Pretty Mental

Pretty Mental

By Pretty MentalHealth & FitnessMental Health
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Pretty Mental episodes

  • 32. Leveraging Beauty & Sensuality to Surrender and Thrive
    • How both pain and beauty are equally powerful elements in the healing journey
    • How creative practices and the arts are powerful and necessary medicines for our souls
    • The importance of switching up our environments & routines
    • Managing feelings of regret and making peace with our individual journies
    • Understanding & overcoming chronic guilt 
    • The necessary balance between softness and strength within all of us

      • Show Notes:

      The Great Surrender 


      Website: PrettyMental.Com

      IG: @PrettyMentalOfficial

      Twitter: @PrettyMentalVal

      1 hr
    • 31. Shaking Off Social Pressure and Honoring Our Own Timelines

      Covered in this episode: 

      • Honoring our own timelines by challenging society’s expectations
      • Leaning into the most authentic versions of our lives and how by freeing ourselves we free others
      • What it means to move through life by the guidance of our intuition and how we can get better at doing this
      • How do we define failure?
      • Lessons from Valentina’s second ayahuasca journey

        • Website: PrettyMental.Com

        IG: @PrettyMentalOfficial

        Twitter: @PrettyMentalVal

        50 min
      • 30. Tackling the Fear of Death and Challenging our Need for Control

        Today we sat down and processed through: 

        • The ways in which control issues are ultimately rooted in our fear of death. 
        • Why leaning into the work of challenging our individual and collective compulsive need for control is particularly important right now for our mental health.
        • What it looks like find a balance between having agency over our lives, taking action, and letting go. 
        • The experiences we have each gone through that caused us to search for a balance in our own controlling issues.
        • Powerful tools that we have discovered for releasing the fearful, controlling mind and surrendering into the present moment.

          • Website: PrettyMental.Com

          IG: @PrettyMentalOfficial

          Twitter: @PrettyMentalVal

          48 min
        • 29. Overcoming Codependency & People Pleasing Habits

          Today we processed through some of the challenges that come along with maintaining a healthy lifestyle in a society where that is still not the norm. This naturally looped us into a deeper conversation on the nuanced aspects of practicing boundaries without getting too rigid. We explored some of the underlying causes of people-pleasing compulsions and how we can begin to challenge this tendency and why it’s so important if we hope to move away from having fear-based co-dependent relationships with each other. Lastly, we talked about why it’s so important for us to challenge our fear of discomfort so that we can experience true joy and love in this lifetime.

          Show Notes: 

          Journey of Souls by Michael Newton, PHD (the book we are both reading right now that goes through case studies of people's spirits after they die and before they are born)


          Website: PrettyMental.Com

          IG: @PrettyMentalOfficial

          Twitter: @PrettyMentalVal

          51 min
        • 28. Understanding Postpartum and General OCD with Kristen Giorgi

          Today we sat down with our close friend, the beautiful soul, and extremely talented Kristen Giorgi to deep dive into her personal experiences with postpartum OCD & depression. We normalize the fact that most of us experience some mental health challenges despite what our social media might depict.  We go over the very real ways in which pregnancy and childbirth are a trauma for the body and why it’s so important to validate and better understand this aspect of the experience for women and for the partners who are accompanying them through it.

          We specifically unpacked and educate you guys on a type of OCD called Harm OCD & we take you through a list of several other possible manifestations of OCD that extend far beyond the stereotypical depictions that the media has popularized which have led to many misconceptions.

          Show Notes: 

          Kristen Giorgi's Instagram: @kristengiorgi.studio

          Website: PrettyMental.Com

          IG: @PrettyMentalOfficial

          Twitter: @PrettyMentalVal

          59 min
        • 27. Why We Need Healthy Boundaries for Open-Hearted Living

          Today we sat down and spoke to the timeliness of acknowledging the need for all of us to engage in heart-opening work if we hope to heal and dismantle the ongoing trauma that is being perpetuated through individual and collective practices of oppression. We also address the ways in which healthy boundaries are absolutely necessary if we are going to feel safe enough to keep our hearts open.

          We take you guys through specific examples of how we can recognize that our boundaries are being crossed, how to practice setting and communicating healthy boundaries, and the negative consequence of people-pleasing habits. We also bring attention to the necessary shift that will have to take place in the way that we speak to ourselves and to each other if we hope to create a culture that is conducive to open-hearted living.


          Shownotes:

          Sarah Blondin “Heart Minded”

          Trigger Warning with Killer Mike

          Website: PrettyMental.Com

          IG: @PrettyMentalOfficial

          Twitter: @PrettyMentalVal

          54 min
        • 26. Challenging the Politics of Silence with Dr. Rumya Putcha

          For today’s podcast we sat down to have an amazing conversation with University of Georgia professor Dr.Rumya Putcha to discuss her research on the intersection between race, gender, systems of oppression and the politics of silence in the United States in general and how this shows up in wellness spaces in particular. We unpacked the ways in which we have come to often misuse the concept of self-care to avoid and turn away from difficult yet necessary conversations and the trauma caused when we allow ourselves to be silenced in the face of oppressive interactions and practices.

          Lastly we made sure to address what we have to do to navigate and recognize these realities while still holding space for our individual and collective racial healing.


          Shownotes:

          Dr. Rumya Putcha

          The Balanced Blonde featuring Rachel Ricketts

          W.E.B Dubois, “The Souls of Black Folks”

          Peggy McIntosh, “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack”

          1 hr 22 min
        • 25. Relating to Anger in a Healthy Way & Dismantling Our Own Privilege
          Today we unpack the biology of our anger and its role in our body’s survival instinct as well as how we can relate to it in a healthy way during these times. We also continue to explore what it looks like to dismantle our own privilege and the language that we use so that we can continue to be actively anti-racist.
          We talked about DARVO which is the strategy that is commonly used by abusers to keep their power and why it’s important to be conscious of this strategy as we continue challenging the systems of oppression and white supremacy in our world.
          Shownotes:
          DL Hughley - The Endangered Species List
          50 min
        • 24. The Narcissistic Roots of Oppression and Why Your Anger is Valid

          In today's podcast we sat down and unpacked the validity of the anger that is coming up right now, the role that Narcissism has played in creating these systems of oppression, and we grappled with the questions of why we did not start speaking out on this more passionately before now,

          We also explore why sustainable change will require that we turn the energy of this movement into a lifestyle, and we finish off with an exploration into the dehumanizing psychology of White Supremacy.

          Shownotes:

          “White Fragility” Robin DiAngelo

          Jane Elliot Video on Racial Discrimination (5 minutes)

          Black Nation App

          Sahara Rose Podcast 

          The Nap Ministry

          55 min
        • 23. Unpacking Systemic Racism & Choosing Sides with Psychotherapist Torri Johnson

          In today’s podcast, we sat down with Psychotherapist and social justice advocate Torri Johnson to dive deeper into the subject of systemic racism and unpacked some of the flaws in the criminal justice system that are allowing the oppression, abuse and killing of Black people in this country. We also addressed What White allies and all non-black allies need to be aware of as we continue forward with the Black Lives Matter movement as well as the importance of continuing to build this momentum while balancing our self-care.

          Shownotes: 

          “White Fragility” by Robin Diangelo

          1 hr 9 min

        About Pretty Mental

        From the publisher's feed

        Pretty Mental is about accepting our full selves and inspiring others to do the same by being daringly unfiltered. This means completely normalizing all things mental health and the wild journey that has brought us here. We are challenging the stigmatization of normal human suffering. We are done pretending and subscribing to the notion that it’s taboo to have challenging mental health experiences.