Going On A Bear Hunt–Understanding The Relationship Between Prayer and Powerful Emotions

Whether trauma, depression, anxiety, anger, or other strong feelings are causing us problems, turning to God in prayer is always a good idea. After all, God loves us and always wants to help us become more fully alive—more fully ourselves.

But in order to really benefit from prayer, we must “also learn how to pray,” as the Catechism of the Catholic Church says (#2650). It’s no wonder the Catechism spends more than three hundred paragraphs on the topic of how to pray.

When it comes to mental health, one trap that people sometimes fall into is treating prayer as a way to avoid the strong feelings that come with a crisis, according to Jacob Flores-Popcak, a pastoral counselor with CatholicCounselors.com.

“An unhealthy relationship to prayer says, ‘Help me climb up above this thing,’” Flores-Popcak said in a recent interview. Underlying that impulse is often the assumption that “spiritual things are higher than these base, awful, physical things like feelings.”

But the view that physical things—and by extension, our emotions—are to be shunned or avoided simply isn’t Catholic, Flores-Popcak said. In fact, this attempt to detach from embodied feelings is more in line with Buddhism or, within the Christian tradition, the old dualistic heresy known as Manichaeism.

The Christian tradition says that feelings are given to us by God for a reason, Popcak said: in fact, they are invitations to go deeper.

“There is no point at which any character, any person in scripture just prays a feeling away,” Flores-Popcak explained. On the contrary, the Bible is full of people who openly embraced their feelings. Jesus wept at the tomb of Lazarus, for example, and expressed his anxiety openly to his Father in the Garden of Gethsemane.

“Feelings are meant to help us bond with other people and they’re meant to help us get certain needs met,” Flores-Popcak explained. “So to pray away a feeling is to pray away an opportunity for connection, and it’s to pray away a need.”

He continued: “God gives us our needs, and God calls us to relationships. Both of those things are, at their core, godly things. If I’m trying to just get rid of that, it’s gonna end up feeling like I’m just repressing the feeling, and it’s just going to come raging back later.”

It’s like the children’s song, “Going on a Bear Hunt,” Flores-Popcak said, in which the hunters come to an insurmountable mountain that blocks the path forward: “The refrain of that song is, ‘Can’t go around it, can’t go over it—gotta go through it.’ We’ve gotta go into that tunnel, into that bear’s den.”

Similarly, prayer is not meant to help us go “over” or “around” our feelings of anguish, anxiety, or sadness. “Prayer is supposed to help me go deeper into it, to find the truth at the center of it, or even on the other side,” Flores-Popcak said. In the Catholic mystical tradition, every challenge is “an opportunity to go deeper into my knowledge of myself, deeper into my knowledge of Christ, and deeper in relationship with other people.”

What does this look like? Instead of trying to pray away your feelings, try praying with these questions:

  1. “Lord, what do you want me to learn from this feeling?”
  2. “How do you want me to respond to the need at the center of this feeling?”
  3. “How do you want me to grow closer to you and to the people around me as a result of experiencing this feeling?”

Such questions align with the example of spiritual masters such as St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Teresa of Avila, and others, all of whom advise that instead of running away from feelings we’d rather not be experiencing, we ought to plunge deeper into their depths, accompanied by Christ and supported by friends—so that we can emerge stronger and more connected to God, ourselves, and the people around us.

If you need help managing your mental health and want to do so in a way that draws on your Catholic faith, reach out to Jacob Flores-Popcak or any of the other Pastoral Counselors at CatholicCounselors.com.

Why Your Faith Might Be Making You Anxious (And How to Fix It)

Practicing religious faith isn’t just good for your spiritual life; it usually has physical and mental health benefits, too.

That conclusion has been the consensus of researchers for decades. When Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Brigham and Women’s Hospital reviewed hundreds of studies in 2022, for example, they found that people who participate in a religious community tend to live healthier, longer lives.

But researchers caution that religious faith and practice isn’t always beneficial in these ways. In fact, sometimes it can actually lead to greater anxiety and other mental health problems.

Such “toxic faith” is usually the result of extrinsic faith or insecure God-attachment, the Pastoral Solutions Institute’s Dr. Greg Popcak explains in his book Unworried: A Life Without Anxiety. Let’s focus on the issue of how extrinsic versus intrinsic faith can impact your mental health.

