When the Backpack Becomes a Steamer Trunk: Grief, Fatigue, and the Weight We Carry

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0:44 Denzel Washington, Welcome to Inspire Vision. Our sole purpose is to elevate the lives of others and to inspire you to do the same. Laura, welcome to the show. Thank you Doug for having me. Hey, I'm excited about having you. As I mentioned before we actually started recording, as I read more about you, your bio and the things that you're doing, it resonated so well with me. I thought, Wow, I'm just really looking forward to this conversation. But before we get started, I'd like you to kind of share with the audience who you are and what was your journey that brought you to this point of doing what you're doing. Well. I'm a licensed minister, I'm the voice behind at the counter with the baking pastor, and I've authored a book in a journal. But all of this really started when I had a breast cancer journey and I had to learn that life can stop and it's okay, you don't have to hold it all together. And the more I work through that, I realized I'm not the only one who's struggling with that, with burnout, with spiritual mental exhaustion, and so I realized that as I was getting my degree in pastoral counseling, that I really wanted to hope folks who were navigating what I was navigating.

2:01 So that's how it all came together. And as you talk about spiritual you'll find I love to define works because for everybody a word might mean something different. So for the audience to find what you mean by spiritual journey. My case, I'm a Christian, and so spiritual journey for me is leaning into God, leaning into the Bible. But for others it could be the higher power of the universe, whatever is their comfort zone. So I do come from a Christian lens, but I do realize not everybody does. Yeah, and I think that's important. I do also, by the way, but I think that's important for everybody that's listening that you know, there's no focus on just quote Christianity when we talk about spiritual it applies to everybody, regardless of what their inclinations are believes because but I think the one point that I think is so important, and I've kind of started to focus on this a little bit with my other social media project, is that truly within each one of us is that divine spark.

3:06 And I think that even for people who haven't really thought about it from that perspective, understanding that within themselves is that goodness that nobody or oftentimes many people don't recognize lies within them. I agree. I agree, there's a lot of things inside us that if we would lean into and tap into, we could have more answers and more comfort and be able to work on some of our own our own baggage. So your main focus now is what just for working with people who are struggling with burnout and those type. Of things, kind of a combination. I like to work with folks who are just struggling in general. Burnouts usually one of them. Maybe they're physically mentally exhausted, maybe they've been to a bad season.

3:59 Often it's it's a loss. But when I say that, people go, well, no one died, But I do a lot of work with grief, and so grief is not just death. It's forty plus other things. And so when I say you know loss, they say, oh, well, no one died. And I said, but have you changed? Have you had any change lately, because any change may or may not need to be grieved, And they say, oh, I broke up with my person, I change jobs, my child moved from elementary to middle school. So any change it is a loss that you may need to grieve. And so when they start realizing that they probably are grieving something and we can work on that, then things start to feel lighter and freer. They feel like layers come off them. And it's just it's unique because everybody, like I said, everybody always goes to oh it's death.

4:50 But it's not just death. But we can have so much heavy baggage wrapped around the grief and the guilt and the shame that we feel because you know, we're carrying all that package. Yeah, And you know what's interesting is and I love how you talk about the fact that you know, sometimes we don't even know that we're experiencing that there's just something that seems to be missing. And I know that you talk a little bit about what emotional and spiritual fatigue looks like. Share with the audience your experience about people who are really experiencing that emotional that spiritual fatigue and what does that look like in their life and how do they suddenly become aware that while this is what's going on, they're getting some clarity so that they can then start looking deeper within themselves.

5:38 Emotional usually comes first. There's things that start happening in the world, in their daily life, and it just feels like there's this snowball rolling down this huge mountain and collects every emotion that they could possibly come up with. Shame because they didn't make the cupcakes for their kids' lunch that they needed to have special, or they missed a meeting or a deadline, and all these things start compiling, and when they do, they just feel so exhausted. Then they try and reach out for their spiritual side, and they often find that it's either missing or lacking or they don't feel connected, and so then they feel bad about that, and so it just continues to be this huge baggage. In some cases, it goes from being like someone's backpack to a steamer trunk to maybe a full blown cruise ship. I mean that just feels what they're lugging around, and they don't know what it is. They just know they wake up tired, they go to bed tired, They're tired all day every day, and it just feels like everything just adds on. And so when they finally stop and say something's not right, I don't know what it is. And I get referred to them, and they meet with me and we'll start unpacking some of the layers and give them a chance to pause and look at what's going on. They're usually surprised at all the stuff they're lugging around and then confused on how to deal with it, because you've got a whole steamer trunk of stuff?

