July 29, 2024 • 55 mins
Justine Mastin, LMFT (she/her) is a pop culture psychology expert and so much more. She literally wrote the book on Therapeutic Fanfiction—Starship Therapise: Using Therapeutic Fanfiction to Rewrite Your Life—and she offered support to healers in The Grieving Therapist: Caring for Yourself and Your Clients When it Feels Like the End of the World. Justine is proud to nurture future therapists as an AAMFT-Approved Supervisor and educator. You can find out more about Justine at http://justinemastin.com/ & follow her on Instagram & TikTok: @mindbodyfandom
You can also follow the links below to find out more about parts of Justine’s work mentioned in this episode!
Fearless Leader: YogaQuest
Podcast co-host: Starship Therapise
Podcast co-host: Dark Side of the Mat
TEDx Speaker: Harnessing the Healing Power of Therapeutic Fanfiction
Instagram: GenderStories
Hosted by Alex Iantaffi
Music by Maxwell von Raven
Gender Stories logo by Lior Effinger-Weintraub
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Alex Iantaffi (00:01):
Hello, and welcome to another episode of
gender stories as ever, and youknow, if you listen to my
podcast, I am excited because Ialways have the best guests. And
today, I am thrilled to beinterviewing Justine Mastin who
is an LMFT. So a fellow Marriageand Family Therapist and
colleague together and I'm justkidding, thank you for being
(00:24):
here. Thank you, as well asbeing an awesome human being.
She's a pop culture, psychologyexpert, and so much more. She
literally wrote the book ontherapeutic fanfiction. And
also, I've seen her present onthis topic and she's
magnificent. But the book isStarship Therapize using
therapeutic conviction torewrite your life. And she's
also offer support to therapistsand healers. In their most more
(00:47):
recent book, The GrievingTherapist: Caring for Yourself
and Your Client When It FeelsLike The End of the World, which
is pretty much everyday as faras I'm concerned, right
nowadays. And if you're watchingthe podcast, you can see the
cover of The Grieving Therapist,I lent Starship Therapize out so
I don't have it with me, that'show great it is I lent it out.
But both books are reallywonderful. And more than that,
(01:12):
Justine also has two podcasts,Yoga Quest is the fearless
leader of Yoga Quest, you do somany things. And she's also
proud to nurture futuretherapists as an AAMFT approved
supervisor and educator and as aTEDx talk. And don't worry, dear
listeners, I'm putting all ofthis links in the description.
(01:33):
So you can go check out themillion things that Justine
does! so welcome. just seen. So
Justine Mastin (01:38):
thank you so much for having me. And thank
you for that lovely intro. Yes.
Sometimes when I hear it allrecited back to me, I think
maybe I need to slow my roll.
Alex Iantaffi (01:49):
I know that feeling so as a follow over
door. Not that I'm saying you'reoverdoing it, but I your
website, and I was like, Oh, howdo you even find time to do all
those things?
Justine Mastin (02:01):
Yeah, I just do.
Although the longer answer isthat I have wonderful people
around me who support me. And,you know, for both of the books,
Starship Therapize, and TheGrieving Therapist, I have a co
author who also happens to be myvery best friend in the world,
who is also a licensed Marriageand Family Therapist, Larisa A.
Garskii. I, I would never wantto write alone.
Alex Iantaffi (02:26):
I know that failing, I wrote like one book
alone. Books I co authored for areason with my writing partner,
MJ, who is also one of myclosest people. So I clearly
understand how important it isto have people you collaborate
with and who support you. Andthen you can do things with it's
just, yes, none of us do thosethings alone or outside of
(02:47):
community, I don't think. Solet's talk about let's start
from Starship Therapize, becausethat's how I first became aware
of you.
Justine Mastin (02:57):
Oh, is that right? That's always fun, to
find out how people heard aboutme!
Alex Iantaffi (03:01):
I know , right.
You didn't know this. Because wehaven't talked about this. But
that's how I became aware ofkind of you and your work. And I
was so excited. Because I alsohave a lot of geeky clients. And
it was so wonderful to seeanother therapist who not only
work with the community, but youalso provide a lot of tools to
(03:21):
therapists on how to usefanfiction and how to use kind
of fandom to connect withclients in a therapeutic manner.
And so I one of the things I'mcurious about, given that this
is Gender Stories is that in myexperience, and it could be just
because I'm older, I don't know,like my 50s. But fandom
communities haven't always beenthe most welcoming in terms of
(03:43):
any gender was basically not acis man or people who are
racialized, not white ordisabled folks. And of course,
there are exceptions likeWiscon, which was one of my, you
know, Oh, yeah. Sounds like ascience fiction and fantasy
convention. That's like afeminist social justice focused,
(04:04):
kind of broader, kind of geekycommunity as at its challenges,
let's say to be Midwestern,perhaps around kind of
differences and diversity andanything that deviates from kind
of the stereotypical fan let'scall it usually a cis white
straight man. And it's younodding so okay, this is so as
(04:27):
you experience being part of thecommunity, let's just start from
there, man. Yeah.
Justine Mastin (04:38):
When I first got interested in pop culture
stories, this was before theinternet was the way the
internet is right. I'm, I'm inmy 40s And so when I was coming
up, like I guess there wasinternet but I was not savvy
enough to be If anywhere nearthat, we didn't have a computer
(05:03):
in our home until Anyway, pointbeing, I had no idea that other
people liked the stuff I liked,or that they felt about it the
way I felt about it. Becauseit's not just that I loved Twin
Peaks, its that Twin Peaksreally meant something to me.
(05:23):
Like, like deeply profoundlymeant something to me. And the
fact that Agent Dale Cooper saidthat he didn't know where we
were going, but he was sure itwould be a place both wonderful
and strange. And as a strangeyoung person who didn't
understand my strangeness yet,and that strangeness was always
(05:44):
presented as bad. Having thisperson that I felt deeply
connected to say, both wonderfuland strange, was was so like,
profoundly meaningful for me.
But I didn't know how to tellanybody. Luckily, I mean, my
parents were both story lovers.
(06:05):
They were both writers andeditors. And, you know, story
was very welcome. In our home,there were always stories, and
it was totally valid to engagewith them. And also, there
wasn't exactly a community thatI could go to and be like, so
everybody loves Dale Cooper,right. And we all like, we're
(06:27):
all giving ourselves a giftevery day. And so my exposure
was I was in theater when I wasyoung. And so I found some folks
in a theater community who werealso embedded in stories, but
again, just didn't know how tohave those conversations about
the deepness and the richness.
And it really wasn't until Imaybe 2010, I had just trained
(06:51):
to be a yoga teacher. And I wentto my first pop culture
convention, that same year, andthe timing was wild, but it just
happened to be what it happenedto be. And I looked around and
thought I haven't felt quite athome in the yoga community. And
(07:16):
I think it's because thiscommunity is what I want. Could
I merge wellness and thesestories that are profoundly
meaningful to me? And the answerwas, you can if you want to, and
you put a lot of time. And so Istarted creating spaces. So
(07:41):
that's a very long windingstory. And then, you know, I've
made my way into many popculture spaces now, where I've
had a variety of experiences.
You know, there are spaces thatare very welcoming. There are
spaces that are meh. Andhistorically, fandom spaces have
(08:08):
not been welcoming to folks whoare outside of, you know, cis
het white dudes. And there wassort of a movement during Star
Trek. Yep. The original series,right. When women started
writing fanfiction
Alex Iantaffi (08:29):
Absolutely. And it's likeI have so many
feelings.
Justine Mastin (08:33):
okay, yeah, jump in. Come in. Otherwise, I will
just monologue. (laughs)
Alex Iantaffi (08:37):
(laughs) That's wonderful. That's great. I was
like, I was sitting back I waslike, Go jJustine, you can have
I think the wellness is embeddedin whatever direction we go.
a whole hour, keep talking.
(both laugh) I'm here with you.
I'm going on this journey oflike, Yeah, Justine, finding
takes and that findingcommunity. I'm here for the
monologue. But I will askquestions, because my brain is
(08:58):
pinging in 10 differentdirections, which is like, you
know, there is this piece whereeven kind of this this feeling,
right? I want to share this withother people, right. One of the
things that I realized that wasa gift for me growing up was
that there wasn't so much thiskind of geeky label if you were
into like, manga or comic books,like usually in the 70s and 80s.
(09:21):
It seemed to be pretty common ormaybe it was just like that was
so oblivious that it made medifferent. Other no could go
either way. But you know, it'slike you could find those things
at the newsstand and everybodyelse watch the same kind of
shows and really, like, youknow, anime was just so big in
Italy in the 70s and 80s. And sowhen I moved to kind of the UK
(09:44):
at first and then the US back in22,008, just realizing that
there were like all thesecommunities that were like
physical communities right?
already connected online, livethe days of Live Journal, like
that. I don't know where wecould talk about like, did you
watch this episode? Did it touchyour heart? Right? So there's
kind of this piece aboutcultural context, right? Where
(10:05):
we label as like other or aspecific interest or a niche.
And then there is this piece oflike, Who is this content for?
Who is the creative thatconsumes it right? But then
there is this other piece aboutwellness and the healing we find
through stories, right? So thereare like three pieces, like each
one of them could be a wholeepisode, quite frankly. So I
(10:28):
leave it to you to pick up likewhich piece you want to talk
about. But really, we could goin any direction. I mean, maybe
I guess we should go thewellness direction, because
we're both therapists, or wecould go another direction too.
(10:49):
Right? Because stories are soinherently healing. So wherever
we go, healing will follow.
Oh my god, I love that. I feellike that should be on a t shirt
wherever we go, healing willfollow. The Final Frontier.
(both laugh)
Justine Mastin (11:04):
That's right.
Boldly going into therapy. (bothlaugh)
Alex Iantaffi (11:09):
Well, I think that's the thing. I think, you
know, you said I love that youtalked about the wonderful and
strange piece right? And TwinPeaks is not my fandom, but I've
been in fandom spaces enoughthat I feel like I've absorbed
some of the shorts wisdom butyou know, affinity, but this
idea that kind of I think a lotof us will feel maybe different
(11:31):
or other often find ourselves inscience fiction in fantasy, you
know, I don't think it's anaccident. I've talked about even
with like, trans authors who'vebeen on the show, right? The how
many trans and queer folks arereally into science fiction and
fantasy, you know, shapeshifting, of course, you know,
or you know, even Octavia Butlerkinda Lilith's Brood, you know,
(11:55):
the beautiful and strange genderexpansive interspecies love, you
know, and creation, and all ofit all the complex themes of
that trilogy. Right. It's like,I think there is something that
draws us when we feel like wedon't fit into the dominant
culture to those stories thatare maybe outside of the current
(12:16):
paradigm. Is that been yourexperience as well? And?
Justine Mastin (12:20):
Yeah, absolutely. I, I was on
Minnesota Public Radio just afew weeks ago, and talking about
parasocial relationships.
Alex Iantaffi (12:30):
Yes.
