The Hidden Power of Grief in Healing Trauma with Rebecca Wong
The Hidden Power of Grief in Healing Trauma with Rebecca Wong
Grief isn’t just about loss — it’s also a doorway into healing. In this deeply resonant conversation, relational therapist Rebecca Wong explores how grief, when met with presence and curiosity, becomes a powerful force for integration and connection. Together, we dive into what it means to turn toward our discomfort, build trust with our nervous systems, and honor the wisdom already within us.
Whether you’re a therapist, a client, or a human navigating this wild experience of being alive, this episode will help you reflect on your own relationship with pain, healing, and connection.
Key Takeaways
Grief as your most untapped therapeutic tool. Discover why it’s more than just sadness and how it opens a door to deep relational healing.
Could your urge to fix block your client’s healing? Explore the subtle shift that changes how your presence impacts clients.
How clients' reactions are actually wisdom in disguise. Learn how to recognize the intelligence of the nervous system, even in shutdown, collapse, or rage.
Guest: Rebecca Wong
Rebecca Wong is a relational therapist, educator, and the creator of Connectfulness®, a practice rooted in presence, curiosity, and the courage to turn toward what’s hard. She supports individuals, couples, and healing professionals in cultivating nervous system trust, relational integrity, and generational repair. Learn more at connectfulness.com.
📩 Contact: rebecca@connectfulness.com
🔗 Social: @connectfulness
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Transcript:
[00:00:00] Rebecca Wong: What it means is that our brain is moving at different speeds, and when our brain is moving really fast, when we're inside of shock, when we're inside of trauma, our brain moves with an urgency and there's something really important about slowing down just to be with what is emerging and to build relationship with what we're discovering around what's emerging.
[00:00:24] Going Inside is a podcast on a mission to help people heal from trauma and reconnect with their authentic self. Join me trauma therapist John Clarke for guest interviews, real life therapy sessions, and soothing guided meditations. Whether you're navigating your own trauma, helping others heal from trauma, or simply yearning for a deeper understanding of yourself, going inside is your companion on the path to healing and self-discovery.
[00:00:47] Download free guided meditations and apply to work with me one-on-one at JohnClarketherapy.com. Thanks for being here. Let's dive in.
[00:00:56] Rebecca Wong is a relational therapist, educator, and the creator [00:01:00] of Connectfullness A practice rooted in presence, curiosity, and the courage to turn toward what's hard. She supports individuals, couples, and healing professionals in cultivating nervous system trust, relational integrity, and generational repair.
[00:01:14] John Clarke: Learn more at connectfullness.com. Rebecca, thank you for being here. It's been. Only years since I've seen you or connected with you in a, a very different realm and different time in life and work and all that. So yeah, catch me up on, um, yeah, what life is like these days and, and what you're up to as it relates to your, your work and everything.
[00:01:37] Rebecca Wong: Oh, that's a big question. Um, it's good to see you. Um, it has been a really long time. Um, what, what is going on over here? Um, I'm raising two teens. Um, two in high school just started back today. And, um, let's see, what else? I'm, I'm doing a lot of relationship intensivess and deepening my work. In, [00:02:00] um, like relational trauma healing.
[00:02:05] Um, that's really been my focus in terms of working with couples, um, offering workshops in my community, offering, uh, containers for grief. Um. I think people are hurt in relationship and we heal in relationship and that happens all the time. And, um, it's an emergent process to, to heal and to grow our connection with ourselves and with each other.
[00:02:33] And, um, yeah, I'm, I'm really into learning from my people about how we work with our systems. Both systems in the world and systems within ourselves.
[00:02:48] John Clarke: You've always had a really strong through line with your work. I'm kind of envious. Um, you're also like really good at branding and putting, you know, like concisely [00:03:00] describing what you do.
[00:03:01] Um. Which is a skill that, you know. You've probably developed over the years. But, um, yeah, everything really rooted in connection and relationship and healing and deepening. Like, every, every thing I see you do is around that deepening. And, um, there's something counterintuitive about how a lot of times our wounding comes from relationships, and so naturally there's parts of us that don't want to go back there.
[00:03:27] Mm. And yet a lot of the, the healing happens. You know, we call it a corrective emotional experience through. Trying again, you know, whether it's with that person or someone else or whomever it is, like that healing also happens like often where the hurt happened.
[00:03:41] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. You know, I was, I was talking to a mentor of mine recently, um, who was saying that.
[00:03:50] Grief is perhaps one of the most integrative experiences like that our brain can be in. And then I came across this quote by Terry Tempes [00:04:00] Williams that said, grief dares us to love once more and. I think that's the thing of it, right? Like when, when we're really being with the truth and the weight, right?
[00:04:12] Because the, the etymology of the word grief kind of really has a lot to do with the gravitas, the gravity, the weight of things when we're really with the weight. Of, of hurt, of harm, of the ouch, of the what needs weren't met or, um, gosh, grief can show up in so many different ways. Right. But, um, when we're really with the grief, it does challenge us.
[00:04:40] It does ask us, it does dare us to, to love.
[00:04:45] John Clarke: Mm-hmm. And, and, um, so much inside of us that is inclined toward running from that pain, moving away from it, not dealing with it,
[00:04:59] Rebecca Wong: [00:05:00] or fighting or shutting down,
[00:05:01] John Clarke: fighting or shutting down, or that there must be an easier way. Right. And yet so much of the work is turning toward, you know, and that that was a piece you kind of put in your, um.
[00:05:13] The, the prompts for this interview around turning toward.
[00:05:16] Rebecca Wong: Mm-hmm.
[00:05:16] John Clarke: And I think, like, regardless of the modality that a therapist is using, that's a lot of what we do is gently inviting clients to turn toward what they've been running from, for often so long.
[00:05:27] Rebecca Wong: Mm-hmm.
[00:05:27] John Clarke: Or their entire lives or whatever it might be.
[00:05:29] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:05:30] John Clarke: And that can feel weird 'cause it's like you're, you're kind of asking me to hurt more.
