Let's Talk About: Meditation

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Can meditation heal spiritual wounds? In this episode of Freestyle Theology, Brad and Brielle unpack their journeys with depression, anxiety, meditation, and spiritual growth. They explore how mindfulness, breathwork, and even sung Scripture can help Christians reconnect with their bodies and cultivate a gentler, richer spiritual rhythm, all while healing from religious trauma. 

Whether you’re in therapy, deconstructing, or simply craving a more authentic connection with God, this conversation will invite you to explore meditation as a practice that bridges faith and nervous system healing—without the baggage of fear-based theology.

We also share how meditation helped us rediscover the beauty of prayer, embrace embodied spirituality, and let go of religious perfectionism. Plus, a hint about a resource we've created to help you bring calm, clarity, and connection back into your spiritual life.

Tune in and discover a different kind of Christian practice.

Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_03 (00:00):
Hey, welcome to a new episode of Freestyle
Theology.
Today I am with a specialperson, my special person.
I'm here with Brielle Goheen, mywife, my I just asked her how I

(00:25):
should introduce her and shegave me a long list of
acclamations.
But there are some.
She's a musical genius.
She's a get your shit togetherguru.
She's all kinds of things.
And as she told me, she's taughtme everything I know.
So we're here together.
So

SPEAKER_00 (00:44):
if you've liked Brad's content, you have me to
thank for it.
I'm just joking.

SPEAKER_03 (00:48):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (00:49):
Not at all.

SPEAKER_03 (00:50):
No, there is a lot we've learned together.

SPEAKER_00 (00:52):
There's a lot we've learned together.

SPEAKER_03 (00:54):
No jokes about that.
But there's so much that we talkabout every single day.
I kind of think we shouldprobably just have a mic on when
we're talking because there'ssome really good stuff every
day.
So what I wanted to do was talkwith you again.
And something that has beenreally important for both of us

(01:19):
Something that has reallytransformed life for us both in
a lot of ways is the practice ofmeditation.
And we've been, it's been acouple years now that we have
been talking about meditation.
So I thought it might be a goodidea to kind of check in again
and see what new things youmight have learned or be

(01:45):
thinking about when it comes tomeditation.
Same for me.
And so that's what I want totalk about today is meditation
and all the things that go alongwith that.
So what has meditation been foryou in the last couple of years?
What is it to you and what haveyou learned about it?

SPEAKER_00 (02:07):
Meditation, I think, is my most important spiritual
practice.
It's changed my whole life.
Like there's no aspect of mylife that hasn't been touched
and changed from this practiceof meditation.
I honestly don't know where Iwould be right now without it
because it's changed me so much.

(02:29):
And I think it's changed me toan extent that some people find
it very uncomfortable becauseI'm no longer the person that
offers to other people thethings that I used to offer to
them because I've learned a lotabout my boundaries and I've
learned a lot about places whereI was self-abandoning and places

(02:52):
where I was just kind of goingwith the flow of life instead of
being really intentional aboutwhich currents I was going to
allow myself to be shaped by andled by.

SPEAKER_03 (03:12):
What was...
What kind of things did you usedto give to people?
Like who was the person, likewho did you used to be for
people before you discoveredmeditation?

SPEAKER_00 (03:24):
I think I used to be annoyingly agreeable.
I would just kind of see myselfas the person who could support
other people, the helper.
I think that's something that'slike really, really typical
among Christian women, right?
You know, the Enneagram.

(03:46):
Somebody said to me a coupleyears ago, whenever they hear a
Christian woman define herselfas an Enneagram 2, which is the
helper, that they're immediatelysuspicious.
Not that there are no Enneagram2s who are Christian women.
Like, there are, you know, sameproportion in Christian women as

(04:06):
any other population.
But...
Christian women have been sosocialized into being the helper
that there's many people who areactually supposed to thrive in
other spaces, in other roles.
They have other strengths togive.
And they end up trying to bendthemselves and fit themselves
into this role of helper.

(04:26):
And so much so that it becomes aself-identity.
And when asked, they callthemselves an Enneagram 2.
And that's something that Idon't think I ever thought that
I was an Enneagram 2 because Ialways felt that internal
struggle.
But I definitely saw myself as ahelper.

(04:46):
But the thing was that I wasnever a very good helper because
that's not really where Ithrive.
So I was trying to fit myselfinto certain molds and certain
ways of being around otherpeople that they didn't feel
genuine about.
to who I was, but they were whoI wanted to be because I wanted
to be good.

(05:07):
But especially in the musiciancommunity, which I'm a musician,
people called bullshit on thatall the time.
People could tell that the waythat I was being and bringing
myself to situations just wasn't100% genuine.
Not because I wasn't trying tobe genuine.
I was trying to be genuine, butI just didn't know myself yet.

(05:27):
And I think that's whatmeditation really has helped me
to do is discover who it is thatI am, who it is that I truly am.

SPEAKER_03 (05:37):
You said...
You used two different words.
You said that you thought youwere being authentic, right?
But you said that you weretrying to be good.

SPEAKER_02 (05:47):
And

SPEAKER_03 (05:47):
those are very different.

SPEAKER_02 (05:48):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (05:49):
Like good is a pretty gigantic category.
It includes, well, everythinggood that exists.
And so...
yes, helping people is good, butso is creating something.
So is standing up for what'sright.

SPEAKER_02 (06:09):
Like

SPEAKER_03 (06:10):
all of those things are good.
And I guess the real issue iswhen, when like a culture or a
subculture, let's say aChristian subculture, its
definitions of good are oftenvery quite narrow, especially
for women.
Right.
And so it's interesting thatyou're, you're You've been on

(06:31):
this journey to discover who youreally are.
And in a lot of ways, that isthe same journey as discovering
how to be good, which is to belike God, right?
And so it's just these thingsoften get– in Christian culture,
we're very uncomfortable withthe whole be yourself, know
yourself, and all that kind oftalk because there's this latent

(06:54):
fear that that means you'regoing to somehow reject God.
But it's probably more likelythe fear is that you're going to
reject God the traditionalauthority structures in place.

SPEAKER_00 (07:04):
Yeah, that definitely rings true.
Because I think that when Ithink back on the person that I
was, let's say five years ago,because five years ago was
around when I started meditatingin 2020 in the pandemic times.
That was when I discoveredmeditation.

(07:26):
So if I look back on where I wasfive, six years ago, What I see
is a very lopsided version ofme, almost like a grotesque
version of my true self.
So it wasn't that I was notbeing authentic.

(07:49):
It wasn't that I was being fakewith people.
Everything that I was allowingout of myself was truly genuine,
but what made it feel wrong tomyself and to other people was
just the fact that there was somuch I was not letting out and
so many areas that I wasn'tletting people in as well.

(08:11):
It's this guardedness, onlyletting out the things that I
perceived to be good.
So I never got angry with peoplebecause it was not good to be
angry.
And I've really discovered howgood it is truly to be angry and
to let your anger out.
So I feel like a much morewell-rounded, fleshed-out

(08:36):
version of who I am, that I'mactually able to show all the
sides of who I am with people,which I think allows freedom for
other people as well to show allsides of who they are.
It's better for relationshipsall around.

SPEAKER_03 (08:54):
That makes a lot more sense.
It's not this simple kind ofblack and white binary of like
you weren't being yourself andnow you are being yourself.
It's kind of like how much ofwho you are is being shown to
the world.
And then if you're in a certain,again, subcultural context that

(09:17):
really praises certain aspectsof a person's personality for
women like they're willingnessto help and sacrifice, then that
gets overblown.
That gets, what's the word I'mlooking for?

