The life of a Third Culture Kid therapist

The life of a Third Culture Kid therapist

Rachel is, amongst many other things, a Third Culture Kid therapist specialising in Life Story Interview and Accompaniment, an approach she developed from her Sociological doctorial research into TCK identity, belonging and relationship to place. This podcast is a place she comes to contribute her ponderings on personal growth, working with pain, and the transformative change that comes from a better understanding of our own stories. For more information about Rachel’s therapeutic work, please visit: www.explorelifestory.com or drop her a line at rachelcason@explorelifestory.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Episodes

171 - Seasonal Traditions - or Habits?

December 23, 2025 • 25 mins
This year I've been encountering a new awful question - not 'Where are you from?' but 'What are your Christmas traditions?' In this episode I get curious about what I find difficult about this question - how traditions can be hard when you've seen and experienced so many different versions of this season, and yet what cultivating habits around this season can do for us.

Hosted on Acast....

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170 - TCKs and Maslow - Safety Needs

December 5, 2025 • 20 mins
And here we have the second instalment of our Maslow series... Safety Needs! What does safety and risk actually mean in our TCK stories? And how do we see these play out in our current chapters?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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169 - TCKs and Maslow - Physiological Needs

November 28, 2025 • 21 mins
This is an episode I've been pondering a while - how do TCKs perceive their own needs in terms of an internalised hierarchy? I explore where Maslow's ideas and my own observations around need-juggling and autonomy interact here - and specifically around our physiological needs.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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168 - Incoherent

November 21, 2025 • 18 mins
Today's episode is pondering around how hard we work to create coherence, and my own experience this week of wanting to let incoherence be. TCKs often work so hard to prune and curate their stories, and I'm exploring here the relief I feel at not doing that today. Thanks for joining me!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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167 - The Rules that Find Us Wanting

November 14, 2025 • 20 mins
What if we actually listed out our expectations of ourselves? What if we really allowed ourselves to acknowledge the many and competing ideas of how we 'should' be, the ones we have collected through our cultures and places - and sat with how utterly impossible they all are to satisfy? And then let go and grieve...

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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166 - Now I Can Be Scared

November 7, 2025 • 21 mins
I felt fear this week - fear jumping over time stamps, into my now. How do we explain feelings that show up out of space and time, dislocated within our own story? How do we understand fear when we are safe?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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165 - Art that Retrieves our Story

October 17, 2025 • 21 mins

This weekend I went to a print fair - and found a piece of art that triggered an unexpected TCK encounter. What is it about images that can press on those tender parts of our story so well?


Check out the artist at www.beicreative.co.uk or on Instagram @_beicreative

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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164 - Loneliness and TCKs

October 10, 2025 • 23 mins
I had some soft slow sadness hit this week - and it took me a while to identify it as loneliness. This episode explores where and why loneliness might be a familiar part of our TCK story.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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163 - Dancing on Social Convention

October 3, 2025 • 26 mins
So I've just been to a wedding - and broke a few of my own self-imposed rules. Here I talk about the moment of choice - to sit back and wait and watch before acting, the context necessary for the risk I took, and the after-effects of the choice I made.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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162 - Feelings as Clues

September 26, 2025 • 21 mins
In this episode, I observe the difficulty so many TCKs have with acknowledging their feelings - especially feelings of discomfort. Why is this, and what do these feelings have to contribute to our story?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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161 - Birthdays, Celebrations and Getting it Right...

September 19, 2025 • 17 mins
So, I found this episode I recorded way back in July! Excited to finally bring it to you - meandering though how TCKs might navigate birthdays and other celebrations when belonging is so often tied into the shape of those modes of celebration and traditions.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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160 - Sabotage... or Resistance?

September 12, 2025 • 32 mins
Back after a long summer gap - but reflecting on the processing there and on a theme showing up a lot this week - self-sabotage! This is an exploration of what are the stories we might be in when we watch ourselves deviate from our own goals and plans - TCK-style!

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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159 - I finished the to-do list... and it feels weird

July 11, 2025 • 23 mins
Reflections on how things actually going to plan - life doing what we wanted - can actually trigger anxiety in TCKs! Even finishing my to-do list...

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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158 - TCK Creatives

July 4, 2025 • 17 mins

Introducing a new online group for TCK creatives! If you are a TCK who loves working creatively, join us via Facebook (just search 'Third Culture Kid Creatives') and discover how many TCKs are exploring their stories creatively, using these creative outlets to process their experiences.


The link to the group on Facebook is https://www.facebook.com/groups/1431710724484174/


See you there!

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157 - Grief Sticks

June 27, 2025 • 11 mins
Inspired by a conversation with another TCK, I've decided to make tangible representations of all those losses that have felt so hard to name - especially the loss of things that we never had - and invite you to do the same.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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156 - The Focus on Arrival

June 20, 2025 • 17 mins
What happens with perfectionism collides with a short internal timeline? This episode I'm exploring the way in which our TCK experiences can shorten our sense of timeline, keeping our focus on achieving 'completion' even with those aspects of life that are just never going to be 'done'...

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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155 - Are you allowed to be happy?

June 13, 2025 • 18 mins
So in this episode I'm exploring the ways in which we absorb different cultural ideas about what kind of life is supposed to make us happy - aka, are we allowed to be happy with something outside of that?

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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154 - Sit with me and be

May 30, 2025 • 12 mins
A shorter one today - This is me just finding myself wanting to sit and be, so I thought I would do it with you - pondering what it is to be still in the midst of spinning between the different facets of self...

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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153 - Now that I'm 40...

May 23, 2025 • 20 mins
I've turned 40! So cue reflections on aging, the ways in which our cultures and places contribute to our perspective on age, and a poem. Thank you so much for being with me for so long, and I'm so grateful to have arrived here, with you.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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152 - Tolerating the Awkward

May 16, 2025 • 18 mins
Good at smoothing out social glitches? Feel desperately uncomfortable being 'demanding'? Welcome to the club! I hear so many of us struggling to tolerate the awkward...

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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