The Self-Connection Podcast: S1 E 18: with Heather Valley

Heather is musician who lives in Hamilton, Ontario and is originally from a smalltown in Northern Ontario. Her music can be described as dream folk or americana noir. I first meet Heather back in July of 2019 at a time when I had first learned about my mothers cancer, and I had experienced a few other significant losses in my life that were very difficult for me.  

Her debut album, Desert Message, was released independently on November 22, 2019 to great critical reception, earning a coveted 5-star review and the #1 album spot at altcountry.nl for 2019. It was included on numerous 2019 "best of" lists and has been reviewed, covered and playlisted by The Philadelphia Inquirer, Hamilton Spectator, View Magazine, Steel City Music to name a few. , She performed at various music festivals and has a growing following. I feel fortunate to have met Heather at this point in her career and to see her play at these small and intimate shows as I’m sure she will grow to have many fans and playing in bigger and bigger venues. 

In this interview we talk about Heather's journey over the past few years, her transition from being a litigation lawyer to a musician, the toxic relationship that played a role in leaving that career, and ultimately her ongoing journey of recovery from a complete breakdown and learning to love herself.

2:00 Heather provides some background about her music and the genre it is situated within. Southern country gothic. Tim shares about encountering Heather’s music and its impact on him. 

6:20 Heather shares her story. Growing up in Northern Ontario surrounded by nature and training as a cross country skier. She describes her relationship with nature which was a touchstone connection that runs through her music. She describes herself as the opposite of an old soul. She describes her naivete and belief in people at their word and her yearning for life experiences. She studied cultural anthropology and transitioned to law school. Pursuing law was a way of proving herself that she could make it in the world of man. The further she went down the path of law the further she diverged away from her natural and inner desire for art, music and nature. This made it more difficult for her to know who she was. As she went further down this path, she describes feeling trapped within it, which then lead her to look for validation in the wrong places. 

14:00 Heather honestly expresses wearing the trappings of roles and exercising that ability to be able to meet everyone else’s expectations and the pain that creates of not knowing who she was. 

14:45 Heather describes the romance that unravelled her life. She shares her experience of being deceived, cheated on and hurt within this relationship and the inner conflict between what she was going through and experiencing. and who she thought she should be as a strong professional woman. She talks about her attempts to leave the relationship but also the ambivalence that can exist in any toxic relationship and how challenging it can be to end such a relationship. 

19:50 After experiencing a great deal of stress and anxiety that manifested in physical symptoms, she took a vacation and went to see Gillian Welch perform live and it reminded her of a world that she longed to be a part of. Soon after she had an intense experience of being so disconnected mentally and physically at work losing her sense of time for several hours and feeling a fogginess of mind that made it feel like she was underwater. That same day she left her office and never returned. 

21:57 Tim asks what kind of validation was she receiving within the romance that lead her to getting caught up in an unhealthy relationship. She describes the emphasis within the practice of law the importance of managing your appearance and impression as part of the role. Heather talks about feeling that aspects of her self outside of specific roles had never felt seen before and that this person was able to make it seem that he could see and wanted to connect to that person. 

24:00 Heather shares about how her shared passion for music that was very romantic in theme finding its way into her experience of the relationship. She bravely shares that she was seeking a way out of the life of a lawyer and that this person offered and encouraged her departure from a life that did not feel authentic to her. 

26:50 Heather describes feeling like she was beginning to know herself through the gaze of this other person, We talk about what may be a necessary step of needing to lose yourself with someone, an unhealthy connection, in order to find yourself. We talk about the widespread dynamic of external approval seeking that we all experience in our growing up, in our education system which then finds its way in how we approach intimate relationships and relationships of any kind. 

29:10 Heather talks about a ‘conflict habituated form of love’ that we can all begin to become attached to because of their emotional intensity. She describes how long it took for her to recover and begin the process of grieving and feeling again. 

30:30 Tim asks Heather how she was able to create a boundary to leave the unhealthy relationship and heal. She describes the challenges of being deceived and struggling to trust. On some level, she thought this was the best that love could be. Heather honestly shares about the ambivalence of wanting to leave and also wanting the relationship to continue.  

In her situation, Heather gives credit to the circumstance of this person being arrested and giving her space as he would not have the means to contact her so she could heal and as part of that to write her songs which was an important part of her healing. 

38:57 Heather offers her story as a caution that when someone breaks your trust to listen to that as an important detail that person and what to expect. She talks about how difficult it is to have a healthy relationship when cheating has taken place. 

40:30 Heather points out that the painful things of our lives do not end neatly. She felt she needed to hit absolute rock bottom and to learn to love herself from that point.    

41:45 Tim shares his reflection on the ways we are invited to play roles and the potential we have to lose ourselves by getting hooked by the expectations of others.

44:30 Heather talks about her wish that she could transform her experiences into something beautiful that could be meaningful for other people. Heather says:

“I don’t believe in justice. I believe the most noble thing you can do with your time is to help other people who are suffering feel less pain and sometimes feeling understood is part of that.” 

“When you have gone through trauma, naming it is a way of taking it out of your own soul and putting it in the world so it’s not able to just eat away at you. And it’s a way of telling the truth of where you have been, which is a way of standing up against abuse.”

46:00 Heather shares feedback about her music from audiences that sound like, “I’ve experienced something that’s being called out in this music and thank you for helping me feel like I’m not alone.” These moments make Heather feel it is all worth it. 

47:10 Heather describes how difficult it can be for people who are highly empathic and who have survived abusive relationships to set boundaries. To not feel guilty about setting boundaries and saying no when that’s what fits and feels safe and right. 

50:50: Heather shares the acronym for identifying toxic relationships: justifying, arguing, defending, explaining. When the relationship is a toxic pattern and you find yourself in these modes of JADE, these efforts are more opportunities to be invalidated. 

51:40 Often, toxic relationships stem from the seeking of validation outside of oneself. This pattern of seeking external validation is established in our public education.  

“You can’t be worried about how you will be received. You just have to be as authentic and true as you can be.” 

54:30 Tim asks Heather how, as a performer, she deals with ego-mind that could easily worry about other’s judgments. 

In preparing for a show, Heather explains her thought as, “I’m going to be as honest as possible and to tell these stories through this music in the best way I’m capable with this practice.” And then I have to just trust that it will connect with people.”

56:30 Heather reflects positively on the challenges she has experienced as allowing to be in a place where she has something that she feels is worth sharing. She talks about overcoming her shyness and the dynamic of sharing something that is specifically her story but general enough that it resonates on the level of human experience with others. 

58:15 Heather shares “It’s ok to be weak. When the right people are in your life, they’re not going to make you pay for those moments. You can’t be strong all the time.” Heather shares that she went through her difficulties because she was so proud and afraid of showing weakness and internalized everything.  

Tim reflects on his work with people, particularly men, who begin with an attitude that feeling and expressing vulnerable emotions is weak. Through their work in therapy, they learn that, in fact, feeling, sharing one's weakness is tremendously courageous and also receiving help can be the ultimate expression of human strength rather than isolation and suppression.  

1:01:40 Heather emphasizes the importance of finding people that you can trust and feel safe with to open up with.  

Heather quotes the saying, “When you’re wearing rose-coloured glasses, all the red flags look like white flags.”