Coming Home to Ourselves: Trauma, Cultural Identity & Compassionate Healing - A Conversation with Dr Bee Lim

In this rich and heartfelt conversation, I sit down with Dr Bee Lim — clinical psychologist, accredited EMDR practitioner, author of Welcome Home: Healing Trauma and Reclaiming Wholeness, and co‑founder of Mind Health Collective.
Together, we explore the emotional landscapes of trauma, cultural identity, intergenerational stories, contemplative practice, and the parts of ourselves we abandon in order to survive.

Whether you are a therapist, psychologist, Asian diaspora practitioner, or someone navigating belonging and healing, this episode offers wisdom, validation, and gentle grounding.

In this episode, we explore:
• Why Bee wrote Welcome Home and how the four animal characters were chosen
• Intergenerational Trauma in the Asian diaspora and the “silence”
• Cultural identity, migration, and the pressure to constantly “prove yourself”
• The concept of cultural dissociation and how therapists lose parts of themselves during Western clinical training
• How to practice culturally responsive therapy without pathologising culture
• IFS‑informed parts work through an Asian lens
• The wolf part: anger, silencing, and reclaiming agency
• The crane part: intellectualising, observing, dissociating from the body
• How contemplative practice supports therapists to return to themselves
• Grief, gardening, and the slow rituals that reconnect us to the body
• How we can become “future ancestors” who pass on emotional wealth
• What it means to be “enough” in a culture of survival and striving

Who this episode is for:
• Therapists and psychologists seeking culturally responsive frameworks
• EMDR, IFS, ACT, and trauma‑informed practitioners
• Asian diaspora therapists and clients navigating identity + belonging
• First‑generation migrants healing intergenerational narratives
• Readers of Welcome Home and those curious about parts work
• Anyone longing for a gentler relationship with themselves

About Dr Bee Lim
Dr Bee Lim is a clinical psychologist and accredited EMDR practitioner whose work centres trauma, identity, displacement, and cultural lineage. Born in Malaysia, trained in New Zealand, and now based in Sydney, she integrates clinical rigour with culturally attuned, trauma‑informed care.

She is the author of Welcome Home, co‑founder of Mind Health Collective, and founder of BeTuned, a therapeutic game‑based platform.

Learn more at:
Meet the four parts of you. Take Dr Bee Lim's free Homecoming Profile: homecoming.drbeelim.com

Then come home to the full story in her book, Welcome Home: drbeelim.com/welcomehome

Follow Bee on Instagram

Resources mentioned:
• When Culture Looks Like Pathology: Understanding Cultural Dissociation in Diaspora Clients Webinar (mentioned)

Connect with your host, Poh Gan
I’m an educational & developmental psychologist and board-approved supervisor specialising in neurodiversity-affirming care and cultural identity. Outside of work, I am a buddhist practitioner with a deep love in meditation and learning to walk the Bodhisattva path.
Instagram: the.blossoming.therapists
Website: www.blossomingtrueself.com.au 

If this episode resonated:

• Leave a review on Apple Podcasts
• Share with a colleague or friend in the Asian diaspora
• Tag us on Instagram with your reflections
• Subscribe for more conversations with therapists on application of Buddhist and contemplative wisdom in work and personal lives. 

Disclaimer:

The content discussed in this podcast is for inspiration and educational purposes only. It is not a substitute for therapy or clinical supervision, and our time together does not constitute a therapeutic relationship. Please seek professional support if you are in need.

Bodhi Inner Path Circle is a contemplative membership community for therapists who long for a regular, supportive, spiritually grounded place to practise meditation, learn Buddha‑Dharma in reflective practice, and connect with dharma friends. It is currently open for enrolment! You're warmly invited to join us to start your cultivation and practice today! 

Transcript

Episode 20 - Coming Home to Ourselves: A conversation with Dr Bee Lim

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Hey! Welcome to the Practitioner's Hut, offering practical Buddhist wisdom for therapists and healthcare workers. If you are keen to deepen your practice beyond the theoretical understanding of Buddhism, if you are finding it hard to calm your little active mind after therapy work, I welcome you to join me to dive a little deeper. Each episode, I'll be sharing some common issues that therapists may face when integrating and practicing awareness, compassion within themselves, and also supporting clients. I'll be sprinkling some pearls of wisdom that I've learned from my master and teachers that will be helpful as internal resources. I'll also be interviewing other therapists who are on this spiritual path together to share their experiences of how they practice wisdom and compassion in their daily lives. I want to let you know that you're not alone, you are part of a bigger community who aspire for greater soul alignment, growth, and awakening. That we can strike a balance of juggling our busy modern life as therapists with a clear mind and an open heart. I hope to inspire more practitioners to explore deeper spiritual meaning and purpose on our path to enlightenment. I'm your host, Po Gan, a psychologist, a Buddhist practitioner, a parent of two children, a fellow human being with a busy mind, but with a great inspired vision for collective awakening. Let's begin.