SPEAKER_00 (09:31):
It's like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I know what you mean.
It's like, it's like it getslike expanded, but at the
expense of something else thatshrinks.

SPEAKER_03 (09:38):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (09:39):
So you end up with like these like strange,
grotesque proportions.

SPEAKER_03 (09:42):
You know, weirdly, the word that kind of is right
at this moment coming to mind isit's idolizing.
It idolizes a certain aspect andit puts it on a pedestal, which
is what you do with an idol.
And it makes it more, it makesit seem more sacred, more
important than it is.

SPEAKER_00 (10:00):
Oh, that is so good.

SPEAKER_03 (10:01):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (10:02):
That's so good.
It's like idolizing the thingsthat are quote unquote
acceptable or quote unquote goodor yeah, the things that society
wants from you or your culture,subculture wants from you.
And it becomes an idolization ofthose things.
manifested in your own life.
So really good way of puttingit.

SPEAKER_03 (10:22):
So prior to discovering meditation, and we
will talk about why that had theimpact it had.
But prior to discoveringmeditation, you seemed to have
discovered that acting in acheerful, happy way that didn't
make other people ever feelconfronted or uncomfortable was

(10:44):
you had learned at some youngage, I'm assuming that that made
the group feel happy?

SPEAKER_00 (10:50):
I remember being, on my fifth birthday, I got a card
from a university student whowas a friend of our family.
We used to have universitystudents over because my dad was
a professor.
And this university student whoI saw him as just being the
kindest, the most wonderfulperson I knew, wrote on my fifth

(11:10):
birthday card, I can stillpicture it, it was a puppy and a
blue balloon, And he wrote onthe blue balloon, he wrote,
never stop smiling.
You have the best smile in theworld.
And I would pull that out of mylittle box of special things.
And I would look at it probablyat least once a month.
I would look at that and I wouldread that little note.

(11:32):
And I would be like, that's whatI need to do is never stop
smiling.
So it's like there was thisbeautiful, beautiful
encouragement.
There's nothing wrong with that.
But I kind of saw that'ssomething that people value.
Okay, I will never stop smiling.
And I didn't.
And that became like a huge partof my identity.

SPEAKER_03 (11:52):
Yeah, and that's what people knew you as, right?

SPEAKER_00 (11:55):
And they don't anymore, which I find that so
interesting.

SPEAKER_03 (12:00):
So walk me through this sort of experience then.
How did the practice ofmeditation...
First, maybe describe like whatwas your practice of meditation
before?
Initially, like what, what gotyou into it?
And how did that have thisimpact of, first of all, kind of

(12:21):
rediscovering these other goodparts of you?
And then allow feeling empoweredto allow them to come out more?
How did meditation serve thatgoal?

SPEAKER_00 (12:35):
Yeah, I wouldn't say that that was the goal when I
was first starting to meditate.
I can't remember if we've evertalked about this before on the
podcast, but I'm sure we'vetalked about many aspects of it
before, but I was deeplyunhappy.
I was very, very depressed.
There was a lot of externalcircumstances that are so many

(12:59):
things in life that stacked upon each other that you could
point to and say, that's why Iwas depressed.
Your sickness, Having a childand experiencing antenatal
depression.
And then postpartum depressionafterward.

SPEAKER_03 (13:13):
While I was

SPEAKER_00 (13:14):
sick.
While you were sick.
An extremely stressful situationworking at a church that was not
treating me right.
All of those things kind ofconverged and led to me feeling
really, really depressed.
And so I was deeply, deeplyunhappy.
And it was getting to the pointthat it was...
causing a lot of problems inlife and making it really hard

(13:36):
for me to function and I hadthese two little girls and you
were sick and I had to I had tobe able to function and so I
ended up going to the doctor andthe doctor told me that I needed
to take medication for the acutesymptoms and I also needed to
look into meditation as like alonger-term way of managing my

(13:59):
stress and my emotions and allof those things.
So that was why I came tomeditation for the first time.
I thought it was reallyinteresting that my medical
doctor mentioned meditation.
I never would have thought that.
And just because of the thingsthat you hear in Christian
culture, I was also verysuspicious of meditation.
I thought meditation is somekind of Eastern religious thing.

(14:22):
And so I was nervous of

SPEAKER_03 (14:24):
it.
You were a lot less open to it.
back then.

SPEAKER_00 (14:28):
Of course, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (14:28):
To the richness, the riches out there of different
spiritualities and stuff.

SPEAKER_00 (14:36):
Yeah.
I hadn't yet started thatjourney of really questioning
things.

SPEAKER_03 (14:42):
Yeah.
So you were suspicious initiallyof meditation.
It's almost hard for me toremember a time when you would
have been like that.

SPEAKER_02 (14:50):
Me too.

SPEAKER_03 (14:51):
Right?
But yeah, you're suspicious, butyou sort of Start to dip your
toes in it.

SPEAKER_00 (14:57):
And I would say less suspicious and more nervous if I
was to describe the feeling.
I was more nervous because Ithink that I did know that it
could help, but I was nervous oflike, well, what else will it
do?
If I like open that door, whatelse is behind that door?
Maybe there's a solution to thisproblem, but maybe it's going to
cause more problems.

SPEAKER_03 (15:16):
And I mean, for me, one of the voices in my head was
there's a lot of– A lot of theselike answers, quote unquote
answers that come withinevangelical culture to different
like cultural questions.
And often they're not very wellthought out.
So I can remember being ateenager and hearing like,

(15:36):
here's why meditation is bad.
And they would be thinking morein the Buddhist way, I think.
Again, operating with purelywith stereotypes.
No real knowledge of what isactually happening.
But it's like, I remember...
youth leaders and differentbooks that make these weird
connections.
Like meditation is aboutclearing your mind.
If you clear your mind, it'sgoing to fill with like, you're

(15:59):
inviting dark, like you'reinviting demonic powers in or
something like that.
And then maybe try to connectthat in a strange, weird way
with what Jesus talks about,about like expelling a demon and
then it being cleaned and thencoming in and seven more.
And then, you know, you're like,is that, what are we talking
about?
Are we just like, making crazystuff up because it's an eastern

(16:21):
practice that makes usuncomfortable because that's
what it really feels like itfeels like a prejudice based on
ignorance and then you give itsome answer that sounds wise
when what it really does is justinculcates some more fear

SPEAKER_00 (16:38):
yeah i definitely heard that argument too that you
have to be careful because Yeah,what are you going to allow room
for?
What are you going to give spaceto?
Assuming that the thing that'sgoing to flood in is evil.

SPEAKER_03 (16:50):
Yeah, and it's not like that argument ever applied
to you need to clean your room.

SPEAKER_00 (16:55):
Yeah, you can't clean your room because you have
no idea what kind of dirt isgoing to just sweep in there and
cover your room.

SPEAKER_03 (17:03):
Or just as crazy as to say you want to be careful
about cleaning your room becauseif you get your room organized,
your mind will be more clear.
And so a demon could come in,right?
Like it's just as, it actuallymakes just as little sense as
that.

SPEAKER_00 (17:16):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (17:17):
Yeah.
So that's an aside, but.

SPEAKER_00 (17:20):
Or don't clean, don't clean under your bed.
Cause then monsters could gofill that space.

SPEAKER_03 (17:24):
Right.
Exactly.
But that is what happens.

SPEAKER_00 (17:27):
Oh yeah.
Sorry.
That's what we teach our kids.

SPEAKER_03 (17:30):
Okay.
So you start dipping your toesinto meditation because you need
to, you're like health and lifedepends on it.

