The Peaceful Home
The Peaceful Home is a place for the modern busy mom looking to break out of the mold left behind by the moms of past generations and write a new narrative. The mom who is willing to embrace the chaos, the overwhelm, and the overstimulation of parenting in a world on fire. Delving deep into the self-worth, personal development, self-esteem, and self-care required to find more peace.
Here on the Peaceful Home, we talk honestly about the hard, we share stories, we laugh, we cry, and we heal but mostly we learn about who we are and we learn all about how to create for ourselves, and our kiddos, the Peaceful Home you have always dreamed of.
The Peaceful Home
Episode 57: Intimacy and It's Roll In Your Greatest Success with Jessa Zimmerman
This week I sat down with sex therapist by day and busy online coach Jessa Zimmerman who is currently creating a whole new life as the founder of the Leveraged Expert Academy, a coaching program that walks other professionals through every step of creating and selling their own online course.
Along with her own journey from stay-at-home mom to a successful career helping others thrive, Jessa shares the struggles and real truth around the death of intimacy, and what, as parents, we can do to cultivate healthy relationships.
Jessa Zimmerman is a certified sex therapist and couples counselor. She specializes in helping couples who have a good relationship but who are avoiding sex because it’s become stressful, negative, disappointing, or pressured. She educates, coaches, and supports people as they go through her 4 Pillar Experiential Process that allows them real-world practice in changing their relationship and their sex life, guiding them to become easily intimate.
She is the author of Sex Without Stress, the host of the Better Sex Podcast, the creator of the Intimacy With Ease Method and is a regularly featured expert in the media, including Refinery29, Business Insider, Mind Body Green, and Marriage.com.
If this episode inspired you in some way, take a screenshot of you listening on your device and post it to your Instagram Stories and tag us, @pamgodboiscoaching and @leveragedexpert
LINKS:
Jessa’s Website: https://www.intimacywithease.com
Jessa’s FREE Masterclass: https://www.intimacywithease.com/masterclass
Jessa’s Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/passiveincomeforserviceprofessionals
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The best thing you can do for yourself and your kids is effectively regulate your nervous system. And a great place to start >> to wire the brain for gratitude. Research tells us that gratitude increases happiness and a peaceful mindset. Make the shift and watch how things in your life start to change. Sign up today! www.pamgodbois.com/gratitude
Welcome back to the out of your mind podcast. On today's episode, I had the opportunity to sit down with Jessa Zimmerman sex therapist by day. But she's busy creating a whole new life as a founder of the leveraged expert academy, a coaching program that walks other professionals. Through every step of creating and selling their own online course. So, whether you're feeling trapped in your intimate relationships. Cause we definitely talk about that. Or your career path. Jess's journey from stay-at-home mom to online expert is an inspiring one. So let's dive in. Well, Jessa thank you so much for being here and for coming on and sharing your story that, what brought you from where you began to where you are now.
Jessa:Well, thank you for having me. It's a, it's a winding road. First I should say that right now where I am, I have two hat. So I am also a therapist. I'm a sex therapist in Seattle and I work with clients still. Uh, I work with couples, so I have that part of my business. then I developed an online course in that niche for women with low desire like women, an otherwise happy relationship, but are struggling with lack of desire. And I, I had that as like a side project and developed this course and got it going where it's generating a lot of income for me passively. So then I also now have the hat of ringing a group coaching program for other professionals like therapists to help do that themselves. Nice. So at this point in time, I'm still straddling those two just so we know where the ending point, or maybe it's a midway point. It's not ending yet. Right, Right. But it all started, I guess I'll go back to when I got divorced, which at this point was 15 years ago maybe. Mm-hmm. and I had three children. And I had been homeschooling them. I was a stay at home mom. I had long ago abandoned The small career I had. Nothing was translatable at that point. Like I couldn't go back to something. And I really had to start over and figure out what I was gonna do now to support myself and three children. And I had some alimony or whatever to get going, but uh, I had to kind of dig deep, like, what am I gonna do? And I remember I had thought about being a therapist, but it seemed too daunt. I have to go get a master's degree, Like this is too big a thing. And so I was thinking about other options and my Devo divorce lawyer said to me, I love these moments. There's a few of these in my story of like, Well, you hear exactly what you need at the right time, right? The divorce lawyer said, You're following your heart getting a divorce, so why would you stop now? So it's like, okay, I'll go get my master's and do the whole thing as to get, license as a therapist and then certified as a sex therapist. That was a a lot, right? But even back then, I knew I was different from most therapists, so, in the graduate program, we had the, we had to take this thing about how some sort of an assessment or tool about how you learn and there were four quadrants, I can't remember the whole thing. I think it was a cold inventory, but I'm not sure. Four quadrants. And the way I learn is to like read about things and then do it, read about it, and do it, like put it immediately into practice. But there were four different styles. I was literally the only person with my style in the whole graduate program. So I thought, oh wait, am. I don't know what this means, but somehow I'm different. And then I got into private practice and I'm building a practice and the business part of it was so fun for me. And yet I had colleagues who were dropping out. I can't do the marketing, I don't like the business part, I just wanna do the clinical work. And it was like the business part that enthused, really drove me. Back then I was even offering groups for other therapists, knew, how to build the business part of their practice. And so I would have 10 people at a time go through this whole thing and I was just sort of trying to share what was coming easily to me. So even way back then I was doing that. And years building a practice, getting more training in sex therapy focused on client work. I wasn't really thinking beyond that. Until I was full and full for a while and realizing the limits of that, couldn't take more people, I couldn't earn more money. It's like, if you, if I took vacation, I lost money. The, I live in Seattle when the Seahawks won the Super Bowl and they had this big parade and, 500,000 people come out. There's a day of clients gone with no, like two days notice. Maybe, nobody could get to my office. All these, our income was at risk, so, That's where I started thinking about what else to do. Plus keeping my, that other part of my brain just sort of go feeding it, I guess, so I ended up, I ended up writing a book, which then I turned into a program that I was walking couples through, which then became prerecorded. And that's what sort of set me on this whole journey of create, creating an actual online course. Right. And doing all the various training to do that. Oh my goodness. It is funny because, yeah, I've sat down with a lot of the. For the podcast in my life. Cause I am a therapist and have been one for yeah. Over two decades cuz I did like the traditional graduate from college. Do this thing, do this thing, get the, get your masters, get your license, get your, like get, do everything first. Yeah. But like I sat down with so many therapists that, that are in that other group that you're talking about, the group that's, I'm just gonna go work for somebody else. Seems like working for myself seems so hard. Yeah. Like I can't get my own clients. I can't get my own. So just the fact that you could be
