“Everything starts with me… I didn’t deserve what I got as a child, but it’s now on me to figure out how to get out of that.”

In this episode, Nick speaks with speaks Christina Russell, founder of the RusMix brand, about her journey through personal and religious trauma, the importance of self-awareness, and the healing process. Christina shares her experiences with a past relationship that led to significant emotional turmoil and how it intertwined with her upbringing and faith.

What to listen for:

• We don’t have to face healing from trauma alone
• Healing is a process that requires self-awareness and action
• Negative thoughts can be protective yet still need to be managed
• Community and connection play a vital role in the healing journey
• It’s essential to have grace and kindness towards oneself during tough times
• The journey of self-discovery can be exhausting but is ultimately rewarding

“I laid on the ground for days… but when I was open to receive it, the right help came at the right time.”

• Real healing often begins the moment we drop resistance and allow ourselves to be supported
• Hitting bottom isn’t the end, It’s often the beginning of something powerful
• Sometimes the help we need doesn’t arrive until we’re ready to actually receive it
• There are dark moments that feel endless, but they can lead to breakthrough if we stay open
• The right support doesn’t always require a fight; when you’re ready, it often meets you halfway

“Name your negative thoughts. Tell them, ‘You’re not needed right now.'”

• Naming the thought/feeling gives you power over it instead of letting it control you
• You can give your inner critic a name, it helps separate it from your true self
• Acknowledge your thoughts and set boundaries
• Most negative thoughts are just your brain trying to keep you safe
• You get to decide which thoughts get airtime and which ones get dismissed

About Christina Russell

Christina is a mindset and self-worth coach, founder of RusMix, and host of the podcast Breaking Curses with Excellence. She helps people break generational cycles, stop self-sabotaging, and step into their power through healing-centered coaching and faith-based mindset work. Her mission is to help people reclaim their worth and grow into the healthiest, most confident version of themselves—inside and out.

• https://TheRusmix.com
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/christina-russell-strong-21502621a
• https://www.instagram.com/rusmixcoaching
• https://www.patreon.com/RusMixExcellence

Resources:

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Click Here To View The Episode Transcript

Nick McGowan (00:00.11)
All right, three, two, hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. Today on the show we have Christina Russell. Christina, how you doing today?

Christina Russell (00:11.423)
I’m doing amazing, how about you?

Nick McGowan (00:13.399)
Good, good, I’m excited to have a conversation. I you’ve talked to my partner and you guys have become friends at this point. And I think you would sign up for the podcast, connect it with her. And you guys have connected a number of times since then and now you’re on the show. So I’m excited with this conversation. I think it’s gonna be great. Why don’t you kick us off? Tell us what you do for a living and what’s one thing most people don’t know about you that’s maybe a little odd or bizarre.

Christina Russell (00:16.561)
Yes, yes, absolutely.

Christina Russell (00:26.817)
Yes.

Christina Russell (00:38.859)
So, Christina, the founder of the Rust Mix brand, focused on empowering, healing, growth, motivation, anything positive. A little sass and fun in there as well. But I have a variety of things, right? So I’m multi-passionate when it comes to my brand. I have a podcast as well, books, et cetera, just to encourage people on their journey, either to start or continue going.

So something odd or bizarre about me, I once fell for…

Nick McGowan (01:08.558)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (01:18.741)
A very good scam, but a Nigerian scam. And I was engaged to be married.

Nick McGowan (01:27.725)
to that prince that emailed you or to somebody else?

Christina Russell (01:28.545)
It wasn’t a prince he didn’t come off as a prince, but he definitely had his game up his sleeve Yeah, yeah, so that that that ended not so great obviously With him mirroring somebody there, right? Well, okay so it ended with finding out that he obviously had someone there and They were got married five months after we were supposed

Nick McGowan (01:41.677)
We can’t just leave it at that.

Christina Russell (01:56.831)
Yeah, five months after we were supposed to get married. I found out about everything that was happening two months before our wedding date. Dresses were already paid for. I already had mine. My bridesmaid had theirs. My guys, I made it simple for them, you know, because he was supposed to come here. I had already been there multiple times, brought my mom, right, stayed with his mom. But yeah, so.

I found out through a friend who was from there as well, that something doesn’t seem right. Because I was telling him, he called me out of the blue, him and his wife had come visit, I tried to be very welcoming to them. This was all through church. And so he was like, this just doesn’t seem right. This would be the happiest time of your lives and it’s not going well. Let me talk to him.

Nick McGowan (02:31.468)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (02:43.948)
Uh-huh.

Christina Russell (02:54.047)
And so he literally had the screenshots of him saying horrible things about me, the picture of the one that he married, like just all of it. So that was my odd and bizarre thing.

