Amber Rules

EPISODE 9: Amber Rules, Rough Patch @roughpatchcounselling 

In this episode of Sobah Life, Dr Clinton Schultz yarns to another mental health professional and founder of Rough Patch, Amber Rules.

While Sydney-sider Amber is passionate about pickles, punk music, non-alcoholic spicy margaritas, Stevie Nicks and her cranky old toothless dog Baxter, she is driven by her purpose to create affordable, accessible and compassionate mental healthcare; destigmatising mental health and addiction issues; building connection and community; uplifting marginalised voices; and radical community care.

"As a kid who had a rough childhood, learning how to maintain relationships has been hard, because I didn’t have some of the important foundational skills to be a good friend. I had to unlearn some shitty behaviours and learn how to show up for people, be compassionate, supportive, forgiving and trustworthy, and at times have difficult conversations," says Amber.

"In my opinion, adversity isn’t a good thing for growth - that cliché of “my pain is what made me strong” doesn’t feel right to me. I had to work harder and suffer more as a result of my painful experiences; I survived in spite of it, but honestly, I’d have preferred to not have experienced it at all." Despite having grown up surrounded by abuse and having experienced mental health concerns for most of her young life, Amber is so full of positive energy, compassion and empathy.   

At Rough Patch, Amber is helping create an entirely new mental health service model in Australia - one that will no doubt increase access for people seeking affordable service and will also better working conditions for counsellors.

"I wish I’d had the practical support and care I needed, and I don’t know any advice would have made that easier. I think I would have liked to have known that eventually, I would be able to create a life that felt safer than it was then. I might have told myself “This is going to be really awful for quite some time, but it will get better eventually”," says Amber in reflection.

Hearing about her work, life philosophies and future desires was inspiring.  An important theme to come out of the yarn was that of self-care and it's connection to caring for others.


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Disclaimer:  Sobah Life Podcasts may contain explicit content relating to social-emotional wellbeing concerns such as abuse, addiction, self-harm and suicide. If you are likely to be offended or triggered by the discussion of these topics we recommend you do not listen to our podcasts. Sobah Life is not intended to replace professional help.  If you have any concerns about your social and emotional wellbeing, you should consult your doctor or mental health practitioner.  If you are triggered by any of the content of our podcasts and need immediate assistance you can call Lifeline (13 11 14), Beyond Blue (1300 22 4636) or if you are a young person, Kids Helpline (1800 55 1800).  A further list of crisis hotlines can be reached at:
https://www.healthdirect.gov.au/mental-health-services-infographic
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Transcript

Clinton Schultz: 0:00

Welcome back. So Sobah Life listeners, thank you for joining us once again, for those that have been with us along this journey, for those who have come along for the first time, I really hope you enjoy the conversation that we have today. We're very fortunate today to be joined by Amber Rules. And Amber is a psychotherapist and counsellor, and the founder of a deadly organisation, based down in Sydney called Rough Patch. But I'm gonna let her talk about that, as we have our yarn today. And as you all know, these pods are really about giving our guests the opportunities to yarn about their journey in their own way. And hopefully everybody can take something away from that. So with that said, I'm going to hand over to Amber, who I think has the coolest name out of anybody that I've seen on this pod, so far, Amber Rules.

Amber Rules: 0:49

Thanks, Clinton. Thanks for having me.

Clinton Schultz: 0:52

Absolute pleasure.

Amber Rules: 0:54

So I guess I mean, to tell you a bit about myself, I like you said, I'm a psychotherapist and clinical counsellor. I've been a drug and alcohol treatment specialist for about a decade. And I sort of came up in rehabs and places like that. So, you know, I have actually been a fan of Sobah for a long time. I love what you guys are doing. Yeah. But yeah, so I sort of I've been doing this work for about 10 years. And prior to that, I worked in the entertainment industry, mostly in music, film and television. So I kind of got a pretty good idea of what those types of industries that are quite full of drug and alcohol use can be like in those non traditional jobs, how tough they can be, particularly if you struggle with drug and alcohol use. And a lot of my clients now, you know, the last 10 years of being a therapist have been people who work in entertainment as either creatives or artists or crew or whatever it might be. And, you know, their stories around working these non traditional jobs and how that impacts their recoveries always really interesting and such a tricky position to me. And I think when your job is so influenced by, you know, the sex, drugs and rock'n'roll kind

Clinton Schultz: 2:13

I mean, that's the reason that most people get of thing. into the industry in the first place. I'm led to believe.

Amber Rules: 2:20

Exactly. I think also, like, for me, it was why I got out of it as well, you know, because I couldn't, I couldn't. I couldn't do that work. You know, I mean, there's lots of other reasons, too. But I couldn't do that work, while also looking after myself in the way that I had decided I needed to and wanted to. So yeah, that was a, that was a curious part of my journey. I actually met my partner who's now my husband, about 14 years ago, when I was considering the transition. And he said to me, you know, you drink a lot, right? And I was like, Huh. And he said, Well, you drink like three or four gin and tonics every night. And I was like, That's just normal. Because I grew up in a family where you know, and my parents have both given me permission to talk about this stuff. Um, I grew up in a family where drinking was super normal. Both my parents are addicts. And it was a violent household as well. So I was just really used to drinking that much. It was my partner who grew up in an ultra religious family. He's not really just himself, but sent to me. Yeah, it's kind of a lot. It worries me. And it was the first time I'd ever actually thought, oh, I realise that not everyone drinks this much every day. That was actually really the catalyst. And you know, we literally just met a few weeks before, and through a series of kind of fortunate and unfortunate events ended up weaving together quite quickly, like much more quickly than you would normally move in with someone. And so he saw what it was like for me every day much more quickly than you would in a new relationship. And so of course, I thought he was wonderful. And I was like, Well, I better clean myself up then. And so that kind of slowly began my process, or at least was a catalyst in my process of significantly reducing my own drug and alcohol use and kind of beginning to conceptualise that I might like to change careers and I might need to change careers in order to look after myself and my relationships

Clinton Schultz: 4:10

You raised a good point, that unfortunately for my- definitely for my generation- and it sounds very much as if it was the same when you were growing up that the normalisation of alcohol was just what it was, it wasn't something that you thought about it wasn't something that- I guess, processed, you're even paying attention to.

Amber Rules: 4:31

Yeah.

Clinton Schultz: 4:32

We all know we pick up everything that we actually observe, that we feel, that we hear when we're young people, and quickly some of those habits can become normalised and they can become very unhealthy habits later on in our in our life that was very much a part of of my lived journey, and I dare say most of the guests that I have had on this pod so far. Would you agree?

