workforce shortages join Doesn't solve the infrastructure problems (i.e., stable Wi-Fi) for rural areas that typically don't have local therapists The people who most benefit: the big tech companies like Better Help The FBI is opposing this legislation due to lack of federal background checks Lack of consumer protection or consistency in what consumers can expect from their therapist Costs for the therapists to get practicing privileges Large gigantic group practices and tech solutions will contract with insurance and leave smaller practices unable to compete and required to be private pay Solving the Problems with the Counseling Compact “It may actually delay [a national license], because it's a band aid where people can go practice in other states. So why would I get a national license, if I can practice in a couple other states and not worry about taking another test, getting another background check…?” – Katie Vernoy Overarching regulation and expectations at a national level Federal bodies to oversee background checks and consumer protections Expensive, time-intensive We don't have universal healthcare, so insurance parity will need to be addressed (and not just by big tech) Our Generous Sponsors for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: OOTify OOTify. "OOT" or "uth" (उठ) means "lift up" in the Hindi language. OOTify is a digital health solution that acts as an evidence-based hub to unify relevant mental health resources. Community, Connection, and Collaboration are critical to OOTIFY.  As they lift the mental healthcare system, they ensure providers are part of the process. OOTIFY is a platform for providers, built by providers, and owned by providers. OOTIFY is the process of lifting up mental healthcare, while lifting each other up. We need to talk about our mental health. We need to make our mental health stronger so we can withstand the things that happen in our life. We're going to go through trials and tribulations. But if we can work on our mental health, proactively, our wellness, we can handle all that as a community and come together. People are more open to talk about these stories and say, “Hey, listen, I'm going through this too.” Do be you want to be a part of the solution by joining a new web three community focused on mental health and wellness? Join the OOTify community as an investor or mental health provider by visiting ootify.com/contact. You can also give us a follow on social media to stay tuned on exciting updates. Turning Point Financial Life Planning Turning Point Financial Life Planning helps therapists stop worrying about money. Confidently navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. Turning Point is a financial planning & coaching firm that helps therapists stop worrying about money. Dave at Turning Point will help you navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. He'll help you move through that feeling of being stuck, frustrated and overwhelmed... And arrive at a place where you feel relief, validation, motivation and hope. And for listeners of MTSG, you'll receive $200 off the price of any service. Just enter promo code Modern Therapist. Be sure and visit turningpointHQ.com and download the free whitepaper “7 Money Mindset Shifts to Reduce Financial Anxiety” Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! Counseling Compact Psypact Very Bad Therapy Podcast Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: Special Series: Fixing Mental Healthcare in America Fixing Mental Health in America: An interview with Dr. Nicole Eberhart, Senior Behavioral Scientist, and Dr. Ryan McBain, Policy Researcher, The RAND Corporation Online Therapy Apps Why You Shouldn't Sell Out to Better Help   Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making "dad jokes" and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt's youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Podcast Homepage Therapy Reimagined Homepage Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube   Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group   Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/   Transcript for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide podcast (Autogenerated): Curt Widhalm  00:00 This episode is brought to you by OOTify.   Katie Vernoy  00:03 OOTify is an immersive digital mental health ecosystem. It's designed to help minimize the fragmentation, trial and error and overwhelm felt by both patients and providers in the process of giving and receiving care. OOTify is the process of lifting up mental health care while lifting each other up.   Curt Widhalm  00:20 Listen at the end of the episode for more information.   Katie Vernoy  00:23 This episode is also brought to you by Turning Point.   Curt Widhalm  00:26  Turning Point Financial Life Planning helps therapists stop worrying about money. Confidently navigate every aspect of your financial life from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing taxes and student loans.   Katie Vernoy  00:39 Visit turningpointhq.com. To learn more and enter the promo code 'moderntherapist' for $200 off any service.   Announcer  00:47 You're listening to The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide where therapists live, breathe and practice as human beings. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, here are your hosts, Curt Widhalm and Katie Vernoy.   Curt Widhalm  01:03 Welcome back modern therapists. This is The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy. And this is the podcast for therapists about things going on in the therapy worlds. And recently, the 10th state has joined the counseling compact, which initiates that it is all coming together for licensed professional counselors here in America. And what this does is creates a whole lot of space for people to make up what they think that it is. And we are here to correct that information. So, Katie, lots of things to talk about in this episode, what are your initial reactions.   Katie Vernoy  01:49 So my initial reactions typically with all of these pacts, so there's Counseling Pact, there's PSYPACT or Counseling Compact and PSYPACT, which is a psychologist, and then the social workers are working on something. As for MFTs so far, we don't have something going on. But I have mixed feelings. Because I think for me, I have clients who travel around to different states. And so I can only see them when they're in states I'm licensed in, I've got ideas around being able to support folks in areas that have fewer clinicians or clinicians who specialize in and what they need. And I also recognize I live in a state that has a very high cost of living. And so if there are therapists in states with much lower cost of living who are quote, unquote, taking my clients, I think it would be something where that that may make it harder for me to compete in my own market. So lots of mixed feelings. And I'm not quite sure at least until we started prepping for this episode, I wasn't quite sure what these compacts meant. And so I think probably we should start with, What's the Counseling Compact? If we, you know, it's PSYPACT different? What's the social workers working on? But broadly, what are these things? And why do people care about them?   Curt Widhalm  03:05 So these pacts are going to be slightly different between the counselors and the psychologists and psychologists is PSYPACT. The Counseling Compact is for counselors, we're not really going to talk a whole lot about social workers and MFTs, because they have not gotten their act together and have anything moving in this direction yet. Social workers do. But in talking about the two that are already in place, or quickly moving into place, what it does is allows for somebody, this is language from the Counseling Compact, what it does is allows for somebody who is licensed in and resides in one of the member states to have practicing privileges through some regulation stuff in other states. So it's not just like a license reciprocity where you are granted now a 10 state license, you have to go through some certain steps of just picking a couple of states out of this here. But if you are, say, practicing in Nebraska, and you have a person in West Virginia, who wants to utilize your services, you would need to go to the West Virginia Board and have a streamlined ability to get a privilege to practice with clients in West Virginia.   Katie Vernoy  04:30 Okay, but you have to live in Nebraska, it can't be like I live in California, and I'm licensed in Nebraska. So now then I can practice with somebody in West Virginia, if I get that streamlined.   Curt Widhalm  04:42 Yes, and this is the language that you have to be licensed in and reside in one of those states. So many people have licensure in multiple states already. If you are not one of the 10 states as a resident this does not apply to you. So this is not like a, you know, huge like opening up the gates to everybody living all over the place. California being where Katie and I reside, we can't just go and get licensed in Utah and now have the ability to practice in all of these other states. A residency requirement is part of this as well.   Katie Vernoy  05:20 Well, one thing, I think that it does start things moving, because I know with PSYPACT, there are 34 states in process. So it is the beginning of something, it's just a matter of right now, this is the very beginning stages and other states may join. But in some of the conversations and research we've done, it sounds like there's a lot that goes into it once a state joins. And even in putting together the overarching compact, there is this need to get kind of almost universal expectations, kind of an overarching, regulatory body, there's also needs to, you know, look at scope of practice issues, which at least as we're aware of MFT stuff, but there's very different scope of practice for California MFTs than there is for Texas, or West Virginia MFTs, for example. And so there's a lot of complexity that's going to be sorted out as this starts to get implemented. But the idea is that these compacts these interstate compacts are meant to provide a launchpad for more states to join, right?   Curt Widhalm  06:29 And this is some of the stuff that's got to be ironed out over the next couple of years. And frankly, I'd be surprised if all 10 of these states are able to address some of these discrepancies over the next few years. And for example, and I know not all of these states are currently part of the 10. But they do sometimes have some legislation to get them involved in the Counseling Compact here. But looking at the different requirements in different states, Georgia as an example, one of the 10 States does have a pretty high barrier to entry when it comes to becoming licensed within the state. And so I'm going to emphasize again, this is practicing privileges in other states, that is not a full reciprocity of license. So if somebody is practicing, gets practicing privileges in Georgia as a member of this Counseling Compact, one of the things that needs to be addressed is the discrepancy between what is allowed from one state to the next, for example, some states allow counselors to provide diagnostics of clients, other states do not and what has yet to be ironed out on this is how much does this change the scope of practice in these other states? What's unclear at this point is how these things are going to be regulated. While there is a central body that will oversee this compact, because of the way that it's set up each of these states are the ones who are still overseeing their own licensees, disciplinary actions and abilities to practice. So it's not like you're gonna be able to sit at home and do telehealth across all of these 10 states, and be able to practice just in the way that you are at home with your home state's clients, you're also going to run into well, I can diagnose this client but not this one. Or I need to be aware of, you know, my ability to do things ethically, one way in one state, but because of the ways that the laws are written in another state, I'm not allowed to do this. So these are some of the things that now have to be centrally addressed across all of these states here.   