Cultivating Emotional Health & Mental Health with Keith Tower

For many people, this year has been one of the most stressful years in recent memory. How do care for our souls and for those around us during this time? Licensed counselor and pastor, Keith Tower, joins for a conversation about maintaining and cultivating emotional and mental health. We also get to hear some about his career as an NBA basketball player in the 1990s such as Michael Jordan on the Chicago Bulls and Shaquille O'Neall on the Orlando Magic.

Topics Discussed

• What it was like to play professional basketball with athletes like Michael Jordan and Shaquille O'Neall.
• Keith’s journey to faith as a professional athlete. 
• Lessons learned as a professional counselor that translate to Christian ministry. 
• Three actions to take when anxiety rises.

Additional Resources

See the episode webpage for additional resources. 

Transcript

David 0:38

well, I am here with Keith tower. Uh, Keith tower is a former NBA basketball player. He is a pastor of a church in the Orlando area and he also is a licensed counselor. And so pastor Keith, it's great to have you with us today.

Keith 0:57

Dave, so good to be with you, man. I just love what you're doing with the podcast and how we're reaching students, talking about faith and leadership, such an important topic today, and a real privilege to be with a great man of God. Like you.

David 1:09

Well, thanks so much. Well, uh, Keith, for those that don't know you, you've got a great last name, Keith tower, and, uh, you tend to live up to that name. Uh, you, you tower over moderately size men, uh, such as myself. So, um, Keith, I understand that this. Played a significant value to you as it helped to lead you into an NBA career. Could you tell us a little bit about that?

Keith 1:35

Yeah, sure. Um, I'm not only been named tower, but as you mentioned, um, uh, always been the tallest kid growing up, uh, finally topped out at just a hair under seven feet tall. So I was funny, like in high school and college you'd have your name on the back of your Jersey and mine would say tower and people would be like, man, why do you get to have your nickname on your Jersey? And I'm like, no, honestly, that's my last name. And, um, so it's quite a conversation starter when people see a seven foot guy. Uh, with the last name of tower, but I grew up in a sports household and was, uh, always I'm interested in, in just about any kind of sport. My dad played professional baseball with the New York and San Francisco giants, and I'm so played a lot of baseball, um, in the household and a seven foot tall pitcher named tower was a quite intimidating in high school, but, uh, eventually realized that. You know, given the, the, the frame that God gave me that basketball is my Avenue and went and played at the university of Notre Dame. And from there went on and enjoyed, uh, seven years in the pros and played with, with and against some of the best players in the nineties. Um, played very briefly when I first came out of college, uh, with the Chicago bulls in 1992, I signed with Chicago, um, was there for. All of training camp and through probably the first 10 or 12 preseason games and then got released. Right. Uh, right before the regular season started. So, got to play with Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippin and, um, which was like traveling with the Beatles whenever we'd show up in a road city, and there'd be, um, people out and fans cheering and it was quite, quite crazy. They were just coming off of the 1992, um, dream team. Um, With us, uh, Pippin and Jordan, and, um, then went from there to the Orlando magic where I got to, uh, back up the great Shaquille O'Neal, uh, guarded him every day in practice for two years and still have bruises to prove it. Um, cause he is a monster when people think I'm big and then they see Shaq. It's just, I mean, I looked like a child next to him. He's so big. So yeah. And then played a couple more years with the, um, The Clippers and Los Angeles, we weren't very good at the time. Not like now, you know, uh, back then you would say you played for Los Angeles and hope people thought that Lakers. Um, but we, uh, So I played for the Clippers and then went and played with the Milwaukee bucks where I was with, um, um, uh, rookie Ray Allen. Who's probably heading to the hall of fame. And a lot of people know him, don't know many other players from the box, but Ray Allen was a rookie there and got to see his professionalism. He has been at a young age and yeah, it was a good season of life.

David 4:05

That's fantastic. Well, certainly playing with a lot of people that even when I was growing up, I certainly admired and looked up to no, no pun intended there. Uh, I didn't have much of a basketball career. It was mostly limited to middle school, but, uh, good times. Well, pastor Keith, I've been just really, I had the pleasure of getting to know you some of these last few years, and I know my wife is a big fan of, of your wife, Jennifer you've, you've traveled around and done various marriage seminars and things, including, um, You know, a conference that we attended last summer. And so just so grateful for you and your life and your ministry, and just really so many, so many interesting things converging and who you are and what you do. Uh, could you just tell us a little bit about how it is that you became a follower of Jesus?

