S1E5 - Your Fatherhood Needs You to Know Your Story, Facing Generational Sin, Trusting God to Bless What’s Been Broken, and Practical Steps Toward Health

0:02 [SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the intentional fatherhood podcast where we give you a strong biblical framework and lots of practical ideas on how to live intentionally as a father and a husband. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm Brooke Moser and I'm Justin Whitmore Early and we're your host to guide you through the many roles and challenges that God is calling you to to live intentionally as a father.

0:21 [SPEAKER_01]: We're following a visual framework that you can check out at intentionalfatherhood.org and it's gonna help you break down fatherhood into eight columns. [SPEAKER_00]: And in each one, we're going to talk about how God made you to be a father and what practical habits you can start trying today in order to live intentionally into that home.

0:39 [SPEAKER_01]: So come along with us as we follow Jesus on this journey towards being more intentional fathers. [SPEAKER_00]: Welcome back to the intentional fatherhood podcast, Justin and I are here with you today. [SPEAKER_00]: We're back. [SPEAKER_00]: We're back episode five. [SPEAKER_00]: One quick note, you made the most amazing breakfast sandwiches this morning.

0:59 [SPEAKER_01]: I appreciate you saying that. [SPEAKER_00]: We need to talk about like, it's funny. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not much in the kitchen, but at breakfast, do you have to enroll? [SPEAKER_00]: And let's just be real. [SPEAKER_00]: So Elizabeth were a way to place recording and Elizabeth sent us with sourdough, fresh made sourdough, some really good sourdough.

1:12 [SPEAKER_00]: That was been great. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's been fun, like, I feel like an old married couple where, you know, you just don't talk, you just fall into your roles. [SPEAKER_00]: You know what I mean? [SPEAKER_00]: You're just like at whatever point without talking, you're like in the kitchen making breakfast.

1:25 [SPEAKER_00]: But dude, [SPEAKER_00]: Those Sam was like, what bacon eggs, uh, cheese, cheddar cheese, uh, chose to let sourdough. [SPEAKER_00]: Chalula, Chipotle, Tabasco, like, that sauce. [SPEAKER_00]: Uh, and then I never had this bananas in almond milk like just together like as a bananas. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it was my nice little touch.

1:44 [SPEAKER_01]: Justin really in the business. [SPEAKER_01]: I know it's fun to let people know where we're at. [SPEAKER_01]: So we're recording these episodes and bend organs. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, one degree outside today today. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's been staying in a cabin together talking about all this getting to know each other.

1:57 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, then fun. [SPEAKER_01]: It's been a fun. [SPEAKER_01]: And now we invite you into our episode five here episode five. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, we kind of decided what if we just got away. [SPEAKER_00]: It'd be much easier for life if we just got away and had a couple days and just [SPEAKER_00]: went all in and and it's been a really great experience and plus the breakfast sandwiches and speaking of going all in we're about to go deep here.

2:17 [SPEAKER_00]: We're about to go deep. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, so maybe just to set up and please help me with this Justin, but again, you can go to intentional fatherhood.org. [SPEAKER_00]: You can see the paradigm we're talking about, but there's two different axes that we're going to be talking about today.

2:29 [SPEAKER_00]: Um, and not every, you know, season or episode will have all of these, you know, with dichotomies, but this is the foundational season in many ways. [SPEAKER_00]: And we need to set this up so that as we continue to talk and go deep on all these different topics, plus more, that there's some foundation.

2:44 [SPEAKER_00]: So the two things we want to talk about today are not only family past, but also family future. [SPEAKER_00]: So next week, we're going to talk about future legacy. [SPEAKER_00]: Your family now a lot of like, what is it like to live in this now? [SPEAKER_00]: But today we want to talk about knowing your story and how your past greatly affects your present.

3:03 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And all of us have different stories. [SPEAKER_00]: So before we dive into that, I do also want to say thank you to everyone who's rated and subscribed. [SPEAKER_00]: That has been. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes. [SPEAKER_00]: So awesome. [SPEAKER_00]: And left comments. [SPEAKER_01]: Do it.

3:12 [SPEAKER_01]: It's so encouraging and interesting to hear your questions. [SPEAKER_01]: See your comments. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: And then on questions, let them know what we're doing with that. [SPEAKER_01]: Send us your, send us your questions, voice memo. [SPEAKER_01]: Hello, I am blank from blank.

3:24 [SPEAKER_01]: And then [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I prefer state your question in the form of question, but Brooke is open to just state a statement. [SPEAKER_00]: Tell us something. [SPEAKER_00]: That's a question. [SPEAKER_00]: You can use it to encourage as well. [SPEAKER_00]: I will take it and then send that to hello at intentional fatherhood.org.

3:39 [SPEAKER_00]: But yes, we do want to hear we're going to gather those and do some episodes. [SPEAKER_00]: We're excited about that. [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, let's talk about the past calm mellow stuff. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Go look at the diagram. [SPEAKER_01]: This will help you. [SPEAKER_01]: This is the the axes we're talking about here is know your story.

3:54 [SPEAKER_01]: We've all come from somewhere and we can't really build our family present or our family legacy until we've done the hard work of looking into our family past and I call that hard work because [SPEAKER_01]: Often this is the shadow and this is the place of difficulty. [SPEAKER_01]: This is the traumas, the brokenness, the frustrations that we've come from also blessings.

4:17 [SPEAKER_01]: We'll talk about both of those. [SPEAKER_01]: But I think it's important first to just be honest about the years the locus might have eaten the problems in our past. [SPEAKER_00]: can't wait to talk about that. [SPEAKER_00]: Well, and in the phrase that we kind of put together for this specific episode that would maybe be the summary, the semis of the episode is how your past affects your fatherhood now and how God builds on your blessings and redeems your brokenness.

4:44 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so that sentence just one more time how your past effects your father had now and how God builds on your blessing and redeemed your brokenness. [SPEAKER_00]: That's really what we want to talk about and and and everyone has a different past, you know, we were even relating today and talking about.

4:59 [SPEAKER_00]: how our upbringing, but also just our past and our stories are very different. [SPEAKER_00]: And that's actually interesting that we kind of find ourselves in the same place today, but how we got to this place in the sense of even friendship or being thoughtful about what we're trying to do, not perfect.

5:15 [SPEAKER_00]: We say this all the time, like, just to try to be intentional, father's like, [SPEAKER_00]: We arrived at intentional fatherhood as an idea, you know, not even as an idea or a concept ministry wise, but to be those types of fathers with very different mediums. [SPEAKER_00]: Is there a sense?

5:31 [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: Like how you got here and how I got here and your reasons for why and my reasons for why are actually different, but we're in the same spot, which I find is interesting. [SPEAKER_01]: So I want to talk about, you know, that's making me think we've said that's a couple times and past episodes.

5:43 [SPEAKER_01]: Your father who needs you to blank [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: Here I think it's your fatherhood needs you to know your story. [SPEAKER_01]: You need to come to terms with your past so that you can bless your children instead of curse them. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: So I say we'd dive in.

5:59 [SPEAKER_01]: Let's dive in and tell us a story. [SPEAKER_00]: I can tell you a story. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: a verse that has been very helpful for me in my own personal life and story and I've come by this many different times and it's always an encouragement and it's actually I only usually say the first part because I can't remember the whole verse you know those like you start to get a lot of those yeah like oh I love this part you know I'm really good at paraphrasing scripture I'm really bad at quoting a setting my own version of it yeah we have all we all do that sometimes [SPEAKER_00]: But at the verse, and I often make it a prayer of my own life.

6:31 [SPEAKER_00]: Lord would you, would you repay or would you heal what the locust have eaten? [SPEAKER_00]: You know, you kind of mentioned that. [SPEAKER_00]: And that's from Joel to twenty five and twenty six. [SPEAKER_00]: But what I actually love is when I actually go back to a read it, I'm always reminded of the real richness.

6:45 [SPEAKER_00]: So let me just read that to you. [SPEAKER_00]: Give us the whole thing. [SPEAKER_00]: I will repay you for your years, the locust have eaten. [SPEAKER_00]: So just sit with that for a second and it's important. [SPEAKER_00]: And then it goes on, you will have plenty to eat until you are full.

6:59 [SPEAKER_00]: And then you will praise the name of the Lord your God who has worked wonders for you. [SPEAKER_00]: Wow, never again will my people be shamed. [SPEAKER_00]: Like if that doesn't fit in a story of pain and trauma, I don't know what does. [SPEAKER_00]: And what brings so much hope to me, you know, any comments on that before I go.

7:20 [SPEAKER_01]: No, just that that I got goosebumps when you read that. [SPEAKER_01]: Only because. [SPEAKER_01]: You have to be honest about the years the locus have eaten to know the joy of what that promise is. [SPEAKER_01]: Like if you haven't actually come face to face with that starvation of the past, like, oh, I was hurt.

7:41 [SPEAKER_01]: I lost something years of the crops years of childhood years of what ought to been memories. [SPEAKER_01]: If you don't face that pain, then you don't really understand the blessing that it is to say, I will restore it to you. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to bring it back. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

7:56 [SPEAKER_01]: So I think you should. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: You had to face and pain once you. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Of course. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think, I mean, it's important to say we all face to certain level of pain being human is a painful experience on any front.

8:10 [SPEAKER_00]: Even as a father, you're best efforts, you're gonna hurt your kids, and you're gonna hurt your spouse, and you're gonna mess things up. [SPEAKER_00]: That's a very common thing. [SPEAKER_00]: You can't get around that. [SPEAKER_00]: You can't avoid that that will happen. [SPEAKER_00]: But there's certain things that can become more extreme, and they take a lot longer to work through and heal from.

8:29 [SPEAKER_00]: So I just want to make that really clear that everyone experiences pain. [SPEAKER_00]: Some is really easily moved through and worked through and around, and some just take a lot longer. [SPEAKER_00]: So I think it's important to share some of my experience in story. [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's actually more important to start with a generation past.

8:48 [SPEAKER_00]: So I'm going to talk to you really fast about my dad's grandfather. [SPEAKER_00]: I actually want to talk to you about my mom's grandfather. [SPEAKER_00]: because it's super easy for us to get really angry at our parents for what they'd had gave us, didn't do, did do. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, we all do that.

