Where does fear reside, and how can we conquer it, especially in the pursuit of new opportunities? These are the questions we grapple with as we examine the unique experiences of women of color in the workplace, guided by the wisdom of our guest, Duly Orozco, a licensed mental health counselor. We delve into the power of relationships, the potential for greatness, and the challenges that inhibit us from forging meaningful connections.
Much like an expedition, we set out to explore the vast landscape of diversity, equity, and inclusion. We take a critical look at assimilation in the United States and the alarming implications of anti-Arabic violence. We unfold the importance of representation in leadership roles and expose the inadequacies of a 'one size fits all' approach to diversity initiatives. This journey compels us to understand the individual stories and experiences that shape our identities, both in and out of the workplace.
Finally, we wrestle with our own biases and the discomfort they stir within us. It's a confrontation that invites us to exercise self-compassion and empathy. We explore how to cultivate relationships, the power of vulnerability, and the growth that comes from recognizing and confronting our biases. Join us, as we open the door to these exciting conversations and more with Duly Sierosco. We guarantee it's a conversation that will challenge, enlighten and empower you.
CONNECT WITH ME MORE AT:
http://www.stopshoulding.me
https://www.instagram.com/minessa.konecky/
🎵 Thank you to Karacter for allowing me to use Telepathy (2005) in my intro.
This is one of my favorite albums of all time.
👉 Check it out: https://karacter.bandcamp.com/album/karacter
Where does fear reside, and how can we conquer it, especially in the pursuit of new opportunities? These are the questions we grapple with as we examine the unique experiences of women of color in the workplace, guided by the wisdom of our guest, Duly Orozco, a licensed mental health counselor. We delve into the power of relationships, the potential for greatness, and the challenges that inhibit us from forging meaningful connections.
Much like an expedition, we set out to explore the vast landscape of diversity, equity, and inclusion. We take a critical look at assimilation in the United States and the alarming implications of anti-Arabic violence. We unfold the importance of representation in leadership roles and expose the inadequacies of a 'one size fits all' approach to diversity initiatives. This journey compels us to understand the individual stories and experiences that shape our identities, both in and out of the workplace.
Finally, we wrestle with our own biases and the discomfort they stir within us. It's a confrontation that invites us to exercise self-compassion and empathy. We explore how to cultivate relationships, the power of vulnerability, and the growth that comes from recognizing and confronting our biases. Join us, as we open the door to these exciting conversations and more with Duly Sierosco. We guarantee it's a conversation that will challenge, enlighten and empower you.
CONNECT WITH ME MORE AT:
http://www.stopshoulding.me
https://www.instagram.com/minessa.konecky/
🎵 Thank you to Karacter for allowing me to use Telepathy (2005) in my intro.
This is one of my favorite albums of all time.
👉 Check it out: https://karacter.bandcamp.com/album/karacter
I can't Right. Well, thank you. Thank you, lissette, for being here. I'm so excited to introduce you to my audience. Now I want to share a little bit about why I thought you were so special and I wanted to have you on the podcast.
Speaker 1:We were on the board of the Staff Short Conference for Women Together and we did an open we did that open sort of conversation where women in the Plymouth community and the South Shore community got together and talked about some of the challenges that they face. And one of the things you said was about how so many of us like one of the things that the challenges is about making friends, building relationships and you talked about fear and about how so many of us are afraid. We're afraid to be accepted, we're afraid we won't be accepted, we're afraid of what other people will think. There's just a lot of fear that comes into our decision making. That, honestly, is almost subconscious and I was like, oh, that's such a delicious conversation to have. I wanted to have you on so we could talk about this idea. But before we dive straight in, let's introduce you to everybody and tell us, tell my audience, a little bit about yourself. Where do you come from? What do you do? Why do you do what you do? Tell us about yourself.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so my name is Duly Sierosco. I am a licensed mental health counselor, in license in the state of Massachusetts, and I just say that because unfortunately it's very limiting because of licensing where and you know where you can do and where can you do it. So I do one on one therapy with women of color, not just Latinas, but women of color in general where I assist them to really find new perspectives so they're able to honor their magic, which I feel that we suppress so so much, just how unique we are and how magical we are. And most recently I also started working with groups of employees of color and I'm really loving that. It just sparked a whole new fire in me.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness, if you said like a few things there that I want to talk about, so I want to hear about your employee thing first. Let's dive into that because I'm so curious. What are you? So? Because this is something that's very I feel, very, I feel very passionately about.
