E951: Rushion Interviews Daniel Carcillo about Brain Trauma and Schellie Fanfan, Mental Health Coach!

00:00:04
Speaker 1: Welcome to Money Making Conversations. It's the show that she has the secrets of success experience firsthand by marketing and Brandon expert Rashan McDonald. I will know he's given me advice on many occasions. In occasion didn't notice I'm not broke. You know. He'll be interview with celebrity CEOs, entrepreneurs and industry decision makers. It's what he likes to do, it's what he likes to share. Now it's time to hear from my man, Rashan McDonald money Making Conversations. Here we come. My next guest is Daniel Carsilo. He is the founder and chief executive officer with SNA Health, biotechnology company focused on developing the novel therapies of tomorrow and delivering new care paradigms for today. Daniel is a well known speaker and IF advocate on behalf of traumatic brain injury t b I survivors and people dealing with mental health challenges. Mr Carsilo played in the n h L which we all know that little circle can be a train wreck. As they say. Reason I say it's a train wreck because his nickname car On car On. During his ten year nh career for his explosive playing on the ice, no for protecting his teammates. They call that an enforce her. Okay, in basketball they got me. Football they got Spen. But in hockey and basketball, those two, those two, there were pops up a lot. Mr Daniel helped Chicago win two Stanley Club Championships with the Blackhawks, but a great personal cost to himself. We'll talk about what son of health and the price you can pay for being and enforcing NHL. Please welcome to money making conversation in Master Cars. Mr Daniel Carno. How you doing, sir, I'm good. How are you? Um? Let's talk about I'm gonna ta my hockey. I'm I love all sports, okay. And I was in New York. I was I think that was in New York and Nanny went to my first hockey game. Was enjoying it. I was enjoying it. It's two shows going in the hockey game, Daniel. You can probably you're on the ice, but there's also a show that goes on in the stands, okay, and the hockey crowd. I think it was the most rowity group of people I've ever been in the stands with Okay, I've been to the baseball games. I've been to the football games. I've been to the basketball games, okay, but that hockey fan beer drinking was extreme and women were the rowdiest I've ever seen in any sports setting. Where the women I would like to actually stunned Daniel at the beer drinking and the rowdiness of the women. Okay, that's my experience in the stands. Then you're dealing with this tremendous, volatile sport of violence was you can say, a time very graceful called ice. How did you get involved with the as a young hockey player? What attracted you to the sport? So? I grew up in Canada, and as soon as you get born, you can walk, you get put on skates. So I started at three years old. And one of the things that attracted me to the sport was just being able to move with a group of guys towards one goal. Because you have to move in synchronicity towards that common goal. Whoever is more connected will ultimately win the game. And and then there was also this other aspect of you know you mentioned going to hockey games. Doesn't want a bounce. It's like m m a on skates and you're legally allowed to hit somebody when when they have the puck. So it was definitely attracted to the aggressive nature of the sport as well. Well. The aggressive nature. Didn't that I wanted to ask you that for now, go back to my experience at the at the at the hockey game. So I'm enjoying the movement, the the gracefulness you all of a sudden at the at the end of the hockey we there's a fight going on. It had nothing to do what the other eat of that. I would I would tell as as a as a fan, I would like, what the heck, what is going on? But everybody in this day like wow, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's I'm as m. I'm as the first time and I've been to more hockey gate system was like like caught off. I remember, I really understand how that played a role into it. And people start educating that's where hockey as they do that. That's how I go like that explained to me? Would you be called carbomb because I'm pleading sure, you're one of the guys at the other end of the ice that I was like confused, that's what were you doing? What was going on here, Daniel. So we have in hockey, you have four lines and forwards. So you have six forwards, two lines that are essentially your skill guys that are quote unquote untouchable, and then you have your third and fourth line who are more grinders who wear the other skill guys down. So one of my jobs was to be an antagonist, was to ensure that the other team knew not to take any shots at our top six guys. So there's a little bit of an unwritten code because then I wouldn't take shots at theirs. And if that did happen, then you know, um, I had a pretty unpredictable nature to myself, so you would have to answer to me. And if their guy took shots at, you know, one of our skill guys, you'd think that I would go after the enforcer, when in fact, I would, you know, take the next shift and my coach would probably put me on the top six line and I would go after one of their skill guys. So kind of tip for tad get their guys instead of thinking about scoring goals distracted by me and trying to trying to keep their head on straight. Yeah, in baseball, that would be if their star player got hit, then the next inning when their planner comes, they can hit him with a baseball. That's now now a lot of people trying to outlawd that now in hockey that the model of what you just spoke to me is that still the norm. Are people trying to show away from neck especially with being on TV so much that days. Yeah, so I think that there's there's a lot of backlash, but I think we have to remember how the game was founded. Ultimately, there's a regular season, but that regular season is all set up to get to the playoffs to then win the Stanley Cup. And the Stanley Cup is a seven game series, right, four rounds of seven games, So at the end of the day, there is always this aspect of taking somebody's will to play away, and the way you do that is you you lean on them with with physicality. Obviously you have to score more goals to win the game, but over that period of time you have to make sure that there's there's a nice meld of physicality and skill. And so I don't know if it will ever you know, be out of the game, but there's definitely less fighting nowadays, which I think is a positive thing, and there's no more enforcers in the sense of the word. There's guys that can fight if something does happen. And so it's trending in