Nick McGowan (03:05.727)
Wow.

Ahem.

Well, that certainly answers that question then. And that sucks. I think there are different scams that people can fall for. I make the joke of like, what was the prince’s name? Because that’s kind of the old version of like, I’m this, yeah, I’m this prince. I have all this money. And for some dumb reason, I think you should get like billions of dollars. Send me some money and then I’ll send you even more.

Christina Russell (03:15.073)
I’m out.

there.

Christina Russell (03:25.459)
Usually it is a print, right?

Christina Russell (03:33.344)
So it would.

It wasn’t even he didn’t he didn’t present like that. He just presented like a regular guy but And we were part of the same religion, right? Which which is supposed to present Trust and loyalty and you know a confidence that you can have versus anybody else, right? So that’s what kind of drew me in and It actually ties to some of my own trauma

as to why I even fell for it in the first place.

Nick McGowan (04:07.627)
Wow. My brain is actively trying to figure out which direction do we go with this because not only that trauma that’s there, but how did that tie into the religious system that you’re a part of? Because once you’re bought into something like that, there’s an assumed trust.

Christina Russell (04:13.099)
Okay.

Christina Russell (04:24.757)
Yes. Yes.

Nick McGowan (04:25.772)
But there’s also biases that people have. Like I was part of churches for, I don’t know, a bit over a decade and played the lead guitar in bands for a decade at churches. And there were still times where like, I would see what people would say and then I would see what they would do. And then I would hear about the things that maybe they did with somebody else’s wife or whatever else. And it’s like…

Christina Russell (04:42.239)
Yes.

Nick McGowan (04:48.075)
We’re all talking a good game, we’re all just fucking humans. instead of talking the game, why not just be real about this stuff instead of just… But there are things that go into that. So even tying in, like your trauma will compact and compound because then you go, all right, well this squished it down, but then this added to it made it even larger. And then the trust or whatever it is starts to just really deteriorate to the point where you can say, I don’t want to do any of it. So…

Christina Russell (04:48.256)
Yes.

Christina Russell (04:55.381)
Yes.

Christina Russell (05:01.025)
There it is.

Christina Russell (05:09.568)
Yes.

Nick McGowan (05:16.852)
I’m sure there was a big ball of all of those things. Where do you want to start with that to be able to kind of unravel those pieces? And can you name what those pieces were that you were like, I can see how these all tied up.

Christina Russell (05:27.841)
So we can start with why I was drawn to him, right? As a child, my father was very charismatic. He drew a lot of attention. He was amazing at getting and appealing to people, right? But he was a monster at home. And his sole purpose at times was to tear down. So tear down my mom, tear down me. So…

I heard a lot of negative things about myself as a child, right? And, you know, after me and my mom finally got away from him, it wasn’t like suddenly this onset of outpouring of loving words and affirmations and building up happened, right? Because my family likes to roast and they like to joke and they like to tease and they like to tell you about yourself, right? So there was nothing to build up. And to be honest with you, the reason why I look back and I said,

Nick McGowan (06:00.456)
Mm-hmm.

Nick McGowan (06:12.01)
Sure.

Nick McGowan (06:15.549)
You

Christina Russell (06:24.777)
It’s because I yearned for that. He poured good words into me, loving words, caring words, adoring words into me. And I soaked it up like a sponge. And that’s I fell for it. You know, really, was, yes, there was that automatic trust because of the religion and things, but I had never heard that I was beautiful every day. I’d never heard all these things that he was saying and how appealing I seemed to be to him.

Nick McGowan (06:28.119)
yeah.

Nick McGowan (06:38.057)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (06:49.044)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (06:54.783)
I had never experienced that. And how it was handled afterwards kind of opened my eyes to some things that I had never paid attention to within the organization, right? Within that belief system. If I’m honest, that was one of my major breakthroughs. Then another one came later. But so all that happens, right? We find out that he was lying about

Nick McGowan (06:56.65)
Hmm.

Christina Russell (07:23.457)
a of things, blah blah blah. Well we had a judicial system inside of the church where if you were to do certain things you were kicked out or you were given discipline.

Nick McGowan (07:29.204)
Hmm.

Christina Russell (07:36.213)
I was told to tell headquarters what he had done.

show all my proof. So then they can either protect other people or and give me justice, right? Basically.

Nick McGowan (07:49.833)
Mm.

Christina Russell (07:51.745)
I get told they’re investigating it and then I’m told that by the local people that I should just get over it and let it go. Now mind you, what this did to me was obviously it’s humiliation, right? There’s huge humiliation. Then there’s the fact that I gambled a lot on us and I’m a single woman working, I was working part time. I had lived a life where I could work part time and be on my own, fully independent, travel and do everything.

