Letting God Father You | Healing Perfectionism, Identity & the Nervous System | Pt. 2 with Dr. Ashleigh Moreland | 032

If you've ever had a theology of a good Father but a nervous system that still doesn't believe it — this episode is where we go next.

In Part 2 of this two-part conversation, I sit back down with Dr. Ashleigh Moreland — neurophysiologist, therapist, and founder of the ReMind Institute — to pick up right where we left off. We go beyond the science of perfectionism and anxiety and get into what healing actually looks like when the sheep stops fighting to escape the mountain and finally lets the Shepherd come in.

In this episode we cover:

• What it looks like to stop performing for God and actually let Him father you
• The neuroscience behind why we literally cannot heal as well in isolation — and what Dr. Ash accidentally discovered in her PhD research about community, oxytocin, and the brain's capacity for change
• The inheritance that matters more than anything you could leave in a bank account
• ADHD, perfectionism, and what it means to live in harmony with how you're wired instead of fighting it
• Dr. Ash's "Tong Theory" and why your diagnosis doesn't get to be your ceiling
• What happened during worship that Dr. Ash hadn't shared with anyone — until this conversation
• How to move from repenting out of fear to repenting from a place of grace
• Why faith is the opposite of control — and how that changes everything for the perfectionist

Whether you're navigating anxiety, perfectionism, relational trauma, or a complicated relationship with God, this conversation will give you hope that healing is not only possible — it's already in motion.

🎧 New here? Start with Episode 031 — Part 1 of this conversation. 

Take the Grace Scale Quiz and find Lenee’s book, You Will Make Mistakes: Discovering God’s Grace in the Midst of Perfectionism, at leneepezzano.com.

Connect with Dr. Ash here:
- ReMIND Institute

- Facebook

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- LinkedIn

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Transcript

Letting God Father You | Healing Perfectionism, Identity & the Nervous System | Pt. 2 with Dr. Ashleigh Moreland | 032

[00:00:00] Last episode, we ended with me sharing ways I practice approaching God just as I am, like picturing Him right next to me on the couch or holding my hand as we talk. And given that my entire walk with the Lord has been built on fear of punishment, that's not a small thing. For some of you, that image might be the thing that you've always wanted, but it might also be the hardest thing to picture because maybe the word father doesn't automatically carry safety.

It might carry expectation or distance or silence or a standard that you'll never quite meet. Maybe it carries shame. It's one thing to have a theology of a good father. It's another to have a nervous system that actually believes it, and that is where we pick up today, and it gets good. If this is your first time visiting the Redeemed Perfectionist podcast, welcome.

[00:01:00] I'm your host, Lenee’ Pezzano, and I get stoked about helping the one sheep realize that God loves her so much that He's willing to leave the 99 to run after her, the outlier, the one who doesn't feel like she fits in or thinks she has to change to some acceptable standard before she deserves to be in the fold.

The one who wonders if maybe she is the exception to the rule. The one whose mountain feels too big to ever move. Now, before you dive into today's episode, I would encourage you to go back and listen to episode 31, where Dr. Ashleigh Moreland and I explain the science behind our patterns and why the one who has tried everything and still feels stuck is not broken.

[00:02:00] She just hasn't had someone come into her mountain yet. But if you are all caught up and ready to go, in part 2 today, we get into what it looks like when the sheep stops fighting to escape the mountain and actually lets the Shepherd come in.

We talk about what it looks like to stop performing for God and actually let Him father you. We talk about parenting and the inheritance that matters more than anything you could leave in a bank account. We talk about community and the neuroscience behind why we literally cannot heal in isolation or not as well as we can in community.

And Dr. Ash shares something that happened in worship that she hadn't told anyone until this conversation. So, if you're the one who's afraid to let love get too close or whose body still braces when she comes to God, even though she can quote all the right scriptures, 

[00:03:00] this episode is going to give you hope.

And if you want to know whether my story might speak to yours, head over to my website at leneepezzano.com and grab your free copy of chapter one of my book, You Will Make Mistakes. It might just give you enough oxygen to awaken the flame in your own heart. Now let's pick up where we left off. 

Audio Only - All Participants: even as a parent, like I, my husband is not the biological father of my children. Mm-hmm. And when we got married he says that he was an infant dad because even though I had been parenting for a number of years, he hadn't.

Yeah. And so he had to start from scratch and he is like, I don't know what I'm doing. I dunno how to do this. I don't know how to parent. And I, there's, there was a number of times and I just said, if this were you and Jesus were your dad right now, how would Jesus love you through this? Mm. And all of a sudden the answer becomes clear and it's like, oh, 

[00:04:00] I don't need to have worldly knowledge of how to be a loving parent. Right. Or how to be a good parent. Right. I just need to connect the Lord to God and go, how would you father me? Yep. Yes. it's such a shift. That's honestly, when I was a kid, I remember at school we used to have these wristbands that were, I don't even think half the kids knew what they were.

