9: Strategies for Triggers in the Holidays

[00:00] Stephanie: Season 3, episode 9. Today, we are looking at what it looks like to be ourselves in the holidays. Hello, Father.

[00:08] Marcus: Hello, Daughter.

[00:09] Stephanie: Good to be with you.

[00:10] Marcus: Good to be together.

[00:11] Stephanie: Merry Christmas.

[00:12] Marcus: Merry Christmas. I dressed for the occasion.

[00:14] Stephanie: You did. I did not, but I really appreciate your festivity.

[00:17] Marcus: Yeah, I do my best. I think it’s my only red shirt and my only green. So, here we are.

[00:23] Stephanie: It’s fabulous. I like it. Well, hey, today we’re taking a pause from our breakthrough series, and we’re gonna do a two-part little Christmas special if you will. A little interlude and just look at — the holidays can be a very special time, and they can also be a little bit of a rough time. And we want to acknowledge that it can be a rough time and give some maybe strategies and hope for how to help it.

And also, hey, this month we have a new course called the Identity Course which is the next in our series of heart-focused discipleship self-paced course curriculum. The first was Freedom Course. Now, Identity Course is here. So, we’re in the mood for Identity. How is it like me to be? How do I act like myself? So why don’t we start there? Why don’t you give a pitch for what does it mean to act like myself.

[01:30] Marcus: Yeah, I remember the first time I heard that expression. I think it was Dr. Wilder saying that mature people act like themselves, and I just laughed. I thought that was the craziest thing I’d ever heard. Because most people I know who say “Hey, I’m just being me,” are doing really stupid things, you know, or they are just the most messed up people ever and they’re saying “Hey, just being me.” Or it’s somebody who’s really angry saying, “Don’t ask me to change. I’m just an angry person, that’s just who I am.”

And so this idea has been really twisted around and can be confusing. So what we’re talking about when we say act like yourself is act like your true self, which just confuses the issue for some people because they’re like, well that’s the whole point. I don’t know who I am. So we’re going to give you a couple of baselines on who I am.

First of all, from a brain perspective, right, my true identity is who I am when I’m living with joy. And so my joy motivations generate my true self, and my fear motivations keep me from being my true self. I’m always going to have fear motivation. So part of the trick there is how do I find some ways to motivate myself with joy? It’s going to give me the best chance of acting like myself.

And then obviously, from a Bible perspective, I am a child of God. I am deeply loved by Jesus. I have an identity that comes out of my relationship with him and the covenant that confirms it. So we’ll look at both of those things.

[03:00] Stephanie: Very good. So when we talk about how to act like myself, it’s how to act like my true self, how God designed me to be. And we want to actually start by looking at two common reasons that people struggle to act like themselves. These aren’t an exhaustive list by any means, but two common reasons, one being pain and the other being what you would call pecking order. So, yeah, just give us a pitch for what you mean by those.

[03:28] Marcus: Yeah, pain and pecking order — the two big reasons I don’t act like myself. Number one, pain, I think is pretty obvious. And that is if I am functioning from a place of pain, that tends to also open up the lies that I believe because of that pain.

And so if I’m going to have a false self, my false self is usually there to decrease the amount of pain I think I will experience. And my false self is there to try to create an image that I think people will like and that they will accept. That can be coming out of the fact that I have pain that has caused me to think people won’t really like me for who I am, and so I will create a false self because of my pain.

The pecking order also causes me to create a false self because I want to be higher up in the pecking order, and so I create an image. I act a certain way that I think is going to get me liked more. And both of those things tend to generate the creation of a false self rather than a true self.

And so we want to talk about how can I be my true self this holiday season and not my false self and how to do that in a way that isn’t just also annoying.

[04:43] Stephanie: Yeah.

[04:44] Marcus: Where I’m sort of, like, shoving it in people’s faces like, you know, this is who I am. Just accept it. You know, that sort of thing. There’s a way to do this with relational skill and a way to do this that lacks relational skill.

