God, Trauma, and 12 Steps: A Wild Ride to Recovery
Today, we're diving deep into the wild world of mental health and past trauma recovery with Richard Tierney, an author who's got the AA seal of approval—like, who wouldn't want that, right? We’re not just talking about your run-of-the-mill chit-chat about feelings; we’re getting into the nitty-gritty of healing those gnarly wounds we all carry around. Richard’s got some mind-blowing insights, especially about how trauma can mess with our heads and how the 12-step program is more than just a list—it's a total game changer. Spoiler alert: it involves giving your younger self back all that baggage you've been dragging around. So, if you’re ready to stop letting the past control your present and maybe even find a little peace, buckle up and join us for this rollercoaster of a convo!
In a riveting episode of the Black Sheep Christian podcast, Ashley and guest Richard Tierney tackle the often-taboo subjects of mental health and past trauma. Richard's journey is marked by personal tragedies, including the suicide of a close friend, which profoundly impacted his faith and worldview. He recounts how his disillusionment with traditional Catholicism led him on a quest for spiritual understanding, ultimately finding solace in a more personal relationship with God, far removed from the rigidity of institutional religion.
The conversation navigates the complexities of trauma, emphasizing that the effects of past experiences often overshadow the actual events themselves. Richard passionately argues that society's perception of mental health can be misleading, as it tends to treat the symptoms rather than the root causes of trauma. He introduces the concept of the ‘hole in the soul,’ a metaphor that resonates with anyone who has experienced deep emotional pain. Through humor and sarcasm, he critiques the absurdity of religious denominations, questioning how one can find clarity in the midst of so many conflicting beliefs and practices.
As the episode unfolds, Richard shares his insights on healing, particularly through the lens of the 12-step recovery program. He discusses the profound impact of visualizing one's younger self and the importance of giving back the burdens of past trauma to that younger version. This transformative practice not only promotes healing but also encourages forgiveness—both of oneself and of others. The episode culminates in a powerful reminder that healing is a journey, and with faith and personal agency, anyone can reclaim their life from the shadows of their past.
Takeaways:
- Talking about mental health and trauma recovery ain't just for therapists; it's for everyone, so let's dive in!
- Richard shares his wild journey of moving from Ireland to Thailand in search of faith and healing, because why not?
- The 12-step program isn't just about sobriety; it's about taking responsibility for your own life and perceptions. Crazy, right?
- Forgiveness is actually for YOU, not the jerk who hurt you, and it can be your golden ticket to freedom!
- We often confuse the symptoms of our trauma with the root cause, leading to a lifelong battle with mental disorders. Who knew?
- Finding God isn’t about fitting into a box; it’s about a personal relationship that can totally change your life.
Transcript
Okay, welcome back.
Speaker A:My name is Ashley and this is Black Sheep Christian podcast.
Speaker A:Today I have Richard Tierney and we are talking about mental health and dealing with past trauma.
Speaker A:He is an author of an approved AA book, which is a.
Speaker A:According to him, which is a very profound accolade to have as far as what he deals in this field.
Speaker A:So we have an expert here, how to heal past trauma and trauma recovery and 12 steps.
Speaker A:Richard, thank you for joining me today.
Speaker B:Actually, thank you for the warm, beautiful welcome.
Speaker B:Really excited about being here.
Speaker B:I love your title, Black Sheep.
Speaker B:It's really cool.
Speaker B:I think we've all felt we were actually at some stage in our lives, you know.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B:Especially around spirituality with the churches.
Speaker B:I lost my way very earlier on.
Speaker B:I'm a raised woman Catholic in Ireland, and I just became disillusioned with that faith, all the rules and regulations.
Speaker B:And I remember in my early days of addiction, someone who I cared about deeply, a very good friend of mine in recovery committed suicide.
Speaker B:And his mother was a devout Catholic, wasn't allowed to bring his body to the church or have it in the cemetery because he committed suicide was a sin.
Speaker B:And he wasn't buried.
Speaker B:To have a service in the church or to be buried in the cemetery, and it destroyed the mother.
Speaker B:She's a devout Christian who went to church every single day, every morning and made every single Lent, you name it, whatever was involved, stations across.
Speaker B:She did everything.
Speaker B:And suddenly her only son took his life and she couldn't have him brought to the family church or to the family plot in the cemetery because she commits suicide.
Speaker B:Those kind of things really true me about this thing about being a Christian just really knocked me sideways.
Speaker B:And then I went to live abroad.
Speaker B:I did the geographical.
Speaker B:Geographical change.
Speaker B:When people talk about when you can't live with yourself and you really can't live around your family, you take the geographical and you move away.
Speaker B:So I moved to Thailand, 7,000 miles away from my home country of Ireland to live.
Speaker B:And I don't even think I went to live.
Speaker B:I think I went to just kind of die in the middle of nowhere or something or disappear or whatever.
Speaker B:And it was there I found my faith.
Speaker B:I tried.
Speaker B:I tried a Jesuit church first.
Speaker B:And again it's very.
Speaker B:It's very much Catholic.
Speaker B:And I just didn't.
Speaker B:Didn't work for me.
Speaker B:I tried a Baptist church and that was too die hard, like in your face.
Speaker B:If you don't, if you're not a Baptist, you're going to go to hell kind of thing.
Speaker B:And that was just really too strong and Then I tried a Protestant church in the Presbyterian church in Anglican church.
Speaker B:And I kept going back to this Protestant minister who was talking about just know Jesus, just embrace Christ and live your life.
Speaker B:And if you never go to a church or a denomination in your lifetime, but you become a Christ follower, then you're on the right path.
Speaker B:That really resonated with me.
Speaker B:That really felt it really well.
Speaker B:So he spent a year and a half teaching me about Jesus in Christ.
Speaker B:Which was the most beautiful thing for a man to do.
Speaker B:Take me for breakfast each morning.
Speaker B:We'd have breakfast.
Speaker B:Now you wouldn't take me, we'd pay our own way.
Speaker B:But for an hour and a half each morning he teached me about Jesus and Christ.
Speaker B:I was just a wonderful experience for me as a young father trying to find my way.
Speaker B:And I found my way.
Speaker B:It was gorgeous.
Speaker B:So anyway, during all this time I had developed a lot of addictions because I suffered a trauma as a 12 year old child.
Speaker B:I was filled with loads of shame and self loathing.
Speaker B:I thought I must have caused this to happen.
Speaker B:I must have given some signal to this person or attracted this person to me or it was my fault.
Speaker B:And so I kind of.
Speaker B:I was full of self harm and self abuse and self hatred.
Speaker B:And so because I developed addictions trying to run away from me.
Speaker B:I was really trying to heal what we call the hole in our soul.
Speaker B:I had this hole in my soul and nothing would fill it.
Speaker B:Nothing would heal us much food or sugar or sex or porn or codependency or hatred.
Speaker B:Nothing would heal this hole in my soul.
Speaker B:It was eating away.
Speaker B:You know, on the outside you look at me, you think of that happy go, lucky guy.
Speaker B:But inside I've got this hole in my soul eating away.
Speaker B:And we all know this feeling when we got a deep secret that eats away our soul and robs us have the will to live and the will to be a part of.
Speaker B:No one sees it.
Speaker B:They all think actually is a really cool normal person.
Speaker B:But actually inside is it's eating weirder.
Speaker B:And same with myself and everybody else that suffered these things.
Speaker B:And so the 12 step program of AA is wonderful.
Speaker B:It's a program of people taking stock of their situation, realizing that the book starts with us.
Speaker B:That my whole life is through my perceptions of life.
Speaker B:It's not what you're doing to me or what my parents are doing to me or what happened in the past.
Speaker B:It's my perceptions, my outlook, my attitude about what happened to me or what's happened to me.
Speaker B:That's how I Relate to life.
Speaker B:So it's not matter what you're doing to me actually right now it doesn't care what you're doing to me.
Speaker B:It's my perception of what you're doing to me is the problem.
Speaker B:So I have to look at myself and that's the, all these 12 step programs, they're wonderful.
