Welcome to the Vander Women Leadership Podcast, where our team talks with top leaders about how to better serve and lead your team. Our goal is for you to gain tangible tips on topics such as culture, leadership, succession, and navigating people's problems. We hope you enjoyed today's show.
SPEAKER_01All right, well, welcome back to the Vanderblumen Leadership Podcast. We are so excited you're joining us today. I'm Kier, your host of this week's episode. With me, I have Ike Miller. We are so excited to have him. He leads Bright City Church in Durham, North Carolina. It's a church he planted with his wife back in 2018. And he's written all kinds of things about the intersection of theology, mental health, family of origin issues all over the place. And he has a new book out called Good Baggage: How Your Difficult Childhood Prepared You for Healthy Relationships. Ike, we are excited to have you talking with our leaders today. Welcome.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely. Thank you so much, Carrie, for having me on. I've been looking forward to our conversation. I love what you guys do at Vanderblumen. And so excited to get to chat a little bit about stuff today.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, absolutely. I see you got your Duke uh basketball prominently displayed right there.
SPEAKER_02Got to represent that actually has Coach K's signature on it.
SPEAKER_01So wow.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I've got it tucked into a corner of my office that doesn't get a lot of sunlight so it doesn't fade the signature.
SPEAKER_01Yep, yep. You gotta you gotta take care of those things.
SPEAKER_02That's right. That's right.
SPEAKER_01Well, well, Ike, we as we said, we're excited to have you on. And especially, you know, we have lots of leaders, uh, pastors that that listen to the podcast every single week. And I think this is such an important topic that you're tackling uh in this book, dealing with hey, what is our childhood and how did what happened to us today, but then how do we have freedom from that as well as as we know the Holy Spirit will set us free from those things? So maybe introduce listeners a little bit more than I did to who you are, to y'all's church, uh, and and just kind of what prompted you to begin writing this book in this journey.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so uh my wife and I, as you said, planted Bright City Church in 2018, and so we will celebrate five years in September. Congratulations. Thank you right in the middle or something. You know, I feel like just the fact that we're still here is amazing. I mean, we were 18 months old as a church when the COVID hit. And so uh on the one hand, you're like, how do we measure things? Because the five years and like growth and that kind of thing, you're like, COVID kind of reset all that. And so, are we like two and a half years old? Are we five, you know, all that stuff? So, um, but yeah, we have three kids, Isaac, Cohen, and Sadie. And uh Sadie was eight months old when we planted, so uh she kind of right with the age of our church, which is awesome. Uh, but we live here in North Carolina, we're both from North Carolina. We spent a few years out in Chicago, uh, but decided the winters were a little too long for us there, and uh made the move back. And just to be honest with you guys, I never envisioned planting a church. It was not something that I wanted to do. In fact, it was something that I was terrified of, uh, just the idea of it. But God just made it so clear, undeniably clear, it's what we were supposed to do to the point where it was kind of like, okay, it would be disobedient for us not to. And so yeah, took that step, launched a church. And and in the midst of COVID is when uh just the the difficulty of that time. I mean, I'd say that anybody was in leadership who was in leadership during that time, making decisions for other people, whether it was around uh health precautions and masks, or uh, are we gonna talk about issues around race? Uh, all you know, the the election, all of those things, it was just such a pressure season for leaders. And for myself included, I just found myself overwhelmed by that season to the point where I needed to take some time off because I just felt like every decision I made, someone was gonna be unhappy. Um, somebody's gonna be mad, somebody might leave. And so I had to take some time to really deal with why is this so exhausting? Why is this crushing me emotionally? And that was really where uh a lot of the book ideas came from was kind of walking through that season and realizing that one of the things that was true for my story is I was reading a book on codependency. And as I was reading this book and listening, at one point the author said, a major part of codependency is that you try to manage other people's emotions and reactions with your words and actions. And I was thinking about my childhood. My childhood is a story where my father struggled with alcoholism, and uh a major outcome of that kind of environment is codependency. And what I had done, I realized is I had taken the codependency of my childhood of working to manage my dad's emotions with my actions and behaviors. How do I keep him happy? How do I make sure I'm safe and transferred that to my whole church, where I was kind of managing everybody's emotions and reactions with my words and actions, and that is just impossible, yeah. Uh, you know, with one person, much less however many are in your church.
