S4E8: Generational Influence on Personal Identity (with Christian Jackson)

Ever grappled with daddy issues and the societal pressure to always people-please? It's okay, many of us can relate. We've all had our share of struggles and have strived to rise above them. Join us as we welcome Christian, a renowned licensed therapist and the force behind Couch with Christian, to share her powerful journey of healing from daddy issues and her mission to aid women in reclaiming their lives.

Career changes are a reality for many, but how we navigate these transitions can shape our sense of self-worth and accomplishment. We've all been there - feeling the weight of societal expectations and the fear of not living up to them. We'll explore ways to set boundaries and live a life that aligns with your passions and purpose.

Christian's insights will cast a fresh light on the impact of generational beliefs and behaviors, and how by understanding our relationships with our parents, we can break the chains of perfectionism and inadequacy.

More About Christian: Christian Jackson, LPC, LPC/S, NCC is a licensed professional counselor supervisor and national board certified counselor. As an EMDR (eye-movement desensitization and reprocessing) trained therapist, Christian works primarily to address symptoms of post-traumatic stress. She is the author of 'Daddy Issues: How to Detangle from the Sins of our Fathers', and its workbook by the same name. Her brand, Couch with Christian, focuses on supporting women in recovery from relationship trauma via facilitating therapy and support groups. Her mission is to provide services that are accessible and affordable for her community.

Connect with Christian via Instagram | Facebook | Website

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INSPIRED ACTIONS/THOUGHTS FOR THIS EPISODE:
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What parental issues are you aware of? AND working through?
Going forward, what does self worth (reinforced) look like for you?
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Transcript

Chantée Christian: 0:07

Hello good people. This is Chantée Christian, and you are listening to the my Best Shift podcast. In this week's episode, I'll be talking to Christian about healing from daddy issues and all the things that can stem from it, including being a people pleaser. Hi, christian, how are you doing today? I'm good. Since, how are you? Well? I've been better. Well, we're going to make it do what it do. Before we get into our conversation today, why don't you tell the people a little bit about yourself?

Christian Jackson: 0:54

Yes, so I am a human on this earth just trying to can right. I like to tell people, most recently just speaking and being authentic, that I'm in recovery from a lot of different things, those things being I'm a people pleaser in recovery. I am a perfectionist in recovery, and that simply means that I am doing my best to not allow myself to fall into that trap of doing for others way more than I do for myself. I am someone who wants to get that word out there in the best way that I know how and to hopefully live by example, but they don't always work. So, as a human, I'm dealing with everything that everybody else does.

Christian Jackson: 1:39

On top of being a proud black woman and a mom and a wife, a good friend, I'm also a business owner and so I am proud of this journey also kind of a little scared I've screwed myself in some of the goals that I've set for myself and proud of the things I've accomplished and things that people are seeing with couch, with Christian.

Christian Jackson: 2:01

So she is my brand, she is me, and I offer services and products that I wish were around when I was like in the throes of my people, pleasing and speaking love and all the things. So I like to try different things. I'm finding what works at my big age of 36, big enough to kind of have, you know, learn some life lessons and then hopefully trying to pull my sisters up through the therapy that I do, the therapeutic coaching that I do. And I used to be the person that compartmentalize things. I really kind of separate these pieces of myself, but in my life experience and in my training I'm learning. I can't separate that. So I'm kind of in this space of discovery. You know, it's been kind of fun.

Chantée Christian: 2:45

Yeah, I resonate with that, and so for anyone that's listening, I will say I sound a little different today. I have the flu, and so by the time y'all listen to this, I won't have a flu, but I have a flu right now while we're recording. But I'm on the tail end. So, you know, when the people that say I supposed to be talking, running my mouth, I'm on the tail end, Give me some grace. Um, because I'm human. I'm human and so I resonate with that. I also resonate with the fact of a lot of times, I think, that people see us in different areas of our lives and assume that we got all our shit together and the reality of it is we can be as effective as we are in those spaces because we've been where they are and or navigating through some of those challenges in the midst of it. Right, yeah, that's good stuff, that's good stuff. So I want to know a little bit more about Couch with Christian.

Christian Jackson: 3:43

Yeah, couch with Christian is my business, she's my baby, she is me. I am a licensed therapist here in Columbia, south Carolina, and so I own a private practice. So there is an arm of couch with Christian that does individual therapeutic services. So I have women that I serve as their licensed therapist. I also serve women or people really across the state as their supervisor, actually just out of a meeting with one of my supervisees to kind of help give back to those who are trying to get full licensure so they learn under me.