[00:05:34] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. Well, can I slow us down for a minute and like, oh, how do I. Turning toward the wisdom of the system, right? Like, I don't wanna turn directly toward the hard thing.
[00:05:50] John Clarke: Mm-hmm.
[00:05:50] Rebecca Wong: Um, but I wanna turn toward. Um, maybe my language is a little different.
[00:05:57] I, I think of it like we have all these wisdom [00:06:00] keepers inside and they know where the hurt is and they know what caused the hurt. They also know the pathway towards healing that hurt. And so if we're turning towards the wisdom keepers, they might also know, now's the time to open this up. Or now's not.
[00:06:16] Right. Mm-hmm. But building relationship and collaboration with them, that's what I wanna encourage folks to turn towards, to turn towards the wisdom in their own system.
[00:06:27] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:06:27] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:06:28] John Clarke: Yeah. So say more about that and um, I guess kind of how you came to understand the, that system and how to work with it.
[00:06:37] Rebecca Wong: Mm-hmm.
[00:06:38] Um, oh gosh. My understanding is layered, right? It's like. The, the generational understanding that we, we learn as little people growing up in our family systems and what we witness, um, around us. And, um, it's the, my own healing journey and it's, uh, sitting with [00:07:00] so many people and my own educational journey, right?
[00:07:04] Like all of the seeking that I've been doing for. For decades has been around this. Like, I keep coming back to this. Um, which is to say that, oh, we all have such wisdom. Like there is wisdom in what we turn away from. There's wisdom in where we shut down. There's wisdom in what we fight. There's wisdom in, in, in all of it.
[00:07:33] There's nothing wrong with any of us. And. Relationships are really hard. Um, are you familiar with the work of Yak Penske?
[00:07:45] John Clarke: No.
[00:07:46] Rebecca Wong: So he talks about a seeking system and, um, the seeking system, it kind of is layered in the brain stem around, uh, the same place that our safety system might be [00:08:00] layered, like the fight, flight, freeze kind of stuff originates from is or is oriented towards.
[00:08:05] Brainstem kind of looks for, am I okay? Am I okay? Am I okay? Yeah. And the seeking system is constantly scanning for and looking for care. Right? And as adults, that might look different. It might also have to do with like, can I care for the people in my life? Can I be generative in different ways? But when we're seeking care, when we're met with care.
[00:08:27] That's beautiful. Like things can can happen and um, exploration happens and play happens, and adult love relationships, lust may happen, but when we're seeking care and we're not met with care, then we might enter a phase of like panic, grief or fear, anxiety, rage, eventually despair. All of that are part of what happens.
[00:08:52] And biologically to us when we're seeking care and it's not there.
[00:08:58] John Clarke: Mm.
[00:08:59] Rebecca Wong: Um, [00:09:00] so like, that's interesting because then if we're thinking about it in that kind of way, then even RAGE is a bid for connection. Right? Despair is a bid for something like, it's like, oh, I want, I'm seeking care. I'm seeking connection.
[00:09:13] I'm seeking being seen, I'm seeking belonging.
[00:09:16] John Clarke: Yeah. Well, I, you know, not to oversimplify it, but I think of almost everything as some sort of bid for connection. Yeah. You know, when my clients are talking about things, like, I was just in a session this morning and my client said, well, I was, you know, in the car talking to my partner and, um, I got really angry about this thing.
[00:09:41] Um, and. I just saw that as a bid for connection, which is like, how, how loud do I need to get for you to take me seriously? Yeah. Or connect with me. Um, and what I'm also really saying is like, I'm actually really afraid, but it feels scary to say I'm, I'm afraid right now. So I show you. My anger, right?
[00:09:59] Rebecca Wong: [00:10:00] Mm-hmm.
[00:10:00] John Clarke: Which the anger is kind of just like, you're not, you're not meeting me right now. Right? You're not seeing me. Um, and also like, I don't really know how to get you to see me. Yeah. So there's just so much that's happening, um, underneath a single interaction, you know, in this case with my client and their partner.
[00:10:15] But, um, and so many of our relationships.
[00:10:19] Rebecca Wong: Yeah, I think there's so much, like the way that you're naming it is so great, and I think that kind of layered thing is happening in most of our interactions most of the time. Right? Like 80, 90% of the time we're looking at the world through history Colored lenses.
[00:10:34] John Clarke: Yeah. Oh yeah,
[00:10:35] Rebecca Wong: yeah,
[00:10:37] John Clarke: yeah. It's like everything is a projection and transference. It's like, what is this person or this thing bringing up in me that is difficult to turn toward or is raw or painful or whatever it is. Right. And like this difficulty in really just truly seeing each other.
[00:10:56] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. Yeah. I, I think it's that.[00:11:00]
[00:11:00] Um, and I also kind of simplified in my mind a little bit, like it's, it's the projection, it's the transference, but it's also just like. This is, this is how my brain shortcuts understanding the world.
[00:11:14] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:11:15] Rebecca Wong: Right. I, I know how to sit in a chair because sometime in my toddlerhood I explored and understood and learned what a chair was, and if I had to calorically figure that out, every time I confronted a chair, I.
[00:11:30] Would waste a lot of energy. Yeah. And so we walk through life in that kind of way where we're using these recon, these consolidated moments of memory to kind of get us through something and, and make a prediction about what next. Yeah. Um, and we do that in relationship all the time.
[00:11:47] John Clarke: Yeah. Well, it's in so much of, um, in my experience, how we got here as therapists for many of us is like, how did I make myself useful in relationships?
[00:11:57] Rebecca Wong: Mm-hmm.
[00:11:58] John Clarke: And that was by
[00:11:59] Rebecca Wong: a lot [00:12:00] of us are fixers or my needs
[00:12:01] John Clarke: and fixing or serving.
[00:12:02] Rebecca Wong: Mm-hmm.
