#003: Pixie Dust Shortage (And Other Spiritual Emergencies)

What happens when the beliefs that once grounded you suddenly don't feel so certain?

In this episode of All Revved Up, we have an honest conversation about something many spiritual people experience but rarely admit: a crisis of faith. We explore what it feels like when the "pixie dust" seems to run out, why doubt isn't the opposite of spirituality, and how questioning your beliefs can actually deepen them.

Along the way, we talk about grief, growth, giving yourself grace, and why sometimes the healthiest spiritual practice isn't pretending you're okay—it's allowing yourself to be exactly where you are.

If you've ever wondered whether it's okay to question what you believe, this conversation is for you.

Thanks for listening!

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe to All Revved Up wherever you enjoy podcasts—or on YouTube—so you never miss a conversation.

Join Rev. Dr. Tiffani Milne, Rev. Dr. Liza Marquez, and Dr. Thor Challgren each week as they explore practical spirituality, real life, and the questions we're all trying to answer.

Transcript

Opening Banter And Real Life Updates

SPEAKER_00 1:05

Hello, hello. Uh, I'm here with Dr. Liza. Dr. Tiffany, Dr. Liza, how are you today?

SPEAKER_02 1:11

I am doing well, feeling so much better. I was a little under the weather, but grateful to be here. Thank you, Dr. Thor, for asking. Dr. Tiffany, how are you?

SPEAKER_01 1:19

I'm doing so much better now that I'm here with both of you. Not I wasn't doing bad before, but it's just been a crazy whirlwind day and week. And this feels like a chance to just breathe in some awesomeness and spend time with people I love. So I'm excited.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

I love that. I love that. And I I don't know why, but I feel like I'm motivated in full transparency to say that at the top of the show, that was our little attempt so that everyone would know whose voice is whose. So I'm like, Dr. Liza, would you like to say something so that we know your voice?

SPEAKER_01 1:51

So You can tell us by the laugh. Liza laugh.

SPEAKER_00 1:55

I can't laugh.

SPEAKER_01 1:55

You can't do it on your hand. I can't. We have to make Liza laugh at some point during this podcast so everybody can hear her laugh. It's my favorite thing.

SPEAKER_02 2:04

At some point. I'm sure because you guys always make me laugh, and that's the beauty of being with you too, a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_00 2:11

I agree. I love the it, you know, I I similarly had a lot going on today. I've spent two hours today recording videos for something I'm doing. So I'm sitting there in front of the camera this whole time, and I was just looking forward to this conversation and being with you guys. So I'm I'm excited about that. Me too.

SPEAKER_02 2:32

My hair's crazy. Just want to let you guys know that. No, it looks good. I mean I pulled my hair up. I pulled my hair up super fast.

SPEAKER_00 2:39

I have not yet seen any results from my hair growing shampoo. I have to report that.

SPEAKER_03 2:44

Wait, how long have you been thinking it?

SPEAKER_00 2:47

Uh not long enough, probably. You know, they say this is the thing. It's funny, it's funny. Like they're like, you shouldn't really expect results for three months. So you that's too much of a commitment.

SPEAKER_01 2:58

How do they keep you from buying it, right? Because and then by the way, of course it is.

SPEAKER_03 3:08

I know.

SPEAKER_01 3:09

I will say I used a red light mask. I had to, anyway, it doesn't matter, but I was anemic and so I had some hair loss as a result of the anemia. And I got one of the red light helmets, and they did say it would take like six to eight weeks to see results. And so I think I should get results immediately.

Hair Growth Myths And Proof

SPEAKER_01 3:30

But I will say, like, after a couple months, I was like, oh, hey, it actually is fuller. It actually is doing its thing. So maybe the same for the shampoo.

SPEAKER_02 3:39

Do you think what I think would be a great idea, Thor, is go ahead and commit to the three months, but take your picture now and take another one in three months.

SPEAKER_03 3:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:48

So that you're not searching for that, like, hey, wait, is it? I mean, I see, is it possible like you'll have a definitive and then ask for your money back if it doesn't work.

SPEAKER_00 3:59

There you go.

SPEAKER_02 3:59

And I'm all about holding people to account.

