|int| Exploring the Canvas of Veteran Recovery w/ Jackie Jones | Ep 97

When Jackie Jones of Flourish Momentum shares her journey from an art educator to a therapist, we're reminded that sometimes the most profound changes in our lives come from unexpected transitions. This episode is a testament to how embracing the art of healing can illuminate a path toward reclaiming life after trauma, particularly for veterans and active-duty military personnel grappling with PTSD and its complex cousins. Together with Jackie, we uncover the layered realities of psychological conditions like moral injury and complicated grief, and the ways in which creative self-expression can be a powerful ally in the fight for mental well-being.

The transformative power of art therapy takes center stage as we recount the evolution of its programs within the military healthcare system. By transcending skepticism and integrating into places like Fort Belvoir, art therapy has emerged as a critical tool for processing trauma and unearthing subconscious issues. Jackie's anecdotes bring to life the profound impact it has on individuals, from a man learning to accept his past to a veteran shouldering immense loss. These stories are a beacon of hope, illustrating that with the right support, the journey to self-acceptance and sharing one's pain is not only possible but life-changing.

Our conversation wraps up, emphasizing the essential nature of personalized mental health treatment. We tackle the frustrations many encounter with overmedication and one-size-fits-all approaches, highlighting the promise of alternative therapies like sound bowl sessions and the importance of addressing the deep-rooted causes of emotional distress. As Jackie and I reflect on these themes, the episode becomes a call to action for anyone looking to understand their trauma and to find the courage to move forward in life. Join us for an honest, insightful look at the challenges and triumphs on the road to healing.

Get in touch and follow Jackie below:

https://flourishmomentum.com/
IG: @Flourish_momentum
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/jackiejones

Contact her on any of the links or simply drop her an email:
Jackie@FlourishMomentum.com

Contact Thad - VictoriousVeteranProject@Gmail.com

Thanks for listening!

Transcript

Jackie Jones: 0:10

There are a lot of people who would come to me with the diagnosis of PTSD and they would say I have been treating PTSD for so long. I don't know why I'm still stuck on this. In the work that we did, I could help them see the more nuance of what they were dealing with. So whether it was more moral injury or more complicated grief or more disenfranchised grief, Shame, Guilt, there's so many things that are more nuanced than PTSD diagnosis and when they were presented with these other terms it was really validating for them because it helped them feel seen for more of what they were actually experiencing.

Jackie Jones: 0:59

To answer your question, the part of it is the labels. Part of it is when people are given certain labels or given certain medications. They feel like I guess I just am this thing for the rest of my life, or I guess I just am this way for the rest of my life, or I guess I just have to be dependent on meds for the rest of my life. But it's not true. Those are all labeling symptoms or dealing with symptoms. But if you can get to the root of what's going on, a lot of times you can completely shift your experience and how you live in the world and feel in the world.

Thad David: 1:34

My name is Thad David. I'm a former Marine recon scout sniper with two deployments to Iraq. As a civilian, I've now facilitated hundreds of personal and professional development trainings across the country, and it struck me recently that the same things that help civilians will also help veterans succeed in their new roles as well. Join me as we define civilian success principles to inspire veteran victories. Welcome to another episode. I'm here today with Jackie Jones of Flourish Momentum. How are you doing, jackie? I'm wonderful.

Jackie Jones: 2:05

How are you doing today?

Thad David: 2:07

Just absolutely incredible. Thank you so much for jumping on. I know you've done a ton of work with active duty military, with veterans, that you're doing now and I've been very excited for this conversation and so thanks for taking some time, If you could. I know you worked with what you're doing now and then also in the past you worked with active duty military members. What did you do? If you could just share a little bit? How did you get into it? What did you do there?

Jackie Jones: 2:34

Of course, okay. So first career I was an art teacher and I had goals of working with at-risk youth. When I was in school for art education, I wound up volunteering I mean leaving college early and volunteering in Brazil for a while, and when I was working with homeless kids and moms in Brazil I felt like I would have had more of the impact I would have wanted to have if I had an art therapy approach versus an art education approach. Came back, became an art teacher because that was my track.

Jackie Jones: 3:20

I had already it was on my way to getting my master's in art education. But as soon as I started there, I started night school with art therapy being my goal, and so it would have. I was on the track to do art therapy with kids, and when I was a teacher though an art teacher things would come up in the kids' artwork and I was interested already in the intersection of art and psychology, where I was noticing these flags coming up in the artwork. But it wasn't my role to process them or address them with the kids. I had to show the artwork to a guidance counselor and then it would never circle back to me. And so, number one, I didn't really like how I'm the one who created the container for these things to come up, but I wasn't allowed to be part of the processing part. And then also as a teacher, it was very clear that when you're dealing with, let's say, behavioral issues in kids, there's only so much you can do. When you realize that either they're learning something from home or they're reacting to something from home, it's also not your role to become a therapist for the parents.

Jackie Jones: 5:00

And also, when I left teaching to go to school for art therapy, the PTA president at the time told me aside and said friendly. But he said no matter what you do, don't go work with adult men because they're not going to get this, they're not going to appreciate what you're bringing to the table. And I took that as a challenge. I was like okay, in my mind. I was like, okay, noted, that's a challenging population. I'm probably going to seek it out. When I was in school for art therapy, I did my first year long internship with kids with cancer. But when you're in school for art therapy, you do a lot of analyzing your own life and a lot of things were coming up for me that I was dissecting in my own life and that I was investigating in my own life. So, number one, I had the experience of being a teacher and learning that to address some of the issues that were showing up in the kids, you would really need to be working with the parents.