Christian Jackson: 4:17

I specialize in trauma and so that is how I treat the people that I'm seeing, whether it's mental wealth, coaching or as a therapist. Just because I just believe, whether or not you call it trauma, I still think there are just so many great interventions and tools and perspectives that help me, help you, and so I'm going to always look through that lens. I believe that, as a person who was clinically trained, that I don't need to keep all my stuff a secret. So I don't do that. So I also train and like meet with my colleagues, other licensed therapists, relationship to life coaches, by hosting and making my own stages. Hello, okay, so I do trainings and stuff about various things in mental health and really trying to make sure that it's not the language that I learned in the textbook, because anybody understand that and that doesn't really always apply. And so as I'm doing my speaking at conferences or I'm hosting my own or invited to work with a staff or something like that around mental health and why I'm dating the wrong person or dating the same person over and over again, I can bring in that life experience and my clinical training. So the goal for couch with Christian is to directly offer services I wish I had when I was really going through my highest levels of anxiety and the rejection and the relationship issues and, dare I say, daddy issues that's another huge piece of my brand is as the daddy issues therapist who wrote the books on them literally. Then I'm trying to help people to reshape their perspective of women with daddy issues. We're women who have experienced emotional trauma and we're trying to take responsibility for the things that have happened to us. I'm not calling you by your trauma. I'm trying to help you pull up yourself because some of us use it as a courage and that's the whole thing.

Christian Jackson: 6:01

The couch with Christian is overall about giving ourselves grace. I love that. You said that earlier. Y'all give me grace. I sound like this because I have the flu, but I got work to do and so a huge part of my brand, now my pivot here in 23, is to help people see that part of overcoming daddy issues or mommy issues or dating the same losers or giving myself the grief that everybody else is giving me, is through grace, and so at the end of my books and in my online course that I wrote, the grace method lives and that is I'm really trying to push now is your grace space and giving women a chance to address different things that they have not given themselves grace about in one whole space. Because I don't know about you and your work, chantay, like the people that you serve, we're just looking for a space to offload and say the unpopular things. Am I right?

Chantée Christian: 6:53

I don't know if you're seeing the same things, yeah, and I feel like and well, is anyone else going through this, right? Or am I the only one? Or I got to be the only one that's struggling through this? And I'm like, have you talked to your sister friends? Yeah, have you looked around?

Chantée Christian: 7:10

And I know sometimes at least for most of the people that I serve is it's hard to look around and see you, and so it's a little more challenging to build a community of people where you can do that check in.

Chantée Christian: 7:25

And I think that a lot of the clients that I have and that I've had have come to me through various ways. But it's always interesting that they're at this like pivotal point in their career where they're trying to decide do I go up to the next level, do I go after that, or am I shifting my perspective or what it is that I really want? The society told me that I wanted to do this. My parents said I should do this, but now I'm sitting here and I got it all and I'm like it's not really bringing me to happiness, to joy and all the things. Right, and it's interesting that you even talk about from a relationship perspective, right, like I have clients that are going through it with their relationships, like I don't want to be here, no more. It's like, okay, hold on hold, on hold, on hold, on hold, on hold on Now. Is it your partner or is it you, is it?

Christian Jackson: 8:19

you. That's literally what my course used to be called. I renamed it, but is it me? Yes, it's it you.

Chantée Christian: 8:25

It's you. It's you, and that's okay, right, and that's fine, that is okay, but be clear that the you that you leave this relationship with is going to be the same you that you go into the next relationship with, would you? And so, is that the you that you want to take or not? Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. You know the conversation is about who are. So a lot of the work that I do is working with and people don't even realize it. So, in theory, as we do, we're doing career transition. I just say, is life, though? Is you coaching really? Because who you are, I believe who you are in one space, is who you are in all spaces. It may manifest differently, mm-hmm, but if you got a communication problem at work, you got a communication problem at home. Yep, you know what it looks like is different, mm-hmm, but it's still an issue and something that we can change, something that, if you want to right, get down to it, it's who are you and are you being who you say you want to be?