SPEAKER_00 4:02

There you go. I have to say, oh, oh, this is exciting. So speaking of holding people to account, I have recently uh a year ago, Liza knows this. I wrote the first 50,000 words in my novel. And I was looking at the calendar recently and going, you know, if I finished the novel by the end of June, I would have written the entire thing in the span of one year. So I've started working on my novel again. And I went back and read it like the first 55,000 words, and I'm like, this actually it surprised me in a few places. There was one place where I cried, which it was the same place I cried when I wrote it. Um, and it it's, you know, Liza, you and I spoke about this when we started this. I I had never written anything before. And so to step into something what we did, where basically you were committing for 30 days that no matter what, you were going to finish this, it was kind of terrifying the first couple of days because I'm like, I don't know how to write a novel. And yet it the great lesson

Writing A Novel One Day

SPEAKER_00 5:10

for me was um just make progress every day. Just put something in and you will figure it out. And that's been like such a huge lesson for me the last couple of months of just get in and start trying to find evidence. Because I'm I'm like someone who can plan so much and think, you know, I got to have it all figured out. And I'm like, that's BS. I mean, what I'm finding for me is that's it's sort of a BS way for me to cop out and and not actually get work done.

SPEAKER_02 5:39

Well, I think that's a BS way for most people to cop out. Like, you know, looking at, oh, I gotta go all the way over there instead of just this next step.

SPEAKER_03 5:48

Yeah.

unknown 5:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:50

Just struggle with like like Thor, you're really good at planning. You're like, okay, once you decide you're gonna do something, you're like, okay, I'm just gonna start and I'll do like 10 minutes, like, you know, the mind tricks that you can play. Like, I've seen the not that you play these mind tricks, but I've seen it like, you know, just tell yourself you only have to put on your running shoes. And then you can go to the gym. And if you hate it after five minutes, you can leave. Just get to the gym. And I feel like a lot of people use those techniques. I still struggle with making myself do things I don't want to do. Like, I see even though like my mind's like, oh, I know that trick, you're gonna make me stay at the gym, or like, I know that trick, like, write five words. And um, I'm always in awe of the ability to just be like, I set my mind to it, I wrote it in my day planner, and now I'm going to just do it regardless of what the voice says. Um, I'm missing that chip, I think.

SPEAKER_00 6:47

And it's interesting uh because I and I I'm I'm curious. I think people would be curious, you know, you might think, oh, someone's a minister, they they probably have like this really evolved practice of like doing affirmations and meditation, all that kind of stuff. Do you guys have, I mean, do you do you find value in anything like that if you're trying to convince yourself to do something or motivate yourself? What what works for you to get yourself to take action on stuff?

SPEAKER_01 7:15

Getting paid. I am the most material when it c seriously, like when it comes to work, like, yep, it's on the to-do list, I get it done. Like, I will never get caught with my pants down at work, right? Well, I that is a terrible phrase and a way to say that, but like I will always get my work done when it comes to work. It's when it's personal projects or it's not, there's

Motivation Tricks And Procrastination

SPEAKER_01 7:40

not um the fear of getting in trouble if I don't, or the fear of not getting a paycheck. Like, you don't get to eat if you don't get your, you know, reports in on time. I do have like a spiritual practice, um, but that is more, I think, for my mental health. Like this is a pretty scary place without making sure that I've really set the tone for what my day is gonna look like and how I want to show up in the world. And so that's really just what I do for everybody that has to be around me, more so than like feeling like it's a scheduled thing. What about you, Liza?

SPEAKER_02 8:18

Well, I would also say a paycheck is a big thing that helps to motivate whether I'm doing something or not for sure. But I mean, I will say I think I've always operated on the 11th hour. It's just if I look back, you know, even in writing papers for college, high school, it was always like even now, packing. Um I don't like it's not where I want to start, but inevitably the fuel of waiting until the last minute, something about just like knowing that it needs to get maybe the chaos, maybe that's part of it, like thriving in the chaos, which I I love less and less, um, but I still find myself I s well, I don't do it as often, but I definitely feel like I wait until the last minute and somewhere in that chaos, like I thrive.

SPEAKER_01 9:12

It's also creating your own consequence. Like I was just talking about the consequence of like if I don't get my work done, like you know, or you know, the motivation of getting paid or whatever. Like I because I'm somebody who will often wait until the last minute as well, like procrastination, like you know, creativity comes at the 11th hour, kind of a belief system. But I do wonder if it's it stems from creating artificial consequence to not getting it done so that I can get it done. I'm not saying that's what's happening for you. I just had my own aha while you were talking.

