Ever wondered how stepping away from conventional roles could redefine your identity? Join us as Jocelyn Tatum, a lifelong journalist and educator, shares her journey of self-discovery and professional evolution. From journalism to teaching to launching a women’s magazine, she reveals how each step uniquely prepared her for her creative path. Her insights highlight storytelling’s profound impact on both career and personal growth.
We discuss the courage needed to share personal stories and their transformative power, especially in prisons and abuse shelters. Jocelyn’s deep understanding of her audience led her toward narrative journalism and storytelling. She also shares her vision for a community-centered bookstore, blending journalism’s authenticity with business while fostering genuine connections.
Exploring identity and self-growth, we examine embracing multiplicity and storytelling’s healing power. Jocelyn reflects on navigating societal expectations, toxic relationships, and self-love. The episode closes with a heartfelt discussion on revisiting our younger selves, offering wisdom, and building a future shaped by perseverance, vulnerability, and a nurturing community.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
similarly, it's just occurred to me.
It was like wait a second, Iwasn't, I wasn't supposed to fit
in, I wasn't meant to.
You know, it was like that wasthe point, like that.
That's been so.
Uh, it's felt so good to doit's's liberating, isn't it?
Yeah, it's like we weren'tmeant to fit in some of these
(00:29):
spaces, you know, and that'sokay.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Hello, this is Maddox .
Speaker 3 (00:47):
And this is Dwight.
We're the Connections andCommunity guys and you're
listening to.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
The For the Love of Creatives podcast.
I stuttered, didn't I?
Speaker 3 (01:00):
It's quite all right.
Today we're joined by ourfeatured guest, Jocelyn Tatum.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Hi, nice to meet y'all.
Good to see y'all again.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Welcome to the podcast, jocelyn.
We're really excited to haveyou here and really excited for
you to share your story, becauseI think it's going to be
something that our audience isgoing to really love listening
to, based on the conversation.
Based on the conversation.
So I'll say, jocelyn and Dwightand I we met at a birthday
party a couple of weeks ago andafter some conversation at the
(01:30):
birthday party, we just realizedthat Jocelyn is like an ideal
candidate, you know, for being afeatured guest.
And so here we are, we invited,and she jumped up and down and
said yes, absolutely.
And I understand from her thatthis is pretty much the first
time that she's really sharedher story publicly.
(01:51):
I think that asking her toshare a story has kind of caused
her to really reflect.
But I'll let her tell you aboutthat.
Jocelyn, I'm going to pass itover to you and let you tell our
audience just a little bitabout who you are and what
you're up to, and then we'll gofrom there.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Yeah, thank you so much for having me.
Yeah, so you know back kind ofrelates to why I haven't shared
my story much.
I'm a lifelong journalist andwe are told to stay out of the
way we are not.
You know we can't use valueloaded terms.
I've been asked to speak quitea bit, but on news writing or
magazine writing, and my storyis never really involved in that
(02:31):
.
So it's kind of fun to.
I'm not allowed to usually talkabout me, so this is kind of
fun to tell my story a littlebit.
So I am a journalist, I am aneditor, I am a.
I've been a college educatoralso most of my life.
I kind of stepped away fromthat because you know the whole
adage when you're teaching,you're not doing, you're
(02:51):
teaching other people to do yourdream, and so it was kind of
something I fell into when I was.
I left the newsroom to moveback home to Texas and was going
to work in the newsrooms here.
But it was 2008 when therewasn't anyone was hiring, and so
I was like I'll just teachcollege for a semester.
I already had a master's innarrative journalism, which is
(03:14):
also known as creative long formcreative nonfiction, and so I
had the ability to teach, and soit ended up being a 12-year
journey, while I was a freelancejournalist on the side and I've
also launched a women'smagazine with someone else owned
it, but I was the executiveeditor and built the magazine
for her and that was beautifuland lovely.
(03:36):
And more recently, yeah, I'vebeen coaching and mentoring, and
so that's a little bit about me.
Sixth generation Texan, buthave lived all over the world.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
I just love the texture that you're building
into the story.
Already you have a broadbackground.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Yeah, it's a little all over the place, but at first
it was concerning to me.
While I was living my life atthe time, jumping all over the
place, I was like, what doesteaching have to do with my
journalism career?
I want to focus on myjournalism career and I was
teaching news writing, whichkept my mind fresh, and then I
was teaching media literacy,which included media ethics,
(04:19):
media economics, media law, andso it was all the research for
the lectures.
And then I was also runningstudent publications for the
district, so I was helpingmanage young reporters and
aspiring journalists, and so itwas like still kept my mind
fresh, but I was like teachingis just gonna like put a big
hole in my career.
But then when I look, you know,as we age and we look back, we
(04:41):
start to see like, oh my gosh,all of it makes sense.
It all absolutely makes senseto like where I'm supposed to be
and what I'm doing now and allof it's lending to the work that
I want to do in, you know, as acreative in the community.
I never called myself a creativeuntil recently.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I absolutely love that.
You know when, that moment whenyou realized all that jumping
around and all those things thatyou did that you didn't think
were related to much, all cameinto vision.
I have a similar experiencewhere I was, you know, in the
beauty industry for 40 years andI had side hustles that were
all over the map and then oneday, when it started to come
(05:21):
into focus, it was like, oh mygosh, this has been, you've been
training for something yourwhole life and didn't realize it
.
Isn't that powerful.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Yes, I love the way you said that, absolutely.
You've been training forsomething your whole life and
every just like a news story,every single bit of it adds
value to the thesis of the story.
Right, like every single piece.
I always think of it as connectthe dots, the thesis of the
story.
Right, like every single pieceI always think of as connect the
dots.
You know, like when you'redrawing the lines to make the
(05:52):
picture, towards the end of thepicture you start to see what
the thing is going to make outlike oh, it's a puppy or it's a
constellation.
You know it's kind of cool.
So we can look back and see,like everything, every moment,
even the heartaches, the resumegaps, you know they all
absolutely added value to wherewe're going next.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
That's amazing Now, when you, as you look back and
you're able to appreciate themasterpiece that has become the
life that you're leaning into.
What were the first hints thatyou were headed in the direction
of being able to share stories,to have an interest in
(06:31):
journalism?
Speaker 1 (06:34):
You know, it's interesting Another seemingly
disconnected part of my life.
I was a philosophy majorstudying ancient.
I loved studying ancientphilosophy and ancient wisdom
and at one point I was living inRome studying great tragedies
and comedies.
And then we went to Greece for10 days to kind of focus on that
(06:55):
part and we were studyingancient art and architecture and
I was just like wow, like thehuman story is universal and
it's never changed.
You hear these stories aboutthese ancient Greek gods, you
know, and their love storiessound very similar to my at the
time 21-year-old self's issues.
And so I was like how can I,you know?
(07:17):
And I was kind of teased alittle bit by like how useless
that degree was and how I waslike good job, jocelyn, you can
now critically think.
And I was like well, that'smore valuable than you think
these days.
But I was like how can I?
It's, it is very like what doyou?
What would I get a job in doingthat, you know?
So it was like human nature andstory is so important for the
(07:41):
healing of humanity and forconnecting people and it helps
me feel less alone.
You know, I had a pretty, prettydark childhood and so it.
Books saved me, stories savedme.
And so it was like, wow, howcan I, how can I make this
mundane, you know like a mundanepractice, and make this
(08:01):
digestible and earthly and notlike stuck in the heavens?
And I was like, oh, journalism.
And so I ended up going fromthat to get a master's in
journalism and so that's where Istarted being drawn to it, and
I ended up immediately met witha mentor there who became still
as a mentor after 20 years.
(08:21):
We were emailing last week.
He was a bureau chief, a WallStreet Journal bureau chief for
Mexico City, chicago, new York,and his big thing was narratives
in journalism, which is a kindof a unique practice.
And it's like how can you usecreative and literary devices in
nonfiction news writing toconnect people and to get people
(08:43):
to care about the subjects?
And I was like, oh my gosh, nowmy philosophy degree is making
sense, you know, with theemphasis in literature and all
that.
So that's, that's where itstarted.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
Oh, that's beautiful and I love the tie-in of how you
were connected to your mentorand I know that in being in a
position where you were.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
But in being in a position where you were
educating, you've probably beenable to pay that forward.
Yes, yeah, you know, I never.
I think for me, I never couldhave guessed this.
It's funny I was kind of I.
I never would wanted to be ateacher, and so when I did it, I
never thought I would love itas much as I did to be a teacher
, and so when I did it, I neverthought I would love it as much
as I did.
And I think it was because partof me knew, like these students
aren't going to rememberprobably 90% of what I'm
teaching them, but I knew thatthey would remember how they
(09:33):
felt in my class and and that itwas so important for me to know
that at least one person on theit doesn't take much right that
one person cared.
One person cared about my heart, my success, and so if I was
that one person, or if I was thethird person in their life,
just to let them know that Ideeply cared about them and
their success and that I wouldalways be there for them, and so
(09:57):
that was the thing aboutteaching that I never thought
would happen.
The thing about teaching that Inever thought would happen.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
That is so beautiful, jocelyn.
I mean, I got cold chills rightnow.
It's just wow, I'm in awe.
That's beautiful.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
So let's start with the here and now.
You know, when you and I spokeat the birthday party, you
shared a little bit.
I want to hear all the juicystuff you shared a little bit
about a dream that you have anda concept that you have begin to
flesh out and formulate.
So please take us there.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Yeah, okay, let's see if I can do this.
It's a little all over theplace, no, but I've really been
thinking about it a lot and kindof building the plane as it
takes off, but it just likeoccurred to me.
You know, one of the thingsthat I've learned about
journalism is that there's allthis gatekeeping, right, there's
like the journalist has to pickup the story and then they have
(10:54):
to pitch it to the editor andthe editor might turn it down,
and then there's like the editormight keep it, but then more ad
space sells, so the new storygets dropped.
Or there's a bigger story thatcomes in.
There's just um, or theadvertisers don't agree with the
content of this.
There's all this gatekeeping.
And so I was like you know, Ithink for me in my healing
(11:17):
journey recently I have beenjournaling about my life.
You trying to reflect on likepieces of my story and just to
write my own story for the firsttime has been so powerful.
In so many ways.
It's just healing, it's kind ofreflective, it integrates parts
of my life that I didn't evenum realize, I hadn't even
(11:39):
reflected on or integrated.
And so I was like how can Ibring all of this experience of
caring, of teaching, of newswriting, of into into the world
and bring that to others.
And so part of like when wehave a when we write, it's like
another way of having a voicewhen we write our story.
(12:00):
So it was like how can I likehelp people understand, have
access to their voice in adifferent way through, like the
writing process, and kind ofbring it out of the ivory tower
into these kind of writingworkshops, slash, healing,
storytelling circles?
So it sounds kind of similar towhat you all are doing a little
bit, but bringing peopletogether in um, in a circle, and
(12:25):
maybe we have a topic and thenwe tell our story and we share.
And I think you know maddox youhad mentioned like tell your
story first, and I think that'sso important.
