Bonus - How To Be Okay Over Easter

Sam: 00:00:18

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Hey there, and welcome to this special bonus episode of beyond the Surface.

In these episodes, we take a break from the personal stories and I get to chat with experts on all things related to religious trauma, cults and deconstruction. These conversations are foundational and educational.

They provide deeper insights and understanding in into the complexities of the experiences we hear in the stories.

Whether you're just beginning your journey, this is the first episode you're listening to, or maybe you're looking to expand your knowledge in general, These episodes are packed with valuable information that will help you navigate wherever you are. I'm your host, Sam, and this is beyond the Surface. Welcome to this week's bonus episode of beyond the Surface. Today I am chatting again. I'm.

I'm just like pulling Jane into as many conversations as humanly possible for this show.

But to mirror last year's episode on how to be okay over Christmas, we are doing an episode on how to be okay over Easter, which is a touch different. It's a touch different for me. I don't know about Jane yet. We'll get into that fairly quickly, I imagine.

But Easter is a loaded time for a lot of people. Post church, during church, all of that.

I do want to make a note before we get into it that Jane and I are both post church and our experience will be based on that.

If you are still in church, finding your feet in a progressive church, wherever you land around, how you feel about Easter, whether you want to throw it in the bin or whether you want to reclaim it and make it something completely different is valid and okay. We are just sharing our experiences and they are just that, ours. So welcome back, Jane.

Jane: 00:02:51

Thank you.

Sam: 00:02:51

Good to be here again. Like I said, I'm always dragging you into these conversations.

I did think about doing this episode with someone else and then Chrissy decided to tell me that that was a terrible idea. And then I needed to mirror the Christmas episode with the Easter episode. So here we are, yes.

Okay, so let's start with, what was Easter for you when you were in church? What did that look like for you?

Jane: 00:03:19

I was reflecting back on some years ago. I started to write my story of coming out of church and faith. And I wrote a whole chapter and called it melancholy.

Sam: 00:03:30

Yeah.

Jane: 00:03:30

And I remember while I was writing it that it was around Easter time. And it was. It was a beautiful reflection at the time of just even then, how far I had come, because it was.

I probably spent more than 20 years of that rhythm of Easter going to church. It was a real family time. There was Easter eggs being thrown out into the congregation at each service.

There was always a really beautiful, special kind of musical or dramatic item. When I was really young, we used to do.

I was part of the dance and drama team as a teenager, and we used to perform to Carmen's the Champion, where Jesus raised us from the dead. And I played a demon, and it was just awesome. And so even from when I was really young, there was this real kind of.

There was something so powerful and exciting about the fact that Jesus had rose from the dead and, you know, like, death could not hold him down. So it was. It was like. I mean, it's kind of the. It's. It's the event of the Christian calendar, really.

And so it was such a rhythm of the year for me for decades. And it was really tender. It was highly emotive. It was really, really special to me. Yeah.

Sam: 00:04:51

Yeah. When I hear stories like that about people who used to play demons in skits.

Plays, I think, man, church was weird, and we just never batted an eyelid at it. Like, it was. It's just so funny to think about, like, decades or years later.

Jane: 00:05:08

It's mortifying.

Sam: 00:05:09

Yeah. It's really interesting because, you know, you sort of said that Easter was a special time.

I don't necessarily like, yes, Easter was a special time, but it was also. It was just like, Easter for me was riddled with just guilt. Like, it was just heavy on the guilt. It was. We. We as a church, never.

The most commercial we went with Easter was Easter eggs. Anything else was just. It had to be very literal, very bib cool. We never had, like, even in Sunday school, I wanted.

When I was teaching Sunday school, I wanted to bring, like, an Easter bunny craft. Not a chance. Like, it just was not. Like, we just could not do that. And so it was. Yeah, it was very heavy on the guilt.

And I think that that made a difference in terms of, like, how I held Easter once I started to Separate from that space was.

I mean, I know the space that I know the church that you are a part of and I also know that you guys used to do like Good Friday services and Sunday services. And so was Easter just a ton of work also? Like.

Jane: 00:06:29

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Because it had to be, it had to be evocative. You know, it had to kind of set the scene, create the atmosphere.

You wanted to pull people in when, you know, so many people wanted to be away camping or you know, taking four days off or whatever. It was still packed. Yeah.

And even, even when the church was young and even other kind of other congregations that I was part of over the years in ministry like it.

You still really made an effort because it was such a, such an important moment to celebrate and you had to really kind of feel into that Good Friday kind of darkness. And, and we always used to kind of go, oh look, it's overcast.

See, like it's, you know, it was always really, you know, like the, the weather was matching the mood and then the sun would come out on Easter Sunday and it was just like amazing. You know, the ability to over spiritualize everything was just incredible.

But when you were just talking about the eggs, I just, I had a bit of a giggle because I was just thinking about the, the rise of the prosperity gospel in Australia from the US and the church that I was a part of. I remember when the Easter eg quality, they were like those sort of candle wax ones back in the day.

And then as the, as the church became wealthier, you know, you got the nice eggs like the cad. Yeah, that's right. That's pretty funny.

Sam: 00:07:54

Oh, that's so funny. Perks. I mean we've got to find like I'm not the Linings person but like Cadbury Chocolate is involved. We want the perks.

I actually, it like it'll probably be out by this point, but I actually just wrote a post where I was like, I. Of a complicated relationship with Easter, but I still really love chocolate. So like, let's just find what we can still take from that space.

But I know that like, like in terms of people listening to this, people are probably going to have very mixed emotions around Easter and some will have seen it as a really beautiful reflective time and special and a time of like inner connection. And others will have been much like me. Heavy on the guilt. I used to play without every year, multiple times.