SPEAKER_00 (17:39):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, um, Naturally, the firstthing that I did was I went to
Christian prayer resources.
There's a really rich traditionin Christianity of contemplative
prayer.
And so I tried, there's varioussites where you could listen to

(18:00):
a daily meditation, but it's notmeditation in the sense that I
would talk about it now.
It's more of like a...
a practice of silence, apractice of prayer.
And so I tried all thosedifferent resources, and I just
never found that I really, itdidn't feel that it was going

(18:20):
deep, and it definitely wasn'tchanging any of my symptoms.
The medication did change mysymptoms, but nothing that I was
trying really felt like it wasactually something that was
changing my brain chemistry,except for the medication
itself.
which did help quite a bit.
I wouldn't have been able to, Iwouldn't be able to be where I

(18:41):
am now without having taken thatmedication at the time as well.

SPEAKER_03 (18:44):
Sure.
It raises the baseline.
It gets you like, you know,imagine you're like, you have
vertigo or something and youkeep falling over.
You need some kind ofintervention to just at least
get you to like stay on yourfeet before you can start to
really address like what's goingon here.
How can I strengthen my, I don'tknow, brain health so that I

(19:06):
don't know what vertigo even is.
I don't

SPEAKER_00 (19:08):
really know.
So maybe that's not the bestexample to use.
Yeah, maybe not the

SPEAKER_03 (19:11):
best.

SPEAKER_00 (19:11):
But I think, yeah, I think the point still stands.
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
So the medication really helped.
And I was trying all thesedifferent things.
And I was listening to a podcastone day.
It was just like a businesspodcast.
And somebody mentioned thisparticular style of meditation
that I ended up really growingto love.
And it was not...

(19:34):
Christian.

SPEAKER_03 (19:35):
This one is more like transcendental almost,
right?
It's more in that vein.

SPEAKER_00 (19:39):
Exactly.
And so I remember the first timeI downloaded this podcast and it
was a lying down meditation andI lay down and I just remember
being so nervous and justpraying my little heart out.
Just praying so much thatwhatever this was, that God

(20:02):
would protect me from it if itwasn't good.
But that if it was good, that Iwould receive the benefits from
it.
But just praying, keep the devilaway from this meditation.
I was so nervous.
It just seems really funny inretrospect, but I mention it
because anybody that feelsnervous around it, there's a

(20:23):
reason why you feel nervousaround it.
The messaging that we get is sointense around meditation.
Of course you're nervous aboutit.

SPEAKER_03 (20:30):
Because it's sort of being framed as an alternative
spirituality.

SPEAKER_00 (20:37):
Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 (20:37):
And then especially within evangelical Protestantism
or Reformed Protestantism, wethink in terms of these
competing religions, competingworldviews, which can easily
lead to and does lead tostereotyping, right?
And like oversimplification.
And then like we look at otherreligions as competing systems

(21:02):
and stories.
But when you look at it in thatcompetitive way, it becomes, I
don't know, it's unhealthy.
It becomes somewhat unhuman too.

SPEAKER_02 (21:13):
You

SPEAKER_03 (21:15):
don't see wisdom.
You don't see God behind othertraditions and things like that.
You just see them as opponents,enemies to be defeated and
avoided for their dangers,right?
I'm so far from that now.
I've found that to be sodestructive to relationships

(21:35):
that, yeah, that's a differenttopic.

SPEAKER_00 (21:37):
And it's not even just the obvious destruction.
It's the subtle destruction,like the fact that I would hold
myself back from a practice thatis deeply healing and that I
knew would help me.
And yet I held myself back fromit.
So I lay down and I did thismeditation and just got
completely lost in the beauty ofthis meditation.

(22:02):
I felt so connected to thedivine and so loved and so held.
And When I sat up, it's reallyhard to describe, but I knew
that my brain was different whenI sat up.
Like I could feel that it wasdifferent and it was working
differently.
And maybe it was my experiencewith medication and feeling the

(22:25):
difference that that made, thatmy brain was suddenly able to
think differently.
And I sat up and I just knew itwas changed.
And I also, because of being amusician, I had a sense that it
had something to do with music.
And mind you, I'd neverresearched any of this before.

(22:47):
I had no idea about what I'mabout to talk about at all.
I just knew that I was hearingsomething happening in the sound
of the music that felt like itwas like massaging my brain.
It's the only way I can describeit.
It felt like it was massaging mybrain.
And so I looked up themeditation.
I looked up the track and thecomposer of the track.

(23:08):
that was underneath themeditation.
And I discovered that they wereusing binaural beats.
And binaural beats, it's a formof bilateral stimulation.
So there's a lot of bilateralstimulation that's used in a lot
of healing practices like EMDR,where you stimulate both sides

(23:32):
of the brain.
And that helps to producehealing effects.
So what I was hearing in themusic was actually, or what I
was feeling actually had a basisin what they were, like the
intention that they had whenthey created the music.
So I just knew that there wassomething to this, just from

(23:53):
having felt it and having heardit and experienced the power of
it.
And so I started doing it everyday and like nothing could keep
me from doing it every daybecause it was like, when you
try to find an exercise that youlike, right?
If you are not a fan of running,you're never going to want to
run every day.
But if you love dancing, thennothing can keep you from that

(24:15):
dance class because it justfeels so good to go.
It feels so good to be there.
And that's what this felt likefor me.
It felt like discoveringsomething that was good for me
and my whole body needed it.

SPEAKER_03 (24:27):
No, I mean, I remember those early days and
the profound experiences youwould be having regularly and it
would it would you knowsometimes it was more the the
rhythm and of the practice ofdoing it sometimes yeah you
would i remember you would talkabout this like it's like my
brain's being massaged i'mfeeling different and sometimes

(24:48):
it would be a particular messagewithin the meditation that just
would be so simple but was kindof not how you had ever You'd
never heard these messages inyour spirituality before.

SPEAKER_00 (25:04):
Yeah.
There's one funny story thatcomes to mind.
This is not the most profound,but I think it's really funny.
There was one time when I wasmeditating and I was hemming and
hawing about, I don't evenremember what the problem was,
but it was some huge problem inmy life that I was having
trouble taking action one way oranother.

(25:24):
And I was like, do I do it thisway or do I do it this way?
And it was like, as it is whenyou start becoming obsessed with
the problem, it's like the exactsame thing.
It's just like the tiniestdifference between the two
options.
And I was getting myself intoquite a state about it.
And I was meditating and tryingto let go of it, but also kind
of praying through themeditation, because often I

(25:45):
would receive a lot of guidance,like defined guidance as I was
meditating.
And so I was just in this state,not being able to really let go
of this problem.
And suddenly, in my mind's eye,in the black, must have been
like a grid of like 100 Nikeswooshes showed up and just

(26:08):
flashed and then left.
And of course, the Nike sloganis just do it.
And I know that slogan verywell.
And I really like the Nikebrand.
So that was amazing.
So funny, so funny to me.
And I just like immediately likereleased into laughter that this
isn't so serious.

(26:28):
Just do it.
Just get on with it.
Just do it.
Let it go.
Let's see what happens.
You know, like don't hold on toall this stuff so tightly.
Just do it.
And so I think the way that youput it afterwards, you were
like, oh, God talked throughcorporate logos.
That's funny.

SPEAKER_03 (26:43):
Yeah.
It's a very, very beautifulvision.