 

The Impact of Extrinsic Faith on Mental Health

Extrinsic faith, as defined by psychologist Gordon Allport, refers to religious or spiritual behavior primarily oriented towards achieving non-religious goals. These goals often include seeking parental or social acceptance, gaining approval, or achieving success in social status. The young adult who goes to church to satisfy her parents, the retiree who is involved mainly to socialize with friends, and the businessperson looking for social status or networking opportunities all exhibit extrinsic faith.

Intrinsic faith, on the other hand, is oriented towards helping a person live a more meaningful, integrated life.

“Extrinsic faith can be sincere in its way, but it is often a poor source of comfort because, unlike intrinsic faith, it is not intended to help you make more sense out of your life,” Dr. Popcak writes. “Rather, it is intended to get another person to give you something you do not feel you can claim for yourself, such as self-esteem, social or cultural identity, or professional success.”

When faith is just a means to an end, it can lead to anxiety and other psychological issues. Constantly trying to gain approval or acceptance from others through religious practices can be exhausting and unfulfilling.

Everyone goes through a phase where their faith is mostly extrinsic, either in childhood or as a newcomer to a faith community: during this initiation period, our practices and beliefs are given to us by others. But at some point, Dr. Popcak writes, each of us must decide whether our faith is a series of hoops we need to jump through to please others or the “source and summit” of our life (to borrow language from the Catechism of the Catholic Church).

 

Three Ways to Better Own Your Faith

Most people have many motivations for practicing their religion, some extrinsic and some intrinsic. But our overall goal should be to keep moving toward a more authentic “owned” faith, one that is a source of meaning, integration, transformation, and transcendence.

This journey begins with a conscious decision to seek a more personal, honest, open connection with God. If you feel the need for a more intrinsic faith, here are three practices to help you begin:

  1. Center Your Faith on Your Relationship with God: When you go to Mass, pray, or read scripture, do so with a genuine desire to connect with God. As the Catechism points out, our prayer and worship ought to lead us to a more intimate relationship with God. Don’t talk “at” God, but with God. Bring your whole self into your prayers, expressing your thoughts, fears, hopes, and gratitude sincerely. The Psalms are a good example of this sort of free-flowing, honest prayer.

  2. Seek Understanding: Spend time learning more about your faith through study and reflection. Learning about your faith can help you better integrate a more genuine faith into your lived practice, as opposed to just “going with the crowd.” Read books that deepen your understanding of spirituality and help you grow closer to God.

  3. Seek Spiritual Direction: A spiritual director or pastoral counselor can help you identify hidden assumptions, old hurts, and patterns of behavior that may be preventing you from growing close to God.

“The more your faith becomes intrinsic, the more you will be able to put aside your anxiety, sit at the feet of the Lord, and let your heart be still, knowing that he is God,” Dr. Popcak writes.

For more about this topic, see Chapter Five of Unworried: A Life Without Anxiety. And if you’d like more personal, one-on-one help with your faith life, reach out to a pastoral counselor at CatholicCounselors.com.

How To Raise The Dead

Guest post by Jacob Francisco M.A., LMHC, Pastoral Counselor at CatholicCounselors.com


There is an emotion that can kill, and that emotion is called shame. Shame is the sense that deep down inside, at the very core of who we are, we are unlovable, unworthy, broken beyond repair, or otherwise
bad. This feeling is something we are all familiar with going all the way back to the garden of Eden. For some of us, this shame seems to kill a part of us. We may describe ourselves as feeling “dead inside” or talk about the skeletons in our closet. Another common description is feeling numb all the time. 

Shame feels repulsive or ugly, like something dead, and we do not want to think about it or anyone else to know about it. It’s a natural impulse to bury something that is dead. We do this in the physical world and we do this emotionally. So we toss it in a hole and throw heavy stones on top to keep it buried. We medicate our self-loathing or despair with things that make us feel better in the moment; food, TV, social media, substances, pornography or other sexual behaviors, oversleeping, overworking. The list is endless. Sometimes the thing we use to bury the shame is even more of what we are ashamed of, and so the cycle continues around and around. Oftentimes we are able to numb out the shame to the point that we rarely consider it consciously anymore. We may deny that we have any shame at all. This dead part of us that we have now buried is a festering, rotting, thing that poisons the other parts of us. It spreads like a plague into many areas of our life, warping our thoughts and emotions into twisted half-truths that trap us in despair or suffering. 

Christ came to raise the dead in all senses of that phrase. He came that you may have life, and have it to the full. When Lazarus had died and Jesus went to Bethany, Martha and Mary asked Jesus for a miracle. In response to this request He says, “Take away the stone.” In other words, Jesus requires an act of faith. He requires that they work for what they pray for. Jesus is the only one who can do this and He requires that we clear the way.

