The Meet Hope Podcast
The Meet Hope Podcast
130: Faith and Anxiety with Pastor Heather Mandala and Ashley Black
What does it look like to pursue a life of faith while also living with the very real, every day experience of chronic mental health difficulties? In this episode, Pastor Heather shares about a recent small group she led around Faith and Anxiety. We hope this episode encourages you in the ways faith can be an anchor when walking through mental struggle, instead of a barrier.
NOTES:
Resources listed:
"Try Softer" by Aundi Kolber
"Winning the War on Your Mind" by Craig Groeschel
"The Worry-Free Parent" by Sissy Goff
"Emotionally Healthy Spirituality" by Peter Scazzero
Sanctuary Mental Health (organization)
"On Getting Out of Bed" podcast by InterVarsity Press
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Welcome to the Meet Hope Podcast, where we have conversations about faith and hope. Hope is one church made of people living out their faith through two expressions in person and online. We believe a hybrid faith experience can lead to a growing influence in our community and our world for the sake of others. Welcome to Hope.
Speaker 2:Hi everyone, welcome to the Meet Hope Podcast. My name is Ashley Black and I am excited to be here with you today. Today, we are talking about the topic of faith and anxiety, and with me I have Pastor Heather. Hey Heather, hi everybody, how are you Good? How are you doing Good?
Speaker 3:Thank you.
Speaker 2:This will come out in about two weeks, but as you and I are talking, you're getting ready to go on vacation. We were just talking about it before I am. Yes, so are you ready for vacation?
Speaker 3:Am I ready for vacation? I am as ready as I can be without that. You know, last load of laundry that has to be done and all the last minute things to be packed, but emotionally and mentally I'm very ready for vacation to be packed but emotionally and mentally I'm very ready for vacation.
Speaker 2:That's good, yeah, well, anybody who is listening who is also getting ready for vacation. We wish you well on your summer adventures. Or if you're away from us somewhere and you're listening, we hope that you're having a great summer. One of the reasons I love the podcast is because it's a great way to stay connected with hope, no matter where you are if you're on a cruise if you're across the world, you know, yeah, anywhere you go. Um, so I'm looking forward to this conversation today.
Speaker 2:Obviously, you and I both have, uh, uh, a passion a passion, a heart, a heart for um the conversations around mental health. We both have a background in mental health. I worked as a counselor before working here at Hope. You are getting your degree in mental health counseling, so we've from time to time tried to touch on this as a topic on our Meet Hope podcast, and so I asked you today to come in, because you recently just wrapped up a small group at Hope. And what was that small group called? It was called Faith and Anxiety.
Speaker 2:And so what led you to run it as a group? So what led you to run this group, particularly right now?
Speaker 3:So I think that it's just something that I see every day, is people struggling with faith and how that relates to their anxiety right, not feeling less than or whatever. So how does faith and anxiety fit together, and I felt like it was the right time. There's a lot of chaos going around the world and people are feeling on edge to begin with, and so those who already have chronic anxiety it's heightened. So, being able to look at it from a Christian perspective and a clinical mental health perspective. I felt like it was time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and just important that those two things can work together and can exist together Exactly. And so let's do a little mental health education before we get started. So for anybody who's listening and for whom the topic of any type of mental health is more foreign, I like to do a little like basics, right, so what?
Speaker 3:is anxiety. So anxiety and it is the definition if you are looking at the DSM, which is the Diagnostic Statistical Manual for Mental Health, it gives us the criteria by which we diagnose, right. So the definition is anxiety is defined as a mental health condition characterized by excessive and persistent worry, fear or apprehension that interferes with daily life and functioning. So it is more than everyday stress or worry. It is a persistent state that can significantly impact a person's ability to work, study, socialize and perform other essential tasks. So it is really. It is excessive worry that will and fear that will carry across multiple areas of one's life. Right, so it's. It is.
Speaker 3:It might not just be fear about my kids being okay, it might be fear about my kids being okay, fear about a car crash happening, fear about an airplane crashing, fear about, like it's this constant, persistent, right. So that's what we call generalized anxiety disorder and that is where it doesn't focus on one thing. It is across your whole life, in all aspects. And then there are more specific as well. So you know, you have panic disorders, you have obsessive compulsive disorders, you have social anxieties. You have a whole bunch of different kinds of specific anxiety disorders as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think that that's the key thing to remember is because I think anxiety is a word that is used a lot, just in common language. And there is just like anxiety. I'm feeling anxious about something, but then there is like anxiety as something that is diagnosed that someone lives with. That is a prevalent, persistent, never goes away kind of experience that interferes with any kind of functioning.