SPEAKER_00 (26:49):
But then there were also more kind of serious and
like really meaningful momentsin meditation.
Like at the end of thismeditation, as it was wrapping
up, it was like, you know, putyour hand over your heart and
take a breath and give thanksfor your beautiful self, right?
And that for me, you know, Iheard it probably a couple

(27:10):
hundred times by the time thatthis particular moment happened
where I heard that.
And it was just a completerelease where I realized that I
can be my own friend, which issomething that I still struggle
with.
But in that moment, it was quitea release that I could be my own
friend.
And I could just be there inmeditation, in this like kind of

(27:33):
communion with yourself and thedivine.
And you can just...
accept that you are loved andyou can just love yourself and
that that's okay.
And, you know, it's not like aone and done kind of thing.
It's not like I love myself nowunconditionally, like you know
better than anybody that Idon't.
But it's a step along, a stepalong a journey.

(27:54):
And that was a really powerfulone because I would say at that
time I hated myself, you know.
And so realizing that I could bea friend to myself was like just
a mind-blowing revelation.

SPEAKER_03 (28:06):
Give thanks for your beautiful self.
It's such a simple message thatcould easily just kind of go
right over your head.
But I actually really doremember that day, how deeply
profound that was for you andhow healing too.
Because sometimes healing islike, sometimes it's more like
physio rehab, like that slow,painful, getting up and trying

(28:31):
again, right?
And sometimes healing is morelike a not healing.
being massaged out and thatmoment where it just kind of

SPEAKER_02 (28:38):
melts,

SPEAKER_03 (28:40):
right?
There's release and then there'salso kind of building up
strength and they both areessential.
But I remember there would justbe some, so the practice of
meditating, like, you know,waking up at seven or whatever
and doing it right when you wakeup, that's more like the physio.
That's more like stretching,exercising, which over time

(29:03):
reaps strength.
compound benefits.
But then there's also the kindthat's like, not immediate, but
requires like targeted pressurethat then causes some reaction
to occur that changeseverything,

SPEAKER_00 (29:17):
right?
Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 (29:19):
So just, I'm actually just interested when
you use the word meditation andyou use the word prayer, what is
different?
What's operating differentlythere?

SPEAKER_00 (29:31):
I actually think that meditation and prayer are
are very, very similar.
And in my life, I actually thinkthey're the same thing.
But at the beginning, they werevery different because I didn't
understand prayer.
I think I thought that prayerhad to do with, I think we may

(29:52):
have talked about this before,but being some kind of
incantation, that you say theright thing, you say the right
words in the right way, and thenthat puts pressure on God to do
something.
Right?
To bend the world to your will.

SPEAKER_03 (30:04):
And it can even just be, it can, you know, there's an
easy response to that beinglike, no, it's not just saying
the right things.
You have to have the rightheart.

SPEAKER_02 (30:12):
But

SPEAKER_03 (30:12):
then the right heart can become the new incantation.

SPEAKER_02 (30:16):
Like the

SPEAKER_03 (30:16):
right attitude.
Right?
Have this honest, contriteattitude.
And then that can eventuallychange.
act the same way as incantation.

SPEAKER_00 (30:27):
Yeah.
And I know also people say,well, it's not about bending
God's will to your will.
It's about you bending your willto God's will.
That's something that people sayas well, which I don't think
that's necessarily untrue.
But I wouldn't say that mostpeople, if you're being really
honest, most people aren'tsitting down in prayer to be

(30:47):
changed.
You're sitting down in prayer tochange.
Right?
To change other people or tochange circumstances or
situations.
Or to get God to change them iswhat I mean.
And I'm just struggling with howto say this.
Because it's all very close.
And so I'm trying to figure outwhat it is that is the heart of
what's different.

(31:08):
I think the heart of it is thatwhat I knew of prayer was that
you sit down with an agenda.
Whether that agenda is to bechanged or to change God or
whatever.
You sit down with an agenda.
And You have to work throughyour agenda with God for your
little meeting.
And what I learned and what Iwould say is the difference
between prayer in the way that Iknew it then and meditation and

(31:32):
prayer in the way that I know itnow is that part of the act of
meditation is just being quietand taking the time to just
observe what exists.
Because we don't even know whatexists within our own hearts.
We don't even know.
We're so good at foolingourselves all day, every day.

(31:54):
We think that we're doing thingsfor these wonderful motives.
And really, sometimes when youget very present to a situation
and present to a feeling, it'shorrifying the motivations that
you're actually motivated byinstead of what you have
cognitively rerouted all ofthese feelings and actions to be

(32:16):
motivated by this very selfless,very good kind of thing.
All that is to say that rightnow I would view meditation and
prayer as just coming to thedivine in silence to gain
clearer vision of what is ratherthan the illusion of what you

(32:41):
think it is.

SPEAKER_03 (32:44):
Wow.
That's good.
I think how I've operated...
with them, even if I haven'treally thought about it, to make
it as simple as possible isprayer is directed communication
outward, like at God, whilemeditation is a look inward.
But what's interesting is thatthat sounds like a directionally

(33:08):
opposite practice, but God iswithin.
Like, you know how St.
Augustine said that God iscloser than our breath.

SPEAKER_02 (33:17):
Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 (33:18):
which is a really powerful line, especially in
light of what we're talkingabout.
But we have this strange thingin Christianity, this tendency
where it's like we almost wantto push God away, far from us.
We talk about how bad we are orsomething like that.
It's like we're trying to belike, look, it's really

(33:39):
important that you understandthat God is far, very different
from us.
It's like we get angry about it.
I'm just thinking of what I'vereceived over the years.
Like, you know, so much, so muchunexamined anger at whenever
someone would say something,even to the effect of like,
well, God is in all things.

(33:59):
And just like this really strongreactive anger immediately
becoming like, you know, heresyhunters or something like that.
When it's like, take a secondand just examine why that makes
you feel the way you feel.
Interestingly, that actuallysounds like meditation.
Meditation is about examiningthe honest why, which is that

(34:22):
that touches on what you'resaying, where acknowledging what
is, the real motivations behindthings, rather than hiding
behind some kind of noblesounding motivations.

SPEAKER_00 (34:36):
And the only way that you can actually have the
strength to do that, becausethat is so unbelievably painful,
to do, to actually begin to takean honest look at where your
motivations for things arecoming from and actually look at
what is in your life, sopainful.
But the only way that you canactually have strength to do

(34:57):
that is if you're held inunconditional love.
And that's what this containerof meditation is, is just this
unconditional love that you arereceiving from the divine,
right?
And through the divine,receiving yourself and giving to

(35:17):
yourself as well, right?
Like you said, God is closerthan our breath.
You know, the Holy Spirit in theChristian tradition lives inside
of us.
And it's so scary for people.
That's why, like, you know, inDutch Calvinist traditions, they
never talk about the HolySpirit.
And when they do, it's veryquick.
It's very rushed.
That's the tradition that I grewup in.

(35:39):
It's very quick and rushedbecause...
That's scary territory when youstart talking about how the Holy
Spirit is actually in us.
And if God is in us, if God isactive and alive in us, then we
are being changed from theinside.
And we are actually beingchanged.

(35:59):
We're actually able to be guidedby an inner guidance that is the
divine or the Holy Spirit in us.
And that's the kind of thingthat like, so many Christians
are distrustful of that kind oflanguage because they're like,
you know, you can't be guided bylike your, you know, you can't
be guided by your inner guidancebecause you need to be guided by

(36:22):
the Bible, what the Bible says.
But it's like, okay, so if youbelieve the Bible is divinely
inspired by the Holy Spirit andthat's the Holy Spirit that
lives in you, then how muchcloser is that spirit, that
guiding spirit to you as it'sinside of you and as you're
actually becoming very presentto it.

