Embrace Your Desires and Rekindle Your Relationships

Summary

Shutting down parts of yourself disconnects your from relationships. Learn how healing religious trauma can strengthen your bonds.

Catherine Quiring helps exvangelicals learn to trust their desires and reconnect to their inner wisdom.  She also helps people-pleasers learn to trust themselves and recenter themselves at the helm of their lives.  Catherine loves this life-changing work of therapy and healing and feels so privileged that she gets to spend her days doing this.

• Show Notes

  Main points from the show:

  Catherine discusses the obstacles that hinder self-trust and reconnecting with our inner selves. They highlight three main teachings from growing up in evangelical circles: distrust of our bodies, negative view of desires, and prioritizing trust in God over ourselves.

  Learn how to heal through embodied practices and movement meditations.

  We also chat about the negative impact of self-doubt and mistrust of personal desires in a Christian environment, as well as the weaponization of scripture.

  Shifting the script to trusting desires, embracing pleasure, and finding a balance between religious practices and personal enjoyment can be the light at the end of the tunnel.

  Stay in touch with Catherine:

  Website: ⁠www.cqcounseling.com⁠

  Trust Yourself Masterclass: ⁠https://catherinequiring.ck.page/b2f3e2a8f8⁠

  Trust Yourself Again course info: ⁠https://www.cqcounseling.com/trust-yourself

  Connect with ⁠Paige Bond⁠

  Instagram: ⁠@paigebondcoaching⁠

  Facebook: ⁠@paigebondcoaching⁠

  Website: ⁠www.paigebond.com⁠

  Paige Bond hosts the Stubborn Love podcast, is a Licensed Marriage Therapist, and is a Polyamory Relationship Coach. Her mission is to help people-pleasing millennials navigate non-monogamy so they can tame their jealousy and love with ease. Her own journey from feeling lonely, insecure, and jealous to feeling empowered and reassured is what fuels her passion to help other people-pleasers to conquer jealousy and embrace love.

  Free Jealousy Workbook: 

  ⁠⁠⁠http://www.paigebond.com/calm-the-chaos-jealousy-workbook-download⁠⁠⁠

  Free People Pleasing Workbook: 

  ⁠⁠⁠https://www.paigebond.com/people-pleasing-workbook⁠⁠⁠

  Disclaimer: This podcast and communication through our email are not meant to serve as professional advice or therapy. If you are in need of mental health support, you are encouraged to connect with a licensed mental health professional to receive the support needed.

  Mental Health Resources:National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255SAMHSA’s National Helpline: 1-800-662-HELP (4357)Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741 for free, 24/7 crisis counseling.

  Intro music by Coma-Media on ⁠⁠⁠pixabay.com⁠

Transcript

Please note that this transcript was generated with AI and there will be errors.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

All right listeners. Welcome back to another episode of Stubborn Love. And I'm excited because we're bringing back another guest that we've had on the show already again, Catherine Queering is gonna be joining us and she's gonna talk about how we can learn to trust our desires and reconnect to our inner wisdom. So, Catherine, thank you for being on the show today. So excited to be here. Tell us where, where do we even start? Like this is a big old thing to accomplish.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Yeah. Right. Well, would you like me to start with what it feels like once you've accomplished that or some of the things that have stood in the way of us, trusting our desires and reconnecting to our inner wisdom.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Let's start with what gets in the way we'll, we'll move through obstacles and then we'll get to the finish line.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Ok. Sounds great. Well, I think today we're gonna focus on how this happens in evangelical circles and religious trauma that comes from that. There are lots of other things like narcissistic relationships and lots of other ways that we're taught not to trust ourselves that we talk about later if you'd like. I think often the whole evangelical system and fundamentalist system can mirror a lot of narcissistic traits and we can talk about that in the future too.

but the, the 33 of the main ways that I've identified that we are taught not to trust ourselves growing up in evangelical subculture and evangelical churches is one, we are taught not to trust in or live in our bodies. There's one this kind of cultural, cultural dualistic framework that we're coming from. And then there's a lot of like very specific stuff about the body is not an ok place to be this to trust God over yourself.

