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Have you ever looked at a situation you’re facing in utter disbelief and thought, "How will I ever get over this?" Lysa TerKeurst understands. After years of heartbreak and emotional trauma, she realized it’s not about just getting over hard circumstances but learning how to work through what she has walked through. Now, she wants to help you do the same. That’s why Lysa teamed up with her personal, licensed professional counselor, Jim Cress, alongside the Director of Theological Research at Proverbs 31 Ministries, Dr. Joel Muddamalle, to bring you "Therapy & Theology." While Lysa, Jim and Joel do tackle some really hard topics, you’ll soon find they're just three friends having a great conversation and learning from each other along the way.
Shae Hill: Hi, friends. Thanks for tuning in to the Therapy and Theology podcast brought to you by Proverbs 31 Ministries, where we help you work through what you walk through. I'm your host, Shae Hill, and I'm so grateful that you're tuning in today.
If you've been listening to the season 10 episodes, you know, Lysa, Dr. Joel and Jim have been sharing topics from their new book, Surviving an Unwanted Divorce. We've received so many messages, DMs and comments from listeners about how this season is helping them personally, but also as they navigate things with friends and family who are struggling through unwanted divorces.
In light of that, today's episode is going to be a little different. You will get to hear live questions asked from listeners just like you, followed by answers from Lysa, Dr. Joel, and Jim. Think of it like a live Q&A that you're getting to sit in. And the good news is this is only part one. We're going to release part two next week. All right, let's jump right in.
Lysa TerKeurst: Thank you so much for joining us for this live stream. I am here with Jim Cress, an amazing therapist, licensed professional counselor, and Dr. Joel Muddamalle. And we have written a book together called Surviving an Unwanted Divorce.
This has been a passion project for me, not because I'm passionate about divorce. Divorce is very heartbreaking, especially when you're trying to survive an unwanted divorce. But it's a passion project because the reality is a lot of people are walking through the heartbreak and the crushing weight of walking into a future they never saw coming. And quite honestly, they didn't want. That was my story. And when I survived my unwanted divorce, I became very passionate about helping other people
There were two people on my journey that helped me probably more than anyone else navigate both the healing side, the therapy side, and the theological wisdom that I needed to be able to not just walk through this, but to be able to talk confidently about what the Bible actually does and does not say about divorce. And those two people, of course, are my co-authors for this book.
Thank you, Jim. And thank you, Joel.
Jim Cress: Thank you.
Lysa TerKeurst: You have submitted some really good questions, some tough questions, some questions worth answering. And so, guys, are you ready to tackle these questions today?
Jim Cress: Let's do it.
Lysa TerKeurst: All right. Let's start with the first one.
Question #1: It's been almost a year since my divorce, but I still feel stuck in sadness and regret over going through with the divorce. As time goes on, it's harder to remember the abuse and betrayal that led to the divorce. And I long for reconciliation. How do I move forward in acceptance of the life that I have instead of being stuck longing for the life I lost or hoping for something that doesn't match reality?
Lysa TerKeurst: I think, as you've taught me, Jim, words frame our reality. So I think there's some pretty key words in this question. One is that she longs for reconciliation, you know, and I understand that longing. Look, it's really hard when you're
you finally get through the intensity of should I or should I not separate? And at first you may even feel some relief, especially if the intensity of the destructive realities inside that marriage were hurting you and causing you a lot of confusion, a lot of heartbreak, a lot of tears. But the longer we get away from the intensity of the initial impact of
And for me, the longer I was living in the house by myself, the relief turned into a very strange longing to go back because going back was going to something that was familiar and walking forward was walking towards something I didn't know. And quite honestly, I never saw that was going to be part of my life. I never saw that I would be a single woman in my 50s carrying the weight of my family by myself.
