Divorce is a tough decision to make, a tough path to walk, and there are tough ramifications to dismantling your family. But what if divorces were actually preventable or even ready for this? Marriages could be restored. Even when everything feels hopeless, it is possible. Today I have brought in Dawn Wiggins. She is a licensed marriage and family therapist, but a different kind. I think after you hear her, you will understand why. Welcome to the Unyoked podcast.

I have so many questions for you.

Hi, Todd. Thank you so much for having me. I am very excited for our conversation.

Yeah, me too. I have been thinking about this all week long, because you and I have already had a phone conversation that got into it. We were like, hold on, stop. We need to record this.

That is right. Let us start here. Christians live under the “God loves marriage, God hates divorce” binary. Now, good luck with all the in-between details. We just do not spend a lot of time in our churches dealing with the “gray” marriage. It is just: “Get married, live happily ever after.” Oh, divorce? “Try not to do that.” It forces a lot of us to have to go outside of the church for answers. Divorce is hard for anybody, whether you are a Christian or not. I think there is an extra level of a pain point given to us because of what we are taught. Sometimes therapy is made a villain, meaning, “If Jesus is your answer, all your answers are in the Bible.” Then we run into a problem and we attack it as the root problem, but really, it is a fruit problem.

I have heard you say that, and it is brilliant.

Yeah. So we are worried about the affair, but we really do not deep dive into what caused the affair. If you could talk a little bit about that—because I am sure this is what you do for a living—letting people know their fruit problem is really a root problem. Can you speak into that? Most people listening are probably dealing with this tough decision. They do not see a way out, they do not know what to do, and maybe their partner does not want to go to therapy. This idea that the problem you are dealing with probably is not the problem—I am leading the witness here, but you can disagree.

Yes, yes, yes. Well, and you and I already had such a powerful exchange, it feels safe to disagree here. I think if more people understood the root issue and were willing to go to the root issue, they would understand much sooner in the process whether to stay or to go. The first thing you mentioned was how we end up going outside of the church to deal with our problems. That is a problem around where the modern church is and how it does not have a good balance of grace and truth. It often calls problems “spiritual” when they are genuinely mental health problems. The church does not say, “Do not go to the hospital and have surgery for that issue because the Bible can solve your surgical issues.” It says go to a medical provider to get medical care. Mental health care is no different. It is part of the physical body. Mental health and physical health are intricately linked. You cannot dissociate one from the other.

Right.

Which brings me to the next level issue: counseling. You cannot dissociate counseling in a mental, emotional, spiritual space from physical health. Many counselors and therapists are not qualified enough to tackle root issues.

I will double down on that as your pastor. Most people, if they are going to go anywhere, they go to the guy who preaches on Sunday mornings and they meet him in his office. But he is no more qualified in his office than he was on the stage. But somehow we think, “Well, we will just reveal more and he has more time for me.” That is not that guy. He did not go to school for this.

No. And my pastor is ideally wise, educated, person-centric, and can hold space, but that is not the same as having the precision skills and understanding of the neurobiology of the brain and how it affects behavior and the body. That is really detailed stuff. Most counselors, let alone most faith-based counselors, do not have that skill. I have heard Jordan Peterson talk about this. I love how he called his tour “We Who Wrestle with God,” because so much of this is wrestling with God. I have heard Jordan Peterson interview an author who says that counseling can do harm. Counseling can do harm when you are not working with a skilled enough therapist to understand root issues. You are probably doing behaviors in counseling that are reinforcing the problem, piling on to the fruit issues.

Yes. I am going to use that: like a massage. Someone laying hands on you qualifies as a massage, but when you have a real good one, you know the difference. They know where the muscles are. When they move your arm, they are getting to places that something changes because they know things exist that you did not even know existed.

Exactly.

Can we backtrack a little bit to the church? I have my own opinions, but why are so many churches reluctant to say anything other than “Jesus is the answer” as the only answer? I believe the Bible is true, but I also believe not all truth is in the Bible. What causes the reluctancy?

First of all, we cannot think ourselves out of traumatic experiences. We understand so much from research these days. And I do not think research tells us the whole story—God’s creation is far deeper—but based on current research, we know that so much of how we function is stored in our cellular data, in our bodies. We are mind, body, and spirit; we cannot think our way out of most of our problems, especially not our traumas. When we just talk about reading the Bible, that is not a holistic way of integrating it. Integration has to come through spiritual, physical, and emotional revelation. God created this body, and there are tools in nature and the body to heal us on an energetic and cellular level. Those are embodiment practices that help unlock things. I think we have become pigeonholed into this idea that “this book is the only thing,” and it comes from a lack of having integrated revelations about how we can heal in meaningful ways. I think those things have been labeled as “witchcraft” or “satanic” because of ego. Leaders want to believe they have the answer. As soon as we decide we know something and it becomes black and white, we are no longer having flexible thought. We are no longer open to hear God move. We are so polarized as a country—I read social media comments and think, “Dear God, have mercy.” We have to have flexible thinking. When you take the Bible as a whole, the message is redemption and love. That is the story God is telling.