SPEAKER_03 (36:42):
Maybe that's why the language of like, you know, this
passage really resonates with meright now because that's like
the spirit and the spirit kindof resonating.
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (36:56):
Right?
Yes.
Yeah, exactly.
It's not that you aren't beingguided by scripture, right?
But it's just that that is, it'slike deep crying to deep, right?
Like the deepest parts of you,the Holy Spirit is there wanting
to communicate with you all thetime.
If you just listen, it is.
That conversation is alwayshappening within us.

(37:18):
And you get present to it.
And sometimes when you'reinteracting with like a holy
text or a text that is holy,that you believe is holy, then
it's like something within thatis interacting with the
conversation that you are havinginternally between you and the
Spirit.

SPEAKER_03 (37:36):
Yeah, so...
Your experience with meditation,just as an easy shorthand, seems
to be more transcendental.
Like you used the phrase, youhad lost yourself in the music.
You're encountering God or thedivine.
And my experience withmeditation is sort of its other

(38:01):
tradition, which is more themindful experience.
the mindfulness tradition,right?
Because I'm encountering it, youknow, especially I'm sick for a
few years, you know, obviouslyyou know the story very well.
I'm sick for a few years,finally find the treatment that
works, my physical healthreturns, but my mental health

(38:25):
had been destroyed.
I had lost all faith in just mybody and the normalcy of things
and was beginning to have panicattacks all the time,
constantly.
which eventually descended intoa panic disorder where the very
thing you're afraid of is thesymptoms of a panic attack so

(38:45):
that it's going to cause anotherone.
And that's a terrible loop to bein.
So kind of like you, I also hadto go to the doctor.
I also got some medication torestore my footing.
And then I'm told by probablythe same doctor, right, to start
meditating as well.
And I have seen your experiencehow that's been good.

(39:07):
So I was already almost primed.
I also didn't have the samereservations or nervousness
about it.
That's probably just more of anupbringing thing.
Like I was less, that wouldn'thave been like a kind of off
limits thing.
It would have been in like theyouth group and all that, but
not in my home as much.

(39:30):
So I was open to it.
I had been really, when I was ateenager, Eastern traditions
were really interesting to me.
The Buddhist traditionespecially was really
interesting to me.
So I was kind of primed for it.
I wasn't afraid of it.
And I also knew at that time, sothis is when, 2022?

(39:51):
Yeah, that

SPEAKER_00 (39:53):
sounds right.

SPEAKER_03 (39:54):
Yeah.
Late 2021, I think, is when Ifirst went to the doctor,
December.
I was like, I have this constantfear of panic attacks.
What's wrong with me?
It wasn't the craziest thing inthe world.
The doctor had heard of itbefore.

SPEAKER_02 (40:08):
You think?

SPEAKER_03 (40:10):
And then early 2022, starting to meditate a lot.
But yeah, I was drawn to themindfulness tradition, which is
all about monitoring.
It's the practice of learningopen monitoring.
So some people might knowmindfulness talks a lot about

(40:33):
noticing what's around you whatyou can see or hear, taste,
touch, feel, the whole fivesenses thing.
That's one layer of it, noticingwhat is, like you were saying
before.
What is, not what should be orwhat could be, but what is.

SPEAKER_02 (40:49):
And

SPEAKER_03 (40:51):
then there's another level, which is becoming mindful
of your own breath, which was,that's another huge thing we
could talk all day about,

SPEAKER_02 (40:59):
breath

SPEAKER_03 (41:00):
and all the different things.
You know, how breath and spiritare the same word in Hebrew, in
Greek, in all kinds oflanguages.
How spirit and wind or breath,chi in Mandarin, and all kinds
of other languages are relatedto spirit.
So it's just like there's somuch we could talk about there.

(41:20):
Maybe another episode on spirit

SPEAKER_00 (41:23):
or

SPEAKER_03 (41:23):
breath.
I would love to do that.
like aware of it, how fast, howslow, and not trying to change
it initially, just noticingwhatever it is.
And then there's another layer,which is becoming mindful or
intentionally noticing youremotional states.

(41:47):
So when you're feeling fearful,acknowledging it, pointing at it
and saying, there it is, fear.
And not holding it too tightlyor too loosely.
Just there it is and it kind ofpasses.
And so for me, meditation wasabout not, it wasn't a practice

(42:07):
of emptying my mind.
That was just a stereotype I hadreceived.
It was a practice of noticingwhat is already there.
And then the physiologicaleffects of that are pretty
incredible.
Because anxiety or panic anddepression are both mental

(42:29):
states that have youdisconnected from the actual
moment that is.
Depression is usually somehowyou're locked in the past, in a
past way of looking at things.
And that is actually shapingyour present and future.
Anxiety is more of afuture-oriented, like a

(42:50):
maladaptive future.
orientation, where you'relooking at what could
conceivably go wrong, and youget stuck in this cloud.
And so that causes so muchsuffering.
So the way to relieve thatsuffering is to return to the
moment that you're in.

(43:13):
And I remember, I've talkedabout this before too, but I
started to notice that that'sactually what Jesus was doing
when he was teaching aboutworry, which really, it was an
amazing discovery for me.
Maybe it jumps out to otherpeople, but Jesus's way of
helping people to stop worryingwasn't just to command them to

(43:33):
stop.
Because that usually justamounts to suppress what you're
feeling and pretend you're notfeeling it.
That's what I used to think whenJesus said, do not worry.
I thought he was saying suppressit.
But then you look at the actionshe takes after saying that, and
it's a very mindful process.
practice of returning to themoment they're in and noticing
the beauty around them, theprovision around them, the

(43:58):
flowers and the birds and allthat.
And I was like, oh, it's like amindful practice.
That is so right.
And so, yeah, my experience withmeditation has been to honestly
monitor what is going on inside.
And I'm just wondering, when Idescribe meditation like that,

(44:23):
what sort of things come up inyou, in your thinking?

SPEAKER_00 (44:26):
Yeah.
I mean, I definitely experiencemeditation in that way as well.
And I think in differentmoments, there's different
things that you need.
And even in different seasons oflife, there's different things
that you need.
And I think it's so beautifulthat there's so many different
types of meditation, right?

(44:46):
And I even think of you, likeyou're talking about that your
main experience of meditation ismindfulness meditation.
But I would argue just fromknowing you and seeing you that
that was your introduction tomeditation.
But I know as well that you'vealso experienced some powerful
things through the moretranscendental type of
meditation as well.

(45:08):
So something can be yourintroduction to meditation,
but...
the world of meditation is verylarge and there's a lot to learn
and there's a lot to know.

SPEAKER_03 (45:23):
I wonder if this, I'm just thinking this right
now, if, because we have thesekind of three conceptual pieces
in play.
We have mindfulness meditation,we have transcendental
meditation, and then we have theChristian tradition of
contemplative prayer, right?
We have these three thingsintertwined.

(45:43):
in play right now.
And what I'm sort of wonderingis one of the strengths of
Christianity and its traditionis it's about people connecting
in an intimate way with thecreator, whether that was by
encountering the incarnate Godin Jesus, whether that's through

(46:05):
the spirit indwelling us andresonating with the spirit
elsewhere, whether that'sthrough prayer as a you know,
this phrase has kind of lost itsbeauty for me, but like a
personal relationship with God,right?
That I don't really use thatlanguage anymore because it's
sort of, it represents somethingthat I'm not, a tradition I'm

(46:28):
not really into.
But I think deep in my bones, Istill, and probably always will,
operate with that at some level,that I have the right to say,
interact with the creator in anintimate way.