And the third one is the desires are bad, evil, suspect and do not trust them. So those are the three of them. We are taught and learn growing up in an evangelical subsystem that makes it very, very difficult to feel like we have safety or space to learn how to trust ourselves.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Yeah. And so when we're not able to be feeling like safe in our own bodies, safe with our God or higher power that we're trusting and being able to like know and accept what our desires are like. It makes sense why people are struggling and why they come find you to help them. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So let's, let's get started with that first one. Like being in our bodies. Can you tell us a little bit more about that, what it looks like and how to help.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Right. So I think the the first piece of it is that our country and culture in general are pretty dualistic, you know, our minds and our bodies are considered separate and our minds are prized over our bodies. There is a lot of, you know, Christian teachings going back even to the middle ages. I think that that talk about some of these things of suspect, being suspect to desires and the body and the flesh and like that holds all of these temptations and things that are supposedly

uncontrollable. And then our minds are supposedly more pure and with reason and logic and those kind of things. And that was really cemented, I think in enlightenment. And then that's become such a core part of our experience of the world and of religion that that is kind of the undergirding of all this, right? And then on top of that, there are the very specific religious messages about your body is actually not your own.

It is supposed to be a container for God, right? So that is what I was taught is there's so many verses around you must become less, so God can become more, you have to empty yourself of yourself so that God can fill you and invite you are evil at your core and depraved and sinful. And the only hope for your redemption is to empty yourself of yourself and invite God in a salvation prayer to come fill you up and that's what you call born again, right?

Is that and I remember really experiencing that as a kid and feeling like I was not allowed to have a self, let alone a body, right? Like I really, I internalized that so young that I know I was dissociating in them by the age of seven because I broke my nose and it was because I was really spaced out and dissociated.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

How do people know when they're dissociating? That's what I was going to ask.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Oh Yeah. So it can feel on the spectrum of like kind of this mild, I'm kind of spaced out. So for example, you're listening to maybe even this talk or a lecture or watching TV, or talking with someone and all of a sudden you realize, oh, I missed part of what they said. That's this dissociation or spacing out. Sometimes our brains need that time to kind of just calm down if we haven't had enough space to process.

And sometimes it's because there's so much going on internally that our attention shifts to whatever emotional or mental kind of thing we're processing internally and sometimes it's because what's outside feels too threatening or scary or triggering. And so then our body kind of shuts that off. So there's a bunch of different. OK. Yes.

Yeah. This internal preoccupation. Like I can't myself enough to make sure I'm OK. Yeah, under hyper vigilance and I remember a really distinct difference before I realized I was not that I was evil like that before that I felt really free and I felt in my body. I remember just being free and dancing and having fun and like living in myself and then after we had like, I think it was called like a children's evangelist or something come speak at our church that basically put this at the

level that kids could understand that they were depraved sinners and they needed to pray the sinner's prayer. They're gonna go to hell. That I was like, oh gosh, I thought I was OK with God. I thought like I was just following God and everything was great. And then all of a sudden, I'm told that's not true. And that was one of the first times that I remember really feeling like what I know inside this religious authority is telling me is not true.

And I am supposed to trust them over myself so that I am saved for eternity. And that shifted a lot inside for me. And that's when I started having more dissociation. And, and really very specifically saying I have to empty myself out in order to let God fill me up and that was excruciating. And I remember it feeling excruciating at the same time that I felt like I had to do it.

And then one of my next memories of that was always having to be helpful and that, that was what a good Christian would do. And so not being allowed to have any boundaries around that. Like I always had to be generous in giving to my younger sister. Even if she wasn't that way back, I didn't have a right to request those things or say those things for myself. Right. I had to always be giving no matter how somebody treated me back, which is just a recipe for people pleasing and

codependency. So that's another like trail that we could go down at some point. But it it comes out of this, you're not allowed to trust yourself. You're not even allowed to live in your body, right? Like living in your body is expelling God and your whole self is simple. So why would you do that?

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

So really anything related to like who you are is not allowed? And so we dissociate to like deal with not being able to feel like we can be ourselves.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Right. Right. And we end up exiling a lot of parts of us in order to meet that external requirement. Yeah. So last time I started talking about the different parts of us inside according to the internal family systems framework and the part that I didn't mention is the exiles. So those are parts of us that hold a lot of wonderful potential and experiences and are often very young and so that they don't keep getting hurt or that they're not exposed and vulnerable.

We exile them, right? Or we know that they might be dangerous to us fitting in this system. So I got rid of any embodiment, sexuality, anything that was assertive or aggressive or not, according to these certain values that I was told were OK. And I was with it only to me that I would live and be aware and everything else got exiled.