Welcome and Introductions

SPEAKER_00 2:32

And today I have B.T. Hi BT. How are you?

SPEAKER_01 2:37

Hi Paul. Good, thank you. It's good to connect.

SPEAKER_00 2:41

I'm very happy to finally meet with you and actually have this podcast recorded after perhaps is that four months of trying to schedule this time together.

Bee Teng Background

SPEAKER_00 2:55

Before we get into chatting, let's introduce you to their listeners. Dr. B. Ting Ling is a clinical psychologist and an accredited EMDR optioner whose work explores the subtle wounds of trauma, the fracture of identity, the inheritance of silence, and the ways we adapt to survive. Born in Malaysia of Tyochu and Hokkien heritage, trained in New Zealand and now based in Sydney, she brings clinical rigor and depth of care to those navigating trauma and displacement. Her practice begins with a person's culture and lineage rather than their irascial. Treating values like duty and filial piety as ground to heal from, not pathology to correct. She holds that we can grow without severing where we come from. She is the author of Welcome Home, Healing Trauma and Reclaiming Holeness, and co-founder of MyHealth Collective, a Sydney-based psychology practice serving clients internationally, and founder of Betuned, a game-based therapeutic and performance platform. Wow. You're a very busy mouthful. It is.

Joy in Reading and Gardening

SPEAKER_01 7:13

And then it always ended up with us thinking about, oh my goodness, so what are the food? Or the good longings that keep family together. So last night we were just having a conversation, um, dreaming about this like piping hot bowl of beef brisket noodles and those tangtang, those Hong Kong diamonds. So I think like that has been really bringing me a lot of joy and groundedness. And something I've kind of done to a little bit more in these few years is also then tendering to the garden. I think I found that really helpful to help me move past grief. Um and um in over the last two months, what I've done is also then starting a little patch of more like a TCM, like a traditional Chinese medicine kind of garden. So we have Alpha's mentors plant in there now, and just having that moment of tendering it um to it and watching and really kind of learning through the cycles around that as well. Hopefully, next year we'll get enough blossoms to dry for tea. It's very grounding. So I think that's probably the two things that I go out, actually, that's helping me in terms of like keeping more well and high spirited during this time.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

Yeah, especially in winter, huh? Yeah, but I find the same thing when I was turning to my grief and watering the plants and looking after my plants have been really a healing process for myself as well. I was just like, oh yes, you found the same thing too.

SPEAKER_01 8:42

Yeah, I think it's just kind of really also being able to observe and learning a bit more about the cycle of life as well.

SPEAKER_00 8:50

That's beautiful. Did you have dandelion in your TCM garden?

SPEAKER_01 8:55

That is actually kind of going in. Yeah. So actually, like let's do some recategorizing.

SPEAKER_00 9:14

That's awesome. I'll have to talk to you more about this later. Okay.

Why Write Welcome Home

SPEAKER_00 9:21

Let's start our conversation with the book, and then we can go into a little bit more about your personal practice. I love your book, Welcome Home, and I have them in my practice consulting room as well. As I was reading them, I noticed that you incorporated um IFS, the principles, and the ideas of returning home, which to me is very consistent with the contemplative practices and really the idea of more holistic, more coming back to wholeness. And maybe we'll start with that. Uh tell us a little bit about what prompted and what gave you the idea of having written this book and the four animals that you chose.

