In this episode, I dive into the complexities of creativity for trauma survivors. In this episode, I answer a question from a listener who is a religious cult trauma survivor and wants to be a film writer / director, but is struggling with putting too much pressure on themselves to tell their story the “right” way.I share personal insights and advice on embracing the messy, emotional journey of creativity. I talk about the importance of releasing pressure and perfectionism, embracing the anger, processing difficult feelings such as shame and guilt, and leveraging creativity as a healing tool.

Timestamps

• Introduction: 0:15
• Listener Question: 2:06
• Outro: 28:58

For episode show notes, please visit: https://www.newviewadvice.com/109

For more free resources and to learn more about New View Advice, visit: https://www.newviewadvice.com/

I am no longer accepting new questions for the podcast, but if you’d like to reach out, you can still email me at newviewadvice@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you!

Thank you for listening and for your support throughout this journey!

Sending you so much love!

Welcome to New View Advice. I'm your host, Amanda Durocher, and I invite you to

join me here each week as I offer advice on how to move through whatever

problem or trauma is holding you back from living life to the fullest. Let's get

started. Hey,

beautiful soul. My name is Amanda Durocher, and welcome to Nuvia Advice.

If you're new here, this is a healing centered advice podcast where I offer guidance

for the healing journey. I don't believe I have all the answers you seek. I

believe you just may need a new view and a little help along the way.

Thank you so much for joining me for today's episode. Today, we are talking about

creativity as a trauma survivor. So in this episode, I answer a question from a

listener who is a religious cult trauma survivor and wants to be a film writer

slash director, but is struggling with putting too much pressure on themselves to tell

their story the quote, unquote right way. I love this question because I think

many people who experience trauma wanna tell their stories in artistic form

but find this challenging for many reasons, including putting too much pressure on

ourselves and also finding that they are processing really

difficult feelings such as shame and guilt and this can impact creativity.

And I'll be talking a lot about my own experience with creativity as a trauma

survivor and what I've learned throughout my journey of creating, especially

creating about my trauma because I just find that not all the advice on the

Internet such as just sit down for 15 minutes a day works for me as

a trauma survivor. So my intention for this episode is to help you to take

the pressure off yourself, lean into the messiness of creativity,

begin creating, and to know that the story in your heart is the

story you are meant to tell in whatever format and in whatever

way that ends up being. But if your heart is asking you to tell a

story, then I believe you are meant to tell that story. So I'm excited to

dive into today's episode. Before we jump in, I just wanted to mention that if

you haven't checked out my website, I invite you to check it out after this

episode for more free resources. I have different healing

hubs. I have poems. I have more podcast episodes and

journal prompts and more. So I invite you to check that out at newviewadvice.com.

And today's episode show notes will be at newviewadvice.com/109.

So with that, let's jump on into talking about creativity.

Dear Amanda, I'm writing in because I have a long standing struggle as an artist

and a human, which I'm hoping you'll relate to and about which you'll be able

to advise. I'm a survivor of religious trauma and narcissistic

abuse due to being born into a religious cult and brought up by narcissistic

parents. I'm estranged from 1 and distant from the other. Over the

decades, I've been on a self help journey which has given me the tools to

understand what I experienced, why it's affecting me now as a 40 year

old despite having left both the cult and the toxic family home as a

teenager of 17. I work in a profession that pays the bills,

but I have long desired to pursue filmmaking as a writer director.

I know that I want to write the things that resonate most with my experience

but feel completely stuck as a result. I feel steeped in shame about

what I went through, guilt that I didn't leave sooner, that I was in some

way complicit in my own entrapment within these toxic systems.

I'm still working my way through the grief process, so I'm aware that I'm probably

not ready to write directly about my experience in a way that is healthy and

collaborative for the viewer slash reader. Yet I don't feel compelled to do

storytelling about frivolous things just to be in the business.