 Here are a few steps to do just that:

  1. Identify the stone. What are the stones I have piled up over my shame? What sinful or unhealthy behaviors do I feel stuck in or powerless to change?
  2. Work for the miracle. I must do what is in my power to grow and become more healthy. I must act before I feel better. I need to cut away sinful behavior from my life. I must act contrary to my unhealthy urges and desires.
  3. Seek help. Big stones rolled in front of tombs are heavy! You will need help from someone trustworthy, mature, and/or professional. Start asking the Lord for the faith you need to believe He can raise the dead.
  4. Tell your story. Shame is like mold. It grows where it is dark and cool and hidden. Share your story with a trusted person. Let the light and the heat into that tomb. 
  5. Have faith and courage. Do what is within your power, and God will do what is within His. Your faith can raise the dead.

If you would like more resources or support to work through shame or other difficult emotions, reach out to a Pastoral Counselor at CatholicCounselors.com.

Use the ‘Fortress and Communion’ Prayer to Heal Past Hurts and Protect Your Heart

Have you ever felt deeply hurt or attacked, only to find yourself struggling to forgive and move forward? Christians are told to love their enemies and pray for those who persecute them— but how do you do this when you are hurting?

This dilemma is what prompted Dave McClow, M.Div., LCSW, LMFT, a therapist at the Pastoral Solutions Institute, to develop a process of healing and forgiveness that he calls the “Fortress and Communion” prayer. This approach helps you protect your heart and transfer negative emotions, ultimately leading to genuine healing and forgiveness.

Understanding the Fortress and Communion Prayer

Dave explained the prayer process in a recent interview with CatholicCounselors.com. When we are hurt, he said, our feelings become dysregulated, and we often turn the people who hurt us into enemies. Moreover, emotional hurt often shows up with physical symptoms.

“When emotions get activated, we get a feeling in our body—it could be in our stomach, chest, shoulders, neck, jaw, eyes, head,” he said. “These physical sensations signal that it’s time to address the underlying emotional pain.”

The Fortress and Communion prayer provides a structured way to begin the healing process and restore a sense of peace and balance, emotionally and physically.

 

Step 1: Building Your Fortress

The first part of the process is about protecting your heart, which McClow describes as creating a “fortress.” He likens it to the walled city of Jerusalem, with your heart being the Holy of Holies at the center of the Temple that must be protected. Visualize this fortress (like the walls around the city) and imagine placing those who have hurt you outside its walls.

McClow suggests that clients use vivid imagery, such as catapulting people out of the fortress, to create a physical and emotional boundary.

“When you get them outside, you want to feel a physiological shift,” he said. This shift might be felt in areas like your stomach or chest, where tension is stored. If the initial boundary doesn’t create enough relief, mentally push them farther away (a tropical island, the moon, Mars, etc.) until you feel a noticeable difference.

Step 2: Transferring Negative Emotions

Once the fortress is established and the hurtful individuals are outside, the next step is to transfer the negative emotions to Jesus. This is where the “communion” aspect comes in. Imagine Jesus on the cross outside your fortress, absorbing all the anger, hurt, and negative energy from the person who hurt you.

“Let all the anger, all the rage, all the hurt from that person go into Jesus,” Dave advised.

This step is about visualizing the transfer of these emotions, allowing Jesus to “take the hit” for you. It’s a deeply spiritual and healing process, McClow said: “Jesus is kind of our emotional sanitation department: he picks up our garbage, processes our sewage, and takes care of it for us.”

Step 3: The Resurrection and Transformation

After transferring the negative emotions to Jesus, ask him to take them through the resurrection. This step involves transforming the negative energy into something positive.

“In physics, you can’t destroy energy; you can only transfer or transform it,” McClow said. “We’ve transferred it; now we’re going to transform it.”

Visualize this transformation as an explosion of love and light, turning the negative into something beautiful. This step can be deeply felt, with some people imagining fireworks or other vivid images.

Step 4: Spiritual Communion

The final step is to ask Jesus to offer spiritual communion to everyone involved. This includes not only yourself and the person who hurt you but also extends to intergenerational healing.

“Ask Jesus to give communion—his infinite love—to everybody involved,” McClow said. “This includes your ancestors, any souls in purgatory connected to the event, and your descendants, ensuring that the healing permeates through generations.”

