5+ Mental Health Strategies from a Professional
I'm excited to introduce you to my friend, Jasmin Blue. Jasmin is a harm reduction advocate, substance use and recovery researcher, musician, and proud native Austinite. She's a mental and community health professional in the process of obtaining her Master's Degree in Public Health.
With a deep-seated dedication to assisting vulnerable communities in improving their overall well-being, Jasmin currently works boots-on-the-ground addressing the present opioid crisis in the United States. Her vision is that her research, publications, and one-on-one interactions can edify and enhance each person's experience on this beautiful planet.
Jasmin is doing important work and today we're going to cover a variety of topics ranging from general anxiety and depression to addiction, not in the traditional sense of the word, but from a broader perspective. We can get addicted to all sorts of things: work, a person, an idea, a lifestyle. More importantly, Jasmin will share strategies that might help.
I'm thrilled to explore this with Jasmin; she's the perfect person for this conversation, and I cannot wait for you to meet her.
Please note: this is not for mental health advice or physical health advice.
MEET JASMIN BLUE, A MENTAL HEALTH PROFESSIONAL
[JT]: Why don't you tell the audience a little bit about yourself and what you've been up to these last couple of years?
[JB]: I am a researcher in the harm reduction field in Austin, Texas. I've been working closely with one project in particular that investigates the efficacy of creating sober MAT (Medication-Assisted Treatment) homes to promote long-term recovery from opioids. This study is the first of its kind to provide free housing and recovery resources and create a community of people dealing with similar issues and on similar medications for their opioid use disorder.
I'm also getting my master's degree in public health at UT Health Science Center at the School of Public Health, and I just got accepted to speak at the Texas SOPHE conference (Society of Public Health Educators), where I'll be presenting on how to connect and reach vulnerable populations, people experiencing homelessness, presently in their drug addiction, or have doubts about the health care system treating them well, or sending them back to jail, or even inpatient treatment.
So I am just busy here in the harm reduction health field in Austin, Texas. That's kind of what I'm into right now.
[JT]: OK, Jasmin, I wish we were on video because my smile is so big. I know you're incredible already, but that's amazing, especially the fact that you got invited to speak at a conference.
Now we know what you're all about from a career perspective, and I'm glad you led with that because a lot of what I wanted to talk to you about is addiction - and not only drug addiction but other things as well.
To piggyback off what you said, you're doing important work with people whose addictions look like what many of us think of when we hear the word addiction. But like I said, I'd like to explore addiction in a more broad sense, because I would say we can get addicted to anything. We can get addicted to a person, idea, work, or whatever else. So at the end of the day, addiction, to me, seems like it's over-rotating into any one specific thing to a point where it becomes unhealthy.
I wanted to speak specifically to you about this, because not only do you work with addiction, but you're also one of the most well-rounded people I know; you're doing all those things you mentioned, but you also have your music, health routine, relationship, and other businesses you support. From my perspective, you live a very balanced life.
Can you share a bit about a typical day in your life and how you make sure you're honoring all of the different parts of yourself and never over-rotating into one specific area?
HOW SHE BALANCES HER LIFE & RESPONSIBILITIES
[JB]: This is an ongoing challenge that I experience every day, and if it wasn't for just organizing the various domains in my life, I wouldn't be able to show up with a smile on my face. And I know that's a broad thing to say, but in essence, if I didn't separate everything into these buckets - my music bucket, work bucket, master's degree bucket, class bucket - I wouldn't be able to be effective or as effective in each domain without staying organized within those various buckets.
What I like to do in the morning is to wake up and go to the gym - I prioritize myself and my health first. And I know that could sound kind of selfish, but I always believed that if you wake up in the morning and the first thing that challenges you is yourself, you're kind of very privileged in that. That's kind of the best thing that you can experience. So, forgive my French, but I always say if you wake up in the morning and you kick your own ass, like in the gym for example, and you challenged yourself, nothing can beat you down for the rest of your day.
