Latest / Neighbourly: Real Stories of Care and Community / Curious Instead of Furious | With Alicia Freeman

Transcript

Curious Instead of Furious | With Alicia Freeman · Neighbourly: Real Stories of Care and Community

0:01
Offering just my presence and my quiet,
0:05
even my presence in their emotions. You know, when somebody else is sad and
0:08
I'm willing to just sit in that sad with them and not
0:12
try to tie it up with a pretty ribbon and find an
0:16
answer or spiritually lead them to a place that
0:19
they're just not ready to go to be willing to just sit in that
0:23
and trust that, you know, God's going to lead them to the hope,
0:28
to the clarity that they might need. But I don't have to do.
0:35
What does it look like to care for someone? Well, when their emotions feel bigger
0:38
than the moment? Because most of us want to help. We want
0:42
to be steady for the people around us, our family, our friends, our neighbors
0:46
and our churches. But when someone is overwhelmed,
0:49
hurting, or reacting in ways we don't fully understand,
0:53
it's so easy to rush in with answers, advice, or a quick fix.
0:57
Hey, everyone, I'm Johan. Welcome to Neighbourly, a podcast about ordinary
1:01
people showing extraordinary care. Today, Shannon sits down with
1:05
someone who is no stranger to neighborly, Alicia, a Care Impact
1:08
trainer whose own journey through foster care, adoption and trauma
1:12
informed learning has shaped the way she helps others understand
1:16
safety, presence, and compassion. But this isn't
1:19
just a conversation about training. It's about a bigger question.
1:24
How do we become the kind of people who can stay curious, offer
1:27
safety, and sit with someone in the messy middle without needing to
1:31
fix everything? Let's listen in and join Shannon and Alicia at
1:35
the table. Alicia, I'm so glad that you
1:39
are on the podcast today. You are not new to this
1:43
podcast, you've been on a couple times. And Alicia, we
1:47
love her at Care Impact. She's such a core part of this team. And
1:51
I can't wait for our listeners to hear more of what
1:54
you do and your heart for it. But before we get into that,
1:58
we always start with the same question. Growing up, who was
2:02
a neighbor that you will never forget? Yeah,
2:06
this question was actually a little tough for me. And then I listened to the
2:10
episode from last week and I was like, oh, my answer is the same as
2:13
hers. So I grew up in
2:16
a very rural community, so I felt like my
2:20
concept of neighbors was not like a lot of other people. People like my neighbors
2:23
were not right next door. It was a little ways away. So I don't feel
2:27
like we necessarily did a lot with, like, our neighbors, the people that
2:31
were, you know, next door to us, because really it was like a next field
2:34
away. Right. It was a very agricultural community. But what
2:38
did come to mind is that I went to A rural
2:42
community, public school. So really, everybody at my school
2:46
were like the people in my neighborhood, which was
2:50
large, but in a rural community like that. It was really neat to have
2:53
all of those families come together in that one place where
2:57
basically all the kids in the community went to that same
3:01
school. And so I remember, you know, like, at Christmas
3:04
time, there'd always be, like, the Christmas concert, and then all the families would be
3:08
there. And because it was like a rural farming community, it was
3:12
like moms and dads and siblings. Like, everybody was there. Even
3:16
when we had, like, middle of the day events, like, we would have, like, a
3:18
school picnic at the end of the year, and the
3:22
families would be there. And so, like, looking back now, I realize how unique
3:26
that was. It really did give me that sense of neighborhood when I was
3:30
at my school every day. Like, all the kids were living similar lives to
3:33
me. So, like, we were all coming from these farms
3:37
in the community and we kind of lived that same lifestyle.
3:41
Yeah. Oh, that's beautiful to think about growing up with
3:45
other families and living life with other people
3:48
in that similar season of life, I'm sure is just. Yeah. So special
3:52
to think back on. Well, I'm really excited to get
3:56
more into this episode and really hear your heart,
4:00
because we're talking a lot about some of the trainings that we do,
4:04
trauma care training, relational care training, and you
4:07
are a big part of that. And so I'd love to hear what led you
4:11
to even want to facilitate trainings like this and
4:15
why is it important to you? Well, my husband and I chose
4:19
to begin building our family through adoption as well
4:22
as providing foster care for vulnerable children in our community. And
4:26
so when we first began our journey of foster care and adoption, we
4:30
were very young, like in our early 20s. And some of the first
4:33
children that God brought into our home were significantly
4:37
challenging children. They had significant needs due to, you know,
4:41
things like prenatal exposure to alcohol or drugs or
4:45
major attachment disruptions, exposure to domestic violence
4:49
and abuse, things like that. So as we attempted to care for these children, we
4:53
quickly started to realize that many of the traditional parenting techniques that
4:57
we were seeing other parents using or that we had been raised with
5:00
were really not as effective as we hoped or possibly even made
5:04
things worse sometimes. So we knew that we needed help.