Sometimes, his clients are still reluctant to ask Jesus to give their enemy or persecutor communion. “If you’re still mad at the bully, you can visualize infinite love knocking him on his butt,” McClow said. “Because infinite love coming into a finite suffering is impactful. So if you need to do that, that’s fine.”

“In the Depths of the Heart’

The Fortress and Communion prayer draws on many sources in the Catholic tradition, but it takes particular inspiration from the Catechism of the Catholic Church’s reflection on the lines about forgiveness in the Lord’s prayer:

“It is there, in fact, ‘in the depths of the heart,’ that everything is bound and loosed. It is not in our power not to feel or to forget an offense; but the heart that offers itself to the Holy Spirit turns injury into compassion and purifies the memory in transforming the hurt into intercession” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2843).

That quote is the entire process in a nutshell, McClow said: “You can have the memory without the feelings. That’s purifying the memory by transforming hurt into intercession.”

The Fortress and Communion prayer is versatile and can be used in various situations, from dealing with past traumas to handling daily annoyances. Like many forms of contemplative or meditative prayer, it gets easier with practice. At first, you may want to set aside 15 to 30 minutes to walk through the process thoroughly. Once it becomes habitual, you will be able to do it in a few minutes—say, when you’re sitting in a frustrating work meeting or trying to be patient about a crying baby on the plane.

You can see a video walkthrough of the Fortress and Communion Prayer on YouTube.

If you’d like McClow to guide you through the process, or if you’d like to work with another Catholic counselor on healing and forgiveness, reach out at CatholicCounselors.com.

How To Walk On Water

Guest Post by Jacob Francisco, MA, LMHC – Pastoral Counselor, CatholicCounselors.com

Anxiety and fear are primal emotions that we all experience to some degree, in big and little ways. The nature of fear and worry is to draw our attention to the object of the feeling, whether inside or outside our head. When we are afraid of something we are alert for that thing and we sometimes see it where it is not actually present. If I am afraid of monsters in the dark, everything in the dark room becomes a possible monster. My perception becomes focused on finding the monsters, so I see them even in ordinary things. If I am worried about an upcoming event, the thoughts about it might be so strong that I stay up at night dwelling on those worries. It can be very difficult to think about anything other than the object of my worry or fear.

Because these emotions take our attention and focus we often cannot see how to deal with them. We become wrapped up within the thoughts and emotions so much that we cannot sleep, have trouble relaxing or find it difficult to think about anything else other than the worry or fear. We may become so paralyzed in a given moment that we are unable to act at all. Maybe we can never think of the right thing to say to our boss or our spouse when they are angry with us. Perhaps we find it difficult to socialize with people in the same room, so we say nothing. Some may have unwelcome and unwanted thoughts come into our mind that take our peace or cause a whole chain of strong emotions and regrettable actions and we become distraught that we cannot seem to be rid of the thoughts.

Recall the story of Jesus and Peter walking on the water. (It is Matthew 14:22-33 if you want to read the whole thing). The disciples in the boat see what they think is a ghost walking through the wind and across the water. Peter calls out to Jesus, walks on the water, and then sinks.

Now here is the key: when Peter “saw the wind” he was afraid, and began to sink. It was fear that caused his sinking. Why? It is precisely the moment that Peter gives attention to the wind that he is no longer focused on Christ. When his focus was on Christ, he could walk across the waves. When he was focused on what brought fear, he sank. He moved towards the object of his gaze. When he took those first steps towards Christ, nothing happened to the wind and the waves. Those remained as strong as ever. His focus on Christ allowed him to move beyond the fear that they instilled.

The disciples were in the boat and very much aware of the wind and waves. So we begin by acknowledging our fears and worries. The avoidance of what causes our fear or worry is a natural strategy for managing these feelings, and we do it because it works for a time. The reality is that this only increases our anxiety over the long term. This becomes a cycle which can get out of control. We must see and acknowledge our wind and waves.

Then we turn our gaze to the healthy thing. This new object of focus can be internal or external. Internally, we can focus on a comforting Scripture verse, a mental image of God or His saints, or some other holy thing. Scripture encourages us to “Set your minds on things that are above” (Col 3:2). When we are confronted with the thoughts and feelings of fear or worry, we need to turn our gaze, or set our mind, on Christ in this way. This is not an easy thing to do. Your attention will wander. The fear or worry will make every attempt to regain your attention. This is unavoidable. Peter was unable to walk all the way to Christ on his first attempt.