SPEAKER_00 (46:45):
Yeah.
And I would say not only thatyou have the right, but you are
always in conversation with thecreator.
You just are as like a createdbeing, which we both believe we
are, right?
As beings that are created bythe creator, we are in

(47:06):
conversation.
We just are inside of our bodiesall day.
every day whether or not we areconscious of the conversation
that's going on or the littlealarm bells that are going off
within us alerting us to thingsthat maybe we need to examine or
areas that we need to deepen orthings that we're lying to
ourselves about.
That conversation is alwayshappening inside our bodies and

(47:28):
I think that's a deeply divinething.

SPEAKER_03 (47:30):
And so then what it makes me think is maybe standing
in the Christian traditionwanting to meditate that's kind
of the place where it needs toreally focus its attention is
on, I'm going to try to hold allthese things together.

(47:53):
Maybe what the Christian sort oftradition can do is becoming
mindful of the transcendent,almost like uncontainable
realities that we are existingin the midst of.

(48:14):
So like the spirit iseverywhere.
God is at work all kinds of waysand places and people and
traditions and always has been,right?
And maybe this meditation canbecome learning to like an
awareness of what is, right?

(48:35):
And so I'm trying to bring themtogether, not to lose any of the
differences between them, butthat there's something, if what
Christianity values and what itbrings to the table really well
is an emphasis on the intimaterelationship between the creator
and the human, then maybe as itincorporates mindful practices,

(48:57):
monitoring, as well astranscendent things, it's like
we are, this is where prayer andmeditation overlap.

UNKNOWN (49:06):
Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 (49:06):
if meditation is like an inner looking, looking
at your inner landscape andbecoming aware of it, and
transcendent is experiencingsort of the awe of all that is,
letting it wash over you?
I

SPEAKER_00 (49:24):
think Christianity has the tendency to, as an
institutionalized religion, ithas had a tendency to disconnect
us from our bodies.

SPEAKER_02 (49:38):
Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (49:39):
And to disconnect us from our internal sense of
knowing, which I think, becauseit's a tradition not always
valuing the body, and not alwaysvaluing that Holy Spirit living
inside of us, living inside ofour bodies.

(50:01):
We are filled with the Spirit,that's a physical thing.

SPEAKER_03 (50:06):
And not just filled with the Spirit like once you
become a Christian, but filledwith the Spirit because we are
filled with the breath of life.

SPEAKER_00 (50:14):
Exactly.
And

SPEAKER_03 (50:14):
the breath of life is the Spirit.
Yes,

SPEAKER_00 (50:17):
that's why you recognize the Spirit when you
do.
So because Christianity has atendency of disconnecting us
from our bodies, And it'sdisconnecting us from the
conversation that we are havingwith the divine.
And that's tragic.
I think it's not thatChristianity must do that.
It's just that institutionalizedChristianity has traditionally

(50:40):
done that.
And then it sometimes tells us,well, this is the conversation
that you ought to be having withthe divine and gives you a
script.
But that script doesn't feelright.
That script doesn't feel genuinebecause it's not a conversation.
It's not the conversation thatis happening inside of you.
And so I just really think thatwithin Christianity, we need to

(51:01):
really begin rethinking whatprayer even is and reconnecting
like our life depends on it,reconnecting with our bodies,
reconnecting to thatconversation that's happening,
reconnecting to our intuition.
Because all of those things aredivinely guided.

SPEAKER_03 (51:24):
Yeah, I thought it's such a huge topic, right?
Like how, and it's somethingI've thought about too, like how
our intuitive, instinctual, thataspect of the human person, how
that is very closely connectedwith the spirit.

(51:45):
Even though we think of thosethings as really far away,
because we tend to think ourmind Our cognitive brain is
closer to spirit.

SPEAKER_02 (51:53):
We

SPEAKER_03 (51:54):
don't say this, but we have this hierarchy of
primal, then intellect, thenspirit.
And I don't think that that istrue at all.
I think that that's just atotal, we made that up because
it seemed, I think it's like abit of a fantasy.

SPEAKER_02 (52:10):
It's like

SPEAKER_03 (52:10):
fanfic of human life where we created this idea that
the intellect was closer tospirit.
And is it?
Why?
The spirit that I encounter inthe Hebrew and Christian
scriptures seems to be a lotmore about instinct and like a
deep knowing without being ableto express it or defend it

(52:33):
rationally sometimes,

SPEAKER_00 (52:35):
you know?
Yeah, you think of stories ofpeople in war times who see
something horrific and theirbody instinct is to vomit,
right?
Yeah.
That's a body reaction andthat's a very spiritual thing.

SPEAKER_01 (52:50):
You

SPEAKER_00 (52:51):
react to this violation of the sacred human
being with a bodily reaction.

SPEAKER_03 (52:56):
The sacred human being.
That is critical because prayeris about encountering the
sacred, communing with thesacred.
Meditation is about lookingwithin and you discover the
sacred.
Right?

SPEAKER_00 (53:15):
I wouldn't even make a distinction, though, between
prayer and meditation.
Because I think they're both...
They're both...
So, you know, we talk about,like, present, past, future.
Right?
You were talking about thatearlier.
Really, all that we have is, youknow, the present, the generous
present moment.
That's all that we have.
The present moment followed bythe present moment, preceded by

(53:36):
the present moment.
Like, that's all we have is thispresent moment.
And becoming...
like really aware of thepresence of the divine in this
present moment and what existsin this present moment and
what's required from you in thispresent moment.

(53:57):
That to me is so much of whatthis is about.
Like, are you bringing your trueself to this present moment,
right?
Or did you abandon yourself inthis present moment?

SPEAKER_03 (54:09):
Are you bringing your honest self full-bodied,
multi-layered self to thismoment?
Or are you only letting acertain spectrum of that light
shine through because that'swhat's acceptable?

SPEAKER_00 (54:24):
Exactly.
So that brings the conversationfull circle, doesn't it?
To what I was talking aboutearlier, where when you are able
to just be honest about what isand just bring what is to the
table, life is so much better.
There's so many more colors.
It feels light.
You're not having to keep trackof anything all the time.

(54:46):
You're not having to edityourself and mutilate your own
sacred being by cutting off thepieces that you think are
unacceptable to other people,which, strangely enough, are
often the things that peoplelove most, are the things that
you thought would beunacceptable.

(55:08):
Or they're the things thatactually bring healing.
Like I think about like ourrelationship and my anger.
Like my anger in ourrelationship actually has
brought about more healing thanmy agreeableness ever did.

SPEAKER_03 (55:22):
Things have only gone, things have only moved in
a direction of health andstrengthening and integration
when I've brought like kind ofput the performing aside and
just been received the anger,let's say in that case,
honestly.
Felt it.
and kind of like just let it sitthere and responding with

(55:47):
honesty.
That doesn't mean that it alwaysgets better immediately.

SPEAKER_02 (55:50):
No.

SPEAKER_03 (55:51):
It doesn't.
Sometimes it takes a while,right?
You know, I think you know this,that I have, since we've been
together, I have a realpropensity towards wanting to
fix things immediately.
And I've been willing to behonest and experience a lot of
pain to...
get that done but that's oftenbeen it's been dishonest because

(56:16):
it's been rushed and it hasn'tallowed the full

SPEAKER_00 (56:19):
the full revelation of what is

SPEAKER_03 (56:22):
yeah

SPEAKER_00 (56:22):
right because if you're trying to like truncate
it to get it over with then thefull revelation of what what
actually is in this in you knowhappening between us or whatever
um it doesn't get to be fullyexposed to the light which means
that there's still parts thatare festering

SPEAKER_01 (56:36):
I

SPEAKER_00 (56:37):
feel like this is a whole other podcast that we
could go down that rabbit holefor a long time.
And I would love to at somepoint.

