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What comes to mind when you think about your father? Is it joy, pain, or indifference? Whatever it is, it can reveal deeper wounds that still affect you today. In this journey of healing, Zach Garza invites you to explore topics like generational sin, emotional scars, and the transformative power of forgiveness through the lens of his own story of growing up without a father in the home. By confronting the past, you'll discover how to break free, embrace your true identity, and experience the unconditional love of God.
Chapter 12, implications in adulthood. The Lord has called me to become what I never had and to be a father to the fatherless. He has opened doors I didn't even know existed and introduced me to people I never thought I'd meet personally. I believe this call will come to fruition through mentoring relationships, which is why I have given my life to mentoring people. Very few things bring me as much joy as seeing a young person being mentored in the name of Jesus, and it is my joy to try to make as many of those relationships happen as possible.
Speaker 1:Yet even in the midst of this calling and joy, I still am working through my father wound. I had an incredible opportunity to interview for a new job a few years ago. This position would have given me the experience and resume that I was looking for to get where I wanted to be. The job description fit me perfectly. The interview couldn't have gone any better.
Speaker 1:I felt peace. It looked as if this opportunity might come to fruition. But as I drove home, the first thing that popped into my mind was doubt. Am I making the right decision? What if I fail in this new role?
Speaker 1:What if my current organization crumbles? My kids will suffer. My wife will suffer. People will laugh at me. This wasn't a casual, fleeting doubt.
Speaker 1:It hit me hard, and I pulled off the highway to compose myself. Doubt turned into fear. Fear turned into anxiety. I needed help. I called a couple of mentors, but no one answered.
Speaker 1:I called some of my friends, but no one picked up. I was searching, and I needed a guide. For the first time in a long time, I thought of how it sure would be nice to call my father right now. There was no anger attached to the thought, no animosity, but a mixture of grief, sadness, and jealousy. There is a part of me that thinks I should be over my father wound by now.
Speaker 1:When an issue comes up that is related to growing up without a father, I sometimes say to myself, this again? When am I gonna be done with this? It is somewhat easy to see how growing up without a father impacts children. Typical symptoms such as anger, inability to trust, and insecurity are fairly easy to identify in children. But how does that play out into adulthood?
Speaker 1:I believe the symptoms are a little bit trickier to identify as grown ups. A scheme of the enemy is to keep me focused on all the ways my childhood is holding me back, but that type of negativity will only keep me spinning my wheels. There is some good that has come from my childhood. It takes work to see it, but the Lord is a God of redemption. Nothing, including my traumatic childhood, is too much for God to handle.
Speaker 1:If he truly works all things for our good, why would growing up without a father be any different? I am going to be vulnerable with you right now as we discuss ways a father wound can impact us as adults. This may seem a little dark and depressing, and it is, as sin has a way of ruining whatever it touches. For those reading who aren't married or a parent, may this be a warning sign for possible obstacles in your future. I also want you to know that you're not alone should you see yourself in these areas, and we will find out how the Lord redeemed all of this in the next chapter.
Speaker 1:So hope is on the way. Critical and controlling nature. We were about a decade into our marriage, and all seemed like it was going well. My wife and I had three beautiful children. My ministry was growing and expanding, and we had friends and a church body to call home.
Speaker 1:That's when my wife started experiencing pretty extreme anxiety and depression. We tried to do whatever we could think of to try to get my wife back to her old self. We tried counseling and mentors. We changed churches and switched up our friend groups. We even ditched the fast paced life of Dallas and moved to the smaller town of Waco, Texas.
Speaker 1:Nothing we did seemed to work. One day, my wife and I got into a pretty big argument. I was running low on grace and compassion and let her know how frustrated I was with her outlook on life. It was not my finest moment. That's when my wife let me have it.
Speaker 1:All you do is focus on what I'm doing wrong. You are so quick to point out ways I could improve and how things can get better, but you never tell me the good things I'm doing, and you sure don't encourage me. It's hard to have good self confidence and self esteem when all I hear all day is what I'm doing wrong. I was taken aback by this. To me, it seemed like she was blaming me for all her issues.
Speaker 1:This seemed like she wasn't taking responsibility, which didn't seem fair. I had all the reasons in the world why I wasn't the issue. Yet she was right. After doing some soul searching and talking to a lot of mentors, friends, and counselors, I realized that I was being overly critical of my wife due to the big fears that I was experiencing in my own life. I started to notice some phrases that I was saying often.