5:08
And so we started to seek out that education and community among
5:12
other Christians who were fostering and adopting at the time.
5:16
And through that, we were invited to join a few of the people in taking
5:19
a training called Trauma Competent Care Through a
5:23
Trauma Free World. And then at the same time, we also started
5:27
attending the Replanted conference in Chicago each
5:31
year. And through those experiences, we began to learn more about what it was
5:34
that our children really needed from us and how to help them
5:38
feel safe and experience healing and
5:42
why their behaviors were sometimes really baffling to us.
5:46
So this gave us so much hope and clarity in our
5:50
parenting journey, and I'm just so grateful that we were given those
5:53
opportunities to learn. And so the more that I learned, the
5:57
more that I wanted to be able to share this information with other families
6:01
and not just for foster and adoptive families. What we really started to realize
6:05
was that this information is really for everyone everywhere. And that's
6:09
what I tell people about trauma care training. I really believe that
6:13
it's for everyone everywhere, especially people in the church,
6:16
because trauma is so common in today's culture and for the church,
6:21
as we want to come in and impact and interact with
6:24
people who are hurting, what we want is to be equipped to do
6:28
that in ways that are truly helpful and healing.
6:32
Yeah. Thank you so much for bringing it back to your
6:36
story and where that. That really started for you.
6:40
I think there's a couple other episodes where you share a little bit more about
6:43
what that journey has been like specifically, but I love where you brought it, because
6:47
as you were talking, I was thinking about those who may not be,
6:51
you know, adoptive parents or foster parents listening and thinking, well, how
6:54
does. How does this kind of content, you know, how would these kinds of trainings
6:58
apply to me? But I think you. You said it right there. It is
7:02
for everyone, for everywhere. And especially as believers
7:06
in the church who were wanting to welcome in hurting
7:10
people broken, lost, and needing to
7:14
create an environment that is
7:17
emotionally and mentally safe for people
7:21
who've experienced a lot. Is training like this is so important?
7:25
So recently, you facilitated a training at a
7:28
pregnancy resource center, and I'd love to hear a little bit
7:32
about just what was that like walking in?
7:36
What did the day feel like when you arrived and when you got there?
7:41
Yeah. So this particular training, the
7:44
Pregnancy Resource center, is really close to my heart, because
7:48
this center is located in our small town, and I know
7:52
so many of the people who are investing their time and their energy and their
7:55
resources in this ministry. And I know that this center is also
7:59
serving a vulnerable population that is really close to my
8:02
heart as well, especially as a foster parent. So I'm just so grateful
8:06
for the way that they have come alongside these young women and men and
8:10
families to try to build in upstream supports.
8:14
So this center has been so eager to host me over the past couple
8:18
of years and inviting me into their space to train their staff and
8:21
volunteers and just to provide a space where they can talk and learn
8:25
and really work to understand their clientele better.
8:29
So when I came into the room, I really was walking into a space where
8:32
there were several people that are very familiar and dear
8:36
faces who might feel comfortable with, which was really nice. My friend
8:40
worked to help me set up, and we ended up using a couple of
8:43
diaper boxes to set up my computer so that it would be, like,
8:47
at the right height for my presentation because we didn't have quite the right
8:51
size of table or stand. And so that was kind of funny because I thought,
8:54
you know, how fitting is this that as we talk about this together, I've got
8:58
my computer propped up on diaper boxes that have been donated
9:02
by these generous community members at the Pregnancy Resource Center.
9:06
So I'd say everyone came in feeling pretty light and friendly. They were chatting
9:09
and pulling out snacks and exchanging hugs and conversation. That
9:13
kind of environment, it was. It was really comfortable. Yeah.
