Struggling with the aftermath of trauma can feel like being lost in a maze with no clear way out. That's where Malka Shaw's poignant insights come into play. As a clinical social worker and founder of Kesher Shalom Projects, Malka joins us to share her invaluable experiences from the trenches of 9/11 to the heart-wrenching events in Israel last October. Our conversation meanders through the transformative world of therapy, discussing EMDR's profound impact on those haunted by traumatic memories and highlighting the resilience of the human spirit in the face of adversity.
In a climate where mental scars are often overlooked, we shine a spotlight on the necessity for therapists to receive specialized training in trauma therapy, an area where Malka's expertise is unparalleled. Her stories paint a vivid picture of the complexities within the Jewish community, illustrating the urgent need for validation and understanding amidst the rising tides of anti-Semitism. We also delve into the significance of peer support, which Malka emphasizes as a cornerstone of healing, and explore how cultural and historical contexts, like Zionism, influence our interpretation and response to trauma.
Ending on a note of hope and solidarity, our episode spotlights the Kesher Shalom project, a beacon of support that transcends religious and cultural barriers within the Jewish community. Malka's passion for fostering empathy and cultural understanding in therapy is a thread that runs through our discussion, reminding us of the power that lies within our interconnectedness. As we bid farewell to Malka, she leaves us with a call to action—to educate ourselves, to engage with sensitivity, and to never underestimate the value of mental health in shaping a more compassionate world.
Please visit http://www.keshershalom.com/
For more information. Kesher Shalom seeks to foster healing, resilience, and understanding within the diverse Jewish communities and beyond.
Struggling with the aftermath of trauma can feel like being lost in a maze with no clear way out. That's where Malka Shaw's poignant insights come into play. As a clinical social worker and founder of Kesher Shalom Projects, Malka joins us to share her invaluable experiences from the trenches of 9/11 to the heart-wrenching events in Israel last October. Our conversation meanders through the transformative world of therapy, discussing EMDR's profound impact on those haunted by traumatic memories and highlighting the resilience of the human spirit in the face of adversity.
In a climate where mental scars are often overlooked, we shine a spotlight on the necessity for therapists to receive specialized training in trauma therapy, an area where Malka's expertise is unparalleled. Her stories paint a vivid picture of the complexities within the Jewish community, illustrating the urgent need for validation and understanding amidst the rising tides of anti-Semitism. We also delve into the significance of peer support, which Malka emphasizes as a cornerstone of healing, and explore how cultural and historical contexts, like Zionism, influence our interpretation and response to trauma.
Ending on a note of hope and solidarity, our episode spotlights the Kesher Shalom project, a beacon of support that transcends religious and cultural barriers within the Jewish community. Malka's passion for fostering empathy and cultural understanding in therapy is a thread that runs through our discussion, reminding us of the power that lies within our interconnectedness. As we bid farewell to Malka, she leaves us with a call to action—to educate ourselves, to engage with sensitivity, and to never underestimate the value of mental health in shaping a more compassionate world.
Please visit http://www.keshershalom.com/
For more information. Kesher Shalom seeks to foster healing, resilience, and understanding within the diverse Jewish communities and beyond.
Hi and welcome to Finding your Way Through Therapy. The goal of this podcast is to demystify therapy, what can happen in therapy and the wide array of conversations you can have in and about therapy Through personal experiences. Guests will talk about therapy, their experiences with it and how psychology and therapy are present in many places in their lives, with lots of authenticity and a touch of humor. Here is your host, steve Bisson.
Steve Bisson:Toujours un privilège, always a privilege. Thank you and welcome to Episode 135. If you haven't listened to Episode 133 and 134, they're a two-part interview with Dr Hayden Duggan Really really important to listen to. That. I really enjoyed it. I really enjoyed Dr Duggan, and I hope you go back and listen to us that. Episode 135 was also very important because of the anti-Semitism that's going on right now.
Steve Bisson:My guest will be Mal Kasha. Mal Kasha is the founder of the Kesher Shalom Projects, which she started after the October 7th attacks in Israel. We will talk a little bit of her experience in New York City and stuff like that and her training opportunities and stuff like that. Mal Kasha is a licensed clinical social worker. She is practicing in the state of New Jersey, new York and Florida. She's been in the field for over 25 years with her own private practice for 15 years. I'm sure she's going to talk about a lot of her experience, but she is an EMDR person. She's worked with trauma for a long time. She's worked with the Red Cross and I really enjoy just reading her bio. She's recommended by a podcaster on the Cycraft Network. I really can't wait to talk to her.
Steve Bisson:And here is the interview. Well, hi everyone and welcome to Episode 135. I can't tell you how excited I am in unfortunate circumstances but, at the same time, very happy to speak to someone recommended by Lisa Mustard. You know she's a friend of the show. We love her to death. But Mal Kasha is a LCSW in New Jersey, new York and Florida Did I get them all right? And she's in private practice for over 15 years. She's been practicing mental health stuff for 25 years and she has a fascinating story. But, more importantly, since the events of October 2023, we have a lot of other issues that we really want to address. But, as all of you know on this podcast, I'm a big fan of First Responders and she actually worked 9-11, and probably will bring that up today. But before we go on and talk about the Kesher Shalom projects and everything else, let's start by saying hi, malka, and welcome to the show.
Malka Shaw:Hi Steve, thank you so much for having me. I'm really honored to be on your show. Lisa's actually part of Kesher Shalom projects, oh okay. And anybody that Lisa recommends. Any friend of Lisa is a friend of ours and we're really honored to be here today. Thank you so much.
Steve Bisson:Lisa will always be a friend of mine. We have a great time and we can talk offline about other stories that we joke around and all that. But let me start with a basic question. There's two basic questions from finding your way through therapy. The first one is pretty easy, because I know you a little bit, but I obviously don't know you well and my audience doesn't know you well. How about you introduce yourself a little better than I did?
Malka Shaw:Sure, thank you so much. Okay, so, as you said, I've been in the field for over 25 years. It's something that I don't like to say out loud, because then I have to admit my age and I like to stay in denial, so we all have our own issues.
Steve Bisson:We'll talk after the show.
Malka Shaw:We'll have a lot of. I was introducing Steve to the word schmooze, which is a Jewish word of we just when you have somebody that you have something in common with and you're very excited to talk to them, they call it a schmooze. So my actual practice before I was in private practice was very wide and varied. I worked in domestic violence. I did some project liberty, which is the post-11 work that Steve it was alluding to. But I was actually in New York City on 9-11. I was actually there. I saw the second tower go down and I was with FEMA and the Red Cross the day of 9-11, 9-12, 9-13, et cetera, in one of the mental health triages which isn't really a recreational Chelsea's peers. I worked in foster care. I worked in adolescent services, teens at risk, and I also was a program director for an outpatient psychiatric day program, partial day program.