Speaker 1:Why do you do it like that? You should do it like this. Don't do that. It's not gonna make anything better. Stop it.
Speaker 1:Don't act like that. Don't say that. It didn't take long for me to see that I was using my words and my tone to control my wife's actions. Fear led to criticism, and criticism led to control. The words weren't the worst part.
Speaker 1:It was the tone and the look I gave when I said it. My wife would later say that anytime I corrected her, my look and tone made her feel like a total idiot. Short authoritative commands said in an extremely direct and critical manner, do not help your wife to feel good about herself. I zeroed in on the status of my heart and came to this conclusion. I had a tough childhood and an absent father.
Speaker 1:More than anything, I wanted my children to have the perfect childhood. I was fearful that if my wife said or did the wrong thing, it was going to lead to my greatest fear, which was my kids having a bad childhood. So I shut my wife down with my critical remarks and took control of the situation. I made sure she said and did the right thing. I operated with a closed fist instead of an open hand.
Speaker 1:All of this came out of the fear of protecting my kids from having the childhood that I did. While my motives were not necessarily bad, the manifestation of these motives were skewed. Self confidence at work. As a natural visionary, I love thinking about what is next. I am one of those guys who can tell you exactly what I'm going to do in five years but have no idea what I'm going to do tomorrow.
Speaker 1:When I was in my late twenties, the Lord moved my heart to start a mentoring organization. I had no idea what I was doing, but God surrounded me with great people who helped me figure it out. For five years, I worked as a teacher and a coach and built a mentoring nonprofit on the side. I had no dreams of this becoming my full time job. I simply wanted to help kids who grew up like I did.
Speaker 1:One day, my board chairman got me a meeting with a large church in the Dallas area. The agenda was centered around whether this church would support us, which would provide more volunteers and funding. I went into my spiel about how our mentoring organization came about and where we were. I really tried to sell them on us and get them on our good side as I badly wanted their partnership. I probably spoke about 90% of the time, which is never a good sign.
Speaker 1:As the meeting ended, the church leadership said something to the effect of, you guys aren't ready yet. You don't even have someone on full time staff. While this was the truth, it was hard to hear. It was like someone took my hopes and beat them over the head with a baseball bat. As the church leaders left, it was just me and my board of directors.
Speaker 1:My chairman looked at me and said something that would change my life. Zach, he said, the time has come for us to hire a full time executive director to take this organization to the next level. I hear you, I replied. But who could we find to be our executive director? He laughed.
Speaker 1:Zach, it's you. I literally never thought in a million years that I could do such a thing. Growing up without a father caused me to believe I couldn't overcome obstacles. I didn't believe I had what it took to succeed and never considered what a new reality for me would look like. Over the last decade, the Lord has put me in situation after situation where I didn't believe I could succeed.
Speaker 1:Here's a list of the things off the top of my head. Networking. I didn't believe I could network because I didn't think people would want to hang out with me. Make phone calls. I have a stutter, and I would do anything to avoid phone calls.
Speaker 1:This isn't a big issue unless your job involves a ton of calling people on the phone. Fundraising. Me? Ask people for money? Are you serious?
Speaker 1:This was about the most terrifying thing I had ever heard of. Be detail oriented. As a visionary, I had a really hard time managing the day to day tasks that needed to be done to advance our organization. Not only was I not good at it, but I didn't like it. Managing a staff.
Speaker 1:I saw managing a staff as handholding people who weren't as hardworking as I was. I didn't like to have meetings to clarify objectives and action plans, and I didn't enjoy encouraging staff during hard times. It is typical for me to think I am doing worse than I am. I routinely ask my board of directors if it's time to find someone else for this job. I ask permission more often than I need to out of my insecurity, and I look for someone else to make the hard decisions so that I am not responsible for the consequences.
Speaker 1:I have a hard time working in teams because I am so used to being in control and doing everything myself. These fears and actions stem from my childhood and lack of father figure in my life. The lies of the enemy imprisoned me and kept me from dreaming or fulfilling my potential. Dating and marriage. As a single man, all I wanted was to get married.
Speaker 1:I can look back now and say that my desire for marriage was more about receiving love and not being alone than loving and serving someone else. Due to my upbringing, all I wanted was to be loved, and I would do whatever it took to make that happen in my dating relationships. On the outside, this looked like I was a great boyfriend, but all of my actions were selfish. If you like flowers and flowers got you to date me, I'd give you a dozen roses every week. If it was a man with strong faith you wanted, I would raise my hands during worship and attend every bible study I could find.
