Survival Mode + Resiliency with Tash Doherty (Part 1)

 "You can make different decisions from now on as you move forward. The most important thing is to not lose your sense of self in all of that."

What happens when your business school education unexpectedly saves your life? For Tash Doherty—writer, author, and creator of Miseducated—a seemingly ordinary morning run in Oaxaca, Mexico transformed into a life-threatening encounter that would test everything she knew about negotiation, personal agency, and survival.

In this powerful conversation, Tash takes us through her remarkable journey from being a 14-year-old aspiring novelist in London to studying at the prestigious Wharton School, where societal expectations temporarily diverted her from her creative dreams. But when faced with a traumatic confrontation in Mexico, it was precisely these business negotiation skills that provided her with the tools to protect herself when it mattered most.

Beyond the harrowing details of her experience, Tash offers a refreshingly nuanced perspective on trauma and healing. She challenges the often-celebrated narrative of "post-traumatic growth" with raw honesty: "Just surviving and carrying on, working on yourself, doing yoga to feel safe in your body again—those are all wins." Her story reminds us that there's no prescribed path for processing difficult experiences; some people become advocates or speakers after trauma, while others focus simply on rebuilding safety in their lives—and both approaches deserve equal respect.

 "You can make different decisions from now on as you move forward. The most important thing is to not lose your sense of self in all of that."

Join us for this deeply moving episode that explores the complex reality of surviving trauma, reclaiming creative passion, and finding your way back to yourself—even when the path forward isn't clearly marked.

About Tash Doherty

I'm the author of a spicy, coming-of-age novel, These Perfectly Ca

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Transcript

Content Warning and Introduction

Speaker 1 0:00

Before we begin today's episode, we just wanna take a few moments to advise you that today's episode does discuss sensitive topics and listener discretion is advised. If at any point, you need to pause or step away, please prioritize your wellbeing. Today we're exploring these complex themes with care and respect because we understand that having an open and informed conversation can foster healing and understanding. Our goal is to create a safe space for dialogue free from judgment.

Speaker 2 0:29

We hope you enjoy All of us reach a point in time where we are depleted and need to somehow find a way to reignite the fire within. But how do we spark that flame? Welcome to Reignite Resilience, where we will venture into the heart of the human spirit. We'll discuss the art of reigniting our passion and strategies to stoke our enthusiasm. And now here are your hosts, natalie Davis and Pamela Cass.

Speaker 1 1:12

Welcome back to another episode of Reignite Resilience. I am your co-host, natalie Davis. I'm so excited to be back with all of you today, and joining us is your co-host, pam Cass. Hello, pam, how are you?

Speaker 3 1:22

Hello, I am. You know what I'm good today. It's been a good day. It's beautiful outside, it's starting to warm up, the trees are starting to bloom, so there's like white flowers on the trees outside, which just makes me happy. So, yeah, so I'm good.

Speaker 1 1:37

Yes, white flowers, not white snow. So that's okay, I will take the white flowers.

Speaker 3 1:44

Done with the snow. We're done with that, yeah.

Speaker 1 1:47

Exactly, it has been quite a winter for us, I feel. Every year I feel like it's a long winter, it hasn't. It's been mild, it's normal, it's fine, it's part of living in Colorado, but somehow it just seems to get under my skin when we get us April and May snow.

Speaker 3 2:03

This is what happens when we get us April and May snow.

Speaker 4 2:05

This is what happens when we get older.

Speaker 3 2:07

Snowbird in warm places like where our guest is right now Exactly. Exactly Be there in person doing this podcast.

Speaker 1 2:15

I would a hundred percent have rather record this live, a hundred percent.

Speaker 3 2:19

Yes, yes, and maybe we'll look at doing that in 2026.

Speaker 1 2:23

Done. I'm sold. We'll come to you. Yeah, you don't have to twist my arm at all, I'm already signed up.

Speaker 3 2:29

I love it.

Speaker 1 2:29

I love it Well why don't you tell our listeners who's joining us today?

