Red Dirt Catholics
Join Jayce, James and guests from "Red Dirt" Oklahoma as they discuss what evangelization and discipleship looks like in real life.
Red Dirt Catholics
Healing and Leadership (ft. Hilary Sanchez)
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Ever wondered how the subtleties of leadership can weave their way through the fibers of a marriage, or how the art of healing can reinforce the bonds we hold dear? Together, we tackle the nuances of communication—sharing a laugh over the wedding text that went astray—and delve into the potency of personal connection in fortifying relationships and fostering mutual understanding. Acknowledging the seven core desires within us all, we confront the shadows cast by our past wounds and the barriers they erect on our journey to wholeness.
Register now for the 2025 Discipleship Conference for the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City! This full-day, bilingual event will feature amazing speakers, breakout sessions, adoration, Mass, confessions, vendors and more at the Oklahoma City Convention Center on Saturday, August 9. Register now to get the early-bird price at OKDisciple.org.
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Links and other stuff from the show:
Pastoral Letter, "On the Unity of the Body and Soul:" archokc.org/pastoral-letters
Red Dirt Catholics Email Address: reddirtcatholics@archokc.org
The Book "From Christendom to Apostolic Mission" (Digital and Print): Amazon
The Social Dilemma: https://www.netflix.com/title/81254224
Daily Examen Prayer: https://bit.ly/309As8z
Lectio Divina How-To: https://bit.ly/3fp8UTa
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Speaker 2:I'm Jason. We got my boy Alex here for yet another episode. We're talking about leadership and healing today and for Red Dirt Catholics. First we have a spouse of a host on the podcast, hillary. Welcome to Red Dirt Catholics.
Speaker 1:Thank you, I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 2:And you guys both recently finished your counseling degrees. What is the actual name of that? Or is it actually a counseling degree and I got it right?
Speaker 3:So it's a Masters of Clinical Mental Health Counseling and I don't think it's too important to dive into our GPAs or anything like that. Yeah, so I don't know how much we want to get into all that, but we know Hillary's just better Marginally, marginally, big margin, but yeah.
Speaker 2:There was a margin. There was a margin and it was large, very good. Yeah, alex, we were talking about some awesome stories before the podcast of when we've texted the wrong person something meaningful, and so I wanted you to start us off with that story.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so we're talking about healing today and I'm hoping this story wasn't wounding for the person. But yeah, there hasn't really been closure yet. But here's the story of how it unfolded. I guess almost 10 years ago, whenever we got married. So you know, I was put together in my list of groomsmen and I was going to do something really just intentional, in person and talk to every groomsman and share stories, share memories and ask them to be my groomsmen, and it was going to be emotional and tearful and we were going to hug it out. Well, deadlines do do all that. Stuff quickly passed, and so it turned from in-person encounters to letters, and then I realized that I've never really written a letter to someone. So the deadline passed quickly for letters as well and moved to phone calls, and once again it continued, and so the pressure was there to just text everybody, and so Can I hurt text.
Speaker 3:And one-on-one, so I had done one meeting with one person and then we were just I feel like I don't know a few months out from the wedding, and it was like you got it.
Speaker 2:You were a few months, I don't even remember it.
Speaker 1:Yeah maybe like four or five months, and I was.
Speaker 3:There was pressure At this point, like you have to ask the people You've got to ask Get it together. You're going to ask I don't have suit measurements. Gosh, the guys don't even know they're in my wedding, so anyway, I don't even care about the story anymore.
Speaker 2:What's it like? What's it like being married to us?
Speaker 3:That's another episode. So I get to this point, I'm like, okay, I just got to text everyone. So boom, I text David, boom I text, call him. I'm texting these guys, bam, bam, bam. And then I get to Felipe, I text Felipe. Hey, I just wanted you to know that I wanted to do this in person. We ran out of time. I just want you to know how much our friendship means to me and I'd be so honored if you were one of my.
Speaker 3:Grimsmen sent and I get back your reply. Alex, I am so honored that you asked me. I know we haven't seen each other recently, but I want you to know I really treasure our friendship and I'd be honored. And I thought, uh-oh, this is weird, because I just hung out with him last week and so I just did. I was like that's strange, you write like that. And I saw the name and I saw the last name and I had been my coworker from the year before and we had spent a lot of hours working together and coaching together and we had gone over to his house for like board games and stuff, you know like board game nights, and so I was- so close, but not close enough.
Speaker 2:Right, I was just one of those on the margin, you know, but kind of a large margin.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:I don't know how many times that'll be applicable, but yeah and so wow, I think I like grabbed my face and just horror and told Hillary and she just was like I can't hear this right now.