Because this can be so challenging, we often need to begin on a more natural level and work our way up to the mental strength to hold an image of Christ in our minds. God created us with a body, and our body is good. We were made to interact with the world in a physical manner. God communicates His grace to us through physical reality every day. The Sacraments and sacramentals convey grace through physical means. Physical things are easier to focus on amid anxiety and fear. If I am having strong unwanted thoughts in my mind, turning my focus to the things my five senses tell me can be very effective. If I am focused on my senses or what my body is telling me, it helps me to move through the thoughts by allowing me to not become overwhelmed.

Each step we take in life, whether spiritual, or emotional, or physical, needs to be with the awareness of grace. God is constantly pouring out His love and grace, that we might be overcomers and conquerors of sin and evil. We have to accept this grace, allow it to fill us consciously so that all our actions move with the strength of that grace.

The next time that you feel afraid or worried, remind yourself of the presence of God’s grace, focus on the healthy thing and take a step out onto the water.

 

To learn more about Jacob Francisco’s work, visit CatholicCounselors.com

Does Jesus Want Us to be ‘Nice’ to the Difficult People in Our Lives?


“But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, and pray for those who mistreat you” (Luke 6:27-28).

Jesus couldn’t have been more clear that following him means imitating the Father’s radically generous, unconditional love. He didn’t just preach this love; he embodied it through his death on the cross, and he expected his disciples to “take up their cross and follow me” (Matthew 16:24).

Over the centuries, those words have inspired countless Christians to heroic acts of love, sometimes to the point of sacrificing their lives.

Unfortunately, too many Christians also take Jesus’ teaching to mean that they ought to patiently put up with bad behavior from difficult—or even abusive—people.

But as Dr. Greg and Lisa Popcak frequently point out to callers on their More2Life radio show, that’s a serious misunderstanding of Jesus’ call to radical love. In fact, such an approach may not be loving at all.

 

Jesus Wasn’t Always ‘Nice’

To see why Christian love sometimes calls for us to stand up for ourselves, set healthy boundaries, and in some cases, even end a relationship, we need to get a fuller picture of who Jesus really was.

Jesus dealt with “difficult” people all the time. Sometimes, those difficult people were even his closest friends! Other times, they were religious authorities who had it out for him.

Did Jesus quietly tolerate problematic behavior in the interest of “being nice”? He certainly stood up to the religious leaders who opposed him, often in forceful terms that left no question about their need for a change of heart.

Nor did he let his friends off the hook when they went astray. He famously rebuked Peter just moments after Peter confessed that Jesus was the Son of God (Matthew 16:23).

At the same time, Jesus met known sinners with tenderness and mercy: think of his encounter with Zacchaeus or the woman caught in adultery, for example.

 

Real Love Works for the Good of the Other

Each of these very different approaches had a common motivation: Jesus’ genuine love for the person, tuned to achieve the good of the person he was encountering. As St. Thomas Aquinas would later put it, Christ-like love “wills the good of the other.” Christian love cooperates with God to help the other person become fully the person God desires them to be.

At the heart of our love for anybody, then, is the question: “What do I need to do to help this person achieve the good that God wants for him or her?”

In a healthy relationship, the answer would begin with the needs and desires of the other person. But in the case of someone whose problematic behavior is causing real, ongoing harm to us or other people, the bar is a lot lower. In these cases, really loving the person begins with not letting them mistreat you or other people. Instead, it begins with helping them become a better person.

Usually, the first step is to engage the person in a respectful, cooperative conversation about how to change the problem behavior. In God Help Me! These People Are Driving Me Nuts! Making Peace with Difficult People, Dr. Popcak outlines a five-step process for doing that.

If a person isn’t open to cooperatively working on the problem, then the next step might be setting limits or boundaries on the relationship. Ideally, these boundaries are targeted at the problem behavior and don’t cut off the relationship completely.

Sometimes, though, it is necessary to end the relationship entirely, especially if your life or health are in danger. As the Church teaches, we have a duty to care for our own life (Catechism of the Catholic Church #2264).

 

The Love of the Cross

At this point, you may wonder how Jesus’ call for his disciples to “take up their cross and follow me” fits into the picture of Christian life. After all, plenty of saints have suffered, and even given their life, for the sake of Christ.

What distinguishes the sacrifice of the cross, though, is that it served a higher purpose; Jesus sacrificed his life to save all humanity. The sacrifices of the saints and martyrs participated in that sacrifice. For instance, saints such as Maximilian Kolbe, Gianna Beretta Molla, Oscar Romero, and Maria Goretti sacrificed their lives in order to save another life, or to stand up for truth and justice.

