#96 The Achiever's Dilemma: Balancing Contentment While Wanting More with Margaret Schay

In this episode of Persistence in Prayer, host Kylie Hein is joined by Margaret Schay, a devoted daughter of God, wife, and mother, who integrates the rich teachings of Catholic psychology into her coaching work. 

Margaret shares her journey from experiencing  depression in college as she found herself striving, to discovering the transformative power of therapy and personal growth, drawing from John Paul II's Theology of the Body. She emphasizes the importance of acknowledging and understanding the different parts of ourselves, particularly our striving and achiever parts, to cultivate a holistic and peaceful interior life. 

The conversation delves into the concept of "parts work," a psychological approach that resonates with Catholic anthropology, encouraging listeners to embrace and integrate all aspects of their personalities for a more fulfilled and spiritually aligned life. The episode concludes with a reflective discussion on Psalm 34, highlighting the importance of feeling our emotions and trusting in God's presence during our suffering.

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Connect with Margaret

• On IG @margaretschay
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Transcript

Samson Q2U Microphone: 0:01

Do you struggle with being content? Do you often find yourself striving for more? Chasing achievement, yet never feeling truly at peace? If so, you're not alone. In this episode, we are going to talk a little bit about psychology and how through the concept of parts work, an approach that aligns beautifully with our Catholic teaching, we can recognize and integrate these beautiful, striving, achieving parts of ourselves. And learn to love them in a peaceful, spiritually grounded way that draws us closer to the Lord rather than leaving us in shame and discontentment. So with that, grab your favorite drink, cozy up, and let's dive in.

0:52

Hello, beautiful souls, and welcome to the Persistence in Prayer podcast hosted by Catholic Mindset coach, wife, mother, educator, and speaker, Kylie Hine. Kylie is passionate about helping you deepen your relationship with God through the power of prayer. This podcast is a space for high achievers who want to do it all, but also want to prioritize their spiritual life and grow in faith. Join us as we explore the beauty of persistence in prayer and the transformative impact it can have on our lives. Get ready to discover practical tips, insights, and inspiration to help you develop a daily prayer practice and cultivate a deeper sense of trust in God's plan for your life. Let's journey together towards a more fulfilled and faithful life as we invite the Holy Spirit in. Let's begin. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to another episode of Persistence in Prayer. Today, I am joined by a dear friend, Margaret Shea. She is a beloved daughter of God, wife and mother to three children on earth and four in heaven. During college, she discovered the transformative beauty of Catholic psychology, sparking a lifelong journey to integrate her heart, mind, body, and soul. With extensive education in John Paul II's Theology of the Body, Margaret incorporates its rich teachings into all of her work. She is the executive director. For right to life in Louisville, where the mission is to build a community that values women for who they are, helping women to thrive and embrace their unique potential while being supported and choosing life for unborn children. Margaret is passionate about all things, French food and fellowship. She delights in sharing her story and knowledge, walking alongside others in their journey toward greater interior peace and a flourishing human formation. Margaret, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be on. Yes. We've had some awesome conversation leading into this off air. And so I'm excited to see what the Holy Spirit is going to guide today for all of our awesome listeners. And. Margaret, I skipped over part of your bio intentionally because I really just want to hear it from you. Will you tell everyone your personal journey to coaching? Kind of what were you looking for and what did you find? Well, I love this question because, since I was really young, I had this kind of part of me that just wanted to, develop and Do better. And, and it was always just this kind of constant striving. And so, when I was in college, I was experiencing very acute depression. And, I don't think I even knew. Knew that exactly. I don't think I would have called it that I wasn't knowledgeable enough. I certainly knew that I was struggling. And so anyway, I reached out for help and providentially in the most amazing way that only God can orchestrate. I was connected with a phenomenal Catholic, therapist in, in the area where I was in school. And she really helped me over the course of two years. And I really started to, in my words, how I put it was kind of untangle my thoughts. I had a lot of, beliefs and, difficulties that I had kind of internalized and Those things were really weighing me down. And so, so that kind of like opened this door. And I remember when I finished that therapy and thinking like, I'm done. I'm great. Life's good. I'm good for it. I'm good. Like I'm done. I've done this. Well, fast forward, marriage and kids and moves and job losses and financial stress, and then, uh, miscarriages. I ended up, realizing, okay, wait a second, this is ongoing. This is ongoing. This is not a one and done. So I went back to therapy and, then over the years I've gone in and out as needed to kind of treating it really like physical therapy. Right. So we, you know, hurt our knee and we go and we get that better. And then maybe we trip again or have a, something goes out again. And so we need to strengthen that muscle again. So I've really developed this relationship with therapy and personal growth and personal development. over the years where