SPEAKER_02 9:46

I think mine's more of a habit that I haven't yet broken.

SPEAKER_00 9:51

But maybe also it it occurs to me that on some level that can work for you. And and I don't know if this is your case, but I'm thinking back to like I'll I'll date myself here. When I was in college, when I was in college, we didn't have computer laptops. So if I was doing a term paper, it was typing, right? And so I would have to type on the typewriter at like midnight if a paper was due the next day. And so if you make a mistake or you're like, oh, I didn't say that right, it's like too bad. You got to keep going because I'm certainly not gonna retype that whole page just to redo a sentence. So I wonder if part of it is you just let go because you really don't have any other choice but to let go. And in the letting go, now you're kind of like your your critical mind that wants to control things in the relative just lets go. And you're like, you know what? I don't have time. And especially like what you said, Liza, where we if if if I go, it's last minute for me, I don't have time anymore to think about it. I just have to do it and trust, have faith that it's actually gonna work.

SPEAKER_02 11:02

Tiffany, do you know what a typewriter is?

SPEAKER_01 11:08

I really want to say no because I want to appear younger than I actually am, but I actually do know what a typewriter is. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 11:16

It's it's this, it's this mine of adding about 25 pounds.

SPEAKER_01 11:21

I love the typewriter. I remember that side when I was a kid.

SPEAKER_02 11:27

I vaguely remember in that college. I think I paid I paid people to have a laptop? I did not have a laptop. Um I went to the I did go to the computer library, I guess. In the library we had computers that you could do your papers, but you could also pay somebody to type them for you. And that's generally what I because I just did I couldn't type. And if you if I had to type a paper at the end of the semester, I'd have to start with the beginning. There's I just didn't how to even now I I wing it, you know.

SPEAKER_01 11:57

I taught myself to type when I got my first job because I was like, oh, like they type here and I have to send emails and I couldn't type. I learned how to type. I taught myself to type with Mavis Beacon, not stating myself. Do you remember Mavis Beacon?

SPEAKER_00 12:11

I remember her. I remember that software.

SPEAKER_01 12:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:15

So I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 12:17

I had typing class in high school. I do remember that.

SPEAKER_01 12:19

Um, Thor, you brought up me up to Clown College, so I didn't have to type papers.

SPEAKER_02 12:24

Can we all graduate recently from clown college?

SPEAKER_01 12:29

Is that what we're calling a ministerial school?

SPEAKER_02 12:33

Doctors of clowning. Thor, you brought up faith. And I sort of wanted to say because one of the things that I've been thinking about since we last spoke is this idea of faith. Is this idea of do I truly believe have faith in what it is that I believe in? I mean, it has been it has been weighing on my mind a lot. Like what happens when, you know, a crisis of faith. You know? And I'm curious if you guys have ever gone through like one thing is just like, ah, I didn't you know, I'm and I'm not saying this is what you guys are doing, but it's like I didn't get what I wanted. I don't this I don't believe in this. I've tried really hard. But have a real existential sort of is this is what I believe in what I believe about life, about myself, about God, about the universe, about this, you know, pure potential of power of energy. Is that really what I believe,

What Faith Means In Crisis

SPEAKER_02 13:40

or are we just living the circumstances of life?

SPEAKER_00 13:43

I I I'll give one quick answer, which is that I'll say, and this is a small subset of what I think is a great, much bigger question that I'm hoping like Tiffany will have, like brilliance on, I know she would. Um what I'll say for me is I I'm starting to have faith in the last three or four months. I just decided at one point, I recognized that uh well, I was in a class, and if a question came to me, and the question was like, well, write down the first thing that comes to your mind, uh, or spend, you know, three minutes writing something down, I would just write it down and I was just clear, like that's exactly what I meant to write down. I didn't even need to second guess it. And past me, I think, would have second guessed stuff ad nauseum, where I would have been like, oh, wait, that's not a good answer. I can come up with something better. And so I that small part for me of faith is just trusting that like whatever came up to me is the thing that meant was meant to come up, and I just go with it. And it's so much more freeing for me just to go with whatever comes up right away and just go, whatever, that's it. So I don't that's not completely to your point, but that's what comes up for me, is just having trust in the moment that it is, you know, my intuition is dialed into the big picture, and and that's it's giving me exactly what I need right in that moment.