Nicole Nordeman song why I used to play it on repeat because the song, all the, all the words just basically just instill like you are like. The last line is like, you are the reason that he has to die.

Jane: 00:09:01

Like, wow.

Sam: 00:09:02

So heavy. Because guilt for me was the only way that I could connect to this idea that somebody had to be brutally murdered.

For me, it just was this concept that I was like, yeah, we get to Sunday and everything is supposed to be really beautiful and wonderful and. And a celebration. It didn't feel like a celebration. Two days later, like, I was like, this still feels really.

So guilt for me was the only way that I could connect to this concept of atonement that just. That just didn't sit right for me. But for a lot of people around me, it was just this most beautiful, reflective.

And it was reflective, just not necessarily in the way that I wanted it to be. Yeah, was. I mean, like, what was your relationship with that concept of suffering and sacrifice that Easter tends to conjure?

Jane: 00:10:01

Oh, so heavy, isn't it? When you kind of just. When you talk about it on. On reflection, not having been in it for some time, it's just like, God, that was just.

There's so much trauma around that. It's interesting now that I understand my own history of complex trauma with language and.

And we understand how, you know, when we experience stuff as kids or in our developmental years, if we don't have somebody there to kind of say to us what happened to you wasn't okay, or to be able to reflect what's actually happening, you just assume it must be your fault. You just assume, oh, there's must be something really wrong with me. Like, it's. It's. I must be bad. And so to.

So to go from that in my childhood into a. Which was also in the 70s in Australia and the 80s, you know, where I grew up, Christianity was sort of very much in the water.

Like, it was kind of just part of, you know, people went to church. It was a bit more normalized. So. So to kind of just slot into that whole idea that Jesus died for me, it was quite. It's quite comfortable, really.

Like, I kind of just went, well, of course, because I'm bad.

Sam: 00:11:18

Yeah.

Jane: 00:11:19

So I didn't kind of. I don't think I really felt the guilt in the. Perhaps in the way he did, because I think I had just assumed that that was right.

Of course, he needs to die for me. And so I actually remember taking it further. I would become really moved and really grateful, and I would.

I would become teary on Good Friday and just go, oh, I can't believe, you know, that Jesus gave his life for me. You Know, like. And I, I. What's that? Him. The Old Rugged Cross.

Sam: 00:11:46

Oh, yeah.

Jane: 00:11:46

It's actually a beautiful tune, but like, the, the language, you know, where the dearest and best for a world of lost sinners was slain. You know, you just like, oh, man. But I remember feeling the weight of that going, yeah, yeah. Like, thank goodness.

Like, what would I do without Jesus?

Sam: 00:12:04

Yeah.

Jane: 00:12:04

And so it kind of didn't really question it. And even like, God help me, I remember showing my kids the Passion of the Christ when they were still kids.

Like they were maybe 10 and 8 or something ridiculous. And they're just. Now they're just like, mom, what the fuck? You know? But like.

But at the time, it was just like, I wanted them to understand how precious the sacrifice was. Oh, it's wild, isn't it?

Sam: 00:12:31

Yeah. I. Anyone who follows me and. And is in my email list knows all of my feelings about the Passion of the Christ.

I watched it a whole one time, and that was enough for me to. Completely traumatized by just watching that. I remember watching it and I literally spent like 20 minutes vomiting afterwards. Like, I was just.

It was like, it impacted me. It's an awful. I have so many feelings about particularly showing that to kids and teenagers and glorifying that.

That type of film and that type of abuse and calling it holy and necessary and. But anyway, we could probably do a whole episode on the Christ, I suspect. But it is.

You know, people and churches whip it out at Easter, like, every year as it's kind of like church's version of my why By Nicole Nordenman. Like, you know, it's used as this tool to incite any sort of emotion, whether it be gratitude or guilt and anything in between that spectrum.

But I think even you sort of using the word weight, I think that's kind of how it sits in people. Whether it's a weight of gratitude or a guilt, it still sit, like, as we talk about it, it's like heaviness.

Like, I can feel it even just talking about it. And so it's. Yeah, guilt, I think, and. Or just like the heaviness of that. Of that time period.

And the impact of Easter is something that tends to linger, I think, just from talking to people a lot longer than the weight of Christmas. It is just a different. Like you said, it's kind of like the calendar event of the year. I think it sits different in us than Christmas does.

Jane: 00:14:27

Yeah, I agree.

Sam: 00:14:28

Yeah.

I am curious for you how you've seen in your own world, but also in people that you Work with the impact of this concept that suffering is holy and suffering is necessary for holiness and for, you know, purity and goodness and that type of thing, because it seeps out of just theology and it seeps into everyday life.

Jane: 00:14:54

Yeah. And if you are a woman or female presenting in the world, you get the double kind of bonus of that being just part of wider society as well.

Sam: 00:15:06

Yeah.

Jane: 00:15:08

Yeah.

It's really interesting because I probably, growing up in the Pentecostal space, I probably wouldn't have named that, like, because everything was about a personal relationship with God. Everything was about success and prosperity and overcoming and sort of personal. Yeah, I guess personal success and whatever that looks like.

And so suffering was just something to be overcome. It wasn't necessarily equated with holiness exactly. But Jesus suffering was for sure.

So to kind of go, this is necessary, like, he has to experience this three days in hell to be able to show us that, you know, there is resurrection, power. And actually, my years as.

As a progressive Christian in the contemplative Christian space, it was actually quite a beautiful concept to be able to take from it to kind of go in. Richard Rohr talks a lot of. Father Richard Rohr talks a lot about, you know, death and. And rebirth and those cycles of.