Malka Shaw:And then my personal life blossomed and I was about to have my first child and I wasn't going to have an insane life of being a program director and at the time there wasn't as many part-time choices and I always had this dream of being in private practice. So my husband, who was my fiance, kind of encouraged me and then, after my first child was born. I was married then. After my first child was born, it really seemed to make the most amount of sense and I had a little bit of an easier transition to private practice than most people, because for the first several years my goal was a part-time private practice. So I had a very successful part-time private practice and then when my youngest started first grade that was always the plan. I blossomed out to being a full-time practice fairly quickly because I already had established roots.
Malka Shaw:So in my practice I work a lot with couples. I was trained in institute training. Back in the old days we used to do full-year of institute, not these quick little three-day trainings like the newbie therapists, so it's a full year of marriage and family therapy. I actually did that abroad, in Israel and then so I work with couples. I also do a lot of maternal wellness and women's issues, from postpartum depression to helping women with transitions of motherhood, working mothers, et cetera.
Malka Shaw:And then my third area, and the one we're going to focus on today, is trauma. I am an EMDR training therapist as well Very grateful to people that trained me and so I do a lot of trauma in my individual practice. Betrayal trauma, infidelity in couples has become a really big hot topic for another time, and the reason Steve has me on the show is I have what I call this unfortunate skill set, because you really don't want me to use this skill set because it means something unfortunate has happened in the world and I had some of the top trainers train me post 9-11 in New York City. It was called Project Liberty and that continued to be trained in those top trainers and was called in for different, various large-scale traumas throughout the years and that skill set kind of remained dormant until October 7, as Steve alluded to.
Steve Bisson:Well, you know, all I can think of is we were chatting away before the interview and I'm like, oh, we should probably press record at some point. It really felt that we had a good connection and then I was writing down everything you said. I've had lots of jobs in my life until I stabilized, especially once I had kids and all that. So we have that in common. I'm EMDR trained. I've never got the certification just because of my own personal reasons, but I am EMDR trained and I love EMDR and my kids my oldest is going to be 16 by the time this comes out. So I know exactly how you feel about 16 year olds and everything else. And you know my the guests for the last two episodes was someone who is a firefighter, who is there at 9-11 working on the pile. So I have, you know, have that a whole lot.
Steve Bisson:And the only thing I would say is my my knowing a little bit of the words that I know is from Howard Stern, so they're not always like. I'm not sure they're appropriate for me to say it all the time. So I'm going to hold back to what I know about my my skills in regards to that. So I'll let you decide what my skills are, maybe after the interview, but I really appreciate you giving a good description of who you are and I can't wait to hear more about the Keshav Shalom projects, because I think that's going to be key, and knowing that Lisa's involved is so important for me too, because Lisa's someone to have a high respect. Obviously, we just met Malka. Have respect for you, but I certainly know Lisa and love Lisa. But one of the standard questions on finding your way through therapy to demystify therapy that's the goal of the podcast in some ways is have you ever been in therapy? And I'm wondering if you've ever been in therapy.
Malka Shaw:Of course, I think that it's a healthy process. I think that anybody who works in the field of therapy needs to work through their issues, because if we're not grounded and very clear about where we are and we're not emotionally regulated, we're not going to be helpful to anybody. So just like I tell all the mothers that I work with the, what is the airline stewardess say we all know this put the oxygen mask on yourself before you could help somebody else.
Malka Shaw:You need to be grounded. Now that does not mean that I'm perfect just because of a therapist, just because I've been to what I've been pushing, this image that I'm perfect, what, what? No, I got shtick. Shtick is a Jewish word, shtick yeah, that's a clean cut word.
Steve Bisson:You can use that Okay, I could use that, okay, good.
Malka Shaw:Yeah, shtick means we all have a little bit of issues, or mischievous means a little bit of issues, but I think that therapy is a healthy thing and everybody could use it at different cross points in their life, whether it is any of the things that I mentioned earlier. Once you get to a certain age in life, which I have now crossed, it is impossible to have not gone through certain life challenges and traumas or griefs or lozing a loved one All these different areas. Then raising children is specifically challenging and your kids have issues. I mean mine are perfect, obviously.
Steve Bisson:Obviously yeah.
Malka Shaw:Obviously, I'm three, perfect, never give me hard time. Children, Perfect, perfect children. But I think it's really important and I'm just going to take the leap. Steve did not ask me, but I like to tell this is the way I like to phrase things is, when people always ask me how do you know that if this is just a little bit of stress or I need to go to a therapist?
Malka Shaw:I always talk about it like this we talk about therapy in terms of duration, frequency and intensity. So everybody has different things, but it's a matter of is the duration of what you're going through and the frequency and the intensity, and that the intensity is only something you can measure. And that is, in fact, why therapy is not a black and white science, because it's based on client reporting and clients are the worst self reporters. So I talk about it in terms of frequency, intensity and duration. And if they're impacting your ability to work, be functioning in life, do your act, what we call ADL activities of daily living? Are you not getting up and going to the grocery store? Are you not taking care of yourself? Are you parenting small children and you can't function? Is it affecting your most important interpersonal relationships? Then it's just normal. You know, I always tell people like if you all of a sudden woke up with this giant rash on your shoulder, what would you hesitate to see a dermatologist?
Voice Over:Right.
Malka Shaw:So why do people have all these hangups about seeing us? We're not going to bite them, not on the first session.
Steve Bisson:I take a few sessions before I bite people. It's totally focacct if you ask me, but I don't know how appropriate that is. See, I told you I learned everything from Howard Sturd, all joking aside, though I mean, like I know that you're an EMDR clinician One of the best therapies I don't know for your training, but for my training I had to go through EMDR myself and I remember telling people not only my therapy. Having gone through EMDR, I have so much more compassion when I do administer EMDR because I've been through it.
Malka Shaw:Well, I'm glad that you said that. I guess we're going on many different topics, but you know EMDR didn't exist when 9-11 happened. I mean it existed, it wasn't well known. And I always say to people I wish I had the knowledge now and I could go back in time, because when I talk about trauma today I talk about, you know, now we're very focused on we understand the somatic piece of trauma and how it affects our body, and that's something that a lot of therapists are aware of.