Pam:doing this really intimate work with people and have this hat, this like business hat of like, Because there's nothing worse than, like, for example, like you, I'm doing a Facebook ad and I, there's a thing that says, click on this thing and you click on the thing and it gives you like 17 pages of the thing of document to read to be able to implement. And I'm like, I'm out not doing that. Forget it. I'll just try to figure it out. Yeah. So it's, it is a, that is such an amazing skill to be able to like read something and then be like, Okay, lemme put it into practice and. It kind of just keeps going
Jessa:and going. Yeah, and I mean, the way I learn is not better than anyone else's is just unique and it, and it is how, it really is how I work. And there's something about the problem solving and the puzzle solving and the piecing it together. Like I've taken, like, I think I counted, I was just at, at another. Workshop and I've taken something like 15 different trainings for all the pieces about how to build this online course world and that, But you get these pieces and you still have to make them all work together like gears. And to me, this stuff is fascinating. I love learning it and thinking about it and systematizing it in my head, making it a step by step pro, I mean, doing that just comes so naturally and it energizes me. I think in some ways that even what is, what energizes me about client work, like the puzzle. How does this go together? How can I help? Where's the leverage point? Like, I think that's, that's how I approach therapy too. I mean, I can't help it. It's just who I am. Good or bad. That's, Well, that's what I was thinking. I don't know.
Pam:Yeah. When you said that, that's what I was thinking. I'm like, Oh, actually that's a perfect fit for a therapist too, because so much stuff just gets thrown at you and you're like, Okay, how does this all work together? How does this, how does this impact this? And how does that impact that? Right, right. Have you always been like that? Has that always been how you've operated and functioned?
Jessa:Oh yeah. Yeah. My whole life when I look back, my, my problem solving and intrigued by all that stuff for sure. And, and the part of me that wants to help other people with what I know, Like I just have always, Even in grad school, we, we had we had the final exam or whatever, and there were all these. Trainings and different things to study and I turned them into an audio thing so I could listen to it as I walked or whatever. And I shared that with the whole class and it turns, The grad program I went to has this culture of like handing things down to the next class and the next class and the next class. So like five or six years later, I met somebody who'd gone through the program and recognized my voice, like they were still handing these recordings down that I just made as a study tool, but wanted to share. And it's got this life, life of its own. Like it's just sort of always been how I've worked. So it's really, That's pretty cool. It's really delightful to, to be finding something. That so suits me, like that, that I can do this and not feel ever drained because, frankly, the therapy therapy part now can drain me a little bit. It's not my total zone of genius. I'm good at it. I'm competent. I, I know I help people but it's not where I totally thrive. So it's been really, uh, I was gonna say, it's been fun to find this other thing. It's a little bit humbling. To think I'm not quite doing what I'm supposed to be. Like I'm close, but I'm not quite there. So it, it feels really good. Make this shift. That's always the case though. We're
Pam:always, we're constantly like putting in little tweaks and little shifts and little, that's how we evolve. Yeah. And so I was just kind of thinking about like, so
Jessa:before, this
Pam:is all, essentially this work that you're doing has been in the last 15 years
Jessa:since you got. Yeah, I mean I had, I had to go to grad school first, so that was two years and a few years years to get licensed. Right. And then a couple years, or a year or so, year and a half to get certified as a sex therapist. Uh, I mean I've been seeing clients since 2010, so that's 12 years. Yeah. And then I probably was full by 2012 cuz I was working part-time still at the agency trying to get hours to get licensed and all that stuff. So yeah, it's all been in the last 10 years. Wow. Yeah. So what made you.
Pam:You said, obviously you shared that your attorney said to you, you kind of just followed your passion. You knew what you, you knew this is the decision you needed to make, and if this is what's coming up for you, it's, but like, what was, what were the, because what you said was, I had thought about this thing
Jessa:becoming a therapist. Well, I had thought about it, not. My whole life, I've wanted to be a therapist. It's not like I had this calling and just couldn't do it. It was more that I had gotten feedback that I've, I'm always easy to talk to. I mean, I, NY Party people are sharing things. I mean, I, I somehow do create a container where people feel safe. And I'm non-judgmental and I often am getting people to talk about themselves. I guess instead of talking about me, I'm trying to work on that. But I'd been this, this space, and so that had been reflected to me and people had said You'd be a good therapist. So when I kind of felt like. I had to make this decision pretty quickly. In some ways it just came to mind like, Oh yeah, I'd be a good therapist. I think I would be a good therapist. So it wasn't like I did a deep dive and I probably should have, I should have done it in college too. Like what would I really. Be great at and love. I didn't somehow have the time for that, but it's like, Oh. So I was thinking about opening, The other thing I was considering, so I was doing this very quickly, like I tend to do actually, it's like I'll open a kid's hair cutting salon on the island where I live cuz we don't have anything like that. So I'll go to hair, go to hair school or whatever it is, and learn to cut hair. And then I'll open a kid's salon and that'll be my. So the other thing, the divorce attorney, you know I got divorced at 45. The other thing, the divorce attorney is saying, you're gonna have to work for a really long time. Cause I'm starting over at 45 and I don't know, cutting hair, being up on your feet when you're 70 is, like is really the. Right angle. So between those two things, the kids haircuts.
