The Practice of Therapy

Gordon Brewer:
Well. Hello everyone and welcome again to the practice of therapy podcast. And I'm so happy to have with me, LaRonda Starling, welcome.
LaRonda Starling:
Thank you for having me.
Gordon Brewer:
Yes, yes. And I was so happy to learn about Loronda and she's going to probably talk about this here in a little bit, just her book on self care and spirituality as in terms of private practice practitioners and people that do this work. And so as I start with everyone Loronda tell folks a little bit about yourself and your private practice journey and how you've kind of landed where your land, wherever you land, where you have landed. Sorry, I got tongue tied there.
LaRonda Starling:
Okay. Episodic. I'm a licensed clinical psychologist, a licensed professional counselor and national certified counselor and I am a professor and adjunct. I am an adjunct professor at a Christian university, see if it happens. So I have a private practice right now in Arlington, sexist. And so I do psychological assessments, I do counseling, I do some consultations with other professionals as needed. And so that's basically what I'm doing right now. I have been in private practice since 2013 because that's when I received my license for clinical psychology. And since then I had started off small with a group of other people. And then about 2017, I had my own office. And so that's where I am actually right now in Arlington, Texas.
Gordon Brewer:
Wow. Yeah. And, and so you do psychological testing. And what, what other sort of kind of people do you tend to work with?
LaRonda Starling:
I work with children, adolescents, I work with adults. And so those people mostly come to me through the insurance panels when they, when they're calling. I was looking for therapists and then I also work with other agencies that we'll just call and say, okay, we need to work with you because maybe some people who need to be tested. And so some of that work is from the state of Texas and a program called Texas workforce commission. It's Texas workforce commission, vocational rehabilitation services. So on their end they're helping people find jobs. And for my part in that I get to be able to, and I'm really grateful to have this opportunity cause I feel like it helps the community. And so for my part, I get to do the psychological, psychological evaluations to let people know if they have a diagnosis of some kind. Some people already know. And so I'm just confirming it.
Gordon Brewer:
I see, I see. Yeah. And so and you're, you're in a solo practice, is that correct? At this point? Yeah. Okay. Cool. Well, I know one of the things that we had said we wanted to talk about, and I think this is just a really pertinent topic, just given kind of what we're going through, what we've been through. Depending on when you're listening to in terms of the whole covert 19 pandemic, I just felt like I don't know about Sheila, Rhonda, but I'm getting kind of wary in a way. I think we've kind of gotten through that adrenaline rush of it all and we're, we're ready to just kinda get on with life. But I know one of the things that you're, you've really addressed in your book and in other ways is just thinking about self care and so you want to say some more about that just in terms of how maybe therapists neglect to take care of themselves and that sort of thing.
LaRonda Starling:
Absolutely. I think we do and I think it's unfortunately I think it's natural because we are a caretakers and most of us we got into this field because we are givers and being a giver you have to sometimes take that time out to say, you know what? Not right now I'm just going to take this small time. Even if it is a small time that you have to take care of yourself and especially in private practice because what I found is that when if you work somewhere, you have people to do things for you so you have someone to do the scheduling and to help you with dealing and to greet your clients and we are private practice, especially as a solo practitioner. You're all of those things. And so you, there is always a time when you can be doing some work. Even, even though I'm in my office right now, if I'm at home, I'm always thinking, Oh, what can I do to kind of make next week work a little bit smoother for me?
LaRonda Starling:
Well I could probably do some paperwork ahead of time or just any number of things that you feel like it can do in terms of marketing. You can always just be doing something. And I think one of the things I I learned while I was writing a book is titled to be steel spiritual self care for mental health professionals. And I think that first part is the most important part is sometimes we just have to be steel. And sometimes that means to physically be steel in terms of just not being so busy in your day and doing something that you actually want to or like to do. And like a hobby or something. Cause of course we like to think they are happy and also to spiritually be steel. And so that's what the book is about.
Gordon Brewer:
Right? Right. Yeah. So what are, what are some of the practices that you kind of recommend that people take part in, in terms of that self care? You know, obviously we think of things like like hobbies and doing things that are fun. What are some other things that you feel like are helpful to people?