[00:12:02] John Clarke: Or being, you know, mom's, therapists or what, whatever it is. Right? Yeah. Um, and there was so much value in that, and that was a way of getting or maintaining or not losing connection. Right. That's right. But it also comes from our woundedness and mm-hmm.
[00:12:17] That can only take you so far, you know,
[00:12:19] Rebecca Wong: it's both and.
[00:12:20] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:12:21] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. There's gifts in there and there's also pain.
[00:12:24] John Clarke: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
[00:12:25] Rebecca Wong: Exactly.
[00:12:26] John Clarke: As therapists, we hold space for so many. But who's holding space for us? If you're craving deeper healing and more powerful tools for your clients, I wanna invite you to my free webinar on Internal Family Systems Therapy. IFS changed my life and the way I practice. It helped me move through burnout, reconnect with my authentic self, and show up more fully for my clients and for myself.
[00:12:49] In this webinar, I'm gonna walk you through what IFS is and why it works. A simple tool that you can use right away and how to bring this work into your practice, even if you're just beginning. [00:13:00] This is for therapists ready to go deeper. Join us now with the link in the description.
[00:13:04] Yeah. What, what else comes to mind around this stuff, or what else did you wanna kind of make sure we explore today as it relates to your, your work?
[00:13:13] Rebecca Wong: Oh, I guess it's just like there's.
[00:13:16] As, as we're naming these kind of like, it's this and that. It's, it's pain and it's healing, it's gifts and it's ouch. It's, it's also like our culture teaches us to avoid a lot of discomfort, right? We don't turn towards hard things, um, oh, you're getting older. Take this medicine or buy this car, get this new face mask, or buy these clothes or, right, like there, there's all these things that we are.
[00:13:45] Sold, um, to avoid discomfort. And it is so much a part of the air we breathe that it can be hard to slow down and really [00:14:00] just be with, oh, I wonder what's going on here, right? Mm-hmm. Like the pause and, and the noticing of what's emerging. Um, what did I read the other day? I read something about. Somebody talking about their therapist.
[00:14:14] I don't know this person, I don't know this therapist, but I was reading about it and they said something like, oh, I was telling my therapist that I was really dysregulated and my therapist said, maybe those are just feelings. Like maybe you're just having a range of experiences, a range of feelings, and I think that's really right, like dysregulation.
[00:14:33] John Clarke: Mm-hmm.
[00:14:33] Rebecca Wong: First of all, I don't think dysregulation is a bad thing.
[00:14:38] John Clarke: Yeah,
[00:14:38] Rebecca Wong: there's no good or bad in that, right? Like, uh, dissociation is not a bad thing. Uh, dysregulation is not a bad thing. Not being in an integrated brain state is not a bad thing. What it means is that our brain is moving at different speeds, and when our brain is moving really fast, when we're inside of shock, when we're inside of trauma, [00:15:00] our brain moves with an urgency.
[00:15:03] And there's something really important about slowing down just to be with what is emerging. Yeah. And to build relationship with what we're discovering around what's emerging. Right. The, the becoming human, the being with ourselves is an emergent process and. Uh, I think that's really revolutionary in a culture that's built upon avoidance to Yeah.
[00:15:28] To make an action where we go, wait, hold on, I wanna be with myself.
[00:15:31] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:15:32] Rebecca Wong: That's a revolutionary act.
[00:15:34] John Clarke: Yeah. Yeah. Well, for, for many of us, uh, it doesn't feel like enough, you know, because we are also so obsessed with efficiency and outcomes and solving and,
[00:15:49] Rebecca Wong: mm-hmm.
[00:15:50] John Clarke: You know, fixing it, right? Yeah. Or being useful to the other person, right?
[00:15:54] So it's like, again, as a therapist, it's like, if all I do quote unquote is like, help you [00:16:00] be with that part of yourself today. Did I do enough? In session. Right. And I also, you know, I train a lot of therapists who are at the beginning of their careers and see them through their associateship and residency.
[00:16:11] And, um, there's a lot of that energy around, like, I've gotta do more in session. I've gotta do a lot. Or if my client's in a really painful place, I need to do something about it. Right. Like, I can't just let them breathe through it.
[00:16:24] Rebecca Wong: Well, but I wanna challenge that a little bit. Is it okay That I do
[00:16:29] John Clarke: Sure.
[00:16:30] Rebecca Wong: Because it's like. Our people have been surviving before they came to us.
[00:16:36] John Clarke: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:16:37] Rebecca Wong: Their nervous systems know how to keep them, keep them going.
[00:16:41] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:16:41] Rebecca Wong: Right. And I really, I think it's far more important that we trust their nervous systems than that we fix them or that even that they trust us.
[00:16:52] John Clarke: Yeah, right.
[00:16:56] Rebecca Wong: So yeah. So it's kind of like. [00:17:00] Is it our job to fix them? What would that mean? What does that mean for their nervous system? Like I was with a client earlier today and they came in kind of with like, I wanna tell you about this. And as they started telling me about the this, um. Something happened and I went, oh, what about this?
[00:17:23] Should we do this? And my agenda got totally in the way and there was a relational rupture in that moment. And I noticed it. I noticed it because their body kind of slowed down and they kind of went into a little bit of like a collapse. Yeah. And then we talked about it and we did some repair work right there in the moment.
[00:17:44] And it turned out that that rupture. Mirrored something that they were gonna tell me about. And the repair was the thing that they were seeking, right? Yeah. But if I had stayed on my course of what I thought they needed, [00:18:00] instead of slowing down, would we have gotten anywhere? Probably not. 'cause they would've just been really collapsed.
[00:18:08] John Clarke: And if you didn't have. The ability and the, the self-energy to attend to the process in that moment and that, that miss then it would've just been a miss. Right? It would've just been another miss. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:18:22] Rebecca Wong: Another ouch
[00:18:24] John Clarke: one, one of the, you know, one a sign. Where I feel like trust is actually there and some degree of safety is really here is when clients can tell me, I missed the mark.
[00:18:33] Rebecca Wong: Yes.