Speaker 3 2:33

Yes. So today, so excited, we have Tash Doherty. She is a British-Irish-American writer and author. She is the creator of Miseducated, a blog and podcast for business and pleasure, and the author of these Perfectly Careless Things, her spicy coming of age debut novel, which she self-published in September of 2023. She graduated from the Wharton School University of Pennsylvania and lives in Mexico City, and it's a beautiful 75 degrees there today. Welcome, we are so excited to have you and I'd love for you just to kind of tell us a little bit about your story and how you got here.

Speaker 4 3:16

Well, thank you so much, Natalie and Pamela, for having me Such a warm welcome. Great to meet you guys, Amazing energy. And yes, I'm Tash.

Speaker 4 3:23

I grew up in London until I was about 19 years old and then I took a gap year and I went to the Wharton School of University of Pennsylvania, which we've got lots of criminals and people running the world right now from my alma mater. So things are a little bit crazy. You know, I loved going to Penn. I studied business and business analytics and then I went into the tech world for about five years and I had this sneaking dream. You know this whole time that I had always wanted to publish my first novel.

Speaker 4 3:49

I actually started publishing and writing stories and stuff, writing that book, specifically when I was 14 years old and at that point, you know in my early 20s, I thought, oh, I need to be a serious business woman. You know I don't have time to write like spicy teen romance fiction. But then, as I got into my late 20s, I was so unhappy with what I was doing in my tech job that I just thought why not quit my job, quit my life in New York City and self-publish my novel, which is called these Perfectly Careless Things. And so, yeah, now I did it. I finally fulfilled and achieved my childhood dreams. I'm really excited to share anything about my story that can help your listeners today. Thank you so much.

Speaker 3 4:26

Okay, so you started writing at 14. I don't know a lot of 14-year-olds that are thinking about writing novels, so what kind of introduced you to writing and what was that spark that you had?

Speaker 4 4:39

Yes, well, in my high school I had an English teacher called Miss Fryer and she told me that another girl in my grade or you know, a couple of grades above me, but at that time I was in, like I don't know, 10th grade or whatever it was Basically this girl had written and published a book in a single summer. So I thought, oh, if that girl can do it I'm trying to remember her name now, it was maybe like something web anyway so she had published this novel, become an author. By the time she was like 16, 17 years old and I just thought, okay, well, why not, I'll give it a shot. So I started. I remember handwriting. You know, my first scene actually for this book was this terrible scene about a candle bobbing through the darkness and getting closer again no characters, no plot, nothing interesting happening. And also, when you're 14 years old, you've never even really learned to type right, like I'm still learning English language and how to express myself and all those kinds of things.

Speaker 4 5:33

But every summer my family and friends can attest to this I was very disciplined and I would sit down and write my novel for at least multiple months in the summer while everyone else was at the lake or whatever in California for at least multiple months in the summer.

Speaker 4 5:46

While everyone else was at the lake or whatever in California, I was, you know, kind of in a masochistic way, just learning and teaching myself how to write properly.

Speaker 4 5:51

And so, anyway, I did that for seven summers. But then again, as I was mentioning, once, I went to the Wharton School. All my classmates were very serious bankers and consultants and wearing suits and having briefcases and things. So I suddenly thought, okay, well, the only way that I'm going to achieve value in this world is by getting a really fancy job and making lots of money. And I tried to do that as much as I could for the next three, four, five years. But then, you know, once I hit kind of like my mid twenties and I was in New York and I was like, oh, this sucks so much, so I better just go back to writing this story that I had dreamed up all along, and I better just go back to writing this story that I had dreamed up all along and I finally then it took me, you know, another two years to finish writing it and then self-publish it in 2023.

Speaker 1 6:30

So yeah, love that Same novel each summer. Or were you just writing excerpts of different stories along the way?

Speaker 4 6:45

Well, I did write a lot of other stories along the way, but novel itself it was pretty intact, but, like through all of the different editions and editors and things happening, um, obviously the story changed a lot, and I was ultimately really happy with how it turned out though, because it really came to represent this super nostalgic time in my life where I had been living in London. You know you can go to beautiful places, you can explore new cities, but doing anything for the first time, you know that only happens once, and that's what I think the whole genre of coming of age and YA is so beautiful, so powerful, so nostalgic that I just got to go back into all my memories of growing up in London and all my favorite things about the place and the setting, and I love setting my books around places, like that's like a huge, huge aspect of it for me. So I hope that you know my readers will get to experience my love of London in the book when they read it, because it's really special.