LaRonda Starling:
From a spiritual point of view? I think the, one of the first things to be to be aware of is who God is as a person. Because that's what I write in the book. If you know who God is, if you know that God is everywhere, if you know that he's all powerful, there's a lot of things that as private practice clinicians that are actually in charge of our business, we going to take so personally because we know that there is someone that we can go to and we can lean on, we can lean on God for those things. And then of course prayer and being intentional about, a lot of times we don't pray until something bad happens or until we have a bad day. But just being intentional throughout the day, just to make that time to pray to God. One of the things I always talk about in the book is just being able to reflect on the good in life.
LaRonda Starling:
There's a passage in the Bible that tells us to think about things that are good and pure. And in our world as, as mental professionals, a lot of times, especially right now is hard to put a finger on. What is good about this, you know, there's nothing good about a virus that's going around and in a lot of ways is invisible because a lot of us can be asymptomatic but then infect another person. And so if you are thinking about that, like what can I pull out of this that's actually good. Oh, I learned how to do teletherapy, which is, it was me and I learned, I had a platform that I had to learn really quickly so that my clients could see me still the ones that were afraid to come out. And for my students, I we had to revamp one of the classes that we had for them a little bit to just tweak some things so they didn't have to have that face to face component.
LaRonda Starling:
And so if you think about, you know, what's the good in that? Well, I practiced the flexibility that I teach as a clinician. And so some of the, a couple of other things, one of the things I taught talked about in the book was saying no and being able to say no in a loving way, not only to other people when they ask you to do something, when you feel overloaded or overwhelmed or overburdened, but also to yourself to be able to say, you know, I could do these extra things, but today we're not going to. And I think a lot of times right now some of our parents who are therapists who actually are having to homeschool their kids now and they're not able to get up in that hour and say, Hey, you know, everybody be still and get quiet and go into your work with.
LaRonda Starling:
They're having to do that now as a stay at home working parents at the same time. And so I think that I've seen a lot of pictures where parents have put signs on the, on the door that says, no, this is not an emergency, you know, give me until this time and I'll come out. And so just even having to have that boundary with their children is something that, you know, we can think about in terms of self care right now in terms of I can only be a therapist right now in this moment. And of course you still are a parent. And then at the end I do talk about what we typically think about self care because we still have to get enough sleep. We still have to eat enough, we still have to exercise and we still have to take care of our bodies in a physical way. And also to surround ourselves with good people and good friends and to be able to combine all those things with our spirituality practices.
Gordon Brewer:
Right, right. Yeah, I love that. I think it's one of the things that I'm reminded of of a there was a psychologist or a therapist back in the, I'm dating myself back in the 1980s, who his name was John Bradshaw. And he wrote a book called healing the shame that binds you. And one of the quotes in there that has just always stuck with me is to always remember that we're human beings, not human doings. And I think a lot of times we can get caught up in just feeling like we got to really push ourselves. Like we've got to get out and strive and do all this stuff. But I think sometimes we do need to take that, that downtime, that Sabbath to use that use that term to be able to just care for ourselves. And I think one of the things that has happened for a lot of us just through the season we're in with the, with the covert 19 and all of that, it's kind of forced us to do that to some degree. We've had been forced to kind of change the way we do things, change our habits. And really for many people become very reflective about those things.
LaRonda Starling:
Absolutely. Cause it caused everybody for at least a month now to actually get somewhere and be still. And there's nowhere else. Most people are going except for if you have to go to work or go to the grocery store. But otherwise you're sitting in your being able to sit in a quiet way. It's just your thoughts. And I think one of those things we do need to think about is how much we're being human beings and not human doing. So I think that's a perfect way to say that because in a lot of ways when people are depending on you to fix things and you always are the fix it person, he can start to feel like you just human doing and that you're not actually allowing yourself to be a real person. For example, if you're having to calm somebody else's fears when all this first started and you also are carrying your own fears about what's going on, that's perfectly okay.
Gordon Brewer:
Yeah. Yeah. And I think so many times with especially with human emotion it's not an either or proposition, but it's more of a both. And, and that we can, it's, it's perfectly reasonable for us to feel two things at once. You know, in terms of feeling anxiety around all that's going on. But at the same time feel compassion for others and feel you know, at peace about things. Yeah,
LaRonda Starling:
Absolutely. Yeah,
Gordon Brewer:
Yeah, yeah. No, go ahead.
