Transcription

• Speaker #0

  Let's talk about porn and sex. Did that get your attention? I bet it did. It sure captures mine. As a parent of five, three of whom are super curious and love to ask me questions about anything, even this subject matter, I have to be ready at a moment's notice to discuss this, even if it's awkward for me, which it is. But you know what? Despite that, The topic of porn and sex is one I enjoy talking about. A lot. I know that sounds sus, but let me explain why. I'm Anna Murby, and this is Honest Christian Conversations. If this is your first time here, welcome. I'm so glad you are here. You picked a powerful episode to start with. And if you're returning, thank you for coming back. You know what to expect. Honest and real conversation grounded in truth. I get pumped discussing porn and sex because I struggled with porn addiction for 17 years of my life. God freed me from my addiction in such a significant way that ever since that moment, I have had a heart to see others set free from their own bondage, especially women who are unfortunately moving the needle toward porn. porn addiction no longer being just a man's issue. This has me thinking, why aren't pastors and Christian podcasters discussing porn and sex addiction in a way that includes women? Why are youth groups only going surface level on this topic instead of hitting it head on? And why are parents afraid to have these tough discussions about sex and porn with their children? If that last question made you wince, don't feel bad. I was there too. I already told you. It's awkward for me. This is not an easy subject. And for many of us, myself included, we were ill-equipped in our own childhoods to have this kind of conversation as parents now. Today, I have Chris Rogers, a certified porn addiction recovery coach, on the show to help me discuss this in honest and vulnerable detail. His specialty is helping the next generation and their parents learn the fundamentals of healthy dialogue about hard topics and shaping teen boys into the men of God they need to be. His heart for seeing the younger generation freed from sexual sin and my heart for women being set free from the shame they feel for struggling with a man's problem means this episode is a recipe for sobriety. for those who struggle with these addictions, and empowerment for parents or grandparents who want to help their loved ones overcome. Are you still unsure about this episode? I get it. Maybe this is too real for you because you aren't ready to face your own or your loved one's struggle with porn or sex addiction head on. Yet, I have a solution for you. Go into the show notes, click on the Retrain Your Brain series link, and let's tackle this one day at a time at your own pace with a special podcast I created just for you. No pressure, only encouragement and freedom. Whether this intro is making you squirm right now or getting you excited to hear more, you are in the right place at the right time. Let's start the conversation. Chris, thank you so much for coming on. This is going to be a very interesting topic that we have to discuss. pornography and how the church is not doing their job as discipling the people, shepherding the people in the right direction. They are avoiding this very glaring topic that is also starting to affect women, not just men. And nobody is talking about it except for us today. That is what we will be talking about. I am so excited. And that sounds weird, but I am excited to talk about. pornography, everything that we can learning about it from a men's perspective, from a woman's perspective, since everyone in my audience who listens for more than just this episode, if you're new, welcome. But I had a pornography addiction for 17 years. So we've got the male and the female perspective today, which is awesome. I am so pumped to talk to you. When you reached out, as soon as I saw that you were a former public school teacher, a worship leader, and now you are a... porn recovery coach and you help parents who are trying to train their young teen boys to become men of God. I love that. Absolutely love that. I knew I had to have you on. So I'm going to stop talking and you're going to start talking and share with us how you got into that because I know that you also had an addiction to pornography.

• Speaker #1

  Absolutely. Well, I'm really stoked to hear your perspective and a bit of your story as well. And seriously, thank you very much for having me and giving me the platform. I am a porn and sex addiction recovery coach. I have a couple programs that I'm very, very proud of. One of which you alluded to is the Rebooted Teen Parent Program, where, yeah, I walk parents by the hand as far as kind of addressing the reality of where we're at in 2026 with the boom of technology and social media and AI. But we also talk about the important. importance of things like mindfulness and what I like to call the culture of curiosity. But what I also am the head coach of is what's called the Rebooted Teen Program. So giving my experience as a teacher, this is my crew, you know, this is my demographic. And as far as being able to, sure, break down some information as far as how something like porn affects the brain, but also what I believe this generation is really, really calling for. and yearning for is a sense of authenticity because I could rattle off a whole bunch of information at you. But for my money, the cliche rings true. People won't care how much you know until they know how much you care. You know, we can just kind of knowledge and information them to death, kind of like bludgeon them in the head with, you know, a whole bunch of facts. But really, if that were enough to take someone out of an unhealthy. cycle, then maybe none of us would need coaching or counseling of any kind. We would just be cured just like that. When really what we're working with is a human issue, it's deeper below the surface. A big thing that I talk about and a big thing that I help clients come to understand for themselves that it's not the thing, it's the place from which it's coming from. What is that inner wound? What's that inner thing that we might be trying to escape? something we're uncomfortable with or trying to run away from or medicate through this particular behavior. And that's mostly what we try to focus on. How is the internal world kind of painting and coloring the external world, right? So that's a little bit of what I do. But as far as how I got into this field goes, like you said, I spent most of my professional life as a teacher. I was in New York City. I was a music teacher for a long time. And... you know, behind closed doors, I had a problem. Just to make a very long story short, you name the thing, I've done the thing, and I'm gonna leave it at that. I, you know, what started off as a teenager as just innocent curiosity, like, what is this? Unfortunately, escalated into things that looked like fairly risky behaviors. And I found a program that radically shaped my life, not even trying to be over the top. My heart and my mission now is to take that teaching skill set, being able to communicate effectively enough and break down info. But also it's an opportunity to, again, like sit alongside somebody and just be like, hey, man, like I've been there as well. Hope is possible. You know, as it's written, when two or more are gathered there, he is in the midst of us. Right. So I want to be that sort of instigator as far as involving a sense of community goes and kind of spark some conversations rather than. choose isolation and sweep some stuff under the rug. And I'm sure we'll get into that. I mean, there's wonderful people that I've met in my church that have been fatherly figures and just people that have the patience and the emotional stability to, you know, handle a tough conversation. But, you know, I think there's definitely a stigma around something like not simply pornography, but around the topic of sex in general, when in reality it's a part of life and we can only pretend it doesn't exist for so long.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  I'm not saying, you know, let's go up on the altar and just start, you know, all right, everybody open up your search history. Like, you know,

• Speaker #0

  yeah, you know,

• Speaker #1

  we can always keep it under the rug for so long. But all of us say it was very long with an intro,

• Speaker #0

  but it's fine. It's fine. Usually people who have an addiction to pornography or a sexual addiction, they tend to have had some sort of abuse in there. younger years. Was that the story for you? Because I know you said you came upon it, but I didn't know. How? And you can share as much or as little as you want. I was just, that's my first question.