So I get that longing for reconciliation. And then I also think it's important to look at these words. She's longing for the life she lost and hoping for something that doesn't match reality. So, of course, you've also taught me, Jim, that
mental health is a commitment to reality at all costs. So I think there's two key phrases here. I think sometimes we long for reality when we do this game, this mental game inside of our head. And I'm not going to put this on you, but I am going to put it on me. So what would happen to me
is I would start longing to text or call the person who for 30 years had been my person whenever something hard happened. And so, of course, I want to do that. It's almost like muscle memory. But in order to justify wanting to reach back to someone who had hurt me probably more than anyone else had hurt me,
Mentally, I would play this game of minimizing what happened and maximizing the scraps of love that I was getting, especially at the end.
And when I did that, it was almost like the children of Israel painting pictures of Egypt in their mind.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: This is so wild. I was literally thinking that. Like that exact story.
Lysa TerKeurst: Like longing for the food, they used to have in Egypt and maximizing that thought while minimizing the extreme abuse they were suffering.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: Which they probably weren't eating that food anyways.
Lysa TerKeurst: The pots of meat and stuff? I know.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: Like, no, I'm not quite sure that's how it worked. But I think you're right, Lysa. It really does show how the human brain is at sometimes wired for that sense of reality that we long for. And it's easy and it's so human to try to paint that picture together
And minimize the reality of the pain and the hardship and the hurt that took place that actually got you into the situation that you're in right now.
Lysa TerKeurst: That's right. In the book, Surviving an Unwanted Divorce, I talk about a conversation I had with a friend of mine. She called me one day when she was on her way to work and she was angry.
So upset, she couldn't hardly even gather her thoughts. And she was sitting in the parking lot needing to go inside, but also needing to process something. And the thing that she wanted to process with me was she'd opened her bathroom cabinet that morning and there were only a few towels left and
in her bathroom cabinet that were folded by her soon-to-be ex-husband. He always folded towels in a very specific way. Her cabinet used to be full of these towels folded this way. But that morning she opened up her cabinet, and as the towels dwindled in number,
it helped her like come to this realization of, wow, this is real. And so while it helped her see reality, it also hurt because she felt like he was slowly disappearing from her life. And I understand that so much. And maybe for you, it's not towels. Maybe it's something else that all of a sudden hits you and makes you go, wow, this is real. Like he really is going to no longer live in this house, you know?
And so as we processed it, I said, can I take you through an exercise that's going to be challenging? But I think it's really important that when we start overly romanticizing what used to be and minimizing the hurt that was being caused, can we just interject reality back into this moment of nostalgia?
And she said, yes, let's do that. And I said, it's not going to be easy, but it is going to be necessary. And I said, so let's think about when he was folding those towels, he was knee deep in a relationship with another woman who was having an affair. So.
was him folding these towels in a special way and putting them in your bathroom cabinet, was it an act of pure love where he was seeking your highest good in every way at that time? And she said, no. And I said, you know, he could have been thinking about his affair partner when he put those towels there. He could have been over at her house folding towels the same way. And I don't say that to reintroduce hurt or pain, but I say it because it's important that we stay committed to what's real
And this was a way for her to see the towels kind of in a more sobering reality than that romanticizing that she was doing. And I said, now, look, here's the deal. The towels are dwindling. He is leaving. And that is true. And can you grieve that? Sure thing.
But I also want you to see an opportunity here. When you use that last towel, this is not an ending. This is actually a beginning. And the beginning is you get to decide how you want your towels folded. You can fold them just like him if you want to. You can fold them in rectangles. You can fold them in squares. You can roll them up.
and a little knot if you want to. You don't have to fold them at all, or you can actually fold them in the shape of animals like they do on cruise ships. Love that. So this is your opportunity to say, okay, I'm going to put a stake in my ground, and I'm going to say this is an opportunity for me to define how I want to move forward.
Jim Cress: You're inviting her to agency. One of our favorite words, aren't you?
Lysa TerKeurst: That's right.
Jim Cress: You weren't forcing her to go there, but creating even her brain. You have agency here which fires a lot of dopamine in her brain at that moment.
Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah. And it's not to make divorce seem like, okay, rah, rah, here we go. We're charging forward. We get to make all of our own decisions. It's not celebrating divorce, but what it is doing is it's making sure that we don't minimize all the hard work
that he was putting us through and maximizing just those little scraps of love, folded towels, whatever it is. And I think that's really important. Okay, let's move on to question number two.