Life-Threatening Encounter in Oaxaca

Speaker 3 7:37

Oh, I bet they will. I bet they will. Now you were in corporate America for a while and it sounds like you had some sort of an event, significant event, happen. Was that what made you kind of walk away from the corporate world and get into just focusing on your book?

Speaker 4 7:55

Yes, I can talk about that experience if you guys are comfortable with it, but I will give a dark trigger warning. It's basically the most messed up thing that's ever happened to me and this happened almost exactly four years ago but I would say it has transformed my experience quite a lot. When you're kind of stuck and you don't know what to do in your life, I think sometimes I was kind of naive and I thought, well, if I have a near-death experience, maybe that will kind of wake me up to this life that I'm living. So you really have to be careful and I'm telling you this now, like if you're wandering around asking the universe for a sign, make sure you ask the universe to also be gentle and give you the message in a kind way, you know, in the way that you need to hear it, rather than smacking you in the face, which is you know existentially what happened to me. So the specific incident that I think you're talking about or referring to is when I was in Oaxaca in Mexico.

Speaker 4 8:48

I was wandering and went for a run alone in this park, a really beautiful park in Oaxaca City. So in Mexico, in Oaxaca, they have a lot of indigenous groups that do amazing dancing in this stadium called the Galaguetza, and it's this incredible spectacle of Mexican culture that happens every year. And so behind that stadium is a national park like a beautiful forested area. But it's very kind of the security, isn't that good, even though there's like armed policemen and stuff who kind of like drive by. So I just went for a run there. I had been living in Oaxaca City for a couple of months, and so I decided to go for a run on this Wednesday morning, you know, 1030, 11am, and what happened was was that when I got to the top of the hill, I heard a rustling, you know, in the bushes. And this is again like the classic, the classic crap that they tell you that it's going to happen to you as a woman when you're running through the park alone. So again, the trigger warning all the dark things are going to happen in the world through the park alone. So again, trigger warning all the dark things are going to happen in the world. So I turn around and I unfortunately see there's one guy walking towards me and he's got in one hand he's got a gun like a handgun, and in his other hand he is like masturbating. So I find myself, you know, and I remember, before I even saw you know that he had his dick out. Whatever. I just thought to myself. You know, this is a moment, you know, in my mind I said to myself let's fucking go, because I knew that this was what the situation and the level of danger that was happening was, that I was going to have to really figure out how to negotiate myself out of the situation. And you know, luckily for all of your listeners, I do have some really important tips. So this is the worst case scenario you find a live in a park and a really dangerous situation.

Speaker 4 10:31

So there were a couple of things that I had on me at the time. All I had was my hotel key, which was about two, three miles away, so that wasn't going to be useful. And then the other thing that I had was 500 pesos. So at the time the exchange rate was about this was about 25 US dollars in cash. That was all I had, and of course you know, but then he's not based.

Speaker 4 10:52

This guy is not being faced with just anyone. I speak Spanish, went to the Wharton School and also studied business and negotiations a lot, so I have a lot of negotiation strategies and tactics under my belt. And, by the way, when you go and you're in this kind of it's a high stakes negotiation situation, your mind goes through immediately. You're taking off, one by one, your possible ways to get out of there, right? So again, I can't. Just I remember thinking to myself could I jump off the side of the hill? Could I scream? Should I shout? What should I do? And ultimately, what I decided, what to do, was not to do any of those things, because if somebody has a weapon and the asymmetry of power is so intense, you do not want to, you know, mess this guy up, make him feel stressed out or scared or freaked out, because that can really easily, you know, mess up your situation and compromise your safety.

Speaker 4 11:44

And there's a really, really good book which I recommend. It's called Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss. So I had read that book. I had also taken some negotiation classes at business school, but I think that book really was the one that saved my life and my body. And there were two things that I remembered from that book, and one was the title, which was called Never Split the Difference, right.