Keith 4:59

Yeah, sure. Uh, so I was in my fourth year in the NBA, uh, playing with the Milwaukee bucks. Um, I grew up nominally Catholic, so had just enough. Kind of church in me to know that the Bible was true, that never dawned on me to actually open it and see what was in it. But I had respect for it. So if somebody could tell me what God said, then I was open to the fact that, you know, that was probably right and true. And, uh, I had a couple, uh, Christian teammates that were, um, with me there in the Milwaukee bucks. And, uh, I broke my hand heading into training camp and training camps kind of boring anyway, but now when you can't actually physically perform at a cast up to my elbow for 10 weeks, um, it's super boring. And, uh, I was, um, at a team meal, um, Kind of sitting by myself feeling sorry for myself because I couldn't play. And a couple of Christian teammates came in, sat down with me. And, uh, by the end of the night, I knew a couple things for sure that God was real. Uh, and that I was very far from him. And if I checked into an attorney that night, it was not going to be good. And, um, you know, I learned so much, uh, I gave my life to Jesus that night and, uh, Learn so much about what it is to follow Christ. Um, In an environment that doesn't necessarily follow Christ. Um, this, these guys took time and discipled me throughout the year, which is so critical. Um, I think sometimes, and I'm a big fan of the church, but sometimes churches, we, we put an emphasis just on the conversion experience and we miss sometimes helping equip people to walk with God for a lifetime. And it's so often what we see on the college campus right, is they've come up through youth group and they've, you know, heard, don't have sex and don't do drugs and Jesus, this is great, but we haven't always really equipped. Um, students don't walk well with God out on a college campus or in my case at that time in an NBA locker room. And, um, so I watched these guys how they loved God and learn from them. And, uh, when I went on to other teams, I just kinda did what they did. And, um, you know, I played three more years after that and, um, because you're quite busy on Sundays and the NBA and things like that, I'd never really. Become part of a local church. And it was probably four years before I actually realized that there were Christians that don't reach out to people. And I was, I was shocked of this thing of lukewarmness cause the only people I knew were it, man, if you're living for God in an NBA locker room, you're serious about him. Uh, cause there's, there's no upside to serving God. Uh, just, you know, culturally, um, in an NBA locker room. So the guys I knew were serious about God and uh, I was kinda surprised to find people that weren't. Um, but yeah, That's that's my story. Yeah.

David 7:48

And how is it that you went from that experience into full time Christian ministry?

Keith 7:54

Yeah. So, great question. Um, you know, once I gave my life to Jesus, I was pretty much like, God, whatever you want to do, I'm in. So, you know, kind of how to an Isaiah moment of here I am send me I'll I'll do whatever, go wherever. And, um, I initially when I retired in 99, I went back like literally a week after my last game, I was enrolled in graduate school and was getting my master's degree in counseling. And, um, I just wanted to help people and I didn't really know what that looked like, but my, I thought, Oh, I'll have a counseling practice and just help as many people as I can. And I got invited by a, none of the retired recently retired NBA player to go to an outreach I'm in Miami. And it was a bunch of, um, Former NBA players. And we were playing some local, all star team, high school, all star team or college. I don't even remember who we were playing. We smoked them by the way,

David 8:51

nice.

Keith 8:51

you know me, but, um, he said humbly so, but we, we were playing this outreach game with the chaplain of the Boston Celtics who put this game together and I got the opportunity to preach the gospel in Miami arena. This full arena that I had. Played in tons of times. Um, and now here I am as a Christian preaching to a full arena. And, uh, I'm like, man, God, I literally just said, Hey, whatever you want to do. And here you've got me in a position where I'm, I'm in a place where I used to live like hell and now I'm. Preaching the gospel and off of that, uh, opportunity, the teammate, uh, that I had connected with down there, a former player invited me about three weeks later to go with him, uh, to the foreign mission field, to Zimbabwe, to do a similar kind of outreach. And it went well. And about every month or two, uh, he would call and we would head off to some far corner of the world to, um, play basketball and preach the gospel. And it's, it's really interesting. I just actually preached a series and I was talking about Moses and early on in Exodus when God is asking Moses to do something amazing. And Moses is like, I'm not sure you got the right guy here. I mean, like, what am I supposed to do? What, what do I offer. And God said to Moses what's in your hand. And Moses said, why have a stick? And he goes, we'll drop it on the ground. He puts it on the ground. It turns into a snake and then he picks it back up and it turns back into a staff. And I've always embraced this idea of, you know, God can do anything with anybody who's willing and he'll just use what's in your hand. In my case, I had a basketball, well, I can bounce a basketball and I can throw it in the hoop. And because of that, people will come and listen to what I have to say. And I'm telling you if you'll do it with a washed up exed athlete that can bounce a basketball man. There were a lot of your listeners that have more in their hands than I've ever had, um, on. And I think if we'll put whatever's in our hand and God's hand, there's no telling what he would do. So a bunch of mission trips, uh, eventually led to. Um, deciding I wanted to just serve God full time. Initially I was doing it, um, simultaneously through a counseling practice. I had a private practice. And then, um, one of the things I noticed that, uh, I was getting the bulk of my clients actually coming in were pastors, um, that didn't have a safe space to talk and. You know who pastors, pastors. And so I found myself ministering to and helping and counseling a lot of pastors. And, um, through that kind of grew a desire to serve God through the local church. Right.