So even for me, the parts of me that hold held pleasure and desire sometimes they could be there. But if they were in competition with any sort of religious issue, they got shoved into the closet too.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

I'm like thinking about the exiling these parts of us that basically are not fitting the mold of what the church religion wants. Right. Right. Yeah. Ok.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

And then when people do allow those parts to come out, they get shamed, they get disciplined. They get, they say, you know, people call them evil. They're sent to awful like Christian schools and boarding schools that, you know, say, like we're disciplining you in the name of love, but it's really abuse. Like those are the, some of the religious, like, extremes of religious trauma that I've heard. But they're not in common.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Wow. Ok. Is there anything more to say about like, what, what happens when we're disassociating.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

It's this fundamental thing of I'm not, it is not OK for me to live in my body and that I am my body like even a step further than that right? Is that I am my body. I'm not just the separate soul inside rattling around inside a body like I am my body. And so all of these cues that we get from our bodies and the way that they hold stress that is us and that's parts of us giving us information and that is part of the like spectrum or trajectory of healing.

Is this like, oh is there permission to even be in my body to be a little bit more present to be a little bit more aware of all the parts of me and all the, you know, sections of my body, right? Some parts might be a lot safer than other parts that might be holding certain emotions or certain experiences. This is why embodied practices can be really helpful like yoga or, you know, dance or things like that where people are able to be in their bodies in a safe way.

I know my first experience with yoga when I did hip openers, I just started crying because I hadn't been able to be aware of that part of my body. And it was very healing. So that is part of the trajectory of healing too of like, can we experience our bodies in any way? Can we live inside of our bodies? And then can we even really embrace this reality of that? I am my body. Yeah. Right. And get rid of the reality that I have my mind in the body.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

We can help ourselves with a healing journey, like through more embodied practices. What what else can help us like healing this part with the dissociation related to religious trauma. How else can we help that?

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

There is a lot of embodiment work being done out there. And so I would say, you know, like one of my favorite books that I read recently is The Wisdom Of Your Body by Hillary mcbride. There's tons of embodiment coaches. I do embodiment work in my therapy, you know, trying out some of these things of can I experience my body? Can I be in my body? What is it like?

You know, and when I'm dissociating what's just being aware like we were talking about last time, I'm moving from judgment to curiosity of like what feels too overwhelming. What am I trying to protect myself from? And how can I heal that? But I don't have to force myself to be present for it. But how can I like be aware and start healing that?

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Yeah. So question like in the last episode we did together, we talked a little bit like this exercise of kind of trusting ourselves with, ok, knowing what foods we like and we don't like and we can feel that in our bodies. So is that an embodiment practice too? Absolutely. Yes.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Hm. Ok. Sometimes more meditation like meditation kind of things can foster this separation instead of being in your body. So I feel like whatever kind of transformational practices you're doing, see if they're ones that can help you be a little bit more in your body rather than taking you out of your body. Right.

So for me, I don't actually do just sit down, listen to meditations very well. I have to do moving meditations. So I do things while I'm walking, while I'm doing yoga, things like that. As well as just being able to like be aware of. Can I touch my hands together or can I touch the floor and be aware of my body doing that?

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Yeah. OK. That is really cool. I didn't I don't know why I didn't think about meditating and using your body with movement rather than just like sitting still how we normally think of meditation. And, and this could be like an actual practice where we get in touch physically with ourselves, right?

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

And I'm guessing that, you know, this may still be part of my lack of embodiment, trauma, dissociation, trauma that just sitting and meditating is hard for me. It may just be a neuro divergence, I'm not sure, but that's never really worked for me. Even deep breathing was really triggering. And so I just want to mention that in case anybody else feels that way. But it's, that's OK. You can find other ways to be embodied another practice that really work for you.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

OK. All right. So that's relieving. All right. So that's how to help get more in tune with our bodies and accepting that we are our bodies. Shall we move on to the next part?

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Yeah, that sounds great.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

OK. So you mentioned the a big part of being brought up in that culture is like you need to trust God or authority over yourself. So can you help us go more into that?

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Yeah, absolutely. There's so many facets to that. So I'm gonna try to remember all of them. But if I miss one, that somebody is like, oh that, that, that one hit me, let us know one part of that is this verse that is a Hallmark verse. That's like I think just about everybody has heard of Proverbs 35 and six. So trust the Lord over with all your heart lean not on your own understanding in all your ways, trust him or submit to him and he will make your path straight.

