Healing Is My Hobby with Jessica Colarco, LCSW

This week's Healing Moment is an action step Jessica uses regularly in her clinical work: writing an unsent letter. It's a simple, powerful practice for releasing what you've been holding onto — honestly, and without ever having to send it.

An unsent letter is written with full honesty, knowing it will never reach its recipient. It's not about the person on the other end — it's about you, and what needs somewhere to go. Jessica offers a few starting points for who or what you might write to:

• A person who hurt you, disappointed you, or left something unresolved between you
• A version of yourself — younger, older, or one you had to leave behind
• A situation that didn't go the way you needed it to
• A loss you've never fully named
• Something you're ready to let go of, but haven't found the words for yet

The instructions are simple: start with "Dear ___," and let it come. Don't edit. Don't make it fair or balanced. When you're done, the letter is yours to burn, delete, fold away, or keep — there's no wrong answer. The healing is in the writing itself.

Jessica also touches on why this practice works: emotions like grief, anger, love, longing, and guilt need expression to move. Left locked inside, they don't disappear — they go underground and show up sideways. The unsent letter gives them somewhere to go.

Jessica leaves listeners with a reflection question to sit with this week: When was the last time you truly relaxed and let go? She also shares a small teaser about the bigger project she's been working on behind the scenes.

📩 Sign up for the newsletter: healingismyhobby.com 📸 Instagram: @healingismyhobby ▶️ YouTube: Healing Is My Hobby 🩺 Clinical practice: jessicacolarcolcsw.com 📸 Practice Instagram: @jessicacolarco

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It's the first Monday of August, and Jessica invites listeners to pause and take stock — not of who they want to be, but of who they've actually been this summer. In this week's Healing Moment, she offers a gentle, guided journal prompt designed to help you see yourself clearly, honestly, and without judgment.

This episode is a journaling exercise built around one core question: "Who have I been this summer?" Jessica walks through a series of follow-up prompts to help you go deeper:

• What has she needed most — rest, connection, space, to be seen, to be left alone?
• What has she been carrying that she didn't ask for?
• Where has she shown up beautifully, even if no one noticed?
• Where has she been hard on herself when she deserved more grace?
• What has brought her joy this season, even in small amounts?
• What has felt heavy, stuck, or unresolved?
• What does she need from you in the next four weeks before fall arrives?

Jessica reminds listeners that this reflection isn't about critique — it's about witnessing yourself the way a good therapist or a loving friend would: with curiosity, not judgment.

Jessica also teases something bigger she's been working on behind the scenes, with more details coming soon.

📩 Sign up for the newsletter: healingismyhobby.com 📸 Instagram: @healingismyhobby ▶️ YouTube: Healing Is My Hobby 🩺 Clinical practice: jessicacolarcolcsw.com 📸 Practice Instagram: @jessicacolarco

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Summer is beautiful, but summer can also be a lot — family in town, packed schedules, travel logistics, heat, and the slow creep toward the end of the season. In this Healing Moments episode, Jessica closes out July with a simple, clinical, and highly effective nervous system tool: box breathing.

Also known as square breathing, this technique is used by athletes, surgeons, and Navy SEALs to stay regulated under pressure — and Jessica leans on it herself, often right in her car between one thing and the next. It's four equal sides of a breath: inhale, hold, exhale, hold, each for a count of four. Jessica walks you through it live, guiding you through three full rounds so you can feel the shift in real time.

You'll learn why it works — how the rhythm interrupts anxious spiraling, slows your breathing rate to signal safety to your brain, and brings you back into your body and the present moment. And you'll leave with a tool you can use anywhere: in the car, mid-family-dinner-escalation, when travel plans fall apart, or when you're in a crowded space and your chest starts to tighten.