I've just made the growth a constant and then, I used therapy as needed. And so that eventually led me to, Metanoia Catholic, their podcast. I started listening to them. I really enjoyed their work. And I'd always wanted to become a therapist. I never have yet. That's still on my to do list when my kids are grown. Cause it's quite a. Quite a time investment. But I thought, okay, well, look, I could do this coach certification. That would be really phenomenal. So I started looking into that and I had a phenomenal opportunity to do that. And, I got that certification. I finished that in October of 2023. And, through there I was introduced to other modalities, other ways of working with your Healing and emotions, ways that I hadn't experienced in traditional therapy. And that just really had a huge impact on me and I found success and results in things that I had struggled with on and off for 17, 16 years, uh, aware that I was struggling with. I should say that, that, you know, a lot of these things predated even when I began therapy, but just a lot of the relationship I had with. With myself and how I would handle my emotions and, look at myself and then how that would impact my relationship with others. I want to just draw attention to a couple things. First of all, you said you were constantly striving and you always had this part of you that felt the need. Yes. And I think that so many of us relate to this, especially the women who listen to this podcast. It's like, there's this hole that we're trying to fill, and we think that we're going to fill it by doing more, and doing it better than is probably feasible or realistic, especially because we're taking on, at least in my case, I was taking on all of the things, not just one thing that I wanted to do better, but all of the things. And just like you said, the constant striving, and it leads to this very Muddled and distorted relationship with ourselves and that relationship with ourselves obviously affects relationships with other people and it therefore also affects our relationship with God because our lens of God is distorted through our lens of ourself and the relationships that we have with other people and so I just wanted to highlight that for a minute because I think that that's so important and That is one of the biggest transformations that I see with coaching when people come to work with me, and I'm sure you see this when women work with you as well, is as their relationship with their self changes, they see tremendous gains in the relationships with their children and with their spouses or their co workers. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. They stop reacting from a place of having to prove and having to earn, and achieve so much. And it's more, from a holistic integrated place of peace. But I think it's really important here to acknowledge that those. Those of us who have those parts within us, maybe like a developer part or restorative part. I'm using kind of Gallup strengths language here. We could use any kind of term that comes to mind. Your achiever part, you know, whatever you call that, that really strong striving part. That's good. Like that's a, that's a really. valid, beautiful part of you. And, I will never forget Christmas day 2018. We just lost our second child to miscarriage. In November and I was still grieving significantly from this loss. It was our son Ben and he was about 17 weeks along so it was very traumatic. Um, very shocking not expected at all very traumatic birth and I remember we had some family members over for Christmas dinner And we had a very lovely time and We had like these little fun questions at our seats or something. And there was some question about, goals And one of my family members commented, um, something to the effect of like. She was, like, really content, like, she didn't feel this, constant urge to keep doing better, she had values and everything that she would pursue, but she, she experienced, a lot of contentment. And I just remember sitting there and thinking, what is she talking about? Like, what, what? There are people, there are people who, who have that? Like, people that I know? What is this? What is she talking about? And I really wrestled with that. And it made, obviously it made a huge impression. I still remember it. And I remember after they left and I was literally sitting there by myself thinking, what is that? and I should be like that. And I, I should be content like that. And I shouldn't have this driving. And I was so harsh on myself and fast forward several years. And I look back and I go, Oh, okay. That was actually okay. I had the striving driving part of me. I still do. Right? And, and there's a reason for that. There's a gift in that. And if I can relate to that part, instead of judge that part or compare that and that family relative could have, you know, obviously different. different aspects of her personality or parts, however you want to call it, that she relates to, right? And so I just thought, wait a second. We're so, we're so quick to judge ourselves. We're so quick to compare ourselves. We're so quick to say, I know I'm a high achieving, striving person. I shouldn't be. And actually what if we said, I know I'm a high achieving, striving person. Hey, let me look inside. Let me learn about that. What is that part trying to tell me? What is the value here? And, how do we bring these kind of aspects of our personality or parts within us? How do we kind of bring these together? And instead of pushing them away, instead of trying to do some habit formation around them or mindset trick around them, how do we say like, Hey, little achieving part. What are you, what are we, what are you looking for? What's going on? What are you afraid will happen if, if we don't achieve? I think that's a really good question. What am I afraid is going to happen if I don't strive? And then we can kind of listen and, and tune in. And when we get that feedback, when we relate to ourselves