SPEAKER_01 10:08

Big questions. So I think it really started with hearing stories from clients, right? So when we sit across clients and understanding a little bit more about their hardships and also understanding in terms of when they are probably feeling more seen and understood. The very sketchy and brief ideas about wanting to write Welcome Home started when a lot of clients walk through and talk about Inside Out, the Pixar film. So a lot of clients should say, like, oh, actually, it helps me understand my emotions. But then also don't see my family in it. So whether the protagonists, Riley's her parents, they would apologize if they have done something that seemed to be hurtful to Riley. But for some of these clients, their parents won't apologize. Or if Riley, the protagonist, were to feel angry, her anger feels really clean. But for a lot of the clients or the diaspora population that I work with, their anger potentially carries generations of silencing, generations of stories that have not been spoken about. So I think like Paul, when you and I kind of talk as therapists, we'll talk about all these different brilliant frameworks that we've been trained in. And they are they are great frameworks to help us in terms of working with our clients. But I think that there's also a sense in terms of potentially this framework might not feel in depth enough for some of the population that we work with. And I think it's it's a book to carry that story deeper and think about the different parts of ourselves, not just happening within the body, but also thinking about the parts of ourselves that carry lineage, that carry land, that carry language, that carry the survival strategies of all those who came before us. The origin story in many ways for Welcome Home just started there in terms of how can we write a story or map this out in a way that a lot of the clients that I work with will also see themselves in it.

SPEAKER_00 12:14

Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. I can imagine, and I've actually lent the book to one of my clients, and it has been really helpful to have the conversation. So it's nice. And I think that the times when I was reading this book, and I think for me in particular, as a therapist of colour and as a first-generation migrant in Australia, it just reminded me of the different stages of my life and my journey. And I think that's probably what you wanted as a writer to be able to have people resonating with that. And I guess that identity that

Migration and Proving Yourself

SPEAKER_00 12:57

we have, you and me, both immigrants, first-generation immigrants, to New Zealand and then to Australia. And I imagine that process of adapting and assimilating and really finding our foot in the foreign land, perhaps will be a journey for you as well. I was wondering whether you will be able to share with us how that experience is like for you.

unknown 13:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:24

Um, I think maybe potentially a lot of your viewers or like people who listen to your podcast didn't know, but you and I went all the way to I forgot to mention that at the beginning. I think for me at that time, 16 or 17 when I went for like college in the first year. Doing psychology is already something quite unconventional at that time in Malaysia. Yeah. And then I transferred my credits and did my undergrad and postgrad in New Zealand before then moving to Australia to start my practice and all that. I think something that really still got me and sometimes got into a bit more of discussions with colleagues or even friends who are migrants, is one of the stories that I shared. So, as I mentioned, I did my undergrad and postgrad in New Zealand. So you would assume that I have written thesis and papers in English and done presentations on that. But one of the things, or one of the first things that I needed to do when migrating to Australia is to sit for an English proficiency test. So that carries some poignancy, mainly just because I think it's the sense of sometimes as migrants, we're not just crossing one border. We need to actually be proving ourselves again and again and again to show that we deserve a place in a country or deserve a seat in a room or on a table somewhere. And I think that journey, it's challenging enough for you and myself as professionals. But I could imagine how disorientating and also how challenging that might be for people that are potentially kind of coming to a new country in different circumstances.

SPEAKER_00 15:18

Yeah, definitely. And I guess like in my friend's circle, I've heard many stories about people who were highly trained, highly experienced professionals in Malaysia, doctors, and when they migrate for a better future for their children, and they have to give up some of the work experience that they have because they don't really want to go through the test and to prove themselves, and they have to change to another job. Definitely, in terms of identity, that's a huge piece of uh adjusting and shifting. I think this part about us having to prove ourselves again and again, and sometimes makes it uh very hard on ourselves. That's right. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:11

Or even deciding which part of ourselves is actually acceptable and get the past and is actually legible and it's presentable to the world. And then which part of ourselves do we need to hide to navigate through the journey? That is definitely the core of welcome home to understand what are some of those parts that hold that story, but we're not able to actually be, or we don't feel like it's presentable to the world, and that's why we feel like we need to keep it outside or cut it off.

SPEAKER_00 16:43

And part of the healing is to be able to recognize and to know those parts and to allow them to be there and to be seen and to be witnessed, isn't it? That's right. Yeah, yeah. You got that for I guess that's because of the shared experience that we have, and your book really allows those parts to be seen and allowed those parts to be expressed in a very accessible way. So I think I really loved the story.

What Coming Home Means

SPEAKER_00 17:13

So, what would you want the readers to know about this part about coming home? What does it mean for you in terms of coming home?