In this episode:

• What box breathing is and why it's used across high-pressure professions
• The importance of nose-in, mouth-out breathing
• A live, guided practice of three rounds of box breathing
• The nervous system science behind why it works
• When to reach for this tool in real life

Connect with Jessica:

Newsletter & Blog: https://www.healingasmyhobby.com

Instagram: instagram.com/healingismyhobby

YouTube: youtube.com/@healingismyhobby

Clinical Practice: https://www.jessicacolarcolcsw.com

Practice Instagram: instagram.com/jessicacolarcolcsw

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Three weeks into the summer series, Jessica shifts from reflection to action. Wellness culture hands us an endless to-do list, meditate, journal, hydrate, ground, breathe, and when the list is endless, we end up doing none of it. This week's Healing Moment is about choosing just one anchor practice to carry you through the rest of the summer.

What You'll Learn

• Why an endless wellness checklist often leads to doing nothing at all
• How to choose your one anchor practice by reflecting on what's stuck with you or asking what your nervous system needs most (calm, expression, or presence)
• Why making your practice small enough that you can't fail is the key to consistency
• Jessica's own anchor practice this summer: a ten-minute, no-phone morning before opening anything

Try It Yourself

Choose one healing practice to anchor your summer:

1. Think back over past practices, grounding, breathwork, slow crafting, news fasting, journaling, somatic tools, compassion practices. What's something that stuck with you?
2. If nothing comes to mind, ask what your nervous system needs most right now: calm, expression, or presence?
3. Make it small enough that you can't fail, three sentences instead of a full journal entry, three conscious breaths instead of 20 minutes of meditation.
4. Write it down somewhere you'll see it: your phone, your journal, a sticky note, your mirror.

Name your anchor and where it fits into your day. The goal isn't transformation by September, it's consistency.

Connect

📩 Sign up for the newsletter at healingismyhobby.com 📷 @healingismyhobby (Instagram) ▶️ Healing Is My Hobby (YouTube) 🩺 jessicacolarcolcsw.com 📷 @jessicacolarcolcsw (Instagram)

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This week's Healing Moment isn't a breathing technique, it's a question. Jessica invites you to slow down and sit with a journal prompt designed to uncover what rest truly means to you, beyond the wellness buzzwords. Because before you can prioritize rest, you have to actually know what it looks and feels like for you personally.

What You'll Learn

• Why most people chase the idea of rest without ever defining what it actually means to them
• The difference between rest that restores you and rest that's just downtime shadowed by guilt
• How to identify what's really getting in the way of rest, external responsibilities or internal beliefs about earning your worth
• Why rest is a biological need and a healing practice, not a reward for productivity

Try It Yourself

Grab something to write with, a journal, your notes app, even a napkin, and sit with this prompt:

What does rest actually mean to me?

Then, let whichever of these follow-up questions pull at you lead the way:

• When I imagine truly resting, what does that look like? What am I doing? Where am I? Who is or isn't there?
• When I rest, do I actually feel restored, or does guilt, the to-do list, or a sense that I should be doing something else follow me in?
• What gets in the way of real rest for me? Is it external (kids, work, responsibilities) or internal (a belief that I have to earn it)?
• When was the last time I genuinely rested, and what made that possible?
• What would I need to let go of, even temporarily, to give myself that again this summer?

Let it be honest. Nobody is reading this but you.

Connect

📩 Sign up for the newsletter at healingismyhobby.com 📷 @healingismyhobby (Instagram) ▶️ Healing Is My Hobby YouTube 🩺 jessicacolarcolcsw.com 📷 @jessicacolarcolcsw (Instagram)

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This summer's Healing Moments series kicks off with one of Jessica's favorite go-to tools: the 4-7-8 breath. In under three minutes, this simple breathing technique can shift your nervous system out of stress mode and into rest and restore. Jessica walks you through it step-by-step, so you can practice it right along with her and start using it anywhere you need a reset.

What You'll Learn

• How the 4-7-8 breathing technique works: inhale for 4 counts, hold for 7, exhale for 8
• Why the extended exhale is the key to activating your parasympathetic nervous system
• How this breath sends your brain a signal of safety, interrupting the stress response cycle
• Practical, anywhere-anytime uses: before a hard conversation, in a chaotic moment, at work, in the parking lot, wherever you need it

Try It Yourself

Find a comfortable position, sitting, lying down, or standing. Close your eyes if it feels safe, or soften your gaze downward. Then follow along:

Inhale through your nose for 4 counts → Hold for 7 counts → Exhale slowly for 8 counts

Repeat three times, and notice what shifts.

