Season 4 (Episode 6): Mental Health Awareness Month

Welcome to Pain, Passion, and Purpose. I am your host, Shakeeta Torres, where I share mental health education, biblical teachings, and tips to help you to heal on purpose so you can walk boldly in your God-given purpose. This podcast is sponsored by Empowered Purpose Academy, a certified online Christian academy where where we provide services such as certification for Christian life coaches, mentorship for master's level aspiring and existing Christian therapists, mentorship for Christians, and continued education courses for the body of Christ. You can visit www.empoweredpurposeacademy.com to learn more and to download your free guide. If you like today's episode, please subscribe and leave us a raving review so that others can tap into the knowledge and wisdom that will be shared on this podcast. Thank you so much for being here. Hey, hey, hey, welcome back to a new episode on Pain, Passion, and Purpose with Shakeeta Torres. And so, as you guys can see, I have an episode posting today on Sunday again this morning. Um, I posted the video from Throwing Thursdays here on the podcast about progressive miracles where the Lord had me teach you guys about Abram to Abraham. Okay, and so if you listen to that, prayerfully it blessed you, and I hope that it did. And so that episode was the last live I will be doing in reference to progressive miracles. I had a feeling that it would be 5 And I was right. So yesterday, the Holy Spirit actually told my husband that that particular series has ended, and God confirmed that in my heart. Okay. And so with that being said, I want to talk to you guys about Mental Health Awareness Month. As you can see by today's episode title, we're going to go into this series called Mental Health Awareness for for the body of Christ, okay? But I will not be doing that here on the podcast. So what that looks like is from May 1st to May 31st, every single day at 7:00 PM Eastern Standard Time, I will be posting, um, information, tips, resources about mental health and faith, or faith and mental wellness. When it comes to the body of Christ related to grief, depression, relationship issues, boundaries, human trafficking, and so much more, to include discounts on the things that I offer within my shop. Okay. And so I highly recommend that you join my email list. There will be a link in the description box of this podcast where you can sign up for my series called Breaking the Stigma. For the body of Christ when it comes to faith and mental wellness. Okay, so I'll be posting that content as well across my platforms. Um, Instagram— not Instagram, Instagram I might have a little bit of reels here and there, but it's not my primary focus. Um, I'll have some up there, but on my Facebook page, LinkedIn, um, and also my email list will receive that particular message every day, okay? But if you don't want to miss it, I really encourage you to join my email list. And so with that being said, I am on intermission now from the podcast and from Thriving Thursdays. For how long? I'm not 100% sure, okay? And so there are some things that I have been working on and things that the Lord has been transitioning me into, and I want to make like 2 or 3 more announcements so you guys can kind of know what's going on, where I'm at, and what, look forward to. So the next thing is I announced, um, earlier this week that I am creating a faith and mental wellness directory for those who are Christian therapists, Christian life coaches, for those who are pastoral counselors, um, for those who are associate level, associate level counselors as well, to join this directory. Okay, it's going to be amazing. Um, for the past month I've been doing a lot of research, um, a lot of, um, just different things, you know, becoming familiar with different directories, which one I want to use, the ones that are already out there, what, what's missing for them, what they have, what they don't have. And so I'm excited because as you guys know, I love to do things in excellence. And so, and I love to highlight people who are, who are truly doing it for the kingdom. Okay, so this directory is for you if you are a person that incorporates your faith and Holy Spirit into your sessions. So what that means is, no, we're not saying that you only serve Christians, that's not what we're saying. But this directory is unique because so many people are coming, you know, asking me. I see on different platforms on social media, but people really do want counseling from people who have who share the same values, okay? Of course you're not going to be exactly alike. Of course it's so many different denominations, it's so many different, um, types of churches here. But the goal is to be able to bring those biblical principles into the session with your secular counseling, okay? And so secular means the things that we learn as professionals, which is therapists, life coaches,, that we learned from school, that we learned from our different trainings that we have. You guys, I have so many trainings in, um, you know, in a variety of areas— grief, trauma, human trafficking, boundaries, relationship issues— as well as I'm trained in a different, um, in different modalities such as CBT, CPT. And so for some of you guys who are in my profession, you already know what these are, what these are. But for those of you who are not don't worry, in this directory we'll be educating people too about the different modalities, what they are, what that looks like, so you can try to work on finding a therapist or a counselor or life coach that is going to be appropriate for your needs. Okay, and so I'm excited. Okay, when the Lord gave me the idea for it in the fall, I really thought that it will be like a year out or so before I actually did this, um, particular project, But in the beginning of April, the Lord