Speaker B:They get you to stop blaming everybody else, stop finding fault everybody else and look at yourself.
Speaker B:It's a really cool concept to life is to take stock of you and where you are in your life.
Speaker B:So I did that 12 step program in two different formats.
Speaker B:Thank God I had two different decisions.
Speaker B:Now it's something I wish I had 10 or 812 editions.
Speaker B:So it could have done 10 or 12 different formats of the same program, you know.
Speaker B:And so, so you end up, they suggest you have one sponsor for your lifetime.
Speaker B:But I felt it was better to have 15 different sponsors with 15 different ways of doing it.
Speaker B:To have different, different 15 different kind of perspectives of the same program to.
Speaker B:You'd have much, much better attitudes, perspective of life.
Speaker B:And that had worked very well for me.
Speaker B:But out of that I, I knew I had to do something about this hole in my soul.
Speaker B:I had to do something to heal the whole of my soul.
Speaker B:And so that put me on a path of finding a solution.
Speaker B:I don't hug up all the, all the conversations.
Speaker B:So when any of you indication actually to if you want to jump in there.
Speaker A:No, I'm just writing a little nugget that you like that, that you said hole in my soul.
Speaker A:And I, I think that's really a profound statement that anybody can, can relate to and, and the story of just going to church.
Speaker A:Especially with the story of someone committing suicide, going to the church and not finding comfort within the walls that are supposed to what we read, supposed to be a place of comforting.
Speaker A:The fact that you had to travel thousands of miles in order.
Speaker A:I mean it's the same, same, same God.
Speaker A:But you didn't find it in the church.
Speaker A:You went thousands of miles to find that.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's, it's very sad.
Speaker B:I love being a Christ follower but really frustrates me that when you think of every other religion there got one book like the Quran, they got the, the Gita for the Hindu or whatever, the Buddhist, they've got one book, one religion.
Speaker B:We for some reason we have the right God, the right Son of God, the right Spirit, the Holy Spirit.
Speaker B:And yet we can have 45,000 different churches and denominations.
Speaker B:How is anyone meant to know the right path?
Speaker B:So if I become a Protestant and I go to the prophet, I'm right at the gates and St.
Speaker B:Peter says, sorry, wrong denomination, you're out.
Speaker B:Like, I mean it just, it just seems so.
Speaker B:How can we be so pedantic or stupid that we would have 45,000 different churches and denominations to confuse sinners, let's say sinners.
Speaker B:If, if you're in a church and you've grown up in a church and you're a family or church going, you've led that way from the day you were born, then you're really in there already.
Speaker B:It's like when Jesus sat with Virginia with the tax collectors and, and the, the Pharisees said what are you doing sitting with them?
Speaker B:And they said they're the ones that need to be saved, not the ones that are in the church already, it's the ones that aren't.
Speaker B:And for all those who are outside the church, those who are lost, and I was lost for many years, how am I meant to choose the right church or the right denomination if the message is just be Catholic?
Speaker B:If you do it this way, Protestant is this way, Anglican is this way, baptism this way.
Speaker B:And they've all these rules, man made rules that imposed in upon it that you have to do it this way.
Speaker B:How do we find and we're meant to believe in the same God who created everything, who created just two genders, created everything in seven days.
Speaker B:He chose Jesus as his son and he died on the cross for our salvation and then he left the Holy Spirit behind him.
Speaker B:When we embrace the Holy Spirit, I go from being Richard Turney, the son of Dick and Peggy Turney, to Richard turning the son of God, Richard turning to Christ, Richard turning a sibling of Jesus.
Speaker B:And I get to act and live as though I was Christ and try and do as Christ would do to the best of my abilities.
Speaker B:Not being Jesus who's blessed with all of Christ's power, I'm just striving to be the best Christ I can be.
Speaker B:What I need to do is when I look at you, actually I see Christ in you.
Speaker B:When I look at my Thai Buddhist wife, I see Christ in my Thai Buddhist wife even though she's not a Christian.
Speaker B:I must see Christ in my wife and my mother in law and all my in laws, they're all Buddhists and they had this problem in Thailand here where the early Christians they met were these die hard missionaries who were like this big Bible thumb thing, you're all going to die trying to force the Bible down their throat and they turned against it.
Speaker B:And they've no desire to become one of us.
Speaker B:So it's a case of I have to see Christ in every person I meet just automatically.
Speaker B:From my perspective, if I look at you actually or if you weren't a Christian, I would say I see Christ in you, actually in my mind.
Speaker B:And then I have to treat you different because I see Christ in you.
Speaker B:So I can't judge you or be ridic, ridicule you or tease you or religion towards you because I see Christ in it and then being religion towards Christ.
Speaker B:So the goal is that we all choose Christ and then see Christ in the other person.
Speaker B:If that's the cream of my ability to witness or to be a Christian, is to see Christ in the other person.
Speaker B:My attitude is going to change.
Speaker B:I'm not going to go to war against Ashley because I see Christ in Ashton.
Speaker B:I'm going to get war against the English or the Canadians or the Americans or the Australians because I see Christ in the other person.
Speaker B:If we can learn to see Christ in the other person and even just that alone, if we could do that in this world, the world would be a better place.
Speaker B:We wouldn't have all this racism and bigotry and people living on the streets because they're less than us or the colored skin or their religion or their whatever.
Speaker B:We just be equal because we can really be equal.
Speaker B:They be better than us because we see Christ.
Speaker B:And that's the idea behind a lot of this.
Speaker B:I felt the 12 step program allows you to choose your own concept of God.
Speaker B:The AA program and all the other programs allow you to choose your own concept of God.
Speaker B:But I felt for me that was a kind of a catch 22.
Speaker B:If I get to choose my own concept of God, that means I'm in control.
Speaker B:Now if I want to do anything in this world, I've got to not be in control.
Speaker B:I need someone to direct me.
Speaker B:So God in heavens, Christ within me and the salvation of Jesus.
Speaker B:I need to have some powers outside of me that I have to go to and say is this okay?
Speaker B:And I said no, okay, but I can't do that.
Speaker B:Or how do I live my life?
Speaker B:Lord, tell me, tell me how to live my life.
Speaker B:Meditate on that and suddenly have this, this spiritual waking kind of going, okay, I try this and do the opposite of what I want to do because I'm tied to this, this four world.
Speaker B:I'm a human being, selfish, self centered in my very nature and a victim.
Speaker B:So that's my nature.
Speaker B:I'm a victim, poor me.
Speaker B:No one likes me, no one loves me, no one cares about me, it's not fair, blah, blah.
Speaker B:And then be self centered.
Speaker B:And I think I'm better than everybody else and less than anybody else at the same time.
Speaker B:So you put that mixture together and I can't be trusted to be in charge of the show, whether I may hear with you or on the present day of America, President of England, the President of Harmony, president of whoever.
Speaker B:I can't be trusted to be in the show unless I have, unless I have what we call God is the, the, what's he called?
Speaker B:The chief in charge that.
Speaker B:The head, the head hunter.
Speaker B:Unless he's telling us what to do.
Speaker B:If I'm lifting my devices, I'm going to be selfish and self centered in making my decisions.
Speaker B:So I want the best for me and mine.
Speaker B:The best for me and mine isn't the best for you?
Speaker B:And I'm very sorry for you.
Speaker B:But I'm looking after me and mine, especially if I'm Irish, I'm looking after the Irish first, over the English, if I'm American, looking after the Americans over the Chinese or over the Canadians or over whatever.
Speaker B:That's our nature of who we are, belonging to a tribe.
Speaker B:So for me I've got to find a way of incorporating the power of God into this fluff symbol.
Speaker B:But I would take a breath and give you a chance to say something immediately.
Speaker B:Catch up my prayers.
Speaker A:No, no, you get a lot of nuggets.
Speaker A:Let's talk about your book with the 12 step program.
Speaker A:Because you have how to heal past trauma and then you have your trauma recovery.
Speaker A:Trauma happens to a lot of us in some shape or form in our lives.
