Welcome and Introduction to the Topic

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories Podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. It is September 14, 2021, I believe, and we are super excited today for a continuation in our series of what we're calling the Gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis series on Mormon Stories Podcast. So just to give a tiny bit of background, a few years ago, Natasha Helfer and I and my wife Margi were overflowing with feedback from people who. Who needed coaching support. And we didn't have enough slots to be able to help everyone. And frankly, we just wanted to have as many people get the help and support that they needed without even needing to pay any money. So we decided to do kind of an altruistic thing, which was to release 70 hours of free coaching for anyone going through a faith crisis. And so we created A podcast at MormonFaithCrisis.com, called the Gift to the Mormon Faith Crisis Podcast and did just that. Released 70 full hours, and that exists today. It's helped so many people, but the only thing that's been really frustrating about it is that no one knew about it. And so what we decided to do once we got Carah Burrell on staff, once we improved our video and our audio and beefed out the Mormon Stories podcast studio, is we decided that we're going to bring back a lot of these topics and bring on a mental health professional or coach each week to provide some content on the Mormon Stories podcast channel to support healing and growth. Yes. Yes, we do history and truth claims. Yes, we do epic faith journeys. Yes, we do current events and response videos. But we also want to do content dedicated to healing and growth. So we are lucky enough that my dear wife Margi agreed to come on at least twice a month to share with us some of her wisdom. A couple weeks ago, we had Margi on. Margi, what did we talk about?

Margi Dehlin [00:01:51] A couple weeks ago we talked about grounding during times of overwhelm.

Carah Burrell [00:01:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:01:57] And I received a ton of positive feedback about that. And today we are covering, for sure, one of the most highly sought after topics in the whole set of topics for navigating a faith crisis. And that is how to communicate with believing family and friends, and specifically how to tell believing family members or loved ones or friends about a faith crisis. And so welcome back. Margi Dehlin. We're so grateful you would be with us.

Margi Dehlin [00:02:22] Thank you. Thank you. I'm glad to be here.

John Dehlin [00:02:24] Yeah. And we also want to welcome our viewing audience. We are streaming to YouTube right now and we want to Incorporate comments and questions from our live viewing audience. We also want to live stream to Facebook, but for some reason, that's not quite working right now, so we will get that working. But to aid us in the moderation of comments to tracking time codes and to be a co participant in the role play and just in the content of this episode, we're so grateful to have Carah Burrell. Hey, Carah.

Carah Burrell [00:02:57] Hey, John. Hey, Margi. Thanks for the woo.

Margi Dehlin [00:03:00] Yeah, baby.

John Dehlin [00:03:01] Woo.

Carah Burrell [00:03:02] So fun. Let's talk about traumatizing things.

John Dehlin [00:03:08] Yeah. And, Carrie, you'll be representing our live streaming audience as well, so thank you for doing that. All right, so today is a big topic. We plan on going two hours, and what we hope to have is a lot of dialogue and conversation with our viewing audience. We have also solicited comments and question that have been posted to the Mormon Stories blog. And one thing I just want to say is we're probably. Margi, not going to be able to cover this topic in one session. There's so many people that have written in and expressed kind of private or personal situations or scenarios that probably deserve their own attention. There is an overview of kind of a framing that we really want to get to today, but then there's also lots of tools and tips and tricks and kind of details and different types of role play. So I think it's safe to say that we're not going to be able to cover today, but this will be a topic that maybe we cover as part of a series. Do you have anything you want to say about that?

Margi Dehlin [00:04:06] Yeah, only to just add and say maybe we'll look at today like an intro of sorts. An intro to the topic.

John Dehlin [00:04:14] Okay.

Margi Dehlin [00:04:14] A way to get started.

John Dehlin [00:04:15] Yeah, I love that. Okay. And so with that, without any further ado, we also hope to incorporate some visuals. And what we. We hope looks pretty decent is a little PowerPoint presentation that we've put together to help kind of give you a few visuals for what you're experiencing. So without any further ado. Should we jump in, Margi?

Margi Dehlin [00:04:35] Let's go.

John Dehlin [00:04:36] Carah, anything I need to check in with you about?

Carah Burrell [00:04:39] No. Everyone in the chat seems excited, and this sounds like very much needed information, so we're all pumped.

John Dehlin [00:04:46] All right, so let's. Let's jump in. All right, so the first thing that I want to introduce today is something that will be familiar to some of you but not familiar to others. I did obtain a PhD in clinical and counseling psychology, and I did that because so many people on Mormon Stories podcast and elsewhere just needed support. And I Wanted to be able to support people as best as I could. And the reason why I'm mentioning that is because the framework that I was trained in is a framework that I think is gonna be really helpful for navigating a faith crisis. So I want to introduce exper. Acceptance and commitment therapy. Not because we're doing therapy here on the podcast, but because I'm gonna be referring to this over and over and over again, Margi. Coaches under this framework. And frankly, if you are looking for a coach or a therapist to get support in your faith crisis, someone who is familiar with the concepts of acceptance and commitment therapy may be really useful to you. Think of acceptance commitment therapy as just a framework. Kind of a secular Buddhism had a baby with cognitive behavioral therapy. They came up with was acceptance and commitment therapy. And we're going to be referring to this map going forward. And there are six basic concepts in acceptance and commitment therapy that we're going to be returning to. The first is acceptance. The second is what I call diffusion, which is holding stories and labels and thoughts and feelings and emotions loosely. There's a heavy focus on. On being present in the moment. Not living in the past or the future, but living in the present moment and engaging in mindfulness and awareness of your thoughts and feelings in your journey. And then there's gonna be a really heavy emphasis on values and on committed action or commitment. Living in the space of your values. And that was a really brief introduction, but. But I'm gonna be referring to it a lot. But the first thing that I wanted to do to kind of set up this idea is there's a context for what happens when you lose your faith and then when you're terrified to come out to believing family and friends. And I just wanna address that right up front. Cause we can jump into how to do it. But what's more important is to understand the framework of what's happened. So I'm gonna introduce a framework. Is that okay, Margi? Of course, yeah. All right. So this is the framework. Mormonism is very much a religion that encourages good behavior. And there's nothing wrong with that. And one of the ways that they encourage good behavior is by kind of stories and myths and role models. And, you know, we're taught from a very young age to read the Book of Mormon. And we are taught, you know, the. That there are good role models and bad role models. And the classic archetypal role model within Mormonism, I think, is Nephi. And I apologize in advance, there's no archetypal positive female role model in Mormonism? Margi, tell me if I'm wrong about that. Were you given an archetypal positive female role model within Mormonism? Can you think of one that you modeled your life after? No, you can't. And that's kind of. That says a lot. But, Carah, was there a female role model, that archetypal role model that you were given in Mormonism?

Carah Burrell [00:08:26] Millie from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers?

John Dehlin [00:08:30] I'm taking your joking.

Carah Burrell [00:08:33] Sort of. That was my. In my home, at least. How about a scripturally.

John Dehlin [00:08:37] Yeah, like a universal role model, female role model.

Carah Burrell [00:08:40] Emma Smith, Shut up and go along with it. I don't know.

John Dehlin [00:08:43] No, like, no. Right. Okay. So, yeah, and so I. I apologize that I'm gonna give a male role model, but I think even women had Nephi, maybe as their role model. Margi, did you ever relate to Nephi at all or not really? That wasn't even someone that you related to?

Margi Dehlin [00:09:02] I think because of the relationship I had with the church and scriptures and kind of things. Remember back to my testimony, and I. I don't know that I wanted to be good, for sure.

John Dehlin [00:09:14] Yeah. But it wasn't Nephi. How about you, Carah? Did you ever want to be kind of Nephi? Is that even a role model that you were connecting to, not connecting to it?

Carah Burrell [00:09:24] No.

John Dehlin [00:09:24] Okay. All right. Well, many. I think that says something about how the Mormon Church needs to work harder to create positive, archetypal, universal female role models. But many of the. You know, one of the false stereotypes of people who leave the church is that the. They leave because they never believed in the first place, that they just wanted to sin, that they really weren't committed, that they were weak. And I found the opposite to be true with the people that I work with on the podcast, people that we've had interviewing on Mormon stories, people that I've coached. And, Margi, maybe you've experienced this as well. These were the people that cared the most. In fact, they lost their faith not because they cared so little, but because. But they lost their faith because they cared so much that they wanted it to be true, that they studied it more than other people, and that they were just really intense in living it. And that can create all sorts of problems. But many of the women and men that I've connected with sort of fall under this paradigm of the Nephi effect, which was that they were the APs on their mission, they were the zone leaders on their mission. They were the Relief Society presidents, they were the sister missionaries that didn't even have to serve a mission, but they were in it to win it. They got married early, they got married in the temple. Many of them didn't have sex until they were married. They had kids as soon as they could, and they were serving faithful in all their callings, going to the temple. And what I wanted to sort of really emphasize is from very early on, for many, many of you listeners, your relationship with your parents was based on you being Nephi, you being the good child, you being the obedient one, being the faithful one, and your ego, your sense of self, your sense of efficacy, your confidence in the world. Just the way you moved about in so many instances was that you were the good child. You were Nephi. And even if you were kind of that prodigal child who in your teen years goofed up or messed up or caused problems, you probably had some sort of salt on the road to Damascus moment or alma, the younger moment. Again, only male role models there where you got right. You, you returned as the prodigal child and you became the faithful one. And then from then forward again, your parents often rewarded you with kudos and love and affirmations, saying, oh, I'm so glad you're faithful. And you developed a connection with your parents or your loved ones that was tied to your faithfulness. And frankly, you got a lot of ego food, you got a lot of affirmation and positive affirmat for your faithfulness and for your righteousness. And within Mormonism, I think that is a key part of our journeys and that is why losing your faith and talking to believing family and friends can be so hard because you actually received food, ego food, support affirmation for your role as being a righteous, faithful one. Now I want to check in first with you, Margi, and then care with you and with the audience to see whether people are even vibing with this point. So, Margi, is this something that you connect with and in your life and or with the people that you coach?

Identity and the Good Child Role in Mormon Culture

Margi Dehlin [00:12:49] I totally connect with it. And I would even say, you know, you mentioned ego and you mentioned affirmation. I think it's even deeper. I think that's how a lot of us felt love. That's a lot like we had that. That's where the hustle was, where we had to become something to get the love. So it's also a lot, it's, it's more vulnerable than that. It's, it's really deep, right? It's, that's how we felt love. That's how we felt approval. So. And there's a lot we can say about that with regard to like moving into health, but you may not want to go there quite yet.

John Dehlin [00:13:28] Yeah, but you relate to that for sure. Carah, do you relate to that and. Or are any of the listeners and viewers kind of.

Carah Burrell [00:13:36] Yeah, I have two comments on that. And I love how Margi just said, um, that's how you know your parents sometimes that's how you relate to each other. And when you're speaking in love languages, I think a lot of our parents, like my parents love language for me is when they see me bear my testimony in church and I can make my mom cry by my words. And I know that that's how she knows that she succeeded as a parent is when she gets to see me, you know, posting pictures that I just got back from the temple. And all of those things are all baked into why my mom loves me. And so when I tell her I won't be doing the things that are the number one source of love that she has for me and I know that it is really a painful place to break. And you have to develop new love languages or just altogether like you're talking about. The NE HIPAA effect is just kind of disregard that. That's. I'm not going to be that child for you anymore. You're going to have to develop new love languages for me.

John Dehlin [00:14:22] And jumping ahead.

Carah Burrell [00:14:24] I'm so sorry, but you have.

John Dehlin [00:14:25] We're getting there.

Carah Burrell [00:14:26] That is so true. It just. When Margi said that, that's what registered really well with me, is developing a new way in that. In that sense. So I didn't mean to jump ahead, but.

John Dehlin [00:14:36] No, no, that's fine. So were you the good?

Looking Outward for Identity and Belonging

Carah Burrell [00:14:39] Were never the good until only when you first have. Because I was the youngest of five and I was already a smart ass my entire life. So I was already told my mom my. If you want to label a child, I would have been labeled like wild child is what my mom always told me. I was always the one that was like being too rowdy and like, oh, I'm worried about Carah. I'm always. She's a. I always knew that my mom was worried about me. So then when you become a teenager, the way that you undo that is the one way you can be performative is at church. And so that's where you take on a new identity of like, my mom always thought I was this way. Well, I'm going to show her up. I'm going to show her that I can be Laurel's presence president. I can show her I can get married in the temple. I'll show. She thinks, I'm gonna be this. Oh, I'm gonna be this. And you kind of have to work out how much of it is your own genuine belief and how much of it is performative for your parents. And then years later, when you kind of break down, this isn't working for me. I'm having all this cognitive dissonance. Like, you actually have to really shuffle between how much of this was performative, how much is it my own.

John Dehlin [00:15:33] So when you got married in the temple, you know, how did that make your parents feel, Right? Did you feel like. Did you feel like you were, you know, being on that path that your parents always wanted you to be? And did your parents reinforce that?

Carah Burrell [00:15:45] Yeah, and yes and no. Because in my Mormon Stories episode, I talk about how I had just had this big breakdown with my mom, and she had, like, read my journal, and she had tried to drag me to the bishop to repent. And so I had to make it very clear that I'm not doing this for you, Mom. I'm doing this because I always wanted to get married in the temple to a worthy priesthood holder, you know, So I had to make that more, like, explicitly clear to her that I am actually choosing this for myself now. And you can say there's a lot of conditioning my entire life that actually went into why I chose it. But having those at 19 years old, those are really hard conversations to have with your mom about the things that you're doing in their religion. It's hard to tease out those different things. But of course, they're super proud, and they cry on your wedding day because you, yay. You chose what they wanted you to choose, you know?

John Dehlin [00:16:26] Yeah. And. Yeah. Thank you, Carah. And so whether you were always the good child, maybe like me and maybe like Margi a bit, or you were kind of the wild child of the prodigal child, maybe a little bit more like Carah, once you reach adulthood, if you go on your mission, if you get married in the temple, if you start having kids, you're kind of on the path that makes your parents proud. And what I think we're kind of highlight is that there really is an element of conditional love within. And I'm not just going to say not just Mormonism, but probably all parenting in or out of religion. There's an element where parents try and imbue in kids a certain set of standards or morals or values, and then the kids try and make their parents proud, but it definitely exists in Mormonism. Within spades. Margi, you look like you were not sure about that.

Margi Dehlin [00:17:13] This is what I look like when I'm thinking over what you're saying. That's what I was doing.

John Dehlin [00:17:17] Okay, okay. Yeah. But I just want to introduce this idea of most of us wanted to be Nephi at some point, and most of us sort of learned to sort of depend on, for our ego, for our sense of happiness, for our sense of health, feedback from our parents that we're good, that we're the good child, that we make them happy, and that this becomes our role. So when we then lose our faith and feel terror about it, what is really going on is that we're recognizing. And you guys can check with me and tell me feel this way. You're recognizing internally two things, that, number one, you're about to disappoint your parents or your siblings or your children or your loved ones because all of a sudden they are going to see you fall from grace. And the extent to which your identity, your self confidence, how you view the world was dependent on being Nephi to everyone, was dependent on making everyone feel secure and happy that you were a great person. You are now all of a sudden terrified that you are about to fall from grace and no longer be viewed. And number one, disappoint them for your fall from grace. And then number two, you are no longer going to get the ego food of being Nephi. So many of us is like, I was Elders Quorum president, I was in the bishopric, I was AP on my mission, I served a mission, I got married in the temple. We ourselves, internally became dependent on other people's approval. That's how conditional love works. You're pleasing somebody else to make them feel happy and secure and healthy, almost like you're telling your parents, you did a good job as parents because I did all the things you wanted me to be. And now I'm Nephi. There's this unhealthy, codependent relationship where you're giving your parents or loved ones ego food that you're on the right path and that they did a good job and that they can feel so comfortable in the world. But then you got mutually reinforced ego food for yourself and confidence that you were a good child. And that is kind of the unhealthy, codependent, conditional love paradigm that underlies our terror in coming out to believing family and friends once we lose our faith. Now, Carrie, you're nodding your head. Why is that?