the right direction being that you know, now they're on ESPN and T n T and you have some TV deals and really people I think in in Canada still there's the purest of the sport where they want to see the fighting, but to attract new fans to the game, I think the game is trending in the right direction where we're moving away from the right. We really we we This is what's just taken to this conversation, that whole circle and how you can just run up to a player and just pin him against the ice and you're moving at a hundred miles an hour and sometimes they don't see him that that that that's coming, and it can lead to an ultimate collision or smash up against the rink itself. And those collisions of what leads us to the conversation we have in the day, those those you know you see him in football, you know a running back is coming through the line, another player is meeting him at the same impactful moment that's causing brain damage and his cause, and people are starting to do tests. Some people are dying and asking can we get that players brains that we can do research on there is That's where we're at with with Sana. Yeah, so I think that donating your brain for research is really important. Unfortunately, that happens after men have passed away with a history of repetitive head trauma. There's never been anybody found to have chronic traumatic encephalopathy, which is a neurodegenerative disease similar to Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, a l S, and dementia where eventually a taw protein takes over your brain and you're unable to do the normal tasks um of an everyday human being. And when these symptoms start to arise and there's little to no education or awareness or understanding, then you have people passing away and trying to cope in a in a number of different various ways. So I think that the settlement with the NFL really opened a lot of people's eyes and in the community of hockey to speaking about how not only the concussive hits are affecting individuals after they're done playing and during but also how these subconcussive hits are are affecting people over a longer period of time. So they've done things like move the age of hitting up um to incur less damage, etcetera. But uh, we are definitely in a brain eccentric age if you look at all supplementations and and even outside of the sporting world, everybody's really focused on on the brain. And so you know, I think making sure that people that the men playing the sports are aware of the risk and then making sure that they have the proper treatment to recover during the sport and then after having the proper resources to rely on, I think is extremely important and it's one of our goals absolutely to raise awareness for that and for traumatic brain injury. You know, I just recently saw a special I want to make sure I get the team weight. I believe it was do your Red Wings versus the Avalanche? Correct? Yeah, and uh and so you know, and my wife, you know, she doesn't watch hockey, and it was so it was such a compelling series. It puts a violence series too. You know, it was like you know, it was like you know, you was you was you were blown away because of the fact that you know, here with two of the violent individuals that were sitting sharing the stage as warriors. Who can actually sit next to you doesn't be civil? How did you translate you being this? You know, you don't get a name like you know, CARBONMB unless you're doing something out there. How did that translate? I know your teammates got you, how did you translate away from the court with your competitors are the other teams in the league, So it's it's funny. Guys that did my job are usually the closest. We'd run into each other at you know, bars or afterwards at other events and shake hands and hug and it was just all part of the game. It's all understood. It's similar to the confusion that you see. I'm sure some people get when m m A fighters are clapping each other and immediately after the fight, right, So hockey's um very much like m m A on skates. I think that's why it's so compelling and exciting when you go and watch it live. That's such a different experience when you're watching it on TV. But we get on. We get on pretty well, and we understand that, you know, we are gladiators in a sense that um, we're programmed to suffer and to take damage for the good of the team. And however that looks if that looks like fighting somebody, then so be it. If it looks like laying down blocking a hundred slap shot, um, however we can get to the final goal of of winning. Uh, it's all, it's all a part of that game. Just just I know the interviews about this, but I just want to get your feedback. I saw that and I was just taken away by the violence and then the team we're in them, camaraderie of it. A person like you who was not part of that and saw that. What was your takeaway? Was it too much violence? Did you say? Wow? Sometimes, oh my god when you watch that that that that that especially that was put put on by ESPN A ray Birds, I mean the reb Wings versus the Avalanche. Yeah. So that's how I learned the game. I watched rock'em Sock Them videos and I watched these men be gladiators out there, and the game was again, like much different back then than it is today right where it's trending in a different direction. But when I came up, I'm only thirty seven years old, and it was very much like that where you would start games, the puck would drop and you'd have two guys fighting right away, and so um. You know, there's a couple of things that bring people out of their seats, and one of them that brings everybody out of their seats is a fight. So um and the fight, their fights were their fights brooke line brawls, right, so you saw less of like five guys fighting and bench clearing brawls, et cetera. It still happened, Um, But I think that, you know, to make the game, to grow the game outside of you know, the six Canadian teams that we have, and and outside of Colorado and these original six teams Chicago, Detroit, we have to the game has to evolve. And that's that's definitely what's what's happening now. Cool. I was speaking of Daniel Carcillo. He's the two time UH Standard Cup champion with the Chicago Black Off. What you did you win those those those titles? So I lost to them in two thousand and ten with the Flyers, and then I ended up signing with them in two thousand and twelve. I won a Cup in two thousand thirteen. I thought, so I was in Chicago. I was managing Steve Harvey at the time and we were doing the talk show at Chicago. I said, he problems up there when I was up there, and one of those titles up there, well, that city was on fire man, because we did out talk to you