It's like share, you know,breaking, kind of breaking the
ice and sharing a bit of mystory.
So then they and I I've neverhad an issue with being
vulnerable or telling peoplekind of the more unsavory parts
(12:48):
of my life and my story, becausethe part is as a journalist,
that's how you get you connectwith your sources.
It's not a I don't want to sayit sounds manipulative when I
say that, but it's just it'sgenuinely.
It's like you're going to tellme something about how you
survived the Rwandan genocide in1994.
I'm I'm happy to cry with youand share part of my story too,
(13:14):
you know.
So if we could do that incircle.
And then I just recently had theidea of bringing this into
prisons, but just teaching themhow to write their story and
then kind of workshop it withthem and make it easy and
accessible, let them know thatit's so doable, but then, like,
pull it together in a sort ofpublication, whether it's a
collection of essays in amagazine or or a book.
And so because journalists don'thave access to inmates, we
(13:36):
can't very, we know very littleabout what goes on in there.
And so, like, if you know, thatwould be like one example,
going into women's abuseshelters or just into a
bookstore or coffee shop, youknow, but getting that kind of
removing that gatekeeping injournalism and getting a first
person account of the news or ofjust things that are going on
(13:57):
in the world.
So that's kind of a part ofwhat I'm working towards right
now, and there's a lot of otherparts to that.
So let me know if I'm going, ifI'm rambling, but there's, it's
, it's.
I'm still kind of likeformulating it, but I've already
started doing it for the lastyear.
There's a little bit of whatI've already started doing.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Oh, it sounds so powerful, as you share, that I
can't help but think of what itis for people to feel seen, and
it's when people are exposed tothose parts of ourselves that
may be a little uncomfortable,that you can see, that they can
see themselves and they open up.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
Yeah, and just kind of looking at someone and saying
that your story matters and itabsolutely matters because it is
a thread in the tapestry oflife and without that one thread
none of the tapestry could beheld together, and that when
people feel that and hear that,they're just like, really I
matter, my story matters.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
And it's so powerful just to just to feel like
someone really gets you andunderstands.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
Yeah, you know, our stories are the one thing that
connect one heart to another,you know, and, and it just it,
it connects us in a way thatnothing else really can.
You know, you made reference toother a moment ago about I
(15:21):
don't remember, I can't say howyou word it, but it was like
building a plane as it takes off.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
I love that because, oh my God, does it take courage
to do that, or what.
I feel like we're.
I didn't have the language forit, I do now.
Thank you so much because Ifeel like we're doing the same
thing.
We're.
We're building a plane as ittakes off and, um, we don't know
whether we don't know whetherit's going to get off the runway
(15:50):
or not, and the only way youcan find out is by doing it.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
And, forgive me, I have all these teaching writing
analogies, but it's kind of likeyou won't know what the
paragraph is going to look likeuntil you write the first
sentence, right?
So you're kind of discoveringthe story and you're doing the
research for the story.
You have to by doing it, byliving it.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
You know research in real time.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
Yeah, yes, I think sometimes that's where creatives
get stuck right, as we thinkthat we a have to do it alone
and be that we have to have itall figured out.
And we don't we, none of us do,we can just um, I think you
know, also at Marissa's party Iran in her boss who had
mentioned, um, he works in thebusiness school right at the
(16:35):
local university and he was likea business plan, don't do that.
I was like what I was like andhe helps, uh, creative
entrepreneurs um build theirbusiness.
And so I was like that's kindof refreshing, because business
plans just they're paralyzing tome, they're so boring.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
You know, we worked on a business plan, formulated
something that was fairly solid,but after we wrote it all out
we set it aside and haven'treflected on it since then.
It is kind of boring.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Yeah, I mean it's like we're in the university of
life, right, forgive the cliche,but like we get to kind of take
the next creative, groundedaction, take the next step and
then the next step unfolds.
It's almost like in that heartled living right, like that
intuitively guided living.
It's like the steps just tokind of appear below your feet
(17:31):
and it takes a lot of deep trust.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
You iterate, you make mistakes and you iterate again.
You pivot when you need to,yeah, but the main thing is you
just have to keep going.
Dwight, did you have somethingyou were going to say?
I thought I heard you try toget a word in edgewise there,
dwight did you have somethingyou were going to say?
Speaker 3 (17:52):
I thought I heard you try to get a word in edgewise
there.
No, I was just talking abouthow all of our efforts to try to
(18:12):
formalize things and to make itso that we had a business plan
of sorts, we eventually wised upand steered toward a true north
of understanding who it wasthat we served and what it was
that we ultimately saw asimportant, and that's that's
really guided our decisions, I'dsay for the last year or two,
yes, and that is actuallyimportant.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Another writing analogy is like before you write
the story, you do need to knowwho your audience is like you,
who you're writing to like whatpublication and who is it geared
to.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
So that came about the opposite of the way you
would think it would.
You know, we didn't reallyidentify who we served, they
just showed up.
You know, it was just one daywe were noticing creative people
just flocking around us and itwas kind of like our audience
picked us instead of us pickingthe audience.
(18:55):
We were like all of a sudden,one day this light bulb went off
and we were going in kind of adifferent direction and we had
this long talk and went.
You know what?
It's right there, you know, andwe know where to find that
audience and we're really drawnto that audience.
And we're really drawn to thataudience and what it and they're
drawn to us.
We abandoned where we weregoing and shifted, rebranded
(19:18):
everything, and this was onlywhat Dwight, two months ago,
three months ago, yeah, it'sbeen.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
it's been in the works.
I'd say maybe, maybe a littlemore like four, but yeah, a lot
of, a lot of parts.
The rebranding was painfulbecause we had a lot of the
collateral for the old stuff.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
And we still come across it, all the artwork and
yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
But you were open to the story changing which is so
valuable.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Yes, I just put an email out to our audience and
said we're pivoting and it'sgoing to cause us to do a
complete rebrand.
So we appreciate your patiencewhile we go through that.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
I mean that's, it's like, and you know any artist
has to be, not has to be.
I don't want to say like that,but you know we need, we have to
be open to the art changing orto, or maybe the draft of the
story isn't working, so wediscard it and we have to be
willing to start over and that'show you get the best.
I guess like product, the bestpainting, the best writing is we
(20:17):
.
That's what they.
I mean, they taught us that ingraduate school.
It's like you have to bewilling to the story changing.
Jocelyn, you went into thisreporting, researching, and you
thought that it was going to bethis and you can't.
You have to throw all the oldnotes away, otherwise you're
going to miss the actual story.
And I was like but all thiswork, you know, I just I've
never wasted analogies this much.
This is funny.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
I'm like teaching a writing class on accident, but
um so is there more to tell moredetails about the current, the
dream, the unfolding, unfoldingthe plane that's taken off as
you're building it?
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Yeah, and so it's interesting because it did start
a little bit different.
And I'm still doing this, butit's helping me.
You know I'm a single mom, soit's helping me pay the bills
this portion of it, because theother one I haven't figured out
how to turn that into a streamof revenue out, how to turn that
into a um, a revenue stream ofrevenue.
(21:14):
But um is.
You know, the local universityhas asked me to speak to their
strategic communicationsdepartment once a year for like
the last seven years about um,creative journalism, non, you
know, creative nonfiction,narrative journalism they call
it, there's like five differentnames for it.
But and to their strategiccommunications is advertising,
public relations and marketing.
(21:34):
And I think I'm missing anotherpiece to it.
But and how the that type ofjournalism would add value to
them putting together likewriting for their clients.
And and then I was like, oh,why don't I do that?
You know, advertising andpublic relations are so
expensive and not as authentic.
You know, like the type of, youknow, journalists when they're
(21:56):
doing their job, well, they are.
It's pure content, right, it'slike it's ideally unbiased, it's
ideally objective and it's alsocompelling and it's engaging
and it's interesting andeducational.
And so, like what if I could dothat for the business world
(22:17):
somehow like skip andcollaborate with their PR people
?
So, and it's still like help,so it's basically helping
nonprofits and businesses alsofind their voice and be seen in
the world in a more authenticway.
So, like, I have a couple ofclients, like a CEO, a couple of
CEOs I'm working with now.
I'm writing their like it's anin-depth news profile, feature
(22:39):
news profile on them and theircompany and then they're using
that for their website or allthose others.
So that's been kind of cool todo that with.
And then in the business world,in the realm, trying to think of
what else I like there's anonprofit I'm helping for next
to nothing right now to do thatfor their story, Like how would
(23:01):
a journalist approach?
How, and then kind of connect Icall it a narrative strategy,
so how to connect them to localmedia outlets.
And then I also want to have abookstore.
And so I want to have abookstore that's like a little
lighthouse in the community,that's like an event space and I
want to have these writingworkshops like events at the
(23:23):
bookstore space, but also likehave guest speakers come in and
then from that and this.
Is this actually something kindof similar out there?
This is where I got all ofthese ideas, but I want the book
space to also like in fromthese storytelling circles.
Right, I'll like curate apublication of some sort because
I love magazines and that'skind of where I've always been
(23:46):
at home is just magazine writingand the design and the paper
and um.
But I was at Marfa, texas, afew years ago and they, um,
there's this place called theSentinel and it's this beautiful
coffee shop, um slash eventspace and they are named after
the local newspaper which wasclosing, and the New York times.
(24:06):
I actually profiled this as acreative revenue model for um
spaces, um and publications andum, yeah, and so it was.
The newspaper was folding andthey decided to, uh, buy the
newspaper and not fund it withads anymore but fund it with,
like any sort of revenue thatcame in from the space, and so I
was like I can do, do thatwhere I'm from and somehow bring
(24:30):
it home.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
I think you're definitely onto something really
big.
My intuition is just speakingvery loudly right now that yes,
yes, yes.
Speaker 3 (24:43):
Yeah, I definitely want to be involved in something
like that.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
Yeah, I mean just like the, just there's, I think,
just like a safe lighthousespace right when we can sit and
share, and in full disclosure.
A lot of this is inspired by mybackground in recovery.
Um, I quit drinking six yearsago.
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Oh, congratulations.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
Thank you.
Thank you.
It's been a journey.
It runs in the family.
My dad warned me and I was likeno, it skips a generation.
But it definitely was impactingmy life in the worst way, and
so when I quit drinking I wasencouraged to join AA circles.
I was like that's not reallyfor me, I don't need that, and
(25:26):
they're like it's not reallyabout drinking or addiction so
much, it's about connection, youknow.
And so I remember having towatch a little Ted talk about
the.
They say the opposite ofaddiction is not sobriety, the
opposite of addiction isconnection.
Speaker 2 (25:43):
And community.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
And community, yeah, and so like, and you just sit in
circle with people and you'vegot what three to five minutes
to share a part of your story,based on whatever topic we're
talking.
You can go off topic if youwant, whatever you need for that
day.
But just connecting with otherpeople in that way, like in such
a vulnerable way, like tell youknow when you're in recovery
(26:06):
rooms you're sharing things thatyour deepest, darkest secrets
sometimes, and no one's judgingyou and everyone's, and you're
uplifting and healing otherpeople on that environment.