SPEAKER_01 15:12

I think for me, I definitely had crises of faith. I mean, you've quite honestly, you two are the people that I call when I'm in those moments of so you've both seen my crises, crises of faith, not just a crisis of faith. Um I think that there's a few things. One, I first of all, I can look back on experiences that I've had in my life where I've experienced the magic or I've experienced the, you know, um life unfolding perfectly or the serendipity. And it's like, okay, you know, that is also true. So I'm feeling this way right now, but I have evidence in my life that I can look back on to support. But I think the bigger thing that helps me pull myself out of it, and I hope this comes across the way that it's intended, but what do I want to believe? Because the truth is, is that maybe I'm wrong and maybe I'm right. Maybe, you know, maybe my faith is, I don't believe that my faith is absolute crap, but like what if it is? So what? If the worst is going to happen, do I want to spend my life in constant fear of the worst is going to happen? Or do I want to believe that my life is unfolding perfectly and that I am equal and up to any challenge that comes my way? And when whatever happens, happens, I'll deal with it then. And so I think for me, it's more about 99% of the time, I'm all in on this and I get it and I believe it. And I have those moments of fear of like, you know, or moments where I'm like, sometimes I think my serendipities run out like that pixie, I Liza and I had this conversation a while ago that like she felt like pixie d dust was just flying out of her tushy, and then one day the pixie d dust just all dried up. And like, what if this is the moment where there's no more pixie dust? And I think, okay, but do I want to live my life thinking I have no more pixie dust, or do I want to deal with not having pixie dust when I have to deal with not having pi like I get to decide how I'm gonna spend my day, and also just action. For me, it's like when I can get out of myself and just go do something, go laugh, go be with people who fill up my tank, go be of service to other people. Um I think for me the challenge is there's beauty everywhere and there's pain everywhere, and they're often interconnected. What am I looking at? Like, do I want to see how much good there is and how amazing and look at the beauty, or do I want to focus on the pain? That was a lot, sorry, but I've had a lot of things.

SPEAKER_02 18:02

No, that was I mean, both of you had great, great answers. And to understand, I mean, I think what you're saying, Tiffany, is you're making a choice. And I think what you're saying, Thor, is is in this moment, like just really paring it down to where you are in the moment to understand where is my belief right now, in this, in this very moment, no matter if there's pixie dust or there's a dry up well of pixie dust, like where am I in in all of it?

SPEAKER_01 18:29

Well, and Ernest Holmes says, get to the highest thought you can conceive of. Like in that moment, what's where is like and let that be your starting point. So if I'm feeling, you know, everything sucks, like it's not working. This is the I always think this is the moment where the universe um is gonna drop me on my tushy, or like, um, and if I have, if I'm sad, like, oh, this is it. I'm just sad now. I just live in sad. I'm never gonna be happy again. This is, you know, and have a tendency to sometimes get sucked into that. But I love that concept of like, can I just get to slightly higher ground and then start from there? And what are the thoughts that I think from there? And then can I use that as a leverage to get me to a higher thought and a higher thought? Um, because I don't want to live in that place where everything sucks.

SPEAKER_00 19:19

I wonder too, if if given enough time, we can get a new perspective on this. And and the reason I say this is I was thinking about this yesterday. Tiffany, you might remember this. The first iteration of All Revved Up was a handful of interviews that I did with folks, and you were one of them. And I remember quite clearly the conversation we had was roughly about February of 2025. And I'm trying to remember what happened then, not to get political in the show, but I remember we had a we had a conversation very much about crisis of how do I deal with this? How do I, how do I move on? And, you know, here we are a year and a half later. Not that it's any better, but I I can I can say for myself, during that time, wonderful things have happened in my life. Like I got to visit Paris for the first time and spend that with my family. And I've I've gone to to on trips that were amazing, and I've had experiences that were amazing. I saw my wife become a practitioner. So there are good things that happened during that time. So I wonder if like in those moments of having that crisis of conscious. Now I don't even know the word. Crisis of consciousness or conscience? Whichever.

SPEAKER_02 20:47

Yeah, probably the similar idea of the thing. I mean maybe both. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:52

I hate that word because whenever I have to write it out, I'm like always. Conscious or conscious conscience. Yeah, I know. Conscience. Conscience. Crisis of conscience. Whatever.

