Science-backed tools.
Spiritually-based wisdom.

Episode Notes

‍

What if healing doesn’t start with managing your emotions—but with understanding how your brain responds to fear, grief, and hope?

In this episode, Dr. Alison sits down with neurosurgeon, author, and Iraq War veteran Dr. Lee Warren to explore trauma, loss, faith, and the brain’s God-given capacity to change. 

After unimaginable loss, Dr. Warren shares how “self-brain surgery”—learning to notice and interrupt destructive thought patterns—helped him restore hope and agency without bypassing grief.

This conversation will help you understand:

—Why most of our thoughts are repetitive, negative, and often untrue

—How trauma wires automatic thoughts—and how those patterns can change

—How faith and neuroscience meet in practical ways

—The difference between the mind and the brain, and why that distinction matters for healing

This episode offers hope without shortcuts. It honors the reality of suffering while reminding us that our past does not get the final word — not neurologically, not emotionally, and not spiritually.

‍

More Resources:

📖 Preorder Dr. Lee Warren’s Latest Book, The Life Changing Art of Self-Brain Surgery

Listen to the Dr. Lee Warren Podcast here.

📥 Grab your 3 free Soul Mending resources here

‍

If you liked this episode, then you’ll love the following:

Episode 186: Stuck in Overthinking? A Simple Practice to Interrupt Stress, Overwhelm, and Habit Loops

Episode 170: The Truth About Venting, Numbing, and Finding Real Relief - Science-Backed Tools to Actually Restore Your Brain and Body

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📖 Find a full transcript and list of resources from this episode here

‍

💬 Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.

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*Some of the links above are Amazon affiliate links. If you choose to purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

While Dr. Cook is a counselor, the content of this podcast and any of the products provided by Dr. Cook are not specific counseling advice nor are they a substitute for individual counseling. The content and products provided on this podcast are for informational purposes only.‍

© 2025 Alison Cook. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please do not copy or share the contents of this webpage or transcript without permission from the author.

‍

TRANSCRIPT

Hey everyone and welcome back to this week's episode of The Best of You. This week

marks the very first full week of something new we're doing here, the best of you

every day. And if you've been listening along, you know that each weekday we've been

slowing down together, anchoring ourselves in scripture and letting it orient how we

live and move through the day. I've needed these morning devotions.

They have helped me so much. I've wanted something like this for a long time,

right? To really let scripture anchor my day, which I've done a lot of in the

past, but also bringing that psychology lens because there is so much good psychology

in scripture. And it's been amazing for me and I hope it's also been helpful for

you. Here's the thing, Thursdays don't change, right? These are still our space, our

day to go deeper together, to stay with the harder questions to explore what it

looks like to live out this kind of wisdom in the midst of our suffering, of our

grief, of real complexity, of relationships, right? We're going to bring in experts

continually on Thursday as well as sometimes I'll do solo episodes going deeper into

how we grow, how we heal, how we apply all of this wisdom to our actual lives.

And today's conversation does exactly that. My guest today is Dr.

Lee Warren. Dr. Warren is an award -winning author, a practicing neurosurgeon, and an

Iraq war veteran. He's amazing. He's just a delightful human being,

and I've loved getting to know him this past year. Outside of the operating room,

his writing and teaching explore the powerful intersection of neuroscience and faith,

offering a vision for real embodied transformation. He's the host of the Dr.

Lee Warren podcast, which I've gotten to be a guest on. He also writes the self

-brain surgery letter on Substack, where his work consistently helps people understand

how the way we think shapes the way we live and how renewal is not just spiritual,

but deeply neurological as well. Lee's story

his scientific expertise and his faith into an integrated, honest reflection on

suffering, healing, and hope. He's got a brand new book coming out in just a few

weeks. It's called The Life Changing Art of Self Brain Surgery, which is available

now for pre -order. And if you pre -order the book, Leah is offering some truly

incredible bonus gifts as a thank you. So these are resources you don't want to

miss out on. And we'll link to that pre -order information in the show notes so you

can learn more about how to get them. If you've been joining me each morning for

Dr. Lee Warren.

I'm so thrilled to just get this chance to, you know, I've gotten to know your

work a little bit through your books and through conversations on a conversation on

your podcast. But I would love to start,

Lee, on kind of some really tough parts of your own life that has led you to this

work, especially this latest book. And to introduce you a little bit in your story

to my audience, you surfed in Iraq. How long ago was that,

Lee? I was in Iraq in 2005. Okay. So 20 years ago.

And pretty intensely, you were a surgeon. And when we talk about PTSD,

this is sort of the old school definition of PTSD.

trauma, loss, grief. Before we dive into the incredible wisdom that you've gained and

that you have for us, take us back a little bit in time. What were you sitting

with in those days? What would we have seen in your heart,

in your faith, in your thinking back then? Well, I think it was a little bit of a

staged evolution, Alice.

of my house and never talked about it and just kind of came home from the war

went to a divorce got out eight weeks after I was in Iraq I was operating in

private practice in Alabama like out of the military and operating and so I stuffed

all that in there and then went on with my life and and try to just work work

through it right because that's what I thought you're supposed to do just work hard

God'll reward you and Then met Lisa, remarried, blended our families,

did all that stuff, started a private practice. My life seemed to be going better.

Everything felt pretty happy. And then in 2013, our son Mitchell, who was 19, was

stabbed to death. And so right when I thought I had finally sort of gotten back to

where, you know, I liked God and he liked me again, I lost my son.

And basically At that point, it felt like I didn't understand what was true anymore.

Because all the things I thought had been true, that if I worked hard enough, it

would work out. And God would, you know, forgive me and I would be okay as long

as I did all the right stuff. All of a sudden, nothing felt true anymore. And it

didn't feel like it was possible for me to believe the things that I had previously

previously believed. And so that's where I was, I think, after that event happened.

It's such a vivid metaphor in a way of literally putting all of your war stuff in

the garage. Yeah. Just tucking it away, figuring if you just got back on the

treadmill, you could earn God's favor in a sense. Yeah. So when you go through this

moment, it sounds like after the loss of your son, it obviously, in and of itself,

a tremendous grief.

I felt like it was back on track. But I hadn't really, I think, figured out the

path to how your life can feel right and be right. I just figured out an operating

system, sort of how to make it work. And so I think when I lost Mitch, really all

the wheels fell off of every coping mechanism I had, everything that I thought was

true. And I think I just had sort of bandaged it up enough to make it work,

but after midstead, it didn't work anymore. Nothing did. What were some of the

thoughts or, you know, can you give us a sense of what happened in your body,

in your mind, in those moments of despair, spiritually, mentally, emotionally,

physically? Interesting that you say body. I mean, we both work around people that

have heard enough to No.

of shingles on my right shoulder blade, which I had never had. And we know now

that shingles is stress -related sometimes. And now, so here 12 years later, like any

time I'm thinking about Mitch or I'm having a reminiscent kind of movement, my right

shoulder blade hurts. And it comes back, that sort of post -herpetic neurologist call

it, that pain syndrome, really does come out in your body. And so I grinded all my

molars in half. I broke a bunch of teeth from grinding my teeth at night. And so

all that stuff was happening.

think that I had ever really thought that God,

let me rephrase that. I think the normal question that everybody has when they go

through something hard, where is God in this? Is there really a God and this does

God love me? I had all those normal questions too, even though I would have said

before that I didn't believe that God allows bad things to happen to us because

he's punishing us in some way. I wouldn't have believed that. But then all of a

sudden, I was feeling it again, and I did believe it. Yeah. Does that make sense?

Totally. So what I thought I believed didn't turn out to be what I really believed.

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Yeah, so this is where your expertise as a neuroscientist is fascinating to me. It

reminds me, Lee, we talked on your podcast after I had a stroke in those moments

when it was happening, my thought life surprised me because I went to things I

don't actually believe. To your point, I thought, is God smiting me?

Yep. And if you were to take me on a...

That's right. And this gets out what you tease apart as the difference between the

mind and the brain, I think. Yeah, that's right. So I want to get into that,

into the meat of this, because I think this is your ability to reflect on that as

a neuroscient, you know, as a literal brain surgeon is so amazing to us. But before

we get there, just how, what was the first flicker of hope? because I could

imagine, given everything,

model so it's not sustaining this trauma i could imagine somebody losing their faith

you know just this is the moment some what how did you have a flicker of hope

that your brain could be rewired and and they're in your so could your faith you

know this is one of those um there's a verse in psalm 34 that says sub 34 18

that says god is close to the hearted. Yes. And this is one of those places where

that promise turned out to be true. And it's interesting that he showed up,

God, showed up in a way that I as a neuroscientist could understand him that he

was showing up. And I'll tell you that story. So we worked, Lisa, my wife, ran our

practice at the time. And our office was at the Auburn University campus in Alabama

in a building where they do functional brain MRI research and so there's this fancy

research machine that they had where you could image what happens in your brain when

you think certain thoughts right and so after Mitch died a few weeks later we had

to go back to work and we ran our own practice and had a bunch of employees and

it was just time we had to go back to work and a few days after that there was

a meeting that was on my schedule where we had to go down and watch some of this

research happening that put research subjects in the scanner and they were asking

them questions through headphones and telling them to think different thoughts than

they had been thinking before. And so here I am in my hopeless, bereaved state, not

wanting to be back at work, but I had to. You know, it's financial obligations and

whatnot. You've got to go back to work at some point. So I'm in this building with

my wife standing next to me. We're watching this research play out and I'm sitting

there with all my thoughts about I'm never going to feel better than I feel right

now. And, you know, what kind of dad loses a child and all those things

be anxious, be grateful instead. Like when you think different thoughts, your body

and your life will do different things. And for me, in that state of being a brief

father, that felt like hope to me. And the reason it felt like hope was because my

traditional neuroscience training, and yours too probably, was that you are the

product of your brain activity, that you get your brain from your genes and your

traumas and your parents and your past history. And that when your brain doesn't

work right, you don't work.

And that started this process of me investigating things on the science side that I

believed that were now being proven to be maybe not accurate, things that I believed

on the spiritual side that may have been altered because I wasn't thinking about

them correctly. And then looking at what God actually said and trying to find

promises that seemed to be true now. And that started feeling like hope. And every

day when I started pursuing that path, I found that science and faith began to

align themselves and that neuroscience actually was pointing to.

so much of that is arriving like you're saying at a more robust, integrated

understanding of the science and what scripture is teaching us. That's beautiful.

Yeah. There are several 10 commandments in the book. This is because it reminds me

of what you're getting at. And they're very powerful, even to just read them in the

table of contents. I thought these are really powerful. I must relentlessly refused

to participate.

Well, I think it goes back to that idea that I said before that most of us have

accepted this idea, at least on some level, that our lives are formed out of the

way that our brains work, right? Yeah. And so the research is pretty clear now if

you actually look at 21st century neuroscience, especially imaging research, and see

what we're actually learning about the fact that you can control what your brain

does by changing what you think about. Yeah. And then there's all this research

recently, especially Daniel Lehman and Jeffrey Schwartz, and a bunch of people have

done this good research that shows that about 80 % of the things that we think on

a given day aren't true. Yeah. Just these negative thoughts that pop into your head.

And about 90 % of our thoughts are repeats of the same thoughts that we thought the

day before. And so, and not only thoughts, but about 80 % of the things that we

feel turn out to be not accurate to anything that's really happening in the world

around us. And most people don't know, as you and I, I'm sure you've told your

listeners all the time, the human brain can't discern between something that's

actually happening and something that you're just imagining or thinking about or

worrying about. And so that means that most of the things that we think and feel,

in a culture that says we're supposed to trust them and follow our heart and live

your truth and all these things, most of the things that we think and feel actually

aren't true. Yeah. And all of them.

turned out to be the case and it hurt my relationship or it caused this problem in

my life so then if you can see that you've done that before then you can get some

data that says hey when i think and feel something i ought to develop some sort of

process to discern whether that thought and feeling is true before i react to it

yeah that would help me and so that idea that relentlessly refuse to participate in

your own demise is this idea don't commit malpractice against yourself like it's

harmful to you when you react to thinking and feeling that's not true because it

creates trouble for you that you have to then unwind and deal with instead of just

dealing with the thought and feeling before you reacted to them right it's so

powerful the way you really break that down because there's two things going on

there's my initial reaction and then there's a you use that word discernment and

then there's my ability to discern to step into a different part of my brain and

actually evaluate the truth of that and it's so simple but of course it's true if

I think about my thoughts you know for those of us who have a harsh inner critic

I talk a lot about you know a lot of my you know my internal thoughts are oh I'm

so stupid I'm such a moron you know that's a big one for me which which isn't

true, but it is, you know, so it affects the way we think negative thoughts about

ourselves. It affects the way that we think, make assumptions about other people. So

it, so, so break this down because you really are saying that this brain surgery,

this is the self brain surgery that we have to do on herself and you're saying

it's this isn't a metaphor this is actually a mechanism for personal change so take

us into that how do we actually do this with ourselves right this happened this

insight happened shortly after that day in the MRI scanner like it dawned me one

day I think it was the Holy Spirit that said okay if we're not actually just the

product of our brain activity and if we, in fact, can influence our brain activity

by changing what we think about, then that's essentially exactly what I do when I

go to the operating room and take out a brain tumor or drain a hemorrhage in the

brain, treat some stroke. I'm intentionally changing the structure of my patient's

brain for the purpose of improving their life in some way or maybe saving their

life. That's surgery. And we know now that in real time when you change from one

thought to another, your brain, my friend Daniel Lehman says your brain is always

and synaptic connections in your brain. They're real. They're literally real. They're

literal. That's why I say it's not a metaphor. When I say you deciding to operate

this process, what we call it neuroplasticity, by the way, the neuroscientist,

neuroplasticity is this fact that the brain is not stuck in a particular way of

being, but it literally changes its own structure all the time. Every day, all the

time your brain is changing. It's never the same brain two days in a row. The

problem is, going back to what

If we're not aware that we have agency in that process, Allison, we begin to

believe this is just how I am. Yes. And the other thing that's interesting is the

brain is running constantly this thing. I call it consent to automate. Your brain

does this thing where it says something to you that you hear in your head in the

form of a thought that you think is a real thought. Your brain is basically saying,

hey, the last time you felt this or thought this, we did this in response to that.

Is that what you want us to do this time?

to be inherent characteristics of who you are. And we start to identify with that

type of thinking and feeling and behaving in our lives instead of recognizing that

it's just habits that we formed because of this automation process, right? And so

then the big, the big to -da moment for me was when I realized that humans are the

only things that God made that have this stagnate, you know, this idea to think

about what we're thinking about instead of just thinking those thoughts or reacting

to them. Yes. Humans are the only ones that have that ability. And we're the only

ones that have the second gift of what we call selective attention. Like you can

literally decide, I don't want to pay attention to this show I'm watching. I want

to scroll on my phone instead. You can literally decide that. I don't want to think

about losing my son right now. I want to think about this brain surgery that I'm

performing So I don't kill my patient. And you can decide I'm going to divert my

mental resources to this other thing. And so if you can understand that you have

agency to make that choice, to think about what you're thinking about and to think

about one thing and not another thing, then you are leveraging neuroplasticity to

direct those structural changes in ways that can start to help you and not to hurt

you. And so the big insight moment for me was that this process is always

happening, whether you decide to control it or not. and because it's all

tomorrow than you did yesterday because you don't have to leave it doesn't have to

be the way it's always been because you can direct that in real time and your

brain will respond every brain is designed to respond in this way

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of the listener who's been through a lot of trauma or whose brain,

because of stuff in childhood, has formed around these neural pathways that are self

-defeating or that are shaming or that are doubting God,

right? And I don't want to minimize how challenging that can be.

When those pathways have formed the grooves, it can be,

it takes some effort to exercise the agency we have. Could you walk us through how

you applied that in your own life? Well, I think the first thing I would say, just

as an aside, is as a neurosurgeon, I am not an expert at cardiology or

endocrinology or lots of other areas of medicine. So when I have a patient that has

a problem in an area in which I'm not an expert, I consult with an expert in that

field. So I call a cardiologist if my patient has a heart problem because I want

to make sure my patient is getting everything they need. So if you're going to say

that I want to become a self -brain surgeon, I want to take care of myself in this

way, just recognize that there are some times when you're not equipped or educated

in certain areas and you need some outside help. And that's where I think therapy,

psychiatry, medical professionals, health care sacrifice.

happening there is what you're describing where you have an expert help you relay

those pathways. Is that accurate to say? Yeah. Okay. That's right. Just to say that

you're not responsible for doing this all by yourself. Yes. You can build a team of

people to help you. Yes. Because I don't want people to say, oh, there's, he's

saying that I'm just supposed to, you know, gut it out and do it all myself.

That's not at all what I'm saying. Yep. And I didn't do that. So good. I had

this, this experience.

After we lost Mitch, we had another child at home still. She was a junior in high

school at the time. And after she graduated, it became just about impossible to be

in the house anymore that we had raised Mitch in. It was so hard. I'd go down to

his room. And I remember, Alice, in this moment, I used to go down to Mitch's room

and go into his closet because I could smell him on his clothes. And I remember

the day that I couldn't smell him on his clothes anymore because he'd been gone so

long. And it was just devastating, right? So it just got to be where being in the

house was really hard. And we ended up deciding to take a job in Wyoming. And we

moved from Alabama to Wyoming thinking, you know, we'd get a fresh start and all

that stuff that people think. We don't think about the fact that he just follows

you to Wyoming. So he goes with you. But shortly after I got to Wyoming, I ended

up on the board of directors of this hospital. and we had a meeting one day.

because it had hurt his business and she was very patient with him and she let him

rant and rave and finally she said look what is it that you want me to do for

you how can I help you move past this and let's find a way to work together and

he said well I want you to not buy this hospital I want you to undo the business

deal and unwind it because it's hurting me and she said well you can't have that

but I can do something else for you if you can find something else that would make

you happy and something happened inside me when I said I

have Mitch back. And so let's make both of those things be true. And that was one

of the first times that I talked to a friend of mine who was a chaplain and he

said that. Like two things can be true at the same time. Like you can be

devastated and lost and have grief that'll never go away. And you can also find

purpose and meaning and hope again. And that's really when I, one of the things

that made me start writing again at that time was to think that I can't

necessarily, I can't

that maybe they can't articulate because they didn't get to go down to that MRI

scanner and watch that happen. Yeah. Right? So for me, that was one of those

moments of, I've got to find some things that I can use to to latch onto as

hopeful and start to move forward. And God gave me that insight in that meeting

that day when there are some things that we think we have to have and we can't

have them. And so once you realize you can't have that, then what is it that you

can have that will start to make things work for you? So I started using the

neuroscience to teach me things that were true and that I could latch onto and use

and leverage, and that started making me be able to move forward. It really is.

Whatever is good, whatever is beautiful, whatever is true, think on that. It really

is. That's incredibly powerful. How does this self -brain surgery affect us

spiritually? And for those who part of their journey is disappointment with God or a

feeling of distance from God, how can this help us spiritually and maybe even share

how it helped you? Yeah. So the first thing is If you understand that we're talking

about principles of how the human brain works. Yes. And that the mind and the brain

are not the same thing. But even if you think they are, it's been proven with good

neuroscience, Andrew Newberg's books, and all these people who aren't really spiritual

can show that spiritual practices make the brain behave and work better, more

resilient and all those things. So even if you're not sure what you believe or you

don't believe anything or you're pretty mad at God and you're not sure that he's

going to be willing to help you, you can leverage the fact that the brain is

designed to get better in response to better thinking. And you can say, well, I

want to be more hopeful. I want to recover from this trauma. I want to find some

things that do work for me. You can use this process of, okay, I'm going to think

different thoughts than I thought yesterday that will produce structural changes in my

brain and my brain will work differently than it did yesterday. and that will prove

to be helpful to me, and I'll start to be moving forward. And then I would just

say, if you find that the principle works and that the prescription that scripture

wrote for how humans can flourish, take your thoughts captive, be transformed and

don't conform, all those things. Ephesians 423 talks about, or 417 through 23 talks

about the difference between people who are lost in their bad thinking. He calls it

futility of their thinking and people who have renewed minds and how the difference

is. And so if you can just say, okay, even if I don't really think God likes me

or maybe he's not real, I can let this scripture stand on its own and say, if I

follow this prescription, the neuroscience backs it up and I actually feel better

when I do these things. And so then I would just invite you to say, I start doing

these practices of taking my thoughts captive and start to apply these prescriptions

and the Ten Commandments and all the things I gave you in the book. And it starts

working and you start feeling more hopeful and you start finding yourself more

resilient and a little bit more peaceful. Then maybe say, wait a minute, if God's

words turn out to be true and this starts to actually work for me, then maybe my

perception and my thoughts and my feelings about him weren't actually accurate. Yeah.

And maybe I should investigate that. Yeah. And then it starts to turn out that the

promises that he made turn out to be true. Yeah. Then maybe I just need to

reevaluate my feelings since I know most of them are accurate. Yeah, I love that.

It reminds me in psychology, we talk about top -down approaches and bottom -up

approaches. So the top -down approach would be to try to get the feeling good again

about God. But the bottom up is just practice it and see if you if you arrive at

the reality of God's goodness from that bottom up. Right. You talk about Lee that

this kind of, and I agree with you, when this psychology and neuroscience and

theology and physics all come together, there's something really seismic,

right? We're not compartmentalizing anymore. And that's the sense when I listen to

you, this becomes spiritual. And sometimes we think of, well, there's my spiritual

practices over here and then there's my mental health habits over here. And that's

part of this bifurcation you were talking about. You know, I was raised in that

medical model, right? Of like the psyche is no longer the soul. It's the mind.

You know, it's over here. And then my spiritual practices are over here. And what

you're describing is that all of this is coming together. Can you break that down a

little bit like what does that collision look like in someone where all of those

things begin to work together? Yeah, I think if you just are a curious person and

you start looking at how things seem to be working, we look at the last 75 years

of biology, for example, since Washington and Crick gave us the structure of DNA.

It's become harder and harder and harder for evolutionary biologists to believe that

it was all some sort of an accident, that it could have, that protein structure and

all the different things that happened could have turned out to have happened

randomly, right? Harder and harder over time to believe that there wasn't design

behind that. Cosmology, since they discovered the Big Bang that the universe actually

did have a beginning. Physicists and cosmologists are having a very hard time

explaining away the needs.

the research start to show you don't actually get happier. You get more trouble. You

have more unwanted pregnancies, more divorces, more STDs, all that stuff. And maybe

people are happier when they're in committed long -term relationships, right? So you

see, okay, now psychology is saying that this prescription turns out to be better a

certain way, right? Then so if you just start being curious about that and say, why

would it be that everything that The spiritual side said all along is seeming to be

borne out on the scientific hard and soft sciences over time. Then you start saying,

well, there's this great synthesis happening. And when I operate my mind according

to, when I operate my life, rather, according to principles that are scientifically

valid, hold up according to good psychological principles, and seem to line up with

spiritual directives that have been prescribed for thousands of years, and my life

gets better, maybe that's because it's all true. And so for me, it was just this

big moment where I said, wait a minute, everything I've believed and practiced

scientifically was sort of skewed because I thought this materialist, I was trained

in this materialist worldview where you're just the sum of your parts, but I never

really believed that. So I had this cognitive dissonance spiritually and

scientifically, and now I'm seeing, wait, the science is now showing us that

materialism is probably not the right path. Yes. Because you can see in an MRI

scanner that mind is in charge of brain. Yeah. And so that's for me that just sort

of meshed it all up and it finally closed the gap that was still there between

what I thought I had to believe and teach as a scientist and what I knew, what I

was believing and hoping to be true spiritually. And now it's just all this

incredible unity that everything, it's this cool verse in Ecclesiastes 311 that says,

God said eternity in the human.

something out, there's going to be another layer underneath it. And that's what

science has now discovered. Yes. Molecular biology discovers the unit protein and they

discover there's 25 molecules that make up that. It's amazing. And now we've got 25

more things to study. Quantum physics is doing that. We think we've understood the

three elemental particles in the universe and now we know that all of them have

elemental particles that make them up. And now there's something like, what, 25

particles or something that they understand? So every time we think we understand

something, God says, hang on a second. Yeah, exactly. Let me show you something

cool, right? So for me, it's just that don't be discouraged by things that you

thought were going to work that didn't turn out to work. Yeah. Be curious and let

God show you over time that he's got more to the story that even if you think

that there's no hope for you that you've found the last medicine to try or the

last therapy to try or the last thing, just hang in there because something's going

to happen and God's going to show you that he does still have a good plan for

you. I love that. I just love that. There's such a humility in it, really, of

there's a humility. And even when I think to the self -brain surgery, like, just in

recognizing my own reactions, my own thoughts, like there's such a humility to go

hold them loosely, be discerning, look for the truth in all things.

And the truth really does set us free. Just as we close, for the person listening

who is carrying something.

for folks who really feel like they've tried everything and really feel like what

they're carrying is too big. I think the last thing I can say is that you need to

just believe with all your heart that nothing that you go through or experience has

inherent power to determine what your future is because it turns out it doesn't,

it's not about at all what happened in the past it's about what happens next

because your brain can change structurally in response to every new thought that

means that how things have been for you do not have to be how things are for you

in the future and so that means get help if you need it read one of allison's

books listen to a podcast find a pastor find a therapist find somebody to help you

reframe the the thing that you've been carrying i love how gabermate said it um

it's not Yeah.

to define you. Yeah. You can change that with your very next thought. That's

incredible.

The life -changing art of self -brain surgery. It's a beautiful book, Lee,

and I just, hard -earned wisdom. Tell everyone where they can find it and where they

can find more information about you and your work. I know you're doing a lot of

different things to serve people. Yeah, so my website is Dr. Lee Warren .com.

Just all one word, d .R .leeworn .com.

leave a five -star review. And be sure to join us each weekday for the best of you

every day, a brief daily reflection to help you start your mornings with a steady

dose of wisdom. Remember, as you become the best of who you are, you honor God,

you heal others, and you stay true to your God -given self.

‍

‍

‍

January has a way of pulling us straight into the how.

How will I fix what feels off?
How will I be more disciplined?
How will I finally get it right?

But what if there’s a deeper—and more grounding—place to begin?

Dr. Alison opens the year by inviting you to start somewhere different. Instead of beginning with self-improvement or striving, Scripture starts with meaning, presence, and relationship.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

-Why losing sight of the why fuels anxiety, striving, and burnout

-How meaning and grounding are closer than you think

-What “the light shines in the darkness” really means

-How orienting your life around love changes everything

Plus, you’ll hear a special announcement about something new coming to The Best of You—a daily way to stay anchored in Scripture and wisdom as you move through your day.

For additional resources and the full episode transcript, visit the podcast episode page here

If you loved this episode, check out:

Episode 122: Navigating Anxiety, Therapy, and Spiritual Formation with John Mark Comer 

Episode 113: A New Vision Of Human Flourishing with Dr. Warren Kinghorn

Get I Shouldn’t Feel This Way for just $2.99.

Grab your 3 free Boundaries For Your Soul resources here

Download Alison’s free printable boundaries guide when you sign up for her weekly email.

Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.

‍

Thanks to our Sponsors!

Go to ⁠Quince.com/bestofyou⁠ for 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order!

‍

*Some of the links above are Amazon affiliate links. If you choose to purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

While Dr. Cook is a counselor, the content of this podcast and any of the products provided by Dr. Cook are not specific counseling advice nor are they a substitute for individual counseling. The content and products provided on this podcast are for informational purposes only.‍

© 2025 Alison Cook. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please do not copy or share the contents of this webpage or transcript without permission from the author.

‍

Transcript

‍

January 1st tends to invite reflection about who we are, about where we're headed,

‍

and how we want to live. It is so easy to lose focus to get pulled in too many

‍

directions when what we need more than ever is to stay grounded in the wisdom of

‍

Scripture and in God's steady presence with us. Today, I have a big announcement.

‍

Starting this year, 26, here at The best of you we're adding something new it's

‍

called the best of you every day hey

‍

everyone and happy new year I'm so glad you're here with me on January 1st this

‍

very first day of the new year there's something about this day that carries so

‍

much meaning, a fresh start, a turning of the page. Even if you're not, someone who

‍

makes resolutions, January 1st tends to invite reflection about who we are,

‍

about where we're headed, and how we want to live. And today, I have a big

‍

announcement. Starting this year, 2026, here at The Best of You, we're adding

‍

something new. It's called The Best of You Every Day. Every single weekday,

‍

I'll be here with you for about 10 minutes. Think of it as a short daily

‍

devotional. We'll read scripture and then I'll reflect on that scripture, especially

‍

through the lens of psychology. What makes this a little different is the lens we'll

‍

be using. Each day we'll be grounding ourselves in scripture, paying particular

‍

attention to what scripture teaches us about being wise humans,

‍

about growing stronger hearts, more discerning minds, in a more grounded spirit.

‍

There's never been a time when we've needed that kind of wisdom more. And scripture

‍

tells us to be innocent as doves and shrewd as serpents. And that feels especially

‍

relevant right now in my life. And I'm guessing also in years.

‍

There's so much happening Thank you.

‍

focus to get pulled in too many directions when what we need more than ever is to

‍

stay grounded in the wisdom of scripture and in God's steady presence with us.

‍

It's with us every single day. And sometimes we forget, right?

‍

I forget. I'm guessing you forget. And that's what I want this space to be,

‍

a place where we ground ourselves daily in real wisdom and in God's anchoring

‍

presence. So each day we'll look at a scripture through the lens of psychology,

‍

paying attention to how it speaks into things like fear, desire, control,

‍

rest, love, shame, anger, courage, relationships,

‍

and trust. You could say that each day we're learning how scripture invites us to

‍

become eyeser humans, innocent as a dove and shrewd as a serpent,

‍

walking always in partnership with God's spirit. This daily podcast doesn't replace

‍

our regular Thursday Best of You episodes. Think of this as your daily anchor.