SPEAKER_01 17:25

I think one of the most common questions that was asked when I was around Australia having different conversations and book launches is people asking me about the format of the book. They just went like, well, actually, you are a professional, you have credibility. Why did you write an illustrated narrative nonfiction? Why didn't you write a self-help? Or why didn't you write a more traditional kind of a textbook to share your knowledge that way? And I do have to say, I think like I have rows of those books in my office as well. I think the the key point or the whole reason of wanting to write Welcome Home is really in terms of helping people to feel seen and to let them know that they are not alone. And for you, you can't like talk about how because we need to keep proving ourselves again and again and again, then oftentimes that is that sense of light. Only if I were to do ABCDE, then I'm I'm worthy. And it's definitely not my intention to write a book that is giving either therapists or clients or even readers another list or another long-to-do list or strategies to do in order to kind of feel better about themselves. I think I want people to actually be able to read the book and feel seen and also feel less alone in terms of understanding that other people actually share some of these stories, or because of some of these experiences that we have inherited in some way, then there's all these different coping strategies, or there's different parts of ourselves that would show up. And they are not pathology, they are just survival strategies. And I want us to be able to actually see them, to be able to see their functions, but then also to actually be able to go like, wow, you have helped me survive some things that's really hard. So I think like coming home for me now really kind of like means that it's not about becoming someone new. It's not about more capable or more presentable or holding more. I think really it's actually be able to return to ourselves and being able to sit with some of these parts, understand their stories, and then if we will want to actually move forward, we move forward together rather than actually feeling like there's only some of these parts that are acceptable, and I'll carry with me and continue to present rather than really living.

SPEAKER_00 20:08

Actually, a lot of therapists would say that they have these parts of being a perfectionistic person or a self-sacrificing type of ideas that, like, you know, other people's needs come before me, and all of that perhaps are survival strategies that really help us to, you know, move forward.

SPEAKER_01 20:31

But once we have changed that relationship with these parts and we are able to kind of like embrace them a little bit more with other yeah, rather than actually wanting it to function even more and then cause that almost rupture of relationships within ourselves, I think really it's actually understanding their function and also I think something that's very center, I think, to your practice as well, Paul, is being able to look at these parts with more compassionate approach and relating to them differently. Beautiful.

The Crane and Feeling Grief

SPEAKER_00 21:04

So, what about for you? Like, how do you relate to these parts with more compassion? And are there certain parts that you in the process of processing?

SPEAKER_01 21:16

Yeah, I think it will always be an ongoing process. And I think you you asked a really kind of good question around that in terms of how about it for me as a therapist, right? We have been trained to be objective.

SPEAKER_00 21:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:34

A few of my friends or well therapists as well read the book, they go like, oh, actually, I thought the crane was the healthy one. And that's a bit of a twist in terms of the book, thinking about the crane and thinking about it in terms of it's that part that's always observing, it's always narrating, it's always formulating a treatment plan. But it's not quite landing. It just feels like a floating part. It's very wise, it's maybe intellectual, and being able to sit well, being able to uh go through these processes, but as much more of a third person. So I think like the biggest process for me actually going through this, it's really being able to land in experiences a bit more. During the the early parts, in terms of you and I talking about grief. And I think it's rather than working with grief, it's even in terms of whether it's actually sitting down with my grief process and understanding what's been lost and sitting with that emotions and holding that in my body, or being able to experience those emotions and know that it's okay. So I think that process has really allowed me to potentially even kind of like gone deeper with some of the plots of the books as well, and talking about the more somatic or physical sensations, or even fear in a more visceral manner. And I think like when we're just writing something from a very clinical perspective, I think that can sometimes also be protective strategies. And I'm not saying to not do that at all. I think as therapists, we do need to be a little bit more integrated to be able to feel safe enough or creating a safe enough environment for us to sit with our own emotions and dynamics as well, just so that we can work with plants more in a healthy and modeling some of the healthy ways of actually working through that.

unknown 23:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:44

I love what you share and I can feel it from it's share from the heart. And I think as therapists and as therapists from Asian background, part of the things that I have to learn very early on is that I'm very head-heavy. I perhaps intellectualize a lot rather than being more in the body and feeling the feelings. Because I think sometimes it's the Asian teachings of being perhaps more stoic and like you know, you have to be more leasing, you know, to be more rational and sometimes steer us away from feeling the feelings. And part of the journey, my own journey is that to be okay, feeling the feelings and still be okay. You spoke about that very beautifully, and that crane can sometimes really walk rather than fly all the time to be on as a person's view. Yeah, I didn't notice that uh when I was reading that book as well.

