The TeleWellness Hub Podcast

50. Designing Therapeutic Journeys with Creativity at the Core with Liz Rhea, LMSW and Ryan DeVane, LCSW

March 04, 2024 Martamaria Hamilton Episode 50
50. Designing Therapeutic Journeys with Creativity at the Core with Liz Rhea, LMSW and Ryan DeVane, LCSW
The TeleWellness Hub Podcast
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The TeleWellness Hub Podcast
50. Designing Therapeutic Journeys with Creativity at the Core with Liz Rhea, LMSW and Ryan DeVane, LCSW
Mar 04, 2024 Episode 50
Martamaria Hamilton
Embark on a transformative journey with Liz Rhea, LMSW and Ryan DeVane, LCSW from Grounded WellBeing as they illuminate the path toward communal healing and personal growth. Liz opens up about the holistic therapy approaches she employs, particularly for the queer, trans, and gender expansive communities, revealing how nurturing a sense of belonging can influence the healing process. Ryan complements this by sharing their innovative methods, blending holistic practices like group yoga with sound healing to broaden the reach of wellness. Together, they demonstrate the power of creative modalities and the pivotal role of community in supporting well-being.

Navigating the world of self-publishing can be as colorful as the pages of a coloring book, a project we dissect with the help of Ryan. Through the lens of this creative venture, we examine the significance of aligning personal values with creative outputs, discussing the intricacies of design and the logistics of bringing a product to life. The inception of the 'Let's Talk About It' conference is also detailed, showcasing how one can craft educational platforms that marry creativity with affirming care for a richer therapeutic practice.

As we gear up for the 'Let's Talk About It' conference, we emphasize its core mission: to enhance queer and trans-affirming care across a spectrum of topics, including Liz's deep dive into religious trauma. A variety of subjects are set to spark conversations and ethical liberation for marginalized communities, while the conference's commitment to inclusivity shines through with hybrid participation options and accessible pricing. Join us and witness how these discussions not only enlighten professionals but also resonate with anyone aiming to provide intentional support in every walk of life.

Get the coloring book!
https://amzn.to/3UY1EFA


Register for the Let’s Talk About it Conference:
https://www.letstalkaboutitcon.com/registration

Learn more about Ryan, check out his content, schedule an appointment at Grounded Wellbeing, purchase his coloring book:
https://telewellnesshub.com/listing/ryan-devane/

Schedule an appointment with Liz:
https://telewellnesshub.com/listing/liz-rhea-msw-lmsw/

Follow Liz Rhea on Tik Tok
https://www.tiktok.com/@lizrheatherapy




Support the Show.

Hey there, future parents living in CALIFORNIA! Are you on the journey to conceive and looking for support and guidance along the way? Conceivable Psychotherapy is your trusted partner from conception through parenthood. Veronica Cardona, Licensed Clinical Social Worker, at Conceivable Psychotherapy, specializes in infertility, perinatal-postpartum struggles, and grief & loss. They offer online therapy throughout California. You don’t have to do this alone; Conceivable Psychotherapy is here to help you. Connect with Veronica through her TeleWellness Hub Profile: https://telewellnesshub.com/listing/veronica-cardona-lcsw/

We are happy and honored to be part of your life changing health and wellness journey:
https://telewellnesshub.com/explore-wellness-experts/

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Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers
Embark on a transformative journey with Liz Rhea, LMSW and Ryan DeVane, LCSW from Grounded WellBeing as they illuminate the path toward communal healing and personal growth. Liz opens up about the holistic therapy approaches she employs, particularly for the queer, trans, and gender expansive communities, revealing how nurturing a sense of belonging can influence the healing process. Ryan complements this by sharing their innovative methods, blending holistic practices like group yoga with sound healing to broaden the reach of wellness. Together, they demonstrate the power of creative modalities and the pivotal role of community in supporting well-being.

Navigating the world of self-publishing can be as colorful as the pages of a coloring book, a project we dissect with the help of Ryan. Through the lens of this creative venture, we examine the significance of aligning personal values with creative outputs, discussing the intricacies of design and the logistics of bringing a product to life. The inception of the 'Let's Talk About It' conference is also detailed, showcasing how one can craft educational platforms that marry creativity with affirming care for a richer therapeutic practice.

