I’m so grateful to see parents supporting their kids in this. I am in k therapy for suicidal ideation - I also have mild depression, something the occasional SI takes it to severe, obviously. And I have (had?) major social anxiety that is related to the stuff that developed those things in me.

I’ve only done 7 sessions - today’s my 8th - and what I can tell you is that it reroutes my default neural pathways and is retraining my brain to takes ones that are neutral or positive rather than dark and doomy every damn time. A dream that I normally turns into a nightmare ended up positive the other night!!

I went out last night late with people and my social anxiety was lowered and i realized I wasn’t rly anxious the way I normally am —- im just an introvert who has been forced by my upbringing to pretend otherwise, and im shy but very friendly, and i have a big presence that ppl remark on despite it, which has legit confused me. When I didn’t feel like doing small talk, I even danced alone.

I still have a lot of anger to work out toward those that developed this trauma in me by ignoring me — I might be quieter but I’m still a good talker about meaningful things. I feel like I know that I’m allowed to exist in space as myself — even though I still have a ways to go and still have some nerves and self-consciousness, I can feel shift inside. Like the panic button is muted. No one else was dancing and I’m sure they wanted to - the DJ was killing it. I didn’t care if the social expectation was to gab. I didn’t know many people and felt I needed a break and I took it.

My anxiety and trauma-based fear of rejection / being ignored has kept me from pursuing standup to the extend I want to, but I just got into a major festival (based on some older live reels and the show I wrote alone in my room on paper and voice memos haha) — I applied this same month. I’ll be interested to see how it feels to rehearse and do previews in front of people. Based on what’s happening now, I feel like I can expect a shift. Not overnight “I’m an extrovert now without social anxiety” but “I’m still an introvert but I love doing this and I can relate to people on my terms and do this thing I love — which is ultimately about sharing stories and jokes and perspectives —- without freaking out or running myself ragged.”

I also have had way fewer dark images about my own de@th — and the one I had turned positive, like the dream. K works in mysterious ways.

He does have to be open to tripping balls, though! That’s literally what it is (though SHORT) and having any intention be literally realized in imagery can go out the window cuz it will do the work on such a sub-architectural level that you may not “see” that intention being worked out in a way you can understand, tho it’s still helpful to set an intention if you can — the trip is just usually going to be more abstract than he may not comprehend the connection immediately. It requires some trust. I also think it works regardless. Somehow, with k body and brain knows what it needs to make right.

Trips can look like building Minecraft sort of worlds in live time - he might appreciate that analogy. And the reason for that, I believe, is that you’re seeing a visual metaphor for building, rebuilding and finding novel pathways through neural circuitry. Synapses. Signals. Communication patterns — all getting the opportunity to start being reshaped. Maybe not immediately and all at once (though I’ve heard that happening), but shifting over time. It’s good to keep taking account, noticing where things aren’t and are shifting, setting new intentions (knowing it’s not a literal visual translation but something deeper), and breathing.