Katie Vernoy  08:48 And I think it's something that can get very confusing, but I want to re emphasize that there is this element of expectation that this means I'm in licensed and these other states and and because it's practicing privileges, is it telehealth only? If I go visit the state, could I still see those clients in person? Like what is the what is the practical difference between practicing privileges and licensure? In this regard.   Curt Widhalm  09:12 The differences is, it's not a license in another state. It's the allowance of you to be able to provide services to people in that state. But it is not the equivalent of having a license in both states.   Katie Vernoy  09:30 But what is the practical difference there? Like why do I care if I'm licensed or have practicing privileges?   Curt Widhalm  09:37 One of the major differences is that it's a lot easier to revoke practicing privileges than it is to revoke somebody's license. Having a license in both states means that you are obligated to both states licensing boards. What practicing privileges means is that you're allowed to practice here but you're still responsible to your own state's governing body for disciplinary actions, and so on and so forth. So it could be very easy. If a therapist is working with a client who's out of state and residing in Georgia, for example, Georgia could very easily be like, you're not meeting the requirements of practice in our state where you're doing out things, things outside the scope of practice in our state. And we don't like that, and you're no longer allowed to practice here. So it's a lot easier than going through a lot of the big disciplinary actions that may require revoking somebody's license in a state that they're actually licensed in.   Katie Vernoy  10:40 So for the clinician, it means that they would really need to be able to identify all the different scope of practice, how to really stay up to date in all these different states, as well as what is that kind of fine line that I can walk, either to treat all my clients the same, but super restricted, or, you know, like having different rubrics for how I treat each client. So it can get pretty complicated is what you're saying, for the clinician to pay attention to what's required of them.   Curt Widhalm  11:11 Yeah, and I think to this is where the goal is over the next couple of years to change some of this information. So that way, we're able to make it a lot simpler for people because the goal in this is with the intention of making practice easier, allowing for more people to have access to more mental health providers. However, these obstacles exist, and giving kind of the next couple of years of the ability for state legislatures to change the subsequent laws that now need to go into effect because this is in place, the goal probably is to simplify this stuff.   Katie Vernoy  11:50 Okay.   Curt Widhalm  11:51 And I haven't heard or seen anything where any of these member states have, you know, any real opposition in this way, it's just that things in the legislature can take other priorities. I mean, we saw this with the COVID 19 pandemic, where it's like all the states for a couple of years where like, everything now has to focus on COVID. So some of these obstacles are still in place. And it's just a acknowledgment that that's the system that we currently live in.   Katie Vernoy  12:21 So you mentioned kind of getting more providers for places that have provider shortages. And I think that's one of the biggest stated benefits, I think, clinician match and finding clinicians that have a specialty when you don't have a lot of clinicians in your state can be very helpful. There's also continuity of care. I've talked about my clients traveling around and especially as things open back up, there's clinicians or clients that are traveling a lot more and so we have to time their sessions versus just being able to meet at a regular time via telehealth, I think there's a lot of positives that are being seen here. We've started talking about some of the hesitations and and and we are aware that the for the MFT stuff CAMFT, AAMFT and AAMFTRB, you know, what least AMFT and CAMFT are talking and have reached out to AAMFTRB, whatever that is.   Curt Widhalm  13:12 Yeah, you got it right.   Katie Vernoy  13:13 So there's, there's conversations happening, I think, and obviously different stages for all the licenses, there's, there's a, there isn't a knowledge that this is something it's kind of the wave of the future, because we can interact so freely across state lines, like why not get this process in place, but there's a lot of complications, you know, the overarching scope of practice, the complication of setting it up and running it and all those kinds of stuff. There's a lot of stuff that's very challenging there. How much do we want to talk about that, that element versus you, you've already previewed for me anyway, that you are a little bit of a skeptic here. When do we want to what do we When do we want to shift gears to that? Because I think that there's so many folks are super excited about this. And I think there are things that are exciting about it. But there are some real concerns that I want to make sure we get to. So where should we go next? I guess is the question that I'm asking here.   Curt Widhalm  14:06 So this has all of the makings of a wonderful piece of legislation and cooperation that I don't know actually addresses what it's saying that it's intended to address.   Katie Vernoy  14:21 Okay.   Curt Widhalm  14:21 It is no surprise to anybody who listens to our podcasts that we have a mental health crisis, and we have a very understaffed mental health workforce. This theoretically allows for more clients to address more providers, but many of these states are amongst the most impacted as far as having the fewest providers available. And so if you combine 10 states who don't have enough workforce for each of their own individual states, by their 10 powers combined, theoretically can't address that even more people are going to be able to access a limited number of providers. It's not like we have, you know, a bunch of people who are all just residing in Utah, there's, you know, 9 million LPCs in Utah, who now just have like all of this free time to go and see clients who need to see counselors that Utah just has this, you know, mass amounts of people who have been confined to by state lines. This is, you know, a bunch of people without enough food now sharing that they don't have enough food with more people in more places.   Katie Vernoy  15:38 It doesn't make it worse. It just doesn't solve it is what is how I see it. But I think if folks who, if these states that have those needs don't get it started, I think it's hard because I think the big states don't need those extra jobs. Right? I mean, it maybe they do. I mean, I think there's a lot of clinicians in California, they're like, yeah, let me practice somewhere else, because I need I need clients, there's, you know, you could trip over a therapist, every few steps in California. So I mean, it's possible that with this starting, I mean, PSYPACT is going on 34 states. So we've moved beyond the the threshold in PSYPACT, where it's just states that are having provider shortages. I think I think I see what you're saying this does not solve? Did you want to start it?   Curt Widhalm  16:28 But I do want to correct one thing that you're saying is, we have a bias because we hang out with a lot of therapists in a very populated city.   Katie Vernoy  16:38 Sure.   Curt Widhalm  16:38 But California has a mental health workforce shortage as well. It's just that, this goes to address that there's rural parts of our states. And there's rural parts of a lot of these other states that are part of this, that we we have our own shortages, and we're not able to address this inviting more people to address, you know, people in rural areas. It's well intended, but it doesn't motivate or necessarily get people to the jobs that are needed in these positions.   Katie Vernoy  17:12 What you just said actually made me think about the series that we're still somewhat in the process of Fixing Mental Healthcare in America. But I think there's that that piece that the the RAND Corporation identified where there has been efforts and telehealth is a great effort to try to bring, you know, therapy to these rural areas, but the infrastructure and you know, good good WiFi, and all of the pieces to actually be able to address these things potentially are more impactful than just adding clinicians from another state that are probably going to want to access or your wealthy urban clients anyway.   Curt Widhalm  17:52 Which leads to my second criticism of this is that because of the scramble that's going to happen, the people who are most likely able to address the shortcomings of this public policy position across these 10 states are venture capital led groups like BetterHelp, that will do all of the legwork to match you up with clients in all of these rural areas. And we've got other episodes that we will talk in, you know, in BetterHelp's defence it's not just BetterHelp who can take advantage of these. But I have my concerns that the people who have already been doing this against the law, as we've discussed in our previous episodes are motivating therapists to practice across state lines, when they're not allowed to are the ones who are going to continue to contribute to the already capitalistic problems of our profession. And once again, not really with the best intentions of what clients have in store for them. But just by virtue of being able to match people more easily than any of the individual therapists in private practice. Where like, hey, my clients going on vacation, I can still see them for their regular session.   Katie Vernoy  19:21 We'll link to a lot of those episodes in the show notes. But but what I'm hearing you say Curt, is that this is super charging the big tech problem.   Curt Widhalm  19:31 Yes, it is.   Katie Vernoy  19:32 Okay. Mic drop.   Curt Widhalm  19:39 Pick that mic right back up, because they're, I don't know, I'm the resident, you know, contrarian of the show, the one who's maybe trying to poke at things and often I hear from listeners or from Katie or other people in my life is like, Why let perfection be the enemy of good? And so I am looking, you know, for who else opposes this? And I did come across somebody else on the opposition side of this. And it's a little group called the FBI.   Katie Vernoy  20:20 Why? Why is the FBI opposing this?   Curt Widhalm  20:25 For those unfamiliar with the FBI, they are a law enforcement agency. And they are one of the generally two places that when you go to get licensed that your background checks go to.   Katie Vernoy  20:38 Ah, yes.   Curt Widhalm  20:39 And so the rationale in other interstate compacts, including Counseling Compact, including PSYPACT, including medical compacts, and nurses compacts, the FBI has had a pretty consistent position on this. And their reasoning is that these states entering into these agreements, does not give them the right to supersede federal background checks. Now, allowing for practicing privileges in another state allows for the bypass of doing a background check for that state.   Katie Vernoy  21:13 Oh, interesting.   Curt Widhalm  21:14 And the way that the Department of Justice allows for some of these states to get the results of background checks, does not allow for them to share the information from those background checks.   