'cause they weren't all Christian, but they were WWJD wristbands. What would Jesus do? Yeah. And they were just the cool thing when I was a kid, you would not find a kid in my town who wasn't wearing one. Yeah. And now, as an adult, I look back at how profound that was, because as a kid it was just a fun wristband.

I didn't have that emotional connection or that intellectual connection to it. Yeah. But now even, if I have a client who hasn't paid an invoice or who has not shown up to an appointment, the world might tell me, you need to send a debt collector and you need to come after them and be mad at them because they didn't show up.

And even just in that moment, even just in how we conduct business, it's like, 

[00:05:00] what would Jesus do? Yeah. Jesus would notice they haven't shown up. And first of all, ask if they're okay. Yeah. Yeah. Ask if everything's doing all right. Jesus would wanna understand context and wanna love them through that.

Would wanna work with them through that. And sometimes maybe, there is love that needs to be convicting. Yeah. And then, yeah. Jesus still had standards. He still had boundaries. That's right. Firmly. That's right. He had boundaries, but he loved people through them. Yeah. And I think that changes how we do every aspect of life.

Again, not intentionally, but a large proportion of my clients are entrepreneurs. Yeah. And I think that's because they're purpose driven. Mm-hmm. They have something that is inscripted on their soul mm-hmm. That they're here to do. Mm-hmm. And unless we can really connect with that and identify the uppercase T truth in that, then we can't have the impact that we're here to have.

Right. And when people are really good, like for me, I was really good at my craft. I was really good at being a practitioner, but I had no 

[00:06:00] idea how to run a business. Yeah. Yeah. And I went and invested insane amounts of money, like multi six figures in business coaching over the years. And the thing that I learned in those spaces was that actually strategy is a worldly thing.

And sometimes God's strategy doesn't make sense. And sometimes God's policies and heaven's procedures simply defy the worlds. Yeah. And it's, it's really good business practice to have things in place and to have boundaries. It's really good parenting practice to have things in place and to have boundaries.

Yeah. But if we outsource our consultation to a policies and procedures manual instead of outsourcing our consultation to the Lord so good, we're never going to get there. That's so good. Well, and here's the thing. I've had people, I've had people try to use the Word to answer 

[00:07:00] something in my life, but because of my consultation directly with Holy Spirit, I knew that word did not directly apply to me in the season.

Yes, right now. And so that's important. I mean, all of this comes back to hearing the voice of God. Jesus was like, mm-hmm. I only did what the Father tells me to do or say, what he tells me to say? I wanna be that close toHim. Yeah. that's how I get through life. And I laugh a little bit at this whole ADHD thing because I, I used to joke about it.

I was like, oh, I bet if I was ever assessed, I would be diagnosed, but I really didn't know what I was saying. And then, here I am literally considering going and getting tested, but almost a hundred percent positive. I'm ADHD as well. And I'm like, what makes me laugh is none of that matters.  The label doesn't matter. 

[00:08:00] The symptoms, the reason it doesn't matter is 'cause I look back and I'm like, but the Lord, I've been walking with the Lord 31 years and he's helped me navigate the symptoms in life, regardless of the label. Now the label --because I'm understanding the symptoms more and what they're tied to and what's behind them -- 

now I'm even more empowered.  The perspective I have now is like, oh, I wasn't something that needed fixed. Yes. it's just I need to learn how to walk in harmony with how I'm wired and walk with the rhythms of how my brain works. Yes. So, this is a whole ‘nother layer of freedom that's super exciting to me, and I don't need to have the label.

So, what would you say to people that, you know around that kind of a topic? What would you say about that? Oh my gosh. Well, the most pragmatic thing I say is are you open to medication? Mm. If you are open to medication, that is the only door a a diagnosis opens. Mm-hmm. That can't be opened without one.

[00:09:00] So at least in Australia, that's the case. So, the only way you can get prescribed medication for A DHD is if you have a formal diagnosis. Gotcha. Outside of medication, it's enough to just understand your patterns, your thoughts, the way that you move through the world, your challenges even. Yeah. And there are two things I would say about this is that when you can understand that label or not, how your brain is wired influences your experience of the world.

Yeah. It influences the way you show up in the world. I think about it like this. The way that I would guard a castle is really different to the way that I would guard a caravan, which is really different to the way that I would guard a beach shack. Mm-hmm. And so, they're all homes. Mm-hmm. But they're different, right?

