The Empowered Catholic Podcast

The question for goals is: What is the harvest that you want? Goals are all about the Law of the Farm: you plan, you prepare the field by removing rocks and tilling, you plant, you water, you do the right things in the right season, and finally you harvest. Goals engage the law of the farm by creating the plan & engaging the process. There is SCIENCE to this; there is also ART.  You make a lot of...

"Why Goals?" Because the rest of your life matters. Grab that mindset. Often we are merely coping. Striving to do what is necessary and carve out a little "life" in between. When we believe that the rest of our life matters in terms of what we live, do, say, and be - we have a different outlook. The people around us need us to show up at our best. The culture around us needs the Christian perspect...

"Why can't I achieve this goal?" There are a lot of reasons. For example, we don't always set the right goals. And when we set them, we don't always have a clear sense of what it will actually be like to achieve them. Also, we have a bunch of unspoken goals that we're already working on consciously and unconsciously, and those can take priority without us even realizing it. So we may not even appr...

Christ is born to be King! He IS King, now. Merry Christmas! That makes us agents of the New Creation because Christ has already started the New Creation. Paul talks about this a lot. God wants to dwell with man and will bring heaven down to earth and they will exist together in the new creation; think of the New Jerusalem descending in Revelations. Christ, he says, is the "first fruits" of the ne...

You are a citizen of Heaven - did you know that? Paul wrote that in Philippians 3. His listeners would immediately know that's like being a citizen of Rome.  Philippi was a colony. Roman citizens there were agents and emissaries of Roman culture, law, language, customs, and power. Roman citizens living in Philippi weren't interested in leaving Philippi and going to Rome if things got dicey. They w...

John is determined to show how the Shekinah has returned in an unexpected way: in the person of Jesus. Then who, when, where, and how of its return is shocking. There could be no messiah without addressing the Temple question. The Messiah would restore the temple. Period. No restored temple, no messiah. The Temple was central to Jewish thought, history, practice, mindset - to everything. If the me...

Most of our listeners know that using the covenant "lens" is a powerful organizing principle for reading Scripture. It helps explain what's happening and creates insights for us today. The Temple "lens" is a similar powerful organizing principle. There are some surprises there, at least for me (Curtis). I knew Jesus referred to himself as a temple but somehow that slid past me because, well, that...

The creation account in Genesis is not understood by modern people. We've pretty much missed every important point in it. We have read all of our modern preconceptions into it, wondered why it makes little sense, and then created pointless controversies about why it is so. Listen to the podcast to grasp what Genesis is actually all about.  God Resting Doesn't Mean Watching the Superbowl, with snac...

Gratitude has its ins and outs! Karen discusses how gratitude shows up in our lives, points to a couple of pitfalls, and shares some tips. We are grateful for you, our listeners, and invite you to join the discussion at The Catholic Midlife podcast.

What a great question! How should you relate to your emotions, indeed? We paint a picture for you in this episode, which wraps up our Surprising Mind season. We also share 10 common, erroneous myths about emotions and talk about how we have synergy or overlap with certain healing ministries.  Painting A Picture for relating to your emotions Think of a Catholic man or woman in midlife, which you pr...

We are not OK with it I'm coming to realize that there are people that believe that they don't deserve compassion. As you sit there, you might think that's ridiculous because you know that God made each of us, so of course, we deserve compassion.  But then you start digging down into some specific situations and particular circumstances and you find, if you dig enough, that you believe you don't d...

Your unconscious mind is in charge of creating and executing your habits! Habits include your thoughts and emotions. Brushing your teeth is a habit. So is the way you manage conflict. Your style of talking to yourself is also a habit - what's your self-talk like? Is it mostly positive? Negative? Some things just "set you off", right? Those "things" are triggers that cause a habit to kick in.  Habi...

Your unconscious mind does some powerful and amazing things for you. . .but how do you get it on board with who you're trying to be and where you're trying to go?  Get some tips on working with your elephant and talking to it the way it likes to be talked to–because after all, your unconscious mind is YOU and it can also be your very best friend.    Contact Info Email or text us:  Text: The Cathol...