As we gear up for the 'Let's Talk About It' conference, we emphasize its core mission: to enhance queer and trans-affirming care across a spectrum of topics, including Liz's deep dive into religious trauma. A variety of subjects are set to spark conversations and ethical liberation for marginalized communities, while the conference's commitment to inclusivity shines through with hybrid participation options and accessible pricing. Join us and witness how these discussions not only enlighten professionals but also resonate with anyone aiming to provide intentional support in every walk of life.

Get the coloring book!
https://amzn.to/3UY1EFA


Register for the Let’s Talk About it Conference:
https://www.letstalkaboutitcon.com/registration

Learn more about Ryan, check out his content, schedule an appointment at Grounded Wellbeing, purchase his coloring book:
https://telewellnesshub.com/listing/ryan-devane/

Schedule an appointment with Liz:
https://telewellnesshub.com/listing/liz-rhea-msw-lmsw/

Follow Liz Rhea on Tik Tok
https://www.tiktok.com/@lizrheatherapy




Support the Show.

Hey there, future parents living in CALIFORNIA! Are you on the journey to conceive and looking for support and guidance along the way? Conceivable Psychotherapy is your trusted partner from conception through parenthood. Veronica Cardona, Licensed Clinical Social Worker, at Conceivable Psychotherapy, specializes in infertility, perinatal-postpartum struggles, and grief & loss. They offer online therapy throughout California. You don’t have to do this alone; Conceivable Psychotherapy is here to help you. Connect with Veronica through her TeleWellness Hub Profile: https://telewellnesshub.com/listing/veronica-cardona-lcsw/

We are happy and honored to be part of your life changing health and wellness journey:
https://telewellnesshub.com/explore-wellness-experts/

Speaker 1:

Hi, my name is Liz and I'm one of the founding members of the let's Talk About it conference, an Atlanta-based conference led by experts in queer and trans clinical care. The conference, taking place on March 14th and 15th and offered in-person and virtually, was born from our experiences with continuing education about working with queer and trans folks as affirming clinicians. We often left these spaces wanting more. Topics covered include ethics and ethical liberation, parenting and nonmonogamy, and more. To register, please visit Let'sTalkAboutItConcom and we hope to see you there.

Speaker 3:

Welcome back amazing listeners to another episode of the Tell-A-Wana's Hub podcast. I'm Rana Hamilton, your host, and today we are speaking with Liz Ray and Ryan Devon from Grounded Well-Being. Some of you may have listened in on my conversation with Ryan in the past. He is the founder and clinical director of Grounded Well-Being and he started this practice to provide holistic wellness services to all people of all identities, by incorporating healing for mind, body and spirit. And now we're also joined by Liz, who provides holistic and affirming care to queer, trans and gender expansive folks, as well as books navigating religious trauma and faith deconstruction living in Georgia and Florida. Welcome Liz, welcome Ryan.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, so excited to be here.

Speaker 3:

Yes, I was so excited to get to talk. If you listen back to our first episode with Ryan, we left off kind of saying we need to talk more, there's more conversations to be had and I personally was left with many, many questions that I, just as a clinician and just personally, I remember wanting to live in Georgia so I can go to your actual group practice and joining on some sound healing and some hypnotherapy. So if you haven't listened to that episode, I recommend that you check out the previous episodes. We had a chance to talk, Ryan and I, a little bit about why he does the wellness work that he does, and today I guess I'm putting Liz on the spot first to ask why do you do the wellness work that you do?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think so much of my values, just as a human being, and also part of the reason that I really got into therapy and providing community resources is just because I believe deeply that we heal in community and that that community can look so different and that wellness has to incorporate communal aspects into it, and I really enjoy getting to work with my clients and building and expanding their community and getting to engage in the communal resources that we offer and be at a practice that prioritizes wellness within community feels so important to me and so congruent with my personal values and my professional values.

Speaker 3:

I'm sure that is so clearly felt by others to the point because I forgot to mention that at Grounded Well-Being the practice, you are the senior clinician and the team will read, so you are leading others. It sounds like a passion beyond just the one-to-one interactions, which can be very powerful with individual clients, but really it's spreading that to other therapists and to the wellness of the practice as a whole. So I think that's probably it speaks for itself. I mean that passion that you mentioned, the why I got to find out too that you take this passion beyond Grounded Well-Being because you're TikTok famous. I'm not on TikTok, but now I'm like I just need to create an account because you have oh how many 14,000 followers. Am I getting that wrong? Is it more?