Speaker 1:I made the other person my god and looked to them to fulfill my needs, and I was completely unaware I was doing this. I continued this way of thinking into my marriage. I looked to my wife to meet my needs. This sounded good in my head, but the bad news is that my wife is human, and she can't measure up to those unrealistic expectations. During our first years of marriage, I said over and over, you don't love me enough.
Speaker 1:Nothing my wife did was enough. Even when she did try to love me, I couldn't receive it. If she wrote me a love note, I would be mad that she didn't give them to me more often. If she tried to give me a gift, I would pout because it wasn't the right one. The weight of my demands and the shame of hearing she was not loving me the right way was too much for her to handle.
Speaker 1:I needed so much attention from her that I kept her from spending time by herself, which is the one thing my introverted wife needed the most. If she wanted to rest one night, I would see it as her not giving me the love and being selfish. If it sounds like I was acting like a child, that's because I was. Because of my trust issues, I held grudges, sometimes for weeks. I withheld my love and attention when she didn't meet my expectations.
Speaker 1:I gave her the silent treatment often. My immaturity caused me to act in a way that denied me the thing I wanted the most. Because I felt unloved as a child, this produced a man who made it his mission to receive love. But here's the catch. No love from a person can fix me.
Speaker 1:I kept looking to my wife to give me something no human is capable of producing. I wanted her to be the answer to my problem, and that produced shame and guilt in the heart of my wife. All the while, the enemy was saying, you're unlovable. No one is going to love you. My parenting.
Speaker 1:I always wanted to be a dad. I wanted to be a good father and dreamed of having a healthy family of my own. I wanted to create the ideal childhood for my own children to give them the father in the childhood that I never had. Once I got married, I could not wait to have kids. When we had our first son, I made being a good father the top of my priority list.
Speaker 1:I read all the books on how to set my kids up for the brightest future possible, but the underlying motivation was the fear that I would somehow mess up and give my kids the same childhood I had. What was the result? I became a helicopter dad, always hovering over my kids to make sure they were safe, productive, and set up for success. If my kid did something dangerous, I would overreact, not because I cared about their safety, but because I cared about not failing as a parent. I read books because I was scared I was missing something as a dad.
Speaker 1:I stayed up nights worrying about their education, their diet, and how much TV they watched. I got onto them about each and every little thing to ensure that they would become all that they were intended to be. Just like in my marriage, my critical nature and controlling tendencies made my kids feel like I cared more about their behavior and their actions than their hearts. Out of fear, I did my best to control everything I could about their lives. Yes.
Speaker 1:There is some wisdom in choosing what your child watches and what school they go to, but I knew that my motive in this was based on fear, not wisdom. I was trying to be their god, protecting them from anything that may not produce the best life. I carry the weight of their success instead of trusting it to the lord. That kind of weight gets heavy after a while. The fear that this responsibility breeds can cause you to elevate your children above all else, including your spouse and marriage.
Speaker 1:Perhaps a big reason for all those fears is the fact that I felt like I was flying solo. I had people to ask, but I had an issue trusting the advice of others and letting them into my life. As a friend, I'm a people person, an extrovert who has never met a stranger. I love being around others. But what happens when you look to others to complete you?
Speaker 1:Is it a good thing to look to others to make you happy? Growing up with an absent father and a mother who worked all the time, my friends became my family. I relied on them for everything, and I carried that same mindset into adulthood. I took no responsibility for my own actions, but instead expected others to make sure that I was doing well. It was never my fault, but always someone else's.
Speaker 1:It was hard to be my friend because I had sky high expectations and would get mad if someone didn't meet my unspoken wants and desires. I also believed the worst in most situations, walking in fear that the worst possible outcome was usually happening. You can see how this kind of behavior can make for quite a difficult friendship. At times, my demands and requests were smothering. Being my friend was hard.
Speaker 1:It depleted others instead of giving them life. All of this was based on fear of being alone. Looking to others to fulfill me, the same issue I had with my wife, was also a major player in this game of dysfunction. Being vulnerable and authentic. Being completely known is one of the most terrifying things a person can choose to do.
Speaker 1:We all want to put on a smile, wave to the neighbors, and pretend like all is okay. The problem is, rarely, is everything okay. Life is hard. You are an imperfect human. Sometimes life gets difficult.
