The UnlearnT Podcast
The UnlearnT Podcast is designed to help you gain the courage to change your mind about things you never thought you would change your mind about. Our hope is that you will begin to move towards a life of freedom after hearing stories from individuals who have chosen to unlearn some things in their lives.
The UnlearnT Podcast
Talks With Middle Adults: Why Am I So Emotional?
We explore the crucial process of unlearning harmful emotional lessons ingrained in us from childhood, emphasizing the importance of emotional vulnerability. This episode dives into the impact of societal expectations and the interplay between faith and emotions while encouraging listeners to confront their emotional baggage for true healing.
• Emphasizing the importance of emotional vulnerability
• Discussing societal and familial influences on emotional habits
• Clarifying the distinction between emotional transparency and vulnerability
• Examining the complexities of faith in relation to feelings
• Encouraging self-exploration and acceptance of emotions
Hello everybody and welcome once again to the Unlearned Podcast. I am your host, ruth Abigail, aka RA. What's up folks? It's your girl, jaquita, and this is the podcast that's helping you gain the courage to change your mind so that we can all experience more freedom. And let's see, we are recording. It's a beautiful Saturday. Queda is putting in a new deck.
Speaker 2:Y'all I've been running today, Okay. You hear me Running. Okay, shout out to my uncle and my cousin who are out here doing home renovation projects with me. And yeah, and my mama was here, and you know, when your mama is at your house, there's no rest, no Sitting down, no, it's so relaxing.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:She see five million things that need to be done, and my mom is the type of person like when she see it, she want it done. Right then, sure, right. So we were going to wash my deck pillows were a little dingy because I bought white pillows because I thought it would be cute not knowing more maintenance because it's white and it's outside, and so my mom was like on me about those pillows. I mean, but hey, you know, I'm saying stuff get done. Though, like when they leave, you feel like you be accomplished. Yeah, you feel like I Absolutely. Do you ever sit and think like I mean, you are, you know, in a parental role? Now, you know like, sometimes I like sit and think and I'm like am I going to be like this?
Speaker 1:Like do you like? Look at yourself now and be like ah, Jacqueline, the answer is yes, you will absolutely be like that.
Speaker 2:It will happen, you don't know how else to be. You know you only know one way it's the way you know. It's like you know. My children are in for a wild ride alright, I'm telling you now.
Speaker 2:There are moments that sticks up on me and I'm like oh no like, no, no, but you know, I think you know, even as a middle adult, because it has to always be mentioned okay, y'all, even as a middle adult, because it has to always be mentioned, ok, y'all got to recognize as a middle adult, like when I started like I went from being like you're like a big sister, you know, to like you're like an auntie. Yeah, you know to like. You know you're just really like a mom to me. That's right, you know, and I realize it through each of those stages of development. Sure, you know, I might write a little PhD about that. The. You know the trajectory of a black woman, you know as she goes through these different tropes. Okay, that was a real academic world. Very Like, you know, yeah, like, and you know. But like when I became like Mama Jaquita, I'm like, hey, let me tell y'all something. Everybody sit down around me, gather round.
Speaker 1:I want to spread my wisdom. Jaquita.
Speaker 2:No, but literally that's how people I think are friends, and then when they introduce you to their friends as their mentor, you're like Hilarious.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's who I am.
Speaker 2:That's more than friendship.
Speaker 1:That's who I am, so that's that's about right. Well, speaking of all the family, um, uh, uh, examples and all of that, we are talking about what things we had to unlearn from our environments. This could be a family, this could be your community. This could be your community. This could be society, um, so, yeah, last, last time, we talked about, uh, unlearning normal, uh, and how to overcome your giant of normal. If you haven't looked at that, feel, uh, you know, feel free, uh, take, take a look back. I think it's a pretty powerful episode because, um, we really have to unlearn what normal means at different seasons of our lives, and so, yeah, that's what we talked about. This week we're talking about something a little different, um, and I think this week I don't know this could be a little sensitive, um, a little sensitive of a topic. Yeah, it's a sensitive thing to talk about. Yes, agreed, yeah, um, so I uh, today's saturday we're recording on a saturday, right and for, on this particular side, this is not every saturday, but on this saturday it happens to be cleaning day, uh, for the gardner household, and so, um, I did a little cleaning.
Speaker 1:Well, the kid has a little play area and he was tasked to clean his play area. Well, he comes and says, okay, hey, I'm done cleaning my play area. I said okay, cool, so I'll go in there. I look at him. I say what's underneath that table? Dude, he looked at me. I said what's underneath the table? And he gonna say, well, it's just toys. I say lift it up, toys too big to fit. He has his bins. It's too too big to fit in the bins. I said okay, we'll lift it up here. I see paper, cardboard, all this trash. I see this whole thing.
Speaker 1:I said I wanted the floor clean. He had a pile of stuff in the corner that was smaller than the pile that he started with and he had stuffed some of the rest of it in the corner that was smaller than the pile that he started with and he had stuffed some of the rest of it under the table. And then there was other stuff, stuff underneath, he going to say I said no, sir. I said I wanted a clean floor. You're not done. He proceeded to take literally the next few hours to do it, did it all by himself, just came from in there before we started recording, recording clean floor. And I said what'd you learn from this dude? He said I'm a, I'm a, I'm a, clean it as I go. And this, I think, is an excellent way to begin this conversation.
Speaker 1:That's good. So what we're talking about today is unlearning what we've had to, the things we learned about emotions growing up and how many of us wish we'd have just cleaned as we went.
Speaker 2:Y'all. She didn't tell me that one that's not in the notes, Okay, she, I was wondering cause she looked like she looked like she was sitting on something. She didn't tell me she had a lead in like that. Oh my Lord, yes, Lord, it's going to be a good one y'all. How many of us?
Speaker 1:wish we would have cleaned up as we went, Because now you're older, you're going to learn all these possibly unhealthy ways of dealing with emotions and now you got to unpack that and look underneath and clean it and throw away the trash and it's taking you a long time to do it right, girl, girl, no, but for real you don't even realize like that.
Speaker 2:You have been stuffing stuff for so long.
Speaker 2:You know how people say I just have layers, right, but some of your layers really need to be discarded, like these are not layers, that, like you, have been stuffing trash underneath things and hiding things and suppressing things Correct, instead of getting it out and keeping a clean vessel. And so you know, I feel like as middle adults, you really get to a point where it really is kind of like you're at a crossroads and you get to a point where it's either I'm going to deal with this or I'm going to allow it to prevent me from prospering. That's right, because you really will get to a point where I can't carry this any further. Sorry, a biblical example just came to mind. Come on, I'm going to sneak it in there.