Thad David: 6:13

Can I ask you about that? Actually, because, just out of curiosity, you mentioned flags with artwork. What is a flag from a kid's artwork? What would that look like? What did you notice there?

Jackie Jones: 6:25

Yeah, actually, okay, this is a good tie for where I wound up. So I had the student in particular who I better understood later when I learned all about art therapy and psychology and development and this kind of thing. But he would be in the middle of a drawing and it would be on track and then all of a sudden we'd have like five minutes left of drawing that day and he would take the black pastel and just color over the entire thing. So he'd go from having a picture that was the assignment to blackening his whole paper, or he would have like a normal second grade project, would be like an architecture project, like design, a dream home or something based on these different principles, and everything would be going according to plan. And then at the last 10 minutes he would like draw a bomb all over it or something. So things like this.

Jackie Jones: 7:35

And then, when you can't be part of the processing, you don't know if it's influence from a video game or influence from a bigger brother, or if he has anger toward people in the school, and so you things come up that you you want to better understand. Is this what's this kid going through? What are the emotions underlying this? Because you don't want to read into something incorrectly, but you're not. That's not your role. It will circle back to when I started working with the military.

Thad David: 8:09

Actually, that's just curious, because I'm thinking, I'm looking at my kids artwork Like I have a. My son drew me a heart within a heart within a heart. So I was like I wonder how am I going to analyze all the drawings they bring home from school? So I was just, I was just curious to know what, what that was. It's very intriguing thing. I would have never thought to think about the psychology inside of what's taking place while kids are drawing, but it makes makes perfect sense and so you wanted to be part of the processing of it and you kind of follow that pathway.

Thad David: 8:43

And so where did you end up after all of this?

Jackie Jones: 8:46

So at the same time also uncovered things about my family, like an uncle who had served in Vietnam died from ODing, and my grandfather, who I never met because he was died before I born. He died before I was born. He had escaped the Holocaust. So that's number one. But number two, he wound up being a service number for the US and later on he died, and he died in a train track, so they don't know if it was suicide or malicious. And and also I was in a relationship where there was the other family had just longstanding prejudices they couldn't overcome. I couldn't see me as who I am, as a person, and but it was rooted in conflict and other areas of the world and other times. And so all these things came together and it's like, ok, it's more than just a challenge to go work with quote unquote adult men. There are lots of reasons that I. It would have made sense for me to go work with kids, but I felt more and more guided to go work with the military in particular. And so my second year internship when I was in grad school for therapy wound up being at NICO. So I was at the National Trepid Center of Excellence at Walter Reed for a year long internship providing our therapy there, and it was a phenomenal experience.

Jackie Jones: 10:39

And while I was there the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund had gotten the money and was breaking ground on outpatient settings. That would be like the NICO, but the NICO program is only four weeks. So especially SEALs would be sent there to do TBI, ptsd assessment and rehab for four weeks, but then they'd return and they would have nowhere to do the same sort of modalities that they had just been exposed to. So, for example, someone may have really been taken to art therapy, but there is. I mean you can get a lot in four sessions, like one time a week for four weeks, but it's more uncovering the root of what's going on. Generally you need longer than that to then, once you have the root of what's going on, process it and integrate the changes and transform within yourself. So anyway, then that's just art therapy. But you know people would receive acupuncture there and then have nowhere to keep getting it or you know that kind of thing. So it started breaking ground, yeah.

Thad David: 12:00

No, it makes me think of, like, if I ever have a gap of time where I stop working out and kind of get out of shape, you know have that moment where I work out for a month and then you kind of hit that crossroads where it's like you know what I can I can go back to eating cheeseburgers, I can and then you let yourself kind of slide, but you're feeling good, and then what I'm hearing is they come to you for four weeks, experience some good stuff, and then they go back to their units.

Thad David: 12:23

Yeah, and then they don't have it back in the same old same old without actually having access to it. And just for clarity sake, what is typical? You mentioned acupuncture. What is art therapy consist of? Just so we can kind of follow along what somebody might be doing for four weeks.

Jackie Jones: 12:40

So what is art therapy consist of? Well, so this was at the night goes, four weeks, and and they've changed the program a bit since then but from there we would do masks. The first session, first week, second week was writing, third week was a montage experience, and then fourth week would be being able to finish any one of those projects if they weren't done yet, or doing something more individualized for the person, because the first three would be groups and then you'd usually have a one on one, so just one on one with people.

Jackie Jones: 13:20

And then, the year I happened to be there as an intern, they were breaking ground on a site at Fort Belvoir. So that was going to be the first satellite center to open. That would be set up very similarly to the the night go, except it the point was that it would be outpatient, so people could still be living at home, still be working with their unit every day, but then also be able to incorporate, you know, longer term treatments along the way. So I, even though the art therapy at night go is really successful, they initially weren't going to include the art therapy at the Fort Belvoir program. So I had written a proposal to the National Endowment for the Arts and was granted some pilot funding, essentially.

Jackie Jones: 14:22

And I presented at Belvoir and said you know, this is everything we're doing at night go, I should give me a chance to bring it here. And they just gave me a room and they weren't paying for me at that point. They just gave me a room and like three months to try to embed myself and within those three months it was really everyone took to it very well. So then I became a contractor, and within that first year they already created a GS physician for me. From there it grew.