Speaker 1:

I think a little over 16,000.

Speaker 3:

I didn't write down the number.

Speaker 2:

Every person matters.

Speaker 3:

Yes, yes, so I mean, I think and you're on there what are some of the things that you're talking about?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so I joined TikTok just as like.

Speaker 1:

Well, let's just like see how this goes and really value.

Speaker 1:

If I'm going to show up on the internet in kind of a professional, public-facing way which feels a little weird to say, then I want to do so that in a way that aligns with my values, and what that has looked like is kind of twofold One it is hard, being a new therapist I mean, I'm still kind of a new therapist.

Speaker 1:

I've only been in this work for a little over a year and a half, right, and I just I didn't know a lot. People weren't answering questions, I didn't know what to do, how to find clients, like, how to network, like anything like that and so. And then, on the flip side of that, as someone who has the privilege of having been in therapy for close to a decade of my life a little over a decade of my life it was so scary the first time I was sitting on the couch in my therapist's office and had no idea what to expect, right. And so, really, one of my primary goals with being on TikTok is making information accessible both to clinicians and clients about what therapy can look like, and just talking about what it looks like to provide gender-affirming care as well, and being a therapist who aligns deeply with values and how that looks in sessions with clients, I think can be really important.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, and I love that you all sound as a practice at Grandin-Well being, through your leadership, at least both of you have been able to really take a look at how to use creativity in providing affirming approaches, in providing awareness and modalities for healing or tapping into wellness. So, whether it's individual therapy sessions, even group yoga, sound healing, whether it's virtually through multiple states right, because that's the beauty of it. Also, it just sounds like you guys really just expand the opportunity to as many people who would like to seek their support and even beyond kind of traditional modalities to be available through social media and even on Amazon. That's why I have you guys on here too to talk about just the creative projects that you have done. Conferences, I wanna talk about that. It's just. I'm just so impressed, honestly, and inspired by the work you're doing. So, if you're open to it, we could talk a little bit about first your queer magic a coloring adventure for queer folks and trans folks that you guys worked on together. Talk about that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so, and I think, too, I feel so honored to know Liz and I was so, so happy to meet her and, yeah, be a part of her journey and professional, yeah, just commitment. She gives everything to everything that she does, and it's just a pleasure to be on the leadership team with her and to build this wonderful thing in so many ways. And I think the other thing that we both share is that we have this idea that if something doesn't exist, well then we must create it, and even if we don't know how to do it, we will figure it out and we will do some research and we will make it happen, because we recognize that, yeah, access is important, we recognize that therapy is a privilege and we wanna make sure that people have access to materials and to things that they might not have otherwise. Right, and so a coloring book was a really fun, creative project that we could engage in in order to bring some healing and love and light to the world for people who might not have the opportunity to sit in our offices individually.

Speaker 2:

I think the other thing that we value is as clinicians, as therapists. We are trained and we have a lot of skills, and all of that can transcend the therapy office, can transcend the therapy room, and so, yeah, I'm just really glad that Liz shares that passion with me and was interested in creating a coloring book when I proposed the idea. So I'll throw it to you, liz, to kinda talk through more about how we did it.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, well, and thank you for I don't know your kind words and I think we just make such a wonderful tea and which has been so fun. And I fondly call it the like how hard can it be, jean? Of like, well, if we don't see it happening, let's just like try it right, what's the harm there? And so, yeah, I mean truly the process for this coloring book was we were chatting about it and was like what one, as therapists were, yeah, like Ryan said, were trained to do therapy really well, but actually therapists have a lot of skills that are you can use in a variety of different ways. It's just learning, like how you wanna use those skills right, and I think you know a coloring book is a really fun way to create a resource that you know most of our clients have got to be all queer, trans, identities, right, and so being able to say, hey, we literally made a coloring book that is centering your identities is so powerful.