Speaker 2:We're not going to belabor the point, but the example that came to mind was Abraham and Lot. You know, abraham left his home of origin, right, and he wasn't supposed to take anything with him, but he brought Lot with him. Oh boy, he said hey, lot, my boy, you coming with Right. But then they got to the point they went as far as they could go together because they were at odds with one another Abraham's servants over here fighting with Lot's servants and they were not going to both be able to prosper in the same land.
Speaker 2:You have to know that your old you and your new. You are not both going to be able to prosper in the same land and you are going to have to make a decision. I want to continue to be set back by the old me and I'm going to end up in a place that I'm going to have to, that I'm going to end up that's going to burn Lot ended up in Sodom and Gomorrah, which ended up burning Like you're going to end up in a place where everything that you didn't deal with is going to come to the forefront and overtake you. Or do you want to give the new you a chance to prosper, but until you do the cleanup work, you won't be able to um to operate in your new season.
Speaker 1:So so much of that of that work is is internal, is with you, is with your heart and how you handle your heart, how you handle emotions, and so we want to share a little, a few things that we had to unlearn about that few things that we had to unlearn about that, particularly because it's what we were either like taught or just like saw. You know what I mean. So it may not have been something anybody specifically said, but it's what you observed and so you learned from that. Right, this is how I handle things, and we all have that Like. We all have those things Again, whether it's directly from your family or just from your community and the environment you were brought up in.
Speaker 1:Like you learn and pick up on certain things that then become habits that you then, you know, you weave into the rest of your life, and then you get to a season maybe that's the season you're in today where you're like this doesn't feel like it's helping me anymore. This is not. I'm not. I'm stuck, but I don't know what else to do because I don't know how. What I saw, this, this is all I know to do. So we want to share some of the things that we had to unlearn about how we handle our emotions and what we believe about emotions.
Speaker 2:Okay, so where to even begin? I know right, I know.
Speaker 1:Like for real, honestly, like when we were going, when I was writing in this, this didn't, this actually didn't take long, like it just kind of flow it flow yeah. Flow.
Speaker 2:That's what it is.
Speaker 1:I don't know what was happening, but it flowed. It didn't take long to come out because I realized, like these are really, these are, these are major things like. This is not. These aren't small things.
Speaker 2:So yeah, what, what, and I think it's something that we've been actively working on. Yeah, yeah, for sure, 100, yeah, 100 um.
Speaker 1:So, queda, why don't you go what you got? What's something you had to learn All?
Speaker 2:right. I think the first thing that we need to address is the sister soldier that's in all of us.
Speaker 1:My.
Speaker 2:Lord, this, this idea of being a strong woman, right. And I think that I saw my mom, single mom, raising two girls, working as many jobs as she had to, you know, doing everything. I saw everything but like an emotionally vulnerable piece, and so I think that part of me I wouldn't say that I'm a highly emotional person, I would but I would say that that is probably the case because I grew up learning to numb and self-soothe pain instead of identifying and addressing it, and so I think that one of the things that I had to unlearn, especially in my thirties. It became a huge deal and I would, I dare say it was really after 35, like I think 30 was when I started saying, huh, these emotions are not going anywhere. It does not matter how many times I try to push them to the side, it doesn't matter how much I try to pretend like they're not there. They are there.
Speaker 2:And I was living so much with all of this kind of accumulated pain and, you know, suffering and sometimes anger and sometimes sadness, sometimes a lot a load of disappointment, right. But I had to learn to really take a step back and say you don't have to be this quote unquote strong woman that continues to push and, push and push and get things done and never feel your feelings. And so I had to learn and it took. It took a while. It took a while for me to be able to step back from a situation because I had been so out of practice from actually having emotional reactions to things that I was not able to identify what emotions was coming up in different situations. Right, so, like I would, I would never, you know. I think people who probably knew me in my twenties and early thirties was like she don't really get angry. You know I have a righteous indignation about the Lord. Okay, they probably saw that.
Speaker 1:You know, if it was something about Jesus, I was like oh wait a minute, I might've flipped the table at two in my day, for my Lord.
Speaker 2:Okay. But when it came to me I was always like oh no, that's okay, oh no, I'm fine, yeah, I'm good. Oh no, I'm not sad, and I, you know. And I had to learn to one take a step back and say no, jaquita, how did that really hit you, so that I could identify the emotions. Then I had to get past my intellectual self, because I am very much an intellectual person and I can intellectualize and rationalize. And I would call Ruth and Joy and all my other friends and I would just sit there and I would talk about my feelings and I'd be like yeah you know, I think I'm angry.
Speaker 2:I think I'm angry. Yeah, I might be angry, but I didn't feel it.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I had to move from identifying it to being, like, I'm not mad about that and it was wrong. You know, you don't be held accountable, right and but. That took such a process for me to be able to, to feel, to feel like I was even worthy of that process, to even be able to have feelings that show up in public spaces public spaces.
Speaker 1:I'm glad you mentioned that public piece because this is something that we we shared. And as specifically, um, I just tagged this on like I had to unlearn that, um, holding back tears publicly made me strong and I, I cause I, I can't say I haven't, I don't cry and I don't release by myself, but it's around others or in a like publicly. It's like I, it's like you want to maintain this of strength, right, and so I don't. It's interesting that that is. I think we both share that, like you said, like that's, there's this, there's this need to feel strong. Where do you like I? I feel like I, I definitely was.
Speaker 1:I admired my father a lot and I could count the number of hands that I see my father cry, um, and I'd seen him be down, I'd seen him, you know, you know, be solemn or just not, but but not cry and uh, and and when he did it, it I just didn't even know how to handle it and I think I kind of took that and um, and I think I kind of took that and really modeled myself after that. It's like, well, you know, I'm like my dad, you know everybody, and everybody used to tell me that, so we don't even have to go, we're never going to go down that road. But everybody used to say to me all the time you're just like your father, just like your father, just like your father. And so in my head, I'm thinking I have to do everything like him, including hold my tears. Wow, right, like that was something that I felt like I needed to do.
Speaker 1:And, um, my mom has never had a problem releasing her emotions, ever. My mother, you were going to know exactly how she feels and cause she's what, and she'll tell you like I, uh, I get it out and then I'm done, I don't, I don't hold on to stuff, and and so she, she and my father are opposite that way, and I I do have the tendency to hold on um to things and not release them immediately, but even more so because, it's like you know, people say I'm like my dad, I want to be like my dad. Um, I don't cry.
Speaker 1:My dad don't cry, wow you know I mean and that I had to unlearn that because, just like, not crying doesn't make you, doesn't make you strong, um what about your dad?
Speaker 2:did you admire that? You thought was like connected to the not crying piece.