Amber Rules: 4:58

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, yeah, I think funny too, I think a lot of psychologists and therapists have, you know, have their own lived experience that needs to be part of why we, we go in to do the work, right? Because you were trying to figure our own stuff out.

Clinton Schultz: 5:12

I'm very open with people that I am a great drug and alcohol counsellor, because I've been there, been through, lived through, barely at times.

Amber Rules: 5:23

Yeah

Clinton Schultz: 5:24

And I'm just very fortunate that I've found the support at the right time. And I have found my own reason to come out the other end of that, not everybody's so lucky.

Amber Rules: 5:34

Absolutely, yeah... And, you know, like... I think, growing up in the household I grew up in, in my parents defence, although a lot of the sort of things that they the choices they made, and the things they did were inexcusable. In their defence, they had their own experiences with trauma and abuse, and, you know, violence and pain, and you know, all those types of things that led them to behave the way they did, and led them to cope with, you know, the intensity of their experiences with drugs and alcohol as well. And it's, it's been, you know, really fascinating part of both my career, but also just my personal journey is like, walking the line between understanding with compassion that they did the best they could, but also that it really wasn't good enough. And that has had a really big impact on me and the decision that I have made over time. And I suppose that you make day in and day out in a lot of ways to not do that to myself, or to children that I might have in the future, or to my relationships, or my siblings, or, you know, whatever it might be, it's a really tricky journey to walk to kind of, you know, feel that the weight of the bad choices that your parents made, and the pain that it caused you. But also understand that they're humans doing their best as well. And yeah, sometimes they didn't do their best either, you know. But that's, that's tricky stuff. And I think you're right, that there are lots of people who just, I think it's just luck of the draw sometimes that just don't get the opportunity to make it out, which that never escapes me how fortunate I have been, while also acknowledging that I've had some really awful experiences as well.

Clinton Schultz: 7:10

Yeah. And, and it talks to the fact that we never know somebody else's journey, either. You know, people can tell us stories, we can hear stories, but we haven't had the experience. Even sometimes, when I'm working with people who I would feel have had quite privileged lives who present with pretty heavy substance abuse issues, you know, my first reaction is to, is to kind of frame it in a'what the fuck are you whinging about?' type compassion. But I have to drag myself back and go,'well, I haven't had their experience, maybe if I'd had their privilege, and I'd lost that in some shape or form, I'd be pretty fucked up.'

Amber Rules: 7:47

Yeah, yeah. Absolutely... it's an interesting challenge. And like my sort of, I mean, without boring your listeners with my therapeutic approach. Therapeutic framework is really like a compassion based one. And I think what people don't understand particularly clinicians don't understand about compassion based approach is that it takes an extraordinary amount of unlearning the shit that we learn in our culture,

Clinton Schultz: 8:12

About what we learn in university...

Unknown: 8:14

At university! Exactly! And I'll also say like, in colonial learning spaces, right, like, where it's only like, European colonial ideas, and no other cultures. But, you know, the idea that, like, uh, you know, well, 'you've had it worse than me. So therefore, you've got the right to complain,' I've had to unlearn a lot of that stuff. And also, to honour your own experience. And to say, like, like I said, before - my parents that had their reasons, but also that was deeply painful. But really, from the outside, I'm a deeply privileged person, you know, it doesn't mean that my pain is any less or any less valid, or any of that, that's really tricky as a therapist to learn how to do that stuff. And just as a person, you know, so you're not constantly either undermining yourself or undermining other people. That's really hard.

Clinton Schultz: 9:08

It's definitely hard. And it's something that I think most people who go into the well being sector, whatever profession they're coming in, from, I'm not a fan of labels, to be honest, I think people get too caught up in the, in the protectionism of their label, then actually doing the work that we all want to do. And that's help other human beings when we come into this space. But a lot of people who come into this sector, like you said, come into it, because they got their own shit that they think going and doing some study is going to help them figure out for themselves and then that may help them help other people. And sometimes that journey can take longer than you expect. So, you know, I went to university and that's what I did. You know, I'd had a whole bunch of fucked up experiences when I was younger. I abused drugs and alcohol for fucking long time after that. I worked as a chef for fricken full time for a dozen years like there's not a more abusive, emotionally physically, psychologically, substance-wise abusive profession. I think they could be in particularly 20-30 years ago when I was when I was in it. So I really went into it thinking, Yeah, this is going to give me an opportunity to see why I'm to figure out why I'm so fucked up. And it wasn't till I came through that other side that I figured out that all those shitty life lived experiences could be transformed and used in a positive way to potentially and hopefully help others.

Amber Rules: 10:37

Yeah, it's interesting, too, I think like, again, going back to that idea of the sort of the labels and colonialism that's part of, you know, mental health care, in Australia or in the Western world, is like that idea that, you know, you will reach a point where you will know enough to be a like, quote, unquote, good therapist. And the longer that I'm a therapist, the more I realise what a ridiculous concept that is, you know, that actually, my job is a therapy, of course, you need to have the professional sort of know how, especially around something like complex mental health and substance use, which is dangerous, you know, but aside from all of that, you just need to be willing to be humble, and to keep learning about who you are so that you can be present with other people. And I think that's a really great skill for any human to have not just a therapist. Yeah, it's it's a constant sort of humbling, at least for me...

Clinton Schultz: 11:34

...we're no expert on anybody else's lives, right?

Amber Rules: 11:38

Yeah...

Clinton Schultz: 11:38

...times I think people think they can be or they are like, I've definitely been in situations where I've had other people present as if they are the expert on my life, and my experience and engagement didn't go so fucking well.

Amber Rules: 11:50

Awful. I mean, and I even have reached the point where I realise I'm not even an expert on my own life. You know what I mean, like, I am constantly still discovering stuff about myself, and I'm the heel that I will die on as a therapist, is that if you are doing therapy, you need to be in therapy yourself. And I will fight to the death on my own with anyone. But yeah, it's, it's, it's such a trip this work, like I often say to colleagues, like what are we actually doing here? We're just talking to people. Isn't that magical and strange? It's amazing.

Clinton Schultz: 12:25

It's strange that an unfortunate byproduct of the capitalist system that we are all stuck having to exist under is that we often have to charge people, you know, we're having to commodify 'help'.

Amber Rules: 12:37

Yeah. Suffering...

Clinton Schultz: 12:38

Which, which is difficult at times when when you want to come from a place of compassion, like you mentioned before, which is in, you know, imperative to being able to do this work in in a really productive and positive way, it's almost an oxymoron to know that you enter have to go through the process of charging other human beings to help.

