Season 1: Episode 2:Breaking Free from Generational Trauma: Tools for Understanding and Healing
Mar 08, 2023Season 1Episode 2
Shalonda Carlisle
What if you had the tools to break free from a cycle of generational trauma? Join your hosts Shalonda Carlisle, Kawaski Williams and Dr. Bianca Bullie as we delve deep into the heart of this often overlooked issue with our esteemed guest, Jonathan Winston, a licensed clinical social worker with over a decade of experience. Jonathan eloquently unravels the complexities behind generational trauma, explaining its profound impact on our lives and how it subtly imprints itself on our genes, akin to a curse passed down through generations.
In the second part of our engaging dialogue, we shed light on the sensitive task of addressing these issues within families. We explore how to approach and engage family members without assigning blame or triggering defensiveness. Jonathan shares his compelling insights on collective responsibility and healing after confronting these deeply-rooted issues. Change can be painful, but it's necessary for healing. This episode is a treasure trove of knowledge and practical advice on how to bravely uproot and confront generational trauma. Tune in to equip yourself with the tools to break free and inspire lasting change.
What if you had the tools to break free from a cycle of generational trauma? Join your hosts Shalonda Carlisle, Kawaski Williams and Dr. Bianca Bullie as we delve deep into the heart of this often overlooked issue with our esteemed guest, Jonathan Winston, a licensed clinical social worker with over a decade of experience. Jonathan eloquently unravels the complexities behind generational trauma, explaining its profound impact on our lives and how it subtly imprints itself on our genes, akin to a curse passed down through generations.
In the second part of our engaging dialogue, we shed light on the sensitive task of addressing these issues within families. We explore how to approach and engage family members without assigning blame or triggering defensiveness. Jonathan shares his compelling insights on collective responsibility and healing after confronting these deeply-rooted issues. Change can be painful, but it's necessary for healing. This episode is a treasure trove of knowledge and practical advice on how to bravely uproot and confront generational trauma. Tune in to equip yourself with the tools to break free and inspire lasting change.
Powerful The Podcast Intro
Powerful the podcast Outro Music
Speaker 1:
Welcome to powerful the podcast. Powerful, optimistic women evolving relentlessly for uplifting lives. This podcast will discuss powerful topics regarding unspoken conversations that we usually shy away from on public platforms. Welcome to powerful the podcast. I am one of your hosts Shalonda Carlile Kawase Williams, dr Bianca Bulley, and today we have Mr Jonathan Winston. Jonathan Winston is a licensed clinical social worker with over a decade of experience. He's a father, a husband, a brother, and he has so many other titles. He has a private practice in Pearl Mississippi called Connecting the Dots. Welcome, mr Winston.
Speaker 2:
Thank you.
Speaker 1:
Okay, so we're going to go ahead and get started. Today's topic we are discussing overcoming broad generational curses. So, mr Winston, what are some habits or behaviors that one may consider to be a generational curse, and if you can give us the definition of generational curses that we great to I will Well thank you, first and foremost, for identifying overcoming generational trauma as a important topic of discussion.
Speaker 2:
First and foremost And I want to be stigmatizing and demonizing the word trauma, if you will, because it's more common, ms Carlile, than we think To have the emotional response of traumatic events is so common, especially in the African American culture, and it is cross cultural, if you will. But for far too long we've been led to believe that our experiences, that they're either a lesson or a blessing. That's what we've been taught, but most times we associate difficult circumstances in unfavorable situation with such a belief. However, to get to the root or to really identify how we overcome generational trauma, we must peel back the layer of generational trauma. We must look beyond the external factors and consider the internal transcription and transmission of trauma. Is that okay?
Speaker 1:
Ms Carlile, that is perfectly okay.
Speaker 2:
To get there, we must answer certain questions. Have you ever felt hopeless and helpless and couldn't explain why? Have you ever arrived to a space in?
Speaker 2:
your life where it seems like everything is truly going right, but you can't enjoy it. Have you ever been in a space and you've been preoccupied with how others feel about you and you often doing absolutely nothing because your actions are predicated on the beliefs of others? your paralyzed mentally? Have you ever been to a space where you negatively, or you view yourself yourself, worse yourself, esteem yourself, confident in a negative light, believing that your best is never good enough? I want to know have you ever craved for wrong people, wrong places and wrong things, despite what you know to be right and what you know to be true? then, despite the negative physical, emotional and spiritual consequences that you have when you indulge and engage in such behavior, it's almost like you have the thought of a frame of mind if loving you is wrong, i don't even want to be right. Well, we must look deeper.
