Neurodivergent Faith

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Birthdays are supposed to be celebrations—but for many neurodivergent people, they can also bring sensory overload, social expectations, disrupted routines, emotional complexity, and the exhausting pressure to perform the “right” kind of happiness and gratitude.

In this episode, Josh reflects on his own complicated relationship with birthdays, including childhood experiences of sensory overwhelm, the discomfort of opening gifts in front of people, and the challenge of being the center of attention. As he approaches his 50th birthday, he explores what he has learned about designing celebrations that actually fit his nervous system—including centering special interests, creating predictable structure, thinking intentionally about social dynamics, and celebrating through connection rather than performance.

Josh also considers what birthdays might teach us about Christian community: What does it mean to rejoice with one another in ways that actually work for each person? What if celebration doesn't have to look the same for everyone? And perhaps most importantly, what does it mean to learn how to receive celebration?

Maybe the question isn't simply, “How should we celebrate birthdays?”

Maybe it's: “How do you want to be celebrated?”

#NeurodivergentFaith #NeurodivergentBirthdays #Autism #ADHD #Neurodivergence #Birthday #Celebration #Masking #NeurodivergentChristians #ChristianSpirituality #Spirituality #Belonging #SelfAcceptance #Receiving #Neurodiversity

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.

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What if your spirituality doesn't need to fit neatly into a box?

Christianity has always contained many different ways of encountering God. In this episode, I explore six historic Christian traditions—contemplative, holiness, charismatic, social justice, evangelical, and incarnational—and consider what each might offer neurodivergent people.

Some practices may feel deeply nourishing. Others may feel restrictive, overwhelming, or simply like they weren't made with your particular brain, body, nervous system, or life experience in mind. And, if you are like me, sometimes, the same practice can be both liberating and overwhelming.

I also share some of my own journey toward what could be called a bespoke spirituality—one that is Christocentric, embodied, and eclectic. Perhaps we neurodivergent Christians are part of a long and beautiful tradition of people who have never fit quite comfortably in any particular box or label. 

#NeurodivergentFaith #NeurodivergentChristian #Neurodiversity #ChristianSpirituality #BespokeSpirituality #NeurodivergentSpirituality #AutisticChristian #ADHDChristian #ChristianFaith #SpiritualDirection #FollowingJesus #FaithAndNeurodiversity

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.

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For many neurodivergent people, apology can become almost automatic: apologizing for having emotions, getting off topic, talking too much, needing an accommodation, thinking differently, or simply taking up space. But what happens when “I’m sorry” becomes less about repairing harm and more about apologizing for being ourselves?

In this episode, we explore the difference between genuine accountability and self-erasure, and consider how masking, shame, and the desire to belong can teach us to make ourselves smaller. We’ll ask a simple contemplative question: “I’m sorry…for what?”

Humility doesn’t require us to disappear. And we don’t have to apologize for being human—or for being neurodivergent.

#NeurodivergentFaith #Neurodivergence #ADHD #Autism #Masking #SelfCompassion #Spirituality #Christianity #NeurodivergentChristians #Belonging #FaithAndNeurodiversity 

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.

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What happens when we read Scripture through the lens of our own lives?

In this episode, I explore what it might mean to engage Scripture through a neurodivergent lens, and why our particular ways of seeing the world might actually help us notice things that have been there all along.

We’ll look at Peter, his deep knowledge of fishing, and the surprising ways Jesus repeatedly meets him in the world he already knows. What if discipleship isn’t a call away from who we are, but a call through it?

We each bring our culture, gender, history, bodies, experiences, questions, and ways of seeing when we encounter Scripture. Rather than pretending those lenses don’t exist, we can become curious about what they help us see—and what they might make harder for us to notice.

Maybe we can bring our whole selves and discover that Jesus is already meeting us there.

#NeurodivergentFaith #NeurodivergentChristian #AutisticChristian #ADHDChristian #Neurodiversity #ReadingScripture #ChristianSpirituality #Jesus #ContemplativeChristianity

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.