Speaker 1:I can't. I was like I already told you you should have done this sooner, and now look what has happened. This is so awkward.
Speaker 3:I can't look at myself, but someone's got to tell Felipe he's not my Grimsman. And so I text him and I just say, dude, I, I want you to know I am so sorry, I am so sorry. In a text, in a text, it had to be done the same way that it had started. I text him like I am so sorry and I told him you know, I meant to ask a different Felipe, but you are like you and your family are so welcome to our wedding and we'd be happy to have you guys. And he replied, no worries, and that was it.
Speaker 2:Have you spoken to him since?
Speaker 1:Not for the years.
Speaker 3:Did you?
Speaker 2:even invite him to the wedding. I invited him to the wedding but he did not come.
Speaker 3:They did not come. But also what's so wild, I could live. I could live a mile away from from my best friend and, and we'll never run into each other at any stores or you know anywhere, like I just don't run into people that I know, but I have run into him multiple times over the last few years at 4th of July gatherings, at parks, at grocery stores, at the Felipe that I accidentally asked. I see this man like a ghost in my life and I'm always like, oh, it's so humbling and so painful and we've never talked about it, but I'm pretty resolved at this moment. Next time we see each other, I'm just going to bring it up, I'm just going to say it has to be funny.
Speaker 2:10 years later, maybe, maybe, maybe not.
Speaker 3:I just am going to say hey, do you remember? Do you remember when I just asked you on accent, to be my Grimsman? And that was weird for all of us, wasn't it? And so I don't really know how to bridge that gap, but it happened. I learned from my mistakes.
Speaker 2:Except we. We look forward to the resolution of that story and hearing how that happened sometime on the podcast. Maybe the next guest every says he's the next guest to talk about healing from the wound that you gave him in real time Healing in real time.
Speaker 3:Oh, that's amazing.
Speaker 2:I. Recently it's not quite like this. We've been working on bringing inviting some sisters from Miami of the Pierce Tart to come to the forge and we sent me a text like hey, they're waiting for a call, just give them a call. I was a Sikh, I gave them a call, got a, went to voicemail and then she and then finally got on the call with her, had a great conversation, they're coming, and then she had me text her, her, my email address, so that should be it Right. When I took the call from her, I was hanging out with Connor Keith, my man, and then was trying to go find him because we were talking about something relevant to work. And so I just I grabbed my phone out and like think I'm texting Connor Keith and I text him where he at like with full bad punctuation, like the most unprofessional text I've ever sent a religious sister in my life.
Speaker 2:And sister Anna. Luckily iPhones have the undo send thing and I got it. I got it pretty fast, but it actually still just says Jase unsent a message. So that's still kind of weird. So maybe I'll talk to sister Anna about that one.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and thank goodness it was where. Yet, and that was I know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because Connor's Connor's, one of my really good friends, I could have sent. I could have sent any number of. I could have sent an embarrassing meme to figure that out, or like there's there's no telling, the Holy Spirit was looking out for me, for sure. But yeah, I love being one of the Holy Spirit's favorites, but anyway. So, talking about, talking about healing, but let's, let's transition with a prayer the Holy Spirit.
Speaker 2:Name of the father, son, holy Spirit, amen, come. Holy Spirit, thank you so much for for Alex and for Hillary, and for the beauty of their marriage and for the ability to talk to the both of them and for all of the hard work that they've put on going through school and understanding counseling in order to help heal the hearts of of your faithful in Oklahoma City. What we pray that the conversation that we have today is full of fruit for everyone, that we're able to dive deeper into. You know what makes us human and what are our desires and what are the things that can hurt us and where do we go from there? We pray that this impacts all of us and that this conversation ultimately leads us and everyone to you.
Speaker 2:In your name we pray Amen, amen. I love the father, son, holy Spirit, amen. So you guys have degrees in this. That was too long for me to actually remember, so I'm going to keep saying counseling. So why don't you like, like what do we need to know? Like what are, like what is healing, I guess would be the first thing that I would ask Like what does that even mean?
Speaker 3:Would you want to take us to get it first?
Speaker 1:Yeah, sure, yeah, so I think for us the call to counseling started really with this idea of healing.
Speaker 1:I think for both of us that was something that underlies what counseling really is for us.
Speaker 1:And in our drive to do counseling For us, we felt like there were many moments that the Holy Spirit was just showing us people's brokenness, their hurts, their woundedness, the places where it was hard for them to let the Lord in and to let the Lord love them or to understand and make sense of their own humanity, and so there were just like a lot of times that we felt like we wanted to go there, but we're really sure how, and so we've both been through counseling and we've had experiences in that, and so for us it was healing.