Mm-hmm. Now I need to know how to live in my home, and that's the making harmony with it. But I also need to 

[00:10:00] know how to guard it. Yeah. And if I don’t, this is the spiritual warfare thing. This is about how understanding how the enemy will infiltrate us and what our possible vulnerabilities are, right?

When that is the home in which we live in, right? And so, I think about this and go, okay, so if I have a brain, rightly or wrongly that meets the diagnostic criteria for this, this is how it behaves. It's like going, having a real estate show you through a home and say, these are the features of this home.

Well, that list of ways in which our brain operates is like the features of our home. Absolutely. and I look at that and go, okay, so based upon the features of this home, how can I optimize and maximize this? Like, how can I work with this? Right. And so that's one thing I would encourage people, if you feel strongly about getting a diagnosis, absolutely.

Pursue that. And that can sometimes open a door for people to have more self-compassion and to 

[00:11:00] understand why they were the way they were or why they did the things they did. But don't stop there. Yeah. Like you actually, you can't just justify why you were the way you were and leave it there. Now you have a responsibility to actually go, well now how can I learn to live in harmony with this?

How can I learn to leverage this? What guards do I need to put in place? Yeah. To be able to prevent harm as a result of this. Yes. And the other thing that I find really risky is, and I have seen this countless times, I've, I would say that I actually see it more with. Autism ASD as opposed to ADHD, but it can come through in ADHD as well.

It made me come up with something I call the Tong Theory. Hmm. And something that I had experienced a lot as a practitioner was people would come to me and say, oh, I can't X, Y, Z because I have ADHD, or because I'm autistic. 

[00:12:00] And I would say to them, it's true that your brain operates in this way, that you meet that diagnostic criteria, but it's not true that you can't hold a compassionate conversation or learn emotional intelligence or be whatever it might be.

And I said to them, imagine you were born without tongs never existed in your home. Would you go through life going, oh, I could never eat steak because I don't have tongs to flip it. Wow. No. How would you flip the steak if you wanted to eat steak? So good. Sure. The one way that the world says when you're cooking steak, you flip it with tongs, but I don't have tongs, so therefore I can't eat steak.

Well, let's, hypothetically, one of my favorite, I had a business mentor called Colin Ray, he passed away a couple of years ago now, but he gave me the strategic sentence and he said, 

[00:13:00] whenever you're struggling with something, ask this. How do I given that? How do I flip the state given that I don't have tongs?

And what it does is it opens up the problem-solving parts of your brain. Nice. And so how do I given that? And if we apply the same thing, well, how do I flip stake given that I don't have tongs? Yeah. I could use my fingers, I could use a fork. I could flip the pan. I could list a hundred different ways that I could flip the stake.

Yeah. And so, it's really not a deficit. Right. When we can apply that and understand, I'm committed to working with the infrastructure that I have, and part of that might look like, do you know what? Do you know what really doesn't work great for my nervous system? Unpredictable sleep timing. I could still get eight hours of sleep, but if that, those eight hours are from 2:00 AM until 10:00 AM Yeah.

My nervous system is fried. Yeah. 

[00:14:00] But if I get eight hours and those eight hours are between 9:00 PM and 5:00 AM oh my gosh. I have clarity of thought. My nervous system feels calm. Yeah. I'm a kinder person. Yes. In the world. Yeah. it's also our responsibility to, to learn, to wanna build a relationship Yeah.

With our brain, to wanna build a relationship with our body. And one of my catchphrases is life is for thriving, not just surviving. Yes. if we have been going through life, whether it's with perfectionism, whether it's with a d, h, adhd, whatever it's with, if we have been going through life, just surviving, just doing our best, but never feeling enough, never feeling worthy.

God's got way more for us than that. Yeah. Yeah. and what would it look like for us to thrive? Right. He’s been telling me for years to dream big and he kept bringing Ephesians 3:20 that he could do exceedingly, abundantly, more than I could ask or imagine Uhhuh. again, when your brain is kind of gonna protect and preserve, scripture says, hope deferred makes the heart grow sick.

[00:15:00] So to protect ourselves. We're not gonna hope in something because it doesn't happen. It doesn't happen. It doesn't happen. It doesn't happen. Well, it must not gonna be happening for me. Right, exactly. But a longing fulfilled is a tree of life it says. And it's been this journey as I've even watched my own healing unfold of how he has had to persuade me of his heart and that he really intends if I will trust Him in the process and the timing of that process and surrender it all, it's gonna be so worth it.

And it already is, but it's just learning the heart of God and then being willing to humble ourselves. To his process that he's the potter where the clay. Yes. And that can be very scary. And that's why learning this stuff is so important. Being aware of it, it's so important. Engaging in conversations with others about it, it's so important.