[00:18:34] John Clarke: Right. Or tell me you're not getting it, or tell me that didn't work or whatever. It's like, thank you so much for telling me. I'm so glad you're telling me this right now and here's this opportunity to potentially work through it. I mean, I'm already seeing like what you, this whole piece you just said is like gonna be a good clip for social media or something because um, what you did write there is, um.
[00:18:56] I mean, it's just so. You made it sound easy the way you [00:19:00] slowed down and tuned in and, and tended to the process and did that repair right then and there. But it's really hard to do and this is coming, you know? Oh yeah. You're a seasoned therapist and so, you know, a lot of the clinicians that I train who are early on, like these moments are, are really intense.
[00:19:16] I can be, and they also often feel like they need to get it right all the time and they can't. Ever miss with their clients. Right. So it feels really high stakes.
[00:19:23] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. I think that's the place where I've done a lot of training with Julianne Taylor Shore.
[00:19:28] John Clarke: Mm-hmm.
[00:19:29] Rebecca Wong: Um, she has created a method called the Stair Method and it's neurobiologically based.
[00:19:35] Um, stair stands for self-trust and Integrative Resilience. And what I love so much about it, um, is that it really promotes the therapist being able to be with themself. And meeting themself with a lot of witness and a lot of compassion and undoing, a lot of aloneness and a lot of little. Um, practices, deliberate practices that we practice outside of [00:20:00] session and we bring back into session.
[00:20:02] And I believe that that's really been revolutionary in helping me to turn towards the parts of me that go, oh, oh no, what just happened there? Or, you know, when it feels like it could be a high stakes, high risk moment. How do I be with myself? Well, in those moments? Yeah. So that I'm not getting ahead of them.
[00:20:21] Ahead of it. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:20:22] John Clarke: That's great. Mm-hmm. That's so much of the work as therapists. That's the work, that's the training is turning back. Toward ourselves. And also, you know, I just wanna add this layer of, for some clients it's not so easy to do the repair or they might not welcome it or be ready, or it might actually be high stakes with them that if we miss, um, we, there there's, there's higher consequences.
[00:20:44] Right. Or Yeah. They shut us out. Right. And that can bring up more stuff for us.
[00:20:48] Rebecca Wong: We might also not know what the repair is that is actually needed.
[00:20:51] John Clarke: Exactly. Yeah.
[00:20:52] Rebecca Wong: Right. And so they're not letting us in might actually be a way of guiding us toward Yeah.
[00:20:58] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:20:59] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. [00:21:00]
[00:21:00] John Clarke: Yeah,
[00:21:01] Rebecca Wong: yeah. It's a hard job we say yes to.
[00:21:04] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:21:04] It's a really hard job.
[00:21:05] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
[00:21:07] John Clarke: Yep. Yeah. This, this is, this is great stuff. Um, so yeah, we've kind of covered a few pieces here and, um, I guess what. A couple of like broad questions. Not to zoom out too much again, is like in your experience and, uh, ideas about all this, like what is trauma and what is healing?
[00:21:37] Rebecca Wong: Hmm. Grief for both.
[00:21:45] John Clarke: Okay. Next question.
[00:21:46] Rebecca Wong: Um, no, no, no. But I, if I can really go a little deeper here, um. Francis Weller wrote a really great book called The, the Wild Edge of Sorrow, and he, he teaches folks how to, [00:22:00] um, or guides folks to. Apprentice their own grief. And I think he's really onto something like he's naming it really well.
[00:22:09] It's not like something new that he's discovered, but I think he's articulating it really well.
[00:22:15] John Clarke: Yeah,
[00:22:15] Rebecca Wong: and he talks about these like five gates of grief and I think this is really what the trauma is, right? Everything we love will lose. Right, which we also hear merit back in, in a lot of different, uh, ways of meeting compassion, right?
[00:22:31] Like suffering is a part of being human. So everything we love will lose. There are places in us that have probably never known love, um, the sorrows of the world, and gosh, right now there's a lot of that. Um, things that we exp like our expectations, what we expected, but we didn't receive. And ancestral grief stuff that lives in our bones.
[00:22:56] John Clarke: Mm-hmm.
[00:22:58] Rebecca Wong: And so when you ask what is [00:23:00] trauma? I think trauma is all of that, right? It's, it's the stuff that we love, but we're afraid of losing. It's the stuff that, uh, the unmet needs and the places in us that haven't known love. It's what we witness collectively in the world around us. It's, um. Not having received a love or receiving something that really didn't feel okay.
[00:23:21] Yeah. And, uh, the ancestral knowings that live in our bones, that is what trauma is in many ways. Um, and I, and I wanna add one more layer onto that. When I define trauma, I'm leaning towards Bonnie Bock's work, and Bonnie talks about trauma. Is any experience. Um, of grief or, or pain that doesn't have the support that it needs to be integrated into the experience of our developing mind through time, through our life.
[00:23:53] So it's, it's when we don't have the support to integrate those losses, that's what causes [00:24:00] the ouch. That's what gets us stuck. Yeah. That's what we hold in our body.
[00:24:04] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:24:04] Rebecca Wong: And what is healing? I think healing is meeting. Meeting that well so that we can undo some aloneness around it and we can be with the reality of what was and what the losses were, and that whether it's within our own nervous system between us and us, between us and our parts, or it's in relationship in therapy or with people in our lives, that we can undo some aloneness so that we don't have to, it, it becomes supported, right?
[00:24:30] It's not an unsupported process of being with, but it's a, it's a process that. Earn some support and that earning of support is earning more security
[00:24:41] John Clarke: mm-hmm.
[00:24:41] Rebecca Wong: In our lives. So I, yeah, I think really being able to, to be with, to be with grief, to be with the truth of what has occurred is, is the healing.
[00:24:53] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:24:55] Yeah. This piece around, um, support and integration I think [00:25:00] is essential. And on the other side of, um. A kind of like a traumatic impact or traumatic reactions is, um, like how do we mitigate crisis or when things are falling apart mm-hmm. Or when, uh, the, the trauma's happening right now. And for me, it's always been around this piece of like a loss of agency and a loss of, um, yeah.
