Kiaundra Jackson, marriage and family therapist, author, and media personality

  Welcome back, friends, to our podcast, Unlocking Your World of Creativity. And just in the last few episodes, our world creative travels have taken us from New York to Austin, from Zurich to Oslo, and today we're stamping our creative passports in Los Angeles, and we're talking with my friend and guest, Kiaundra Jackson.

Kiaundra, welcome

to the show. Thank you so much for having me. I am beyond excited to be here with

you today. It's great to see your smile and feel your energy. Kiaundra is a licensed marriage and family therapist, but she is also an author, a TV, what, star almost at this point, the TV therapist, we got to get the word out there about how to make our relationships work. So Kiaundra and I are going to explore a couple of different angles. We'll talk about her work, and then we'd love to explore the creative process. So Kiaundra, just starting with your work, I saw a fantastic Instagram post you made that made me chuckle, that your mom has asked you really.

What do you do? And if I couldn't relate to that, I wouldn't have laughed so hard. My mom, who's 88 now, still hasn't a clue what I've been doing for the last half a century, let alone what I do now. So what do you say to mom when you try to explain? To be

honest, I initially got Annoyed because at this point, she shouldn't know about what I do.

She's literally seen me on TV. She's attended my speaking engagements in person with me before. So it was a shocking question for her to pose that to me. And this just happened yesterday. So this is fresh off the press and I have had this conversation with her and my dad multiple times. So this isn't the first time she has inquired about that, but I think it's.

A combination of me wearing so many different hats, one day I'm on TV the next day I'm speaking the next day I'm talking about books and the other day after that I'm coaching new and emerging speakers. And so I think it's hard for her and my dad to grasp that their daughter is doing so many different things and she's not just a therapist, but she wears many hats and this is going to be an ongoing conversation for her because I'm not sure if she knows how to respond to other people when they say, Hey, what does your daughter do?

That's right. What is she up to? And I bring it up much in the context of being a family therapist, and all these family relationships that we juggle.

And you've really gained a reputation for really honing in on some of these key principles of developing these relationships, not only in marriage, but in the wider family. Maybe you can share some insights of your approach, and I guess, how it might differ from what people think are traditional therapy methods.

Yeah, I think my approach is very unique. It really speaks to just my personality and my style. If you've ever seen any of my videos or engaged with me in person, and this is how I met Mark at a speaking engagement that I was at recently. I was like one of the keynote speakers and he came up to me afterwards and we connected.

And so I think my approach is just very raw. It's authentic. People can feel that I want the best for them. And my approach is very much. I can hold your hand a little bit. I can coddle you through the process and give you those tips and resources, but I'm also very much so there's a point in a time where you need a little bit of a kick in the butt.

Do you need to say, okay, hold on. What's going here? What's going on here? Let's go deeper. What's the real issue here. And it's not just very surface. So I like to take people on that deeper journey a lot of the times. And even though they don't like me in the beginning. Eventually, they do love, the little bit of a push that I give them to help them go to the better, or to the next relationship, to the next level in their relationship, or even better their relationships.

Yes.

And this approach has really set you apart, but it's also attracted some media attention. You've been on OWN TV, you've been in Oprah's O Magazine, Essence, Forbes, these other places. What do you think attracts the media to wanting to cover? You, your approach. Every time I pick up something, there's another three steps.

There's another four bullets. There's another technique that I can use, which is what I love. I love the recipe, but maybe you can tell me what they've been attracted to.

Yeah, I think that the media is attracted to authenticity. I think they enjoy real stories and real people. I'm no different than anybody else who is on this journey, but I do also feel that in the psychology space and in the therapy world, you don't see as many people on television and in the media.

You see them having a private practice or working in different settings. And so to see a therapist, especially a younger therapist, a millennial therapist, a black woman therapist, To be in this space. I think it's very attractive to a lot of people. And I'm here for that. I really appreciate the people who reach out to me and want to interview me and connect with me and allow me to be on their platforms.

I think the secret sauce to it all is consistency. I was just having a conversation with my mentee the other day because she was slacking off a little bit on some things. And I said, hold on, we need to get back on track here. And so I really pushed to get So I'm going on her approach on her social media strategy on the systems in her business, because it was just all over the place.