Speaker 4 12:05

So you go into a high stakes negotiation and you need to remember what you are not going to compromise. So in this specific experience, I said I don't want to compromise my body right, like if I can get out of here without him touching me, that's going to be a win for me. Additionally, I would like to survive. That would be great. So those were my main things, like my main compromising things on the table that I wanted to negotiate, that I was not going to compromise on those things.

Speaker 4 12:33

And the other thing that I remembered from that book was this thing called the late night DJ voice, and so, basically, this is another tool that he talks about, where, again, when you're in that high stakes situation, you don't want to shout and scream, you don't want to freak this person out, you want to be cool, you want to be like, hey, you're treating them like a normal person, maybe like a friend, because ultimately, ultimately, the human that you're dealing with in these high stakes situations are, you know, irrational people who are emotional, and you know that's very important as well. So, anyway, that kind of all put that all together. And then I said to him in Spanish and talking to him in Spanish, I tried to shake his hand and I'm like oh, hey, like what do you? You know, let's be friends, like I can, let's, I'll give you my phone number, like let's, let's leave the park, like no big deal. Meanwhile he's, like you know, get on the ground and like pull your pants down.

Speaker 4 13:24

So basically, then I managed to remember that I had this 500 pesos 25 us dollars in cash. And the thing also to remember with negotiations is that, again, my body is incredibly, incredibly valuable to me, right, but 500 pesos $25, not that valuable slash. I would take him to the ATM and take out 10K or however much he wanted that I had in my bank account at the time. So basically, you have to also think that the difference there between what might be valuable to him, anyway, in Oaxaca, like a normal laborer, 500 pesos is like I think what you could make maybe in like half a week or at least a couple of days of like salary for like minimum wage.

Speaker 4 14:04

So again, that's my privilege in that situation was having that money on me, and so I used that money and I told him hey, I will give you 500 pesos if you promise not to touch me. At first he was like, oh, you have 500 pesos, and I was like, yeah, like here. So I gave him the money and then basically he was just like, oh, come on, you know, quickly. And I was like no dude, like give me my 500 pesos back, like it's either this money or you know, that's it right. So eventually he took that money and he walked away.

Speaker 4 14:34

So that is the main issue of the story, right there, and sorry, I've been talking for like a minute you know, there's a lot of other follow-up questions which I'd love to answer for you, because I now live in Mexico.

Speaker 4 14:46

So this, but this event did, you know, have a big impact on me? But, yeah, I think ultimately and I just did a ceremony yesterday where I was doing working on some trauma integration and I think ultimately and I just did a ceremony yesterday where I was doing working on some trauma integration and I think ultimately, like what, how it's affecting me now is that, like I have overcome probably one of the worst things you know in the world. I don't think that anything like this will ever hopefully happen to me again, but if I, you know, showed up in that moment and I was there for myself, like, and I overcame, what can I not do? You know, like that's the kind of perspective that I'm having now. So that's taken me four years of a lot of therapy and trauma and work to get to that place. So, yes, I'm happy to answer any follow-up questions.

Speaker 3 15:28

Well, you had mentioned that you had quite a bit of PTSD from going through that. How did that show up for you?

Speaker 4 16:37

Yeah. So basically, if anybody else in your listener base has had PTSD before, they'll know that the triggers are almost exactly mirrored from the experience that you had. So for me it would be like things like running in a park. I was really freaked out doing that. Obviously, the first time that I held 500 pesos, right, I came back to Mexico, took out money from the ATM. I'm holding 500 pesos, my you know, my body is like freaking out. I'm having like a you know, my heart is beating a lot, those kinds of things.

Speaker 4 17:02

Also, what ended up happening, which I still kind of suffer from now, is that like I am super sensitive to everything over my right shoulder, because that was the direction that I turned around to hear the guide, right in the bush. So my whole right side of my body, especially in the first six months, if somebody sneezed on the bus behind my shoulder, I was like like constantly like that. So that's actually some some more physical work that I still think that I have to do. But it affects you a lot and I remember even like I couldn't have male co-workers like slack message me, you know, because I felt like it was they were individual, any kind of individual way that like men were trying to like interact with me was like quite triggering and ultimately, I remember, like the first time that I hugged a guy he was like my friend's boyfriend. I like he like gave me a hug after you know it was like four months afterwards or whatever and I like felt safe again and I was like okay, like I can feel safe, you know.

