Finding Light in Darkness | with Dr. Joshua Caraballo

Key Takeaways:

- Renegotiating relationships with family while staying true to your authentic self.

- Finding harmony requires holding seemingly contradictory truths simultaneously.

- Our core purpose often resonates with us from a young age, but life's layers and societal expectations can obscure it.

An extraordinary conversation with Dr. Joshua Caraballo, an industrial organizational psychologist whose life story defies simple categorization. As a cisgendered, gay Puerto Rican cancer survivor, who grew up in a Jehovah's Witness household, Dr. Josh shares how multiple intersecting identities shaped his understanding of purpose and acceptance.

The discussion traverses deeply personal terrain, from Dr. Josh's earliest memories of attraction to the devastating stage-four Hodgkin's lymphoma diagnosis he received at just 18 years old. Most poignantly, he reveals how this diagnosis initially reinforced internalized religious guilt—"God had just punished me"—before eventually catalyzing profound spiritual growth. These experiences form the backbone of his memoir, aptly titled "I'm Not Dead Yet…”

What distinguishes this conversation is Dr. Josh's practical wisdom for cultivating resilience. He introduces listeners to the PERMA-V framework for mental wellbeing: Positive emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning, Achievement, and Vitality. This multi-dimensional approach acknowledges healing isn't linear but requires continuous self-awareness and acceptance. 

All links to today's guest's work and official site

Dr Josh's Website ➡️ https://www.drjosh.solutions

Instagram Account ➡️ @dr_josh_solutions

LinkedIn ➡️ https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-josh/

Chapters

• 0:00 Recovering from The Vandalism
• 2:50 Personal Reflections
• 6:15 Introducing Dr. Joshua Caraballo
• 8:10 Discovering His Sexuality
• 10:12 Identity- Self Suppression
• 12:09 Cancer Diagnosis and Religious Guilt
• 13:35 Seeing Through the Darkness
• 18:15 Renegotiating Personal Relationships
• 21:28 Reconciling Identity
• 27:30 I'm Not Dead Yet
• 30:20 It's OKAY not Being Okay
• 32:12 Cultivating Mental Health with PERMA-V
• 37:07 Recreating Personal Relationships
• 38:29 Psychological Reactance and Reconciling Values
• 42:15 The Silver Lining
• 43:45 Working with our Emotions
• 44:27 Cultivating Resilience
• 49:38 Self-Acceptance & The Spectrum of Layers
• 58:33 Dr. Josh's Work
• 1:02:12 Core Purpose and Closing Thoughts

Transcript

Kertia: 0:00

Hello everybody. I hope you are all having an amazing, amazing summer break. Summer started off somehow a little bit shaky for me. I recently got robbed, my car was broken into and it was not a fun experience. I am still trying to unravel everything that came from that. It was a bit traumatizing for me. To be honest, it's not something that I've ever experienced in my life. I haven't ever experienced anything like that. So it was jarring. It kind of shocked my system for a bit and yeah, but the recovery process hasn't been so bad and thankfully the aftermath of that wasn't so. It was heavy, but it wasn't as heavy as it could have been.

Kertia: 1:02

Let's say I'm safe, everyone is safe, so that is the most important thing and anything that is lost can be recovered. I mean, it's just material things at the end of the day, and the most important thing is life and health and safety. So you know, coming back from that, I've just been so grateful, so so grateful about how everything has turned out. There are so many lessons that came out of that experience alone, so many lessons. That has kind of touched different aspects of my life. Actually, it's crazy how one thing can lead to so much, can teach you so much and I've learned so much from it and I'm just so grateful and I've learned so much from it and I'm just so grateful for everything that has occurred and for how easy the recovery process has been for me. And me saying that the recovery process has been easy, it's not to negate how difficult the situation has been to deal with, how hurtful it was to me. But you know, having faced a lot of challenges in life, I think I have developed a certain sense of awareness and a certain level of resilience and, as with anything that happens in life because, as we all know, life be life in the level of consciousness with which you approach any situation largely determines the outcome. And I think you know, with that being said, it's just a matter of perspective and how you choose to respond to life's situation.

Kertia: 3:17

A lot is happening in the world right now and many people are going through it. You know there is a lot of chaotic energy out there and, as a part of my own healing process dealing with this and just regular life stuff, I really thought that it was important for me to send healing prayers to the person who vandalized my car and stole my possessions, my earthly possessions, my earthly possessions. Um, yeah, I, I thought that it was very important for me to do that and you know, when you're in pain, it is so easy to create more pain. So, as hurtful as that experience has been for me, I have nothing but transparent about the beginning of my summer and what that has been like. I'm still looking forward to having an amazing year ahead. I'm still optimistic and, yeah, still pushing through. Yeah, still pushing through. And speaking of that, I feel like, with everything that I have been through in life, I realize how resilient I am and I think I don't give myself enough credit for that. Yeah, I think a lot of the times when we go through things and when we go through life and the way that we come back from a lot of the things that we go through, I think we don't give ourselves enough credit for how we handle situations, for how we survive situations, and we definitely all need to give ourselves more grace and more love and more compassion. So, yeah, speaking of that, I recently had such an inspiring conversation with Dr Joshua Caraballo.

Kertia: 6:32

He's an industrial organizational psychologist and we spoke about the transformative power of resilience and self-acceptance, which is also one of the key messages within his memoir I'm Not Dead Yet.

Kertia: 6:43

I love that. Love the title. Dr Josh is such a beautiful soul. I had such a pleasure speaking with him. He seeks to inspire others through storytelling, which is really special, especially for those who have been historically marginalized and oppressed. Been historically marginalized and oppressed, and touching on his own personal story of being a cisgendered gay Puerto Rican cancer survivor who struggled with his identity on so many levels. Dr Josh truly delivered an empowering talk during our exchange and I hope this conversation is a reminder for you that whatever it is that you may be going through, that is not the end, that you can make it, even when it feels impossible. All right. So your introduction to me you spoke about various adversities that you went through and you know like that came out, even with your memoir. But definitely I want to address the piece around your sexuality and what that journey has been like for you and why it was so important for you to tell your story.