Speaker 1:I think it was how other people held him, the regard that other people held him in, and that he seemed to be the place where other people came. And it's like if you feel, if, if I feel like I don't have, if I don't, if I don't seem like I have it together, then how can I be there for other people? You know what I mean. So if I have this perception of, well, she's just gonna break down, well, I can't, I can't count on her to be strong, so I, I gotta, I need somebody who can, who I can be strong around.
Speaker 2:And so I think in the back of my head that may have been playing itself out like people don't, people don't rely on people who don't have it together wow, wow and see, I think for me the thing that was the kind of like mantra that was going through my head was that, like, you have to rely on yourself, and so I was trying to be strong for me, like, yes, for other people too. But I was like, hey, if you break down, there may not be a way to put you back together, and I think that that's always been like something that was kind of like like an undercurrent, even in the ways that, like I, like built friendships and built relationships, the ways I related to, like my parents and everyone else, it was a hey, if you, if you break down, there's nobody going to be able to put the pieces back together.
Speaker 2:And so I think that there was something internally that was like hold it together, hold it together, hold it together, hold it together. But you get to a point where things around you start crumbling and you have to like go back and find that inner thing. But I think it's important, even as we're continuing to have this conversation about kind of like you know, emotional vulnerability, how we found it, how we've grown in it. You know, and for everyone listening is that you have to figure out what is kind of like that, that that thing that you have believed, that has built, you know, entire structures and understandings about how you relate to other people. What is the thing that you believe that has kept you from really being able to dig deeper into your emotions? And for me it definitely was like there is not going to be anyone that's going to come, that's going to be able to help you, and so and you know, and it sounds like for you you were like I won't be respected yeah if I express that emotions like that's and that and and what's.
Speaker 1:What's interesting is you know, there's a quote that I, I've, I think I've said it before and I it's just. It's a quote my father shared with me years ago. That just stuck with me. Don't know who said it. It's a psychologist. Nobody's really credited to a specific person, but he's credited to a psychologist that says children are great imitators of their fathers, but terrible, terrible interpreters.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've heard that, but that's good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think that has a lot to do with we see and we do, but we don't understand, right. And so in my case I see that and it's like I want to be respected. Don't cry, because it makes you seem weak and you people don't respect people who are weak. But I don't know how much crying my father has done outside of my presence to make him respected because he understands people, not just because he's strong, because he understands people, because he's cried too, and that's what didn't.
Speaker 1:I don't know that because when I'm growing up, all I see is he doesn't cry. But I don't know that because when I'm growing up, all I see is he doesn't cry. But I don't know how he got to the place he got. There was a lot of crying. That happened, um, and so I think that's just like to your point. I mean, we have to be so careful not to pick up truth just from observation, with no understanding.
Speaker 2:I don't know why that hit me, but it did. Even in thinking about my own life, I saw the work my mom did. I don't know what was going on internally because I did not even as a child. If I had seen it, I don't know how I would have processed it, you know, and so there's a lot. Even you know.
Speaker 2:The Bible says that we see in part. It also says we prophesy in part. But I think it's important to know that, like, what you are seeing is not yours. You can never see the entire picture because we don't see as God sees. That's right, and so you know it was also only in my 30s that I really started having real conversations with my parents. That helped me to understand. Like I had conversations with my dad and I was like, wait a minute, what? What happened to your child? Yeah, what you endured, what you went through, what, and it gave it opened up. I mean rooms and rooms and rooms of understanding for me. But like I didn't have that information as a child and so everything that I processed emotionally from you know, experiences and relationships you only I was processing with half the information you know that's not to remove accountability in anyone's situation.
Speaker 2:Right, you know, but realize you don't know the whole story.
Speaker 2:Man look, you don't know the whole story and even after all that he's told me, I'm like there's still so many layers that I still you know what I'm saying, I still don't know, you know, still, you know what I'm saying, I still don't know. You know, um. But I think one thing I want to make sure I uh, I point out, when it comes to um, what I was saying about not being able to identify my feelings. For there may be some other people, you know, I always tell people everyone looks different when they get overwhelmed, right. You have some people who get overwhelmed and they scream, fuss and fight, right. And they are like really, really, they start articulating that I'm tired, I'm sick of this, I don't want to be here. Then you have other people who get really quiet, withdrawn, right.
Speaker 2:I know for me, when I feel overwhelmed, I get stuck, it's like I can't, I can't produce when I'm, when I have too much sitting up here, and part of the uh, the thing I had to do was especially with understanding being emotionally overwhelmed, meaning you're overloaded with feelings that you don't always understand and that you can't yet express. I again, before I say anything, I just want to reiterate we are not counselors. We are just middle adults. We've been out here, that's it Living life.
Speaker 1:We have no degrees in counseling or psychology. I ain't got it. None of that. Nope, I got a divinity degree though. Yeah, I have a communications degree. I'm degreed to play and I'm music. Come on, you know break out Ruth's a worshiper. Well, amen, I could talk a little bit A Levite, if you will. Goodbye, jaquita, Keep going with your story. I'm sorry.
Speaker 2:I really only said that to get on her nerves, but listen, okay. So listen, nothing we saying here is going to take the place of any good counselor. Now, a good one, a good counselor, you know what I'm saying Pastoral counseling, christian counseling, regular counseling, therapy, all of the things right. But I will encourage you to whatever is going to be kind of your next step, to seek out something that's going to help you to understand your emotional depth and how you are going to begin processing and and addressing the things that are on the inside of you Because, like we said, you know it's a lot of stuff we've been stuffing under the table, that we've been hiding in boxes and in closets and and sorry, I got stuck coming out the closet, you know in the M and M song.
Speaker 2:But anyways, we you. There's so much stuff that we've been storing and you need help processing those things, you know. So I just want to take a moment to encourage you. It doesn't matter how mild you believe your situation is, I guarantee you when you start digging you'll be like dang, okay, I got some things to work on here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you do, you do for sure More than you believe, do, uh for sure more than you believe. Um, I, I think, I think this is a good, I want to, I want to bring up another unlearning that I had that, um, I think, connects to what you're saying, and that's this idea of vulnerability, because I think we, we, we get it, uh, we get it confused with transparency. So, um, like you said, identifying something like this is what it is, I'm identifying it and that is so. So, one of the things I had to learn, number one the transparency. And because they're experts, but just in the best way, we know how right Transparency is like I think I've heard oh man, I hope I don't mess this up I think I've heard it said like this Transparency is like looking through a window and vulnerability is like looking in a mirror.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:And so I think that's right. We're going to go with that for right now, but yeah we're going to keep. Well, we'll keep going. If that doesn't make sense, hopefully this next thing will like. But? But essentially, transparency is releasing like that's the. There is stuff that is true, that has happened, that you release and you make known. That is. That is. That is transparency. Vulnerability is the act of allowing yourself to be exposed right so that other people have access to what you have been protected because of those things that you've released.
Speaker 2:Come on, it ain't vulnerable if you ain't been protecting it.
