If you have chronic pain, a long-term health condition, anxiety, grief, or feel overwhelmed, it may feel like there aren’t many supportive resources available. Especially for trans and gender-diverse people, it’s challenging to find inclusive providers and resources.
So I’m excited to learn more about inclusive magical game-inspired practices for health and wellness from Justin Paladino. Justin is a wizard and health and wellness coach at Wizard Wellness of Oregon, LLC. ‘E uses metaphors such as Spell Slots and practices inspired by tabletop games to help support and heal all kinds of people.
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Let’s dive in!
(This interview has been lightly edited and condensed.)
Rey: Can you share some general examples of who your coaching is for? What problems or topics might you address?
Justin: Absolutely! (First, a note on ‘nouns: I have many and we like to alternate as a conversation occurs within ourselves. See: Internal Family Systems.)
We hope to be available for an inclusive range of folks, with a special interest in serving communities we’re a part of, such as those in my local area, artists, creatives, LGBTQIA+ people, technology workers, and environmentalists.
I am able to operate worldwide from my desk in Oregon as a coach, researching each client’s local area to abide by any applicable regulations.
Being a Health & Wellness Coach (we can call this HWC) is about taking a client-centered approach. An HWC like me, as I pursue board-certification, will use coaching to encourage and empower the person in front of us to resolve their own health challenges. Seeking board certification requires an HWC to be familiar with some of the most common chronic medical conditions impacting people right now, such as diabetes, heart disease, and chronic pain.
In addition to our coaching experience, we have over a decade of computer engineering experience and can still very-much utilize those skills! Lately, I have been creating video content and editing it myself. I can use my analytical skills to help a client figure out the meanings of their health screening results. I’m not a doctor, but I can take the time to help them figure it out.
I offer a special style of group-coaching, integrated into Tabletop Role-Playing Games (TTRPGs). A group of friends can book my time, and we’ll schedule either a one-shot or campaign. We’ll create characters with metaphors for real-life health challenges integrated into their stories.
We’ll then play out those stories in the theater of our minds, role-playing as the characters in a world of fantastical happenings!
I have several TTRPG Books on hand which I can use to run such a game: D&D-5e, Daggerheart, and Candela Obscura.
Rey: Can you share what it’s like to be coached by a wizard? How do you create a magical atmosphere for your clients?
Justin: We reshape our coaching to match the specific needs of the client in front of us.
Reputable providers of Health & Wellness Coaching base their practice around the principles of positive psychology, motivational interviewing, flow theory, and an understanding of behavior change.
Coaching is a future-focused and client-centered process of guiding behavior change towards positive states of wellness.
Although your doctor might not provide additional care once you’re “healthy” - a neutral state - your coach may continue to work with you until you are truly thriving, resulting in a POSITIVE state of wellness. There’s a certain magic to all of that on its own!
In addition to the basics, we, as a wizard, like to use some concepts to put an extra “magical” flavor into it! One is an adapted version of Spoon Theory merged with the concept of Spell Slots from Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition, “[A caster] can only cast a limited number of spells before resting. Manipulating the fabric of magic and channeling its energy into even a simple spell is physically and mentally taxing, and higher-level spells are even more so…. When a character casts a spell, he or she expends a slot of that spell’s level or higher, effectively ‘filling’ a slot with the spell. You can think of a spell slot as a groove of a certain size - small for a 1st-level slot, larger for a spell of higher level…. Finishing a long rest restores any expended spell slots.”
So, how does this work in practice?
Spell Slots are used along with “free to cast” simple magic called Cantrips in D&D. We can think of simple things like washing hands or getting a glass of water as Cantrips in real life. In a fantasy world Cantrips might be a simple flurry of lights, a magical sound, or closing all the windows in a room. Such trivial uses of energy do not need to be managed, as the cost is so low that the energy to do the activity will not run out.