Speaker 1:And this isn't true for all of counseling, I would say. Some counseling and counselors wouldn't necessarily view what they're doing as maybe like healing or healing initiative in that sense. But I think for us it's bringing light and understanding and compassion to broken and wounded and hurting places that we've either developed within ourselves or lies that we've believed, things like that Just trying to aright some of these things that maybe went wrong for us and we weren't really sure how or when it happened to explore that and bring more wholeness and integration, and yeah, I think that's.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, I think, as I've studied more and reflected more and talked with Hillary and other counselors and experienced it myself, see that there's like a lot of approaches to counseling, a lot of approaches to healing, a lot of understanding or differences in understanding of healing what it looks like, what it feels like, what the effects of it, things like that.
Speaker 3:But I think too, I'm starting to see more and more that it's not just something that's parallel to the faith. You have Christianity and then you have psychology and they both meet different needs. I don't see that at all, but I see that actually the language of the church there is knowledge and wisdom and language of the church that gives perspective and realization when it comes to healing. So originally I was thinking we'll kind of get into this a little bit A lot of the wounds that we have come from unmet needs, needs that we have as people, needs that we have as men and women that are unmet, and the church, I think, would call that sins of omission, things that didn't happen, and whether things that you didn't do or things that maybe didn't happen, that should have happened in your life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, let's talk about the seven needs of the human person then.
Speaker 3:So we'd have that. So we'd have some of these unmet needs, that we have this document here from the JP2 healing center and we can kind of discuss some of these. But the seven desires that Bob shoots is just a phenomenal resource for healing Some of the desires that he lays out. He says the first desire of the human heart is to be heard and understood. The second is to be affirmed, which is to be shown that you are good. The third is to be blessed, which is to be given unconditional love. The fourth desire of every heart is to be safe, physically and emotionally. The fifth desire is to be touched in a healthy, affirmative show of affection, like to be hugged or embraced or held. The sixth is to be chosen, to feel special and unique. And the seventh is to be included or to be a part of something. So just after laying those out, I don't know if there's something that comes of mind for you, hilary or Jace, as we talk about those seven desires.
Speaker 2:So yeah, Hilary, tell me, what does it really mean? What do we mean when we say to be heard and understood? Because obviously we hear people all the time, but there's a difference between when someone says I feel misunderstood or I don't feel heard. What do we mean when we speak that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think for many of us we would say we want to be heard or we want to be understood, but that's not necessarily our experience.
Speaker 1:And so I think to be heard and to be understood I think in that too is a big part of it is to be received. Where someone understands what you're saying, they receive that, they listen, they give space for it, without trying to interject or without even trying to speak over you or without already having an agenda in their mind of what they want, what you to hear from them or what they have to give. But I think for a lot of people and I feel like it's hard even sometimes to put our finger on some of these desires of our heart because we've maybe gone so long without them or we've never had that experience of being heard and understood in its fullness or in a way that lets let that need in our heart be met. But I think really underneath that is like a deep desire to be received without someone already, maybe necessarily like trying to get something in or already deciding what they're gonna say, but receiving you and what you have to bring and who you are as a person.
Speaker 2:Or even if, like, what comes to my mind is like, say, I'm just giving a hypothetical here of, say, as a kid, your dad just wasn't a talker, and like you might say all of these things to your dad and he gives a okay. Or like barely barely an acknowledgement that there's that he's like he was obviously there, he was obviously listening, but like didn't, didn't acknowledge it or respond, or just yet received, is a really cool way of putting that.
Speaker 2:Like that could that could lead to that desire not being met and you can even realize and that can be normal, Like that's the craziest thing about some of these things Is if, for whatever reason, this need or desire of the heart isn't met throughout your life, like ever, then it's like a pure, a pure, like you have a question mark, like something that's like I don't even really, like I don't even realize I have this desire you know right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think with that it affects how you treat others. Yeah, exactly, and I think for a lot of people they begin to shut down those desires, and so it's part of the healing process is getting in touch with those desires that maybe have been shut down or pushed away or closed off because they were never met, or yeah.
Speaker 3:And I was gonna say too I think we'll get into some of the effects but, like in leadership or in life, but if you have this desire, we all have this desire to be heard, understood, to be received, to be acknowledged, and we never experienced that. And then we are put in a leadership position where someone is sharing something with us, whether that's a child or another person or a friend or coworker or whatever and we are in a position where they are sharing something with us. We have no capacity to offer that at all. We have no capacity to offer the receptivity, the gift of allowing another person to be heard and understood.
