September 12, 2025 • 22 mins
Leanne is back with Scott and Ketric for another episode of our "Ask the God Pod" series. This week they tackle a question many newcomers to faith share: What does prayer look like?
In this episode of "Ask the God Pod," Scott and Ketric are back to tackle a listener's heartfelt question about coping with the immense stress of supporting a loved one struggling with addiction. For over two decades, this listener has been on a turbulent journey alongside her brother, who battles alcoholism. Initially driven by the hope of saving him, the toll on her own well-being has become increasingly apparent. She's endured the emotional rollercoaster of multiple rehab attempts, homelessness, and hospitalizations, all while feeling the weight of responsibility grow heavier. As the stress seeped into every aspect of her life, from relationships to her own health, she wants to know how to detach from the drama and reclaim a sense of control and peace amidst the chaos. Join us as we explore the power of perspective, resilience, and faith in navigating the challenges of loving someone through addiction.
Links to the Acting As If Series:
Episode 1: (THINKING) When Downward Spiral Thoughts Rule Your Life
Episode 2: (FEELING) When Your Thoughts Don't Match How You Feel
Episode 3: (BELIEVING) When Your Self-Image Undermines What You Really Want
Episode 4: (DOING) When What You Say Doesn't Align With What You Do
HOST: Leanne Ellington // StresslessEating.com // @leanneellington
GUEST: Ketric Newell & Scott Stephens
To learn more about Leanne, head over to www.LeanneEllington.com, and to share your thoughts, questions, feedback, or guest suggestions instantly, head on over to www.WhatsGodGotToDoWithIt.com.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
If you want to go on a journey. If you're skeptical,
don't worry.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I'm here to preach gonn to keep it clean and
talk to me and recall where faith needs stops nature,
get in touch with your creator with a baking.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Love and joke.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
She even speaks Hebrew.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
What's that?
Speaker 2 (00:31):
What's that?
Speaker 4 (00:37):
That's well station talking transformation?
Speaker 1 (00:41):
What'stop down to.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Well?
Speaker 5 (00:45):
Hello, and welcome back to What's God got to do
with It? We are here for another ask the God
Pod episode. When you go to What's God Got to
do with It and you submit your question, you can
say that I have a question I want I'm looking
for advice. And so this comes from Becky where she
said she wanted some advice and she says, I'm at
the top of my stress level and it has nothing
(01:06):
to do with me. My brother is a lifeline alcoholic.
I've been with him on this journey for more than
twenty years. At first I thought I was saving him
from himself. Then after putting him into multiple rehabilitation centers,
homeless shelters, and hospitals, I'm now trying to save myself.
I've aged with the stress because I've taken it on myself.
(01:27):
Many of my relationships have been affected by my continued
care for him, including my marriage. When something happens with him,
I jump and immediately go to drama. He's drinking again.
Oh great, he's going to get kicked out of his
apartment or he will get arrested again, or where will
he live?
Speaker 1 (01:44):
What am I going to do?
Speaker 5 (01:45):
I listen to the Acting as If episode about thinking,
and it really resonated with me. I'm going to keep
practicing the data versus the drama. Thank you so first
of all before we dive into everything, and thank you
for sharing your circuit stances, Becky, and I can only
imagine how challenging this is for you.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
I want to just share thing about advice giving.
Speaker 5 (02:06):
One of my big you know, thought processes is I
never give unsolicited advice. When we're coming here on this podcast,
it's always going to be solicited. So thank you for asking.
But also just know that we are here to just
share our beliefs and our thoughts and it's never just
like a this is what you should do, or this
is the way, or you know the right way. So
just know that obviously, you know, coming from this perspective
(02:28):
where we're not in a therapeutic space.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
We are just here to give you wisdom and point
you in.
Speaker 5 (02:33):
The right direction. So wanted to just say that before
we dive in. So we've got Ketrick and Scott back
here with us.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Who wants to dive in first?
Speaker 3 (02:43):
You want to take us in the shallow waters first, Ketric.
Speaker 4 (02:46):
So, I work with students that live in the inner city,
and I've just been around being in ministry. There's been
a lot of moments where you all meet with people
and have these conversations. I too, like you're saying, I
have found my self and scenarios where I'm trying to
save people from themselves. And I thought in those moments
that that actually was like the god thing to do
(03:09):
and the right thing to do. And what I've learned
over the years is that sometimes I'm saving them from
experiencing the thing that they need to experience to actually
realize that they have a problem. And a lot of
times I'm saving them from something and they don't even
know what the problem is. So I'm trying to fix
a problem that they don't even know they have. And
(03:31):
when you live in that world of I'm fixing your
problem that you don't know you have, you are going
to continue to live in the cycle of I'm the
rescuer and that's my role. And if I'm the rescuer,
what I'm doing is I'm violating you, the person that's
being rescued. And there's a great book actually by Danny
Silk called Keep Your Love On, and I would tell
(03:52):
you to read that book. It's one of the best
books I've ever read. There's an example that he uses
in that book. He says that if you were walking
in a parking lot, like at a store like whatever,
Walmart or Target or whatever, you pick your thing, and
you saw someone had locked their keys in their car,
if you walked up and busted out the window and
grab their keys and handed it to them, you would
(04:13):
be fixing their problem, but you would be violating them.