Dr. Josh: 8:04

Absolutely, and thank you so much for having me on your show. I really do appreciate it. My queerness, from the earliest memory that I can remember anyway, was me as a young lad, if you will not, knowing anything about sex, sexuality Even from a physical standpoint, I was not in a place to where I could be aroused in a way that you know like sexually aroused, and I don't mean that to be like rude or sound gross or anything like that, it's just to put things into perspective. I understood what an attraction was, based on emotion and some physicality as well, but it was much different. It was almost like a spiritual feeling and the affinity that I had towards the male form and this was was.

Dr. Josh: 9:03

So, back again to my earliest memories, just looking at like a jc penny catalog, which I don't even think they make anymore, send out to home. So I was born in 1977, just to give you an indication. So we're talking about like maybe I was six or seven and as I was, I would flip through the catalog. I would have this visceral reaction, like I said, to that male form.

Dr. Josh: 9:29

Again, did not understand, didn't have the words or the language to attach to that, just a true understanding of what that was. Obviously, I was able to put more words to that, but it was scary for me because I grew up in the Jehovah's Witness household. That also taught me at a very young age that a man who sleeps with a man to quote from the Bible is an abomination. What I felt was my true sense of being and what and who I wanted to love, versus what I was being taught at a very young age, was wrong, and people deal with this in so many different ways. The way that I dealt with it was to suppress and to try to change myself, and the more I did that, the harder it became.

Dr. Josh: 10:41

And the more I did that, the harder it became, the harder it became for me to live day to day and be happy lot, because I had, uh, effeminate behaviors growing up that I tried to correct a lot, so the typical sort of like, um, effeminate behaviors that you would think about although that in of itself could be a whole discussion right. Like we bring up our children, for the most part not everyone Like for men to act masculine. You must not do this or that, you can't walk or talk a certain way, and so I fit the bill, if you will, for being effeminate and because of that I really had to bear the brunt of these social I don't know what word to use like social sanctioning that I had. So it wasn't just for my family, it was from the people in the church, it was also when I went to school Again, my earliest memories.

Dr. Josh: 11:43

As time progressed, I was eventually able to leave my home at the age of 18 and I went to New York to study and, as you might imagine, everything that I was suppressing for about 18 years of my life I did.

Dr. Josh: 12:00

It was time for me to do all those things good, bad, indifferent, whatever it was, I was doing it. And just a few months after that I was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma, and it was in stage four. Now, from a practical perspective and, of course, years later removed from that situation, it is obvious that being in stage four meant that this was something that was growing inside of me the cancer for quite some time. But from the perspective of a young man at the age of 18 who finally let loose and did all the things that he's ever wanted to do and then got cancer to me, it was very clear during that time that God had just punished me and he was telling me something loud and clear you finally did what you were not supposed to do and now you have to pay the price. So, as you might imagine, that really messes with you, messes with your brain, messes with your emotion and messes with your ability to become an adult.

Dr. Josh: 13:01

It messes with your emotion, it messes with your ability to become an adult, and for many years thereafter, there were multiple layers of my identity, of various things that I had to go through, obviously including cancer and, thankfully, surviving. It did come back a second time and at that point in time I thought I was done, but I'm not. I'm here and like the book, but I'm not. I'm here and, like the book says, I'm not dead yet. So, as long as I'm alive, I'm now understanding not just now, but for the last, I'd say, 10 plus years, I've finally started to click and understand.

Dr. Josh: 13:42

All of these experiences were for a reason. All of these things that I was able to get through and survive is to make me a better person, and so it becomes my job to learn those lessons, to apply those lessons, to continuously practice being a better person, which will take the rest of my life to do, which is fine and then also to help other people who are going through similar things, whether it be exactly the same, like going through cancer, being a gay youth growing up, or something different, but still tied to that, because we all know what oppression feels like being called out for your identity when you know deep down inside that there's nothing wrong with that, that it is actually a natural thing to do, but going against the grain where society for the most part is telling you, no, you're not supposed to be here, or if you are, you're not supposed to be where you're at. You're supposed to be down in the trenches for the rest of your life because you're not worthy of living a life like some of these other people might.

Kertia: 14:48

Yeah, you have such a powerful message. One thing I'd love to know you mentioning when you first got the cancer, when you were 18, when you were doing all the things and thinking like, okay, now, God, this must be my punishment for doing the bad thing, right? How did you then change your mindset to step into this more empowered version of yourself? Because cancer is no joke, and of course, I understand. When you are faced with all these social constructs of what you should be, what you shouldn't be, what it means to be a man and what it means to be masculine and you being seen as the opposite of all of that, being faced with all of those things, the meanings and the symbolism and how that was projected onto you from such an early age, from family, from friends and whoever else, how did you manage to change your mindset from I'm being punished to no, I am okay, there's nothing wrong with me?

Dr. Josh: 15:58

Yeah, it's a great question and the answer is very multifaceted. There's so many different things that had to happen for me to get to the place that I am now, and I would venture to say it would look different for everyone, but the trajectory that I had to take was really about me going down a dark path for quite some time and then realizing that that dark path was not the best for me and then figuring out ways to undo all of that.

Dr. Josh: 16:29

So I ended up abusing drugs and alcohol for quite some time, because after I was diagnosed as being in remission from cancer, you would think I would be so elated and so thankful to have my life back, so to speak, and maybe you want to catch up on some of those years. It was about five years of treatment and waiting with scans just to make sure that the cancer was gone. But that's not what happened to me. I was lost. I didn't know where I belonged. I was lost. I didn't know where I belonged. I tended to gravitate back and forth to the extreme. So you know, trying to change myself completely and make myself masculine and make myself straight, and at one point even trying to make myself as white as possible, because I thought that's what would make me successful.