And it's like how powerfulwould it be to kind of again
like bring that out of thatenvironment into, like the
secular, mundane space?
Speaker 2 (26:24):
Circles are magical in so many ways, especially if
they're well led.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Yeah, that's my fear.
It's like I don't know how tolead a circle.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
So that's why I'm kind of like that's my next, we
can help you with that?
Speaker 1 (26:38):
Yes, I need help with that.
Speaker 3 (26:40):
We're going to talk about a possible collaboration
later on, okay, and thankfullyyou've got so many models to
work from, because I look at howyou.
All you have to do is look atwhat's done in with indigenous
peoples, when a great example istheir approach to justice.
(27:04):
You know, for them it's notabout crime and punishment.
It's about knowing, when peoplefall astray, that they have a
chance to be redeemed, and wecan learn a lot from that kind
of value of human life andcontribution.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Yeah, and just that being rehabilitated and
understanding that a lot oftimes crime either comes from a
mental health issue or a sense,a place of misinformation or
hurt, you know, and the factthat we skipped that step in our
justice system here.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Unhealed trauma.
Yes, so take us back to thevery beginning.
I would love to know when didyou know that you were drawn to
creative stuff?
How did creativity show up inyour life in the very early
stages?
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Oh, I don't know.
See, it's funny, I never wouldhave thought of myself as a
creative person until recently.
But because I have this twinsister who we're opposite, twins
right, and I'm the left braintwin and she's the right brain
twin and she's her hair's dark,her skin's beautiful olive color
, she looks almost Italian andshe's the wild creative, like
(28:19):
the right brain.
And I'm like you know, I go toschool, I make straight A's, I
loved math, I loved science, youknow, and I studied, you know,
news writing, which is notcreative.
I said that it is very creative, I'm realizing, especially the
type I practice.
But I did win a lot of artawards as a kid and I love to
color in the lines she coloredout of the lines.
(28:39):
It's just two different typesof creative, right?
But I never really saw thatuntil recently.
Um and um, yeah, so as a, as achild, I, I just um, I loved art
, but I never, yeah, I never sawmyself as a creative cause.
I was comparing myself to her.
Speaker 2 (28:57):
You know from where I'm standing.
You are highly creative.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
Yes, it's funny how parents kind of can do that to
kids, right, they're like kindof put you in a box.
It's funny how parents kind ofcan do that to kids, right,
they're like kind of put you ina box.
Like Jocelyn's the left braingrounded one, lauren's the wild,
creative one, jocelyn's theintrovert, lauren's the
extrovert, you know like and.
But what happens is like whatif we're both?
(29:22):
And you know like what if wecan be a tomboy and a girly girl
?
Like why do we have to be oneor the other?
Um, which was that was kind ofmy story as a kid.
I was always the tomboy, but Iwas confused because I also was
not into sports.
I was into gymnastics andhorseback riding.
So it was like I'm confused,but now you know, learning that
(29:42):
we can be all of the above.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Yes, I love that and it's not an.
It's an.
And I love that and it's not an.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
and it's an, and I love that, like yes and but yeah
, my journey as a kid you know Ihate to say this, but I'm sure
this is probably true for a lotof people is that I think all
the pain I experienced, thethings that we kind of endured
in our lives, have also kind ofbecome our purpose, right?
Yes, yeah, absolutely yes, yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
Absolutely yes.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
And it's like sometimes there was this I don't
think it was a masterclass thatnotes that a friend shared with
me.
So this is again playingtelephone, but I've heard this
before.
When you're trying to figureout what your purpose is in life
, ask yourself what breaks yourheart the most about the world.
And for me, there was a lot ofneglect in my childhood, there
was a lot of abandonment, and soit was.
(30:33):
I lived so much just beingunseen and I was like I want to
make sure people are seen.
I don't care what what thatlooks like if that's through
telling their story, you know,and so that was.
I think that has been mybiggest.
My pain has been my biggestcreative inspiration, and I know
I'm not unique in that, butthat's pretty much where I've
(30:57):
been led.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
I worked with a marketing guru at one point
coach that approached it from avery spiritual place, which is
kind of odd marketing and spirit.
But one of the things he saidto me that I've never forgotten
and it rang true the minute hesaid it it was like, oh my God,
yes, he said, the people thatyou are most suited to have the
(31:26):
biggest impact with are thepeople who have experienced the
same trauma that you have.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (31:36):
That our pain becomes our purpose.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Yeah, and I feel, like you know, in storytelling,
I feel like what I've started tonotice was that there's this
kind of we all have like uniqueexpressions of we're, all unique
expressions of universe orwhatever, but all have like
unique expressions of we're allunique expressions of universe
or whatever.
But we also have uniqueexpressions of pain.
But underneath that, our kindof painful experience, there's
almost like this river of, likea common thread in all of our
(32:07):
hurts that I always, throughwriting, wanted to bring out
Like're.
So there's this division rightmore now than ever, but I've
seen it my whole life wherethere's like the other, the
other person they're separatefrom me, but if we kind of can
like, whenever we read someone'sstory or learn someone's story,
we realize that, like, thatpain is not a whole lot
(32:28):
different from my pain and ifthat is illustrated well through
writing that we can maybe stoppointing fingers so much.
You know, right now I'm dealingwith a very toxic, abusive
ex-boyfriend that has beenseparated for seven months.
But you know, they call it theholiday Hoover is what I'm just
(32:52):
learning about, but yesterday, Idon't know, christmas night
they call it the holiday Hooveris what I'm just learning about,
but yesterday or no.
Christmas night I got a bunchof devastating emails, just kind
of this weird out of nowhereafter two months launch of
things, and I just it justreally occurred to me like his
pain is not a whole lotdifferent from my pain.
He's acting out of desperation,not that I need to jump to
compassion too fast, but ithelps me.
(33:15):
Let go and move on.
Speaker 2 (33:17):
And yeah, when you referred to the holiday hoover,
were you meaning that you tendto get sucked back in?
Speaker 1 (33:26):
Well, it's kind of it's typical.
So I'm kind of also an expertof like abuse cycles.
I've just studied them my wholelife to try and make sense of
some things in my life and thethings I'm.
But one of the abuse cycle kindof patterns is they hoover you
back, they abuse you and thenthey hoover you back in.
(33:46):
Then there's the honeymoonphase and then they abuse you
and hoover you back in.
So it's kind of a circle thatjust happens.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
So it's like a vacuum clip You're getting you back in
.
So it's kind of a circle thatjust happens.
So it's like a vacuum clipYou're getting sucked back in.
Speaker 1 (33:54):
Yes, it's a term that a lot of these kind of people
use that research, narcissistickind of abuse, psychological
abuse, emotional abuse but yeah,it's a.
It's like a hoovering, suckingyou back in, and they'll pick
important days like birthdays,holidays to to do it because
they're they're missing you,they need their supply, kind of
like energetic vampires, and soI just kind of be prepared for
(34:20):
that.
But my biggest life mission isto help.
One of them is to help peopleunderstand what that looks like
and that they're not alone,because that has also been a big
part of my story.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
And does working with others make it easier for you
as you deal with the holiday,hoover and the like in your own
personal life?
Speaker 1 (34:41):
yeah.
So you know, for me, like um,writing is how I make sense of
the world and so in thisparticular case, um, so my
therapist this is kind of acreative process I'm in the
middle of because I still writeand so she, my therapist, said
write a letter to the newgirlfriend, but don't give it to
(35:03):
her, just like a pretend, likewarning her of all the things to
expect and what's going tohappen.
And then I have 12 pages singlespaced, type to later.
I was like this is one of themost powerful things I've ever
written.
I was like this needs to bepublished and you know, and that
again is me sharing my storyand my journey.
(35:25):
But also I realized in the top Iput a writer's note this is a
letter to any person enduringpsychological manipulation or
abuse, anytime they're in,whether it's a system, whether
it's a workplace, a religion, agovernment system, whatever it
is, anytime there's someonethat's words and actions aren't
(35:45):
matching, they're manipulatingyou and your reality is being
distorted and broken by thismanipulative system.
So it was like this letterisn't just to the new girlfriend
, this letter is to like anyperson who's confused about what
they're experiencing in a workenvironment that's, or any
environment that's not savory, Iguess.
(36:05):
So that's kind of like a wayI'm using writing to, yeah, to
help others and work with othersin that sense different from
the writing workshops, but I dowant to have writing workshops
around psychological abuse.
Speaker 3 (36:18):
Beautiful so.
Speaker 2 (36:20):
I'd like to hear a little bit about.
You know you have a rich story,a rich journey, lots of really
fabulous stuff that you've done.
Let's talk challenges.
What's been the hard stuffduring that journey, the things
that you found your way to theother side of?
Speaker 1 (36:40):
Oh my gosh, I think the biggest one you know, back
to the and this is really upuntil the last six months, this
has been my whole life, but Ithink I'm finally breaking out
of that mold is just the neglectand the emotional.
I think neglect, emotionalabuse and psychological abuse
that's been.
It shows up in every part of mylife which makes me think I'm
(37:02):
there's a lesson I'm notlearning here, like what's going
on, and so the way I'veovercome that is, I'm realizing
now, looking back on my wholelife and reflecting and through
writing, is that it's just beena journey to self-love and
self-worth and understanding howwe can validate ourselves and
our own experiences.
That is the biggest weapon wecan have against any of these
(37:26):
interpersonal relationships orworkplace whatever systems that
are taking our power away.
When something's taking ourpower away, when something's
taking our power away, we'realso giving our power away, you
know.
And so there's like this kind oftakes two to tango dance
situation, and sometimes it'sunwittingly right Like we're not
(37:46):
.
It's I don't.
I don't realize I'm doing it,but when I've spent my life
trying to get these unhealed,you know people who are not very
self-aware, living out theirwounds unconsciously, trying to
get them to validate my worth isjust inviting the abuse right,
and so it's like the biggestthing I think I've overcome is
(38:07):
just absolute beautiful, beamingself-love.
In all the ways I am okay, nomatter who leaves me or who says
something to me, or who does ordoesn't like me.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
You know this was a little bit of our conversation
at the birthday party Heavyconversation for a birthday
party.
I know and I remember youtalked about the neglect and the
abuse and I remember saying toyou you know, people,
experiences in life are a mirror.
You know those experiences arereflecting back to you, back to
(38:46):
you, and oftentimes that showsup in the form of you perhaps
neglected yourself or perhapsabused yourself and when these
other people saw you do that,they thought it was okay.
They thought it was okay to doit too.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
It's almost like an easy target, it's like an
invitation.
They can read your energypretty well.
It's like vampires smell blood,you know, and and and if we are
, if I you know me beingstruggling with self um,
self-esteem, confidence issues,you know they sense that and
(39:27):
they just swoop right in andlike how can I?
What's, what's that, what'sthat phrase Like, if you don't
know who you are, the world willtell you.