[00:25:25] Connection and the ability to have what I need to get through a really. Difficult or impossible situation. Mm-hmm. Or some people that have been through massive, like natural disasters and are less traumatized than others. Right. Um, you know, I, I think about this a lot because, um, and I don't know if I mentioned this years ago when you interviewed me on your podcast, which feels like. Eternity.
[00:25:52] Rebecca Wong: I mean, years ago, my old, like three
[00:25:54] podcasts ago, they're all retired now. Podcasts.
[00:25:56] John Clarke: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. But I think it's still out there somewhere.
[00:25:59] Rebecca Wong: Somewhere, yeah.
[00:25:59] John Clarke: [00:26:00] Um, but you know, I, I was an EMT for many years and out of the many thousands of calls I ran, there was really only a couple that actually like, left a mark and one of them was where, um.
[00:26:14] You know, not enough people showed up to help me deal with the, the call. Yeah. Right. And I didn't have what I needed to, to deal with it. Yeah. Um, and that. That loss of agency, that loss of connection, that loss of being able to like do something about it was like profoundly traumatic versus all those other thousands of calls that were objectively like, just as hard or as intense or, it's the aloneness stake.
[00:26:40] It's the aloneness, right?
[00:26:41] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:26:42] John Clarke: And not having what you need to, to do the job or get through the moment or whatever. So, um, yeah, it, it took me years to understand like. Why that particular call was so impactful more than others that on paper would've seemed way more, um, traumatic. You know?
[00:26:57] Rebecca Wong: Totally. Yeah.
[00:26:58] This is why I've started [00:27:00] holding grief gatherings. Yeah. I'm, I'm holding them. Oh, I'm, I'm aiming for every other month or so.
[00:27:06] John Clarke: Mm.
[00:27:07] Rebecca Wong: Just like a community collective call. Um. They're free. It's just a place for people to gather. That's amazing. But I have found that, that we need witness. Right? Like that's, that's a piece that we really need.
[00:27:21] We need witness. Yeah. Yeah. Especially around grief. Especially around hard moments.
[00:27:26] John Clarke: Yep.
[00:27:27] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. And something else you said got me thinking a little bit, um, of a Viktor Frankl quote. Um. I'm, I'm a bit of a nerd. I keep dropping quotes. Apologize for that. I'm loving.
[00:27:38] John Clarke: You're, you're, you're ready.
[00:27:40] Rebecca Wong: They're, they're just in there.
[00:27:41] But I'm thinking of how Viktor Frankl, uh, talked about between the stimulus and the response there lies a space, right?
[00:27:49] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:27:49] Rebecca Wong: And in that space lies our freedom to choose our response. And I, I'm thinking about that, especially in the hard moments, but it's also something that if we don't [00:28:00] practice.
[00:28:00] Deliberately in our lives, it's less available to us in the heart moments. Yeah. Yeah. And so it's a muscle that we can build. Um, yeah. It's something that we can be really deliberate about.
[00:28:12] John Clarke: That's right.
[00:28:12] Rebecca Wong: How do we, how do we work with that? That's like the essence of my work. I slow down and I work with micro practices around that a lot.
[00:28:21] About how do we slow down, how do we be with ourselves in those moments?
[00:28:25] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:28:25] Rebecca Wong: If the, you know, how do we, um, discern what's coming towards us Yeah. So that we can respond in ways that are aligned with how we wanna show up in the next moment.
[00:28:35] John Clarke: Yeah. Um.
[00:28:37] Rebecca Wong: Yeah, because all of us have auto par autopilot parts that will just take over.
[00:28:42] Um, but if we can practice slowing down and being with, then that is another part of like the inner revolution.
[00:28:49] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:28:50] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:28:51] John Clarke: Choice is massive and something I think about so big all the time with Yeah. My work, my clients, especially in the realm of trauma and um, [00:29:00] you know, um. I've been going through the somatic experiencing training the past couple years.
[00:29:05] Yeah. Do living stuff.
[00:29:06] Rebecca Wong: Um, yeah. Are you liking it?
[00:29:08] John Clarke: I love it. Um, it's, I like it even more than I thought I would. Um, it's. It's so slow that it makes me mad. But that's another point. Yeah. There isn't like one pdf f of like, here's the model. It's like we titrate the model like a more at a time and then you deal with it and integrate it and I'm like, I need all of it.
[00:29:27] Um, they're like, that is the model. Yeah. You know, it's like titration. Yeah. And pendulation and all these pieces, but, um. You know, Peter Lean talks about the trauma vortex and the healing vortex. Mm-hmm. And I think about choice as a big part of the healing vortex. You know, I had a client who went to like this wellness retreat, um, and they started having everyone like sit in a circle and share and do like some pretty intense breath work.
[00:29:53] Um. Without screening or asking anyone about the histories or anything like that, right? Like really well intending stuff. Just, [00:30:00] you know, it could be like going to a yoga class and something gets really opened up that you weren't ready for. Um, and the class might not have the support for what gets opened up.
[00:30:08] But, you know, my client was able to have choice in that moment and go, um, this isn't a good. Idea for me, I'm gonna set this one out. Right. Amazing. And despite like the shame, the embarrassment, everything that, that, that came up with like raising your hand and being like, you know, I'm choosing making the choice that like, this is not gonna be good for me.
[00:30:25] Um, like going inside doesn't feel good for me right now. And also their history and all that. So I was like extremely proud of Yeah. In that moment because a year ago they would've just said, oh my gosh, I just need to do it and I need to do this breathing exercise. No matter what happens. Right. Unlock stuff.
[00:30:44] Rebecca Wong: That's the sign I think of really moving through a healing process is when we I think so too, and learning how to negotiate that and learning that. Yeah. Oh, I have agency here. That's right. That is so huge. Yeah.