Christian Jackson: 9:30

Yes, that's one thing. It's funny that you are bringing that up because I'm actually working with someone and have, for like probably two years, who has gone through some not career changes, but definitely job changes in her career, and she also has a side business that she's very successful at and I guess, without giving too much information away, I'll just say she's she's doing her thing in this field and she really loves it. She gets to express herself in this way and in her nine to five she has kind of reached the top and she's a boss like people look for her, because a lot of the women that work with our professional they have like degrees Not to say that you have to have those things to work Christian, but they just had. I just happened to attract women who look like me, right, so they are serving in their communities in different ways, and so she has been sought out for certain positions and still didn't see that they saw her, which I found is interesting. We had a conversation, I think, like last week, and she was like so I'm realizing that I don't really need to climb this ladder no more, like she's also playing this black woman in a white boys game. It's a whole different thing and she's been realizing after, really, like you said, coaching herself because I'm sitting there, I facilitate the conversation and doing the things.

Christian Jackson: 10:54

But as she talked more and heard herself talk about herself more than the pattern that she's finding is that she was really living to prove to some jerk she met in eighth grade that she's smart, from her like English AP class and like grade or something like that. And so when you realize, when you blink your eyes and you realize it's been 20 some odd years, I have been proven to some stupid eighth grade boy that I'm good enough, then sometimes that can be traumatic in itself because you're like my God, I've lived and got married and all this stuff, as this person I was pretending to be. And then sometimes when people are coming to me and this is why grace is so important it's okay, says you've learned this thing about yourself. Slow down, like it's okay, you can kind of reinvent yourself. You didn't do anything wrong by making these accomplishments, because in her case she actually does like the job.

Christian Jackson: 11:50

And then people wake up and they're like I don't even want to be in this field and it's up, and that realizing that can be a lot for some people. So we have to slow down sometimes and that's what I'm able to do, like I'm hoping to, when, when people work with me, the grace method is is an acronym grace itself getting to know your symptoms, rescripting your negative messages, addressing your self care needs, connecting with people that makes sense To be the sea used to be for connecting with healthy people. How many of us know that we don't always know what healthy looks like, especially we're not. So I'm changing the language on that. Yeah, for enforcing proper boundaries and we're working through basically that system grace which literally saved my life because I haven't been through some things now.

Chantée Christian: 12:40

And and you know, I think that one of the things that your client is going through is something that so many black women go through, right, and so I'm not a therapist, I'm just coach, and I make sure that I make that very clear on day one. We appreciate that I'm that it. That's not my, that's not my field, is not my life, that's not my calling. However, one of the things that I do have my clients do when we get to spaces of I don't know why I'm here is Well, how'd you get here? Trace it back to when you decided that this was. It had to do it for me, though, and I had for me it was.

Chantée Christian: 13:26

I'm really good at a lot of things. I don't mean I want to get paid for it, although getting paid for it was real nice, right, real real nice. Sometimes I'd be looking at my bank account like I should go back, but the truth of the matter is it brought me no joy, and so I'm like well, where did I get this idea that I had to work, regardless if I liked it or not, because it brought in good money? Well, what does good money look like, right? So then it was like having to go and unpill this multi layered onion. I feel like I was that outback, like just kept pulling and pulling and pulling, and it was like I saw my parents, my parents, my parents parents working, getting paid, working, getting paid. None of them love their jobs.

Christian Jackson: 14:24

They're not existing in their roles. That's brilliant, that's it.

Chantée Christian: 14:29

And I was fine. It's so much more than life it's got to be, because, let me tell you something, she is a lot of gotta be. It's nothing like pulling up now we don't do it like we used to anymore but like pulling up to your job, taking a deep breath, rolling your eyes before you can even cross the threshold.

Christian Jackson: 14:48

We started the day at you.

Chantée Christian: 14:50

You know people be like, oh, sunday blues. No, it used to be every day blue. I will drop. The closer I would get, my body will start to tense up my mind. I'm like why I've been doing this for over 15 years. Why am I so? Why what is happening? I hate this place. I don't hate the place, I hate the action and I hate that I was the one that was doing it. Say that, to say that it took me undoing and unlearning the fact that just because I'm good at something meant that I had to get paid for it. Right, because I'm good at a lot of things. However, that thing that was bringing in the money, from that perspective, wasn't the thing that I loved anymore.