Nick McGowan (08:10.94)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (08:19.165)
Hmm.

Christina Russell (08:20.383)
Well, I gambled so much and I take wholeheartedly responsibility for that, but I gambled so much that now I’m in debt and I can’t live on my own. So now have to leave my place. And thankfully a friend took me in for a period of time. I have to continue paying off the wedding things that didn’t happen, you know?

Nick McGowan (08:29.97)
Hmm.

Christina Russell (08:45.121)
I’m this how I don’t even know how to put it People look down on me and some people even come at me with the idea that I did something wrong People who had known me my entire life disconnected from me drew back said certain things to me that I couldn’t imagine saying to my worst enemy and

the people that were supposed to be in the wedding, didn’t even talk to them anymore. So it just, my world came crumbling down, but it helped me to see that there wasn’t as much justice. I knew there wasn’t justice, but I don’t think I realized.

Nick McGowan (09:11.721)
Hmm.

Christina Russell (09:26.753)
How are you supposed to feel like you’re worthy of God’s love? You’re valuable to Him. You matter to Him.

Christina Russell (09:37.319)
if what happens to you doesn’t matter to anybody. It only matters that you keep giving of yourself, of your time, of your money. Just keep giving. Just let everything else go. Because we were a part of the religion when I was abused and they knew it. They knew my dad was like that and nothing ever happened to him.

Nick McGowan (09:53.32)
Hmm.

Christina Russell (10:03.211)
So that snowballed into a lot of things, Me disconnecting from the people that I had always thought loved and adored me. The closeness that I had, the trust in the religion that I had, right? It’s like, this isn’t adding up. This isn’t matching what I’m being told every day, right? And then I obviously have over the years seen other examples, not just my own, of people suffering in that religion.

Nick McGowan (10:17.916)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (10:24.644)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (10:32.073)
into this idea that you’re never good enough, right? But then people who go out and destroy people’s lives, it’s okay because God forgives and loves the sinner. It just, you know.

I can’t even describe what that did to me inside because I was a very devoted person. My religion was everything. It was a lifestyle for me. I had moved alone to New York to volunteer, to do construction. I had served in what they call full-time service for many years. I had learned Spanish and been a part of a Spanish-speaking section of the church for 10 years.

Nick McGowan (10:54.363)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (11:19.029)
I really gave it my all. And to feel like when you are vulnerable and you are in need of help and support, it’s just like, just let that go. know, nobody can really handle you. You know I mean? Like there’s no time for all this. Right, right. Just, my life is in shambles, but okay. I’ll just let it go. Exactly, exactly.

Nick McGowan (11:34.543)
Yeah. okay. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (11:40.013)
yeah, fine. I didn’t think about that. That’s an option? okay. Great.

Christina Russell (11:47.787)
Here’s the crazy thing is that a year later this man calls me.

And he’s talking about how horrible he feels about what he did.

Nick McGowan (12:01.777)
Did he need more money? Yeah.

Christina Russell (12:01.887)
Now you’re married to somebody else. And ultimately that’s what one of friends told me he was trying to see if he could get more money.

Nick McGowan (12:10.054)
Man. Man.

Ahem.

Christina Russell (12:16.797)
Here I am being called and harassed by a married man at this point, right? Inside the church. Right? And what am I told? I’m told, try to find out where he is and you have to talk to the men over there.

Nick McGowan (12:20.359)
Jeez.

Christina Russell (12:30.175)
But this is the men driven… Like the organization is based off of men talking to men and men being the leaders. But I was supposed to find out where he was and talk to the men where he was. In an African country. And so that compounded my already traumatized heart. Compounded the trauma that I already had. That feeling of not being good enough. That feeling of…

Nick McGowan (12:44.368)
Hahaha

Christina Russell (13:00.839)
no matter what I did no matter how much I gave how much I did it was never going to be enough it was

At the same time, while there was this standard down here for other people, I felt like the standard for me just kept getting higher and higher. And I’m crushing under the pressure, you know? Because I don’t feel like it’s right. There’s a part of me that’s still screaming, this is not right. This is not right. And I would literally, I don’t say this as an exaggeration, I would cry every night for a lot of reasons. I was severely depressed for many years, even way before him.

Nick McGowan (13:17.254)
Hmm.

Nick McGowan (13:23.569)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Christina Russell (13:40.491)
Honestly.

But I was always told, you know, just kind of let things go and let them be and, you know, maybe God will handle it. And it’s like, if you say you’re his representatives, then how are you not him? You know what I mean? Like you say that his Holy Spirit appointed you. So, yeah, yeah. And so I came out with a lot of religious trauma along with my childhood trauma.