Malka Shaw:We were focused much more on the CBT type of techniques back then and one of the things that we talk about at the Kesher Shalom Projects training is the marrying and one of my philosophies is the marrying, the both. I find a lot of the newer therapists coming out of school these days are just focused on the somatic piece and really if you want to get a true healing you have to have the cognitive and the somatic. And then I talk about how we blend both philosophies together. But if you had told me about EMDR in 2001, 2002, I remember first hearing about it, thinking it was a little Mishukena you like the word?
Steve Bisson:Mishukena yeah, I love that one too, I really didn't, but then.
Malka Shaw:But then I became a true believer and I decided to take the opportunity to train myself, and it is what I. I don't want to say it's a miracle, but I used to feel like I was very good at getting clients from like 0 to 80% or 0 to 90. And there was a piece missing, and for me as a clinician, that's the missing piece that I didn't know that I needed until I did it.
Steve Bisson:You know, I think the EMDR you know Francine Shapiro had done the discovered it accidentally, I think, in the 1980s, but really didn't become very popular until the mid 2000s to early 2010s. And it is a game changer for my work working with first responders, I work with the military once in a while, the medical staff. It's just a game changer for me. And, yeah, 9-11, that would have been a great time to have that skill set because it would have brought people to the other side. And I want to just add another thing that you said. First of all, we go all over the place because, finding your way through therapy, if you expect a, I'm not doing a training, I'm doing a podcast, so I'm just like, wherever we go. Again, I feel like I'm plugging Howard Stern through no ends, but I'm the Howard Stern guy. We go anywhere you want, I don't care, I'll follow you.
Malka Shaw:I'm following your lead, but okay.
Steve Bisson:Don't worry about me, I'm just, I'm just a host. But you know, when we talk about, you know doing EMDR, one of the things that I talk about the mind, body, spirit and I tell people that if you're physically not doing well, your mind won't do well, your spirit won't do well, or if only two of them are doing well, the third one's going to affect the other ones. You need to be able to balance and it's a constant work place and for me, you're right, I think the somatic has become much more a problem. And again I, I, the people, this is going to be my, my plateau until someone hears me. When I break my arm, it takes a half second to break, but then I got to be in a cast for eight weeks and then I got to do PT and it could take up to three months Mental health. I'm supposed to cure you after two sessions. I mean, what the hell?
Voice Over:That's not how it works.
Steve Bisson:So you know you need to give therapy. It's due to and give it its time.
Malka Shaw:Trauma sits in the body. The analysis treated trauma to sit in the body forever for 30 years. They have it in brain scans now. The science is unbelievable.
Steve Bisson:And yeah, that's what EMDR teaches us. But you know, speaking of trauma, I know that you know one of my. Again, you know I work with first responders. A lot of people on the podcast here know that that's one of my biggest passions. 9-11 really impacted a whole lot of individuals, particularly first responders, and I know that that's kind of where you wanted to start off with and talk a little bit about.
Malka Shaw:Sure. So I just wanted to start by telling you that when I first heard the news of October 7th, it was one of the most devastating things in my lifetime including 9-11, that I've ever experienced, because I knew in a minute my life was never going to be the same. It wasn't just that it was October 7th. The difference and they call it the Jewish 9-11? No, no.
Malka Shaw:I'm going to correct everyone. In 9-11, I was living in New York City. I was a young therapist. The entire world came to support New Yorkers. There was so much validation and love and support for New Yorkers. Nobody pointed their fingers and blamed New Yorkers. October 7th happened and the world stayed silent. The silence and the victim blaming and the gaslighting the worst. When we talk about trauma at large, we talk about the concept of. One of the most important things you need for healing is support system and validation. What has happened to the world that, all of a sudden, the victims of the? These are kids that went to a music festival. Let's just repeat that. These are kids that and Nova stands for peace. It was called the Nova Peace Music Festival. And the people that live in Kibbutz down in southern Israel? People don't. They're like Kibbutz things are like this ideological hippie-dippy, like they live in these beautiful little communities. These are the most peaceful people. That's probably why they attack them.
Malka Shaw:There's the most peaceful people, but the world stood silent. And when the world stood silent and then the world turned against us, that's when my heart broke. That was the most heartbreaking thing for me personally. We got alerts my kids go to Jewish schools. We got alerts that my kids should not walk home from school for a few weeks because the town is going to be in high security. There are so many things that happened, even in the United States that just weren't even reported In the mainstream news. My community there was already three arrests of threats in my area, not reported, not reported. So I'm not reporting in mainstream media. So I knew that something was going to happen and I was ready to react and I didn't know what or how. And then on one of the mental health chats, somebody this came up and somebody knew my background and they're like Malka, would you host a Zoom? And I said okay sure, does anybody?
Malka Shaw:want to do it with me. My phone was binging from Stacy Shafiro. She was binging my phone and before I knew it I was doing a Zoom with a few therapists to talk about trauma and health, helping and coping and we thought, Steve, 30, 40 people might show up because it was just on a couple chats. The Zoom maxed out of the 300 person limit.
Steve Bisson:Wow.
Malka Shaw:We were asked to do it again. It maxed the therapist that had the Zoom up her limit on the Zoom. It maxed out again and again and then and then we did it for a couple organizations and that was all. The beginning was voluntary, and then we got a lot of responses from the non-Jewish therapists hey, we want this training because the original training was for Jewish therapists to help them through counter-transference. To define counter-transference, so people know.
Steve Bisson:Please do, because I think that that's the point of finding your way through therapies to take away all the mystics.
Malka Shaw:So basically counter-transference, just when you see, therapists, there's going to be unresolved, there's going to be unconscious issues Like I could have. Came on the show and Steve was like oh, maka reminds me of the girl that was mean to me in high school. Well then, all of a sudden, unconsciously, he doesn't like me and he doesn't even understand why he doesn't. But the therapist, we're human beings too and we have issues. As I said, we're not perfect, except for me and Steve. We're totally perfect. The rest of everybody, you know.
Steve Bisson:We've been working with Lisa to get her there. She's still on the fence, but go ahead.
Malka Shaw:Well, Lisa might be perfect, Lisa might be. So you know, when I said absolutely, I've been through therapy, we need to work through our issues, both in therapy and in proper clinical supervision, which is another thing that I do provide for therapists, I forgot to mention that because you can't mention everything and we usually have those issues resolved, but this was what we call an act of trauma. There's no way those issues could be resolved. And when clients are coming in with anti-Semitic statements towards their therapist and yes, there's been a lot of anti-Semitism in what's supposed to be the safest place is a therapy room or Jewish clients are going to non-Jewish therapists, hearing terrible things or being unvalidated by their therapist, you know, because they're having reactions to what's going on. So we were approached by it, so we just somebody so Stacey came up with the idea.