Speaker 1:Sharing how you are truly doing is a hard thing to do, especially if you come from a fatherless home. The fear inside you screams, if they know you are weak, they will surely leave you. There is no way anyone is going to love you if they know what is actually going on. Plus, as a society, we are not too good at being open and honest about our junk. The truth is, vulnerably sharing about your hard times is one of the most helpful things you can do.
Speaker 1:Confessing your need for help and where you went wrong is the first step towards lightening your load. See James five sixteen. Being authentic instead of pretending all is okay is one of the most courageous things you can possibly do. I have found most people, men especially, think being real and showing weakness is something they could never do. But when we are weak, that gives Jesus an opportunity to be strong.
Speaker 1:Jesus came to heal the sick. The healthy have no need for a savior, as it says in Luke five thirty one. There was a time when I couldn't let anyone peek behind the curtain of my soul. No one knew I was hurt, lost, and paralyzed with fear. I pretended like I was the big strong man who didn't need any help.
Speaker 1:Emotions were a foreign language to me. No one, not even me, knew who I truly was behind the mask. Let me tell you, that did not serve me well. It was only when I stopped being fake and admitted that I needed help that the true healthy process could begin. Faith is needed to be vulnerable and authentic.
Speaker 1:The act of opening yourself up to others whom you trust is saying, okay, Lord, I did my part by confessing and being honest. Now it's time for you to do your part and start the process of healing. It also gives others an opportunity to be the hands and feet of Jesus towards you. No one is perfect. We all have needs.
Speaker 1:Might as well be open and honest about them instead of pretending all is well. Trust that the Lord will see your vulnerability and authenticity in all your humility and courage as a sacrifice that is pleasing to him. Authority and receiving feedback. I remember this event like it was yesterday because the Lord used it to shape the man I am today. It was one of the greatest gifts God has ever given to me.
Speaker 1:My mentoring organization was growing rapidly, and it was time for our annual board of directors retreat. My board and I were gonna take a few days to review the past year, plan out the upcoming year, and have some fun and fellowship. I was really looking forward to this and saw it as a starting point for an incredible new year. The five of us were sitting in the living room going over the prior year's accomplishments and shortcomings. I was leaving the meeting, and the board members were asking questions for clarification or because they saw something that could make our organization better.
Speaker 1:The problem is I would push back and tell them why they were wrong and I was right. I believed I knew more about mentoring than anyone else in the room and shouldn't be questioned. After a few of these exchanges, my board chairman said, every time we bring something up you can improve, you reject it. You aren't listening to us, Zach. If you won't listen, then why are we here?
Speaker 1:I didn't understand where he was coming from and thought he was totally off base. I sat there, all eyes on me, and realized I had two options. I could blow up on the sky, or I could shut down. Shutting down seemed like the more Christian thing to do. Head down, I did not say a word.
Speaker 1:I sat there in a pool of failure. That's when the lies of the enemy came. They are all gonna leave you. You don't have what it takes to do this job. Everyone is going to find out about this and make fun of you.
Speaker 1:You're done. You won't have a job. Your wife won't love you, and your kids won't respect you. This story is a good example of how I saw authority. People in charge of me were out to get me, and they couldn't be trusted.
Speaker 1:Why was this? Possibly because the main male authority in my life hurt me and couldn't be trusted. These board members who had authority over me never stood a chance. From day one, I was on the lookout for how they were going to hurt me. The slightest misstep from them, things like slightly raising their voice or not giving feedback in a gentle enough way, was enough for me to see them as the enemy.
Speaker 1:I viewed authority not as someone who was there to help me, but as someone who had hurt me. Authority was hard for me for several reasons, but mostly because I was not used to it. When my dad left, his authority left too. My mom did the best she could to be an authoritative figure who guided me, but she was busy making ends meet. And a six foot eight inch teenage kid doesn't respond too well to a five foot four mom telling him what to do.
Speaker 1:Until adulthood, I simply did not have to submit to many people. It was a foreign concept to me as I was used to doing whatever I wanted. I also didn't receive feedback well because my identity was tied to my performance. If I did something wrong, I was wrong. If my project failed, I was a failure.
Speaker 1:This stemmed from feeling like I had to earn love. The only time I felt love as a child was when I did something right. Good grades, success in sports, and popularity were what it took to be loved as a child, and this carried into adulthood. Success at work meant I was a success. If people questioned how I did things or gave me constructive criticism on how to improve, I would go into fight or flight mode, doing whatever I could to show I was right.