Jackie Jones: 14:53

Wow and circling back to the story about the kid in school that I was talking about. When I first came into the Fort Belvoir clinic, the reason that I think people took to it so quickly was they had really established psychologists, psychiatrists, who, in in talking to certain clients, would do what they would normally do. But then there were a couple of clients in particular who had bring in artwork that they were making, whether they created a sculpture at a community ceramic center or had drawn an image at home that they brought in to share with the psychologist or psychiatrist, and like one, for example, one of the first ones brought to me. I'll tell the story more simply. One of my very first days there, psychiatrist came up to me and he said this is the artwork, that's, that's so, and so is creating.

Jackie Jones: 16:02

Do you think you can work with this? It's like, of course, because as a art therapist you're trained to be able to process no matter what is shown in a piece of work. So, whereas another provider may be hesitant to like, analyze incorrectly a piece of art work of someone blowing their head off, this is the kind of thing that would show up, like it would show up in sessions and in the processing throughout therapy. You know the difference of is this a call for help because someone's about them and their own life, or is this someone depicting what it feels like to have a TBI? Or is this what someone is, how someone is expressing how they feel like they're just exploding emotionally. So, whereas in schools a lot of times you have to shut down certain symbolism before you can really get to the root of what it means, it was really nice working for the military and having the ability to not shut down what came up but to just be able to authentically process it.

Thad David: 17:34

And so what do you do when you promise me, what does that processing look like? I mean, what do you do after that point, or what would you? What did you do in those situations?

Jackie Jones: 17:44

Well, it varies across the board, but so I'll say that in psychology, a lot of times they're taught to analyze artwork, meaning that certain symbols mean certain things, but in art therapy we are taught that the same symbol could mean something very different for everyone who creates it. So, instead of taking someone's art and just analyzing it, for them it's very much a process of you're sitting with them while they're creating. You're aware of the sequence that they're creating different things in. You're aware of the energy that they're creating different parts of the picture or sculpture or painting, whatever it is in. You're aware of, like the order or the placement you're looking at at body cues. You're really observing so many different things.

Jackie Jones: 18:49

And then, after the person has created what they've created and it's there on the table number one, we have a triangle that occurs where it's no longer like the dynamic between a therapist and a client.

Jackie Jones: 19:03

It's the therapist and the client, and the artwork becomes a third party which helps it be removed from the client. So they can not feel like they're talking about themself quite so much and they're describing the artwork. And through the describing of the artwork you can learn a lot and help guide them through really getting the insight into why they did things in a certain order, or like you can really analyze the dynamics of things on a page. So, just as an easy example, someone who made a mask one day in his very first session was able to look at it and say, oh my God, I thought that X thing was affecting me 5%, but I see that that one thing is actually affecting me like 95%. So that thing that I wasn't dealing with because I didn't think it really mattered is actually what I should be dealing with first. So you get to really help people communicate more with their subconscious and learn the wisdom from what's within.

Thad David: 20:19

So does it? Does everybody align with this? I mean, does everybody come in and have great experiences with it? And it makes me think of, because I hear of different types of therapy and I always wonder which one is best for, and I would imagine it varies. But I'm just, I'm genuinely curious to know what your thoughts are of if it's positive for everybody or if somebody's dabbling in it. What thoughts do you have there if somebody's considering therapy?

Jackie Jones: 20:43

Well, I think it can work with everyone. You don't have to be an artist. So initially people avoid it because they think they have to be an artist, or they avoid it because they think it's quote, unquote, hippie shit and it's not gonna do anything for them. So it's less about who it's for and it's more about when it's for the person.

Jackie Jones: 21:04

So, there's some people who would come into the clinic and there's less stigma, like there's the least stigma associated with, like, your leg hurting, right. So there are people who might be afraid of addressing any mental health concerns but they'll show up in the clinic because they need some PT. So then they'll be in PT for a while and then their PT will start to say, hey, jackie, I'm gonna refer so and so to you because he keeps talking to me about things in our sessions that I am not trained to talk, to respond to. So then they might gradually get from PT sent to me or they might not be ready for therapy yet and they might be sent to occupational therapy or speech therapy and occupational therapy and speech therapy is often a brilliant bridge to then come work with us because, for example, in speech, they might be learning all of the techniques and strategies that they need to learn in order to deal with their TBI symptoms. But the speech therapist will get to a point where they're like I don't know why they're not integrating them. They know them, they understand them. I don't know why they're not integrating them, they can't verbalize it to me. And then they would get sent to our therapy because it's a nonverbal therapy and even when people would go to I mean, there's less stigma associated with going to a social worker than coming to an art therapist so there would be people who'd come in and they'd be ready to see a social worker and then they would hit points that they just could not talk about.

Jackie Jones: 22:59

And so the thing about trauma is that when something traumatic happens, the verbal areas of our brain become inhibited and so they're not online when you're really in the depths of experiencing the trauma.

Jackie Jones: 23:17

So it's really hard then, when you're taking a primarily verbal approach, to understand what happened and why it impacted you, because the verbal parts weren't there.

