Billy Mays III joins Josh to talk about how music played an important roll in his healing, and how he has told the live story of his emotions through his art and music!

If you like what you watched, consider supporting Billy's Kickstarter!

Billy's Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Website: https://winthenight.org
Substack: https://winthenight.blog
Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

Edited by Froydinger: https://froydinger.com

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

At some point around two in the morning, I started treating the glow from my laptop like sunlight. I was sitting on the couch, hunched over a computer, drinking something from a can that promised energy and mostly delivered heartburn, convincing myself that this was what momentum felt like.

Everybody else had been asleep for hours. I had a blanket half on me and half on the floor, and a charger stretched across the room in a way that was eventually going to kill one of us. I should have gone to bed, but the thing was working.

It was not finished, because it was never finished. People who build things know that “finished” is mostly a word you use when somebody asks why you are still awake. But it worked. The pieces were finally talking to each other, and the idea that had been living in my head was suddenly doing stuff on a screen.

I built it, and I really thought that was going to change me.

I thought there would be a clear before and after. Before, I was the person who had a lot of ideas. After, I would be the person who proved they could pull one all the way out of their brain and make it real. I would be more confident, more legitimate, and less desperate for somebody else to tell me I belonged in the room.

Instead, I woke up tired, opened the laptop, and kept working.

There is a particular kind of delusion that comes with building something ambitious. You start believing the next solved problem will finally let you relax. Then you solve it and immediately discover three smaller problems wearing a trench coat, so you keep going.

You skip the movie. You answer “in a minute” when somebody you love asks if you are coming to bed. You carry the problem into dinner and the five minutes when your kid is trying to show you something that should be more important to you too. You tell yourself it is temporary and that it will all make sense once the thing is done. I have written about that pacing problem before, back when I still thought it was a scheduling issue.

The embarrassing part is that I did finish it, or I got close enough that the difference stopped mattering. It existed. It worked. It was real enough for other people to touch, use, discuss, and make decisions about.

Then the arrangement changed.

That is the clean version. The real version is that I was building this for a company, not just tinkering with a personal idea in my living room. There were expectations, deadlines, conversations about where I fit when it all got real, and a whole lot of work that became easy to take for granted once it was visible.

Once the thing became valuable, my place beside it became negotiable. Conversations got strange. Things I thought were understood suddenly required proof. The work was still there, but the story of how it got there started being edited in real time. I went from helping build the thing to feeling like I was standing outside of something I had spent an unreasonable amount of my life making.

I am not turning this into a public autopsy or laying out screenshots like a person with a corkboard and twelve feet of red string. I do not want to live there, and the details are not actually the point.

The point is that I had attached so much of myself to the outcome that when the outcome got taken out of my hands, I did not know what to do with the person left behind. I had built the thing, so why did I still feel like I had something to prove?

For a while, I thought the answer was obvious: because I got screwed. And, to be clear, I did.

That anger is real, and I am not going to sand it down into some clean little lesson about gratitude. Sometimes a company benefits from your work and becomes very creative about why it does not owe you what it happily promised while it still needed you.

That sucks. There. Very profound.

Still, being angry did not fully explain the emptiness. It explained why I wanted to throw my phone into a lake, but it did not explain why the accomplishment itself suddenly felt so far away.

That is a lot to ask from an app.

I think I expected the finished product to reach backward through time and validate every version of me that had ever been underestimated.

It was supposed to prove I was not scattered or just another creative person who gets excited and moves on. Mostly, it was supposed to settle an argument I had been having with myself.

The problem is that you can build something impressive and still carry the same old voice into the launch. That voice does not look at all the impossible shit you figured out and say, “Wow, good work.” It asks why it took so long. It asks why somebody else has more users, more money, a cleaner announcement, or a nicer chair. That voice is not new. I named three of its favorite fears a while back, and it has not retired a single one.

Mine asked why I had not protected myself better, and that question hurt because it was not completely wrong.

Turns out, you should inspect that shit.

I was so focused on proving I could build the thing that I did not spend enough time making sure I could keep my place in it. I treated trust like infrastructure and assumed it would hold because everybody was standing on it. I have written about what trust is supposed to look like. It turns out I am better at describing it than inspecting it.