David 11:35

That's fantastic. Uh, you know, it's interesting, you mentioned that, uh, that aspect about people in ministry and the need that they have for, for care, uh, how, as you've transitioned into pastoring and working in the local church, how have your experiences in counseling informed and aided your pastoral ministry?

Keith 11:57

Yeah, well, that's a, that's a great question. Um, so I would say a couple of things, uh, outside of the Bible and the Holy spirit. Um, my counseling experience is probably the most valuable thing that I bring to ministry, uh, for a couple reasons first, when, whenever you'd go to help people, um, you need to understand people. You know, I think in ministry, I'm in seminaries, we spend so much time helping people understand the Bible, which is crucial. Um, but it's not just a knowledge of the Bible. It's the right application of the Bible that helps set people free. And, um, that, that means that we've got to understand people. So my ability, I think that, that I gained through counseling to assess where people are, uh, to understand maybe some of the underlying issues. Um, to know how to ask good questions and discover where they are. And then at the same time, uh, be building a, what we call in counseling, a therapeutic relationship, but just, just building enough relational equity that, um, when it comes time to confront or to challenge or to, to push somebody on their beliefs a little bit, um, you've established enough of relationships. So that was super helpful in terms of being a helper. Um, But I think one thing that they just really, really, really, really, really stressed out my counselor training was, um, being able to take care of yourself. Cause there's something about, uh, entering into people's pain and entering into people's brokenness and entering into people's vulnerable, uh, places. To, to help them to meet them in there that if you're not careful, that kind of stuff can, can stick and, um, it can, you know, it can start to affect you. And, um, so I learned quite a few, um, simple techniques of how to, how to enter into people's pain, but then how to not take it home with me. And, um, uh, that's been, that's been super helpful.

David 13:54

Yeah. Yeah, that is so great. Uh, just as someone who myself has been in full time ministry now for a decade and a half, uh, I think this self care aspect, it is really important, you know, and that goes for everyone. It's not limited to any kind of vocational path, but, uh, you know, several books that I've read have been particularly helpful, like Peter scares there emotionally healthy church and emotionally healthy leader. Uh, but just this idea of really caring for your own soul, I think, um, and my, my wife, Katie, whom, you know, she's a nurse and so she's. Kind of in that same vein of, Hey, I want to help people, but there's something about, uh, as you engage in, in any kind of service where there can be a certain kind of fatigue that comes along with that over time, if you don't really care for yourself. And I wonder, even in this time that we're living in now with the pandemic and just 20, 20, Being such an incredibly stressful year for lots of reasons. I just wonder how that's gonna affect people, how that is affecting people and just, what, what kind of longterm effects we're going to see. Um, anything that you would say to this, any insights that you have that would speak to this cultural moment that we're in, in regards to self care.