Carah Burrell [00:19:45] Yeah, Yeah. I think that just is a really good summary of kind of what I was trying to explain before about the ego food and that you're kind of. Yeah. What is the wording you just used where you're kind of in a mutually beneficial, unhealthy.

John Dehlin [00:19:56] I mean, it's, it's, it's as normal as the human experience and it's an unhealthy, codependent relationship.

Carah Burrell [00:20:03] Yeah. It just reminds me of like basic tribalism 101 in like, this is the tribe. And if you want to conform and you want your needs to be met, whether it's a roof over your head and food and college and everything else that goes into something you're going to need to conform to, this is the tribe that your family's kind of in. And that's what I think has grown a lot of like humanity, honestly. But then when you need to break out of it, if it threatens your relationships and threatens, you know, grandparents not wanting to, kids not seeing their grandkids and just all these inner family dynamics, if we can find a way to navigate when you need to break away from the tribe that raised you, how to do that in the healthiest ways possible, which we're obviously going to get into. Um, and if you wouldn't mind, I'm going to read just a quick comment that Shannon wrote. She said maybe it's a good thing that the church didn't have any female role models that forced us women to look outside of Mormonism, which is part of my shelf breaking, because isn't that interesting? Because a lot of those female role models you might look at, look to, those are not going to be well behaved women necessarily. So you're going to kind of get better mentorship.

John Dehlin [00:21:03] That's a good point. Margi, did you want to add something?

Margi Dehlin [00:21:06] Oh, I was going to add because when you look at we named our children after people and who I named in particular, like our girls, you know, it was like revolutionary. Yeah, it was Clara Barton. Clara's named after Clara Barton, who was the founder of the Red Cross, or Maya Angelou from Maya. So, yeah, it's very true.

John Dehlin [00:21:29] I love it. Okay, so I'm going to take some time just to show and read a couple comments because there's a lot of really good comments coming in and I'm just going to highlight a few. So Bobby England writes, I was the third born son. Two older brothers were somewhat wayward. I was always the obedient one. Total Nephi effect. I love that. Amber writes, I've been out for 10 years, but my parents and I haven't been able to have the conversation yet. I'm scared they won't fully accept it. They won't listen to my perspective. And that's just every so many people. I cannot count on the roles of the Mormon Church. How many people stay active, stay engaged just because they're terrified that their parents or their loved ones or their co workers are going to find out that they're in faith crisis? So you are not alone if you are still active in the Mormon. And we don't care if you're active or not. We support Mormon Church activity. We support people that need or want to leave for health reasons. But I just, I want you guys to know that if you are currently staying in the church, feeling trapped because you're terrified to tell your family or loved ones that you've lost your faith, you are not alone. There are literally probably hundreds of thousands of you in the Mormon Church today. So Amber, I just wanna say you're not alone. Amber also writes, you know, obedience meant love in your family. I wanna give a shout out to Anthony Miller. Anthony Miller has been on Mormon Stories podcast before and he is, I hope, going to be a part of this series on the gift of the Mormon faith. CR super wise human. Anthony, thanks for following and joining us today. Anthony writes, absolutely. My sense of personal and moral identity was completely enmeshed with the forms of my belief, my roles and callings, and my Nephi effect manifestations of growth and faithfulness. So that's just beautiful. And we just love how many people are commenting. Katie Modoff writes, my parents associate being a good person with being religious. I hate disappointing them. Part of the reason I like sharing these comments is because it lets our listeners know they're not alone. And I just wanna encourage you if you can go to the live stream now or later and you can actually read through these comments on YouTube and share your feedback, read other people and just realize that you're not alone. Okay. You know, Taylor writes that confidence feels good when there is a million kids. He's talking about how, how he derived lots of confidence from being faithful to Jodas writes, I'm still codependent. I left almost three decades ago. There are just so many amazing comments here. So anyway, what I want to do now is jump to the next slide. We're going to go back to the acceptance commitment therapy slide. And what you'll notice sort of at, let's just say seven o', clock, seven or eight o' clock on the slide is this notion of diffusion. And diffusion is a really important concept both within Buddhism but also within acceptance and commitment therapy. And what diffusion relates to is how interwoven we get with labels, with roles, with stories, with our thoughts and our emotions. And it's basically if you study secular Buddhism at all. And I want to recommend the Secular Buddhism podcast, Sarah, if you'll add, Carah, if you'll add that to the notes for this, I'll tell Sarah, if you'll notice, yeah, secular Buddhism is a great way to learn about this, but basically the idea is that labels and stories and emotions and thoughts and feelings, they all are necessary, but they all can be chains that bind us. And one of the things you'll learn from the Gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis Retreat, which we'll also add in our show notes, we talk there in mental health section about how negative labels can be kind of lead chains, but positive labels can be what Noah Roshetta refers to as gold chains or what secular Buddhism refers to as gold chains. And it turns out that Being Nephi can be a golden chain. In other words, it's a chain that limits and binds you. And Margi, you're nodding about that. Can you just tell us how you're resonating or vibing with this idea that Being Nephi can be a golden chain? Why are you nodding about that? Well, someone who was the good girl, maybe a little in your family, I

Margi Dehlin [00:26:07] think an insight that I have around that is being in that position, you are constantly looking outward for who you are. And so I, I don't think it's a mistake that so many people come to us for help coaching to our retreats who resonate with the knee, being the Nephi, because I think it keeps you disconnected from yourself. You're basically looking to the other, your parent, to tell you who you are. And so in that way, it's surely a golden chain because it keeps you, it keeps you on a path and it keeps you from disconnecting from yourself. You're only connecting to either what, what you need to obey at the moment, how you need to sort of be approved of in the moment. And you're always striving, you're never resting. You can never be in that situation. You're always doing. It's always about actively. And that is exhausting. And most people burn out or have some type of. And they come literally saying, I don't know who I am.

John Dehlin [00:27:20] Exactly. I love that. That's exactly what was coming to my mind. When you are trying to fill a role for somebody else, even if it's the good role, it's exhausting and there's, there's is always. I'm going to say this directly to the camera, your desire, your need, your dependence on being. Nephi has come at the cost of your own self discovery, your own self knowledge, and it's likely come at the cost of your own mental health and wellbeing. You probably have had high anxiety, you probably have suffered from scrupulosity or perfectionism. You're on this treadmill of worthiness. And one of the big downsides to the, to this codependent, you know, Nephi effect sort of situation is you've spent your life hustling for approval and love of other people. And that's spending time in your life not necessarily doing what's meaningful to you, what's part of your values, what brings you healing and joy and growth. It's basically living someone else's script for you. Now, I'm not saying Mormon church is bad. I'm not saying religion's bad. This is all part of the kind of Richard Rohr second half of life awakening that's going to happen. No matter what tradition you are raised in, or even if you're raised as a good atheist or good agnostic, you're still probably going to disappoint your parents if you like, start believing all of a sudden because atheism or agnosticism didn't work for you. Now, Carah, I saw you nodding really quick. I just want to check in with you either on the comments or just with what you were nodding about, because I want to just get your feedback on that. Or were you vibing with that idea?

Carah Burrell [00:29:03] Just vibing across the board on that.

Margi Dehlin [00:29:05] Yeah.

Carah Burrell [00:29:06] I don't have a whole lot to add.

John Dehlin [00:29:07] Okay, that's fine.

Carah Burrell [00:29:08] Other than I wanted to read, I'm so. I cannot pronounce her name. Akism. That's not. I'm sorry, I can't do it. It's a. It's like a European looking name. Uh, but vibing along with what I was saying earlier, they said from an evolutionary perspective, the fear of being shunned is so powerful because of hundreds of thousands of years. We were essentially doomed without the protection of the tribe. And I. When you're talking about anxiety and talking about conformity and all of these things. I mentioned this again in my Mormon Stories interview that when we were leaving Mormonism and you're trying to search for meaning and things, the very first place that I found a lot of peace was in study evolutionary biology and understanding the reasons why things are kind of baked into my programming. And If I don't acknowledge that and I am consistently trying to fight against it instead of working with it, then I'm just in a place of like pain and frustration. So I really encourage people to analyze why they're feeling this anxiety. What is it from. Had it gave us an evolutionary advantage, maybe that we are trying to work against now by trying to break out of this mold, this pre written script for us that could be just baked into our, our programming over hundreds of thousands of years potentially. And to recognize that like, again like you're not alone, you're not crazy. These things are, they're very difficult to break out of. And so give yourself patience and hope that there are other people in all different walks of life, not just Mormonism going through the same thing and that you're not crazy.

John Dehlin [00:30:30] Yeah, I think. Thank you, Carah. I think it's Akeem and Akeem. Ach I M. If you want to type in how to phonetically pronounce your name, we'll try and get it right. But thank you, Akeem, for that comment. Thanks for all the comments. Margi, did you want to add something to that?

Parenting, Conditional Love, and the Only Way Through

Margi Dehlin [00:30:46] I was just thinking of another kind of thing that came up for me in looking at parenting, you know, at this point in which you're. A lot of times our pain becomes a seed for a new way of being. So if we look at this also, I'm looking at children being asked to show up to fill the needs of parents. That's really what this whole structure does. It's sort of like children learning how to make their parents feel happy, children learning and then following in line to have their parents feel proud, to feel like they've done a good job, to feel like. And it's only been in the last probably five years, as we've started reparenting more conscious parenting, realizing how incredibly insidious that is, how unhealthy. And that is another takeaway from sort of the Nephi and the, the counter of being layman and Lemuel of this structure where we as children and this will come up today, this is why I'm bringing it up. Because once you start having difficult conversations with your parents, oftentimes children start feeling like they need to take care of, of their parents, that they need to actually, even though they're suffering the child, even though the child needs help and understanding that they start to be in that role of again needing. And they may not understand why. And this is why. It's because we've grown up on some level, showing up to sort of cater our personalities, cater who we are, cater what we want in life so that our parents feel happy.

John Dehlin [00:32:32] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [00:32:33] And that's deeply problematic.

John Dehlin [00:32:35] Yeah, it. It. I've come to feel like it borders on abuse for a parent to pressure a kid to feed the needs of the parent I used to think I want to be. I want my kids to make me proud. I want my kids to live the life that I want to live. And if I'm feeling all sorts of emotions, my kids need to have, help take care of and. Or help manage or alleviate or assuage my emotional needs or frankly, traumas or inadequacies. And part of, you know, what you guys all need to understand as parents, but also, if you have parents that you're afraid to talk to, is that it is inappropriate for an adult parent to look to their kids to. To feed their emotional needs, to manage their emotional needs, and to take care of their emotional needs. Literally, being a parent means caring about your kids enough to just want their own fulfillment and development and putting your own emotional needs aside. And that's something we get so wrong in Mormonism. And so I need you to understand that now because as you're terrified to talk to your parents, you need to understand that it's wrong for them to be putting that on you. And so you need to understand that, and it'll help you in your future as you raise your own kids to learn to not do that. And I'm getting a big nod from Margi because you. That's part of the whole conscious parenting thing. And I just want to ask Carah if you'll add Margi and I on the Gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis podcast. At MormonFaithCrisis.com we have an episode or two on conscious parenting. If you want to understand more about conscious parenting, we'll put a link to that in the show notes. But going back to acceptance commitment therapy, this idea of diffusion, if I just had to summarize it, it's a really awkward term. But what it means is when you think of diffusion, I want you to think of holding labels loosely, holding stories loosely, holding emotions loosely, learning to separate you from the labels. The good child, the bad child, the parent, the son, the good son, the good daughter, you know, apostate, faithful, learning to hold stories loosely, labels loosely, relationships loosely. And that is its own lifetime worth of mental health management and meditation and mindfulness and psychological practice. But you have to at least understand these labels and stories so that then you can start observing them and holding them at a distance. Because the idea is to break those chains. You want to break the chain of being the Nephi. You want to break it not because you don't want to be a good person, but because that chain of being your mommy and daddy's faithful little girl or boy is limiting your growth, it's limiting your health, it's probably negatively affecting your mental health and your physical wellbeing and limiting the potential of what you can be. So you want to break it. Okay, and so now I want to sort of take you to the next part of. And this is probably the most difficult of all parts of this conversation. The next part of this conversation is learning to accept the reality of conditional love. What do I mean by that? If we return to the ACT model, what you'll see is that at, let's just say 10 or 11 o' clock on the ACT model is the idea of acceptance. If you study Buddhism, you will know that acceptance is the foundation of Buddhism. Buddhism starts with the premise that life is suffering. Now, why would any effective, successful world religion start with the idea that life is suffering? It's because that is the reality. It's not that all life is suffering. It's not that all relationships are only suffering. But there's no way to avoid suffering in life. And ironically, and we can talk about this in future episodes, the more you try to avoid suffering, the more suffering you probably often cause yourself. So what is, you know, the example that we often give is the pink elephant. You know, try not to think of the pink elephant. Elephant. You're going to think about it, you know, 50 times in a minute. Try not to have sexual thoughts. You're going to think you're going to sexualize shoulders, you're going to sexualize hymns, you're going to sexualize every part of your Mormon experience. Trying not to have sexual thoughts. And I'm going to just say it right here, trying to avoid the pain of disappointing your parents, trying to avoid your downfall as Nephi. No longer being Nephi, as becoming Laman and Lemuel, trying to avoid that is likely going to cause you more suffering. And so as you're contemplating, this is just one of the most important things I could say. As you're contemplating talking to believing family and friends, your parents, etc, about losing your faith, you're gonna want to be thinking about, how do I do this in a way to where I can stay Nephi? I wanna keep being Nephi and come out to them. And so one of the ways that we screw up is we immediately try and come out and couple the coming out with, here's all the reasons why. It's not because I'm bad, it's not because I'm immoral, it's not because I wanna sin. I'm still a good person. So it's because of Book of Abraham, it's because of Joseph Smith and his polygamy and polyandry. It's because of, you know, the, the seer stone and the hat and the kinderhook plates. And you want, in LGBT stuff, you want to sort of come out in a way that couples justifications so that you can not have to accept that you are about to be downgraded in the eyes of not just your parents, but your siblings, your children, your ward members, your friends and everybody. And what I'm going to say is that frenetic, frantic attempt to maintain the role of Nephi, to stay as Nephi in everybody's eyes, is likely doomed to failure. But what's worse is it's likely to increase your suffering because what you're going to do is create in them the backfire effect. You're going to make them terrified that you're not safe, that you're trying to change their faith faith, that you're trying to pressure them to follow your path. And you're going to make them think less of you. You're going to fulfill the stereotype of being the angry ex Mormon missionary that's trying to deconvert everybody. And you're going to make them not want to let you be around them. You're going to make them not want to let you be around their children, other siblings, ward members, and you're going to make your bishop or stake president want to excommunicate you. So what I'm trying to say is non acceptance of falling from grace as Nephi will be the source of pain and discomfort. And the alternative to that is accepting. This is the hardest, one of the hardest things I'm going to tell you today. We're going to tell you, accepting that you have fallen or will fall from grace and will no longer be Daddy's good little girl, will no longer be Mommy's little Nepha, will no longer be the ward's, you know, faithful priesthood leader or Relief Society president, that your mission president will now look down on you as a disappointment, accepting that reality now is actually likely your gateway to healing and growth. And that is one of the most counterintuitive and super hard things to understand about communicating with believing family and friends. Now I'm going to pause for a Second and first I'm asked, Margi, what's coming up for you? When I, when I say that, do you agree? Do you disagree? What are you thinking?