Dr. Josh: 17:24

So, there's a lot of layers that I had built up upon myself, that were fake, that were not truly who I was, and so it doesn't happen overnight.

Dr. Josh: 17:32

I had to spend a lot of time, many years, undoing all those layers so I can get back to the core of who I am and fall in love with that, and for me, it required a lot. It required first making a conviction that I would stop treating myself and my body in a way that was so bad and so unhealthy, so that I could clear the way for understanding what all these layers were. That I added as a way to survive. Understanding what all these layers were, that I added as a way to survive, and that they were no longer serving me, would not serve me moving, they would not serve me moving forward Sorry, if I could say it right and that I also need to renegotiate every single one of my relationships. So I had to look at the relationship that I have with my parents, my extended family, the relationship that I had with myself, which is, first and foremost, the relationship that I had with religion generally speaking, because I am not a Jehovah's Witness.

Dr. Josh: 18:36

I think that's obvious. But what it also does for someone like myself is it kind of gives you a bad taste about religion altogether.

Kertia: 18:44

Yeah.

Dr. Josh: 18:46

And yet that is yet another way of looking at the world and all or nothing thinking there's good, bad and everything in between in everything that you look at. And so I think religion is no different for me. Even if I eschew religion altogether, I think it's still good to look back and find the pieces that work for me. Yeah, and so I still believe in god, and so what I did is I just renegotiated what god looks like to me. He is not a hateful person or entity, he, she, whatever you prefer, um, and he loves me. He wants me to be here. He knows I'm not a bad person.

Dr. Josh: 19:27

See, I say all these things out loud, but I have to truly believe that, and that's where my faith comes in. Faith is the expectation of something not yet beheld, which I think is amazing. All the great things that it can do to you might feel like an exercise in silliness, but when you hold onto something like that, it can really change your life, and I needed that. I needed to rethink what God was and is and can be, and that, along with everything else that I renegotiated in my life, was but a part of how I became better. The last thing I'll mention for now because, like I said, it's so multifaceted that any one of these aspects that I utilized in my life I could talk about for an entire hour.

Dr. Josh: 20:18

But psychology, psychology has been very helpful, whether it be from the helping relationships that I had one-on-one with a psychologist therapist, or whether it be something outside of that, like the studies that I did to gain my doctoral degree in psychology. Although it was focused on what's called industrial organizational psychology, a lot of it is drawn from the clinical psychology literature. So it's just applied differently and, as you might guess, whatever you do in the workplace, for most people anyway carries over into your life, unless you're in the movie or in the TV show Severance. So that again, I know it's a long answer and I haven't even hit on every aspect, but I think those are the major things that have truly made a difference for me oh, my goodness.

Kertia: 21:16

Yeah, you said so many phenomenal things. Um, what would you say has been the most challenging part of all of that? Because I can only imagine what your experience has been like, especially as a man. We all know how. You know it's bad enough when you think about everything that the queer community has to deal with, but then, when it comes to men, it's just like so much heavier and there's just so much more violence geared towards men as well, and for you having to go through, I guess, struggling with accepting yourself. You even mentioned your ethnicity. Like even that aspect of it, like that is just like so layered, it's a lot of layers, and I can only imagine what that journey has been like. It's like excruciating. I can only imagine appreciating, I can only imagine right. So I'd love to know, like what could you say has been one of the most? I think that's like there's just I don't know, I don't even know if this is like a proper question, because, like I don't. How do you choose what is the most challenging out of?

Dr. Josh: 22:42

all of that like that is crazy. I'm with you, but I think it's a great.

Kertia: 22:49

It's a great question, yeah but I want to know, like, how do you take out of, like I guess, the most challenging aspect of that to create this like really profound work that you're doing right now, the memoir that you have? Like how did that work for you?

Dr. Josh: 23:10

Yeah, yeah, I mean, it is really difficult to pinpoint one thing. I'll give you a couple. So one of the things for me was really figuring out a way to stop playing the victim, but also being okay with being the victim, because I actually was a victim in so many different ways the way I grew up. I'm a puerto rican, so in terms of my heritage, um, being latino under that umbrella, if you will although some, uh, puerto ricans will will not identify that way, but I'm okay with it that adds, like you said, a whole other layer to it and I can easily go back to being a victim. But at some point in my life and I've pinpointed when that was. It was after cancer, maybe a few years after that I just told myself I can't, this is not the way I want to live. I don't want to be the victim.

Dr. Josh: 24:09

There's always something or someone or a group of people that are faring much worse than myself, even with all those layers that you mentioned. For instance, black trans women are dying, are being killed. I see the connections now between masculinity, femininity. I mean I wrote a whole dissertation on it. So we won't get into that whole thing unless you'd like to get into it more, but I see those connections in life because of what I've gone through, and so my second really big learning lesson is being able to hold two disparate, polar opposite sort of ideals and find a way to function.

Dr. Josh: 24:56

So you look at the sort of trajectory again of my life and the mainstays that have come through being effeminate versus understanding masculinity polar opposites in my mind or can be, and me having to find a way to. Where do I fit into that so that I can feel comfortable with who I am and what I bring to the table? It's the same thing with religion. So you have religion on one end and its extremist values or theories, and then on the other end you have people who just say there is no such thing as God. I believe in science. Although we could poke holes in that as well, there is some science that kind of verifies at least that there is some sort of creator out there oh yeah but I don't mean to get on too many tangents, but my point is, because this is part of it there are nuances to everything.

Dr. Josh: 25:55

So when you start to break it down and this has been really helpful for me as well, for the politics of our nation in the united states as of late, where things have become a lot more extreme and it's just too easy to pick one side, because that's a way that we save cognitions, energy, et cetera.