Keith 15:14

Uh, sure. So great questions. Uh, Dave you're, you're really astute as you're, um, as you're looking at the moment that we're in, um, you know, the, the, the, the church has not always been great. Um, Leadership at, and again, I love, I love the local church. I'm part of it. So this is a, this is a broad brush and I hate broad brushing the bride of Christ, but I think there's been seasons where we've not looked at self care properly. Um, we've either seen it as maybe selfish, like, Hey, you, you know, you should be out there serving the world. Why are you serving self? And I, you know, I see Jesus. Pulling away from people on a consistent basis and getting time alone with the father. And, and I see him eating and I see him resting and I see him pacing himself. Cause he was, he was limited to human flesh, although he was certainly God in the flesh. And there's nothing selfish about taking care of yourself. Um, ultimately I think it's how you're going to better be able to help others. And I think the other kind of flip side is we've looked sometimes and have seen self care is maybe a lack of faith. You know, if you're, well, if you just have enough faith, you won't get tired. If you just have enough faith, you can do anything. And, um, Faith is certainly important, but I think it's when it's misplaced, I think we can overlook some of the other tools that God's given us a long with faith and not instead of, but along with faith, he's given us wisdom, right? He's given us a mind. Um, he's given us physical limitations and, and I think when we can distinguish what is, where, where my limits are. Um, and then. Just stay about a step or two back I'm. I'm no good for anybody. Um, if I'm burned out. Um, I no good for anybody if my tank's empty and, you know, Paul speaks of being poured out like a drink offering, but then he also, you know, refilled the di the cup is as quickly as possible. And he wasn't always living from an empty cup. He had something to pour out and, um, you know, the, the moment that we're in. David. It's not good for any of us. You know, I used to laugh because I love like personality tests. And you know, when the lockdowns were initially starting, it was like an introvert's dream, right? I mean, now they get to go in and shut their door and nobody can come in and bother them. And, but this, this isn't good, even for introverts, because there are two things that are true about humanity that this. This pandemic is denying us. Number one, we are created for relationship we're created for tactile life-on-life intimate, close interpersonal relationship. Even the most introverted among us need to know people and to be known. And that's difficult when life gets flattened out through a zoom screen and it gets flattened out through six feet, distance and people approach. And, you know, we've got huggers in our church and they're just like, ah, I'm just dying for physical. Contact we're we're meant to be in close relationship. And this is making that very difficult. The other thing is we're created to be free, right? We're we're meant where the spirit of the Lord is. There is freedom and we're, we're not, we don't flourish. Humanity, doesn't flourish with external governance. Telling it, what it can and can't do. Now we have internal governments that the Holy spirit, right. Governing our hearts and our motives and the restraint that we feel by God to choose and to not choose. But that's, that is in fact a freedom. But when we're told you, can't leave your house. Now I'm denied relationship. And, you know, I don't mean like an American overly patriotic freedom, but, but a freedom from God where I have the Liberty to move and to become who I'm supposed to be. Those are hampered. And that's going to take a longterm effect. I'm really concerned about, you know, a younger generation coming up. If you're 10 years old, you know, this thing let's say drags on for a year, like truly 10% of your life.

David 19:20

yeah.

Keith 19:20

lived and shaped by something. That's not the way that God has created humans to flourish and that's going to be difficult. You and I, as, as adults and parents and leaders, you know, we can make personal adjustments. You know, when the lockdown first started, I grabbed our staff, we've got 16 or 17 people on our staff and I'm like, okay, listen long, think long game. Right. You need to take care of yourself. If you, if you shortcut yourself on taking a Sabbath, whatever you do, don't do that. Now, I, you know, in our next staff meeting, I want to hear a new exercise that you're doing something you've eliminated from your diet. Like give me something tangible that you're doing to take care of yourself, because if we're not the normal kind of life rhythms, Of, well, I, you know, I have, I've got some good friends and if I'm a little discouraged, well, you know, we can go laugh and have a pizza and I can leave that a little bit, propped up though. The props are not there anymore. And it's me and God and my own habits now. And, um, if we don't have good habits and we don't know how to take care of ourselves, or we're thinking that somehow it's more noble to just. Press through and play hurt. That was a, you know, in basketball, it was always like, you know, there was great if you could play hurt when I'm like, well, that's fine in a sport. And you know, now that I'm, you know, above 40 and been retired for awhile, I have stuff that still hurts because I played hurt.

David 20:49

right.

Keith 20:50

I don't want to be a hurt helper. I want to be a helpful wholly whole healthy helper. So

David 20:57

What's a really helpful distinction. We all want to be helpers. And I think anybody listening to this, they wouldn't be listening if they didn't want to grow and develop and be of use and of help to others in service of Christ. Uh, but to aim at being a whole helper, uh, not just a hurt helper. I think that's an interesting distinction to make. Um, Pastor Keith, I know I've heard you speak in other environments about a distinction between mental health and emotional health. I found that a helpful distinction. Could you unpack that a little bit for us here today?

