Faithful on the Clock is a podcast with the mission of getting your work and faith aligned. We want you to understand Who you're serving and why so you can get more joy and legacy from every minute spent on the clock. Thanks for joining us and taking this step toward a more fulfilling job and relationship with God!

Want to join us on social media?

We'd love to have you stay up-to-date with the show on all our platforms!

Threads

Bluesky

Facebook

Pinterest

Instagram

LinkedIn

YouTube

In this episode...

Understanding Soul Care with Greg Woodard

https://faithfulontheclock.com/understanding-soul-care-with-greg-woodard

Wellness has become a trillion-dollar industry, but are you caring for your soul? Episode 147 of Faithful on the Clock welcomes guest Greg Woodard to help you understand soul care and how to approach it.

Timestamps:

[00:04] - Intro

[00:43] - Greg’s background

[04:10] - Definition of soul care and differentiation from self care

[08:14] - The four main elements of soul care

[11:05] - Why soul care is critical for leaders

[13:02] - Jesus practicing soul care in Scripture

[15:25] - How practicing soul care changes the way we hear God’s voice

[18:30] - Advice for those who feel too busy for soul care

[25:51] - How Greg takes help when he needs it; how start taking help and the value of having many people who can contribute

[31:17] - Options to get started with soul care

[35:36] - Surprising elements Greg encountered when writing his book

[40:27] - Our identity as God’s beloved versus being valued for doing tasks

[47:05] - The importance of soul care for reconnecting to God; the gap between knowing what’s right and doing what’s right and why it’s normal for the doing to lag behind the knowing

[51:09] - How to learn more about and connect with Greg

[52:02] - Prayer

[53:18] - Outro/What’s coming up next

Key takeaways:

1. Soul care is a holistic practice where the soul, body, mind, and emotions are all interconnected. It involves caring for multiple parts of ourselves at once to achieve ideal wellness.
2. Soul care requires acknowledging and embracing who God really made you to be — that is what you protect in your practice. Because everyone is unique, their soul care practice also must be unique, built on distinct, personal rhythms or structures. What works for one person will not necessarily work for another.
3. Soul care is especially important for leaders because they tend to be so busy and have heavy responsibility. It’s a reiteration of the advice to fill your cup first so you can pour out.
4. Scripture demonstrates Jesus practicing soul care, particularly in the way He retreated from the crowds for private time with God.
5. Soul care encourages us to slow down in a way that makes it easier to hear God’s voice. Greg’s view thus is that if you can’t take time for soul care, you’re too busy! Our calendars reveal what our priorities really are, meaning that time for soul care and God should be there. Community is essential in ensuring we can carve out time for soul care and don’t have to be responsible for everything alone. Many people can fill many small needs we have — we don’t necessarily have to depend on one person.
6. Soul care can include a plethora of different activities. Be willing to try a bunch of options to find what works for you, rather than assuming it doesn’t work because the first one or two things you experimented with weren’t successful.
7. While writing his book, Greg was surprised at how important it was to look at his emotions and respectfully say no to others. He found it helpful to have others check on how he was doing — developing a personal board of directors of people who truly care about you and not your accolades helps this consistently happen.
8. Leaders often focus on what they do and take their identity from it. But Greg focuses on the fact he’s simply God’s beloved — we all are. We are precious to Him just because we are His children who give Him joy. The story of the Prodigal Son exemplifies that.
9. In preparing for his book launch, Greg struggled with overwhelm. He recognized that he wasn’t living a lot of what he preached. Many of us are in a similar position, whether in everyday life or our faith — it’s normal for there to be a gap between what we know is right to do and actually completing the practice. Scripture reflects even the early disciples understanding Jesus’ teaching but still struggling with sin. But we can be self-forgiving and recommit to growth within our practice, and we don’t have to wait for perfection before we share the good things that we know.

• Leading Without Burning Out — Gregory Woodard
• Leadership from Within | Discover Your Leadership Potential — Gregory Woodard
• Gregory Woodard | Transform Your Life Now

CTAs:

1. Self assess your current soul care practice. Identify which areas are strong or weak.
2. Select one activity to try for soul care this week.

What’s coming up next:

We all want to grow ourselves and our businesses. But Episode 148 of Faithful on the Clock looks at a paradox — our ability to connect deeply in a way that builds trust can diminish the bigger or more popular we get.

Support the show!

Visit the Faithful on the Clock Patreon page to choose a tier plan and become a supporting member. You'll gain access to goodies like early episode access, newsletters, and more based on the plan that's right for you.

patreon.com/faithfulontheclock

Give a one-off tip or donation on our Captivate support page. You can become a member there with the same great tier options you'll find at Patreon, too.

Support Faithful on the Clock

Visit our sister site! Faithfulonthclock.com features additional free, free-with-registration, and paid access content to grow your faith, including

1. social media archives,
2. previously published faith-based articles,
3. original blogs,
4. inspirational videos,
5. episode teasers and replays
6. exclusive faith-based essays and articles,
7. exclusive videos
8. exclusive audio
9. exclusive in-depth devotionals.

Share the show! Like these episodes? Share them on social media, in texts or emails, or in person.