When Religion Becomes Trauma: Dr. Moe's Journey to Healing w/ Dr. Maurice Turmel | EP 444 - Grief 2 Growth

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Close your eyes and imagine what if the things in
life that cause us the greatestpain, the things that bring us
grief, are challenges,challenges designed to help us
grow to ultimately become whatwe were always meant to be.
We feel like we've been buried,but what if, like a seed, we've

(00:21):
been planted and, having beenplanted, we grow to become a
mighty tree?
Now open your eyes.
Open your eyes to this way ofviewing life.
Come with me as we explore yourtrue, infinite, eternal nature.
This is Grief to Growth, and Iam your host, brian Smith.

(00:42):
Hey there, I'm Brian.
Host Brian Smith.
Today's episode is a powerfulone, and it's one that's deeply
personal for me.

(01:03):
I'm honored to welcome DrMaurice Turmel, affectionately
known as Dr Mo.
Dr Mo is a seasoned spiritualpsychologist, an acclaimed
author and a performingsongwriter whose path through
trauma, healing and spiritualawakening offers a light to
those navigating their own darknights of the soul.
With a PhD in counselingpsychology and over 25 years in

(01:25):
clinical practice, dr Mo hasspent his life helping people
heal emotionally and spiritually.
But his expertise isn't justacademic it's actually lived.
He grew up with emotionaltrauma, religious repression and
deep self-doubt.
Yet he broke free from thechains of early conditioning and
emerged with a life-affirmingtruth.
We are spiritual beings on ahuman journey.

(01:46):
In today's conversation we'regoing to explore how religion
for some, can become a form ofinstitutionalized trauma and how
to begin untangling thatconditioning.
We're going to talk about whatmakes religious trauma unique
and how to heal from it.
We'll talk about the momentthat Dr Mo broke the spell and
reclaimed his inner authority.
We'll talk about how to shiftfrom guilt and fear into love

(02:09):
and empowerment and even afterdecades of emotional repression,
and how music and creativitybecame a spiritual lifeline in
Dr Mo's personal journey.
We'll talk about his latestbooks, including Breaking the
Spell of Religion and Healingthe Trauma and when Angels Call,
coping with Grief and Loss, andhow his work can guide others

(02:29):
on their own healing andawakening paths.
So if you've ever struggledwith breaking free from harmful
beliefs or if you're seeking away forward after spiritual or
emotional trauma, this episodeis for you.
And remember, after the episode, the conversation doesn't end
here.
Join me at grief to growthcomslash community to carry on the
conversation there and, withthat, like to welcome Dr Mo to

(02:52):
grief to growth.

Speaker 2 (02:54):
Hi, Brian, and hi to all your listeners and yeah,
yeah great, it's great to behere.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
It's great to have you here.
We were starting to talk alittle bit before we got started
.
We do have this thing in common.
Anybody that's listened to mefor any amount of time knows my
background and I share a littlebit of what I went through.
But I want to talk about whatyou went through in terms of
your religious upbringing orwhatever it was that started you
on this journey.

Speaker 2 (03:33):
Well, I was born into a typical Catholic family and,
in my case, being up here inCanada, it just so happens that
I also have a French-Canadianbackground.
But it's Catholicism, no matterwhat language we speak, has its
application and its generalformats.
And, as you and I were sharingearlier, before you started this
session, all those typicalpractices that you got in

(03:54):
childhood I got as well, youknow, in terms of the
conditioning towards yourparticular religion.
Mine was obviously conditioningtowards the Catholic view of
life and my education was alsooverseen by nuns, who were not
only instructors, you know, inthe typical ABCs and mathematics

(04:18):
of life, but you got yourcatechism and your rote
learnings.
You know that you had topractice on a regular basis and
in Catholicism, basically,you're defined as a sinner and
shame and guilt are prettypowerful tools that are used on
you to condition you towardstheir definitions, the church's

(04:42):
definitions of who and whatyou're supposed to be.
And it becomes not that youknow it when you're a child,
because you'll recall in yourown childhood you don't have
references to guide you alongand say, hey, this isn't right
or things may not feel right,but if your parents were
indoctrinated into this system,if your parents were

(05:04):
indoctrinated into this systemand they're your reference point
at home, then there's no one tothrow a kink or a monkey wrench
into things here and say hey,no, no, this doesn't make sense.

(05:25):
So what has to happen and I'mgoing to guess it happened for
you because it happened for methere's an awakening at some
point in your life and youryounger adult life.
But the first thing thathappens is when you start
self-reflecting.
Then you start asking thosequestions like why doesn't this
feel right?
Or you know what's wrong withthis, or how come there's so
many contradictions in thisso-called, this religion that

(05:47):
I'm supposed to be part of?
And why is it that I have to beperfect?
And how the heck am I supposedto be perfect?
You know, if I make theslightest mistake, then I failed
, you know, and on and on itgoes, and the latter that they
present to you is well, then youcan seek redemption, and that
means praying and that meanslighting candles and that means

(06:09):
putting money into the kitty.
Don't worry, we'll get you toheaven.
We got the keys, but you haveto be perfect and it goes, and
that's my overview of my ownupbringing.
What happened for me?
It was I was married very youngthe first time and within five

(06:30):
years it wasn't working, and mywife and I at the time we had
two children, two daughters,which are beautiful young women
today and we both loved them,and her and I are not friends,
but we're okay with each otherbecause life was so different.
But, for me.
It sent me reeling and it sentme into an environment where I

(06:54):
met a medical doctor who wasinto psychology and he
introduced me to books andmaterials on psychology, and
that opened the door for me tostart questioning things, and
and and that's when I like touse that term self-reflection,

(07:14):
when we start to look atourselves and we get and then
those early stages, we get help.
You know, we get to bounceideas and thoughts and concerns
and questions off of otherpeople, people who are there in
front of us with levels of skilland education that you know, we
respect and we can admire, andthey start saying things to us

(07:38):
that make sense.
And here's another thing thatclicks in is when something
makes sense, it feels right.
And when things start to feelright, it's like our heart
starts to vibrate and say, ooh,I got to understand more of this
, I've got to find more of this.
And so we keep seeking and wetalk to these people who are

(08:02):
giving us information, andthey're not trying to program us
, they're just saying, well, youknow, look at this, read this
book, look at that, and if youhave questions, come back and
talk to me, and all of a suddenwe have permission to examine
things that were drilled into usand you know, we can use more
severe terms like brainwashingor, at the very least,

(08:25):
indoctrination and we can startto question those things and we
can start to develop this newinner map that says it's a good
thing to start listening to ourown heart.
Our heart is telling us things,our feelings are telling us

(08:46):
things.
Even though the church told usor told me anyway, and maybe you
had this experience too youcan't trust your feelings
because everything you need toknow is in a book and read this
here and boom, boom, boom, right.
So one of the earliest andworst things done to us as
children is we're taught not totrust ourselves and not to trust

(09:10):
our own feelings.

