foreign it is going to be one hell of a profound conversation I just feel it in my bones because I'm going to introduce you to this woman named Dr Tama Bryant our conversation today is going to help you connect with the truth of who you are even if you've never truly met the most powerful version of yourself she says you can always come back home to yourself hey it's your friend Mel and welcome to the Mel Robbins podcast I am so glad that you tuned into the podcast today I'm actually out in Los Angeles for
our daughter's college graduation and while I was out here I reached out to a woman that I have just I don't even know how to describe the level of respect and awe I've never met her before you're going to meet her the same moment that I meet her and I just know that today it is going to be one hell of a profound conversation I just feel it in my bones because I'm going to introduce you to this woman named Dr Tama Bryant now Dr Tama wears so many hats and the one thing that is
the through line in her work is that people around the world who are seeking deeper connection and meaning in life trust her they turn to her for guidance she is a psychologist a minister a tenured professor at Pepperdine University she's a New York Times best-selling author and in 2023 she was named the very first black female president of the American Psychological Association Dr Bryant completed her doctorate in Clinical Psychology at Duke University and her postdoctoral training at Harvard Medical School centers victims of violence program our conversation today will lead you on a journey back to
who you really are so that you can own your full identity and fly Dr Tama Bryant is going to help you connect with the truth of who you are even if you've never truly met the most powerful version of yourself she says you can always come back home to yourself Dr Tama Bryant's brand new book homecoming overcome fear and Trauma to reclaim your whole authentic self it is a must read Dr Tama I am so thrilled that you are here I am thrilled to be here I love you I love your work and I love
getting the word out about the journey home because we need it oh do we ever you know I was I'm I'm pretty emotional today because I'm here in Los Angeles because our uh one of our daughters is graduating from college in a couple days and I am going after our interview to hear her do her final senior performance ah beautiful and it's a full circle moment because I'm going to the theater where she got her invitation to audition to even be admitted into the program wow and I've been calling it a full circle moment but
what I realize is it's a homecoming it is and I guess that's where I want to start because it makes me emotional to think about this because I lived for so long feeling what you would call psychologically homeless yes disconnected from my true self and the feeling that you have when you finally feel whole it is unlike anything I've ever experienced yes and I appreciate the honesty and the transparency because we do get disconnected you know life disconnects us and you know if you don't mind saying how could you tell you were disconnected or what
was it like when you were psychologically wandering it felt like there was the physical me walking around in my life doing the things that we all do getting up going to work taking care of the kids calling friends watching TV but there was a part of me that was separate that felt um I guess you could call it like a knowing I I wonder if even that critical voice that we listen to is also almost like grinding at you because you're not really on a path where you feel like you are truly I mean and
sometimes I think back I think I didn't even feel like I was alive for crying out loud just on autopilot just feeling no spiritual center yeah no connection to values just existing and so I guess it would be for me this feeling of separateness um yeah separated from yourself and then separated from other people because you're surrounded by people but they don't really see you know you can fool a lot of people including yourself right so a part of when I talk about homecoming is telling yourself the truth and then living based on that truth
that you tell yourself right because I can lie to myself that social script is I'm fine I'm fine and you know I'm in a lot of faith-based communities and the term is like I'm blessed right it's like yeah you can be blessed and also have a lot going on yeah uh blessed and lost so that Awakening what I like to say and I think I say it in the book is can we get to the place where we can admit I miss myself wow okay I just want to make sure that you listening to us
just got what Dr Tama just said to you I miss myself how does somebody who feels like they don't even know who they are like you hear that a lot I don't even know who I am yes yeah so I like to say even if you feel like you were never at home with yourself you can still come home to yourself and that is a reality for a lot of people who grew up with stress and Trauma who perhaps were born into families where there was a lot of stress and Trauma so you learned early
to be in survival mode or you learned to play small or you learn to people please and so you never got to what I like to call unfold right you never got to connect with the truth of who you are and so even if you have never met you you can come home to you and that's kind of the good news of this process wow there's a West African uh Fable that you tell at the very beginning of the book that I think will give us a visual and a story to lock on to that