Speaker 3:Exactly, and I think that you know, we all are going to carry anxiety with us from time to time. It's a normal part of life and, honestly, it serves a purpose, right. It heightens our awareness, it causes us to be more on guard. So, yeah, if you're going into a strange location, anxiety can really serve you well to keep your eyes open, you see what's around you, you're observant. The problem is, for people with chronic anxiety, there is never a come down from that. Yeah, there's no relief. Yeah, there's no relief, and so it is. It doesn't matter, it isn't serving its purpose, right? It's our brain over functioning and and often it can stem from a whole host of things, from genetics to childhood trauma to you know you, there are lots of reasons.
Speaker 2:This occurs in individuals, of our emotions, kind of exist on like a, like a spectrum or like a on like a roller coaster. Yeah, um, and and so for us, if you're, if you're just typically experiencing emotions, it's like right, you're gonna feel mad, you're gonna feel anxious, you're gonna feel frustrated or worried or or even like positive emotions, you're gonna feel overjoyed, but like they peak and then you kind of come back to like a neutral and for someone experiencing something like this or another mental health difficulty, it's that you kind of your, your body and mind gets stuck there and don't come down.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we talk about it and the reality is there can be an unhealthy level of anxiety amongst people who don't have chronic anxiety also, right. So that key really is when it stops us from being able to live our lives the way we would choose to live our lives. And one of the analogies we use a lot and I love it is anxiety is going to come with you, right, whether it's chronic or whether it's just normal lifestyle anxiety. It's fine. It can sit in the passenger seat when it starts to drive, it's a problem right, that's a really great metaphor.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that, to me, is one of the ways it's helpful to look at if you're thinking about yourself like is this anxiety? Do I need to address this? Do I need to talk to somebody about this? What's going on? Yeah, these are some of the things we look at.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So before we go any further, I just say that if any of that feels familiar and you've never talked to anybody about it, I would encourage you to do so as soon as possible. You can always reach out to Heather or I to help you get connected with someone, um, but that it's really important that if you recognize yourself in this conversation and you're feeling like you're in a place where you're stuck and are not supported in figuring out how to live your your best life, then to to reach out.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and there are a host of like physical symptoms as well. Right, it's that present. So you may have somebody who gets up and throws up every morning because their cortisol levels are so high and they are so anxious and it presents in their gut. There are people who will get migraines because of it. There are people who will have all kinds of aches and pains. There are people who will shut down, so there are a variety of ways that it impacts our life. It's not just sitting, being afraid to leave your house.
Speaker 2:You know, there's a lot of ways that it can keep you from living your best life. I think that's what makes anxiety, in particular, a really difficult thing for people to kind of like untangle in their lives. If it is a part of them is because we live in a high stress culture. We live in a culture that rewards anxious that rewards um anxious behavior Like it rewards constant production. It rewards that like you're so tired because you worked so hard all the time and you're always trying to say 10 steps ahead and like it.
Speaker 2:it rewards the kind of similar like response in our bodies that also is can be so damaging to us. So yeah, so, anyway.
Speaker 1:that being said, that's a lot of information, but we wanted to make sure we kind of covered our bases.
Speaker 2:But you did a group on faith and anxiety, and so I wanted to ask you when you think about the world of our lives, when we are practicing faith and the mental health experience of anxiety, there are ways that they bump into each other and there is tension and there are ways that they can work really well together and be a strength or a support. So I thought we could talk about both of those. So let's start with how does it tend to maybe bump into each other? Where can it, almost like, become a difficult barrier to break through?
Speaker 3:So I think a lot of it comes in misunderstanding, right. So I think that individuals who haven't experienced chronic anxiety or haven't lived with someone who experiences chronic anxiety have difficulty understanding the depths of chronic anxiety and the inability to control it with just positive thinking or praying it away, right. And so we, as humans, often try to avoid sitting in uncomfortable emotions. We want to push them down, we want to ignore them, we want to move through them. So it is really easy for someone in a church to say you just need to pray about it and it will get better, right, which is not terrible advice, except when it is a clinical mental health problem.
Speaker 3:There are more pieces than that and it requires addressing it as a full picture. So it's not that someone isn't praying the right way or isn't praying hard enough or doesn't trust Jesus enough. So it's not that someone isn't praying the right way or isn't praying hard enough or doesn't trust Jesus enough, like that's not it. But because it's easier to write someone off as well, they're just not serious about their faith, or they're just not praying hard enough, or what that does is give them an out of having to sit in the discomfort with someone, which is exactly what Jesus calls us to. We are called to sit in the discomfort with someone which is exactly what Jesus calls us to.