Of death to life and what they can look like. So being able to take that out of it was helpful.

But I think the idea that suffering then has to happen for us to be refined or for you to be good, you have to experience pain is definitely something that has come out of many high control spaces or quite conservative theological spaces. And people internalize that. Absolutely. And go, oh, well, again, it must be me. It must be my fault. I just must not be trying hard enough. Yeah.

I must have to just sit in this and. And suffer in silence or just feel the guilt or. It doesn't really provide access to a.

A pressure release valve, like, because you kind of don't think you deserve it. You just have to go through it to be able to come out the other end.

And what doesn't kill me makes me stronger and all that kind of crap that we hear, you know, what doesn't kill you can sometimes leave you with ptsd. So, you know.

Sam: 00:17:26

Yes, absolutely.

And I think it's where the Easter story, you know, we've talked a little bit about, like, the difference between it sitting with either gratitude or guilt. The Easter story turning into shame and.

Jane: 00:17:39

Yeah.

Sam: 00:17:39

Yes. A little bit like in the what Doesn't Kill you Makes yous Stronger is Kelly Clarkson.

I'm going to Taylor Swift, which is like the, it's me, Hi, I'm the problem, it's me. And it's got absolutely nothing to do what you have with what you have done or the way that you live your life. It's just like this baseline core.

I am bad, I am broken. I deserve this irrespective of who I am, what I do, how I live my life, any of that.

And it trickles very quickly into that shame space which as we know can spiral into nearly every facet of, of someone's life.

One of the biggest things for me when navigating the guilt post, like post church was and I am sort of suggesting this as like a potential helpful tip for people if they are sitting in that guilt space, which is whose voice is this? And it's so simple, but it, and it's like, it's such a simple question, but it's such a powerful question.

It's is this me or is this something that I have been told? And, and I think I have a perfect example of how guilt tends to linger even years later, even years after.

I very logically would not consider myself a Bible believing Christian anymore. That's not the space that I sit in.

But late last year my wife and I went to see Jesus Christ Superstar and, and I think I, I don't know whether I mentioned this to. It's like Chrissy was pretty tentative, having her own religious trauma and, and I was like, no, like it'll be fine.

Like if you can get past like the loaded, you know, story, like biblical story. Like the score is just incredible, the music's incredible, all of that sort of thing. And so I was like, it'll be fine. Like I know it'll be fine.

And for anybody who knows the show will know that there is a song in there called 39 lashes. And, and it's pretty self descriptive as to what scene is about and, and it's like a sensory overload in terms of like the sounds of the whipping.

Like, you know, and like, yeah, it's just a sensory overload of what that is like.

And I found myself in that moment having to like close my eyes and I had an instinctual and default response internally where I had this little voice inside go, go. Oh, I'm so sorry. And it was like, oh, where the did that come from?

Like, you know, I've not, I've not had any sort of like firm belief in the Easter story for a very long time.

And, and yet, and I thankfully unpacked this with my therapist but like that default setting to apologize for something that you had nothing to do with, that you did not do, that you are not responsible for. It can still linger. That guilt can still linger and pop up in the most unexpected of locations.

I mean, yeah, going to see a musical about the death of Jesus might not be a super unexpected location, but I certainly didn't go into that thinking that it was going to be an issue by any means. And I think it's, you know, a really good reminder that some of that stuff lingers.

You know, trauma triggers, and they can pop up in situations that we don't expect. Have you had that happen?

Jane: 00:21:25

Absolutely. In so many different ways. Yeah. But I think I like your question, like, whose voice is that? Because it's sort of going well.

I mean, you have to take into account how many years or, you know, the time frame that you spent in a particular space and how that language or those concepts and beliefs became so normalized. And then where else it was being reflected back to you? Like, was it family? Was it school? Was it, you know, peer group? Did you go to youth?

Like, where kind of, where else are you hearing the things that are popping up?

And I think it's so, like we say to people in the DV space, like, time and distance from your experience does help, but there is always going to be those little sort of lingering things. But I think, like, being able to go, well, who are the new voices now that I can listen to? And, you know, what.

What do I surround myself with now that counteracts that message, that I should feel guilty or shame or gratitude for something that has nothing to do with me? It's interesting. I had a conversation with a theologian the other day about hell, and I kind of said, so. A progressive theologian, I should say.

And I said, so then if you're talking to people about, you know, who are trying to get their heads around, you know, concepts of hell now and, you know, and the whole idea of the crucifixion, like, what. What do you say when people go, well, why did Jesus have to die if. If hell isn't real and if the whole Easter story and the resurrection story is.

Is just symbolic or, you know, metaphoric, like, what is it all? What does it all mean? Yeah, and we had this great conversation about how, well they killed him.

Like, he was subversive, he was outspoken, he was justice seeking. He, you know, spoke truth to power, he was against empire. And so, of course, they.

They kill people that do that, you know, and so trying to kind of go, you know, like, there's this, there seems to be these hills that, you know, when we are conservative that we tend to want to die on. And this seems to be one of them. You know, it's like the, the whole.

You can't discount the whole Easter story or the whole crucifixion and resurrection story because that's the thing that forgives us of our sin or that's the thing that gives us eternal life.

And it's like, well, but if we kind of distance ourselves from it a little bit and kind of just look at the whole thing, if we believe Jesus was an actual historical figure. Yeah, they kill people that speak up to Empire, you know.

Sam: 00:24:10

Yeah, absolutely. I think it's something is so helpful, not just with Easter, but in. With anything that you used to believe in.

That space is to look at it from like multiple different lenses and looking at it from other people's lenses. And, you know, because there is no space for nuance typically in these spaces or curiosity or other people, People's perspectives.