we can keep coming back to to help keep people in the conversation yeah so would you mind telling us is it a female what do you yeah you can say it's a fable I um I lived in Liberia West Africa for high school so I'm gonna do it in my version of Liberian English but any liberians who are listening will tell you Ah that's not the for true so um once upon a time once upon a time in West Africa there was one animal expert and this animal expert knew every animal that was in the
bush you people say forest but the real word is if he's the giraffe you know the thing giraffe if you see lion you know the thing lion so this animal expert is walking one day so so and he goes behind one farm and he's passing the farm and behind the farm he sees so so chickens in the middle of the chickens is one eagle um he said what the eagle doing with these chickens he go to the front of the farm and he say bop bop you people say knock knock the real sound that's he
say bop bop the man inside say who that the man outside say that me you might open the door and see so he opens the door he said well your business here he's saying the back of your farm you got so so chickens but in the middle it's one Eagle the farmer laughed he said no I only have chicken the animal experts that I'll show you they go to the back of the farm he picks up the one he's calling an eagle he puts it on his arm he says listen to me you're not chicken
chickens can't fly you can fly go ahead and fly the ego listened to him but then he looked down at his chicken brothers and sisters eating their chicken food he jumped down off the man's arm and he go back with the chickens the farmer starts laughing at the animal expert the animal expert is Vex he said I coming to go he's storm away the next day he come back he comes so soon in the morning God himself was not awake yet eh he come and say what Baba the man is I say who that the
man outside say that me open the door and see he opens the door he takes him he says what are you doing here he said I came here because you have one eagle this time he took the eagle and he climbed to the roof of the barn they get to the top of the barn and at that moment the sun started to rise the animal expert says to the eagle all your life people told you you were a chicken they told you talk like chicken act like chicken walk like chicken but you're not a chicken
you're an eagle um the eagle said to himself I think if I don't try this thing this man will come every day bothering me maybe today I will try it so he spread his wings and he started to fly and I tell you my eyes could never see him again and that's the whole reason why you and I are here today because there are those who are listening who have been treated like chickens dating like chickens picking jobs like chickens but you're not a chicken you're an eagle so fly oh I just gotta do that
right now oh my gosh that that is why this book is required reading for everyone this is why you wrote the book in fact I would love for you to read this part up to there oh sure the eagle made it home he made it to the truth of who he was this is homecoming I wrote this book for all of you who at different points in your life have found yourself living like someone you are not you may have started acting different because of how you were treated or what other people told you about
yourself or how you saw others acting you have not felt comfortable or safe enough to truly be yourself or to feel at home in your identity the recognized and unrecognized traumas of your past may have taught you to hide your gifts and voice in order to survive this book facilitates your journey back to who you really are so you can own your full identity and fly beautiful thank you thank you and it has been such a gift being able to get this out to people because so many of us are hungry for more like you
have the sense this can't be it right like this this just can't be it right in whatever area of my life and so uh to know that healing is work but we're worth it right yeah and when we are not at home we're paying a cost anyway how much has it cost me to live some other woman's life ah I don't want to pay it anymore yeah yeah yeah it costs you your life right it costs you your life absolutely so let's walk through the process of homecoming yes I'm an eagle in Disguise as a
chicken right I come in yeah and I want to begin this journey and I have the honor of sitting down across from you Dr Tama yes but I don't know I'm an eagle right when every when any patient comes in and sits down that you work with are you like oh we got another Eagle who's in it who's in a chicken suit right now yeah how do we start like what where is the beginning step yeah to your own homecoming I start every session with the breath okay because we're so busy and Scattered and we
have been tricked duped Hoodwinked into believing I can prove my worthiness with my busyness and so people can come in you know running a million miles and have believed themselves that if I'm so productive I must be at home but we often are not and so I invite people to take a moment to tune into their breath to inhale in through the nose and exhale out through the mouth to begin to scan their bodies noticing any place where you're holding tension and sending breath throughout the body giving yourself permission to breathe and release as we
set intentions for self-compassion and for clarity and that's how we begin I feel different yeah right tell me the different what did you notice um I just noticed that my mind went quiet and I dropped out of my head yeah and into my body that's it and there was a slowing that kind of went with this knowing right that this feels better than the thoughts that are racing or the things that are on my mind or the sound that is distracting me that it feels better what's it feel like for you right it is the