9:06 [SPEAKER_00]: We all have certain feelings of like, well, I wish they would have done this, or I wish they would be this, or I wish they wouldn't have done that. [SPEAKER_00]: That's all very real. [SPEAKER_00]: But they're in the context of a story. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, we've been talking about, we're a story to people.

9:20 [SPEAKER_00]: We are in a narrative [SPEAKER_00]: That kingdom narrative, we're in this beautiful storyline of the kingdom of God. [SPEAKER_00]: And we are Jesus' people, if you're following him, we are Jesus' people within this story. [SPEAKER_00]: Well, same with you and your family. [SPEAKER_00]: It started way before you showed up on the scene, but we often just blame those directly our neighbor, our parents, who's closest?

9:42 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, you guys. [SPEAKER_00]: But it often starts way before. [SPEAKER_00]: My dad grew up in different parts of the Midwest. [SPEAKER_00]: But his parents were German immigrants that came in from Germany and moved here during just different low times in Germany. [SPEAKER_00]: And my dad's grandfather [SPEAKER_00]: was an insanely hard abusive, painful person who was so abusive to his son, which is my dad's dad, my grandfather.

10:17 [SPEAKER_00]: And insanely abusive physically, emotionally, all the ways that you can be. [SPEAKER_00]: And it was really interesting because as my dad grew up, he experienced a father who passed on a lot of what his father gave him, which is so common. [SPEAKER_00]: Generational sin is such a real thing.

10:38 [SPEAKER_00]: So my dad is the baby of ten kids. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god. [SPEAKER_00]: Ten kids. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, grandma and grandpa. [SPEAKER_00]: My grandma and grandpa were Catholic and it was basically like, you know, they didn't believe in birth control, the whole thing. [SPEAKER_00]: So they had ten kids.

10:53 [SPEAKER_00]: My dad was born at seven months, two months prematurely because my grandfather, who was incredibly physically abusive and sexually abusive to his wife and his kids. [SPEAKER_00]: was, my grandma did something and he threw her against a parked car, her stomach hit the car, and she went into labor.

11:17 [SPEAKER_00]: And so my dad was born two months premature in a very traumatic way. [SPEAKER_00]: Wow. [SPEAKER_00]: The way he came into the world was very traumatic. [SPEAKER_00]: Wow. [SPEAKER_00]: And so that was very common. [SPEAKER_00]: And this episode, if you are listening by the way, if you have kids in the car, there are some elements and themes within this episode that will be very mature.

11:42 [SPEAKER_00]: And so this might be a moment to push pause way to you can listen to it or put in some airbud, something like that. [SPEAKER_01]: Good point. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: So, but that said, moving on, you've been warned. [SPEAKER_00]: Diving in deeper, [SPEAKER_00]: This traumatic experience within my grandfather, my dad's dad, led to him being an incredibly abusive human to his wife and kids.

12:07 [SPEAKER_00]: And again, like physically mentally. [SPEAKER_00]: And not to be overly graphic here, but there was sexual abuse on all fronts. [SPEAKER_00]: Now my dad was not sexually abused by his dad, but that's primarily because my grandmother said no, not this one. [SPEAKER_00]: You can't have this one.

12:19 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my gosh. [SPEAKER_00]: But there was all sorts of levels of sexual abuse, including rape of his own daughters. [SPEAKER_00]: That was the environment that my dad grew up in. [SPEAKER_00]: Now I know this is very heavy, but I'm telling you this to simply say, it is so easy for us to get mad at our parents and forget the context of the pain that they came from or live in.

12:42 [SPEAKER_00]: Yes. [SPEAKER_00]: And so I do have a lot of different elements of pain, but I also have a lot of understanding of how good of a situation I had comparatively. [SPEAKER_00]: So I'll get into that in a minute. [SPEAKER_01]: Can I just interject? [SPEAKER_01]: I just feel like this is the spirit's prompting on us a little bit.

13:01 [SPEAKER_01]: Because I'm learning a lot of this for the first time. [SPEAKER_01]: Like we've gotten to know each other, but you're telling me the level of your story that I haven't even heard. [SPEAKER_01]: So most people out there, the same thing. [SPEAKER_03]: Sure. [SPEAKER_01]: And when you face the past years, the locus of eating the trauma, or when you hear of it, like I'm hearing it right now, it is [SPEAKER_01]: not easy to know what to do with a story like that.

13:24 [SPEAKER_01]: Like I'm literally sitting here like I don't know what to say. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know to do like wow or oh or my goodness. [SPEAKER_01]: And I just want to note that because I think that's part of why this and this idea, this episode is so important because it is not easy to face the stories of the past.

13:41 [SPEAKER_01]: You may not know what to do with it. [SPEAKER_01]: And that's precisely the point that we've got to do that work to [SPEAKER_01]: stare into it and say, what do I do with this brokenness in the world, in my life, in my grandparents' lives, my father, my mother's life. [SPEAKER_01]: But that's hard.

14:00 [SPEAKER_01]: As I just want to note, anyone listening, if you don't know what to do with this, that's because it's hard to figure out what to do with this. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and maybe just to help you know what to do with the little is to say, you know, you don't have to be overly [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think you have to, it's a deep thing because it hits you in the soul in a place that everyone goes, that's viscerly dynamically, entirely evil and wrong.

14:24 [SPEAKER_00]: And what you feel is the evil, I think, that exists in the world. [SPEAKER_00]: The reason I tell you the story is because this is not as uncommon as it seems. [SPEAKER_00]: It's just that it is not talked about. [SPEAKER_00]: It's often not described and it's often not addressed. [SPEAKER_00]: So this actually is not, of course, the extreme of which I'm talking about is maybe a little more rare, but in one sense it's also pain is very common in different levels of the pain.

14:51 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm just explaining the level of pain. [SPEAKER_00]: And the reason I'm giving some detail is simply to say, [SPEAKER_00]: Detail makes this real. [SPEAKER_00]: It's easy for me to say like my past was hard. [SPEAKER_00]: My dad's past was bad. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And you can fill in whatever blanks you want.

15:03 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm just trying to paint a picture of like, it was actually very hard. [SPEAKER_00]: And it was objectively not good and objectively painful. [SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, there's an honoring of like, I'm not trying, I won't over share certain parts of my dad's. [SPEAKER_00]: There's a lot I'm leaving out even now.

15:19 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm just trying to give context of the fact that this is not as simple as you might think. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's not as easy as they didn't give me what I wanted. [SPEAKER_00]: They were these types of people to me. [SPEAKER_00]: Therefore, I get to be this kind of person to them, or I'm just the way I am now, because what they did to me, like we have a responsibility to know our story.

15:42 [SPEAKER_00]: And my mom, you know, less dramatic, but a similar situation, extreme alcoholism, extreme poverty, her dad was in the war and different, uh, different, uh, he was in the army for a very long time, experienced the V and I'm more experienced a lot of different things and very, um, poor, and then extreme alcoholism, the middle of five kids abuse and all sorts of different ways.

16:05 [SPEAKER_00]: This is where [SPEAKER_00]: My mom and my dad find each other. [SPEAKER_00]: They meet in North Dakota of all the places. [SPEAKER_00]: Anyone that's listening from there, they meet in North Dakota and they're both, sixteen, they meet in high school and categorically want to get out of their situation.

16:24 [SPEAKER_00]: They find Jesus, they find each other and they get married to the eighteen and essentially eject from their respective family situations. [SPEAKER_00]: They get married at eighteen and they decide at twenty they're ready to have kids, so they have my brother, they have me, my sister by the time they're twenty three, they have three children.

16:45 [SPEAKER_00]: And that's really young. [SPEAKER_00]: It's really fast. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm in the middle. [SPEAKER_00]: of that. [SPEAKER_00]: I was born into this situation of two people who were well-meaning loving that came from really hard situations themselves and I will say this to both honor and be honest about my parents.

17:12 [SPEAKER_00]: There's so many things that they didn't pass on. [SPEAKER_00]: I was never sexually abused by my parents, right? [SPEAKER_00]: I was never, there was a lot of things that never happened that could have happened and would have been like, well, that kind of makes sense, you know, that's what they experienced.

17:26 [SPEAKER_00]: So even though they weren't able to give me everything, they protected me from a lot. [SPEAKER_00]: They protected me from things that could have been far worse. [SPEAKER_00]: Now, there were still a lot that was there that was very hard and very traumatic. [SPEAKER_00]: But I have to note, when you look at the history, why knowing your story is important is because it helps you understand that you are a part of a greater thing.

17:51 [SPEAKER_00]: And it helps you say, well, maybe God was already protecting me and redeeming some of my story before it was even born. [SPEAKER_01]: And some merciful and kind, I think for you to note that, because there's a lot that also was hard. [SPEAKER_00]: It was, it was you're going to say that's taking a lot of years to get to this spot and we're going to talk about in a second what it looks like to really do that work to get to a place where I mean, I still feel deeply about this and I wouldn't say, oh, I'm all fine.

18:18 [SPEAKER_00]: I would just say, I've had a lot of time to work through it. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, you can't go around suffering. [SPEAKER_00]: You can't go around trauma. [SPEAKER_00]: We try to go over it. [SPEAKER_00]: We try to go over it. [SPEAKER_00]: We try to go around it. [SPEAKER_00]: All you can do is go through it.

18:29 [SPEAKER_00]: And you have to be committed to the process of going through it. [SPEAKER_00]: And then even on the ups and downs when you're in the middle of it, it's very hard. [SPEAKER_00]: But if you can say committed to go like, I don't know what, like how I'm going to get through this, I'm just going to keep going.

18:42 [SPEAKER_00]: I do think there is hope on the other side. [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm way more regulated about it. [SPEAKER_00]: I can be very honest about it. [SPEAKER_00]: on both directions. [SPEAKER_00]: I can be honest in both directions about like that was really lame and also very helpful to to learn to be in the spot.

19:00 [SPEAKER_00]: So I'd say you have to know your story. [SPEAKER_00]: Now all all that said. [SPEAKER_00]: I grew up in the middle of that chaotic environment. [SPEAKER_00]: My parents were trying to figure out how do we love Jesus, love each other, and have three children. [SPEAKER_00]: That's really hard.