Speaker 3:I think for me, the thing that was coming to mind with this, with being received, was being heard and understood. For me, it feels like I have a desire for someone else to understand my experience, like my thoughts, my feelings, my desires. I want to make sense. I wanna make sense to myself and I wanna make sense to someone else. I've known that that's been there for a long time. But I think a lot of us carry this thought of like why am I so angry? Why am I so sad? Why am I getting so jealous about this thing? And a lot of us we don't make sense to ourself, and I think a lot of that's because we haven't been able to make sense of ourself to someone else in a way that they've received and said oh that makes sense, makes sense, you'd feel that way.
Speaker 2:So when that need isn't met, that need to be understood. What is the wound? What wound happens to you when that need isn't being consistently met?
Speaker 3:It's a, I'd say there's probably a few. I think one of the things would be because there's not again, for me there's not a way to make sense of it. I need to find a way to make sense of it and I think if you go down to the bottom here, you have there's experiences of wounds and then there's beliefs and lies. So I guess, to back up, when we experience a wound, oftentimes we are trying to make sense of the pain, of the emotion, so that registers, that processes, that stores in our mind as a belief about ourself, about the world, about other people, or a lie about ourself, or a judgment or whatever it is that turns into a vow of like I will never do this. I will always do that to avoid repeating the wound.
Speaker 3:So when I think of someone's desire to be heard and understood not being met and causing a wound, then it would lead to some kind of belief or lie. So if I have something to share, if I'm feeling something, if I'm thinking something, and it feels like nobody cares or nobody understands, then what kind of belief would I come to by myself? Like something's wrong with me, right? Like nobody cares what I have to say. I must be wrong, like there's, you would come to some kind of assessment to help make it make sense. But usually manifests as a belief about other people, like people just don't care about me or I'm not fun, I'm not smart.
Speaker 3:I'm not attractive, I'm not interesting, or a lie. Those would also be lies, but lies that something's wrong with me, like I don't make sense to anyone, so something must be wrong with me. So that's why I see some of these wounds leading to beliefs and lies about ourselves. So I think in that one that's what might come up.
Speaker 2:That makes sense. And so, like, moving on to the next, like desire of the human heart is we're talking about to be affirmed and to be shown that you are good, what it like.
Speaker 3:let's expand on like what that looks like in a human being, yeah, I was gonna ask you a little bit about the book on affirmation that you read, because I think when we think of affirmation, we think of verbal affirmation, which I think is a huge part of it, but there's a little bit deeper way to affirm someone and I think that comes through, like your presence. I think your presence speaks even in a deeper way, I think, to someone's goodness than words, right? So, like, if you have a birthday party and nobody shows up, obviously that feels unaffirming, right, because there's a lack of presence or there's a lack of affirmation. It's like, again, what's wrong with me? But if people are like, oh yeah, like we would love to go there, like it, you know, but I couldn't, it still means something. But I think that I don't feel like the desire is not met of affirmation fully, other than presence. So that's something that comes up and I'm happy to expand on, but I wanna get your thoughts early with that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think when someone is deeply affirmed, it's not for what they've done but who they are, and I think that's where the difference comes in.
Speaker 1:With, like affirmation, we can give praise a lot for what someone has done or what they've produced throughout the output or the outcome of something, but I think to be affirmed deeply, to be shown that you are good, is to be shown that you are a gift simply because you are period. That's what I think about that God had a desire for you to be in this world for some reason, whether or not that's like to produce something, just simply by you being here, that's it and you are good because of it. And I think for us in our counseling program, we went to Divine Mercy, which was a really yeah shout out to Divine Mercy, but they, I think, formed us really well in a lot of, yeah, dmu, but they formed us in a lot of these deeper truths of how we view the person as Catholics, and I think that's one that could can't be spoken enough is that this belief that we as Catholics actually believe in an innate dignity and goodness and worth that can't be taken away simply because of what someone does or doesn't do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's kind of foundational and I mean, all of these are foundational in a way. They're a key human heart need. But the amount of examples came flooding into my head just so that I can illustrate it.
Speaker 1:And you can tell me?
Speaker 2:if I'm doing this right, like if you're a parent, for example, like I'm just thinking of myself and Peter like, say, he cleans up the mess, or something like that or the mess that you made without me asking him to, and as a proud parent and being really appreciative of it, I could say Peter, thank you for cleaning up that mess. That was really good of you to do. But that's not affirming him as Peter, that's affirming what he did and I think, as Americans, we're really like whoo, this is killing right now, as I'm thinking like I'm like holy cow.
Speaker 2:I have to stop.