So I think that's the biggestthing is like I'm learning who I
am, and it's truly throughwriting my own story I've
written hundreds of pages in thelast six months of my own story
, trying and really discoveringthe woman that I am and the
(39:51):
person that I am and that hashelped me.
It's almost like a strongfoundation, like a shield
against these things.
Speaker 2 (39:59):
If you were going to share just a sentence or two
words of wisdom for how to loveyourself, what would that be?
Speaker 1 (40:07):
Oh my gosh, I know there's all these affirmations
out there, I know there's allthese affirmations out there,
but for me it's just like doing,doing little things for myself.
So like I take myself on theselong, beautiful walks and, um, I
(40:27):
take, I've cooked myself dinner, I'll take myself to the movies
, and I know it's not likeforever that I'm doing this.
This is I know.
I think I had a friend bring itup recently.
She's like, you know, beingalone all the time.
Friend bring it up recently,she's like being alone all the
time isn't necessarily the point, john, it's like I know, but
it's like being okay with beingalone.
Speaker 2 (40:39):
It's like oh, you're courting yourself.
Speaker 1 (40:42):
Yeah, like not abandoning myself when things
get hard.
I think one of the mostpowerful things I did recently,
when I had another I don't knowif you call it energetic attack
or whatever from the ex, is, Ijust crumbled to the floor and I
said Jocelyn, I'm not leavingyou, I'm not going to leave you
in the middle of this, I'm notgoing to.
You know, as a kid, if I cried,it was like go to your room.
(41:04):
That's weird, what is wrongwith you?
And so it's like how can I showup for myself when I'm not the
person I think I should be inthat moment?
Not strong enough, not, youknow, happy enough or whatever.
Like just sitting with myselfin all of it in ways that no one
else ever has, and it's been sopowerful.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Wow, I can hear how you're having a lot of moments
of discovering your ownself-worth and having all of
this clarity around how you weretrying to deal with feeling
abandoned and neglected.
How has that informed what itis you're modeling for your
(41:51):
child?
Speaker 1 (41:58):
informed what it is you're modeling for your child.
Oh my, um, my son is is.
He is one of the neatest peopleI have ever met.
I always joke I'm going to bejust like him when I grow up.
I've, I mean, like completelyevolved past me as a human and I
think it's just that I havetaught him that you know just to
trust that voice that says thisdoesn't feel good.
(42:20):
And he does have a friend thathas mastered the art of
manipulation at six years old.
My son's now almost 13, butthey're still friends.
And watching my son just createboundaries with him and know
that that's not.
Whatever comes at him is notabout I'm like did that hurt
your feelings?
Are you okay?
He's like that wasn't about me,mom.
(42:42):
I was like what?
I wouldn't be like that when Iwas his age, or even now.
Speaker 2 (42:50):
Definitely an evolved soul.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
Yeah, he's just an old old soul and he's always,
you know they'll be asleep overwith five of his best friends
and he wasn't included.
He's like I'm fine, it wasn'tabout me.
And it's like I was like wow,okay, and I'm seeing how kind of
what I've been through has been.
I think he was born that way.
But I will take a little creditthat I've imparted maybe some
of my journey for him and sharedsome of the wisdom I picked up
(43:15):
with him.
Speaker 3 (43:16):
No doubt.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
So we always, in every episode, kind of draw this
in, because this is the themeof the podcast and that is, in
all this journey and everythingyou've experienced, how has
community shown up in that?
How has it played a role inyour creative journey, good or
bad?
Speaker 1 (43:39):
Oh, so good or bad.
I mean, let's see, I do findthat this new kind of journey,
since I left the college in 2021, and I did edit, was an editor
for a local news organizationfor a little while and left that
and I find it to be kind of asolitary experience, you know,
(44:00):
after being so used to working,like in buildings, with people
and nine to five, um, but I, youknow, as far as, like, I've
found I, you know, someone saidonce like, if you't have, stop
waiting for something to show up, create it.
And so, like I created a littlecommunity of women who have
left corporate, left the nine tofive, trying to build their own
(44:23):
dreams, and so, like we kind oftalk about what it's like to
like recover from theseworkplaces and so like, in a
sense, like I'm finding mycommunity.
In that sense, I would likemore of it.
I do.
I am a bit introverted and I dolike my alone time, so I don't
go to a bunch of events, but Iwould like to be doing.
I feel like 2025 is more of that, like being out and out in the
(44:46):
world.
I've been in my littlechrysalis for like the last year
and a half but also likecommunity and you know I would
say like the journalisticcommunity can be a little
pretentious and so like it'sbeen.
You know there's a little bitof this.
I don't know if it's like meangirls is kind of the expression,
but it's also guys too, right,but there's this pretentiousness
(45:10):
about that I've never reallyfallen for and so I find it hard
to fit in in some of these moretraditional communities in my
career and so in that sense thatcommunity has been.
It's also like, just like themovies, right, newsrooms can be
quite abusive.
The screaming the editors likeyou suck, and the screaming the
(45:33):
editor is like you suck.
Speaker 2 (45:33):
You know, there was a lot of my life that I felt like
I didn't fit in and I had areally, really big breakthrough
when I realized that most ofthose situations where I didn't
feel like I fit in, when Istepped back and really looked
at it and asked myself, Irealized that I didn't want to
fit into that.
(45:54):
And when I realized that I waskind of unconsciously making a
choice, it changed everything.
Instead of going, oh woe is me,I don't fit in, I was looking
at these environments like thatpretentious stuff and saying no.
no, this is not, I don't't fitin, this is I choose not to fit
(46:15):
in, this isn't.
These are not my people.
Speaker 1 (46:18):
It's yeah.
Similarly, it's just occurredto me.
It was like wait a second, Iwasn't.
I wasn't supposed to fit in, Iwasn't meant to.
You know, it was like that wasthe point.
Like that's been so.
It's felt so good to do.
Speaker 2 (46:34):
Yeah it's liberating, isn't it?
Speaker 1 (46:35):
Yeah, it's like we weren't meant to fit in some of
these spaces, you know, andthat's okay, wow.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
This has been an amazing conversation and I have
loved every minute of your story.
Speaker 1 (46:49):
Oh, thank you, and it's been great talking to you
all.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
So normally we do three rapid fire questions, but
I dozed off somehow and forgotto formulate three rapid fire
questions.
So, dwight, we're going to haveto shoot from the hip.
We're going to have to makethem up.
I'll go first with one.
I've got one.
So you find out that you onlyhave a few days to live and
(47:29):
you're reflecting back on yourlife.
What is the thing that you feelthe best about when you reflect
back on the time you've been onthe planet.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
Hmm, I mean first reaction, first response.
If I had to think fast my heartlike just the way I have moved
about the world my whole life,even in my days of drinking Not
to say I'm not saying I movedaround the world perfectly or as
(48:01):
a saint, but I have alwayscared deeply about people and
humanity and everything I'vedone has been in some service to
the world.
Speaker 2 (48:14):
I sense that about you, like the moment I met you.
It's obvious you wear it onyour sleeve, as the saying goes.
Speaker 1 (48:22):
Yeah, yeah.
So I used to be told I care toomuch and I was like, and I
remember thinking I tried totemper that for a while and then
I was like, but wait, justrecently again like maybe it's
okay, maybe that's.
Speaker 2 (48:35):
I've been told most of my life that I cared too much
.
My mom would say it to me whenI was a kid you just care too
much.
Speaker 1 (48:41):
Yeah, but maybe it's not a bad thing, right.
Speaker 2 (48:44):
No, why is that a bad thing?
Yeah, have you got a rapid fire?
Speaker 3 (48:48):
Well, of course.
Well, we're both two highlysensitive people.
I think it would be reallyinteresting to see how you would
answer this, Given that you gotto go to places where you could
study antiquity and reach outand touch things, and you have
(49:09):
an interest in stories.
Who is it that you can relateto, be it in fiction or in myth
or in history, as a character,as an avatar that more or less
tells your story?
And tell us a little bit why?
Speaker 1 (49:28):
Oh my gosh, that's a really beautiful question.
I am, oh my gosh, I'm going tohave to think about that.
Who tells my story?
Oh well, I mean, actually I dohave an answer to this.
We kind of talked about this atthe beginning, but Simba from
(49:49):
the Lion King oh, and becauseand I'm just now realizing why I
was so drawn to that and helost his father and he felt like
it was him to blame and he wentabout the world kind of ran
away.
But really it was just on thisjourney of self-discovery.
(50:12):
And I think my favorite sceneis when he's back in this field
and he is a young, a young manat this point, and Rafiki the
baboon comes with his stick andhe's acting kind of silly and
and, um, he's like the mysticright, he's the shaman of the of
the show and he, he, he says,um, I know who you are.
And he's like you don't knowwho I am.
(50:32):
And he's like you don't evenknow who you are.
And he's like who am I?
Then?
And Simba says to Rufiki, and hesays you're Mufasa's boy.
And he's like how did you knowthat?
And then he says my father died, I hate to tell you.
And he's like no, and I thinkthis is the point of kind of
like all of the work I'm doingtoo right now.
But he leads him to a puddle ofwater and he looks in the the
(50:56):
um.
He says look, he lives, lookthere, there he is.
And he looks his reflectionright and he's like that's just
me.
It's like no, look hard.
And then he sees his father andfor me it's not literal, it's
not my actual father, but it islike my higher self, my goddess,
mother, father, god, source,universe, love, whatever that we
(51:18):
are deeply connected to.
They live in us.
And he rolls in on this massivecloud in the field and he says
you have forgotten who you are.
You must go back home and takeyour place in the circle of life
.
And I think that's where I amright now.
It's just finding my place.
Speaker 2 (51:35):
Wow, I had forgotten about that scene and I'm like
I'm going to email it to y'allafter this.
I'm having flashbacks.
I'd forgotten about it and Iremember how it affected me.
When I saw it on the screen, itjust brought me to tears.
Speaker 1 (51:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:50):
Wow, that's beautiful .
Okay, final question you havethis magical ability to go back
in time to visit your youngerself at any age that you choose.
How old would you be the partof you that you would visit, and
(52:11):
what words of wisdom would youshare with that younger part of
you, knowing what you know now?
Speaker 1 (52:17):
now y'all are gonna make me cry.
Oh, I talk to her a lot thesedays.
Um, I would say 13, rightbefore my mom moved away and I
was left with nobody.
And, yeah, I would tell her, Iwould love on her and tell her
(52:37):
that there's never been anythingwrong with her, that she didn't
cause any of this, thatanything that's going to happen
to her life she did not cause it, and that she's worthy and that
she doesn't need a title tovalidate her.
She doesn't need anythingoutside of herself to validate
(52:58):
her, that she is complete andwhole and everything that she is
, and um, and that's.
I would just want, yeah, I'dwant to share that with her that
she's going to be okay, morethan okay, and she's going to
have a beautiful life ahead ofher, all of her own creation.
Speaker 2 (53:16):
Thank you for that.
I'm crying too.
Wow, awesome.
This has been an amazing timetogether.
What a beautiful conversation,and I feel so honored that you
just shared so vulnerably andopenly.