the first season and y'all wanted and then y'all wanted the game man. That city was on fire about the black Hawks, man, it was. Yeah, it was a really amazing time to be a block Hawk, to be in the city. It really was one of the modern dynasties because you don't see many teams winning three times within an eight year period. We'll be right back with more money Making Conversations Masterclass with Rushan McDonald. Now, let's return to money Making Conversations Masterclass with Rushan McDonald. So, now now you're out of hockey, and so let's say we do play the game to play the game. You play the game to win. You play the game because God gave your talent. When you start realizing that something's not right in the game that you're playing, when did you start realizing that, Daniel? So, when I signed with the block Hawks, I made an intention to not, you know, manage my symptoms with you know, alcohol, opiates, um toward her all quarters, all these anti inflammatories that most athletes are on. So that was at twenty five and when I got to the black Hawks, I met Steve Monitor, who was seven years sober and he had been through sixteen traumatic brain injuries at that time, and we were kind of just um. We became really really fast friends and and stayed by each other's side for the next five years. In two thousand and thirteen, Steve got cleared for four concussions in a twelve week period, and so at that point he had nineteen and he started to really suffer and I started to see very similar symptoms in myself that he had. And then those symptoms, Daniel, can you tell us who that's what those symptoms were that you started to notice. Yeah, so things like light sensitivity, slurred speech, headache, head pressure, insomnia, impulse control issues, appetite loss, short term long term memory loss, anxiety, depression, sue side all ideation there was. You know, they're pretty serious symptoms and it's it's kind of the first onset of dementia. And when you're experiencing that at thirty three thirty four, while you're still playing, and I'm watching my friend who then retired, really accelerate his degradation if you will. Um, I just looked at myself and I just had my son. In two thousand fourteen, two thousand fifteen February, Steve passed away and then he was found to have a stage three ct E, which is a pretty progressive stage for him only being thirty four. So at the end of that year, we ended up winning again, but I ended up suffering pretty bad. And then I got my seventh concussion in March, and for reasons that I made for my family and for myself, I decided to retire and step away. And then I've sent Spen on this eight year brain health journey to recover my brain quality of life, and it's brought me across a number of different treatments and tools and modalities that I've been able to luckily share with with the following that I have. Well, you know the interesting thing about it, when this interview opportunity presented itself to me, you know, you know, coming off mental health, Mond, coming off mental health and minorities, and we're coming off with so many the layers of trying to get the message across Daniel is that the football Pro Football has done a good job of getting the word out that we have a problem. You know, we have a problem. They've talked about high school, they've talked about middle school. Changing the way you tackle, you know, not tackling with your head. All these things have been put in place, and I felt that at least should allow you to start telling your story, the NHL story, because changes don't happen if it's just only a few people hear about it. And I hope that my platform allows more people to hear about it. What are you trying to get out the most doing this interview about the WHATSNA health platform as well as the experiences that may need to happen within the inn ajail for it to be a safer what's still entertaining league? Yeah, So as far as the NHL goes, I'm really not trying to do anything to change any rules. I just want because damage is gonna happen, So I just want individuals in the league, outside of the league, if you have kids, to know that there's things that you can do to train your brain to increase processing speed, hand eye coordination, as well as peripheral vision. Because unfortunately, right now, there's only a couple of things that can protect your brain from further injury, which is seeing the hit coming and bracing for it so that you stopped the whiplash, effect effectively stopping the damage of your brain slashing around in a rigid skull. And then things like CBD, which is a patented neuro protect and patented by the US government in two thousand three, the only patented neuro protecting on Earth. So things like that that I advocate for, and then just the treatments that I've come across. I've been a astaunis mental health traumatic brain injury advocate, and I always preface it with things can happen in different arenas, because I've talked with veterans, have talked with domestic abuse survivors, have talked with football players, um cheerleaders, you know, swimming people that swim and hit their heads during practice because the pool is populated, so there's equestrian I mean, there's a bunch of different arenas, and I always just speak from the context of if you're suffering, there's things that you can do, and those things don't always include medicine. They can because it does help but they can also include things like float tanks or self deprivation tanks, hyperbaric chamber, cranial sacral which is a technique to to decompress the brain, and also supplementation regiments. And really that's where we saw it was founded because up until three years ago, I was still suffering. If you see them before and after pictures, I was a complete shell of myself. I wasn't able to put thoughts, words, conversations together, and I was deteriorating pretty quickly. It was a very scary time in my life. And and then I took an invitation to go to a decriminalized city and use the active ingredient in magic mushrooms, which is psilocybin, to recover my brain health. And it happened in a in about a sixty day period. And I've now been on that regiment for almost three and a half years, and I've never been a healthier version of myself or higher operating. And just making sure that you know, once you find something that you can create something like we sanna, which can go through the proper regulatory scientific rigor with the FDA to create a new medication for people. Because I believe that people need a diagnosis and then they need a prescription um that doesn't nest necessarily take them six months to get acclimated to like the current essess or as an antidepressants