How To Identify How Your Past Trauma Affects Your Life
Estefana Johnson, LCSW, discusses a mission to reshape how we view mental health—emphasizing mental wellness and normalizing the human experience. Drawing from her background as a first-generation Mexican-American, she reflects on the cultural silence around mental health in her community and how her personal and professional journey led her to become a therapist. The initiative brings together clinicians to create accessible, practical tools for understanding mental wellness, aiming to combat stigma and make mental health knowledge relatable to both professionals and everyday people.
Throughout the conversation, she debunks common myths about mental health, such as the belief that only those with mental illness need therapy. She highlights the importance of awareness—how upbringing, culture, and unprocessed experiences shape our behaviors and perceptions. Using real-life examples, she explains how unresolved trauma often manifests in behaviors that may seem irrational without context but actually serve as coping mechanisms rooted in survival. Her central message encourages compassion, understanding, and education about how the mind works, emphasizing that mental health is a shared, deeply human experience rather than a clinical outlier.