Question #2: How can I keep from feeling like my life is stalled out while waiting for my divorce to be finalized? I feel like I can't move on or function because I'm afraid of my husband's retaliation until we're legally divorced.
Lysa TerKeurst: I really relate to this question, too, because I know what it feels like to feel like life is just completely stalled out when you're in that in-between time. You're separated, not feeling married at all, and yet the divorce hasn't finalized. So it's just a really weird state. I want to toss it to you guys and see what you have to say to this question.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: Yeah, I mean, I'll go first. I think that there's this really great quote from Charles Spurgeon, and I'm going to paraphrase it. But essentially, Spurgeon talks about when you're in a season of waiting and your season of delay and it feels like you're stuck and you're waiting for rescue, you're looking for hope. And he has this like brilliant line where he says that hope.
the one who brings rescue, God himself, has never been known to be late. And so it's this kind of like reframing of that moment of being in pause of saying, wait a minute, I'm waiting for rescue. I'm in this place of longing. And God's timing is also perfect. And so as we're in this place of patience, what do we do? And Lysa, one of the things that I think that is so important, the
language is vital in the language of the scriptures. There's a preposition, the preposition through, which is the most important preposition in my view of the scriptures. But we don't live in a society that wants to go through anything, do we? You know, like even on the way here, I saw traffic, you know, to get here. My map said, do you want to save four minutes? I said, yes, absolutely. I don't even have to think. I'm annoyed that my maps even suggest that anymore. Just save me the time. And so, yeah,
But sometimes we have to go through things. Sometimes there is no shortcut. There is no route to bypass the traffic. And you sit there waiting in traffic and you make an inch by inch move. And the people of Israel had to go through the Red Sea so they could experience the power of God. They had to go through the wilderness so they could experience the provision of the Lord. Jesus has to go through Samaria so he can meet a Samaritan woman to meet
The presence of God. And Jesus has to go through the cross so that you and I today can experience his power, his presence, and his provision. And so I would just say as you're sitting there in that waiting moment, you're actually participating in something that might not feel like that's what you're doing, but this is exactly what you're doing. You're actively engaging in the preposition through.
You're walking through that moment and you're also experiencing the grace and the mercy of God in the midst of it. And it is still grace and it is still mercy, even if it doesn't feel like that in that moment.
Lysa TerKeurst: So good, Joel. Jim, I know you really helped me a lot during this. The different waiting seasons when I was walking through. My journey was very, very long. The last 10 years of my marriage, I was separated five of those. So there was a lot of alone time. I was struggling with the loneliness. I felt like it was such a waste of time. I just wanted to know, like, which direction is my life going to go? Am I going to be divorced? Am I going to get back together? And even once I knew that
that the death of my marriage was there. The state of North Carolina requires that you're separated a year and a day. And I just felt like this is an entire year of my life where everything is just on pause. But you really helped me because during that time frame, I was expressing to you in our therapy sessions, Jim, how intense the loneliness was. And you gave me this advice that I really did not like.
Jim Cress: I remember.
Lysa TerKeurst: And I said, I feel like the loneliness is just killing me. Like, I just, I just feel it's like I get home from work and my house used to be full of raising five kids and a husband. And now I walk in the door and it's quiet, just eerily quiet, more quiet than I'd ever been in my life. And up to that point, I had never lived alone, never.
And so you told me, Lysa, I think it's a good idea for you to learn to go home and sit in the quiet.
And I remember thinking, I just told you I'm lonely and the quiet feels like torture. And your advice is to tell me to go home and learn to sit with my own thoughts. And then you followed up with something profound that, you know, a sign of getting healthy is that we can be alone with our own thoughts and be okay. I'm probably not saying it exactly right. But, Jim, that really wound up helping me, even though I didn't like the advice at first.