Speaker 1:So, going back into corporate America, you know, when I was on the outside of corporate America, I would see all the DEI initiative stuff in the news and people talking about it, but like I mean, I was doing my own thing outside so I could be. You know, I was inclusive in my community and my audience and so on, so corporate America didn't really impact me that much. Having gone back into corporate America now, as a person of color who passes and then who has so many friends who are people of color, who are, I would love like we have a very different experience of corporate America, I think, than our colleagues do who are, who are white, and so I am curious to know what are some of the challenges that you're, what are some of the things that you're finding that are challenges that employees of color are facing in the workplace, and how is like how you know that you mentioned that you're finding a real fulfilling. I'm curious to know like what excites you about working with this group and the potential of for greatness there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I say that I was raised as a therapist in a very conservative way and I was raised as a human being in a in also a very conservative way, but but as a therapist I mean that because you know it's almost like following the path. What was the path? The path was you go to school, you get your license, which for me was very difficult and just because of how the process of being an international student was right and then you know having to be sponsored by a company and all of that like the immigration process behind the scenes, and then what you see, what you typically see me as, is people working in community mental health setting, which I did for many years, especially Spanish being my first language and being a cultural therapist I had so many like the level of people that were referred to me was so high, right, and then my daughter was born and for for my family it just didn't make sense financially to give and it's a very personal decision but for us it didn't make sense to give someone pretty much my whole salary, so I could, you know that person, could watch her and I could go work, and that's when I started my private practice and what I always saw was people you know taking insurance. So taking insurance was the way to do it and I decided not to take one or two, but every single insurance, like I was part of like 12 insurance, different insurance network, right, and I was a generalist and I had so many referrals.
Speaker 2:Again, I spoke, I speak Spanish is my first language and, depending on the day, I speak Portuguese or Portugese, it depends, right, like sometimes it's Portuguese, sometimes it's like a mixture, but just because of that I got so many referrals. So in my mind, being a therapist meant doing one-on-one therapy, right, and not choosing and not and then like very organically through COVID. Well, that's that's. Maybe that's another story.
Speaker 2:I'm not a part of myself, but basically what happened is that I was able to see how fear was stopping me from doing more and trying new things. And this, a local corporation, reached out to me and they were like we have a lot of international employees. Are you open to have a workshop? This was December 2020, the middle of the pandemic, and none of them could travel to see their families. So they were like, do you want to do a workshop on how to approach the holidays? And I was like, let's do it. I did it and I realized that what they wanted was to talk. So when they came back to me and they were like, they love that, can we do a workshop a month? I was like I don't think they want to hear me talking. They want to talk among themselves, right? So that was my proposal and I've been working with them ever since, for the past two year plus. But that opened up possibilities to do workshops about things that we're afraid to say and we need to say and what happens, right? What are your? So?
Speaker 2:Going back to your challenges, the question about challenges I feel, minesa, that many times we see in paper or when you see a website, it's like we are inclusive, we have all this, you know, like ERGs and diversity, equity and inclusion, and the reality is not, you know, when you really dig into what happens, that's not the case, unfortunately. Right, it checks every mark when you look at it from the outside, but not from the inside. So, having an opportunity to talk about what's going on, which, for me, has been surprising, really the fact that people are speaking up, and I feel it's because they're tired, they just you know they cannot sustain this lifestyle anymore. Yeah, so the challenges that I've seen are not enough representation and just the mandates that are put up when something happens, right Like that, get covered up with more mandates, like bigger mandates, and that's just, it's collapsing. So people are leaving, people are very dissatisfied and I feel that more and more, some of them are speaking up, while some of them feel trapped and while some of them feel this is never going to change.
Speaker 2:This is how I've always been treated. It's better than what my parents had. Therefore, you know, I do have a job, while everybody else is being laid off. What should I be complaining about? And this create all these cognitive dissonance in your mind and you feel like crap, right Like. So that's kind of like the ongoing challenge I've seen which is. It's just worsening, unfortunately. Does that answer your?