we have on the market. When they sat the bio over to me about certain things they want to talk about. When I hear the word psychedelic assisted therapy, I'm going old school. I hate the word a LSD. When I hear psychodad, Okay, cool, are we're talking about that? Or we're talking about CBD or what are we talking about when you talk about the assisted therapy, Because it's a it's a combination that I've taken both hallucinogenic and non hallucinogenic. So when you're doing the larger doses of psilocybin, you definitely want to have a person there that's guiding you. So that's what they speak about in the context of psychedelic assisted psychotherapy and psychotherapy works. We know that. And when you add in something like psilocybin or m d M A that's going to be coming online there and it's in phase three for PTSD survivors with the FDA right now. You are basically in a lot of these substances UM, looking at the trauma, meeting the trauma head on. So in the context of addiction, you are figuring out and you will be shown why you are addicted to a certain substance or why you're suffering from PTSD. You have to relive that trauma in order to come out of that ceremony UM feeling a little less weight. So then when in real life you have something that triggers you and triggers that trauma, you have a less emotional response to it, effectively not needing the alcohol or the other substances that you would normally need to numb that down. So it's a really efficacious way of of dealing with mental health symptoms and it's um successful over sixty seven percent of the time, unlike what we have on the market now that works around seventeen to thirty percent of the time. Was talking to Daniel Corsillo, I'm gos to um. It was Sound Health, a two time champion that's right standing Cup and Chicago Blackhawks. He's a champion there now he's trying champion of calls that's out there trying to make a difference with with the brain traumatic brain injury. You know, then and we can talk with this car accidents, we can talk about it's a lot of different ways. I like a like a knucklehead. I tell you, I got a hicky right here, Daniel. When I was undeath, the cabinet forgot the top cabinet was up and raised up automatically, and bro I saw if I saw stars, I saw I could I could touch them. And so these type of injuries, you know, we kind of like blow them off, but people have died from these type of injuries, you know, sudden impact on your brain. So we cannot trivialize what you're talking about in any situation, especially when you involve your kid in physical sports, whether it's uh, you know, like I said, whether you know, we look at it. We look at it. We look at wrastling, we look at football, we look at uh hockey. But it also happens in basketball because the physical contact, the elbows to the face, you know, a sudden going and elevating the air, you fall, hit your head on the floor. There's so many ways that kids and young people are walking away. I just want to let you know, man, you look fantastic. You're very articulate, and to say that you were a staged several years ago where you were a shell of a man. Today, my brother, you are outstanding. Man. I am I am U. I am a walking testimony to hear you that I want to see me. Whatever you gotta send to me to promote what you're doing, because if this is what it can get you from some from a shell, to get you control of your life, being articulate, having a smile, brand awareness, socially awareness. Let's get that message out there. What's son a? Where you at? Man? That's that's my new world conduct. Okay, thank you man. I appreciate the kind words. And it's um, yeah, it's been uh, it's been a long journey. I feel I've always felt that there's a larger purpose to life than you know, essentially pushing a punk around. You know, it's kind of always U. I have a mind that was always kind of looking for other things even though I was in my career and um, I feel like, you know, you get tested and this is uh, not necessarily another test, but really a culmination of everything that I've done in my life up to this point to help mitigate suffering, whether it's in the traumatic brain injury context or whether it's outside of it, because these medicines have the potential to help activate the brain, help flush out you know, inflammation uh from from damaged parts of the brain, stimulate the brain, essentially making us feel better, more creative, better access to language and memory. And it's um yeah, it's just a really exciting time. So I appreciate you having me on your platform to to talk about this. Well. Appreciate you because first of all, a knowledge is power, and when you have knowledge and you're able to share with people who may not be aware, I think it's even more incredible. Experiens the fact that you've taken a brilliant career ten years and any sport, especially at the level you played, to walk away two championships and then to be on my interview and be able to articulate the next phase of your life. This is the one that I always tell people anything in life. You know, athletics is a sharp phase of your life. The other phase of your life that fifty plus period. What are you doing now? You have a plan, my friend Daniel and I am I want a champion in and I'm very serious. Whatever you do, I want to kind of like, you know, if you give me something that we can part down the information so I can put it in my social media, put it on my newsletter and things like that on my LinkedIn account. I definitely want to assist you and that spread the word. Okay, of course I appreciate that. I'll definitely send over some information. Thank you. I want to thank him for coming on my show two times, Stanley cup Chop. He was he wanted when I was in Chicago, Okay, so I feel like I got little ownership for this man's relationship. Again, thank you for coming on Money Making Conversation about the class, Daniel, So come thanks together. If you want to see this interview or hear this interview on money Making Conversation Masterclass, please go to money Making Conversation dot com. I'm Rashan McDonald. I am your host. We'll be right back with more money Making Conversations Masterclass with Rushan McDonald. You are now tuned into the money Making Conversations Minute of Inspiration with Rashan McDonald. Hi, I'm ra Sean McDonald for money Making Conversation Masterclass with your daily meaning of Inspiration. This week, I sat down with attorney arbitrator Arthur and Emmy nominated host of Divorce Court Judge Faith Jenkins. Judge Faith Jenkins shares why it may be beneficial to add your own perspective and opinion to your position. What would happen with someone's case would literally depend on who got