[00:30:55] John Clarke: Yeah. And sometimes clients don't realize that as. In my [00:31:00] opinion, like a massive indicator of change or progress.
[00:31:02] Rebecca Wong: Mm-hmm.
[00:31:03] John Clarke: You know, because it's like, oh, I said no to something. Or sometimes it's like I dealt with a difficult moment and I didn't get extremely activated, right? Mm-hmm. So it's like sometimes that lack of a trigger is huge progress. Yeah.
[00:31:13] Rebecca Wong: And sometimes it's the opposite. It's like sometimes it's, oh, instead of shutting down, I got really activated.
[00:31:18] Yeah. That also might be a sign of progress, right? Like when we think about how we moved. Uh, the nervous system through things, right? Yeah. When we are really frozen and collapsed and stuck, we need to move back through activation, which could look like fight or flight.
[00:31:31] John Clarke: That's right.
[00:31:32] Rebecca Wong: And before we get back into a eventual vagal state, into a collected state that is able to, uh, connect with others and be more curious and compassionate and collaborative.
[00:31:42] John Clarke: Yeah. Yeah. That's it. Yeah. Yeah. And I, I like, um, the SE stuff because it just really honors and you learn to work directly with the nervous system rather than trying to control it or tamp it down.
[00:31:53] Rebecca Wong: Mm-hmm.
[00:31:54] John Clarke: You know, which is what a lot of, I think like. Direct like regulation skills end up kind of teaching is like, to your point, like [00:32:00] it's not good to be activated or it's bad to be dysregulated or whatever.
[00:32:03] Everyone needs to be like, you know, walking around like a, a, a Buddhist mon all day and it's just like, that's just not realistic. Yeah. And we need some activation and it
[00:32:12] Rebecca Wong: We do.
[00:32:13] John Clarke: Yeah,
[00:32:14] Rebecca Wong: we do. Like if, if I'm walking across the street and a truck is coming towards me, I need the activation to help me jump outta the way in time.
[00:32:21] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:32:22] Rebecca Wong: Like I need that. That's, it's not a good or bad thing. It's a survival thing.
[00:32:26] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:32:27] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. And if I'm trying to have
[00:32:28] John Clarke: return from that state,
[00:32:30] Rebecca Wong: yeah. Because if I come home and I'm trying to have a conversation with my partner and I'm still inside of that state, that conversation is gonna go really differently than if I come home and I've like taken a few breaths, or my partner gives me a hug and we talk about what happened.
[00:32:45] Then the conversation that we might need to have is gonna go differently.
[00:32:48] John Clarke: Yep.
[00:32:49] Rebecca Wong: Yeah,
[00:32:50] John Clarke: we, we used to, um, my wife and I used to fly a lot with our, my, my dog. She was like a therapy dog. Um, and she would be incredibly [00:33:00] calm and laid back on flights and then, you know, when the flight would land and then, you know, when the plane is like breaking and it speeds up and it's really loud.
[00:33:07] That's the only part she would panic with. And so she would kind of panic, um, during that moment. And then when it was over, like. She would just go back to sleep. Right. And I always like thought about that and how she could just go right back to like being asleep. Mm-hmm. And what's different about us that like, we might have that moment, but then every time we get on a plane she, you know, we might go home and then think about that moment or fear that moment happening again.
[00:33:33] Right. Or think about how bad that was. Right. And we, I think so much of our suffering is also tied into the memories we have. And then the fear we build up around. Something happening again or something going wrong again. Right. And like, do I need to be in some of that state in case it happens again? Yeah.
[00:33:48] Versus like, my dog just went right back to sleeping.
[00:33:51] Rebecca Wong: I, I think that you're naming it really well there, John. And I think there's another layer that I'm catching, which has to do with like social terror.
[00:33:59] John Clarke: Mm-hmm.
[00:33:59] Rebecca Wong: Like what do [00:34:00] other people think of me kind of stuff. Um, I don't think our dogs think about that as much.
[00:34:05] Right. But as humans, we, we spend a lot of time in those places of, yeah. What did other people think? And yeah. I think that has a lot to do with this, this reach for care and for belonging. Yeah. We all wanna be part of, um, we wanna be accepted. Uh, we wanna be loved.
[00:34:22] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:34:22] Rebecca Wong: Um, and I think there's a real difference between belonging and fitting in.
[00:34:26] Yeah. And, um, if we're, if we're truly belonging somewhere, we're belonging with the fullness of how we show up in the moment. Mm-hmm. So my anxiety doesn't mean I don't belong.
[00:34:39] John Clarke: But for, and, and for so many of us, that's where that takes us, right, is mm-hmm. I'm anxious and people are noticing and I'm less lovable.
[00:34:47] Yeah. I'm less worthy of connection.
[00:34:50] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:34:51] John Clarke: You know,
[00:34:51] Rebecca Wong: that's the feeling inside.
[00:34:53] John Clarke: That's the feeling. Yeah. That's where it takes us. Yeah. So I have to do all this work to like conceal. My vulnerability.
[00:34:59] Rebecca Wong: [00:35:00] Oh, but see, there we are again. We're back in a place of avoiding discomfort. Yeah. Right? Yeah. And so that's, that's the thing that I keep trying to turn us towards is this.
[00:35:09] Yeah. Oh yeah. Let's, let's be with that. Right? Like, let's be with that impulse. Mm-hmm. Even to conceal that discomfort. Um, and what would, like, what happens in the moments where. Where that discomfort is revealed, where others can witness it. What I often find, whether I'm running groups or workshops or just working with a couple, or even working with someone individually and then they go home and they come back, is that in the moments where stuff is revealed and held, those are the healing moments.
[00:35:43] Yeah. Right. Like, oh, I saw your anxiety. I'm so glad you named it. 'cause I have stuff like that that lives in Me too. It made me feel more belonging to see it in you. We don't have to be perfect. That's a lot to stand up to. Yeah. But yeah. Yeah. I need to avoid [00:36:00]
[00:36:01] John Clarke: that again. Like you're making it look easy, but it's not that piece you just named.