Dr. Josh: 26:17

But it's a shortcut. It's a shortcut to understanding the nuances of life, and I have to acknowledge that it's going to take a lot more energy whether it be emotional, cognitive or otherwise for me to understand those nuances. But it is worth every second Because that's where the value is. And so when I find myself going back to those all or nothing sort of stances which I will do because I'm a human being and all of us do it it's one of our biases, that's built into our brain and it's also a way, like I said, for us to save energy. So when I see myself involved in a shortcut, so to speak, where it's left or right, et cetera, et cetera, I try to question myself and challenge myself, and that's been so, so helpful. That's a really broad umbrella that I've utilized in so many different ways, but it just keeps coming back to me, and so I think that's been one of those huge learning lessons for me, and I love talking about it because anyone could apply that in their lives right here, right now. You don't have to wait.

Kertia: 27:19

Yeah, yes, the everything you just said, yes, the everything you just said. Yes to everything you just said.

Dr. Josh: 27:40

Yes to everything you just said. Yeah, oh gosh. So tell me, tell us about your everything that's happened in my life. There's been a lot of feedback that I've gotten reviews, et cetera, where people have said this was so grueling for me to get through. But I'm so glad I read it, because we need stories like this, and that has really warmed my heart.

Dr. Josh: 28:06

It is my first book, so there are, just to be super honest, some editorial mistakes, but you can still get through the book and understand it. And I just say that because I don't want to come across like, yeah, I've accomplished these things and I'm a perfect person. I'm not. I make mistakes all the time. I'm still struggling. I'm not struggling as much as I used to, but I will struggle for the rest of my life and that's fine, that's great, I'm embracing that and that's what's really part of what's making me a better person.

Dr. Josh: 28:35

So writing this book the first book I've ever written and put out there is not a perfect book, but it is one to where you will know everything about me up until this point in my life probably more than you ever wanted to know. But the point is not to just like divulge everything and make you feel like I've overshared. It's really to provide solidarity and hope and to show that, no matter how dark things get, no matter how bad it gets in your life, there's always something that you can look forward to. And I know it's harder for some than others, especially in this day and age, but that hope is so, so worth it and I'm hoping that I can give just a smidge of that to people who read the book.

Kertia: 29:23

That's beautiful. Now I got to read it.

Dr. Josh: 29:30

Please, yes, or you can listen to it as well. It's an audio book, it is an e-book and a regular softcover book. So choices, you have options.

Kertia: 29:41

Amazing, amazing, yeah, oh my gosh. You mentioned so many important things. It's hard for me to pinpoint what I want to, like ask you, but you know one thing, one thing that stood out to know what does your, I guess, what does your maintenance, your mental health maintenance, look like? Now? You mentioned therapy before. You mentioned psychology. You know, of course, the struggle. It never ends. There is always some aspects that comes up from time to time that we still have to address. So I'd like to know, like how are you? What is your healing journey, or mental health journey? What does that look like for you right now?

Dr. Josh: 30:38

Absolutely so. Fair notice, this will be maybe a longer response than usual. No worries, I'm already a very verbose person, but it's an important question and it's not just an easy answer for me. The first thing is, if you don't have the energy, the capacity and you just want to sit and do nothing, that's okay. I think for me, I've had to be more and more okay with that.

Dr. Josh: 31:13

I am the type of person that wants to achieve and achieve, and I think we live in a world, especially in the Western sort of predilection that we are taught from very young age you got to go, go go, you got to do, do, do. This is how you make it, and as we get older, those things become more and more difficult. We have more well, just a bunch of different things happening simultaneously, especially now. So I think one of the biggest things is just practice kindness, patience, compassion with yourself and be okay with just sitting around and doing nothing and don't try to tell yourself that you're doing something wrong, bad, that you're lazy, et cetera. Those are messages from the world that don't need to apply to you Now. If you're doing that for months, that's different. Right, that's like yeah, so just monitor it and see how long you need to be in that space. But outside of that, when I do have the cognition and the ability and the capacity to work on what's going to keep up my mental health, there's a model that I use. It's called PERMA, it's an acronym P-E-R-M-A and sometimes it's referred to as PERMA-V, with a V at the end, and I'll try to be as quick as possible here.

Dr. Josh: 32:31

So the P is positive emotion. You have a cookie, your favorite cookie. Mine is like a soft batch of white chocolate, macadamia nut. I'll have to be careful, because now I'm vegan and the white chocolate isn't always vegan, but that is like wow, that is something that makes me feel so good. That's positive emotion. It could be through sex, it could be through playing a video game. There's so many different ways you do it. But here's the caveat about the P, if you will it. But here's the caveat about the P, if you will. There is a threshold by which, if you go past that threshold, you will start to have diminishing returns. Example go back to the cookie. After my third one, I'm not feeling so great anymore. In fact, if I have four or five, I'm probably feeling a little bit sick. That's for me, and everyone has their own threshold. But when you engage in positive emotion as it's defined under PERMA or PERMA-V, you have to be careful. You don't want all of your feel-goods, if you will, to come from that one part, which is why there's other aspects to the acronym.

Dr. Josh: 33:40

The E is engagement, and that can mean so many different things to so many different people. However, engagement in this particular case means that you're engaging with the world by utilizing your inner values and obviously, in order to do that, you have to know yourself. You have to know what those values are. Here's something to keep in mind Values cannot be negative. Negative, they cannot be detrimental to yourself or the world. So if somebody is thinking, well, you know what? If somebody's values is to go and, you know, harm people, that cannot be a value. A value that is lived in action every day is a beautiful thing. That actually brings comfort, hope, resilience, oh resilience. So many great things. So by tapping into that and by trying to create surroundings where those are actualized, you're actually creating well-being.