Speaker 1 (09:11):
Yes, yes, there's a verse, I think it's in Jeremiah,
that says the heart is wickedabove all things, or something
like that.
And they tell you whatever youdo, don't listen to your heart.

Speaker 2 (09:23):
There you go, and here's one that I like to throw
back at them.
Brian Jesus said the kingdom iswithin.
All right and for me as apsychologist and before I became
a psychologist, that resonatedfor me and that is one of the
things, the key things, thatallowed me to start to trust my

(09:46):
own feelings.

Speaker 1 (09:47):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (09:50):
For me that was the most important relic that I
could take from that.
And you know, let go of all theother stuff that came from the
appliers of the religion, whichare not spokespersons, you know,
unless they have video of Jesusof Nazareth saying certain
things to us, or a video of Himwalking on water, then you know

(10:12):
you might have made it up oryou're certainly exaggerating,
and I don't know if you havethis in your Pentecostal system,
but apparently with Catholicismyou show up in the crib, in the
needle-nail ward, and you gotoriginal sin.
You know.
Yeah, there's your start inlife.

Speaker 1 (10:32):
Let's talk about that experience of being a child and
going through this.
You know, as you said, theoriginal sin thing and you know,
I remember being like afive-year-old kid, maybe eight,
maybe I was a little older thanfive and they're like well,
you're born in sin because Adamsinned.
You sinned, therefore yousinned, and therefore God he

(10:53):
loves you but he can't stand you.
And you know, as you saidearlier, when your parents take
you to this place, where thenuns, or in my case, the Sunday
school teachers, are telling youthis, as a child, you have no
defense and even though itdoesn't feel right, you're like
well, it must be true.

Speaker 2 (11:12):
Yeah, you're told it's true and, as you said, it's
underlined by your own parents'faith and their indoctrination.
And if somebody said that wordto you when you're eight years
old, you're not going to knowwhat that means.
This is your reality, this ishow my family functions and my
family goes to this church andthis is the kind of instruction

(11:35):
they got and now I'm getting,and you don't have the
wherewithal yet and theself-reflective ability yet,
because that only comes later inlife, as you mature.
You don't have those tools, soyou go along, but at some level
even you might not have wordsfor it something doesn't feel

(11:56):
right, something just doesn'tfeel right, and it's later on
that you know, when you'recapable of reflecting and you're
getting guidance for thatthrough a book or through
someone you value about grief togrowth For me.
That was when the fire ofpersonal growth lit up like an

(12:30):
explosion, because all of asudden, so, from book to book
and from specialist tospecialist, as I went through
things, it's just like this bigpath opened up in front of me
and I followed it.
And there were some wrong turns, there were some bad forks in
the road, but most of the pathled to something valuable which

(12:54):
led to something else valuable,which led to something else, and
it just grew and it grew and itgrew.
And somewhere along the earlystages of that path I said I
want to be a psychologist.
I didn't look it up in a book,I didn't look like a holistic
policeman, this person, thisperson, lawyer, I didn't look it

(13:17):
up, it just came from my heart,it came from inside.
This is what I want to do, thismakes sense to me and that was
a very big turning point for meyeah.

Speaker 1 (13:29):
I'm thinking that it was for you yeah, so in your
experience, um, when you were achild and you're, as you're,
going through this, when did yourealize there was something
wrong, that it just didn't feelright to you?

Speaker 2 (13:44):
probably Probably early on, and not in the sense
that I actually thought about it, but my father was prone to
violence and I was the eldestand I got the worst of that.
And so how can areligious-oriented person go off

(14:07):
the rails like he did a fewtimes with myself and my sisters
and the only remedy was that,you know.
So I would talk to a teacherabout it or I would talk to my
mother about it.
My mother knew there wassomething going on there and at
that age I had no information orwherewithal to understand that.

(14:29):
He grew up in a violent homethat was also surrounded with
religion.
So, like we've already seen, youhave no access points for
alternative ideas.
You have no access points foralternative ideas not until
later in life when you're moreon your own and you can do the
kind of self-explorations thatyou've obviously done, to be

(14:53):
interested in what you do and todevelop it into a podcast so
that you provide a venue forpeople to come and talk about
stuff and come and share theirpain and their difficulties.
You know there's a long trailthat led to where Brian sits
today.
There's a long trail to where Isit today.
And then you and I are meetingat this point and we're talking

(15:16):
about hey, my trail was verymuch like yours, except, you
know, I'm French-Canadian andda-da-da-da-da-da, but my
religion did the same kinds ofthings to me as yours did to you
.

Speaker 1 (15:28):
It's the same thing.
And you know, for me I thoughtwhen I was younger, like what's
wrong with me?
You know why is this workingfor other people but it's not
working for me?
I just I couldn't accept thefact that.
You know again, I was born asinner.
God only loved me because hekilled Jesus for me.

(15:48):
So I'm like I love Jesus but Idon't want anything to do with
this guy.
But for some people it doesn'tseem to bother them.