Speaker A:Some is early childhood, some it's early adult, you know, so there's some sort of trauma that we all can agree that we experience, but it's not about the trauma, it's about how we get through the trauma that really separates us.
Speaker B:Well, the thing is we've been conditioned to believe that what happened in the past is ours to process today.
Speaker B:All of society, all mental health, every single thing tells us that whatever happened in the past is ours to process today.
Speaker B:And this is the big lie, okay?
Speaker B:Science tells us, I've mentioned before, it's all about cause and effect.
Speaker B:Whatever happened in your past is the cause and however it manifests in your present is the effect.
Speaker B:So if you had a past trauma, let's say you were a veteran of a war and you have a memory of a past trauma event that causes you nightmares, flashbacks, triggers, affects your thinking Your feeling.
Speaker B:You set what we call stinking thinking and faulty feeling.
Speaker B:You push everything away.
Speaker B:You're angry all the time.
Speaker B:These are the effects.
Speaker B:They're not the cause, they're the effects.
Speaker B:Your mental disorder, you're diagnosed in the effect, not the problem.
Speaker B:They're how the problem manifests in your life.
Speaker B:But the whole world will have us treating the effect, the mental disorder as the problem.
Speaker B:And we have.
Speaker B:I go through the numbers.
Speaker B:I was shocked recently.
Speaker B:I saw like I know, hundreds of thousands of people diagnosed with ptsd, hundred thousand people diagnosed with depression, hundred thousand people.
Speaker B:That's not the problem, that's the effect.
Speaker B:The problem is the cause.
Speaker B:What happened in the past.
Speaker B:So we have to find a way of getting rid of what's happened in the past.
Speaker B:And the truth is, what happened in the past didn't happen to the you or I of today.
Speaker B:My life exists in these 24 hours old.
Speaker B:And the beautiful thing of having God in your life is at night time when I go to bed, I give God my whole day.
Speaker B:That's why I do it for your listeners.
Speaker B:I get down on my knees by the bed, I hold this, my hands up like I'm holding across and I say, lord God, I've carried this cross since the day I was born.
Speaker B:And like your son Jesus, I fought it more than once.
Speaker B:I've got all my pains, anger, resentments on this cross from the day I was born.
Speaker B:All the abuse I went through, all the trauma, all the rejections and abandonments, all the betrayals, the troubles in workplaces and difficult bosses and colleagues and stuff, all that stuff plays my mind and keeps me from sleeping and I can't do it anymore.
Speaker B:You take this cross off me for eight hours and I imagine seeing a host of angels coming up and taking this cross over.
Speaker B:I want to feel that sensation.
Speaker B:I dropped a hand down to my lap, I went to the bathroom, washed my face, brushed my teeth, get back into bed, put my head in the pillow, put a smile on my face, close my eyes.
Speaker B:I end up falling into an eight hour sleep where I have no nightmares, no flashbacks, no triggers.
Speaker B:All the thoughts are gone, is I've given them to God.
Speaker B:So I get this peace for eight hours.
Speaker B:And then when I wake up in the morning, I back down on my knees and I say, okay God, I'm ready to take my cross back.
Speaker B:And I hear this voice from the heaven saying, my beautiful, my beautiful beloved son, Richard, I've taken your old cross from you and you're not getting it back.
Speaker B:I'm giving you A new cross for the next 16 hours.
Speaker B:Everything of your past I've taken from you.
Speaker B:And all your fears and doubts of the future are taken from you as well.
Speaker B:You only have these 16 hours.
Speaker B:Eight hours of work and eight hours of play to contend with for all of your life.
Speaker B:You may not wake up tomorrow.
Speaker B:You've only got these 16 hours in front of me.
Speaker B:I want you to focus on these 16 hours only.
Speaker B:Practice self restraint of pen, tongue and deed.
Speaker B:Don't try and fix and save anybody if someone asks you for help and you can help without being codependent or people pleasing help.
Speaker B:Otherwise say no and do your job.
Speaker B:Give 100% today and you only have 30% to give.
Speaker B:Give me 100% of 30% but just give me today what you can give me today.
Speaker B:And at the end of the day come back and give me this cross back on the side all over again.
Speaker B:And the beauty of having God in your life and believing in God that you know that you've given him your cross and he's taken from you and he says he's keeping it.
Speaker B:I only have 16 hours to live to deal with.
Speaker B:So today 16 hours for me today was I got this morning and bought the dog for walk.
Speaker B:Dropped my children into the water festival here over in Thailand.
Speaker B:Dropped my children to experience the water festival this morning went shopping with my wife to do a lot of pushing trolleys and chauffeuring when you go shopping and that's just my job, you know it's days chauffeuring and doing pushing a trolley and paying the bill and then coming home.
Speaker B:Then I had a little nap and go to dark walk again.
Speaker B:I did some work and I got prepared for meeting you actually and now I'm here with you this evening it's 8:21pm here and I go to bed at 10pm and being 8:21 it means is after 8:00.
Speaker B:So I only have two hours of my day left.
Speaker B:I have from 8pm now to 10pm all of my pass is gone.
Speaker B:I only have this two hours now.
Speaker B:At 10pm I'll be asleep.
Speaker B:So I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow.
Speaker B:I only have to deal with two hours not 64 years and this 24 hours a day.
Speaker B:I only have these two hours only and the first of these two hours is the last 20 minutes being with you and it's been a joy and I could do this all night long.
Speaker B:I could stay with you next door I was tell my wife and not going to bed.
Speaker B:So it's like, but that's where my life is.
Speaker B:And that you have to learn is that our existence is in the present.
Speaker B:Because God's name is I am.
Speaker B:He tells Moses in the Old Testament, I am, that I am and that you are.
Speaker B:We still know that I am God and you are in the made of the image of God.
Speaker B:We are filled with the Holy Spirit each day.
Speaker B:So we are Christ.
Speaker B:We are an extension of God.
Speaker B:So we have to live in the present.
Speaker B:The only, the only person who can be in the past and the future is God.
Speaker B:The same in the past, in the beginning, wasn't in the past.
Speaker B:And the present future, God is all one.
Speaker B:We can only be in reality, in existence, in the I am right now, in these 24 hours.
Speaker B:And then each hour that goes out of our day, it's 23 hours, 22.
Speaker B:So for me, I go to 6 o'clock this morning, go to bed at 10 o'clock at night.
Speaker B:I have two hours left in my life.
Speaker B:That's it.
Speaker B:Not what happened in the last 64 year years.
Speaker B:What's going to happen in the next 20 years?
Speaker B:I only have these two hours and we have to find a way of getting into just these two hours.
Speaker B:So the first part of this 12 step program is called how to heal any Past Trauma Memory.
Speaker B:And we do so by giving it back to our younger self.
Speaker B:So I'll give you an idea.
Speaker B:So, Ashley, I'm looking at you and I'm probably going to get your age wrong.
Speaker B:I think you're about probably at 45.
Speaker B:I'm probably way out, way out in this.
Speaker B:Or say 42.
Speaker B:You'd be on the safe side.
Speaker B:So let's say you're 42 years of age.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:And you're going through some really horrible trauma in your life today, but you're committed to going through this so that I know the version of you and say 20 years time won't have to, won't have to do this.
Speaker B:Okay?
Speaker B:So it could be a partner, an ex partner, could be a job.
Speaker B:Really horrible stuff.
Speaker B:But you're suffering this and you get, you're getting to it and finally you suffer, you endure and you survive it and you defeat it and you come out the far side and it's like wonderful and it's like it made you stronger, the experience of that and you're a stronger person for it now you're able to be there for your partner and children, whatever you have in your life.
Speaker B:And it's wonderful, enjoys and you can do this podcast and everything's great.
Speaker B:And then lo and behold you're, you're.
Speaker B:You're.
Speaker B:You're looking into the future.
Speaker B:You see an older version of you say about 20 years time, some older version years, maybe 65 years of age.
Speaker B:Going into the attic of their mind and putting out a chest from the corner and opening up this chest and inside is a cloak.
Speaker B:They take this cloak out of the chest and the cloak is all of your trauma you just gone through.