You know what I mean? You challenged yourself, you ran, you lifted heavy, whatever it was. And now nothing throughout the rest of your day is going to be as hard as that. So I like to do that.
I wake up in the morning and I work out, I come home and I shower and just kind of cleanse myself. I stretch and then I get to what I need to do for either school or work. And a lot of that is checking in with clients. So I have a caseload and I have an order of operations of what tasks need to be prioritized. And that is constantly rotating. And that's kind of what a simple day is.
And when you allow yourself a little bit of that freedom and you already know what's prioritized, you allow yourself to be adaptable within your day because the day always throws random things at you, especially the population I work with, plus running a business with my partner, all kinds of things just pop up without your ability to control them. So being adaptable within your day and making sure you already prioritized yourself in the morning - I think is my secret. There's not much organization that happens past that aside from a lot of writing, reflecting, and prioritization.
[JT]: Yeah, I love what you said. It's funny you mentioned organization because I love organization and I was just working on some stuff for my business that talks about financial organization and how organization in your finances is one of the secrets. But I think you spoke well about how organization in your life overall might be the real secret.
I also love what you said about prioritizing yourself first; I don't think that's selfish at all. I believe you can't be there for anyone else or be a good employee or partner or whatever unless you are first honoring yourself and prioritizing your needs. I like what you said about kicking your ass in the gym first thing in the morning because then nothing else will be as hard. It's a valid point and it's something I needed to hear.
MENTAL HEALTH BEST PRACTICES
Something else that I love about what you said is adaptability. I imagine it's like this in healthcare too, but in my life experiences, I think adaptability and flexibility are also huge keys to being able to not only go about your day and remain sane but also to stay happy and well-rounded.
I'd like to dig just a little bit deeper into that with you because I think organization is maybe the most important. But I think adaptability would be a very close second. So when you're going through your day and you have your plan, how do you make sure that you're paying attention to how you feel and how to be flexible and adaptable when things maybe don't go your way? Are there specific things you do to regularly check in with yourself and your feelings and dig into what you need when things don't go as planned?
[JB]: Sure. I would say: I don't care who you are or what power you feel within your mind, body, and soul - you have to write your feelings down. It helps if it's daily, but I would even challenge everyone to try this weekly. You have to write these feelings down and you have to ask yourself: am I staying true to my mission? And the kicker is: what is my mission?
So what is it in the first place? Why are you here doing these things? Is it to fulfill a role? Is it to be a good employee, or do you have a greater mission?
And that's something that everyone struggles with, but it's something that must exist within your brain so you can stay true to it. And that's my checks and balances: my mission. I understand that my main mission is to help people enhance their preexisting strength within themselves to promote overall health and well-being and maybe even beat their addiction.
You can boil that down to I just want to help people. I know that sounds very cliche, but I know that my mission is to give a little bit of myself up, a little bit of my day up, to allow people to be honest with their feelings and be honest with their availability to be vulnerable. And within that, I have to be vulnerable. So I check in with myself: Am I being vulnerable? Am I being open to this person's experience?
And a lot of that isn't even mental. It's: Am I presenting body language that makes someone feel comfortable enough to talk to me? Am I using words people can understand clearly? Do they understand me? I think so many times in the world, we're all just nodding along: "Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know what you mean," or, "Oh, yeah, I agree," or as I like to say, "I feel you." But do you really feel that person?
That boils down to your vulnerability to allow yourself patience to provide someone else that patience because if you're going to be so kind to strangers and you're going to prioritize strangers, clients, or any person that isn't you, are you showing yourself that type of vulnerability? Are you checking in with yourself? Are you being sensitive with yourself? Did you cry in the past week?
All these things encapsulate the feeling that you bring to the table every time you have a conversation with somebody, and honoring your feelings and digging into what you need has to be the first step. You have to bring that to every conversation you have with somebody because that's what makes you you.