Speaker 2 (16:11):
Have you figured out why some people can go along
with this for so long and itjust seems to be okay?
In most religions the systemsare closed, so you can't go
banging at the doors or openingcracks.
There's a certain amount ofcomfort and predictability in

(16:31):
being told what to do and beingtold that this is how life is
now thinking and feeling.
Persons at some point in theirlife are going to start
questioning things.
That's what's happened to you,that's what's happened to me.
But there are people who comeinto your religion and come into
the one I was born into asadults, and what they're there

(16:52):
for and yeah, it's puzzlingright.
Yeah, but you know what they'rethere for, brian is the comfort
of a place.
It's.
It's because religion is nowlike a super parent.
They'll tell you what to do.
They'll tell you what to think.
They'll scold you when you makemistakes.
They'll reward you in somefashion when you do something

(17:15):
that they say you need to do.
It's got a predictability to it.
It's got a familiarity to it.
It's a closed system.
Every cult is and mostreligions are cults, even though
the big ones that you and Iknow and grew up in.
Typically, when they talk aboutcults, they talk about the

(17:39):
Moonies and these people atairports who are dancing and
collecting money for whatever.
The fact is that most religions, these restrictive religions,
they're cults, but that'scomfortable for some people and
they'll stay there.
You have to actively and maybenot consciously, but actively

(18:03):
submerge your own feelings.
Something rises up and says,hey, this doesn't feel right.
Oh, but the teacher said this,or the Sunday school teacher
said that, or mom said this, ordad said that, and then it goes
back down.
So we're already repressingstuff in those early days, brian
, and we're doing it notconsciously.

(18:25):
We're doing it because we needto survive in this environment
that we're in, and so this ishow it works here.
So at those stages of our lifewe comply.
Later on, when we are able toquestion and look at things from
a different perspective, thatchanges, and then we get

(18:47):
condemned for daring tochallenge that right.

Speaker 1 (18:51):
Yes, yes, we get condemned.

Speaker 2 (18:53):
You know, in my former church there's
excommunication.
There may be something similarin what you grew up in, but what
keeps people there to answerthat question is there's a
certain comfort to it,predictability to it, and they
don't want to have to think orfeel beyond what they're

(19:13):
familiar with.
So they comply.

Speaker 1 (19:16):
Yeah, I know you refer to religion as
institutionalized pathology andwe've also thrown around the c
word here, the the cult wordword.
Yeah, and I remember when I wascoming out and I found this guy
named martin zender who was achristian and he wrote a book
how to quit church withoutquitting god and I just and I
was like you were saying so, Iwas just grabbing everything I

(19:37):
find at the time and I rememberthere's a chapter and he listed
20 traits of a cult and then hecompared this to the traits of
the church and it was like it'sa cult.
It was pretty clear.
So when you refer to religionas institutionalized pathology,
what do you mean when you usethat term?

Speaker 2 (19:58):
Well, pathology, Brian, is anything that harms
you.
So back in the 80s, and there'sa very brave woman on television
named Oprah Winfrey and shebrought on experts in all kinds
of areas and she wasinstrumental in opening the

(20:21):
doors to people understandingthe dynamics of dysfunctional
families, starting withunderstanding the dynamics of a
family where one or more of theparents, but usually one, was a
raging alcoholic, an alcoholic,so dysfunctional family, a whole

(20:45):
group of people onunderstanding these
dysfunctional family dynamics.
Well, when that door opened andOprah had these guests on her
show, there were great books toread and I read most of them,
most from the guests that shepresented, and it was amazing.

Speaker 1 (21:03):
most from the guests that you presented and it was
amazing.

Speaker 2 (21:05):
Well, in the last 10, 15 years, as I was pulling my
book together, I realized thesynchronicity between
understanding dysfunctionalfamily dynamics and
dysfunctional religions and samelevels of pathology.
Conditioning right, it's thisway, this way, this way.

(21:25):
That's the way it is.
And, as you said, don't trustyour feelings, don't trust your
heart, Only trust what we say.
It's written in scripture, it'setched in stone, so this is
what you can believe and it'sthat they deliver that strict

(21:45):
edict to you.
This is how the world works.
Then you read this book how toQuit Religion, but Not God.
That's beautiful, because youdon't give up spirituality to
walk away from religion.
As a matter of fact, yourspirituality takes a much deeper

(22:09):
turn now, because now themessage now is I have to trust
myself, I have to trust mydeepest self, I have to trust
it's not just have to, it's okayto trust my own feelings.
And as we go through theselayers, brian, the layers of

(22:33):
indoctrination, and we take oneaway and then another one and
another one, we get closer andcloser and deeper and deeper
into our own heart, deeper anddeeper into our own heart, and
our feelings start to revealthis beautiful, majestic,
amazing world.
And I don't know if thishappens for you, but when I walk
in nature now I talk to thetrees, I just say good morning,

(22:59):
you know, and I touch thembecause I can feel the
vibrations coming from them andthey're just waving in the wind,
you know they're beautiful.
Or flowers and the bugs and thebutterflies and the bees you
know floating about, and thebest place to go is a playground
and watch little kids yellingand screaming and having a ball.
They're unhindered, right,they're unhindered, and they're

(23:22):
just expressing that beautifulinner nature.
Sure, they make mistakes, butmistakes can be corrected.
When you define someone asdefective, how does a child
correct that hammer that knocksthem down and keeps them trapped

(23:44):
in that unhealthy, traumatizingsituation?
And that's it's my point ofview with religion is they have
committed crimes againsthumanity in terms of hammering
away at our hearts, our feelingnature, which needs guidance, of

(24:11):
course, needs nurturing, ofcourse, and behavior needs
guidance, of course.
Correcting behavior andteaching kids that they can
trust their feelings is fardifferent than defining
everything as negative andbroken and defining the person
as defective.
That's a crime against humanity.

Speaker 1 (24:32):
I agree and you know the thing is, as I mentioned to
you earlier, my grandfather wasthe pastor of my church and my
parents, and you know and I knowthese people all had good
intentions and I don't holdanything against them in terms
of that.
But looking at it now andlooking at what people are

(24:52):
teaching to children in the nameof religion, it's child abuse.
And when you were speakingabout your father being a
violent man and someone mightsay, well, how could someone who
follows God be a violent man?
Look at the guy they told usabout.
I mean, this is a guy who wouldliterally torment you forever
just for being the way that youwere born.

(25:14):
So why wouldn't you be aviolent person?

