Provocative, non-religious conversations about life, love and God.
Hosted by Jonathan Puddle and Tryphena Perumalla-Gagnon.
Text transcriptions are available for most episodes.
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Tryphena and I kept the mics rolling right after our interview with Aundi Kolber, and let me tell you… it’s a wild ride! We discussed the provocativeness of wholeness, including a physics lesson and a reflection on quantum physics… Why? Because presence is a powerful resource, and I have some theories about it. We talked about anger and injustice, we examined the time that Jesus had a panic attack, and we landed on rest and the safety of unproductivity. Strap in, it’s a wild ride.
Read MoreTherapist (and my good friend) Aundi Kolber returns to the show to discuss her brand new book, Strong Like Water: Finding the Freedom, Safety, and Compassion to Move through Hard Things—and Experience True Flourishing. Our conversation revolves around reframing many things we’ve seen as weaknesses, even sins, as forms of strength that enabled us to survive hard things. We reflected on the particular shame we feel after having put in years of healing work in therapy, only to feel like we fall apart again. Aundi explained how resilience has been weaponized at times, and she honours the fact that we should never have had to be this strong. This is a powerful and intimate conversation that I think will bring real hope to you. Enjoy.
Read MoreThis here’s a B-Side, folks! As Tryphena and I walked back through our interview with Kevin Sweeney about mystics, mushrooms and the power of letting go, we found ourselves camped out discussing our value and worth when we’re not productive. Tryphena asks, if a flower shines with no one to see its beauty, is it still beautiful? We shared some dark night of the soul stories and challenged each other to live present, right here and now, in this cosmos, rather than escape.
Read MoreBy popular demand, Aundi Kolber returns to The Puddcast this week. Aundi and I discuss the success and impact of Try Softer, the brand new Try Softer Guided Journey companion book, and we riff at length on Jesus’ relationship to traumatic events. Expect to learn more about how your process pain and shift into the shame-free life that God has designed you for.
Read MoreChristina Dent joins me on The Puddcast this week to talk about the war on drugs. Christina is the Founder and President of End It For Good, a nonprofit advocating a health-centred approach to drugs rather than a criminal justice one. Living in Mississippi, Christina changed her own mind about how best to approach drug laws after she became a foster parent and saw the negative effects of our current approach up close. She shared powerfully with me about the real choices before us as people who claim to care about humans made in the image of God. Get ready to be challenged!
Read MoreOn The Puddcast this week is writer and cartoonist, Heather Caliri. Heather’s work on finding God’s grace in awkward, uncomfortable places has been featured on ChristianityToday.com, In Touch Magazine, Fathom Magazine, Relevant Magazine.com and more. Heather shared with me how she asked the most serious questions of her faith and experienced God respond with love and dignity. That grace slowly transformed her life, and now she teaches others how to let dignity transform their lives and their most difficult relationships.
Read MoreThis week I am joined by my friend Lisa Colón DeLay to talk about the healing power of spiritual practices. Lisa begins by explaining why we should acknowledge that we live in a white-dominant culture and the importance of learning about non-white spiritual practices, especially embodiment. We discussed a rubric for identifying our core areas of trauma as well as how to move them from areas of non-awareness into conscious awareness, through spiritual practices led by the Holy Spirit. Lisa unpacks many themes from her excellent book, The Wild Land Within: Cultivating Wholeness Through Spiritual Practice, which is an excellent discipleship resource.
Read MoreThis week we are joined by pastor, podcaster and author Kurt Willems, to discuss how Jesus’ humanity redeems and transforms our human suffering. Kurt is a delightful blend of the academic, the pastoral, and deep spiritual formation. We talked about how Jesus meets us in our brokenness and leads us through the traumas of our life, renewing our humanity in the process. And a whole lot more, as usual!
Read MoreThis week you get to enjoy a brand-new piece of content, the first Puddcast B-Side! I sat down (virtually) with my good friend Chris and we unpacked the ways that episodes 100 and 101 (the panel on Jesus & Trauma) impacted us. I also shared some behind-the-scenes discussion on how the panel came together, some challenges I faced running it and more. Going forward, I’ll be releasing a B-Side for every episode, where a friend of mine and I discuss the topics in further depth. You may also get some funny bloopers, mistakes, gotchas and various other things. It's gonna be fun!
Read MoreThis week we dive into the 2nd half of our panel discussion on Jesus & Trauma. Once again, my guests are Wm. Paul Young, Alison Cook, Ph.D, Dr. Jerome D. Lubbe and Ahmeda Mansaray-Richardson. Building on the discussion in the first half, where the lenses of psychology, neurology, theology, and cultural studies were applied to matters of identity, brokenness, colonialism, institutional religious structures, diversity and more, we went after forgiveness and reconciliation next. The conversation is shorter but no less robust.