And I think everyone wants to have a genuine conversation with somebody. They don't want to nod along. They'll forget that, but to quote Maya Angelou, "They'll never forget how you made them feel." I'm paraphrasing, but I always think about that quote. And I think that's what makes the world go round. That's the good stuff right there.
DEAL WITH MENTAL DISCOMFORT WHEN IT'S HAPPENING
[JT]: That certainly is. So it sounds like what you're doing regularly to check in with yourself is to continue to make sure that you're being vulnerable, which, in mental health and addiction work, I think is critical. But I think that's something all of us can learn from because no matter what situation we're in, we all have relationships with other people. And, to your point, how we make people feel is what is most important. And being able to show ourselves that same vulnerability and making sure that we're making ourselves feel good, I think is of the utmost importance.
Now, I'm assuming most people reading this probably wouldn't qualify as addicts in terms of substance abuse, but they might have things that they are struggling with in the broader sense of addiction. Or maybe it's that they just feel like something is off in their life. Maybe it's some other kind of mental health thing.
For example, there have been times in my life, even recently, when I've had this weird feeling of discomfort throughout the day, I just don't feel comfortable in my skin, or I'm questioning my decisions, I wonder if I'm on the right path. I just get into this negative outlook that I feel could lead to negative behaviors, whatever that looks like for me.
The point is, I can't pinpoint what's wrong, but I know I don't feel good. And many times I'm not sure how to shake that feeling. So do you have any thoughts for me or other people who might be feeling this way? What would you say to somebody who's struggling with something like that?
[JB]: Yeah, first, I'll touch on what you said about how to change that discomfort when it's happening. And then I'm going to speak a little bit more about addiction, not substance addiction, maybe behavioral.
But first, if there's one thing that doing psychedelics has taught me, it's to change your scene. Like, the minute, the minute you are tripping on something, the actual feeling of being uncomfortable, flip your environment around, get up, walk across the room, is your hair down, put that shit up in a ponytail, like change something so you don't project your discomfort onto the world around you. And then that affects your whole perception of how you're experiencing your day.
To back up, oftentimes that discomfort just arises within our bodily neural functioning, and it manifests as anxiety. And whether or not other people in the room realize you're being anxious, you do. And that's okay. So feel that. That's natural. But then do what you can to just change something around you in your environment.
And I brought up psychedelics because they're such a good example of how they can intensify your environment and how it makes things really kind of over-obvious about what's bothering you, like, "Oh, that music's so loud. " or, "Oh, it's so bright in here." But when you're in your normal day-to-day life, and especially here in America where a lot of things are muted and kind of easier for us, our survival instincts are still acting in the way that they're going to act.
And so change something. And I bought up that hair thing. I literally put my hair up in a ponytail or let it down as soon as I start to feel uncomfortable. And sometimes it works for me. And I know that sounds so weird and so trivial, but change something about your body, your position, your mind. Cross your legs. Connect the right and left sides of your brain. Uncross those legs.
Do something that just kind of connects your mind and body to what's occurring in your life around you. And change it. Just do something different. Because oftentimes you're projecting that discomfort onto other people. And to speak from personal experience, that's oftentimes the conflicts I would get in with partners or even friends.
I'd be so uncomfortable that I'd project my anger or anxiety on the situation when the situation is fine. We're at a bar, club, or gathering, and that gathering objectively is fine, but I just have my own subjective sense of being uncomfortable.
And everyone's anxiety is different, but it exists in everybody. So I think learning the little tools that you can apply to your day-to-day life to just change something and maybe enhance your feelings and how you react towards things - that's a practice we all have to try. And I say practice and I use the word in almost a medical sense. Doctors practice medicine, which means they do it every day. It's not the fact that they're experts in medicine. They practice every day.
Yoga is a practice because you have to do it every day as a way to check in with yourself and change those things and be like, "Oh, okay, well, I know I'm tired. That's what it is. Oh, shit, I'm just tired. Let me turn off my phone. Let me get away from what I'm doing."