their case. So if I got a case and it was a young person from Harlem, I would have a different perspective than a lot of my colleagues. So it was very important for me to add my perspective to that job. So when it came time to calling on me for television, they were looking for people like me. You could add a different perspective and opinion when giving analysis on these cases. If you want to listen to this full interview with Judge Faith Jenkins is available on money Making Conversation dot com. Now let's return to Money Making Conversations Masterclass with Rashan McDonald's. My guest is Shelly fan Fan fan Fan is the Florida state licensed mental health counselor. She's currently the chief executive officer of Harmony Mental Health and Behavioral Services for Children, Adolescents and Adults. Shelly is also the founder and sole owner of Asked Shelley Consulting, LLC. Or she consoles with individual businesses, ministries, and organizations to maximize performance and productivity. Shelly's passion is to change the world, one life, one family, and one community at a time. Please work with the Money Making Conversation Master Class Shelly fan Fan. How you doing? I am well? Hello, thank you for having me. Well, you see, bright Chipper is that it's a standard and mo for your personality. Absolutely, I got up this morning. I still have purpose. Uh, impact is my my my currency. So yes, there's so much more to smile about than there is to frown about. But you know, but you always get these people go, why are you so happy? Well, you know they want to bring you down. You know they want they feel there's a reason or dysfunctional role in your life to have this level of enthusiasm that I say that not even joking, because they have people like that. How do you how do you deal with people who who have that negative built in energy that they want to just spread instead of absorbing positivity. I try to be as positive as possible and make sure that I do that consistently, because being fulfilled and being in purpose and finding a reason to smile is no longer a normal thing. It's quite abnormal. So when people respond to that, it's because they are acting you to be defeated. They're expecting you to be discouraged, They're expected you to be at your wits end. And so it's not uncommon for people to ask me, like, why are you smiling so big? But the reason why my mantra is lived in your smile is because I went from that stage in my life where I'm you know, you know, I spread the misery because I was so miserable on the inside. And so I am very intentional about spreading positivity. And when I deal with people or when I come to across across people who have that attitude, I just basically confunct them and encourage them to fix their focus, and um, I try my best to give them a different perspective and let them know that there's so much more working for us than there is working against us when you speak of that different perspective, because if it's based on who you meet, there's no cookie color game plan you can give to everybody. Otherwise you're not really servicing the correctly and also hearing their issues. You know, now, your name is that I introduced you with Shelley fan Fan was that born and raised name. It is okay, cool, So you know, we go through life and you know, I remember when middle school at times I was bullied. Okay, and you have a name, your name as a little odd due to a fan fan. So will you teased and when you would tease? Did they lead to any bullying incidents that you can remember that you had to overcome or share with your parents or the teachers to to you know, keep you focused and enjoy going to school. I'm happy that you bring that up such a good question because I love my name. Now. It works so well with campaigns because people are like, I'm a fan of fan Fan. I'm like, yeah, keep that energy going. But let me tell you, I never it took a long time for me to really embrace that name because I was bullied. Fan Fan is a very uncommon name. Is actually of Haitian descent. It's pronounced Fafa, but of course you know, in our English language it is pronounced fan fan. That's what people get, that's how they are able to pronounce it. And so in school, I was bullied for having a very strange last name. I was bullied for being so skinny. I was bullied for being Haitian all the things that make me me, and so it really impacted my capacity to self accept now you know, I know that I would when I look back in my life, I kind of went with the flow. You know when I say that, is that the things that people tease me about, I stopped doing it so I can fit in, you know, like they like my teacher used to always asked me to read publicly, you know, and put in the classroom. And one I remember a couple of students they were very, very upset that I was always chosen to read. And that really hit me when I look back on it, and not not just started, you know, just started breaking up my words and saying eight instead of isn't so I can stop being the special student and so and so. I I understand that because of the fact that when you start talking about mental health, people need to understand it doesn't start in high school. It just start as an adult. Sometimes you can go all the way back to you know, uh, preschool, how the adults allowed certain situations, the crying baby or the kid in the corner by itself, or the way the kids dressed. And because kids started a blank slate. So let's start at the at the at that age level that you start counseling and and and treating, so we can then we move up to adolescents, then teens, then adults, and adults are a whole new story. But sometimes if you don't get your adulthood with the proper guidance, then your disaster correct. Well, I'd like to take it back one more stage, and that's in vitro. And it's important for people to understand that mental health starts when you are in the womb of your mom. Because in your room, the womb of a woman, a child is developing, the brain is developing, there is a soul, they have the sense of hearing. I could go on and on about the fetus inside of a woman's womb. And a lot of the times when I'm dealing with individuals who are trying to overcome trauma, their trauma dates back all the way to when they were in their mother's womb. And it could be because the mother was a victim of violence herself, or the mother was a drug abuser. I could go on and on, and so it's important to understand that our mental health lifeline actually starts when we were in the womb of our mother's The way that our mothers cared for them, for herself, her mental health, how well she attended to her health needs while she was pregnant with you, has to do and it is included in