I feel like I'm still so angry about what happened and still feel a certain

lack of agency in my life, an inability to give myself permission to

live and create meaning. I was so strongly conditioned to give my

agency over to a higher authority that it feels terrifying to attempt to

claim that right in a meaningful and intentional way. I guess I assume

that expressing it through art is one way of doing it, but sense that I'm

perhaps making the wrong assumptions. I sense that I'm putting so much pressure

on myself to heal and immediately become a successful filmmaker, probably

because of my perfectionist tendencies. Yet I haven't been able to find

someone who quite gets what it's like living in this weird place of contradiction

between self denial and an unquenchable desire to connect with that self

authentically? How can I find a way to reconcile my need to express

myself artistically in a way that's authentic and collaborative rather than

about getting all preachy and angry towards my audience? Thank you so much for

this question. This is a great question. And I want to say this was a

really well written question, so I just want to call out here that you definitely

are a good writer. I love this question. I can completely relate to your

question. And the more I read your question, the more I was like, I think

I'm actually going through this right now. And I had to be like, wow. I'm

gonna give myself some advice here too. So thank you so much for writing this

question. First, I just wanna say I am so sorry for

what you've experienced in your past, and I wanna honor where you're at in

your journey. You've clearly done a lot of inner work,

and I hope you are continuing to be kind and compassionate with yourself as you

continue to heal. Sounds like you've been through a lot, and I

just wanna honor that. It takes time and patience to heal

from childhood wounds and it sounds like you grew up in a

toxic childhood environment. And that's gonna take time and I'm just

grateful that you're taking the time. And I wanted to call out here that you

were in no way complicit in your own entrapment and the abusive

situations you found yourself in. I was struck by the guilt

you felt for not leaving sooner and feeling complicit. I

think it's so interesting how hard it is for us to let go

of things that happened in our childhood because I know you know this,

and I know that me saying this isn't going to erase your pain.

But 17 is a child. You were a child when you left. I

think it's incredibly brave that you left. I think it shows your strength that you

were able to leave at 17. I experienced a lot of

abuse in my youth and a lot of trauma, and I did

not begin looking at it until my twenties. I did not leave a lot of

these situations. I actually got involved in more toxic and abusive situations. And I

don't know where your path has led you, but I just really want to assure

you that it's not your fault. I am so sorry that you

believe it's your fault. I know that's part of narcissism and that's part of that

cult like structure is the mind games and the

brainwashing is what I call it. I also experienced narcissistic abuse and I

spent the summer healing from a lot of the beliefs I took on from

living in a household with someone with narcissistic traits. And what

I'm struck by is how much it's like being brainwashed and

how coming out of that brainwashing takes time,

energy, compassion, a lot of tears and it's hard

work. So I just put that here because I just want you to

know that none of this was your fault. And it's so interesting because

I read your question and I'm so clearly like oh my god none of this

was your fault. Please be kind to yourself. Please be kind to your 17 year

old self who still resides in you. Please be kind to all the younger yous.

But it's so much harder to be kind to ourselves than it is to others.

And I just wanted to take a moment to really say that none of this

is your fault, and I'm so sorry you grew up in such a abusive environment.

And I also wanted to say that I think you're so brave. I think it's

incredible that you were able to leave that environment at 17.

And I've been thinking a lot about the word bravery, and I just wanted to

talk a bit about it here because people listening are trauma survivors.

And I think trauma survivors are called brave all the time, and I think we

are brave. But what I've really been thinking about bravery recently because

I've been working with a trauma specialist who will call me brave all the time.

And I'm always like, yeah. Yeah. Okay. It's so hard.