Thank you for this.
Speaker 1 (53:34):
Thank you all so much for having me.
I loved getting to talk withyou all and I'm excited to be
joining some of y'all circlescoming up here soon and February
1st right.
Speaker 2 (53:44):
Yes, we can't wait.
Speaker 1 (53:49):
Thank you all so much .
Speaker 2 (53:50):
Thank you.
similarly, it's just occurred to me.
It was like wait a second, Iwasn't, I wasn't supposed to fit
in, I wasn't meant to.
You know, it was like that wasthe point, like that.
That's been so.
Uh, it's felt so good to doit's's liberating, isn't it?
Yeah, it's like we weren'tmeant to fit in some of these
(00:29):
spaces, you know, and that'sokay.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Hello, this is Maddox .
Speaker 3 (00:47):
And this is Dwight.
We're the Connections andCommunity guys and you're
listening to.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
The For the Love of Creatives podcast.
I stuttered, didn't I?
Speaker 3 (01:00):
It's quite all right.
Today we're joined by ourfeatured guest, Jocelyn Tatum.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
Hi, nice to meet y'all.
Good to see y'all again.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Welcome to the podcast, jocelyn.
We're really excited to haveyou here and really excited for
you to share your story, becauseI think it's going to be
something that our audience isgoing to really love listening
to, based on the conversation.
Based on the conversation.
So I'll say, jocelyn and Dwightand I we met at a birthday
party a couple of weeks ago andafter some conversation at the
(01:30):
birthday party, we just realizedthat Jocelyn is like an ideal
candidate, you know, for being afeatured guest.
And so here we are, we invited,and she jumped up and down and
said yes, absolutely.
And I understand from her thatthis is pretty much the first
time that she's really sharedher story publicly.
(01:51):
I think that asking her toshare a story has kind of caused
her to really reflect.
But I'll let her tell you aboutthat.
Jocelyn, I'm going to pass itover to you and let you tell our
audience just a little bitabout who you are and what
you're up to, and then we'll gofrom there.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Yeah, thank you so much for having me.
Yeah, so you know back kind ofrelates to why I haven't shared
my story much.
I'm a lifelong journalist andwe are told to stay out of the
way we are not.
You know we can't use valueloaded terms.
I've been asked to speak quitea bit, but on news writing or
magazine writing, and my storyis never really involved in that
(02:31):
.
So it's kind of fun to.
I'm not allowed to usually talkabout me, so this is kind of
fun to tell my story a littlebit.
So I am a journalist, I am aneditor, I am a.
I've been a college educatoralso most of my life.
I kind of stepped away fromthat because you know the whole
adage when you're teaching,you're not doing, you're
(02:51):
teaching other people to do yourdream, and so it was kind of
something I fell into when I was.
I left the newsroom to moveback home to Texas and was going
to work in the newsrooms here.
But it was 2008 when therewasn't anyone was hiring, and so
I was like I'll just teachcollege for a semester.
I already had a master's innarrative journalism, which is
(03:14):
also known as creative long formcreative nonfiction, and so I
had the ability to teach, and soit ended up being a 12-year
journey, while I was a freelancejournalist on the side and I've
also launched a women'smagazine with someone else owned
it, but I was the executiveeditor and built the magazine
for her and that was beautifuland lovely.
(03:36):
And more recently, yeah, I'vebeen coaching and mentoring, and
so that's a little bit about me.
Sixth generation Texan, buthave lived all over the world.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
I just love the texture that you're building
into the story.
Already you have a broadbackground.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Yeah, it's a little all over the place, but at first
it was concerning to me.
While I was living my life atthe time, jumping all over the
place, I was like, what doesteaching have to do with my
journalism career?
I want to focus on myjournalism career and I was
teaching news writing, whichkept my mind fresh, and then I
was teaching media literacy,which included media ethics,
(04:19):
media economics, media law, andso it was all the research for
the lectures.
And then I was also runningstudent publications for the
district, so I was helpingmanage young reporters and
aspiring journalists, and so itwas like still kept my mind
fresh, but I was like teachingis just gonna like put a big
hole in my career.
But then when I look, you know,as we age and we look back, we
(04:41):
start to see like, oh my gosh,all of it makes sense.
It all absolutely makes senseto like where I'm supposed to be
and what I'm doing now and allof it's lending to the work that
I want to do in, you know, as acreative in the community.
I never called myself a creativeuntil recently.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I absolutely love that.
You know when, that moment whenyou realized all that jumping
around and all those things thatyou did that you didn't think
were related to much, all cameinto vision.
I have a similar experiencewhere I was, you know, in the
beauty industry for 40 years andI had side hustles that were
all over the map and then oneday, when it started to come
(05:21):
into focus, it was like, oh mygosh, this has been, you've been
training for something yourwhole life and didn't realize it
.
Isn't that powerful.
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Yes, I love the way you said that, absolutely.
You've been training forsomething your whole life and
every just like a news story,every single bit of it adds
value to the thesis of the story.
Right, like every single piece.
I always think of it as connectthe dots, the thesis of the
story.
Right, like every single pieceI always think of as connect the
dots.
You know, like when you'redrawing the lines to make the
(05:52):
picture, towards the end of thepicture you start to see what
the thing is going to make outlike oh, it's a puppy or it's a
constellation.
You know it's kind of cool.
So we can look back and see,like everything, every moment,
even the heartaches, the resumegaps, you know they all
absolutely added value to wherewe're going next.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
That's amazing Now, when you, as you look back and
you're able to appreciate themasterpiece that has become the
life that you're leaning into.
What were the first hints thatyou were headed in the direction
of being able to share stories,to have an interest in
(06:31):
journalism?
Speaker 1 (06:34):
You know, it's interesting Another seemingly
disconnected part of my life.
I was a philosophy majorstudying ancient.
I loved studying ancientphilosophy and ancient wisdom
and at one point I was living inRome studying great tragedies
and comedies.
And then we went to Greece for10 days to kind of focus on that
(06:55):
part and we were studyingancient art and architecture and
I was just like wow, like thehuman story is universal and
it's never changed.
You hear these stories aboutthese ancient Greek gods, you
know, and their love storiessound very similar to my at the
time 21-year-old self's issues.
And so I was like how can I,you know?
(07:17):
And I was kind of teased alittle bit by like how useless
that degree was and how I waslike good job, jocelyn, you can
now critically think.
And I was like well, that'smore valuable than you think
these days.
But I was like how can I?
It's, it is very like what doyou?
What would I get a job in doingthat, you know?
So it was like human nature andstory is so important for the
(07:41):
healing of humanity and forconnecting people and it helps
me feel less alone.
You know, I had a pretty, prettydark childhood and so it.
Books saved me, stories savedme.
And so it was like, wow, howcan I, how can I make this
mundane, you know like a mundanepractice, and make this
(08:01):
digestible and earthly and notlike stuck in the heavens?
And I was like, oh, journalism.
And so I ended up going fromthat to get a master's in
journalism and so that's where Istarted being drawn to it, and
I ended up immediately met witha mentor there who became still
as a mentor after 20 years.
(08:21):
We were emailing last week.
He was a bureau chief, a WallStreet Journal bureau chief for
Mexico City, chicago, new York,and his big thing was narratives
in journalism, which is a kindof a unique practice.
And it's like how can you usecreative and literary devices in
nonfiction news writing toconnect people and to get people
(08:43):
to care about the subjects?
And I was like, oh my gosh, nowmy philosophy degree is making
sense, you know, with theemphasis in literature and all
that.
So that's, that's where itstarted.
Speaker 3 (08:52):
Oh, that's beautiful and I love the tie-in of how you
were connected to your mentorand I know that in being in a
position where you were.
Speaker 1 (09:10):
But in being in a position where you were
educating, you've probably beenable to pay that forward.
Yes, yeah, you know, I never.
I think for me, I never couldhave guessed this.
It's funny I was kind of I.
I never would wanted to be ateacher, and so when I did it, I
never thought I would love itas much as I did to be a teacher
, and so when I did it, I neverthought I would love it as much
as I did.
And I think it was because partof me knew, like these students
aren't going to rememberprobably 90% of what I'm
teaching them, but I knew thatthey would remember how they
(09:33):
felt in my class and and that itwas so important for me to know
that at least one person on theit doesn't take much right that
one person cared.
One person cared about my heart, my success, and so if I was
that one person, or if I was thethird person in their life,
just to let them know that Ideeply cared about them and
their success and that I wouldalways be there for them, and so
(09:57):
that was the thing aboutteaching that I never thought
would happen.
The thing about teaching that Inever thought would happen.
Speaker 2 (10:02):
That is so beautiful, jocelyn.
I mean, I got cold chills rightnow.
It's just wow, I'm in awe.
That's beautiful.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
So let's start with the here and now.
You know, when you and I spokeat the birthday party, you
shared a little bit.
I want to hear all the juicystuff you shared a little bit
about a dream that you have anda concept that you have begin to
flesh out and formulate.
So please take us there.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Yeah, okay, let's see if I can do this.
It's a little all over theplace, no, but I've really been
thinking about it a lot and kindof building the plane as it
takes off, but it just likeoccurred to me.
You know, one of the thingsthat I've learned about
journalism is that there's allthis gatekeeping, right, there's
like the journalist has to pickup the story and then they have
(10:54):
to pitch it to the editor andthe editor might turn it down,
and then there's like the editormight keep it, but then more ad
space sells, so the new storygets dropped.
Or there's a bigger story thatcomes in.
There's just um, or theadvertisers don't agree with the
content of this.
There's all this gatekeeping.
And so I was like you know, Ithink for me in my healing
(11:17):
journey recently I have beenjournaling about my life.
You trying to reflect on likepieces of my story and just to
write my own story for the firsttime has been so powerful.
In so many ways.
It's just healing, it's kind ofreflective, it integrates parts
of my life that I didn't evenum realize, I hadn't even
(11:39):
reflected on or integrated.
And so I was like how can Ibring all of this experience of
caring, of teaching, of newswriting, of into into the world
and bring that to others.
And so part of like when wehave a when we write, it's like
another way of having a voicewhen we write our story.
(12:00):
So it was like how can I likehelp people understand, have
access to their voice in adifferent way through, like the
writing process, and kind ofbring it out of the ivory tower
into these kind of writingworkshops, slash, healing,
storytelling circles?
So it sounds kind of similar towhat you all are doing a little
bit, but bringing peopletogether in um, in a circle, and
(12:25):
maybe we have a topic and thenwe tell our story and we share.
And I think you know maddox youhad mentioned like tell your
story first, and I think that'sso important.
It's like share, you know,breaking, kind of breaking the
ice and sharing a bit of mystory.
So then they and I I've neverhad an issue with being
vulnerable or telling peoplekind of the more unsavory parts
(12:48):
of my life and my story, becausethe part is as a journalist,
that's how you get you connectwith your sources.
It's not a I don't want to sayit sounds manipulative when I
say that, but it's just it'sgenuinely.
It's like you're going to tellme something about how you
survived the Rwandan genocide in1994.