9:17
When you're getting ready for these kinds of trainings and
9:21
you're thinking about prior experiences of it, what have
9:24
you learned? Helps you to really facilitate a learning experience that kind
9:28
of goes deeper and goes beyond some of that
9:32
surface level. I think one of the key aspects
9:36
is just, you know, making sure that as we all
9:40
come into that space and particularly as I, you
9:43
know, begin my presentation, that they can really see me
9:47
as another human being. That sounds funny, but,
9:51
you know, that I'm not just standing there as the trainer, that I'm here with
9:55
them. And so often what I try to present near the beginning is, you
9:58
know, a little bit about my story and what's brought me here. And really trying
10:02
to help people understand that when I'm in the training room with them, I'm here
10:05
to learn alongside and that I really want to hear from them as
10:09
well, because there's a lot of people that I end up, you know,
10:13
training who hold a lot of pieces of knowledge and. And some that
10:16
I don't have. So it's really beautiful when we're able to
10:20
step into that conversation and end up learning from each other. But I feel
10:24
like it's really important for participants to feel that comfort that
10:28
I want you to share. I want you to even disagree or
10:31
have different opinions. And let's talk it through. Let's figure out what
10:35
are your questions, what are your thoughts, or what are your learning experiences
10:39
that would contribute to this conversation. Yeah, I'd love to hear some
10:43
of those more specific moments that stood out to you, but
10:46
to maybe give our listeners a little bit of context, in a nutshell, what
10:50
was some of the content that you were training or sharing with this
10:54
group? Just kind of generally speaking. Yeah.
10:57
So my content at this training was called navigating
11:01
overwhelming emotions. And so we were really talking
11:04
about, first of all, what do we do with our own overwhelming
11:08
emotions? So when we are having overwhelming emotions, what's
11:12
going on in our brains and our bodies, our nervous
11:15
systems? What might we be experiencing on a holistic level?
11:19
And then how does that impact our ability to
11:23
interact with other people around us? So, really,
11:27
even though I was definitely coming to serve
11:30
as far as helping to equip them in navigating
11:34
overwhelming emotions with other people, but what we ended up talking
11:38
about a lot is our own overwhelming emotions. And I think
11:42
the more that we understand what to do with our own emotions, the more
11:45
compassion and empathy that we have for other people's big
11:49
emotions. And it just helps us to have better clarity as to,
11:52
like, what approach is needed here. If I know what works for me when I'm
11:56
feeling overwhelmed and I'm comfortable with my own
11:59
emotions, then it really does help me to be able to
12:03
enter into somebody else's experience and not feel easily
12:07
threatened or triggered by that. Yeah, that's so good. I think
12:10
about how helpful that would be for me.
12:14
And I'm not even a parent. I'm just thinking about daily life, and
12:19
that's so good. So I'd love to hear then, what were some of those
12:22
moments from. From that training that really stayed with you
12:26
of what people were learning and what was just coming to mind for
12:30
them? So one of the moments that really stayed with me from this
12:33
training was when one participant was really digging into the
12:37
content and asking some really good and hard questions about our
12:41
emotions and how God sees our emotions and what it
12:44
looks like to understand our emotions in light of the gospel and
12:48
the Holy Spirit's work in our lives and sanctifying us, all of
12:52
that. And really, she was gently but persistently
12:55
disagreeing with the approach that I was taking to the content.
12:59
And it was just that sort of moment where you feel this tension build.
13:03
Right. But one of the things that I love most about the time that I've
13:07
spent learning about trauma and its impact on people is that
13:11
it's really helped me to learn how to exercise curiosity.
13:15
A phrase that we often repeat is curious instead of furious.
13:19
And this little line really is so helpful in practicing
13:22
Active listening and offering those felt safety
13:26
strategies. And honestly, just this posture of humility.