7:08 What do you do with it? Well, and as we talk about spiritual fatigue, and again, if we really look at that and depth, for me, I look at that there's not that communication. There's not that sense of internal sense of goodness and love and whatever and peace, really feeling that sense of peace and enjoy in our lives. And yet on a daily basis, we're experience we're not experiencing that, And so that's where I see that spiritual gap and fatigue really comes into play. And gratitude, I mean, take time every day for the little things. As I walk to get my mail.

7:48 We live in the country and I'll notice a butterfly or a flower coming up, a tree, a cloud, and I stop and pause, and you know, I'm grateful that we have a light wind in today, or that we have the sun today. I'm grateful for the flowers because that means there's crops growing and we'll have food. I'm grateful for the truckers who bring the food to us. So I kind of take it all the way back. But the little bits of gratitude can go a really long way. Oh that's so true. And you know, as people are listening to this, and obviously they're just starting to listen, but as they listen and they're thinking to themselves, you know what I am feeling that fatigue, that emotional fatigue, that spiritual fatigue that I'm not really experience in what I know I really desire to experience. What becomes the next step for them? If they can ultimately just realize that while I'm feeling that, then what's my next step?

8:50 What do you suggest to people their next step is? I suggest they go get an actual physical journal, paper and pen or favorite writing and you take a few moments and I call it a brain dump. Whatever is rattling around in your brain, just get it out on paper. People like, oh, I'll just type in my phone. No, no, no, you need that connection from your brain down your arm to your hand writing. It doesn't have to look pretty on the page. It doesn't have to be orderly or bullet pointed. Just like, throw up on the page and get it all out there. And then once you see it, you have a little more clarity because it's not all running around in your head. And then you can just pick one one of those topics and lean into that. What are you feeling with that topic?

9:35 Is it serving you? Is it a burden? Is it something you want to continue with? Is it something you really have no desire to do anymore? Or no season that it doesn't make sense to still have, and then as you work on that one thing, you'll notice a little lightness, and then when you're ready, you can come back and look at the second thing, and if more things start messing around in your head, add them to the big list. You're not carrying them around. I love people to do it, especially at night before they go to bed, because if they don't, their brain like going one hundred miles an hour and they're not able to sleep, and then of course they're already tired, so they're needing the rest. But if you can get it. All out, and then in the morning, after you've rested, come back and look at that journal, what's going on?

10:21 And pause with it? You know, am I really? Am? I tired? I'm tired, But what's behind it? Is it I'm overworked, I'm overwhelmed. Whatever's going on? Well, And for those of us that do not like to sit down and write, my handwriting sucks, and so I'm not really journal. But here's one thing I've learned to do, which I'll love to get your opinion on. For those that may not choose the journal, and this may be even more difficult, but what I love to do is to actually just get on to my phone or onto my computer whenever, and actually dictate and just talk talk about what I'm feeling, talk about my experience, and record that and then listen back to that recording and go okay, because I find that if I verbalize what I'm experiencing or what I'm feeling, oftentimes that is for me as powerful as writing it down and trying to read it.

11:20 I like that idea, but I realized that there are people who are going to be challenged at hearing themselves. Number one, hearing themselves talk on a recording, but hearing back and the fear that maybe somebody else will hear what they're saying, but then not being able to see the whole picture. That's really why I like it written down. And it doesn't matter if it's in chicken scratch, if it's misspelled, if whatever, as long as you can tell what's there. But that reflection back is really really important, because if you do a recording, then the only challenge is you know you're going to have to go back and listen to it. Okay, do I want to work on this? Okay, go forward. Do I want to work on this, but maybe a little more challenging to do that, but being able to reflect is huge and say it, because if you can't see it so that you can name it and then be able to claim it and work on it, then you're going to have challenges. I was working with someone yesterday who said, why can I not sleep? Why do I not feel safe? And I said, because you've been doing some work of your abuse, and that abuse is making you feel unsafe again and it's taking you back.