Connect

📩 Sign up for the newsletter at healingismyhobby.com 📷 @healingismyhobby (Instagram) ▶️ Healing Is My Hobby (YouTube) 🩺 jessicacolarcolcsw.com 📷 @jessicacolarcolcsw (Instagram)

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It's the Season One finale of Healing Is My Hobby! Jessica takes you on a month-by-month journey through everything we explored together this year — from grounding in October to identity in June. She revisits the biggest reframes, the healing lab experiments, and the tools that mattered most, then sends you into summer with five practical ways to carry your healing forward. Plus, a first look at what's coming next: weekly summer micro-episodes starting July 7th, and a Season Two reveal in September.

In This Episode:

• A month-by-month recap of Season One's themes: grounding (October), burnout (November), social media and the nervous system (December), anxiety (January), regulation (February), trauma (March), grief (April), shame (May), and identity (June)
• The healing lab experiments that shaped the season — warm water therapy, slow crafting, and a four-day social media reset
• The reframe that changed everything: "What happened to me?" instead of "What's wrong with me?"
• Why regulation isn't the same as being calm — and why it's not selfish
• The difference between guilt and shame, and why shame heals in relationship
• Five tips for carrying your healing into summer: keep one tool, regulate before the chaos hits, let grief move, protect your digital peace, and do something slow just because
• An announcement: Healing Moments, a summer series of short weekly micro-episodes starting Monday, July 7th
• A tease for Season Two, launching in September

Key Takeaways:

• Healing doesn't have to be complicated — sometimes it's a five-minute journal entry or a single boundary.
• Burnout recovery needs small, consistent moments of nervous system repair, not a two-week vacation.
• Your worth is not measured in likes. Post and leave. Share and close the app.
• Anxiety isn't your enemy — it's your nervous system trying to protect you.
• You don't have to justify your grief. If it mattered, losing it deserves space.
• Shame collapses inward; guilt can be a compass. Shame heals when it's witnessed.
• Identity is the story you carry about who you are — and you get to author it yourself.
• You are not a project to fix. You are a person to support.

What's Next:

Starting Monday, July 7th, join Jessica every week this summer for Healing Moments — short micro-episodes with a guided breathing practice, a journal prompt, or a small action step to keep you supported all summer long. Season Two begins in September.

Connect with Jessica:

📩 Sign up for the newsletter at healingismyhobby.com 📷 Follow on Instagram: @healingismyhobby ▶️ Subscribe on YouTube: Healing Is My Hobby 🩺 Learn more about Jessica's clinical practice: https://jessicacolarcolcsw.com/ 📷 Follow her clinical work on Instagram: @jessicacolarcolcsw

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Are the stories you tell about yourself actually true — or are they ones you inherited, adapted, or took on to survive? This month's Healing Lab experiment is deceptively simple: spend seven days noticing every fixed label you use to describe yourself, and ask one question — is this true, or is this adapted?

In this episode, Jessica walks you through the clinical framework behind this experiment (narrative therapy and the research of psychologist Dan McAdams), explains how repeated self-stories literally become the self we inhabit, and guides you through a small but powerful practice: catching the story, holding it up to the light, and trying a gentle rewrite when you're ready.

This isn't about tearing yourself down. It's about getting intentional — keeping what's genuinely yours and loosening your grip on what was never really yours to begin with.

This week's experiment:

For the next seven days, notice every time you use a fixed label to describe yourself — out loud or in your head. Pause and ask: is this actually who I am, or is this who I learned to be? If the answer is adapted or inherited, try one small rewrite. Not a declaration — just something a little more honest and a little more spacious than the original.

Want to stay in the know? Subscribe to our newsletter here. Contact Jessica here. Let's connect: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healingismyhobby/ | YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@healingismyhobby | Would you like to learn more about Jessica's clinical practice? Click here.