Step away from the computer. Step away from your journal and just rest your eyes. What if that was the answer the whole time? So that's what I wanted to open with is just changing your perspective, change your scene. Just alter something.
THE OPPOSITE OF ADDICTION IS CONNECTION
And then I wanted to touch a little bit on addiction and just not even chemical addiction, which is what I work with directly, but behavioral addiction or even just dependency on a feeling or a person or a food or a task, any of those things. And I want to open it with this statement that changed my perspective on addiction when I was taking chemical dependency classes at St. Ed's in my undergrad.
I was 18 years old, very much in a problematic age where I could have formed an addiction. Luckily, I was privileged enough to be educated on the chemical occurrences that were happening in my neural network and the behavioral things that were happening outside of my environment.
So I was very aware. I was very privileged to go to college and also just carrying this awareness with me that I think took me the extra step to have a protective factor against addiction, which I was so thankful for. But that statement is: "The opposite of addiction is not sobriety; the opposite of addiction is connection." And I just always loved that. And I think it carries a lot of weight.
And I learned it in a TED Talk. But it's something I always think about. And so within that, that addiction, that crutch, that dependency only exists in your life because you're lacking a connection elsewhere.
Maybe you're lacking a connection to your family or a hobby or something that makes you feel good. That connection is what we need to emphasize and find out and write about and be curious about and not the crutch because those things will always exist. Vices, chemicals, and behaviors will always be there.
But what can you be connected to that grounds you into something that stimulates your brain and makes you feel good? And for me, that's music. For others, that's painting. Sometimes that connection, for some people, can be their work.
But I think that's the main thing we need to talk about: the opposite of addiction is not sobriety, the opposite of addiction is connection.
[JT]: Jasmin, I love talking to you. Yes. I feel like this every time we talk. I'm so happy that we're recording this so that other people can listen to this because this is helping me, and I feel like this is gold that can help other people as well.
I feel like I have so many things to say in response to what you just said. A couple of things I picked up on are, number one, when you realize that you're feeling off, whatever that looks like for you, one of the main things that needs to happen is you have to take action. It reminds me of that quote, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result." So it means you have to recognize what's happening and do something about it, take action, and make some kind of a change.
But I think if you dig even deeper into that, it's almost like first you have to be present enough to even recognize that something's wrong rather than numbing it out with social media or pills or TV or whatever that looks like in your life. So number one, presence, which takes me back to what you were talking about, maybe about journaling, writing your feelings down. Presence, then taking action, which I think is a nice way to summarize what you said.
HOW PSYCHEDELICS CAN HELP: MICRO-DOSING
Another thing I love that you brought up is psychedelics, which we can talk about from a scientific/research perspective. I would love to understand if there's research that you know about, either in the past or maybe that's currently being done where if someone feels in some way like they're struggling - again, if their life is off, or if maybe they do feel like they're coming up on like actual addiction or whatever, there's some issue and they don't know how to deal with that - could psychedelics help them? And, if so, how would they be able to go about exploring that in a way that is legal and where they wouldn't get into trouble?
[JB]: Yeah. So I'll start by saying I'm open to talking about my own psychedelic experience. I will say that there are two different types of basically "treatment" you can utilize psychedelics for. It's kind of like there's a short-term treatment, where you just kind of dose yourself and, hopefully, you have this beautiful occurrence of feelings and perspectives that is life-changing and teaches you the habits and words and experiences that maybe you need to change.
And then there's like a long-term where you can micro-dose, and I'm sure people have heard of this term, where you can micro-dose psychedelics and you kind of change the chemical and structural, functional aspects of your brain. And this has to be done at a therapeutic dose for a micro-dose. But this is just a small dose that you can take every day or every other day, whatever is advised.
There's a lot of research going on right now that I can dig into, but this dose that you take every day is effectively altering the neuroplasticity of your brain to change and connect formations of neuron communication that wouldn't have been there without the psychedelics that are presented. And just to put that into layman's terms, essentially psychedelic-assisted therapy helps connect things in your brain that could have had a block in it.