homecoming that I and that's a part of the closing our eyes are lowering our gaze is when we're open we're open to all the stimulation around us and especially if you're uh a trauma Survivor you are tuned into other people right so what are they thinking what are they feeling what do they need it's dangerous to relax yes when you're a victim of trauma and discrimination and violence yeah then truth shows up right and many of us suppress and run and hide and so then that heightens the belief that I can't see myself right and
so that keeps us running so instead to give people permission and with the support because they're not having to face it by themselves I'm with them for us to actually tune in to what's going on in there and uh to start to look at what are the signs of my disconnection so that's where the Journey Begins for us to notice right where is my disconnection showing up in me so if homecoming means coming back home and feeling connected yeah to your most authentic self to recognizing the eagle yes that is in there yes and ignoring
what everybody said and all the stuff around you that makes you chicken makes you feel like a chicken what are the signs yeah of disconnection so when we are in a place of feeling powerless hopelessness uh despair those are indicators that we have lost sight of our power and voice because the truth is we do have capacity voice and agency but we've been in environments where that wasn't welcomed or that wasn't responded to and so then that can leave us feeling like we're empty and there's a story you tell in the book about um being
at a event where you're giving one of the bazillion keynote speeches that you give and a survivor of sexual abuse comes up to you can you share that story yes so I was speaking at a conference on sexual assault and I'm a sexual assault Survivor and I give the presentation and when it's over people are responding really well and then I'm standing there in this line which I know you are used to and there's a long line of people waiting to kind of share their their response or their connection to what you said and uh
I see toward the back of the line uh this woman who we would say had had a bad attitude right but I know attitude is despair but uh hold on a second attitude is despair yeah so a form of depression people often don't recognize is irritable depression right yeah wow and and people don't respond to compassion with compassion to women with a quote unquote bad attitude but if we said when I see that woman she's in despair maybe then I would respond with compassion but some of us by Family by Culture by religion were taught
that sadness is weakness so we mask our sadness with anger with bitterness with attitude right but underneath it is the despair so true yeah it's like an iceberg you see the anger on the top but there's something so much deeper much deeper underneath wow yeah so you could pick up on the attitude and the energy but I know there's the story there yeah right especially because when you know you haven't done anything right so I am I am feeling on the receiving end of your upset and I haven't done anything so that I know there's
a story yeah so you know when it gets to be her place uh she's next in the line and she says to me with the attitude um so you're a survivor and I say look I just gave a whole keynote on it right I say yes and she says well you don't look like any Survivor I've ever known so the doubting can be triggering as we think about not being believed but then I go deeper than that uh and decide not to get defensive instead I just let her question slash statement hang in the air
and I just uh what I would say soften right I soften and I just look at her and it's like now she can see me like on the stage with my PowerPoint and my pants suit she couldn't she couldn't see me right she could only see the strength and the uh oratorical skills but now standing in front of her kind of woman to woman she could see the vulnerability and seeing the vulnerability she said you know the only survivors I've ever known were fat and uh poor like me right so then it's the different ways
our surviving shows up and for some of us who are often overlooked we coped with busyness and with what I would call a spirit of Excellence and when you are excellent people don't notice your wounds and sometimes you don't notice them you feel you've outrun it yes but it's there late at night early in the morning when you're in certain environments it shows up that it's still bleeding and you've just gotten busy but not healed what's the difference I guess what is healing yeah so it is the homecoming of being accepting and loving of myself
when I accept me I have nothing to prove there's a life coach here in in Los Angeles uh um I'm gonna I'm gonna come I'm gonna give you her name later but she has a beautiful quote I love which is uh I don't want to be driven I want to be called and this idea of like when you're driven your trauma can drive you yeah like your insecurity can you know where you have to constantly prove yourself and it's this franticness versus when I'm at home that I can be in flow with what is me
yeah wow um if you have somebody in your life who has that irritable depression yeah how do you practice softening yeah and compassion because oftentimes if you're around somebody who's constantly irritable who is always angry about or frustrated with something I have several people that come to mind right now in my own life yeah what are some some tools that we can use to practice more compassion in those moments so that we lead with compassion rather than get so reactive right and I love that question because I think what we often get pulled into is