Speaker 3:We are called to sit in the discomfort with each other and encourage each other. You know, weep with those who weep and rejoice with those who are rejoicing, and I think sometimes we have a really hard time with that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean you and I have talked on this podcast before about phrases we use or behaviors that we have, that sometimes we they've become like cliche and we say them and we don't mean them and that like one of uh oh, you just need to pray about it, like that it that can be tossed off as such a casual thing, yeah, when it really can be a very deep spiritual dish discipline that brings peace to someone's lives as they're walking through something really difficult, um, but but it's gotten caught in that place of being kind of tossed aside.
Speaker 2:A magic eight ball right.
Speaker 3:Like I'm just going to pray and it's going to be better. And the reality is prayer is this incredibly intimate exchange with God where we are changed and we are better able to hear his voice and learn his voice. But when you have chronic mental health, that needs to be paired with some concrete strategies as well, and God uses those strategies.
Speaker 2:Yeah well, the other thing I was thinking about in terms of that too, is that there is this like false narrative, often in our church culture, in church culture not here, yes, in general church culture, in church culture not here, but in church culture there's kind of this false narrative that if you are following God the right way, everything is peaceful and comfortable, all the time and life is together. And it's really funny to me because it is more, I would say, like popular, like American faith culture than what living as a follower of Jesus would look like, especially if you read scripture and even if you just read what the first followers of Jesus experienced after his resurrection, starting a new church experience. It is not that we are promised a super comfortable life.
Speaker 3:No, there's nothing actually that says that, but as humans.
Speaker 3:I think it's like oh, we feel good, so that must be how it's supposed to be, and that's, I think, where that gets stuck I think we often misunderstand things like the peace that passes understanding yeah for comfort in the sense of like I have my, my air-conditioned house and I have my air-conditioned car and I have my air-conditioned car and I have my you know, like the creature comforts that peace and comfort are not the same. They are not the same. And likewise you also get people who think that like the joy of the Lord means that everything in my life is good, so I'm happy all the time. That is not what the joy of the Lord is.
Speaker 3:The joy of the Lord is this deep understanding of God's goodness even in the midst of the bad right, and so I think that gets distorted again, because it's a lot easier for us as humans to sit in the happy emotions than it is to sit in the harder emotions.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it doesn't become a place you live in all the time. It's like a thread that's woven through you. And that is always. You always carry with you.
Speaker 3:That doesn't come from us right, right, it is Holy Spirit bound, right, and that's one of the things too, it is. I have also heard a lot from people well, you're just going to be a Christian counselor, right? And my response is well, I am a Christian and I will counsel. Yes, and there are people who will come to me and faith is an integral part of their lives.
Speaker 3:And there are some beautiful ways we integrate that in. Because here's the thing. You talk about cognitive behavioral therapy. You talk about rational emotive therapy, behavioral therapy. You talk about rational emotive therapy, behavioral therapy. You talk about narrative therapy all of these different types of therapy that are used in modern counseling today. They're in scripture. They're laid out in scripture for us.
Speaker 3:The world just took a while to catch on to it, right? So you know, cbt is this idea of taking every thought captive for Christ, so recognizing our thought patterns and refocusing them onto Jesus. The rational mode of behavioral therapy, again, it's recognizing that the emotion is not necessarily the truth, that we can be feeling one thing, but God's truth is more than that right. That can be the joy that passes the situation and the peace that passes this situation, that our emotions aren't truth. They are indicators and important to listen to. And narrative therapy this is this idea that we tell ourselves stories all the time in our subconscious, from our past, from what people have said to us, from what we believe about ourselves and our world perspective, and so narrative therapy is really truly realigning ourself with what Jesus tells us.
Speaker 3:It's about rewriting things in light of God's truth, which is exactly what the renewing of one's mind is right. So we don't conform to the ways of the world, but we are instead renewed, and that renewal comes when we start to recognize the negative patterns that we have been embracing and the thought processes that we maybe weren't even aware were happening.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, as you're talking, it makes me think about like, yeah, the things that we kind of allow to like rule our lives instead of maybe where is, like, the best place for our hearts and minds to land? So you kind of already answered this and what you were talking about with different models of therapy. But how else would you say that our faith can, that partnering with God through living with something like chronic anxiety can be a gift and a blessing to our lives?