Speaker 1:question. Oh my God, so good. As you're talking, all I could think of was I was almost like you were sharing, like, because I remember when I first came to the state. So I am an American citizen, but I lived in Pakistan my whole life until I was 20 something. So when I came here, I essentially immigrated. However, I had the enormous privilege of already having a US passport, which meant that I didn't have to deal with all of the additional, honestly, trauma and exhaustion, and that comes from having to prove that you are worthy and OK to be allowed into the country, right. So I didn't have to prove anything, I just was able to come in. So that's enormous amount of privilege, even including that, even taking that into consideration, it's when you come here and now you think about how your parents grew up, because, as you said, that that really resonated to me, because I'm thinking to myself.
Speaker 1:Ok, my grandparents lived in a very small village in northern India, right in Bhavendi, and so, and then they moved to Karachi and they they were after partition they were one of the first families to move to Karachi, to Pakistan, and left a lot of. Some of the family came, but some of them stayed there, right. So that's the context that for many of us that we use, right. So like I'm not working in a mud hut, so I'm good, right. And so now you come here and you're working in, like we have electricity and we have. I mean, we had electricity too, but you know, like they, you know, at some point in my, my, my ancestral past, we didn't, and you know, so you were willing. I think the framework we bring in is that we're willing to tolerate a lot less, because where our, our experience shows Well, and then there's the you said earlier I should be grateful to have a job Like that's a, that's a big one.
Speaker 1:You know, that's a big story. That is so because it's almost like you're somebody's, like literally beating you up and just saying you should be grateful that you have a roof over your head. Yes, I know this hurts, but you'd be grateful to have a roof over your head. And you know it's interesting, because I feel like people are talking about it now, do you? I don't think that they've talked about it in the past and I think that now that they are talking about it, what I'm and I'm curious to know what your thoughts are on this, because this is something that, like, my brain gets muddy when I think about it, cause I'm like how do we solve this problem?
Speaker 1:So you have a bunch of people who are in a space that they're feeling unheard, they're feeling they're overworked, they're overwhelmed. Covid didn't help, because you've got this. Now you're working from home and you may not have the boundary set, and for many of us, we were raised with work ethics that have you literally working till your knuckles are bleeding and so you will work without having that. I'm shutting the door and leaving the office. You will work until you drop dead. What, as somebody who works with these corporations, do you feel like the companies understand what's happening, or see what's happening? Like what do you think is happening on that level? Cause it seems like they're saying the words. The people on the bottom are saying they're in trouble, the solution isn't actually helping. So what is actually happening in that spot?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so this is relatively new for me, right? I've been doing this work for the past two years, which is not too long. I feel that I'm learning more as I go and I haven't had so I haven't had the chance to work on going with many corporations. Right, I've worked on going with about three or so nonprofits and also colleges, and I feel that's a whole different ball game than the representation of a firm.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:And I see the difference. So I do see the difference. To answer your question, and I don't know if what I've seen is so. I don't wanna generalize, right, but from what I've seen, no, they do not understand. However, I don't know if part of it is denial, right, like there's a very naive part of me that wants to believe it's denial, but what I've seen is that, or like the bigger part of me, and it makes me sad to say this, but I'm gonna say it is productivity and capitalism and numbers, right, and even in mental health coming from a mental health background, in a nonprofit, mind you productivity was a big part of how the whole system, the health care system, which I don't think works well or well enough, right, it was productivity and it was an incentive that was based on whether or not you meet that productivity and we got to the point where we were encouraged to double book clients, right. So it's.
Speaker 2:But to answer your question, I wanna believe that they don't understand it because they don't know what's going on. But I feel that, unfortunately, they do know what's going on and they don't care. Or like the level of turnover or the level of dissatisfaction among employees, that's not big enough to change the culture right. However, I see this. Smaller companies that completely align with my values and that are like so not every company needs to be like that, but I see that in the like I feel that's. I see that in smaller companies means I feel like this big, big corporations lack that, and not because they don't have good people there. I absolutely wanna say that there's beautiful, amazing people there, but sometimes they're not enough. What like their efforts are not enough right, or what they're doing it's not enough and it might not be as valued and as appreciated, and it gets to the point where they can even be seen as travel makers or, you know, like just somebody that is going against the flow or which. I've been, I've been all of that, I've been named, all of that.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm all about that. I'm all about disruption.