the mental health lifeline. When we're working with preschool children or kindergarteners, those young because I treat from the ages of two to it's important to understand that there's so much um of there's so much involved in a child's development of self identity that incorporates their peer interactions. And so when we as parents and caregivers minimize when they come to us and say such and such was talking about meet all the things that we find trivial, it's very huge to a child, and so it's important to understand that those things create impressions. Everything creates impressions. Our brain is a huge recorder. Even those memories that we don't have access to have power. And so as we develop through those developmental stages and we are trying to find ourselves, it's important to understand that all of those experiences matter. They are impressions, and what we impress, we will express. What we impress is what we express so a lot of times when I'm working with adults, it's important for me to kind of go back to those learned experiences that cause those impressions and try to unlearned them so that they can find some freedom and the opportunity to relearn healthy connections and healthy ideas. Absolutely, now as I'm talking to doctor excuse me, I'm talking to Shelley fan Fan. She is a license important license mental health counselor. And I reason like I've been interviewed a lot of African Americans, people of color about mental health because in the community of black and brown we kind of shy way, you know, because just using street terms, I don't want think I'm crazy, you know, I don't think you know, you know, people still use the word retarded and associated with you know, craziness, and you know, these are terminologies within our community that we have not wrapped our conversation around, and that it doesn't allow us to move forward. You know, we call our kids slow. You know, it's still humor tied to a child not functioning properly. That child may be discarded into the back of the house or to a different conversation, or may not be included in part of the family conversation because of embarrassment. How do you deal with those? Because, like said, we started to move forward now because it's called participation, it's called inclusive awareness of a child, um intelligence, a child's social adaptability, adaptability, and things like that. Talk to us well, it starts with education because our breakthrough is often on the other side of something we do not know. And so this idea of crazy. Usually when people say crazy, I asked them, what does that look like for you? And so most people will define like a person. Think of a man at a seven eleven who's talking to himself, you know, wiggling his fingers and responding to internal stimuli. Most of the time people see that as mental illness. When they think of the word mental health, they automatically think mental illness, the person who has schizophrenia, the person who has bipolar who's blowing up things, burning things, and having anger outbursts. And what I try to teach every opportunity that I have, especially to black and brown communities, is that mental health is a spectrum. It starts with being completely whole and emotionally well, and most of us do not fit into that category all the way to having a diet ignosable mental health disorder. So what I try to teach is, what does it look like outside of that space, outside of the area that criteria for mental illness, What does the rest of that spectrum look like? The rest of that spectrum looks like your inability to commit to another person. It looks like your inability to get eight hours of uninterrupted rests. It looks like your self doubt. It looks like your fear and anxiety that keeps you stuck. It looks like your procrastination. It looks like that book that you haven't written. It looks like that song that you haven't sung. It looks like your inability to overcome your emotional issues. It's your inability to to communicate effectively without allowing your emotions to drive the car. It's your incapacity to manage your anger and be successful at work. It's your inability to manage your fin answers effectively. When we look at it that way, it changes our mind about what mental health really looks like, and then it expands the need in our communities for health. Right. Well, you know the thing about it is that you have an inner city, then you have or which is which which is totally a lockdown, and well, you know there's a lot of work has to be done. You're talking about the wealth gap, that's a mental gap too. That's we're definitely in the mind of city. But it's all about embarrassing how people feel the statue or the place they want to be recognized within the community. And it starts with your children. And your children are your future. And so you know, we bring these innocent, taught or innocent people into our lives. And I always tell people to have a healthy child and that maybe define what you might call healthy into a life is a miracle. And in the process of the adults, this is the whole thing. You have an adult, you have the child, and then and the child may not be living up to the physical and mental expectations of the parents. How do you deal with that? So the love and the in the not lawering the standards, but raising the love and being able to push that child at that level to their maximum efforts. How do you balance that because you're dealing with all three. You're dealing with the lessons, you're dealing with the children, and you're dealing with the adults. So in parenting, when we are providing parenting training. One of the things, one of the main lessons that we teach is that the love and affection, celebration of life, those things should not be contingent upon expectations or what we define as good behavior. It should never right. And so sometimes I'll have parents say, or what, we canceled his birthday party because he was blah blah blah blah right, he didn't listen, he got in trouble. And so we have to help parents understand what's healthy to have as contingencies because a lot of parenting is very performance based, and then we grow up as adults and we are over performers, we are perfectionists. We're not living happy lives. And where does that come from? That comes from performance based parenting. Where I love you when I say when I believe you're doing good, when the report cards all aids, when you got that trophy at school. It is at that point that I give you love and affection, but when you are not meeting my expectations, I withhold my love and affection. It causes children to understand that love depends on fill in the blank, and that's a that's a problem for a