being combative with them and they're always going to out combat us because they're in Warrior mode right and so uh you know when they come with the intensity uh then I respond to the softness and I would say one of two ways one is if I if I can relate it all I'll give my own experience right and that helps them not to feel judged right I'm not saying like calling you out because I see what you're doing is just saying you know there was a time where and whatever that story is and often I
I have learned transparency is contagious and sometimes then people say oh me too right right I'm like yeah you too yeah so the testimonial or if I know anything that's been happening in their life to name that to say because they're responding with all this intensity about distraction right so then I will say um well I really wanted to check in because I know this is such a busy time with you you know that you're moving that you're this that you're that and for us to ask a deeper question because the how are you gives
us finding you yeah right so break out of the script and so instead with everything you're holding you know what's been helping you to manage right or what do you need or how can I help yeah um so I'm speaking to the unspoken if you bring in the chicken and the eagle can we use that that Fable to describe that moment where the Survivor in the audience yeah has this irritable depressive moment with you right what is happening for her in your opinion as a psychologist yeah so I like to say the reason you feel
unsettled is because you're not supposed to settle say that again the reason you feel unsettled is because you're not supposed to settle so what area of your life are you settling and I would imagine that any area where you feel unsettled right there it is there it is so you know what happens is often we are focused so much outwardly if only if only my spouse would do this if only my kids would do this if only my supervisor would do this um and in this moment we don't have the capacity to shift them so
how might you want to shift right that's a big ask because it's easier to try to order everybody else around yes and frustrating and annoying and yes and draining but it also uh lets me off the hook because I can keep waiting for their homecoming right I can come home to myself when they come home to themselves well everybody is on their own timing and what I like to remind myself is I don't want to be I don't want to keep my healing hostage waiting for the healing of those who harmed me oh wow and
that's what we're doing when we're like waiting for the apology yeah it's like I can't heal till you see what you did to me yes like that could be years it might be your whole life it may be your whole life right they have gone on with their lives they don't care they're not thinking about it and so I want to take my healing out of their hands um and give it back to yourself yeah and so the process of coming home and the homecoming is the act of self-healing yes it's about joining back in
with yourself you know because we have such a huge International audience and therapy can be very expensive I would love for you to read these six questions that you often ask patients that can be a sign of what you call psychological homelessness and so I would also love for you Dr Thomas who talk about what is psychological homelessness I've never heard that phrase before but it makes so much sense so uh psychological homelessness is this sense of wandering being ungrounded unrooted confused and we can spend years saying I don't know I'm not sure and even
when I'm waiting for other people to give me the answer then they're my compass but I need a compass that's what we talk about with therapy is at some point people need to internalize it so it's not just every week people coming and saying so Tama what do you think yeah right they have to get to the point where I was having this conversation with my sister and I realized I was doing this and so I sh well there it is right now you have become your compass right so here are the questions does the
state of your life internally or externally fall short of what you imagined did you attain what you thought you wanted only to discover that you still feel empty and unfulfilled do you have a sense of powerlessness or hopelessness do you lack the energy or motivation to pursue the things that used to matter to you do you feel there are no words to capture the ache in your heart do you find yourself crying often or does it seem impossible to cry if somebody resonates with any of those questions yeah what should they do yes so I
want to First say to anyone who connected with those you've taken the first step which is awareness because I can't come home to myself if I don't realize I'm wandering yeah right sometimes we don't realize it you can time is passing and you don't know it so the fact that in this moment as you're listening you chose to tell yourself the truth that is your mind heart Body Spirit telling to you we're ready right because when we don't feel ready you know we we're distracting ourselves we're busying ourselves and then truth shows up so telling
yourself the truth is the first step and then we think about both self-care and Community Care and sometimes when we don't feel good about ourselves uh we neglect ourselves and we erase ourselves and that those can have cultural messages and gender messages and religious messages where people will say self-care is selfish right you know and so to say uh to myself I am not just a tool for other people's nourishing I am not just a pathway for other people to get goodness in life that I too am a living soul that is deserving of the