[04:59] Stephanie: And maybe a little bit also on the, you know, idea of strong and weak and if you have people in your life who tend to come with that perspective, how can you help?

As you were talking, I was just flashbacking to a social media reel I saw this morning where, you know, there’s this girl, and she’s like, I’m going home for the holidays. And, and I’ve been working on all these therapy things, and, I’m gonna go in, and this is the attitude I’m gonna have, and these are the boundaries I’m gonna set. And then it’s like, she did not do these boundaries, and she did not — she got back in with her family and went right back to her, you know, angsty whatever triggered part —

[05:46] Marcus: Right.

[05:46] Stephanie: — and this is how she reacted when she was in that environment. It was one of those things where it was lighthearted because it’s relatable. But it’s also sad because I know a lot of people feel like that where it’s just like, I’m doing the work and I’m trying to, you know, to get healing and stuff, but then there are times when I’m put back into environments that bring out the old me or trigger me or I don’t have the capacity for. So.

[06:12] Marcus: So, it’s true, right? And I know a lot of people — you know, we’ve been blessed to have a family that has had relatively low triggering at the holidays. But there are — I say that so that she won’t bring up the story. No, I’m just kidding.

[06:27] Stephanie: No (laughter).

[06:29] Marcus: No, but it’s true. I know people who — this is not just a joke — it is a very real thing, because what happens is every family has its own culture, and within that culture, there’s a pecking order. And I use pecking order beyond just who’s on top and who’s at the bottom, who’s strong and who’s weak, though that’s definitely part of it. There’s also this understanding of the role that you have and the role that you play and what’s acceptable and what’s unacceptable.

And so it gets really confusing for people. And part of this is that there is an appropriate level at which we don’t go out of our way to offend people, and we don’t put obstacles in people’s way. And there is some of that. That’s fine. Like, I’m going in there not trying to trigger people and create conflict and doing those sorts of things, but also understanding that there is a high probability I’m going to get triggered while I’m there. And so that brings us to, well, what do I do if I get triggered? How do I handle that? And there are some things that we can offer, some help.

[07:40] Stephanie: Before we even get into that, you and I were talking recently about Jesus and how Jesus, God in his incarnational self, still didn’t show up to every situation, just flaunting his glory and doing everything that he had the authority to do.

[08:05] Marcus: Jesus is a great example, right? And that is if you say, “Did Jesus act like himself?”

[08:12] Stephanie: Yes.

[08:13] Marcus: And the answer is yes. But think about how vast his self is. And that is that there is the glorified Jesus that the apostles got to see on the Mount of Transfiguration. There is the glorified Jesus who is going to return someday, and there is the powerful Jesus who parts the Red Sea and wipes out whole armies with a word and forms, you know, worlds. There’s this powerful Jesus.

So when you say Jesus, act like yourself, that, you know, that doesn’t mean he’s always showing up as the warrior. There are different roles that you can play and still be yourself depending on the context that you’re in, being yourself in that context, and depending on what your mission is on that thing. The point is to not create a false self and be somebody that you’re not.

[09:06] Stephanie: You’re not role playing, like pretend, but there’s a contextually appropriate way.

[09:11] Marcus: There’s a contextually appropriate way to do that. So, you know, Jesus most of the time showed up very humble and unassuming in a way where you would never know who he was. And he didn’t come in demanding that people, you know, recognize who he was and treat him with the appropriate respect. And he wasn’t demanding about his identity. He was very humble about it. And so part of what we’re after here is — what I’ve found is — the more confidence I have in my identity, the more humility comes easily.

[09:43] Stephanie: The more secure you are in your identity, the less you care if people see it.

[09:47] Marcus: Exactly. The more secure you are. That’s worth repeating, right? The more secure you are in your sense of identity, the easier it is to be humble and the less you care what other people think about you, because you know who you are and you know that that’s how God sees you and that God knows who you are.

