Do you ever get mad about not having the ability to do whatever you want to do whenever you want to do it? How does the word limitations make you feel? Limitations is often thought of as a weakness. What do limitations teach us? Take a listen to this week’s podcast to find out more.
Thoughts:
Martha’s Limitations as Hospitality Director
Elijah’s Limitations as Prophet of God
Moses’ Limitations as Spokesperson and Leader for God
Trusting God: How many of us have thought in our minds, or asked someone the question: “Do you trust me?” Have you ever stopped to think of God asking us this question? Tune in to Episode 53 and find out what happens when we trust God while we wait.
Outline for “Do you trust me?”
Introduction
Our MO when we trust God
My Trust Test
Photo by Nicole De Khors at Burst by Shopify
Meditation Verses
Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.
Episode 45: Be Still: The Healing Aspect of Living with Trauma
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Be Still Podcast Outline
Definition of Still
Definition of Know
Dissection of Psalm 46: 10
What Happens With the Combo of Trauma and Constant Busyness
Photo by Fabio Manuel Neto da luz
Podcast Transcript:
Good afternoon! Welcome to Healing Our Brokenness, episode 45,
Entitled, “Be Still:” The Healing Aspect of Living with Trauma on a Daily Basis”
What does it mean to be still?
Being still means without movement, without speech, calm,
peaceful, serene.
I like to think of stillness as the act of eliminating busyness
and distractions.
In Psalm 46: 10, God tells us, “Be still and know that I am
God.”
To know means to be aware of through information and observation. For us to know something or someone, we must
spend time with that person or learning about that topic. If we want to know
God, we must quiet our spirits, stop the striving, distractions, busyness, and
do what is required to be in a relationship with him. If we want to heal from
trauma, we also need a stillness to exist.
This stillness required from healing that helps us to know
about our mind and body connection, can only happen when we purposefully have 2
things: time and space.
When we are busy every minute of the day, we don’t have time
to know our bodies. Our bodies reveal the secrets behind our emotions. Just recently, and recently being about 3
months ago, I started working a full-time job. After a month, I realized that I
needed to tweak my schedule for the weekend. I had to block out 3 hours on my weekend
mornings in order to make sure that I could continue having my time of
stillness. Without stillness, it is hard to gain clarity.
Before working full time, I had more time and space for this
stillness to occur. Now, since my schedule has changed, i must be more
intentional about giving myself margin.
Right before starting work with this job, I had a traumatic
event to occur. Along with learning new things at work, and relearning how to
drive after 30 years, I was exhibiting “ADHD-like” trauma symptoms, and having
a hard time focusing. I knew that it was
only a matter of time till the emotional effects of this event would come out. My
system had to be relaxed enough with stillness, and time and space to go
through the steps of processing everything that had gone down.
The first symptom that was exhibited was that of nausea. I
knew immediately that this was grief. And how was I able to tell that? Four
years ago, when I was living at my previous residence , I became very nauseated
one evening after eating. It was the
worst case ever. I thought that I was
coming down with the flu or some type of virus. It was also during this time
that I had not begun to process any of the traumatic events that had occurred in
the previous 3 years. My system was on
emotional and mental overload.
All of a sudden, before I knew it, I ended up regurgitating 3
to 4 times. In between each time, I felt like I needed to cry very deeply. This
is how I was able to make the connection that nausea for me equals the need for
grief to be released from my body. At
the time, my son asked me about the contents of what I ate that could have made
me so sick. I told him that I realized that it had nothing to do with the food
that I ate.
When I told my therapist about what happened, she said, “Yes,
this was definitely physiological.”
Another symptom that occurred recently is where my lips started
to become numb. I knew immediately that
this represented anger that I needed to work through. Once again, if I did not have the time within
the last few years to process some of the trauma, I would not have had a clue of
what was going on. I probably would have
gotten myself all worked up and anxious, perpetuating the problem.
I was then able to go to God and ask him, “What is this
anger about? Is it just this traumatic event, or something else along with it?”.