Speaker 2 (25:17):
Yeah, yeah, good point, good point.
That's a you know.
You know who George Carlin is.

Speaker 1 (25:27):
Oh yeah.

Speaker 2 (25:28):
George Carlin.
All right, he was raisedCatholic.
He goes through that long listof things that you've already
cited.
You know, just one after theother, all the definitions of
how you're defective, and thenthe punchline is but God loves
you.

Speaker 1 (25:42):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (25:43):
How can that be One of the things that we need to
understand in personal growthand you must be getting it now
if you're trusting your heart.
We have to love ourselves.

Speaker 1 (25:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (25:57):
So the first step I call this my three-step system
Self-reflection opens the door.
It leads to self-acceptance.
All right, now I'm okay, andnow you're in that mode of well,
I want to learn more and absorbmore and try more.

(26:18):
And self-acceptance leads toself-love touching your heart.
Look, buddy, we gotta loveourselves, otherwise we can't.
And you used these termsearlier, these questions why am
I here?
Who am I and why am I here?
You use those, I use those verysame phrases who am I and why

(26:39):
am I here?
Well, your heart will tell youwhy you're here.
Home is where the heart is andthat's where I live Inside my
sorrows.
I have learned to forgive.
I have learned to love again.
I am happy.
No more chagrin.
That's one of my song lyrics.

Speaker 1 (26:56):
I love that yeah.

Speaker 2 (26:58):
Thank you, it's just beautiful.
The heart is the biggest andmost important part of us, and
even a guy named Albert Einsteinyou might be familiar with that
name said love is the mostpowerful force in the universe.
Well, when we feel it, we canfeel how powerful that is, and

(27:22):
sometimes it really shakes us aswe dig down deeper and uncover,
remove the rubble and theshambles of what we were
indoctrinated with.
We get into those deeper layersof feeling and love, not just
for ourselves, becausenarcissists don't love
themselves.
Narcissists are people hidingbehind a whole plethora of

(27:46):
defense mechanisms.
They are, but self-loveexcludes no one.
In the healthiest sense itexcludes no one.
Why it's okay.
I want my children to lovethemselves.
I'm going to model that forthem.
We're going to correct behavior, but behavior is not a

(28:07):
definition of who they are.
It's an act that needs.
We want them to trust theirhearts because the natural
goodness is there and they'relike.
You see kids playing with petsand with bugs and whatever you

(28:29):
know.
They're adorable in the waythey care and the way they emote
and show their feelings.
It's beautiful.
If that's our naturalinclination, don't we want to
favor that?
Don't we want to allow that togrow and let them become whoever
they are, whatever they'remeant to be, including loving

(28:49):
and accepting themselves alongthe way, because they're only
going to have more success interms of what they're going to
bring to life, in terms of theirgifts, in terms of their
uniqueness, in terms ofanswering their question of who
am I and why am I here.
You can trust your heart my son, my daughter and your heart
will tell you who you are andwhy you're here.

Speaker 1 (29:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (29:13):
And that's your guidance.

Speaker 1 (29:15):
So for you you mentioned meeting someone who
was a psychologist and youmentioned your marriage when you
were young.
Was there something inparticular that said where you
just said, okay, I can't do thisanymore.
Was there like a breaking pointfor you?

Speaker 2 (29:30):
Yeah, there was the first book that I got introduced
to and you may or may not befamiliar with it because this
goes back to the early 70s, butit was called I'm Okay, You're
Okay.
It's that simple, and theauthor's name is Richard Harris,
and he explained that I'm okay,you're okay simply means I'm a
good person, you're a goodperson, you respect me, I

(29:55):
respect you, I respect myself.
And then he used the othercombinations of it, and we can
call them dysfunctionalcombinations of it.
I'm okay, you're not okay.
In other words, I'm aself-centered narcissist who
thinks I'm better than everybodyand you're a loser.

(30:16):
And we know and we hear people,including people in politics,
who use those phrases they'relosers, they're losers,
da-da-da-da-da.
So I'm not okay, you're notokay.
Well, that means we're allscrewed up, that means we're all
losers right.
And yeah and I'm not okay,you're okay means I'm a loser

(30:38):
and you're okay and kind of thatkind of defines the way we come
out of our religion.
If our teachers and our nunsand these people who are
indoctrinating us, if they'reokay, then why do I feel bad
about this?
So that was a door opener, butso was.

(31:04):
I can't think of his name.
Anyway, he was probably aminister of some sorts, but his
book was called the Power ofPositive Thinking.

Speaker 1 (31:09):
Oh, Norman Vincent Peale.

Speaker 2 (31:11):
Norman Vincent Peale.
I'm pushing 80 now, so mymemory isn't as—recalling stuff
like that, but what a powerhousemessage that delivered the
power of positive thinking.
But you can't think positivelyif you're being programmed to
think of yourself as a sinnerand to think of yourself as
defective in the eyes of thisinstitution that your parents

(31:34):
belong to and you belong to,that your parents belong to and
you belong to.
So between that, those were theearly stirrings that led to,
and there was mountains of booksthat came out in the 70s and
some very famous psychologistscoming out of the US, and in my
profession one of the top oneswas Carl Rogers, and Carl Rogers

(31:56):
is what, in my profession, wecall the father of
client-centered therapy.
He developed an approach tobasically listening to people.
Listening to people, which isthe same thing you do for
someone who's in pain, but it'sthe same thing you do for
someone who is grieving the lossof a loved one.
Listening to them and creatingan environment where they can

(32:21):
talk about what they're feeling.
People who are grieving,they're hurting.
They need to talk about that,to express those feelings.
There's lots of tools that youcan use, whether it's about
grieving the loss of a loved oneor grieving your own childhood
and that poor little kid thatyou were, who was lost in that

(32:42):
morass of all those do's anddon'ts that were driving him
crazy at that time.
Well, now he, she, needs you,the adult, you, to look back
down, look back on them.
Not down on them, but look backon them and say, hey, I know
what you've been through, I mean, you know what you lived it.