Margi Dehlin [00:40:54] I totally agree. I agree. I feel like within, as in so many things in life, in this, in this particular situation, that the only way through is through. And when you start kind of, of taking those steps to go through, that is when you actually have the chance for liberation. Liberation from approval, Liberation in the sense that you know yourself and you're connected to yourself and you matter to yourself, which up to that point you matter, you keep trying to matter to your parents, you know, and so I, I think it's just, it, it's a beautiful thing. And I would just say the other part of that is there are pieces that are painful in that suffering. There are things in suffering that change the way we live. They change the way we relate. And some of those pieces in my suffering, I think in our suffering, had us realize that, you know, some of the healing that maybe we wanted to do with our parents or with some of the relationships we had, there were limitations there. We maybe couldn't do all that work ourselves. But when you have experiences where you suffer in parent child relationship, sometimes the only healing you have is with your own children is that marker or what it felt like. You remember that pain of being misunderstood or not seen or not valued for your courage or not, you know, and then it changes the way you show up for your children. And that's where the healing for you can happen is in that relationship.

John Dehlin [00:42:45] So let me tell you, let me see if I understand what you're saying. What you're saying is, yes, we have to accept that we may be an eternal disappointment in the eyes of our parents or loved ones. I always like to say that sometimes a post Mormon can cure cancer or win the Nobel Peace Prize, and this is in all high demand religions. And they'll still likely be an eternal disappointment to their parents. And it's not because their parents are evil. It's because the parents have been taught this plan of happiness that's actually sad heaven, where if any one person doesn't reach celestial kingdom, then the whole family's missing Ms. Empty Chairs. They're, they're missing somebody. So Mormon parents and family members and loved ones come by this honestly, but they're just, there's no changing the fact that you've broken the eternal circle of family for them in sad Mormon heaven. And so you just have to accept that. But what you're saying is, you know, we titled the podcast or the series? The Gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis. What I hear you saying, Margi, is one of the huge gifts is even though you have to accept, accept that, and there may be grieving and mourning that comes along with disappointing your parents or other loved ones, one of the huge gifts is you won't be the cycle, the dysfunctional, broken cycle of toxic, codependent, unhealthy parenting relationships will stop with you and you won't be passing on that toxicity to your children. Is that. Is that what you're saying?

Margi Dehlin [00:44:12] That's right.

John Dehlin [00:44:13] That's beautiful. I love that.

Margi Dehlin [00:44:14] That.

John Dehlin [00:44:14] Thank you for sharing that, Carah. I'm seeing you nod and you're also monitoring the comments, any feedback from you personally and anything you want to share from the listeners or viewers.

Carah Burrell [00:44:24] The comments are really, really active and people are really connecting with a lot of these things. It is the number one most painful, like, deeply painful, physically wounding, mentally exhausting. Part of leaving the church is how to figure out how to communicate. It feels like now all of a sudden you. You don't have the verbiage, you don't have the language to speak in English to your parents anymore. Suddenly you're speaking, like, German or. And you're like. And I always, I think John says this too, you know, going by the motto of like, less is more, that you don't need to always be talking about every single thing that's on your mind. Like, again with the Nephi effect. If you only knew about the Book of Abraham or the Book of Mormon, you'd be on my side. And that is just not advantageous. They're not in a place to hear that. And it's, it's. Sometimes it comes down to, like, okay, if you're speaking one language, I'm speaking another one. The only thing we need to communicate is about the fact that I'm not going to be going to that church anymore. That's just the basics of the conversation is I'm no longer that. The reasons why everything else that takes language that I don't have yet, that you wouldn't even be able to listen and understand yet. And we are going to have to meet at that place when we can hold space for one another, that we're on different paths. But that's usually not going to be in the first year or two or decade or whatever it is, depending on the family. Right? So that's the first thing on my mind. And then I am reminded of when Leah was here, when Leah Young was here, and, and she said one of the most beautiful things is how difficult it is to hold space for somebody who's not holding space for you, that you're able to see them as the product of their conditioning and they're not seeing anything good in you. They are just seeing you in a fall from grace and being okay with that, being okay that they're not in a space to listen to you and understand why you're doing the things you are doing. And just sitting with that and being comfortable with it while still having love, unconditional love back. For them, seeing them is the process, product of their decades of being grown up, growing up in the church, having maybe pioneer heritage. That is such a difficult thing to do. But if you can get to that, like, how do you ever just, you know that feeling when you get to that place and you're like, I have so much love for my family, for humanity, for what the church gave them and for what it gave me, and I can put that in its own little box and I'm going to be completely fine and okay that I've disappointed them, but I am an adult. I've taken the good lessons and I'm moving on with it now. And, and whether or not they respect that, it's going to be irrelevant because they don't have the language to understand me. And I'm just going to move on from it. And in real terms, I just wanted to add that, like, I, sometimes I'll test myself and see how comfortable I feel. Remember we were talking about grounding with checking in, you know, as I'll do things when my family come over that I normally wouldn't do, but I know to my core are not sinful things. And we're having a big family party over July 24, and I poured myself a mixed drink in my house. It wasn't my family's house, it was my house house. And they saw that there's a bottle of liquor on the. That is a very normal, not Mormon thing to do is to drink at a family party, you know, and it's beautiful. And of, and I, I, I was like, okay, I know that my family's gonna see that out there. And I know they're gonna go in the car, ride home and they're going to be talking about it and they're going to be whispering with each other. Am I okay with that? Yeah, I'm okay with that. Because I know that there's, I know to my core there's nothing wrong with this. I'm not getting drunk in front of my family or My kids, I'm doing completely normal, adult thing right now. Now. And I'm gonna let that be their problem for now, and I'm gonna separate their confusion for, like, alcoholism and, like, what does this mean for Carah Now? I'm gonna let them think that on their own, and I'm sorry that they think that, but I'm gonna be living a very normal, adult postmorm in life, separating myself from their anxieties and their fears.

John Dehlin [00:47:48] Love it.

Margi Dehlin [00:47:48] It's like, let's applaud for. That's healthy differentiation.

John Dehlin [00:47:53] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [00:47:53] And that, honestly, there is a lot of grief work, I think, in that. That grief work has to happen for us to get to that place. And also, on a level, showing up for ourselves with those things we always relied on our parents for. And that's reparenting, which is something different. But this. That is a crucial, crucial part of getting to that place. Leah describes where you're going to show up in a way that the other person can't show up. And the superpower that allows you to do that is, I've got me. I've got me. I don't need you to get me, because I've got me.

Silver Linings and Gifts of Leaving the Church

John Dehlin [00:48:29] Yeah, I love that. And we're gonna. We're gonna come back to that. We're gonna come back to. I just want to do two things. First of all, I want to at least Highlight One comment. J.C. jorgensen writes, I'm watching a few minutes behind, but this is. So this is putting all of my inner turmoil into language that makes sense. And I'm so grateful that people are finding that. I also. So there was another comment earlier on about somebody that's never been Mormon, and they're writing that even though they've never been Mormon, that this conversation is helping them also put things into context. I also want to shout out to those who are donating through super chat. YouTube has a feature where if you want to financially support this program, we give this away for free. But we want to be able to pay people like Carah and Margi and Leah, Natasha and others who help out with this type of stuff. And so. So we want to thank Mark Fuentes for his Super Chat donation. And if any of you on the YouTube stream want to support us, we just always appreciate that. Okay. So going back to this idea of acceptance, you know, that's one of the hardest things you have to do is accept that you are going to be a disappointment. And so I've got this idea of unbecoming Nephi. You have to just take off the Nephi and discard the Nephi. And the alternative to that is learning to accept the reality of conditional love. So this is a two part thing that we're kind of highlighting as the next step, kind of in the time codes or in the flow of this conversation is you have to just, just meditate and do daily meditations on the fact that I'm no longer Nephi. I'm no longer Nephi. I'm no longer daddy's little good little girl. I'm no longer that perfect person. You know, there's that line in the Frozen song, you know, do you guys remember the line, maybe some of you listeners, where you're kind of letting go of the good girl, that perfect girl is gone. That's the line from Frozen, the Frozen song. Let it go. There it is, actually can be refreshing to let go of that perfect good or boy. But it's hard. And so acceptance means learning to accept the reality of letting go of being that perfect girl or letting go of being Nephi. And then accepting the fact that you now will become a disappointment to many people. And then recognizing, and this is just really so really hard, is realizing that there's a good chance that your relationship with your parents or your relationship with your kids or your relationship with your bishop or your mission president or your good friends or your siblings was based on conditional love. And we all at our core want to believe that our parents loved us or love us unconditionally, or that our spouse loves us unconditionally or that our children love us unconditionally. And that sometimes is true. And this will be a. We talk about, you know, Christ talked about sifting the wheat from the tares. Coming out as a non believer will kind of be a sifting. You'll find out which relationships were authentic and real and you'll find out which ones were based on conditional love. And that is going to be hard. That is going to be its own death. You will have multiple cuts, paper cuts or lacerations when you discover which relationships were based on conditional love. And there's a bitterness to that, there's a sadness to that. You'll have to grief to grieve. And that will leave some holes inside of you. But there's also some gifts even in that. And so Margi, I'm going to ask you, I'm going to throw this question to you. What in the world. Let's just say you, your parents are now you're an eternal disappointment to your parents or you lose siblings that no longer want you in their life, or you lose a spouse who divorces you because they no longer want you to be in the marriage. Or you lose kids that are ostracized from you now because your loss of faith or friends or your mission president now is disappointed in you. What in the world can be the gifts of the loss of seeing those relationships for what they are? Because for many of you, you, it's going to be months or years of suffering as you realize that you've lost or downgraded relationships. What is the bright side to that? There's a softball for you, Margi. What's the bright side?

Margi Dehlin [00:53:10] Well, I don't know that it's going to feel like a bright side for some time, but I do feel like for me, some of that. I always talk about it like the clearing of the room, like my room of people kind of cleared out out during a certain point in time. But what that allows you to do, if you do grieve and if you do give yourself time to feel the loss of those relationships, is you'll process actually what you miss, what you desired, what you had hoped for. And those things will point you forward to relationships. You'll know what you're looking for, you know, and I think it kind of. It serves as a driver forward. So I always say my room cleared quite a bit, but sometimes there's a clarifier in that. And then there can also be a real intentionality around who do I want in that room, who's welcome in my room? Not just people who were born and think that, you know, they should have access to me, but this, it really can be a gift to my children. Always talk about it like chosen family. Like to choose to have this power of choosing who you want to surround yourself with and then to feel and create and practice unconditional love and respect and regard in sort of your own. Your own realm of being. That's been one of the most beautiful parts. It took time. It took a lot of time to sort of slowly cultivate that. But I really feel like I'm in a place in my life now where I just have a lot of good love. And when you have that good love that you know what you're looking for and the things that are important to you when you have it, it's like no other. And when you look back and you look at, you know, you have this sense of acceptance for what people were offering and their own level of unconsciousness. It's not on purpose, but you're like, wow, love is large. Love is really Huge. And yeah, maybe mistaking some of the love from before, it just can blow your mind. It can blow your mind a bit.

John Dehlin [00:55:42] So I'm hearing that it can tell me if I'm summarizing this right. I think what I hear you saying is clearing out, you know, and some relationships will be lost, others will be downgraded to lower levels of intimacy, and we'll talk about that. But that will create holes. But that allows you to then fill the holes with healthier relationships that can be more edifying and meaningful. Is that part of what I just heard?

Margi Dehlin [00:56:07] Yes. And the process of loss can clarify to you what matters most in intimacy and loving relationships in your life. And that's priceless to. To have a sense for what you need, what you value, and what love feels like when you're loved. Well, I mean, that. That's a gift. Like, for me, that's been worth it.

John Dehlin [00:56:32] I love it. What do you want to add, Carah, or what. What are you?

Audience Questions and Coming Out Scenarios

Carah Burrell [00:56:35] The best job in the entire world. For many reasons, but one is I get to hear Margi's wise wisdom and words coming straight into my ear holes through these headphones, like I'm not missing a word. So I love how you said that things that were more unconscious that the, the way that you love the way that people love you. In Mormonism, it's so prescribed in a lot of ways of who you can love and to what degree. But don't show empathy too much. And this is your eternal family here. And, and how you're talking about, like, choosing your own new family, set on. On a new, new values. And I know that that is the scariest thing. There's nothing scarier than forging new pathways in your brain and going out into uncharted waters in that way. But I can say that, like, as you were describing, that I'm putting myself back maybe two years ago when I went through those things that, you know, it's equal, it's weighty, it's heavy, it's. It's difficult. You feel like your life is finally on your own terms, but then, yeah, your life is finally on your own terms. Like it's. It's this equal part of, like this yin and yang that is so painful but so rewarding. And like you're talking about. Yeah, choosing your own family, choosing your own values. Yeah. I especially love that you're going from an unconscious state into a more conscious one. You can be a lot more intentional. And I always like to say that. I think, I think Mormons, they genuinely know that they're is even if they're trying to hold tight to the, the churches like LGBTQ type doctrine around people. I think a lot of Mormons know that there are way too many people that don't fit within that box and those parameters within, within the church. And the second that they break out of it, they go, oh, this is a lot more complicated than I thought it was. Oh, there's not just these two genders. There's not just these two prescribed, perfect ways of expressing sexuality within this context that was written, you know, ages ago. People are free to love, love other people and be involved in, you know, going to their friends, gay weddings or just. There's so many areas where you can just love openly and express the love you have for different types of people, different races of different cultures of people. You don't feel held back anymore. So there's just a whole wide world open to you of receiving love and giving love.

Margi Dehlin [00:58:45] That's right. So beautiful.

John Dehlin [00:58:47] I love it.

Margi Dehlin [00:58:48] Love is large.

John Dehlin [00:58:49] All right, and listeners, please, please feel free to give comments or questions and we'll have Carah maybe convey some of those also during this conversation. As as they go, I just created a summary slide now. The gifts of telling loved ones about your faith crisis. So so many of you are like, should I do it? When should I do it? How should I do it? What I've summarized from what we've talked about so far is the gifts of telling loved ones about your faith crisis are it can lead to relief and better mental health. Because being Nephi or daddy's perfect little girl can be exhausting. It can be draining. It can really affect your mental health, your physical health, sometimes even chronic fatigue or autoimmune diseases can come from just the unhealthy cortisol and chemicals streaming through your veins. As you're basically living an inauthentic life and doing a bunch of things that aren't healthy for you for a long, long period of time. So breaking those golden or lead chains, it helps give you relief and better mental health. It helps you see relationships for what they are, as painful as that may be. To find out that relationships were sometimes very conditional or only conditional. At least you get to now live in reality and see the relationships for what they are. You can replace the lost or downgraded relationships with healthier ones. But then where Margi is really helping us understand and Carrie, you reflect the to this improved self knowledge, you can have the opportunity to become strong and independent. We're going to talk about that in a bit and you get to help eventually start living like you said, Carah, living your best and most authentic life. So those are some of the many gifts of why you should consider coming out when it's right for you. But again, you need to have acceptance and the reality of conditioned love built into it so that you're not fighting against the inevitable and that frankly, you're not disappointed. Because if you go into disclosing to your family and friends that you're no longer a believer and you're expecting the worst case scenario, which is that they may be disappointed and sad, they may even cut you off, you may even lose the relationship. One of the nice gifts of a faith crisis can be when orthodox Mormons surprise you. Because there are orthodox believing Mormons who believe in unconditional love or who care more about people than beliefs. And you may find that, you know, one of the really great comments that we got on the Mormon Stories podcast post about this episode is that sometimes we live in fear. We're so terrorized by the fear of what might happen when we come out that we invent in our mind all sorts of worst case scenarios that actually may not come to pass. Your parents may surprise you, you don't want to expect that, but your parents may surprise you, your siblings may surprise you, your children may surprise you, your spouse may surprise you. You know what, one of the most fun discoveries that I've found is how many partners in a marriage or in a relationship have been going through a faith crisis and then when they, you know, alone terrorized that they'll lose their loved one when they disclose, they disclose to their loved one only to discover that their, their loved one has also been going through the same faith crisis. But they too have been terrorized. To tell you that's happened in marriages, that's happened in parent child relationships, that's happened in sibling relationships. We don't want you to go into the disclosure expecting that. But sometimes best, you know, worst case scenarios, you lose the relationship. But there are, there are possible positive outcomes that can include unsurprising love from the believer to discovering that they also are going through it. And, and, and you know, those are all possible positive outcomes.