Speaker 2:It's like you can't have children to disrupt, but. I think you know there's an element of not being afraid.
Speaker 1:You know, in order to do that because, like you said, some people can't afford to be seen as a travel maker, because they need to be able to have that job right, so they can't speak up.
Speaker 2:Yes, but unfortunately that only exacerbates all these beliefs and all these trauma and all these cycles. So it's like, yes, I see it right. And maybe you're a single mom and maybe you also have been harassed by your boss and you feel that's the thing. It's like where is that line where, even though you're afraid, you're well-being, you're emotional well-being, you're right, like it's like where is that line and how much are you willing to take right?
Speaker 2:Because there's this part of you that feels that you cannot speak up and it's I feel it's impossible to do it unless you have the resources. And where are those resources? Right?
Speaker 1:Which goes back to the capitalism thing, cause, again, it's like you have to acknowledge that something's a problem and then also acknowledge that, okay, this resource is needed to solve it, and then provide that resource in order for that to happen. Right, and then you have someone at the higher levels in a corporation who has that perspective. Then that's just not where the money or the resources are gonna go. You know, and you said something. You said, oh shoot, what was it that? You said? I'm so good, it was so good. Hold on, I hate it when that happens. You were talking about people. Oh, you were talking about people who are like. You were like where is that line? Right, where is that line? And I think that's such a powerful thing right, cause, like when you think about any change in your life, there is the moment before you found the line and the moment after. Now it may take you six years to leave the marriage or leave the relationship or whatever, but the moment that you discover the line, you'll never forget that. That's the moment you decided I'm done.
Speaker 2:And I'm going and you cannot unsee it.
Speaker 1:I know right, you can try, you can try and you're like no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 2:I don't want to see it, I don't want to think about it, but deep down in your heart you know that it's there.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and I think you know what you said earlier about the fact that more people are talking about it. Now, I was. There's a. I follow a, vanessa Bennett online. She's a therapist and she's fabulous, and so she did. I can't remember a video a long time ago where she was talking about how she said that we are entering into a space where people are just tired of other people telling them what to do. People are tired of having to, you know.
Speaker 1:Going back to what you were saying earlier, actually we're talking about magic, helping, you know, women of color find their magic, and that's so much of it is is of our magic is inside.
Speaker 1:Right, I'm gonna connect these two thoughts together, because I there's a drawing I have of myself that I put on Instagram. That is me standing there. It's like a cartoon, me, and just like sparkles coming out of my fingers. Right, because in my mind, I see my magic like unleashing and like lighting up a page, and it's like it's such a cute little picture. I'm like, oh, I see myself, but that's literally how I see what's happening to me now, whereas before I see myself as having been like almost dulled and grayed out, and so I wanted to ask you like, and it's only of late that I started to realize how much women of color have to suppress their inner magic. Like it's it's actually so sad, like it's heartbreaking, right, because I can remember. I remember and now so I'm curious to know why do you feel like women of color feel like we have to hide all the things about us that are magical?
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's so many things to this question, but the first thing I think of it's survival right. It's like it seems to me that for so long, and unfortunately for some people, even still now, you really need it to blend in the less attention that you cause, the better Even. You know, right now there's, at least with Spanish, and I feel that it's happening with many other languages too. But please tell me what you think. You know, I see this almost like the shame on second, third generation, because they don't speak Spanish, and it's like but why didn't you did? Why did this happen? Right, Like not blaming their grandparents, their parents, but almost like asking why. And it's because, well, you know, we didn't want to speak any Spanish. Or, like, you know, if we spoke English it was better. Like less attention. And I feel that it comes back to this, to blending in the less attention you cause, the better, right, like, and I feel that that magic, really the for many, many people, goes back to who you are and what makes you you. But what makes me me is partly being a Venezuelan immigrant, like, that's part of me that I cannot, you know, just decide to forget about that and that's part of my magic, right, and I feel that for so many of us perhaps you know, even like I've talked to some woman about that working, finance and that working and big, big, like titles, right, and then saying that they do not dress with the colors they want to dress, being Latinas, and you know, like I don't know like hot pink or whatever it is, we like color. But because you know they're in that environment and they don't feel and it's, this is something very, it can't be seen as something very little, right, like what color of clothes you want to wear. But it goes up to how do you want to wear your hair? Right, like how, what's the volume? Or do you allow yourself to use when you're talking? Because for so many people it's like why are you screaming? Or you know, like, why are you moving your hands so much? It's like, it's, it's.