I know more about boundaries now. I know enthusiasm is not an agreement, and being useful can make you feel secure right up until your usefulness has been packaged into something that no longer needs you in the room. It was a brutal way to learn that, but the lesson is still mine.

So is everything else.

I know how to take a half-formed idea and give it structure, learn the part I do not know yet, and stay with a problem after the fun part is over. I know how to keep moving when the whole thing feels held together with caffeine and spite.

Nobody gets to retroactively remove that from me. They can minimize the work, rearrange the credits, or pretend the thing arrived fully formed. I still know what I built, and more importantly, I know who built it.

Maybe that is why I do not feel different. I kept waiting for the finished thing to hand me a new identity, when the work had been changing me quietly the entire time. There was no progress bar that reached one hundred percent and announced that I was now confident, legitimate, and immune to bullshit.

I just became somebody who could do it. Then I became somebody who could survive what happened after.

I wish that second part had not been included in the curriculum. I would have happily skipped that module. But here we are.

The laptop is still here, and so am I.

These days, I am trying to be more careful about what I sacrifice for the work. I do not want to confuse obsession with commitment or exhaustion with evidence that it matters. The people in the room with me are not interruptions from my life. They are my life.

I am still building things, but I am trying to do it for a better reason. The next one will not finally make me enough or win the imaginary trial in my head. I am building because it is what I do, and because turning a blank screen into something real still feels a little like magic, even after I have seen what people can do once the trick works.

I built the thing. It did not transform me on command, protect me, or make everything fair. But it left proof, and this time I know the proof belongs to me.

Everyone was out in the driveway hanging out at my brother in laws house, listening to music and watching wrestling on his projector. But I did that thing where I was physically there but not really there yet.

Phone out, thumb moving, my brain half in the driveway, half somewhere else. The stupid part is I was scrolling Substack.

So I was reading other people’s thoughts about life while actively missing mine. That is embarrassing enough to be worth writing down for sure.

I caught myself after a little bit and put the phone away. No big dramatic moment. Not a grand realization with soft piano music behind it. It was really just that tiny internal “dude, what are you doing?” that shows up every once in a while when your better self taps on the glass.

This girl really wanted to play in the dirt, so we played in the dirt.

That was literally the whole activity.

We dug around, moved stuff, made a mess, and built what I can only describe as a summoning circle for ants. I don’t know if the ants appreciated the architecture, but spiritually, I think we nailed it.

She got filthy. Like actual dirt filthy.

Not “oh no, there’s a little dust on my shoe” filthy. More like “this child is absolutely going to bring half the yard into the house” filthy.

At some point, I am about 90% sure she ate dirt on a piece of salami.I saw it happen, processed it, and made the executive decision to let that one belong to God.

There are probably parenting books that would have a problem with this.

That’s fine; they can start their own Substack.

Because later, at bedtime, she was still talking about the dirt and the ant friends we made. The weird little adventure that only happened because I put my phone down long enough to let the day become something.

That’s the part I keep coming back to.

I don’t think boredom is really what we hate.

I think we hate the tiny bit of discomfort before it turns into something else.

That little stretch of nothing, the awkward pause.

And as soon as there isn’t a screen telling us what to think about, laugh at, buy, fear, believe, fix, or become? We treat that space like something went wrong.

So we fill it. Standing in line, waiting for coffee, sitting in the car for thirty seconds before seeing the family, hanging out with people we love; we still, somehow find a way to fill it.

Usually with a glowing rectangle full of strangers who are also trying to figure out how to be alive.

I’m not anti-phone.

I’m not anti-internet. I’m definitely not anti-Substack; but I do think we’ve gotten weird about empty space.

We act like every unfilled moment is wasted and we don’t often think that maybe some of them are invitations.

A kid asking you to play in the dirt is not exactly a calendar event. It does not ping you fifteen minutes beforehand. It does not come with a clean little productivity label. It will not improve your brand strategy. It might even involve dirt salami. ☺️

But it is also the kind of thing that gets remembered.