Amber Rules: 13:00

Absolutely 100% agree. And that's exactly why I started Rough Patch, because I, I mean, as far as I mean, for a bit of history- like sort of background Rough Patch is what we call an affordable counselling practice. So we run on a social enterprise model, which basically means that any profit we make - we don't make any profit, but if we did - that that would go back and be re invested back into the business. And as you probably know, a lot of social enterprises solve kind of agricultural or industrial problems. They're not necessarily like, you know, human based kind of stuff. So most places who do free or affordable counselling in Australia are charities and very often they face based charities, you know, that are government funded, and they give money to, you know, church kind of organisations. And so we we kind of borrowed this model, this wonderful Canadian social worker called Kate- and had this great idea that she wanted to create an inclusive community led counselling practice, where the counsellors would offer lower cost counselling on a sliding scale. And the payoff for the counsellors would be that they would get really robust support from the organisation, but would still be able to work as private practitioners in their own small business. And so a lot of you know, people who don't work in the mental health industry might not know that there's, you know, there's the publicly funded services. And then there's the private services, which is basically you going out on your own or, you know, with partners making your own business, and that is fraught with lots of different difficulties when you're a therapist. First of all, a lot of therapists aren't very good business people, because that's just not our skill set. Right. And second of all, it's expensive to be a therapist, and this is where one of the sort of problems or pain points is created is that people deserve in my opinion, have the right as a human right to have psychological support in the same way they have physical so thoughts. So in my mind, going to therapists should be the same as going to the gym going to see your GP, you know, that kind of stuff. But unfortunately, like you said, because it has to be commodified so that the people who are offering the therapy can afford to be therapists, it, that cost has to be passed on to the client, unless you're getting funding from somewhere. So Kate's magical idea is we give these therapists as much care support, help them understand how to be a private practitioner, have a community of practice, where we can all work together to support each other. And then we offer our counsellors very, very low cost room rentals. And so the, the costs for them of being a private practitioner are significantly lower, so they can then pass that savings on to their clients. And so they still get paid about $5 more than they would on average than if they worked in a government funded or charity service. And they also get this added benefit of being able to work for themselves feel empowered, have have a sense of agency be able to learn, and, and kind of grow as a therapist. And then the idea is they would step out into their own private practice, if that's what they wanted to do and be really successful. Because they've had the support early in their career, or not necessarily early in their career, but I suppose early in their private practice career

Clinton Schultz: 16:20

with that comes the added burden of having to figure out your own tax with.

Amber Rules: 16:25

Yes, that's right. When we're not very good at any of that, are we? I just maths, I'm bad at math. Sometimes I dial it wrong phone number. Numbers,

Clinton Schultz: 16:34

the amount of stats courses I had to do at uni, and I'm like, I can't figure out my tax after that.

Amber Rules: 16:40

Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's the joy of being a psychotherapist is I didn't have to do statistics, something which I? I mean, I probably would have done me good. But I don't know if I'd have passed, to be honest (laughs)

Clinton Schultz: 16:53

I think it would have done you any good in the wonderful work that you're actually doing.

Amber Rules: 16:57

Yeah. Yeah, they're very different things really, aren't they? You know, that, which is why I'm really proud to call myself a counsellor. And, and I think, you know, going back to that idea before about labels, and the way we view ourselves, I suppose as, as practitioners, there's a you probably know, there's a bit of a pecking order in the mental health world, and counsellors tend to kind of fall towards the bottom, which is a real shame. So one of the things is that we can't offer Medicare rebates, and the government has never given us a compelling reason why they just, I don't know, they just don't seem interested in it. And our professional associations have been lobbying for years. I mean, I've been a therapist for nearly 11 years. And they were saying, Oh, we're so close, we're so close when I graduated 10 years ago. So I don't know what to make of all of that. But that's part of why rough patch is really special, to me, at least, is that we're supporting counsellors, and we're really clear and open that we're a space for counsellors, and we do have a psychologist and a social worker who work here, but they, they very much kind of onboard with our mission and understanding around, you know, counselling as equally valuable as the other disciplines.

Clinton Schultz: 18:03

So going back to when you're still working in the TV sort of space. What was some of the greatest challenges that you experienced, or that you've seen others experience in terms of managing well being working in that space?

Amber Rules: 18:19

Well, I mean, the big thing is the way in which the work happens, so. So if you're working film and television film, especially, I think even more intense than television, sometimes television, yeah, there's a bit of a rhythm to it. But if you're if you work on films, you might have three months of a job where you're working 10 plus hour days. And if you're like on set crew, sometimes that can be 12-14-16 hour days, particularly if you have to travel to get there and that kind of stuff. And then you might have three or four months of no job at all. So you know that there's lots of First of all, you completely tired burnt out, you know, after doing that much hard work. And then all of a sudden, you're if you're at a loose end for two or three months, while you're waiting for the next job to start. So that's really tricky for people. And when people are working that hard, obviously they need to have coping strategies. And so not everyone but some people's coping strategy is to use drugs and alcohol and certainly some people's strategy to manage boredom and time to themselves is drugs and alcohol as well.

Clinton Schultz: 19:25

They've they've tried to make some inroads in some of those spaces. You know, like, for instance, you're not supposed to have real alcohol on sets anymore. You know, if there's a beer in a scene, it's supposed to be a non-alc beer, if it's supposed to be a rum and coke then it's just a coke that's sort of been watered down so it has the same appearance, etc, etc. But I know for a fact that there's there's many people who want those rules. Yeah. And so there is still issues with with drugs and alcohol being around the sets and around the job as such.

Amber Rules: 19:58

And that's especially The Case for music, which was, you know, the most of my work was actually in music, not film and television. And so you know, musics a whole different beast, right? First of all, it's at a pub or a bar or a venue that's selling alcohol. Second of all, it's, you know, 99.9% of the time, it's at night. And so you're waking up, maybe 11-12-1-2 in the afternoon, having these really wild hours, if you're on tour, you know, life is completely. What's the word I'm looking for? It's a fantasy. Like it's not real. When you're on tour, you know, you're up until five in the morning. And there's still so much romanticising, that kind of way of life. And it's not unless you're a really, really big artist.

Clinton Schultz: 20:53

And a wide expectation that you just will be fucked up.