And that's what happens when we choose to be rescuers
with someone that doesn't know they have a problem, because
what we're doing is we're violating them, and it doesn't
seem that way, but we're actually not helping them know
that they have a problem. So the place to start
with someone in that scenario, which you're far beyond that,
(04:37):
with the many times of helping, But the real question
is what is the problem and what is my problem?
And you know it's not your problem when you go
to bed every night. Now, I know that this sounds
kind of mean, but the truth is you're never going
to fix someone else when they don't actually know that
they have a problem, and it's not your job. You're
(04:58):
actually don't have boundary to put in place to keep
you realizing that's not mine and the end of view.
Realizing where the end of view ends and where they
start is a massive thing to understand because once you
understand where you end and they begin, is where you
can set the boundary so that you don't continue to
(05:19):
live this cycle of I'm always rescuing, but they're never
getting it because they actually don't know absolutely.
Speaker 5 (05:25):
Yeah. One of the things that came up for me
and the work that I do was it from necessity,
was the distinction between a servant and a savior, Like,
where am I serving somebody? And where am I trying
to save somebody? And there's a time and place when
somebody needs you to save them. But twenty years is
a long time to be in that role. And again
I'm not trying to sound callous or mean either we're
here to serve you and help you kind of get
(05:45):
your power back from this circumstance that you feel like
you're drowning in. And I discovered this distinction firsthand when
many moons ago a former lifetime, it seems like I
was in the fitness industry and people kept coming to
me and they were like, I need another six week challenge.
They were all as if I felt like a drug
dealer of these six week challenges. But on the flip side,
I was also taking responsibility for their results. I was
(06:06):
taking responsibility if they got them, and I was taking
responsibility if they didn't get them. And then I was
coming to this in this position of like I was
always needing to save and rescue them. And what I
realized was that in the short run I might be
saving them, but in the long run, I am not
serving them because I'm not inviting them or even forcing
them to become the version of themselves that they need
to be to take radical responsibility of their problems. I
(06:29):
was taking radical responsibility for their problems and in a
way kind of enabling them and forcing them to almost
be codependent on needing me to stand into air quotes
save them. So you know, I could share that very
overused analogy of putting your oxygen mask on first, which
we hear about all the time, right, But really it's
like you can lead a horse to water, but you
(06:50):
can't make them drink. You can invite your brother to
take responsibility for his own healing journey, but you can't
force somebody to solve a problem that they don't acknowledge
that they have right. And so part of it is
really this, it's a conversation of radical responsibility. And you know,
obviously we can say this with love and care and
adoration for your brother, but also coming from a place
(07:12):
of like you cannot take more responsibility for his problem
than he's willing to take responsibility for himself, because it
does fall into the category of enabling and codependency.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
Leanne can you tell us?
Speaker 3 (07:25):
At the end, she says, I listened to Acting as
If thinking dot dot dot, and it really resonated with me.
I'm going to practice keeping to the data.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Yeah, can you can you tell?
Speaker 3 (07:36):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (07:36):
Just to fill in those gaps, there was a four
part series called Acting as If. You can check it
out and we'll link it in the show notes. But
it really got into the neuroscience of shifting your beliefs
and where that kind of actually led up to What's
God got to do with It?
Speaker 1 (07:47):
Podcast? But I give this distinction of the data versus
the drama.
Speaker 3 (07:52):
Right.
Speaker 5 (07:52):
The data is my brother is still consuming alcohol, right.
The data is what happened. The facts the actual circumstances
of what happened. The drama is anything that you added,
any meaning that you give it, any beliefs associated with it,
any iteration of the problem that.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
Is not just facts.
Speaker 5 (08:11):
And one of my favorite quotes that I've heard is
feelings are not facts. Right. And so when it comes
to the data, coming back to this specific example, the
data is he's still consuming alcohol. It's been twenty years, right,
and he's been diagnosed as an alcoholic. The drama is
it's my responsibility to save him.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
It's my fault.
Speaker 5 (08:30):
I'm not doing enough fill in the blank.
Speaker 4 (08:32):
Right.
Speaker 5 (08:33):
And then you specifically gave us the data or your
drama was he's drinking again. Oh great, he's going to
get kicked out of his apartment, he will get arrested.
But what the drama that you're not saying within that
drama that you did identify is is, and it's my
responsibility to save him right, and so coming from that
place of being a savior where in the long run
(08:53):
you're not serving him, And that's where I really want
you to be mindful of the drama that you're associating
with the data.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Hey, Becky, thanks for sharing. I wanted to ask your
permission to speak into your life. And if you give
it to me, go ahead and keep listening. If not,
just fast forward. Everybody else can listen without it. But
that's an intense reality that you live with each day
and your husband experiences, your family. It's not easy. So
(09:30):
I want to acknowledge that, and it's not easy for
twenty years. That's a long time. A couple things that
came to mind, the word surrender invitation. The first thing
that came to mind was actually what you said, And
I don't think you meant to write this word, but
you said, my brother is a lifeline alcoholic.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
I think she meant lifetime. Oh okay, yeah, but what
the picture I got was a lifeline.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Or life long. Maybe she meant yeah, maybe right, yeah,
but I.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Lifeline. And I believe God.