SPEAKER_03 21:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:02

A a moment where I don't I doubt whether I how to move forward and whether, you know, I I I believe in stuff. Maybe in that moment I can just be like, well, you you know, you had it a year and a half ago, and and some things turned out okay. Now, I get that there are many people for whom the last year and a half did not turn out great at all. It was horrible for many people. But maybe that's one way that I could at least could could look at when something like that comes up is is is know that in the fullness of time, both good things and sucky things will happen, but put my attention on the good.

SPEAKER_01 21:42

I'm actually really glad that you brought that up because it's amazing the amnesia that we get. But now I remember that period in my life where I felt I I was absolutely having a crisis of faith and a crisis of conscious or consciousness or whatever word we've decided we're going with. Um the crisis of faith. Yeah. And I was I was really struggling. I was really struggling. And it's interesting, you know, I can look back and and first of all, I I called you guys. I did something about it. I got into action. I didn't, you know, whatever it was that just was helping in the moment, um, minute by minute. And I look at where I'm at now, and quite honestly, a lot of the relative facts have not changed all that much. You know, a lot of what was going on then is still going on now. Um, and some of it's quite honestly even worse or, you know, at least has a greater stronghold. And yet I feel more solid and more confident and more connected than I ever have, or at least I have in a really long time. And so I think those are the moments where it's like, oh, like if I look when I'm in those moments, if I can look back and go, oh, I was there and then I got out of it, I will get out. Of this again too. And I think one of the biggest things I did is just leaned into it. I didn't try to fix it. I didn't try to change it. I didn't try to pretend like it wasn't happening. Um, I think a lot of times with ministers, we can think that we're supposed to, like, I can't have a crisis of faith. I'm not allowed to. So I have to pretend like it's not happening. And I was so broken that I was like, yeah, no, I'm my I'm a mess. And I'm just gonna experience that.

SPEAKER_02 23:30

I think that's the most important thing, even as I'm asking the question, is to really kind of not move away from it, like not shy away from the fact that you're having this. Like I think the importance is to be questioning at all times what it is that you believe in what you're doing in order to continue to grow and not to try to get-I mean, listen, no one wants to be uncomfortable. And when you're going through a crisis of faith, I think you're really at your most uncomfortable because you're basically questioning the root, the core of who you are and what you believe. And when you're in that state, it's like, you know, it's it's beyond I uncomfortable is a nice way to put it, you know. And I think, as you said, Tiffany, leaning into it to really kind of not try to go around it or pretend it's not there and to really go, what is this that's showing up for me and why is it showing up for me? And I think I don't know that there's a I think you have to find your process out, but I do agree that reminding yourself, because we don't get to be the age that we are right now without having some kind of crisis of consciousness or whatever beforehand. And when we realize that we got through it, I think that is the beauty of it.

SPEAKER_01 24:45

Just to clarify, some of us are a lot younger than the rest of us.

SPEAKER_02 24:49

Some of us don't know what a typewriter is. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_01 24:51

I have no idea. No, you're absolutely right. Yeah. Well, and change is painful. Like change change, it we want to stick to our comfort zone because it's where we feel safe and cozy and comfortable, but we're supposed to be evolving. We're supposed to be changing, we're supposed to be growing. And I think of like when you're a kid and you have growing pains, right? And like your knees ache and whatever, but like on the other side of that is a growth spurt and it it changes, and then you get comfortable in the new body that you're in. Um, and so if I can look at it as that, like, oh, I'm growing. What what are the lessons that I need to learn from this? What's here for me to learn? And what can I glean from this versus thinking? Because sometimes I think like the universe is is trying to get me, right? Or the pixie dust has run out. And it's like, no, pixie dust is still there. This is just there's another iteration of Liza on the other side of whatever you're experiencing right now. So, what I what do I need to learn right now in this moment so that I can flourish into that next gorgeous iteration that wants to be birthed.

SPEAKER_00 26:02

So I I have a question because I as there's two sort of competing ideas on this topic that are swirling around. And one is this idea that to give yourself grace to understand you're in a season, to understand, yes, I I don't want to stick my head in the sand. I want to feel what this is and try and process it. There's that. And then there can be another sort of competing or potentially competing idea, which is well, you could just decide to feel better. You could just decide. You you're you're the one that's deciding to feel sorry for yourself or to feel upset. And I'm not saying I believe that, but I yeah, I would actually punch somebody in the face if they came to me with all you should just decide to feel better, Liza.