Steve Bisson:Before you go on, I'm going to give you another example because I want people to understand counter-transference. Okay, so if you had a partner, a former partner, that rejected you, and the person that's across from you in therapy causes you to like they either looked at them, they say something like that, or they broke up with their partner in the same way they did with you and you start having this negative reaction to it. That's the most typical counter-transference issue, or getting for therapists. The typical stuff is getting overly attached to your client because of attraction, because of other stuff that's not related to therapy.
Steve Bisson:So, so I just something to keep in mind. I want to like. I like to take away all this like mystical stuff about therapy, because therapy should not be mystical. It's very normal, but please go ahead. I apologize, I stopped you.
Malka Shaw:So right.
Malka Shaw:So what happened is when we put those initial trainings and we really didn't have a lot of time to put these trainings together I spoke about counter transference and we watched other organizations and a few other places put things out, but they were more like zooms of discussion or process.
Malka Shaw:They weren't giving practical skills, and I feel like I was one of the first people to bring up counter-transference and I spoke about it at length and how do we work through it and still work with our clients. And then we got calls from non-Jewish therapists like hey, we want to be in these trainings, we want to be part of this, we need to be part of this. So we came up with the idea and I feel like it was one of the miracles along the way is that we got accredited pretty fast to make it a CU program, and one of the things that we're offering which also doesn't exist really very and if it doesn't it's very rare is we added a Jewish cultural component to the program. So the one that's for both therapists. We a little bit, unfortunately, has to take away a little bit of the counter transference piece, although it's still there, because we've experienced any kind of discrimination or racism even if you're not Jewish. It could trigger your own counter transference.
Malka Shaw:So we added this Jewish cultural component and that you know, one of the things I was trying to see before we went online is people don't consider Jews a minority and we got a lot of pushback in the field of mental health. How can you do Jewish trainings? How did you do? But Stephen can attest that every other minority group has their own trainings. It's just one of the first times that we started posting on some of these chats and groups that were doing it just for the Jews.
Malka Shaw:I wasn't allowed and some of the chats will say post on minority day and I would post and they would like tell me I'm breaking the rules, you don't get to, I'm like. So I want to just tell you the facts. People who identify as BIPOC in America is about 33 to 34 percent, depending on the source. People identify as Black is around 11 to 12 percent. People identify as Hispanic is around 17 percent. Asian is about seven percent. The amount the people that identify as Jews in United States of America is 2.2 percent. Jews make up 0.2 percent of the United, the entire world.
Malka Shaw:So when you tell us that we're not a minority, what does that mean Statistically? We are Right and we talk. We do get a little bit into, like what makes Jews a little bit, why Jews are putting in that kind of category and what are the you know, what are the stereotypes. So we took this and then what the second piece of it was not just the reaction to October 7th, which is the one that's unfortunately probably going to be around longer is the rise and the normalization of anti-Semitism in everyday culture, not just the college campuses. We're seeing it in the mental health field, and so these trainings had to happen and we're going to continue doing them and we're going to continue perfecting them and making them a little bit stronger and deeper. And as we continue them, I'm even continuing figuring out, working on different new ways of looking at trauma, kind of combining the CBT of you know and, am I allowed to say, psychodynamic, and people feel like that's-.
Steve Bisson:Whoa, whoa, whoa, stop swearing on my podcast.
Malka Shaw:So psychodynamic people think is ancient but there's. I want to remind people that there's still parts of it that are relevant and healthy. We just have to adopt it a little bit to modern times. So when you take the psychodynamic and the CBT and the somatic interventions, you really have a much more comprehensive treatment modality for trauma. So that's part one of what we do and then we really address what's going on in the Jewish communities. We're addressing it by training Jewish therapists. We've invited educational professionals and clergy to our training because people need to understand. Anybody who's in a leadership position has to understand the Jewish perspective of what's going on. Our trainings are not political. I want to make a very strong statement that we're not getting into politics. We're talking as trauma therapists.
Steve Bisson:The fact that you have to say that is fucking sad, but that's go ahead.
Malka Shaw:Oh, but the comments that we get online.
Steve Bisson:I know why you said it. I know why you said it. I just find it very sad that we have to say those things.
Malka Shaw:Oh, I had to fight Facebook on my professional page when I wanted to boost the post. It first got rejected as political, which is probably like auto-bot, and then I had to write a whole response to get each boost accepted into the system.
Steve Bisson:But anyway, it's not political, sorry.
Malka Shaw:Right, it's not political, but we are talking about one people's experience and we're giving over the history, because the Jewish people right now are experiencing what we call an act of trauma and they're also experiencing what we are now labeling a communal trauma. And, if it's okay with you, steve, I would like to define communal trauma because, collective trauma is what some people are redefining it as.
Malka Shaw:Collective trauma is something we all experience in COVID, when the whole world shut down together or New York City shut down. But communal trauma is because we're the targeted people, we're targeted to a specific people, and then you have, on top of that, intergenerational trauma which every Jewish person has. And now we know from research that trauma could be passed down genetically from generation to generation. And one of the things the training talks about is the 3,000 years not one to 3,000 years of persecution. We've been enslaved four different times. We've been kicked out of our homeland countless amount of times. We've been colonized, kicked out. And that is intergenerational trauma on top of the act of trauma. And then on top of it, you know the anti-Semitism and being gaslit there's. It's almost impossible for not for some, for somebody who identifies as Jewish, not to be feeling something today, in today's day and age.
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Steve Bisson:As my client, who is not Jewish, mentioned he's like you know people are still walking around with those tattoos. We're not talking about ancient fucking history. We're talking about what happened 80 years ago. Somehow this has been wiped from people's memories for some God awful reason. You talk about 3,000 years of history. Let's look 80 years ago. Maybe we can wake up some people I don't know, but to me I remember him saying that and I wanted to say that too, because if you don't believe in that 3,000, and it's not like it's a belief system, it fucking happened. But if you don't believe that World War II was based on the eradication of the Jewish community, period and the story, right.
Malka Shaw:So the one little political thing I will say is they'll always come for the Jews first, but then they'll come for some. They'll come for everyone else next. So if you don't stand up, they will come for you. Whoever the wheat, whoever the they is, throughout the generation the day has been different. So we have all these different pieces of trauma on top of trauma. And the other thing we talk about is trauma.