Speaker 4 17:57

And that's ultimately why I have to be grateful to myself and the way that I acted in that moment, because if, if that had happened, you know, and if my body had been compromised, I think I would have been messed up for like a really, really long time, like much longer than the six months that I had and I wanted to be able to like and I write a lot about pleasure and about, you know, female sexuality and I wanted to be able to have pleas, feel safe with this person. I can still enjoy everything that's on the other side because, luckily, I acted in the way that I did, given the situation. So, yeah, that, in a nutshell, is like some of the ways that it shows up, but I'm sure it's not fun. I wouldn't recommend PTSD on anyone.

Speaker 1 18:45

Well, and it seems like it was. I mean, as you know, listening to the story secondhand now, it was a victorious opportunity for you, right, Like the one thing that you were not willing to compromise you didn't have to compromise on. Your body was safe. You were able to safely get out of that situation. It could have gone so many different ways and so, for just you know, someone hearing your story it's like, oh no, this was a win, this was so good for you, Like everything worked out great.

Speaker 1 19:11

You went home and, yeah, you might have had a little bit of a scare, but your mind and your body went to absolutely not. This is this. We have not gotten through this yet. That fight, flight or freeze is going to carry on with us a little bit longer, this a little bit longer. And so to know, you know, to pick up on those things like just over your right shoulder, like the impact of someone being on that side of you, or even just messages received from a professional standpoint, that's significant. Did you see any blocks within your writing and the creative piece during the six month window as well?

Speaker 4 19:44

Yeah, totally. I had actually just interviewed a girl about a company that was doing sexual assault testing kits and I was planning to publish that episode on my podcast. And again, I wouldn't tempt the universe because at that point I had always been one of those women who was like, oh, sexual assault, that's such a sad thing, you know, never happened to me. But like I feel my heart goes out to those women, blah, blah, blah, you know. And then with a doozy of a situation so again, be very careful what you tell the universe with but I actually was not able to publish that podcast episode and I even tried to go back to work for like three months and then I just realized that the culminative effects of it was just like it was way too much and so I had to take. Luckily, at the time at Vox Media they had like three months of medical leave that you could take, so I got all of that. I went the recommendation of my therapist as well and then then I spent a lot of the summer like writing my book.

Speaker 4 20:38

So yeah, I would say it was going through something and having that level of PTSD, you're gonna be pretty messed up for a while. But again, it's like those really intense initial impacts will eventually wear off. But I still even get triggers, you know, now and then today, sometimes, when I can't really control them, and that's annoying, right, because you're just like, oh, that guy or whoever he was, you know, just wandering around out there in the world. And here I am, you know, shuddering again when somebody sneezes over my right shoulder and it's been four years since the incident, you know. So you know that just requires me. That's when I need to be more self-compassionate towards myself, I think, and just be like, hey, this is gonna have affected you for like a long time and it's it's normal, you know and it's okay yeah, absolutely.

Challenging Post-Traumatic Growth Narratives

Speaker 1 21:27

Well, I love that you say tempting the universe, because, just for our listeners, I want to say, like that can pop up in a variety of ways, because you said it and it reminded me of a space that I was in, gosh, maybe 10, 12 years ago. I was attending a training workshop and we were working on keynote speeches and things like that, and I was in a room of people that have lived life right, they've gone through divorce, multiple divorces, children that have passed away, parents that have passed away. And I remember sitting in that room and I'm like, what do I have to offer? I mean, look at all of these fabulous stories in this space. Well then, fast forward.

Speaker 1 22:01

And it's like, well, now life has happened, now you've got stories to share. And could I have still shared and had impact then, absolutely. But it's one of those things where, like, you just dismiss what you bring to the table, so it's not like a you know what universe would be better if you just let me have this and then I can. You know I'll accelerate from there. It shows up in, like our thoughts and what we think about ourselves and how we're. Yeah, so we've got to be careful with that because we're we're willing it into our lives when we start to say that Law of attraction it is, it is yeah.