LaRonda Starling:
As I say, that's where I, once I was able to feel, feel, finish setting up the teletherapy and getting my students that were anxious, calm, I just had to tell myself, you know, it's okay right now. Correct. If you want to just have a peaceful feeling. Because for myself, I needed to be a peace, but also for my clients, I needed to be able to be at peace when I saw them. And so I think that's important.
Gordon Brewer:
Right, right. Yeah. So what are, what are some other things that you feel are important for people to think about in terms of self care and you know, how they do that, particularly in the, in the spaces that we work in that I know a lot of times we get to hear some very heavy stuff from people. And I think that's something that yeah. So what are your thoughts about that?
LaRonda Starling:
You know what I learned, I was working at a community counseling center when I was an intern and a long time ago, but one of the supervisors that I had told me, he said, you know, when you come in, when you come in here, you're going to hear a lot of hard things. And Pete was right. And he said, just pretend you have a backpack. And when you come in here, you put that backpack on and in that backpack you're going to put all those people's burdens and all the stories. And I was scary things. You hear all the hard things that are here. You're gonna put it in that backpack. When you leave the door, you're not going to leave with that stuff. You're going to leave it right here. And so then when you come back, you can pick it up and then take it back into those rooms with you where it needs to be, the things that you need to remember to help your clients.
LaRonda Starling:
And I've taken that to heart this whole time. I think that's a good way to take care of yourself is to have a boundary with yourself and say, you know, when I walked through this door and I'm an intern and I'm somebody's therapist and I'm somebody rock, and when I leave this place, I am still a rock for some people because you know, you still have family and friends. But in terms of doing that all the time and always being turned on to the ability to know that, okay, I'm going to have to be a helper right now. It's okay to turn that off. And I think that as if you think about our profession, there are some things we can't turn off. So once you learn how to active, listen, it is really hard to turn that off. Like I remember being in a grocery store when I first learned how to do it and I'm talking to somebody and I'm going, conversation did not stop.
LaRonda Starling:
So there are some things that we've learned that we can't turn off because it's just having good listening skills are really good thing to have. But and so in so many ways that as a private practice clinician or just as a therapist in general is very important to say, you know, there are some things that I can't turn off, so I'm just going to protect that right now. And I think you can protect that sometimes by going somewhere where you can be by yourself, undistracted by the things of the world, even if it, even if you can't take a whole day, cause some people can't take a whole day. If you can take an hour, 30 minutes or 10 minutes, depending on how big your family is, and just take some time by yourself and just be able to reflect on what's going on with you and taking good care of you.
Gordon Brewer:
Right, right. Yeah, I think it's I think it's also important to build into our schedules that, that self care time. I know one of the times for me and it's been a little bit disrupted with what we've been going through here lately, but usually I like to walk in the mornings, weather permitting, and I usually, that's a time when I listen to podcasts, do some reflection and meditation and, you know, as you mentioned, prayer and that sort of thing. I think it's good that we have that built in to our daily lives, right. To be able to do that and take on those, take on those, those practices. I'm also reminded of you know and this is a kind of an illustration or a metaphor that I use a lot with, with clients is that one of the things that we as therapists want to do more than anything else is help others.
Gordon Brewer:
And what I'm always reminded of when we fly when you get on a plane, the first thing they do before they take off is go through the safety routine about you know, where the exits are and all of that. And they talk about the oxygen mask coming down in terms of, you know, if the cabin were to lose pressure. And the thing that they always tell you about that is you need to put on your own oxygen mask first before you try to help anyone else. And so I'm on, you know, certainly we're on the same page just about self care. I think it's, it's so important that we, that we're mindful of that as therapists and it's important that otherwise we're not going to do good work.
LaRonda Starling:
Absolutely. And I think the other thing out, cause I love to walk and just listen to music and especially being outside in the nature and just not being, cause in a lot of ways where unless you have therapy where sometimes I have therapists go outside and they're walking in, they're talking at the same time. But unless that's what your practice is about, you're going to be in the office all the time. And so being able to be outside, it's just a refreshing difference. And so hopefully when this is all we can all get back outside and walking. And also I think it is very important to take care of our own mental health and being able to say, you know, when you're having a bad time in life, okay, let me address this and I'm not pushing it to the side or ignoring it so that you can still get being able to take good care of you.
