Project I Am

Dr. David J Schlosz

Project I Am is a podcast dedicated to personal transformation, self-discovery, and mental well-being. In this series, we explore the power of choosing yourself, revisiting your past with fresh perspectives, and crafting a more empowered narrative for your future. Through thoughtful discussions, reflective exercises, and creative tools, each episode offers listeners a space to reconnect with their inner strength and embrace their true potential. Whether you’re on a journey of healing, growth, or simply seeking deeper self-awareness, this podcast will inspire you to reclaim your story and thrive.

Disclaimer: While I am a mental health professional and educator, this podcast and the information shared within it are intended solely for informational, educational, and entertainment purposes. The content discussed does not constitute therapy, counseling, or any form of professional mental health services. It should not be used as a substitute for therapy or personalized mental health treatment. If you are in need of support, please consult with a licensed therapist or appropriate healthcare professional.

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Avg 38 min
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S2 · E27
August 22 · 53 min
The Contraction After Expansion: When a Dream Makes us Visible.
What happens after you do the brave thing? You send the proposal, share the idea, apply for the position, set the boundary, or finally allow yourself to be seen. For a moment, it feels like expansion. Then the adrenaline fades, doubt rushes in, and a familiar voice asks, “Who do you think you are?” In this episode of Project I Am, I share a recent experience of putting something into the world and the internal collapse that followed. Together, we explore why courage can be followed by contraction, why being perceived can feel so vulnerable, and how growth may awaken old fears about criticism, failure, success, belonging, and the relationships we could disrupt by becoming more fully ourselves. We also examine the difference between fear and wisdom, between disappearing and setting a healthy boundary, and between protecting ourselves and abandoning ourselves. Rather than treating contraction as proof that we made a mistake, what if we approached it as a protective response deserving curiosity and compassion but not always authority? Perhaps we do not need to eliminate fear before moving forward. Perhaps a different kind of confidence becomes possible: not the certainty that nothing difficult will happen, but the trust that we will remain in relationship with ourselves when it does.
S2 · E26
July 26 · 31 min
Living in the Realm of Possibility: Dreaming at the Size of Your Self
Nobody dreams bigger than their relationship with themselves will allow. In this episode, Dr. David Schlosz explores why the size of our dreams is a measure not of imagination but of self-concept, the quiet, adaptive answer we carry to the question who am I allowed to be? Drawing on NARM's insight that we disconnect from ourselves to stay connected to others, Carl Rogers' conditions of worth, the possible-selves research of Markus and Nurius, Bandura's work on self-efficacy, and Snyder's hope theory, this episode reframes small dreaming as an old act of protection and shows where present-moment agency lives. For clinicians: what it means to hold a client's possibility in trust until their self-concept can hold it themselves. For everyone: a guided somatic practice called Breathing Room, making a quarter-inch more space in the self. Referenced (as attributed paraphrase): Rosamund Stone Zander & Benjamin Zander, Laurence Heller (NARM), Carl Rogers, Hazel Markus & Paula Nurius, Daphna Oyserman, Albert Bandura, C.R. Snyder, Judith Herman, D.W. Winnicott, Murray Bowen, Parker Palmer, Rilke, Desmond Tutu (Ubuntu).
S2 · E25
July 19 · 40 min
An Interview with Kim Fry: The Therapist's Greatest Tool - Bringing Your Whole Self
What if the most important thing a therapist brings into the room isn't a technique, intervention, or perfectly timed question, but themselves? In this deeply personal conversation, I sit down with licensed marriage and family therapist Kim Fry to explore how our relationship with ourselves shapes every relationship we have with others. Together we talk about the transformative power of curiosity, why therapists don't heal people by fixing them, and how our own unresolved stories inevitably show up in the therapy room. Kim shares the profound story of a single voicemail from her own therapist that forever changed her relationship with anger, authenticity, and what it means to truly be seen. From there, our conversation unfolds into an exploration of presence, supervision, vulnerability, and why healing begins when we stop performing and start showing up as fully human. Whether you're a therapist, helping professional, or simply someone longing to live more authentically, this episode is an invitation to consider a different question: What if your greatest gift to another person is not having the answers—but being fully present with them? In this episode, we explore: Why the therapist's relationship with themselves matters more than any intervention How curiosity creates the conditions for healing The difference between fixing someone and being with someone What anger can teach us about ourselves Why authenticity is often our greatest challenge, and our greatest gift How therapists can cultivate a more sustainable and deeply human practice
S2 · E24
July 9 · 25 min
The Well (3 of 3): Offering the Cup.