19:16 [SPEAKER_00]: They're first generation Christians. [SPEAKER_00]: They're trying to like follow Jesus. [SPEAKER_00]: And you can only imagine the vices and pain that both my parents had. [SPEAKER_00]: from trying to deal with what they experienced as kids. [SPEAKER_00]: And so they're trying to raise kids, protect them, raise them in the way of Jesus.

19:33 [SPEAKER_00]: It was very complex. [SPEAKER_00]: I can look at it with grace and mercy at this point. [SPEAKER_00]: It was hard. [SPEAKER_00]: But I still grew up in a very chaotic environment in many different ways. [SPEAKER_00]: And to honor [SPEAKER_00]: honor my mom who is alive and my dad who is not.

19:49 [SPEAKER_00]: I don't feel it important to go into every detail of how trauma happened to me, but I would just say I was launched into adulthood with a handful of different dispositions and struggles and basically ways of operating that were not healthy for me. [SPEAKER_00]: not healthy for my life, my family.

20:14 [SPEAKER_00]: And it's vague, but I'm trying to just, again, you can understand and respect. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm just trying to honor those who who need honor, right? [SPEAKER_00]: But it's just to say, like, I was in adulthood found myself married at twenty one, having our son at age twenty three. [SPEAKER_00]: and really having very little understanding of my own story, but found myself in this place of over-responding, or being incredibly anxious, or being unaware.

20:45 [SPEAKER_00]: I wouldn't have called it anxiety. [SPEAKER_00]: Just all of these different reactions that I was living out of, just anger that I'd experienced living in my body that I didn't even really know. [SPEAKER_00]: Just responding out of it. [SPEAKER_00]: And I knew stuff was wrong and Elizabeth was good at giving me feedback like, that's pretty messed up.

21:08 [SPEAKER_00]: So I was launched into adulthood realizing like, I don't know how to be a good dad. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know how to be a good husband. [SPEAKER_00]: I really don't know what's even going on. [SPEAKER_01]: I think you've been very kind to your parents and you're obviously being non-specific about some things.

21:26 [SPEAKER_01]: At that point in your life, did you respect your father? [SPEAKER_01]: Did you want to become like him? [SPEAKER_00]: No, not at all, okay. [SPEAKER_00]: No, but I would say, you know, truth. [SPEAKER_00]: The truth is because my dad grew up in the environment he did, he had a lot of vices.

21:44 [SPEAKER_00]: The problem with that was that he hid them from everybody. [SPEAKER_00]: And it wasn't until I was about seventeen that everything came out. [SPEAKER_01]: So right before you head into adulthood, like right before you leave the house, you realize there's been a lot of secrets that you have no idea about.

22:01 [SPEAKER_00]: That I had no idea about. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's a very jarring experience when, because when you're in a chaotic emotional environment like that where there's double living going on, what happens? [SPEAKER_00]: No matter how good the intentions are of the family, [SPEAKER_00]: disorder only happens.

22:19 [SPEAKER_00]: Disorder and chaos happen because you're feeling like, hey, something's really off. [SPEAKER_00]: So everyone's saying, it's not off. [SPEAKER_01]: So you, you were noticing some of these things. [SPEAKER_01]: I was sort of, but thinking, everybody's telling you, no, this isn't actually happening.

22:34 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and it was never as direct as like, hey, this thing's going on. [SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't direct. [SPEAKER_00]: There's like, what is that about? [SPEAKER_00]: And then being told, no, it's not, everything's fine. [SPEAKER_00]: We're okay. [SPEAKER_00]: Everything's okay. [SPEAKER_00]: Nothing's wrong.

22:44 [SPEAKER_00]: But you're like, [SPEAKER_00]: I feel it. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to like a more intuitive that way. [SPEAKER_00]: Like there's something off. [SPEAKER_01]: So what I'm hearing. [SPEAKER_01]: Tell me if there's right your your whole childhood. [SPEAKER_01]: is filled with this idea of, can I believe the reality that's happening or not?

23:03 [SPEAKER_01]: Like, which is it? [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_00]: Because that's got to be very confusing. [SPEAKER_00]: It's very confusing. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's confusing because even now is an adult, it's hard to trust and understand my own feelings. [SPEAKER_00]: Because, well, I've been told for so long to just like, don't look here.

23:21 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, something's weird. [SPEAKER_00]: Just look the other way around. [SPEAKER_00]: Don't look here. [SPEAKER_00]: Wow. [SPEAKER_00]: And that love, like, it's hard to even put into words. [SPEAKER_00]: It's easy to say, like, that's not that bad. [SPEAKER_00]: Live in it your whole life and try to function as an adult in a real world.

23:35 [SPEAKER_00]: You will find how complex that is because every different dynamic that I couldn't even share, like, it's hard to even go into detail. [SPEAKER_00]: It affects everything in all the ways that you don't even know. [SPEAKER_00]: And that's the other part is like, you don't know how, like, layered it is.

23:51 [SPEAKER_00]: And so with that dynamic and finding out that my dad's world, my mom's world, like that they were dad was living one way mom was trying to keep the family together, very noble in her desires, but like still, even just that is creates a level. [SPEAKER_00]: It creates these waves or ripple effects of dysfunction that you can't even fully put your finger on.

24:18 [SPEAKER_00]: So what ends up happening is you are family fell into the classic, what psychologists would call a dysfunctional family system, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And this is very classic, and if you've done any sort of therapy work, you've probably heard this phrase before, but if the idea that when there is a chasm at the top, the top being the mom and the dad, there's a chasm of alcoholism or addiction or infidelity, [SPEAKER_00]: And yet, they try to keep everything going and normal in the same.

24:50 [SPEAKER_00]: It creates because it's not meant to be that way. [SPEAKER_00]: It creates these dysfunction. [SPEAKER_00]: So everyone starts playing these different roles to adapt to what happens. [SPEAKER_00]: My brother became overly responsible. [SPEAKER_00]: I became very funny to deal with everything in the family to let the air out of the tire.

25:06 [SPEAKER_00]: Nothing is that serious. [SPEAKER_00]: I was in many ways the clown. [SPEAKER_00]: There's like these actual lows, the rules. [SPEAKER_00]: I fell into the clown role because it was like, okay, well, it doesn't give me too much attention, but it gives me enough and I wanted attention, but not too much.

25:21 [SPEAKER_00]: Interesting. [SPEAKER_00]: And then my sister became a scapegoat and she just started living a different life. [SPEAKER_00]: But didn't tell anybody. [SPEAKER_00]: She kind of, you know, followed the pattern, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And again, these are their stories to tell not mine. [SPEAKER_00]: But I would just say that happened.

25:39 [SPEAKER_00]: The dysfunctional family system and the disordered living in our home is not to be underestimated with how impactful and confusing and hard that was. [SPEAKER_00]: I find myself in adulthood not wanting to repeat this, but also being like, this is all I know. [SPEAKER_00]: I only know chaotic emotional relationships and I not to trust myself really.

26:00 [SPEAKER_00]: And I don't know what it means to be a good husband. [SPEAKER_00]: I would try to put myself around guys who I would be like, you seem like a good husband, like I'd love to learn from you, or older men that I'm like, I can trust and respect and learn from. [SPEAKER_00]: But no, to answer your question, I did not.

26:17 [SPEAKER_00]: At that point, especially, there was no respect for my father. [SPEAKER_00]: Because once I learned who he really was and once I learned the life that he had been living in that not telling anyone, especially his kids, it was so painful. [SPEAKER_00]: It was so painful. [SPEAKER_00]: And I wanted nothing to do with him for a long time.

26:39 [SPEAKER_01]: I feel like so many people with stories like this, [SPEAKER_01]: Ignore it. [SPEAKER_01]: Because it's easier to ignore it. [SPEAKER_01]: It's easier to move on, especially when you've been told, hey, don't look here. [SPEAKER_01]: No problems here. [SPEAKER_01]: When did you realize that you had to confront the past in order to move to the future?

26:57 [SPEAKER_01]: And at one point, did you realize I think I'm going to need help to do that? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, thanks for this is this is a good question and it's helpful because I could stay you know There's so many layers to this I could stay in this for a very long time and I don't want to my hope is to be helpful with this story, but I would say I was twenty nine and It actually wasn't it didn't show up in my home it showed up in my work and so what I'll explain is I was a pastor for a lot of years and Interestingly enough [SPEAKER_00]: Pastoral work is very attractive for dysfunctional people.

27:38 [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm not sure why. [SPEAKER_00]: That's not always the case. [SPEAKER_00]: But it's very attractive for dysfunctional people. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think some of that has to do with the fact that God is like the ultimate father. [SPEAKER_00]: He's a father that we always wanted and never had.

27:55 [SPEAKER_00]: We've experienced so much healing in the faith that we want other people to experience the same level of dynamic, faith, change that we have. [SPEAKER_00]: That's not to say that every, this is not a blanket statement, right? [SPEAKER_00]: There's a lot of very healthy, godly, wonderful pastors.

28:06 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm just saying it's appealing to a certain demographic of people in pain. [SPEAKER_00]: And because of that, I was very drawn to ministry, but not, but not, I couldn't say that. [SPEAKER_00]: Then I'm hindsight. [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't fully know what that then, right? [SPEAKER_00]: But what I learned is there's also a lot of dysfunctional people like me that are in ministry that are very good at communicating and might get a lot of authority and responsibility when emotionally they're not ready for it.

28:32 [SPEAKER_00]: They can they can say a lot, but they can't lead their own life doesn't hold up. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, it's that their charisma is is actually far stronger than their character. [SPEAKER_00]: And I started connecting with some, I was working at a particular place, and again, no need to, I don't know, sheer names or anything, but it's working directly with a person who is like, had authority over me, who's my boss, so to speak.

28:58 [SPEAKER_00]: And it wasn't in my home, but in my work, this guy was enough. [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know this until later. [SPEAKER_00]: But everything about him, [SPEAKER_00]: the way he operated, the kind of like subtleties of the way he moved through the world, the way he made decisions, the way he spent his time.