Speaker 1:

And, honestly, it did take us a whole lot of time to really create the coloring book, because I feel like once we get our wheels spinning, it's just like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Here we go, like that's just what can happen and it's been so cool. Like I know, we have a lot of clients and people who have like even clinicians who have come to events, who have used the coloring books in sessions, because I know for me as a therapist a lot of my clients it's really regulating to color during sessions and it's really wonderful to be like hi, here's a queer and transgender coloring book that you get to color during sessions. That's not just like I don't know a random rainbow, which is also great, and you know something that's centering their identities is really important.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I'm so inspired, honestly, the idea of like, if it doesn't exist, let's just create it, but how affirming right to be able to have that, just to really just feel so individualized and so custom. And I love what Ryan mentioned, that for those who maybe can't come into the appointment, they still have that love and healing intention from granted well-being at their fingertips In terms of it turning into from idea to kind of content. This is just me. I've never published any kind of book, so I'm curious, how do you get it onto paper? And then you know, was that hard to do?

Speaker 1:

Yes, no, I would say Honestly. We were able to design a lot of it through like TANDA, which is using like that's a software that we use so frequently right, and being able to design it through that, which was really fun, the getting it onto paper I'm going to throw that to Ryan, because that was mostly Ryan is really great at figuring out some of the logistics of that type of stuff.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, because I'm so curious, I will put the link to the book in the show notes. But for those who are listening and imagining what it looks like, it's really cool designs and kind of the outlines black and white, and it looks like there's 20 designs, everything chosen, family, my existence matters. So like, just did someone, did one of you draw it out? Did you get it printed? All of that sounds just.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so the beauty of Canva is that there's lots of designs on there that other artists have, you know, created and that they're open to others using, and so we kind of took some foundational pieces that we really liked on there and then put our own creative queer and trans lens, twist on it and really designed it in a way that we thought was thoughtful and, yeah, approachable to others. Like Liz said, you know we use this in our sessions with our clients. Once we published it, you know, we made it accessible and readily available for them. We started with a digital download version, and so I think that was the easiest way to just kind of, you know, get it going, get it started. Again, we like to build the plane as we fly it and, of course, while we're doing very good work, but the final product doesn't have to be you know where you start, and so, for anyone listening, you know, I think, just give yourself permission to have imperfect action and to not, yeah, to just do it. To just do it, even if you don't know exactly where it's going to end up or how to make it happen. Just get started and you'll figure it out along the way.

Speaker 2:

So, yeah, we started with the digital download that's still available on our website, so anybody can purchase it and, you know, download it and then print it themselves.

Speaker 2:

And then we also created the Amazon version, which we use the Kindle Direct Publishing through Amazon in order to do which, again, you know they walk you through it, it's not as hard as it sounds. The most difficult part was, you know, getting the formatting correct to a point where Amazon would accept it, but after, I think, 20 edits and revisions, we made it happen and it is live now. It lives there. And so you know, I think, yeah, doing some research and, you know, walking through some of those opportunities that exist, you know, and just figuring it out from other people. I think you know that's something that Liz and I both really deeply value is not gatekeeping in for me, then, and sharing it. And so you know, if this is something that you're interested in or you've been wanting to do some kind of creative project and you're not sure how to get started, we are open to sharing the wisdom and knowledge that we have.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. I love that. Yeah, I was just going to add one other thing, which is that when we started this coloring book, it was mostly for us, right. We were like this is a coloring book that we're creating something that, like, we would want to use and, whether other people like it, whether it, you know, we're able to get it published on Amazon, because around the 10th time it was looking a little dicey there we are losing a little bit of hope, but, you know, creating something and using that creative outlet for us and then as like a primary thing, and then you know, going from there and seeing how it grew, kind of like Ryan was saying I'm like, yeah, where we started and where we ended up was kind of different and it's just been cool to see it like I don't know land in other people's offices, which is so fun.

Speaker 3:

Yes, and what a great metaphor, like you describe, ryan, to just where you might start off. You might not know, but you kind of work through it and you know. Before we hit record, we were talking a little bit about the importance of knowing your values as a therapist and I heard a little, you know, just in this recording you all have mentioned, you both have mentioned a little bit about community and affirming care and creativity, and I'm not sure if those are exactly your values, but you can hear it come through with just your dedication and commitment to a project like this and I think it's. I think it's so, so cool that you're kind of tapping into and embracing the opportunity for freedom and creativity within the therapy world.