Having my time of stillness, and space for reflection allowed me to get to the
root of the problem so that I could start healing from, it. That anger had been coming out sideways for about
2 1/2 weeks.
Music is one of my main go-to’s for enabling me to process
trauma , and so when I added more of this into my time and space, I gained even
more wisdom and discernment , along with being able to release the grief from
my system through crying heavily.
Changes are good. However,
changes are only fully embraced once the old has been grieved. All of the “would
haves”, “should haves”, and “not any more’s”. If you are having problems
healing from trauma, ask yourself if you are allowing yourself the time and
space of sitting in God’s stillness. The
pain, loneliness, and loss have to be grieved. I don’t want to mislead you. There
will be pain in this process. There’s no way to go around it. And I promise
you, if there was, everyone would be signing up for it. There is God’s grace,
mercy, and presence there. And it is
very much needed. It is also in this stillness that our mind, body, soul, and
spirit will begin to reveal the answers to our questions. It will help us to
lead the way and or continue our journey to a life of thriving.
First, try starting off with one hour of lying down without
any distractions and see if you can notice the difference of what this new
stillness brings. Initially, it will feel very uncomfortable because you will
want to quickly fill up your time with busyness. However, this quiet time will
begin to declutter your mind and allow you to get to the root of your issues, along
with the help a therapist.
I hope that “Episode 45: ‘Be Still: The Healing Aspect Of
Living With Trauma’” has been beneficial to you in some way. If Healing Our
Brokenness is making a difference in your life, please leave a review, tag a
friend, and give a shout out on social media. God bless! Have a wonderful week!
Welcome to Healing Our Brokenness Episode 44: Remembering the Sabbath.
What does the word Sabbath mean?
Sabbath means to rest or to
cease. Sunday, the Sabbath, was my
favorite day of the week as a child. It
still is. It was a time when I knew that
I had that “rest easy” deep down in my soul kind of feeling. Sundays could be enjoyed to the fullest
because Saturday was used as a preparation day to deal with meals, clothes,
hair, cleaning, and laundry. On Sundays,
we went to church for a good portion of the day, and if there were no other
programs going on at church, we bought a soul food meal from the church, along
with pop and pound cake and headed home.
Other times, we stopped at the grocery store’s deli department to pick
up Kaiser rolls, crab meat or tuna, and muffins. The rest of the day was filled with reading,
listening to music, and enjoying family time.
Why did God
create the Sabbath? God created the
Sabbath for our benefit. God didn’t need
to rest, but he rested on the Sabbath as an example to us, to remember to take
time out to worship and rest in Him on this holy day: “Then God blessed the seventh day and
sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had
created and made.” (Genesis 2:3, NASB)
Another reason why God created the Sabbath is
to make sure that we don’t go back into a slavery mentality: “Remember that you were
slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you
out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore
the Lord your
God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.” (Deuteronomy 5: 15,
NIV) When you are slaves, there are no
breaks. You’re constantly on the
move. You wear yourselves out to the
point of exhaustion. Sabbath puts a
boundary around this mentality.
Observing Sabbath demonstrates to God that we know he is more than
capable of giving us the strength and endurance that we need to get things done
during the remaining six days. It forces
us to meditate on the fact that God’s gift of freedom given to us via the cross
is enough.
Dear God,
Thank you for the
Sabbath. Thank you for the realization
that we don’t have to work ourselves to the point of exhaustion in order to
keep up. We praise you for your
promises, and the freedom that only you can give.
In your name we
pray,
Amen
Thank you for listening to Healing Our Brokenness Episode 44: Remembering the Sabbath. Have a blessed week!
Background on Recovery: When you are recovering from PTSD/trauma, it requires a lot of in-depth work. This poem depicts just that. You have to regain your sense of self, learn to listen to your body for its story, and be still with patience as God does his work.
Would you consider yourself a person of grace and truth, or a person of just truth? What is the difference? Find out by listening to today’s podcast to see what happens when we have one without the other. Remember to catch up on last week’s episode here first.