Dr. Josh: 34:32

The R is for positive relationships, so obviously you can have bad relationships. I used to have a really bad relationship with God and then, when I transformed that into something, as well as my family, when I transformed that and renegotiated what I needed to be in that relationship. It's not perfect, so I'm still holding those two disparate sort of thoughts, like people who think that the people like me do not belong on this earth, that God will destroy me, and love loving those same people. Wow, what a challenge. But that's the relationship part. The M is meaning. You have to create meaning in your life, which just simply means you're living for more than yourself. That could be through religion, it could be through spirituality, it could be going to a nonprofit and dedicating some of your time outside of work. Going to a nonprofit and dedicating some of your time outside of work, et cetera, et cetera.

Dr. Josh: 35:32

The A is for achievement, and this is the part where I go back to what I said in the beginning. It doesn't have to be I'm getting a master's degree. It could be you clean the kitchen. That's an achievement. Getting out of the house sometimes is an achievement. Sleeping eight or nine hours whatever you need in one night can be also an achievement. So the small things, the medium-sized things as well as the large things, but it doesn't all have to be big.

Dr. Josh: 35:58

And then the V is vitality. Figure out ways to make yourself feel that vitality, whether it be through exercising, doing a puzzle, doing something nice for someone, sending a nice note, buying a gift, embracing someone, petting a cat or a dog if you prefer All of those things. So it's a lot to say it all in one sitting, just to answer one question. But again, I go back to there's not going to be an easy, quick thing to do. Like, just do this every morning, make your bed at 8 am and you'll be good. That's not how it is. It's hard, it's multifaceted and you have to really want it, and then the days that you just can't deal with it, let it go.

Kertia: 36:46

Yeah, that was a perfect response.

Dr. Josh: 36:50

That was amazing.

Kertia: 36:51

That was amazing, dr Josh, I love that, thank you. So many things, so many things. Oh my gosh. I could continue this conversation with you for hours. I'd love to pick your brain, but you said something about relationships. I'd like to know how did you begin to, I guess, reestablish the relationships or, if not, recreate the meanings of these relationships around you?

Dr. Josh: 37:22

Yeah, I made a lot of mistakes. Relationships around you. Yeah, I made a lot of mistakes. I did it before I was truly grounded, and I think that's okay, because, again, it always starts with yourself. What is it you need in order to maintain your happiness, your health, all of that, your flourishing? And then being grounded in that that's hard, because when I first went to my parents to kind of attempt this renegotiation, if you will, I felt grounded, but it all fell apart and we ended up arguing. I got upset, I stormed away, I yelled you know all that kind of stuff.

Dr. Josh: 38:08

If I had to do it again, I wouldn't change anything, though, because I needed that. I need that feedback in a moment to know that what I was doing was a little too aggressive. And then I needed to find more of a balance, that they were not going to respond well to me, just banging down doors, so to speak, and coming in and being like this is who I am. You better accept it if you love me. It's the same thing with just about anything in life. Adults do not respond well when they feel like you're taking away their ability to make a decision. There's actually it's a concept in psychology, it's called psychological reactance. It's the very reason why, if we again back to the left and the right fighting with each other because they both have the truth, right Quote, unquote the truth.

Dr. Josh: 38:54

And they're both doing things the right way, and so now they have to tell the other person what they're doing wrong and the other side automatically shuts down. You're not getting anywhere. Same thing with religion. There's so many different religions and a lot of the ways that they're taught is that this is the true religion, this is the right way to practice and serve your God, and then what inevitably ends up happening is we feel like we have something this righteous indignation, if you will, and other people that are not doing it are in the wrong. That's a huge problem, because we're not helping each other, and I had to square that away with my family.

Dr. Josh: 39:34

I had first come in and be like this is who I am, but that wasn't the way that it was going to work, and what I love about it is my family. Now I had options too. I could say I'll never talk to them again, but that's just not who I am. I go back to my values. How am I going to create this sort of engagement with life? I want to keep some semblance of a relationship with my family. That's my choice. I'm not saying everybody else has to do that, but because that's my goal, now I need to figure out a way to make that work.

Dr. Josh: 40:07

And so now we're both sort of like figure out a way to come to terms. So there's a win win. My family hasn't changed their beliefs, and neither have I. I haven't changed my ways, but we figured out a way to love each other. Is it perfect? No, not at all. There are times when something might come up, like I recently got engaged and I knew the answer to this, but I wanted to ask anyway will you come to the wedding? And the answer was no, and I wasn't shocked by it but, I, wanted to ask anyway.

Dr. Josh: 40:40

So I'm constantly kind of like testing the waters and wondering where we're at, and then I get that reminder again like no, we haven't changed who we are, but we still love you, and I think that's wonderful.

Dr. Josh: 40:50

I know not everybody has that and nor can everyone do that, but I feel lucky that I was able to forge that with my family my immediate family anyway. So that is something that I try to apply. It's like a microcosm for what I can do in the world. So every time I come across somebody who also might be engaging in ideologies that are destructive to who I am in my community, I can easily just walk away, feel hate towards them and I do sometimes. But again, going back to that challenge, I don't have to. They're not my family but if I try to practice this more and more, will I be helping to make this world somewhat of a better place, even if it's just a tiny, tiny bit. If that's all I can do during my lifetime, then I'll take it. That's what I want to be a part of, knowing that it's easier said than done, and sometimes I just need to walk away because it's like talking to a rock.

Kertia: 41:55

Yeah, beautiful, congrats on your engagement.

Dr. Josh: 41:58

Oh, thank you. Exciting stuff ahead yeah, that's amazing. I love that for you. Oh, it's like I had to throw that in there, right, something, something positive and happy and something to look forward to. Yeah, it's not all doom and gloom. Um, there, there's a silver lining I found to everything, even when I had. But it usually happens after the fact. Looking in hindsight, I say, well, please, I didn't like anyone that told me while I was going through that, oh you'll, you'll live through this, everything will be fine. You're young. I didn't want to hear any of that. I just wanted to be the victim and that's okay. But in hindsight I thought, wow, yeah, there was a lot of learning lessons in that. I appreciate life more than I perhaps ever would have before. There's so many things that I just appreciate that I'm not certain I would appreciate at this level if I hadn't gone through all the things that I have. So that's the gift that I have right now.