I'm like, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm brave, but, like, really, like, I'm a coward. And

she's like, no. You're brave. And I'm like, no. No. No. I'm a coward. Let's

move on. But, you know, she calls me brave every week, so it's made me

think about being brave. And what I've realized about bravery

is that we don't feel brave in the moment. We often feel a lot

of fear, a lot of terror. And so you are

brave, and I think it's beautiful that you've created a beautiful life for yourself and

continue to give yourself the love and attention you deserve despite what you've

been through. You know? That to me is brave. It is brave when trauma

survivors take their power back. It is brave even though it can

feel really terrifying. And I wanted to begin this episode by talking

about bravery because I think it's really brave that you want to

create and write about your experience. I think it's really

brave that you wanna pursue writing and directing. I think it's

really brave that you wanna write a story that's connected to your heart and to

your authentic expression. And so I say this because

throughout your question, it sounds like there's a lot of fear coming up,

which is leaving you stuck. But I wanna remind you here at the

beginning that you are brave and that it's brave that you wanna do this and

you are courageous and that you will write the story that's in your

heart. It just may take a little bit longer than your

mind wants it to take. So the first thing I wanna talk about, which I

think is the most important thing, is that you need to take the

pressure off yourself. I think you've put a lot of expectations

on what this story means, and it is blocking you

from just writing the story that wants to be written.

So I really feel like you need to give yourself permission to write

for you and to just write this first draft as it

needs to be written. It's okay if it comes out angry. It's okay if

it comes out sad. It's okay if it comes out preachy. It's a first

draft. It's okay no matter what it comes out as. But I think you

really need to give yourself permission to just write from where you

are. Because what I find is that writing changes. It

evolves. Story evolves as we write it. It's why I like it. It's why I

find it so enjoyable. And in your question, you mentioned that you

struggle to give yourself permission to live and to create. And I think this is

an example of that. By having so much pressure and expectations on

this story, you're stopping yourself from creating. So I think

you need to take a deep breath and give yourself permission to write

whatever you want. And I think perfectionism is a way we keep

ourselves from creating. Creating is a messy process. It's never

perfect. Every single thing I create, I think, could be better

or could have more information or

could have been done differently. There has never been an episode of

newbie advice that I have recorded that I haven't listened back and said, shoot.

I should have said x as well. But I continue to just

show up and hope that the episodes resonate and that what I say on the

episodes is what I needed to say. But the truth is I never feel like

any of these episodes are perfect. I never feel like any of my writing is

perfect. I have a bunch of poems on my website. I go back and I

fiddle with them all the time. I don't think anything's ever

perfect, and I think that's part of creativity. And maybe that's part of my

own perfectionism as well that nothing's ever perfect. But part of

creativity is finding ways to move past your own

perfectionism, you know, and allowing yourself to show up. And I think part of

perfectionism is a fear of being vulnerable and creativity is very

vulnerable. It comes from you. And we live in a world where people love to

criticize creativity, and that's okay. It's part of the

world we live in. But it can be really hard, especially as a trauma survivor

who grew up with a lot of criticism in their youth. I know for me,

being a survivor of trauma, but also growing up in a critical household, growing up

with teachers that were critical, I still really struggle with criticism.

And it's been a practice for me to learn how to not allow

that criticism to stop me from creating. But honestly, it's more the

fear of criticism stops me from creating than actual criticism.

Sometimes people will leave mean comments on my podcast. That's fine. Sometimes they

knock me down. Usually though, what knocks me down first is my

fear of what people will say, not actually what people say.

And that has been a kind of like an inner monster that I've

had to learn how to dance with. Vulnerability can be scary especially when we grew

up in abusive environments because oftentimes that vulnerability is what

was punished. So I just ask you to be kind to yourself throughout

this process and patient and notice what your triggers are. Like,

where are you stuck? Why are you stuck? I know you mentioned the pressure and

the perfectionism, but what are the thoughts arising? Is it that this needs to be

perfect? Is it that this is your ticket out of your life? Is it that

you fear repercussions from the

people who you grew up with in your youth? I know I've struggled with that.

I talk a lot about what happened to me in my teen years. I used

to really be afraid that the people who raped me would, like, come after me.

And now I'm like, they'd have to admit they raped me to come after me.

They're not gonna say anything. And if they do, we'll figure

that out. But, you know, a lot of fears can arise.