(33:03):
But I, the adult me, know whatyou, the child, me, have been
through and we're listening, I'mlistening, tell me what you're
feeling and if you need to cry,let's cry.
If you need to scream becauseyou're angry, scream.
You know, get the feelings out,you know, and that's the safest

(33:26):
thing to do with a safe personor a safe environment.
Or you can use tools likejournaling, talking to a friend,
joining a group.
There's grief groups for allkinds of things.
There's personal growth groups.
Well, you're talking aboutgrief and growth.
They go together.
Grieving a lost childhood isnot much different than grieving
the loss of a loved one.

Speaker 1 (33:44):
I want to emphasize what you just said there,
because when I was going throughyou know my deconstruction
phase and everything I rememberI was in my mid-30s and I was
like I was on antidepressants.
I was having panic attacks allthe time and I was like I was on
antidepressants, I was havingpanic attacks all the time and I
was like, okay, there'ssomething, I've got to figure
out what this is.
And I had enough intuition, Iguess, to say I'm going to go to

(34:08):
a counselor, but it has to be aChristian counselor.
So I went to a Christiancounselor and she helped me to
understand that I had to grievefor that child and I thought it
was nonsense at the time.
I'm like, what are you talkingabout inner child?
And I got what I needed.
And she's like, well, did youget what you needed?
I'm like, yeah, I was fed, Iwas clothed, I was taken to

(34:31):
Sunday school.
But I realized that wassomething really important for
me to figure out because I wastraumatized.
And again, I'm not blaming my.
I realized that was somethingreally important for me to
figure out because I wastraumatized.
And again, I'm not blaming myparents or even my Sunday school
teachers.
They were doing the best theycould, but for me.
I just felt like, why is God soangry at me?
You know what did I do?

(34:52):
And I felt like I would neverbe good enough, and that lasted
until I was in my mid-30s.

Speaker 2 (34:58):
Yeah, that's a big load to carry.
And you see how what you justdescribed is how all that
conditioning worked.
I mean, you were still in yourmind, fighting with yourself,
because the definitions you'vebeen given was, you know,
suggested that God's angry atyou for something.
So well, what have I done wrong?

(35:18):
And I don't know if you havethe same terminology as we had
with original sin, but if you'reborn defective, then what
possible chance do you have tohave a decent, fulfilling life
or to make a positivecontribution to mankind, because

(35:42):
you're already broken.
How did you get broken?
Well, you can't figure that out, because you never were broken.
You were just conditioned tobelieve by the same system that
indoctrinated your parents, bythe same system that
indoctrinated your parents, bythe same system that
indoctrinated your parents'parents and all the way back, by
the same systems that basicallyare in the service of keeping

(36:07):
those institutions afloat andkeeping them prominent on the
landscape where they have majorinfluence in our lives.
You know how many directivescome from the Vatican, and now
that you've got an American Popefrom Chicago who is sitting in
that chair, now you know all ofthese things, but the foundation

(36:31):
upon which those things arebuilt, the renunciations, the
references to scripture and thisand that Show me the videos,
show me the origins, show mewhen Christ said this or when
God said you know you'redefective and I am pissed off

(36:51):
with you.
No, no, no, no.
Here's the punchline, and youknow this already, but if not,
you'll get it.
We are God.
That is what we're getting intouch with.
That is our originalspirituality.
We are spiritual, and so thatbook you read how to break free

(37:14):
of religion but still be friendswith God.
It's a beautiful thing.
There's someone who opened thedoor for you.
You read that.
That opened the door for youand for me.
Same thing happened, but just adifferent array of books.
But back in my mind see a lotof people who break free of

(37:38):
religion and there's books likethis, and there's one by his
name is Dr Darryl Ray and it'scalled the God Virus.
He's an atheist, so you haveatheists or agnostics.
There's something lost there.
Then all we are is this humanform inside this body with a

(38:06):
very strict due date, like afiery date, right.
That's got to come up and thenwe're gone.
I didn't have evidence at thetime, but I always thought
there's got to be more to thisthan just me being in this body.
And if that's the case, why amI going through these particular

(38:29):
life lessons?
Why are these particularchallenges coming?
Well, at this point and you mayagree with me you and I have
walked the path to this pointwhere we learned with others,

(38:50):
because they're doing or they'recoming, they're coming up
against the same things you cameup with years ago, when, when,
when, things broke open for youthe same thing with me yeah
people need our experience andand, and we're benefiting from
people ahead of us who offeredus their experience.
Right, you see the pattern there, right?

(39:11):
And so we could be upset aboutwhy we were born into these
circumstances, or we can turn itinto life lessons and gifts to
ourselves, ultimately, but giftsto the generations coming up
behind us.
And the beautiful part aboutregaining spirituality and and I

(39:34):
like being.
I like being identified as aspiritual psychologist, because
most people in my professiondon't no I like doing that
because it's part of the, it'spart of the access of of our
deepest inner self, it's part ofof, it's part of connecting
with our heart.

Speaker 1 (39:52):
Yeah, I want to get back to that because I really
appreciate you using that term.
But I also want to emphasize apoint you just made.
You know, religions can do sucha disservice in so many ways,
but one of the ways they do adisservice is they can kill our
spirituality, and that they can,you know, again tell us we're
less than nothing.
Or like my friend I remember hewas part of we were part of a

(40:14):
church called the Vineyard,which is a huge you know
movement and stuff, and he wasall into it, he was a missionary
, et cetera, but then when itstarted to fall apart from him,
he went to the other extreme andbecame the atheistic
materialist and completely losthis spirituality because he said
, if, if, this is what god is,this doesn't make any sense.