Speaker 3:I think that people who live with chronic anxiety are some of the strongest people I know. The fight that it takes to go through their every day is more than most of us will ever experience, or only experience in our very worst of times.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 3:And so, um, so, that the faith that they have is such a key component in understanding that this isn't all there is and that when I know Jesus, I know there is more, and that I can look to him to see the more. And I know that he can use these challenges, these heightened emotions, these trials, that he can use them in my life and and help me use them to help others, Right. So so I, um, I think faith. I honestly don't know how people go through it without faith. Yeah, you can cause you.
Speaker 2:I've I've been a witness to it too, in in in personal people I know and in people I have worked with. It is a hard-worked-for faith that someone has when this is their everyday experience.
Speaker 2:And it might look different, and I always just want to learn from that, because there is an understanding there that is. That's so poignant. Yeah, so coming out of this group that you did because that's kind of how our conversation started so you did a small group that ran five weeks, six weeks. It was a six week study. Okay, what would you say are your biggest takeaways from the group? So if somebody's listening and they were like I really wanted to go to the group, I couldn't sign up, or they're curious about it, or maybe they want to check it out next time.
Speaker 3:Yes, and we will run it again, probably in the fall and probably again in the winter, so it's something that will kind of recur. I think one of the things that the feedback I got from the people who went through the course was that was most helpful was that there had some real concrete strategies right, some ways to combat the physical effects and the mental effects of anxiety in our everyday lives. But we were able to understand them and why they work through the light of scripture right. So we understand why some cognitive behavior techniques can work when we look at it through the lens of scripture, which was around way before cognitive behavioral therapy was right, and so these are opportunities to learn some techniques and you know the people who were in this group are no strangers to chronic anxiety.
Speaker 3:They were there because this is something they live with right, this is their day-to-day, so for a lot of these people, they weren't new strategies, it wasn't new information to them, but they hadn't looked at it through the lens of Jesus before, and so that, I think, is what they found really eye-opening. And, as we all know, we can understand something and know something and it falls off our radar. We forget about it over time, and and so that being able to sit in it with other people who sit in it as well, and to say, oh gosh, that really, that really does work, and I haven't been doing it, for whatever reason, I forgot about it, I, you know, it drifted out of my mind, whatever, yeah.
Speaker 3:So I think that was. That was huge, I love. One of the members of the group said that was huge, I love. One of the members of the group said I know I feel more peaceful and people around me are seeing it. That's really great they're saying I'm not as reactive as I was, I'm not as snappy as I was, I'm not as quick to need it to be my way. I'm able to more easily let go of things.
Speaker 2:Um, and I think they were really surprised that other people saw it yeah and that's the beauty of of being in a group, in a community, with around others who understand you, who you for whom you don't have to explain your experience to, and then there's already like a a kind of trust. I think there. That then, when that those that community can reflect back to you how they've seen you shift or grow is is so meaningful. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we also are able to do a lot of hey, we're human and it's going to happen again.
Speaker 2:So what are you going to do when this group is not here to solve anxiety?
Speaker 3:right, Like that's not, you're going to walk out of here and you're going to feel great, and then in two weeks, something is going to trigger your anxiety and you're going to be back, feel like you were back where you were. If we know that that's probably going to happen again, what can we do when?
Speaker 2:it happens.
Speaker 3:Let's have a plan. Let's figure out what that is. Who can you reach out to? What techniques work really well for you that you want to pull back out? What scriptures can you read? What books can you read, what? What can you do to re-immerse yourself in that culture of um God's peace and and techniques?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's great, and so you're. You said, you said you're you're hoping to run this group again. Yes, we want to run this group again?
Speaker 3:Um, it most likely we are running the.
Speaker 2:the group did not want to end groups too, and I understand that you know we don't want to be done.
Speaker 1:We don't have to be done.
Speaker 3:So, um, what we're doing next is the book called try softer um by Andy Kobler. And uh, it is. She is a Christian and an LPC, a licensed practicing clinician, a counselor, and she is. She deals beautifully with the idea of allowing God to do the hard work.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah, I had listened to her audio book on a long drive back in the fall and I thought I had sent it to you, or I suggested it to you and I yeah, I particularly really loved the approach of not. I really, truly am passionate about people knowing that they don't have to muscle through life alone and it doesn't all have to be so hard, and it doesn't all have to be so hard and that really, Jesus invites us to. That's what the phrase is try softer. We're invited to compassion.