‍

Here's how it works. Every weekday, one day through Friday, you'll receive a short

‍

episode about 10 minutes where we simply open up scripture and let it orient us for

‍

the day ahead. You'll want to be sure you're subscribed to the best of you because

‍

it will show up at the top of your feed each morning. We're not going to have ads

‍

on the daily podcast, no extra fluff, just a daily place to anchor our hearts and

‍

souls together, looking at scripture through the lens of psychology. And then on

‍

Thursdays, we'll still meet here for our regular long form, The Best of You podcast,

‍

where we'll have extended teaching, guest experts, and deeper dives into the topics

‍

that matter most to your emotional, relational, and spiritual health. So the best of

‍

you every day will drop on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday. Short 10 minutes

‍

anchoring for the day. And on Thursdays, we'll continue with our regular weekly show.

‍

This daily practice actually comes out of a longing in my own soul.

‍

I've been looking for years really for

‍

understand how the human mind and emotions work. Scripture helps us understand why

‍

our lives matter, what we're living toward and who we're becoming. On Thursdays,

‍

in our longer, best of you episodes, we'll continue to focus on the how, how we

‍

meant, how we heal, how we grow, how we relate, and how we care for our inner

‍

lives and our relationships. On the other days, we're going to return to the why.

‍

Why this work matters, why love is worth orienting our lives around and who is the

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one we partner with every single day, right? This isn't self -improvement.

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This is a deeper current of connecting to God's love at work in our lives every

‍

single day. In every single moment, in every single one of our relationships.

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This daily space is where those two things meet. The how, how we change, how we

‍

heal, how we grow, how we learn skills, and the why. Why does it matter? And it

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matters because of God himself and the son he sent to be with us every single

‍

moment of our lives. So today, on January first, I thought there was no better

‍

place to begin than the opening lines of the gospel of John.

‍

So today I want to give you a little preview of what the best of you every day

‍

is going to be like. We'll get started with today's scripture. John 1, 1 through 5.

‍

In the beginning was the word. And the word was with God and the word was God.

‍

He was with God in the beginning. through him all things were made without him

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nothing was made that has been made in him was life and that life was the light

‍

of all mankind the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome

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it man that is such a powerful word to start off our new year in the beginning On

‍

day one, the word was with God and the word was God.

‍

Right there, we see the powerful anchoring force of all of our lives,

‍

right? Jesus was with God in the beginning. We are built on that relationship,

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the relationship between God, the Father, God, the Son, and God, the Holy Spirit

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that has been since the beginning of time and the word was god jesus also is god

‍

think about it when john opens this powerful gospel he doesn't begin with advice

‍

it's not about self -help he doesn't begin with instruction or even a story he

‍

begins with meaning in the beginning was the word and the word was with god and

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the word was God. That phrase in the beginning is intentional.

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John is taking us all the way back before our plans, before our effort, before

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resolution, before anything messy started, before our current situations even existed.

‍

He's taking us out of ourselves and into the bigger picture, the foundation. And

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what does he place at the center? Not chaos, not striving,

‍

not uncertainty, but relationship. The word was with God and the word was God.

‍

In other words, before there was anything to fix or prove or manage, there was

‍

connection. And that matters as we begin a new year. So often January invites us to

‍

start with the how. How will I finally lose weight? How will I be more disciplined?

‍

How will I fix what feels off? But scripture starts us somewhere deeper.

‍

Before we ask how, John invites us to remember why. Why do we have hope?

‍

Why does love even matter? Why does presence always come before productivity?

‍

And John goes on, all things came into being through him. What has come into being

‍

in him was life And the life was the light of all people. Notice what he doesn't

‍

say. He doesn't say life comes from our effort or from our achievements or from

‍

getting it right all the time. Life comes from being connected to the source of

‍

life. From a psychological perspective, this is profoundly grounding.

‍

We don't flourish from our own efforts, right? from our own striving we flourish

‍

when we're oriented around meaning connection and love capital l love himself when we

‍

lose sight of the why we easily become anxious driven or overwhelmed even good

‍

worthy goals start to feel heavy when they're disconnected from purpose john's opening

‍

reminds is that at the center of reality is not a task, but a presence.

‍

And then he says this, the light shines in the darkness.

‍

And the darkness did not overcome it, not will not, did not,

‍

which means that whatever this year holds, whatever uncertainty, whatever loss,

‍

whatever fears, whatever change, whatever hope, the deeper current has already been

‍

named. Light is not fragile. Love is not an afterthought.

‍

Meaning is not something we have to manufacture. As you begin this new year,

‍

the invitation is not to have everything figured out, right? It's not to have the

‍

perfect goals or your own self -effort. It's to begin oriented to what's true,

‍

to let your days be shaped not only by what you need to do, but by what is

‍

already true, that your life is held, that love always proceeds,

‍

effort that God's presence is already at work before you even try, before you even

‍

decide, before you even move. That's the way we return to every single day.

‍

That's the why. And we highlighted here on this first day of the new year. The

‍

word was with God and the word was God and the light outshone the darkness.

‍

Not only then, but today and every single day this year. So as we close this time

‍

together, may you begin this day and this year rooted in God's love. May you live

‍

from love today rather than striving, and may the light that was present in the

‍

beginning guide you on this day. Thank you for joining me for this episode of The

‍

Best of You. Be sure to check out the show notes for any resources and links

‍

mentioned in the show. You can find those on my website at Dr. Allison Cook .com.

‍

That's Alison with one l .cook .com.

‍

If gratitude and grief seem to arrive hand in hand this season or hope feels costly, like putting your armor down in the middle of a battle… Nothing is wrong with you. Your brain is doing exactly what it was designed to do.

In this episode, Dr. Alison Cook sits down with researcher, author, trauma educator, and joy scholar Dr. Mary Catherine McDonald, (MC) to explore the often misunderstood relationship between trauma and joy.

Drawing from neuroscience, trauma research, and lived experience, Dr MaryCatherine explains why joy can feel threatening after loss or prolonged stress, and how joy isn’t something we force, but something we practice in small, embodied ways.

Together, they unpack:

• Why trauma responses are strength responses, not weaknesses
  
  
• The “joy thieves” that quietly steal our capacity for delight (hypervigilance, guilt, fear of loss, shame)
  
  
• Why joy and grief are not opposites, and often show up together
  
  
• How tiny, 10–20 second moments of joy can gently retrain the nervous system
  
  
• What neuroscientists call the hope circuit, and how activating it turns off the fear circuit
  
  

This conversation is both tender and practical, especially for anyone navigating holidays, anniversaries, or seasons where pain and beauty coexist.

Joy, as Dr MaryCatherine reminds us, isn’t the absence of suffering.
It’s a posture of healing.
A way of saying trauma doesn’t get the final word.

‍

‍

📖 Dr MaryCatherine's book, The Joy Reset: Six Ways Trauma Steals Happiness and How to Win it Back

📖 This Christmas, gift a loved one (or yourself!) Dr Alison’s latest book, The Best of You!

📥 Grab your 3 free Boundaries For Your Soul resources here

📥 Download Alison’s free printable with the five boundary tools when you sign up for her weekly email.

📖 Find a full transcript and list of resources from this episode here

💬 Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.

‍

Thanks to our Sponsors!

• Go to ⁠Quince.com/bestofyou⁠ for 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order!
• If you’re looking for a Bible that helps you live the Word, not just read it, then grab this beautiful one I’m currently using at NIVapplicationbible.com.
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• Go to AquaTru.com now for 20% off (your purifier) using promo code BESTOFYOU 

‍

*Some of the links above are Amazon affiliate links. If you choose to purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

While Dr. Cook is a counselor, the content of this podcast and any of the products provided by Dr. Cook are not specific counseling advice nor are they a substitute for individual counseling. The content and products provided on this podcast are for informational purposes only.‍

© 2025 Alison Cook. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please do not copy or share the contents of this webpage or transcript without permission from the author.

‍

TRANSCRIPT 

Hey everyone, and Welcome back to this week’s episode of The Best of You podcast.

Today we’re diving into a topic that feels especially timely as we move toward the holiday season — how we can reconnect with joy, and hope even in a world that feels heavy or uncertain. If you've ever found

yourself wondering, how do I keep showing up when life has been hard? How do I not lose myself to stress, grief, or that lingering sense of exhaustion? This episode has something for you. It's incredible. 

‍

I loved this conversation with Dr. Mary Catherine McDonald. She goes by MC. She's a researcher, an author, an educator and life coach,

and she focuses on trauma, grief, and healing, but also on joy. I love that juxtaposition, and it's so rich in our episode today. You might know her from her previous books, Unbroken. The trauma response is never wrong and other things you need to know to take back your life. And her brand new book release, this one came out this spring. She talks about it a lot in the episode today. It's called the  joy reset six ways trauma steals happiness and how to win it back in the joy reset

‍

MC explores how joy isn't just a fleeting feeling it's a radical act of healing she talks about how trauma can change the brain what she calls the joy thieves that keep us stuck things like hypervigilance fear of loss guilt and shame and how to reactivate what neuroscientists call the hope circuit. So this is super practical.

‍

It's also spiritual because we want to experience joy and hope, especially at the holiday season. But we also want to be realistic about what's hard. So today we're going to talk about what that hope circuit is, why it matters, and how we can train our brains and our hearts to visit it more often. Because When we do, we start to find those glimmers of hope and joy even in the mess, even in the heart. And you'll hear MC talk about a really painful experience she had at the holidays and how she found joy even in the midst of it. And that's

‍

what I want for each one of you. And for me too, this holiday season, it won't be perfect. It will be messy. But how can we find and orient ourselves to also find the joy and the goodness and the hope this holiday season. As you'll hear MC explain, joy isn't the absence of pain. It's a posture of healing, a way of saying that trauma doesn't get the final word. I cannot wait for you to hear this conversation. It's thoughtful, grounded in science, and full of practical ways to bring a little more joy into your day -to -day life. 

‍

Please enjoy my conversation with Dr. Mary Macdonald

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (00:03.056)

Well, MC, I am so thrilled to have you here with me. I am just obsessed with this new book, even the title itself. It's called The Joy Reset, Six Ways Trauma Steals Happiness and How to Win It Back. It's such a great title, this sort of back and forth between joy and trauma. And I love that that's what you're doing and taking all your research and trauma and kind of teaching us how to refine joy. And I wanted to have you on, especially right now with the holidays.

‍

We're smack in the middle of the holidays. As you know, as I know from my years of working in clinical practice for my own life, this is a season where we see that juxtaposition, right? We're supposed to be feeling joy. And yet for so many of us, the holidays are complicated.

‍

MC (00:32.43)

Yeah.

‍

MC (00:50.127)

yeah. Force.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (00:51.56)

And right. so, and then we can feel the guilt about the fact that they feel complicated. We have to bump up into family members that are harder. We have grief memories or, you know, so many different things that can rob our joy. So I'd love to start our conversation today, kind of with a big picture framing of how you see trauma and how it steals our happiness. And then move into how we can find more joy, real authentic joy.

‍

MC (00:55.438)

Thank you.

‍

MC (01:12.375)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (01:20.779)

even when we're dealing with trauma.

‍

MC (01:23.286)

Yes, first of all, thank you so much for having me. I am so excited to be here and talk to you about this and especially during the season, which for me is one of the hardest seasons of the year. And I've learned how to take back joy during the holidays. So think if it's okay, actually, I want to start there because...

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (01:39.375)

Yeah.

‍

MC (01:41.826)

And then we can go into sort of how we define trauma and why trauma takes away joy and how to deal with it. when I was 24, my father died really suddenly on Christmas Day. And so the holidays are obviously incredibly, I mean just...

‍

shattered in that moment, right? And he was the person in the family who was sort of like Father Christmas, you know? He loved Christmas and loved to celebrate with all of us. so that moment was such a huge reckoning for a bunch of reasons. One, being raised Catholic, you know, I thought, OK, here's the miracle, right? He's not doing well. He's in the hospital. This is really scary, but it's Christmas Eve.

‍

and here will be the miracle and then the miracle doesn't come and then

‍

here's where the joy comes in. We were at the funeral, which was of course just a couple days after Christmas, since he died on Christmas. And so the church was still decorated for the holidays. And the church was so packed that we couldn't see to the front of the church as we were walking up the aisle. And I think I was just looking down because I was trying to steady myself, you know? And when we got to the altar, we were met with these ginormous plastic

‍

full-size lawn animals on the front of the altar because the church had decided to kind of go in a different direction. Usually they had this very sort of discrete small glass nativity scene sort of off to the left of the altar, but this was this huge, garish, kind of hilarious scene. And the thing that made it even funnier was that...

‍

MC (03:28.942)

my dad thought that animatronic animals were the funniest thing in the world. So he would have been the first person to absolutely have to leave church from laughing. And I remember just kind of collapsing into the joy of that moment and the mercy of that laughter because it came at such a brutal moment and it was like a deep breath, you know?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (03:33.2)

MC (03:51.36)

And so there's kind of one example of a million that I have of where you are in the deepest, darkest moment of your life and then joy shows up. And like almost knocks you over. It can be jarring because you're like, no, no, I'm doing the grief thing right now. I'm doing the sad thing. Like why is this joy coming up and interrupting my serious moment?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (04:01.082)

Yeah, wow.

‍

MC (04:16.81)

But if we can learn to recognize that and see it, the beauty of what that joy does in the moment is that it sustains us through those things. And so to begin kind of talking about joy and trauma, we have to sort of first take apart the wall between them. I think we pretend like they don't coexist and they're standing right next to each other. And there's a reason for that, you know?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (04:43.972)

That is so powerful. Thank you for sharing that. It perfectly frames this conversation because what you just said, taking down the wall between them. I just literally wanna throw out all my notes and just dive into that, right? Because this is also my experience that when we have this sort of bifurcation of, like you said, I'm doing my grief work now.

‍

MC (04:47.062)

of course.

‍

MC (04:57.174)

Yeah, let's do it.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (05:08.644)

And then joy surprises us. It strikes me that the muscle we need to develop has far more to do with flexibility, that you could be open to that moment. It says something to me about your own sort of inner system, that you could be open to it. You didn't miss it. And it strikes me that's part of the goal, right? I mean, that was such a powerful, it's not just that it happened, it's that you could be open to it.

‍

MC (05:17.506)

Yes.

‍

MC (05:25.249)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Great.

‍

MC (05:36.034)

Great.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (05:36.4)

and allow it to come in. So what's happening there? How does that occur? How can we begin to address that wall that we create, that sort of false binary internally?

‍

MC (05:43.436)

Mm-hmm.

‍

MC (05:48.888)

Yeah.

‍

I mean, think the first thing is to say, our emotions are not, you know, just like us, they contain multitudes and they're not these neat little tidy categories that fit into these tiny boxes and never meet each other. I think actually the movies Inside Out have done a really good job of showing us how emotions are mixed. You know, most emotions aren't like primary colors. You think about things like bittersweetness, right? That's literally too

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (06:10.49)

Yeah.

‍

MC (06:19.696)

emotions at once. And then I think the other thing that really gets in the way is that we shame ourselves for our emotions. Instead of seeing them as biological events that exist for a reason, just like every other biological event, we say, oh my god, I'm feeling joy in this moment where I'm supposed to be feeling grief. Now I need to go into guilt. And this is where we get into what I call in the Joy Reset the Joy Thieves, because there are these thieves that show up. when I think when joy comes in, in a moment,

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (06:31.461)

Yeah.

‍

MC (06:49.856)

where it's unexpected, it's there to help us sustain ourselves. But then these trauma responses come in and steal it away because joy can be jarring to a nervous system that's not ready for it. So I think the first step is saying, okay, emotions are valid and real. They're not primary colors. They can be very mixed and confusing. And when I encounter one, I'm going to try as best as I can, no matter how inconvenient that emotion.

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Dr. Alison Cook (07:02.32)

Wow.

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MC (07:19.596)

is to turn to it and try to welcome it in.

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Dr. Alison Cook (07:22.96)

So let's talk about these joy thieves. I think that's a really interesting way to put it. And you talk about these thieves of joy in the context of these nervous system responses that we might think of as trauma responses. They're neurobiological. There's no shame in them, right? And I think that, again, I was talking to you a little bit before we started. A lot of myself and my

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MC (07:28.097)

Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (07:50.883)

audience and maybe you, you know, from your background come from, think well intended, but sometimes spiritually bypassing faith settings where it's like, choose joy, right? As if it's something we, it's almost like a moral imperative. And yet our bodies are saying, I'm in fight or flight right now, or I'm anxious, or this person that I have to spend this time with is really hard for me, or, you know, something really painful.

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just happened. And so we don't want to shame ourselves to your point about what we're feeling and the different emotions. And simultaneously, we don't want to lose that access to joy. So let's talk about how you see those joy thieves, not from a shaming perspective, but I love how you're just naming it. This is what it is. This is what's happening.

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MC (08:20.898)

Great. Great.

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MC (08:38.894)

Yeah.

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MC (08:43.15)

Yeah, and I just wrote down shame versus bypassing because I think those are two sort of sides of the same coin where we can either put ourselves into shame or we can sort of try to bypass the emotion and for this kind of greater purpose of like, well, but you have to welcome and enjoy, but you can't be feeling, you know, this is God's purpose. So how can you be feeling sad? The truth is that there, yeah, we can come back to that.

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Dr. Alison Cook (08:48.176)

Hmm.

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Dr. Alison Cook (08:54.757)

Yes!

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Dr. Alison Cook (09:03.342)

Yes.

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MC (09:09.162)

When it comes to the Joy Thieves, so the book that I wrote before the Joy Reset is called Unbroken, the trauma response is never wrong, and the whole purpose of it is to figure out how to recontextualize trauma.

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without shame. So neurobiologically, if we look at the trauma response, fight, flight, freeze, fawn, all of these responses that we talk about, they are there to help us survive. They are literally strength responses. And yet culturally, we look at them as a sign of brokenness or weakness. And that's now that we know so much more about the brain than we did 150 years ago, we can see that they are literally strength responses. So the goal of that book was to try to kind of update

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definition of trauma. Trauma is a strength response. That doesn't mean it doesn't cause pain, right? When we get stuck in a trauma response in moments when we are not being, you know, we're not actually in danger, that can be really disruptive for your life.

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One of the things that I was seeing when I was doing research and working, starting kind of in 2020, I reached for positive psychology because I felt really under-resourced. I've been working with clients since 2011, but in 2020, I just started to feel like none of the tools were enough. And I was like, okay, what do we have from positive psychology? How can this help get us back to baseline? And one of the cool things is that a lot of the positive psychology hypotheses from the 60s and 70s have been sort

‍

strengthened by the neuroscience. So we know that making a gratitude list or leaning into joy is something that's going to be profoundly regulating for your nervous system. And so I was seeing all these clients and I had these groups at the time and I was like let's use positive psychology we just need to get back to joy. And what I found was that the majority of my clients were incredibly resistant.

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MC (11:04.71)

And as I'm sure you know, like resistance is a message too. Resistance tells us something. And so instead of turning away from it and being like, you know, what's wrong with this person? It's like, wait, hold on. What's in the resistance? What am I missing? And the thing that I found was that...

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When we have a hypervigilant nervous system or when we have a nervous system that is conditioned by trauma or chronic stress or fear, joy, asking that nervous system to stop and embrace joy is like asking you to put your armor down in the middle of a battle.

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Dr. Alison Cook (11:42.254)

Yes, yes.

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MC (11:43.905)

And your nervous system is going to say, no, I'm not going to do that. That's not for me. Right. And I'm doing it and that's what's keeping us alive. And that's right. Right. So then it's like a build and how do you build a bridge from that trauma response back to joy? And again, going back to this idea of like first being aware of it, it's, you know, what are the joy thieves in the way? Is it hypervigilance that has got you scanning, waiting for the next threat so that when something good happens, you immediately dismiss it? Because

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Dr. Alison Cook (11:47.012)

Yes, I have a job to do. Yeah.

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Yeah. Yes.

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MC (12:13.908)

it's getting in the way of your scanning. Is it emotional numbing where you had to numb your emotions in order to survive because you were feeling so much intense fear and anxiety and sadness that you ended up kind of flatlining all of your emotions so that joy comes in and you can cognitively understand that good things are happening but you can't feel into it. So on and on which kind of thief is in the room and then how can we outsmart it and bring us back to joy and actually get that benefit to your nervous system.

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that Joy is offering.

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Dr. Alison Cook (12:47.392)

That's so good. That really clicks in for me when you're saying that because I feel, I will feel it in myself. If I'm really worried about something or there's some sort of, you know, it's like, I can't just, it's like trying to shift into a different lane too quickly to jump to joy. And so we're pausing long enough to go this hypervigilance, this scanning for the other shoe to drop, this numbing that I'm kind of defaulting to.

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MC (13:02.412)

Right. Right.

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Dr. Alison Cook (13:16.696)

It's there for a reason. I love how you talk about it. It's actually a strength response, not a weakness. It's how I learned to survive. And so from there, so we need some intermediary steps, it strikes me. So let's say, we're going into the holidays and we're noticing, right? The scanning or the hypervigilance or the numbing or whatever, the withdrawal, the avoidance, whatever.

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MC (13:31.074)

Yeah.

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MC (13:35.874)

Yep. Yep.

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Dr. Alison Cook (13:45.317)

the thing may be and some part of us is like, wish I could just enjoy the holidays to some degree. What is the intermediate? What are some of the steps that we can take to put our neurobiology in the position to receive the moment that you so beautifully set up for us at the top of this episode where it might be unexpected. It's

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MC (13:51.522)

Yep. All right.

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Yeah.

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MC (14:02.798)

Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (14:12.046)

the least place we would expect it, but we've done the work to till the soil to where when that person that drives us crazy does something at family dinner that suddenly we're laughing at the absurdity of it as a, right, we can find, what can we do to kind of put ourselves in the position for that?

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MC (14:16.334)

and

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MC (14:22.028)

Right.

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MC (14:30.796)

Yeah. So the good news with all of this is that there are practices you can start to use like right this second. And I'll give you a couple of really simple ones because...

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Dr. Alison Cook (14:37.765)

Yeah.

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MC (14:40.878)

You said a minute ago, it's almost like a muscle, right? This ability to recognize joy and welcome it in is a muscle and it's one that, especially if you've been dealing with trauma or chronic stress, you're not used to exercising. So of course it's not robust and strong, and that's totally fine. It's important to kind of recognize where you're at and then figure out, do I instill some sort of counter practices that welcome joy in with

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Dr. Alison Cook (14:44.559)

Yeah.

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MC (15:10.832)

activating my nervous system and bringing just snapping me right back to hypervigilance because I think that's the risk and I think you just said it so perfectly when you were like okay I'm gonna set up this huge pressure for myself how do I enjoy holidays right knowing that I'm stressed out and you're introducing more stress into that situation yeah yeah yeah

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Dr. Alison Cook (15:24.952)

Yeah. Yes!

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Dr. Alison Cook (15:31.428)

Yes, exactly. That we put this pressure on that just almost backfires and increases the, so we're kind of trying to take baby steps here. I love this. Like baby steps to putting ourselves in the path of a little bit of joy, right? And that's a beautiful lofty goal.

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MC (15:42.318)

Yes.

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MC (15:48.781)

Yep, yep, and a tiny.

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bit of joy. this is the book was originally called Tiny Little Joys because this is a practice that came out of 2020 and all of my research around joy, which was really designed from, I don't know if I'm sure you're familiar with Peter Levine's ideas of pendulation and titration where you understand that like, if you want to process trauma, you need to kind of swing into it, let yourself feel it a little bit and then bring yourself back to baseline. And I think we're very used to that framing like, okay, I'm going to go into my trigger

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Dr. Alison Cook (15:56.848)

Hmm.

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Dr. Alison Cook (16:07.791)

Yeah

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MC (16:23.108)

then I'm going to come back out into safety. We have to do the same thing with joy if we're understanding that joy is also activating to the nervous system. so tiny little joys is a practice where you literally take 10 to 20 seconds to scan your environment for something that gives you a very small

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little burst of joy. So for example, I have a nail polish on my desk that my sister gave to me last Christmas that I love. And so as I was talking to you right then, I just noticed that. And then can I lean into the joy of having that object? And can I think about my sister and the fact that she sent me something for Christmas last year and what that means and all this stuff just for 20 seconds and then go back to whatever I was doing? If that was stressing out about Thanksgiving dinner, if that was worrying about seating charts,

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or my uncle who's going to say something dumb and make everybody mad, then so be it. But you've given yourself now a 20 second nervous system reset. And the amazing thing is that that's not just a thought experiment. What that does is it lets your body kind of dampen the stress response because when you imprint 20 seconds of joy, you're releasing a bunch of chemicals and stress responses in your brain that counter fear and counter

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stress.

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Dr. Alison Cook (17:43.035)

So, okay, so let me, that was just so well stated. it's all, think what I'm hearing you say, let me just make sure I'm getting it for all of us listening, that just as we have to, in a way, learn our triggers, learn what they feel like, learn to be with them. And there's so much therapy speak about, right, feel your emotions, you know, and the negative emotions, right? And I'm part of that and I get that and I needed to learn that, right? I was a great sort of.

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MC (17:50.53)

Yes. I said a lot.

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Dr. Alison Cook (18:11.342)

spiritual bypasser, I was a great sort of emotional bypasser. So, and, but just as much as we need to do that, be aware of our triggers, be aware of where we're gonna feel activated and be able to lean into that and also flow out of that. It sounds like you're saying we also have to learn our joy triggers, for lack of a better word. Find them, feel them, notice them, seek them out so that that part of us is primed.

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MC (18:30.828)

Yep, yep, yep, exactly. Right, right, right.

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MC (18:41.504)

Yes, exactly.

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Dr. Alison Cook (18:42.586)

That's so interesting.

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MC (18:44.142)

And then in a moment of stress or when you're having a tough day or whatever, you will find yourself automatically going to the place of joy instead of the place of fear because your body learns to kind of look for that, that counter to the stress that you're dealing with. I made the sort of hilarious decision January 1st of 2025 on Instagram live, on Instagram, that I was gonna do tiny little joys every single day. And you know, it's hilarious because

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you don't know what the year is gonna present you and you're gonna do this, make a video every single day, that's absurd. And 2025 served up like one of the hardest years to date. And the cool thing about that though is that I've been able to see in real time and show people in real time how anchoring that is to be able to like hold yourself to that practice and then see what sort of benefits you can reap, you know?

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Dr. Alison Cook (19:24.688)

Wow.

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Dr. Alison Cook (19:32.442)

Wow.

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Dr. Alison Cook (19:41.561)

I want to see that. That's cool. That's really beautiful. I want to switch gears just a little bit to a related topic that you talk about and also related to this time of year, which is the hope circuit, right? Hope. How do we rewire our brains for the hope circuit? First of all, how is that different? How is hope different from joy? And is it a similar process?

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MC (19:43.468)

Yeah.

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MC (19:48.877)

Yes.

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MC (19:54.861)

Yes.

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MC (20:02.552)

Yeah.

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MC (20:07.416)

That's great question. I think if you want to think of, I'm going with this metaphor of like primary colors versus mixed colors. I don't know why I'm not an artist, but it's just what's here. If you think about like hope and joy and imagination as different colors on the same palette, then I think that's a helpful framing. So joy and hope and gratitude and kindness and imagination, all are emotions and entryways into

‍

that has been termed the hope circuit in the brain. Which is just a series of brain areas that wire together and fire up when you're experience, when you're making a gratitude list from a really like present place or when you're practicing tiny little joys or when you're doing something called absurd hope, which I can explain in a second. All of those things activate the hope circuit. The cool thing about the hope circuit is that it turns off the fear circuit.

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So when you think about like sort of electrical circuits in your brain, you can think about your brain almost like it's an old house. And in an old house, you may have had this experience. If you're running the air conditioner, you can't turn the microwave on or you'll blow a fuse. That's just because these circuits are counterposed. They can't be on at the same time. Our brains are the same. We don't have endless energy and electric ability in our brains. We have limitations. And so when you're in fear,

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about this a couple of minutes ago, you can't access joy. When you're in the fear circuit, that part of your brain kind of goes dark because all of your resources are needed to handle whatever the stressor or threat that you're dealing with is. And we all know that and that's very, like we've had that experience. the smoke alarm is going off in your house, you can't do like complex math and balance your checkbook because you're too in the fear. The cool thing is that in like

‍

2015 neuroscientists discovered that it also goes the other way. So if the hope circuit is online by a practice of joy or hope or kindness or gratitude, then the fear circuit can't be online either. And so we can leverage that by then making ourselves, like holding ourselves accountable. Do I have a couple of exercises every day where I'm intentionally going in and turning on the hope circuit? Because if I can do that for five minutes or 20 seconds, that's five whole minutes.

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MC (22:36.976)

that the fear circuit is offline. And that makes changes in your entire body because the fear circuit releases stress hormones and the hope circuit releases hormones and chemicals that counter stress.

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Dr. Alison Cook (22:48.746)

my gosh, that's unbelievable. Yeah, that's amazing. It's just amazing to me how the brain is wired. And I guess what comes to mind is, gosh, we've spent, I feel like, so much time kind of shaming ourselves for not feeling these emotions as if they're magic. But we can sort of unlock.

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MC (22:51.182)

Isn't that cool?

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MC (22:57.165)

I know.