Christian Jackson: 15:33

Yes, and you say good at a lot of things. Let me add this I was also good at just taking a bunch of crap, just because that's what I watched my parents do. I'm good at that. I'm good at sacrificing my own needs just so that the people in my life can get what they want or need, and that included my supervisors. Just, you know, along the lines of what you were talking about as far as work goes, but I mean my 12 year old. I broke my toe everyone Okay, my left toe, one of them is broken and it's been a struggle because it's forcing me to slow down. And so our 12 year old is very loving, caring, he's a sweetheart and he is forcing mommy to sit down. Because I'm good at running the household. I'm good at doing the things, being the supportive wife and the mom and the cooking and all this stuff, and it's interesting to see how the house looks when you know. No shade to my husband. I love him, but when daddy runs it, you know it's not terrible.

Christian Jackson: 16:32

But you know, like the schedule that I have and it's interesting how they run past daddy and come to me, which is a whole different talk. But my son was like you always care for everybody else. Like what are you just going to sit down and just like put your foot up, like the doctor says, mommy, because I'm good at walking around on a broken toe, and if you are not catching the metaphor, folks, what did you walk around with? That's broken, that you're just like, oh, I'll heal later. And so that you get numb. And a lot of my clients will say I'm just existing, I'm floating through life, I don't know what it is.

Christian Jackson: 17:09

I'm launching your grace space right now, which is a community that I want women to come to and just talk through things, and at first I thought it was we're going to talk about relationships in dating and how to show up and be graceful as a partner. I knew that would be a huge part of it. But that conversation that I had with the focus group I led in the very first year of grace space was a lot about Am I strong or am I numb? And that was one of the women brought up as a black woman, especially she's like you know. We're talking about how we're strong black women and I can go to a job that I hate because it's what my grandma did, because she would look at me crazy if I said, oh, I'm just living my bliss, you know. Or I'm resting or taking a mental health day, you know, I think, as a proud millennial, I'm okay with that.

Christian Jackson: 17:55

Gen Z years are very good mental health day, but grandma, great grandmother, looking like you're like what they of course work so that we didn't have to sacrifice our mental health and emotional health, and so your great space was a really good place for the women to just be like. You know what I was numb through life. I was overlooked, and I was okay with that, floated into the background because I was told I was too dark, wasn't pretty enough. I was pitted against the people that I should have been in community with, because society says a bnc, and so that part really resonated with me. In regards to what is overlooked by other people when you are living your experience, and how does that numb you? And if you're walking around numb.

Christian Jackson: 18:42

That's how we wake up and blink our eyes and it's 1015 years later and I'm living a life that I never really thought I would have, or I'm living a life that my eight year old self strove for. Those dreams are outdated. So, like you said to your point, we have to be in a place where we are willing to unlearn those things Because sometimes, healthy or otherwise, those ideals, those narratives, they're comforting, even if it's dysfunctional, they serve some kind of purpose because we're used to it.

Chantée Christian: 19:16

Yeah, I mean, and I think that sometimes we don't even realize the unconscious purpose that they serve. Right, because, like, I think about, I think about discipline, I think about, well, like so I was at the cry out conference, shout out to the cry out conference, came back, but you know, the devil works. Anyway, I went to the cry out conference and something that Pastor Keon has said that is still resonating with me, and I may mess it up a little bit, so I'm going to alter it just slightly, however. So my mom was one that believed in not sparing the rod. She can get mad if she won't, but it was the truth. Her mom was one that believed in not sparing the rod. Her mom's mom, so my great grandmother, was one that believed in not sparing the rod. Her mother believed in not sparing the rod. Her mother learned that, though, because of being a slave and understanding what it meant when you weren't quiet, when you weren't obedient, because she learned that from the masters of the house, right, and so we continue to bring in those same things, sometimes not even realizing the why.

Chantée Christian: 20:39

Right, right, and so we're disrespectful to talk about what they're not supposed to be talking about. Well, wait a minute, let's take a pause. There was a time when that made sense and now it's a little different. And so how is it serving us in our households and our relationships now? And so when you think about like I think about like the different, my different sides of my family and one of them is a whole lot more like let the kids be other ones, like they need to shut up, why are they talking Like go close that door with kids in this house, like you know all the things, and I think about the differences of their experiences, right, and to which they, the lenses, to which they live their lives. Let's trickle down to how their children raise children and so on and so forth.