SPEAKER_01But let me just say every pastor that's listening right now, that's that's heart is pounding fast because they're realizing, wait, I feel like I identify with that. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely. And so I think I shared with you before we jumped on here some of these ideas were originally around how did our difficult childhood prepare us for healthy leadership? Because I was realizing if this is true for me, I'm sure this is other true for other leaders. And beginning to realize there are so many ways that our difficult childhoods are undermining and sabotaging our leadership that we're just not even aware of. And so it's a conversation we need to start having.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's great. That's great. You know, as we think about the leaders on here specifically that are going to be watching, listening, something that can be scary is once you start identifying some of those things within yourself, how do you talk about those in a safe way? You know, some churches, uh if one of the board members even hears like a hint of, hey, I may be questioning something, that they they can be released right there. And that's a lot of pressure on pastors, especially. And have even that kind of pressure, then knowing what's in the background, you know, you said you took a little bit of time away. Like, like, how did you go about that journey of dealing with that pressure of I'm the pastor, right here for everyone? And yet I need to take a step away.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and I think some of it begins with kind of the culture we're creating in our churches. Um, I think that there's a way that we can begin this conversation in a more general way before we begin that work of transparency and vulnerability. Um, and so we have always talked a lot about wanting to be a culture that was more like AA than this perfect place for perfect people. Um, and a big part of that being if people can't come and be honest about where they are, then when they really are struggling, they will not be able to be honest because now it's not only am I struggling, but I've had this appearance that I've been keeping up and it's going to be exposed.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And how do we begin to create environments in our churches through our preaching, through our teaching, through our programs where we say, we've all got baggage, we've all got stuff. It doesn't matter how dysfunctional our childhood was. We've all experienced uh a mist uh a broken trust of some sort. We've experienced dishonesty, we've experienced rejection and abandonment of some sort. We've all experienced that. And so let's begin talking about what does that look like when we experience it? So some of it's the culture. The other piece of it is beginning with just one person. It doesn't necessarily even need to be somebody in your church. It may even be better if it's not somebody in your church. Um, and honestly, the best person would be a counselor. I know that that's another question, and there's stigmas around that, but having just one person that you can begin to open up to because there's also a little bit of a fear threshold, as you might say, that we have to break through to realize like, I think we imagine the first time I tell somebody about this, they're gonna be, I think it they're gonna be more like, man, thank you so much for telling me that. Like, I'm so glad to hear you share that. And you know, I've got I've got some stuff too, and I'd love to just talk through that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think there's that compassion within us that that comes up typically, and that says, Hey, you know, you're someone I love, I respect as a leader. Like, I want that. And I do think the counseling is so pivotal. I know for me going and seeing my own counselor, that's been so pivotal throughout my ministry journey, right? Uh, and yet there is still that stigma at times and in places, and so finding that one confidant, find that's one of my favorite things about what I get to do at Vanderblumen, uh, is just meet with pastors all over the place. And sometimes we're the only voice or ear that they have that can be that neutral place. And so uh it's a pastoral to the pastors, and maybe even finding that pastor for yourself, right? Outside of you having to be the pastor.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely so good.
SPEAKER_00When your team isn't whole, it disrupts your mission. We've stacked over 2,500 missions of faith. Build your best team through our customized executive search. Go to Vanderblumen.com slash get started to talk with our team.
SPEAKER_01So when we think about adult children of dysfunctional families, as you talk about within the book, you know, one of the things that it can feel like, uh, and you mentioned this, is that it feels like everything depends on you, right? And you're responsible for making everything okay for everybody, which gets especially dangerous in a children, yeah, if you're leading an organization. So, how do you begin to unpack that, unwind that?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So, in terms of kind of where that comes from for us, first of all, and and this is true of all kinds of dysfunctional families, it's not just true of children who grew up in a count in a context with alcoholism. Um, but there was a psychologist named Lindsay Gibson who wrote a book called Um Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents. And just a great book. But one of the things that she talks about in there is how, as children, we're not aware of other dynamics in the world. We're not aware of how our parents are being affected by their work, by the pressures that they're under. And so when we look at the world, we just think, okay, I did this and this happened. Yeah. I said this and my parent reacted this way. I did this and then this parent left. I did this and then this fell apart. And so we operate as children almost as if we are omnipotent, that we have control over everything.