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In this episode of Neurodivergent Faith, I begin with listener mail—including some thoughtful questions about parenting, sensory overwhelm, gratitude, accommodation, and the difference between stretching ourselves and pushing ourselves into dysregulation.

Then, I transition into my own seasonal inventory: What's working for me? What's not working? And what's changing?

I share some things that are surprisingly life-giving right now—from spiritual direction with podcast listeners, to my current journal, rearranging my office, and an unexpected breakthrough at our family-and-friends “dinner dinner.”

I also talk honestly about what's not working: Sabbath days, family Sabbath dinners, summertime overstimulation, unpredictable schedules, shifting ministry meetings, and the deceptively disruptive practice of checking email and texts on low-demand days.

And underneath all of it is a deeper question about capacity and discernment.

I've spent much of my life assuming that if something isn't working, the answer is to try harder, become more disciplined, or figure out how to make myself fit. 

Sometimes discernment means asking not only, “What is God calling me to do?” but also: What is actually sustainable for me?

#NeurodivergentFaith #Neurodivergence #Autism #ADHD #SpiritualDirection #ChristianSpirituality #Discernment #Capacity #SensoryOverload #NeurodivergentChristians #FaithAndNeurodiversity #ChristianPodcast #Overwhelm #SelfKnowledge

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.

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In this special episode of Neurodivergent Faith, I’m sharing a replay of my conversation on Deb Gregory’s Betwixt podcast. Deb is an author and spiritual director, and as someone who is part of a neurodiverse family, she and I share a lot of common ground—and a deep curiosity about the ways neurodivergent people experience God and the world.

In our conversation, we explore sensory challenges and sensory joy, differences in imagination, masking, belonging, and the unique gifts neurodivergent people bring to the body of Christ.

What happens when we stop viewing neurodivergence primarily through the lens of difficulty or deficit and begin asking what neurodivergent people might uniquely contribute to our communities of faith? How might our different ways of sensing, imagining, noticing, and experiencing the world become gifts rather than things we need to hide?

This conversation is an invitation to consider a different kind of belonging—one that doesn't require us to mask, conform, or become more like everyone else in order to have a place in the body of Christ.

This episode is a replay of Betwixt, Deb Gregory's podcast. You can find the original podcast and explore more of Deb's work at Flourish Spiritual Direction & Contemplative Center — Betwixt Podcast. 

#NeurodivergentFaith #BelongingWithoutBecomingSomeoneElse #NeurodiversityAndFaith #NeurodivergentChristian #AutisticChristian #ADHDFaith #NeurodivergentCommunity #SensoryJoy #NeurodivergentGifts #Masking #ChristianContemplation #SpiritualDirection #Belonging #BodyOfChrist

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.

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In this solo episode of Neurodivergent Faith, I explore what prayer can look like for Christians with ADHD, drawing inspiration from Megan Fowler’s Christianity Today article, “How to Pray with ADHD.” Along the way, I reflect on the shame many ADHD Christians carry when they struggle to maintain traditional spiritual practices—and the “lesser than” mindset that can develop when we measure spiritual maturity by neurotypical standards.

We explore the freedom of realizing, “I get to pray differently.” Maybe stillness and silence help you connect with God—or maybe walking, doodling, stretching, knitting, or fidgeting helps your attention become available. Maybe your hyperfocus isn't something you need to overcome in order to pray. What if you could actually share your fascination, curiosity, joy, and discoveries with God?

I also explore how ancient Christian practices—from Lectio Divina and the Jesus Prayer to liturgy, repetition, movement, prayer beads, physical postures, and the rhythms of the church calendar—can offer neurodivergent Christians meaningful ways to encounter God.

And toward the end of the episode, we move from talking about prayer to actually praying together. Whether you're walking, doodling, fidgeting, driving, or simply sitting wherever you are, I invite you to notice where your attention is and share it with God.

Because prayer is not a performance. Prayer is relationship.