Doing that can only expand our perspective and our knowledge. And also that allows it to go from this is what I was taught to. This is what I think. This is what I.

Because suddenly we're now diversifying the perspectives and the thoughts and opinions and, you know, all of that to form our own opinion and our thoughts and our own beliefs.

I know that one of the things that we talked about in the Christmas episode, which will be really relevant still, I think, for a lot of people, but is again, not super duper relevant in terms of our stories because neither of us come from faith based families, which means we are lucky in the sense that, you know, neither of us are navigating, having to have awkward conversations about not going to church this year for Easter. But I know a lot of people are.

And a lot of people are having to, you know, deal with evangelistic opportunities from their family to use Easter as an opportunity to try and draw people back in. And.

And I know from the people that I have spoken to about that happening is that it's fucking exhausting and you know, and it often will create further trauma on top of the trauma that already exists. Yeah, yeah. What was it like for you coming out of church and starting to like, change your thoughts around Easter?

And how do I navigate that, at least within my own family, who up until this point I've put in those scenarios and we've gone to church and we've watched Passion of the Christ and we've done the thing that we've always done. And now I'm changing That on its head.

Jane: 00:26:27

There was a lot.

Sam: 00:26:30

We're full of wisdom this morning.

Jane: 00:26:34

But it's interesting how, like. Like just thinking about what you were saying before about how, you know, having to go back into these spaces when we're. We're maybe physically and.

But mentally out.

Sam: 00:26:45

Yeah.

Jane: 00:26:45

Or when we're trying to sort of figure out how to be. We can just say, no, I'm not going.

Like, if that feels safe to just kind of go, I'm actually going away, or I'm going to do something else, or just stay at home and watch Netflix, like, whatever you want to do. Yeah. But I think. Yeah, I think for. For me, it was a gradual process of kind of going, I can't be part of institutionalized religion anymore.

I can't be part of an actual. Something I have to be a member of anymore, because that doesn't feel okay. But particularly.

Well, one of my kids at the time was not going as regularly, but still felt a connection certainly to faith.

And so we would go along just to Easter Sunday, and so we wouldn't go any other time of the year, but maybe for three or four years after I had stopped going and he had stopped sort of really going much, we would still just go to the Easter Sunday service. And I would just weep the whole way through it. Like, I would just cry, and I would just be thinking, and I would feel so uncomfortable being there.

And there were years where it felt like, well, that's because you meant to be here. You know, that's because you've walked away and, you know, and trying to sort of make sense of all of that, but wanting to be there for him.

Sam: 00:28:08

Yeah.

Jane: 00:28:09

But also kind of going, let's just. And then we would go for lunch afterwards, or we would kind of try to make it a bit, you know, like a.

I don't know, like a new tradition or something that kind of took the edge off the heaviness of it. And then we would start to talk about it. We talk about faith. What. How is it different? What does it mean to you?

What does it mean to be a spiritual person? And. And certainly his sister was. You know, she came out of it a lot. Yeah. Earlier than we both did. And so. And has a mouth on it.

And so, you know, like, some of the. Some of the stuff that she would say and throw into the mix, and they were great conversations. Patience.

They still are, you know, And I think for us, it was. It was a beautiful. It was hard for me, particularly there was grief in it, but it was.

It was a Beautiful opportunity to just open up a conversation about what it might look like to be a person of faith that wasn't part of something super prescriptive and something that required more than was reasonable to expect of you as a human, you know? Yeah. So it's. And then we kind of just stopped going all together. We didn't really kind of talk about it. It just kind of happened.

Yeah, but we still have those conversations, which is really lovely. But none of this is easy. I was, I was actually thinking about this conversation that you and I are going to have today.

Over the weekend I was reading Martha Beck has a fabulous new book out called Beyond Anxiety, which I'm loving.

And she, she talks about this exercise which I think could be really helpful for people that still feel like they have to go to some family events where it's going to be awkward or whatever. She says just create. She said, even if you do it with a friend, just create like a bingo sheet. And she's like, just, just like literally create one.

Like color it in, put stickers on it. Like take, take the, A four bit of paper with you with stickers to the family event and just go, mom is going to lose a shit over this.

Dad is going to bring up politics. My auntie is going to make me pray before the meal. This is going to be really awkward. That's going to trigger me. Something's going.

They're going to make me eat meat when they know that I'm a vegan.

Like whatever it might be, you know, like, it's just like list 20 things that are possible that are going to happen and then show a friend or like a trusted person, your therapist, anyone, like just kind of create it. Take the stickers and then like message them during the day going, I've got 10 out of 20 bingo.

But like do whatever you can to just kind of make it okay, you know, make it safe for yourself to be able to be there.

Sam: 00:30:45

I love that. That's, I mean that's just like a beautiful. I love using humor as a way to navigate awkward or uncomfortable situations. And I love that.

I just think that's great. That's so much fun. Also, I mean, just add like a little like what do I get when I get bingo? Like, that's right. Give yourself a treat. Yeah, exactly.

Like give yourself something nice for, for doing something that you wouldn't typically choose to do but you are doing for whatever reason. We need to offer ourselves some self affirmation and praise and rewards for doing hard things. Also.

Jane: 00:31:26

It just, and like, sorry, like, like we said in our Christmas episode, you also have to factor in recovery time from that stuff.

So if you're going to extend yourself and be in an uncomfortable position where you kind of feel like it's easier to be there than, you know, have to deal with the drama of not being there, or there is something that's worth it for you in being there, maybe there is that one person you do want to connect with. You have to allow recovery time after. Whatever that looks like for you.

Sam: 00:31:57

Yeah, absolutely.