[00:16:00] Community, we were not built to do this alone for sure. No, we weren't. And it's so interesting that you say that this had dropped in for me before, but one of the accidental findings of my PhD, so my whole PhD was on neuroplasticity. And one of the accidental things that happened was I was pregnant with my first child during my f, my PhD.

And that meant that I had a deadline. I had to have all of my data collected before I had my baby. That was like, I had to push for that because once I had my baby, I was doing an intervention study. So, what that means is that it needed to be 16 weeks straight. I could not have a baby in the middle of that and just pick up where I left off.

Yeah. So, it was a 16-week straight intervention and the deadline resulted in me going, well, how do I get all of these people through a 16-week intervention given that I have this deadline? 

[00:17:00] And the only solution that made it feasible was to actually have people come in, in groups instead of one-on-one.

Wow. I would love to say that was a choice made by my exceptional intellect. It wasn't, it was necessity because I was pregnant. Right. That part did not make it into my thesis. I will add, but that's the reality. And I had results that had never been replicated in the literature before in terms of neuroplasticity, and I could not explain it.

And I found this study where They had done this brain modulation research and the people who didn't respond to the brain modulation, protocol, they gave levodopa and levodopa is essentially a dopamine medication, right? Mm-hmm. The people who didn't respond to the original neuroplasticity protocol after they were given dopamine responded.

[00:18:00] Wow. The interesting thing about this is that we have two pathways for dopamine. People with ADHD tend to rely on the cortisol pathway for dopamine. Mm. Our body is constantly in a stress state. We're constantly pumping out cortisol and what is the one thing that will get ADHD people who struggle with task initiation to actually get the task done?

Is pressure. Pressure. See, because the cortisol floods our system. Yes. And it turns on our sense of self networks and it turns on the front part of our brain. That's the dopamine. Mm. So we have chaos in our lives, and there's so much stuff everywhere where we are getting dopamine off the back of cortisol.

Mm. However, do you wanna know what the other pathway to dopamine is? Acceptance. Community. It's oxytocin. Okay. Oxytocin is our connection. Hormone connection. Yes. And this is my hypothesis. 

[00:19:00] What I had accidentally done is created a Petri dish environment where elderly people, retirees were coming into a group environment, forming connections, building relationships, making friends, having community.

Which boosts oxytocin, which boosts dopamine, which primes the brain for change. Wow. And that's why the program that I talked about before, that the 30 hours over 10 weeks is very intensive, but that is ideal for people who have experienced childhood trauma. Yeah. Or who, and not even like big t trauma, like abuse or neglect or anything like that, it can be, but more so for little t trauma where they just didn't feel seen, they didn't feel heard, they didn't feel valued, they didn't feel loved, or they didn't feel like they belonged because that is relational.

That primes the brain where the world 

[00:20:00] around me and every relationship is threatening. Wow. That's why we get the cortisol and I have never ever been able to replicate the results that we get from the group program by working with someone one-on-one. And I fully believe it is because of this mechanism that God created us for community.

Wow. God created us for relationship with him. He wants us to have a relationship with him. Yes. But if we don't feel safe, if we don't trust, if we can't be vulnerable, if we constantly see relationship as threat, then we can't have relationship with him either. Absolutely. And so, it is one of my favorite things and it's something that people will often say, I don't feel safe.

I like, I don't wanna do group work, it's the group work that makes me not wanna do it. And I'm like, that's the reason we need to. Absolutely. Oh my gosh. So, because ultimately they wanna be accepted and loved. It's just, right now it feels like a threat. Exactly. Yeah. What is, and that's the biggest thing.

[00:21:00] People walk away and they go, literally, after the first session, they go, oh my gosh, I found my people. I've never felt so safe. I was just gonna ask, what are some of the favorite things, transformations that you see? And that sounds like that's one of them. Oh my gosh. So, what I see a lot when our nervous system is very dysregulated, when the whole world feels threatening, people's worlds become very small.

Yeah. And like I said earlier, an example for me is that I wouldn't even try new things because if I was bad at it, it felt threatening. Yeah. I didn't like meeting new people because I was constantly having to manage how they perceived me. I wouldn't take opportunities because the fear of judgment was so profound.

And so probably as a macro level, like overall, I love to see people's lives expand and I love to see the possibilities. Like God is a God of more, He wants more for us. And one of my favorite things is God wants to 

[00:22:00] take you further, but first He has to take you deeper. and I'm constantly reminded of this, of going okay.

When I feel like I'm in the weeds, when I feel like I'm journeying with God through a really difficult season, and it's painful and I'm crying and it's hurting and I feel like this isn't fair, I'm reminded and I'm encouraged. I listen to the goodness of God, and I'm encouraged that he is a good God and he is taking me further and he is in the weeds with me.