goodness that I want other people to experience and so it is a sacred act to begin to care for ourselves and the catch is when we talk about behavioral psychology with behavioral psychology you start to do the action even if you don't feel it yet right so if I say like I'm gonna wait till I have high self-esteem and then take good care of myself like it's not going to work right so I have to start doing it even when I don't feel it yes right yes what do you like I keep the word that
keeps coming to mind is purpose so you hear a lot of people say I don't know what my purpose is I I need to find a purpose is that a code word for I am disconnected from myself that is definitely a code word and the name came back to me of the life coach I quote it so I just want to give Shannon Yvette okay it's the one who gave the quote I said earlier but uh when people don't have a sense of their purpose uh that's a an indication of disconnection I also want like
to say when we are in unhealthy relationships and on toxic jobs in order to survive those you have to disconnect it's impossible to be at home with yourself and stay in relationship with someone who is dishonoring you perpetually wow yeah so for somebody that just had like yes a wake-up call mm-hmm then you can have compassion for yourself because people will judge you and say like why'd you stay so long right but you weren't connected to you you had been disconnected from yourself so you don't even feel the capacity to dream again to imagine to
believe that better is possible for you and that you are deserving of it and worthy of it we see this both in relationships and jobs all the time in fact through the whole chapter about how to handle a toxic work environment that's right so if somebody is listening to this and they're on their way in to a job that is slowly just draining their soul right the first step is to acknowledge it yeah and to recognize that you're disconnected from yourself and you already gave us the way that you would know right any area that
you are unsettled in that does not feel cohesive that is where you're settling that is a point of disconnection you talk to us about breathing yeah yeah close your eyes come back into your body you've talked also about self-care what does that mean self-care yeah so self-care is nourishing every part of yourself so there is the physical part uh so it is hard to heal and come home to yourself if you're living out of vending machines and drive-through windows why because your food affects your mood and there's nothing life-giving in fake food so uh yes
I like to say as your grandmother would say like uh put some vegetables on that plate put some greens on that plate uh so fruit and vegetables I like to think of before I eat something can I say I'm eating this because I love myself and some things I won't be able to put in my body because I actually want to live and we have it flipped where we will call those things the treat I am treating myself by giving myself something that's killing me so to have to flip it and of course in moderation
because when people hear that they're like do you mean I can never have right so in my and drinking water instead of all the soda sleep is a big one it is hard to come home to yourself when you're exhausted you know we are busy busy uh and then all night people are on their phones or you know up and can't sleep and I say if your idea and hopefully this is okay to say you can say whatever you want yes if your idea of relaxing before you go to sleep is watching three episodes of
Law and Order I would encourage you to think about why is trauma relaxing to me oh that's what it is I mean it's harm crime violation attacks and that's what is going to soothe me into my bedtime so what is the answer yeah that a lot of people give you when they do go into therapy about that connection is that it's normal and familiar some of us grew up in high stress so we think calmness is either fake or boring wow right people mistake peace for boring and it's like to come home to yourself you
have to lean into the discomfort because it's because it's gonna feel unfamiliar I was working with a client an adult woman and her mom and they had been disconnected because the mother dealt with addiction and didn't raise her but they are reconnected now and living together and the adult daughter really wanted her mom to say she loves her and the mother uh just said to me that just seems fake so she had not grown up with that had not heard it to her it's like something people do on TV and so I said to her
if you mean it it's not fake it just feels like it because you're not used to saying it um it is amazing how many people don't tell the people that they love that they don't that they love them right and I hadn't occurred to me it's because they never were told that themselves yeah and that it might feel forced or not authentic yes whoa yeah and that's the importance of us learning the Each Other's Love Languages because you know her response was the response of probably many of her generation which was you had food on
the table or you have a roof over your head yes what more do you want for me right what more what more um I love also that homecoming is not only therapy that there is a deeply spiritual aspect to this so what is sort of the how would you describe the difference between therapy and spirituality and the work that you need to do in both areas that's right so unfortunately many people who are in the mental health field did not get trained to incorporate spirituality and so there's research that shows on average mental health professionals