Pam:I think we think you pay like 15 bucks for a kid. I don't know. I have a kid who's got more three times as much hair as I
do,
Jessa:so she's never, Yeah, I'm not sure. I never, I never got to the point of like an actual business plan around this. It was just some sort of idea of something I could latch onto and do really quickly. And, and it was quicker than being a therapist, but obviously being a therapist was a, was a better decision but it still wasn't totally lined up with me. Like there's a better option that I'm moving into. That idea
Pam:that you're talking about, like as a mom, be, so often I hear this from a lot of moms, like, what can I do that I, that I can see is lacking, like, that I can see is like, that I need for my kids, or that wasn't available for my kids. Like, could I fill that need? And sometimes it's like, yes and right on, and that's definitely what you need to be doing. And other times it's like, oh.
Jessa:Someone else can do that. Somebody else got hair right? Exactly.
Pam:Exactly. Funny, So funny. Now how old are
Jessa:your kids? Uh, well, my oldest is gonna be 28 soon. My middle one just turned 25 and then my youngest turned 21 a few weeks ago and is finishing up college. So I am, I'm not almost done with being a mom, but I am almost done with the part of my job where, Really responsible for the last month. Right? So none of the worry or the love or any of that stops, but you know, at least I've almost gotten the, the last one across the finish line. Right.
Pam:So as you're talking about your story and like what that has looked like, it's interesting to me because, you said, Oh, I'm really good at like listening to other people's stories and getting them to talk about themselves, but not necessarily, maybe not talking about yourself as much. Allowing other people space to talk about themselves, which is a really common, uh, it's a common trait in a therapist.
Jessa:Absolutely. It is. It is what we do in the therapy room, Right.
Pam:Yeah. And I'm pretty sure that every friendship I had through my twenties was a therapy relationship that should, shouldn't have been a friendship. That was a friendship and not a therapy relationship. One of those mm-hmm. Yeah. From like providing ther, They're calling me all the time and they're all the problems. And I'm like, what is, I'm working 24 hours a day. Yeah. So what kind of work have you done or are you doing
Jessa:to shift
Pam:that for yourself so that you're able, Cause obviously as an online entrepreneur as a small business owner, it's important that people hear your story. It's important that people get to know who you are, not
Jessa:just, Oh, I have these skills. Yeah.
Pam:So what's the kind of work that you've been
doing
Jessa:to make that shift? Well, I think it's on a, it's a couple different levels because I think part of me, historically, the part of my nature that didn't necessarily share about myself was waiting to be invited cuz I would invite other people and then I'd wait for them to invite me. And if they didn't, I just didn't do anything about it. So I think there was a part of people don't reach out in the same way and I would let that happen. And I'm trying to take more risks, I suppose, and just, I go just at this workshop, invite myself along. Can I sit with you guys? Can I have dinner? I'm just not, uh, in the energetic space where I have to sit back and wait anymore. And I've always been willing to reach out for help. Like, if I was going through some big thing, my friends would be there. It wasn't totally one sided. But certainly at a cocktail party or something, I'm more like, People, talking about themselves, telling you their life story. Right. Talking about their divorce or their ki the thing, well now they're sex life cuz I'm a sex therapist. Right now they're sex life. Yeah. But in, in the, the other transition that happens, the difference between being a therapist where it really is not about us and we really only share something about us if it's therapeutically valuable for the client, we're kind of supposed to be. In some ways, invisible or or small in the room, inconspicuous, right? Uh, in the online world, it needs to be more about you and you have to take stands and you have to let people know what you think and you have to differentiate, you are so much, I am so much more a part of that. And that was a bit of a leap. To go make videos and say what I think and take a stand on stuff and share my story, especially in the sex course, my story's really personal in there and I share that in the webinar that thousands of people have seen. So it was, it's a bit of a stretch and it's actually part of the leap. Anybody I'm helping in my program has to make too, from wait. It's not about me to wait. I, I need to be a real part of this equation. It's not, it's not an easy jump to make. Mm,
Pam:For sure, for sure. And I would imagine that like that some of that work, that there's been stumbling blocks along the way that there's been like, that it hasn't just been like smooth sailing of like, All right, I'm just gonna lean in and do this thing.