Each of us has everyday opportunities to practice this sort of sacrificial love: quietly putting up with a spouse’s annoying but harmless habit, getting up with the baby so your spouse can get some much-needed rest, ignoring a stranger’s rudeness out of charity.

But if you’re dealing with someone whose behavior is causing real problems, then ask yourself: Is putting up with this behavior really the best way to love this person? Does it serve Christ and the Kingdom of God?

If the answer is “no,” then it might be time to imitate Jesus’ other ways of loving difficult people.

For much more on this topic, check out God Help Me! These People Are Driving Me Nuts! And if you need professional, one-on-one help navigating a difficult relationship, reach out to one of the Catholic counselors at CatholicCounselors.com.

Who Is Narrating Your Life? How You Answer Has a Big Impact on Your Happiness

In the movie Stranger Than Fiction, Will Ferrell plays Harold Crick, an IRS agent who is haunted by the voice of an unseen narrator who offers a running commentary on the events of his life.

Mr. Crick’s unseen narrator turned out to be a frustrated author. But the truth is, each of us have an internal voice that “narrates” the events of our life. The nature of that running commentary shapes the way we react to situations and events—and that, in turn, has a big impact on our overall happiness.

Like Mr. Crick, then, it’s a good idea to occasionally interrogate that internal narrator.

Interrogating Our Narrator

In his book, God Help Me! This Stress Is Driving Me Crazy!, Dr. Greg Popcak proposes a simple exercise. Whenever you hear that unbidden voice interpreting a situation or event in your life, stop and ask: Is this thought true or false?

In the context of this exercise, we’re not so much analyzing the factual accuracy of the thought. Most of the time, our internal narrator’s interpretation of events contains at least a grain of truth. Rather, we’re trying to determine whether the thought leads us to the richer, more joyful life that God wants for us.

“We know that a thought or feeling is true (healthy, productive, rational) if acting on that thought or feeling would lead us to experience a greater degree of hope, confidence, competence, intimacy, security, peace, strength, and so on, even in the face of problems,” Dr. Popcak writes. “On the other hand, we know a thought or feeling is false (not of God, who is ‘the way and the truth and the life’) if acting on that thought or feeling would lead to hopelessness, confusion, doubt, anxiety, despair, estrangement, insecurity, ignorance, or incompetence, none of which come from God.”

Let’s look at an example. Your boss asks to meet with you on Friday without specifying the reason for the meeting. How does your inner voice narrate this situation?

Here’s one option: “Is she mad at me? Did I do something to upset her? What if she fires me? I don’t need this kind of stress!” This is an example of a “false” thought—not because it is inaccurate, but because it doesn’t help you deal with the situation. You can tell this thought is not from God because it leads to worry, hopelessness, and despair, none of which do anything to help you.

Here’s another option: “I wonder what she wants to meet about? I guess I won’t know until Friday. I’ll just have to wait and see what happens. I’m a little nervous, though; maybe I need to pray for peace.” This thought is “true” because it provides a helpful path forward.

Let’s take another example. Martha looks at her calendar for the week; it’s crammed with medical appointments, school events, and work obligations—and that’s on top of her usual busy routine.

Her interior narrator might respond negatively: “I am so overwhelmed! There’s no way I can juggle all this. If one more person puts one more thing on my plate, I’m going to scream.” Those thoughts are “false” because they don’t lead to more peace. They don’t come from God; in fact, they obscure God’s will for Martha’s well-being.

On the other hand, her internal narrator might respond more “truthfully”: “This is way too much for one person to handle. To get through the week, I’m going to have to drop some of these commitments or hand them off to someone else. I need a plan!” This way of narrating her situation might not make it magically better, but it provides a more hopeful path forward.

Tuning into God’s Grace

Both of these scenarios illustrate the power that our internal narration—what psychology calls our “automatic thoughts”—has over the quality of our day-to-day lives. False thoughts send us down a path where we waste energy, spin our wheels, and stew in stress. Worse, these noisy thoughts often distract us from the help and comfort God offers us. True thoughts, on the other hand, help us tune into God’s grace. And when we’re tuned into God, he opens our eyes to new possibilities and strengthens us to get through tough situations.

The key is to be more intentional about what our internal narrator is telling us. Like Harold Crick in Stranger Than Fiction, we need to confront our own personal narrators. If they’re not reading from God’s script, then we need to change that.

Poor Harold Crick had to get hit by a bus in order to get a new script. Thankfully, most of us won’t have to go to such lengths. If you need some professional, faith-based help, though, connect with a Catholic counselor at CatholicCounselors.com.

