Today we’d like to introduce you to Jason Adams.
Jason, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
In truth my story cannot be told in brief. My story is a story of fierce grace, the journey from hell to heaven, from guilt to innocence…a journey from fear to a heart wide open, from broken to whole.
I was born here right outside of Nashville and grew up in Mt. Juliet. I played baseball throughout my childhood which provided me community and purpose. Being a latchkey kid, I was raised partially by screens and partially by peers. When your culture pushes its citizens to work constantly, and by that time it required both parents working to get by, the children suffer immensely. So I suffered. I suffered silently without knowing I was suffering. I watched the adults around me fight each other through categories of race, gender, politics, etc. There was an extensive amount of trauma, both emotional and sexual, which seems to have made childhood more common than many of us can currently acknowledge-understandably.
I remember being scared and alone in middle school and high school, even though I was surrounded by people. Self-conscious, lacking boundaries, lacking context for my life, no sense of a future, no awareness of feelings, no clue what it meant to have a body/mind. No clue of what it meant to metabolize or process the experiences I had lived through..
I lost a very important figure in my life at the age of 17. He passed away in front of myself and 3 other friends in high school which contribute to the loss of interest in most things especially baseball at the time. No clue what direction to go, I followed my girlfriend at the time to ETSU. I studied psychology and sociology-double majoring in the two. I went to The university of southern Mississippi for grad school in counseling. I didn’t chose counseling, it chose me.
My 20’s and 30’s contained long term relationships with really difficult endings-my culture did not teach me what real intimacy was so I struggled. A relationship with alcohol and drugs, which had been a part of my life since the age of 17, after the loss, peaked in my late 30’s. I was thrust into the opiate spiderweb, after an accident, which lead to an admission into Cumberland heights rehabilitation center in 2019. My story includes every drug you can imagine culminating in a battle with heroine and fentanyl. I lived in hell, as did those around me, for many years. But, I know now, that entire experience was fierce grace. I have been in recovery since August of 2019, I have a very specific definition of recovery: awakening from the dream that I am separate from life, that I am separate from God.
I have been practicing therapy here in the Nashville area for almost 20 years and have been in private practice now for the last 6 years. I am also a consultant and am currently working with the leadership team at Nashville Record Pressing providing them an emotional intelligence workshop. I work extensively with those still struggling with addiction (which is really everyone at some level if you really understand it). I offer nation wide coaching for trauma and recovery and I also offer an extensive intensive monthly in-home recovery program.
Therapy is the latest institutionalized form of what every functioning human culture has always had:
a socially recognized role whose job it is to take a person whose soul has become tangled, stuck, possessed, fragmented, or exiled, and re-weave them back into meaningful connection with (1) the human community, (2) the cosmos / the gods / the ancestors / Being itself, and (3) their own depths.
That role has existed everywhere and always. Only the costume and the vocabulary change. I inhabit this role with more reverence, integrity, curiosity, and wisdom than I could ever reached by my own power.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
I’m not sure I know anyone whose life would be defined as a smooth ride. Just look around at the planet we live on? This place has teeth. Here is a list of some of the struggles (not exhaustive I’m sure): my mother having to leave me with a baby sitter as an infant (must have had an impact, lol), over sexualized culture, a culture focused on competition and judgment, a shaming culture, a culture that gave me absolutely no information on what it meant to have a body and a mind, sexual abuse, hypersexualized culture, but a repressed culture, an addicted culture. To be blunt: the struggles stem from an agnostic, atheistic and secular culture.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
It seems to me that therapy is an art which requires an extensive amount of creativity. An early part of a therapy career can rely heavy on “theoretical orientation “ but that is really about the fear and anxieties of the person in the therapist role. Or a therapist can rely heavily on asking things like: how did that make you feel, etc. which is perfectly fine, it’s just not what I do. I specialize in trauma and addiction and I work to be a container for people to feel safe enough to finally stop hiding. A lot of what I do now, in my role as a therapist, coach and consultant is provide information that none of us were given as children. Information many of us are in desperate need of-especially now at this moment in time. I am working on introducing art and creativity in the form of workshops as well. I’m in the process of putting together other day to two day workshops with colleagues around town—all in the flavor of self-expression, healing and embodiment (or somatic work).
Do you any memories from childhood that you can share with us?
I have many, many wonderful memories from childhood. Many wonderful baseball memories. I played highly competitive travel baseball and those guys, and there parents, we like family to me for years. I have fond memories of Christmas mornings and the snow as a child. I remember innocence.
Pricing:
- Individual therapy ranges from 50-250 an hour
- Consulting varies per job
- Intensive in-home recovery therapy-2,500 a month—it’s 3 sessions a week with a home visit and drug testing and alcohol testing
- Coaching jobs vary in price
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.newroadstherapy.life
- Instagram: @newroadstherapy
- Facebook: Jason Adams and new roads therapy