Yes. But when I see what's on the other side of that, when I see that expansion, when I see the possibilities, when I see the people walking through doors that they wouldn't have even seen before. Yes. The risk taking. I love it. Why? Why do I love that so much? Because that's the ripple effect. Yes. When they can feel safe to walk through those doors that God has opened for them.

He wants to use them for his will. Yes. And this is one of the things that I, one of the most profound things that did come out of business coaching once was someone said to me, 

[00:23:00] I had this fear of offending people if I reached out. I fully believe, like the Lord's been saying to me for years now, that I'm not, to journey alone and that my impact will come when there's collaboration and, and doing his work in relationship.

Mm. I'm partnering with, nutritionists and I'm partnering with people who have their own walk with God and expertise in other areas. And that's the body. That's the body life. I was, yes. And I was scared to reach out and I was scared to build these relationships because I was afraid that they would think I was trying to.

Steal their clients or make money or whatever. Mm-hmm. I was scared that they would judge my heart posture mm-hmm. As being impure. Mm-hmm. or my motives as being impure. And someone just said to me once, they're like, are you seriously gonna prevent all these people from getting the help that they need from you simply because you are scared of what someone's gonna think of you.

[00:24:00] Mm. get over yourself. And it was quite brutal at the time, but I'm looking back and going, oh, I'm so grateful for that. Because it was true. It was like, that was how, again, if you think about the strategies and techniques and tools that the enemy has at their disposal, I see it with business owners all the time.

I have all these skills and I have all these gifts, but I don't wanna tell the world about it because what if they judge me? What if I make a mistake? What if they think I'm a phony? What if they think I'm not good enough? What if What if they write a mean comment on TikTok? Mm-hmm. And that's how the enemy is gonna keep us in our box.

Yeah. Yeah. That's where I feel like that bushfire effect of just, yeah, yeah, yeah. Explosion of God's will in the world is so cool. I tell people all the time, we have to take the steps that will build our bold. That's what I say. You’re not just going to wake up and be like, oh, cool.

I'm not gonna feel afraid. 

[00:25:00] Even Paul in scripture talks about that there were fears within and without, but courage and the desire to obey the Lord trumped the feelings. And for every step of obedience, I've ever taken, as scary as it was, once I got to the other side, I look back and what used to be a threat to me no longer is, but I had to build that muscle.

I had to build the bold. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And we don't realize we're feeding team Satan whenever we don't walk in faith. I've been doing a study recently on, it was, it's faith that was counted as righteousness for people like Abraham, for all of us. Yeah. It's faith in Jesus. It's with faith that pleases the Lord and without it.

 it's impossible to please God. It says, and we all wanna please Him. That's where our hearts have been. But every time we feel, but faith is the opposite to control faith. 

[00:26:00] Yes. That's exactly right. And I remember when all this started to unfold for me and I was taken to Galatians and I was like, oh my word.

I have been trying to justify myself through the law, which is another gospel. Yeah. Which is a cursed. it was like, it, my salvation was very authentic. But then I was trying to maintain my salvation back to the law instead of walking in grace and, yeah. He is so faithful. His loving kindness brings us into repentance.

He knew the trauma. He knew why I did what I did, and he didn't condemn me for it like he has been performing surgery time after time to get those toxins outta my belief system and replenish my belief system with truth because he has life more abundantly. He says he came to bring.

Exactly. That's the heart of God. Yes, totally. 

[00:27:00] And I've got a line that's coming to my mind right now. And it's not that, it's not that God will love you when you change, and that's the lie is that I need to change. I need to be enough. I need to be worthy. It's that He loves you so you can Yes. Yes. Oh, isn't that like we surrender?

I was in church two Sundays ago. I haven't shared this with anyone actually. Maybe this is the conversation to share it, but I was in church two Sundays ago and during worship, I had my eyes closed and I was singing about God's love. And I imagined, like I had this picture in my mind of quicksand and I felt panic.

Like, imagine how scary it would be to be being all consumed by quicksand and the feeling of fighting and gasping and trying to fight our way out of it. But then He showed me that that quicksand was his love and it wants to consume me and it is trying to consume me, but I am fighting to try and escape it.

[00:28:00] I'm trying to get my way out of it. and I asked Him like, what am I seeing that I'm fighting towards You want to all consume and for me to go down into that, I need to surrender. Yeah. But I feel like right now it doesn't feel safe to surrender. So, what is it that I'm fighting to retain that I think is more important than surrendering to your love?