Speaker 2:I have to change how I compliment my son when he does great things Because I mean, like the thing of itself is good, but it's because he is good, so that's just, and that can go into anything. I mean, I was thinking about Alex. Honestly, I checked in on something with you recently and you were really intentional about this and that's something that, like, I've seen it over the course of our friendship, even of you saying you are really good for saying that, and like it was you affirming me as a person and not just the action of what I did, which is I just don't think that that's a habit a lot of people have. Is that something that? Was that something that you guys had to develop over the course of this study? What was that like? Like that's gotta be a hard aspect.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's a really good point too, that it's something that is like.
Speaker 1:I think, for both of us it's something that is an ongoing journey of trying to shift the way that we think and the way that we see the world, the way that we see others, and trying to adapt the way that we are living or the way that we say things or interact even with each other and our kids.
Speaker 1:It's not something that we're taught from like a young age, so it's like we're reteaching ourselves in the process of all of this in order to bring greater affirmation to those in our life, hopefully, and to our, I think, especially our children.
Speaker 1:I think, in parenting and in those roles that we've been put, in our roles as spouse, I think those are the ways that we really intentionally, daily, are practicing it and then carrying it out from there with friends and then with our clients, the people that we work with. But I think, yeah, it's a continual, because there are times where I'll praise something, even like in our kids, and then later I have to like, redirect and say actually I want to rephrase that, and sometimes I back up and I say I want to say that different, just so that they kind of have that constant reminder that okay, yes, I'm affirmed in what I've done or been praised for doing something, but whether or not they do it, we try to give them the impression that we, like they are good, and we are affirming them, whether or not they've done something, a certain way.
Speaker 2:And how does that like key understanding of the human being come into play when, like someone disappoints you? Or like on the flip side where they've done something negative but they are not negative Like what's the how does? The language. Look in that space. So like actively communicate those things well without damaging that need.
Speaker 1:Great question.
Speaker 3:Yeah, as a face-lapper, for sure, I think, to be honest, my mind goes to I don't know. But we're really working hard on apologizing and I think, because we often get it wrong and I often get it wrong and I'm often overwhelmed by, like, the feeling of anger and disappointment and something not going the way I wanted, or one of my kids not doing something that I asked him to do for the third time or whatever, and it'll come out of just a place of just pure anger and, in a way that I can see, shut them down and I have to backpedal and I do this all the time, probably every other day, every three days probably, and say, hey, I wanted you to know that, how mad I got because you're, you know your room was messy or whatever, like it had nothing to do with you and yes, we would like you to clean your room. Yes, please do it. On the first time, we ask but how mad I got had nothing to do with with you not doing that. But it's something I'm really trying to work on. So it's clear of like you still need to do the thing, or we're still asking you to do the thing, we still want you to be respectful and responsible, all those things. And yet, like I need to own the disproportionate amount of like my, of my reaction that's coming out. And again, I think too, that's work with parenting, I think, even with people like relationally. I think that that Sometimes we just need like the space and the time to process an interaction or some kind of rupture.
Speaker 3:Right, someone says something or does something that is hurtful, harmful and, and sometimes it Does like trigger of like man. Maybe they just are like malicious, or maybe they just are this way, like they're. You know that they're not gonna change and they're not gonna grow whatever. And I have to think to myself that, right there, that thought process is is really just a thought process to help keep me safe. It's to help me feel better and more secure, and it's not really the truth, but it's. It's helping me handle the, the heart of motions. I'm feeling right now All right. I'm feeling really hurt. It's gonna soothe it if I just think that's the kind of person that that is, because it helps distance me some from some of that emotion. So, anyways, does that make sense?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it a hundred percent makes sense, and so it would. It would appear to me that, like, the wound that like is tied to that in a big way, it's just shame, right? I can even think about, I think about totally. I think about some of my fights with my wife, and one of the things that she said to me and I'm pretty sure she'd be okay with me saying it, like the way that I can phrase things sometimes is she's like I feel like you're telling me it's my fault, when that's not. That wasn't necessarily my intention in a in some spots and maybe it is another is when I'm being really, really lame and sinful.
Speaker 2:But that this idea that it's my fault and I am bad because of Because of this thing that we're discussing, or this thing that I did, and all of that like, oh my gosh, I was in a, I was in a target with Peter one time and we are. We were just there, we were go. I was there looking for a birthday gift for Danielle and I took him. Danielle was doing something I was trying to like give her, like be a good husband and give her a break from having with the being with Peter. So we were there and, oh my gosh, this kid Kept like running into those stupid like you know how they like to play hide and seek in those like clothes.