And I mean, I think it often can come back to the thing that, you know, we talk a lot about, you know, between us, but also with the collective in terms of we do so much just to feel like we have a place of belonging and still a sense of community. And I think when I think about Easter, that's what I miss the most is this, like, communal we are.

Even if I think what we were going through, quote unquote, was absolute madness, we were still doing it together. And we, you know, there was church lunches and, you know, you had solidarity for a whole weekend together and you were all in the same space.

And so, you know, when I look back, that's what I miss the most. And so don't beat yourself up if that's why you are doing those things. It's why you're still going to the family lunches and things like that.

Because it is just belonging is just such a human need for everybody. And we will do whatever it takes typically, to get that sense. But we do need to look after ourselves in the process of trying to. To get it.

But I mean, that's probably a good leaning point.

And also you mentioned it when you were talking about coming out, which is that, you know, the Easter story and, and shifting thoughts and beliefs around it comes with so much grief. I mean, most. I mean, I think both of us have a pretty baseline belief that religious trauma is. Is grief and the two are essentially synonymous with.

With one another. But coming out of a space that is so highly emotive is going to produce a grief response in us, even if we don't completely leave it behind.

Even just shifting it somewhat is still going to result in some form of grief, I think, for. For the vast majority of people, I think.

Jane: 00:33:52

Yeah, absolutely. And like all grief, it isn't linear. It's not kind of one and done. There'll be a sense of kind of, shouldn't I be over this by now?

But often we're not. Triggers come at us from all over the place.

But like all grief work, it's always about ways to ground ourselves, ways to connect with the present, ways to feel safe in our bodies in the present moment, even with the, the loss or the pain that we're feeling.

And ways create new rituals around, you know, some of the, the practices that we used to have, even if that is around food or, you know, maybe you go to sunrise yoga on Easter Sunday.

Maybe you kind of, you know, like maybe you, you know, create a really beautiful meal or an event or you, you do something each Easter now that is, is meaningful for you. There's like, I've done that over the years now. There's the certain food that I make at Easter time.

There's, there's things, things that I will sit and do and whether it's journaling, whether it is practicing gratitude, whether it is being able to just be quiet and still and, and for some people, that can be really scary. So, so don't do that if that's scary.

But, you know, but find the things, the practices, the ways to be connected to yourself that are meaningful and are able to make you feel safe in your body in that time. Move your body, you know, like, do whatever you can to just move, I think connect with nature, connect with a trusted person. Yeah.

All the things that we would do to recover from grief of any kind. I think it's, it's really important to, to have those same grief practices around what we lose in this space too.

Sam: 00:35:57

Yeah.

I think rituals in general are just such a powerful part of healing and grief and, and I say that like I did, because you don't heal from grief, you just heal grief. It doesn't.

Jane: 00:36:10

Yeah.

Sam: 00:36:10

You know, grief doesn't just magically disappear. We just learn ways to hold it, ideally heal differently and gently.

But I think rituals in general are just a really important part of healing with grief. And, and they will. It doesn't have to be, you know, when we talk about rituals, it doesn't have to be the same every year.

Like it's creating a habit, it's just creating something and, and allowing that to evolve over time. I think for the first couple of years coming out, I just avoided anything Easter related, hibernated in my house.

And I was like, I don't want to see anything Easter related. And, and that was what I needed. I just needed to not see anything.

I just needed to veg out on the couch and watch comfort 90s movies and not, and not see any of that. And for the love of all goodness, staying off social media because even, you know, Facebook Memories are not kind to me at Easter time.

It reminds me of a very different part of myself that comes out and, and it can be triggering and I'm, I think, even more so.

We talked a little bit about triggers in the Christmas episode, but I think Easter is just a far more triggering time in terms of like, we actually physically have a very, you know, clear response sometimes to that because it is such an emotive time. It lives so deeply entwined in our being and, and I think even that will change over years as well.

I still, I still feel a little nauseous when I see a crucifix. I can't, it's just automatic. I can't help it. Even if it's not like the typical ones, even if it's an artistic.

I was at a training last year and it was just art on the shape of what looked like, like a cross. And my body still responded to it.

And so, you know, I think Easter just comes with a ton more, more triggers than, than usual, you know, Christian event or religious event.

Jane: 00:38:22

And you have to take care in, in the place of that wounding, you know, like the play and figuring out what it is that you are grieving. So like you say, is it that sense of community and solidarity or is it, is it the certainty of a faith framework?

Is it, you know, what is it that you're actually aching for? And how can you bring care to that part of yourself to be able to nurture that in different ways?

I remember just some years ago, driving, driving in an area where I used to go quite regularly and there was a church there that had this massive, of like bigger than life size wooden cross that for a couple of weeks before Easter, they actually created this incredible. They used like real flowers, like real plants. This amazing kind of installation of all these beautiful fresh flowers around this cross.

And I kind of watched it over the weeks just become this amazing artwork. And I remember just being like, like I just found it so compelling. Like, I just couldn't look away from it.

Like I found it so beautiful, but at the same time it just made me ache. Yeah.

So, yeah, it's, it's, it's interesting to kind of note the things that, like you're, you know, nausea around the crucifix or whatever it is that's happening in your body. You know, like what, what are these reactions and how do I bring care and nurture to those places and within myself?

Sam: 00:39:56

Yeah, absolutely.

I think it's also like, you know, we always are talking about nuance and we have that in the way that we respond to something as well, in that we can see the beauty and feel the ache at the same time, like you just described. And not beating yourself up for, like, seeing beauty and something that you're like, oh, this should. I should feel awful about this.

Like, this reminds me of X. Yeah, Y and Z.