Keith 21:32

Sure. Yeah. And I appreciate you asking, because this is, this goes to, how do we help? Right, right now, just about every thing that's going on inside of people is falling under the label of mental health and mental health and emotional health. Aren't the same thing. And because they're not the same thing, they're not treated the same way. But if we lump everything under one banner, we're going to treat everything with the same modality and consequently, I'm not going to be as effective as we need to be. So the big distinction between mental health and um, health, um, mental health is an organic brain issue. So brain health would be another way of saying it. So there's something maybe a misconnected misfiring assumption. Using very simplistic terms, but maybe misfiring or something out of balance in the chemistry of my brain, which causes my brain to, um, uh, interfere with my mental processes. So perhaps I would see something that's not actually there, or I would hear a voice that's not there. I would have an interaction with reality. That's not. Objectively real because something is wrong with my brain. So the way my brain is perceiving and interacting. And so when you see somebody with true mental illness from a, from a biochemical brain health issue, their speech may be scrambled or they might speak of hallucinations or delusions. So anything on what we would call the, the psychotic spectrum, right. Where I would a psychotic. Episode is simply a break with reality or any of the delusion disorders where I see things or perceive things that aren't there. It's because something's misfiring in my brain and that's a, that is a medical issue, right? The only way we really have to treat those is is, is through medicine because it's a physiological problem. That's showing itself in my mental processes. So therefore it's mental health. So I would go to, in that case, a, a psychiatrist then psychiatrist is an MD who specializes in the health of the brain so they can prescribe medications. They can bring about a physical treatment modalities to work on the chemistry of the brain or the connections in the brain, uh, to help me. Function and have proper cognitive mental function. So that that's what we would call mental health. And that's usually the things that, um, as followers of Christ that are trying to help people walk well with him. When we see those, you want to refer those immediately to a doctor, anything on the schizophrenia, spectrum autism. Um, those are biochemical any of the psychotic disorders and it's a very, very small segment of the population. You know, we hear like 40% of the population struggling with mental health and that's actually not correct. It's closer to about 2% have a true mental health, a brain health issue. That's, uh, it's impairing their mental function. Now, when we talk about this 40%, or now it's gone up to 50, even as high as 60%, they're saying now with. Uh, the pandemic, um, tip, but typically it'd be in the 20 to 30% of the us population. Anyway, uh, we're talking more about emotional health and this would be things that would fall under the, typically the mood disorders, anxiety, depression, um, mania bipolar. So there's something happening where I don't feel right. My mood is off. And of the mood disorders, anxiety and depression. There's a number of things that can cause them those, um, you know, some are biochemical in nature, but it's a small percentage that are, and, but sometimes our, just our motor just runs a little hot and we just need a, maybe a slight medical adjustment. Um, but other times it's a thinking pattern. Um, other times it's, uh, if we can adjust our thinking or adjusting our behavior, it can help adjust how we feel. So. That's different than a medical approach, right? So counseling or psychotherapy or talk therapy, or what we do is ministers with helping people renew their thought life through scripture, or develop spiritual disciplines or self care. Those types of things really work for emotional health. It's the health of my emotions, right? That's the care of my soul. It's how I feel. And. You know, we're seeing a huge spike with anxiety and a huge spike with depression during this. Because again, the, the things that would normally be happening in my life, um, that that helped my mood. I don't have access to anymore. I don't have friendships. Uh, it's difficult to get outside. Um, it's hard to, to eat well when all we're doing is getting takeout and things like that. So there was some, some acute factors and, and it's stressful. You know, I have two college age, one that just graduated and, uh, she has a job, but it's not the job. Right. So she had, had gotten a job offer, but was not able to take it. Cause the industry basically collapsed. That's a stressful thing. And if you stack up several stressful things, it causes, you know, the end result of stress is anxiety and it. Can cause anxiety. And we're seeing that on the rise or, you know, I have another daughter who had an internship in her dream city and it had to get moved to be online. And instead of being in her, spending all summer in her dream city, she's spending it at her parents' house on zoom, doing an internship, which is great, but it's, you know, there's, there's a disappointment there. And if you stack up a number of disappointments, you know, the. Continuation of disappointments becomes depression. And now that's an emotional health issue, acute situations. It starts to stack up and it can help me slide into the blues. And we're seeing that a lot.

David 27:18

Hmm. Yeah. And you know, and just what I've been observing is even for quite a while before this pandemic, is that a lot of people were struggling in this area of anxiety and depression. And so it seems certainly to have been compounded over recent months, but it's been a rising issue for a long time. Uh, but I do know that even just in recent weeks, I've had conversations with several, uh, very mature leaders who have just been struggling. And so, uh, pastor Keith, what are some key habits or practices, uh, that in this time, and even beyond this time, because I've got to hold out hope that we are going to get beyond this time. Uh, what are some key habits that we can include in our lives to help cultivate. Better emotional health.