Speaker 3:

I think traditionally it's been like therapists I'm a therapist is my background, so I feel like there's been kind of a box, like you said, whether it's eight keeping or this is how you do the work and I love that. There's this opportunity for creativity, so to have freedom in the way clinicians are doing their wellness work, and I think it's awesome because I, you also. So there's there's the coloring book, it's digital, it's paperback. There's also, I mentioned earlier, you guys are organizing a conference. You also have audio meditation. So let's talk about the conference, because I'm, I'm, I'm excited to learn more too.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, well, I mean, what a great segue into the conference name, which is let's talk about it and um the con. You know, the conference really was born really last summer and it was kind of I it just felt so like universal synchronicities of. I was sitting in a training that was sintering, working with queer and trans families, and it was just really 101. And I texted Ryan and I said we could do this, right, really, bringing in the. How hard can it be, jean? I'm like we can, we can put this to a 201, 301, right, like, we can go a little bit deeper than this training that I'm in At the truly like.

Speaker 1:

Within the same couple of days, a couple other friends to Chris and Casey who the four of us make up are the founding organizers of this conference Also texted Ryan about hey, we are really disappointed in this training, maybe we should do some trainings.

Speaker 1:

And what we thought was going to be a small little training endeavor has turned into a two day full blend conference where we have we're partnering with Kennesaw State University and it's virtual and in person, so you can literally it's anywhere in the world, anywhere in the country, which is amazing, because we really wanted to prioritize accessibility in that way and not just saying, hey, if you can actually travel to Kennesaw, then you can access this conference, but you can access it from anywhere. You can be in Kennesaw and access it from the comfort of your own home and making sure we're really aligning with their value of accessibility in that way, and we have. I think it's 12 presenters Ryan, I could be wrong around like 12 presentations. I think that are all you know sintering, queer and trans, affirming care and how we can go a little bit deeper than just here are some definitions right, but what does it mean to engaging, you know, ethical liberation when working with queer and trans folks, right? Things like that that I think are really important and not talked about enough.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and Liz is also presenting on religious trauma, faith deconstruction, purity, culture type things and working with queer and trans people, and so, yeah, we have, you know, a wonderful array of presenters and topics that are being covered, and I think you know something for everyone. There's ethics presentations. You know there's some presentations around defining families and, you know, being expansive around that, we've got some things around working and play therapy and working with queer and trans youth and young adults, and so, yeah, there's a lot of really great stuff there and I think you know the intention around it, right like where we started is not where we're ending up, and we love that. We love to see it. There's been a lot of, you know. I think it speaks, speaks to the need. You know we work in the South, we are located in Georgia. There's not a lot of opportunities for a conference like this and it's just a need that exists and so, yeah, we are taking it upon ourselves to help create it.

Speaker 2:

I think that's also something that Liz and I are really good at. We are good at connecting people, creating spaces, holding spaces and this. Again, these are all qualities that we have as therapists. This is stuff that we're trained in. We're just doing it in a creative way and so we're really excited about it. You know, and like Liz said, there's hybrid options available. We can offer CEUs if you are in Georgia and if you're outside of Georgia but want to access the information, it's priced. In order to do that, we also have accessibility pricing as well and on sponsorship opportunities for you to sponsor and attendee. So, you know, we wanted to make sure that we were thoughtful around the pricing and creating access to and giving students the opportunity to participate as well, and so, again, we heal within community. We're excited about creating this community. I think you know that was another big intention around this was just creating a community of affirming providers and people who are interested in this work to start having these conversations and, yeah, see where we end up with it.

Speaker 3:

I love this. I'm writing this down because I need to go sign up as a therapist. I'm not in Georgia, but I think, yeah, it's. I even just in this conversation, I think that there's a lot that can come up and I typically refer out. But, you know, just being able to hold space with, with more intentionality, before you know, like the referring, and just saying you know, I don't know, I'm not, I'm not an expert in this area, but I know others who are, and being able to be more affirming along the process, even when it comes to a referral, when it comes to working with family members, just as a as a person living in this world, being able to be affirming. It's important. So I love that, that it's for for providers and creating that community. And you mentioned students, because is this for graduate students? Just so I'm clear, so I can okay.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so it's for graduate students, professional working already who are licensed. Anyone really who is interested in attending and wanting access to some of this information? You're welcome to attend, Okay.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, we really wanted to make sure that student pricing was available, because it it's so hard in grad school. Being like what am I doing? Like especially for folks you know who, in March. They're going to be graduating in a couple of months and joining, you know, practice community, mental health, like, whatever that looks like right. And being like, yeah, you deserve access to this information too, even if you're still in grad school.