Speaker 3 (10:03):
Is speaking wisdom even in your deepest, darkest moment. He's
literally speaking through this statement, which goes back to like journaling,
you will not ever imagine what you start writing.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
And so I got this picture.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
That you've been throwing a lifeline out of the boat
to your brother for twenty years, and maybe sometimes he's
grabbed it, maybe other times he hasn't. He's never gotten
in the boat. And eventually instead of throwing the lifeline,
you dove in the water, and now you can't get
back in the boat. And so there's an invitation. Like
(10:39):
the God of the universe, he works through invitations, and
he's saying, Becky, I want to throw you a lifeline
back in the boat, and I want to throw your
brother a lifeline. I want you to quit throwing him
a lifeline. I want you to surrender. The only way
you can get back in the boat. The abundant life,
(11:02):
the joy in your marriage and your day to day
life is if you take the lifeline and you surrender
your brother.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
I'm not asking you to do this.
Speaker 3 (11:12):
I acknowledge it's hard, but I believe Jesus through your
own words, is saying I want to give you a lifeline,
and the way that you accept the lifeline is you
surrender your brother. And the only way you can do
that with peace is believing that God is good and
he loves your brother more than you or anyone else
(11:33):
in the whole world, and he is not pulling back
the lifeline. In fact, he's the one continuing to throw
it to your brother, and so you have to let him.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
If you do, this is what your life will look like.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Your Thursday night moment with your husband over dinner. Maybe
you're watching Love Is Blind season six.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
Anyways, I have to admit that is one of my
guilty pleasures.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
If she'd say, God forgive me. We had to lighten
that up a little bit.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
So your Thursday night dinner with your husband, where normally
you get a text, Oh he's drinking again, you finally
just get to enjoy watching Love Is Blind in peace
like your husband and you have a hour long conversation
about the next trip you're gonna take, cause you probably
haven't taken many trips when your brother's been living like this. Right,
the dream that you guys have never experienced like this
(12:24):
is finally going to be an opportunity for you experience that.
That's what happens if you receive the invitation of the
lifeline God's throwing you. You surrender your brother, and trust
that God's going to keep throwing lifelines to him.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
So I just want to bless you.
Speaker 3 (12:38):
Surrender is the hardest thing, especially when we think we
can do it. And I just want you to remind
yourself of the words that God spoke through your statement
Lifeline Lifeline. Amen.
Speaker 5 (12:51):
Yeah, and hearing that, I can only imagine Becky, that
you might be thinking but like, I can't do that.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
That's so selfish of me, Like how can I just
you know, leave him more, abandon him?
Speaker 5 (13:00):
And I just want to invite you into another possibility
because right now, nobody is winning, nobody is getting served. Right,
you shared that your marriage is suffering. I'm assuming your
social life has been neglected. I can only imagine what
this is doing to your mental, emotional, you.
Speaker 1 (13:15):
Know, physical health.
Speaker 5 (13:16):
Like this is really taxing on anyone, right and so
you know a lot of times, and this could be
anyone who's listening, This could be anyone who feels like
you are neglecting yourself in order to serve other people.
But you can't serve from an empty cup. And so
but we think, like, no taking care of myself or
you know, identifying my own needs and feeding those needs.
(13:37):
That's selfish, But what if it was actually selfish not
to What if all the other people that need that
need your love and attention and care, including yourself, are
not able to get it because you're not taking care
of yourself and taking care of yourself first and foremost.
And I would invite you like a relationship with God
is the perfect first ingredient of that.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
But like, what if taking care.
Speaker 5 (13:59):
Of yourself was the best way to serve other people
because now all the other people that are in line
to get your love, attention, care are going to be
able to get you, but also without the resent like
I can only imagine when if I've sacrificed as much
as you have for my brother, there's bound to be
resent and anger, and then of course that comes in
and spills over into our relationships. So I think you know,
(14:22):
changing your definition of what you know taking care of yourself,
because it's not anti your brother, it's just pro you.
You cannot, you know, sacrifice your entire life. And I
don't mean this again to be callous or mean, but
you do have twenty years of data that shows that
your version of trying to save him has not worked right,
(14:42):
and so you've never tried this other way of really
taking care of yourself, filling up your own cup. And
you can support him and love him and believe in
him and pour into him in certain ways. But I
do want to say, like, I don't believe you personally
will ever be able to air quotes save him. He
(15:02):
has to take radical ownership and responsibility of his own
necessity to be a part in that saving journey.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
Yeah, I think everything you guys have said it's been awesome.
I think the biggest, the biggest help that you could
do is to decide what only you can control in this scenario.
And the only thing you can control is what you're
responsible for. And if you've said that, oh, I'm responsible
for my brother, that's actually not true, right, Yeah, But
(15:31):
you're responsible for your marriage and you're responsible for whoever
else is involved in that. And that's what a powerful
person does. Is a powerful person says I control me.