Jessa:Yeah, I mean, it's not, it's not always easy. It took a long time for me to put my own story in that sex, uh, webinar. The first versions didn't go back through everything that I is in there now. And I don't, I, I suppose I felt ashamed, but of course that's part of what the people that need this course feel. So it's like, it's so important to do, to lead with that, uh, ability to just be open and, and really be seen, right. Yeah. Showing. Yeah. Yeah. And then I sent a very divisive slash vulnerable email after Roe v. Wade was overturned because I really didn't think that as, as a sex therapist, I could not take a stand on that. So I really felt like, and I have list of like 5,000 people, not at my sex therapy practice, but in the sex course kind of world. Right. And I just felt like I can't be silent about this, so I have to be willing to take a stand and I'm gonna lose some people over this. This is a really divisive issue, right? and I, my approach wasn't like, we're not, we're not gonna convince each other. Somebody who's pro-life, somebody who's through choice. We're not gonna change each other's mind, but where was the common ground around preventing unwanted pregnancy in the first place? There was always this room to work together towards shared goals. And why hasn't that happened? But I just, I knew I had to send the email, so. Right, right. So how do your kids feel about your. Well, I mean, which part? There's the sex therapy part, which actually, yeah, that's what I'm think
Pam:I'm very curious about. Just think I have a 13 year old who if I was like, I'm a sex therapist, would be like, Oh my God.
Jessa:So here's the thing, it's evolved a little bit. I mean, all three of my kids are different, but Jack, my son, the youngest, used to love opening the boxes that would come from Amazon. At a certain point, he stopped doing that. When it kept being sex books, it's like, ah, but I actually think that all three really respect and value it. So Emma went to college. She's my oldest. She went to college. Her dad, my ex, uh, works in the Italian wine business, so he shipped her a bunch of wine. She's 18 right at the time, and I have sent her off with my favorite book about sex called The Guide to Getting It On. So it's this whole encyclopedia and she's got this stuff and the, the people in her dorm are like, Where do you come from? Like, who is, what is this world that, these are your parents? But everybody borrowed the book, And I've actually bought it for lots of my kids' friends, and I think they. Appreciate the sex positivity and openness and support, and the fact that they could talk to me about anything and that I'm really a wealth of knowledge and support for them in this. So I think they've really embraced it. So I think that, there was a little bit of time, uh, where Jack, I think was somewhat embarrassed, uh, but now he just thinks it's really cool. So, Yeah. And that
Pam:probably, I mean, part of the reason that I asked that question was because they were older when you were, when you started doing this work. I mean, Yeah, they, it's not like you, it's not like you did the work and then they came along. It was like, Right, right, right.
Jessa:A single mom before I was raised in a sex positive household. So I was already that kind of parent, like trying to have those conversations, they're not always open to it. So then this just sort of added on when all the books started arriving and things like that. But it wasn't a major 180 degree turn in my approach to sex with them. But I think they, they now think it's pretty cool. You. Yeah. Yeah.
Pam:Yeah. That's pretty cool that you grew up in an environment too, that just kind of, created space for uda, be able to have conversations.
Jessa:Yeah, Yeah, yeah. And then I know that I think well, I think they're also really aware that I'm building a business now and I'm really an entrepreneur, and it's like I have gone from divorce with no career to having basically put'em all through college and be, support, we bought a house and, different things that it's like, Oh, I, I think I've modeled something. I think, it came at a little bit of a cost when I, I had been a stay at home mom, Right. And then I had went back to school, start working full time, which I'd never done with the kids. And so Jack especially got a little bit less of my attention, like before and after school care and things like that, that I'd never done, uh, with the other two because they were a little bit older when this all started. So it comes with some trade offs, but I think they're, I think they're proud of me, so, yeah. Yeah. That's pretty cool. That's pretty cool. So,
Pam:This is what's happening in my brain. Okay. So to go from, Hey, you're good at listening to me, You should become a therapist to knowing that you wanna become a sex therapist, even with a sex positivity growing up, a sex positivity household. What was that
Jessa:journey like for you? Well, so here's another one of, Its such weird, Well, it maybe, maybe perspective. It's not
Pam:weird. It's not weird. I don't mean as weird what you are doing. I mean like Right, right. Culture is like, Ooh, we don't talk about that. It's taboo.
Jessa:It's Shane. Yeah. Well see this was another one of, another one of those light bulb moments where somebody says the right thing. So in a moment it's like I knew so very early in grad school getting my masters, we had this module, this is what they called it, Mini mod weekend training in sex. The, the person who was teaching had gone through the program. She was a certified sex therapist, and she made a comment that she considered sex therapy to mostly be grief and loss work, and it just sort of like, bam. Hit me because I'd had these struggles in my own marriage. We got divorced. It wasn't just over sex. It was a lot of things. But you know, it just sort of hit me that people are suffering when their sex life isn't working. I had had a lot of sex positive experiences in my life, and then I knew what it was like to suffer and it just sort of hit grief and loss. This is so significant and it's like that's what I wanna do. And I had almost two years left of my master's, and then I had to wait a year to do the sex therapy training. And then that was a year, and then I had to do supervision. It was a long process to actually finish it, but from that moment I knew. So it was another one of those like, boy, you hear exactly what you need, so, Right.
Pam:Yeah. Right. And that's kind of what I was trying to figure out, like what's the, what's the train of thought? And I don't, I think that we definitely live in a culture where I had somebody else that, that on the podcast a while back that was also a sex therapist and she was, So my email is probably gonna end up in your junk mailbox if you, because Google has, has decided that I'm spam because of, because of what I do and because it's like deny all, whatever, however they do the things on the back end. Right. It's just kind
Jessa:of the culture that we live in
Pam:so
Jessa:much that, and
Pam:yet you're saying, I'm full, I'm booked out. I can't do more. I need to, I need to build something else, some other resources for people because I can't see everybody individually or as a couple, in a, in a partnership because I don't have enough time.