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MC (23:12.472)

Right.

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MC (23:16.022)

Yes.

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Dr. Alison Cook (23:16.816)

We now understand it a little bit more now we can again put ourselves on the pathway toward a meaningful rich experience of hope that's amazing

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MC (23:22.35)

Yeah.

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Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I think hope is another one of these things where it gets very bypassy, right? We tell people in the deepest, darkest moments of, we can't give up hope. Actually, you can. And you will. right? And the cool thing is that hope and joy actually don't need you to believe in them for them to exist. And they will come and find you, even when you don't want them to, you know?

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Dr. Alison Cook (23:33.998)

Yes, 100%.

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Dr. Alison Cook (23:39.544)

Hmm. Yes!

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Dr. Alison Cook (23:52.741)

That's incredible. And to me, that's where the psychology meets the spirituality, right? We're putting ourselves in the path for these incredible, real realities to find us through the miracle of the way our brain is designed. I mean, that's just incredible. I wanna ask you, MC, if you're okay with this, since you so just beautifully shared with us your experience.

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MC (23:56.738)

Yes, totally.

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Right.

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MC (24:06.55)

Yes, exactly.

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MC (24:10.702)

Right. Yeah.

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MC (24:16.215)

Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (24:22.34)

do you going into the holiday season, going into Christmas, knowing you have, I would imagine, this twofold experience of hope and excitement and joy or wanting to have that and also knowing you're going to have some grief?

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MC (24:30.477)

Yeah.

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MC (24:41.23)

Yep. For sure.

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Dr. Alison Cook (24:44.112)

come up, knowing that all of that is part of the beautiful multicolor, all can coexist. How do you set yourself up for both holidays?

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MC (24:51.35)

Yep.

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MC (24:57.494)

Yeah, that's a great question.

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I want to start by saying that I very much subscribe to sort of like a toolbox method of coping rather than a singular tool because I know there are going to be moments where I feel anxiety. There's going to be moments where I feel grief. There's going to be moments where I feel sort of desperation or loneliness or isolation. And each of these moments is going to require a different tool. And I think so going in, it's like, okay, what let's get the toolbox

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Dr. Alison Cook (25:27.568)

Mm-hmm.

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MC (25:31.706)

ready, not just the one singular tool.

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Dr. Alison Cook (25:34.341)

Before you go into the toolbox, which I love, what you just said is a big part of it. I'm going into it knowing I'm going to feel all these different things. I mean, right there, it's like, this is baseline. I'm going to have moments that are going to be hard. I'm going to have moments that are going to feel rich. And even that right there, that posture, I think is a huge reset for so many of us. Again, it's not putting that pressure of, need to have a joyful season. It's like, it's going to be complicated.

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MC (25:41.398)

Yeah, yes, right. Yeah.

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MC (25:48.643)

Yep.

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MC (25:52.835)

Mm-hmm.

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MC (25:57.123)

Yeah.

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Right. Yeah, it's going to have all the right. Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (26:04.336)

So I love that. Yeah. Okay, great. And so then how, kind of tools help you and that do you recommend to help you through each of those?

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MC (26:13.634)

So the Tiny Little Joys, I would highly recommend. think that's a great anchor and can join us on Instagram if you are so called or you can do it yourself. You can do it with a group. I've had people do it with their kids at dinner every night or in the car when you're commuting. But that's an anchoring practice. also love, there's a practice called absurd hope where you kind of go into the hope circuit and flip it on. But instead of trying to hope for your own future, which can sometimes be complicated, you hope for a future

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Dr. Alison Cook (26:17.583)

Yeah.

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MC (26:43.618)

that you know is ridiculous and will not happen. So I use the example of I'm going to be a cartoon elephant, ballerina, who lives in Paris and eats baguettes all day long. And then spend five minutes, you can sort of...

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tack this onto a habit that you already do like brushing your teeth or showering and imagine that future that you know is absurd in the most vivid detail possible. So what are your shoes going to look like as a cartoon ballerina in Paris? What kind of friends are you going to have? What's your apartment going to be like? What kind of animation are we talking? Is this Pixar? Is this anime? Is this something else, right? Like because when you get into the hope circuit and can activate it and turn it on for any extended period of time,

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you are shutting down the fear circuit and that's going to change what's happening in your biology. And I think sometimes when we're in really difficult seasons, we fixate on what's happening, of course we do, right in the here and now. I'm worried about Thanksgiving and who's going to come and whether they're going to be angry and what the conversation is going to be like and are we going to talk about politics and what then? And instead of that, if you could take yourself out of that negative loop for five minutes every single day, you will see that you have more resilience.

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and then loading up on tools to deal with whatever you know is coming. So think about last Christmas. What did you really struggle with? Was it anxiety? Okay, what helps you with anxiety? Having tactile fidgets around or a playlist that's really calming, taking cold showers? Like what are your tools to deal with these core emotions that are gonna come up and then make a list of them and put it somewhere you can see it, whether that's in your phone or on your

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Dr. Alison Cook (28:09.082)

Yeah.

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MC (28:28.528)

refrigerator or your bathroom mirror so that you're cued to do the things when you're in the overwhelm. Because the other issue with overwhelm is that it disconnects you from the part of your brain that remembers the list. And so that's, think, why we get stuck in these things where I'm like, I know I'm supposed to do X, Y, or Z, but I really struggle remembering.

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Dr. Alison Cook (28:34.084)

Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (28:45.529)

Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (28:48.878)

love that. You've mentioned the word imagination and it strikes me that in the hope circuitry and in the exercise you just shared about, it sparks imagination. I've found imagination to be such a powerful tool. can, in my life, I'm not sure about my listeners or you all, just be a candid, it can turn into fantasy, which...

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MC (29:00.705)

Yeah.

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MC (29:14.157)

Mm.

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Dr. Alison Cook (29:15.226)

can take me out of, can be a little bit of a spiritual bypass, but at its best, imagination has been a very powerful tool. I guess what I think about is even from, I think about Viktor Frankl's Man Search for Meaning where he used, he imagined his loved ones and he imagined the love and that helped him through just impossible.

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MC (29:19.436)

Yep.

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MC (29:36.28)

Yeah.

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MC (29:41.016)

Yep. Great.

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Dr. Alison Cook (29:42.765)

circumstances. So from something like that, I know I've done that in my own life when I felt really isolated or alone, will think, I will imagine the people who I love surrounding me, you What are your thoughts on imagination and how that, I know for me that can be a built-in tool. Like you're saying, I kind of want to remind myself, I want to put it as a sticky note on the mirror.

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MC (30:06.796)

Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (30:09.52)

because if I'm alone or I don't have immediate access to something, thoughts on that and its relationship to joy and hope.

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MC (30:13.707)

and

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MC (30:18.924)

Yeah, and I mean, think it's part of what your question is, like, how do we make sure we're not maladaptive daydreaming? that? Yeah. Yeah. Yes.

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Dr. Alison Cook (30:24.952)

Yeah, yes, yes, yes, not escapism, but helpful.

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MC (30:30.004)

Right. So I mean, I think there is, there are some subtle differences between these kinds of imaginations, right? I actually get this question a lot because I think people are really wary of imagination. And I think that's super fascinating, right? Like it's like, where's this going to take me? Where are we going? There's something about it that's a little bit scary because it's unknown and we know that it's made up. And so what does that mean about this life we're living? And I point this out because I just think this is another one

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Dr. Alison Cook (30:57.829)

Yeah.

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MC (30:59.918)

of these places where you can see the sort of tension between trauma and joy if we want to put them under sort of umbrella, you know, names. It's like, yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (31:11.652)

Yeah, for sure. Because fantasy or escape hatches that we build in our mind can be a way to survive a traumatic event. And again, to your point, it's an incredibly brilliant, strong way. How do we bring that back into a healthy thing in the moment? Yeah.

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MC (31:18.606)

Totally. Right, right.

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MC (31:25.292)

Great.

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MC (31:31.779)

And I think, so one thing that differentiates between the kind of maladaptive daydreaming or escapism and true imagination is that maladaptive daydreaming has an ache to it that imagination replaces with silliness.

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Dr. Alison Cook (31:50.768)

Yeah.

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MC (31:51.437)

Right? So if I'm thinking about being a ballerina, even as a human being and not a cartoon elephant in Paris, there's a real silliness to that because I'm a clumsy person. Yeah. And there may be like a shadow of an ache of like, maybe I do want to take dance classes and that's maybe something to actually do. But when you get into the space of maladaptive daydreaming, there's part of that, the way that I understand it, that is about sort of, it's like giving you access to the pain of the fact that you don't have

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Dr. Alison Cook (31:59.161)

Yeah, platefulness. Yeah.

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MC (32:21.41)

that life. Does that make sense?

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Dr. Alison Cook (32:22.352)

Yeah, sure. Yes. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. And go ahead.

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MC (32:26.446)

So, and that is run. No, you go.

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Dr. Alison Cook (32:32.206)

Well, no, that ache is a good word because then there's a longing that we actually want to pay attention to. And what is that about versus the joy and delight that comes from imaginative play that we all had a taste of when we were kids, right? That's what kids do, right? And so that makes sense to me that when there's that ache in it or a sorrow in it, that might be when to look at it go, is there something there underneath that that I actually want in my real life?

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MC (32:37.73)

Right, totally. Right. Yeah.

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MC (32:49.262)

Right.

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MC (32:59.04)

Right. Right, right, right.

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Dr. Alison Cook (33:02.744)

or need.

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MC (33:02.86)

And then turn to that, yeah. And maybe you do this practice every day in the shower and you're like, okay, I'm imagining a different scene every day, but like there's a theme and what's the theme? Okay, I need to think about that. But I think when it comes to escapism, I don't think we're really at risk until we're abandoning our own lives. So the practice that I'm talking about is that you take five minutes or 15 minutes and you're enhancing your day. You're not escaping from a task

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Dr. Alison Cook (33:10.947)

Yes.

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Dr. Alison Cook (33:29.348)

Yeah. Yes.

‍

MC (33:32.824)

or your real relationship or a feeling that's over here that you don't want to feel.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (33:36.933)

Yes, I love it. You're exercising that muscle. You're being intentional about exercising the hope. I love that. feel like you need to, this is unsolicited, but speaking of the holiday seasons, we've covered hope and joy. Now we need to have you back on and we'll talk about peace. Right? Because all of these beautiful, you know, I think about the holiday, all the songs we sing, know, hope, joy and peace.

‍

MC (33:41.218)

Yeah.

‍

MC (33:55.052)

There we go, yeah.

‍

MC (34:02.925)

Right.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (34:04.484)

They are available to us. And I love that you are not minimizing the pain and the trauma. You're teaching us how to work with our design.

‍

MC (34:06.392)

Yep.

‍

MC (34:12.611)

Yeah.

‍

Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think, you know, there's, I'm huge on exercises. There's exercises at the end of every chapter in the Joy Reset, but also just knowing this framework. What exercises can you think of for yourself, right? How is your life structured and situated? And how can you adapt these exercises so that they really work for you, you know?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (34:30.384)

Yeah. Yeah.

‍

MC (34:39.222)

And to your point about music, think music is incredibly powerful. And so that can be another tool, right? If you have 15 minutes, do you have a playlist that really lets you feel inspired or lets you feel a bunch of sadness? And then you turn the playlist off and go make dinner, you know, like, yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (34:42.938)

Yeah. Yes. Yep.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (34:53.623)

Yes!

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (34:57.518)

that's good. Yeah, that gives you that outlet and you're doing it intentionally. You're giving yourself that sad song or that that joyful song. Yeah, I love it. And see, I'm gonna go check out your I love the the joy challenge. I think that's really beautiful. Tell my listeners where they can find you and your work and these resources are just so helpful.

‍

MC (35:02.349)

Yeah.

‍

Yeah. Yeah.

‍

MC (35:16.877)

Yes.

‍

MC (35:21.006)

thank you. I am on TikTok and Instagram at the same handle, just mc.phd. And then my website is just alchemycoaching.life.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (35:32.484)

Beautiful, so you provide coaching services as well.

‍

MC (35:35.672)

Yes, yep, I do curriculum and I work with corporations and groups and individuals and all sorts of stuff. yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (35:40.528)

Amazing. Okay, we will link to everything in the show notes. Thank you for sharing your time and your wisdom with us today.

‍

MC (35:48.856)

Thank you so much for having me. This was lovely.

‍

‍

If the holidays bring up a lot for you, old roles, old emotions, or the pressure to keep everyone happy, you’re not alone. Christmas has a way of activating the patterns and survival strategies that once helped you feel safe, pleasing, perfecting, over-functioning, or shutting down.

In this episode, Dr. Alison Cook shares how these patterns show up in her own life, why they resurface, and how you can gently find your way back to peace. You’ll learn:

• the three types of needs that get tangled inside
• why holiday dynamics awaken old wounds and responses
• a simple way to return to the place of peace at your center
• how to redefine “success” this holiday season

‍

This Christmas, gift a loved one (or yourself!) Dr Alison’s latest book, The Best of You!

📥 Grab your 3 free Boundaries For Your Soul resources here 

📥 Download Alison’s free printable with the five boundary tools when you sign up for her weekly email.

If you liked this episode, you’ll love: 

Episode 131: Navigating Holiday Emotions

Episode 135: Tackling Holiday People Pleasing

📖 Find a full transcript and list of resources from this episode here

‍

💬 Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.

‍

Thanks to our Sponsors!

• Go to ⁠Quince.com/bestofyou⁠ for 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order!
• If you’re looking for a Bible that helps you live the Word, not just read it, then grab this beautiful one I’m currently using at NIVapplicationbible.com.
• Head to AirDoctorPro.com and use promo code BESTOFYOU to get UP TO $300 off today!
• Give online therapy, brought to you by betterhelp.com/BESTOFYOU and get on your way to being your best self.
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*Some of the links above are Amazon affiliate links. If you choose to purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

While Dr. Cook is a counselor, the content of this podcast and any of the products provided by Dr. Cook are not specific counseling advice nor are they a substitute for individual counseling. The content and products provided on this podcast are for informational purposes only.‍

© 2025 Alison Cook. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please do not copy or share the contents of this webpage or transcript without permission from the author.

‍

Please hear me say this clearly. Nothing is wrong with you. Truly, this time of

‍

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‍

You don't need a long quiet time or a perfectly structured ritual or long hours to

‍

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‍

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‍

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‍

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‍

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‍

Hey, everyone. And welcome back to this week's episode of The Best of You. We are

‍

quickly approaching Christmas. And I know so many of you, if you're anything like

‍

me, are feeling the swirl of this season. The beauty, the charm. Yes,

‍

but also the pressure, the weight sometimes of expectations and the emotional

‍

complexity that tends to rise to the surface in December. This is the time of year

‍

when we're told to slow down and savor the moment, and yet for so many of us,

‍

our hearts feel anything but settled. Maybe you're feeling polled between family needs

‍

or old dynamics that still tug at you the moment you walk through a familiar

‍

doorway. Maybe you're carrying the invisible labor of making things feel magical for

‍

everybody else, or you might be navigating loneliness, grief, or the quiet ache of

‍

feeling misunderstood. And then there's the internal pressure,

‍

that little voice that says you should be more present, more grateful, more joyful,

‍

it's more spiritual. It can be a lot. And our hearts can end up feeling stretched

‍

thin and pulled in every direction at once. Today,

‍

I want to offer you something gentle. A simple, grounded practice that you can

‍

return to any time you feel the swirl inside you start to rise, a way of gathering

‍

all those scattered pieces of your heart and soul, and returning to a deeper

‍

presence within, the presence of love that is with you even here.

‍

As we settle in, I want to name something I see so often this time of year.

‍

In my clients, in my listeners, and also, most definitely also in myself. It's what

‍

I call the intertangle. You know that feeling when everything inside you starts

‍

firing at once? Overwhelm creeps in. Your mind starts spinning. Your body feels

‍

tight. And suddenly, the simplest things, a comment from a family member, a change

‍

in plans, a moment of silence feels strangely amplified. For many of us,

‍

Christmas doesn't just bring external busyness. It also stirs up the deeper layers of

‍

our inner world. Old wounds can resurface moments when you felt left out,

‍

unseen, responsible for holding everyone else together from long ago, long before the

‍

current moment. Memories you didn't even know were still tucked inside you can

‍

suddenly feel close to the surface and the different parts of your soul, they start

‍

working in overtime. Maybe your inner pleaser jumps to attention.

‍

Just keep everybody happy. Don't rock the boat. Or your inner perfectionist begins

‍

tightening up the reins. Make it special. Don't miss a detail. It's all on you to

‍

make it perfect for everyone. Maybe there's a lonely one inside of you who feels

‍

the quiet ache of not being truly known, even when you're surrounded by people you

‍

love, or a tired one who has simply carried too much for too long and feels like

‍

she's running on fumes. These different parts of your soul aren't problems.

‍

They're ancient feelings. Often they go all the way back to survival strategies you

‍

learned in childhood long ago that come to the surface in seasons of stress and

‍

also seasons of joy and overwhelm like Christmas. These parts of you are trying to

‍

help you feel safe, loved and connected. And the holidays have a way of lighting

‍

them up because this season is so rooted in memory, in nostalgia, in expectation,

‍

in longing. So if you're feeling that intertangle rise, if you're exhausted, stretched

‍

thin or suddenly emotional, please hear me say this clearly. Nothing is wrong with

‍

you. Truly, this time of years simply shines a brighter light on the inner world

‍

you carry every day. It brings these inner parts of your soul to the surface.

‍

It awakens old patterns that once kept you safe. It highlights the places inside you

‍

that still long for tenderness, for reassurance, for rest.

‍

The good news is those different activation points, those little flares inside become

‍

invitations. Not to shame yourself, but to pay attention and to meet your own soul

‍

with compassion to return gently to God's loving presence.

‍

We'll move toward that together in just a moment, but first I want to anchor us in

‍

a spiritual reframe. As we notice this intertangle at Christmas,

‍

I want to bring us back to a grounding truth, one that has anchored people of

‍

faith for thousands of years. It's the invitation from Psalm 4610. I love this

‍

Psalm. Be still and know that I am God.

‍

Be still and know that I am God.

‍

Most of us hear those words and immediately think of kind of an external stillness,

‍

quiet rooms, candles, soft music, a pause from the noise, something that feels out

‍

of reach for many of us in a busy season. And while those things can help the

‍

stillness, scripture speaks of is something so much deeper.

‍

It's within our bodies. It's within our souls. It's a whole body stillness that

‍

starts within. Stillness is not passivity.

‍

It's not shutting down. It's not pretending. Everything is fine. Stillness is inner

‍

spaciousness. It's the gentle, courageous act of turning inward,

‍

of noticing what's swirling inside and making room for God to meet you there.

‍

This is one of the most beautiful truths of the spiritual life of Christmas. God

‍

doesn't meet us in the performance of this season, not in the perfect gathering or

‍

the perfectly managed emotions or the beautiful candlelit room, although those things

‍

are beautiful. It's not in trying to hold everyone else together, right? God meets

‍

us in the center of the storm within ourselves, in the quiet core beneath all the

‍

pressures in the place inside where you can finally exhale and simply draw near to

‍

God. When scripture says be still, it's not commanding you to shut down your

‍

emotions or silence the ache inside. It's inviting you to return to the truth deep

‍

within that God is already here. God is already with you. God is already beside

‍

you, ahead of you, before you, and within you through the power of his spirit. God

‍

comes to the middle of the storm. So this is where we're headed.

‍

We're going to practice what it means to come home to that inner place of love.

‍

The place where your scattered parts of your soul can gather, where they can get

‍

bandaged up and healed and touched by love itself,

‍

where God holds you steady, where you remember that you are not alone in this

‍

season or in any season. It's just a breath away. There's nothing you have to

‍

force. There's nothing you have to make happen. We're simply making space for God to

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‍

Before we move into the practice itself, I want to show you a simple visual that

‍

captures what so many of us feel during December. I found this so helpful. I call

‍

it the three circles of presence. If you're watching on video, I'm going to hold up

‍

a whiteboard showing you what I'm describing, but if you're listening, you can just

‍

picture three overlapping circles, like a Venn diagram. And circle one up here at

‍

the top is the circle of what others want from me. And you could even make a list

‍

if you draw your own, all the things you feel like others want or need from you.

‍

Circle two becomes what I expect of myself, right? These are those inner pressures,

‍

our inner expectations. You can make a list of those, the different ways we put

‍

pressure on ourselves. And then circle three down here at the bottom is what my

‍

soul actually needs for me, right? What my soul actually needs.

‍

And then right here at the center, I'll take a little sharpy here and color this

‍

in. Where they overlap is what I call this place of peace.

‍

I'm going to write that here. This is the place of peace at the center.

‍

Now, I want to walk you through what tends to happen during the holidays. Most of

‍

us spend a lot of time right here in circle one, right? This is what others want

‍

for me, right? The invitations, the expectations, the family dynamics, the emotional

‍

and we want to have expectations of ourselves, this isn't all bad, but it's the

‍

pressure you tend to put on your own shoulders, to be cheerful, to be happy, to be

‍

present, to make it meaningful, to not disappoint anyone. This is where your inner

‍

achiever, your inner perfectionist, or definitely your inner critic tends to take

‍

over, right? If you don't hold this in balance, insisting you hold everything

‍

together. But Rarely, so rarely, do we pause long enough to notice Circle 3?

‍

And this is what my soul actually needs, right? This is the longing beneath these

‍

other outer expectations, outer and inner expectations. It's the place inside where

‍

parts of you feel tender, parts of you carry grief from the past or from the

‍

present, where parts of you might be lonely or exhausted or overwhelmed or maybe

‍

want to sense your own sense of wonder in this season, right? You have your own

‍

memories you're tapping into, right? So this is often the part of us. We're not

‍

connecting to enough. And here's the thing. Peace, again, is found in the overlap.

‍

It's not in abandoning people, right, or dropping every responsibility. That wouldn't

‍

make us who we are. We're not that kind of person. We do care about other people.

‍

We do care about our own standards. But when we gently step back and also bring

‍

into focus what our soul needs, what my soul actually needs from me,

‍

from others, from the season, from God, right? What my soul actually also needs,

‍

right? This isn't also

‍

conversation right your spiritual life lives in that center space this is the space

‍

where we have to get still for just a moment not to ignore the needs of other

‍

people around us not to ignore the expectations we put on ourselves but to connect

‍

to the deeper longings in our own souls right This is where God meets us at the

‍

center of who we are. As you look at this visual or maybe draw it out for

‍

yourself, I want to imagine yourself slowly, stepping out of the outer swirl of

‍

Circle 1 for just a moment today while we're together and out of the inner pressure

‍

of Circle 2 and join me for just a moment in Circle 3,

‍

where you connect to your own deeper longings this season.

‍

We're going to take just a few moments to move into an inner check -in together.

‍

If you're able, if you're not driving a car, you can close your eyes. Let your

‍

shoulders drop for just a moment. Maybe unclench your hands close your eyes and take

‍

a slow breath in and a long steady exhale out and just right now while you're

‍

listening ask yourself this question who's present in me most right now

‍

Just notice which part of you comes forward.

‍

You might notice the pleaser, working hard to keep everyone happy.

‍

Maybe it's the perfectionist, tightening her grip.

‍

Maybe it's a lonely one feeling a quiet ache beneath the surface or the tired one

‍

who's carried too much for too long.

‍

Just notice which part of you comes to the surface and

‍

then gently ask whoever shows up, what are you afraid of right now?

‍

Listen for even the faintest whisper.

‍

Maybe she's afraid of disappointing someone. Maybe she fears being left out or

‍

misunderstood.

‍

Maybe she fears being alone or feeling invisible.

‍

Maybe she's terrified of letting something drop.

‍

Whatever comes, simply honor it.

‍

Now, as this part of you,

‍

what do you need?

‍

It's not what you should need, not what others need.

‍

But what does this part of you need from you in this moment?

‍

Maybe it's just a deep breath.

‍

Maybe it's a boundary. She's aching for you to set. Maybe it's a moment of

‍

stillness each day for just a few minutes like this.

‍

Maybe it's reassurance that you see her, that you're with her.

‍

Maybe it's to be minded she doesn't have to carry the weight on her shoulders

‍

and now picture god turning toward this part of you with warmth not critiquing not

‍

correcting simply turning toward this part of your soul With compassion,

‍

imagine God bending low,

‍

meeting this young version of you at eye level,

‍

calling her by name and saying, I see you, you are precious to me.

‍

You don't have to hold this alone.

‍

let this part of you rest for a moment in that presence

‍

this is the beginning of returning to that center of peace,

‍

not by forcing yourself to be calm, but by tending to what is true and real inside

‍

of you and allowing love to meet you there.

‍

Take one more deep breath, and when you're ready,

‍

we'll gently move forward together.

‍

I want to share a little story from my own life here because this intertangle we're

‍

talking about is something I know really well. When my kids were younger, especially

‍

in those early years, I would make myself absolutely crazy over the holidays.

‍

And I didn't know then that it was younger parts of me stirring up, but I can see

‍

it so clearly now. I wanted to knock it out of the park for everybody else. I

‍

wanted to create magic and memories to please every member of the family to fill

‍

everyone with delight. This well -intentioned part of me just took it as her job to

‍

be the Christmas fairy, you know, just sprinkling magic Christmas everywhere. And

‍

underneath, all of that effort was this deep pressure inside myself. This belief that

‍

if I could just get it right, everyone would feel loved and I would finally feel

‍

at peace. But the truth was I was completely disconnected from my own needs.

‍

This pleaser part of me was really young. She had needs that I wasn't aware of,

‍

but she was running the show and my achiever part was right there with her task

‍

list and her clipboard, you know, gift after gift after gift, just redoing and

‍

overdoing and doing more and just running on empty. And deep inside,

‍

there was a part of me who longed for rest and for connection. And I didn't

‍

realize then that that part of me could never get those needs met through all that

‍

effort out here. That that part of me needed God's love and needed me too,

‍

right? That part of me also needed love this Christmas season.

‍

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‍

And here's what would inevitably happen by the time Christmas finally arrived or

‍

maybe the day after, I would be exhausted, bone tired, run down,

‍

and in some cases I'd get irritable or I'd completely shut down, right? I'd poured

‍

everything out and there was nothing left and that didn't serve anyone. It didn't

‍

serve my family. That's not what they wanted. It was an exhausted parent running

‍

around and it certainly didn't serve me. Over time, year after year,

‍

I had to learn how to find this place of peace we've been talking about, that

‍

place in the center of the three circles. It included what others need, a desire to

‍

please others at the holidays. That's a beautiful gift, right? When it's held in

‍

balance with my own self -expectations, my own capacity, and also when held in

‍

balance with what my soul actually needs underneath at all.

‍

The shifts started small. I still remember the year it began to click for me. It

‍

happened with gift buying. I realized one December that by the time I got to the

‍

fifth or sixth present for the kids, those extra gifts weren't adding any real joy.

‍

They weren't improving anything for anyone. They were coming from my pressure, not

‍

their delight. My family, my kids were just as happy, maybe even happier with the

‍

first one or two thoughtful gifts. Right? It seemed silly, but it was a huge moment

‍

of reckoning. Like, I can just stop at a point. It was the part of me that was

‍

overreaching that didn't need to do that. It wasn't pleasing anyone, least of all

‍

myself. So I experimented with something new the next year. I stopped.

‍

I set a boundary with a part of me who kept pushing for just one more. I thanked

‍

her for wanting to create meaningful memories and then I gently told her, we're

‍

good. We've done enough. Let's rest. And you know what happened?

‍

Everyone was still happy. The joy was still there Christmas morning. And for the

‍

first time in years, I had a little gas left in the tank. I was present. And that

‍

small shift opened up a door for me. Over the next few years, I started applying

‍

the same mindset to other places to my schedule, saying no to things that looked

‍

lovely, but would ultimately drain me. I said no to some of my own expectations,

‍

letting go of the image of the perfect Christmas, which, spoiler alert, when you let

‍

go of that, you tend to find it in unexpected places. And to my inner soul,

‍

listening for what each part of me needed instead of letting them run on autopilot.

‍

And slowly, steadily, I began to discover that inner place of peace,

‍

not by doing more, not by performing harder, but by coming home to what my soul

‍

actually needs. And I share that story because I want you to know you are not

‍

alone in this. This work takes time. It's a practice and every small step toward

‍

that inner place of peace matters. It matters for you.

‍

It matters for the people you love. And it's the place where God loves to meet us,

‍

which is after all the whole point of Christmas, right? It's God coming into the

‍

mess and meeting us right where we are. So as you hear my story and engage with

‍

your own soul, I want to turn this toward your life, toward the real moments you're

‍

walking through this December, right, as we head into Christmas. Because here's the

‍

truth. You don't need a long, quiet time or a perfectly structured ritual or long

‍

hours to come back to center. Most days, all you need is two minutes of awareness.

‍

I call this the two -minute return to center. It's based in mindfulness, which is

‍

based on the episode I did with Dr. Judd Brewer in last week's episode. So if you

‍

want the deep dive, go back and listen to that conversation. It was such a powerful

‍

conversation. But this is the simple three -step version. It's simple. It's repeatable

‍

and it breaks the cycle of overwhelm right in the moment. You can practice this

‍

every day or any time you feel overwhelmed, chaotic, or just notice one of those

‍

parts of you that we tapped into earlier today. Here's how it works. Step one,

‍

you just pause. Take a deep breath. If it helps place a hand on your heart or

‍

your stomach, just enough to signal to your soul. I'm here.

‍

I'm listening. Right? It's that simple. Step two, name the part of you that you

‍

notice. I see a part of me that's worried, that's bracing,

‍

that's lonely, that's overfunctioning, that's tired.