Speaker 1:I wanted to be right so that others would approve of me and ultimately not leave me. Submission to proper authority and learning from the feedback from others is godly and will set you on a path of success, but I would have none of it. My childhood left me unprepared for these realities. Being judgmental. I have come to the conclusion that I am a very judgmental person.
Speaker 1:Now I know that a lot of people deal with judgment, but I think I am more judgmental than most, and I think it has to do with my childhood. Hear me out. Being alone most of my life forced me to figure out most things on my own. I'm a lone wolf, and most of my successes in life have been because of my efforts. No one else was going to help me, so I did whatever I had to do to be successful.
Speaker 1:This type of extreme self reliance, while unhealthy, has caused me to do quite well in this results oriented world. I have a strong work ethic and a relentless motor, but these actions come from an ugly place. They come from a place of produce in order to survive. While it may look like I'm striving for excellence, fear truly is my motivator. Because of that, I look down on anyone who is unsuccessful.
Speaker 1:In my sinful perspective, they didn't work hard enough, grind long enough, or sacrifice enough to prove their worth. Simply put, they aren't me. They didn't pull themselves up by their bootstraps, and that causes me to look down on them. Not only that, but I am slow to give grace, have sky high expectations, and run at a breakneck speed. Now I know this sounds extremely arrogant and egotistical, and there is probably a lot of that in there, but this ties back to the father wound because it created in me the opinion that you are only as good as what you produce.
Speaker 1:I only received love when I performed, and I only gave love when others performed. Most of the time, my love is conditional, which is the exact opposite of the love of Christ. Fear of failure. I grew up believing I had to perform and be successful in order to be loved. Therefore, I also believe that if I didn't do those things, I would not be loved.
Speaker 1:My whole life was spent trying to keep it all together and appearing like I was without blemish. The fear of failure and, more importantly, losing love is always in the back of my head. That's what happens when you don't get love from your father for one reason or another. It only makes sense that I would be apprehensive to admit that I messed up. In my mind, if I confess my mistakes, there is a really good chance you will leave me while muttering under your breath.
Speaker 1:I knew he'd blow it. You'd take your love with you too. If I get called out for my mishaps, I'm going to fight tooth and nail to convince you that I was right. This fear also kept me from taking risks. Playing it safe meant that I was a whole lot less likely to fail.
Speaker 1:It also kept me from apologizing when I fell short or hurt someone. Even in adulthood, I want to do whatever I can to trick others into loving me. Sometimes that means acting perfect, and other times that means covering up my failures. No matter the situation, it's never a good thing to let fear drive your actions. Extension.
Speaker 1:Adulthood is not a compartment cut off from the events of your childhood. Instead, adulthood is an extension of your childhood. For better or worse, childhood is formative. This may leave you enjoying a healthy foundation for life or repairing that foundation for life. For me, fear was and still is a major issue as an adult.
Speaker 1:Perhaps I couldn't control a lot when I was a child, so I take every opportunity to control what I can now as an adult. I was forced to be self reliant in my youth and never figured out another way to operate. I find myself having to be in charge often. Here's the kicker. My childhood forced me to grow up before I should have, giving me ample opportunities to be responsible, organized, and disciplined.
Speaker 1:The choice was either to grow in those areas or be a total failure. It is those character traits that have led me to be successful in my job. I am responsible and self motivated. I don't let many things fall through the cracks, and I am disciplined to achieve goals when they need to be done. But those exact traits that help me from nine to five hurt me the second I walk in the door at home.
Speaker 1:All of these things are a product of growing up feeling alone without the guidance of my father. I thought that once I grew up, I wouldn't have to deal with my father wound anymore, and I have found that to be untrue. In fact, adulthood is the perfect time to identify and deal with these wounds. Even now, as you read these words, you have more perspective and experience than ever and are well suited to face what you may have neglected. The truth is, unless you deal with the symptoms of your past, they'll just continue wreaking havoc forever.
Speaker 1:You have to replace the bad habits with good ones, and that takes a ridiculous amount of effort, intentionality, and perseverance. It's a hard process, but one that I believe you can do. Let's talk about what that process looks like next. Tell me, do you resonate with any of the issues listed in this chapter? If so, which ones?
Speaker 1:How have they impacted your life? Which areas of your life have been impacted the most by your childhood, for better or worse? What are some ways that they affect your relationships, your work, and your family life? What are the common fears that you have? How do those play out on a daily basis?