And so sometimes when you’re in situations like that, it’s just sad that they don’t get it. And sometimes it’s even humorous how much they don’t get it, but it can still be painful that they don’t get it, especially when that has been something that no one has ever seen you for the way that God sees you.

[10:24] Stephanie: Yeah. So, okay, so let’s go into a game plan then. What are some things that we can do as we are preparing to enter environments where we might be expecting to fall into old self or getting triggered or what have you?

[10:40] Marcus: So some of the things you can do to prepare. First of all, this is an opportunity to ask Jesus, “What is it that normally gets triggered when I go there? What is getting triggered? Is there a memory that you would like to heal before I go, or is there an emotion you want to prepare me for?” And you talk to him, say, “God, what memory comes to mind? What emotion comes to mind?”

And I think in our last episode we talked about T-bar charts. This is a good opportunity to go into it saying, “God, what do you want me to know about this upcoming time with my family? What are the beliefs that I currently have when I get triggered being around my family? What are the common beliefs that come up, and what are the beliefs you want me to have as I’m going into this?”

So that I’ve already pre-thought through, okay, this is the perspective Jesus wants me to have on this. Just so I can remind myself so that when I do get triggered, that emotion does come up, those beliefs do start flooding my mind, I’ve already got a game plan in mind that says, okay, I need to remind myself of this. I need to, also in the moment, remind myself to breathe, remind myself to do some quieting things.

Understand that I’m probably going to need to take some private time along the way for doing quieting exercises and reminding myself of the beliefs that are actually true, and that I’m going to need some recovery. That this, you know, is probably going to be one of those things where I will need to do some recovery afterwards. And in the moment then, the other thing I want to look forward to — so one is quieting exercises. One is getting that T-bar belief charts thing going.

The third suggestion I guess would be that people think through their approach to their motivation and that is that we motivate ourselves with either fear or with joy. So if I know I’m going into a situation and there’s an obvious fear factor, then I’m probably not going to get rid of that fear factor altogether. And that’s okay. But I want to find something joyful that I can look forward to.

Is there anything to motivate myself with joy for being in this environment? And I need to find that and try to focus on that and to strengthen that, the joyful reason for being there. So those are three kind of concrete things I can do. Are there any beliefs I need to get straightened out ahead of time, practice quieting, and then find some joy motivation to try to help offset some of the fear.

[13:23] Stephanie: And I think, on top of that, once you have that foundation, a great way to make it not about you so you’re just not in this victim mindset of, oh, I’m like, how do I? I need to be joyful, I need to, I, I, I. Like there’s a time and a place where you call yourself out and you say, “Hey, like, I am acting this way or this is what is important to me and I need to act this way.” Like, that’s okay. “But how can I be a servant and make this not all about me? How can I add joy to the situation I’m in and make it not all about me?” Now, obviously, any good thing you can do, you don’t want to do it in a codependent way or in a like falling into —

[14:04] Marcus: Yeah, well, one of the reasons we focus on I, I, I at this stage of the game is the basic thing that you can’t control other people. You can only control yourself. And so with that in mind, like, I can’t control whether people say painful things, if they say wounding things. I can’t control how people interact. I can’t change all of the family dynamics.

So the only thing I can control is me. And so we do tend to start by focusing on what I can control and that is my thought life, my quieting skills, finding some joyful motivations, and trying to stay relationally present with Jesus throughout this. So these are some things that I can control.

Now you get into what happens when I still get wounded and I still get hurt, and it still is painful. That’s where I’ve got to just plan on the fact there’s going to need to be some recovery, and I’m probably going to need to revisit these things. You know, what needs to get healed? How do I quiet? And how can I find some joy in whatever’s coming next? And so we keep coming back to those things.