Nick McGowan (13:52.39)
you

Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (14:04.262)
self-proclaimed.

Nick McGowan (14:11.366)
Mm-hmm.

Christina Russell (14:17.205)
Yeah, that’s all I can really think of at the moment.

Nick McGowan (14:22.779)
You know, most people will tell me something little and wild or like this thing that happened to them. And I ask that question upfront because I like to see where it takes us. And as I even said, before we hit record, like it’ll typically take us on some wild path and this is it. mean, this is what a beautiful conversation we can have because of this. And I say it that way because what a shit storm you were in. And to go through that.

must have been incredibly tough feels stupid to say because it just, how do I put words to that sort of stuff? However, I think that’s a really good example. If we pull out 50 feet, a hundred feet up, you and I looking at it, along with everybody else that’s listened to this episode, this is a good situation of a real story that happened that most of us go through something pretty difficult, but then there are times where things just fucking stack up.

Like it’s one hit and the hit just keeps coming and it keeps coming. And then you will start to see different situations if you allow yourself to see those. Like you saw the system in work, in action. The religious system, the patriarchy at that point within that system.

Christina Russell (15:21.665)
Yes.

Thank you.

Nick McGowan (15:41.006)
the traumas that you’ve had, all that sort of stuff. And I think there are situations where people can go through that maybe they lost somebody and then got a divorce and then maybe they lost somebody else or maybe they had a major surgery and now life has changed differently and then something else happened. Or maybe it’s just you fucking stub your toe. You forget that you needed gas in the car. You spill your coffee and these dumb little things that can almost feel similar.

Like not to take from what you’ve done and say, is similar to somebody spilling a little bit of their coffee or stubbing their toe. Correct. And our bodies can feel that and our body can also go back to those old things. So semantically, it just lives in ourselves, which is so difficult to be able to say, well, this trauma is different from somebody else’s. Like there are situations that happen. You see people on social media or…

Christina Russell (16:09.963)
Yes.

Christina Russell (16:14.625)
No, but it is changing, yeah!

Christina Russell (16:24.042)
Mmhmm.

Nick McGowan (16:35.893)
usually on social media because people are a little tougher tougher behind a screen

where they’ll say things that they’re like, well, you should just grow up because this situation happened. It’s like, you don’t understand because you don’t have the same context. You don’t have the same situations. And the recipe may have looked different. Somebody lost their dog and maybe it destroyed them. Somebody else lost their dog and they thought, well, I just didn’t want a dog anyway. But who were you to say anything other way? These things are similar. So that’s one of the reasons why I love to have these conversations on this podcast is to be able to talk about

Christina Russell (16:41.451)
Yes, they are.

Christina Russell (17:07.073)
Thank

Nick McGowan (17:11.159)
crazy shit you’ve gone through and that you’re still working through and you’re still processing. So there’s somebody that’s gonna listen to this that’s in their job or they’re deep in their business and they’re like, look, I hate what’s going on in this piece of my life right now and it feels like the fucking hits just keep coming. It is a dumb, heartless thing to say at times like, well, you know, it just gotta get better. Of course, fine, just shut the fuck up.

Christina Russell (17:29.024)
Yes.

Nick McGowan (17:38.772)
I understand, but right now this sucks. So for somebody in that spot that’s actively in that spot, not years ahead where you are, even with the years of depression and all that stuff, if somebody’s in it right now and listening to this, what do you give them? What do you tell them that’s actually fucking human and not just like, you know, things are gonna get better for you?

Christina Russell (18:02.367)
Right? I think for me, I will never subscribe to the victim blaming idea. Right? Well, you should have seen this. You should have seen that. But I will say something that I learned is that everything starts with me. Right? I didn’t deserve what I got as a child, but it’s now on me to figure out how to get out of that. Right? And the only way that I don’t make the same choices again,

Nick McGowan (18:19.328)
Mm-hmm.

Christina Russell (18:30.241)
only way I don’t experience the same things is by getting the help I need. I can’t, you know, I think of it this way, if I didn’t do the damage to myself, it’s going to be hard for me alone to fix it.

Nick McGowan (18:44.516)
Yeah, what a great way to put that. So many people think they can do things on their own, but it’s sometimes you just need somebody else even to talk to, vent to, or some modality.

Christina Russell (18:54.303)
Yes, yes and and for me it was the professionals who were trained on how to deal with my trauma, right? I talked many years to people that you know, loved me, right? But they weren’t trained to deal with my trauma and a lot of times things were said that made it worse. So for me what I would tell anybody who is in that place is to get help.