Malka Shaw:Therapists Is when you have a trauma that's not resolved and it builds on top of another trauma. So you could have these Grand capital T traumas and they may have little T traumas, like somebody you were fired from a job. Steve Is not the same as a 9-11 trauma, but it's still a trauma. So you have that on top of another trauma and if they weren't resolved, it just keeps adding up and adding up, and adding up, so that there's a lot of pain going on and there's a lot of feeling betrayed, because there's Clients are coming to us and people are coming to us saying you know, I had these co-workers that we used to talk about the game or we used to talk about the bachelor, and Now they're posting anti-semitic things or they're laughing about anti-semitic things online you know, and.
Malka Shaw:How? Who do I trust? Who do I trust, steve? I have friends that never commented, didn't even. I've posted. You can look me up on Facebook. I've posted everything and not one empathy of the caring emoji or the thumbs up emoji, complete silence, and I think silence is one of the hardest things to really wrap your minds around.
Steve Bisson:Man that happened in 1936 to for the record right.
Malka Shaw:We just didn't have social media, so it wasn't. You see it like that? And what's happening now in people's minds? They're like, were they always anti-semitic? And it's just acceptable to be anti-semitic now? Was it always there in their head? Or they're just following the crowd? But who can I trust around me? Who is really an ally? Because there's being silent or they're posting things. What is what does that say about the relationship I have with them before? And it's a really scary place to be, because who can you trust is a big issue that's coming up and you know.
Malka Shaw:You know we talk about anxiety and curing anxiety, but there's also healthy anxiety. At a certain point we need to be, be realistic of where we are. You know, I had it really hit me the second week in October. I was locking up the therapy office. I saw I used out my own really amazing office, shut it down and COVID and now I'm hybrid, so I just rent space two days a week and it happens to be downstairs is a dentist office, a Jewish dentist office, and so who's clearly Jewish, like a yarmulke wearing dentist, and then there's the therapist. There's a bunch of therapists who share, since COVID upstairs and I heard some random noise and I'm like, oh, my goodness, do they like? I had a paranoid thought I'm not a paranoid person and my husband had gone out and got us all these pepper sprays me and the kids and I like I Grapped it, but it really it was just an animal that was in the parking lot kicking at something.
Steve Bisson:Yeah.
Malka Shaw:But we have to be on high alert because there's so many things going on and it's and I want to be very clear that what's going on is not about Israel anymore, because it's really about Israel. Why are they? What are they? Why are they doing this to the Jewish businesses? They're shoot a Montreal you mentioned Montreal, steve, my friend who lives in Montreal. There were shootings in a religious boys high school in Montreal.
Steve Bisson:That's correct. There, you know the summer just happened just happened.
Malka Shaw:My friend son goes to that school, so it's, you know, there's all and I just want to go finish on one thing.
Steve Bisson:You talked about big T versus small T, trauma.
Malka Shaw:Yes, that's a big part.
Steve Bisson:I want to make sure that everyone understands that I don't get to decide, even if I'm the perfect therapist. If it's a small T or a big T for you, you decide that. And if you think that it's not a big T because Jewish people are not in Israel, how about? That's not for you to decide. Number one and number two. That's very fucking short-sighted for people to say and I just want to mention that because I think that's what I've heard and in some comments Like well, why would Jewish people hear be worried? It's happening in Israel?
Malka Shaw:I'm like okay, so I want to. I want to have a lot to respond to that, but I understand.
Steve Bisson:I just want to put it out there because One of the things I hear that.
Malka Shaw:I'm sure one of the things I talk about in my trauma experience, in my trauma trainings, is Trauma. Let's, let's even step back. What's the definition of trauma? It's anytime you feel unsafe, out of control or overwhelmed, and it doesn't matter if it's a V, it's reality or subjective. It's that experience that you're having. That's why you and I could be in the same exact car accident or fire and one of us could walk out fine and the other one could I PTSD. So it's that feeling or that experience where that I always feel, I always explain it's like a flip switches in your mind, like it's in the amygdala, and we're not gonna get into the science today, but it's when that flip switches, that's when that trauma happens.
Steve Bisson:It's that flip brain versus a cerebral cortex. That's how I explain it right.
Malka Shaw:So it could be a subjective experience, but I want to explain that it's not a subjective experience, because when people attack Israel and when people attack Zionism and I'm going to step define what Zionism means, because people are saying all these outrageous things of what Zionism means and that's not what it means Israel was created as a state, as a safety net For after the Holocaust. So Israel represents to most Jews not all Jews, most Jews Is a safety. So what is trauma? Trauma is the threat of safety and that's when the flip switches and we go and something is threatening our survival mode. So Israel represents that safety.
Malka Shaw:So people are saying all these things that are saying I'm not anti-semit, I'm just anti-Zionist. Well, what does Zionist mean? We are not colonizing, doesn't mean colonizers, it doesn't mean genocide, it doesn't mean any of that. Zion is the word for Jerusalem. Zionism has been around before the birth of Christianity, before the birth of Muslim, to be honest with you. And Zionism it really just means the belief that the Jews have the right to have their own homeland and not for most people that homeland is Israel. But it doesn't even necessarily mean that the basic definition as Zionism is a juice of the right to self-determination and to have their own homeland because they've had historically have not been treated very well in other people's homes. So that's what Zionism means. It's been around for so many years. When they used to say call to Zion, that happened in 70 70 CE. I hope you can fact check.
Steve Bisson:I'll take your word on it. How's that?
Malka Shaw:after the see, when that, when we were exiled into Syria after the Roman, after the Roman exploit. So the Romans, they kicked us out. And then the I believe it was Ezra and a hamya in the Bible called the Jews back, that said it called to Zion and the Jews that didn't come back stated Syria, which was called Persia, and that was also that they were under the threat of another genocide. And that's actually the modern days. That's the modern-day holiday of her. I'm. So when you're saying I'm not anti-Semitic, I'm just anti-Zionist, you're actually saying one of the most gaslighting anti-Semitic comments because you're saying I don't believe you have the right to safety. I don't believe that you can. You do, you deserve the right to safety. And I want to be clear the idea of Israel and Zionism we need to separate from modern-day politics. Because modern-day, you can. You can disagree with Israel, you can disagree with Natsun Yahu. That's fine, because if you're really honest with yourself, do you really agree with everything of your own government all the time?
Steve Bisson:right.