So like this is enshrined in so much of what we're taught. That is a Hallmark verse that everyone I think just about everybody memorizes, you could tell I just rattled that off that you are not supposed to trust yourself. You were supposed to trust God over yourself. Right? And any time there is a discrepancy, you have to trust God over yourself.

And if you're not, you're sinning is the language around it or you're rebellious, there's a lot of talk about being rebellious and even the like, supposedly supportive groups in these situations, they're called accountability groups. They're like accountability to be doing and thinking the right things not support groups to really help you get through life.

Right. And I think when I was in that system, I was the most support I got. So I thought of them as support groups, but like you couldn't get non judgmental support at all. You couldn't ask certain questions. You didn't believe certain things like, you couldn't be struggling with certain things and mention it really. All that was safe to mention is like, I know someone who's sick, let's pray for them.

Any sort of struggles were considered sinful or you're not trusting God enough or you just haven't gotten to the place or he's testing you like there's just so there's so many unhealthy interpretations of that, I think understanding our experiences.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Am I getting it right? If like I, is it like the mindset of, well, gosh, if you're struggling, you're not quote Christian enough and you should be a better Christian, right?

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Ok. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Or if you're feeling that long enough, it means you probably aren't a Christian and you get saved again. Or recommit your life or whatever that is. And there was also this language around anything that God called you to, you probably wouldn't want to do. So. I remember there being a lot of like invitations to calls to ministry and putting some quotes, right?

Of like any sort of work within religious setting of the church or sharing God's message or whatever. So, missionary work or being a pastor or whatever, that was, the assumption was you were gonna fight against it until you submitted to God that nobody actually wanted it. That was at least the setting I grew up in. That was very different than some of the people I've heard in settings that weren't such like high control settings.

But that was the message that I got repeatedly over and over and over is that you surrender to the call ministry, you surrender to God like it was never something you wanted. Yeah. And that you knew you were doing something, right? If you didn't want to do it, like how confusing is that, that instead of being able to trust those impulses and desires and information inside of you, you have to say, oh well, that means that's wrong.

That means I'm wrong. What God says instead, right? I always have to have this hyper vigilance and like double check around. Am I doing the right thing? Is this God's will? Is this what God wants and this sense that there's this like fixed timeline of things that God wants for you and you have to figure them out like a puzzle instead of you get to explore and just experience your life, which is really, I think breeds

some like O CD and hypervigilance and things like that too. That's not very good at you're again checking with its outside source instead of being able to trust yourself.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Yeah. And I'm just thinking that like this perpetuates a belief for people going through this, that like they're just always going to be in a one down position where they're not smart enough. They are not Christian enough, good enough. They are not like an enough in all kinds of ways. So it, it just like completely wrecks you, right?

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

And you're supposed to be helpless like I can't, I, I used, I still am, I was gonna say I used to be triggered by Christian songs. I still am. And I've been trying, you know, trying to piece apart what are the reasons why? What are the themes? And one of them is that you are supposed to think of yourself as a worthless person and God came to save you and you always have to keep repeating this reality about yourself that you're helpless, but God came to save you, you're

worthless. But God is your worthiness, right? That like you're not allowed to have any worth as a person on your own or trust yourself there or celebrate yourself or any of that.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Oh, that touches me. That's, that's heartbreaking. Yeah. To, to think that, you know, we can be conditioned to, to think like this and in what we think is a supportive environment, right? Because we're surrounded by people who we think we're, we're trusting who we think are good for us. And then, you know, realizing that's not the best thing for us.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

And I mean, I think most of the people that are in the system and perpetuating it, they're doing it because they believe it and they care about you, right? Their intentions are generally good and most people are not malicious in their intentions, but they're in a system with these really distorted beliefs in this high control environment that perpetuates this fear and anxiety and control.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

So and I know we're gonna get to talking about desires too but is it separate and like how we learn to trust self over like this authority? I know we went into it in our previous episode. But is there anything else particularly about? OK, how do I navigate this power imbalance where I believe that God is superior to me and I don't have any, you know, advocacy for myself, right?

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

So I'm gonna mention three things if I can remember them all. One is this sense of enshrining the nuclear family and the authority of the parents in the nuclear family. So that's another layer of, like, enforcing this authority. And I definitely experienced that and I had like, pretty warm caring responsive parents. So, in some ways they, you know, lightened the stress of the system, but in other ways they were in this system.