Jackie Jones: 23:32

So that's where a nonverbal therapy like art therapy is really great, because we actually a lot of therapy goes top down, which means like you know something's bothering you and then you understand like the emotions and unconscious reactions that were beneath it. But in our therapy at Surveys it's bottom up. So we create an environment where you just create intuitively and then, based on whatever was intuitively created, things come up from the subconscious and then you're able to describe what's on the page and then you have meaning and understanding from it. So a lot of people are able to find success through these nonverbal ways of expressing and processing that could break through the blocks that they were just getting to verbally. So sometimes it looks like resistance, like sometimes there were providers who thought the clients like just weren't talking, but those clients would come to me and say I didn't have anything else to say, and so it's important to have all of these different pieces working together.

Jackie Jones: 25:00

Yeah, so it's less about who it's for and more about when it's for you.

Thad David: 25:05

And I could see some. I love that you pointed out that people say I'm not an artist. It's probably something I would imagine comes up really quickly and I'm really intrigued by it. What would and obviously I would encourage anybody that's seeking it go see a professional, and I'm curious what would be the first like would you literally just sit down and start drawing something? Is that?

Jackie Jones: 25:28

Well, in our therapy it's funny it kind of seems like we're doing nothing but we're actually doing a lot. So, like in a first session, it would be hard to take someone who doesn't consider themself an artist at all and just give them a blank piece of paper and say draw something, because it's kind of like the container of possibilities is too wide and the person would shut down or not know where to start.

Jackie Jones: 26:01

And so we think a lot about the right amount of a container to provide someone and then the right directive so that they have ample opportunity for genuine self-expression within that container. So yeah, it looks very different in every session, but there's a method to the madness. There's a reason that will give a mask versus a piece of paper versus a canvas, and there's a reason we'll give colored pencils versus charcoal, versus magazines to cut up.

Thad David: 26:41

Sensing a Marine Corps eating crayons joke somewhere that some of you listening is probably gonna be. That's why you didn't mention those, because us Marines are just gonna eat them. You mentioned the, and it's something that I talk about in other areas, but so when the container of possibilities too large, people shut down.

Jackie Jones: 27:01

Yes, yeah.

Thad David: 27:03

Why is that?

Jackie Jones: 27:06

I think because there's time for them to get in their head.

Thad David: 27:09

Okay.

Jackie Jones: 27:10

I think there's time for you to get in your head and you put in your own self-judgment before you can let your intuition start to guide you. So we give just enough container that the direction is there, but there's also freedom to self-express.

Thad David: 27:29

There's a sculptor and I forget her name. I'm gonna say Shen and King, but it's a favorite quote of mine. Process freezes us from the poverty of our own intentions, and she just mentions that once you have your median like she's a sculptor. But if you're just thinking about the artwork, you just, in the very same light, you don't really know. But once you say you know what, I'm gonna pick this medium, I'm gonna do this on this piece, then your freedom starts and the creativity starts to come out because you've dialed in of where you're going with it. And that's what I thought of when you were talking about the containers.

Thad David: 28:03

Too big is just her quote. I think it's really cool how it lines up. So I'm curious to ask what was the? Because I'm sure you've seen a lot of different things. So the biggest I don't know if a better word to call it, but success story or biggest benefit somebody's got from it that you saw as much as you can share. Obviously, these are private sessions, but I'd love to know what are some of the good things that you've seen come out of it, or specific stories.

Jackie Jones: 28:32

Yeah Well, first can I address something you said about the quote that that artist said Please, yeah, I would love to.

Jackie Jones: 28:45

What that made me think of was because my background I was an artist and I was an art teacher and that whole process, what people are used to, is where it's product oriented. So you have a goal in mind, you create your thumbnail sketches, you think about how you're gonna make it happen and then you actualize it. And that does play into art therapy too, but generally art therapy is process over product. So you try to get the goal is to get people, get people creating where it's more process oriented. They're using a color in that moment because that's what feels right to use in that moment. They create a certain image, a certain way, because that's what they're guided to create in that moment, and then the product comes and then you can explore the product to see everything that it meant to you. But it winds up being so.

Jackie Jones: 29:52

This circles back to the last question, because I think a lot of people understand art as being product oriented.

Jackie Jones: 29:58

So if you just give someone on their first day a blank piece of paper, there's this pressure that they need to be Michelangelo or they're gonna be a laughing stock in the room. But if you can really bring it back to actually just see this as problem solving just literally grab the first color that's speaking to you, create a mark in a way that's most speaking to you right now, and the product will come. And then, once someone is on that path of creating intuitively, they get in that flow state and their inner wisdom can really come up on the page before they have a chance to shut it down. So and it was really freeing for me actually to it was hard at first, honestly, going from being an art teacher to becoming an art therapist, because I had all these natural ways of being that were more ed appropriate. I had to learn how to rein that in and like save the art ed for later when it would be helpful for a person and not shut down their authentic self-expression. So, yeah, so I just wanted to respond to that.

Thad David: 31:18

Yeah, no, I'm glad that you did pause and you mentioned something that kind of gave me a thought of just getting into flow state, and I think that's something that I've heard time and time again of various things that therapy or just things that can help people, help veterans, flow state seems to be a common thread of somehow getting into that flow state. And why is that so important to get into that flow state?

Jackie Jones: 31:47

Oh, so many reasons. Number one it helps you quiet your mind. So, going this weekend I'll be doing the next week at Outdoor Odyssey, which I'm really excited about. I'm gonna be bringing Zentangle there. It's a mindfulness drawing technique and this is what I've been contracted by VA's to offer, as well as classes. A reason it's so good is because it's doing art therapy without the processing. It's teaching people how to get into flow state without processing things, so they're quieting their mind when they didn't think they could quiet it.