Chantée Christian: 21:32

I say that to say a lot of times, like you were saying, we pick up things as our own and really, when we take a minute, like I take a, I say take a beat. But when we take a beat and we really pay attention to what's going on and looking around us, we realize maybe, just maybe, it's not me, it's not something that I want to own, it's not something that I actually want to continue to do, and that in itself is shattering, like to some people right, it literally shakes the foundation to which they have existed. Right Like I have a lot of clients who are recovering people pleasers, the thought of not pleasing someone is literally enough to like shut down the session. Just shut it down Because well, what else would I do?

Christian Jackson: 22:26

Who am I? If I don't please somebody else? What use do I have? What value do I have?

Chantée Christian: 22:31

Yes, really real things, yes, and if the people don't like what I say, what will I do? And one of my questions is well, did they ever tell you that's what they wanted? So often there's this idea of pleasing people that never ask for the pleasure when did that come from? And then it's like I don't know, like what you do know, take a beat, right, let's take a minute and explore it. But it's always interesting because I feel like there's a similar thread between that and recovering perfectionists.

Christian Jackson: 23:15

Oh, absolutely.

Chantée Christian: 23:16

Right there's a very similar thread and theme of perception, unrealistic expectations and life.

Christian Jackson: 23:27

And so you know, value, self-worth comes back up again too, and I think when you bring up perfectionism, I'm thinking about these two P's people, pleasing and perfectionism I guess three right. When I first dropped my book, then daddy issues. In the tagline is how to detangle from the sins of our fathers. So with you talking about these generational things like that is what my book is about. I categorize different women with daddy issues, and so the daddy's girl is one of the women that have daddy issues and the type quote unquote of women and y'all can't see me, but I just raised my hand.

Christian Jackson: 24:08

You know I got so much pushback about daddy issues, period, right. And then also I would have friends and you know family. That would say you know, I have a good relationship with my dad. What do you mean? You don't have daddy issues, and that's a whole different show. I can break that down. It's in my books, of course, but one of the things that I've done to kind of boil it down and make it plain or a lot of my daddy issues, the daddy's girls, are my perfectionism people and my people pleasers, and that comes from, like a host of different factors.

Christian Jackson: 24:41

But if you're someone who is taking that beat and wanting to ask yourself, like, where this come from, then we have to go back to our parents. We go back to the village who raised us, whoever that might be. And a good question to ask yourself is when is the first time, or the worst time, I felt this level of the need to please, just for the sake of this conversation, who do I please first? When you, for me, like you, can do a pros and cons list, because we get something out of that. As kids, we want to make our parents proud, we want to stay out of trouble, we want to try to show them that we're good, and sometimes that is the extent of why some of my clients will say I people please? They won't say people please, but they'll say why. I just don't think about myself. It's for everybody else. I want to make somebody proud and that's a good clue for me with my training as a therapist. Like thinking about trauma and specifically, I'm thinking OK, so there was some kind of stop of developmental stages where something happened during this time where your brain said, oh, this is the only way I'm going to be able to live life or make friends, like what happened around that time. That is always an interesting conversation to navigate through the narratives that we all have that are old, they're outdated, they serve the purpose at the time, like you mentioned, but they don't now as an adult.

Christian Jackson: 26:05

So, like I do, parts work too. It's called inter integrated family systems, where you're thinking about the different parts that make up ourselves. So you hear people say, naturally, that's part of me that want to do this, I want to go turn up, but then I also want to be settled down with a family. Like that, we're battling with ourselves the different roles that these different parts have, right, so that is a real thing where the anxiety comes from trying to satisfy both parts of ourselves. We want to do this and we want to do that and they may conflict because of some narrative that we were told in society.

Christian Jackson: 26:38

It's always really interesting to just pull apart. How old was that person, like my eight year old self, is the people pleaser that just took that and ran until I was 45. But I've learned new things, made friends, saw people and they're doing stuff, difference, and I was like, like you said, the awareness like, oh crap, I'm a people pleaser, but where does this come from? It's always very interesting, very real conversation and we have to give ourselves grace during that because it doesn't feel pretty all the time.

Chantée Christian: 27:08

I think that that so many pieces of what you said, and right, this work does not feel good. No, Like. I never forget when I first started doing the work and one of my mentors would say you know you're doing, you got to keep doing the work. And I was like but when is the work done? And she said baby, you are the work, the work is done when you die. I said, oh yeah.