SPEAKER_01 24:47

And I think with the choosing of the cranes, that's the whole purpose around that as well, is that I think like within Asian or Chinese kind of culture, thinking about cranes, you're always thinking about oh, the very transcendent one. And you have this aura of like I guess idealization of that. But maybe it's also knowing that actually to be fully human and wholly human is about the integration of all these parts of us that an emotion is not just a feeling, right? It's just thinking about it in terms of like it's our thought, it's our body sensations, it's all these different elements of it as well coming together.

SPEAKER_00 25:26

Yeah, yeah, it's really nice and really beautiful.

Culturally Responsive Therapy

SPEAKER_00 25:29

Recently you had a workshop talking about like to look at not just the pathology but the cultural heritage of clients from the Asian background. What do you hope that the Western trained therapists or therapists in general, what do you want them to know about culturally responsive healing? Because I could see that those different paths and acknowledging them in the process of healing or in the process of therapy would be really helpful. What is your thought about that?

SPEAKER_01 26:06

I think oftentimes when I even kind of thinking about culturally responsive care, and I think as therapists, it's very common for us to even seek therapy very early on in our training, just mainly because we want to actually also understand how was it like to be a client. Um and and I share this experience about going to therapy during my first year of clinical training. At that time, I have intentionally already chosen someone that I thought might be could provide more culturally responsive care. And then talking a little bit more about my cultural kind of like context, potentially some of the expectations, and and then having the therapist just outright tell me that, like, oh, actually, you are totally enmesh. You're never going to actually be able to complete your training if you don't cut relationship with your family. And that experience was very jarring. Yeah, very jarring. Very, very jarring. Yeah, and I think that was actually always been an experience that I hold in my mind in terms of I can understand in terms of where that maybe recommendations is kind of coming from, but also feeling really misunderstood in that context, in terms of while drawing boundaries and all that can be really healthy. But how can we understand the nuances around maintaining, say, for example, autonomy, but also continue to have that interconnectedness with healthy relationships in our lives, whether it's from a family or from an extended kind of family kind of perspective. During the webinar, I think something that I talk about is really in terms of when we are being trained with all our clinical manuals, very oftentimes when we formulate, what we think about is what is wrong with this person. But maybe the deeper question, the additional questions that I really want people to actually be able to consider is what relationships is ruptured for this person to lead to them presenting this way. And the relationship can be within themselves, like in terms of that relationship with our body being ruptured, or whether it's actually the relationship with the family was ruptured because of different reasons, or for people with a more displacement background, then it's that relationship to their land or to their heritage that's being ruptured. And I think understanding that helps us to be able to understand the person's story, taking a more culturally humility perspective around that, and allowing our clients to be able to tell stories to help us inform what the story is and what actually needed to be worked with with the client rather than um hearing a story and then already labeling it as pathology. So um so I think that is probably the bigger picture around that. I think is being able to dig a little bit deeper and understand that story better rather than thinking about it in terms of much more of a symptom-based perspective.

SPEAKER_00 29:30

To have that curiosity and that openness to be able to see what was actually possible, how they relate to each other, rather than oh, this is this is the symptom, and like you know, this has to be changed in order to for the person to feel better.

SPEAKER_01 29:47

Or come up with like five diagnoses and a lot of the clients to walk away with that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:54

That's beautiful. That part is more of the therapist, like you know, relating with the clients and having that cultural views and that cultural lens, and I think it's when we are reflecting back to ourselves and our relationship as a therapist with our own cultural background and our heritage.

Cultural Dissociation and Integration

SPEAKER_00 30:17

And the next question perhaps is more for the therapist with the Asian background. How would they be able to allow these cultural lands, culturally informed perspective, to show up more and to trust themselves more and in order to be uh more integrated? I imagine that as a therapist going through this journey of being trained in a Western context and a western land, perhaps there are more things that they're trying to be like, more like them, and they will go through a bit of a process to then be okay and recognizing their own and what they bring to the table. What is your thought about that?