Jackie Jones: 32:29

Time flies by in ways that they haven't experienced. If they're dealing with pain, the pain goes away. If they're dealing with anxiety, the anxiety goes away and it's also a boost of dopamine. So when people feel like they have a hard time accessing that, naturally this is a way that you can do that. So chemically it's really good for you. It makes people feel happy and connected and joy, a lot of feelings that they thought were turned off in them just by getting into flow state, just by being fully present and knowing that, if they can get totally fully present, the pain that's usually nagging them subsides, or the thoughts that are usually nagging them subside.

Thad David: 33:23

That makes just a ton of sense. I'm so happy we took this little journey down into, into flow state and different things, because and how would you best? Just for anybody listening to? I don't know that I've ever defined it, it's always just a feeling that I've never put a definition into. But just for anybody listening that might not have defined it, do you have a definition for flow state, of what that actually means to you?

Jackie Jones: 33:47

They're to me, yeah, so there is a definition?

Jackie Jones: 33:51

Yeah, there's a definition. It's a coined term but it basically embossed it. It means when you're so immersed in something that you're basically you're so immersed in something, your physical needs fall away. So, like you forget you're hungry, you forget you're thirsty, you're not really thinking, you're just totally immersed and one pointed focused on something. And it comes with, yeah, being fully present.

Jackie Jones: 34:22

For me, how I would get deeper in that is how, so, as an art.

Jackie Jones: 34:31

So I got into art when I was born, I mean since I've been born and I got into yoga and meditation in my later twenties and so the whole time that art was my thing.

Jackie Jones: 34:44

And even working in the military, I'd have chaplains or I'd have bosses telling me like, oh, you're not doing spiritual things, oh, you're not. Like art, therapy is not spiritual. I'm like people are having spiritual experiences in here and it is my spiritual where I go to tap into that and to be connected to something greater than me and to tap into that inner knowing that I can't know just from my own, like busy mind, and so it's really so. I think like flow state is you're doing an activity that gets you so immersed, you're fully present and the same, and you wind up with like a transcendent experience where you tapped into creativity that you wouldn't have been able to otherwise, or you tap into ways to problem solve, or your awareness grows in ways that you wouldn't have been able to if you didn't do something to expand yourself. So for me it's kind of like the bridge between like an activity that a waking state person is doing to get so fully present and immersed that they wind up expanded in some way.

Thad David: 36:04

Right on. Do you think there's a correlation? Because it made me think of in the military and thinking of being in combat is 100%, I mean you're getting into flow. It'd be hard to not get into some sort of a flow state being in combat but also just I mean for anybody that wasn't in combat, but I'm not speaking from veterans perspectives, but when you go into these, even just go into boot camp, going into your primary schools, and a lot of times that flow state I think it's forced upon you. Is there a correlation there?

Jackie Jones: 36:36

just for that connection point, the familiarity, yeah, I think I know how to answer a question, but yeah, so the first thing that comes to mind and you can redefine your question if I'm not hitting it right but there would be some people who would come to sessions and they would be really hard and like trauma processing sessions.

Jackie Jones: 37:02

In the earlier years of doing art therapy with the military, there was someone in particular who one day told me that he built it into a schedule to come to art therapy and then go to the shooting range before he goes back to work, and at first I took that as like oh my goodness, he's like going to get out some rage. But then he explained it to me like no, that's how I know to control my breathing. Like that is the one place I know how to control my breathing so much that I'm calm and stable. That was his main way of emotionally regulating and so that's really good information, because then I could start bringing like the yoga and meditation breathing into sessions and not have people leaving feeling like they needed to go to the range but also like that's a really I mean, that's a really good, I think, connection point to understand.

Thad David: 38:04

But I know there's a ton of great benefits and everything you mentioned was great, just tying of a definition of it, why it's important to get into it, and it just made me think that if people aren't getting into it and it's so good to find it again, I'm pretty confident anybody in the military had definitely experienced it while in while they were in the military. And then if they get out, obvious benefits of doing it for the benefit of just getting into flow state. But I wonder what that? Yeah, it's been interesting for me.

Thad David: 38:34

The breathing, which I'm excited to talk to you about more, is when we get to it, because I've been doing a lot of running and heart rate training and being very intentional with everything that impacts my heart rate at all times and it's been pretty fascinating. So I'm excited to ask you about that in a little bit, but I don't wanna derail us from where we're at and I did ask you earlier. I thank you for taking this side road because it was very beneficial for me. I really enjoyed it. What success stories or story? What are the benefits? What have you seen people kind of get on the back end of going through our therapy?

Jackie Jones: 39:14

So many. So the first thing that comes to mind is how many people have said I don't think I'd be here anymore if it weren't for the work we did together. So that's huge. And so many success stories, so many success stories. So there's ones of people who, through the art therapy, really came to art and created a whole second career out of it. People who came into the art therapy not having made art before and then wound up exhibiting their pieces afterwards and connecting with others in that way. And then there's success stories that you would never even know. Someone went to art therapy Like one example comes to mind someone who was so ashamed of something that he had accidentally done that he totally shut off from his family and he just in his mind.