Nick McGowan (19:07.553)
Mm-hmm.

Christina Russell (19:22.795)
whatever way that you feel comfortable, right? For me, sometimes it’s books. I don’t wanna talk to anybody. I don’t wanna hear, but I can hear a book and it can help me in my own brain start to, that’s a way of getting help, right? A workbook that helps guide me through with my own answers, right? By all means, get help. That’s what I would say, get help. And it’s,

Nick McGowan (19:42.786)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (19:50.125)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (19:51.485)
is not a sign of weakness. For me, my humble opinion, it is a sign of strength to work on ourselves. Because to be honest, you can never find people who value and appreciate you if you don’t for yourself. But that’s going to take some undoing if you have years of being torn out. Decades. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (19:57.784)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (20:05.858)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (20:10.051)
They’re decades. Yeah. There are two things that you’re pointing out too without really saying the words. The self-awareness of it and then the actions.

These are two simple yet really difficult things to do. Like we can be self aware of different things and know like, should really fix that or I should do something a little different. And we can expand it and say like, well, I should change the way that I eat. So therefore I’m not gonna eat any sugar. I’m not gonna do this. I’m not gonna do that. And then you cut everything off and you completely fuck yourself up. And next thing you know, you’re gorging and you got like a six foot candy bar going down your throat because you’re just like, this is all I want right now.

Christina Russell (20:46.966)
Yes.

Christina Russell (20:50.281)
Right, right.

Nick McGowan (20:50.357)
and having that self-awareness to go, shit, I’m doing that again. It’s like a game within a game to be able to do that and then take those little actions. So even for you to say, like, get help, talk to somebody, do the work, there’s that weird gray area where people go, I have a problem, and I could really use some help to, hi, my name is, I have a problem, and I’ve hired you to help me. That gray area is like,

Christina Russell (21:17.877)
different.

Nick McGowan (21:20.035)
trying to travel through a black hole. It can be super fucking difficult. And there are people that I know even for myself, I can say things almost flippantly at times. And I try to call back to it and go, the reason why I said it like that is because all this other work that has happened after that, and believe me, I still probably have fucking problems with it. And like we all do, but being able to see that for what it is, can you recall back to what that looked like for you going from that awareness to starting to take those actions?

Christina Russell (21:39.679)
Right. You do.

Christina Russell (21:51.489)
So if I’m honest, like when my major breakthrough came, I had been in therapy. I actually been taking the steps, but for me it had to be, I had to hit rock bottom, for lack of a better word. I know it sounds so cliche, right? But I…

Nick McGowan (21:59.81)
Good, okay.

Nick McGowan (22:09.634)
Mm-hmm.

It is what it is.

Christina Russell (22:16.673)
I’m dealing with the pressure of the religion and realizing really this is not working for me. This has been horrible for my mental health, right? I’m trying to hold on to it though. I’m asking for help. I’m telling them that this is affecting my relationship with God. And then I’m at work and my boss does something that triggers me to being that little girl who is helpless again.

and

Christina Russell (22:46.273)
I kind of lost it in that moment.

Nick McGowan (22:48.331)
Hmm.

Christina Russell (22:49.919)
the two combined feelings. I reached out to my primary care doctor actually. Actually she was a nurse practitioner. And when I say this woman saved my life, it’s an understatement. I was just talking to her and she said, I want you to go somewhere. And so she had me go to intense therapy.

Nick McGowan (22:59.424)
Okay.

Christina Russell (23:16.993)
and

That changed my life.

Nick McGowan (23:23.553)
Think about those steps. Yeah.

Christina Russell (23:23.615)
I sat in a room listening to strangers. So, what’d you say? Sorry.

Nick McGowan (23:28.512)
those steps that led to that, you like you pointed out, like you had the things that happened, but it was after you already started moving, which I think is a solid point. Like it’s like those little steps, there are sometimes I talk to people where they’re like, man, I just really want to be healed. Even within myself, I’ve said this to my coach and therapist where I’m like, I just want this to be fucking done. Like I don’t want it to be a thing anymore. I want it to be done. And that’s cool. You can still want that.

Christina Russell (23:31.883)
So.

Christina Russell (23:49.739)
Right. Right. Right. Right. Right.

Nick McGowan (23:55.308)
but it’s not going to be until it’s done. It’s like, I recently heard the quote, impatience is like arguing with reality. Thanks Rick Rubin and his new book. And that hit me pretty hard because oftentimes, especially in healing and really tough situations where we know I’m self-aware of this and I need to heal from this, we argue with reality like it’s going to change something. But it’s because we’re just tantruming. And we’re like, we just don’t wanna deal with this right now.