lot of marriages too. I always say when you say I love you, because everything after the word because becomes a condition. And so we have to actually teach parents how to unconditionally love and accept their children. And half the time parents who parent that way is because they were parented that way. And so it's about going back and breaking those generational understanding, those generational choices, those generational curses, in order to set the children free. One of the things also in addition to that teaching unconditional love in our parenting, we also have to teach that there's no such thing as good or bad parenting. It's either it's effective or ineffective. And when we are not raising children that are emotionally intelligent and mentally stable, there is some ineffectivity in the way that a person parents, And then it gives us an opportunity to teach parents new skills. New skills are really the key. It's when they seem a series of questions for me to include in my interview, which you I'm speaking with Shell They and Fan. She's a licensed in the state of Florida mental health counselor. She also has another organization called as Shelley Consulting LLCEE where she consults with individuals, businesses, ministries, and organization to maximize performance and productivity. That's how we talked about that productivity, especially coming out of the COVID experience, but also came out of the COVID experience was two words that I heard a lot, conflict resolution, and I heard it a lot in law enforcement. Confluent resolution. Of course, you know, confluence happens in everything, happens in children, happens in relationships, happens in the two adults trying to get into the same door going into a seven elevel. So we need to work conflict resolution. I'm sure that's been a prominent part of your conversations. How what exactly does that mean? Conflict resolution? Well, it means that it's it's basically a process by which we manage on met expectations. Because when you think about conflict, conflict is a problem. It's a nice word for problems. Problems are always rooted in an expectation that wasn't meant. Think of a problem right now, think of problems that you dealt with. It always goes back to a an expectation that you had of someone something, an outcome that you were expecting and the expectation wasn't meant, and so conflict resolution teaches skill sets on how to manage that distress. If that conflict is with another person, Conflict resolution teaches how to have those courageous conversations and be solution focused in it. How do you manage your emotions that disappointment, that anger, that frustration, How do you manage that in order to get to a resolution with someone that you want to preserve a relationship with. Sometimes the resolution is deuces, and that's okay too, But conflict resolution is about that. And one of the things that I teach as a corporate trainer is a lot of the time when we say conflict resolution, what we're trying to say is conflict management. Why because we may not always resolve our conflict the resolution maybe that we're just gonna agree to disagree. Is that a resolve? Well maybe not, But it's a way that we're managing conflict so that we can still be affective, we can still be partners, we can still be married, we can still be co parents, we could still you know, be effective and work towards the go. Conflict management is always the key. We'll be right back with more Money Making Conversations Masterclass with Rushan McDonald. Now let's return to Money Making Conversations Masterclass with Rashan McDonald. Conflict management can be sectioned off. You know, when you're when you're in a police officer, that's a separate conflict management. When you go in for mediation with parenting, that's a separate conflict management resolution discussion, as well as in a girlfriend or a partner relationship or husband and wife relationship, because there's certain contractual agreements that you have when you get married. A lot of people don't realize you've signed a contract, you know, where when you're just a partner, a girlfriend, boy for you can go do somehout, you know, depending on if you've moved in with that person, then that's a different duce. There's a certain mediation that's the conflict can get kind of kind of dicey. But and and and talking to you in mental health and and you know, it all goes back to stress. It always goes back to am I living up to my personal standards? Then? And then if you're not living up your personal standards, are you're living up to your kids stand are you living up to your job standards, So you can just put all this weight on your back and like that that little image of that guy holding up the world Atlas holding you can feel like that person and guess what, it may never come off of you unless you learn how to handle stress. Now I've always felt that, you know, stress, for me, I handled a lot of different ways. Uh, even when I when I bought a house in Atlanta, I made sure I had water near me, or I go near water. I just watched that calmness of the water, and it's just just seeing it. It just really brings me down. And So because I'm not agar cigar smoker, I don't drink wine, so everything's always one on me. And so how I deal with that. I love to bake. I love to cook, you know, because it's a short term window and I can see success. Sometimes stress is tied to goals. So and then in my office I have a garden and so I have this forty five day window where I can see tomatoes, I can see okraw, I can see collar greens, and so that's how ideal with stress. And as I'm just giving those examples of because there's so many different ways. But I time, I tend to tie short time which short term windows too to be able, especially if you're goal order in person like me and you have these long committed plans where you it's a month of whales a year way, or you're not even reaching your goals. Well, I can go out to my garden. I can want me to cherry tomatoes and I'm happy. So when you say stress management, am I in the right direction? Chilly? You are? Absolutely you hit the veil on the head. Stress management is about under first and foremost understanding the importance of having practical wellness tools. What you just talked about. Our wellness tools. I garden. I make sure that I am living by the water, and you know I have these. I give myself an opportunity to achieve success. That's what that is like. I want to be able to see the tomatoes growing. That's success. These are wellness tools, and unfortunately many people don't have many. They may have one or two tools that they use. So if my tool is a glass of wine and sleep, that I'm not dealing with