• Speaker #1

  No, I appreciate it. So the term abuse, I want to be tactful with because, you know, I don't want to, you know, use it kind of frivolously and mean a bunch of different things. But within the, I will say the clients that I've spoken to, you know, it is a fairly common tale, you know, as far as let's put it this way, their introduction to sex was done against their will. therefore kind of shifting their reality and kind of quote unquote teaching them that this is what sexuality is. Yeah. This is just what it looks like. This is what life is like. And a lot of the recovery process involves a lot of unlearning and a lot of untangling yourself from unhealthy conditioning. and introduce you to... Not just, you know, a new perspective, but an overall, you know, new and fresh lifestyle. But in my own experience, you know, while thankfully I haven't had as tragic and traumatic an experience like that, I can, at least as far as, you know, how I quote unquote discovered, you know, pornography, again, it was a pop-up on the family computer before we all had smartphones.

• Speaker #0

  The stupid pop-ups.

• Speaker #1

  No one would get you, man.

• Speaker #0

  Or just as my mom did once. I actually shared my story and I've shared it on several podcasts, but one part of my story, not exactly how I came upon it, but probably more how I came upon actual pornography is my mom was trying to type in one word and she misspelled it by one letter. Something popped up and she freaked out and I caught a glimpse, like not that long, but it was enough to be in my brain. What's that?

• Speaker #1

  Right.

• Speaker #0

  That wasn't even my first encounter. But continue. I just that that made me think of that.

• Speaker #1

  Blast you back. But no, but but all that is to say, again, what started off as just that same thing. What is this? And there was a lot of secrecy. There was a lot of hush hushness about it. It's like at least in my household and God bless my parents at the time, I understand that they did the best they could when it came to. protecting me from certain things.

• Speaker #0

  Did you grow up in a Christian home?

• Speaker #1

  I did. Yeah. Both my parents, you know, grew up and, you know, they were, they have angelic voices, you know, they grew up kind of like being the faces of the franchise when it came to my church choir and stuff. But, you know, as much as I did grow up in a Christian home, my parents did get divorced.

• Speaker #0

  Mine too.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  So my parents sheltered me from a lot of the things, like everything you were saying about they didn't talk about. this. It wasn't talked about. I can relate. I didn't have anyone explaining things to me.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. And I think that is fairly a common tale. And because of that, there almost became this almost mystical quality. It's like, you know, don't do X, Y, Z. Then naturally you're sort of just like, why?

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. Curiosity. Yeah, exactly.

• Speaker #1

  So it starts there for most people. At least It's a very common tale within the clients that I see. to do. And really what I try to help people understand is that if there's going to be a conversation about something like sex or pornography, it doesn't have to be weird. You know, it's again, when it comes to something like sex and porn, we can get a little more nuanced, but building our way there. Let's start with something like sex, right? It's something that exists now. Yeah. All at the birds and the bees. You can call it this, that and the third. As far as an... overall rule of thumb, if you're going to be weird about it, they're probably going to end up feeling weird about it. So as far as being the initiator of a conversation, if you're a parent or guardian or caregiver, oftentimes there is a bit of a need for the release of shame on our own end. Because when it comes to your children looking at you, especially in their younger into formative years, a whole ton of it is monkey see monkey do. As soon as you think they're not listening, as soon as you think they're not paying attention, they're keeping their eye on you. Like, I noticed that mom and dad, they treat each other this way. Oh, okay, that's just how to do it. Oh, I noticed that whenever a conversation around this sort of topic, it could be anything like money. There's like a lot of tension that builds. Oh, money equals fear. That's just a lesson that's learned. So if you're going to approach it with this sort of like. tiptoe look for the mines in the minefield. Really just it's when I mentioned this overall idea, like the culture of curiosity, like there's a story that I often go to. I was at a family party. This was like a year or two ago. And my cousin, like she knows what I do. He has a nine-year-old son. He was nine at the time. He was like, yeah, you know, my son. I caught them kind of like looking at some things on the internet. Can you talk to them?

• Speaker #0

  Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  It's in the middle of a family party. Oh, yeah, So I pull him aside. You know, we grab a table. We grab some seats, right? I'm just like, yeah. Your mom was telling me you were checking some things out. Now, immediately right off. that her son's first thought was like, tail between the legs, oh, I'm in trouble. When I'm just like, well, no, I'm just like, what were you checking out? What was going on? And he was like, yeah, it's like porn and stuff. And I was like, okay. Like, what is that? Like kind of playing dumb in a way, getting a feel for what they know already. Like, what does it make them feel? You know, like having the answers truly kind of come from them. Again, it's not just the behavior itself. It's not just the thing they're being exposed to, although we'll get to that. One thing that I truly want to encourage people as far as an overall attitude and approach is choose your target wisely. Again, it's not the thing. It's the place from which it's coming from. You know, we don't necessarily need to fix, you know, porn. what's the thing that is sort of like the internal magnet that would like pull us toward a particularly unhealthy behavior that's the target you know yeah so he was like yeah you know it was like porn and stuff oh what is that oh it's like you know it's like sex or whatever it's like okay it's like like what what is that you know how does that make you feel when you watch that and not looking for an answer just genuinely like oh you know it makes me like i don't know it excites me or whatever i was like oh okay i mean I understand. To be feeling that particular way, particularly as a growing boy who will one day become a man, feeling those types of things are part of the package. They're not going anywhere. My clients ask me, hey, Chris, how do I get rid of urges? I'm like, brother,

• Speaker #0

  as soon as you figure that one out. Poor things.

• Speaker #1

  You know, but, you know, but but there's. of course, the difference between feeling that natural human sexual desire and lust. It's like one is healthy and part of the package and one is the fixation on it.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. That's where self-control comes into play. Yeah,

• Speaker #1

  exactly. So it's really kind of separating the two because just because you're having a sexual urge or thought or feeling, they're not synonyms. Does that make sense? You know, like sometimes a lot of the conversations that are had, they kind of put both on the same pedestal. It's like if you're having a sexual feeling or thought at all, you're sinning just by experiencing that. And we do dive into, you know, ways to, you know, develop self-control. So that way, whatever feeling we have, they're not driving the car, right? We remain in control. We talk about practical ways to do that. But the fact that you're feeling it at all, like. We got to just, you know, really separate the difference between healthy human sexual feelings and lust. So really starting there that the fact you're feeling this isn't bad, but yeah, it's just something to be aware of and something to expect, especially as a man speaking to a growing man. I put it on myself as part of my role to be like, hey, man, I've seen this movie before. Like this is what to expect. These are where the jump scares happen. This is what's a part of it. And this is what to do. So anyway, I know I'm sharing a whole ton. I appreciate you listening. No,

• Speaker #0

  it's it's very interesting, very helpful. And it makes me realize even more that I did not handle this situation with my son very well when he was in fifth grade. And I've shared this story before, but I. I caught him looking at something. Long story short, God helped me find out that he was doing that. Praise God. It was after like only one time or two times. But he had a very terrible friend who told him about two videos on YouTube and he had watched those. And I flipped my gourd because coming from having a major addiction to it for 17 years. I didn't handle it very well. He was crying. I was crying. I snapped. I explained to him why I was upset. I told him about my addiction, how it affected me. Like, I just, I just was honest with him. And I told him, I still love you. I will always love you. But I just, I was extremely emotional.