Christina Russell (24:13.761)
Right. Right.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. I don’t want to do this. Yeah, yeah, I don’t want to do this. I, yeah, I have, I have done that even recently. I’ve taken over it.

Nick McGowan (24:26.741)
Yeah, you’re just tantruming. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (24:33.249)
Oh yeah, I did that yesterday. I mean, shit, I did it this morning. We all do, but it is that awareness of going, why are we doing that thing? I mean, candidly, two hours before our call, I knew that we had our call and I also had a bunch of other things to do and we’re pet sitting, I need to take the dog out for a hike and do all these other things. And there are part of me that’s like, oh my God, I really wish I had like seven more hours to do anything else that I wanna do.

Christina Russell (25:01.483)
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

Nick McGowan (25:01.909)
But being able to see it and go, well really I feel like I have to rush to do these things and I don’t. I just need to move along. And here we are. You didn’t experience anything when you and I hopped on a call because I wasn’t feeling what I would have felt before. And I think that’s part of those steps. And I’m not afraid to call that out on myself. mean, shit, the people that know me that know me are like, my God, Nick, I know I’ve been on the phone with you at those different times or I fucking watched you.

Christina Russell (25:10.069)
Yes.

Christina Russell (25:17.761)
Right. Yes.

Christina Russell (25:25.543)
Right.

Nick McGowan (25:28.692)
But being able to see it and you go, you motherfucker, I see you again. There you are. And being able to work on it,

Christina Russell (25:32.629)
Yes, there you are again. Yes, yes. You know, I had a coach who told me to name my negative thoughts.

Nick McGowan (25:42.238)
Yeah, I love that.

Christina Russell (25:43.773)
And she was like, when she shows up, you tell her, you’re not welcomed here, you’re not needed right now. Or she was even like, because I struggle with self-sabotage and the idea that somebody could actually love me wholeheartedly, right? So she comes with these negative thoughts and it’s really protection. She said, it’s your mind trying to protect you.

Nick McGowan (25:47.615)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (26:09.524)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (26:09.995)
from what you already experienced, right? So you can be kind to her and say, I know you’re trying to protect me, but you’re not needed. It’s amazing because it is. It’s not always malice. It isn’t always that we’re trying to be difficult. It is that we’re trying to protect ourselves from previous pain.

Nick McGowan (26:17.461)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (26:28.575)
Yeah.

That’s the subconscious job. Its job is to keep us alive. Like listen, you stupid organic human, you can’t just walk into traffic. So I’m going to make sure you don’t do that. Did you look left? Did you look right? Okay, do it again. And now go, you know?

Christina Russell (26:43.677)
Right Right, right, absolutely. So yeah, that’s it is about those steps and having a moment to take those steps, right so Just a little bit about how I got into that therapy Like I said the pressure of that my boss starts doing this very demeaning things. I don’t know what got into him but

Nick McGowan (26:49.312)
Ahem.

Christina Russell (27:09.899)
You know, we started going back into the office like one day a week or whatever. And so I come in and I’m thinking I’m doing an amazing job. Like I did all my tax audits. I did my payroll because it was a payroll day. Did my payroll audits. I think I’m floating along good, right? It’s about 11 o’clock and he walks over to my desk and he was like, come here, put your mask on and come here. I’m like, okay. So he walks me over to his desk and he was like, look at this. How long have you been here?

You are the only person who hasn’t done this. Now mind you, was initials when aligned.

Nick McGowan (27:46.655)
Okay.

Christina Russell (27:47.913)
It was saying that I had done the audits, that’s it. And he proceeds to berate me for not putting my initials.

Nick McGowan (27:54.655)
So what happened him that morning? Yeah. Yeah. Or what things weren’t you self-aware of?

Christina Russell (27:57.727)
Right, like who peed in your ladies? But Right, right and so that that kind of humiliation Reminded me of my childhood, you know for simple things Yeah, and and so It really really like really really really really really really triggering me and I ended up taking fma

Nick McGowan (28:12.735)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (28:26.741)
Because it wasn’t the first time he had done- treated me like that. He just had this- I don’t know. He was from the military and I don’t know if he saw my kindness as weakness. And so he’s trying to- you know, I don’t know what- Yeah, it was no excuse. It was no excuse for it. But-

Nick McGowan (28:30.708)
That’s not right.

Nick McGowan (28:35.965)
No excuse. Yeah. Yeah.

Christina Russell (28:44.469)
During that two months and me getting that help and I sat in a room full of other people who had other problems, And I thought about the fact that although I didn’t have an alcohol problem, I didn’t have a drug problem, we all ended up in the same place.

Nick McGowan (28:59.823)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (29:01.693)
And it all came, a lot of it came from our childhoods. We had the same struggles.