Carah Burrell [01:02:46] Carah, what about this possible outcome I've never heard discussed? Maddie asks, could we talk about the denial that comes but with telling family I told mine last year and they act like the conversation never happened and it was really ugly to too when family just.

John Dehlin [01:03:00] Okay, so that is a great point. So, so the, the, so just to close out the one point I was trying to make is if we go back to our ACT model, there's the concept of being present, which is at 12 o'. Clock. And I just want to say that, that in your mental health, please understand that sometimes living out of fear of the future can terrorize you and bind you and can limit you from healing and growth. And so not assuming that the worst case scenario is always going to happen can be really healthy along with accepting that the worst case scenario may happen. Now, going to the point that was just made, Carah, and this was something that was reflected in the comments on the Mormon Stories podcast blog. There are so many people when they come out who expect bishops or ward members or parents or family and friends to do what would seem completely normal. Which is to say this is like everyone's dream. Oh my gosh, you've lost your faith. I can't believe it. I thought the church was true. I love you and respect you. I think you're brilliant. Tell me everything about why you lost your faith. Tell me everything you've written, read, tell me everything you've learned. I'll sit here for the next 15 hours and have you hold class on why you lost your faith. Said no orthodox Mormon ever. Right. Like the. The most common reaction is what we call the crickets effect. And you need to understand that that is going to be the most likely reaction. The most likely reaction you are going to receive is that no one ever wants to know anything about your faith crisis. And so many orthodox believing Mormons will never ask you about it. So many ward members are going to just disappear. The most common reaction is no reaction at all. You should know that, you should expect it, you should understand it and you can embrace it because that is called the crickets effect and that is what we should expect. Now Margi, I want to give you a chance to respond to that and then Carah, I want to give you a chance to ask a follow up question to that.

Denial, Silence, and Expected Reactions from Family

Margi Dehlin [01:05:15] So one thing I was just going to build on that the reason why I feel like. And you can, you know, add or the reason why I feel like it. That's such an expected response. If we look at this is it is the way the church oftentimes responds to conflict. Like, you know, it's sort of like we don't do conflict or maybe I'll say differentiation. Well, right. Different opinions. Well, we're not taught how to do that in a church scenario. There's kind of one narrative, one train track. We're riding in a lesson that takes us from point A to point B and we're kind of all along for the ride just nodding our heads or giving the 10 answers that are expected. And if you add on to that family culture, we all have family cultures. They're real. We have family conflicts cultures. What is, how does our family deal with different opinions? How do we deal with conflict that arises? And I think for many people, they don't just have the church kind of layering of how we deal with sort of differentiation, which is just. We don't, we don't really. But they have a family culture layering as well, where it's like, wow, we've never, we're just stunned to silence. We, you're just, we're going to walk around it and pretend like it never happened. And so I think being able to step back with a lens of more like an anthropologist kind of of like, how, how did we deal with conflict in. How did I see conflict resolved or worked through in my home? How did we deal with differing opinions? How did we. It can kind of normalize it and allow you to see it's really not about you. It's, it's, it's about those people in your kind of family system and what they do to cope when they're scared.

John Dehlin [01:07:07] Yeah, because, you know, religion is what people build their lives around. Their careers, their jobs, their education, their marriage, their, their community relationships. So it's just like for you, it was terrifying to consider losing your faith. And then when you lost it, it's been very hard. Of course, believing loved ones are not going to want to know anything about your faith crisis because they're going to be worried that they'll get infected and that they'll have their worldview fall apart too. So that's why they never ask. Don't take it personally. And there's a, there is a pro and a con to the crickets effect to them not wanting to talk about it. The downside is you're like, wait, I thought you loved me. You know, I thought, I thought we had unconditional love. I thought you really cared about me. I thought you respected me. Me. And my only point there is to go back to kind of the expectations you thought that you were in a relationship of unconditional love. And this is one of the hard things to accept. You weren't. They love you, your ward loves you. The ward members respect and appreciate you. If unfortunately, you continue your orthodox belief in the church, for the most part, it's a conditional thing. Mormon marriages are conditional on belief in the church. Church Mormon parent child relationships are often Conditional unbelief in the church, your ward relationships and your friendships and your sibling relationships are largely based on the conditionality of mutual belief in the church. So when you break that deal, they're terrified, they're afraid, and they are going to want to create distance from you. And you should go into this expecting and knowing that, not. Not denying reality. That's the downside that, that, that, that, you know, they're gonna not want to talk about it. It's going to make you feel like you weren't really loved unconditionally. There is a positive side because by them not wanting to talk about it, it means you don't have to go on this tour of trying to explain it. That is, it can end up probably ruining many, many more relationships as you try and explain it. So please, Don, I don't think that them not wanting to talk about it is all bad. Yes, it means you didn't have the relationships you thought. But it's also good because I promise you what we're going to get to in the role play in just a second is you probably don't want to have this conversation. They don't want to know. And having the conversation probably isn't going to go well. So that's my. That's my first answer to that question. Carah, any. Any response to that?

Carah Burrell [01:09:46] Yeah, and I think in real terms, as somebody who I just left the church two years ago, and from the first conversation that I had with my mom up until literally this past weekend, it has still been a constant two years of my mom not getting that I do not believe in her religion, even though she knows what I do for a living. She knows I set this table for a living now. So they took my kids to church last week because they were watching my kids. What are you gonna do about it? Every Christmas, they're still giving my kids church books. Books. They're constantly still. You know, they'll send conference talks. They think that this, this will be the one that'll get Carah back. You know, they still are acting as though there's some hope that if they just have the right. The right conference talk will be the thing that gets her to feel the spirit and come back. And it feels like every conversation, any groundwork that we have done didn't even happen with them. And I think that's kind of originally the comment that I was reading from Matt Daddy. I think that's a real common problem that a lot of people just a few years post faith transition always have to deal with is their family not just the cricket effect of them not wanting to know the reasons why, but literally acting like nothing has changed. Maybe it's, I guess you guys can speak to that. Like, is it too difficult for them to literally accept that I put a line in the sand and they just, they go ahead and erase that line over and over and over again? Like, no, I'm literally, I don't believe in this anymore. Going to go erase that line.

John Dehlin [01:11:07] You know, really quick, I want to do a shout out to Jeff Smith, who just donated through the super chat feature on YouTube. He wrote the comment, no amount can compensate for saving my marriage with your support. Thanks, John and Margi and Carah for your continued efforts in shedding light. So Jeff, I just want to thank you for those donations. They help pay for Carah and for this, this initiative, the gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis. So thank you for the, that. Thank you for that comment, Carah. Margi, did you have a quick response?

Margi Dehlin [01:11:37] I was going to just say, like, that is. I feel that when you talk about it, I feel just the not being seen in that. I feel the exhaustion of kind of the resubmit, which I think maybe boundaries there, there might be some boundary work there. But also I see their coping and, and that's painful because I think sometimes you lose people and you start experiencing more of the coping of people. So instead of having a relationship with your mom where you're like talking and connecting about real things, real concerns, you're like hitting up against an Ensign article, which is coping. I don't see that as part of your mom. I see it as her attempt to sort of assuage the pain she's feeling that you don't go anymore, you know, and it's a very different connection. And there's loss in that. It's like, hello, is my mom in there? And it's unconscious, which makes it more complicated because if you, if it was, if it was conscious, you could reach her, you know?

Carah Burrell [01:12:38] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:12:38] So it's like this on you. She feels unreachable, which is a loss on some level. It can feel like, you know, where are you? Where did you go? Are you in there? Like, why can't I connect?

John Dehlin [01:12:49] You love me? How about do you love me?

Margi Dehlin [01:12:51] Do you see me, me? Yeah.

Carah Burrell [01:12:53] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:12:53] That's painful.

Carah Burrell [01:12:54] In any respect. If you feel unseen, that's lonely, that's anxiety ridden. It's fear, it's. There's so many things that you never want to feel unseen, especially by the people who raised you and gave birth to you and you felt so Seen all growing up and then when you have to walk on your own into your new life now being. Yeah. Completely butting up against Clementine article. It's so. So fortunately I have a thick skin about it and it's kind of like a roll my eyes. But I know for people, other people, it can be a lot more, a lot more painful to be butting up against that constantly. Your parents never get it that I'm not, I'm not part of this faith anymore.

Margi Dehlin [01:13:34] Yeah. There's this idea of if you want to know if it's conditional or unconditional love, differentiate. Go get some data.

John Dehlin [01:13:43] If you want to know if your love is conditional, try differentiating from what you're doing, your loved one wants or expects from you and you'll see how unconditional the love is. That's great. Okay. We want to get to role plays because we know that that's one of the parts that people love and value most. Before we do that, there's one more point that we've been touching on, hinting on that I just wanted to add here. When we, when we talk about the benefits or the gifts of telling loved ones about your faith crisis, one of the last, you know, few points we listen to was self knowledge, becoming strong and independent and living your best and most authentic life. And this, this introduces a concept, Margi, that you wanted to make sure and mention, which is self sovereignty. And before we jump to that, I'm going to pull back to the ACT model really quick because I'm going to refer to this a thousand times during the Gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis. But on the right hand side, you'll see values as a really important concept within act. ACT value simply means you getting in touch with who you are, what turns you on, what gets you excited and what you value. And it's something religion carefully trains you not to do. Religions don't want you tapping into your inner drive, your inner interest, your inner wisdom to figure out what you believe and what's exciting for you and what turns you on and what you care about. They want you just sort of importing their value, what they care about, what they want you to do. And it's not because they're nefarious necessarily, it's just because that's how the first half of life system works. But if you want to live your most actuated, fulfilling, meaningful life, what you need to then learn to do, and this is part of any good coach or therapist is going to work through this with you, you need to do a Values inventory to figure out what's most important to you. And you need to start living your best life based on your own values. Not on values that your church gave you, not on the values that your parents gave you, not even on the values that your spouse gave you. Figuring out what turns you on, what gets you excited, what you want your life to be about. If you had a tombstone, what would you want to be on the tombstone? If someone was going to give an eulogy for you at your funeral, what would you want them to say? These are ways to think about what values are and why they matter. And one really important value you, that Margi wanted to maybe talk about a little bit is this idea of self sovereignty. Margi, can you just introduce this concept of self sovereignty and why it's important? And you also have this idea of reparenting kind of parenting yourself. Can you just introduce this really quick and then we'll go to role play?

Self-Sovereignty and Parenting Ourselves

Margi Dehlin [01:16:25] Sure. So I think when we look at kind of where we come from. Okay. And. And many of our families of origin and how we experienced love and how we were parented, I think a lot of what we feel moving forward and having these tough conversations, it makes a lot of sense and we kind of have to unpack that. Self sovereignty, to me means that I am actively processing my relationships with people in my life and the incoming data, and I connect with myself about it, and I connect with my values about it, and I intentionalize those relationships. I consider the actual level of relationship I have with that person, for example, which we haven't really talked about yet. But this idea is oftentimes because it's family, and we grew up in a religion that said family was everything that we look at our. Our family relationships like, they're all level five. My. My relationship with my mom is level five. It's deep. I tell her I should be able to tell her everything. I should trust her, and I should experience this love. Right. Oftentimes people, that's their default family's level five.

John Dehlin [01:17:38] They assume that.

Margi Dehlin [01:17:39] They'll assume it. Right. But when you actually look at the level of relationship that you have with a sibling, with a parent, with, you know, your. Your dad, you're actually like, well, it's actually more of a level two. And we can call once you differentiate.

John Dehlin [01:17:53] Like, I think that's the point you're making. Once you start differentiating, you see that these relationships that you just assumed were all fives. Oh, my ward. I've been bishop in my ward. I was Relief Society president. They really Love me. They'll care about when I lose my faith. Oh, my mission president really valued me. He'll care. He'll want to know why. My siblings, they're my best friends. Care. I think you've had this right. My siblings are my best friends. I tell them everything. My sister's gonna just super want to know every little detail about why I lost my faith. Not. Not true. They're not all fives once you start differentiating, Right?

Margi Dehlin [01:18:28] Yeah. And oftentimes not even before then. Before then, we still have this posturing of like, I'm fine. I'm great. Are you fine? Yeah, I'm fine. Like, we have that perfection. Yes. And we don't talk about the, you know, so even before I would say. But I would just say, kind of take a moment to reflect on. That's an important piece of kind of honoring yourself, of seeing relationships for who they. For what level they really are. So it's not uncommon for people to go in with a level five disclosure. Let me tell you about. With a lot of vulnerability, with a lot of, like, you would just. Your dearest human, but you're actually talking to your mom, who's like level two, which it's like we talk, you know, about the day and my kids and what's going on with our, you know, family's lives and people. And occasionally. And occasionally, like, I'll get into like, an issue about my child. So there's some depth there, but it's not a whole lot. Well, you might want to consider matching, you know, the. Your approach to the level of relationship you actually have. So in other words, your conversation would be more of level two. It's like, I'm going to give you kind of basics, but I'm not going to really go in. So that's.

John Dehlin [01:19:41] That's that we're going to come back to that. But. But the self sovereignty point is what if you. If you have been dependent on your parents for ego, for self confidence.

Margi Dehlin [01:19:53] Right.

John Dehlin [01:19:53] If you've been dependent on your spouse, if you've been dependent on your ward, how the community looks at you, your stake, your ward.

Margi Dehlin [01:20:01] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:20:02] You know, you. Sovereign sovereignty. You've. You've basically outsourced sovereignty to an external.

Margi Dehlin [01:20:09] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:20:09] System. And that's, you know, that's natural. That's normal. Like we said, a lone monkey is a dead monkey. We all do it. It takes a village. We all got to adulthood by leaning on the esteem of our parents, our siblings, our children, our grandparents, our ward, our bishop. Bishop.

Margi Dehlin [01:20:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:20:27] But there is a better way I think there's a healthier way. So can you talk about self sovereignty and how people might start moving in that direction?

Margi Dehlin [01:20:36] Yeah. So self sovereignty is the first time I kind of felt that was from Brene Brown braving the wilderness, where she talks about until you belong to yourself, until you brave the wilderness of just being alone with your, you know, meaning you're true to yourself and you lose people and you're in that wilderness place, you never belong to yourself and you'll never belong anywhere else. And so it's this idea of self advocacy, of self honoring, of connecting with yourself, of coming out of these structures where you for so long showed up for the needs of others and beginning to kind of show up for your own needs as well. Your own needs, you take into account, you trust your own voice and you practice, you know, kind of the application of your values in different ways as you kind of live your days. That's how I look at self sovereignty. It's inner driven.

John Dehlin [01:21:36] Yeah. And so isn't there a psychological shift where in learning to, instead of constantly needing the validation of others, do. Do you work with your clients about a way to kind of. Of provide your own self validation? Is that what you talked about?