Speaker B:They put this cloak on the, on their back and they zip front this up and zip it up and then they go around telling everybody what happened to you 20 years ago happened to them.
Speaker B:How would that make you feel?
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:Obviously how the how would that make me feel?
Speaker A:That's a really good.
Speaker B:They're robbing your truth and tell everybody.
Speaker A:Happens to them as a person.
Speaker A:It's funny because depends on I.
Speaker A:The reason why I hesitate is because in my old stage of life it was.
Speaker A:I would have felt like some type of embarrassment.
Speaker A:In my new stage of life it's kind of like I don't care anymore.
Speaker B:Oh for me I was pissed.
Speaker B:I was kind of going I.
Speaker B:I sacrificed so much.
Speaker B:You'd be free to have a life beyond my wildest dreams.
Speaker B:And you're choosing to go back into my past and take my pain and tell it happened to you.
Speaker B:It's got nothing to do with you.
Speaker B:It happened to me and I suffered.
Speaker B:I went through whatever it was a year, two years of harming so 12 year old child.
Speaker B:I remember having the conversation with my 12 year old self.
Speaker B:He used a lot of colorful language.
Speaker B:I'm fearful my wife said I shouldn't use colorful language.
Speaker B:Just say colorful language to you rather than using bad language on your podcast.
Speaker B:But he was all F and you name it.
Speaker B:He's saying like what the F do you think you're effing doing?
Speaker B:Taking my crap and bringing it to your present and living it like it happened to you.
Speaker B:I can't cross over into the life into mansion prefer me my father's mansion until I have all my baggage and you're blocking me from crossing over and the only one you're.
Speaker B:You're.
Speaker B:You're doing anything for it is my abusers.
Speaker B:You're giving them life in your in your future.
Speaker B:You're worshiping them, you're honoring them, you're praising them, you're revering them.
Speaker B:How is that helping me?
Speaker B:You're blocking me.
Speaker B:So I had this, this two way conversation where I felt this small.
Speaker B:I had my younger self saying to me how dare you take my, and, and to, to reject my life there.
Speaker B:I've got a beautiful wife, two wonderful teenage children, I call them children.
Speaker B:They're in university now, they both got into university from homeschooling.
Speaker B:And my mother in law is a godsend and I've got great fans.
Speaker B:And I'm choosing to ignore all of this I have in my life today to fixate on something that didn't happen to me to happen to a 12 year old child 50 years ago until it really happened to me.
Speaker B:So my younger self didn't hold back with his colorful language and he really told me to just give him back his shit, give him back all of his.
Speaker B:So this is a 12 year old child using colorful language of me in this, in this visualization he's saying to me give me back all of my shit.
Speaker B:I mean what do you think you're doing?
Speaker B:And it was the most breathtakingly wonderful experience for me to finally realize I'd made a mistake.
Speaker B:I had betrayed my younger self.
Speaker B:And I was set to have self sabotaging my life and betraying him by taking his baggage into my present.
Speaker B:And then he couldn't cross over into the light, which is all we want for our, our loved ones is when they, when they die, they get to go to heaven and be with Jesus and be in that safe place where there's no harm or hurt.
Speaker B:And to think that us taking their past into the present and giving life to a dead thing is okay.
Speaker B:When we give life to a dead thing and we can to our present.
Speaker B:The death and decay of the dead, the dead thing destroys everything it touches.
Speaker B:All my relationships have been destroyed, all my intimacies have been destroyed.
Speaker B:I had to find a way of giving it back.
Speaker B:So this 12, this healing event called how to heal any past Trauma Memory is a visualization practice where you actually give the events back to your younger self.
Speaker B:Now I want to clarify this.
Speaker B:We're not giving the memory back.
Speaker B:We're meant to have all our memories, but the details in the baggage are none of our business.
Speaker B:It didn't happen to a 64 year old man, it happened to a 12 year old child.
Speaker B:So the very first part of this program is you get an A4 sheet of paper, you draw a line down the middle on one side I write down 64 year old Richard and I might have a picture of 64 year old Richard and I'll delete that.
Speaker B:I live in Thailand, my wife's beau, I have two children.
Speaker B:Everything about me living today.
Speaker B:And then the other side of the line put down.
Speaker B:12 year old Richie, lives with his parents, has five siblings, lives in his family home in Ireland and put all his information genocide.
Speaker B:And I can clearly see when I look at both these pages, they're not the same person.
Speaker B:They're two different lives completely.
Speaker B: So for me here in: Speaker B:It's a lie.
Speaker B:We can't.
Speaker B:There's no therapist out there who can fix you or fix me.
Speaker B:I can't fix you, Ashley.
Speaker B:I can't fix any of my clients.
Speaker B:But I can teach you how to claim your miracle promise in the Bible of casting out your demons, of letting go of the past.
Speaker B:The Bible says to us we're meant to focus only on the here and now and the I am.
Speaker B:We let the dead bury the dead.
Speaker B:That's what the Bible tells us, that the dead bury the dead.
Speaker B:And if your younger self wants to leave this plane of existence and deserves this plane of existence, who are we to hold them back and to worship their abusers?
Speaker B:So we have to let our younger self go.
Speaker B:So the first part of this program is called how to heal any past trauma Memory.
Speaker B:It's available on the Amazon platform exclusively.
Speaker B:And this is.
Speaker B:It takes about two hours to realize the error of a ways and to experience the visualization of giving the past back.
Speaker B:And we have to give.
Speaker B:Give it back to somebody.
Speaker B:We can't just pretend it didn't happen and bury our heads in the sand and go on.
Speaker B:People have tried.
Speaker B:That doesn't work.
Speaker B:And you can easily see why.
Speaker B:You actually have to actually like as though we're actually taking all this baggage from her body and holding her soul and the stress on her shoulders, like the way they work in the shoulders and the elephant on her chest, like it's weighing us down.
Speaker B:We can't breathe.
Speaker B:They think all that energy, that black energy is blocking her spirit and say, okay, younger self, here's your crap back.
Speaker B:I'm very sorry for taking both.
Speaker B:You're giving it back to your neighborhood.
Speaker B:Kind of goes, thank goodness.
Speaker B:I've been waiting for 50 years for you to give me back to me.
Speaker B:I take.
Speaker B:And then we go to visualizing.
Speaker B:See them taking it off us, giving it to angels.
Speaker B:They take it into the light.
Speaker B:And when I feel like it's all gone, I see him stepping into the light.
Speaker B:In that moment, it's gone.
Speaker B:And that moment I have the memory what happened to my younger self, but not the details.
Speaker B:So if my therapist asked Me.
Speaker B:How does that make you feel?
Speaker B:I kind of go, no, it just didn't happen to me.
Speaker B:Like, it's not my stuff.
Speaker B:Does that matter how I feel?
Speaker B:I feel sorry for my younger self.
Speaker B:He had a horrible time, but he's gone.
Speaker B:My life right now is living in the presence with my wife and my children.
Speaker B:And I need you to teach me healthy boundaries and how to respect people and love people.
Speaker B:And if you hand to that for me, I'll get some other therapists.
Speaker B:But talk about the past.
Speaker B:It's none of my business anymore.
Speaker B:I let it go.
Speaker B:I've released it.
Speaker B:And so we.
Speaker B:Then we take on the 12 step program of trauma recovery numbers, which is the 12 steps designed to cleanse the carnage and mayhem caused by the mental disorder that we have.
Speaker B:So whether it's PTSD or depression or anxiety or schizophrenia, we use these 12 steps to.
Speaker B:To break away.
Speaker B:Because with the.
Speaker B:With the.
Speaker B:With the cause gone, there's no longer any rhyme or reason for the mental disorders be in our lives.
Speaker B:Mental disorder is born out of the manifestations of the core event.
Speaker B:Where we give the core event away, there's no longer any reason for us to have the effect.
Speaker B:The nightmares disappear, the flashbacks disappear, the angry moods and thinking disappear.
Speaker B:And now it's just a learned behavior we have to unlearn.
Speaker B:And this 12 step program teaches us to like an AA.