12:25 I said, so what we need to do to make your bedroom safe? And so we came up with a plan. Because the brain does some really weird, amazing things, but sometimes it does things that kind of throw us off our balance well. And so have you found as you work with a number of people that there's some commonality in some of the issues that they're facing. You know, for instance, you know you're talking about abuse, and that obviously is a major one. Have you found that there are other common issues that people seem to really deal with that are causing that discomfort and that fatigue. What I found with working with a number of folks through trauma and abuse is that they go through and get all the counseling for that, but they're still not over it because they haven't done the grief work. Probably ninety five percent of the trauma and abuse people who come to me have never grieved that they lost their childhood or their sense of their body, or the freedom to make their own choices, the change that that particular incident made in their life. And when they sit down and realize all the things that that caused or caused them not to be able to do and start working on it, then it's like, so you know again, it's getting back to that root cause of what's going on. Yes, you can work on some of the surface stuff, but a lot of trauma abuse is rooted in grief. A lot of folks who've been through who were children of divorces that didn't go well, the same thing. They grieve

13:59 the childhood that they missed, or they saw their friends doing things, or maybe they had a parent who was ill and they had to help with the other children, so they didn't get to be the normal child out playing and having friends and sleepovers and all that. They really had to become an adult, and oftentimes they really regret, and I'm like, well, then go out and just have fun, go do something childlike, there's nothing wrong with that. Well, and as you talk about grief, and you know, as you were talking, I was thinking about myself as I was growing up. My dad was extremely successful as a college professor, a local teacher, but he was so focused on that that there's a lot of things my friends were doing that I wasn't able to do. And you know, that just came up in my mind as you were talking, and then I think, how would I grieve that? So, as you talk about grief, as people are listening to us, what is number one? We know what grief is, you're feeling bad, whatever that happens to be.

14:59 But how does someone actually work through grief consciously to where they can start to put that a little bit away so it's not affecting them. Well, I use a program to help them with that, But if they're not using that particular program, suggestions would be name what it is. So if you were talking about your childhood. And you realize that there were things you missed out maybe not doing with your dad father son thinks you know, obviously you can't go always and recreate those especially if that person is no longer with us, But can you be okay? Can you acknowledge what was really missed? Now that you're alerted to it, can you go back and spend some time and think through what was it I actually missed and how did that really impact me? You know, if dad had taken me fishing, you know what, I've become a really good fisherman and had a great hobby.

15:56 Or if we had done road trips together, what I've you know, learn more places to go? What would that experience maybe have taught you that you didn't necessarily get And then after you again, name it, you know you can own it, claim it and say, Okay, I didn't I didn't get to do that like my friends did. And am I okay with that? And if you can be okay with that you my suggestion would be to dictate. In your case, I would normally suggest writing, but write a letter. Dictate a letter to your dad and to say, hey, I've been I've just been reviewing our relationship and what I realized is we never got to do And you know, I apologize if there's anything I need to apologize for. I forgive you for working. Yes, I know you were working and that was your job and you were providing for us and that's great, but I forgive you for not being there to take me.

16:52 Fishing or on that road trip or more father son. Time, and explain maybe I saw my friends doing all these cool things with their dads and that really that really hurt me, and I didn't realize it at the time, but looking back, it really hurt me. And then when you're done, just sign the letter, you know, love Doug until next time. And I call it a PS letter. So if you're if things come up, because once you start rattling that cage, there's gonna be more that comes up, make a couple notes in your phone or on your journal of the different topics that pop up that you may still need to address in a PS letter. So instead of like you've written your letter and then a PS at the end, be like, hey dad, you know, I've been really thinking this through and there's a couple more things that.

17:34 Are still kind of nagged at me. And then verbalize that and. So and I do. I do love. In fact, I encourage people to write in their journal too, so don't misunderstand me. But but as people do that, now, when I I'm writing a letter to my dad, my dad's not here anymore, so that's That's what I wanted to point out is that really what you're talking is you're writing a letter to someone. You may never send that letter to, but the key is is that you're writing it, and you're to write gaining that clarity. Ideally, you need to write it and you need to read it to someone. Now, if that person's no longer here, find a trusted person that you can read it to who will be judgment free and just be there to listen.

