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Spirituality + Masculinity | How They Are Interwoven & Why They're Important for Healthy Masculinity
178 Plays1 year ago
In today’s solo episode, Josh is sharing honestly about his own journey. He dives into the ways pain and disappointment can create a byproduct of isolation, not only from others but also from God. He dives into how this happened to him and offers some practical ways to change your “spiritual status quo” if you’re unhappy with where you’re currently at.
In this episode you'll learn:
- How pain and disappointment can hinder your relationship with God.
- Why your spirituality is vital to nurturing healthy masculinity.
- Why it’s important to be brutally honest with yourself and God.
- What you can do if you’re unhappy with your current spirituality.
Links
Host: Josh Cearbaugh
Website: https://joshcearbaugh.com
Instagram: https://instagram.com/joshcearbaugh
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshcearbaugh/
Online Course: https://www.jumpstartyourlife.com
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Spirituality and Personal Growth
00:00:00
Speaker
Today's another solo episode where we get to dive into the deep recesses of my heart and spirit and life and hopefully you guys can extract some
00:00:12
Speaker
takeaways and some lessons and also be challenged because that's really why I'm doing this is to provoke thought conversation and hopefully move all of us in the direction of improving our lives, whatever that may look like for you. Today specifically, we're talking about spirituality or maybe even lack thereof in a sense. And really kind of my journey of
00:00:37
Speaker
my relationship with God, and this isn't like, this is my whole life story, but really what's transpired in the last, let's say, three or four years that I realized a few weeks ago, and I'm working on integrating, and it's actually much harder than I thought it would be to do that. We're gonna get into the details of all of that, but overall, it's really just a synapses of where I'm at spiritually,
00:01:05
Speaker
and why I made certain choices spiritually, and the consequences that I'm living with, with those decisions, for better or for worse, and where hopefully I can
Spirituality and Masculinity: A Personal Journey
00:01:22
Speaker
get takeaways from that, maybe you can get takeaways from that because I don't think that my story is that much different. I mean, obviously it's unique to me, but it's not that much different than what a lot of us go through in the sense of disappointment, heartache, et cetera, and how that can influence and affect our relationship with our spirituality.
00:01:49
Speaker
If you haven't already, I'd ask you to subscribe as well as leave a comment. As always, I read all of them and I appreciate them. If you've got any ideas as far as topics to chat about or if you want to be a guest, feel free to reach out to me at multifacetedmasculinity.com. So without further ado, let's dive into kind of my journey with God and some of the challenging takeaways that I have had here in the last few weeks.
00:02:15
Speaker
Men, we are not simple, chest-thumping, rock-smashing, fire-starting barbarians. We have depth. We intensely feel. We are scared, yet brave. We love to have fun. We're imperfect and make mistakes. We're compassionate and loving. We are multifaceted. Let's explore the reality of masculinity together.
00:02:45
Speaker
All right, I actually want to start with a question for you. And that is, what is your spirituality look like? And how does that integrate or tie into your masculinity? We've touched on that some in previous episodes with different guests, but I'm really curious for you to pause and even maybe even pause the podcast before we even get started. And just ask yourself,
00:03:09
Speaker
What currently, take inventory, we're so busy with all the to-dos and kids and work and business and whatever it may be in our life, just to slow down and take inventory and ask yourself, what is your spirituality currently look like? And I don't wanna say what is your relationship with God look like, because I don't wanna tie it to just that.
00:03:35
Speaker
I wanna broaden it and really have you look at what is your spirituality and that may just be, not just, but that may be your relationship with God and that is all of your spirituality.
00:03:46
Speaker
That may be you going to church on a regular basis and tied into your community and having experiences, et cetera. That may be you getting out into nature and connecting to the universe. I personally feel like the universe, God, spirituality, they're all synonymous. They're the avenues that we use to really lean on and to find something that's greater than ourselves that
00:04:13
Speaker
makes us feel not so alone. And I'm asking you this question because quite frankly, I did not pause and ask myself this question for years, quite frankly.
00:04:30
Speaker
Long, long, long story short, I went through a divorce,
Interwoven Spirituality in Relationships
00:04:33
Speaker
but even before I went through that divorce, I obviously got married. We were married for almost 12 years, and when I was dating my ex-wife,
00:04:44
Speaker
my spirituality was so interwoven with that relationship. And when I say so interwoven, I mean, I was, I'll give you one example. There was a moment where my ex-wife, she was, we were in Africa and we were doing missions and she felt like God had said that I was supposed to be her husband and she's like, yeah, there's no way, we're just friends, I'm too young, it's not right, et cetera.