Speaker B:We're the problem.
Speaker B:We have to change it.
Speaker B:So the 12 steps, the first three steps, which are either foundation zones, are one.
Speaker B:We're not a victim.
Speaker B:Whatever happened in the past didn't happen to you or I.
Speaker B:When I was molested as a child, he wasn't.
Speaker B:He didn't wake up that morning and say, I'm going to molest Richard Journey.
Speaker B:This abuser happened to just choose to molest somebody.
Speaker B:And I happened to be not in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Speaker B:Our paths crossed, but I wasn't his target.
Speaker B:I wasn't his chosen victim.
Speaker B:It just so happened that our line, our paths crossed, our lines of energy crossed.
Speaker B:And it happened to me.
Speaker B:But it could have been anyone.
Speaker B:I wasn't the target victim.
Speaker B:I wasn't the victim of the case.
Speaker B:And so if I can embrace that idea that whatever happened, like if you're a veteran of a war, the other country didn't decide, I'm going to go to war just to get rid of attorney.
Speaker B:Let's have this battle and have just reach attorney.
Speaker B:It happened to a group of people from your country in a battle, but it wasn't aimed at you.
Speaker B:You weren't the victim of it.
Speaker B:You weren't the target of it.
Speaker B:You happened to suffer it, but it wasn't about you.
Speaker B:We can learn to see that the other person was the problem.
Speaker B:It wasn't the case that I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, or it was my own fault, or I attracted the trauma to me.
Speaker B:Nothing.
Speaker B:I was completely not responsible for any part of it.
Speaker B:Someone else's behavior happened in my company, and I am not the victim.
Speaker B:And if we can get that idea that no matter what happens in our life today, so you lose your job, your.
Speaker B:Your boyfriend leaves, your girlfriend leaves you, your wife leaves, your husband leaves you, you lose friendship or something, you lose your job.
Speaker B:It's not about you.
Speaker B:But there's our case.
Speaker B:They're out to get you.
Speaker B:They're looking after their best interests.
Speaker B:They're not out to get you.
Speaker B:They're looking after their best interest.
Speaker B:And their best interest means not having them in their life.
Speaker B:Whatever reason.
Speaker B:It's not about you.
Speaker B:It's about them taking care of the best interest.
Speaker B:So we have to realize today, I'm not a victim.
Speaker B:Whatever happens, I am not a victim.
Speaker B:And relate that to every part of your life and just accept that whatever happens in my life today, I'm not a victim.
Speaker B:If I'm planning to go and play golf and today with my friends, as soon as it pours out of the heavens and goes, and it rains so hard, we can't play golf.
Speaker B:I can't sit and think, oh, God's made it rain, so I can't play golf.
Speaker B:Shift happens.
Speaker B:Excuse my French, but shift happens.
Speaker B:It's not about me.
Speaker B:It's not in case everyone's out to get me.
Speaker B:Richard.
Speaker B:Tyranny, the rain that affects those of other people, they're out to get me.
Speaker B:I'm not a victim.
Speaker B:It happened to everybody.
Speaker B:It happened.
Speaker B:Whatever.
Speaker B:If the world ends, it didn't end just for Richard.
Speaker B:It ends for everybody.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:It's just a new way of looking at things, becoming responsible and becoming our own therapist to say that, okay, I am not a victim.
Speaker B:It's not about me.
Speaker B:It was.
Speaker B:I am the target.
Speaker B:And that's your first step.
Speaker B:The second step is to understand you're never alone.
Speaker B:Whether you come onto one of these podcast platforms, you find Ashley's podcast, you listen to Ashley's podcast, and maybe you listen to my words, and I offer you hope.
Speaker B:That's a.
Speaker B:That's a higher power.
Speaker B:Maybe it's your dog.
Speaker B:For me, my wife is a Chihuahua dog.
Speaker B:I'm the one who gets to walk him every day.
Speaker B:And if my head is up, is up my ass, I go for walk.
Speaker B:My dog is getting an earful of everything's going on for me.
Speaker B:I'd be talking at this dog.
Speaker B:I'd be giving him all my grief.
Speaker B:I walk around the village, come back, he's a dog.
Speaker B:He doesn't get any of it.
Speaker B:But I've given it to someone or something, and I feel released for it.
Speaker B:So I'll give it to the dog.
Speaker B:I'll give it to a bush, I'll give it to a tree.
Speaker B:We're not alone.
Speaker B:We always have someone or something.
Speaker B:We can.
Speaker B:We can.
Speaker B:If you're having a bad day, go and have an ice cream and you feel better for it and come.
Speaker B:This is ice par.
Speaker B:Ice cream is a higher heart.
Speaker B:Me, now, I won't eat so much ice cream.
Speaker B:I'll become overweight or anything.
Speaker B:But I know now if I.
Speaker B:If I'm feeling bad, I can go to church and pray or I can have an ice cream.
Speaker B:There's always something I can do to get out of myself.
Speaker B:Talk to somebody, go to confession, talk to your priest or pastor.
Speaker B:All I want you to do is listen to me, Father.
Speaker B:Don't give me any advice, any suggestions.
Speaker B:Just listen to me at least.
Speaker B:I say yes, and you talk, Adam.
Speaker B:You vent, Adam.
Speaker B:And then you walk away and you feel better for it.
Speaker B:And he kind of goes, God help that poor soul.
Speaker B:But you vent it.
Speaker B:I mean, you're at an airport and you're going crazy and you see a stranger and maybe, maybe he doesn't speak in English.
Speaker B:To go over, say you kind of go, I talk.
Speaker B:And he goes, and you just spew this crap out of him.
Speaker B:And he doesn't speak in English, doesn't understand a word you're saying, and you spew it at him and he goes smiling and not this kind of stuff.
Speaker B:Doesn't know you're using every, every colorful language in the world, but you're effing and blind and whatever.
Speaker B:At the end of it, he gets up and walks away.
Speaker B:You get to walk away.
Speaker B:And it's like, so we're never alone.
Speaker B:And then the third part is, give God a second chance.
Speaker B:I say this to those people who haven't.
Speaker B:Haven't got a faith.
Speaker B:The sinners out there, the tax collectors.
Speaker B:But Jesus said, the people who need to be saved.
Speaker B:You have nothing to lose giving God a second chance.
Speaker B:So the prayer I share with my clients is, I say, just try this.
Speaker B:What you need to understand is God hears all our prayers all day long.
Speaker B:The prayers aren't what we learned in school or we learned in church or we learned at home.
Speaker B:There are other people's prayers.
Speaker B:They're powerful prayers, but they're powerful for them.
Speaker B:So the St.
Speaker B:Francis prayer or the Lord's Prayer are wonderfully powerful prayers, but they're written by somebody else, and they're very effective for them.
Speaker B:We're just repeating somebody else's prayer, but they're not our prayer.
Speaker B:Now we can take the Lord's Prayer and we can mold it to be our prayer.
Speaker B:So I do a thing where I say, our Father, the father of my wife, beau of my mother, nor nig of my my children, queen in Kevin, of Ashley, and of myself, who art in heaven, who's in my subconscious mind, in my.
Speaker B:In my.
Speaker B:My imaginations, in my thoughts and feelings.
Speaker B:I want you to manifest into my reality of my actions and my words and my deeds.
Speaker B:And you say your name is I am.
Speaker B:I would choose not to attach to the I am in me anything negative.
Speaker B:So I would choose to be happy, joyous, and free.
Speaker B:I am happy.
Speaker B:I am joyous.
Speaker B:I am free.
Speaker B:I would try not to say I am depressed or I am suicidal, or I am hateful or am I altruistic is happy and joyful.
Speaker B:I am love.
Speaker B:Joseph Murphy says, great meditation is I am love.
Speaker B:I am loved.
Speaker B:I am loving.
Speaker B:I am lovable.
Speaker B:Which is basically, I am God.
Speaker B:I am God.
Speaker B:I am God.
Speaker B:I am God.
Speaker B:It's just a really powerful way of saying God's name in the four different versions of love and just meditate on that for half an hour and everything changes.