And that is annoying, because I love a good overcomplicated system. I love a plan. I love a tool. I love convincing myself that the next app or workflow or idea is going to finally make me the version of myself who is fully present and emotionally regulated and drinking enough water.

Then my daughter grabs some sticks and accidentally teaches the whole lesson in five minutes:

Just gotta let yourself be bored long enough for real life to find you.

Leave a comment

Trust me, I’ve looked.

I’ve spent plenty of time waiting for difficult seasons to end before allowing myself to feel okay again. Waiting for anxiety to calm down. Waiting for circumstances to improve. Waiting for some magical moment where everything finally clicks into place.

But as I’m sure you know, life hardly ever works on our timeline.

Some storms do pass quickly, sure.

Others seem determined to unpack their bags and stay way past the agreed weekend.

And if we’re constantly waiting for perfect weather, we end up putting our lives on hold.

Stop Trying to Control Everything

I know... Easier said than done.

When things start falling apart, most of us go straight into problem-solving mode. We want answers. We want a plan. We want some kind of guarantee that everything will work out in the end.

I’ve learned the hard way that not every problem can be solved immediately. (WHAT?!)

Some situations just have to be lived through, and that means you can’t even start to think about giving up.

It means recognizing the difference between what you can control and what you can’t, and how powerful that is in your real life.

You can’t stop the rain, but you can decide how you’re going to walk through it.

The Next Step Matters More Than the Whole Journey

One thing that always gets me into trouble is trying to solve my entire future at 2 a.m. Maybe you can relate. I still have an issue with this, but I’m human and I’m trying. It’s part of the reason why I write like this.

It helps me when I can help others feel less alone.

When life gets overwhelming, I tend to start looking ten miles down the road instead of focusing on what’s directly in front of me.

The truth is, most of us don’t need the entire map.

We just need the next step.

Sometimes that step is something big, sometimes it’s getting out of bed. Sometimes it’s answering that text you’ve been avoiding, and sometimes it’s just making yourself a cup of coffee and deciding you’ll try again tomorrow.

Small steps count too.

Especially during the heavier storms.

You’re Allowed to Have Bad Days

This one took me a long time to learn.

For years, I thought strength meant pushing everything down and pretending I was fine. Spoiler alert: that doesn’t work.

At least not for very long.

Ignoring your feelings doesn’t make them disappear. It just means they eventually show up at the worst possible time.

You gotta remind yourself that you’re allowed to be frustrated.

You’re allowed to be scared.

You’re allowed to admit that things are fucking hard.

Be honest about who you are to others, but also yourself because that is the real first step toward healing.

Don’t Miss What’s Still Good

Storms have a way of grabbing all our attention.

We focus on what’s wrong.

What’s broken.

What’s missing.

What’s uncertain.

That is just human nature. Our minds like to protect ourselves, so we have to focus on fixing what is broken first. That “instinct”, we’ll call it, is helpful for a TON of things; but it can get out of control fast.

I’ve been guilty of that more times than I can count.

But even in difficult seasons, there are usually small things worth holding onto.

A conversation with someone you love.

A good meal, a quiet evening, a laugh you weren’t expecting.

Remind yourself with those things that life isn’t all storm, at least not all the time.

You’re More Than What You’re Going Through

Whatever storm you’re facing right now, remember this:

It isn’t who you are.

It’s something you’re experiencing.

Those are two very different things.

You are not your anxiety, your grief, or your worst moment. You’re a person doing their best to navigate a difficult season.

That is enough.

If you’re in the middle of a storm right now, I don’t have a magic solution for you.

I wish I did. What I can tell you is that you don’t need to have everything figured out today. You don’t need to know how the story ends, or carry tomorrow’s weight before it arrives.

Just focus on the next step, and then the one after that.

Keep moving and keep showing up.

And when the clouds finally break (and believe me, eventually they will; where there is dark there must be equal light) you’ll realize something important:

You were stronger than you thought.

You just couldn’t see it through the rain.

Leave a comment

Share Win The Night

We cover the technical and creative aspects of FPV (First-Person View) flying, building a drone business, and the community-driven philosophy of the Flight Club.

