Inspired Life Counseling - Group Private Practice

11/04/2025

The expectations burning you out aren't coming from your boss, your partner, or your schedule. They're coming from inside.

If you're a first responder, medical professional, entrepreneur, or parent, you know what it's like to push through exhaustion. You've been told that resilience means never stopping, that strength means handling it all without complaint.

But that's not strength—that's survival mode. And survival mode was never meant to be a permanent way of living.

Here's what we see in our work with high-stress professionals: The people who burn out aren't weak. They're incredibly strong people who've been running on that strength for so long, they've forgotten they're allowed to rest.

They've persevered through so much. They've shown up when it was hard. They've carried responsibilities that would overwhelm most people. That's real. That's powerful.

But strength isn't just about endurance—it's also about knowing when to pause, reassess, and give yourself permission to be human.

What if the most courageous thing you did today was let go of one expectation you're placing on yourself?

Not the deadline. Not the responsibility. Just the internal voice that says "I should be doing more" or "I should be handling this better."

You're already doing enough. You've already proven yourself. The next level of strength isn't doing more—it's allowing yourself to be imperfect and still worthy.

At Inspired Life Counseling, we work with first responders, medical professionals, and other high-stress individuals who are ready to redefine what strength really means. Seeking support isn't a sign you're failing—it's a sign you're ready to thrive

09/04/2025

When we are on a healing journey it's so tempting to look externally. If I put boundaries on THEM then I'll be happier and more successful. I mean, maybe... probably... but that's putting the cart before the horse. 🚃🐎

♥️ The first part of any healing journey is to figure out how we are breaking our own hearts.

🔎 What am I telling myself about myself?

We often hear from people the following:

🎤 No one will ever love me (they might know they're loveable, but dont believe anyone will see and honor it).

📣 "I'm not good enough as I am." Just because we have growing and healing to do doesn't mean we're not good enough for the blessing of the love of the people in our lives.

👂 "I deserve to hurt/bad things." Regular mistakes have consequences, and we can reap what we sew. But, no matter how we have contributed to someone's pain doesn't mean that we can't repair and make it right. That's repentance. We atone for how we have hurt someone and then move forward in our blessings or new journey.

💪 "I am weak." Both genders interpret this differently but are plagued by the vulnerability of being weak. How others perceive them, the way they feel safe/respected/empowered in the world, and it can wreck havoc on a person's ability to see the forest through the trees when they are trying to prove to themselves they are not weak.

*Where are you going with this Jessica?!?*

The first boundary is one with ourselves! Capturing the thoughts that isolate us from our true selves and sabotage our journey toward our goals is the first boundary. These thoughts keep us stuck. We fear that if we fail then we will prove them right - and that's a fate worse than death (if those thoughts are true).

Noticing how we are sabotaging our own happiness and then practicing thought stopping and redirection creates a domino effect in our psyche. Once you've gotten this handled, then you can start working on boundaries toward others. Its much easier because if we're unwilling to accept negative statements and beliefs within us, then we end up having no patience for the shenanigans of others. Laying down the boundaries with others becomes reasonably seamless.

Our biggest challenge is ourselves. All those other people are much easier to be boundaried with! We've got this!

This blurb is a bit more of my processing for the retreat Jessica hoping to put together next summer where she'll help women wrestle with their inner identity while thet relax somewhere sunny and fabulous with water and a tide. Stay tuned!

09/03/2025

Jessica, Ashlyn, and Madison H. from the front office are out to lunch. Bonding and relaxing together is one of the cornerstone traits for the Inspired Life team!

08/08/2025

WOMEN & PEOPLE WHO LOVE MEN ROMANTICALLY, THIS IS FOR YOU.

Sometimes I see things and HAVE to speak on them. *This is one of those.* During those wars when men were sending love letters, emotionally low-effort men still existed. Today, men who are willing to reassure their women exist. I have friends with beautiful relationships whose partners look forward to contacting them when they are apart for periods of time. I see healthy relationships all around me in my social life (my professional life has a bias of people struggling to learn healthy relationship skills).

The thing that's actually the issue is when the partner who is feeling blown off or treated like they're "too much" internalizes it and thinks they just have to accept this is "men today." No. Men today are also good men.

Yes, communicate your needs and your standards. If that partner treats you like you're asking too much, then realize that your relationship values aren't aligned and you deserve the person who would write you letters if they were in war. You are holding out for the person who not only sees your value, but is willing to put in the emotional labor to actually do the work to value you.

Someone who is misaligned with you isn't necessarily a bad person, but they have been pursuing someone they are ill equipped to honor. It is not our responsibility to beat them over the head or beg them to treat us how we require. It is our job to communicate our standards, to respectfully inform them when they need to correct course, and then to be honest with ourselves on whether we want to allow the other person to experience the consequence of their choices.