my stress because the tools that I'm using are very avoidant. And so we teach how to classify your stressors into two main categories. What stressors are avoidable and what stressors are unavoidable? Because the ones that are avoidable, that we need to be strategic about avoiding them in a healthy way, because escape avoidance sometimes becomes very unhealthy. You're not really living life because you're just living in escape avoidance, just running from those stressors. So in a healthy way, how do we avoid those avoidable stressors? And how do we manage our stress in those unavoidable stressors? And I am telling you in the twenty four years that I have been in practice, there are so many people out there that do not know how to Here's a word. Here's a word, and that is decompressed. Like decompressed. What do you do to decompress? Because if you're trying to manage your stress, but you don't have the capacity to decompress, it's gonna be very difficult to manage the stress. So of course we teach, you know, a good planning, making sure that we teach harmony versus balance, teach make sure that you are around people that are going to pour life into your accountability partnerships, set realistic goals. But but deeper than that has to be the capacity to decompress. That's your ability to take your anger from a ten to a six, your anxiety from a seven two a three, leaving your office and going at home and understanding you have to change roles. Now, your hats have to change. There has to be an exchange made either at your front door or on your way home so that you're not bringing that energy into your sanctuary. Decompression is key, and there are people that don't know this. They have to learn how, and that's why therapy is so effective. Again, I'm speaking to Shelley fan Fan. I'm a fan of fan Fan Okay, and she's like State of Florida mental health counselor and also she deals with what I'd like to talk about the conversation. We don't have children have mental health. They are not tied to the words that we use because there's so many stress levels the kids have to do. Because we have technology, you know, video games create stress. Uh, just being able to have apps create stress. The fact that your child and yourself are tied to a phone, so they're they're prevoud the conversations while you're driving in the car. That was not privy when I was growing up and we drove, we drove, We got the car. Now you're on the phone. That child may want that attention, but you're given all that attention to the person you're dealing on the phone. They may hear your stress levels and they pick that up. So I know that your world. Sometimes you're inviting that stress into your child's life because of technology. So I want to close what you give me us some pointers on overcoming life obstacle. Absolutely, And are you talking about in terms of children? Because you hit something, you hit, you hit the nail on the head. When you talked about children watching how their parents handle stress, how children learn by watching their parents managing their stress, managing conflict and things of that nature. And so a lot of times when parents come in and they sign up for therapy for their kids, do you know what we do? We asked them to sign up themselves first, because our children are sponges, and it's very important that caregivers are tapping into their own mental health so that they can be better examples for their children and that stress in childhood. I'm so happy that you mentioned that because it's key and all of this emphasis on gaming and winning and likes and shares and all of that, one thing that I want to say here. And I could go on and on about this, but I'm going to keep it brief. Parents have to encourage peer interactions. You can negotiate with your kids. Four hours of peer interaction gets you one hour of gaming. Like, we have to make sure that our children are still connecting with their peers. That's so important. That peer interaction is so important and alleviates a lot of the internal distress that children deal with on a day to day basis. And we have to make sure that children have the opportunity to express themselves. This idea that children should be seen and not heard, that's like a thing of the past. That is unhealthy. It causes mental illness. We have kids that are cutting themselves, they are self mutilating. We have to allow children to speak their minds and parents have to give them the space to do that. Well. I want to thank you Chilling. And like I said, I am based in Atlanta, Georgia. I know you're licensed in Florida. You make trips to Georgia. Please make time and come over. We can talk stress free. You know. I can show you my guard I can make some sauce right in front of you with the holla opinions. I freshly picked the onions, I freshly picked the cilantro. I freshly picked in the hockey ChIL beef steaf tomatoes that we're gonna stred up and enjoy. Of course, the chips are going to be storeball. I can't do everything. Get okay, but again, U I, I appreciate your smiles, appreciate you and the more important to honest conversation. That's why a couple of bringing on Money Making Conversations master Class. So no, you have a home here, to be able to afform to be able to communicate, and I like to believe that the conversation I was able to deliver you was one of honesty and one that you was able to expound on and deliver information for my audience. Okay, absolutely, thank you for having me. Cool. If you want to hear or see this interview on money Making Conversations, UH, go to money Making Conversation dot com. I'm with Sean McDonald. I am your host. You've been listening to Money Making Conversations Masterclass with Rushan McDonald. Always remember to lead with your gifts. Money Making Conversations Masterclass is a presentation of fifteen media Incorporated. You are now tuned into the Money Making Conversations. Minute of Inspiration with Rashan McDonald. This is what I sat down with Earthquake. He's starting to Day Chapelle home teaming Earthquake Legendari streaming on Netflix. Earthquake shares why he puts his faith in his work and allows it to speak for itself. You to real deal correct Earthquake. Yes, I mean because I've just believe let the work speak for itself. There's nothing else. I always felt in our profession that stage is an equalizer. The credits can get you applause in the beginning, but the jokes work. You could tell who works on their craft and who's in our craft. Um deserved to be there, and I think that so I always concentrated on the workshop. Who works speak for itself. If you want to listen to this four interview with Earthquake is available on Mindy Making Conversation dot com