18:19 They don't have to comment, they don't have to acknowledge, they just need to hear it. And that act of verbalizing it out into the universe is really powerful. It's being able to just okay, I'm done with that. Yeah, well you and you mentioned something. I'm sorry, it didn't mean to interrupt there. You mentioned something about you have your own methodology to help people work through grief. Is that something in your book? Is it something that people can read outside of your book if it's not there, or is that a proprietary methodology that belongs to you. It's a methodology I was trained in. It's called the Grief Recovery Method, and so I really really enjoy it.

19:00 It is an eight week program and so it has been studied at the university level. It absolutely works on pretty much any type of grief. The program says from moving beyond death, divorce, and other losses including health, career and faith. So I actually went to take that program because I was grieving the loss of being able. To have children after cancer. Part of my cancer, I ended up with ovarian cancer as well, and so they removed my ovaries. And at that point my husband and I had only. Been married a year and a half and we were trying for kids, and when they said we don't have time to move all the stuff around to make it possible, it was really that hit hard. I knew I was having reconstruction surgery. So some people do grieve the loss of body parts that it's their identity. That wasn't the case, but in my case, I was just grieving I wasn't going to be a natural biological parent. And of course I heard all the stories, Oh, you can adopt, or you could do this, or you could do that. Well, yes I could, but you're negating the fact that I can't do it myself. And so I went to the program originally for that and then they're like, well, before you can work on a health challenge, you need to work on a person, a relate, a real relationship that either is or has happened.

20:22 So I worked on it. And was like, oh wow, yes, I was finally able to go back and work on that other one. But since it's been really really fun to see just how much junk is tied up in that. So it's called a grief recovery program. Grief recovery method, yees method. Okay, well that's great. You know what I find interesting. I was reading an article the other day from Substack and they were talking about the various and I've interviewed so many people and all these topics, but you know, they're breathing, the meditation, the EFT, whatever that happens to be, trying to eliminate some of this subconscious imprinting that is really affecting our lives. And the point of it was, you know what, it's not one is not the only solution.

21:14 In other words, you know, if you're meditating, it's not the only solution. If you're deep breathing, that's not the only solution. If you're doing EFT or NLP or whatever it happens to be, it's not the only solution. But I love the fact that you're getting down into the root cause of the fact that probably at the very basic level of grief is one of the major foundations or the challenges that we are experiencing. And even for the imprints that are experiencing in their lives. I love that you mentioned the imprints. So, for example, there's a book called Feelings Buried Alive, Never Die by Carol with A. K.

21:55 Truman. And I'll have people who are strong ruggling with things like anger, and we'll go and we'll look, and that impacts your your stomach or your small intestines, your colon area, and oftentimes when we are able to name the emotions, they're buried deep inside of us, like you said in printing. And so anyway, Carol has some scripts where you can ask your subconscious, super conscious higher power to find the root cause of the anger or whatever emotion you pick, and to help release it, and to put that script in your body on repeat for the next and it's an odd the next one hundred and eighty days or until it's resolved. But most people when they come and I feel perplexed what's going on, I'll ask their emotions and I'll look them up and say, are you dealing with any health issues?

22:50 By chance? And usually it's like, how did you know? Because your feelings are inside yourselves and they're going to be their cause and all kinds of issues underlying. Yeah. Absolutely, And and so you know, one of the things I know you also talk about, and I think this is something that I've really noticed. So often we focus and there's so much out there now about personal transformation and all of that, and there's so much focus on that, and so often as individuals that becomes our focus. I've got to really transform myself. I've got to do this, I've got to be able to feel better and so forth. But the thought comes to my mind and the quote, and I've used this for years, that which we resist persists, and so how do you help people to move away from that as being the main focus to where they quietly work with that in a way that rather than it continuing to persist, they really start to eliminate some of those issues because they haven't made that their main focus or has that been your experience?

23:58 Actually it has been my experience. But I I think about where we are culturally. You know, they go to TikTok. They got a thirty second clip. They can't wait two and a half minutes for microwave popcorn. Every sitcom or whatever's on TV, it wraps up commercials and off from opening to problem to solution in thirty minutes. We are been trained that solutions need to happen fast, but in reality, whatever's going on with us didn't happen overnight, and so it's not going to resolve overnight. So they'll come and say, well, I've tried all these things and it hasn't worked. Okay, so try mine. Try not pushing, not prodding, not trying to fit into that framework or that system. Try just giving yourself space to think, space to slow down, and space to pause and just allow what's going on to be felt and to you know, the most important thing, I say, rattle that backpack that you're carrying around. See what pops up.