But just, you know, you know, to sort of highlight that you can ex, you know, experience multiple emotions at the same time, even if they seem conflicting or, you know, contradictory.

Jane: 00:40:38

And you probably will. Yes.

Sam: 00:40:40

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

I mean, I'm always bringing up inside out as like, a way to remind people that at the very end, like, you can experience joy and sadness at the same time and they don't. It's not about them being opposites, they're just different.

Okay, I'm thinking let's talk about your favorite topic, which you've already started alluding to, because I think this episode has probably identified for most people what their triggers are in thinking about Easter. I think for a lot of people, they can be fairly obvious.

But side note, I would encourage people to be wary of Instagram reels because it has apparently become a trend to. For people who are not even doing reels that are faith based, but to use religious songs because they sound pretty and they're very emotive.

The amount of times that I have watched a reel that is just like nature based, but I'm turn the sound on and I'm hearing oceans in the background.

Jane: 00:41:36

It's just like, how am I Bethel right now?

Sam: 00:41:39

Yeah, I'm just like, I can't deal with this. This, like, be cautious of Instagram reels at the moment.

Even my nail tech, who doesn't know a single thing, like, I had to teach her about some of these mega churches, she'd never heard of them, is like, oh, but I really love this song. And it was oceans. And I was like, it is like seeping out into. Into, you know, seemingly safer spaces to not hear those things.

So be cautious of that at the moment.

But I know that one of your favorite topics of conversation is grounding and talking about how to look after yourself with identifying all of these triggers. And so I think that is probably what is going to be the most helpful for people in terms of navigating Easter.

I think when we talked about Christmas, it was heavy on, like, boundaries. And yes, we talked about grounding, but boundaries were big thing around Christmas, I think.

Yeah, grounding and navigating your own emotive responses to things I think is going to be the most helpful for people.

Jane: 00:42:49

During this time, I think the first thing is to.

And it might sound strange, but to welcome the emotion, what we instinctively want to do is squash it down, get rid of it, overcome it, fix it it, and make it better. But I think the more we fight something, the. The more powerful it can sometimes be. So I think that the first step is awareness, as we said. Like what.

What is happening? Like what. What is it? Is. Does your tummy kind of clench up? Does your breath become shallow? Do you start to shake? Do you feel afraid?

Do you feel like you want to run? Like what. What is going on? Do you get an instant headache? Do you want to throw up? Do you run to the bathroom?

Like all of these PH signs that something is not right are your data points for what is happening to you. And because they.

They often happen pretty thick and fast in sort of, you know, a matter of seconds, it can be difficult to kind of go, oh, that's what's happening. But awareness is always that. That first step.

And I think even to go back a little bit further than that to kind of what is a trigger, you know, And I think when we experience often in childhood, but it can be, you know, anytime, really, as an adult, we can experience something that is overwhelming. Too much, has a sense of inescapability. It exceeds our capacity to cope.

And so whatever is happening in that moment, if we are not able to make sense of it, or we are not able to either run or fight back or. Or be able to express how we are feeling about that thing. Our bodies are very, very clever. Nervous systems give us an out. So often we freeze in time.

And so our brains learn. Oh, I can. I can just associate here. I can just check out, or I can.

I can experience something that perhaps feels like power, which might be a surge of anger or like feeling wired, like ready to kind of punch a hole in a wal. The. The experience in our body that happens when we feel trapped is our clue into what is going on.

And so to then notice those triggers in relation to Easter messages, whether they're about the theology or about the church community or your family dynamics or whatever it might be, is always the first step. What do I notice in my body? What is happening?

And then to be able to literally just hold that, like, if it's happening, you know, in your chest, if your chest feels tight, put your hands there, you know, hold that part of you, nurture that part of you. If you can take a really deep breath into your belly with a much longer exhale and just be still for a moment and notice this is happening.

This is my nervous system. This is my very, very clever brain alert system trying to let me know that something isn't right.

And then the very next question is always, what do I need next? Yeah, what do I need in this moment? How do I steady myself?

Do I need to actually just put my arms around myself like I'm giving myself a hug and just stand and close my eyes for five seconds and breathe? Or maybe sway rock? Do I need to.

If I'm sitting at work and I'm shaking, can I just clench my fists under the desk, you know, and feel like I have some power?

I don't need to go to the bathroom and just shake my hands really, really, you know, strongly to kind of feel like I'm getting some of this energy out. But I think notice what's happening. Notice what your body wants to do and ask yourself what you need next.

And if you're not sure about the answers to those questions or you don't feel like maybe you can, or you know, how to trust your own intuition yet, or your, or what your body is telling you, just, we can just continue to spend more time with that, just continue to bring more awareness to it. Maybe do some reading on what is a trigger? What. What is my body trying to tell me? You know, maybe talk to someone. But the, the wisdom. Thank you, Dr.

Hilary McBride. The wisdom of your body is very powerful, you know, and our bodies give us this information and this data to tell us that something isn't right.

But our bodies also give us the ability to ground and to be able to. To feel safe and to be able to feel like I'm right now in this moment, I'm okay.

Sam: 00:47:23

Yeah, absolutely. I'm just sitting here thinking, like every time Jane talks about grounding, you just always make it sound so beautiful, like I don't know what it is.

And when I talk about grounding, it's just far less pretty.

It also might be that, like, I mean, as you sort of talked about, we all have, you know, we all use different trauma responses and, and things like that in different situations, but sometimes some of us have default trauma responses as well. And, and I have a pretty strong fight trauma response in my nervous system.

And one of the biggest things that I have worked out is that sometimes stereotypical, like, gentle, lovely grounding is just not going to cut it. Particularly, you know, if you're. Your fight response, you know, sits in your nervous system.