Speaker 2:We're invited to knowing that we are beloved by God that we are created in God's image, that we don't need to feel, we don't need to carry around shame and guilt and and the weight of what we all walk through every day, whether it be anxiety or depression or, uh or just relationship or things are hard at work or economic struggle, like anything all kinds of things that.
Speaker 3:So, whether it's situational or it is biological, you know we all experience it. It's in some way shape or form. And again, that's part of when we talk about what's your strategy when this comes, when you feel anxious again or when there's a crisis again. And a big part of that is community. It is being in community with others in an authentic way, in a way that you are able to be yourself and ask for help and give help Right, and she deals a lot with that as well and what it looks like internally and then what it looks like when we engage externally.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Well, I'm very excited to do that group this summer.
Speaker 2:I know you are too. So if you're listening and you're interested, as I mentioned, you can find it at meethopeorg slash today by clicking on groups and you can sign up right there. And I had asked you before we started if there was any other resources you would recommend. So is it okay if I just I'll just list these out? Heather gave me a list of some other books and things that was helpful in putting together the Faith and Anxiety curriculum. So we said you know, there's Try Software by Andy Kolber, there's also Winning the War on your Mind by Craig Groeschel, the Worry-Free Parent by Sissy Golf, and you said there's also a podcast that they do.
Speaker 3:She has a podcast.
Speaker 2:Okay, I love podcasts. Same name, obviously Emotionally Healthy Spirituality by Peter Cicero. There is an organization called Sanctuary Mental Health. We actually did a group in the fall or in the winter around some of their curriculums.
Speaker 2:Sanctuary Mental Health is a newer organization that is a faith organization that's really really walking through some of figuring out some of this faith and mental health stuff and it's great and they have podcasts and they have playlists, which I love, and they have articles and book suggestions. So I would definitely suggest checking them out. And I just started a podcast yesterday. It's called On Getting Out of Bed by InterVarsity Press and it's pretty great. It talks kind of what you talked about about that daily struggle for-.
Speaker 3:For those living in a state of chronic anxiety or depression.
Speaker 2:So we will link all of them in our show notes, but I just wanted to list them out here for anybody listening. So how would you like to wrap up today, Heather? Is there anything else that you would like?
Speaker 3:to say. I think, for me, what I really want to say is grace, yeah, right. So grace is a huge piece of this, and I want to encourage you if you have not struggled with a mental health issue in the past, if you've not struggled with chronic anxiety or depression, have grace, because it is an experience that you don't understand and that's okay, right. But know that their experience and their feelings are real for those people who are going through it, and it isn't just a switch we can turn on or off, right when we're in the midst of it. So so have grace for those around you who are struggling and those who may be struggling and living with chronic anxiety and depression. Have grace for yourself, right.
Speaker 3:Every day. His mercies are new every morning, every day is a new day, and there is no failure, there's only learning, you know. So if, if anxiety is driving one day, that's okay, that's okay. We get to start all over again the next day, and so you know this whole process. This is a life of looking like Jesus, right, this is a lifestyle of becoming more like Jesus, and that doesn't happen overnight, ever. It's a process.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was thinking as you were talking and I was trying to find there's a podcast somewhere and I can't find it but I will. If I find it, I'll link it in the show notes. But I was thinking that how valuable it is to listen to other people talk about themselves kind of firsthand.
Speaker 2:Who, if you're trying, if you have a loved one who is walking through a mental health difficulty and you are like I don't understand to listen to other people kind of talk about their lived experiences can be such a gift and a helpful thing, and so there is one particular podcast that I'm thinking about where he interviews different people and they talk about these moments in their lives, and I found it to be a really great gift. So if I find it, I'll link it. But if not, just search, look out, you know, look around, look for people's stories, and it's a great way to just um, if you're trying to learn, learn more, and if you're walking through something to feel like you're not alone.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and, and don't hesitate to to reach out right, yeah. There. Any one of us here on staff would be happy to talk with you, point you in the right direction, support you Again. Life is not meant to be done alone.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's exactly why we even do the podcast, yep, because we hope that you hear something here that reminds you that you're not alone, yep. So okay, heather. Well, thank you so much for being here today. Thank you, and I hope you have a nice and until next time. This is the Meet Hope Podcast. If you enjoyed what you were listening to, please make sure to subscribe so you don't miss a new episode. We put out new episodes every Monday and you can find us anywhere. You listen to podcasts and you can follow Hope Church at Meet Hope Church on social media, and so we hope that this finds you well and we will see you next time.
Speaker 1:Thanks for being a part of the Hope Community as we continue our conversations about faith and hope. Well, and we will see you next time.