Speaker 2:I feel that it goes back to survival and the more I blend in, the better. It was right For me or for my family. And because we've been living in survival mode for so many years, there's so much self-doubt miness in like wait, like what's gonna happen? Right, like is this, what do I even like? And I feel that that's a lot of what I do through my workshops. It's like really exploring that self-identity piece what's yours, what's not yours? You've been told this and that, but is that something? What do you think? Right? Because I feel that there's all this talk about diversity, equity and inclusion, which is great, but it seems to me that we don't really get to appreciate and get all the benefit from that until we truly know who we are Like. Who is it that? That? Yeah. So I feel that we're suppressed, all of that, because we've been living on survival mode for so, so, so long, trying to blend in, trying to be okay, being quiet, right and just being humble, being grateful, all these things. Does that make sense, minna? What do you?
Speaker 1:think it does. And you know the thing that actually, I think you've given me like the best segue ever. This is gonna be such a great clip, so we're gonna pull this as a freaking clip, is that? No, because you said, right, you're talking about blending in and, like, it gave me a perfect segue to talk about why whiteness is a privilege. Right, because I'm Pakistani but I look white, I pass, and that gives me the ultimate privilege of being able to completely blend in if I choose to, which means that I only need to claim my identity if I want to. I don't, and that's a privilege, right.
Speaker 1:And so, and in the context of what you just said, that makes sense as to why that's a privilege right, cause a lot of times, people will say, like, why is whiteness a privilege? Like, what does that do for me, especially if you're not a person of color at all? Like, you're just white, white right, and you're just like dude, I don't understand. I grew up, I had to struggle, I had to do all those things. Like, why is whiteness like? Why does that be a privilege? Why can that be a privilege? And I think the key thing that you talked about is that everybody's trying to blend in, and the better and easier you, the easier of a journey you have to blend in right, the more privilege you have because you're blending in, and so this is something that's like so important for people to recognize, right. Because now, on the flip side of that conversation, okay Is this I'm not Pakistani enough because I'm not dark enough I use to talk about, so I speak Urdu.
Speaker 1:I grew up speaking Urdu, but there's a lot in fact, my first language was Urdu, right, so, like I spoke English a lot of my life. But you know, my first word was Hathi, you know. So that means elephant, and my mom always thought that was funny that my first word was Hathi. When I was living in the United States, I was like it was in. Like you know, I was living in Texas for like that year, right before I moved, and so I was in Pakistan.
Speaker 1:I was never Pakistani enough. I was always the white one, right, I was always the, and so there's like a huge for me. I always felt left out because I was like, well, I'm not you know enough for my culture, right, and then here and so, like it's really interesting, I think, as we talk about these ideas just in general, the fact that we all have to think about these in and of themselves adds to it a layer of privilege to somebody who never has to think about these things, right? So like I never have to think about whether I'm like because I like not me, but like I'm talking about somebody who literally never has to think about these things, because I still think about them, just in a different way, and I think that for me, I suppressed so much of myself in various ways because again trying to assimilate, because I came to the States in 1998 and 2001 was September 11th right.
Speaker 2:So like almost immediately.
Speaker 1:I'm now at Pakistani in the States and people are always making these terrorism jokes and they're like and there's a lot. It was like why do people hate our country? There's just so like. At that time it was in my best interest to just blend in right absolutely where it is safer, because people there was a lot of Anti-arid violence at the time, brown skin violence, that kind of thing I mean at the time like that doesn't happen now.