Jim Cress: Well, it echoes the words of the great poet.
philosopher Blaise Pascal, a Christian, who said all of our problems, I'm paraphrasing only lightly, all of our problems stem from the refusal or the inability to sit alone with yourself and
quietly in a room because you're alone with yourself. And back to Joel, I use this all the time. Prepositions matter. And so when you're wanting that Greek word ek, get me out of, which a lot of Christians have, just get me out of this. Okay, that works in traffic. But notice the framing of the question. How can I, and I stop a full stop in the question.
How can I keep from feeling and just stop? The rest of it is like my life is stalled out. Well, right now I would honor the feeling. I would honor the fact and the impact of your life does feel stalled out right now. And to sit with that for a moment, pick up a pen and some paper and begin to journal.
So much of that's alive inside a person to put that down on a page. Journaling often is very, very much free therapy. But to go inward and to notice when you're alone with yourself in that, remember the words of Isaiah. When you go through the waters, there's through again, through the fire, through the flood, through all of it, I will be with you.
So that's that going vertical to say, God, what are you—now watch, not trying to teach me during this moment. That might be there. But what work are you wanting to do in me? The author C.S. Lewis would say God wants to take us further up and further in. There's a whole reality to not—don't waste your trauma. Don't waste the thoroughness of what's going on. You're in the messy middle. Let's be honest about it.
You're in that park. Notice in your story and narrative, the part of you thought, Jim, wasn't the first time. Jim, you crazy up in there for inviting me to go do that. And yet what I know about you time and time and time again is you persistently, consistently would go do it and say, let me go enter into that sacred chamber of being alone with myself.
And with God, often what feels like something ridiculous and you want out, ponder, slow down and say, God, what are you wanting to do in me as I sit in this and go through it?
Lysa TerKeurst: That's really powerful. You know, one thing that I did during the going through it, besides learning to sit with my own thoughts and be okay, is I decided we serve a creator God. And so if I could make myself do something creative, I felt
very close to God. Is this your painting era? Yes, this is my painting era. And the purpose of my painting era wasn't because I'm good at painting, not at all. She's cutting it. She's actually very good at painting.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: Which is honestly a little bit annoying to me that anything that you put your mind to, you become great at it.
Lysa TerKeurst: Joel, I do not have one of my paintings hanging in my home or in anyone else's home. So Joel is being very kind. Thank you, Joel. I'll receive your kindness, but also you're not telling the truth. Okay.
So here's the thing, though. I really had to challenge myself when I would pick up a paintbrush and I would look at a blank canvas. This was so important.
Jim Cress: Yeah. Good.
Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah.
And that became such an important visual for me because I was walking toward a blank canvas. I didn't know what my life was going to look like. It would be so easy for me to judge the imperfections of my life now. But doing something creative, there's so many things. You don't have to do painting. You could pick up, you know, like pottery. I've seen lots of women do that or even men. I know this goes both ways. Sometimes it's the man that has been devastated and is walking through an unwanted divorce. I think it's important to say that.
But maybe for you, it's learning to knit. Or recently, I've really enjoyed making flower arrangements. Again, none of it has to be perfect. But what it does do is it connects our creative heart with our Father's creative heart. And we just have to promise not to judge whatever comes out, but intentionally look for the beauty. Because the more we look for the beauty, the more we'll start to see it. Even though our future, you see how it connects?
Jim Cress: Oh, yeah.
Lysa TerKeurst: Even if our future is not perfect, the perfect future that we thought it would be. All right, let's go on to the next question.
Question #3: I'm working so hard daily at forgiveness for my partner with 13 years who left our marriage. And I'm wondering how you move forward when you share children and you try to co-parent with the very person that has hurt you. What does this look like and how can we learn together? to co-parent well?
Lysa TerKeurst: I think the first word that I pick up on in this question is how do I co-parent well? But also I think even deeper, how do I right now parent well? And I think there's a lot that you guys probably have to say with this question. So I'll just make a quick comment and then toss it right over to you. I remember getting the advice that my kids deserve one healthy parent.