Katie Vernoy  21:27 Oh, that's why if you get licensed in another state, even if you can say like, Hey, I'm licensed over here, they did my background check. The new state still needs a background check.   Curt Widhalm  21:37 And giving practicing privileges as I understand this legislation to be written today does not require background checks. It allows for the disciplinary boards to share information about discipline. But let's say that a therapist from one of these 10 states, goes on a weekend Bender in Vegas and ends up in the Clark County Jail. That information does not necessarily get shared with either licensing states because why, but then also doesn't get shared with any of the other practicing privileged states. It's not something that would mess like up. Overall therapists don't get arrested.   Katie Vernoy  22:22 Yeah, just don't   Curt Widhalm  22:23 Yes. But especially don't get arrested in your practicing states, because you're practicing states have with their own State Department of Justice's, like, California BBS. Like if somebody gets arrested, and they're licensed California, they get a little like, ping the next morning of like, hey, one of your licensees was arrested. But if you're, if you're gonna get arrested, don't get arrested, you know, being outside of your jurisdiction, at least, there's some opportunities to fall through the cracks there. And the...   Katie Vernoy  22:55 Are you telling people to how to avoid getting in trouble?   Curt Widhalm  22:58 This is not legal advice. And legal advice, once again, is don't get arrested. But what the FBI's database does, is allows for this information to be pinged in each time that somebody goes through a background check. The FBI is saying that this does not actually empower any of the states to know information if somebody was to have a an offense against them that wasn't caught or happened after their own background check to get a license in their own state.   Katie Vernoy  23:31 Well, I'm just even thinking for myself, I have not been arrested. I don't have anything that I have to worry about. But yeah, I haven't had a background check for 15 years? So I could be doing all kinds of stuff and get practicing privileges elsewhere - is what you're telling me?   Curt Widhalm  23:48 Yes. And so this very much goes against, according to the FBI, any sort of patient protection that any of these licensing boards are put into place in the first place to protect consumers.   Katie Vernoy  24:03 Well, I haven't think taking this further the whole consumer protection angle, and I think I'm gonna give you credit, you mentioned this before we started recording. But as a consumer, I have no place to check if you actually do have practicing privileges in my state, or if there's any problems. I mean, I guess I could look at your licensing state if I knew how to do that, knew where to do it, and can see if there's any any dings on your license, but, but it really takes some of the stuff out of the consumers hand being able to identify, you know, anything about the person that they're working with.   Curt Widhalm  24:41 And I imagine that these are things that are going to need to be addressed over the next few years as having some way of centrally notifying each other's state licensures or any of that kind of stuff. And I'm sure that there's somebody out there saying, But Curt this hasn't been a problem with PSYPACT yet. And the answer that I have back in response to you is "that we know of, and it will likely happen."   Katie Vernoy  25:13 Well, I think it's something where there's, and this was something that I hadn't thought about. But in a conversation that we had, I think it's something where, with psychologists, the, as far as I know, the licensing exams, their expectations are pretty constant across the United States. And so if somebody messes up in the state that they're licensed in, that's going to have a big impact, because it is the same pretty far across and I, this doesn't address the federal background checks. But I think it does address this kind of idea of all the complexity and and consumers having an issue because what they're expecting from their clinician is not what they get, because their clinician practices way differently than anybody in their state, for example, but MFTs don't have that. I mean, there's that there's a national association, but all 50 states basically have different expectations. Counselors, I think, are a little bit more streamlined and so that's probably why they're moving forward. Social workers are very streamlined, and I'm sure they're going to probably get, you know, glide through this. But I think it's something where that feels solvable, you know, getting a getting some way that there's this the background checks and that kind of stuff, if you're if you're part of this compact, if you choose to get practicing privileges, there's a federal body that you then have to get a background check. And then that, you know, somebody at the federal level is running it versus each state having to do it. You know, I think there's some legislation that could probably really help this. But that seems really expensive. And I'm wondering, you know, there's part of me, that's like do therapists care? Do to consumers care? I mean, like, we're worried about this regulation and there's part of me, and there's a whole podcast devoted to this Very Bad Therapy. But there's, there's bad clinicians that are not going to have oversight. But then there's also all of these clients, who don't have access to therapists who accept them as who they are. And so having some of these things come into place, like to me, it seems like it could be good. So I'm getting all over the place. So bring us back to something that's that's helpful. But I think there's, there's this element of it feels solvable. I just don't know the timeline, or how much money, but...   Curt Widhalm  27:36 That those two points are the problems that I foresee with this, that it's none of these things that I'm bringing up are unsolvable. Maybe the BetterHelp thing. But...   Katie Vernoy  27:52 That's a different problem. It's separate from this problem to solve.   Curt Widhalm  27:55 Right. But it's probably going to be a lot more costs that are passed on to the providers than anybody sees. The buzz that I'm initially hearing from people on this is very much like you that most people are taking this as, oh, I can just kind of see my clients wherever they travel, as long as they're in one of these 10 states.   Katie Vernoy  28:19 Yeah.   Curt Widhalm  28:19 And that is not true. And each one of these states is going to be additional costs. And you know, the background checks thing is, all right, you still go down to your local fingerprinting place, you do your live scan, you're just having it reported to a different state board and the FBI each time. And those things add up, you know, 50 bucks at a time adds up. Yeah, times that by 10 states, times it by the application fees, because part of the legislation that was written for all of these states is basically written by the same people. And it's, you know, quote, unquote, not actually a direct quote here, but not going to have anything more than administrative costs passed on to clinicians. There's a lot of administration costs in this that any of the licensing boards are more or less operating at a break even point that adding on a bunch of new staff to process out of state therapists and to verify things. Those are going to be cost that add up. Are they going to be cheaper than getting a license and meeting all the requirements in these other states? Absolutely. But these are costs that are going to add up for people. This is not going to be a free for all that all of these state licensing boards are going to allow here.   Katie Vernoy  29:40 Yeah, I think that's the thing that's that's hard because there's a lot of elements to this, that says that like this is this, this makes everything smooth and easy. This really provides additional access and the more we've talked together about it when we've talked to other folks about it, it just I'm hearing that there is so much complexity to how this operates, that it may not happen for all states, because you know, states that have enough clinician, states that have a higher cost of living, they may not feel the need to, to add to their costs, or their clinician base. And so they're not going to take it on. But but when I look at, you know, really what we're talking about, it's, it's trying to put a bandaid on this problem. And hopefully, it's it's something that there's actually real federal legislation that can help to increase the infrastructure in places that need more clinicians, help to, to create systems that actually address some of these concerns that you're bringing up. But that would require tax dollars, versus clinicians paying application fees, and all those things. I mean, I heard, I think that's the thing I heard was like, millions of dollars to get this setup, you know, I mean, like, that's, I guess, if you've got a lot of clinicians, that's a cross of a lot of clinicians, you know, if they are savvy clinicians, those fees are then incorporated into the fees they charge, which then for private pay clinicians anyway means that they're charging more. Insurance panels aren't going to pay you more just because you've got some extra that's under your belt. And so it's something where the cost thing hasn't been figured out, nor has the infrastructure both on the client side, but also on this regulatory side, it feels like there's just so much to figure out here.   Curt Widhalm  31:35 And that's something that I haven't even seen how insurance is going to work across state lines that I willingly admit that I don't know the inner workings of a lot of the insurance process, but knowing that, all right, yeah, it's great that you can see a client to timezones away. But does their insurance allow it? And this is another factor that's going to be in it. And, you know, we can talk all day long, and I'm already pre addressing some of the criticisms of this episode from people. We don't yet have universal health care. Don't even bring that up, like...   Katie Vernoy  32:14 Sure.   Curt Widhalm  32:15 Don't make arguments about systems that we don't have. These are problems that need to be addressed in the meantime. And yeah, I know that some people are going to say that this is the first step towards national licensure and this kind of stuff. OK or maybe...   Katie Vernoy  32:32 It may, it may actually delay it, it may delay it, because it's a band aid where people can go practice in other states. So why would I get a national license, if I can practice in a couple other states and not worry about taking another task, getting another background check, blah, blah, blah. I before we before we finish up, because I think there's probably going to be responses that then lead to additional episodes on this topic. But I think that just to kind of maybe poke the beast here a little bit. But with the with the insurance stuff, I think we're already seeing what insurance companies are going to do. And that is contract with these large tech companies that have clinicians across all the states pay them more so clinicians can get more, but it means that individual practitioners almost de facto have to be private pay, because they're going to get worse insurance rates, and they're not going to be able to really compete, certainly not in advertising dollars, or whatever. And we have a whole episode on this, but they're not able to compete with a gigantic quote unquote, tech solutions and or group practices. And so I think, I think it's something where there is a lot to consider here. I think there's going to be a lot of conversations that we want to have related to the disruptors, the tech disruptors in the space, who are the good ones, who are the ones that are challenging, and potentially hurting our profession? How do we, you know, step into this and, and take ownership of this space because, you know, there is so much and and potentially these these compacts allow for us to compete at this level. Or it may make it harder and I guess that's to be seen, I really think.   