So maybe there's a survival or a functional reason why you aren't connecting these two things to save your brain and your brain created that block. And sometimes this is trauma and sometimes this is perspective-bending material that deserves more attention. However, that's why there's kind of a short-term and a long-term way to utilize psychedelics. And I'm a huge advocate for psychedelic-assisted therapy, CBD cannabis, all of it. Ketamine is arising. I know not as much about ketamine as the mushrooms.
But for millennia, these things have existed to help humans connect these ideas in their brains because the brain is a very smart thing. And the brain will fool itself into having these feelings and those functionalities to make you go and live and survive. But that's not what life is about. Life isn't about surviving. Life is about feeling and life is about reflecting and enjoying the present moment.
And a lot of the time people's depression or their anxiety prevents them from feeling in the moment. And so they're like, "What is life?" And I get that question so many times, especially from my clients. And so that's why psychedelics can be utilized to introduce these things to people.
However, then we have to differentiate dependency. I think we've all met a kid in college who did too much acid and that guy wasn't truly connecting to anything, right? He was just going out and listening to live music, which is fun, but unsustainable. He wasn't doing it to make himself better.
HOW PSYCHEDELICS CAN HELP: MACRO-DOSING
But I guess that's my little spiel on the short-term and the long-term. So I emphasized the long-term, and I want to talk about the short-term when one doses themselves with a psychedelic that maybe was strong enough to change their perspective about X, Y, or Z. And I feel like everyone kind of has a story like this, but my favorite is when people utilize psychedelics and then they come out of it and they're like, "I don't ever want to have a cigarette again," or they come out of it and say, "I will never need a drink of alcohol ever again."
And those stories are beautiful, but it just kind of teaches you that, oh, okay, there is a way to introduce these things into your brain, either synthetic or naturally occurring from nature that assist you into basically getting out of survival mode and into life mode and into enjoying and into being present. So I can go on tangents with psychedelics - there are so many things to talk about - but there's a fine line too. As an addiction counselor, I can be an advocate, but I'm also like: "Be safe out there!"
[JT]: Right, right. Well, yeah. And what is tricky is, for anyone who's psychedelic curious, it's difficult because of the law surrounding it. So yeah, it's almost like, depending on your state and where you live, you would have to go into some form of therapy to do it legally.
But I just wanted to explore this with you specifically because of the field that you're in and the research you do. And since you brought up psychedelics, I wanted to share whatever you were willing to because, from my own experience, they've been a powerful tool, speaking as someone who's never been a natural at connecting to my feelings or making time to be present.
I have a habit of getting addicted to my work. So using psychedelics helped me get much more in tune with who I am, what I want, what I need to prioritize, and what's important, and honestly, they changed my life. And it's not like I'm doing this all the time or anything like that. But yeah, in my experience with setting an intention and using these as a way to learn something, I found them to be very powerful. So I was interested in hearing your opinion as well.
[JB]: Yes, placing an intention. I think that's probably one of the deciding factors of things going into a dependency versus being recreational. Like: I intend to use the substance responsibly and maybe not leave my house and maybe write a little bit and paint a little bit in my room. That is intentional. And I like that you put that piece in there. That's so helpful to mention. That's certainly a defining line.
3 STEPS TO HELP WITH FINANCIAL ANXIETY
[JT]: Something else I've noticed in working with different people is that money can cause stress, anxiety, depression, and various mental health issues.
What would you say to somebody who struggles with stress, anxiety, or depression over finances? How would you advise somebody who's struggling with mental health issues tied to money?
[JB]: I'll start by saying I am a child of a single mother who made probably less than $30K while child-rearing, right? Like my mom, she was a hustler and it was awesome to watch her with her work ethic, but she was not bringing home a lot.
And I was always very over-aware of how we were struggling with money, basically my whole childhood, which made me get my first job at 14. I was always very aware that we didn't have it like other people, and that's cool. And I think more people are experiencing that. I think that's just the nature of our capitalistic society here in America that some people are going to be at the bottom inherently and children will be raised down there.