Justine Mastin (12:31):
And for any of your listeners or watchers who
aren't familiar with thatconcept. parasocial
relationships are the one sidedrelationships that we have with
fandom characters. So that couldbe fictional characters that
could be celebrities whom we'venever met. It could be
historical characters. And Icall them fandom attachments,
(12:54):
because it's all aboutattachment. And we are
attachment seeking creatures bynature. And if we aren't finding
the community that we're lookingfor, if we aren't seeing
ourselves represented in otherstories, we're going to
gravitate towards that whichfeels is calling to us that we
(13:14):
can attach to. And of course, wewant to attach to, you know,
something that that feelsaligned. And for folks who are
outside the mainstream. Often,that is fantasy and sci fi,
because those folks are thinkingoutside the cultural paradigm.
(13:38):
And they're sometimes not doinga great job. I mean, I love the
television series Supernatural.
I'm a, I'm a big Supernaturalfan. And they haven't done great
with thinking outside the box.
But their fans are great atthinking outside.
Alex Iantaffi (14:00):
Which I think is where the fan fiction comes in.
Right? Sometimes this fictionthat love even more than the
original stories and a lot ofways.
Justine Mastin (14:08):
Yes, well, and you know, I think of a character
like Dean Winchester, I JensenAckles, has said over and over
again, that he plays Dean as aheterosexual dude. That is not
what I observe. When I watch theshow and see his behavior and
eye contact and body movement.
And, you know, I'm like, as a biI am seeing myself reflected in
(14:32):
you sir and it's, it's fine ifthat's not how you plan to play
it, but that's how I'm receivingit. And I'm connecting to you
because I am receiving that. Andso my headcanon my personal
fanfiction is Dean, you arebisexual and that means that I
feel like I can connect to youbetter.
Alex Iantaffi (14:55):
And that's the beauty I think in the wellness
and the healing of storiesright? Who do we connect to and
why you know, and we might evenhave an act to characters that
are so different from us, right?
Aliens or even Non Humans, orshapeshifters. Right. But how do
we find that kind of heartconnection that helps us
understand ourselves? Sometimesit's also that comfort thing.
(15:18):
Recently, I've been rewatchingJessica Jones, and I'm like, why
am I watching this show? There'sso much trauma,
intergenerational, like, youknow, family dynamics. And I'll
say, you know, what am I doing?
But then I was watching seasontwo, and I'm like, oh, there it
(15:39):
is. There is this piece whereshe's just reflecting right? And
she talks about, I'm not like,whew, you know, we Kilgrave and
I'm like, you her mom. I don'tthink it's been out for a while.
You can't spoiler.
Justine Mastin (15:52):
I don't think you can spoiler. Anyone. There
were also comics.
Alex Iantaffi (15:55):
Yeah, there were also comics for a long time
before Marvel picked them up.
Yeah, boy, that was like, so Idon't think it's a spoiler. But
you know, I'm always like, socareful. But there is this piece
where she's like, No, I can'tcontrol myself, right. So I'm
more powerful than right kind oftaking your power back taking
your agency. And I think thatsometimes, you know, growing up,
like when you feel like youdon't have agency either because
(16:16):
maybe you are kind of, you know,you present or brought up
feminine in the world, or youfeel like you then have power in
some other way or experiencedtrauma, right? Those stories
help us make sense, right, in away to represent the side of me
that wishes I could just be anasshole and let all my rage out.
The way she does right, kind of.
(16:38):
She has a very differentmanagement strategy. She's not a
people pleaser, I am. There'ssomething satisfying, I think,
to see the side, you know, whichis kind of in me but doesn't get
expressed because the peoplepleaser aside always wins,
right? But to see this characteralmost embody this anger, rage,
(16:59):
isolation, difficulties withintimacy that any of us who
experienced trauma, understandwhat that feels like. Does that
make sense? So this intersectionis so beautiful. Absolutely.
Justine Mastin (17:10):
And what was coming up for me as you were
talking, I was thinking aboutBuffy the Vampire Slayer, which
came out my final year of highschool. And I remember just
thinking, Where was this? Yes,where was this, I needed this.
And I, I became a Buffy devotee,you know, start to finish. And
(17:34):
we could have a wholeconversation about creators and
how they disappoint us. And thatis a story for another time.
There's a lot to be said aboutcreators and how they disappoint
us. But the character of Buffy,was so meaningful to me in a
similar way to what you'resaying with Jessica Jones. It's
(17:56):
like, okay, so you're telling methat a girl can be powerful, and
stylish, and athletic, and soft,and complicated and funny, and
all these things? Whoa, becausewhen I was coming up as a
teenager, in the 90s, everythingwas just this, like,
(18:20):
polarization you are either thisor that. You can't be two
things. Pick a lane, you'regoing to be a theater nerd,
you're not going to be athletic,and like you can do dance,
that's fine. But that's notYou're not athletic. Let's just
be clear about that. You'regonna be soft, you're choosing a
soft lane. And I'm like, but I'mactually like, kind of soft
(18:41):
Butch, although I don't havethat language yet. You know, but
I have a chain wallet. Because?
Because I know that feels right,somehow. But it's not okay for
me to be those many things. Andhere was Buffy, coming in saying
no, you can be all those things,and have community.
Alex Iantaffi (19:04):
And have community. That's right, because
there was this piece aboutcommunity, even surrogate
parental figures with Giles. I'ma Buffy fan too and yes, all our
favorites are problematic. Wecan we could talk about that
like for the whole episode. Youknow, we almost called our
oldest child Joss or Anyanka.
So, you know, before we knewwhere all our favorites are
(19:26):
problematic, this was a timeago, you know, two decades ago,
and a little bit more actuallynow. From when I was kind of
gestating but yeah, that's likeI think there is something in
that. And they're all articles.
So at the end, we like sharingthe power right? About being
exceptional, or individuallyexceptional, right? That
(19:48):
actually you cannot do this inisolation and that's what I love
about Buffy as well. And that'slike finding different pieces
and different fandoms right,like in Buffy it's like it's an
ensemble piece I think aboutSome of those beautiful shots
were the move as a group, right?
Yeah. Especially like in themusical episode,
Justine Mastin (20:07):
Oh, Once More With Feeling has amazing shots
of the whole . Yeah.
Alex Iantaffi (20:12):
Yeah. Right.
Like, it's very much an ensemblepiece where I think, you know,
Jessica Jones way yeah, she hasallies, but she's pushing people
away, right, it's differentparts of ourselves and in a way
are different people that canrelate to different parts. And I
love that what you said aboutlike, you know, you can be
complex, you can be many thingsin a world that often wants to
(20:34):
wants us to be very this or thatyou're either kind of smart, but
you can't be pretty if you're agirl, you know, you can be soft
if you're a girl, but you can behard, right? You can be really
good at math, but then thatmeans you're not supposed to
care about what you look like orwhat you know, like. And even as
a parent, I see that it's breaksmy heart that my kid who is like
(20:54):
in her early 20s is stilldealing with some of that.
misogyny, that's just like, kindof not going away. Right. And
it's so it's so interesting thatwe can make sense of ourselves
through those stories, whilethen also having to deal with
the kind of relating withinfandom with folks who are also
(21:16):
perpetuating some of thestories. Does that make sense?
Yes. Do your clients ever talkabout that? I mean, obviously,
not disclosing any personalinformation, but like, this
theme of like, oh, this is mycommunity, but also this
community is sometimes asmisogynistic or transphobic, or
racist, and or all of the above,you know, or queer phobic, and
(21:38):
it hurts me in this ways. Thisis where I should feel like I
belong. And yeah, I also, like,sometimes I don't belong. Does
that make sense? Yeah,
Justine Mastin (21:50):
well, and I can speak to actually having those
conversations in fandom spaces.
Because for the past 10 years orso I've been going to pop
culture conventions and talkingabout wellness, whether it's,
you know, moving our bodies orself care or mental health. And
I'll talk about the power ofcommunity. And, you know,
someone inevitably will raisetheir hand and say, Well, what
(22:13):
if your community is toxic?
Alex Iantaffi (22:17):
Surprise.
Justine Mastin (22:21):
Right. And so, I, obviously, the answer is, it
depends. But if we're talkingabout, you know, fandom spaces,
like the internet, sure, thereare going to be some forums that
are going to be different thanother ones. And, to my mind,
(22:44):
it's, in the same way that weacknowledge that we love Aunt
Doris as a human, and we rejecther beliefs about certain groups
of people. We can accept thatthese other people love
Supernatural. And let go of oftheir belief system that doesn't
(23:09):
match with ours. And that'sokay. Because we're all allowed
to have that fanfiction. And ifthey're trying to put that on us
and say we're bad, or that we'rewrong, thank you so much. Next.
Alex Iantaffi (23:27):
Absolutely. And find your people who are gonna
share that, right because it'slike, and it's so interesting,
because even not just withfanfiction, but also with
reimagining our existingmaterial. I'm thinking about
Bridgerton In some ways as itsown fandom, right? I love almost
everything can be a fandom atthis point, you know, and
(23:47):
there's been so much outrageabout changing the gender of
some of the characters. It'smore queer in the TV series, and
it was in the books, even thoughthe book's author was like, this
was cool with me. Some peoplewere having feelings and I try
not to engage. Sometimes like Ican't resist when it's late at
night, and I can't sleep, I'mlike, let me put this little
(24:07):
comment.
Justine Mastin (24:08):
Let's get into a fight (laughs)
Alex Iantaffi (24:11):
Let's get into an internet fight for five minutes.
And I try it was like, I'm like,I'm trying to educate the see if
there's an opening, right. Andsometimes there is an opening
actually, I was trying toapproach with like, I'm curious,
sort of, like, Hey, did you havethis piece of information, you
know, somebody was like, andalso it's fascinating that it
was about queerness, but theymanaged to make it about gender
(24:32):
because of the change in genderfrom the book to the TV series.
Justine Mastin (24:34):
Sure, yeah.
Alex Iantaffi (24:35):
It beCame this whole transphobic like slew of
comments about, you know,there's only two genders Why do
they have to change the genderof the character? And I was
like, well, first of all, like,that's not even like there's a
trans person in Bridgerton rightnow. So you know,
Justine Mastin (24:50):
not that we are aware of!
Alex Iantaffi (24:52):
Not that we know as being revealed. I haven't
read the books, so I'm onlywatching the TV series, right. I
was Like, you know that actuallybecause they were like nature,
right? You know, this male andfemale in nature, I was like,
Oh, actually nature is much moreexpansive. Resources, it's happy
(25:13):
to share some resources. Right.
And for me, sometimes pushingback is also like what, you
know, 98% probability is thatthis person is not going to be
open to what I'm saying. Butthis piece about, like other
people in the comments alsogoing, Oh, my god, somebody else
gets it, somebody else ispushing back, maybe I don't have
the capacity to do that, right?