SPEAKER_01All of those different tentacles reaching in. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And so we begin to to believe, okay, well, it's it everything will be okay as long as I just perform the right way, if I say the right words. Yeah. So we grow up and we get older, we realize it's not that cut and dry, but that forms in us at such a young age that we continue to work with that mentality. Now, add to that something that we'll talk a little bit more about later at some point, but that we respond to our difficult childhoods in one of two ways, generally speaking. We either internalize the pain of our childhood, meaning we believe that the solution to our problems in our family is somewhere inside of ourselves. And if I can change myself, I can change what's going on around me. Others of us externalize, meaning we kind of reach a point where we realize, you know what? If everybody else would fix their junk, then I would be okay. If everybody else would make things better, then I'll be okay. And for those of us who internalize, we internalize that sense of it's my job to make things okay. If they're not, it's because I haven't worked hard enough, I haven't tried hard enough, I need to improve myself. And so you can see very easily how this plays out as pastors who feel like, well, if anything is wrong, it's my job to fix it. And I've got to make it okay. And the buck stops with me. And a lot of times, you know, um, we tend to think, and and we describe that as narcissism, and and that's a big word right now is narcissism. But there is a sense in which, even for myself, I felt a need to make things okay, not because I thought like I'm such a big deal, but out of a sense of responsibility, right? Yeah, to make things work, and so it wasn't this like big ego narcissism, but it was more a sense of if if this is gonna be anybody's responsibility, it's mine, and so I got to fix it.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, no, and I think especially for pastors, that's true. I mean, we have scriptures that tell us, hey, Pastor, you're gonna be held more accountable for the work that you do, right? And if we're approaching, you know, that scripture with our own health, we're we're gonna read that in a way that's gonna trigger some behaviors in us for sure.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01So then how do we, you know, first steps we gotta have someone that we can begin talking to this about, but but then really how do we go about with healing for this? Uh both for us, uh, but then something I want us to get into is sometimes, you know, first I gotta get healthy, right? I'm on the airplane, bring the mask down on me. But oftentimes, as pastors, as leaders, it's it's not us just dealing with us, it's the people that we're charged to lead, whether it's staff or congregationally. So, how do we go about uh that process of healing for this?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I think for each of us, it's gonna be a little bit different. I I think for us as pastors in particular, we've got to reckon with some of our own theology around this kind of stuff. And in particular, that that question of what am I responsible for and what am I not responsible for? And one of the things that's been really helpful from a biblical and scriptural standpoint has been able to see, well, if Jesus is our model who we follow as pastors, he's the good shepherd. Uh there are times where Jesus doesn't fix everything. I I love the end of I can't remember if it's Mark chapter one or two right now, but his disciples come to him and they're like, Hey, there are people who are coming out to see you. And Jesus goes, Let's go on to the next town. Yeah. And you're like, Jesus, there's people right here that need you. And for us to be able to realize that, okay, Jesus didn't fix it all for everybody right there in the moment where they asked him to. And so we need to be able to say, okay, it's okay if I don't fix everybody's problems right now.
SPEAKER_01That's so hard though. Like, like especially that pastoral heart that's like, no, I want to take care of you. But I think, as you said, uh, where's that I want to take care of you coming from? Right.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely. And so then you get into some of those questions of, why am I doing this? Why do I feel this pressure to never stop, to never be able to put up a boundary, to never be able to say no? And for a lot of us as pastors, uh, especially if we grew up in this kind of dysfunctional family or difficult context, but it's not even necessarily that. I think we all struggle with this, which is when we don't have a clear sense of our own identity and where our value comes from in Christ, then we will not be able to separate how our parishioners and the people in our congregation feel about us from how we feel about ourselves. And so at the end of the day, how content we can be with ourselves will depend entirely on how happy are my people with me right now.
SPEAKER_01Oh man, there's and there's some people pulling off the side of the road right now as they're listening to this, because that's so true. As pastors, we get into that place where we've got all of these voices coming in, and it can be so hard to quiet that to hear the voice of the Lord and what he's specifically speaking to us and over us.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And so some of the work there then begins with um a term that I would encourage if anybody is listening and never heard never heard this term before, but it's a term uh self-differentiation. Uh, it's this idea of being able to remain emotionally close to people without being emotionally hijacked by them. So you can remain relationally close, you can stay connected to them, but when they get worked up, when they are in emotional turmoil, you're able to distance your sense of self enough from them that it doesn't take over your emotional world.
SPEAKER_01Right.
SPEAKER_02And where this is really important is, and I think I think almost any pastor out there that's listening will understand this. There is a pressure in high emotional moments where people will come to us with this overwhelming sense of urgency that this has got to be fixed right now. This is a crisis, this is end of the world kind of stuff. And so you will respond immediately, you will put everything aside and you will engage and you will pour hours, you will stay up till two o'clock in the morning, whatever it takes dealing with this. And the next day or the next week, you are real, you are exhausted, you are emotionally spent, and you see them, and they're just good. Like, oh good, and you're like, I'm still a mess, like I'm still recovering from that. And so, my encouragement to pastors is in those moments to be aware of okay, how much am I investing emotionally in this? And is it more than they're emotionally investing in this? Because if I'm investing more in this than they are, there's a uh an inequality that needs to be addressed. And is that coming from a place of um I can only feel good about myself if I have done everything in my power to make sure they're happy with me?