That is right.

If whatever the church is delivering is not about redemption and love, it is not accurate. It is not biblical in totality.

It is really funny. I always wondered, when God kicked Adam and Eve out of the garden, did he say, “I’m going to do you a favor, here is how to make a fire,” or did he let them figure it out? Clearly, he didn’t tell them everything. We are still learning things today, thousands of years later.

Oh, my word.

Thousands of years.

Well, yes. Yeah. Stuff that we have also learned, right. That’s been suppressed. So let’s go back to those root issues. Many of these root issues cannot be treated with counseling alone because counseling is a very intellectual process. Take attachment styles—anxious or avoidant. An attachment style affects how we do relationships, whether we experience them as safe or unsafe. That extends to our relationship with God. Someone with an avoidant attachment style will try to be self-reliant within the church. Someone with an anxious attachment style will not experience God as a secure provider. Anybody getting divorced, I automatically understand they have attachment-related concerns that go back to their very early childhood brain map. That has to be rewired through a somatic experience. It is an intricate process. If more therapists were skilled enough to identify that in session one, it would change everything.

Would you recommend that people go through counseling before they are married to know their attachment style, or do you only deal with the car wrecks?

Wouldn’t that be brilliant, Todd? But here is the thing. I went through premarital counseling in the church and I still got divorced. Because we talked about “fruit” issues, not the deep-dive root issues required to understand the viability of the marriage.

No. Even enneagram types. But that’s still not the exact same thing as attachment.

No.

As well as realizing that God has wired us all certain ways which are identifiable mixed with trauma. And you said environment of where you grew up, all these little things make you who you are, make you, you have defense mechanisms. Some are smart, some are not. Some are good, some are bad. And then you just sort of live your life. You meet somebody and you fall in love and you’re like, okay, well, I’m gonna marry this person. And you’re like, you have no idea who you really are. They have no idea who they really are. And you’re just coexisting till somebody reacts to one of these problems, and then we say, oh, they had an affair. Oh, they drink too much. Oh, they’re falling in love with their work and not me and all the reasons. And really, they’re fruits of something way deeper. Did I say that right?

Yes, brilliantly. Yeah. Fruits of something way deeper. And attachment style is just one lens to look at deeper rooted issues. Right. There are so many issues that we inherit genetically or energetically that turn up as depression, anxiety, addiction, OCD, like, name it. There’s a lot of that stuff that it’s influenced environmentally and how we’re raised and how we were parented and what adversities, how much child adversity we experienced or not.

Um, let’s lay bad theology over that, because there’s all that, and then there’s bad theology once again, as a christians, or we’re getting told divorce bad, no matter what, put up with trauma. Oh, he hit you. Well, you know, what did you do to make him do that? Or, you know, whatever. All the stuff that we live with, a lot of christians, not all, but a lot, live with this. God will be angry with you if you solve this problem, because his desire for you to be married trumps his desire for you to be safe or anything else. And then you live with that, and then you never, ever get to the root of the problem.

Todd, you were telling, like, I believe my parents story, right? My mother’s story and my story. I believe, you know, I married a Christian, really pleased my mother, and good boy from church, he goes to church, he’s a Christian. But there were deep root issues. Both of us had, both of us very much had. But when we made the decision to get divorced, there were panic things that came up inside of me that were so distressing that I really had to wrestle with God about, am I going to go to hell? And I think when you raise children to, you know, we wouldn’t let most of our young zero to seven kids watch rated r movies, but we would show them, you know, the passion of the Christmas, that then we internalize this. Our nervous systems would watch the passion of the Christ and be like, dear Lord, have mercy. I will be crucified if I don’t give or take. Follow this religious path. It feels life or death to our nervous system. And I think I told you about in our conversation, this book that I am obsessed with right now, trauma in the pews.

I bought it. It is on my kitchen table.

Oh, so good. Right where we’re so afraid from an attachment style perspective. Very often where we have that, if I go outside of this doctrine, I’m going to get in trouble. Right. For even exploring into, for instance, counseling or for me, when I got divorced, that was yoga. I went and found yoga and it was liberating. But I was like, I would sometimes panic. Yeah. Is, am I going to get in trouble with God for going to yoga?

Well, I’m going to double that. You’re worried about God. You’re also worried about your peers. It’s both, right?