(25:35):
Because that matters, you know,when you do a panel, and there
is that person who stands up andgo, but what about, you know,
like, there's probably another,like 50 people standing up, and
I was sitting there thinkingthis thing. And so how would you
feel like the people find kindof spaces within spaces to take
care of themselves? So thosespaces where maybe the larger
(25:59):
fandom? Lets you know, it'scomplicated? And like you said,
it's like you just leave ontourists alone? Or, or maybe you
have one mild argument over acup of tea, and then kind of let
it go, when you feel like it,but then how do you find the
space, the smaller space withinthe larger space, where you can
(26:19):
feel supported and connected andheard? Yeah,
Justine Mastin (26:23):
So my invitation to folks, whether it's online or
in person, is go into spaces,where folks are similar to you,
which is like, Well, how do Ifind them? If you're going to a
convention, if you are a queerperson, look for the header that
says, This is a panel aboutqueer characters or by you know,
(26:47):
queer creators, or, you know,the, the industry has gotten...
Well, not the industry, theconversations at pop culture
events, and some other satellitelocations have been so much more
welcoming, welcoming ofdisability rights, and
Alex Iantaffi (27:05):
Absolutely. And I think that then it's like, you
transgender rights, and bringingin creators with those
identities to talk about theirown work and their own
experience. And so keep youreyes out for that. And then go
talk to the presenters, theyreally do want to talk to you,
say hi to the person sittingnext to you, because clearly,
(27:29):
you have at least something incommon, which is, you were
interested enough in this panelto make time for it. And that
doesn't necessarily mean thateveryone in the room has the
same identities. But there arepeople in the room with the same
values. Yes, for the most part,there is typically at least a
(27:53):
couple of folks that are justgoing to show up to hate watch,
and maybe hate comment. Becausethat's the world that we live
in. But the majority of peopleare there earnestly wanting to
make connections wanting tolearn more, also wanting to be
in community. And if you turn toyour neighbor and say, Hey, I'm
(28:18):
Justine, nice to meet ya, theywill also introduce themselves.
know, as well as this parasocialrelationships, and you're
creating some genuine communityconnection. Yes, if you go to
the same events over and over,right, and that can be really
(28:38):
scary. In relationships we havewith characters, right. Whereas
in connecting with other withour fellow humans, even if we
come on, there's always like thedanger of like rejection or
being hurt or feeling. And Ithink that's often what people
struggle with. I wonder ifyou've seen any example of
spaces where there is anintentionality around enabling
(29:01):
people to connect, right,because it can be hard for
people to connect. And I think,I don't know, maybe it's just me
or people I know. But for a lotof us, we're like, you're spicy
or different in other ways andfandom spaces. You know, it can
be a little intimidating. And somaybe even Yoga Quest, which is
one of the spaces you'vecreated, and curated and lead.
(29:24):
And I can definitely think ofexamples, but what do you see
those spaces do? Or like I said,maybe you can want to talk about
your own experience of creatingthat kind of space?
Justine Mastin (29:33):
Yeah, I mean, I created Yoga Quest exactly for
the reasons that you're sayingis that I went to that
convention and looked around andthought, how come we aren't
talking about how healing all ofthis is? And it's inherently
(29:55):
healing, but we could also bringin some additional self care
stuff like we're, we're allowedto move our body Yes, and no
matter our size or ability, andat the time, that was a pretty
radical thing to be seeing inyoga spaces.
Alex Iantaffi (30:12):
Yes, that's true.
Justine Mastin (30:15):
And yeah, I've always been a little bit of a
rabble rouser. So I was like,well, just, I don't see this
space anywhere. I'll just makeit. Yeah, and just sort of
reached out to here in the TwinCities, there's a group called
the Geek Partnership Society.
And I discovered that they had afitness branch, or what was it
(30:37):
called Geek Physique? was whatit was called. That's amazing.
It may still exist. But Ireached out to their organizer.
So it's something alreadyexisted, right? And I reached
out and said, hey, you know, I'myoga teacher, I'm a nerd. I have
this idea. It might flop. Butlike, Could I come over to your
(30:58):
warehouse and try it? And theywanted to meet me? to vet me,
which, of course, totally fair.
I want to make sure I wasn'tsome, you know, hardcore
cheerleader girl who was goingto be on everybody for
something. Yeah, exactly. Like Iwas coming in to bully
(31:18):
everybody. And I mean, I'm, I'mpretty, like, I'm a pretty
traditional Yogi looker, or verymuch was at the time, you know,
the petite blonde woman. Butafter talking for a bit, it's
like, okay, you're, you're cool.
Alex Iantaffi (31:39):
You might be pithy than blonde, but you're
one of us. Exactly. It was like,All right, just like Buffy.
Justine Mastin (31:47):
Exactly you can, you can be many things at once.
But I understood it. And I wasjust very intentional that I, I
wanted this to be as welcomingas possible. And so I was really
explicit. When people came in,to give permission, like, for
(32:08):
doing a pose, you don't like,I'll give some options. If you
don't like any of those, youhave to do anything I'm saying.
Because guess what, Friends, youare autonomous human beings who
get to decide what to do withyour minds and bodies.
Alex Iantaffi (32:19):
What? (laughs)
Justine Mastin (32:21):
And truly, it was mind blowing for people. And
I started getting more and moretraction, because people were
like, Alright, so this, thislittle lady isn't going to be
mean to me, then she's going totell me that I deserve and I'm
worth the effort to take care ofmyself. Wow. And I'm not the
(32:47):
only person who was doing this.
It was sort of part of thezeitgeist, I noticed at the
time. And there there are somefitness orgs that are still
going my, my friend at Geek GirlStrong. Who does an online
business mostly. But I thinkshe's in Philly. She was in New
York. But I started going toconventions and teaching yoga
(33:09):
and people like wow, I just, youknow, I, I've never been given
permission like this before. Andso my invitation to folks, and I
know, it's scary. I do. I knowit's scary. If you don't see the
thing that you need, or want,you're allowed to make it. And
(33:32):
that's how we got all of theawesome stories that we love so
much, is that people didn't seethe story they needed. And so
they made it.
Alex Iantaffi (33:47):
Absolutely, and so much of fanfiction is that
right? Or some people writingthem ourselves in the stories?
Right? Okay, I don't see thequeerness. So there is subtext
about the queerness. So makethat subtext text right? Or I'm
gonna imagine doing somethingdifferent with this Canon, that
makes me feel more included.
Absolutely. And then sometimesas, as we do that, and become
(34:11):
more involved in community, wemight also find, oh, hang on a
minute. There are all theseother stories that are maybe not
as mainstream, but actuallywhere I can see myself I can see
my racialized identity or mygender or my queerness or my
disability, right. And it'sbeautiful, kind of to see that.
There's now more opportunitiesfor people to also just get the
(34:32):
stories out in the worldbecause, yes, well,
Justine Mastin (34:37):
and as you're talking about this, I'm thinking
of, you know, when when youasked like, how do you also how
do you find your people? Thereare stories that exist, that are
doing good work, like Our FlagMeans Death?
Alex Iantaffi (34:51):
Oh, my God. I love that show so much. I just
watched it again for the thirdtime. Let's talk about that.
Justine Mastin (34:59):
Right And for folks who aren't familiar, it's
it's also lovingly known as thegay pirate show. Taika Waititi
and Rhys Darby as Blackbeard andStede Bonnet, the gentleman
pirate on the high seas. Andthey are canonically a couple.
Alex Iantaffi (35:22):
And it's not just that they're canonically a
couple, they're also like, kindof, like, messed up by their
family of origin, you know, sothere's some trauma. I think a
lot of our flag means daffodilsabout what this family means.
And what does it mean? Family,it's very much about queer
(35:44):
family. And, and there are a lotof lots of prayer stories where
people are not necessarilylooking the way we expect them
to look. So for me as I strugglewith aging, quite frankly, to
see like a same gender story oftwo older man was like very,
it's very healing. Especiallylike, there's a lot of kind of
(36:06):
ageism, in terms of kind ofyouth worship in gay male
community in my experience,right for a lot of jokes about
but that by the time you turn30, you might as well be dead,
you know, like, I mean,especially somebody who grew up
like during the AIDS crisis, Iwas like, Yeah, right. One of
our people did that. They did.
You know, like, I went to themcarrying exhibit of the walker.
(36:27):
And I was just like cryingthinking about how much more you
could have done right, if youlive longer, you know, he died
like in his 30s. So many amazingpeople died in their 30s. You
know, people would have been myelders now. Right, right. Like
we lost so many algos. And so tosee a story, like our flag mean
stuff with tool, man, it's notjust the queerness. It's also
(36:50):
like, they're older, thecharacters are complicated,
they're messy. They're dealingwith PTSD, and trauma, and
finding themselves in a worldthat's like, also systemically
complex in terms of class andgender. And yeah, it's such a
beautiful story, right?
Justine Mastin (37:12):
Yeah. What what did you think of Jim?
Alex Iantaffi (37:17):
I love Jim. And I love how Jim is handled, that's
another piece right? There isthis like non binary actor
playing this character, whenthere is like the gender reveal,
so to speak, that this personwho we perceive as a man at the
beginning, is actually maybe nota man, where there is this piece
where people are confused, andthey just go, it's just Jim and
(37:39):
everybody is just like, oh,okay, you know, or when they
meet the person or kind ofbrought them up basically, after
their family dies. They're like,this It's just Jim now, and the
person is just like, Yeah, youknow, the non just goes into
Jim, and they just seamlessly,right? It's even not a thing.
(38:01):
And I loved it. I loved it,because it wasn't, the emphasis
is not on that piece of thestory. They're just the
character. Same as in the latestseason of Doctor Who there's
been a lot of combo
Justine Mastin (38:14):
I'm not, I'm not caught up. But what I do know
all of the buzz, yes.
Alex Iantaffi (38:19):
yeah, there's just some good I will not do any
spoilers because like peoplejust saying that I used to have
a favorite doctor and I have anew favorite doctor. Ncuti is
amazing as a new doctor, and butthere are kind of just beautiful
day, that moment and DisabilityJustice stuff. It's very subtle.
It's just there, you know, to beexplained without having to be
(38:42):
the focus of the story. And whenthat happens, what about you?
Well, what did you like aboutOur Flag Means Death? What was
the thing that spoke to you themost?
Justine Mastin (38:52):
Yeah, I mean, there were so there were so many
things. The this focus on foundfamily was just just spoke to my
heart so much, and I've been ona few panels about Our Flag
Means Death. And you know whyit's so revolutionary. And you
know, why it has such a strongfan base, many of whom are queer
(39:17):
folks, disabled folks of variousmarginalized identities, like,
Well, I think to the scene wherethey're making flags. Yes. And
they're going to vote on whichone is the best flag and then
they will fly the best flag andthey fly everybody's flag. And
(39:39):
in that moment, I was 100%bought in because I was like,
they get it. We're allimportant. We all deserve to
have our flag flown.