I'm I'm happy to cry with youand share part of my story too,
(13:14):
you know.
So if we could do that incircle.
And then I just recently had theidea of bringing this into
prisons, but just teaching themhow to write their story and
then kind of workshop it withthem and make it easy and
accessible, let them know thatit's so doable, but then, like,
pull it together in a sort ofpublication, whether it's a
collection of essays in amagazine or or a book.
And so because journalists don'thave access to inmates, we
(13:36):
can't very, we know very littleabout what goes on in there.
And so, like, if you know, thatwould be like one example,
going into women's abuseshelters or just into a
bookstore or coffee shop, youknow, but getting that kind of
removing that gatekeeping injournalism and getting a first
person account of the news or ofjust things that are going on
(13:57):
in the world.
So that's kind of a part ofwhat I'm working towards right
now, and there's a lot of otherparts to that.
So let me know if I'm going, ifI'm rambling, but there's, it's
, it's.
I'm still kind of likeformulating it, but I've already
started doing it for the lastyear.
There's a little bit of whatI've already started doing.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Oh, it sounds so powerful, as you share, that I
can't help but think of what itis for people to feel seen, and
it's when people are exposed tothose parts of ourselves that
may be a little uncomfortable,that you can see, that they can
see themselves and they open up.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
Yeah, and just kind of looking at someone and saying
that your story matters and itabsolutely matters because it is
a thread in the tapestry oflife and without that one thread
none of the tapestry could beheld together, and that when
people feel that and hear that,they're just like, really I
matter, my story matters.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
And it's so powerful just to just to feel like
someone really gets you andunderstands.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
Yeah, you know, our stories are the one thing that
connect one heart to another,you know, and, and it just it,
it connects us in a way thatnothing else really can.
You know, you made reference toother a moment ago about I
(15:21):
don't remember, I can't say howyou word it, but it was like
building a plane as it takes off.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
I love that because, oh my God, does it take courage
to do that, or what.
I feel like we're.
I didn't have the language forit, I do now.
Thank you so much because Ifeel like we're doing the same
thing.
We're.
We're building a plane as ittakes off and, um, we don't know
whether we don't know whetherit's going to get off the runway
(15:50):
or not, and the only way youcan find out is by doing it.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
And, forgive me, I have all these teaching writing
analogies, but it's kind of likeyou won't know what the
paragraph is going to look likeuntil you write the first
sentence, right?
So you're kind of discoveringthe story and you're doing the
research for the story.
You have to by doing it, byliving it.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
You know research in real time.
Speaker 1 (16:14):
Yeah, yes, I think sometimes that's where creatives
get stuck right, as we thinkthat we a have to do it alone
and be that we have to have itall figured out.
And we don't we, none of us do,we can just um, I think you
know, also at Marissa's party Iran in her boss who had
mentioned, um, he works in thebusiness school right at the
(16:35):
local university and he was likea business plan, don't do that.
I was like what I was like andhe helps, uh, creative
entrepreneurs um build theirbusiness.
And so I was like that's kindof refreshing, because business
plans just they're paralyzing tome, they're so boring.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
You know, we worked on a business plan, formulated
something that was fairly solid,but after we wrote it all out
we set it aside and haven'treflected on it since then.
It is kind of boring.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Yeah, I mean it's like we're in the university of
life, right, forgive the cliche,but like we get to kind of take
the next creative, groundedaction, take the next step and
then the next step unfolds.
It's almost like in that heartled living right, like that
intuitively guided living.
It's like the steps just tokind of appear below your feet
(17:31):
and it takes a lot of deep trust.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
You iterate, you make mistakes and you iterate again.
You pivot when you need to,yeah, but the main thing is you
just have to keep going.
Dwight, did you have somethingyou were going to say?
I thought I heard you try toget a word in edgewise there,
dwight did you have somethingyou were going to say?
Speaker 3 (17:52):
I thought I heard you try to get a word in edgewise
there.
No, I was just talking abouthow all of our efforts to try to
(18:12):
formalize things and to make itso that we had a business plan
of sorts, we eventually wised upand steered toward a true north
of understanding who it wasthat we served and what it was
that we ultimately saw asimportant, and that's that's
really guided our decisions, I'dsay for the last year or two,
yes, and that is actuallyimportant.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Another writing analogy is like before you write
the story, you do need to knowwho your audience is like you,
who you're writing to like whatpublication and who is it geared
to.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
So that came about the opposite of the way you
would think it would.
You know, we didn't reallyidentify who we served, they
just showed up.
You know, it was just one daywe were noticing creative people
just flocking around us and itwas kind of like our audience
picked us instead of us pickingthe audience.
(18:55):
We were like all of a sudden,one day this light bulb went off
and we were going in kind of adifferent direction and we had
this long talk and went.
You know what?
It's right there, you know, andwe know where to find that
audience and we're really drawnto that audience.
And we're really drawn to thataudience and what it and they're
drawn to us.
We abandoned where we weregoing and shifted, rebranded
(19:18):
everything, and this was onlywhat Dwight, two months ago,
three months ago, yeah, it'sbeen.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
it's been in the works.
I'd say maybe, maybe a littlemore like four, but yeah, a lot
of, a lot of parts.
The rebranding was painfulbecause we had a lot of the
collateral for the old stuff.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
And we still come across it, all the artwork and
yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
But you were open to the story changing which is so
valuable.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
Yes, I just put an email out to our audience and
said we're pivoting and it'sgoing to cause us to do a
complete rebrand.
So we appreciate your patiencewhile we go through that.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
I mean that's, it's like, and you know any artist
has to be, not has to be.
I don't want to say like that,but you know we need, we have to
be open to the art changing orto, or maybe the draft of the
story isn't working, so wediscard it and we have to be
willing to start over and that'show you get the best.
I guess like product, the bestpainting, the best writing is we
(20:17):
.
That's what they.
I mean, they taught us that ingraduate school.
It's like you have to bewilling to the story changing.
Jocelyn, you went into thisreporting, researching, and you
thought that it was going to bethis and you can't.
You have to throw all the oldnotes away, otherwise you're
going to miss the actual story.
And I was like but all thiswork, you know, I just I've
never wasted analogies this much.
This is funny.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
I'm like teaching a writing class on accident, but
um so is there more to tell moredetails about the current, the
dream, the unfolding, unfoldingthe plane that's taken off as
you're building it?
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Yeah, and so it's interesting because it did start
a little bit different.
And I'm still doing this, butit's helping me.
You know I'm a single mom, soit's helping me pay the bills
this portion of it, because theother one I haven't figured out
how to turn that into a streamof revenue out, how to turn that
into a um, a revenue stream ofrevenue.
(21:14):
But um is.
You know, the local universityhas asked me to speak to their
strategic communicationsdepartment once a year for like
the last seven years about um,creative journalism, non, you
know, creative nonfiction,narrative journalism they call
it, there's like five differentnames for it.
But and to their strategiccommunications is advertising,
public relations and marketing.
(21:34):
And I think I'm missing anotherpiece to it.
But and how the that type ofjournalism would add value to
them putting together likewriting for their clients.
And and then I was like, oh,why don't I do that?
You know, advertising andpublic relations are so
expensive and not as authentic.
You know, like the type of, youknow, journalists when they're
(21:56):
doing their job, well, they are.
It's pure content, right, it'slike it's ideally unbiased, it's
ideally objective and it's alsocompelling and it's engaging
and it's interesting andeducational.
And so, like what if I could dothat for the business world
(22:17):
somehow like skip andcollaborate with their PR people
?
So, and it's still like help,so it's basically helping
nonprofits and businesses alsofind their voice and be seen in
the world in a more authenticway.
So, like, I have a couple ofclients, like a CEO, a couple of
CEOs I'm working with now.
I'm writing their like it's anin-depth news profile, feature
(22:39):
news profile on them and theircompany and then they're using
that for their website or allthose others.
So that's been kind of cool todo that with.
And then in the business world,in the realm, trying to think of
what else I like there's anonprofit I'm helping for next
to nothing right now to do thatfor their story, Like how would
(23:01):
a journalist approach?
How, and then kind of connect Icall it a narrative strategy,
so how to connect them to localmedia outlets.
And then I also want to have abookstore.
And so I want to have abookstore that's like a little
lighthouse in the community,that's like an event space and I
want to have these writingworkshops like events at the
(23:23):
bookstore space, but also likehave guest speakers come in and
then from that and this.
Is this actually something kindof similar out there?
This is where I got all ofthese ideas, but I want the book
space to also like in fromthese storytelling circles.
Right, I'll like curate apublication of some sort because
I love magazines and that'skind of where I've always been
(23:46):
at home is just magazine writingand the design and the paper
and um.
But I was at Marfa, texas, afew years ago and they, um,
there's this place called theSentinel and it's this beautiful
coffee shop, um slash eventspace and they are named after
the local newspaper which wasclosing, and the New York times.
(24:06):
I actually profiled this as acreative revenue model for um
spaces, um and publications andum, yeah, and so it was.
The newspaper was folding andthey decided to, uh, buy the
newspaper and not fund it withads anymore but fund it with,
like any sort of revenue thatcame in from the space, and so I
was like I can do, do thatwhere I'm from and somehow bring
(24:30):
it home.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
I think you're definitely onto something really
big.
My intuition is just speakingvery loudly right now that yes,
yes, yes.
Speaker 3 (24:43):
Yeah, I definitely want to be involved in something
like that.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
Yeah, I mean just like the, just there's, I think,
just like a safe lighthousespace right when we can sit and
share, and in full disclosure.
A lot of this is inspired by mybackground in recovery.
Um, I quit drinking six yearsago.
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Oh, congratulations.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
Thank you.
Thank you.
It's been a journey.
It runs in the family.
My dad warned me and I was likeno, it skips a generation.
But it definitely was impactingmy life in the worst way, and
so when I quit drinking I wasencouraged to join AA circles.
I was like that's not reallyfor me, I don't need that, and
(25:26):
they're like it's not reallyabout drinking or addiction so
much, it's about connection, youknow.
And so I remember having towatch a little Ted talk about
the.
They say the opposite ofaddiction is not sobriety, the
opposite of addiction isconnection.
Speaker 2 (25:43):
And community.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
And community, yeah, and so like, and you just sit in
circle with people and you'vegot what three to five minutes
to share a part of your story,based on whatever topic we're
talking.
You can go off topic if youwant, whatever you need for that
day.
But just connecting with otherpeople in that way, like in such
a vulnerable way, like tell youknow when you're in recovery
(26:06):
rooms you're sharing things thatyour deepest, darkest secrets
sometimes, and no one's judgingyou and everyone's, and you're
uplifting and healing otherpeople on that environment.
And it's like how powerfulwould it be to kind of again
like bring that out of thatenvironment into, like the
secular, mundane space?
Speaker 2 (26:24):
Circles are magical in so many ways, especially if
they're well led.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Yeah, that's my fear.
It's like I don't know how tolead a circle.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
So that's why I'm kind of like that's my next, we
can help you with that?