Curt Widhalm  34:14 Giving over the power, giving over the insurance contracts to publicly traded corporations means decisions get made quarter by quarter based on profits. And that is not what the healthcare system should be. We're kind of in a space where some people are able to compete against that but so many more episodes to be done on this. We will include some links to some stuff in our show notes. You can find those over at mtsgpodcast.com. You can bring up your concerns or tell us why you think that I am wrong on our social media.   Katie Vernoy  34:54 Or I'm wrong. I we've got a lot that we said here. So definitely join us over at the Facebook Group, tell us what we're what we missed, because we certainly missed a lot, I'm sure.   Curt Widhalm  35:04 And until next time, I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy.   Katie Vernoy  35:08 Thanks again to our sponsor, OOTify.   Curt Widhalm  35:10 “OOT” or “uth” (उठ) means “lift up” in the Hindi language. OOTify is a digital health solution that acts as an evidence based hub to unify relevant mental health resources. Community connection and collaboration are critical to OOTify. As they lift the mental health care system, they ensure providers are part of the process. OOTify is a platform for providers built by providers and owned by providers. OOTify is in the process of lifting up mental health care while lifting each other up.   OOTify  35:43 We need to talk about our mental health. We need to make our mental health stronger so we can withstand the things that happen in our life. We're gonna go through trials and tribulations. But if we can work on our mental health proactively our wellness, we can handle all that as a community and come together, people are more open to talk about these stories and say, Hey, listen, I'm going through this too. Do you want to be a part of the solution by joining a new web three community focused on mental health and wellness? Join the unified community as an investor or mental health provider by visiting ootify.com/contact. You can also give us a follow on social media to stay tuned on exciting updates.   Curt Widhalm  36:25 This episode is also brought to you by Turning Point.   Katie Vernoy  36:29 We wanted to tell you a little bit more about our sponsor Turning Point. Turning Point is a financial planning and coaching firm that helps therapists stop worrying about money. Dave, our good buddy over atTurning Point will help you navigate every aspect of your financial life from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. He'll help you move through that feeling of being stuck, frustrated and overwhelmed, and arrive at a place where you feel relief, validation, motivation and hope.   Curt Widhalm  37:00 And for listeners of MTSG you'll receive $200 off the price of any service. Just enter the promo code 'moderntherapist', be sure and visit turningpointhq.com and download the free white papers Seven Money Mindset Shifts to Reduce Financial Anxiety. That's turningpointhq.com   Announcer  37:18 Thank you for listening to The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. Learn more about who we are and what we do at mtsgpodcast.com. You can also join us on Facebook and Twitter. And please don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss any of our episodes.

Clinical Considerations When Working with Asian Immigrants, Refugees, and Dreamers: An Interview with Soo Jin Lee Curt and Katie interview Soo Jin Lee, LMFT on the clinical implications of working with Asian American immigrants, refugees, and dreamers. We explore how best to assess these clients, specific clinical considerations related to the immigration experience (and legal status in the country), and ideas for working with these clients clinically. We also talk about the impact of societal views, media portrayals, and representation on AAPI clients. An Interview with Soo Jin Lee, LMFT Soo Jin Lee is a co-director of Yellow Chair Collective and co-founder of Entwine Community. She is a licensed marriage and family therapist in CA and has a special focus on training and consulting on Asian mental health related issues. She is passionate about assisting individuals find a sense of belonging and identity through reckoning of intersectional identity work and those that are navigating through difficult life changes.   In this podcast episode, we talk about what therapists should know about Asian American immigrants, refugees, and dreamers In preparation for Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage month, we wanted to dig more deeply into specific issues relevant to the AAPI community that are often not discussed in grad school or therapist training programs. What assessment questions should be included for AAPI immigrant clients? How to assess and ask about the immigration story (including about whether someone is documented or undocumented) The assumption of citizenship status during the assessment Exploration of cultural values and family dynamics The definitions for refugee, asylum seekers, immigrant, undocumented immigrant, dreamer Looking at reasons behind coming to the United States as well as legal status in the country   What is the impact of societal views and media portrayals of Asians on AAPI clients? The common stereotypes and the gap in the representation in the Asian diaspora The typical portrayal of undocumented immigrants from Latin America, Mexico, etc. Lack of representation in the media of the broad experience of being an undocumented immigrant or refugee The misrepresentation of families being all documented or undocumented (it's actually a mix of statuses) Language, cultural and values differences between the generations   What are the unique clinical issues for refugees and undocumented immigrants? “We call ourselves dreamers, but at the same time the dreams tend to be a lot smaller or not attainable because there are also educational barriers and there are financial barriers as well.” – Soo Jin Lee, LMFT The uncertainty of staying in the country The hidden traumas and the fear of being kicked out The lack of planning for the future Education and financial barriers to pursuing the future Trauma and PTSD are key elements, but sharing the story means that their survival is at risk   How do therapists more effectively work with refugees and undocumented immigrants in therapy? “Provide a safe enough space and perhaps a more creative space, so that the story, the entirety of their journey, does not have to be nitpicked and talked about in a verbal manner. Are there modalities that you can adapt as a therapist, that they can go through in their mind, in a story book, in an art format, or any other way… that they can tell their story without being asked and interrogated about their story?” – Soo Jin Lee, LMFT The fear and risk involved in disclosure and the challenge of talking about identity Exploring their story creatively, without nitpicking or having to interrogate or make them verbalize their story The importance of building trust and building a safe space within therapy Bringing the mainstream media into the session Addressing fear and decision-making Soo Jin Lee's healing journey to become a therapist and advice for other dreamers   Our Generous Sponsors for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide: Turning Point Financial Life Planning Turning Point Financial Life Planning helps therapists stop worrying about money. Confidently navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. Turning Point is a financial planning & coaching firm that helps therapists stop worrying about money. Dave at Turning Point will help you navigate every aspect of your financial life - from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing, taxes and student loans. He'll help you move through that feeling of being stuck, frustrated and overwhelmed... And arrive at a place where you feel relief, validation, motivation and hope. And for listeners of MTSG, you'll receive $200 off the price of any service. Just enter promo code Modern Therapist. Be sure and visit turningpointHQ.com and download the free whitepaper “7 Money Mindset Shifts to Reduce Financial Anxiety”   OOTify OOTify. "OOT" or "uth" (उठ) means "lift up" in the Hindi language. OOTify is a digital health solution that acts as an evidence-based hub to unify relevant mental health resources. Community, Connection, and Collaboration are critical to OOTIFY.  As they lift the mental healthcare system, they ensure providers are part of the process. OOTIFY is a platform for providers, built by providers, and owned by providers. OOTIFY is the process of lifting up mental healthcare, while lifting each other up. We need to talk about our mental health. We need to make our mental health stronger so we can withstand the things that happen in our life. We're going to go through trials and tribulations. But if we can work on our mental health, proactively, our wellness, we can handle all that as a community and come together. People are more open to talk about these stories and say, “Hey, listen, I'm going through this too.” Do be you want to be a part of the solution by joining a new web three community focused on mental health and wellness? Join the OOTify community as an investor or mental health provider by visiting ootify.com/contact. You can also give us a follow on social media to stay tuned on exciting updates. Resources for Modern Therapists mentioned in this Podcast Episode: We've pulled together resources mentioned in this episode and put together some handy-dandy links. Please note that some of the links below may be affiliate links, so if you purchase after clicking below, we may get a little bit of cash in our pockets. We thank you in advance! Yellow Chair Collective Yellow Chair Collective on Instagram Asian American Experience Support Group   Relevant Episodes of MTSG Podcast: Asian American Mental Health: An interview with Linda Yoon, LCSW Let's Talk About Race Again: An interview with Yin Li, LMFT Therapy with an Accent: An interview with Nam Rindani, LMFT Invisible and Scrutinized: An interview with Dr. Sheila Modir Therapy for Intercountry Transracial Adoptees: An interview with Moses Farrow, LMFT     Who we are: Curt Widhalm, LMFT Curt Widhalm is in private practice in the Los Angeles area. He is the cofounder of the Therapy Reimagined conference, an Adjunct Professor at Pepperdine University and CSUN, a former Subject Matter Expert for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences, former CFO of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and a loving husband and father. He is 1/2 great person, 1/2 provocateur, and 1/2 geek, in that order. He dabbles in the dark art of making "dad jokes" and usually has a half-empty cup of coffee somewhere nearby. Learn more at: www.curtwidhalm.com Katie Vernoy, LMFT Katie Vernoy is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, coach, and consultant supporting leaders, visionaries, executives, and helping professionals to create sustainable careers. Katie, with Curt, has developed workshops and a conference, Therapy Reimagined, to support therapists navigating through the modern challenges of this profession. Katie is also a former President of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. In her spare time, Katie is secretly siphoning off Curt's youthful energy, so that she can take over the world. Learn more at: www.katievernoy.com A Quick Note: Our opinions are our own. We are only speaking for ourselves – except when we speak for each other, or over each other. We're working on it. Our guests are also only speaking for themselves and have their own opinions. We aren't trying to take their voice, and no one speaks for us either. Mostly because they don't want to, but hey. Stay in Touch with Curt, Katie, and the whole Therapy Reimagined #TherapyMovement: Patreon Buy Me A Coffee Podcast Homepage Therapy Reimagined Homepage Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube   Consultation services with Curt Widhalm or Katie Vernoy: The Fifty-Minute Hour Connect with the Modern Therapist Community: Our Facebook Group – The Modern Therapists Group   Modern Therapist's Survival Guide Creative Credits: Voice Over by DW McCann https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano https://groomsymusic.com/   Transcript for this episode of the Modern Therapist's Survival Guide podcast (Autogenerated):   Curt Widhalm  00:00 This episode of Modern Therapist's Survival Guide is brought to you by Turning Point.   