Jessa:Yeah. So, and not only that, when I got certified as a sex therapist, I was like the sixth person in Washington state. We must have 40 or 50 now and 35 in Seattle we're awful. I mean, this is not just me and I'm like this lone person trying to do it all. Like there is so much need for this because any couple over time is gonna struggle with sex. It's inevitable. It just doesn't work like clockwork. It's not like, Oh, I'm with the right person. Never have a problem. So there's just so much need and sometimes I. I reflect on the courage, it must take people to come tell a stranger about their sex life. And some people walls right in, they're like all in it right away, and other people are much more timid and it's hard, but I, and I have to hold that space and make it safe. But people are more and more and more willing, uh, to acknowledge there are struggles and to reach out for help. So that's good. Right? Yeah. It's so
Pam:good. Yeah. I mean, there's so many things that are going on that are you. Positives from that.
Jessa:Yeah, from that perspective. Yeah. And you were talking about, it's not so much Google, I think that has a problem, but Facebook, when I, so, so I, right, I developed this course, right? And my, my book is called Sex Without Stress, so that's what I named, That was my website. That's what I named my course. I did this whole thing and then I tried to advertise for my webinar, and you can't say the word. I couldn't have the word sex in my url, so my Better Sex podcast, Blacklisted for the Pixel, like just because the words, I mean, it's like, ugh. It just is so aggravating that somehow sex is a dirty word and he couldn't, even though when I'm advertising, it's not like sex work or pay, nothing. It's totally legitimate. I'm a certified sex therapist trying to help people, and I couldn't advertise it. I had to rebrand everything. And call it intimacy with ease. And all my advertising has to hint around or say intimacy or desire, have to beat around the bush and it, it's like, right. I, I can barely swallow that, but I, but I have to if I'm gonna advertise on Facebook. Well,
Pam:yeah. And like impact people's lives because that's what comes down to you, right. Fine. I'll suck it up and not say sex Facebook so that you can be happy with what I'm putting out there. Like, Yeah. And I've seen a lot of that. I've seen a lot of all over the place, TikTok, uh, Instagram, whatever, where whether it's, regardless of whether they're doing the work that you're doing or they're doing something else Well, where people will say things like, Yeah, I have one of those pages, or Yeah, I have a blah,
Jessa:whatever. Yeah. It's like I was on TikTok briefly. I, I hired somebody to help me do that and I ultimately just didn't want to. I had to say she had to write segs like eggs with an S to avoid. She, was trying to avoid all these filters and it just is, talk about perpetuating the problem. Sex is not a dirty word. We should be able to talk about this. Just like eating, It's just a Yes. It's, and it's such an important part of relationships. It's just, I could pull my hair out over this. Yeah. Right. So what do we do? What do we do as I don't, as an individual human beings. I don't know. I mean, I guess, talk about it, And if this is a podcast for moms, right? So people with children, I mean, one of the things I would really say is do your own work around this if you need to, so you can be comfortable. I mean, I think the biggest gift we can, well, two biggest gifts we can give our kids first is a really solid relationship with our partner. If we've. And have that foundation and that stability and model that for them. So invest in a really good relationship. Part of that is your sex life. And then we can give them a different kind of comfort around sex than maybe we were raised with. Now, I was raised with it, but most people are not. And so why not tackle that on behalf of our children? So that it's not this taboo scary thing or this thing they can't talk about or this thing they don't understand or afraid of or this thing they're kind of going crazy with. Cuz they don't know. I mean, we. We need to have these conversations in our own households, and create, change the environment around it. Just in our house. I think that's all we can do as individuals. I suppose we could try to show up at the school board meetings and say, Yes, we need good sex ed. That's a whole other thing, right? How bad or non-existent sex ed is in, in schools too, but, Right. Yeah. Yeah. And
Pam:I'm just thinking about like the, the, all the, So I went to college in the 90. High. I graduated from high school in the mid nineties and there was this whole thing around like, you can't give kids condoms cuz it'll make'em have sex. I mean, they're still saying that, but that was kind of when it first they Yeah, that was like the thing. Right. And I, thankfully I went, college campuses ares vastly different anyway. And so you go into like the housing office and they've got a big fish bowl full of condoms and you go into the health office and they've got a big, you know, like they're not dumb. Yeah. And so, But I mean like we we're in this culture where there are, there are educated adults, like educated, like they've got degrees, they've gone to, most of them have gone to like really expensive Ivy League schools and they're like, Oh, we talk about sex. If we talk about if we provide children or anybody with information, it's going to lead down this road
Jessa:of. Yeah, well. Well, what we do know, I mean, I can't cite the studies, but I believe there are studies that show that Abstine is only education does not. Does not work. You just tell kids it's not like lack of information is gonna prevent them from having sex. So why not equip them? And then I think I have heard this, and I don't know if it's an actual study or whatever, but the children of sex therapists have sex later So that there is something about information and framing it in such a way, and my, my message is around sex or not, Hey, go crazy. It was like, here's how it works, here's what it's for. You need to be really respectful and safe and it's. Being safe emotionally and physically and, I I was trying to put it in context for them where they make really intentional, responsible decisions around it, and we can't do that without information. Correct. So. Correct. So how
Pam:do we go about, as parents, as women, as human beings, how do we go about getting comfortable with talking about sex, especially if we grow up in an environment that is, I grew up, I, I'm, I'm a, I've been a therapist for a long time. I'm pretty comfortable with these conversations, but I grew up in a household, like a Catholic household where you don't talk about anything.