in that way, it's just completely different and much more effective because I'm going to tell you. Until I started getting into parts work, which is what I've been referencing, it really was just kind of pushing through, white knuckling, I gotta be like that family member. This Achiever in me is bad, you know, I'm not content, that's wrong, so. I am so glad that you shared that story because I had a similar journey. I remember taking the StrengthsFinder test, and number one was Achiever, and at the same time I was going through Spiritual Direction, and my Spiritual Director was just constantly highlighting, you are not a human doing, you are a human being. The Lord wants you to just Learn how to be and that is a beautiful thing, but then I started thinking, how do I turn off this Achiever part because it is stressing me out. I am stressed and overwhelmed because I go from this high, high point where I feel like I can do everything in the world to this low, low crash where I'm like, there's so much going on and I'm so stressed and I'm not sleeping because I can't go to sleep until I finish everything. And then so several years down the road, I was like, man, I've made so much growth with the Lord. I took that StrengthsFinder again at a different job and you know what, Achiever came up again as my number one and I was so mad because I thought, ah, I thought I learned how to like temper that and turn it off. And I was still struggling with just seeing this as a beautiful gift that the Lord had given me. And instead of looking at it through the lens of, you know, we have these beautiful saints. Some of them definitely had Achiever parts or Developer parts or Restorative parts like you talked about. Right. That is what helps them to become Saints, that resilience and perseverance and wanting to always be better. But of course there has to be a balance, and so I'm really excited about this conversation. We talked about, again, loving these get it all done parts that we have within us. Can you just break down for us, when we're talking about parts, What is parts work? What does that mean for anyone who doesn't know? Yeah, I think it's really, really simple. It's, you know, when I, when I'm going, to some of the doctor appointments I'll go to, I will pass by this. delicious ice cream store that I love. And I don't know how you feel about like purchasing ice cream. Some people are really strongly opinionated on this, like that that is like such a luxury to go out and just, you know, spend 10 on an ice cream cone. I don't do it a lot, but I have to say it's like one of my favorite treats. And I guarantee you every time I drive past there, there is a part of me that says, Ooh, I wonder. If I should stop. Oh, I wonder like, uh, that would be so good. Oh, do I have time? Can I do this? Like how many points do I have in my ice cream app and then I'm like, okay, well I can, or I can't, you know, I should, or I shouldn't, I got to go. I don't have to go, you know, I have this appointment or do it on my way home. I won't do it. And so we have these. Experiences in our day to day life, whether it's with ice cream or getting out of bed or what task to do first, I mean, whatever it is, there's a part of us that wants to do something or is interested or intrigued. And then there's another part of us that's like, maybe not. Maybe we shouldn't. How much money do we have in our bank account? What is our time schedule? Right? So we experience this all the time, all the time. Every single one of us does. And really what parts work is, is it saying, okay, we have these kind of elements, we could call them, sub personalities. I mean, there's different words we can use. And we're not saying a personality disorder. I always have to give that disclosure. We're not saying that, but we have these kinds of parts within us that make up our whole person. Make up the parts of our personality. And, These parts have their own kind of desires and goals, and they always mean well for us. They're always trying to help us, protect us and guide us. And then we have our inmost self. Now, our inmost self is not a part. Our inmost self is the child of God within, the image of God. So God saw all that he had made, and he saw that it was good, right? And so, I mean, this is like, to me, very theology of the body. Very, based in, of course, our church's teachings on the person made in the image and likeness of God, so we have our inmost self, which is this, perfect, truly perfect image of God within us, right? Not a part. And the inmost self is supposed to lead and guide that system of parts. And if that sounds a little crazy, I think one of the easiest way to explain this, is just to think about the Trinity. We know that the Trinity is an eternal exchange of love, where you have the love. Between God, the Father and God, the Son is the Holy Spirit. And there's this eternal giving and receiving of love. And so if we believe, as we do, that we are made in God's image and likeness, and God saw all that he had made and he saw that it was good, it makes sense that the person would also have an eternal, internal relationship within. That we would not be a monolithic whole. If we're made in God's image and likeness, And God isn't a monolithic whole, right? He's a union of persons. Then we too would reflect that in some way. And so the verse we always look to for this is, when Jesus says the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and to love your neighbor as yourself. To love your neighbor as yourself. So from there, we gather that we are to love ourself. Now, if I'm supposed to love myself, Again, I can't be a monolithic whole love requires a giver and a receiver, right? Just like in the Trinity, there has to be a giver and there has to be a receiver. You can't have, you know, a rock can't love itself. So we have to have this ability to love. And so, so who, who is the lover who loves, right? So our inmost self is that, image of God within us. That has been given