• Speaker #1

  Which I want to give you grace for, you know, I don't think you necessarily did anything wrong. You were honest and you reacted, you know, but you realized where it came from, which is what a lot of people won't do. So good on you for kind of like picking up on that. So that's really, really key.

• Speaker #0

  Well, thank you for that. Yeah, it is definitely very important that when... we see our kids doing this or we catch them doing something that we don't make them feel like the worst person ever. They probably already feel a lot of guilt, shame and embarrassment because you actually caught them doing something or watching something. I don't think adding on our embarrassment, our shame that we're feeling because our child is looking at this stuff is very helpful to them. And it brings back to what you were saying. about monkey see monkey do they see how we react to this so therefore they're going to be like oh okay so this is bad this is awful this is evil I can't do this right I don't know why but I'm not supposed to do this because this is the reaction I'm going to get when people hear about it and I think that's why a lot of people have a lot of guilt and shame and they hide it and they don't want people to know because that's the reaction you usually get when someone says oh I have an addiction to to pornography, you just get this big, oh no, like that's disgusting. How could you? You awful thing, you. And it's like, well, look internally at your own heart. The Bible clearly says that if you look at someone with the intent of lust, you're sinning. So he's not saying those who look at pornography, he's saying those who do that, you're already sinning. You're already committing adultery. So. That leads me to believe that we all have the capability of doing that. You don't have to actually be looking at porn to have those lustful feelings. And it's like you said, there's a difference between lust and what we're supposed to have. He created us to procreate. You can't do that if you have no desire to do that. So, of course, we have those desires that he has for us to have, but we have to have the self-control to. overcome and not let it get to the last. So I've soaked in everything you're saying. I absolutely agree. I love it. And yeah, as a parent of five kids, this is a situation that is very difficult for me. I did not do things well when my oldest was home. And then, like I mentioned, my son. He had a douchey friend who told him about websites. He would have never, I mean, he probably would have being in junior high and high school. We can't be naive about what they are hearing or not. And that's what I learned, especially after that subject. I kind of already knew it because I'm not dumb. But after that. that situation, that's when I realized I can't be naive about what they know already. And I also have to get over my own anxieties about having these kind of conversations. Because I also grew up in a family where we didn't discuss these things. And if we did, we used silly words. I don't know if you've ever seen the show Scrubs. But one of the old doctors used to make fun of the blonde nurse, I forget what her name was, because she'd call lady parts hoo-ha and all this other stuff. Like she just gave them silly names because she just couldn't say it. And I resonated so much with that and laughed at it because of how stupid it is. But at the same time, I was that person. That was me up until this situation with my son. And I'm like, I can't be that anymore. Because if something happens to them, they have to be able to have a conversation with me. Hey, so-and-so did this to me, or this happened to me at school, or someone asked me about this and I don't know what it is. I wanted them to feel comfortable to be able to come to me and have those conversations. And in order for that, I had to suck up whatever discomfort I had from never having those conversations. It's gotten a lot easier, and I will just... My daughters, my youngest ones, are trying to come up with some code name for things. I was like, no, call it what it is. This is what it is. And it's still weird for me to say it, but it's necessary. And I know how necessary it is. Yeah, we as parents need to be there for our children. We need to be mature and handle things in a more mature way. And if we can't do it on our own, we need to have people help us. We need to pray and ask God to help us because it's not easy to have these conversations, especially because, you know, they might actually know more than you because if they're in public school, I mean, my son has asked me questions that. I never would have asked my parents back in the day because those were things that were never going to come up. Transgender this. Why is there a dude wearing a dress at my school? Like these were just well, I went to a Christian school, so really wouldn't have happened. Right. You know, even that happens at Christian schools. Now they talk about these things, so they know more than we think they do. Or we're just being naive if we don't believe that. Even if they go to a Christian school, they know things. They're hearing things. They're finding things. out. What tips do you have for parents who are either actually naive to what their kids might know, even if they feel they've sheltered them enough, or they are just pretending like they're naive because they really want to keep their kids safe. So they're pretending like they just, oh, my kids don't know these things, but they actually do. Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  I will go as far as saying they do. They know, you know, the Internet is a big place. And if you have access to it, understand that you have access not just to, you know, YouTube and, you know, a couple of clicker games. You have access to all of the information that, you know, has ever been documented, essentially. So with that, you know, with unfiltered access to all the information that all the world has ever had, they have probably heard some things that, like you said, you would have never brought up to your parents or. Stuff you would have never even known existed. But that doesn't need to give you a reason to freak out, sound the alarm, and blow every whistle, and everything down that line. Again, the trick is to instill that culture of curiosity. We can talk about the things that they're seeing. We can talk about the things that they're watching or perhaps things that have been exposed to them. But how does it feel like when you are watching that? Get to know the heart of the situation. The goal of a lot of these types of conversations, I would truly, truly suggest, is to instill, yes, that culture of curiosity, but truly that culture of discernment. Like, what is, what do you actually want? Like, who are you? The Bible talks about, you know, who you're designed to be. If you're made in his image, your body is a temple, who are you? And what do you actually want? And do these types of behaviors and these types of things align with that? So by the time you have an inclination to act out in a certain way or go down a certain road or hang out with a certain person, could be anything, do you have that skill of discernment to be able to pick apart one voice that comes from the essence of you? or something that deviates from it. It's like you can start to look at decisions sort of like a crossroad. Like one is leading you down a road you've been called to go down and the other is leading you in an opposite direction. Because we can talk about filters. We can talk about blockers. We can talk about limiters.

• Speaker #0

  And we can probably figure out how to get around those anyway.

• Speaker #1

  Absolutely. Yeah, I mean,

• Speaker #0

  I could, I could. That's how nobody knew I had it. I knew how to delete my browser history. how to make it look like I wasn't anywhere. I mean, yeah, you can figure this out if you really want to.

