Caroline Dooner coined the term "The Jesus Situation.” She says this phrase best describes what she has been going through. I’ve been going through my own “God Situation” for the past two years as well. I didn’t know if I would ever talk publicly about my new relationship with God—because of the fear of what I might lose (business, clients, etc).
The fear of being socially ostracized if I talk about God felt similar to the fear that many feel when they quit drinking.
It seems like a lot of people I know reject (the traditional Christian) God.
One of Caroline’s Substack posts describes some viewpoints I once held, "I was extremely turned off by religion. It seemed so controlling and so limited. So closed minded. I’d learned too much about abuses in different churches. It was all too culty, I thought. So the term “God” was too associated with religion to me. I didn’t use it, really. And when I did, I think I meant “universe.”
However, Caroline’s current Instagram bio now says: “I’m like Christian now…it’s weird. Mostly posting about God.” Though our stories are different in some ways, just like individual drinking stories, I can relate to many parts of Caroline’s journey from the New Age to Jesus.
Old-school recovery language and current Christianese language can have a similar feeling.
Gray area drinking, sober curious, sober for the health of it, is relatable language. There aren’t a lot of negative connotations or emotional charge with these drinking descriptions. The term gray area drinking gave me (and thousands of others) the courage to speak publicly about taking an early exit from alcohol.
Self-identified alcoholics talking about alcoholism often isn’t relatable to gray area drinkers. Just like life-long Christians talking about Christianity isn’t always relatable to non-religious people who are just discovering or re-discovering God. So perhaps Caroline’s term—the “Jesus Situation”—is a helpful way to put words around exploring God for the first time or in a new way. Just like the term gray area drinking is a helpful term when exploring a life without alcohol.
I’ve decided, despite my fears, to share more of my spiritual story. In large part because it helped me when I heard people like Caroline share their stories. Maybe my story will help someone too. A couple weeks ago, I sat down with This Naked Mind coaches Christy Osborne and Meade Holland Shirley over Zoom. We became fast friends. We bonded as fellow coaches working in the alcohol-free space who also want to talk about God.
A couple days later Kelly Miller interviewed me on her podcast. The same thing happened—fast friends! I love these conversations. And I love finding others who are walking this path. There’s a peace, I’ve found, that permeates these Jesus-infused connections.
That deep cellular knowing in my bones
I knew in my bones I was done with alcohol in 2014. I also had a cellular knowing in 2021 that after 30 years of spiraling in and through the “spiritual but not religious life,” I was done. Enough was enough. It was time for me to stand with God. I recently read something along the lines of, “Once I saw how real evil is, it became clear how real (and more powerful) God is!”
The irony!
Seeing the darkness so clearly as it rose to the surface the past couple years is exactly what led me straight to God.
Sometimes I feel like I wasted 30 years of my life being “spiritual but not religious”—there’s so much to catch up on. So much I feel like I missed out on and lots I’m still learning and unlearning. Just like when we quit drinking! But I don’t think I’d be as resolute about not drinking if I hadn’t experienced the misery of drinking. I also don’t think I’d be so hungry for knowing God if I hadn't seen and experienced the darkness and deception within the New Age.
The missing pieces — seeking the root cause and foundations
In the traditional recovery and alcohol-free spaces, we’re missing the comprehensive understanding of biochemical depletions and deficiencies—especially neurotransmitters, amino acids, minerals, fatty acids. We’ve missed the connection with stored trauma in the body (epigenetics) and the neurobiological support found in somatics, polyvagal theory, attachment theory, limbic brain repair. As well as functional medicine support for blood sugar, cortisol, estrogen/progesterone, sleep, and so much more. We need all these foundations to replenish ourselves after we stop drinking.
But we need foundational spiritual resources in our modern-day Jesus Revolution as well. Many people are returning to God and want to learn about God after wandering in spiritual deserts for years.
I’ve spent the past decade sharing the missing physiological resources with others because when I quit drinking there wasn't a central hub that housed all the pieces in one place.
When I found myself in my “Jesus Situation,” it was just like when I quit drinking. I didn’t know what I didn’t know—let alone where I should begin. So I want to share some of what I’ve pieced together over the past two years, aka, my favorite Healthy Discoveries that I’ve found along the way.
How I started to study the Bible, when I’d never read the Bible all the way through before.
Two excellent books with compelling evidence for this whole “Jesus Situation.”
My favorite book, which I’ve now read a couple times. It’s about Rembrandt, coupled with a story in the Bible explained in a way I hadn’t considered before.
Two C.S. Lewis lecture series that stopped me in my tracks because they make sense of this world that otherwise seems to make no sense.
The biography that impacted me deeply.
A Christian psychiatrist, author, who was one of my biggest Healthy Discoveries in 2022.
Two really good books on prayer.
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