endorse a lower level of spirituality or religiosity than the general public really yes why do you think that is well I think a part of that can go with higher levels of Education that a lot of times people can disconnect as with education can feel like they need to prove everything and spirituality is beyond our proving or our being able to um to to manipulate it right so it's like it's it's not concrete right and so that's in the field of psychology the actual you know the founders in the field were often people of Faith
but then there was this move in the field where we wanted to prove we're a science um so we we're not we want to prove that we're a science then we can't talk about anything people find spooky or soft or you know in some other realm and so uh then there has been a neglect from it from that area and then I think the other part of it has been the recognition that some people have been harmed in spiritual spaces so then some therapists will over generalize and think that it is all harmful as opposed
to whenever you get people together you're going to have some good and some bad some things that are healthy or unhealthy what is your definition of spirituality it is an awareness of the sacred beyond what we can see oh I love that definition and now that we're on this topic it occurs to me how could you possibly heal without pulling Faith yes and a belief that something that you have not experienced is possible that's it 100 because I even say to be a therapist social worker life coach any of these things you have to have
faith and for people to show up there has to be a faith that there can be more than what I have seen and what I have experienced it's like when I'm counseling people who've only had unhealthy relationships and I have to say just because this one is better doesn't mean it's good right if you're just used to bad treatment if people like call you back you're like oh yeah they call me back and it's like that was nice but there's more right there's more yes yes so we've kind of started stepping yeah toward this awareness
how do you combine the spiritual practice and the belief in something that you may have never experienced or seen right with the work to start to heal or as you say repair it yourself yeah in the physical space that's right so a part of it is what gives us the motivation to do the work because a lot of times we're operating based on evidence which is what we've seen so if I've only had bad experiences my parents abandoned me this person left me this person mistreated me if I believe that is all that exists then
the conclusion would be I am unworthy right that's the only possible Right conclusion because you know this idea this you know victim blaming self-blaming of if I deserved better I would have received better and you will hear people blaming other people for being mistreated you know they'll say oh well you must have allowed it and so uh in order for me to come to a different conclusion that I am worthy of what I have not yet experienced I have to have the belief of the more how the heck do you do that yes your whole
life yeah you have experienced either abuse or mistreatment or discrimination yes or violence how do you when you have evidence that does make you feel unworthy because I'm sure you get these DMS and these emails all day long so do we yeah of people who so want to believe that they are worthy that something is better that they can change your life for the better and you and I can sit where we are and go of course you can I have just wait you I have so much evidence that it's possible it's most spiritual and
I could argue the case yes yes but for somebody who is sitting in the disbelief yeah how do you cross over right to believe yeah so it's a couple of levels one of them is to get people to reflect on what do they believe all human beings deserve well I believe I'm a chicken yeah and all I see are chickens well and I believe I'm on the ground you know what I'm saying like we go back to this yeah how do you possibly convince yourself right you could be an eagle if you've never seen one
yes yes so what we uh connect with is disrupting what we call the cognitive distortions so it's not that's a big word what is cognitive distortion so your false thoughts the lies okay the lies you told yourself and the lies other people told you what if let me give you an example okay please so uh for people who were molested yes they either were told directly or indirectly that that is their fault right that um it's because they developed early or it's because they shouldn't have been over there or whatever it is that somehow that's
on you and so we have to uh demonstrate that that is a lie so how do I demonstrate that that is a lie does Every Girl Who develops breasts early deserve to be molested of course not so you are not an exception to that rule oh I see yeah I can see another lie because I'm a Survivor of uh that kind of abuse yeah it's the shhh don't tell anyone or you'll get in trouble yeah yeah and what I learned about that uh I say for my own journey is I was taught that keeping quiet
kept the peace until I realized whose piece is it keeping oh right the offender's at peace the people who don't want to deal with it at peace and I in this little body am holding all of the war so I don't want to hold it anymore wow yeah you know this is what we're taught you're gonna upset things you're gonna upset people nobody wants to hear that and uh yeah there's no peace whose piece are you keeping yeah you're making it easy for everybody else as it's slowly right destroying you absolutely and often then they're