Carrying Your Cross—Concrete Steps to Overcoming Difficulties

 

Life can feel like one challenge after the next. Or maybe, when things are good, we have a hard time trusting the good, because it feels like we are always waiting for the other shoe to drop, so to speak.

The Theology Of The Body reminds us that although the world is fallen, God is working through us to rebuild his kingdom. Carrying our cross doesn’t mean just learning to put up with the problems and frustrations of this broken world, but rather to face them with strength and virtue and where possible, through God’s grace, to overcome them. Pope St. John Paul reminded us that focusing on what God created us and the world to be is more important than focusing on what we and the world are today.

We tend to get frustrated when we have to deal with persistent problems, challenges, and stressors. Of course, that’s understandable. But when we look through the lens of the Theology of the Body, we can see that God is always giving us the grace we need to bounce back in the face of trials and respond in ways that help us to cooperate with his grace and make a positive difference. As Christians, we’re called to do whatever we can to show the world that God’s power is always working in us–even in the middle of persistent problems–and that he is giving us the ability to make whatever challenge we’re facing better–even if just in small ways.

It’s true that some days that work can seem harder than others.  But there are a few tips we can draw from the Theology of the Body to persevere even when we start to doubt ourselves or feel worn down.  First we need to keep our eyes, not on what’s in front of us, but rather on how God wants to work through us to make the situation into what he wants it to be. Second, we need to remember that it isn’t all up to us.  We need to keep bringing the situation to God–not just once, but again and agin until its resolved– and ask him to help us discern the next small step.  Third, we need to lean into virtue–that is, the spiritual strengths God wants to give us.  We need to prayerfully ask, “What are the virtues or strengths would help me overcome this challenge and what would it look like to practice them?”  Fourth, we need to look at failure–not as a closed door–but as feedback that we bring back to prayer and then leads us back thought these steps until we find the solution.  If we can work this process, we can fulfill the promise that St Paul makes in Romans 8:28 that to those who love God, all things work to the good.

Here are three practical steps to accomplish the above points:

1.  Center Yourself– When you’re struggling to recover from a setback or disappointment, before doing anything else, the first step has to be centering yourself. Bring the situation to God, pray, “Lord, help me rest in you, trust in your grace, and gather the resources and support I need to make a plan and see this through.”  Then refocus on a goal–any goal–that represents the next small step you can take.  You’ll feel less like running away if you can identify the next step forward and focus on gathering the resources to help you take that next step.

2.  Get Out of the Tunnel–We often find it hard to bounce back from disappointments or challenges because tunnel vision causes us to get stuck trying to find the one big thing we can do to solve this problem once and for all. Especially with more complicated situations, there is rarely one thing you can do to make the problem disappear. Instead, concentrate on the next small thing you can do to either address the problem or insulate yourself from the problem or both. Focusing on small steps you can take in several areas– instead of searching for ultimate answers to the one big question–allows you to come out of the tunnel and begin to see new options on the horizon.

3. Make A “Got It Done” List–We all know about To-Do lists but what about making a “Got it Done” list?  Sometimes we struggle with bouncing back from a problem or setbacks because we feel like we’re  just not up to the challenge.  You can combat these feelings by intentionally calling to mind–and better yet, writing down–all the past times in your life when you were sure you weren’t up to a challenge but, through God’s grace and your good efforts, you managed to succeed.  Making a “Got It Done List” will help you remember that you have conquered many difficult situations before and remind you that between you and God, there is nothing you can’t handle moving forward.

Looking for more practical steps to navigating life’s challenges? Check out our videos, books, and pastoral tele-counseling services at CatholicCounselors.com.

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Quick Links and Resources:

God Help Me! This Stress is Driving Me Crazy!

God Help Me! These People Are Driving Me Nuts!

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Baby Steps – Guest Post by Judi Phillips, Pastoral Counselor at CatholicCounselors.com

Guest Post by Judi Phillips, Pastoral Counselor at CatholicCounselors.com

Often, in the course of my daily professional work, I find that clients are so focused on the ‘big picture,’ that they can become easily overwhelmed, frozen, and find themselves struggling to do anything at all. This often leads to internal self-talk that further sabotages their efforts at moving forward. Statements such as, “This is all too much,” “I always end up like this,” “I don’t know where to begin,” “How am I ever going to get any of this done,” along with any other similar form of self talk that is indicative of believing one’s self to be powerless.