So when you feel stuck, I find writer's block for me is really

about looking at the fears that are arising, the self doubt and this negative self

talk more so than just pushing myself to

sit down and be disciplined. I think that is part of it. Part of being

a creative is being disciplined with your talent. Half the

battle is putting time aside. But I also think as a trauma survivor that that

negative self talk and those criticisms from your youth and the pain and

the trauma can be debilitating. And so sometimes

for that 15 minutes you were gonna write, it's looking at why you're not writing

and it's looking at the fear that's arising and it's doing the inner child work

and it's being with yourself and allowing it to be okay

that you're not productive that day. And that's what I found personally. Last

week, I uploaded an episode that I had recorded a while ago. I had planned

on recording a new episode, but I was knocked down last Monday. I record on

Mondays. And I was knocked down by a few

things that happened, and I just really was in a place of, like, life is

unfair. I was just processing the fact that I experienced trauma, and

I was just grieving the life I could have had, which I know that's not

how it works. I'm a believer that we're life's a journey. It's not

about the destination. But I still had a lot of feelings

about how unfair life felt, how it felt like at 32,

I'm beginning a bunch of new things. I'm beginning piano

and singing and a few different artistic hobbies. And

I just had this moment where it was like, if I hadn't been gang raped,

where would I be? I just had to allow myself that.

But then I had to pick myself back up. And I had to be

like, okay, you had all your feelings but this is where you are, Amanda. You

have to accept where you are and what do you want with your life

from here? You get to choose moving forward. Right? So that's that agency you're

talking about. And I love that you brought up agency because you do get to

choose from here on out what you get your life to be and what your

life looks like and you get to be intentional with it. And you are

brave because a bunch of fears are gonna be triggered. I view it as those

negative beliefs are programmed into our brain. Our brain is like a computer

and if we took on negative beliefs as a child we have to

unprogram them. We have to go into that supercomputer in our brain and

we have to find the belief and we have to take it out and put

in a new one And that takes a lot of time, energy, and feelings.

As I mentioned, stories evolve as you write them, so allow yourself to just

write what wants to be written right now. And as a writer,

you have to tell the story your heart wants to tell because it's gonna lead

you either to the next story or to a healing, but our hearts have the

story it wants us to tell. I once had a writing teacher say that we

write because we're looking for the answer to a question. And I love that because

that's been true for me in my life is that oftentimes the stories I write,

I haven't always even been conscious of the question I'm asking, but it's

like, oh, my mind was trying to figure something out. It can

be about people's indifference or about emotions and grief

or trying to figure out something about your childhood and seeing that something really

wasn't your fault or seeing maybe where someone else was coming from. But

what I love about creativity is that creativity is often a gift.

Right? And it's a gift that you get to have first and then you get

the choice if you wanna share that gift with the world. Most stories I have

written live in my desk drawer, so they have just been gifts for me. But

each story has given me a gift. And though those stories

live in a drawer, each of them gave me a gift and helped me come

to the next story. And it's one of the frustrating things about being a creative

is I feel like the outside world would tell you, you have to produce things

that sell. And this creative, me, and a lot of

creatives I know, they write more than ever is sold. You know what

I mean? It's really that you write or you

podcast or you draw, and maybe some of that

gets put out in the world. But it's really this inner process, if that makes

sense, and it's a gift for you first. Another thing I wanted to mention is

that creativity is an amazing tool for healing. I talk about it all the time.

And so when you write that angry draft for whatever is authentic to you, but

when you just start allowing yourself to write, you will begin

moving energy and moving feelings. And you might find that you

write the first act of this movie and it's super angry, and

you get out so much of that anger that you're already ready to go back

and write a new draft. Or you just write an angry outline, and then you're

ready to reevaluate that outline. You have to just start moving this energy.