• Speaker #1

  Oh, yeah. It's truly not that difficult, but it truly calls to mind the biggest lesson of all. The biggest filter that your child will ever have is going to be themselves. What do you teach and what do you encourage? Let's say when they go off to somewhere like college, right? When they leave the home eventually. Do they have the skills necessary for? that sense of, yes, curiosity, but discernment. When they're kind of like living unfiltered, when they have like devices around them that don't have the blocker on them or don't have filter of some kind on them, do they have the wherewithal and the community to lean on that can help them out? Do they have that clear distinction of what they want and the skill of being able to make decisions based on that? And in the program, we talk about like, for example,

• Speaker #0

  just to kind of like give one brief little coaching exercise. One of my favorite tools of all time is something called dialoguing. So how it works, just to give a brief example, it's really, really fun, actually. It's a journaling exercise. So basically what you do is you take out a notebook, you take out a pencil or pen, and you essentially script out a conversation between yourself and what a counselor who wrote this book called Breaking the Cycle, George Collins. Really easy read, but awesome, awesome information. He calls a sub personality. So it's a part of your personality. So let's talk about what he might call your addict self. So there's you over here and there's your addict self, right? So you essentially write out a conversation between yourself and your addict sub personality. It's like you say something and then they say something. It's literally like you're writing out like lines in a movie script, essentially. You know, it's like. Hence, like a dialogue between two characters, right? Yeah. You're over here, you say something. They're over there, they say something. And you go back and forth. And you speak from both perspectives. Now, just from that one example, just from that one sort of dialoguing exercise, what does that prove? A couple of things. One, you're over here and it is over here. So, therefore, you are not this subpersonality. You are not this feeling. You're not this thought. And it is not you. You SUP- Separate yourself from it, not in a sense of like, oh, let me, you know, distract myself with something so I don't have to feel it. Or let me just shame it away or let me just, you know, do something else where I don't have to feel it or let me numb it in some way. You're separating yourself from it from really a sense of compassion, truly from a sense of compassion. It's like, OK, this is a part of me. It's not the entirety of me. It's just a part of me that wants something. It's like another way to think about it is like a sub personality can be someone knocking on the door, like after you've had a long day of school or a long day of work, whatever fits. Right. And you answer the door. You're tired. You're groggy. You don't want to talk to anybody. But you open up the door and you see the person at the door and it's someone that you're not a super big fan of. Whoever just popped into your head. That's not the film right now. So You got two options, right? You can either like, hey, good to see you. Bye. You know, slam the door in their face. Or you can let them in at least for a little while and ask why they came to visit you at all. Dialoguing is about choosing that option. You let them in for a while, have a brief conversation. What's on your mind? What do you want? And you give them the opportunity to say their piece. And because you're writing from their perspective, that's a way of... processing that particular feeling. That's a way of letting it pass. You're literally validating its existence by one, giving it a name. That's where you can have some fun with it. You can like literally give it a name and you're giving it a voice. You're giving it the chance to speak. It's your nervous system trying to tell you something. So you're letting it process, you're letting it speak and you go back and forth. You have that conversation. One great way to kind of keep that conversation going is simply ask it questions. What do you want? Why do you want this so badly? And you go back and forth. And however long the dialogue, however long the conversation goes on, it can be really, really healthy. But here's the best part. Because it's your house, in that house example, you have the final say to when it's time for them to leave. Right? So you take the power back. You not only separate yourself from that feeling or urge or thought pattern, from a sense of compassion, but you also remind yourself who. has the final choice. And that's you. You are in charge of your decision making. It can be a really, really empowering exercise. But just from that one tool alone, there's a lot of different exercises that sort of branch off that one idea. What's going on internally to the point where it's affecting me externally. So with all that being said, those are the types of skills that I would encourage parents and caregivers to encourage and teach. And you can make it. fun. You can gamify it. And we talk about this more in the program, but that could be a fun place to start.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. I love that. That's actually very insightful. And the imagery of someone knocking at your door, I feel like, I feel like a horrible person because what came to mind was Jehovah's Witness. Like, oh, because I have this woman who does come over and she's very sweet and but she always comes when I can't actually talk. a lot of times I wonder, does she think I'm just saying that? I legit can't talk whenever she comes, but that's what I thought about. I'm like, I'm a person, but I talk to her. I do. I do when she, when I'm able to, even if it's like five minutes, but we still talk. But I do love that analogy completely. And it makes sense in this idea as well. And I think it can work for any addiction, really. And for anything, not even what we would consider addictions, but anger, sadness, all these different things. Like it's just a very powerful tool for helping you understand deep feelings of why you're feeling this way.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. in this type of work. going back and forth with that particular sub personality, that particular part of you. It's a great place to start. But like you said, once you kind of get more used to this type of exercise, you can start to make it much more nuanced. Have a conversation with your anxious side. Have a conversation with your overwhelmed side. If you experience like states of depression, have a conversation with it. Get curious. Let it process, you know, because the more we sort of distract ourselves from a particular feeling or urge or thought pattern, whatever it is, that's where like anxiety, angst, tension piles up.

• Speaker #1

  You know,

• Speaker #0

  this is where like that thing in our stomach, like we're doing something bad. It's, we're not letting certain things process. It's like your nervous system is sort of like freezing over time. And with that release, there's that sense of like, you know?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  So, so. Your point, you can really make an exercise like that much more specific. Yeah, I love it.

• Speaker #1

  I could see why. It's an amazing tool and it just seems so simple. It probably isn't when you first start because you probably feel a little weird. You're talking to yourself. But we all do it anyways. We all talk to ourselves. So why not get real with yourself and be honest with yourself? When you were talking about how, you know, if you don't let those things out that you're thinking, the, I guess, dark thoughts, it reminds me of Dexter. I used to watch that show back in the day, and his dad taught him how to handle the dark thoughts. In my opinion, he didn't teach him how to do it right because he was murdering, but we won't go there. He was trying to help him harness that into a more, quote unquote, healthy way. And that's what we need to do with our dark thoughts. We can't dismiss them because as you mentioned, you can only do that for so long before they come out somehow in some way that is unhealthy. It reminds me of when I used to bottle up all my anger. I was a very big people pleaser when I was younger. I didn't want to hurt anybody, so I didn't make waves. Everything just got shoved into a bottle until that bottle was full and... What are you going to do? You can't shove anything else in there. So it just explodes on some random person who just asked me, did you want pickles on that? And it's like, no, I hate pickles. How could you not know? Stupid McDonald's worker. And it's like, they're just doing their job. They wouldn't know that I don't like pickles. But because I've been shoving down all this random stuff forever, I just lashed out at them. And I hated doing that. And I knew it was wrong, but I didn't know how. I didn't know what to do. And anger happened to be one of my triggers for why I looked at pornography. So if I had had this tool, this mindset of you can talk to that. It's not wrong to have these feelings. You just need to figure out why they are so significant to you. I never had anyone to ask me those questions. I never asked those questions. I was just like, I can't have these. I don't want people to know that I have this stuff. So I need to hide it. And because of that, I had a 17-year addiction. I was a miserable person to be around. I didn't even want to be around me because I didn't know who me was. I was too busy being me to everybody else. So yeah, I absolutely think that this is a transformative idea. I know you've got other ideas on how parents can help their children. But let's also talk about how if you're personally dealing with a pornography addiction, what other tips do you have for them on how to handle it? Because I think it's different when you're teaching a parent how to help their child or when you're helping a teen yourself, you're helping them. But how do you approach it with an adult where you're the adult, they're an adult? you can have that adult conversation together.