Speaker B:You don't know how.
Speaker B:So you find out that our prayers are the self.
Speaker B:Our self talk the things we say to ourselves.
Speaker B:We think no one's listening.
Speaker B:There are prayers.
Speaker B:So if you have this pretty face on and you're like, I'm Ashley.
Speaker B:I'm running a podcast, and I look like I'm really happy when I'm thinking going, I hate my life.
Speaker B:I hate my boyfriend.
Speaker B:I hate my job.
Speaker B:I hate this house.
Speaker B:I hate that fish tank.
Speaker B:I hate fish.
Speaker B:I'm allergic to fish.
Speaker B:I hate this life.
Speaker B:I don't like living this life.
Speaker B:I don't like this town, like this city.
Speaker B:I don't like my neighbors.
Speaker B:If this is what we're saying, there are prayers.
Speaker B:And because God gave us a book of instructions and free will, he accepts better excess.
Speaker B:And what if we ask for that's what we truly want?
Speaker B:She doesn't do feelings.
Speaker B:So if you're saying, I hate my life, he's assuming, oh, Ashley hates her life.
Speaker B:And that's what she wants, to feel good and happy.
Speaker B:So I give her 10 expressions of reasons why she'd hate her life.
Speaker B:And suddenly you find everything goes wrong in 10 different ways.
Speaker B:And you know what's going on.
Speaker B:I can't stand this.
Speaker B:No one likes me.
Speaker B:And suddenly you've got 10 expressions of people not liking.
Speaker B:You're kind of going, what's going on here?
Speaker B:Why does everyone not like me?
Speaker B:And this is what we're asking God to give us.
Speaker B:And because he loves us unconditionally, he'll give us what we ask for.
Speaker B:So we have to learn to change our prayers into saying, I am happy, I am joyous.
Speaker B:I am free.
Speaker B:I am love.
Speaker B:I am loved.
Speaker B:I am loving.
Speaker B:I'm lovable.
Speaker B:I am abundant.
Speaker B:I am a rich millionaire.
Speaker B:I am a rich billionaire.
Speaker B:I am prosperous, I am opulent.
Speaker B:We have to learn to change our prayers into being what we want.
Speaker B:And we say it enough.
Speaker B:God will say, oh, yeah, no, he really wants that.
Speaker B:I'll give that to you.
Speaker B:Certainly.
Speaker B:You win the lottery or you get a job, or you get a rent rise, a pay rise, from nowhere you're going to go, how did that happen?
Speaker B:So if you didn't know, it's my prayers.
Speaker B:So we have to learn to pray.
Speaker B:So if I'm working with what we call sinners, people who haven't got the faith, I say, try this prayer, okay?
Speaker B:All you say is, lord God, Richard says that you will give me whatever I want for a 24 hour period.
Speaker B:So right now I'm going to ask you for the next 10 minutes, you're going to ask you, Richard, if I can have peace of mind.
Speaker B:Mind fill me with hope and peace of mind.
Speaker B:Remove the voices from my head, getting to be quiet to get my demons and give me peace for the next 10 minutes.
Speaker B:So just when I'm sitting here with Ashley and Richard, I can feel a sense of peace.
Speaker B:I cast out my dream as I give them to you now.
Speaker B:I see a host of ages coming down, taking these demons, family.
Speaker B:And this moment, I feel a complete release of all my demons, of all the voices in my head, they're gone for the next 10 minutes.
Speaker B:They're not allowed back.
Speaker B:I've been into my nose.
Speaker B:I release these demons.
Speaker B:That's it.
Speaker B:And when you allow my words sink into your psyche, or you say this yourself, you will find you've got 10 minutes of peace of mind.
Speaker B:And you're gonna go that's 10 minutes.
Speaker B:I'll try that for eight hours of sleep tonight and I'll try that for an hour.
Speaker B:Now when I'm going to commute to work tomorrow, not going on a date.
Speaker B:I try that for my 40 minute date or I try that for my one hour interview and just try.
Speaker B:Give God a second chance.
Speaker B:You have nothing to lose.
Speaker B:If it turns out he doesn't hear you, you just listen to your prayers then you'll know he's not there.
Speaker B:But if you give him this opportunity to answer your prayer and you actually say to him give me 30 minutes of peace of mind right now in the company of Ashley and Richard.
Speaker B:Remove the voices from ahead and let me just hear what Richard and Ashley are saying that I can be filled with hope.
Speaker B:Take these voices from me now.
Speaker B:Thank you Lord.
Speaker B:I'm free.
Speaker B:And the time you watch say okay it's 8:34.
Speaker B:I've got to 9:04 to be free.
Speaker B:I sit back now.
Speaker B:Breathing in and only breathe into your nose.
Speaker B:Never breathe into your mouth.
Speaker B:When you breathe into your mouth we aggravate anxiety and panic.
Speaker B:To breathe into your nose only.
Speaker B:And if you can throw a smile in there in the half an hour, help, help him out.
Speaker B:Don't let him do all the work himself.
Speaker B:They say fate without works is dead.
Speaker B:So he's done the face giving you freedom for half an hour.
Speaker B:Smile, breathe into your nose.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker B:And see what happens.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:You know what?
Speaker A:I find a little nugget that, that you see said was to give a God.
Speaker A:To give.
Speaker A:To give a God.
Speaker A:Oh my gosh.
Speaker A:God is going to be so upset but that I said it that way to give God a second chance because he provides everything.
Speaker A:He gives everything.
Speaker A:All we have to do is say yes.
Speaker A:So give God a second chance.
Speaker A:You have nothing to lose in this life.
Speaker A:You have nothing to lose right now.
Speaker A:He is, has given you a moment to be able to go back to him which, which I find profound.
Speaker B:Well if you really, you think about it right now, if you're an atheist or an unbeliever and your life is and it really is, I mean so many, I know so many people who are unbelievers and life is hard.
Speaker B:This isn't an easy life.
Speaker B:You look at what's going on around the world between countries and you name it and how neighbors are treating neighbors and this wokeism thing I really, I'm trying not to get involved in this.
Speaker B:I'm trying to leave it to the Lord to decide the end.
Speaker B:But what does he want to Do.
Speaker B:Because if I can evolve this Jesus, practice self esteem.
Speaker B:Practice self esteem.
Speaker B:As much as I want to go around there and tell them all to show off their orchism, I really have to just stand back and look after my space.
Speaker B:To my wife and my children, my clients, meeting people like Ashley and doing a good podcast and carrying a mess of hope for their clients.
Speaker B:But that's really it.
Speaker B:There's 8 billion people in the world, but the other 7,999,999,000 take care of the world.
Speaker B:I just focus on being the best version of me I can be today.
Speaker B:But if I'm a non believer or an atheist, I say to people I work with, if you're an atheist or non believer and your families know you as an atheist, non believer, stay that way in public.
Speaker B:But go to your bedroom, lock the door, close the curtains, climb into the wardrobe and say, God, I'm going to give you a second chance.
Speaker B:Just between you and me, I don't my family to know about this or my friends know about this, but I'm going to give you a chance to take my demons off me for the next eight hours, just for a peaceful night's sleep.
Speaker B:So I'm going to write down all of these, I'm going to call them out.
Speaker B:So I'm taking them out of my mind.
Speaker B:We're making white and paper.
Speaker B:We're taking it from my mind.
Speaker B:We can speak it verbally to, to a mirror or to a window or something, or to a plant.
Speaker B:This is my list of all the shit in my life.
Speaker B:I'm giving it to you now, but we say God, I'm giving it to you.
Speaker B:For Christians, we believe God created everything in seven days.
Speaker B:The whole world, everything, universes, everything.
Speaker B:And if you can't, if you think he can't take your shit off you for eight hours.
Speaker B:That isn't even a drop in the ocean, that isn't even a minute particle to a drop in the ocean.
Speaker B:That's like insignificant ask.
Speaker B:It's no trouble to him whatsoever.
Speaker B:He can do it in the splittest of a second, the minutest splitters of any second, he can do that.
