For this final episode of the season, I talk to Julie Lythcott-Haims, who is asking the question “what does it mean to grow up?” For her, it’s about lovingly letting go of your past burdens so that you can be true to yourself – while not trampling on anybody else. Our conversation flows naturally from topic to topic as we learn about how learning mindfulness took her from being a lawyer and dean of a university to becoming a New York Times bestselling author, speaker, and activist focused on helping humans find their true north. Later, we bring these themes into a discussion of inclusion, identity, and intergenerational healing. Julie shares about growing up as a Black and biracial person with a white mother, healing her past to be the parent she wants to be, and widening her scope to community engagement after isolation during COVID 19.

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Julie Lythcott-Haims believes in humans and is deeply interested in what gets in our way. Her work encompasses writing, speaking, teaching, mentoring, and activism. She is the New York Times bestselling author of How to Raise an Adult which gave rise to a popular TED Talk. Her second book is the critically-acclaimed and award-winning prose poetry memoir Real American, which illustrates her experience as a Black and biracial person in white spaces. Her third book, Your Turn: How to Be an Adult, has been called a “groundbreakingly frank” guide to adulthood. Julie holds degrees from Stanford, Harvard Law, and California College of the Arts. She currently serves on the boards of Black Women’s Health Imperative, Narrative Magazine, and on the Board of Trustees at California College of the Arts. She serves on the advisory boards of LeanIn, Sir Ken Robinson Foundation and Baldwin For the Arts. She lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her partner of over thirty years, their itinerant young adults, and her mother. Learn more and follow Julie at julielythcotthaims.com.

Julie is currently running for office with Palo Alto City Council, support her campaign at julieforpaloalto.com.

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If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive in deeper, consider joining one of Rebecca’s online offerings to deepen your relational skills and expand your Self care. Learn more at connectfulness.com/offerings

Also, please check out our short form weekly WHY DOES MY PARTNER sister podcast.

This podcast is not a substitute for counseling with a licensed provider.

Mentioned in this episode:

WDMP Integrating Heart+Mind

WDMP Integrating Heart+Mind

I'm excited to share this podcast conversation with one of my dearest friends Akilah Riley-Richardson. Akilah has been in clinical practice for 16 years, is based in Trinidad and Tobago, and specializes in work with sexual and racial minorities. In this conversation, Akilah and I talk about relational privilege and the impact historical and race based trauma has on relationships. Akilah teaches to pivot, rumble and imagine to help gain a sense of where the hurt is, what the body needs, and how these needs connect back to the behaviors expressed is relationship…and what is needed now. And we rumble with the politics of interest, the impact of feeling that your experiences in the world matter (or don’t) within intimate relational spaces.

RESOURCES: 

Find Akilah online at akilahrileyrichardson.com, and dive in even deeper to learn more with Akilah in her Academy of Therapy Wisdom course Relational Privilege and Systemic Trauma: Confronting Race and Sex Discrimination in Couples Work

additional resources mentioned in this episode:

Resmaa Menakem

Shawn A. Ginwright’s The Four Pivots

adrienne maree brown’s concept of radical imagination (see this poem)

If you want to dive in deeper with Rebecca, consider joining our Relationship Bootcamp or exploring her offerings to deepen your relational skills and expand your self-care.  Learn more at connectfulness.com

Also, please check out our sister podcast, Why Does My Partner

Mentioned in this episode:

WDMP Integrating Heart+Mind

WDMP Integrating Heart+Mind

Moraya Seeger DeGeare is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, consultant, writer, activist, and mom. We recorded this conversation in-person, meandering in our discussion around moving within a world that tries to adhere to dominant culture all the time. Here’s what we hope you get out of this conversation: if you are someone who’s not walking around in a dominant culture body, we hope you can simply listen and not have to do extra work to find resonance. And if you are someone that's walking around in a dominant culture body (white, cis, heterosexual, able-bodied, neurotypical, etc), we hope we’ve opened some awareness that not everyone experiences the world the way you do. Check in on the people around you.

Moraya is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, consultant, writer, activist, and mom. She is the co-owner of BFF Therapy in Beacon, NY and has a monthly sex and relationship column, Can We Talk? with Refinery 29. The connecting line through all of her passions from research analyst to being active on a school board is that she engages in life with an understanding that culture and connection need to be understood first. Moraya is certified in Emotionally Focused Therapy and specializes in mixed race LGBTQIA+ couples and racial identity development. Her activism work encourages intergenerational conversations on systemic issues.

Find Moraya online at bfftherapy.com, PeteSeegerfamily.com, and her monthly sex and relationship column with Refinery29 “Can We Talk?”

If you want to dive in deeper with Rebecca, consider joining our Relationship Bootcamp or exploring her offerings to deepen your relational skills and expand your self-care.  Learn more at connectfulness.com

Also, please check out our sister podcast, Why Does My Partner

Mentioned in this episode:

WDMP Integrating Heart+Mind

WDMP Integrating Heart+Mind