Relationships are hard. It doesn’t matter whether it’s family,
friends, or coworkers, it can be challenging. One thing about relationships is that they
require time, energy, grace, and love.
When disagreements arise, and they will, we can be so intent on wanting
to be right, that we can damage the relationship even more.
God tells us in his word: “And
you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:32,
NLT) We shouldn’t be foolish, and pretend that the truth doesn’t matter. When
we ignore the truth, we train our minds and bodies to slowly downplay the cues
they tell us that signify something is wrong.
Only applying the truth can also bring in legalism. Because God gives us grace, we are able to
extend grace to others. Only applying
grace without truth and boundaries leads to being taken advantage of, an out of
control situation, and the other person constantly pressing the envelope to see
how far they can go. “Then we will no
longer be infants, tossed about by the waves and carried around by every wind
of teaching and by the clever cunning of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will
in all things grow up into Christ Himself, who is the head.” (Ephesians
4:14-15, BSB)
There are
individuals in my own life who have hurt me dearly. I cannot ignore the revelation of truth that
healing has brought me. At the same
time, if I focused only on the truth of these situations, it would make my
heart bitter. The truth is, we are all
broken individuals, and since we are all broken individuals, we all have sin in
our lives. If it weren’t for God’s mercy
in eliminating certain people and things from my life, I could very well have
gone down that path. Offering grace and
truth to people doesn’t mean restoration of the relationship. It could mean grieving what is no longer
there, acceptance, and the ability to move on.
Dear God,
We thank you
for the relationships that you have blessed us with. We pray that you would give us discernment
when it comes to applying grace and truth in difficult situations. Please help us to understand that we are all
broken individuals in need of a Savior.
Good evening! Welcome to Healing Our Brokenness Episode 36. Last week’s episode, Value of Prayer, can be found here.
Transcript:
There is hunger and lack of clean water in
several countries all over the world.
The problem of hunger is so bad that people have lost hope for
themselves and their children. It has
been said that the amount of food that we throw away as waste is enough food to
stop world hunger. The thing about being
good stewards, when it comes to God, is that stewardship is not just about
money, it is for everything that God owns:
“The earth is the LORD’s,
and everything in it. The world and all its people belong to him.” (Psalms
24:1, NLT) This means our time, talents, our bodies, everything!
When I grew up as a child, we placed value on food, and how we used
it. It wasn’t just because we were poor,
but it was also because we realized just how many people were going without
food, and in such a desperate need. In
this day and age, we think nothing of having our kids throw whole plates of
food in the garbage without blinking an eye.
As Christians, sometimes we get so cozy in our homes, and the
immediate needs of our families, that we forget about our responsibility to
take care of the poor: “Religion that
is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their
affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” (James 1:27, ESV) It makes some of us uncomfortable to think about
giving away some of what we have. A lot
of times, when it comes to clothing, we have the same few pieces of clothing
that we like to wear over and over again anyway. Having a closet full of clothes gives the
illusion of false self-worth.
After the day
of Pentecost, the Christians were on such a spiritual high from the workings of
the Holy Spirit, that no one was in need: “All
the believers were of one heart and mind, and no one felt that what he owned
was his own; everyone was sharing. And
the apostles preached powerful sermons about the resurrection of the Lord
Jesus, and there was warm fellowship among all the believers,and no
poverty—for all who owned land or houses sold them and brought the money to the
apostles to give to others in need.” (Acts 4:32-37, TLB)
What would be required in order
for us to have this kind of situation going on now? It would require a change of heart and a
change of mind. Then our behavior will
follow: “If my people, which are called by my name,
shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked
ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal
their land.” (2 Chronicles 7:14, KJV) God blesses repentance and good stewardship.
Dear God,
Thank you for what we have. We pray that you would move in our hearts to
do more to help others in need. We know
that we cannot outdo you when it comes to giving. Please help us to be mindful and sensitive to
others who are in dire circumstances, and that if we don’t have anything to
give, our hearts will be stirred to pray for those individuals.
In Jesus’ name,
Amen
Thank you for listening to Healing Our Brokenness. If the show is making a difference in your life, please refer a friend.