A powerless person says you control me. So in this scenario,
every time brother, your brother, since the text ree does
the thing we can all and I've lived here. This
is again all of us are saying, we have all
(15:54):
been here. In different scenarios in our lives, and we
can talk about that, but the big portion is today,
what am I going to now choose to be powerful?
How am I going to choose to be powerful for me?
And the biggest thing that you can do is to
decide right now what you're going to do before he
sends that next text.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
So if you will, if.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
You will right now, and what you need to do
is you need to write it down because it is
going to be so foreign for the last twenty years again,
talk about neuroscience right the neuropathways, like you've worked this
six lane highway. Every time your brother to knee jerk,
react to just doing the thing he wants you to do,
or to try to bell him out, it's going to
feel weird and it's going to feel like you're doing
(16:36):
something wrong. But what you have to really realize is
what I would do to just start the process is
I would write it down and then I would share
it with my husband, with your husband and say to him,
I need you to hold me to this because I
know my reaction the last twenty years is to come
to be to be his rescuer. And I need to
(16:56):
also say I'm sorry that I've allowed him to be
over our marriage like that alone? What healing that would
do in your marriage to your husband to just let
him know because you feel it, I can hear I can,
I can. I feel like I can hear it in
the statement that you're making, it's like you don't want
to keep doing the same thing again and again and again.
Then you're seeing how it's played. It's it's it's taken
(17:17):
a toll. But you have to actively go no, I'm powerful.
I can control me. I can't control him. I'm in
control of me and what you have given to me.
What I can do the best thing I can do
for my marriage and whoever else that's involved. If there's kids,
you know, then is I can start now to say
yes to them. And if you can start doing that,
(17:40):
where to agree upon anything, it will be given to them.
If you and your husband can get an agreement, it's
the most powerful force on this side of heaven when
to agree upon anything. And if your husband's been there,
it's been the tension between you. If you just said,
you know what, I need to repent. I have put
my brother over I never actually left that relationship to
(18:03):
really actually conform to our relationship, and I need to
repent of that and say those things that right there
is an act that is so powerful. And then you
guys get an agreement. It will change the next twenty
years of your life, like even Scott was saying, and
you will live a life that you didn't even know
was possible when you two get an agreement about something
(18:26):
that maybe you've never been in agreement about. You've never
this may be the whole thing. Once you choose to
get an agreement, do that and then and then have
them hold you to it and watch how your obedience
to what God is telling you to do and what
you're feeling in your heart. You can't worry about what
it does to someone else. You're only held to be
(18:46):
obedient to the things God is telling you to do
and believe that he'll fill in the gaps where you
have said no to something else and when you've said
yes to God, and you've got to trust that. The
last thing I'll say is this, I would ask the Lord,
where did I believe that I've found my worth in
my past by rescuing people?
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Like?
Speaker 4 (19:05):
Where did I believe that this is my identity? Because
it's rooted somewhere back in your past too, that this
is where I find my worth is rescuing, and that
part of it, if you can find the root of that,
God will begin to show you where that started and
take away, help you take away where it's rooted, and
(19:25):
allow you to plant new things so that you can
grow the fruit that you actually desire and want.
Speaker 5 (19:30):
And also like identifying when you do get clear on that,
like there's probably going to be a thought about well
who am I if I'm not rescuing, And that's where
God can fill in those gaps as well.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Can I just say who she's going to be? Yes?
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Please?
Speaker 3 (19:43):
And it's interesting we have not said this to anyone else,
but I just want to say we love you, and
you're like, you don't know me, and I'm like, well,
I'm feeling just an immense love for you.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
In the sweetest way.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
And I appreciate Ketrick and Leam because what they did
was they said this, this is practically what it looks
like to surrender and take the lifeline to get back
in the boat. I just imagine every time he texts
at first, it's a God, I'm giving you my brother,
I'm giving you back my brother.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Right.
Speaker 3 (20:14):
Eventually you're gonna say, how's your brother?
Speaker 2 (20:17):
You say, I gave him back to God.
Speaker 3 (20:19):
Wow. And then what we've learned is God loves to
give us good gifts. So when you give back your brother,
God will give you back your beauty and they will
call you Becky the beautiful Yes.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
And just I'm so thankful for you. Thank you for
sharing your heart and.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Your life, Becky the beautiful Yes.
Speaker 5 (20:37):
And there's this beautiful soul inside of you. That's why
you want to serve. There is this heart of a servant,
but you can't be a servant when you're in savior mode.
Thank you so much for sending in that question. That
is it for this episode of Ask the God Pod.
We will be back with more very soon.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Bye. We'll be back with more What's God Got to
Do with It?
Speaker 5 (20:59):
But in the meantime, I would definitely love to hear
from you, so just tell me where you are in
your story or maybe what questions you have, like where
do you feel you need clarity or support or wisdom
in your own journey. I definitely want to hear from you,
So head on over to What's God Got to Do
with It? Dot com and scroll down to the form
(21:20):
to share your thoughts, your questions, your feedback, and you
can do that instantly. So What's God Got to Do
With It? Dot com you'll find all the ways.