• Speaker #0

  100%. The biggest thing to start off with is... What do you want? It sounds like a simple question, but it's like, what do you want? Why are you here? Let's say like you're my client. You're here for a reason. I pretty much ask you like, do you want this? You know, like, do you want to do away with whether it's porn or, you know, other compulsive sexual behavior? Like, you know, do you want that? OK, cool. So if yes, you know, what does that life look like for you? So in which case, we know what you don't want. What do you want? Because the system that I want to help provide is accountability and a system that makes you getting there as streamlined as possible. Because we're not just trying to put the problem on a pedestal. We're trying to shine a spotlight on the solution. That's what real recovery is all about. There's going to be a hustle either way. There's going to be work involved. But the hustle isn't simply you running away. from a particular behavior, but running toward that thing that you say that you want. And my role as a coach is to give you the tips, tools, and techniques to help get you there. So that's how we would work. What is it going to take and have it come from you? And from that point on, it's us coming up with a system, a structure, and you delving into community to sure motivate you and encourage you and pick you up if you're down, but Yeah, like really starting off with the mindset that slips aren't failure. This might be a little controversial, but I'm not a big fan of the overall model that a slip means you go back to day one. I don't personally abide by that. It's data. It's information. It's an opportunity for you to learn about yourself, your triggers. I don't really care how long it's been since the last time you had a slip. It could be a day. it could be a week. It could be years. Being able to do away with a particularly unhealthy behavior for a long time is a feat and absolutely deserves to be celebrated. But are you actually recovering or are you only? Because in mainstream recovery speak, you know, we kind of put the term sobriety and recovery kind of on the same pedestal when one has to do with the other, but they're not mutually exclusive. Does that make sense? So just to put that down. So sobriety is the term that's often used where we're like, we're not drinking anymore. We're not using a drug. We're not engaging in a particularly compulsive activity. Right. We're not doing that thing anymore. We're free from this. We're sober from it. Right. Now, recovery. Now, that's the key word. What is the thing that needs to be recovered? What's the thing that needs to be healed? That's the internal stuff. So sobriety. or doing away with a particular behavior, it's an important piece of the puzzle, but it's just one piece. You know what I'm saying? It's just one piece of the overall puzzle. Some of the other pieces include that curiosity, that discernment, the community, the discipline aspect, the communal aspect. It's other pieces that eventually form that image of the person that you actually want to be. So how do you start off with a client? that is dealing with a compulsive behavior, you start off with pretty much outlining that. We're going to talk about different tools and tips that you can do in the moment to get yourself out of a jam. We're going to start nice and basic, but long term, it takes statistically about a year and a half, two years for the brain to fully rewire. We're not just dealing with a behavioral modification here. We're dealing with a lifestyle change. We're dealing with an identity change. You know, it's like we've conditioned ourselves for so long to be like, OK, if I'm feeling X, then I do Y. That's been the formula we've been following. And the solution isn't OK from now on. If I feel X, then I do Z. It's just like I'm feeling X and that's OK. I'm not necessarily bad for feeling X, but understanding that I have the. tools to process it in a particular way so that I can feel this thing without letting it dictate my decision making. I can feel this particular thing without it becoming an overall hindrance toward the person that I actually want to be. I have a community that I can lean on and I can trust and verbalize these ideas to. I have a coach that I can lean on. And it starts there. It's not, this isn't like a replacement behavior group.

• Speaker #1

  Replacement behavior doesn't help because if you already are addicted to something and you try to retrain your brain with that thing. I think you can, well, it's happened to me, you can transfer that addiction to something else. And it may be not as bad as, you know, whatever it was you were addicted to, but it's still, you're creating a new one rather than like you said, getting to the heart of it, recovering, not just, you're just creating something new. That's what I did. I got sucked into eating and then I got sucked into working out. after a while, I couldn't work out anymore. I kept getting hurt. I'm like, okay, now what do I do? God's like, finally, you can recover then. It's like, okay. And honestly,

• Speaker #0

  it's in the church, it's probably like Christianese, but honestly, it's those breakdowns that leads to one's breakthrough. We are literally running away from a particular thing, maybe in your case, literally running, shocking. Once you hurt yourself, it's sort of like you're slowed down And you kind of have no choice but to kind of like be with yourself for a while. And that's when you said, oh, I can finally recover. I can finally process some stuff and be with it. And that's all it wants. That's so good. You know, conversations that I've heard and ones that I've been a part of in a church environment, I heard this amazing thing that a pastor said one time where the enemy will oftentimes make its way to you through your wants. And I want to break down what that means. So through your wants. So it's like, I want to be validated. I want to feel happy. I want to feel a part of something. I want to feel sexy. I want to feel attractive to somebody. I want to feel like I'm connected to somebody. Okay. Here's this thing called pornography.

• Speaker #1

  You know?

• Speaker #0

  Oh, I want to feel successful. I want to take the edge off. I want to. to feel like I'm free of responsibilities. Okay, here's something called alcohol. Here's something called this particular vice. The enemy will make its way to you through your wants. But when we release ourselves from those particular wants, as far as our emotional attachment to them, to the point we cling on to it so that we're identifying intimately with it, when we release that and put it before his altar, it's like, you know, I mean, literally, how does Psalm 23 start? The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. I'm free from my attachment to want because in this moment, in this relationship, I have everything I need. You know, it really kind of gets to the core. So once that concept hit, I was like, yeah,