begins to speak to me and says, start the directory now. And I'm glad I did because I forgot that with some domains you have to wait 60 days before you transfer over to a different site. And so guess what? I have to wait for 60 days, you guys, to transfer that particular domain, which is going to be called faithandmentalwellnessdirectory.faith. To my directory, okay? Which in the beginning I was a little aggravated, I'm not going to lie, but it's okay. It's delayed, not denied, right? So if you are in that category, make sure you join the waitlist by filling out the form. Uh, we'll ask you questions about who you are, where you live, your area expertise, and so much more, okay? So I'm excited, I hope you are too. And hope that you would join. All righty, so the next thing is I'm having a human trafficking event on June 3rd, which is in person and virtually, okay? And so just the past like month, month and a half, I've spoken about human trafficking 3 different times in 3 different locations, okay? And so this past Saturday, which was actually yesterday for me, um, I I spoke at Fayetteville State University to the social work department there for the master's program. So my good friend, my sister, who was also the vice president of Doing It for the Kingdom, you know, a little over a year ago now, she is an adjunct professor and she invited me to come speak to her students about human trafficking, about social work, about my journey, about how to diversify who they are and not be stuck in a box. And just, it was just so amazing, you guys. I can't even put it into words how much I've enjoyed it. I felt like I was home. I felt like I was like in the right place at the right time. And the students were so amazing. They also presented their capstone projects and information about their particular internship they were at for this semester. And it was just so good. My daughters came with me. They were there cheering me on. And my husband had to go to work, otherwise he would have been there too. So I want to thank her for inviting me. And so with that being said, the next event is going to be on June 3rd on a Saturday from 11:00 AM to 12:30 PM Eastern Standard Time. Dr. Hardy and I will be speaking about youth empowerment, and our primary focus is going to be educating them about financial literacy to the families, to the parents. If you're in a foster care system and you work there, if you work at DSS, if you a social worker, a therapist, a case manager, this is going to be important for you guys to know. And I'll be speaking more about human trafficking, the signs, and how to educate our youth about human trafficking as well. So be sure to go to Eventbrite. That link will also be in the description box as well for you to go register. If you are professional, you need to get a certificate of attendance, you will be able to get that as well as an option. And as you guys know, you know, I'm able to do that because I'm a therapist. I'm— I have my own private practice., and I'm able to give you guys credit for that. Okay. So it's also for therapists too who need to get their hours for their licensure renewal. Okay. As of right now, North Carolina and Arkansas is eligible for virtual or, um, live virtual or in-person, um, hours. You can, you can get that when it comes to any social work type stuff. Okay. So let's see here, what else do I have? And so with that being said, um, I'll also be creating more content for my paid podcast community. Um, for some of you who have been following me for a while on my podcast, you can hear that, um, I have a paid subscription and I'm getting ready to really amp up that and get some more content in there. It's going to be amazing, okay? We're going to have worksheets, um, and not only that, I'm going to like be recording myself on how to complete the worksheet and the strategy, okay? So it's going to be amazing. It's for you if you have a low budget and you cannot afford to go actually see a counselor, um, it's for you, um, if you need like a— to like supplement what you already receiving as far as counseling and coaching. If you are a counselor or coach, you can, um, join as well to be able to learn how to use different tools for your clients. Okay. And it's for you if you just want to increase your knowledge in general. Okay. To help with your children, to help, to give to your friends, to give to your families. That's one thing I love about being a counselor is that my clients, they sometimes, not sometimes, half the time, give what I give to them, to their family, and it helps them. I've had, I have so much knowledge, you guys, and I say that humbly, and I say that from a place of just being grateful that, you know, God has called me to this particular profession. And I've been working as a social worker since 2006. Okay, so I learned a lot. I learned a whole lot. The dos, the don'ts, what works, what might not work. And so I want to pour out as much as I can to be able to help others, right? But everything cannot be free because it was not free for me. So with that being said, thank you so much for listening to all my episodes. I have content everywhere. I'm talking about Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram. My email list gets content as well. I have a little bit on TikTok, a little bit, not much. And so that is it. Again, thank you for listening, and hopefully I will see you over on my email list for the Mental Health Month series. Talk to you soon. Thank you so much for being here today. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and share with your family and your friends, and please stay tuned for more content. If you would like. Also, you can download my free ebook at www.shakeetatorres.com and stay in contact with me to learn about new courses, new workshops, and new content that I'll be coming out in the future. Thanks again. Talk to you soon.