VIDEO PODCAST: Finding the Courage to Tell Your Story
In this episode, I reflect on the experience of making my last podcast episode (Reclaiming Spirituality After Religious Trauma), as well as explore:
Reasons why I was afraid to speak up
How I dealt with my fear
The "Compassion Conundrum"
The importance of prioritizing personal happiness
Post Traumatic Growth
The Fourth Survival Response
ACEs & PCEs
Being better than the "old god"
Why caring is sharing
The meaning of FEAR
And so much more...
There are TWO transcripts after the video (below). The FIRST transcript is of the onscreen text in the video. The SECOND transcript is of the spoken words. So if you just want to listen and then circle back later to scan the additional text elements here, I have made that easy.
Thanks, as always, for your time and attention. I hope you find this informative and/or helpful.
TRANSCRIPT 1: Onscreen Text Transcript
THE INSIDE OUT - Finding the Courage to Tell Your Story
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Transcripts are available at LukeRenner.com
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Two reasons I wouldn't tell my story:
FEAR
COMPASSION
Prioritizing the happiness of others over oneself may lead to resentment and dissatisfaction in one’s own life.
While valuing others' happiness is important, prioritizing it too much can sacrifice personal fulfillment. Balancing care for others with self-care is crucial for a fulfilling life.
An inability to express oneself honestly can have severe consequences, such as depression, loss of purpose, decreased motivation, and even suicidal thoughts.
Despite the challenges and hardships that trauma can bring, it is possible to experience post-traumatic growth as an outcome.
This growth can manifest in various ways, such as increased resilience, a deeper appreciation for life, and a sense of personal growth and empowerment.
Therefore, even in the face of adversity, it's important to hold onto hope and recognize the potential for growth and healing on the other side of trauma.
When confronted with a traumatic experience, the most commonly recognized survival responses are fight, flight, and freeze.
In 'Complex PTSD – From Surviving to Thriving,' author Peter Walker defines "Fawning" as a survival response characterized by an excessive effort to please others and avoid conflict at all costs.
Fawning can lead individuals to prioritize others' needs and boundaries over their own, resulting in feelings of shame, guilt, and low self-worth.
By understanding and recognizing the impact of fawning, individuals with C-PTSD can seek appropriate support and care to heal from trauma.
ACEs (Adverse Childhood Experiences) are stressful or traumatic events that occur during childhood, such as abuse, neglect, or household dysfunction, which can have long-term impacts on physical and mental health.
Positive Childhood Experiences (PCEs) are events or circumstances that promote healthy development and well-being in childhood.
Working to develop your voice while protecting the dignity of others with whom you may disagree can be difficult.
Moving slowly and taking the time to be thoughtful about how you proceed not only reduces pressure on you, it may also provide the time and space needed to see more and better possibilities.
“Vengeance is mine”
Deuteronomy 32:35
Hebrews 10:30
Romans 12:19
Religions throughout history have worshiped dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of gods, making it difficult to give a specific minimum number of gods that have been named.
It is nonsensical for one particular religion to claim that it has the "one true god" because the claim assumes there is only one correct way to understand and relate to the divine (if there is a divine at all).
While there may be many subjective experiences or beliefs that lead individuals to believe in God, these cannot be considered as objective evidence that can be tested and verified by others.
Ad populum arguments that one religion is the ultimate truth because “so many people believe it” falls apart because, at any given moment, there are more people who do not believe it, instead stacking the numbers against it.
If an individual can demonstrate greater love, forgiveness, grace, self-direction, protection, or other virtues than a proposed deity, then that deity is not worthy of being called supreme or special.
As I matured and healed, I found that the god presented by my old religious beliefs no longer resonated with me and felt too small for my expanded understanding.
As my worldview expanded, so did my sense of compassion, which presented the challenge of seeking to improve people's lives while also prioritizing their well-being and avoiding harm.
My goal is not to elevate myself above others. I only want to challenge myself to exceed my own, past achievements.
I now believe it is presumptuous and disrespectful to assume that others cannot handle my changing beliefs.
One of the most practical ways to show love to ourselves is to be true to our own convictions.
Internal conflicts such as cognitive dissonance can lead to stress, anxiety, depression, and other mental health problems.