SPEAKER_03 (56:43):
I would love to as well.
And let's do it right now.
Okay.
Well, then the last thing I wantto talk about is we looked at
some of your journey withmeditation and some of mine.
Some people might not know thatwe, for a while, we created a
bunch of meditations where wetried to blend a lot of these
things together, right?

UNKNOWN (57:03):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 (57:04):
Yeah.
So I was experiencing just thispowerful transformation from
meditation and it just felt likethe answer to so many problems
and so many painful things thatI saw people experiencing in
life.
And it just felt like if peoplecould come to love meditation

(57:26):
and experience it, how deep thispractice really can be and have
their views of what prayer evenis, shaped and changed, then
like what a powerful thing thatcould be.
What a powerful healing forcethat could be within, you know,
church communities or for just,you know, not for the whole

(57:47):
community, but for anindividual, even an individual
who's left a church communitybecause the church communities
are too painful.
You still like, just becauseyou've had to leave a community
that is hurting you, you stillcarry so much of so many of the
good things from that communityyou really miss.

(58:07):
And like you still love God andyou still want to pray and all
of these things and you stillrevere these sacred texts,
right?
And so I wanted to createsomething that for people who
are nervous of meditation, ameditation that feels prayerful,

(58:29):
you know, a meditation thatMeditations on the sacred text
of the scripture.
Meditations that we're talkingabout communing with God.
It's a very, very Christian,very prayerful thing to do.
So in that sense, you don't haveto be afraid of it.

(58:49):
This is what we're doing.
We're here to commune with thedivine.
We're here to commune with God.
But then at the same time,something that for those people
who have found Christianity,institutionalized Christianity,
to be something that's reallyhurt them.
Like I know that I, there'ssongs that, you know, you and I
will be in church and somebodywill start playing a song and

(59:10):
I'll just have to leave and goto the bathroom because I like,
my body has a reaction to thepain that I feel hearing that
music.
I just think I would getemotional about that.
But yeah, so like there's still,there's things that are just
really deeply painful fromexperiences that we've had in
church.
And I don't want to trigger thatpain for people.
And so often religious languagetriggers that pain.

(59:35):
And so I thought I wanted tocreate something that was deeply
Christian, but also useslanguage that is surprising and
fresh and hopefully asnon-triggering to people as
possible.
So if I would write down athought as I was creating these
meditations, I would look atwhat I had written and say, is

(59:56):
there any other way that I couldsay that?
Can I just string this beautifulgift of words that we've been
given, can I string wordstogether in a way that it's like
you haven't quite heard it thatway before and said in those
terms so it doesn't trigger somekind of painful memory for
people or like a memory of atime when that phrase was used
against you, weaponized againstyou or something like that.

(01:00:18):
And I also wanted to bring insome just like really ancient
and beautiful traditions likesung scripture.
which a lot of us don't get toexperience very often, but it's
so beautiful.
And words just hit differentlywhen they're tucked into music,
right?
They hit differently.

(01:00:39):
And also there's a sense towhich they're more memorable
sometimes.
The sung scripture has a way oflike sinking into your bones
while at the same time helpingyou to hear things hear things
differently, passages ofscripture that you may be heard
many times before, but you hearthem a little differently.

SPEAKER_03 (01:00:59):
And it also is a counter to the hyper-literalism
that Western Christians havelived in for the last 140 years,
where we have a real inabilityto receive texts poetically.
We our first question is alwayslike, did this really happen?

(01:01:20):
Is this literal?
Like we go through that and it'stiring and exhausting and often
misses the point completely.
And I've noticed that when Ilisten to the meditations you
made and it gets to thescripture part and you sing it,
it doesn't hurt that you're likea trained singer.
That helps.
But it's done in this likereally ancient medieval sounding

(01:01:40):
style.
And it is transcendent.
It's transportative, like ittransports you

SPEAKER_02 (01:01:47):
into

SPEAKER_03 (01:01:49):
a different state and scene, imaginative scene.
And I found that it allowed meto hear passages and stop
obsessing over the literalistview and just receive the poetry
that was there.

SPEAKER_00 (01:02:06):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm glad to hear that youreceive it that way, that you
hear it and experience it thatway.
The beginning of themeditations, too, I included
some just breathing practices,some meditative, practical
breathing practices to helpbring us into this present
moment so that we can just behere, be present, be aware of

(01:02:30):
what is, be aware of what'sgoing on in our bodies and in
our minds, and so that we canbegin to just take note of the
conversations that are present.

SPEAKER_03 (01:02:39):
So that's that incorporating of the mindful
traditions through breathawareness and some of the
mindful techniques, right?
That is woven in to themeditations.
The other thing that's woven inis one of the sort of
therapeutic modalities that'sbeen really powerful for both of
us is IFS, internal familysystems.

(01:03:02):
And we wrote reflections,meditative reflections, which
are also in these meditations.

SPEAKER_00 (01:03:07):
That was the joint part of this project.
That was the joint

SPEAKER_03 (01:03:09):
part.
I was part of this.
So reflections, like kind oflike deeply, again, Christian
reflections or putting at leastputting the Christian
contemplative tradition andscripture into conversation with
IFS, Internal Family SystemsTherapy.

(01:03:31):
And so that's another big aspectof these.
And what we've come up with wasif you know anything about IFS
is IFS talks a lot about thevarious parts that a human is
composed of, like that a personis almost a community.
of parts.

SPEAKER_00 (01:03:46):
Yeah, I feel like it's worth saying like Richard
Schwartz is a psychotherapistand he was counseling families.
That was what he did.
And he would notice that attimes in individual sessions
with individuals, he would justbe asking them questions and the
way that they were speaking,kind of showed that there was
some kind of internalconversation happening.
There's a part of me that saysthis and a part of me that says

(01:04:08):
this.
And he started noticing thatthey interacted, the parts
within a person were interactingvery much in the way that the
people in a family wouldinteract when they were in
family sessions.
And so he started developingthis theory of parts therapy,
right?
Where a person is made of manyparts.
But over his time working withthat modality parts therapy.

(01:04:32):
He kind of came to a place withmany of his clients where they
would be talking throughsomething and he'd be like, you
know, what part is saying this?
And they would be able toidentify what part of them is
speaking and what part is sayingthat.
And sometimes he would ask himwhat part is speaking now?
And they would say, oh, that oneisn't a part.
That one's just me.
So he started noting down thecharacteristics of like what

(01:04:55):
characteristics were presentwhen the people would say, oh,
that one's just me.
And so he came up with eightcharacteristics of the true
self.
So parts in internal familysystems therapy, the goal is to
be self-led.
So you listen to thecongregation of parts that are
within you, but you want theself to be leading.

SPEAKER_03 (01:05:14):
So Richard Schwartz, the founder of IFS therapy,
noticed that when people werespeaking from their true self,
they always seemed to displaythese eight characteristics.

SPEAKER_00 (01:05:30):
Calm, clear, connected, compassionate,
confident, courageous, creative,and curious.
So they're the eight C's.
So in our meditation, I like tomeditate usually in the morning,
sometimes in the evening.
But I find that those are themost powerful times of day to

(01:05:51):
meditate.
in our IFS-inspired meditationseries.
We actually created itoriginally for an app because we
were, we created an app becausewe thought that would be the
best way to help people andserve people because people do
meditation on apps.
But we realized we're just nottechy, we're just not really

(01:06:14):
interested in all of the upkeepthat it takes to actually run an
app, but we loved creating themeditations.
So this series we created was,to help people reconnect with
that true self that is the selfthat we want to be led by.
So there's actually a total of10 morning meditations, 10

(01:06:35):
evening meditations, and theyencompass the eight Cs of the
IFS true self.