Speaker 1:No like that's the difference and it's like, hey, you can release stuff and you can still release, but still protect you in the process. I could tell you things that have happened but not be open to your response to that. I'm not vulnerable. So what I had to unlearn is that releasing, just simply releasing things and releasing your emotions makes you vulnerable. That's not true. It doesn't make you vulnerable. You have to understand what's behind the emotion.
Speaker 1:Like you got to go deeper, right, um, I remember me and Queen were talking about that. We talked about this a while back and this is, um, I feel like we'd be repeating stuff, queen, because I feel like we said this on the pod before, early on, but maybe it's a conversation me and you had and we were talking about, like this, um, like you know, you get into a point where you're you're wanting to be more vulnerable, right, and uh, describing like there is a um, you know there's stuff on the inside and, like you, you're like, okay, I'm, I'm getting old, but then there's this little like safe in the corner and there's a key to that safe and the vulnerability is unlocking the safe, even though there's all this other stuff around it. It's like it's like the difference between, okay, with, like, you robbing a bank and just robbing the teller, or you're going to the vault. Okay, I'm just I can't think of anything better but it's like why we gotta be robbing. I'm sorry. Okay, all right, I don't know what. It didn't need to be robbed, you're right.
Speaker 1:True, but the good stuff is in the vault. Yes, it's not behind the desk, okay, and so you know. So you have to be brave enough to get to the vault, and we talked about that, and it's just like, hey, there's, yeah, this is good, but what's? What's? What's in the vault and what's behind the thing that you're releasing?
Speaker 2:And that's where your vulnerability comes and that's that's really the emotion that has to be dealt with, um is what's behind the information that you're releasing let's just call them suitors Things that I've tried and they're like, yeah, I'm a really vulnerable person you won't find anyone more vulnerable than me and I'm like you're very transparent. You tell a lot of stories, you're a great storyteller, but you are not really unpacking how this has really affected. You Affect affected emotions Like you have not really. You have you are not really forthright with what's going on internally. You don't mind telling your business to make it, but that's almost to throw you off Right. And and people do that People trauma dump. Yeah, people you know, like they, they can't wait to tell somebody about. You know what they've been through and you know everything that happened to them, but you're not really. That's not unpacking. Yeah, that's showing me what's in the case.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Hey, come over here and look at this case, look at everything in there, and when I reach in and be like, hey, let's take that out, no-transcript. You know, like I'm like you, in order for this to be a very vulnerable moment, you have to escort me in. Yes.
Speaker 1:To your vault.
Speaker 2:Do not make me. I can't break down the door myself. Right, you have you. You know they got the vaults with the big locks that go like that. Look like you know steering wheels and you want me to break down the wall to get into your? No, you have to escort somebody else in and you have to give them the key and you have to allow them to have a key to you, and y'all have to experience vulnerability as a shared experience.
Speaker 1:Yes, really good.
Speaker 2:You get what I'm saying. That's great Because it's an exposure. Yeah, it is being exposed and I think that if you have not done the work yourself to really begin to unpack yourself what's in there, it is going to be difficult for you to explain to somebody else what's in your vault. You know, I don't know if anyone watches Manifest. It's a. I think it's like four or five series on Netflix. It's the series about the airplane and they come back and they've been lost for five years and right.
Speaker 2:But there's a one episode where they're walking into, they're walking this man who seems really troubled. He was holding up a bank and he was like take me to the vault. And they got the vault. Finally, they get the vault open and they're looking. They're like look, there's your money, I don't care about this money. And he pulls out like a wristwatch and he starts boohoo, crying and they all looking at him like and then he tells the story about how his grandfather was saved in World War II because because he had that, uh, that thing in his pocket, in his breast pocket. And it's like nobody else.
Speaker 2:If I go in and look in your vault, I'm just gonna see plain things, I'm gonna okay, there's I. Nobody else is gonna be able to tell you what this stuff means. Yeah, you are gonna be able to have. You are gonna have to be able to articulate what's in your vault and not just, hey, I let you in. No, no, baby. What? This is a random little. Why is this so important? Did your mama throw this at you? What happened? Why is this impactful to you? You have to be able to articulate this is.
Speaker 1:This was the significance of this to me and this is why I've been holding it so so close um and trying to secure it um a good a good uh, a good resource to help unpack, uh, your vault and to name it uh is is, if you haven't heard, um, the emotion wheel, the wheel of emotions, okay, and cause, sometimes it's hard to identify what the actual emotion is. I mean, there's so many different emotions and we really only talk about a handful of them. Um, but what, what you might have classified as sadness, might actually be disappointment. What you, um, what you may have classified as anger, may actually have been, um, pride, um, or you know, uh, or anxiety, or something that there, it's something that you don't, you don't, we don't often talk use.
Speaker 1:The language of. That can help, so you can Google it. It's a million different types of them. But look at it and like, if you're like, hey, I need to, I need to name this, I need to begin to identify what's really behind this stuff so that you know what it really is, and then, like was saying the um, the story behind it becomes, becomes more apparent, right, uh, as opposed to, that made me sad. You weren't really sad, you know your expectation wasn't met. Like that's deeper than sadness, like you were deeply disappointed and like what does that lead to? So, just, you know, I'm sure, some, a lot of you have heard of it, but you may not use it, you may not look at it. It's really really helpful, um, really helpful to really get some different language around different emotions.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'll definitely say that that was one of the things that helped me to learn how to like. I would just be sitting there and I'd be like I feel big feelings, yeah, I don't know what it is. And then I would go and I'd be like okay, which one of these bigger words match? Okay, it's anger. Okay, out of anger, out of the ones under anger. Okay, I'm frustrated. Yeah, right, and then it. That helps you to better navigate the moment. Yes, that's good.
Speaker 1:Um Quido, what's up? What's something else you've had to unlearn?
Speaker 2:Okay, okay, okay. So I I think I have talked about this before, but it's it's always worth mentioning. Um, I had to unlearn being positive, patty. Oh, I was, I was silver lining McGee out here. Okay, I was, you know. Hey, everything is rainbows and sunshine, okay, all the time. And when people would present me with hard situations, I would immediately try to flip it for them and say, hey, you know, but it's really not that bad, because when you look at it this way, it's going to work for your good. Yeah, there you go.
Speaker 2:I have been like that since childhood, and one thing that I really began unpacking as we were preparing for this episode is is that I internalized thinking that being positive is what made people want to keep me around Right. People want to keep me around Right, and so that, like as long as my mission in life became make them smile, make them feel good about themselves, and then they won't try to push you out, or they will. They will always feel a need for you because you are the positive person. And so I really built kind of like an emotional life around. I'm going one way or another. We're going to flip it and people are going to leave an encounter with me feeling great about their situation, and it took me a while to trust the integrity of my relationships enough to tell people the whole truth. That's good.