• Speaker #1

  that's what's happening to my mind right now. That is brilliant. And you So very helpful in so many different ways, not just with a pornography addiction, but for the one who's listening right now and they're feeling this in their soul that they have a problem with connecting with the bad things that they think and they feel shame and guilt because of it and they don't know how to get rid of it. You've just given them some very solid ways to help. work through that, not just get rid of it until the next one comes or distractions. As you mentioned, this world is full of distractions and we don't need any distractions. We need to sometimes slow down and focus on what it is so that it won't become a problem next time. I'm always telling my kids, if you don't like having to hear me say this over and over again, I don't like having to say it over and over again. So if you don't want to have this conversation again, learn what I'm telling you now and implement that so that this doesn't have to come up again another time. But if you don't learn from it, then don't be surprised when we have to have this same conversation again. And it's the same thing with us. That's what God is telling us. If you don't want to have to keep dealing with this addiction. do this, work through this, let's fix this problem, not just put a bandaid on it until the next time. That's not going to help anything. And yeah, I love everything you're saying. It's absolutely so helpful, so freeing. And I know the audience is taking notes. They better be. You better be taking notes. If you aren't taking notes, you're going to have to listen to this again and take notes. These are good things. You can't ignore this. We all have something that we can work through. You may not have an addiction like we had of pornography or sex or alcohol or drugs. There's many things you can be addicted to. It's been discussed through this whole season so far. So we've all had something that we are addicted to. And these are tools that not only help for pornography or for helping your kids through that, it can help in any type of situation you're going through. So there is really no excuse at this point for you to feel alone and like you can't do this, you can't overcome this negative thing or whatever. Chris has given us many opportunities to write stuff down and practice and implement it, which I will definitely be working on and helping my kids do as well. So you too, who's listening, you need to be doing this as well. We are not in this alone. We are in this together. And that is what this podcast is for, is for community and helping each other through. So if you need prayer at all during this time, I'm here for you. Go to honestchristianconversations.com contact and let me know what you need help with, because I don't want to see you suffer anymore. This is... This life is short and we don't need to suffer alone. So yeah, if you need help, I'm here for you. Chris, let's transition a little bit and talk about how the church can do better with this subject and helping parents with their kids who are dealing with it and just help get rid of the stigma that the church seems to have around this topic.

• Speaker #0

  Sure. in a sentence, if you lead with shame, they will stay the same.

• Speaker #1

  Oh, I love it. Put it on a t-shirt.

• Speaker #0

  No, but this kind of goes back to what we were talking about in the beginning of our conversation. Perhaps a lot of our experiences, and I think it might be common for your listeners too, around something like porn or sex. It's a lot of like, just no. It's just kind of like a big do not enter sign, right? But again, there's... there's that balance between like, you know, this is what's going on and let's be solutions oriented. We're not going to go into panic zone. We're going to remind ourselves that no matter what's going on, our God is bigger. So let's not choose the anxiety route. Let's not get up in arms. Like let's, let's just be solutions oriented. Yes. And amen. So here's what do you do? So as far as from my perspective, one, Be aware of what your children are being exposed to. From my experience as a teacher, I had a very interesting experience working as a teacher in the middle of the pandemic. Here we are, I mean, of course, here we are now, speaking through a screen, but when we were doing school online for a while, because I used to teach high school, middle school, but I also taught elementary school too, ran the whole gamut. And I noticed how- how that period of isolation and dependency on a screen affected my young ones. Because by the time they kind of, we started getting back into the building and stuff, let's say my students as young as kindergarten, when we came back to the building, they were going into second grade. But socially, they were still very much in kindergarten. Here we are trying to do our best with all the positive intentions in the world. There's more to the world than just your screen. Hey, put your screen down, touch grass, put some time away. It might not compute because we got to keep in mind what was their experience during that time? It's like, here's everything that they could ever want. What were some of the lessons that were taught during that period of time? All right, here's where school is going to be. Here's where your entertainment is going to be. Here's where your... community, your friends, your family are going to be seen and heard and interacted with, right? Here's where all the information you can find is going to be. It's all in a one-stop shop. So with the term, when I was your age, we have to really start by understanding it doesn't as, it doesn't apply as neatly as we might think it does. Okay. We're talking about a generation that is coming up in an age that doesn't know what life was like before something like social media. We're talking about a generation that's growing up without an experience of not knowing what AI is. Like this generation's cooked. It's meeting them where they're at. You and I, you know, we at least maybe we grew up in an age maybe before the massive boom of the internet right yeah and then before we knew it myspace became a thing facebook rolled around youtube right the dawn of you yeah google i think i'm older than google there you go yeah so we at least have that experience they don't it's like we have an option whether or not to partake But something like just social media and even pornography, it's become such an integral part of just the cultural zeitgeist. It's not just like an option, but it's sort of like the expectation. Like this is just what. Well,

• Speaker #1

  look at what they watch, too. I mean, they're trying to push it in there, too. Soft porn is everywhere. So, yeah. Advertising. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  So with all that said, just being aware. So with all that context intact. The first thing to keep in mind is we're talking about a generation that is having an experience that we did not have. So blanket statements like, you know, when I was your age don't fit as neatly. And it sort of invalidates their experience. Starting there, just as a perspective switch, I think is a good place to start. That's the first thing. Second thing, with that in mind, again, instill that culture of curiosity. Take it back to that family party conversation. What do you know? Now, the precursor being build a relationship through something like Sunday school, whether it's through something like youth group or a young adults group, like just take the weirdness out of the room. Sometimes nothing's more powerful than your own testimony. Just really kind of meet people where they're at and just show that health and salvation and recovery are indeed real things and very much possible. there's something that you can use from your own experience and your own walk to bring light and truth to that, then I would certainly recommend that you share it. I think that, again, we're talking about, again, a generation in the age of fake news and artificial intelligence and where things can be easily manipulated and it's just constant stimulation where there's just a new think piece and political sway of things. Everything is just happening all at once. once. So it's very, it's become even to us increasingly difficult to know what's true and what isn't. We're talking about a generation that is hungry and parched for a sense of authenticity, encouraging really a community that is, that's the motor of their car. Like what I used to tell to my students all the time and what I've shared in the Rebooted Teen program, coming from a music teacher background, I would always say like, you know, that moment in time where you see a singer on stage. maybe on American Idol or even in person, and they're singing a song, they're doing their thing, and all of a sudden they just start getting choked up. They just start like breaking down crying. You ever see that before? And for all intents and purposes, they're not sounding very good in that moment. They're like straight in their voice and maybe they're forgetting their words and they're singing notes wrong or whatever. But you also notice something else. Whenever that happens, it's not like anyone in the crowd is just like, boo. They're literally doing the exact opposite. They're like standing. They're like, yes, that's what we're paying for. That's what we want to see. The lesson being people would rather see something real than something perfect. In the age of filters, in the age of, again, AI, where everything needs to be crafted and formulated in just the right way. It's something in us that is just crazy. craving for that sense of authenticity, particularly this generation. And what I try to share is that people would rather see something real than something perfect. I talk about it with clients all the time. Another example is think about any comedy movie ever. The movie is funny enough. And then many times at the end of the movie, what do they have? The blooper reel, all these actors that are messing up their lines or whatever. And they're like laughing because of it. Why do we oftentimes... enjoy that more. People would rather see something real than something perfect. It's just this thing. So when it comes to, oh, I don't know if I can share about this. Oh, can I talk about this? I feel weird. The more personal something is, the more universal it actually is. If you want to talk about something like porn, as far as feeling awkward or weird about it, I completely understand why you would feel that.