And I really felt that in the sense of like, I had to put everything out in front of them that I was thinking, and then see what they thought was the right thing. And then I'd pick that one. Like, I didn't make any choices or assertions about things that I thought might have any religious or moral undertones. Like there were other things that were pretty innocuous.

It was like, I can choose this after school hobby or I can choose this. I had a lot of freedom and like, self awareness around that. But other things like you have to put it out there and see what the parents think because they're the authority. And if I disagree with them, I, my mom literally told me once, if you're not right with me, you're not right with God.

And that was just because I was asserting myself and, like, trying to have my own beliefs about things, right? That it's just so ingrained in the way that they think they're supposed to protect us, right? Like I, I know that it came out of goodwill and like wanting to protect me, but it also really curtailed my ability to trust myself. And I also did not have a sense that they trusted me in these areas, right.

They had to know it was best for me to figure it out and tell me what to do. Right. And so that's a lot of this self trust awareness comes out of like I can trust myself to make those decisions. I don't have to prove it to anyone in authority and make sure that they agree with me. Like, what if I just stop having to prove it to anyone? I'm like, it's OK.

As long as I feel like it's important, then I can, I can step out on that. That's, that's part of the healing of that part of that. And of course, I forgot the other things I was going to mention there. But if you think of them later, I'll mention them. Yeah. Yeah, I did remember 11 is a like a bigger grander scale thing of how this subculture teaches that the authority of the scripture and reading it literally is so crucial to be believe in God and being a Christian that if you don't, that

probably means you're not a Christian or you're not right with God. And that has been something that the, the Bible has been weaponized in this way. Over time, it was weaponized in this way with slavery as well that all the verses about being slave owners and just being gentle, kind like slave owners was upheld as the literal word of God, right?

And because of that, they use the Bible to defend slavery and to defend racism and defend white supremacy. And we still see that legacy in evangelical circles, right? That's like rearing its head and being way more overt than it was for many years, that was just kind of under the surface not as obvious to white people, but definitely obvious to people of color.

you know, even the book white Fragility by Robin d'angelo, she talks about the, the movie The Blind Side. And that was just so eye opening to me of that expresses so much paternalism. And to me that is just such an encapsulation of the kind of evangelical culture I grew up in and also like what Rhonda Santis maybe like represents now, right? It just feels like exactly the same thing of like, it always felt a little bit off to me or a little bit wrong, but I didn't know why and it's because

of this white Savior mentality. So I didn't mean to get off on that too much, but that's, that's part of this picture of how the authority of scripture, which is the term that they use a lot. But like, we have to be under the authority of scripture that it's actually a weapon and it's actually control, it's not actually about believing God. And so now it's used against homosexuality and against abortion and against so many of these other, like, social, human rights issues that

really, it doesn't have to be about, but it's become this litmus test and it's become a weapon, right? That I think, understanding the legacy of how that's been used as a weapon over time is really helpful and being like, I really don't have to listen to that at all. That's just there, there's no reason to have to dissect all of those like verses that people use as bully verses and understand, oh it, it's so entrenched in how white supremacy and control and domination culture have

been in our world, right? There's just like external domination and there's this internal domination, right? Which is what we're feeling. Yeah. Yeah. So if you're not able to trust your own desires.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

I think we can like take an even bigger dive talking about the white supremacy and oppression of like people who are not quote fitting into the church in the terms of like, if you are not like us, you can't be like us and you are wrong for not being like us. So we will definitely have a lot more to talk about in the future on that. So we have this last part here talking about you know, we can't trust our desires in the church. So talk a little bit more about that.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

I, I have a bunch of things written down that I've like different inputs and messages that I heard in the church about this that I think are interesting that there's just so much input about this over time. I remember hearing like trust in the Lord with all your heart. There's a, a hymn that says prone to wander, Lord. I feel it prone to leave the God I love, take my heart or take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above.

And like the sense of I can't trust my heart to lead me to God or the divine or whatever I want. Like I have to be suspect of that and always think that I'm gonna be going the wrong direction, right? That my, and this keeps being said over and over that. Any desire, any impulse that we have is something that we can't trust and something we should be suspect of.