Speaker 2:It's not that what I was saying wasn't true, because I still, you know, I'm a person that's of great hope and I'm always excited and hopeful and I really do find a positive thing, the positive side of things and hopeful, and I really do find the positive thing, the positive side of things. But I, I think in my middle adult years, I started being able to hand people a full picture and say, hey, it's hard right now and, yes, this sucks, and yes, what they did was wrong, and you have every right to feel the way that you feel. But and you know what I'm saying Like I was able to give a more layered response because I wasn't, I wasn't looking for I, I, I didn't need from the interaction, reinforcement and and my emotions kind of a massage. Yeah, I was able to serve because I learned that, like you're more than just positive.
Speaker 1:Yeah, um, I think you said something really key is you had to trust the integrity of your relationships. That's really really. That's really really, man. That is key, because how many of us temper our emotions based on the reaction from others, because you're unsure of what that's going to bring, because you're really unsure about the relationship you don't know Right, and I think that's that's such a and we, and again, those are things we learned how to do, based on how we just grew up and began to manage ourselves emotionally. Like this is this is this is what I can, um, I I have to make sure that this relationship remains intact. So I learned how to manage my emotions around that, their responses and that's.
Speaker 2:that's a big deal. I think that I think that even as we're talking about, you know, like kind of these, uh, kitchen table topics and things that, like, you've learned from your family of origin, right, A lot of what you learned and a lot of the ways that you, you know how people say just this, just the way I am.
Speaker 1:Right, what made you that way, man? What made you that way?
Speaker 2:Come on, because maybe you don't have to be that way and maybe maybe after you're done unpacking, you might look around and be like this is actually not who I am. No, that's right. You know. What was really interesting is when I was back in high school, like if you had asked anybody like what they like what their impression of me was, they would have said something like oh yeah, jaquita, like she's kind of quiet, she's shy, she doesn't talk a lot. You know like she is, you know bubbly around her friends, but you know she's a little bit more introverted, right. Anybody who knew me in college would be like who are you talking about? Because that is not Jaquita.
Speaker 2:But when I was in high school I was surrounded by friends who were kind of popular, like they were out there, everybody loved them, right.
Speaker 2:And I was also fighting a lot of insecurities and fighting this idea of being too much.
Speaker 2:Somebody called me intimidating one day and that just completely rocked my world and I was shrinking and I was getting smaller and smaller and smaller until I started kind of looking up under the table and in the boxes and in the places where I had hid all the things, that I started trying really exploring who I was and allowing myself to be outgoing and vibrant and you know, and a big and take up space. And I remember the summer after high school I went to a friend's house and it was a bunch of people over there and I was over there cracking jokes and you know, being myself, and they were like we didn't know you talk, we didn't know you were funny. Like, didn't know I was funny, imagine Right. But like they, they were absolutely like in shock. And that's when I realized, like who you are today, when you start unpacking that stuff that you've been stuffing away and what you've been trying to suppress, you would be surprised at who you actually end up being.
Speaker 2:So, all of these people who try to get us to accept the version of you that has not gone through a process. We're looking at you. Sometimes you have people who are looking at you and they're like no, there's more there, there's more to you than what you're presenting we just got to again. Emotional vulnerability is going to be the key that will begin unlocking.
Speaker 1:Yeah, um, can we uh, yes, I, I think, uh, this is interesting because what you, what sometimes, uh, we call, we call our, the personality traits. Our personality traits that we, um, that we identify with, our personality traits that we identify with, are really, uh, products of dysfunction. And so, when we begin to be more functional and when we begin to actually become more healthy, a lot of sometimes those personality traits begin to shift and you have to allow yourself to be reintroduced to the healthy version of you.
Speaker 2:Hmm, yeah.
Speaker 1:Which can be, which can be weird. Sometimes it could be like you know a little and it could be weird for other people because they're not used to the and they don't necessarily know that it's unhealthy, right.
Speaker 2:Not just weird, challenging.
Speaker 1:Challenging Cause. They've gotten to know you a certain way and like, like. For you, quina, like you were saying, if you could imagine you being the quiet version of yourself, the quiet person you really didn't say a whole lot, and so the people around you, and then all of a sudden you turn into somebody who has a lot more life, energy, more outgoing, and it's like, well, that's not who you used to be. So now it feels like I don't even really even know you anymore, like, or I feel like our personalities are competing, or the spotlight is more on you than me and I need to. Now it's like now we're fighting for the, for the, for the, for the attention or whatever, like, and.
Speaker 1:But I think that's that's sometimes the risk of understanding who you are emotionally. Um, is the risk is the change that comes as a result of that Like your personality. It's very possible that your personality will go through a shift that will make others uncomfortable around this new version of you. But is it worth being dysfunctional and maintaining relationships as a dysfunctional version of yourself or becoming more healthy and developing relationships as a person that you actually want to continue to cultivate and maintain?
Speaker 2:So this is kind of bumping against one of my other points, because I think one of the things that I continually was I continually was especially kind of like in my 30s and moving. You know, in your 30s you start off in your early 30s, sure. You have your middle 30s, sure. And you have your late 30s, sure. I have just now entered into the realm of the late 30s. There you go, all right. All right, middle adults you understand, you understand.
Speaker 2:But I think in my early 30s is when I really started to really consider, like, what am I not requiring of other people? But what am I? What am I communicating to other people that I need and allowing that to to be a part, one of the driving forces in our relationships? Because in my 20s I was focused on hey way they relate to me. It was almost like I had to be more aware of people's emotional state than they were, because I was so afraid of how something might come back on me, like you know, like if somebody expressed anger, I was like, okay, wait a minute, wait a minute, I got it. First of all, I need to be able to foresee that. I don't want no surprises. Don't pop up on me surprised. I'm like eyeballing you. All right, you know the way she picked that teddy bear up and how she normally pick a teddy bear up and she about to pop off and I need to be ready and it's a very high, strong place to be. And so I spent so much of my life really, really keyed in to what's going on inside of other people and I never expected or requested or really advocated for people doing the same for me yeah, yeah, yeah you know, maybe not in that way, but hey, I need you to know that how I feel this is, and I think this is part of the new way that I started showing up.
Speaker 2:I started being like, hey, that really bothers me when you do that and I don't like that. Yeah, and people were like unbothered Jaquita, right, not as preferences. Like unbothered Jaquita not has preferences, yeah, she does. Okay, she does. She not just taking anything that's presented to her. Yeah, right, you know, unbothered Jaquita was out here getting walked all over. Yeah, and I think that that's something that you and I talked a lot about in our friendship was like hey, jaquita, no, you need to stand up for yourself. Yeah. Was like hey, no, you need to stand up for yourself. Yeah, and, but I was afraid to because you are weighing the balance of what might I lose? Yes, if I assert anything or if I ask for anything, am I gonna lose everything? If I ask for anything, am I gonna lose everything? That's good.