‍

Whatever rises, name it. Naming brings compassion and differentiation into the room.

‍

You're becoming mindful of what's happening in your own soul. You're getting into

‍

that third circle, right? That third circle of what my soul actually needs.

‍

And then step three, I want you to bless this part of you. Offer a simple

‍

kindness. It makes sense that you're here. I get it.

‍

You've worked hard. You're not alone. God is here,

‍

too. As part of step three, you might invite God into this place in your soul.

‍

God, meet me right here. Not to fix, not to change,

‍

but just to be with. Right. This is the opposite of inner pressure. It's inner

‍

welcome. Right. It's welcoming Christ right there into that place in your own soul.

‍

Just those three steps. Pause. Take a breath. Place a hand somewhere over where you

‍

sense that inner voice, right? Name what you notice.

‍

Give it a name. And then three, welcome with a blessing. I bless you, tiredness.

‍

It's understandable that you're here. You're welcome at the table of my soul. I

‍

bless you, you inner overworker. Right. I get your good intentions.

‍

Right. You're welcome at the table. I don't want you to take over, but you get a

‍

place in my soul. And then as you take that breath, right, as you take that pause,

‍

you might just check in with yourself. What's one thing I need today? Maybe it's

‍

just a deep breath. Maybe it's to untense my shoulders. Maybe it's to take a short

‍

walk, right? It doesn't have to be fancy or a lot, but you're just trying to

‍

interrupt that loop in your soul. This simple practice can shift the entire tone of

‍

your day. It brings you out of autopilot, out of old patterns, out of those loops,

‍

and back into a grounded presence where God meets you, right in the middle of what

‍

you're feeling. Here's what I want you to remember. Peace this season will not look

‍

like perfection. It will look like presence, small,

‍

grounded moments. It might look like saying a gentle no to something that stretches

‍

you too thin, like leaving a gathering just a few minutes early without guilt,

‍

like taking three slow breaths before responding,

‍

like stepping into a bathroom or a hallway for just a few minutes to re -center and

‍

listen to your own soul. It might mean letting go of the idea of perfection or

‍

perfect memories and instead looking for what is because what is is is good and

‍

beautiful. It might mean allowing a place for grief or loneliness to sit at the

‍

table of your soul. It might mean honoring your limits without apologizing,

‍

offering compassion to yourself, to others, instead of performance.

‍

Peace is so much less like those flawless holiday photos. It's more like a steady

‍

inner exhale. It's the quiet confidence that you don't have to run ragged to be

‍

loved.

‍

finds you. You are not alone. I promise you there is a place inside of you where

‍

God is already waiting to greet you to welcome every single part of your soul with

‍

love. Thank you for joining me for this episode of The Best of You Be sure to

‍

check out the show notes for any resources and links mentioned in the show. You can

‍

find those on my website at dr. Allison cook .com. That's Allison with one L .cook

‍

.com. Before you forget, I hope you'll follow the show now so that you don't miss

‍

an episode. And I'd love it if you'd go ahead and leave a review. It helps so

‍

much to get the word out. I look forward to seeing you back here next Thursday.

‍

And remember, as you become the best of who you are, you honor God, you heal

‍

others, and you stay true to your God -given self.

‍

If discomfort sends you into overthinking, numbing, or trying to fix what you can’t control…

If certain habits feel automatic no matter how much you try to change them…

You’re not alone—and your brain is more trainable than you think.

In this episode, Dr. Alison Cook sits down with Dr. Jud Brewer—psychiatrist, neuroscientist, and New York Times best-selling author who specializes in habit change and mindfulness. 

They unpack why we get stuck in these loops and a simple practice to steady your soul.

Instead of relying on willpower or self-judgment, this conversation invites you to:‍

• ‍Notice your inner patterns with kindness
• Differentiate discomfort from distress
• Understand the habit loops that drive anxiety, worry, or doom-scrolling
• Apply the #1 tool to help you create real, lasting change
• Deepen your connection to God

This episode is a grounding companion for anyone navigating stress, emotional triggers, or the pull toward old coping strategies—especially in seasons that stir up more than we expect.

📥 Grab your 3 free Boundaries For Your Soul resources here 

📥 Download Alison’s free printable with the five boundary tools when you sign up for her weekly email.

If you liked this episode, you’ll love: 

Episode 75: Your Secret Weapon Against Stress and Anxiety

Episode 112: Navigating Anxiety

📖 Find a full transcript and list of resources from this episode here

‍

💬 Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.

‍

Thanks to our Sponsors!

• Go to ⁠Quince.com/bestofyou⁠ for 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order!
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• Check out cozyearth.com and use code BESTOFYOU to get up to 40% off. 
• Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/BESTOFYOU and get on your way to being your best self.

‍

*Some of the links above are Amazon affiliate links. If you choose to purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

While Dr. Cook is a counselor, the content of this podcast and any of the products provided by Dr. Cook are not specific counseling advice nor are they a substitute for individual counseling. The content and products provided on this podcast are for informational purposes only.‍

© 2025 Alison Cook. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please do not copy or share the contents of this webpage or transcript without permission from the author.

‍

Transcript

‍

Anxiety is probably an evolutionary bottleneck in this respect because it pulls

‍

together fear and planning. The more we worry, the less we're actually able to plan.

‍

We can get stuck in these habit loops of distraction where we're not learning to be

‍

with our unpleasant experiences. And if we're constantly running away from it, we're

‍

not going to know how to deal with things that are uncomfortable in the future.

‍

When we get out of our own way, when it's not about us, when it's about something

‍

much bigger than us, suddenly we've got all the strength in the world.

‍

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‍

Hey everyone and welcome back to this week's episode of the best of you. As we are

‍

heading into this Christmas season, so many of us brace ourselves, not just for the

‍

busyness, but also for the emotional undercurrents that show up around family,

‍

expectations, the pressure to feel joy when maybe we're not feeling so joyful,

‍

and not to mention the constant stream of hard news in the world. It's a time when

‍

our nervous systems can run hot, our minds can spin fast, and those familiar

‍

triggers can flare. And in those moments, we often reach for whatever helps us cope.

‍

It could be doom scrolling, stress eating, that extra glass of wine, small attempts

‍

to soothe the nervous system that's overwhelmed and searching for steady ground. And

‍

today we're talking about something that I love. It's just such a life -changing

‍

topic, a lifeline for so many of us navigating these kinds of moments. It's

‍

mindfulness. Research consistently shows that mindfulness can reduce anxiety,

‍

improve emotional regulation and interrupt those unhealthy habit loops by strengthening

‍

your capacity for awareness and self -control. This is a powerful, powerful tool.

‍

But before we get started, I want to name something up front, especially for those

‍

of you who've been tuning into the podcast these past few years. For some of us,

‍

the word mindfulness can carry some baggage. For some of you, it might feel too

‍

self -focused or too secular or even at odds with Christian prayer.

‍

And we touch on this at the end of the episode in a beautiful way. But I know

‍

that for some of you, it can bring up images of emptying your mind or practices

‍

you've been told to avoid. And I want to begin this episode by reframing what

‍

mindfulness actually is and what it isn't because it's so much more compatible with

‍

Christian prayer and forms of spiritual practices than many people realize.

‍

Mindfulness at its core is simply the practice of paying attention. Attention without

‍

judgment, presence, without striving, awareness, without shame.

‍

That sounds a whole lot like what this journey of learning to walk with Jesus is

‍

all about. In the Christian tradition, prayer has always been about turning our

‍

attention, our awareness toward God, being fully present to the one who is already

‍

present with us. And while mindfulness doesn't require a spiritual framework,

‍

Christians absolutely can and do practice mindfulness in a way that enhances our

‍

spiritual lives. In fact, countless believers throughout history of practice forms of

‍

mindful attention through silence and solitude, through breath prayer,

‍

through reflection and contemplative prayer. Where prayer tends to connect us to God,

‍

mindfulness helps us notice what's happening inside of us so we can bring that

‍

experience into an awareness of God. It helps us slow down enough to notice,

‍

where is my body tense? What emotion is surfacing? Which part of me feels threatened

‍

or overwhelmed? What is this moment stirring up inside of me?

‍

This awareness doesn't replace prayer, but it allows us to invite more of God's

‍

presence to be with us in whatever we're experiencing.

‍

It allows us to experience more of God's presence with us. And here's why today's

‍

conversation matters. We are living in a time of constant triggers, anxiety,

‍

overconsumption, stress eating, doomscrolling, numbing behaviors, emotional spirals. The

‍

brain falls into habit loops when we're overwhelmed. And for many of us, those loops

‍

are rooted in fear, stress or trying to self -soothe the best way we know how.

‍

Mindfulness helps us interrupt those loops. It gives us tools to notice what's

‍

happening in real time instead of getting swept away by old patterns. It helps us

‍

learn to respond rather than react. And that's something every one of us needs right

‍

now. And that brings me to today's guest. Dr. Judd Brewer is one of the leading

‍

voices and

‍

love about Dr. Judd's work is that he makes something as profound as mindfulness

‍

incredibly practical. He breaks it down and helps us understanding what's happening in

‍

the brain when we get hooked, whether it's by anxiety or doom scrolling or social

‍

media or people pleasing, and he teaches us how small moments of awareness can

‍

actually help us change those habits. So today, we're going to explore what

‍

mindfulness actually is, how it helps us approach these triggers, especially during

‍

stressful seasons and why our brains get stuck in habit loops and how curiosity and

‍

small shifts in attention can help us create lasting change. And lastly,

‍

we'll talk about how mindfulness can expand our practices of prayer, helping us to

‍

gain access to an even deeper sense of God's loving, powerful presence right in the

‍

middle of our struggles. This is such a rich and beautiful and encouraging

‍

conversation and I am thrilled to bring you my conversation with Dr. Judd Brewer.

‍

Judd, I'm thrilled to have you on the podcast today. I'm just such a big fan of

‍

your work and all that you're doing to help us understand mindfulness. Can you help

‍

us understand first off, right? You're at the start what it is and maybe what it

‍

isn't. Yes. So let's start with what it isn't. It isn't a judgmental stance on

‍

life. You know, so it's really, there are two main components, awareness and

‍

curiosity. And I would also add that with the curiosity, there's an attitude of

‍

kindness. So this kind curiosity, if we could put it that way, that helps us meet

‍

whatever we're being aware of in a different way than what we often habitually do,

‍

which is judging our experience, whether it's judging ourselves, judging others,

‍

judging the world. And so does it not only apply to awareness of myself?

‍

Can we also apply mindfulness to our awareness of others? Absolutely. Oh,

‍

interesting.

‍

Gotcha. So it's different from maybe a sort of focus only on the inner life,

‍

although that's part of it. It's not, so for example, meditation, right, where you're

‍

trying to um that yeah flesh that out a little bit because i think that's a

‍

misconception even i have absolutely well often you know meditation is seen as you

‍

know the proverbial navel gazing or however you know however it's seen but really

‍

it's about bringing awareness and seeing relationality so seeing our relationship with

‍

ourselves which is internal but also seeing our relationship with others and with the

‍

world, which is external. And I would even go as far as saying that's an artificial

‍

distinction between internal and external. It's really about being aware of everything

‍

in an ongoing flow. And it's, you know, to say internal and external,

‍

it can be helpful to make distinctions at times and it can also develop official

‍

dichotomies that can get in the way. Can you give me an example of even in a

‍

moment like right now?

‍

I'm aware we had some technology difficulties hopping on right.

‍

And I've learned over time to be present to what's happening and what's real Versus

‍

flipping into self -shame or self -judgment. Can you give me,

‍

is there a form of mindfulness that speaks to even a moment like that,

‍

a moment right now where I have some inner noise and there's a way I can be kind

‍

toward what I'm noticing versus judging what I'm noticing. Yeah, absolutely.

‍

So let's say that something isn't going as planned. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

‍

And when something isn't going as planned, we can get in the habit of judging

‍

ourselves. We can get in the habit of judging some piece of technological equipment.

‍

We can get in the habit of judging other people. We can bring awareness in and see

‍

how we are kind of going down those spirals of the judgment,

‍

internal, external, whatever, equipment. And we can also, so it helps us be able to

‍

recognize that. And then also helps us be able to kind of meet that with this

‍

curious awareness. So for example, you know, if something isn't working, like a

‍

technological glitch in a podcast, we can We can go, oh, crap.

‍

And when we do that, our mind, you know, whether it's judging ourselves,

‍

judging the experience, judging whatever, that kind of closes us down and puts us in

‍

this kind of constricted, contracted, frustrated mindset, which ironically makes it

‍

harder to step back and problem solve, you know. And so there we bring flip that

‍

oh no or oh crap to oh okay this you know this piece of technology isn't working

‍

what um how you know and it opens us to be able to see all the possibilities much

‍

more readily than if we were just locked into you know that you know must be that

‍

or must be that that's really that's really at the heart of it is to is to bring

‍

this playful curiosity even when things aren't going.

‍

how society is collectively getting trained to use their phones.

‍

Cornell West describes it as these weapons of mass distraction, right? And so all

‍

over the place, whether it's my students at Brown University or people on the

‍

streets or people in restaurants or just all over the place. People are just

‍

constantly, you know, they're captured, their attention is captured by their phones.

‍

And what I'm seeing is that when something unpleasant is happening, so somebody has,

‍

it could be as simple as boredom, that I, you know, student might have some boredom

‍

or a patient might feel anxious. And then this phone promises a distraction that

‍

makes that, you know, they can temporarily distract them from that unpleasant

‍

sensation or the emotion or the thought and we can get stuck in these habit loops

‍

of distraction where we're not learning to be with our unpleasant experiences so

‍

there you know there can be something that's uncomfortable and if we're constantly

‍

running away from it we're not going to know how to deal with things that are

‍

uncomfortable in the future. If we can't deal with them now, even if it's boredom

‍

as a very minor example. So here, you know, I'm not seeing people learning to lean

‍

into difficulty. I'm seeing more and more that people are being trained to go,

‍

you know, be distracted by this shiny object, whether it's cute pictures of puppies

‍

on Instagram or whatever.

‍

When December hits and the pace finally slows, the moment I look forward to most is

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So how does that work? We're going into the holidays.

‍

How does that work in a social gathering

‍

where you're going to be, let's say, for example, at a family dinner or tough stuff

‍

in the news,

‍

a tough topic comes up. Or I guess these are two different things, but, you know,

‍

even, you know, just news headlines themselves, right? How do we learn to stay

‍

mindful, stay present without just going into sort of that distract,

‍

avoidant, or fight, you know, even a fight -flight response, right? Because it strikes

‍

me that what you're describing is the opposite of a fight -flight response. It's

‍

staying present. Yes, it is the, well, yeah, I would say it's the opposite. It's

‍

hard to say because fight -flight is really so instinctual.

‍

This is, it's a different time scale. Interesting. So it's important just to be able

‍

to distinguish those. So, you know, we're going to, if we put our hand on a hot

‍

stove, we're going to, we're going to move that the way before the signal even

‍

reaches our brain, right? It just is arcs through our spinal cord. Yep. And when

‍

somebody has, you know, a fight, flight response, they're going to be reacting faster

‍

than conscious awareness because we don't have time to sit back and process. You

‍

know, you have, you got to move literally. And after that,

‍

you know, in the after effect of that, we can learn. and that's really where

‍

mindfulness comes in where we can start to first recognize how we are habitually

‍

reacting in life so let's use the holidays just you know something might feel

‍

uncomfortable and if our automatic reaction has been to you know turn away from the

‍

discomfort one of my students I was just a couple of days ago in a seminar that

‍

it

‍

this is the first level of where awareness can be helpful. And I'm going to use

‍

the word curiosity here because mindfulness is a concept. Let's just get right at

‍

the, you know, so that people aren't confused or misinterpret at concept. Let's just

‍

get right at the raw material here. So the raw material is curiosity.

‍

And so if we can notice that we are habitually reacting and we have a habit loop

‍

around turning away from discomfort, right? Because we don't know how to deal with

‍

distress, right? This is where the distress comes in when we can't handle discomfort.

‍

There's an eye in there, if that makes sense. Yeah. So it helps us recognize these

‍

habit loops and then helps us be able to

‍

that you know versus the experience so for example i work a lot with patients with

‍

anxiety and i've had one person come in and say i feel like anxiety is deeply

‍

etched in my bones that's how identified she was with her anxiety and so the idea

‍

here is to see that i'm a person who has feelings thoughts sensations of anxiety

‍

and just to be able to make that differentiation helped her distinguish between

‍

discomfort I have discomfort versus distress where I am distressed the difference

‍

between have and I am. Yeah, I am experiencing anxiety is different than I am an

‍

anxious person or so this is where and I don't want to take a rabbit trail here,

‍

but I do want to run this past you because my listeners are very familiar with

‍

parts work because my background is in IFS.

‍

And it strikes me from what you're saying. There's some overlaps because IFS is

‍

teaching us to get curious about, for example, that anxiety as a part of me versus

‍

as something I'm overtaken by. So there is some overlaps with mindfulness.

‍

Maybe even you might say IFS is a specific form of it. I'm not sure. They're not

‍

the same. But that's some overlap that I'm hearing there. Does that? Absolutely.

‍

Right. So for example, somebody could bring awareness in to recognize that part of

‍

that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, which allows me then to tolerate the presence of it without

‍

being overtaken by it. I'm curious, I want to touch on a lot of your work is

‍

focused on addiction. Is that, is that right? Addiction and anxiety. Yeah.

‍

And what have you learned about, you talk about habits, right? What have you learned

‍

about these behaviors and why we get so hooked in the first place?

‍

Because it strikes me that the instinctive response is the, you know, kind of the

‍

first response. And then it's almost like you said, the mindfulness comes after when

‍

we can come back to. So why do we get so hooked in the first place? Yes.

‍

It's a great question. And it really boils down to these very strong evolutionary

‍

learning processes that were set up or evolved to help us find food and remember

‍

where it is and also avoid danger. So, for example, you know,

‍

B .F. Skinner became known in the 50s for this concept of operating conditioning or

‍

positive and negative reinforcement. And if you think about those processes, they're

‍

very basic where, you know, three elements are necessary and sufficient, where,

‍

let's think of our ancient ancestors, you know, they see food in the woods or in

‍

the savannah. That's the trigger. The behavior is that they eat the food. And then

‍

from a neuroscience standpoint, there's a reward, meaning that there's a dopamine

‍

spritz in their brain. And I want to be very clear about this because reward can

‍

be interpreted different ways. So to the brain, there are these reward circuits,

‍

meaning the dopamine fires as a way to help somebody learn. So they're truly,

‍

these reward circuits are set up to help us form memories. So we remember where the

‍

food is, so we can go and get it again. We also remember where the danger is so

‍

we can avoid it in the future. And those are the two flavors of reinforcement

‍

learning. Positive reinforcement. Go do that again. negative reinforces.

‍

be erroneous that this is where there's this is where there's a dopamine hit of

‍

reward. So go back to it. Yes. Yes. And in fact, it's not something that is

‍

genuinely giving me true relief. Is that right? Is that right? And yes,

‍

absolutely. So let's take two examples. One is if you look at food and another

‍

example is experience. So in modern day, we've had both food and experience be

‍

really designed to be hyper -palatable, meaning, you know, we hear all this stuff

‍

about hyper -processed food, which is hardly food anymore. The hyper -processed thing

‍

that has calories that gets us addicted, that's really how these things became hyper

‍

processed is because they get us hooked to eating them more. And the same is true

‍

for social media, even news feeds now. They've been hyper processed to be hyper

‍

palatable and also addictive. So there are a number of, we don't have to go into

‍

all of the, there are a myriad different ways in which those, their elements brought

‍

together to make them more and more addictive. But But that's, you know, a very

‍

common example. And now I'll bring something more nuanced, which I never learned in

‍

medical school or residency, but was probably the most important thing that I missed,

‍

which was, or that none of us were taught, is that even experiences like anxiety

‍

can be driven in that same reinforcement process. And Thomas Borkevaca psychologist

‍

wrote in a two -page very humble paper back in the 1980s suggested,

‍

he suggested that anxiety could be driven through negative reinforcement. And this got

‍

buried in the Prozac lead because Prozac came out and everybody thought, oh, great.

‍

You know, depression and anxiety solved with one pill. Yeah. Turned out not to be

‍

the case. No. Not even close. And so his suggestion was that the feeling of anxiety

‍

triggers the

‍

that, it gives us a feeling of control. Yes. And I'll add one more,

‍

which is that if people worry all the time and they solve a problem,

‍

they're very likely to associate those two because they're worrying all the time.

‍

And so they make this false association that worrying equals problem solving, but

‍

it's that correlation that does not equal causation problem there where they're

‍

correlated but not causal and the way I start you know exploring that with my

‍

patients is to say well have you ever solved a problem when you weren't worrying

‍

yes do you solve more problems when you're not worrying yes so yeah but it's just

‍

when somebody has for example as somebody has generalized anxiety disorder and they're

‍

worrying literally all the time the likelihood that they're going to be worrying when

‍

they solve a problem is pretty high. Sure. It makes perfect sense.

‍

So how do we knowing in some ways I don't want to, I don't want to say

‍

negatively, but we're sort of working against to some degree these ways in which

‍

we've been conditioned for a variety of reasons. So how do we begin to change those

‍

pathways and how is mindfulness a part of that? Yes. That's the million dollar

‍

question. That's the million dollar question. And it's not just a pill. And we've

‍

learned so many things about, you know, and I think to some degree, these are

‍

skills we have to learn, right? There's no, there's no easy button for it.

‍

And also some of these things work. Right. Yeah. So let's use the example of

‍

anxiety because that's what we've, my lab's been studying the most recently, but

‍

we've done studies where this applies to smoking. We got five times the quit rates

‍

of gold standard treatment for smoking, for example. So just showing that this

‍

applies to other things. We, if you look at anxiety, there is,

‍

and you look at any habit, these habits form through this process of reinforcement

‍

learning that you and I have been speaking about. And there's actually a very simple

‍

formula that was developed back in the 1970s by these two researchers last names

‍

were Raskorla and Wagner. And this Raskorla Wagner formula is still in play today.

‍

My lab still uses it. And the idea is that once we set up a habit,

‍

by definition, it is something that we do automatically. And I just want to be

‍

clear that most habits are actually helpful. So this isn't to demonize habits, you

‍

know, imagine, imagine trying to live your life having to relearn everything you've

‍

learned in your life every day. You know, we'd be exhausted before breakfast, you

‍

know, we'd have to relearn how to walk, put our clothes on, make breakfast, and all

‍

that stuff. So most habits are really helpful. So this is a good survival mechanism,

‍

yet some of them get in the way. Anxiety is probably an evolutionary bottleneck in

‍

this respect because it pulls together fear and planning.

‍

So fear in the present moment is helpful, right? Because it helps us learn. And

‍

planning in the present moment is also helpful planning for the future. But you

‍

can't be afraid of the future in the sense that when we worry about the future,

‍

we don't have control over it right now. So it actually, the research is pretty

‍

clear on this. The more we worry, the less we're actually able to plan and,

‍

you know, problem solve for the future. So it's this evolutionary bottleneck that

‍

comes in. So going back to your question of how do we, how does mindfulness come

‍

in here, if you look at that equation, for any habit to change, you have to bring

‍

awareness back in to update the reward value. And the reason for that is, if

‍

something's rewarding, we're going to do it again. Right. And if something's not

‍

rewarding, it opens up that space for change. Let's use an everyday example. Let's

‍

say that I have a certain reward value in my mind for mango habanero truffles,

‍

which is true. Okay. My mother -in I love it. Yeah, these great mango habanernera

‍

truffles at the holidays from the Seattle area, and they are delicious. Let's say a

‍

new chaklariti opens up in my neighborhood, and I go in and I eat,

‍

they have mango habinerd truffles. And I'm like, great, let me try one of those. If

‍

I eat one, and it's just like mind -blowingly good, I get what's called a positive

‍

prediction error, meaning that that was better than expected. I had a certain

‍

expectation that it probably wasn't going to be as good as the ones that I get at

‍

Christmas. And it was better than expected. So I get this dopamine spritz in my

‍

brain and I learn this is a good chocolate. Go back and eat and get chocolates

‍

there again. On the other hand, if they taste like cardboard, I get what's called a

‍

negative prediction error, which said, where my brain's like, yeah, not as good as

‍

expected. I also get a dopamine spritz and I learn don't go back there again.

‍

Notice how there's learning on both sides. Yeah. And critical for learning, one

‍

ingredient awareness. I have to pay attention. If I'm on the phone and I eat one

‍

of those and, you know, my wife says, hey, how is the chocolate or G? I'm like, I

‍

don't know. I just I don't remember what it tasted like. So I haven't changed that

‍

reward value or that expectation when I haven't paid attention. So that's where this

‍

comes in. And I want to highlight something. Notice how willpower has nothing to do

‍

with this. Yeah. Nothing is critical because everybody, you know, if somebody's trying

‍

to stop overeating, if somebody's trying to stop worrying. You know, there's, I don't

‍

know if you ever saw this Bob Newhart skit from the 70s called Stop It. It's

‍

amazing. It's hilarious. We'll post it. It's an amazing clip. It's incredible. But

‍

back in the 70s, he was highlighting the problematic nature where there's all this

‍

emphasis on cognitive therapies, like they were going to solve all our ills, just

‍

like present. And the idea is we can't think our way out of a paper bag. And if

‍

you look at it now from a neuroscience perspective, nobody knew this in the 70s.

‍

Neuroscience was a very young field back then. If you look at it from a

‍

neuroscience standpoint, this isn't about thinking. In fact, the parts of our brain

‍

that are associated with cognitive control and willpower, you know, willpower is more

‍

myth than muscle, but those go offline when we get stressed at or anxious. So at

‍

best, we don't have access to these resources. At worst,

‍

they're more myth than muscle. So wherever somebody is on that spectrum, you know,

‍

that's not, that's not what I would go to to help somebody work with anxiety as an

‍

example. That is so helpful. And I think what you're saying there, dovetails,

‍

again, it's different, but what I found so powerful coming out of being trained in

‍

more of a CBT area when I discovered IFS. Because I was like, oh, this actually

‍

helps me. Yeah. And, and, um, interesting, Interesting, isn't it? Because I can think

‍

about the, I know the logic. The logic is, you know, but that doesn't help me in

‍

the moment. Right. And if you look at it, our feeling body is much stronger than

‍

our thinking brain. Yeah. So logic is helpful to, you know, solve a logic problem.

‍

Yeah. But logic doesn't solve emotional issues, right? And Reward value gets set up

‍

as a feeling. It doesn't get set up as a logic problem. If it did,

‍

all my patients would have quit smoking the first time I told them to stop smoking.

‍

A hundred percent. I know I shouldn't smoke, right? How often have we? So just a

‍

quick example. Let me see if I'm hearing you correctly, practically. I had never

‍

been on TikTok. I discovered it. And it's like crack. I've never seen anything like

‍

it. And I've noticed, and is this kind of what we're saying, I don't go, but I've

‍

noticed, I'm like, some part of me, but despite all logic, if I'm stressed out to

‍

click on that app feels like relief. And so I can't talk myself out of that with

‍

logic. But what I might do, and I'm wondering if this is, is become aware.

‍

What is going on in that moment that I want to push, click on that app? There's

‍

something pulling me and it almost always is my own distress,

‍

wanting a relief. I am getting a hit of dopamine. That's not untrue.

‍

I'm curious if I'm saying this correctly. I don't have to talk myself out of that

‍

by saying, no, this is bad for No, no, no, it, in some way there is a hit of

‍

dopamine I'm getting, but if I can become aware, it allows me to make a different

‍

choice and bring more of my,

‍

finish that for me. What is, I'm aware that that's working, but I'm not sure why.

‍

Ish. Yes. So here, and I diagram this, we did a series of studies a couple of

‍

years ago now. We published these.

‍

example, that we're worrying. And often people don't think of worrying as a behavior,

‍

but it's a behavior, right? It says mental behavior. Some people are so habituated

‍

to worrying. They don't even notice that they're doing it just because it's

‍

automatic. It's a habit. So the first step is being able to recognize that we're

‍

worrying. The second step is to leverage this reinforcement learning process that you

‍

and I've been talking about by asking a simple question, which is, what am I

‍

getting from this? So if we take this to your TikTok example, right, where TikTok

‍

is the algorithm is dialed in so much that it is like the most, it's,

‍

it's a more safely guarded secret than like the Colonel Sanders secret recipe for

‍

KFC. You know, it's like this is this is buried in the vaults of wherever because

‍

they did such a good job of algorithmically addicting people. And there was even one

‍

of the ongoing lawsuits against TikTok where the, I think it was the Attorney

‍

General of Kentucky, their documents were accidentally unredactable,

‍

like where they could redact the redaction. And I think it was NPR that broke the

‍

story where they found that the people are saying, you know, we can dial in, we

‍

know exactly how long it takes to addict somebody. And it's like as few as 30

‍

videos. It's a very short period of time where they're that good at that. So it's

‍

not about telling ourselves, oh, TikTok's addictive, because we know it is. It's

‍

about asking ourselves this simple question. What do I get from going on TikTok? And

‍

that then gets to this piece where I think of this is we can develop these

‍

disenchantment databases where if we're enchanted with something,

‍

we're going to keep doing it, right? Because the reward value is high enough that

‍

we keep doing it. If we become disenchanted, it's much easier to say, you know, why

‍

would I do that? It's just, I'm just not into that anymore. And that's where asking

‍

that question brings online or curiosity. We can go, oh, what am I getting from

‍

this? Right. And It's not that TikTok is inherently bad, you know, like there are

‍

plenty of entertaining short videos that whatever, I don't really, you know, whatever

‍

people get, you know, are into in TikTok, there are lots of different things.