Speaker 4 (21:28):
To do that.
Speaker 5 (21:29):
And if you like this podcast and want to hear more,
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Speaker 1 (21:38):
Of What's God Got to Do With It?
Speaker 5 (21:40):
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Speaker 1 (21:44):
Be sure to rate and review to show your support.
It really means so much.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
What's God Got to Do With It is an iHeartRadio
podcast on the Amy Brown Podcast Network. It's written and
hosted by me Leanne Ellington, executive produced by Elizabeth Fazzio,
post production and editing by Houston Tilly, and original music
written by Cheryl Stark and produced by Adam Stark
If you want to go on a journey. If you're skeptical,
don't worry.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I'm here to preach gonn to keep it clean and
talk to me and recall where faith needs stops nature,
get in touch with your creator with a baking.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Love and joke.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
She even speaks Hebrew.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
What's that?
Speaker 2 (00:31):
What's that?
Speaker 4 (00:37):
That's well station talking transformation?
Speaker 1 (00:41):
What'stop down to.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Well?
Speaker 5 (00:45):
Hello, and welcome back to What's God got to do
with It? We are here for another ask the God
Pod episode. When you go to What's God Got to
do with It and you submit your question, you can
say that I have a question I want I'm looking
for advice. And so this comes from Becky where she
said she wanted some advice and she says, I'm at
the top of my stress level and it has nothing
(01:06):
to do with me. My brother is a lifeline alcoholic.
I've been with him on this journey for more than
twenty years. At first I thought I was saving him
from himself. Then after putting him into multiple rehabilitation centers,
homeless shelters, and hospitals, I'm now trying to save myself.
I've aged with the stress because I've taken it on myself.
(01:27):
Many of my relationships have been affected by my continued
care for him, including my marriage. When something happens with him,
I jump and immediately go to drama. He's drinking again.
Oh great, he's going to get kicked out of his
apartment or he will get arrested again, or where will
he live?
Speaker 1 (01:44):
What am I going to do?
Speaker 5 (01:45):
I listen to the Acting as If episode about thinking,
and it really resonated with me. I'm going to keep
practicing the data versus the drama. Thank you so first
of all before we dive into everything, and thank you
for sharing your circuit stances, Becky, and I can only
imagine how challenging this is for you.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
I want to just share thing about advice giving.
Speaker 5 (02:06):
One of my big you know, thought processes is I
never give unsolicited advice. When we're coming here on this podcast,
it's always going to be solicited. So thank you for asking.
But also just know that we are here to just
share our beliefs and our thoughts and it's never just
like a this is what you should do, or this
is the way, or you know the right way. So
just know that obviously, you know, coming from this perspective
(02:28):
where we're not in a therapeutic space.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
We are just here to give you wisdom and point
you in.
Speaker 5 (02:33):
The right direction. So wanted to just say that before
we dive in. So we've got Ketrick and Scott back
here with us.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Who wants to dive in first?
Speaker 3 (02:43):
You want to take us in the shallow waters first, Ketric.
Speaker 4 (02:46):
So, I work with students that live in the inner city,
and I've just been around being in ministry. There's been
a lot of moments where you all meet with people
and have these conversations. I too, like you're saying, I
have found my self and scenarios where I'm trying to
save people from themselves. And I thought in those moments
that that actually was like the god thing to do
(03:09):
and the right thing to do. And what I've learned
over the years is that sometimes I'm saving them from
experiencing the thing that they need to experience to actually
realize that they have a problem. And a lot of
times I'm saving them from something and they don't even
know what the problem is. So I'm trying to fix
a problem that they don't even know they have. And
(03:31):
when you live in that world of I'm fixing your
problem that you don't know you have, you are going
to continue to live in the cycle of I'm the
rescuer and that's my role. And if I'm the rescuer,
what I'm doing is I'm violating you, the person that's
being rescued. And there's a great book actually by Danny
Silk called Keep Your Love On, and I would tell
(03:52):
you to read that book. It's one of the best
books I've ever read. There's an example that he uses
in that book. He says that if you were walking
in a parking lot, like at a store like whatever,
Walmart or Target or whatever, you pick your thing, and
you saw someone had locked their keys in their car,
if you walked up and busted out the window and
grab their keys and handed it to them, you would
(04:13):
be fixing their problem, but you would be violating them.
And that's what happens when we choose to be rescuers
with someone that doesn't know they have a problem, because
what we're doing is we're violating them, and it doesn't
seem that way, but we're actually not helping them know
that they have a problem. So the place to start
with someone in that scenario, which you're far beyond that,
(04:37):
with the many times of helping, But the real question
is what is the problem and what is my problem?
And you know it's not your problem when you go
to bed every night. Now, I know that this sounds
kind of mean, but the truth is you're never going
to fix someone else when they don't actually know that
they have a problem, and it's not your job. You're
(04:58):
actually don't have boundary to put in place to keep
you realizing that's not mine and the end of view.
Realizing where the end of view ends and where they
start is a massive thing to understand because once you
understand where you end and they begin, is where you
can set the boundary so that you don't continue to
(05:19):
live this cycle of I'm always rescuing, but they're never
getting it because they actually don't know absolutely.