If you're dating someone who is breadcrumbing you, it hurts. Walking away also hurts. Even if you've only been dating a few months, it still hurts because you're a warm-hearted person who saw something special and worthy in the other person. When they refuse to honor you in the way you've expressed you need to be honored it feels like someone who you took a chance on, well, they just threw rocks at your freshly exposed heart. I know. I've been there.

But while you make excuses by saying "men aren't like they used to be" you're devaluing yourself. Men ARE like they used to be. Good men who can see you and will value you exist. If you're spinning your wheels trying to get this man to make time for you or trying to get him to create emotional space for you, then you're distracted and you can't notice the ones who will be a good partner. You also might be robbing him of an opportunity to grow and have self-reflection so he can learn the traits he needs to keep a high quality woman like you.

The momentary pain from acknowledging the only one here who is willing to treat me with respect, love, and consideration is me - it hurts, yes. But it opens you to find your match who will ultimately love you in the way you deserve to be loved. Don't settle.

Misalignment hurts for a lot longer than the momentary pain of ending a misaligned relationship. ❤️❤️❤️

08/06/2025

Inspired Life Counseling is showing up to talk about mental health and showcase our expansion into Redding! Elena Diaz, Associate Clinical Social Worker, and Jessica Darling, owner and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist are pictured here.

05/16/2025

Day 2 of Jessica Darling, LMFT adding to her EMDR expertise to help clients specifically target the wounded parts of themselves. At times, people may be successful in multiple areas of their lives, but this one area has always been a struggle (romantic relationships, friendships, pursuing goals, fear of rejection or failure, perfectionism, and more). We don't necessarily need to work through all events in our histories, but rather target the part of the person that's holding them back.

Jessica brings her expertise to help all staff at ILC with their practice of EMDR through their consultation groups and associate supervision. Inspired Life Counseling is committed to bringing ongoing expertise to Chico and Redding.

05/15/2025

Ever the learner, Jessica Darling continues her journey to combine parts work with EMDR so she can not only help her clients deeply heal but also bring these skills to her contribution to consultation group and supervision with associates so the whole team at Inspired Life can continue to grow their EMDR expertise.

03/24/2025

People pleasing doesn't just happen. We learn that we are safer if we go along with things, go with the flow, or fall in line. We will be ignored, slandered, or experience punishment if we decline a request or prioritize our own desires or needs. Then as an adult, we get confused and hurt when we people please the rest of the world, but no one is reciprocating our sacrifice. Sometimes, we become targets for people who use others for their own benefit. Here's a quick video by Terry Real to help folks identify if this is something that might serve them better to work on:

Too many people trade real intimacy for false security. They avoid hard conversations, resentfully accommodate, and mistake conflict avoidance for a healthy ...

03/03/2025

When you prune a rose bush, the bush looks terrible! It's all branches and empty spaces. It's like an awkward tween. But then with each passing day the bush gives nutrients to what was left and gorgeous roses begin to bud and then bloom. That is the same awkward feeling when we start pruning our own lives. There are holes where we used to put time and attention, and that can feel really uncomfortable.

This discomfort has a tendency to romanticize the old patterns, and try to fill in the gaps. But trust yourself! The pruning we did was intentional. The uncomfortable gaps are going to bloom, and as we get accustomed to these gaps we begin to protect them and cherish them. We begin to find peace in the gaps. We nourish the blooms because nothing but the very best will ever be worthy of our gap.

Prune, baby, prune. Do it with thought and consideration. But know that the way we care for flowers, so we must also care for our souls.

02/24/2025

The human experience is one filled with paradoxes, two truths that seem to oppose and yet holding true in the same space. Some people will think you're the bee's knees and let you know. Others might think your a-okay, but they aren't words of affirmation folks, so you don't know how they feel. Then there's a segment of people who see your sparkle, enjoy your sparkle, wish they could shine the way you shine, and it creates in them a bitterness toward you. This is because they desperately want the recipe to your secret sauce, but they are so focused on the disparity they perceive to be between you that their jealousy and resentment overtakes them.

They don't actually wish ill upon you, they just experience pain when their mind plays tricks on them because it's in comparison mode. Deep down, they often like you or think more positive things about you than they think of negative. Then they get stuck in loop. Unfortunately and unbeknownst to you, they have their idea of you in that loop with them.

None of this is your journey. You are not responsible for someone else's internal world. You are responsible for navigating your own life according to your ethics, morals, pursuit of dreams and goals, and honoring the loving and supportive relationships in your life. Sometimes, though, it can help our own confusion on why people are behaving in certain ways when we have a bit of understanding on the experience for them. We can gracefully hand back whatever dysfunction they are trying to give us, and in our mind just refuse any ownership or responsibility toward their healing.

Once they're ready to stop pretending they can't stand you, then it might be possible for real relationship building to start. Until then, just keep facing in the direction of your own destiny as best you can.

- Jessica Darling