[00:36:06] Rebecca Wong: It's practiced
[00:36:07] John Clarke: resonance, like accurate resonance and like seeing it in them and even just like naming it of like there's some of that in me too. Yeah. And we can kind of be together in that. First of all, it takes therapists off of this pedestal that we are naturally can become, can be on, and clients put us on of being the expert or knowing a lot or being more wise or whatever it is, right?
[00:36:29] Um, and yet the more we can come down from that and just meet them and their humanness like the better, and yet it's. When we come out of grad school, there's so much theory and technique and stuff that's like layered on top of how I should be and how I should sit. Right? Or like concealing lots of my humanity or like just being helpful or like, I don't know, doing cognitive restructuring, whatever I'm like trying to do that kind of takes me further from my humanity.
[00:36:55] Rebecca Wong: Mm-hmm.
[00:36:55] John Clarke: Which ironically is also like, that's why the client chose you. 'cause of your humanity and your [00:37:00] person.
[00:37:00] Rebecca Wong: Right.
[00:37:00] John Clarke: Versus like,
[00:37:01] Rebecca Wong: and if, and if we're taking people away from human, if we're taking ourselves away from humanity, if we're taking our people away from, we're, we're perpetuating the aloneness, right?
[00:37:11] Yeah. We're, we're dehumanizing ourselves each other. We're not meeting each other in a place of,
[00:37:17] John Clarke: yeah.
[00:37:17] Rebecca Wong: Gosh, being human is hard.
[00:37:19] Yeah, of course it is.
[00:37:21] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:37:22] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:37:23] John Clarke: It seems like, you know, my experience like a lot of the. You know, my, um, my, my therapist is, um. Either 84 or 85. Mm-hmm. And I remember one day I, I was in session with him and um, I was just going through it.
[00:37:39] I was just in an absolute valley and just, um, coming there with just grief and so much heaviness and just feeling so lost. And I finished, you know, probably a really long monologue about it all. And I'm just like, kind of sobbing and I just look up. Um, and he's just like. Incredibly with [00:38:00] me. And yeah, it's clearly impacting him.
[00:38:02] Uh, he's clearly like in that resonance and he just said something like, my heart goes out to you, or something like that. Um, and I'll never forget that moment, how impactful that was, because it's huge. It was just that being with part that, again, it's so hard, it's so simple, but not easy for many of us.
[00:38:20] Just like, would it be enough if I were just with him in this moment, right? Where everything feels like the bottom is falling out. And it'd be so tempting to like go into solution mode or try to fix or communicate like, you know, it's kinda like, how do I help you feel better? I just, in a way, inadvertently
[00:38:38] Rebecca Wong: feel better by being with them.
[00:38:39] Like your therapist did.
[00:38:40] John Clarke: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:38:41] Rebecca Wong: But that, that
[00:38:42] John Clarke: inadvertently communicates, it's not okay to feel bad or feel this much grief or feel this much despair. There's nothing wrong with you, get you out of this. Yeah. Yeah.
[00:38:49] Rebecca Wong: I'm thinking of, um, Peter Levi, I, I can't remember which of his books it was that he wrote.
[00:38:57] Uh, about the car accident that he had been in [00:39:00] and that the most healing words he heard from someone who attended to him at the accident is, I am with you. Mm-hmm. Right? I'm here with you. Like that is, that is our work. Yeah. Our work, whether we're partners, whether we're parents, whether we're friends, whether we're community members, whether we're therapists or teachers or whoever it is, our work is, I am here with you.
[00:39:20] I'm, we're journeying together. We're, we're moving through the suffering of being human with each other.
[00:39:25] John Clarke: Yeah. Yeah, it's huge. Um, I'll just throw this little story in there, but, um, years ago during my EMT work, um, I was attending to like one of the worst car crashes I had ever worked. Mm. And um, there was a woman who was stuck in the car and they had been waiting probably 20 minutes 'cause we were out kind of in a rural area in Virginia.
[00:39:48] And um
[00:39:50] Rebecca Wong: mm-hmm.
[00:39:50] John Clarke: This woman absolutely would've gone into shock if it weren't for this bystander who. Got in the car with her and just held her hand. [00:40:00] Um, they also didn't even speak the same language, but he was like incredibly with her. Um, and when I got there it was like this, this guy's literally, yeah.
[00:40:08] The only reason why she's not going into shock or dying. Yeah. Um, and it turned out that the best. Thing we could do was also to bring him with us in the ambulance.
[00:40:18] Rebecca Wong: That makes a lot of sense.
[00:40:19] John Clarke: And I remember getting her out of that car and her, her saying like, he can't leave me. He can't leave me. You know, she doesn't even know who this guy is.
[00:40:26] Right. I'm just like, okay, put, you know, put him in the car.
[00:40:28] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:40:29] John Clarke: But looking back on it, just like that connection was so powerful. Like dealing with a life or death situation. Yeah. So
[00:40:35] Rebecca Wong: my guess is what you witnessed there was two nervous systems and in real resonance with each other.
[00:40:41] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:40:43] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:40:46] John Clarke: It was powerful and like literally probably saved her life.
[00:40:49] Rebecca Wong: Yeah. Maybe his too.
[00:40:51] John Clarke: Yeah. Yeah. These examples are everywhere, right? You know, everywhere looking for them. And again, these bids for connection are everywhere. [00:41:00] Um, yeah.
[00:41:02] Rebecca Wong: It really is.
[00:41:04] John Clarke: Yeah. Um, I'm also realizing like, just to bookmark this, Rebecca, I'm gonna have to bring you back for another episode because. I wanna talk to you about parenting because I feel like, okay, this, oh gosh, you have a lot of thoughts on it and you know, you're parenting a couple of teens.
[00:41:22] I'm parenting a 5-year-old and a six week old. Mm. Um, and so I just, through so much of my work as a therapist and working mostly with adults, I'm thinking about intending to their inner children. Yeah. And the wounding and the messaging around like, wipe those tears away. It's okay. You know, don't. Don't worry, don't be ridiculous.