SPEAKER_03 (01:06:43):
So there's 10 morning meditations.
Eight of those meditations areon one of the aspects of the
true self.
There's 10 evening meditations,which are a little shorter.
There's eight of those focus onthe eight Cs of the true self or

(01:07:03):
those aspects of the true self.
along with an introduction and aconclusion one for each.

SPEAKER_00 (01:07:08):
Yeah.
And each one of them has abinaural beat that underlays the
whole thing.
So again, it's using bilateralstimulation to help your mind
actually create new neuralpathways so that you actually
are able to heal quite a bitfaster.
So the way I like to use them isif I wake up and I know that
today I'm going to have to havea really hard conversation, then

(01:07:31):
so I choose the courageousmeditation in the morning.
And then that would just get meprimed for being in my true
self, having to go into thisconversation, being like letting
that courageous part of my trueself lead.
Or maybe I go to bed and I'mfeeling really anxious.
And so I might choose the calmmeditation to just help me

(01:07:54):
release fear and just rememberthat that process piece of me
that is actually the true selfthat is calm, doesn't have to
listen to all the other voicesright now as I'm going to sleep.
They might have legitimateconcerns, but this true self,
this true self can lead incalmness so that I can get a
good sleep so that tomorrow wecan tackle tomorrow's problems.

SPEAKER_03 (01:08:14):
And maybe one of the things that we bring to this,
these IFS inspired meditationsis this awareness that becoming
aware of of our close intimatecommunion with the creator is a
part of being a fully realizedhuman self, is being in clear

(01:08:36):
communion with the spirit.
And so these meditations, theyfeature IFS inspired
reflections, but they alsofeature mindful breath work that
is very infused with like thespirit, the spirit as breath.
as well as the bilateralstimulation that comes from

(01:08:58):
binaural beats.
So that's kind of like creatinga nourishing meditative
environment, sonic environment,along with sung scripture.
And all those things are inevery meditation.

SPEAKER_00 (01:09:12):
And one element that we haven't talked at all about,
which is there's a lot of space.

SPEAKER_03 (01:09:16):
A lot of space.

SPEAKER_00 (01:09:17):
A lot of just like spaciousness where there's
nothing happening except thebinaural beats.
So you're able to just reallytake time to check in and see
what is in this present momentand what is the spirit saying to
you in this moment.
Because I do think that beingself-led is being spirit-led,

(01:09:37):
right?
The self and the way thatSchwartz talks about it, I
believe that that is spirit-led.
That's the spirit within us.

SPEAKER_03 (01:09:42):
Especially because the eight Cs and the fruit of
the spirit are kind of the same.
Unintentionally, I think.
I think Schwartz was just anobservant person who is noticing
the patterns and the fruit.
When the spirit is alwayspresent, but when the spirit is
allowed to grow, when we're nothiding, when we're not trapping

(01:10:07):
ourselves in shame and hidingwho we really are or only
letting certain pieces out, Ithink when we do that, the
growth can happen freely.
Just like if you put plantsunderneath a tree You shield
them and hide them in thebasement.
They'll keep growing for a whilein sort of a mutated form,

(01:10:28):
anemic form.
But eventually they'll get moldyand it'll just get worse and
worse.
So it's like in the open air, inthe open light, like real
healthy growth can happen.

SPEAKER_00 (01:10:42):
Yeah.
So kind of recently, just maybetwo weeks ago, like I said, we
had an app for a while.
We closed that down because wejust couldn't– We just couldn't
find the passion.
Running an

SPEAKER_03 (01:10:54):
app just wasn't working for us.

SPEAKER_00 (01:10:56):
Running an app is not what we are made to do.
But we had created this thing.
And for the last, since we shutit down, I can't remember
exactly when that was, but we'vehad all of these things that I
still really believe in.
And I think that we had thisresource that we wanted to share

(01:11:16):
with people, but the app formatwas just not working.
So it was just two weeks ago.
All of a sudden I was like, Weneed to just make these
available for people

SPEAKER_02 (01:11:24):
so

SPEAKER_00 (01:11:25):
that if and when they want them, they're there.
We've made them.
We put so much care andattention and so much prayerful,
spirit-led energy into makingthese.
And we're keeping them frompeople just by not having them
available.
And so I remember texting Bradand saying, we need to just

(01:11:46):
create a site and make themavailable for people.

SPEAKER_03 (01:11:50):
And that's what we did.
So they're called Whole andHoly, the Whole and Holy
Meditation Series, 20IFS-inspired Christian
meditations.
So like we said, there's 10morning, 10 evening.
The morning ones are about 20minutes apiece.
The evenings are about 15.

(01:12:10):
And if you want to purchase theentire library of these IFS
meditations, you can do that.
If you head over to my site,bradleymella.com slash
meditation.
So that'sB-R-A-D-L-E-Y-M-E-L-L-E.com
slash meditation.
And you can get them there andthen you can download all of

(01:12:33):
them in one go.

SPEAKER_00 (01:12:35):
A 20 bundle, 20 meditation bundle.

SPEAKER_03 (01:12:38):
20 meditation bundle.
It's all you need.

SPEAKER_00 (01:12:40):
That's what I was about to say.
It's really all you need.
And because it hits so many oflife's moments, it addresses so
many of the things that we...
that we feel, that we encounter.
So it runs the gamut.

SPEAKER_03 (01:12:53):
It does.

SPEAKER_00 (01:12:54):
In those 20 meditations.

SPEAKER_03 (01:12:56):
Yeah, so if you're interested in what we've been
talking about, head over tobradleymallow.com slash
meditation.
Or if you want just to talk morewith us, you're always welcome
to email me at freestyletheologyat gmail.com or follow me,
freestyletheology, on Instagram,where I talk about this kind of

(01:13:17):
stuff often.
in addition to a lot of otherthings about church history.

SPEAKER_00 (01:13:21):
And we've struggled a lot, I feel like, over the
course of this conversation,struggled a lot with how to say
it and how to speak about it.
At least I know I have.
And there's so much more to say.
So I would just encourage you,if you have any questions or
anything that you, any questionsthat come up or clarifications
of things you're wondering, liketo send Brad an email because we

(01:13:44):
can definitely do a follow-upconversation on this because we
could talk about this for hoursand hours and hours.
And just knowing where yourquestions are at, that helps us
to know how to direct ourconversations too.

SPEAKER_03 (01:13:58):
Yeah, I felt like we were on this highway trying to
go really fast.

SPEAKER_02 (01:14:01):
And

SPEAKER_03 (01:14:01):
there was all these exits to amazing conversational
places that we could have taken.
And I'd actually like to takesome of them.
Well, thankfully, you live in myroom.
so i can probably get you on thepodcast pretty easily

SPEAKER_00 (01:14:19):
yeah we can probably just go down to the basement any
evening and record anotherconversation because that's what
we do in the evenings anyway

SPEAKER_03 (01:14:26):
yeah we talk might as well push record

SPEAKER_00 (01:14:28):
yeah

SPEAKER_03 (01:14:28):
well it's been good having you here again and um

SPEAKER_00 (01:14:32):
thanks for having me on the program

SPEAKER_03 (01:14:34):
you're welcome so