Jessa:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I don't have a, I don't have like the, Absolute answer to this, but I would imagine that first there's getting comfortable with sex in general, just in your own head, so like that book I mentioned, the Guide to Getting It On, I love, it's very heteronormative, but it's, it's a great book about sex. So learn, and, and sort of relax around the whole topic. I think it'd be helpful to get more and more comfortable talking to your partner if you have one about it. Cuz lots of couples are not talking about this. So between adults, can we talk about what we're doing, what we like, what we don't like, how we feel about it, what we. What's happening, what's not happening, and, and sort of open up the conversation there. And then in terms of creating the environment around kids, I mean, I've interviewed some, actually a number of people on my own podcast, The Better Sex Podcast. There are other people with podcasts, there are other books and resources around exactly how to have this conversation in age appropriate ways. Like what do you do with little ones? I mean, it's, a sars, which is calling body parts like by their real names. Let's just be open about our physical bodies and what happens with them. Right. But I think there'd be a lot of guidance for parents based on the age of the kids in terms of what you. Be thinking about trying to communicate and then base it in your values. Like everybody, not everybody's the same. You're not gonna have the same conversations, but how do you tie it to the values you're trying to instill in your kids? But lack of information is not going to prevent anything. It's just gonna leave them ill-equipped to deal with realities when it happens, right? Across
Pam:the board. I mean, we're talking about sex right now, but that's in anything.
Jessa:Yeah. And I think my husband's money, whatever, Yeah. Yeah. My husband's
Pam:a therapist as well, and he worked his, he's worked for Riley's my daughter's whole life in addiction treatment. We're having conversations about people overdosing on heroin with her at Yeah. Seven years old. Right? Right. She's a kid that's like people, all of her friends now come to her and she's like, That's dumb. Don't do that. These are all the reasons why you shouldn't.
Jessa:Yeah. And so this, it's gonna happen to you. This is a really good parallel around where information is protective and you're gonna be less likely to jump into some of this stuff rather than I know nothing, so, Sure. I'll take that from my friend. I mean, information is really protective and you're trying to instill in your kids an ability to. Rational, thoughtful choices. And give them the whole context around that. So yeah, talking about drugs, talking about money, talking about sex, all the, all these big things. It really is important. All the big things.
Pam:All the things. And I think that like, as a, as an adult kind of reflecting on the things that we struggle to sit down and have a conversation about. So if you're listening to this episode and you're like, Oops, you can't, couldn't have that conversa, like that's probably a really good indicator that there's some work that needs to
Jessa:be done on. Yeah. Yeah. And I just wanna so invite people to do that because if you don't do it in yourself, you can't give something different to your children. That's a, And I think that can motivate us to do things we don't otherwise wanna do, because it's right. I'll do it for my kids. I won't do it for me. So this, it really is worth wrestling with this and transforming this and getting more and more comfortable so you can give your kids a different foundation with this and a different starting point.
Pam:Yeah, I love that. And like I said, I think that goes across the board in all the things that we're doing as parents, as as, and even if even not parents, right? Cause one of the things that I teach all the time is that like, if you are a per, if you are a significant person in a child's life, like you said, you're not only can your kids come to you. They're friends that have built trusting relationships
Jessa:with you can come to you. Yeah. Nieces and nephews, whatever, whatever it is. Yeah,
Pam:yeah. That doesn't have to be your own, the child, you birthed Right. To, to be able to be a support to people. Right. And model, healthy, healthy communication and healthy talking about issues
Jessa:of all. Right. Yeah. Cuz some of those kids friends probably have a different kind of household, and they need some other thing modeled, maybe you've got the house where all the kids come after school, you're that place, because you have that environment and you have an opportunity to really make a difference. Right, Right.
Pam:I say to my daughter's friends all the time, cuz 13, they're in eighth grade. I'm like 13 and 14. I'm like, well she has one friend in particular and they always say, I'm just too much. I'm just so much
Jessa:to. I'm like, Well, who told you that story first of all? Yeah. Yeah. That's where your brain goes right away, like, Oh boy, where did that come from? Yeah. But being able
Pam:to Internalize it ourself and teach our tiny humans that we get to write our own stories, each one of us individually like that I'm not responsible for writing my child's story. I'm not responsible for helping her on that path to writing her own story.
Jessa:Right.
Pam:And when you're dealing. Beliefs that I'm not good enough. I'm not capable. I'm not, I'm a lot to handle. I'm or individuals that have experienced trauma. That can be, mm-hmm. can
Jessa:be a hard, can be a hard one. Yes, Absolut. What
Pam:is the work? So you have the, you have obviously you're doing therapy and I wanna say one on one, but I know you said you're doing couples. It's
Jessa:one on two, right? I I only see couples. Yeah. One on two.