Good afternoon! Welcome to Episode 22 of Healing Our Brokenness. Today’s Episode is entitled, “Opposition Against Your Calling”.
Analyzing Calling
How many of you have been told by God that you were destined for a calling? You went through the steps of walking in that calling until Satan started to shame you with your personal struggles, and what your present reality is, rather than God’s truth. That is what has happened to me as well.
When life’s disappointments begin to scream at us from every direction known to man, we start to second guess what it is that God already promised us. As a matter of fact, when God spoke your calling over your life, the promise was so strong, that you could feel God’s peace over you.
God is not a liar. His word will not return unto him void. However, we are not in charge of the timing. But, because we don’t see God’s promise coming to fruition right away, we allow the enemy to shame us with doubt and negative views of God. We detach ourselves from seeing his provision, faithfulness, and goodness while we wait.
The Effects of Our Calling
When God puts a calling on our lives, it can bring out the best or the worst in people. Some people will cheer you on and confirm the calling that has been spoken to you clearly about. They might even offer to help you with anything that you need to get started. These are usually the ones who will pray for and with you and walk through the entire birthing process that God has placed upon you.
But then we have the second group of people. This is the group of people who will try to do everything that they can do to discourage you from stepping into what God has already told you is yours. I have had this to happen to me unfortunately. They will spew out everything that they can possibly think of in the area of negativity. There will be subtle hints of how you should do something else. Or hints of your current status not being representative of anything close to your calling. They might make comments about your clothing or physical appearance.
Unfortunately, in my own personal experience, I had all three of the above instances to occur. I noticed there was a pattern that occurred. As I celebrated each small accomplishment, there were suggestions that I should do something else. It took me a while to catch on. What becomes dangerous, and something that we very much must watch out for is when people will use the Holy Spirit to speak into what you are supposed to do, and it is not lining up with what God has told you. God does speak to other people. However, if it is in direct contradiction with what we have been told, we need to be careful. The scriptures tell us to test the spirits.
One thing about negativity is that when it gets into your head, it becomes like a disease. It is easy going in, but not easy getting out. Your mood will shift from one of being upbeat to depression until you start noticing where the source of this negativity is coming from.
What Happened to Me in My Calling
When everything fell apart in my life in 2018, and I started the beginning of my job trials, Satan tried to convince me to stop following the steps of my calling. However, now that I look back, his work was so evident that he decided to have almost every single appliance in my home to break down one after the other. It was unbelievable.
Then, within the last week, as I was coming to a place of acceptance of letting God direct me in my next steps, and on a spiritual high from this “new place”, once again, Satan showed up in trying to prevent me from doing my calling. Out of nowhere, I had major problems with my printer. Then, I narrowed it down to realizing that the issue was just with my laptop.
Then, I thought, “Oh Great!” I found myself getting upset because it took several hours away from productivity for the day. I had already had two days where I couldn’t do as much work since I wasn’t feeling well, and this particular day, I was ready to get things done. However, the printer was not. I came up with a plan to tackle it later and kept going.
What Happened to Me in My Calling- Part 2
And the enemy kept going. I had three blog posts to get done, and two podcast recordings to complete before the week was out, and my blog’s website had a three-part glitch. The technicians fixed two problems and gave me a workaround solution for third fix so that I could get back to working.
The temporary fix caused about six other problems. At this point, I had to pray. I admitted to the Lord that I was really angry at this point. I asked him to help me not to sin in this anger, and to work through the problem. Sometimes we just have to get honest with our feelings. He was already aware of what was going on. The six other problems resolved by this morning, and I am still working in a temporary editor until their developer fixes the bug. But God is good! Satan didn’t totally cripple me from doing what I needed to do. However, there was a lot of frustration along the way.
As Nehemiah and his people tried to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, they faced a lot of opposition. Like with myself, people tried any and everything in order to get Nehemiah to come down from building the wall. Sanballat and his crew even sent a false prophet to Nehemiah to make it seem like the Lord had given orders.