Kertia: 43:00

And I embrace it.

Kertia: 43:01

Amazing, amazing, oh my gosh, this is lovely. So how would you say, you know? Because we spoke about like it's okay to be the victim, but it's also vital. It's also important that we step out of that at some point in time Because, yes, there are things that happen that are oftentimes beyond our control and we cannot really control how other people choose to react to us or treat us. And so being able to recognize that bad things happen and you are experiencing something very difficult and it's okay to go through it's actually. It's actually very important that you allow yourself to feel the emotions during those moments and not try to, I guess, like push them down or, I guess, invalidate yourself because I think society does a very good job at already invalidating us and our experiences but not to invalidate yourself or suppress your emotions, but to actually feel them and go through that and live in that state. Right, but at some point we have to step out of that.

Kertia: 44:25

And what I want to ask is how then can we, you know, when life is life and the shit stinks? How can we cultivate resilience?

Dr. Josh: 44:41

Yeah, this is a really important and tough question. Yeah, I go back to. It looks different for every single person, something I learned at a very young age. I've always been interested in acting and performance and when I first started studying, when I went to New York I had my very first acting class and some people might be thinking like why is he talking about acting? But don't worry, I'm going to tie it together.

Dr. Josh: 45:09

So I had a wonderful teacher who said your job is to become the best actor you possibly can, and that is not by emulating the most famous actors that are out there. It is not by reading about a teacher and trying to emulate all the things that that teacher taught. Your job is to pick and choose the elements, emulate all the things that that teacher taught. Your job is to pick and choose the elements of all the models and frameworks that exist out there to create your own. And that never left me. It resonated with me so deeply because it's not just about acting, it is about everything in life. Your task is not to copy somebody else. You are unique and so you must create your own model, your own framework, by picking and choosing the things that resonate with you, which could change over time. What resonates with you right here and now might look so much different five, 10 years from now, and that's okay. Might look so much different five, 10 years from now, and that's okay.

Dr. Josh: 46:17

So what's resonating with me in the moment as I'm a victim, is working for me, because I'm processing negative emotions and even calling them negative. Some people say don't do that, it's just emotion. You're processing all these things that are happening in real time and whatever that takes, it takes. Some people ask well, how do you know? How do you know if you're just like down in the deep too long and you need to get out? Well, if you're asking yourself that question, then maybe that's an indication. But having a relationship with yourself is so, so important and understanding when you might need help to get yourself out, and it might take more than one chance, or more than one opportunity, if you will Like. Sometimes it takes many, many, many different chances or opportunities for you to get out of something. So I think about all of that and I think about having a support system that is so important during those times.

Dr. Josh: 47:08

Sometimes you'll get some people will say hey, you know, you've been crying about this for three days. Maybe you ought to sometimes that that's not the best thing for you to hear, but the friendly, loving reminders occasionally, um could be helpful, because then you could just say no, this is not the right time for me, I don't care that it's day three, I don't care that it's week three. You know, it all depends on what exactly has been going on. But for the most part, most people will begin to understand like, okay, I've processed this and I think I'm ready. I think I'm ready to start making a change.

Dr. Josh: 47:45

I talked to one of my colleagues not too long ago and she had a horrible relationship. She got married and the marriage ended very badly about two or three years ago and she's still processing that. And one of the things she had said to me was I can't believe, I'm still processing this. And I said but this was the love of your life. You had every indication or thought, for good reason, that this is what you, this would be your life right and that it all got taken away in a very bad way.

Dr. Josh: 48:20

So the fact that you're still processing that two or three, who's to tell you that you need to get over it? No, no, you process that somebody dies in your immediate family. You may, may never get over it. You just learn how to live with that feeling still there, that emptiness. So you know it really depends on the circumstances and I think don't give yourself limits. Allow yourself to process, like you said so very astutely. Yes, do not try to squelch, push down, deny yourself that. And that's hard because society is telling you everything else like, no, no, positive vibes only. It's like well, what does that mean? If I'm not feeling positive, that I need to dismiss myself, I can't be part of society and culture, yeah, no, no, that's toxic. We need to embrace all of those things and I think we also need to do better at embracing it, because let's acknowledge that we're not taught how to embrace those things and so, as we adult, that's when we start learning. So we're going to make a lot of mistakes and that's okay.

Kertia: 49:36

Yeah, and just linking that to the self-acceptance space. Right, I think that goes hand in hand with everything that you just said, because you know, being able to acknowledge where we are and just being okay with that oh my gosh, yes right.

Kertia: 49:57

Yeah, I'd love for you to speak on that because, um, I think when you think about self-acceptance, it seems like you know, like it seems like it's something going in line with being positive and like all the nice empowering. Empowering fluffy stuff that feels good, but also a part of that is also embracing where you are in the now. That's right.

Kertia: 50:21

If everything in your life doesn't look the way you want it to look, if your relationships are a mess, if you're still trying to figure out what your career path is, if you're still struggling with identity, with your identity and all the things right. Being able to accept yourself as is now is also. It's as important as imagining the self, or recognizing the self, that you want to be right, Recognizing the self that you want to be right.

Dr. Josh: 50:52

Absolutely. From the moment that we are born, our bodies, our minds, our spirits, if you will, are giving us signals. They're talking to us, yeah. Our task, then, is to understand what those signals mean, and that's very difficult to do if you don't have a relationship with yourself, if you've been ignoring all the signals, the chatter, if you will, and just saying whatever, or putting layers upon layers on it.