Often temperature can play such a really valuable part in that. Because if we Think about anger. And anger and our fight response are very closely interlinked. It's hot.

It's sitting in your nervous system and your body with actual heat. Like, if you've ever watched somebody get angry, you can sometimes literally see their chest and their neck become red.

And so, you know, like, temperature can play such a huge part in that. Run your hands under some cold water. Have a cold glass of water if you can.

Like any sort of cooling mechanism can be so powerful in that moment in just being able to. It's not necessarily in that moment about changing your emotive response, but just change your physical, physical response to what is happening.

And, and yeah, I have found temperature or just, you know, something as simple as like hands on a wall and push all of your weight. Like if it's a plaster wall, be careful. But like just like all of your force, like as much as humanly possible pressed into that wall.

And it, yeah, you might feel absolutely insane and bat shake crazy doing it. That's okay. Unless somebody's watching you. Nobody is going to see what you're doing, but it is just trying to move that energy out of your body.

And sometimes that looks like really beautiful, like lovely, soothing grounding exercises that Jane will give you and other times it's, you know, crazily dancing around your living room or running your hands. Hands under cold water or if you have a cold shower, if you have the ability to.

Or, you know, weirdly pressing your hands into a brick wall or something like that. Yeah, yeah. It is just about moving that energy and that nervous system response.

However, it is going to work for you and there is no right or wrong way to do that. There probably is a wrong way to do that, but there's no right way to do do that. It's however your body is going to respond best to that.

And some people need something more vigorous and energizing and other people need something more gentle and soothing. And neither is right, neither is wrong. They're just different.

Jane: 00:50:39

Yeah. And which is why it's so important to go, what do I need right now? What do I need next?

And, and also if you need permission to feel anger, we're giving it to you.

Sam: 00:50:49

Yeah.

Jane: 00:50:50

Like anger is okay. Anger is a survival mechanism. Your body is meant to feel it.

And something that that animals do who share our same nervous system makeup is they growl. You know, sometimes I will clench my fist and just go, oh yeah, you know, it might again to the batshit crazy. But it helps.

And we're not about necessarily. It's not Catharsis. It's not like you have to have a big kind of meltdown. It's. It's metabolizing or alchemizing.

It's being able to feel safe with whatever emotion is, you know, is coming up for you in the moment. But you have to give it space. We have to be. We have to welcome it, we have to allow it in for it to be able to settle in us.

Sam: 00:51:36

Yeah. And our ability to actually go like, what was that? Is not going to be possible whilst you are in that.

And I think that's the biggest thing is that we often want to be able. Able to work it out and make it make sense.

We can't do that whilst we are essentially our nervous system is in like, survival mode in that moment and is just responding to whatever trigger we have come up against. And so doing whatever it is that you do in that moment is allowing your body some.

Some ease and some rest in that moment and to just move that energy. But it's also gives you space then to be able. Able to go, what the was that like? And.

And give you an opportunity later to be able to make sense of it and to then be. Go. To be able to go, like, what do I need longer term as opposed to. I need shorter term in this moment. And so I think we just.

We always want to know why something is happening, but when you're in. It is not the time for that to happen.

Jane: 00:52:43

And that's okay. Yeah.

Sam: 00:52:45

Yeah, absolutely. We will always give permission for anger in spades. Like, it just. I think it is just such a vital.

And in the same way that, you know, we've talked a lot about guilt. Guilt is also such a necessary emotion as well. But it's again coming back to like, what am I feeling guilty for? What is the guilt about?

Where is this coming from?

Jane: 00:53:06

Misplaced. Yeah.

Sam: 00:53:07

Yes, exactly. And who is like, am I recognizing that I'm feeling guilty about something that I've done, or is somebody else saying that I should feel guilty?

And so I think it. Yeah, it's coming back to like, what. Like, what is this? Where is this coming from? What is this about?

Jane: 00:53:25

And if people need reassurance, I. It has been many years since I have felt the way. Height of this impact around Easter. It was really, really real. It took a long time. I would have.

I would experience full body triggers. It would be painful. It would be. I would feel unsettled.

It would just feel just like I'd forgotten to be somewhere, you know, like, it was just a strange feeling. Like I said at the start like that it was melancholy. It was. It just felt heavy. It's been a long time since I have felt any of that. Like, there.

There is relief, you know, like being able to tend to yourself, to give yourself, to give your body what it is asking for, you know, like to be able to just sit with it, to tolerate it, to move beyond it, to get some distance from. You know, I'm okay now when it comes to Easter. It's not to say I'll never be triggered, but it's been a long time since I have.

I can, can, can handle it now, you know, but being able to just even being able to sort of ask that question, what do I need? Can even be tricky sometimes because we're so conditioned to not ask for what we need. Yeah. And to put our own needs last.

So even just starting there, if you need permission to do that, you also have it.

Sam: 00:54:47

Yeah, we're all. We're giving all of the permission today. Yeah. And I think that that's.

I mean, one of the beautiful episode, beautiful reasons why these episodes work is because you and I are in different time periods in terms of being post church. And I think if I'm doing math correctly, and it is a Monday morning, so there's every chance it's not.

I'm still probably a good year or so away from being a decade out of church. And so, you know, whilst I'm not brand new, I'm also not decades out either.

And so I think, you know, we say this to go, like, healing is possible and it. And it can happen. And you don't need to live in this space forever, but where you are is also okay. And. And I think, you know, I.

It will go in waves, I think.

Jane: 00:55:39

Yes, absolutely.

Sam: 00:55:40

The more I.