We have a tendency, in our humanity, to doubt that we can accomplish what needs to be accomplished. We focus on ‘all there is to do,’ and we lose sight of the fact that there is always something we can do. However, we won’t be able to do a small thing if we are focusing on everything or if we are focusing only on the big picture. We need to break down, whatever it is that we are facing, into smaller segments, smaller ‘bites’ so to speak. I often say to my clients, “Does a person get from the base of Mt. Everest in a giant step? No! It’s one small step and then the next, and the next…” This is the very way that we need to address any problem we may face in daily life.

To compound this challenge, there is a rampant belief system in our culture, the “all or nothing” belief of I either have to do ‘all of it the right way and perfectly,’ or I ‘can’t do anything.’ This often leads to the continuous cycle of starting and expecting perfection, which is unrealistic, or stopping and not doing anything.

God created us to have the ability to be empowered. We know this because of the way our brain is created. There is a part of our brain dedicated to being aware of and processing emotions and a part of our brain dedicated to logic, reasoning, and cognitive processing. Using both parts of our brain, we can determine a way forward, which is God’s desire for us, to know that we have the potential to always take a step forward. Essentially, we are empowered in the ways God intends when we operate from the place that ‘there is always something I can do’ no matter how small it might be. 

So, the next time you find yourself feeling overwhelmed or frozen, remember…”There is always something I can do!” Then ask yourself, “What is one small step I can take to begin helping myself to address this issue?” You’ll find it is a small thing that has a HUGE payoff!

If you would like more support on this topic or another area of your life, schedule an appointment with Judi Phillips (or any of our Pastoral Counselors) at CatholicCounselors.com!

Fasting From Falsehood

The Lenten season has arrived. For some, this season is a time of great healing, blessings, and connectedness to God. For others, this time is challenging or comes with feelings of sadness or suffering. But what really is the point of Lent? And whether it is difficult or peaceful, how can we use this time to strengthen our relationship with God? 

A common Lenten practice focuses on sacrificing, or giving something up for 40 days. The intention of this is to say, “Lord, I love you more than I love this thing that I am giving up.” Then, each time we think about the thing we have sacrificed, or have a desire for what are fasting from, we instead shift our focus to the Lord and do something in that moment that leads us closer to Him. However, it’s easy for this practice of sacrificing to become twisted into the belief that we are meant to suffer throughout Lent (or in general). While this is not the case, there are two important things to address about suffering in order to understand why. 

First, we must recognize that we are not called to just suffer. Jesus did not suffer for the sake of suffering, he suffered to work for a greater good—for our greater good. This is the difference between suffering and redemptive suffering. Suffering without meaning is misery. Suffering with meaning, however, is redemptive suffering—and redemptive suffering leads to healing, works for a greater good, and leads us closer to God.

Second, it is important to understand the difference between what St. Ignatius referred to as Consolations and Desolations. Consolations are movements of the Holy Spirit that lead us closer to God and help us move towards meaningfulness, intimacy, and virtue in our life and our relationships. Desolations are moments where satan is whispering in our ear and we are being lead towards feelings of powerlessness, isolation, and self pity and/or self indulgence. Now, this does not mean that consolations always feel good and desolations always feel bad. Consolations can sometimes be very difficult, sometimes they don’t feel good at all in the moment—but they do ultimately lead us towards meaningfulness, intimacy, and virtue. 

So how do these concepts relate to our Lenten practice? If making some sort of Lenten sacrifice leads you towards greater healing through meaningfulness, intimacy, and virtue, then that can be a wonderful focus for the next 40 days. However, if giving something up leads towards a sense of powerless, isolation, or self pity/self indulgence and feelings of empty suffering, God might be calling you to focus on something different this Lent. Perhaps if you struggle with self esteem or self acceptance a helpful Lenten practice would be to focus on taking care of yourself. This might be difficult, but would lead you closer to God by being a good steward of God’s creation in you. Maybe if your tendency is to bury your feelings or hide your feelings behind an unhealthy coping mechanism a fruitful Lenten practice would be to begin journaling daily or seek counseling. Again, this may feel uncomfortable, but would be a practice of redemptive suffering which would lead you towards greater healing and strengthen your relationship with God.

These are only two examples, however the goal and focus of Lent is to grow in relationship with God and to move us closer to becoming the whole, healed, godly, grace-filled selves we were created to be. 

If you need support throughout your Lenten journey or would like to learn more about how to move from a place of desolation to a place of consolation, check out The Life God Wants You To Have, or reach out to our Pastoral Counselors at CatholicCounselors.com.