Speaker 2:And that is where, again, emotional vulnerability, trusting the integrity of your relationships you have to take the risk to peek your head out and say, hey, I don't want to hide in the shadows of this relationship anymore. I want to be a star player in my own life. I want to be a star player in my own life. I want to be a star player in these one-on-one relationships that I have with people that I say I'm really close with. I want to be the star.
Speaker 2:I'm not a supporting cast member. Yeah, in in our, in our friendship. Yeah, I'm not. I'm not the side character, I'm not a walk-on, sure, sure'm a main. We are both main characters and, as the protagonist, okay, I have needs. I have the storyline right. We're going to have conversations that explore what both of us are getting and what both of us need, and it's going to be vulnerable for everybody. But you have to start showing up in that relationship like that and not as, like you know, like the Niecy to Myesha yeah, yeah, yeah, you know what I'm saying. Or Moesha, moesha, yeah, moesha. Or what's another sidekick? The Dejanay to Penny? There you go From the Proud Family.
Speaker 1:You know, what I'm saying I don't know, I couldn't, I couldn't get you know I'm saying starsky and hutch, you know, uh, I'm not, I'm not getting anymore.
Speaker 2:You're not as good as this, you know you could at least went. Bonnie and clive. No, it's too late, it's too late. It's too late, you know, but we're both, we are both main characters. Right, and you to stop. I think a lot of times we make ourselves the side character. I was the side character. Yeah, that's real. I was showing up like hey y'all, I'm just here to make sure the main character has a great time and that their storyline gets told well, and I'm just here for a little comic relief. And then I'ma peace out. Absolutely not little adult baby sit down. We got to talk. Yeah, okay, hey friend, hey bestie, all right, let's chit in the chat. All right, because I have needs. You know, side characters they don't get to have needs, except for that special episode that you do every other season, sure.
Speaker 1:You know, every other season they're like you know what?
Speaker 2:Sure you know what, like Martin, they be. Like Tommy, this your show. Yeah, this show today is about Tommy. That's right. How many Tommy episodes did we get? You can go on and see, yeah, but you cannot. You are going to get to a point in middle adult years and your young adult years, you know like, you feel like, hey, this side character gig is going to work out One day.
Speaker 1:It's going to One day they're going to make a season about me. Sometimes you get them.
Speaker 2:Sometimes you get the sequels. They rebooted the whole Proud Family, the whole Proud Family franchise, and did a whole reboot. And still DeJanea side character, hilarious Still all the friends side characters. You're going to end up in a reboot and you're going to feel like you are reliving your twenties all over again. Don't, let me tell you something the only way to avoid a reboot is that you are going to have to stand up and demand what it is you need, and for so long I was afraid to do that and I thought the show was going to get canceled. I thought, if I, if I became a person in a relationship that needed something and that the other person is like ew, I have to cater to you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's tough.
Speaker 2:You know what I'm saying. I thought I was like they're going to end the relationship, they're going to back away from me, I'm not going to have this person in my life anymore. And we can talk about all of the deep reasons why I had these fears, right. But right now we're dealing with my emotional vulnerability and how I got there. I had to say you know what? I trust the safety of these relationships, that they're not going to end, and I will tell you you have to be okay with taking a step, because that's how they got deeper. Yes, that was how we went to the next level and that was how we've maintained 20 years of friendship. That's right. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2:We weren't going to maintain it with everybody being side characters. Nobody wants to watch that. Who wants to watch a whole season of side characters? We're going to be like all right, even the Avengers got a leader. Y'all know Avengers be having leaders. Everybody step up to be the main character at some point. Yeah, all right, either. Captain America got to be like all right. Iron man be like, hey, all right, somebody got to be the leader, right. Somebody got to step up and bring main character energy out here in these streets. Absolutely, you have to allow for that.
Speaker 1:Amen, can we do this? Can y'all indulge us for a few more minutes as we pivot to something I think is really, really important for us to address? Um it? We haven't talked a whole lot about how kind of your, your faith um walk, your faith journey impacts the way you perceive emotions, and so, um, I think I think this is important.
Speaker 1:I, I, I'll, I grew up in a family. You know, my father's a pastor. We grew up in church, we was church people, all that stuff. Um, we grew up I was, we were the family that did Bible studies in the morning at 5am. He would teach us things. Um, you know I was, I went to a Christian school.
Speaker 1:Uh, we were very, very, very um, immersed in the word of God and the Bible. Okay, we knew a high, high biblical knowledge. Um, and that could sometimes be, uh, hmm, how do I say this? As we grew, as we grew, as I grew older, what I, what I begin to realize is that I sometimes begin to use my biblical knowledge as a, as a cop out for feeling, feelings, feelings. So it's like well, because I know the truth, I really don't need to be paying attention to these feelings, because these feelings don't don't, um, don't outweigh the truth, which is true.
Speaker 1:Let me be clear Feelings don't outweigh the truth, but it doesn't mean they're irrelevant, and I had to unlearn that because I was so, the truth was so ingrained in me that I didn't know how to feel real feelings and be okay with that. And I had to unlearn that. I really had to unlearn that truth that Jesus didn't care about my feelings, he only cared about the truth. No, no, he cares about how you feel, but they don't outweigh the truth. I do want to say that very clearly. They do not outweigh the truth, but they matter. And sometimes I think in Christian culture, in church culture, it could come across like your feelings don't matter.
Speaker 2:Listen, oh my gosh, I okay. Just as a note, my story is almost the exact opposite of you. I did not grow up with 5 am prayer. I did not grow up, you know, I think we went to church for a while and then we didn't. And then I found, really, really I found church going friends in high school and they were like, hey, we're joining the gospel choir like senior year. And then that was when I was like what's this gospel music you speak of? This is different. Huh, a little hand clap, a little rock, this is a whole different vibe, right.
Speaker 2:And then that was kind of like started my journey to walk with God, especially in my college years, and I will say, as I was really getting to know God and faith and church, I was learning faith and truth, along with learning, like all of these emotions are now starting to come up about what I'm experiencing and I feel like there were a couple of times when I felt like it was like, hey, you need to really shut down the feelings, because we don't operate off of feelings, we operate off of faith. Yeah, yeah, like we are not. You know, listen, all them tears. Yeah, no, you need to pray. Yeah, you know, you need to go find a scripture and hold fast to God's unchanging word. You know, and I didn't struggle with that at first because I was like, oh, okay, you know what I'm saying. First of all, I'm not really a crier anyway, so cool. And then also, okay, you don't want me to feel cool, I don't need to, I don't need to address my feelings, right, I, I.