And no matter what is going on in my personal life, I still show up and be great online and in person, and I'm not saying that to be fake or that's something that other people should do. But I do think that if people peeled back my real life. And really explored what has been going on with me over the last three years.

I would say you would see that my whole house flooded. You would see my sister being diagnosed with cancer. You would see my dad getting into a massive car accident. All of these things are happening in my life, but I'm still showing up consistency, consistently. And. That's a superpower and that's one of my superpowers and I'm going to keep using that to go to the next level of my career.

And I'm glad you brought up this authenticity. All the life events, sometimes we say that sounds good in a paper. That sounds good on a book. That sounds good on a stage. But what's it like in real life? And I love the fact that a lot of your relationship and mental health Advice.

Acknowledged even by Beyonce and NAACP for this cultural awareness for this inclusivity. I think about, hey, it's great. Dr. Phil's awesome. And the Jerry Springer world that's coming gone, which we can all be thankful for. But I do think there's the time has come for this cultural awareness and inclusivity.

And sounds like you're really tapping in to the need

there. Absolutely. There's a greater need in the black and, just. With people of color in general, we're traditionally not prone to going to therapy or really implementing mental health practices or having healthier relationships.

And so I do think that I want to be one of the forerunners and just making sure that our community has all of the resources as much as possible as needed. And so I'm seeing a shift where people are more open to therapy, more open to conversations about mental health, and I'm here for that. And I hope it continues to be a bigger and bigger thing that people embrace.

And thinking about the couples or individuals sitting on your couch, what do you start with? How do you begin to tap into what

they're looking for? Yeah. I transitioned from my private practice doing one on one work, to doing all of the other things that we just talked about the media, the books, the speaking, and so making sure that my message is reaching a larger audience, not just the one on one.

But I'm not too far removed from that. So a conversation of what that would even look like just for people who might be listening or who may want to go to therapy, but they're a little apprehensive. I had a conversation with one of my friends this weekend. He was nervous.

And so he reached out to me and said, Kiaundra, what can I expect in my first therapy session? And so I said, there's a number of things that you can expect, but you really have to come in and from a place of Being raw, being real, being authentic, being yourself and being honest. Too many people want to present well in their therapy sessions.

They want to come off like they're doing well, or they're doing great. And I'm like, no, the whole point of you being here is to get the help that you need. So be honest about your troubles, about your weaknesses, all of those things, what is going on in your relationship, because that's going to be helpful.

Typically, when a client comes in, they get what we would call like an assessment. So they will fill out some paperwork where you will get to learn and know a little bit about their background, their history, any symptoms, anything that they may be experiencing. And that really helps the therapist create what we will call like a treatment plan or a goals of where we're going.

In therapy, we have to have some type of progress here. So we need to know where we're tracking and where we're going. And so that first session is really just information gathering and building rapport with your therapist. So making sure that you guys are good fit. There's good energy there.

You can trust this person. They can trust you. And that is going to be a safe place for you moving forward, because this is going to be a place where you are going to be extremely vulnerable to be able to help you to deal with whatever issues you may have going on. Yes.

And you bring up this openness and honesty.

How many people have you seen, they want to get a gold star? Star. They want to impress the therapist. Aren't I doing well? Am I your favorite? It's like this is not what you should be doing, right? Yeah,

this is not a competition here. This is the, the battle of the clients to see who's Kiaundra's favorite or not, but I have seen in past that people do want to show up as their best selves.

I understand that you don't want to come in and have a professional thinking that, your whole life is in shambles, but Most people's life is in shambles, and that's why they have to seek out therapy. And so I just encourage that openness, that vulnerability, that honesty. The therapist can't help you if you're not open and honest.

And I always say, I did a post about this not too long ago, your therapist can't want you to heal and be better more than you want to heal and for you to be better. So you have to have that. Tenacious, the tenacity to want more for yourself.

So good. Let's transition to that second part of our discussion, and that is talking about your creative process.

As you mentioned, transitioning from, the day to day licensed therapist to this now award winning speaker, best selling author. But it started somewhere. You said, one day, this is where I want to go and what the direction. What was your creative journey start

like? Oh, Mark, it was definitely a journey.

I think people look at me and they think that my path was very linear. I just got out of high school and I know exactly what I people

always see the after picture and they go, Oh, wow, that was easy.