We are going to share a metaphor with you about how your mind works and suggest a couple of ways for you to manage yourself with more grace.  The ancients knew that teaching wisdom involved touching the heart and the mind. Here are a couple of examples:  " It is better to obey the Lord and to have only a little than to be very rich and terribly anxious." And " Blessed are the poor in spirit for th...

Karen tells the story of the man who thought he was Jesus Christ, somewhere in California in the sixties. It took a while for this version of Jesus to figure that one out. He needed a little help from Richard Bandler, who went on to become a famous psychologist. All I can say to California Jesus, is: Dude, like, that's so bogus, right?   Everything that you know about the world around you came to...

Time for a new season! It's your surprising mind. Getting a handle on some of its quirks can really give you a head start on navigating life's obstacles and continuing to grow.  Perspectives on the prodigal son  The parable of the prodigal son. Think about what you've thought and heard about it. Here's the younger son, shockingly asking for his share of the estate before his father is dead. Then g...

We often unconsciously resist receiving God's love and the graces that flow with it.  We get discouraged, we ruminate, and we isolate ourselves. We criticize ourselves. We criticize other people. We get stuck in these judgment loops and all of that keeps us both from hearing God's voice and from seeing ourselves the way that God sees us. What if we saw ourselves through the eyes of God's compassio...

What do I need now?  Oh, that's EASY: I need some chocolate, coffee, or both!  LOL, no, That's not what I need - that's more like a passing thought before I realize: no, I need a lot more than that at this time.  Asking "What do I need now" is the third step in the self-compassion break.  Our habit is to skip straight to this question. Or to skip even this question and ask, instead, what does THIS...

Do those around you deserve to be treated with compassion?  With compassionate speech, which is kind and sensitive to speak in a manner that is helpful?  With an act of compassion, such as a hug, a hand on the shoulder, or a smile at the right time?  Do they deserve to be encouraged when life is offering them difficulty?  What does it say about you, when you are able to act compassionately?  What...

When am I supposed to practice the skill of self-compassion? There are lots of chances every day!  If you hate being late and you're being late to someplace -  maybe your automatic reaction is I should have done "this" or "that" and why didn't I and why am I so dumb?  That's an opportunity to stop and use some self-compassion. Maybe you need to make a difficult phone call and fear of looking dumb...

"I realized I had been engaging in a lot of self-criticisms because I saw it as part of being virtuous. I thought being a big self-critic helped me serve others better and not be selfish. After practicing self-compassion, I began to realize that my self-criticism was actually keeping my focus on myself. It was a self-oriented and self-absorbed habit. Self-compassion helps me move my focus away fro...

HOPE is a theme of our podcast. HOPE. We keep coming back to it. Because we need a LOT of it. We need a lot of it because life is either challenging us, or even kicking us when we are down, and because we are leaning into new challenges that S-T-R-E-T-C-H us. Life is short and needs lots of hope if we want to accept it and embrace it.  Supernatural hope does not disappoint. It certainly does CHALL...

How do you KNOW you are living with meaning and purpose? We are wrapping-up this season on meaning and purpose: shoot us an email if you want our list of eight items to ponder if you are living with meaning and purpose.  How do you know? If you are ABSOLUTELY MISSING it, you likely know it. And if you are ABSOLUTING SMASHING IT, you likely know that. The interesting bit is the in-between.  I'm rea...

In life, we often don't make progress until we ask the RIGHT question.    That's why we are so impressed with Dr. John Olesnavage 's approach: finding Your Most Powerful Question. He has written the book Your Most Powerful Question; Finding purpose and meaning in God's plan.    It's the fruit of years of professional work as a Doctor of Psychology, many years' experience with his own most powerful...

If you were heading out to canoe for two weeks in the Boundary Waters, a series of pristine lakes up around Ely, Minnesota, you would be unpacking your gear and selecting what you need to go into the canoe with you. You would not want what you don't need. You would want what you need and no more.    It would be REALLY hard to decide what to take OUT of your bag and what to put INTO your bag if you...