An invitation to stay with yourself. We've spent two episodes digging the well and learning how to draw water. Now it's time to drink. The final episode in The Well series is unlike any previous episode of Project I Am. Rather than another teaching, this is a guided experience, a gentle invitation to slow down, and reconnect with your body. Through reflection, visualization, and somatic awareness, Dr. David Schlosz guides listeners back to the place where healing begins, not by becoming someone different, but by finally learning how to stay with themselves. You don't have to earn rest. You don't have to earn compassion. You don't have to become perfect before you deserve love. The deepest wells are not filled by striving. They're filled by relationship. They're filled by grace. They're filled by the courage to keep coming home to yourself. If you've journeyed through Parts One and Two, this final episode brings the series to its emotional and spiritual conclusion. Take a deep breath. Come to the well. The water is waiting.
S2 · E23
July 3 · 25 min
The Well (2 of 3): Drawing Water. How Your Healing Becomes Someone Else's Hope
How your healing becomes someone else's hope. We've spent years talking about self-awareness. But what actually happens when two nervous systems meet? In Part Two of The Well, Dr. David Schlosz explores the invisible space between people, the place where healing relationships are formed. Why do some people make us feel instantly safe? Why do we sometimes carry emotions that don't belong to us? How can we remain deeply compassionate without losing ourselves? Drawing from counseling, attachment, interpersonal neurobiology, and years of clinical experience, David unpacks the profound difference between rescuing and accompanying, empathy and emotional fusion, and reacting versus remaining present. In this episode, you'll discover: Why your body is always listening The hidden wisdom of countertransference How to ask, "Whose feeling is this?" Why differentiation is essential for healthy relationships The difference between helping someone and carrying them Most importantly, you'll discover that people rarely heal because someone says the perfect thing. They heal because they discover someone who isn't afraid to stay. Whether you're a therapist, a student, a caregiver, or someone who simply wants to love the people in your life more deeply, this conversation will change the way you understand connection and yourself. Because when you've spent years digging your own well... you finally have water to offer.
S2 · E22
June 29 · 40 min
The Well (1 of 3): Digging. Why Your Healing Begins with You
Why your healing begins with you. Before we can become a safe place for someone else, we have to learn how to become a safe place for ourselves. In Part One of this three-part series, Dr. David Schlosz explores one of the most important and often overlooked truths of healing: the work we avoid in ourselves inevitably shapes the way we show up in our relationships. Using the metaphor of a well, David reflects on why personal growth isn't separate from helping others, it is the foundation of it. Whether you're a counselor, parent, teacher, leader, or simply someone longing for deeper relationships, this episode is an invitation to stop performing, stop abandoning yourself, and begin the courageous work of digging beneath the surface. Together, we'll explore: Why healing is expansion, not erasure How childhood adaptations become adult patterns The difference between surviving and truly living Why your greatest gift to others is your willingness to keep doing your own work Because every difficult conversation... Every honest therapy session... Every boundary... Every tear... Every moment you choose yourself instead of abandoning yourself... You're digging the well. And one day, someone else's hope may come from the depth you've been willing to create. "Every place you've learned to stay with yourself becomes another place you can stay with someone else."
S2 · E21
June 22 · 51 min
Empathic Witness: The Reaching
There is a particular kind of loneliness that has nothing to do with being alone. You can be loved, married, surrounded, texted-back-within-the-hour, and still feel that no one in the room is meeting the real you. Just the version you sent ahead. The easy one. The capable one. The one who's fine. For a lot of us, that gap wasn't an accident. We built it. Because somewhere along the way, being seen stopped feeling safe. In this episode, Dr. David Schlosz explores the need to be seen: why it's biology rather than neediness, why we run from it even as we ache for it, and what happens in the body when someone finally stays long enough to witness us and doesn't look away. As he says, "We were made for the dance." Three lenses: your inner life, the therapy room, and the one who does the seeing. The episode ends with a short guided practice. You are not broken. You were adapting. Come as you are.