Alex Iantaffi (39:51):
That is so beautiful. And that's maybe a
good segue, because I'm aware oftime I feel like I could talk to
you for like the whole day andmaybe we'll just have another
episode. But for now, maybethat's a good segue to talk
about The Grieving Therapist,because when I first saw that
you had another book coming out,came out, you know, when it was
like preorder. It was like, whatthat's fascinating that you went
(40:13):
from like fanfiction, and usingfanfiction, therapeutically, to
you know, something like, TheGrieving Therapist, which is
really about, you know, caringfor yourself as a therapist and
a healer during this time oflike, you know, climate crisis,
and genocide, you know, theincrease of global fascism, I
(40:34):
mean, you know, take your book,
Justine Mastin (40:36):
just everything, everything crisis
Alex Iantaffi (40:40):
was talking to my therapist, and I was like, you
know, I don't know if I'm, like,depressed or if this is a good
reaction to what's happening inthe world, or if it's
perimenopause, or even knowanymore, or maybe a side effect
of this medication? I honestlydon't know, I'm kind of sitting
with it with curiosity, right?
There's a lot to be depressedabout. But not yet. Do you know,
like, I feel like it's areasonable response to the
(41:00):
world. But I was curious, like,how did we go from like, fan
fiction to The GrievingTherapist in a, you know, I made
sense of it once I read thebook. But I'm curious about from
your point of view, if it feltlike a change in trajectory or
not so much, or if it felt justlike a continuation of your
(41:22):
story, in some way?
Justine Mastin (41:25):
Yeah, well, so something that I talk to my
students about a lot is theimportance of understanding
historical context. And tounderstand how I went from
starships that are PIs to thegrieving therapist requires
historical context there.
Larissa and I had been pitchingstarship therapies for a long
(41:48):
time, we were finally able tofind the most wonderful editor.
And that picked us up andbrought us into North Atlantic
books. And we, we were soexcited. Three months later, the
pandemic happened. We wrote theentirety of Starship Therapize
(42:09):
during the pandemic. So thismostly quite light hearted, you
know, foray into play and storywas written during some of the
most depressing times in ourlives. Yeah. And we didn't get
to do any of the things that wethought we were gonna get to do.
(42:31):
Like when we sold StarshipTherapize. The intention was,
we're going to be at Comic Con,we're going to be at smaller pop
culture conventions, we're goingto do all this stuff to release
the book and be in all thesepublic spaces and all these
convention fandom spaces. Theworld was shut down for years.
(42:52):
And so The Grieving Therapistcame out of the literal grief we
experienced, from having to letgo of our dream of what it was
going to be, to, to be authorsto release a book, to be
therapists, to you know, to behumans in this world. There is
(43:15):
just there was so much grieving.
It was so awful. And when ourwhen our wonderful editor, Shana
came to us and said, Hey, whatdo you want to write next?
Larisa I sat down, we wrote outa bunch of ideas. And I was
like, I think it'd be reallyimportant for us to write about
(43:35):
the grief we experienced. Whichis very funny. If you know me
and Larisa, becausehistorically, I am a Kirk. I am.
I am the boisterous bravado,let's just get in the ship and
fly. And she's very Spock, shewants to sit and consider and
but she also tends to be theholder of emotions for us. And
(43:57):
so me saying let's talk aboutgrief. She's like, what is
happening? Yeah, what ishappening? But from her Spock
mind, she was playing it out andgoing, this is going to be
really painful. And hard. And Idon't want to do that. And my
Kirkness is like, we alreadyfelt the pain, Larisa. So we're
(44:17):
just writing about it. Yeah,see, we're not It's not like
we're gonna feel it again.
Alex Iantaffi (44:24):
I mean, then you might, but that's part of the
process. Right? Yeah. I
Justine Mastin (44:29):
The funny thing is oh, boy, did we feel it?
Yeah. Yeah. But Shana was soexcited about this book was
like, Yeah, let's do it. And wespent nine months reliving grief
and stepping into all of thesegrieving spaces. And I got COVID
which turned into long COVID Andit had major psychological
(44:53):
impact on me as well as youknow, bodily impact and I may
It's a major self discoveriesduring that time. So, even
though it seems like the, how isThe Grieving Therapist, the
spiritual sequel to StarshipTherapize, it was what came
(45:17):
next.
Alex Iantaffi (45:18):
Absolutely. Yeah.
Which to me makes complete sensein terms of timing. I was like,
Oh, yes, this is so you know,it's this is so essential in
terms of where we are, andnothing Well, comes to mind, as
you were talking was also how wefind ourselves through writing
stories, as well as listeningand consuming stories, right,
(45:41):
which is hard to, you know, justlike fanfiction, but we also
when we write nonfiction, we'realso making sense of our own
stories. And I love how youdescribe that beautiful arc of
actually, like, there was allthis excitement, and then life
had other plans, which actually,often is at the heart of many of
the stories we love, right? Weare on one path and life has
(46:05):
other plan and find us on thislike, very different quest.
Sometimes a side quest becomesthe main quest.
Justine Mastin (46:15):
Yeah. And we did get to still write some fanfic.
We got to fanfic, some of ourfavorite theorists are from a
variety of realms into animalspirits that were wandering
through this sort of fantasticalland that we created. And if you
(46:37):
haven't read the book, friendsat home, I promise it all
connects and makes sense. (bothlaugh)
Alex Iantaffi (46:41):
Yes. That's all makes sense. If you read the
book capsule, well, and, and ina way, I also do see the spirit
of what you're doing with yogaquest in this book, right? It's
like this connection of like,how can stories help us make
sense, right? When we bringstories into movement for yoga,
(47:02):
right? When we bring our storiesinto fandom, when we bring story
and narrative into our emotion,our grief, right? We need to
make sense. We need stories andwe need analytics, right?
Whether it's animal allies, orother characters or fantastic
allies of some kind, right? Weneed to feel that we're not
alone, right? Kind of almostgoes back to the beginning of
(47:25):
this interview when you werelike, oh, Twin Peaks, and now
with with share with where mypeople are gonna get as excited
as I am about this, right? Yeah,absolutely. I love that. Wow. I
feel like I could go on and ontalking about all of this with
you and dear listeners, ifyou're listening, and you're
like, I love all of this. Andbooks are not my thing. Do not
(47:47):
fear because just see an authorhas got two podcasts in the
spirit of doing all the things.
Justine Mastin (47:54):
So I, we completed the Starship Therapize
podcast, it has it has concludedand we were very mindful about
the conclusion. So we even wespend several episodes talking
about how we're about to saygoodbye.
Alex Iantaffi (48:09):
Proper therapists that's been there. I like many,
like over 80 episodes. Oh, yeah,you can. You can spend some time
and spend some time with it feellike podcasts live forever, even
when they're done. You know whatI mean? That's right. Yeah.
Justine Mastin (48:21):
And then dark side of the mat is in
investigative journalism pilotpodcast about the creeps, cults
and crimes that show up in thewellness and yoga industry. We
put out episodes, verysporadically, because me and my
co host cat both, both have toomany jobs. But there, there are
(48:44):
a few apps on there. And they'redelightful. And also, if you
liked the sound of my voicetoday, I do the audiobooks. So
if you're more of a listenerthat are then a sit down reader.
You can also you can hear thisvoice say comforting things to
you for 10 hours, which
Alex Iantaffi (49:06):
be great.
Exactly. And I think even withdark side of the mouths, there's
like over 20 episodes out. Sothat's still like if people
haven't gotten into into it.
Like that sounds reallyinteresting. There's plenty of
others out and I get it I'vebecome much more regular. But
definitely, I've had my momentsat one point. During the
pandemic. I was like, I have notreleased an episode for a year.
(49:28):
Oh, how did that happen?
Justine Mastin (49:31):
Oops. Oh, well,
Alex Iantaffi (49:33):
what is more? My Calendar. I'm trying to release
one every two weeks and I'vebeen very good to season so
we'll see how it goes. The swordYes, there are many ways of
seeing your wisdom, whether it'sbooks, audiobooks, electronic
versions of your books, whichalso exists. The two existed
podcasts and probably though,will there be agreement
(49:55):
therapist podcasts? I think itwould be beautiful. I don't
know. But
Justine Mastin (49:59):
we're Still trying to figure out what the
grieving therapist will be Ivery much would love to have a
retreat type environment wherewe literally sit around the
campfire. And we literally drawmaps. But that's right now I
(50:20):
need to focus on I'm startingseveral new chapters of my life.
So stay tuned. Yes,
Alex Iantaffi (50:29):
and I know that you're in transition in a number
of ways. But if people are localin Minnesota, you have a
wonderful opportunity coming up,I think soon after. This episode
is released for folks to endowwith you in person you want to
literally write well, I don'tknow if there's gonna be a
campfire because it's pretty hotat the moment up here. But
(50:52):
metaphorical campfire,
Justine Mastin (50:54):
there will be a literal campfire. So thank you
for for that setup, your if ifyou are local to the Twin Cities
or want to travel to the TwinCities on August 16. Me and my
colleague Mari appel Doran areputting on an event called camp
(51:15):
counselor, which is a full dayworkshop of nurturing community.
So while there will betrainings, and opportunities for
CEUs really the point is you getto radically nurture yourself
and community and the day is allabout choice, want to go to a
(51:39):
session, cool, go to thesession, want to go walk the
labyrinth, cool, go walk thelabyrinth, want to be in
community, with your fellows andsit on a bench, great, take a
nap, swim in the pool, there'sso many options, and we'll be
we'll be taking the lens ofinternal family systems, and
(52:02):
enhancing our not just self ofthe therapist, but our self
energy of the therapist. So thatwe can return to our work
feeling actually replenished,rather than the way we typically
feel at the end of day oftraining. And I would love to
(52:22):
see folks there and I will bemoving out of the Twin Cities
area very shortly afterwards. SoI would love to meet people in
person. Oh, come on down to CampCounselor. There are also really
cute T shirts.
Alex Iantaffi (52:36):
If that sounds so good. I'm hoping to make it. And
if you're listening to thisepisode, after that has
happened, do not fear becausethere are going to be all this
opportunities for you to engagewith Justine's material. And I'm
sure there will be all kind ofpanels, you know, conventions
and so on. And I'll put all ofthose kind of in the episode
(52:56):
description as well. But isthere a place where if people
are looking for you, you know,where your books or podcasts are
to hire you like, where shouldthey go?
Justine Mastin (53:05):
Yep. If folks want to follow me on social
media, I'm always delighted. I'mon Instagram, and Tiktok at Mind
Body Fandom, because I take aholistic approach to healing
mind, body and fandom. And thenyou can find more info about
everything that I do. And mywebsite, Justinemastin.com.
Alex Iantaffi (53:26):
Beautiful thank you Justine, I feel like I could
keep having this conversation.
But I'm gonna be respectful ofyour time. So I will ask you the
question that I always ask allmy guess is that anything that
we have not talked about? Thatyou really was, were hoping to
kind of patch out or you werehoping to talk about?
Justine Mastin (53:44):
Now, this was such a delightful conversation.
I feel like we we traveled allthrough middle earth today.
We you know, we visited theelves we visited the dwarves we
saw the eagles. I feel verycomplete. So thank you so much
for having me.
Alex Iantaffi (54:04):
That's beautiful.
I also feel like we went on ajourney together. And it was so
fun. I was like, Oh, I know. Iwas like, oh, maybe we should
just have more conversationsaround fandoms and that gender
like specific fandoms andgender, that would be so fun.