29:16 [SPEAKER_00]: Like your dad, he was like my dad. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay. [SPEAKER_00]: And so this led to like one day, I'll tell this story isn't highly embarrassing, but I think very important to understand how crazy things like this can be without you knowing. [SPEAKER_00]: We are in a meeting.

29:34 [SPEAKER_00]: And this is a large church. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I'm on a team, a large church. [SPEAKER_00]: A lot of people, I have employees that work for me. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm one of his employees, right? [SPEAKER_00]: We had a meeting. [SPEAKER_00]: He had basically said, like, okay, hey, I won't make this decision unless X and Y and Z happened because I know if I make this decision and will affect your team pretty greatly.

29:54 [SPEAKER_00]: So you have my word, we're not going to change this until you say it's ready because your team has to fulfill the thing. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm being vague on purpose. [SPEAKER_00]: That said, we're sitting in a meeting. [SPEAKER_00]: There's eight guys around the table, some gals from some, guys, the gals around the table.

30:11 [SPEAKER_00]: And he just says, hey, we're doing the thing. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I was like, wait, wait. [SPEAKER_00]: A week ago, you said you were going to wait for me. [SPEAKER_00]: And I told you, we're not actually ready to do that yet. [SPEAKER_00]: We will be soon, but like, we're just not there.

30:22 [SPEAKER_00]: We don't have this person. [SPEAKER_00]: We just have to let this person go. [SPEAKER_00]: We're rehiring like, you said you wouldn't do it. [SPEAKER_00]: What are you talking about? [SPEAKER_00]: And he's like, no, we're gonna, we're gonna do it. [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, but you said, you wouldn't do it.

30:35 [SPEAKER_00]: And you're saying, now we're doing it. [SPEAKER_00]: And like, this isn't a meeting with people. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, truly, truth, truth be told, like everything went, like everyone in the room just went dark. [SPEAKER_00]: And I just focused in on this dude. [SPEAKER_00]: I remember. [SPEAKER_00]: And I have, like, I'm a kind person, but like, I have a strong eight wing in the sense of an eagram.

30:54 [SPEAKER_00]: I have no problem dealing with conflict or going toe to toe with people. [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm not saying that arrogance, like, I just have no, like, if there's a problem, we'll deal with it. [SPEAKER_00]: I'll go for it. [SPEAKER_00]: I have no problem addressing it. [SPEAKER_00]: I won't shy away because of discomfort.

31:06 [SPEAKER_00]: that said it was out of hand and basically he says no we're not doing it and I said I am categorically not okay with that like you told me this wouldn't happen and you lied to my face and he's like you need to so then he's like you need to leave the meeting so I said escalating that's always escalating dude I'm just telling you how crazy this gets [SPEAKER_00]: And I said, so he says, you need to leave the meeting.

31:32 [SPEAKER_00]: And I said, OK, are you sure? [SPEAKER_00]: Are you sure you want me to leave the meeting? [SPEAKER_00]: And he said, yes, I'm sure. [SPEAKER_00]: I said, I just want you to know. [SPEAKER_00]: If you ask me to leave this meeting, you're telling everyone, young and old in this room, which we have both, that when we disagree with you and when you [SPEAKER_00]: When we call you out for not keeping your word, you dismiss us because you do not think that what we have to say matters.

31:55 [SPEAKER_00]: Do you understand your communicating? [SPEAKER_00]: Yes or no? [SPEAKER_00]: And he goes, I understand leave the meeting. [SPEAKER_00]: And he was not a guy that dealt with conflict. [SPEAKER_00]: And so I was like, all right, now you know, so I mean, I got up and left and was in a fuming state like just I mean again like why am I so mad like I'm trying to figure out why am I so why does that make like all that stuff was hijacking me all the time.

32:23 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so this didn't so and could I now hear a ton of this is true. [SPEAKER_01]: Even when you're right and sounds like you were right in the meeting sure something wrong was happening inside something school wrong. [SPEAKER_00]: It was not from the right place. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, there was something more was happening.

32:38 [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, it was energized by pain decades of pain right like there was no. [SPEAKER_00]: kindness. [SPEAKER_00]: There was no thoughtfulness. [SPEAKER_00]: There was no respective authority. [SPEAKER_00]: There was no, I couldn't see anything. [SPEAKER_00]: It was just like blood red. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I'm going to destroy you for causing me this pain.

32:53 [SPEAKER_00]: And what happened, you know, hindsight looking back, he had triggered a deep deep wound in me, which was, I see. [SPEAKER_00]: And triggering is important, because I learned about this a while ago in therapy, triggering, we use this word, it's a buzzword right now, but being triggered is actually more like time travel.

33:10 [SPEAKER_00]: Being triggered means that you are essentially brought back into a moment in time, maybe you can articulate it or not, but a moment in time when you felt that same feeling and your body responds in real time how it responded then, because there hasn't been healing. [SPEAKER_00]: So triggering is time traveling.

33:29 [SPEAKER_00]: You time travel back to this moment. [SPEAKER_00]: So I was time traveling back to when I was a kid and my dad lied to me, I was told me something changes mine, whatever. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't remember the exact scenario. [SPEAKER_00]: So it showed up for me in my work and it was problematic.

33:42 [SPEAKER_01]: Touching that you said touching the wound, that was that's helpful for me. [SPEAKER_01]: I think a lot of my friends and conversations that the idea of having father wounds, of having [SPEAKER_01]: a wound that you've lived with and you might even have known until some of my touches that you rose on my gosh, there's a gaping hole in it.

33:59 [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: I haven't done the healing. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: And I've been reacting out of hurt and pain for so long. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: And so what ended up happening for for me is to finish that story because it is interesting.

34:17 [SPEAKER_00]: He comes out of the meeting. [SPEAKER_00]: And I go into his office and he's like, you can't ever do that again. [SPEAKER_00]: You can't disagree with me like that in front of people. [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, you're right. [SPEAKER_00]: That was not that was not cool. [SPEAKER_00]: Like how I handled that I was able to come down.

34:30 [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, you're right. [SPEAKER_00]: That wasn't cool. [SPEAKER_00]: But you lied to me. [SPEAKER_00]: So how do we fix this? [SPEAKER_00]: He's like, I don't know, but don't do that to me again. [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: So [SPEAKER_00]: It's that, so I had to just leave it.

34:46 [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, you know, I have to tell my wife, you know, embarrassing that is, you know, it's not only embarrassing. [SPEAKER_00]: And I wasn't even fully wrong. [SPEAKER_00]: That was the other thing. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm sort of like, wait a minute. [SPEAKER_00]: No, it was embarrassing.

34:57 [SPEAKER_00]: You were right here. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's bothering you. [SPEAKER_00]: But, but, but men listening, Father's listen, how many times have we done the right thing with the wrong energy? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: The right thing. [SPEAKER_00]: The right thing. [SPEAKER_00]: The wrong heart.

35:10 [SPEAKER_00]: My heart wasn't to help him. [SPEAKER_00]: It was to kill him. [SPEAKER_00]: He went to hurt him. [SPEAKER_00]: I want to hurt him because he hurt me, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Did you want to? [SPEAKER_00]: Is there a part of you that wanted to hurt your dad or tell your dad that or address that to your dad or did you not even know that I would have connected it fully, but after after I started doing some of the work, I started to realize, oh, well, it's a let me let me move on.

35:32 [SPEAKER_00]: My work showed up because I'll I'll answer that question just a second. [SPEAKER_00]: Showed up in my work. [SPEAKER_00]: I was already dysfunctional in many ways at home, meaning like my response is my own anger, my own like I was just always like my my my nervous system was always rebs so high.

35:48 [SPEAKER_00]: And what happens when you experience trauma and I learn this again like through the years of trauma therapy is [SPEAKER_00]: When you experience trauma, your baseline, your nervous system lives at like a seven or eight. [SPEAKER_00]: Now, most of the time, if you're a healthy, regulated human, you have stresses in your day and you probably out of a one to ten or like on a scale from one to three.

36:06 [SPEAKER_00]: You get stuck in traffic, work happens. [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe you get to a four or five, right? [SPEAKER_00]: You have stress and all of us do. [SPEAKER_00]: But you're not tipping that edge where it like tips you into fighter flight and you're like overdone. [SPEAKER_00]: When you experience trauma a lot of times, you live at a seven or an eight.

36:21 [SPEAKER_00]: So it only takes traffic. [SPEAKER_00]: It only takes once and you're in the red zone. [SPEAKER_00]: And you're in the red zone. [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: This is what I was experiencing all the time. [SPEAKER_00]: I see. [SPEAKER_00]: And this was on minor and major things all the time.

36:31 [SPEAKER_00]: But you think this is normal to look like this. [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's normal because I don't know any different, but everyone giving me feedback that was close to me is like, [SPEAKER_00]: That said, I did the very humbling, and I was so embarrassed, I was so confused, but I was just like, I have to find out there because I reached out to, I think I reached out actually to my brother-in-law.

37:00 [SPEAKER_00]: John Mark and I said, hey, I know you see somebody that you love that you've said is great. [SPEAKER_00]: We just give me his number. [SPEAKER_00]: So he did. [SPEAKER_00]: And I go to see this guy, I'll never forget this day, but walking to a very small office in Portland, think of Rainy Treeery Portland.

37:16 [SPEAKER_00]: brick office. [SPEAKER_00]: Um, and it's it's cozy and small, but it has this chair that looks like everyone in the world has sat in it. [SPEAKER_00]: It looks like the chair is disease ridden just been there for like thirty five years. [SPEAKER_01]: I need to work on interior decor. [SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't care.

37:32 [SPEAKER_00]: He's working on the soul. [SPEAKER_00]: He's like, he's not he does not care about the feel. [SPEAKER_00]: And I walk in skip. [SPEAKER_00]: He skips all the niceties. [SPEAKER_00]: No niceties. [SPEAKER_00]: Just like, no high how are you? [SPEAKER_00]: What's your name? [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm like, I'm gonna hate this guy.

37:46 [SPEAKER_00]: And I mean, because there's no warmth really. [SPEAKER_00]: And I sit down in this chair and like I'm getting a disease as I'm sitting here and I'm listening to him and he and he just says to me. [SPEAKER_00]: So what's going on? [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know what happened with that phrase, but I begin to share everything in exquisite vivid detail from my childhood to the present, as fast as I could.