S2 · E20
June 14 · 1 hr 2 min
Capacity: The Art of Staying
What determines whether pain breaks us or transforms us? In this episode, David explores one of the most neglected concepts in psychological healing: capacity, the room we have for our own difficult emotions, and for each other's. Through three lenses, our own inner life, the therapy room, and the heart of the helper, this episode weaves together the window of tolerance, research on emotional suppression and experiential avoidance, the neuroscience distinguishing empathy from compassion, and stories of people learning that the feelings they feared would drown them were actually survivable. Whether you're a clinician, a leader, a parent, or simply someone carrying something heavy, this episode offers both a framework and a practice: capacity is not a trait you're born with. It is a room you build, one ninety-second stay at a time.
S2 · E19
June 7 · 23 min
When Healing Changes Your Relationships
We often imagine healing as a journey toward peace, freedom, and deeper connection. But what happens when your growth starts changing the relationships around you? In this episode of Project I AM, Dr. David Schlosz explores one of the most difficult and rarely discussed realities of healing: not everyone benefits from your becoming healthier. As you learn to set boundaries, listen to your body, speak your truth, and stop abandoning yourself to keep the peace, relationships inevitably shift. Conversations change. Roles dissolve. Old patterns are challenged. And sometimes the people who seemed most comfortable with you are actually most comfortable with the version of you that ignored your own needs. If you've ever felt guilty for growing, lonely for changing, or confused by how others respond to your healing journey, this conversation is for you. Because sometimes healing isn't about learning how to keep everyone else comfortable. Sometimes it's about learning how to remain loving without disappearing. "You do not need to become less compassionate to become whole. You simply need to include yourself in the circle of compassion." #ProjectIAM #HealingJourney #Boundaries #SelfWorth #AttachmentHealing #Relationships #TraumaRecovery #MentalHealthPodcast #Authenticity #PersonalGrowth #NARM #RelationalHealing #SelfCompassion #TherapyInsights #EmotionalHealth
S2 · E18
May 30 · 22 min
Anger as Protest
Anger is one of the most misunderstood emotions we experience. Many of us were taught to fear it, suppress it, spiritualize it away, or turn it inward against ourselves. But what if anger is not the enemy? What if healthy anger is actually a form of protest, agency, dignity, and self-protection? In this episode of Project I Am, Dr. David Schlosz explores the difference between destructive rage and healthy, integrated anger. Drawing from trauma psychology, somatic work, relational healing, and personal reflection, David discusses how suppressed anger often becomes shame, depression, self-abandonment, perfectionism, and self-criticism. Sometimes anger is not evidence that something is wrong with you. Sometimes it is evidence that something inside you still knows you deserve dignity. If you’ve ever struggled with self-blame, resentment, people pleasing, emotional suppression, or feeling disconnected from your own needs, this episode is for you.
S2 · E17
May 24 · 34 min
Abandoning Ourselves to Protect Ourselves
There are moments in life when we abandon ourselves in order to protect ourselves. We stay silent instead of speaking honestly. We disconnect from our feelings to avoid conflict, rejection, shame, or discomfort. And afterward, something painful lingers: the feeling that we betrayed ourselves. In this episode of Project I AM, Dr. David J. Schlosz explores the hidden cost of self-abandonment and why so many of us learned to disconnect from ourselves in order to survive. Drawing from relational therapy, trauma work, somatic psychology, and personal experience, David unpacks how self-protection can quietly become self-betrayal and why choosing ourselves in healthy, grounded ways is one of the most courageous acts we can make. If you’ve ever felt exhausted from performing, people-pleasing, caretaking, or disappearing inside relationships, this conversation is for you. You do not have to disappear to be loved.