13:30
So it was really encouraging because I felt like I was able to really just
13:33
lean into this participant's questions and perspectives and, and
13:37
open up conversation and allow the rest of the group to provide their
13:40
feedback as well. That's a great example of. We
13:44
talked about this on our last episode a lot about remaining
13:48
curious and related to making assumptions about others,
13:51
but just that same concept of maybe easy. You're probably
13:55
navigating your own emotions in that moment and thinking,
13:58
okay, pause, let me hear where this person's coming from. Let me really ask
14:03
good questions to help you know them learn, but also
14:06
yourself learn. And yeah, that's such a great a learning
14:10
opportunity, I think, for everybody. So, Alicia, as you were
14:14
going through that moment, what are some of the things you noticed either
14:18
in the room or in yourself as you were
14:22
walking through that with that participant? Yeah,
14:25
in myself, I really sense this, like, urgency to
14:29
try to fix it, you know, talk more, explain more, which is so
14:33
often what we feel when we sense some kind of threat to our own
14:37
perspective or our own experience. But I also sense this
14:40
calmness and confidence that was really neat to feel. I still really
14:44
think of myself as an amateur on all these topics
14:47
and on training, so I feel like I can easily be derailed by someone
14:51
going off topic or. Or asking a hard question that I wasn't
14:54
anticipating. But this time, I really just sensed this deep, grounded
14:58
assurance that I needed to lean into this and that the content would speak for
15:02
itself. And one of my fellow Care Impact trainers, Amy Jo,
15:05
always reminds me, you can trust the content, and I really
15:09
find that to be true. When we know that what we're presenting is
15:13
valuable and trusted and wisely sourced, we can present confidently
15:17
and really rest in that knowledge. So, yeah, as
15:20
I resisted that urge to jump in and fix it all, I was
15:24
able to ask questions and really listen to this participant and
15:28
understand her perspective and allow others to be part of that
15:31
learning moment and just let the conversation play out a little bit. And I
15:35
felt like everyone else really leaned in then as well, which was so
15:39
beautiful to watch. And I think we were all pretty invested at that
15:42
point in figuring out, like, how do these pieces fit together?
15:47
Wow. Yeah, that's so good, because it makes me think about
15:51
when we lean into the messy
15:54
moments or maybe even think of it of, like, wrestling with God a little bit
15:58
of, like, trying to work out our faith and these concepts and
16:02
God, how does this fit and how does this make sense that is
16:05
actually like where so much growth happens. And that's really what it sounds like was
16:09
kind of happening in that moment. Why do you think that
16:13
moment itself really mattered? Yeah, it
16:17
just, it turned into such a beautiful piece of the training that really
16:21
helped us all to engage on a much deeper level.
16:25
And I really felt like we were able to learn together and see how the
16:28
content actually brought us full circle versus just
16:32
me standing up there and talking the whole time or claiming to have all the
16:35
answers. And. And what I noticed was that everyone really started exploring,
16:39
experiencing what we were talking about, overwhelming
16:43
emotions. So as they process the content in more personal
16:46
ways, I think we really experienced something special that, that
16:50
day that, that just held a lot more weight than it would have if we
16:54
hadn't been willing to kind of dig into those harder
16:57
questions. Thanks for sharing more about that.
17:01
In that specific training or even if you think back on some of the
17:05
others that you have done, what have you learned that it can look
17:09
like to really help somebody feel safe when they're coming into
17:12
this learning experience? Maybe not knowing totally what to expect
17:16
if, you know, their pastor signed them up or their boss
17:20
signed them up for this thing. What are some of the things that you've
17:23
learned to help people as they come into the room?
17:27
Yeah, one of the things that I always like to do at the beginning
17:31
is really help people find their own personal why
17:35
for being there. People feel safer when they feel like
17:39
they're not expected to all be coming for the same reason or with the
17:43
same story. And so to try to, you know, to share my why for
17:47
being here, but then really opening it up and giving them a
17:50
chance to actually, you know, often I'll have them maybe
17:54
draw something or sketch something or write something down or actually
17:58
like physically taking some time and space to think about, like,
18:01
why am I here and what are my expectations for this.
18:05
I think just really allows people, right. Right from the get go to be honest
18:09
about their experience and how they're feeling about being here. And then
18:13
like we talked about before, just curiosity, you know, asking
18:17
questions, making sure that people have opportunity to
18:21
speak. I tend to, you know, I prepare the
18:24
trainings and I've been so invested in. I've been studying all the material and
18:28
prepping the slide notes, all of the things. Right. And then I have so much
18:31
that I want to say and usually like such little time and
18:35
it's so tempting for me to just talk the whole time. I'm like, I've got
18:39
content to move through and it's also great I just really want to move through
18:42
it. But again, something I've learned from my Care Impact
18:46
team is just the value of asking really good questions
18:49
and making sure that I'm giving time and space for people to
18:53
process at their own speed. And that might look different
18:57
than what I prepared. It might look different than what I hoped for
19:01
and thought was what they needed. But people really do
19:05
learn best when they're given the freedom to process things at their
19:09
own pace and have some time to be able to learn together.