to every single one of us, every single one of us made in his image and likeness, the human person, every single one of us has an inmost self. This doesn't come at baptism. The inmost self is part of our humanity being made in his image and likeness. And so that inmost self gets to know those parts, gets to love those parts, gets to see, hear and affirm those parts. And then those parts Kind of look to the inmost self as like the Good Shepherd who then leads them to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. It's very much a reflection, a mirroring of Jesus and his work here, right? So he gives us this inmost self to guide us. And the goal is that we listen to those parts that sometimes misbehave. Sometimes our parts, we can send through our parts, we can have parts that act out like crazy teenagers or toddlers or all kinds of different things. It's, it's not any excuse for a sin or something. So we have these parts that are good and they mean well, but just like any teenager or toddler or adult, they can misbehave. And we might have, a really insecure part. Um, who is. Really doubting themselves and in that doubt, they are impatient and react or something, right? We hurt somebody and we're unkind. And so the goal would be then to, for the inmo self, to talk to that part, to lead that part, to ask what's going on, and to help understand and guide them just like a parent would with their child. Does that make sense? Or does that seem a little No, the inmost self reminds me of the inner dwelling of the Trinity that St. Elizabeth of the Trinity talks about. It's like this inner chamber, this inner cell where the Lord resides, right? And that is the image. That's what you're talking about. So different saints use different words to describe that. But again, theology of the body, we are made in the image of God. And I just want to highlight love of self because if you read Particular writings. There's a lot of talk about the crucifixion of the self, the dying of self, self love is the root of all evil, right? There's all of these things, but we're talking about a proper love of self. And that is different than a love of our fleshly desires and passions, right? It's a loving of, like you said that in most self, of the Trinity that is within us. Is that worded correctly? Yeah. I mean, people do get a little uncomfortable with this, especially Catholics. I think we go, wait a second. What are we saying? Self love? What? And I think we could just be super practical and just ask ourselves this. Can you think of a time where you were, where you were corrected in a harsh, shameful or critical way and you felt terrible and you tried to do better, but you felt so discouraged you didn't really do better. And it was just really awkward and uncomfortable and painful. And then can you think of a time where somebody really genuinely loved you and saw you in your pain and suffering? Maybe held you in your sin. Maybe you were talking about something you've done that you felt really bad about and you just received so much mercy, that you were inspired to do better. Right? We've all had that experience in our life where we've been shamed and felt worse about something we've done or struggled with or we've been Affirmed and valued and given mercy and we've been transformed and that's really what we're talking about here that that that Relationship with the parts that love of self is the parts of Having what we would call in the psychology world, a secure attachment to the self in the same way that a child needs a secure attachment with their parents, our little parts need a secure attachment to our inmost self. So that's what we mean by inmost by loving the inmost self. And then, of course, I can't give what I don't have. So if I don't love myself, if I'm always going back to that example of shaming and berating and criticizing, if I'm always shaming, berating, and criticizing my parts or myself, or, you know, beating myself up inside, well, that's going to come out, it's going to come out of my parenting. It's going to come out in my working relationships and my marriage and my prayer and how I relate to God. So it all, I think it just kind of resonates with the human experience. Yes. Yes. This. Foundational piece of loving ourselves as the Lord loves us, like not hiding, right? Because in shame, we hide the day we're recording on Valentine's Day and that scripture today at mass was of the fall. So this is perfect, right? But not hiding, not hiding in shame, but seeing who we are right now, all of these imperfect pieces, these unfinished parts. That maybe just haven't grown into the fullness and the perfection of what they will one day become and first and foremost is the attachment that in most self are attachment to the Lord versus attachment to other things. Yeah, and that we really actually, and this is where you know, some listeners might go, Kylie, did you vet her? We really have to love ourself first. That's actually not. A false teaching. Okay. So if we do understand that our self is actually the indwelling of the Holy Spirit within us, then we actually have to love ourselves first and then we love God and then we love others. And this is really, something we get very, very uncomfortable with, very uncomfortable with, but it is grounded in our churches teachings in our understanding of. Our call to sanctity and to unification with the Lord. And we look at Aquinas and he says, grace builds on nature. And so that, that experience of the inmost self, which is again, let me very, very clear here. The inmost self is not a minor deity. We're not saying we're little gods. I think this is where internal family systems can take it too far. They can, they can go a little, um. different kind of eastern spirit religion kind of approach. We do not at all subscribe to that. So we can take the best from internal family systems, which is the parts work founded by Dr Richard Schwartz. We can take the best from there and put that through our