Yeah. I just kind of, like, burned it down. I was like, well, I’m gonna go find myself and I’m gonna make new groups of people that, you know, where it doesn’t feel so shame based. I went back to church, too. Like, I found church spaces. Right. But it is very hard to create an integrated body mind healing inside of the church. It’s just the things that are truly healing are not celebrated or lifted up in churches. They’re just not.

They’re not. Okay. I just. I just realized something you already know, okay. Because it just hit me as an epiphany. So if you are in a marriage and it is a dumpster fire and you decide, I am going to try to salvage it to the best of my ability, and you sort of have this awakening or everything we talk about, you go to a capture and you’re. You get the awakening. It’s one thing to fix what you think God thinks of you and your situation. It’s another worry about your peers. But if your spouse isn’t all in, then, man, how hard is it to stay yoked to somebody when you’re awoke and they’re not woke? If that’s a weird way to say that, like, isn’t that an extra burden of, hey, babe, let’s. I know we’re mad at each other, and I know we got all this stuff, but let’s fix this. And if only one does it. Ouch.

And I think that that’s been my lived clinical experience, is I’m a marriage and family therapist. I knew in the 6th grade I wanted to be a marriage and family therapist, and that’s because I was a child of divorce, and I was codependently going to spare all the children from having to experience what I experienced, which I later learned, much later learned, was codependency. But I do believe I’m living in my God given gifts, right? I do believe I’m living my calling. But that said, I went into it wanting to help heal families and marriages and very quickly experienced in my clinical practice that too often one and not the other is motivated to do the work. And you can’t heal enough to heal on behalf of your partner. Right. I can’t pee for you. There are certain things I just can’t do for you. And that’s why, you know, to circle back to what you said in the beginning, I am pro marriage, but if we went to the root causes earlier, if we said, okay, these are attachment style issues, this is actually an addiction issue or this is actually XYZ, I think very quickly people disqualify themselves from being willing to do that work. Now, what we know from divorce rates, you know, broad statistics, right, that first marriage is 50%, 2nd marriage is 70 something percent, third marriage, it gets upward in the high 80% divorce rate. People go on to repeat exactly the same patterns if they’re not deeply transformed. Deeply transformed.

Right. Because you’re gonna pick the same type guy or whatever it is from a.

Subconscious place, from that zero to seven brain map.

Yeah. Okay. Wow. All right, so, um, I’m gonna ask you a really tough question.

All right, bring it. My favorite.

If we have to edit it, we’ll edit it.

Okay.

But churches, most, you know, it’s. I hate using word all and never, and I hate using all churches. Right? There are some great churches out there, and some churches do some things good and some bad, right? So I’m not trying to pick on churches, but in general, churches use affair and abuse. Those are their trump card. God said, here’s the verse about that. When you counsel what, where do you tell people they are allowed to land? And I’ll give you my first so that you can say whatever you want. But I do believe that there are people who abandon their marriages, and that looks multiple ways. And my argument is, you know, somebody just verbally abuses somebody just constantly and they live in a state of high dysregulation. Yes. And it’s like, God doesn’t. I don’t see anywhere God’s asking you to stay in that just so his marriage is high. Divorce is bad. Like, why are we supposed to. I don’t believe you just should get divorced because you’re unhappy or, you know, it’s just be better for the kids. Like, I believe you’re going to love my answer.

Okay, well, hit me. Hit me because I can go on. I have expounded my reasons that I believe divorce is okay. And I’m just curious what you say to people.

Um, my answer might is going to be deep and wide. So we attract spouses. I’m going to get into things that people call woo woo, but they’re not woo woo. They’re God’s quantum worlds that God created. Right? We attract spouses that are vibrating at a matching frequency, energetic frequency. That is to say that we attract spouses that we are equally yoked. We can’t. It’s impossible to be unequally yoked, if that makes any sense. We have become so good at masking that marriages can look unequally yoked, but the codependent attracts the narcissist. And those two issues have equal levels of pathology. When we look at the neurobiology of trauma, of attachment style, of brain and behavior, it’s wild. So I believe that in God’s creation, there are no accidents. Duh, dawn. Um, however, when these issues are playing out in our marriages, abuse, addiction, um, codependency, attachment styles, you name it, that marriage becomes a vehicle to heal the thing that was always at play subconsciously, that was cultivated either genetically or early childhood brain map, right? And that marriage just becomes an echo of what was experienced in early childhood. And now we have the opportunity within this marriage to heal from the very early experiences that created that. That caused me to pick this person in the first place, to cause me to be attracted to this person in the first place. So now my advice tends to be, go all in on healing yourself. All in on healing yourself. Attraction over promotion. That’s a, you know, a line from the twelve steps.

But while married, you say, while married.

Go all in on that.

You do you.