19:12
That's the other thing. We usually try to do some group work in our
19:16
trainings to make sure that people have time to stop and have conversations with the
19:19
people who are next to them or a pre assigned group, whatever it might be,
19:23
so that they're not only learning from the presenter
19:27
and the slide deck, but they're also having conversation with each other as
19:30
participants and they're asking each other questions. They have
19:34
more time to speak. Yeah. And to give
19:38
our listeners a bit of a picture because I'm thinking about how they could see
19:42
themselves in this, you know, as they're hearing you talk
19:46
about people, you know, coming into the room. Aside from a Pregnancy
19:50
Resource center, what are some of the other types of groups that
19:53
you have done this training or similar trainings with?
19:57
Mm, I don't feel like I've ever had a training that is
20:01
just kind of one group of people. Even with this training,
20:04
even though the reason we were all there was because they were all connected to
20:08
the Pregnancy Resource center, what I found is that they were applying the
20:11
material across the board in their lives. So they weren't just
20:15
thinking about this material in, in regards to their
20:19
relationship with the clients or their work at the Pregnancy Resource Center.
20:22
They were, they were thinking about it, you know, with their family and their friends
20:26
and the people they go to church with and their neighbors. So
20:29
in other trainings as well, I definitely, often there are,
20:33
you know, foster families, adoptive families.
20:37
I've done some training with different camps in working with that type
20:41
of ministry. You know, girls clubs, boys clubs, people
20:45
who are working with children or youth who are, who have
20:48
experienced significant trauma. But I feel like the
20:52
repeated question that I've had every time I do a training
20:56
because I'm a parent and I'm parenting children who've experienced trauma.
21:00
I tend to use a lot of examples of my children or my
21:03
experiences with children, but inevitably people are always asking,
21:07
like, what about other adults in my life? What does it look like for
21:11
my brother or my nephew or my neighbor
21:15
who I'm Close with who I know has experienced traumatic things.
21:19
What does it look like for me to translate this to them? So one of
21:22
the things that care impact that we become really passionate about is really making
21:26
this material really easy for people to translate
21:30
into the experiences that they're having with all those different people
21:34
in their lives and just broadening that language a little bit. Because
21:37
the same types of strategies that we would use with kids are the
21:41
strategies that we are going to use with adults as well. But sometimes we need
21:45
help kind of connecting those dots, right? And figuring out what would it look like
21:48
to provide safety to an adult who doesn't
21:52
feel safe? Or what does it look like for me to really listen
21:55
and like active practice active listening with another adult
21:59
versus a child? Or what does it look like when
22:03
an adult's brain and body is overstimulated or
22:07
dysregulated? What does that look like and what should I do in that
22:10
moment? Because a dysregulated adult looks a lot scarier
22:14
than a dysregulated five year old. Right. And so even though we're using the
22:18
same types of strategies, sometimes it's worth really having those conversations
22:22
and digging into that. That's really helpful. And
22:25
I think that's really important for those who are
22:29
listening because I think that is really relatable for a lot of people that
22:32
whether they're working in spaces with children and youth or
22:36
foster adoptive families are not. That's something that we can, I think,
22:40
all relate to that there are adults in our life, whether they're close or not,
22:44
who have experienced some really hard things in life
22:48
and we want to show up well for them. So
22:52
not to try and give you a, you know, do a whole training in two
22:56
minutes right now, but what are some of the things that you
22:59
say when people ask that question of, you know, if you're in a moment with
23:03
someone who is overwhelmed or hurting, especially an adult, what
23:07
can it look like to show up well and care well for them
23:10
in that moment? That's such a great question.