And so even before we talk about co-parenting, I want to just mention, like, if you are walking toward an unwanted divorce, if you're trying to survive an unwanted divorce because there was destructive realities in your home, then you making this decision to no longer allow those destructive realities in your home is you taking a stand for your children so that they don't then
get these behaviors that they had witnessed and then start repeating them in their own life. But it is going to be crucial that you pursue healing because your kids do deserve one healthy parent. I had a friend one time that was in a co-parenting situation and her husband or soon to be ex-husband was bringing who used to be the affair partner to all the kids' soccer games.
And she was devastated by this. And it was really hard for her to see it. And not only that, they would often make fun of her, you know. So it's like the husband and the affair partner, they were now a team. And now here she is as the soon-to-be ex-wife over here trying to cheer for her kids, but feeling...
just so beat down mentally in the process. And I remember looking at her and I said, prove them wrong. If they're sitting over there accusing you or talking or laughing or making fun of you because they're trying to paint some kind of picture that you're the soon to be crazy ex-wife, then prove them wrong. Don't act crazy. If they see you as weak, then don't act weak.
Find some kind of strength that you can bring to that dynamic. And one of the strength is cheer your kids on. Smile, laugh, make it all about the kids and make it a whole lot less about the people that are hurting you.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: Yeah, that's really good. There's a common theme amongst all the questions that I think I want to just address. And especially for this one, I just want to acknowledge your pain. I just want to acknowledge the deep hurt. The thing that stuck out to me is when you say 13 years, I just think, whew.
That is so painful. And I just think that you need to hear that. You need to hear the acknowledgement of the pain. And I've been doing some studying and there's a little bit of theological evidence behind this, actually a lot bit, that when Adam and Eve come together, the Bible uses very specific language about them bonding together. And often we think of bonding in the context of intimacy, but that Hebrew word, the Vak, it's actually the exact same word that's used of alligator scales that are like
And so I would just say like what you're experiencing is the reality of that divakta bonding that has been ripped apart. Yeah.
And so now there's a wounding that is there. And that's just human. That's so honest. And there's a good God who's walking you through the healing process. And healing is a process. I think one of the things that you might be able to do, and you can do this if this is true, if this is true, the scenario is our eyes at times are trained to see things.
the things that are negative, the things that were so painful and hurtful. One of the things that might ease this process is to be, and this is going to feel so counterproductive, but by the way, this is the ethics of the kingdom of God, God's kingdom, Jesus sermon on the mountain. This is exactly what it is. And so look at your ex-husband and that scenario and say, okay, does he actually really love his kids? Because the question is about co-parenting.
Does he love his kids? Is he doing the best that he can with his kids? And if he is, then you can honor that aspect of what is true. You honor what's honorable, but we can't honor what's dishonorable. But in that process of co-parenting, do you both have an alignment for the best well-being of these children? And if so, and that's true and authentic, I think that might be a path of starting to move forward in this journey of co-parenting. But I'm stepping into therapeutic waters. Jim, you can correct me if I'm wrong.
Jim Cress: You do a wonderful job when you do, seriously. Following Joel and Lysa's heart, too, I, too, want to honor—this is hard—
It's Lysa's book, that classic book. It's not supposed to be this way. Let's again start with reality there. Our words frame our reality, don't they? And sometimes the very letters of a word, like how do I co-parent? Always remember in life, and as therapists were trained, all of us at this table are trained, we listen for the question itself. Jesus was so magnificent at listening to the very question. How do I co? And I'd put a full stop there.
How do I co-parent? Co means with. And so there is a reality that's harsh, isn't it? When there is a divorce, there is a death of the nuclear family, meaning you, your spouse, and the kids. There are now two nuclear families at one level, right? And that's hard to deal with. So the idea is, can I co-parent? You'd want to look across the street at your spouse, your ex-spouse, and are they with you, co? Are they with you?