Amber Rules: 20:57

Yes, exactly. Yeah. And if you if you're not a really, really big artist, you're not touring all the time, either. And so, you know, some people love touring, because of all of that, because they get to act up and be silly and misbehave. And you know, that it will get written off as 'Oh, well, that's just part of the job.' You know, and there are some...

Clinton Schultz: 21:17

What happens on tour stays on tour type mentality.

Amber Rules: 21:19

Exactly. Yeah, yeah. And then there are some people who dread it who hate touring, because it's such a disruption to their life, and they know that it's going to be exhausting, and they're going to be pressured to do stuff they don't necessarily want to do. And, you know, it requires a real sense of understanding who you are and what you're about to be able to consistently look after yourself. In a context. That's so messy at times.

Clinton Schultz: 21:45

I think there's been much positive change? Like we work with a couple of pretty well known bands. When they're on tour, we supply them with Sobah and they take it on tour with them so that they've got non-alc beverages available to them. And sometimes that's because they openly admit there's that pressure that they should have a beer in their hand so they can pour Sobah in a glass, nobody fucking knows that it's a non-alc. Others have just made a decision that they don't want to get fucked up every night anymore, that they actually want to enjoy the process of making music or being a part of their art. And they've forgotten a whole bunch of it, because they've been too messed up to, to know what even occurred. Yeah. Do you reckon there's been some positive movement?

Amber Rules: 22:27

I think there has an and, look, I think there's always gonna be, well, let me put it this way. Maybe I'm looking for it more these days. And maybe the position that I'm in means that I get to see it more as well, right. But one of the conversations I often have with creative clients is, and like, you'll have to excuse my bluntness here. What the fuck does drinking and drugs? And you know, that whole lifestyle? What's that got to do with the art that you make? Absolutely fucking nothing. You know, like, and I think sometimes people...

Clinton Schultz: 23:01

...are unlikely to be making it better.

Amber Rules: 23:03

Certainly not. And I know there's people that would argue with me about that.

Clinton Schultz: 23:06

I've done some drawings, when I've been pissed off my face across the years and fuck me. They look like my five year old could have done it.

Amber Rules: 23:12

(laughs) Do you know my supervisor, he's a wonderful man, my clinical supervisor said to me once that he - oh God, I hope it's okay to tell this story! I'm sure it is. He said to me, that once he, he, he was doing something he shouldn't have been, and thought that he'd had a really genius idea and woke up the next morning, and he'd written, 'I'm so high', or something like that, in his diary. And I just remember thinking that such the perfect distillation of like 'we think we're geniuses when we're in that state', or 'we think we're really funny', or really sexy or whatever. And then we wake up and it's like, 'oh, that's actually not the case at all'. So yeah, my challenge to creatives is always to think like, 'what does that got to do with your art? And is it a values led decision that you're making? Like, which is it that you want?' And I think, you know, a lot of people who start out in those industries are young, when they start out, it's hard to have a sense of who you are, when you're young, you're still figuring it out. And that's okay. But also I just, and this I think is probably because I'm now getting old that I just tend to think now why would you want to do that when what you could do instead is create and do amazing artistic stuff. Like I wouldn't want that to be kind of salida or you know, kind of made grovia by drug and alcohol use but yeah, that's just me. I know I sound like an old child. I say that.

Clinton Schultz: 24:39

(laughs) But we've you know, we've also we've been through the same process to get where we are now so yeah, it's all well and good for us in you know, hindsight to go 'fuck, I would have been so better at a B or C if I'd stayed straight and off the piss'. Yeah, we weren't in that headspace at that time. So yeah, it's hard. It's hard to understand the position that many people are in, in this generation. Like I look at young people today, and a lot of the things that I that I see young people complaining about today, I struggle to conceive as an issue to some of the things that that I've witnessed and experienced, and I've seen others experience, etc, etc, across time, but it's not my space. Yeah. I just have to practice acceptance of their, of their experience.

Amber Rules: 25:29

Yeah, you know, this is, this is why I love love punk music so much, right, is that the values and the ethic that comes with punk, the punk sort of, you know, scene and culture, over time have always been really fascinating to me. So I don't just love the music. I love the ethos. And I think I watched these great documentary recently, I think it's just called punk. And it was all about punk over time, and how really passing the baton is one of the most punk things you can do, you know, like, growing old and seeing the new generation of people come through and do really cool stuff. And we as people who and I know, I'm not old, old, but I'm certainly not young anymore. And like that, I think that's a really big challenge for people as they grow older, is to kind of go well, I don't get it. But man, I love your passion. Cool. How can I help you do that better. I mean, that's, you know, really important. And something that gives me certainly a lot of sense of purpose in my life. It's helping me therapists as they come through, and, you know, not really necessarily understanding their position, but being like, Yeah, cool. Okay, how can we, how can we innovate this together? I think that's really exciting.

Clinton Schultz: 26:45

Really good point. You know, I think there's a massive gain for the counselling professions in not getting so caught up in the science side of it, and actually getting back to understanding this as an art form itself.

Amber Rules: 26:57

Absolutely

Clinton Schultz: 26:58

Being able to form a conversation, being able to reshape a narrative, it's an art form. And it's a wonderful thing to be a part of, but I don't think it's a skill that many people are afforded the opportunity to, to learn through the training that is provided.

Amber Rules: 27:12

Yeah. And I think, again, this might be one of those differences between psychology training and counselling training, is that, you know, and I think there's a place for both, I think counsellors are compelled to be more evidence based, and to kind of read more research. And, you know, I didn't even learn how to do research in my degree, I had to figure that out later. You know, like, that's not a good thing. But also, I've worked with so many psychologists who are so uptight about doing things a certain way that it completely drains them have the capacity to be creative and innovative, and just meet people where they're at, you know, and not worry about, like, all the, you know, uptight sort of things they should, should should be doing. Now, that's important. When you're starting out, when you've got your training wheels on as a therapist, you've got to follow the rules. But like, the art part comes later. And that's when you get to kind of relax. And that, to me is where the real, like the absolute bliss of doing my job is when I get to just meet someone where they're at and understand more about their experience. i What an incredible privilege that so few people in the world actually get to do that for a living, but also even have the skills and the capacity to do it in the first place. You know...

Clinton Schultz: 28:25

So have you seen in the work that youse are doing there at present, has there been an increase or an influx of people from the arts coming through due to the impact of, of the pandemic over the last few years, like I know how tough it's been particularly within the music industry, film and television kind of boomed you like you can't even get a warehouse here on the Gold Coast because film and television has bought up every single frickin warehouse. So their industry seems to be going okay here but use those have really fucking suffered, you know, avenues open, you ain't performing. You ain't getting to create you aren't getting to express yourself. You don't have those outlets as well as opportunity for income.