• Speaker #1

  But you're not alone.

• Speaker #0

  You're so not alone. Oh, my gosh. You're so not alone. I know what it's like. And maybe you do, too. Like, I know what that's like to feel like. One, no one's going to get it. Two, no one's going to accept it. Three, or just the feelings in that ballpark, you know?

• Speaker #1

  I felt like a big hypocrite the whole time, calling myself a Christian and still doing that.

• Speaker #0

  And yeah,

• Speaker #1

  you are like hitting it hard, man. And I love it. I, nobody wants perfection if it's fake.

• Speaker #0

  Mm hmm.

• Speaker #1

  And yeah, I absolutely agree with that. I've been craving authenticity lately, too. Just haven't wanted to be anywhere near social media because everyone's posting perfect pictures that they took who knows how long to do. And I don't do it very often, but I do notice that I have a nice hair day and I want to take a picture. I don't usually go with just the first one. Here's a little... Inside note for everybody who sees my posts, I don't always go for just the first one unless it was really good, which rarely happens. So we all do it. We all have our moments. But sometimes you just get overwhelmed and you need a break, a mental break, a physical break from seeing it, whatever that break is.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  And it's okay to have those moments where perfection is I'm over it. I just want someone. to be real with me. When you go to church and someone says, hey, how are you? And you just say, oh, I'm fine. But you're not. Your life is crumbling around you. It's a dumpster fire right now. But you don't want to tell them that. You should, because maybe God is giving them an opportunity to help you do better. And I think that's where church has a lot of problems, the church body, not the building church. But we... like to mask the bad things that are going on around us, our imperfections, our negative emotions. We don't want to share those with people because we don't want to be judged or we don't want people to think that we're a bad Christian. And that's where we can take your dialogue and we can say, well, why don't we want people to know that? Maybe you are actually doing something that is you that bad that you don't want people to know, in which case you should repent for that and work through it. Maybe you're just putting those on yourself. Maybe Satan's messing with you and making you feel like you have to be isolated.

• Speaker #0

  And that's the thing. It's like, any type of, you'll notice that sin at the root of every vice resides pride.

• Speaker #1

  It's like,

• Speaker #0

  oh, I can stop anytime I want. Oh, no one needs to know.

• Speaker #1

  I used to say that. And I could. It was funny. I was like a binge porner. I don't even think that's a word, but that's what it was like a binge drinker. They might be able to go for months not doing it. And then they'll just have like one time where it's like, they just go hard. That's what I used to do with my addiction. Sometimes it would last for a month and then I'd be fine for a month or for like. like two weeks, and then maybe it would come back. Like you just never knew when it was going to rear its ugly head and for how long. But yeah, that's what I thought of when you said that. Continue.

• Speaker #0

  No, no, no. So, but bringing it back to what can the church do? I mean, of course, in an ideal, perfect world, yes, conversation is key because, you know, sin thrives in isolation,

• Speaker #1

  right?

• Speaker #0

  It's easier to have the enemy help you out when you're kind of keeping yourself in the dark. Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  But again, regarding it's really important for me to articulate as as often as I can. As soon as you think, like I said, man, no one know, no one's gonna get this. No one's gonna hear me. No one's gonna accept me, whatever, whatever. Man, this is where coaching comes into play. This is where, you know, therapy comes into play. This is where, you know. Going to confession comes into play, getting it off of your chest and speaking to someone who is sworn to keep your stuff a secret. You know, like like just practicing that sense of expression. There's this concept that I would share with clients, too, where the opposite of depression isn't happiness. The opposite of depression is expression. Think about it. It's literally just like this physical state of just I I'm just I don't. want to do anything. It's this desperate height of just apathy. You know, it's this complete ennui and just unwillingness to engage with. anyone or anything, let alone yourself. It's like, I'm just going to crawl into a corner and just die here. That's kind of what depression is like. You're kind of twirling into a shell. But when you finally release that, express that, there's depression and then there's expression. You don't have to do it all at once. This is where having a structure and a system like a program can help. But just the simple act of just saying it. Just start small. You don't have to start with a big declaration. You don't have to do everything over the top. You don't have to come to God with a grand gesture. He already knows your heart. Just start simple, right? So community is key. It can be medicinal. It can be a step in that direction, in that healthy direction. It's, again, When two or more are gathered, there you are in the midst of us. And we are going to walk in that through choosing community over isolation. I know it can feel awkward and I know it can feel difficult because it makes it real. You know what I mean? Like, it's just like, oh, other people are involved. The moment we start telling ourselves, oh, I don't want to be that guy or that girl with all the problems. I don't want to burden them with my stuff. Right. Jump on them. Right. Yeah. And I understand that too. And I appreciate, you know, wanting to be, you know, mindful and everything. But I'm telling you, you know, you said you bottled up anger a lot. I am completely, I feel you, literally. Like I do the same exact thing. It's like anger was this unacceptable thing. It's like if I'm feeling angry, oh, then I'm doing something wrong.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  I'm not seeing the whole picture. I'm not considering someone else's feelings or whatever.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  I'm in. Just, I'll be honest, sometimes that pattern comes around in my day to day. I had a fairly vulnerable conversation just a couple weeks ago with my brother where I noticed that there was like a lot of stuff that I had just been kind of holding on to and what I finally like just scared it. Again, the opposite of depression isn't just happiness and I got a smile on my face. It's expression. It's a release. It's like God's not after our happiness. He's after our joy. The Lord's my shepherd. I shall not want, like, I want to maintain this very calculated, very filtered, very strategic exterior. So nobody can know the real me when that's the thing that your savior is after. You know, that's the thing he wants. And the more bricks we put up, the more we make it hard for ourselves to experience that connection for, Ooh, I'm getting emotional.

• Speaker #1

  The more like when we let it out, let it out, Chris,

• Speaker #0

  but that's that's we do it to ourselves. And I just want to encourage anybody out there, community like a healthy community that that has made it clear. And this is where the church can do better. We are here to not shame you. We're going to talk about sin, which. in archery terms, is simply missing the mark. We're all sinners in need of a savior. We've all messed up. Join the club. You know, Jesus literally said, like, this isn't a hospital for the healthy. It's a hospital for the sick. Look around. Like, we're all experiencing the human condition. You ain't alone. But we're here to realign ourselves with, you know, why we're here and that sense of purpose and connection. So, yeah, I really think that to bring it back to the original leg of this part of the conversation. If we're making that the hook, I think we're going to catch a lot more fish that way.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. Yeah. I absolutely agree. I just.