‍

They'll, they'll get on TikTok. But if we find that we're spending every, you know,

‍

two hours a day or five hours or eight hours a day scrolling on TikTok, or we're

‍

turning to that as our distress tolerance, you know,

‍

or avoidance mechanism. It's not a distress tolerance mechanism. Then it falls more

‍

into the unhelpful spectrum. And so if we ask, what am I getting from this? And we

‍

feel into our direct experience and we see, oh, you know, every now and then a few

‍

TikTok videos, fine. But if I'm, if this is my ruling my life now, not so good.

‍

And we become disenchanted with that. I think I call this the pleasure plateau. We

‍

do the same thing with eating. We can do the same thing with all sorts of

‍

behaviors. Yes. So we can find where it's fine and we can find where we're going

‍

off that cliff of overindulgence. And then we can, the third step, just to finish

‍

this quickly, the third step is to find what I call the bigger, better offer. And

‍

this is where simply stepping out of doing the thing is better than being sucked

‍

into it right so if we find that you know scrolling on instagram a couple of times

‍

a day when we just need a mental reset is fine but when we find that we're going

‍

to scroll on instagram instead of confronting our partner because we're you know

‍

there's we're going to have to have a tough conversation not so fine right and we

‍

can so we can start to dial in and see kind of get control back over where we

‍

might be pulled to do something to distract ourselves and come back into reality and

‍

learn to lean into discomfort. This is where discomfort does not need to become

‍

distress. It can simply be discomfort because we learn, oh, you know,

‍

curiosity is a superpower for this. I'll just mention one other thing, just applying

‍

this, for example, to worrying. When we feel anxious, that feeling of anxiety could

‍

lead us to worry, oh, no, what's going to happen? It could lead us to distract

‍

ourselves by going on TikTok. Or we could learn to lean into curiosity and flip

‍

that, oh, no, to oh. So let me ask you, which one feels better?

‍

Oh, no or oh? Oh, this is interesting. I wonder what's happening here. Yes.

‍

So powerful. So you're leveraging that same reinforcement learning mechanism.

‍

You're leveraging it against itself. And that's where we're getting huge changes in

‍

anxiety, for example. It's so powerful. You work with yourself. I really want to ask

‍

you this. And if a lot of,

‍

that is a huge bucket. So a lot of my listeners come from faith backgrounds.

‍

And I am curious about how, and I know you've done a little study on this, I

‍

think, how spiritual practices like prayer can function as a form of mindfulness.

‍

Just from my own experience, what I find is some of what we're talking about can

‍

apply in the sense of if I'm going to prayer as a sort of cognitive way to try

‍

to pull myself up out of what I'm feeling, versus if I'm sort of going to prayer

‍

as a way of inviting God to attune with me to what is. They function very

‍

differently. Can you, are you comfortable speaking to that? Oh, absolutely. I'm trying

‍

to get at in a very short amount of time. Well, I think you articulated it

‍

beautifully. One example of this is centering prayer, which is a specific practice

‍

that uses prayer to help people center. That's why it's called centering prayer,

‍

but also be present. And so what it can do is help people really dial into this

‍

strength of presence. Yeah. And that strength of presence, Talk about distress

‍

tolerance. Yes. You know, when somebody knows that God has their back,

‍

who needs to run away from anything? Yes.

‍

And it's in, God has your back in it. Yes, in it. Not necessarily as an example.

‍

Let me help you cover your eyes so you don't see it. Yes. Yes. Oh, that's such a

‍

helpful centering prayer. That's a great connection there. I love that. And so that

‍

is a form of bringing mindfulness into a spiritual practice. Yes. Yeah. And if you

‍

look at many, I haven't studied every spiritual tradition out there, but if you look

‍

at many religions, many spiritual traditions, they're going to use different language

‍

for this experience. Yeah. Of being present, right? I love the phrase,

‍

dying to the small self so God can,

‍

world.

‍

I love that. I love that. Can you let us know, let my listeners know where to

‍

find out more about your work? I know you've written a couple of books. You've got

‍

a lot of resources. Where can people find more information? I want to find all the

‍

information myself. Sure. I run a program called Going Beyond Anxiety that actually

‍

teaches these skills that we've been talking about in terms of helping people relate

‍

to anxiety differently. I also have a website so that that's just going beyondanxiety

‍

.com and I also have a website just Dr. Judd .com that has a lot of free resources

‍

and also has my books on it like unwinding anxiety is most relevant to this

‍

conversation but also wrote a book called The Hunger Habit if people struggle

‍

struggle with eating, you know, emotional eating and that's That's just DRJUD .com,

‍

Dr. Judd .com. Awesome. Yeah. Also write a substack, Judd Brewer dot substack.

‍

That you can find me there. All right. We will link to all of that. I'm so

‍

grateful for your time. I love this topic and I'm just so grateful for your work

‍

in this space and all you're doing to bring these resources to people. So thank

‍

you. Yeah. My pleasure. Thank you for joining me for this episode of the best of

‍

you. Be sure to check out the show notes for any resources and links mentioned in

‍

the show. You can find those on my website at Dr. Allison Cook .com. That's Allison

‍

with one L .cook .com. Before you forget, I hope you'll follow the show now so that

‍

you don't miss an episode. And I love it if you'd go ahead and leave a review. It

‍

helps so much to get the word out. I look forward to seeing you back here next

‍

Thursday. And remember, as you become the best of who you are, you honor God,

‍

you heal others, and you stay true to your God -given self.

‍

If you’ve ever found yourself wide awake at night replaying a conversation…
If you spiral through guilt after setting even the gentlest boundary…
If you carry everyone else’s emotions while losing sight of your own…

You’re not alone.

In today’s episode, Dr. Alison shares personally about these moments in her own life and guides you through a real-time reflective practice you can do right alongside her. It’s the most effective tool we’ve found to help when overwhelm rises, when you’re tempted to slip back into people-pleasing, or when conflict sends your nervous system into overdrive.

Instead of overthinking, overanalyzing, or pushing your feelings aside, this practice helps you:

• Notice what’s happening inside with kindness
  
  
• Connect with the part of you that’s working overtime to keep you safe
  
  
• Offer compassion to your own soul — the same compassion you extend so easily to others
  
  
• Invite God’s loving, steady presence into the places that feel tangled, tense, or afraid

📥 Grab your 3 free Boundaries For Your Soul resources here 

📥 Download Alison’s free printable with the five boundary tools when you sign up for her weekly email.

If you liked this episode, you’ll love: 

Episode 75: Your Secret Weapon Against Stress and Anxiety

Episode 112: Navigating Anxiety

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📖 Find a full transcript and list of resources from this episode here

‍

💬 Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.

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‍

TRANSCRIPT

I wanted to give you a real time tool. The most helpful tool,

‍

in fact, I've ever found to help me when I'm feeling chaotic, overwhelmed, and

‍

anxious. And I'm so worried about the other person. This isn't healthy self

‍

-sacrifice. This is a form of self -erasure and even self -harm. Anxiety,

‍

overwhelm, grief, stress. These things don't mean you're failing.

‍

These are invitations to connect more lovingly to this beautiful soul God has made.

‍

Hey, everyone, and welcome back to this week's episode of The Best of You. I'm so

‍

glad you're here with me this week. This is our last episode before Thanksgiving.

‍

So we're going to take next week, Thanksgiving off. And I wanted to record a sort

‍

of special episode for you. I wanted to give you a real time tool.

‍

The most helpful tool, in fact, I've ever found to help me when I'm feeling

‍

chaotic, overwhelmed, and anxious. In fact, this last week I found myself exactly in

‍

that place completely tied up in knots. In this case, it was over all things

‍

conflict. I hate conflict with anyone. Now,

‍

I've done a lot of work around trying to be clear, trying to communicate as well

‍

as around healthy boundaries. I teach this stuff all the time. And yet, even after

‍

all that work, there's still a deeply feeling, deeply empathetic part of my soul

‍

that resins.

‍

what I feel, what I think, what I need, I've already imagined exactly what I think

‍

the other person must be feeling, right? It's like I'm carrying both of our emotions

‍

at once. I'm carrying everything the other person is going through right alongside

‍

and sometimes even before what I'm trying to work through. It's a familiar cocktail,

‍

right? I write about this in the best of you, right? It's a mix of my own

‍

personality style. I'm highly sensitive. I'm highly empathetic. My own childhood

‍

conditioning and church messages that have told me to always think of others first.

‍

These are not bad qualities and I'm grateful that I have them, but when I really

‍

need to have the hard conversations, these qualities can get the best of me.

‍

that drive to keep the peace, to make everyone else okay,

‍

that's the place where a codependent part of me takes root in my life and starts

‍

spinning all these catastrophizing and worst case scenarios where I'm worried more

‍

about the other person, even though I'm not doing anything wrong. And I'm so worried

‍

about the other person that I start risking doing harm to myself,

‍

right? This isn't healthy self -sacrifice. This is a form of self -erasure and even

‍

self -harm. And even now, it can still creep up on me. When I'm tangled up like

‍

that inside, it tends to show up as anxiety. My heart starts raising. I feel a

‍

rush of adrenaline. My whole nervous system goes into high alert. It's hard to sleep

‍

and it can take a full day sometimes too for everything to begin to settle down

‍

and then after I finally say the hard thing and speak up or even just set a very

‍

gentle boundary another wave will hit a wave of guilt a wave of self -doubt that

‍

feeling of did I do something wrong that really can still show up in my mind it's

‍

like my body goes through the conflict twice. Once before I speak and once after.

‍

I'm guessing many of you know exactly what that feels like. You wrestle and wrestle

‍

with whether to say the hard thing, whether to pull back, whether to say no,

‍

whether to show up, whether to not show up. And then when you finally make the

‍

decision, there's a backlash, almost like your internal system can't believe you

‍

actually stood up for yourself, right? And you start worrying about all the

‍

implications. This is where my own inner work has been life -changing.

‍

I can tell myself all the truths that I know. I can use logic on myself.

‍

I can analyze the situation. I can even talk to a friend who reminds me of what's

‍

real. And all of those things are important. But what has helped me the most in

‍

these situations? The only thing that actually calms my soul and restores peace to

‍

my body is when I turn inward and acknowledge the part of my soul that's in

‍

distress. When I connect with this part of me like a person in my life in need of

‍

care when I recognize this part of me is as deserving of my empathy and of my

‍

care as everyone else out there. If you've ever found yourself like me wide awake

‍

at night, replaying a conversation or caught in that loop of what ifs, you're not

‍

alone. It's so deeply human. Anxiety is a part of being human.

‍

Overwhelm is a part of being human. It happens to all of us. It's one of the ways

‍

our soul signal that something inside is seeking safety,

‍

connection, or care, right, where we can extend that same sort of empathy, that same

‍

sort of compassion to an inner part of our souls that we're extending to other

‍

people out there. In different seasons, this kind of anxiety can wear many faces.

‍

Sometimes it hides behind perfectionism, right? You'll find yourself whispering. If I

‍

could just get it right, maybe then I could relax. Or it shows up as chronic

‍

people pleasing. If everyone else is happy, then I'll be okay. For some of you,

‍

like me, it shows up from a fear of conflict. If I stay quiet, maybe I'll stay

‍

safe. And for many of us today, it's triggered even by social media and technology,

‍

right? The endless scroll that keeps us looped in a toxic,

‍

anxious place in our minds. Over the past few episodes, we've talked about each of

‍

these topics. What happens when other people push your buttons? We've talked about

‍

that with Dr. Stuart Ablon. We've talked about anxious habits like doom scrolling

‍

with Dr. Bethany Teachman. And I shared with you some of my own thoughts on

‍

comparison. Today, I want to offer you something different.

‍

to compare, a fear of conflict, worry about your own children, or worry about the

‍

headlines. Whatever it is, if you're able, I want you to walk through this

‍

reflection with me. Now, it means you'll need to be in a quiet space, so hopefully

‍

you can close your eyes. So if you're driving in a car, go ahead and listen and

‍

attune to what I'm saying, but keep your eyes on the road. But if you can, find a

‍

safe place where you can close your eyes and join me in this exercise.

‍

This isn't about fixing or suppressing or analyzing your anxiety.

‍

It's about learning to notice what's happening inside of you with compassion and

‍

inviting God into those anxious spaces in your soul. Because that's what I believe

‍

mindfulness is. It's a sacred noticing. It's deeply tied to our spiritual formation.

‍

It's slowing down long enough to observe what's happening within you, not to judge

‍

it, but to be present to it and to invite God's presence to be with you too.

‍

We're going to talk more about mindfulness after the holidays. Again, I think it's

‍

such a helpful type of awareness to understand especially as we go into this holiday

‍

season. But when you integrate it with a parts -based, God -centered approach,

‍

something incredible happens. We realize we can notice the anxious,

‍

tied up in knots, turned inside out, scared parts of our souls,

‍

not as all of who we are, but as one part of us that's working overtime to make

‍

us safe. And we remember that we don't face these things alone.

‍

God is with us right here in the middle of whatever it is we're going through.

‍

This show is brought to you by BetterHelp. As the days get shorter and the light

‍

fades a little earlier, it's easy to feel the weight of the season. I've been

‍

reminding myself lately to reach out to check in on friends I haven't seen in a

‍

while or to send that quick text that says, hey, you've been on my mind. Shorter

‍

days don't have to feel dismal. Staying connected, whether it's calling a friend

‍

grabbing coffee or even writing a note, reminds us that we're not alone. And that

‍

same courage it takes to reach out to someone you care about, it's the same kind

‍

of courage it can take to reach out for therapy. And once you do, you often

‍

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So let's get to it. The next 10 to 12 minutes, I'm going to walk you through a

‍

guided reflection, right? You can follow right along with me in real time.

‍

You can hit the pause button on wherever you're watching, whether you're listening or

‍

watching. If you want more time with each one of these prompts, I'm going to give

‍

you. Ideally, you can get to a place where you can close your eyes and really

‍

focus on what's happening inside your own soul.

‍

in need of care. So often your attention is outward, caring for others,

‍

caring for your kids, caring for your family, caring for the people with whom you

‍

work, right? This is your time to care for your own soul in that same way.

‍

I want you to bring to mind a situation that has stirred up stress or anxiety or

‍

overwhelm recently. It doesn't have to be the biggest one,

‍

just something mild or moderate, that has caused you some distress. Maybe it's an

‍

upcoming meeting that you have. Or one that you had last week. Maybe it's a

‍

conversation you've been dreading or one that didn't go so well.

‍

Maybe it's something you saw on social media that stung or hurt or caused a mental

‍

loop. Maybe you noticed your friends were getting together and didn't include you.

‍

As you called to mind that situation, see if you can locate where that anxiety or

‍

stress or tension lives in your body is

‍

it in your chest your stomach your throat is it up in your mind you don't have to

‍

change or fix it just notice it.

‍

Now, as you notice this feeling, imagine that it belongs to a part of you.

‍

A younger, hardworking part of your soul that carries anxiety on your behalf.

‍

This anxious or overwhelmed part of you has likely been with you for a long time.

‍

You might even picture it as a younger version of yourself, tugging at your sleeve

‍

saying, please pay attention. I need you.

‍

Take a moment and notice that part of your soul. How old is she?

‍

What does she look like?

‍

Let her know you see her, that you're with her, that you recognize she's there.

‍

And notice how this part of you responds to your presence. Is their relief,

‍

resistance,

‍

tears.

‍

Whatever you notice, just stay with this place in your soul that needs your care.

‍

As you're connecting with this part of your soul, ask yourself this question.

‍

What are you afraid would happen if this part of you didn't work so hard to keep

‍

you on alert?

‍

This part of you is there for reason. She's holding all that anxious energy to try

‍

to help what does she fear would happen if she stepped back or softened just a

‍

little bit

‍

listen for whatever comes whatever you notice maybe this part of you is afraid

‍

you'll be rejected Maybe it fears you'll fail.

‍

Maybe it's terrified. You'll lose control. Or that someone will be hurt or

‍

disappointed.

‍

You don't have to solve anything. Just notice the fear behind all this anxious

‍

energy. Listen to this part of your own soul as if you're...

‍

for working so hard on my behalf.

‍

Thank you so hard for working to keep me safe.

‍

Notice what happens inside as you honor this hardworking part of your soul,

‍

the one working so hard to try to keep you safe.

‍

And now I want you to imagine inviting God.

‍

or the face of Jesus, full of kindness, right there with you and this anxious part

‍

of you. Not trying to fix you just with you,

‍

present to you, connected to you. You might simply sense the presence of love.

‍

Invite God to be near this anxious part of you.

‍

And notice how this part of you responds to God's presence.

‍

Is this part of you open to God's presence, or does it hesitate?

‍

If you notice any reluctance or hesitance, that's okay. Some parts of us haven't yet

‍

learned to fully put our trust in God. It's great to become aware of that.

‍

And if you notice that, ask the part of you what it's afraid might happen If God

‍

were to come closer, sometimes parts of us fear God's presence or don't trust that

‍

God will accept us as we are.

‍

Remember, God is never in a hurry. God's presence is patient and tender and kind

‍

As you imagine what it's like to have God draw near,

‍

notice what this anxious part needs from God.

‍

Maybe it needs reassurance. You're not alone in this. Maybe it needs rest to lay

‍

down the heavy burdens this part of you's been carrying.

‍

Maybe it needs to know it's not responsible for holding everything together that this

‍

part of you can let the ceiling fall.

‍

Just notice what reassurances this part of you needs. You might picture God speaking

‍

gently to this anxious part of you. my beloved child,

‍

I see how hard you're working. You don't have to do this alone. You are safe in

‍

my care.

‍

Let those words wash over, this anxious place within your soul.

‍

Let them sink deep into this place where anxiety lives within your body.

‍

Now, take another deep breath and notice what it feels like for this anxious part

‍

of you to be seen, not only by you, but by God.

‍

Is there any small shift you notice any

‍

sense of peace?

‍

with kindness, with care, and with compassion.

‍

Just rest a few more moments in this place of connection, where you're with yourself

‍

and with the God who loves every part of you.

‍

Ask God to help you remember to connect with this anxious part of you with

‍

compassion to help you care for this part of your own soul gently the way you care

‍

for so many other people.

‍

When you're ready,

‍

slowly bring your awareness back to the room.

‍

This practice of noticing what's happening inside of you is an evidenced -based form

‍

of mindfulness. It's also crucial not only to your mental health, as we'll learn in

‍

upcoming episodes, but also to our spiritual health.

‍

that's what we want from other people. So often we just want their presence with

‍

us. More than we need their words of advice or their analysis, right, is we just

‍

need their love, their steady presence with us, saying, I see that you're anxious

‍

and I'm here with you. This is what we're doing with this part of our souls.

‍

Instead of fixing and analyzing, we're saying, I get it. You're anxious. You're

‍

scared and I'm here with you and you're no longer alone.

‍

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Americans spend about 90 % of their time indoors, and here's the surprising part.

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his mind, his longings, all turning toward God in connection.

‍

It's whole being, whole soul, whole body, connection with God.

‍

So you might think of this practice as connecting with God from your soul instead

‍

of just your head. You're connecting with God with all of who you are. So often,

‍

even when it's well -intended prayer, can keep us in our heads. We come to God with

‍

words, ideas, or requests. Sometimes we even come to God with analysis. And there's

‍

nothing wrong with that kind of prayer. But this is a different kind of prayer. A

‍

whole body connectedness where our whole being enters into the presence of God.

‍

God meets us in the places that are still hurting, that haven't been fixed, that

‍

don't want analysis that don't need more advice, that don't need more solutions that

‍

just need loving presence. Analysis and insight and head knowledge are great,

‍

but they only take us so far. Soul -based connection is different. It's slowing down

‍

long enough to bring your whole self, your thoughts, your emotions, your body, your

‍

nervous system into God's presence. It's not about saying the right words.

‍

It's about making space for God to meet you in what's real and what's happening

‍

right now. When you connect with God from your whole soul, you move from talking

‍

about God or even talking at God to being with God. You begin to experience what

‍

the psalmist describes when they say, be still and know that am God,

‍

right? That kind of knowing doesn't come from your head. It comes from that deep

‍

inner place where your spirit and God's spirit meet in perfect connection in the way

‍

that we were meant to walk with God and the way that we were created to walk with

‍

God in the beginning where connection came easy before things got broken.

‍

You get a glimpse of what that deep walking with being with God's soda soul really

‍

feels like and God's presence brings that calm not just to your mind but to your

‍

entire being and maybe your problems don't get solved in that moment right but you

‍

get a glimpse of what that connection feels like the kind of connection,

‍

that kind of partnership with God for which we were created is a glimpse not only

‍

of the beginning in Eden, but a glimpse of where we're headed again,

‍

a glimpse of heaven where we walk in harmony with God no matter what we're feeling.

‍

God loves to bring his loving presence to be with us.

‍

When you learn to attune to the anxious, overwhelmed places in your soul,

‍

not just from your head, but from your whole being, you start to experience the

‍

kind of peace Jesus showed us, the kind of peace Paul talked about,

‍

the peace that doesn't depend on our circumstances.

‍

out of a soul that is anchored in God's loving presence.

‍

You learn to be with what is real and you learn to trust that God is with you

‍

right here, right now, no matter what you're going through. That's why this practice

‍

matters. You're not trying to make anxiety or stress or overwhelm disappear as if we

‍

could on this side of heaven. You're learning to meet it differently. You're creating

‍

space for love to enter the very place where fear lives inside your soul.

‍

Anxiety. My friends, my listeners, my watchers, my fellow soul menders.

‍

As we consider this upcoming holiday season, remember this anxiety,

‍

overwhelm, grief, stress, these things don't mean you're failing.

‍

These are invitations to connect more lovingly to this beautiful soul God has made.

‍

It doesn't mean you're failing. It means there's a part of you longing for safety

‍

and connection. Over time, as you tend to these parts of your soul,

‍

you'll begin to notice a subtle shift. you'll notice less fear, less anxiety,

‍

less reactivity, more grounded presence. And when the anxiety shows up again,

‍

as it surely will, you'll know what to do. You can pause, you can breathe,

‍

and you can say, I see you here, old friend, you're welcome here. God is with us

‍

here too. This is the beginning of change.

‍

It's not the absence of anxiety, but the presence of love in the middle of it.

‍

The goal isn't to get rid of the anxiety. The goal is to change your relationship

‍

to it. That's what this practice helps you do. You learn to meet anxiety and

‍

overwhelm and stress, not with fear or shame or more criticism, but with compassion

‍

and the power of God's loving presence. As you move through these next few weeks,

‍

I hope you'll return to this practice. Whenever you notice anxiety or fear or

‍

overwhelm start to rise, you can return to this exercise and we'll walk through it

‍

together. I know I'll be doing it multiple times. Offer yourself compassionate

‍

connection.

‍

Find those on my website at Dr. Allisoncook .com. That's Allison with 1L .cook .com.

‍

Before you forget, I hope you'll follow the show now so that you don't miss an

‍

episode. And I love it if you'd go ahead and leave a review. It helps so much to

‍

get the word out. I look forward to seeing you back here next Thursday. And

‍

remember, as you become the best of who you are, you honor God, you heal others,

‍

and you stay true to your God -given self.

‍

Most of us think the goal is to get rid of anxiety.
But what if the key isn’t fighting it - it's understanding it?

This week, Dr. Alison talks with Dr. Bethany Teachman, professor of clinical psychology at the University of Virginia and director of the PACT Lab, about what healthy anxiety looks like, why it’s actually useful, and how to stop letting it run your life. 

Dr. Teachman explains how to know when anxiety is becoming a problem and shares practical ways to calm anxious thoughts, build resilience, and approach your fears with curiosity instead of control. She says,

“Anxiety is uncomfortable, but it’s not dangerous, when you stop treating it like a threat, it loses its power over you.”

They also dive into how technology impacts anxiety - why doom-scrolling keeps us trapped in fear, and how digital tools, when used intentionally, can actually support mental health and resilience.

In this episode, we cover:

• The difference between healthy anxiety and unhealthy anxiety
  
  
• How to recognize when your threat response doesn’t match the situation
  
  
• Why trying to “get rid” of anxiety often makes it worse
  
  
• How reframing challenges as opportunities builds resilience
  
  
• Using technology intentionally to support your mental health

Resources Mentioned

• TYDE (Thriving Youth in a Digital Environment) — A University of Virginia initiative co-directed by Dr. Teachman focused on youth, technology, and mental health.
• MindTrails — A suite of digital and mobile interventions designed to help people manage anxiety and increase access to care, including. 

I recently had the joy of joining my friend Steve Macchia from Leadership Transformations on The Discerning Leader Podcast. We talked about the deeper work of spiritual formation and what it means to lead from a centered and discerning heart. Leadership Transformations has been a shaping influence in my own journey—especially through their Emmaus program, a two-year cohort that deeply formed me in the practices of formational leadership. If you’d like to receive ongoing encouragement for your own soul—weekly reflections and practices for deepening your formation, discernment, and renewal—I recommend subscribing to their free weekly email, PATHWAYS, at leadershiptransformations.org/pathways.

📥 Grab your 3 free Boundaries For Your Soul resources here 

📥 Download Alison’s free printable with the five boundary tools when you sign up for her weekly email.

If you liked this episode, you’ll love: 

Episode 129: Understanding Your Anxiety

Episode 54: Can I Pray My Anxiety Away?

‍

📖 Find a full transcript and list of resources from this episode here

‍

💬 Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.

‍

Thanks to our Sponsors!

• Go to ⁠Quince.com/bestofyou⁠ for 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order!
• If you’re looking for a Bible that helps you live the Word, not just read it, then grab this beautiful one I’m currently using at NIVapplicationbible.com.
• Head to moshlife.com/BESTOFYOU to save 20% off plus FREE shipping 

‍

*Some of the links above are Amazon affiliate links. If you choose to purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

While Dr. Cook is a counselor, the content of this podcast and any of the products provided by Dr. Cook are not specific counseling advice nor are they a substitute for individual counseling. The content and products provided on this podcast are for informational purposes only.‍

© 2025 Alison Cook. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please do not copy or share the contents of this webpage or transcript without permission from the author.

TRANSCRIPT:

‍

What is a healthy understanding of anxiety and at what point does anxiety become a

‍

problem? Anxiety is uncomfortable but not dangerous. The level of danger is not

‍

matching our threat response and our anxiety response. We can learn to recognize that

‍

things can be challenges rather than threats. It completely shifts how we respond to

‍

them.

‍

Hey, everyone, and welcome back to this week's episode of The Best of You. Today,

‍

we have an incredible conversation with a renowned expert on anxiety, Dr.

‍

Bethany Teachman. She's a leading researcher whose work sits right at the intersection

‍

of psychology, technology, technology, and emotional health. She's a professor of

‍

clinical psychology at the University of Virginia, where Bethany directs the program

‍

for anxiety, cognition, and treatment. It's called the PACT Lab. And today,

‍

you're going to hear just her take on what anxiety is, how it affects all of us,

‍

how we learn to regulate anxiety and understand the difference between normal,

‍

healthy anxiety, and the kind of anxiety that begins to debilitate us and take over

‍

our lives. She talks about the thoughts and feelings that happen beneath our

‍

conscious awareness and how we can begin to identify them and actually take control

‍

or command of our anxiety instead of it taking control of us. At the PAC Lab,

‍

Bethany and her team are asking some really interesting questions. Like, why do we

‍

get stuck in patterns of anxious thinking or avoidance? How do these loops keep us

‍

trapped in fear that is unnecessary? And most importantly, how can we learn to

‍

change them? And what was so fascinating to me about this conversation is they're

‍

not just studying these questions in a lab. They're using real life people, kids,

‍

college students. They're in conversation with them and trying to figure out how to

‍

pair good technology with real needs to help people understand their anxiety and take

‍

charge of it in healthy ways. Their goal is to make evidence -based interventions

‍

more accessible to anyone who needs them. And at the end of the episode, she's

‍

going to share with us just where you can go to find some of these resources

‍

yourself without the big barriers that we often find with things like cost and

‍

accessibility and transportation or even the stigma that can come with seeking mental

‍

health care. She has some really fascinating insights into doom scrolling and social

‍

media and some of the compulsive poll we feel to keep reading the bad news or

‍

staying online even when it's stressing us out. Her insights are really interesting,

‍

reminding us that technology can be a big part of the problem, but it can also

‍

become a part of the solution when we use it intentionally. She really gets into

‍

how we can learn to not escape our anxiety. We wouldn't want to. We actually need

‍

it to, but to better understand it, how to regulate, how to let it work for us

‍

instead of against us. So please enjoy my conversation with Dr. Bethany Teachman.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (00:31.79)

Well, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for sharing your expertise. You've got such amazing expertise on anxiety, which is just so important for all of us. So just first, I'm so thrilled that you're here.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (00:48.134)

Thank you so much for having me. Appreciate it.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (00:50.25)

Yeah, thanks for your time. So I would love to start, Bethany, at a really high level. One of the things I really appreciate about your work is that you normalize anxiety, that anxiety itself is not the enemy, that there's in fact a healthy level of anxiety. Could you start by kind of orienting us to what is a healthy understanding of anxiety and at what point does anxiety become

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (01:07.154)

Right.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (01:17.198)

a problem, whether it's for me or for my kids or for a loved one.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (01:21.21)

No, absolutely. It's a great question because anxiety is actually a very adaptive emotion. some people look at me like I'm crazy when I initially say that, because of course it doesn't feel very good, but it is our body's danger signal. So if a bear was chasing us in the wood, it'd be really good to get anxious, right? So that we can get out of the way and not be in danger's way in that sense. And the same thing comes up in our daily life, right? So anxiety serves to tell us that something is threatening and we may need to like mobilize some

‍

resources to manage that threat. The tricky part is that beautiful alarm system that our body has sometimes goes off too often and we start to have a false alarm system. So what happens is that the level of danger

‍

is not matching our threat response and our anxiety response. So we're overreacting to the level of actual danger in the environment and we're thinking there's danger when it's not really such a serious situation. And so when we move into the like clinical level where somebody has an anxiety disorder, that's where people are regularly having this false alarm that's going off. And we're seeing that they have a pattern of high levels of anxiety that are occurring frequently.