Nick McGowan (29:06.409)
think about the formative years. Yeah, I mean, we all go through, in different, we’re in different situations in similar systems.

And those people that raised us were in the same sort of deal. Different situations, it’s similar systems, timeframes, things that are okay or not okay. Like I hope the kids in 20 years can learn from the experiences we’re going through now, but probably not. Like they’ll probably learn some things, but they’ll still fuck up their kids. Cause everybody does. Like it’s just been happening forever.

Christina Russell (29:36.733)
I And I just hope, my hope now is that our generation by trying to heal ourselves can be better. I think we’ll still, you said we’ll still fuck up our kids, we’ll still screw up, we’re imperfect, right? But they will hopefully see and reflect on the effort that we put in to be better. Because whether it’s lack of resources, the stigmas that came around getting help back when our parents were young.

Nick McGowan (29:48.99)
Of course.

Yeah.

Nick McGowan (29:58.408)
Correct, yeah.

Nick McGowan (30:06.034)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (30:06.593)
Or just like a desire they didn’t get it. You know, they didn’t do it.

Nick McGowan (30:10.854)
Yeah. Well, I point that out about people messing up their kids because the kids are going to experience things how they’re going to experience it. The way they view life. Yeah. And it’s like, I have a good friend of mine who I think back to him and his brother at times where his mom or stepmom told him

make sure you look both ways when you cross the street. You could get hit by a car. And my friend thought, cool, that’s a pro tip, thanks. Like I’ll be mindful of that. And his brother took it as like, shit, if I walk outside, I could potentially die. And the diversion happened at that point at like seven years old or whatever it was, where the mom was just saying like, just look both ways when you go out, I trust you, go outside and come on home for dinner. but.

Christina Russell (30:36.641)
Right.

Christina Russell (30:42.497)
Right

Christina Russell (30:46.599)
no. no.

Christina Russell (30:52.513)
Yeah,

Nick McGowan (31:00.273)
They took that two different ways and experienced that two different ways. This guy now has kids and does everything he can to love on his kids. My friend who took the like, cool, that’s a pro tip. Thanks. And he, and I’ve even talked about that. He’s like, man, I do the best that I can. love on the kids as much as I can, but I’m sure I’m still, they’re probably going to have conversations about me in therapy years from now because of whatever situation looked like to them. And that’s just how it worked. so I appreciate that you’ve talked about.

Christina Russell (31:02.977)
You You alright?

Christina Russell (31:16.609)
Great.

Christina Russell (31:25.397)
Thanks. Bye.

Nick McGowan (31:31.034)
Seeing that stuff for what it was and stuff is an easy word to say because it’s just whatever things and stuff are going through our head and I think those emotions that start to compound at that point are really just trying to get our attention. They’re like, I’ve been trying to tell you, I’ve been trying to tell you and by the way, I’ve been trying to fucking tell you and one more time I’m gonna try to tell you and the next thing you know you’re crying in your car or whatever and like it’s just getting out of your system. But for the people that are going through

Christina Russell (31:45.515)
Yes.

Christina Russell (31:57.524)
Yes, yes, yes sir.

Nick McGowan (32:00.131)
similar situations and have gone through similar situations and on their path towards self-mastery, what advice would you give those people?

Christina Russell (32:09.971)
When it comes to… So on your way, I think it’s important to have grace on yourself. Because it’s gonna look different. It’s gonna look ugly. You’re gonna feel things that you don’t wanna feel. You’re gonna face things that you would prefer to lock in a closet and keep there. It will be…

healing self-mastery, feel like mindset change can be exhausting. Because for each one of us, it is a different kind of fight. And it is a consistent one, right? It is you sometimes like literally in the ring fighting yourself. Like there’s nobody else to say anything, but those discouraging words, whoever they came from become our own voices at times in our heads. So you’re gonna fight, it may be ugly.

Nick McGowan (32:38.364)
yeah.

Nick McGowan (32:56.359)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (33:01.547)
But it is worth it. And I would hope anybody would remember that they are worth it. Don’t stop. Even when you feel like giving up, reach out in any way possible. I mean, sometimes to be honest with you, I know people say that TikTok is a, can be a waste of time. But for me, sometimes opening it up and seeing somebody’s video where they say something that resonates with me or they give a positive word, that’s what helps change my mindset.

And so reach out for helping those moments where you feel like giving up, but keep going. But also have mercy on yourself. Be kind, be gentle the way you would to a friend. But keep going. Don’t stop. let yourself get relaxed into old habits. You will realize how many patterns you have perpetuated.

Nick McGowan (33:41.981)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (33:56.285)
Mm-hmm.