• Speaker #0

  Sorry, I'm preaching. I don't.

• Speaker #1

  No, I love it. I was thinking about it. I was like, has he ever thought about becoming a youth pastor?

• Speaker #0

  You know, I. Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  You should. You've got the look.

• Speaker #0

  Can I be completely honest? Yes. This shirt is actually from my church. That's awesome. Okay, so I'm a worship leader as well. Like I play at music ministry and stuff. And I literally, this is so embarrassing, but I got this jacket that I just so happened to be wearing. I think I got it off of like Tino or something. I don't know. You know, I literally searched up like, what was it? like pastor. outfit.

• Speaker #1

  And this was like one of the first things I was like,

• Speaker #0

  you know, that jacket's fly.

• Speaker #1

  It's pawing. It's a calling.

• Speaker #0

  You might be onto something.

• Speaker #1

  I just, you have such a way with words, with passion. You're honest. You're vulnerable. You're what we need in a lot of youth groups now. There's so many teens who are suffering with all this because their parents don't know how to handle this situation. They don't want to go to their parents because they're either old school or they just they're not approachable with it. They need people that they can rely on, that they can trust. Like you said, a community of people who are going to care about them and what they're going through and aren't going to make them feel that shame. And I think, sadly, a lot of parents, maybe not intentionally, are coming off as people that aren't approachable for these things. My oldest right now is a prodigal child, and she talks about a lot of different things. At one point, she thought she was trans, and sometimes she goes back into that, sometimes she doesn't. And I have loved her unconditionally through that, which I, if you had asked me back in high school years if I was going to have a child who was going to talk about this, at this age, how would I have reacted? It's completely different from how I am actually reacting. But it's because I've learned from my own, how I did things, how my parents did things when I was a prodigal child. I didn't want to do what they did because what they did, or at least my mom, I love her to death and she's my biggest supporter for everything and always has been. Even when I was going through my bad seasons. I intentionally went out of my way to tell her the wrong things I was doing because I wanted to see her scorn because I knew she would. And I told myself, I can't be like that because my oldest is very headstrong and she will do the opposite of what I tell her to do. So I don't tell her to do things anymore. One, she's already an adult. So it's like there's so much I cannot tell her anyway. But I just don't react to the stuff anymore. And when my son asks me things he's heard at school, I don't react anymore. I have to take a step back sometimes. And I was like, how do I answer this? And then my youngest two, they're very curious as well. I'm like, God, what are you doing to me? All five of my kids are very outspoken. They're very honest. They're very talkative, friendly. They just have questions. I'm like, what am I supposed to do with this? I'm not. any of that. I do have questions, but I just, I have to get over myself. And we as parents have to get over ourself and realize we are raising the next generation. And that's why our children need to have people they feel safe with when we're still figuring things out as parents, so that they're not left without options, but that they have an option. Okay. I know my parents are going to be weird if I talk to them about this, but I have Chris to talk to, or I have my youth pastor, my older mature friend from church, a family friend, a grandparent, you know, like whatever it is, they need to have that connection to somebody when their parents aren't it. And that's what I tell my kids as well. I was like, if you don't feel like you can talk to me about it, talk to your dad. If you don't feel that you can talk about this, find someone from church. If you don't have anyone at church, you need to find somebody that you can trust to talk to if you don't feel you can come to me. But I always let them know you can come to me. I'm not going to make you feel weird about anything. Yeah, you just have this openness about you that I think a lot of teens would flock to. So you should really take a look at becoming a youth pastor.

• Speaker #0

  I really appreciate that.

• Speaker #1

  No problem. Well, Chris, this has been absolutely encouraging, edifying. And again, if you are not taking notes, you better come back and listen to this again and take some notes because there were some good nuggets here that you can. take into your life and run with. If they want to get in touch with you, maybe they want to get some coaching from you, or they just want to thank you for this conversation. How can they do that?

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, totally. So for anyone who is listening and curious about all the stuff we've been talking about and what it actually looks like when put into practice, you can visit rebootedteen.com. And that's where you'll find the opportunity to access the Rebooted Teen Parent Program, which is completely free. It's my gift to you. Just a series of modules as far as how to get started in a practical way with all this stuff that you almost see me crying about. And how to start applying it to your own situation and kind of starting to, you know, be that kind of open place for your child or children. And definitely check that out. Plenty of samples at Rebooted Teen on Instagram. But if you feel that the Rebooted Teen program is the right move for your child or children, let's definitely talk. There's a Facebook community through the parent program where other parents and caregivers and guardians are. you know, trading notes and holding each other accountable and sharing stories and sharing wins. It's a cool, encouraging atmosphere. So feel free to check that out. It was mentioned a few times, but if you take anything away from this conversation, we're talking about a generation that once again is yearning for, yes, that sense of authenticity, but just knowing that they're seen, that they're heard and that, you know, they're going to be okay. Sex is real. Porn is real. But, you know, my God is real as well. While this particular program, you don't necessarily have to be a believer to join, but all we want to do is share the sense of that help is real, that hope is real. And again, we're not after putting the problem on a pedestal. We're here to shine a spotlight on the solution. We're going to introduce different ways of how to increase that sense of awareness and ultimately how to turn that awareness into action so that your child over time can learn how to advocate for themselves. All the best athletes in the world are, you know, amazing at what they do, but all those athletes have all had coaches. So it was my honor to be that coach. And thank you very much for the platform. You know, I've done a couple of these podcast episodes now, but I really appreciate you giving me the space. I think this was a really fruitful talk and it was awesome. So thank you very much.

• Speaker #1

  Thank you for everything. I have enjoyed this so much. Thank you again, Chris, for coming on and talking with me.

• Speaker #0

  Absolutely.

• Speaker #1

  Boom. Mic drop episode. I love talking about this subject. It is so needed, especially in this culture today. Chris and I got this awkward porn and sex ball rolling for you. You're welcome, by the way. Now it's your turn to keep it going for your family. Talk with your kids. Be aware of your own struggles and those of your children. And be prepared and equipped for the day they ask you a tough question. or you catch them in a compromising situation with love, grace, and wisdom on how to handle it. If this conversation rocked you, please leave me a review and let others know how much it impacted you. And if you are feeling tension right now because you struggle with porn or sex addiction, don't leave here feeling full of guilt and shame. That's not of God. He is calling you to a better life. Please join the Retrain Your Brain series to find the healing you need to be your whole healthy self one episode at a time. The links to leave a review and the Retrain Your Brain series are in the show notes. Thanks again for joining me today. I look forward to our next conversation.