Unknown Speaker 0:07 Hello, welcome to it's okay to feel with Jennifer and known a nominee OC podcast where we explore mental health topics that help you feel your feelings and feel a little less alone. We're so happy you're here. Now, on to the show. Unknown Speaker 0:24 Welcome to it's okay to feel a podcast by Naomi OC and hosted by me Non Wells and my dear friend, Jennifer Lynn. Hello, Jennifer. Unknown Speaker 0:36 Hello, that's me. Unknown Speaker 0:37 That's you. And we have Austin Messick here. He works at NAMI, Mister Austin. Welcome. Unknown Speaker 0:45 Hi, thanks. No. Hi, Jennifer. Unknown Speaker 0:47 Hi. Unknown Speaker 0:49 Thanks for being here. So before we get to things, let's just go around the table and introduce ourselves and kind of what we do Austin, why don't you kick us off? Unknown Speaker 1:00 Sure. So again, my name is Austin Messick, I'm a development assistant and events coordinator with NAMI. Orange County. Unknown Speaker 1:07 Amazing. Jennifer, how about you? Unknown Speaker 1:09 Hello. I am an illustrator, author and podcast host. And I like empowering people and bringing them up in this world bringing them up. It sounds like I'm everyone's mother. Oh, you are Unknown Speaker 1:21 you're the world's Unknown Speaker 1:23 Mother Earth. Unknown Speaker 1:26 I just want to make the world a more empowering place. And I do that with happy quirky illustrations and vulnerably humorous books and a mental wellness podcast called rainy day diaries. Unknown Speaker 1:40 Amazing. Yeah, it's all lovely people. And yeah, I My name is Non Wells. That's Non with the straight line over the so called a Macron. It's very nerdy. I didn't give this name to myself. My parents did. Unknown Speaker 1:54 How unusual. They'll give themselves their own names. Unknown Speaker 1:58 How dare you? How dare you. Hi. I'm also in the mental health podcasting game. My my podcast is called human empathy. And I have a little small business called the feeling human collective. And I want to put more empathy and feelings and vulnerability into the world and really grateful to be a part of this. This this project for NAMI OC called it's okay to feel very excited. So let's, let's talk a little bit about how this came to be and a little bit of the why of this podcast. I want to I want to bring it back to Austin. Austin, like, where did this idea come from? Why did you think of us and really butter us up? Sure. So Unknown Speaker 2:47 I guess the origin of the it's okay to do podcast, which is being coordinated in conjunction with our new media masterclass, which I'll explain a little bit later, it all came from a grant proposal that we submitted for cares Act funding to create some mental wellness programming for high school and college students here in Orange County. You know, as we saw at the COVID-19 pandemic, and kind of all of the social unrest that's happening, and the upheaval of everyday life, you know, especially for high school and college students whose school lives were turned completely upside down, you know, has left many students in need of mental health resources and, you know, connection to people and ideas and inspire them. So, you know, our goal with this podcast was to give you know, high school and college students, particularly here in Orange County, a chance to hear stories and ideas that will inspire them and let them know that they're not alone. Unknown Speaker 3:36 Amazing. Yeah, that's that's, that makes me feel good to be a part of it, you know, because it's, it's certainly the work that Jennifer and I appreciate. And as close to our heart is just, yeah, reminding people that we're not alone, that our feelings matter that talking about mental health is crucial, because we all have mental health, right? Unknown Speaker 3:56 Especially for that age bracket. Because I know growing up, I didn't have resources, or I wasn't introduced to resources. And I'm hoping that this will really resonate with some people who might need some encouragement. Unknown Speaker 4:12 Absolutely. Yeah. That's a really good point. Yeah. When I was growing up, it seemed like there was just like rocks and sticks, and I had to like figure out how those Unknown Speaker 4:21 are creating so much fire back. Right. Unknown Speaker 4:24 I made the wheel and I, you know, did paintings on caves. It was it was a whole thing. But yeah, no, I truly though it does. It does, like warmed my heart to know that there are organizations like NAMI and others, doing this kind of work making people feel less alone in the world because we're in this together truly. So let's, let's talk a little bit about before