99Relapses Podcast Episode #17 Part III- Show Transcript

Hi, I’m James Egidio Welcome to the 99 relapses podcast. The podcast that moves you from recovery to discovery. Through the grace and mercy of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ. This is episode number 17, part three, titled false beliefs and how they define your addiction. In this episode of the 99 relapses podcast, I will dive deeper into three perspectives of false beliefs. That is. Where they come from, the effect of a false belief has on you and others and how to change these false beliefs. Just to recap, episode number 16. I defined what our beliefs. Not from so much a religious or faith-based perspective. But more of a belief systems and how they influence your addiction, personal belief systems. And then I compared and contrast, and of course, true beliefs from false beliefs. So then the question is where do these false beliefs come from? False beliefs systems come from and lie within and are deep seated from your childhood during childhood and they have their existence in two ways they’re called projected lies, which are lies that other people may have told you either about yourself or your life. Which are called projected lies. And these projected lies will go something like this they’ll come usually from, most commonly a parent, an abusive parent, verbally abusive parent. And I, of course personally experienced this myself. Who may say something to the effect of, you’re no good or you’re bad or you’re just like you’re drunk and father or, you’ll never amount to anything, or you’re unattractive and these projected lies stem from other people like I say your parent who take their hurts and fears and they, their own personal hurts and fears that is that may have been passed on to them and they project them onto you and over time, these are damaging they’re so damaging that as a child when these projected lies are being projected on to you you have no defense for these projected lies because you have so much stock and confidence in an authority figure or a caregiver such as your parent. So these lies, these projected lies go straight to the heart and they end up becoming truths. They become self fulfilling prophecies of truth that continue to sabotage your attempt at any type of success in life and you’ve probably heard the term, That words can be used as a weapon. And this is a case when that happens now as a child, this is damaging because it’s hard to distinguish between something that is, morally bad or having even made an honest mistake. So when it comes to this damaging experience, this is where you, the person who becomes a victim of these projected lies, eventually at some point must come to terms and forgive the person who is. Verbally abusing you, with these projected lies. I wil be doing a future podcast episodes. A series of episodes on forgiveness and how it plays a role in addiction because it’s very important. I can remember, and I’ll just briefly mention this. And I’ll get into more detail when I do the episodes on forgiveness, but. I was carrying so much angst and anger for many years against my father who physically, and verbally abused me, which the verbal abuse was these projected lies that I believed for so long and it just, it destroyed me and I was angry and and rebelled and the rebellion came through the addiction and I came to a point of forgiving him in 2002. And when I did that it freed me up. These projected lies, of course, results in the inability to tell the difference between, what you did and who you are as a person and between having made a mistake and in. We’re being, stupid or a bad person. So in other words, when projected lies are very deep in your subconscious they can usually leave you second guessing yourself, and even the decisions that you make leading to bad choices down the road. So there are very deep seeded and there in the subconscious and they just lay dormant and they manifest themselves at times when you make of course bad choices. But I will say this the one thing that never leaves you second guessing about anything is the love and the grace and the mercy and presence of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ. And that’s in Deuteronomy 31:6 which reads be strong and of good courage do not fear nor be afraid of them. For the Lord, your God, he is the one who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you. And then Psalm 3:3 reads. But you O’Lord are a shield around me. You are my glory. The one who holds my head high. And then Psalm 125:12 reads for you blessed the Godly,. O’Lord you surround them with your shield of love. And then finally Psalm 36:5 reads. Your unfailing Love, O’ Lord is as vast as the heavens your faithfulness reaches beyond the clouds. So for the people who do cast these projected lies upon you they’re dealing with their own sin nature and their own issues that require your understanding and forgiveness as I have mentioned and of course this all comes with letting go of your personal pride and ego with, forgiving and understanding and it’s easier said than done and to accomplish that and the only way to accomplish that is through your faith in our Lord and savior Jesus Christ. This is where the secular recovery processes, fall short, as far as I’m concerned, secular recovery tells you that, you don’t need to tolerate that. You can do it all on your own. You’re better than that but that never resolves things because what’s happening in that situation is you’re not humbling yourself and you’re not becoming forgiving. Jesus Christ took the punishment for our sins and It’s a hard concept to comprehend and it’s a bitter pill to swallow to accept those types of things. I’m guilty of that I’ll ,put up my guard and get defensive about certain things, because I know it’s my pride, my ego. And, when you carry that anger and that unforgiveness, what it does, is it short circuits, your faith in God and it weakens you and that’s the enemy that’s attacking you. this is how we’re wired as human beings with our sin nature. The second kind of lie that creates this false belief is called a survival lie. And this works like. This is the lie that people tell themselves. As a way to survive. And I discussed some of these coping mechanisms. In episode number 15. So for example, You might come from a family environment that was emotionally abusive where you had this need for nurturing and it was neglected and the very act of having a need at that time and it’s a lot because yet you have to understand that, you’re vulnerable as a child and sensitive to a lot of things that are said you don’t, there’s not much life experience there to understand what’s going on. So when those needs are not met. You get hurt over and over again and in time you come up with a way to stop being vulnerable in that situation in order to survive that hurt. So you may tell yourself things like. I don’t need anybody and as as a child, your needs are denied or they’re punished. So you develop a belief system to protect yourself and build this wall around yourself. You see this a lot when people are hurt in relationships because they put their trust in people and we’re in person. And they get hurt. And the first thing they’ll do is they’ll say, oh, I don’t need anybody or anything. And I had mentioned this early on in the 99 relapses podcast when I mentioned the dire consequences of isolation and anger when it comes to overcoming an addiction. You must, surrender and you have to make yourself vulnerable to