Pam:Okay. So that, that's, that's where I'm go when I say, when I speak in that language, that's what I'm talking about. Yeah. Yeah. The therapy work versus like, in these group programs. And then eventually, you're kind of doing some stuff with other therapists, but what kinda stuff are you doing in your group program? How, what? Evolution of that work look like for the individuals that you're
Jessa:working with? Well, I mean, I guess I should go back to my, my other lightning moment that comes to mind. So I took all these classes, all these trainings and all that time and all that money to learn how to do this so I could build my own course, right? So right now the desire spa lives in the world for these women and. I was trying to get a friend who had also written a book, another therapist, all about grief, and I was trying to get her to do the same thing. It's like, you have to create this into an online course, so you gotta take this program and this program and this program and put'em, And she's, she's just like, too much. And she's like, Can't, can't you just tell me what to do? And it was like, boom. Yes, I actually, I can. So that's where I started coaching her one on one. And then I threw it out to therapists in Seattle with people that sort of knew me and got a whole group of people to sort of go through this process. And now it's, evolved into this whole leveraged expert academy. So people are working through the material to go from. How could they take what they do professionally and extract a method out of that that could become an online course? So who are they gonna help? What problem are they gonna solve? What is their approach to this? What can become part of a course, in what order? All that stuff. And then have to build, an audience. So again, this can be a real leap for therapists, but a lot of people in service professions, they don't advertise or get visible, right? So how are they gonna start to. Leverage social media and an email list and build an audience and use video and all this stuff to, to grow and grow and grow awareness so people know you're gonna have this method, right, and then build out the course and build out the sales mechanism. Like I mentioned a webinar, That's what I use. People can do a free training and get something from it and be invited into the program, right? So how do they figure out what's gonna be in that and develop this whole thing and then automate the whole thing. So all of it's built like a machine that you build once and then you can sit back and go on vacation, right? So I'm, I've developed all the content for this and all the instructions for this and all the templates for this and all the tech demo videos for this. And then I also coach them through it. So we have regular group coaching calls where I can help people with it, whatever, any part of the process. Super. So it's, it's a big project. I can't, I can't take away from the fact it's a big project, but it's a whole lot easier if somebody's telling you exactly what to do, know, instead of you have to figure it out. I was
Pam:gonna say on the consumer end, thinking about all the therapists that I know that are like, ugh. I couldn't, I couldn't do what you do. And they say that to me all the time. I couldn't do what you do because there's, there's just so many things. I don't know. You just know those things. I'm like, well, well, I learned those things. Right, Right. Sorry, my master's in social work didn't teach me all those
Jessa:things either. Yeah, exactly. But who not? Everybody's got the inclination to go do all that research, figure it out, how does it go together? Try it, like it's just, I can just save people so much time because, Build it into a process. And again, that's how my brain works. I love taking 15 classes and figuring out out how it goes together. Most people don't, right? Mm-hmm. And then my brain, the way it works is like, Oh, let me organize this. It goes into this step by step thing. I, I sort of can't help that. So that's, that's to everybody else's benefit. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, for sure. And the what's.
Pam:The program, the original group program that you had around that was kind of came from your practice as a sex
Jessa:therapist? What's, Well, originally I ca originally I called it Sex without Stress, but then I had to change it to intimacy with ease and so that, Right, exactly. So that was geared still towards couples. Okay. But what I found was in this online course world, it's hard to do something when two people have to agree to do it. It's sort of exponentially more difficult than getting one person. So I have redone this a few times, and now it is the Desire Spa, and it's just for women who are the lower desire person in an otherwise happy relationship. So instead of trying to serve everybody with every, every couple, with every sexual issue like I do in my practice, it's been beneficial to be like, speak directly to one person solving, working with one thing. The Desire Spa has sort of three phases. I, I even call'em room. So first you start in the soak room. I, I named it the Desire Spa because people who are struggling with desire, women who, who feel like they don't want sex, they feel broken. About this. They think something's wrong with them. They think they're in trouble. They're being blamed often by their partner too, but they've internalized that something is wrong with them, that they're missing this, and that is a really disempowering place to be like, That's just like a frozen in the corner. I can't look at this kind of space. So I really wanted to communicate. That this is a safe, supportive environment to kind of look at your stuff, but not be broken so it's like, where do you, I love to go to the spa. It's like that's a place I just feel like, yes, I can take all my clothes off and be comfortable in just my, it's this lovely, lovely space. And that's what I wanted to sort of. instill in people. So you start in the soak room where you learn stuff, you soak in information, like there's a lot of myths about sex, a lot of paradigm about this, and belief systems and understanding how much of that is wrong and what the reality is and why this makes sense that you're struggling. All this kind of stuff. So that's sort of like, oh, a little bit of relief, right? I'm not broken. Mm-hmm. this is how sex really works. Then you go into the scrub. Where you really apply this to yourself, like, what's my background? What kind of obstacles do I have? What's my role in this? What's the stance I do with my partner? How do I, reflect on how this is showing up for me. And then we go into the massage room, which is action steps. How do we work this out, in real life and do things? And then what I did is I included an entire partner participation pack that's free, but where your partner, you send a link to your partner so they can get this information from. I'm talking directly to them as a higher desire person and what kind of role they're having, because this is not just up to the lower desire person to fix, they're not the problem. It's a two person system. So you share this and I can tell your higher desire partner how they're making this worse and how their approach to this is making worse and creating obstacles. And then there's a whole bunch of stuff for the two of you together to totally transform it. So this course is totally prerecord. I basically have a short video, like if you did one a day, it might take a month. I think there's 30 videos. Okay. But there's short little segments. There's some homework with each one, and then the partner part might take longer, once you're both working on the actual exercises. Oh, and then I added, I added a whole bonus on emotional intimacy. Because it's not, it's not just about the sex. Right. It's a, it's both emotional and physical intimacy. So there's this whole thing about developing emotional closeness too, because for a lot of people, they need to feel that before they're even gonna be open to having sex. So anyway, I think that's everything that's in that program. Wow. And so it takes, it's all pre-recorded so people can go through it at their own pace. It's not, So how long it takes in a, If you wanted, Yeah. You could totally binge it in a weekend if you want to, or you could take your time. It doesn't, it doesn't matter. Yeah. Yep.
Pam:Cool. Yeah. And you know that that idea that the concept that you just mentioned around emotional intimacy is so, because obviously maybe not obvious to those that are listening, obvious to you and I if the lower desire partner is feeling broken. and that there's something wrong with them. Then the story is, I'm not good enough. I'm not worthy of this other person's care and love and respect and all the things. And then like where there's no in you can't. That's like trying to force intimacy with a brick wall.