Dr. Josh: 51:20

The other thing is, when you forge or create an identity that is not true to who you are, you end up validating an identity that doesn't truly exist. And so when you go home at night and you feel empty inside, it's because you're not truly validating who you are. You're validating something else that doesn't even exist. I think the other thing is, once you start to have that relationship, you tend to understand where you gravitate and where you lean more towards as a human being, so you can help yourself kind of I wouldn't even say balance out, because balance kind of gives this idea that there's a one-to-one ratio and it doesn't always look that way. Sometimes someone's balance might be totally off kilter for someone else. One of the things I learned that I thought was really fruitful was negativity, generally speaking, works much differently in the brain for human beings than positive emotions and positive thoughts, and the reason why which sounds very logical is because our brains are meant to take negativity above and beyond positive things to help us survive. So you walk into a room and you're scanning, and this is in a fraction of a second. So it's not your conscious mind doing it Although your conscious mind can actually also do it as an additional layer, but you are constantly scanning everywhere you go for danger. That's how your brain is built. It's because we are meant to survive. The only time that's not happening is when we are creating layers upon layers or involving ourselves in substance use. To where that starts to change how our brain is able to scan the environment.

Dr. Josh: 53:06

So once you understand that, then it makes sense that you could have a best friend that's with you for five years and then they do that one thing that really steams you and everything else, at least for that moment and perhaps for the time being, melts all away and you're fixated on this thing that has harmed or hurt you. That makes sense. So how does that happen in the world? Once you realize that we're picking up all the time on these negative things as a way to survive, then you can actively tell yourself I need to seek out the good so that I can help to again. Maybe it's not a balance, maybe it's more like a synergy, maybe it's more like a harmonic way of looking at the world. How do I find my harmony? And the science has been really fruitful for me, because this is an average, but for every negative thing that happens, you need about three to seven good things to help to counterbalance that. So it's not just like you have one negative thing and then if I think of one positive thing, it's good.

Dr. Josh: 54:09

So your friend harms you. So it's not just like you have one negative thing and then if I think of one positive thing, it's good. So your friend harms you. Hopefully it's not too bad of a harm. Maybe it's just disrespect or something.

Dr. Josh: 54:22

You need to consciously think about all the things that have gone well, and that's the same with any relationship. It could be a boss, it could be a significant other, and this is how you help yourself. Now, going back to like that's something that I feel like once you learn, you can try to control. There are things that also have happened in our lives, like we grow up in a Western world but we're taught certain things from a very young age, especially here in the United States. It's all about independent thinking and what we call the independent control.

Dr. Josh: 54:55

I'm out for myself, I need to make it, I have to live the dream, all those things. As we get older we see the realities are not really tied to that, but what we need to understand is that, because we've been taught that for a good portion of our lives, especially those who've gone to public school, there are ways that that is being enacted in our everyday situations without us even realizing and knowing it. So when you start to look at the literature at least for me I thought to myself well, what's the opposite of that? It's interdependence.

Kertia: 55:29

Yeah.

Dr. Josh: 55:30

And so what are all the ways that I can help myself thread more interdependence in my life? Now, why is that my charge? Because I know where my go-to is. From my formative years, when my brain is soaking up all this information, I was taught from many, many different people and in many different ways that independence is the best way to go. That's what's going to make you successful, and I know as an adult that's not always true and it's also an extreme and it's also an all or nothing. So I'm utilizing all these tools to find out where am I on this spectrum and how do I find a way, or some semblance, to create more harmony in my life?

Dr. Josh: 56:13

First, you have to know where you stand on that spectrum and if you think about, a lot of human phenomenon can exist on a spectrum and they actually do. And if you think of it that way and it's not about I'm on the left, you're on the right. It's like here I am today, I might be here tomorrow, from the left to the right, and all of that's okay. I feel more balanced here. Even though it's leaning more towards the left, somebody else might feel opposite. You know what I mean Relationship or that semblance of some type of harmony cannot exist unless you know where you stand. You cannot know where you stand unless you know who you are. You cannot know who you are if you are not listening to yourself.

Dr. Josh: 57:04

You cannot listen to yourself if you've spent the majority of your life building up layer upon layer of muck, if you will, because when you wake up in the morning, this used to happen to me all the time. Last thing I'll say for this part, I would have this gigantic headache and I would say to myself oh my gosh, am I sick, is there something wrong? And I wouldn't know why, because I wasn't drinking out the last night. So I've built layer upon layer and I have no way of truly understanding what's happening to me in that moment. Those are choices that I've made.

Dr. Josh: 57:47

So that's a different sort of example, because it's about like activities that you did the night before. But think about all the different ways that we kind of add these layers, whether it get on yeah, they could be narratives that we tell ourselves. There's so many different ways to do that, and so clearing that should be an activity that we do constantly, because as human beings we're naturally gravitating towards all of those layers. Clear the way, so you can listen to yourself, so that you can try to live the best life you can, even if it's just for the moment, and then try again in the next moment, if you can. Don't let it go Amazing amazing, amazing.

Kertia: 58:27

So you said so many amazing things today.

Dr. Josh: 58:40

I'll ask you about your work now um to tell me about what, what you're working on and all the all the good things, sure. So I've been embedded in non-profit, the non-profit industry now, for 13 years, and my focus is on research and evaluation. As I mentioned, I got a doctorate in industrial organizational psychology, and so I utilize IO psychology principles, as they refer to it as, not just in the workplace, as I mentioned, but also in my very life, right Knowing that I'm the same person when I leave work for the most part. I mean, there are nuances and changes that I make, just like I'm not going to curse in front of my grandmother. That will not happen, because she will literally smack me, and that, to me, is not abuse. I'm the one who abused the relationship by cursing, but it's the same thing. Like you know, we're nuanced in different scenarios, situations depending on who we're talking to, and that's okay. What I don't want to happen is losing myself. I want to be firm in my values, which will not change, and if they do, though, you know, over time then I'll reevaluate and make sure that I'm living out those values.