Jackie Jones: 40:27

There was no way that if his wife knew he had done this thing, that she would ever accept him as a person. And he carried this and it was eating him up and it was really affecting his whole dynamic at home, with his family and internally. And so we spent time identifying what that thing was and then doing work to process through it and then integrating it within him enough that he could accept himself, enough for it that he felt ready to talk to his wife about it. And so then we created, we set up a session where he invited her into a session so that he could share this with her. And then the thing is, when he shared it she said I know Basically he had told the story when he was blackout drunk one night and that was like a year prior. So it was really healing for him to know that she never left him. She didn't view him differently after even knowing that, like before, he even came to Art Therapy to work through it. But also going through the Art Therapy brought him to the point that he accepted himself enough to even be able to bring it up. And that's just one example.

Jackie Jones: 41:59

But there's people who a lot of Marines in particular are like so passionate and they really saw many Marines would when they were so upset about things that like physiological symptoms were great. Not just Marines, but this happened a lot had people so angry at themselves that they like burst their abs from the inside, or who were constantly passing out, like just blackout, passing out in random places when their stress would get high, or whose heart rates would send them to the ER and they wouldn't even know what they were thinking of. And so for one person who was having a lot of medical issues, it really stemmed from the fact that he had over 60 losses whether they were people who served under him who were killed during combat, or there were people who came home and committed suicide or came home and died of something medical later. But he was carrying over 60 losses.

Jackie Jones: 43:33

And in the Art Therapy he is someone who on the first day he left because he knew it was going to open him up, but he came back and apologized and we worked together and it was really deep and we did a lot of work together and one of our culminating projects was actually going through and processing all of those it was like 67 deaths and creating a piece. And so he was able to really unpack each person, each experience, how he wanted to integrate each person forward and then created this really beautiful commemorative artwork that he has in his home. And then there's a reduction in medical issues and a reduction in all the ways that stress just can kill you from the inside out. So a lot of stories like that.

Thad David: 44:41

That is fascinating, what you just shared. And circling back to the first thing that you had talked about with the gentleman that didn't want his spouse to know, or she didn't want to be judged, and aside from the fact that she already knew, but he was carrying this burden, I think that will resonate with several people because a lot of times I think we carry this burden and we hold it in because we don't want to be judged, and it's a really incredible story, and even more so the fact that she had already known about it and he was still carrying it, even though she had already known and then was obviously didn't leave him. So that's amazing. Thank you for sharing all of this about art therapy and what are you doing currently? I know we talked about quite a bit and went down some of that stuff. What are you currently doing right now with the flourish momentum?

Jackie Jones: 45:37

Yeah, so after after Belvoir, I went to Eglene Air Force Base.

Jackie Jones: 45:43

So, okay, the Air Force Base was the last branch to have a. The Air Force was the last branch to have a invisible wound center. They opened their first one at Eglene so I got to go there and be one of the first staff people there and there I built up their therapy program. But also I got to teach yoga and meditation there as well. So I got to start kind of co-treating like even within myself, and there were people that would come for our therapy. There were people who would just come for yoga or IRS, yoga, nidra, and there were some people that would do both. And I had found it important to start to integrate the yoga and meditation because in the art therapy people would get so much insight and self awareness and increase empathy for self and others and feel less isolated and less in shame and guilt and improve their mood and all these things. But a lot of times they would have the insight and self awareness but then they'd say things like I know I should feel more happy, but I just haven't felt happy in so long I don't even know what that feels like in my body anymore. And so the yoga wound up at first being a place to help people somatically feel into these emotions, that they wanted to start feeling into more, that they just, essentially their body, forgot how to feel into them. But then it became more than that. Especially at Eglin there were so many I worked with a lot of grain brates who were like constantly still deploying, and when you're coming to a session or two and then going away for months back into a combat situation, it's not good for you to be like opening up. Closing up it's difficult. When you're in combat you have to be really externally focused and if you get too internally focused then it puts you in danger. So the yoga wound up being so in that setting.

Jackie Jones: 48:17

Art therapy was really good for people who were like about to transition out and had more time to really focus on their mental health and kind of processing through anything they didn't want to carry forward the effects of as they moved into their post retirement life.

Jackie Jones: 48:41

But the people who were still constantly in a deployment cycle yoga was actually really helpful for because they didn't have to process anything, they didn't have to open up. It was just more like a place where they could get so present. Their mind was clean and clear and quiet. It was a place where they could practice meeting parts of themself that they were uncomfortable with, but in a compassionate, accepting way, so that those things didn't have to carry the same emotional reactionary weight that they would if they didn't meet them. In the yoga nidra there were people who, in one session, things that used to cause nightmares would just become dreams, and so it wound up being a really nice way for them to have therapeutic effects of having less nightmares, being able to quiet their mind, working through emotions they were struggling with without having to open up and process anything. And then the people yeah, what?

Thad David: 49:54

were you going to say?

Jackie Jones: 49:57

Oh I was just going to say, and then the people that I could do both with, who were there for a while, I just got a deeper sense of kind of how to interplay the modalities and what makes the most sense to give someone when. And then that led into eventually going private, so just quickly to make the bridge and we can dive into what aspects that you want to do. But as a provider, there's a lot of you know. There's compassion, fatigue, there's vicarious trauma, there's using all your tools on yourself and then also getting help. But when you're treating trauma like nine hours a day, every day of the week, sometimes you start to lose. Like you can feel a feeling, you can feel a reaction. You don't know if it's yours or if it's someone else's, that you've absorbed or it's just important to then have ways to address your energy as well. Basically, so when there's confusion about like well, I've worked through this, is this my grief or is this someone else's? That kind of thing, I wound up getting into Reiki and that was really helpful for clearing the things that I had already worked through psychologically, that I had already worked through somatically, and from there I went private so I could bring everything all together.