00:05:13
Speaker
And then she says to God, you know what, God, you either need to give him if this is really you, you need to give him a dream tonight or an open vision tomorrow saying that we are to be married or this is not God. This is just something that's in my imagination. These are just my hormones and I'm blowing it off.
00:05:33
Speaker
The next day we were in a class together and I was doing this fast and trying to learn how to hear God's voice and kind of leaning into my relationship with God, et cetera. And all of a sudden I
Crisis of Faith Post-Divorce
00:05:47
Speaker
got this picture. It's kind of like vivid picture, not an open vision as if we were standing there, but in my mind's eye. And I got this picture of my ex and I standing there holding hands and she was in a wedding gown and I was standing next to her and I was like,
00:06:02
Speaker
I review you, Satan. Of course you're trying to distract me because I'm trying to learn how to hear God's voice and you would try to come in at this time and plant these seeds. I'm just all young and super spiritual about my response, but I couldn't shake it.
00:06:19
Speaker
And eventually it got to a point where I wrote a little note on my notepad and passed it over to her and I was like, basically said, hey, this might sound crazy. I need you to pray for me afterwards because as you know, I'm trying to learn how to hear God's voice and I'm distracted by this silly little picture of you and I being married. Obviously it's not God. I need you to like pray and shake this off of me.
00:06:45
Speaker
and she wouldn't do it. She wouldn't pray for me. She started laughing and obviously I didn't understand at the time but she was getting this confirmation right from God that it actually was meant to be and we probably had
00:07:00
Speaker
15 or more of those little Interactions where neither one of us knew the other story but we were having these kind of spiritual experiences and Confirming that this you know, this is the one and so when we eventually started dating and we kind of went into it with this understanding that yeah, I mean it may be
00:07:25
Speaker
a year, it may be five years, it may be 20 years, but eventually I'm gonna marry this woman. And that's kind of how I saw it because I had all these my own sets of confirmations. And what ended up happening was when that marriage came to an end, obviously with any divorce, there is grief. There's not just grief of the pain and the accusations and the heartache that you're saying to one another.
00:07:54
Speaker
but there's also the pain of grieving the past, sure, but there's the pain of grieving the future. We had dreams together, we created three human beings together, et cetera.
00:08:08
Speaker
And for me, because God was so interwoven with us getting together. And when I was standing there on our wedding day and it said, the pastor said, what God brings together, let no man separate. I believe that I was all in on that theology. And I was all in that, you know, there's no way we're going to have hard times.
00:08:32
Speaker
We're gonna have disagreements, we're gonna have financial hardships, we're gonna not see each other. All that's gonna happen, but I can always fall back on this reassurance that our coming together was so supernatural that there's no way that this would actually come to an end.
Isolation and Loss of Community
00:08:53
Speaker
And so when it did,
00:08:56
Speaker
It was not only the death of my marriage, but really in a large sense, the death of my relationship with God, or what I knew to be my relationship with God at the time. And you couple that with that we were very involved with church at the time, and most of our friends who we had moved across the country with to plan a church, in a sense kind of disappeared.
00:09:19
Speaker
they didn't really know what to do about our situation and so a lot of them basically did the obligatory I'm so sorry I'll pray for you but then really not much else no texts no calls and and so a lot so my community disappeared our large percentage of my community disappeared at the same time that my marriage disappeared at the same time this
00:09:44
Speaker
life that I had built building towards been making all kinds of mistakes had insecurities dealt with depression like it wasn't perfect but I've been building towards this long term vision of growing old with this woman that came to an end and there was a death there
00:10:02
Speaker
And I mean, I reached a point where ultimately I, after my divorce, got to a point where I literally had a gun to my head. And anybody who's been listening to my story long enough knows that that's a part of it. Where I was propped up on a lot of VA medications and
00:10:20
Speaker
they weren't sufficient for me, right, for me. I know that they really helped some people, but for me, they basically kept me alive but didn't help me live. And I reached a point where I had a gun to my head and because I had lost everything that I knew to be my life. And I'm saying all that to say and to tie into this whole conversation around spirituality was what I didn't realize was that
00:10:51
Speaker
In that moment, during that time, I inadvertently subconsciously said to God, never again, that hurt too bad.
Rebuilding and Healing with Psychedelics
00:11:05
Speaker
I can't...
00:11:06
Speaker
be close to you because I felt so close to you when we got together, when my ex and I got together, I felt so close to God. Like I could hear his voice and I was in the Bible and I was involved in church and that was just a part of who I was. And then when there was a death of all of it and I reached a point where I felt, now fortunately I didn't pull the trigger, right?