6 When word came to Sanballat, Tobiah, Geshem the Arab and the rest of our enemies that I had rebuilt the wall and not a gap was left in it—though up to that time I had not set the doors in the gates— 2 Sanballat and Geshem sent me this message: “Come, let us meet together in one of the villages[a] on the plain of Ono.”
But they were scheming to harm me; 3 so I sent messengers to them with this reply: “I am carrying on a great project and cannot go down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and go down to you?” 4 Four times they sent me the same message, and each time I gave them the same answer.
5 Then, the fifth time, Sanballat sent his aide to me with the same message, and in his hand was an unsealed letter 6 in which was written:
“It is reported among the nations—and Geshem[b] says it is true—that you and the Jews are plotting to revolt, and therefore you are building the wall. Moreover, according to these reports you are about to become their king 7 and have even appointed prophets to make this proclamation about you in Jerusalem: ‘There is a king in Judah!’ Now this report will get back to the king; so come, let us meet together.”
8 I sent him this reply: “Nothing like what you are saying is happening; you are just making it up out of your head.”
9 They were all trying to frighten us, thinking, “Their hands will get too weak for the work, and it will not be completed.”
But I prayed, “Now strengthen my hands.”
Scripture Part 2
10 One day I went to the house of Shemaiah son of Delaiah, the son of Mehetabel, who was shut in at his home. He said, “Let us meet in the house of God, inside the temple, and let us close the temple doors, because men are coming to kill you—by night they are coming to kill you.”
11 But I said, “Should a man like me run away? Or should someone like me go into the temple to save his life? I will not go!” 12 I realized that God had not sent him, but that he had prophesied against me because Tobiah and Sanballat had hired him. 13 He had been hired to intimidate me so that I would commit a sin by doing this, and then they would give me a bad name to discredit me.
14 Remember Tobiah and Sanballat, my God, because of what they have done; remember also the prophet Noadiah and how she and the rest of the prophets have been trying to intimidate me. 15 So the wall was completed on the twenty-fifth of Elul, in fifty-two days.
Opposition to the Completed Wall
16 When all our enemies heard about this, all the surrounding nations were afraid and lost their self-confidence, because they realized that this work had been done with the help of our God.
17 Also, in those days the nobles of Judah were sending many letters to Tobiah and replies from Tobiah kept coming to them. 18 For many in Judah were under oath to him, since he was son-in-law to Shekaniah son of Arah, and his son Jehohanan had married the daughter of Meshullam son of Berekiah. 19 Moreover, they kept reporting to me his good deeds and then telling him what I said. And Tobiah sent letters to intimidate me.
Just like with Nehemiah and myself, Satan will send anybody and anything to stop you from doing what God wants you to do. He will send your kids, your family, your friends, appliance and technology failure, etc. Anything! He will send people to us to have us to waste five hours that could be invested in getting things done. Or better yet, waste five hours surfing on social media, and then for sure you aren’t going to want to do anything afterwards.
Solutions for Opposition
How do we combat the opposition against our calling?
Be aware of patterns of behavior in others in others that cause depression and sadness through the spirit of negativity.
Prepare yourself to do some exchanging of your inner and outer circles.
Know that if at no other time, your calling will be the time when it will be clear if you will have to let some friendships go.
Test the spirit to see if what was prophesied lines up with what God promised you.
Keep yourself prayed up and encouraged in the Lord. There are many times that David had to do that.
Persevere with consistency and give yourself grace along the way.
Be honest with your feelings when opposition comes your way.
Thank you for listening to Healing Our Brokenness: Episode 22: Opposition Against Your Calling. I hope that you have been able to have some takeaways to add to your healing. God bless!
In case you missed our last podcast episode, you can catch that one here:
Podcast Episode 21: Approval Addiction Outline:
Dissecting Approval Addiction
Analyzing People-Pleasing
Perfectionism’s Trap
My Issues with Perfectionism
Moses’ Issues with People-Pleasing
Solutions
Podcast Transcript
Approval Addiction
Good afternoon! Welcome to Episode 21: Healing Our Brokenness. Today’s Episode is entitled, “Approval Addiction”.