Keith 28:12

Sure. So let me, let me super quick. If I can, Dave, maybe, uh, kind of lay out a model, so those listening, understand why I'm going to recommend the things I'm going to recommend you and I approach and view every one of life situations through. A constant and fluid interplay of our actions or our behaviors, our thoughts, or what's going on in our mind and our feelings or our emotions. We have, we have behaviors, thoughts, and feelings about everything that's happening. Now, two of those three, you and I have the ability to directly control. You can control how you behave. Right. I can stand up. I can sit down. I can talk on this podcast or I can, you know, not talk on this podcast. I have the ability to directly control my behavior. I have the ability to directly control how I think. Right. We do a little, little practice game. I'm going to close your eyes. And at the count of three, I want you to think of an Apple ready. One, two, three, right? So you can form a mental image of that. Red juicy fruit, or maybe you went with the golden Apple, or maybe you're thinking of your computer, right? We can, we can form a mental image. What we don't have the ability to do is to directly control our emotions. They're a response to both our thoughts and our actions. So I can't directly control our feelings. Let's do a little thought experiment with your listeners right now. All right. I'm going to count to three and I want you to feel happy. Ready? One, two. Okay. Here's what you're doing. You're starting to think happy thoughts, right? Because your emotions are a response to how you think or how you behave. There is no gauge that you can find and move your. Your mood, you know that Dave you've had your you're married, maybe you and your wife have had conversations and you've gone like, well, just stop feeling that way. Well, well, how does that go?

David 30:04

not good,

Keith 30:05

Not good,

David 30:06

not good at all.

Keith 30:07

Not good at, because we're not choosing to feel the way we feel our emotions, our response to how we think and or how we act. So if I want to help my mood right. Rather than, you know, Oh, God helped me with my mood and I pray about it. If you've, uh, you know, or we, we hand people two scriptures about being anxious and, you know, we, we've got, you know, Philippians four with be anxious for nothing. Well, okay. I'm struggling with anxiety, someone hands me a Bible verse that says be anxious for nothing. And now I'm more anxious, right? Because now God doesn't want me to be anxious and I can't help the fact that I'm anxious. So then I pray, Oh Lord, help me not be anxious. Oh Lord, help me not be anxious. So Lord help me. And I'll be anxious. And I still feel anxious because I don't have a meter to adjust my emotion. But what I can do is adjust how I think. Cause if you read the rest of Philippians four, it says be anxious for nothing, which means there's a possible state whereby I can not be anxious, but in thing through prayer and supplication, prayer and petition, prayer and supplication are actions. Right? So I'm going to do something I'm going to pray. And I'm going to pray what not about my mood, but about everything. The implication there is about everything that would make me anxious. So I have a daughter away at college and, um, you know, anxious about her making good choices rather than pray. Lord, help me not be anxious. Lord, help me not be anxious. If I'm thinking about her making good decisions that produces an anxiety, anxiety, and a dad. But so what I do is I bring the situation that's causing me anxiety. Lord, I'm bringing my daughter to you right now in the name of Jesus and help her with wisdom and help her with friendships and help her. And as I unpack that burden to God, I'm physical, we doing something I'm praying. And I'm thinking through the thing that is causing me anxiety. And I'm bringing that to God. Then what he says is the peace of God. Will guard your heart, the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding will guard your heart in Christ Jesus, that word guard, your heart means like to stand century. So I, if I do and think God will guard how I feel. And rather than anxiety being in my heart, he will guard anxiety from getting into my heart and he'll guard the peace that he's depositing in my heart from getting out. So.

David 32:36

Hmm.