Speaker 2:And whatnot, and I'm just like and I'm already out of my element. I'm a, I'm a guy, I'm trying, I'm going through the women's clothing rack trying to find something. I'm right wife over there and I'm like already a little bit out of my element. And he I've asked it, probably on the fifth try I Like I snap a little bit and Peter's like just has a meltdown in the store. I don't say a whole lot, I just bring him. I'm like alright, we're leaving and I do my best to like Not say a whole lot. And you know, we get in the car and in my mind I think I'm doing.
Speaker 1:I'm like I didn't yell at him. I think that's pretty good.
Speaker 2:I'm doing pretty good right now that at the, at the fact that I'm not yelling at him over this, and I just calmly walked out of the deal. And so he's still crying and we drive for five minutes in my and then, peter, just from the back seat, I hear him. He says Daddy, do you hate me because I'm a bad guy? Mm-hmm, mm-hmm I. And it just like I'm tearing up now and I teared up then. When he said that.
Speaker 1:I was like, oh my gosh, dude you are not a bad guy because you didn't listen to me in the store.
Speaker 2:But it's super foundational. I feel like I don't know, maybe it's just because I've seen it in my family in different ways, but I feel like that one like in the spiritual life, is just like insane, you know, and it's like a really challenging one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that is yeah, just yeah.
Speaker 1:I think that hits a place in our own heart and we can really understand what that's like as parents to have your child say something like that and you're like, oh, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:Did I give that impression? Did I like I'm sorry? Like you know, I need a backtrack, but I think too, for us as Catholics, the beauty of understanding like brokenness and understanding wounds and its relation to sin is, I think all of it too, and I think, for being able to see these in light of this is like from the beginning, like this is a natural consequence of like sin and the natural consequence of the fall and the more that I am able to see people in light of that, or that they have experienced a lot of sin and brokenness at the hands of someone else, whether that's a parent, and then their parents' parents, and understanding that, like for most people, it's because they haven't been taught or they haven't been, you know, they haven't been walked to this place of understanding their behavior or beliefs about themselves, and so it's just, they internalize it and they carry it, and they carry it throughout their life and then they pass it on.
Speaker 3:And I think to that point when I've been thinking about healing, I've been thinking I hear your story and I think about just what happened in that interaction and what happens in all interactions that are wounding. But then we have a chance for connection, like you did with Peter, and is we experience something difficult or painful or confusing or sad or whatever it is, and then what happens is there is typically no one there to help us make sense of it.
Speaker 3:Like there's no one there to help us store that memory or that experience or process that in the right way. So that's why we come to these places. That's why Peter vocalized that right, as we get older, we stop vocalizing that. He vocalized and said like, do you hate me because I'm a bad guy? As we get older, we would just think that to ourselves, like they just hate me because I'm whatever. But you wouldn't speak anymore. So there's a period of our time, of our life, and there's a moment in what is healing is like when we let someone else in to help us make sense of something and reprocess it like, store it differently. So, peter, he opens up and he's like dad, help me make sense of this. Is this what you're thinking? Is this what this situation means? Is this what this experience means? And so what's beautiful is like, even though it's like so sad, he still gives you an opportunity to speak back into that and say that's not true.
Speaker 3:And you're not that way and that had nothing to do with you. And so what counseling often is is like, honestly, it's going back to those kind of moments like him in the car all throughout people's life and say, tell me about the wound that got stored, that got processed in a certain way, and let me see if we can't store it in a different way, let's see if we can't make sense of it in a different way. So that's really what this is, and so it's a beautiful, beautiful example. But at some point along the way we just become so used to being isolated and processing it that we're just like, yeah, this is what it must mean, yeah, this is what it must mean.
Speaker 2:Why do you think that that isolation and processing it happens? Because, yeah, Peter's been great about giving us those opportunities you know, until I say you know what? That's not why I'm communicating at all, you are good and I love you because you are, you there's nothing that you could ever do. All of those things and communicating them, and I remember even conversations like that with my parents or whatever. But I, you know, we all still carry that, it seems like, in some shape or form.
Speaker 3:So what is?
Speaker 2:it about becoming? Do we just learn to we get wounded from like communicating that at some point, or like it just doesn't make any sense to me.
Speaker 1:Like why?
Speaker 2:I guess the first time is that we say those things. Someone reacts poorly. We learn. I guess we just learn time over time. Is that the basics of it, or is there something?
Speaker 3:I think it could be as simple as someone being like too busy or distracted or like, sorry, what was that? You're like oh, it was nothing. You know, it was nothing. I mean it could be as nonchalant as that, as us storing well, I guess what I had to say wasn't that important. Or it could be someone being angry of, like that's not what I said at all. You know, like I didn't mean that and you're too dramatic, right, that's like you over exaggerate, you're too dramatic, you're too sensitive, and there's a number of reactions that would say, well, it's safer to process this on my own.