Speaker 2:And so when I went to divinity school, after four years of I had really given my life to God, I became a religion major. The Lord sent me to continue learning about ministry. I went to divinity school and I was like child, you know, I was like this is the, this is the word of God and y'all need to respect it and reverence it and learn, and learn to walk in it. And I became like a talking head, right, I became like a hey, hey, what about the word? What about the word, what about the word? And it was, I remember, because I used to be hard. I was hard on the yard in that divinity school.
Speaker 1:Okay, I was like hey, hey, friends.
Speaker 2:I don't know. Y'all supposed to be preparing to be pastors, ministers and leaders and I need y'all to believe the things and be able to articulate things. I remember I was standing on a balcony one day and the Lord was like why are you judging my people? Who gave you that right? Who basically like a? Who do you think you are? But it was. It was me taking down that wall that allowed me to begin feeling the feelings and seeing the things and then becoming overwhelmed with the weight of things like shame and guilt and sadness, grief, anger, but still actively in my twenties, trying to suppress that. Because I'm trying to be a woman of faith. I'm trying to be.
Speaker 2:Now I got, I have the MDiv and I want people to trust me with it. I want people to say, okay, jaquita, maybe that's somebody that could be useful in ministry. I didn't yet want to be a minister, but I wanted to be useful, right, I wanted to feel trusted in faith spaces because I was beginning to be seen as someone with a call or someone that could be given a microphone and I wanted to be trusted. And I didn't think I could be trusted if I was also emotional. I was also being told you cannot be trusted until you learn to stop being, until you learn to stop having feelings. But the feelings were so strong I mean it was like everything from my entire life was coming up to the surface and I think one of the things that I had to unlearn was that being spiritual meant being emotionally blank or emotionally void of emotions. Right, that we process things through a lens of faith and that we should not be processing things through the lens of our carnality. But you are a real life person having real life experiences. That's right.
Speaker 2:And now when I look back, you know, and I and I kind of merged the world of like my religious vocation and kind of my vocation of working, kind of in like higher education and working with students and working I realized that, like one, when you look at the Bible, there were a lot of emotionally bothered people that we base a lot of our walk on. I mean, david was going through it. He was angry, he was grieved, he was disappointed, he was sorrowful, he was guilty. You know he had shame, he was working through those emotions and some of the Psalms that we are like constantly repeating, like you know David would be like the waves, are washing over me in my grief, you know like, creating me a clean heart, renewing me a right spirit. These are emotional Psalms. When you think about Jeremiah the crying prophet, he was crying and prophesying, he was lamenting and tearing down Right and.
Speaker 2:And when you think about the duality of it, you have got it. Your faith wall, your, your belief in God, who, who is the greatest lover of your soul, who is king, but he's also father, right? When you start thinking about the balance of it, you have to be able to trust God with the seed of your emotions. You have to put him on the seat and put him on the throne and say, god, I have this, but I'm trusting you with it, and not try to say, god, I have this, but I'm working really hard to get rid of it. I'm working really hard not to be angry anymore, and when I stop being angry, I'll come back and chat with you about it. But you know, no, you have to go to God and say, god, I'm angry and I really need some perspective so that you can help me to unpack it. Not help me to stop being angry, right, but God helped me to understand the root of it and unpack it.
Speaker 1:And I think that when you do that, something else, that in that process of bringing your emotions to God, bringing your emotions and like I like how you said that putting him on the seat of your emotions, you need to be prepared for that emotion to be met with a truth that may not always be emotionally satisfying. So there is a reality to being honest about your emotions and bringing that and then being able to receive truth in the midst of it, in the midst of how you feel, and understanding that sometimes you might still feel how you feel, even if you know the truth. And that's okay, that is okay. You know that when you hear the truth, when because when you, when you bring, when you bring God into the situation, when you, when you allow him to sit on that seat, he is going to be compassionate and loving and truthful, he's going to be gracious and truthful. God is not going to leave you swimming in your feelings that he wouldn't be a good God if he did that. So you will, and so, but understand I think that's the beauty of the of what the seeming dichotomy of grace and truth grace prepares you for, truth, that's that's.
Speaker 1:You have to have that in order to receive it. So truth can be difficult to hear, but grace is kind of like the um, uh, that, no, that's not what I want to say. Okay, grace, grace often prepares it when, when, prepares you to hear, to hear the truth, and so I think that's what is. Is is important. As you are practicing releasing your emotions and giving them to God, don't think that you're not going to then be met with a truth that might not solve how you feel in the moment. That's not the point.
Speaker 2:That's not what it's supposed to do.
Speaker 1:You get to feel how you feel and accept the truth at the same time. As a lot of people like to say, two things can be true at the same time. The truth is the truth and you feel how you feel. One does not cancel out the other, and I think in church and in Christian culture, we try to make one override the other, when really they need to be. You need to learn, um, exist in that tension, because the reality is that tension is going to, it's going to be inside of you all the time, and the worst thing we can do and I think what we tend to do and, queen, I'm going to tag back to what you said earlier about this being positive, being overly positive, right, I think in Christian culture, we tend to color our real emotions with Christian positivity.
Speaker 1:That's not really true and we use truth to do that. Like you said, right, um, god's gonna work it out for my good. Okay, cool, but you just lost the most important person in your life. Don't tell me that God is gonna work it out for my good. Who wants to hear that? Like, that is not. So I don't look, look, is it true? Yes, is it true, absolutely. However, don't try to pull me from my grief by coloring something positive with the truth. Don't misuse God's word with God's people and I think that's that is. It's a disservice sometimes to. I mean that is, we have to be very careful about that. I think the truth is the truth and you get to feel how you feel. At the same time, you have to allow for that tension to exist and you have to allow for people to exist in that tension. Don't try to pull people out of that because you're uncomfortable with it, because often that's the case right, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't think people realize I took a lot of pastoral care class and it takes walking with people through tough moments, through hardly any moment counseling people through anything. It is not when you are counseling somebody. It is often not All right. Yeah, just take the scripture, all right, you know, like, like, like it's Tylenol, take, take two of these in the morning, all right, and you'll be fine. You'll be fine. It is not. You are literally the work that we're talking about, that we've been doing. You are literally helping them to walk through the work. Right, and you, it is not. Yes, you're using scripture to give perspective and to give understanding. You are not using scripture to help people bypass their hard moments, and I think that we do do that a lot of times.
Speaker 1:We're like hey, you don't really need to grieve.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, because they're in a better place Like right, Correct you don't have to feel the feelings.
Speaker 2:Right, this is a praise party, right, we're rejoicing, you know, and it's like you have not. To me is a. You don't really understand the depth of how, how much we can apply scripture to our lives, because it is not. A scripture Doesn't just paint over things.