SPEAKER_01 26:50

Just decide. No, I know what you're saying. You're not saying that. I yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:54

But it's no, but there, but there are there are people we know who not saying exactly that, but that will say everything is a decision. And so

Grace Versus Spiritual Bypassing

SPEAKER_00 27:05

how do you how do you know? And then here's uh I'll I'll throw out one um just a book that I absolutely love called Life is in the Transitions um by Bruce Feiler. And one of the things that he talks about, he interviewed like 200 people and and talked with them about big transition moments in their lives. And what he found was people have way more transition moments, and he calls them life quakes, where like something like it would be like um uh a death, uh, a divorce, a lot losing a job or something like that. He goes, People have way more of these in their lives than we think. And and to our discussion, he said they last longer than you think. And they're not like you could just get over them, you know, like like snap out of it. He's like, sometimes they take a while, and you just have to give yourself that space to know it takes a while.

SPEAKER_02 28:02

Well, and along the lines of what you're saying, first of all, I shouldn't promote violence. I wouldn't punch anybody in the face, maybe in the knee. Maybe I kick them in the knee. Um but I, you know, when you're in that moment saying, Well, what do you want to decide? Like, you know, you can choose to decide. Like it's so hard to say you can do this because the implication is that you're creating this, and we kind of know that you do, but when you're in the moment and you're telling someone they, well, you can turn it around and you can create something else. I think probably the better way to phrase that is what is it that you would like to feel in this moment? And that sort of lets the pressure out of saying, Well, you can turn this around if you choose something different. It's like, well, what is it that you'd actually like to be feeling instead of what you are feeling? Because I think that then turns it around. It it reminds me a lot of, you know, Abraham Hicks or Esther Hicks always says, like you mentioned, Tiffany, like reach for the better feeling. So if you're in the if you're depressed, um maybe reach for frustration or reach for anger. And then from there, I mean, that's still not where your goal is, but it's better than depressed. And then from anger, you know, confusion. Still not where you want to be, but it's at least better. I mean, you know, like we talked about uh a couple of episodes ago, inductive and deductive reasoning, you know. Sometimes you just know and sometimes you have to, you know, make the inquiry towards what it is that you want to know. And I think when you ask the question, what is it that you would like to feel? It sort of lets the pressure off of what it is. I know that works for me anyway. I'll say that. It works for me to go, okay, right. What is it that I actually want to feel? Because I am so completely, you know, in engulfed. I'm so consumed with this crisis of faith or this situation or whatever. I'm so consumed in it that I can't see, you know, the window to crack open. But if I stop for a second and ask the question, what is it that I'd like to feel? It stops me in my tracks and brings me right to the moment.

SPEAKER_01 30:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:16

I think that's also like there's I think it's one of the like most misused thing of our teaching is that I can just bypass it, right? I can just decide to feel something else. Like I can just decide to experience something else. And not that I don't believe that that's true if I'm in a place to make that decision and I and you know, but or maybe I don't believe that's true. I think that if I believe that my life is unfolding perfectly, then it means that everything that I'm experiences is unfolding perfectly. And I get to decide what consciousness I want to approach that from. So yes, I can have, I can be feeling depressed, I can be feeling sad, but I can simultaneously know a higher truth as well. And I can also make choices. The decision really comes do I pick up the phone and call Dr. Thor or Dr. Liza because I'm feeling really depressed and feeling miserable because I know that that will help me get to the next elevated state. Or am I choosing, am I deciding to sit and wallow in it? It's not, I just decide, nope, it's over, because that's really bypassing it and that's not really dealing with it. And I believe that's what turns into ailments and illness in my body is by my mind deciding it's over something while my cells and my body are actually storing the emotions. So if I can go, this sucks, this hurts, what you know, or whatever I'm experiencing, but I decide to pick up the phone. I decide to go to the center, I decide to read a book. Those are the decisions that lead to the elevated thinking that ultimately help me navigate and to see a bigger picture or zoom out to a 30,000-foot view versus being stuck in um whatever crisis I'm in the middle of.