Because this was what, you know, I’ve always been a systems thinker. This is why I wanted to be a marriage and family therapist. They tried to, in college, they tried to get me to be a social worker. And I’m like, no, I’m a systems thinker. You change one part of the system and the entire system becomes changed.

It ripples. Yep.

Right? So if I’ve got a shot at redeeming this marriage, heal myself, body, mind, spirit, not just spiritually, because that’s not. That’s. God is a. Is a trinity, right? A triune God, body, mind, spirit. So heal yourself on all those levels as best you can while still in the place, right? In the hard place with the hard person or whatever. And that’s the shot you got at your miracle, if you will. Right? Go all in, become well boundaried, cultivate a secure attachment style. Cultivate a deep, meaningful relationship with God, which most of us that are in the early stages, most of us who are questioning, should I get a divorce typically don’t have a deep, meaningful relationship with God. We have a very surface level relationship with God. Um, I I. Right. I’d love for someone to prove me wrong, but that’s, you know, maybe you have someone who did go all in on healing, and they’re still wrestling with this question, and they’re at that end stage of, um, healing themselves and trying, but most of the time. Right. So go all in on healing yourself. And then from a grounded place where you’ve wrestled it out with God, where you’ve wrestled it out with a very skilled therapist, where you’ve healed these things and you’ve changed your brain map, you’re vibrating at a different frequency. Now, make your decision, and your partner may or may not have come along.

Right.

And from there, I very rarely, if someone comes to that place and regardless of what the issue is that they’re grappling with at that point, root or fruit. Right. I would rarely, rarely condemn any decision from that spot because some things, we just have to wrestle with God, and I believe that God uses everything for good, that, you know, very often things that we don’t understand that are going to come as a result of a transformation, come through painful experiences. For me, my divorce was that point of liberation where I really stepped into everything that God wanted for me in my life. And it truly, I believe it was the right thing. And I just think that the biggest right or wrong that we could, if, you know, because we get really dogmatic about what is right and what is wrong and the biggest right or wrong that we need to be measuring against is love and redemption and to understand that redemption can come out of any story. So you’re never going to hear me condemn, condemn someone’s choice to get divorced regardless of root or fruit, because it’s all going to turn into fertilizer.

That’s right. Okay. Right. And I was going to say something, too. The other day, somebody told me something about redemption. You’re talking about my marriage. And they were asking if there was a redemption story. And my. Hold on, I got to hit stop. Oh, there it is. So I was talking to somebody the other day about my redemption story, and they were talking about redemption of marriage. Like, is there a chance your marriage has redemption? I was like, no, but there is a chance of redemption. Like, I’m not going to let you define what redemption looks like.

Redemption looks like we are. Right. That’s when we get too dogmatic about things. It’s. We. We miss the message.

I totally agree. Okay, so what you’re saying is by the time you work on yourself and you come back to your marriage, you have a better set of lenses. And the problem is either still going on or it stopped or whatever, or.

It’S improved or it improved.

But if two people both worked on themselves with clear lenses, I believe, and I haven’t set the chairs you’ve sat in. So you tell me where I’m right or wrong. I believe there ought to be a high lens of grace on to say, wow, I was so messed up. No wonder you did what you did.

Yes.

Or I caused that. I was a part of it. Not nobody’s innocent. When we realize the mess we have, no one’s innocent. And then you can look back and say, okay, now, I did love you. I loved you in a different way. Now I think I can love you better and different. Let’s throw that marriage out the window. Not divorce. Roll that.

And, yeah. Rebirth, right? Brand new. Yeah. Start over. Start again.

I tell you that all the time. Like, if people try. I’m trying to salvage my marriage. I’m like, well, you can salvage the same sheet of paper down to the courthouse, but that marriage is dead, dead, dead. You’re starting over and you’re going to have to burn everything to the ground and say, I love the person that’s behind that mask that I’ve been married to. And they’re going to have to see if they like the person behind this mask.

I think that when two people commit to doing this work, Todd, my podcast producer, actually, producer, Joy, her story is a story of marriage redemption, and it’s remarkable. And I got the joy of holding space for that marriage to do that. Right. You know? Right. You got a therapist in the family, you know, and a relentless one at that. Right. Like, I don’t hold any punches where it comes to feedback and calling it. And anyways, so when two people really commit to the. To the root cause work, not the fruit work. Right. It’s rare that I’ve never seen an example of that not work out if.

Both people are all in on the root workout.

Root work. Yeah.

I’ve actually heard some great stories. My. I have some family members who are big into this. This counseling, this level of counseling and this level of never say quit, and they’re like, sleep on the back patio and a sleeping bag and let that other person know that you may be mad at me or whatever, but I’m here. I am going to be all in, and I’m putting in the work. And when you’re ready, I’ll lean in, but not, not to save face with the church. Not because, well, you know, not for all the superficial reason. Yeah. There’s a flawed thought in there. It’s an ivory tower thought, I think. Right. When, well, for someone to be able to pull off that, they probably have an avoidant attachments to you.