gone they're doing it to multiple people over the course of years uh because the silence gives freedom to for it to continue how do you counsel people who in the process of starting to come back home to themselves to learn to fly to stop holding the peace for other people around you how do you counsel people to then go back into their life like you're let's just say it's a relationship yeah where you have somebody that you're dating or in relationship with and there's alcohol or drugs you've had the conversation you've gone around and around
and around yeah and you're the one that's not saying anything so you're keeping the peace for them right how do you handle like that sort of disruption in your life now that you're starting to because it's scary yes the homecoming process can also be scary because you're going to have to confront things and it's gonna require some losses and some people are not going to be happy with the new you people like the silent you they like the compliant you they like the doormat you who wouldn't like that so when you start getting some opinions
and start getting your voice and not wanting to do some of the unhealthy things you've been doing uh not everyone is going to celebrate and that will be important for you to see who wants me whole and who prefers Me Broken and then I will have to start making some adjustments and there are a range of ways we can do it so like in the work chapter we say there's one path for if I want to stay on this job and how do I restore myself and there's another path where I need to leave this
job and in relationship with people whether romantic or otherwise some I will have to end and some it will have to be different because I'm different and uh there's there can be a grieving there wow you know in your new role you are um really wanting to bring access to therapy to mental health support to the process of a homecoming for people to as many people as possible so why is there what is therapy and why is it important yeah so therapy is when you have uh trained licensed facilitator [Music] who understands how to Journey
with you from where you are back home to yourself without judgment and with compassion and without needing you to take care of them oh that last part was the big one that's the big one that's why your friend is not the same thing your family member is not the same thing wow yeah I had always said objective and licensed but the fact that you just said yeah you don't have to take care of them that's right wow yeah that's the huge part especially for those of us who have Tendencies toward taking care of people right
yeah so then in your other relationships you'll say I don't want to burden people or I know they have a lot going on so let me just pour into them well this is the space where you don't have to give you don't have to be on you don't have to you don't have to do that you know I tell my clients I'm good right I have spaces outside of here that are for me so you don't have to worry I I have the capacity to hold it and and that's what we need and you also
have the tools yes to help us recognize and call ourselves out where we're being a chicken right or we could be an eagle yeah and how to take flight and and I will say um it is so important to have the tools and the understanding because people who don't will often blame let's say if you have a child who's depressed and their parents just call them lazy yes right they don't understand what they're looking at and so that's a part of what's important as well is perspective uh and insight into what I'm seeing if somebody
in your life is struggling I'm just going to send my husband to therapy just going to send my kid to therapy does that work so there is a benefit of individual and family okay right because I'll say especially uh with Children what I saw when I first started was people would drop off their child and I would spend like an hour building this kid up and then they picked them up and in the parking lot they're cussing the kid out oh it's like this like it did they didn't even make it home so like it
it's what are we are we just gonna do this every week and so now I'm seeing like what the real Dynamic is so you know with couples um I will say there is a part of our work that is individual let's say if I'm working with a sexual trauma Survivor so there's a part that is that person's Journey but then there's a part for the couple to say like what will the intimacy be like for us given the history and how do we support each other and have patience with each other and I want to
name is we're talking about people is not only self-care but Community Care let's talk about that what does that even mean yeah so we heal in relationship to other people there is something very liberating and healing in being known like you reveal yourself and people still love you right that people still choose you that people that you feel seen and heard and supported uh there's emotional social support which is like someone I can cry with someone I can share my good news with someone who I can vent to but then there's also instrumental social support
are there people who can help me in concrete practical ways and it's important that we know which friend or family member is good at what right you may have a relative who's not touchy-feely right they're not good with the tears but they can help you find a job right so that's another type of support yeah for I'm surprised and saddened by the number of people that will reach out when they hear you say that yeah and say I have no one when you have somebody that you are working with who is telling themselves the story