SPEAKER_01 31:04

So I think like Paul, you you talk about that webinar that I ran, Project Horizon. And I think the concept that even I explore a bit more during that webinar was that concept of cultural dissociation. And um and I thought there are a lot of established definitions around that, but actually when I kind of look deeper into it, not much being said around that. But a bit of context, I think, for the people listening to the podcast will be that the idea of cultural dissociation is that because we have learned to abandon parts of ourselves in order to survive, right? As therapists, sometimes I think there's also a sense of this way of knowing is wrong. Because in order to actually be an objective therapist, I need to be doing all these different things. So going through and having a lot of conversations with different therapists as well through book launchers, one of the heartwarming moments is also therapists and kind of coming through and go like, oh, okay. I also realize that I have been that because I don't want to be labeled as an Asian therapist. I don't want to actually be appearing as less evidence-based just mainly because I was talking about some of these different aspects of healing, or thinking about some of these different concepts of healing as well. I think part of actually being therapists of color ourselves, I think the work for us is to even then understand for ourselves what are some of the parts that we have actually abandoned, or what are some of the things that we have learned to erase as actually a way of knowing because we're trying to survive our training. And I make it really clear to say that it's not an either-all. It doesn't mean like we just throw everything out because we are being Western trained and those ways of knowing is wrong. I think it's probably in terms of thinking about integrating that both as well, in terms of still taking an evidence-based rigorous lens, but also being able to be, like you say, open and curious about these other ways of knowing as well, and understanding how that might actually help to build a client up, rather than feeling like we need to choose. I think that was the whole idea of it, is that the protagonist, Isabel Malin, being able to go like, well, I'm neither, I'm not just Isabel, and I'm not just Malin. The integration comes with bringing all these different parts, or these two halves, if you like, in this case, and then being able to go like both mind, and they can exist, and they can actually help me having a more integrating way of moving through the world or relating to other people.

SPEAKER_00 34:00

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It sounds like bringing all parts of us in the journey rather than having to drop any parts of them. I don't know why when I was talking about that. I have in mind, um this is totally off. Um, but I have in mind C O C like you know, this journey to the West to get the sutra, and that they have the the monkey and also the pig, and the other one, the monk, and also the master. It's like bring all parts of us to coach in the journey, but you don't have to leave anyone behind, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:51

And and I think like each of these parts as much as their parts that potentially sometimes we didn't like it as much, but they also then have the different strengths and resilience that come through with that as well.

SPEAKER_00 35:04

Now I'm drawing parallel between stories. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 35:10

Well, I think there needs to be another episode on that.

Anger and the Wolf Part

SPEAKER_00 35:16

Are there parts of that therapist or Asian diaspora tend to exile away from like through the book launches and the clients that you are seeing?

SPEAKER_01 35:30

So I think from the therapist ones, oftentimes I think is that having to actually be the crane, right? But through the book launches and potentially even thinking about in terms of clients and also ourselves as well. Actually, woof is a very interesting one, just mainly because woof is a part of us that carry that rage or carry that anger, but there is no safe place to go. And for our clients, I think maybe it's not even just Asian diaspora and our clients as well, is thinking about it in terms of that being able to voice our anger or being able to even admit to us feeling angry is such a big no-no because there are all these expectations that no, keep silent or continue to kind of suppress that. So during the Canberra book launch, I think someone, a reader, has asked a question about anger. It's like, what do I do with mine? What do I do with my anger? And I can feel like I'm holding it in a lot because it's not okay to express it. And I think sometimes it's actually even talking to our clients or helping them having language and understand what the function of anger is. Because really, the function of anger or the reason we feel angry is because we observe an injustice. Yeah. That's not right. That's not okay. So feeling angry does not equal aggression or being physically violent or emotionally violent. Feeling angry and being able to label it and understand the function and the message that is giving us, and also the function for our clients, potentially also help them verbalize it and being able to feel less scared of that emotions coming out. So I think that is probably the one that observed the most. Unnamed. Sometimes it feels like it needs to be, I need to name it for my clients. Or I need to actually kind of, well, I feel really angry when I hear this, when you know this happened. So yeah, so I think that's probably something that I observe a bit more. The ox and carrying all the loads and all that is probably what we are all kind of familiar with. But it just even I think the reason all these different animals have been chosen, it's really because it's a common experience, or there are common parts that come out for different people. So whether someone is a therapist of color or readers of color or not, I think the whole aim of it is to actually understand the that because of our experiences, this part has come up and they serve a function, and how would we like them to be in the future or going forward?