23:15
I feel like, you know, I'm so grateful in my own life for the Holy
23:19
Spirit, because I think first of all, we need the
23:23
Holy Spirit to be able to guide us in those interactions and help
23:27
us to know what's really going to speak to this person. But
23:30
I feel like I keep bringing up the same things. But that, that curiosity
23:34
again, like, I feel like I can't think of a situation
23:38
where the first approach isn't going to be curiosity,
23:42
you know, like to just whether that's outwardly or just
23:45
internally to just really take that pause and ask
23:49
that question like why, why is this person
23:52
feeling this way? Or why is this person behaving in the way that they
23:56
are? And what I love about curiosity is that it
24:00
really just unleashes empathy in us. I think as soon as we
24:04
are willing to be curious, we kind of step out of that
24:07
protective mode, we step out of that defensive mode,
24:11
and we're able to really start thinking, oh, wait a
24:15
minute, this person has their own perspective and their own experience. And
24:19
I wonder what that is. And oftentimes when we
24:23
do that, the other person can sense that. And you know, if
24:26
we're able to ask questions like, I'd love to understand
24:30
more about that, can you tell me more about that? Or you know,
24:34
just really, really validating their, their experience, you
24:38
know, if they're able to share with us to say, well, yeah, that makes a
24:40
lot of sense. Of course you feel that way. I think I would feel that
24:44
way too, to doing that, that relating to them and
24:48
trying to help them feel like they're, they're not alone and they're not crazy
24:51
for, for feeling the way that they do is really
24:55
helpful. So yeah, curiosity helping them to,
24:59
to feel like they're not alone. And then really if it's the
25:03
kind of relationship where you're able to really try to offer those
25:06
regulation type strategies. So, you know, we all know that
25:10
sometimes just taking a deep breath can be really helpful. If
25:14
it's a child that you're working with, you know, you might be able to say
25:17
it that's simply like, hey, can you take a deep breath with me?
25:20
Or there's lots of different fun regulation tools that we have,
25:24
especially for younger kids. Things like a bowl of hot
25:27
soup or a mug of hot chocolate where you're gently blowing
25:31
to cool it off and then gently inhaling to
25:35
smell it and those kinds of strategies. Figure
25:39
8. Breathing, things like that. Obviously with a youth or
25:42
with an older youth or an adult, it might not
25:46
feel as comfortable to prompt them to take a deep breath.
25:51
They might feel kind of judged if you do that to them. Right? But there's
25:55
still ways that we can notice that dysregulation that's happening
25:58
in their bodies and figure out how to work that out. So
26:02
maybe it's even just like, hey, do you want to take a walk? And just
26:06
walking as you talk is going to allow their bodies to move around
26:10
a little bit instead of feeling so stuck. Drives, I find, are
26:14
also great. You know, if you're in the car talking to somebody and you don't
26:16
have that direct eye contact. Sometimes offering
26:20
like, do you need a minute? There's a space over here where it's
26:24
quiet. Do you want to just take a break for a minute? Things
26:27
like that can be really helpful in just helping somebody to be able
26:31
to step away from that moment for a little bit and not feel the
26:35
pressure. Yeah, that's so good. So many practical
26:39
tips there you've just shared. And one thing I think about, you kind of
26:43
mentioned this earlier too, is I can sometimes default
26:46
into wanting to fix a situation or fix something.
26:50
And I'm really trying to work on not
26:54
defaulting to that. And so in that same vein, maybe what
26:57
is something people don't need to have figured out
27:01
before they step into, you know, a kind of situation
27:05
like that where they don't need to have that pressure
27:09
of going in, trying to fix something. Any
27:12
thoughts around that? I
27:16
love that because even for me, I've spent so
27:20
much time now in this material and I feel like I should
27:23
have a great toolbox. But sometimes in the moment,
27:27
all of that is gone. I can't remember. I don't
27:31
know what's going to be helpful. But this is where I
27:35
just. I love the practical ways that we can love
27:38
people is often just listening and being willing
27:42
to really sit in that space with them and not try to
27:46
fix it and not try to sort it out. I think one of
27:50
the things that I've really learned over the last few years in my own life
27:54
and walking with others who have been through some really
27:58
difficult things is that offering
28:02
just my presence and just
28:05
my quiet, steady presence, even my presence
28:09
in their emotions when somebody else is sad and I'm willing to
28:13
just sit in that sad with them and not try to tie
28:17
it up with a pretty ribbon and find an answer
28:20
or spiritually lead them to a place that they're just
28:24
not ready to go to be willing to just sit in that and
28:28
trust that, you know, God's going to lead them to that, to the hope,
28:32
to the clarity that they might need. But I don't have to
28:36
do that. And I can relate to you, Shannon.
