We were lucky to catch up with Joseline Mejia recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Joseline, thanks for joining us today. What did your parents do right and how has that impacted you in your life and career?

I’m not sure if this has happened to you but personally and in therapy we process the things that hurt us as a child and the shortcomings that our parents had and during that process is also important to identify and recognize the things that they did right.

If this question was asked when I was 15y/o, 25, or even a couple of years back my answers would’ve been very different from each other because we view the world and our parents differently in every stage of our lives.

When I look back on the things my parents did right, I think of modeling hard work and courage. My parents had the courage to move to a new country to start from scratch with three daughters. We were already 15y/o, 10y/o, and 8y/o when we moved to the US. Their determination to give us a better life, to survive, and pay their debt (that they had back in Guatemala) were some motivators to make such a bold move. I have two children (18y/o and 10y/o) and just the thought of moving to a new country to start from 0 is very scary. My parents worked very hard to make sure we had everything we needed. I used to go work with my father delivering newspapers and with my mom collecting reclining cardboard from restaurants and places around our neighborhood on the side of their regular job. They also introduced me at a very young age to have a connection and relationship with God and ever since it has been the most powerful and helpful tool they have given me to help me through difficult moments. My parents thoughts us to value family, to be kind and helpful to others, and to persevere to accomplish our goals and dreams and for that Im forever grateful.

Joseline, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I knew I wanted to become a psychotherapist since I was in 6th grade back in Guatemala. I came to the US as a sophomore in High School, without knowing the language, no extended family, and no friends. When I thought my dreams were far from becoming a reality in this country, my mother encouraged me to continue trying to achieve them. I’ve always had a passion for human behavior, helping people to alleviate pain, heal, and have a better quality of life. Growing up I saw and experienced pain and I didn’t know how to help with friends and myself since then I developed a passion for my career. I’ve been in the field for more than 13 years and it has been quite a journey. I’ve worked with children (0-18), young adults, and adults to seniors. My specialization is trauma, depression, anxiety, and relationships. I’ve worked with different socioeconomic statuses from Specialized foster care, court-ordered, low-income families, to high-income professionals such as surgeons, lawyers, professors, etc. I have also developed a love for community outreach to break the stigma about mental health, and emotional intelligence and to breach the gap between accessibility and resources by training corporations to have better work environments, small businesses, schools, and parents.
From that view and passion Konnect Counseling and Stream Konnections Academy was founded. We have developed our own Methodology called the N.E.T Method, we provide individual psychotherapy services, life coaching, training for corporations and small businesses, Community mental health awareness courses, parenting courses, emotional intelligence courses, trauma-informed courses, etc. Our goal is to help you make life less complicated than it could be, connect with life again and enjoy every step of the healing journey.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

One of the things that I had to unlearn is boundaries. I grew up in a hard-working household with no boundaries when it came to work-life balance. Work was always a priority (we were in a new country surviving so it makes sense why my parents were so focused on making it through), however, at my young age, I got it wrong and had no work-life balance. I would eat through my lunch, work extra hours, and go to work when sick and if I didn’t it meant that “I wasn’t a responsible person”. I reached a burnt-out state at the community agency I was working as a clinical supervisor and that is when I decided to create Konnect Counseling Services. I started learning boundaries with work and remind me that my health is also important and that I’m not in the same situation my parents were in 23 years ago.

Do you think you’d choose a different profession or specialty if you were starting now?

If I would go back I would choose the same profession, however, I would also explore other fields such as teaching and traveling agent (I know this one is very far from psychotherapist but traveling is my other passion) I love traveling, meeting new people, understanding new cultures and of course trying new foods. I absolutely love new experiences that show me how different yet amazing we all are. I know that part of my specialization in trauma was my own trauma experience and the subconscious need to heal it. Even though, I have gone through that journey of healing myself I think I would not change my profession, I would just add other things to it to enrich the experience. I probably would like to do more research on different cultures and different parts of the world and see how they approach and heal from trauma. Don’t get me wrong I’m already doing it but I would start earlier. I was a High School teacher for a couple of years when I was getting my Masters’s degree and I really enjoyed it so another field that I would consider would be teaching, however, I think that is why we also developed Stream Konnections Academy to be able to teach and transmit knowledge to improve people’s lives.     

Contact Info:

• Website: www.streamkonnections.com
• Instagram: @streamkonnections
• Facebook: @streamkonnections