One of the things that I’ve learned about self-awareness over the last few years is that self-awareness is something we can choose, but it’s also something that happens to us.

It comes at certain points in our lives without our consent, experiences of pain and crisis often becoming the catalyst for this deeper awakening. While I don’t hold to the idea that God causes crisis and suffering, I do know that these things come along, and God uses them. He often uses them to facilitate our own encounter with some of the deepest parts of ourselves.

In this episode, I talk about 3 kinds of crises that our journeys hold: developmental transitions, intrusive events, and internal uprisings. I also talk about why our responses to self-awareness are so important. How we respond can either increase shame or motivate change…and this makes all the difference.

*Some of the concepts of this episode were taken and adapted from “Regerts” by Jennifer Hunt.