Katie Vernoy  00:04 Turning Point Financial Life Planning helps therapists stop worrying about money. Confidently navigate every aspect of your financial life from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing taxes and student loans.   Curt Widhalm  00:17 Visit turningpointhq.com to learn more and enter the promo code "moderntherapist" for $200 off any service.   Katie Vernoy  00:25 This episode is also brought to you by OOTify.   Curt Widhalm  00:28 OOTify is an immersive digital mental health ecosystem. It's designed to help minimize the fragmentation, trial and error, and overwhelmed felt by both patients and providers in the process of giving and receiving care. OOTify is the process of lifting up mental health care while lifting each other up.   Katie Vernoy  00:45 Listen at the end of the episode for more information.   Announcer  00:48 You're listening to The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide, where therapists live, breathe, and practice as human beings. To support you as a whole person and a therapist, here are your hosts, Curt Widhalm, and Katie Vernoy.   Curt Widhalm  01:04 Welcome back modern therapists, this is The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy and this is the podcast for therapists about the things that we do, the things that we should be aware of in helping our clients and making the therapy a better place. And we are joined today by Soo Jin Lee, LMFT, and director of the Yellow Chair Collective, and wanting to have a really good conversation today about working with immigrants and refugees. Particularly, we're going to focus this episode around working with Asian clients, Asian immigrants and refugees, some of the considerations that we should have and how this fits within kind of the broader discussions around immigrants. And we're working with these kinds of clients that we've either ignored or not really had a great conversation about. So welcome to the podcasts. Thanks for joining us.   Soo Jin Lee  02:05 Thank you for having me.   Katie Vernoy  02:06 We are so excited to have you here and have this conversation. You and I met like almost probably a year ago and talked about this. And so I'm so glad we were able to make this happen. The first question we ask everyone is who are you? And what are you putting out into the world?   Soo Jin Lee  02:23 Yeah. So as Curt introduced, my name is Soo Jin Lee, I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist and the director here at Yellow Chair Collective. I guess a little bit about me outside of that is I myself am also an immigrant. So I am what's considered a 1.5 generation immigrant. And that just means that I came here at a very young age. I will also talk about this a little bit, I'm sure within this podcast, but I also grew up as an undocumented immigrant. And so those are aspects that I would love to introduce everyone to today.   Curt Widhalm  03:02 So we usually start with questions to help people in the learning process. This is not a shaming sort of question. This is a if we can prevent people from making the same mistakes that other people have made in the past. But what do therapists typically get wrong in working with immigrants and refugees?   Soo Jin Lee  03:22 Yeah, so one of the biggest things that come to mind for me is not having a proper assessment questions, or maybe even just having a lot of fear, general fear around asking clients about their immigration story. Right? When I say immigration story, I imagine that when people see me when I went to go see a therapist, my therapist also never bothered to ask me about my immigration story. So she'd never, in the span of two years, found out that I was an immigrant, and that even I was an undocumented immigrant, which speaks to a big chunk of my life, right. And so those are missing pieces, I think, in the therapy room, oftentimes, because those are not asked. So the therapists don't really get a full picture of a lot of immigrant and refugee experiences or the family of origin backgrounds. And I think this comes often for the case for a lot of mono lingual clinicians that are speaking English. And they find themselves sitting with a client that also speaks English very fluently. So then the assumption is that we're both American citizens sitting in the room together, right?   Curt Widhalm  04:46 There seems to be a lot of space for assumption in here and wondering if you could maybe give a little bit more guidance as far as like, on one hand, I don't want to assume that you're American by birth, but also don't want to assume that you're in immigrant just because you would appear different than a monolingual like clinician. I can see this potentially going both ways here and you have maybe a recommendation for people working with communities outside of their own backgrounds to maybe navigate that line a little bit.   Soo Jin Lee  05:20 Yeah, for sure. And I think one of the things that we'll go into detail about a little bit later is about how to frame and ask these questions. But I think the first thing is to quick get into the mindset of when you're assessing a client, just as much as you're asking them about their trauma history, that you get into the habit of asking about their cultural values and backgrounds and belief systems, which not only includes their immigration story, but it also includes their spiritual backgrounds as well.   Katie Vernoy  05:51 I would imagine that even just broadly asking about family and about cultural values, that that would be something that would organically come up. Is that your experience?   Soo Jin Lee  06:01 Exactly.   Katie Vernoy  06:01 Your immagration story?   Soo Jin Lee  06:02 Yeah, exactly. Right. And so when the therapist was asking me and I often are asking about family dynamic issues, or things that are impacting barriers that your parent and you are having, oftentimes, the immigration story is part of that if they are immigrants or refugees.   Katie Vernoy  06:23 It seems like there's a knowledge here that we need to have that we don't quite have yet. And so I want to ask more of a basic question, which is we're kind of using immigrant, refugee and undocumented immigrant, can you help us kind of make sure that we're all on the same page on those definitions?   Soo Jin Lee  06:40 Yes. So let's start by definitions, the fun stuff, right. All right. So I'm going to add another term to this conversation as well. Another definition as well. But first things, let's define refugees, right? This is a term that is being thrown around a lot on the news right now. So refugees are people who have fled their own country, because they are at the risk of serious human rights violation and persecution, from where they're residing, right. They're fleeing their country, they're fleeing their home. Okay, so those are widely known as refugees and can be defined as being refugees. Now, another term that I want to define that you didn't ask, is asylum seekers. And the reason why I want to do that is because on the news, they're also used, you know, interchangeably.   Katie Vernoy  07:34 Yeah.   Soo Jin Lee  07:34 Yeah. So asylum seekers are exactly the same, like a person that is leaving their country and seeking protection from persecution and serious human rights violations from their own country, but who haven't yet been legally recognized as a refugee, and they're waiting to receive the decisions for the claim of their asylum. Right? So there's kind of this legal status, that is the difference. So on the news, they're kind of thrown around, you know, interchangeably. But if a client is defining themselves to be either asylum seeker or refugee, that really speaks into kind of this political legal status of standing that they're in, in this country. So now we go into immigrants then. And immigrants, like I identified myself as an immigrant, right, are people that have made a conscious decision to leave their country, their home and to move to a foreign country and their intention of moving is to resettle there, right, to not go back home and relive there but to resettle into this new country. So we have a lot of immigrants in this country, right. A lot of people come from other places around the world and their intention and they make that decision very consciously. They plan for this immigration journey. And they intend on resettling here making this into their home, right. A lot of the reasons for resettling, a lot of people ask me this too like, what why do people want to live here? Why the United States? Some of them with a little bit of a snarky attitude, right, like why would anybody want to live here? Right. And there's a bunch of reasons. So I can't tell you exactly what those reasons are. And that's for you to find out with your client.   Katie Vernoy  09:37 Sure sure.   Soo Jin Lee  09:38  There are that immigrants if they're the refugees, and you know that these are two different kind of journey that they have gone through, if they're refugee, they've really left out of a need, while for immigrants to they do leave out of a need oftentimes, too. But for refugees, really they had no choice but to leave. But for most of the times, a lot of immigrants did would have the choice to leave. Now I'm gonna add to that just a little bit. Because for me, as I've introduced myself, it was kind of a unique, where I didn't really get a choice to leave, but I am still an immigrant too, right. And so an undocumented immigrant are people who are born in another country, but have no legal status in the United States. You know, it's funny, because as I was kind of preparing this, and I was trying to think about how to define these kinds of terms, I read an article that was defining undocumented immigrants as foreign born person who does not have legal rights to remain in the United States. Right. And so when I saw this definition, I felt like, wow, this is perfect portrayal of how many Americans think about undocumented immigrants, right, that they don't have any rights to be here.   Katie Vernoy  11:03 Hmm, interesting. Yeah.   Soo Jin Lee  11:07 So my definition is that I just don't have or had in the past, a legal status here, a document that tells me my identity as anything here in the United States.   Curt Widhalm  11:20 You're talking about dreamers. Right.   Soo Jin Lee  11:22 So dreamers? Well, I do identify as dreamers, but undocumented immigrants or anyone that does not have any legal status in the United States.   Curt Widhalm  11:32 Okay.   Soo Jin Lee  11:33 Yeah, dreamers, I identify as dreamers. And that's another term where they came so with their parents, as young children in the United States, and became undocumented through that journey, right.   Curt Widhalm  11:49 Okay.   