Speaker 1:I know at the time it was very intense because of that particular issue. Right now, where's a whole different volume happening and I would argue, and intensified and accelerated thing that now People in the workplace have to think about right, and so the question I think is is, like you know, there's an element of so. For some people, dei is like an activity that they're doing, but I think for people of color, dei is more about safety, right, about feeling safe in the workplace. What do you think about that?
Speaker 2:I Feel it depends on the context. What I've seen is that in theory, it could help them feel safe, but Unfortunately it could also trans. It could also be seen as a check mark Right, like oh, our company, we're doing this, check right, and you can tell when that's the case. And I feel, looking at it from that perspective, it almost, instead of helping you feel safe, I feel that it has the opposite effect, because you feel it, you know it, so it's like oh, no, right, like this is. Do you know what I mean, vanessa? What do you think? Oh, you're muted.
Speaker 1:Yes, no, I yeah, no, I'm honestly with you because I think that that's the difference, right, between the DEI initiatives that work in the ones that don't. Because, like, yeah, I'm approaching DEI from a space of, okay, I want to make sure that my employees feel safe in this place, okay, so the first thing I have to do is make sure I have a person of color on HR, just have to make sure that that happens, right.
Speaker 2:so, like, and hopefully every department, but my yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm just using this example, right, and then I mean, wait a minute, we need people of color in every department. But I yes my actual point, though, is that if anybody has any problems, they have to have someone to be able to take it to right. So, like I gotta have that right, what other things do I need?
Speaker 2:you just said adding, you know, making sure that there's people of color in departments leadership positions, because what right like so Can you really show that it is possible For you to grow in that corporation as a person of color? Not because you're a person of color, but because you're great at what you do and because you deserve the Deserve it. You deserve it, you deserve the, the opportunity of being seen.
Speaker 1:But when you don't see representation, it's, it's hotter, right, um, I mean you don't think that like, because it sends a message You're not the person we're looking for. Yeah, so, people of color and leadership, people of color, and you know, and it has to be, you know when I think about because, like, in some places that are smaller, right, you've got to like, think to yourself if I five people, you know how many are you, how many people are you gonna have? Like, and not thinking about it in terms of, oh my god, dude, I saw this thing the other day and I thought it was so like. So somebody posted and said Don't put you the color on your staff because of like, we're not spices. You don't just add us here and be like, okay, right, and so I really made me think about it a lot, right, and I realized you know what it's not about spices and I said you know what it is.
Speaker 1:It's about the fact that Each person you have forget about color for a moment, let's just talk about each person with a different background, a different set of experiences that you bring into a conversation or a room will bring that much more Brilliance, that much more problem-solving ability, that much more depth, because you're getting a lot of different perspectives. Absolutely, we're thinking about DEI. We really need to not be thinking about it in terms of color, race, but different experiences, and saying, okay, well, the only person who could have had this type of different experiences is a black man from Detroit or is a you know, or like the black community in Boston or the Pakistani community here, or anyone Could have this if they grew up, you know, in poverty or whatever. But like the Experiences. And then at that point you're actually going to, by default, bring in people of a variety of races, religions, colors, like you'll have a spectrum, because you're actually looking for the different experiences.
Speaker 1:But I think right now we're so fixated and I mean life experiences, I don't mean work experiences, because if you leave a work experience, you're gonna put the same list over and over again. I'm thinking like you came from Venezuela, wow, think like I know how much work you had to do to be able to get into the, to be able to get the visas, and Over the years, like just how it, just how the system works right, mm-hmm, and so that's an experience I don't have. Bringing you to the room by default makes it a better room.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and also I Feel that right now, in many spaces I go, I feel this division. It's like Us versus them all almost right, like it's it's either good or bad. It's like I Don't want to get into politics, but that you know, exact, surveyed all of this black and white thinking for so many people and it's like can we just what happens when you listen to each other, right, and when you're there's, it's just like what can you learn? Like what can I know this might sound so cliche mean, is somebody's like, but you know, like what happens when you are able to listen somebody else talking about their life experience, or listen somebody else talking about whatever it is, but with that level of tolerance and compassion and Even if, like, it doesn't have to be anything huge, and many times that's where the magic is.