Because functionally, I encourage people to first start with being a single parent. Now, that's hard. And saying, how do I parent the way I want to? And a paraphrase of the serenity prayer is, God help me, I will control the things I can, which you have some control over.
and then let the rest of it go. So he gets over there and he lets them, he's a Disney dad, or they get to watch TV or buys five Xboxes or whatever. There's a level of controlling only what you can. And to think, which your heart may long to co-parent with your ex, it often is not doable. And sometimes in their own spite can say, I'll try to control you back by helping you get angry.
because I'm going to do things that you wouldn't approve of. How do you then also, one last thing, avoid triangulation? And that would be your kids coming back to you or this pipeline and conduit of, well, my ex said this and they said, well, your ex is wrong. You can speak your truth, but just be mindful of the warning of not triangulating and talking and over-talking about your ex's as much as you'd want to with your kids.
Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah. Really good advice. And you know, the first part of this is she's working so hard at forgiveness. And I know with this, you'll have to have appropriate boundaries. Um,
But in the midst of boundaries, you want to make sure that your heart is in a place of forgiveness and not bitterness, because then that's where that triangulation can come. Weaponizing can come using the kids, you know, trying to get them on your side. And look, all of that is understandable, especially in really challenging dynamics. And so, like you said, Joel, my heart really goes out to you. Take it one day at a time.
Love your kids when they have to go over to, you know, the time that they're going to spend with your ex-spouse mentally and prayerfully place them in the hands of God, because that may be a lot easier for you to place them in the hands of God and let God carry them into their second home.
rather than just handing them over to a spouse that maybe there's a lot of, or ex-spouse where there's lots of tension to that. So, all right, let's go on to question number four.
Question #4: What is your best advice for how to move forward into new relationships, especially when you've been betrayed by an ex-husband before and you are trying to be intentional about healing so that you don't bring old wounds into new relationships, but you're still scared?
Lysa TerKeurst: This is a doozy of a question. First of all,
When I was going through the divorce and just after the divorce for several years after the divorce, I kept saying, I will never, ever get into a relationship where my well-being can be so impacted.
Like it was when I was married. So that was me kind of drawing this line in the sand and just saying, like, I'm not even open to this. And I remember one time.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: Clarification of that, too. Just the inside scoop of that is when Lysa says that, what she means is she made that personal decision, but she verbalized that personal decision with the people that were the closest to her.
Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: And so she said that to her kids. She said that to Jim and I. She said that to her girlfriends that have been walking. I think of two specifically that were walking through a very similar season. And that built in a sense of accountability for you where I think maybe you could have been tempted to, you know, Jim has that phrase having and you had to be careful how you say it. Make sure that you're Picker is not wrong.
Jim Cress: Right.
Lysa TerKeurst: Right. And so I think you have some accountability on that. Sorry. No, thank you for that clarification. Yeah. But I remember my oldest daughter, Hope, saying, Mom, maybe you shouldn't use never. Wow. Because there may come a day where it becomes a possibility. So, you know, don't put your whole future in this box labeled never, you know. And she was right, because they're eventually gone.
came a time where I felt like I was ready.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: And, um, but the, the most surfer loves coffee is just got great taste watches.
Lysa TerKeurst: Yes. I mean, you know, um, but it, it was a very terrifying reality for me to think about even going on a date with another person, even starting the possibility of a new relationship. And so in those years before I was open to dating at all, um,
That's exactly what Jim said. Lysa, you have to be careful because your picker is broken. And if you're not careful, you will, and you don't use this time to really heal. We attract what we are. And so you'll go out and you'll pick someone that feels normal and comfortable. And if you do it too soon, you'll pick the same dysfunction that you just got out of and the cycle will repeat all over again.
Jim Cress: Even if you've committed, I'll never do that again. I will never. I'll go 180 away from the spouse who is now my ex. That logic will be there. And it's almost like we say in the 12 steps, Chaz knows this.
your best thinking got you here. It's not bad thinking in your mind in the moment. It's like, no, I won't do that. And here's what I'll do. And you'll do the same thing often.
Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah. Yeah. And I did not want to choose that same level of unhelp again. And so it was really important for me to let time unfold and not rush into a new relationship because I did not want to need another man to help me heal from the divorce. I wanted to be healed enough to want the right kind of person. And so that's where I landed.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: Yeah. I, um, you guys know this. I, last week at the time, as we're talking right now, it's just like last week I was in Oxford, uh, which is like, I think the most magical place.