Malka Shaw:No, I think there's no way you loved Biden and love Trump Like you. You know you do not possible. And you could love a politician and not like some of their policies, and that's totally fine. That's why we have we're in a democracy with free speech right.
Malka Shaw:Say that you hate that country deserves to be just demolished, or to say the people of that country Because you might not agree with something politically. That is anti-Semitism, and anti-Semitism is a form of racism. It's not so? I love the people that say I would never be racist. I would never be. You know, anti-gay, I'm just a little anti-Semitic. Well, look, how is it not the same?
Steve Bisson:Just, you know, it's just what does that, even freaking mean really, I'm just a little anti-Semitic. What is the hell does that mean I?
Malka Shaw:Don't know, can you be a little bit racist?
Steve Bisson:I mean, no, that's what I mean, it's not like it's a, it's not like I'm a little pregnant.
Malka Shaw:So these are the things that we're seeing on social media and around us. We're seeing the leaders of what's supposed to be the highest levels of institutions say it's okay to say Say genocide to the Jews is okay, depending on the context. All of those are going to be the little tea traumas that we all experience. Watching these, these presidents of these higher education say this, of course it's going to be triggering. It's going to be triggering to me as a therapist who has all the toolboxes available to her. How is it not going to be available to somebody else who maybe before October 7th, was already not a hundred percent grounded. Maybe they were struggling with addictions or eating disorders or their marriage was falling apart. Now they're a part of a communal trauma. So if you just imagine what that would do to somebody you know.
Malka Shaw:So I always I spoke about COVID a lot and I always called COVID like the magnifying glass of problems, when people would say like, oh, covid, put me my marriage break. It's no, covid didn't make your marriage break, it was, there was cracks and it was the magnifying glass. So that's what trauma is. Trauma is this magnifying glass for the things that were already not there. So you either have a choice you're they're going to crack or you're going to get stronger, and there's lots of discuss that we really want everyone to become. Come out of it being a stronger, more resilient human being. But I really want to bring out this awareness that you might think it's funny to do the ha ha sign of an anti-semetic post, or you might think it's funny to crack a joke, or you might think it's cool to be part of, but you know Whatever sayings you want to say, but what you're actually doing is you're causing trauma for somebody else who's reading it. You're causing heartbreak for somebody else. Is that who you really want to be? Is that really?
Steve Bisson:And I you really want to be, but you need a very good therapist and I go back to a few things you said, just to bring back a little bit of therapy. I don't believe, like when you talk about the whole anti-Semitism, there's no such thing as a little anti-Semitic. You're anti-Semitic or you're not. There's no middle ground. The all-or-nothing brain is what has caused a lot of issues in this country and in the world. Frankly, because you talk about Benjamin Netanyahu, I'm not a big fan of the guy.
Malka Shaw:That's not good, and you don't know that. No, no, no but that's fine.
Steve Bisson:But what I'm saying is that at the same time, that doesn't mean like, well, I don't like Israel, but Benjamin Netanyahu, some of his politics drive me absolutely insane, and you know like it's. At the end of the day, that's okay. But now we have a cult of personality of someone I don't want to mention here that's running for president, that people are just like, no matter what that person says, we're going to go for all or nothing, and that is what is wrong with this world is that we go into all or nothing brains. You can be in the middle ground, you know like that's. The problem, I find, is that you know, like you can disagree with Benjamin Netanyahu, that doesn't mean you disagree with the whole of Israel or a whole of him, frankly. And I think that at the end of the day, you can disagree with Donald Trump. You may like part of them. I don't know.
Steve Bisson:I'm not trying not to say too much here, but at the same time, it's just like finding ways to like, be critical and also apologizing, which is also a fucking I lost art, because you know I'm not above making some comments that might be insensitive, because I'm a guy who talks from the hip and if I do something that's insensitive to any of my clients or to anyone and I try not to, but if I am I'm not above of saying, oh my God, I didn't even think about that, I apologize. That came out wrong, that's not what I meant, and it's okay to be apologetic, but nowadays it seems like if you say something that's wrong, instead of apologizing you double down on your shithead, and I think that that's what we got to learn how to also do. Is that if someone says, look, what you just said, there is kind of like anti-Semitic. No, I'm not, I'm. I love the all Jews.
Malka Shaw:There's this cognitive dissonance that's going on in the world where, like, I'm a good person but I could still be anti-Semitic, or I'm a good person but I could still, you know, chant these horrible things in a rally. So you know, there's this piece of like. Well, where is that coming from? And I don't know what that says about a society as a whole? But, like, how could you be these feminist organizations but not be empathetic to the fact that October 7th was full of sexual assaults? You know that was a major part of their weaponry was gang rapes on young children. I hope this. I don't know if we want to put it as that part, but young children and finding I don't care.
Steve Bisson:I don't care, we talk reality here.
Malka Shaw:Yeah. So the anti workers said that they had to repair like the pelvis of a seven year old girl right.
Malka Shaw:Because she was seriously gang raped and then and she wasn't the only one Seven year old girl, but they did to baby. I mean, where is that cognitive dissonance? Like you're supposed to know, sexual assault is not okay. I don't care if you're the wife of the leader of the person of the Hamas attacks. She still doesn't deserve that. You know. So you know there has to be, there has to be something where we say this behavior is just a stain on humanity and we have to have this ability to be you know where, why they're not humanizing it. What there's? Just this cognitive dissonance of like somehow these victims don't count, but those victims count, and it's mind blowing and it's heartbreaking.
Steve Bisson:It's. You talked about cognitive dissonance. I think you hit the nail on the head in regards to that. You talk about sexual assault and the torture you know like. What's not spoken of is some of them were also very much tortured and we like to forget about that because that's not fun for us to think about. I've never. You know, I'll put a disclosure at the beginning of my and when I do the intro, but ultimately, for me, don't ever like this. This is about reality. I find that people finding your way through therapy and my work in general, I hate living in the world where we don't talk about real stuff.
Malka Shaw:So please feel free to talk about anything, but when you they were, they were go pros to show the world.
Voice Over:Right, correct.
Malka Shaw:So you know, apparently a lot of the Nazi soldiers would get drunk at night, and they were. They were ashamed. These people were loud and proud and they put podcasts in it all over the world to show what they. They were cutting off limbs of people. They were putting babies in ovens, right, they were assaulting children in front of mothers, mothers in front of children. I mean anything that you can know. I want to, I want to say imagine, because I wouldn't have imagined it. It's like a. It was basically like a horror movie, but it wasn't aliens, it was human beings doing this to other human beings and they were recording it on go pros.