But thank you for your time totoday. I really appreciate you
and I really appreciate yourwork just the Thank you. So good
(54:25):
to see you. And to you, deargender stories, listeners or
watchers, for those of us thatyou're watching on YouTube. Take
care of yourself and find waysto replenish your soul. And I'm
really curious about whatstories fire you up. So feel
free to contact me and let meknow. And then maybe I can make
sure that we talk about thosestories in future episodes. And
(54:47):
until next time, take care
Hello, and welcome to another episode of
gender stories as ever, and youknow, if you listen to my
podcast, I am excited because Ialways have the best guests. And
today, I am thrilled to beinterviewing Justine Mastin who
is an LMFT. So a fellow Marriageand Family Therapist and
colleague together and I'm justkidding, thank you for being
(00:24):
here. Thank you, as well asbeing an awesome human being.
She's a pop culture, psychologyexpert, and so much more. She
literally wrote the book ontherapeutic fanfiction. And
also, I've seen her present onthis topic and she's
magnificent. But the book isStarship Therapize using
therapeutic conviction torewrite your life. And she's
also offer support to therapistsand healers. In their most more
(00:47):
recent book, The GrievingTherapist: Caring for Yourself
and Your Client When It FeelsLike The End of the World, which
is pretty much everyday as faras I'm concerned, right
nowadays. And if you're watchingthe podcast, you can see the
cover of The Grieving Therapist,I lent Starship Therapize out so
I don't have it with me, that'show great it is I lent it out.
But both books are reallywonderful. And more than that,
(01:12):
Justine also has two podcasts,Yoga Quest is the fearless
leader of Yoga Quest, you do somany things. And she's also
proud to nurture futuretherapists as an AAMFT approved
supervisor and educator and as aTEDx talk. And don't worry, dear
listeners, I'm putting all ofthis links in the description.
(01:33):
So you can go check out themillion things that Justine
does! so welcome. just seen. So
Justine Mastin (01:38):
thank you so much for having me. And thank
you for that lovely intro. Yes.
Sometimes when I hear it allrecited back to me, I think
maybe I need to slow my roll.
Alex Iantaffi (01:49):
I know that feeling so as a follow over
door. Not that I'm saying you'reoverdoing it, but I your
website, and I was like, Oh, howdo you even find time to do all
those things?
Justine Mastin (02:01):
Yeah, I just do.
Although the longer answer isthat I have wonderful people
around me who support me. And,you know, for both of the books,
Starship Therapize, and TheGrieving Therapist, I have a co
author who also happens to be myvery best friend in the world,
who is also a licensed Marriageand Family Therapist, Larisa A.
Garskii. I, I would never wantto write alone.
Alex Iantaffi (02:26):
I know that failing, I wrote like one book
alone. Books I co authored for areason with my writing partner,
MJ, who is also one of myclosest people. So I clearly
understand how important it isto have people you collaborate
with and who support you. Andthen you can do things with it's
just, yes, none of us do thosethings alone or outside of
(02:47):
community, I don't think. Solet's talk about let's start
from Starship Therapize, becausethat's how I first became aware
of you.
Justine Mastin (02:57):
Oh, is that right? That's always fun, to
find out how people heard aboutme!
Alex Iantaffi (03:01):
I know , right.
You didn't know this. Because wehaven't talked about this. But
that's how I became aware ofkind of you and your work. And I
was so excited. Because I alsohave a lot of geeky clients. And
it was so wonderful to seeanother therapist who not only
work with the community, but youalso provide a lot of tools to
(03:21):
therapists on how to usefanfiction and how to use kind
of fandom to connect withclients in a therapeutic manner.
And so I one of the things I'mcurious about, given that this
is Gender Stories is that in myexperience, and it could be just
because I'm older, I don't know,like my 50s. But fandom
communities haven't always beenthe most welcoming in terms of
(03:43):
any gender was basically not acis man or people who are
racialized, not white ordisabled folks. And of course,
there are exceptions likeWiscon, which was one of my, you
know, Oh, yeah. Sounds like ascience fiction and fantasy
convention. That's like afeminist social justice focused,
(04:04):
kind of broader, kind of geekycommunity as at its challenges,
let's say to be Midwestern,perhaps around kind of
differences and diversity andanything that deviates from kind
of the stereotypical fan let'scall it usually a cis white
straight man. And it's younodding so okay, this is so as
(04:27):
you experience being part of thecommunity, let's just start from
there, man. Yeah.
Justine Mastin (04:38):
When I first got interested in pop culture
stories, this was before theinternet was the way the
internet is right. I'm, I'm inmy 40s And so when I was coming
up, like I guess there wasinternet but I was not savvy
enough to be If anywhere nearthat, we didn't have a computer
(05:03):
in our home until Anyway, pointbeing, I had no idea that other
people liked the stuff I liked,or that they felt about it the
way I felt about it. Becauseit's not just that I loved Twin
Peaks, its that Twin Peaksreally meant something to me.
(05:23):
Like, like deeply profoundlymeant something to me. And the
fact that Agent Dale Cooper saidthat he didn't know where we
were going, but he was sure itwould be a place both wonderful
and strange. And as a strangeyoung person who didn't
understand my strangeness yet,and that strangeness was always
(05:44):
presented as bad. Having thisperson that I felt deeply
connected to say, both wonderfuland strange, was was so like,
profoundly meaningful for me.
But I didn't know how to tellanybody. Luckily, I mean, my
parents were both story lovers.
(06:05):
They were both writers andeditors. And, you know, story
was very welcome. In our home,there were always stories, and
it was totally valid to engagewith them. And also, there
wasn't exactly a community thatI could go to and be like, so
everybody loves Dale Cooper,right. And we all like, we're
(06:27):
all giving ourselves a giftevery day. And so my exposure
was I was in theater when I wasyoung. And so I found some folks
in a theater community who werealso embedded in stories, but
again, just didn't know how tohave those conversations about
the deepness and the richness.
And it really wasn't until Imaybe 2010, I had just trained
(06:51):
to be a yoga teacher. And I wentto my first pop culture
convention, that same year, andthe timing was wild, but it just
happened to be what it happenedto be. And I looked around and
thought I haven't felt quite athome in the yoga community. And
(07:16):
I think it's because thiscommunity is what I want. Could
I merge wellness and thesestories that are profoundly
meaningful to me? And the answerwas, you can if you want to, and
you put a lot of time. And so Istarted creating spaces. So
(07:41):
that's a very long windingstory. And then, you know, I've
made my way into many popculture spaces now, where I've
had a variety of experiences.
You know, there are spaces thatare very welcoming. There are
spaces that are meh. Andhistorically, fandom spaces have
(08:08):
not been welcoming to folks whoare outside of, you know, cis
het white dudes. And there wassort of a movement during Star
Trek. Yep. The original series,right. When women started
writing fanfiction
Alex Iantaffi (08:29):
Absolutely. And it's likeI have so many
feelings.
Justine Mastin (08:33):
okay, yeah, jump in. Come in. Otherwise, I will
just monologue. (laughs)
Alex Iantaffi (08:37):
(laughs) That's wonderful. That's great. I was
like, I was sitting back I waslike, Go jJustine, you can have
I think the wellness is embeddedin whatever direction we go.
a whole hour, keep talking.
(both laugh) I'm here with you.
I'm going on this journey oflike, Yeah, Justine, finding
takes and that findingcommunity. I'm here for the
monologue. But I will askquestions, because my brain is
(08:58):
pinging in 10 differentdirections, which is like, you
know, there is this piece whereeven kind of this this feeling,
right? I want to share this withother people, right. One of the
things that I realized that wasa gift for me growing up was
that there wasn't so much thiskind of geeky label if you were
into like, manga or comic books,like usually in the 70s and 80s.
(09:21):
It seemed to be pretty common ormaybe it was just like that was
so oblivious that it made medifferent. Other no could go
either way. But you know, it'slike you could find those things
at the newsstand and everybodyelse watch the same kind of
shows and really, like, youknow, anime was just so big in
Italy in the 70s and 80s. And sowhen I moved to kind of the UK
(09:44):
at first and then the US back in22,008, just realizing that
there were like all thesecommunities that were like
physical communities right?
already connected online, livethe days of Live Journal, like
that. I don't know where wecould talk about like, did you
watch this episode? Did it touchyour heart? Right? So there's
kind of this piece aboutcultural context, right? Where
(10:05):
we label as like other or aspecific interest or a niche.
And then there is this piece oflike, Who is this content for?
Who is the creative thatconsumes it right? But then
there is this other piece aboutwellness and the healing we find
through stories, right? So thereare like three pieces, like each
one of them could be a wholeepisode, quite frankly. So I
(10:28):
leave it to you to pick up likewhich piece you want to talk
about. But really, we could goin any direction. I mean, maybe
I guess we should go thewellness direction, because
we're both therapists, or wecould go another direction too.
(10:49):
Right? Because stories are soinherently healing. So wherever
we go, healing will follow.
Oh my god, I love that. I feellike that should be on a t shirt
wherever we go, healing willfollow. The Final Frontier.
(both laugh)
Justine Mastin (11:04):
That's right.
Boldly going into therapy. (bothlaugh)
Alex Iantaffi (11:09):
Well, I think that's the thing. I think, you
know, you said I love that youtalked about the wonderful and
strange piece right? And TwinPeaks is not my fandom, but I've
been in fandom spaces enoughthat I feel like I've absorbed
some of the shorts wisdom butyou know, affinity, but this
idea that kind of I think a lotof us will feel maybe different
(11:31):
or other often find ourselves inscience fiction in fantasy, you
know, I don't think it's anaccident. I've talked about even
with like, trans authors who'vebeen on the show, right? The how
many trans and queer folks arereally into science fiction and
fantasy, you know, shapeshifting, of course, you know,
or you know, even Octavia Butlerkinda Lilith's Brood, you know,
(11:55):
the beautiful and strange genderexpansive interspecies love, you
know, and creation, and all ofit all the complex themes of
that trilogy. Right. It's like,I think there is something that
draws us when we feel like wedon't fit into the dominant
culture to those stories thatare maybe outside of the current
(12:16):
paradigm. Is that been yourexperience as well? And?
Justine Mastin (12:20):
Yeah, absolutely. I, I was on
Minnesota Public Radio just afew weeks ago, and talking about
parasocial relationships.
Alex Iantaffi (12:30):
Yes.
Justine Mastin (12:31):
And for any of your listeners or watchers who
aren't familiar with thatconcept. parasocial
relationships are the one sidedrelationships that we have with
fandom characters. So that couldbe fictional characters that
could be celebrities whom we'venever met. It could be
historical characters. And Icall them fandom attachments,
(12:54):
because it's all aboutattachment. And we are
attachment seeking creatures bynature. And if we aren't finding
the community that we're lookingfor, if we aren't seeing
ourselves represented in otherstories, we're going to
gravitate towards that whichfeels is calling to us that we
(13:14):
can attach to. And of course, wewant to attach to, you know,
something that that feelsaligned. And for folks who are
outside the mainstream. Often,that is fantasy and sci fi,
because those folks are thinkingoutside the cultural paradigm.