Lysa TerKeurst: Joel, are you shining your halo and just trying to make me jealous right now?
Jim Cress: Oxford, Alabama or Oxford, North Carolina, which isn't far from here.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: Oxford, England, my favorite, the home of C.S. Lewis and J.R. Tolkien.
Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah, it's working. It's working. I'm jealous.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: And I walked into this church, St. Aldate's Church. And y'all, this church has been around for a thousand years. Can you just think about that for a second? Yeah a thousand years of followers of Jesus walking into this building. And the rector there, that's the word they use for pastor, the rector is a guy named Stephen Foster, and he made this prayer. And there's a phrase in here that really sticks out to me of this question, which is about old wounds. And Stephen Foster prayed this prayer over us. And the prayer, there's a phrase where he said that he prayed that the Lord would heal our wounds and deploy our scars.
I just thought how actually my instant thought was like, I hate this prayer because it's like, I don't want like, how about can we edit this prayer? Like not how about heal our wounds and erase our scars or even better? How about prevent our wounds so that we never even have scars in the first place? But it's fascinating that in order for wounds to be healed,
at some level, the honesty of those wounds are going to be scarred over. And where those wounds are scarred over, that scar serves as a witness to the honesty of what you have experienced and what you've gone through. And the economy of God's kingdom is,
Only the Lord could use such pain and deploy it in such a way that it can bring beauty to you. And so I think of you, Lysa, I'm like, oh my gosh, look at what you've been able to walk through and how you've allowed the time to bring healing to
And I think you'd be the first person to say, and there are scars. You can see the scars. I mean, actually physically on your body.
Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: There are scars. You know, I think about like the year where you dedicated time to like check all your medical checkups and everything else. And you found that what was happening emotionally was taking a toll on you physically.
Lysa TerKeurst: Yeah.
Dr. Joel Muddamalle: And that created physical scars as surgeons had to come in and bring healing to your body. And so, um, Yeah, like allow the time for our wounds to be healed so they can create the scars that are needed and recognize that those scars are not a witness of God's displeasure in your life. Actually, they can be a winsome witness of the beauty of what God is about to bring.
Lysa TerKeurst: And then even when I was ready to date, I was so terrified that I might miss red flags. And it was creating this weird dynamic for me where I would go into a date and just be be hyper focused on what's wrong with him, what's wrong with him. And when you do that, it's really hard to even open up your heart to anything that's right about a person.
And so I remember telling my friend, When I go into a date now, one of my number one goals is not to figure out what's wrong with him, but instead to just listen, to just be present and to figure out what I do want and what I don't want, because this is an opportunity for me to decide that.
And, you know, one of the first dates that I went on, I walked away from that date and I thought I've learned something profound about myself. I don't want to spend the rest of my life talking about shipping containers. Shipping containers are amazing and they're necessary. And it is a wonderful profession.
But that's not me. That's not how I'm wired. You know, I want to talk about things like therapy, theology, you know, like ministry stuff. And so I learned stuff about myself that helped me then better define what would be a good fit for me in the future.
Jim Cress: I'd like to speak to that for a moment. You want a healthy me mindset a healthy we that goes forward. So get a PhD in yourself. Take the time. I would posit with a coach, with a therapist, a pastor, a good friend, but to do most people I've encountered in therapy have not done their own deeper dive into their own life story, the facts and the impact and the track of their story, right? So I would get a PhD in yourself and don't waste your pain. Don't waste your divorce. There is much to mine out of that for you during this time.
Shae Hill: Hey friends, I hope you enjoyed today's conversation.
Before you go, I want to give a special thank you to the generous donors who give and not only make today's episode possible, but also ensure that it reaches the hearts of those who need it the most. If you'd like to help Proverbs 31 Ministries reach even more women with the truth of God's word, I want to invite you to give a financial gift today by simply going to proverbs31.org backslash give.
That's all for today, friends. Thanks for tuning in and we'll see you next time.