Dr. Josh: 59:52

But, um, what has really been the gift of working in non-profits is obviously not working for a profit motive has been really the biggest thing for me. It doesn't make everything perfect, like there are non-profits, that that run like just like for-profit entities, and there are toxic people in all different types of organizations. But what I do love is my ability to align with my purpose has been extremely important that I feel like I'm working towards the betterment of society, even if it's one person at a time, through a mission orientation that I can jump on board with and say, yes, I want to be a part of this. 40 plus hours a week to me is a lot, and I want to be able to feel like, when I come home from that, that I'm actually contributing to something and that's me and that will never go away. So if I have to pivot and be in a job that doesn't offer me that, I will still apply the principles. It'll just be a lot harder for me to do so. So I say that because there are plenty of people who are in for-profit jobs and entities that can create just as much well-being and whatever else. They want to help their lives flourish, and that's really what encapsulates my career.

Dr. Josh: 1:01:21

Those are the underlying mechanisms that help me to understand am I getting the best out of my current position? What's next for me? All those things are answered by that through line. Is it going to serve other people? Also, I have to serve myself because you know, I mean if I'm not here, if I'm not healthy, but inevitably, especially for work, it's about doing that. So, uh, that's been my life for the last 13 years and, um, I'm really proud of that and I look forward to continuing that for perhaps another 20 years or so. We'll see.

Kertia: 1:01:58

I love that. I love that. So one last question before I head out, and then you can tell us where we can find your memoir and anything else that you'd like us to check out? Sure, you'd like us to check out. Sure, you know. Thinking about your experience in the grand scheme of things, from where you've been to where you now are. You mentioned purpose there. I'd love to know you know from who you were before and the version of you now? How do you define purpose? What is purpose for you?

Dr. Josh: 1:02:32

Oh my gosh, I love this question. It's such a great question and it resonates with me so deeply. I can't speak for everyone, obviously, but I think our purpose is something that we understand at a very, very young age young age, I know. For me that was definitely the case, but again, all these layers that were built up over life had to be removed in order for me to go back to what I felt was my purpose.

Dr. Josh: 1:03:03

So some of my earliest memories on the good side now, because I talked about some of my earliest memories being confused and maybe not so good, but this was a really great memory that I had and a little funny too when I, when I recount it. So I would be out with my mom, specifically, me and her would do all sorts of things that I remember as a toddler, and I would run towards strangers and I was so tiny, all I could do was like grasp their legs. That's how small I was and that's what I remember. I remember running up to strangers. I didn't know that there were strangers, I didn't even know, what a stranger was.

Dr. Josh: 1:03:43

All I knew that I was going up and grabbing their legs and hugging them as tight as I could. My mom would take me aside and she would get so angry with me. I remember this. You can't do that. No, don't do that. Someone someday is going to take advantage of that.

Dr. Josh: 1:04:00

You can't, you can't just do that, sorry, and I would get so upset I was crying. What was going on there? My assessment of the situation was that I wanted to embrace people and it didn't matter who they were, that my job was to embrace them. Now I don't run up to strangers today and hug them. That might put me in a very awkward position, but I can still embrace people.

Dr. Josh: 1:04:33

It doesn't mean literally, figuratively. I can find all sorts of ways to embrace people and I feel like that's my purpose. It's going to look different for everyone and maybe I fooled myself into thinking that's my purpose, but I don't think so. Whenever I talk about it, whenever I think about what that felt like as a kid and going back to that, there's something within me that just lights up and I feel just like everything else that's come into my life multiple times. I don't know if we can call it the universe or God or whatever you like, but there's a reason why it keeps coming back to me. But there's a reason why it keeps coming back to me, and to me that means that I have to listen to it and that's how I fulfill my purpose. So that's how I define that.

Kertia: 1:05:23

Beautiful. I love that and it's so true and I definitely see that because when we're kids and we're still in that, we're still connected to that purest, truest aspect of ourselves, before all the layers of society and conditioning and programming gets laid onto us, we know we follow that intuition that God spark, whatever that is, whatever you want to call it. We follow that calling naturally. We naturally gravitate towards the things that make us light up, that makes us expand, that makes us feel expansive. And that was it for you, absolutely so I truly do.

Dr. Josh: 1:06:28

Yeah, and that is it. That is pretty much you connecting to the tr every year for my parents and they would be Bible stories, because those are the only stories that we were allowed to kind of read and listen to. But I naturally without even knowing what acting was, what the stage or theater was, or storytelling, I was doing that, and so embracing people through storytelling is truly whether I do that through research or through an actual production that I engage in that's on the theater or short film those are all things that have been mainstays in my life. As long as that story has a message to help people become better, I'm all about it, and so that has been another sort of like through line for me that existed ever since I was a little kid. So, yeah, I mean, I think I don't think I know that's exactly what I'm here for.

Kertia: 1:07:27

And.

Dr. Josh: 1:07:28

I hope that other people are able to find that very thing as well, because that's where your true authenticity lies.

Kertia: 1:07:35

Exactly, yeah, yeah, awesome. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. This was an amazing conversation. Now, where can we find your work, your memoir, anything else that you're working on?

Dr. Josh: 1:07:46

Yes, well, and thank you. That's very nice of you, Very nice of you. So my website's the easiest way to get a hold of me. That is drjoshsolutions, spelled just like the word, with an S at the end and that's in place of a com or org. So it's drjoshsolutions, and you'll find my contact information, my social media, the book that we talked about, just some other little blurbs here and there about how I think about work and IO, psychology generally speaking, and anyone that's interested can feel free to send me an email and I'd be happy to respond to that.

Kertia: 1:08:30

So yeah, perfect. Thank you so much.

Dr. Josh: 1:08:34

Oh, you're so welcome. Thank you again for having me on your show.

Kertia: 1:08:38

Thank you so much, everyone, for tuning in. This was such an amazing conversation with Dr Josh. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did and, as usual, text us your input, reach out to us and tell us what you think, or just to say hey, hi, we always respond. We love when you reach out and you'll find Dr Josh's information in the show notes of this recording. Please reach out to him about any inquiries you may have or just to connect. All right, thank you so much. Until next time.