Amber Rules: 29:04

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So we so because I've been doing work with creatives, for some time and kind of getting, you know, like, I don't know, this might be the same to you. But you know, once you kind of work with a cohort of people, they start to tell each other about your work, right. So I have for many years worked with creatives. And when rough patch opened, we suspected because this was the case in Canada, and because it just makes sense that a lot of the people who would come through here would be people who have either insecure work, who are studying or who are young people, you know, or other marginalised kind of communities. And so we expected that that would be the case. So most of our clients are kind of under 35. Sort of either casually or part time employed. Yeah, university students, creatives, that kind of stuff. There's a wonderful organisation called Support Act, who are a national kind of hotline. I mean, they do lots of different things, but they have a hotline for people who work in the arts. So they provide counselling,

Clinton Schultz: 30:11

My 'dhargun', my brother, they're from my mob, Mitch Tambo is an ambassador for a post of the other day. So yeah, big, big shout out to Mitch.

Amber Rules: 30:20

They're an amazing organisation. And so I think, I think you've hit the nail on the head that for musicians, it's been really difficult because all the venues are being closed. And unfortunately, I think music kind of falls to the end of the entertainment totem pole a lot of the time. Whereas since we were all in lockdown, obviously, film and television is going to be the kind of priorities because we can all watch TV. Right? Yeah. So yeah, we do, we do have lots of young creatives, makeup, our client base, and then, you know, it's just expensive to live in Sydney. It's particularly expensive to live in Sydney. So but you know, part of our mission is made like had the two pillars of rough patch, really our accessibility and affordability. And we know that both of those things are subjective terms. But those are those are the kind of lenses that we run our decision making through. And so yeah, one of those, we never expected, for example, to be a zoom counselling service, that was never the the kind of plan. But of course, we've had to do that. And we've realised that that's, you know, significantly increased accessibility. Technically speaking, we can see anyone across Australia if they're willing to do some counselling with us. So, you know, that was a really cool discovery that came out of COVID. For us. And I think one of the conversations that often gets missed around any type of access is for people with chronic illnesses and disabilities. And, you know, I've heard so many clients and friends with chronic illnesses, and even for myself, as someone who lives with chronic illness, that access of just being able to do a phone call with a doctor, instead of having to spend half your day getting there. And I'm able bodied, you know, I have chronic illness, but I don't have a disability for people with physical disabilities, and might be a whole day sort of project, getting to a GP appointment, or something like that. And so that's been a really joyful part of this process for us, too. And part of the innovation of rough patch is wondering how we can shake things up, how we can survive without Medicare rebates, how we can offer accessibility and affordability in lots of different ways that you can't do when you're government funded. Because there's so much red tape you have to get through, or as asked if we have an idea in the morning, and it seems like it's gonna be a good fit, we can implement it in the afternoon. And I can't tell you how joyful and relieving that is to someone who worked in NGOs for a long time, to be able to say, Yeah, let's do that. That's a great idea. It's amazing.

Clinton Schultz: 32:50

So what would you say are the most common themes that are coming through in the service... presently?

Amber Rules: 32:57

Well, it's really all of the normal stuff, except intensified over the last kind of, you know, well, we've only been open 18 months. But I think because of COVID, it's really just intensified everyone's normal experiences, day to day experiences. And so what we often get is people who would maybe not normally see a therapist because they couldn't afford to, or because it wasn't quite bad enough, that kind of stuff, saying, okay, maybe I do need this support. So really, we all have, we have 15 counsellors at the moment, all of them have different specialties. And the idea is, hopefully that we can find a therapist, at least one option for anyone who came here.

Clinton Schultz: 33:43

Going back to some of your own journey. So you're saying that you were a three drink a night person back in the day before, before you decided to put some changes in place for your own wellbeing and and in terms of benefiting your relationship? [Yeah.] How did you go through that process? What did you do? What worked? What didn't work? What have you tried? What have you thrown out? What have you kept?

Amber Rules: 34:10

Yeah, I mean, gosh, that's a big question. Because, for me, I think for all of the things that were difficult about my childhood and upbringing, one of the things that I was really blessed to have was a mum who really believed in the power of counselling. And so from a early age, I always had access to counselling, and as support, but also, it wasn't stigmatised for me the way it was for a lot of other people. So I have never felt shame about seeing a therapist. And I have seen a therapist for more years of my life than I haven't, you know, even when I was little. And so I think a huge part of my change was being was knowing on a kind of cellular level that if I wanted to make some change, I would be be able to find somebody to support me with that

Clinton Schultz: 35:02

that notion of sames a funny thing, isn't it? Like I often say to people, I guarantee every time you go to the barber or the hairdresser, you tell them your whole fucking life story. feeling shame about that. So I don't get what the whole stigma and shame is about talking to a counsellor. Just if maybe if I have a pair of scissors in my hand, people will feel more fucking comfortable.

Amber Rules: 35:21

You know what, it's not such a bad idea. And there are there are, there are definitely kind of a well certainly i've read research that has said, in particular, teenagers do much better with opening up and talking about what's going on to them when they're doing an activity. So, you know, one of the old sort of tenets of being a young people's therapist is you do therapy, shoulder to shoulder not face to face. Which I think that's a great tip just for parents generally, as well. If you want to talk to a teenager Don't Don't look at him while you're doing it, you know? But um, yeah, I agree with you. It's such a weird thing that our culture does that makes therapy really scary and some, some kind of failure. And I think particularly men are socialised that way, right to be told that you supposed to be tough and stoic and see this stuff out by yourself. And I think there's a real vulnerability that's required in order to kind of challenge that and its hard. But yeah, I was really lucky that I, for whatever reason, I'm yeah, I'm an open book. I'm pretty shameless. I'll tell anyone anything about me, you know. So I think that has helped me as well, you know, some people's personalities, maybe just more suited to it as well find it a bit easier. But I kind of I think my change had been in the works for a long time. That was just the kind of crystallising moment with someone that I cared about and, and could see a future with saying to me, I don't know if I'm into these if this is how this continues. And so I think it was, you know, I for some time known that my life was getting a little bit out of control. And I was never one of those drug or alcohol users where i- There were certainly times where I was I did things that were, you know, very shameful and inappropriate, but I never quite made it to that point...

Clinton Schultz: 37:14

I still do those and I'm fucking sober. So...

Amber Rules: 37:16

(laughs) well, yes, fair enough me too when you put it like that. But yeah, I didn't ever reach like what we I don't like the word addict, but I think it captures.