Jessa:It's not gonna, Yeah, no, exactly. If you're coming at this to prove you're not broken or to take care of your partner's needs, and you're always letting'em down, that just makes it so much easier to avoid this whole thing. It's not, it's not engaging. We have to help people actually want, find their desire for sex and make it fulfilling for them, and it matters just as much as what makes it fulfilling for your partner. So trying to create that kind of space and permission and, equal. Power equalization really, uh, because a lower desire person is not broken. There's no amount of desire we're supposed to have. Desire works differently than you think in the first place, and people have legitimate things in their way. We have to honor that and figure out what those are and move as many as we can out of the way. So, can I mention my free training in case people are intrigued by this So if you, if you go to intimacy with ease.com/masterclass, You can sign up for the free webinar that I mentioned, so that's gonna walk through some really important concepts that, first, I think can change your life just with those, but also we'll give you some sense of whether this course would be of interest, whether I resonate with you and the course seems like it would fit. So, yeah. For sure.
Pam:Thank you. I will link that up in the show notes so people can take a look at that. Cause I think this is such a valuable, important conversation to be having. Yes, it's the work that you're doing and you're creating courses for it and all that stuff, but I also just think that, that getting comfortable with ourselves, especially as women especially, add additional layer of being a mom on top of that. And like, just thinking about going back to the time when your kids are tiny and. Crawling on you and they're sick and they're, they're feeding and they're, you're changing their diaper and you haven't showered in four days and you've got poop underneath your fingernails or whatever other things. Right. Probably
Jessa:intimacy is not real high on the list. Yeah. Talk about a legitimate obstacle, right. Right, Right. Yes. But being
Pam:able to kind of give yourself permission to. Have these conversations regardless of where you are in the process
Jessa:is so important. Right. But I will say, so I've been that mom but it's also really easy to constantly put your partner off. Correct. So I did do that. It's like I didn't need one more kid, one more person who needed me. And so I could always put my kids first, and that was somewhat legitimate. But I neglected my marriage. And my sexual relationship and that ultimately for me led to divorce. So while I think it is totally legitimate when you're buried in kids and everything else and your needs matter, it would really encourage people not to, to put off dealing with some of this and figuring out how to prioritize your relationship some, and how to feed that part of your life and not just let it wither on the vine, cuz it really can have a severe cost. Yeah. And not
Pam:just, not just in divorce, Right, Right. Like there are plenty of people that stay together and they don't get divorced and they Yes. Live fine together and it's not an issue, uh, it's not an issue in that way. But like the, I can't tell you the number of moms that I've spoken to that are like, uh, the go through this process of having a bunch of little kids attached to them, peeking on them, all the things and and are like, come out the other side and they're like, I don't even know who I am anymore. And it's because we're not tuning into and doing our own. Like what do we need? What are the things? Because as lovely
Jessa:as it is to be a mother, that's not the only thing. You need Right? Right. And your relationship needs some care and feeding it, it's gonna, it's gonna take a hit. It's not gonna be the same as before. Children. I mean, there are the realities of this, but boy, like sort of back to my. My statement that I think the best gift we give our kids is a really solid relationship with our partner if we have one. And so don't neglect that. And it's so easy to put the kids in between you in bed and to use that as it's not just an excuse, it's real, but to sort of hide behind that and not take yourself on and make sure you are tending to this very priceless relationship. Cuz otherwise, you're right. You don't just get divorced, you can wake up just totally disconnected. There are situations where someone is cheating. There are situations where people just sort of have this icy chill or they're living like roommates, whatever this is, Your kids are living in it too. So again, change it for you, but really change it for your kids. Like it's, it's just so worth trying to figure this out. And there are sex therapists around all over the country, pretty much. That can help if, if you need that kind of support. Right, right. Yeah.
Pam:Really some really, really important things. Yeah. I appreciate you
Jessa:coming out and talking about that stuff.
Pam:Joseph, where can people find you online? Like where do you hang out? Where's
Jessa:your Where's your online place to be chilling these days? Well, I mean, I have, I have Instagram, so Intimacy with Ease is sort of the sex hat. And then Leveraged Expert is the Coaching Online Course Hat If people are in Washington, uh, seattle sex therapist.com is my therapy. And then there's intimacy with these.com for sort of the, the broader sex course and things like that. Right? Yeah. And then Better Sex podcast if people wanna listen. I've, It's on pause, so I haven't made any new episodes since April, but there's something like, there's over 200 episodes about all kinds of things. Wow. So cool.
Pam:I'm gonna check it out just because I
Jessa:love to listen to the people's podcasts and Yeah. Yeah. There's some, there's some good ones in there. So, yeah. Well, and I think, being
Pam:able to have con, having, being, going back to that idea, like being able to, to carve out time for yourself, having conversations that are going to lead to deeper, more meaningful connection with self, with partner, with children, with like the people. The people that are important to you. Yeah. And the people. And the people that, that we hope that I sit here and hope. For my listeners out there that are important to them that there's resources. I mean, I think that's the bottom line, is that like there's resources. Yeah. And anything we're great as moms being like, I don't have enough time,
Jessa:but like, really avoidance doesn't make anything better. so.
Pam:Correct. Yeah. And most of the time makes it worse. Yes.
Jessa:So.
Pam:Awesome. Thank you so much. You are welcome sharing all of this, and I will share all the ways to contact you in the show notes. And guys, if there are things that, uh, specifically about today's episode that you would like to share with either one of us please, please, please reach out. We would love to answer questions. Tag us on Instagram. We would love to hear from you. All right, thank you guys for being here. I appreciate the hell out of you and I'll see you all next week. Take care.