24:57 That's probably what you need to work on first. And if they will stop, looks great. Yeah. And as you talk about the culture part of it, I had a real epiphany the other day. I love to listen to particular Christian music Gaither Vocal. I don't know if you've ever heard of him, but you know, I love to hear that. And then I also grew up. My dad, like I say, was a classical voice teacher at the university levels, so I learned to appreciate classical music. And as I was listening one day while I was driving, it hit me that all that music, whether it's classical or whether otherwise, most of the time it starts out gentle and slow and working, and at the very end it's high pitched and it's really loud. And you think about that, and it's like, we literally have grown up in this culture that we start slow, but our ultimate expectation, whether it's movies or whatever it happens to be your music, is this finalized that is just so terrific. And I think that's what we've kind of created an expectation in our life to be like that.

26:07 And I think too, because I deal a lot with women, primarily, and they'll come and they maybe had a divorce, or maybe they haven't found their their shining night, and they don't have the house with the picket fence and the two kids and the dog and the cat, and they're realizing that was a dream, that was a dream that is not going to come true, Holy moly, what am I going to do with that? And again that's another one of those lost things. But then you know what, everybody else is here and I'm only here. Okay, that's fine. Everybody else is on their own trajectory. But are you okay? Do you like where you are? And if you don't, what baby steps can you take to get where you want to go? Because everybody's like, oh, I've got to do all these things. Well, if you're try and do all.

26:51 Those things, you're going to be burned out. Again, that's not helpful. Pick one, just one? Well, and I love where you say that. I used to work with small businesses bit and one of the things that I talked to them about that ultimately really came into reality with working with people too, was this concept of what is that dream where do you want to be in business, in life or whatever? And if that's your ideal, what would be just previous to that, the thing that would have to change in your life or in your business? Well, I need I would I would need to be able to do that, okay, And in order to be able to do that, what would be the thing just before that that would need to change?

27:33 And as you slowly start to work backwards, you finally get to that airbones basic. All right, this is the first step that I need to take. And I think so often people jump ahead of themselves because they're so impatient, and yet the reality is is get back to that first step. And I loved what you said, and I want you to talk about it a little bit more. This concept of grief, but this concept of gratitude. And I think so often and this isn't in all experiences, So I want to make sure I say that ahead of time. But many times, you know, when I look at, for instance, when I look at my experience with my dad, now want you to talk to any of my sons and guess what they're going to tell you. Wow, Dad, it was so amazing. You were there, You taught us to fish, you were at all of our sports games, you did all this. I can't tell you how much I appreciate that. And they've literally said that to me multiple times, and I think, wow, you know, if I have the gratitude that because of that experience in my childhood, I changed the entire experience for my children in their childhood, and I can be grateful for that talk a little bit about how important gratitude is even looking at some of these experiences that we would term negative in our early lives, and how we can see that with gratitude, dude, we really can change that whole dimension.

29:04 So when I first was diagnosed with cancer, that was a shock for me, but probably a month into a eighteen month journey, I started feeling grateful for having it, feeling blessed, and I can now say I was truly blessed to have cancer. Obviously, No, it wasn't easy. There was a ton of surgeries and treatments and whatnot. But the people I got to meet, the people who prayed over me, I got to pray over, and the people I've connected with since I know I would not have met had I not had that situation. And it's tough to be in a bad place, you know, a death, a financial situation, a divorce, and to feel grateful. But if you're you know, if I look at it, if you're getting a divorce, there's a reason, and you should be blessed that you found that reason and you're not going to continue to suffer in that relationship. If you've got a hell challenge, Yes, you may have had a health challenge, but you're getting healed, you're getting surgery, you're getting treatment, you're getting a clear bill of health, and so that's a blessing. But I think we're so tied up in the issue and being done to us that it's really hard because our society is all about performance and less about presence. And when you take a step back and say, wow, okay.

30:24 I'm present in this, I have this. People are sending me cards, people are praying for me, people are really you know, thinking happy thoughts. I'm getting through this because other people are thinking about me and encouraging me. And so you can take something as horrible as having cancer and be blessed with it, but you have to allow yourself to be open to that. Well, there's so much pressure out there too, to be perfect, to be successful, to do all of those things. And you know, being a pastor, here's my question to you. How often does and it's true of any religion, how often does that concept of being perfect and obviously, as Christian you have that quote from the New Testament be therefore perfect. How much does that create those imprints in our lives where we never feel good, we're not good enough because we're trying to be perfect, which, incidentally, if you get to the word is an entirely different meaning.