(13:38):
And they're sometimes not doinga great job. I mean, I love the
television series Supernatural.
I'm a, I'm a big Supernaturalfan. And they haven't done great
with thinking outside the box.
But their fans are great atthinking outside.
Alex Iantaffi (14:00):
Which I think is where the fan fiction comes in.
Right? Sometimes this fictionthat love even more than the
original stories and a lot ofways.
Justine Mastin (14:08):
Yes, well, and you know, I think of a character
like Dean Winchester, I JensenAckles, has said over and over
again, that he plays Dean as aheterosexual dude. That is not
what I observe. When I watch theshow and see his behavior and
eye contact and body movement.
And, you know, I'm like, as a biI am seeing myself reflected in
(14:32):
you sir and it's, it's fine ifthat's not how you plan to play
it, but that's how I'm receivingit. And I'm connecting to you
because I am receiving that. Andso my headcanon my personal
fanfiction is Dean, you arebisexual and that means that I
feel like I can connect to youbetter.
Alex Iantaffi (14:55):
And that's the beauty I think in the wellness
and the healing of storiesright? Who do we connect to and
why you know, and we might evenhave an act to characters that
are so different from us, right?
Aliens or even Non Humans, orshapeshifters. Right. But how do
we find that kind of heartconnection that helps us
understand ourselves? Sometimesit's also that comfort thing.
(15:18):
Recently, I've been rewatchingJessica Jones, and I'm like, why
am I watching this show? There'sso much trauma,
intergenerational, like, youknow, family dynamics. And I'll
say, you know, what am I doing?
But then I was watching seasontwo, and I'm like, oh, there it
(15:39):
is. There is this piece whereshe's just reflecting right? And
she talks about, I'm not like,whew, you know, we Kilgrave and
I'm like, you her mom. I don'tthink it's been out for a while.
You can't spoiler.
Justine Mastin (15:52):
I don't think you can spoiler. Anyone. There
were also comics.
Alex Iantaffi (15:55):
Yeah, there were also comics for a long time
before Marvel picked them up.
Yeah, boy, that was like, so Idon't think it's a spoiler. But
you know, I'm always like, socareful. But there is this piece
where she's like, No, I can'tcontrol myself, right. So I'm
more powerful than right kind oftaking your power back taking
your agency. And I think thatsometimes, you know, growing up,
like when you feel like youdon't have agency either because
(16:16):
maybe you are kind of, you know,you present or brought up
feminine in the world, or youfeel like you then have power in
some other way or experiencedtrauma, right? Those stories
help us make sense, right, in away to represent the side of me
that wishes I could just be anasshole and let all my rage out.
The way she does right, kind of.
(16:38):
She has a very differentmanagement strategy. She's not a
people pleaser, I am. There'ssomething satisfying, I think,
to see the side, you know, whichis kind of in me but doesn't get
expressed because the peoplepleaser aside always wins,
right? But to see this characteralmost embody this anger, rage,
(16:59):
isolation, difficulties withintimacy that any of us who
experienced trauma, understandwhat that feels like. Does that
make sense? So this intersectionis so beautiful. Absolutely.
Justine Mastin (17:10):
And what was coming up for me as you were
talking, I was thinking aboutBuffy the Vampire Slayer, which
came out my final year of highschool. And I remember just
thinking, Where was this? Yes,where was this, I needed this.
And I, I became a Buffy devotee,you know, start to finish. And
(17:34):
we could have a wholeconversation about creators and
how they disappoint us. And thatis a story for another time.
There's a lot to be said aboutcreators and how they disappoint
us. But the character of Buffy,was so meaningful to me in a
similar way to what you'resaying with Jessica Jones. It's
(17:56):
like, okay, so you're telling methat a girl can be powerful, and
stylish, and athletic, and soft,and complicated and funny, and
all these things? Whoa, becausewhen I was coming up as a
teenager, in the 90s, everythingwas just this, like,
(18:20):
polarization you are either thisor that. You can't be two
things. Pick a lane, you'regoing to be a theater nerd,
you're not going to be athletic,and like you can do dance,
that's fine. But that's notYou're not athletic. Let's just
be clear about that. You'regonna be soft, you're choosing a
soft lane. And I'm like, but I'mactually like, kind of soft
(18:41):
Butch, although I don't havethat language yet. You know, but
I have a chain wallet. Because?
Because I know that feels right,somehow. But it's not okay for
me to be those many things. Andhere was Buffy, coming in saying
no, you can be all those things,and have community.
Alex Iantaffi (19:04):
And have community. That's right, because
there was this piece aboutcommunity, even surrogate
parental figures with Giles. I'ma Buffy fan too and yes, all our
favorites are problematic. Wecan we could talk about that
like for the whole episode. Youknow, we almost called our
oldest child Joss or Anyanka.
So, you know, before we knewwhere all our favorites are
(19:26):
problematic, this was a timeago, you know, two decades ago,
and a little bit more actuallynow. From when I was kind of
gestating but yeah, that's likeI think there is something in
that. And they're all articles.
So at the end, we like sharingthe power right? About being
exceptional, or individuallyexceptional, right? That
(19:48):
actually you cannot do this inisolation and that's what I love
about Buffy as well. And that'slike finding different pieces
and different fandoms right,like in Buffy it's like it's an
ensemble piece I think aboutSome of those beautiful shots
were the move as a group, right?
Yeah. Especially like in themusical episode,
Justine Mastin (20:07):
Oh, Once More With Feeling has amazing shots
of the whole . Yeah.
Alex Iantaffi (20:12):
Yeah. Right.
Like, it's very much an ensemblepiece where I think, you know,
Jessica Jones way yeah, she hasallies, but she's pushing people
away, right, it's differentparts of ourselves and in a way
are different people that canrelate to different parts. And I
love that what you said aboutlike, you know, you can be
complex, you can be many thingsin a world that often wants to
(20:34):
wants us to be very this or thatyou're either kind of smart, but
you can't be pretty if you're agirl, you know, you can be soft
if you're a girl, but you can behard, right? You can be really
good at math, but then thatmeans you're not supposed to
care about what you look like orwhat you know, like. And even as
a parent, I see that it's breaksmy heart that my kid who is like
(20:54):
in her early 20s is stilldealing with some of that.
misogyny, that's just like, kindof not going away. Right. And
it's so it's so interesting thatwe can make sense of ourselves
through those stories, whilethen also having to deal with
the kind of relating withinfandom with folks who are also
(21:16):
perpetuating some of thestories. Does that make sense?
Yes. Do your clients ever talkabout that? I mean, obviously,
not disclosing any personalinformation, but like, this
theme of like, oh, this is mycommunity, but also this
community is sometimes asmisogynistic or transphobic, or
racist, and or all of the above,you know, or queer phobic, and
(21:38):
it hurts me in this ways. Thisis where I should feel like I
belong. And yeah, I also, like,sometimes I don't belong. Does
that make sense? Yeah,
Justine Mastin (21:50):
well, and I can speak to actually having those
conversations in fandom spaces.
Because for the past 10 years orso I've been going to pop
culture conventions and talkingabout wellness, whether it's,
you know, moving our bodies orself care or mental health. And
I'll talk about the power ofcommunity. And, you know,
someone inevitably will raisetheir hand and say, Well, what
(22:13):
if your community is toxic?
Alex Iantaffi (22:17):
Surprise.
Justine Mastin (22:21):
Right. And so, I, obviously, the answer is, it
depends. But if we're talkingabout, you know, fandom spaces,
like the internet, sure, thereare going to be some forums that
are going to be different thanother ones. And, to my mind,
(22:44):
it's, in the same way that weacknowledge that we love Aunt
Doris as a human, and we rejecther beliefs about certain groups
of people. We can accept thatthese other people love
Supernatural. And let go of oftheir belief system that doesn't
(23:09):
match with ours. And that'sokay. Because we're all allowed
to have that fanfiction. And ifthey're trying to put that on us
and say we're bad, or that we'rewrong, thank you so much. Next.
Alex Iantaffi (23:27):
Absolutely. And find your people who are gonna
share that, right because it'slike, and it's so interesting,
because even not just withfanfiction, but also with
reimagining our existingmaterial. I'm thinking about
Bridgerton In some ways as itsown fandom, right? I love almost
everything can be a fandom atthis point, you know, and
(23:47):
there's been so much outrageabout changing the gender of
some of the characters. It'smore queer in the TV series, and
it was in the books, even thoughthe book's author was like, this
was cool with me. Some peoplewere having feelings and I try
not to engage. Sometimes like Ican't resist when it's late at
night, and I can't sleep, I'mlike, let me put this little
(24:07):
comment.
Justine Mastin (24:08):
Let's get into a fight (laughs)
Alex Iantaffi (24:11):
Let's get into an internet fight for five minutes.
And I try it was like, I'm like,I'm trying to educate the see if
there's an opening, right. Andsometimes there is an opening
actually, I was trying toapproach with like, I'm curious,
sort of, like, Hey, did you havethis piece of information, you
know, somebody was like, andalso it's fascinating that it
was about queerness, but theymanaged to make it about gender
(24:32):
because of the change in genderfrom the book to the TV series.
Justine Mastin (24:34):
Sure, yeah.
Alex Iantaffi (24:35):
It beCame this whole transphobic like slew of
comments about, you know,there's only two genders Why do
they have to change the genderof the character? And I was
like, well, first of all, like,that's not even like there's a
trans person in Bridgerton rightnow. So you know,
Justine Mastin (24:50):
not that we are aware of!
Alex Iantaffi (24:52):
Not that we know as being revealed. I haven't
read the books, so I'm onlywatching the TV series, right. I
was Like, you know that actuallybecause they were like nature,
right? You know, this male andfemale in nature, I was like,
Oh, actually nature is much moreexpansive. Resources, it's happy
(25:13):
to share some resources. Right.
And for me, sometimes pushingback is also like what, you
know, 98% probability is thatthis person is not going to be
open to what I'm saying. Butthis piece about, like other
people in the comments alsogoing, Oh, my god, somebody else
gets it, somebody else ispushing back, maybe I don't have
the capacity to do that, right?
(25:35):
Because that matters, you know,when you do a panel, and there
is that person who stands up andgo, but what about, you know,
like, there's probably another,like 50 people standing up, and
I was sitting there thinkingthis thing. And so how would you
feel like the people find kindof spaces within spaces to take
care of themselves? So thosespaces where maybe the larger
(25:59):
fandom? Lets you know, it'scomplicated? And like you said,
it's like you just leave ontourists alone? Or, or maybe you
have one mild argument over acup of tea, and then kind of let
it go, when you feel like it,but then how do you find the
space, the smaller space withinthe larger space, where you can
(26:19):
feel supported and connected andheard? Yeah,
Justine Mastin (26:23):
So my invitation to folks, whether it's online or
in person, is go into spaces,where folks are similar to you,
which is like, Well, how do Ifind them? If you're going to a
convention, if you are a queerperson, look for the header that
says, This is a panel aboutqueer characters or by you know,
(26:47):
queer creators, or, you know,the, the industry has gotten...