Beyond the drones, Joel talks about the "deep work": addressing ADHD, dismantling codependency, and healing from generational trauma.

Learn how he turned ADHD into a strength for cinematic storytelling and why he believes the "learn, fly, crash, and build" mindset applies just as much to life as it does to flying.

🔔 Subscribe HERE for More Episodes of Win the Night:

Win The Night

One Connection, One Story, One Conversation at a Time.

By Jake Freudinger

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:
Website: https://winthenight.org
Substack: https://winthenight.blog
Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

Edited by Froydinger: https://froydinger.com
Want help making a thumbnail like in this video? Ask Arc: https://askarc.chat

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

There’s something you’ve been carrying around that you haven’t said out loud yet.

Not because you don’t have the words. You have the words. You’ve rehearsed them in the car, in the shower, right before you fall asleep. You know exactly how it starts.

You just haven’t said it to anyone who would actually sit with it.

That’s kind of why we made this show.

We’ve had people sit down with us and say the thing they’ve been circling for years. Not because we asked the right questions or because we created some perfect environment; we just give them a room where the goal isn’t to fix anything.

No advice. No reframe. No “have you tried...”

Just say the thing.

And every single time, something shifts. Not for us watching. For them. You can see it happen. So I’m asking you directly: what’s the thing you keep almost saying?

It doesn’t have to be heavy. It doesn’t have to be dramatic. It just has to be true.

Drop it in the comments. Or don’t. But if you’ve been waiting for a sign that someone actually wants to hear it, this is it.

Maybe it’s not here or now. Maybe it is something that you take with you today and share a little more with that family member, or close friend. I truly believe saying and doing the uncomfortable thing sometimes is the key to a great life. I’m still not the best at it, but I’ve seen what it can do.

Learning to overcome those adversities is now almost fun to an extent, and I can’t wait to see what’s next.

If you want to see what these conversations actually look like, we’re on YouTube and we post every episode here:

Subscribe now

Full episodes, real people, no scripts. And if you want to dig deeper into what Win The Night is about, head to winthenight.org And if you want to share your story, hit us up at winthenight.org/guest

We’re listening.

Win The Night

One Connection, One Story, One Conversation at a Time.

By Jake Freudinger

In Part Two of our conversation with Joel Galam, we dive deep into the often-unseen realities of a 30-year nursing career.

Joel shares the cultural and personal influences that led to pursuing nursing, including an early aptitude for biological sciences and a profound childhood memory of witnessing a patient injury. The journey was far from easy, starting with flunking out of university due to unmanaged ADHD and lack of focus, which led to taking the Associates Degree route to get back on track.

Hear how the frequency of death and traumatic incidents in the ICU forces nurses to develop a dark sense of humor as a self-defense mechanism, and how constant exposure to mortality reinforces the importance of appreciating life.

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:
Website: https://winthenight.org
Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

Edited by Froydinger: https://froydinger.com

Want help making a thumbnail like in this video? Ask Arc: https://askarc.chat

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

…the struggle with impulsivity, and the core challenge of executive dysfunction that impacts task completion and organization. Joel Galam details how his diagnosis 10 years ago explained years of struggles, despite maintaining straight A’s in school.

What to Expect:

• The discussion explores how a strict, structured family environment provided external motivation that Joel Galam struggles to replicate independently.

• Joel Galam discusses the social struggles he faced growing up Filipino, coping with bullying by becoming a bully to gain acceptance.

• Learn about Joel Galam’s impulsive decision-making style, “building the parachute on the way down,” and how his strategic younger brother acts as his “voice of reason”.

• Joel Galam shares the critical mantra that has helped him succeed: “ADHD is an explanation for their behavior but never an excuse”.

If you or a loved one is navigating ADHD, executive dysfunction, or a history of impulsivity, this vulnerable conversation will provide a deep understanding and hope for building a structured, successful life.

💬 QUESTION FOR YOU: What part of living with ADHD or impulsivity resonated most with your story? Drop it in the comments so others know they’re not alone.

🔔 Subscribe for more deep dives into mental health, relationships, and human growth:

Win The Night

One Connection, One Story, One Conversation at a Time.