Dissecting Approval Addiction
Perfectionism and People pleasing are more acceptable words to say. It sounds better and makes us feel better than to tell someone that we suffer from approval addiction. Saying the words approval addiction makes us want to cringe. However, the deeper issue of these two sins is the need for approval. When it comes to the brokenness that occurs in our lives, either we tend to follow in the footsteps that this emotion caused, or we will do the exact opposite. People pleasing and perfectionism stem from rejection. If we are rejected, then the natural thing to do is to 1) disappear, or become invisible, or 2) to make sure that someone sees me.
Analyzing People-Pleasing
First of all, we will examine the sin of people pleasing. When it comes to people pleasing, we are focusing on doing the things that people want us to do. If it gets to the extreme, where we are so trying to keep everybody happy, that we have literally lost our own sense of self in the process, that’s when we get to the point of waking up one day, and then asking ourselves, “Okay, what do I want?”
I have done everything that everyone else wanted me to do. How do I live outside of this? For example, If there are 50 people in a room, and we took a survey to see how all fifty of these people thought that we should style our hair, we could possibly have anywhere between 20 to 50 answers. What if we decided to follow their advice, we’d be going around just like the energizer bunny, worn out, and a tired, hot mess. They would be happy, but we wouldn’t be because we have decided to forego being true to ourselves. We have lost a sense of what we value and hold true to ourselves.
Perfectionism’s Trap
The next sin that we will examine is that of perfectionism. I was abandoned by my dad at age 11. I felt rejected. Since my mom and dad were no longer together, and we were total opposites, and I had to have some kind of conclusion to come to in a child’s mind, then I felt rejected by her. Thirdly, I had a situation where I stood outside of the Baptist church that I grew up in, and one teenager said to another, “Her mother is so beautiful. I wonder what happened to her.”
To a teenage girl, this is devastating. Mix it in with the fact that I already had double issues of rejection from my parents, as well as physical insecurities. It rocked my world. I internalized what was said. And then, I was setup on the course for dating and then marrying my ex-husband, who had his only brokenness of being controlling, manipulative, emotionally abusive, serial cheating, and the list goes on. I endured a 20-year marriage of this. And the question is, since I had grounds for divorce, why did I stay so long?
My Issues with Perfectionism
The above two reasons that I mentioned: extreme insecurities about my appearance and the three-part rejection issue. He was able to keep me in his back pocket so long because of my low-self worth. And, unfortunately, in my brokenness, I allowed it. It wasn’t until about three years ago that I got to the root of my perfectionism/approval addiction issues.
God was gracious and merciful at the time. Secondly, he showed me how it played out. I was the rule follower. The “good girl” in grammar school and high school. Katina didn’t get into trouble. My perfection played out in winning spelling bees, high grades in school, and performing in oratorical contests. I loved doing all these things. However, there was also recognition for doing all these things. Instead of choosing to become invisible, I chose to be seen.
Because of my ex-husband’s brokenness, he pretended like all I had to do was a few things and we would get back to the way that things were. What I didn’t know in the beginning is that I could do 50 things, or 1000 things, and the relationship was never going back to the beginning. I had been love-bombed, gaslight, devalued, and being groomed for discard unfortunately.
Perfectionism went from one area of my life to every area as I tried to fix him and give structure and control an out-of-control person. Who was I fooling? There was a two-way street going. I was on a mission to the fixing what he needed, and I took the devil’s bait of getting my self-worth from him instead of God. We will never be filled by another individual in an area that only God can fill. And if you are dealing with someone with his type of brokenness, they will just keep adding to the list, making you think, “if only you do this”. Trust me, it will never happen.
Moses’ Issues with People-Pleasing
Moses had the same setup from the Israelites. He led the
people out of Egypt as God had told him, but then all of the
needy people were coming to him for everything.