catholic anthropology and lens and then, discard what is not relevant, what is not helpful. And so, IFS might say that we do become like little gods, right? But of course we would not say that at all, but we'd say the Lord is within us, just like you said, Elizabeth of the Trinity. So, and Teresa of Avila writes about this, um, Teresa Blaseur, I mean, not in the same words we're using today, but this whole concept of being that little child and Loving the Lord who's within us loving loving the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in us. That really is our foundation. And then from there, we get to love our father and our heavenly mother and others, right? Um, but that love of. Self, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the inmost self is actually the foundation. I'm so glad that you brought some of this up because one, I think that we can't grow without being uncomfortable. And so when we feel resistance. to things even within our own faith. For some of us, our natural inclination is to just run away from it, to ignore it, or to automatically discredit it. And so I think just allowing ourselves, and this can happen with everyday occurrences too, right? Like when we are uncomfortable, it's hard to sometimes just sit with the Lord. We want to distract ourselves from it. So just allowing ourselves to sit in the discomfort and ask the Lord to reveal to us what is true. And I'm so grateful that you brought up Whenever we are looking at psychology or just really anything in the world to just pray to be awake, St. Ignatius always talks about this, be awake, be aware. So just be aware, you just mentioned internal family systems sometimes can, can go too far, but there are really, really great and incredible Catholic psychologists who Oh yes, phenomenal. Can again, root this back in some of the teachings of the saints, they can root it back in scripture. They can bring the fullness of our Catholic faith together to give us a really beautiful human formation. And God is the ultimate healer. But we can also approach things from different aspects to help us find that full healing. Yes, yes, definitely. And we have such a rich tradition in the church of doing this. I mean, Augustine referenced Plato a lot, and Aquinas referenced Aristotle a lot, right? So these are both You know, pagan philosophers who predated Christ, but we take, we take the truth from what we have, wherever it comes from, and then discard the parts that aren't true or aren't relevant or aren't, conducive to our faith. Absolutely. Okay. So can you give our audience some tangible takeaways of Recognizing these parts that we have and how can we learn to love them and help them work together? Yeah, I think it's, it really is first just, it's that, it's that awareness. And we kind of experience that awareness in the resistance you mentioned. We'll feel uncomfortable with something. I mean, this could be, I walk into my kitchen and, it's a mess. You know, somebody hasn't finished their job or somebody left their, shoes in the doorway. Or a, a coworker didn't respond promptly or politely to an email, whatever it is, whether it's at work at home and church in our prayer life, when we experience some type of internal frustration or reaction, we can kind of look at that, as a part and just kind of turn inward just acknowledge that. Just acknowledge that. And again, when we go back to our own human experience, we all know that those moments in our life where we've just been acknowledged in our suffering, not dismissed, not given some little happy quote, but just acknowledge like that hurts. Hey, I see you in new pain, right? That just really calms, calms, um, the part down, calms ourselves down and helps to begin that relationship. The first thing is awareness, acknowledgement of the part there that's, that's probably speaking up that you're experiencing in that tension or frustration of some level. So much of this is, again, just taking me to St. Ignatius of Loyola, be aware, understand, and take action is what he always says, and I'm going to have to do some research because I'm fascinated to hear how the parts work kind of meshes with movements of the spirits, good spirits and bad spirits. I think that's beyond the scope of this podcast, but that's where my mind is going. But I'm just hearing you saying we need to feel our feelings. And just recognize that they are happening, not trying to suppress them and shove them down. That image that I think is used a lot in psychology is like the beach ball in the water, where we're trying to push it down and we push it under the water, but we know, the harder we push it down, it's gonna explode back up in our face. Right. You just have to, to feel what we are feeling. Recognize it. It doesn't mean we have to take a negative action, but feelings are neutral. Yeah, and it's excruciatingly painful. Let's just be really honest with the human condition here. It is so so So painful. You know, we think about pain and we think of childbirth or wisdom, teeth removal or surgeries, whatever, the result after, running a marathon, whatever we think of those kinds of things. But I honestly think, on a daily basis, the pain of actually feeling our emotions is so significant that most of us tend to numb those in some form or capacity. And I certainly don't say that to incur shame or, or, uh, guilt anybody, but to say, you know, when I, I, so I have this, I have a bit of a fiery temperament and, there's a part of me that can get, can be, I call her my, I call it my feisty protector. So I can have this kind of part that can get really upset really easily. And the more I just noticed that part and just. allow myself to sit there and feel the pain. You know, it's like when you're getting like a blood draw at the doctor and you just have to sit there and breathe through it and you can't run away. You can't stop it. And you know that if you like sit there and grit your teeth, it's going to feel worse. You just have to breathe