Jackie Jones: 51:48

So I work with people privately now and I address the mind, body, soul and space, and so I can pull in the art therapy when it's needed. I can pull in the yoga and meditation when that's needed. I can pull in the energy work like Reiki and theta healing and sound bowl therapy when that's needed. I can pull in feng shui when we need to work with the energy of the environment and the space, and so it's a much more holistic approach now. I really loved working in the military settings, but even in the setting where I was brought on to do yoga and meditation too, it's like all down to numbers and so like if my art therapy waitlist was longer, sometimes they would just cancel one of my yoga sessions and have me do art therapy instead, and I'm like I understand, but I also there's this whole like treatment plan I have going on with people and it's anyway. So now I have more ability to really bring to each person what they need at that time.

Thad David: 52:50

And so that's what you're currently doing. Now is people contact you, they reach out and you're currently helping them process through items.

Jackie Jones: 53:01

Yeah, so people come and they have some sort of emotional or physical pain or when they have some sort of block, they just something's holding them back and they can't figure it out. Patients come and they are tired of doing the run around that's not really giving them answers. Have people who are able to decrease the medications they've been put on by bolstering their like holistic ability to deal with their symptoms. So people come for a lot of different reasons but, yeah, I provide them holistic therapy, which means while one person's working with me, they might experience a variety of actual modalities.

Thad David: 53:51

And you had mentioned, you know, if somebody's tired of the run around, what are the common? I don't know if triggers is the right word. What are the common things that people would notice or should be looking out for? That it's like you know what the I could actually benefit from this and it's. I would imagine it's a lot more subtle, or we think it's subtle because maybe we're so numb to these things that are continually happening. What are those? What does it look like in somebody's life where it's like they should look for it and maybe consider to come seek some help?

Jackie Jones: 54:19

Well, I think a lot of people get frustrated when they feel like they are treated like a number. So, number one don't treat people like numbers. They're very much who they are. One has a really individualized treatment plan. Number two I think people get really frustrated when they feel like they go to provider with a symptom and they're just given a med straight away for it.

Jackie Jones: 54:48

And then they get more frustrated when they wind up being on one medication that is causing symptoms. So then they're put on another medication that addresses those symptoms because there's other ones and they just start kind of symptom chasing without dealing with the root. So with this we can really come to the root. Also, a lot of times with mental health I hear a lot of people get frustrated with the BA because, let's say, someone has an anger issue and so they're put in a. What's offered is a six week group for anger, but they might not need the psychoeducation, they might not need the group setting. They might need something that's going to really go to the root of their particular anger. No-transcript.

Jackie Jones: 55:55

And a lot of times when people go to, when they're assigned a counselor through the BA, the sessions are short. Either the duration of sessions they're allotted or the individual sessions they feel like are too short to really get into the meat of where they need to go. But also, what's nice about coming here is you don't have to talk if you don't want to. So I have really transformative sessions that happen when someone is just laying for an hour and a half receiving sound bowl therapy and so for them they just get to come and completely relax, go into a theta state which it feels like you're lucid dreaming. It's really relaxing and then at the end of it you have released things that you didn't know how to otherwise and real transformation and shifts happen. So a lot of the current feedback I get, especially after the energy sessions, is like I don't know what happened, but that just doesn't bother me anymore.

Jackie Jones: 57:02

Those kinds of shifts just happen after each session, so there's a lot more room to dive deep in a different way here.

Thad David: 57:12

And if there are let's say there's 100 veterans listening at this very moment in time that don't know if they need to go see, get therapy or get some help or reach out, if you mentioned, to anger issues or what are the things that somebody that's listening that isn't even considering this, what are the things that would be signs or symptoms of like you know what? If this is happening, you might want to consider going to talk to somebody.

Jackie Jones: 57:39

I would say if your past is driving your future, Okay. So, yeah, if anything in your past is getting in the way of you being who you most want to be or living the life you most truly want, then this is perfect. So what I come equipped with you know the psychology side of things, and so we can meet and process the root, but I also come equipped with the things that help propel people forward in a very authentic way, like the transformations, the shifts happen internally. Got it?

Jackie Jones: 58:30

So, the thing is, and something that we talk about a lot in yoga meditation is, the subconscious drives your past and your future is the unconscious. So if you don't know how to tap into, like expanding your mind, then your past is driving your future and that's not how to get where you really want to be. It's not your maximum potential.

Thad David: 59:01

So what is the because you mentioned subconscious and then unconscious? What is the difference between the subconscious and unconscious mind?

Jackie Jones: 59:10

So the subconscious is more like your conditioning, so things that have happened to you may affect your reactions or your triggers or your tendencies, because the unconscious is more where you're at, when you're just like fully present, in a state of witness and awareness. It's a deeper wisdom, so, like the answer is how to get to where you need to go, are within each of us. But when our past experiences are traumatic or our conditioning is really prevalent and loud, it's hard to get beneath that into the deeper inner wisdom that knows how to get where we need to get.

Thad David: 1:00:07

So, if I'm hearing this all correctly, the subconscious, the past, the conditioning is almost a blocker for getting into that unconscious, deeper wisdom.

Jackie Jones: 1:00:18

Yeah.

Thad David: 1:00:19

Okay, I very much appreciate that definition that I asked. I've always wondered, I've heard the differences, but I've never actually stopped and asked somebody. So that's great, thank you.