Yeah, and that wasn't true at all. Honestly, I didn't know what I wanted to do. I was torn between being a dermatologist and a neonatologist, which works in the NICU With the babies who are ill, and so I had no idea what I wanted to do.

So after high school, I went to a community college and I just took random classes. To be honest with you, I took for two and a half years. I took random classes to see what I liked, to see what I was interested in, and I just couldn't figure it out. And it wasn't until the very last semester, right when I was about to get my AA degree, I took a literal marriage and family class.

And I fell in love, Mark. The teacher was a licensed marriage and family therapist like myself. And I just love the content. And I was like. This is what I think I want to do. And so I wasn't 100 percent sure that I wanted to be a therapist, but at least I had some direction at that point. So after that, I went on to the university and double majored in psychology and sociology, and further went on to grad school to get my degree in clinical psychology with an emphasis in marriage and family therapy.

And so my journey was a little rocky in the beginning, and. I just want to encourage people who are listening. If their journey is rocky in the beginning, don't give up. Don't feel like you're a failure. Don't feel like, you don't know what you're doing, but you will find your way as long as you keep at it and you don't give up in the process.

That's very helpful. And thinking about your creative process and writing books, then you're talking about not only maybe your therapeutic experience, but your own personal experiences and marriage and family. But I was reading the hard work or harmony, it says a go to guide for women, but of course I couldn't resist.

I read it anyway, and I actually got a lot of great ideas, but, healthy relationships thinking about how you craft these stories and. Beyond just, securing the people's, confidentiality. But I'm talking about really telling the stories that people can relate to. How do you approach that?

Yeah. I have tons of stories, right? As a therapist, we're bound by confidentiality. So I have the juiciest stories that I really can't tell anyone legally, and sometimes obviously we have to rearrange some stories and, change names and some type of events to make sure that particular client doesn't know that I'm talking about them.

But I do think that it's important to include real life stories and scenarios because people can see themselves in the tech. If I was just very theoretical and talking about theory and psychology and these outlandish things that the average person doesn't really know about, it wouldn't hit home as much as even with you reading it, it probably wouldn't hit home.

But knowing those stories and knowing and seeing themselves in someone else. Or even seeing themselves in me, because I've shared some very personal things in some of my books as well, they can say, wow, this is something that I can relate to. And I can change this in my life. I can do better. Or I can allow someone else in my family or friends who is going through this to let them see how they can overcome as well.

So I think. really sharing true authentic stories is important because if not, then we may have that disconnect of being able to relate to what the author is trying to get across.

And so many listeners of this podcast have been thinking about speaking engagements. They've been thinking about, getting their craft and their message out in the world.

And it's quite a competitive field, isn't it? Getting these speaking engagements, What strategies have you found to be effective, whether it's Keynote speeches or book signings all the like.

Yeah, I think the biggest thing in regards to speaking is, yeah, it's a very saturated field. I know so many people who just wake up one day and they're like, I want to be a speaker.

And they just start speaking and that isn't necessarily a bad thing or a wrong way to go about it. But also there's a number of people who don't have the skill set to be able to be a transformational speaker. Oftentimes I tell people, even those that I coach is. Speaking is a skill set, just like you would do anything else.

You have to hone your craft. You have to practice, get into Toastmasters, do some things that is going to help you elevate those speaking skills and not just wake up thinking that you're going to be great just because you're already a coach or you're already an author. Those things don't already guarantee that you will be a great speaker.

So for me, the journey has been building a brand. Building a personal brand. And I know that those things may feel like they're very different. But when you have showed up as the expert in your lane, whether that's relationships, mental health, fitness, finance, whatever your lane is, and you show up as the authority in that, and you have the branding attached to it, you have a great social media platform, you have books, you have a great website, you're showing up as that very thing, It attracts people.

It really wants people really want to say, Hey, who is this person? How can I learn from her or him? And how can I really glean from what they have to say? And so for me, it was just really showing up consistently. Again, that word is coming up again, consistently on social media to get exposure. I showed up consistently, relentlessly.

Always talking about two things, either relationships or mental health. That's all I talked about. That's it, yes. That's it. And once you show up talking about things consistently, people notice. And so people started coming to me and being attracted to me for those very reasons. And then that just led to people reaching out and saying, hey.