Speaker 5 (05:25):
Yeah. One of the things that came up for me
and the work that I do was it from necessity,
was the distinction between a servant and a savior, Like,
where am I serving somebody? And where am I trying
to save somebody? And there's a time and place when
somebody needs you to save them. But twenty years is
a long time to be in that role. And again
I'm not trying to sound callous or mean either we're
here to serve you and help you kind of get
(05:45):
your power back from this circumstance that you feel like
you're drowning in. And I discovered this distinction firsthand when
many moons ago a former lifetime, it seems like I
was in the fitness industry and people kept coming to
me and they were like, I need another six week challenge.
They were all as if I felt like a drug
dealer of these six week challenges. But on the flip side,
I was also taking responsibility for their results. I was
(06:06):
taking responsibility if they got them, and I was taking
responsibility if they didn't get them. And then I was
coming to this in this position of like I was
always needing to save and rescue them. And what I
realized was that in the short run I might be
saving them, but in the long run, I am not
serving them because I'm not inviting them or even forcing
them to become the version of themselves that they need
to be to take radical responsibility of their problems. I
(06:29):
was taking radical responsibility for their problems and in a
way kind of enabling them and forcing them to almost
be codependent on needing me to stand into air quotes
save them. So you know, I could share that very
overused analogy of putting your oxygen mask on first, which
we hear about all the time, right, But really it's
like you can lead a horse to water, but you
(06:50):
can't make them drink. You can invite your brother to
take responsibility for his own healing journey, but you can't
force somebody to solve a problem that they don't acknowledge
that they have right. And so part of it is
really this, it's a conversation of radical responsibility. And you know,
obviously we can say this with love and care and
adoration for your brother, but also coming from a place
(07:12):
of like you cannot take more responsibility for his problem
than he's willing to take responsibility for himself, because it
does fall into the category of enabling and codependency.
Speaker 2 (07:24):
Leanne can you tell us?
Speaker 3 (07:25):
At the end, she says, I listened to Acting as
If thinking dot dot dot, and it really resonated with me.
I'm going to practice keeping to the data.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Yeah, can you can you tell?
Speaker 3 (07:36):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (07:36):
Just to fill in those gaps, there was a four
part series called Acting as If. You can check it
out and we'll link it in the show notes. But
it really got into the neuroscience of shifting your beliefs
and where that kind of actually led up to What's
God got to do with It?
Speaker 1 (07:47):
Podcast? But I give this distinction of the data versus
the drama.
Speaker 3 (07:52):
Right.
Speaker 5 (07:52):
The data is my brother is still consuming alcohol, right.
The data is what happened. The facts the actual circumstances
of what happened. The drama is anything that you added,
any meaning that you give it, any beliefs associated with it,
any iteration of the problem that.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
Is not just facts.
Speaker 5 (08:11):
And one of my favorite quotes that I've heard is
feelings are not facts. Right. And so when it comes
to the data, coming back to this specific example, the
data is he's still consuming alcohol. It's been twenty years, right,
and he's been diagnosed as an alcoholic. The drama is
it's my responsibility to save him.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
It's my fault.
Speaker 5 (08:30):
I'm not doing enough fill in the blank.
Speaker 4 (08:32):
Right.
Speaker 5 (08:33):
And then you specifically gave us the data or your
drama was he's drinking again. Oh great, he's going to
get kicked out of his apartment, he will get arrested.
But what the drama that you're not saying within that
drama that you did identify is is, and it's my
responsibility to save him right, and so coming from that
place of being a savior where in the long run
(08:53):
you're not serving him, And that's where I really want
you to be mindful of the drama that you're associating
with the data.
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Hey, Becky, thanks for sharing. I wanted to ask your
permission to speak into your life. And if you give
it to me, go ahead and keep listening. If not,
just fast forward. Everybody else can listen without it. But
that's an intense reality that you live with each day
and your husband experiences, your family. It's not easy. So
(09:30):
I want to acknowledge that, and it's not easy for
twenty years. That's a long time. A couple things that
came to mind, the word surrender invitation. The first thing
that came to mind was actually what you said, And
I don't think you meant to write this word, but
you said, my brother is a lifeline alcoholic.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
I think she meant lifetime. Oh okay, yeah, but what
the picture I got was a lifeline.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Or life long. Maybe she meant yeah, maybe right, yeah,
but I.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
Lifeline. And I believe God.
Speaker 3 (10:03):
Is speaking wisdom even in your deepest, darkest moment. He's
literally speaking through this statement, which goes back to like journaling,
you will not ever imagine what you start writing.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
And so I got this picture.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
That you've been throwing a lifeline out of the boat
to your brother for twenty years, and maybe sometimes he's
grabbed it, maybe other times he hasn't. He's never gotten
in the boat. And eventually instead of throwing the lifeline,
you dove in the water, and now you can't get
back in the boat. And so there's an invitation. Like
(10:39):
the God of the universe, he works through invitations, and
he's saying, Becky, I want to throw you a lifeline
back in the boat, and I want to throw your
brother a lifeline. I want you to quit throwing him
a lifeline. I want you to surrender. The only way
you can get back in the boat. The abundant life,
(11:02):
the joy in your marriage and your day to day
life is if you take the lifeline and you surrender
your brother.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
I'm not asking you to do this.