SPEAKER_00 38:24

As I was l listening to you talking about this, I was just thinking that a lot of my clients, or maybe perhaps myself, that we didn't have a lot of examples growing up, learning how to deal with anger. And so it feels really like a hot potato. Like, we don't know what to do with this. I guess being able to name this now allows us to be the parent or the therapist or whoever, to be us, humans, learning how to be okay with the anger and using that energy to be able to make things right, make the injustice right. And and also as a woman, women are usually socialized to be a bit more submissive and not showing anger, and we don't know how to show that, right? I imagine that these would be really helpful for the future generation, that we kind of untie some of these knots in our heart, and perhaps that would then mean that my daughter in the future need not to feel like this, and yeah, that it would be okay. Exactly. To trust themselves that it is okay.

SPEAKER_01 39:38

I think one of the terms that I really liked is to actually thinking about ourselves as like we talk about our ancestors, but essentially all of us are future ancestors. So I think doing the work now and being able to see this and then being able to work through some of this then allow us to really live that intergenerational wealth in terms of mental health and fellowshiping for the people to come.

SPEAKER_00 40:06

I love that. And this work and this book has carried so many layers of meaning in many ways, isn't it? It's like a pattern that gets passed on. Right. Okay.

Community and Contemplative Practice

SPEAKER_00 40:19

So I did have another question about what do you want therapists to remember when they feel they must choose between being competent and being whole? I'm not sure, like, is that kind of like duplicate of what we have discussed so far?

SPEAKER_01 40:38

Yeah. I think really it's finding your community as well. I think like bringing it to supervisions, talking to other therapists, other professionals who are on this process and on this journey as well. And I think like remembering that we are not alone in terms of trying to work this out. So, yeah, so I think like part of actually healing is also healing happened in community. So, how can we surround ourselves with people that will help us being able to do that?

SPEAKER_00 41:08

And so, what about your own practice? Like how does contemplative practice influence your life or work?

SPEAKER_01 41:18

I think the contemplative practice part really then just I think it's even giving ourselves that space. I think I really appreciate having that space of sitting down and being able to reflect on some of these processes and some of these relationships and also the dynamic to whether it's actually in session with a client or understanding in terms of when the client leaves our consulting room as well, they are going into an environment in which they are also having some of this dynamic with other people. And so I think the contemplative practice allows me to actually seeing beyond the surface about what's happening and understanding the mechanisms underlying it, just so that we can really sit with that, reflect on that, but also the becoming aware of it, I think is the first step of change, right? Um because we are not aware of it, then we won't be able to actually do anything about it. So once we kind of become aware of it, then that allows us to actually, whether it's work with someone or finding ways that's actually kind of forward from there.

Final Takeaway

SPEAKER_00 42:33

I think we have covered a lot of different layers and different lands, and like you know, a little bit about ourselves and also and a little bit about the work that we do and the book. I'm so um happy that we have had this conversation. If there is one, maybe use the garden metaphor. We both love gardening, that if we will be able to plant a seed in the listener's heart, what would you hope that would be? The final takeaway from today, from today, or from the work that you have been working on seeing your clients and also your book launches, and I think this has been such a journey for you yourself as well.

SPEAKER_01 43:20

And what do you hope the listeners will get away from that we are enough, we have done enough, and that's it. We're going planted enough trees today forest.

SPEAKER_00 43:45

Okay, if the listeners are interested to find out more about your work, where can they find you?

SPEAKER_01 43:52

Um, drbim.com slash welcome home. Um, in the process of actually kind of developing a little bit of almost like a questionnaire to help people understand a little bit more about their parts as well, which I'm more than happy to actually share that with your listeners, um Paul. And it's totally kind of complimentary. And then if the listener already have the book, then some prompts at the back of the book as well to then better understand those parts. That sounds good.

SPEAKER_00 44:20

Thank you so much for your time and energy today, and it's been a pleasure. We haven't actually had time to talk about the EMDR and the be tuned as much, but maybe that will be a discussion for another day.

SPEAKER_01 44:38

It will be amazing.

SPEAKER_00 44:42

As we close our practice for today, I want to thank you for sharing this time. If this episode resonated with you, the most meaningful way to support the podcast is to share it. Share it with a colleague or leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. It helps our community to reach other people who need it. Until next time, keep your heart open, keep your mind clear and steady, so be your amazing self as you awaken yourself and others. See you next time. Just a gentle reminder that our conversation today is for inspiration and education only. It is not a substitute for therapy or clinical supervision. And our time together doesn't constitute a therapeutic relationship.