Speaker 2 (40:36):
Yeah, yeah, that's uh , 180 degrees from the original
problem is still a problemexactly.
Throwing the baby out with thebathwater, and for some people

(40:58):
that's a hard conception to buy.
So what this person is actuallyexhibiting by throwing the baby
out with the bathwater is thatthere's this big pool of rage
inside of him or her, and that'stheir answer.
To just throw the whole thingaway.
Throw it all away, and I paththat these experiences recommend

(41:30):
is regaining trust in our ownheart, and our own heart will
lead us to what we need and thespiritual dimensions which are
there all around us.
I have no problem with that.
I don't need to see them toknow they're there, because
funny things show up in yourlife when you least expect them,

(41:51):
but they're exactly what youneed at that moment.
How did this happen?
How did zinder's book show upwhen you needed it?
You know the kinds of thingsthat showed up for me, the
things that we needed when weneeded them, and you know.
So where is that directioncoming from?
Well, it isn't going to be tilla long time later that you're

(42:12):
ready to accept your spiritualnature in your heart, that you
realize there's been somethingkind of guiding you along and
just giving you a little nudge.
Just hey, look at this buddy,what do you think of this?
Try this on, try this on.
And that's the beauty of thespiritual connection and the

(42:33):
understanding that we're part ofsomething way bigger.
And this body is a vehicle forthis life experience on this
planet at this time and for whatwe're here to learn and for
what we're here to give, forwhat we're here to return to
pass on to others.
And I think, and I know in myheart, that there's an awakening

(42:59):
going on, and people like youand I and many others and people
that we look to for guidanceand instruction are part of it.
And the awakening is that we'regood, beautiful people on the
inside, that we have beautiful,brave hearts, that we care, that

(43:19):
love is the most powerful forcein the universe and we want to
spread that around like wildfirebecause it's the best medicine
for healing just about anythingyeah, right, yeah, yeah, it's
why, as you were saying that,because, um, we can get very
almost evangelical, you know, um, which is to spread the good

(43:40):
news.

Speaker 1 (43:40):
There's nothing wrong with that word, right, we?
And?
And I I'm like I, ironically, I, because I used to be um, I was
a Christian apologist.
I would go back in the day AOL,I'd go in the chat rooms with
the atheists and Jewish peopleand I'd try to convert people,
and I had websites to convertpeople to Christianity.
So I was doing all that stuffand I don't do that at this

(44:05):
point in my life, but I do wantto offer people what was offered
to me.
I found a site calledTentmakers back in the day when
the internet was just coming up,and I found these people that
gave me permission to thinkdifferently, because when you're
in that, as you called it, it'sa closed loop.
You can't think outside thatbox and they indoctrinate.
They will tell you don't listento your heart, don't listen

(44:28):
when anybody tells you anything.
They're going to tell you thesethings and they're going to
sound really good, but you can'tlisten to them.

Speaker 2 (44:37):
And those things keep playing back in our heads.
Yeah, there's the resonatingfactor of these that are our
earliest conditioning that playsout, so it's a growth process.
Conditioning that plays out, soit's a growth process.
You know, once that door, oncewe put that door open and we
apply those tools that are nowreadily available the first one

(44:59):
being self-reflection,self-reflection it just didn't
happen.
A book opened your mind, openedyour heart, an encounter with a
person or a TV program,something started to make sense
to you and you dug deeper.
Now I like to use the analogy ofpeeling away layers, because

(45:25):
none of this gets done in onefell swoop.
It doesn't happen that way andit's not desirable for things to
happen that way.
I know there's people, maybestill in the Christian
traditions, that say they have arebirth experience.
I'm not sure what that is, andit's not something I aspire to

(45:49):
or I think I need in my own life.
If what I'm going through is arebirth experience, well, the
rebirth is simply that you knowI'm trusting the original self
that I was born into before allthe garbage got tossed on top of
it.
I'm trusting that part of me andmy own inner goodness, and

(46:12):
that's an important thing torecognize in ourselves.
Because that's when blackbecomes white Things just flip
right around.
You were defined and held thatdefinition of yourself as
defective for so long.
But that thing had to flip.

(46:32):
And when it did and now you'recoming from the position of I'm
a good person, who's learning,who's got stuff to share, who's
growing, and I've got lots moreto learn, and as long as I'm
here, I want to keep learning.
Therefore, that's what I do Igrow.
Well, growing is a process.

(46:55):
It's never a fait accompli.
It's a process and we keepgrowing.
I like to quote George Burns.
Once in a while George Burns, agreat comic he said I ain't
done till I'm done, and he wasin his 90s and he was still
working and he was stillexpressing who he was and he had

(47:17):
a great sense of humor andgenuine heart and kindness, and
he just showed that all the timeand right till the last minute.
And that's what I want for me.
That's what I want for me andthat's what I want for me.
That's what I want for me andthat's what I want for my kids
and my grandkids.
I've got several of those now.
That's what I want for them tolearn to trust themselves and to

(47:42):
follow the inner directives,which is where we need to be, to
recognize that we're divine tobegin with, as opposed to
defective, as we were schooledto believe.
We are divine, but we're alldivine, so I'm not better than
you and you're not better thanme.

(48:03):
We have all these capacitiesand when we see it in other
people, it's it makes us smile.
You know we have conversationswith people that you can see
they're happy with themselves.
You can see their genuinekindness.
You know just their way ofbeing in the world.
You feel good when you're withthem yeah feel good, right why?

Speaker 1 (48:26):
do I trust them because it feels good and I
trust what I feel you know it'sfunny, you, you mentioned
something about rebirth and I'vebeen thinking about that
recently because I still think alot, I read, still think about
the Bible a lot and I there's alot.
I think there's a lot of goodstuff in the Bible, I think
there's a lot of good stuff inreligion and Jesus talks about

(48:47):
being born again and I'm like,okay, what does that mean?
And when I I know you're in themusic there's a song by a group
.
The group is called Enigma andthe song is called Return to
Innocence.
And when they're playing, whenthey do the video for the song,
they show this person they'reold and they're just getting
younger and younger and youngerand the song's about returning
to innocence.
So for me, being born again,it's like we come into this

(49:11):
world and we are innocent.
We are born innocent, we areborn good, and then the world
says, no, you suck, you knowyou're broken, and then we have
to fight to get back to that.
So for me, that's what myrebirth is about.
My rebirth is returning to thatinnocent child that I was
before they told me I was broken.

Speaker 2 (49:31):
Yeah, and Brian, that's, psychologically speaking
.
We're talking about the samething, Right?
You know all these psychologypeople who talked about and
brought out all the dimensionsthat we now understand about
connecting with your inner child.