True. I think that was a little hyperbole. But to show the other person I’m not leaving, I am put in the work. That’s what I really meant. That was.

Yeah, yeah. But I mean, I don’t know that that level of commitment is available to someone that’s got that level of root work to do. Right. I’m just, I’m just saying, like, if I had had that maturity when I was getting divorced, right. I wouldn’t have been getting divorced. So I’m just saying, like, I think that’s why I really go with the, go all in on your healing yourself because there’s no downside to that. You know what I mean? There’s no, it, it removes the needing to grapple with. Can I commit to this? Or every time I start to get in the inquiry, should I say or should I go, my nervous system gets dysregulated because all my abandonment stuff, you know, I just think when you remove it, even being about the marriage, and it just becomes about me with me, because it’s always me with me and me with God. Right. It just creates a healthier space. I think that when we start talking about, I’m going to stay no matter what. I don’t know. I don’t think that’s realistic.

Yeah, no, I get that view. I also know that there are people. Well, you feel. I feel so ignorant. Talk to somebody who has the words around my thoughts. So.

But I love. That’s such a good feeling, though, like, oh, you read my mind. Yeah.

I like the idea of a person who is ready to make the choice of divorce and the other person just saying I’m willing to put in the work.

Uh huh. That’s what I mean. Yes. Okay. That humility. The humility of saying, I don’t know. What I don’t know. I believe in miracles. I’m willing.

I’m willing. And then proving that. Not just getting into the I’m right, you’re wrong. Yeah game.

Yeah.

I want to say so because I wrote this down as a question for you just to see what your thoughts were. But I’m embarrassed to say it took my world burning down for me to put in the work.

Samesies.

What to do, what samesies. Like, yeah, it sucks because it’s just like telling somebody. Somebody has a heart attack and they tell somebody, you know, you really need to exercise. And everybody’s like, okay, whatever. Then you. Then they have their heart attack. You’re like, hey, we got exercise.

Yeah.

I feel like I am not the man that I am today had it not been for my divorce, because in my marriage, I would have had no motivation.

Yeah.

To work on myself. And it just is frustrating because I just. On this side of it, I want to tell everybody, if you put in the work, your marriage will 10x and you’ll live a vibrant life like people do it.

Yeah. Well, I think that’s why we’re here having this conversation. Right. So I don’t know about you, but I didn’t have this message. Right. I didn’t.

Never heard it.

This. Never heard it. Never heard it. I was told to pray more. I was told to study my Bible more. I was a therapist, so I knew about counseling, but I didn’t know about any counseling. That was treatment of root issues. Nobody ever explained to me what my root issues were. I really believe that we are in a different time collectively with regards to access to the information. And that pivoted during COVID when we were all sitting at home with our phones and TikTok and we learned about what these root issues are.

Education, availability was better. We had more free time.

Yep.

And then people are putting out more content that’s readily available.

Yes, yes. And it hasn’t permeated to all the layers of society, but there’s enough of it there that it’s gaining momentum.

It’s my. You know, you have your lens. My lighthouse is just to get churches to have epiphanies. Like a paradigm shift. I want churches, years. To realize that the Bible can still be true, but that truth outside of the Bible, embrace it, encourage it. There’s holistic ways to approach issues. And then the word I want to keep using is trauma. Like, whether it’s trauma of divorce or the trauma. Whatever gets you in divorce, it’s still trauma. And the church doesn’t talk about trauma. It’s not even a word.

No.

It’s not even our theological lexicon.

No.

And I. Why?

I know when I read trauma in the pews, the first thing I did was give a copy to my pastor.

Okay. Wow.

Yeah.

All the way. I’m barely in it. I came on your recommendation, so, yeah, I’m actually headed on a vacation, and I’m taking it with me. So I’m gonna consume the whole thing in a week. Yeah. So what? Yeah. What is that? Like? Like, there’s a thousand things God left out of the Bible. Right? He didn’t teach us how to raise teenagers. He didn’t teach us how. What to do about social media.

Yeah. Teaches any of that stuff. Right?

Yeah. But.

But this idea of, like. Oh, yeah. There are physical mental changes during trauma, and it’s just a thing, and you’ll have to study it and learn it and adapt to it, but I’m not even going to teach you how to. I’m not even going to give you a heads up on it.