‍

and that are getting in the way of them meeting their life goals. So it's really when we start to see that impairment that we really start to worry.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (02:44.908)

That is so helpful. I love the idea of a bear. There are times where we want that signal. So I was thinking about this interview and I was at the gym and I started going to the gym again. I haven't gone in years. have always, much of my life struggled with a certain level of social anxiety. I wouldn't have known to call it that. And there was a particular person I kept running into and I was aware, I became aware, my nervous system, and this is where I'm curious, it the...

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (03:03.004)

Sure.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (03:14.168)

thoughts in my mind, is it the feeling? But whatever was happening in my body was registering, I have to stop going to the gym. And I knew that was irrational. I just had to work through the awkwardness of, I'm running into somebody I know. I have to figure out how to interact with them in this space where it's out of context and I don't know, do they wanna talk to me? Do I wanna, you know? And all of that kind of ratcheted up to an over.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (03:22.673)

Right.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (03:31.836)

Right.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (03:41.185)

index on I can just never go to the gym again. And I know enough right now to know, well, that's silly. You know, I just have to figure this out. But it was, I was thinking about that. I thought that that can happen to people, right? Where that, that, so what is happening inside there? What piece of that is anxiety?

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (03:46.193)

Right.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (03:57.976)

Yeah, it all is and it's a

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (04:01.495)

Okay.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (04:03.42)

I love the example you gave and your initial questions was is that a thought, is that a feeling, what's going on there? And the answer is it's all of the above. So the model of therapy that I tend to work from is cognitive behavioral therapy. And it starts with this kind of silly idea of a triangle and at one point is thoughts and another point is feelings and another point is behavior. And the reason is that they're all very much interconnected. And so you described your reaction as silly and I would say instead it's not silly, it's that it's sensible given the way that

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (04:07.533)

Yeah.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (04:33.364)

you are responding to the situation. So whether you were perfectly conscious of it or not, you had a reaction when you saw that person at the gym of, I'm not going to know what to say, they're not going to want to talk to me, I'm going to say something really awkward, that you know, I don't know what your particular version was, but there's a flood of thoughts that happen in those situations. Now, if you take as sort of fact this idea that this person's going to evaluate me negatively, I'm going to mess this up, I'm going to be really awkward,

‍

then it makes perfect sense that your reaction was, gotta get out of here. I don't want to go to the gym and be in this situation. Imagine instead that your reaction was, it might be a little awkward, but like I'll say hi and if it goes badly, like who really cares? The sun will come up tomorrow. Like I've had plenty of awkward conversations, right? So if we can reduce the importance of that, the likelihood that it's going to be catastrophic.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (05:07.404)

Yeah, yeah, good point.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (05:26.5)

then you stay at the gym. So it's not that your reaction is crazy in some way or silly, it's that because you're interpreting the situation in a certain way, because you're interpreting that physiological activation that you're having when you feel anxious, it makes you feel like you have to leave. And so if we can shift that initial like sense making of the situation, then you don't have the same feeling that you have to leave. So it's the thoughts, it's the feelings and behaviors all connected.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (05:50.562)

Gotcha.

‍

So what I think I hear you saying is it's that initial reactivity or reaction, whatever that is, is in and of itself not the problem, it's how we make sense of it.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (06:05.286)

Yeah, so there is nothing wrong with getting anxious. So I'm a person who has a huge startle response and you know, my kids love to tease me and like, you know, jump scare me or whatever and I will every time have a big reaction. That's not under my control. I just do. So it was very challenging when my youngest was learning to drive. She did not want to practice with me in the car because I would have barely big reactions, right? Can't help it. But...

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Dr. Alison Cook (06:11.019)

Okay.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (06:29.067)

Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (06:31.376)

What I'm able to do is recognize like, yeah, that's Bethany's jump scare reaction. It's not a sign that something is actually dangerous or that I'm under threat. So I don't escalate that alarm response. So we can't fully control all the time whether we have some alarm response.

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Dr. Alison Cook (06:38.958)

Interesting.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (06:48.198)

but we can decide what we make of it and which ones we decide are meaningful alarms we want to react to and which ones we just say, okay, this is my awkward feeling at the gym, that's what happens for me, but not the end of the world because you've probably felt awkward in lots of situations. I certainly have, right? And so it's only if we think that's a terrible thing to have that experience.

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Dr. Alison Cook (07:10.35)

did you get there? What are the steps from going? How do you walk people through that discernment? There's a discernment in that, right? Because it presumes that I can trust myself to know what is actually worthy of my fear response. There's danger, stranger danger, whatever it is, or, my kid who's learning how to drive is about to hit someone where I need to have a big response. And this is me.

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This is just me, my system is more this way. You know, it's one thing, I guess, when you're driving in a car, kind of the examples we're giving, but there are situations, I think, where people aren't sure how to understand and trust the wisdom of their body. How do we start to build that with ourselves and with this normal anxiety that we all have?

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (07:49.362)

100%.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (08:01.732)

It's a skill and it really is a practice thing. So I talk to people about like you're building a new muscle and it's not going to be like easy and natural and all those kinds of things. But I encourage a few different strategies for people. So when you're trying to figure it out, ask, know, look around. What are others doing in that situation? What would you say to a friend in that situation? So there's things that we can do to help us recognize like where does our reaction fall on the continuum? But I actually think there's like three buckets of reaction.

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Dr. Alison Cook (08:28.834)

Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (08:31.686)

we can have there. And so you're not limited to one strategy. And you know happy to go in more detail but there's things you can do to shift the thoughts that you're having in the situation to make them less catastrophic and less threatening. There's things that you can actively do to help you accept those thoughts so that you observe them but don't have a big reaction to them. And then there's things that you can do that make those thoughts not mean as much. So it's not that you don't have them or that you think they're great it's just that you decide they're not that important. So for example,

‍

I bet some of your listeners at some point already in our conversation have had a thought of what am I going to get for lunch? When am I going to pick up this thing from the grocery store? You know, whatever it happens to be. Our mind has lots of thoughts that come through it. But we decide which are the ones we need to respond to right now, which are the ones we think are really meaningful, which are consistent with our goals and our values. So there's skills that you can learn that can help you decide in the moment, do I want to think about this thought in a different way? Do I want to accept it?

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reacting in a huge way or do I want to say it's just not that important and so the premise behind this is like you get to be a mini scientist. It's trial and error you get to make the choice of like here's what I think is going on how would I gather evidence how would I test that is this working for me or not working for me so it isn't one skill we get a battery or repertoire of options to try to manage those hard feelings and hard thoughts.

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Dr. Alison Cook (09:58.029)

Yeah, I love that. And you talk a lot about that skill of becoming your own scientist, sort of a student of your own anxiety, really. A key feature of that is curiosity, not self-criticism. Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (10:05.127)

Right.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (10:13.65)

Absolutely. Absolutely. So we want people to be curious about their own reactions and to figure out which of those reactions we really want to hang on to and which are ones that they want to shift. And also curious about others' reactions. So that can help us also when we're talking to someone who has a really different view than the view that we have. And so if we can approach it of trying to understand our and others' worldviews,

‍

it becomes a lot less threatening, right? So if we look at thoughts as ideas to be played with rather than as like, if you have the thought, therefore it's true, therefore it's a fact, it takes some of the pressure off and bringing that viewpoint of curiosity is how we do that.

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Dr. Alison Cook (10:58.712)

The thought is just neutral. It's just there. We get to assign meaning to it. I've heard you say, and I thought this was interesting, for folks who really, for whom their anxiety has escalated and they have panic attacks, they spiral into anxiety. I've heard you say, and I want to talk about that because number one, I think the skill takes time to develop.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (11:23.43)

Sure.

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Dr. Alison Cook (11:26.498)

Well, I've got about three questions in this. I'm gonna give you a bunch of thoughts and let you break it down. Because immediately I went to, for folks who've dealt with anxiety for long time, it could feel like, can't do that. Like I'm too ratcheted up to be able to calmly observe my thought and understand what it is. So a couple of thoughts in that. One,

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (11:28.85)

You sure?

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Dr. Alison Cook (11:49.325)

I've heard you say that when you've worked with people who have panic, they know they're getting to the point of probably not having panic attacks anymore when they realize the panic attack won't hurt them to some degree. Am I saying that correctly? How do you say that?

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (12:08.245)

absolutely. So what we teach people is anxiety is uncomfortable but not dangerous. And it's this idea and you know it's going to sound crazy but when I start doing a panic treatment for someone who comes in I say you're not going to believe me but

‍

for this when this treatment is successful you're not going to care that much whether or not you have a panic attack because as soon as you don't care that much whether you have a panic attack you actually stop having them because you've taken away the control and the power because right now for people who have anxiety disorders often what's happening is that the fear of fear the fear of becoming anxious is a huge part of what's driving it and that means that you think anxiety is dangerous you have to make decisions based on anxiety it takes away your choice

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Dr. Alison Cook (12:33.549)

Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (12:43.51)

Yes. Yes.

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Dr. Alison Cook (12:49.698)

Yes.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (12:53.044)

all of those kinds of things. And if you learn how to see anxiety is just like a wave of emotion, it's got uncomfortable parts but it won't stay that way. And for those who are having false alarms, it's not really reliably signaling danger for you, then it doesn't have the same power over you. So it's not that I say you're gonna love the feeling of anxiety, none of us like it. But when you realize it's uncomfortable but not dangerous, unless there actually is the bear chasing you, which is pretty rare, then it stops having the same power over

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Dr. Alison Cook (13:19.95)

Right.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (13:23.1)

you and then that is the best way for anxiety to come down. So when we actively say we must reduce anxiety, we have to get rid of this, it tends to actually fuel the anxiety because it's putting all this pressure on it and saying anxiety is this really bad dangerous thing that we can't handle and we teach people that you can actually tolerate anxiety and that's the best way to make it go down.

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Dr. Alison Cook (13:46.777)

That's so good that it's uncomfortable, but not dangerous. And the fear of it, I'm thinking about kids, anxiety about school or making a new friend, or it is uncomfortable. It is, we are learning to tolerate the discomfort of it, which paradoxically begins to reduce the anxiety. That's so good.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (13:58.161)

Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (14:09.091)

Exactly.

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And you know, one of the things that we do to help them, and we do a lot of different strategies, but one of the things we do, you talked about going to the gym. So I'm guessing your heart rate went up. I'm guessing you got sweaty at the gym. I'm guessing, you know, if you...

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Dr. Alison Cook (14:21.866)

huh.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (14:25.83)

did a run you haven't done for a long time on the treadmill, your legs were a little bit shaky, right? So we're actually like pretty familiar with lots of the sensations that are associated with anxiety. So then we have to look at what meaning are you assigning to them? Because when you have those sensations at the gym or you get jittery after two cups of coffee or you know, whatever it happens to be,

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Dr. Alison Cook (14:38.828)

Yes.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (14:46.98)

you have another explanation for the symptoms that you're feeling and so you don't panic about them. You don't escalate them. You're like, I'm feeling jittery because I had two cups of coffee. So if we can practice getting more comfortable with those sensations, not liking them, they still feel uncomfortable but realizing, this is my anxiety reaction but it's a false alarm, then it's not so different than the exercise leading to it, the coffee leading to it, or anything else.

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Dr. Alison Cook (14:56.43)

Hmm.

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Dr. Alison Cook (15:03.128)

Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (15:09.612)

Right.

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Dr. Alison Cook (15:13.344)

Yep. And it doesn't, it's not just because I have it doesn't mean I'm doing something I shouldn't be doing. And that's where it begins to drive our lives. I thought of another, I was thinking about you talk about it. There's a real parallel hood of resilience. It strikes me. You're learning. I was thinking that I just took the podcast to video. I've talked about this a little bit and you know, it's a whole new skill set. It's hard. My anxiety spiked. You know, I'm trying to figure it out. And I started thinking.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (15:19.566)

Exactly.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (15:27.154)

100%. 100%. Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (15:42.234)

I shouldn't do this. I've made a mistake, right? And then I have enough tools, I'm like, what if this is just hard? It's uncomfortable. It's a learning curve, which is such a powerful reframe.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (15:43.962)

Right. Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (15:52.252)

basically.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (15:58.034)

Absolutely, if we can learn to recognize that things can be challenges rather than threats, it completely shifts how we respond to them. I, you know, I do a lot of research and I teach and all those kinds of things and I half joke but I actually mean I'm in a job where I have the joy of feeling stupid every single day. I'm surrounded by people who are know things I don't know, they push me to like try things I don't know how to do, they ask hard questions, the work we do is

‍

And I've learned to embrace that feeling of stupidity because it's a reminder to me that I am growing and learning and trying hard things. Because what's the alternative? If I feel comfortable all the time, it's probably not much change that's happening. There's probably not much growth that's happening, right? So that shift you made of going to video, like that's an example of like, you know, there's this really nice concept in psychology of desirable difficulty and it's this idea of like

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Dr. Alison Cook (16:44.344)

Yeah. Yes. Yes.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (16:56.238)

Hmm.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (16:58.108)

there's a really beautiful sweet spot where we can take where we're at and move a level that feels hard for us to do but it's not wildly out of our skill set, right? So it's the like, I haven't been doing much running but I bet in like two months I could be ready to do a 5k.

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Dr. Alison Cook (17:09.452)

Yeah. Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (17:15.843)

Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (17:16.538)

If you haven't been doing running, don't say that in a month you're doing a marathon. Like that's a, you know, that's, that's not desirable difficulty. That's impossible. So, or pretty unrealistic at any rate. So it's that sweet spot of like challenging ourselves. And so that's what we do with folks is we help them realize like, what are the steps to keep adding to that desirable difficulty so that they learn? Cause I'm not going to convince them. There's no words I'm going to say that are going to magically make somebody believe they can do these things they didn't think they could do. But we introduce those

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Dr. Alison Cook (17:20.856)

Yep.

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Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (17:46.404)

difficulty steps where they now start showing themselves that they are way more capable than they thought they were, that they could tolerate anxiety in ways that they didn't realize that they could and then that's what helps them decide maybe I'll take another step here.

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Dr. Alison Cook (18:01.036)

love that.

‍

I love that. It's a very much in motion and it makes sense because anxiety kind of keeps you stuck. And so it makes sense that the antidote would be small, calculated, smart, strategic steps through it. I want to ask you a couple of questions because you're in the research. You're right at the cutting edge of all of this. And there's so much about anxiety in the news on a couple of different fronts. Number one, I've heard you talk about this, but there's so much talk about sort of an anxiety epidemic.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (18:08.146)

100%.

‍

Exactly.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (18:17.071)

Exactly.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (18:33.616)

Right.

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Dr. Alison Cook (18:34.184)

so much of an uptick in anxiety, especially in our younger kids. What are your thoughts on that? Are we more anxious? Are we just naming our anxiety more? Are we diagnosing it more? What are your thoughts on that?

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (18:50.258)

think it's a really good and really tricky question. So my best guess is that we have a bit of both going on. So what I mean by that is there are some signals that suggest we are in fact having increases in anxiety in the last, you know, set of years, particularly among young people. And so that is a significant area for concern. Some portion of that increase appears to be actual increases in the prevalence rates. Some is likely also due to people being more open about talking about it. So that really

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Dr. Alison Cook (18:56.993)

Okay.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (19:20.242)

positive side of reductions in stigma. We also have changes in our health care system that have led to more screening for anxiety and so we're more likely to catch those problems. From my perspective those are all really positive things that are leading to those numbers going up because we want to know that those challenges are there. We want to catch them early because we're better at treating if we catch things early. The other piece that I'm going to say is going to sound a bit contradictory which is that I have thought there was a

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know, epidemic of mental health challenges for a really long time, not just since we've had the anxious generation come out or all the other things that have been in the conversation. Really, you COVID brought a lot of this conversation to light in ways that I think have been really helpful.

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It's not actually a new problem. So yes, we have some increases, but it's not like it was okay before. For a very, very long time, we've had a mental health care system that hasn't been meeting the needs. In fact, we could literally double the number of mental health providers, double, and we still would not meet the mental health care needs.

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Dr. Alison Cook (20:09.731)

Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (20:26.096)

Yeah, so again, you know, it's not that this is a brand new problem and we were doing super well before. So yes, there's an increase and I'm glad it's getting the attention that it's getting, but this conversation should have been happening for a very long time.

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Dr. Alison Cook (20:33.037)

Right.

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Dr. Alison Cook (20:42.24)

Yeah, that's so interesting because also when there's not, when you think about prevention, a lot of what you're describing is almost like when we don't have the basic tools, it also makes the problem worse, which makes the demand greater. Whereas you're right, it's not like so many of my listeners and I talk about this, we just didn't have any tools for emotional management or emotional regulation or anxiety regulation.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (21:05.884)

Right.

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Dr. Alison Cook (21:10.042)

And it's not even that there needed to be a full-blown disorder. It's just, I didn't know how to manage basic. And so we're still missing, we're still barely catching up with basic education, let alone with where... So Bethany, when you say that, when you talk about this deficit of providers, it leads me into sort of the big thing of what you guys are doing there at UVA, is kind of trying to find, use technology to help people

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (21:16.017)

right.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (21:21.625)

Exactly.

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Dr. Alison Cook (21:40.225)

understand their anxiety, implement some of what we're talking about, get skills. So I want to ask you about that. And I also want to ask you, because you did a really interesting, there was, you've been quoted a lot on doom scrolling. And I'm very curious about that because, one of the things, so let's start there. One of the things, you know, we, you know, I think anecdotally tossed around, it's in the anxious generation is the intersection of technology and anxiety.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (21:53.894)

Yes.

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Dr. Alison Cook (22:09.782)

Right? And this is why was so interested to talk with you because there's so much concern about whether it's social media, whether it's AI and our kids turning to chat bots or us people turning to chat bots in ways that aren't healthy, in ways that are spiking anxiety on one hand and then maybe not kind of caring for it on the other. And yet technology, just like with anything, can also be super helpful in

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (22:14.758)

Yeah, 100%.

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Dr. Alison Cook (22:39.522)

filling in some of these gaps where we don't have enough providers. So talk to me a little bit, I just kind of threw all of that at you, but talk to me a little bit about, you're kind of on the cutting edge of the both and there, you what's not good about technology and what's really promising about it.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (22:46.768)

No, absolutely.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (22:52.401)

Yeah, thank you.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (22:56.315)

Yeah.

‍

No, it's a great set of questions. So I'll start and then tell me if I'm not hitting on some of the pieces that you're interested in. So I have the great good fortune at University of Virginia to co-direct an initiative that's called Thriving Youth in a Digital Environment or TIDE. And it was started because of exactly the issues that you're talking about is that sometimes we sort of fall into camps of everything to do with technology is terrible and is destroying individual's brains or the category of, hey, if we just

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Dr. Alison Cook (23:01.591)

Okay.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (23:21.719)

Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (23:27.124)

Digital technology is to solve all of humanity's problems and solve all of the mental health challenges. And I think that those conversations are not significantly nuanced and that actually we need to bring those two sides together and have a much deeper and more interesting conversation. And so Tide tries to look at two questions at the same time. The first is recognizing that youth in particular are spending so much of their time on screens and so we need to understand it better. And that means understanding the ways it harms us.

‍

but also the ways that it helps us because it has been shown to also have benefits in addition to harms. And what is it actually just another developmental context and not, you know, having a huge impact. And then secondly, meet people where they are. So given people are using screens so much, can we leverage that as a way to increase access to evidence-based interventions that are going to help people? So with TIDE, we're really trying to do work on both of those sides and sometimes bringing them together. And a big part of what we do because we're

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Dr. Alison Cook (24:18.326)

Interesting.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (24:26.93)

you know, we tend to focus on those teenage years, so adolescence and, you know, emerging adulthood, those challenging years where we know technology use is really high and it's the onset of lots of mental health challenges. And so we're trying to bring those together and really center youth's voice in figuring out what's going to work for them. So instead of, you know, having adults alone decide here's the way that social media should be regulated or here's what you need to do for your mental health, we're trying to partner

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Dr. Alison Cook (24:40.674)

Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (24:56.98)

with teens to learn what do they think is actually going to work for them? What supports do they need? What will they actually use? And I'm happy to talk about different examples of how we're trying to do that. But again, you can take a problem like doom scrolling. That's a lovely example, right? Where people go down this rabbit hole and for readers who are less familiar with it, it's like you get you start on something negative and then you go story after story after story and it tends to really hurt your mood. It leads to us not sleeping well, all kinds of challenges and it kind of distorts

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (25:19.96)

Yeah.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (25:26.92)

our sense of like how safe is the world, how much threat am I under, all those kinds of things. And so there are strategies, there's recent research that came out just in the last couple of weeks that shows that you can actually shift the algorithm and what your feed is by reliably starting out your day looking intentionally at some positive news articles, right? That hope scrolling idea. So there's things that you can do that may help in those ways. Tonight we are having our youth advisory board. So these are high schools

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Dr. Alison Cook (25:29.571)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (25:45.974)

Hmm.

‍

Mm-hmm.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (25:56.612)

students who advise us on how we can do our work better in a way that will meet their needs. And we're developing with the youth an intervention that is designed to help youth make less negative social comparisons when they use social media. So one of the things that probably makes time spent on social media damaging when it does have those negative effects is when people do a lot of thinking, I'm not as attractive, I'm not as accomplished, I'm not as smart, I don't have

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Dr. Alison Cook (25:58.424)

Mm.

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Dr. Alison Cook (26:11.155)

Mm. Mm-hmm.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (26:23.491)

Yep.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (26:26.536)

as many friends, don't, you know, all of those kinds of things. All the I'm not as good as.

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Dr. Alison Cook (26:31.149)

Yep.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (26:31.812)

And so we've been working with teens and college students and they're actually developing a new intervention, a new app that's designed to actually help teens do less of that negative social comparison. So again, we're taking that same question of like, are the impacts of social media? When is it helpful? When is it harmful? And then how can we leverage that same time they're spending on screens to make it something that's more adaptive and helpful for them?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (26:43.31)

Hmm.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (26:51.022)

Mm-hmm.

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Dr. Alison Cook (26:59.342)

Hmm, wow, so kind of trying to work with the, yeah, rather than, yeah. How do, so that's a good question. How do you, like, how would I, you know, think I'll use myself as an example, you know, if I grew up in a social media area, I think I would have struggled. I would have struggled with it. What are,

‍

ways if we're parenting kids or we ourselves are struggling with that loop of negative comparison, you the doom scrolling, you know, I'll know if I'm really tired, it's almost like I'll go look for something, you know, it's almost like it's a weird kind of thing that happens on there. What are some tools that I love what you're saying about kind of try to jimmy your algorithm and actually feed yourself toward hope but

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (27:41.927)

Right.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (27:52.379)

Right, right.

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Dr. Alison Cook (27:54.85)

But what are some other tools that you see working from that research?

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (27:58.834)

Yeah.

‍

Absolutely, part of why we're doing this research is that we have a lot to figure out still, so I don't think we have the perfect answers. But I think, interestingly, some of the things that we do offline to kind of help with this can also help us online. So I had a graduate student, Alana Lattis, who did a project of trying to do an intervention of helping people to shift their thinking when they're doing those negative social comparisons online. So things that we do offline can also help us in those situations. But also, know, youth themselves are really good at thinking this through.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (28:02.39)

Yeah. Yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (28:20.276)

interesting. Yeah.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (28:29.188)

So, and it doesn't mean they don't need parental guidance and all those, you know, and regulations. They absolutely do. But, you know, my youngest daughter would say when she was with a group of friends and if they would sort of resort to like just sitting on their phones, one of them would say to the other like stop being a screen-ager and then they would kind of re-engage and you know, it's kind of cute or whatever and they don't do it reliably in all the best ways. But like they're figuring out also ways to increase what I call their digital literacy, right? Their ability to make tools work for them.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (28:32.366)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (28:48.994)

Yeah.

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Dr. Alison Cook (28:53.613)

Right.

‍

Right.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (28:59.028)

Students are also telling me about creative things they do using like the brick or other methods that help them turn on and off certain apps for like times they want to use them, times that they don't, lots of people set alarms, all those kinds of things. But it's also some trial and error. So whether it's frankly teens or adults, because it's not like this is actually just a teen issue, even though that's what's in the media. The truth is this is like a human issue, right?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (29:09.955)

Yep.

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Dr. Alison Cook (29:19.17)

Yeah, totally.

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Bethany Teachman (she/her) (29:23.728)

So, you know, again, just like I talked about before, I encourage people to do trial and error. So maybe it's that, you know, if your use of screens is making really interrupting your sleep, then set a time after which you're not using the device and don't keep it in the bedroom. If on the other hand, that's not really where the issue is, is that you're doing doom scrolling in a different kind of way, then you might decide that like the way you're going to get news is to like look at trusted sources for a period of time in the morning and a period of time after work and other

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (29:51.064)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (29:53.604)

otherwise don't look at news sources that are like making you feel really miserable. Like find that balance where you stay informed but don't go down the rabbit hole. So it's not a single solution that's going to work for people. We have to look at what are your vulnerabilities, trial and error of what's working for you, and then recognize that again we need to empower people to figure out what's going to work for them. And so from a parenting strategy a big part of that is like keep it an open conversation. So is the only time is a

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (29:56.109)

Yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (30:01.08)

Yeah.

‍

Yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (30:14.06)

Yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (30:21.464)

Yeah.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (30:23.708)

you communicate with your child about their screen use is yelling and saying this is destroying you. They're not going to tell you when they struggle. They're not going to tell you when they hit the hard parts. So make it an ongoing open conversation about how are you using your device and what ways does it make you happy and what ways does it not? How is it helping you with social connection? How is it hurting it, right?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (30:29.326)

get off. Right.

‍

Yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (30:41.74)

Yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (30:46.604)

Right.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (30:47.184)

normalize that conversation and you have to have it a bunch because as kids develop what they're doing on their devices is changing a lot.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (30:55.054)

Yeah, and it could be different for different kids to your point. It's not a one size fits all. And so you just have to really stay in conversation with them. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. So, okay, so just kind of as we're, you know, I love this theme, you know, I'm hearing, you know, first of all, there's not a one, knowing yourself, you have to know your own inner signal.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (31:18.738)

Absolutely.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (31:23.254)

that again, and it reminds me even with the doom scrolling or the technology, like this doesn't feel good. There's anxiety here, whether it's, whatever it is, that is not, and again, I'm not shaming myself for that, I'm noticing that. then how do I, then my sort of the skill is how do I reframe what's happening?

‍

So maybe again, it's not, I'm such, what's wrong with me that I can't get off social media? It's, you know, I wonder what's going on here. You know, maybe I could set it aside and try to get curious, have a conversation with somebody in real life about, you know, why am I drawn to it? What's not good about it? is, you know, again, it strikes me that there's a real process of self-awareness of,

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (32:06.034)

Absolutely.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (32:13.232)

Right?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (32:18.31)

recognizing the cues. Anything else you would add to that just sort of from as someone listening, even, you know, driving in their car, you know, like a pause, you know, what, what, how can we, because all of this, it strikes me, it comes back to, I think of, I think of my listeners, I think we talk a lot about the fruit of the spirit, right? When you know, you're kind of living aligned, right? With that, you know, and I think about the fruit of the spirit of self-control, not in a controlling, rigid way, but in a, I can take command of myself.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (32:24.293)

Absolutely.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (32:37.159)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (32:47.986)

Absolutely, and no, I think you're exactly right. And know, two things tied to that.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (32:48.236)

Right? Yeah.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (32:53.87)

I think of it as intentionality and I think we're talking about something very similar. instead of it being about this just happens to me, three hours go by and I realize like all I've done is swipe, swipe, swipe, swipe, swipe, That's not using it as a tool to work for you. That's letting the tool drive you. Intentionality is about, and whether it's in the screen area or in lots of areas of our life, is about thinking about what are our goals? What do we want out of this? How do we want to engage? And monitoring, is it working for us?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (32:56.088)

Hmm.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (33:04.898)

Yeah

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (33:10.595)

Yep.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (33:15.926)

Yep. Yep.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (33:23.814)

meet our goals or is it getting in the way of meeting our goals? So maybe I feel like you know what I just want to zone out for an hour. Fine, zone out for an hour. But at other times I'm like my gosh I have you know this project I have to do and need to you know make you know whatever else it is that I need to do. And so I want to think about

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (33:25.826)

Yeah. Yep.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (33:32.406)

Yeah, sure.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (33:43.708)

What are my goals and the way I use technology like everything else, trying to think intentionally about how I want to do that. The other piece though that I think goes to the comments you were making about how we ask ourselves, how is this fitting in our life, right? Is it aligned with, you know, whether the spirit, the values, the goals, all of those pieces is, you know, one of the things we know is that it's not so much when we look at the technology space, it's not so much actually about like how many hours do you spend on a device.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (33:50.648)

Yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (33:58.273)

Yeah.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (34:13.742)

It's about what are you not doing in the rest of your life because of the effects. So are you not, you mentioned like do you reach out to a friend in person. If you're not doing that, if you're not sleeping, if you're not exercising, if you're not in nature, if you're not relaxing, if you're not having fun, you know. So we need to look at do you have that balance of healthy activities in your life?