Speaker B:So you get a pen and paper and you write out all your anger, even at him.
Speaker B:I'm angry at you, God, because who hurt me was a priest or a power whatever or a parent who used you as a weapon, whatever it is.
Speaker B:You write down a sheet of paper, all your anger and resentment, all your frustration and fear and doubt and insecurity, self loathing, all of It.
Speaker B:And then when you've written it all down, you read it aloud and say, I'm giving this to you.
Speaker B:These are all my demons.
Speaker B:And the voices in my head, which I know are not from you.
Speaker B:The voices in the head are belonging to this fallen world.
Speaker B:They're the servants of Satan.
Speaker B:And their job is to keep you disconnected from you.
Speaker B:I ask you to cast those voices out for the next eight hours so I can sleep peacefully.
Speaker B:And all my demons are given to you now in this sheet, I'm calling out to you and give it to you.
Speaker B:When you're giving to him, take that sheet of paper, tear it up, flush down the toilet, wash your face, brush your teeth, go into your bed, put your head on the pillow, put a gentle smile on your face, close your eyes, and I promise you you'll wake up eight hours later.
Speaker B:Eight hours later.
Speaker B:Think of what happens.
Speaker B:It's like, it really is that easy.
Speaker B:If you never go to a church or join a denomination or a man made religion in your life, that's okay.
Speaker B:God wants a personal, intimate relationship with you.
Speaker B:If you end up having a relationship with him in your wardrobe for the next 40 years of your life and outside the public, you pretend you're an atheist and agnostic, fit with your family, that's okay.
Speaker B:He wants a personal, intimate relationship with you.
Speaker B:That's all he wants.
Speaker B:That's the only charge, the only cost for the.
Speaker B:This is you to commit to a personal, intimate relationship.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:Wow, that's beautiful.
Speaker A:I'm writing down little nuggets.
Speaker A:I'm writing down nuggets over here.
Speaker A:If you see my head is down, that's because I'm writing something down.
Speaker B:I think that's a compliment.
Speaker A:I mean, I wrote down like, he made the world in seven days to take away your pain as my nude.
Speaker A:And, and, and that's a true statement.
Speaker A:That, that is a very true statement.
Speaker A:If God can be able to create the universe, create the world in seven days, galaxies, then, then why can he not take away your pain?
Speaker A:And you know, that also is a way of saying that, that he cares.
Speaker A:Like, like pain to us is, is big.
Speaker A:And, and part of it is because when we deal with trauma, especially with mental health, there are times in my experience where your world really does become small.
Speaker A:Like, it's as if you're in a world, but you're not in it.
Speaker A:And it's just like a complete opposite direction.
Speaker A:It almost feels like you're another planet that is within a planet.
Speaker A:And so when you walk around thinking that there's Nothing that can't change is.
Speaker A:Is not only sad, but it's also.
Speaker A:You're diminishing what God can do.
Speaker B:We've been conditioned to be that way.
Speaker B:The whole world is set up.
Speaker B:This is the, this is the most driving industry out there.
Speaker B:It's like, it's a huge industry.
Speaker B:There's something like 1 billion cases of people with mental disorders and there's no case of any mental disorder ever been cured.
Speaker B:Because.
Speaker B:Because it's not the.
Speaker B:The reason, it's not the core problem.
Speaker B:The problem is what happened in the past.
Speaker B:They can treat disorders as the problem because it's not the problem.
Speaker B:So we're going to have mental disorders forever unless we teach clients to teach to heal themselves.
Speaker B:So I went, I went.
Speaker B:I had two therapies in my lifetime early on in my, in my youth, my early 20s.
Speaker B:They're the most beautiful, profound, empathetic people, absolutely glorious.
Speaker B:And they dedicated their lives to helping suffering mental illness, whatever you want to call it, mental disorder.
Speaker B:People who suffer trauma and were expressing depression and PTSD like myself.
Speaker B:And they gave of themselves day and there.
Speaker B:I mean back in Ireland, the wages for someone in the industry was pretty poor.
Speaker B:But you were given long hours and you're giving all of your energy and your spirit trying to help people.
Speaker B:But no matter what they did, I knew, I knew dear deep down they couldn't help.
Speaker B:I mean it was a great place to go for an hour every week and to be able to and moan about my family, whatever.
Speaker B:They'd hear me and I feel like I was heard and they were trying to give me advice and suggestions.
Speaker B:But at the end of the day was a case of I would go in at medicate for the rest of the week.
Speaker B:So finally the rest of the week I'd medicate.
Speaker B:So I got back to another hour of this fantastic.
Speaker B:I started thinking I wish she was my mother, you know, I wish he was my father.
Speaker B:It was a kind of crazy because we're being heard, we have a voice.
Speaker B:And it got a stage where I was rejecting my family of origin and my friends and certainly my whole life was this therapy and these were my new.
Speaker B:I wouldn't be my parents.
Speaker B:And we see it so much and therapists firing or dropping clients because becoming too attached and too.
Speaker B:And we're really stuck in the space where we've been conditioned to depend as a ward of the state on the stage or on that whole thing and not live our own lives.
Speaker B:But God tells us we are meant to live in the.
Speaker B:I am in the moment we're meant to walk around with Christ in our souls and to be Christian and loving to each another.
Speaker B:But we have to forgive our past.
Speaker B:A big part of the, of the God thing.
Speaker B:And this is the beauty of the God thing.
Speaker B:Again, atheist, agnostics.
Speaker B:There's a piece in the Bible, I'd love you to read it yourself.
Speaker B:I hate telling this to, to newcomers, to unbelievers and atheists because it's almost like if you read this yourself, it'll blow your mind.
Speaker B:Absolutely.
Speaker B:So here's what it is.
Speaker B:God says that vengeance is his okay.
Speaker B:This means that if you, if you suffered a trauma of some kind and you're on a vengeance road in your life and you're going to get vengeance for this person.
Speaker B:So let's imagine you're committed to getting vengeance and justice.
Speaker B:And eventually after maybe 10 or 20 years, you get this person to go to court and you get into the court in front of people and they haven't found, finds out what they did to you.
Speaker B:And because the prisons are full with real criminals and there's no space, he gets a slap in the wrist and let out after six months.
Speaker B:That's your vengeance paid.
Speaker B:And you don't get him, he doesn't, God doesn't seek vengeance on him because you've, you've seek vengeance yourself.
Speaker B:So for all the pain and hurt you've suffered, he's getting a slap in the wrist in six months probation.
Speaker B:Are you going to be okay with that vengeance?
Speaker B:Is that going to equal equates the pain you suffered?
Speaker B:But here's the thing.
Speaker B:If you now today say, okay, God, I can't do this, this is too much for me, I'm going to forgive him.
Speaker B:Not to his face because that would be a stupid thing to do.
Speaker B:That would just empower him to hurt me even more.
Speaker B:So to you, Lord, I'm going to forgive him and I'm going to give him to you and I'm going to wish for him everything I want in my life, I want to wish for him.
Speaker B:And that moment God takes up the mantle of vengeance.
Speaker B:Now he can go on and have this magnificent life on this earth.
Speaker B:You might think God, he's got away with so much and he's living this big five hotel, he's big house, he's got a big car and great life and he's traveling, he's got loads of money, whatever.
Speaker B:When he meets his maker, he's going to face the rat of God.
Speaker B:He's going to burn the fires of hell for eternity.
Speaker B:Now I'm 64 years of age and I look back and that 64, 64 years went in an instant.
Speaker B:I can't.
Speaker B:It wasn't like I had this 64 glorious years.
Speaker B:I can remember each one of them.
Speaker B:Some of them went in the blur, some of them I forget about.
Speaker B:But they've gone so fast.
Speaker B:And 64 years can go so fast, but eternity can last forever.
Speaker B:I think I'd first see him getting eternity than a slap in the wrist and a six month probation.
Speaker B:That's the way I see it.
Speaker B:I might be selfish about this.
Speaker B:I want this person who abused me at the age 12 to suffer the horrors of hell forever.