S2 · E16
May 20 · 33 min
I Didn’t Deserve This
In one of the most personal and vulnerable episodes of Project I AM to date, Dr. David Schlosz explores the painful intersection of shame, trauma, grief, and healing. Drawing from his recent experiences in an intensive training, David reflects on a profound realization that moved from intellectual understanding into something much deeper. This episode explores how children internalize blame in order to survive unsafe environments, how shame becomes embedded in identity, and how survival strategies formed in trauma can later affect relationships, emotional regulation, and self-worth. David discusses the difference between cognitively knowing something and emotionally believing it, the role of the nervous system in trauma, and why anger often protects deeper grief. Blending personal storytelling, somatic awareness, relational healing, and reflections from thinkers like Gabor Maté and Carl Rogers, this episode offers a deeply human reminder that survival was never your identity, it was an adaptation. And beneath the adaptations, there is still a self worthy of love, grief, compassion, and belonging. This episode contains discussions of childhood trauma, sexual abuse, conversion therapy, shame, and grief. Listener discretion and self-care are encouraged.
S2 · E15
May 15 · 24 min
Confessions of a Covert Narcissist: Protecting Instead of Connecting
In this follow-up episode, David moves beyond labels and into honest self-reflection with a powerful conversation titled “Confessions of a Covert Narcissist.” This episode is not about diagnosing others. It is about recognizing the subtle ways fear, shame, insecurity, and emotional self-protection can shape all of our behaviors. Why do we become defensive when receiving feedback? Why do we sometimes over-give and quietly keep score? Why does being misunderstood feel so painful? Why do we perform instead of authentically connect? Blending psychology, nervous system insight, personal anecdotes, therapeutic wisdom, and compassionate reflection, David explores how covert narcissistic tendencies often emerge not from arrogance… but from unhealed shame and the desperate need to protect ourselves from emotional pain. This episode offers a compassionate reminder: Having protective patterns does not make you broken. It makes you human. The work is becoming aware enough to choose connection over protection. Because awareness is not condemnation. Awareness is the beginning of freedom.
S2 · E14
May 12 · 45 min
The Hidden Armor: Understanding Covert Narcissism With Compassion
What if narcissism isn’t always loud? In this compassionate episode of Project I Am, David explores the hidden world of covert narcissism: the quiet, vulnerable, and often misunderstood ways people protect themselves from shame, rejection, and emotional pain. Rather than reducing people to labels or internet buzzwords, this episode looks beneath the behavior to the deeper wounds that often fuel defensiveness, validation-seeking, self-absorption, withdrawal, perfectionism, martyrdom, and emotional fragility. This conversation is not about blame. It is about awareness. Blending psychology, personal insight, therapeutic wisdom, quotes, and heartfelt reflection, this episode invites listeners to move away from judgment and toward compassionate self-awareness. Because sometimes the behaviors that hurt others most are rooted in the deepest fear of not being enough. This episode is for anyone who has: struggled with criticism or defensiveness felt unseen or emotionally fragile experienced confusing relational dynamics over-given while secretly longing for validation wondered whether healing is possible for deeply ingrained patterns Healing begins when we stop protecting the image… and start telling the truth.
S2 · E13
May 8 · 53 min
Why Healing Trauma Requires More Than Talking About It
There are some wounds that insight alone cannot heal. In this episode of Project I Am, Dr. David J. Schlosz explores why effective trauma therapy must go beyond cognition and include the body and nervous system. While many people understand their trauma intellectually, they often continue to struggle because the trauma remains unprocessed physiologically. This episode dives into the growing field of somatic experiencing and explains the difference between top-down healing (thoughts, insight, narrative) and bottom-up healing (nervous system regulation, embodiment, and safety in the body). Drawing from attachment theory, neuroscience, Polyvagal Theory, and trauma research, Dr. Schlosz explores how trauma lives in muscle tension, hypervigilance, shutdown, shame, and relational patterns and why healing often requires reconnecting with the body compassionately and slowly. Through stories, reflections, quotes, and therapeutic insights, this conversation offers a deeper understanding of why people can “know better” cognitively and still feel stuck emotionally and physically. This episode is for therapists, counseling students, trauma survivors, and anyone seeking a deeper understanding of healing. “Trauma is not what happens to us, but what we hold inside in the absence of an empathetic witness.” — Peter Levine
S2 · E12
May 3 · 51 min
A Conversation about Grief with Elli and Rachel
We think we can prepare for grief. We read about it. We anticipate it. We try to brace ourselves for the moment we know is coming. And then it happens… and nothing prepares us. In this deeply human and unfiltered conversation, David sits with two guests to explore the lived experience of losing a mother through illness, through distance, through time, and through the quiet shock that follows even when the loss is expected. This is not a clinical discussion. It’s not a guide. It’s not five steps to healing. It’s a real conversation about what grief actually feels like: the illusion of being prepared the isolation of mourning alone the weight of being present at the end the disorientation of feeling untethered the complexity of loving imperfect parents and the slow, ongoing work of learning to live without them There are moments of heartbreak. Moments of honesty. Moments of unexpected laughter. And somewhere in it all… a quiet recognition that grief does not take everything, it reveals what remains. If you’ve ever lost someone… or know that one day you will… this conversation is for you.