(49:52):
That's what it's about.
So you know, whatever languageyou're comfortable with, and it
defines that experience, butrecovering that beautiful,
nascent, innocent child and nowknowing, in a vastly different
way than what you wereconditioned to, that of course I

(50:14):
was innocent.
I tell people this when we'redealing with the religious
subject in terms of grieving, Isay go to a hospital and go to
the neonatal ward and look atthose babies and start, you know
, point at one and say, hey, yougot original sin, and point at

(50:42):
another one and say that Can youdo that?
Some people have tried it.
They can't.
Can't assign that negativity tothat.
You know this.
This thing is wiggling aroundand it's breathing and it's it's
.
It just arrived.
Hey, it just arrived yeah justarrived.

Speaker 1 (50:56):
It hasn't had time to screw up it's interesting to
talk about this because I wasraised um, you talked about
original sin, but catholics tome are interesting because and I
was raised to believe thecatholics were going to hell, by
the way.
So, but you know, cathCatholics have this concept.
Well, you have to baptize thebaby right away because they
have original sin.
We didn't have that In ourfaith.

(51:17):
You had to be baptized as anadult.
So what they did was actuallymade this whole thing up.
It's not in the Bible at all.
They called it age ofaccountability.
So if you were good up until acertain very fuzzy age, but you
had original sin, but God atleast knew enough not to send
babies to hell, so that was oneadvantage we had yes, you were,

(51:41):
you were ahead of us, becausepeople would say, well, you
can't look at the babies of thebaby to hell.
Not even God would do that.

Speaker 2 (51:51):
So they're good up until they understand what
they're doing the hardest thingfor as we're traveling that path
, and you can't introduce theidea too early on.
For people who are recoveringfrom religion and recovering
themselves the idea that we'redivine, that just seems
blasphemous to even suggest thatidea.

Speaker 1 (52:13):
Yes yes.

Speaker 2 (52:15):
But Jesus said it yeah.
We have to get past those earlydefinitions.

Speaker 1 (52:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (52:22):
And when we're at a point where we can accept that.
It's not about thinking we'reso superior, it's just about
recognizing that we are energyand our soul is energy and our
soul is the active ingredientinside our bodies.
When our bodies are done, oursoul goes on to do whatever and

(52:43):
maybe come back.
Two-thirds of the planetbelieves in reincarnation.
I don't have any problem withit.
Thirds of the planet believesin reincarnation.
I don't have any problem withit.
But also most religions, andmine included, will teach you
only have one life.
So well, you know, what doesthat do?

(53:04):
That gives them more control,because if you have
reincarnation, well, I can comeback and I'll do it better next
time or next time and next time,no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
You've got to do it perfect thistime, according to them, but
getting to that spiritual pointwhere you recognize that
divinity and all you're doing isyou're recognizing that energy
that you are, that primal energythat showed up in that little

(53:27):
baby's body when you firstshowed up and then you grew into
this environment, the earthenvironment and life experiences
, and now you're you're workingthrough those issues, that that
defined you early on but damagedyou and hurt you, and, and now
you recognize that and nowyou're recovering from that, but
you haven't tossed away theidea of your spiritual self.

(53:51):
Well, now you can accommodateyourself to that idea and at
some point you can just simplyaccept it.
And it's not like we glow inthe dark, you know, or like
we're a big exploding star.
We're just divine, just apackage of energy.
We're just divine, a justpackage of energy.
We're having experiences andwe're driven by our hearts,

(54:15):
which are basically home-based,for love, the fuel that fuels
life and makes life beautifuland warm and cozy and fuzzy, and
all those good things, and, uh,you know, we hug together as
family and and uh as uh.

(54:35):
What?
What do you have?
A partner or a wife?

Speaker 1 (54:38):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (54:41):
And and children.

Speaker 1 (54:43):
I have one, one child in spirit and one child here,
yeah, All right.
Yeah.
Well then I understand thatyou've gone through some heavy
grief, yeah, and you know aswe're talking about.
You know grief and we.
We talk about grief as losing.
You know losing people, losingchildren, parents, whatever.
There's also the grief oflosing your religion.

(55:04):
There there is a real you.
That, for me, was a scary,scary process, wow, where you
feel like you're stepping off acliff.
Sometimes, right, it's like ifI let go of this, will there be
anything there to catch me?

Speaker 2 (55:19):
Yeah, yeah, that fits in with what you asked me
earlier.
What keeps people inside?
It's that comfort andfamiliarity.
But yeah, I mean, that's a gooddescription like you're
stepping off a cliff Becauseyou're stepping out of that
familiar definition of who andwhat you are and what life is

(55:43):
and why it's safer in here andthose people over there In your
case, you were pointing atCatholics while we were busy
pointing at you but what you andI have in common is the
understanding of ourspirituality, and we're exactly
the same.

Speaker 1 (56:04):
We are.

Speaker 2 (56:05):
We are Exactly the same.

Speaker 1 (56:07):
Well, I'd like to.
We talked a lot about breakingfree of trauma or religious
trauma.
Talk about your book and whatpeople will find when they read
your book.
How will it help people ontheir journey?

Speaker 2 (56:21):
The title says everything that you and I have
been talking about Breaking thespell of religion.
You standing on the top of yourcliff and ready to go and
healing the trauma.
The trauma is all thosenegative definitions that we
received, all of thatconditioning, all of that
indoctrination, justpsychologically speaking.

(56:43):
Defining people as broken, asnegative, as a failure is.
Well, you took all theantidepressants and all the
medication to try and undo thatand to a point that'll give you
an artificial lift.
But redefining yourself orrediscovering who and what you
are is much better medicine thanyour antidepressants.

(57:07):
And connecting with your heartand now trusting yourself and
now being able to send love tothat little Brian who grew up in
that hellhole he needs you andhe's going to be more playful.
The more attention you pay tohim, the more playful he's going
to be, because he's just goingto be that kid in the playground

(57:28):
dancing around, looking at bugsand looking at birds and you
know, talking to the grass ortalking to the rabbits or the
birds or the trees or whatever,and just enjoying life.
You get to recover.
That that's a rebirthexperience.
That's a beautiful thing topass on.
So for me it ties into.