Gordon Brewer:
Right, right. And I, I'm a big proponent of every therapist needs a therapist so that they get yeah. And that's a, I know that's been valuable for me in my life. It's just being able to meet with my own therapist and being able to just talk about those things because, and I think too, just you know, regardless of how long you've been in practice doing supervision every now and then like you said, particularly for people that are in solo practices, having a way to bounce that their cases off of other people, other professionals and other people in this space to be able to, you know, get that feedback and get that get that support.
LaRonda Starling:
Absolutely. Yeah. And I think it's good for us to have support or getting to get into an organization where you have that support around my area. I am in the Fort worth
LaRonda Starling:
Association of psychological, I can't remember exactly all the, the words and the acronym is called WAAPA. So it's FW APA site here in Fort worth. It's really, really close to me. And we get together once a month. We have it since March, but we used, usually get together once a month to do a CEU and have lunch together. But it's also a time just to surround yourself with other clinicians. And so that you can have those talks if you need to about, you know, consultations or, you know, what are, what are we doing for our best practices? And also just not isolating yourself to your office. And if you, if you're not in solo practice, if you do have a few other colleagues, just not isolating yourself to those few places. Also, you know, nurturing other professional relationships.
Gordon Brewer:
Right, right. And that's you know one of the things that I do here at the practice of therapies, I have some focus groups that I lead and that is really the whole purpose behind that is, is to get that support and just be able to, to interact with other people that are going through same issues, same kind of things in their practices. And so, yeah, I think it's absolutely in, you know, having mentors, having people that you can lean on is just so important for, for doing the work that we do. So, yeah, I love that.
LaRonda Starling:
I just remember is Fort worth area, psychological association? Maybe nobody needs to know that, but my brain,
Gordon Brewer:
Yeah. Okay. Yeah. You had to say it, you had to say. Yeah, I get, I get it so well. Laronda is, as we think about I want to be respectful of your time and I'm so glad you joined me for this conversation. What are some other things or maybe parting thoughts you have for people that are listening just about self care and they're just maybe also talk a little bit more about your book and how they can get that and that sort of thing.
LaRonda Starling:
Okay. So just for a therapist out there, and even if you're not a therapist, even if you're just in a helping profession, because a lot of times when people are in the helping profession, but they might not be a therapist, you're still helping people. If you're, for example, if you're a teacher or you're working anywhere where people are depending on you and needing you for something right now, I would say just remember to take good care of yourself. People need you and they need you to be a healthy, humble youth. Unless you're taking care of yourself, it's going to be really, really hard. So, of course, you know, and I'm talking to myself, you know, when you can and when we are able to go back outside, freely get out there and do the walking if you're, if you can, the doctor allows you to let's do things that remind us who we actually are in terms of who we are when we were not their fist or who went when we were not teachers.
LaRonda Starling:
We're not helpers. So remember those hobbies and all the fun things that you like to do. Surround yourself with good people so that you do have that good social support network for when you need it. If things get too bad right now. I think just remember to reflect on what is good about what's going on right now. And I think a lot of times as therapists, we don't get looked at as the frontline workers. But in many ways I see that you are as mental professionals because when, when everything to go wrong and people started to become unemployed or they had a few less hours, now they're having to deal with their kids more than they have to. And then more behavior problems set in because they're not getting those kiddos, not being able to get that energy out of school. You're having to deal with that.
LaRonda Starling:
And so I'm just saying as a therapist, I see you and thank you for what you do if nobody has thanked you. And so of course my book is called be still spiritual self care for mental health professionals. And it can be found almost at any bookstore. So it's at Amazon, it's at Barnes and noble. It's not in the Barnes and noble store. But what they'll do is if you order it there, they will print it for you and then they will call you when it's finished, when it's finished printing, and then you can come in and pick that up. And so, you know, that's it.
Gordon Brewer:
Yes. Yes. Wonderful. And well, we'll have links to all this and the show summary and show notes. And so yeah, so Miranda, so glad to have you with us and I hope have other conversations with you here in the future. Sure,
LaRonda Starling:
Of course. Just call me you too.