#93 - Tom Smalley - Turning His Struggle into Strength, Living with OCD

Scarlett’s guest is Tom Smalley, the founder of Struggle Into Strength. He is a mental health advocate, performance coach and weightlifter. Tom shares a powerful story when he stood up to his college coach’s bullying behavior that made headlines in the national news. He forgave his coach and chose love over fear instead of anger and hatred which is what we teach at the Choose Love Movement. Tom and Scarlett discuss how we as a society can show that vulnerability can actually be our biggest strength.  Scarlett and Tom discuss his diagnosis of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and his struggle to overcome his adversity with proper treatment and medication. His mission statement is ‘striving to break the negative stigma around mental health by showing that internal struggle does not make you weak, and that our struggle can actually be turned into our greatest strength.’  Tom says he is not an activist, he is an advocate. He wants to educate others in a loving way instead of getting angry at those who don’t understand his OCD. Scarlett talks about how you reach and make a more meaningful connection with more people with love and it is something that connects us all. His mission is to get kids diagnosed sooner and get the treatment they need faster by getting more people trained to work with kids who suffer from OCD.