Speaker B:That's as far as I'm sweating.
Speaker B:Forgave this person to God.
Speaker B:I forgive this person.
Speaker B:I named him.
Speaker B:I forgive him completely.
Speaker B:And I ask you to give him everything he wants on this earth.
Speaker B:Give him the most splendid life here on this earth.
Speaker B:Other things I want for myself, would you give it to him?
Speaker B:I forgive him completely in your eyes.
Speaker B:I let go of this and I'm going to forgive him every single day and pray for him every single day until he's gone from my mind.
Speaker B:So he no longer triggers me.
Speaker B:So if I see him around or I hear any noise, I'm not triggered.
Speaker B:And when I no longer trust triggered, I know you've taken them from me.
Speaker B:And that moment I know that poor fecker is going to suffer hell for all eternity.
Speaker B:And there's no way back from as also not just himself, but three generations of his Bible says three generations of his is going to suffer along with him.
Speaker B:So it's like, you know, I'm covered on all fronts.
Speaker A:So wow, wow.
Speaker A:Oh my goodness.
Speaker A:Nuggets, nuggets.
Speaker A:My mind is like where should I go next?
Speaker A:But you know, it's almost when with the example of the person going to court and forgiving them and it's a hard lesson that forgiveness isn't for them, it's for you.
Speaker A:But you know, it also is another way to think of it is, is you're releasing the pain.
Speaker A:Forgiveness is all about releasing the pain in that trauma and that's all it does.
Speaker A:And, and that person, whether they're sorry for what they did to you or not, it no longer gives them power over you.
Speaker B:Definitely.
Speaker B:But also it's about, it's then about between them and God.
Speaker B:So if they feel regret for what they did, it's up to them then to make it right somewhere with God.
Speaker B:So they suddenly give up their life and to become a missionary or whatever it might Instigate them becoming like a pole.
Speaker B:Like anybody in the Bible.
Speaker B:Paul hunted down Christians and true stone and all the kind of stuff, stoning and everything.
Speaker B:He's very involved in hunting town Christians.
Speaker B:And then God, Christ said to him, what are you doing to my people?
Speaker B:And he went, oh, my God, I'm sorry.
Speaker B:And he said he changed his tune, but he had heard so many Christians before that.
Speaker B:And so he became the greatest apostle ever.
Speaker B:Maybe that the person that abused you, you forgive them so much, that is it rubs off in them and then they feel the horror of what they've done to you.
Speaker B:And suddenly they become like Paul and they suddenly go on to achieve greatness for Jesus.
Speaker B:Way past you.
Speaker B:You I could forgive.
Speaker B:How is it I'm the one thing I'm going to achieve greatness and this Becker is achieving more than me.
Speaker B:Like, it's like that's.
Speaker B:God might have put you and I on this path that we forgive somebody and the person we forgive, give, goes on to create a cure for cancer aids.
Speaker B:And if we hadn't forgiven them, they wouldn't have created a cure for cancer aids.
Speaker B:Now, no one will know that we did this.
Speaker B:No one will give us the accolades for our partners.
Speaker B:But God would have had a plan 7,000 years ago that two people were going to be born, one in America and one in Ireland.
Speaker B: podcast together in the year: Speaker B:Or if you have two people and those two people are going to create a cure for cancer AIDS or one of their descendants in three generations, great, secure for cancer aids.
Speaker B:And no one knows that it was Ashley and Richard and Ashley's audience that played the part in this.
Speaker B:But God knows he planned his way ahead.
Speaker B:And we're even oblivious to his plan.
Speaker B:But somewhere down the road, someone creates a cure for cancer aids.
Speaker B:And it happened because you and I met here today.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker B:It wasn't our plan to meet here today.
Speaker B:We by chance we found each other on a podcast platform and agreed to meet.
Speaker B:But it wasn't like we.
Speaker B:We said I was okay.
Speaker B:I'm going to find Ashley and ask her, can I go on our podcast or you'll find me and when I speak on your.
Speaker B:On your.
Speaker B:God planned everything that we'd meet today to carry the message and maybe as one of your audience will get hope from this and they'll go on to.
Speaker B:To get married and start a life and have children and one of their descents will Create a cure for cancer rates.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Or one of your children or whatever, one of your boyfriend's family.
Speaker B:They'll.
Speaker B:They'll go on because of this podcast.
Speaker B:They'll create a cure for cancer rates.
Speaker B:We'll never get the accolades for it, but again, we don't need them because God know.
Speaker B:And that's.
Speaker B:That's like we found our purpose without even knowing.
Speaker B:We've done our purpose.
Speaker B:We've done our purpose.
Speaker B:It's that.
Speaker B:It's that wonderful.
Speaker B:And I think we all have.
Speaker B:We all have a purpose.
Speaker B:And having God in your life is an easier way of finding a purpose than trying to do it on your own.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:So give him a second chance.
Speaker A:No, I think Paul's a great way to end Paul.
Speaker A:The fact that you use Paul as an example is a great way to end this conversation, because Paul committed genocide.
Speaker A:Like he.
Speaker A:He did some serious crimes that in our opinion, he deserved the death penalty in some people's eyes.
Speaker A:But the fact that God chose love and forgiveness.
Speaker A:I mean, Paul is.
Speaker A:Is considered the writer of more than half of the New Testament.
Speaker A:And.
Speaker A: And here we are today in: Speaker A:I don't think he thought his letters.
Speaker A: this long, but here we are in: Speaker B:Gentiles.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Reciting a man who essentially committed genocide.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:So God had a plan for.
Speaker B:It wasn't.
Speaker B:I had this plan this morning to talk about Paul or whatever.
Speaker B:You had the plan this morning.
Speaker B:God chose that we would carry a message of hope to your listeners.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:All this wasn't.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:It is wonderful.
Speaker A:Richard, I just want to thank you for joining me today.
Speaker A:Your two books, you said they're on Amazon.
Speaker A:Correct.
Speaker A:How to Heal Any Past Trauma and your Trauma Recovery.
Speaker B:Trauma Recovery Anonymous.
Speaker B:It's a 12 step.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:On Amazon and basically on every other platform.
Speaker B:But.
Speaker B:But the Healing Event is only available on Amazon.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:All right.
Speaker B:That's in print and digital.
Speaker A:Okay, nice.
Speaker A:So anyway, there.
Speaker A:There is no excuse.
Speaker A:You can have it in paper, you can have in digital.
Speaker A:Put it together for you to be able to move on.
Speaker B:Isn't that God, My head's swelling out here.
Speaker B:My head is going so big now it's all about me.
Speaker B:But I better watch that.
Speaker A:Oh, but no, I mean, to.
Speaker A:To be able to.
Speaker A:Your story is very powerful.
Speaker A:And to be.
Speaker A:Recover from that.
Speaker A:And not only just that, because there's one thing to recover and then there's one thing to be healed to the point where you are able to talk about your testimony and to be able to take the time to create a plan that was approved.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker A:By AA so others can be able to heal from that is.
Speaker A:Is extraordinary.
Speaker B:Thank you very much.
Speaker A:Yeah, it's extraordinary.
Speaker A:Richard.
Speaker A:I hope we're going to have these conversations again.
Speaker B:I look forward to it.
Speaker B:I look forward to.
Speaker B:It's really a great pleasure.
Speaker B:Thank you very much.
Speaker B:Ashley, it was wonderful.
Speaker B:You put your light on your fish tank.
Speaker A:Well, it's.
Speaker A:No, it's.
Speaker A:It's a timer.
Speaker A:It's a timer.
Speaker A:Joe, great picture.
Speaker A:Right, right, right.
Speaker A:It's time for the fish to wake up and start their day.
Speaker B:Thank you very much.
Speaker B:Really enjoyed it.
Speaker B:Super.
Speaker B:And your audience, thank you for listening to me.
Speaker B:I hope I've offered you some glimmer of hope, you know.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B:Just give God a second chance.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:And if you're talking to a non believer, it's just simple.
Speaker B:Say give God a second chance.
Speaker B:There's no catch.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Beautiful.