Margi Dehlin [01:21:54] Is that what you're thinking with reparenting? The idea behind reparenting? Yes, is in part some of that, particularly if that works really well if you were in a really, you're feeling rejected or abandoned. But it's also in those times when you find yourself having tough emotions or that you're able to show up for yourself in a way you wish your parent had in a way you deserved as a child, that you start offering it to yourself as opposed to wanting your spouse to do it when you can't do it, or that you kind of practice being whole, self sustaining and showing up and not abandoning yourself to run to the. Because that's what happens right. When we're busy taking care of our mom who's distressed, stressed, we tend to leave ourselves to do that. We leave our own emotions, harm ourselves.

John Dehlin [01:22:48] Right.

Margi Dehlin [01:22:49] We harm ourselves. We may betray ourselves for that. And this is how we've learned to kind of cope. And this is all part of the system. And so that's a little bit about reparenting. It is a practice. It's. It can be daily for people depending on if they have a lot of harsh judgments that they hear that is like a parental voice in their heads when they make mistakes or when they, you know. And so this idea of reparenting comes up a lot and it'll come up today when we're talking in these conversations.

John Dehlin [01:23:23] I love it. Okay, so that is the, that is the last kind of structural framework that we wanted to share is as a part of your values, you should have it as one of your values to develop self, self sovereignty and to learn to reparent or to parent yourself. And that is going to really serve you well. Okay, so that is, so that, that was my best idea this morning as I was thinking about how to provide a framework that is the framework we wanted to share with you as an introduction because I think those are some of the most important structural things that speak about why we're so afraid grade and what's going on when we actually do come out. I hope that was useful. And again we'll be coming back to acceptance commitment therapy later. Then, then I, I started to put together kind of a list of some basic tips on coming out and I'm just going to tell you right now we are not going to cover these in depth today. We're going to save for a part two going more into these basic tips. But I want to introduce them them just in a minute so that then when we do some role play you can identify some of the, some of the actual tips being employed in the role play. So really quickly when you are planning to disclose to believing family members that you no longer believe, it's important to understand your own attention intention to get clear on what it is you hope to accomplish by having that conversation with them. Them. Margi, you talked about this idea of checking in with them to ask permission because a lot of people don't want to know or they don't even want to know what you're going through. And, and just this idea of informed consent before traumatizing them or sharing something with them really hard. Margi, we're going to be talking in another episode about asking permission to come out to them and talk to them about something really hard card. We're gonna be talking about matching the level of relationship. Matching your disclosure with the emotional intimacy levels in the relationship. That's really important. Thinking about proper time and place, whether you do it in private or in a more family setting. Those are all important things to consider. Whether you do it through face to face or on the telephone or over email. I never recommend text. We could talk about that another time. Creating an environment of safety with them so that they feel safe, that they don't feel like you're trying to ruin their life or convert them to your point of view. Less is more is Something that we're going to be talking about today, which is minimizing the actual words you use and the content you try and share. Healthy boundaries are going to be really important as they try and lure you into unhealthy types of conversations. That's something we're going to be practicing today. And then I'm just going to reiterate acceptance. Acceptance, Acceptance versus resisting reality. And then the final thing I'm going to add, there is a concept of getting help, relying on a coach or a therapist to kind of help prepare you for this type of intervention and then also to decompress what happens afterwards. So those are just some basic tips. We're going to cover those at a future time. I just want to introduce them them. Now it's time for everyone's favorite part of these episodes, Roleplay. What do you think, Margi? You ready for some role play?

Framework and Tips for Disclosing a Faith Transition

Margi Dehlin [01:27:00] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:27:01] Are you excited for role play?

Margi Dehlin [01:27:03] Excited? Well, I'm ready.

John Dehlin [01:27:05] Carrie, you've told our listeners in the past you're a fan of role play. Is that right?

Carah Burrell [01:27:08] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [01:27:08] You're amazing at it.

Carah Burrell [01:27:09] Call back to your own joke. Your own failed joke there, John.

John Dehlin [01:27:12] Inside joke.

Carah Burrell [01:27:13] No, John's referencing something I said in Kelly Trust interview. Go watch it anyway. Not. You have to watch the entire five hours to get the joke.

John Dehlin [01:27:22] We just have a little humor here and there. What were you going to say?

Carah Burrell [01:27:25] Yeah, who do I get to be in this role play?

John Dehlin [01:27:27] Yeah. Well, we'll see. We'll see. So this is the time of role play and we're going to role play three different scenarios. The first scenario we're going to role play is the minimalist disclosure. So Margi is going to play the role of the. Well, let's start with the unhealthy disclosure. Right. So Carah, I'm going to. I'm going to put you on the spot. Spot. And do you want to, do you want to represent the unhealthy disclosure or the parent who's res. Or family member that's receiving the unhealthy disclosure?

Carah Burrell [01:27:57] Yeah, like I can role play my mom really easy.

John Dehlin [01:27:59] Is that, can you do that? Okay, so I'm in a role play to begin the unhealthy disclosure. And you're going to. You're going to be your mom. Is that okay?

Carah Burrell [01:28:09] Yeah. Oh, I'm doing it with you, not Margi.

John Dehlin [01:28:10] Yeah. And then Margi's going to. I'm going to roleplay the healthy disclosure with Margi. Is that okay?

Carah Burrell [01:28:15] Oh, yes.

Margi Dehlin [01:28:16] Okay.

John Dehlin [01:28:16] Okay. So I'm gonna. This is an unhealthy disclosure. And this is where more is more, where you're unsafe. So going back to the basic tips, I'm gonna model not making them feel safe. I'm gonna model terrorizing your loved one. I'm gonna model unhealthy boundaries. And I'm in a model making them feel unsafe. And more is more versus less is less. Is that okay? Okay.

Margi Dehlin [01:28:41] Yeah.

Carah Burrell [01:28:41] So you're going to pretty much do, like, typical things. Somebody just read the CES letter or something and they just want to, like, let their mom know that they hate the religion they came from and nothing healthy about it.

John Dehlin [01:28:53] Yeah. So this is the word vomit disclosure. That's unsafe. Here we go. So I am child. You are. Mom. Are you ready? Mom. Okay. All right. Mom, I know that you. I know that you're, you know, in the middle of a really stressful thing where all, you know, we're preparing for a family reunion. And I know this is a really hard time, but I've got something on my chest and it's really important and I just. I need you to know about it. All right?

Role Play: Telling a Parent About Leaving the Church

Carah Burrell [01:29:21] All right. You get in the car wreck?

John Dehlin [01:29:23] No.

Carah Burrell [01:29:24] Get somebody pregnant.

John Dehlin [01:29:25] Are you worried? Are you worried?

Margi Dehlin [01:29:26] Out with it.

John Dehlin [01:29:27] Okay. All right. So I just need you to know that I no longer believe the church is true. I have decided that the Mormon Church is probably more like a cult than a church, and it's really harmed me. And there are a lot of reasons why. I need you to know that I haven't lost my faith because I wanted to sin. But the truth is that I started reading about Joseph Smith and I realized that Joseph Smith.

Carah Burrell [01:29:58] Well, what were your sources? Where'd you even find this information about Joseph Smith? Okay, well, you need to stick to church approved sources. That's your first problem, John.

John Dehlin [01:30:06] Well, mom, can you please just hear me out? Joseph Smith was a polygamist. He married 30 wives.

Carah Burrell [01:30:12] Yeah, and I already know about that. You know what? There's a lot of things you'll find on the Internet and they're actually, they're. They're called anti Mormon lies for a reason. John, you know better than to go searching around on the Internet.

John Dehlin [01:30:23] Mom, I need you to listen to me. It's not just. It's not just.

Carah Burrell [01:30:26] This is because I didn't hold you enough as a child, is it?

John Dehlin [01:30:28] No, listen, mom, it's not just that.

Carah Burrell [01:30:30] Because I was a working mom.

John Dehlin [01:30:31] It's that he used a stone and a hat to translate the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon is not a historical document.

Carah Burrell [01:30:37] Are you hearing this stuff, this is not true. You're just making stuff up. You're just trying to sin, probably. John.

John Dehlin [01:30:43] No, Mom, I'm serious. This is really important to me. And I need you to understand that the things that I have learned are credible. That the church is not true. And I want you to learn the same things I've learned so that you can not be captivated by an unhealthy organization. I'm trying to save you, Mom.

Carah Burrell [01:31:05] You think that the church is not true when just look at all of the good fruits. Look at the temple. Remember your covenants. Everything your father and I have given you. Everything. You're a college educated. You have. Have a beautiful family. Now, what happened? This is. This is not the way that I raised you. You know better than this, John, to be searching around on the Internet for reasons to believe. All of this anti Mormon business over here. Just stick with what you already know. I can't believe that you'd be so easily persuaded like this.

John Dehlin [01:31:32] Look, you know that I'm smart. I was ap on my mission.

Margi Dehlin [01:31:35] And.

John Dehlin [01:31:36] And you sound like you're disappointed in me. You sound like all of that up, but you sound like you're just some.

Carah Burrell [01:31:42] Probably some podcaster that you found on YouTube. Why are you trusting these other sources? Trust what you already know.

John Dehlin [01:31:49] But mom, it sounds like you're disappointed in me. I'm still your good little boy. I just. I've learned some things and you should care about these things if you love me.

Carah Burrell [01:31:58] Yeah, I am disappointed in you because I had a. A really hard time raising you. Your dad was at work all the time and we took you to church and we taught you the right things. And I can't believe you'd give that up just for some.

Margi Dehlin [01:32:09] Some.

Carah Burrell [01:32:09] Some anti Mormon lies.

John Dehlin [01:32:12] All right, beautiful. Margi's nodding. Hopefully the audience related to some of that. Carrie, you can tell us if any audience members have made any comments that are.

Carah Burrell [01:32:23] People are commenting on my face. I just channeled Carol. It wasn't. That's my mom. I just. I've had this conversation before, so I'll be like, what would Carol say?

John Dehlin [01:32:30] Okay, well, if there's any comments you want to browse through really quickly, let us know if the audience is at all vibing with that ineffective role play. That was ineffective role play. Those are things you don't want to do. Going into details, not having a healthy, calm set and setting. More is more word vomiting all over them, making them feel terrorized, making them feel like you're trying to convert them. Those are all you know, crossing unhealthy boundaries, modeling control. They're not accepting the fact that you're going to be a disappointment. Those are all things you don't want to do. Now we're going to do is turn the time over to Margi. We're going to do some healthy role play. Margi is going to model the healthy disclosure and I am going to model the parent now and we're going to model a healthy role play. So we'll put these in the time notes in the time codes so that you can jump forward to these points as you need to. But Margi, is there anything you want to do to set up the, the, the tenants of your disclosure?

Role Play: Disclosing to a Believing Spouse

Margi Dehlin [01:33:39] Yeah. So here is, are some things to know about, you know, the type of relationship this is. So in order for me to give this type of role play and the responses I have, have, this person is a relatively safe, safe person in my life that I'm talking to. I would say probably a level 2 to 3, which is oftentimes where we tend to be with family relationships. And yeah, I kind of feel like, yeah, those are the main points. You're safe, you're, you're a reason.

John Dehlin [01:34:16] You want to communicate that they're safe,

Margi Dehlin [01:34:18] they're a safe person. So not highly volatile, not highly antagonistic, not highly defensive. You're relatively safe.

John Dehlin [01:34:25] You want to make them feel safe.

Margi Dehlin [01:34:26] And we have kind of a level 2, ish, 2 to 3 relationship.

Carah Burrell [01:34:31] And can I add one more thing? I think from the role play John and I had. I just remember the way that John was acting when he's doing an unhealthy disclosure. It sounded like when you're in that position, it's like reaching for. We remember we're talking about acceptance and all of the things you just mentioned. It sounded like when somebody's in that unhealthy place, they're desperate that if I can just get this one thing out, hear me out on this one issue too. But that space is already not established for everything that you're talking about, Right? So this is the space that you want to establish. If that space isn't there, you will not be heard, no matter how much you want to say. But listen to this point. But I still, I'm still going to be this, I have good reasons to leave. I'm not gonna let you down. That space is not even, we're not even in the room on the same planet of that space. So like give up, give that part up and work towards what Margi's gonna do here.

Margi Dehlin [01:35:17] That is so true. And can I just say holistic psychologist. I feel like everyone can know that

John Dehlin [01:35:21] contact, that's a good for the show notes.

Margi Dehlin [01:35:24] That's a good reference. Something she always talks about is when you're over explaining that's a sign you're seeking approval. We don't over explain with people. We have secure attachment with, with and so anytime you're in this place of like hear me, hear me, I'm going to give you more and more details. We don't want to ever be in that place.

John Dehlin [01:35:43] My friend Roger Hendricks, who we've had a Mormon stories, he always says when you're explaining your losing. Yeah, yeah. So it's, it's not your role to explain. Okay. So you're gonna model a healthy disclosure. You're gonna make them feel safe. Less is more. Are you gonna do the love sandwich where you start out with something loving then do the disclosure and then end with something loving. Are you gonna do that?

Margi Dehlin [01:36:04] So this is someone I value in my life. This is a relationship. I, I, So the things I'm saying, everything you want to say in this, you want to be true. So if the things I'm saying are not true to you, you don't value the relationship or you don't then you would want to put things in place that actually are true but that are positive or so that's an important thing is we don't want people lying now.

John Dehlin [01:36:26] Oh, go ahead.

Margi Dehlin [01:36:26] I have one more framing that we're going to care about environment. So this is not, this is something I will have cared about before we talk and the environment, what that we're looking for is something that is kind of low stimuli. There's some privacy that we can have and it's a good time for me, a good time emotionally for me. And as far as I can tell, it's a good time of day, good time for them. They're not rushed for an appointment. They're not. So those are a couple things. And another thing people tend to do sometimes is they add drama to the environment and timing. They'll like over care where it's like I have something really important to tell you and I want to meet you at 8 o' clock clock and at my living room. And and I learned this from Natasha. It like you dramatize the environment before you ever talk. It's like now the person's like oh

Carah Burrell [01:37:19] my gosh, I have to go over

Margi Dehlin [01:37:20] at 8pm and it's in the living room.

John Dehlin [01:37:23] This is really gonna happen. Is he addicted to porn?

Margi Dehlin [01:37:25] We want to be sensitive, that we're careful about privacy, we're careful about being a good time, but we're not dramatizing over.

John Dehlin [01:37:32] Dramatizing what's happening.

Margi Dehlin [01:37:33] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:37:33] Okay. All right. Okay. Okay. So this is a. Oh, and I'm going to say one last thing. Margi's going to be doing this, you know, face to face. I want you to think about how your. If you decide to disclose through email, a lot of these same principles apply about the love sandwich, about making them feel safe, about less is more and. And set and setting. Is that okay? Because I think this disclosure that you're going to do verbally probably could apply to. To a written email as well. Okay.

Margi Dehlin [01:38:07] And I'm going to break down the steps.

John Dehlin [01:38:08] Okay, let's do it.

Margi Dehlin [01:38:09] People can see.

John Dehlin [01:38:10] All right, so we're. So I'm the parent.

Margi Dehlin [01:38:13] You want to be dad.

John Dehlin [01:38:15] I'm dad, and you're my daughter.

Margi Dehlin [01:38:17] Okay.

John Dehlin [01:38:17] Okay.

Margi Dehlin [01:38:18] Okay. All right, so the first thing I'm going to do is the invitation. So I'm going to say. Start by saying like, hey, dad, it's good to see you. How are you doing?

John Dehlin [01:38:29] Good. Yeah, everything's great. Everything's always great. How are you?

Margi Dehlin [01:38:34] I'm feeling pretty good. I have been wanting to talk to you for some time and I'm curious. You know, it's kind of feeling vulnerable for me right now, so I'm curious if it feels like a good time for you to kind of listen and hold it or if it's. If we should try for another time. I mean, does this. Do you feel in a position where you feel like you could listen and. Wow. Because I'm feeling kind of scared.