Clinton Schultz: 37:30

I think it's a trap, I think. [Yeah.] And it's one of those label things that,[yeah], for some people, it helps because it gives them that label to base change on but other people that can become a trap where they then become that way. [Yeah], addict and they've struggled to get away from the label.

Amber Rules: 37:50

Totally. Yeah, it's restricted... Absolutely. And I think, you know, I, I'm not sort of disparaging 12 Step. But I think the 12 Step culture has got a lot to do with that as well. And you know, that's a whole other podcast, how I feel about 12 Step, I think it's hugely supportive and helpful for some people. And, you know, quite the opposite for others. So I think that label thing, it's helpful until it's not helpful. But you know, I kind of wasn't, I hadn't gotten to that point where I needed to stop altogether. But I did need to very seriously put the brakes on and really kind of pull up and decide whether this is how I wanted my life to be. And thank God, I think I just had the intellectual capacity to put together that if you've got two parents who are well, three, really, who were, you know, addicted and that you grew up in a household where there was trauma that it's very likely that you can become addicted if you're not careful. And so, for whatever reason, I mean, I guess an alcoholic might call it a moment of clarity or religious person might call it a spiritual awakening. For me, it was just like, it just, I just crystallised when this person that I was falling in love with said to me, yeah, man, you know, so I think I was really lucky. It had been in the works for a while. And like, that's when the hard work started. Because that's when I realised my shit. Now, I don't know what to do about all of this now. So I had to change career. I mean, my this is kind of my, one of the the both painful and funny stories of that time was that I was working for a television production company, and who mostly did like ads for TV and stuff like that, but had done other stuff as well. And I got fired three weeks into the job and this job I'd done plenty of times before, like I could do this job. And I just remember thinking, fuck this! This is just not for me anymore. And I just got fired by this woman who is just completely clueless and narcissistic. And I was just like, I'm out. Forget this, you know. So for me, I think a lot of it was like just anger and frustration and disappointment that this, you know, this industry that I put time and so much like blood sweat and tears into, I don't know, it just felt really symbolic to me. And that was when this change started to happen. Not long after that I applied to uni. So I thought, well, if I'm going to do it, I might as well do it now. And I think I'm one of those people who's really motivated by spite. I'm gonna smash this.

Clinton Schultz: 40:31

I tell people all the time, I've got a fucking PhD because I had a fucking teacher who told me that by the time I was 18, I'd be fucking dead or in jail. I'm like, fuck you, I gotta get a PhD. So yes, spite can be a good driver at times.

Amber Rules: 40:44

Yeah. Oh, I agree. I've always joked that if I ever got a PhD would be out of spite. And that's all. Yeah, so I think, you know, that was part of what, what helped me I think was just my psychological makeup, going to therapy, and finding purpose in something that wasn't sort of wrapped up in self loathing, which I think a lot of the, you know, my lifestyle had been until that point. And, you know, I was lucky enough to meet a person who and funny my partner is like, people were really surprised when we started dating because he was a mutual friend, basically. But a mutual friend of a friend. And a lot of people were really surprised when we started going out because we were pretty different. It just the right time was right. And I'm really lucky, I don't believe in Disney shit, you know, but I was really lucky that just the care that he showed me, was enough to kick start my own desire to want to love and care for myself, which, you know, I'm extraordinarily grateful for.

Clinton Schultz: 41:47

And there's probably nothing more healing than self love. But it's something that again, we in Australian society, we are really discouraged from doing because people confuse it with being arrogant or cocky, or a fucking whole bunch of other things. Rather than recognising that if I if I can't accept and cherish and love myself, how the fuck am I supposed to produce that positivity for anybody else?

Unknown: 42:13

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, I think this is what Western folks or who're European descent and folks get wrong is a lot of I mean, not all, but I think and, and why I think we have in Australia, in particular, so much to learn from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, is because community I think, for us, and culture for us is sometimes non existent. And that idea of, you know, like, caring about yourself, in order to show the people that you love and your community that you care about them is a concept. I think that's kind of missing a bit. For white folks, sometimes, you know, that in caring for myself, I care for the people around me, and my community. And, you know, when I have self respect, I also have respect for the environment, and you know, all of that stuff. I don't think we do that terribly well, sometimes. So, yeah. Anyway, side note, I suppose.

Clinton Schultz: 43:14

No, I'd agree. I definitely think that Australia and many other places, to be honest, have a lot that they can allow themselves to learn from First Nations societies around the world. Yeah, we've been working in the space of wellbeing for a fucking long time, we've learned a few things across that space. You know, we've we've learned that selfishness, greed, self loathing, all these things just lead to damage to self, other and place. Yeah, that's why our systems are very much structured around being best being the best version of yourself for other and place. And I think there's a lot of strength and power in understanding that connectivity. And it's not something that the West really understands. It doesn't really have a grasp. It loves to use the fad term connections. But I don't believe it's wrapped its head around what it actually means and how you actually practice being a connected entity.

Amber Rules: 44:14

Absolutely. Yeah. I totally agree. And I think, yeah, we're, we're shamed for being self involved in our culture. But we also don't know how to care for yourself. It's a really weird paradox. It's like we're not allowed to look after celebrate our achievements feel like we're an okay person at the core of who we are. And yet, those are the things that we need to survive and be a good person for other people and you know, be healthy and happy and all that stuff. It's a weird paradox.

Clinton Schultz: 44:51

self acceptance and self gratification has become so externally based and more so particularly with young people you know, in the influence of social media. It's so externally based that people have completely lost track of the fact that you have to start with self. Yeah, if you're not practising, not imparting love to self with self, that you just cannot generate that positive energy to be sharing around. And as much as you know that there's something missing, and so therefore, you inherently go looking for it in other, you're not going to get what you're looking for. Yeah, so putting out 1000 Fucking Insta posts and getting 10,000 likes on them, still doesn't give you the sense of self love that you're doing that for?

Amber Rules: 45:37

Yeah, yeah. And, you know, I think too, like, so I personally feel like, it's really easy for people to shit on things like Instagram, as a as a way of self-expression or whatever. And like anything, you know, there's pros and cons to it. But I think you know, anything we do in life, whether it's posting to Instagram, or the way we behave, or whatever, you know, you can, you can have an Instagram account and have lots of followers. And it can still be not kind of not giving you what you need it to. Or you can do those things and have a sense of, Well, this isn't really that important, and just a bit of fun, or this is how I make my living or whatever it might be. And the difference isn't the thing externally that you're doing. But the way you feel about yourself and the self esteem that you have in the process. You know what I mean? It's so complicated. I think it's not something we really learn how to do, certainly not formally, like they don't sit us down in school and say, Hey, here's how to self esteem yourself, which, which is and of course, we learn or don't learn that stuff by osmosis from our parents. So it's like, it's really tricky. And I think that's what therapy does. I love therapy. And I really see therapy as, you know, self care. And as important as physical care, because that's where we learn that stuff in therapy, particularly in psychotherapy, you know, like long term therapeutic relationships can really help us with that.