You know, that's what it sounds like you have. The pressure you're putting on yourself

and this stuckness is like this big weight you're carrying, and you just

have to start chipping away at that weight. And then it'll be

like a river is the visual I'm getting. Right? So there's this big

boulder, and this river is gonna come at that boulder. And eventually, it's

just gonna push the boulder off, and the creativity is just gonna start

flowing. But you have to stop judging it ahead of time. You're like,

how do I not write this angry, preachy draft? It's like write that angry, preachy

draft first and see if it's that angry and preachy. An example from my

life is that I've been working on a memoir. It feels like the bane of

my existence. I try to put this memoir on the shelf over and over

again because part of me does not want to write this story and then my

heart's like we are writing this story. But I wrote a draft of it in

the spring called my Villain Origin Story. So I tell this because

that was my angry draft. It was me embodying the villain

because many trauma survivors, when they try to talk about their

trauma, end up feeling like a villain. They end up feeling like the bad guy

because they're calling people on bad behavior. They're saying things people don't wanna hear.

And a lot of times, people will victim blame and things like that. And

so I wrote this draft of my memoir. It wasn't even a complete draft, to

be completely honest. It was just a bunch of chapters. And I wrote them

from this angry, villainous perspective. And then I froze. And

I didn't do anything with it and I kept judging myself like this is what

you wanted, why aren't you doing anything with this? And what I realized was those

drafts needed to be written. I needed to move that anger.

But once I moved that anger, I was able to see some relationships clearer,

situations clearer, and I had some more healing to do. But after

I came to terms with some things and some people in my life, I

realized I didn't want to be the villain. I don't want to be the villain.

I don't see myself as a villain. I'm just a human. I'm a trauma

survivor. I actually think I'm a good person on most days. I can still

judge myself. But I needed to write that angry

draft. I needed to embody the villain. Because

one, not everything I wrote needs to be thrown in the trash. I'm

actually gonna share on Friday. I'm gonna start doing, like, story time Fridays or Friday

shares. You will find out Friday what I'm calling it, where I share short stories

that I've written. And one of them is from this villain

memoir. I'm going to share it Friday as an example of angry

writing that I don't think is preachy.

I was angry when I wrote it and it's about anger, but

it's a realistic look at my life as a trauma

survivor. When I was reading your question, I was also reminded of the

movie Promising Young Women. I don't know if you've seen it. It was written and

directed by Emerald Fennel. And, I share this with you because, to

me, that movie's an angry movie. It's a revenge

movie. It's not a happy go lucky movie. I wouldn't call it frivolous.

She probably wrote it from an angry place. And that's what makes it powerful,

impactful, and memorable. So I invite you to give yourself

permission to write your angry draft. My guess is

that you probably judge your anger. I'm not sure

this is true, but I know for a long time I used to judge my

anger. Anger moves energy and

anger shows us where our boundaries have been lacking and shows

us where we are not loving ourselves. Anger is a communicator

and it's so uncomfortable and then we can't ignore it. So I

invite you to lean into your anger. Like I said, write that angry

draft. It's okay to be angry about what you experienced.

You know, I find a lot of times anger is trying to show us, like,

look here. Look at this situation. This is a situation where

you created a belief about yourself that is not true. And

so I just invite you to lean into the anger

and to take the pressure off and to release all expectations

around what you think this story needs to be. I find creativity has a

life of its own. I view creative projects like children in a way.

They come from us and they're going to have their own

life. And we want to control it. Like so many people wanna control their children.

But the truth is, these creations come to us. I believe

from a higher power. You can believe from your heart, from yourself, from your brain,

whatever you believe in. I believe it comes from the divine. And the divine gives

us this gift. And it's got a life of its

own and we get to go along for the ride with it. And we create

the boundaries for it. Right? The disciplined space for that gift to

come into the world. But we're birthing that gift.