Resources & Links:

Narrative therapy and the self-narrative research of Dan McAdams

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You've been going through your life and somewhere along the way, you stopped recognizing yourself. Maybe you feel like you're watching from the outside. Maybe you wake up and wonder if this is actually your life. If that resonates, this episode is for you.

In this final episode of June's Identity series, Jessica puts a clinical name to an experience so many people are quietly living: identity disruption. She breaks down what's actually happening in the brain and nervous system when trauma, chronic stress, or major life transitions crack your sense of self open, and she makes a distinction that matters deeply: identity collapse versus identity evolution.

This episode is a reminder that the disorientation you're feeling isn't a breakdown. It's a becoming.

What You'll Hear:

• What identity disruption is and why it's a recognized psychological phenomenon, not a personal failing
• How the brain disconnects you from a felt sense of self as a protective response to trauma and chronic stress
• The spectrum of depersonalization and derealization, including the subtle, low-grade versions most people have learned to live with
• Why major life transitions (divorce, loss, parenthood, career changes, ending defining relationships) can destabilize identity at the root
• The difference between identity collapse and identity evolution, and why they can feel identical from the inside
• What integration actually means, and why it's not about going back to who you were before
• Why the distortion isn't the problem; it's the passage

Connect With Jessica:

• Sign up for the newsletter at healingismyhobby.com
• Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healingismyhobby/
• Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@healingismyhobby
• Learn about Jessica's clinical practice at jessicacolarcolcsw.com | @jessicacolarcolcsw

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A guided identity workout to help you sort the roles you've chosen from the ones you've just been carrying.

Episode Overview

This episode is part of the June identity series and follows Episode 1's exploration of where identity comes from. In this Therapy Is My Cardio segment, Jessica guides listeners through a structured, journal-based workout to surface their roles — and honestly assess which ones were chosen, which were inherited, and which were born out of survival.

Just like a real workout, this episode has a warm-up, a hard middle, and a cool-down. Listeners are invited to grab a journal or simply move through the exercise in their heads — but either way, show up ready to be honest.

What You'll Explore in This Episode

• How to identify all the roles you currently hold — including the invisible ones
• A three-category sorting framework: Chosen, Inherited, and Survival roles
• Why high-achieving, high-functioning people often find their most defining roles in the Inherited and Survival categories
• How survival roles quietly become personality — and what it costs us when we stop questioning them
• A closing reflection question to sit with through the week

The Role-Sorting Exercise

Step 1 — List Your Roles Write down every role you currently hold. Include the obvious ones (mom, partner, employee, friend) and the invisible ones — the peacemaker, the one who holds it together, the responsible one, the helper, the one who's always fine.

Step 2 — Sort Into Three Categories

Chosen — Roles you actively want. They feel like you. You'd choose them again.

Inherited — Roles given to you by your family, culture, birth order, gender, or social expectations — already in place before you had a say.

Survival — Roles you took on because you had to. They kept you safe, kept the peace, helped you belong or avoid conflict or earn love. They were never consciously chosen — they were adaptive.

Step 3 — Look at the Whole Picture Where did most of your roles land? If the bulk of your most defining roles are in Inherited or Survival — that's not a weakness. It's what happens when we grow up in systems that had needs, and we were the ones who met them.

This Week's Reflection Question

"If you removed every role that was assigned to you, every role you took on to survive, to belong, to keep the peace — who would be left?"

You don't have to answer it today. Let it sit. The blank space you feel when you try — that's not emptiness. That's possibility. That's the beginning of choosing yourself on purpose.

Coming Up Next Week

In Episode 3 — the Healing Lab — Jessica builds directly on this exercise. She'll try a personal practice around identity and roles and report back on what she discovered. If this episode stirred something in you, next week takes it further.

Connect & Stay in the Loop

Sign up for the newsletter at healingismyhobby.com Follow on Instagram: @healingismyhobby Watch on YouTube: @healingismyhobby Learn about Jessica's clinical practice: jessicacolarcolcsw.com Follow Jessica on Instagram: @jessicacolarcolcsw

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