Speaker 1 (26:38):
Yes, I need help with that.
Speaker 3 (26:40):
We're going to talk about a possible collaboration
later on, okay, and thankfullyyou've got so many models to
work from, because I look at howyou.
All you have to do is look atwhat's done in with indigenous
peoples, when a great example istheir approach to justice.
(27:04):
You know, for them it's notabout crime and punishment.
It's about knowing, when peoplefall astray, that they have a
chance to be redeemed, and wecan learn a lot from that kind
of value of human life andcontribution.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Yeah, and just that being rehabilitated and
understanding that a lot oftimes crime either comes from a
mental health issue or a sense,a place of misinformation or
hurt, you know, and the factthat we skipped that step in our
justice system here.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Unhealed trauma.
Yes, so take us back to thevery beginning.
I would love to know when didyou know that you were drawn to
creative stuff?
How did creativity show up inyour life in the very early
stages?
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Oh, I don't know.
See, it's funny, I never wouldhave thought of myself as a
creative person until recently.
But because I have this twinsister who we're opposite, twins
right, and I'm the left braintwin and she's the right brain
twin and she's her hair's dark,her skin's beautiful olive color
, she looks almost Italian andshe's the wild creative, like
(28:19):
the right brain.
And I'm like you know, I go toschool, I make straight A's, I
loved math, I loved science, youknow, and I studied, you know,
news writing, which is notcreative.
I said that it is very creative, I'm realizing, especially the
type I practice.
But I did win a lot of artawards as a kid and I love to
color in the lines she coloredout of the lines.
(28:39):
It's just two different typesof creative, right?
But I never really saw thatuntil recently.
Um and um, yeah, so as a, as achild, I, I just um, I loved art
, but I never, yeah, I never sawmyself as a creative cause.
I was comparing myself to her.
Speaker 2 (28:57):
You know from where I'm standing.
You are highly creative.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
Yes, it's funny how parents kind of can do that to
kids, right, they're like kindof put you in a box.
It's funny how parents kind ofcan do that to kids, right,
they're like kind of put you ina box.
Like Jocelyn's the left braingrounded one, lauren's the wild,
creative one, jocelyn's theintrovert, lauren's the
extrovert, you know like and.
But what happens is like whatif we're both?
(29:22):
And you know like what if wecan be a tomboy and a girly girl
?
Like why do we have to be oneor the other?
Um, which was that was kind ofmy story as a kid.
I was always the tomboy, but Iwas confused because I also was
not into sports.
I was into gymnastics andhorseback riding.
So it was like I'm confused,but now you know, learning that
(29:42):
we can be all of the above.
Speaker 2 (29:44):
Yes, I love that and it's not an.
It's an.
And I love that and it's not an.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
and it's an, and I love that, like yes and but yeah
, my journey as a kid you know Ihate to say this, but I'm sure
this is probably true for a lotof people is that I think all
the pain I experienced, thethings that we kind of endured
in our lives, have also kind ofbecome our purpose, right?
Yes, yeah, absolutely yes, yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:10):
Absolutely yes.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
And it's like sometimes there was this I don't
think it was a masterclass thatnotes that a friend shared with
me.
So this is again playingtelephone, but I've heard this
before.
When you're trying to figureout what your purpose is in life
, ask yourself what breaks yourheart the most about the world.
And for me, there was a lot ofneglect in my childhood, there
was a lot of abandonment, and soit was.
(30:33):
I lived so much just beingunseen and I was like I want to
make sure people are seen.
I don't care what what thatlooks like if that's through
telling their story, you know,and so that was.
I think that has been mybiggest.
My pain has been my biggestcreative inspiration, and I know
I'm not unique in that, butthat's pretty much where I've
(30:57):
been led.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
I worked with a marketing guru at one point
coach that approached it from avery spiritual place, which is
kind of odd marketing and spirit.
But one of the things he saidto me that I've never forgotten
and it rang true the minute hesaid it it was like, oh my God,
yes, he said, the people thatyou are most suited to have the
(31:26):
biggest impact with are thepeople who have experienced the
same trauma that you have.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (31:36):
That our pain becomes our purpose.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Yeah, and I feel, like you know, in storytelling,
I feel like what I've started tonotice was that there's this
kind of we all have like uniqueexpressions of we're, all unique
expressions of universe orwhatever, but all have like
unique expressions of we're allunique expressions of universe
or whatever.
But we also have uniqueexpressions of pain.
But underneath that, our kindof painful experience, there's
almost like this river of, likea common thread in all of our
(32:07):
hurts that I always, throughwriting, wanted to bring out
Like're.
So there's this division rightmore now than ever, but I've
seen it my whole life wherethere's like the other, the
other person they're separatefrom me, but if we kind of can
like, whenever we read someone'sstory or learn someone's story,
we realize that, like, thatpain is not a whole lot
(32:28):
different from my pain and ifthat is illustrated well through
writing that we can maybe stoppointing fingers so much.
You know, right now I'm dealingwith a very toxic, abusive
ex-boyfriend that has beenseparated for seven months.
But you know, they call it theholiday Hoover is what I'm just
(32:52):
learning about, but yesterday, Idon't know, christmas night
they call it the holiday Hooveris what I'm just learning about,
but yesterday or no.
Christmas night I got a bunchof devastating emails, just kind
of this weird out of nowhereafter two months launch of
things, and I just it justreally occurred to me like his
pain is not a whole lotdifferent from my pain.
He's acting out of desperation,not that I need to jump to
compassion too fast, but ithelps me.
(33:15):
Let go and move on.
Speaker 2 (33:17):
And yeah, when you referred to the holiday hoover,
were you meaning that you tendto get sucked back in?
Speaker 1 (33:26):
Well, it's kind of it's typical.
So I'm kind of also an expertof like abuse cycles.
I've just studied them my wholelife to try and make sense of
some things in my life and thethings I'm.
But one of the abuse cycle kindof patterns is they hoover you
back, they abuse you and thenthey hoover you back in.
(33:46):
Then there's the honeymoonphase and then they abuse you
and hoover you back in.
So it's kind of a circle thatjust happens.
Speaker 2 (33:51):
So it's like a vacuum clip You're getting you back in
.
So it's kind of a circle thatjust happens.
So it's like a vacuum clipYou're getting sucked back in.
Speaker 1 (33:54):
Yes, it's a term that a lot of these kind of people
use that research, narcissistickind of abuse, psychological
abuse, emotional abuse but yeah,it's a.
It's like a hoovering, suckingyou back in, and they'll pick
important days like birthdays,holidays to to do it because
they're they're missing you,they need their supply, kind of
like energetic vampires, and soI just kind of be prepared for
(34:20):
that.
But my biggest life mission isto help.
One of them is to help peopleunderstand what that looks like
and that they're not alone,because that has also been a big
part of my story.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
And does working with others make it easier for you
as you deal with the holiday,hoover and the like in your own
personal life?
Speaker 1 (34:41):
yeah.
So you know, for me, like um,writing is how I make sense of
the world and so in thisparticular case, um, so my
therapist this is kind of acreative process I'm in the
middle of because I still writeand so she, my therapist, said
write a letter to the newgirlfriend, but don't give it to
(35:03):
her, just like a pretend, likewarning her of all the things to
expect and what's going tohappen.
And then I have 12 pages singlespaced, type to later.
I was like this is one of themost powerful things I've ever
written.
I was like this needs to bepublished and you know, and that
again is me sharing my storyand my journey.
(35:25):
But also I realized in the top Iput a writer's note this is a
letter to any person enduringpsychological manipulation or
abuse, anytime they're in,whether it's a system, whether
it's a workplace, a religion, agovernment system, whatever it
is, anytime there's someonethat's words and actions aren't
(35:45):
matching, they're manipulatingyou and your reality is being
distorted and broken by thismanipulative system.
So it was like this letterisn't just to the new girlfriend
, this letter is to like anyperson who's confused about what
they're experiencing in a workenvironment that's, or any
environment that's not savory, Iguess.
(36:05):
So that's kind of like a wayI'm using writing to, yeah, to
help others and work with othersin that sense different from
the writing workshops, but I dowant to have writing workshops
around psychological abuse.
Speaker 3 (36:18):
Beautiful so.
Speaker 2 (36:20):
I'd like to hear a little bit about.
You know you have a rich story,a rich journey, lots of really
fabulous stuff that you've done.
Let's talk challenges.
What's been the hard stuffduring that journey, the things
that you found your way to theother side of?
Speaker 1 (36:40):
Oh my gosh, I think the biggest one you know, back
to the and this is really upuntil the last six months, this
has been my whole life, but Ithink I'm finally breaking out
of that mold is just the neglectand the emotional.
I think neglect, emotionalabuse and psychological abuse
that's been.
It shows up in every part of mylife which makes me think I'm
(37:02):
there's a lesson I'm notlearning here, like what's going
on, and so the way I'veovercome that is, I'm realizing
now, looking back on my wholelife and reflecting and through
writing, is that it's just beena journey to self-love and
self-worth and understanding howwe can validate ourselves and
our own experiences.
That is the biggest weapon wecan have against any of these
(37:26):
interpersonal relationships orworkplace whatever systems that
are taking our power away.
When something's taking ourpower away, when something's
taking our power away, we'realso giving our power away, you
know.
And so there's like this kind oftakes two to tango dance
situation, and sometimes it'sunwittingly right Like we're not
(37:46):
.
It's I don't.
I don't realize I'm doing it,but when I've spent my life
trying to get these unhealed,you know people who are not very
self-aware, living out theirwounds unconsciously, trying to
get them to validate my worth isjust inviting the abuse right,
and so it's like the biggestthing I think I've overcome is
(38:07):
just absolute beautiful, beamingself-love.
In all the ways I am okay, nomatter who leaves me or who says
something to me, or who does ordoesn't like me.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
You know this was a little bit of our conversation
at the birthday party Heavyconversation for a birthday
party.
I know and I remember youtalked about the neglect and the
abuse and I remember saying toyou you know, people,
experiences in life are a mirror.
You know those experiences arereflecting back to you, back to
(38:46):
you, and oftentimes that showsup in the form of you perhaps
neglected yourself or perhapsabused yourself and when these
other people saw you do that,they thought it was okay.
They thought it was okay to doit too.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
It's almost like an easy target, it's like an
invitation.
They can read your energypretty well.
It's like vampires smell blood,you know, and and and if we are
, if I you know me beingstruggling with self um,
self-esteem, confidence issues,you know they sense that and
(39:27):
they just swoop right in andlike how can I?
What's, what's that, what'sthat phrase Like, if you don't
know who you are, the world willtell you.
So I think that's the biggestthing is like I'm learning who I
am, and it's truly throughwriting my own story I've
written hundreds of pages in thelast six months of my own story
, trying and really discoveringthe woman that I am and the
(39:51):
person that I am and that hashelped me.
It's almost like a strongfoundation, like a shield
against these things.
Speaker 2 (39:59):
If you were going to share just a sentence or two
words of wisdom for how to loveyourself, what would that be?