Keith 32:36

what can we do? What habits can we do? Well, when we think of our mood, anxiety or depression, um, any, I mean, the kind of the gold standard for counseling, by the way, what I'm telling you is it's biblical because God said it, but it's also how anybody in the mental health field would treat anxiety or depression it's through either cognitive or behavioral therapy. How I think. Or what I'm doing, right. So we adjust my thoughts or I adjust my actions. So very simply if I am struggling with anxiety or I'm struggling with depression, um, I want to take actions and there's three simple types of actions you can take. I would say physical, uh, purposeful. And biblical do something physical, get out and move. One of the ways we treat people with depression is we take them out in sunlight and we're going to go for a five minute walk and they're going to be screaming. No, no, no, no, no. Like a vampire being exposed to the light. But once they get out and move, something starts to happen because my, my, my emotions are gonna move in response to my physical activity. In the same way that my physical activity moves in response to my mood when I'm struggling with depression, I'm my activity level goes down. I draw the shades, I disengage from relationship. So if I can physically do the opposite of that, my mood will eventually follow as well. So physical activity is a wonderful thing for emotional health purposeful activity. And this has been one that we've found as. Physical activities, especially early on when things were really locked down, physical activity was constrained quite a bit purposeful activity, doing what you were created on earth to do. And even if you can't do it from a job standpoint, right. You and I were created to bring order to chaos we're made in the image of God. And in Genesis chapter one in Genesis chapter two, we see the spirit of God coming into chaos and starting to bring order to it. You and I are made to have purposeful activity where we order chaos. So. Straighten out a closet. If you have a closet junk drawer, that's not been dealt with grab that chaotic formula void. Like the earth was when God started moving and bring your intellect and bring a system to it and start to order it. Uh, that'll be super helpful. One of the things that happen, especially early in the lockdown is, you know, there was nothing to put on our calendars anymore. I don't like a calendar, but I have to have some. Structure and rhythm to my day. And it's been totally interrupted and totally disrupted, you know, you and I were talking before the podcast about, you know, are our children in school and what it's going to be like to try to develop a rhythm. We need to have some form of structure in order. So, you know, my one daughter was, was really. Struggling her anxiety was starting to go up and I said, listen, get a calendar and, and start to fill it out with things you're going to do. And she goes, well, dad, I'm not doing anything. And I'm like, here's what I want you to put on it. Wake up. Then I want you to put, eat breakfast. Then I want you to put, read a book, set a goal to read a book. Then I want you to put like, Watch one episode, she wanted to go back through and watch the series loss. Then I'm like, okay, figure out over the course of the summer, how many you got to watch in a day? And I'm like, go ahead and binge watch, but don't binge watch purpose, Leslie binge-watch from a there's, you know, six seasons or whatever it is. And I'm going to divide it up by like, like start to bring order to chaos. And what you do is you, you bring to bear the image of God inside of you. Into the earth. So just do something simple. That's purposeful. And then lastly do something biblical, like not, not all activity is created the same, uh, so I can drink and a lot and feel less anxiety about the world, but I'm going to wake up tomorrow and I've compounded my problem. Right. So I want to have biblical activities engaged to the extent that I can and relationships engage in. Actively Bible reading, engage in active pursuit of podcasts like this one. And, um, as I will do physical, purposeful and biblical activity, I promise you your mood is going to change.

David 36:48

Well, that's fantastic. Thank you so much. I'm I'm over here taking notes as you're speaking, this is so good. Yeah. I saw that in my own life as well, just when everything was shutting down and, and you know, of course in my area of the country, up here in the Northeast, the weather was still not very good at that point. It was, it was gray. It was cold. It was rainy. And. So getting outside was a challenge and everything was changing every day. And it was a great opportunity. I did find that I felt better when I started to even just use little household projects and fixing things and painting the kids' swing set and things like that. So I love this list actions that are physical, purposeful, biblical that's. Excellent.

Keith 37:32

really important because part of the challenge of, of the situation, it's not, it's not changing as rapidly now as it was, but man, remember those early to everything was getting canceled and, and what felt like an ordered life was becoming chaotic and that's, uh, that's not, uh, great for human thriving. Right. Cause again, we bear the image of God who brings order to chaos. And when we were losing, not that we have to be in control, but any sense of, of order. And now we're being thrust into this thing where we can't, it's picking something that you can, you can fix that you can repair, that you can organize, that you can strategize, um, is super duper helpful. So.

David 38:15

Yeah, well, pastor Keith, this has been fantastic. I'd like to ask you one final question. If I could, uh, is this is a, a podcast really aimed at young leaders, whether it be those serving, uh, on the campus as students or those that are maybe beyond college, but still working within the university community. Um, If you could give one piece of advice to the 18 year old version of you, what would that be?