Here is the scripture taken from Exodus 18:
Jethro’s Advice
“18 Jethro, the priest of Midian, Moses’ father-in-law, heard of all that God had done for Moses and for Israel his people, how the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt. 2 Now Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, had taken Zipporah, Moses’ wife, after he had sent her home, 3 along with her two sons. The name of the one was Gershom (for he said, “I have been a sojourner[a] in a foreign land”), 4 and the name of the other, Eliezer[b] (for he said, “The God of my father was my help, and delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh”). 5 Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, came with his sons and his wife to Moses in the wilderness where he was encamped at the mountain of God.
6 And when he sent word to Moses, “I,[c] your father-in-law Jethro, am coming to you with your wife and her two sons with her,” 7 Moses went out to meet his father-in-law and bowed down and kissed him. And they asked each other of their welfare and went into the tent. 8 Then Moses told his father-in-law all that the Lord had done to Pharaoh and to the Egyptians for Israel’s sake, all the hardship that had come upon them in the way, and how the Lord had delivered them. 9 And Jethro rejoiced for all the good that the Lord had done to Israel, in that he had delivered them out of the hand of the Egyptians.
10 Jethro said, “Blessed be the Lord, who has delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of Pharaoh and has delivered the people from under the hand of the Egyptians. 11 Now I know that the Lord is greater than all gods, because in this affair they dealt arrogantly with the people.”[d]12 And Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law, brought a burnt offering and sacrifices to God; and Aaron came with all the elders of Israel to eat bread with Moses’ father-in-law before God.
13 The next day Moses sat to judge the people, and the people stood around Moses from morning till evening. 14 When Moses’ father-in-law saw all that he was doing for the people, he said, “What is this that you are doing for the people? Why do you sit alone, and all the people stand around you from morning till evening?” 15 And Moses said to his father-in-law, “Because the people come to me to inquire of God;
16 when they have a dispute, they come to me and I decide between one person and another, and I make them know the statutes of God and his laws.”17 Moses’ father-in-law said to him, “What you are doing is not good.18 You and the people with you will certainly wear yourselves out, for the thing is too heavy for you. You are not able to do it alone.
19 Now obey my voice; I will give you advice, and God be with you! You shall represent the people before God and bring their cases to God, 20 and you shall warn them about the statutes and the laws, and make them know the way in which they must walk and what they must do. 21 Moreover, look for able men from all the people, men who fear God, who are trustworthy and hate a bribe, and place such men over the people as chiefs of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens.
22 And let them judge the people at all times. Every great matter they shall bring to you, but any small matter they shall decide themselves. So it will be easier for you, and they will bear the burden with you. 23 If you do this, God will direct you, you will be able to endure, and all this people also will go to their place in peace.”
24 So Moses listened to the voice of his father-in-law and did all that he had said. 25 Moses chose able men out of all Israel and made them heads over the people, chiefs of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens.26 And they judged the people at all times. Any hard case they brought to Moses, but any small matter they decided themselves. 27 Then Moses let his father-in-law depart, and he went away to his own country.”
What happened to Moses is kind of like having your children say, “Mom”. You answer and then it turns into fifty more times. And to be honest, by then you are aggravated, and ready to run away or ring someone’s neck. It gets played out real fast. However, like in my relationship, Moses had his rejection issues from birth, and then his life in Egypt that were never resolved. He got caught in people pleasing/approval addiction. He could help the people in their neediness, and they could help provide him with the approval that he craved that should have been filled by God.
What happens? We get tired after a while. Emotional, physical, spiritual, and psychological exhaustion takes place on both sides. Codependency sets in, like in me and Moses’ situation. Bottom Line: We can’t give people what they need.
God is telling us like he told Martha, “Come, sit at my feet. Rest in me. Fill your soul with spirit-filled activities. People are never going to be enough.” He is a jealous God. And he is jealous of our people worship.
He keeps telling us: “Come unto me all ye that labor, and I will give you rest.”
When we choose people pleasing and perfectionism over God, then we choose to settle for broken pieces of shame, other people’s expectations, rejection, unworthiness, and unacceptance.
Solutions
So, how do we start the recovery process from approval addiction?
We remind ourselves that our identity is in Christ.
We speak to our soul and tell it, “God loves you!”
