Licensed therapist and CSAT Jeremy Mast hosts Emily Delster, LMFT, CSAT, and Certified Financial Disorders Therapist, discussing her background from The Meadows to launching a Santa Monica private practice and beginning a PhD in performance psychology focused on healing trauma and addiction while sustaining excellence. Delster describes how high-achieving clients often avoid “rock bottom,” struggle with trust, intimacy, and power/control rooted in early powerlessness, and may use success and money to maintain an illusion of control. She explains sex and porn addiction as intimacy disorders driven by avoiding vulnerability, mistaking intensity for intimacy, and reinforcing shame through ritualized behaviors tied to trauma and dopamine. They highlight therapy as a reparative relationship, the need for relational skill-building, and early warning signs via feedback from loved ones or lack of close relationships. Delster outlines help options including CSAT assessment, ITAP directories, residential programs like Gentle Path, and 12-step groups, and defines financial disorders as disordered relationships with money including gambling, overspending, underearning, overworking, and financial abuse.

00:00 Welcome to the Podcast

01:20 Meet Emily Delster

02:22 Emily’s Origin Story

05:53 From Meadows to Malibu

08:15 Treating High Performers

11:06 Trust Intimacy Control

14:58 Therapy and Vulnerability

16:55 Intimacy Disorder Explained

19:33 Intensity Trauma Dopamine

23:27 No Rock Bottom Warning Signs

27:29 Modern Men and Intimacy

34:22 Getting Help and Treatment

37:56 Financial Disorders Overview

41:43 Connect and Closing

Links:

• Center for Integrative Change: www.centerforintegrativechange.com
• www.CICFreeConsult.com
• www.emilydelster.com