Read MoreWelcome to the 100th episode of The Puddcast! As I looked back over the first 3 years I realized that the intersection of Jesus & trauma formed a throughline across many conversations. I wanted to do something special and so I assembled a panel to discuss this subject. My guests are Wm. Paul Young, Alison Cook, Ph.D, Dr. Jerome D. Lubbe and Ahmeda Mansaray-Richardson. Using the lenses of psychology, neurology, theology, cultural studies, and more we look at identity, brokenness, colonialism, institutional religious structures, diversity and more. If you’ve ever wished to know precisely why it’s so hard to believe that God loves you, if you’ve wanted to understand yourself better, to know why our societies are so busted right now, why we struggle to put ourselves in other’s shoes, and more… then this is the discussion for you.
Read MoreThis week we do a bit of a retrospective and I highlight some of the most popular episodes since The Puddcast began, as well as those that were the most impactful in my own life. As promised, I also reveal the guests of my upcoming panel on Jesus + Trauma! Inside, you’ll find a replay of the very first episode of The Puddcast (“God is Everywhere”) as well as clips from my interviews with Luke Gifford, Aundi Kolber and Stephanie Tait. There’s also lots of further commentary from me looking back on the first 3 years of The Puddcast. Tune in to hear the exciting news of what I’ll be able to do once I hit 70 Patrons!
Read MorePopular author Lysa TerKeurst returns to the show this week to catch us up on the reconciliation of her marriage and how to forgive things that can’t be forgotten. We discussed dealing honestly with grief and acknowledging pain instead of spiritual bypassing. We talked at length about forgiveness, why it’s important for our healing, and how to give forgiveness to someone who really doesn’t deserve it… and why maybe the matter of their deserving-ness is the wrong question. I highly recommend you check this out along with her new book, Forgiving What You Can’t Forget. I was moved, y’all.
Read MoreTo celebrate my book launch in a few days, you get a very special edition of The Puddcast this week where my friend Anthony McLean hosts the show and interviews me! We talked about trauma, vulnerability, courage, blackness, the importance of embodiment in our spiritual practice, performance vs identity, challenges Enneagram type 2s tend to experience, and we practiced some self-compassionate meditation together.
Read MoreMany of us were raised to believe all kinds of myths about emotions, such as they’re sinful, they lead us astray, that emotions aren’t spiritual and so on. Right now, terrorized by the fear of a global pandemic, we’re surrounded by emotions! The truth is that emotions are a God-given source of wisdom when we know how to interpret them. In this episode, I share some science on what emotions are in our brains and bodies, a few practical tips on how to process the fear, anger and sadness coming up during this COVID-19 crisis, and then we practice accessing our emotions and bringing them to God.
Read MoreMy guest this week is Dr. Jerome D. Lubbe, the creator of the Brain-Based Enneagram. We talked about science, hope, trauma, shame, the Brain-Based Enneagram… pretty much anything relating to the psychological framework of Jesus and the application for that in our lives. Dive in!
Read MoreThis week's guest on The Puddcast is yours truly! I'm introducing my new devotional through a free daily email during the season of Lent. In this episode, I explain how Easter is like heart surgery for Christians and why it’s worth preparing for surgery, and then I read the first daily reflection along with the accompanying meditation from my book. My invitation to you is to give up self-hatred, self-doubt and self-condemnation for lent this year and try on love instead.
Read MoreThis week I am joined by Courtney Burg AKA Mombojombo, to talk about everything to do with trauma-informed parenting. We touched on boundaries, safety, self-regulation, rewiring your own brain, tantrums, and changing your parenting to reflect the unconditional love of God. Even if you’re not a parent, there’s something in here for you!
Read MoreGary Thomas, bestselling author of Sacred Marriage, joined me this week to turn my whole world upside down. His latest book, When To Walk Away: Finding Freedom from Toxic People hit me square between the eyes and so we talked about difficult relationships, protecting our identity and mission, and knowing when to call it a day. Gary covers toxicity in the context of church, workplace relationships, parents, marriages and more. Please listen to this important discussion.
Read MoreAundi Kolber is a licensed therapist and author who I’ve been following online for the last couple of years. We finally managed to schedule some time together and the result is a really helpful conversation on trauma, what it does in our bodies and brains, and how God designed our bodies and brains to give us the feedback we need in order to heal. As Aundi says, you can become a partner with God in your own healing. Listen and share today!
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