Spell Slots, on the other hand, are associated with activities that are not trivial. These will vary from person to person, but one example of a 1st-Level Spell is “Take a Shower,” a 2nd-Level Spell is “Shower and Wash Hair,” and a 3rd-Level Spell is “Shower, Wash Hair, Style Hair, and Put On Formal Attire” - representing different tiers of personal hygiene routines.
People with a chronic condition often need to carefully manage their energy. Personally, we have a body with every-day chronic pain, and are always in need of management strategies for reduced energy levels.
Spoon Theory is a way of managing energy - the spoons represent interchangeable units of energy for daily tasks. By converting to using Cantrips and Spell Slots, this helps visualize how some energy is considered unlimited and other energy is limited in tiers.
This approach helps someone to make decisions such as, “I will only take a shower but not wash my hair, so I can save some 2nd-Level energy to Make a Pie later,” or, “I don’t have much energy so I’m going to Wash Hands and Wash Face (both Cantrips) and skip my Shower today. I’ll Eat Cereal with a Cantrip, and save all my other energy for my work today, and maybe I can Make A Pie another day…
Watch on YouTube: Justin Paladino and Elena Lunt discuss Spell Slots on the Ferally Magical Podcast:
Rey: What processes do you have for inclusivity in your practice? What difference do you think inclusivity makes?
Justin: What a great question… Inclusive practice means absolutely everything to me.
Having parted ways from workplaces where inclusivity is given only lip-service without any actual meaning behind it, I now ensure I have enough control of my spaces to make them inclusive in a genuine way.
By holding these inclusive spaces, we grow in our own understanding of the world and various communities within. We can also help to support people in those communities to simply be their authentic selves without apology.
Authentic existence is the difference that inclusivity makes.
We consider ourselves to be within the LGBTQIA+ community, identifying as a queer non-binary wizard. We use wizard as a gender identity.
We do not shy away from the need to call for social justice, so we are often outspoken on social media. We make every possible effort to de-stigmatize health conditions without invalidating the needs of those struggling with them.
We offer a sliding scale service intended to help lower-income populations access coaching.
Rey: Do you have any advice specifically for trans people who are anxious, fearful, or feeling grief right now?
Justin: I would say it’s good advice for everyone to trust their feelings and emotions, and to connect with others in their community.
Rey: Really love this, great advice!
Justin: Communities are no longer strictly local in the era of social media, so even if physically isolated, we can still find each other out there.
Coaches can help people look forward towards a state of wellness. Coaching (which does not directly treat health conditions, isn’t therapy, and isn’t mental health counseling) can be paired with mental health therapy and primary health care if someone needs to treat a mental health condition such as anxiety or depression.
If you don’t have access to health care, do what you can. A health coach can’t medically diagnose, treat, prescribe medication, etc, but can still help identify reliable sources of information.
Rey: What brings you hope?
Justin: There is hope in communities. There is hope that people are still finding time to smile. There is hope in dogs, cats, guinea pigs, and all the other furry friends. There is hope in books, video games, and telling stories.
Personally, we found a lot of hope in the story of Andor, a Star Wars TV series, a show about characters working for a sunrise they’ll never get to see. Whether or not the world reaches a state we want for it in our lives, we can be among the ones working towards that sunrise.
My favorite TTRPG right now is Daggerheart, in which an actual game mechanic is Hope & Fear. Player characters gather Hope from completion of their successful actions, and whoever is running the game gathers Fear when actions aren’t completed smoothly.
Hope tends to win out, as Fear is NOT a more powerful force than Hope.
Rey: I love this, thank you so much for sharing, Justin!
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Since our interview, Justin has completed the mentioned Board-Certification journey: Justin Paladino, the wizard, NBC-HWC. Congratulations!
Please check out Justin Paladino’s Health & Wellness Coaching For Everyday Adventurers, subscribe on YouTube, and follow Justin on LinkedIn.
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What’s a magical part of your gender journey? Please feel free to share in the comments.