John Dehlin [01:38:56] Wow, that's. Oh, my gosh. Well, now I'm really worried if something happened, but it's so nice of you to ask. Yeah, I'm. I'm actually feeling okay right now. And now I'm a little worried about what's going on, but.

Margi Dehlin [01:39:08] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:39:08] But yeah, I always want to talk to you and, and, and help in any way that I can.

Margi Dehlin [01:39:13] I really appreciate that. Yeah. And to be honest, things have been a little bit challenging. Nothing for you to really, really worry about out. But things have been kind of challenging for me and I just. I'm feeling really grateful that for our relationship and that I have you in my life and that I can actually, on some level, you know, be in a position to share a bit of this because I wonder if you're seeing things or observing things at all, that maybe this will help explain it, so.

John Dehlin [01:39:43] Oh, well, thank you for those kind words of support and, yeah, thanks for asking me. I'm very eager to hear what's going on.

Margi Dehlin [01:39:52] Yeah, I think the big news is for a while now, I've been feeling, oh, a lot of things, but for now I'm feeling like I need to step away from the church. I'm feeling this desire to have more space during this time, and I know that that may be particularly hard for you to hear. Is it feeling hard for you to hear?

John Dehlin [01:40:16] Wow. Well, this is. I mean, this is every parent's kind of worst. Every Mormon parents worst nightmare. Like, yeah, this is. I mean, honestly, this is the worst possible news you could probably give me.

Margi Dehlin [01:40:29] Wow. Okay. Well, I hear that and I, I can appreciate your feelings around that. I feel like this will be good for me, and so I would really appreciate your support on it. What I can tell you is I feel like this will be really healthy for me and I don't want you to worry about me. I feel like I'm still the same person I've always been, that a lot like my values are still my values, but that for me, when I'm kind of considering my health, this is a decision that just is feeling really, really right for me.

John Dehlin [01:41:09] Okay, so.

Margi Dehlin [01:41:10] So I've just done safety. Sorry, I should have told you that. So I provided a simple explanation. I'm going to step away. I use those words because they're not really clear. And for a lot of people when they're in this step, they're not really sure. They're not sure what they're doing. And it doesn't necessarily benefit the parent to know I've made this decision and here's the decision and, but. So it's.

John Dehlin [01:41:34] Can I, can I add something there?

Margi Dehlin [01:41:35] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:41:36] So when you use the term stepping away, that actually was a tiny bit jarring for me as a coach. I use, I sometimes have recommended slightly softer words like I'm, you know, my, my. You know, Margi and I are, are kind of working through our feelings about the church. We're, we're, you know, we've. We've had some questions about the church, and right now the church isn't feeling, you know, church activity right now isn't a super healthy thing for us. We're finding that it's just not right now a healthy thing for us or for our family. And so all I just wanted to say is we're taking some time to work through that and to process it and to figure out what that means for us. And I, and I'M just saying there's a subtle word difference between stepping up, stepping away. I think that's what you used and kind of. Of figuring things out. It's kind of a soft. It's kind of a soft way to describe.

Margi Dehlin [01:42:34] We could use space instead.

John Dehlin [01:42:36] Taking some space. Taking space, taking a break.

Margi Dehlin [01:42:39] Another thing is we're. We're taking a pause. We're put. We're placing a. A pause. All these things are things you can say. And language is important. And so for everyone, use terminology that feels true and good for you. This is just to give kind of a structure or a flow as to what it would feel like. So. So, yeah, one thing. Yeah.

Carah Burrell [01:43:00] Remember we were talking about the values, and John always. I remember him talking about that you need to reevaluate. Maybe honesty was a really high priority for you when you were Mormon, and maybe now it's not advantageous to this relationship. So it sounds like that's the honest thing to say, is that we're stepping away, but it's not advantageous to the type of discussion you're having. And that's why John's trying to, like, use softer terminology.

Margi Dehlin [01:43:20] Yeah.

Carah Burrell [01:43:20] So I think what you were just saying is people need to actually think, how high stakes is this to my family right now? What will resonate with. In a way that will not cause them to flip a table and freak out? What's the softest way to put it? And maybe that is using less honest language about what you're actually. Maybe you're completely an atheist now, or maybe you're completely never going back to church. But if you say that in such direct terms, it's not advantageous.

Margi Dehlin [01:43:44] That's.

Carah Burrell [01:43:45] At this point in time.

Margi Dehlin [01:43:46] That's. That's beautiful. And to me, here's. Here's me. If It's a level 2, 3 person for me and they're safe, I'm gonna say step away way. But that's me. And that's why everyone has to kind of use the language and assess the relationship like you're saying. And the softness required. Right. For this situation.

John Dehlin [01:44:06] And Mar, is it okay if we flip now and I. I do mine?

Margi Dehlin [01:44:09] I'm not done yet.

John Dehlin [01:44:10] Oh, go ahead. Okay. Yeah, keep going. So we're back in role play now.

Margi Dehlin [01:44:13] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:44:13] Okay, so we haven't finished your role play. Okay. Keep going.

Margi Dehlin [01:44:16] But that was the safety. That was kind of creating safety. I validated your feelings. And then I also kind of said, hey, my values. I'm still the same person. I'm still the same. Which is meant to sort of, hey, kind of assuage. I'm not saying everything's the same. I'm saying a lot of my values are the same. Okay. And then I'm gonna say, you know, I really appreciate where you're coming from. And I would never want to, you know, try to persuade you to, you know, understand or to see my point of view or to show you learn, because I, because I support you doing what feels best to you. And I also ask that you do the same for me, that I need that from you right now, and I'm asking for it and I, I will give it to you. And I'm requesting it as well.

John Dehlin [01:45:04] But, sweetie, I, I, I get a sense that, you know, honey, I sense that you have probably been watching or listening to podcasts. You shouldn't. That you probably stumbled on anti Mormon literature. And I want you to know I've read it all, I know it all, and I've studied fair Mormon and I've got answers for any question you have. And so if you are losing your faith, either I can help you resolve it, or I can get you in touch with people that can resolve the next one.

Margi Dehlin [01:45:32] Now to this one where you're trying to persuade me.

John Dehlin [01:45:34] No, yeah, actually, you're right. Go ahead and do it. Go and do it.

Margi Dehlin [01:45:38] But I can't respond. I can't do it.

John Dehlin [01:45:40] Go and respond.

Margi Dehlin [01:45:40] Okay. Yeah. I really appreciate where you're coming from, and I think it's important that this journey is my own. Own. But I appreciate your offering, but I

John Dehlin [01:45:49] really want to help you. I really want to support you.

Margi Dehlin [01:45:52] I really hear that. And I think it's a journey I have to make on my own. But I appreciate you offering. The boundary is repetition. So sometimes boundaries, words, oftentimes if you have a really insistent person who's. We'll show that in the next one. If someone's really kind of. Then there are other boundaries you can make other than words, especially if they're not listening to your words.

John Dehlin [01:46:13] I love it. Okay. What, what? Any other parts of the disclosure you want to share?

Margi Dehlin [01:46:19] No, that's the main thing. It's just sort of. And it can look really different for different people. But those tenants were there. Oh, yeah. And then when we end, it's like, hey, I really love you. I appreciate you. Thank you for giving me this time and space.

John Dehlin [01:46:31] I love it. Okay. So if it's okay. That was beautiful, Margi. Thank you. We're gonna flip it and do the same thing. I'm gonna just give my standard disclosure and you play the role of, let's just say a spouse. So you're my, you're my believing wife. I'm a non believing husband. And I'm going to come out to

Margi Dehlin [01:46:50] you and wait, am I doing this well or am I doing this?

John Dehlin [01:46:53] You're going to be reasonable? Yeah. You're not going to be pro, you know, argumentative or problematic because the purpose.

Margi Dehlin [01:46:59] Give another option.

John Dehlin [01:46:59] Yeah. What I just want to do is kind of now do it right in my words so that people have kind of.

Margi Dehlin [01:47:05] This is so important.

John Dehlin [01:47:06] Two different, two different options.

Carah Burrell [01:47:07] Is that okay?

Margi Dehlin [01:47:08] That's great.

John Dehlin [01:47:08] Okay. Okay. So I'm non role play. I'm non believing husband. You're non believing wife or you're believing. And we'll have this as its own time code. Okay. So. Hey, sweetie, I've got something kind of important I need to talk to you about. And do you have a few minutes? Is this a good time?

Margi Dehlin [01:47:30] Yeah, sure. Sure.

John Dehlin [01:47:31] Okay. I wanted to begin just by saying, first of all, there's nothing. There's nothing like there's no big problem. There's nothing you need to be afraid of. I actually am seeing this is really good. But I don't want you to worry. This, this is, this is something that I feel like is going to be really good in the end. But what I wanted to just say is, first of all, I want you to know that I love you as my wife. I am happier now in many ways in our marriage than I've ever been. I'm so committed to you. I love you so much. And I'm just grateful for the loving and supportive wife that you've been over the years. And I've. I've loved our journey together. So I wanted to start by saying that.

Margi Dehlin [01:48:17] Okay, now I'm a little. And okay.

John Dehlin [01:48:22] Yeah. Well, I just want to start that because I really feel those things and, and I. I don't want that to get lost because that's probably the most important thing. I just want you to know how much I love you and how much you mean to me. Now, I know that this. You're probably afraid. So let me just tell you the main thing I want you to know. And this is, this is difficult, but my relationship with the church is kind of changing. I don't know how it's going to end, but I'm in this process of learning things about the church, not feeling perfect, not feeling great in the church and trying to figure out what it means and, and basically just wrestling with the church. And I just wanted to let you know this so that you're not surprised, so you don't hear from somebody else. And I just want you to know that I'm going through that right now. And. But I also want to let you know that I'm. I. You are safe with me. Me. That I care about our relationship more than anything. And I am never going to ever share with you any of the doubts that I have. I'm never going to try and take your faith away. I respect you and your faith so much that this is something that I'm going to be working through, and you don't need to worry. And I just want you to know that I believe we're going to be okay in the end. And. But I just wanted to let you know ahead of time. Time that that's what I'm going through.

Margi Dehlin [01:49:48] What does that mean for us? I just. I'm so scared. What does that mean? What does all this mean?

John Dehlin [01:49:55] Yeah. Yeah. Well, what I want to reassure you about, to make sure you feel safe, is that I'm committed to you. And what it doesn't mean is that I'm questioning our marriage. It doesn't mean that I'm questioning my faithfulness to you. It doesn't mean that I'm going to now start. Start doing unhealthy, irresponsible behaviors, that I'm not going to go off a cliff. I'm going to be the same loving and kind, devoted husband and father that I've always been. It just means that I'm working through some questions that I have. And it may mean that for a time, I might need to not always go to church or take a break for a season to try and work through all this. But I want you to feel assured that I'm not changing at my core who I am. I'm not changing my values. And that I'm as committed to you and the family and the children as. As. As ever.

Margi Dehlin [01:50:58] Can't you just go on Sunday? Do you have to not go? Like, what about the kids? What do we say to the kids? I just don't. Like, can you. Are you leaving? Like, are you thinking you're gonna leave?

John Dehlin [01:51:10] Those are. Those are. I'm. I'm. Yeah. I'm. I'm so sorry that this is scaring you. I can tell that this is scaring you. And I just want you to know I'm not leaving. I am committed to you. I'm committed to our kids. And I want you to know that I'm gonna need to, you know, as I'm Wrestling through this. I'm gonna do my best to make it minimally disruptive. So I'm not going to talk to the kids without your, your consent and approval. I'm not going to go like trying to go all over the Internet and spread doubt and fear with other people. I will attend church with you as much as I can if it can be healthy for me. I'm going to just be there right by you and give you and the kids time to adjust. I'm not going to change any of our basic commitments. I'm not going to start drinking. I'm not going to start smoking. I'm not going to just immediately stop paying my tithing or stop wearing my garments unless we talk about that first. I am going to go as slow and as steady and as communicative as I can with you so that we walk through this journey together and so that it's minimally disruptive to you and to the kids.

Margi Dehlin [01:52:21] Well, that means a lot. This is scary, but that means a lot to me and I wish I could could. I don't think I want to hear what you're, I'm not ready to hear the things that you're. But I really do like sharing things. So I think I just need some time and space to think it through.

John Dehlin [01:52:39] Yeah. And I just want to re, re reassure you that I won't be sharing. I, I, I respect your faith. I respect where you stand. I respect that our family right now was created under the, you know, common belief in the church that the kids are all in it. And I'm not going to do anything to try and persuade you to no longer believe or to like mess with the kids beliefs intentionally. We're going to walk this path together and I am going to do my best to make you and the kids feel safe while I'm working through this. You have my commitment on that, that and I'm going to go through it slowly. Hopefully we can hold hands together and go through this. I don't know where it's going to lead, but I want you to feel secure that I, you have my love and support, so do the kids. And I'm going to check in with you every step of the way on any changes that might happen so that you never feel misled, you never feel deceived and you never feel like I've betrayed your trust. Because it's really important to me in this process. Process that I not betray your trust.

Margi Dehlin [01:53:52] Okay. Thank you, love. I appreciate it.

John Dehlin [01:53:57] Okay.

Margi Dehlin [01:53:57] I feel like a level, like a level four or that was mean by that. Just like a very safe because. Because you gave a lot as the person who to me you. You gave a lot. So did you it to me it felt like an intimate as opposed to the one I was doing, which is like a level two or three where there were some boundaries there and you're trying to kind of of right with yours. That felt very open and intimate and generous. That was a really. Yeah, it's beautiful.

John Dehlin [01:54:29] Oh, thank you. Okay.

Carah Burrell [01:54:30] Carah, as somebody who had that conversation like two years ago, I am like just the same with Leah's. Remember to me like literally the same thing. Maybe I was wearing the same exact outfit with the same bun in my hair, you know, and into a couple role plays. I get the emotions going and I'm like, oh, I had that kind of conversation. That was congratulations to my husband, by the way. He. Without listening to any of this stuff. I think my husband did a really good job. I was Margi in this situation two years ago. John was definitely in Aaron's position and I think Aaron did a great job. But because we come from a religion that is has a covenant path and it's so black and white, no matter how gracious and generous how my husband talked to me, I was doing Mark, you kind of alluded to it like, well, what does this mean? I immediately went to like, does that mean you're not baptizing the kids? And now I look at the shame of like, oh my gosh, my somebody else is gonna have to baptize our kids. That's all I'm thinking about. I'm not listening to what you're saying anymore because I'm panicking that my kids baptism's coming up or I'm panicking that I'm going to be okay. I have to vision myself sitting in the pew alone. I have to vision myself going to a temple wedding by myself without my husband there.

John Dehlin [01:55:30] All of the, you know, not those

Carah Burrell [01:55:33] necessarily get divorced, just the, just those could happen too. But just the basic like standard Mormon logistical things of, oh, I had a vision of our life being along this line and then the rug being ripped out. Now what does this mean? What is this, what is this going to look like? I've never had my brain go through this painful like muscle process of re evaluating what it's going to look like to have a mixed faith marriage that is so immediately kind of traumatizing and you get hot and you get like get flooded and you're almost what they're saying doesn't even matter anymore because you're just like, you're kind of having a freak out. And so when we, the main thing I think we're talking about is making it safe. That just so you know, I'm not going to do anything that's going to disrupt the safety. And so along those lines, we had a good comment from Thomas I wanted to introduce where he said the concept of not talking about any messy church history, even objectively with my spouse, doesn't feel like something I can immediately agree to you. What is wrong about me feeling this? So John, you said in that role play that you're like, I'm, I'm not going to bring up church history things which I think that's when, when mixed faith marriages go from non mixed faith and they both leave together, it usually comes from like, okay, give me a little breadcrumb of what have you been learning? So yeah, that's a great, that's just kind of like off the table in that immediate conversation, I think. But eventually things are going to need to be shared about.