And so within that, I've had to address some anxieties that I already had around money that weren't even my own choice. These things were kind of put into me by my mom and my experience growing up being broke.
STEP 1: KNOW YOU'RE WORTH BEING PAID
Step 1: know that you are worth getting paid. You are valuable and worth a lot as a human who tries and shows up. I'm saying: name your price. Know that you carry a lot in the conversation and to whatever business or corporation you may work for. Know your worth. When I grew up broke, I didn't know I was worth a lot.
My current partner is great with money - I was not. I've just been good at going to school, being empathetic with people, and making music. And my partner has been so wonderful with kind of framing my mind around a few things. He's the one who helped me find my value and worth. So step one, realize that you are more than an employee and you are worth getting paid.
STEP 2: MAKE A PLAN AND USE YOUR SUPPORT SYSTEM
Step 2: Be as open as you can with your partner, your support system, and your parents about money. I love my mom to death, but we were stressed about money. There was no plan of action, saving for a vacation, or long-term decision-making. So make that long-term. Put out a plan. Even if you're broke, make the one-year plan. How am I going to get un-broke? Five-year plan. How am I going to get not as broke? How am I going to change this?
And that takes a lot, especially if you're in that stress or in that depression; you carry that anxiety. You struggle naturally - literally chemically - to look in front of you and create a plan. So understand that. Understand that you're being affected by your anxiety and depression, and start to take steps to unravel it.
And that starts with being mindful and present in your current situation. So write down what things look like right now, then look at that piece of paper, literally crumple it up and throw it away, and then write down what you want things to look like.
These can be crazy things. Go big or go home. This is Texas. This is America. This is a capitalistic culture. So how are you going to change your situation? Big strides must be made or small micro-behaviors because, if you do enough micro-behaviors, you're changing some big things.
STEP 3: MAKE THAT MONEY (HARD WORK BEATS TALENT)
Step 3: Go make that money. Get the confidence you need and apply yourself because there's someone out there that's above you and they're going to see that you're hustling. They're going to see that you're making that effort.
And trust me: Hard work beats talent. You will always get picked for a position or promotion if you show up 10 minutes early, leave when you're supposed to, and reply to emails as soon as you receive them - whatever it looks like in your field, as long as you're over there working hard, they're going to want to pay you more.
Especially in this environment right now, I think we're seeing a lot of people who are feeling residual effects from COVID when we all just stayed home and didn't do anything. Don't be that person anymore. Lockdown isn't a thing anymore. We're out of quarantine. Let's go and create our path. Let's go and manifest what we want in this world because if you're privileged enough to be in a country that allows you the mobility to move up, take advantage of that.
And reach out to your support system. If you need to ask somebody for coffee money or a ride, and they maybe can't provide that for you, maybe they're not your support system and that's okay. Life is long and there are so many people in the world. But you don't have to do this alone. When I lived with my mom, we were only able to get to where we were because she was open and vulnerable and had a beautiful support system. So utilize these people around you. You're not alone.
Those are my pieces to destroy depression and anxiety surrounding money because, as a person who has experienced that - it gets better.
JASMIN'S FINANCIAL PLANS
I would be remiss if I didn't mention some of our plans. My partner and I have a few Bitcoin, and we are planning on acquiring more. Another goal is to have 100 stocks of Tesla and we're about halfway there. We also like to keep Solana and other crypto.
And I like to have information to know what these things are, so it takes time to research. If social media is going to exist, let that thing work for you. Research what people are saying about these things on social media. Research the market. Get familiar. If you're scared about investing, maybe follow the Goodbye July podcast more closely.
Those are some things we do with our partnership around money that make us more confident in the things we do for our long-term goals, which I'm sure everyone's long-term goal is to travel and see the world and be comfortable one day. So write that down and see what micro-behaviors you can change to work toward that because I truly do feel like it's possible for everyone.