Well, not the industry, theconversations at pop culture
events, and some other satellitelocations have been so much more
welcoming, welcoming ofdisability rights, and
Alex Iantaffi (27:05):
Absolutely. And I think that then it's like, you
transgender rights, and bringingin creators with those
identities to talk about theirown work and their own
experience. And so keep youreyes out for that. And then go
talk to the presenters, theyreally do want to talk to you,
say hi to the person sittingnext to you, because clearly,
(27:29):
you have at least something incommon, which is, you were
interested enough in this panelto make time for it. And that
doesn't necessarily mean thateveryone in the room has the
same identities. But there arepeople in the room with the same
values. Yes, for the most part,there is typically at least a
(27:53):
couple of folks that are justgoing to show up to hate watch,
and maybe hate comment. Becausethat's the world that we live
in. But the majority of peopleare there earnestly wanting to
make connections wanting tolearn more, also wanting to be
in community. And if you turn toyour neighbor and say, Hey, I'm
(28:18):
Justine, nice to meet ya, theywill also introduce themselves.
know, as well as this parasocialrelationships, and you're
creating some genuine communityconnection. Yes, if you go to
the same events over and over,right, and that can be really
(28:38):
scary. In relationships we havewith characters, right. Whereas
in connecting with other withour fellow humans, even if we
come on, there's always like thedanger of like rejection or
being hurt or feeling. And Ithink that's often what people
struggle with. I wonder ifyou've seen any example of
spaces where there is anintentionality around enabling
(29:01):
people to connect, right,because it can be hard for
people to connect. And I think,I don't know, maybe it's just me
or people I know. But for a lotof us, we're like, you're spicy
or different in other ways andfandom spaces. You know, it can
be a little intimidating. And somaybe even Yoga Quest, which is
one of the spaces you'vecreated, and curated and lead.
(29:24):
And I can definitely think ofexamples, but what do you see
those spaces do? Or like I said,maybe you can want to talk about
your own experience of creatingthat kind of space?
Justine Mastin (29:33):
Yeah, I mean, I created Yoga Quest exactly for
the reasons that you're sayingis that I went to that
convention and looked around andthought, how come we aren't
talking about how healing all ofthis is? And it's inherently
(29:55):
healing, but we could also bringin some additional self care
stuff like we're, we're allowedto move our body Yes, and no
matter our size or ability, andat the time, that was a pretty
radical thing to be seeing inyoga spaces.
Alex Iantaffi (30:12):
Yes, that's true.
Justine Mastin (30:15):
And yeah, I've always been a little bit of a
rabble rouser. So I was like,well, just, I don't see this
space anywhere. I'll just makeit. Yeah, and just sort of
reached out to here in the TwinCities, there's a group called
the Geek Partnership Society.
And I discovered that they had afitness branch, or what was it
(30:37):
called Geek Physique? was whatit was called. That's amazing.
It may still exist. But Ireached out to their organizer.
So it's something alreadyexisted, right? And I reached
out and said, hey, you know, I'myoga teacher, I'm a nerd. I have
this idea. It might flop. Butlike, Could I come over to your
(30:58):
warehouse and try it? And theywanted to meet me? to vet me,
which, of course, totally fair.
I want to make sure I wasn'tsome, you know, hardcore
cheerleader girl who was goingto be on everybody for
something. Yeah, exactly. Like Iwas coming in to bully
(31:18):
everybody. And I mean, I'm, I'mpretty, like, I'm a pretty
traditional Yogi looker, or verymuch was at the time, you know,
the petite blonde woman. Butafter talking for a bit, it's
like, okay, you're, you're cool.
Alex Iantaffi (31:39):
You might be pithy than blonde, but you're
one of us. Exactly. It was like,All right, just like Buffy.
Justine Mastin (31:47):
Exactly you can, you can be many things at once.
But I understood it. And I wasjust very intentional that I, I
wanted this to be as welcomingas possible. And so I was really
explicit. When people came in,to give permission, like, for
(32:08):
doing a pose, you don't like,I'll give some options. If you
don't like any of those, youhave to do anything I'm saying.
Because guess what, Friends, youare autonomous human beings who
get to decide what to do withyour minds and bodies.
Alex Iantaffi (32:19):
What? (laughs)
Justine Mastin (32:21):
And truly, it was mind blowing for people. And
I started getting more and moretraction, because people were
like, Alright, so this, thislittle lady isn't going to be
mean to me, then she's going totell me that I deserve and I'm
worth the effort to take care ofmyself. Wow. And I'm not the
(32:47):
only person who was doing this.
It was sort of part of thezeitgeist, I noticed at the
time. And there there are somefitness orgs that are still
going my, my friend at Geek GirlStrong. Who does an online
business mostly. But I thinkshe's in Philly. She was in New
York. But I started going toconventions and teaching yoga
(33:09):
and people like wow, I just, youknow, I, I've never been given
permission like this before. Andso my invitation to folks, and I
know, it's scary. I do. I knowit's scary. If you don't see the
thing that you need, or want,you're allowed to make it. And
(33:32):
that's how we got all of theawesome stories that we love so
much, is that people didn't seethe story they needed. And so
they made it.
Alex Iantaffi (33:47):
Absolutely, and so much of fanfiction is that
right? Or some people writingthem ourselves in the stories?
Right? Okay, I don't see thequeerness. So there is subtext
about the queerness. So makethat subtext text right? Or I'm
gonna imagine doing somethingdifferent with this Canon, that
makes me feel more included.
Absolutely. And then sometimesas, as we do that, and become
(34:11):
more involved in community, wemight also find, oh, hang on a
minute. There are all theseother stories that are maybe not
as mainstream, but actuallywhere I can see myself I can see
my racialized identity or mygender or my queerness or my
disability, right. And it'sbeautiful, kind of to see that.
There's now more opportunitiesfor people to also just get the
(34:32):
stories out in the worldbecause, yes, well,
Justine Mastin (34:37):
and as you're talking about this, I'm thinking
of, you know, when when youasked like, how do you also how
do you find your people? Thereare stories that exist, that are
doing good work, like Our FlagMeans Death?
Alex Iantaffi (34:51):
Oh, my God. I love that show so much. I just
watched it again for the thirdtime. Let's talk about that.
Justine Mastin (34:59):
Right And for folks who aren't familiar, it's
it's also lovingly known as thegay pirate show. Taika Waititi
and Rhys Darby as Blackbeard andStede Bonnet, the gentleman
pirate on the high seas. Andthey are canonically a couple.
Alex Iantaffi (35:22):
And it's not just that they're canonically a
couple, they're also like, kindof, like, messed up by their
family of origin, you know, sothere's some trauma. I think a
lot of our flag means daffodilsabout what this family means.
And what does it mean? Family,it's very much about queer
(35:44):
family. And, and there are a lotof lots of prayer stories where
people are not necessarilylooking the way we expect them
to look. So for me as I strugglewith aging, quite frankly, to
see like a same gender story oftwo older man was like very,
it's very healing. Especiallylike, there's a lot of kind of
(36:06):
ageism, in terms of kind ofyouth worship in gay male
community in my experience,right for a lot of jokes about
but that by the time you turn30, you might as well be dead,
you know, like, I mean,especially somebody who grew up
like during the AIDS crisis, Iwas like, Yeah, right. One of
our people did that. They did.
You know, like, I went to themcarrying exhibit of the walker.
(36:27):
And I was just like cryingthinking about how much more you
could have done right, if youlive longer, you know, he died
like in his 30s. So many amazingpeople died in their 30s. You
know, people would have been myelders now. Right, right. Like
we lost so many algos. And so tosee a story, like our flag mean
stuff with tool, man, it's notjust the queerness. It's also
(36:50):
like, they're older, thecharacters are complicated,
they're messy. They're dealingwith PTSD, and trauma, and
finding themselves in a worldthat's like, also systemically
complex in terms of class andgender. And yeah, it's such a
beautiful story, right?
Justine Mastin (37:12):
Yeah. What what did you think of Jim?
Alex Iantaffi (37:17):
I love Jim. And I love how Jim is handled, that's
another piece right? There isthis like non binary actor
playing this character, whenthere is like the gender reveal,
so to speak, that this personwho we perceive as a man at the
beginning, is actually maybe nota man, where there is this piece
where people are confused, andthey just go, it's just Jim and
(37:39):
everybody is just like, oh,okay, you know, or when they
meet the person or kind ofbrought them up basically, after
their family dies. They're like,this It's just Jim now, and the
person is just like, Yeah, youknow, the non just goes into
Jim, and they just seamlessly,right? It's even not a thing.
(38:01):
And I loved it. I loved it,because it wasn't, the emphasis
is not on that piece of thestory. They're just the
character. Same as in the latestseason of Doctor Who there's
been a lot of combo
Justine Mastin (38:14):
I'm not, I'm not caught up. But what I do know
all of the buzz, yes.
Alex Iantaffi (38:19):
yeah, there's just some good I will not do any
spoilers because like peoplejust saying that I used to have
a favorite doctor and I have anew favorite doctor. Ncuti is
amazing as a new doctor, and butthere are kind of just beautiful
day, that moment and DisabilityJustice stuff. It's very subtle.
It's just there, you know, to beexplained without having to be
(38:42):
the focus of the story. And whenthat happens, what about you?
Well, what did you like aboutOur Flag Means Death? What was
the thing that spoke to you themost?
Justine Mastin (38:52):
Yeah, I mean, there were so there were so many
things. The this focus on foundfamily was just just spoke to my
heart so much, and I've been ona few panels about Our Flag
Means Death. And you know whyit's so revolutionary. And you
know, why it has such a strongfan base, many of whom are queer
(39:17):
folks, disabled folks of variousmarginalized identities, like,
Well, I think to the scene wherethey're making flags. Yes. And
they're going to vote on whichone is the best flag and then
they will fly the best flag andthey fly everybody's flag. And
(39:39):
in that moment, I was 100%bought in because I was like,
they get it. We're allimportant. We all deserve to
have our flag flown.
Alex Iantaffi (39:51):
That is so beautiful. And that's maybe a
good segue, because I'm aware oftime I feel like I could talk to
you for like the whole day andmaybe we'll just have another
episode. But for now, maybethat's a good segue to talk
about The Grieving Therapist,because when I first saw that
you had another book coming out,came out, you know, when it was
like preorder. It was like, whatthat's fascinating that you went
(40:13):
from like fanfiction, and usingfanfiction, therapeutically, to
you know, something like, TheGrieving Therapist, which is
really about, you know, caringfor yourself as a therapist and
a healer during this time oflike, you know, climate crisis,
and genocide, you know, theincrease of global fascism, I
(40:34):
mean, you know, take your book,
Justine Mastin (40:36):
just everything, everything crisis
Alex Iantaffi (40:40):
was talking to my therapist, and I was like, you
know, I don't know if I'm, like,depressed or if this is a good
reaction to what's happening inthe world, or if it's
perimenopause, or even knowanymore, or maybe a side effect
of this medication? I honestlydon't know, I'm kind of sitting
with it with curiosity, right?
