Oh, hello.
I wanted to say hi and introduce myself. My name is Joanna and I’m a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in Los Angeles, California. Well, I guess that is what I do and where I live - who am I though? I am a creative person who struggles with confidence and knowing I have a voice that matters. I am intuitive and sensitive to my own emotions and those around me. I am a loyal friend and have an innate desire to make space for people to be themselves. I worry about little things too much and am always reminding myself to embrace “beginner’s mind” to help quiet my inner critic.
Throughout my life I did what I thought I “should” do. I looked to those around me for direction rather than looking inside myself. I invested years into a career path working a corporate job in business and longed for a more personal connection to my 40-hour work week. After a health scare at the age of 30 I thought, if not now, when? My old “should” mentality became a “could” mentality. What could I do now? The answer was, really anything. I moved back home to California and went to graduate school to study clinical psychology and I became a therapist.
Years later, I know now that I didn’t have to leave a career in order to live a more purposeful life or be more authentically myself. I know now that starting over allows for a blank canvas but it also disrupts stability of all kinds. I chose the blank canvas route, the temporary instability, the unknown. Some days this felt brave, other days this felt naive. I look back not with regret, but rather with a better understanding of all the ways I could have achieved a deeper connection that didn’t require turning my life upside down. I guess what I’m saying is, I don’t believe you have to change your whole life to find yourself – you can though, if you want. :)
This is my story of how I got where I am today. Thanks for listening, I hope to hear your story one day.
Joanna
“Wherever we go, there we are.”
-Jon Kabat-Zinn