through it. And I find that when I just feel that pain of the uncomfortable, Emotion that the part that's acting up and I don't say anything to take it out on somebody. I don't do a cognitive exercise. I don't ask myself what I'm learning from this. I don't do some type of, mental jujitsu. It's it's just just be with it. Don't don't ask yourself what the blessing in it is. Don't do anything. It's and it's very counterintuitive. Because our natural reaction is to make it go away. If I eat, I'll make it go away. If I scroll, I'll make it go away. If I yell, I'll make it go away. If I, go for a run, I'll make it go away. Some of these things can be really good things. You know, if I exercise, I'll make it go away. What if we first just sat with it? Like Jesus with the woman at the well, he meets her in her sin. He meets her in her mess. He meets her in like the height of her emotional lows, right? She's built this whole life around her sinful lifestyle. She now goes to the well at the worst time of day, the most uncomfortable time of day. And he meets her in that. He doesn't meet her. On her way to the well, he doesn't meet her after the well, he meets her at the well. And I think that's a great message to us. In the moment of our sin, of our struggle, of our resistance, of our emotional pain, we just have to be there with it. First. The self with the parts, right? We don't even have to worry about, I want to say this really carefully. Our, our life can be a prayer, right? So we don't even have to like, stop and quote, pray, like just accompanying our parts is modeling exactly what the good shepherd did for us does for us. Just like Jesus accompanied the woman at the well and everyone he accompanied. So that in most self is like the shepherd for our parts. Thanks. Truly is the guide. And it's so uncomfortable. We just have to own that. Because I hate it when I get really upset when that feisty protector comes out. I mean, I will literally, sometimes just be like, I'm just gonna lay down on the floor just so my body can feel all the parts of the floor on it. Not on my bed, on the floor, and just, just feel it. That's it. Just feel it. Like a blood draw. That's what I think about all the time. Yeah, I love that. I'm not as familiar with parts work. I'm Exploring it more, but I've talked about the four temperaments a lot on this podcast and the choleric quick reactor in me. Yes. It comes out and we talk about a lot that this can often come out as anger or frustration. Normally for me, it's interior frustration, often with myself, but this quick reactor came out in me the other day because I made a mistake. And. That shouldn't be a big deal, right? We all make mistakes, we overlook things, but because it affected someone else, I just immediately felt shame and terrible about myself. And it was nighttime, and just like you said, I wanted to avoid that feeling so badly. I want to go eat some chocolate, I want to just open up a book on my phone and read a good book, like, a story to take me out of what I'm feeling, but Like you said, just sitting and feeling, I was about to pray my nightly exam and so I sat there, I didn't do a lot of reflecting for me, you know, like you said, we don't necessarily have to use words, but for me, my simple prayer was Lord, this is so uncomfortable. Just help me to embrace the discomfort and that was like, just sit here and the quicker we can just sit in it. Actually, the faster it goes away, really, it's because it's that acknowledgement. Mm hmm. Because when we try to shove it down, it just sticks with us. And it's like it festers and grows bigger. Absolutely, it does. And when we don't acknowledge, those parts, they really do freak out. I mean, I think about this all the time, especially as a mother. You know, we all have. experiences with our children, especially when they're younger and they want something. Maybe like they're a toddler and they're nagging for something. Maybe we're in the midst of making dinner and we, brush it aside and go just a minute, just a minute, just a minute, just a minute. And then they start freaking out eventually, throwing things, I don't know, you know, having an accident in their pants, whatever happens, right. They freak out and, and. That's really what happens with us, you know, so eventually the parts are just like, wow. And so, when we attune to another in the same way, when we attune to those parts within us, they feel seen and heard and they calm down and, it, it does work and it does make a difference. And it is very different than that kind of top down approach of like thought emotion action, I think and then I have a feeling because of that thought and then I act. That's, that's a very, different approach. This is more kind of tuning in more to our body, and listening there and understanding our body is this way that God communicates with us. John Paul II tells us in the theology of the body that the body and it alone is capable of revealing the divine. And the physical, right? So we know that the Lord communicates to us through our bodies and he himself saved us through his body. He didn't save us. Through an angel, he didn't save us through, like, he didn't have to save us through his son, right? He could have just saved us by snapping his fingers. He could have saved us any way he wanted to. And yet he saved us through, the humanity and divinity of Jesus Christ. And I think that tells us a lot that how important it is to integrate our body into our healing. Absolutely. I love that. as we get near to wrapping up, how have you found this part's work has impacted your spiritual life? That's a really, that is a really interesting question because it has had a huge impact. I would say that the parts work has really impacted my spiritual life and my, my relationship with God, especially God, my father. It's had a huge impact because as I have kind of Attuned to myself to go into my interior castle is Teresa of Avala would say, and kind of be there and get to know