There's a lot to be depressedabout. But not yet. Do you know,
like, I feel like it's areasonable response to the
(41:00):
world. But I was curious, like,how did we go from like, fan
fiction to The GrievingTherapist in a, you know, I made
sense of it once I read thebook. But I'm curious about from
your point of view, if it feltlike a change in trajectory or
not so much, or if it felt justlike a continuation of your
(41:22):
story, in some way?
Justine Mastin (41:25):
Yeah, well, so something that I talk to my
students about a lot is theimportance of understanding
historical context. And tounderstand how I went from
starships that are PIs to thegrieving therapist requires
historical context there.
Larissa and I had been pitchingstarship therapies for a long
(41:48):
time, we were finally able tofind the most wonderful editor.
And that picked us up andbrought us into North Atlantic
books. And we, we were soexcited. Three months later, the
pandemic happened. We wrote theentirety of Starship Therapize
(42:09):
during the pandemic. So thismostly quite light hearted, you
know, foray into play and storywas written during some of the
most depressing times in ourlives. Yeah. And we didn't get
to do any of the things that wethought we were gonna get to do.
(42:31):
Like when we sold StarshipTherapize. The intention was,
we're going to be at Comic Con,we're going to be at smaller pop
culture conventions, we're goingto do all this stuff to release
the book and be in all thesepublic spaces and all these
convention fandom spaces. Theworld was shut down for years.
(42:52):
And so The Grieving Therapistcame out of the literal grief we
experienced, from having to letgo of our dream of what it was
going to be, to, to be authorsto release a book, to be
therapists, to you know, to behumans in this world. There is
(43:15):
just there was so much grieving.
It was so awful. And when ourwhen our wonderful editor, Shana
came to us and said, Hey, whatdo you want to write next?
Larisa I sat down, we wrote outa bunch of ideas. And I was
like, I think it'd be reallyimportant for us to write about
(43:35):
the grief we experienced. Whichis very funny. If you know me
and Larisa, becausehistorically, I am a Kirk. I am.
I am the boisterous bravado,let's just get in the ship and
fly. And she's very Spock, shewants to sit and consider and
but she also tends to be theholder of emotions for us. And
(43:57):
so me saying let's talk aboutgrief. She's like, what is
happening? Yeah, what ishappening? But from her Spock
mind, she was playing it out andgoing, this is going to be
really painful. And hard. And Idon't want to do that. And my
Kirkness is like, we alreadyfelt the pain, Larisa. So we're
(44:17):
just writing about it. Yeah,see, we're not It's not like
we're gonna feel it again.
Alex Iantaffi (44:24):
I mean, then you might, but that's part of the
process. Right? Yeah. I
Justine Mastin (44:29):
The funny thing is oh, boy, did we feel it?
Yeah. Yeah. But Shana was soexcited about this book was
like, Yeah, let's do it. And wespent nine months reliving grief
and stepping into all of thesegrieving spaces. And I got COVID
which turned into long COVID Andit had major psychological
(44:53):
impact on me as well as youknow, bodily impact and I may
It's a major self discoveriesduring that time. So, even
though it seems like the, how isThe Grieving Therapist, the
spiritual sequel to StarshipTherapize, it was what came
(45:17):
next.
Alex Iantaffi (45:18):
Absolutely. Yeah.
Which to me makes complete sensein terms of timing. I was like,
Oh, yes, this is so you know,it's this is so essential in
terms of where we are, andnothing Well, comes to mind, as
you were talking was also how wefind ourselves through writing
stories, as well as listeningand consuming stories, right,
(45:41):
which is hard to, you know, justlike fanfiction, but we also
when we write nonfiction, we'realso making sense of our own
stories. And I love how youdescribe that beautiful arc of
actually, like, there was allthis excitement, and then life
had other plans, which actually,often is at the heart of many of
the stories we love, right? Weare on one path and life has
(46:05):
other plan and find us on thislike, very different quest.
Sometimes a side quest becomesthe main quest.
Justine Mastin (46:15):
Yeah. And we did get to still write some fanfic.
We got to fanfic, some of ourfavorite theorists are from a
variety of realms into animalspirits that were wandering
through this sort of fantasticalland that we created. And if you
(46:37):
haven't read the book, friendsat home, I promise it all
connects and makes sense. (bothlaugh)
Alex Iantaffi (46:41):
Yes. That's all makes sense. If you read the
book capsule, well, and, and ina way, I also do see the spirit
of what you're doing with yogaquest in this book, right? It's
like this connection of like,how can stories help us make
sense, right? When we bringstories into movement for yoga,
(47:02):
right? When we bring our storiesinto fandom, when we bring story
and narrative into our emotion,our grief, right? We need to
make sense. We need stories andwe need analytics, right?
Whether it's animal allies, orother characters or fantastic
allies of some kind, right? Weneed to feel that we're not
alone, right? Kind of almostgoes back to the beginning of
(47:25):
this interview when you werelike, oh, Twin Peaks, and now
with with share with where mypeople are gonna get as excited
as I am about this, right? Yeah,absolutely. I love that. Wow. I
feel like I could go on and ontalking about all of this with
you and dear listeners, ifyou're listening, and you're
like, I love all of this. Andbooks are not my thing. Do not
(47:47):
fear because just see an authorhas got two podcasts in the
spirit of doing all the things.
Justine Mastin (47:54):
So I, we completed the Starship Therapize
podcast, it has it has concludedand we were very mindful about
the conclusion. So we even wespend several episodes talking
about how we're about to saygoodbye.
Alex Iantaffi (48:09):
Proper therapists that's been there. I like many,
like over 80 episodes. Oh, yeah,you can. You can spend some time
and spend some time with it feellike podcasts live forever, even
when they're done. You know whatI mean? That's right. Yeah.
Justine Mastin (48:21):
And then dark side of the mat is in
investigative journalism pilotpodcast about the creeps, cults
and crimes that show up in thewellness and yoga industry. We
put out episodes, verysporadically, because me and my
co host cat both, both have toomany jobs. But there, there are
(48:44):
a few apps on there. And they'redelightful. And also, if you
liked the sound of my voicetoday, I do the audiobooks. So
if you're more of a listenerthat are then a sit down reader.
You can also you can hear thisvoice say comforting things to
you for 10 hours, which
Alex Iantaffi (49:06):
be great.
Exactly. And I think even withdark side of the mouths, there's
like over 20 episodes out. Sothat's still like if people
haven't gotten into into it.
Like that sounds reallyinteresting. There's plenty of
others out and I get it I'vebecome much more regular. But
definitely, I've had my momentsat one point. During the
pandemic. I was like, I have notreleased an episode for a year.
(49:28):
Oh, how did that happen?
Justine Mastin (49:31):
Oops. Oh, well,
Alex Iantaffi (49:33):
what is more? My Calendar. I'm trying to release
one every two weeks and I'vebeen very good to season so
we'll see how it goes. The swordYes, there are many ways of
seeing your wisdom, whether it'sbooks, audiobooks, electronic
versions of your books, whichalso exists. The two existed
podcasts and probably though,will there be agreement
(49:55):
therapist podcasts? I think itwould be beautiful. I don't
know. But
Justine Mastin (49:59):
we're Still trying to figure out what the
grieving therapist will be Ivery much would love to have a
retreat type environment wherewe literally sit around the
campfire. And we literally drawmaps. But that's right now I
(50:20):
need to focus on I'm startingseveral new chapters of my life.
So stay tuned. Yes,
Alex Iantaffi (50:29):
and I know that you're in transition in a number
of ways. But if people are localin Minnesota, you have a
wonderful opportunity coming up,I think soon after. This episode
is released for folks to endowwith you in person you want to
literally write well, I don'tknow if there's gonna be a
campfire because it's pretty hotat the moment up here. But
(50:52):
metaphorical campfire,
Justine Mastin (50:54):
there will be a literal campfire. So thank you
for for that setup, your if ifyou are local to the Twin Cities
or want to travel to the TwinCities on August 16. Me and my
colleague Mari appel Doran areputting on an event called camp
(51:15):
counselor, which is a full dayworkshop of nurturing community.
So while there will betrainings, and opportunities for
CEUs really the point is you getto radically nurture yourself
and community and the day is allabout choice, want to go to a
(51:39):
session, cool, go to thesession, want to go walk the
labyrinth, cool, go walk thelabyrinth, want to be in
community, with your fellows andsit on a bench, great, take a
nap, swim in the pool, there'sso many options, and we'll be
we'll be taking the lens ofinternal family systems, and
(52:02):
enhancing our not just self ofthe therapist, but our self
energy of the therapist. So thatwe can return to our work
feeling actually replenished,rather than the way we typically
feel at the end of day oftraining. And I would love to
(52:22):
see folks there and I will bemoving out of the Twin Cities
area very shortly afterwards. SoI would love to meet people in
person. Oh, come on down to CampCounselor. There are also really
cute T shirts.
Alex Iantaffi (52:36):
If that sounds so good. I'm hoping to make it. And
if you're listening to thisepisode, after that has
happened, do not fear becausethere are going to be all this
opportunities for you to engagewith Justine's material. And I'm
sure there will be all kind ofpanels, you know, conventions
and so on. And I'll put all ofthose kind of in the episode
(52:56):
description as well. But isthere a place where if people
are looking for you, you know,where your books or podcasts are
to hire you like, where shouldthey go?
Justine Mastin (53:05):
Yep. If folks want to follow me on social
media, I'm always delighted. I'mon Instagram, and Tiktok at Mind
Body Fandom, because I take aholistic approach to healing
mind, body and fandom. And thenyou can find more info about
everything that I do. And mywebsite, Justinemastin.com.
Alex Iantaffi (53:26):
Beautiful thank you Justine, I feel like I could
keep having this conversation.
But I'm gonna be respectful ofyour time. So I will ask you the
question that I always ask allmy guess is that anything that
we have not talked about? Thatyou really was, were hoping to
kind of patch out or you werehoping to talk about?
Justine Mastin (53:44):
Now, this was such a delightful conversation.
I feel like we we traveled allthrough middle earth today.
We you know, we visited theelves we visited the dwarves we
saw the eagles. I feel verycomplete. So thank you so much
for having me.
Alex Iantaffi (54:04):
That's beautiful.
I also feel like we went on ajourney together. And it was so
fun. I was like, Oh, I know. Iwas like, oh, maybe we should
just have more conversationsaround fandoms and that gender
like specific fandoms andgender, that would be so fun.
But thank you for your time totoday. I really appreciate you
and I really appreciate yourwork just the Thank you. So good
(54:25):
to see you. And to you, deargender stories, listeners or
watchers, for those of us thatyou're watching on YouTube. Take
care of yourself and find waysto replenish your soul. And I'm
really curious about whatstories fire you up. So feel
free to contact me and let meknow. And then maybe I can make
sure that we talk about thosestories in future episodes. And
(54:47):
until next time, take care
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