we get into kind of like the preview of you know, the next few months of this podcast, I want to hear from Austin a little bit about The media masterclass, like how is that gonna play a role in this podcast? Unknown Speaker 5:06 Sure. So the media masterclass is the second part of this program. And it's a course that we were specifically designing for high school and college students, particularly age 16, through 24, to give them a chance to learn, you know, the basics of podcasting, how to form their authentic on air persona, so they can kind of more comfortably express themselves on things like podcasts and YouTube, some strategies for building a following and advertising their creative work on social media and successfully connecting kind of all of these parts of their content ecosystem, if you will, to kind of have this cohesive message and create a vibrant personal brand. And we're really focusing on you know, helping students in this age bracket provide messages of hope and positivity about mental wellness. So that's, that's a major component of this. And when students graduate from our media masterclass, they'll have a chance to host and produce their very own episode of this the it's okay to feel podcast. And, you know, we're hoping to launch those student led podcasts by the beginning of November, but we're probably gonna have some surprise guest hosts before then as well. So everybody Keep your eyes and your ears out for that to Unknown Speaker 6:14 do you want to talk about how they can sign up or who can sign up for this program. And then when the classes start. Unknown Speaker 6:22 So anyone in that 16 to 24 age bracket can sign up. We are primarily here for Orange County residents, but if you're outside of Orange County, you can still sign up. To do that. You can email info that's i n fo at NAMIoc.org, and just right media masterclass in the subject line, and we will sign you up. Unknown Speaker 6:46 All right. Unknown Speaker 6:47 All right. You know, what I love about that is, you know, it goes back to like, you know, having the support and doing, you know, processing these things, and thinking about mental health, through the medium of podcasting is very powerful. And I think that it's a good reminder of like, the various ways that we can process mental health and we can think about our mental health and our feelings is there, there are no right or wrong ways to do it. And there are myriad ways and mediums like podcasting that that we can do it with. So it's a it's very empowering, to me, at least. And only me. Just Unknown Speaker 7:31 I wanted to ask Austin, Why us? Why are we the amazing podcast hosts for this new podcast? Unknown Speaker 7:39 Sure, as leading up to this, I was doing a lot of research, trying to find mental health podcasts. And one of my colleagues at NAMI, connecting me to known because she had taken one of the feeling human empathy workshops and loved it and recommended his podcast, you mean empathy. And, you know, I loved that knowing you have these, you know, impressive stories and experts who come in and touch on mental wellness topics that are so important right now. And then, you know, through some more research, I encountered Jennifer's rainy day diaries podcast, which, you know, Jennifer, I just love the way you're able to authentically connect with your guests. And I saw that Laurie Gottlieb was on there, and I had just read her book, maybe you should talk to someone. So I got kind of excited to hear her, you know, talk on a podcast that I hadn't really heard of before. So it was just kind of fun to see that you were interviewing her. And then, you know, when I ended up talking to both of you, I could not decide who to choose. Because I just loved both of your approaches and thought for a second Well, maybe we could get you to to co-host together and see what kind of dynamic duo, we could we could create. And lo and behold, you agreed and I'm very excited because the two of you, you know, you bring so much to the table and you know, a lot of experience and a lot of love and dedication to you know, talking about mental wellness that, you know, I'm just excited to see what you two are, are able to, you know, bring to this podcast and how we can kind of all work together to really bring a a strong message of mental wellness to, you know, teens and young adults in that high school and college area. Unknown Speaker 9:16 Lovely. Well, I mean, but if you were to like rank, Jennifer now, I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. Unknown Speaker 9:24 Obviously, me. Yeah, obviously. Unknown Speaker 9:28 The way that this, I'm talking