And then we have to come back to this external authority to tell us what's right and what's true and over and over saying we have keep having to like renounce our desires or they're considered rebellious or evil or sinful. I mean, I remember there was a like a train analogy that was used a lot. growing up of like the front of the train is your thoughts and your logic and that's what's supposed to drive the train and then your desires and feelings come after that and they're not to be

trusted. They're the caboose, they're just kind of following along and, you know, if there's any disagreement, you need to trust your logic, do not trust your emotions, they're always gonna lead you astray is basically what I remember hearing, like very overtly. And then, you know, there's so much with, there's so many different types and levels of desires, right?

There's just the desire for rest. There's the desire for playfulness, desire to not take yourself so seriously the desire of like what you want to eat or what behaviors you want to do or things like that, right? That are so great to have freedom and space and ability to listen to. That's what gives us life and vibrancy and balance in our lives.

And instead we were supposed to consider all of those as suspect or evil and only rely on the parts of us that were seeking Godliness or seeking to further the kingdom of God or evangelism or whatever the missions of the church were like, that's what you were supposed to spend all your energy on. And if you had any emotions come up of shame or anxiety or depression or things that now I would label as trauma responses, right?

Or stress responses. They were saying that you were not doing the right thing and you're supposed to double down and push harder and try harder and trust God more and like all these just do it kind of language.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

And then I can see how it's so easy to not trust our internal voice of like the inner critic coming out when you know, we, we screw up and then we're like, you know, pushed by external factors of like, OK, you didn't do that, right? Do it harder, push yourself more and then the inner critic is just going and going and going.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Right. Exactly. And you're supposed to listen to the critic, right? Instead of your desires. Yeah. You know, we we've been talking about the the ifs internal family systems framework of parts and the three, the three main parts that they mentioned are the managers that are like do it better work harder, try harder, they help you prevent pain or achieve whatever you think for you need for success.

And then there's the parts that we they call the firefighters, but in their healthiest state, they're actually our desire holders. So they're the parts of us that help us distract, relax, avoid pain, bring like tone that down. So we can feel better and find just pure desire and pleasure in life. And those are such wonderful parts of us that basically just get villainized, right?

And so part of this work of healing is being like, oh, actually those desires are good. I can pay attention to those I can have any sort of desires that I want and that's OK. And then both of those sets of parts are protecting the exiles underneath that are holding pain or that we send away because we don't think they're gonna be accepted that we get to bring back and heal as well.

And then our core stuff that leads it all that has our inner knowing. But I would just say that to say, I think like embracing that these parts of us with our desires are actually such a vital part of our well being and a vital part of us that we get to go through that framework of trusting yourself that I mentioned before, too of like moving to curiosity about them, to befriending them, to being able to like have them as part of the team and trusting them and trusting us.

And you know, there's, it can be a lot easier to trust little desires, I think sometimes and then we keep moving towards these bigger things of like, you know, there's the whole section of desires encapsulated in sexuality, right? And that goes to both embodiment and desires, right? That has been so villainized. When really that is such a life giving part of us to be able to live in that and express that in any part of that be ok. can be really healing. Yeah.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Well, what I'm being reminded of and I can't remember what you were saying about it. So I want you to talk about it again. But before we got on here we talked about, pleasure and how that's, that's not really, something that's accepted. Ok. And in, in yourself, in your body, things like that.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Right. So, one of my early memories with it, even a pretty innocuous pleasure was, we were supposed to do devotions every morning. So that means like quite quiet time with God. It was called our devotions where you read the Bible and you pray and that was essential in order to maintain a good relationship with God, this codependent relationship that you're supposed to have.

And the message was that if you didn't do that and you felt some distance between you and God that you weren't right with God. And that had like eternal ramifications and you had to change that and you had to like, do all these things to get God back on your side basically or like make it up to Him or make it OK. And so there are pretty big consequences to that and a lot of reasons to say I need to do this every day.

And so I remember one Saturday morning thinking like, ok, I need to do my devotions. But also the cartoon that I really want to watch is on like one of my favorite shows that brings me so much, just rest and rejuvenation and playfulness in my body. And I chose to do my devotions instead because I wasn't sure if I would get to them any time in the day and I sacrificed the pleasure for the discipline and that was always rewarded.

I remember even being proud of myself at that time or even though like a part of me was just devastated and shut away. Right. That, that was really a shift inside of me where my managers really took over and there really wasn't that much space for pleasure left. And that kind of just impulse of, oh, this is something I wanna do that's really lighthearted and fun and feeds me everything was managed down to the second.