Speaker 2:
These behaviors, or the feeling that I'm knowledge by nature. It comes from some way And more times than not, it is birthed out of generational trauma. Those addictive behaviors and obesity, depression, anxiety and numerous medical and mental health conditions are patterns. They are cycles that, if we really look at our family history, it's passed along from generation to generation, from my great-granddaddy, to my granddad and my dad and then to me. But it must stop now. What it is honestly, carlisle, is trauma-unfair And, i must be honest, i had to do a bit of research to look deeper and to see how really does it pass from one generation to the next? Is it simply the observational learning? Is it simply through what I'm taught by my dad? And sometimes, believe it or not, we will never have met our father, but yet act just like him.
Speaker 2:
Where does that come from? Where does that come from? I'll tell you, it's trauma-left unchecked. And the danger is trauma-left unchecked can leave a chemical mark on a person's genes which can then be passed from to future generations. So what am I saying? Chroma can actually affect the bloodline.
Speaker 2:
Now let's be clear This mark Shalonda doesn't cause a genetic mutation, but it does alter the mechanism by which the gene is expressed. This alteration is not genetic but guess what? It's epigenetic. This is a new found revelation for scientists. Epigenetic That reveals, although trauma, of course it doesn't change our DNA And let me make that clear But it does change the expression of a gene, in other words the genes for addiction, the genes for obesity, depression. It times, then times it on, and it puts us at risk for developing such mental health conditions or mood disorders and personality disorders. It's almost like, literally, it's a generational curse, pass down to the bloodline. And just because my grandmother was raped and that birth out of being raped and feeling vulnerable and feeling robbed of your life, pretty much That passed down. It is not changed. It's put a chemical mark on our gene.
Speaker 1:
So how do we break that?
Speaker 2:
How do we break that? I got you. We must first call it out. We got to first learn to call it what it is, because until we put a name to it, nothing in life responds to a call. If you do not call it by its name, call what it is. For my family it was verbal abuse. In order for me to change that curse that my grandfather did to my grandmother and my father did to my mother, i had to recognize and call it out.
Speaker 1:
But these other things? hi, jonathan, this is Kowalski. These are the things that we're not supposed to talk about when we're around, when we're with family or if family functions.
Speaker 2:
Everybody sees it, but nobody wants to call it out Exactly. Thus, it keeps the power to continue to go from one generation to the next. Not only that, we have to acknowledge you guys need to change. What do you think about that?
Speaker 3:
We do have to. This is Dr Bulley, we do have to acknowledge it And we have to stop letting it be the taboo, the unspoken in family generations passed along from one generation to the next. How do you believe we could address a family member regarding an issue or the generational curse, without placing the blame on the person or making them become defensive, without ensuing a conflict, because we get together at the family function. Everybody sees the child that was birthed in incest or the predator that is molesting one child out the next, or we may see some other incidents that the family, we know about it, we don't discuss it And we make it. How do we address that family member?
Speaker 2:
We start out by first acknowledging that you just didn't start with them, so we make it not a you thing but a we thing And anyone if you come to them with. we need to change and not you need to change. there'll be more apps to leave.
Speaker 3:
I can see that, because if it's going on from one one generation to the next, that means someone was everyone included, was knowing about and allowing it to continue to happen. So it is a we thing, it's a family thing and we should address it is how do we, you know, stop this?
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and the next question go ahead. I'm sorry, No, and even as parents, we have to be honest. A lot of times we see things, bad behavior or things that our children do that we scold them for And, to be honest, they got it from us. It doesn't just start with this generation, but it has happened before And in order to change it, we must be honest and own it ourselves We can. So how do we properly heal after confronting the issue or the behavior.
Speaker 2:
It doesn't feel good because when you have been attached to something for so long, you begin to make relationship with it. It makes you comfortable, and anybody that has ever been in a relationship with anything it could be food and I think that today you find comfort in it. So it's almost like you have to create a new normal change. It's painful. How do I feel it's painful? But then I must understand that it's necessary if I want to be better.
Speaker 1:
I agree. I agree, this was a wonderful topic, a wonderful discussion that we had today About breaking generational trauma and you know, mr Winston, i want to thank you. Do you have any closing thoughts before we conclude this segment?
Speaker 2:
Well, just, we'll like to say that cycle can be broken, but we must rise up and choose to do something different in this generation. Great point.
Speaker 1:
Thank you for joining us today For our segment on overcoming generational trauma. I want you all to have a great day and stay blessed. Bye, bye. Thank you, mr Winston.