Emancipate Your Mind

My kids all started school this week and I received the paperwork with the demands for scheduling and parent volunteer hours this semester in order for them to participate. It’s much more hectic than I anticipated and the craziness already began this week. As they are entering a busier and more demanding phase in their… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 121: Unexpected Changes

The primary developmental task your teen will go through, whether they grew up in high demand religion or not, is differentiation. Differentiation is a process all humans go through to establish an individual identity separate from their parents and authority figures. It is a process whereby we discover our values, our beliefs, our desires, and… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 120: Helping Your Teen Discover Their Personal Identity

Creating a sense of emotional safety in your home after high demand religion with teens is a little different than starting with young children. You’ve likely already established relationship patterns. And if it feels like your teen is closed off or won’t share their feelings and thoughts freely with you, there’s likely some work needed… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 119: Healing Emotional Safety For Teens After High-Demand Religion

Parenting after deconstructing high demand religion can feel daunting. Going from a system where you’re given a road map for how to raise your children to having to rely on both your inner guidance and the guidance your kids share with you can feel scary and confusing. Creating a parenting environment where you’re able to… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 118: Creating Emotional Safety for Young Children

When we left Mormonism, we were terrified of what that would mean for our kids. It’s been 6 years of trusting ourselves as parents, trusting our kids input about what they want for their lives, and creating a dynamic parenting strategy together. While it has been far from perfect, we’re pleased with how things are… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 117: What We’ve Learned About Parenting Since Leaving High-Demand Religion with Kevin Hales

How do you even begin to create community for yourself after leaving high demand religion? In this episode, Communication Coach, Chris Peck and I explore how we can be intentional with the process, take cues from our relationship with ourselves, and lean into the sometimes awkward rehearsal process of practicing new ways of relating in… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 116: Intentional Community Creation After High-Demand Religion with Chris Peck

I’m so excited to have Chris Peck from Speak Into Action Communications back on the podcast to talk about the subconscious scripts we intentionally or reactively use in our relationships with others. In Part 1 of this episode we explore the difference between showing up intentionally versus showing up in a reactionary way. We also… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 115: Practicing Intentional Scripts to Build Stronger Relationships with Chris Peck

I know you’ve heard it before and you’re going to hear it again at least one more time today. You’re not meant to be everyone’s cup of tea. Today we discuss the reality that you may fully accept who someone is and STILL not be compatible with their reality. It doesn’t mean something is wrong… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 114: How to Deal with Relationship Incompatibility Without Driving Yourself Crazy

We all crave acceptance, but what does it really mean to accept someone? In this episode we discuss the pieces of acceptance everyone seems to agree on…and some of the problematic ideas around acceptance that lead to us feeling used, confused, and sometimes abused. We’ll then talk about how you can walk the line between… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 113: What Acceptance Is (and Isn’t)

Sharing our stories in a safe environment is an important step in healing from trauma. Often we engage in this important step with others who have experienced similar things in their past. When we tell our story and someone else says, “Me too! I get it. I’ve been through something similar” we feel seen, heard,… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 112: The Benefits and Pitfalls of Bonding Over Shared Trauma

As we’ve talked about healthy attachments, two words kept cropping up in conversations: Trauma Bonding. Many people used these words to describe the almost instant friendship between two people who have experienced the same trauma and can validate one another’s experience. However, this is known as “bonding over trauma”. (We’ll talk more about this next… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 111: What Is Trauma Bonding?

Developing healthy interdependence with our partners, family, and friends is healthy and normal. Relationships where we feel free to both give and receive support and love can help us feel more emotionally stable and studies are showing that it can even help us live longer. But in our Western culture where independence is prized almost… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 110: Codependency or Co-regulation? How to Tell the Difference

Developing a safe, intimate connection with others can feel scary for those who are trying to reclaim a sense of personal identity after religious trauma or interpersonal codependency. In this episode, we discuss what healthy emotional co-regulation looks like and how we can set the stage for this powerful experience in our most important relationships.… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 109: Learning to Co-regulate Your Nervous System

If you’ve been in a relationship with insecure attachment patterns, how do you begin practicing secure attachment? Licensed Professional Counselor and my husband, Kevin Hales, discusses the first three steps he shares with couples in his therapy room as well as practical examples of conflict resolution from our own marriage. ________________________________________________________ RESOURCES: Fredrickson, Ronald. “Living… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 108: Practicing Secure Attachments in Adult Relationships

In today’s episode, we explore the last of the 4 attachment styles and how high demand religion may have influenced our primary caregivers or us as children and how we relate with others. Disorganized Attachment Style, otherwise known as Fearful-Avoidant Attachment Style, is a unique combination of both Anxious and Avoidant behaviors. Today we talk… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 107: Disorganized Attachment Style and High Demand Religion

If you have an avoidant attachment style, you may feel highly uncomfortable getting emotionally vulnerable with other people, which makes it difficult to create the deep connections you both crave and fear. On the one hand, you would love to feel the joy of connection with another special human but on the other hand, because… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 106: Avoidant Attachment and High-Demand Christianity

If you have an anxious attachment style, you likely spend your time trying to people please, take care of the people around you, and in general try to win the love and connection you so desperately crave. But, you may worry that those you love don’t care about you as much as you care about… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 105: Anxious Attachment and High-Demand Religious Parenting

Do you crave close relationships with others but find it hard to connect on a deep level? Do you often feel lonely or misunderstood? Do you worry deeply that those you love will abandon you? You are likely struggling with an insecure attachment style. For the next few episodes, we’re going to talk about what… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 104: What Is Healthy Attachment and Why Does It Matter?

Have you ever thought about how high demand religion taught you to relate to and attach with God? Have you considered how your learned attachment style with the God you were taught to worship might have informed your childhood relationships and may still inform your relationships today? In this episode, Self-Trust Coach and Licensed Mental… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 103: Exploring and Healing Attachment Wounds with God with Catherine Quiring

Often, some of the most difficult conflicts of values we’ll face is with the people we love the most. Many of us were taught through codependent patterns and practices that love means always agreeing with one another on the things that matter most. This kind of thinking is reinforced through scripture that tells us that… Read More »Emancipate Your Mind: 102: Resolving Values Conflicts with Others