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (34:16.674)

Right. Yeah.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (34:27.373)

Yep.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (34:34.894)

Yep.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (34:36.048)

Technology is one of the things that can interfere with that. It's not the only one, right? You'd say the same thing to someone who is working 18 hours a day of like, probably isn't healthy for you because look at, it's not that work is bad. It's look at all the things you're not having in your life that probably are needed for you to be a healthy, balanced person that feels like you're being fulfilled and living your purposeful life and all those things, right? So it's what's not happening is actually at least and probably more important than

‍

sometimes what is happening.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (35:08.29)

Yeah, that's really helpful, both in our own lives. Am I at a balance? Like to your point, like if I'm scrolling for half an hour and it's kind of silly and laughing at funny TikTok videos and I'm living a balanced life, you know, who cares? Or our kids, you know, I could imagine, right? Again, to that point of just being really intentional. That's a great, a great word. How, know, Bethany, you guys are doing a lot of work to get in the PAC lab, I know is doing a lot of work to try to connect people.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (35:20.466)

Absolutely.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (35:37.785)

who can't get the care that they need for anxiety with web-based digital resources that are designed for this work. This is not just a shot in the dark. You're trying to get people really high level care when there is, when we can't get to a provider or a clinician, how could people connect to the work that you're doing or learn more about it?

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (35:46.865)

Right.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (36:06.544)

Yeah, so two things. I encourage people to go to Tide's website, is tide.virginia.edu. So it's T-Y-D-E. And you can see lots of information about some of the things that we work on there. And then they should feel free to reach out to me and I'm happy to share resources with them. We have a suite of digital interventions called MindTrails where we try to help people get connected and we're launching those at different times. We have previously had a website that, you know, we were fortunate, had a lot of folks visiting. It was used in

‍

85 plus countries around the world of offering these anxiety interventions. We've now shifted to a suite of mobile apps so that we can actually personalize the interventions in different ways and we are developing different apps for different communities. So we have one for teens that's different than what we do for adults. We have one that's called MindTrails Espanol for those who are Spanish speaking. We're launching one for patients with Parkinson's and Huntington's disease who experience anxiety. So we're kind of developing these different digital

‍

that can allow people to increase their access to care and get the sort of resources that they need in the moment that they need. And I should say I get to work with an amazing array of collaborators in engineering and computer science and education and nursing to help do this work and try to meet the needs of different communities.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (39:28.462)

I just love that you guys are working on that and trying to create something that is meaningful for people. And thank you so much just for sharing your time and the benefit of your wisdom with so many people and with us today.

‍

Bethany Teachman (she/her) (39:44.084)

Thank you for the great discussion. appreciate it.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (39:46.274)

Yeah, thanks so much.

‍

Dr. Alison Cook (39:53.999)

Well,

‍

It can happen so fast - you feel grateful one moment, and five minutes on Instagram later you’re suddenly feeling small or behind. But what if comparison isn’t the problem itself, but a messenger?

Dr. Alison explores how comparison, when we pause to listen, can actually reveal our deepest longings and lead us back to connection with God, with others, and with ourselves. She explains why comparison is wired into us, what it’s trying to show us, and how to shift from competition to curiosity and compassion.

This conversation invites you to slow down, notice what stirs inside you when comparison shows up, and remember: your story is unfolding at its own sacred pace.

In this episode, we cover:

• Why comparison isn’t always toxic, and what it’s really telling you
  
  
• How to move from calibration to condemnation (and back again)
  
  
• The two types of comparison
  
  
• A simple three-step practice to use when you find yourself comparing

📥 Grab your 3 free Boundaries For Your Soul resources here 

📥 Download Alison’s free printable with the five boundary tools when you sign up for her weekly email.

Here are some other episodes you might like :

Episode 37: The Problem with Toxic Thinking

Episode 140: If You Struggle with Guilt and Second-Guessing Yourself, This Will Set You Free

‍

📖 Find a full transcript and list of resources from this episode here

‍

💬 Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.

‍

Thanks to our Sponsors!

• This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/BESTOFYOU and get on your way to being your best self.
• Black Friday has come early at Cozy Earth! Use my code BESTOFYOU at cozyearth.com to get up to 40% off. 

• If you’re looking for a Bible that helps you live the Word, not just read it, then grab this beautiful one I’m currently using at NIVapplicationbible.com.
• Go to ⁠Quince.com/bestofyou⁠ for 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order!

‍

*Some of the links above are Amazon affiliate links. If you choose to purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

While Dr. Cook is a counselor, the content of this podcast and any of the products provided by Dr. Cook are not specific counseling advice nor are they a substitute for individual counseling. The content and products provided on this podcast are for informational purposes only.‍

© 2025 Alison Cook. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please do not copy or share the contents of this webpage or transcript without permission from the author.

‍

TRANSCRIPT:

Honestly, comparison is so often a longing for something that we see reflected in

‍

someone else, but that longing is so important for us to pay attention to. Where

‍

comparison leads depends on how we relate to it. Again, it's not the comparison in

‍

itself that's the problem. It's the fruit that it bears in your soul. When it's

‍

healthy, it can help us tune in to our surroundings and find our place among

‍

others. But it's when we move from that calibration to condemnation. When the goal

‍

shifts from connection to competition, that we start to lose the grounding in who we

‍

are. What is this longing trying to show me? What is it revealing about what

‍

matters most to my own soul?

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It's funny how I can feel perfectly content with my life one minute, grateful even,

‍

and then five minutes on Instagram later, I feel behind inadequate or invisible. It

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happens so fast. Maybe for you, it's not social media. Maybe it's that friend who

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seems to have the kind of marriage you wish you had, or the sibling who always

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lands on her feet. Maybe it's someone in your church who seems to have endless

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blessings while you're just trying to hang on. Comparison has a way of sneaking in

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quietly. It shows up in our friendships, in our families, even in our faith. One

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moment we feel grounded, connected, confident in who we are in the next, that inner

‍

voice starts whispering, you're falling behind, she's better than you are. You're not

‍

good enough. The truth is, Comparison isn't really about envy.

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It's about longing. The longing to feel seen, valued, and secure in our own story

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and in our own lives. So as we begin today, I want to invite you to slow down

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for a moment as you're listening or as you're watching and notice, who do you tend

‍

to compare yourself to? Who's that person that stirs up that inner voice of

‍

comparison. And most importantly, what messages do you hear about yourself when you

‍

notice that person? For those of you watching the video, you'll see a vase of mums

‍

here on the screen. Some are in full bloom, right? These red ones took a while to

‍

come out, and I love it when they come out in full bloom. They're so beautiful.

‍

But you'll also see some of these buds haven't opened up at all, right?

‍

A little while back, we had asked you to share about your experiences around

‍

comparison, and we heard from so many of you, and here's what a few of you had to

‍

say. Hi, Allison, this is Julie from Connecticut, and I was calling to follow up

‍

about your question about where I compare myself to others. And one area I noticed

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in working through some difficult relationships in the past several years is kind of

‍

comparing myself to some people who are maybe not acting ways that would be healthy

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and kind of constantly trying to criticize myself, like, see your acting just as

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badly as they are. Hi, my name is Katie from South Mississippi.

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I often compare myself to where others are in their spiritual journey,

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and I know what God has placed on my heart and the future that he has for me.

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I know it's great, but in the moment, in the mundane, I get lost in the daily

‍

task of being a stay -at -home mom, and I would love to grow in faith and courage,

‍

knowing that what God has shown me in my past for my future will come,

‍

and I just need to trust and lean on now.

‍

Hi, my name is Rebecca. I'm calling from Seattle, Washington. I was just listening

‍

to your podcast on comparison. And comparison has affected me psychologically,

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spiritually, for most of my life. I'm pretty new to the faith. I was saved by

‍

Jesus in January of this year after a really long, painful,

‍

divorce, trauma, death, grief. And I had this sensation that God was holding out on

‍

me. I would look on Instagram and I would see people getting married and pregnant

‍

and I'm divorced I'm divorced in a one -bedroom apartment trying to make ends meet.

‍

In that oppression of comparison, one thing that's really helped me is reflecting on

‍

few scriptures, like, I've seen the God who sees me, and just resting in the

‍

assurance that God has a good plan for my life. I've been anchored in the knowing

‍

that God is going to use this season of my life, wherever I feel lack for his

‍

glory, for his redemption. So thank you so much for speaking on this. You can hear

‍

the thread, the common thread of comparison and the ache. So many of us feel

‍

beneath these stories. Comparison is never really about the other person.

‍

It's something deeper going on inside our own souls. And honestly,

‍

comparison is so often a longing for something that we see reflected in someone

‍

else. But that longing is so important for us to pay attention to.

‍

This is the work of what I call taking a U -turn and noticing what's happening

‍

inside of us as we're comparing ourselves to others. And I love how each one of

‍

these women who shared,

‍

that longing and gently attune to the place inside your own soul that's speaking.

‍

Here's the truth. Comparison is wired into us. It's not a flaw. It's part of being

‍

human. Psychologists call this social comparison theory, and I write about this in my

‍

book. I shouldn't feel this way. Social comparison is the instinct to measure

‍

ourselves against others. It's a way of finding belonging and safety.

‍

We look around us at others to gauge our own sense of belonging. It's like walking

‍

into a room full of people and realizing you didn't get the memo. I do this all

‍

the time and I hate it when this happens. But I look around and I see that

‍

everyone else in the room is in jeans and t -shirts and I'm standing there in heels

‍

and a cocktail dress and wanting to literally just run and hide because I'm not in

‍

sort of coordination with the group. And that quick scan,

‍

right, to see what's everyone else is doing. How do I measure up? Is your nervous

‍

system trying to find belonging? It's how our nervous system once tried to figure

‍

out, am I okay here? Do I fit in? Am I safe in this group.

‍

Do I belong? Think about when you start a new job or step into a new community,

‍

maybe a small group at church or a new job or a new workout class at the gym. At

‍

first, you kind of find yourself scanning the room. How do people interact here?

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What's normal? How do things work? Do people talk to each other? Do they not? I'm

‍

trying to figure out What are the social norms in the room? And that kind of

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comparison is just natural. It's not all bad. It helps us attune to our environments

‍

and find our places in it. You're not judging yourself or others. You're just

‍

gathering data, right? You're gathering the information. What are the norms here? How

‍

do I fit in here? How do I feel safe and connected? In psychology, we call this

‍

social calibration. It's how we learn the rhythms of a group.

‍

others to orient ourselves. We don't want to care too much,

‍

right, about what other people think, but we do care a little. It's part of being

‍

human. You want to have some sense that you fit in, that you understand and that

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you're part of the larger whole. And here's the thing. If you do want to stand

‍

out, right, you do want to be different than the group. You do it knowingly because

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you wanted to, because you chose to, because you understood the norms and you said,

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this is how I want to be different, not because you misunderstood the assignment. So

‍

here's the bottom line. Comparison itself isn't the problem. When it's healthy,

‍

it can help us tune in to our surroundings and find our place among others. This

‍

is part of our biology. It's part of our wiring. It's how God made us. But it's

‍

when we move from that calibration to condemnation, when the goal shifts from

‍

connection to competition, that we start to lose the grounding in who we are.

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There are actually two kinds of comparison, and we saw these reflected in the

‍

messages today. One is called upward comparison. We tend to look towards someone who

‍

we think is ahead of us in some way. That can either inspire us or it can leave

‍

us feeling deflated, depending on how we relate to it. The other type of comparison

‍

is downward comparison. When we look towards someone who seems to be struggling more

‍

than we are, and that might give us a sense of comfort, but sometimes it can feed

‍

a sense of pride or distance or false confidence rooted in superiority,

‍

rather in a healthy self -examination. Here's the thing. Neither of these is all bad

‍

or all good. Again, it's not the comparison in itself that's the problem.

‍

It's the fruit that it bears in your soul. Upward comparison,

‍

when you look to someone who you see as ahead of you, can become an inspiration.

‍

You see someone who's excelling in a certain way, and instead of shrinking back, You

‍

let it wake up something really alive.

‍

descending way, but in a deeply human way, right? Instead of judging or looking down

‍

on or distancing, you pause and you notice. You think, gosh,

‍

I see that they're struggling and I feel bad for them. I also am grateful in a

‍

way that I'm not struggling in that way. I'm not there anymore. And it reminds you

‍

to be grateful for what you have. It brings a sort of healthy humility and a

‍

healthy gratitude of, gosh, I'm not there. I've come far.

‍

I'm at a different place in my life. And that can be another healthy form of

‍

comparison. When it opens your heart and it awakens empathy as well as inspiration

‍

and it brings you closer, both to God and to others and more fully into your true

‍

self, where you want to go with your own life. When comparison brings a good fruit

‍

of courage or inspiration or gratitude, it's healthy. But here's the thing.

‍

So often, and especially in this social media age, comparison starts to bear the

‍

fruit of envy, resentment, even desolation and despair, it can also bear the fruit

‍

of pride again. When we're divided from our own worth,

‍

from our own love, from our own passions, from our own gifts, that's the signal

‍

that it's time to come back home to your own soul, that something's off,

‍

that there's work to be done inside of you. Comparison becomes a signal,

‍

a cue. Oh my gosh, I'm not being inspired. I'm not feeling gratitude. I'm not

‍

feeling compassion or empathy. I'm just beating up on myself. I'm just hating on

‍

myself. I'm just feeling, you know, sort of desolate inside of myself as I see

‍

myself in comparison to others. That's when it becomes toxic. And that's when we

‍

have to pause and pay attention. Because it's taking us away from our own sense of

‍

belovedness. And we forget that like those moms, right? We have our own pace,

‍

our own path. We will bloom in our own time, but we don't want to squash those

‍

buds that aren't quite there yet. We want to give them the good soil and the water

‍

and the nutrients that they need to bloom in their own time.

‍

And this is when we begin to hear that phrase that so many of you have heard.

‍

It's called comparison becomes the thief of joy. And it's really true.

‍

But I'm not sure that comparison is only the thief of joy. It's also the thief of

‍

connection. Because when we're comparing ourselves negatively to other people, whether

‍

upward or downward, we're robbing ourselves of connectedness. Instead of seeing people

‍

as other people with whom to walk, to be inspired to more greatness or to

‍

understand our own gratitude for where we've come and have a sense of compassion and

‍

even a desire to lift up someone else who's struggling. We become really self

‍

-focused, right? We become focused on our own insecurities,

‍

our own perceived flaws. And we lose connection with other people,

‍

with ourselves and with God. If you think about comparison, right, on a line,

‍

right, on a line, I'm holding my hands out here if you're watching the video. At

‍

the top of that line is the word inspiration, right? In the middle is observation.

‍

And at the bottom is despair, right? Where comparison leads depends on how we relate

‍

to it. When it's observation, it's just neutral. I notice something about this other

‍

person. I notice something about this other person. I notice where they're struggling.

‍

I notice where this person is excelling. Right. I'm making an observation. When it

‍

moves to inspiration, it helps bring out the best of who we are. When it moves to

‍

empathy or compassion, it helps bring out the best of who we are. but when we

‍

judge ourselves or judge someone else, it moves down to despair.

‍

The invitation with comparison is to stay curious. When we notice that observation,

‍

right, when we're noticing what's going on with someone else, is to ask ourselves,

‍

what is this longing trying to show me? What is it revealing about what matters

‍

most to my own soul. So we've talked a little bit about the psychology of

‍

comparison, how it's wired into us, how it can lead us toward inspiration and

‍

gratitude, or how it can lead us away from connection toward despair.

‍

Now I want to bring this a little deeper into the language of scripture. I think

‍

of Psalm 139. It's such a beautiful verse that we all know. It says you are

‍

fearfully and wonderfully made. That's not just a poetic statement,

‍

right? That's a grounding truth. That's an ontological reality of your being. You are

‍

beautifully and wonderfully made. It means that your pace and your wiring and the

‍

blooming that you are designed to do was formed with intention and care.

‍

God, put that in you. It's there. It can't be taken away.

‍

Right. So when you catch yourself comparing yourself to someone else, it's not just

‍

an invitation to stop. It's an invitation to look to God,

‍

right? To look to God as that ultimate compass. I think of the plum line, right?

‍

If you're into building or if you're into construction or if you've renovated your

‍

house, builders use these plum lines to make sure that lines are straight. And

‍

there's sort of like a weighted magnet that pulls toward the center of gravity to

‍

make sure that the line is straight. And that plum line of who you are and who

‍

you're meant to become always has to be anchored vertically, first and foremost, to

‍

God, the one who created your soul and designed you for a wonderful purpose and

‍

with wonderful gifts to contribute to this world. And ultimately, that has to be the

‍

anchoring for our ultimate comparison. So when you notice yourself observing something

‍

going on and someone else, right, you take that as a cue and then you always take

‍

it back vertically to God. And that's how you begin to bring in to check and move

‍

toward inspiration, toward gratitude, toward connection, and away from those negative

‍

components of comparison. This is about trust. And trust in God is not passive.

‍

It's active. It's a partnership. Trusting God includes trusting the person.

‍

God is forming inside of you. The person he's made inside of you.

‍

Sometimes comparison reveals a longing, a spark of something sacred,

‍

right? That longing might be pointing you toward a part of your story or a part of

‍

your soul that really wants to grow. I remember a season when I was comparing

‍

myself to a woman incessantly and it was negative. But I noticed it and I paused

‍

and this was years ago. She was a writer. She had such a great lovely presence.

‍

She had kids. She worked from home and she wrote books, incredible books. And I

‍

just would notice myself comparing myself to her. And it had a little bit of tinge

‍

of envy in that case. But when I paused,

‍

that you want.

‍

One of you wrote in, you didn't want to use your voice, but you talked about how

‍

you compare yourself to others spiritually. And I thought, what a beautiful cue that

‍

a part of you really longs for a spiritually vibrant life. You long for a

‍

spiritually vital relationship with God where you're walking in harmony with God. What

‍

a beautiful longing. And that cue that you're comparing.

‍

from you. And in that way, comparison can become a signal about what our real

‍

longings are. Lori, you mentioned how easy it is to compare yourself to your

‍

friends. And I love that you're paying attention to that. Friendship can be such a

‍

fertile ground for comparison for all of us. But it's also such a great place to

‍

practice this attunement. What is that longing you feel and how is it actually a

‍

signal to honor your own unique desire, something that's showing up inside of you

‍

and that before God you could cultivate in the soil of your own soul.

‍

Rebecca, you talked about how you've been comparing your stage of life when going

‍

through a divorce, making ends meet, and comparing yourself to others on social

‍

media, and it makes so much sense that you're feeling that way. I think so many of

‍

us can relate to you. And we're in a tough season of life. We've just come through

‍

something, right? And we see other people in a different season of life, and it's

‍

painful. And I hope you know you're not alone that so many of us have felt that

‍

way. I know I have felt that way in different seasons of my life. And that

‍

longing, you know, for stability and the joy of a healthy relationship and to feel

‍

like you've come through something and you're out the other side is so beautiful.

‍

It's a sign that your soul is intact. It's a sign that your soul longs for

‍

something God longs for you also to have. And I hear in your desire to trust God

‍

and to acknowledge where you are, but to know that you also long for more.

‍

Remember, your story isn't behind. It's unfolding at a pace that's right for you.

‍

God is still writing your story, even in these chapters that feel uncertain and

‍

different from others. Julie, you talked about comparing yourself to others with

‍

unhealthy habits. I thought it was so interesting because in a way, you're

‍

criticizing yourself in comparison to others. and sometimes that's how we try to feel

‍

safe, right, by kind of looking at others and gauging ourselves in comparison to how

‍

they're doing. But it's also a deeper longing. What if that longing is some part of

‍

you that's kind of trying to tell you, I want to work on some habits. I want to

‍

work on some habits. I don't want to beat myself up about them, but I want to

‍

work on some habits in my own life. What's that deeper longing and how can you

‍

take that longing and move it away from that horizontal comparison and toward that

‍

vertical inquiry with God. God, what's this about? What part of my soul is speaking

‍

to me and longing for something that actually has nothing to do with these other

‍

people, but that is all about my own health and something that you're calling me to

‍

into a deeper grace and the freedom to release this sense of comparison,

‍

both toward others and this criticism toward my own self. So whether it's friendship,

‍

faith, or life stage, or someone else's habits, each of these longings points us

‍

back to the same truth. You are fearfully and wonderfully made.

‍

Your timeline is not their timeline. Your story is not their story.

‍

And the God who formed you is still forming you. So what does this actually look

‍

like? Moving from comparison into a deeper sense of connection with ourselves, with

‍

God, and with others. How do we take that moment of noticing, that observation, that

‍

spark of longing, and turn it into something life -giving? Here's a simple practice I

‍

often use. It's the name it, frame it, brave it model that I write about. And I

‍

shouldn't feel.

‍

name it and make a note of it, especially if it's recurring. Number two, frame it.

‍

What messages do you tell yourself about this situation?

‍

Are you self -critical? I should have been better. I should be more like they are.

‍

Do you notice guilt messages? I shouldn't feel this way. Do you feel envy?

‍

I want what they have. Do you notice self -doubt? I'll never be good enough,

‍

right? The second part of framing it is to normalize it. This is part of being

‍

human. Everyone compares. Everyone has moments of insecurity and longing, right?

‍

This is part of being human. It's the sign that your soul is working. You're not

‍

broken because you feel this way. You're alive, right? This is the sign of a

‍

healthy soul. It's what you do with it. Right. So reframe it in your mind that

‍

way. When you notice comparison, don't beat yourself up. But instead, notice that,

‍

oh, this is it. This is, there I go again. That part of me is scanning for

‍

belonging. And it's normal. And everyone does it. And then number three,

‍

we get into the final step, which is rave it. Ask yourself, what is a step I can

‍

take? I've kind of analyzed and thought about this observation, right?

‍

I want it to move me toward inspiration, toward gratitude. So what is a step I can

‍

take? Maybe it's showing you a value you hold, something God has placed within you

‍

that wants attention. What's a step I can take toward nurturing that value. Maybe

‍

it's showing you a need for rest. Maybe you need more encouragement. Maybe to find

‍

a sense of purpose. Maybe to find more connection. What step can you take to

‍

cultivate those things in your own life? Whatever it is, always bring that

‍

observation, that comparison back to that plum line anchoring yourself in the love of

‍

God. You might simply pray, God, show me what you're forming in me through this

‍

feeling. Or you might just say, thank you, God, for the life you've given me today.

‍

Thank you for what's mine to hold and what's mine to release. Gratitude doesn't

‍

erase longing. It grounds it. It helps you see your own story with tenderness,

‍

always in the light of God's love for you. When you put these steps together, you

‍

start to rewire how your soul responds. Comparison becomes a cue for connection.

‍

Longing becomes a doorway into greater relationship with God, and slowly you begin to

‍

live from that deep, steady place inside, the place where you know who you are, you

‍

know you are fearfully and wonderfully made take a moment as we close and just

‍

picture that person you often compare yourself to notice what you feel inside maybe

‍

it's tension maybe it's envy maybe it's sadness now bring that part of you your

‍

comparing part of you into the light of god's love What does that part of you need

‍

from God right now, today? As we close, I want you to remember this.

‍

Comparison is a signal, not a sin. It's a messenger from your soul,

‍

a sign that something inside you is longing to grow, to be seen, to be loved,

‍

and God's plan has always included your becoming. It's not just about the

‍

destination, right? It's about

‍

restores your sense of enoughness. It grounds you back in your own story,

‍

reminding you who you are and whose you are. There is such beauty in blooming right

‍

where you are today. So as you head into your week, I want to leave you with this

‍

affirmation. There is no timeline on your becoming. The same God who made you

‍

uniquely is the one who's growing you at your own pace.

‍

Take a few minutes today to journal or pray about one area where comparison has

‍

been whispering to you lately and ask God, what are you showing me through this

‍

longing? Thank you for joining me for this episode of The Best of You. Be sure to

‍

check out the show notes for any resources and links mentioned in the show. You can

‍

find those on my website at And Allison cook .com. That's Allison with one L .cook

‍

.com. Before you forget, I hope you'll follow the show now so that you don't miss

‍

an episode. And I love it if you'd go ahead and leave a review. It helps so much

‍

to get the word out. I look forward to seeing you back here next Thursday. And

‍

remember, as you become the best of who you are, you honor God, you heal others,

‍

and you stay true to your God -given self.

‍

When insecurity takes over, most of us double down on self-improvement. But what if freedom doesn’t come from focusing more on yourself - but less?

In this powerful conversation, Dr. Alison and author of Free of Me and Gazing at God, Sharon Hodde Miller, discuss the promises and pitfalls of self-esteem culture - and why a bigger story of belovedness, stewardship, and connection sets us free.  We talk about how self-preoccupation doesn’t improve self-esteem, why “just love yourself more” can reinforce the problem, and how beholding God (not abandoning yourself) recenters your life with humility and purpose.

In this episode, we cover:

• Why self-focus can erode your confidence and joy
  
  
• The difference between self-esteem and self-preoccupation
  
  
• What it means to de-center yourself without losing your worth
  
  
• How wounds can masquerade as pride or insecurity
  
  
• The freedom that comes from remembering: you are not the hero of the story
  
  

Get your hands on a copy of Sharon's books! You can find them here:

📚Free of Me: Why Life Is Better When It's Not about You

📚Gazing at God: A 40-Day Journey to Greater Freedom from Self

Here are some other episodes you might like :

Episode 99: I Shouldn’t Feel Like My Spirit is Broken

Episode 67: The Inextricable Link Between Faith & Emotional Healing with Cindy Gao

‍

📖 Find a full transcript and list of resources from this episode here

‍

💬 Got a question? Call 307-429-2525 and leave a message for a future episode.

‍

Thanks to our Sponsors!

• Go to ⁠Quince.com/bestofyou⁠ for 365-day returns, plus free shipping on your order!
• If you’re looking for a Bible that helps you live the Word, not just read it, then grab this beautiful one I’m currently using at NIVapplicationbible.com.

‍

*Some of the links above are Amazon affiliate links. If you choose to purchase through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

While Dr. Cook is a counselor, the content of this podcast and any of the products provided by Dr. Cook are not specific counseling advice nor are they a substitute for individual counseling. The content and products provided on this podcast are for informational purposes only.‍

© 2025 Alison Cook. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Please do not copy or share the contents of this webpage or transcript without permission from the author.

‍

‍Transcript‍

“Self-esteem culture” would be good in the title of this. . .

‍

Sharon, I have admired your work for a long time. We've followed each other, you know, online. You're always posting really nuanced, thoughtful things. It's interesting because at face value, someone could look at our books and think we are coming at things from a different direction.

‍

Right, your book, Free of Me, is all about kind of stop looking at yourself, look at God, gazing at God. Did I say that right? That's the other way. know, gazing at God, right? My book's the best of you. You know, it's all about you, right? Boundaries for your soul. Now, that's face value because that is not what either, I actually, as I look at your work and I look at my work, we're both after wholeness. We're after.

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Sharon (01:04.798)

Mm hmm.

‍

Sharon (01:10.766)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

‍

Mm-hmm. Yep, that's the devotional. Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (01:22.093)

Yeah.

‍

Sharon (01:33.538)

Right. Mm hmm. Mm hmm.

‍

Alison Cook (01:34.353)

health, right? And you're focusing on, in my mind, I think about, you know, the greats, know, Augustine, I always go back to Augustine and Calvin and whatever you think of their theology, the soul cannot be separated from God, God cannot be separated from the soul, the two go hand in hand. They're two sides of the same coin. And you're making sure we're staying connected to God. We're not trying to look at the self absent of God. And I'm saying, yes, 100 %

‍

Sharon (01:50.284)

Mm-hmm. Right.

‍

Sharon (01:57.048)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Alison Cook (02:02.748)

And sometimes we have to look inward. We have to understand the contents of our own soul to heal and to understand what we're bringing to God. can't exile the self. We can't bypass the self in the work. Right? that was a long-winded way to say I'd love to just that I'm so excited about this conversation because I think we're so like-minded and there's so much that we're both trying to get at that's so important. And I want to just

‍

Sharon (02:13.805)

100%. Mm-hmm. Yes.

‍

Sharon (02:28.527)

Yeah. And I quote you a bunch of times in Gazing at God and I think that's what people will be surprised. It's a devotional about freedom from self. But the first two sections are about the self and about the goodness of the self. And so I drew on you heavily for those sections.

‍

Alison Cook (02:41.828)

Yes!

‍

Alison Cook (02:45.744)

100%. You are absolutely, I mean, there's just such a yin yang to the work that we're doing. Before we get into the deep end of all this stuff, I want to ask you personally, was there a moment or a season of your life where you realized that your faith was becoming too much about you that prompted you to write Free of Me, that prompted you to move in this direction?

‍

Sharon (02:51.447)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (02:55.767)

Okay.

‍

Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (03:11.501)

Yes. So rewind to maybe 15 years ago. So that's a while ago now. At that time, I was in ministry. I was writing. I was speaking. I was doing a lot of the things I'm doing now still. And at the time, I found the work to be inherently meaningful. So I just I especially really love teaching the Bible. That is one of my favorite things that I do is just to teach the Bible.