Now on the servant part of it, it’s a good point to make and that is that sometimes in focusing on what I can control and what I can’t control, I can feel the pressure to perform and to be perfect and to get everything right. And that’s why I say the more confident I am in these things, the easier it is to be humble. One of the ways that humility shows itself is that I don’t make anything about me. To the extent possible, I don’t make things about me. I try to find ways to serve and to validate other people.

So keeping the V.C.R. tool at hand is usually a good idea here. V.C.R. stands for validate, comfort, recover. And that is whether you agree with someone’s emotions or not, just identifying them correctly and saying, “I see you, like I can see how this is making you feel,” and validating people. Because a lot of times we don’t agree.

That’s part of what’s stressful is we’re going to be around a lot of people we don’t agree with, a lot of what they believe or how they’re living or things like this. But if you can see the emotions underneath it, and you can recognize those accurately and what that emotion is accurately, how big that emotion is for them. And simply validating by itself often helps to keep the situation more relational than it otherwise would be instead of just breaking down completely into choosing sides and going to war.

[16:52] Stephanie: So it also strikes me that a lot of what we’re talking about right now is presupposing community. And for a lot of people, holidays can be hard because they’re not able to share it with people or not able to share it with the people that they wish they could share it with.

[17:09] Marcus: Yeah.

[17:09] Stephanie: Obviously everybody has a different situation — we can’t cover every single thing here — but like if somebody is, oh, it’s not that I have a bad community environment, it’s I have no community or somebody really important to me isn’t able to be here or something. What are, what are some strategies?

[17:26] Marcus: That’s true. I did see an interesting statistic not long ago that said retirees, like 41% of them are lonely, but in gen Z, over 70% feel lonely. And so what we have is an increasingly disconnected society and an increasing sense of loneliness and isolation and not having anybody to share things with. And so if that is you, for whatever reason, it’s not available to you, there’s one thing about having literally no one, which does happen sometimes, in which case really all you have to push into at times like that are memories and the presence of God because there isn’t anybody there.

And so you’re looking for joyful memories to focus on, things to be grateful for so that you can keep yourself in a state of being okay despite what’s happening, spending time with Jesus, you know, and trying to get his perspective on things. And then you’re probably just — Christmas isn’t going to be that special anyway. It differs for different people.

Some people are going to just treat it like any other day, and they’re going to do other things and that’s fine. There’s nothing wrong with that. And other people are going to make it as special as they can anyway, and they’re going to find all the joy they can in it. And they’re both perfectly fine approaches.

[18:59] Stephanie: Can I just also add that, you know, we at Deeper Walk, our focus is a lot on healing and freedom. And so we tend to talk about, you know, connecting with Jesus and strengthening your attachment in those contexts, but you can have fun with Jesus.

[19:15] Marcus: Yes.

[19:16] Stephanie: You know, I even like, for my birthday this year, I actually did a day retreat with Jesus, and I got some scripture and a journal and I just started reading through and anything that would like, pop out to me as I was read reading, I would just scribble it out. And if I felt like I wanted to press into it, I would say, “God, what’s going on here?” And I would like, talk to him about things or, you know, sometimes it’s like, “What do you want me to see today?” Or, you know, you can have a happy — you can press into things with Jesus on a happy, fun, relational level, and it doesn’t always have to be about processing your pain.

[19:59] Marcus: That is very true.

[20:00] Stephanie: I just wanted to throw that out there that if, you know, if you’re alone on Christmas, it doesn’t have to be I need to now go process my pain with Jesus about being alone on Christmas. You could do some fun things with him too.

[20:13] Marcus: Oh, that’s very true. And like I said, there’s people who are truly alone, and there’s people who just have limited options. And so part of what we want to look at too is among my limited options, is there any way to add some joy to any of these people? Because a lot of times just by adding some joy to somebody else, it bounces back, and it helps you feel a little more joy too.