And it's things like justice. Mm. It was things like being right. Yeah. It was things like, and so I was like, oh my gosh. The reason that I can't surrender into His love and pour that love into these people over here who have hurt me or my parents who were essentially the villains in my trauma story or whatever it was, the reason that I couldn't forgive and love them, which would ha if I was in surrender, if I was completely engulfed, completely encapsulated by the quicksand of God's love, how would I show up?

[00:29:00] How would, what would my heart posture be towards my parents, towards my ex-husband, towards my, whoever, anyone who's wronged me. It would be so different. Yeah. But there's this lie out here that says, I need to hold onto justice. Yeah. Or I deserve to have this hardened heart towards these people.

Because if you only knew what they did. yeah. Like it's justified. Yeah. That's our flesh. And it, it was so profound to just go, that's profound. Oh my gosh. Like I can, I could feel the panic in the body about being pulled down by the quicksand and wanting to fight for my life. Right? Yeah. Yeah. And that is the old is gone.

The new has come. Yes. Like you have to die to the flesh. Yeah. This is what it feels like. Yeah. Because you have a nervous system that is fighting for your life. Yeah. And it thinks that's what it is. Yeah. And so, when I say to people, when we go through this 10-week program, there are times when you feel like you're suffocating and, and this ego, this, this part of you.

[00:30:00] So I have little characters, I call them Harry and Sally. Yeah. I think I sent you the photo. So, Harry is the little wooden hippo. Yeah. And Sally is the decorated toilet roll. Yeah. But so, Sally is my renewed identity in Christ, the fully surrendered to his love and all of that. But Harry is our ego.

Harry is the one that is trying to fight. It's the flesh. It's the one that wants to be right. It's the one that wants to have tantrums. It's the one that wants to be perfect and it will condemn us. Anyway, it was just, it was a really profound moment and I'm glad that I'm talking about this because I have powerful, have pondered it for two, nearly two weeks now, so that's so powerful.

and I think a, again, another component, and this is where being a follower of Jesus is so helpful here because, scripture says that our 

[00:31:00] flesh is contrary to the spirit. Yes. And that our carnal mind is enmity toward the Lord. Right? Yeah. So, it's helpful to walk into the healing journey knowing there's a part of us that's going to fight tooth and nail.

Mm-hmm. You know? Yeah. and, but that's the part that has to die. And so that it helps to then know that, so that we can then start to partner with God and deny the agreements that we've been making in our flesh with the enemy. Mm-hmm. We have to stop making those agreements. I used to repent out of a, again, fear of punishment.

I was white knuckling my own strength through it. Now I'm partnering with God in the repentance process again. He's not waiting to love me. Once I change, Hs loving me so that I can. Yeah. And as I'm learning to lean into that and receive that. It is so powerful. I said to him the other day, I am so sorry.

[00:32:00] Like my biggest sins have been unbelief and fear. Yeah. And that's huge. Yeah. And I said, I have to start accepting who you've said that I am. I have to start loving me the way you have loved me and the way others have loved me. How am I talking to myself? There's life and death in the power of the tongue.

How am I talking to me? Yeah. How am I thinking about me? What am I still feeding with my energy? Yeah. I just, it's so cool to be this time repenting from a place of His grace and saying, Lord, I believe help my unbelief. Or approaching his throne and saying, I need grace to do this. I can't do this on my own.

Help me. it's just a much different process than I would've said it was a decade ago. Yeah. So powerful. Totally. and that is, it takes courage. Yeah. it can be scary and confronting 

[00:33:00] and we need to give God permission to reveal things to us. Yeah. And reveal things to us that are ugly, that are hard to see that, gosh tell you, life is a whole lot more comfortable and a whole lot easier when we get to move through life with our head in the sand and that everyone else is, it's their fault and we haven't done anything wrong and you know that we are the ones who are the victims who have been wronged.

That is a whole lot easier. Yeah. What is it though, really? We think it is, but think about how to Harry it's easier. Yeah. Yeah. To the flesh it's easier. Yeah. Think about how miserable and lonely and, but to our soul, it's like poison. Poison. It's harmful. Yeah. Yeah. and this is what, I dread the question when, at networking events or even just anywhere where someone says, oh, what do you do?

I can't answer that. I don't know. I dunno what I do. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. But I'm not a counselor. I'm trained as a counselor, but I'm not a counselor. Yeah. I am 

[00:34:00] trained in all of these different modalities, but I'm not that. And if anything, I don't know. Like I feel like I'm a soul-based therapist or a, I don't know.

I don't know. I, you also have, there's like a..there's a facilitation aspect to it as well, yeah. And this is the crazy thing. You, most of the people who come through the program, the live run program are people who have, who are only there because of the witness of someone else.