31:26 And you know people always come to me, oh, I have to be perfect. Well, Typically the people who are striving with perfection are trying to overcome and compensate for something that has gone wrong in their life. Specifically, a lot of folks who've been through trauma and abuse are trying to control their life. Thus the perfectionism. If I control it and do it perfect, I won't have that bad outcome again. Then they come back and they'll say, but you know, I've read the Bible, and the Bible says there's only one perfect person, and it was Jesus exactly. So if we can never live up to that standard, why are you on that treadmill forcing yourself to try and get there? You know, it's a never ending battle.

32:06 It's not going to happen, and that's going to lead to the burnout and the stress and all the other health issues that you really don't need. But it's all everybody, not everybody. A good portion of people strive to be perfect. Some people are just content. You know. There's like the people school who want to make the straight a's and the people who are content to just slide by with a high D or a C and that's okay. You know the world has people in all different levels. So as you work with people, have you found that oftentimes, you know, I'm sure as you're working with those that particularly have suffered abuse, that oftentimes they end up getting into a relationship with someone who again is creating abuse.

32:49 And have you ever looked at that and worked with people and helped them understand why is it that we continue to make the same choices and attract the same time people into our lives when we recognize that's not what we want. It's a perpetual pattern. It happens frequently. I'll have clients who were abused as a young child, who then when they start their relationships, end up with an abusive partner and may eventually marry an abusive person. And they're like, well, I just don't understand. But what I find is usually there's this victim mentality energy that's in them, and it's like it pulls narcissists or oh, this person suffering so I could take advantage of them.

33:36 It's like it magnet, It just pulls. These other folks to them, even though they say that's not who they want. But in all honesty, they don't really know how to focus and function in a relationship that's not that kind of abuse because they've never had it. A lot of them have fear over getting in, as they call it, a normalish relationship. When they can say, Okay, these are the characteristics you don't want, why are you accepting them? You had this abuse happen before, why are you allowing it now? And when they come to grips with it and realize, oh my gosh, yes, the last three people have all been this. Okay, let's work on you.

34:16 No more people right now, Let's work on you. Now. Who do you want in the future? I suggest making a list of characteristics you want in a future partner, and if they don't have them, don't give in because you get one. If you have ten, get ten. And they looked at me really strange. Well, and do you find that they're going to continue to be attracted? I mean, you can even say, you know, here's the red flag, so don't be attracted to anyone that blah blah blah blah blah. But unless unless we get to that rut, cause unless we get to what was that experience? And as you say you work with women who have gone through abuse, you know, as they look back at that exp experience, how do they get to the point where that is no longer occurring in their lives? And you mentioned grief, is that the first step is to grieve it, but how else besides grief you help them to move to a point where that energy that's coming from within is no longer attracting those type of people.

35:22 Yes, they may have to deal with the grief, but they also need to start valuing themselves and working on their worth and their value because these these abusers have taken away their value and their worth, their self esteem, and so they're at a point where any any affection feels like it's the good affection. And so instead of just jumping to that, I want them to feel value in themselves, in value alone. And then if somebody comes in that complements them, and I usually have them put a support structure up so they'll have a couple friends who who know what they really want, what they're expecting, what they're hoping for. And so if this other person comes in and they don't get the approval, then these backup friends are like, just sit in the person, keep going and they can check them. So I mean sometimes it's hard to do on your own. So that backup person is really a helpful person.

36:15 Have well, and you've written this book had the Counter, and I don't have a little name you can share with the audience. They WoT name. But you talk about spiritual recipes. I'd love for you, what do you talk about in your book and then talk a little bit about what you mean by spiritual recipes. So the title is at the Counter Spiritual Recipes for Faith in everyday life. It's a weekly devotional, it has scripture in it, it has family recipes. As a pastor, I would take meals like a homemade chicken pop pie, but for people who don't have time, because as a pastor sometimes you find out the last minute someone had to have an emergency surgery. You need a quick one.