Christian Jackson: 27:37

When you die. Yes, it's a lot. My own therapist, I see I'm on the biweekly panel right now because I'm just going through with this pivot in my business and just some personal things. So I and I also have a business coach, I have mentors, so like there's a place for all of us, right? Coaches, mentor all the things. Because, first of all, what I want people to know is that you've got to get your healing the way that makes sense for you. Maybe therapy is not for you, which is why coaches and life life coaches and relationship coaches exist. They have a very specific training too, and I appreciate the one to appreciate training of like a therapist or something and know when to refer. But maybe your healing is. I'm going to listen to this affirmation mixtape. You know, maybe I'm going to change who I'll follow on Instagram because I'm being triggered by all the things on baller alert. You know, I don't know.

Chantée Christian: 28:28

Say so.

Christian Jackson: 28:29

Say it, say it, yeah. So what is that going to look like for you? How are you going to change those narratives? And I think one of the things I've learned and given myself permission to do is to think outside the box when it comes to my healing and to not run away from the people that will tell me the truth. Because my, this lady, oh, shout out to her, she is, she don't, pull no punches. This she don't, and I love it.

Chantée Christian: 28:52

I love it. Let me tell you something. So I'm an only child and I've never wanted a sibling, ever. I'm doing it ever. And one of the things that I have in the last, I'd say, five years, in the last five years, something that I have truly appreciated more Right, kind of go back to what we were talking about earlier was the community of women that I have built around me, because they were not just doing their thing, they were honest about their process.

Chantée Christian: 29:30

They have been honest about what it looks like for them to heal. They've been honest about things that have worked for them and things that haven't worked for them, and so in creating a space of vulnerability that I would have never expected from women at their levels and at their statures, right, and so it reminds me constantly that we're human. We're all human, we all have our vices, we all got our things and, like you were saying about, like the daddy issues, I am a self and other people proclaim daddy's girl. It ain't no secret behind it. That's my number one dude, and it was two years ago, but I was like you're the reason why I'm doing my relationships. I was doing some work and I was like, okay, why do I keep dating dudes that are emotionally unavailable, sometimes physically, like they would be here, they would leave, they'd be here, they'd leave, they'd be here, they'd leave. And.

Chantée Christian: 30:41

I'd be like okay, I'm right here. I'm right here. What is this? So we did some work on that one and I was like this Joker. You're the reason why, you know, and my dad was in the Army I'm active duty and in the Army during the time where they were getting sent off to a and everywhere to go fight any and every war, and that was his job.

Christian Jackson: 31:05

And you were used to that in and out.

Chantée Christian: 31:07

I was used to it and I saw it from knee high to a duck's butt until I graduated college. I had gotten used to it and it was familiar and it was comfortable until it wasn't until it wasn't right. Like one of my friends and I joke all the time. Everything's funny until it's not.

Christian Jackson: 31:26

All of a sudden it's like it's playing right.

Chantée Christian: 31:28

Okay, all right, all right. And then it was just like no, could it be? And I can remember the day right, and it was just like that snapshot of age and timeframe 35, 60 years later, I'm still. This got to go. I got how are we, how are we getting rid of this? How are we getting rid of this? But I also learned from my mother.

Chantée Christian: 31:58

I got mommy issues too, cause she played her part too right, cause that's what they were doing. They had a collective unit right, and that's not to bash them or anything like that, but what it did for me, once I realized my why was, I was able to make a conscious choice, and that's one of the things that I talk about. So when I talk about the triple A's, I'm always missing the part that's really important, which is the choice, cause it don't fit into my little triple A, this choice. And when we start making conscious choices, they hit different. They do, they hit different. And I tell people all the time that awareness is like a spotlight, more like a search light, like that. Joe could be like oh, you turned me on, hey, what you gonna do? Well, let's go Sometimes right To something that you said earlier. Sometimes we have to remember that we are a work in progress and take a beat, because we can't heal it all at once. I feel like when people get awareness, they're like, oh, I gotta do something with it. Yes and right.

Christian Jackson: 33:08

Slowly, at a pace of grace, if I must say okay, because the wild thing about progress right Is that it's not linear. Period. Say that Like it.

Chantée Christian: 33:23

I think it's not, it's not, it is not Like. I think about this whole flu situation. I haven't had the flu since college and I was like no, I'm not, I'm good. I'm good, I'm just, I'm appraising. I've been socializing. I'm good, no one else in the clique is sick, I'm good. I literally sat on the plane to come back home and was like yo, you're not good.

Christian Jackson: 33:48

When you sat down, when you got to sit, when I sat down. I'm catching what you're putting down. Now I get it Right.