Yeah. And that witness is so real and so tangible. 'cause they have walked it, they have lived it. Yeah. And they're like, I can't explain it. I don't know how it does it or how she does it, or I don't even know what she is. I don't know what, but all I know is that my heart is transformed. My life is transformed.

Yeah. And that's been something that, again, like from a worldly business perspective and wanting to be perfect and wanting to tick the boxes and all these kinds of things, I don't know what copy to write. 

[00:35:00] Yeah. I don't, I I struggle with that. Yeah. But. I have, again, with relationship and just trusting like the Lord has led people, the Lord has led people and to me and opened doors, and I hear time and time again.

This has been an answer to prayer. And the craziest thing is I have, like I said, I operate in a secular space. Sure. So, although I work a lot with Christians Yeah. It's not just Christians. And it is so crazy that when people get to the depths of their desperation that they will pray. Yeah. Wow. and yeah.

Wow. What an evangelistic opportunity as well. It’s just, it's like you're a minister of soul renewal, and, oh, thank you. Yeah. But I was laughing then because even my ego came into that early on and I said to my husband, I'm like. Should I be telling people about Jesus and 

[00:36:00] evangelizing in what it looks like in evangelism and he's like, oh my gosh, Ash, get over yourself.

God will use us at all different parts of the journey because he's like, God is using you. There will be someone who will evangelize them in that traditional way, but if their hearts are closed, they can't receive it. And that has been so encouraging. I've journeyed with people for years now and they've come in very, very, I mean, all of us, come in broken and then I'll get a message out of the blue and say, Ash, I feel like I need to go to church.

Or Ash, I really wanna buy a Bible. Which version would you recommend? Or Ash, I really want, or I've been praying lately or I've been curious about this. And I just go, oh my gosh. And it has been years, but early on I felt I actually. It's very interesting. Actually. What it was is I had a fear of judgment of the pastors and religious leaders in, in my life, like 

[00:37:00] faith leaders in my life of judging me or judging the work I was doing if I wasn't openly talking about Jesus and I was just teaching on biblical principles and I was teaching on the heart of God, but in language that was safe, right.

Right. For those people. And he can, and I was afraid of their judgment, and I was afraid that they would, condemn me for, I don't know. Yeah. it reminds me of how Paul ministered to the Gentiles, right? Yes. And so, like Exactly. Yeah. It’s marketplace ministry. It's life. That's right. It’s so awesome.

And I, I've had so many people encourage me in that over the years. Yeah. because I can get up if I had a a keynote topic. I can get up and speak that in front of 200 business owners who are not Christian, and then I can speak the same thing in front of 200 Christians. Just change the language where instead of saying, you are so loved, I could say Jesus loves you.  They're both true.

[00:38:00] Yep. It's amazing. I, I, I do, I remember the one meeting you and I had before today, and I was touched by that. I was like, this is rare. It's a gift that you can minister to both a non-Christian and a Christian. I think that is such a powerful gift. For sure. Thank you. I'll receive that.

Yeah. So, what would you like to leave our audience with as we wrap up? Oh my gosh. Pray. To see yourself the way God sees you. Mm. That's it. Yeah. And so, my ministry is unbecoming who you had to become to survive. Mm-hmm. Who you had to become, to fit in, to belong, to feel like you were enough to meet the conditions and actually come home to who God created you to be.

And when you can see yourself through His eyes, when you can align yourself with Truth and Love, everything changes, and your capacity to be able to see others, the way that God sees them is going to be dependent on your capacity to see yourself the way He sees you. 

[00:39:00] Yeah. So That's right. Allow Him to minister to you and have the courage to look into the mirrors that are the hard mirrors.

To look into. Don't look into the mirror on the wall in your bathroom and see your flaws and your faults. Don't look into the mirrors of your friendship groups and see your failings. Don't look into the mirrors of your marriage. Look into the mirror of the Lord first and foremost. Yeah. Because He's going to reflect what it, what you, and who you truly are.

When we start there, when we actually just start at renewing and restoring our sense of self and who we are in Christ, then we can eventually work towards using our marriage as a mirror, using our parenting as the mirror to reveal to us our flaws and our faults and when we wanna heal and grow.

Yeah. But it has to start in that renewal of sense of self. That's, it's gotta start there. it truly because as I have become more secure in His love, I am so much more capable. 

[00:40:00] Of receiving correction. Yes. I'm so much more capable of loving the enemy. It's so different when you're walking in security and you're, again, not trying to white-knuckle or perform your way through life.

But to receive Him and be connected to Him throughout the day so that your life is an overflow of that connection with him. It's so different. It's beautiful. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And the ripple effect that has, if we are e even if it's at the local level of our home, the ripple effect of us doing this work transforms marriages.