John Dehlin [01:56:59] So let me, let me explain kind of the strategy around that. Yeah.

Carah Burrell [01:57:02] Because it's important.

John Dehlin [01:57:02] And thanks for, for reading those comments and sharing them, Carah and Thomas, thanks for making that comment and that question. First of all, let me give a couple stipulations. This isn't, you know, we're not, you know, this isn't true like the, the approach I just gave or the approach Margi gave. It's not like they're the one true or the two true approaches. Everyone's approach is going to be different. These are just some techniques that we've developed over time that we found who worked for some people. So you're gonna have to decide, be your own internal authority and decide what's best for you and your family. So I just wanna say that there's nothing that's quote true, capital T about these approaches. But let me tell you, Thomas and everyone, the strategy behind the make them feel safe. So this is something I've talked about in a million different places. There's this thing called the backfire effect where take abortion or take gun rights or take, you know, the immunization, like the COVID vaccine. There's a psychological dynamic that has been demonstrated in some cases where when you go to your loved one or friend with evidence that actually demonstrates to them that their closely held belief is wrong, when you provide them with evidence that actually demonstrates that it's wrong, what you actually create in them sometimes psychologically is what's called the backfire effect, where they actually when they feel threatened to their core in terms of their own identity, political identity, religious identity, worldview, they actually sometimes recoil and even hold tighter and believe stronger in the things that you try to talk to them about. So, Thomas, you may have a desire to want to do the word vomit, as we say, and read them the high points of the CES letter. And all I'm going to say is there may be a time where they want to know that usually, and we just talked about this usually, you know, when I was watching Margi's eyes as I was disclosing to her what the believing spouse or family member hears, you're saying, I've lost my faith. Everything's going to be okay. In their mind, all they're hearing is, you're going to divorce me, you're going to start cheating on me, you're going to become a drug addict or an alcoholic. My eternal family has now been destroyed. That's all they're going to be hearing almost no matter what words you say. That's why we recommend keeping it safe, the right time and setting and minimizing the words, because it's likely going to go bad no matter what you do. And that takes us back to the concept of acceptance. You should just accept that it's never going to be as good as Margi's response. Or is my response to Margi? It's going to be likely. Tears and weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth and sometimes even anger and shouting. Now, you don't have to engage in that, but you should just expect something really bad, and then hopefully you're pleasantly surprised, but you can make it worse. And so what I'm telling you, Thomas, is there's a strategy behind less is more. And the strategy is that over time, if you make them feel safe, if you make them feel like you're never going to try and convert them them out of the church, if you never try and shove the reasons why you've left the church at them over time, psychologically, you're not creating the backfire effect, and you're making them feel safe. And once you've made them feel safe, over time, you actually increase the likelihood that someday they might ask you what the things were that caused you to lose your faith. And that's the strategy, Thomas. It's not that you're never going to tell your spouse or your kids or your parents or your siblings or your loved ones what the things were. It's that you're going to have a higher likelihood of them actually caring and wanting to learn themselves if you haven't made them feel defensive and if you haven't already generated in them the defensiveness of the backfire effect. So that's the strategy behind less is more. And Thomas, I hope that makes sense. And what I want now to do is take us to the next role play. Role play number two is handling attempts to debate and rescue around content. Now we talked about this a little bit, but what often is going to happen is you're going to feel like you want to descend into the argument and they're going to feel like they want to rescue you or save you or debate. Debate about the reasons why you lost your faith. And so what I'm trying to say is you don't want to ever do that. You don't want to get into that debate. It just leads to tension, it just leads to arguments. There's this saying, you never can convert someone out of a position emotionally or no, sorry, you can't convert someone out of a position they arrived at emotionally with logic or evidence or reason. They likely arrived at their faith from an emotional place. And you're not going to talk them out of it using facts or evidence or logic. And so you don't want to try. And so the best you want to do is not get into the specifics. And then if you need to, if they're really insistent on wanting to learn, you refer them to resources that they can check out on their own where you're not their teacher. So let's now move to the role play number two, Margi, which is handling attempts to debate or rescue about content. So what we'll do is we'll jump to the part of the role play where one of us is the believing rescuer and the other is the believer who's going to, you know, who's going to try and either put up a boundary or actually engage in the debate. Now, Carah, you and I role played this a little bit when you were the believing parent. Parent where we were trying to get into the problem. So let's just role play really quickly. So I'm, I'm the person who's lost their faith, you're the believer. We're going to remind people what that role play is like. So I'm going to say I'm going to do a bad role play of, of attempting to debate. So. So, mom, I've discovered that some things about the church aren't true. Did you know that Joseph Smith was a polygamist?

Role Play: Handling Debates and High-Stakes Conversations

Carah Burrell [02:03:24] You don't know about that? I don't know about that.

John Dehlin [02:03:27] No, no, no, listen, listen.

Carah Burrell [02:03:28] You've got some wacky sources.

John Dehlin [02:03:30] No, no, no, listen. The church's own website has an essay about polygamy and it says that Joseph smith had over 30 wives.

Carah Burrell [02:03:36] You know those things can be hacked. I don't believe.

John Dehlin [02:03:39] No, mom, I'm talking about the church's own website.

Carah Burrell [02:03:41] No, even if he did, you know that he's a prophet of God and it was those things, they're ceilings for, you know, eternity. But you're, you're trying to like look for reasons and try to find reasons to not believe that he was a

John Dehlin [02:03:52] prophetic 14 year old girls.

Carah Burrell [02:03:55] Read the Book of Mormon and you'll feel the spirit.

John Dehlin [02:03:57] No, mom, listen, just listen to me. Read the Book of Mormon. No, mom, will you listen to me? Will you listen to me for just a second, please? This is important. Joseph Smith married 14 year olds. He married other men's wives. He, he, he engaged in polyandry.

Carah Burrell [02:04:11] That was a normal thing back then. You're, you were just completely looking for reasons to go and smoke cigarettes with your friends behind the door.

John Dehlin [02:04:19] Mom, Joseph Smith was a, was a sexual predator. He was a pedophile file.

Margi Dehlin [02:04:22] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Carah Burrell [02:04:24] Well, all right, if you want to believe that, go ahead and go smoke cigarettes now with your friends if that's what makes you sleep at night. But you know the truth. You know that he was the prophet of the restoration. You know that you can't deny the spirit that you felt. You know the Book of Mormons. True. No other man could write that book. So I don't care what he did. He's obviously a prophet. I know it and you know it. But whatever, whatever, John.

John Dehlin [02:04:46] Okay, that was great. And I hope you, you know, you probably, if you've already tried this with bleeding family and friends, you know that that's often how it goes. Those, it's worthless. Okay. So now Margi, let's model a different approach. So go ahead.

Margi Dehlin [02:05:00] So I'm a little bit confused because I was going to have us modeling as the. How would you put it? Non believing. I don't really love, but to the believing because for me that's where I was envisioning oftentimes at like family gatherings. You, you don't want to talk about it. You are living your life as has and moved on from the church, but you have believing people coming up, trying to bring it up, trying to say,

John Dehlin [02:05:26] okay, so let's do it. So I'm going to be. Either way works, but I'm going to be the believer you're going to be the non believer.

Margi Dehlin [02:05:34] Oh, okay.

John Dehlin [02:05:35] I'm going to come at you with either wanting to know what happened or debating with you and.

Margi Dehlin [02:05:40] Do I know you?

John Dehlin [02:05:40] Well, let's just say that I'm. I'm the average parent or sibling.

Margi Dehlin [02:05:45] Okay, so you're an average sibling to me.

John Dehlin [02:05:48] Yeah, sibling. Let's just say I'm your. I'm your. I mean, yeah, these things kind of matter.

Margi Dehlin [02:05:53] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:05:54] Okay.

Margi Dehlin [02:05:54] Am I close to you?

John Dehlin [02:05:55] Yeah. Let's say I'm your sibling and you lost your faith and I'm the return missionary. Ap. I've read all the apologetics and I want to get into it with you. And what I want you to role model for us is healthy boundaries and how to handle, you know, the, the, the attempts at rescuing or debating.

Margi Dehlin [02:06:15] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:06:16] Is that okay?

Margi Dehlin [02:06:17] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:06:17] Okay. So, Sister Margi.

Margi Dehlin [02:06:21] Hi, Jed.

John Dehlin [02:06:23] So you just, you know, I heard that you had the talk with mom and dad and I heard you lost your faith and I've heard you've been. You've probably been on Mormon Stories podcast or reading the CES letter, and I just want you to know. Know that I have read Fair Mormon. I. I've read it. I know all the answers and I'm eager to find out what are the things that cause you lose your faith and. Let's talk about it.

Margi Dehlin [02:06:48] Yeah, well, I appreciate what you're trying to do here in connection, trying to connect with me around it. I actually, I don't really feel like. Like it's a good time or place to do that, but I appreciate you making the effort.

John Dehlin [02:07:03] No, no, seriously, like, this is important and I. I want you to know I can really help you. So let me just ask you if it's okay, was it Book of Mormon historicity? Was it that? Was it the steel and the horses in the Book of Mormon? Is that what caused you to lose your faith? Because I've got answers for that.

Carah Burrell [02:07:18] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:07:18] I can really see this is important to you right now, but I. Because we're about ready to have dinner. I just in. It's kind of a fan. I just don't feel like this is. And you know what? I. To be honest with you, I value our relationship, you know, in a way that I value it more than this conversation. So I value it way too much to actually have this conversation with you.

John Dehlin [02:07:41] But I'm strong. I want you to know that. I have my testimony. You could never shake it. You could never affect my testimony. I care about you and I just really want to know, was it polygamy Was it Joseph Smith's polygamy? I want to. I've got answers. I can tell you. You.

Margi Dehlin [02:07:55] Yeah, I hear that. And I think we're getting ready to have dinner, so I'm. It's probably not the time or place to have this.

John Dehlin [02:08:02] What if you don't have the dinner excuse?

Margi Dehlin [02:08:04] Oh, really?

John Dehlin [02:08:04] Yeah.

Margi Dehlin [02:08:05] Then it would be like I value you too much to have this conversation with you. I feel. I feel your desire to have it, and I value this. I. I value our relationship way more than to have this conversation.

John Dehlin [02:08:18] I promise. I promise you it's not going to affect our relationship. I will.

Carah Burrell [02:08:21] Will.

John Dehlin [02:08:22] I will love you no matter what. I just want you to tell me because I want to help you, frankly.

Margi Dehlin [02:08:27] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:08:28] So don't worry about our relationship.

Margi Dehlin [02:08:29] I hear that from you, and I'm still not going to have the conversation with you. What I would love to hear about is how it's been since you've been back and what's been lighting you up lately.

John Dehlin [02:08:40] Okay, so that was kind of.

Margi Dehlin [02:08:42] I would redirect.

John Dehlin [02:08:43] Okay?

Margi Dehlin [02:08:43] So I said it twice. So if you have someone that keeps coming at you, repetition is a boundary in and of itself to repeat what you say. People get that usually really, really quickly. Another thing you can do is just redirect and say, I really appreciate that. You know what? Something I've been curious about, though, is what you've been at. And then redirect it in an earnest way around a conversation you actually want to have with the person. Okay. So that's another way you can go about it sometimes. You know, I've been in situations before where I've actually been physically cornered by someone in a. Like a party situation where I've just physically left them, where I'm like. I've tried all the stops I've tried. And so then you create a physical boundary of having to actually just. Just leave.

John Dehlin [02:09:32] Okay?

Margi Dehlin [02:09:33] So those are all boundaries.

John Dehlin [02:09:34] I love that. Let's. Let's do a quite. Let's do a slight modulation on the role play.

Margi Dehlin [02:09:38] Okay?

John Dehlin [02:09:39] In this case, we're besties. You know that we have unconditional love.

Margi Dehlin [02:09:44] Okay?

John Dehlin [02:09:44] You know that I'm safe. You know that I'm going to love you no matter what. You know that. And you know that I'm going to believe. I'm going to believe what you tell me about the church and about the church history. And so I'm going to ask you,

Margi Dehlin [02:09:57] how about I do that? And then you model it.

John Dehlin [02:09:59] Okay? Okay. All right. So you are the believing wife. I'M the believing husband. I'm the non believing husband. Now we have a relationship that's a five. And you're going to ask me to be your teacher, and I'm going to tell you kind of one tip I recommend. Sometimes, even when somebody really wants to know, when you feel safe, I'm in a role play, not being someone's teacher. Okay. So that's this role play for the. For the time codes.

Margi Dehlin [02:10:28] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:10:28] Not playing, not being someone's teacher. So go ahead and ask the question.

Margi Dehlin [02:10:32] Okay. Hey, I've been thinking about, you know, when you came and you told me that you were having issues and I was curious. I really. I'm feeling like I want to kind of connect with you about it. Is there something you would recommend that I read or. I kind of start with ask me

John Dehlin [02:10:50] to teach you to. Ask me to tell you. Oh, in the role play, ask me to tell you what I learned.

Margi Dehlin [02:10:58] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:10:59] That's what most people do.

Margi Dehlin [02:11:00] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:11:01] You just gave the answer in your question, so. Sorry, sorry. Roll back. What you're going to do is the believing spouse is ask me to teach you. You. What I've learned that caused me to lose my faith.

Margi Dehlin [02:11:12] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:11:12] And I'm in a role model, not being your teacher.

Margi Dehlin [02:11:15] Okay. Hey, love, I've been thinking a lot about you and kind of the things that you mentioned the other day, and I was really curious. What. What is it that you've learned about Joseph Smith that's so disturbing? What. What have you found out?

John Dehlin [02:11:31] Okay, so, sweetie, I. It means a lot to me that you'd ask. It's so rare that people ask. And. And you're. You're giving me a lot of trust by asking, and I really do. There's part of me that really wants to share with you everything that I've learned, but there's a couple things that I'm worried about. One is that you're going to feel like I'm trying to take your faith away, and I'd never want that to happen. But also, I don't want other family members to be able to blame me for taking. I don't want your parents to think that I caused you to doubt. I want this to be your journey and I don't want to influence it. And there's this idea of a dual relationship where I just. I want you to figure things out for yourself, and I don't want to in any way negatively influence your life and your journey. And so what I'd like to do is instead of teaching you, I. It's if it's okay, I want to point you to some essays that the Church has published. They're called the Gospel Topics essays. They're on the church's website. There's ones on polygamy, there's ones on the Book of Mormon. There's ones on Joseph Smith's use of a stone in the hat in the Book of Mormon. There's one on DNA in the Book of Mormon. These are some of the issues. But I, I would rather you start the journey of, of self discovery and learning. And, and I think a really safe, healthy place to start is on the church's own website with the Gospel Topics essays. And what we can do is maybe I can give you those links. You can start with those. And then once you've gone through those, if you have more questions, I can point you to other resources like Mormon Stories Podcast or the CES Letter for further learning. But how do you feel about having your own learning journey and me, me not mixing up our marriage and our relationship with, with trying to be your teacher?

Margi Dehlin [02:13:27] That feels great to me.

John Dehlin [02:13:29] You sure?

Margi Dehlin [02:13:30] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:13:30] Do you feel like I'm kind of blowing you off?

Margi Dehlin [02:13:34] No, I don't. I think it makes sense. I'll start with the, the church essays. I didn't know they had that.

John Dehlin [02:13:39] Okay. Beautiful. Okay. So that is, you know, sort of handling attempts to debate and rescue about content or requests for you to be the teacher future. And those are some approaches that we have found worked. Carah, do you have any quick reactions, comments from listeners or reactions yourself?