Speaker 2:But I guess what I'm what I want to bring is how that opens up space for you being more tolerant, you learning, you learn about yourself, because you also learn about what is it that trigger you or what is it that you don't like? You know, you learning that we all have, we're all biased, right and and saying that I'm not, it's just not Not true. Um, but yeah, it's. It's like everything that can open up one one that space is a possibility, and in so many Places right now, it's not even a possibility, like it's not even something to consider.
Speaker 1:So so let me ask you something. Actually, you talked about. I think probably the most important thing was, like you've said. I mean, you said a lot, like you've said so many important things. All this is this entire episode. It's just clips and clips. And I looked at the time just now and I'm like, oh my god, have we already been talking for 45 minutes? Like how does that happen? I haven't even asked you a single question from my list. This is this is how great. This love it. Um, but here I think let's, let's wrap on. This question is One of the most important things I think we all need to do, and this is the hardest thing I do in my life.
Speaker 1:I think, anytime I do it is confront our own biases. So I'm curious to know if we're all going to walk away from this and say okay, because we talked a lot today about DEI and how people feel. I think this is such a great opportunity for people to get to know a different experience of the world and just sort of like, because I feel like these are the things we talk about when we're just talking, not on a podcast, so you get to be a fly on the wall, but I think that walking away, being able to challenge your own biases, is probably the greatest gift you can walk away with, because it'll make it easier to create empathy, to create relationships. So I'd love to hear from you If I came to you as a client as a client or patient, sorry, as a patient and I'm basically I want to learn how to confront my own biases and deal with that awful discomfort that comes when you realize you have a bias. How do we navigate that uncomfortable space? And like, how would you recommend somebody work through some of that?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I would say first of all and I say this for so many things, but I don't get tired of saying it you don't have to do it on your own Right. Like I feel that so many of us were so good at convincing ourselves that we can do it on our own. We've been doing it. We have proof that we can do it on our own. We can get very good at it. I don't need any help. I can be hyper-independent, and it's like well, what if you ask for help to start out with.
Speaker 2:And, minnes, I feel that self-compassion can be such a key ingredient to for everything, really like that self-compassion change my life. That's a pillar on the work I do. I feel that, as people of color, is exceptionally hard to practice self-compassion, even though we might understand that in theory. But adding self-compassion to this process of, well, you can be nice to yourself learning about it and navigating through it, and nice to yourself by letting somebody hold you right and help you. You don't need to do it on your own. And you know like there's the elements of self-compassion that I don't want to talk about now, but when we really break self-compassion into what it means, each of those elements can be so, so helpful in the whole process.
Speaker 1:So you made me tear up there. I like that self-compassion. I think, honestly, it was the single greatest skill that I learned in my healing journey. It has helped me enormously, like throughout the years. Like I cannot stress enough that that is. If you take nothing away from this podcast, take that away Self-compassion, all right. So, to wrap up, you are located in Massachusetts. So let's say, someone in Massachusetts is looking for a therapist how do they find you? How do they work with you? Or someone wants to hire you for their company. How?
Speaker 2:do they connect? Yeah, yeah, so I'm in Massachusetts Duelcioreuscocom that's my website. I'm active through LinkedIn and Instagram and it's Latina immigrant therapist altogether. So I work one-on-one with mostly women of color in Massachusetts, and the good thing is that I can work with corporations or groups or colleges nationwide, because that is not therapy. What I do with in that setting is not therapy. So they can connect with me. We'll take it from there, we'll explore what they need and I also started doing, you know, those corporations that have retreats.
Speaker 2:So I started working, yeah, so I'm so excited to explore all these different avenues. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh, that's fab. All right, you know that I am a total proponent of therapy. So if you're in Massachusetts and you're looking for a therapist, don't say as your person Go. And then if you own a company, or if your company needs this kind of support or heck, if you just want to find, explore and learn a little more, make sure you reach out to her. Duelcioreuscocom. Thank you so much for your time today. It was so great talking to you.
Speaker 2:Thank you, minnes, thank you, Thank you. I know that I could talk to you for hours and hours, and hours.
Speaker 1:I know right, we really could. I was like, oh my God, it's time to go, okay, okay, there we go.