Christina Russell (33:59.197)
know that you’re worth the other side and that the best version of yourself and the best life is waiting for you.

Nick McGowan (34:07.261)
I think that’s always a true thing. That can also be pretty difficult to hear when you’re in the dark times because it’s like I hear you but right now I don’t feel that.

Christina Russell (34:13.845)
Yeah. Yeah.

Nick McGowan (34:19.605)
And that’s, that can be true. I mean, that, that’s, that’s absolutely true. You cannot feel that. You can feel hopeless. You can feel like everything just keeps hitting, keeps hitting. And it can be easy to hear people go, Oh, well, some people on a podcast said they went through shit and that they’re all right. Well, fuck those people. They’re not me. It can be super easy to do that because we’ve all done that. please.

Christina Russell (34:26.923)
You can’t.

Christina Russell (34:43.329)
Can I be completely transparent and say that I was hopeless for most of my life? What I did and how I did it was not because I had hoped, I feel like…

Nick McGowan (34:48.838)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (34:56.528)
Mm-hmm.

Christina Russell (35:01.929)
It was the inner stubbornness. My faith too, know, despite it all, my faith helped me get through it. And I get, there’s the cliche, it’ll get better, right? There’s the cliche.

Nick McGowan (35:07.068)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (35:18.785)
and that should be given space to. That’s a great cliche and you’re just saying that and you don’t know my life. And the reality is I don’t, But I know that trying to reach a better version of yourself.

Nick McGowan (35:23.152)
Yeah, exactly.

Nick McGowan (35:31.793)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (35:40.927)
the best for everybody.

Nick McGowan (35:42.907)
Yeah, absolutely. And even if, even if we can look in the moment now, so if somebody’s listening to this and they’re in a really, really dark spot, this might be a little bit more difficult than somebody who’s in a pretty good spot and they’re just driving to work or whatever. Listening to it and understanding that even just holding that, that things could be better. Even just holding the hope that tomorrow could look a little different.

then allow the day to be what it is. Work through it, see these things for what they are. The emotions are trying to tell us there’s something that’s going on and then we can do something with it. But even if you can just hold that and go, well, maybe tomorrow could be better. It might be two days from now that it’s a little better. It might be two weeks, might be two years. Well, whatever. But even just holding that.

can change the way that we then move through the rest of those things. And that is a thing that comes with self-awareness and comes with going through those tough situations.

Christina Russell (36:40.639)
I think too, like, realizing that.

Christina Russell (36:49.641)
It takes action, right?

Nick McGowan (36:51.194)
Mm-hmm.

Christina Russell (36:53.739)
When all that happened with my ex-fiance, I laid on the ground for days at times. I just couldn’t pick myself up. And I did reach out for some help and it did not go well. But I feel like when I was open to receive it, the right help came at the right time. And…

Nick McGowan (37:14.117)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (37:17.793)
after I put forth that effort, when I finally got the help, didn’t even really have to do anything. It was like it failed. You know what I mean? Like the right person saw the right need in me. The therapist, she said the day that you walked in this room, I knew you were worth fighting.

Nick McGowan (37:25.103)
Yeah.

Nick McGowan (37:34.885)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (37:36.289)
And to hear that after all the years of not feeling like I was worth fighting for. So that’s why I encourage anyone who’s in a dark moment, even in a moment where they feel like they want to give up life.

Nick McGowan (37:42.363)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (37:57.153)
Please hold on and I will never be a person to say that it’s just a it’s a permanent solution to a to a temporary situation I would never say that because I don’t know how long you’ve suffered You know You may not it may not be temporary for you But I just would implore anybody to

Nick McGowan (38:08.891)
Yeah.

Christina Russell (38:19.901)
not do it alone.

Nick McGowan (38:21.773)
Absolutely. Awesome. Great way to put that and look, Christina, it’s been wonderful having you on. I appreciate your time today. Before I let you go, where can people find you and where can they connect with you?

Christina Russell (38:34.337)
So TikTok is where I have most of my videos. I know everybody’s not on TikTok, I’m rustmixallgoods. Just because it’s a wide variety of things. There’s also my website, therustmix.com. So it’s T-H-E and then R-U-S-M-I-X. It’s a combination of my family names. And that kind of shows everything. It shows my Facebook. I have rustmixlove and life coaching.

My t-shirt brand all of that is there so that’s that’s that’s where you can get a hold of me the best And then my podcast as well. It’s on there. Yeah, the rest mix calm

Nick McGowan (39:17.28)
Awesome. Well, again, it’s been a pleasure having you on. I appreciate your time today.

Christina Russell (39:21.429)
Thank you so much for having me.