Malka Shaw:So when people don't support that and they'll say but they deserved it, or what about this and this whole? What about ism? Of course you know, of course we have sympathy for any victim of war. If you think that I don't have empathy or or caring about the somebody innocent in Gaza that got hurt as a side effect of the war, then you wouldn't. That's not me. Of course I care about them, right, but there's has to be that. But why? Why are the Jews not given the same level of respect and empathy? All human beings deserve respect, empathy and dignity Period.
Steve Bisson:It's not about to me, it's humanity, you know it. You know I'm not going to get too much off on a tangent here because I want to really hear about the Kesher Shalom projects. You know I was talking to a few. I have a few female clients and I know it's not about necessarily Israel, but I promise it's related. You know, like if men had to go through you know the biopsies and the stuff that they have to do in regards to OBGYN stuff, there would be 1400 ways to treat it so they don't feel any pain. Women like, oh yeah, we'll freeze a little bit of that area and we're going to go biopsy you directly. And we, we don't have any thoughts about that as a man because that's not something.
Steve Bisson:But it's unbelievable how we have always like two different measures for two different things and it's not a comparison game, it's a human game and I feel that people lost their humanity overall because I felt bad for the Syrian people years ago when they were getting bombed by their own government and even our government, but at the same time I also had limited to no empathy for the government itself in Syria, who was didn't give a crap about their own people or they just want to put money in their pocket, and it's okay to have those thought processes, but I didn't say all Syrians are bad, or all Syrians are good, or all Muslims are good or all Muslims are bad.
Steve Bisson:I made I can discriminate and I can think about how I do my thought process. It's become very easy to go well, what about this, what about that? It's not a comparison game. Who has it better? I don't know. We're all going to end up in the same place. Whether you believe in heaven or hell or whatever, we all end up in the same place. So why don't we start teaching ourselves to treat people equally? That's just my two cents. I wouldn't. That's maybe a good way for us to move away from these very traumatic words that we just use and maybe talk a little more about the Keshe Shalom projects.
Malka Shaw:Sure, so I call it the project that I didn't plan for. Normally, you see a business venture or project, whatever it is, it's something that you plan out and think about. No, we have these things. And then it just kept getting pushed forward, kept pushed forward, and I was watching what other people were doing and nobody was really providing quite the same level of support that me and my colleagues have been providing in quite the same manner. And it was really surprising to me because there's like large Jewish families, like there's large organizations with power behind them, and they did a lot of support groups and a lot of process groups, but not really the in-depth training in the way that we can.
Malka Shaw:And the other thing you should know is that Keshe Shalom, by definition, is Jewish diverse. So I saw a lot of different specific sects of Judaism support. Like Orthodox Jews have a lot of support within their own sect, especially in this time. We have a saying called all of Israel, like Kuali Israel, like Ahad, like we're all one people. And this is for anybody, especially from a third. If you identify as Jewish, this is your part, we're here for you and we're here.
Malka Shaw:And one of the things that I really like about the people on the board is we represent the wide range Like I might be more on the observant side and some of my colleagues might be intermarried and we have this wide range and it's a lot of mutual respect and love because we're all kind of experiencing it slightly differently, but we're all going through this together and we just want to support communities, we want to educate leaders out there. We don't know 100% where Kesher Shalom is going, but we're here and as long as the need is here. One of the things when talking about Lisa, one of her pure brilliances is she videotaped a few of us doing different calming and regulation exercises and it's on like the secret, like it's not. You can't search at podcast and you sign up for our mailing list and you automatically have access to that, and Lisa has a lot of plans of what she wants to do with this private podcast. I'm just going to follow Lisa with this and you should.
Steve Bisson:She's a brilliant woman.
Malka Shaw:She's so brilliant. I was asked to speak at a synagogue on Sunday and we did these take like a, you know, a copic, like a self care, and then she got a QR code. So you just have to press, you just have to do the QR code and it gets you right there. She I wouldn't, I don't have that text out so she was. That was all. Lisa and also Robin Cheyne helped with the. There's a lot of amazing therapists, so if you're needing more guests, they're all amazing people that you can have on your program. So you know we're there.
Malka Shaw:When you know, a few different synagogues and all the different sex have been reaching out and I'll go and I'll speak and my colleagues will come and speak and what's going on in college campuses is just really devastating right now. So we're we're really here where it's called Kesher Shalomcom. Again, kesher means connections and shallow means peace, and that's just how it was developed, because that name wasn't taken of some of the other names and we wanted it to definitely have a Hebrew name to it. So it's clearly a Jewish program, but it also has a universal theme and the universal theme is connections, and we're just here to make connections and start communications, because if people have are starting to believe some of the propaganda or some of the lies about the Jewish community, we're happy to do an, you know, an educational seminar to you know, demystify some of the myths.
Steve Bisson:I think it's important.
Malka Shaw:It's really important. Every race, you know. One of the biggest myths is that we're white. Do you know that the Jewish population and I mean, I know, I look, you know I'm on what's called Ashkenazi, like European descent the majority of the Jews are actually Spartan and that's considered Spanish and North Africa. So the majority of the Jews in the world are not white and they're all every single ethnicity. If you come to my synagogue you will see everything. So that's a big myth of like, well, what are you? And I think that's the biggest, the biggest thing.
Malka Shaw:That's confusing because it's a culture, it's an ethnicity and it's a religion. And some people will identify with the culture and not not the religion. And some people say I'm ethnically Jewish and you could be one or all three and that might confuse people. But it is a necessity and it's a targeted ethnicity. And you know the fact that we don't get a seat at the minority table is really the well-designed, just because we might be considered. I'm going to quote Jordan Peterson. He calls us the successful minority. So you know we don't have a victim mentality as Jews. We have a survivor mentality and we don't like to look at ourselves as victims. So that also kind of goes into that mythology of well, maybe they're not really a minority, but your numbers alone.
Steve Bisson:Well, you know, I, I, I could say so many things about that when one of the things that would you know, when this comes out, christmas will pass. But I remind people, remember Jesus was a Jew, right, you understand that. And number two, I kind of remind people, like I'm from Quebec and we're six million. I know there's eight million Quebecers, but about six million speak French. We're six million, surrounded by over 400 million English speakers and 400 million plus Spanish speakers. We're very much of a minority, yeah, but you're safe within an English population. Like, yeah, but go speak French in Boston and see how many dirty looks you get. And that's the truth.