SPEAKER_01Yes. Yeah, that I think you get into that people pleasing mindset, right? And slip completely into letting other people control you at that point. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And with people pleasing, it's interesting. I think, especially when it comes to codependency in our childhoods, but uh people pleasing oftentimes is really not the issue, it's the symptom of something deeper, which is a loss of self. Codependency, the best definition I know of it, is uh it's a trauma-related loss of self, meaning we went through something at some point in our life that required us to be someone other than ourselves in order to survive. We had to put on an image, we had to pretend to be somebody in order to ensure our own protection, our well-being, our approval. And in that, we lost our sense of self. And so now we go into other contexts. And because we don't have a clear sense of who we are, we try to be who we think others want us to be so that we can feel okay with ourselves. And so that's where the people pleasing comes in.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, super hard, super hard. How do you uh let's engage you know, outside of the self now, the people we lead? Because as you said, they're gonna come at us. Uh, and then the even if we have staff, right? You know, staff and congregational members a little bit different there in the congregation, you know, probably some good distance there from a staff standpoint, though, often we're charged as the pastors to be helping them through that. And if they're really experiencing some difficulties with this, it's probably what's at the root of some performance uh issues that are going on in the workplace. And I and I think this is a healthy place for us to be able to explore and think about what you talked about earlier. What else is going on? That was kind of always one of my first thoughts when I was in my executive pastor chair and I'm working with a staff member is hey, how's home? Right? Like, like what else is going on there? So, how have you tried to deal with that uh to help from a discipleship standpoint in your staff and in in your congregation?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so each of those is a little bit different. Obviously, with your staff, uh, there's going to be a more intimate kind of connection with them. You're working with them day in and day out. And so there's two pieces that I would encourage uh pastors as they're working with their staff. The first one is to have a consistent part of your meetings with your staff that is strictly relational, that you're you're connecting with them, um, you're checking in kind of what's going on in your world beyond just ministry. Um and a big part of that is um there was a study done several years ago where it's really fascinating. They took a piece of paper and they wrote on it kind of three lateral X's representing, you know, you and your coworkers, your lateral coworkers. And then above that, they put another X that represented your boss. And they went to the team and they said, Okay, draw a circle around your team. And they drew a circle around the bottom three X's, but left the boss out. Then they went to bosses and said, Draw a circle around your team. And they drew a circle around themselves and their whole team. In other words, what's going on there is there's a gap in trust. Wow. That I'm I trust my coworkers, but this power gap leads to a trust gap. And so the only way that we lessen that trust gap is through good communication, meaning you care about me beyond just what I am producing for you as an employee. Right. And when we take time beyond just the crisis moments to connect, it says, I care about your whole world, not just what you're doing for me. So that would be the first thing is having consistent relational connection with your team to know kind of their world more generally. And then that serves two purposes. One, you know what's their baseline and when are they off. Yeah. They're kind of normal operating world, and then when are they off? But the second thing I would do then and working with your team is as they're processing something, if there's something going on, then I encourage uh pastors and leaders to what I would call follow the pain. Meaning don't just address the the the presenting symptom, sure, but work down a couple of layers and uh pay attention to uh what are the what are the moments where they are feeling the most pain? What are the moments that trigger pain for them? Is it certain conversations? Is it um certain relational dynamics? Is it certain ministry responsibilities? And being able to follow the pain down through that a little bit to be able to get to some root issues, because there are all kinds of things that play out in ministry that are a symptom of something much deeper.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's great. That's great. Well, I it has been great to talk with you a little bit, be able to kind of journey in. Uh those of you that are listening, we hope that uh if something here, uh the Holy Spirit's just nudging on you and pressing on you that uh find someone to talk to, uh, get Pastor Ike's book, uh, just start exploring. What does God have for you? Because He's put a special call on your life, uh, and He's put a call for you to pastor, to shepherd, to lead people to uh a fruitful, growing relationship with Christ. And we need you guys healthy. The kingdom needs you healthy. That's exactly and we want to help you get there. So, uh, Pastor Ike, tell us uh where can people uh find you, follow you, and and just see more about your contribution to the kingdom?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so there's a couple of places. IkeMiller.com is my website. Uh the book is will be available wherever books are sold. A couple of things I would point them to is I've written a couple of articles for CT pastors around these issues, around codependency, around kind of navigating the challenges of being present with our people, but not being overwhelmed by them. Um, and so I think that's a great resource for pastors. And then lastly, uh, I'm doing a uh series of podcast conversations on good baggage in the book, kind of introducing people to the idea. So good baggage podcast.
SPEAKER_01Awesome. Well, Ike, great to meet you. I'm so thankful we got to have this combo. And for all of y'all, thank you for being here listening to the Vanderblumen Leadership Podcast. We will catch you guys next week.
SPEAKER_00Thanks for listening to the Vanderblumen Leadership Podcast. At Vader Blumen, we help organizations build their best teams through hiring, succession, culture, compensation, and diversity solutions. Visit our website, Vanderblumen.com, to learn more and subscribe to our Vader Blumen Leadership Podcast, wherever you listen to podcasts to keep up with our latest episodes. Thanks for listening.