Speaker 3 (11:12):
I acknowledge it's hard, but I believe Jesus through your
own words, is saying I want to give you a lifeline,
and the way that you accept the lifeline is you
surrender your brother. And the only way you can do
that with peace is believing that God is good and
he loves your brother more than you or anyone else
(11:33):
in the whole world, and he is not pulling back
the lifeline. In fact, he's the one continuing to throw
it to your brother, and so you have to let him.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
If you do, this is what your life will look like.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Your Thursday night moment with your husband over dinner. Maybe
you're watching Love Is Blind season six.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
Anyways, I have to admit that is one of my
guilty pleasures.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
If she'd say, God forgive me. We had to lighten
that up a little bit.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
So your Thursday night dinner with your husband, where normally
you get a text, Oh he's drinking again, you finally
just get to enjoy watching Love Is Blind in peace
like your husband and you have a hour long conversation
about the next trip you're gonna take, cause you probably
haven't taken many trips when your brother's been living like this. Right,
the dream that you guys have never experienced like this
(12:24):
is finally going to be an opportunity for you experience that.
That's what happens if you receive the invitation of the
lifeline God's throwing you. You surrender your brother, and trust
that God's going to keep throwing lifelines to him.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
So I just want to bless you.
Speaker 3 (12:38):
Surrender is the hardest thing, especially when we think we
can do it. And I just want you to remind
yourself of the words that God spoke through your statement
Lifeline Lifeline. Amen.
Speaker 5 (12:51):
Yeah, and hearing that, I can only imagine Becky, that
you might be thinking but like, I can't do that.
Speaker 1 (12:56):
That's so selfish of me, Like how can I just
you know, leave him more, abandon him?
Speaker 5 (13:00):
And I just want to invite you into another possibility
because right now, nobody is winning, nobody is getting served. Right,
you shared that your marriage is suffering. I'm assuming your
social life has been neglected. I can only imagine what
this is doing to your mental, emotional, you.
Speaker 1 (13:15):
Know, physical health.
Speaker 5 (13:16):
Like this is really taxing on anyone, right and so
you know a lot of times, and this could be
anyone who's listening, This could be anyone who feels like
you are neglecting yourself in order to serve other people.
But you can't serve from an empty cup. And so
but we think, like, no taking care of myself or
you know, identifying my own needs and feeding those needs.
(13:37):
That's selfish, But what if it was actually selfish not
to What if all the other people that need that
need your love and attention and care, including yourself, are
not able to get it because you're not taking care
of yourself and taking care of yourself first and foremost.
And I would invite you like a relationship with God
is the perfect first ingredient of that.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
But like, what if taking care.
Speaker 5 (13:59):
Of yourself was the best way to serve other people
because now all the other people that are in line
to get your love, attention, care are going to be
able to get you, but also without the resent like
I can only imagine when if I've sacrificed as much
as you have for my brother, there's bound to be
resent and anger, and then of course that comes in
and spills over into our relationships. So I think you know,
(14:22):
changing your definition of what you know taking care of yourself,
because it's not anti your brother, it's just pro you.
You cannot, you know, sacrifice your entire life. And I
don't mean this again to be callous or mean, but
you do have twenty years of data that shows that
your version of trying to save him has not worked right,
(14:42):
and so you've never tried this other way of really
taking care of yourself, filling up your own cup. And
you can support him and love him and believe in
him and pour into him in certain ways. But I
do want to say, like, I don't believe you personally
will ever be able to air quotes save him. He
(15:02):
has to take radical ownership and responsibility of his own
necessity to be a part in that saving journey.
Speaker 4 (15:09):
Yeah, I think everything you guys have said it's been awesome.
I think the biggest, the biggest help that you could
do is to decide what only you can control in this scenario.
And the only thing you can control is what you're
responsible for. And if you've said that, oh, I'm responsible
for my brother, that's actually not true, right, Yeah, But
(15:31):
you're responsible for your marriage and you're responsible for whoever
else is involved in that. And that's what a powerful
person does. Is a powerful person says I control me.
A powerless person says you control me. So in this scenario,
every time brother, your brother, since the text ree does
the thing we can all and I've lived here. This
is again all of us are saying, we have all
(15:54):
been here. In different scenarios in our lives, and we
can talk about that, but the big portion is today,
what am I going to now choose to be powerful?
How am I going to choose to be powerful for me?
And the biggest thing that you can do is to
decide right now what you're going to do before he
sends that next text.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
So if you will, if.