You don't have to become someone else before God will meet you. You get to come to God as the person God created you to be.

#NeurodivergentFaith #PrayingWithADHD #ADHDFaith #NeurodiversityAndFaith #ADHDChristian #NeurodivergentChristian #AutisticChristian #SpiritualDirection #ChristianContemplation #NeurodivergentCommunity #Prayer #SpiritualPractices #ADHDSpirituality #Neurodiversity #ChristianPodcast

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.

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What happens when the world keeps telling you that you don’t fit?

In this episode of Neurodivergent Faith, I talk with Daniel Curtis, a speaker, storyteller, composer, and late-diagnosed ADD adult from South Wales. Daniel shares openly about being bullied, struggling with self-doubt, being told by a teacher that music wasn’t for him, and the long journey of learning to question the stories others had written about him.

At the heart of our conversation is a question Daniel often asks: “Who were you before the world told you who to be?”

Together, we explore what it means to go looking for who we really are—to notice what brings us alive, what makes us shut down, who helps us become more fully ourselves, and what we might want the rest of our lives to look like.

And we ask an important question for anyone who has ever felt like they didn't quite fit the mold: Is there room in God’s Kingdom for someone like me?

Daniel’s story is ultimately one of trusting that the person God created us to be may be far more beautiful than the person the world told us we needed to become.

Daniel Curtis | Speaker, Storyteller & Composer | www.danielcurtishq.com

#NeurodivergentFaith #WhenYouDontFitTheMold #NeurodiversityAndFaith #ADDandFaith #ADHDFaith #NeurodivergentChristian #NeurodivergentCommunity #FaithAndIdentity #NeurodivergentCalling #NeurodivergentCreativity #Belonging #Masking #LateDiagnosedADD #ChristianPodcast

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.

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In this episode of Neurodivergent Faith, I continue my conversation with Neurodiverse Couples Coach Robin Tate—and bring our series on executive function and faith to a close.

Together, we explore two more executive functions that have a profound impact on our daily lives: persistence/perseverance, and stress resilience.

What does it mean to keep going when our brains and bodies are overwhelmed? And how do we discern the difference between faithful perseverance and pushing ourselves beyond what is healthy or sustainable? What might it look like to cultivate resilience without turning resilience into another demand to perform?

Throughout this series, Robin and I have explored executive function not simply as a set of skills we need to improve, but as a reality of neurodiversity. Each unique brain has executive function strengths and challenges...and each person is worthy of dignity and inclusion as an image-bearer of God. 

#NeurodivergentFaith #ExecutiveFunction #NeurodiversityAndFaith #Persistence #Perseverance #StressResilience #NeurodivergentChristian #ADHDFaith #AutisticChristian #NeurodivergentCommunity #FaithAndNeurodiversity

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.

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In this episode, I continue my conversation with Neurodiverse Couples Coach Robin Tate in Part Four of our series exploring executive function and neurodivergence.

This time, we turn our attention to two often-overlooked executive functions: cognitive flexibility and self-awareness. Together, we explore what it means to shift our perspective, hold multiple possibilities, notice what is happening within us, and grow in our understanding of ourselves.

And, of course, we explore what all of this has to do with faith.

How does cognitive flexibility shape the way we relate to God?  How might growing in self-awareness change the way we love ourselves and relate to the people around us?

As we continue this conversation, Robin and I uncover the reality that executive function isn't just about getting things done. It can also shape the way we experience God, understand ourselves, navigate relationships, and participate in the life of faith.

#NeurodivergentFaith #ExecutiveFunction #NeurodiversityAndFaith #SelfAwareness #NeurodivergentChristian #ADHDFaith #AutisticChristian #NeurodivergentCommunity #CognitiveFlexibility

To connect further, find Josh on Facebook, Instagram or email at: [email protected]. You can also join the conversation in our Neurodivergent Faith Community Group on Facebook. Or, for personal encouragement on your own journey of neurodivergence, consider booking a spiritual direction session with Josh through Patreon.