It's not about controlling that gift. Okay, so now that we've

talked about taking the pressure off and allowing yourself to write that angry draft, allowing

yourself to write whatever your heart wants, right? You might sit down and it might

end up being a sad draft, too. So just allow yourself to begin

working on this project. I really think you just need to give yourself permission from

what it sounds like and permission to not be perfect. As I've mentioned, creativity is

a messy process. It's never perfect on the first

draft. We just have to start getting words on the page and then

the flow will start. You know what I mean? Some things you might not ever

have to edit in your final draft and other things will be rewritten 7 times.

It's just part of the process. It's a messy process. You know you have to

allow yourself to get your hands dirty and that's okay. Okay

so now that we've talked about why you should take the pressure off yourself I

wanna talk about how it still may be hard to create and I think this

does with all the hard feelings you've talked about. You mentioned feeling

shame, guilt, anger and grief. You know, that's a lot of

difficult feelings. And I think creativity can really help us process our

hard feelings, but these hard feelings can also cause us to freeze or

to go into different stress responses, right, like fight or flight, especially the

shame and guilt, And that can keep us from doing the things we wanna

do. You know, you mentioned self denial. And that is something I have

struggled with throughout my life as well is that I really have had

to work on not denying myself the things I want to do

most, if that makes sense. You know, I find that

when I don't allow myself to be creative, sometimes it's because the

universe is asking me to wait. But many times it's a form

of self punishment or it's because creativity

can be triggering so I ignore it. Right? Like writing my

memoir. It feels so hard because it can trigger me so I often

avoid it because I don't wanna be triggered. But the truth is when I sit

down and write it, I feel empowered and it helps me in so

many ways and it's a story I really want to tell. It's a story only

I can tell. Right? And this movie you wanna write is only a story you

can tell. And with all that, it's also understanding that

it's okay if there are days where these hard feelings you

expressed keep you from creating. I have found that

creativity is much harder when we are hard on ourselves, and I find

my creativity flourishes when I'm kind to myself. And it's blocked when I beat

myself up. And shame and guilt can really create negative self talk.

So I want you to begin noticing this. You know? What stories are you telling

yourself about writing, directing, about telling your

story? What beliefs are coming up? What thoughts are playing on repeat? You know? Really

become aware. And I find when it comes to telling stories about

our past, especially as trauma survivors, guilt so often comes up

because we feel guilty portraying people a certain way. It sounds like you might be

writing a fictionalized story, but I've taken memoir writing classes

and everybody experiences the guilt of talking about

people in their life. Part of the writing is processing the guilt

and letting go of the guilt and knowing that you deserve to tell your story.

You deserve to have your point of view and you do not have to be

afraid. For me in my life, by doing this podcast

and writing my memoir and writing short stories about my life, I am humbled

time and time again about how much I fear telling my story, how much I

fear what other people think, what other people say. So many fears come

up, but it's also been so healing because creativity triggers us,

but it also triggers us to heal. Right? So many things that I

have healed and looked at and processed, I never would have looked at if I

never started this podcast. I never would have looked at it if I didn't write

my memoir. It is almost like creativity is bringing us towards

our greatest expansion, you know, the fullest version of ourselves, the

version of ourselves we dream of being. And so I find with healing,

sometimes we're triggered along the way because we have to look at certain things that

are keeping us from being the version of ourselves we dream of or the version

of ourselves that feels really alive. So, again,

it's just allowing the balance of

writing, taking the pressure off, and allowing days where

you may just have to process some feelings because you have been through a lot

and that is okay. I've always dreamed of being a creative who hadn't been

through anything because then I could just create all the time. But the truth is

I wouldn't have anything to say. All my creativity comes from my trauma. That's

just who I am. That's where my voice comes from. That's where the messages I

wanna share come from. They come from what I've survived. They've come from my

healing. And the last thing I want to touch on before I wrap up this

question is how you that it feels terrifying to claim agency over your own

life. 1, I wanna say that you're doing this every single day. Every day you

choose to heal, you choose to show up intentionally, you choose to align with your