By Jake Freudinger

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Website: https://winthenight.org

Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

Edited by Froydinger: https://froydinger.com

Want help making a thumbnail like in this video? Ask Arc: https://askarc.chat

Disclaimer: This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

Curley breaks down the “jigsaw puzzle” of family dynamics, explaining why the relationship itself is the client. From the rigid “movie scripts” of family roles to the weight of being the “black sheep,” this episode explores how one person’s growth can shift the entire unit.

Key insights in this episode:

• The Mission vs. The Self: Why rescheduling for health is a victory for presence and professional integrity.1

• The Family Genogram: How mapping out blended families and complex histories provides clarity for healing.

• Love Languages for Kids: Shifting from “I love you all the same” to “I love you uniquely” to meet individual needs.

• Better Parenting, Not Bad Parenting: Moving away from defensiveness and toward collaborative goal setting.

• Win vs. Heal: The definitive question every family must ask during conflict: Are you trying to win the argument, or are you trying to heal the relationship?

Join the Win The Night Community:

Visit Our Website

Subscribe now

Most couples go to therapy citing “communication problems,” but trauma therapist Curley Lawson reveals that communication is rarely the actual root of the issue.

In this episode, we discuss:

• The Communication Myth: Why “talking more” isn’t always the solution and what lies beneath the surface.

• Individual vs. Couples Therapy: Why you might not be ready for couples counseling yet.

• Relationship Maintenance: The “Live Orchid” analogy and why 1 hour a week can save your marriage.

• The Military Burden: How deployments and cultural messages like “work first, family second” impact veteran foundations.

• Navigating Resentment: How to stop the “two against one” dynamic in therapy and feel truly heard.

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Website:

https://winthenight.org

Substack:

https://winthenight.blog

Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

Thanks for watching Win The Night! Subscribe for free to receive new episodes and support our mission.

Edited by Froydinger:

https://froydinger.com

Want help making a thumbnail like in this video? Ask Arc:

https://askarc.chat

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

This is Part 6 of a Series:

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

Part 4:

Part 5:

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

You’ve felt this struggle. Just by reading the title, you likely relate to it right now or have at some point in your life. If that’s you, keep reading.

We tend to judge ourselves with a ferocity we’d never turn on anyone else. You’ve heard the cliché that you are your own worst critic. As basic or “campy” as that sounds, it’s a fundamental truth we have to remind ourselves of constantly.

The Art of Stepping Away

I’ve started using a specific mental trick: the perspective of a stranger.

When I’m spiraling, I take whatever is upsetting me and pretend I’m hearing about a stranger with that exact problem. For some reason, removing my own ego from the equation allows me to give “the other person” much better advice.

I discovered this by accident, just talking out loud to myself one day. But since I turned it into a habit, my entire self-perception has shifted. I’ve realized that I am not broken; I was just off track.

What I thought was the end of my rope was actually the key to finding my wife and starting our family.

Beauty in the Broken

What I thought was “broken” in me actually saved me. For years, I tried to hide certain parts of myself, pushing them deeper inside.

As it turns out, those were the exact traits my wife fell in love with.

I’m not just here to gush about her (though she is incredibly cool). I’m here to tell you that there is hope in the hurt.

The Compassion Finding You

It can be a brutal world. The sooner you open your heart and start believing in that hope, the sooner it will find you.

That starts with compassion; not just for the people around you, but for the person looking back at you in the mirror.

There is a unique kind of beauty that only comes from being broken and putting the pieces back together.

Tighten your grip on that hope. It’s well worth the effort.

Share

Leave a comment

Share

Subscribe now

In this episode Josh reunites with Trent from “Tino’s Time” for a powerful nine-month check-in.

Trent opens up about the “crippling anxiety” and mental hurdles he faced following a serious car accident with a semi-truck in October 2025.

Despite these challenges, his channel has seen explosive growth, nearing the 5,000 subscriber milestone just in time for his 5-year streaming anniversary and WrestleMania.

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow Trent https://youtube.com/@tinostime

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Win The Night

One Connection, One Story, One Conversation at a Time.