I mean, I remember in college I had verses, verses of the Bible on a little key ring that I would try to memorize or read between classes. Like I did not even get myself space between classes to just have freedom of thought and space. It was just accomplish, accomplish, accomplish, do more, do more, do more, which is part of our culture and part of this religious framework for discipline and upbringing.

And, you know, like, always choose the managers, always choose the better yourself. the discipline, not the pleasure when really. And then my body had so much anxiety and so many like physical ailments that it took. Oh my gosh. I need the rest. I need the pleasure. That is a part of me that I've had to work really hard to reclaim now. But it's been so and refreshing.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Yeah. So the part with the desires. Is it more so of just basically recognizing what we're truly wanting? And, and starting to, to work with that self trust again and going into, oh, well, this desire might be all right? Or, or what is the process of like? Yeah.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Yeah. I think it kind of starts with this space to be curious about and let those desires arise without shutting them down. Right. And then if we notice we're trying to shut them down, can we take care of those parts of us that are criticizing or trying to shut them down or trying to control them and ask those parts of us to like step back and trust us a little bit and then have some space to be curious about the pleasure, right?

Like yeah, that sounds like that might be really good for me. What is that gonna feel like in my body if I give myself space for that? Right? Does that feel like rest? Does it feel like relief? Does it feel like just pure joy, pleasure, ecstasy, whatever that is? Right. There's so many of our experiences come through our bodies and our emotions?

My pleasure comes from that. Yeah. And it might be a really simple thing like, yeah, I'm gonna take a little extra time to rest before going to work today or I'm gonna leave early or it might be like, oh I'm gonna, you know, try out this new sexual kink like who knows? Like it could be anything.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Yeah. Yeah. And being able to practice that and do those things that bring pleasure without that judgment or shame from our inner critic, right? So healing when we think about religion and this could be again, probably another whole episode that we can do. how, how can we know when we're in this if we don't know that this isn't really good for us.

Because, because right, what you said with disassociating, we don't really recognize it's happening, we just space out. So like are there red flags that people should look out for? Because there, there are some, you know, experiences in religion where it can be beneficial for people and it can be healthy.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

So how do we recognize that the biggest thing to look for is if it's a high control environment or not? So, in a high control environment, you're supposed to trust the leader or the like authority figure. And you know, we might be most familiar in thinking about that of like sensationalized cults that we've heard about, right, of this one, magnetic charismatic leader.

But it can also be this whole set of beliefs that you are supposed to live by. Like we've been talking about in fundamentalist and evangelical circles where you have to be and think a certain way and you have to turn off other parts of you and other ways of knowing any time you hear or sense that in your body and be like, oh, that might not be good for me. This might not be the right place for me. And any places where there is more exploration and more curiosity and more trust of yourself and

more space to get to know yourself. And from there, connect to the divine and connect to God. That's gonna be a space that's safe because you are allowed to flourish and trust yourself and be a whole person there versus you have to cut off certain parts of you or exile them or distrust them in order to survive there.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

I love how you put that in such a clear and simplified way for people to picture of, oh, is this right for me or am am I you know leaning on the other side where it's really high controlled environment? So thank you for explaining that. Yeah, you're welcome. Yeah. So are there any other things that our listeners need to know about trusting our desires and reconnecting to their inner wisdom?

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

I think just keep coming back to this possibility of like hope and life and joy and freedom and choices that we have inside of us and any place that you find that calls that out, do that more, listen to that more and start practicing that for yourself and then try it out, you know, in your circles and your relationships and see how that goes there and how people respond.

Just starting to kind of notice that for yourself that we talk about of, oh, this is desire. Can I have space for it? Can I learn to befriend it? Can I create space for it in my life? to have more of that there?

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Yeah, I love that. That's a fantastic guidance for people to start practicing today. Well, Catherine, it looks like we are at the end of our time today. Thank you so much for hopping on here and talking about these really important things that not a lot of people are open to having conversations about. So this is really tough stuff that you're bringing up and you're sharing with people and thank you so much for that.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

Yeah, you're so very welcome. It's my pleasure.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

Yes. And that's what I was gonna say. It's always a pleasure to have you on the show. So, looking forward to more episodes with you.

Catherine Quiring, LMHC & Self-Trust Coach

That sounds great. Thanks, great.

Paige Bond, Relationship Expert

All right. So we will have all of Catherine's links in the show notes so you can check out, read her blog, hop on our email list or grab one of her freebies and until next time, take care.