If it's possible for a little girl and her mom who grew up in a tiny apartment here in Austin, Texas, it's possible for anyone. Use that privilege to be able to move around in society, and use that beautiful mind of yours to check your brain and say, "Hey, sure I'm broke right now, but I don't have to be broke forever."
WHAT'S NEXT FOR JASMIN
[JT]: I noticed a lot of similar themes to what we talked about earlier: It seems like some self-reflection is necessary. And I love what you said about just knowing your worth outside of money and separating yourself from that.
Another big theme I saw is to TAKE ACTION, whether that's deciding you're not going to be broke anymore, you're going to go for the promotion, or using your support network - and the vulnerability that comes with those things. But again, presence and action seem to be two big themes that are coming up for all of the different issues that we discussed today. Thank you for sharing some information about your finances, your vulnerability, and some of your story and the things you've gone through.
You're so well-rounded, you have so many interests, and you're good at managing all of it. I'd love to know what's next for you, and if people want to follow along with your journey, where can they find you?
[JB]: I'm going to publish a few papers and present more on the projects I've been working on here in Austin, with the housing specifically, and for those in recovery from opioids. So look out for some of those publications I'm working on.
I've been compiling things for my presentation. I'm going to secure this master's degree and then work on getting a certification to do therapy. I'm looking into doing couples therapy, but not husband and wife; I'm looking into mother/daughter, father/son, or maybe even business relation therapy. So maybe there are partners in a brokerage firm that have been working together for 30 years that need a little bit more connection - something like that. I'm also leaning into what can I do with AI therapy and VR and how I can be in a room with somebody without being in the room.
I'm leaving my mind open to what therapy will look like in 20 years - and even what being empathetic for someone's situation will look like, and especially how that revolves around behavioral and chemical addictions. How can I be so accessible to people that they can utilize me from a different country? That's kind of trippy, but hey, we have to think that far out.
THE BIG PICTURE
And what would I leave for listeners? I would say to find your connection. Find your tribe. Find a partner who wants to hustle with you. Find your own healthy outlook on the world that enhances your preexisting strengths because you have them. You do have them. It's not because you don't have them.
It's because you're not connected to utilizing them. So find that connection and use your support system. Create your support system if it's not there. And just know that sometimes you're all you need. So reflect, be present, and make that action plan.
Thank you so much for having me on this podcast, Jess. It was really fun. When you asked me to come on the show, I was like, "Oh, of course! I can't wait!" because not only am I a fan of this podcast, but I'm also a fan of how you enhance women and people around you who need financial literacy. I'm very much in adoration for what you do for people because I'm one of the people you help.
I still have money in Ellevest and I still use some of the spreadsheets you have provided me. And I think you have a lot to teach people. And we shouldn't be afraid of money - we should be able to enhance our preexisting strengths because we have them. And I think you help people do that with money. And that's amazing.
[JT]: Thank you for saying that. Isn't it interesting how, whether it's money or anything in our life, it's so easy to get caught up on all of the things that we do wrong? It's so easy to focus on all those things that are not going right. But there are all these things that ARE going right where we can focus, instead.
And if you work on enhancing your strength and what's already working, I think you're going to make way more progress than you would by sitting there focusing on what's not going well. So I love that. And I appreciate the compliment. I'm so glad you were able to join.
NEXT STEPS
If you want to follow Jasmin's journey, you can find her past and future publications on Google Scholar, her music on Spotify or Instagram, and her everyday life on her personal Instagram. Here is the TED Talk she referenced about connection.
If you're struggling with mental health, know this: you are not alone. But no one can help you until you take some kind of action. So write your feelings down, change something up in your life, and certainly don't be afraid to reach out to a professional. Speaking from experience, going to a therapist was one of the best decisions of my life.
And if you're struggling with depression or anxiety over money, I'll echo Jasmin: make a plan to change that. A great place to start is by investing in yourself. I've made a free resource that gives you 5 ideas on how to do so: 5 Ways to Invest in Yourself.
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