Remind ourselves that Jesus was despised and rejected so he can identify with our pain.
Christ is enough, and we are enough in Christ.
Rest in God.
We tell ourselves the follow statement:
“We are all broken, and so when we look to others for approval, we are getting approval from everyone else’s broken lens.”-Katina Horton
Thank you for listening to Healing Our Brokenness: Episode 21: Approval Addiction. I hope that you have been able to have some takeaways to add to your healing. God bless!
When things are predictable, we feel safe, secure, and at ease. We are not God, and thus, the truth of the matter is that not everything in life will be predictable. However, when unpredictability becomes your norm, then it can be the perfect recipe for disaster. If you already have a history of PTSD or trauma, then after a round of unpredictability at its finest, you will be in line for more.
I was young, in my 20s, married, a full-time employee and a full-time student. And although I was very busy, and I did feel stress because of it, it wasn’t anything major. Out of the blue, everything changed. I went from doing all of the above to running to the emergency room and/or doctor’s office once or twice a week. Unpredictability rocked my world to put it mildly.
The symptoms started off with a racing heart. My ex-husband dropped me off in front of our apartment building one night so that I could get settled, and he could continue driving around to find a park. My heart started racing like crazy. I remember thinking to myself, “What is going on?” It finally stopped by the time that I got upstairs.
A couple of weeks after that, on my 24th birthday to be exact, I was standing in front of the copy machine at work when I started feeling excruciating chest pains. One of my coworkers rushed me to the ER in her car. They didn’t find anything.
However, after that, every few days there was a new symptom occurring: extremely high blood pressure, racing pulse, hammer-pounding headaches that made you long for heaven, diarrhea, an unsafe drop in weight, fibromyalgia,etc. It got to the point where my belts were no longer able to keep my pants up.
Days turned into weeks and weeks into months as the physician ran every kind of blood test that he could think of. On one particular occasion, I was blow drying my hair, when all of a sudden, my heart and pulse starting racing as if it was going to beat out of my chest, and then my entire body started twitching. I finished blow drying my hair and headed to the ER. My mother, my ex-husband, and some other family members met me there.
As soon as my ex-husband saw me with my hair just blow dried and no curls, he stated, ” You couldn’t have done anything to your hair?” It was one of those moments when you stared in shock, cognitive dissonance sets in, and then you pretend like you didn’t hear what you just heard.
This vibrant twenty year-old, straight “A” student who was able to do it all suffered a time-out. I ended up having to drop two of my classes. The exhaustion and insomnia wouldn’t allow me to keep up.
Finally, during one particular visit to my physician, I gave in and told him that I was feeling depressed. He said that it was just the stress. My reply was, “Something is wrong with me.” He listed everything that he had done already, and then he said, ” How about we check your thyroid?”
In no time, I got the results. Bingo! I had hyperactive thyroid. Better known as Graves disease. I finally had an answer for this madness. I was happy and feeling blessed. However, that didn’t last long when I found out that it would take about four months before I would start feeling better.
I decided upon the “Radioactive Cocktail” as my method of treatment. A lady who worked in the nuclear medicine department gave me the best advice ever. She told me not to be surprised if my condition reverses because of medicine not being an “exact science”. It was the same thing that had happened to her.
At first, I was mad, and wondering why she would say something like this. However, I soon realized that it was the best advice ever because I was prepared. Just like she forewarned, my thyroid condition went normal, and then reversed to the other side, better known as hypothyroidism.
Four months later, I was back to my normal self so it seemed. However, the unpredictability of trips to the doctor and ER led me to develop compounded trauma. I already had childhood trauma under my belt. Then were was the trauma of being in a toxic relationship, a verbally abusive job, and my physical health was now added to that list.
If I had to look back at that twenty-four year old woman, I would tell her what I now know: “Breathe! Allow yourself to feel the feelings! When you don’t allow yourself to feel the feelings of overwhelm, your body will take it on. The stress has to go somewhere. Let it out! Nothing is worth your health. Community is everything. God is enough!”
Blessings all!
Katina
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