Speaker 1 (40:07):
Oh my gosh, I know there's all these affirmations
out there, I know there's allthese affirmations out there,
but for me it's just like doing,doing little things for myself.
So like I take myself on theselong, beautiful walks and, um, I
(40:27):
take, I've cooked myself dinner, I'll take myself to the movies
, and I know it's not likeforever that I'm doing this.
This is I know.
I think I had a friend bring itup recently.
She's like, you know, beingalone all the time.
Friend bring it up recently,she's like being alone all the
time isn't necessarily the point, john, it's like I know, but
it's like being okay with beingalone.
Speaker 2 (40:39):
It's like oh, you're courting yourself.
Speaker 1 (40:42):
Yeah, like not abandoning myself when things
get hard.
I think one of the mostpowerful things I did recently,
when I had another I don't knowif you call it energetic attack
or whatever from the ex, is, Ijust crumbled to the floor and I
said Jocelyn, I'm not leavingyou, I'm not going to leave you
in the middle of this, I'm notgoing to.
You know, as a kid, if I cried,it was like go to your room.
(41:04):
That's weird, what is wrongwith you?
And so it's like how can I showup for myself when I'm not the
person I think I should be inthat moment?
Not strong enough, not, youknow, happy enough or whatever.
Like just sitting with myselfin all of it in ways that no one
else ever has, and it's been sopowerful.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Wow, I can hear how you're having a lot of moments
of discovering your ownself-worth and having all of
this clarity around how you weretrying to deal with feeling
abandoned and neglected.
How has that informed what itis you're modeling for your
(41:51):
child?
Speaker 1 (41:58):
informed what it is you're modeling for your child.
Oh my, um, my son is is.
He is one of the neatest peopleI have ever met.
I always joke I'm going to bejust like him when I grow up.
I've, I mean, like completelyevolved past me as a human and I
think it's just that I havetaught him that you know just to
trust that voice that says thisdoesn't feel good.
(42:20):
And he does have a friend thathas mastered the art of
manipulation at six years old.
My son's now almost 13, butthey're still friends.
And watching my son just createboundaries with him and know
that that's not.
Whatever comes at him is notabout I'm like did that hurt
your feelings?
Are you okay?
He's like that wasn't about me,mom.
(42:42):
I was like what?
I wouldn't be like that when Iwas his age, or even now.
Speaker 2 (42:50):
Definitely an evolved soul.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
Yeah, he's just an old old soul and he's always,
you know they'll be asleep overwith five of his best friends
and he wasn't included.
He's like I'm fine, it wasn'tabout me.
And it's like I was like wow,okay, and I'm seeing how kind of
what I've been through has been.
I think he was born that way.
But I will take a little creditthat I've imparted maybe some
of my journey for him and sharedsome of the wisdom I picked up
(43:15):
with him.
Speaker 3 (43:16):
No doubt.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
So we always, in every episode, kind of draw this
in, because this is the themeof the podcast and that is, in
all this journey and everythingyou've experienced, how has
community shown up in that?
How has it played a role inyour creative journey, good or
bad?
Speaker 1 (43:39):
Oh, so good or bad.
I mean, let's see, I do findthat this new kind of journey,
since I left the college in 2021, and I did edit, was an editor
for a local news organizationfor a little while and left that
and I find it to be kind of asolitary experience, you know,
(44:00):
after being so used to working,like in buildings, with people
and nine to five, um, but I, youknow, as far as, like, I've
found I, you know, someone saidonce like, if you't have, stop
waiting for something to show up, create it.
And so, like I created a littlecommunity of women who have
left corporate, left the nine tofive, trying to build their own
(44:23):
dreams, and so, like we kind oftalk about what it's like to
like recover from theseworkplaces and so like, in a
sense, like I'm finding mycommunity.
In that sense, I would likemore of it.
I do.
I am a bit introverted and I dolike my alone time, so I don't
go to a bunch of events, but Iwould like to be doing.
I feel like 2025 is more of that, like being out and out in the
(44:46):
world.
I've been in my littlechrysalis for like the last year
and a half but also likecommunity and you know I would
say like the journalisticcommunity can be a little
pretentious and so like it'sbeen.
You know there's a little bitof this.
I don't know if it's like meangirls is kind of the expression,
but it's also guys too, right,but there's this pretentiousness
(45:10):
about that I've never reallyfallen for and so I find it hard
to fit in in some of these moretraditional communities in my
career and so in that sense thatcommunity has been.
It's also like, just like themovies, right, newsrooms can be
quite abusive.
The screaming the editors likeyou suck, and the screaming the
(45:33):
editor is like you suck.
Speaker 2 (45:33):
You know, there was a lot of my life that I felt like
I didn't fit in and I had areally, really big breakthrough
when I realized that most ofthose situations where I didn't
feel like I fit in, when Istepped back and really looked
at it and asked myself, Irealized that I didn't want to
fit into that.
(45:54):
And when I realized that I waskind of unconsciously making a
choice, it changed everything.
Instead of going, oh woe is me,I don't fit in, I was looking
at these environments like thatpretentious stuff and saying no.
no, this is not, I don't't fitin, this is I choose not to fit
(46:15):
in, this isn't.
These are not my people.
Speaker 1 (46:18):
It's yeah.
Similarly, it's just occurredto me.
It was like wait a second, Iwasn't.
I wasn't supposed to fit in, Iwasn't meant to.
You know, it was like that wasthe point.
Like that's been so.
It's felt so good to do.
Speaker 2 (46:34):
Yeah it's liberating, isn't it?
Speaker 1 (46:35):
Yeah, it's like we weren't meant to fit in some of
these spaces, you know, andthat's okay, wow.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
This has been an amazing conversation and I have
loved every minute of your story.
Speaker 1 (46:49):
Oh, thank you, and it's been great talking to you
all.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
So normally we do three rapid fire questions, but
I dozed off somehow and forgotto formulate three rapid fire
questions.
So, dwight, we're going to haveto shoot from the hip.
We're going to have to makethem up.
I'll go first with one.
I've got one.
So you find out that you onlyhave a few days to live and
(47:29):
you're reflecting back on yourlife.
What is the thing that you feelthe best about when you reflect
back on the time you've been onthe planet.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
Hmm, I mean first reaction, first response.
If I had to think fast my heartlike just the way I have moved
about the world my whole life,even in my days of drinking Not
to say I'm not saying I movedaround the world perfectly or as
(48:01):
a saint, but I have alwayscared deeply about people and
humanity and everything I'vedone has been in some service to
the world.
Speaker 2 (48:14):
I sense that about you, like the moment I met you.
It's obvious you wear it onyour sleeve, as the saying goes.
Speaker 1 (48:22):
Yeah, yeah.
So I used to be told I care toomuch and I was like, and I
remember thinking I tried totemper that for a while and then
I was like, but wait, justrecently again like maybe it's
okay, maybe that's.
Speaker 2 (48:35):
I've been told most of my life that I cared too much
.
My mom would say it to me whenI was a kid you just care too
much.
Speaker 1 (48:41):
Yeah, but maybe it's not a bad thing, right.
Speaker 2 (48:44):
No, why is that a bad thing?
Yeah, have you got a rapid fire?
Speaker 3 (48:48):
Well, of course.
Well, we're both two highlysensitive people.
I think it would be reallyinteresting to see how you would
answer this, Given that you gotto go to places where you could
study antiquity and reach outand touch things, and you have
(49:09):
an interest in stories.
Who is it that you can relateto, be it in fiction or in myth
or in history, as a character,as an avatar that more or less
tells your story?
And tell us a little bit why?
Speaker 1 (49:28):
Oh my gosh, that's a really beautiful question.
I am, oh my gosh, I'm going tohave to think about that.
Who tells my story?
Oh well, I mean, actually I dohave an answer to this.
We kind of talked about this atthe beginning, but Simba from
(49:49):
the Lion King oh, and becauseand I'm just now realizing why I
was so drawn to that and helost his father and he felt like
it was him to blame and he wentabout the world kind of ran
away.
But really it was just on thisjourney of self-discovery.
(50:12):
And I think my favorite sceneis when he's back in this field
and he is a young, a young manat this point, and Rafiki the
baboon comes with his stick andhe's acting kind of silly and
and, um, he's like the mysticright, he's the shaman of the of
the show and he, he, he says,um, I know who you are.
And he's like you don't knowwho I am.
(50:32):
And he's like you don't evenknow who you are.
And he's like who am I?
Then?
And Simba says to Rufiki, and hesays you're Mufasa's boy.
And he's like how did you knowthat?
And then he says my father died, I hate to tell you.
And he's like no, and I thinkthis is the point of kind of
like all of the work I'm doingtoo right now.
But he leads him to a puddle ofwater and he looks in the the
(50:56):
um.
He says look, he lives, lookthere, there he is.
And he looks his reflectionright and he's like that's just
me.
It's like no, look hard.
And then he sees his father andfor me it's not literal, it's
not my actual father, but it islike my higher self, my goddess,
mother, father, god, source,universe, love, whatever that we
(51:18):
are deeply connected to.
They live in us.
And he rolls in on this massivecloud in the field and he says
you have forgotten who you are.
You must go back home and takeyour place in the circle of life
.
And I think that's where I amright now.
It's just finding my place.
Speaker 2 (51:35):
Wow, I had forgotten about that scene and I'm like
I'm going to email it to y'allafter this.
I'm having flashbacks.
I'd forgotten about it and Iremember how it affected me.
When I saw it on the screen, itjust brought me to tears.
Speaker 1 (51:49):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:50):
Wow, that's beautiful .
Okay, final question you havethis magical ability to go back
in time to visit your youngerself at any age that you choose.
How old would you be the partof you that you would visit, and
(52:11):
what words of wisdom would youshare with that younger part of
you, knowing what you know now?
Speaker 1 (52:17):
now y'all are gonna make me cry.
Oh, I talk to her a lot thesedays.
Um, I would say 13, rightbefore my mom moved away and I
was left with nobody.
And, yeah, I would tell her, Iwould love on her and tell her
(52:37):
that there's never been anythingwrong with her, that she didn't
cause any of this, thatanything that's going to happen
to her life she did not cause it, and that she's worthy and that
she doesn't need a title tovalidate her.
She doesn't need anythingoutside of herself to validate
(52:58):
her, that she is complete andwhole and everything that she is
, and um, and that's.
I would just want, yeah, I'dwant to share that with her that
she's going to be okay, morethan okay, and she's going to
have a beautiful life ahead ofher, all of her own creation.
Speaker 2 (53:16):
Thank you for that.
I'm crying too.
Wow, awesome.
This has been an amazing timetogether.
What a beautiful conversation,and I feel so honored that you
just shared so vulnerably andopenly.
Thank you for this.
Speaker 1 (53:34):
Thank you all so much for having me.
I loved getting to talk withyou all and I'm excited to be
joining some of y'all circlescoming up here soon and February
1st right.
Speaker 2 (53:44):
Yes, we can't wait.
Speaker 1 (53:49):
Thank you all so much .
Speaker 2 (53:50):
Thank you.
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