healthy relationships and you have to put yourself out there because there are going to be consequences people are going to let you down even though you trust them and when it comes to overcoming an addiction this is the situation that you have to put yourself in. A common example of this type of survival lie you’ll see, a lot of times also develops in these families. That from the outside look as though everything is together, with status, power, prestige and wealth and, great home and family environment, at least that’s what you’re thinking, which it seems like that on the outside and on the inside. There’s this detachment and this destruction and physical and emotional abuse along with, out of control addictions amongst, spouses and children, and pretty much sometimes even everyone in the household. So these survivor lies or are lies that we use to build a wall around ourselves. And it takes work and it takes understanding as to where this all stems from, and of course it stems from the fact that we want to protect our egos and our pride. The other question is what are the effects of these false beliefs? And here’s the effect of it is that. Believing that you don’t need anyone. Will potentially result in loneliness and it will cause pain deep in your heart and your soul and of course this kind of pain, often results in compulsive behaviors, because what you’re doing is you’re substituting those relationships, those healthy relationships in that pain for a healthy relationship and your substitute for things like drugs, alcohol, overeating, overspending, gambling, and overworking. Or even acting out sexually. And if you subconsciously or even consciously believe I don’t need anybody. You might be able to trust people and if you’re not able to trust people, you’ll end up lonely and isolated. You’ll be angry. And again, as I mentioned early on in the 99 relapses podcast. That’s important when it comes to sobriety, is relationships healthy relationships and I also mentioned in episodes four and five episodes titled desire and how it relates to addiction is that the premise was that we repress through these false beliefs based on, projected lies and survivor lies this desire for God. By burying and distracting ourselves and other interests. As I had mentioned, like drugs, alcohol, work, games, money, power, social media and smartphones which of course become addictions. And we fall into these addictions for self-fulfilling comfort, which is normal and we substitute it for God. And this leads to sin and more addiction. As I outlined in episodes eight and nine where I titled Is Addiction Sin? So the true source of love is that it’s buried by all that and it’s ultimately found in Jesus Christ. And I believe that the more you take responsibility and your own up to your addiction and self-reflect on the root cause of your addiction and you humbly accept and surrender to Jesus Christ. The closer you’ll get to sobriety. The question is; how do you change these false beliefs? And changing these false beliefs about yourself requires identifying your beliefs and how they’re affecting you. And the best way to do that is determining whether or not. What’s true and what’s false and it identify each false belief as a projected lie or survive a lie and replace it with truth at the end of these episodes 15, 16, and 17 I have on the website, 99 relapses.org. Some in-depth. Exercises and tools to identify these false. Lies and these true lies. Or false beliefs and true beliefs. And it’s a really good way to self reflect and I highly advise you to take advantage of the tools and exercises that I post to the website that are in accord with each episode, because they really help to self-reflect and to get through your addictions. And get you to full sobriety and. Like I said, when you begin to substitute false beliefs to true beliefs, these destructive ways of thinking and behavior will begin to change. And it’ll set you free from the addiction and from your hangups and what you’re going through. And it’s why it’s important to accept and own and take responsibility for your addiction and faith and you can only receive this discerning spirit from God through the holy spirit, in order to make the change that will set you free. One of the verse that comes to mind about setting you free comes from John 8 32 and it reads. And you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free. You have to remember that. Rebellion is fear of being controlled and the response to rebellion is manifested by. An under reaction or even an overreaction and more than likely involves pain from an old wound. So these wounds are protected by these false beliefs and these behaviors that you’ve developed over time since childhood. So we all behave and we react from our belief systems that were instilled in us from childhood. And the only way to get through this and overcome is through our faith in our Lord and savior Jesus Christ. I would like to close out this episode out with a prayer Heavenly Father. We just give you so much thanks and praise the Lord. We just thank you so much for each and every day that you give us that you. Provide us faith, love, and hope each and everyday give us strength and courage and a discerning spirit to get through each and every day and to get through our addictions, knowing that we’re at a weak point in our lives when we are going through addictions and that you give us that strength and that courage through your son, Jesus Christ, our Lord and savior, who you brought here in a physical body to be sacrificed at the cross Lord. To be sacrificed at the cross for our sins to wash then away way clean and paid the ultimate price that we didn’t deserve. And as I continue to pray, Lord. we know that these lies, these projected lies and these survival lies that are cast upon us. And can be and have been cast upon us, in childhood. That they’re just that they’re just lies we know that the truth is in your son, Jesus Christ He is the way the truth and the life. And we know that no one can come to you, except through him and we’re just so grateful for that Lord knowing that we have that precious gift of faith through you and that strength again, to get through our addictions. And as I continue to pray, Lord, we just thank you so much in your son’s name Jesus Christ Amen. Thank you for listening to this episode of the 99 relapses podcast for current podcast episodes, episode show notes, episode memory versus as well as episode recovery lessons and tools. Go to 99 relapses.org. That’s the number 99 relapses.org. Also, if you would like prayer request for yourself, family or friends, please do not hesitate to send me your prayer request. If you have an interesting story to share about how God changed your life through addiction and recovery. Or an expert I feel of Christian addiction and recovery have published a book, have a Christian. Addiction and recovery podcast or website, and we’d like to promote it on the 99 relapses podcast. Please email me anytime by going to 99 relapses.org. And go to the contact page to message me. I will respond within 24 to 48 hours. Finally the 99 relapses podcast is a nonprofit 501 C3 ministry and a donation in any amount would be much appreciated in order to get God’s word out during these perilous times confronted with an out of control addiction all proceeds, go towards covering the expenses for the production of the podcast, content creation of the podcast as well as the maintenance of the website thank you and God Bless