Chronic stress, in turn, can contribute to physical health problems such as cardiovascular disease, hypertension, and digestive disorders.
Thus, when we are living in disagreement within ourselves, we may be threatening our very ability to survive and thrive.
By understanding and honoring this, we can truly begin to improve the quality and quantity of life for ourselves and for others.
A healthy community is inclusive, diverse, and respects individual differences, while promoting a sense of connectedness and belonging among its members.
Communities do not necessarily need to share the same values. They are able to respect one another's autonomy, protect everyone's right to live as they please, and not infringe upon the rights of others.
Healthy communities are able to create and sustain an inclusive environment that does not discriminate based on factors such as race, gender, sexuality, religion, or socioeconomic status.
A healthy community actively works to break down barriers to inclusion, and strives to ensure that all community members have equal access to resources, opportunities, and services.
False
Evidence
Appearing
Real
Don’t forget the good that’s possible.
There is a saying:
“Hurting people hurt people.”
But this is also true:
“Healed people heal people.”
Sharing your personal story can be a meaningful and transformative experience, and while it's okay to feel hesitant about taking the first step, remember that it's never too late to begin.
Perfection is an elusive goal that can hold us back from taking action. Instead of waiting for everything to be just right, it's important to recognize that fear is a natural part of growth and change.
Your heart is beating.
The clock is running.
Opportunity is passing.
What will you say?
How will you say it?
When will you begin?
TRANSCRIPT 2: Spoken Word Transcript
Hello and welcome to the Inside Out. My name is Luke Renner. Thanks for checking in and spending some time with me here. I put a little bit of my heart and soul into these so it means a lot to me for folks to tune in and listen.
A little housekeeping right off the top. If you are connecting with this on YouTube, if you wouldn't mind too much, please do me a huge favor and subscribe to the channel. If you like the episode, maybe hit like. I do suggest that people click the little bell button. That will give you alerts whenever I post new material. Sometimes I'm not exactly on a consistent schedule, so to save you from having to keep checking back or from forgetting about it entirely, if you check that bell button, YouTube will send you an email or something when I release new material.
Also, just so everybody knows, on YouTube, you have the ability to turn on captioning or subtitles if you find that it would be useful to read along while you're listening to the material. If you want to read transcripts of the episodes, you can find those along with the video in the blog section of my website at Luke Renner.com.
Also, and this is sort of a recent development, all of this material moving forward, starting with the episode just before this one (Episode 16)‚ all of that material will now also co-exist as audio-only podcasts and you can find those also on my website or in your favorite podcast platform. Just search for‚ “The Inside Out.”
You might need to add my name for a little while because I've not been, like I said, terribly consistent, so things may not be showing up as quickly in a search if you just use the name of the podcast. So, either search for that and my name or maybe just my name and see if that ... whatever works better for you.
Let me know, by the way, because I need to keep tabs on that.
So that is housekeeping. And now let's get on with this episode.
A couple of weeks ago, I released a podcast titled‚ ’Reclaiming Spirituality After Religious Trauma.’ If you're listening to this episode on YouTube, I will put a link to that episode at the end of this video. And maybe, you know, on one of those little cards that pops up on the screen. I'll also put it in the video descriptions, but the link will also be on my blog and all that too.
So anyway, since I released that episode, I have sort of affectionately begun to think of it as my spiritual‚ ”coming out.” And I'm using quotation fingers here because even though I have technically been in that headspace for quite a while, privately, it's taken me a long time to find the courage, quite frankly, to say anything like what I said in that episode in a public-facing way.
In general, I am making this episode as a kind of follow up to that one. It's my opportunity to say, “Hey, here's what it's been like since I posted that.” And I'm doing this as a kind of encouragement to you. Thinking there may be somebody out there who has been thinking about having their own public-facing expression of a spiritual‚ ”coming out.”
Maybe you're feeling a little scared or tenuous or hung up about that yourself. And so this episode here is sort of like me reflecting on what that's been like. What the last couple of weeks have been like, what it was like for me to make that, and to put that out, really kind of as an attempt to be helpful to you.
Right. So I'm here to offer in this episode, a little peek behind the curtain of my process, in case that's useful. So that's what we're going to do here today.
Now, I said that, you know, I had been having this spiritual change, this shift happening inside of me for a very long time. But I was not ready to just sort