Speaker 4 22:35

And I think it's really important though, because it did take. It's taken me so long again I'm four years out it still is affecting some ways that you know. I really am so nervous about this concept of post-traumatic growth. You know, I think again, like, maybe maybe a couple of these people are doing keynote speeches, or the people that you met, but a lot of times it's just surviving thing, you know, and eventually, great, I can now turn around and be like, oh, I overcame this. You know, maybe maybe a stronger person.

Speaker 4 23:03

But I feel like I have also friends who, like, have chronic illnesses. You know, people just experience suffering for no reason and I just think do we? Do we have to have this, you know, happen in order for me to learn this? Like, do it? Does everything happen for a reason? Like, because that by saying that, you're basically saying that every single ounce of pain that any person ever experiences, whether it's like the birth of, like getting like a child or something like that, like it's so, it's so complex. The world is such a messed up place that you know you don't need to lose hope, right, but also, at the same time, like there's a lot of unnecessary suffering in the world. So that's why I didn't say like, oh, it happens for a reason, and everyone you know who goes through something traumatic should become Oprah. You know, like just surviving and like carrying on working on yourself, doing yoga, to feel safe in your body again, like those are all wins, right, and yeah, that's, I feel strongly about that.

Speaker 3 23:58

I love that you say that, because I just had this like realization, because every guest that we've had on has gone through some traumatic thing and every one of them has now become a coach or a speaker or an author, and I think it's a good message to remind our listeners that just because you've gone through something traumatic doesn't mean you have to go write a book and you have to do this. Our goal with this podcast is to create a community of people that are going through stuff so you feel like you're not alone. But just because you haven't written a book about some horrible thing that happened doesn't mean that you're not, that you're, you've not survived it. It just means you survived in a different, in a different capacity, and so I think that's you can change careers or it can impact you in all different ways.

Speaker 4 24:44

You know, I also have friends who you know they maybe lost this child and then they go become grief counselors, like parents, and these events can change the course of your life. But at the same time it's like, yeah, that post-traumatic growth, I think, is such a it's such a mean kind of like punishing. I don't want to grow, yeah yeah, you're like like I just go through hell and back and like now I'm back.

Speaker 1 25:09

You know, that doesn't mean I have to be Oprah so now you turn around and pour into everyone else again, like just keep pouring just instead of taking that time to reflect and do the work that you mentioned, right, because it's easy for us to go back into that space of well.

Speaker 4 25:22

This has happened to me, so I I'm now obliged to fill in the blank and I think also what is difficult about my story though, which maybe not other people can relate to or it can depend right on your character in the moment but like I still have agency in my situation, like I still have never lost agency throughout areas of my life, like maybe I've been, I don't know, gotten too drunk at times and I'm like, oh well, shouldn't have done that, you know.

Speaker 4 25:48

But like have done that, you know, but like I haven't actually lost control in the official sense.

Speaker 4 25:50

So I think that's also something to keep in mind is like I talked to a girl recently after the incident that had basically also had a guy force himself upon her, like in the in a park, right, and like she had had to like give him like oral sex, but then she ended up going to the hospital and like getting swabbed, and then they caught the guy and you know he was put in prison, right, whereas like my perpetrator guy, no way you're gonna find him out.

Speaker 4 26:12

He was wearing like a mask and a baseball cap, right and like in the middle of Oaxaca, and I don't plan on going back there ever again, you know. So it's annoying because it's like, okay, she in a sense had something more physical happen to her, that maybe she felt less in control, but then she was still able to change that situation and actually get the guy right. So like it's a whole different dynamic of like who's got power and who doesn't. But I think the most important thing to remember is that, like just even surviving it, you still have agency and you can make different decisions from now on and you know as you move forward. So that's the most important thing is to not lose your sense of self in all of that.

Speaker 1 26:52

That's powerful Absolutely, and I think that's where the power resides as well.

Closing Thoughts on Agency and Power

Speaker 2 26:57

Thank you for joining us today on the Reignite Resilience podcast. We hope you had some aha moments and learned a few new real life ideas. To fuel the flames of passion, please subscribe on your favorite streaming platform, like or download your favorite episodes and, of course, share with your friends and family. We look forward to seeing you again next time on Reignite Resilience.