Soo Jin Lee  11:49 So an example of that is, and you can add this too. So the reason why I was undocumented is because my parents came here with a ToR visa, a visitor's visa. So a visitor's visa in the United States from where I'm from, allows you to stay in the United States for up to six months. Their intention was to overstay the visa and resettle here. But they could not find any other way of staying in the United States. Without having found a job in the six months of visiting the country, right, which they really couldn't, they couldn't find a right sponsor and the job. So then, during the time that my parents were looking for a job that would sponsor them to become residents, we all became undocumented. And then, during the time, where that sponsorship, was gained and lost, and this whole process of becoming a resident, I ended up becoming 21 years of age and older, which meant that my parents were able to gain their residency status, where I had to now be an adult here by myself, applying to become a resident. So that defined me to be a dreamer. Dreamers are under this umbrella of undocumented immigrants.   Curt Widhalm  13:22 So depending on the mainstream news source that people watch, there's some different portrayals of people. And I think that that has created an overarching narrative around some of these terms, and especially around you know, as you're describing undocumented, and refugees, and I don't know that the media necessarily separates them as well as you do here. Katie, and I is born and bred, people from America, we have a different perspective on how the media portrays immigrants. How are from your side of things, how are Asian immigrants portrayed? And what does that impact like?   Soo Jin Lee  14:04 Yeah, that's a really good question. So Asian Americans in general, right, whether they are immigrants, whether they're refugees, whether they're undocumented, or and all of these terms, whether they were born here, or whether even they might be fourth or fifth, sixth generation Americans, they're all portrayed into this box. And often this box is painted as Asians with lighter skin color, often East Asians, and often a lot more recently, too, as wealthy or quote unquote, Crazy Rich, right? They're often portrayed to be smart, law abiding, but not yet citizens. They're still foreigners, but they are law abiding right? So there's this huge gap of representation in the Asian diaspora. So geographically, Middle East, Southeast Asians are still part of Asia too. Right. But in the United States, it really seems that how Asian and Asian Americans are displayed is really just one way in one picture. And I fall under that category to as Korean American as East Asian, often I find myself seeing people that look like me have my colored skin being displayed on the media. But yeah, they don't really have the full scale of experience that I carry, right. They're usually very wealthy, I have no idea what they, how those people got their wealth. But often, right, that those are the stories that are being told. And none of the other stories get to be represented in the media.   Katie Vernoy  16:02 Or it seems like if they're represented in the media, there is this kind of sinister tone to it. And there's kind of a negative portrayal. And so I guess the question I have we've, we've had some of this conversation before, we've talked a few times about the model minority myth, we've talked about kind of some of the representations in the media, but but like, holding this conversation into immigrants, refugees, and undocumented immigrants, it seems like that experience is a bit different than the folks that are fourth, fifth generation, those types of things. Because I think there's, there's something that we're missing, when we don't have that full perspective. So maybe speaking into that would be helpful for our audience today. And we'll link to the other episodes in the show notes so people can dig deeper into kind of the broader topic of AAPI mental health.   Soo Jin Lee  16:52 Yeah, for sure. And so going off of that a little bit. So then when you think of undocumented immigrants, right, oftentimes, there is absolutely no portrayal or representation of Asian immigrants in that picture in that light at all. Right? Oftentimes, you are seeing on the news of people from Mexico or Latin America, Central America that are crossing the border, or they're criminals, or they are portrayed to be drug dealers, and undocumented immigrants, for a lot of them, although around half of them are from either Mexico or Latin America. A lot of the other half are from all other parts of the world, and a big chunk of that are Asians. And yet, we're not being displayed in that way. Right? We don't We are not represented in that manner.   Curt Widhalm  17:50 What's the impact on people growing up without that representation?   Soo Jin Lee  17:55 A lot of the things the, I guess, the commonly shared concerns that undocumented immigrants and refugees have, first of all, most of the immigrants and refugee families when we also think about them, it's that family unit that we think are all immigrants, or refugees, right? Because that's also portrayed in the media, like all the families are coming together to have this survival. But in the United States, most immigrants and refugee families are what we like to call a mix immigration status. Right. So one of the examples of that is, of course, what I've mentioned, right, where my parents became president, and then now citizens were I wasn't able to I was undocumented. Right. So there's this mix immigration status within one family unit. So I read that about two thirds of children of undocumented parents, right. Have US foreign citizen, kids. So then they also have a lot of this, you know, mixed status within families. Right. And then there's also children, like me, who move to the country at a young age and then stay undocumented. And then their parents got status. So there's a lot, right. Commonly shared concern that this family unit can have is this gap, right? between parents and children. There's a huge gap of sometimes language barrier, but cultural barrier and value barriers to an understanding each other. And so these are things that a lot of our clients, my own clients are bringing to the table of being able to kind of discuss, hey, here's my identity as this one person And my parents do not share that identity in a similar manner, or their struggles are looks so different from me. And yet I'm trying to figure out how to connect with them, and connect with myself and connect with the community. And so these are very, very common struggles that I hear.   Katie Vernoy  20:20 I'm thinking that you have two clients, similar age, potentially similar heritage, you know, let's say both are Korean American, and one is a refugee and one or, or an undocumented intergroup immigrant. And you can decide which one is more relevant here. And one is fourth or fifth generation. I may make assumptions if I don't understand the different stories, but But what might be the nuance there of what I need to be aware of for this client that has either refugee undocumented immigrant status, like what what what are the things that are important for me to be aware of separate from kind of the experience as an Asian American, or Korean American in the United States?   Soo Jin Lee  21:02 Yeah. So as undocumented or refugee immigrant, that daily struggles of unhidden trauma that they endure, can look really different. If you can imagine, if you're an undocumented immigrant in the United States, you always can be thrown out of your home at any time of the day, they literally come to your door, say pack up your things, and then you're headed to the jail, where then you will wait to be sent to the airport, and then out of here. For a lot of undocumented immigrants like me, who consider themselves to be dreamers, this is our home. This is where we grew up, we have no other home, we have, oftentimes, the dreamers may not even speak the language of their parents origin or where they come from themselves, right? So then there's this continual fear of is this going to be it. So a lot of times, you'll find that we call them dreamers, we call ourselves dreamers. But at the same time, the dreams tend to be a lot smaller or not attainable, because there's also educational barriers. And there's financial barriers to right. Undocumented immigrants also suffer from the fact that after you graduate from high school, you may not be able to go to college, because oftentimes, undocumented immigrants need to go through this whole other other paperwork in order for them to be admitted, and pay for the tuition. And out of college, if they do get through college, then how to find a job, right. Without documentation, oftentimes, they are unable to find employment, or when they do, it's what's called, you know, under the table, pay, right? So then this whole question of what is my future going to look like? I want to become this or that I want to be an engineer, just like everyone else. And I'm told that in America, that we can fulfill this dream, right? I'm told I can be anything. Except I'm not an American. So that dream is not really applicable to me. Right? What I have to think about is, what I'm, what am I going to do to survive here? What am I going to do to obtain status here so that that dream can come true? Right, so this extra barrier, extra concern, extra fear, that is always in the back of their minds.   Curt Widhalm  23:48 What do you recommend for therapists to do to work with this? I mean, there seems to be such great existential exploration here. But a lot of existential stuff can kind of come with the, at least the traditional ways that it seems to be taught comes with the security of at least you have this time in this space that is going to be yours. But what do you recommend therapists do in working with clients presenting with kind of this fear that's kind of constantly always sitting there?   Soo Jin Lee  24:20 Yeah, so I think for a lot of therapists, you're pretty familiar with being able to work with trauma, and being familiar with working with PTSD. And so the first thing that I do want to note is for a lot of undocumented immigrants and for refugees, sharing the story oftentimes meant that they their survival was at risk. And it speaks true still for undocumented immigrants that are living here, right. For refugees, that might mean that back home that that was the case, if they identify themselves in a certain way or if they find And if people find out or the government finds out about their their identity, their status, then they might be murdered, right? For undocumented immigrants here, if their undocumented status becomes known to the public known to the government, anybody reports them, or anything like that, there's always the fear that now my home is going to be taken away, my everything will be taken away, right. So there's always that fear. So being able to come to therapy, and to be asked to speak on your identity, to speak on your journey is quite a huge gap of what's being told for you to do on a survival basis. Right. And to get to that story, I think, takes a long time of building rapport. And, of course, that is the basic of all therapy. But really, though, to treat it, treat it very carefully, and being able to provide a safe enough space, and perhaps a more creative space. So that perhaps the story, the entirety of their journey, does not have to be nitpicked and talked about in a verbal manner, right? Are there modalities that you can adapt as a therapist, that they can go through in their mind, in a storybook, in an art format, or any other way in a motion format, right? That they can tell their story, without having to be asked and interrogated about their story.   Katie Vernoy  26:39 I feel like I want to know more about what you're describing here. Because this I think I'm understanding but I don't want to make, I want to make sure I'm not making assumptions. So you're talking about putting creative methods forward.   Soo Jin Lee  26:53 Yeah.   Katie Vernoy  26:54 Tell me more. I'm still kind of trying to sort this out.   