‍

And so I love doing that. I loved doing it for God. But over the years, something inside of me started to shift. And the way that I've often explained it is scripture talks about faith as a race. That's a metaphor that scripture uses. And at some point, I started looking to the people running next to me and I started comparing myself to them. And then I started looking at the people who are a few paces ahead of me and needing

‍

approval and acknowledgement and affirmation from them. And if I didn't compare well, or if I didn't get affirmation, I became really fragile, really insecure. It was no longer enough just to do a good job for the glory of God and the good of the church. I took all the joy out of my work. And so I became really insecure. And I remember there's this

‍

this key moment one day where I had written something and it didn't get the reception I thought that it would. And I was just crying and my husband was holding me. And I said to him, you know, what is going on with me? I've become this really insecure person. How did I get here? And so I'm I'm a researcher. And so I started reading books about insecurity, blogs, articles. I also started just

‍

searching scripture for what does it say about me and just affirming myself and remembering what is true, you know, what God thinks about me, how he loves me, his purpose for my life, all of that. So I do this for six months to a year, maybe. And at the end of it, realized it had not worked like it hadn't helped at all.

‍

Sharon (05:31.429)

And I think a lot of people have this experience of experiencing insecurity, but not getting any traction in it, even though you're kind of like doing all the right things. And so I realized that whatever was causing the insecurity, this approach of just affirming myself was actually not touching that thing. And to make a really long story short, and this is what Free of Me is about this journey of discovering.

‍

Alison Cook (05:50.288)

Mm.

‍

Sharon (05:56.959)

is that there was something else that was causing my insecurity. And the way that I often describe it is that I see there being kind of two different causes of insecurity. One is the one that we're most familiar with, which is low self-esteem. And I would define that as seeing yourself in a way that is incorrect, like out of sync with how God sees you or what he declares about you to be true. And the answer to that absolutely is the truth of God's word and his unconditional love for you.

‍

Alison Cook (06:18.328)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (06:26.166)

But what I realized through this journey is there is another cause of insecurity that I'd never even heard of, which was self preoccupation. That when you make yourself the center of the story, when you make something about you that's not about you, whether it's your marriage or your parenting or your job, or in my case, my ministry, it then turns that thing into a referendum on your value and on your worth. And when that thing is going well,

‍

then you feel great. But as soon as that thing is not going well, then your confidence just falls through the floor. And so for me, I realized my self-esteem was actually fine. I was not struggling to believe God's love for me. was not struggling to believe any of those truths. That wasn't the issue. The issue is that I had taken something that was meant to be about God and I had made it about me.

‍

Alison Cook (06:56.378)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Alison Cook (07:22.629)

Hmm.

‍

Sharon (07:23.018)

And it started to crush me as a result. And so that's that's what free of me is about. And one of the questions that I mentioned to you before we started recording that I've really been anxious to talk to you about is in free of me, I go into the self-esteem movement and where it originated, how we tend to blame millennials for being kind of the like trophy kid generation. But it

‍

It actually traces its roots back to boomers, which was really interesting. But kind of the like central wisdom at the heart of it is if you just knew how special you were that this would like set you free. And so it's basically this alternative gospel. And I think that for me, what happened was I I approached my insecurity the way that that self-esteem culture

‍

Alison Cook (08:23.311)

Mmm.

‍

Sharon (08:23.532)

And I think the way the reason that what I also get into and free of me is that the self-esteem culture did not deliver on what it promised. And my the thing that I wanted to know is I kind of have a theory about why, but I'm I wanted to test it with you because you're you're an official expert.

‍

Alison Cook (08:35.14)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Alison Cook (08:42.669)

I want to hear. I love it. I love this stuff. Yeah, let's hear it. I love it.

‍

Sharon (08:49.28)

So my theory about why the whole self-esteem movement ultimately failed, I mean, I think there's probably multiple reasons. But my theory about why it failed is I think that the self-esteem culture on the one hand was putting its finger on something really important. Coming out of generations where children are kind of like seen and not heard and we are taught.

‍

not to engage hard emotions and we just bury it and we hide it like whatever it is. I think the self-esteem culture was a needed correction to that problem. Where I suspect it ultimately failed is that its purpose, its goal for our lives ultimately is just too small.

‍

Alison Cook (09:24.665)

Yep. Yep.

‍

Sharon (09:40.799)

I think it's it has essentially told us that the thing that will set you free is this kind of self actualization that as long as you you yourself are whole and you love yourself and accept yourself that that that is you will have arrived. And I think that for Christians, we can agree with.

‍

the goodness of affirming the self. And this is where what you write on and what I write on in Gazing at God absolutely overlap is that yes, yourself is good. Yourself is a reflection of the image of God in a unique way that nobody else reflects. And also that is not the end point of your life.

‍

that it doesn't all just end there. It's not all going to that place, but instead you your healing is one step into this much larger purpose of loving God and loving others. And so my theory has been that part of the reason the self-esteem movement failed is it handed people a purpose that was too small for their souls and ultimately created its own sickness as a result.

‍

And so what I need from you is to tell me if I have been misleading people all this time or if there's some validity to my theory.

‍

Alison Cook (11:03.618)

I think that's backed up by a lot of research we're seeing as well as just the truth. I agree with you and how I think about it as a clinician, as a psychologist is I'm focusing on the psyche, which is the self in my work. But if I ever get out of balance in focusing on that too much,

‍

Sharon (11:09.782)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (11:23.03)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Alison Cook (11:31.894)

out of connection with God or out of connection with community and others, we have a problem. And you could say the same thing, know, part of my draw to the field is almost the opposite of yours. I knew, I felt, I knew so much about God, I knew nothing about myself and I needed to go through a significant period of time of focusing on the self, not as an end, but as a means to deeper healing.

‍

Sharon (11:59.318)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Alison Cook (12:01.355)

never away from God or out of partnership with others, but because there were wounds that needed attention. But I do think, I think you could almost, with everything you said, we could almost replace therapy culture with self-esteem culture, right? In that overcorrection of hyper focusing on the individual, and hyper focusing on the self, and hyper focusing on self-esteem as the end game.

‍

Sharon (12:16.47)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

‍

Sharon (12:22.924)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Alison Cook (12:31.427)

That's to me exactly what you're saying. That's the issue. There's a piece of it that's important, but it's only a piece of the larger whole. So I couldn't agree with you more. And that's why I love how your work starts there with honoring the self. And I love because you're in ministry and because you're a pastor, I want more pastors to have that holistic. And I think more pastors are getting that. And that's one of the things I think therapy has, I always say I was just at a,

‍

Sharon (12:31.519)

Mm-hmm. Yep.

‍

Sharon (12:35.98)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Right.

‍

Alison Cook (13:01.199)

conference and they're like, you know, it was a bunch of us more in this, you know, psychiatry, psychology, therapy space. And they were saying, what does this have to do for the church? And I was like, gosh, I'd love to see more, not churches becoming therapists, but more of this holistic understanding of the soul in churches, because you, what can happen on what I've seen happen is people replace communal embodied togetherness with others and with God, with therapy.

‍

Sharon (13:18.956)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (13:26.465)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (13:31.212)

Mmm, mhm.

‍

Alison Cook (13:32.056)

And that's that hyper individualistic, it's kind of a riff on what you're saying, right? It creates that hyper individualistic, I get all my needs met here, but I'm not really kind of knocking up against other people and figuring out my purpose in the larger whole. That's not actually true self-esteem. If we want to take it right back there, that's not actually true sense of my belovedness of God, even as I honor and celebrate the belovedness in each and every one of these other people.

‍

Sharon (13:36.032)

Yeah.

‍

Sharon (13:41.611)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (13:49.845)

Right.

‍

Sharon (13:54.124)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (14:01.259)

Yeah, absolutely. Well, that's a huge validation coming from you and I will continue to repeat that theory elsewhere now that I have your blessing.

‍

Alison Cook (14:02.287)

So I agree with you. Yeah.

‍

Yeah.

‍

Alison Cook (14:12.161)

Yeah, I love how you're saying that. And I love, Sharon, how your work comes out of your own journey of recognizing, and let me see if I'm hearing you correctly, recognizing that this self-focus was leading nowhere good to kind of eroding your sense of worth and your self-esteem and that therefore a solution that focused on more self-focus, right? Just love yourself more.

‍

Sharon (14:26.058)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (14:30.656)

Mm-hm.

‍

Mm-hmm. Right. Mm-hmm.

‍

Sharon (14:40.021)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

‍

Alison Cook (14:42.241)

was not the correct solution.

‍

Sharon (14:44.167)

Exactly. It was reinforcing the problem instead of correcting it. Yeah. And part of what really helped me to even see this is, you know, I shared with you that initially I went to scripture asking, what does it say about me? But when I realized that that wasn't helping me specifically and again, there is a place for that. I want to be really clear that that for some people, if

‍

Alison Cook (14:47.875)

Yeah, that make-

‍

Alison Cook (15:03.503)

Mm.

‍

Alison Cook (15:13.22)

Yes.

‍

Sharon (15:13.533)

If you had a lie spoken over you as a child or some wound that is shaping you and keeping you in bondage to shame or whatever it is that the truth of God's word is is really important and is bondage breaking. And so I want to be really clear about that. But when I reapproach scripture and ask a different question, which was when people in the Bible who had insecurities brought those insecurities to God.

‍

What did God actually say to them? That was really illuminating because I looked at people like Moses and Jeremiah and Gideon and Moses is a really great example of someone that God appointed for this calling and he pushes back and says, actually, I don't think I am the person for this job. I don't speak well. We don't know if he had a speech impediment of some sort. We don't know what the reason is, but he thinks

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Alison Cook (15:44.751)

Hmm.

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Sharon (16:12.765)

He is not equipped for this. There's something flawed about him that he's bringing a sense of inadequacy to God. And I think if Moses were my friend and he came to me, what I would say to him is, actually, Moses, you are the best person for this job. you just strictly resume speaking because he was raised in the palace. He was groomed to be a leader. Like if anyone in Israel, really just on paper.

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is probably the best person for this job. But that isn't what God says to Moses. Instead, God says to him, Moses, who gave human beings their mouths? Was it not I, the Lord? And I really love in her book, Women of the Word, Jen Wilkin, she describes this interaction as God changing the subject off of Moses's inability and onto God's ability.

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And I think that's such a great just in a nutshell of what it is we are often craving when we feel our limitations, when we feel overwhelmed, when we feel inadequate for the task before us, is we have centered ourselves in a way that is making the burden heavier than it needs to be because we think we're the hero of the story. We think it rises and falls on us. And we need to be reminded that

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No, in fact, God is the hero of the story. You are not the center of it. It does not rise and fall on your shoulders. And that is a much freer way to live. And so that was really that was also just really honestly liberating for me personally, not just in the instance that I described, but that's something that I have carried with me. We planted a church about seven years ago and it is so easy to think.

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this thing rises and falls on mine and my husband's shoulders. And when we feel that way or if people leave the church, know, whatever it is, and I start to feel just crushed by the weight of that, I remember, wait a second, A, this church does not rise and fall on my shoulders. I'm not the hero. I'm not the savior of this church. But also my job is not to win people to me.

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Alison Cook (18:08.047)

Hmm.

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Alison Cook (18:24.943)

Hmm.

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Sharon (18:32.35)

But that's not what my job is. My job is to point people to Jesus and I can succeed at that whether they go to my church or if they leave my church. I can still succeed at that. And that has just taken such a weight off of my shoulders when I remember I am not the center of this story.

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Alison Cook (18:32.578)

Mm.

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Alison Cook (18:49.199)

Mm.

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Alison Cook (18:56.783)

Gosh, there's so much in what you're saying. It, it's such a paradox. What I hear you saying is when you when you don't center yourself, it's actually freeing. Like the whole it's not about you. It's actually not about me. It's about a larger story. It doesn't diminish your sense of worth or your value or your self esteem. It actually makes you feel lighter.

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Sharon (19:25.63)

Mm-hmm. Yes. And it's because the reason it doesn't diminish you is because when you center yourself, you are actually forgetting who you are, which is you are not God. And so to de-center yourself is not to diminish you. It is to be restored to who you actually are, which is a human with limitations.

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Alison Cook (19:25.935)

And freer?

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Sharon (19:52.691)

And that is not a diminishment at all. That is just reality. And so that's why it's not a diminishment.

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Alison Cook (19:59.6)

So it's so interesting because I'm imagining someone listening who has felt, has never felt centered.

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Sharon (20:12.471)

Mm, mm-hmm.

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Alison Cook (20:15.651)

And well, let me, I'm gonna delete that before I go there. Everything you're saying I think applies in so many settings. So first of all, as a parent, how freeing is it when we have those moments of realizing this is not all on me? I cannot be the perfect parent. I cannot be omniscient. I cannot be all knowing. I am not God. Thank goodness God actually cares about these.

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Sharon (20:31.625)

Right.

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Sharon (20:35.625)

Yeah.

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Sharon (20:41.554)

Yeah. And that your your children already have a perfect parent and it's not you.

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Alison Cook (20:45.931)

Yeah. Yeah, and my job is to do the best I can and point them, but it doesn't diminish my role. And I think intuitively as parents that we feel that freedom. I'm thinking about vocationally. I think that's a tricky one. Vocationally. And I'm curious about your thoughts on this. We need to feel a sense of place in the world that our lives matter.

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Sharon (20:53.183)

Right.

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Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (21:01.172)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (21:11.252)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

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Alison Cook (21:13.763)

that our work matters to me, it's one of the biggest toxins that social media has brought is there's just this ability to compare yourself to people you never should have been comparing yourself to, right? It takes away some of the dignity of just my place in my local embodied world. there is that, there's that delicate tension that we're holding, right? So I'm thinking of you as a minister, I get what you're saying.

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Sharon (21:26.568)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (21:32.328)

Mm hmm. Yeah.

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Sharon (21:39.444)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

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Alison Cook (21:44.182)

My job matters. Like what I'm doing in this community really matters. There's a sense of healthy pride and dignity in this work. And also paradoxically, it's not about me.

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Sharon (21:46.142)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (21:53.118)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yep. Yeah.

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Yeah, so that is actually why I wrote Gazing at God. So I wrote Free of Me and I wouldn't necessarily change anything about that book. But after I released it, I started to notice that, especially in pastoring our church, oftentimes when people were struggling with self-focus, self-preoccupation, it wasn't

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Alison Cook (22:03.993)

Good.

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Sharon (22:29.394)

because of pride or vanity. Very often it was because of a wound. There was a wound there. And the metaphor that I've often used is of like a physical wound. If I were to walk outside my office and trip on the curb and turn my ankle over, I would give all my attention to that ankle. I would go to the doctor. I would ice it or heat it or whatever they say to do. would take ibuprofen. I would wear a brace.

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Alison Cook (22:36.622)

Yeah.

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Sharon (22:58.866)

It would change the way that I walked. know, everything would be about this ankle because it was hurting me and that is really healthy. Your pain demands your attention and that's really healthy. Right. And so I think there's that's a great way of understanding that our souls are that way, that very often what is pulling our attention inward is often pain. And so to say to people,

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Alison Cook (23:08.719)

Yes, not selfish. Yeah.

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Sharon (23:28.052)

there is freedom and focusing on God and focusing on living, know, loving God and loving others without addressing the fact that the thing that is pulling your attention back inward could be a wound of some sort. It felt like there's kind of a missing step. And so part of what I wanted to do with gazing at God was to name, like give attention to what is happening in your interior world so that you can better understand it because

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Alison Cook (23:41.027)

Mm.

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Sharon (23:57.266)

Another piece of this and you have done, this is why I think we connect so well is you've done a great job of identifying the ways that self-denial, which is a Christian teaching, we get it from Jesus himself, but the ways that self-denial has been poorly, badly taught in ways that are either unbiblical or theologically problematic where

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We are saying self denial, but what we really mean is self rejection or self abandonment or self neglect. And so between those two things, I felt it was really important to start with that interior work that our self esteem culture, therapy culture, whatever you want to call it is is equipping its resourcing people well to pay attention to what's actually going inside myself. And then to also.

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start with a biblical affirmation of the self, that the self bears the image of God in some unique and important way to equip people with an understanding of stewardship, that self-neglect is actually bad stewardship because God has put things in you that not only glorify him but are for the good of your community.

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And so for us to neglect whatever God has put in this goes back to your question about vocation to neglect what God has put in you is actually bad stewardship. And so all that to say the reason that matters in this conversation about self forgetfulness and self denial is if we can start with an affirmation of who you are in Christ, who, God made you to be what

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Alison Cook (25:31.437)

Yeah.

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Sharon (25:48.402)

that does is it keeps us from running to these other things, to our vocation, to our role as parents, to affirm this thing that we lack. We don't lack it in Christ. And so it gives us this healthier relationship with those things that we tend to over identify with to make up for what is actually missing inside of us.

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Alison Cook (26:10.607)

That's great. That's well stated. instead of, it's not a false binary of I look to God and so don't care about this. It actually puts it in proper relationship when you behold God. I want to touch on gazing at God because I love this behold idea and beholding God is very different than what many of us have understood and I think that's part of where

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Sharon (26:19.825)

Right. Mm-hmm. 100%.

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Alison Cook (26:40.083)

that misalignment arises, right? It's sort of a bifurcation. I'm either thinking about God or I'm thinking about myself. What have you found in your own life and as you've worked through gazing at God with others about this idea of beholding God? Talk to us a little bit about that.

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Sharon (26:48.787)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (26:55.899)

Hmm. One story in scripture that I think captures what it is I'm trying to communicate with gazing at God is the story of Peter walking on water. So we have this famous story in the Gospels where Jesus is in the waves. There's a storm. Peter has the courage to get out of the boat, unlike the rest of the disciples. I think he's not commended enough for that. He gets out of the boat.

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he starts walking towards Jesus, but then he lowers his gaze onto the waves. And as soon as that is where his focus is, he begins to sink. But as soon as he locks eyes again with Jesus, he realizes that he is secure. And I think that that story is

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A metaphor for many things, I think it's a metaphor for what it is we're doing whenever we worship is we are adjusting our gaze and remembering what really defines our reality. What really defines our security is not the storm kind of happening around us. It's Jesus. But it's also just a metaphor for the power of our attention that very often what we give our attention to is going to influence our

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interior worlds, it's going to influence our direction, it influences a lot. And so this isn't about neglecting the self. It's really self forgetfulness is the freedom from being preoccupied by the self. Like I can't help but run everything through the filter of self, not because the self is bad or because the self doesn't matter, but because the self cannot ultimately be

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Alison Cook (28:32.943)

Yeah.

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Sharon (28:43.165)

the foundation of our security. It has to come from something outside of ourselves and that is Jesus. But that's how those two things fit together.

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Alison Cook (28:52.781)

Yeah, I love that. And in that passage, he still has work to do. He's still part of it. Sometimes I like the idea of partnering with God. That's that alignment. When we're with God, everything just is more aligned. We're still doing our part. There's still meaning and purpose. And again, that healthy sense of, know, I'm in this. I'm in this. I'm part of this. But it doesn't end and rise with me.

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Sharon (29:01.523)

Mm-hmm.

‍

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (29:11.71)

Right?

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Sharon (29:17.807)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Exactly.

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Alison Cook (29:22.223)

I love that. How has do you have a what's your time like? know we chatted for a while. So are you do you have a hard stop?

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Sharon (29:30.057)

I'm free until 1 30 my time. It's 12 45. So I've got about 45 minutes left.

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Alison Cook (29:34.957)

Okay, so you have a little bit of time.

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What would you say to someone who's listening, who feels fragmented? Maybe they feel they want to honor God, but they can't sense God's presence and they're sort of just in that mode of trying to hold themselves together, right? What first step or what really, what's a simple step someone could take

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Sharon (29:52.617)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (30:02.279)

Mm-hmm.

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Alison Cook (30:09.773)

that isn't that kind of self. I love how there's all these words. want to, don't want to say, let me say that again. What's a step they could take that isn't that sort of dishonoring of self, but is moving toward that gaze of God. What's a practical step that you do in your own life to reorient that maybe isn't always like, I just suddenly feel God, right? But that is a

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Sharon (30:22.44)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (30:33.319)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (30:37.692)

Mm-hmm.

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Alison Cook (30:38.744)

I'm taking a step toward God in a very practical, tangible way.

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Sharon (30:43.592)

So one just very early step, this is early in gazing at God as well. And this is going to feel probably a little bit distant from that step towards God. But I think it's actually really important is I talk about noticing your scripts.

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Alison Cook (31:03.247)

Mm.

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Sharon (31:03.472)

noticing the language that you're using. One thing that I learned in my research that I'm sure you already know, but there's a number of studies around people who are experiencing depression tend to use more me centered language. And I thought that was so interesting. And for me, when I'm noticing a lot of I language, a lot of me, a lot of mine, when I'm kind of in these spirals of

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Alison Cook (31:19.3)

Yeah.

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Sharon (31:32.465)

Why didn't they text me back? Why didn't they invite me? Why did they treat me that way? Are they mad at me? That's a kind of a yellow flag for me that I'm not OK. Like this is actually a symptom that something is something deeper is going on and to kind of step back from that spiral that I was in the middle of.

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Alison Cook (31:47.663)

Mmm.

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Alison Cook (31:55.395)

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

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Sharon (31:57.959)

And so that has been a really helpful practice. then another practice for me. And this is this one takes a little bit more nuance depending on the situation. And so I want to be really, really careful. And you might even be able to help me nuance this a little bit. But I have stopped fighting my insecurity and treating it like a threat and that I need to if I feel insecure.

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Alison Cook (32:23.887)

And that I need to.

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Sharon (32:27.546)

I need to kind of puff myself up or make myself big or not do whatever I can to not feel humiliated in this moment. But I've really learned to receive when I experience insecurity to get kind of curious about it and ask what information does this have that I need to hear? Because if I'm feeling insecure, it probably means I'm not standing on something secure.

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What am I standing on that is shaking right now? And that's really important information for me to have to know that I've actually rooted my identity, my value, my worth, whatever it is on something that shakes. And how can I name that and then do the work of rooting my identity on Jesus instead? And so that's how that really honestly has

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Alison Cook (33:17.935)

Mm.

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Sharon (33:23.256)

very little to do with whether or not I feel God in any given moment, but it is work that has been really powerful and meaningful to me.

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Alison Cook (33:27.279)

Mmm.

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Alison Cook (33:34.314)

Yeah, I love those steps because it does bring that curiosity piece about your own soul, which again, we think about David, you why are you downcast? my soul, right? There's that sense of noticing not in a fixation way. How do I fix it? How do I not feel this way? Which isn't good psychology and also not doesn't take us, but it's that more spiritual practice way of, I noticed this.

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Sharon (33:46.152)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (33:51.751)

Mm-hmm.

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Alison Cook (34:02.551)

in partnership with God. And also what you're saying, Sharon, I love it's right. That's right out of, you know, boundaries for your soul, right? Getting curious about the part of you, not trying to make it go away, not trying to fix it with a false, you know, you're doing great, which, you know, parts of us that's not just noticing. And what's that about? And where did I start to maybe care more about what this other person thinks of me than

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Sharon (34:04.476)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (34:13.116)

Mm hmm. Yeah. Mm hmm. Mm hmm.

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Sharon (34:27.718)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

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Alison Cook (34:30.989)

You know, so I think that's a beautiful reframe and I love the practicality of those steps. How have you, how's your own journey with God? You know, right now as you're kind of, I know when we write these books, right? It's often very much in our, in our own space, right? How has your own journey with God been shaped?

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Sharon (34:52.262)

Mm-hmm.

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Alison Cook (34:57.379)

by this work? What do you notice in your own soul as you, you you talked about where you started? Is it easier for you now? Is it more intuitive for you now? What do you notice about your own practice of gazing at God?

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Sharon (34:57.564)

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (35:06.098)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (35:11.976)

It definitely is easier. Like it comes faster. It's not that I don't struggle with insecurity anymore, but I have I have tools to process it and kind of understand it and where to sort of place it. And so that has been really helpful. I have been really helped by no longer fighting opportunities for humility. And when you plant a church,

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Alison Cook (35:14.031)

Mm.

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Sharon (35:40.936)

There are so many opportunities for humility. You know, I really cannot I could not have written a better book to shepherd my soul through the journey of planting a church because so much goes wrong. So much is out of your control when you plant a church. It's primarily volunteer led. And so if someone drops the ball, it looks bad on you as the leader. You look incompetent and obviously you're not going to just throw this person under the bus. And so you just have to kind of take it.

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Alison Cook (35:50.745)

Wow.

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Yeah.

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Alison Cook (36:02.937)

Yeah.

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Sharon (36:09.721)

But I recognize now those opportunities that are embarrassing or humiliating are for me a very needed course correction of remembering what are we doing here? Like I said earlier, I'm not winning people to me. That's not the point of the church. And so if they think I'm not a very good leader,

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Alison Cook (36:23.555)

Big picture.

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Sharon (36:32.955)

That's actually okay, as long as they still love Jesus and are growing in their relationship with him. What they think of me doesn't really matter. And I look so often to the example of Paul and Philippians where he's writing from prison, he's facing imminent death. And yet this is the most joyful of any of his letters. And then you have this moment where other Christians, these rival Christians,

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are competing with him, are preaching the gospel for the wrong reason, are sort of delighting in his imprisonment. I mean, talk about church hurt. Like I would become so bitter, so cynical about Christianity if I was treated that way. And for him to say instead, you know what? It was never about me. I didn't do any of this for me to win people to me. And so

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Alison Cook (37:12.429)

Yeah, good.

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Sharon (37:31.056)

If as long as people are still coming to Jesus, I'm I'm good with that. That is actually still a success. And we have it's such a portrait of freedom because on the one hand, he is in chains, but his interior, his soul is so, so free. And I look to that a lot. And it is it's such a source of comfort for me, because as a leader, you constantly disappoint people, especially.

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Alison Cook (37:51.119)

Hmm.

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Sharon (37:58.768)

Back when we were leading in 2020, I mean, it was impossible. There was no way to please everyone. And so to remember at the end of the day, I'm not winning people to myself. That was something that fundamentally sustained me during that season.

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Alison Cook (38:11.193)

Yeah.

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Alison Cook (38:15.275)

It's powerful and that therefore then I can go on because I understand this isn't ultimately about me. This is, it's such a beautiful paradox. It's such a beautiful paradox. It's what then allows us to do the work. And it's that upside down sort of beauty of, think what following Jesus is all about, right? It's that, and I love it. I think of Adam Grant always talks about

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Sharon (38:28.356)

Mm-hmm. Yes.

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Sharon (38:37.083)

Mm-hmm.

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Alison Cook (38:42.979)

I love that used the word humility. You humility is actually rooted in confidence. Like we have humility when we have a sense of the gifts that we bring. Again, it's that paradox, right? And I love that's what you're saying. You're not saying this sort of false, you know, we hear this, right? This fault, it's not about me, it's only about God. And it's like, I'm always like, well, it's a little about, you know, it's a little about us in that sense that we are bringing the gifts that we have.

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Sharon (38:53.063)

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

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Alison Cook (39:11.423)

and God is using them, but it's always in that healthy alignment, right? That healthy alignment, and it's so freeing and sustainable, and I see in your face, I mean, I can't imagine it's easy to lead right now in our world. And if it was all about your own accolades, it would be excruciating, but when you can keep your eyes on that larger focus, you can run the race.

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Sharon (39:25.041)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (39:32.017)

Right.

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Mm-hmm. Yeah.

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Yeah, because absolutely just.

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As an example of the noticing my scripts, like this is a this is a season of leadership because of everything that's happening in our nation. This is a season of leadership where it is really tempting for me to spiral saying things like how could they misunderstand me? Don't they know me? Don't they know my commitment to Jesus or how rigorously I study scripture or how devoted I am to be

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Alison Cook (39:58.67)

Yeah. Yeah.

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Sharon (40:10.888)

being theologically integrated, like all of these things that I want to say, how can they still think this about me or why did they hear me saying it that way? And when I find myself just running through these scripts of wanting to defend myself, because that's really what it is, is I want to defend myself to stop and say, this is why you feel like garbage right now. Because you're running it through this filter.

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Alison Cook (40:35.108)

Yeah. Yeah.

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Sharon (40:39.674)

that there is no life there. It's not going to set you free. And so to remember, OK, are have I been a faithful witness to Jesus? Are they still good with Jesus? And sometimes that also means asking the question, do I even if I'm mostly right, is there anything that I need to apologize for so that they can still have confidence in?

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Alison Cook (40:39.822)

Yeah. There's no life there. Yeah.

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Alison Cook (41:03.482)

Hmm.

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Sharon (41:09.434)

the church capital C, know, church leaders generally, even even if they're not good with me, I still want them to be connected to Jesus and his community. And so that also means a lot of like dying to self of like wanting to defend myself and my reputation in their eyes. But it's the better way.

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Alison Cook (41:11.162)

Mm. Mm.

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Alison Cook (41:20.398)

Yeah.

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Alison Cook (41:26.457)

Yeah.

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Yeah. that's, that's incredible. I let my readers know where to find your work and find all the things you're working on because I just, my, my, let my listeners know where they can find your work and all the things you're working on. Cause I just, I just think we need more people like you, Sharon. I love what you're doing.

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Sharon (41:49.584)

Thank you so much. am pretty active on Instagram, Sharon H Miller, and then my books, Free of Me, which Free of Me re-released this year with a new cover that's on Amazon and Engaging at God, which just released in August, are both on Amazon.

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Alison Cook (42:05.87)

And I just want to say to my listeners, these are resources, as you've heard in this conversation, that are going to integrate. You're going to find that integrated piece. You're not going to go into these feeling like I've got to set myself at the door. We get to bring ourself into this work. And I just love that you're doing that. And I think it's so powerful and so beautiful. So thank you for sharing the benefit of your wisdom with us.

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Sharon (42:14.81)

Mm-hmm.

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Sharon (42:30.852)

That means a lot coming from you, so thank you.

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