Ironically, and it's not really ironic, it makes perfect sense, but the more I started to work in this space, the more I realized that I actually got triggered more by Easter all of a sudden than I might have the year before. And I, you know, the more consumed you are in a space, the more it is likely to. To be present as well.

And so whether you are decades out or weeks out, wherever you are, okay, coming into Easter is okay day that it will. It will be. It can feel a little bit like riding waves or a roller coaster or whatever analogy you want to use there, but we always want people to.

To know that you can be okay. And for some people, that takes longer than others, but it is. It is possible and it can happen. I do want to talk.

Talk Quickly, about the need, I think. And. And this is probably me wanting to give people permission. You don't have to reclaim Easter if you don't want to.

You can throw it in the bin and do nothing with it, if that's what you want to do. And so I would love to know what you would say to. To people in terms of, like, what do people do with Easter now?

Jane: 00:57:04

Yeah, well, exactly. Whatever you goddamn want.

Sam: 00:57:07

Yeah, exactly.

Jane: 00:57:09

Yeah. Permission to kind of go away. Permission to work. Permission to sort of do whatever you want to do that weekend. Yeah, I.

I've been thinking about what I would like to do this weekend. And for me, it. This year, it was going to symbolize rest.

Sam: 00:57:27

Yeah.

Jane: 00:57:27

Because I haven't had four days off since January, you know, in a row. So it's like I'm giving myself that space to just rest. Rest and do whatever I feel like doing. Puzzles, you know, Lego baking, whatever I want to do.

I'll probably, you know, catch up with friends. We're thinking about going to the Botanical Gardens in the Blue Mountains. You know, like, it's just some beautiful things.

But whatever rest is going to mean for me is what I'm gonna do. And. Yeah, again, permission to just choose yourself.

Sam: 00:58:00

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think if you want to find new meaning, do that also. You also have the power.

You know, that's the beauty of agency and the power to make something, whatever you want to make it. If you still want it to be a weekend of reflection and connection with people, do that.

Jane: 00:58:20

If.

Sam: 00:58:22

But I think sometimes there is this need to try and still find meaning in something, particularly if it caused us pain or if it was something so important to us. There is still just this part that goes, yeah, but I should make. I should just turn it into something new. I should.

You know, it can be the start of something new. Well, that's a High School Musical reference. Yeah, we're pulling out all of the music references.

But if you don't want to reclaim it, if you don't want to turn it into something new, that is just as much of a validation, Valid response as somebody who does. I am that person. I didn't want to reclaim Easter. I don't give a. About Easter anymore.

Yes, there might be moments where, like, I drive down my street and there's, like, crosses with the purple garment and all of that sort of thing hanging and sitting and all of that, but I don't feel the need to turn it into something that it doesn't need to be. My Easter weekend will look like A bit of a mishmash. There'll be some work because as Jane knows, I can't say no.

Typically I'm doing some podcast recording over Easter weekend, which just seems like beautifully ironic and symbolic for me. And, and so it will be a mishmash of work and cricket and good food and copious amounts of hot cross buns and chocolate.

Because who doesn't love a hot cross bun? Like, they're just too, they're just good.

Jane: 00:59:47

So do you know at this bakery that I have just found, they make hot cross buns and they have taken the flavor, like the spices from the buns and they have made a butter spiced ice cream to go within it. I will absolute lutely be having one of them. Probably two.

Sam: 01:00:04

Sounds so good. Yeah. So I mean, find, find whatever it is, like it can be random, it can be symbolic, it can be meaningful, or it cannot be you.

It's again, coming back to that, what do I need? And, and that's like, what do I need when I'm triggered, but also what do I need that weekend to look like so that I'm looking after myself?

And, and that can just be a whole host of different things. But, you know, I just.

We're full of giving permission in this episode, so I very much wanted to give permission for people, people who didn't want to find meaning in something if they didn't want to just as much as finding it if you do.

So, and I love that we kind of just naturally talked a little bit about what we were going to be doing over Easter because that was going to be my last question, but we've already done it, so I like that.

But I think wherever this episode lands for you, just, just, you know, take care and, and look after yourself because, you know, we certainly didn't want to do this episode as a way to just like trigger the. Out of people by talking about atonement theology. But God. And we, and we definitely could.

Didn't go into that as much as what we probably, you know, could have easily. But I don't think either of us want to sit here and have a theological discussion for you.

So I think like we said with the Christmas episode, take what you need and, and leave the rest, like I typically will say with most things.

And if for whatever reason, Easter is sitting particularly heavy for you this year and you do need some extra support, there are people out there who can support you and who will sit in that space of going, going, yeah, this, this is, and this is why it was. And this is what we can do to deal with the.

So like, you know, there is space for that and so, you know, there will be links in the show notes and all of that for the collective in terms of people who understand the weight of Easter on a personal level, but also understand ways to deal with that weight as well.

Jane: 01:02:25

Yeah, yeah.

And I think just connect, whatever that looks like, you know, just have a plan to be able to connect with someone if it just starts to feel a bit wobbly.

Sam: 01:02:34

Yeah.

Jane: 01:02:35

And yeah, as they say, take care.

Sam: 01:02:37

Yeah. Thanks for joining me again.

Jane: 01:02:39

Pleasure.

Sam: 01:02:40

These episodes are always a touch chaotic, which I love. So, like, I hope you've enjoyed our pure chaos of Jane and sa. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of beyond the Surface.

I hope you found today's conversation as insightful and inspiring as I did. If you enjoyed the episode, be sure to subscribe, leave a review and share it with others who might benefit from these stories.

Stay connected with us on social media for updates and more content. I love connecting with all of you. Remember, no matter where you are on your journey journey, you're not alone.

Until next time, keep exploring, keep questioning and keep moving forward. Take care.