Speaker 3:And I still remember memories that I had, that I processed on my own, that stuck with me for years and years and I always remember this experience of like fifth grade and texting these different guys and hey, do you wanna hang out, do you wanna hang out? And it takes like four different people and they all were like hey, sorry, we're going to this birthday party of this person, all of them to the same, and by the fourth one. And when I finished it was just like actually I had called them the fourth time I hung up. I just was thinking like why didn't I?
Speaker 1:get invited.
Speaker 3:You know, like what's wrong with me, like this, that family is super Christian. I remember thinking at the time that family is super Christian. They probably invited everyone. Like we go to a small school. Like I just don't get it. And somewhere along the line I thought like something like they must not like me, they must not like, I just don't get it. It was so distressing but it led to this vow of like. Man, I always want to be included. I always want to be friends with someone. I want to never give someone a reason to not like me. But I just remember that was a time that I processed a wound in isolation, came into a belief something is wrong with me and a vow of like I won't let this happen again. But it always stays out like sticks out in my mind.
Speaker 3:But part of the healing- is like when are those moments that we've stored that and is there a chance to reprocess that differently?
Speaker 1:I think, yeah, with that, there's the feeling at times that we didn't have a safe place, or the reaction, or the response to something at some point maybe wasn't safe, and so then we kind of put up our guard and we're like, oh, I don't want this to happen again, so we protect ourselves by I'll just Never being in that situation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'll just stay here, closed in on myself, and I think the feeling of vulnerability that it takes to step out of that place is hard. It's hard for a child and it's hard for an adult.
Speaker 3:Super and Haley and I like it's actually an amazing to hear your reaction to Peter, because what would have been normal for me, like, and why I have to keep apologizing to my kids, is if I was in that situation, I would have probably turned around and said, peter, you know, I would have just spilled the beans and I'm trying to get a gift from mom that she likes. I didn't want to be in there, I tried to bring you so we could do something together and you weren't listening the whole time. That's why I'm angry. Like that would probably have come out and that feels real and raw to me.
Speaker 3:And so sometimes I'm not good at giving myself space to, like, take care of their needs first, because I'm already overwhelmed. So in my mind, if I had done that right, or if you had done that, it's like, peter, why can't you just listen? We're trying to get you something for mom, just listen. That tells him I'm having this experience. But like, really I just need, like I'm not good, I need to be better, and by being a better listener next time, more responsible, next time, that's gonna earn my dad's favor, right? Does that make sense? Yeah, but that's what I actually, what I do so. It's actually like so often and cause I'm wounded. But that's why it's beautiful to hear that story with you and him. But that's why the repair is so important to open back the door of like.
Speaker 2:Well, that just happened to be the one spot where he asked it in a way that was just like heartbreak, Right right it just cuts me that, cuts to the quick. But as you were saying that, I was like oh my gosh. I said can't you just listen?
Speaker 1:recently, I was just.
Speaker 2:I think it's like I had to figure this out, like, so that's a huge one, that's great Thanks for sharing that though. Yeah, man, to be a firm, that's a huge one. So the next one is the idea of to being blessed, to be given unconditional love. Let's unpack that a little bit.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think to be affirmed and to be blessed are similar, but kind of what you were saying earlier is like is the love I'm offering, is the blessing I'm offering or that I've been offered? Is it conditional? Does it ride on something that I'm doing or something that I achieve, or is it taken away when I do something that I'm not supposed to or not been asked to do? And I just think about that for myself, of going back even to my own life, like having these moments that felt like I was in good favor if I did these things and I wasn't if I did these things. And I kind of think I can see even in my own family life like it's kind of a fork in the road of like, okay, are you gonna work extra hard to be in good favor and be the high achiever, no-transcript, and get all of the things that you're being asked or that feels like needs to be asked, or are you gonna kind of be the rebel of the family and the black sheep? And I think I can look back and see ways that my sister went one way and kind of became like a really good example in a lot of ways and parents praise a lot of things she did and I can remember kind of being the black sheep and being in trouble at school and stuff in a home sometimes and just feeling that, okay, I'm not good and sometimes feeling like that love was based on doing the right thing, keeping things clean, getting good grades and things like that at a young age and being smart. And I remember feeling this and I wanna just give a shout out to my parents now because they have just had amazing conversions that are so good at offering blessing and love to me now. But I still remember just being young and storing some of these things of like, yeah, teachers, they only I have to do certain things to stay in good grace and when I'm the class clown I just cause problems.