By Jake

Edited by Froydinger: https://froydinger.com

Want help making a thumbnail like in this video? Ask Arc

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

Subscribe now

In Part Two of our conversation with Shelley Bee, creator of Middle-aged Mama Drama, we dive deeper into her life as a mother, starting with her experience of non-traditional motherhood as a single parent from age 33.

Shelley details the immense stress of juggling full-time work and caregiving, explaining how the resulting exhaustion led to emotional absence for her first child, contributing to an anxious preoccupied attachment style.

Shelley and Josh discuss the heavy reality of single motherhood and how the “survival mode” of juggling all of it applies.

We explore the direct impact this stress has on a child’s attachment style and why the “do it all” standard is a dangerous myth. This ties in to the surprising birth of her second child at 43, who was identified as having both dyslexia and ADHD, and the journey of pursuing early intervention like neuro-feedback.

▶️ Watch PART 1:

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

Leave a comment

🔗 Follow more of Shelley's story:

Substack:

Middle-Aged Mama Drama

By Shelley Bee

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Substack:

Win The Night

One Connection, One Story, One Conversation at a Time.

By Jake

Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

Website: https://winthenight.org

Edited by Froydinger: https://froydinger.com

Want help making a thumbnail like the one for this episode? Ask Arc!

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

Subscribe now

In this deeply personal conversation, Josh sits down with Shelley Bee

Shelley is a licensed relational therapist, EFT practitioner, and the creator of Middle-aged Mama Drama!

Middle-Aged Mama Drama

By Shelley Bee

Shelley Bee shares her journey from a challenging childhood marked by parentification and low-income living to becoming a specialist in trauma and relationships.

This episode dives into the raw reality of the "wounded healer" concept, emphasizing that true therapeutic effectiveness requires deep, continued personal work to process one's own trauma—far beyond academic requirements.

🔗 Follow more of Shelley's story:

Shelley's Substack: https://shelleybee.substack.com

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Website: https://winthenight.org
Substack: https://winthenight.blog
Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

Edited by Froydinger: https://froydinger.com
Want help polishing a thumbnail like in this video? Ask Arc: https://askarc.chat

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

Trauma therapist Curley Lawson joins us to discuss the “fine print” of life—including why love sometimes means letting go.

From identifying “red flags” like emotional manipulation to understanding why healthy relationships require shared responsibility, this episode provides a roadmap for those ready to stop fighting for change and start living it.

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Website: https://winthenight.org
Substack: https://winthenight.blog
Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

Edited by Froydinger: https://froydinger.com
Want help making a thumbnail like in this video? Ask Arc: https://askarc.chat

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

This is Part 5 of the Series:

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

Part 4:

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

The conversation explores the profound loss of purpose many veterans face and the importance of finding a "new mission" through community service and mentorship.

They dip into the unique nature of military camaraderie—a bond forged by living and working together—and the challenges of replicating that connection in the civilian world.

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Website: https://winthenight.org
Substack: https://winthenight.blog
Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

Edited by Froydinger: https://froydinger.com
Want help making a thumbnail like in this video? Ask Arc: https://askarc.chat

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

This is Part 4 of a 5 Part Series:

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

Part 5:

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

Subscribe now

In Part 3 of his story, we sit down with trauma therapist and Air Force veteran Curley Lawson to pull back the curtain on the "human side" of therapy.

We discuss the raw reality of pet grief, the pivotal moments that lead a service member to hang up the uniform, and why genuine leadership requires more than just following rank.

From the lessons learned in nursing homes to the frustrations of military bureaucracy, this conversation is a crash course in finding purpose during life’s most difficult chapters.

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Website: https://winthenight.org
Substack: https://winthenight.blog
Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

This publication is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

This is Part 3 of a 5 Part Series:

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 4:

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

Part 5:

Subscribe now

In PART 2 of this multi-episode series, we continue our deep dive with Curley Lawson, an Air Force Veteran and trauma therapist.

Picking up from his decision to join the military, Curley explores the psychological shifts that occur from recruitment to active service and the profound impact of leadership on a soldier's development.