Clinton Schultz: 47:13

Yeah, no, I, I personally think that it's another inherent problem that we have with the society that we've created is that we have disconnected families. Yeah, we don't have parents fulfilling the roles of parents, we have parents being forced into labour quickly as possible to meet the capitalist regime. Yeah, therefore children and parents not actually getting that beautiful, special time together, where they get to build really strong bonds and where you get to pass values, morals, ethics, etc. On to the next generation, we have industry, supposedly doing that, on our behalf it through pretty much bit from day kids have entered into childcare. Yeah, and they come to university, there is the constant influence from systems and institutions and the values they want to impart rather than parents having the opportunity and, and systems valuing, yeah, time that parents should have. And I completely understand I'm no different, you know, I've had to do the same thing with all three of my kids. And I can't blame them now for being spoiled, entitled, little brats, because that's what society has taught them, they should value rather than the things that I want to impart them, well, I should have ensured that I had more time to impart those values into my kids at the age where it needed to be absorbed fucking prior to five years old. So it was ingrained. So it's all good for me to sit here and blame the system. But I've been suckered into that same system as everybody else. And I don't think we're aware of that a lot of the time, I don't think we completely have got a grasp of how much we play into the societal problems that we are now having to face in terms of social emotional well being disturbance.

Amber Rules: 48:55

I agree. I mean, I think you know, any, I don't, it's not something that I necessarily advertise about my theraputic stance, but I have a deeply anti capitalistic view of the world. And my approach to therapy is being you know...

Clinton Schultz: 49:12

I'm gunna have the fucking AFP coming, knocking on my door, promoting anti capitalism, which they'll quickly shift into some fucking notion of fucking support and a Red Army or some bullshit, because that's what they like to do. But anyway...

Amber Rules: 49:26

I mean, I often joke with people, like I'm a communist from the Inner West, you're just if you know Sydney the Inner West is full of Lefties, you know, but But yeah, I think this is a really important thing for people who work with people to know that you don't have to. You don't even necessarily know that you're a part of the system, you know, but you have to understand the way these systems oppress people so that you can understand that it's not your fault. You know, the fact

Clinton Schultz: 49:58

that absolutely agree because it helps to remove that shame, yeah,

Amber Rules: 50:01

anyway, wait, maybe we should start a whole other podcast about this Clinton(laughs)

Clinton Schultz: 50:08

Tell us a bit about what you guys are doing down there in the organisation in rough patch, how it differs from, I guess, the run of the mill approach that many people will have only had the opportunity to be exposed to or to experience? Yes, what it is that you really hoping to achieve?

Amber Rules: 50:28

Well, I've really massive dreams for Rough Patch, or the idea. As far as we know, we're the second organisation in the world to be doing this, so, you know, Kate in Canada came up with the idea, they're going great guns there, they unfortunately have had a huge impact from COVID in a way that we didn't here in Australia. So they basically been on online for two years. And a really big part of the model, which is one of the innovative parts is that we also have the mental health shop. And so the mental health shop, I mean, talking about capitalism, but the mental health shop subsidises the counselling practice. So basically, rather than getting funding from the government, we have this shop where people can drop in. So it's first of all de-stigmatises. Because a retail space is familiar for people. And it's okay, or maybe more okay for somebody to walk into a building that has the word mental health on the outside, if they're buying a book, or if they're just having a chat to someone who works in the shop. So you can come into the bookshop, you can get recommendations for resources, you can have a chat to a mental health professional, you don't have to make an appointment, because it's a shop. And then a lot of people have walked in and said, Oh, you do counselling as well, and then ended up coming through the counselling service. Because you know, the ease of access, and they get to ask questions, they don't have to make that daunting phone call. And for some people, I think maybe they didn't even decide they needed therapy. But then they saw the whole thing was like, that's a good idea, which, you know, that feels really cool and exciting to me.

Clinton Schultz: 52:07

Imagine when people you know, because at Sobah, we're building a brewery at the moment. And as I said earlier, we want to try and achieve many of the same things that they've already managed to achieve. Imagine when they come into a fucking brewery and they go, Oh, my God, you've got a brewery and you do counselling as well. That's going to be some interesting conversations.

Amber Rules: 52:25

Yeah. But isn't that cool? That's what I love about Pough Patch. It's so exciting. Like, the idea to me is like, I don't know, I just, I guess it just has really spoken to me, I'm so lucky that I came across it. The idea, I suppose. And I know, we've also worked incredibly hard on it, as well. And, you know, at great personal cost, in a lot of ways. But yeah, I mean, the sky's the limit, in terms of what I want to do with rough patch, what I love to do, and what we've already started to do is consult to other people who might want to open their own version, we would really like to expand, that's our big challenge at the moment is, you know, having a Sydney landlord is really tricky. You know, it costs a lot of money to be in the building that we're in, it's not really fit for purpose. But what we'd ultimately love to do is have a really long term lease or a heavily subsidised lease, where we can double the amount of counselling rooms we've got, we've got to at the moment, make the shop really big, put it social enterprise cafe in as well. Have, you know, four counselling rooms, have a nice big group room that we can do groups, have community stuff there, a backyard, you know, maybe have therapy, pet therapy animals on site, like we want to go big. But unfortunately, with something like Rough Patch, unless we have a philanthropist who really deeply believes in, you know how important this is, or, you know, financial backers who don't want to see, quote, unquote, return on their investment, because we'll never be able to offer financial return, we'll be able to offer returns in terms of healthy communities. And so if somebody sees that as a valuable use of their money, then that's brilliant, you know. But yeah, that's really what we want to be doing. We want to go large, that's the plan.

Clinton Schultz: 54:26

Sounds like a bloody good plan to me. What would be the final piece of advice that you'd want to give to anybody who's been struggling, is struggling to find help that suits them and their journey in how to move forward?