Speaker 2:Scripture goes in and dwells with us, and when you come in and try to paint over something that God is trying to dwell in, you do those people a disservice because you painted over something that God is trying to dwell in. You do those people a disservice because you painted over something that they're going to end up being, um, uh, what's the word I'm looking for that they're going to? That can make somebody bitter, absolutely. You know what I'm saying, that, that, that, can that. That can be the beginning of church, hurt, because somebody told me, or if you know that somebody is sick and you're like hey, you know, we just believe that.
Speaker 2:You know God is a healer. All right, he's a healer, he's going to do it. Yeah, it's like again, don't paint over what God is saying. Invite me into the situation. Don't just try to dictate what you think is going to happen. That's it. The best thing you could do is say hey, whatever this moment is, we're going to invite God into this moment with you, and letting people know that God is in the moment with them and not you know he is not a distant God, so don't, don't apply scripture like he's distant.
Speaker 1:And sometimes I will say, and I think, let's, I think, uh, something else comes to mind. It's just timing, you know, and knowing, like, when is the right time to to, um, you know, to begin to, I'm a, I'm a person, you know me, I do, I value truth, I value, I do Right, that's that's, that's something I value, we know this I've had to learn over time the appropriate moments to share truth it, it I.
Speaker 1:that is something I've had to unlearn and part of that is kind of dealing is like being honest with my own emotions and understanding like hey, like I said, I came from a family where truth was held at a high regard. Biblical truth was held a high regard. That's what we, we, we practice. That Like that's we, we, um, we we said it out loud, like it was. That was very much how we behave, is how we were taught to move, and so when I am sitting and with other people, my first inclination is to tell them the truth. Right, but I've had to learn that the timing there's a very delicate timing when it comes to meeting emotions with truth, and that comes whether or not you're saying something to another person or even saying something to yourself.
Speaker 1:I think that's also something I had to learn from myself is let myself feel. I know the truth, but it may not be the time to just go truth, truth, truth, truth, truth. Feel it. It's okay. Allow the truth again to exist with your feeling. Don't let it, don't discount the feeling for the truth. And so, because we are whole human people, we just are. We're not going to. We can. We're not robotic. We can't just decide that we stop feeling a certain way Like that doesn.
Speaker 1:that's not real yeah um, and so I remember this moment uh, my grandmother passed several years ago. We were at the funeral and my, it was my mom's mom and, uh, my mom is, is, uh, very much a truth person that's, that is, that is my, she is that person and, uh, we, we were going by and we were viewing the body and I was, I was, you know, I was kind of, I was holding it together to some degree Um, and I saw, you know, um, and and I'll say this, my mom had dealt with a lot of grief in her life with her siblings and she had lost both of them. She lost her father, she had lost this was her last um know, immediate family member, and so she had gone through this moment multiple times. And so, because of that, the way she talked about it to us, with very much in the lens of truth, right, death is real, we're going to you know, we know where they are. I want you to be prepared for that. All this. It was very the way we learned about, honestly, death was very high truth, lower on the field. Okay, that's how we, that's how we were, how we were kind of trained growing up, and so in that moment we were doing, we're passing, and we were all, we were being seated and they closed the casket. And when they closed that casket, my mom broke.
Speaker 1:And I remember seeing that this is when I was in my I think it was in my twenties, early thirties Um, and I broke. I saw her break and I broke. It was almost like I have, I have permission to break because I wasn't sure, because I was like my mom is. So I don't want her to feel like she has done this, for I don't want her to feel like I don't believe what I'm supposed to believe, because I know what I believe and I know what she's taught me. But it was like when I saw her break, I felt permission to break because in that moment she said I need to feel this.
Speaker 1:I closed the casket on my mother, like that's a moment to feel, that's not a moment to just focus on truth, it's a moment to feel the real feelings. And I remember for that moment and she broke. And then I broke and my aunt was right next to me. She just kind of held me. I just remember. I'll never forget that and it was such a profound moment for me because I think it was what I'm and I'm I'm kind of realizing this now, but it's one of those moments that I remember being like almost like um relieved um that I that I could release, I I don't know that I really fully knew that I could release like that in a moment of grief y'all listen.
Speaker 2:Okay, I got two things to say. One, I think, when we give people the moment to feel the grief and to express in that moment, I think that we remind them it is also a moment where God is allowed to be God Absolutely In that moment and they can feel the presence and the power of God, and so I think that those moments are super important. The last thing I want to say is that I think that you know, we do this podcast to serve. We do this podcast because we want you know as much as we've seen God move in our lives and it's continuing to move.
Speaker 2:Because this, you know, I feel like we are very current, like we don't get on here and talk to y'all about, hey, you know, yeah, this is, this is what I learned five years ago, right, like these are things that, like, I'm like, oh yeah, I just came into the realization of these things, you know, um, but I want you guys to know how healing it is for I'm gonna speak for me.
Speaker 2:I'm also going to speak for Ruth Abigail, because I'm using best friend privileges here, but it is a healing experience, uh, to have these conversations, um, conversations, because even what Ruth Abigail just said in that okay, jaquita, it's okay you can release, and that's something I'm going to take with me because I can't say that I have the answer for y'all today, but I'm going to come back and I'm going to figure out, because I think that for me that is a hard thing, that is a really difficult thing to just release whatever it is I'm holding. You know, I think I've done a good job in identifying, interpreting, articulating, expressing, like I've been doing all of that, but to let it go and to be like all right, I did it, like I set that thing aside, that's something that I'm definitely still actively working.
Speaker 1:Man, that's good. Wow, that's powerful. Well, on that note, we're gonna hey, friends make sure you like share and subscribe.
Speaker 2:Did you tell somebody? Yet did you hit that button? Yet we didn't do it at the beginning of the episode.
Speaker 1:but we're coming at you now. We're doing it Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Some of y'all are like oh, I keep missing it. Oh, you know, they got technology now. Yeah, they do. They'll tell you when it's coming. Y'all join the family, join the community. We got some plans. We want to continue actively engaging with y'all. But you want to, you want to make sure you keep in. I'm, I'm sick of it. Hilarious y'all put me a hint about how to keep these in. I have small ears, so they know is that the problem. Yeah, it's bigger than my ear, so it's like interesting yeah, very weird, okay.
Speaker 1:Um well, uh, all right guys, uh like, share, subscribe, comment, download. Let people know. If you have value in this podcast, share it with somebody else. Don't keep it to yourself and listen. We will be back next week with another. Uh, until then, let's keep unlearning together so that we can all experience more freedom, peace. Thank you once again for listening to the Unlearned Podcast. We would love to hear your comments and your feedback about the episode. Feel free to follow us on Facebook and Instagram and to let us know what you think. We're looking forward to the next time when we are able to unlearn together to move forward towards freedom. See you then.
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