36:57 So I have Laura's real version and I have a short cut the Christian. But I have all kinds of recipes in there. And there's journal points and pauses soul pauses as I like to call them, and they're there to give you just a chance to think. Actually, this one's funny. It says gratitude is not a finish line. It's a way of noticing what grace has quietly restored. So it's not a recipe for food, it's a recipe for life. There are a recipe both there are there are recipes, and there are recipes, so you have a place to have a soul pause, which is a question, a soul note like I just read, and then there's a prayer for each week. Some people it was meant to be weekly, but some people just jump and go right through it.

37:44 I include different little antidotes and stories, one about finding out that the whole world doesn't make brownies with marshmallows and frosting on them. As I grew up with I thought that was just the norm, until I realized it wasn't recipe years of comfort. When you say weekly, how long does that last? Is that a twelve week program? Is that a sixteen week program? The book is fifty three chapters, I believe, or fifty two chapters, so one per week, and then an epilogue. So you could read one of these little short couple page devotions in a week, or you could do them daily. It's up to you. It's not really a program, although some churches in small groups have actually started doing a Bible study with it, and so I created leader guides that would be either six or twelve weeks to help guide them along the way to have discussions. Oftentimes, we need to know that we're not alone in this, and so by having a facilitator there with a couple folks meeting and being able to address the questions, you know, you feel in a safe place, You feel comfortable sharing. Being able to share is a good second step of what's going on. All that baggage. You have a safe place you can unload and unpack that one portion this week. And so there are several groups going right now upper East coast of the US, and they are.

39:08 Really enjoying just sitting down. In fact, one of the groups kicked off making one of the recipes from the book and they are enjoying food and conversation because at the counter is a real thing. The counter is a counter that came to my house. My great grandfather built it for my great grandmother. It was a counter that was built into their house and when we moved, I actually got that and so it's in my house and I look out over it, there's a window behind it, and I think conversations happen at the counter. It's where you can come in, take off your shoes, grab a cup of coffee, and just let your hair down and say, Okay, here's what's going on in my life. And so when I say spiritual recipes, it's let's think about what's going on, let's talk about it.

39:54 So not everybody knows. So I gave them like a little nudge question that kind of goes along with the topic. I gave a little piece of scripture that fits that point, kind of getting them triggered and ready with all their information and just give them a chance to just pause. And what was funny was I wrote the book, but I put the journaling pieces in the book. Well, the book also has recipes, and so I heard a number of comments, Laura, I don't want to write in the book because I don't if somebody gets a recipe, I don't want them to see my answers. So then I had to go make a separate journal with the one hundred and seventeen prompts so they could have their privacy. And I get it. But it was really funny.

40:34 So you know, I want people to think when they grab the book, they can just pull up to the counter, have a sit, ponder what's in there. It may or may not resonate for that day, but it may be a couple weeks later they come back and they're like, yeah, you wrote about that chicken pot pie. You know, I don't remember the thing, but I just remember the poppie was there. So I went back and looked that recipe up and yeah, that's how I was feeling that day and. Being able to name it. Because we have all these emotions, but we just so fast paced we can't take the time to actually clarify what it is we're feeling and how we're going to resonate with it if it's. Going to trigger. How do people find the book? It's on Amazon or can be ordered through any bookstore. Wonderful. So we're running out of time, So what would you like to share with the audience? Kind of as a final message, Well, if.

41:22 This conversation has resonated, please go to Bakingpastor dot com. There is a button on the homepage for a free special edition Soul Pause Journal, which has some topics and some prayers you can walk through. You can also connect with the book and have links to my podcasts or reach out if you just need. Help, and the name of your podcast is at. The counter with the Baking Pastor. All Right, I love it, Laura, thanks so much. This this has been a fun conversation. And you know, obviously we could go on and on and on because it's such a deep subject that I love how you talk about this spiritual fatigue and this emotional fatigue and for people to be able to recognize that that's what they're experiencing, and that there's a way not by just total focus, but there's a way to gain clarity and to start to overcome that. And again, if people want to reach out to you once again, how do they find you.

42:21 They find me at the Bakingpastor dot com. Wonderful, Lora, thanks so much. Thank you Doug for having me. I appreciate it. And folks, I hope you gained something out of this. As usual, I probably gain more than anybody. I just see a very wonderful people like you. But anyway, folks, thanks for listening. Hope you join us again soon. So this is doctor Doug saying no mistay