Speaker 4 (16:14):
You will right now, and what you need to do
is you need to write it down because it is
going to be so foreign for the last twenty years again,
talk about neuroscience right the neuropathways, like you've worked this
six lane highway. Every time your brother to knee jerk,
react to just doing the thing he wants you to do,
or to try to bell him out, it's going to
feel weird and it's going to feel like you're doing
(16:36):
something wrong. But what you have to really realize is
what I would do to just start the process is
I would write it down and then I would share
it with my husband, with your husband and say to him,
I need you to hold me to this because I
know my reaction the last twenty years is to come
to be to be his rescuer. And I need to
(16:56):
also say I'm sorry that I've allowed him to be
over our marriage like that alone? What healing that would
do in your marriage to your husband to just let
him know because you feel it, I can hear I can,
I can. I feel like I can hear it in
the statement that you're making, it's like you don't want
to keep doing the same thing again and again and again.
Then you're seeing how it's played. It's it's it's taken
(17:17):
a toll. But you have to actively go no, I'm powerful.
I can control me. I can't control him. I'm in
control of me and what you have given to me.
What I can do the best thing I can do
for my marriage and whoever else that's involved. If there's kids,
you know, then is I can start now to say
yes to them. And if you can start doing that,
(17:40):
where to agree upon anything, it will be given to them.
If you and your husband can get an agreement, it's
the most powerful force on this side of heaven when
to agree upon anything. And if your husband's been there,
it's been the tension between you. If you just said,
you know what, I need to repent. I have put
my brother over I never actually left that relationship to
(18:03):
really actually conform to our relationship, and I need to
repent of that and say those things that right there
is an act that is so powerful. And then you
guys get an agreement. It will change the next twenty
years of your life, like even Scott was saying, and
you will live a life that you didn't even know
was possible when you two get an agreement about something
(18:26):
that maybe you've never been in agreement about. You've never
this may be the whole thing. Once you choose to
get an agreement, do that and then and then have
them hold you to it and watch how your obedience
to what God is telling you to do and what
you're feeling in your heart. You can't worry about what
it does to someone else. You're only held to be
(18:46):
obedient to the things God is telling you to do
and believe that he'll fill in the gaps where you
have said no to something else and when you've said
yes to God, and you've got to trust that. The
last thing I'll say is this, I would ask the Lord,
where did I believe that I've found my worth in
my past by rescuing people?
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Like?
Speaker 4 (19:05):
Where did I believe that this is my identity? Because
it's rooted somewhere back in your past too, that this
is where I find my worth is rescuing, and that
part of it, if you can find the root of that,
God will begin to show you where that started and
take away, help you take away where it's rooted, and
(19:25):
allow you to plant new things so that you can
grow the fruit that you actually desire and want.
Speaker 5 (19:30):
And also like identifying when you do get clear on that,
like there's probably going to be a thought about well
who am I if I'm not rescuing, And that's where
God can fill in those gaps as well.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Can I just say who she's going to be? Yes?
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Please?
Speaker 3 (19:43):
And it's interesting we have not said this to anyone else,
but I just want to say we love you, and
you're like, you don't know me, and I'm like, well,
I'm feeling just an immense love for you.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
In the sweetest way.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
And I appreciate Ketrick and Leam because what they did
was they said this, this is practically what it looks
like to surrender and take the lifeline to get back
in the boat. I just imagine every time he texts
at first, it's a God, I'm giving you my brother,
I'm giving you back my brother.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Right.
Speaker 3 (20:14):
Eventually you're gonna say, how's your brother?
Speaker 2 (20:17):
You say, I gave him back to God.
Speaker 3 (20:19):
Wow. And then what we've learned is God loves to
give us good gifts. So when you give back your brother,
God will give you back your beauty and they will
call you Becky the beautiful Yes.
Speaker 2 (20:31):
And just I'm so thankful for you. Thank you for
sharing your heart and.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Your life, Becky the beautiful Yes.
Speaker 5 (20:37):
And there's this beautiful soul inside of you. That's why
you want to serve. There is this heart of a servant,
but you can't be a servant when you're in savior mode.
Thank you so much for sending in that question. That
is it for this episode of Ask the God Pod.
We will be back with more very soon.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Bye. We'll be back with more What's God Got to
Do with It?
Speaker 5 (20:59):
But in the meantime, I would definitely love to hear
from you, so just tell me where you are in
your story or maybe what questions you have, like where
do you feel you need clarity or support or wisdom
in your own journey. I definitely want to hear from you,
So head on over to What's God Got to Do
with It? Dot com and scroll down to the form
(21:20):
to share your thoughts, your questions, your feedback, and you
can do that instantly. So What's God Got to Do
With It? Dot com you'll find all the ways.
Speaker 4 (21:28):
To do that.
Speaker 5 (21:29):
And if you like this podcast and want to hear more,
go ahead and follow, like, and subscribe wherever you listen
to podcasts to get your weekly dose.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
Of What's God Got to Do With It?
Speaker 5 (21:40):
New episodes drop every single Tuesday, and while you're there.
Speaker 1 (21:44):
Be sure to rate and review to show your support.
It really means so much.
Speaker 5 (21:50):
What's God Got to Do With It is an iHeartRadio
podcast on the Amy Brown Podcast Network. It's written and
hosted by me Leanne Ellington, executive produced by Elizabeth Fazzio,
post production and editing by Houston Tilly, and original music
written by Cheryl Stark and produced by Adam Stark
Feeling Things with Amy & Kat News
Host
Amy Brown
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