It transforms our kids. It literally is like the best insurance policy we could ever take out on the healthy mind development of our kids and their future. so many people. Again, in business coaching where people are obsessed with setting themselves up financially and investing and learning how, because they wanna leave their kids an inheritance.

[00:41:00] Yes. And I sit there and go, do you wanna know the most important inheritance you can leave your kids is to know who they are in Christ is to know who they were created to be, to know what their strengths are, to know that they're a gift in this world, and, and to actually draw that out of them. That's the most important inheritance you can leave.

And if chasing that worldly inheritance of riches and money and all of these things costs them that, then we have done the work of the enemy. Yeah, that's right. And so, it's not to say that kind of inheritance is bad, that's, don't hear what I'm not saying. That kind of inheritance can absolutely be a blessing.

Right. And it can be a resource for good, but not at the expense of the inheritance of that sound mind and strong identity and true peace. True peace. Yeah. Totally. For sure. All the fruits of the Spirit. No, totally. and we're not put here for just us. We are, we really do have a Divine purpose.

[00:42:00] And so I am so glad that I met you. I'm honored to have you on the show. I, I'm not gonna say we're never gonna hear you again, because we absolutely may. We've got some links we're gonna make sure in the show notes. So, there's everything from the ReMIND Institute to the Rise and Thrive, to your personal website, to the Cycle Breakers Facebook group, as well as your social media links.

We'll make sure that's in the show notes. And how do you feel about praying us out today? Oh, it would be an honor. Let's do it. 

Oh, Heavenly Father, I thank you for these Divine connections. I thank you that you just bring people into our paths at the right place in the right time. I thank you for this conversation.

I, I thank you for Lenee’, and I thank you that we have been brought together to have you speak through us for the people who are listening today and I, and whatever day that they're listening, Lord, I just pray that this conversation blesses them, that they feel drawn nearer to you, that they feel more connected to you and stronger in their faith.

[00:43:00] Lord, I, yeah, I, I also just feel really strongly to pray over this show, this, this podcast, Lord, um, to, to pray that it grows, that it is given a platform that, um, the people that come onto this podcast really are here for, for your will and, um. Yeah. And that, that just advances throughout all the listeners.

Mm. Amen. Amen. Amen. Ah, I receive that girl. I love when Spirit moves.

There really is no greater joy for me than to see someone like you restored to the heart of the Father. For far too long, the enemy has robbed God's children of their identity in Him, and God is on a mission to fix that. I really believe it. And if you stuck around for this episode, something in you clearly wants to be found.

[00:44:00] So, I want to say this to you directly. If you seek Him, you will find Him. And He may not look like what you thought. He may encourage you instead of chastise you. He may hug you instead of punish you. He may talk with you instead of at you. He may listen instead of condemn.  He may feel less like a courtroom and more like a couch. 

That's what we are after here on The Redeemed Perfectionist podcast. Not just information about God, but revelation of Him. Because I believe that together, as it says in Ephesians 3, we can begin to know the great magnitude of His astonishing love in all its dimensions.  How deeply intimate and far-reaching, how enduring and 

[00:45:00] inclusive His love is for those who are in Him. A love that is truly beyond our understanding and I want that to stop being a verse that you've heard and start being something you have actually experienced. 

If today's conversation on healing perfectionism or ADHD or anxiety and your relationship with God stirred something in you, here's a few ways to keep going:

Firstly, if you haven't yet, grab my book, You Will Make Mistakes: Discovering God's Grace in The Midst of Perfectionism. It was written for the woman who loves Jesus but is exhausted trying to become the version of herself she thinks He will finally be pleased with. It's a place to begin again and to receive some of the foundation that maybe wasn't given to you at the start of your walk.

Again, you can find it at leneepezzano.com. That's L-E-N-E-E-P-E-Z-Z-A-N-O.com,

[00:46:00] and that'll be in the show notes. Secondly, if you want a gentle way to identify where perfectionism might be quietly shaping the way you relate to God and yourself, maybe take my free Grace Scale quiz. That's also on the website. Not all perfectionism looks dramatic. Sometimes it looks like over-repenting or never quite feeling at peace with God, no matter how hard you try. 

And thirdly, come find us in the Redeemed Perfectionist Facebook community, where women just like you are learning together how to break up with perfectionism and actually receive the grace that was always meant for them.

Until next time, Sis, the Shepherd doesn't stay with the ninety-nine. He goes after the one, and you were never the exception to that. You were always the one He was running toward. And friend, he is still running

[00:47:00] So just know that it's okay that you don't have all the answers. It's okay if you're afraid. It's even okay that you don't know what to do next He will guide you if you begin to let Him.

Will you let him?