28:40
I like to fix things. That's been a real challenge for me to learn that
28:43
skill. And that's something that I'm working really hard
28:47
to learn. And God's been really faithful to bring me into a lot of
28:51
experiences where I get to practice that
28:55
over the last few years. So, yeah, I think that I'm
28:59
slowly getting better at that. But to be able to just say, oh, that sounds
29:02
really hard. Like, I'm sorry. I'm really sorry that
29:06
you're walking through that. Or that makes sense. That makes so
29:10
much sense that you would feel that way, even just
29:13
offering, you know, that the little line like. Like, of course you do,
29:17
you know, like, of course you feel that way. And we all need to feel
29:21
like we're not alone and we're not crazy when we're having overwhelming
29:24
emotions. And I think that offers a lot of safety
29:28
and connection. Yeah. So good. Well,
29:31
we're getting to the end here of our time together. Is there
29:35
anything, Alicia, that I haven't asked or anything just on your heart
29:39
to share that you want to say before we close today?
29:43
I'm thinking about. We talk quite a bit about this training, and we alluded
29:46
earlier to that idea that trauma care is really for
29:50
everyone everywhere. And we talked a bit about how important
29:54
it is for the church in our role, in the ways that we're
29:58
trying to step into community. But I think that's really been
30:02
on my heart lately, and something that I've really come to notice and
30:06
see. And, you know, as I've walked through hard experiences in my own life
30:09
and as I've watched other people walk through difficult experiences
30:13
and really seeing the church, I think I've
30:17
seen it both ways. I've seen experiences
30:20
where the church really stepped in and was able to care in really,
30:24
really wonderful, thoughtful ways and really come alongside and
30:28
support people in navigating those difficult
30:31
circumstances. And then I think most of us have also
30:35
seen the alternative where we see the church step
30:39
in and instead of finding safety, you know, that that
30:43
person feels a lot of judgment or feels a lot of that fix
30:46
it culture where, you know, we want to kind of slap on
30:50
our. Our programs and our. Our agendas
30:54
onto. Onto other people in their situations. And,
30:58
yeah, I guess I just. I'm really hopeful for the church in Canada.
31:01
I think that a lot of people are asking a lot of really good
31:05
questions, and I think that there is a willingness and an eagerness
31:09
to learn new things. And I'm so excited every
31:12
time I get a peek at that. I'm thinking of one training
31:16
in particular, where it was a connection through a camp, and really there was
31:20
a family who was really struggling, and their church reached out
31:24
and said, would you bring this training to us? Because we just really want to
31:28
wrap around this family and this child. And that
31:31
was so encouraging to me because I thought,
31:35
wow, that's. That's just. That's what church is supposed to look like,
31:39
you know, like they, they knew that they didn't have the answers, but
31:42
they really wanted to be helpful and they were really mindful of
31:46
helping in the right ways. And so they reached out,
31:50
they took the initiative to say, like, I wonder if this is something that would
31:53
be helpful to us. Would you help us to understand better?
31:57
And so I'm really excited for, for the different opportunities
32:01
that have been coming our way at Care Impact. And we love the church in
32:04
Canada and we want to help. We want to help come alongside everything
32:08
that the people are already doing. There's so many wonderful
32:12
ministries and work that is happening and we really want
32:16
to come alongside and support that and help everybody feel like they're equipped to do
32:19
that as well as they can. That's right. Thank you so much,
32:23
Alicia, for coming on today. You said it exactly. Our
32:27
heart is for the church in Canada and to
32:30
help equip her and empower her to care well for community.
32:35
And that's what this is all about. So thank you. Thanks for sharing your
32:39
story and your wisdom, and I hope to have
32:42
you back on again really soon. Thank you for having
32:46
me. It's always so fun to talk to you. The
32:50
stories we share here remind us that CARE does not have to be perfect to
32:54
be powerful. It just has to be present. Neighbourly is an
32:57
initiative of Care Impact, a Canadian charity equipping churches,
33:01
agencies and communities with technology and training to care better
33:05
together. This episode was produced by CARE Creatives co,
33:08
a social enterprise of Care Impact. If you're building a podcast and want help
33:12
with strategy, editing or full production, visit
33:15
CareCreativesCo CA to connect with us.
33:19
I'm Johan. Thanks for listening and keep being the kind of
33:22
neighbor someone will never forget. In a good way.
33:40
Breaking all chains When I see you
33:43
in a stranger I'm no longer a slave
33:49
Turning over table Tearing down
33:53
wall Building up the bridges
33:58
between the stones of this
34:01
Turning over table Breaking.