00:11:36
Speaker
but I felt that my only way out was to end my life. That's how low and desperate I felt. Now, fortunately, I found psychedelics and they saved my life amongst other things, yoga, community, rebuilding a life, et cetera. But what I decided deep in the recesses of my heart was that I have to do this on my own.
00:12:01
Speaker
I have to do this thing called life on my own. And yes, I have had these really cool spiritual experiences with psychedelics and separate from psychedelics in nature with God. And it's not that it's been completely void, but at the core of who I am, I can't rely on God to be there for me. I can't rely on God to kind of be my savior because I counted on that.
00:12:30
Speaker
And it didn't work out. It didn't work out. And you can logically say, well, yes, there is God and there is spirituality, but there's also free will. And there are two individuals that both have free will. And if both don't choose into that marriage for one reason or the other, then it won't work no matter how much God tries to intervene. God loves us so much that he gave us free will so that we would have to be able to choose him in response.
00:12:58
Speaker
But for me...
00:13:01
Speaker
I have a tendency of kind of being all or nothing at times, black and white. You know, I had a friend in California who used to always encourage me. He's like, man, you got to find the middle ground. You got to find balance, you know, all these catch phrases. I'm like, show me one person who's made any change in the world that had balance. Anybody who's been effective has been all in, you know, he's like, great. Well, look for the radical middle. You got to be all out in something, radically pursue the middle.
00:13:32
Speaker
Now I was a little young to hear that at the time, but I'm learning more and more the value of that. But for me with my spirituality,
00:13:40
Speaker
It kind of was an all or nothing thing where I can no longer count on God. It has to be all on me. And I need to take the weight of digging myself out of this hole. I need to take the weight of really my own spirituality and in a sense find that God from within me. And I think that there is
00:14:05
Speaker
aspects of all of us that show the beauty of God, and I think God does reside in each one of us, but I essentially eliminated God from my day-to-day relationship. I eliminated God from my conversation, from my pursuit, from my journaling, from my meditation.
00:14:25
Speaker
And i turned to microdosing psychedelics first and then working with ayahuasca and psilocybin and so on and had powerful experiences in those moments.
00:14:37
Speaker
where you get those insights and revelations. And that's why I do psychedelic integration coaching because I have this deep seated need to go, okay, I got those insights. Essentially treating God like a vending machine saying, thanks for the cookie. Now I'm gonna walk away from the vending machine and I'm gonna eat it.
00:14:58
Speaker
I put such an emphasis on the integration component of it where essentially it's on me to do. I get these revelations, insights, whatever they may be, whether it be from God or from psychedelics or from having coffee with a friend. But it's on me to figure out how to do it. And this is not, please hear me, this is not an out for personal responsibility. I'm a massive proponent of personal responsibility and not playing the victim role.
Rejecting and Reevaluating Spirituality
00:15:26
Speaker
But when it comes to spirituality, there's so much more to it. And when, for me, when I eliminated God, essentially from the, not just the conversation, but from the room, I was like, you need to get the hell out because last time you were in here, we had an argument and you hit me with a two by four and I'm not feeling that pain again. So the only way I can not feel that pain is remove the guy with a two by four. That was my perception.
00:15:56
Speaker
what that generated in me at the core of who I am. I eliminated that comfort. I eliminated having something larger than me to build with. I eliminated my ability to dream, to pursue good things. Now, I have remarried. I have bought a ranch in Texas. I have done things.
00:16:23
Speaker
But if I'm honest with myself and I'm honest with you, a lot of that has been driven by my wife, my current wife. She's big on manifestations and dreaming and pursuing something bigger. But I had so removed God that I had, I had removed the creator and then was mad at myself because I couldn't create.
00:16:48
Speaker
And one of the things that I do is every year I get away for a couple days to kind of reflect and think about the year and sometimes dream or strategize or plan or journal for the coming year and kind of what I want out of that year. Highly recommend it to everyone. But for me, I did that a few weeks ago and I actually was working with MDMA at the time and was processing a lot of this and
00:17:17
Speaker
really for the first time probably in at least two years. Outside of I'm tucking my kids in at night and my son says, hey, dad, can you pray with me? Like, yeah, sure, dear God, pray that everybody sleeps good tonight and my kids get good grades, amen. You know, I just, not that flippant, but not really any emotion, no relationship to it. No interaction with God, just words out of my mouth.
00:17:48
Speaker
And I went for a walk. It was a gorgeous sunset. And I just began to cry. And I said, I don't want to do it alone anymore. He's actually been a guest on this podcast recently. David Charleston, who's one of my closest friends and my coach.