38:11 [SPEAKER_00]: I have no idea why those five words, if it is that many, opened up, yeah, you can count. [SPEAKER_01]: You undo the contraction it is. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [UNKNOWN]: Thank you so much. [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you,

38:52 [SPEAKER_00]: I can't believe you're standing. [SPEAKER_00]: What? [SPEAKER_00]: I can't believe you're standing after all this. [SPEAKER_00]: You must be completely overwhelmed. [SPEAKER_00]: You must be absolutely shattered inside. [SPEAKER_00]: And I mean, due to this day, like the most impactful, compassionate listening I've ever experienced.

39:11 [SPEAKER_00]: And it was the first time that someone I'd like given me feedback that I wasn't crazy. [SPEAKER_00]: and said like, you should feel as overwhelmed as you do. [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm gonna, you should feel as heavy as you do. [SPEAKER_00]: And then he said, I also want you to know, I'm just sobbing, like just on like years of pent up pain.

39:35 [SPEAKER_00]: And he says to me, I want you to know that I really give people advice, but I'm gonna give you some advice. [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, [SPEAKER_00]: The therapist, but he rarely gives advice. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, there's different types of modalities in therapies. [SPEAKER_01]: Sounds like just his, his listening and affirmation.

39:52 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, dude, moves mountains. [SPEAKER_00]: He knows what he's doing. [SPEAKER_00]: He's a mix of Mr. Rogers, Yoda, and, and Jesus. [SPEAKER_00]: Like he looks. [SPEAKER_00]: He's a seventy five year old dude who's like, where's a tie and there's a mustache. [SPEAKER_00]: He looks like Mr. Roger.

40:06 [SPEAKER_00]: It, it's so, he's amazing. [SPEAKER_00]: But no, he knew what he was doing. [SPEAKER_00]: He knew he's been doing this for forty years with some incredibly, well, with incredible experiences all to say. [SPEAKER_00]: And he specifically looked into my soul and said, I want to give you advice because he knew that I didn't know.

40:26 [SPEAKER_00]: He knew that it was, this stuff wasn't happening out of my, he's like, you need direction because you don't know what you're doing. [SPEAKER_00]: You don't know the unnecessary pain you're going to cause yourself if you don't like wake up to some stuff. [SPEAKER_00]: So he just simply said to me, because I remember I went in because I thought it was a work problem.

40:42 [SPEAKER_00]: He just said, you need to unhook your pain and your problems from work and you need to start treating work like you work in a coal mine. [SPEAKER_00]: You take your pale of lunch, you go do your job, you put your head down, you get through work, and you go home. [SPEAKER_00]: You do not need extra problems at work.

41:06 [SPEAKER_00]: This is not about your work. [SPEAKER_00]: This is not about your situation. [SPEAKER_00]: This is not about the person that frustrated you. [SPEAKER_00]: This is about your father and this is about your mom and this is about these different dynamics that you've dealt with and there's no way that you are going to be able to work through this if you also need to find a job.

41:22 [SPEAKER_00]: So you need to put your head down, do your work and you need to and you need to start coming back and we'll start this work. [SPEAKER_00]: That was ten years ago. [SPEAKER_00]: Do the work. [SPEAKER_01]: All right, we're going to pick up into three episodes on vocation, and doing the work.

41:41 [SPEAKER_01]: And I just want to note for a second, when you first started saying that, you need to treat your job like a coal mine, just go there. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm thinking, you're in ministry, you're past your way. [SPEAKER_01]: This is rubbing me the wrong way. [SPEAKER_01]: But suddenly, I think I'm having an epiphany.

41:55 [SPEAKER_01]: You tell me, I'm right. [SPEAKER_01]: So many of us with pain in our past, that what happens is we think the circumstances now are the problem, that it was a work problem, that it was conflict at work or whatever it is. [SPEAKER_01]: And what we're trying to tell people right now is what your therapist told you is that it's not the circumstances right now.

42:19 [SPEAKER_01]: You think this is a marriage problem, you think this is a job problem, you think this is a health problem. [SPEAKER_01]: I think it's a story problem. [SPEAKER_01]: You need to look back and face the ways that you have been broken and do the work there because it's not the circumstances right now.

42:35 [SPEAKER_00]: Is that what he was saying? [SPEAKER_00]: That's what he is exactly what he was saying. [SPEAKER_00]: And he was trying to help me see that you are thinking that this person is the problem. [SPEAKER_00]: You are thinking that the job is causing the trouble. [SPEAKER_00]: And this is not what's causing the problem.

42:46 [SPEAKER_00]: So much deeper. [SPEAKER_00]: This will chase you in every job. [SPEAKER_00]: And truth was, I'd had versions more mild versions of that in every job that I've had. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [SPEAKER_00]: And it was always with a male authority figure that if I looked back, now I'd connect this to later.

42:59 [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [SPEAKER_00]: Always had elements or versions of my father. [SPEAKER_01]: All right. [SPEAKER_01]: So I have two questions to talk to the listeners here. [SPEAKER_01]: How would you encourage them to start doing the work? [SPEAKER_01]: If somebody's listening right now and saying, oh my gosh, this is me, or they've known it's them, but they haven't started doing the work.

43:25 [SPEAKER_01]: How do they start? [SPEAKER_01]: That's first question. [SPEAKER_01]: I have another one. [SPEAKER_00]: First question, I would just simply say it starts with you being sick of the patterns and the pain that you're in. [SPEAKER_00]: You have to get to a spot where you realize it's as bad as it is.

43:41 [SPEAKER_00]: I think there's a lot of times there's denial and things that [SPEAKER_00]: We say that's not that bad, but you have to remember there's lots of different parts of you. [SPEAKER_00]: If you think of internal family systems as a modality, as an example, the idea there is like that we have these different parts that tell us different things to keep us safe, but also sometimes they're not always fully honest because they're trying to keep us safe from really wounded parts and so the idea would be [SPEAKER_00]: to be honest about the fact that there's a part of you that wants to say that it's not that bad, but there's also another part of you that knows it's as bad as it is.

44:14 [SPEAKER_00]: I would say the first step is to pray. [SPEAKER_00]: Ask God to begin to give you a soft heart towards your story and your situation, to know your story. [SPEAKER_00]: So I think prayer is the first part because some people here in this are like, there's no in the world, I'm going to therapy, fat-chance man.

44:29 [SPEAKER_00]: And it's funny. [SPEAKER_01]: And praying is naming this, right? [SPEAKER_01]: When you say pray about it, you have to talk to God. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: But let me just say this, man, you know you know that this is a problem. [SPEAKER_00]: You are in denial of that. [SPEAKER_00]: I knew that this was a problem.

44:48 [SPEAKER_00]: It was not that I wasn't aware of how deep it was, but I was not blind. [SPEAKER_00]: We often just pretend because we're not as aware as we are that we are blind. [SPEAKER_00]: Most of us have an idea and have had enough feedback in different variations of our life, especially if you're married, to say, no, I got to work on that.

45:06 [SPEAKER_00]: Even today, the amount of people that I will meet that are even in some of the fields that you and I get to work in and do and some of the people we meet, they are a staunch advocate of therapy and have really never gone. [SPEAKER_00]: I find that very interesting, interesting. [SPEAKER_00]: All to say, it's one thing to be an advocate for therapy.

45:27 [SPEAKER_00]: It's another thing to just shut up and do it. [SPEAKER_00]: And at the end of the day, what I would encourage you to do, and I know this sounds really harsh, but dude, sometimes I know when you this, we just need to shut up and do the work. [SPEAKER_00]: You just need to literally put your head down and go to therapy and spend the money and skip the the nice thing that you want to buy because you need like, I did [SPEAKER_00]: That I'm not trying to be glamorous here.

45:47 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm saying it was hard. [SPEAKER_00]: It's so hard. [SPEAKER_01]: Costs money, it costs time, it costs emotionally admitting that you need help. [SPEAKER_01]: It costs living past the. [SPEAKER_00]: And let me just say this too. [SPEAKER_00]: One thing I started learning is every time I'd have a really deep therapy session, I would be wrecked for like two or three days.

46:04 [SPEAKER_00]: And when I say wrecked, I mean, like, I'd get home. [SPEAKER_00]: I was so exhausted and so tired and snappy, like so here, like agitated. [SPEAKER_00]: And then I was exhausted. [SPEAKER_00]: I would sleep for like twelve hours that. [SPEAKER_00]: Like it was bizarre. [SPEAKER_00]: Like stuff that I just never experienced.

46:20 [SPEAKER_00]: Like why are you talking about this? [SPEAKER_01]: This is hooking to our last episode too. [SPEAKER_01]: You were carrying a lot of this in your physical body. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, right. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, which great. [SPEAKER_01]: I probably, if this helps people name that, it probably some of the addictions you're coping with, some of the stress you're carrying, the mental health that could be anxiety depression, could be just [SPEAKER_01]: odd ways that you feel like your health is not working right?

46:42 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's because you're you haven't dealt with your story and this is all connected. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, you got to know your story and so maybe just some of this up because I want to talk about how, you know, God obviously we want to build on our blessings. [SPEAKER_00]: Wherever you're at, I think you need to start praying.

46:57 [SPEAKER_00]: That's the first thing. [SPEAKER_00]: You need to ask if you are married. [SPEAKER_00]: That's applicable. [SPEAKER_00]: You need to say, honey, is this true? [SPEAKER_00]: Where are the things in me? [SPEAKER_00]: If you want one of the best and hardest questions to ask your spouse, you need to ask her.

47:15 [SPEAKER_00]: What is it like really living with me? [SPEAKER_00]: How do you, how do you really experience me? [SPEAKER_00]: Please be gentle with your words, but be very honest. [SPEAKER_00]: Right. [SPEAKER_00]: I think that's a very important phrase. [SPEAKER_00]: Gentle with your words, but very honest.

47:28 [SPEAKER_00]: I can only handle so much. [SPEAKER_00]: And then let her speak into it. [SPEAKER_00]: And then I would say prayerfully find a Jesus loving therapist. [SPEAKER_00]: That's a very important dynamic of you. [SPEAKER_00]: I follow Jesus. [SPEAKER_00]: You have got to follow somebody with the same worldview.