Soo Jin Lee  26:56 Okay. I don't know. So, I really love utilizing EMDR as part of my practice. And I know brainspotting can be another another one that goes off of EMDR. Because it utilizes the body, and it goes through the journey of people's trauma without having to verbalize it. I think that's a perfect example of how people can go through processing their fear and trauma responses, without having to tell me about it.   Katie Vernoy  27:29 That makes sense. Thank you.   Soo Jin Lee  27:32 Yeah. Another thing EMDR is definitely not for everyone. And it may not be very acceptable for some of my clients too, especially some of the older older folks. They really don't like having to move their eyes or, you know, they they really don't understand, like, Why Why am I keep tapping myself. So, so then I introduce just another format of like, being able to draw out their story. So literally trying it out, like is there a color that represents how you're feeling is there, or a rock or any item on your on your table that you want to tell me about? Right, that speaks to your culture, that speaks to your value. So then we're talking about this headband, that's sitting on their table, we're talking about sensory oriented things, too. We talk about the weather a lot, actually, as a way to imagine and use imagery of going back into their place of origin. Because weather exists everywhere, it's a common thing that we are experiencing. And we are using our sensories to connect with it all the time, connect with ourselves, and our sense of belonging in the world is oftentimes through temperature through weather through the humidity in the air. So then we talk about that, and we talk about in comparison to how it was back in your country as well, right. And so then that brings about a little bit of healing in a way I get to explore, I get to talk about my other self, or my other parts that I was told that I have to be hiding. And I get to bring that in here without being interrogated.   Curt Widhalm  29:25 And like you said earlier, this for clinicians who are coming from different backgrounds takes a lot of time to develop that trust and that ability to create and honor the space and the stories of people being able to tell them in their own ways. You know, one of the things and this is totally not on our list of questions, but one of the things that I've seen a lot of excitement about is even just kind of the positive representations of like the movie Turning Red coming out that has really opened up a lot of these stories and opportunities to talk about things in ways that haven't necessarily been so mainstream that clients, clinicians are really resonating with as an opportunity to say, oh, yeah, this is this is now something that allows for me to connect to this in a way that you might not have understood before.   Soo Jin Lee  30:22 Yes. What is the question in that?   Curt Widhalm  30:25 There is not a question.   Soo Jin Lee  30:30 Okay, yes, for sure. I think if I were to kind of just add to that, yeah. For a lot of clinicians, you can do a lot of research now, on looking at these shows, and being able to bring that into the therapy room, I think being able to talk about some of the mainstream media, that is how they are portraying certain cultures, and how clients they resonate with that or not resonate with that, what the differences are, what were you drawn to, what emotions came out of you from that watching that? Those are really good conversations to have about their family immigration journey, or they're just their own understanding of their, their own cultural backgrounds.   Katie Vernoy  31:14 I want to address a couple of things. I know, we don't have a lot of time, but I want to address a couple of things that you've talked about, because I think they're just so visceral to me. And I think that that element of fear, and dreams are small, and some of these ideas around when you have either an undocumented status, or if your refugee status maybe is at risk, depending on I know, there's a lot of different ways that folks are able to seek refugee status. And I know that there's some folks that have to keep reupping it every, you know, whatever, few years, those types of things. And I think it can be extremely hard to build a life when you don't know if the future is what the future holds. And so maybe a little bit more into that topic, because there's the trauma, of course, and I love how you talked about kind of assessing that and being able to heal that. But I'm a practical person, I'm like, Okay, well, part of our mental health is being able to set a course for our lives and be able to do some of these things. And I know that just doesn't sound like it's completely possible. So maybe if you can talk a little bit about how you walk in that space of finding mental health and wellness, while also knowing that these fears are completely justified. And this temporary status is something that that really does impact folks on a day to day basis.   Soo Jin Lee  32:41 Yeah. So when we talk about how fear interrupts their day to day basis, then we're getting into more of the behavior and the cognition of what what it looks like on their day to day and how it impacts their day to day, right. So if the client is interested in working through their decision making, because the fear is getting in the way of making certain decisions of, for example, let's say should I even accept this college? Because I'm not even sure if I'm going to continue into graduation? Why bother? Right? Now, that's a mindset and a cognition, and that belief system that we can work through, within whatever, you know, therapists modality of choice in order for them to achieve the whatever it is that the client wants to achieve. Is it that they really want to go into college, but the fear is getting getting in the way, right. Another thing, I think, on a very practical level, is just the level of anxiety and the threshold that they're living with on a day to day basis. So then the fear response, and the trauma response comes out in a way where it's oftentimes is insomnia, within their relationships. Right. So those are things that I think, as mental wellness practitioners can really provide the tools for, right on a day to day basis of like, okay, what are you eating? What, how are you sleeping? And are these things that we really should be concerned about? Right.   Katie Vernoy  34:15 And just the the final question that I have is, is about, you're walking this journey yourself. And so I'm thinking about our audience members, who are also undocumented immigrants or folks who are in this space and you've accomplished becoming a therapist and doing those things, but it seems like it's something where there would be some additional things for our health, mental health providers who are in these spaces to be able to take care of themselves and to think about their journey as a therapist. And so kind of the survivor guide element for our our therapists who are, are grappling with being undocumented or being a dreamer.   Soo Jin Lee  34:56 For me, I think I and everyone has their story of why they became a therapist. For me, I became a therapist because of my immigration journey. And that practice of finding myself, my story, my voice, and how to even understand that was the healing journey for me. And I found that through working with others that were telling about their story and was willing to open up their lives, their emotions, their family dynamic issues with me, I think. So oftentimes people find understanding, through relating their stories with others. The theme of what we're talking about today is how we're not being represented enough, that we're not being seen enough, we're not being heard enough, right? In all these different aspects of layers, in the media, in the government, through this whole legal journey. So I think what I want to say is, finding myself was the most healing thing that I could have done for my community at the end.   Katie Vernoy  36:28 I love that.   Curt Widhalm  36:30 Where can people find out more about you and the work that you're doing?   Soo Jin Lee  36:34 So you can find us at yellowchaircollective.com and on Instagram at YellowTreeCollective. We provide individual, family, couples therapy services. But the unique thing that I think we're providing is the cultural specific identity issues. And the support groups that built around those issues. Right, we have a support group, just called the Asian American Experience support group. And although we wanted to make it a little bit of a therapy group, where people can be doing doing a lot of processing, which we do, but we call that a support group, because we realized that a lot of people outside of California were in need of mental health support and community spaces that they couldn't find it within their own states. So that we expanded it to be a support group. That way anyone in the United States can find us and sit in this online space, and hear other people's stories like and connect and relate and find healing and that   Curt Widhalm  37:48 We will include links to all of that in our show notes. You can find those over at mtsgpodcast.com. And follow us on our social media, join our Facebook group, The Modern Therapist group. And let us know your reactions to this episode as well as, especially if you are a therapist with a similar story around being a refugee, immigrant. we would love to continue to elevate voices in our community around that. And until next time, I'm Curt Widhalm with Katie Vernoy and Soo Jin Lee.   Katie Vernoy  38:26 Thanks again to our sponsor, Turning Point.   Curt Widhalm  38:29 Wanted to tell you a little bit more about our sponsor Turning Point. Turning Point is a financial planning and coaching firm that helps therapists stop worrying about money. Dave at Turning Point will help you navigate every aspect of your financial life from practice financials and personal budgeting to investing taxes and student loans. He will help you move through that feeling of being stuck, frustrated and overwhelmed and arrive at a place where you feel relief, validation, motivation and hope.   Katie Vernoy  38:58 And for listeners of The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. You'll receive $200 off the price of any service. Just enter promo code 'moderntherapist' and be sure and visit turningpointhq.com and download the free white paper Seven Money Mindset Shifts to Reduce Financial Anxiety. Thanks again to Turning Point.   Curt Widhalm  39:18 This episode is also brought to you by OOTify.   Katie Vernoy  39:22 "OOT" or "uth" (उठ) means "lift up" in the Hindi language. OOTify is a digital health solution that acts as an evidence based hub to unify relevant mental health resources. Community connection and collaboration are critical to OOTify as they lift the mental health care system. They ensure providers are part of the process. OOTify is a platform for providers built by providers and owned by providers. OOTify is a process of lifting up mental health care while lifting each other up.   OOTify  39:54 We need to talk about our mental health. We need to make our mental health stronger so we can withstand the things that happen in our life. We're gonna go through trials and tribulations. But if we can work on our mental health, proactively our wellness, we can handle all that as a community and come together. People are more open to talk about these stories and say, Hey, listen, I'm going through this too. Do be you want to be a part of the solution by joining a new web three community focused on mental health and wellness? Join the OOTify community as an investor or mental health provider by visiting ootify.com/contact. You can also give us a follow on social media to stay tuned on exciting updates.   Announcer  40:35 Thank you for listening to The Modern Therapist's Survival Guide. Learn more about who we are and what we do at mtsgpodcast.com. You can also join us on Facebook and Twitter. And please don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss any of our episodes.