00:18:11
Speaker
And he's worked with me, and I remember him actually saying that the area of loneliness, because when it comes to me and business, yes, I have people around me, but I felt, and I still do feel, I'm working through this, it's not a light switch, but I felt so alone.
00:18:32
Speaker
And that loneliness, now you could say practically speaking, COVID-19 happened. We got isolated. Our societies changed. We've gotten more into our silos. We've got a presidential election coming up and people are mad at everybody. Like all those factors are real. I'm not dismissing any of those factors, but at the core of who I am, I felt alone.
00:18:56
Speaker
I would be sitting in my office at home where I'm recording this now and I wouldn't have much drive. I would literally sit in front of my computer, be like, okay, I need to do emails now. And they would just feel like I'm running a marathon through a swamp with ankle weights on. That's how that loneliness felt to me.
00:19:20
Speaker
And yes, I've struggled with depression and there are things that I do to help mitigate that. And I hope that you're hearing what I'm trying to say in this is I'm not trying to throw out the practicals, right? I get my blood work done. I've got episodes on the importance of all kinds of the thing, you know, whether it be positive triggers for your emotions or physical health or sleep or all of that is important. I'm just talking about one ingredient in the recipe of life and I'm focusing in on that one ingredient.
Renewed Relationship with God
00:19:52
Speaker
And for me, removing God from the room after the divorce, it's really no surprise that I've been using that metaphor, sitting alone in the room. And then I hire a coach and we work on all kinds of things, but one of them was my loneliness.
00:20:13
Speaker
And I'm like, ah, I'm so alone, I'm so lonely. And I could go and I could do yoga or I could go on a date with my wife or we could have friends over, but there was a deeper seated loneliness that was still there. I was still haunting me, still kind of like a black noise in the background. It's not even a white noise. It's like a black noise in the background. It's just like, yeah, you might be laughing right now at this comedy special, but you're still alone.
00:20:43
Speaker
And my wife has been gracious. My wife is super supportive. I don't per se feel alone in my relationship with her. I feel like we are a partnership. Except for times that we're arguing and then we kind of go to unhealthy self protective things. But in general, right, we have a great relationship. But I felt alone.
00:21:09
Speaker
See, I had effectively kicked out my best friend and then played the victim card. This is all subconsciously, but played the victim card and cried to my coach about my loneliness. And so using that metaphor,
00:21:28
Speaker
I kicked my best friend out of the room. I sat alone in the room. And then I had somebody come to the window and I'd crack open the window and go, I'm so alone. I'm so alone. And then slam the window shut. Cause I'd have my session with him, right? I'd have my hour meeting with him and I'd feel connected and I'd feel encouraged. And, but then that hour meeting would come to an end. And here I was all alone, all over again.
00:21:57
Speaker
And I'm sharing this with you for really two reasons. One is because what I've found in my own life is that when I talk about these things, it helps kind of solidify those experiences and where I'm at. Me articulating where I'm at helps me better own where I'm at for myself. And when I was on that walk and I said, I don't want to do it alone, I was equally honest with God.
00:22:28
Speaker
I said, I don't really know how to have a relationship with you anymore. I don't know what that looks like. I did the all or nothing thing where I was all in, even in my brokenness and dysfunction, I was all in. And then I was all out, but I wasn't like a 16 year old rebellious teenager that was like, screw you God, I'm going to do whatever is evil. I just kicked him out of the room.
00:22:55
Speaker
And now I'm opening the door and I'm going, I see you standing there, but I don't really know how to invite you in. And if I'm honest, my heart still feels a little scared, still feels a little scared to open back up.
00:23:17
Speaker
because logically I can see the situation, I can see my divorce and I can analyze it. I can see my side of things and I've spent time looking at the areas that really in a sense I fell short or where I didn't show up. And I can see the pain that my ex-wife was going through and kind of some of the driving forces of her actions.
00:23:42
Speaker
And actually my ex and I, we have a great relationship now, right? We co-parent and we talk regularly and we've forgiven one another and we've had hard conversations. So I can see that. I can look at all of that, but my heart and my spirituality, my spirit, it's still kind of calloused. It's still.
00:24:07
Speaker
feels timid to be able to do that all in, right? And maybe all in, even me saying those words right now out loud, maybe I don't need to go all in. Maybe there is a healthy radical middle that I can pursue with God.
00:24:26
Speaker
Because for me, it means, okay, I'm not going to be going to church three times a week and reading my Bible twice a day and becoming a scholar. It's not that. What I want and what I'm looking for is that relationship, that relationship piece that I shut down.