47:43 [SPEAKER_01]: I really want to emphasize that I do not claim to know a lot about therapy or a lot about this world. [SPEAKER_01]: I just know that there is also, particularly after the year and a half, I've spent sort of studying the body and thinking about this. [SPEAKER_01]: And there is a lot of bad advice, tons.

48:00 [SPEAKER_01]: There's a lot of bad advice. [SPEAKER_01]: And this area is high stakes. [SPEAKER_01]: So I respect a lot of the expertise, but I really appreciate your point of ideally find somebody who loves Jesus. [SPEAKER_01]: And understands your body, and understands your mind, and understands therapy, and understands how to deal with the past.

48:17 [SPEAKER_00]: Well, you're building on different foundations. [SPEAKER_00]: And that's the thing that we have to talk about, like, a lot of therapists that I know that would have a different worldview would say, well, the ultimate goal is your happiness and peace. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: No, I would say it was a Jesus follower.

48:29 [SPEAKER_00]: That's not my ultimate. [SPEAKER_00]: It's not. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's not. [SPEAKER_00]: And biblically, I don't actually believe that. [SPEAKER_00]: And I don't actually think that is actually something that happens this side of heaven for. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: So anyway, like foundation.

48:41 [SPEAKER_00]: So pray. [SPEAKER_00]: prayerfully consider the idea of therapy, do it. [SPEAKER_00]: And then if there's only one last thing I could say, hang on for dear life, no matter how hard it is. [SPEAKER_00]: There will be so many moments that you want to quit, there will be so many moments that you need a break.

48:58 [SPEAKER_00]: It's okay to take a break. [SPEAKER_00]: There's been times where I've taken months off because I just need a break. [SPEAKER_00]: That's okay. [SPEAKER_00]: But being willing to go all the way through and work through these things and having a network of care, asking God, will you give me a friend, a soul friend?

49:16 [SPEAKER_00]: Will you give me an understanding spouse? [SPEAKER_00]: Will you give me a therapist that cares? [SPEAKER_00]: Will you give me your Holy Spirit to help heal? [SPEAKER_00]: It is not just a therapist or your wife or a friend. [SPEAKER_00]: It is the accumulation of these things that bring healing in a deep way.

49:31 [SPEAKER_00]: And so I think my prayer and hope, not just prayer and hope, but just like we were mentioning, Joel, to twenty five. [SPEAKER_00]: I have a responsibility to build on blessing. [SPEAKER_00]: But how I got to the space where I feel like I can actually do that? [SPEAKER_00]: Again, like we said, it was very different.

49:52 [SPEAKER_00]: It's been a hard-fought road for me to get to a spot where I feel just like baseline and feel normal. [SPEAKER_00]: And that is a really, like I can get really mad at that sometimes. [SPEAKER_00]: I really bothers me because I'm like, I'm almost forty and I'm finally feeling like a normal human.

50:06 [SPEAKER_00]: That doesn't seem fair. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, that's, you know, that's the verse, right? [SPEAKER_01]: The the locus of eaten something in your past. [SPEAKER_01]: So you don't have something in your past that you're supposed to that you ought to. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: Do you honest question?

50:18 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Do you feel like the Lord will give it back? [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, so the verse says is that that he'll give it back. [SPEAKER_01]: That that he'll restore to you the years the locus have eaten. [SPEAKER_01]: Do you be over story yet? [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know if you, I don't know if I'll ever feel fully restored, right?

50:35 [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know if any of us feel like. [SPEAKER_00]: All right, but I will say this. [SPEAKER_00]: I feel like he has been. [SPEAKER_00]: I feel like I am so grateful. [SPEAKER_00]: I've done the work. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm doing the work and going to continue to do the work because it's put me on a trajectory that [SPEAKER_00]: is healing.

50:53 [SPEAKER_00]: I've been healing. [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm just happier when I'm just with myself. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I didn't realize how unhappy I was to just be myself. [SPEAKER_00]: I would have said things like, I'm an extrovert. [SPEAKER_00]: I need to be around people. [SPEAKER_00]: I like people.

51:06 [SPEAKER_00]: I like noise. [SPEAKER_00]: I like all that stuff because you want to do avoid yourself. [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know that. [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know this, but it was just because I wasn't comfortable with myself. [SPEAKER_00]: I couldn't be comfortable with myself for so many reasons.

51:15 [SPEAKER_00]: And I can sit with myself and I enjoy me. [SPEAKER_00]: But not in a way that's arrogant or prideful. [SPEAKER_00]: I just mean, I can sit with me and be okay and I can sit with me in God's presence and be okay. [SPEAKER_00]: So I would say, has he repaid it in ways that I didn't expect?

51:32 [SPEAKER_00]: And I would also say, one of my prayers has been God like don't waste my pain. [SPEAKER_00]: And what I love about that is I never planned on helping people. [SPEAKER_00]: I never planned on doing what we're sitting here doing now, having a microphone to talk to people. [SPEAKER_00]: It surprises me still that people will even listen.

51:54 [SPEAKER_00]: But I think if I'm being very honest, I'm grateful for an outlet to be able to say, guys, it's totally possible. [SPEAKER_00]: You will not regret it. [SPEAKER_00]: It will be very hard. [SPEAKER_00]: It will take a lot of sacrifice. [SPEAKER_00]: But anything worth doing in life takes those things.

52:09 [SPEAKER_00]: It's worth in sacrifice. [SPEAKER_00]: And so put your energy in the right place. [SPEAKER_00]: Know your story so that you can grow from your story. [SPEAKER_01]: I have a very different background, which I'll share about what I can ask you. [SPEAKER_01]: But I think there's been two things in my life.

52:28 [SPEAKER_01]: One with my grandfather and one with a former disciple of mine. [SPEAKER_01]: My grandfather was a bipolar alcoholic. [SPEAKER_01]: He had a lot of problems he caused in his family. [SPEAKER_01]: I had a disciple or at some point I'll also be vague who really just imploded morally and left the faith.

52:46 [SPEAKER_01]: In my anxiety crisis that I've shared about, there was a point where I [SPEAKER_01]: thought, oh, here's what's happening. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm becoming my grandfather. [SPEAKER_01]: As if the brokenness of my past and this was like past past, you know, like my mom fortunately did not pass any of this on to me, but there was a point in my anxiety crisis where I thought, oh, my story is really my DNA.

53:10 [SPEAKER_01]: Like I destined to become the problems of my ancestors. [SPEAKER_01]: And one of the most meaningful things that ever happened to me was what I talked to my mom about that actually. [SPEAKER_01]: And she looked me in the eye and suggested you are not your grandfather. [SPEAKER_01]: You are not.

53:29 [SPEAKER_01]: And she [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, those were, I don't know if she knew what spiritual authority she carried when she said that. [SPEAKER_01]: Wow. [SPEAKER_01]: She kind of broke the back of that way of thinking to hear her look at me and say, I know my dad and I know my son and you're not him.

53:47 [SPEAKER_01]: And I was, I like walked free of it, not instantly, but it really [SPEAKER_01]: It really deeply changed to me. [SPEAKER_01]: I had another mentor who said the same thing when I talked about my former disciple or he was like, you're not, that's not your destiny. [SPEAKER_01]: Just because he trained you in the faith, that doesn't mean you're going to.

54:04 [SPEAKER_01]: And I just, I see in you, you know, a lot of your story, I'm just learning along with our listeners. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: But a lot of your life, you know, I see now. [SPEAKER_01]: And it strikes me that you don't believe that you have to become your father. [SPEAKER_00]: Hmm.

54:20 [SPEAKER_00]: No, I don't. [SPEAKER_01]: I really don't. [SPEAKER_01]: But that's abnormal. [SPEAKER_01]: Most of us, I think, do feel this intuitive sense that we're kind of stuck with our past and we're going to repeat it no matter what. [SPEAKER_00]: I hear you on that. [SPEAKER_00]: I would just say, and I had those moments when I was younger and maybe more.

54:36 [SPEAKER_00]: I think this is where, you know, therapy is also education. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, how does it actually work? [SPEAKER_00]: Is that how things work? [SPEAKER_00]: Well, all you have to do is express that to a therapist for two seconds for them to say that's not how that works. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

54:50 [SPEAKER_00]: So just so you know from [SPEAKER_00]: tons of clinical experience, that's not how things are passed on fully, right? [SPEAKER_00]: There are elements of what you're saying that are true, but most of it's not. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, and I just think it's so encouraging to hear you say that, to hear my mom say it, to watch your life because I do think what the enemy tells us is the opposite.

55:07 [SPEAKER_01]: What the enemy whispers in all of your ears, you know, you who are listening, all of our ears is that, you know, you're going to become your father. [SPEAKER_01]: You're going to repeat the mistakes. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, your parents got divorced. [SPEAKER_00]: You're getting divorced. [SPEAKER_01]: You are destined.

55:20 [SPEAKER_01]: Because we, this is the theme of this episode, right? [SPEAKER_01]: We're, we're a story to people. [SPEAKER_01]: We live in the grand narrative of creation, fall, redemption, the kingdom to come. [SPEAKER_01]: And so our DNA, our brain, everything about us, our soul, we long for a story to make sense of the world.

55:35 [SPEAKER_01]: And so the enemy comes and wants to tell you a lie about this story and say, that story that you want to be true that God will actually have my Bible open to Romans is actually a true Bible. [SPEAKER_01]: Romans ate this whole time that then in all things we know that God will work Good for those who love him who have been called according to his purpose We want so badly to believe that story and then he's like, it's not true.

55:59 [SPEAKER_01]: You're stuck with your your father's mistakes and your mother's mistakes [SPEAKER_01]: And so I just appreciate you saying out loud. [SPEAKER_01]: I think it breaks the chains of these lies. [SPEAKER_00]: Let me just add one thing and then let's talk about building blessing because we've all been given blessing.