to listeners now the way that this podcast, it's okay to feel is going to work is the next, you know, basically through the end of the year into early January. We're going to release you know, episodes interview episodes with expert guests every Monday, starting on starting today, October 19. And, and then as Austin said, you know, sometime in November, hopefully early November, the media masterclass episodes will be coming out on Thursdays I believe. And the way the episodes that Jennifer and I will be a part of is we're really kind of structuring them to kind of really hit on big mental health topics like anxiety, like, why it's okay to feel like body image, like, so many, like these big sort of meaty mental health topics. And we we've sort of designed the next three and a half months to kind of start basic and like, work, you know, lead us to like some more complex areas of mental health. And we'll have the guest interview. But then Jennifer and I will also have like a pre interview sort of preamble where we talk a little bit about our relationship to the topic. And we've already recorded a few of those, obviously, and they've been a lot of fun. Unknown Speaker 10:54 Yeah, it's been really great. I think you all are going to love it. Indeed, Unknown Speaker 10:59 indeed, Rooney. So, what else do we want to say? I guess I will just say that I'm happy you're here and happy you're listening. I hope you can continue listening. This is something that means a lot to us. You know, we got to talk about our mental health, we got to talk about our feelings it these things matter. And we even have, if you want to reach out to the show, we have an email address, it's okay to feel at namioc.org that's, it's okay to feel okay spelled out at namioc.org. And you'll be able to listen to all of the episodes wherever you listen to podcasts, apple, Spotify, etc. and show notes for this show will be on the namioc.org website. Unknown Speaker 11:55 Yay. Unknown Speaker 11:59 Hooray. Well, I'm excited for the next few months. I know Jennifer's excited. I know Austin can barely keep it together. He's so excited. Unknown Speaker 12:11 I am over the moon. I am certainly shaking in my boots. I'm over the moon. I really I just can't wait to get this started and, you know, provide some great content for our listeners. So you know, thank you for having me. And, and thank you for hosting this show you too. It's, it's gonna be great fun. Unknown Speaker 12:27 Thank you for having us. It's like it's a blessing. And we're super excited to be a part of this Unknown Speaker 12:32 indeed. And we have a couple of disclaimers that we need to share because we love the first we love disclaimers period. And the second thing is that we're not therapists, Jennifer and I are not therapists. So I will say that it's okay to feel is for informational, educational and or entertainment purposes only. And is not a substitute for medical or psychiatric advice, diagnosis or treatment. That basically means again, we're not therapists. We're here as people with lots of lived experience. But if you are, you know, struggling and you know, you need to talk to someone, you know, NAMI OC has amazing resources. There are crisis support lines, and we'll make sure to include all of that in the show notes for this episode. We also have a funding statement that my pal Jennifer is going to read right now. Unknown Speaker 13:28 We are This podcast was funded by orange county health care agency, OC HCA behavioral health services Coronavirus, aid relief and economic security cares Act, which basically means people believe in this mission to bring more care to the world podcast style, and we are very grateful for their support. Unknown Speaker 13:48 Indeed we are and we have an statement that I'm going to read right now. But before I do, I feel like the way I'm approaching this is like purred happily in parks and rec. Unknown Speaker 14:00 I feel like you don't have to say this is the I know Unknown Speaker 14:03 it's kind of fun to say Unknown Speaker 14:05 I have an statement right. Unknown Speaker 14:07 The statement is about to begin right now. Hey, remember that your feelings are valid. Your feelings are guideposts on your journey and it's always okay to feel. Unknown Speaker 14:21 Thank you so much for listening. If you love the episode, we would love for you to subscribe and leave us a review. For more information or just to say hello, head over to Instagram at NAMI underscore OC and NAMI underscore OC or say hi to known at you me empathy, or me, Jennifer? Jennifer Lynn JNIPHGRLY n fakes Have a beautiful day Transcribed by https://otter.ai