my parts. I've gotten to see the ways that some of my parts within me, you know, sometimes we use this language of like our inner child or something like that. We could say some of our parts carry these burdens, these fears, these experiences or memories where They really struggle with something, maybe something from our childhood, something that was really difficult and, what I've seen is that when I have helped my parts attune to my inmost self, to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit within me, and when I've, from my inmost self, guided them and seen them and loved them and not shamed them, they have Been able to see that that is actually the way my father in heaven loves me. We hear all of these things growing up, especially in our Sunday school and, Catholic school, wherever you are about, you know, Jesus loves you and God loves you and you're unique and you're unrepeatable. And of course, all of that's true and beautiful, but so often it's something that's in our head and it's not at all in our heart. We say that a lot. And so I think the parts work has really helped to bring things that intellectually I believed, but emotionally and physically I didn't feel or believe. And it's helped to bring those things home. I mean, we, we actually have to have a felt. Sense of safety and love. It is not enough for any one of us. This is a fundamental principle of psychology. It is not enough for any one of us to simply intellectually know that I am loved or safe or cared for. I have to actually feel that in my body. I have to feel that in my body. This is wiring from God, right? I have to know that. I mean, that's, that's why he came in bodily form. Very, very tangible. And so, we have to have that experience. And when we can have that experience in our inner system, that's what we call like the relationship between our self and our parts. Then I think that does have a huge impact on our faith and I know it has for me and it's been a very gradual journey I've had my own wounds and feeling of neglect and, different experiences and, and things like that. And so when my parts have come to trust my inmost self, they've also been able to open up to trusting my heavenly father, which has made a big difference. That is beautiful. It's so beautiful to just look at how the Lord has taken you from your head into your heart, which is so important. That's what we talk about in my Spiritual Direction classes. Our goal is as a director to let the Holy Spirit lead the directee from the head into the heart, because the heart is where the Lord operates. And we see that over and over again in Scripture. So just like you said, many people know intellectually or can believe intellectually, for example, the Eucharist, that that is the body, blood, soul, and divinity of God. But if they have never experienced that in their heart, then They miss that miracle that occurs at mass. It's kind of going through the motions type of thing is how I think of it. Oh, absolutely. And we think about this in all our relationships. I mean, you can't just, your kid can't just know you love him. He has to feel it, right? And same with your spouse. And, we can't live life just going through the motions. There has to be a relational piece, a felt sense of safety and love. It's key. Absolutely. I want to highlight a couple of other things that you said before we get to our closing. I love this question that you said at the beginning, is asking ourselves, what is the fear? What will happen if I don't achieve? What will happen if I stop striving? And just sit with that question. Take that to the Lord in prayer. The significance of allowing our parts to be seen. Our inner, if our inner part is having a toddler tantrum and meltdown, just acknowledge that. And then most importantly, I think just sitting in the discomfort, even when it's painful, allowing ourselves to feel our feelings. Yes. Yeah. We have to feel to heal. We can't go around it, under it, over it, you know, I mean, I love that book, Going on a Bear Hunt. It's a classic children's book, and they have to go through it. They can't go over it, they can't go under it. Oh, that just took me to childhood memory. My mom used to do that with us all the time. Yeah, it's a great book. Okay, I always end every episode with a prayer tip or a scripture verse. You gave me Psalm 34. This is a longer one, but I'm going to read it because I just think it is so powerful. In the very first line, I'm part of the Legion of Mary and It just takes me back to the part of the prayer we always say, You, O Lord, will open my mouth and my tongue shall announce your praise. And this phrase just goes in my head all the time, especially when I feel anxious about speaking, or anything like that. And it's like, no, the Lord, just let the Lord speak. And he takes care of it. So Psalm 34, I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall always be in my mouth. My soul will glory in the Lord. Let the poor hear and be glad. Magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together. I sought the Lord, and he answered me, delivered me from all my fears. Look to him and be radiant, and your faces may not blush for shame. This poor one cried out, and the Lord heard him, and from all his distress he saved him. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him, and he saves them. Taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the stalwart one who takes refuge in him. Fear the Lord, you his holy ones. Nothing is lacking to those who fear him. The rich grow poor and go hungry. But those who seek the Lord lack no good thing. Come, children, listen to me. I will teach you to fear the Lord. Who is the man who delights in life, who loves to see the good days? Keep your tongue from evil, your lips from speaking lies. Turn from evil and do good. Seek peace and pursue it. The eyes of the Lord are directed toward the righteous and his ears toward their cry. The Lord's face is against evildoers to wipe out their memory from the earth. The righteous cry out, the Lord hears, and he rescues them from all their afflictions. The Lord is close to the brokenhearted. He saves those whose spirit is crushed. Many are the troubles of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him from them all. He watches over all his bones, not one of them shall be broken. Evil will slay the wicked, those who hate the righteous are condemned. The Lord is the redeemer of the souls of his servants. And none are condemned who take refuge in him. Such a beautiful psalm. I think I could sit with any verse from that and just sit with it. Like, that's, that's a holy hour right there, just a single phrase. Yes. Yes. And I just want to really quickly acknowledge that that is, it's a Psalm I love. It's also a Psalm that greatly challenges many of my parts because some of my parts go, wait, what do you mean? The Lord is close to the broken hearted, like where was he when I hurt, when I was suffered. And so I just want to just say for your audience, you know, if you're reading that or reading any prayer or any Psalm, and you're, you're wrestling with that. That's okay. So we can just sit with that part. So a lot of times when I pray that song, which is one of my favorites is I sit with those parts that go, okay, where were you? Because that is such a valid question. You know? I mean, that's what, that's what they asked. Jesus, when Lazarus died, where were you? And so we have these parts often that ask that and can we sit with those parts that come up in various prayers when we talk about the Lord's goodness and we have these little parts that go, what do you mean? What do you mean he's good? Look what happened to my family. That's okay to sit with them and to ask, where were you and to tell him how you feel about it? Like, Lord, I don't feel like you were there and it makes me angry or it makes me sad, or he does reveal to you where he was and we might not like it. Yeah. We can tell him those things. It's important to tell him those things. Yes, and even before that, like to listen to those parts that tell you, let's first hear what the parts have to say, what are they upset about? Amen. And then we can bring that to him. Yeah. This has been so good, Margaret. I'm so grateful for you to bring in, for bringing this to me because parts work was something I did struggle with a little bit and I really had to. Right. Through it. Yes. You had parts that were like, well, I just, I didn't know enough. And it was honestly, I did a little bit of reading and a little bit of listening and it really just lifted all of those resistances that I had to it. But again, it's just that praying to be aware. And it's not a bad thing to have resistance. It's a good thing, right? It's a good thing in our faith to not just openly accept anything and everything. Oh, absolutely. And we, we do have to be aware. And I'm so grateful for all of the Catholic communities and all of these men and women who are so diligent in Taking human formation and these beautiful practices and going back and showing how they are rooted in our faith and in the saints and in scripture. It's incredible and it's beautiful and these are all just different avenues, I think, to approach that human formation that can help lead us from the head to the heart. So if this doesn't fit with you, that is okay. There are other avenues, but I just pray that for someone listening, if this Resonates with you. Then go explore more. Do you have any favorite resources, Margaret, on Hearts work? I, I love the Souls and Hearts community. So Souls and hearts.com, that's Dr. Peter Malinowski and Jerry Crete run that. Dr. Jerry Cree wrote the book, litanies of the Heart, published by Sophia Institute Press. That came out in January of. 2024, that's a phenomenal Catholic, approach to parts. And he has a very helpful criticism of, Dr. Richard Schwartz, his book, no bad parts, um, his book on IFS. And so Dr. Jerry kind of takes us through. Parts work from a Catholic perspective and discarding the parts of IFS that aren't helpful or good. So those are like some of my favorites. Of course, there's the Interior Integration for Catholics podcast. That's Dr. Peter Malinowski's podcast on parts. So that's kind of where I hang out a lot. And then, of course, I work with people helping them with parts. I really integrate that into everything that I do in my coaching. I coach leadership groups, parishes, staff, and then I do individual, and I offer book studies and things like that. Always bringing a lot of stuff back through the parts lens. And Margaret is an excellent coach. I've been coached by her. We went through certification together and also just stayed connected and we coach each other from off and on just training coaching. I think it's always wonderful just to get coached by different people and let their gifts that God has given them shine through. We experience different things. So I'm so grateful for you, Margaret, and for being here and I still remember last June, I think you and I had had a conversation, and we were talking about parts work prior to this, and I went to a spiritual direction, kind of formation thing, and we had a Catholic therapist there, and I sat with him at lunch, and I was like, tell me what you know about parts work, because I just really wanted to be open to it, and I think that kind of Kind of broke that, resistance that I had and brought me, further around. So I'm excited to continue with it. That's awesome. Yeah. It's been life changing for me. It really has. So thank you again. Thank you. Thank you so much. Beautiful souls, thank you again for journeying with me. If you have been blessed by this episode, it would mean the world to me if you would leave a review. Be sure to screenshot it, share it on your social media stories, and don't forget to tag me on Instagram or Facebook at Kylie M. Hine. Stay persistent in prayer, protect your peace, and as always, share the light of Christ with everyone around you.