56:13 [SPEAKER_00]: And as fathers, part of knowing your story is knowing how to build on the blessing that you've been given, even if you got to it, whatever way you got to it. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, I would say it was easy to go like am I going to repeat those patterns? [SPEAKER_00]: But when it comes to God redeeming and when it comes to him restoring the years of the locusts eaten, has eaten?

56:34 [SPEAKER_00]: He does it in ways that you're not always fully present to in the moment. [SPEAKER_00]: Let me give you just one for instance. [SPEAKER_00]: I was seventeen years old when my dad and my mom basically shared with us what had been going on in my dad's life. [SPEAKER_00]: I met my now wife at that same age, and interestingly enough, I met her father.

56:56 [SPEAKER_00]: And my father-in-law, to this day, right? [SPEAKER_00]: I needed a dad more than I ever knew during that time. [SPEAKER_00]: If you've met Phil, he is one of the most fatherly people in the whole world without trying. [SPEAKER_00]: It's just like oozes from his wife. [SPEAKER_00]: It's so good.

57:13 [SPEAKER_01]: Had tip to fill, I've met him one time and how he gave me was like, oh, [SPEAKER_01]: I've known you forever and I want to know you forever, but it's a botherly hug. [SPEAKER_00]: That said, though. [SPEAKER_00]: I needed a dad. [SPEAKER_00]: My dad could not stay in my life in a present way during that handful of years.

57:34 [SPEAKER_00]: He was so broken in so many ways and trying to get help and trying to figure things out. [SPEAKER_00]: He was not present at all. [SPEAKER_00]: Couldn't be. [SPEAKER_00]: And I needed to know, like, where am I going to school? [SPEAKER_00]: How do I do budget? [SPEAKER_00]: How do I ask your daughter to marry me?

57:50 [SPEAKER_00]: What kind of things do I need to do to have that life set up? [SPEAKER_00]: He functionally became a dad to me. [SPEAKER_00]: God gave me a father when my father couldn't be present. [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't know he's going to be my father-in-law, but Phil is still as equal parts a dad to me as my own dad.

58:08 [SPEAKER_00]: And I would just say what is really interesting without dishonoring my dad at all. [SPEAKER_00]: Um, my dad was as much of a dad as he could be up to a point. [SPEAKER_00]: And God knew, like I think, God in his grace, like understood what I would need. [SPEAKER_00]: New my dad was not going to be able to do that.

58:23 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And he put somebody in my life. [SPEAKER_00]: So when I say that he's restored or he retains, he does it in ways we don't expect. [SPEAKER_00]: I needed a dad. [SPEAKER_00]: I still got one. [SPEAKER_00]: Now, it wasn't blood. [SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't what I planned. [SPEAKER_00]: It was, you know, I can get hung up on the semantics.

58:37 [SPEAKER_00]: But I've had a very functional present father and still due to this day, even though my earthly father has passed. [SPEAKER_01]: That's a gift. [SPEAKER_01]: That's a gift. [SPEAKER_01]: So we need to know our story. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: It's got to redeem our brokenness. [SPEAKER_01]: We need to know it also so he can build on our blessings.

58:53 [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: I have a very very different story. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: People often ask me because I write about parenting. [SPEAKER_01]: You know what your parents like. [SPEAKER_01]: And I always don't even really know how to be genuine enough about it because. [SPEAKER_01]: They were so, so good to us.

59:09 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm one of six kids. [SPEAKER_01]: That's great. [SPEAKER_01]: And the dominant fact of my childhood was that I always felt like I had a mom and dad who loved each other and loved us. [SPEAKER_01]: That's a gift, dude. [SPEAKER_01]: And love Jesus. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: And I get even emotional as I say it because the more I hear of people's stories, the more I'm like, [SPEAKER_01]: Almost embarrassed of my blessing.

59:29 [SPEAKER_01]: Almost like, oh, maybe I shouldn't talk about it. [SPEAKER_01]: It's kind of like if you make more money than somebody else and you're sort of getting embarrassed to talk about it because like, oh, I don't, I don't know. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't think you can't just say this. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

59:39 [SPEAKER_00]: You should Elizabeth the same way. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, she comes in with some of the situation and she would say the same thing about her upbringing. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, just now on the embarrassment, I don't think you need to be embarrassed, but I do think you have a stewardship, right?

59:51 [SPEAKER_00]: Like I did something to Stuart to help because you come into this world without as many scars and wounds. [SPEAKER_00]: You just do and that's objectively true. [SPEAKER_00]: And that's what it is. [SPEAKER_00]: But I think there's also, you know, you're redeeming the, there's a stewardship that I think you hold.

1:00:07 [SPEAKER_01]: No, I actually think there's a sobriety and even like a scaring us to that because I think anybody who's listening, who maybe feels more like my side of the story, you've been given a lot. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, the parable, the talents is a bit frightening. [SPEAKER_01]: The parable of the people who have been given much, much will be asked of them as a kind of sobering.

1:00:25 [SPEAKER_01]: There's a way in which you're like, okay, now [SPEAKER_01]: Well, and this is part of my story. [SPEAKER_01]: Will I squander that blessing? [SPEAKER_01]: You know, because I messed up, you know, I'm broken even even though I've been given so much. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm broken.

1:00:37 [SPEAKER_01]: And so, you know, he just just won vignette from my childhood. [SPEAKER_01]: My dad, he was in, he was also lawyer. [SPEAKER_01]: He went to politics when I was in late middle school in high school. [SPEAKER_01]: He was the attorney general of Virginia. [SPEAKER_01]: And so I knew my dad was of influence.

1:00:55 [SPEAKER_01]: I also knew he was greatly devoted to Jesus. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, one of the norms of my upbringing was I would walk upstairs in the morning and find him in his study reading his Bible. [SPEAKER_01]: And in high school, he decided to run for governor. [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so this is like my senior year of high school.

1:01:15 [SPEAKER_01]: He ended up losing the race for governor of Virginia. [SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, I was just like so sad, a crush. [SPEAKER_01]: I cried myself to sleep at night. [SPEAKER_00]: No, I was in eighteen year old. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I was about to maybe as a middle, my senior year, I can't remember.

1:01:34 [SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, as an seventeen year old, I cry myself to sleep because I still wanted to live in the governor's mansion of Virginia. [SPEAKER_01]: I was going to get a body card. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I thought this was going to be great for social life. [SPEAKER_01]: It would have been. [SPEAKER_01]: I see these two.

1:01:47 [SPEAKER_01]: I am like so blessed. [SPEAKER_00]: The bodyguard would be pretty good. [SPEAKER_01]: It's not a pretty good to be around. [SPEAKER_01]: In retrospect, I think it was so good for me that I did not get to be the son of a governor. [SPEAKER_01]: I think it would have not served me well in college.

1:01:58 [SPEAKER_01]: So, till we just leave it at that fair. [SPEAKER_01]: I walk up the next morning. [SPEAKER_01]: And Dad is, they mostly let us not go to school that day. [SPEAKER_01]: So Dad is making pancakes for everybody like whistling in the kitchen. [SPEAKER_01]: And over breakfast he sits down and tells us what he was reading about in this quiet time and how excited he is for what the Lord had for him in the next season.

1:02:25 [SPEAKER_01]: And there are times like that that you don't even know at the time that anything important is happening. [SPEAKER_01]: This is, you guys kind of the theme of the podcast being intentional for others in the little moments. [SPEAKER_01]: You don't maybe know anything miraculous is happening.

1:02:37 [SPEAKER_01]: But I would think about this for years to come that in one of the moments that might be an identity crisis for my dad. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, we know the politicians get weird. [SPEAKER_01]: They have huge ups and downs. [SPEAKER_01]: My dad was really steady. [SPEAKER_01]: He really wasn't weird.

1:02:51 [SPEAKER_01]: Still isn't. [SPEAKER_01]: And probably why he didn't win. [SPEAKER_01]: I think a lot, yeah, you need to be a little more weird to win. [SPEAKER_01]: I think a lot about how much it served him as a father to be rooted in the scriptures devoted to prayer, following Jesus before he followed the whims of career and the whims of the, you know, the body politic because he knew who he was, you know, he knew who he was.

1:03:17 [SPEAKER_01]: And the interesting thing about this is so during that same period in high school, [SPEAKER_01]: He was starting to regularly invite me into his quiet times. [SPEAKER_01]: So this is part of like, I think him, I see now him calling me, you know, in a manhood. [SPEAKER_01]: He was about once a week, I think, invite me to come read the Bible with him.

1:03:35 [SPEAKER_01]: That coincided with the period of my life. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm a senior where I am rebelling against everything they've ever taught me, right? [SPEAKER_01]: I'm living a double life. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm doing things they don't know about. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm full of shame. [SPEAKER_01]: So I kind of like all the things that you think you hope your kids don't do in high school, like I'm sure you're thinking of them now.

1:03:52 [SPEAKER_01]: I was dabbling in all those things. [SPEAKER_01]: I was embarrassed of, you know, sexually, what was happening in my life. [SPEAKER_01]: I was embarrassed of, you know, drugs and alcohol and things that I was experimenting with. [SPEAKER_01]: I was just, I was living a double life. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't think my dad was completely unaware of this.

1:04:09 [SPEAKER_01]: And yet he invited me. [SPEAKER_01]: I thought he was thinking back, I don't know. [SPEAKER_01]: He invited me over and over into this space of prayer. [SPEAKER_01]: And so many more, I was like, follow us upon a sleep. [SPEAKER_01]: I wouldn't even pay attention. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't remember, you know, many of the prayers we prayed, what we read.

1:04:25 [SPEAKER_01]: I just remember that he did it, okay? [SPEAKER_01]: That's very encouraging. [SPEAKER_01]: So, yeah, now fast forward. [SPEAKER_01]: In college, I finally really break down, and I realize this life is not working for me. [SPEAKER_01]: And I met a guy in college who basically got a bunch of guys together and was like, we need to tell the stories of our fathers.

1:04:48 [SPEAKER_01]: Whoa, and I was like, what? [SPEAKER_01]: Is this a thing? [SPEAKER_01]: Okay. [SPEAKER_01]: And everybody shared stories of like brokenness, of like abuse of trauma, of their dad's leaving, of their dad's alcoholism. [SPEAKER_01]: And they get to me. [SPEAKER_01]: And by the way, all these guys are like mature Christians who are like walking with the Lord, sharing about their traumas.