Speaker 3:

What are? If you don't mind, you mentioned something earlier. I wish I had written it down. What are some topics that are going to be new at this conference? Let's talk about a conference for providers to maybe get get really excited about that. You, you've seen us something that's been missing from other trainings because you mentioned you weren't this training. You're like this is one on one. I'd like to go a little bit deeper. I know you talked about faith, deconstruction, anything else that you think of that is really important for people to consider and think about.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so we really and I'm doing this by memory because I don't have it pulled up, but I know we also have on the on the schedule to. You know there's topics around substance use and you know, working with clients who might be navigating that we have, do you know, more than idealist go ahead.

Speaker 1:

I, I do, I have a couple. What that I am really excited about is around geek therapy, yeah, and so this is something that at least you know. I'm not in the geek therapy world, so maybe this is being more talked about in larger circles, but, yeah, one of the people who actually works like ground well being is doing a presentation on Geek therapy and how to like use the media that your client already Engages with in order to connect with them and build a therapeutic relationship, which we're excited about. I think. Another one is it can be really difficult to access trainings on parenting and non-monogamy, and we have One of our presenters is doing, I think, a 90-minute presentation on what it looks like just navigating parenting and when you're in a non-monogamous relationship, which that is like I'm. I'm pumped for that one because I work a lot with Clients who are navigating escrow non-monogamy, a lot of whom do have children. Um, yeah, and I'm trying to think of others, I'm also doing it off of the top of my head.

Speaker 3:

Yes, that is that such. What a wonderful opportunity to have this conference and be able to gain access to Just really important topics to talk about. That maybe also some things you may not even Consider. I'm thinking for some providers you don't know what, you don't know right and and you may be missing out on an opportunity to really provide some affirming, supportive care, and so I'm excited about this conference. I just can't imagine like your brain must be always thinking Like I just picture it, like coloring books and the audio, and let's do, let's do a conference, you know.

Speaker 2:

Yes, yes, another of our values, that grounded well-being, is being visionaries and and envisioning the world and creating the world that we want to exist and actually see.

Speaker 2:

And so I think, you know, I again really appreciate Liz because she shares that value as well. And I think too, you know, as you, you know, kind of grow into more of a leadership position that really limits your ability to work one-on-one with people, and so I think you know, liz and I both, we really value the work that we share in the light that we bring to the world, and so we needed to figure out other ways that we could still, you know, create change or, you know I'm influence others in a positive light without actually having to sit across from them in one-hour sessions. And so the meditations that we're recording, you know we're specifically around, you know, creating more self-compassion. If you are queer and trans or you're just anybody, we all need self-compassion, right. So some self-compassion based meditations, resiliency meditations. We've got a deck of affirmation cards that we designed that are specifically around yeah, some self-compassion, and Designed for queer and trans folks.

Speaker 3:

How can people access those, the affirmation cards?

Speaker 2:

Okay, so all of that is on our Grounded Well-Being website, so we have it in the store and the affirmation cards right now. Again, it's not where we're gonna end up, but it's what we've got. Right now. We have a digital download of them, oh, where you can print them out at home, and then, yeah, we have big plans of getting them actually printed, kind of like an oracle deck would be. So we do have a lot of, you know, clients who are really interested in tarot cards, oracle cards, affirmation card decks, and so, you know, this was just another kind of creative way that we could lean into this and create some change. And then we have big plans of one day, you know, having retreat centered around queer and trans clinicians and or people who want to hold affirming spaces with others to really just again build Community that's a huge value that we have at Grounded Well-Being and to connect with each other and to take up this space, because this work is hard and we need each other.

Speaker 3:

Yes, I love the work that you are, all that everyone I grant I see for all of Grounded Well-Being.