S2 · E11
April 15 · 15 min
Holding What Remains - A Grief Meditation
Grief has a way of undoing us. It can leave us feeling unanchored… disoriented… like something essential has been taken and nothing quite makes sense anymore. And while the world keeps moving, something inside of us feels like it has come to a standstill. In this episode of Project I Am, I invite you into a different kind of encounter with grief. Not one that tries to fix it. Not one that rushes you through it. But one that gently makes space for it. This is a guided meditation designed to help you sit with your grief… to notice where it lives in your body… and to reconnect with what remains. Because while loss changes everything, it does not erase the love, the connection, or the imprint left behind. Whether you are grieving the loss of a loved one, the end of a relationship, a life transition, or a version of yourself… this space is for you. Slow down. Breathe. Come as you are. You don’t have to carry this alone.
S2 · E10
March 15 · 1 hr 3 min
The Courage to Be Seen Part 2 - Stories of Truth and Transformation
What does courage really look like? In this second group conversation about Courage, Dr. David Schlosz invites four new guests to share a defining moment in their lives when they chose courage. What unfolds is an honest and deeply moving conversation about truth, returning to self, saying yes, being an ally, new beginnings, and the difficult decisions that shape who we become. Each guest shares a personal story followed by a meaningful poem, and together the group reflects on what courage feels like, what it costs, and how it often requires us to choose authenticity over approval. The conversation becomes something unexpected: a sacred space of reflection where strangers witness each other's courage and discover the common thread connecting their stories. If you are navigating a difficult decision, a season of change, or a moment where life is asking you to be brave, this episode will resonate deeply.
S2 · E9
March 10 · 1 hr 2 min
The Courage to Be Seen Part 1 - Stories of Truth and Transformation
What does courage really look like? In this powerful roundtable episode of Project I Am, Dr. David Schlosz invites four guests to share a defining moment in their lives when they chose courage. What unfolds is an honest and deeply moving conversation about truth, grief, leadership, self-trust, and the difficult decisions that shape who we become. Each guest shares a personal story followed by a meaningful poem, and together the group reflects on what courage feels like, what it costs, and how it often requires us to choose authenticity over approval. In this episode you will hear stories about: • Speaking the truth despite painful consequences • Standing up to authority with integrity • Choosing your own path when expectations say otherwise • Navigating grief and loss • Leaving situations that no longer honor who you are The conversation becomes something unexpected: a sacred space of reflection where strangers witness each other's courage and discover the common thread connecting their stories. If you are navigating a difficult decision, a season of change, or a moment where life is asking you to be brave, this episode will resonate deeply.
S2 · E8
March 8 · 14 min
Relational Identity Integration Part 3: The Relational Field - How Integration Happens in Therapy
If fragmentation forms in relationship, integration must also happen in relationship. In this episode, Dr. David Schlosz enters the therapy room to explore how identity integration unfolds in real time. Drawing from the existential immediacy of Irvin Yalom and the relational conditions described by Carl Rogers, he describes how subtle micro-moments in therapy create opportunities for reintegration. This is a practical and clinical episode — exploring how therapists can work with parts without pathologizing them, how shame is metabolized in relationship, and why the therapist’s own regulation is central to integration. Integration is not technique alone. It is relational presence in action.

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