Speaker 3:But that's kind of my own consolation. It's like I get a few laughs but I don't know how to get good grades, I don't know how to work hard, I don't know how to do these things is what it felt like, and so some of that conditional love then kind of got rerouted through, like I just wanna make good friends and have a lot of laughter and have a lot of fun and I'm not gonna even try to earn some of the praise in my family life.
Speaker 1:So I don't know if that registers, but yeah, and I would add too that I feel like for a lot of these they kind of build on one another or they feed into one another in different ways or they're different aspects of a very similar thing or an experience or lack of experience. But I think for me I can see the ways, like going off of what Alex said, the ways that I wasn't affirmed and had. I grew up like poor. I grew up with like this idea that if I was going to be something, I had to earn it, and so I felt like there were times in my life where that affirmation I wasn't able to understand that at a young age, but I didn't have like a deep seated feeling of like I'm affirmed, I'm good. I felt like underneath there's something wrong with me and I need to prove to the world and to others that I am good and in that also, like that's how I fight blessing, that's how I get and receive this unconditional love that you know searching after, like that my heart needs.
Speaker 2:By being worthy of it or not.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, I need to show that I'm worthy to have this, and so it's like I had to do X, y or Z and so for me, in a lot of ways, I was a high achiever I, you know, was the first one of my family to go to college but in a lot of ways that that's like it was an outlet for that place in my, that unmet need in my heart to try to get filled and to try to feel lovable and to be loved, which, yeah, I've done a lot of counseling and stuff and, through that, have looked at these places where I'm like, whoa, I had a lot, had a lot and have at times still these feelings of shame that come up that I've never like when I was young, never was able to really to understand or look at.
Speaker 1:But, yeah, in that I feel like I've had these like healing experiences throughout my life, whereas I like my ongoing journey and faith with the Lord and having the Lord come and meet these places in my heart to understand what true unconditional love is and what true affirmation is and, yeah, seeing the ways too that it combats that feeling of I need to do X, y or Z to be loved, where I'm getting better at saying I actually don't have to do these things to be loved and I'm not as worried about the way that I perceived or what I do to receive and achieve these desires. But yeah, in a lot of ways I think that to be blessed, to be given unconditional love, is tied in a lot with affirmation. It's still different, but I think for us as Christians it has a very unique place because of what we talk about Like God's unconditional love. For a lot of us it's very hard to receive that.
Speaker 3:And it speaks so much to the fear of failure, of like if I make a mistake, if I mess up, if I don't measure up, will I still be loved, will I still be accepted? So I think this to be blessed in particular hits in the fear of failure, and it's like the father who welcomes the prodigal son is like, yeah, failure doesn't define you, like, you're still my son, and so I think that's part of this too. But I wanted to just say I know we're approaching the end here, but something I think is incredible is I have had the chance over the past few weeks or months, in a non-counseling setting, to sit down with someone in their later years of life and revisit some of the things that had happened in their life. And it was just, it was incredible to hear them tap into these memories from nine years old and 13 years old. And I asked pointedly if you could just bring that moment to mind when you were just little and no one was there and you were crying and you were alone.
Speaker 3:What do you think you wanted? Like, if you could just bring back that moment of time right now, what would you give that young version of yourself? What would you give and almost like exactly, it's these things. Like I wish I had had someone to listen to me. So I wish I had had someone to take me out to spend time with me. I wish I had had someone to hug me and to hold me. I wish I had had someone to tell me that I was good. I wish someone would have rescued me and taken me out of the situation. I wish I would have been safe. Like without ever seeing this document and without ever having those experiences, never having formation, never having anything, and one of the first times I ever telling this story, they put their finger on these desires and I thought like what they have just laid out is so deeply embedded in the human heart that, no matter what culture, what race, what age, these are like so true and so good the way that we're talking about this like and like it's hard to.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna try and end it on a happier note than what I'm about to say, but it feels hopeless, like to, and it honestly just was like revealing to me like the fruit of it is, like I'm just understanding, like, what grace is and why grace is so necessary in some of those things and like the reality of original sin and it's concupiscence and it's effects, like it like feeling so frustrated and able to like really clearly, like communicate all of these things with your kid is probably like a huge part of it, and like where that sin comes. There's a paper.
Speaker 2:There's a paper to write about sin and counseling within this, and so I'm super excited to keep digging into it with you guys and how it reflects like parenting and evangelization and just like relating to each other in the workplace. So stick around for the next one and we'll keep it rolling, but it's been great. This has been Red Dirt Catholics. We'll see you next time.