Yes. I don’t know. But let me say this. I don’t. I don’t know that that’s true. I don’t know that that’s really true. Let me say this. I’m going to go to the. I’m going to really go to the out there place. Something I’ve been called to in the last couple of years is something called constitutional homeopathy, okay? Homeopathy is not widely understood, and it’s not widely accepted, but there was this guy in 1779. His name is Hahnemann. In the christian circles, he is known as a freemason, and therefore is whatever. I don’t even know what goes on in the christian circles about that. Right. But, like, just forget about it. Okay? So whether he was or he wasn’t, I don’t know. I don’t care. Right? But he’s a. He’s a preeminent doctor of the time. He studied in Leipzig, he studied in Vienna. And so, like, whatever preeminent doctoring was in the late 17 hundreds, I don’t know. Right? But they’re treating malaria with cinchona bark and something like, he’s got, like, a little itch in the back of his brain, and he’s like, well, I don’t have malaria. What happens if I eat the chinchona bark and he eats it and he gets all the symptoms of malaria? Not malaria, but the presentation of those symptoms. This is where we live in a vibrational world. Like, calls to, like. Like, cures. Like, then him and his buddies, whoever those people are, they’re like, let’s go out proving a bunch, right? Let’s just start eating stuff and recording symptoms and matching it to disease profiles, and their homeopathy is born. Now, you can use homeopathy to treat an acute issue. Like, I stubbed my toe. You would use arnica. Um. Right. Or, um. I have watery eyes and a stuffy nose. Allium sepa. It’s that’s onion. Right? So when we cut onions. Right. What’s the. What’s the symptom profile of. Right. Is allergies. Right. Okay. So I could use allium to treat allergies, right? Or you could practice constitutional homeopathy, which is what I’ve added to my therapy practice, where you take the totality of someone’s symptoms, body, mind, spirit, through the timeline of their entire life, and you find that matching remedy in nature. And that goes to the energetic core. Talk about root versus fruit. I have started using this in my practice, and the transformations I’ve seen go so far and beyond what any counselor or therapist or, I don’t know, yoga can even accomplish. It is wild, and this is not. Well, I have seen. I don’t have the scripture for you, but, gosh, I should go find it. But there are places in scripture I’ve seen. Homeopaths who have studied for years will reference where homeopathy can be seen in the Bible, where God gave us everything we need to heal and to be whole. It was already here. We didn’t need to cure cancer. Homeopathy already cures cancer. Right. But we thought we had to reinvent the wheel.

And you have me at hello on this. Like, I know there will be people listening. This is a little too much for their fundamental baptist brain, but it doesn’t mean it’s not true.

Right?

Okay.

Exactly.

I did not this morning when I woke up, think I was going to ask you this question, but we have walked down this trail and I’m walking even further. Yeah, you and I did have a talk about yoga the other day, and I. Once again, I’m going to beat a dead horse here. But it’s a big concept. The Bible can be all true, but not all truth is in the Bible. Well, if that is true, that there are truths that are God’s truths, because they’re true, he just didn’t reveal him. He didn’t. It wasn’t important to him. Or he’s like, yeah, yeah, I’ll figure that out. You figure out about the moon and how long it takes to go around there. I’m not telling you. You’ll figure that out. Well, I actually believe there are some truths that we are told not to mess with, and then there are some just truths that I didn’t say that was off limits, but we as christians make it off limits. So the Bible does say, stay away from witchcraft. Well, there’s a verse where Saul summoned a witch and then he talked to Elijah. Well, was the Bible didn’t say that wasn’t Elijah. He didn’t say he thought it was a lot. It was Elijah. Like somehow, some way, a witch summoned somebody. Well, the Bible just says that was a sin. Like, he shouldn’t have done that. Right? Like, that wasn’t what he should have done. Okay, I buy that. But when? When, and I’m going to use the word God, but it’s not yoga. What’s the other one? That tantric, this idea of, like, well, this space has yellow energy, and this one has red energy, and we have these.

Oh, Reiki.

Reiki.

Mm hmm.

Yes, Reiki. I’m sorry. Well, yeah, I don’t know what the tantric came from. Anyway, whatever. The point is, doesn’t mean God’s like, yeah, that’s the way I created it. I didn’t tell you that, but that’s true.

That the way I created it.

They’re doing those things without a godly worldview, and so they turn it into.

Their own without a godly worldview. That’s it. Right.

So with a godly worldview, why is.

It wrong wrestling these things with God? And they have been coming up hard and fast in my life. I will give you some examples. I’m going to be vulnerable. I’m going to put my stuff out there, right?

Please. I’m doing.

When I read trauma in the pews, I experienced a state change because I have a lot of religious trauma. I went away from the church for a very long time, and not because I wanted to, but because it was not a safe place for me. And I had to heal enough that I could even tolerate words like Jesus and Bible and scripture. And it’s in recent history that I am able to sit with those things and feel good with them. Okay. But I never went away from God.