What if you CAN condense 10s, 20s, or even 30-years of storytelling experience and high-level knowledge about human behavior into 30+ minutes only? And what would that teach you about how to create a meaningful piece of content that you can be proud of AND one that impacts other people's lives? Paul Puri, MD is an Assistant Clinical Professor at UCLA, consultant writer for 3 seasons on Chicago Med on NBC, Chief Medical Officer at mental health-focused company OOTify, and is a licensed psychotherapist. Today, shares eye-opening insights about storytelling that you didn't know you needed for your life, work, content, business, and others. Join other listeners in 60+ countries, and click Follow, Add, Save, Collect, and Download. OR, listen now.

Episode 18 on Professional Perspectives: Ravi Sharma. Hosted by Alisha Gupta Ravi Sharma is a repeat founder as well as an early stage venture investor through iBOS and through TiE Angels. He also is currently an operator of a mental healthcare startup called OOTify and has had two successful exits as an entrepreneur in the past. Ravi cares deeply about the environment and health & wellness and is passionate about social impact ventures that have the potential to have a significant, positive impact on humanity. Most recently, Ravi was one of the youngest portfolio managers at the award-winning investment manager, Western Asset Management Co. (Western Asset) and was personally responsible for approximately $1.3 billion in assets on behalf of sovereign wealth and institutional clients. Prior to Western Asset, he worked at PNMAC Capital Management, Arch Bay Capital, and Bank of America Merrill Lynch. HumanityRising.org --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/humanity-rising-voices/support

Sharon Peykar, ACSW is an LA-based therapist and life coach who uses a transparent and collaborative approach with her clients. She works a lot with young women who are dealing with managing their work stress, life stress, and trying to learn better self care. Sharon talks with us about how she decided to go into private practice with this population, advice she gives women in the workplace about setting boundaries, the imposter syndrome issue, and how to find the right therapist for you.  00:05:00: What's Sharon's current job? 00:06:15: What licensure and credentials does a therapist need and how long does it take to get them?  00:11:00: Sharon tells us about her career trajectory and how she got to her current role. 00:21:20: We talk about common work/life balance issues that women face. 00:24:30: What advice does Sharon give to women in the workplace about setting boundaries? 00:26:42: What are the biggest workplace challenges she sees people face? 00:33:20: We talk about self care and spirituality, and how spirituality can mean different things to different people. 00:41:00: What are some common myths and misconceptions about therapy? 00:44:20: How can someone find the right therapist? 00:50:32: Sharon tells us about her work with the therapy app Ootify. 00:54:06: Back to the Future: What advice would Sharon give her younger self? 00:58:00: What's the biggest business mistake she's made, and what did she learn from it? 01:01:00: A Day in the Life: What does a therapist's day-to-day look like? How many clients does she see a day? What other work is there to do? 01:06:00: How does a therapist market themselves? 01:08:32: Listener questions: What do you do about recurring nightmares about work? Do therapists do remote sessions? What are some strategies to not bring work home? What do you do when coworkers try to rope you into toxic workplace gossip? How do you keep boundaries in an inflexible job?  01:20:00: Quick Answers 

  Ravi Sharma's experience has predominantly been in structured finance and banking (e.g. Western Asset Management Company). He is also a repeat founder with exits in healthcare and cleantech. After having family struggle with mental health and losing a friend to suicide, Ravi has embraced the challenge to democratize mental healthcare. OOTify is a mental health community that provides mental health support utilizing AI chatbots and telehealth technology and educational content.

Ravi Sharma, Co-Founder & CEO of OOtify, TiE Charter Member, Investor, and Mentor

Ravi Sharma, the co-founder, and CEO of OOTify (ootify.com) delivers an informative overview of the important work his company is engaged in that seeks to bring quality mental health care to everyone who needs it. Sharma has a wealth of experience in multiple sectors of industry and is a proven leader in business, technology, and investing, but his passion and primary goal is to improve mental health options for everyone. Sharma's background includes his tenure at Western Asset Management Company where his skills in on-boarding quality lenders, drafting underwriting guidelines for investment mandates, loan level due diligence for credit and compliance, and more, helped lift the company to a higher level of success. And in just 3 years at Western Asset Management Company, Sharma grew the loan portfolio to more than $1 billion, targeting double-digit returns. Before his successful time with Western Asset Management Company, Sharma helped to build and then exit several tech companies. He is a strong advocate for mental health and clean technology. Sharma describes OOTify as a mental health marketplace that seeks to match individuals with the best possible providers for their unique needs. OOTify is a community of professionals, mentors and peers focused intently on personal development and helping individuals build healthier relationships. Part of the company name, ‘oot,' is derived from the Hindi language; it means, simply, to ‘lift up,' and OOTify's mission is certainly all about lifting people up. OOTify allows users to connect with mental health professionals, a life coach, or verified mentor, easily and swiftly, via their phone. Sharma describes the many options users can take advantage of on the platform, such as audio, video, or messaging, connecting with trained professionals who can help, right from the comfort of the user's phone. It's on-demand online therapy that seeks to improve lives. Sharma discusses ‘the fabric,' which is his term for the community forum that is a compilation of different threads that is modified by multiple, qualified individuals who provide support. Users can benefit from hearing and reading about others' experiences, engage in Q&A with experienced professionals, and more. Sharma describes how OOTify's powerful mental health technology utilizes artificial intelligence (AI) to match mental health providers, life coaches, and other carefully screened professionals to users through their open marketplace. OOTify will assist with the intake process via their AI chatbot, streamline it, and improve the process of delivery of quality mental health care. And Sharma discusses the importance of quality matching, which is why OOTify's intake process is essential. For as Sharma states, while the most educated and celebrated authority on a particular mental illness may seem perfect on paper, credentials, and experience aside, that individual may not be right for everyone because it is critical that the mental healthcare seeker connect or vibe well with their mental health care provider. The healthcare technology advocate discusses the massive amount of feedback he has received from healthcare professionals who appreciate how OOTify is leveraging technology to bring care to individuals. Healthcare professionals acknowledge the power of the OOTify application as it hosts powerful productivity tools such as HIPAA compliant video, audio and messaging, and also assists with billing and scheduling. OOTify stresses however that the AI does not make any care decisions for those seeking help, but rather is leveraged to help providers match with new clients, gain insight via client data metrics, and generally be more efficient overall, so they can spend their time helping people as opposed to doing administrative work.  Sharma details the OOTify rewards program and other ways in which they seek to acknowledge and support those providers who receive exceptional feedback and high ratings from users. He provides information on some notable acknowledgments of their groundbreaking mental health technology work that they have received from respected institutions such as the USC Keck School of Medicine. OOTify partners with prestigious institutions such as the University of Southern California, Loyola Marymount University, and others, as well as many respected businesses and community leaders. And the community is supported by technologists, businesses, many other academic institutions, non-profits, teachers, parents, and nearly everyone who grasps the importance of providing quality mental health care.

Ravi Sharma is the CEO and co-founder of OOTify - a platform devoted to destigmatizing mental health conversations. It connects people in need of help with clinical professionals on demand. OOTify leverages artificial intelligence to match mental health-care providers (clinicians, coaches, and mentors) with support seekers primarily millennials, gen-z, and i-gen) in real-time. Ravi has a background in investment management, real estate lending and health and clean-tech industries --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/theindustryshow/support

You've heard of Uber; you've heard of Yelp. Now there's OOTify, a new platform for users seeking resources like therapy and life coaching to find professionals who offer those services on a streamlined, vetted, privacy secured medium. Today, we have as our guests Ravi Sharma and Michael Quinones, the founders of OOTify. We hope you listen, share, and speak up.