[00:41:43] Whatever it is. Like yeah. Little boys dealing with anger, um, whatever it is. So I just have so much, um, curiosity around your thoughts on that, but Sure. And I,
[00:41:53] Rebecca Wong: I don't work with kids. Like I have my own children, but I don't work with kids in my office. But I'm happy to join you for a conversation. [00:42:00] Yeah, yeah.
[00:42:00] John Clarke: But yeah, just these, again, these bits for connection, right? Or like, it's all the time. It's all the time. Like, yeah. You know, for these. The question I ask myself when like my 5-year-old is dealing with big feelings is like, if it's feeling like too much for me, it's like, why is her pro her feeling a problem for me?
[00:42:18] Right? Mm-hmm. Why is her anger a problem for me? Or her fear, right? Or she's afraid like, no one's gonna sit with me at lunch. Right? And there's a part of me that wants to fix or reassure her, but it's like, I don't know how lunch will go, you know? Yeah. And it's scary to not know if anyone's gonna sit with me, but so much of my conditioning is around like.
[00:42:35] It kind of like swiftly get your kid through that feeling, right? Yeah. 'cause it's uncomfortable for us or unacceptable to us.
[00:42:43] Rebecca Wong: You know, I was talking to a friend of mine, um, about, about parenting the other day and this is a therapist friend and weird nerds together about stuff like this. And what we were talking about was how important.
[00:42:57] Our ability to respond is how important Yeah. [00:43:00] That presence is, right, because it's not about getting them through it, but it's about, oh, I can stay with you as you negotiate this, as you
[00:43:07] John Clarke: Exactly.
[00:43:07] Rebecca Wong: Build relationship with yourself and build trust in yourself that you can. Manage if nobody sits with you, like, oh yeah, that would be really hard.
[00:43:17] Oh, what might you feel? Right? Like, like that kind of just I can be with you as we think about it ahead of time.
[00:43:23] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:43:23] Rebecca Wong: I think that's the work of parenting. It's am I able to respond? Am I able to attune to, it's not, can I fix or can I teach you all the time?
[00:43:32] John Clarke: Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
[00:43:34] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:43:35] John Clarke: And I imagine for parenting teenagers, a lot of it is like.
[00:43:38] It's the same, helping them evaluate. Yeah. And and it's the same. It's the same. And helping them evaluate like the decisions they're making or, you know. Mm-hmm. Um, just like, what, what is the role of parent at that stage? So, yeah.
[00:43:52] Rebecca Wong: Well, I think on some level, the first challenge as they get older and older is to stay attuned and connected.
[00:43:58] Right. And, um, [00:44:00] that's not always easy, right? As peers come in, they, they're. They tend to try to sway towards their peers, and part of our work of parents is to stay connected.
[00:44:11] John Clarke: Yeah, yeah. Doesn't it all back to your brand? Doesn't Yeah. Yeah.
[00:44:15] Rebecca Wong: I guess so.
[00:44:16] John Clarke: Yeah.
[00:44:17] Rebecca Wong: Yeah,
[00:44:18] John Clarke: yeah. But it really is like the, the, the central thread to, to everything.
[00:44:22] Um
[00:44:22] Rebecca Wong: mm-hmm.
[00:44:22] John Clarke: Yeah. Yeah. Uh, Rebecca, what, what, um, yeah, anything left for today that kind of feels unsaid or, and or if not, um, let us know a little bit more about like how your. Working with people right now and how people
[00:44:36] Rebecca Wong: mm-hmm.
[00:44:36] John Clarke: Learn more about your work and get in touch.
[00:44:38] Rebecca Wong: Oh, okay. Um, yeah, I think that that covers a lot of, a lot of what I thought we were gonna be talking about today, John.
[00:44:48] Um, I, I have a few offerings these days. Like I, I mentioned the, the grief gatherings. I'm calling them the Geography of Grief.
[00:44:57] John Clarke: Mm-hmm.
[00:44:57] Rebecca Wong: Um, but I have those [00:45:00] gatherings. I think the next one is, uh, mid-October. Um,
[00:45:04] John Clarke: great.
[00:45:05] Rebecca Wong: And then I, uh, for people who are in the Hudson Valley in New York's Hudson Valley, I have a workshop series coming up called Relationally Rooted.
[00:45:14] The first workshop is in, at the end of September, and it's about turning towards, the next one is about, um, boundaries and edges, and the third workshop is about, uh. Ruptures and repairs, and those are each like, I don't know, like three and a half, four hour workshops. They include a meal. Uh, folks can come to one or all.
[00:45:36] Um. And I run consultation groups for therapists that are kicking off next week and I run my intensives. Um, so those are like 20 hour packages for individuals or couples or other, other formations of adults, um
[00:45:53] John Clarke: mm-hmm.
[00:45:53] Rebecca Wong: Throuple and other kinds of groups that, uh, just kind of wanna do some really deep work.
[00:45:59] Um.
[00:45:59] John Clarke: Mm-hmm. [00:46:00]
[00:46:00] Rebecca Wong: So those are my offerings and everything that I do can be found@connectfullness.com.
[00:46:06] John Clarke: Great. Yeah. Easy enough. Yeah. Um, Rebecca, thank you so much for being here and for your work and, uh, your message. And, um, yeah. It's good to see you after probably a decade.
[00:46:17] Rebecca Wong: Yeah, it's been a long time. It's really good to see you again, John.
[00:46:21] Thanks for having me.
[00:46:22] John Clarke: Yeah. Thanks again.
[00:46:23] Rebecca Wong: Yeah.
[00:46:24] John Clarke: Thanks for listening to another episode of Going Inside. If you enjoyed this episode, please like and subscribe wherever you're listening or watching, and share your favorite episode with a friend. You can follow me on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok at johnclarketherapy and apply to work with me one-on-one at JohnClarketherapy.com.
[00:46:42] See you next time.