SPEAKER_02 32:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:16

Yeah. I I think it's interesting when we, you know, bringing up the phrase, my life is unfolding perfectly no matter what. If you say that and you're in the middle of something like really sucky, then you it it maybe what it does is it prompts you to go, okay, well, if that's so, and I really at least want to believe that it's true, that my life is unfolding perfectly, then it means I have to be able to find something in this situation that I can work with. There must be some kind of raw material here. And to your point, Tiffany, of like, okay, what can I choose? Can I choose a call? Can I choose a book? Can I choose, you know, go listen to something that inspires me as a way to move myself through this? Um, maybe that's what it is. It's just in that moment when you say my life is folding perfectly. Okay, so prove it. Do something that proves it.

SPEAKER_01 33:10

Well, and sometimes a good cry is the something. Sometimes I need to just cry and throw a fit and throw it, but I I don't have any judgment about any of it. I think that's the difference. Rather than judging my like, sometimes I need a good cry. So a crisis of faith is not a bad thing if the other side of it leads to a more grounded truth and a more grounded understanding. Like, and nobody says I want to experience the bad, but the truth, like, I think about when my dad died. I'd never experienced grief like that before. It was the most painful thing ever. And I just my skin was on fire and it was falling off. Um, and I actually, it was Dr. Liza that said to me, because I was like, I was in ministerial school at the time, and I was like, I gotta get out of here. Like, I don't know if I believe any of this. And she said, don't let go of the only string that may be keeping you tethered to knowing who you are. Like it was like there was this invisible string tethering me to my faith, even though I it was so painful. And

Grief As Growth And Healing

SPEAKER_01 34:15

on the other side of, and grief is forever. Grief isn't something like, oh, I, you know, it's seven years, so now I'm fine and I never shed a tear again. But taking a step back from that time where it was so raw, I recognized there's so much beauty in that, in that experience and who I became on the others. I was completely changed and transformed, and my edges were softened. I'm not saying I want to experience grief to be able to get, but I am a better person today because I experienced that. And so how can I say that that is a bad piece, like bad piece of my life and this is a good piece? Like it's it's the tapestry, it's all of it.

SPEAKER_02 35:00

Yeah, so true. I mean, Dr. Thor and I were talking about this, you know, just the thought of would you ever tell anyone to stop being happy? And I'm not saying that you have to sit in your grief, but you know, we we're so conditioned to go, oh no, no, no, you know, don't feel sad. Don't feel sad. Oh my god, don't feel sad. Like I feel uncomfortable because you're feeling sad. So let's not feel sad, you know.

SPEAKER_01 35:23

Don't make me uncomfortable. So can you just get happy because it'll be more convenient for me? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:28

Exactly. Exactly. So if you're not gonna take if I'm not gonna sit here and go, Oh my god, you're so filled with joy right now, and I just need you to stop. Like, you know, you'd never do that to somebody.

SPEAKER_01 35:37

Like I mean, there are some people that you'd like to slap the happy, I mean again, physical violence, but you're like, really? Like you're always that happy. Like it can be annoying. I'm not gonna lie.

SPEAKER_00 35:48

I I feel like this show is gonna have like an explicit warning on it. Like, may induce violence.

SPEAKER_02 35:53

Don't let the children watch.

SPEAKER_01 35:55

It's true. What does Liza say? This is not your mother's grandmother's ministry.

SPEAKER_02 36:02

This is not your grandma's ministry.

SPEAKER_00 36:04

I feel like I should I should ask this question. Do either of you have any um family background of anyone that even came close to being officially in ministry or anything like that?

SPEAKER_02 36:16

Not that I'm aware of in my family.

SPEAKER_00 36:18

So you're the first minister?

SPEAKER_02 36:21

The first minister that I'm aware of, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 36:23

I mean, I'm Jewish, and so I mean, it's sacrilege to have become a minister of anything.

SPEAKER_00 36:30

Yeah, what are you doing? You at least should leave this work to the men.

SPEAKER_01 36:34

I mean, it's kind of crazy. Um, so no, no rabbis either.

SPEAKER_00 36:40

Okay, yeah, me either. I mean, I was my upbringing was um we would go to like a Lutheran church if we happened to be somewhere, or if we lived on a military base somewhere, we would just go to the chapel. So that was it for me. Um on holidays. And holiday, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 36:58

Oh yeah, you gotta go for the high holidays. Otherwise, like I which is always so funny to me. Like we would be we would be Jewish like twice a year.