I'm having this event. Do you mind speaking? Hey, you mind being a trainer at my company? Hey, do you mind being a keynote or a workshop or even being on a panel? And it just went and skyrocketed from there. So I would encourage people to build a personal brand and show up as the authority in their lane to help get into the speaking industry.

And then,

of course, balancing all of that with your own life, your own relationships, your own family commitments and .

To be honest, it's not. I know there's a lot of people who might Be challenged in this area, but I've always had very strong boundaries my whole entire life. I don't have a problem telling anyone though, whether that's a family member, a business opportunity, whoever I know how important my self care is for the last, I would probably say seven, eight years, Mark.

I have not worked on a Friday. I call it self care Friday where I do absolutely positively nothing. I don't check emails. I don't do any type of work and I've incorporated that. And I just use that time to pour into myself. I do whatever I want to do, whether that's cooking, going to the beach, binge watching TV shows that I have missed, whatever I want to do on that day, it really just helps me disconnect from all of the busyness and the responsibilities that I have.

And so it is, and can be a challenge when people want to pull on you left and right. But. My family and my friends know because I've already taught them because you teach people how to treat you right, I've already taught them how to interact with me. And so I think I'm pretty good on the relationships in my life.

Yeah

it's encouraging to see how these principles can be put into practice. Oh yes. It's not just chapter seven in the book. I practice what I preach. We're going to look ahead in a second, Kiaundra, but I want to make sure everybody knows where to look you up, where to find you, where to learn more about your work.

Where can we

do that? This has been such a fruitful conversation. You can stay connected with me by visiting my website, which is KiaundraJackson. com or you can stay connected with me on all social media at the same, which is KiaundraJackson and make sure to follow me on YouTube because I have some really juicy shows on my YouTube channel, the KiaundraJackson show and keeping it real with Kiaundra.

And I think your listeners will really. Really find it

helpful. Terrific. And we're going to put all those links in the show notes, folks, so you can find them easily. So clearly you have a vision, not only of what you wanted to do, but now let's turn that into future tense. What kind of future projects and endeavors are you getting excited about?

This is such a juicy conversation. I don't know if I mentioned this earlier, but I never wanted any of this. I never wanted to be a speaker, never wanted to be on television. But I really just wanted to be in my private practice, see clients until I'm a hundred years old. And that's all I wanted to do.

But I knew because I am a woman of faith and faith is really important to me. I knew that God was calling me to something more, something deeper and reaching a larger audience. And for me, that's what this next leg of my journey is going to look like. I know I mentioned that I have a few shows on my YouTube channel, but I want to go bigger than that.

I actually want to have my own TV show on a network. And because I love, love, love anything relationships and mental health, I would love to have a show that is geared towards some unscripted television where I'm helping people either find love. I keep love. And so I am in the process of pitching myself for that.

Hopefully something lands very soon. But in the meantime, I'm still doing other media projects where I am showing up as the expert. I'll be on to be very soon, really dissecting and breaking down some true crying. cases from a relationship perspective and, still being on the local news and national TV shows.

And so I just want to do more of that. I want Keondra Jackson to be a staple, to be a household name and not for the sake of myself with all of the fame and the fortune, but so I can help as many people as possible. Yes. And that's

a great why. A lot of people looking for that stardom and spotlight, but the ability is to serve and help other people.

Absolutely. It's a real drive. Yes. Kiaundra, I can't thank you enough for the fantastic conversation. Oh, A, I've learned a lot. And B, it's pretty exciting to see what kind of, inspiration we can have for these relationships. Absolutely. I'm so glad we got a chance to meet. Absolutely. It's great to see you again and listeners be sure to follow Kiaundra Jackson as she said on all the socials, all the TV projects you're going to be seeing lots of new books, I'm sure.

There's lots to be coming from Kiaundra. Thanks again.

Thank you so much for having me.

And listeners come back again next time. We're going to continue our around the world journeys. We love talking to creative practitioners like we have today with Kiandra, about how they get inspired.

Yes, but also how they organize those ideas and how they gain the confidence and the connections to launch their work out into the world. And that's what we creatives want to do. So come back again next time and we'll continue to unlock your world of creativity.