Speaker 3:

I just love that, the visionary you guys are in, in action, with, with, with what you dream of, and it's inspirational for, I'm sure, for a lot of people, for individuals who are Interested in the wellness world, to know that there's accessibility, that there is Opportunity, that it wellness may look different for everybody, and even approach and the path to, whether it's before therapy, there's affirmation cards or whatever it may look like, or a coloring book and different opportunities to connect with the work that you all are doing and have been Trained in, but also so thoughtful and passionate about and and and just kind of infused with creativity and love. I love that. I think, in turn, I'm gonna make sure that we upload your tele wellness hub profiles. I realize this with all these things because I Think I might have a little bit of that gene like, well, let's do it. I never envisioned making a directory slash podcast. I was mining my own business in my practice but I was like, why doesn't this exist?

Speaker 3:

You know so yes yes, yeah, I, I can relate a little bit to that. So I was personally very inspired by this episode and I'm sure that listeners and who are looking for these resources Didn't know they existed. Perhaps now they do. So I'm so grateful for your time and for providers who have been looking for amazing colleagues. I cannot stress it enough to connect connect with grounded well-being and Register for the let's talk about it conference and anything else you want to mention in terms of long-term vision impact when it comes to Maybe more insight for community.

Speaker 1:

I Think you know, and I don't know I might be you can jump in here, ryan, too, but I think something that we are hoping to, you know, long-term Vision for grounded well-being is to really have. You know, we love our office and we'd love to have a much more community based space when we can offer a lot of community resources at free and or lower costs, more accessible pricing, so that we can have a Space to just like gather and be is like we're in France people, providers, clients, things like that. I don't know if that's where you were gonna go, ryan, but that was my first thought. I, I, I.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, and so we want to create community in both ways, right, and I think it's incredibly powerful for clients to be able to see queer and trans clinicians thriving and us to be able to model what success and you know, thriving Especially the South, you know can can look like and that we're doing it and we're okay, and then, yeah, to share that space with them is really powerful.

Speaker 2:

We partner with other local organizations as well and we hold a, you know, kind of like partner free community for board games base For trans youth yes, for trans adolescents, locally as well, and so we try to partner with other organizations too and get the word out and share things via our newsletter and I think, big, big, long-term goals, liz and I would like to have a community of, you know, therapists and clinicians who just want to connect with each other and do some of these fun, creative projects, talk their ideas, things that we can share knowledge about, do the retreats, do that community building and then potentially, yeah, be able to offer our own trainings and CEU's and all of that good stuff.

Speaker 2:

So, yeah, kind of bringing the vision together and we have plans and having, like Liz mentioned, like a community access fund as well, and I spent a lot of years in nonprofit management Before going into private practice, and so I have a lot of those skills that I can also bring to the table. And I think as social workers, we also think, as you know, systems thinking a lot of times as well, and so, yeah, we just try to do everything that we can in that way.

Speaker 3:

I love that. How can people connect? To be part of this journey with you, while you Make your visions come, come true and all, and to be able to access all the the resources that you have. What's the best way for them to connect?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so you can visit our website, grounded well being org. You can follow grounded well being on Instagram. Our handle is at GWB healing. You can follow my Personal tick talk. I don't have as many followers, liz, I'm a baby at this, but it's at mindful transcendor. I hope to one day be able to share more around, like meditations, mindfulness, things like that, and just take up my space within the wellness sector. Yeah, and connect with other queer and trans folks in that way and, liz, I will throw it to you for your tick tock.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, so my tick talk is at Liz Ray therapy and so I'm only on tick tock. I have not been turned into the world of Instagram, but yeah, and then, like like Ryan said, through our website as well as, I'm sure, anything else. I think those are kind of the three main ways that people can connect with us other clinicians that our practice also have Like tick tock, sir, instagram's when they're, you know, talking about their own like wellness work, which is really cool too.

Speaker 3:

I love that, so we'll make sure I include those candles in there. Ryan and Liz, thank you so much for represented grounded well being and for Representing grounded well being and for sharing your time and for being a part of our wellness journey. Thank you for having us.

Wellness Work and Creative Projects
Self-Publishing and Creative Therapy
Therapist Conference
Grounded Well-Being Conference Topics
Wellness Sector Representation and Connection