00:24:52
Speaker
that I shut down and it caused me to deal with the loneliness of it. And just like if you were hurt in a previous relationship, it's really scary to open your heart up to somebody else, at least it was for me. But doing that, when I did that, I found beauty, I found love, I found a new life, another opportunity, it's something different.
00:25:23
Speaker
My wife and I, now, will never have the relationship that my ex and I have, or had. Well, had or have. We won't. It's fundamentally different on many levels. And that's really what I'm looking for now, is that relationship with God that is fundamentally different on many levels.
Spirituality's Role in Masculinity
00:25:49
Speaker
but I'm open to it and I'm curious about it. And what I've found is I'm starting to take those ankle weights off and I can see there's actually an end to the swamp. There's flat road ahead and there's a water station where I can take a break.
00:26:13
Speaker
doesn't mean that I still don't have challenges, that I still won't get frustrated, that if I'm tired, I won't snap at somebody and have to apologize. Doesn't mean any of that. But what it means is that I don't have to do it alone. And what I want to encourage you with from this story and from where I'm at currently, real time, is that you don't have to do it alone. You don't have to do it alone.
00:26:40
Speaker
There's a lot of levels within that statement in and of itself, right? I don't know about you, but statistically speaking, men are not the best at reaching out and asking for help. I know I'm not, I know most of my friends are not. So maybe not doing it alone is doing just that. It's asking for help. Maybe it's getting involved in something new.
00:27:10
Speaker
Maybe it's finding a new recreation that you have always wanted to try, but you haven't tried. And maybe it's taking a moment to pause and ask yourself that question I asked at the very beginning of this recording, which is where is your spirituality now? Do you feel alone in your spirituality? Because if you do,
00:27:37
Speaker
There's a good chance that somewhere in your journey, somewhere in your life, maybe you didn't turn your back on God, maybe you did. And this isn't an altar call. This is just an invitation to consider it, to look at it, to look at your spirituality objectively and go, where am I at? And am I really happy with it? Is this what I want? For me, when I started to do that, the answer was a simple no.
00:28:09
Speaker
and I'm still sifting through what that looks like. I'm sifting through how to do it different, and I'm stumbling forward, and there's still days that have gone by where I haven't prayed and I haven't engaged in my spirituality. But you know what? There's days that I have. There's days that I've gone on walks and began to pray while I was walking. There's days that I'm starting to do things different, to ease into a new relationship with God.
00:28:40
Speaker
And if somebody as stubborn as me can begin that process and trust me, ask my wife, I'm one stubborn guy. If somebody as stubborn as me can begin to change that relationship, I'm willing to bet that regardless of where you are, maybe you're totally content. Maybe this podcast episode is like, yeah, that's a good story, Josh, but I'm good. Great.
00:29:07
Speaker
You're living with the consequences of the actions that you've taken in your spirituality. I think that's awesome. But maybe you're not happy with where you're at. And it's an opportunity to go, you know what? It's not gonna be easy. It's not even gonna be fun sometimes, but it will be rewarding. Just like my new relationship with my wife, it's not easy sometimes. It's not fun sometimes.
00:29:37
Speaker
but it's beautiful and it's rewarding and it's healing. And I think we all have that opportunity to be able to do that with God. And lastly, I would say that the spirituality masculinity component, I personally believe that it's very hard to be locked into your masculine without a spiritual component to it.
Encouragement for Personal Spiritual Assessment
00:30:05
Speaker
whatever shape that takes for you, right? I'm not here to say what religion it is or what form that takes or what practices you need.
00:30:14
Speaker
But I don't, just like I didn't know of any man that was balanced, that created change in the world. And I would argue that I could actually find some examples now. I also don't know of any men that found greatness in their life void of spirituality, where they took it all on their shoulders to do with themselves.
00:30:41
Speaker
Now there are men that have done amazing things and they're very self-driven men, but I'm talking about those men in the moments where they're all by their selves, laying down with their head on their pillow, brutally honest with themselves, to ask the question whether or not there's spirituality present in their masculinity. Because just like me being able to do some things on my own,
00:31:10
Speaker
You know, I've worked on business and I've bought a home and I've gotten married and I've done things, but I haven't really enjoyed it. I've enjoyed moments of it, but I haven't enjoyed it with the black noise of loneliness in the background. And I'm beginning to just feel the, the slow melting of that loneliness in my heart. And I gotta be honest, it feels really damn good.
00:31:40
Speaker
So if somebody stubborn like me can do it, I guarantee that if you're willing to be brutally honest with yourself, assess your spirituality, your relationship with God, and be willing to challenge yourself to change it if you're not happy with it. And then have the balls to be able to take one step forward when maybe your heart is scared or you've been hurt. That you'll find something beautiful on the other side of it.