Amber Rules: 54:42

I think I think accepting can be a really good and useful skill to hone. You need to accept that I am where I am right now. To accept that things have happened the way they happened. To accept that I have difficult feelings. And you know that everyone goes through rough patches, everyone has hard feelings to deal with. And that we we don't, we don't necessarily need to stop feeling those feelings in order to get support and help, you know, you can walk through the door and see a counsellor feeling shame, or feeling embarrassed or feeling like you've failed, whatever it might be, and

Clinton Schultz: 55:24

you can leave feeling shit to write Yeah, and you can leave feeling shit, you don't have to expect that when you leave that room, everything's going to be fucking wonderful, all your problems have disappeared and rainbows and fairy floss. I think that's something people struggle with sometimes as they come in for that first experience, and they think we're gonna wave a magical wand and take away all their distress and all their problems and their concerns, and shits gonna be fixed when that's not a fucking reality. Yeah.

Amber Rules: 55:52

Which is so disappointing. And I think that's where Acceptance comes into, is like, when you're a person who is in distress, and you walk in, like, you know, this happens again, to me, often as someone who's who has chronic illnesses is I go to a doctor, and I expect them to be able to help me and when they can't, that's really crushing. And so I think that's the same to people who are in emotional distress, you know, they walk in our door and expect to be able to be helped. And that can be really painful as well. And I really get here and honour that, you know, for a lot of people that is their experience, but, you know, going back to the acceptance piece, I think accepting that things are sometimes difficult and not always perfect. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't try and shouldn't try for yourself, you know, like to improve your circumstance, or not your circumstance, improve your care for yourself. And that sometimes accepting that rough patches happen can be actually an easier way through it than railing against it. That would be my advice is, you know, to keep going, and to be gentle with yourself. I search my clients all the time, you know, to the point where I think it's frustrating, because it's like, well, how, how do I do that? And that's the tricky part is that that's the learning in at all I think if you can find some joy in the exploration, and some acceptance, that life is suffering, you know, we are ultimately just sacks of meat floating around in a rock on a rock in space, you know, nothing's got any meaning. And like, to me, that's actually really freeing. So you might as well make the best of it while you're here, you know.

Clinton Schultz: 57:34

yeah, and I think acceptance is one of the

Amber Rules: 57:35

I think you're right. Acceptance doesn't mean most powerful and wonderful healing tools that we freely have available to us as human beings. But it's something that people often get confused with. Agree. [Yeah, absolutely.] I have to agree that things are being shit. And you have to at times accept that maybe I can't go back in a fucking TARDIS and change it, or I have to accept that. It wasn't born into a certain part of of society that was a, you know, offered more fuckin power and privilege than maybe I had to be that there's shit out there out of my control. So when we're yarning about acceptance. It's really important that we help people to understand that there's really only three little fucking things in this universe you have any control over and that you need to accept ownership of those. And that's what you say think and do? [Absolutely. Yeah. And] I think that everything else is just, it just is you might have some influence, but you have absolutely no fucking control. My kids, I have no control over my fucking kids. I get a wonderful opportunity to be a positive influence in their lives. But I have to accept that all I can do through what I say, think and do is be a positive influence. Yeah. Otherwise, I'm gonna feel like a fucking letdown if one of them makes a dumbass mistake in their life. that it didn't hurt or that it was okay. Or that it's fair. You know, acceptance doesn't mean any of that. But are you going back to when we started this conversation me thinking about, you know, how do I sit with the painful experiences from my past? The answer is sometimes I don't, you know, sometimes I rail against them. And I feel really angry about it. And I feel disappointed and I still have tentative relationships with my family members because of those things. It doesn't mean that any of those things are okay. It just means that it is what it is. And I can either be full of fury about it, or I can try my best to look after myself and offer myself compassion and by extension of other people compassion, because shit happens and it's what we do with it. I think that's the important part.

Clinton Schultz: 59:49

And we can accept to find lessons in the worst of fucking situations at time and I think sometimes that can help us to turn the most shit experiences into something more positive to move with then just getting stuck in the sorrow, the pain, the loss, the hurt.

Amber Rules: 1:00:05

Yeah. And that that's in a lot of ways, that's how I do my life is like, I could have easily gone a different way. And what sometimes I think, you know, one of the really, the huge privileges of the work that I do is that I get to be with someone in their deep pain and shame and hurt in a way that I didn't always have someone to be there for me. And there's something about that, that heals me as well. Like, How incredible is that? That by helping someone else heal, I get to do it as well, like. So that's the kind of stuff I think that is really special and important to me about my work. And it doesn't mean that I always get it right or that I'm not furious some days. I'm curious a lot of days, but it doesn't. Yeah, it doesn't take up as much space as it used to, certainly,

Clinton Schultz: 1:01:03

To round out our conversation for the afternoon. Why don't you tell everybody how they can get in touch with the organisation, be it if they want to assist? Or there's somebody who is seeking assistance?

Amber Rules: 1:01:17

Yeah, thank you. Well, if you'd like to access counselling, we can offer counselling via Telehealth Australia-wide. So we know that some people prefer in person, if you're in Sydney, you're certainly welcome to come in and see us in person. We do have to prioritise people who are close by to us for various reasons. But if you're struggling, and you need us to refer you to someone, we can also help with that. So we do single session counselling, basically where we help people find supports closer to them, because we know that navigating the mental healthcare system is really tricky. And if you don't know some of the stuff that maybe a counsellor or psychologist knows that it's really hard for you to do so we can help people with that as well. You can one of the best ways you can support us is by shopping in our mental health shop. So we have you know, books, self care, products, resources, gifts, all that kind of stuff. Our websites, rough patch counselling.com. The other thing that is super supportive for us is skilled volunteers. So you don't need to be in person, we've got amazing volunteers who built our website for us who manage our social media for our so do lots of stuff like that. So if you want to volunteer a couple of hours a week, that's a huge support to us. And as with any organisation like ours, donations, of course, are really super useful and help us keep the doors open as well. And you can be assured that that goes directly into our programmes because of the way our social enterprise is set up. So that doesn't get, you know, paid on to people who don't need it to be paid on to them.

Clinton Schultz: 1:02:55

I think you guys are doing deadly work down, they're doing amazing work down there. And I really encourage anybody who feels that they can assist to get in touch and offer that assistance. It's very difficult as as small entities, particularly social enterprises to to work outside the box at time so I commend you for putting yourself out there and getting this organisation started. Thank you very much for coming on Sobah Life and sharing some of your journey and your experiences in this social emotional well being space both personally and professionally. And look forward to having a yarn again, Gaba ngindu

Amber Rules: 1:03:36

Thanks Clinton. Take care.