Chantée Christian: 33:55

And then the next day was the worst day, mm. Like I was like what? Oh, it's because I've been doing too much? And I was like my level of do much is on a high level of ridiculous Like, and I'm fully aware and I'm fully aware of what that comes up to. But I just I was like couldn't get out the bed, like literally couldn't open my computer to tell my clients I can't come. And I was like, well, this different Just gonna roll over. And the next day I was like all right, I'm good, I feel better, me, me, me. I'm like I'm like what my voice said. My voice said I go to the doctor. I was like I took a.

Chantée Christian: 34:38

COVID test. I'm fine, they were like you, ma'am. This is not fine. Yes, I was like no, seriously, I'm better, I'm better. I got home I was like yo, you're not fine, and every morning people are like hey, how you feeling, Like I got the flu, Like like that's how I feel right, and so I say that to say. And then today I woke up and I was like look, I got some things that got to get done.

Christian Jackson: 35:07

Do they according to who's playing?

Chantée Christian: 35:09

That's what I'm trying to learn myself, Well we had a deal, and sometimes y'all got to make a deal with God. I don't know if y'all make y'all deals with it, but my deal was with God. I was like, listen, I haven't talked all week. You know, that's how I get paid and this is how I thrive. I was asking for an hour and a half, and I'll shut up until Tuesday, please, jesus, and when I woke up, I had which all here and I said OK. I say that to say, though, healing takes a lot of time, and sometimes it looks like you're going backwards in order to go forward, and so often and I can't speak for your clientele, but I know for mine, so often that moment where they feel as though they've gone backwards is an uproar in their system.

Christian Jackson: 36:11

Yes, it's withdrawals sometimes. Yes, because they'll need like. I used to work with people in recovery from substance use disorders like alcohol and drugs, really exclusively, and that's what that can look like Like. I'm aware that I have a problem quote, unquote and now my body is like where is my crack? Where is my alcohol? This is crazy. What are you doing? You know you're talking about. It could be withdrawal. Whether it's healthy or not, y'all we function a certain way and when we've been doing that for years and we don't have that thing, everything's out of work. Listen, we got to be ready for that.

Chantée Christian: 36:52

Listen, one of my dearest friends, who I can't remember what season Adam was on, but he talked about how, as an addict he was, or when he was, he was trying to fill holes. But he was creating more holes and steady trying to fill them. And I told him afterwards that that was beyond relatable for me because, well, I don't have a substance abuse. Unless you consider Mountain Dew a substance abuse. Sometimes I'm questionable about what's in that. But I used to have a bad addiction to shopping, just to shop. I don't even need to shit Like why am I doing this? And it wasn't making me feel good.

Chantée Christian: 37:52

And again, I had to trace it back to why I was not doing this every Saturday that we would be close to home. My mom and my great-grandmother would go shopping. That was my great-grandmother's jam, like let's go to Delaware, let's go here, let's go. Why are we at the thrift store? What are we getting, ma'am? Anything, anything. And I was like, so I'm just buying shit to buy it, like this is silly. But I couldn't stop until I had to right. And I say that to say like the process of uncovering things about ourselves is important to understand how we operate, but it's also important to understand how we exist right. And understanding that that was a thing for me, like a huge thing for me, allowed me to go back into my closet and be like, oh, that's why all this junk in here still got tagged. So I say junk, but it ain't really junk. But all this stuff still gets tagged in it and I never don't intend on ever wearing it.

Christian Jackson: 39:00

It is what it is, and a lot of what that sounds like is on control, because we do have control issues from one and I'm also, if I may say, in recovery from being a control freak. Yes, it's hard.

Chantée Christian: 39:15

Every time I get called out I'm like you think that's control, yeah right, and then it goes.

Christian Jackson: 39:21

I'm hoping that people will, after hearing this, just consider expanding your perspective on things. You may not call the people pleasing, because you just never have, but what if it is people pleasing? What if I am a control freak? What if let's just go down the rabbit hole and see what this may look like? Because that's going to be your first step into this very sometimes winding road. It can be a cycle. It's never a straight line, but there's a winding road to somewhere.

Christian Jackson: 39:51

Because I am a whole licensed therapist and national boy certified trauma trained. I got good training, I'm good at what I do and, like I said, I'm human. Ok, so I'll be in my sessions with my own therapist and I'm like, damn, I learned that, I studied this and yet you know what I'm saying. Yeah, I'll be open to that kind of feedback. I have to relinquish control, yeah.