Steve Bisson:And I again, I'm not going to compare myself to anything that's Jewish, I'm not saying that at all. But sometimes people I think I have a lot of empathy from what I consider like minorities that are invisible, because that's where I grew up and how I grew up, and so I get it a little bit more than most people. Probably I don't get it fully, obviously, but just because you're successful and you think that they're minority, the Jewish population is a minority in period, end of story. You can argue all you want with me, and I think that what happens is. We need these type of trainings to educate people, because there's a lot of stereotypes and I consider myself this is the other thing that I want everyone to understand I consider myself someone who's very open and learning a lot.
Steve Bisson:I have stereotypes, I got to work on them. I need help, and not because I'm a bad human being, but because I'm very knowledgeable that I don't know everything, and if we could also accept that as a population I don't know everything about everyone. That's just not how I work and I'm okay with that when I know if it's an atemble. And I think that when you think about the Kesher Shalom projects, it's important to not only talk about stereotypes but be willing to go there and be challenged, and not because you're a bad human being, but be challenged so that you can learn something. And I think that that's very important to also to make clear that that's what I get from you, malka, and the work that you guys are going to do is to also work on that not to shame people, but to educate people. So just want to mention that Exactly.
Malka Shaw:I mean the most. The tenement of therapy is safety and empathy, and so when people are writing to us, when we're getting letters from people saying that I don't feel safe, I don't feel safe in the therapy room anymore, my therapist isn't being empathetic to what's going on with me and my experience of what's going on, I question the person's ability to be in the mental health field. How are you in the mental health field if you can't have empathy, even if you don't agree with the situation? It all comes down to the core emotions that right now we're experiencing, but everybody's experienced grief, loss, betrayal, doubt, fear, anger, sadness. Those are the core emotions behind all of it and, as a therapist, that's our place as a whole space and to give them empathy for all of that, for all clients that are walking through the door and I think, at the end of this day, is that I've learned that if you're not understanding something, I've learned to say I don't know.
Steve Bisson:There's two things that therapists should never say is oh, I know exactly how you feel and I'm not curious about what you're saying.
Malka Shaw:No one of my favorite parts about being a therapist is Kesha, shalem aside is the amazing people that have walked through my doors over the years and I feel like they've helped me and taught me.
Malka Shaw:You do become a little bit of a jack of all trades.
Malka Shaw:And then when I talk about culture, there's not even just religious culture, but there's like the culture of working in a hospital or working in a Michelin star kitchen and the culture of being a teacher and firefighter and we talked a lot.
Malka Shaw:We started, you know, I've had a lot of cops that have come through my offices and a lot of teachers that have come through my offices and I just feel like I get exposed to all these different and then, you know, just maybe because of where my office is located, I get a lot of Hispanic clients and a lot of Indian clients and very well versed in the cultures and very empathetic and it just I feel like it's such a gift that I was given to like really be able to get a little peek into all these different worlds that I might have not naturally been exposed to. You know, working with police officers, they're like they have their own specific brotherhood and way of looking at the world and firefighters and teachers and all the different. So I it's to me it's one of the best parts about my job is I get to meet really amazing people. I mean, I think one of the bummer parts is sometimes you're like, oh, I wish I could have been friends with this client, but I can because we have the boundaries.
Malka Shaw:I don't know if, Steve, do you ever have that I'm like?
Steve Bisson:oh, yeah, I have that. And when Mike Lydes said that I always joke around, I said, okay, if we become friends, that means you got to listen to my stories and my problems too. Oh, I don't know if we could be friends. I'm like, exactly, and I respect you and all that. But yes, and it's sad, but that's the kind of what I remind myself. And I got to wrap it up. We're on the hour already, okay great what.
Steve Bisson:I would like you to do is remind me of the website again, just so that everyone can go and put in the show notes.
Malka Shaw:Sure, kesher K E S H E R Shalom S? H A L O M dot com. Kesher Shalom dot com and that will lead you to and I think it's Kesher Shalom dot com slash newsletter will lead you to the secret Lisa Lisa Mustard podcast of the therapist giving some free things over. If you want to get in touch with me as a therapist, I am malchashawcom M a l K a s h a w dot com. You can reach out to me. I can see clients virtually in New York and in Florida and only in person in New Jersey. And, steve, I hope I can consider you a colleague and a friend after today because you've been amazing.
Steve Bisson:I consider your friend and colleague myself. This was a great interview and you know I'm thinking that we're going to have to redo this and do a reeducation several times and I hope you come back.
Malka Shaw:I know you talk about your back. Maybe I'll bring some of the other members of the team with me. We would love to come back you know, and please, please do.
Steve Bisson:From the bottom of my heart, I'm very sorry for everything that's going through. I know I didn't, I didn't do anything, but I still feel the hurt. I don't know how it feels exactly, but I do feel, definitely feel it, and I want to send that out. And your project is so important. I can't wait to actually do it myself. This is not a plug, this is not anything else, but I want to do it and I want and encourage therapists, clients, people listening to me right now, to go and do it too, because I, like I said, that's why I wanted to finish on. I don't know everything, and I'm OK with that. And you don't know everything, and that's OK too, and anything that could educate you in a better way, especially in these harder times, is only essential for everyone's development.
Malka Shaw:So all the trauma treatment could be applied to anybody. Just a cultural piece, but the all the other pieces, the safety period as a whole, like EFT demonstration they could be. This could be used for any client anywhere.
Steve Bisson:Well, malcolm, thank you, let's stay in touch and I appreciate you.
Malka Shaw:Thank you so much.
Steve Bisson:Well, this concludes episode 135. I hope you got your. You get your breath after this one. It was very poignant, very meaningful, very you know, I don't even know how to describe it. You know I'm recording this conclusion a little later on, after I did the interview and it still gets to me. So I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did, even though it was a hard subject, a very hard, difficult thing to talk about. And again, you'll have the link in the websites for joining part of the project that she's working on right now with the Kesha Shalom projects. Episode 136 is going to be with a returning group of men, a group of mental men. They've been on before. I think episode 122 is one of them. I think the other one was 107 or 108 around there, I can't remember exactly. But this we're going to continue our conversation, Mentorship, we've talked about different things, but it's just a great bunch of guys. So I hope you join me for that interview on the next episode.
Voice Over:Please like, subscribe and follow this podcast on your favorite platform. A glowing review is always helpful and, as a reminder, this podcast is for informational, educational and entertainment purposes only. If you're struggling with a mental health or substance abuse issue, please reach out to a professional counselor for consultation. If you are in a mental health crisis, call 988 for assistance. This number is available in the United States.