(57:52):
I come at it from thepsychological point of view, but
it's no different than yourpoint of view.
We're talking the same language.
But the trauma is very, veryharmful and trauma means that
there's going to be pain andsorrow and there's going to be
some crying and there's going tobe some anger.
There is going to be some angerof how we were mistreated, how

(58:17):
we were defined in thosenegative ways.
So one of the tools I alwaysrecommend to people is
journaling.
Write it down, write it down,get it out.
I've been journaling for 30-plusyears.
I write things down, write itdown, get it out.
I've been journaling for 30plus years.
I write things down Every fewmonths.

(58:37):
I shred the last few monthsstuff because I don't need to
look at it again.
It's just a place where I cantalk to myself about my feelings
and sometimes I can have aconversation with little Maurice
, the little child in me.
So I'll put in the margin meadult, me say how are you doing

(58:58):
today, little Maurice?
And then I'll put little M andI let that voice speak to me.
I just write it down and shetells me what's your feeling.
And it's a conversation, it's apart of you from the past
speaking to the adult.
You now, and you speaking tothem and you're making room for

(59:22):
them to express themselves.
Because in those early days,brian, survival meant numbing
out, because things didn't makesense and we were being crushed
with all these negativedefinitions of ourselves.
The only thing we could do wasnumb out.
God consciously do that.

(59:43):
It's just a natural protectivemechanism, natural protective
mechanism.
That's why, with psychology, wecan dismantle, we can identify
and then dismantle all thosedefense mechanisms projection,
anger, and I had anxiety attackstoo before I started getting

(01:00:05):
the medical and psychologicalhelp.
And that's our bodies rebellingagainst these definitions of
ourselves.
And anxiety attacks arebasically little wars in our own
body with different parts ofourselves, and they're a clear
sign that something doesn't makesense and isn't working.

(01:00:27):
So, as we unpack that you don'thave anxiety attacks now, do
you?

Speaker 1 (01:00:33):
No, I don't no.

Speaker 2 (01:00:34):
No, you don't, neither do I.
Those things got taken care ofbecause we had different parts
of ourselves, so differentdimensions of our own energy, or
colliding with ourselves, andanyway, that's the simplest
picture as I can give.

(01:00:56):
But at this stage andeverything you've come through
and you've climbed quite amountain or dove off quite a
cliff.
So have I, and we have theperspective of all of that
behind us and the realizationthat the growth path that we're
still on is still there in frontof us.

(01:01:18):
And we're not done yet.
We're learning every day.
I talk to you, you talk to me.
We learn from each other.
I get confirmation of, or I getto recognize.
I'm looking at a mirror.
I see a guy named Brian, buthe's lived very similar things
to me.
Back when you were aPentecostal and I was a Catholic

(01:01:39):
, you and I would have nevertalked to each other Because,
for different reasons, you weregoing to hell and so was I.

Speaker 1 (01:01:46):
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2 (01:01:48):
But now we're on the same page.
That's a beautiful thing.

Speaker 1 (01:01:52):
Yeah, and I want to thank you so much for the work
that you're doing, the workyou've done for putting your
books out in the world, forcalling yourself a spiritual
psychologist.
I think that's beautiful,because a lot of times people in
that profession run away fromspirituality and you can't treat
somebody without understandingthat they're spiritual beings in

(01:02:13):
the first place.
I don't understand how we canget away from that, so I want to
thank you for doing that.
Let people know, dr Mo, wherethey can reach you, where they
can find out more about you.

Speaker 2 (01:02:25):
Well they can reach you.
Go to Amazon and you'll find mybooks there.
So, breaking the Spell ofReligion and Healing the Trauma,
and when Angels Call, copingwith Grief and Loss.
So I like angels, and in thedescriptions of each item

(01:02:48):
there's references to my musicsite, which is at Bandcamp, and
I have songs that are spiritualin nature in terms of affirming
the very things that you and Iare talking about, and I like
that song that you referenced.

(01:03:08):
Was it Enigma?

Speaker 1 (01:03:10):
Enigma Return to Innocence.
Enigma Return to Innocence,yeah yeah, return to Innocence.

Speaker 2 (01:03:14):
I'm going to check that out, so or otherwise.
You just Google my name.
Oh, I'm on Facebook.
Oh, here I'm on Facebook.
Yeah, under the title of DrMoe's.
If you Google my name atFacebook, I've got three sites

(01:03:36):
Spiritual Connection, motormeljust Motormel, my personal site,
and what is that?
One called Dr Mo's CosmicPerspective.
Okay, dr Mo's CosmicPerspective, that's a big word.

(01:03:57):
But, I like the word cosmic andmy YouTube site is the
Spiritual Psychologist.

Speaker 1 (01:04:07):
Alright, cool, very good, so great to meet you.
We'll have to do this again.
There's some more things thatwe could talk about.
I'd love to talk aboutspirituality in music.
I used to be a big CCM fanChristian contemporary music,
which I can't listen to anymore,so I'm always looking for good
spiritual music.
So we'll have to talk again.

Speaker 2 (01:04:28):
Brian, if you want to write this down, oh no, it's on
my signature, on my emails.
There's a link there That'lltake you to the music site.
All right, awesome.
So go and sample what's there.
It's free streaming at the site.
If you choose to download stuff, then you pay, but while you're

(01:04:51):
there you can look at anything,and most of the songs, the
lyrics, are there, and I likethe idea of coming back and
meeting with you again.
Last week I had a meeting witha person that we did a podcast
last summer and it was like awhole new view of where he was

(01:05:12):
at and where I'm at and what wehad to share, and I was worried
that we'd just be repeatingourselves, but we weren't.
He changed and I changed, and afew months down the road, six
months down the road, wheneveryou and I, we're going to have
more to talk about and more toshare, and that's good for me
and if it's good for you, thenit's win-win for both of us.

Speaker 1 (01:05:35):
Sounds great.
Well, enjoy the rest of yourafternoon.
I'll talk to you later.

Speaker 2 (01:05:38):
All right, thanks for this, so you.

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When Religion Becomes Trauma: Dr. Moe's Journey to Healing w/ Dr. Maurice Turmel | EP 444

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}When Religion Becomes Trauma: Dr. Moe's Journey to Healing w/ Dr. Maurice Turmel | EP 444