Christian Jackson: 40:18

And my husband would tell me all the time, like you just need to chill out, like why does this even matter? Why am I working myself up? It's hard for me to sit still sometimes. It's a lot of what my clients also deal with. It shows up in your relationships. It shows up in the way you're dating who you're choosing, who you're allowing to choose you and the voice that you're not using in your relationships. And so that's slow and down piece. Be ready for that withdrawal, aka that freakout that your body is going to have when you make a resolution to put yourself first. As healthy as that sounds to some people, it freaks us out Because we're like what am I supposed to do? What would people say about me if I don't? Yeah, am I going to be selfish? So many layers here, so many, so two things.

Chantée Christian: 41:03

So I think that it's important for people to also hear that what comes from control is based this fear, and so, when you're thinking about the things that you are attempting to control, what is it that you're most afraid of? Because that's underneath it, wholeheartedly and as a human, we're all afraid of something.

Christian Jackson: 41:27

Yep, we're trying to stay safe from something. It's a protective mechanism.

Chantée Christian: 41:31

Absolutely, absolutely, and that's why it's important to be clear about what our intentions are as we're moving forward, even as healing. So even when you're talking about I want to heal from, ok, go, what does that look like for you? Because it might not look like a bi-weekly session with your therapist, with your coach. It may look like, look, I just need this on a monthly basis because it's too much, right, but being able to self-regulate is so important, so so important. And because the medicine got my mind messed up, I can't remember the point.

Christian Jackson: 42:03

So here we are. It's supposed to happen this way. We just go go.

Chantée Christian: 42:08

It's supposed to be like this. So, as we wrap up, what would you like to leave the people with?

Christian Jackson: 42:14

Oh man, I've been thinking about that since you asked me and I still don't really have an answer that I thought would be beautiful and eloquent. Except let me just leave y'all with this. Let me think as someone who is still working on her marriage. Still showing up differently in a relationship we would say is a terminal thing, right, because everybody wants to be married, whatever. I have the kids, I have good friends, my circle is tight. Even when I think I'm quote unquote done with stuff, then I still find myself trying to fix things from my past, things like I'm not gonna let my friend or my husband or my kids talk this way, which you know is healthy to a degree. But if I continue to live in the past and say I'm doing this because out of spite or because I'm trying to fix things, I'm gonna stay stuck back there.

Christian Jackson: 43:07

A lot of what we do when we are replaying these same narratives, these same unhealthy relationship patterns, the same way I communicate with people in general, is because you're stuck somewhere and I'm inviting you and challenging you to consider what am I trying to resolve? That really has no place in your present. So I wanna leave people with this mindfulness piece, where it's a huge buzzword now. Mindfulness simply means being present. If you cannot be present, if you can't stay where you are, you gotta figure out the barriers. Because we want to experience what's going on in your life now, taking responsibility now so we can move forward. And that looks like actually saying now, what do I need?

Christian Jackson: 43:58

Eight year old Christian, who I call Ray Ray, she responds one way how can I bring myself to the present and think about what I need now, which is what I think is so hard for us to think about and consider because we haven't been allowed to. So I wanna challenge you to stay mindful. What are you grateful for now? What do you want to do now? What do you need now? Because that piece is not selfish, it's really just I wanna stay in the present and recreate a healthy experience today, instead of replaying the negative and traumatic experiences from before. Yeah, that's good, that's good.

Chantée Christian: 44:32

Thank you for joining me on my podcast and tell the people where they can find you.

Christian Jackson: 44:38

Yes, you can find me most active interacting with y'all on the gram Instagram, at couch C-O-U-C-H with W-I-T-H Christian C-H-R-I-S-T-I-N. At couch with Christian on TikTok as well, and you can find my website couchwithchristiancom.

Chantée Christian: 44:57

Thank you for joining me, and that should be easy enough. My last name is Christian. I don't know how to find her.

Christian Jackson: 45:04

Yes, thank you for having me. I'll see you next time.

Chantée Christian: 45:11

Thank you for listening to this week's episode of the my Best Shift podcast. I enjoyed talking with Christian about healing ourselves from all of our issues, especially daddy issues. For more information or if you'd like to reach out to us, please visit at mybestshift underscore LLC on Instagram. Remember, stop doing shit that doesn't serve you. See you later. Listen closely.