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The Glorious Mess

The Glorious Mess

Written by: The Ethnic Anomaly
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About this listen

The Glorious Mess is a storytelling space for the ones who grew up in chaos and still became something. Hosted by Raymond Jordan Johnson-Brown — a social worker-in-training and multi-hyphenate creative — the show explores the power of story: the ones we lived, the ones we hid, and the counter-stories we’re claiming now.


Each episode sits in narrative, not advice. You’ll hear lived experience, moments of meaning-making, and conversations that open space for listeners to draw their own conclusions. Every season brings a new guest host as we talk healing, identity, and all the messy, brilliant ways people rebuild their lives.



© 2025 The Glorious Mess
Self-Help Success
Episodes
  • The Obsession Question | Who Benefits From Men Wanting Us Like This?
    Dec 17 2025

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    In The Obsession Question, Raymond and Carla wade into the uncomfortable territory of desire, attention, and power and ask when being wanted starts to feel less like attraction and more like control.

    Why do some men continue to pursue even when there’s no response? How did attention become something we’re expected to manage or soften? And why does desire so often feel pressurized or unsafe?

    From Carla’s experience of persistent messaging to a broader look at feminism, state power, and how systems create dependency, this episode explores the myth of the perfect victim and the perfect enemy and what gets lost when harm is flattened into binaries.

    A little uncomfortable, very honest.

    New episodes every month. Recorded at Virage Studios.

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    31 mins
  • Invisible Rulers | How Much of the Story Are We Actually Getting?
    Dec 2 2025

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    In Invisible Rulers, Raymond and Carla wade into the messy question of who actually decides what we know and how much of the truth ever makes it out.

    What stories get told on the news? Which ones get buried? Who benefits from the way information moves? And how much of what we “know” is really just good marketing?

    From pop culture contradictions to Raya as a class filter disguised as a dating app, this episode examines the quiet power shaping our feeds and our beliefs.

    Then, we take it somewhere deeper: reframing psychosis as cultural insight, unpacking sleep paralysis as a global story, and asking why some forms of meaning-making are dismissed while others are celebrated.

    A little paranoid, a lot curious.

    New episodes every month. Recorded at Virage Studios.

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    32 mins
  • Gay Parents & Getting Sober | Is Sobriety Just Another Kind of Coming Out?
    Nov 15 2025

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    In Gay Parents & Getting Sober, Raymond and Carla sit down for an honest, funny, and unexpectedly tender conversation about the families that shaped them and the clarity they’re choosing now.

    What does it mean to be raised by gay parents? What does it mean to be raised by deeply religious Jamaican foster parents? And how does sobriety force you to look back at those stories with new eyes?

    From coming out (in all its forms) to unlearning chaos, this episode explores the truths we inherit, the ones we run from, and the ones we finally claim as our own.

    A little messy, a lot real.

    New episodes every month. Recorded at Virage Studios.

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    34 mins
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