Jackie Jones: 1:00:35

And so do you do work.

Thad David: 1:00:37

What's up?

Jackie Jones: 1:00:39

I was just going to say so concretely in here. If we need to better understand a subconscious block, we have the tools for that, like the therapy, and then, if you've already processed through a lot of times, people come there like I've been in therapy for years, like I know what's bothering me, I know why, but I can't shake it. So it's getting beneath that and being able to drop into these like deeper states of consciousness where you can create more of the life that you're seeking.

Thad David: 1:01:16

Which is the goal and that gets back to. If your past is driving your future, then it might be time to consider, or it might be beneficial to go consider speaking to somebody. Do you do any virtual work or is it all in person? If somebody was looking to reach out to you and get some help, does it have to be locally or do you devote virtual stuff?

Jackie Jones: 1:01:39

Yeah, I do both. So I have an office, people come in person, but I also can do everything virtually. So I would say it's about half and half right now. For a while it's like two thirds virtually, one third in person. It's about half and half right now, but yeah, I can work with people from anywhere.

Thad David: 1:02:02

And what would somebody do to get in touch with that? Do you have one more question I want to ask you about, but what would be the ways for people to get in touch with you? What's the best way for somebody to just kind of look into and see where you're at and possibly reach out to get some help?

Jackie Jones: 1:02:17

So lots of ways. I have a website. It's flourishmomentumcom. So you can, on the homepage, click, get my free guided meditations. That will give you a free gift. It will also put you on my email list. There's a contact me form. If any of that is not working, my email is Jackie at flourishmomentumcom.

Thad David: 1:02:46

And.

Jackie Jones: 1:02:46

I'm active on Instagram, flourish underscore momentum. You can DM me or learn more about what I do there. I have over 100 videos on YouTube, so that's just youtubecom slash. Jackie Jones, it's a lot of guided meditations and yoga practices, yeah lots of ways.

Thad David: 1:03:06

Great, I'm jotting those down and those will be ones that I'll just pretty bit of listening. I'm going to do my best to link those in the bio just so they can have quick, easy access. If they're thinking about it, don't hesitate, just go click something and check it out further. And something that I wanted to ask you about and we have talked about it, but what are some of the things that you've noticed that, if it's not already something that we've talked about, but just that you've seen, is like somebody getting out of the military and going off to hopefully be a live, a happy life I was going to say successful, but I don't know that that's that what would be the happy life. What are the things that they're doing to live that happy life? What are the driving forces that send them off in that direction versus people that are struggling? Have you noticed any correlations there or things that the people that are living that happier life are doing or not doing?

Jackie Jones: 1:04:04

Okay, so this might seem like a roundabout answer, but it's direct, that's my answer.

Jackie Jones: 1:04:10

There are a lot of people who would come to me with the diagnosis of PTSD and they would say I have been treating PTSD for so long. I don't know why I'm still stuck on this. In the work that we did, I could help them see the more nuance of what they were dealing with. It was more moral injury or more complicated grief, or more disenfranchised grief, shame, guilt. There's so many things that are more nuanced than PTSD diagnosis and when they were presented with these other terms it was really validating for them because it helped them feel seen for more of what they were actually experiencing.

Jackie Jones: 1:05:05

To answer your question, the part of it is the labels. Part of it is when people are given certain labels or given certain medications, they feel like I guess I just am this thing for the rest of my life, or I guess I just am this way for the rest of my life, or I guess I just have to be dependent on meds for the rest of my life. But it's not true. Those are all labeling symptoms or dealing with symptoms. But if you can get to the root of what's going on, a lot of times you can completely shift your experience and how you live in the world and feel in the world. So I would say number one it's like not getting fixed and stuck, and things that may have helped at one point don't necessarily have to be there forever. A lot of times it's really underlying grief and shame and guilt. So it's having the avenues to have people feel safe enough to go where they need to go to really meet and integrate the parts of themselves that they may be doing everything they can to hide from.

Thad David: 1:06:33

It almost made me think of, with hearing you describe it and then just kind of reflecting on everything, that it almost feels like these items that are stuck with us would almost be comparable to, I think, back in the day you could buy a car that had a governor on it that wouldn't allow it to go over X speed, and it's almost like going through therapy that it can almost remove that governor and allow the full potential to go forward at whatever speed or direction that you want to go.

Jackie Jones: 1:07:10

Yeah, and I would say a big stuck point at the root of a lot of it is when people just get to a point where they feel like they can't trust themselves. So they might feel like I don't know if I can trust myself in a relationship, I don't know if I can trust myself home alone by myself, I don't know. There's so many ways that people who are walking around the world seeming very confident and nothing is, quote unquote, wrong with them, but then underneath it all have a shame that it just really has a hold on them or who has a feeling like they can't trust themselves deep down. So there's these blocks that just happen and have people stuck in certain patterns that they want to break free of but don't know how until they can reach that point and work through that point.

Thad David: 1:08:21

It makes a ton of sense. Thank you so much, jackie. I really appreciate you jumping on and sharing your experiences, sharing what you do and, most importantly, thanks for all the work you're doing to help out the military, to help out veterans. It's really, it sounds like amazing stuff. So thank you.

Jackie Jones: 1:08:39

Thank you so much for having me here. I really, really appreciate it.

Thad David: 1:08:43

Yeah, absolutely, it was a wonderful conversation.