Right away from you.

I was getting closer to God while I was further from church. Oh, would you look at that. Now, what are some of the tools I used to get closer to God while I was moving further from church? There are things that many christians would call witchcraft. I used tarot cards, I used crystals, I used reiki, I used all of those things to draw closer to God. I used law of attraction. And in the end, because I was coming at all of those things with a godly mindset, you were looking at.

Like, I’m not looking for a replacement for God. I’m seeing God is in this different mindset.

Yes. Yes.

Interesting. And did, did you, was the journey hard? Because, you know, there’s the Jerry Falwell approach of like, I don’t need to stick my head in the sewer to know it stinks. And then other people are like, well, no, I need to stick my head in. I’ll make a decision. Like, you can know something is not of God. It doesn’t mean that you as christians can’t own it. Like acupuncture, for people listening who don’t know what we’re talking about, this is called acupuncture. Acupuncture is not the Bible. But then there are people who do acupuncture… It’s like, well, as a Christian, like, why can’t I do acupuncture? It’s not the Bible. But what if that the truths are there and I can know there’s a God, I know there’s a trinity. I have good theology, and I still can go get acupuncture. Why can’t that work with other things?

I think that I want to get this really right. Christians have lost track of, I’m painting with a broad brush, obviously.

I’ve been doing it all day.

I’m not, I’m not. I hate that I’m saying christians and. Right. But generally speaking, I think this is really true. This came up at my kids school this morning, this thing about yoga. What? Yoga? You don’t think that’s sinful? And I’m like, I think that thought is ignorant.

Did it this morning. I think it’s crazy that everybody knew it.

Yeah. I think it’s neurobiologically sound. I think that anyone who can get still and use the body to wrestle with God and find their breath and move towards peace, I think that’s sanctification. I think that’s sinful. Right. But I think that christians have lost track of a deep, meaningful relationship with God. I think the whole reason Christ died on the cross for our sins was so that we could have a personal relationship with him. And I don’t think most christians have a deep personal relationship. And I think that christians are used to air quotes, hearing God through anxiety and shame, and they misinterpret the emotional experience of anxiety and shame as conviction, and they cannot, they don’t know that that’s not how God speaks. And so when they hear something like tarot or yoga or whatever it is, they immediately feel shame and anxiety and therefore think that that is not of God. And that’s, yeah, evil. Call it evil. I’m going to go a little bit, not further. Just let put another layer on top of this in fundamental christian evangelism. I don’t know. I don’t want to say Protestantism. Protestant churches, christian conservative Protestantism. The idea that our job and a mature Christian looks like a studier of the Bible, that is what we call a good Christian. Go to church, consume sermons.

Well, even a regurgitator of the Bible, maybe not even a study or a regurgitator.

That’s right. And this idea that, that’s what good christians go to Bible studies and listen to christian music, and we pray to this box, what we call a good Christian, you vote this way, you look this way, you act this way, whatever. And like, I’m like, I look in scripture, I’m like, none of that’s there. There’s nowhere in scripture to tell. We’re like, everybody needs an accountability partner. But Jesus didn’t tell us. We did. But the concept’s there. Discipleship, it’s there, but there’s. We take a little. We go a long way with it. We also go with this, just this idea that we’re supposed to wake up every morning and study our Bible for an hour while 10 billion people live on this planet, they can’t even read. That wasn’t God’s plan. It wasn’t. And we as christians, we were quick to say, well, if this is what a good Christian looks like, then anything else must be bad. And what you and I are saying is, pull yourself out of christian culturalism.

Yes. Seek God and just seek God and be open. Right. You know that old joke about I prayed for a. I prayed for God to rescue me in the flood and then he sent a canoe and I said, nope, I’m waiting for. For God. He’s in a helicopter. Nope, I’m waiting for God. That’s that, right? And yeah, God speaks to us in so many ways, and I can’t tell you how often. And studying the law of attraction is what really helped me understand this about the nature of God, that God is going to send us solutions all the time and then can we receive them? Can we receive God’s love? Because it is all around us all the time. But when we’re shame based or fear based, which most of the planet is, we cannot receive God because we’re so, you know, narrowly dialed into this fear and shame bit that keeps us stuck. And so I think back to what you said a few minutes ago, which was, you know, I just want to highlight is that through my divorce, through burning it all down, is where, you know, I found the work or became committed to the work. And I think for people, especially who are so self reliant and so capable. That’s how God works. That’s how it works. He brings us to our knees till we are humble enough to truly, truly surrender. And in that surrendered place, we get open, open, open, open. And in that surrendered place, you know what? I reached for yoga, and that’s God working through my life. And I celebrate those moments. You know, I call myself a sadistic therapist because when people are breaking, I’m like, yeah, right.