1:05:04 [SPEAKER_01]: And they get to me. [SPEAKER_01]: And I share about [SPEAKER_01]: a dad who I'm so proud of. [SPEAKER_01]: And I love. [SPEAKER_01]: And they're looking at me who's like, you know, I'm out, I'm out drinking, I'm out with girls like I'm barely sort of like on the edge of Christian community.

1:05:20 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm coming to this men's group and I'm sharing the story and I'm thinking, one, I'm squandering my blessing. [SPEAKER_01]: Like I am the prodigal. [SPEAKER_01]: And two, I don't want to be like me. [SPEAKER_01]: You know who I want to be like? [SPEAKER_01]: And I realized it literally sitting in a group of guys talking about their dad's.

1:05:37 [SPEAKER_01]: I want to be like my dad. [SPEAKER_01]: my life. [SPEAKER_01]: And it was such, I shared that for two reasons. [SPEAKER_01]: One, if anybody is listening and they feel like their kids are going off the rails and like, oh, how nice it is to talk about fatherhood, but actually like I have a kid who's who's humbling everything I gave them.

1:05:55 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, I think that's probably how my death felt about me. [SPEAKER_01]: And the Lord, the years that the locus ate, then he restored to me. [SPEAKER_01]: through the inheritance to my father, because I looked at him and I said, okay, I see where my life is going, and I see where my dad is, and I don't like my path, and I want to find him again.

1:06:14 [SPEAKER_01]: And I really started to, that was the year in college, that was the change of my freshman to sophomore year. [SPEAKER_01]: Where I look at that and I say, that's, I knew about Jesus, I believe him. [SPEAKER_01]: That's when I started following Jesus for the first time. [SPEAKER_01]: And I did it by following my dad.

1:06:31 [SPEAKER_01]: I wrote him a letter. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, yeah, tell me about this. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I wrote him a letter. [SPEAKER_01]: Kind of confessing a lot of things that was going on in my life. [SPEAKER_01]: And telling him that I wanted to follow Jesus and be more like him and like Jesus. [SPEAKER_01]: incredible thing happened that summer he he sat down with me and he said by the way I forgive you you know you asked for my forgiveness in the letter forgive you and you know I made a lot of mistakes too and you started being honest with me about some of his mistakes and we entered into a new space of feeling like oh [SPEAKER_01]: He had broken this and yet he gave me so much.

1:07:10 [SPEAKER_01]: I just broke a lot of stuff and yet the Lord has given me so much. [SPEAKER_01]: And the Lord just used that time to turn me around and set me on a path that really has been my life ever since of honoring my father of trying to follow in his footsteps and by doing that follow Jesus. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'll close with this.

1:07:29 [SPEAKER_01]: It was amazing to me. [SPEAKER_01]: My dad gave me his Bible years later. [SPEAKER_01]: I can't remember one, but it's the one I keep on my desk when I write. [SPEAKER_01]: And I was writing about in the Common Rule, I have a description before phone. [SPEAKER_01]: We talked about a couple of episodes ago.

1:07:42 [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm looking at the Bible, I open up the Bible that my dad used. [SPEAKER_01]: And I see, I'm not a big, like, [SPEAKER_01]: open the Bible and just ascribe meaning to whatever you find, but I've never been the Bible. [SPEAKER_01]: And it falls open, I think it was to Colossians. [SPEAKER_01]: And it was like January, you know, one, two thousand two, I think it was.

1:08:03 [SPEAKER_01]: I can't remember, read this chapter, read that chapter. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm like, this was the, these were the days right after he lost the governor's election. [SPEAKER_01]: He was in the word reading these passages. [SPEAKER_01]: And I just brought to mind the way that his rhythm of the scriptures anchored him.

1:08:20 [SPEAKER_01]: And then I look closely and I see with Justin underneath these annotations with Justin with Justin. [SPEAKER_01]: And again, I don't remember. [SPEAKER_01]: That's so good. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't remember reading these passages with him. [SPEAKER_01]: Of course you don't. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't remember the prayers we prayed, but no, I do remember.

1:08:37 [SPEAKER_01]: I remember having a dad who loved me when I felt so unlovable and so broken and so hidden. [SPEAKER_01]: And I remember having a dad who woke me up and said, come in with me, come, pray with me when I felt like I was scared to be found. [SPEAKER_01]: And even though I don't remember any of those passages, I remember the feeling of having a father that wanted to love me even when I felt unlovable.

1:09:01 [SPEAKER_01]: And I think that more than anything was the inheritance of a father who loves Jesus. [SPEAKER_01]: And I would just encourage anybody listening whether you're broken past or whether you've received a lot and much will be asked of you. [SPEAKER_01]: The possibility that we have [SPEAKER_01]: to pass the love of Jesus on to our children, changes their future.

1:09:22 [SPEAKER_01]: It changes generations. [SPEAKER_01]: We don't have to be our past. [SPEAKER_01]: We don't even have to be our current brokenness. [SPEAKER_01]: That love of the Father who invites us to him even when we are broken. [SPEAKER_01]: Yes. [SPEAKER_01]: Is the thing that makes us the kinds of fathers who can say, okay, I'm going to change the generations of sin.

1:09:39 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to change my sin. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to follow Jesus into the future. [SPEAKER_01]: And that is the gift of grace. [SPEAKER_01]: That is newness. [SPEAKER_00]: I love that I am thinking of that the next episode is going to be a ton about how to actually live into this but so we won't go into depth here but you know some of the practical things to take away today do the work remember you are not feeling the blank your grandfather [SPEAKER_00]: your father, your situation, and then tell your story.

1:10:06 [SPEAKER_01]: Tell your story. [SPEAKER_01]: Find somebody to tell your story, too, that the guy's sitting around, who one guy just said, we're all gonna tell the stories of our fathers, that moment changed my life. [SPEAKER_01]: So get with a close friend, a spiritual friend, like we talked about a couple episodes ago, get with a pastor, Bible studies, somebody, anybody, maybe it's your spouse.

1:10:25 [SPEAKER_01]: And if you never told the story of your father or your family, tell it. [SPEAKER_01]: And maybe write a letter. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And I would say, you know, for you, you wrote a letter to your dad, apologizing, saying what you wanted to do and how you respected him. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, we were talking before recorded.

1:10:41 [SPEAKER_00]: I said, I also wrote a letter. [SPEAKER_00]: Your letter was quite different, right? [SPEAKER_00]: My letter had to be different, right? [SPEAKER_00]: Because I wasn't writing a letter of, I want to be more like you. [SPEAKER_00]: I had to write a letter for giving my father, right? [SPEAKER_00]: And so, [SPEAKER_00]: The quick, the two stories on that, the two seconds on that is my dad died of cancer three years ago.

1:11:07 [SPEAKER_00]: That's a whole other story in itself, but it was a journey of dying to cancer, which many people do. [SPEAKER_00]: It's usually a slow process, which makes it so hard. [SPEAKER_00]: He was in and out of the hospital all the time. [SPEAKER_00]: And one particular morning I woke up and I, my mom texted and said, hey, he's back in the hospital again.

1:11:20 [SPEAKER_00]: And so I had this sense come over me like he could die any day, even this week. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't want him to die thinking that I haven't forgiven him. [SPEAKER_00]: Now, this is like eight years, seven years into the work, maybe. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, we're talking about the deep work.

1:11:39 [SPEAKER_00]: And I just had this sense, like I need to tell him that I forgive him. [SPEAKER_00]: And I need to tell him the things that he did teach me. [SPEAKER_00]: And I need to tell him the things that I am thankful for even though [SPEAKER_00]: It's taking a long time to see it. [SPEAKER_00]: And so Elizabeth and I drove three hours to get to their house and actually get to the hospital that he was in.

1:11:59 [SPEAKER_00]: And I sat there with my general open in a lot of tears and just needed to make sure that he knew that I did forgive him. [SPEAKER_00]: and was honest. [SPEAKER_00]: I was really honest about how hard everything was. [SPEAKER_00]: But I also was was clear that I did forgive it. [SPEAKER_00]: And I feel to this day that that's true.

1:12:20 [SPEAKER_00]: And it doesn't hold the activating weight that it once did to even talk about it. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: I can hold it and go, yeah, it was lame. [SPEAKER_00]: I wish it didn't happen. [SPEAKER_00]: And it also is something that I can see and know and understand and have grace for.

1:12:35 [SPEAKER_00]: My story isn't one of perfection. [SPEAKER_00]: It was very messy and really fought with a lot of immaturities and how to paint. [SPEAKER_00]: But that said, I say that story to say most of us need to write a letter. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: It just might look very different. [SPEAKER_00]: I needed to write a letter.

1:12:49 [SPEAKER_01]: Because I want to say a lot harder. [SPEAKER_01]: I was eager to give mine to my dad. [SPEAKER_01]: I imagine you and many others. [SPEAKER_01]: This is going to be one of the hardest things they write. [SPEAKER_01]: And some people actually aren't going to be able to deliver it. [SPEAKER_01]: So you might just need to write that letter and your dad is either gone, you might be dead, or might not want the letter.

1:13:10 [SPEAKER_00]: But they should write it anyway. [SPEAKER_00]: They should write it anyway. [SPEAKER_00]: And you can pray that their heart might be open to it. [SPEAKER_00]: So as we close, we want you to remember as a father, your father had needs your story. [SPEAKER_00]: You need to know your story for your father to grow.

1:13:28 [SPEAKER_00]: And remember, you know, I think this is the phrase we started, but your past affects your fatherhood now, and God helps you build on the blessings and redeems your brokenness. [SPEAKER_00]: That is so encouraging to me. [SPEAKER_00]: So wherever you're at, wherever you're listening, thank you for taking the time.

1:13:44 [SPEAKER_00]: Be honest about your story. [SPEAKER_00]: Do the work. [SPEAKER_00]: Remember, you're not whoever you think you are until your story. [SPEAKER_00]: Amen. [SPEAKER_00]: Come back next week. [SPEAKER_00]: We're going to talk about some more positive things. [SPEAKER_01]: get up, being practical next week, but things I will leave it here.