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Website: https://winthenight.org
Substack: https://winthenight.blog
Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

This publication is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.

Full stop. I am a firm believer that things happen every day that simply cannot be explained away by science, reason, or cold logic. Those singular moments that feel like genuine magic? I like to think they actually are. I’m writing this because I believe it’s vital context for the philosophy I’m about to lay out.

Life is defined by “Big Moments,” but they don’t always show up in the way people think.

They come in all shapes and sizes. Sure, sometimes it’s those huge monumental shifts... like marriages, deaths, moving into a new home, or a massive career leap.

Other times, it’s the quiet flickers of grace: the barista telling you the coffee is on the house, a coworker remembering your favorite snack and grabbing an extra bag from the vending machine, or the traffic suddenly clearing the moment you merge onto the highway.

These moments don’t exist in a vacuum.

The good and the bad compound; they stack.

We all live through distinct seasons, and you know them when you’re in them. There are months where you feel invincible and months where you feel invisible. If life moves in these rhythmic waves, it stands to reason that there is something behind it. There would need to be an external driving force, a cosmic momentum if you will.

For a long time, understanding that force was a hunger I couldn’t satisfy. I was obsessed with the “Why” and the “When.”

But eventually, I had to get real with myself and adopt a mindset that felt contradictory but necessary: You have to act like no one is coming to save you, even if you don’t fully believe it.

Some say the universe, some say it’s mother nature, personally, I think it’s God. Now, for those of you who are anti-church and anti-religion PLEASE stick with me here. I am very much someone who deconstructed and reconstructed my faith on my own terms. I promise I am the furthest from preachy.

In the beginning...

I grew up in the church. I grew up loving God, and I still do.

My relationship with Jesus is still central to who I am. But not central to what I talk about.

I suppose I’m in that camp of people who love the cause but have grown weary of the performance and harm of the church and the words they twist.

Nowadays, I am a believer of just being the best version of me that I can be and showing practical love through my actions. And then if people ask me why, I’ll share.

What I realized back then, however, was that the more I obsessed over the external force (in my case, God) the more I failed to understand the very nature of the faith I claimed to have.

I’ve started to look at things differently now.

I mean think about it for a second. If a parent, for example, has a relentless pursuing faith in his children, that faith is an investment in that child’s agency and not their helplessness.

I’ve realized that if we spend our time constantly looking at the horizon for a rescue boat, we forget how to swim. My reliance on an outside force used to be rooted in a kind of underlying fear. A “please don’t let anything bad happen” or “if i don’t do this right i’ll be punished by God” mentality. But that isn’t faith, it is quite literally a hostage situation. (Also it’s super not helpful for those who have intrusive thoughts and the like.)

Now, I aim for coexistence with fear.

Essentially, if we spend more time preparing ourselves for the waves, the “bad” seasons won’t feel quite as devastating.

When you strengthen your own spirit and take ownership of your preparation, you honor the potential you were gifted.

Does that take God out of the equation?

For some, sure. For me? Not at all. Quite the opposite, actually. It made me hyper-aware of the things that I believe God has done to show his presence and power in my life.

The miracles will still happen. The grace will still fall.

I still royally screw things up every day; I am human, and you are too. Remind yourself of that, say it out loud the next time you feel that you have let yourself down, or if the barrage of bullshit doesn’t seem to stop coming your way: “I am a human, I am allowed to fuck up.”

The question you then have to ask yourself when the next tide comes in is simple:

Will the wave swallow you whole, or have you prepared yourself to ride it?

Leave a comment

Share

…with a fresh episode featuring Curley Lawson! Curley is a LICSW — Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker

We’re extremely excited about this upcoming series of episodes.

Join Josh as he talks with licensed therapist and retired Airforce veteran Curley Lawson, exploring his early life, battling poverty, joining the Airforce, and how these experiences have shaped his identity as a therapist today.

💬 Let us know what resonated with you in the comments!

🔗 Follow more of our story:

Check out our website: https://winthenight.org

Substack: https://winthenight.blog

Instagram: https://instagram.com/@win_the_night

This channel is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace therapy or serve as legal advice.