Navigating Disclosure with Difficult or Toxic Relationships

Carah Burrell [02:13:59] The, the main comment that I'm seeing is, you know, when things are a little bit more intensely high stakes, where like you're going to be talking with somebody and this is a toxic person, but you need to tell them something. And you could have all the right strategies. Remember going back to Leah's thing and you can show up in all the right ways. Margi had to come around here and grab a microphone. Cause she had that very important point to make that like, what's your advice for people? Where they know they need to have these conversations with people, but they're working with a very difficult individual and they're kind of setting themselves up as best they can for a successful conversation, but the other person might just be too toxic to handle. What would your advice be?

Margi Dehlin [02:14:41] Yeah, I think so. One thing I would add to where John says, come in with low expectations with regard to how people. I have a letting go of people's reaction, like practicing how you want to show up what your intention is and then letting go of their reaction, their response there. Because that is not. You don't, you can't control that, that's beyond you. And they're going to just have it, you know. So what I would rather have you focus on are things that actually are within your control. So like your tone. Are you emotionally connected to the person you know? You know, have you kind of taken care of yourself, kind of arriving? But yeah, toxic people. I'm trying to think, you know, I would guard against really communicating overly with toxic people in general. I think that's some of the sorting we do when we intentionalize why am I coming out to this person or sharing? And then I would probably, I might if I had, if I really felt like I had a strong intention to come out to someone who's volatile, let's just say aggressive at times, or someone I don't have a lot of trust in, then I would probably really cater it to like informant information and probably be prepared to use a lot of boundary statements. So get very clear about what I'm going to say and what I'm not going to say. And holding boundaries and that's, that's really difficult work for most of us because I think for many of us we think the hard part is setting a boundary, but actually the hardest part is like that point where you're holding it in conversation because it feels really uncomfortable. I don't know, you know, when you're saying it again, that's holding a boundary. Like this is not something I don't feel comfortable sharing with you right now. Or and this is not, yeah, I still don't feel comfortable sharing, sharing with, with you right now. And you're basically saying I've, I've sometimes had to say it four times, you know, or redirecting and trying to hold the redirection or this is, this is very skilled. It's like PhD level. So I'm like, have a whole lot of compassion for yourself. Take good care of yourself. Be sure that this is someone you really have to disclose to and get your boundaries straight and just make sure you're coming at the right level of intimacy.

Carah Burrell [02:17:04] See, and I have two follow up question and a comment to that is when I have those conversations with my family. Remember you just said about, you know, having low expectations and if my intention for this conversation is to not change their mind, it's only to communicate information. My intentions for their behavior are going to be. My expectations for their behavior, I mean, are actually going to be quite low that I'm going to change their mind. All of that is just not even part of the entering my brain at that point. And so remember you're talking about like when John was role playing with me and it's like, oh, if only I could just say this one thing that will change your mind. Giving up that sense with like a toxic person. If you can already admit in your mind that this person has a history of. Anytime I've been vulnerable, anytime that I have needed help, anytime that I have done X, Y and Z with this person, how have they reacted? Okay, what would give me, what would inform any new decision, that they would act differently. So just giving up a sense that if I can communicate in this one way, they'll absolutely see it my way or whatever.

Margi Dehlin [02:18:00] Letting go. Like.

Carah Burrell [02:18:01] So, yes, when you're talking about that really uncomfortable boundary, I've been in that space where it's like, oh, I want to say something, I want to say something. Oh, I have a good comeback to that. Oh, I know that if, but just like, it's not worth it, it's not worth it, it's not worth it, it's not worth it. Just communicate the information and then suck it in and then, you know, go text my sister later or something else where I can get it out. But it's not in this situation with my parents right now. And then on top of that, so Stephanie was asking where she can find more information about this level two, level three stuff that, that you were, that you're mentioning and kind of putting people into these different.

John Dehlin [02:18:36] I, I, I've thought about that. Unless you do, do you have a quick reaction to that?

Carah Burrell [02:18:38] Yeah. Okay, speak more to that and then where they can find more information on that.

John Dehlin [02:18:42] Yeah, so, so this, this whole series on Mormon Stories podcast is called the Gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis. And as I mentioned at the beginning, there's a website called mormonfaithcrisis.com where there's 70 hours of free coaching. And already me and Margi and Natasha have given this content away for free. You can go there and get it for free. And in there we record a full two and a half day retreat where we talk in depth about mental health, going through a faith transition, communicating with believing family and friends, healthy sexuality, and we talk in depth about conscious parenting and we also talk about these levels of intimacy. And there's several individual episodes where we've gone into for another two or three hours on communicating with children after a crisis of faith, communicating with your bishop and ward leaders after a crisis of faith. You know, just coming out to believing Family and friends, all the different, you know, things grieving. So we want to just point you to that website, Gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis, which is@mormonfaithcrisis.com 70 hours of free coach that one retreat. If you just google Mormon Stories Retreat and just watch that two and a half day retreat, that is probably the single most thing I'm most proud of in the 16 years I've been doing Mormon Stories podcast is the content that me and Margi and Natasha have developed, recorded and shared with you guys. So we will be doing more of this here on Mormon Stories podcast. So you can expect a weekly episode on the this going forward, but MormonFaithCrises.com is a great place to start. I will say just really quickly that we want to make sure that if you value this part, this type of content on Mormon Stories Podcast and you're not already a donor, we would ask you to please consider voluntarily making a donation if you really want to see this content continue again.

Margi Dehlin [02:20:43] And

John Dehlin [02:20:45] we want to make this financially sustainable. So you can go to mormonfaithcrisis.com, click on the donate button and become a monthly subscriber. 10 bucks a month, 20 bucks a month, 100 bucks a month, anything you can afford. We will use that to again pay for care services to, you know, provide Margi a thank you for her expertise. We're going to have Natasha on just this Thursday about healing from sexual shame. We would ask you to please support this series so that we can keep providing it to you for free. Again, if you can't donate and support, you don't have to. We give you this for free anyway. But if you are in the position to support, please do so. Also you can always make a donation through the super chat feature on YouTube. A lot of you are benefiting that and I think Facebook has a feature called Stars, but that's my kind of of answer is check out Gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis podcast and check out in future weeks because we're going to be coming back to this topic and we're going to make sure make it really easy for you to find this content on Mormon Stories. Margi, did you want to add something?

Margi Dehlin [02:21:49] Yeah, I was just going to say if Stephanie's question was about levels of relationship in particular, that's something maybe I'll consider writing a blog about. It's something I do a lot in coaching work with people, but I don't think I've written about it and I do know it is on Gift of the Morning Faith crisis. And we can do it here. If that's something that's interesting to people, that is something we can go into greater depth. And then one last thing too. Was it Andrew who wrote about the toxic. Someone wrote a comment about the toxic person. And kind of one thing I wanted to just say about that is something we don't give enough thought to around kind of of mental health and good boundaries is sometimes you don't need to engage with a toxic person at all. Period. And I think because of the way we've been brought up and how other centered we are and especially if that person's a family member. But we also have a difficult time with boundaries. And so you know, there is something to deciding sometimes that the conversation does not need to be had bad. And if it affects your mental health going into that to, to kind of feel like you're, you have to do that. It, that is a great reason to say no right there. You don't have to, you don't have to take the hit.

John Dehlin [02:23:10] Yeah, I, I so many of you made comments and shared your experiences on the Mormon Stories blog. I'm just going to share one. Melissa writes, we have never felt the need to announce our decision to resign and you could, you could exchange for that your loss of faith or whatever. She goes on to say part of that decision was in watching others deal with the backlash of their coming out. However, we are very open to share when people ask. I have found peace in setting healthy boundaries, being mindful of the intent of questions and pausing before responding. Three years later and our family is much happier and healthier. There's hope, but it's not a race. Just take it one day at a time and do what's right for you. I'm going to add to that there are other people that just comment. For some it's the right answer is never coming out. It's never having this conversation at all. And we want to make sure you feel the freedom to decide that maybe your parents have cancer and they're in their 90s and you just realize that you're going to choose compassion over authenticity and say with their few months that are remaining in their lives or they're just toxic people where they're never going to get it. Maybe the parents in their 70s who are just never going to be able to accept and you might just decide that for you the answer is to actually never have this conversation at all. And so we're going to have a future. Part 2 of this episode where we go into more depth, take more Questions and comments. Talk about some of these tools more in depth and explore the many variety of options which can include never having this conversation at all. Do you agree with that, Margi?

Margi Dehlin [02:24:44] I really agree with that. I think think being able to identify that this is something that's very personal to you and you know, being able to be in this place, the power to choose who you allow in to see that is absolutely a key component and it's a completely viable choice. It can be a really, really healthy choice. I see this a lot of times when people live across the country from their families, families and you know, there's not. But you know, yeah, listen to, listen to yourself. Honor yourself. Honor your own values. And you know, there are many, many ways I feel like to do this in a healthy, honoring kind of way.

John Dehlin [02:25:30] I love it. And with that there's a comment I'm going to share. JC writes, thank you so much for your work and effort. I think this is to all of us in helping so many people live true were to themselves and overcome trauma. You are doing an amazing job. And Margi looks absolutely beautiful. So we just had to give that shout out.

Closing Reflections, Resources, and Farewell

Margi Dehlin [02:25:51] Margi, well that's very nice.

John Dehlin [02:25:53] Thank you. Did I embarrass you? Well, it's JC's fault. So JC, thank you for embarrassing Margi. I appreciate it. Okay, so this is only part one. We've gone a little bit over what we wanted to. There's so many comments that we weren't able to get to to. There are comments on the Mormon Stories podcast page and other things that we want to share. I do want to share one last thing. We just announced the Thrive Initiative which is a new website called thrivebeyondreligion.com where we're going to be having a lot of events. So many of you have been asking how do I go to a faith crisis retreat? How do I meet other people who need our support? So there's two things I'm going to sort of just plug to end. If you're needing support, if you want to go to a retreat, one of our faith crisis retreats. If you need extra support, if you go to thrivebeyondreligion.com events you will find several events that are coming up. One of them is a faith transition retreat that Margi and I, Natasha, will be at. And the only reason I'm plugging it is because I know that these events have changed many lives. Lives. So if you go to thrivebeyondreligion.com events, find the Faith Transitions Retreat. It's October 15th to 17th, 2021. It's going to be in Provo. And you can register today for that retreat. And you know that is something people have been asking for. I want to let you know about it. There's another event. The next Thrive event that's open for registration is Thrive Day in November. So if you guys heard about the big Thrive event we had in the Salt palace two years ago, we're having another one. And today is the first day we're opening registration. That is November 14th at 10am in the Salt Palace. And you can register for that today. We are planning on 5,000 people attending. We've got a lot of really cool things in store. We also have Thrive St. George on February 11th and we also have Thrive Alberta, Canada also on February, sorry, on January 22nd. And we want to let you know that we want to host more Thrive events in your area. So if you want to actually host a Thrive event, you can now go to the Thrive website and you can click on the page how to host an event. And we will help you host your own Thrive event wherever you live. And we also are looking to create face to face communities through Thrive. And you could also go to thrivebeyondreligion.com right now and create a local face to face community where you can meet people in real life to get the support you need. So those are some resources I wanted to let you guys know about. Margi, did you want to add one last thing? Thing before we go?

Margi Dehlin [02:28:52] I was just gonna get back to just sending our final support and love around a really difficult, challenging topic. And these are really, I feel like advanced level skills that most of us, you know, you know, they're new for most of us and we're asking a lot of ourselves in trying to kind of show up in these ways during a difficult time for ourselves. So just wanted to send love, support and a recognition of that and then just, you know, a little ask of just being good to yourselves as you are navigating this tough terrain.

John Dehlin [02:29:34] I love it. Well, it's so great to have you, Markie. And we're grateful that you're willing to just volunteer your time to help people in need. And you're a lovely companion and partner. Partner. So thank you for joining us. Thank you, Carah. Thank you so much for, for being co host and for moderating the comments and doing all the production. Any final thoughts or words you want to share today?

Carah Burrell [02:29:59] Any day where Margi's here and there's a role play is a fabulous time. And you Killed nine. So thank you for giving me the opportunity to, like, really bring back my improv rob from high school.

Margi Dehlin [02:30:11] It's amazing.

Carah Burrell [02:30:12] I really feel like I'm doing my theater director proud right now.

Margi Dehlin [02:30:16] Okay. It's a gift to witness and your insight carrot.

Carah Burrell [02:30:20] That's okay.

Margi Dehlin [02:30:21] Amazing insight.

Carah Burrell [02:30:22] It's all right. I listened to some good podcasts before. I'm just regurgitating things I've heard. Just kidding.

Margi Dehlin [02:30:28] I'm seeing you duck my compliment, but, you know.

Carah Burrell [02:30:30] Okay, good. All right. Thank you, Margi. I will not boundary your compliment.

Margi Dehlin [02:30:34] Never.

Carah Burrell [02:30:34] I will accept it. I will sit with it. I hear your compliment and I'm gonna go home feeling really positive about myself. Beautiful.

John Dehlin [02:30:42] All right, well, Carah, it's great to have you. Thanks so much for all you do. And many people have said you've breathed a breath of fresh air into Mormon Stories podcast, and I want to echo that. And thank you for doing that.

Carah Burrell [02:30:54] Oh, thanks.

John Dehlin [02:30:55] Yeah. All right, everyone, you guys take care. And know again that we are going to continue this series. This Thursday afternoon, you can expect an episode with Natasha Helfer. We're going to be talking about healing from sexual Mormon shame. It's going to be really valuable. It's going to be part of this gift of the Mormon Faith Crisis series. And again, if you value this type of content, if you're not a donor to Mormon Stories Podcast and you want to see this content continue, you can make it happen by donating. Go To Mormon Faith Crisis.com Click on the Donate button. Become a monthly donor and we will provide this content as long as you find value in it. So thank you so much. Thanks for all the support. Please be good to each other and stay in touch. Email us@mormonstoriesmail.com provide us with feedback and subscribe on all the different social medias. Check out our TikTok. Carah. I mean, I'm hoping that maybe some of these role plays will end up on Tick Tock.

Carah Burrell [02:31:50] Yeah, I edited the one last one with Margi. I put that one on Instagram because it's like nine minutes long, but I didn't want to edit it down because it's so important. Important. So I'll try my best to put some of these on Tick Tock because I have a three minute limit there now.

John Dehlin [02:32:02] Yeah.

Carah Burrell [02:32:02] But I think I took some notes. I think there's some really good little nuggets that we can post that'll be helpful for people.

John Dehlin [02:32:08] Beautiful. Yeah. Well, I also have to say, check out us. Check us out on Tick Tock or Tick Tock channels Mormon Stories podcast on Tick Tock and we have over 70, 000 followers now and over 1.2 million likes. And our Tick Tock is really helping a lot of people and caring. Sarah, you have been leading that effort, so thank you.

Carah Burrell [02:32:27] Now it's the guests. It's just me doing this, but it's people sitting in this chair pouring out their like life and all of this vulnerability that we are so grateful people take the time and effort and put themselves out there that we're even able to distill it and put it into something that will be hopefully validating and helpful and spur people to go onto the YouTube or the the podcast app to go listen to the full thing and facilitate their own healing and growth and just continue onward and upward and all that.

John Dehlin [02:32:57] I love it. I love it. So check out us on TikTok. And finally, if you like this, email us@mormonstoriesgmail.com and let us know. Or leave a comment in on YouTube or wherever you get this episode. And then if you have ideas on how we can make this time better, make it more efficient, make it more constructive, things we left out, things you want us to cover in future episodes. We will literally generate content, content that meets your needs. So please just communicate with us, leave comments on our blog, leave comments on YouTube or email us@mormonstories gmail.com and we'll get you the content you need. Thanks everybody. Love you guys. Stay in touch and we'll see you guys all again very soon for another episode of Mormon Stories podcast. Take care. Thanks, Carah.

Carah Burrell [02:33:39] Thanks, guys.

John Dehlin [02:33:40] Thanks, Margi.

Margi Dehlin [02:33:41] Thank you.

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