yeah that I have no one what are the rituals or the tools or the tactics because you give homework in this yeah every chapter has homework I would imagine every counseling session that you do as a therapist has homework so what would the homework be if you're somebody who says I have no one then one of our goals will be to make friends and at first get their buy-in can we say that that's a goal for you is to make friends and so then we have to think about where are we going to get these
friends sometimes it's brand new people so it may be you sign up for a cooking class or you join a book club or you join a political organization or your yoga group uh and then sometimes you have people but you have kept it very surface so then I want to deepen my relationships and the Surgeon General has been talking recently and issued the advisory about loneliness yeah and what I like to tell people is loneliness is nothing to be ashamed of some people when they hear you say you're lonely they just say you need to
love yourself and I like to say that's not the same thing you can love yourself and still desire a connection to other people so that is not an automatic absence of self-love and so then uh if I have acquaintances that are all very surfaced then to deepen it am I willing to go deeper because again I can start to shift the tide when I talk about deeper things than other people will often meet me there wow and what about you talked we just touched on this and I know so many people do not like what
they do for a living yeah and in the book you write about having a job that was very toxic can you describe what it felt like to walk into work and how you practice a homecoming yeah when you're in a toxic environment yes uh it is so uh stressful in your body and your mind and that's even before you can do your work right just the Sunday scaries the driving in the dreading it it's it's terrible so then of course you can't flow in a spirit of Excellence because you're you know battling all of these
other Dynamics and so I'd like to encourage people to create a morning ritual so that you show up with your cup already full so can you give us an example what does that mean yes so first of all wake up before you have to get up okay what does that mean that means don't set your alarm for the time you have to jump out of bed and jump in the shower because now you've already started your day frantic yes so now I'm going into a toxic place already feeling anxious okay so you want to wake
up a little bit earlier and then figure out what are the practices that would nourish me for some people that will be listening to music I like to say and every season of your life come up with your theme song yep so your theme song will get you in the right mindset uh doing some stretching next to the bed body movement exercise some people go for early morning walk so then they already feel settled and slowed down uh meditation and or prayer uh reading something inspirational can and that can kind of create the mantra for
your day why is this matter you know because like because when somebody's like you have no idea yeah I have this abusive boss and these jerks that I work with and I can't quit and I've got bills to play don't sit here Dr Tama and tell me that I should I should freaking stretch yes go for a walk are you crazy woman yeah why does this matter I want to introduce you to the part of you that is not an employee you are more than your labor oh so if we Center our full session every
week on your boss then all you are is your boss's worker and there is a you beyond your boss wow is that true about being in a bad relationship too yeah that uh they they consume a lot of your energy and time but you were a person before you met them and whether this continues or not you're going to be a person and we want to meet that person we want to nourish that person because there is more to you than what they see and a part of what they're responding to is they see the
vastness of you and don't like it you end every therapy session and every chapter of the book the same way and you also end every episode of the homecoming podcast the same way so I would love to have you to invite you yeah to end our conversation with it beautiful I invite your soul to tell your heart mind body and spirit welcome home doctor Tama Brian you are a gift from God to all of us oh thank you so much and I want each of you who are listening to know you're worthy of the journey
home Dr Tama that is such a beautiful vision helping all of us to be the light posts along the way to get each other home if I really stop and think about it one of the reasons why always end my episodes with the same sentiment every single time is because I'm trying to help you return home to yourself that's why I always remind you that I love you and I believe in you and I believe in your ability to create a better life and find your way back home to yourself oh one more thing it's
the legal language this podcast is presented solely for educational and entertainment purposes it is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician professional coach psychotherapist or other qualified professionals [Music] thank you [Music] hey it's Mel thank you so much for being here if you enjoyed that video by God please subscribe because I don't want you to miss a thing thank you so much for being here we've got so much amazing stuff coming thank you so much for sending this stuff to your friends and your family I love you we create these videos
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