SPEAKER_02 37:07

Of course you are. Important two days of

Sacred Spaces And Everyday Awe

SPEAKER_02 37:10

the year for the Jews. Yeah, you have to. I think I was Jewish during that time too.

SPEAKER_03 37:13

That's right.

SPEAKER_02 37:14

Um I actually still do go to um midnight mass. There's something about the pageantry of it and everything that they do and the kids and I don't know. I I love it. It's almost like yeah, there's something about it that I really do enjoy and love. So I do go to midnight mass on my own. Sometimes I go with my family if they, you know. Even if it's I might go to a to a service to a mass, you know, if they asked me to go. I mean, there's always something to clean. I'd go I by the way, I'd go to anything anywhere all the time. Like I've been to a mosque because I got invited to when I was in Morocco, um, in Thailand, I was at a Buddhist temple. I mean, I love it. I'm so fascinated and obsessed with what it is that calls people to spirituality or religion, you know.

SPEAKER_01 38:11

Same. I mean, I'll go anywhere. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:14

I think that's true. That just I I think back to the two places that were sort of most awe-inspiring to me, both from the Christian world were uh St. Peter's in Rome and Notre Dame in Paris, which I saw last year, and they were just they had finished much of the restoration work after the fire there however many five years ago. And it is stunning on the inside. But going in those places, you just, I mean, I'm not, I'm certainly not a Catholic, but going in there, you're just like, there's an energy about the awe-inspiringness of it where I could see where it how compelling it would be for people just to come away from this with this feeling of reverence.

SPEAKER_02 38:58

Well, I think it's also back to faith. Like the people that were there in on any of these had so much faith and they had a passion for what it is that they were building and constructing and, you know, being a part of. So it wasn't just like they were building a building. It was like the reverence they had for the job that they were doing, I'm sure, is felt throughout the walls of these places, you know? Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 39:21

It feels to me like a soul's remembrance. It's the same feeling I have sometimes when I like see pictures of Earth from a space shuttle, or when you look up at a, you know, starlit sky, or you go into a cathedral or a church. There's just it speaks to a place in me that doesn't, that transcends, you know, the thinking mind, that that transcends all of like the relative everything going on in your life. It's like the it's like your soul recognizes that as truth and beauty. And you yeah, like you can get that in a mosque, you can get that in a temple, you can get it, you know, probably at a Burger King. I don't know, but I'm I I I want I want more of that because I spend that's what counteracts the times when I can get really jaded. Um or get really caught up in what's happening in the world.

SPEAKER_00 40:26

What it what did Mr. Rogers say, uh, you know, in times of trouble, look for the helpers. And maybe that's like a like what you're saying, Tiffany, is look for the good. Like the i it's there. I mean, when we were uh at Notre Dame last year, they had, because it was still under construction, they had like these murals out front that showed the progress they had made over the last couple of years. And and what was fascinating was how many regions of the entire country of France were engaged in producing the material to fix Notre Dame. Like they would be like, here's this forest where they cut down these trees, and here are these carpenters who created the beams, and like it was it was a whole country's effort, and like they were just in love with the idea of recreating this thing that meant so much to their nation. And people were just giving themselves, and and it's such a beautiful thing to see. And like that's to me, that's the best of who we could be when we remember that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_01 41:25

Well, yeah, it's who do I wanna, what do I want to be looking at? And who do I want to be? Like I always talk about after 9-11, like 9-11 was this travesty. It was horrific, it was awful. But immediately afterwards, like people ran, like we were one country for, you know, five minutes, and ever there was so much love that the blood banks were full for the for they were turning people away. And all of these people ran to be the solution. Um, and so what do I want to like? That's who I want to be. That's what I I don't want. I'd love to get to a place where we don't need the tragedy to bring out the best in us. My greatest hope is that we can recognize that we are that and we can be that without needing something that we're doing it in response to. But for now, until we recognize that as who we are, I'm all in for okay, this this thing happened. Where's the love? Where are the people coming together? I want to be with them. I want to, that's who I want to be.

SPEAKER_00 42:34

Yeah. I love that. I love this conversation. And I know that whatever we talk about next week on All Revd Up, I'm gonna love that too. So thank you to both of you today.

SPEAKER_01 42:47

Yay! Yay, this is fun. It's always fun.

SPEAKER_00 42:51

I'll yep. I love you guys. I'll we'll talk next week. Sounds good. Bye.