Keith 38:43

Wow. So I was not walking with Christ, so that would be the first one. Um, did you become in many ways? Like those that you spend your time with. So I would learn to spend time with God and I would really embrace spending time with God's people. That would be first and foremost. I so appreciate what you do and your team up there in Philadelphia on the campuses, because you're creating environments and spaces, you know, in, in a. You know, on some college campuses where there may not be great senses of Christian community. And I would say learning to spend time with God, and it sounds kind of cliche, but that's the one thing that once I realized God was real at 26, I'm like, wow, I've wasted a lot of time. And, and I, I look at my kids now in their twenties and they've been walking with God for 12, 13, 14 years now. And I, and they're so much more secure and, and, and just in a totally different place than where I was. So that would be first, I would say number two, um, uh, This is super practical is doesn't have anything to do with like the kingdom of God, but don't overlook the relationships that you can build in college, um, network, I mean, network, network, network, not for the sake of just, you know, having contacts and connections, but man, you just never know, uh, what God can do through relationships through to people that'll stay in touch. It's it's just amazing. And I've now it, you know, 50 years old. I watch the relationships that I, that have come along the way. And, um, it's just remarkable when you're, when you're 18, 1920, and on a college campus, people want to meet each other and want to get to know each other and, and get to know them. And when their families come and go to go to dinner with them. And when your family comes in, take three or four friends with you and just, you know, when Dave says, Hey, I'm. Buy an ice cream on campus show up and bring three or four people with you and, and, and take the time to get to know people. Cause I think that's one of God's greatest treasures. Um, and you just never know. You know, I mentioned my, my one daughter, um, that had a great job offer job of her dreams and the industry, you know, went on shutdown and she called somebody that she had had been networking with. And just on a Lark and that person now she's in a, you know, working a dynamic job in a startup, um, because she had, had, had built good relationships. Um, the other thing, what would I tell 18 year old me? Um, probably don't take myself too seriously. Uh, it's it's rare that the mistakes you make along the way are fatal. take a risk, take a shot. Dare to do something great. My, my other daughter, one of her favorite sayings, I heard her say, and, and I asked her where she got it. And she said, she got it from me. I'm like, really? But, uh, she has a bracelet that says, why not you? And, and I asked her about it and, and she said, dad, you, you, you say that to me all the time. And I'm like, I do. And she goes, yeah. When I'm like thinking, well, should I go out for a role in this play out? You always say, why not? You someone's going to get that role. Why wouldn't it be you? Whenever I talked about applying to an internship for the top theater in, in, in, in the country. And, and I'm like, I don't know if I'm going to get it. And dad, you said, why not? You someone's going to get it, take a shot. And I'm like, Oh, I apparently, I did say that. But, uh, why, why not?

David 42:33

Hmm,

Keith 42:34

Take a shot. I mean, I'm seven feet tall and you don't see a lot of us walking around, but there are plenty of six, 10, six, 11, seven feet tall people that never played in the NBA. I did, I'm one of 300 people when I was playing, there were 300 people in the NBA and every year, 4,000 people get struck by lightning, which means I had a 13 times a better chance of being struck by lightning than I did of playing in the NBA. But I, I made it why? Cause I went for it. I took a shot and. You know, what's the worst thing that happened? Well, I took a shot at the NBA and I ended up doing something else or why not? You? So I would tell 18 year old man, uh, the same thing I've told 18 year old, my daughters take a swing, go for it, you know, do your best and let Jesus do the rest. You have no idea what he may want to do with your life.

David 43:23

Well, that's fantastic. Well, pastor Keith. Yeah, this has just been gold. Really appreciate you investing your time into younger leaders and college students. And so, uh, again, thank you so much. This has just been so generous of you. You're, uh, just a hero to me and, uh, just. Just a, a resource of such rich wisdom and insight. Uh, some people in listening to this may want to hear more from you or get in contact with you, if you could share, uh, you know, whether there's a church website or anything where people might be able to further connect with you.

Keith 43:57

Sure. Our website is high point orlando.com high point orlando.com, H I G H P O I N T orlando.com. We post all of our sermons and messages there and, uh, you can follow us Highpoint, Orlando. Uh, on Facebook on Instagram, we do lots of just kind of goofy, fun stuff online. And Dave, before I get off, I would be remiss without saying, uh, you're one of my heroes as well. I so appreciate what you do for, for college students, the way you've developed leaders, the way you've sacrificially given of yourself, uh, to a younger generation, man, you have made a profound difference in the earth and, uh, very proud of you and your great family. Thank you so much for what you do. And thanks for having me on today.

44:39

Well, I so appreciated that insight and perspective from Keith tower. Just his years of experience in counseling, combined with pastoral ministry. And, uh, in particular to some of his insights in regards to anxiety and depression so I hope you're able to grab hold of some helpful takeaways there. I know I certainly did. And, uh, Hey, I'm in the midst of planning some upcoming episodes for the fall and lining up some guests I want to invite you to share some input. If there are people that you think, would be great guests, people that you might like to hear from here on this podcast, please shoot me a message. Let me know. And, uh, really my aim here is to serve you the listener. And so. Uh, really welcome that input. as you continue living and leading in the midst of, uh, what are some difficult times here? Um, I hope you are staying encouraged and, uh, I look forward to. Uh, hearing from you. So until next time, take care and stay encouraged