heart, you are taking agency over your own life. You know, you

deserve to live an intentional life which you already are. And I

wanna shift your perspective a bit and point out that no matter what you do

or don't do, your life already has meaning. Every second your life has

meaning. It matters. The fact that you breathe every day is a miracle. So I

invite you to spend time acknowledging the present and being grateful for what you have

today even if it's just the shirt on your back and the breath in your

lungs because I am a fellow trauma survivor. And the more I heal, the more

I'm like, holy shit. It's such a miracle that I'm still here. It's such a

miracle that I'm not a horrible person. I'm a good person. It's such a

miracle where I have ended up. And, again, last week, I had feelings about

how unfair it is about where I ended up. So this is a endless cycle

I feel like I'm in where I'm just evolving over time. So please be kind

to me. I might contradict myself sometimes on the podcast and that's just part of

the healing journey. So thank you for being here. But I just wanted to point

out the miracle thing because I think you're putting so much pressure on this story

and that's because you're putting a lot of pressure on the future. And the more

present you become and the more you appreciate the present moment, I know it sounds

hippie dippie, but the more you appreciate the present moment, the more you don't need

to be anywhere else. The more that you are just grateful to be right

here, right now. The more that you allow

the mysteries of life to work through you. And that's what

creativity is. It's a mystery. That's how I view it. Maybe somebody out

there has cracked it, the code of creativity, but I think it's a mystery

because it always brings me a gift, it always heals me in some way,

it always evolves me, and it's always so much freaking fun when

I just let go. So with the agency over your life, I

mentioned that letting go piece because I think that with perfectionism

there's a piece of control. We're trying to control the outcome.

And as I think I've mentioned a few times throughout this episode is that with

creativity it's really a process of letting go. It's a process of

surrendering. It's a process of not being in

control. You can write an outline for your story, but so often

it's still going to take on a life of its own. So I

mentioned that letting go because I think that can be one of the fears we

have around creativity is letting go, is sitting down for that 15 minutes.

Because as I mentioned I avoid it because sometimes it triggers me. But in order

for me to be honest with my creativity and allow

creativity to come through me, I have to let go. And sometimes it does trigger

me. Sometimes it brings up hard feelings. Sometimes it feels fantastic. Not

every day. And a lot of days, it's just the act of sitting down even

when I don't want to. I think this fear of taking agency over your

life is also a fear of letting go, allowing

yourself to let go of some of this control you might be clinging

onto. You know, as trauma survivors, it is very hard to let

go of control. I have to do that over and over again in my life.

I think that that's an endless process, letting go of control, understanding life is

outside of our control, understanding that things are not what we expect. So many

times expectations are the thief of joy. Expectations lead to

disappointment. Expectations lead to depression. And so how do we

let go of expectations? We come back to the present moment. How do we let

go of pressure? We come back to the present moment. We let go.

It's learning to ride the wave of life, and that happens one step

at a time and I wonder if your first step is allowing yourself to get

a little messy and start writing your story, any story. So I hope something

in this answer was helpful. Thank you so much for this question.

Thank you so much for joining me for another episode of Nuvia Advice. As always,

I love having these conversations each week. I hope this episode was helpful for someone

out there or at least somebody can resonate and be like, yeah, me too. If

you haven't already, I invite you to subscribe to the podcast. I was inspired by

this question and I have been avoiding a project I have had in the

back of my mind for a really long time and it is minisodes on Fridays

where I share short stories from my life on the podcast. So I'll be starting

that this Friday in order to hold myself accountable.

I'm just gonna do it. I'm just gonna throw it out there. And I hope

that inspires somebody out there too to just take that step because this is

something I have been talking about but haven't done. And I've

decided, you know what? YOLO. Anybody else out there, a millennial YOLO. You

only live once. So, anyways, I'm gonna start short

episodes on Friday. So if you haven't already, subscribe to the podcast so you don't

miss a thing. And I hope I was able to offer you a new view.

Thank you so much for joining me, and I hope to see you again.