And so, yeah, you might not be in a position where you can do much about it. And so you just have to maximize what you can. And that’s maximizing the connection to Jesus in whatever way is life giving and also figuring out, well, who do I have a connection with and what could I do to add a little joy to them? Not expecting anything back. I’m not doing it so that I will feel better. But oftentimes that does end up happening. As the Bible says, “It’s more blessed to give than to receive.” And that’s kind of part of the mindset there.

[21:13] Stephanie: That’s awesome. Well, we’re going to continue this conversation in the next episode, but I want to take a moment to reiterate: Identity Course. We’ve got this new course, Identity Course, and it’s really, really wonderful. And Dad, do you want to give a pitch for why you love it?

[21:32] Marcus: Well, yeah, I mean, I don’t know of any other course like it that combines both the Biblical who-I-am-in-Christ information and the brain science — what’s going on with how I develop my sense of identity and how do I combine these things together in order to form the strongest possible identity. So, I’m excited about it because it’s a rare course. There may be another one out there like it, but if so, I haven’t seen it that combines these two things together. And I think that people are going to find it very, very helpful.

[22:02] Stephanie: Mm-hmm. I’m very excited about it. I also wanted to let people know we at Deeper Walk have a little gift for you that — we’ve talked a lot over the years about how fun it would be to have acrostics — like things that help us with our acrostics. And I’m sure there’s much more to come.

But right now you can find the link in our description, but we have images that have some of our core acrostics that you can download and print off as a poster or you can add as a your screensaver or your wallpaper on your phone or your laptop or what have you, and things that would just help you keep them in mind and keep them fresh and keep them for reference. And it’s got a beautiful nature background on it and all the things. So anyway, I’m excited about it.

[22:58] Marcus: Download it, print it off, put it on the refrigerator.

[23:02] Stephanie: Kudos to the team for putting it together. So you can find that in the link in our description. And then also it is the end of year, and so I just wanted to thank everybody who, one, is a Trailblazer who is a monthly donor who supports us. We could not do what we do without you.

And also want to just ask that you know, as you’re considering your year-end donations that you keep Deeper Walk in mind. Is there anything you want to say about that, Father?

[23:34] Marcus: Well, we have three specific goals that we’re after this year. One is we are hoping to complete the F.I.S.H. courses —

[23:41] Stephanie: This year as in 2025?

[23:43] Marcus: 2025, the upcoming year. We’re hoping to complete these, what we call the F.I.S.H. courses. It’s basically an in-depth, self-paced system for going through heart-focused discipleship. And people have been asking us for this for years.

We’re finally going to have a complete system that can be used both as an individual or in a group setting that should be completed next year. Donations are going to help make that possible. Secondly, we are looking to extend our influence overseas, as we say, put the international into international.

[24:16] Stephanie: Into Deeper Walk International.

[24:17] Marcus: Yeah, into Deeper Walk International. We’re seeing more and more of that happening. We have people from Honduras and Lebanon and Africa and Asia that have been connecting with us online, that have been connecting through more and more things that we’re doing. You were very helpful in getting out a Spanish edition.

[24:38] Stephanie: I was about to say, oh my goodness, I think that we haven’t actually announced this on podcast yet. This year, we finalized and published a labor of love from several very wonderful volunteers that put together a Spanish translation of What Every believer Should Know About Spiritual Warfare. So, you can find that in print and ebook at our website and on Amazon. And we’re very excited to have that offering. Yeah.

[25:07] Marcus: So number one, we’re planning to finish our Heart-Focused Discipleship system. Two, we’re planning to continue expanding our reach into the international community. And then thirdly, continue to expand what we’re doing in the school of ministry: training prayer ministers, giving them more advanced course options and seeing that grow.

And donations help make all that possible. As we often say, about 50% of what we bring in comes from sales and registrations, but at least 50% of it comes from donations. So, we are very grateful for those who support us, especially at the end of the year.

[25:45] Stephanie: Yeah, it’s all very epic. Well, we will continue this conversation next week. Thank you for joining us.

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