No, I love it. No, that’s funny. I want to add something here, especially people who, you know, I live in the fundamental christian world, but I’m probably way more edgy than most people there. But I would say for those listening that are struggling with the idea of, like, well, you can find God anywhere. Okay, I will say this. If something contradicts the Bible, I’m out. The Bible trumps for me. Like, obviously if I heard somebody outside, I got some what I would call truth. Or, I don’t buy people who say, well, the Lord told me this. I’m like, and that contradicts scripture, so it can be right. But just because it contradicts your church, you can pastor or what you grew up in challenge those things. But yeah, let the Bible trumpet. But you’ll be surprised what’s not in the Bible. That we act like it’s. It’s the same problem. Jesus dealt with the Pharisees because they.

WERE RIPPING THE WHOLE TIME.

And he’s like, yes, I’m not doing anything wrong. I’m disobeying your laws. That doesn’t make me disobedient.

Yes, well said.

Me and God.

Well said. Wow. Okay. We can go on forever, and we will, because we’re gonna have another podcast, right?

Yes.

But for those listening who came in on the topic of their marriage is in a whirlwind and they don’t know what to do. They’re contemplating just running from the problem, like, I’ll just get a divorce. But that comes with deep ramifications.

Deep ramifications.

What do you recommend? Like, what’s the next step? What do you want them to do? How can they even get a hold of you? Or where do you want to point them? Like, that’s a big answer, but I’m turning it over. You what?

Yeah. I would say that God can redeem anything, but becoming redeemed is a choice, and he gave us that choice. And so you cannot make that choice for your partner, but you can make a choice for yourself to be redeemed. And perhaps in the process of you becoming redeemed, your marriage will become redeemed. And if it doesn’t, then don’t sweat it, because you can’t choose redemption for anyone else. That is a deeply personal choice, and that was a God given design. And so if you want more information about healing root issues, definitely come find me. Right.

Your information, if you’re listening to this, it’s in the show notes. It’s below the YouTube video. Like, yeah, your links will be here. So if you’re listening.

Yes.

Look below.

Yes. I have a therapy practice where I see, you know, patients one on one. And I actually have my own podcast, Dear Divorce Diary, which is obviously for folks who. But not necessarily. It’s a therapy podcast. Right. But with the pain point of divorce, because that’s where I dug in and did the work. But we talk about all this stuff on in there. Yeah.

Love it. I love it. This is so good. Okay, part two coming up. Thank you so much for your time. There’s a lot to delve into, and I’m gonna. I’m gonna latch on to what you said is that people need to know this. People need to. Yeah. As christians, once again, for the hundredth time, we think our pastor is the man of God. What he’s reading out of the Bible, not to question. He doesn’t always read scripture verbatim. He gives a lot of opinions. And those people, 95% of the people on stage has never been divorced, and so what do they know?

And. And, Todd, let’s get really honest. We’re opening a whole nother loop at the very end of the episode.

We are.

Let’s get really honest for those of us that are on stages. Because you’re on a stage, I’m on a stage. We tend towards being egocentric. I am predisposed as someone who is built first. I was built for a stage. God gave me this gift. To be able to be on a stage and be charismatic and draw people to me, that very quickly turns into an egoic journey. So pastors automatically need to. We need to have that lens of, like, is this a leader who’s truly humble and leading from a place of a deep, personal, humble relationship with God, or is this person crossed that line into that egoic space? And, you know, it’s not my job to take that person’s inventory, but I need to know that about pastors. Does that make sense?

It totally does. Which is why Jesus says pastors will be judged differently. Like, they will be. He goes, you’re going to be graded on occur because of everything you just said, Jesus knows this. He goes, that’s why you are held to a higher standard.

Higher standard. And then you pair that with, the meek shall inherit the earth. Right? Because the meek are not egoic there, right? Yeah. So call me out anytime on the. It’s the thing that I hold myself accountable for the most is, am I doing this for the right reasons? Am I still right? Like, is this about vanity or is this about glorifying God? And I think that anyone who spends a lot of time on stage, as you ask them that question, it’s going to, you know, it might depend on the day, right, that it gets muddy.

Sometimes it gets muddy. And sometimes you get ritualistic and you’re just like, okay, here’s the same speech. But in essence, when you, your daily conversation with God, I remind myself, too, my, sometimes I’ll get into the weeds of being a podcast producer, if you will. And then I’ll get an email from somebody who’s like, just going through it. I’m like, oh, yeah, that’s why I do this. I forget sometimes. I do.

Beautifully said.

All right. All right. Thank you. So thank you for your time.

Yeah.

Information about you and how to get a hold of you will be below this, and we will continue this conversation.

I don’t know. Thank you. Bye.